May
27
2026

Yeah, We Can, and Should, Do Better Than Kristi Noem on a Horse

Jim Geraghty X-plugs his latest WaPo article:

Continuing the snipped tweet:

Apparently, to the Trump administration, things like the U.S. State Department's Counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference center and Voice of America just aren't worth the cost. But it will spend $200 million on an ad campaign featuring then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on a horse.

Jim's article: In the disinformation war, the U.S. unilaterally disarmed. (WaPo gifted link) On that first point about what the bad guys are doing:

The Russian government’s draft budget for 2026 allocated $1.77 billion for propaganda efforts. But that figure just covers overt state media. Covert troll farms, front organizations and cyber operations add further spending on top of that.

The total for China is even harder to pin down. In 2023, the U.S. State Department’s Global Engagement Center issued a report that the People’s Republic of China “spends billions of dollars annually on foreign information manipulation efforts.” In 2024, the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a right-of-center Washington think tank, put the figure at $10 billion.

And even Iran, with a much smaller economy, spent an estimated $600 million on propaganda over the 12 months that ended in March 2025. Again, as with Russia, that’s the official figure for state media at home and abroad. The covert propaganda and disinformation spending by parts of the government such as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is off the books — and substantial.

A sample of what Iran's been generating:

… it's pretty grim.

Also of note:

  • And for more from the indispensable Jim Geraghty… He's just full of bad news, predicting The Coming AOC Presidential Campaign.

    Axios reports that New York Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is “making new moves toward a possible White House bid. Ocasio-Cortez launched a national tour in recent weeks — without calling it one. Democratic operatives expect she would easily raise $100 million just from small-dollar donors, mobilize many supporters of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ past campaigns, and command attention as few other candidates could.”

    When lots of people tell a party’s rising star that he should run for president, he often ends up running for president. (AOC was elected in 2018, so she’s probably not a “rising star” in Democratic politics anymore; she’s a full-on star.) There’s no guarantee that four to eight years from now, Democrats will be as enamored with her. Every incentive is to strike when the iron is hot, and if you’re a Democrat, you probably feel pretty good about your odds in 2028 in a national electorate likely to be absolutely exhausted from the Trump era.

    This is not good news for the U.S., which faces a dangerous world now and is likely to face a comparably dangerous world when the next president takes the oath of office on January 20, 2029. In February, when AOC went to the Munich Security Conference, she was asked a very basic yes-or-no question of “would and should the U.S. actually commit U.S. troops to defend Taiwan if China were to [invade]” and answered with incoherent word salad. If the congresswoman had ever put any thought into what the U.S. ought to do in that scenario, she hid it exceptionally well.

    Hilary in 2016, Joe in 2020, Kamala in 2024, AOC in 2028, … Constitutional and fictional issues aside, will we be looking at a Philomena Cunk candidacy in 2032? I would not rule it out!

  • I had already answered "No" after reading the first four words. Jeffrey Blehar asks us: Do You Trust Trump to Make a Deal?

    For those unaware, President Donald Trump kicked off the long weekend by announcing on Friday that he was in advanced negotiations with the Iranian regime about a 60-day cease-fire that would lead to the end of the war:

    I am in the Oval Office at the White House where we just had a very good call with President Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud, of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, of The United Arab Emirates, Emir Tamim bin Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim bin Jaber Al Thani, and Minister Ali al-Thawadi, of Qatar, Field Marshal Syed Asim Munir Ahmed Shah, of Pakistan, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, of Türkiye, President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, of Egypt, King Abdullah II, of Jordan, and King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, of Bahrain, concerning the Islamic Republic of Iran, and all things related to a Memorandum of Understanding pertaining to PEACE. An Agreement has been largely negotiated, subject to finalization between the United States of America, the Islamic Republic of Iran, and the various other Countries, as listed. Separately, I had a call with Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, of Israel, which, likewise, went very well. Final aspects and details of the Deal are currently being discussed, and will be announced shortly. In addition to many other elements of the Agreement, the Strait of Hormuz will be opened. Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP

    Nobody (outside the named parties, perhaps) knows what this means. And I mean nobody. Almost immediately after the post was made, Iranian regime sources hotly contested every word of it, saying the regime would be assuming full sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz and would never forfeit their weapons-grade nuclear material or forgo the goal of building a nuclear program. Then, as details of the purported deal emerged — including the potential unfreezing of billions of confiscated Iranian assets as a payoff — Trump took to Truth Social to back and fill, saying he wouldn’t “rush” a deal, or that he might make no deal at all, or that he might agree to a five-day delay to negotiate a 60-day truce to negotiate a final settlement, etc.

    Jeffrey posted that yesterday morning (May 26), and it may have been overtaken by events since. Or not. Basically, the usual "fog of war" has combined with "clouds of Trumpian bullshit" and "offensive Iranian Lego videos" to make we wonder if I can believe anything anyone is saying.

  • Another triumph for Betteridge's Law of Headlines. Jack Salmon questions a "progressive" claim: Did High Taxes Build the Middle Class? Specifically:

    Since he is a raging demagogue, Steyer's solution was, of course, "Tax billionaires." Jack rebuts:

    Yes, top tax rates were significantly higher in the past than they are today. This is about the only part of Steyer’s post that is accurate.

    Today, in several states, the top earners pay combined federal and state marginal tax rates north of 50%, but for the sake of simplicity, let’s focus on federal income taxes over time. Then we can address Steyer’s other points that lead on from this one.

    Let’s take 1952 for example, when the top income tax rate was 92 percent (compared to 37 percent today). Steyer asks what did we do with all that money? Well, first we need to observe how much “all that money” amounts to with a 92 percent top rate.

    In 1952, the federal government raised 18 percent of GDP in tax revenues. This compares with federal revenues of 17 percent of GDP today. So, relative to today, “all that money” amounted to only about 1 percent of GDP in federal revenue, roughly $300 billion in today’s economy, or about 2 weeks of current government spending.

    Jack goes on to carefully document the fact that Uncle Stupid spends vastly more on transportation, healthcare, and education than he did in the days of high marginal income tax rates.

  • [Amazon Link]
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    Like rock and roll. Matthew Hennessey assures us dads: Dad Books Will Never Die. (WSJ gifted link) It's in response to a WSJ article mentioned here a couple days ago: Dad Books Are a Dying Breed. (WSJ gifted link)

    I’m a dad who reads dad books. I have plowed through many 700-page Ron Chernow books in my day. On my nightstand currently are David Herbert Donald’s “Lincoln,” Rick Atkinson’s “The British Are Coming” and “The Daily Telegraph Book of Obituaries,” edited by Hugh Massingberd. Great books all. Dad books all.

    This dad disputes the podcast thesis. Most of us don’t listen to podcasts instead of reading. We listen while driving to Costco, walking to work or doing the dishes. Some dads listen to podcasts while working out. I didn’t put that on the main list of things that dads do while listening to podcasts because plenty of people who know me would have read that and laughed. But I’m reliably informed that some dads do work out, and listen to podcasts at the same time.

    My list differs from Matthew's, which is fine. But let me recommend one I'm currently reading: the new book Peak Human by Johan Norberg (Amazon link at your right.) It's just about the perfect dad book! Report coming in a few more days.