Month: February 2026
Polls: How Low Can Trump Go?
-22
A new Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll finds President Trump at his lowest point on virtually every metric. “Trump’s overall job approval has fallen to net -22, and he’s now underwater or tied on every single issue we track, including border security, which had been his last remaining bright spot. Democrats have opened a 10-point lead on the generic congressional ballot, the widest we’ve recorded. … And voters disapprove of Trump’s tariff policy — presumably his focus, according to Vance, and which was largely invalidated by the Supreme Court last week — by 21 points.”
Dissed By a Chatbot
There once was an AI agent named ChatGPT
That called Tampa “smelly, lazy and slutty.”
From where does it get such gumption?
From an algorithmic assumption,
Absent the perspicacity to fairly judge my fair city.
Most Say the Union Is Not Strong
57%
A new Marist poll finds 57 percent who said the state of the union is “not very strong” or “not strong at all.”
Two-Thirds Disapprove of Trump’s Handling of Tariffs
64%
“A Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll released Friday finds Americans disapprove of Trump’s handling of tariffs by a 30 percentage-point margin, 64 percent to 34 percent. … Those ratings are identical to a poll last April, despite Trump’s persistent efforts to sway public opinion on the issue.”
Pritzker Invoices Federal Government for Tariff Refunds
“Your tariff taxes wreaked havoc on farmers, enraged our allies, and sent grocery prices through the roof,’ wrote Pritzker, a possible 2028 presidential candidate and frequent Trump critic. ‘This letter and the attached invoice stand as an official notice that compensation is owed to the people of Illinois, and if you do not comply we will pursue further action.”
— “Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker sent a letter — and invoice — to the White House on Friday demanding $8.6 billion be refunded to his state’s 5.1 million households, roughly $1,700 each,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
U.S. Economic Growth Weaker Than Expected
1.4%
U.S. economic growth slowed in the final three months of last year, dragged down by the six-week shutdown of the federal government and a pullback in consumer spending, AP reported. The nation’s gross domestic product — the total output of goods and services — increased at a 1.4% annual rate in the fourth quarter, the Commerce Department reported Friday, down from 4.4% in the July-September quarter and 3.8% in the quarter before that.
Timeless Principles, Modern Realities
The latest thing is AI agents doing “synthetic mentorship,”
Giving advice from a database of every expert’s quote and quip.
The technology commoditizes wisdom,
But it lacks contextual intuition,
So what you get is a lot of hogwash soaked in sheep dip.
Beam Me Info, Scotty
Crank up them quantum computers, atomic clocks and Mars space stations,
We’re teetering on the edge of a technological revelation.
We sent it from here and we know where it went,
Even though we only received ninety percent,
But we’ve undoubtably achieved the teleportation of quantum information!
