Poetic Justice
Buck Banks | Jul. 24, 2026
Trump and the Iranians seem to be in different realities,
Though they share a callousness toward the war’s casualties.
Is Trump insane
Or just insanely vain?
And how can we extract ourselves from his “Quagmire of the Vanities?”
Verbatim
“If any politician wants to get mothers on their side, they should adopt this issue. It’s such an obvious electoral winner. And what I’ve learned is there is no force in the universe stronger than mothers trying to protect their kids.”
— Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, quoted by Politico, on the threats posed by social media and artificial intelligence.
“I’m very good at flagpoles!”
— President Trump bragged during an “impromptu tour of his various White House construction projects,” Mediaite reports.
“There are a lot of Ukrainian drones in the air. It would be dangerous.”
— Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, quoted by the Associated Press, when President Trump asked him if he would accept Moscow as a venue for peace talks.
Numerati
+750
“The number of U.S. service members wounded since the start of the Iran war has passed 750, according to the Defense Department’s war casualty database,” CNN reports.
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+175,000
“The U.S. State Department announced on Monday that it has revoked more than 175,000 visas during President Donald Trump’s administration so far,” Fox News reports.
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$4,600
President Donald Trump is asking for $1,500,000 million for the military for next year. That’s close to $600 billion (adjusted for inflation) more than we were spending on the military in fiscal year 2025, before Trump took office, Alternet reports. This increase is huge by any measure. It comes to around $4,600 per household. It is around 8% of the total budget.
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11
A new Emerson College survey of likely 2026 voters finds the Democrats with an 11-point advantage over the Republicans on the generic congressional ballot, leading 53% to 42%. President Trump holds a 39% job approval rating, consistent with the past two months, whereas his disapproval increased another point, to 57%.
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30%
A new American Research Group poll finds just 30% of Americans say they approve of the way Donald Trump is handling his job as president and 67% say they disapprove.
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