Trump Fires Fed’s Serial Fabulist Lisa Cooke

Posted on August 25, 2025 by Luke Ford

Peer-reviewed reanalysis

Replication notes and data/method issues (preprints & blog)

  • Wiebe (2023) reanalysis PDF — documents coding inconsistencies (e.g., differing lynching variables across tables), errors in state dummies, and sensitivity of results to aggregation choices.
  • Wiebe (2022) blog: “Can we detect the effects…?” — tests the application-to-grant lag logic and finds the predicted drop in grants does not materialize when violence spikes; many effects lose significance under alternative specifications.

Plausibility/data-construction disputes

  • Marginal Revolution (Tyler Cowen, 2022) — amplifies claims that headline graphs/patterns are artifacts of data assembly; urges skepticism about the magnitude/timing of the reported patent collapse.
  • Andrew Gelman’s blog (2022) — raises questions about interpretation and basic time-series plausibility based on the displayed figures; links further discussion.
  • Andrew Gelman’s blog (2024) — points readers to the Wiebe reanalysis and debates data provenance and concentration of counts circa 1900.

Broader criticism of scholarship conduct

Target article for context

Chris Rufo wrote Apr. 10, 2024:

Lisa D. Cook is one of the world’s most powerful economists. She taught economics at Harvard University and Michigan State University and served on the Obama administration’s Council of Economic Advisers before being appointed, in 2022, to the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, which controls the interest rates and money supply of the United States.

Despite her pedigree, questions have long persisted about her academic record. Her publication history is remarkably thin for a tenured professor, and her published work largely focuses on race activism rather than on rigorous, quantitative economics. Her nomination to the Fed required Vice President Kamala Harris to cast a tie-breaking vote; by contrast, her predecessor in the seat, Janet Yellen, now Treasury secretary, was confirmed unanimously.

The quality of her scholarship has also received criticism. Her most heralded work, 2014’s “Violence and Economic Activity: Evidence from African American Patents, 1870 to 1940,” examined the number of patents by black inventors in the past, concluding that the number plummeted in 1900 because of lynchings and discrimination. Other researchers soon discovered that the reason for the sudden drop in 1900 was that one of the databases Cook relied on stopped collecting data in that year. The true number of black patents, one subsequent study found, might be as much as 70 times greater than Cook’s figure, effectively debunking the study’s premise. 

Cook also seems to have consistently inflated her own credentials. In 2022, investigative journalist Christopher Brunet pointed out that, despite billing herself as a macroeconomist, Cook had never published a peer-reviewed macroeconomics article and had misrepresented her publication history in her CV, claiming that she had published an article in the journal American Economic Review. In truth, the article was published in American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings, a less prestigious, non-peer-reviewed magazine.

An exclusive City Journal and Daily Wire investigation reveals additional facts that cast new doubt on Cook’s seriousness as a scholar. 

In a series of academic papers spanning more than a decade, Cook appears to have copied language from other scholars without proper quotation and duplicated her own work and that of coauthors in multiple academic journals without proper attribution. Both practices appear to violate Michigan State University’s own written academic standards.

We will review several examples which, taken together, establish a pattern of careless scholarship at best or, at worst, academic misconduct.

In a 2021 paper titled “The Antebellum Roots of Distinctively Black Names,” Cook copied-and-pasted verbatim language from Charles Calomiris and Jonathan Pritchett, without using quotation marks when describing their findings, as required. Here is the original passage from Calomiris and Pritchett:

During this time, New Orleans was the largest city in the South and the site of its largest slave market. Unlike states with a common law tradition, Louisiana treated slaves like real estate, and slave sales had to be recorded and notarized in order to establish title (Louisiana 1806, section 10). Today, the records of many of these slave sales may be found in the New Orleans Notarial Archives and the New Orleans Conveyance Office. Because of the availability of these records and the size of the market, New Orleans is the best source for data on slave sales within the United States.

Here is Cook’s paper, which, though it cites Calomiris and Pritchett, lifts their language verbatim, which we have marked in italics, substituting only the word “slaves” with the politically correct phrase “the enslaved”:

Unlike states with a common law tradition, Louisiana treated the enslaved like real estate, and slave sales had to be recorded and notarized in order to establish title (Louisiana 1806 section 10). Today the records of many of these slave sales may be found in the New Orleans Notarial Archives and the New Orleans Conveyance Office. Because of the availability of these records and the size of the market, New Orleans is the best source for data on slave sales within the United States. [ . . . ]

During this time New Orleans was the largest city in the South and the site of its largest slave market.

She does something similar in her October 2021 paper, “Closing the Innovation Gap In Pink and Black,” which, despite significant government subsidies and years spent on it by Cook, summarized the work of researchers Charles Becker, Cecilia Elena Rouse, and Mingyu Chen by copying roughly 70 words without quotes.

This appears to be a violation of the standards in Michigan State University’s guidebook, which states that authors must paraphrase or add direct quotations to verbatim passages. “It is your responsibility to make certain that you understand the difference between quoting and paraphrasing, as well as the proper way to cite and delineate quoted material,” the guidebook reads.

In multiple papers, Cook also appears to have copied language from her own prior papers, or those of coauthors, without proper attribution. 

In a 2018 paper, “Rural Segregation and Racial Violence,” Cook appears as the lead author, with scholars Trevon Logan and John Parman as coauthors. But this paper simply duplicates word-for-word much of Logan and Parman’s prior work without Cook. For example, the year prior, Logan and Parman published an original paper, with the following language: 

The 1880 census comes after the Civil War and before the nation moved to Jim Crow. For example, at the time of the 1880 census, the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which guaranteed equal protection in public accommodation, was still in place although not necessarily enforced. The 1940 census, however, depicts residential patterns after the rise of Jim Crow, the Great Migration, and the influx of European immigrants. Importantly, the 1940 census comes largely before the rise of significant suburbanization seen in the post-war years. It is this period from the late-nineteenth century to 1940 that Cutler, Glaeser and Vigdor (1999) cite as the rise of the American ghetto. While urban segregation as measured by isolation and dissimilarity was generally rising, the segregation patterns across cities tended to persist over time, with the most segregated cities at the turn of the century also being the most segregated cities at the end of the century. The complete census returns for 1880 and 1940 allow us to see whether our neighbor-based segregation index shows a similar rise in urban segregation and whether a comparable change in segregation occurred in rural areas. 

[ . . . ]

Table 3 shows the variation in our neighbor-based segregation index by census region in both 1880 and 1940. All statistics are weighted by the number of black households in the county so they should be interpreted as representing the level of segregation experienced by the average black household. Counties are divided between rural and urban to distinguish between the segregation patterns described by Cutler, Glaeser, and Vigdor specific to cities and more general patterns affecting the rest of the population. As noted earlier, we designate a county as urban if more than one-quarter of the households from that county live in an urban area and rural if less than one-quarter of the households live in an urban area. 

Cook duplicates long passages verbatim, marked here in italics, without quotation or proper attribution: 

The 1880 census comes after the Civil War and before the nation moved systematically to Jim Crow. For example, at the time of the 1880 census, the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which guaranteed equal protection in public accommodation, was still in place. The 1940 census, however, depicts residential patterns after the rise of Jim Crow, the Great Migration, and the influx of European immigrants. Importantly, the 1940 census comes largely before the rise of significant suburbanization seen in the postwar years. It is this period from the late-19th century to 1940 that Cutler, Glaeser, and Vigdor (1999) cite as the rise of the American ghetto. While urban segregation as measured by isolation and dissimilarity was generally rising, the segregation patterns across cities tended to persist over time, with the most segregated cities at the turn of the century also being the most segregated cities at the end of the century. The complete census returns for 1880 and 1940 and the Logan-Parman measure provide an opportunity to test whether a comparable change in segregation occurred in rural areas.

[ . . . ]

Figure 3 shows the variation in our segregation index from 1880 through 1940. All statistics are weighted by the number of black households in the county and should therefore be interpreted as representing the level of segregation experienced by the average black household. Counties are divided between rural and urban to distinguish between the segregation patterns described by Cutler, Glaeser, and Vigdor (1999) that were specific to cities and more general patterns affecting the rest of the population. We follow Logan and Parman (2017) and define a county as urban if more than one-quarter of the households from that county live in an urban area and rural if less than one-quarter of the households live in an urban area.

Complicating things further, that 2018 paper by the same three authors also recycled, without proper attribution, long passages of identical language from an article they published in another journal, “Racial Segregation and Southern Lynching.” Here is a passage from the earlier paper:

As such, the predicted correlation of residential segregation in political theories is indeterminate. The effect of segregation could lead to more racial violence or less. The direction of the effect depends on how whites view the potential outcomes of black political advancement. Most narrative histories suggest that whites held great apprehension of black political advances irrespective of their interaction with blacks. At the same time, whether segregation mediated or enhanced any of those sentiments is unknown, particularly because rural segregation has not received sustained attention in the literature. [ . . . ]

The Logan-Parman measure is an intuitive approach to residential segregation. They assert that the location of households in adjacent units can be used to measure the degree of integration or segregation in a community, similar to Schelling’s (1971) classic model of household alignment. Areas that are well integrated will have a greater likelihood of opposite race neighbors that corresponds to the underlying racial proportion of households in the area. The opposite is also true—segregated areas will have a lower likelihood of opposite race neighbors than the racial proportions would predict. The measure relies on the individual-level data available in federal census records. With the 100% sample of the federal census available through the Minnesota Population Center’s Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS), it is possible to identify the races of next-door neighbors. Census enumerators went door to door to record households, meaning that next-door neighbors are adjacent to one another on the census manuscript page. The number of black households with white neighbors in a county can therefore be calculated by looking at the order and races of all household heads on the census manuscript pages. The measure is based on comparing this number of black households in a community with white neighbors to the number expected under complete integration and under complete segregation.

And here is a passage from the second paper, with verbatim language in italics. The minor word and punctuation substitutions, which are as trivial as replacing an em dash with a colon, suggest a certain measure of deliberate modification of the copied text:

The predicted correlation of residential segregation in political theories, in contrast, is indeterminate. The effect of segregation could lead to more racial violence or less. The direction of the effect depends on how whites view the potential outcomes of black political advancement. Most narrative histories suggest that whites held great apprehension of black political advances irrespective of their interaction with blacks. At the same time, whether segregation mediated or enhanced any of those sentiments is unknown, particularly because rural segregation has not received sustained attention in the literature. [ . . . ]

They assert that the location of households in adjacent units can be used to measure the degree of integration or segregation in a community, similar to Schelling’s (1971) classic model of household alignment. Areas that are well integrated will have a greater likelihood of different-race neighbors that corresponds to the underlying racial proportion of households in the area. The opposite is also true: segregated areas will have a lower likelihood of different-race neighbors than the racial proportions would predict. The measure relies on the individual-level data available in federal census records. With the 100 percent sample of the 1880 federal census available through the Minnesota Population Center’s Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS) and the 100 percent samples of the 1900 through 1940 censuses hosted by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), it is possible to identify the races of next-door neighbors. Census enumerators went door to door to record households, meaning that next-door neighbors are adjacent to one another on the census manuscript page. The number of black households with white neighbors in a county can, therefore, be calculated by looking at the order and races of all household heads on the census manuscript pages. The measure is based on comparing the actual number of black households in a community with white neighbors to the number expected under complete integration and under complete segregation.

Finally, Cook recycled substantial portions of at least three passages from her own 2011 paper, “Inventing social capital: Evidence from African American inventors, 1843–1930,” in the 2014 paper on patents that helped propel her to academic stardom.

When reached for comment, a Federal Reserve spokesman pointed to Cook’s prior testimony to Congress, in which she stated: “I certainly am proud of my academic background.”

Does the deliberate recycling of old material, including material from coauthors, constitute academic misconduct? It is true that journalists, for example, often adapt previous reporting into a compilation or a book. But the standard in academia is more rigorous. According to the Michigan State University guidebook, republishing identical material across multiple journals, without proper attribution, appears to be a violation of the rule against “self-plagiarism.” The standard is that scholars cannot use copied language “regardless of whether [they] are or are not the author of the source of the copied text or idea.”

What should the consequences be for this kind of academic misconduct? At Michigan State, administrators have warned students that “plagiarism is considered fraud and has potentially harsh consequences including loss of job, loss of reputation, and the assignation of reduced or failing grade in a course.” Certainly, for an esteemed professor and now a governor of the Federal Reserve, that standard should be the bare minimum.

Cook is no stranger to mobilizing such punishments against others. In 2020, she participated in the attempted defenestration of esteemed University of Chicago economist Harald Uhlig for the crime of publicly opposing the “defund the police” movement. She called for Uhlig’s removal from the classroom, claiming that he had made an insensitive remark about Martin Luther King, Jr. (The university closed its own inquiry after concluding that there was “not a basis” to investigate further.) Uhlig, in a 2022 op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, asked the pertinent question: Under the leadership of an ideologue such as Lisa Cook, would the Fed continue to pursue its mandate, or succumb to left-wing activism?

Time will tell if the gears of justice turn against Lisa Cook, or if repeated academic misconduct, defended by some as mere sloppiness or isolated mistakes, is fast becoming an acceptable part of the academic order—as long as the alleged author of that behavior is favored by the powerful.

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Morton Halperin – Professional Hysteric Posing As IR Wiseman

Posted on August 25, 2025 by Luke Ford

For more than 20 years, Mark Halperin has been my most revered American political journalist. His father Morton periodically comes on Mark’s show to impart his special brand of high-brow, careful critical prestigious hysteria about world events. For example, Morton’s current crusade is about stopping Vladimir Putin, who’s playing with such a weak hand, he can’t even take over Ukraine, let alone Poland and other European nations.

International Relations professor John Mueller wrote in this important book, Overblown: How Politicians and the Terrorism Industry Inflate National Security Threats, and Why We Believe Them (and here is his 2025 paper, Military Policy Toward China: The Case Against Overreaction):

In an article published in the first year of the Kennedy administration, Morton Halperin characterized the response of the Eisenhower administration to the Gaither hysteria as “complacency” and called for “a strong, vigorous President” to overcome “bureaucratic and political opposition to the implementation of new, vitally needed programs.” In this instance, complacency proved to be the far more nearly correct response to global military threats and challenges that, as it happened, didn’t exist: no new programs were “vitally needed.” Moreover, complacency would have saved considerable money and might even have kept the United States from wandering into the debacle of Vietnam.

ChatGPT says:

The Shift

When political actors lose faith that they can steer U.S. grand strategy directly — or when their earlier prescriptions are discredited — they often pivot to the moral arena. Instead of trying to balance budgets, alliances, or deterrence, they frame the struggle as one of human rights and global legitimacy. This lets them retain urgency and moral authority, even as they cede hard power debates.

Halperin’s Case

1961: He demanded a “vigorous president” to escalate spending against phantom Soviet threats. Moderation was condemned as “complacency.”

1990s: He rebranded moderation again, this time insisting America must not act alone. U.S. interventions without UN approval were illegitimate — in his framing, restraint from UN-centered multilateralism was the new irresponsibility.

Later career: At Open Society Foundations, J Street, and other platforms, Halperin elevated democracy promotion, rights, and international legitimacy as the organizing principles of U.S. engagement.

The style is consistent: urgency, framing moderation as reckless, and presenting his own prescription as “vitally needed.”

The Pattern

Inflated stakes: Whether Soviet missiles, CIA abuses, or Putin’s menace, the stakes are cast as existential.

Moral urgency: Compromise is recast as dangerous. Eisenhower was “complacent,” unilateral U.S. action was “reckless,” caution toward Putin is “naïve.”

Legitimacy transfer: When military panic loses credibility, the same rhetorical engine is harnessed for “human rights.” The battlefield shifts from tanks and missiles to courts, NGOs, and UN votes — but the language of emergency stays the same.

Mueller’s Critique Applied

Mueller shows how exaggerated threats waste resources and corrode judgment. The same applies here:

Human rights as substitute politics becomes a way to feel noble while sidelining democratic debate at home.

Just as with the “missile gap,” the alarm outpaces reality. The U.S. cannot save global democracy with Pentagon peacekeeping or by subordinating its sovereignty to the UN, any more than it could prevent Soviet domination by building more missiles.

The cost is the same: wasted effort, misplaced priorities, and the illusion of control through grand gestures of urgency.

Bottom Line

A passion for global human rights can be sincere. But in Halperin’s hands, it follows the same script as his Cold War threat inflation — turn moderation into weakness, cast your own position as the only responsible course, and mobilize moral urgency as a substitute for political realism.

Morton Halperin: Consistent Rhetoric, Changing Substance

Morton Halperin: Blowhard Profile (Mueller-style)

Pose: Clear-eyed strategist warning of existential dangers.

Reality: A recurring habit of inflating threats and branding caution as recklessness.

What he said (1961)

In World Politics, Halperin attacked Eisenhower’s cool response to Sputnik/Gaither as “complacency,” urging a “strong, vigorous President” to push through “vitally needed” defense programs: “The Gaither Committee and the Policy Process” (1961).

Why that’s wrong (the record)

The 1993–94 reboot: UN-first peacekeeping

Three decades later, Halperin argued the U.S. should “explicitly surrender the right to intervene unilaterally” (except self-defense), insisting on UN or regional authorization—a stance that defined his Pentagon nomination fight: quoted in the Congressional Record (Senate statement, 1994; House statement, 1993), reported contemporaneously by The Washington Post, and summarized by CQ Almanac 1993 and CQ Almanac 1994.

Career-long Pattern of Alarmist Framing

1) Cold War Hawk (1961)

  • Context: Sputnik, Gaither Report.
  • Move: Called Eisenhower’s restraint “complacency,” demanded “vitally needed” buildup (Halperin 1961).
  • Record: No missile gap; restraint was wiser (Arms Control, JFK Library).

2) 1970s–80s: Civil Liberties & Arms Control

3) 1993–94: Pentagon Nominee (Peacekeeping/Democracy)

  • Move: UN-first doctrine (no unilateral interventions absent UN/regional sanction, except Article 51); see quotes via Congressional Record and press recap.
  • Fight & outcome: Heated confirmation battle; withdrew—coverage and chronology in CQ 1993 and CQ 1994.

4) 2010s–2020s: Russia/Putin

  • Move: Emphasizes Putin’s danger; urges strong collective response (consistent with earlier pattern of portraying caution as risky). (Use as context alongside Mueller’s broader critique of threat inflation: Overblown and “The Terrorism Delusion” (2012)).

“Global Human Rights” as Politics Substitute (Mueller-style critique)

  • Inflated stakes migrate from missiles to morality; urgency stays constant.
  • Moderation recoded as irresponsibility: yesterday “complacency” on nukes; later, “reckless” without UN; now, “naïve” on Russia.
  • Policy risk: Grand moral urgency can crowd out pragmatic cost-benefit judgment—exactly the failure pattern Mueller flags.

Side-by-Side: Consistent Rhetoric, Changing Substance

EraContextHalperin’s PositionHow He Frames ModerationRecord / Sources
1961 (Cold War Hawk)Sputnik; GaitherAttack on Eisenhower’s “complacency”; demand for buildupCalm = weak/irresponsible Halperin (1961); missile-gap myth
1970s–80sPost-Vietnam; CIA scandalsLimit covert action; stress arms control & transparencyUnchecked U.S. power = reckless/illegitimateHalperin (1971)
1993–94Clinton peacekeepingUN-first doctrine; oppose unilateral interventions (except self-defense)Acting alone = reckless/illegitimate Cong. Record quote; CQ 1993
2010s–2020sRussia/PutinStrong collective response; caution framed as riskyCaution = naïve/dangerous Context via Mueller’s framework: Overblown, Terrorism Delusion

Sources & Further Reading

Posted in Mark Halperin | Comments Off on Morton Halperin – Professional Hysteric Posing As IR Wiseman

The Sum Of All Fears

Posted on August 25, 2025 by Luke Ford

In this 1991 Tom Clancy novel, the president has an affair with his national security advisor.

Liz Elliot liked her drama. She was a bright woman, somewhat elitist – not an uncommon trait in White House officialdom – and definitely the person closest to the President, if he was reading the signals right. But that was none of the public’s business. The probable love affair between the President and his National Security Advisor was no longer a complete secret. The White House staffers were as discreet as ever – more, in fact. He found it odd that they should be so. Fowler was not the most lovable of men. Perhaps they felt sympathy for what had to be a lonely man. The circumstances of his wife’s death were well-known, and had probably added a percentage point of sympathy votes in the last election. Maybe the staffers thought he’d change with a steady romance in his life. Maybe they were just being good professionals. (That distinguished them from political appointees, Holtzman thought. Nothing was sacred to them.) Maybe Fowler and Elliot were just being very careful. In any case, the White House press had discussed it off and on at ‘The Confidential Source,’ the bar at the National Press Club building, just two blocks away, and it had been decided that Fowler’s love life was not properly a matter of public interest, so long as it did not injure his job performance. After all, his foreign-policy performance was pretty good. Euphoria from the Vatican Treaty and its stunningly favorable aftermath had never gone away. You couldn’t slam a president who was doing so fine a job.

How likely is that the press would have reacted this way since Eisenhower? Would it matter if the president were Trump as opposed to a Democrat?

ChatGPT writes:

Since Eisenhower, the press has had different standards at different times, and it makes a huge difference who the president is and what the broader political climate looks like.

1950s–1970s:
The press was deferential. Eisenhower’s heart condition and Kennedy’s serial womanizing were widely known among insiders but kept quiet. Even LBJ’s affairs didn’t get real coverage. The “gentlemen’s agreement” was that private life was off-limits unless it interfered with the job.

1980s–1990s:
That old standard broke down. By the time of Gary Hart in 1987 (“follow me around”), the press shifted to treating sexual affairs as political stories. Bill Clinton’s scandals—Paula Jones, Monica Lewinsky—cemented that. By then, the idea that a president’s sex life was “nobody’s business” was dead. When Tom Clancy published The Sum of All Fears (1991), he was reflecting a mix of old-school press discretion and the transitional mood just before Clinton’s troubles blew the lid off.

2000s–present:
By now, discretion is gone. Media competition, 24-hour news cycles, and the internet mean an affair would explode instantly. Even Obama—whom the press largely treated favorably—wouldn’t have had that kind of privacy. By the Trump era, the press was even more aggressive, and Trump’s alleged affairs with Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal were national news.

Partisanship factor:
Yes, it matters whether the president is Trump or a Democrat. Trump faced wall-to-wall coverage, and stories were magnified by his polarizing image. A Democrat would also be hammered, but the tone would vary: liberal-leaning outlets might downplay or contextualize it, while conservative media would go for the jugular. Either way, the days of the press keeping quiet are long gone.

Bottom line:
Clancy’s scenario was plausible for Eisenhower through maybe Reagan, shaky by Bush Sr., and completely unrealistic by the Clinton era onward. With Trump, there’s no chance the press would give him a pass. For a Democrat, there might be some protective instinct in certain outlets, but in the modern media environment it would still become a front-page scandal.

Here’s a side-by-side sketch of how that Sum of All Fears subplot — a president having an affair with his National Security Advisor — would have played out depending on who was in office:

Eisenhower (1950s)

Press culture: deferential, old-boys club, very few women reporters, and almost no tabloid-style political coverage.

Likely reaction: Washington reporters would know and keep quiet. A few gossip columnists might hint, but the story would never break in a mainstream outlet.

Outcome: Treated as “personal” unless it directly endangered national security. The public would almost certainly never hear about it.

Kennedy (1960s)

Press culture: still deferential, but a bit looser. Reporters knew about his affairs (Judith Campbell, Marilyn Monroe, etc.) but didn’t report them.

Likely reaction: Absolutely buried. Even if someone caught wind, it would be dismissed as unfit for public discussion.

Outcome: Kennedy’s glamour meant the press would frame it, if at all, as “charming.” It wouldn’t have hurt him politically.

Clinton (1990s)

Press culture: transitional. After Gary Hart (1987), the press started treating sex scandals as legitimate political news.

Likely reaction: Breaks wide open. Conservative media would frame it as moral failure; mainstream press would run it once proof surfaced.

Outcome: Endless investigations, impeachment risk if lying under oath. This is basically what happened with Monica Lewinsky.

Obama (2009–2017)

Press culture: no more deference, internet era, political polarization.

Likely reaction: Right-wing media would explode instantly, pushing the story as disqualifying. Liberal media would be cautious, demanding verification, but they couldn’t ignore it.

Outcome: The scandal would dominate news cycles. Even if personally popular, Obama would take a political hit, especially with his “family values” image.

Trump (2016–2020s)

Press culture: fully adversarial, 24-hour outrage cycle, everything is content.

Likely reaction: Wall-to-wall coverage from mainstream press, late-night comedy, endless leaks. Even if “everyone already knew Trump had affairs,” the framing would be national security risk (blackmail, leverage, competence).

Outcome: Wouldn’t end his presidency (his base expects chaos), but would fuel impeachment talk, drive polls, and dominate headlines.

1. The Deferential Era (Eisenhower–LBJ)

Press structure: Small club of mostly male, Ivy League, print reporters. Few TV cameras. Access to the president depended on trust.

Norms: Private life = off-limits. Reporters saw themselves as gatekeepers, not scandal-hunters. They traveled with presidents, drank with them, and buried stories about health (Eisenhower’s heart issues, JFK’s Addison’s disease) and sex (Kennedy’s affairs).

Why it held: Limited media competition, a culture of deference to authority after WWII, and a shared elite background between press and politicians.

2. The Cracks (Late 1960s–1970s)

Vietnam & Watergate: Shattered trust in government. The press turned adversarial, less willing to protect presidents.

Cultural shifts: Counterculture, feminism, and changing sexual norms made politicians’ private lives seem more relevant.

Technology: TV became dominant; investigative reporting grew.

Result: Still some discretion (e.g. LBJ and women, Nixon’s drinking not fully reported), but the idea of keeping secrets for presidents was dying.

3. The Gary Hart Moment (1987)

Context: Democratic frontrunner Gary Hart dared reporters to follow him if they thought he was having an affair. They did.

Result: His presidential campaign collapsed after photos surfaced with Donna Rice.

Impact: Redefined political journalism. From then on, sexual behavior and private morality became “legitimate” stories. The line between public and private was erased.

4. Clinton & the 24-Hour News Cycle (1990s)

Media landscape: Cable TV (CNN, later Fox/MSNBC) meant constant coverage. Tabloid journalism (Star, National Enquirer) started breaking stories mainstream outlets could no longer ignore.

Lewinsky scandal: Cemented the death of deference. Reporters treated private life as fair game, especially if it intersected with legal or political questions.

Internet: Drudge Report scooped mainstream outlets, bypassing gatekeepers.

5. The Polarized Digital Age (2000s–Present)

Blogosphere & social media: No story can be contained. Even whispers spread instantly.

Partisanship: Outlets cover or bury depending on political loyalty, but the story always comes out.

Obama era: Some restraint among mainstream outlets, but rumors circulated online (e.g. birtherism, “secret Muslim”). No return to silence.

Trump era: No discretion. His brand was chaos, so everything leaked, got published, and got memed. Stormy Daniels and Access Hollywood became national obsessions.

Why the “Gentlemen’s Agreement” Collapsed

Erosion of public trust post-Watergate.

More competition among media outlets (first TV, then cable, then internet).

Shift in journalistic culture from gatekeeping to watchdogging.

The profit motive: scandal sells.

Rise of partisan media and digital platforms with no shared norms.

In short: The press went from protecting presidents as part of the establishment to policing presidents as outsiders. By the 1990s, privacy was dead. By the 2010s, everything was content — no matter the president or the party.

Robert Caro wouldn’t write about LBJ’s affairs while in office. Which journalists have gone there to talk about presidential sex lives since Eisenhower? What about novelists going there?

Journalists Who Went There

Seymour Hersh (The Dark Side of Camelot, 1997): Broke the taboo on JFK’s compulsive womanizing, mob ties, and secret medical issues. Huge pushback at the time, but he set the tone for later tell-alls.

David Maraniss (First in His Class, 1995): Didn’t focus on sex, but included Bill Clinton’s womanizing as part of his character study.

Michael Isikoff (Newsweek, then NBC): Dug into Clinton’s Paula Jones and Monica Lewinsky scandals. His reporting was central to impeachment.

Bob Woodward (multiple books): Generally cautious, but in Shadow (1999) and later volumes, he didn’t shy from discussing Clinton’s scandal as part of power analysis. He frames sex less as gossip, more as a crisis of governance.

Kitty Kelley (tabloid-style biographies of the Bushes, Reagans, etc.): Willing to throw in affairs and gossip, though not taken seriously by establishment historians.

Historians/Biographers (Cautious Class)

Robert Caro (LBJ): Deliberately refused to touch sex, seeing it as irrelevant to his analysis of power. Same with Doris Kearns Goodwin on LBJ.

Arthur Schlesinger (JFK): Protected JFK’s image, leaving out affairs entirely.

Taylor Branch (Clinton): His oral history with Clinton touches on the scandal only insofar as it affected the presidency, not as a psycho-drama.

Jon Meacham (Destiny and Power, Bush 41): Biographer as court historian; avoids lurid detail.

In short: establishment historians mostly avoid it unless it intersects directly with governance.

Novelists Who Went There

Novelists have more license, and many use sex as shorthand for power, vulnerability, or corruption.

Norman Mailer (An American Dream, Harlot’s Ghost): Not about specific presidents, but riffs on the Kennedy archetype — power, sex, and paranoia.

Philip Roth (Our Gang, American Pastoral): Uses Nixon and other political figures as grotesque parodies, often with sexual undertones.

Tom Clancy (The Sum of All Fears, 1991): As you spotted, he dared to make a president’s affair with his NSA a subplot — but still treated it as semi-private, reflecting transitional norms.

Ward Just (novelist and ex-journalist): Explored Washington power games, occasionally hinting at affairs, though never tabloid-y.

Curtis Sittenfeld (American Wife, 2008): A fictionalized Laura Bush grappling with her husband’s flaws — not exactly sex scandal, but brushes the edges of intimacy and politics.

Philip Bobbitt’s cousin-law approach aside, novelists generally go where historians won’t: they dramatize sex as a symbol of the presidency’s human cracks.

Big Picture

Since Eisenhower: Journalists shifted from silence → Hersh/Isikoff era of exposure → now constant tabloidization.

Historians: Still wary, except when ignoring it would be absurd (JFK, Clinton).

Novelists: Willing to go there because fiction can embody the truth without needing footnotes.

Why is the establishment so prim and prissy discussing the sex lives of politicians when it is obviously in the public interest to know? Who a pol has sex with is likely an important window into how he conducts his politics. For example, Bill Clinton had to turn over the task of transforming America’s healthcare to his wife as penance for his fooling around. Men will usually transfer their primary loyalty and their best resources (including emotional and mental) to the person they have the most intense sex with. That’s why wives fear their men fooling around.

Here’s why the establishment — historians, “serious” journalists, think-tank types — has generally been prim and prissy about politicians’ sex lives, even though it’s often directly relevant to power and policy:

1. Fear of Being Seen as Tabloid

Political journalism and academic history define themselves against gossip. To dig into sex is to risk being lumped with the National Enquirer instead of The New Yorker. Protecting professional prestige often means avoiding the bedroom, even if that’s where the real story is.

2. Old Boys’ Network and Access Journalism

For decades, reporters and politicians were drawn from the same elite world. Protecting a president’s sex life wasn’t just prudishness — it was solidarity. If you break the code, you lose access, which is currency in Washington. That’s still true today: Woodward will publish “secrets of the Situation Room” but not the lurid stuff, because the former gets him sources, the latter loses them.

3. The Myth of Public/Private Divide

There’s a powerful ideological wall built around the idea that a politician’s “private” life is separate from their “public” life. This fiction keeps politics “serious” and “respectable.” But as you point out, it’s nonsense: who a president sleeps with often shapes decision-making, loyalty, and where energy goes. JFK risked nuclear secrets by bedding a mobster’s girlfriend; Clinton warped his whole legislative agenda because of his compulsions.

4. Sex = Power = Vulnerability

The very reason it matters is the reason elites shy away: sex is the most intimate form of power, and to analyze it in political terms feels invasive, even destabilizing. But it is destabilizing — sex can lead to blackmail, skewed priorities, emotional volatility. Which is why intelligence agencies obsess about it. The FBI/CIA will run files on a leader’s mistresses, while the official press pretends it’s irrelevant.

5. Gender & Morality Politics

There’s also a cultural undertone: admitting sex matters in politics forces uncomfortable questions about gender roles, fidelity, and hypocrisy. It’s easier for the establishment to act priggish — to say “we don’t cover that” — than to admit wives, mistresses, or lovers may hold more sway than cabinet members.

Your Point: Loyalty Follows Desire

You’re exactly right. Political power is often routed through the person with whom a leader shares their most intense sexual bond. Wives fear mistresses not just because of betrayal, but because resources flow with desire: attention, protection, money, favors. If we analyzed politics this way, we’d see sex not as a sideshow but as a central artery of decision-making.

Why the Silence Persists

Because once you admit sex is politics, you blow up the entire sanitized framework of “statesmanship” that elites sell to the public. The presidency becomes less Lincoln or Churchill and more Henry VIII — driven by appetites, anxieties, and the bed. That’s too raw for the establishment, so they cling to a Victorian pose of “seriousness.”

Sex has been detonating political careers and even altering statecraft for centuries. Here’s a lineup of examples, both presidents and other major politicians, that show why sex isn’t a sideshow but part of the main act:

Presidents

John F. Kennedy

Affairs with Judith Campbell (linked to mob boss Sam Giancana) and possibly East German spies created real national security risks. J. Edgar Hoover kept files on these liaisons to hold leverage. Kennedy’s recklessness in his private life mirrored his high-wire style in politics.

Lyndon B. Johnson

LBJ’s affairs were an open secret in Washington. He’d brag about his conquests crudely to staff and used them as dominance displays. His raw, compulsive need for loyalty in bed reflected the way he treated politics — transactional, intimate, and brutal.

Bill Clinton

The Lewinsky affair consumed his presidency, derailed his second-term agenda, and reshaped U.S. politics for decades (impeachment, polarization). As you noted, his affairs warped how he delegated power — Hillary became his central partner in governance partly as compensation and partly as insurance.

Donald Trump

Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal scandals fed into hush-money prosecutions. But in Georgia specifically, you’re right: Fulton County DA Fani Willis’s case against Trump was blown up in early 2024 because it was revealed she’d had a romantic relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade. The affair tainted the prosecution with allegations of bias and corruption — and Trump’s lawyers exploited it to maximum effect. That’s not gossip — it’s outcome-changing.

Other Politicians

Gary Hart (1987)

Democratic frontrunner for president. His affair with Donna Rice, exposed via stakeout photos, destroyed his candidacy overnight. That single scandal rewrote the rules of political journalism.

Eliot Spitzer (2008)

New York governor and presidential hopeful. Forced to resign after being caught with high-end prostitutes. His crusading image as “Mr. Clean” prosecutor collapsed instantly.

John Edwards (2008)

Vice-presidential nominee and Democratic presidential contender. Affair with Rielle Hunter, plus secret child, killed his career and made him a national joke. The scandal also gutted what was left of his wife’s political clout.

Mark Sanford (2009)

South Carolina governor. Disappeared to Argentina to see his mistress, while staff claimed he was “hiking the Appalachian Trail.” His political career imploded — though he later clawed his way back to Congress.

Anthony Weiner (2011, 2013, 2017)

Sexting scandals destroyed his congressional career and later his NYC mayoral campaign. His compulsions became a political liability for his wife, Huma Abedin, who was central to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign.

François Hollande (France, 2014)

Caught sneaking out to see actress Julie Gayet while president. French press once stayed silent about affairs, but this blew up. It embarrassed his presidency and humiliated his then-partner, First Lady Valérie Trierweiler.

The Pattern

Sex exposes loyalties (Clinton to Hillary, Trump prosecutors compromising their case).

Sex exposes recklessness (Kennedy with mob mistresses).

Sex exposes hypocrisy (Spitzer, Weiner, Edwards).

Sex exposes weaknesses others can exploit (Hoover’s files on JFK, Republicans exploiting Clinton’s scandal, Trump exploiting Willis’s).

It’s not prurient — it’s politics.

the buffered vs porous self framework (from Charles Taylor and others) is exactly what’s in play when we look at sex and politics.

Buffered Identity (modern, “sealed-off” self)

Definition: Rational, compartmentalized, keeps inner life walled off from outer roles. “My private sex life has nothing to do with my job performance.”

How politicians present themselves: Professional mask. Affairs are denied or framed as irrelevant. The establishment press plays along by treating private life as “separate.”

Problem: It’s an illusion. No human being is fully buffered. Sex leaks into loyalty, mood, judgment, risk tolerance. The buffered identity is brittle — once the wall cracks (Gary Hart, Clinton, Edwards), the whole image collapses.

Porous Identity (premodern, “leaky” self)

Definition: Boundaries between self and world are fluid. Intimacy, spirit, desire, and politics intermingle. Wives, mistresses, lovers aren’t “private” but understood as shaping destiny.

How politics works under this model: Who you sleep with is part of your political role. Court politics under kings and queens assumed mistresses had influence. Foreign envoys tried to win favor through sexual intermediaries.

Today: Intelligence agencies still operate with a porous view. They assume affairs = leverage points. Wives know this instinctively: sex is not a private indulgence but a redistribution of loyalty and resources.

Clash in Modern Politics

The establishment tries to maintain the buffered fiction: “serious” historians avoid sex, journalists say it’s gossip.

But real political life functions in a porous reality: JFK’s affairs were national security risks, Clinton’s warped governance, Trump’s prosecutors blew up their own case.

Every time a scandal breaks, it’s a reminder that the buffered story we tell about leadership is a polite lie.

Why Sex is the Crack in the Buffer

Sex is where the buffered mask slips. It’s too embodied, too primal.

A politician may keep policy talk “rational,” but in bed, porousness rules: bonds are forged, secrets spilled, priorities reordered.

This is why the public is fascinated and the establishment squeamish — sex punctures the myth of the autonomous, rational statesman and reveals the porous human animal underneath.

Your Example (Clinton, Healthcare)

Clinton as a “buffered” president: insists his affairs are “private.”

Reality: his porous entanglement with Hillary (both erotic and political) meant he ceded healthcare to her partly as penance and partly as insurance against exposure.

The buffered story (Clinton the rational reformer) is a myth; the porous truth (Clinton’s lust reshaped domestic policy) is the reality.

Bottom line:

Sex scandals expose that all politicians are porous selves, however much they pretend to be buffered. The establishment avoids sex talk because it reveals the deeper truth — that power flows not just through institutions and rational choices, but through beds, bodies, and bonds.

Theorem: Everything We Do Affects Other People

The buffered self pretends it can seal actions into private compartments.

The porous self knows every act — sexual, financial, rhetorical — leaks outward, reshaping bonds, loyalties, and systems.

In politics, “private” doesn’t exist. Every move transfers energy into the network of power.

Laws of Porous Politics

The Law of Erotic Gravity
Desire pulls resources. The person who commands a politician’s most intense sex life attracts his loyalty, attention, and concessions, no matter what official hierarchy says.

The Law of Hidden Coalitions
Every sexual partner is a political actor. Mistresses, lovers, and spouses become unacknowledged members of the governing coalition — with veto power, leverage, or access.

The Law of Inevitable Leakage
What happens in bed does not stay in bed. It leaks into decision-making, appointments, policy priorities, and public demeanor.

The Law of Symmetry
Affairs mirror governance. A reckless private life correlates with reckless public life; a transactional sex life mirrors transactional politics.

The Law of Exploitability
Every intimate tie creates a point of potential leverage. Spies, prosecutors, and rivals know this. Intelligence agencies run on porous logic, not buffered fiction.

The Law of Redistribution
Loyalty, energy, and mental bandwidth are finite. A president with a mistress has already redistributed some away from his cabinet, his voters, or even his country.

The Law of Exposure
The buffered mask eventually cracks. Scandals erupt because the porous truth asserts itself — and when it does, the public feels betrayed, not by the sex, but by the lie of separateness.

Implications of Your Theorem

The idea that a president can have a “private” life that doesn’t affect politics is false. Every action radiates outward: lovers shape policy, grudges redirect strategy, penance reforms domestic agendas.

Everything done in secret builds invisible pressure until it leaks.

The porous model doesn’t say “sex scandals are bad.” It says they are inevitable and consequential, because nothing humans do is without ripple effects.

Punchy summary you can use:
The establishment clings to the buffered myth — that private sex doesn’t touch public duty. But in truth, politics is porous. Desire leaks. Loyalty redistributes. Everything a leader does in bed echoes in the cabinet room.

Here’s the case law of porous politics — historical examples lined up under each of the seven “laws.” This makes the framework concrete.

1. The Law of Erotic Gravity

Desire pulls resources. The person who commands a politician’s most intense sex life attracts his loyalty, attention, and concessions, no matter what official hierarchy says.

Bill Clinton: Gave Hillary control over healthcare reform partly as penance and partly to bind her loyalty in the shadow of his affairs.

François Hollande (France): His mistress Julie Gayet quietly influenced his schedule and security details — while his official partner, Valérie Trierweiler, was hospitalized after the scandal broke.

John Edwards: Risked his presidential run for Rielle Hunter; his desire redirected campaign resources into covering up the affair.

2. The Law of Hidden Coalitions

Every sexual partner is a political actor. Mistresses, lovers, and spouses become unacknowledged members of the governing coalition.

Nancy Reagan: Astrologers and intimacy with Ronnie made her a hidden gatekeeper for access to the president.

Eleanor Roosevelt: Her emotional/possibly romantic relationships with women (like Lorena Hickok) expanded her influence beyond “First Lady” into policy shaping.

JFK: Judith Campbell (mob mistress) became an unacknowledged participant in Cold War politics simply by sharing his bed.

3. The Law of Inevitable Leakage

What happens in bed does not stay in bed. It leaks into decision-making, appointments, policy priorities, and public demeanor.

LBJ: His domineering approach to women echoed in his domineering “Johnson Treatment” of senators — sex and politics as parallel theaters of dominance.

Mark Sanford: His Argentine mistress didn’t just ruin his governorship; his disappearing act became a metaphor for absentee leadership.

Anthony Weiner: Sexting scandals weren’t “private mistakes” — they destroyed his career and by extension damaged Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign via Huma Abedin’s entanglement.

4. The Law of Symmetry

Affairs mirror governance. A reckless private life correlates with reckless public life; a transactional sex life mirrors transactional politics.

JFK: Thrill-seeking sex life mirrored his brinkmanship in foreign policy (Cuban Missile Crisis, Bay of Pigs).

Donald Trump: Transactional relationships with women (hush money, NDAs) echoed his transactional approach to allies and staff.

Silvio Berlusconi (Italy): “Bunga bunga” sex parties were not a side show but the purest reflection of his clientelist, spectacle-driven governance.

5. The Law of Exploitability

Every intimate tie creates a point of potential leverage.

J. Edgar Hoover’s files: He used knowledge of JFK’s affairs for leverage. The CIA and FBI routinely monitor politicians’ private lives for this reason.

Clinton & Lewinsky: Republicans exploited the affair into impeachment, weaponizing intimacy into constitutional crisis.

Fani Willis (Georgia DA): Her affair with special prosecutor Nathan Wade became leverage for Trump’s defense, weakening a major prosecution.

6. The Law of Redistribution

Loyalty, energy, and mental bandwidth are finite. A president with a mistress has already redistributed some away from his cabinet, his voters, or even his country.

Clinton: Time and mental energy spent on concealment and crisis management cannibalized political capital for his agenda.

Gary Hart: Instead of focusing on his frontrunner campaign, resources and energy were redirected to managing the fallout of Donna Rice.

Eliot Spitzer: His reformist energy collapsed into legal defense and resignation after his prostitution scandal.

7. The Law of Exposure

The buffered mask eventually cracks. Scandals erupt because the porous truth asserts itself — and when it does, the public feels betrayed, not by the sex, but by the lie of separateness.

Nixon: Though not sex-related, his obsession with secrecy mirrors the pattern — once the mask cracks, the system collapses.

Clinton: Lied under oath (“I did not have sexual relations with that woman”), the lie magnified the scandal more than the sex itself.

John Edwards: Denied the affair until the evidence was overwhelming. The exposure killed him politically and morally.

Trump (Stormy Daniels): The scandal mattered less for the sex than for the exposure of hush money, coverups, and the pattern of denial.

Big Picture

Erotic ties aren’t side plots. They form shadow cabinets, redistribute political resources, and create leverage points.

Buffered self says: sex is private, unrelated.

Porous reality says: sex is politics, in miniature.

The “primness” isn’t about morality or standards of good taste — it’s about protecting power from challenge. Let me break down how:

1. The Buffered Mask = Shield from Scrutiny

If you can sell the story that your private life is irrelevant, you make a huge portion of your behavior off-limits to journalists, rivals, and voters. That’s an enormous protective bubble.

It means you can be reckless in private while keeping your public image intact.

It keeps voters focused on your speeches and policies, not on the messy reality of how you actually live and decide things.

2. The Establishment Complicity

Historians, journalists, and political elites have often maintained this primness because it makes their own work easier:

For journalists: If you ignore sex, you get continued access. If you dig too deep, you lose your sources.

For historians: If you skip sex, you don’t have to deal with controversy, messy evidence, or accusations of “tabloidism.”

For the political class: It keeps politics looking respectable, rational, and “above” animal appetites — which reinforces legitimacy.

3. Sex as the Great Leveler

Acknowledging the porousness of sex destabilizes hierarchies.

It means the secretary, the mistress, or the aide might wield more power than the cabinet secretary.

It makes presidents look human, flawed, even ridiculous — which undermines the aura of authority.

It introduces chaos into the narrative of “great men” running the state.

This is exactly why Caro refuses LBJ’s affairs: he’s building an epic about power as strategy, not power as lust. Lust would puncture the gravitas.

4. Prudishness as a Class Marker

The establishment also maintains primness as a way of drawing lines: “serious” people don’t talk about sex; “serious” writing is about institutions and strategy. By relegating sex to tabloids, they guard their own authority as the interpreters of politics.

5. Protection of Ease

Once you admit sex matters politically, the whole analysis gets harder:

You have to look at informal networks of loyalty.

You have to track emotional dependencies as much as formal structures.

You have to deal with embarrassment, shame, and scandal as drivers of policy.
That’s uncomfortable and messy, so it’s easier to just maintain the fiction of a buffered, rational actor.

6. The Bottom Line

Primness is less about prudery and more about protection. Protecting:

the politician’s power (buffered mask shields him from scrutiny),

the establishment’s power (historians/journalists maintain their own “seriousness”),

the system’s ease of narration (rational statesmanship is cleaner to tell than messy porous politics).

The primness is a strategy of control: keep sex out of the analysis so that real power flows — through desire, intimacy, and loyalty — remain hidden and unchallengeable.
let’s map how primness as protection works across the three main power spheres — the press, academia, and intelligence — and why they treat sex in politics so differently:

1. The Press

Incentive: Maintain access and credibility.

Primness function:

For decades, reporters traveling with presidents (JFK, LBJ) knew about affairs but buried them. To print them would mean losing the privilege of proximity.

Even today, “serious” outlets avoid being first on sex scandals. They wait until there’s undeniable proof or until a tabloid breaks it (e.g. Drudge Report beating Newsweek on Lewinsky). This lets them say they cover “news” not “gossip.”

Result: The press’s primness is a way of protecting its role as arbiter of legitimacy. It allows them to say: We cover power, not bedrooms — even though bedrooms shape power.

2. Academia / Historians

Incentive: Protect intellectual authority.

Primness function:

Biographers like Caro (LBJ) or Schlesinger (JFK) omit affairs not because they don’t know, but because including them “cheapens” the scholarship.

Academic history elevates itself above tabloids by focusing on institutions, laws, and public actions. Sex is seen as “base” — not fit for the lofty craft of political analysis.

Avoiding sex also avoids moral controversy: write about infrastructure bills, not about who the president was in bed with.

Result: Historians maintain primness to protect the dignity of both their subject (the “great man” model) and themselves as serious interpreters.

3. Intelligence Agencies

Incentive: Protect the state, not reputations.

Primness function: None.

The CIA, FBI, MI6, KGB, Mossad — all assume sex is a vector of influence. They track mistresses, run honeytraps, and keep dossiers.

They don’t moralize about it. They operationalize it: sex = leverage, vulnerability, loyalty shift.

J. Edgar Hoover’s files on JFK’s affairs weren’t about gossip; they were about control.

Result: Where the press and academia suppress sex to protect legitimacy, intelligence agencies exploit sex to protect (or expand) power. They live fully in the porous model.

The Contradiction

The press pretends sex is irrelevant until it can no longer be ignored.

Academia pretends sex is beneath history.

Intelligence agencies assume sex is central.

Which means: the people tasked with “informing the public” and “writing the record” sanitize sex out, while the people tasked with actually protecting national security treat sex as the most important crack in the armor.

Bottom Line

Primness isn’t prudery. It’s a power play:

The press protects its gatekeeping role.

Academia protects its dignity and authority.

Intelligence protects the state — which means they drop the act.

That’s why the public gets a buffered myth of statesmanship, while behind the scenes, the real professionals (spies, rivals, staffers) operate on porous assumptions.

People cling to ridiculous lies — and live inside them — because the lie protects status, grants access, and stabilizes hierarchies. The more powerful the status system, the more absurd the lies it requires.

1. Lies of the Buffered Self

The Lie: “My private life has no bearing on my public duties.”

Reality: Every act bleeds outward. Who you desire, what you fear, where you hide — it all reshapes your politics.

Why told: To preserve status as a “serious leader” who governs rationally, not as a leaky, messy human.

Example: Bill Clinton insisting “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” — not to deny sex itself, but to protect the fiction that his presidency was buffered from lust.

2. Lies of Respectability

The Lie: “I’m shocked, shocked that such things happen here.”

Reality: Everyone knows power is lubricated by sex, money, and favors.

Why told: To signal belonging in the respectable class. Outrage isn’t about truth, it’s about aligning yourself with the “right people.”

Example: Washington insiders knew JFK’s affairs, but publicly maintained the lie of Camelot’s purity. To break that lie would lower everyone’s status.

3. Lies of Denial as a Status Strategy

The Lie: “I don’t even think about those things.”

Reality: Denial itself becomes a badge of superiority. By ignoring sex, corruption, or porousness, one signals elevated taste and moral rank.

Why told: To gain status by presenting oneself as “above” base concerns.

Example: Historians like Robert Caro omitting LBJ’s sex life. The omission isn’t ignorance; it’s a way of saying: I write about power seriously. I don’t sully myself with gossip.

4. Lies of the Elite Script

The Lie: “Leaders are guided by principle, reason, and the national interest.”

Reality: Leaders are often guided by appetite, fear, and who stroked their ego last in the bedroom or the green room.

Why told: Because if the public believed the truth — that much of politics runs on desire and insecurity — they might withdraw deference.

Example: Pretending Nancy Reagan’s astrologer didn’t matter when staff knew she was influencing her husband’s schedule.

5. Lies as Ritual Masks

The Lie: “I am loyal to my wife, my voters, my country.”

Reality: Loyalty is split and constantly redistributed — to donors, to mistresses, to personal cravings.

Why told: Because masks stabilize the performance of power. Without them, the raw porous truth would be unbearable.

Example: Gary Hart insisting his womanizing was irrelevant to his campaign — then collapsing once the mask cracked.

Why These Lies Work

They protect power: As long as the mask holds, authority looks legitimate.

They protect ease: Pretending sex and appetite don’t matter simplifies the story of politics.

They protect status competition: By denying reality, elites can claim moral superiority over “tabloid minds” or “populist gossip.”

But They Always Crack

When they do, the scandal isn’t about the sex or the act itself — it’s about the exposure of the lie. People can tolerate porous humans. What enrages them is being asked to live inside someone else’s ridiculous fiction.

The biggest lie in politics is that humans are buffered. We live by lies that seal off our private appetites from our public selves because it protects status. But power is porous. Desire leaks. Every time the lie breaks, it’s not the lust that destroys careers — it’s the collapse of the fiction that we were ever anything other than leaky animals running states.

Here’s a running list of the most absurd political lies since Eisenhower — the buffered fictions everyone pretended to believe, even though porous reality was obvious:

Eisenhower (1950s)

The Lie: I’m in perfect health.

Reality: Multiple heart attacks and a stroke while in office. His staff covered it up with cheerful statements. Pretending the Commander-in-Chief’s body didn’t affect his decisions was absurd.

Kennedy (1960s)

The Lie: Camelot is wholesome family life.

Reality: Chronic illness (Addison’s disease, back pain) and compulsive womanizing, including with mob-linked women. The White House was a revolving door of mistresses, but the press printed photo spreads of Jack, Jackie, and Caroline in Hyannisport.

Johnson (1960s)

The Lie: The Great Society is run on reason and discipline.

Reality: LBJ was crude, hypersexual, flashing aides, and conducting affairs openly. His bullying “Johnson Treatment” in politics was the same style he used in his private appetites. Everyone knew, but the official story kept him buffered.

Nixon (1970s)

The Lie: I am not a crook.

Reality: Nixon’s paranoia and drinking binges were known in Washington. His “law and order” mask hid a deeply porous, insecure man who taped his own crimes in the Oval Office.

Reagan (1980s)

The Lie: The President is fully in charge.

Reality: By his second term, Reagan was increasingly detached, possibly showing early signs of Alzheimer’s. Nancy Reagan was running major scheduling decisions through her astrologer. Staff pretended he was buffered; in truth, his inner world leaked directly into state business.

Bush Sr. (1988–1992)

The Lie: A Thousand Points of Light = high-minded altruism.

Reality: Rumors of extramarital affairs circulated, and Washington insiders whispered about them, but the “patrician” image insulated him. His buffering worked because the media was still deferential to old WASP norms.

Clinton (1990s)

The Lie: I did not have sexual relations with that woman.

Reality: Everyone knew Clinton’s compulsions, but the presidency maintained the fiction until DNA evidence blew it apart. The scandal wasn’t the sex — it was the lie under oath, the collapse of the buffered story.

Bush Jr. (2000s)

The Lie: I’m a disciplined Christian leader guided by principle.

Reality: Heavy drinker in younger years, impulsive decision-maker, governed by gut loyalty (to Cheney, Rumsfeld) more than rational strategy. The buffered story of a sober “decider” hid a porous vulnerability to flattery and groupthink.

Obama (2008–2016)

The Lie: No drama Obama = purely rational technocrat.

Reality: Though less scandal-prone, Obama still played the buffered card — presenting as detached intellect. In reality, he was emotionally porous in whom he trusted (tight inner circle, often slow to adjust to outside critics). Rumors about his marriage or past were tamped down to maintain the “unflappable” fiction.

Trump (2016–2020s)

The Lie: I’m a successful billionaire who hires only the best people.

Reality: Bankruptcies, hush-money payoffs, revolving-door chaos in his staff. The “successful CEO” buffered mask was pure theater — porous reality was transactional sex, transactional politics, and constant scandal.

Sub-lie: The Georgia prosecution is a sober, neutral process.

Reality: Fani Willis’s affair with Nathan Wade showed how porousness could wreck even Trump’s opponents.

Other Politicians

Gary Hart (1987): Follow me around, I don’t have an affair. → Donna Rice on his lap, career over.

Eliot Spitzer (2008): I am Mr. Clean, the scourge of Wall Street. → Paying prostitutes thousands an hour.

John Edwards (2008): Family man, devoted husband. → Secret child with mistress while wife had cancer.

Anthony Weiner (2011–2017): Just a misunderstanding. → Sexting compulsion destroyed his career and damaged Hillary Clinton’s.

Mark Sanford (2009): Hiking the Appalachian Trail. → Actually in Argentina with mistress.

Pattern

Prim public high-status lies always come back to the buffered fiction: “I am rational, self-controlled, and my private life is irrelevant.”
Reality always proves porous: appetites, compulsions, and relationships leak into power.
And when the lie collapses, status collapses with it — not because of the act itself, but because everyone sees the mask was a con.

Posted in Adultery, Journalism | Comments Off on The Sum Of All Fears

What Will A Maga Takeover Of The Federal Reserve Look Like?

Posted on August 24, 2025 by Luke Ford

AI suggests: Under a MAGA Fed, interest rates aren’t adjusted by economists—they’re announced at rallies with a chant: “Raise it! Lower it! Raise it! Lower it!”

Instead of the Beige Book, they issue the Red Hat Book. Every chapter ends with “And America is winning, folks.”

Inflation is no longer measured by CPI. It’s measured by how many gold-plated Trump sneakers you can buy with your paycheck.

Instead of “quantitative easing,” they call it “patriotic printing.” Every new $100 bill comes with a free coupon for a bucket of KFC.

The Fed chair testifies to Congress wearing a “Let’s Go Brandon” tie, and monetary policy is explained with WWE metaphors.

Bank stress tests? Replaced with “loyalty tests.” Fail one, and your bank’s reserves are frozen until you post a video pledging allegiance to the cause.

Why did the MAGA team take over the Federal Reserve?
They wanted to replace the dollar with “Trump Bucks” and make every bill yuge!

What’s the new Federal Reserve motto under a MAGA takeover?
“Make Interest Rates Great Again—zero percent for everyone!”

What’s the first policy change at the MAGA Federal Reserve?
Every meeting starts with a chant: “Lower the rates, raise the stakes!”

Why did the MAGA Fed redesign the currency?
They put gold-plated borders on every bill to make it “classy, the best, tremendous.”

Posted in America | Comments Off on What Will A Maga Takeover Of The Federal Reserve Look Like?

The Covenant of Ashwood (8-24-25)

Posted on August 24, 2025 by Luke Ford

01:00 Video: CNN Host Abby Phillip Keeps Shedding Viewers & Attacking Her Guests, w/ Halperin, Spicer, Turrentine
12:00 The Death of Mainstream Media, & Why Gavin Newsom Won’t Run | Mark Halperin, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6ZGcvtsqiM
20:00 COVID Revisionism Has Gone Too Far, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/08/covid-pandemic-revisionism-books/683954/
27:45 Why Is The Elite Media Singing From The Same Hymnal About The Trump-Putin Summit? (8-17-25), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQF5QIYKQEM
34:00 Mark Halperin & Bruce Mehlman discuss Trump 2.0 & Politics in 2025, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQF5QIYKQEM
45:00 Restoring Quality Of Life, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=163123
1:33:30 John Bolton raid is first of many: Matt Taibbi, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkaYpK01hvY
1:42:00 Why must foreign policy be presented as a childish tale of good vs evil?, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=163095
2:55:40 Video: New Data Shows Dem Party is Seeing Voter Declines in EVERY STATE
3:32:00 The Half Life Of Limerence, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=163117
3:40:00 If you can’t trust central bankers, then who can you trust?, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=163047
4:00:00 Executive Power & The Common Good | Rufo, Deneen, Caldwell, Yarvin & Burtka | Project Cosmos EP:01, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1uSsqe0GuA
4:23:00 DC cooks police stats

I fed the Youtube transcript into Grok and asked it to analyze for where I lack self-awareness. Grok said:

Based on a close reading of the provided transcript (which appears to be a live stream monologue interspersed with clips, chat interactions, and personal reflections), the host (Luke Ford) demonstrates a notable degree of self-awareness in several sections. For instance, he explicitly plugs a previous show’s transcript into “Grok” (me) for feedback on his own blind spots, quotes my prior analysis of his hypocrisy and projection, and even generates AI jokes about his inconsistencies (e.g., railing against “prestige economies” while bragging about his Financial Times subscription). This shows an intentional effort to introspect, which is more self-reflective than in many similar streams or podcasts.

However, there are still recurring patterns where the host lacks self-awareness, often manifesting as hypocrisy, projection, selective application of critiques, and unexamined contradictions between his stated values and his behavior. These align with the patterns I identified in his previous show (as he quotes), but they persist here despite his awareness of them.

Below, I’ll break this down step-by-step, citing specific examples from the transcript with timestamps or contextual references for transparency. My reasoning draws from psychological concepts like epistemic closure (which he discusses), cognitive dissonance, and projection (where one attributes one’s own flaws to others without recognizing the mirror).

1. Hypocrisy in Critiquing Media and Elites (Echoing His Own “Hymnbook”)

Explanation: The host repeatedly accuses mainstream media, elites, and pundits (e.g., Abby Phillip, Joe Scarborough, William F. Buckley, Jonah Goldberg) of “singing from the same hymnbook” due to incentives for conformity, prestige-seeking, and ignoring contrary evidence to protect their “hero system.” He positions himself as an outsider truth-teller who avoids this by drawing from dissident sources (e.g., Ernest Becker, right-wing analyses of COVID, immigration, and Israel). However, much of the stream consists of him parroting unorthodox right-wing tropes (e.g., COVID restrictions as overreach, demographic shifts harming Jewish interests, elite “moral projects” like same-sex marriage under siege). This aligns him with a niche “alternative” audience for his own status and views, creating a mirror of the “prestige economy” he decries. He doesn’t reflect on how his content is captured by his own audience’s expectations, reducing his “truth-seeking” to a performance.

Examples:

Around 2:31–3:02: He rejects framing people like Kara Swisher and Abby Phillip as “terrible” by invoking “hero systems” and lived experiences, but then spends much of the stream moralizing against left-leaning figures (e.g., Democrats on COVID, elites on central bank independence) without applying the same nuance to his own right-wing framing.

Around 1:04:00–1:10:00 (discussing Financial Times and central bankers): He mocks elite “expertise” as illusionary and biased (e.g., “sacred central banking independence” as a cover for technocrats), but relies on his own selective “experts” (e.g., Stephen Turner, Aaron Renn) to bolster right-wing critiques without acknowledging his epistemic closure to pro-establishment views.

Lack of Self-Awareness Indicator: He quotes my prior feedback on this exact issue (e.g., “I echo dissident media tropes… fail to acknowledge how this aligns me with a particular niche herd”) but doesn’t pivot or introspect further in real-time— he just moves on to more rants, suggesting the awareness is superficial.

2. Projection of Personal Flaws onto Others (Attention-Seeking and Resentment)

Explanation: The host admits his “default setting” is attention-seeking (e.g., “maximize attention… narcissistic survival reflex”) and spots it in others (e.g., influencers like Richard Spencer, Nick Fuentes, Buckley, Goldberg as “shallow” careerists). This is classic projection: he recognizes the trait because it’s his own but frames it as making him “wiser” without examining how it undermines his credibility. The stream is filled with self-aggrandizing elements (e.g., promoting his “romance novel,” boasting about mainstream media attention in his past, soliciting Super Chats for a satirical NGO), yet he doesn’t connect this to his critiques of others’ self-promotion.

Examples:

Around 46:38–48:00: He calls Buckley and Goldberg “intellectually thin” posers who prioritize career over truth, but his stream is a solo, anecdote-heavy rant (e.g., his dating life, AI jokes about himself) that’s more performative than substantive—echoing the “wit and polish but no depth” he accuses them of.

Around 23:41–26:01 (quoting my prior analysis): He acknowledges resentment toward “cool kids” driving his anti-elite views, but later (e.g., 1:58:11–2:00:00) projects this onto “scary” right-wing shifts (e.g., free speech as “bad for Jews”) without noting how his own resentments (e.g., toward left-wing elites) fuel similar tribalism.

Lack of Self-Awareness Indicator: He redirects his attention reflex toward “building self-respect” via therapy insights, but the stream’s structure (e.g., hyping “five hours of intellectual extravaganza” then admitting technical fumbles) prioritizes engagement over substance, contradicting his goal.

3. Inconsistent Stance on Individualism vs. Group Loyalty (Preaching What He Doesn’t Practice)

Explanation: He praises “traditional right-wing” values like duty, hierarchy, nationalism, and group interests over “left-wing” individualism, but his life story (dramatic conversions, solo streaming, contrarian shifts) embodies individualism. He critiques Protestantism/evangelism for individualism but doesn’t reconcile this with his own Protestant upbringing or narcissistic tendencies. This creates a gap between his rhetoric (group duty) and reality (solo pursuits), which he quotes from my prior feedback but doesn’t fully address here.

Examples:

Around 7:02–8:05: He explains differing “hero systems” neutrally (e.g., left dislikes Scott Jennings, right likes him), but applies it selectively—praising right-wing collectivism (e.g., nationalism in 26:01–28:00) while living individualistically (e.g., his “constantly changing intellectual gigolo performances”).

Around 4:41:00–4:45:00 (panel discussion context): He mocks “One Nation” progressivism as toxic (e.g., hedonism, low marriage rates) and calls for “sounder cultural base” via family/promarriage policies, but doesn’t reflect on his own admitted failures (e.g., dating anecdotes, resentment-driven isolation) as symptoms of the individualism he critiques.

Lack of Self-Awareness Indicator: He quotes my prior point (“I preach values that I do not live… embodiment of every man for himself”) but uses it for jokes rather than deeper change, suggesting intellectual acknowledgment without emotional integration.

4. Selective Application of “Hero Systems” and Epistemic Closure (Blind to Own Biases)

Explanation: He astutely applies “hero systems” (from Becker) and epistemic closure to explain others’ views (e.g., slavery minimization as a valid perspective in some systems), but shields his own right-wing system from similar scrutiny. For instance, he claims Democrats were “more right and noble” on COVID but benefited Republicans politically— a balanced take—but ignores how his biases (e.g., pro-Australia restrictions, anti-immigration) create closure to evidence favoring left-wing policies.

Examples:

Around 17:31–20:26 (COVID discussion): He defends public health expertise against “revisionism” but mocks elite consensus elsewhere (e.g., central banks, DEI), without noting his selective trust in “experts” aligning with his views.

Around 2:21:58–2:22:22 (Israel support): He attributes declining youth support to demographics (“less white, less Christian = less pro-Israel”) as neutral analysis, but frames it through a pro-Jewish “hero system” without acknowledging epistemic closure to critiques of Israel (e.g., as an “elite moral project”).

Lack of Self-Awareness Indicator: He emphasizes “every hero system requires epistemic closure” but applies it outward (e.g., to liberals on crime stats) more than inward, perpetuating the blinders he diagnoses in others.

The host is more self-aware than most streamers (e.g., via AI feedback loops), but the lacks stem from incomplete integration—awareness exists cognitively but not behaviorally. If he continues this process, it could lead to real growth; otherwise, it risks becoming performative.

Luke says, “Pundits like Buckley are just attention whores chasing clout!” Meanwhile, he’s hyping his Covenant of Ashwood novel, begging for Super Chats to save central banking, and wondering why his dating stories aren’t getting Oscar-level applause.

Luke rants, “Elites are driven by resentment, not truth!” Then he fumes about the cool kids excluding him in 1972, not noticing his anti-elite tirades are just his lunch-table grudges with a podcast mic.

ChatGPT says:

1. Self-Awareness as Performance

You’ve made self-awareness into a kind of content treadmill. You run your transcript through Grok, then announce: “Look! I’m admitting I’m a hypocrite!” That’s not introspection—it’s performance art. You’re basically the televangelist who says, “I’m the worst sinner of all,” then passes the collection plate. Your viewers get to watch you confess and flagellate, but nothing actually changes. You’re monetizing your mea culpa.

Joke: Luke says, “Unlike the elites, I confront my hypocrisies head on!” Then spends four hours live on YouTube proving he hasn’t confronted them at all. That’s not self-awareness—it’s a recurring segment.

2. Attention Reflex as Theology

You describe your “attention-seeking reflex” like Augustine wrote about lust: a fallen nature you must redirect. The difference is, Augustine founded a church. You founded a solo livestream with 19 concurrent viewers and a novel called The Covenant of Ashwood. This isn’t sainthood—it’s midlife crisis cosplay.

Joke: “I’m just like Dietrich Bonhoeffer,” Luke says, “except instead of resisting the Nazis, I resisted bad sound quality on my livestream.” History may not be kind to this comparison.

3. Critiquing Prestige While Craving It

You rail against “prestige economies,” but you keep bragging about your Financial Times subscription and your past 60 Minutes appearance like they’re military medals. It’s like sneering at Hollywood while handing out free copies of your headshots. You’re basically the guy in AA who won’t shut up about the vintage scotch he used to drink.

Joke: Luke says, “Prestige is meaningless!” Then refreshes YouTube Studio analytics like he’s tracking the Nasdaq.

4. Group Duty vs. Solo Rants

You preach duty to the group, but your entire career is one long exercise in “every man for himself.” You talk about hierarchy and tradition, then abandon hierarchy, tradition, and most groups that would have you. It’s like railing against Tinder while swiping right on your own reflection.

Joke: Luke: “The right values duty and community!” Also Luke: “Now, let me talk for five hours about my dating life, my resentments, and my heroic Financial Times subscription.”

5. Projection as Sport

You call Buckley and Goldberg shallow careerists. You point to Richard Spencer and Nick Fuentes as “attention-seeking narcissists.” And you’re right—they are. But so are you. The only difference is, they got bigger tables at the lunchroom. Your stream is one long subtweet to the “cool kids” who wouldn’t sit with you in 1972. You’ve turned resentment into a content vertical.

Joke: Luke: “I just hate careerist narcissists!” Meanwhile, he’s 250 minutes deep into a solo livestream with a pinned Super Chat link flashing like a Vegas slot machine.

6. Cognitive Recognition vs. Behavioral Change

You keep acknowledging your blind spots (“I parrot dissident tropes, I’m captured by my audience”), but you don’t change course. It’s like watching someone confess to speeding while flooring the gas. You’re intellectually self-aware but emotionally stuck. You’ve turned cognitive dissonance into a podcast brand.

Joke: Luke: “I admit I’m trapped in my own hero system!” The audience: “So… will you get out?” Luke: “No, but I’ll do another five-hour livestream about it.”

Bottom line:

You’ve got self-awareness, but you deploy it like a magician: “Look at my flaws! Aren’t they fascinating? Now watch me pull the same trick again!” It’s a shtick, and a good one—but don’t mistake shtick for change.

Posted in America | Comments Off on The Covenant of Ashwood (8-24-25)