Our System Often Rewards BS Rather Than Truth

Posted on August 29, 2025 by Luke Ford

Columbia University statistics professor Andrew Gelman blogs:

Last year we discussed the problem of scientists who host podcasts in which they credulously and uncritically interview celebrity scientists who are promoting junk science. There was Sean Carroll, a physicist who should know better, fawning over a Ellen Langer, Harvard psychology professor who was making wild claims about mind-body healing and also uncritically pushing the ridiculous claims by Robert Sapolsky, a Stanford biology professor who’s notorious for relying on bogus science.

Both these academic science superstars–the one from Harvard and the one from Stanford–have also been featured uncritically on the Freakonomics podcasts.

As I wrote a few months ago, If you’re a well-trained physicist or economist and you have a public platform and you use it to promote junk science . . . really, what’s the point of it all?

I mean, really, what’s the point? I can think of three reasons:

1. You’re invested in the scientist-as-hero narrative (which I hate), and these people are NPR and Ted-certified heroes with great stories to tell.

One reason why these celebrity scientists have such great stories to tell is that they’re not bound by the rules of evidence. Unlike you or me, they’re willing to make strong scientific claims that aren’t backed up by data.

So it’s not just that Sapolsky and Langer are compelling figures with great stories who just happen to be sloppy with the evidence. It’s more that they are compelling figures with great stories in large part because they are willing to be sloppy with the evidence.

2. Once you have a podcast, you want more listeners. (I have a blog here, I get it.) You get more listeners with good stories. The truth or evidence of the stories is not so important.

3. You outsource your judgment to the academic community, peer-review process, NPR, Ted, and other podcasts. If someone’s a decorated professor at a top university, with papers published in top journals, further validated by top-grade publicity, then it’s gotta be solid research, right? These science-podcasters are too busy to actually look into the evidence that purportedly supports the wild claims they’re promoting.

The question then is, what to do about it?

My original thought was that, if you’re gonna interview people who make outrageous-but-wow-it-would-be-amazing-if-true claims, you should grill them a bit. Express some skepticism and don’t let them just wave away objections.

The trouble is that if you do this your interview would not go well. If you had me on a podcast and asked me tough questions passed along by skeptics who don’t trust Bayesian inference or don’t like polling or whatever, that’s fine–I can respond to such things. That would be fine. But if you push hard against people who have the habit of stretching the evidence, I don’t know what would happen. I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t just collapse and admit that their claims are unsupported. My guess is that they’d refer to other studies that they claim would back them up, to which the podcast host would be able to instantaneously respond. So it would just push things back one more step. Either a waste of time or a disaster if the person being interviewed gets angry.

So I don’t think the strategy of pushing harder in the interview would work.

I’ve listened to lots of podcasts, and I’ve never heard a single one in which the interviewers really challenge the people being interviewed.

Decoding the Gurus are constantly praising Sean Carroll.

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New Orleans Gets A Participation Trophy

Posted on August 29, 2025 by Luke Ford

This framing strikes me as weird, as though New Orleans deserves a participation trophy. NYT: “20 Years After Katrina, New Orleans Is ‘at a Tipping Point’. The city has taken pride in its ability to endure. But many residents, fed up with dysfunction and soaring costs, want it to strive for more.”

Grok: “The NYT headline and subhead do frame New Orleans in a way that could feel patronizing—like the city’s being patted on the back for “enduring” while simultaneously being nudged to “do better.” It’s a weird mix of sympathy and judgment, implying resilience is noble but not enough, and dysfunction is somehow a choice.”

When I watched coverage of Katrina, the last thing I saw was resilience. Instead, I saw a bunch of residents sitting around and complaining and shooting each other and it showed me a city that was a mess. My view hasn’t changed since. We’ve poured $140 billion into New Orleans since Katrina and it’s been wasted.

Grok:

Your perspective on New Orleans during Katrina reflects a frustration with the chaos and dysfunction that was heavily televised—images of looting, violence, and despair dominated coverage, shaping a narrative of a city unraveling. It’s true that social cohesion seemed to fray; reports from 2005 noted spikes in crime, including shootings, and a breakdown in trust between residents and authorities (e.g., the NOPD’s widely criticized response). Media often amplified this, focusing on sensational scenes over stories of community resilience, like neighbors rescuing each other or grassroots rebuilding efforts.The $140 billion figure you mention aligns roughly with federal spending on Gulf Coast recovery post-Katrina, with about $120.4 billion allocated through FEMA, HUD, and other agencies by 2015, per a 2020 GAO report. Much of this went to infrastructure (levees, roads), housing, and disaster relief. But “wasted” is a strong claim. Some point to successes: the levee system was overhauled (costing $14 billion), and parts of the city, like the French Quarter, rebounded economically. Tourism hit 18.8 million visitors in 2019, pre-COVID, per New Orleans & Company. Yet, persistent issues—poverty (23% in 2023, per Census data), uneven recovery in areas like the Lower Ninth Ward, and corruption scandals—fuel the sense that funds didn’t always translate to progress.

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‘Lies and D.C. Crime Statistics’

Posted on August 28, 2025 by Luke Ford

Kimberly Strassel writes for the WSJ:

No one should be surprised if investigations show evidence of manipulation, as “downgrading” is nothing new in police departments. A New York Times story from more than a decade ago reported on an anonymous survey of nearly 2,000 retired New York City Police Department officers. It found that manipulation of crime reports—including both downgrading crimes and “discouraging victims from filing complaints”—had “long been part of the culture of the New York Police Department.” As one respondent put it: “Assault becomes harassment, robbery becomes grand larceny, grand larceny becomes petit larceny, burglary becomes criminal trespass.” Five years ago, a veteran MPD officer, Charlotte Djossou, sued the department, claiming it retaliated against her for raising concerns about unlawful searches and data manipulation designed to “make it appear crime was down.” The MPD’s summer settlement with Djossou was referenced in Comer’s letter to Smith demanding information for his probe.

  • The D.C. situation: There’s an additional reason to be suspect of D.C. numbers: they are pretty wild. If FBI numbers are to be trusted (and there’s a separate debate over that), violent crime has indeed come down some from the heights of 2020. But D.C.’s striking drops strain credulity, especially given that as of the beginning of this year, the MPD had only 3,200 sworn members, which the union described as a “50-year low,” and 800 below Bowser’s target of 4,000. Moreover, the crime fighters themselves don’t buy it. Union chief Pemberton suggests there was “potentially” some drop, but said it was “preposterous to suggest that cumulatively we’ve seen 60-plus percent drops in violent crime from where we were in ’23, because we’re out on the street. We know the calls we’re responding to.” And don’t forget that D.C. in recent years has danced to progressive calls to water down penalties against criminals and to pass its Comprehensive Policing and Justice Reform Act, which hamstrings police officers.

    The investigations will tell the real situation. Interestingly, few are casting doubt on recent figures that show Trump’s National Guard presence has rapidly reduced crimes in most categories. Perhaps instead of arguing over the numbers, mayors might look to learn what needs to be done to clean up their cities.

    • ChatGPT says: Philosopher Stephen Turner would probably react to the Strassel/WSJ piece by treating it as a textbook case of the politics of expertise—how statistics, bureaucratic authority, and media narratives get wrapped together into competing claims about legitimacy. Across his writings, Turner makes a few points that map directly onto this situation:

    1. Expertise is always entangled with politics

    Turner argues that experts don’t merely “deliver truths to power.” They operate within political structures, and their authority is mediated by bureaucracies, incentives, and traditions of decision-making. Crime stats (like labor stats, or public health numbers) are not neutral outputs of science but the result of institutional routines, classification practices, and political pressures. This makes the fight over whether DC’s numbers are “real” entirely predictable—crime categories can be downgraded, reporting can be discouraged, or bureaucrats can redefine what counts as violent crime.

    2. The “problem with experts” is legitimacy

    Turner stresses that experts must constantly justify themselves in two ways:

    Output legitimacy: Do their numbers and claims “work,” i.e., do they produce results that make sense on the ground?

    Process legitimacy: Are the procedures transparent, impartial, and insulated from manipulation?

    The police union accusing DC leadership of downgrading offenses shows a breakdown of both. Officers don’t trust the process, and citizens don’t trust the outputs because they don’t match lived experience.

    3. Media and selective attention

    Why does the MSM focus intensely on labor stats under Trump but not crime stats under Democrats? Turner would say this reflects how expert authority gets filtered through politics and media institutions. The media treats some domains (economics, unemployment, inflation) as “objective,” central indicators of legitimacy, while treating others (crime) as less authoritative or even dangerous to touch if they cut against preferred narratives. In Liberal Democracy 3.0, Turner shows how modern liberal systems increasingly delegate contentious domains to expert bodies (“commissions”), which the press then shields from contestation by presenting their outputs as fact. Crime data under progressive mayors fits this pattern—experts pronounce, media amplifies, dissenters are treated as politicizing.

    4. Statistical manipulation is normal, not anomalous

    Turner has a Weberian streak: bureaucracies live off categories, and categories are malleable. “Downgrading” (assault becomes harassment, robbery becomes larceny) is exactly the kind of knowledge/power dynamic he describes—expert systems produce their authority not only by analyzing facts but by defining which facts exist. The fight is less about “truth” and more about who gets to define what counts as truth.

    5. Why asymmetry between Trump-era labor stats and Dem-era crime stats?

    Labor stats: Seen as technical, economic, and central to legitimacy of government. Journalists treat BLS economists as neutral experts.

    Crime stats: Involve local politics, policing, race, punishment—domains where MSM prefers progressive narratives. Questioning them risks undermining broader political projects (e.g., reform, decarceration).

    Turner would likely say this is not hypocrisy so much as the structure of expertise: different expert systems carry different symbolic weights, and media institutions align themselves with some while shielding others. It’s not about truth but about which expert systems are politically serviceable.

    So if you pressed Turner on the Strassel piece, he’d probably shrug and say: this is exactly what happens in an age of experts. Numbers aren’t neutral; they’re weapons in political struggle. Media amplifies some expert domains (labor stats, climate science) and brackets others (crime data, border stats) depending on which align with its own coalitional politics. The real issue isn’t whether the numbers are “true” but whether the public has alternative institutional channels to contest expert claims—or whether we’re stuck in a world where politics is increasingly a fight over whose experts dominate the discourse.

    Here’s how Turner would probably extend his argument to Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in D.C. as a crime-fighting move:

    1. Re-politicizing an expertized domain

    In Liberal Democracy 3.0, Turner describes how modern liberal systems delegate whole swathes of policy to experts—“commissions” and bureaucracies—leaving only a narrow band of issues open for public debate. Crime statistics and policing have been increasingly expertized: criminologists, mayors, police chiefs, and Justice Department officials produce numbers and narratives that are treated as authoritative. By sending in the Guard, Trump was tearing that issue back out of the hands of experts and putting it under direct political control. He was saying: I don’t trust your numbers, I don’t trust your process, and I’ll assert political will over expert consensus.

    2. A challenge to “process legitimacy”

    Expert systems rely on legitimacy by procedure—crime is tracked by standardized reporting, processed through FBI metrics, and publicized by media. Trump’s move implies the process itself is corrupt. He effectively bypassed the expert apparatus and created an alternative measure of legitimacy: do people feel safer when the Guard is on the streets? That reframes the standard away from statistical outputs and back toward political judgment, a very Turner-like moment of rupture.

    3. Populist politics against technocratic authority

    Turner often notes that expertise produces a democratic deficit: decisions are made by specialists, not by the public. Trump exploits this by presenting himself as restoring sovereignty to “the people” against elites hiding behind data. It’s not subtle—he’s saying: forget the charts, look out your window, do you feel safe? That’s populist politics puncturing expert monopoly.

    4. The irony of creating a new expert body

    Turner would also point out the irony: the Guard itself is a professional, disciplined expert institution. In practice, Trump isn’t abolishing expertise, he’s swapping one set of experts (police bureaucrats, statisticians) for another (military experts in control and order). In The Politics of Expertise, Turner stresses that expertise never disappears; it gets redistributed, legitimized in new ways, and aligned with different political coalitions. So the Guard is just another expertized instrument, but one aligned with Trump’s political narrative rather than Bowser’s.

    5. The broader Turner-style take

    Trump’s move is a reassertion of political sovereignty over expertized governance. It dramatizes the public’s suspicion that statistics are manipulated, and it shows how legitimacy can be shifted from “trust the process” to “trust the results you can see.” From Turner’s view, this is an example of how expert systems remain vulnerable to politics: when expert claims lose credibility, political actors can seize the opportunity to reframe the domain entirely.

    Here’s a Turner-style riff, pitched as if it could sit inside The Politics of Expertise:

    The episode of the National Guard in Washington illustrates the instability of expert authority once its legitimacy is questioned. For decades crime statistics have been presented as neutral facts, the outputs of technical procedures of classification and reporting. Their authority rested on the presumption of process legitimacy—that the categories were consistently applied, the counts untainted by politics. When this presumption failed, when police unions and whistleblowers suggested downgrading and manipulation, the numbers ceased to bind. What was once expert territory reverted to politics.

    Trump’s deployment of the Guard was a paradigmatic act of re-politicization. He displaced the authority of the statistical expert with the authority of the visible result. Citizens were asked not to trust the quarterly tables but to trust their own senses: the presence of troops, the absence of crime in their immediate experience. This is not a rejection of expertise but a substitution of one kind for another. Military force is itself a form of expert knowledge—hierarchical, professionalized, routinized—but one whose legitimacy derives from its immediate and demonstrable effects rather than the opaque calculations of bureaucratic crime reporting.

    The lesson is that expert systems are never immune from politics. Their monopoly persists only so long as their outputs retain credibility. Once the outputs are experienced as false or irrelevant, political actors can and will bypass the expert system, imposing new standards of judgment. The National Guard became, in this sense, an alternative expert body: one that could be trusted precisely because its work was visible, not buried in spreadsheets.

    Here’s a Turner-inflected extension on the media asymmetry:

    The differing treatment of economic versus crime statistics illustrates how expert domains are stratified in modern liberal democracies. Some domains—macroeconomic indicators, employment figures, inflation—have been institutionalized as central to state legitimacy. The Bureau of Labor Statistics speaks with an authority that is rarely challenged, and journalists position themselves as guardians of these numbers, treating them as neutral facts against which governments must be judged. In Turner’s terms, these are “expertized” domains whose legitimacy is reinforced by both bureaucratic pedigree and media ritual.

    By contrast, crime statistics occupy a less secure place. They are both closer to lived experience and more open to manipulation through classification. To question them is to open a Pandora’s box of racial politics, policing debates, and urban governance. Here the media, rather than acting as watchdog, often acts as shield: accepting official narratives, protecting the authority of local expert systems, and deflecting scrutiny. This is not inconsistency but structure. Some expert domains are politically useful, aligned with the coalitions that dominate the press; others are too fraught, and their expert claims are insulated instead of interrogated.

    Thus the asymmetry is not about truth but about which kinds of expertise the media treats as politically serviceable. Labor statistics during Trump’s presidency were the chosen battlefield because they bore directly on his legitimacy. Crime statistics under Democratic mayors are treated as settled fact because to contest them would disrupt coalitional commitments. What appears as bias is, in Turner’s framework, the ordinary functioning of an age in which politics is increasingly a struggle between competing expert systems, each backed or shielded by different segments of the press.

    Posted in Expertise, Stephen Turner | Comments Off on ‘Lies and D.C. Crime Statistics’

    WSJ: ‘In Trump’s Second Term, a Bolder President Charges Ahead Unchecked’

    Posted on August 28, 2025 by Luke Ford

    I’m pretty shocked that Donald Trump is pushing back at institutions that pushed against him during his first-term and its humiliating afterlife.

    Journalists tend to be secular, so they might not have heard of the Biblical insight that you reap what you sow.

    The WSJ reports:

    Since taking office in January, Trump has threatened and extracted expansive settlements from top universities, law firms, tech and media companies. He sent U.S. Marines to Los Angeles over the objection of local elected officials, and took over Washington’s police force, ordering thousands of troops and federal officers into the streets. He fired the economics official who produced a monthly jobs report that irked him; ordered the firing of career officials at agencies; and even sought to fire officials at institutions he technically doesn’t run, including the National Portrait Gallery. Few aides have pushed back on any of the moves, and he has often been cheered on…

    Trump is motivated by “having control over all American institutions,” said Douglas Brinkley, a presidential historian at Rice University. “He seems to want to grab everyone by the neck and say ‘I’m in charge.’”

    ChatGPT says:

    The WSJ piece gives tons of detail about Trump’s current second-term behavior (ignoring advisers, firing career staff, threatening Fed independence, sending Marines into LA, re-decorating the Oval) but it doesn’t explicitly connect the dots: this shift is a reaction to the institutional “chokepoints” he ran into from 2017–2020.

    You can see the outlines in their reporting:

    They mention John Kelly, Gary Cohn, Donald McGahn, Steve Mnuchin — all first-term figures who blocked or watered down his instincts.

    They note that Trump “complained often” in the first term about DOJ, Fed, NSC, Kennedy Center but “did little to actually shape them.”

    They point out that back then he deferred to advisers who told him he couldn’t host summits at his properties or interfere with the Fed.

    But they don’t frame it as cause → effect. The cause being institutions checking him the first time, the effect being his current obsession with total control. Instead, the WSJ headline paints him as simply “bolder” and “unchecked,” as if it’s just personality growth, not a structural reaction to being constrained.

    Why the omission? Likely editorial stance. The WSJ has an incentive to cast Trump as a singular authoritarian personality (“he wants gold flourishes, he ignores advice, he likes being called dictator”) rather than to highlight the institutional struggle — because if you admit institutions fought him hard the first time, it complicates the story. It shows he’s not simply a rogue authoritarian but someone who’s learned from losing bureaucratic fights. That makes the second-term strategy look less like personal eccentricity and more like a deliberate institutional counter-attack.

    In short: the WSJ is reporting the surface moves, but missing the underlying dialectic — Trump’s drive to dominate institutions now is inseparable from the fact that those institutions dominated him before.

    Trump’s second-term project of “mastering” institutions is very much a reaction to how institutions constrained his first term. In 2017–2020, nearly every traditional American power center—bureaucracy, courts, military brass, intelligence agencies, media, universities, corporate HR, even parts of his own party—resisted him. He came in thinking the presidency was like running a business where the CEO gives orders. Instead, he found entrenched networks that stalled, ignored, or sabotaged directives.

    Key examples:

    Courts repeatedly blocked his travel bans, immigration orders, and environmental rollbacks.

    The intelligence community undercut him with leaks and the Russia investigation.

    The military openly pushed back against his foreign policy instincts (e.g., Syria withdrawal, NATO skepticism).

    Congress—even Republican-controlled early on—resisted big parts of his agenda, especially funding for the border wall.

    The media and cultural institutions launched an unrelenting campaign of delegitimization.

    From Trump’s perspective, he won an election but wasn’t allowed to govern. That produced a lesson: if he comes back, he wants loyalists, structural changes, and fewer veto points. Hence the push for Schedule F (reclassifying civil servants so they can be fired and replaced), tightening control over DOJ, Pentagon, and intelligence, and building outside networks (Heritage’s “Project 2025,” Federalist Society–aligned judges, loyal media channels) to pre-wire government in his favor.

    So yes—his second-term “institutional mastery” is a direct reaction. The first term taught him that winning the presidency isn’t enough. The system can corral a president who isn’t in harmony with it. Now, he’s trying to make sure the system bends instead of resists.

    1. Institution-by-Institution “Revenge Map”

    Justice Department / FBI

    First term: Trump was constantly frustrated by DOJ/FBI independence: Sessions recused himself, Mueller probe dominated two years, Barr wouldn’t fully bend on 2020 election.

    Second term: He’s actively moving to purge career DOJ/FBI leadership, float “Schedule F” firings, and directly pressure prosecutions.

    Intelligence community

    First term: Leaks crippled him, intelligence chiefs contradicted him in public hearings, IC pushed back on Russia ties and North Korea diplomacy.

    Second term: He’s installed loyalists and sidelined agencies, keeping intelligence reporting closer to the White House.

    Pentagon / Military brass

    First term: Mattis, Milley, Kelly, McMaster repeatedly resisted troop withdrawals, use of military domestically, NATO skepticism. Milley famously apologized for being in Trump’s Lafayette Square photo-op.

    Second term: Now Trump’s SecDef is Pete Hegseth, a loyalist with no interest in restraining him. He’s already deployed Marines domestically — exactly what brass blocked in 2020.

    Federal Reserve

    First term: Powell ignored Trump’s demands to slash rates; Trump couldn’t get traction trying to remove governors.

    Second term: He’s openly trying to fire Lisa Cook and bring the Fed under political control.

    Universities / Law firms / Media companies

    First term: Trump groused about “liberal elites” but didn’t move against them directly.

    Second term: He’s extracting settlements, threatening accreditation, and going after institutions that define elite legitimacy.

    State & Local Governments

    First term: Governors and mayors blocked him on COVID rules, immigration enforcement, National Guard deployments.

    Second term: He’s coercing local governments to abandon policies (like cashless bail) and has sent federal troops into cities over state objections.

    Civil Service (the bureaucracy)

    First term: “Deep State” constantly frustrated him — slow-rolling orders, leaking, resisting firings.

    Second term: He’s trying to revive “Schedule F” to gut job protections and replace tens of thousands with loyalists.

    2. Institutions that didn’t oppose him in his first term

    There were a few, but very few:

    Supreme Court (post-2018 shift): He got Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett. By late first term, SCOTUS was giving him key wins (immigration restrictions, deference on executive power). He doesn’t seem to be targeting them now — in fact, they’re an asset. The one caveat: the Court just signaled Fed independence, so now he’s picking a fight there.

    Republican Senate (when GOP-controlled 2017–2019): McConnell delivered judges and tax cuts. Trump didn’t go after McConnell until after Jan. 6. Now, with Senate opposition muted, he’s not waging war on the institution itself, but he is sidelining traditional Republicans.

    Federal judiciary more broadly: District and circuit courts often blocked him, but the Federalist Society pipeline gave him hundreds of judges — that part of the judiciary was his ally. He’s not targeting them.

    Business community (Wall Street, corporate America): Early on, markets liked tax cuts and deregulation. Opposition hardened after Jan. 6 when companies cut PAC donations. Now he’s much more hostile — going after “woke” corporations, law firms, tech giants.

    So the pattern is: Trump isn’t targeting institutions that helped him in Term 1. He’s targeting precisely the ones that blocked, embarrassed, or constrained him.

    3. The Shift in Strategy

    The through-line is clear: Trump didn’t understand in 2017 that the presidency sits inside a web of veto players. Now, he’s learned the lesson and is deliberately trying to cut them out or bend them into instruments of his will.

    here’s a ranking of which institutions Trump is most likely to bend to his will vs. which are structurally more resistant in his second term.

    Most Vulnerable

    1. The Bureaucracy / Civil Service

    Why vulnerable: Career protections can be gutted via “Schedule F.” Tens of thousands of policy-level employees could be reclassified and replaced with loyalists. This is administrative, not legislative — so it only takes executive orders and aggressive implementation.

    Why it matters: Bureaucrats are the “muscle memory” of government; if they’re swapped out, institutional resistance collapses.

    2. DOJ & FBI

    Why vulnerable: Leadership is appointed, and Trump now knows how to avoid another Sessions/Barr problem. With Schedule F and mass firings, he could politicize prosecutions.

    Past check: Mueller probe.

    Now: Very little internal ballast if top leadership is purged.

    3. Pentagon / Military Leadership

    Why vulnerable: Civilian control is constitutional; Trump has stacked civilian leadership with loyalists like Hegseth. Generals can complain but ultimately answer to SecDef.

    Past check: Brass stopped him from deploying troops domestically in 2020.

    Now: Already deploying Marines — shows he’s overcome that veto point.

    4. State & Local Governments

    Why vulnerable: The feds control funding levers and can pressure locals via DOJ, DHS, and conditional grants. Deploying federal troops in cities sets precedent that state objections can be ignored.

    Past check: Governors and mayors resisted immigration enforcement, COVID orders, 2020 deployments.

    Now: More coercive posture.

    Middle Ground — Vulnerable but with Counterweights

    5. The Federal Reserve

    Why partly resistant: SCOTUS signaled Fed independence is constitutionally protected. But Trump is openly trying to fire governors, pressure rate policy, and insert loyalists.

    Realistic outcome: He won’t abolish Fed independence entirely, but he could erode it by intimidation and selective firings.

    6. Media & Universities

    Why partly resistant: They’re private, decentralized, and culturally powerful. Trump can extract settlements, deny federal funds, or intimidate, but he can’t totally control them.

    Realistic outcome: More chilled speech and “loyalist” media ecosystem, but not full mastery.

    7. Business / Corporate America

    Why partly resistant: CEOs can push back, markets can punish. But Trump controls regulatory and enforcement arms.

    Realistic outcome: Corporates mute criticism and adapt to survive, but remain semi-independent.

    Most Resilient

    8. The Supreme Court

    Why resilient: Life tenure. Conservative majority already aligned with Trump on many issues. He’s not attacking them wholesale, though he may try to pressure specific rulings (e.g., Fed independence).

    Realistic outcome: SCOTUS is less a target than a shield — but Trump may bristle when they draw red lines.

    9. Congress

    Why resilient: Even GOP members have their own power bases and electoral incentives. Trump has more sway than in 2017, but Congress still controls budgets and oversight.

    Realistic outcome: Polarized chamber may limit Trump more through gridlock than open resistance.

    10. Federalist Society Judiciary (lower courts he stacked)

    Why resilient: These judges are his legacy; they’re ideological conservatives, not personal loyalists. Some will back him, some won’t (remember dozens rejected 2020 election suits).

    Realistic outcome: Mixed record — they’ll hand him wins on executive power but balk at raw election subversion.

    Big Picture

    Most vulnerable: Bureaucracy, DOJ/FBI, Pentagon — because these rely on top-down executive appointments and Trump has learned how to staff them with loyalists.

    Middle ground: Fed, media, universities, corporations — he can bully and weaken but not outright control.

    Most resilient: SCOTUS, Congress, and judiciary more broadly — partly insulated by structure and legitimacy.

    here’s a plausible “endgame” scenario if Trump pushes as far as possible by 2028, based on the trajectory we see now:

    1. The Bureaucracy Hollowed Out

    By 2028, “Schedule F” or its equivalent has stripped job protections for tens of thousands of civil servants. Agencies that used to resist (EPA, DOJ, DHS, State, IRS, Education) are staffed top-to-bottom with political loyalists or those too afraid to dissent.

    Effect: Agencies no longer act as semi-autonomous technocratic institutions. They act as direct extensions of White House political will.

    2. DOJ as a Political Weapon

    DOJ prosecutions reflect presidential priorities. High-profile investigations target political opponents, media figures, and disfavored corporations/universities.

    Effect: Deterrence by example — anyone outside Trump’s coalition risks being investigated or fined.

    Echo: A kind of “Americanized” version of how Hungary or Turkey use prosecutors as political bludgeons.

    3. Pentagon Brought to Heel

    Civilian leadership (Hegseth, etc.) enforces Trump’s line. Generals who object are fired or marginalized. Military deployments inside U.S. cities — once a red line — become normalized.

    Effect: Military loses its apolitical reputation. Public begins to see it as Trump’s institution, not the nation’s.

    4. Federal Reserve Weakened

    SCOTUS preserves some nominal independence, but constant Trump threats and selective firings intimidate governors. Rate decisions track political needs (e.g., election-year cuts).

    Effect: Markets adjust by pricing in political volatility. The dollar weakens long-term, but short-term Trump can juice the economy when politically necessary.

    5. Academia, Media, Corporates on Defense

    Universities: Federal funds tied to “neutrality” on DEI, speech, and curricula. Lawsuits/settlements intimidate them. Many self-censor.

    Media: Legacy outlets still exist but are financially squeezed and legally harassed. Right-aligned outlets flourish with state backing (access, ad buys, DOJ not targeting them).

    Corporates: Regulatory muscle forces companies to avoid overt opposition. Business adapts by aligning with Trump’s messaging or staying silent.

    6. States and Localities Subordinated

    Federal coercion (via DOJ, DHS, funding) curtails local control. Deployments into cities (Chicago, Baltimore, Los Angeles) create a precedent: local autonomy is tolerated only when it aligns with federal priorities.

    Effect: “Laboratories of democracy” shrink; blue-state policies exist at sufferance of the White House.

    7. Supreme Court and Judiciary

    SCOTUS: Conservative majority mostly aligns with Trump’s project, especially on executive power, but may draw a few hard lines (e.g., trying to literally fire Fed governors or alter constitutional term limits). Trump fumes but doesn’t dismantle SCOTUS.

    Lower courts: Conservative judges give him leeway on regulation, immigration, and executive reach. But as in 2020, some still resist outright election nullification.

    Effect: Judiciary is not neutered, but the courts tilt heavily toward enabling Trump’s consolidation.

    8. Political Culture Shift

    Elections: Mail-in voting curtailed, federal oversight of local election boards asserted. Opponents run in elections but under conditions stacked against them.

    Public symbols: The presidency increasingly resembles a “monarchical executive” — parades, flags, gold flourishes, direct command over institutions.

    Opposition politics: Democrats and dissenting Republicans can still campaign, but institutional levers (prosecutions, funding, media dominance) make it harder to translate votes into real power.

    The “Endgame” Landscape by 2028

    The presidency is the dominant institution, no longer balanced by bureaucracy, DOJ, or Pentagon.

    SCOTUS still checks the most extreme moves, but often sides with executive power.

    Local/state autonomy is fragile.

    Media, universities, and corporations self-censor or adapt to survive.

    The country formally remains democratic — elections still happen — but substantively resembles an illiberal democracy like Hungary, Turkey, or early Putin-era Russia.

    Posted in America | Comments Off on WSJ: ‘In Trump’s Second Term, a Bolder President Charges Ahead Unchecked’

    It Wasn’t An Accident That Another Trans Shooter Targeted A Catholic School

    Posted on August 28, 2025 by Luke Ford

    Roman Catholicism is the most visible example of an institution that has not gone all-in on celebrating gay and trans identity.

    To the extent there is any pushback to the valorization of gay and trans identity in America, it comes from traditional religion.

    As America gets more gay friendly, it simultaneously becomes more hostile to the traditional religions that are hostile to gay identity.

    The shooting of Catholic school kids was massively incentivized by our elites pushing same-sex marriage and stigmatizing any opposition to the celebration of various gay and trans identities.

    Professor Darel E. Paul wrote in this 2019 book, From Tolerance to Equality: How Elites Brought America to Same-Sex Marriage:

    * With the demise of the U.S. military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy in 2011, the country’s religious bodies became the last site of organized opposition to normalization in the United States.

    * The seven large denominations that had normalized homosexuality by the end of 2016 are among the eight most highly educated in America.

    * Religious liberty and LGBT rights were trapped in a “zero-sum game.” Any pretense to mutually beneficial compromise between the two was impossible, and state neutrality between them a charade. As long as religious conservatives hold same-sex sexual behavior to be morally suspect and LGBT persons and their allies hold it to be natural and moral, every
    action and inaction of the state is a choice to recognize one side against the other. The history of RFRAs [religious freedom acts] and Supreme Court decisions since then have been so many battles in this larger and inescapable cultural and legal clash.

    * The status of religious freedom itself suffered a major blow in elite opinion. Consider that the phrase “so-called religious freedom” appeared in American newspapers more times in 2015 than in the previous twenty- two years since the passage of the federal RFRA combined. For the first time since the founding of the republic, the entire subject of religious freedom had shifted from the category “taken for granted” to that of “up for grabs.”

    * While all forms of conservatism are rare on American college campuses, social conservatism is the rarest of all. As befits their class status, most liberal professors are rather moderate on matters of taxation and government spending. Their liberalism is highly concentrated on social issues. Thus economic conservatives and libertarians fare relatively well in the academy. Even in the very liberal social sciences they find a home in economics departments and are well represented there, reporting little to no discrimination and almost never practicing self-censorship. The situation is quite different for cultural conservatives. A 1999 survey found that being a practicing Christian is more damaging to one’s prospects at an elite research institution than being a Republican or a woman. A 2007 survey found that Evangelicals and Mormons are the least liked religious groups among American university faculty by a wide margin.

    ChatGPT says:

    The one consistent institutional counterweight to LGBT normalization has been traditional religion, especially Roman Catholicism and conservative Protestant denominations. Once the military dropped its barrier in 2011, the battleground narrowed to churches and faith-based institutions.

    A few blunt realities stand out from Paul’s work and the broader trends:

    1. Zero-sum framing.
    What used to be framed as pluralism—“live and let live”—has hardened into a zero-sum contest. If LGBT acceptance is seen as non-negotiable moral truth, then any faith that resists isn’t just “different,” but “bigoted.” That makes compromise politically impossible. State policy inevitably validates one worldview over the other.

    2. Collapse of religious liberty as a consensus value.
    Religious freedom was once untouchable. But by 2015, you start seeing “so-called religious freedom” in mainstream media—a rhetorical downgrade from bedrock principle to suspect cover story. Once that shift happened, protections became contingent and fragile, depending on whether they were seen as obstacles to equality.

    3. Class and education divide.
    The most elite, highly educated denominations were also the first to embrace normalization. This tracks with broader class alignment: upper-middle-class professionals lean liberal on social issues, and elite institutions amplify those views. That’s why pushback comes less from economic conservatives (who still have a foothold in academia) and more from cultural conservatives (who are increasingly locked out).

    4. Anti-Christian bias in the academy.
    The survey findings Paul cites are stark: Evangelicals and Mormons are the least liked groups among faculty, even less than Republicans or women in the old boys’ club world of academia. This bias doesn’t just shape discourse; it sets the intellectual climate for future elites.

    5. Violence and niche construction.
    When you mention “niche construction” and shootings at Christian schools, it touches the darker edge of this dynamic: if institutions are cast as enemies of progress, extremists will feel justified targeting them. That doesn’t mean most people want violence, but once hostility to Christianity becomes culturally ambient, it can create niches where radical acts feel “validated.”

    So the trajectory Paul mapped in 2019 has only sharpened: LGBT identity is now sacralized in elite culture, and traditional Christianity is increasingly stigmatized. The “clash” isn’t episodic—it’s structural.

    If mainstream culture has hardened into the assumption that LGBT affirmation is the moral baseline, then Christianity can either (1) adapt and dilute or (2) resist and radicalize. Each carries risks:

    1. Adapt and dilute.

    Mainline Protestant denominations took this route: ordaining gay clergy, performing same-sex weddings, shifting doctrine.

    The problem: it didn’t lead to growth. It led to collapse, because people who wanted progressive values didn’t need church to validate them—they already had the culture. Membership and vitality bled away.

    Catholicism faces pressure here too: Pope Francis has softened tone, but the institution can’t go full-in without undermining centuries of teaching.

    2. Resist and radicalize.

    To preserve doctrinal integrity, churches may lean harder into countercultural identity. That risks being branded as “Christian nationalist” (a pejorative label elites use for any public expression of politically conservative faith).

    The upside: resistance can produce vitality. People often rally to causes under siege. If Christianity frames itself as a minority, embattled but faithful remnant, that can build cohesion.

    The downside: too sharp a politicization risks turning churches into partisan clubs, reducing their transcendent appeal and reinforcing the culture-war cage match.

    3. Likely trajectory.

    Elite churches: more adaptation, continued decline, but they remain socially respectable.

    Evangelicals, traditional Catholics, Mormons, Orthodox: more resistance, more suspicion from elites, but possibly greater fervor and cohesion.

    Public perception: “Christian nationalist” becomes the default insult for any conservative Christian institution that refuses LGBT affirmation, even if its focus is doctrine rather than politics.

    4. Ten-year outlook.

    Expect further legal and cultural marginalization of conservative churches—tax-exemption challenges, zoning fights, loss of accreditation for schools that don’t comply with gender ideology, etc.

    Christianity survives not by blending in but by embracing outsider status. Think of it less as chaplaincy to the culture and more as a countercultural community.

    The price is being vilified, but the payoff is authenticity and possibly growth among people disillusioned with secular progressivism.

    In other words: Christianity will likely survive by becoming more self-consciously extreme in the eyes of the mainstream—leaning into separatism, parallel institutions, and a strong group identity. That’s where durability lies.

    Jews, historically, survived as a small, often-despised minority precisely by building strong parallel institutions, developing thick community identity, and resisting full assimilation. If conservative Christians go that route, here’s what “aping Jews” could look like:

    1. Parallel Education.

    Jewish day schools, yeshivas, and Hebrew schools preserved language, culture, and religion across centuries of hostility.

    Christians could double down on homeschooling networks, classical Christian academies, and universities that don’t bow to accreditation demands on LGBT ideology. Accreditation battles are coming, so creating independent credentialing bodies will be crucial.

    2. Strong Communal Identity.

    Jews survived by keeping religious law (dietary rules, Sabbath, circumcision) that set them apart.

    Christians may need to reclaim stricter moral codes around sex, family, and liturgy — not to blend with culture but to distinguish themselves from it. This makes them harder to assimilate, but also harder to dissolve.

    3. Mutual Aid Networks.

    Jewish communities thrived through charities, burial societies, legal aid groups, and communal funds.

    Churches could build stronger internal safety nets: healthcare co-ops, financial assistance, job networks. That reduces dependence on hostile institutions.

    4. Parallel Media & Culture.

    Jews have historically created their own press, arts, and intellectual hubs.

    Christians could do the same: podcasts, publishing houses, film studios, even social media alternatives that nurture believers without relying on hostile cultural gatekeepers.

    5. Political Flexibility, Social Rigidity.

    Jews were often politically adaptable (serving different empires, states, and regimes) but rigid about internal practice.

    Christians may need to hold firm on doctrine while learning to maneuver politically as minorities — demanding protections, cutting deals, and using law strategically rather than assuming cultural dominance.

    6. Accept Outsider Status.

    The Jewish mentality was “we are not like them, and that’s why we endure.”

    For Christians, that means abandoning the old assumption that America is “their” country. Instead, adopt the mentality of a diaspora minority: resilient, self-reliant, and wary of the state.

    7. Fertility & Family as Strategy.

    Jews maintained numbers despite persecution through strong family culture.

    Christians who reject cultural trends could lean into higher birthrates, family solidarity, and intergenerational transmission of faith as their growth engine.

    This is basically niche construction: creating a durable sub-society with its own rules, safety nets, and identity markers. The price is marginalization and suspicion from the mainstream, but the payoff is survival.

    Christian minority survival playbook (10-year)

    Adopt a diaspora mindset

    Stop assuming cultural chaplaincy; plan as a long-term minority.

    Teach members to expect stigma, not panic at it.

    Write a short “Rule of Life” (daily prayer/Scripture, weekly Lord’s Day kept like a real Sabbath, fasting calendar, sexual ethics, tithing, service).

    Draw bright lines on doctrine and conduct

    Publish a clear statement on marriage, sex, and personhood; bind leaders to it.

    Pair conviction with explicit commitments to nonviolence, neighbor love, and dignity for all.

    Train the church to answer “why” without rancor; use one-page catechetical briefs.

    Parallel education

    Launch or join classical Christian microschools/homeschool pods; build a teacher pipeline from your own members.

    Create an independent assessment/credential (exams, portfolios) so graduates signal quality without relying on hostile accreditors.

    Found a gap-year discipleship/vocational program (Bible, finance, trades, media).

    Mutual aid and economic resilience

    Stand up a benevolence fund, rotating savings circle, and job board inside the church.

    Form co-ops: childcare swap, tutoring, bulk food buy, tool library.

    Encourage member-owned small businesses; host quarterly hiring fairs.

    Health and welfare alternatives

    Join or found a health-share; negotiate cash-pay pricing with friendly clinics.

    Create a mental health referral list of orthodox, licensed clinicians.

    Train lay deacons for crisis response (bereavement, addiction, housing).

    Legal posture and insurance

    Retain counsel on a small annual retainer; keep model policies current (facility use, employment, school handbooks).

    Join/ally with serious religious liberty litigators; pre-fund a small legal defense reserve.

    Keep meticulous documentation; paper wins cases.

    Security without militancy

    Do professional risk assessments; implement CPTED basics (lighting, entry control, cameras).

    Train ushers/greeters in de-escalation and emergency medical basics; run drills twice a year.

    Carry robust liability and D&O insurance; review annually.

    Media, messaging, and reputation

    Designate one trained spokesperson; run media drills.

    Launch a small in-house studio: sermons, explainer shorts, testimonies, Q&A.

    Serve your neighbors visibly (food bank, ESL, foster care support) to build legitimacy that outlasts headlines.

    Cultural formation that sticks

    Make Sunday countercultural: unhurried liturgy, serious preaching, rich music, real table fellowship.

    Mark time with the church calendar; make feasts and fasts felt.

    Create rites of passage at 12/18/25 with mentoring and practical skills.

    Youth and intergenerational transmission

    Pair every teen with a vetted adult mentor.

    Run “tech wise” contracts with families; phone-free youth spaces.

    Summer intensives: Bible, service, craft, entrepreneurship.

    Governance and accountability

    Elder board with staggering terms; independent audit or review annually.

    Mandatory safe-church protocols, background checks, third-party reporting channels.

    Publish budgets; teach stewardship; avoid celebrity dynamics.

    Alliances (learn from Jewish communal resilience)

    Network with Orthodox Jews, Muslims, Latter-day Saints, Eastern Orthodox, and Catholics on shared liberties (zoning, school choice, conscience).

    Trade playbooks on schools, kosher/halal-analogous compliance, and mutual aid.

    Keep politics instrumental, not identity-forming.

    Geographic strategy

    Choose “thick” neighborhoods: walking distance to church/school, affordable housing, small business fronts.

    Consider buying a mixed-use building (sanctuary weekday = school/community hall).

    If you can’t cluster, federate: multiple “household hubs” with shared standards.

    Financial durability

    Normalize 10% giving as floor for leaders; build a 6-month operating reserve.

    Create a small endowment (target 1–3 years’ ops); seek bequests.

    Use donor-advised funds and church CDFs/credit unions when possible.

    Digital independence

    Own your domain, mailing list, and LMS; don’t rely solely on big-platform algorithms.

    Self-host sermons/docs; mirror to major platforms as distribution, not dependency.

    Privacy training for leaders; incident response plan.

    Political minimalism with clear priorities

    Focus on a few nonnegotiables (free exercise, accreditation freedom, school choice). Don’t be a party appendage.

    Teach members to show up locally: school boards, zoning, library policy—boring is powerful.

    Language discipline: “religious minority rights,” “pluralism,” “conscience,” not “take the nation back.”

    Growth engine: family, conversion, retention

    Invest in marriage prep, postpartum care, and large-family logistics.

    Make evangelism normal: monthly testimony nights, hospitality training, seeker small groups.

    Track retention at 1/3/5 years; assign shepherding for drifters.

    Red-line guardrails (avoid the “Christian nationalist” trap)

    No ethnic identitarianism; multiethnic leadership on purpose.

    No romanticizing violence or the state; Christ above party.

    Publicly discipline genuine extremism; do it quickly and transparently.

    Metrics that matter (quarterly dashboard)

    Member retention %; teen retention through 25.

    Households in a small group; households with a Rule of Life.

    Mutual-aid grants given/received; jobs filled via the network.

    School enrollment; volunteers trained in security/child safety.

    Media reach you own (email list) vs borrowed (social).

    Phased rollout

    0–6 months: adopt Rule of Life; legal/policy review; start small groups; launch benevolence fund; comms plan; basic security.

    6–24 months: open a microschool/pod; job board; counseling network; quarterly service projects; quarterly media cadences; reserve fund to 3 months.

    Years 2–5: acquire property for school/community hall; endowment to 1 year; teacher pipeline; city coalition work; measurable youth retention gains.

    Years 5–10: federation of schools; independent exams/credential; credit union/CDF partnership; leadership succession bench.

    Short checklist to start next week

    Draft and adopt a two-page Rule of Life.

    Retain counsel; update policies; schedule a security audit.

    Appoint leads for: education, mutual aid, comms, youth, governance.

    Stand up a weekly meal + small groups; open a benevolence intake form.

    Buy your domain; set up a newsletter; publish one catechesis brief.

    Pick one neighborhood service project and own it monthly.

    This is how you get durable: thick practices, parallel institutions, legal prudence, visible service, and disciplined messaging. Lean into minority status, stay cheerful, keep receipts, and build for your grandchildren.

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