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Wanting on the private motivations of the assorted actors in our mutual Trump 2.0 period polycrisis is a generally helpful lens for analyzing present occasions.
This publish is my private try to seize the 2025 zeitgeist utilizing that lens to enhance earlier makes an attempt to grasp whether or not Trump and his opponents are delusional, drugged, or disinformed.
Earlier than we drill down into the private lives, motivations, and pecadillos of a number of American political figures, I need to element one thing that’s private to me, thousands and thousands of rural Individuals and 1000’s of small enterprise house owners.
Rural America Is a Information Desert Due to Google
I’ll begin with some systemic context that helps clarify how Trump has gained such a maintain over rural America: the persevering with demise of native information and data in lots of elements of the US, through Axios (don’t fear that is going to get surprisingly private very quick together with a reveal of my secret id):
— Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) October 23, 2025
By the numbers: Half of the 136 newspaper closures in America over the previous 14 months have been from impartial, for-profit newspaper chains that personal 5 or fewer for-profit papers, based on a brand new report from Northwestern’s Medill Faculty of Journalism.
By comparability, solely eight newspapers owned by funding companies shuttered in the identical time interval.
Researchers started sounding the alarm in regards to the rise of “information deserts” a decade in the past, again when non-public funding companies started gobbling up and consolidating native papers.
However most of these closures occurred in suburbs the place newspapers may extra simply be rolled up into larger, close by metropolis papers. Not like the impartial newspaper closures we’re seeing at the moment, fewer hyper-rural retailers had been impacted by the big funding agency rollups.
A couple of-third (38%) of the 8,891 U.S. newspapers that existed 20 years in the past have since shuttered.
Round 50 million folks within the U.S. at the moment dwell with restricted or no entry to native information.
Whereas these particulars are new and horrifying, one angle that isn’t ever talked about is the impression of Google’s monopoly management of the online advertising trade.
Issues Acquired Private for Nat Wilson Turner, Previously Often called Child Nate
This one is private to me as it destroyed the very profitable site I had run since 2007, forcing me to promote at a loss and discover myself unemployed post-50 with children and a mortgage (please don’t be confused by my actual identify quite than my Bare Capitalism nom de pen.)
I tweeted about it from my useless identify account:
Google did this in October of 2023 with the “Useful High quality Replace” which focused independently owned internet sites: pic.twitter.com/6VfZd2Oj1x
— Thoht, Doge of Knowledge (@KidNate) October 21, 2025
Whereas my internet site visitors, income, and in the end my enterprise was being destroyed from October 2023 to February 2024, I knew it was due to Google’s Useful Content material Replace. What I didn’t know was that the HCU was not punishing my website due to “poor cell response” or bugs with their “Uncover” system.
What I solely discovered later, after I’d spent all my capital transferring to a brand new server arrange and paying a charge to flee my “advert associate” was that Google’s Useful Content material Replace systematically attacked websites with impartial, non-corporate possession.
It’s believed they did this in response to ChatGPT’s risk to their core search enterprise and solely wished to drive site visitors to main corporations they minimize offers with to make use of the information content material for his or her AI engine. That is believed to be why Reddit all of a sudden surged in site visitors from Google following a $60 million greenback deal in February 2024.
Columbia Journalism Overview explains what this deal has meant within the 18 months since struck:
n the previous few years, Reddit’s place within the media trade has undergone a dramatic shift. As soon as regarded primarily as an unruly discussion board for poisonous discourse, it’s now a consequential participant within the evolving relationship between tech platforms and media corporations.
That’s partly as a result of Reddit has provided itself up as an important provider of information for AI corporations. In February 2024, the identical day it filed for an IPO, the corporate introduced a content-licensing cope with Google for sixty million {dollars} a 12 months. The settlement gave Google entry to real-time content material from Reddit’s huge user-authored boards. Just a few months later, Reddit struck an analogous partnership with OpenAI that’s estimated to be value round seventy million a 12 months.
These offers imply that when folks seek for content material on-line, Reddit surfaces extra typically. The analytics platform Profound confirmed that, between August 2024 and June 2025, Reddit was probably the most cited area by Google AI Overviews and Perplexity, and the second most cited by ChatGPT. Additionally, an replace to Google’s algorithm that boosted boards like Quora and Reddit in its search rankings practically tripled Reddit’s readership between August 2023 and April 2024, from 132 million to 346 million guests.
I didn’t know any of this on the time.
It wasn’t till client product evaluation website Housefresh revealed this in February 2024 (per the Wayback Machine) that I noticed what was taking place.
Google repeatedly launches updates to its algorithm to repeatedly enhance search outcomes high quality. Consider these updates as a refresh of the system the place rankings change: some web sites see an enchancment whereas others see a decline.
At HouseFresh, we control Google’s information and documentation as a result of these updates can actually make or break our web site. That stated, we don’t write for Google’s robots and at all times make editorial choices with our readers in thoughts.
We all know that on the finish of the day, Google will reward us if our readers discover our articles helpful.
Or that’s what we thought.
You may need seen that it doesn’t matter what you google, there’s at all times a collection of the identical publishers exhibiting up on the high of the outcomes:
— Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) October 23, 2025
The article goes on to elucidate how huge company internet sites moved into the product evaluation area regardless of not doing precise product critiques. On the time they had been hopeful Google would modify the protocols, however by Might they had been giving up.
This tweet explains what was happening within the product evaluation internet area pretty succinctly (it’s too lengthy to embed), nevertheless it wasn’t restricted to any explicit content material area of interest.
It was a full-on apocalypse of impartial bloggers as documented in items like: “Google Has Destroyed the Unbiased Bloggers” or “Google Search Adjustments Are Killing Web sites in an Age of AI Spam” or “How Google’s Useful Content material Replace Retains Destroying Web sites” or “Google Killed My Six-Determine Blogs In a single day — And I By no means Noticed It Coming.”
The demise of so many impartial information publishers implies that the oligarchs have a lot wider latitude to pursue their private pursuits.
Let’s begin on the high.
Sufficient About Me, Let’s Get to Trump’s Private Motivations
Following my “Who’s Delusional, Who’s Drugged, Who’s Disinformed? It’s Arduous to Inform” publish which struggled to parse POTUS Donald Trump’s motivations I occurred to catch Russian information analyst John Helmer on Dialogue Works and he minimize the proverbial Gordian knot with one thing that ought to have been apparent to anybody however a mark like me.
Nima R. Alkhorshid: What does President Trump actually care about?
John Helmer: Effectively, presidents, and he’s nothing new about this, care about their energy.
He cares a bit extra, or heaps extra, than some presidents about turning his energy into fast stability sheet money in all his companies, the companies he runs straight by his sons.
So turning energy into cash is primary and quantity two is preserving that energy, reclaiming it from the Congress if that’s essential and defending it on the subsequent midterm election, at all times two years away from election, proper? After which defending it and preserving it uh on your subsequent time period if you happen to can run for reelection, as most presidents hope to do, or if you happen to can’t, as Trump’s place is for the time being, it’s to guarantee that your successors or probably your self (if you happen to can give you a constitutional method of doing it) to protect your energy.
Helmer goes on to elucidate that the huge quantities of cash being spent by NATO member nations on arms for Ukraine and the chances for the Trump household to personally enrich themselves are possible irresistible, so we shouldn’t anticipate any peace offers.
Trump Extorting the Division of Justice for Money
Trump proves Helmer’s level with this unprecedented demand, per the NYT:
President Trump is demanding that the Justice Division pay him about $230 million in compensation for the federal investigations into him, based on folks aware of the matter, who added that any settlement would possibly in the end be authorised by senior division officers who defended him or these in his orbit.
The scenario has no parallel in American historical past, as Mr. Trump, a presidential candidate, was pursued by federal legislation enforcement and finally received the election, taking up the very authorities that should now evaluation his claims. Additionally it is the starkest instance but of potential moral conflicts created by putting in the president’s former attorneys atop the Justice Division.
Mr. Trump submitted complaints by an administrative declare course of that usually is the precursor to lawsuits. The primary declare, lodged in late 2023, seeks damages for quite a few purported violations of his rights, together with the F.B.I. and particular counsel investigation into Russian election tampering and attainable connections to the 2016 Trump marketing campaign, based on folks aware of the matter. They spoke on the situation of anonymity as a result of the declare has not been made public.
The second grievance, filed in the summertime of 2024, accuses the F.B.I. of violating Mr. Trump’s privateness by looking Mar-a-Lago, his membership and residence in Florida, in 2022 for labeled paperwork. It additionally accuses the Justice Division of malicious prosecution in charging him with mishandling delicate information after he left workplace.
Obama’s Cynicism Set the Desk for Trump
Trump’s model of flagrant corruption wouldn’t have been attainable earlier than 2016. It took eight years of bait and swap from Barack Obama to make voters cynical sufficient to vote for Trump.
This TikTok video from Shaking Sheets does an excellent job of reminding everybody simply how a lot Obama’s private cynicism impacted the private psychological state of the entire American voters:
@shakingsheets For those who take inventory of all the common grownup within the US has skilled within the final 2/3 a long time of our political equipment… every part begins to make a complete lot of sense! #fypシ #politics #leftist #blacktiktok #historical past ♬ authentic sound – Nia Òla 💗
Partial transcript:
In 2008 when then senator of Illinois Barack Hussein Obama launched his marketing campaign for president and was looking for the official nomination from the Democratic Occasion his marketing campaign guarantees and insurance policies included however weren’t restricted to: …
[Nat: She lists many of Obama’s specific empty promises and progressive campaign platform items and continues] ..this is the reason he was “the hope candidate” “the change candidate” and in 2008 the folks overwhelmingly voted for this man voted for left wing populism and he shitted on his constituents heads.
He obtained lower than 40% of what he stated he would carried out and most of his guarantees, he instantly rolled again. Famously when he was requested about his day one promise to codify abortion entry trigger he had the Democrat tremendous majority he stated it was “nowhere close to a day one precedence” regardless of promising that on the marketing campaign path.
It’s fairly actually how he swung the ladies’s vote in (the 2008 main) and if you happen to ask the common American about that in 2025 they wouldn’t even know that is what Obama ran on and those who did [remember] do know and that’s the place they get their political disillusionment from.
There’s a cause folks had been enthusiastic about Obama and it was not simply because he was younger and an orator and black, it was as a result of he was the closest we had gotten to actual progressive politics in a decade and in all of the ways in which mattered to the people who voted for him he capitulated to the proper.
…(Obama’s) deceit has produced apathy and till individuals are keen to reply to that to apologize, to reconcile with the American folks we’ll be on this place and I don’t know what number of different methods to say that
Since Obama destroyed the voters’s hope for change, the western public has had quite a few horrifically gross scandals come to gentle: Invoice Cosby, Harvey Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein, Jimmy Saville, and so forth.
However let’s take a look at one very private scandal involving a politician that hasn’t gotten as a lot consideration as perhaps it ought to.
I’m referring to long-time U.S. Speaker of the Home of Representatives and convicted intercourse offender Dennis Hastert.
The Pedophilia Was Private, however Exploiting It Was Systemic
I’ve quoted from this Aaron Good interview with BettBeat Media in a earlier publish nevertheless it’s filled with a lot perception I’m going again to the properly.
The dialog turns to the Jeffrey Epstein pedophilia scandal and it’s possible hyperlinks to zionism when Good brings up Hastert, a largely forgotten determine and connects it to the larger polycrisis confronted by the U.S. empire:
Dr Aaron Good: The kicker to that is if you happen to perceive how many individuals the US political system kills yearly by way of the structural violence: perhaps 9 million folks a 12 months die of like malnutrition, lack of entry to transportable water, lack of entry to fundamental well being care. This is sort of a holocaust 12 months in 12 months out.
And so Dennis Hastert, (former) Speaker of the Home, prolific pedophile, his pedophile crimes are literally within the mixture nearly nothing. They don’t quantity to something. They’re insignificant in comparison with the precise system that he protects.
However on he particular person degree, my God, that is horrendous. How can this be? (However Hastert’s pedophila and attainable political exploitation of similar) captures quite a lot of the the evil of this technique.
And it it’s beginning to register with folks with the Epstein issues like how can this be? How can they get away with this? We tolerate all types of political abuses and corruption however the trafficking of kids to folks in excessive locations to blackmail them in order that they’ll act in opposition to the general public curiosity. That is unacceptable.
I feel that that this type of gradual understanding, even incomplete as it’s, and never with good political evaluation, particularly while you’re speaking about the proper, is exhibiting an empire that’s going through a legitimacy disaster prefer it’s by no means confronted on the similar time that it’s dropping its materials wherewithal to efficiently decide the outcomes of army confrontations.
I feel that Israel misplaced the struggle with Iran. That NATO is dropping in Ukraine. A struggle in Taiwan can be a catastrophe. I feel a struggle in Venezuela can be a catastrophe. Though I don’t know if it could have success within the brief time period or not.
The empire by way of comfortable energy and laborious energy is within the worst place in my lifetime, most likely within the historical past of western civilization as a result of it’s been consolidated below this US management and now this complete mission is simply so tainted and illegitimate that it may possibly’t be defended until you simply ignore huge quantities of of actuality. You must have a made up model of actuality to even argue remotely on behalf of the prevailing order that we dwell below.
Good additionally speculates that Hastert’s pedophilia may need been your complete foundation of his political profession as the person was a very undistinguished wrestling coach who went on to climb the heights of the American political system regardless of by no means displaying any expertise for…something.
Hastert was extensively seen as a pawn of Home Majority Chief Tom DeLay for a lot of his tenure. DeLay was so highly effective at one time that his biographer Lou Dubose known as him “maybe the primary Prime Minister in American historical past.”
DeLay was additionally so infamous and controversial that he wasn’t viable to run for Speaker of the Home, so the simply managed Hastert was an ideal stooge.
Talking of stooges, let’s pivot to a extra present American politician whose private psychological well being having a huge effect on many. I’m talking of Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman.
Senator John Fetterman’s Private Psychological State Turns into Very Political for Pennsylvania
Earlier this 12 months Fetterman’s workers started leaking particulars of his private psychological state. Be mindful Fetterman had a stroke mid-campaign in 2022.
The New York Instances obtained some scoop:
The previous chief of workers to Senator John Fetterman, Democrat of Pennsylvania, was so alarmed together with his ex-boss’s erratic habits final 12 months that he wrote a prolonged letter to his physician warning that the senator was spiraling uncontrolled and that his psychological well being points may price him his life.
“I’m nervous that if John stays on his present trajectory he received’t be with us for for much longer,” Adam Jentleson, the previous chief of workers, wrote on Might 20 to a physician who had handled Mr. Fetterman at Walter Reed Nationwide Navy Medical Middle.
…
have additionally lengthy been warned by no means to get in a automotive if Mr. Fetterman is behind the wheel due to his harmful driving habits. His unstable and regarding habits, which aides seen final 12 months was taking a flip for the more serious, has solely elevated because the election, individuals who have hung out with him stated. That has coincided with a interval when his politics have grow to be extra conservative, as he has watched his house state of Pennsylvania swing for Mr. Trump.“He doesn’t see his medical doctors,” Mr. Jentleson wrote final 12 months to the medical director who oversaw his 2023 hospitalization for psychological well being points. “I’m not certain when he final noticed a heart specialist, however I don’t suppose he’s seen one since he was launched. He way back ordered us to cease placing common drop-bys with Dr. Monahan on his schedule, even supposing he had agreed to these as a part of the plan.” Dr. Brian P. Monahan is the Navy physician who has served for practically 15 years because the on-site doctor within the Capitol.
…
Fetterman was discharged March 31 from Walter Reed Nationwide Navy Medical Middle in Washington, the place he had been receiving remedy for medical melancholy. He checked himself in for remedy on Feb. 15, with workers members citing a psychological well being battle that they stated intensified throughout his restoration from a stroke he suffered on the marketing campaign path in Might 2022.
When Fetterman first caught the eye of the nationwide press, journalists wrote about him like he was a benevolent ogre crossed with a people hero. Extra particularly, that’s how I wrote about him.
“That is the story of Massive John Fetterman, the large who lives in an deserted automotive dealership beside a metal mill,” my 2018 profile within the Washington Put up started.
“He’s six-eight, arms lined in ink, head as bald as a wrecking ball.”
On the time, Fetterman was mayor of Braddock, which appeared quite a bit just like the left-behind corners of the nation that had flocked to Donald Trump. He was working for lieutenant governor of the state, and it was straightforward to see his attraction: He was a bit introverted and curmudgeonly, however humorous, good, and passionate in regards to the destiny of communities like Braddock, tattooing the date of every homicide that occurred within the city throughout his tenure on his arm. Endorsed by Bernie Sanders, but in addition sympathetic to fracking and different positions that minimize in opposition to the progressive grain, he cruised to victory that 12 months.
The stroke in 2022 made it troublesome for Fetterman to speak, which was painfully evident in his one televised debate with Oz.
As Republicans piled on with claims that Fetterman was incapable of doing the job, Democrats rallied to his protection and confidently predicted he would nonetheless be match to serve.
Now, though he requires the assistance of captioning on an iPhone to cope with an auditory-processing obstacle, he stays a promising politician, at the very least to informal observers. He nonetheless exudes an elusive sense of authenticity, somebody who can chop it up with manosphere chieftains like Joe Rogan whereas sustaining his robust stance on trans rights.
A current ballot from Morning Seek the advice of discovered that his total reputation is on the rise, with 50 p.c of respondents approving of the job he’s doing, in opposition to simply 35 p.c who don’t. With the Democratic Occasion out of energy and combating with itself about how one can transfer ahead, it could be straightforward to think about a “Fetterman 2028” machine kicking into gear.
As a substitute, a lot of his former staffers are hoping it by no means occurs. “A part of the tragedy right here is that it is a man who might be main Democrats out of the wilderness,” Jentleson stated. “However I additionally suppose he’s struggling in a method that shouldn’t be hidden from the general public.”
Issues had been dangerous sufficient that Fetterman needed to “come clear” with the general public confession so beloved of the American MSM in an interview with NBC Information:
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., stated in candid remarks about his struggles with melancholy that he feared looking for remedy can be the top of his political profession.
In an unique interview with NBC Information’ “Meet the Press,” the primary time period senator, who was discharged in March from inpatient remedy for medical melancholy, recalled a “very darkish” second in December 2022 when he was unable to get away from bed whereas “dreading” his Senate swearing-in ceremony on Jan. 3.
“Folks hear all their lives about ‘I can’t get away from bed,’ and you actually can’t perceive what that basically means. You possibly can’t get away from bed till it occurs to you. And it did,” he informed moderator Kristen Welker.
“And I used to be scaring my kids, they usually had been confused,” he added. “And, after all, my spouse was involved, and I feel she understands higher than the youngsters did.”
Requested how he was feeling in comparison with a 12 months in the past, earlier than he sought remedy for melancholy, Fetterman stated that “issues are a lot totally different” now.
“The road [is] ‘I’m dwelling my finest life,’ and I actually am, as a result of I simply am so grateful,” he stated. “And I’m at all times speaking about psychological well being, as a result of I would like all people that may hear that’s that assist works, and it’s best to get assist. And please, don’t endure any longer, since you need to be higher. And I’m so grateful to do this, and I’m paying it ahead by speaking about it.”
Fetterman’s numbers have nosedived amongst Democratic voters, sadly for his workers he’s doing nice with Republicans and simply high-quality with “independents”:
The brand new Quinnipiac College ballot, launched Oct. 1, confirmed 46% of Pennsylvania voters authorised of how Fetterman was dealing with his job as senator whereas 38% disapproved. One other 16% didn’t provide an opinion, based on the ballot.
Nevertheless, the ballot discovered that extra Republicans than Democrats approve of how Fetterman was dealing with his job. This comes as Fetterman has often criticized his personal occasion and bucked Democratic management in key votes, together with voting for the GOP-led spending invoice earlier this week.
Even President Donald Trump has praised him in a number of situations for splitting together with his occasion, saying Fetterman is the “best Democrat.”
The brand new ballot discovered that 62% of Republicans authorised of Fetterman’s job efficiency whereas 21% disapproved. In distinction, 54% of Democrats disapproved of Fetterman whereas 33% authorised.
Independents are evenly cut up, with 43 p.c approving and 43 p.c disapproving.
“One-time Democratic darling John Fetterman flips the approval script as Republicans embrace him and Democrats give him low marks practically two years after GOP voters wouldn’t give him the time of day,” Quinnipiac polling analyst Tim Malloy stated in an announcement.
Sadly for Fetterman’s Democratic staffers, the numbers he’s polling are nonetheless a powerful statewide majority.
It’s laborious to not be sympathetic to Fetterman. He’s actually been by an excellent deal. Nonetheless, his private points are impacting the general public he’s nominally been elected to serve.
I hope this publish has been a helpful train in higher understanding what’s motivating a number of the folks in energy.
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