1. Which news media mogul recently declared:
“The companies driving A.I., already among the richest and most powerful in human history, are consolidating their outsize control over our data and our attention. At the same time, they are failing to embrace a core responsibility that comes with this power — to ensure the public has access to trustworthy news and information. Their hijacking of the public square is made possible by the original sin that animates their A.I. products — a brazen theft of intellectual property that has occurred at an unprecedented scale. Tech giants strip-mine news websites without permission or compensation. They repackage these stolen goods as their own, siphoning off the audiences and revenue that otherwise would go to the news organizations that created this work. And this happens not just once during the training process, but countless times every single day.”
A) Jeff Bezos, owner of The Washington Post,
B) A. G. Sulzberger, publisher of The New York Times,
C) David Ellison, CEO of Paramount Skydance, which owns CBS News, or
D) Patrick Soon-Shiong, owner of The Los Angeles Times.
2. Which big tech mogul sent President Trump a fawning text message of a “letter to the president” that one of their grade-school children had written to him saying that they “looked forward to the golden age of America” (a phrase Trump often uses at his rallies)?
A) Elon Musk, who has at least 8 young children,
B) Mark Zuckerberg, who has three,
C) Peter Thiel, who has two, or
D) Sam Altman, who has one.
3. Which of these is not the name of one of Musk or Zuckerberg’s children?
A) X Æ A-Xii
B) Techno Mechanicus
C) Seldon Lycurgus
D) Maxima
E) Aurelia
F) Arcadia
G) Aston Martin
4. Which truism about politics does the implosion of Graham Platner’s Senate campaign teach us?
A) Don’t believe the hype.
B) Don’t scrimp on doing your own opposition research on yourself before you launch your campaign.
C) Never fall in love with a politician; they will break your heart.
D) Democratic voters care more about politicians who abuse women than Republican voters.
5. Which of these statements made about Platner over the last few months by one of his supporters was never said?
A) “For what it’s worth, Platner might be the only Democratic candidate or congressman I wouldn’t want to mess with, whereas the Republicans have at least half a dozen guys who could put me in a headlock.” – Author Sebastian Junger
B) “I’m impressed that the media is so concerned with the [Nazi] tattoo. We are dealing with a collapsing health care system and you are asking me whether or not a guy should get a tattoo removed?” –Senator Bernie Sanders
C) “Graham Platner isn’t just our best and only chance to beat Susan Collins, he’s a good, decent man who’s struggled and grown and is always trying to do better.” –Jon Favreau, Pod Save America co-host.
D) “Not to overstate it, but this is a crucial moment for the Democratic Party. If they decide that normal people with some small skeletons in their closet (or inked on their chest) are not welcome, they are finished. Because they’ve tried the other way and it didn’t work.” --Ryan Grim, DropSite News co-founder
E) “Platner understood that those years that he came back were not the best years of his life. Then he, unlike others, took accountability for it. And he’s worked to be a better man.” --Rep. Ro Khanna
6. Speaking of dying Senate ambitions, which of these quotes was never said by longtime Republican Senator Mitch McConnell, who was hospitalized on June 14:
A) “The country doesn’t need saving.”
B) “ The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”
C) “One of my proudest moments was when I looked Barack Obama in the eye and I said, ‘Mr. President, you will not fill the Supreme Court vacancy.’”
D) "Look, we cannot simply hand out stimulus checks; if we feed the American people every single day, they will never learn to photosynthesize."
E) “All Citizens United did was to level the playing field for corporate speech. We now have, I think, the most free and open system we’ve had in modern times.
F) “Where did this notion get going that we were spending too much in campaigns? Compared to what? Americans spent more [last year] on potato chips than they did on politics.”
7. Across America, roughly 75% of people over the age of 45 are registered to vote. What percentage of 18-year-olds are registered to vote?
A) 20%
B) 30%
C) 45%
D) 60%
8. According to a Data for Progress poll of 1,257 likely voters done in August 2025, what percentage of Democratic voters said they would take a favorable view of a hypothetical political figure described this way: “A democratic socialist elected official in your town or city, whose agenda is primarily focused on how to make life more affordable for working people in your community by bringing down the costs of housing, groceries, and electric bills”?
A) 25%
B) 42%
C) 59%
D) 75%
9. According to the same Data for Progress poll, what percentage of Republican voters agreed with the following statement: “Corporations and the wealthy have too much influence in the political party that I usually vote for.”
A) 14%
B) 31%
C) 42%
D) 60%
10. According to the Chapman University annual survey of American fears, what is the number one thing feared by the largest percentage of people:
A) Loved ones dying
B) Economic or financial collapse
C) Cyber-terrorism
D) Corrupt government officials
E) Loved ones becoming seriously ill
Answers: 1-B, 2-B, 3-G, 4-All of the above, 5-None of the Above, 6-D, 7-B, 8-C, 9-D, 10-D.
Not only do Americans fear corrupt government officials (69%) more than loved ones becoming seriously ill (59%) or economic/financial collapse (58%), this has been their number one fear for the last ten years. Dr. Steven Pfaff, Professor of Sociology at Chapman University, comments: “As it has for over a decade, the Chapman Survey finds that well over half of all Americans report fear of corrupt government officials. Indeed, fear of corrupt government officials remains the top fear among the many we survey. Majorities of Americans across partisan lines share this fear, which our analysis suggests stems from their perception that money has distorted the political process, and that powerful and resourceful interests achieve their goals even at the expense of the public good and voter preferences.”
—Tomorrow (Thursday) at 1pm ET: I’ll be talking with super-organizer Jess Craven via Substack Live hosted by Rory Truex (Princeton political scientist and host of the weekly Civic Forum). Our topic: “What Do I Do At A Time Like This?” Here’s the link to join: https://open.substack.com/live-stream/220990.
Plucky Belgium indeed!
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