My next book is The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI, out next month. Pre-order it now, including as a DRM-free audiobook or ebook, at my Kickstarter, and help me continue to prove that DRM-free isn't just the right way to reach an audience, it's also the best way to reach them.

Perhaps the most demoralizing part of Trumpismo is the fear that the people around you are so cruel and senseless that they approve of the violence, the racism, the pig-ignorant lies and rampant theft:

https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/08/who-goes-maga/

One of the things keeping me going in these dark days is the pollster G Elliot Morris, whose "Strength in Numbers" newsletter is a reliable, robust and nuanced source of information about the way other people – including Trump's base – feel about him from moment to moment. Reading items like "A reminder: Very few people support Donald Trump's presidency" make it easier to get through the day:

https://www.gelliottmorris.com/p/a-reminder-very-few-people-support

It's a very good piece, breaking down the collapse in support for Trumpismo and confidence in Trump's mental health, even among the people who have historically stood by him, even though – incredibly! – about a third of Americans still support him and believe in his fitness to rule.

But the most interesting part of this post is the eye-popping poll result on a question that is only incidentally about Trump: the extremely broad, bipartisan support for both age limits and term limits for the House, the Senate, the Presidency and the Supreme Court.

How broad and bipartisan are these results?

80% of Americans want age limits in the House and Senate (D78%, R83%; I79%);

Most Americans want age limits for the presidency (R73%, I61%) (the most popular age limit is 79);

Most Americans (65%) want an 18-year term limit for Supreme Court justices;

Most Americans (79%) want age limits for Supreme Court justices.

As Morris writes, this represents "a level of cross-partisan agreement that’s almost unheard of on a high-salience issue."

There are different ways to parse this out. The past decade has shown that, in the absence of a hard rule to the contrary, incumbents will stay in office long after it's obvious they should step down. That was true of Biden, who continued to campaign for a presidential term long after it was obvious that he was no longer physically and mentally capable of doing the job.

It was true of Ruth Bader-Ginsburg, whose commitment to the symbolic value of having her successor appointed by the first woman president allowed Trump to appoint the monstrous Amy Coney Barrett to a lifetime on the Supreme Court, which could well last another 30 years. It was true of Antonin Scalia, who would have handed a Supreme Court pick to the Obama administration if it wasn't for Mitch McConnell's willingness to steal a seat for Neal Gorsuch.

It's true of Kay Granger, a sitting congresswoman whose staff hid the fact that her dementia had progressed to the point that she had to be moved to an assisted living facility – while still holding office:

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/03/14/kay-granger-dementia-dc-media-00210317

It was true of Gerry Connolly, who insisted that he – not AOC – should be the head of the Oversight Committee, despite the fact that he was dying of cancer:

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/rep-gerry-connolly-announces-return-of-cancer-steps-down-as-top-oversight-democrat

It was true of Dianne Feinstein, who continued to serve in the Senate despite having advanced dementia:

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2023/04/sen-dianne-feinsteins-saga-is-a-very-public-example-of-a-national-crisis/

These politicians are wed to a system of seniority and patronage that insists that everyone who "pays their dues" should get a turn. It's a system that relies on politicians banking favors from their peers and then paying them back by anointing successors, thus requiring politicians to serve until they are ready to choose that successor.

We have created a system in which no one dares to hand over power, because to do so is to unilaterally disarm, while the other side keeps their permanent gerontocrats in positions of authority. Not only does this system starve the pipeline of young politicians who can progress to fill those new roles, it also exposes each party to significant risk. If your majority rests on a handful of seats and your caucus includes a dozen people who are actuarially certain to die soon, then the whole system could be upended by a couple of highly likely blood-clots:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/01/designated-survivors/

It's not that every politician over the age of 70 (or 80, or 85) is incapable of doing the job: it's that a system that runs on a mix of incumbency advantage, seniority, patronage and hubris is a bad system and the only fix for it is to put hard limits on terms – both based on how many years you hold office, and how many years you walk the earth.

The system where everyone who pays their dues gets a turn was never going to work, and that should have been especially obvious to the system's longest-tenured participants, who've had decades to notice how long-lived their colleagues are, and to compare those lifespans to the number of committee chairs, senate seats and other treasures there are to be had in the halls of power.

There are lots of good ideas – like abolishing the Electoral College or limiting political spending – that are popular with a majority of Americans, but these ideas are often very unpopular with conservatives:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/18/the-people-no/#tell-ya-what-i-want-what-i-really-really-want

But this is a realm in which – as Morris says – there is "almost unheard-of…cross-partisan agreement." It's the one idea that all Americans – including older Americans (at least the ones who aren't in the House, Senate or Oval Office; or on the Supreme Court) agree on: rule by permanent gerontocracy is bad, and should end.

In not so many months, both parties are going to have to pick their next presidential candidates (in the case of Republicans, it may be sooner, depending on Trump's cheeseburger intake). Those primary contests are going to implicitly raise the issue of whether we should be ruled according to the principle of "everyone who pays their dues gets a turn." But a shrewd politician could win a lot of favor among voters (and fury among their colleagues) by campaigning on age- and term-limits for high office.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2026/05/14/who-it-does-it-for/#who-it-does-it-to

Image: Pacamah (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Supreme_Court_building_at_Night.jpg

From the article:

Casual international observers would be forgiven for assuming Canada is in the comforting hands of a climate champ. After all, while climate policy rollbacks reign supreme in Donald Trump’s America, Canada is now led by a man who, while serving as governor of the Bank of England, delivered a celebrated 2015 speech, “Breaking the tragedy of the horizon”, warning the global investment community of the financial risks of climate change; who went on to serve as UN special envoy for climate action and finance; and whose 2022 book Value(s) had much to say about the “existential threat” of climate change. A man who recently dazzled the world with his Davos speech on how middle powers can stand up to global bullies. Look, we get it. Next to the US president, Carney seems so debonair, thoughtful and calm – a lifeline of stability in a volatile new world. Many within Canada were only recently of the same view. Indeed, only a little over a year ago, hundreds if not thousands of climate activists joined the Liberal party of Canada to help elect Carney as Justin Trudeau’s successor. Months later, hundreds of thousands of climate-concerned voters cast ballots in support of Carney as prime minister.

Read more.

On September 20th 2025 across Canada there will be a series of strikes, marches, rallies and gatherings to protest the government and Canada's richest corporations hoarding wealth, gutting our public services, fuelling climate collapse, attacking migrants, exploiting Indigenous lands, and propping up the genocide in Palestine.

Please. Every single person that participates matters. It is extremely important that we don't just sit here and watch the world collapse. We are capable of making a difference so long as we stand together. The more people that share this and join, the stronger an impact that this protest has the ability to make.

More information about DRAW THE LINE can be found here: https://drawtheline.world/canada?r=CA&d=BC&lang=en

Dalton Highway, through the Brooks Range

omg they're building another pipeline!? this is the Dakota Access Pipeline all over again

Excerpt from this story from Inside Climate News:

“This is the last turn and the end of the fourth hill of life, when Bad River, as a spirit, transforms into something other, something extraordinary,” Mike Wiggins said as he rounded a final bend in one of the largest and most pristine wetlands on the shores of Lake Superior, one of the biggest freshwater lakes in the world.

It’s “similar to our spiritual journey off this planet into something other and extraordinary.”

From the driver’s seat of his small fishing boat, Wiggins, the former chairman of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, contemplated his surroundings with awe as a bald eagle soared overhead.

Beds of wild rice, a key food source and cultural pillar of the Bad River tribe, danced in his wake, glinting under the afternoon sun and nearly ready for harvest. 

“This is a power place,” he said as he blasted Unbound, a recently released album by musicians including fellow Bad River tribal member Dylan Jennings. “It’s just no place for an oil pipeline.”

It has one, though. Seventy-one years ago, Lakehead Pipeline, a predecessor to Canadian pipeline company Enbridge, commissioned the construction of Line 5, a 30-inch diameter crude oil pipeline that transports up to 540,000 barrels of hydrocarbons per day from Superior, Wisconsin, to Sarnia, Ontario. The 645-mile line is part of a network that originates more than a thousand miles to the northwest in the oil fields of Alberta and, in the case of Line 5, ends back in Canada. It includes a 12-mile stretch that bisects the Bad River reservation, which is heavily forested with river crossings and large swaths of wetlands.

Any spill from the pipeline would drain into the Bad River and Kakagon Sloughs, where Wiggins fished. Known as the “Everglades of the North,” the area is protected under an international environmental agreement as well as multiple treaties between the U.S. and the Chippewa people, also known as the Ojibwe.

The path through the reservation was originally approved by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. However, more than a dozen easements granted to the pipeline, which was completed in 1953, have since expired.

In 2017, the Bad River tribal council voted unanimously not to renew them. Two years later, the tribe sued to have the pipeline removed from the reservation. The ongoing “David vs. Goliath” legal battle was chronicled in Bad River, a recent documentary.