The Attention-Whore Index

Simply declaring that you’re a candidate for president is enough to qualify you as an Attention Whore. But the real genius, in terms of competing seriously (here in A.W.I., if not necessarily in I.O.W.A.), lies in finding a way to stand out in a crowded field. That’s exactly what Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has pulled off, winning last week’s poll handily, with 44.4 percent of your votes. Perennials Harry and Meghan were a distant second at 18.7 percent, followed by the globe-trotting centenarian Henry Kissinger (12.2 percent), the crime-scene opportunist Rudy Giuliani (9.8 percent), and—oh, God—Donald Trump (9.4 percent). Then the rest of the field.

As for who grabs the brass ring next, that’s entirely up to you.

The nominees in this week’s edition of the Attention-Whore Index Poll are …

1.

KING CHARLES

The King (net worth: $2.3 billion) is getting a pay raise. In 2025, the taxpayer-funded “sovereign grant”—the profits from the Crown Estate that go to the family—will balloon to $160 million. That’s a 45 percent increase, which ought to cover inflation—the rate last month was 7.9 percent. Best to err on the side of caution.

2.

ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR.

This week’s defending champ told Fox News that the media was being meaner to him than it ever was to Donald Trump, who as we all know was the most Unfairly Witch-Hunted Person in the History of the Country. Until now, apparently: “I mean, listen, if I believed the stuff that’s written about me in the papers and reported about me on the mainstream news sites, I would definitely not vote for me. I would think I was a very despicable person.” Noted.

3.

ELON MUSK

Flipped the bird the bird, replacing Twitter’s familiar feathered blue logo with a black-and-white X: the new look is meant to reflect an “everything app.” When the going gets tough, the tough rebrand. And when 18-year-old Bronny James, LeBron James’s son, suffered cardiac arrest during a basketball workout at U.S.C., it was of course Musk’s considered medical diagnosis the world was waiting for: “We cannot ascribe everything to the [coronavirus] vaccine, but, by the same token, we cannot ascribe nothing,” he tweeted (or x’d?). “Myocarditis is a known side-effect. The only question is whether it is rare or common.”

4.

RON D_ESANTIS

Was involved in a car crash—literally, not metaphorically like his campaign so far. Laid off a third of his staff. Defended Florida’s new grade-school curriculum—you remember, the one that teaches how, in so many ways, the slaves actually had it good—because Florida’s new whitewashed history books are “probably going to show that some of the [enslaved] folks … eventually parlayed, you know, being a blacksmith into doing things later in life.” Also: an unaired documentary, The Guantanamo Candidate, reportedly contains testimony that DeSantis—then a U.S. Navy lawyer—was an enthusiastic and appreciative observer of the force-feeding of detainees, and in fact may have authorized it. Although those detainee folks probably parlayed skills they learned at Guantanamo into doing things later in life.

5.

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU

Hell-bent on pushing through a controversial overhaul of the judicial system—which he succeeded in doing—Israel’s prime minister punctuated the run-up to the voting by being fitted for a pacemaker. It’s always about him.

6.

BARBIE

Enough already.

And now for this week’s Diary …

Cricket fans trying to find hotel rooms in this western Indian city for October 15—the day Ahmedabad will host the India-Pakistan World Cup match—discovered that the nightly rates had already climbed to $850 and so looked elsewhere for lodging: they’re booking hospital beds for $40–$300. According to one hospital director quoted in the DailyO, “they are asking for a full-body check-up and an overnight stay, so both of their purposes are fulfilled—saving money on lodging and getting their health check-up done.”

Dozens of Japanese universities will introduce a quota system to raise the number of women studying science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Japan Today reported that although “Japanese girls [score] second-highest in the world in maths and third in science,” female university students majoring in such disciplines are stigmatized in Japan because of “the notion that women in the STEM field are too busy at work to juggle dating or families so have a hard time finding husbands.”

Meanwhile, in academic news elsewhere, Russian schoolchildren will be studying the operation and implementation of combat drones as part of their curriculum. The lessons, which begin in September, were announced “as a part of the ‘Basics of Life Safety’ syllabus,” according to Euronews. “Year 10 and 11 students will also be trained to operate assault rifles and hand grenades as a part of the programme.”

Passengers on the cruise ship Ambition, among them members of ORCA, a conservation charity “dedicated to the long-term study and protection of whales, dolphins and porpoises,” inadvertently observed the killing of 78 pilot whales in the Faroe Islands, a local tradition in which “over 40 small boats and Jet Skis herded the whales to a beach where 150 people worked to haul the animals ashore with hooks and slaughter them with lances,” NPR reported. Yikes. The cruise line apologized, said it “strongly object[s] to this practice,” and added that it “fully appreciate[s] that witnessing this local event would have been distressing for the majority of guests onboard.”

Citizens here—or make that citizens here who are interested in creating a “non-smoking culture”—should head for a mirror and start practicing their most reproachful looks. “When the members of the public see people smoking in non-smoking areas, even if no law enforcement officers can show up immediately, we can stare at the smokers,” Hong Kong’s health minister announced, according to Sky News. “When someone takes out a cigarette at a restaurant, everyone on the premises can stare at that person.” Secondhand disapproval?

A new cult-of-personality-enhancing show at the Okryu Exhibition House here includes at least eight paintings of Kim Jong Un, including one in which North Korea’s Supreme Leader is depicted “perhaps somewhat less portly than in real life, wearing a tan overcoat with a fur collar riding a white horse,” according to The Times of London. “Smiling benevolently, his face is aglow with the rose-gold sunset beyond.” Aesthetically the paintings fall between those big-eyed children painted by Margaret Keane and the dogs-playing-poker series … but, hey, art is art! In case you miss the show, there are also portraits of Kim sitting on a tractor and planting trees (two different pictures, to be clear). —George Kalogerakis

George Kalogerakis, one of the original editor-writers at Spy, later worked for Vanity Fair, New York, and The New York Times, where he was deputy op-ed editor. A co-author of Spy: The Funny Years and co-editor of Disunion: A History of the Civil War, he is a Writer at Large at AIR MAIL