All through this feature’s brief year-end hiatus, the elite class of Attention Whores kept in fighting trim. At that level of professionalism, holidays are an afterthought. One A.W.I. mainstay who ignored neither the season nor the spotlight was Donald Trump, with his festive message to the death-row inmates whose sentences President Biden had commuted to life in prison: “I refuse to wish a Merry Christmas to those lucky ‘souls’ but, instead, will say, GO TO HELL!”

Clarence Thomas kept his hand in as well when it was revealed that—oops!—he’d forgotten to disclose still more free trips (private plane, yacht) bestowed by his favorite billionaire-conservative patron. And Lincoln County, Oregon, received some unwanted but well-earned attention after an anonymous letter circulated in the community encouraging citizens to report and track “brown folks,” just in case they were undocumented immigrants.

But all that was long ago, as was our most recent poll, which was won handily by Silicon Valley (24.9 percent) for its collective suck-up to the incoming felon-president.

Onward? If we must. But first:

“People are not respecting our country very much and they’re gonna respect us a lot.”

—Donald Trump

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

1.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU

Stepped down as prime minister and head of Canada’s Liberal Party. Better that, we suppose, than staying on as governor of the 51st state.

2.

ELON MUSK

President-unelected Musk, like his sidekick President-elect Trump, celebrated the holidays without ceding the spotlight, posing in a Santa Claus outfit while admitting he takes a weight-loss drug. The shy, retiring billionaire didn’t stop there. Musk inserted himself into German politics, declaring that “only the AfD”—the neo-Nazi-friendly Alternative for Germany party—“can save Germany.” He also inserted himself into British politics, agitating for the release of the frequently imprisoned, violent, far-right fraudster Tommy Robinson; deciding that anti-immigrant Reform U.K. leader Nigel Farage, whom he had enthusiastically supported, in fact “doesn’t have what it takes”; falsely accusing Prime Minister Keir Starmer of not having gone after child rapists; and calling on King Charles to dissolve Parliament.

Closer to home, Musk found time to spread misinformation about H-1B visas, advising those who didn’t support them to “take a big step back and F*CK YOURSELF in the face,” which angered Steve Bannon (“Your trashing of the MAGA movement…. How dare you…. I don’t care how big a check you wrote”) and confused Donald Trump, who in backing Musk over MAGA mixed up H-1B with H-2A and H-2B visas. In short, if you want a metaphor for our present time—and our immediate future—look no further than that Tesla Cybertruck exploding in front of the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas.

3.

MEGHAN MARKLE

Released a trailer for her upcoming Netflix series, With Love, Meghan, an apparent return to her lifestyle-blogging days that casts her as a kind of Everyduchess who’s never happier than when she’s slicing vegetables, hanging with friends, and—curiously, some have noted, because it’s a hobby her sister-in-law, Kate, as well as Queen Camilla have enjoyed for years—beekeeping.

4.

Donald Trump

And it hasn’t even officially begun. Annex Canada, invade Panama, acquire Greenland, threaten that “all hell will break out” in the Middle East and that the Gulf of Mexico will become the Gulf of America, plus those faucets that “drip, drip, drip,” “banana republics,” “deranged” Jack Smith, “brilliant” Aileen Cannon, the “terrible thing” Jimmy Carter (at that moment lying in state) did with the Canal, the California wildfires caused by “Governor Gavin Newscum,” and by the way, “the windmills are driving the whales crazy, obviously.”

5.

RUDY GIULIANI

Found in contempt of court for having continued to defame the poll workers he was found guilty of defaming. Also held in contempt following several missed deadlines for handing over $11 million in assets to the two women. When asked by the skeptical judge why so much of the sports memorabilia he’d claimed to own had vanished from his apartment, Giuliani, who denied that he was hiding any assets, replied, “When I looked, this is what I found.” As for that missing signed Joe DiMaggio jersey, “I don’t know where it is … I am personally conducting my own investigation.”

6.

BOB MENENDEZ

Lawyers for the disgraced former senator argued for a lenient sentence because his bribery conviction “has rendered him a national punchline and stripped him of every conceivable personal, professional, and financial benefit.” Also, said the lawyers, Menendez is gallantly “helping his wife battle a life-threatening cancer diagnosis in the midst of her upcoming trial in this case,” even as he continues to blame said wife for all his problems, claiming he was “unaware of activities that Nadine was undertaking, including the receipt and sale of gold bars by Nadine, and cash she stored in her locked closet and her safe deposit box.”

7.

MELANIA TRUMP

The incoming First Lady will get her own “unprecedented, behind-the-scenes” documentary, courtesy of newly Trump-curious Jeff Bezos’s Amazon Prime, which is so “excited to share this truly unique story with our millions of customers around the world” it’s spending $40 million to license it. Brett Ratner, who hasn’t made a film since six women accused him of sexual misconduct in 2017—no charges brought, and he denied the allegations—will direct. Melania herself will be executive producer, so we can rest assured the doc will pull no punches.

8.

MATT GAETZ

How do you follow the release of a House Ethics Committee investigation concluding you’d paid tens of thousands of dollars “for sex and/or drugs” on more than 20 occasions, including with a 17-year-old? You invite George Santos onto your new online talk show and ask him, “What’s going on with my makeup? Help me! Give me advice!” And how do you follow that? By announcing you’re thinking of running for governor of Florida when Ron DeSantis’s second and last term ends in 2026.

9.

GEORGE SANTOS

A judge granted Santos the “one-time courtesy” of a sentencing delay until April so he can keep making episodes of his new podcast, Pants on Fire with George Santos, in an attempt to raise the $600,000 he owes the government. In the meantime, Santos is also advising Matt Gaetz on cosmetic matters. (See above.) “Stop highlighting the center of your face,” he counseled Gaetz. “When you’re tan and you’re a Florida man, you don’t need that level of highlighter.” —George Kalogerakis

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