Alone on the entire planet, only Donald Trump’s stock seems to be going up, and only here in the Attention-Whore Index. Last week a wide range of spotlight seekers, from Marine Le Pen to Kelsey Grammer, did their best to dislodge him from the top spot, but nothing doing. Even the chatty Cory Booker (who we think might still be speaking before the Senate) could draw only 8 percent of A.W.I. voters, for fourth place. Elon Musk—a tanking stock in human(ish) shape—was third (11.2 percent), the conspiracy-buff Trump whisperer Laura Loomer was second (15.4 percent), and first, with 51 percent, was the Orange Inevitable.
There’s a new slate of candidates below, but first:
“I think it’s going very well—The MARKETS are going to BOOM.... THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO GET RICH, RICHER THAN EVER BEFORE!!!”
—Donald Trump
The nominees in this week’s edition of the Attention-Whore Index Poll are …
1.
EMMANUEL MACRON
A new book by a French journalist claims that President Emmanuel Macron uses “industrial amounts” of Dior Eau Sauvage cologne (“The epitome of French elegance … iconic freshness and a chic, mischievous spirit,” asserts Dior) all day long as a way of marking his territory. “Less-accustomed visitors [to the palace] may find themselves overcome by the floral and musky scent.... It is a sign of one thing: that the president is in the building,” writes Olivier Beaumont in The Tragedy of the Elysée. “Just as Louis XIV made his perfumes an attribute of power when he paraded through the galleries of Versailles, Emmanuel Macron uses his as an element of his authority at the Elysée.” L’odeur, c’est moi.
2.
RUSSELL BRAND
In London, the born-again, MAGA-friendly actor-comedian was charged with rape, sexual assault, and indecent assault. Brand has long denied the charges, and did so again in a new post: “I’ve never engaged in non-consensual activity. I pray that you can see that by looking in my eyes.... I am now going to have the opportunity to defend these charges in court.” For Russell Brand of Essex, opportunity knocks on May 2.
3.
DONALD TRUMP
What a surprise. How could anyone—make that 77,303,568 anyones—have seen this coming? An insecure narcissist who’s never been wrong in his life, who knows more about everything than any so-called experts, deliberately sends the world’s economy into a tailspin. And then—after flirting with insider trading by first posting “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT”—reverses himself. “This was his strategy all along,” said Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. “The greatest economic master strategy from an American president in history,” posted deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller. Trump soon contradicted his sycophants: “[People] were getting a little bit yippy, a little bit afraid.” What we can all agree on, either literally or sarcastically: this guy really knows what he’s doing. And so, amid the stock-market free fall, Trump also found time to sign an executive order rolling back Democratic restrictions on showerhead flow, thereby “undoing the left’s war on water pressure.”
4.
BILL ACKMAN
America’s financial poohbahs became suddenly alarmed by the president’s actions, and not just the Silicon Valley moguls who invested millions in Trump II and are wondering why. The hedge-fund billionaire Bill Ackman, whose 1,800-word endorsement of Trump last October praised “an imperfect man” who was “by far the superior candidate,” warned that “the president is losing the confidence of business leaders around the globe.” (JPMorgan C.E.O. Jamie Dimon also piped up: “America First is fine, as long as it doesn’t end up being America alone.”) However, Trump knows better than Ackman et al. The tariffs are “a very beautiful thing.” As he told a reporter who asked about a “threshold” at which he might reconsider them, “I think your question is so stupid.” A few days later, Trump reached that threshold, and Ackman was right there again: “This was brilliantly executed,” he fawned. “Thank you on behalf of all Americans.”
5.
ELON MUSK
Maybe he was upset to find himself the loathed object, along with his co-president, of 1,400 protests involving millions of Americans across all 50 states. Or maybe it was because the White House trade adviser Peter Navarro dismissed him as a “car assembler,” not really a manufacturer. Whatever it was, Musk was soon calling Navarro “truly a moron” and “Peter Retarrdo” and “dumber than a sack of bricks,” although “that was so unfair to the bricks.” Musk is 53 years old.
6.
MARK ZUCKERBERG
Post-tariffs, lost more than $27 billion in just two days, according to Bloomberg. Still managed to find $23 million down the back of the couch to buy a 15,000-square-foot pied-à-terre in Washington, D.C. The buyer’s identity had been widely speculated until Politico reported that it was indeed the suddenly Washington-friendly Meta C.E.O., who is facing (and, according to The Wall Street Journal, is eager to avoid) a landmark anti-trust trial next week. Zuckerberg’s newest home puts him within easy lobbying distance of the White House, anyway.
7.
ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR.
Took time out from combating chronic disease (by cutting funding for programs combating chronic disease) in order to attend the funeral of an unvaccinated eight-year-old Texas girl who died of measles. It was only the second confirmed measles fatality in the United States in a decade; both occurred after the vaccine-skeptic Kennedy became health secretary. Feebly endorsed the measles vaccine, adding—because he can’t help himself—that it hasn’t been “safely tested” and “wanes very quickly.” Offered praise to “two extraordinary healers,” vaccine-skeptic doctors who instead use aerosolized budesonide and clarithromycin, which have no proven success in treating measles.
8.
Thomas pynchon
How disappointing: Pynchon, the refreshing inverse of an Attention Whore, has fallen prey to the spotlight and will publish a new novel in October. Shadow Ticket, the 10th book from the impossible-to-pin-down (or even locate) 87-year-old author, follows hard on the heels of his last book, which was released in … O.K., 2013. Now we’ll be endlessly subjected again to that photo of him from his high-school yearbook. —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