The Top 10 Powerful Bald White Guys (PBWGs) of 2025
This list is dedicated to the late radio host Austin Hill. He was a great guy who left us far too soon. He loved this list and gave it more attention than it ever deserved. May he never be forgotten.
This list was inspired by Dann Florek, who played Police Captain Donald Cragen on the “Law & Order” franchises for nearly three decades.
Jeff Bezos did not make the list. He is no longer the richest man in the world or the CEO of Amazon. Being rich is not the same as being powerful. Bring powerful requires doing things.
Kevin O’Leary did not make the list. Mr. Wonderful is still wonderful, but he seems to be more interested in collecting designer watches than truly being a PBWG.
Prince William just missed the cut. While most of the Royal Family are useless dilettantes, Prince William and his wife seem to be in the tradition of the late Queen Elizabeth. William appears genuinely committed to public service. He seems to be a loyal husband and doting father. He ha stayed free of scandal. Nevertheless, with everything going on in the world, he cannot be a top PBWG until he becomes King.
With that, here are the Top 10 PBWGs of 2025
10.) Bruce Willis and Rob Reiner— This is a heartbreaking one to write. Both of these men had legions of fans and suffered cruel fates. Reiner and his wife were murdered on Hanukkah by their own drug-addicted son. Willis is still alive, but a shell of his former self. He is suffering from a cruel form of dementia called aphasia. He has largely retreated from public view. Willis was a lifelong Republican and Reiner was a die hard Democrat. Yet they both achieved international fame. They both succeeded as television actors before branching out. Willis became a movie star and musician who played the harmonica. Reiner became a movie director. For their respective bodies of work, they both deserve lifetime achievement awards. May their families take solace in their being PBWGs.
9.) Joe Rogan — He has the top podcast in America. People trust him because he is seen as a straight shooter. He asks questions that nobody else seems willing to ask. He is not politically ideological in either direction. He wants to hear arguments and let his listeners decide for themselves. He is truly one of the last open-minded hosts around. His interview with Donald Trump combined with Kamala Harris avoiding his program played a major role in Trump winning back the White House. Rogan has come a long way since Newsradio.
8.) Minnesota Governor Tim Walz — This Elmer Fudd doofus almost became Vice President. Now he is embroiled in a massive corruption scandal. Apparently Somali Muslims in Minneapolis fraudulently received taxpayer dollars and laundered that money to foreign terrorists overseas. Normally this would get a politician indicted, but being a PBWG has its privileges. So does being a liberal. For being a PBWG and having the politically correct leftist politics, Walz will get a free pass under the Jon Corzine doctrine. To be fair, Corzine worked at Goldman Sachs, which is an automatic free pass for all conduct. So he had 3 privilege cards while Walz has only two. Walz is determined to fail upward, and will skyrocket up this list if he wins the presidency.
7.) Howard Lutnick — The Trump administration’s Commerce Secretary was the former head of Cantor Fitzgerald. That was the firm that lost 658 employees on September 11th, 2001. Lutnick will is a unique Commerce secretary. Unlike previous Republican Commerce Secretaries, Lutnick is pro-tariff. Lutnick is the first Commerce Secretary who is navigating cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin. Lutnick is pro-crypto. He would rank higher, but he seems to be a symbolic figurehead who just follows presidential orders. Lutnick really wanted to be Treasury Secretary, and he seems less influential than Scott Bessent.
6.) Brendan Carr — Trump’s FCC Chair has turned the FCC from a leftist anti-freedom organization into one where all ideological viewpoints truly are allowed. Carr successfully repealed the purposely and dishonestly named net neutrality laws that were anything but neutral. Design to force liberal speech on everyone and suppress conservative speech, Carr defeated that anti-freedom scourge. Carr has waged war on DEI practices that allow talentless people to rise above their abilities solely due to their skin color or sexual orientation.
5.) Russell Vought — Trump’s OMB Director held the job in the first administration as well. He has kept his foot on the gas. Not one to shy away from a fight, Vought has taken sledgehammer to the Elizabeth Warren inspired and utterly useless Consumer Financial Protections Bureau. He also closed out the corrupt US Aid program. Vought has become a conservative hero for his dedication to trying to smash the bloated federal civil service bureaucracy and the increasingly corrupt and unconstitutional administrative state. With Elon Musk returning to Tesla full-time, Vought is also in charge of the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE
4.) David Solomon — Normally the Head Sled at Golden Sachs is the top PBWG because Goldman Sachs runs the world. Goldman Sachs has a history of flitting in between corporate power and government power. Jon Corzine, Hank Paulson, and Lloyd Blankfein are all former Goldman Sachs PBWG top dogs. Solomon initially missed out on the top spot due to tough economic times, war raging across the world, and an anti-Wall Street climate. Yet in 2024, happy days returned. That allowed Solomon to be last year’s Top PBWG.. In 2025, the stock market hit an all time high. Goldman Sachs now has its usual level of undue influence over the government. The company that is too big to fail with executives who are too big to jail escaped scrutiny during financial meltdowns. They are not going to lose power when Wall Street is making money hand over fist. Yet major political events prevented Solomon from winning the top PBWG spot back to back.
3.) Tom Homan — The Trump administration began with a promise a decade ago to crack down hard on illegal immigration. Homan came out of retirement to fulfill that promise. Despite threats to his family and himself, Homan has refused to back down. He has brought law and order to cities where crime was out of control. As Homan has reminded us, it did not take an act of Congress to restore public trust and safety. It only took a president firmly committed to those things. Trump has unleashed Homan, and Homan has unleashed the gates of hell on drug traffickers and other violent felons.
2.) Stephen Miller — As fantastic as Homan is, Trump’s deputy policy advisor Miller wants to go even further. Homan is dedicated to removing all violent felons in America illegally. Miller seeks to remove every single illegal immigrant. Illegal immigration is a crime. As the Minneapolis corruption scandal shows, the consequences of illegal immigration extend far beyond America’s recently porous borders. Miller and Trump have a mind meld just like former PBWG Ben Rhodes had with Barack Obama. Yet while Rhodes was dedicated to subverting the law, Miller is obsessed with enforcing it.
Normally, Homan and miller would be competing with Solomon for the top spot. Yet 2025 brought one event that up-ended the entire PBWG list.
As said every year, this list was inspired by Dann Forek’s Captain Donald Cragen. In the 27th season opener of Law & Order Special Victims Unit, it was revealed that Captain Cragen had died of natural causes.Since Actor Dann Florek is very much alive, it is time to give him the richly deserved lifetime achievement award. Unlike Willis and Reiner, it is not too late for shower praise on Florek for his lifetime contribution to PBWGs everywhere.
1.) Dann Florek — The man repeatedly barked that “One Police Plaza is all over my @ss!” His scenes with PBWG Superior Chief of Detectives were standard. He’d say “Chief.” The Chief would reply “Don.” That was enough to convey the messages without small talk. Every PBWG owes Florek’s Captain Cragen a debt of gratitude Guys who not only get the job done bu took authoritative while doing so are a treasure. If people saw Florek on the street, they would just assume he was in senior management somewhere getting things done and looking tough doing it.
While Florek inspired this list, the death of Cragen means Florek may never be on his own list again, much less topping it.Yet real men leave a legacy that lasts beyond their own life. Cragen’s subordinate Detective Elliott Stabler now has his own program, Law & Order Organized Crime. Just as Stabler made rage proud, folliclely challenged actor Chris Meloni will make Florek proud. May Stabler carry on Cragen’s PBWG legacy for years to come.
A toast to Captain Donald Cragen, who will be missed but forever a PBWG. Extend that toast to Dann Florek, who gave rage his stern PBWG personality.