Another Oy Weekend 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀🚢 

Weekend Follies:  After first deciding not to include VP Vance with his negotiating team, Trump then cancelled real estate bro Witkoff and son in law Kushner’s trip to Pakistan so there’s little new to report on the war front except that overnight Iran sent in a proposal to end the war, leaving nuke negotiations for another time which kind of makes the pointless “excursion” that much more pointless.  The Strait of Hormuz remains mostly closed, a particularly gnarly problem for those countries that rely on their oil and fertilizer transiting past Iran but also for everyone else because of the impact on related commodity prices.  Oil shock aside, the bigger story of the weekend was the Saturday night shooting at the Washington Hilton, the hotel hosting the White House Correspondent’s dinner. Everything about the event was distressing.  First and foremost, no one should try to assassinate anyone and no one particularly an unhinged guy with murderous intent should have access to guns. That said, a lot was wrong about the Correspondent’s dinner, not just the apparently inadequate security at the hotel, but the fact that Trump and his team, the very same people who routinely attack the press, calling them traitors or worse, and as reported last week had launched a criminal investigation into Elizabeth Williamson, the NY Times reporter for writing about FBI Director Kash Patel’s girlfriend, her FBI plane privileges and her government paid SWAT entourage, were in attendance, some hosted by the very same press outlets they routinely lambast. Sure, it’s normal for the White House to complain about press coverage but it’s not normal to routinely intimidate them and to ban mainstream outlets from the White House and Pentagon pools as this administration does. Much of the press keeps acting like an abused spouse, cowering, and subjecting themselves to more abuse rather than taking a firm stand against their abuser. Ironic but sadly not unexpected that during his quickly scheduled appearance on Sunday’s 60 Minutes Trump called Norah O’Donnell out as a horrible, disgraceful person who should be ashamed of herself when she asked about the contents of the attempted shooter’s manifesto while also saying it’s “the hate speech of the Democrats” that is “very dangerous” because while it’s cool for him and his team to viscously attack everyone, it’s not okay for Democrats to complain about him.  In case you missed it new Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin called Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer who Trump routinely calls a Palestinian terrorist, a scumbag on Fox last week, and no one there even blinked.  Moreover, the White House line is now that Trump’s east room ballroom monstrosity is needed more than ever, because a security breach would never happen in his desired eponymous Fortress Trump even though it probably could and would in part because the team leading his security would still be largely made up of the people he appointed for their money and obsequiousness rather than their ability.    

Econ 101: Back in the before times there was Eastern Airlines which flew up and down the east coast of the US and to Latin America.  Eastern ran the original Shuttle which flew hourly flights between NYC’s LaGuardia, Washington DC, and Boston, putting on extra flights at particularly busy times. Early on you could even buy your ticket on the plane. Like a lot of airlines, Eastern which was not known for either its comfort or its financial acumen was merged out of existence but in 1989, before it disappeared it sold its prized shuttle business including its fleet of Boeing 727s and its gate rights to Trump for $365 million. Trump who of course renamed the shuttle the Trump Shuttle, refitted the outdated gas guzzling 727s with heavy gold fixtures, making them heavier and more expensive to fly, and then in 1990 defaulted on Trump Shuttle’s debt. The consortium of lenders who’d financed his purchase then took back the shuttle, selling it to US Air.  Trump now plans to use $500 million of our tax dollars to buy Spirit Airlines, the not so good airline which is struggling even more due to the rise in fuel prices attributable to the Iran war.  What could possibly go wrong? Spirit isn’t his only acquisition, Trump who is supposedly a free-market Republican keeps using our tax dollars to invest in businesses under the guise of national security and while some of those investments might be justifiable, barely, purchasing Spirit Airlines is not.  By the way, those tariffs he collected, his other brilliant economic move, the mechanism to return $166 billion of them is now in place.  The good news is that the administration is abiding by the Supreme Court decision that ruled the tariffs illegal, the not so good news is that Trump is trying to intimidate the companies who paid the tariffs, saying that it would be in their best interests, wink, wink, not to apply for the refunds they’re owed.  And the rest of us, who paid higher prices for tariffed products, forget about it.       

More 💩:  The Trump DOJ is going after the Southern Poverty Law Center, the legal advocacy organization that specializes in civil rights and public interest litigation.  The DOJ got an Alabama grand jury to indict the Law Center for fraud. The allegation is that the Law Center deceived their contributors by using donations to pay informants to assist them in doing what they do, exposing the activities of the Ku Klux Klan and other hate groups. A large group of the Law Center’s donors have called B💩, saying that they’ve long been aware of where their donations go and that they’re fine with their money being used to unmask hate groups.  Moreover, my TV and podcast legal advisor Andrew Weissmann, of Mueller fame, says the Law Center’s activities are legitimate and that there’s a reason that the DOJ sought the indictment in Alabama. Trump who ties everything to his 2020 election loss to Biden has pointed to the indictment as proof that the election was stolen.  Don’t try to make sense of that because it’s nonsensical.  In other election related news, yesterday while it considers the RNC lawsuit that the Virginia redistricting passed by the state’s voters should be blocked, Virginia’s Supreme Court denied the RNC’s request for a preliminary injunction blocking the new congressional map.  And lastly, the DOJ kind of said that its pointless investigation of Fed Chair William Powell is over and as a result Republican Senator Thom Tillis who’d been holding up Trump nominee Kevin Warsh’s confirmation will now support him. Warsh by the way won’t come out and say that Trump lost in 2020, an indication that he is unlikely to be as independent as he says he will be. Also, Trump won’t say that he won’t have the DOJ restart its investigation into Powell.  And  Julia Varvaro, a 29-year-old Deputy Assistant Secretary for Counterterrorism at DHS, was placed on administrative leave following allegations from an ex-boyfriend that she engaged in a "sugar daddy" scheme and extorted him for money and luxury gifts.  Only the best people protecting us from terrorist attacks.     

 

Counting Heads 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀🚢 

War Chronicles:  We appear to have moved into the war of attrition phase of Trump’s Iran excursion.  There’s no question that the US has more military capability than the Iranians and has significantly damaged Iran’s military and infrastructure.  The challenge is that fueled by religious fervor, Iran’s leaders and the IRGC who are fighting for their lives and still have lots of missile capability, mines and small boats are convinced that despite Trump’s rhetoric, at some point he will declare victory and move on. As to that rhetoric yesterday Trump, who given current polls showing his approval ratings mired in the mid-thirties, knows that the specter of a prolonged war isn’t going over well on the homefront, responded to questions from reporters about his timeline by calling them stupid.  He went on to say “we were in Viet Nam for like 18 years, we were in Iraq for many, many years. I don’t like to say WW II, because that was a biggie. But we were four and a half almost five years in WW II.  We were in Korea for seven years.  I’ve been doing this for six weeks.”  Putting aside the inaccuracy of the historically challenged Trump’s timelines, comparing his Iran “excursion” to any one of those wars is probably not going to win him any popularity points.  On a more positive front, Trump announced yesterday that the Lebanon-Israel ceasefire has been extended by three weeks.  That’s good but ceasefires in and around Israel tend to be ephemeral, here today, gone tomorrow.  

Military Peeps:  Trump fired John Phelan, the Secretary of the Navy, or more accurately had Secretary of War/Beer Pete deliver the pink slip on his behalf.  On the one hand, firing the Secretary of the Navy during a Naval war seems a bit disruptive, on the other hand Phelan, whose chief qualification for the job was that he was one of Trump’s Mar a Lago cronies and a donor, wasn’t all that qualified for the position in the first place. Today’s NY Times reports that he was fired for failing to come up with a quickly implementable plan to get a least one of Trump’s super big, powerful, and full of bells and whistles golden battleships built by 2028. While it’s true that Phelan had made virtually no progress, it wasn’t really his fault as military experts say that it would be impossible to even finish the plans for Trump’s desired battleship on that timeline.  Moreover, they all believe that Trump’s golden battleship plans will be tabled the minute he leaves office.  Today’s NYT also reports that we are running out of critical munitions so maybe that’s what Trump should really be focused on but what’s the fun in that, perhaps another reason that yesterday Trump was off on another tangent discussing his marble choices and plans for his reflecting pool project. As to Phelan’s replacement, the new Acting Secretary of the Navy Hung Cao doesn’t really seem all that qualified either although given his earlier remarks about how Monterey California has turned into a Wiccan hellscape, something that true Christians shouldn’t tolerate, his religious beliefs seem to fit in well with Pete Hegseth’s.  In other military personnel news, yesterday US Army Master Sgt Gannon Ken Van Dyke, one of the US special forces soldiers involved in the capturing of Venezuela’s Maduro, was arrested for betting $23,000 on Maduro’s removal on Polymarket before news of the raid was made public. His winnings totaled $409,000.  Now would be a good time for the DOJ to look into the reports of the rumored bets that others within Trump’s proximity have reported to have placed on some of his other TACO decisions because some people have been winning big on stock and energy market movements.

Headcounts:  Democratic Georgia Congressman David Scott, the civil rights advocate who was 80-year-old, died this week just one day after casting what turned out to be his final House vote. Scott is the fifth member of the House and fourth Democrat to die while in office this year. Reports are that 57-year-old New Jersey Republican Tom Kean Jr is still among the living, but the Congressman has been absent from the House since March 5.  His office says that Kean who is running for reelection in what is expected to be a hotly contested race is dealing with a personal matter but has provided no other information about his unspecified health problems or whereabouts.  Iowa’s 90-year-old Republican Senator Chuck Grassley who like the energizer bunny keeps going and going had gall bladder surgery over the weekend.  He reported via one of his typically quirky tweets that he’s recovering well and though he missed a key vote on DHS funding this week will be back soon. His vote or lack thereof was cancelled out by Virginia’s Senator Mark Warner absence. Democrat Warner who also missed the key DHS vote was out mourning the death of his 36-year-old daughter Madison who died this week from long term health complications related to her juvenile diabetes. Lots of sadness but also a reminder that with headcounts as close as they are, every vote matters, particularly in the House where revolts by disgruntled Republicans are common. To that end, Republicans have sued to prevent this week’s Virginia redistricting from going into effect.  A lower Virginia state court has put the redistricting on hold however it’s expected (hopefully) that a higher state court will rule in favor of the redistricting in a timely fashion.  Of course, Trump called the Virginia election a hoax, once again citing his favorite last minute “dumping” of ballots arguments while also saying that even a genius like him couldn’t understand the language in the redistricting amendment. A preview of what he’ll be saying about the midterms.              

More 💩:  RFK Jr testified in front of the Senate Health committee during the week.  He stuck with his usual obfuscation, misquoting studies and denying some of his earlier outrageous statements. Though he finally said that it would be a good idea for children to get the MMR vaccine, he continues to assert that vaccines have had little to do with the reductions in the incidence of childhood diseases, instead citing improvement in living conditions as the only reason that diseases have declined.  He said that even though some of the vaccines he dissed became available long after the improvements in living conditions and sewage treatment took place and the impact of the vaccines on disease reduction is clearly quantifiable.  He denied his earlier incredibly outrageous and racist statement that because all Black children are on ADHD medications they should be “reparented” and placed in special farms even when presented with transcripts of his despicable statements.  And to cap the week, the acting head of the CDC Jay Bhattacharya took the unprecedented step of cancelling the release of a CDC study that documented the efficacy of the COVID vaccine using the now familiar RFK era excuse that the study didn’t follow the “right” protocol. Right in this case meaning that it didn’t provide the answer that the anti-vaccine, anti-mRNA crowd wanted to see.  

 

Virginia is for Lovers 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀🚢 

War Chronicles:  After threatening to bomb Iran out of existence while also teeing up the Kushner, Witkoff, Vance team to head to Pakistan to negotiate with the Iranians, Trump pulled a TACO yesterday.  After a tense meeting in the White House that included VP Vance, Secretary of State Rubio, War/Beer Hegseth, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Dan Caine, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Real Estate Bro Witkoff, and son in law Kushner but excluded Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, he extended the about to expire ceasefire indefinitely while maintaining the blockade of all of Iran’s ports. Top Iranian officials haven’t publicly responded to Trump’s announcement, but they did attack two ships overnight making it clear that they are following their own playbook. Iran’s situation isn’t good, but the country’s leaders, whoever they are, perceive that they’ve got Trump stuck between a rock and a hard place, that hard place including the upcoming midterms in the face of declining popularity at home. At least for now the truce between Lebanon and Israel, while fragile appears to be holding, more or less.

Virginia!  On the home front, much to the chagrin of Republicans Virginians voted to redraw their state congressional map for the remainder of the decade.  As a result, Virginia’s congressional delegation is expected to shift from six Democrats and five Republicans to ten Democrats and one Republican. It turns out that the redistricting battle that Republicans started in Texas isn’t working out as planned because this time around Democrats fought fire with fire, engaging in their own voter approved gerrymandering.  At this point, it appears that with a big lift from California and Virginia,  Democrats have cancelled out most, maybe even all, of the 9 to 12 seats that Republicans hoped to pick up with their redrawing of the maps in Texas, North Carolina, and Missouri.  The fight isn’t over yet because Florida may join the battle, although Governor DeSantis has been wavering, not because he doesn’t want to hand the Republicans a few more seats but because he’s afraid that with voter sentiment especially among Latino voters shifting blue, a Florida redistricting could backfire instead resulting in a “dummymander," a failed gerrymander where a political party draws district lines to maximize their seats but spreads their own voters too thin, leading to unexpected losses, especially during unfavorable political tides like the one that’s expected to occur this November, assuming that Trump’s plans to disrupt the elections don’t come to pass. Thought last night’s Virginia election results have Democrats smiling and Republicans outraged, all is not necessarily hunky dory for Democrats because it’s widely expected that the Supreme Court will further dismantle the Voting Rights Act handing a few Democratic seats in Louisiana and Ohio back to Republicans.

Peeps:  Labor Secretary Lori Chavez–DeRemer has resigned.  The only thing surprising about her departure is that it took so long to occur. A few months back the NY Post, hardly a radical left paper, did an expose on her “problems.”  Her list of infractions included an affair with her bodyguard, daytime drinking of alcohol in her office, and “travel fraud” by having her chief of staff and deputy chief of staff “make up” official trips to destinations where she could spend time with family or friends on the taxpayers’ dime. They also reported that Chavez-DeRemer’s husband had been banned from her office building for sexually harassing Labor Department employees. So far all of the cabinet members booted by Trump have been women and if reports hold true, another one is likely to follow Noem, Bondi and Chavez-DeRemer out the door because the exit drums appear to be beating for DNI Tulsi who reportedly has been told that “she has until the midterms to pack up her bags and leave.” 🤷‍♀️ Though he hasn’t been booted yet, FBI Director Kash Patel is lashing out and probably also sweating profusely. As promised his lawyers filed a $250 million lawsuit against The Atlantic for their weekend article about his many failings.  The detailed complaint which claims that the reports of his absences and drinking are all unequivocably false even though just about everyone saw him downing champagne with the USA Hockey team and there are probably quite a few waiters and waitresses who also saw him at Las Vegas’ Poodle Club or at Washington DC’s Ned Club, two of the places cited in the Atlantic article, not to mention all the FBI agents he recently fired for failing to be sufficiently loyal to Trump.  A number of media outlets have already done FOIA requests for his bar receipts. It’s expected that his lawsuit, which was filed by a law firm known for filing complaints that go nowhere will go nowhere because discovery won’t be fun for Kash.   On the House front, Florida Democrat Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick who has been indicted for fraud has resigned to avoid what was expected to be an expulsion.  Florida Republican Cory Mills who is being investigated for violating campaign finance laws and for engaging in sexual misconduct as in threatening a few former girlfriends is still hanging on but won’t be for long if his fellow Republican, the also quirky Nancy Mace has anything to do with it.  She’s introduced a resolution to have him expelled but at least so far he’s got the backing of Speaker Mike Johnson, whose response so far is that lots of people in Congress screw around.        

Wow:  Something remarkable may be happening with regard to the treatment of pancreatic cancer.  One potential treatment involves experimental drug daraxonrasib, the other involves a personalized vaccine using mRNA technology.  The study results associated with both of these drugs have some in the medical field believing (hoping) that they could be the breakthrough for pancreatic cancer that Herceptin has been for those with HER2 positive breast cancer. Notably, one of the patients in the daraxonrasib study is former Senator Ben Sasse who disclosed in December that he had metastatic state 4 pancreatic cancer and was expected to die within three to four months.  He posted this week that the drug had shrunk his tumors, allowing him to reduce his reliance on pain medication. That might not sound like much, but for a cancer study it really is especially given his dire prognosis. The potentially awesome news is that there could be one or more treatments for pancreatic cancer on the not so distant horizon, the not so good news is that RFK’s crowd is still defending their decision to defund mRNA research because they are so blinded by their hate of the technology and its role in preventing COVID deaths that they refuse to recognize its lifesaving potential.

More 💩:  The UAE, home of Dubai, is asking the Trump administration to provide a wartime financial lifeline, possibly a currency swap line to help with the negative financial impact that the Iran war is having on its economy.  Tucker Carlson’s son who had been part of JD Vance’s team is no longer working for the VP, perhaps because dad Tucker now says that he regrets ever supporting Trump. And lastly, Pete Hegseth who apparently knows nothing about the 1918 flu epidemic that killed 45,000 members of the US military has removed the requirement that members of the military get flu shots.  What could possibly go wrong with bunches of unvaccinated young men and women in close quarters in barracks, subs, and other navy vessels?  

 

Weird Science 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀🚢 

War Chronicles:  On Friday, asserting that Iran had made major concessions, Trump said the war with Iran was essentially over.  Oil prices dropped and equity markets rallied.  Then the weekend happened. Despite Trump’s claim, the Strait of Hormuz or as Trump inadvertently called it in one of his Truth Social posts, the Strait of Iran, still isn’t open. The US is blocking the passage of Iran’s ships and Iran is blocking all the others.  Yesterday, to protest Iran’s failure to “cooperate” the US seized an Iranian cargo ship.  The short-term ceasefire is scheduled to end on Tuesday.  Yesterday Trump said that he was sending Jared Kushner and Steven Witkoff to Pakistan for another round of talks with Iran.  Initially he said that the team wouldn’t include VP Vance because it was “too dangerous” but then he backtracked and said that of course he’d be sending Vance.  Whether or not Vance is part of peace squad may now be academic because in response to the seizure of their cargo ship and perhaps also in response to another one of Trump’s threatening “all hell will rain down” posts, Iran says that since they doubt the US is really serious about peace, they have no plans to send a team to Pakistan though they haven’t made a final decision yet. Josh Dawsey, the Washington Post expatriate who is now with the Wall Street Journal wrote this weekend that Trump who’s been “veering between belligerent and conciliatory approaches and grappling behind the scenes with just how badly things could go wrong” sometimes “loses focus,” spending more time on the details of his plans for the White House ballroom and midterm fundraisers.”  Trump is in over his skis and unfocused while the Iranians who say, despite Trump’s assertion otherwise, they haven’t agreed to much and most certainly haven’t agreed to give up their nukes, follow their own rules, and continue to show that they have a high tolerance for pain. The bottom line is there is no bottom line.

Peeps:  There’s no point in trying to figure out who among Trump’s team Is the worst or who among them will be next to be shown the door because so many of them are exit worthy.  That said, this week FBI Director Kash Patel could be leading the crowded pack, not that uber Christian nationalist Hegseth or wackadoodle RFK are far behind. Citing a number of unnamed sources, The Atlantic’s Susan Fitzpatrick detailed Patel’s drinking and partying habits, reporting that the frequently MIA Patel has been so out of it that FBI agents have come close to breaking down his doors to rescue him from what they thought was an alcohol (and drug?) induced coma and that when he had trouble logging in to his computer the extremely paranoid Patel freaked out believing he’d been fired. Patel is so irate about the article that he’s had his lawyer send one of those “lawsuit incoming” warning letter to The Atlantic but it’s hard to believe that the respected magazine or the also very respected and experienced Fitzpatrick didn’t thoroughly vet the piece with their lawyers before publication.  If Patel moves forward with a suit, the discovery, which will certainly include the viral pictures of Patel downing alcohol in the locker room with Team USA at the Milan Olympics, will be epic. Patel told Fox News that “arrests are coming this week” over the “rigged 2020 election” because he needs a lifeline and promising Trump that he’s on the verge of arresting those who “stole” the election is a good one. Duck if you see any FBI guys coming your way because someone needs to be frog marched off in handcuffs and it’s not clear that Patel cares whose life he ruins.

More Retribution:  It’s not just Patel who is playing up to Trump; Acting AG Todd Blanche who’d really like to lose the acting part of his title is doing the same.  Over the weekend the DOJ removed Maria Medetis Long, the career federal prosecutor leading the investigation into former CIA head John Brennan, after she resisted pressure to quickly bring charges.  Those “charges” relate to the Russia probe that led to Trump’s first impeachment. Blanche has now appointed blast from the past Trump lawyer Joseph diGenova to serve as his special counsel for what is being referred to as “grand conspiracy” probe, the conspiracy referring to anything associated with the investigation into Trump’s Russia canoodling. The expectation is that diGenova together with another attorney named Christopher-James DeLorenz who previously clerked for Florida Judge Aileen Cannon, will do everything he can to get his subpoena requests and case in front of the Trump friendly judge.  Cannon has every reason to stay in Trump’s good graces especially since the soon to be 80-year-old Trump more than hinted last week that it’s time for some of those older guys on the Supreme Court like 76-year-old Justices Alito and 77-year-old Thomas to retire so that he can replace them with younger extreme right-wing versions. Both Thomas and Alito, who was recently hospitalized for a bout of dehydration, say that they have no plans to retire anytime soon but if Trump loses the Senate in the midterms, he’ll surely kneecap at least one of them, pulling another Amy Coney Barret like confirmation coup.  In any case, Cannon will have competition for the SCOTUS slots since Senators Mike Lee and Ted Cruz may also be on Trump’s replacement short list. Cue up the vomit 🤮 bags.  As to the elections, Trump really fears their outcomes which is why he has the DOJ trying to scoop up election records and voter lists all over the country because if he can’t win fair and square, in the absence of SCOTUS telling him all the voting maps that don’t favor Republicans are unfair, cheating, like declaring martial law, is an option.   

Weird 💩:  If you are into conspiracies but not into discounting fair election results something may or may not be a foot on the scientist front.  Apparently ten or more of them have gone missing. 🤷‍♀️ Or not.  As if we don’t already have enough to worry about. 

  

Pulp Fiction 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀 

War Chronicles:  According to Trump Iran has made major concessions in negotiations and a deal to end the war could be made very soon.  He also said that it may not be necessary to extend the ceasefire because the two sides are so close to making a deal.  If true, that would be good news.  The problem is that Trump says lots of things that aren’t true and it’s not clear what those concessions are, to the extent they exist, so skepticism is warranted. Moreover, since Arab and European leaders believe that it will take months to come to a real peace accord, they believe that an extension of the ceasefire is necessary.  Iran has yet to comment on Trump’s assertion that they’ve agreed to his demands.  On a more believable note, Trump also announced that Israel and Lebanon had agreed to a 10-day ceasefire which as of right now appear to be for real.  At least for the moment Hezbollah which takes its orders from Iran appears to be abiding by the pause, emphasis on for now. Back at home, by vote of 214 to 213 with centrist soon to retire Maine Democrat Jared Golden joining all Republicans except Thomas Massie who voted with the Democrats the House failed once again to pass a war powers resolution. By a vote of 52 to 47 Senate Republicans blocked a vote on a similar measure.  All Republican Senators in attendance with the exception of Kentucky’s Rand Paul voted with the majority.  Pennsylvania Democrat John Fetterman voted with the Republicans. West Virginia’s Jim Justice missed the vote entirely because he was home trying to prevent banks from foreclosing on his family’s Greenbrier resort. Presumably, Babydog, the bulldog who accompanies Senator Justice everywhere also missed the vote.  In two separate votes, the Senate voted down Bernie Sanders measures to restrict sales of bulldozers and 1000-pound bombs to Israel. Though both measures failed it’s notable that 40 Democratic Senators voted to restrict the bulldozer sales while 36 voted to restrict the bombs. The shift in sentiment among Democrats is a bad omen for Israel.  Some of those who voted for the measures said they did so to express their disapproval of all things Netanyahu, others to show their general disapproval of all things Israel with some of those, especially those from states like Michigan, more concerned about cultivating pro-Palestinian voters than holding on to all their usual Jewish constituents. Lastly on the war front, Secretary of War and Beer Pete quoted a Quentin Tarantino made up bible verse from Pulp Fiction to justify the administrations actions while Trump and JD Vance ramped up their war with Pope Leo.  At a Turning Point USA event that was so poorly attended that an embarrassed Erika Kirk cited a security concern that the Secret Service said did not exist to justify her failure to attend, Newbie Catholic Vance insisted that he’s more of an expert on Catholic theology than the Pope, an odd position but one that reflects the hubris as well as the idiocy of this administration. It’s hard to see how enraging Catholics makes for a good policy or how it will benefit Vance’s presidential ambitions, but MAGA is MAGA and the rest of us have been wrong before.

MAHA Not:  Keeping with the lying theme, during his testimony before the House, RFK who according to a new biography cut the penis off of a raccoon while his kids were waiting in their car, because of course he did, lied and denied repeatedly.  When asked about the rise in measles cases he said we’ve done better than lots of countries even though the US has seen a bigger percentage increase than any other country.  When asked about an interview where he said that Black children on ADHD medication should be re-parented he claimed he’d never said that even though it’s on tape. He questioned the legitimacy of a report about health care fraudsters who have been pardoned by Trump even though the report was true. And now, having screwed around with vaccine recommendations, he’s got his sights set on remaking the panel that determines recommended preventive health care services.  That matters because insurance companies take their cues about what they cover from that panel.  In other health care news, yesterday Trump announced that he’s nominating Erica Schwartz who served as Deputy Surgeon General during his first administration to serve as the head of the CDC.  Dr. Schwartz who is pro-vaccine, is a traditional choice meaning that her views are mainstream. Her nomination, likely an indication that Trump or at least some of his advisors recognize that RFK’s quack positions aren’t going over well with lots of voters, has already outraged some in RFK’s orbit. It will be interesting to see if she lasts or if she leaves in frustration like Susan Monarez did after she was kneecapped by RFK and those in his immediate orbit. One of those “health” advisors/conspiracy theorists in RFK’s immediate orbit is Calley Means whose sister Casey’s nomination to serve as Surgeon General remains in limbo.     

More 💩: Trump is expected to re-nominate Cameron Hamilton, a former U.S. Navy SEAL, as FEMA’s permanent administrator. Hamilton’s first nomination for the permanent role was scuttled after he contradicted then DHS head ICE Barbie Noem by saying that he didn’t think that FEMA should be disbanded.  Just a little churn among friends.  Along those lines, Todd Lyons the temporary head of ICE, announced he’ll be leaving at the end of May.  Last night the House passed a 10- day extension of the FISA surveillance law. Despite whipping by Trump, Speaker Johnson is having a hard time getting a full extension passed. Johnson now has another Democrat to contend with as yesterday Democrat Analilia Mejia who is expected to join the progressive “squad” easily won the special election for the House seat vacated by NJ Governor Mikie Sherrill. And lastly for today, Hungary’s new leader is cleaning shop, one of his actions concerns CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Committee whose Hungarian arm had been receiving funding from Viktor Orban which explains why CPAC had such a presence in Hungary and may also explain why Tucker Carlson spent so much time there as well.

  

 

Blasphemy Among Friends 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀 🐷💄 

🥜 🥜 🥜: In a nutshell, the Iran war is not over, the US is blocking the Strait of Hormuz, and though it’s good that Secretary of State Rubio hosted a meeting between Lebanon and Israel, both sides in that front acknowledge that a large part of their problem is the not in attendance Hezbollah, its continued support from Iran, and its unwillingness to put down its guns and missiles. Now to the whole nut, earlier this week Trump posted an AI generated picture depicting himself dressed in white robes, placing a glowing hand over an ill or deceased man in a hospital bed, as if to heal or resurrect him. The image was taken by many, especially Catholics and conservative Christians, as him presenting himself as Jesus. In no position to assess what counts as blasphemy, I just thought it was nuts, not only because it’s incredibly weird to depict oneself as a supreme religious figure but because the people he offended, most notably Catholics make up one fifth of the US population and are, according to Axios, America’s most powerful swing religious bloc.  Offending them while also taking on Pope Leo seems self-destructive, especially in the run up to the midterms when members of his coalition are already upset about gas prices and inflation, bigly problems that can’t be dismissed with an orchestrated visit by a not so real door dash actress to the White House. That’s the message that members of his staff and a number of politicians must have whispered into his ear because Trump removed the post, saying that he mistook the Jesus figure depicted in the picture for a doctor. That lame excuse wasn’t just dubious,  it was just another indication of the damaged state of his brain, because it turns out that his White House advisors wanted him to claim that the image had been doctored not that it was a picture of a doctor. It’s no wonder he missed those warnings about how difficult it would be to keep the Strait of Hormuz open if he waged an all-out war against Iran.  Maybe he thought they said the war and protecting the Strait could be accomplished while he was taking a snooze🤷‍♀️? 

🐷 Ugh 🐷:  Though they have all got to know that Trump is well within 25^th Amendment territory, neither newbie Catholic VP Vance, nor any member of his cabinet of complicit cronies are likely to do anything about it because ignoring the obvious is a whole lot easier even if the “it” in question leaves Trump with his finger on the proverbial button. Though the consequence of their inaction is far more dangerous, as it turns out they aren’t alone in ignoring the obvious because the word out of Congress is that lots of people in the House and in the press knew that California Democrat Eric Swalwell had what is charitably being called a flirtation problem.  To be clear, that “flirtation” problem didn’t just involve making inappropriate remarks and engaging in consensual affairs, according to a number of his accusers it also involved rape. The best that can be said about Swalwell at this point is that he had the good sense to resign from Congress.  Not only is he out, but Texas Republican Tony Gonzales, who “allegedly” repeatedly harassed a number of his female staff members and who is likely responsible for one of them choosing to kill herself through self- immolation has resigned too. As a result of their paired resignations, the House headcount stands at 216 Republicans, 214 Democrats and 1 independent.  For all practical purposes since that one Independent, California’s Kevin Kiley who recently switched his party affiliation in an effort to survive California’s recent redistricting, is still caucusing with the Republicans, that means that Mike Johnson’s count is 217. That barely-there majority explains why the Department of Homeland Security is still not funded, the extension of FISA (the spying legislation) is hanging by a thread, and little else that requires Congressional authorization is getting done. Also, that headcount isn’t set in stone because Republicans are still pushing for Florida Democrat Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick to be ousted for committing COVID fund fraud and Democrats are pushing for Florida Republican Cory Mills to be ousted for physically accosting one or more of his girlfriends, the girlfriends he was seeing while still married. Former US Congressman Madison Cawthorn had a whole lot of problems, but it turns out that his assertion that there were lots of sordid activities going on among his colleagues may not have been far off the mark.  TMZ has recently opened a Washington DC office, they didn’t do that to report on legislation so we may soon be learning more than any of them want us to know.

More 💩: Acting AG Todd Blanche says that since there’s nothing left to see, or that he wants anyone to see, there will be no more Epstein file releases. He’s also started the process of expunging the convictions of the Proud Boys and Oath Seekers who were convicted and then pardoned by Trump for their January 6 crimes.  Blanche’s competition, or competition in her own mind, for the permanent AG slot, Jeanine Pirro, sent a few of her goons to “inspect” the Federal Reserve Construction site in an effort to dig up more faux dirt on Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. That could be a problem for Kevin Warsh, Trump’s nominee to replace Powell because North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis says that he won’t vote Warsh out of committee while Trump or his minions are going after Powell.  Once confirmed, and odds are he will eventually be confirmed, Warsh will be the richest Fed Chair ever and that’s not counting the wealth of his wife Jane Lauder, an Estee Lauder heiress.  Given the number of those engaging in piggish behavior in the administration and in Congress, it’s fitting that someone with access to lots of lipstick could soon be in government.  💄meet 🐷.

           

 

 Goulash With Paprika 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀

Cage Matches:  Trump attending an Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) cage match with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Ivanka, Tiffany, and Don Jr while his designated chump, Vice President Vance, was in Pakistan trying but failing to clean up his Iran mess may be this millennium’s most Nero fiddling while Rome burns moment. Then again, given that the orange one is just a little over one year into this term, a few more of those moments likely lay ahead. Vance and his negotiating compatriots, Trump real estate buddy Witkoff and son in law Kushner, left Pakistan without a deal, depressing but not all that surprising because as more skilled negotiators from prior administrations have learned the Iranians aren’t easy to negotiate with. The Trump team demands, including that Iran give up its nukes and uranium, call off it’s Hezbollah and Houthi surrogates, open up the Strait of Hormuz, were rejected by Iran which countered with a few of its own, including that it get to control the Strait, receive war reparations, and for a ceasefire across the region including in Lebanon where their Hezbollah surrogates are a significant part of the problem. After learning of Vance’s “failure” Trump announced via Truth Social that “Effective immediately, the United States Navy, the Finest in the World, will begin the process of BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz.”  Forget about his earlier promise that the Strait would open on its own, instead think higher prices at the pump but Trump says that’s only for a while so not a bigly deal.

The Blue Danube:  All and all, it’s fair to say that Vance had a hard week since the other purpose of his trip was to rally support for Hungary’s now ex-Prime Minister Viktor Orbán who was trounced in his election by challenger Peter Magyar, whose party won a National Assembly (parliamentary) super majority. Magyar isn’t a liberal snowflake; he used to be a member of Orbán’s Fidesz party but broke away to join the fledgling Tisza party to protest Orbán’s excesses, including his corruption, his trashing of Hungary’s economy, and the pardoning of a former official convicted of covering up the abuse of underaged boys at a children’s home.  Trump, who together with Putin, Tucker Carlson and Steve Bannon, is among Orbán’s staunchest supporters can’t be happy about the Hungarian election results or that Orbán so quickly conceded to Magyar.  As of early this morning Trump hasn’t yet weighed in on the election instead choosing to deflect his rage towards Pope Leo via a long, rambling Truth Social post, in which he attacked the Catholic leader for being “weak on crime,” for calling for peaceful resolutions instead of war, and for saying that immigrants should be treated kindly.  For whacko measure Trump also ranted about how he likes the Pope’s MAGA brother Louis much more than he likes the Pope while also throwing in a few sharp words about how priests and ministers were arrested for violating COVID rules, something that he says that Pope Leo should fear far more than the mistreatment of those murderous, violent immigrants that Venezuela had been sending to the US before the US invasion.  If you are trying to make any of Trump’s utterances make sense, give it up.  They are the rantings of a madman, albeit one with his finger on the nuke button.  The Pope responded by saying he will keep saying whatever he wants to say. Might be worth checking to see if Kalshi or Polymarket are making markets on how long it will take caught in the middle of this maelstrom VP Vance to renounce his 2019 conversion to Catholicism?   

Californication:  Republicans haven’t cornered the market on bad behavior. Over the weekend the bottom fell out for California Congressman Eric Swalwell who for a while looked like he might be the next Governor of California.  Apparently, the seven term Congressman, one-time presidential contender has a number of gnarly skeletons in his closet and by skeletons think sexually abused and/or harassed female staffers, including at least one who he allegedly raped when she was inebriated. The married Swalwell has admitted to misconduct but denies the rape.  Pressured by politicians on both sides of aisle, he has suspended his run for Governor.   What that means for California’s June 2 jungle primary, where only the top two finishers move on to the November election is anyone’s guess but it’s fair to assume that a reshuffling of the primary leaderboard is about to happen. No doubt the pollsters been doing their thing all weekend and will provide some new rankings soon.  Expect lots of new endorsements shortly.  Trump’s Republican supporters have been trying to trash Swalwell who has long been a vocal Trump critic for some time so it’s odd that these skeletons didn’t come out sooner, then again it’s kind of hard for Trump to take the lead in going after others for sex crimes and lots of members of Congress, many who are probably awfully nervous right now, have full closets. In any case, it looks like Swalwell’s problems are having a cascading effect because calls for him to leave the House ASAP are being paired with calls for Tony Gonzales, the married Texas Republican whose girlfriend/staff member killed herself when their affair went belly up, to also be kicked to the curb.

More 💩:  The economy is taking it on the chin and everywhere else. The March Consumer Price Index (CPI) report released on Friday showed a 3.3% annual inflation rate, the highest since April 2024, driven primarily by a 10.9% surge in energy costs due to the conflict in Iran.  That rate doesn’t reflect the upward pressure on oil prices from Trump’s Sunday blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. The University of Michigan’s latest consumer survey also released on Friday showed that consumer sentiment declined 11% early this month to a reading of 47.6, lower than anything seen in the post-World War II era, including during the Great Recession, the pandemic downturn and the inflation that took place afterward.  On the Melania front, it turns out that her unexpected presser was likely a prebuttal to the El Pais publication of an interview of Amanda Ungaro, the long-time girlfriend of her former model agent, Paolo Zampolli.  Ungaro who has since married a green card holder was deported back to Brazil this year while she was in the process of getting US residency papers. Zampolli who remains tight with Trump and Melania, is Trump’s Special Representative for Global Partnerships, one of those jobs you give people to keep them quiet. Also, because he apparently has nothing more important to do, Trump has disclosed detailed plans for his planned garish and huge Potomac River Triumphal Arch while also announcing plans to paint the granite exterior of the historic Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to the White House with a white "magic paint with silicate" that could cause permanent, irreversible damage to the building.  Also, the steel being used for his East Wing ball room project was donated by a Luxembourg based company that not so coincidentally benefited from a cut in steel tariffs that occurred almost simultaneously.