Quarters 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀

State of the War:  The coalition to open the Strait of Hormuz that Trump said he would be announcing shortly isn’t happening.  So far Australia, France, Germany, Japan, the UK,  Canada, Italy, Greece, South Korea, Poland, Ireland, and Spain have all demurred.  The reasons vary, with some saying it’s not their war and others saying that once the situation calms down and the bombing has ceased, they’ll consider escorting ships through the Strait.  Trump who seemed to believe that getting countries to take up arms would be akin to bullying them into trade deals is bigly mad and once again threatening to pull from the NATO alliance. In addition, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that Putin’s Russia is helping Iran target US assets, which makes Trump’s decision to lift some sanctions against Russian that much more bizarre.  Here at home,  Joe Kent, a top counterterrorism official who worked with Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard resigned yesterday.  He didn’t leave quietly though he did give VP Vance a heads up regarding his plans.  In his very public letter of resignation Kent questioned the rationale for the Iran war, writing that “Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” the latter reason his way of exonerating Trump by going with increasingly popular “blame it on Bibi” narrative.  The most surprising thing about Kent’s departure is that it didn’t happen sooner, he’s an America firster/isolationist who was against Trump’s Venezuela venture. He’s also an “imperfect” messenger since he’s a known election denier, white supremacist, and conspiracy theorist, all reasons that he was appointed to the administration in the first place. Kent now plans to sit for an interview with Tucker Carlson where the two are expected to bond over their shared affinity for Nazis and the like. The question now is how much longer Gabbard, who like Kent was sidelined in the run up to the Iran strikes and whose most recent “national security” assignment included glomming on to the 2020 Fulton County election records, sticks around. While yesterday’s hubbub was centered on Kent’s resignation, Israel continued playing whack a mole with Iranian leadership. Yesterday they announced the “elimination” of Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, and General Gholam Reza Soleimani, the head of the Revolutionary Guard's Basij force, not to be confused with the Soleimani that Trump took out during his first administration. Though he wasn’t the new Supreme Leader, for all practical purposes Larijani was running Iran and the war.  Soleimani had been responsible for the violent suppression of Iran’s nationwide anti-government demonstrations. While it’s far from clear that Israel’s efforts to eliminate Iran’s leadership will lead to regime change, their success at taking out so many is indicative of how much help they are getting from within the country. The “take outs” aren’t over, this morning Israel announced the elimination of another Iranian leader, intelligence chief Esmaili Khatib. Decapitation or not, the war drags on.  

Peeps:  During his Monday press conference Trump claimed that he had spoken with a former president, not Bush, but one he said he likes, who expressed regrets that he hadn’t done what he is doing in Iran. Clinton, Obama, and Biden all deny any such conversation has occurred. We all know Trump lies, so he probably was lying but it’s also possible that he spoke to himself or maybe Andrew Jackson, in either case its not good.  He also revealed that Chief of Staff Susie Wiles has been diagnosed with a very early stage of breast cancer and that she plans to keep on working while receiving treatment. There have been reports that Wiles plans to leave after the midterms, but that decision is probably independent of her recent diagnosis.  While Wiles appears to have signed off on Trump disclosing her diagnosis, it doesn’t appear that Republican Congressman Neal Dunn knew that his private health information was about to go public.  Trump revealed that Dunn had a terminal diagnosis but then added that he had helped get him life extending treatment so that now he won’t “die by June.”  It’s not clear that Trump’s intervention will extend Dunn’s life, but he’s really happy that he has convinced Dunn to spend his final days in Congress because he needs his vote. In other people news, Border Patrol honcho Gregory Bovino, who was so evil at his job that he made CAVA bag guy Tom Homan look good by comparison, announced that he’s retiring.  Bovino is hoping that his exit shortcuts plans to investigate him for lots of the bad things he did. War/Beer Pete had better hope that he gets a pardon from Trump because his pledge of "no quarter, no mercy for our enemies" violates a bright‑line ban in the laws of war while also putting our soldiers at risk.

The Courts:  RFK Jr still has his job but some of his policies have been put on hold because on Monday, federal Judge Brian Murphy put a halt to his attempts to overhaul childhood vaccine policies, specifically those changes that sought to reduce the schedule and number of recommended shots.  The judge also removed RFK’s handpicked members from the key vaccine advisory panel, finding that the changes disregarded federal law and ignored established scientific processes.  That’s good news, but probably just a temporary disease reprieve since Judge Murphy’s ruling will be appealed. At least for now, the vaccine advisory committees next scheduled meeting where the plan was to attack, maybe even kill, mRNA COVID shots has been put on hold. Election denier Kari Lake is also facing legal head wind.  Yesterday, federal judge Royce Lamberth ruled that her near shutdown of Voice of America was illegal and ordered the government to reinstate more than 1,000 people who had been placed on leave. Despite the Iran war and Trump’s not so subtle suggestions that he has his eyes on Cuba, and that both “strategies” could use the type of message sharing that VOA used to provide, the administration is expected to appeal assuming anyone can find AG Bondi. Though it’s not clear she plans to cooperate, she has been subpoenaed by the House Oversight Committee to answer questions about the Epstein investigation.

More 💩:  Homeland Security funding is still on hold.  Republicans and the administration are blaming the Democrats asserting that long lines at airports are their fault.  The Democrats are blaming the Republicans, saying that they’ve offered up funding for everything except the bloated and overreaching INS. The Trump administration says that if they get the funding they want, they promise not to deport any US citizens, a kind of admission that they have been illegally deporting US decisions.  With all Republican Senators except Lisa Murkowski voting yes and all Democrats voting no, the voter squelching SAVE Act has now made it to the Senate floor for debate.  Republicans continue to insist that the Act is only about requiring voter IDs.  They’re lying, the Senate version also kills mail-in voting, and like the House version limits the types of IDs that would be acceptable, it requires that states provide the federal government with lots of voter information they shouldn’t get and so on.  Senate Leader John Thune continues to say that he won’t dispense with the 60-vote threshold required by the filibuster, so SAVE shouldn’t pass but Trump remains insistent, persistent, and desperate so stay posted.

Midterms:  Illinois Governor JB Pritzker is officially running for a third term and probably also running for president.  Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton, his candidate to replace retiring Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, won her primary yesterday beating out previous frontrunner Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi.  Since Trump hasn’t yet endorsed anyone in Texas, both incumbent Senator John Cornyn and AG Ken Paxton’s names will appear on the run-off ballot since the last day for either one to withdraw has now passed.  That means Republicans will be spending (wasting) more money on the runoff, not necessarily a bad thing.  

 

One Battle After Another  😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀🍀☘️

War, War, War:  The war that Trump says is only an excursion will be over when he “feels” it in his “bones” at which time, maybe this week, maybe in months or more, he’ll declare victory, say that Iran no longer has any nuclear capability and move on to more fun things like building his East Wing mega ballroom, emblazoning his name on more buildings, and disrupting the midterms. Victory declaration or not, with the Strait of Hormuz almost totally closed to ships from countries not allied with Iran and oil prices continuing to rise, a barrel of Brent Crude is somewhere around $103 this morning, Trump is now faced with having to deal with the Iranian stranglehold on the Strait and its impact on the economy, ours and others. Before the war he was told that keeping the Strait open would be a bigly problem but either he didn’t understand what he was told or chose to ignore the warning, figuring that since he alone can fix things he’d deal with the problem when he needed to.  Though he still doesn’t understand why Joint Chiefs of Staff General Caine can’t keep it open by shooting more missiles, Trump says that he’ll soon be announcing that he’s put together a coalition of countries to escort ships through the Strait of Hormuz.  Maybe he will, though it’s not yet clear which countries will participate or whether the coalition is another one of those things that Trump feels will happen in his bones.  In any case, getting that coalition together before starting the war probably would have been a better idea but planning isn’t one of Trump’s strong points and anyway, the Strait is one of the key reasons that previous US presidents, including Trump during his first administration, haven’t attacked Iran. Trump is now sending 2200 more Marines to the Middle East maybe to seize Iran’s key oil export terminal on Kharg Island if tanker traffic remains restricted.  Are we about to have boots on the ground? If we are, does that also mean that we’ll be at war with China and Russia, two countries who seem to be enjoying, even benefiting off of our mess?  🤷‍♀️ Stay tuned, but only to Fox.   

Press Freedom:  The war against Iran is just one of the wars that Trump is fighting right now.  With the help of War Pete and Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr, he’s ramped up his anti-press rhetoric, making threats against those media outlets that don’t report the rosy war stories he wants to hear.  On Friday, during his morning Pentagon news conference, War/Beer Pete’s outrageous performance included scripted attacks on the press for publishing “fake news.” He endorsed conservative media mogul David Ellison’s upcoming takeover of CNN, actually saying that “the sooner Ellison takes over the better,” the implication being that Ellison has agreed to Trump-wash CNN, along the lines of what Bari Weiss is in the process of doing to CBS News and what Jeff Bezos, who terminated his Middle East and Ukraine bureaus last month, has done to the ever shrinking Washington Post. Keeping with that theme, last night on his flight back from a weekend at Mar a Lago Trump responded to a reporter from ABC who asked him about the appropriateness of his PAC fundraising off of the dignified transfer of dead soldiers, thirteen at last count, by first asking where the reporter was from and then saying that ABC is “the most corrupt news organization on the planet….they’re terrible, I don’t want any more from ABC.” That strategy of attacking anyone who asks any question that he doesn’t like has become standard operating procedure for Trump.  Later last night, during what appears to have been a particularly agitated overnight Truth Social posting session, where he went off on a tangent about tariffs while laying into the Supreme Court, particularly the “disloyal” Justices he appointed, he asserted that all successful Iranian strikes were really AI generated, again berated the press for failing to acknowledge his 2020 election victory, and said that the “corrupt media outlets” should be brought up on treason adding that he was thrilled that Brendon Carr was looking at pulling the licenses of those “Highly Unpatriotic News Organizations.” The anti-press strategy is part of the autocrat playbook and though he’s not much of a reader, Trump appears to have memorized that chapter.  

More 💩:  Trump isn’t just furious with SCOTUS, like DC US Attorney Jeanine Pirro who threw a full on shxt fit on Friday, he’s bigly mad at DC District Court Judge Boasberg who took the highly unusual step of quashing two Justice Department subpoenas which targeted Fed Chair Jerome Powell.  Boasberg ruled that “There is abundant evidence that the subpoenas’ dominant (if not sole) purpose is to harass and pressure Powell either to yield to the President or to resign and make way for a Fed Chair who will…..The Government has offered no evidence whatsoever that Powell committed any crime other than displeasing the President.” Pirro, who if she wasn’t drunk during the press conference in which she lambasted Boasberg, sure sounded as if she was, says that she will be appealing Boasberg’s ruling.  North Carolina’s Senator Tillis, the Republican Senator who has grown cojones since announcing that he’s not running for reelection says that he will continue to hold up the confirmation of Trump’s choice to replace Powell if Pirro proceeds with her appeal which makes the appeal that much more idiotic but given how Trump went ballistic when the DOJ said that it wouldn’t appeal the rulings against his penalizing of law firms, it’s fair to assume that Pirro will stick with idiocy.  On the personnel front, Trump has fired Richard Grennell who had been heading up the Kennedy Center because someone has to be held responsible for all the entertainers who have cancelled their performances. However, Health Secretary RFK who last night posted a video of an AI generated beefed up version of himself wrestling with an oversized golden yellow twinkie, still has his job.           

 

 
Just an Excursion 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀

State of Play:  The Iran war, or as Trump inexplicably calls it, the Iran “excursion,” is going about as well as expected.  It turns out that going to war with Iran, a militarized nation motivated by religious fervor, in possession of what appears to be an inexhaustible number of missiles and drones, and with a population of 90 million people is somewhat more challenging than decapitating the leadership of Venezuela, a country with one third the population and a lot less weaponry.  Iran’s navy has suffered what is being described as catastrophic losses, but weakened or not, Iran has managed to strangle transit through the critical Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway that 20 to 30% of the world’s total oil consumption transits through.  As a result, the price of a barrel of Brent crude which had temporarily recovered after Trump falsely asserted that his excursion would be short lived, closed yesterday above $100. Trump wants us to believe that higher gas prices are good for Americans so on Thursday he actually babbled that “The United States is the largest Oil Producer in the World, by far, so when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money” but even he knows that’s an absurd thing to say, particularly in the run up to the midterms when affordability is a bigly issue which explains why he’s releasing 172 million gallons of oil from our strategic reserve. Last night he also lifted some of the sanctions against Russian oil, another attempt to help keep prices down, one that benefits Putin, a consequence that Trump finds convenient because after all its Vlad. Four more US servicemen died yesterday after their refueling jet crashed in neighboring Iraq and now the Iran excursion has reached the home front.  Over the weekend, two men, inspired by ISIS, came close to exploding IEDs in the residential area near NYC’s Gracie Mansion and yesterday another terrorist was killed while ramming a truck into a Michigan synagogue that housed a childhood center while still another ISIS inspired shooter shot up a classroom at Virginia’s Old Dominion University. A security officer was hurt but no one was killed during the Michigan attack largely because of the temple’s robust security but sadly one person, an ROTC instructor, was killed and two students were shot at Old Dominion. As to the attack at Michigan’s Temple Israel, it was hardly an isolated event, attacks on Jewish institutions are becoming increasingly frequent occurrences which is the reason that Temple Israel, like many other synagogues had security in place. There were shooting incidents at three Jewish temples in Toronto, Canada this week and yesterday, at the same time as the Michigan attack, Norway’s Trondheim synagogue, one of only two in Norway, a country with only 1500 Jews, was also being attacked.  The trend sucks, and anyone who thinks that anti-Zionism isn’t just code for anti-Semitism is either delusional or part of the problem.  One more thing, when Trump says excursion, he’s confusing excursion with incursion, not surprising since he’s the same guy who consistently says that asylum seeking refugees are people being released from mental institutions, so no one should be confused that Trump who according to his Aunt paid someone to take his SATs has a comprehension and vocabulary problem.  Anyway, excursion or incursion, it’s a war.   

Political Machinations:  Texas Senator John Cornyn who is locked in a runoff battle with Ken Paxton, his state’s Attorney General, is now embracing dispensing with the filibuster to pass the voter squelching SAVE Act even though he used to be an ardent supporter of the filibuster and the Act is a solution in search of a problem.  His change of heart is motivated by Paxton saying that he’ll only drop out of the race if the filibuster is dropped to pass the Act and is nothing more than a desperate attempt to get Trump’s endorsement.  So far Senate Leader John Thune continues to oppose getting rid of the filibuster rule to pass the SAVE Act however to placate Trump he will be bringing it to the Senate floor for “vigorous” debate even though the doesn’t have the votes to pass it.  Republicans plan to make it sound as if those “cheating” Democrats are for illegal voting.  Don’t be fooled, hardly any aliens or other illegal voters show up to the polls.  The sole purpose of the SAVE Act is to make it harder for people who tend to vote for Democrats to vote.  Trump is desperate to see the Act passed because he fears the consequences of losing the House and maybe even the Senate.  He’s also sent his election denier teams back to Arizona’s Maricopa County, part of his attempt to “prove” that he really won the 2020 election that he lost. If that sounds familiar, it is because it is. In 2021 a group of election deniers called the Cyber Ninjas examined the Maricopa ballots for cheating and traces of Chinese bamboo.  Not only did they validate Biden’s win, but they actually found more Biden votes, not that any of that matters to Trump and his acolytes. As to the midterms, while it’s far too early to focus on polls, a few revealing ones have started popping up.  In Ohio’s Governor race, Democrat Amy Acton is polling ten (!) points ahead of Republican/one-time presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy while former Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown is polling a few points ahead of current Senator/JD Vance replacement Jon Husted.  Texas polls show Democrat James Talarico slightly ahead of both Cornyn and Paxton, but it’s Texas and we’ve been fooled before.  Republicans are truly panicked about losing the House but are holding out hope that once the scads of money that Trump and his PACs have raised start funding campaigns their chances will improve.  They might not be wrong about that since Republicans have been outraising Democrats by a lot this cycle and money matters. Lastly, Congressman Jim Clyburn, the South Carolina Democrat and kingmaker whose support has been key to several presidential candidates announced yesterday that he’s running for reelection.  He’s 85-years-old but feeling pretty chipper, I guess.

More 💩:  FBI Director Kash Patel who has fired lots of skilled and experienced FBI Agents including those with experience dealing with domestic terrorism is teaming up with the UFC and has “top” ultimate fighters and mixed martial arts experts coming to FBI headquarters to provide FBI Agents with a two-day training session.   No word if any of them are Farsi speakers or even know any foreign languages but you have to give it to Patel, he may be a lousy FBI Director, but he knows how to keep boss Trump happy. Lastly, it turns out that those fears about Musk’s DOGE rats stealing our Social Security data were valid. The Department of Justice has now admitted that DOGE members improperly shared Social Security data using a non-government, unapproved third-party server, bypassing agency safety protocols.

 

L'eggs 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀

War:  The thing about having an administration led by a reality TV star and made up of broken toys, Fox news commentators, grifters, and real estate buddies is that you have an administration made up of broken toys, Fox news commentators, grifters, and real estate buddies.  That’s a problem under the best of circumstances but throw in a war, skirmish, or whatever the Iran escapade is being called today and it’s even more of a problem.  Trump’s unwillingness to assume responsibility for the bombing of the girls’ elementary school in Iran serves as an example of much of what’s wrong with him and his administration.  Bad things happen during wars and sometimes those bad things involve the accidental bombing of civilian targets. As Louisiana Senator John Kennedy said of the deaths at the school, Trump should say "It was terrible. We made a mistake… We would never do that intentionally. I think the department is investigating it now, and I'm sorry. I'm just so sorry it happened. It was a mistake."  Trump however is incapable of issuing apologies or admitting wrong so instead he’s doing what he does, deflecting and lying, claiming the tomahawk missile that hit the school must have come from some other country, maybe even Iran while asserting that lots of countries have those missiles.  The problem is that lots of countries don’t have those missiles, they’re made by Raytheon for us and we’ve only sold them to the UK, Australia and more recently Japan and the Netherlands and none of those countries shot missiles at Iran. Even worse, War Pete who has bragged about maximizing lethality has fired most of the Defense Department’s unit responsible for mitigating harm to civilians and for investigating civilian casualties during combat operations.  The Trump administration can’t even keep their story straight about the purpose of the war, they’re still vacillating between taking out the nukes, getting rid of the missiles, regime change, and the always popular Bibi and Israel made us do it. It’s hard to believe that no one warned Trump that going to war with Iran would impact oil prices and the equity markets, yet he seems shocked to see that it has.  Similarly, his response to Iran mining, or trying to mine, the critical Strait of Hormuz is tough talk and threats, rather than the implementation of any well thought out plan that should have been in his war quiver.  He’s rattled which might explain why he’s spewing more than his usual bit of nonsense.  For example, Monday night at the GOP retreat in Florida he said that there “were dead people walking around with no arms or legs.” WTF.  Additionally, he, or at the very least War Pete should have anticipated that Iran had what appears to be an unending supply of relatively inexpensive lethal drones, yet months ago the administration “brushed off an offer from Ukraine for assistance in strengthening defense systems against them.” Ukraine is helping us now, however, giving Trump’s antipathy to all things Zelenskyy he’s barely acknowledged the assistance.  Instead, he and his real estate buddy/negotiator Witkoff continue to insist, that their trusted good friend Vlad Putin isn’t helping Iran pinpoint US targets even though he is. Vlad is also benefitting from rising oil prices, a windfall that he’s using to bolster his economy and fund his war against Ukraine.  Sadly, our incompetence isn’t surprising given who’s in charge.  Seven Americans dead, somewhere around 140 wounded and it’s not clear what will have been accomplished when, or if, this war is ever over which isn’t to say that Iran isn’t hurting. Reports are that one of the reasons we haven’t seen the new Ayatollah Khamenei is because he was injured during the attack that killed the last one, the other reason is that he fears that he’s got a target on his back. There’s a reason that several members of the Iranian Women’s soccer team have decided to stay in Australia rather than return home, the bigly problem is that this war is unlikely to liberate Iran from the Ayatollahs and the IRGC or make it more hospitable to athletes who had the nerve to not sing their national anthem.

Midterm Madness: In addition to his nonsensical remark about legless people walking, Trump told his GOP apparatchik’s that the only way they can win in the midterms is by passing the SAVE Act. Forget about improving the economy or making things more affordable, Trump’s position is that making it more difficult for those who might vote for Democrats is the way to go. Anyone who thinks that the SAVE Act is just about making sure that non-citizens who almost never try to vote don’t vote, is delusional.  We don’t have an alien voting problem; we do however have a desperate president who wants to limit voting to those most likely to vote red because he fears the specter of a Democrat led Congress. Senate Leader John Thune continues to say that he won’t get rid of the filibuster to facilitate the passage of the SAVE Act.  However, to placate Trump he has agreed to bring the act up for a vote even though he doesn’t have the sixty votes necessary for its passage. Remember how much crap, Senator Schumer got for refusing to ditch the filibuster when he was the Senate leader, this is why he held firm.  Now we’d better hope that Thune sticks to his guns.  As to the midterms, Trump still hasn’t endorsed anyone in the Texas Republican Senate race but there were two notable primaries yesterday.  In Mississippi, 78 -year-old Democrat Bernie Thompson easily won a primary against a younger opponent whose chief argument was that it was time for a changing of the guard.  In Georgia in the special election for the seat that opened up as a result of Marjorie Taylor Greene’s departure from the House, Democrat Shawn Harris came out on top with 37% of the vote. Trump endorsed candidate Republican Clayton Fuller came in second with 35% of the vote.  Since neither received the requisite 50% of the vote, they will face off in a primary that will likely be won by Republican Fuller because though Democrat Harris performed well, once the Republican votes consolidate behind one Republican candidate he is expected to lose in the ruby red district. On a more positive note, in another special election Democrat Bobbi Boudman flipped a Republican state seat in New Hampshire. Those state elections don’t involve many votes but do appear to be indicative of a trend towards blue.

Faux US Attorneys:   On Monday, a federal judge ruled that the three-person leadership team of the New Jersey federal prosecutor’s office that had been put in place after Trump lawyer Alina Habba had overstayed her “temporary” status, was unlawful.  The judge said that Trump’s “insistence on handpicking US attorneys showed that the White House cared more about personal control than public safety.” He added that Trump’s continued reliance on unlawful mechanisms to appoint top federal prosecutors meant that “scores of dangerous criminals could have their cases dismissed or convictions eventually reversed.” Keeping with that theme, Federal judges in Milwaukee announced that they won’t extend former Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel’s temporary appointment as US Attorney for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, meaning his appointment will expire next week.  The judges said that they “await the nomination and confirmation of a full-time United States Attorney by the President and United State Senate.”  They may be waiting a long time because neither Attorney General Bondi nor Trump seem to care about the rules and both seem willing to let this problem fester even if the result is criminals getting away with criming. On a more gossipy note, Alina Habba who currently serves as Senior Advisor to the Attorney General for US Attorneys within the Department of Justice, focusing on national violent crime efforts whatever that really means, just divorced her second husband and moved to a house near Trump’s Mar a Lago club as one does when one is supposedly working for the federal government in DC. And though not a legal issue, RFK had rotor cuff surgery yesterday because maybe its not such a good idea for 72-year-olds to do pull-ups in airports?  As to airports, the DHS is restarting Global Entry because it’s also not such a good idea to punish Americans over the DHS funding battle by making lines at airports longer.     

More 💩:  Perhaps emboldened by the Iran war, or more likely because he is a hate filled bigot Tennessee Republican Congressman Andy Ogles who previously argued that NY Mayor Mamdani should be deported posted on social media on Monday that "Muslims don’t belong in American society.”  Though some Republicans including former Ambassador Richard Grennell who currently heads the Kennedy Center or what’s left of it called him out for his post, most have ignored it or shrugged it off but then again many of them previously ignored Florida Congressman Randy Fine’s saying that all Muslims should be deported. For his part Speaker Johnson, the we are a Christian nation guy, mumbled something about how while that wasn’t the language he would use, he understood the fear of Sharia law. Oy.          

 

 
Capping the News 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀

Just a Skirmish? The new leader of Iran is Mojtaba Khamenei. If that name sounds familiar it’s because it is, the new Khamenei is the very recently orphaned and widowed 56-year- old son of the 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei who was taken out at the beginning of the war.  Reports are that the new Khamenei’s hardline views and commitment to exporting the Islamic revolution abroad are the same as those of his deceased father and that he has very close ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards and was their favored candidate. It’s fair to assume that he’s hiding or at least trying to hide from incoming missiles.  Bloomberg News says he controls a secret, multimillion-pound London property portfolio which includes 11 properties with total holdings estimated over £100 million so it’s also fair to assume that wherever he’s hiding he isn’t lacking for creature comforts. As to missiles, there are lots of them going in both directions, hitting military and civilian sites on both sides.  Although Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian apologized for Iranian strikes on its neighboring Gulf states, facing criticism from other Iranian leaders he’s since backtracked and Iran has continued those attacks. Also, there are reports that Putin, another one of those with a vast empire outside of his country, is helping Iran pinpoint US targets. The war is either going according to plan or not going according to plan.  It’s going to end in days, weeks, months, or years.  Everything bad that happens is Israel’s fault, everything good is due to Trump’s acumen and why shouldn’t Putin who Trump still treats with kid gloves help Iran out?  Crude oil prices spiked to near $120 per barrel this morning before falling back to a still high $106.  Gas at the tank is heading north too but not to worry because Trump says the increase is temporary, but then again despite Friday’s job report, the one that showed February’s job loss at 92,000 and unemployment ticking up to 4.4%, he insists the economy is roaring.

Trump🧢: The press, at least the press on the left, got all bent out of shape over the weekend because Trump wore one of his baseball caps during what was supposed to be the dignified transfer of the returning remains of the American soldiers who died last week. May all their memories be a blessing.  Fox watchers were spared the 🧢 because Fox “accidentally” showed an earlier transfer where Trump wasn’t wearing one. The hat thing was disrespectful, but that’s the least of our problems. Trump clearly knows that which explains why he’s once again pushing very, very hard to pass an expanded version of the voter squelching SAVE Act, one that further limits mail-in voting while also including an anti-trans provision to excite his base.  He’s threatening to never again sign any legislation if the Senate doesn’t dispense with the filibuster to get it passed because he’s seen the polls and fears the consequences of losing control of the House and maybe even the Senate. The Department of Homeland Security funding package still hasn’t passed, not really a problem given all the extra money they were awarded in last year’s budget but an excuse to start making airport security lines long and slow.  And for some inexplicable reason, the White House has halted the release of a federal intelligence bulletin warning of a heightened terrorism threat within US. The road gets rockier from here, for Trump, for us, and for the world. As to the world, Trump’s talking Cuba now.  Maybe he, Marco Rubio and Bibi whisperer Linsdey Grahams think that with all eyes focused on the Middle East, few outside Miami will notice a little Caribbean excursion?   

More 💩:  South Carolina’s Post and Courier news has examined the accusations made by the woman who claims she was abused as a minor by both Epstein and Trump.  They’ve corroborated much of what she told the FBI about her life during her four interviews using “archived government records and news accounts.”  They found that the woman “provided verifiable details to agents about her family background and its legal entanglements. She offered the name of an Epstein business associate on South Carolina’s Hilton Head Island who became a central figure in the drama, with specifics that are reflected in public records.” Naturally, the White House still insists that she lied about everything and that her troubled past proves that she’s unreliable.  Sexual predators like Epstein tended to prey upon those who came from broken families living on the edge and those preyed upon often go on to have even more troubled lives so, if anything, her troubled past can be seen as more validation of her allegations. That said, the paper did not provide proof that she was sexually abused.  ICE Barbie Noem isn’t the only Trump person who is exiting. Vinay Prasad, the controversial head of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, is departing the agency for the second time in less than a year.  His departure follows drug industry criticism of his handling of vaccine and the impediments he’s put in front of rare disease drug reviews. To be clear, RFK still doesn’t like vaccines, but with the midterms coming the Trump administration wants to downplay that perhaps because measles epidemics don’t go over well with the electorate.  On the legal front, US Attorney/former Fox commentator Jeanine Pirro has given up on going after Biden and his autopen, largely because his use of an autopen for pardons was not illegal.  Despite her best efforts to prove otherwise, she knows that no Grand Jury would think that it was. Lastly, federal judge Royce Lamberth, a Reagan appointee, ruled that Kari Lake’s appointment as acting CEO of the US Agency for Global Media was illegal. The ruling voids all her actions since including the mass layoffs of hundreds of Voice of America journalists and staff. It’s fair to assume that the Trump administration will appeal the ruling because, why would we need Farsi speakers broadcasting messages when we are trying to rally the people of Iran?     

Bye Bye Barbie 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀

ICE Barbie Out:  By the end of March Kristi Noem will no longer be the Secretary of Homeland Security. Her departure means that Corey Lewandowski, her very special advisor, is out too.  Noem’s alleged affair with Lewandowski is just one of the reasons that she was ousted, not because of the affair itself, but because when she was asked about it during her House testimony, she attacked the questioners but failed to say that the rumors weren’t true because even she knew that would be a provable lie and that lying to Congress is illegal. While the affair didn’t help, it was her answers about the $220 million ad campaign that featured her in various cosplay outfits that was the last straw for Trump.  Overseeing DHS’s brutal operations and then calling the Americans who had been killed in Minneapolis terrorists, that was okay but telling Congress that Trump had personally approved a no-bid contract to a company that had been incorporated for only eight days which then subcontracted a significant amount of its “business” to a senior aide’s spouses, that was the last straw. Shortly after Trump denied knowledge of the sketchy contract, Trump axed Noem via a Truth Social Post, appointing her to a new and seriously bogus position: Special envoy for “The Shield of the Americas.” Presumably, her new position doesn’t include a plane with a cozy luxury suite, nor does she get to take lover Lewandowski with her. Trump was prepared with the Shield spot, because he had been given a heads up from Louisiana Senator John Kennedy that he planned to ask Noem about the contract during her Senate appearance.  That also explains why Trump had already teed up Noem’s replacement, Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin. Mullin has no applicable experience but he’s a former mixed martial arts fighter who looks good on TV where he has frequently appeared as an outspoken defender of Trump and his policies. Sitting Senators tend to skate through their confirmation hearings, so it’s expected that Mullin will be confirmed although, he might want to send flowers to Homeland Security Chair Rand Paul who he previously called a “freaking snake.”

Peeps: Under pressure from Republican party leaders, the real freaking snake, Tony Gonzales, the Texas congressman who had an affair with the aide who then committed suicide by self-immolation has dropped his reelection bid. Canoodling with aides violates ethics rules but Gonzalez is not being forced to depart Congress right this second because Speaker Johnson can’t afford to lose another member of his caucus. As a result of Gonzales’s departure from the race, Brandon Herrera, the far-right gun activist who had been scheduled to face off against him in a May runoff will advance to the general election. Johnson’s majority is so precarious that he has asked Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt not to appoint any of Oklahoma’s sitting Representatives, all Republicans, to the Senate seat being vacated by soon to be DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. In other runoff news, it’s not clear if the one between incumbent Senator John Cornyn and State Attorney General Ken Paxton will go forward.  Under pressure from Senate Leader John Thune who wants to save his money for the general election race against Democrat Senate candidate James Talarico rather than spend some of it in a contentious Texas runoff, Trump said that he plans to endorse one of them, most likely Cornyn, and wants the unendorsed one, probably Paxton, to drop from the race. The problem is that Paxton isn’t going down without a fight.  After saying that he plans to stay in the race with or without Trump’s endorsement, Paxton then said that he’ll drop out only if Republicans dispense with the filibuster to pass the voter squelching SAVE Act. That’s not likely to happen largely because Thune doesn’t plan to get rid of the filibuster. This will probably play itself out over the next day or so, maybe Trump can create a Shield of the Galaxy position for Paxton? It’s not just Texas, something’s up in Montana. Minutes before the window for filing election paperwork expired, incumbent Republican Senator Steve Daines who previously served in Republican leadership surprised almost everyone by announcing that he won’t be running for reelection. Obviously, he did give a heads up to one person because Republican prosecutor Kurt Alme then filed his paperwork to run on the Republican ticket with only seconds to spare. Until 2024, Montana had a Democratic Senator, Jon Tester, so with Daines out of the picture it’s conceivable that the Dems stand a chance, albeit a very small one of picking up the seat. Crossing the aisle, North Carolina’s incumbent Congresswoman Valerie Foushee’s Bernie Sanders endorsed opponent Nida Allam has conceded her loss and will not be requesting a recount, meaning that despite the anti-AIPAC forces campaigning against her, Foushee who did not accept any AIPAC money this cycle will be the Democrat’s nominee and, in all likelihood will keep her House seat.  Lastly in other people news, the Florida Bar has launched an investigation into Lindsey Halligan, who for a time served as faux US Attorney for Virginia.  Florida Bar investigations take years to complete so Halligan is safe for now but the investigation is probably one of the reasons that the Department of Justice posted a notice in the Federal Register that it is seeking to intervene in state bar association reviews.  That’s not kosher but then again Pam Bondi is the Attorney General and it’s not like she’s all that into rules although yesterday the DOJ finally posted the three previously hidden interviews of the Epstein victim who asserts that as a tween she was assaulted by Trump.  The interviews, which the White House of course asserts are full of lies made by an obvious liar, are gruesome.     

War:  Neither the House nor the Senate managed to pass a war powers resolution but maybe it doesn’t matter because despite Trump saying that we’re at war, Speaker Johnson says that we’re only involved in a skirmish. Spoiler alert, it’s a war and though Israel’s El Al has resumed some flights it’s still on and is likely to continue for a long, long time. Also, despite earlier reports that Israel was responsible for the bombing of an Iranian girls school in Minab the NY Times reports that the missile that was aimed at an IRGC naval base but which hit the school, killing over one hundred girls, was shot off by the US though so far no one in authority in the US has acknowledged that. Anyway, War Pete will probably label the NY Times report as fake news because that’s what he does.  And since irony remains a thing, the US has asked Ukraine’s Zelenskyy for help countering Iranian drones. Apparently, those Iranian built drones have been used by Russia against Ukraine and Zelenskyy’s military tech wizards have developed some specialized interceptors.   

 

 

Furies and Scapegoats 😱 ✡️🌻😱 💣🚀

The W Word:  Operation Fury is definitely a war though for technical reasons, the Trump administration would rather that no one use the W word.  Voting on the war’s legitimacy may be cathartic but with the war ongoing it’s akin to closing the barn door after the horse has bolted.  Nevertheless Congress, mostly but not only Democrats, is trying to move forward with some type of war powers resolution. As to the rationale for the war, you’d think that an administration made up of former Fox hosts would have worked on its messaging, but apparently not as evidenced by War Pete’s bellicose performance during the Pentagon’s press conference.  Depending on who’s speaking and the vagaries of the weather, the war is about regime change, nukes, missiles, freeing long-suffering Iranians, and/or because Bibi made Trump do it. While it’s fair to say that Bibi has been pushing to take Iran out for many years and through several administrations, including Trump’s first one, Trump’s the one in charge. The buck stops with him, if he had made it clear that he didn’t want the Iran attack to go forward, Bibi would have been unhappy, but the war wouldn’t be happening.  That said, Bibi, Israel, and “the Jews” make for good scapegoats so the scapegoating is on and will likely continue although Trump must have read Secretary of State Rubio the riot act because he’s pulled back on the “blame it on Bibi” assertion, at least for now. As to war logistics, is anyone really surprised that our crackerjack administration didn’t anticipate that they’d need to help American civilians stuck in the warzone get back home? The US doesn’t even have confirmed ambassadors in Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Egypt, Kuwait, Algeria, Libya, or Iraq; not because the Senate hasn’t confirmed them but because Trump hasn’t nominated any. Remember when Trump said: “I only can fix it,” he meant it, and anyway aren’t son-in-law Jared and real estate buddy Witkoff enough of a tag team? Maybe that’s why FBI guy Kash fired a whole bunch of counter-intelligence agents with Iran expertise.  Given Trump’s preference for military action, including last night’s operation against Ecuadorean drug traffickers, is anyone really surprised about reports that our stock of munitions is running low? Maybe a lack of arms will prevent Trump from moving on to Cuba, then again, maybe not. As to Iran, leadership vacuum or not, they’ve got a huge Revolutionary Guard force, estimated at one million. Their strategy of shooting missiles at neighbors, presumably part of an effort to pressure them to force an end to the hostilities may have sounded good in the bunker but appears to be having the opposite effect, at least for now. Lots of fury, no end in sight. It would be really great if Operation Epic Fury succeeds but that’s likely wishful thinking.

Primarily Yours: With 53% of the vote, Texas State legislator James Talarico, the moderate Christian minister, comfortably beat Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett, the firebrand, by 7 points to become the Democratic candidate for the Senate. Talarico’s victory was marred by some controversy due to Texas’ recent redistricting and changes in rules about where voters could cast their ballots.  Crockett is right to be upset about some of her Dallas area voters losing access but even if their votes had counted, Talarico would have been the winner. Unlike the Democrats, Republicans don’t yet have a candidate.  Incumbent Senator John Thune received the most votes in the Republican primary, barely, but with only 41.8% of the vote he fell far short of the 50% needed to win so he’ll face off on May 26 in a runoff against Attorney General Ken Paxton, the impeached, morally flawed candidate that Democrats think they could, well maybe, beat in the fall. Had Trump weighed in there probably wouldn’t be a Republican runoff, but because he didn’t Republicans will have to spend boatloads more money for the runoff and then probably boatloads more to try to win the general election.  In other Texas news, Dan Crenshaw, the Republican congressman best known for his eyepatch lost to far right MAGA candidate Steve Toth. Tony Gonzales, the Republican Congressman whose distraught ex-girlfriend self-emulated came in second in his race and will now be going to a runoff against his opponent MAGA gun activist Brandon Herrrera.  On the Democratic side Al Green a victim of redistricting best known for initiating the Trump impeachments came in second in his race against fellow Democratic Congressman Christian Menefee, another redistricting victim.  Their race is also expected to go to a runoff. As of now it looks like former Congressman Colin Alred will also face a runoff against fellow Democrat Julie Johnson, who replaced him when he ran for the Senate and lost. Moving east, in North Carolina former Governor Roy Cooper easily won the state’s Democratic Senate primary and will face off against Republican Michael Whatley who also easily won his primary. North Carolina is viewed as the Democrats most likely chance to pick-up a Senate seat.  In a closely watched North Carolina House election, it appears that Congresswoman Valerie Foushee may have managed to eke out a victory against her Bernie Sanders endorsed challenger Nida Allam. Foushee had been facing criticism for her earlier support of Israel.  Lastly, in Arkansas, Democrat Alex Holloday didn’t just flip a state legislative seat, but he won in double digits.  That’s not the kind of thing that’s supposed to happen in Arkansas.

More 💩:  On Monday, the DOJ announced that it would not appeal its losses in the cases brought by the law firms standing up to Trump.  Ketchup must have started flying at the White House because on Tuesday the DOJ did a 180, telling the court that it had changed its mind and would pursue the appeals.  Although no one was throwing ketchup during her Senate hearing, ICE Barbie Noem probably wished she was at a McDonalds because not only was she set upon by a few Democratic Senators, but she was also slammed by a few Republicans including North Carolina’s Thom Tillis who now that he’s no longer running for reelection has found his cojones.  Tillis told her she should be impeached, questioned her competency, and even attacked her for bragging about killing her dog. Tillis is a known dog lover so that dog thing real set up on fire.  While he didn’t bring up the slaughtered dog, Louisiana’s John Kennedy, a Rhodes Scholar who frequently pretends to be a country bumpkin, laid into her as well.  Lastly, since there is always more on Epstein, reports are that with the Iran war raging, the DOJ has been disappearing more files.  Also, Commerce Secretary Lutwick has agreed to meet with the Oversight Committee.