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.