Adios Amigo 😱 ✡️🌻 😱 🚀🚢 🗳️

The Morass:  The WSJ reports that thinking he could get Iran to fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz, Trump was ready to declare victory without achieving a nuclear deal with Iran.  The problem is that Iran’s leadership, smelling his desperation, isn’t cooperating. They see what everyone sees, that the US midterms are looming and that the US economy is suffering so perceiving they have the upper hand they’re seeking billions of US dollars, the removal of all troops in the region, an end to the US naval blockade and in exchange they want to maintain control over and monetize the Strait passage. What a conundrum for Trump, he went to war to get rid of Iran’s nukes and now not only won’t he achieve that goal. but he’s lost a critical transit point. Even for him, the master of deception, that’s hard to spin. Further complicating the regional mess, we’re not the only country with elections looming.  Israel’s, scheduled to take place in October, are right around the corner so it’s no surprise that Trump’s plan for Gaza is falling flat too because fighting for his political life and to stay out of an Israeli jail, Netanyahu isn’t all that interested in making concessions either.  Turns out that like health care and just about everything else Trump has promised to fix in two weeks, achieving Middle East peace is complicated, really complicated.   

Domestic Issues: My suggestion that Todd Blanche’s confirmation was up in the air was wishful thinking because on Friday afternoon Dead Man Walking Senator Bill Cassidy caved.  Stammering during a convoluted speech where he essentially justified voting for Blanche by insisting that everyone would be better off if Trump had a confirmed Attorney General who was competent even if that competence involved facilitating all the evil things he demands, Cassidy threw his support behind Blanche. It was painful to watch Cassidy eat what was left of his soul, especially since, like his vote for RFK’s confirmation, we’re the ones who will suffer.  Then again, suffering, at least for those not related to Trump, is all the vogue these days.  As revealed by Friday’s unexpectedly depressing report, 23,000 people lost their jobs in July.  Unemployment ticked down a smidge but only because hundreds of thousands of people dropped out of the workforce.  It’s not just jobs or the lack thereof, that’s a problem, gas prices are once again increasing due to uncertainty about who will or will not be able to transit through the Strait of Hormuz.  If the “it’s the economy stupid”  mantra holds the midterms might really go against Trump and his Maga-tized Republican party assuming that he doesn’t manage to disrupt the elections, and all indications are that he’ll try.  

Senate Machinations: Now that he’s won his primary Michigan Democrat Abdul El Sayed is trying to shimmy back towards a more middle ground or at the very least to a left of center spot that makes him more acceptable to a wider swath of his state’s voters.  That shift involves him saying that he “loves and reveres the Jewish People,” a variation of Trump pointing to Hershel Walker while saying “I have a Black friend.” It has worked for Trump so it might work for El Sayed 🤷‍♀️.  El Sayed appears to still be standing by the left-wing’s current darling, anti-Semitic streamer Hasan Piker, excusing Piker’s remark that the US deserved 9.11, by more or less saying everyone’s allowed to say stupid things now and then.  The Cook Political Report now has Michigan’s Senate race as a toss-up.  With so much attention on Michigan and on Maine, it would be easy to miss the odd goings on in a few other Senate races.  Democratic candidates aren’t fielding party candidates in Nebraska, Idaho, and South Dakota.  Instead, Democrats are supporting Independent candidates in the hope that they’ll be more electable and if any of them win, that they’ll caucus blue.  In Nebraska, the Independent candidate running against Republican incumbent Pete Ricketts is Dan Osborn; in South Dakota it is Brian Beng running against Republican incumbent Mike Rounds; and in Idaho it is Todd Achilles challenging Republican incumbent Jim Risch.  To date Alani Bankhead, the Democrat running against Republican Kurt Alme in Montana who became the Republican’s candidate when Senator Steve Daines announced he wasn’t running at the last possible minute, has withstood the pressure to pull out.. However, a number of Democrats including former Democratic Senator Jon Tester have endorsed her Independent opponent Seth Bodnar and are calling for her to exit the race by the end of today, the deadline for being taken off of the ballot.  Also, tomorrow is special primary day in South Carolina.  Even with Trump’s endorsement it’s not clear that Lindsey Graham’s sister Darline will be able to get the 50% of the vote needed to secure her candidacy since the Republican field is very crowded so a runoff at the end of the month is highly likely.

More 💩:  Writing that “Each President is a temporary tenant, not the owner, of the White House and its Executive Residence. The President has no … constitutionally assigned authority over that property, which is designed and maintained for the use of all Presidents, current and future, and for the American people. … Whether or not a massive ballroom should be constructed is for Congress to decide and is not a matter for Executive self-help,” The US Appeals court ruled that Trump has to stop work on his east wing ballroom.  Trump is now rebranding the ballroom project calling it a “military center” in the hopes that doing so will help him circumvent the ruling.  He’s also pushing hard to get US Attorney for DC Janine Pirro of Fox and Wine fame to bring back the charges she dropped against the Olympic canoer and the others who according to him deserve to be severely punished for destroying the Reflecting Pond that he and his contractors destroyed. With regard to birthright citizenship, it’s not just babies born to “birth tourists” and people who “hate” America, that he wants to strip citizenship rights from, he wants to take them from children born in US territories like Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, and Guam.  Puerto Ricans were granted citizenship by Congress by legislation passed in 1917; Trump wants that legislation revoked.  Weird how he’s all in on giving citizenship to white South Africans but wants to strip it from Puerto Ricans.  He must really hate Bad Bunny.