Iran Is Not Winning Friends in Region. What If Trump Were a Democrat? Eyes on Texas Primary. Nurse Ratched Now a Committed Lefty. More
As the Middle Eastern conflict enters its fourth day, Iran is lashing out with “indiscriminate” strikes across the Gulf of Oman—so indiscriminate that Iran took out one of its own oil-transporting “ghost” ships.
Iran is operating with—shall we say—a slimmed down roster of top leaders. The New York Post cover features a scowling President Trump with the headline “Wait for the Big One.” The U.S. appears to have sunk the entire Iranian navy. Satellite images analyzed by the New York Times show an Iranian naval base and four ships on fire:
No notable salvaging efforts are visible.
“No, Marco Rubio Didn’t Claim That Israel Dragged Trump into War with Iran” National Review responds to the latest canard from the President’s critics:
Trump isn’t exactly shy about pressuring people into doing what he wants….People are free to agree or disagree with Trump’s decision, but it’s patently clear that Rubio was not trying to argue that Israel dragged the U.S. into this war.
“An Emboldened Israel Is Seizing Opportunities to Remake Region” is the headline on a New York Times analysis. Is there some other country in the Middle East you’d prefer to remake the region?
“Iran Is Collapsing, but Islamism Is Spreading,” Ayan Hirsi Ali writes in The Free Press. “The fall of the Islamic Republic would be a defeat for political Islam. But an election in Britain and an attack in Texas suggest that Islamism poses an increasing threat to the West,” she argues.
Meanwhile, Wall Street Journal columnist Gerard Baker makes the case for “cautious optimism” about President Trump’s strikes on Iran:
So if regime change doesn’t come now, what kind of regime survives? Leaderless, impoverished, isolated, besieged, mostly disarmed, is Iran likely to be stronger after being on the receiving end of a campaign from the most technologically sophisticated and best-equipped militaries in the world? There are risks, and news of the first U.S. casualties reminds us that the costs are dear. But for an opportunistic president, there may never be a better opportunity.
“Trump Tries to Avoid the Iraq Trap” is the headline on international affairs guru Walter Russell Mead’s column. Mead writes that Trump “practices 21st-century gunboat diplomacy” in Venezuela and Iran:
The attack is the biggest gamble of Mr. Trump’s political career. A success that ends nearly half a century of brutal, bigoted and utterly unscrupulous rule by a clique of fanatical clerics would serve both the American national interest and the welfare of humanity. Failure could irreparably dent Mr. Trump’s prestige abroad, shatter his political coalition, and destroy his authority at home.
The early stages of battle should leave Mr. Trump hopeful.
There are several other good articles on Iran on the Wall Street Journal’s Opinion pages this morning. An editorial contends that Iran has expanded the “Trump coalition” by attacking its Arab neighbors. “Iran was counting on the West’s cravenness,” writes Scalia Law School Professor Eugene Kontorovich but instead was met by the “confluence of brave and aligned leaders in Washington and Jerusalem.” Bill McGurn asks what would happen if Trump were a Democrat. He’d talk a good game but not act.
Along these lines, you might enjoy “Why Trump and Hegseth’s Swagger Leaves Washington’s ‘Elite’ Seething,” by Glenn Reynolds in the New York Post.
The midterms begin today with the primaries for a Senate seat in Texas. “I hope Crockett wins Texas primary so she can lose in November” is USA TODAY’s conservative columnist Nicole Russell’s headline. The latest Emerson poll has Texas AG Ken Paxton, MAGA darling, ahead of Senator John Cornyn but Cornyn is by no means out of the game. The shooting in Austin, by a man wearing a “Property of Allah” T-shirt, and a spewer of hatred, has become a campaign issue. The shooting also should put a spotlight on security for all of us during this tense time. “Memo to Dems: There’s a War On — Stop Blocking Funds for Homeland Security” is the headline over a New York Post editorial.
The Supreme Court has blocked California’s restrictions on telling parents that their children identify as transgender. You likely know who voted how:
The Supreme Court on Mondaybarred California from enforcing state rules that restrict when schools can notify parents about students who come out as transgender and requires teachers to use children’s preferred pronouns.
The court, on a 6-3 vote on ideological lines, allowed a federal judge’s ruling in favor of parents who oppose the policy on religious grounds to go into effect. The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had put the judge’s decision on hold pending further litigation.
The Associated Press headline says that the Court blocked “outing transgender students to their parents in California.” Outing to their parents? “Who says Democrats have learned their lesson about ‘gender-affirming’ treatments for kids?” begins a City Journal article in an Oregon law that would hide data about gender procedures for children?”
The Supreme Court also sided with New York Republican Rep. Nicole Meliotakis, who challenged a Democratic redistricting plan:
Over the dissent of the court’s three liberal justices, the conservative majority halted a state court ruling that had ordered New York’s redistricting commission to redraw the district held by Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y., that covers Staten Island and a small piece of Brooklyn. A judge had ruled that the district was drawn in a way that dilutes the power of its Black and Hispanic voters and had instructed the state’s Independent Redistricting Commission to complete a new map.
We’re just now getting the full story (with video) of Hillary Clinton’s dramatic threatened walk out during her Epstein House Oversight Committee hearing after Rep. Lauren Boebert leaned a picture of the proceedings (against the rules). Also, here.
On the other hand, we might never have gotten the true figures from the Mamdani administration about the number of New Yorkers who froze to death in the snow without the relentless digging of the New York Post:
Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s administration admitted that an additional seven New Yorkers froze to death indoors — bringing the tally of fatalities from the recent stretch of frigid weather to 29.
The updated death toll was only released after The Post pressed the admin Monday on a list showing 31 possible fatalities that was circulated in City Hall and some agencies during the historic cold snap in mid-January to early February.
A City Hall representative said seven more indoor deaths that occurred between Jan. 23 and Feb. 10 were ruled as being caused by hypothermia, bringing the total number of New Yorkers who died from the cold at home to 14.
“Why Are So Many Nurses Left-Wing?” is the alarming headline on a City Journal article. It begins:
National Nurses United has a message for the White House: “ICE messed with the wrong profession.” After intensive-care nurse Alex Pretti was killed in Minneapolis last month, the union’s members called U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement a “fascist, terrorizing, and lawless paramilitary force violently enforcing a white supremacist agenda.” In another statement, the union called federal immigration enforcement agencies one of America’s “top public health threats,” adding to a string of similar declarations it made about racism, climate change, and Israeli “apartheid.”
The helping professions—occupations like therapy, social work, and nursing—have increasingly drifted from their traditional roles as carers and embraced social-justice advocacy. These fields have long leaned left and female, but the skew has recently intensified, following broader trends in academia. Progressives now vastly outnumber conservatives, creating an echo chamber that has radicalized a segment of the workforce.
In “J.D. Vance’s Iran Dilemma” The Free Press’s Eli Lake suggests, “The vice president is caught between Donald Trump and Tucker Carlson.” Vance went on Jesse Waters show last night to talk about Iran. Did he put to rest the notion that the strikes go against his long held beliefs?
