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Author: Charlotte Hays

Venezuelan Earthquakes. Mamdani Earthquake: Do Old Guard Dems Know What Hit Them? Testy Trump-GOP Meeting On Hill. Iran. Wacky Wiki. Contrarian Take on an Independent Woman. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

This is a morning to think about earthquakes.

Venezuela faces a difficult recovery from the two historically strong earthquakes that devastated the country after hitting in rapid succession. Up to a hundred are feared dead as President Trump vows to help.

Unlike the people of Venezuela, the Democratic Party doesn’t quite seem to understand what hit them. The Mamdani Earthquake, which hit full force in New York on Tuesday, is historic.

An editorial in the Wall Street Journal (“The Socialist Democrats of America”) explores the meaning of the “Mamdani left” on the Democratic Party and the country at large:

It’s tempting to dismiss Tuesday’s primary sweep by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) as an artifact of weird New York City. It is that, but also more. The victories by Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s slate of leftists will change the Democratic Party—and perhaps the politics of the country…

This shows the DSA is highly organized and can get out the vote of the young progressives who have replaced the white centrist voters who have fled New York.

It’s hard to overstate how far to the left the Mamdani slate is. Aber Kawas, who won the primary for a state Senate seat, has said she found it “reprehensible” to apologize for 9/11 when America hasn’t apologized for its “system of capitalism, and racism and white supremacy.” We guess she won’t be going to the 25th anniversary ceremony at Ground Zero…

Another reason for the socialist rise is that mainstream liberals put up so little resistance. Like other Democrats, Mr. Espaillat shares the socialist left’s goals but wants to get there more gradually. This is a feeble answer when angry voters want immediate progress. The defeated Democrats in New York refused to make principled arguments against socialism or the antisemitism of the Mamdani left.

After Tuesday they may offer even less resistance. 

Only 7 per cent of registered voters turned out, mostly young and white. The New York Post calls them “The Young and the Clueless.”  The situation presents “a governing nightmare” for Democrats, according to an editorial in the Washington Post. City Journal notes that the Mamdani socialists are prepared to storm Congress. This should be a “jolt for complacent Democrats.” A Wall Street Journal Free Expression calls the Mamdani socialists “The Radicals Inside the Tent:”

Mainstream Democrats hope far-left insurgents will settle down after arriving in Washington. They’re in for an ugly surprise.

Columnist Hugh Hewitt writes that the current situation stems from the the Obama years:

This is the third act in a three-act tragedy.

First, former President Barack Obama’s achievement-free eight years atop the country and the Democratic Party saw a generation of federal, state and local Democratic youngsters get wiped out in the political earthquakes of 2010, 2014 and 2016. Obama always took care of himself, but left the party to the ossified care of Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer to collectively run, and they ran it aground.

Trump Derangement Syndrome, which consumed Democrats, Hewitt asserts “left the party without a platform or a leader of any ability or charisma who wasn’t also eligible for Social Security.” Part three was the “passing of the baton” from Senator Bernie Sanders to the energetic AOC.

Mamdani socialists are hostile to the state of Israel and Jews in general. This leaves Commentary editor John Podhoretz to observe that “We’re in a Waking Nightmare.” Mark Halperin writes about “How Israel Became the Biggest Litmus Test in American Politics.” It has to do with bad ideas.

It wasn’t quite an earthquake, but President Trump stunned Republicans yesterday when at the last minute he cancelled the signing ceremony for a bipartisan housing bill. The President says he won’t sign the popular housing bill until Congress passes the Save America Act (which would require an ID to vote). If a bill passed by both the House and Senate is ignored and not signed within ten days, it automatically becomes law. It’s unclear what Trump plans to do. A Wall Street Journal editorial says Trump was right not to sign the Elizabeth Warren backed housing bill, even though he did so for what the editors believe is the wrong reason.

But the President still turned up for a scheduled meeting with Capitol Hill Republicans, which did not go smoothly:

President Trump’s meeting with Republican senators on Wednesday turned testy, and at one point, he sternly told Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy to sit down, after questions arose about the War Powers Resolution, according to sources directly familiar with the meeting. 

Cassidy had been trying to respond to the president, telling the president he should sit down — but Cassidy later relented, saying he would be seated, but not at Mr. Trump’s behest. …

The more-than-hourlong meeting with Mr. Trump focused mostly on the Iran war and the War Powers Resolution. On Tuesday, the Senate approved a Democrat-led resolution to keep the president from ordering further military action in Iran. Four Republicans voted in favor of the concurrent resolution, which is symbolic and does not carry the force of law.

Senator Cassidy lost his Senate primary for the GOP nomination to a Trump-backed opponent. Key Republican Senators switched their votes after the meeting, causing the war powers resolution to fail.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, whose miserable demeanor while President Trump outlined the Iran deal has been much remarked upon, is traveling among our Gulf allies. Amid deep Israeli dissatisfaction with the deal, Rubio this morning assured Gulf allies that a Hormuz toll or fees just won’t happen.

Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance is touting “our new relationship with Iran,” which Sohrab Ahmari in turn touts at Unherd. Larry Kudlow also touts the Iran agreement as “Neither Neocon or Obama–and It Is Working.” An op-ed in the WSJ warns the administration not to help Iran prop up its terror proxy Hezbollah. Karl Rove in the same outlet takes stock of the political peril for a deal with Iran.

Our friend Emily Jashinsky writes that Trump’s fraud crackdown is an easy win. To that point, Fox Digital reports on a Michigan childcare provider that collected $1.1M in taxpayer funds despite no visible signs of operating. There were no children anywhere to be found.

It’s so unfair when somebody gets a stiff prison sentence just for killing an innocent person. I mean, c’mon. Kirsten Fleming documents the “Free Karmelo” movement:

It’s been two weeks since Karmelo Anthony was found guilty of murder, and the lies keep rolling out….

I’ll give [Sunny] Hostin this: She and her “View” crew aren’t as bad as the ghouls posting AI images of themselves urinating on [teen-aged murder victim] Metcalf’s grave. Nor are they as depraved as the disgusting teens on TikTok doing the “Austin Bop,” where they dance around pretending to stab themselves in the heart.

Shorts …

You likely remember the horrific photo of a girl being napalmed in Vietnam. Who really took the photo? New doc explores alleged AP coverup of real photographer of Vietnam’s most horrifying image.

Wacky Wiki. It doesn’t help to promote balance and fairness at Wikipedia:

Left-leaning website Wikipedia has taken the drastic action of permanently blocking one of its founders from editing pages — after he had campaigned to make it more balanced and fair.

Last month, Larry Sanger launched WikiProject Intellectual Diversity (WID), a group designed to help reinforce the online encyclopedia’s “original, firm commitment to intellectual diversity,” by emphasizing neutrality and transparency.

Refreshingly Contrarian. “Great Americans: The Strange Dependence of an Independent Woman” is the headline on a Free Press entry into a series. The subject is Eliza Lucas Pinckney, who at 16 was thrust into running her family’s vast properties:

Eliza Lucas Pinckney (1722–1793) is an ideal figure to help us think through the meanings of independence. She forged a far more independent life than what we might imagine was possible for an 18th-century woman. Yet her life also reveals that no one, at any time, lives a truly independent life, whether a founding father or a 21st-century American.

Socialists Paint New York Red. Big Winner Says: Forgot My Napkins So I’ll Wipe My Dirty Hands on American Flag. Scott Bessent: Hamilton! Freddy Hearts U.S. Sad Guthrie Update. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

New York, New York: It’s Mamdani’s town.

A “socialist earthquake” in New York has left “Democrats reeling” as Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s three chosen candidates swept to victories last night in New York’s Democratic primaries:

Progressive allies of Zohran Mamdani swept through New York’s primaries Tuesday, handing defeats to mainstream Democrats in deep-blue congressional districts and boosting the New York City mayor’s standing as a kingmaker in the party.

Former New York City Comptroller Brad Lander ousted incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman in a race that centered on Israel and the war in Gaza. State Assemblywoman Claire Valdez and community organizer Darializa Avila Chevalier, members of the Democratic Socialists of America, defeated Democratic candidates endorsed by establishment leaders. …

All of the candidates endorsed by Mamdani have called for the dismantling of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and want additional housing and other measures to make life affordable for working families. They are also highly critical of the Israeli government and the war in Gaza.

One of the Mamdani Three, Darializa Avila Chevalier, whose defeat of Rep. Adriano Espaillat practically assures a win in November, has a history of virulently anti-America rhetoric, having called the United States “a f—–g disgrace”:

Darializa Avila Chevalier, 32, is a community organizer who studied at Columbia University where she was known for leftist agitation and her membership in a group called Columbia University Apartheid Divest that would later post “Death to America” on its social media.

Avila Chevalier, who positioned herself further to the left than powerful progressives including former Vice President Kamala Harris, has faced scrutiny for her stance on private property, police, borders and calls to nationalize large swaths of the private sector in now-deleted posts from 2018 to 2022.

“I forgot to get napkins so I just wiped my hand on the American flag behind me,” she reportedly said.

Last night was a win or the radical, anti-Israel wing of the Democratic Party. The New York Post dubs it the “Hate Slate.” The Free Press’s Peter Savodnik and Olivia Reingold:

On Tuesday, radical House candidates won big in the city. ‘It doesn’t feel safe to be Jewish anymore.’

Townhall’s Matt Vespa has the tweets. Here’s one from David Marcus:

Decades of black and Hispanic political power in New York City were just seized by Muslim Marxists.

Dream Dies. In other New York election news, National Review’s Jeffrey Behar notes that “Alas, there will be no Kennedy resurgence in the Democratic Party,” as JFK grandson Jack Schlossberg lost his bid for Jerry Nadler’s old seat. Also looser: Anti-Trumper George Conway, in the same silk-stocking district. AOC’s win was never in doubt.

Alan Wilson, boosted by last-minute Trump endorsement (he also endorsed the other candidate), win the GOP primary for Governor of South Carolina.

Here’s something that’s not going to be popular with New York’s new Socialist leaders: A Federal appeals court yesterday ruled in favor of the Trump administration’s efforts to fast-track deportations for illegal immigrants. Meanwhile, alleged Antifa members received decades-long prison sentences from a federal Judge in Texas for violent anti-ICE protests.  Several received sentences as long as 100 years. Even with probation ….

I don’t believe this: Iran is trying to promote the incredible idea that ordinary women, without their headscarves, are taking to the streets on their own initiative to rally for the regime. But I do believe this: More of Iran’s brave women are taking the risk of ignoring the regimes hijab rules. The ink on the Iran deal wasn’t even dry on the deal before the regime ordered 74 lashes for this female singer.

Many Israeli leaders are hopping mad at President Trump for the way the Jewish state was treated in the Iran deal. There is also widespread consternation about Iran’s alleged scourge of “jellyfish” drones:

The unsettling swarm of drones that a downed US pilot in Iran said moved in a bizarre “jellyfish-like” formation indicates the Iranian regime has devoted significant resources to beefing up its drone program — so it can counter the conventional battlefield tech of its rivals.

“They are adapting faster than us,” Brett Velicovich, drone expert and founder of Powerus, told The Post.

“Iran has spent years developing capabilities designed to offset the overwhelmingly conventional advantages of the United States and its allies.”

President Trump “took bold actions other Presidents never dared,” write Reuel Marc Gerecht and Ray Takeyh in the Wall Street Journal, but Iran has plans to consolidate its power.

Forget the Song and Dance. Unlike the cast of Lin Manuel Miranda play about Alexander Hamilton, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent doesn’t sing and dance about the Founding Father. But I’d be more inclined to take seriously Bessent’s WSJ piece headlined “Hamilton Inspires Trump’s Economic Statecraft:”

First, economic security begins with national capacity. We have rediscovered at great cost what Alexander Hamilton taught us: that every nation “ought to endeavor to possess within itself all the essentials of national supply.” Our strength is derived from what we can build, for the nation that can’t produce what it needs isn’t truly secure. The nation that depends on its adversaries for critical inputs isn’t truly sovereign. And the nation that reduces its economics to consumption isn’t truly prosperous.

As Hamilton put it, we must enlarge “the sphere of our domestic commerce.” Economic security begins with the capacity to build, invent, finance and scale the industries that will define the next century, among them semiconductors, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, advanced manufacturing, shipbuilding, critical minerals and pharmaceuticals. More than economic sectors, these are sources of national power. The U.S. must lead in all of them.

Ms. Must mentioned yesterday the education miracle New Orleans pulled off by going all charter schools. We’ll have none of that success stuff, say teachers’ unions honchos Randi Weingarten and Becky Pringle. An editorial at the WSJ:

On Tuesday the heads of the nation’s two largest teachers unions delivered their marching orders to the country’s 24 Democratic Governors: Don’t opt into the new federal tax-credit scholarship program, or suffer their political wrath….

Money has been pouring into public schools for decades even as student learning falls. Schools hire more staff to pad union ranks, but students who graduate often can’t read or do middle-school math. Many states and cities also have “hold harmless” policies that keep schools funded as students leave. See New York City, which is spending $290 million to make sure schools don’t lose money next year even as they lose tens of thousands of students.

We’re Sorry We Killed Your Mom. Today co-host Savannah Guthrie spoke about her family’s “agony” over her mother’s disappearance and shared information about a “chilling ransom note. The apparent abductors said that Mrs. Guthrie died in their care but it was an accident and they are sorry.

For He Knows His Time Is Short. Controversial Acting DNI chief Bill Pulte already has indulged in a firing spree. It’s always good to keep busy, even if you’re a temp, no?  

Somebody Forgot to Tell Him We’re Fascists. Nicole Russell, whose work usually appears in USA TODAY, takes to Human Events to write about the German soccer fan who is showing us what loving America is all about:

EzoicJust a few weeks shy of America’s 250th birthday, I’d hoped to see a surge of patriotism among Americans nationwide and in Texas where I live, I have. But I’ve also been delighted to see it from another surprising source: Europeans tourists.

There’s a German soccer fan who’s caught the country’s attention and whose patriotism and excitement for all things Americana has warmed my heart. His wide-eyed fervor for America provides a lesson for all of us, a we inch closer to July 4.

“Freddy,” posting as @FreddyLA7 on X, came to the U.S. to follow Germany’s World Cup progress, but his account quickly went viral for the enthusiasm he’s shown for America’s sights, sounds, scenes and food. And he’s not the only one. Frenchmen, Englishmen, and others have been sharing their love of this country after finding themselves in various World Cup locations.

Minimum Wage Fail. John Stossel notices:

Lots of people like gig work. It’s flexible. You work when you want to work.

But “workers’ rights” activists and governing socialists don’t like that. Gig workers rarely join unions. They don’t get a minimum wage.

“Uber and Lyft exploit their workers” is a headline at MS NOW. “We can’t ignore it.”

The Democratic Socialists said they had a solution. Seattle’s city council imposed a $26 delivery driver minimum wage.

What could go wrong?

Mullah Moolah. Bad Feelings. Primary Races: Will Mamdani Proteges Paint the Town Red? New Orleans School Miracle. Something Was WEIRD in WaPo Report on Kavanagh’s Would-Be Assassin.

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

Seems the Trump administration’s Iran deal has ushered in an Era of Bad Feelings.

Take the usually Trump-friendly New York Post, which this morning runs its second brutal Iran deal cover. “Easy Mullah,” shrieks the headline, as a grinning Mullah counts his moolah. That’s because the U.S. is dropping sanctions for two months, which will give Iran a payday of up to $10 billion, no pallets needed.  

“Bad Feelings All Around After Iran Deal” is the headline on Examiner Chief Political Correspondent Byron York’s column:

The United States and Israel are mad at each other. At home, supporters of President Donald Trump‘s decision to go to war are mad at him over the peace deal. Trump’s critics are happy the war might be coming to an end but mad at Trump for starting it. As far as the general public is concerned, a new CBS News poll found that 78% of those surveyed want the war to end now, while just 22% said it should continue “until Iran gives up more.”

On the U.S. side, no amount of talking can get around the fact that what began as a military attack that top American officials said had four goals — prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, destroy its ballistic missiles, sink its navy, and end its ability to arm proxies — ended, despite making great progress toward those goals, as a desperate effort to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and limit damage to the global economy. In the end, the only really concrete parts of the memorandum of understanding between the U.S. and Iran were about the Strait of Hormuz and the U.S. blockade. …

When things go wrong and frustration mounts, people start pointing fingers at each other, even if they are ostensibly on the same side. Bad feelings spread. That’s where things are now.

A Wall Street Journal report “parsed President Trump’s shifting rhetoric on Iran War,” while an editorial in the same paper notes that moolah is indeed already flowing to the mullahs even at this early stage.  Meanwhile, the New York Times reports that Iran says it won’t allow inspections of its damaged nuclear sites.

In “Anatomy of a Gamble,” Jonathan Spyer argues in Middle East Forum that Iran has emerged from the deal strengthened on a strategic level:

It is difficult from all this not to draw the conclusion that the US Administration entered the war on February 28 without a proper analysis of what the Iranian regime was, and of its strengths and weaknesses. The president was correct, as he often noted, that Iran has little left by way of a navy. “Their navy is totally gone – 100 per cent” he told Fox News recently. “The air force is totally gone – 100 per cent.”

The problem with this is that the particular strengths possessed by the Iranian regime are not located in the field of conventional air or sea power. The regime in Tehran is an Islamist, ideological gathering, engaged in a ‘forever war’ of its own, of society against society, rather than army against army. Its practical successes both in retaining power in Iran and in building influence and strength from the Gulf of Aden to the Mediterranean derive from its ability to mobilise (mainly but not only) Shia Muslim loyalties and commitments, and to use these as the engine for political and paramilitary mobilization.

Guy Benson suggests it might be better to walk away from the deal, while Victor Davis Hanson, historian of warfare ancient and modern, argues that the memorandum of understanding is not a surrender or the beginning of a new era but rather the next stage of a strategy built on pressure, deterrence, and avoiding another costly Middle East war.

Paint the Town Red. Will three socialists candidates backed by New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani prevail in three closely watched primaries today in New York? The most watched of the three races race is New York’s 13th District. National Review explains (“Zohranism Looks to Expand Its Reach”):

But of course, few Mamdani-endorsed candidates can compare to the magnificently named Darializa Avila Chevalier, running in New York’s 13th district (Harlem and parts of the Bronx) and challenging not merely any random incumbent, but Congressional Hispanic Caucus Chairman Adriano Espaillat. Chevalier, a Democratic Socialist, recently made the news for being so gung-ho pro-Hamas in her sympathies that she refused to even condemn the violence of the October 7 massacre. But that’s probably less troubling than her completely sincere — to the point of madness — belief in prison abolition. Needless to say, she’s at even odds to knock off Espaillat tonight.

In a Wall Street Journal editorial headlined “The Rise of the Democratic Socialists” editors take note of socialist control of big cities and gains in Congress. Amazing but Israel is a big issue tonight. The Zo has outdone himself by branding the pro-Israel AIPAC “monsters.” A New York Post editorial observes that “Mamdani takes the Jew-hate all the way to 11.”

Tonight we’ll also learn the electoral fate of Jack Schlossberg—John Bouvier Kennedy Schosberg, to give the lad his due—who is running for retiring New York Congressman Jerry Nadler’s capacious old seat.

So far, the only tears shed over the fall of UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer seem to be the ones he choked back during his resignation remarks. “Mr. Sensible Keir Starmer bowed to the left and made the UK an unholy mess — a stern warning to Democrats,” suggests Brandon O’Neill in the New York Post.

Philly’s ultra progressive DA Larry Krasner “found out” something, according to GW law professor and Fox Contributor Jonathan Turley—what Krasner found out was that he was going too far for even liberal judges in granting new trials to people who had committed serious crimes—murder, for example—without sufficient reason that another trial is justified.

Ms. Must, daughter of the south, has been heartened by the recent spate of stories about southern states turning around failing public schools. The latest is Paul Vallas’ City Journal piece about the nearly all-charter public school system instituted in New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina:

The latest Education Scorecard, produced by researchers at Harvard, Stanford, and Dartmouth, places Louisiana near the top nationally for growth between 2022 and 2025: second in reading improvement, third in math, and the only state to exceed its pre-pandemic performance in both subjects. New Orleans was the state’s most important reform laboratory.

This is all the more remarkable because Louisiana sits in the bottom third of states in per-pupil funding—about $17,300 per student, some $2,600 below the national average. The city thus rebukes the familiar claim that bad results mainly reflect inadequate funding. Institutions and incentives matter more than money spent.

Before the hurricane, New Orleans ran some of the worst schools in America. …

This plays to one of my pet peeves—that spending more on failing schools is not the way to ix them. Don’t get me wrong. Teachers deserve good salaries. The teachers in my family were dedicated and prepared to teach. But a lot of the lavish spending turns out to be for administrators.

I couldn’t get over the feeling that something was … wrong, as I read this Washington Post story on the would-be assassin of Justice Brett Kavanaugh:

From her home in California, 26-year-old Sophie Roske figured out Kavanaugh’s address in suburban Maryland. She bought a gun, practiced shooting and acquired lock-picking tools, black face paint and a laser sight. After packing her gear into a suitcase she checked at the airport, Roske flew cross-country and took a cab to the justice’s home, arriving just after 1 a.m.

Wasn’t the attempted assassin a man? It is not until after twenty—twenty—or so paragraphs that we find this:

Roske was named Nicholas Roske at birth and raised as a boy in a Southern California family active in a large Evangelical church. (Roske was identified by her name at birth in earlier coverage of the case.) Roske reached the rank of Eagle Scout, earned a philosophy degree Cal State Northridge and began to transition to a woman. “Sophie’s depression remained unresolved at least in part due to her gender dysphoria, which was not being addressed by her treatment,” Boardman said from the bench.

Roske wasn’t just “raised as a boy.” Roske was a boy and is a man today. Shame on the Washington Post! Similarly, as I noted yesterday, Father’s Day [was] one more opportunity to promote transgender ideology at the New York Times, which James Freeman covers today.

Look into the Reflecting Pool. Downing Street Cat Larry Seeks New Manservant. Hot Time in Switzerland. NYT Celebrates Father’s Day with ‘Trans’ Dad Essay. Rise of Socialism. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

 

Talk about seeing your own image reflected in a pool of water …. Some jerks are overjoyed that the iconic Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool is threatened by algae just in time for America’s 250th birthday:

A small group of activists who called themselves “Team Algae” — including a member dressed as a purple frog — took up position in front of the Lincoln Memorial, cheering on the algae as a symbol of resistance to the Trump administration.

Jon and Shelly Wiseman, a retired couple who walked down to the reflecting pool from their home in Northwest Washington, called the paint job “basically a vanity project” for the president.

President Trump, as you may recall, spent a lot of money repairing the Reflecting Pool and painting the bottom “American flag blue” to be ready for July 4. Unfortunately, the renovation appears to have been unsuccessful. I know a Trump hater who is filled with vicious glee. Several people, including Olympian David Hearn, have been arrested for alleged vandalism at the Reflecting Pool. Hearn denies the charge. An increasingly frustrated President Trump alleges vandalism, writing on Truth Social that vandals had thrown a destructive chemical into the pool.

I was surprised that Maureen Dowd, Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times columnist and DC native, wrote this (“Creature from the Green Lagoon”) yesterday:  

To give Trump his due, the capital needed freshening up in many spots, and he’s the first president in a while to restore beautiful statues and fountains that had fallen into disrepair. …

Surprisingly generous. She added, however:

Even when Trump starts with a glimmer of truth — that many iconic spots in D.C. had been allowed to shamefully deteriorate — he goes overboard in such a Trumpian way that he often ends up making things worse.

Meanwhile, the Reflecting Pool reflects the sad divisions of America 250.

A visibly emotional UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has resigned. The Washington Post reports:

Starmer’s surrender came fast on the heels of a special parliamentary election in Makerfield on Thursday, in which Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham won a decisive victory, returning him to the House of Commons and positioning him to mount a Labour Party leadership challenge that Starmer seemed all but certain to lose.

History lecturer Richard Johnson writes in Unherd:

Starmer’s premiership has been an extraordinary political failure. He has squandered a historic majority. He has trashed the reputation of his party. He leaves little by way of policy legacy. Trust in politics under his premiership has sunk further still. And what was it all for?

When Starmer once said “there is no such thing as Starmerism and there never will be,” he was right, except in the narrowest sense: Starmerism was always about Keir Starmer. There was no doctrine, policy program, or tradition. The Starmer project was simply an effort to make him prime minister.

Spiked Online dubs putative successor Andy Burnham just Keir Starmer in jeans:

Labour doesn’t have a Keir Starmer problem. It has a Labour problem. It is organisationally and ideologically estranged from its working-class support base.

Labour may be planning a Burnham Koronation. U.S. Dems could tell them the pros and Kams of this.

And now our attention turns to the real Master of 10 Downing Street, Larry the Downing Street Cat, who welcomes world leaders and is now taking applications for his seventh new manservant. Here’s someone who aspires to serve Larry.

Vice President Vance and Iranian officials spent the weekend negotiating over nuclear issues in Switzerland, with the Iranians apparently dismissing President Trump’s Strait of Hormuz threats as bluffing. Iran has stepped up the hanging of dissidents. Axios describes the situation as “messy.”

Two opinion pieces in the Wall Street Journal tackle President Trump’s and Vance’s recent verbal attacks on U.S. ally Israel. “Iran and Trump Blame Israel First” is the headline on an editorial:

President Trump’s new era of Middle East peace is off to a rocky start, as Iran declared Saturday it has again closed the Strait of Hormuz. But at least the Trump Administration and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps agree on the culprit—Israel.

Vice President Vance was even more threatening….

“Donald Trump and JD Vance Echo the Anti-Israel Left” is the headline on Allysia Finley’s column.” She sees the specter of Tucker Carlson. Gatestone Institute has several takes on the deal, mostly negative. Also at Gatestone, Amir Taheri has an interesting dissent. “Tehran Is Poised to Overplay Its Hand” writes Nate Swanson in Foreign Affairs. This Just In: Iran’s Delegation appears to have walked out. But by lunch they may be back. Who knows?

But They Still Won’t Put Their “In Fauci We Trust” T-shirts in Mothballs. On the way out the door, former DNI Tulsi Gabbard releases documents that apparently “reveal evidence of U.S. taxpayer-funded global biolab program.” “The Anthony Fauci, COVID-19 origins cover-up runs ‘deep’ into our intelligence community,” writes Miranda Devine.

The End of Innocence. The New York Times observed Father’s Day with a laudatory Guest Essay about a “trans” Dad:

The New York Times is facing backlash after publishing a Father’s Day guest essay about a transgender parent who described learning how to be a “trans dad.”

The essay, titled “To My Daughter, My Gender Was Never Complicated,” was published Sunday morning and presented in comic-strip form. It was written by Zach Ellams, a biological woman who identifies as a male, and focuses on Ellams’ experience raising a daughter while navigating questions about gender….

In another scene at a pool, the child asks, “How did you grow a mustache if you were a lady?”

A separate panel shows the daughter on a playground telling another child, “I want to grow a beard when I grow up.”

“You can’t grow a beard. You’re a girl,” the other child replies.

“My dad did, and he was a girl,” Ellams’ daughter says.

The essay suggests the child accepts Ellams’ gender identity with ease, helping the author more fully “embrace” who they are.

This Is Awful, Too. Woke NYC fifth graders pantomime getting shot by cops in outrageous dance routine.

Also awful: Socialism. Megan McArdle has a column in the Washington Post headlined “Socialism is back in vogue. Wait for reality to set in.” She writes:

It has never been a better time in America to be a socialist. We aging Gen Xers who thought that socialism had been decisively refuted by the fall of the Berlin Wall have been refuted ourselves: Democratic socialists now run Seattle and New York City, and come January, probably D.C. too, where Janeese Lewis George won the Democratic primary that generally decides the district’s mayoral elections.

It is a heady moment for the left, because socialism’s tainted brand has recovered from the vivid failures of the Soviet Union. Fully 66 percent of Democrats tell Gallup they view socialism favorably, while 42 percent say the same of capitalism. This makes the left see a revolution marching toward victory, because it can promise something that the center left cannot: a disruptive break with an unsatisfying status quo….

The challenge is that socialism’s rise is spiky, concentrated in blue cities where affluent (but often downwardly mobile) college graduates cluster. That’s a problem for the Democratic Party, where the excesses of progressive governance are helping to make the party’s brand toxic in the less true-blue areas. But it’s also a challenge for the socialists, because cities are the hardest place to execute big plans for new taxing and spending.

Mollie Hemingway said on Fox that the rise of socialism is a consequence of former President Barack Obama’s leadership for the past 15 years:

What Mamdani is talking about there is a very real thing that the Democratic Party went through, really when they decided in 2008 to support Barack Obama.

Prior to that, Bill Clinton had been the leader of the party. Yes, he was on the left but center-left. He was able to reposition if he felt he had gone too far or if the public reacted.

With the election of Barack Obama — and there’s no confusion about it, Barack Obama runs the Democratic Party now — you’re seeing more and more of this type of extremism.

With President Obama and earlier followers, they would hide their radicalism. Now it’s out there in the open, and in really blue districts, you’re seeing they’re letting the freak flag fly about what they’re going to do.

Two Veep Reviews. Catholic intellectual Robby George’s review of Vice President Vance’s new book is very different from Barton Swaim’s also excellent review.

Debating the Deal. Braindead Cross Burner: KK Who? Obama’s Pharaoh Moment. Steve Hilton: How to Save California. Gavin Newsom’s ‘Trump Prosecution Envy.’ The Joy of Dads.

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

What better setting than Versailles—”one place where all that glitters is gold indeed“—for a historic moment? President Trump thought Versailles the ideal backdrop for affixing his signature to the  Iran deal:

Trump—who in an unexpected move signed the deal Wednesday in Versailles—said he was influenced by the stock market’s rise as he worked toward a resolution of the conflict. He said he didn’t want to be compared with former President Herbert Hoover, who was president during the 1929 market crash that led to the Great Depression.

“He was always the one I didn’t want to be,” Trump told reporters at the Hôtel Royal where he and other world leaders gathered for the Group of Seven meeting. “I didn’t want to see an economic catastrophe.”

Pain at the pump appears to be easing. The price of crude oil is the lowest it has been since March, and market futures early today are positive. Definitely not looking Hooverian.

Criticism of President Trump’s Iran deal is not easing. “Is Iran Really a ‘Normal Country’?” asks the headline of a Wall Street Journal editorial:

Vice President Vance is using that term, “normal country,” on network after network as he tries to sell the agreement. But the regime in Iran has never shown over 47 years that it wants to build a normal country or “join the international community.” At every turn it has banked U.S. relief and concessions and used them to promote terrorism and spread its Shiite revolution.

“What the President is trying to do is actually extend the hand of peace,” Mr. Vance said on Fox. … Mr. Vance and the President seem to believe that the lure of gleaming hotels and $300 billion in investment is enough for the regime to abandon its revolutionary cause. It could have had those hotels and prosperity for decades but always chose revolution and terror. If Iran really is committed to a new direction, it shouldn’t take 60 days to find out. If the regime won’t abandon its nuclear program, it prefers revolution.

Another Wall Street editorial (“Around the Strait of Hormuz in 60 Days“) observes that Iran has not even committed to not charging tolls. The real winner in the Iran agreement is Pakistan, according to columnist Sadanand Dhume. The Editors of National Review conclude an excellent analysis of the deal this way:

Trump has said in the past that Iran has never won a war, yet never lost a negotiation. As the president and his administration now make the case for a memorandum of understanding that doesn’t meet any U.S. strategic objective, it’s impossible to say he was wrong.

Former UN Ambassador Niki Haley, who calls the MOU “a mistake,” is among the conservative critics (as is Mark Levine). Even Senator Lindsey Graham is adding caveats. Douglas Murray writes “How Trump Fell into the Iranian Trap” in The Free Press. Niall Ferguson of The Free Press, however, has a dissident take: “It’s Too Soon to Call This a U.S. Surrender.” Ferguson’s argument:

An agreement offering Iran sanctions relief, unfrozen assets, and billions in promised investment has prompted outrage. But the outcomes of wars depend on more than pieces of paper.

The sage Victor Davis Hanson is also willing to give the peace deal a chance. Miranda Devine says, “Trump is showing the world, G7 leaders who’s the ‘boss’ and deserves respect for his deal-making.”

President Trump was able to partake of Louis XIV’s splendor last night. But former President Obama’s aesthetic seems to be more ancient Egypt than ancient regime. “The Obama Presidential Center: A Pharaonic Temple in Chicago” is how architectural writer Michael J. Lewis describes the new Obama Presidential Center. Lewis writes:

Yet there is a lingering uneasiness engendered by that upright slab. It is, after all, the most ancient of monumental forms—whether stele, totem, obelisk or pylon—the universal form for commemorating a man or god. For some types of rulers it is fitting and proper, even part of the job description—say, for an Egyptian pharaoh, Roman emperor, or one of the world’s many “presidents for life.” But is it something that an American citizen-president, even one out of office, should build to himself?

… This is a vanity project, and although it slipped in under the radar in the guise of that most innocuous of architectural objects, the “Presidential (yawn) Library,” it turned into something that would be recognized by Cheops, Trajan and even Ozymandias himself.

A-listers expected for the grand opening.

Socialist Janeese Lewis George continues to hold a double-digit lead in the race to be DC’s next Mayor. If she wins, it could put the District on a collision course with President Trump, who warned that he could federalize the District. Meanwhile, the Democratic Socialists of America, to which Ms. Lewis George belongs, have just adopted a radical new agenda, according to Stu Smith in City Journal:

The group wants to abolish the Senate, destroy constitutional checks and balances, and eliminate the “carceral forces of the capitalist state.”

How Dumb Do You Have to Be? An Asian American college kid burned a cross in Chicago’s Grant Park to protest President Trump. But he had no idea that burning crosses was associated with the KKK and claimed to have scant knowledge of the Klan.

Even dumber, the authorities are outraged about racism even though the kid was too brain-dead to know that cross-burning is racist. The cherry on top:

“I put a red hat to signify the MAGA hat, the Make America Great Again hat,” he said. “So that was, yeah, that’s what I tied on top.”

Can This State Be Saved? The Republican candidate for Governor of California writes an op-ed headlined “California Needs a Pro-Business Governor.” Steve Hilton writes:

“Why does a state with so much money, talent and promise make life for ordinary people so hard?” Mr. Zakaria asked. The answer is that for the past 16 years, California has effectively operated as a one-party state. …

The results have been dismal. California today suffers the highest poverty rate, the highest unemployment rate and the highest cost of living in America. California families and businesses pay the highest gasoline and electricity prices in the continental U.S., nearly double the national average. Last year U.S. News & World Report ranked California 50th out of 50 states for opportunity. …

California still has everything you would want to start and grow a business: networks of talent, capital and universities; land, ports and a diverse supply chain; and above all a culture that celebrates risk-taking and innovation more than anywhere in the world.

All we need is a governor who acts decisively to reduce the taxes and bloat that are crushing the spirit of enterprise and a business community that actually supports business.

Governor Gavin Newsom, the man Hilton hopes to succeed, is suffering from what Examiner Chief Political Correspondent Byron York calls “Trump Prosecution Envy”:

Gavin Newsom is outraged. “In recent days, federal agents have knocked on the doors of family friends and former employees,” the California governor said in a recently released video accusing President Donald Trump of directing the Justice Department to investigate him. “They’re demanding records. They’re abusing the grand jury process, digging through years and years of random documents.”

“Donald Trump isn’t just coming after me because of my mean tweets,” Newsom continued. “He’s coming after me because I’m considering running for president, because he hates that I’ve consistently called him out over and over again for his lies and deceit.”

All of this raises the question: Is Trump weaponizing the Justice Department to pursue a popular Democratic politician and possible 2028 presidential candidate? Or are there legitimate reasons that people around Newsom might attract the attention of prosecutors?

Bet on the latter.

Independent Women is closed tomorrow for Juneteenth, so this is my last opportunity to say happy Father’s Day. Instead of socks or a tie, I want to give Brad Wilcox’s Free Press piece on “America’s Great Dad Divide.” Children need fathers, but it’s not a one-way street:

This growing tendency to sidestep family life is celebrated by many on the left—and some on the right (think Andrew Tate)—as a form of freedom. But for many men, that freedom is a lie. Whatever journalists or influencers say, men without children are disproportionately lonelier, less purposeful, and less happy than their peers who have found their way to the altar and the delivery room.

Will Iran Get a Signing Bonus? Neville, You Know Who Invoked. Was Yesterday the First Day of Vance 2028? Socialist Has Serious Lead in DC Mayor’s Race. Obama’s ‘Quaint’ Legacy. Musk Built That.

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

The Trump-friendly New York Post cover is beyond brutal. “Trump Devastated Iran,” it fumes, “now he hits them with a LOVEBOMB. … Prez Says Islamic regime ‘not radical’ [as] his deal showers mullahs with cash—and no sanctions.”

Yikes. We’re still in a fog regarding the memorandum of understanding to end the Iran war, which had not been released early this morning, but rumors and apparent details are circulating. Axios has a story that purports to break down “the billions Iran could receive” under the still undisclosed deal. From Axios:

The White House says the discourse is being poisoned by Iranian “misinformation,” and that its “pay for performance” structure is the best way to achieve the strongest-possible deal.

But U.S. officials acknowledge that at least some benefits will flow to Iran upfront.

What Axios describes as “one of the most politically explosive provisions” of the deal is a $300 billion fund for rebuilding Iran if the regime lives up to the goal of ending its nuclear ambitions:

Vice President Vance told Fox News the money would not come from U.S. taxpayers and would come into play only if Iran permanently ends its nuclear program, gives up its enriched uranium and allows nuclear inspections.

More positive reviews of the deal will follow, but these shrieks are what I find early this morning. This AEI analysis was two days ago: “Trump Made Neville Chamberlain Look Like Winston Churchill.” It is suggested that Iran no longer fears America. Relying on a leaked document, U.K. Telegraph Diplomatic Editor Joe Barnes says the deal “favors Iran.”  Here’s one aspect of the deal that will be popular: Oil prices plunge more than 5%; optimism grows over US-Iran deal.

Vice President J. D. Vance—who was everywhere yesterday (read Powerline’s account of Vance and the Den of the Harridans)—is portrayed as the “architect” of the deal. AEI’s Danielle Pletka writes:

It’s a cliché to call a moment the first of the next presidential campaign. But if you’re curious how J.D. Vance is going to set himself up as a loyal vice president on the question of Iran, yet opposed to what increasingly looks like a debacle for the Trump/Vance team, here’s one element of the plan: It was Israel’s fault. More specifically, it was Bibi Netanyahu’s fault. Helping him cement that narrative will be United States Special Envoy to the Middle East and Special Envoy for Peace Missions Steve Witkoff and presidential son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Jim Geraghty proposes in his Washington Post column that Vance is being set up for failure. Interesting idea. But this is the snippet that struck me:

Note that the Iranian regime has a long and sordid history of breaking its promises and violating its treaty agreements. It is more than a little bizarre to see a U.S. president, and his No. 2, convinced that diplomacy can work with a regime whose inaugural act was to take American diplomats hostage. There’s a reason our negotiators aren’t meeting in Tehran.

Swimming against the stream, the iconoclastic The American Conservative (TAC) says the deal could “help transform America’s Middle East strategy.” “Washington doesn’t need to be the region’s micromanager,” writes TAC.

Ms. Must was not surprised this morning to wake up and discover that her hometown is on the verge of going full-Mamdani: Democratic Socialist Janeese Lewis George has a serious lead in the DC mayoral primary:

Lewis George was leading in every ward except Ward 3, the city’s wealthiest ward, with about two-thirds of the vote counted.

More traditional Democrat Kenyon McDuffie trails in second place. A business owner expressed a practical concern at one of the parties after the polls closed:

John Guggenmos, chairman of the D.C. Nightlife Council and co-owner of the gay bars Trade and Number 9, said he voted for McDuffie because he doesn’t have any doubts that the candidate wants to support local businesses, including the city’s nightlife industry.

“It is one of the biggest tax producers, beyond the government, that we have,” he said. “If that industry suffers, then the whole city is going to.”

President Trump racked up another primary victory as Rep. Mike Collins won the Georgia battle to be the GOP Senate nominee. He defeated former college football coach Derek Dooley and will face Senator Jon Ossoff, whom Republicans see as vulnerable and are heavily targeting. But the president’s gubernatorial pick lost to Governor Brian Kemp’s choice.

The president’s choice for the GOP Senate nomination in Alabama, Barry Moore, also won. Trump-backed Henry Hern cruised to victory as Oklahoma’s Republican nominee for Senate:

Deep in Trump country, a Republican vying for a seat in the Senate is wondering why his possible future colleagues can’t pass a key voter ID and citizenship verification bill.

Speaking of the voter ID and citizenship bill:

President Trump said on Wednesday that he’s delaying Jay Clayton’s nomination to lead the U.S. intelligence community in a bid to force Congress to act on a voter ID bill that currently lacks enough support for passage.

Mr. Trump said in a lengthy post on his social media site that he will keep Bill Pulte, a top U.S. housing official, as acting director of national intelligence.

The Pulte nomination was unpopular with Senators from both parties. It is unclear how this maneuver advances the voter ID bill.

Mother Courage. It had to be difficult, but the mother of one of the alleged UFC attack plotters alerted the authorities about the activities of her son, 19-year-old Tycen Proper, and that led to the unravelling of their plans. Details here.

Now She Tells Us. “Hillary Clinton Savages Joe Biden: ‘He Made a Terrible Mistake… For the Country.’” Sorry, but saying this now doesn’t count. Hillary added that if the Dems had had a primary, anyone who emerged could have beaten Trump. Meow, Kamala.

As long as we’re sauntering down Memory Lane … What is former President Barack Obama’s legacy? The Trump presidency, answers Matthew Continetti. Continetti begins:

Close to a decade in the making, the $850 million Obama Presidential Center opens to the public on Friday. The 225-foot brutalist building—dubbed the Obamalisk—looms over a 19-acre campus on Chicago’s South Side. Even the most imposing facade can’t mask the failures of the 44th president.

Barack Obama has remained popular. As America’s first black president, he is guaranteed a place in history. But his grand ambitions now seem quaint. In 2008 Mr. Obama likened himself to Ronald Reagan, who he said had “changed the trajectory of the nation.” If Mr. Obama altered the nation’s direction, it was toward decline.

“He Didn’t Pay to Build That?” James Freeman asks:

Is there a community organizer somewhere in Chicago who can help local businesspeople collect money they’re owed on a giant construction project? People who thought conservationists got steamrolled by the Obama Presidential Center’s takeover of historic parkland should see what’s happening to the builders.

Elon Musk Did Build That. “Elon Musk’s trillionaire status is an American success story,” comments USA TODAY’s Nicole Russell:

On June 12, against all odds – even his own – Elon Musk became a trillionaire when SpaceX’s IPO debuted. The stock closed at $161, up 19% on its first day.

Musk’s wealth has made economists, politicians and Democrats mad. This is shortsighted: His extraordinary net worth isn’t a symbol of greed or inequality; it’s a byproduct of ingenuity, risk-taking and perseverance – traits that have always defined American success.

That doesn’t seem to matter though. The SpaceX IPO has reignited Democrats’ longstanding push for policies that penalize entrepreneurs and wealthy Americans. This would be a mistake.

“Another Major Transgender Suicide Study Crumbles,” by the invaluable Leor Sapir in City Journal, deals with another discredited but oft-cited “scientific” study. Claire Abernathy, a victim of gender medicine—her breasts were amputated when she was 15—writes an open letter to her surgeon, who, she says, gave her the double mastectomy after a 15-minute consultation.

Will he bring back more swag for the Oval Office? … Why do I still love George Will? Because in a column about two Senators introducing a bill to enhance the separation of powers, he writes sentences like this:

Texas Republican Ted Cruz is, figuratively speaking, to the right of the soup spoon. Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden is to the left of the salad fork. Their bipartisan anxiety concerns First Amendment speech rights.