Author: Charlotte Hays

Big Speech tonight. President Trump is scheduled to deliver a primetime address to the American people. We aren’t certain yet what he wants to talk about. Townhall speculates on what the promised “really big news” might be. CBS suggests the president will allege Chinese meddling in U.S. elections.

“‘Scared s–tless’: Republicans brace for Trump’s primetime speech” is the Politico headline. The subhead:

Rehashing grievances about the 2020 election could motivate the Republican base and press GOP lawmakers to pass the SAVE America Act.

Of course, if that’s the case, it might be the Dems who are scared—uh—witless. President Trump has indicated the speech will focus on “free and fair elections,” leaving us to wonder if he will return to 2020. 

Rocky day on Capitol Hill yesterday as Trump AG pick Todd Blanche was grilled by the Senate Judiciary Committee, and almost half of House Democrats voted to end aid to Israel, revealing a shift from the party’s traditional support of Israel.

Here are live moments from the Blanche hearing. Politico seems to be pulling for Senator John Cornyn, whose defeat in the GOP primary was largely the fault of President Trump, to sink the nomination. But an editorial in the Wall Street Journal suggests that a confirmed AG might be a stabilizing force:

Mr. Blanche comes across as a lawyer doing his best to deal with an impossible client, who in this case is the President. The best argument for confirming him is that a permanent Attorney General might have more stature to reject the wild ideas that are sure to come.

And Hilarity Ensued. Once again, Senator Mazie Hirono, perhaps not the brightest bulb in the chandelier, did not disappoint. 

Iran has a red line—U.S. targeting of (remaining) infrastructure. While preferring diplomacy, President Trump leans towards military escalation. Hugh Hewitt proposes in his “Morning Glory” column that what we need is a few rogue Iranian colonels to crack Iran’s theocratic dictatorship. Iran is already on its third-tier leadership of men, many of whom were retired and none of whom were important enough to be in the death bunker with Iran’s late Supreme Leader:

Imagine how utterly ruthless a benched and passed-over killer must be, and how many grudges he must hold against those who put him out to pasture in the first place.

It only takes a few people to crack the whole of the IRGC tyranny. Trump says to the public that he isn’t going to rush that takeover. But who knows what he and the Israelis see and hear courtesy of their intelligence communities. The allies certainly had all the information they needed on February 28. Don’t doubt that they have more and add to their collection every day.

Unfortunately, according to an editorial in the Wall Street Journal, Senator Chuck Schumer’s Senate minority is “helping Iran and other adversaries by obstructing vital defense and intelligence bills.” The resumption of military action in Iran, with the consequent effect on the economy, has us wondering about the midterms. There was some good economic news about consumer prices, but will Americans feel it in time for the midterms?

“Who Has the Midterm Upper Hand?” asks Karl Rove this morning. Rove notes that the party out of the White House usually gains seats but that this is not a sure thing:

These various advantages on each party won’t be totally predictive. The strengths and weaknesses of individual candidates will matter too. A Republican campaign may prevail with better strategy and strong fundraising, organization and voter targeting, or a candidate who convinces swing voters he has a vision for the economy. A Democrat may lose by being too ideologically extreme for his state or district, or because the Republican seems more authentic, approachable, hardworking and caring.

Candidates who shine in these areas can outrun their party—providing victory in races that the fundamentals suggest should be losers. Given the stakes, that’s why this midterm election is so interesting and consequential.

Captured by Socialists. Joel Kotkin explains in City Journal that cities, including Seattle, Portland, and Los Angeles, have become new political battlegrounds for a socialist resurgence:

As Tom Edsall observed recently in the New York Times, this is not a working-class movement or driven by “people of color.” Portland and Seattle are among the whitest big cities in America, and most unions, particularly outside the government sector, remain tied to the more centrist Democratic establishment.

On the same theme, “Democrats Fall for Socialism Again” is the headline on Matt Continetti’s column. Subtitle: “The party’s rage against Trump strengthens the millennial Jacobins who don’t share its interests.” Continetti runs through the policies over which socialists and average voters are at odds:

The DSA calls for demilitarizing (i.e., opening) the border, giving amnesty to every illegal immigrant, and ending immigration controls, detention and deportations. That is not meeting voters where they are—it’s running in the opposite direction.

Voters are critical of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and open to reforming it. But they haven’t abandoned immigration enforcement. In an April poll by the left-leaning Center for American Progress and Blue Rose Research, 61% of voters agreed that illegal immigration is a “big problem” and supported stronger border security. A May Harvard-Harris poll showed that 80% of registered voters, including 71% of Democrats, support deporting illegal immigrants who have committed crimes. Immigration was President Trump’s strongest issue.

The FBI alleges in an affidavit that drugs were found in the van involved in the Houston ICE shooting. Meanwhile, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz had a baffling response to the Trump administration’s deporting of an illegal alien convicted of raping a child whom Walz had pardoned:

“Did that make us any safer? Did that make the children that are left behind any more stable,” Walz asked – days after Secretary of State Marco Rubio revealed that he revoked the legal status of Tou Lue Vang, a 42-year-old from Laos.

“Did it improve the idea that we can’t all be judged by our worst day? And I want to be very clear, these are horrific crimes. They often are,” Walz added, according to KTTC.

It was an even worse day for the monster’s child victim.

What do they teach our children? Might we infer something from the tone of the special event put on by a powerful education union:

The Chicago Teacher’s Union (CTU) hosted a Marxist, virulently anti-Israel conference last weekend which openly celebrated terrorism, introduced fledgling activists to “the growing BDS movement,” and called on its members to support Iran’s “axis of resistance” and prepare for violence against the United States and Israel.

More parents are wanting to take control of their children’s education. “Tennessee’s Religious Charter School Test,” about state approval of a Christian charter school, could become the next landmark Supreme Court case on religion and public education, might interest these parents.

One More on Education: “Mom, Dad, I Want to Be a Welder” in the New York Times. … One More on Illegal Aliens: “No English, No Problem — Until the Crash Happens,” by Brian Lonergan in Chronicles, is about people who should be alive today but aren’t. … How’s Your Testosterone, Missy? A New York Times headline: “Hegseth Plans to Screen All Troops, Including Women, for Low Testosterone.” … Elegy for the Fedora: Joseph Epstein laments that the fedora has been replaced by the baseball cap:

Something is lost with the disappearance of the fedora as the masculine headwear of choice. That something is a certain formality, adultness and seriousness that the fedora conferred on its wearer. The fedora marked a distinction between boyhood and manhood; the baseball cap renders all men ageless.

And finally, is “The Odyssey” sexist? Actress Lupita Nyong’o, who appears in Christopher Nolan’s movie adaptation of the 3,000-year-old poem, says it is. In “The Odyssey Hullabaloo,” Victor Davis Hanson, our favorite classicist, writes that the ancient epic’s women tell a far different story.

The Iran War is officially back on, despite President Trump’s  U-turn on his 20% toll to escort ships through the Strait of Hormuz. Here’s an update on military actions.

Negotiations with Iran were never going to work, according to Jason Brodskey of the London Spectator:

With the reimposition of the American naval blockade against Iran, the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Washington and Tehran seems dead. Its demise reveals the Islamic Republic for what it has always been: an aggressive, terroristic power that has no interest in rejoining the community of nations.

The Trump administration demonstrated with the MOU that it was willing to go big on sanctions relief for Iran. As part of its terms was a General License X that permitted Iran to sell oil using dollars for the first time in decades. The US military blockade was lifted. Discussions were beginning on the unfreezing of billions of dollars in frozen or restricted Iranian assets. The document also dangled a $300 billion investment fund for economic development and reconstruction of the country as part of a final settlement.

In “How to negotiate with Tehran,” Danielle Pletka has an interesting suggestion:

Present Iran with an MOU drafted in the United States, not Tehran or Islamabad, and explain that it is a take it or leave it offer.

In a column unpropitiously headlined “No Pain, No Gain in Iran Blockade,” the Wall Street Journal’s Holman Jenkins nevertheless says something quite encouraging: Trump’s war, according to Jenkins, has a saving grace: Its goals are in alignment with energy realism.

The New York Post cover this morning shouts, “Tear Down this Sprawl!” The sprawl consists of homeless encampments that New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani won’t let the cops clear. An editorial inside the paper orders, “Mayor Mamdani: Tear down this sprawl!” The Editors observe: 

The Department of Homeless Services estimates it will spend an astounding $97,000 per street homeless person in the next fiscal year.

If taxpayers are going to shell out that much money, we need — nay, deserve — something in return.

And that something is streets free of homeless encampments.

Unherd’s Sohrab Ahmari writes about his night spent in a “Mamdani-Ville.” Mamdani’s is responding to the encampments “very gently,” says Ahmari:

Mamdani’s response amounts to a careful threading of the needle between doing what’s necessary and keeping the activist, anti-police Left at bay. He doesn’t want a “Mamdani-Ville” mushrooming on his watch, feeding daily horror images to the tabloids. But he’s tackling it with the lowest-intensity and -visibility means possible. 

Michael Goodwin has a good column on Mamdani’s socialist policies in general and the homeless encampments in particular.

Ms. Must is getting ready to live in a socialist-run District of Columbia. The progressive City Council is getting a head start on our incoming socialist mayor by attempting to pay for “affordability” by making food deliveries more expensive, potentially harmful to elderly and disabled citizens. But onward to a socialist paradise! Speaking of which, the Democratic Socialists of America have released a new platform:

The Democratic Socialists of America launched a new platform on Tuesday night, part of which calls to “replace” the presidency and Supreme Court with “an executive and judiciary chosen by and subordinate to Congress.”

“Whenever people are like, ‘Oh my God, they want to get rid of the president,’ I was like, ‘Well, I don’t know what we would call it in the future. We could call it the ‘head honcho’ or whatever,” Michaela Brangan, who helped draft the platform, said on a Tuesday evening webinar.

Never say nobody told you.

As you’ve probably heard, Justices Elaine Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett made a joint appearance on the Hill yesterday to ask for more security for Justices. Justice Barrett told a poignant anecdote about her 12-year-old son noticing her bulletproof vest. A Wall Street Journal editorial attributes the need for additional security to the Left’s demonization of the Court:

But the larger fault in recent years lies with Democrats. In 2020 Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) declared that Justices Kavanaugh and Gorsuch had “released the whirlwind and you will pay the price.” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D., R.I.) has made smearing the Justices as corrupt a personal mission. The social-media left is vitriolic and often unhinged.

It doesn’t take much for a disturbed individual to turn this into a cause to kill. This is why it will cost more to protect the Justices and their ability to rule on cases without intimidation or fear for their safety. The price for the country will be far greater if a Justice is killed.

Berkeley law prof John Yoo also says the Left’s war on the Court is responsible for the security scare.

Our Favorite Skunk at the Garden Party. “There’s Not a Money Fairy Up Here!” Senator John Kennedy responds:

“Well, I’m sorry they feel insecure. They’re not the only ones. And if I sound unsympathetic I don’t mean to, Griff. But look, I listened to part of their testimony — they want a 10% budget increase for security,” Kennedy said. “They’re like everybody else up here, their favorite kind of spending is ‘more.'”

He continued, “There’s not a money fairy up here. This money that we appropriate comes out of people’s pockets or we have to borrow it.”

Meanwhile, “whirlwind Chuckles” plans to sit out the Maine Senate race until a replacement for the Nazi tattoo guy is selected, and Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin says the SAVE America Act would make it ‘hard for any Democrat’ to win an election. Republicans accuse Slotkin of “saying the quiet part out loud.”

CNBC’s ranking of America’s 10 worst states to live in for 2026 is getting blowback. USA TODAY columnist Nicolle Russell refutes the effete snobs with a column headlined “CNBC claims Texas is miserable. Texans want to keep it that way“:

Promise me you won’t move to Texas after reading this.

No, really. I need you to promise, because some of you will want to. Shake off those feelings of freedom and affordability, gather your progressive senses and keep loathing God’s country like you’re told to, for reasons that don’t make much sense, at least not to most conservatives.

Why the warning? CNBC just ranked Texas one of “America’s 10 worst states to live in for 2026.” I can’t decide if I’m offended, surprised or relieved.

Funny thing: Texas, Florida, North Carolina and Tennessee sit at the top of the U-Haul Growth Index‘s list of states people are actually moving to.

So, CNBC gets it wrong about Texas, and Matthew Hennessey says that “The WNBA Is Mishandling Caitlin Clark.” The women’s basketball league is missing the marketing opportunity of a lifetime, argues Hennessey:

What is wrong with the WNBA?

The women’s professional basketball league has never really caught on. For decades the only thing keeping it afloat was money from the cash factory known as the NBA.

Then, suddenly, Caitlin Clark arrived. The Indiana Fever guard seemed like the savior the WNBA had been waiting for. She could help get the struggling league off life support….

Ms. Clark has what it takes to put the WNBA on the map for real . . . and for good. So why does it seem like the powers that be are trying to make sure it doesn’t happen?

Remember when you thought college was supposed to expose young people to the best that has been written and thought? Mark Bauerlein explains why this is no longer the case in “Gen Ed Is a Joke at Most Schools”:

Getting courses included in college general-education requirements is how fringe academic departments with few majors justify their existence.

Whenever people refer to The Odyssey as “a book,” Ms. Must can feel her inner pedant wanting to correct them. Instead, I submit John Miller’s delightful “How ‘The Odyssey’ Evolved“:

The epic poem popularly attributed to Homer almost certainly grew out of a much older oral tradition.

Ms. Must understands the movie has evolved further, but that’s a topic for another day.

With the U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz to be reimposed, President Trump has given the United States a nifty new title—“guardian” of the Strait:  

“We’ll become the guardian of the strait. Maybe we’ll become the guardian angel of the strait, and we should be reimbursed for that,” he said. “When we do that we’re going to be reimbursed because the other nations are very wealthy, they’re on our side, and we can’t be expected to do that for nothing unlike we had for many years.” 

“We guarded the strait for 50 years, and we never got paid for it,” he added. “We guarded it for nothing.” 

This time, the president says, we’ll charge a service fee:

“The U.S.A… will be reimbursed, at the rate of 20% on all cargo shipped, for any and all costs necessary to do the job of providing safety and security to ​this very volatile section of the World,” he said.

The Free Press’s Aaron MacLean says the president got it half right—MacLean supports the reimposition of the blockade, but not the toll. An editorial in the generally hawkish Wall Street Journal hopes that the president realizes the memorandum of understanding Iran signed with him was a fraud:

“The U.S.A. will be, from this point forward, known as ‘THE GUARDIAN OF THE HORMUZ STRAIT,’” Mr. Trump added, “but as such, and as a matter of FAIRNESS, will be reimbursed, at the rate of 20% on all cargo shipped.”

Bracket that last part for now, as no one knows how serious Mr. Trump is about a $15-a-barrel toll on oil exiting the Strait. It’s a bad idea, but the impulse that the U.S. should be compensated for doing what only it can in defense of Hormuz and the global economy isn’t crazy. Better ways can be found for the wealthy Gulf countries and Asian buyers of Gulf oil and gas to chip in.

Most important is Mr. Trump’s commitment to the Strait. After ducking the matter in wartime, and then trying to solve it via diplomacy only for Iran to renege, the President now declares U.S. guardianship. This was always required to “finish the job,” as he lately describes his goal.

Rich Lowry was for ending the “phony peace.” Wall Street Journal international affairs guru Walter Russell Mead contends (“The ‘Irrepressible’ U.S.-Iran Conflict“) that both sides have too much to lose to reach an agreement. Oil prices have surged. But are we being myopic? Victor Davis Hanson—sage and classicist—looks ahead in “The World Made Anew“:

Soon the Strait of Hormuz—Iran’s supposed trump card—will be nearly as irrelevant to global energy markets as it is already to the United States. …  The United States is the largest producer of oil and gas in history and does not need Middle Eastern oil or gas—or, for that matter, much of anything else besides.

Possibly Best News of the Day. “Why We’re Dismantling the International Criminal Court,” by Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the Wall Street Journal, throws down the gauntlet to an elite-created tribunal (think Amal Clooney) that seeks to override the U.S. Constitution:

Most of us would struggle to imagine a world in which U.S. soldiers, police officers, Border Patrol agents and elected leaders could be dragged before an international court, tried by judges from random countries across the globe, found guilty under international laws we neither consent to nor control, and then imprisoned thousands of miles from America.

But that is what the International Criminal Court now claims the power to do.

The ICC was born at the turn of the century. At first, it was marketed as a narrow backstop to prosecute the gravest crimes. Now the ICC and its allies seek a standing world tribunal with near-unlimited reach, empowered to override the courts and constitutions of the U.S. and other sovereign states—and to prosecute and arrest our citizens.

Americans never agreed to any of this.

Marco-ed Man. The Left, meanwhile, appears to regard Rubio as the most dangerous threat to the socialist project. 

South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster appointed the late Senator Lindsey Graham’s sister Darline Graham Nordone to fill her brother’s seat for the rest of his term. It was an undeniably sweet moment as Graham brought up his little sister after their parents died. National Review’s Jeffrey Blehar says that, between Graham and Senator Mitch McConnell, we must prepare for a changing of the guard. Never forget: Lindsey Graham’s finest hour.

Not His Finish Hour. What a Free Press headline bills as “Ro Khanna’s Dishonest Israel Stunt” didn’t come off as the camera-friendly Congressman must have hoped. TFP’s sub-head:

The California lawmaker turned a brief West Bank confrontation into a national controversy—and revealed how Israel has become a stage for the Democratic Party’s next political fight.

An editorial in the New York Post calls Khanna’s West Bank “hostage stunt” a “new low for a total phony”:

Rep. Ro Khanna’s latest showboating stunt is too much even for other Democratic electeds — not only a transparent ploy to get past his all-in bet on the Graham Platner campaign, but a transparently pathetic bid to play victim of those darn Israelis.

Just days after his scorched-earth defense of the Maine Senate candidate failed to stop the implosion, Khanna (D-Calif.) rushed off to the Middle East to change his storyline.

He headed to the West Bank, intentionally directing his entourage into a restricted zone, then pretended he’d been taken hostage by Israeli “settlers” run amok.

In reality, he was briefly stopped by local security; after the army checked out his story he was free to proceed on his inane “fact-finding” mission.

The Federalist’s fun headline is “Ro Khanna Is Very Important, Explains Ro Khanna“:

Brace yourself, because Khanna explained that Israel had made a major mistake by crossing a very important man: “Free advice to the Israelis: It’s not a good idea to detain long-shot presidential candidates,” he told the Times.

Let’s get serious again. Corey DeAngelis has an excellent op-ed in the Washington Post (have you noticed the vast improvement in the WaPo’s opinion pages?) headlined “School choice for me, but not for thee.” Senators, who routinely pick private schools for their own kids, prevent other parents from choosing.

May I use this to revert to the late Lindsey Graham for a moment? Unlike many people who come to Congress from humble beginnings and then rival Croesus for gilt-edged investments, Graham died with very modest wealth. It was the portfolio of an intelligent average guy. Somehow, I can’t get over this modesty and probity in a high place.  

A “trans” activist expressed the hope that the murder of Ann Widdecombe, outspoken conservative, former Member of Parliament, Brexit-backer, Strictly Come Dancing alum, and Catholic convert, was “extremely painful.” U.K. counter-terrorism officials have been called in to investigate the murder.

In an obituary at Unherd, Mary Harrington celebrates Ann Widdecombe as “Britain’s last Battleaxe.” What a glorious and enviable accolade “battleaxe” is! A snippet to inspire you:

If she’d been losing out since the war, the British Battleaxe was eclipsed by the death of Diana. As a public figure, she held on in the Tories in the person of Ann Widdecombe, until David Cameron — the man who arguably Dianafied the Tories — forced her disgusted departure, with her calling him “big-headed” and “dismissive of everything that had gone before”. After this, Widdecombe stood more or less alone: the last British Battleaxe in a world grown simpering, sentimental, and mandatorily progressive.

In keeping with her status as the People’s Battleaxe, as well as conviction politician, her murder has prompted an outpouring of memories. Friends and sparring-partners alike all recall her as funny, warm, and courteous even to those with whom she disagreed. This is all in keeping with the culture of pre-Diana Britain: one that saw public service as a duty, and private life and conscience as inviolably private. But this outlook has grown less common. Especially among 21st-century progressives, it has come to seem just as self-evident that private conscience ought always to conform to public duty, while the presence of any boundary between the two is cause for suspicion.

Please, God, make me a battle-axe.

Mystery Solved: We now know why President Trump abruptly ditched plans to take his brand-new Qatari-gifted Air Force One out of Ankara, flying to London, where he switched planes, to the old Air Force One.   

Seems Iran had hatched a plot to kill the president and the new Air Force One lacks defensive countermeasures of the old jet:

The new Air Force One, which President Trump flew on earlier this week to Turkey, lacks the same defensive countermeasures that were security features of the old model, including its advanced antimissile capabilities, according to multiple officials who have been briefed on how the jet was retrofitted.

Experts say the absence of those capabilities on the Boeing 747-8 aircraft, which was donated by Qatar, creates potential risk in using the jet abroad, a dynamic underscored by the abrupt decision on Wednesday for Mr. Trump to leave Turkey on the old Air Force One at the urging of the Secret Service.

The episode is intensifying the focus on Mr. Trump’s demands to rapidly retrofit the donated 747 to replace an aging fleet that had served as the official presidential planes.

Israeli intelligence revealed the plot to kill the president, whose response was curious: “They want to take out the US leader — me. I’m on whatever list. I saw this morning I’m on every single one of their lists. And so far, I guess I’ve been a bit lucky, but maybe that doesn’t last very long.” Query: Should we beware of Qataris bearing gifts?

Iran finally buried its late Supreme Leader, as the war roared back to life. We now have photos of the late ayatollah’s bombed-out headquarters. Ayatollah Junior has yet to put in an appearance. A deal to remove Syria from the U.S. terror list might lead ultimately to a way to bypass the Strait of Hormuz. This could thwart Iran’s strategy to strangle the world’s oil supply. Victoria Coates writes that Iran’s plan for the strait could derail Gulf nations.

The New York Post’s cover is a picture of an eerily hooded Tyler Robinson. The headline shouts: “Trans Lover of Charlie Kirk’s ‘killer’ reveals in Courtroom: Tyler confessed to me.” A video interview with Lance Twiggs, former roommate and sexual partner of the accused, was played during a hearing into Kirk’s assassination in the Provo, Utah courtroom:

The former lover of Charlie Kirk’s accused assassin told Utah prosecutors that the suspected killer “wishes he hadn’t done it,” according to a video played in court Thursday.

“I just asked him in person if what he said was true the night before, and he said it was, started crying a little bit and said he wishes he hadn’t done it,” Lance Twiggs told investigators in a video interview.

The night before, according to text messages prosecutors displayed later, Robinson allegedly took credit for Kirk’s shooting in a conversation with Twiggs. …

“I am still ok my love, but am stuck in orem for a little while longer yet,” Robinson replied — allegedly. “Shouldn’t be long until I can come home, but I gotta grab my rifle still. To be honest I had hoped to keep this secret till I died of old age. I am sorry to involve you.”

More on Twiggs’ testimony. Everything you need to know about the Charlie Kirk murder: The Federalist provides helpful sketches of the personnel and what the judge said when he denied grieving widow Erika Kirk’s request that more of the Lance Twiggs interview be shown in court.

You Knew This Was Going to Happen. The New York Times blames Donald Trump for the Graham Platner debacle. Don’t miss—or maybe do miss: “‘There’s No Graham Platner Without Donald Trump’: 3 Writers on the Fiasco in Maine.” In “What we really learned from Graham Platner’s dropout video,” Monica Hesse of the Washington Post writes:

The through-line of Platner’s nearly year-long campaign was authenticity. The fact that he was a back-deck and graphic-tee kind of candidate, the polar opposite of Collins, who is prim and decorous and always concerned and who has maybe never swung a kettlebell on a lawn in her whole life. “The difference between Susan Collins and Ted Cruz is, at least Ted Cruz is honest,” he’d said in his announcement video. Platner vowed to always be honest.

Did Graham Platner ever seem “authentic” to you? No, he didn’t to me either. The lesson of the Platner campaign is that the elites have a hard time spotting a genuine member of the white male working class. No, hard as it is for elites to believe, not all of them have Nazi tattoos and mistreat women.

Meanwhile, Democrat Party elites were understandably eager to rid themselves of Graham Platner, but Examiner Chief Political Correspondent Byron York asks about the Maine voters who gave him a stunning win in “Giving Platner the Bum’s Rush.” Dropping candidates is getting to be a habit, and it’s not a sign of strength, according to Michael Barone:

There are lessons here aplenty. It’s risky to support little-known candidates. Nostalgia for a working-class politics that hasn’t existed for two generations can produce bad strategy. It’s off-putting when those who claim to be preserving “democracy” overturn the choices of voters. Going off the deep end may not be a profitable response to the otherwise going off the deep end.

“‘Bet on Democrats’ Midterm Enthusiasm” is the headline on Matthew Continetti’s Friday piece. Continetti writes:

The problem for Republicans is that energetic voters can overwhelm structural barriers. Democrats are fired up to vote. They have been voting in primaries in greater numbers than Republicans. They’re more likely to say that they’re “absolutely certain” to vote and that voting is “much more important” this year than in the past. They have led the generic congressional ballot since March 2025. And they have been overperforming in special elections, flipping 30 state legislative seats. No seat has flipped from Democrat to Republican….

Enthusiasm can’t be manufactured; it’s organic. And it’s the difference between winning and losing….

Is “Useful Idiot” too harsh? Yep, the New York Times again. Ira Stoll explains at the Washington Free Beacon why the NYT headline “How Economic Anxiety Is Driving the Democratic Socialists’ Surge” is so dumb.

But I Thought We Were at War with Iran? “A Top Mamdani Official Tried to Meet with Iran” is an alarming City Journal headline. The scheduled meeting was called off but:

The development is a continuation of Commissioner Archila and the Mamdani administration’s ongoing use of public resources to advance an agenda that extends well beyond New York City. On April 16, a message seen by City Journal was sent to staff within the Mayor’s Office for International Affairs asking them to prioritize diplomatic engagement in part based on whether foreign officials “are . . . in political alignment/leftist.” The message confirms previous reporting by El País, noting that Archila has “focused . . . on deepening relations with foreign leaders who share Mamdani’s worldview.”

That Archila’s meeting was even contemplated raises questions about her judgment and the administration’s priorities.

“How worried should Democrats be about the Democratic Socialists of America?” Jake Altman asks in the lead to a City Journal story. Headline: “I Watched the DSA Go Crazy. The Democrats May Be Next.” Altman explores the strategy and tactics of the anti-democratic Left. Ms. Must’s Question: What percentage of the party is sympathetic to the far Left?

Former Chicago Mayor and Obama administration figure Rahm Emmanuel, who harbors 2028 aspirations, is clearly attempting to position himself as a moderate Democrat. Emmanuel delivered a speech in Israel on “the US-Israel relationship: where it stands today and the road ahead.” I haven’t read it and so hope my skepticism is ill-placed.

We’re sorry to learn that Senator Mitch McConnell is still in the hospital. The Left is in a frenzy of unsubstantiated rumors that the condition of McConnell, who will go down in history as a master of the Senate, is being concealed so that a special election can be avoided.

Some of McConnell’s colleagues are beginning to sound like the Dems on Joe Biden, but I can’t imagine McConnell is that bad off. Nevertheless, Nicole Russell of USA TODAY urges more transparency. We wish the Senator a speedy and full recovery.

Well, the U.S. certainly bent over backwards to give peace a chance.

Iran. Not so much. Resumed strikes by both countries are the result (here, here, here, here, and here). I guess you could say that we’re giving war another chance.

A Wall Street Journal editorial headlined “Trump Tells the Truth About Iran” is the newspaper’s Editorial Board’s response to renewed military hostilities:

In June Mr. Trump called Iran’s new leaders “very rational people” who were “nice to deal with.” Vice President JD Vance, the lead U.S. negotiator, insisted that even the thugs atop the Revolutionary Guard Corps want to “turn over a new leaf” with the U.S.

This Age of Innocence lasted all of three weeks. Perhaps Mr. Vance will tell us why he believed that and whether he still does. Asked on Wednesday what changed his view of Iran’s leaders, Mr. Trump answered: “I got to know them.”

The question is what the President will do with that knowledge. He said talks could continue but added, “I’m not sure I want to make a deal. Let’s just finish the job.” That won’t get done with on-again, off-again talks and tit-for-tat bombing. Any U.S. action risks escalation, so it had better be with a strategic purpose.

The U.S. is striking targets near the all-important Strait of Hormuz:

This was the second day in a row that the U.S. had attacked Iranian targets in what U.S. officials say is an effort to stop Tehran from striking commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz.

The funeral of the late Supreme Leader made Iran appear united and just as powerful as before the war. The Free Press suggests that it was a Potemkin funeral. In “The Iran the Funeral Cameras Don’t Show,” Masih Alinejab writes:

… Don’t take what you’re seeing at face value.

In the months since Khamenei’s death, I have received hundreds of messages from friends and contacts inside Iran. They are not messages of grief but of disbelief, relief and, when people feel safe enough, joy. A woman from Isfahan told me in March that she had been dancing in the street with strangers. A man in Tehran sent a voice note laughing so hard he could barely speak. Then he caught himself: “Don’t use my name.”

He was still afraid. They are always afraid.

The regime has always “used mass mobilization as a proof of legitimacy.” The Free Press shows how the spectacle was put on and takes us to places the cameras don’t go. Aaron MacLean in the same outlet argues: “The president has to choose between four options on the Strait of Hormuz. None of them are pain-free.” Meanwhile, the president says Iran has called and … they want to make a deal.

The Wall Street Journal has a tick-tock on Oval Office discussion that led to the breakdown of the deal. I wonder if your reaction will be the same as mine: Look out, JD. Rubio stock rising.

Beware Qataris Bearing Gifts? President Trump was forced to use the old Air Force One instead of the shiny new one gifted by the Qatari government to leave the NATO Ankara summit.

Maine’s Nazi tattoo guy officially dropped out of the race to unseat Maine’s moderate Republican Senator Susan Collins. The (satirical—but just barely) Babylon Bee reacts:

Democrats Quietly Add ‘Have You Raped Anyone?’ To Questionnaire for Aspiring Candidates

Politico, which helped torpedo Platner’s candidacy, chronicles what happened “inside the tense final hours of Graham Platner’s campaign.”

The New York Post’s Miranda Devine’s headline reads: “Slimy Dems — the party of Me Too — show their true colors in Graham Platner scandal.” Fun: The Washington Free Beacon highlights the 2028 Dems who disgraced themselves to defend erstwhile candidate Graham Platner. Big Three: Ro Khanna, Ruben Gallego, and Elizabeth Warren. Ms. Must also disgraced herself yesterday: I don’t know how I did it, but I mixed up New York Times Michelles—Cottle and Goldberg—in an item commenting on the Free Beacon’s story on Michelle Goldberg’s reluctant disillusion with Platner. Apologies to both Michelles.

Nice Try. You’ve got to hand it to ingenious Dems, who attempt to paint warnings about the socialist surge in their party as old-fashioned red-baiting (here and here). Political guru Karl Rove, however, writes that the socialists spell trouble for the Dems:

Socialists running in deep-blue districts can keep saying outrageous things and win. But it’s places like Colorado’s Eighth District, pitting the former Army helicopter pilot against the leftist Yale law graduate, that will decide which party runs the House. Game on!

Meanwhile, Wall Street Journal columnist Jason Riley takes us beyond the immediate electoral aspects of the socialist surge with a column headlined “Socialism and the Decline of the Black Family.” Riley writes:

Conservatives are right to be concerned about the impact on our free-market capitalist system if enough people with such views are elected to positions of power. But socialism’s impact on the traditional family structure is no less concerning….

But socialists such as Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels dismissed the traditional family as a tool of oppression that advanced the patriarchy by exploiting the domestic labor of women. Similar thinking informs today’s politicians and policymakers who want to expand the welfare state to address economic inequality. For them, nuclear families in general, and fathers in particular, were an obstacle to central planning schemes.

“How the Smithsonian Lost America’s Plot” is the headline on a Wall Street Journal editorial on the Trump administration’s controversial report on the Smithsonian:

The report isn’t a cheerleading document seeking to hide America’s warts. What it seeks is a history of the U.S. that doesn’t resemble the 1619 Project in its partisan bias.

The report’s examples show the degree to which progressives have captured the history museum. In one exhibit, the Pledge of Allegiance was described as a tool to “instill American nationalism through flag ceremonies.” Nationalism? That’s a needlessly pejorative edge. How about patriotism?

Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III decried the report as “not fair,” while old guard Washington Post architectural critic Philip Kennicott made angry harumphing noises. As long as we’re on the subject of aesthetics, I detect a certain unattractive glee in this: Trump’s D.C. makeover hits another snag at Meridian Hill. The fountain pipes are rusty, and so the water is brown—all President Trump’s fault. Is this Pulitzer Prize material or what?

When Gavin Newsom Helps Women. “How California Effectively Legalized an Open-Air Sex Market” in City Journal tells a more aesthetically unappealing story. Christopher Rufo and Kenneth Schrupp write:

It’s midafternoon outside KIPP Academy of Opportunity, a charter school serving children in fifth through eighth grade on South Figueroa Street in residential Los Angeles. As children inside prepare for their futures, a young female struts by in high heels, wearing nothing but a bikini and a jacket. 

“We’ll see some police officers roll by and some young women out here just prostituting. They’re walking right by, and the police drive right by them,” the school’s gun-toting security guard said. “It’s normal.”

This was all the predictable result of public policy. In 2022, Governor Gavin Newsom signed a law decriminalizing loitering with intent to commit prostitution. When he signed the bill, Newsom suggested it would help would reduce the harassment of women.

Far from it: prostitution activity began spiking up.

Three For the Road. We know that current Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent admires Hamilton! But former Senator Phil Gramm and Donald Boudreaux counter that “Hamilton Was No Protectionist.” … Richard Porter at RCP has an interesting take on President Trump’s $2 billion earnings last year:

… I think voters have long-since come to terms with Trump’s eagerness to continue doing business even while in office. That’s not my concern. I’m wondering whether Trump and his family will become the kind of “cheerful” givers that would make them happier, while bequeathing a prize that would benefit the world. 

Next Time Somebody Says Capitalism Doesn’t Work. Tell them about this Costco cashier.