Come Together to Inspire, Interact, Influence, and Impact.

Join
x
Notifications

Log Out? Are you sure you want to log out?
Log Out

Category: Daily Musts

No Stolen Land Acknowledgment! Instead King and President Extol Sentimental Ties. Breaking Up: U.A.E. & OPEC. Indictments: Fauci Ally and Comey. Old Indomitables. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

Well, it was all quite refreshing.

King Charles made a playful allusion to the Brits’ unfortunate behavior in 1814 and offered a heartfelt tribute to the shared heritage of two great nations. No stolen land acknowledgment, you’ll be glad to hear, even though we did sort of make off with a sizeable chunk of Charles’ former empire.

Earlier in the day, King Charles III addressed a joint session of Congress (excerpt here). The King’s hometown weekly, the London Spectator, commented on the royal visit:

President Trump lavished praise upon King Charles from the Oval Office at the outset of his four-day state visit to the United States. The US president called the monarch ‘a man of class’. ‘It’s great to have a king in here,’ he said. A conspicuous absence of ‘No Kings’ protests in the presence of a real king had not gone unnoticed. But it was Charles’s address to a joint session of Congress that was eagerly awaited on both sides of the Atlantic.

His most substantial public speech since he acceded the throne in September 2022, there was a good deal riding on its success. His mother had addressed Congress in May 1991. Her text was an uncontroversial message of ‘collaboration and respect’ between the two nations. Then, as now, the speech took place against the backdrop of war in the Middle East – the Gulf War had concluded a few months before. But the stakes were higher this time round, for any number of reasons. The assassination attempt on Trump on Saturday being only the most recent.

King Charles was here as the anti-Starmer. Prime Minister Keir Starmer infuriated President Trump when he denied the U.S. use of U.K. air bases and airspace in the Iran conflict. The King did an excellent job for his country. “The King has proved he is the only British leader Trump will listen to,” U.K. Telegraph royals expert Hannah Furness writes.

One of the King’s assignments was to make the case for NATO. Furness isn’t certain that that message was thoroughly received. The resolutely anti-Trump New York Times churlishly discovered “subtle rebuttals” to the president in the King’s overall remarks. Charles came with the perfect present for President Trump—a golden bell from HMS Trump, a World War II submarine. The Queen in historic jewelry and the First Lady in a shade of pink that complemented the Queen’s gown were dazzlers. The merry monarch and the not-King of the U.S. looked like happy lads.

The president’s remarks at the dinner blew Ms. Must away. It was an ebullient and unabashed celebration of American and English civilization and ties. The president got so carried away that he said something nice about the Crusades! I’d wager that the speechwriter has read “Albion’s Seed,” one of my favorite books, by David Hackett Fischer, about the English settlement of the 13 colonies. It’s a fabulous story that in no way diminishes the contributions of others who have come [legally] to our shores. Fischer himself wrote a subsequent book on African Founders.

A Few More Dinner Notes. The Guest List. The Menu. The Pageantry and the Protocol. Charles and Camilla’s Next Stop.

While the King and the non-King celebrated unity, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) celebrated disunity by suddenly dumping OPEC. This is a major blow to the OPEC cartel:

“The decision to withdraw from OPEC is part of a broader decision by the U.A.E. to chart its own path when it comes to alliances,” said Eric Alter, the dean of the Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy in Abu Dhabi, which is close to the Emirati government.

The U.A.E. said it would also exit OPEC+, a group of major oil producers that includes Russia, and gradually increase production afterward, it added.

“Its departure therefore removes one of the core pillars underpinning OPEC’s ability to manage the market,” said Jorge Leon, head of geopolitical analysis at consulting firm Rystad Energy and a former energy demand analyst at OPEC. “Losing a member with 4.8 million barrels a day of capacity, and the ambition to produce more, takes a real tool out of the group’s hands.”

Heritage Foundation economist E. J. Antoni addressed the great OPEC crackup at Townhall:

For decades, the UAE has been part of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), which has artificially limited global oil supplies and thereby put upward pressure on prices. … The idea behind the cartel was simple: gather all the major oil-producing countries into a room and agree to act like a monopoly, thereby maximizing profits at the expense of the rest of the world. …

So, while the UAE’s decision is significant, it’s not necessarily a death knell for OPEC, which has seen other members come and go over the last six decades. Rather, this move is the latest chapter in the story of American energy independence and energy dominance that is being kicked into high gear by pro-growth tax and regulatory reductions.

The energy world is a-changing. To that point, Iran’s economy is approaching a death spiral, as President Trump tells aides that the U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz will continue. An editorial at the Wall Street Journal says that the UAE broke up with OPEC because of U.S. fracking and the Iran war.

OPEC isn’t the only thing that’s cracking. The alleged Covid cover-up wall is cracking. The stunning federal indictment of David Morens, longtime ally of Dr. Anthony Fauci, for allegedly concealing or destroying relevant documents, is a huge crack in the wall:

David Morens, 78, has been charged with one count of conspiracy against the United States; two counts of destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in federal investigations; and two counts of concealment, removal, or mutilation of records.

The conspiracy also included an alleged “kickback” scheme where Morens took or was promised gifts — including wine bottles and meals at Michelin-starred restaurants — to conduct “official acts favorable” to a federal grantee.

Real Clear Investigations, which was on the Morens story before it broke, has a long analysis. The Washington Post portrays the indictment as catering to Trump supporters. More on Morens from Just the News. The same outlet gives its take on a new bombshell indictment of former FBI head James Comey. Some believe the Comey indictment should be eighty-sixed: Editors of The Free Press, for example, suggest it will backfire.

Meanwhile, Jason Riley suggests that the reclassification of pot could backfire. In today’s “To promote ‘social justice,’ don’t subsidize marijuana dealers. Protect the poor from street predators,” Riley argues today in his Wall Street Journal column.

Two Indomitable Presidents. Rich Lowry compares Andrew Jackson and Donald Trump. Both are assassination attempt survivors (Jackson ran at his would-be assassin with his walking cane). Lowry writes:

Trump isn’t a former general or wizened old Indian fighter like Jackson, but he partakes of the same spirit of aggressive defiance.

By all appearances, the least fearful people in the ballroom of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner were a random old man from New York who kept eating his dinner during the mayhem . . . and the target of the attack himself.

Donald Trump is one of the most indomitable figures in the history of our politics. No matter how much he’s mocked or hated, no matter how intense the controversy or how impossible the fix, no matter how dramatic the situation, he never breaks or loses his sense of command.

An indomitable Woman. Meghan Cox Gurdon has stood firm in the storm of vitriol that greeted her perfectly sensible response to celebrity chef/philanthropist Jose Andres silly, glass-encased message at Reagan National Airport.

In closing, former President Barack Obama’s gaffe about the WHCA shooter is just the Light Bringer’s latest porkie pie, according to New York Post writer Isaac Sshorr.

Third Assassination Attempt at Ritzy DC Media Dinner. Drawing a Straight Line: From Hasan Piker to California Teacher Cole Allen. Obama Wonders What Motive Might Be. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

Thank God the third time wasn’t a charm.

President Trump dodged another bullet, the third assassination attempt of President Trump on record. This time the would-be White House Correspondents’ Association dinner assassin left behind a manifesto that makes his motives crystal clear.  

Except for the willfully blind brigade who hide behind “the search for a motive.” Yes, that includes Barack Obama. In a mealy-mouthed X post the ex-President opined that “it’s incumbent upon all of us to reject the idea that violence has any place in our democracy.” Ya think?

Begging to differ is alleged shooter Cal Tech grad Cole Allen, 31, a teacher (why am I not surprised?), who emailed his “manifesto” to his family 10 minutes before the attack. Which is decidedly inconvenient but not an insurmountable obstacle for the “search for a motive” crowd. The dinner took place at the Washington Hilton (which, alas, does not have an unblemished record with regard to gunmen and Presidents) (via CBS linked above):

The White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting suspect wrote a “manifesto” that stated he planned to target Trump administration officials, “prioritized from highest-ranking to lowest,” according to a copy obtained by CBS News. 

Cole Allen, 31, wrote that law enforcement, hotel employees and guests weren’t his intended targets but that he would still attack them to get to the administration, adding: “I really hope it doesn’t come to that.”

Allen’s “screed,” which the New York Post published yesterday began “Hello, everybody!” and called President Trump “a pedophile, rapist, and traitor,” familiar TDS themes showing. Allen outlined his “rules of engagement”—i.e., he said he would not kill Secret Service agents, Capitol police, or guests unless necessary. Curiously, the manifesto said he would not attack FBI Director Kash Patel, who was present at the dinner.

The scene was shocking. Guests hid under tables (and here and here) as the Secret Service and law enforcement officers rushed into the ballroom, some with weapons drawn, to remove the president and administration officials from harm’s way. The New York Post’s Miranda Devine writes about president Trump’s masterful presser shortly after the attempt:

Two hours later, he was at the podium in the White House press briefing room — named after James Brady, the White House press secretary shot in the head and paralyzed in the 1981 assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan outside the same Washington Hilton hotel.

The historical echo was not lost on any of the hastily assembled journalists still dressed in their black-tie finery.

If his Trump-deranged critics could be honest with themselves for a moment, they would admit that the president’s remarks that night were pitch-perfect. 

Wearing his tuxedo, he offered calm reassurance, wry humor, and even kindness to the shaken reporters and to a nation sick of ongoing political violence.

He called on Weijia Jiang, president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, who had been sitting next to him on stage that night, to ask the first question, complimenting the CBS News reporter with whom he has had an acrimonious relationship.

“Madam chairman,” he said, “I just want to say you did a fantastic job. What a beautiful evening.”

Then he quipped: “And after that, it’s very tough for her to ask a killer question.”

The president called for unity and demanded that the WHCA dinner be held again within 30 days. Faith Bottum of the Wall Street Journal says that Trump stood tall under fire.

An editorial in the Wall Street Journal is headlined “A ‘Friendly Federal Assassin’ in Washington” (that’s what Allen called himself) also said that Trump hit the right notes. The WSJ editorial also reminds us of what we don’t need:

Rep. Ro Khanna, the California Democrat with his own designs on the White House, called Sunday for a commission on political violence. But we don’t need a study group to tell Americans how to behave. We need our political and media classes to stop talking and writing in apocalyptic terms and restore reason to political debates. We need to revive the traditional moral line that violence is unacceptable.

Trump was more obstreperous later on “60 Minutes.” (And here.) Security concerns at the Hilton turn out to be a boost for the ballroom. The Free Beacon explores Allen’s Bluesky posts, Kamala Harris support, and attendance at “No Kings” event. Please, somebody, find a motive! The Free Press’s lead story early this morning is an editorial that finds the WHCA dinner attack “only the latest assault on the foundations of our way of life.” Suzy Weiss in the same outlet had a takeaway from the evening: “Dudes Rock.” Weiss writes:

It was a big night for men who use the word ‘vehicle,’ opine on the Roman Empire, and show up as heroes when we actually need them.

Ms. Must was delighted that National Review drew a straight line from the violence advocated last week in the New York Tines by leftie darling Hasan Piker and Saturday’s near tragedy. George Washington University law professor and Fox Contributor Jonathan Turley also penned a good column on the “moral monstrosity” of the New York Times Hasan Piker podcast. Victor Davis Hanson writes about mainstreaming hate against the president.

Sadly, Ms. Must doesn’t expect the likes of Piker & Co. to refrain from putting targets on the backs of those they oppose. But the Wall Street Journal has a good editorial on “One of ‘the Rich’ Answers Mamdani’s Insult.” New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a Piker ally, stood in front of hedge fund CEO Ken Griffin’s apartment to put a target on Griffin’s back. Griffin may decline to build a multi-billion-dollar project in New York. The Editors:

Stigmatizing the rich by name is popular on the left these days, in the manner advised by Saul Alinsky. It’s good to see at least someone fighting back. More CEOs and others will have to do so if the U.S. is going to defeat what is becoming an ugly campaign to turn America into a socialist state.

The WHCA dinner isn’t the only sacred institution (just kidding) under attack. Mollie Hemingway, whose new book on Justice Alito is making waves, writes that the collegiality of the Supreme Court is dangerously threatened. Rep. Elise Stefanik’s recent book, meanwhile, is hailed as providing an antidote to Ivy League decay in a review of her new book, “Poisoned Ivies,” by Danielle Shapiro at City Journal:

Stefanik anchors her diagnosis of elite American academia in the now-infamous congressional hearings during which she pressed the presidents of Harvard, MIT, and the University of Pennsylvania until they admitted that endorsing the genocide of Jews did not necessarily violate their institutions’ codes of conduct. Drawing on statistical data, documentary evidence, and individual stories, Stefanik demonstrates that this sort of “academically lazy moral bankruptcy” is entrenched across the elite universities and within the bureaucracy of each school.

It’s easy to get lost in Stefanik’s “catalog of horrors,” but her accounts reveal four types of institutional deterioration: financial dependencies, administrative double standards, faculty radicalization, and physical violence….

Stefanik has shown how universities have abandoned their commitments. It’s up to the American people and lawmakers to get them back on a more constructive path.

“Why Can’t Americans Buy More Affordable Health-Care Plans?” in City Journal proposes that households should be able to enroll in plans exempt from ACA rules, which would help to reduce costs. Chris Pipes concludes:

One-size-fits-all coverage may be an inevitable consequence of single-payer health care systems. It need not be a feature of American private insurance.

Looks like Jerome Powell won’t be the man who came to dinner (and wouldn’t leave). Senator Thom Tillis will vote yes for Fed head nominee Kevin Warsh. Fox Digital has a series of updates on the Iran situation. As some wag said, looks like Iran’s leaders are reading MSNBC Now and think they’re winning. They seem to think they have more bargaining chips than is the case.

Hasan Piker’s New Rules for Radicals: Shoplifting Is Chic. Trump Hailed as ‘First Feminist President.’ Ayaan Hirsi Ali: SPLC Targeted Me. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

It’s high time we got to know Hasan Piker … and this week Piker was in the spotlight, celebrated by the New York Times, for heaven’s sake.   

Mr. Piker, emerging one of the biggest voices on the left for some time now, had a breakout moment this week. Piker joined a New York Times group chat.

A transcript of the chat appears in the Times under the fetching headline “The Rich Don’t Play by the Rules. So Why Should I?” Among other things, Piker proposed that assassinated United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson was the real murderer in the case. Piker further argued in favor of stealing, as long as it’s from big companies. National Review’s Charles C.W. Cooke on what happened next when the mainstream media professionals were confronted with Piker’s moral inversions:

To which Piker’s interlocutors, the Times’ Nadja Spiegelman and the New Yorker’s Jia Tolentino, responded, “Wow, that all seems utterly psychotic, have you considered getting professional help?”

Nah, I’m just kidding. In reality, Tolentino responded by explaining that she is opposed to “profoundly selfish, immoral, collectively destructive” actions such as “getting iced coffee in a plastic cup” or flying on airplanes for pleasure, but that she is supportive of selfless, moral, collectively constructive actions such as “blowing up a pipeline,” and Spiegelman responded by saying, “I can relate to what you were saying, Jia. It is so hard to live ethically in an unethical society.”

According to Vox, Dems are having a hard time getting Piker out of the limelight:  

For the last month, some moderate Democrats have called on their party to shun Piker in light of his “antisemitic” and “hateful” remarks — among them, that “America deserved 9/11,” that “Hamas is 1,000 times better than Israel,” and that ultra-Orthodox Jews are “inbred.”

This ostracism campaign has gained little traction. In recent weeks, the center-left columnist Ezra Klein defended Piker against charges of antisemitism, while the flagship podcast of Resistance liberalism — Pod Save America — had the streamer on its show. And even resolutely pro-Israel Democratic politicians, such as Rahm Emmanuel and Gavin Newsom, have suggested they would appear on Piker’s livestream.

Kudos to one liberal magazine for acknowledging that shoplifting is not to be held up as an example of virtue. In honor of the affluent New Yorker mag writer’s admission (make that boast) of pilfering lemons from Whole Foods The Atlantic uses a bin of lemons as the art for a story headlined “Theft Is Now Progressive Chic,” Townhall describes Piker as “a glamorous backer of theft and murder.” Unherd sees “the latest example of moral confusion” in “microlooting.” Douglas Murray writes about the New York Times Piker chat this morning, too. Murray notes another admission from the irksome New Yorker writer:

New Yorker writer Jia Tolentino chimed in that she frequently does things that are ethnically questionable. “Like getting iced coffee in a plastic cup. I find that to be a profoundly selfish, immoral, collectively destructive action.”

As apparently, is taking a commercial flight.

All of which makes something that the trio didn’t seem to find morally troubling all the more startling.

As long as we’re in a morally inverted world, there’s this: Trans-identifying male prison inmates in Massachusetts are getting away with threatening the safety of incarcerated females. City Journal is on the case:

Just west of Boston, the state’s MCI–Framingham facility houses at least 11 trans-identified men, including serial rapists, wife-murderers, and child molesters, whose presence imposes degrading and dangerous conditions on female inmates. (MCI–Framingham did not return a request for comment for this article.)

Charles Horton, a level-three sex offender, was sentenced in 2000 to one year of house arrest for raping a minor. In 2019, he was convicted of repeatedly kidnapping and sexually assaulting a 14-year-old at gunpoint. He is now serving a 25- to 35-year sentence at MCI–Framingham as “Charlise.”

Meanwhile, “a biological male [i.e., male] killer housed in Oregon women’s prison wins high-dollar legal settlement in sex abuse suit.” Ms. Must would be against unkindness, including to Zera Lola Zombie, as the former Daniel Lee Smith, who beat his girlfriend to death, but the offense on the part of prison personnel seems to be this:

The claim said Zombie was discriminated against based on gender, that officials broke the law by housing a female in a male prison, said they failed to “follow both federal and Oregon rules and laws concerning the designation and protection of plaintiff as a Vulnerable Adult-In-Custody … at high risk for both physical and sexual assault,” housed an inmate with a known sexual predator, refused to provide legally-mandated counseling and failed to report the sexual assaults per Oregon and federal law.

We’d best get to the hard news segment of today’s programing. An Iranian ship tried to get past the U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, but one of our destroyers chased it down. The U.S. blockade is reaching peak leverage. Meanwhile, U.K. writer Joanna Williams makes the counterintuitive claim that that President Trump’s actions regarding Iran make him “America’s first ‘feminist’ president?” “In taking on the ayatollahs and the trans activists, The Donald has done far more for women than his woke opponents,” Williams argues.

The Wall Street Journal has a very sensible editorial on the recent DOJ indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center:

President Trump’s lawfare against his political opponents is destructive, but that doesn’t mean every case is unjustified. Consider Tuesday’s stunning grand jury indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) on charges the group funneled donor money to hate groups it was publicly warning about.

According to the indictment, between 2014 and 2023 the Alabama-based nonprofit used donor contributions to infiltrate right-wing extremist groups and pay informants. The SPLC’s mission is to fight hate and extremism, but the SPLC allegedly helped the groups by paying more than $3 million to leaders at the likes of the Ku Klux Klan and the National Socialist Movement….

Using informants to warn about threats of violence may be defensible. But the charges, if true, reveal a problematic symbiosis between the SPLC and its informant sources. One informant was allegedly the member of a chat group that helped plan the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Va. The source, who was paid $270,000 between 2015 and 2023, “made racist postings under the supervision of the SPLC,” the indictment says. The Charlottesville protests proved to be a great fund-raising event for the SPLC, with sizable donations from George Clooney, Apple Inc., and others….

To the extent the money encouraged or sustained the racist groups, tacitly or otherwise, SPLC benefited from perpetuating racial division. A court will decide if that’s illegal, but it’s certainly disreputable.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, one of Ms. Must’s heroines, writes “The SPLC Targeted Me. Now Its Reckoning Has Come” at The Free Press.

Gosh, I Wish He Wouldn’t Do Things Like This. “Trump Calls for 2020 Presidential Election to be ‘Permanently Wiped from the Books’ if Southern Poverty Law Center Convicted of Fraud” is a New York Post headline.

“Liberals Shocked! San Francisco Fixed Its Subway by Stopping Crime” is the headline on a Hill story by Robby Soave. Soave writes:  

Today, we have an exciting new report from Obvious Land: San Francisco’s public transportation system has raised revenue, dramatically improved customer safety, and is cleaner and more orderly than ever, and they accomplished it all with one neat trick. They actually cracked down on crime. And it worked. 

This news won’t surprise most normal people, but liberals might be in for a shock. It turns out that when you install new gates that it make impossible for fare-evaders — that’s the euphemism we use to describe criminals who refuse to pay to use the subway — to jump the gate, you magically improve everything about the subway. Seriously. 

Ms. Must avers there is absolutely no basis for the dastardly rumor that a New Yorker writer was detained trying to jump the fare gate in San Francisco.

“Pope Leo: Between Gospel Witness and Humanitarian Illusions,” by Daniel J. Mahoney, in City Journal contends that the Holy Father was right to warn against hatred and rash recourse to war—but his tendency toward a kind of functional pacifism marks a departure from older Christian wisdom.

SPLC: Hate For Profit. Judge: No, Virginia. Iran’s Bluff. Scoop: Kagan’s Clerks ‘Have Fear in Their Eyes.’ No Fear: DJT Goes to Nerd Prom. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

Enquiring Minds Want to Know: Are there any “very fine people” at the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) in Mobile, Alabama?

The SPLC is alleged to have hoodwinked its own donors by funneling millions of dollars into the “hate” groups the SPLC supposedly hates. Donors include George Clooney, who gave a million dollars, George Soros, JPMorgan, and ex-Apple CEO Tim Cook. 

The indictment alleges that tax-deductible donations made to SPLC ended up in the hands of Ku Kluxers and other charmers. The SPLC insists that this was for informers to keep themselves safe from all the haters. Another explanation: Recipients of SPLC largesse egged on violent protests, thus churning up business for the SPLC. In other words, the SPLC manufactured racism for financial gain.

Spreading fear of the elusive white supremacist was big business for the SPLC:

The Southern Poverty Law Center more than doubled its revenue in the months following the deadly 2017 Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally — a surge now drawing renewed scrutiny after a Department of Justice indictment alleged the group paid an informant tied to the event’s organizers.

The 2017 rally, which left one woman dead, became a cultural flashpoint over white nationalism and political violence, driving widespread condemnation and a surge in donations to civil rights groups, including the SPLC. The fallout also shaped the 2020 presidential election, as President Donald Trump’s response — including his remarks about “very fine people” on both sides — was hammered by the left, with former President Joe Biden later citing Charlottesville as a reason he entered the race.

As a southern conservative who grew up in a famously liberal enclave, where liberal self-congratulation was not in short supply, I can’t suppress a soupcon (okay, a big bucketful of) schadenfreude. The SPLC targeted as “hate groups” worthy organizations and individuals such as Focus on the Family, Turning Point, USA, and Moms for Liberty. (I’m willing to bet they didn’t pay a Moms for Liberty “informant”!) PJ Media’s Robert Spencer writes about this in “Hey SPLC, Where’s My Check?” Brendan O’Neill writes at Spiked Online:

Every now and then, there’s a news event that feels simultaneously insane and entirely logical. The stink swirling around the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is just such an event. At first blush, the suggestion that the centre has been ‘fund[ing] the extremism that it claimed to be fighting’ seems wild. But then it hits you – such duplicitous antics, if true, would be wholly in keeping with an activist class that continually inflates the far-right threat in order to make itself feel purposeful and virtuous….

The possibility that the turbo-smug coastal elites were unwittingly giving money to literal Nazis is almost too good to be true. These are people who look down on the ‘rednecks’ who voted for Trump as dim minions of the new fascism. Yet it’s now alleged that one of their own beloved organisations pumped $3million into groups with names like Aryan Nations. I don’t know much about Aryan Nations but it doesn’t sound nice.

The Free Press’s Jed Rubenfeld suggests that, while the SPLC has undoubtedly spread hatred, it might not be guilty of a crime.

No, Virginia. Virginia’s controversial Democratic redistricting plan, which narrowly was passed by voters, is being blocked by a judge. I am amused that CNN describes the judge “as judge in rural southern Virginia.” Yes, Virginia, rural judges rule things unconstitutional, too. An editorial in the Wall Street Journal is headlined “Virginia’s Race to the Gerrymander Bottom“:

The gerrymander race to the bottom escalated on Tuesday as Democrats in Virginia won a narrow victory to redraw their state map to add as many as four Democratic House seats. This is bad news for GOP control of the House in November, but Republicans can also blame President Trump for starting this rolling rock that has now come down on their heads.

The narrow 51.4%-48.6% margin attests to how brazenly partisan this exercise was. …

Barack Obama on Tuesday hailed Virginia for “stand[ing] up for our democracy,” but the vote effectively ends competitive elections for Congress in most of the state. This is why voters don’t take seriously Democratic complaints about GOP threats to democracy.

In “Virginia Failed the Basic Test of Our Democracy” at The Free Press Charles Lane argues: “A liberal society can’t work if both sides seize every advantage they can. But the latest gerrymander suggests we’ve gone awfully far down that road.”

We’re Starting Without You. Senate Republicans have rammed through a blueprint to bankroll ICE and the Border Patrol through the end of the Trump administration:

Senate Republicans adopted their budget resolution, which tees up funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol, and effectively cuts congressional Democrats out of the process entirely.

It’s the first major step toward unlocking the budget reconciliation process, which Republicans are diving into once again after Democrats refused to fund ICE and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) without stringent reforms. …

Is there more hope that we’re led to believe for the GOP in the midterms? “Democrats in Peril, From Barcelona to Boise” is the headline on Karl Rove’s column today. Rove writes that the Democratic party is “a mess, notwithstanding the GOP’s problems.” An interesting feature of the modern Dems is increasing opposition to the state of Isael. Matthew Continetti describes this in a column headlined “The Democrats Unify Against Israel“:

Israel is the Democratic Party’s new litmus test, and Senator Bernie Sanders is leading the turn against the Jewish state. In 2024, 19 Democrats voted with him to deny military aid to a U.S. ally at war. In 2025, 24 did the same. This year, as the U.S. and Israel fought side by side against the Iranian theocracy, 40 of 47 Democratic senators were with Mr. Sanders.

Democratic elites follow the polls. Anti-Israel sentiment runs through every level of the party, from former presidents to insurgent candidates. The woolly fringe is now mainstream. Barack Obama was all smiles in a recent photo-op with New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a socialist for whom anti-Zionism is a calling card. The Democrats’ newest congresswoman, Analilia Mejia of New Jersey, is a former Sanders delegate who omitted Israeli terror victims from an Oct. 10, 2023, social-media post condemning violence in Gaza.

The front-runner in Maine’s Democratic Senate primary, Graham Platner, says he plans to remove the Nazi-associated tattoo on his chest. …

Get Me Rewrite. Not without poignance, it’s time to rewrite “Rule, Britania.” Because guess what country comes closest to ruling the seas? “How U.S. Ship Boardings Have Kicked Off a New Phase of the Iran War” is a news headline in the Wall Street Journal. The U.S. has boarded an Iran-linked tanker in the Indian Ocean. Most of the legacy media has focused on Secretary Hegseth’s firing of the Secretary of the Navy, whose name you probably don’t remember.

More meaningfully, Victor Davis Hanson writes at American Greatness about “How Iran Committed Suicide.” The subhead:

Iran’s decades-long bluff—built on terror proxies, nuclear brinkmanship, and Western appeasement—collapsed the moment it faced direct force and a changed geopolitical landscape.

Meanwhile, Eli Lake at The Free Press compares former President Obama’s JCPOA with Iran and Trump’s nuclear deal.

Writing at City Journal, Heather Mac Donald shines light on “The Climate Litigation Swindle.” The greenies rely on lawsuits utilizing junk science to bankrupt energy companies, which undermine the basis of American power.

Another shocking revelation from Mollie Hemingway’s new book on Justice Alito: Justice Kagan is not a sweetie pie! No!

According to the book, Kagan—widely regarded as the intellectual leader of the Court’s liberal bloc—is admired for her sharp legal mind, strategic skill in oral arguments, and ability to build coalitions with conservative justices. But that reputation is paired with repeated accounts from clerks and court insiders describing her as emotionally abusive and demoralizing inside chambers….

“‘Kagan’s clerks had fear in their eyes,’ recalls someone who clerked for a different justice,” Hemingway wrote in the book. “Other clerks compared her to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, moving from extremely kind to extremely angry.”

President Donald Trump will not have fear in his eyes as he attends the White House Correspondents Dinner this weekend, even though the trendy Daily Beast, and other beasts, will be lying in wait for him.

Virginia Reeling. Iran: Too Confused to Field Negotiating Team? DOJ Finds No ‘Fine People’ at Southern Poverty Law Center. Hemingway Does Alito. Trump Goes to Lion’s Den—at Media Prom. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

Yes, Virginia did it.

Virginia voters narrowly approved a Democratic redistricting plan (and here). The Dems put forth an aggressive plan that radically alters the landscape for Virginia politics, possibly signaling curtains for Republicans in a heretofore purple state:  

The new map is designed to allow Democrats to pick up as many as four seats in the upcoming midterm elections.

The newly passed constitutional amendment will temporarily bypass the state’s bipartisan redistricting commission to implement a new congressional map until 2030, when mapmaking responsibilities will return to the commission.

The redistricting plan is a naked power grab by Dems. Virginia’s new map transforms a Dem edge of 6-to-1 into an overwhelming advantage of 10-to-1. In other words, the Commonwealth now joins the ranks of one-party states, and we know how that works out. National Review’s Jeffrey Blehar wrote last night (“Virginia Democrats Cast Republicans into the Outer Darkness on a Bare Majority Vote“) after the results were clear:

D.C.-area Democrats, with little more than a slight majority, have voted to federally disenfranchise the rest of the state’s Republicans. Why? Because they could. There is no “bright side” to tonight’s vote for Republicans.

The Supreme Court of Virginia could still strike down the new map — the case was put on procedural hold to be reviewed on the merits after the referendum — but that is a slim reed on which to hang one’s hopes. Republicans should never bet on a judicial deus ex machina.

It would seem, therefore, that these are Virginia’s new congressional lines until 2032 at least. The state will be represented in Congress almost entirely by Fairfax County, and most of its “downstate” representatives will hail from within a 50-mile radius of Washington, D.C. Who knows what Virginia will look like demographically once the state returns to court-drawn maps in 2032 — or what will happen to the state’s Republican Party after it has been locked out of nearly all power and relevance for six years?

Former Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin is calling upon the state Supreme Court to step in. Here is Governor Youngkin’s response to the passage of the Dem redistricting scheme on X. Former President Barack Obama is ecstatic over the vote.

Twinkly Brit Piers Morgan admitted yesterday on “The Five” that he has “no idea” what is going on with regard to Iran. Ditto Ms. Must. Ditto Democrat Senator Chris Murphy, who fell for Iranian propaganda, pronounced the terror regime’s fabricated exploit “awesome” and then tried to wiggle out by saying he was just being sarcastic.

Well, most of us aren’t that dumb. (By popular demand, another Chris Murphy item, by Townhall’s David Strom.) The U.S. and Iran delayed negotiations in Islamabad in what a Wall Street Journal headline calls “a high-stakes game of chicken.” This may be good news because, as the WSJ report indicates, Iran’s negotiators may be in disarray:

During the meetings, aides told Trump that Iran’s government wasn’t a unified entity, with hardline factions in Tehran unwilling to bend to the president’s demands. Questions were raised at the White House about whether Iran was really even in a position to negotiate and stick to any commitments.

The New York Post cover this morning acknowledges that President Trump has extended the Iran ceasefire and displays a panel of eight women Iran plans to execute with the injunction: “Save Them!“

This is the first time I’ve seen a reference to the actual people of Iran, as opposed to their monstrous leaders, in a long time. Meanwhile, three container ships in the Strait of Hormuz were hit by Iranian fire after the ceasefire was announced. This Just In: Iranian media says Iran has two container ships in custody. They are Panamanian- and Liberia-flagged tankers.

Examiner Chief Political Correspondent Byron York addresses President Trump’s frustration and Iran’s delaying tactics. “Moral Inversion and the Iran War” at The Free Press examines a new poll that finds Democrats under the age of 50 view terror-exporting Iran more favorably than Israel.

Couldn’t happen to nicer bunch of people. Not. “Southern Poverty Law Center Charged with Defrauding Donors with Payments to Extremist Informants” is an AP headline:

The Justice Department alleges the civil rights group defrauded donors by using their money to fund the very extremism it claimed to be fighting, with more than $3 million paid to informants through a now-defunct program to infiltrate white supremacist and other extremist groups. Prosecutors allege some of the money was used by extremists to carry out other crimes, but court papers did not include specific examples.

I don’t want to be the skunk at the garden party because the SPLC has a loathsome and reckless habit of designating conservatives as fomenting “hate,” but the charges seemed vague last night when Acting AG Todd Blanche discussed them on the Ingraham Angle. SPLC, however, did pay informants involved with the deadly Charlottesville, Va., incident that gave rise to the spurious “fine people on both sides” slur on President Trump. If it can be proven that the informants egged on the protests on covert behalf of SPLC, it might put the kibosh on at least one hate-spewing group: the awful SPLC itself.

The publication of a new Mollie Hemingway book is An Event. Hemingway’s “Alito: The Justice Who Reshaped the Supreme Court and Restored the Constitution” came out yesterday. Hemingway calls Alito the “Most ‘Courageous’ SCOTUS Justice You’ve Never Read About (Until Now)” at the Federalist, while at the same fine outlet, Shawn Fleetwood writes about Hemingway’s book today. Hemingway discusses her new book on Larry O’Connor’s show. Hemingway aired an intriguing idea on “The Megyn Kelly Show”—that Chief Justice Roberts, not Justice Alito, as has been bruited about by hopeful Alito-detractors, will be the Court’s next Justice to step down.

Socialist Concept of “Your” Retirement Funds. New York City Comptroller Mark Levine has announced that he will repurpose $4 billion of the city’s roughly $320 billion in pension funds to develop “affordable” housing. City Journal calls this risky and points out that the money belongs to pensioners, not housing projects. Allison Shrager writes:

Levine’s Housing Investment Initiative is not just poor risk management; it is also misguided and ill-timed. After the Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act of 2019 devastated the value of affordable housing, investments with real-estate firms Related Companies and Hudson Companies declined by 69 percent. Why inflict more damage? If these regulations continue in their current form, the affordable housing sector of the real-estate market has poor prospects for profitability, let alone competitive returns. The outlook will only worsen if the Rent Guidelines Board approves Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s promise to freeze rents. He recently placed six sympathetic appointees on that board to make it happen.

Landlords of rent-stabilized housing are already struggling. A rent freeze would push more of them into bankruptcy, devaluing mortgages that the city would buy and further eroding the profitability of affordable housing investments. Even the New York Times concedes that market-rate investors shy away from affordable housing because the returns are so low.

This plan takes Margaret Thatcher’s famous dictum about socialism and running out of other people’s money to a whole new level.

President Trump will go into the lion’s den this weekend. This is the den formally known as the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Journalists misleadingly refer to the affair as “nerd prom” because they think this makes them feel like they were smart in high school. James Kirchick of The Free Press takes a novel position on the impending dinner: both the journalist and President Trump are vain, so they will fit right in with each other. Dan Rather and Sam Donaldson (and, yes, before you check Google, they’re both still with us) are demanding that the journalists in attendance confront President Trump. (This could backfire.) Most of the journalists who will attend had their consciousnesses formed (and their egos expanded) way back in the Watergate era, when journalists actually did bring down a Republican president. I wish I were going this year. It might be fun for once.

Virginia Votes: Show Us the Map. What Matters in Iran. Nepo Supreme Leader Dumped. Ilhan Omar’s Accountant. Never Forget: Hersh. More

Posted on by Charlotte Hays

Virginians go to the polls today, but there’s no candidate’s name on the ballot. It’s even more important than that:  

Residents of Virginia face a crucial decision in an off-year trip to the ballot box on Tuesday: Hand power from the state’s independent redistricting commission over to the Democratic-controlled legislature, which could potentially gain four blue congressional seats from the move, or reject the move and give Republicans a better chance at maintaining control of the U.S. House in November.

Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger is pushing the gerrymandering referendum, despite having averred as a candidate that she had no intention of doing so. “Behold the great bait and switch,” says a Republican member of the state legislature. The change would require an amendment to the Constitution of the Commonwealth, which former Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin describes as a “bastardization” of said document.

Fans of the gerrymandering bill are saying the issue is “fairness.” But c’mon—Virginia’s Senator Tim Kaine admits what it’s really about—DJT. Isn’t everything? From The Federalist:

When asked how it was fair that 90 percent of Virginians will be represented by a Democrat, even though former Vice President Kamala Harris only won the commonwealth by five points, Kaine replied, “Ninety percent of Virginians are not Democrats, that’s true, but about 100 percent of Virginians want election results to be respected. We’re deeply worried that Donald Trump will try to interfere with the election results this November or in 2028, cause we saw him do it before.”

Meanwhile, a Fox Digital opinion piece says it’s revealing that the Dems are chary about showing the proposed new map. Author Chad Mizelle, a former DOJ official, argues:

This dishonest power play seeks to make the congressional representation of a purple state nearly as blue as Massachusetts. It disenfranchises nearly half the commonwealth (Virginia went 51.8%-46.6% for Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024). The proposed districts are extreme – running from heavily populated blue areas deep into rural red areas. Federal government employees in Arlington and Fairfax will essentially dictate the congressional representation of farmers and shopkeepers up to 100 miles away.

Mizelle has mapped out a “bold option” to have the Dems shouting “unfair”: give bluey blue Arlington back to the District of Columbia. It would fit in right, no?

Speaking of one’s view of President Trump’s being the root of everything, the Wall Street Journal’s Bill McGurn writes this morning that Trump’s critics can’t cheer for American victory because it brings him credit. McGurn says that, unlike his critics, Trump knows what matters in Iran:

It comes down to victory in Iran.

The Democrats don’t matter. Nor do the Republicans. Or NATO, or other U.S. allies. Pope Leo XIV is at best a footnote. All that now matters for this president is that the U.S. prevails and the Islamic Republic ceases to be a menace to America and its interests.

The president seems to get it. His legacy, it is now clear, will rest on whether his war against Iran succeeds or fails. And that success hinges on whether Iran remains a threat not only to Israel but to our Sunni Arab friends, who have their own reasons for wanting Iran defanged. …

President Trump has put the mullahs on their heels. Now is the time to make sure the U.S. doesn’t squander these gains and let the Iranians come back and do it all over again.

This rankles American establishments. …

A Washington Post headline has the planned Islamabad negotiations with Iran, round II, on “shaky footing” because the U.S. seized a vessel in the Strait of Hormuz—not mind you, because of anything the Iranians have done. Meanwhile, Iran ratchets up the rhetoric, claiming they have “new cards” (also here) to play. An analyst says that Iran’s choice of a new IRGC head [who chose him?] is not a sign that the regime is moderating. Mojtaba, We Hardly Knew Ye. The IRGC leader has sidelined Iran’s new nepo Supreme Leader.

Not often that people tell President Trump to get tougher, but … Elliot Kaufman of the Wall Street Journal argues that the Iranians “take Trump for a sucker” because, as Kaufman sees it, the president has let them get away with playing games.

Meanwhile, a Native American has just endorsed Graham Platner in his race against GOP liberal Senator Susan Collins of Maine. No word on whether Senator Elizabeth Warren had a powwow with Mr. Platner over his storied Nazi warpaint.

“Clarence Thomas, the Constitution, and Their Critics,” by Ilya Shapiro, at City Journal, explains the importance of Justice Thomas’ recent remarks at the University of Texas:

The easiest way to misunderstand Justice Clarence Thomas’s recent speech at the University of Texas is as a conventional swipe at contemporary progressives. His target was instead deeper and older: the capital-P Progressive challenge to the American Founding itself.

Appearing in Austin as part of a celebration of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas framed the issue as one of first principles. “The Constitution is the means of government,” he said, and “it is the Declaration that announces the ends of government.”

Justice Thomas’s Austin speech was a reminder of that forgotten truth. The American Founding was a claim about human nature, political power, and the institutions needed to keep freedom alive. Any successor worthy of his seat should understand that, too.

Emeritus Harvard Professor Harvey Mansfield, one of the few conservatives on the faculty, writes about what went wrong at the once-revered institution:

Harvard makes its case for government money by emphasizing the scientific cancer research it performs. This, they imply, is service to both parties that keeps Harvard independent while still deserving of support.

Yet earlier Harvard, had gone so far as to renounce its independence. In 2023, it appointed a president, Claudine Gay, who immediately declared that the old idea of an Ivory Tower was obsolete. Harvard would now act as a “part of society.” What is the difference?

In “Ilhan Omar’s Amazing Accounting,” the Wall Street Journal writes about the scoop that wasn’t:

A bombshell report in the Journal on Friday night has triggered a media feeding frenzy. Just kidding—the story is about questionable disclosures from a left-wing politician, so the partisan press corps is largely ignoring it.

Fed head nominee Kevin Warsh’s confirmation hearing is today before the Senate Banking Committee. The hearing will require Warsh to perform a high-wire act of convincing investors without angering President Trump. Current Fed Chair Jerome Powell could remain a member of the Fed after leaving chairmanship, though there will be a new era for the Fed.

Never Forget. Rachel Goldberg-Polin writes a heart-wrenching memoir about the loss of her son, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who was held hostage by Hamas. Hersh’s arm was blown off, and he was later executed by Hamas.

TRANSITIONS. … Apple’s longtime CEO Tim Cook is stepping down, naming John Ternus, the affable head of its hardware division, to replace him. Ternus, 50, must “rekindle the creative fire and chart a hardware-heavy future in the AI era.”

… The Dersh Did It! “Why I’m Becoming a Republican,” by Alan Derschowitz, appears in today’s WSJ. He says “hostility to Israel” was the tipping point.

… Rep. Nancy Mace is moving to transition Florida Rep. Cory Mills, a Republican, who has faced domestic violence, sexual misconduct, and stolen valor allegations, out of Congress.

…  Also reluctant to transition is indicted House Democrat Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, who refuses to “abandon her District.” She faces the possibility of expulsion:

Cherfilus-McCormick was found guilty of more than two dozen ethics violations involving financial misconduct during a rare House ethics trial in March. She has denied any wrongdoing and is facing a separate criminal trial after being indicted by a federal grand jury in 2025.