Category: Daily Musts

Whither the Democrats?

After Abdul El-Sayed’s nod for the Senate nomination by Michigan Democrats, the future of the Democratic Party is very much up for grabs. Ditto the nation.     

The U.K. Telegraph calls El-Sayed’s victory “the night the Democrats lost control of their own party.” In the same outlet, El-Sayed is depicted as “an Oxford-educated doctor taking on [Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer.”

“The March of the El-Sayed Democrats” is the headline on a Wall Street Journal editorial. According to the editors, El-Sayed’s win “sets up the race of the year in November.” A few snippets:

Mr. El-Sayed is counting on anti-Donald Trump fury to unite Democrats despite his radical views. Look for the Democratic establishment, including Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, to rally behind him despite their support for Ms. Stevens. Ben Rhodes, Dan Pfeiffer and the rest of the Barack Obama apparat are already lined up for him.

The stakes here are higher than a single Senate race. Nominating a leftist could cost the party a Senate majority that is very much in reach. If Mr. Rogers wins, one lesson will be that Mr. El-Sayed was too far left to win in a swing state even in what is likely to be an excellent Democratic year. Democrats might rethink this year’s headlong rush left as they consider the 2028 presidential race….

But if Mr. El-Sayed wins, he will immediately become a media favorite bent on colonizing the Democratic Party from the socialist left. He has said one of his first tasks will be trying to defeat John Fetterman, the pro-Israel Pennsylvania Democrat who is up for re-election in 2028. “Put one ogre on a pike and then everyone else gets the message,” he told a donor, according to leaked audio.

Heads on pikes? What, no guillotine? Michigan voters have to decide how polarizing and left-wing they want American politics to become.

“‘A Turning Point for Our Nation’: How Abdul El-Sayed Won” is a Free Press headline. Olivia Reingold’s take: “In Michigan this week, I saw the future of the Democratic Party. It is angry, energized, and on the march.” The “turning point” quote comes from Amir Makled, a Dearborn lawyer who has made a career out of anti-Israel advocacy. He means turning point in a good way. Why the sudden surge of socialist candidates such as El-Sayed and New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani? Writing in the WSJ’s “Free Expression” section, psychotherapist and “Therapy Nation” author Jonathan Alpert has an answer: socialism feels good. Alpert writes:

Before people decide what government should do, they decide why their lives aren’t working. … They haven’t abandoned ambition or effort. What changes is where they expect meaningful change to come from. They place more faith in government, institutions and systemic reform than in personal agency, resilience and individual responsibility. As confidence shifts outward, political solutions become more attractive than personal ones….

Elections work the same way. Economic hardship doesn’t produce democratic socialists any more than unemployment produces conservatives or libertarians. Hardship produces frustration. Political movements compete to explain that frustration.

Democratic socialism offers a compelling explanation….

New York Post columnist Miranda Devine writes:

If El-Sayed can pull off a victory in November in the Midwest, in the swingiest of swing states, what will stop a Marxist heading for the White House?

This menacing hard-left takeover is disastrous for Democrats and frightening for America, but it is also a potential golden opportunity for the GOP — if they don’t screw it up, which is nowhere near certain.

Like his comrades, he has a vast trove of deleted social media posts expressing his true hard-left beliefs …. The level of deception skills involved in this metamorphosis has pundits praising him as a “political athlete” and likening him to Bill Clinton.

But his extremism is not hard to detect, no matter how flowery the language disguising it.

Money will be key in the midterms, writes Karl Rove, who gives a rundown of the strengths and weaknesses of both parties. Byron York of the Washington Examiner looks at the big picture:

You’re likely to hear many comments to the effect that el Sayed, who was expected to win by a big margin, instead got in by the skin of his teeth. It’s true, but it’s also not hugely important. The hugely important thing is that el Sayed won. And now, he has a chance in November.

Both the U.S. and Iran say a Hormuz deal is near, but are they on the same page? The deal reportedly does not include tolls. Nuclear experts urge President Trump not to let Iran steer talks away from the regime’s atomic threat.

Meanwhile, Iran just executed at least 56 people. This provoked the United Nations to declare such executions “deeply troubling” (ya think?) and insist that the barbaric practice of impromptu public murders “has no place in our world.” But it does have a place: Iran. Next thing you know, the UN will bravely proclaim the practice is “unacceptable.”

Iran’s President is finding it hard to communicate with the Supreme Leader, who may be dead or grievously injured. And Nicole Russell of USA TODAY is finding herself disillusioned with the Iran War: I don’t regret voting for Trump, but …

“The Hard Truth About the Sanctuary Movement” is The Federalist’s Sean Davis’s contribution to Hillsdale’s Imprimis series. Germane to this is an Axios report that Trump deportations cost taxpayers $2,358 each. Sorry, Axios, but this should be a conservative talking point. That figure is so much less than what it costs not to deport illegal aliens.

Vice President JD Vance’s op-ed in the Washington Post touts the Trump administration’s war on fraud. It’s a huge scandal that should be receiving more attention. But there is a problem: The fraud is found in the country’s massive and unaccountable web of federal assistance programs—Medicare, Medicaid, and food stamps—and the Dems and the press don’t want to go near it.

City Journal explores the human wreckage of misguided government welfare policies, including AI-driven job displacement. “The Permanent Underclass Is Already Here,” by Sanjana Friedman, concludes that more government assistance is not the solution. Also at City Journal, Chris Rufo and Ryan Thorpe write that a medieval disease is spreading in Los Angeles. As with the bubonic plague, it’s rats. The vermin-ridden county is seeing a staggering rise of typhus cases and horror stories:

Another told us that he’d seen a rat eating through the bandage of an injured man while he was asleep. “The rat chewed off the bandage he had, and literally the flesh off him, eating the dead flesh off his arm,” he said….

Individually, each of these incidents might be dismissed as an isolated failure. But taken together, they paint a different picture. A county struggles to keep its streets clean, to keep garbage from piling up, to bring homelessness under control, to contain its growing rat problem, and to prevent medieval diseases from infecting its citizens—all in a state more interested in “mountain lions and other wildlife” than the health of its own people. At a certain point, like the rats that torment Angelenos, the pattern becomes too overwhelming to ignore.

Ms. Must wrote about Jason Arday, the fabulist and DEI standard bearer, yesterday. Mr. Arday resigned his position at Cambridge. Rather than dwelling on plagiarism accusations, the New York headline just linked calls Arday a “star scholar.” Spiked Online’s rather more honest headline is “The Not-So Talented Mr. Arday.” Arday survived in one of the world’s great universities as long as he did because of identitarian politics:

The identitarian capture of elite institutions, supercharged by the Black Lives Matter movement of 2020, has entailed the suspension of the values which once defined them – the displacement of truth, merit and excellence in pursuit of a mystical racial reckoning.

“There’s a reason it’s a swing state.”

That’s how the New York Post begins its report on what early this morning remained a nail-biter in Michigan. Even if there is a winner by the time you read this, the NYP analysis is relevant:

Michigan voters threw a wrench in expectations that Dr. Abdul El-Sayed would easily coast to victory over Rep. Haley Stevens in the closely watched Democratic Senate primary.

El-Sayed’s backers had seen the race as a battle for “the soul of the Democratic Party,” and the far-left’s attempt to prove that their candidates are just as electable, if not more, than centrist Dems.

But despite El-Sayed’s frequent double-digit leads in most polls, he wrapped up his watch party speech with a nearly two-percentage-point lead that was shrinking on Tuesday night.

Polling guru Nate Silver delivers this verdict: “Abdul El-Sayed’s apparent victory is a big win for the left — but a disaster for polling and a case study in poor expectations management.” Polls gave El-Sayed an overwhelming lead, but when Silver was writing at 4 am Eastern Time, he was only 1.4 points ahead. Jack Butler of The Wall Street Journal’s “Free Expression” section says El-Sayed’s apparent win only amounts to “Michigan’s Middling Momentum for the Left.”

Elsewhere in the Wolverine state, William Lawrence—a Bernie Sanders anti-ICE activist—cruised to victory, defeating two more moderate contenders to win the Democratic nomination for Michigan’s seventh congressional district. Primaries in other states provide mixed signals for the entrail readers: 

Across the country, similar ideological battles were waged with mixed results. And in two red states, voters rejected GOP-led ballot measures that would have given state legislators more power to reshape law on key issues, including abortion.

Virginia’s 1^st district congressional race will be among the most competitive in November. Democrat Shannon Taylor, a moderate-leaning candidate and county prosecutor, goes up against GOP incumbent Rep. Rob Wittman. The district includes Richmond. More Virginia results. Missouri was one of the most interesting congressional races (back to the WaPo):

The Missouri race assessed the power of AIPAC as it did when the duo competed in 2024.AIPAC’s spending that year made the race one of the most expensive primaries in U.S. history and helped [Rep. Wesley] Bell unseat Cori Bush. The former congresswoman, an ex-member of “the Squad” of several progressive lawmakers, harshly criticized Israel over the war in Gaza before some Democrats even began to question their stance. On the night of her 2024 loss, Bush hinted at a comeback bid: “AIPAC, I’m coming to tear your kingdom down.”  On the night of her 2024 loss, Bush hinted at a comeback bid: “AIPAC, I’m coming to tear your kingdom down.”

But don’t heave a sigh of relief, AIPAC. Squad member Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington state had a better night and will advance to the general election with 53% of the vote in the state’s jungle primary.

Not Again. In what appears to have been yet another Trump assassination attempt, a man carrying ammunition was arrested near the Trump National Golf Club in LA before the president’s Southern California trip. From CBS:

When deputies approached the man, who has been identified as 38-year-old Downey resident Jeanine John Taele, they determined he was already under investigation by the El Segundo Police Department for a separate incident. 

Investigators said an illegally modified AR platform rifle, a 1911 .45 caliber pistol, an AR platform upper receiver, body armor, high-capacity magazines, bulk pistol and rifle ammunition, two radio signal devices and multiple notebooks containing “concerning statements” were recovered from the home during Monday’s search warrant.

Ms. Must is most eager to find out more about the strangely named suspect Jeanine John Taele and those “concerning statements.”

Maine Senator Susan Collins announced that she will not vote to confirm acting AG Todd Blanche. From Politico:

The Maine Republican, who is facing a difficult race for reelection, said in a statement she would oppose Blanche, citing “several actions that have further eroded the Department’s independence.” She specifically mentioned his role in a controversial IRS settlement with President Donald Trump and over having “promised an anti-abortion organization that he would seek to prohibit the mailing of abortion medication to women nationwide.”

Senators Bill Cassidy and Lisa Murkowski are undecided. Blanche must win one of their votes to be confirmed.

Iran seems to have found something it likes even more than the prospect of nuclear annihilation. “Iran Is Staking Everything on Controlling the Strait of Hormuz,” the Wall Street Journal reports. According to the WSJ, “Tehran’s hard-line approach threatens to destroy its economy and relations with neighbors.”

A Foundation for the Defense of Democracies analyst sums up the regime’s ruse to win:

“This is a regime that knows it cannot win an outright battle of conventional capability,” Foundation for Defense of Democracies Iran Program Senior Director Behnam Ben Taleblu said on Fox News’ “America Reports.”

“They’re even fighting a battle of wills right now against the Trump administration, both on the battlefield and diplomatically,” he added.

Warnings that the U.S. is low on munitions are alarming, and such information should be classified, as Dana Perino astutely noted on The Five. It’s not unfair to note that former President Joe Biden’s $7 billion Taliban weapons tab, which is still coming due, is a factor.

Meanwhile, the (just barely) satirical Babylon Bee responds to the impasse in Iran with this:

Trump Warns Iran This Is Their Fourth-To-Last Chance at Peace

Is U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro getting a last-chance warning from President Trump? Judge Jeanine was called on the carpet by the president, who claimed that the reason she dropped charges in the Lincoln Reflecting Pool case was that she “choked.” Pirro dropped criminal charges in three Reflecting Pool vandalism cases involving the pool lining. The president disputes that faulty construction caused the problems.

A Washington Post editorial charges that Judge Jeanine, as the U.S. attorney is known, is fighting for her job because of what it terms the “absurdity of the Reflecting Pool prosecutions.” Riddle Me This: How many last warnings will Judge Jeanine get?

DEI is everywhere and nowhere more hilariously than at the U.K.’s revered Cambridge University, where academic superstar Jason Arday was “hired three years ago amid great fanfare as the youngest black professor in the history of that institution.”

Arday, as Kyle Smith tells us, was also a fabulist. He fabricated astonishing academic credentials and a tale of overcoming adversity (he claimed to have been diagnosed with autism at three). Arday’s story fell apart when seemingly irrefutable charges of plagiarism emerged. Smith recounts:

Shortly after being hired, Mr. Arday claimed he was sent vicious racist emails; that the severed head of a pig was sent to his parents’ place in South London; and that an intruder came at him in his office, twice, the second time with a knife. After the first incident, the university installed extra surveillance equipment including CCTV but no images of anyone with a knife have been found. Mr. Arday helpfully gave the Guardian the name of a local butcher’s shop that police supposedly investigated because it had supposedly sold a whole pig on the morning of the incident, but the butchers denied this (“That’s the kind of thing we’d remember”) and so did the police (“categorically”).

When the Guardian, whose woke credentials are usually seen as unassailable, confronted Mr. Arday about his misadventures with truth, he said, “To be honest with you, I thought you’d just believe me.”

 If you can’t get enough of Jason Arday—and, dear me, who can?—here, here, and here. Here’s my favorite and most relevant to college admissions: “Who Had to Lose for Jason Arday to Win?“

Married Ladies to Starve in Mamdani’s New York: “NYC Mayor Mamdani Demands ID for Groceries but Not Voting.”

Two from Compact Magazine. “Why Democrats Can’t Stop the DSA,” by Alex Hogan, and “The Racial Crossroads,” by Helen Andrews. It was published two days ago, but I can’t stop thinking about Dominic Green’s “The Ceuta Invasion Is Stranger Than Fiction,” about the Moroccan invasion of Spain.

It’ll be a hot time in the political world tonight.

After the polls close tonight, we’ll know a lot more about the direction of the Democratic Party. Is it leaning socialist or towards the party’s old guard? A bellwether race: Michigan’s high-drama Senate nomination battle, which is “a fight for the Democratic Party’s future.” The New York Times’ thumbnail sketch:

The bitter, expensive race pits Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive former public health official, against Representative Haley Stevens, a centrist supported by party leaders. The winner will defend the seat of Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat who is retiring, in a battleground state that could determine control of the Senate. Along with Michigan, four other states are holding primaries on Tuesday: Kansas, Virginia, Washington and Missouri.

El-Sayed says, implausibly, that he is not a socialist. He has campaigned, however, with radical streamer and lightning rod Hasan Piker, who’s exhilarated by what he sees as El-Sayed’s chances tonight:

On the eve of his Senate primary, Dr. Abdul El-Sayed stumped with controversial lefty streamer Hasan Piker, who once claimed that “America deserved 9/11” — and delivered a final speech reflecting on the country’s flaws.

“I’ve been seeing a lot of clips of like white dude bros that are so stoked to vote for you in the f–king Democratic primaries,” Piker marveled about El-Sayed. “Like, these are people that normally never vote at all, let alone in a primary, let alone for a Democrat.”

The two also gloated over veteran Democratic strategist James Carville floating the possibility of leaving the party if Piker takes over. The streamer argued that the threat was “sweetening the deal.”

El-Sayed also touts the endorsement of Horace Sheffield III, an influential Detroit pastor and radio host who once heaped praise on Nation of Islam minister Louis Farrakhan. A video from 2018 that features El-Sayed advocating driver’s licenses for illegals has surfaced. Another race with big implications: Democratic Socialist Francesca Hong’s race for the Democratic nomination for Governor of Wisconsin is said to be DSA’s biggest test yet.

Embattled Democratic Committee Chair Ken Martin is having a hard time raising money. We’re learning more (via a New York Times scoop) about the DNC’s botched autopsy of the 2024 presidential debacle—the autopsy left out the most important chapter. You know what we need now to cheer us up? Kamala Harris! “This is your moment, Kamala Harris. America needs you,” suggests the Washington Post’s Kate Andrews:

Her political resurrection cannot come soon enough.

Some uplifting cheeriness is needed immediately.

“We each have light inside of us,” the former vice president told Don Lemon on YouTube in June. “And when we feel that and not allow an election or an individual to dampen that light, and instead let that light kind of carry us, in particular through moments of darkness, that we not only act on that hope, but we inspire that hope in each other.”

This is Harris’s gift to America’s political discourse. She is the antidote, the welcome comic relief amid today’s heaviness.

Ms. Must is betting that Judge Jeanine (Pirro) might be in need of some comic relief after President Trump accused the judge of “folding like an umbrella” after she concluded damage at the Lincoln Reflecting Pool was not caused by vandals. Her job is said to be safe—for now.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, meanwhile, moves closer to confirmation as AG after GOP Senators Thom Tillis and John Cornyn dropped their objections after Blanche issued a formal statement that President Trump’s beloved $1.8 billion “anti-weaponisation” fund is dead. A Wall Street Journal editorial concludes:

The two Senators say they’re ready to confirm Mr. Blanche. Democrats will complain they should block him anyway, but since Mr. Trump can keep his man as acting AG, the question is realistic alternatives. And as Mr. Trump put it in his threat on Saturday: “Todd Blanche was a voice of reason!”

Not implausible. Messrs. Cornyn and Tillis got the Justice Department to bend, and it’s good to see Senators use their advise-and-consent power productively.

President Trump is giving Iran “one last chance” to sign a deal before “decapitation.” It feels as if we’ve been here before. Details are emerging about a cargo ship stuck in the Strait of Hormuz. Iran claims it is close to a deal with Oman for control of Hormuz—the deal would include fees. A U.S. official denied the report. There are conflicting signals about the Strait.

In “President Trump’s Triple Bogey,” Hugh Hewitt uses the way Trump golfs as giving hope that the U.S. will prevail in Iran.  Walter Russell Mead, WSJ’s foreign affairs guru, uses the game of bridge to make the point that “Trump’s Unpredictability Has Costs, Too.” Gerard Baker, in the same outlet, predicts that Iran will be handed off to Trump’s successor (ugh) and also dings the president’s unpredictability:

Some see this endless back and forth as the enigmatic work of a pure genius…. Others see it as the derangements of a trapped and helpless man….

Ms. Must can’t stop thinking about Dr. Anthony Fauci’s pleading the Fifth 111 times in testimony aimed at ascertaining the origin of Covid 19. In “Covid’s Moral Injuries,” Meghan Cox Gurdon argues, “Strict lockdowns forced us to deny obvious truths.” Ms. Gurdon writes:

If you, like me, suffered profound moral injury five and six years ago you may have felt the old wounds throbbing this past week. It was hard to see Anthony Fauci demonstrate his contempt for Americans by pleading the Fifth Amendment and refusing to answer questions from members of Congress—even though he was pre-emptively pardoned for any potential alleged lies and crimes by President Biden. The sight of the smug little doctor, silent for once, was all the more galling alongside the release of diary entries he kept on his work computer that reveal what a preening, dissembling popinjay he was all along.

Like Dr. Fauci, former President Joe Biden got by (sort of) with denying obvious truths. Jonathan Turley writes in the Hill that the tapes Biden fought hard to conceal reveal that he confessed everything about his handling of classified material.

Special Counsel Robert Hur let President Biden off because he found him a “sympathetic” elderly man with a bad memory:

It is hard to see how any of that would present “a sympathetic, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory.” It sounds more like a cynical, shrewd politician with poor ethics. It also sounds like it would have been a strong foundation for a prosecution.

Vice President JD Vance is seen as the potential frontrunner for the GOP 2028 nomination. That makes Bill McGurn’s Wall Street Journal column—”JD Vance ‘Fixes’ Capitalism”—this morning quite timely. McGurn writes:

Vice President JD Vance would seem to have little in common with J.D. Rockefeller (1839-1937), once the wealthiest man in the world. But the two Republicans have in common a belief that capitalism doesn’t work for the American people. Mr. Vance has little faith in market competition, which Rockefeller called “a sin.” …

Today Mr. Vance says that while [free market economist Milton] Friedman’s ideas might have worked “in a world where there are Christian guardrails on everything,” they are ill-suited for our more secular age.

If you’re interested in this, Peter Berkowitz had a fascinating article over the weekend about Patrick Deneen, the Notre Dame professor and Vance influencer, who also has reservations about classical liberalism.

Good news from our friend Dr. Sally Satel. “Med Schools Are Over Their Politics Fever,” Sally writes in the Wall Street Journal’s Free Expression section. “Students aren’t swearing to uproot ‘structural violence’ anymore. They’re taking the Hippocratic Oath,’ she reveals.

“Should I Get a Gun?” asks Larissa Phillips of The Free Press. “I’ve opposed them for most of my life. But right now, I’m considering getting a handgun,” Phillips admits.

“Will Republicans Renounce Max Miller?” asks a headline in the same publication. “The GOP congressman’s ex-wife has accused him of assault amid a custody battle. He has denied the claims and said he’ll stay in his race.” Miller’s ex-wife is the daughter of Senator Bernie Moreno.

“Is ‘Communist’ No Longer a Slur?” asks Victor Davis Hanson’s headline at American Greatness. We’ll know more about the answer after tonight.

A mob boss woulda been proud. Dr. Anthony Fauci invoked the Fifth Amendment 111 times yesterday in his appearance before a Senate Committee.

Miranda Devinewrites that Fauci’s silence “spoke volumes” about his “Covid sins” and “solidified him as a reprehensible villain”:

In the history of Congress, only a couple of mob bosses have invoked the privilege more.

“On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer, based upon my rights, under the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution,” the Machiavellian career bureaucrat said over and over in the nearly three-hour hearing before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

But Fauci’s silence rendered him a villain more powerfully than his usual sly deceptions.

Shameful, too, were the Democrats and their media handmaidens who continue to run cover for Fauci, singing his praises, and denying their flock the truth about a man who filled his pandemic ­diary with self-praise and celebrity worship while remaining callously aloof from the human suffering he had caused.

Devine praises RFK Jr. “whose doggedness unearthed Fauci’s diary.” George Washington University law professor and Fox Contributor Jonathan Turley writes that, while Fauci took the Fifth, the diary “may have already answered for him”:

The question many will ask is why Fauci could not just “stick with the science” and resolve these contradictions. The fact is that he would have had difficulty dealing with his own “inconvenient truths.”

The new evidence shows that Fauci connected the Wuhan lab to the emerging crisis before most people had ever heard of the lab. It also shows him repeatedly referencing the lab’s gain-of-function work and discounting the “wet market” as the true origin of the virus, viewing it instead as an “amplifier.”

Some of the most embarrassing areas for Fauci concerned his entries acknowledging that he pushed to close schools despite public denials that he ever recommended such closures….

It is a “murky area” whether he can be held for contempt of Congress after yesterday’s performance. One of Fauci’s many lawyers was thrown out of the hearing because he “seemed to think he could rebut the senators by proxy.” For once, political theater—when Senator Josh Hawley tore into Fauci—was most satisfying and entirely justified. Here are the “five most shocking moments” from the hearing.  

Jack Butler writes about Fauci in a Wall Street Journal “Free Expression” piece entitled “Anthony Fauci, Modern Narcissus“:

The diaries do more than flesh out the psychological profile of the man who became the face of elite overreaction to the pandemic. They also provide evidence of deliberate deception….

As Matthew Hennessey wrote last month, when the Journal’s “The Lockdown Dissidents” documentary premiered, elites continue to form, impose and enforce consensus heedless of dissent and counterevidence. “The authoritarianism of arrogance” remains important to challenge.

The same goes for narcissism. Dr. Fauci, a powerful bureaucrat who spent decades priming himself for his Covid moment, succumbed easily.

Fauci made the cover of the New York Post as “Doctor NO.” A Wall Street Journal editorial headlined “Dr. Fauci Takes the Fifth, Alas” emphasizes the legacy media’s role in helping Dr. Fauci avoid more timely scrutiny:

Journalists need sources, and friendships aren’t uncommon. But the conformist media idolatry of Dr. Fauci was a way of shutting off debate over Covid policy. It also became a way for the press to attack President Trump in an election year. Locking down debate over Covid was as damaging as the lockdowns.

Acting AG Todd Blanche is facing a delay in the vote on whether he will be able to ditch the “acting.” Senators John Cornyn and Thom Tillis, neither of whom will be returning next term, have accused Blanche of refusing to put on paper his promise to kill aspects of the deal he cut to settle President Trump’s suit against the agency. The vote on Blanche, scheduled for yesterday, is postponed.

The U.S. retaliated against Iran’s missile attacks on our troops in Jordan with air strikes. The airstrikes came after President Trump vowed to hit Iran “very hard.” The Saudi Foreign Minister had a previously unscheduled White House meeting yesterday. The message, via Axios, appeared to be that the Saudis do not want to broaden the war but will defend themselves. Meanwhile, Egypt said it had come under attack from an unidentified drone. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had a frank conversation with Vice President Vance, his leading critic within the Trump administration. Netanyahu and President Trump also met and discussed severe measures to end the war.

“Why Mamdani Is Asking My Mom to Pay His Pied-à-Terre Tax,” by Alex Berenson for The Free Press, illustrates what will be the real-world effects of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s latest plan to eat the rich:

My 81-year-old mother has lived in New York for 30 years, but the city presumes she owes a $55,048 fee for out-of-towners.

Mr. Berenson’s elderly mother’s name almost certainly appeared on what an editorial in the Wall Street Journal calls “Mamdani’s Class Enemies List,” the list he made public of the names and addresses of his new property-tax targets. The most fascinating aspect—one of Mamdani’s advisers:

Don’t be surprised if Mr. Mamdani soon calls for extending the pied-a-terre tax to primary homes of “wealthy” New Yorkers. During his campaign, he called for “de-commodifying” housing—a euphemism for ending private property ownership—and confiscatory taxes are one way to do it.

In related news, Mr. Mamdani’s legal adviser Ali Najmi, who also serves as a special counsel at the personal injury firm Liakas Law, said this week he plans to file a lawsuit against the city for the tragic death of a teenage tourist in a horse-carriage accident in Central Park. Mr. Najmi leads the Mayor’s committee that appoints judges to city courts. Conflict of interest?

“Who’s Afraid of the DSA?” asks Karl Rove’s politics column. Well, Senators Mark Kelly and Tim Kaine, who can’t find the courage to oppose their party’s radicals, for starters. Rove concludes:

In a narrowly polarized America, a DSA takeover would drag Democrats to defeat in battleground districts and states. If Democrats like Messrs. Kaine and Kelly can’t find the courage to stand up to the DSA, a debacle awaits their party.

We learned how deluded the media tends to be in the Covid debacle (see above). Looks like we need to relearn the message. The New Republic has a piece out headlined “The new red scare is here—and it’s dumber than ever.” News Flash: Lefty Media Still Dumb.

Evan Barker, a former DSA fundraiser, meanwhile, tells “The Inside Story of How Democrats Lost the Working Class.”

There are two recommended stories about “restorative justice” and its effect on kids. “‘Restorative Justice’ Brings Violent Schools” is President of Federalism in Action’s Tony Woodlief’s story in the Wall Street Journal. “Why would anyone think you could discipline bullies by inviting them to talk about their feelings?” asks Woodlief. He writes:

Concerns about restorative justice emerged soon after the Obama administration began pushing it. Public schools in Philadelphia that implemented it experienced “skyrocketing truancy, serious misbehavior, and declining achievement,” Manhattan Institute researchers observed in 2017. Other cities experienced similar results.

If any school district needed help diverting struggling children from a path that begins with school suspensions and ends in prison, it was the Little Rock School District in Arkansas. … Who could blame LRSD for forming a partnership with the Tendaji Community Development Corp., which claims its alternative discipline methods “promote cohesion among students and administrators while fostering a growth mindset and positive relationships”? LRSD engaged Tendaji in 2022, paying it almost $1.5 million between 2023 and 2025 alone to provide digital social-emotional learning tutorials, on-site peer mediation and “restorative circles,” among other services.

What followed was a catastrophe. Since the 2021-22 school year, districtwide assaults by students on other students have jumped 118%. Assaults by students on teachers and staff have climbed 151%.

“Students Need Consequences, Not ‘Restorative Justice’” in City Journal concurs with Woodlief. Anti-disciplinary policies ignore the vital factor of motivation, the authors contend.