Race to November Is On! Guess Which Party REALLY Stands for Women. DSA Split: How Marxist Shall We Be? Mamdani Refuses to Say Home. Clancy Jurors Speak. Peril: Fat Genocide. More
Well, we’re off and running. Finally.
The GOP is hoping to get a jolt from its inaugural midterm convention that kicks off today in Dallas. Meanwhile, the New Hampshire primaries yesterday resulted in what USA TODAY calls “safer bets” for both parties:
Within minutes of the polls closing, results were called for the Democratic and Republican nominations for Senate, which easily went to Rep. Chris Pappas and former Sen. John E. Sununu, respectively….
Recruiting Sununu was a big get for the GOP, which is promising to spend $17 million in the state this year to flip the seat. He comes from a popular family in the state and served in the Senate previously, having defeated Jeanne Shaheen in 2002 before losing their rematch six years later.
President Trump will deliver tonight’s keynote speech at the GOP convention (tentatively scheduled for 9 pm ET). The New York Times proposes that the president’s ability to channel voter concerns will be tested. Encouraging for the GOP, however, Byron York writes that Trump has been true to his base:
A new analysis in the Wall Street Journal offers striking evidence that, for all his problems, President Donald Trump has delivered economic benefits to the voters whose support was the foundation of his victory in 2024.
The Wall Street Journal’s headline and story synopsis read: “Americans Without College Degrees Are Having One of the Best Job Markets in Years; Unemployment among younger workers who didn’t go to college has rarely been lower in recent decades. It is the opposite story for college grads.”
In a similar vein, Heather Higgins writes at Real Clear Politics that “Republicans Should Make Clear Who Stands for Women“:
The WNBA’s stunning inability to explain why Enes Kanter Freedom shouldn’t be eligible for women’s professional basketball is an unexpected gift to Republicans facing a difficult midterm election.
Once again, voters see how the left is now so controlled by radical ideologues that they can no longer acknowledge the obvious realities that made them champion Title IX and the need for separate sports teams for biological women.
But why stop with sports?
A Race to Watch: Sportscaster Michele Tafoya is giving Lt. Governor Peggy Flanagan a tougher race than was expected in Minnesota’s Senate race. USA TODAY’s Nicole Russell writes that the Texas Senate race is tightening as Democrat James Talarico’s mask is slipping:
Despite his moderate everyman pitch, Talarico’s true progressive beliefs keep surfacing, slowly shifting voter sentiment and leaving Texans wondering what he actually believes.
Meanwhile, Audrey Fahlberg of The Free Press writes about “The Civil War Inside the DSA“:
The movement is split between pragmatists, who prioritize winning elections, and purists who don’t want to compromise their Marxist principles.
Jenny Holland of Spiked Online writes about “the sickness and silliness of modern ‘socialism’.” Please, please do not miss the artwork—masked socialists bewailing the non-existent “genocide” of fat people.
The DSA split is not The Free Press’s only Must Read today. Simon Sebag Montefiore’s “Who Will Rule the Middle East?” explores the future for this region that has “confounded diplomats for generations.”
“Iran Signals Readiness to Escalate Fight in Face of Rising U.S. Pressure” is a New York Times headline. Yes, Iran is escalating its threats, but how able is the weakened regime to do much more than threaten? The U.S. has struck Iranian tankers in response to Iran’s possible attacks on Navy ships. Looks like Iran’s claimed hits might be mullah fantasy. Not Good: Oil Hits $100 for First Time Since July.
“From O.J. Simpson to Lindsay Clancy” is the headline on Emma Camp’s feature at the Wall Street Journal’s Free Expression:
To Ms. Clancy’s defenders, she is representative of the ways in which mothers are continually failed in modern America. On the other side, both the crimes and the public response to the crimes are taken as evidence that feminism was a mistake. If the Simpson case was a trial of American race relations, the Clancy case is a trial of the American gender wars.
Just as support for Simpson was split along racial lines, support for Ms. Clancy is split along gender lines. On TikTok, mothers have been sharing video of themselves holding their own young children with the caption “same, Lindsay.” Crowds of pink-clad women gather outside the courthouse in a show of solidarity. These women speak of the suffering and loneliness that mothers of young children too often experience, and they aren’t wrong about that.
But the emergence of a Lindsay Clancy fandom is disturbing, to put it mildly….
Lindsay Clancy’s jurors are beginning to let us know what happened behind closed doors. The jurors found the sole holdout—a male juror—who would not go for an innocent by reason of insanity “arrogant”:
“He would not interact with us and try to understand,” [the juror] continued. “We read to him, on numerous occasions, the definition of reasonable doubt from Judge [William] Sullivan’s instruction.”
“But he had the hardest time getting over the fact that Lindsay viciously killed her children,” she explained.
Powerline’s John Hinderaker was also struck by the “he had the hardest time” line. It should also be mentioned that the jurors found the prosecution “didn’t show enough compassion toward Clancy,” who was suffering from “gripping insomnia” etc., etc. (I should just mention again that the respected psychiatrist Sally Satel does make a strong case that psychosis drove Clancy to kill her children.)
Despite families of those who died September 11 begging him to stay away, New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani insists on attending New York’s solemn commemoration of the twenty-fifth anniversary of that terrible day. New York Post columnist Michael Goodwin refers to “Mamdani’s toxic Ground Zero blame game,” which “latches on to still-open wounds” in order to “boost himself.”
“What We Have Forgotten About 9/11“: Tal Fortgang writes at City Journal that we have forgotten “the fundamental truth that a real difference exists between us and our enemies”:
George W. Bush, much maligned, was actually right: you are either with us or against us. Our terrorism laws are designed to force institutions around the world to choose between affiliating with the United States—its markets, citizens, and institutions—or aligning with groups we have designated as a uniquely dangerous class of adversary.
What did you learn in grad school today? An editorial in the Wall Street Journal explores the subject of “What They Teach Teachers in Grad School“:
Children learn a great deal about race and gender in schools these days, but not nearly enough about reading and math. A big reason is the colleges that teach the teachers, and a new report forthcoming Wednesday brings more insight into how they promote politics instead of the basics of instruction.
The evidence comes from Daniel Buck of the American Enterprise Institute, who examined syllabi for programs at eight public graduate schools of education across five states. For each school he analyzed one master’s or certification program that “aligned most closely with an elementary teaching degree,” he writes, not programs that are “overtly political.”
One More What If: “What if California Becomes a ‘Failed State’?” by Richard Shinder, suggests that not only California is at risk:
The DSA and other progressives are pushing the public-policy Overton window into uncharted territory—a policy mix that could saddle U.S. states with what international investors call “political risk.” In economic terms, political risk is the additional required return on an investment due to the possibility a sovereign jurisdiction may seize an asset or otherwise diminish its value. In extreme cases—war-torn regions, full-blown kleptocracies—Western companies might decline to invest or do business….
A slate of progressive policies and proposals could make the risks of doing business or even residing in certain American states and cities too unpredictable to calculate—or a compensating gain too difficult to obtain. These include wealth taxes (such as California’s “billionaire tax” initiative on the ballot this fall), exit taxes, novel property levies (such as the pied-à-terre tax in New York City), and slavery reparation task forces (including in California, always a free state).
As for slavery reparations, Nigel Biggar, author of THE book on colonialism, says nope: Britain’s role in the slave trade was minuscule compared with Arab and African nations.
Legacy Considered. Today is the fiftieth anniversary of Mao’s death. Wonder if Hasan Piker will wear his fetching Mao jacket today (he really does sport one)?
