The Kennedy Center Dis-Honors. LA Mayor: Who’ll Provide Child Care If We Arrest Illegals? Newsom ‘Anointed.’ Cuomo Challenged. & More
No matter who is in the White House, the Kennedy Center has traditionally served as an outpost of the dominant liberal culture of Washington, D.C. And that was never clearer than last night.
President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump stepped out, daring to take in a performance of Les Misérables at that fabled cultural institution. This made a lot of culture vultures miserable. The Trumps were booed, and several actors in the touring company of Les Mis pointedly boycotted the performance, according to People magazine. Some in the audience, however, looked decidedly unmiserable:
The drag queens – Tara Hoot, Ricky Rosa, Vagenesis and Maria Con Carne – waved to the crowd before taking their seats.
The Trumps, who also received cheers last night, appeared unfazed:
A dressed-to-the-nines President Trump hit the Kennedy Center red carpet hand-in-hand with first lady Melania Wednesday night to see “Les Misérables” — and was unfazed by reports that some cast members of his favorite musical planned to boycott opening night due to his presence.
“I couldn’t care less [some dictator!], all I do is run the country well,” the black tuxedo-clad commander in chief told The Post as he stood next to Melania, who wore a sleek black sleeveless gown and silver stilettos for the event.
It was the president’s first visit to the Washington, DC, performing arts venue since he appointed himself chairman in February, when he declared it was in “tremendous disrepair” and made it his mission to restore the center.
“We want to bring it back better than ever,” Trump said. “As you know, it needs a little help from the standpoint of age and fitness, but it’s going to be fantastic.”
Trump’s February reorganization of the Kennedy Center Board, installing Ric Grennell as President of the Kennedy Center Board, did not make him popular with the liberal cultural establishment. The musical “Hamilton” even cancelled a scheduled Kennedy Center performance. President Trump has always refrained from attending the Kennedy Center Honors, the Center’s signature event—where he is not wanted.
But you know what? I bet last night would have been pretty much the same if the president had not sought to make changes at the Kennedy Center. The culture of Washington, as embodied by the Kennedy Center, is hostile turf for the Trump administration. The lefty U.K. Guardian attempted to summon some heavy-handed irony, noting that politics furnish a partial theme for Les Mis. The Guardian opens with a celebrated line from a Les Mis song:
“Do you hear the people sing? / Singing the song of angry men? / It is the music of a people who will not be slaves again!”
Hey, sounds pretty MAGA to me.
The pro-illegal alien riots continue in Los Angeles. A previously deported illegal immigrant is accused of trying to kill or injure cops with a Molotov cocktail. Today’s New York Post cover features him with the headline “This is who they protest for?” ICE arrests also include child molesters. Meanwhile, LA Mayor Karen Bass worries that ICE will arrest so many people that there will be no one left to do child care.
California Governor Gavin Newsom reportedly has been “anointed” the leader of the Democratic Party in the wake of his anti-Trump screed about the LA riots. The Free Press’s Batya Ungar-Sargon reveals “Why Gavin Newsom Will Never Be President.” Whatever his prospects for the top job, Berkeley law professor John Yoo charges that Newsom is committing constitutional malpractice. Yoo writes:
…California officials will soon learn in court, just as they are learning on the streets, that the California National Guard reports to President Trump, not Governor Newsom. President Trump has multiple grounds on which to call out the U.S. Armed Forces to put down the riots. There is a long and important tradition in our country, expressed in the Posse Comitatus Act, against using the military domestically. The PCA prohibits the use of the military “to execute the laws,” except when “expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress. The traditional bar on the use of the military domestically, therefore, has important exceptions, such as protecting the national government and breaking up resistance to federal law, which the Constitution itself and statute authorizes. The Supremacy Clause declares a fundamental constitutional principle that federal law is superior to state law; California’s officials and residents have no right to block the enforcement of federal immigration policy, no matter how much they disagree with it.
Whatever the constitutional issues, a more basic question concerns what we know about what’s actually happening on the ground in LA. Alex Berenson hits on the disturbing truth that we can’t trust the media to tell us. Issues and Insights dubs the LA riots “The Joe Biden Riots.” No explanation needed.
Boy wonder David Hogg is out at the DNC, having decided not to run again for his slot. Young Hogg said a few weeks ago that Rep. Jasmine Crockett is the appropriate leader for the Democratic Party, and it’s unclear whether Gavin Newsom has used the riots to unseat her.
Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo was once seen as a possible leader for the Democratic Party. “This Is Andrew Cuomo’s Nightmare Scenario” is the headline on a Free Press story that shows socialist mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani with a lot of momentum. Politico goes further and says Mamdani has surged in the polls and is, for the first time, ahead of Cuomo.
The United States is pulling nonessential personnel out of our embassy in Baghdad. Axios says that this action, taking place amid U.S.-Iran nuclear negotiations, could indicate that we fear Iranian strikes in retaliation for any strike on Iran. Citing CBS, Townhall suggests that an Israeli strike on Iran could be coming. Jerusalem’s patience for diplomacy may run out.
So, I’m a fan of the independent-minded Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. But that doesn’t mean I’m not a bit mystified, or even put out, by Gabbard’s recent escapade:
DNI Tulsi Gabbard on Tuesday released a short video on the devastation wrought by the atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Her account is morally obtuse history in pursuit of feckless lessons for contemporary foreign policy. Regardless of where one draws the moral line on the decision to drop the bombs, America has nothing to apologize for — and the DNI should not be conducting her own foreign policy media strategy with campaign-style videos.
In narrating the moving story of Japanese civilian suffering from the bombs and their radioactive aftereffects, Gabbard refers to each bombing as an “attack,” without even mentioning the war that they arose from and ended. That war was started by Imperial Japan.
Ms. Must is fiendishly devoted to watching the daily panel on Fox’s Special Report. Liberal commentator Leslie Marshall was talking about ICE raids. As a twist on ladies who lunch, Leslie said you might have to dive under the table if ICE raids a restaurant where you and your friends are lunching. C’mon, Leslie.
In honor of Leslie, I leave you this morning with a snippet from Rich Lowry’s National Review piece headlined “This Is Not What Authoritarianism Looks Like“:
Most people don’t feel threatened or provoked by guys in camo standing impassively in front of a federal building.
The old saw about the Nazis is, “First, they came for the Jews . . .,” not, “First, they protected government property from violent demonstrators . . .”
