Iran
Reading the many and various takes on the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Iran is like reading through a stack of inkblot interpretations. People see in it what they are inclined to see. I agree with Don Surber that David Limbaugh’s view is the most accurate:
Read more Starmer resigned: What happens when you consistently betray your nation
Maybe I’m too optimistic but the more time that passes the less I’m worried about the MOU because Trump has made clear that he knows what all lawyers know: an agreement to agree is not binding like a formal contract and that — it now seems to be clear — is how he regards the MOU.
Further, he has made it quite clear that he not only retains the right, authority, and literal power to renew destruction on that hellish regime, when, not if, it grossly misbehaves, but that he will actually do so. In the meantime, maybe we can avoid a bloodbath in the midterms (I’m less pessimistic here too than most) and continue to do great things.
I just wish there would be less rebuking of Israel, especially by VP JD Vance. They are and remain our strongest and most worthy and unfairly maligned ally in this entire situation.
The woke right will continue also to malign those of us who support Israel and falsely accuse us of putting Israel’s interests above America’s and of being neocons who want boots on the ground and forever wars.
Their repeated lies to that effect do not alter the reality that it’s simply not true. We, not them, are America first. We, not them, want to protect the US, Israel, and everyone else from a nuclear holocaust initiated by the one regime that is affirmatively incentivized to launch such destruction as a matter of its mad ideology and thus not likely to be deterred by the calculus of mutually assured destruction.
So hats off to President Trump and PM Netanyahu for working together to set back the nuclear ambitions of the maniacs, hopefully for decades already and eventually much longer. God bless us all.
Both the warmongers and the anti-Trump crowd seem to seize upon Tehran’s blustering lies, lies designed as much for international propaganda as for retaining domestic power by projecting strength when there isn’t any. Indeed. By Saturday Tehran claimed that it was again shutting down the Strait of Hormuz. Centcom begs to differ, and I know which version of events I credit.
CENTCOM: “Commercial ship traffic in the Strait of Hormuz increased June 20 as U.S. forces continued operating in the general area to support freedom of navigation.”
“Safe passage through the international waterway remained intact today as 55 merchant ships transited, moving large amounts of cargo and more than 17 million barrels of oil to global markets.”
“U.S. forces remain present and vigilant to ensure all aspects of the agreement with Iran are adhered to, obeyed, and in full force and effect.”
Fauci, The IC, and the Media
Speaking of liars, on her way out of the head of the DNI office, Tulsi Gabbard laid out a documented (1600 pages) indictment of Dr. Anthony Fauci. Jeff Childers draws some lines to show how members of the Intelligence Community knew Fauci was lying, but nevertheless let him control the investigation into the origins of the COVID virus, and how they are now about to pay the price for such perfidy.
As for Fauci, Gabbard said:
“He blatantly lied to Congress under oath during his 2024 testimony,” she said. Then she added, “Dr. Fauci funded dangerous gain-of-function coronavirus research linked to Big Pharma and their pursuit of universal vaccines, worth trillions of dollars.” Later: “Dr. Fauci became the nation’s pandemic pundit, and he publicly pushed lies, disinformation, and censorship using every platform available.”
Tulsi has now proven that the IC is profoundly and dangerously broken. It’s like opening the monkey cage and discovering the chimps playing with a crate of hand grenades. What, after all, was more important in 2020 than for our intelligence agencies to quickly figure out where the pandemic really came from? We all know the rule by heart. Every Outbreak-style horror movie uses the same clichéd trope — find patient zero. Not hide patient zero.
You could say that the sitting Director of National Intelligence just built a documentary record that, in its own terms, the intelligence community is unprepared for the next pandemic. And I’ve been led to believe there is nothing worse or less urgent than being unprepared for pandemics.
Finally, it’s worth noting how much coverage the story is getting on social and conservative media, even as it remains completely invisible on traditional corporate media platforms. They’ve locked this story in narrative quarantine. They aren’t even fact-checking it. Think of how scared of it they must be not even to run debunking stories.
Or, maybe their terror of touching it should be unsurprising, given that corporate media were co-conspirators in helping Fauci cover up the lab-leak theory.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court vs. Philly’s Crooked DA
Jonathan Turley provides the details on the most unusual ruling of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s “scathing new opinion, which accuses Philadelphia’s DA of leading a dishonest effort to undermine criminal cases to engineer new trials for defendants.”
I’ve seen a lot of prosecutorial conduct I considered outrageous but Krasner’s takes the cake and it’s impossible for me to take issue with the court’s stern rebuke.
He threatened to arrest FBI agents and “hunt down” ICE officers. He filed “misleading and mendacious filings to undermine criminal cases” and then when the defendants filed for relief, failed to oppose their demands for new trials. The court found that his concession of error was unreliable and he had violated his “duty of candor”, “withheld material evidence from the court, opposed efforts by amici to gain access to this evidence, submitted a false stipulation of fact, misstated facts in its pleadings, failed to conduct a reasonable investigation, and opposed a required evidentiary hearing.” In simpler terms, he rigged the case against his own office in one case and conceded relief in roughly 100 murder cases using the same “untrustworthy concessions” and misrepresentations.
One of his subordinates has already been disbarred, another has been barred for three years from handling cases before the court. Krasner remains unrepentant, complaining of racism and of judicial conduct threatening democracy. He’s been admonished by the court twice before for misconduct, which unfortunately only seems to be an electoral boost.
This is a Democrat-controlled Supreme Court and, per Turley, ”It appears that even these liberal justices have had enough.”
Maybe Philly ought to modify its nickname — the City of Brotherly Love — to add the modifier (for criminals).
Read more Engineering a crisis