Dear Everybody:
The big news today is that everybody suddenly seems to have figured out that Pete Hegseth has totally screwed the pooch on the Iran War:
In Pentagon/Pete Hegseth news:
–I told you about Army Secretary Dan Driscoll stepping down. Today I found out that prior to resigning, he took his concerns directly to Trump. Driscoll told Trump that Hegseth had fired, pushed out, or passed over so many generals that the Army could no longer transform itself in the ways it needed to. Trump was apparently surprised at the information–he had no idea they had all been fired.
Trump sided with Hegseth, and Driscoll resigned immediately.
–Driscoll’s second-in-command, Deputy UnderSecretary Dave Fitzpatrick, may resign this week, too.
–In my list of who Hegseth has gotten rid of yesterday, I forgot to mention Africa commander Christopher Donahue and Training Command Chief General David Hodne. The Army is now left without a Senate-confirmed secretary or chief of staff.
–After the Washington Post published a story saying high-ranking military officers warned against extending the war on Iran, the Pentagon removed decades of classified documents from a secret database which is where officers file their “non-concurs,” (their official, on–the-record objections to decisions.)
–Reports from the Pentagon say Hegseth is so obsessed with warriors, muscles, and testosterone, that he is totally ignoring everything else. They say he should be focused on adapting to drone warfare and modernization instead. (I posted a couple of weeks ago that he just disbanded the drone warfare research department.)
–GOP Senator Tom Tillis urged Trump to replace Hegseth, saying he had “never witnessed more inept management of the brave men and women
–GOP Rep Don Bacon (who was in the military): “He would not be on my team. I think he has not been a good leader in many ways.”
In other Iran War news:
–The US bombed an Iranian wedding and killed one child and three others. Fifty civilians were injured. This definitely qualifies as a war crime.
–Trump: “If the failed Nation retaliates for this very just attack, they will be hit again at a much harder and higher level, but it will not be the biggest attack of them all, that is waiting in the wings and, when it’s over, there will be very little left of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
–Zach Ford: “So the President is threatening nuclear war to blow an entire nation off the planet. Totally normal stuff!”
–Trump’s not the only one threatening Iran. Secretary of the Treasury Scott Besent explicitly threatened Iranian officials. Bessent: “My experience over the past twenty or thirty years is that in general, people like having their heads attached to their necks.”
–And his entire administration is lying about the war. Secretary of the Treasury Howard Lutnick: “The way the President is playing Iran–there haven’t been American deaths–it’s really just an economic chokeout…” (Note: At least 18 American troops have been killed in the war.)
–Trump has the war in Iran so sewn up that the only question is what to call the Strait of Hormuz. Trump: “Now that we have it under USA control, should we change the name Hormuz Strait to Trump Strait??? Like America itself, it would be ‘hotter’ than ever before! Thank you for your attention to this matter! President Donald J. Trump.”
–Nathaniel Willim Holden: “Privately Trump is having discussions with senior aides about whether to declare the Iran War over, US officials said, noting Trump has said he favors the idea.”
–At the same time that Trump was calling the war over, Hegseth announced the extension of troop deployments in the Middle East into well into 2027.
–Richard N. Haas: “This has been a fiasco. That’s the harsh reality. He can declare ‘mission accomplished.’ He can try to sell the argument as he often tries to, almost to create reality. But it’s going to be a long hard slog.”
Meanwhile, back at home, Trump is focused on his big midterm Republican convention:
–The purpose is to gin up excitement for Republican candidates in the election, but so far it doesn’t seem to be working out too well.
–For one thing, they are charging everyone, including candidates and their spouses, a $25,000 entrance fee to the convention.
–For another, Trump is calling it the “Trumpalooza” and plans to make himself the center of it and the main speaker on both days.
–For yet another, the convention, in a triumph of planning and thinking ahead, is scheduled against the first two NFL football games of the season.
–Also, photos with Trump will cost $88,000 and attending a roundtable with him will cost $250,000. JD Vance is cheaper–a mere $35,000 for a photo and $75,000 for a roundtable with him.
–Joshua Blank: “It raises the question of whether the timing is somewhere between ill-conceived or just not conceived at all. It seems more like a reaction to concerns about enthusiasm among Republican voters. It is more a reaction than it is a clear plan.”
–Trump is still refusing to share his PAC money with Republicans unless it somehow benefits him. He says he does not want to donate to or spend money on losers. He is, however, going to run a series of ads highlighting his many glorious accomplishments.
–45 Republicans running for office have already said they don’t plan to go, claiming previous engagements like visiting colleges with their daughter, a dove-hunting event, and having to wash their hair. (I made that last one up, but not the others.)
–Even diehard Trumper James Comer isn’t going. His excuse? “I had stuff already planned in my Congressional district.”
–The Bi of Hormuz: “So here’s the thing: under normal circumstances, candidates skipping a national event to go to in-district events would be unremarkable, but this is remarkable because the GOP (especially hardliners like Comer) is defined by fealty to Trump.”
–Auburn Blake: “They also spend all their time running from their constituents by refusing town halls and giving them real answers. now they all have in-district events they have to get to.”
–Stevie D–“If I had spent most of the last twelve years publicly calling lots of people losers, I probably would avoid naming a festival after myself that sounds so much like ‘Trump A Loser.’”
In Trump’s and the US Post Office’s voting scheme news:
–Top US Post Office officials expressed concerns in meetings about how the rules in Trump’s scheme could delay or block ballots from reaching large swaths of eligible voters, but their objections were ignored and the rules moved forward anyway. One employee called it a “shitshow.”
–The US Post Office has adopted a zero-percent failure policy–one error in a big batch of ballots means the whole batch gets thrown out.
–They were worried that if even one bar code on one single ballot in a bulk mailing of 10,000 ballots to properly scan during the verification process, the entire batch would be rejected and sent back to the state–effectively stopping the ballots from being mailed to voters.
–In some states, it’s even worse than that. In Arizona, ballots are sent out 2 million at a time. One error would delay the entire mailing.
–Most counties don’t have the type of barcodes needed to make the system function and the Post Office hasn’t told election officials how to design new ballot envelopes and get them approved by the Post Office in this short of a timeline.
–The head of the Post Office claims it does not “intend to seize control of administration of elections and that the rule need not and should not prevent a single voter from voting by mail.” (You don’t need to seize control of the administration of elections if you just stop all the ballots from being delivered in the first place.)
–Dem Sen Ron Blumenthal accused the administration of being “hellbent in changing the framework of casting ballots in this country, clearly for political reasons.”
–Seth Abramson: “This IS an election rigging scheme, and the fact that there was a conspiracy in the executive branch to hide it makes it likely this constitutes a criminal conspiracy to commit election fraud headed by Donald J. Trump.”
–Pasqualino: “It is a federal crime to interfere with the delivery of the US mail.” (And refusing to send out ballots or return them unless they are on a list of approved names is definitely interference.)
–Seth Abramson: “The plan here is to block MILLIONS of legal mail-in ballots via a series of schemes and policies that were hidden from voters, hidden from the press, and hidden from the courts. We only know of them via a whistleblower. And all of this was done EXPLICITLY under a Trump order.”
–Stephen Michel: “Suppression was part of the plan. When they say they will withdraw an entire batch of votes if even only one has a slight error, they intend to suppress votes.”-
–Ballots of military and overseas voters MUST be sent out this month.
In Absolutely Craven Behavior news:
–Apple caved under pressure from Trump and renamed Lake Ontario to Lake America.
–How do I know it was under pressure? Because Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum said, “I know that the President reached out to Apple directly, so I’m sure that we may be seeing that change coming up soon as Lake America.” And, sure enough…
–The executives are mad at Burgum because “the White House had framed any decision Apple made as one in which it was capitulating to the President’s demands.” (That’s because they were capitulating to the President’s demands.)
–Blue_Gene: “They’d score points and business with every potential customer in the country just by taking this tiny stand against our crumbling, cut-rate Caligula. But no, it’s better to live on your corrupt knees.”
–The executives admitted Trump “will fuck with the company if the company doesn’t do what he wants.”
–Employees at Apple say, “There is not a soul who is for it. Everyone considers it fucking nuts.”
In Epstein/Trump news:
–Journalist Jim Acosta got hold of Ghislaine Maxwell’s prison transfer form through a FOIA request. It was completely redacted.
–Jim Acosta: “What they’re trying to do for Ghislaine Maxwell is really, it’s just unconscionable. Almost every single part of the form is redacted. Maxwell’s name is highlighted at the top of the form and then literally everything else is whited out.”
–Legally, this is highly dubious. A FOIA request has to weigh the need to keep something classified for national security reasons vs. the public’s right to know. There is no need why this would need to be classified.
–Not only did they black out everything, but the Bureau of Prisons dragged their feet for over a year in turning the form over.
–Acosta stated, “Legally this is highly dubious,” and said lawsuits were going to be necessary to get the unredacted form. In the meantime, they’ve managed to delay disclosure again.
–Ricardo Santos: “BOY! APPARENTLY MOST OF TRUMP’S ADMINISTRATION IS IN ONE WAY OR ANOTHER INVOLVED IN THE EPSTEIN SCANDAL!” (Ya think? Everything they do literally SCREAMS that this is a cover-up and they’re guilty as hell!)
In “Where’s Mitch?” news:
–Mitch McConnell has now been missing for 80 days without a single public appearance sine his June 14 hospitalization and no updates from his office at all since those two photos (about which people had a number of doubts) and a written statement which anybody could have written.
–McConnell has missed 60 votes in Congress on everything from an Iran war powers resolution to Attorney General Todd Blanche’s confirmation, and his vote is essential with such a narrow margin for Republicans.
–The Daily Beast visited McConnell’s house in DC and found it heavily guarded by three unmarked SUVs with tinted windows, plus marked Capitol Police cars stationed at each end of the street. Most of the curtains were drawn, though a first-floor window was open. No mail was piled up outside. (Note: Does this level of security strike anybody else as odd? I mean, what exactly are they protecting?)
–Reporter Sarah Ewall-Wice: “All of this has become the talk of Congress, with confusion growing over why the veteran lawmaker has insisted on keeping his Kentucky constituents and his party in the dark.”
–Scott Jennings and others who claimed to have talked to McConnell “for twenty minutes, discussing Senate business” have all gone silent, and Scott Jennings, who was being talked about as replacing Karoline Leavitt as press secretary, has had his name quietly dropped from the list of applicants. Is that because when we eventually find out what happened to Mitch, he will be shown to have been totally lying?
–Stephen Beschloss: “Still waiting for evidence that Mitch McConnell is still alive.”
Over in the fever swamps of the right:
–Fox News reported that some men are skipping showers before dates to embrace a new trend called pheromone-maxxing, hoping their natural scent will make them more attractive. (You just do that. Great idea!)
In other news:
–Pete Hegseth is contemplating a run for president in 2028. According to NBC News, Hegseth’s wife wants him to run. “Pete, 46, and Jennifer, 49, are under the impression that some of the Defense Secretary’s characteristics overlap with President Trump’s and could therefore be an asset in a 2028 presidential campaign.” (There are no words.)
–The USS Abraham Lincoln just pulled into port in Asia, unpainted and covered in rust. (Not a good look for what’s supposed to be the best Navy in the world.
–The sailor who jumped from the USS Abraham Lincoln in an attempt to commit suicide after being on the ship for nine months in terrible conditions is now facing disciplinary action from the Navy.
In good news:
–Democrats blocked the constitutional amendment to lock the number of Supreme Court justices at 9 justices. The vote was 212-206, well short of the two-thirds majority needed for an amendment to pass.
–The good people of Independence, Missouri, just recalled a city councilman over his support of data centers.
–A federal judge just tossed out the DOJ’s effort to revoke Rochester, New York’s status as a sanctuary city.
Best words uttered without a touch of irony, from GOP Rep Clay Fuller: “It is not a controversial idea for people to say if someone commits a sex crime against a child, they expect us to take them outside the courthouse quickly and find a rope.” (True, but I don’t think he has any idea he’s talking about Trump.)
In sad news, Gloria Steinem died today at the age of 92. She spent her entire life working for women’s rights, and was a leader in the women’s liberation movement, a true pioneer.
Best comment of the day, from Sue Addison: “Trump and his goons are doing everything they can to steal the election. They are authoritarians who only care about power and money. No matter what, we must vote for the Democrats for every office on the ballot.”
Keep calm and carry on,
Connie Willis
