Trump’s war in Iran appears to be heading for a T.S. Eliot ending — not with a bang, but a whimper. But not right away. Someday, though, it will just whimper out.

This week Trump has gone from deciding to just ignore the war for a while, to claiming that the Strait of Hormuz is under U.S. control. Objective reality at the Strait appears to suggest otherwise.

Yesterday Trump wrote on Truth Social that the U.S. has “total control” over the Strait, and “I THINK WE WILL KEEP IT.” Today Tehran announced that the Strait of Hormuz is “under Iran’s control and management.” (I understand the potential deal for a joint operation with Oman fell apart over details. A shame.)

But maybe Trump should stick to just ignoring the war. Did he think people would believe  him when he said the U.S. controls the Strait? Because anybody following the news knows that’s not true. This is not something a halfway rational person would have claimed.

Trump has few options left. The depletion of our weapons is putting our military personnel deployed to the region in greater danger.

Shrunken inventories of Patriot and Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptors may force the US and its Middle Eastern allies to take greater risks to conserve those air defences, according to an analysis by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think tank. For example, it said, American forces may launch fewer missiles against incoming Iranian drones and missiles, raising the chance of one getting through.

The Pentagon now is pushing the defense industry to crank out more missiles as fast as possible. But I understand the high tech stuff takes several months, maybe a couple of years, to be ready to use.  Trump isn’t gong to get his big stockpile back anytime soon.

You’ve probably heard about what’s been going on with the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln. The aircraft carrier has been at sea way too long. The crew is burned out. Families are reporting that the crew isn’t getting enough to eat. There are sewage and other sanitation problems with the ship. Recently several crew members have attempted to jump overboard, and one actually did (he survived). Naturally Pete Hegseth has been brushing off these issues as no big deal. Then several Democrats in Congress made noises about an investigation. Today it was announed that the U.S.S. George Washington would be relieving the Abraham Lincoln.

These bozos had better not start World War III, because none of them can manage their way out of a rusty mess kit. Under Hegseth it’s not the Department of War but the Department of What the Bleep Are We Doing?.

But as there aren’t many options left I’m predicting the war will just whimper along as a low-grade hostility until Trump leaves office. Let’s just hope no one else has to die for it.

And I have nothing original to say about Operation Catering Truck, so I’ll just quote this bit from Heather Cox Richardson:

National security reporter David Rothkopf wrote: “The man who cowered hiding from the Iranians in a catering truck and who has personally done more to increase Iran’s strategic influence than anyone in its own government ever has, is now blathering nonsense via social media. The world sees him more as an impotent fool today than ever before.”

In other news, but related:

The first news story I saw this morning was headlined Homeland Security Paid $464 Million for Airplanes. Then It Parked Them. This is a gift article from the New York Times.

Starting last fall, the Department of Homeland Security spent $464 million on a no-bid contract to buy 10 used airplanes from a firm in Northern Virginia.

That was an enormous price tag, but the department said it had no time to consider other offers. The planes were needed urgently for deportation flights.

But since then, the department has barely used this new fleet — for deportations, or anything else.

Apparently the agency doesn’t have the staff to operate the plans.

The contract also illuminated a broader trend within the second Trump administration: no-bid contracts awarded to people with connections to Mr. Trump or his cabinet secretaries. The company that received this contract, Daedalus Aviation Corporation, is led by a chairman who had donated to a political committee supporting the previous Homeland Security Secretary, Kristi Noem. …

… The situation with the planes was reminiscent of the department’s about-face on a plan to acquire warehouses to hold detainees. The department spent heavily on those when Ms. Noem was secretary, but reversed itself just months later under Mr. Mullin. The department is now giving away or selling seven warehouses that it bought for more than $700 million.

I remember reading that the agency was offering amounts way above the market price for those warehouses. Yet The Gnome was the same person who caused huge delays in releasing disaster relief funds by insisting on new layers of review, creating a $17 billion bottleneck. .

And then there’s Trump, spending taxpayer money lavishly on his monuments projects and on covering perfectly presentable statues in gold leaf while we can’t afford health care. But I’m beginning to think even Americans who don’t pay attention to politics are starting to notice something is very screwy. And a big part of that screwiness is that the people in charge of critical government departments are grossly unqualified for their jobs. The Gnome is gone, but I don’t see the overall situation improving

And I honestly don’t think Trump is living in the same time-space continuum as the rest of us.

And you’ve probably heard Karoline Leavitt is leaving at the end of this month. I can’t get too excited because I’m sure whoever replaces her will be just as bad. But I am mildly curious as to why, since she just heroically came back from having a baby, her second child. I certainly appreciate how hard that is. But she’s the one who came back. Maybe there’s another reason. Well, someday somebody will write a book and spill the beans.

Oh one more thing. See Kennedy Center Board Decides to Inscribe Trump’s Name on Building. Seriously.

If you missed Rachel Maddow last night, do watch:

See also Dr. Phil and a Texas Oil Firm Go to Greenland With a Suspicious Agenda. Signs Point to Trump’s Imperialist Visions. by Nicole LaFond at Talking Points Memo.

A Texas-based oil company with ties to President Trump, called Greenland Energy, is reportedly readying resources to begin drilling in a remote area of Greenland even though it does not yet have permission to do so from the Greenland government and local officials. Locals living in the remote area of Greenland’s Nunap Qeqqa, or Jameson Land, have reported seeing drilling equipment being brought ashore and unloaded in the region in recent weeks and the Greenland government issued a “strong warning” against unauthorized actions in the area in a statement in late July.

The Texans are moving in their equipment as if they own the place. Greenland says they don’t have permission.

This will be a little different. I need to rant about health care.

As y’all well know, the United States is the only industrialized nation on the planet still trying to provide health care through a private for-profit system, only using government programs as patches for what the private system won’t touch because there’s no profit in it, like taking care of the elderly.

In 2024, the United States spent an estimated $15,474 per person on health care, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. This isn’t just government spending but all spending, including what we pay out of pocket.

Now let’s look at what other industrialized nations spend. Germany has one of the most expensive health care systems in Europe. They’re spending $9,365 USD per capita per year. Again, that’s all spending. Germany’s health care system is ranked a lot higher than ours, by the way, as measured by outcomes and accessibility. The average spending in European Union countries is $5,005.50 annually per capita. Quality varies, but several of those countries rank higher than the U.S. in quality.

Why are we spending so much more? One reason is that we have no cost controls. I understand providers of pharmaceuticals and medical technology have been free to charge whatever they want in most circumstances. And where else do pharmaceutical companies spend millions on television advertising? Often the same products are far more expensive in the U.S. than anywhere else. Another reason is that keeping track of the many separate insurance plans requires an army of clerical workers to keep track of them. And when uninsured patients can’t pay, or he insurance companies won’t pay, for care already provided, medical facilities often add hidden surcharges to everybody’s bills to make up for the loss.

Other industrialized nations don’t have identical systems, but generally they offer healthcare to everybody through a taxpayer supported system in one way or another. Everybody is covered. These systems get economies of scale and negotiate uniform prices with providers. There is no clerical or advertising overhead. Often there are legal limits on how much profit anyone can charge. H Continue reading →

I’m heartbroken about what’s being done to Dr. Fauci. This is from David Kurtz at TPM:

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee voted this morning to hold Fauci in contempt of Congress for having invoked his 5th Amendment rights not to testify at last week’s witch hunt of a hearing.

At least two Senate committees are actively going after Fauci.

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), chair of the Senate Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, revealed last night that he had obtained Fauci’s COVID-era phone from the Department of Health and Human Services, Fauci’s former government employer, which left Republicans salivating that they had another motherlode of fodder to stoke the fires against Fauci.

It’s bad enough that they published his diary. Plus, the AGs of Florida, west Virginia, and Louisiana have issued subpoenas to Dr. Fauci. They are alleging he  “profited” from the recommendations he gave during the Covid pandemic. I notice that just about every other nation on the planet followed the same or very similar recommendations. But for some reason our political Right in the U.S. became angry about it, and is still angry. Is that happening anywhere else? Not that I’ve heard.

This demonizing of Dr. Fauci began almost immediately, btw. Yesterday when I was looking for something else I came across an old Mahablog post from May 2, 2020, headlined Righties Have Mythology, Not a Cause. It reminded me of episodes I’d forgotten, like a huge protest in Lansing, Michigan in which righties threw a collective tantrum over the covid restrictions. Dana Milbank’s description is priceless:

At the American Patriot Rally at the state Capitol in Lansing, Mich., on Thursday, many of the hundreds of protesters wore red “Make America Great Again” caps or flew “Trump 2020” banners and “Build the Wall” or “Drain the Swamp” signs. Others waved the yellow “Don’t Tread on Me” flags of the tea party. Demonstrators, several armed with military-style guns, then marched into the statehouse and stared down the police.

What did they propose to do with these weapons? Shoot the virus? Shoot the governor? Shoot themselves in the foot?

They didn’t seem to have a plan. They were there to rail against Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s pandemic restrictions, though hers are not so different from those in other states, even those run by Republican governors. They howled about “tyranny” even though the country is now run by the man they helped elect. They fretted about losing their Second Amendment rights even as they carried guns, legally under Michigan law, into the Capitol. They complained about runaway government spending and money-printing even though Trump and the GOP have championed it.

This was still in the first half of 2020, mind you. The pandemic was just getting started. In New York City the hospitals were renting refrigerated trucks to store the excess dead, and some would be doing this until well into 2021. Yet these bozos were throwing fits over mandatory masks and school closings?  And as I documented in the post, they’d already singled out Dr. Fauci as a villain for handing out the same advice that all the other heads of public health in most other countries were handing out. They were also protesting Bill Gates, but at the moment I don’t remember why.

So the question must be asked, what is wrong with these people?  And why do they seem concentrated in the U.S.? What are we doing wrong to generate all these, um, specimens within our borders?

I may have mentioned this before, but by 2021 there was data showing that people who lived in counties that voted for Trump in 2020 were getting infected and dying at higher rates than people in counties that voted for Biden. And this was largely because more of the blue-county people were getting vaccinated and otherwise taking Dr. Fauci’s advice, while more of the red-county people were not. The MAGAts were paying for their “freedom” with their lives. They haven’t noticed this and won’t believe you even if you show them the data. See also David Frum, Anthony Fauci Is Not the Villain in This Story, at The Atlantic.

In other news — it appears to have been called to Trump’s attention that the U.S. has blown through much of its stockpile of high-tech missiles and other weapons. He blew up at Pete Hegseth in the Oval Office, according to several accounts. And then I’m sure he fell back on blaming Joe Biden. But Trump really has no options left in Iran now. I understand that Iran and Oman are very close to finalizing their deal to mutually control the Strait of Hormuz, and I’m reading at MS Now that Trump and other top U.S. officials are speaking approvingly of the deal, which indicates they may just accept it and slink away. And this may be the best outcome anyone is going to get in the short term. Short term meaning “while Trump is still POTUS.” Some future president may have to revisit all this, but maybe not. We can hope.

In more other news — A federal appeals court panel ruled that Donald Trump must stop aboveground construction on his beloved ballroom unless he gets approval for the project from Congress. I take it Trump plans to appeal to the Supreme Court instead of just getting approval from Congress. See Trump Majorly Flips Out as Judges Rule His Ballroom Is Illegal by Edith Olmsted at The New Republic.

In even more other news — It looks like Todd Blanche has the votes to be confirmed.

See also — Barring Mamdani From the 9/11 Commemoration Lets the Enemy Win by me at Patheos.

There are talks going on regarding Iran and the Strait of Hormuz, but the United States is not part of those talks. Instead, they are going on between Iran and Oman. And what gets decided could be the resolution to Trump’s War. From the New York Times:

Iran and Oman are closing in on an agreement to reopen shipping traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, according to Iranian and American officials, but if the accord goes into effect it could come at a high price — ratifying Tehran’s control over what, before the war, was an open, international waterway.

As described by officials familiar with the emerging accord, vessels heading into the Persian Gulf will transit a channel controlled by Iran, and close to its coast. Ships leaving the Gulf will travel on a channel near Oman.

Iranian officials say that while there will be no tolls charged the agreement includes a “service fee” to cover the environmental impact of the shipping, security for the cargo ships and tankers, and staffing. Revenues would be divided equally between Iran and Oman, two Iranian officials said.

I understand this is an “interim” agreement, not a permanent resolution, but if the “interim” lasts as long as Trump is in the White House I wouldn’t argue about it. In the short run this might be the best resolution we’re going to get. If this agreement opens the Strait and gets everyone to back off what seems to be turning into a much wider war, I say take it. Yes, it would leave Iran with some big, fat leverage it didn’t have before Trump started the war. But is there a way to force Iran to give up that leverage? And if so, what is it? Shooting missiles at them doesn’t seem to be working. And we’re running ut of missiles.

But where does the Administration stand?

But a U.S. official familiar with the negotiations said on Monday that the Iranian account was “not accurate,” and said that any “temporary” routes established through the strait would not involve approvals or permissions by Iran, and would involve no tolls.

Yeah, good luck with an agreement regarding Iran that doesn’t involve Iran. But that was yesterday. Today Trump is saying that he wants this deal to be made immediately, or he’ll shoot what’s left of our missiles at them. But Trump also appears to believe that he, or somebody representing the U.S., is an active participant in these talks.

“It’s not very complex. We’re talking about the strait, the opening of the strait, having it open, literally by tomorrow. Completely open,” Trump said. The president claimed that would be the first phase before proceeding to denuclearization talks.

Ok, so?

But Esmaeil Baghaei, spokesperson for Iran’s foreign ministry, told reporters Monday that Iran was not currently in talks with the U.S. He said Iran was in the final stages of discussions with Oman to open the strait.  

In response, Trump called Iran’s leadership “unbelievably duplicitous,” claiming in a social media post before the press conference they’d begged him to restart talks.  

By now Iran’s leadership is well aware that what Trump says and objectively verifiable realty do not live in the same zip code.

The New York Times article goes on to say that opening the Strait would be a benefit to Trump politically, as it would take a lot of pressure off the economy. It would do nothing about Iran’s nuclear stockpile, but let’s be frank — nothing good can come from talks with Iran as long as the Trump Regime is involved. It would be better to just get the U.S. completely out of it, at least until we have a real President again. But getting Trump to shut his yap about Iran is probably more than we can hope for.

In other news — There are a mess of primaries today, including the Democratic nomination for a U.S. Senate seat from Michigan, being contested between Haley Stevens and Abdul El-Sayed that’s been in the news quite a bit. I’m rooting for El-Sayed but making no predictions.

Paul Waldman at The Cross Section has an essay on electability that I heartily endorse. And there’s another good read by David Graham at The Atlantic, Americans Are Turning on Trump.

There are reports that Cornyn and Tillis have caved and are now on board with allowing a vote to confirm Todd Blanche as Attorney General. Blanch appears to have given them written assurance that the slush fund is dead.  But did he?

Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling writes at The New Republic:

On its face, Blanche’s note appeared to terminate the fund, specifying that the order was “rescinded and shall have no force or effect.” However, journalists were quick to comment that the language employed in the rest of Blanche’s memo not only suggested that the honeypot fund would be preserved in some form but also failed to terminate Trump’s underlying IRS immunity arrangement.

This, I believe, is the statement Blanche signed and issued. It says there is no fund, but makes no assurances there won’t be one in the future. And it doesn’t say squat about the IRS audit immunity. See emptywheel for more.

As near as I can make out — in a fit of pique, Trump is now declaring that if the Senate won’t confirm his nominee for AG, Todd Blanch, he’s going back to demanding that his weaponization slush fund be reinstated.

“It will immediately be back on the table, and I will get it done,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social account, vowing to pass an “Anti-Weaponization Bill” should his nomination of Todd Blanche for attorney general fail in the Senate.

Trump added that he would keep Blanche as acting attorney general and blasted two GOP senators — John Cornyn (Texas) and Thom Tillis (North Carolina) — who have blocked the nomination from advancing over concerns about the fund.

It appears that Trump is backing off from insisting that the Senate stay in session until it approves Todd Blanche’s nomination for Attorney General. He “truthed” a social media post saying he was considering withdrawing Blanche’s nomination until next year, when John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who are not on board with Blanche, will no longer be in the Senate. Steve Benen writes that there are two potential problems with this plan. One is that there are legal questions about how long Blanche can fill the role in an “acting” capacity. Two, there is no guarantee Trump will have a Republican majority in the Senate next year. (Please.)

See also The GOP revolt over Todd Blanche is suddenly very real by Mychael Schnell.

Cornyn and Tillis, both of whom are leaving Congress at the end of the year, say the Trump administration has yet to satisfy their demands on Trump’s IRS settlement. The pair is asking Blanche to formally kill the so-called anti-weaponization fund and narrow the scope of the IRS audit immunity afforded to Trump, his family, his businesses and others under the agreement.

Until then, they’re refusing to advance his nomination to the Senate floor.

However, today the Senate Finance Committee voted down an amendment to a tax procedure bill that would have prevented the IRS from making any tax audit immunity deals with a sitting president, their family, or any connected entities. Which would effectively have killed Trump’s IRS audit immunity deal. And Cornyn voted to kill the amendment. So I don’t know what’s going on with that.

Trump could, of course, get the Blanche nomination back on track as soon as he releases written assurance that there will be no anti-weaponization slush fund or IRS audit immunity. But he won’t, probably because he cares about the slush fund and the audit immunity more than about Todd Blanche.

Trump also has been saying that John Thune may not be majority leader for much longer, as if he has anything to say about it.

John Light at Talking Point Memo

Throughout Trump’s SAVE Act pressure campaign on his Senate allies, he has repeatedly made demands that misunderstand the reality of how the Senate functions, and how bills become law. He has seemed amenable to passing what everyone has taken to calling the “SAVE Act” through budget reconciliation, even though a SAVE Act done through reconciliation, while bad, would likely be without the nationwide voter-ID and proof-of-citizenship mandates that are core to what the SAVE Act is. It is unclear whether Trump realizes this. 

Pathetic. But the senators who are running for re-election are no doubt eager to get home and do some campaigning. And it appears neither Todd Blanche nor the SAVE America Act has the votes now. And I don’t see anything Trump can do to change that.

You’ll want to read We’ve Officially Entered the Twilight of Late-Stage Trumpism by Greg Sargent.

I’m trying to not pay attention to what’s going on in the Fauci Senate hearings. It’s too painful. I suspect I’ll be subjected to highlight films eventually.

Trump has been trying to strong-arm the Senate into delaying their August recess until they pass the SAVE America Act. From what I can tell from news stories, they are unlikely to comply. If Senate Republicans had the votes to pass it, they would have done it already. Majority Leader Thune is saying the Senate could stay in session until Christmas and the bill still wouldn’t get passed.

And I’m seeing news stories saying the Todd Blanche nomination is in trouble. Sen. John Cornyn of Texas is holding out. This is from WaPo:

The senator has also said he wants the administration to limit, in writing, the scope of a Justice Department agreement not to pursue President Donald Trump or his family over past tax claims, for example by clarifying that it does not apply to the family’s future actions.

I haven’t disappeared; I’ve just been super busy doing other things. I just wanted to mention something I just read — Trump Will End Subsidies for Medicare Drug Premiums

The Trump administration announced on Tuesday that it intended to end a Biden-era program that for the past two years has helped tamp down the cost of monthly premiums for drug coverage for people on Medicare.

The decision means that millions of Americans 65 and older could face higher Medicare drug premiums next year, when the cost of living is already a major concern. That could be politically damaging for Republicans in the midterm elections. In the weeks leading up to November, Medicare beneficiaries could experience sticker shock while shopping for next year’s drug plan.

For 2025 and 2026, the federal government gave health insurers billions of dollars in subsidies to help them keep down drug premiums for people on Medicare. Without the subsidies, millions of people could have had to pay hundreds of dollars more a year for their drug plans.

Dr. Mehmet Oz, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, said in a post on social media on Tuesday that the subsidies had been ended because the insurers no longer needed them. He said every Medicare beneficiary would still have options for low-cost plans.

It is not at all clear to me what Oz thinks has changed so that the subsidies are not longer needed. I’m betting Dem congressional candidates around the nation are already arranging for ads to be made about this. Once again, it’s almost as if Trump wants Republicans to lose.