The Fourth is over and so is the heat wave, in the NYC area it least. At mid-morning it’s 65 degrees and pouring rain. The AC can rest for a while.

Trump is on his way to a NATO conference, where he will further display his ignorance of what NATO even is and piss off our used-to-be allies. The Wall Street Journal is running a story that is headlined ‘There Is No Going Back’: The Inside Story of Europe’s Rupture With America.” It sounds juicy, but it’s behind a paywall.

I’ve heard elsewhere that European leaders are pretty much done being nice to Trump to his face to dissuade him from doing more damage. It doesn’t work, anyway. But I don’t know what they’ll do with him at the meeting. They’d probably like to shove  him under a bus, but they probably won’t.

I want to look at the further adventures of the SAVE America Act. Yesterday Mike Johnson announced that the House will pass SAVE America one more time as part of a budget reconciliation bill. Which, of course, would allow the Senate to bypass the 60-vote threshold and pass it with Republican votes. They tried this trick once already, and the Senate Parliamentarian nixed it. The Byrd Rule dictates that only provisions with a direct impact on federal spending and revenue can be in a reconciliation bill, and that seems to me to leave out the SAVE America Act. I understand Johnson has talked about adding a $4 billion grant program attached to the SAVE America act to make it about revenue.

However, Mychael Schnell at MS NOW says that even Republicans are tired of getting bogged down with the SAVE America Act.

“He wants to go it alone, his way to the highway, and it don’t work,” Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., who’s retiring at the end of the year, told MS NOW. “He’s trying to pound the square peg through the circle, and it doesn’t work.” … …

,,,Yet another House GOP lawmaker was more succinct: “Republicans — those of us who can do math — would like the president and other members to recognize that there isn’t a path forward.”

As Trump continues his pressure campaign — he managed to mention the SAVE America Act during his July Fourth speech on the National Mall on Saturday night — several Republicans say it’s time for him to pivot. Instead of trying to force GOP skeptics in line, some lawmakers said Trump should consider a compromise with those holdouts, or even with Democrats.

“There’s things that we should be able to do,” the House GOP lawmaker said, “but we’re so focused on legislation that will never get a Democratic vote and won’t make it through the reconciliation that it’s stopping all progress.”

Some House Republicans say that Trump needs to put pressure on Democrats to change their votes. But I say hell hath no fury like what the Democratic base would do to any Dem who played ball with Trump on this bill.

The last time it was voted on in the Senate, all Dems plus four Republicans voted no, and if that holds it would not pass even if only a majority vote were required.

In other news — Trump’s interference in the World Cup games is turning into an international big deal.

FIFA has dismissed Belgium’s challenge over the eligibility of Folarin Balogun after world soccer’s governing body decided to suspend his one-game ban ahead of the World Cup round-of-16 game with the United States.

Despite being dismissed against Bosnia and Herzegovina, the USMNT striker is available to face Belgium in Seattle on Monday night after an intervention involving U.S. President Donald Trump, government officials, U.S. Soccer and an extensive legal team.

Belgium formally objected to that decision, saying it had “no alternative but to challenge (Balogun’s) eligibility for the upcoming match”.

FIFA’s appeals committee, however, has rendered the request submitted by the Royal Belgian Football Association (RBFA) as “inadmissible”. They did so on the grounds that “the RBFA is not a party to the proceedings and, as such, has no standing to appeal the decision,” a statement from FIFA said.

I have not been following the World Cup games and have no idea if the penalty imposed on Balogun was fair or not. But the appearance of the thing stinks out loud, to mix metaphors a bit. I’ve seen people on social media calling for the U.S. team to voluntarily bench Balogun for tonight’s game, to show good sportsmanship. I haven’t heard anything from the team, though. See also FIFA Loses Control of World Cup After Bending the Knee to Trump by Hafiz Rashid at The New Republic.

Update: It looks like Graham Platner’s campaign is in big trouble. There have been no allegations, and he’s canceled several campaign events. Platner may be toast. I have been told that by Maine rules if he drops out by July 13 the Dems can appoint a replacement. But then he released a video that doesn’t sound like he’s dropping out.

The heat is keeping me indoor by the AC this weekend, and I’ve given up even thinking of attending any local celebrations. So I’m sitting this one out, sadly. I hope you all at least enjoy some barbeque and maybe watch the young folks run around with sparklers, if young folks still do that.

The more I hear about the so called “Great America State Fair,” the worse it sounds. It obviously was put together by people who had no idea what a state fair is really like. They seem to have thought a state fair is something like an exhibit hall attached to a convention, but with a little rodeo and a Ferris wheel.

And what makes this even more of a bleeping shame is that Congress put together funds and a commission to plan for the 250th anniversary ten years ago. Among other things, they were going to help fund a lot of celebrations around the country. DOGE stripped them of a lot of funds last year, causing a lot of plans to be scaled back. Then Trump siphoned off more money and managed to fraudulently redirect donations to the official commission into his own plans. And the result is just awful. So we’ve been robbed of the 250th celebration we could have had.

Do read ‘I’m Mad at Trump’: Even Trumpers Can’t Stand How Shoddy the Great American State Fair Is by Josh Kovensky and Allegra Kirkland at TPM.

After the Freedom Truck, we spotted, visited, and avoided a Budweiser Truck ($12 Michelob, no thank you), and then moved on to a tent with a religious theme. A “Great Awakening” booth had books and DVDs on the essential fakeness of the COVID pandemic, the country’s Christian founding, and more. My friend and I stopped to speak with an attendant at the stall; she immediately began to try to convert us. She asked if we really knew what would happen once we died; I replied that I didn’t think anyone knew the answer to that question. Her eyes now burning, she told us that she knew, asked our names, and started to pray for us. Once she asked if we could repeat after her that Jesus Christ was our lord and savior, we walked away.

I believe I would have walked away a lot sooner.

Real state fairs are pretty amazing. Back in the early 1970s when I was a student at the University of Missouri school of journalism, I got a summer job working for the Missouri State Fair. It was a hoot. I even lived on the fairgrounds while the fair was open, so it was a 24/7 experience. Most of my job involved writing press releases of the livestock competitions, an assignment I got because I was the only college student they hired who knew what a steer was. But there were also stock car races and a big carnival with lots of rides and a real old-time sideshow. There were some decent entertainers, and Bob Hope was the headliner. I got to go to a Bob Hope press conference. I also vividly remember the Coon Dog Water Races and the Mule Show. The whole thing was a great experience; I still get a kick out of thinking about it. Too bad about whatever that thing is in D.C.

So Trump’s financial disclosure statements show he made something like $2 billion last year while most Americans suffered financially. And if this were any other POTUS, or at least a Democratic one, this would be a massive scandal. But it’s Trump, so … NBC News:

The figures from 2025 — the first year of Trump’s second term — were disclosed to the U.S. Office of Government Ethics in a 927-page document. By comparison, President Barack Obama’s final disclosure form was eight pages, while President Joe Biden’s was 11. Vice President JD Vance’s form for last year is 17 pages.

I understand the biggest source of income for Trump is in crypto. But as I understand it, he’s not making money from investing in crypto but in selling it. The people buying the stuff from Trump are losing their shirts, apparently. Associated Press:

Trump got more than $500 million from his World Liberty Financial business selling “governance tokens” and “stablecoins” and other crypto assets. Another crypto business, CIC Digital LLC, took in more than $600 million from sales of souvenir-type “meme” coins stamped with his face.

Both the tokens and the meme coins have plunged in value since his sales, partly because they are so difficult to value. Governance tokens, for instance, confer to holders only the power to vote on certain management policies at a company, not equity stakes, and so typical valuation measures don’t apply.

I don’t understand any of this, and I doubt many of the people who bought this stuff understood it either. More from the AP:

He took in tens of millions from new property holdings in foreign countries eager to please a man with power over where to deploy the U.S. military and how much to charge in tariffs. And he got tens of million more suing media companies worried they could lose their broadcast licenses or not get deals approved by his regulators.

Ever the salesman, Trump even made big money off the smallest of things, pulling in millions by slapping his name on Bibles, guitars and watches — the latter alone bringing in $4.7 million.

Has any president ever directly profited from selling his personal branded merch while in the White House? Not that I can remember.

Profits at Trump’s golf courses and other properties also are up, I understand. And he’s made some money in the stock market, sometimes putting money into businesses that were subject to his regulation decisions.

See the New York Times, The Key Ways Trump’s Financial Interests Intersect With Government Policy. It begins,

When President Trump’s annual financial disclosure was released on Tuesday, it showed that he reaped at least $2.2 billion from his various businesses last year, a singular haul for a president. Many of the gains stemmed from ventures that intersect with his administration, posing unparalleled potential conflicts of interest.

And  here’s just one example:

The Trump Organization has announced new international deals in Qatar and Saudi Arabia, licensing the family name in exchange for payments from government-backed developments. Both countries are key U.S. allies in a region that has been upended by the war with Iran. Last year, Qatar gave the U.S. a Boeing plane that Trump began using this week as Air Force One.

The earnings were $14 million for these new deals and a total of at least $37 million from all the Middle East deals.

But there’s so much more. It’s a gift link, so do read it all.

And then there’s Trump’s badly flopping 250th Anniversary observance. Today Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee accused Trump and his cronies of misleading donors. If you hadn’t figured it out already, there are two organizations competing for donations and attention that had planned to put on celebrations. One is America 250, which was established by Congress a decade ago to plan nonpartisan celebrations nationwide. The other is Freedom 250, being run out of the White House, which is putting on the stupid “Great American State Fair” on the National Mall, the concert series that was canceled because all the acts bailed out, and that garish UFC match at the White House.

I understand that a lot of the money that had been allocated for America 250 was cut by DOGE last year, so a great many plans for local celebrations around the country had to be scaled back. And some was “redirected” by Trump toward his own projects. But the Democrats documented that a lot of people who had planned to give money to America250 were tricked into giving it to Freedom 250. WaPo:

The donors meant to give money to America250, a congressionally chartered initiative to celebrate the nation’s semiquincentennial, according to Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee. They instead were given routing and account numbers that directed their funds to Freedom 250, which President Donald Trump established last year to organize anniversary events, the report says.

Trump is planning a big whoop-dee-doo this Saturday, the 4th. But the weather service is saying the day could be the hottest in recorded history for the D.C. area, which is bound to keep the crowds away. I was in D.C. on a 4th of July many years ago, and it was seriously hot then but nothing like what it’s going to be on Saturday. Heh.

A DSAer knocked off a15-term House incumbent Dem in Colorado primaries yesterday, and the centrists are in a panic. And Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser won the Democratic primary race for governor over Michael Bennet, a three-term incumbent U.S. senator. WaPo:

Weiser tweaked Bennet for voting to confirm eight of Trump’s Cabinet members. Bennet stood by his votes, except for the one to confirm Energy Secretary Chris Wright. He argued his support was necessary to help the state secure federal resources.

Update: And I see we have a request for the dancing banana.

So birthright citizenship is safe. Trump meltdown on the way … Thomas, Alito, and  Gorsuch dissented. Kavanaugh quibbled with the majority opinion reasoning but voted with the majority anyway. Here’s the decision. I haven’t read it yet.

Skimming through social media comments, I’ve noticed an alarming number of people who think the Supreme Court has just created some radical new policy regarding immigrants. One commenter worried that Hispanic people born here before the decision would now suddenly become citizens, as if they weren’t already citizens. I swear, ignorance is killing us.

In other decisions, SCOTUS allowed states to ban transgender athletes from competing in their schools. And in In National Republican Senatorial Committee v. Federal Election Commission, the Court ruled 6-3 with the Republicans (big surprise) that federal limits on coordinated campaign expenditures by political parties violate the First Amendment.

I’ll post more here if I see any juicy reactions or commentaries.

Update: I’m seeing news stories saying Alito is retiring. I’m also seeing news stories retracting the stories that Alito is retiring.

Update: I haven’t heard of any reaction from Trump, but the rest of MAGA is having a meltdown. You’d think the SCOTUS had created some new immigration law rather than just uphold what’s been in the bleeping Constitution since 1868.

Update: Mike Johnson and some others are seizing on Kavanaugh’s opinion, which (I understand) is that the President has no authority to change birthright citizenship, but Congress could. Again, I haven’t found Kavanaugh’s opinion in all the mountain of writing about this decision today. But that’s what I’ve read.

So that’s going to be the next attempt. The problem is that it appears to be the clear opinion of five of the justices that birthright citizenship is guaranteed in the 14th Amendment, period, and the Constitution can’t be overwritten by legislation alone any more than it can be overwritten by executive orders. But I bet they’re going to try. See Johnson Follows Kavanaugh’s Lead, Says Congress Will ‘Deal With’ Birthright Citizenship by Nicole LaFond at TPM.

SCOTUS is dumping a ton of decisions before its summer recess. Among these is the birthright citizenship case, Trump v. Barbara. I like the name. Tomorrow is the last day before recess. Are they waiting until the last minute before they dash out the door before bombing the 14th Amendment? Stay tuned.

I’ve been following along on SCOTUSblog. It hasn’t been all bad news so far. The Court will not hear Trump’s appeal of the $5 million a jury awarded to E. Jean Carroll. (Trump’s reaction is unhinged.) They upheld a Mississippi law that allows election officials to count mail-in ballots that are postmarked by Election Day and received within five days after. They stopped Trump from firing Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook.

However, John Roberts’s campaign to implement the Unitary Executive Theory continues. Kate Riga writes at TPM:

The Supreme Court cast its long-telegraphed death blow to independent agencies Monday, confirming that the president can fire at-will civil servants that were meant to be insulated from political backlash. In a second opinion, though, the Court gave the Federal Reserve a special carveout from this new reality. 

The odd baby-splitting in the combination of Trump v. Slaughter and Trump v. Cook — both authored by Chief Justice John Roberts — reveals the right-wing Court’s priorities: It may be sanguine about the demolition of agencies mostly used to regulate big business and protect worker rights, but is far less willing to let President Trump take over the Fed and unleash global economic chaos. 

Translation: The Chief Justice draw the line as far as his personal financial investments are concerned. See also Josh Marshall’s commentary, The Supreme Court’s Corruption Must Be Broken.

And see also Paul Krugman:

… but much more important is Humphrey’s Executor, which is the generations-long precedent that says that when Congress creates an independent agency, it is independent. It’s able to make decisions.

Of course, the president has some role. Typically, the president can choose the agency’s head subject to congressional approval, but the president can’t just go and fire officials that he doesn’t like for whatever reason or for no reason, because the agencies that operate the U.S. government and basically run our society are supposed to be professional. They’re supposed to be following their legal mandate. They’re not supposed to be personal tools of a dictator in the White House.

Well, the court just scrapped that. Now, lawyers, people who are legal experts, can do a better job of explaining just what went down. But what I think is important to understand is not only does this give essentially dictatorial powers to the occupant of the White House, but it also makes it extremely difficult for the economy to function. It makes it extremely difficult for society to function.

John Roberts (and the justices who agree with hm) seem to have a cognitive dysfunction that doesn’t allow him to anticipate the effects of his decisions. Or else he doesn’t care. Citizens United anyone? Of course it had a corrupting influence on politics. Gutting the Voting Rights Act brought on a return of Jim Crow in several southern states. Now Trump can merrily destroy whatever federal agencies are still functioning. No skin off Roberts’s nose, I guess.

I guess they’re done for today. Tomorrow we’re supposed to get the decisions on birthright citizenship, transgender athlete bans, and a challenge brought by Republicans to how much money candidates can spend in coordination with their political party. I’m gong to assume the Republicans will win that one.

The winner of my House district’s primary, Cait Conley, is the candidate the Democratic establishment wanted. And I think she can beat Mike Lawler in the general, although of course a lot can happen between now and November.  But I’ve bumped into some younger progressives in the district who swear they will not vote for her, because she’s not pure enough on one issue or another. And I don’t disagree with them as far as the issues are concerned, but House Democratic majority, folks. The bigger, the better. Vote Blue No Matter Who.

Now I think some other people need to hear that same message. See, for example, After wins by democratic socialists, centrist Democrats unite to push back by Matthew Choi in WaPo. (I appear to be out of gift links, but maybe you can read some of it.)

Thirteen Democratic House members and candidates announced their support Thursday for a centrist initiative aimed at pushing back against the party’s tilt toward democratic socialism. …

… “They should not be the face of our party,” said Jessica Killin, a Democratic candidate running in a competitive Colorado district. “We need to be organized and clear in our vision.”

Killin is one of the 13 who signed on to the “Promise to America” initiative that commits candidates to a set of centrist principles, including capitalism, fiscal discipline, strong borders and pride in the United States.

Yeah, that sets up such a strong contrast to Republicans, right?

Part of me does appreciate that Republicans are absolutely going to seize on the flakier DSA candidates and hang them about the necks of every Democrat running everywhere. Darializa Avila Chevalier, one of the Mamdani-endorsed candidates who won on Tuesday, is a bit much even for me and will probably serve nicely as this year’s “defund the police.” But it appears I’m not the only Democratic voter who has had it with the centrists. Michelle Goldberg writes in the New York Times,

Many Democratic primary voters, however, are in no mood for defensiveness. As they see it, they’ve been failed by a cautious, compromising establishment, and they’re going to overthrow it. The Democratic version of the Tea Party is here, with dramatic implications for the midterms and possibly the next presidential election. As Mamdani said at a rally at Brooklyn’s Kings Theater last week, people are asking when the race for 2028 begins. “It starts now,” he said.

then later, Goldberg writes,

That means the 2026 midterms could end up being a giant national experiment that tests the populist left’s theory of victory. For years, it has argued that Democrats have failed because, in thrall to corporate interests, they let themselves become the party of the status quo. Unable or unwilling to galvanize voters with an economically progressive alternative to the right, they’ve offered only timid, business-friendly incrementalism. Usamah Andrabi, a spokesman for Justice Democrats, the organization that recruited Avila Chevalier to run for Congress, told me that too often, the Democratic Party “tries to stymie big and bold ideas” in favor of technocratic pragmatism. “I think what voters have really made clear, particularly this past year, is that they are desperate for bold, visionary leadership,” he said.

What I’ve been saying for at least a couple of decades.

See also A Far-Left Freedom Caucus Would Be a Nightmare for Jeffries by Paul Kane at NOTUS. It begins:

Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-New York) has a message for the far-left Democrats who won in Tuesday’s primaries and are all but guaranteed to join Congress in January: tone it down.

But Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York), the liberal icon whose 2018 upset win inspired this movement, had a very different message directed at the old-line Democrats: welcome these incoming progressives with open arms, or else they’ll spark ideological clashes.

This is worth reading. It quotes AOC,

“My hope is that they are not met with the hostility and the cruelty, frankly, that I experienced, and I think that a lot of that can inform what happens afterwards,” she added, noting that they should be respected for having won their districts just like everyone else.

I hadn’t realized she’d been dissed so badly when she first came to the House in 2019. But, yes, the DSAers were elected like everyone else, and should they win in November their constituents expect them to deliver what they ran on, or at least be seen trying real hard. Once again, it looks like the centrists are the real clogs in the machine who insist their timid, incremental approach is the only legitimate one and everybody had better get with their program. And the centrists will still be the whopping majority in the House, so it’s not like they’re going to lose control in the near future.

Update: Josh Marshal comments on this very same theme. See ‘Centrists,’ This Is on You.

On to the outrage du jour. So Congress passed a bipartisan housing bill. Yes, it actually did something intended to be useful. The bill would have done some good. But Trump is refusing to sign it, naturally.

As near as I can tell, the main virtue of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing bill is that it would have restricted large institutional investors from buying single-family homes to turn into rentals. In some cities, especially in the South, investors have bought up as much as 25 percent of the single-family homes. They drive up rental rates and also make it harder for regular people to buy a house. The bill also made changes to federal rules to make it easier and cheaper for developers to build more housing. The bill is far from a quick fix, but over time it could have done some good. And it was genuinely bipartisan.

There was supposed to be a signing ceremony this afternoon. But Trump called it off.

“Today’s Housing News Conference and Signing is hereby cancelled until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency,” Trump said in a post to Truth Social.

You remember the Save America Act. It is intended to disenfranchise large numbers of people by creating a ridiculous documentation hurdle for voting. This is to cure the (nonexistent) in-person voter fraud problem. It also mandates that all states submit their voter lists to a Department of Homeland Security tool that has been found to erroneously flag U.S. citizens.

The bill passed in the House, but it stalled in the Senate, five times. It wasn’t just that it couldn’t clear the Senate’s notorious 60-vote threshold. Some Republican senators actually voted with the Democrats.  I suspect they recognized that the barriers would impact their voters as badly as Democratic ones, a point lost on Trump. See also Some Republicans dumbfounded over Trump’s housing bill move: ‘What a s— show’.

Apparently news that Trump refused to sign the housing bill reached Congress as a bunch of congress critters were giving a press conference about the bill and how much help Trump had been in getting it passed. Hah.

So is the housing bill dead? It can still become law without Trump’s signature, a couple of ways.  As I understand it, as long as Trump doesn’t actually veto it, and if Congress stays in session for the next ten days (excluding Sundays), the bill automatically becomes law. And that’s probably what will happen. The other way is for a supermajority of both the House and Senate vote to pass it again, and I don’t see that happening.

And I don’t see the Senate passing the Save America bill. Trump seems to think that if he can throw a big enough tantrum he can get whatever he wants. But the Senate math hasn’t changed. The votes aren’t there.

A couple of hours after announcing he wasn’t signing the housing bill, Trump had a closed-door lunch meeting with Senate Republicans. Yelling was reported. I wrote yesterday that there appears to be a growing tension between Trump and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, and I think if Trump isn’t careful this could turn into a rift with other Senate Republicans.

From Politico:

Sen. Thom Tillis, a retiring North Carolina Republican who hasn’t been shy about leveling criticism toward Trump, said he didn’t understand why the president was “holding a bill that’s ready for signature hostage, [for] a bill that will never pass in this Congress. Makes no sense to me.”

Also, this happened today:

A federal judge on Wednesday permanently barred President Donald Trump’s administration from implementing most of his first executive order on elections, part of which sought to require people to show documentary proof of citizenship when they register to vote.

Trump had tried to change election laws through executive order, but that is way outside a president’s actual constitutional power. But speaking of not having constitutional power, today the Postmaster General said that U.S. Postal Service could refuse to deliver mail ballots in states that fail to turn over voter rolls to the Trump administration.

But here’s an idea I agree with:

Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.) is calling on President Donald Trump to personally pay back taxpayers for the millions he spent revamping the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, which is now a cesspool of algae and chunks of blue sealant.

Why stop with the Reflecting Pool? Someday I want Trump to personally pay for restoring the Rose Garden, and the East Wing, and demolishing the Marie Antoinette Memorial Airplane Hangar and the garish Arc de Trump. He didn’t get authorization or go through proper channels for any of that, so the cost of putting stuff back as it should be shouldn’t fall on taxpayers. It should fall on him, or his estate. Whichever applies. And if he refuses, the feds can seize  his properties.

It wouldn’t surprise me if the Reflecting Pool fiasco is what finally collapses the Trump Administration. The Iran debacle is much more serious, yes, but to most Americans I suspect it’s a bit of an abstraction, and complicated. But the Reflecting Pool is simple. Trump bragged about how he was going to fix it, and obviously he made it worse. It has become a national joke. And Trump’s frantic excuses about vandalism aren’t helping him, I don’t think.

But here’s a nice surprise. The Senate passed a war resolution today.

The Senate for the first time approved a war powers resolution Tuesday seeking to block U.S. military action against Iran, as lawmakers warily watch President Donald Trump’s efforts to resolve a conflict that the administration launched on its own and now needs Congress to fund.

It was the 10th time the Senate has tried to stop the war, and the outcome, on a vote of 50-48, was a stunning turnaround from past efforts. While the resolution is largely symbolic, and does not fully carry the force of law, it reflects the growing concerns from a number of Republican lawmakers in both the House and Senate over both the war and the deal Trump struck with Iran to end it. The House approved the resolution earlier this month.

So what changed? Maybe nothing. Four Republican senators who have voted for curbing the war in the past voted to curb it again. These are Republicans Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana. But a couple of Republican senators (Mitch McConnell, who is in a hospital, and Dave McCormick of Pennsylvania) missed the vote. So I can’t claim that maybe this is a sign that Trump’s support among Senate Republicans is slipping.

But there also have been reports of a growing feud between Trump and Senate Majority Leader John Thune.  Trump is annoyed that Thune is not as utterly obsequious as Mike Johnson. And getting legislation through the Senate, given the filibuster rules, is a lot trickier than in the House, where you just need a simple majority. So Thune hasn’t been able to deliver legislation on demand as efficiently as Johnson, and Trump blames Thune. And a rift is growing. The article linked above suggests most of the Republican senators are on Thune’s side, although they aren’t rebelling against Trump, yet.

This was primary day in New York. In my district we voted for the Dem nominee who will face Republican Mike Lawler for a U.S. House seat in November. This is a district carved out of three counties that went for Kamala Harris in 2024, and I’m reading Lawler is vulnerable this year. There were five Democratic candidates on the ballot, and they are all respectable, although I don’t expect the one I voted for (the most progressive one) to win.

Nothing seems to be going right for Donald Trump. He thought he had the Strait of Hormuz open. But Israel’s continued bombing of Lebanon caused Iran to announce the re-closing of the Strait. Then Trump posted on Truth Social, “Iran must immediately stop their highly paid PROXIES in Lebanon from causing trouble. If they don’t, we’ll hit Iran very hard again, just like we did last week, only harder!!!” and also “You close it and you won’t have a country.”

Now apparently the Trump Administration and Iranian officials are arguing over whether the Strait is closed or not.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Sunday that the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz is returning “back towards normal,” a day after Iranian officials signaled they would be closing the vital waterway due to Israeli strikes in Lebanon.

The Trump administration official said 67 ships went through the strait on Saturday, a slight increase from 55 on Friday as the U.S. military escorts vessels through a southern route in the channel.

But the most recent news I can find has Iran saying that “unauthorized” vessels are not being allowed through, whatever that means. And the BBC reports that “Tracking data monitored by BBC Verify suggested that at least five tankers passed through the strait on Saturday while several vessels appeared to have made U-turns in the area.” Several media outlets are reporting that it’s not clear if the Strait is opened or closed now.

Iranians and J.D. Vance are supposed to be meeting in Switzerland now , but the Iranians walked out after about 80 minutes, reportedly because of an “insulting message by the U.S. president.”  So we’re off to a great start. The Iranians are saying that the deal depends on the war between Israel and Lebanon stopping, now. We’ll see how that goes.

Trump and Netanyahu are no longer speaking, I take it. Until recently Trump was more popular in Israel than he was here, but now Israelis have turned against him. Israel is holding elections in October, and I’ve read that the Likud party had prepared an ad campaign that featured the great relationship between Trump and Netanyahu. That’s been scrapped.

Trump’s plans for the 4th of July aren’t looking that good, either. He’d promised a multi-day entertainment extravaganza featuring the likes of, um, what’s left of Milli Vanilli? Plus a whole lot of other people I don’t remember from the 1990s. Now I take it it’s been compressed to a Trump rally. Trump says also there will be “more than 300 Members of our strong and talented Military Bands, Orchestras, and Ceremonial Units, will perform Patriotic Melodies and American Classics, and my Playlist.”  Too bad Lawrence Welk couldn’t be there.  Trump is also promising the biggest fireworks display of all time, which means people should steer clear of DC because that’s bound to get screwed up, too. I just hope the celebration doesn’t kill anybody.

And then there’s the Reflecting Pool fiasco. Trump’s “cleanup” made it worst, and everything done to clean up the cleanup has made is more worse. See Science Has a Name for What’s Plaguing the Reflecting Pool by Matt Viser at The Atlantic. I assume y’all have seen that not only is the water green, the “American flag blue” paint on the bottom Trump was so proud of is peeling off and floating to the top. Trump has decided the failure of his cleanup must have been caused by vandals, so now he’s got National Guard guarding the algae. And the algae probably need to lawyer up.

Tourists have been taking away chunks of the blue paint as souvenirs. But this morning a fellow was arrested for just touching one of the floating blue blobs of peeled paint. This was David Hearn, a former Olympic canoeist and cyclist from Bethesda, Maryland. Trump claimed that US Park Police had “arrested multiple individuals for vandalizing our Nations magnificent Reflecting Pool,” but as near as I can tell it was just the one guy. I don’t know if he’s still being detained.

And Trump is saying the pool needs to be drained again. Someone might want to explain to him he needs different contractors who know what they are doing. But I doubt he would listen.

Trump has also lost  his best friend in Europe, Italian PM Giorgia Meloni. He got into some kind of stupid spat with her. This was possibly because she refused to have anything to do with the Iran war.

But the man can’t get anything right these days. I wonder what he will screw up next?