The rumor is that Trump has agreed to release $20 billion in frozen funds to Iran in exchange for agreement that they will “suspend” their nuclear program indefinitely. (He’s denying it but nothing he says can be taken at face value, obviously.)Too bad nobody ever thought of that before.
Trump spent years in a jealous rage, relentlessly slamming Barack Obama for unfreezing $1.7 billion of Iran’s own money to Iran, calling it pathetic ransom money and proof of a disastrous, weak-kneed surrender.
Driven by petty obsession, Trump spitefully ripped up the Iran nuclear deal in 2018, shredding every restraint on Tehran, and smugly promised the world a “better deal.” Instead, his childish vendetta supercharged Iran’s nuclear program, pushing it dangerously close to the bomb. Now, in a breathtaking display of hypocrisy and failure, Trump is negotiating to hand Iran access to $20 billion in frozen funds — more than ten times what he once condemned — in exchange for the regime surrendering its near-weapons-grade uranium stockpile.
This is Trump at his most embarrassingly stupid: destroying a deal that had capped Iran’s enrichment and kept it under watch, only to crawl back offering vastly more cash after his own incompetence made the threat far worse. The man who mocked Obama for “giving” Iran money is now dangling a fortune in frozen assets while pretending it’s a brilliant victory.
It’s not leadership — it’s ego-driven incompetence and rank hypocrisy, a petty grudge that backfired spectacularly and left America facing a more expensive, more dangerous mess. Trump’s jealous tantrum didn’t make America safer; it just made the cleanup bill ten times bigger.
You really can’t make this stuff up.
It’s good news if the war is coming to an end, at least for now. (There’s no guarantee, of course.) But Trump and Netanyahu precipitated it in the first place and now Iran knows that it can close the Strait at will, they have a new younger,more hardline Ayatollah who will no doubt crack down even harder on the population and spend the money they will get from the U.S. to rebuild the regime even stronger.
But yeah, it’s a real victory. Trump is already saying that he’s ended another war. He’s discovered that he can start wars and then end them, claiming he’s the second coming in the process. It probably won’t be the last.
Just when you thought Hegseth couldn’t get more ridiculous
SECDEF/WAR! Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s God Warrior, quoted a garbled Bible quote from Pulp Fiction (1994) in one of his Pentagon “sermons” this week.
“They call it CSAR 25:17, which I think is meant to reflect Ezekiel 25:17,” Hegseth erroneously said, saying the lead planner of the Combat Search And Rescue operation in Iran shared it with him.
So the prayer is CSAR 25:17 and it reads … “the path of the downed aviator is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of camaraderie and duty, shepherd the lost through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper, and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to capture and destroy my brother. And you will know my call sign is Sandy One when I lay my vengeance upon thee.”
Almost every single line from Hegseth’s prayer is ripped from Jackson’s iconic recitation of Ezekiel 25:17 in Tarantino’s film, not the prophet Ezekiel as ordained by God.
Here’s what the original verse in the Bible actually reads:
I will execute great vengeance on them with furious rebukes; and they shall know that I am the LORD, when I lay My vengeance upon them.
That’s it. The flowery language, the allusions to destruction of evil—all come from Tarantino.
On Wednesday, the flowery language came from former Fox Weekend co-host/alcoholic, Hegseth, in front of a Pentagon audience. One assumes Hegseth’s attitude regarding “stupid rules of engagement” now applies to rules for quoting the Holy Bible by which he sets such store.
A man of maturity (and cultural literacy) would think better about quoting that “prayer.” He would anticipate how it would make him, his office, his troops, and his boss look to the press and to the world.
A clip of Secretary Pete Hegseth reading a version of Samuel L. Jackson’s famous monologue from “Pulp Fiction” — that partly quotes actual scripture — is circulating online. ABC News’ Ian Pannell reports.
All that performative, right-wing bluster about loving “our troops” is about to blow up like a girls’ school in Iran (USA Today):
Dan F. was alarmed when his daughter, a Marine aboard the USS Tripoli, a warship deployed to fight the Iran war, sent him a photo of a meal served on the ship. A lunch tray, two-thirds empty, carried one small scoop of shredded meat and a single folded tortilla.
A picture of a mid-April dinner on the USS Abraham Lincoln, shared by a service member with his family, was similarly unappetizing – a small handful of boiled carrots, a dry meat patty and a gray slab of processed meat.
Dan and other military family members worried that their loved ones deployed to the Middle East are going hungry are filling boxes with items they hope could help service members ride out prolonged deployments in the Middle East – homemade fudge, Jolly Ranchers, crossword puzzle books, playing cards, toothpaste, Girl Scout cookies and fresh socks. But mail delivery to military ZIP codes across the Middle East has been indefinitely suspended as of April, and packages in transit now hang in limbo.
Service members Donald Trump deployed to the Persian Gulf for his unsanctioned Iran war are going hungry. One Texas mother has sent over $2,000 worth of packages to her sailor son. None have reached him. She asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation against her son.
These meals are short one or two items from U.S. agriculture secretary, Brooke Rollins’s a piece of chicken, a piece of broccoli, a corn tortilla and “one other thing.”
Karen Erskine-Valentine, pastor of a church in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, said she was alarmed to hear from a community member whose son is in the Middle East aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln about the poor quality of food on the ship. The Abraham Lincoln is one of two aircraft carriers sent to the region, along with the USS Gerald Ford. A third, the USS George H.W. Bush, is on the way.
“The food is tasteless and there’s not nearly enough and they’re hungry all the time,” Erskine-Valentine said. “That kind of breaks your heart.”
The Pentagon has not responded to a request for comment. I half expect them to brush off the USA Today story as Iranian (but surely not Russian) propaganda. No other major news outlets have confirmed it as I write.
Images of food being served to sailors on the USS Abraham Lincoln and USS Tripoli, published by USA Today.
A spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service tells USA Today that no parcels are being returned to sender. They are held up until the military lifts delivery restrictions imposed, according to an Army spokesman, “due to airspace closures and other logistical impacts from the ongoing conflict.”
This story will blow upall acrossthe globe. MAGAs already “sick” of Trump will increase their numbers. Soon there won’t just be spray tan on Trump’s face, but a lot of unserved egg substitute. And on SECDEF/WAR! Pete Hegseth’s face in his makeup studio.
Do us a favor and spread this report everywhere you can think of over the weekend.
"You're spending taxpayer dollars to drink milk shirtless in a hot tub with Kid Rock. Somehow you think that's a better public health message than informing the public about the benefits of vaccines. Really? — Rep. Linda Sanchez to RFK Jr pic.twitter.com/2Oy7kzTGpn
“One thing I find incredible is that you suspended this pro-vaccine messaging campaign, but somehow you’re spending taxpayer dollars to drink milk shirtless in a hot tub with Kid Rock. And somehow you think that’s a better public health message.”
Bobby had a bad day. But not as bad as the kids who got measles because their MAHA weirdo parents decided not to vaccinate them when Bobby Jr told them it was dangerous.
No greater metaphor for this entire week than Pete Hegseth quoting a fake Bible verse from the movie Pulp Fiction to Pentagon staff. pic.twitter.com/Zv1GFwPTrG
All I’ve been hearing all year is that Democrats can’t raise any money and it’s taken as yet more proof that while voters loathe Trump they don’t like the Democrats any better. And, needless to say, that translates into a lot of sanctimonious advice that Democrats not get their hopes up despite the polls and the off year wins at the ballot box.
Even at a time of inflated political-fundraising hauls, the numbers Democrats reported Wednesday stand out.
Many of the Democratic Party’s top candidates reported gargantuan fundraising totals for the first three months of the year — figures that reinforce the party’s growing confidence that it is gaining momentum roughly six months before the midterm election.
The Democrats’ Senate nominee in Texas, James Talarico, led the way by raising $27 million in the year’s first fundraising quarter, a figure that until recently would have been considered a strong return for a major presidential candidate, let alone a congressional contender.
But he wasn’t the only Senate Democratic nominee to post an impressive report to the Federal Election Commission: Roy Cooper, the Democrats’ Senate nominee in North Carolina, raised nearly $14 million, and Mary Peltola, the putative party nominee for Senate in Alaska, raised almost $9 million. Sherrod Brown, the likely nominee in Ohio, raised $12.5 million.
People aren’t sending to the DNC, that’s true. But they’re sending A LOT to the candidates who have the best chance of turning over the Congress and that’s huge.
I was talking to someone yesterday who was absolutely over the moon about Talerico and he’s a hard core lefty from way back. He’s not a religious person nor is he someone who’s particularly moderate in temperament or politics. But he’s very excited at the prospect of Talerico. Why? First, because he thinks he can win and second because he thinks his religiousity is the kind that will lead him to left leaning policies. Maybe more of a Jimmy Carter kind of thing.
I have no doubt that this will end up causing a lot of strife within the coalition which is not necessarily going to be on the same page policy-wise. We’ve been there before. But that’s a problem for another day.
Anyway, it’s good news that the candidates will have enough money to compete. The Republicans will pour cash into all these races — they have unlimited funds. But after a point that can have diminishing returns. The only thing that matters is that the Dems have enough and it looks like they will.
There was a time when the very concept of a conflict of interest in politics was a serious matter that could cause investigations and resignations in the federal government. Long before Watergate, Richard Nixon was famously accused of corruption when it was revealed at the height of the 1952 presidential election, in which he was Dwight D. Eisenhower’s running mate, that some supporters had set up a slush fund to help pay for his expenses. Nixon went on television and delivered his famous “Checkers” speech to upwards of 60 million people, insisting that his wife Pat wore a respectable Republican cloth coat and that they intended to keep Checkers, the little dog a supporter had given to his daughters. He got away with it that time, but the moniker ‘Tricky Dick” stuck with him throughout his political career.
Nixon wasn’t the only Republican dogged by conflict of interest accusations in the 1950s. Sherman Adams, Eisenhower’s chief of staff, resigned in 1958 after refusing to answer questions about a vicuña coat and an Asian rug given to him by a textile manufacturer. Two years later, John C. Doerfer, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, likewise bowed out when it was revealed he had vacationed on the yacht of a wealthy friend.
Seventy years later, it all sounds so quaint.
At one time, it was considered an absolute necessity for public officials to observe these rules and take proper action to avoid them. If they didn’t there would be consequences: dismissal or resignation, and sometimes legal action.
The following decades saw scandals featuring legislators and political operatives of both parties who were accused of conflicts of interest, which were generally defined as a person’s private interests. These were usually financial and directly clashed with their duties, making it difficult for them to act objectively. Many were even determined to have the appearance of conflict of interest — the distinction being that even if a person were acting ethically, someone else might look at their situation and believe they could be compromised — in which case they were required to either divest themselves of the conflict or resign their public position. At one time, it was considered an absolute necessity for public officials to observe these rules and take proper action to avoid them. If they didn’t there would be consequences: dismissal or resignation, and sometimes legal action.
Advertisement: The way money and power converge in our political system, some amount of corruption is probably inevitable. In fact, the system is built for it. But Donald Trump and his cronies have made all the previous cases look like child’s play. As the president himself would say, “We’ve never seen anything like it.”
And if you want to really see why these prohibitions once existed, you have only to look at Trump’s special envoys for peace: Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, whose lack of experience and conflicts of interest have turned the Middle East into a raging fire and even helped lead to the Iran war.
Related
Trump revealed his objective in Iran — 40 years ago The New York Times reported on Monday about an event that would have been unthinkable just a decade ago when Republicans were shrieking that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should be disqualified from running for president because she would supposedly sell out America’s national security to procure money from foreign leaders to fund her family’s global charity. In late March, as the Iran war was dragging into its 26th day, Kushner appeared at a Saudi investment conference in Miami. The president’s son-in-law, who had represented the U.S. in the failed talks that led to war breaking out with Iran, was not in south Florida as an American official but as the founder and chief executive of Affinity Partners, an investment firm that had received billions from the Saudi Arabia sovereign wealth fund.
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Kushner was reportedly fundraising for another massive cash injection from the Saudi crown prince at the same time he was serving as a special envoy in the administration’s negotiations with Iran — and as the Saudis were reportedly pushing for war with the Islamic Republic. It is one of the most egregious examples of conflict of interest in American political history. And nobody said a word.
Within days he was off to the Middle East for more talks with Trump’s other special envoy, Steve Witkoff, another arrogant real estate investor with no diplomatic experience who is botching American foreign policy all over the globe.
Want more sharp takes on politics? Sign up for our free newsletter, Standing Room Only, written by Amanda Marcotte, now also a weekly show on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
Like his partner in duplicity, Witkoff’s conflicts are numerous. He previously joined with the Trump family in the cryptocurrency World Liberty Financial, and after he was named special envoy, Witkoff leveraged his position to argue for an export deal to export the world’s most advanced artificial intelligence chips to the United Arab Emirates, a deal which had not been previously approved due to national security concerns. Coincidentally, I’m sure, a UAE government-backed company handed World Liberty a $2 billion investment in its stablecoin. Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Ron Wyden of Oregon issued a statement saying that “[the deal] appears to have aided a foreign power’s effort to acquire U.S. technology with serious economic and national security implications — and [Witkoff] potentially did so in exchange for his personal financial benefit.”
This is a marked contrast to the Clinton Foundation, which did accept foreign and corporate donations in support of programs to fight HIV/AIDS and economic empowerment for women. But when issues about the appearance of conflicts of interest were raised during Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign for president, how did the organization respond? By pledging to stop taking foreign and corporate corporations if she were elected, and by ending the Clinton Global Initiative regardless.
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Ten years later, it’s apparently fine for Kushner and Witkoff to allegedly be profiteering from their diplomatic partners.
The epic failure of this duo in dealing with the Iran war — at least from a national security perspective, if not their own personal portfolios — shows how this sort of conflict of interest can warp someone’s ability to do the job. As the Times lays out, Kushner and Witkoff represent Donald Trump’s mindset — “a rogue version of diplomacy that’s focused on the flashy and theatrical, a reflection of the Trump real estate developer ethos. But that ethos has failed, and Iran is proof.”
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Subscribe today to support Heather Digby Parton’s commentary But they also symbolize his blatantly corrupt view of government as a legitimate tool for growing their own personal fortunes. As Trump himself said in January after being asked by Times reporters why he was no longer abiding by any ethics rules about conflicts of interest, “because I found out that nobody cared. I’m allowed to.”
Blatant corruption, it seems, has become just another perk of the job.
The White House is not requiring Kushner to file financial disclosure documents, and certification of Witkoff’s has been inexplicably delayed for months. Since Trump has promised to issue mass pardons to his staff before leaving office, it’s highly unlikely the pair will be held accountable for their behavior.
Advertisement:
But the lesson is clear: Allowing government officials, even so-called special envoys, to leverage their positions for personal financial gain is a recipe for disaster. When Democrats return to power, those arcane rules about conflicts of interest should be codified into law — and made to stick.
There was a time when the very concept of a conflict of interest in politics was a serious matter that could cause investigations and resignations in the federal government. Long before Watergate, Richard Nixon was famously accused of corruption when it was revealed at the height of the 1952 presidential election, in which he was Dwight D. Eisenhower’s running mate, that some supporters had set up a slush fund to help pay for his expenses. Nixon went on television and delivered his famous “Checkers” speech to upwards of 60 million people, insisting that his wife Pat wore a respectable Republican cloth coat and that they intended to keep Checkers, the little dog a supporter had given to his daughters. He got away with it that time, but the moniker ‘Tricky Dick” stuck with him throughout his political career.
Nixon wasn’t the only Republican dogged by conflict of interest accusations in the 1950s. Sherman Adams, Eisenhower’s chief of staff, resigned in 1958 after refusing to answer questions about a vicuña coat and an Asian rug given to him by a textile manufacturer. Two years later, John C. Doerfer, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, likewise bowed out when it was revealed he had vacationed on the yacht of a wealthy friend.
Seventy years later, it all sounds so quaint.
The following decades saw scandals featuring legislators and political operatives of both parties who were accused of conflicts of interest, which were generally defined as a person’s private interests. These were usually financial and directly clashed with their duties, making it difficult for them to act objectively. Many were even determined to have the appearance of conflict of interest — the distinction being that even if a person were acting ethically, someone else might look at their situation and believe they could be compromised — in which case they were required to either divest themselves of the conflict or resign their public position. At one time, it was considered an absolute necessity for public officials to observe these rules and take proper action to avoid them. If they didn’t there would be consequences: dismissal or resignation, and sometimes legal action.
The way money and power converge in our political system, some amount of corruption is probably inevitable. In fact, the system is built for it. But Donald Trump and his cronies have made all the previous cases look like child’s play. As the president himself would say, “We’ve never seen anything like it.”
And if you want to really see why these prohibitions once existed, you have only to look at Trump’s special envoys for peace: Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, whose lack of experience and conflicts of interest have turned the Middle East into a raging fire and even helped lead to the Iran war.
The New York Times reported on Monday about an event that would have been unthinkable just a decade ago when Republicans were shrieking that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should be disqualified from running for president because she would supposedly sell out America’s national security to procure money from foreign leaders to fund her family’s global charity. In late March, as the Iran war was dragging into its 26th day, Kushner appeared at a Saudi investment conference in Miami. The president’s son-in-law, who had represented the U.S. in the failed talks that led to war breaking out with Iran, was not in south Florida as an American official but as the founder and chief executive of Affinity Partners, an investment firm that had received billions from the Saudi Arabia sovereign wealth fund.
Advertisement:
Kushner was reportedly fundraising for another massive cash injection from the Saudi crown prince at the same time he was serving as a special envoy in the administration’s negotiations with Iran — and as the Saudis were reportedly pushing for war with the Islamic Republic. It is one of the most egregious examples of conflict of interest in American political history. And nobody said a word.
Within days he was off to the Middle East for more talks with Trump’s other special envoy, Steve Witkoff, another arrogant real estate investor with no diplomatic experience who is botching American foreign policy all over the globe
Like his partner in duplicity, Witkoff’s conflicts are numerous. He previously joined with the Trump family in the cryptocurrency World Liberty Financial, and after he was named special envoy, Witkoff leveraged his position to argue for an export deal to export the world’s most advanced artificial intelligence chips to the United Arab Emirates, a deal which had not been previously approved due to national security concerns. Coincidentally, I’m sure, a UAE government-backed company handed World Liberty a $2 billion investment in its stablecoin. Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Ron Wyden of Oregon issued a statement saying that “[the deal] appears to have aided a foreign power’s effort to acquire U.S. technology with serious economic and national security implications — and [Witkoff] potentially did so in exchange for his personal financial benefit.”
This is a marked contrast to the Clinton Foundation, which did accept foreign and corporate donations in support of programs to fight HIV/AIDS and economic empowerment for women. But when issues about the appearance of conflicts of interest were raised during Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign for president, how did the organization respond? By pledging to stop taking foreign and corporate corporations if she were elected, and by ending the Clinton Global Initiative regardless.
Ten years later, it’s apparently fine for Kushner and Witkoff to allegedly be profiteering from their diplomatic partners.
The epic failure of this duo in dealing with the Iran war — at least from a national security perspective, if not their own personal portfolios — shows how this sort of conflict of interest can warp someone’s ability to do the job. As the Times lays out, Kushner and Witkoff represent Donald Trump’s mindset — “a rogue version of diplomacy that’s focused on the flashy and theatrical, a reflection of the Trump real estate developer ethos. But that ethos has failed, and Iran is proof.”
But they also symbolize his blatantly corrupt view of government as a legitimate tool for growing their own personal fortunes. As Trump himself said in January after being asked by Times reporters why he was no longer abiding by any ethics rules about conflicts of interest, “because I found out that nobody cared. I’m allowed to.”
Blatant corruption, it seems, has become just another perk of the job.
The White House is not requiring Kushner to file financial disclosure documents, and certification of Witkoff’s has been inexplicably delayed for months. Since Trump has promised to issue mass pardons to his staff before leaving office, it’s highly unlikely the pair will be held accountable for their behavior.
But the lesson is clear: Allowing government officials, even so-called special envoys, to leverage their positions for personal financial gain is a recipe for disaster. When Democrats return to power, those arcane rules about conflicts of interest should be codified into law — and made to stick.
The Trump administration wants automakers and other American manufacturers to play a larger role in weapons production, reminiscent of a practice used during World War II.
Senior defense officials have held talks about producing weapons and other military supplies with the top executives of several companies, including Mary Barra, chief executive officer of General Motors and Jim Farley, CEO of Ford Motor, according to people familiar with the discussions.
The Pentagon is interested in enlisting the companies to use their personnel and factory capacity to increase production of munitions and other equipment as the wars in Ukraine and Iran deplete stocks. The talks were preliminary and wide-ranging, the people said. Defense officials said American manufacturers might be needed to backstop traditional defense companies and asked whether the companies could rapidly shift to defense work.
GE Aerospace and the vehicle and machinery maker Oshkosh were among the companies involved in the talks with defense officials. The Defense Department “is committed to rapidly expanding the defense industrial base by leveraging all available commercial solutions and technologies to ensure our warfighters maintain a decisive advantage,” a Pentagon official said.
The discussions are the latest by the administration to put military manufacturing on what Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has called a “wartime footing.”
