JULY 2026: “A REALLY ENORMOUS PUMP AND DUMP SCHEME”

7.31 The San Antonio Current reports that Patriot Takes, a left-leaning political action committee, has released a video showing Brandon Herrera, a gun influencer running as a Republican to represent Texas’ 23rd Congressional District, referring to children as “cum trophies” and dismissing the political opinions of mothers: “The fact that you kept your cum trophy doesn’t make you any less wrong about the dumb shit that you say,” Herrera says in the clip. “Being a mother doesn’t make your opinion any more or less valid. Just because you let somebody creampie you doesn’t mean I have to give a shit about your political opinions.”

7.31 David Frum in The Atlantic: “Fauci may have misjudged, mishandled, or misstated many particulars. He was a scientist and bureaucrat unaccustomed to—and dazzled by—celebrity. History will judge his actions with more dispassion than the present day can or will. One thing that people should keep in mind, however, is that Fauci was thrust into his pandemic-leadership role because of Trump’s shameful and deadly dereliction of duty. Trump’s record of dishonesty, callousness, and selfishness during the pandemic is a documented reality. The imputations against Fauci are mostly fantasies.”

7.31 Federal prosecutors drop a criminal charge filed against David Hearn, an Olympic canoeist, who had been accused of vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial’s Reflecting Pool, suggesting that the damage was instead due to a “botched” and rushed installation. Trump had repeatedly blamed vandals.  7.30 TNR: A CNN poll “finds that only 34 percent of Americans approve of Trump’s job performance, matching the low point he hit after inciting a violent insurrection on January 6, 2021. Here are some striking findings on his personal traits and obsessions:

7.29 Axios: Canadian travel to the U.S. fell 25% last year,and the decline has persisted into 2026. The decline is especially painful for tourist towns near the border. Canadians’ spending on visits to the U.S. fell to about $13.3 billion in 2025, down from about $15.7 billion in 2024.

7.29 Trump, regarding Iran, on Fox News: “We’re going to beat the fucking shit out of them”

7.29 Anthony Fauci appears before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. The Atlantic: “Faced with personal attacks, he offered no response. “You became a narcissist and a megalomaniac and a liar,” Hawley said. “You’ve done more to harm science than anybody in my lifetime.” Paul called the hearing the “capstone” to Fauci’s career and said he’d displayed “hubris the likes of which the world has rarely seen.” Rick Scott, a Republican from Florida, told Fauci he was a “villain” who had “destroyed the federal government’s credibility when it comes to public health” because he wanted to fuel his own ego. “What would you do differently, knowing what you know today, Dr. Fauci?” Scott asked him. Fauci consulted the paper in front of him. “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution.” 7.27 Christian Science Monitor: “[T]he war has also become a test of the credibility of U.S. military deterrence now that the war’s aims have shifted from denying the regime nuclear arms to reopening the strait. Meanwhile, Iran – a country that now has no navy due to U.S. strikes – is flexing its previously unexercised power to close the strategic waterway with speedboats and drones. As a young Marine officer, [retired Col. Mark Cancian, a defense analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies], recalls taking part in amphobious exercises to capture Abu Musa, Qeshm and Kharg islands.  The U.S. Navy “has been thinking about this problem for 45 years – and I mean that literally,” he says. “And so the fact that we seem to be helpless now that the moment has arrived is astonishing.” Now the war is at a stalemate, in part because political leaders expected an easy victory and wanted to avoid casualties, which may have limited military planning. “However, blaming the political establishment alone is too easy. Much criticism must also fall on the military, particularly the Navy,” which “has not given senior decision makers acceptable options because of historical, glaring gaps in capability that it has not addressed,” he wrote in an analysis last week. This includes mine clearance – the loss of the skill has long been “bemoaned” in professional military journals, Mr. Cancian notes – as well as convoy operations against “asymmetric adversaries in constricted waters.”

7.27 Vulture jamboree in Stonebriar.

7.26 The Washington Post:About 1 in 5 reliable Republican base voters are at risk this November, according to Nathan Nascimento of Americans for Prosperity Action, a conservative super PAC. Those voters in Iowa, Ohio, North Carolina, Montana, New Hampshire and Michigan are either saying they may stay home or are weighing voting for Democrats, according to their data, which is based on polling and extensive efforts to engage targeted Republican voters by knocking on their doors. The voters are primarily worried about inflation and the economy. “This is a big chunk,” Nascimento said. “This is a scary number.”

7.26 Paul Krugman: The New York Times estimated that 300 billionaires and their families made 19 percent of all political contributions in the 2024 election.

7.26 Lucian K. Truscott IV:  Why didn’t you stand up, one by one, and walk out during Trump’s obscene tsunami of lies that he called a speech? White House correspondents, or D.C. media honchos, or whatever you think you are – you’re not politicians who need his endorsement to get elected. You don’t hang out at the Republican clubs around town frequented by Scott Bessent and Stephen Miller and Don Jr. You don’t owe Donald Trump your loyalty. Why did you just sit there in a spangly ballroom he claimed to have built, decorated with chandeliers he bragged had “Czech crystal,” and watch him fall asleep when awards were being given out to reporters who had stood up to him? You’re not reporting from the Oval Office, watching him sleep in the presence of idiots like EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin as he kissed Trump’s ass. It was your dinner. He stood up there, when he finally woke up, and he insulted your colleagues and friends like Kaitlin Collins and others. They’re the ones you should be loyal to, and you just sat there and according to reports, looked uncomfortable and studied your phones. This was your chance to stand up to him.

7.25 Young Washington

7.25 Lebron James signs with the 76ers

7.24 The Fire Agent, by David Baerwald                                                                                                                                                                                                  7.24 Shawn McCreesh in the Times: “The president who showed up to a dinner honoring the work of journalists is the same president who last week declared that “NBC and ABC fake news” should have their broadcast licenses revoked. At one point during the dinner attendees were asked to applaud the Pentagon press corps. There was no mention that Mr. Trump’s defense secretary Pete Hegseth, who was in the room, has tried to kick reporters out of the Pentagon at the same time that the Trump administration is waging a new war. This month, the administration issued subpoenas seeking phone records and grand jury testimony from New York Times journalists who wrote articles revealing security concerns about Mr. Trump’s new Qatari-donated Air Force One. . . .One of the Times reporters who was a subject of the subpoenas, Tyler Pager, accepted an award onstage Friday. The president shook hands with reporters including Kaitlan Collins of CNN and Josh Dawsey of The Wall Street Journal as they walked across the stage to accept awards for their tough coverage of the White House. One particularly awkward moment played out when CNN’s Wolf Blitzer welcomed a group of reporters from The Wall Street Journal to the stage to accept an award for their “courageous reporting on President Trump’s past relationship with financier Jeffrey Epstein” that “triggered the release of the so-called Epstein files.” Mr. Blitzer reminded the crowd that “Trump quickly filed a $20 billion lawsuit against The Journal, revealing reporter Khadeeja Safdar’s home address. Her family had to be relocated. The Journal was kicked off of Air Force One.” As the reporters took their awards, Mr. Trump threw his hands in the air theatrically, as if to say, Oh well, what can you do. Nervous laughter rippled across the ballroom. . . .He told some jokes about his administration. “I hope that everyone finally got to enjoy their entire very delicious beef tenderloin, very special beef,” he said, winding up. “And I want you all to know that Bobby Kennedy, who’s right here, personally ran over the cow in his car, and he cut it up and he brought it here for you to eat tonight.” About the nation’s health secretary, the president added: “He is a very different kind of a person.”            7.24 Maura Judkis in the Washington Post:  “The weirdest White House correspondents’ dinner had abruptly ended three months ago with shoes and rolls of bread on the floor, Secret Service evacuating the building and journalists ducked under tables, reporting that a gunman had attempted to assassinate the president. The second-weirdest White House correspondents’ dinner was much less dramatic — security made sure of that — but made up for it by being crass and surreal and deeply cringeworthy. This time, the journalists and Cabinet members got to eat their surf and turf. This time, they got to hear the president speak. And boy, did he ever, in a more-than-hour-long speech that swerved between jokes that fell flat and flat-out insults. He told a sex joke and several fat jokes. He called Sen. Adam Schiff “Watermelon head.” He went on long tangents about subjects ranging from the Fourth of July fireworks to Bruce Springsteen to his forthcoming ballroom. Joking about a third and even fourth term, he trotted out his often-repeated lines about how America used to be a “dead country” and is now the “hottest country anywhere in the world.” He told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins that she didn’t deserve the award she had won that night, before calling her a “young, attractive woman” who “never smiles.” He inexplicably brought back some vintage first-term insults about Chris Christie and Sen. Elizabeth Warren. And he even criticized his own speechwriters, calling his script “fricking stupid.” “Is this supposed to be fun?” asked the president at one point. “Am I supposed to be serious? Am I supposed to be a comedian?” 

7.23 Vinnie Rotondaro, in TNR, writing about George Orwell’s The Road to Wigan Pier: “Half of [the book] presented a devastating account of English coal-mining poverty, and the other half a lengthy, still-controversial essay about why working people, the miners themselves, didn’t like socialists. It wasn’t that the miners disagreed with socialist principles, Orwell said. Instead, he pointed to the obvious fact of the class divide, diagnosing the problem of “middle-class” socialism: “One sometimes gets the impression that the mere words ‘Socialism’ and ‘Communism’ draw towards them with magnetic force every fruit-juice drinker, nudist, sandal-wearer, sex-maniac, Quaker, ‘Nature Cure’ quack, pacifist, and feminist in England.”                                    7.23 Timothy Noah in The New Republic: “Trump has granted nine pardons for corporations. These were never a thing before Trump—not in the modern era, and possibly never. According to Bloomberg’s Ava Benny-Morrison, the nine pardons wiped out $200 million in financial penalties, “some of which were destined for victims of wrongdoing.”                                                                                                                                                                                7.23 Gavin Newsom: Donald Trump is setting everyone up. Everyone knows what he is doing. He’s doing it in plain sight. He’s going to have masked men in and around polling places like he did in Los Angeles last November. He said our redistricting effort was rigged — with no evidence. He sent out the Department of Justice to find some anomaly and went to the Supreme Court to try and throw out the election.That is what he will do this November at scale. The thing about Trump is that he believes in competitive authoritarianism. Meaning, he wants an election, but he wants the elections that Putin has where he gets 87.3% and the next guy gets 4.6%. That’s what the SAVE Act is about. He wants to pick and choose who votes.                                                7.23 Kim Strassel in the Wall Street Journal: “Mr. Vance is a sensitive bunny,”                                                                                                                        7.22 Georgia GOP governor nominee Rick Jackson, at a rally with Trump:  “We’re going to reduce affordability to the lowest it’s ever been.”                7.22 We visit the Civil War Naval Museum in Columbus GA. A very good museum, featuring the remnants of the CSS Jackson (top left),  replicas of the CSS Albemarle (bottom) and the USS Monitor (top right), a tremendous collection of flags, and displays highlighting Cushing, Farragut, Porter, and other notables from both sides of the conflict. I really enjoyed it.   7.21 H.W. Brands, a historian at the University of Texas-Austin, quoted in the Times: “Donald Trump has a strange charisma unique among presidents. He is more like the leader of a cult than of a party, in that the worse things get for his followers, the more stubbornly they stick with him. The Democrats have helped him by embracing policies, especially on cultural issues, that make them seem hopelessly out of touch with ordinary Americans.”                                                    7.21 Donald Moynihan, a professor of public policy at the University of Michigan, quoted in the Times: “There are three categories of Trump failures: disasters of mismanagement, disasters by design and disasters of greed. What are the achievements of the second Trump presidency thus far? Persistent inflation, sluggish economic growth, an unpopular war, aggressive immigration enforcement that has outraged many and the shredding of the safety net to fund a large tax cut. . . .Trump no longer feels the need to be bound by precedent, norms or good advice. We can see this at the superficial level (the Reflecting Pool) or for issues where there are extraordinary stakes, such as the Iran war. Trump has lost any inhibitions he had while creating a bubble where he is surrounded by yes men. . . .Some of the failings of the second administration are by design. More people will lose access to SNAP as One Big Beautiful Bill policies are being implemented. Medicaid restrictions will kick in by next year, similarly excluding millions of eligible citizens. The buildup of an immigration police state was also a feature of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Many of Trump’s most punitive actions are not the result of miscalculation but the faithful implementation of his vision.”

7.21 Michael Bailey, a political scientist at Georgetown University, quoted in the Times: “Many presidents have made mistakes, but none have made mistakes so cavalierly as President Trump. He makes rash, reckless decisions; at best, they are based on bar-stool theories of how the world works, and at worst, they are driven by corrupt motives. Since he “just knows” he is right about how tariffs work, no evidence will sway him. In the short term, the country has been in many ways resilient, but he is corroding state capacity, democratic norms and the very sense of a unified nation. . . .Trump is, however, quite skilled as a political leader, combining a hold on the Republican primary electorate with a willingness to relentlessly demand total obedience to his personal goals.”
7.21 Matthew Dallek, a political historian at George Washington University, quoted in the Times: “Governing via conspiracy theories, personal whim and wish-casting, Trump has taken his place as the most consistently inept president of this century. At home and abroad, in many cabinet and sub-cabinet agencies, the administration’s culture is dominated by incompetence.”

7.20 Lucien Truscott: “The Persian Gulf is not a playground, and war is not a spat. War is serious business. We do not have serious people in charge of the war we are waging against Iran. We have people presenting cage fights on the White House lawn, people who cannot fill a reflecting pool with water without turning it lime green. That is why we are nowhere close to achieving even one goal Trump claimed we had when we began bombing Iran.”

7.20 Andy Burnham becomes Prime Minister of Great Britain.

7,19 Spain wins the World Cup by defeating Argentina 1-0. Sports Illustrated: “The 2026 World Cup will be remembered as perhaps the most interesting edition in the tournament’s rich history . . . . Picking the best storyline of the tournament or the most memorable game is an impossible task. Cabo Verde’s underdog run and epic round of 32 match against Argentina would be a good choice. Argentina also had incredible comebacks against Egypt and England en route to the final. England had its own stunning comeback in the round of 32 against DR Congo, then played an instant classic against co-host Mexico at the iconic Estadio Azteca and later won a bonkers third-place game against France. Norway had its best World Cup performance ever as Erling Haaland announced himself to the North American audience as one of the best players in the world. The list goes on and on. But there’s no denying that Spain and Argentina wrapped it up with a dud.”

7.16 Trump delivers a speech to rally support for the Save America Act. David Frum in The Atlantic: “If you are pro-Trump, you heard a message of despair. Your president, in whom you trust, described a hopelessly compromised voting system, so broken that it fooled even Trump himself in his first presidency. Between the Chinese, the illegal aliens, and the hated liberal media, your vote will probably count for nothing. Plus, it’s crooked and unpatriotic to vote by mail. It’s all hopeless. Why bother? . . . [T]he message makes no sense for the Republicans who are actually on the ballot in 2026. There are marginal Republican-held seats that might be saved by an exciting message about Republican themes, by an economic plan to curb inflation, by some good news about the war in Iran. Instead, Trump is serving dismalness. Even the people credulous enough to believe that Trump lost the presidency in 2020 because he got outsmarted by crafty Venezuelans cannot be too eager to return to the polls so he can be outsmarted again.” Lucian Truscott: “Trump didn’t look good tonight. He was whiny and out of sorts and he sped through the script like he just wanted to get to the end of it and take the elevator upstairs so he could start posting on Truth Social about what a great speech he had given and how he had had the largest television audience in American history. It was a joke. His MAGA 30 percent, those who watched it or will hear about it on Fox News or right-wing podcasts, they’ll believe what he said. But not the rest of the American electorate. They’re tired of him. They didn’t tune in. They don’t believe his lies. . . .He’s tired. He’s worn out. He fell asleep at a big military security conference he went to at the Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania yesterday. Tomorrow and Sunday he will play golf. He’s going to hold rallies. They’ll have to get the FBI to arrest people and haul them to the rallies in cuffs to fill the seats. People are tired of his act.”
7.15 The House rejects a measure to eliminate U.S. aid to Israel, but almost half of Democrats support the move, reflecting a rapid and dramatic shift within the party away from decades of unequivocal support for the Jewish state.

7.15 Trump defends ICE agents, countermands order to stop arrests.

7.14 The the Dividing Weir Bridge, between the Ashokan reservoir in the foreground and Catskill mountains in the background, by Paige Dana

7.14 After fatal shootings in Maine and Texas, ICE halts traffic stop arrests.

7.14 David Ignatius in the Washington Post: “Trump’s daily barrage of bluster and braggadocio amounts to negotiating with himself. He declares victory one day, resumes war the next. He praises Iran’s leaders, then calls them “scum.” He foolishly announces a 20 percent fee for protecting the Strait of Hormuz and then rescinds the rash proposal the next day. Trump must imagine this nonstop trash talk gives him leverage. He’s wrong. It makes him look weak in the eyes of Iran and the world. Zoom out and you can see the chaotic situation more clearly: Iran’s economy is severely weakened; its nuclear facilities are buried under rubble and its top nuclear scientists are dead; its leadership appears divided over whether to do a deal with the United States. Hard-liners exult that they have survived an onslaught from America and Israel, but they don’t seem to have a strategy for what’s next. Now zoom out on America: Trump is fighting an unpopular war with significant economic costs. He went to war with a poorly defined strategy and no good exit ramp; his negotiators floated an ambitious proposal for modernization of postwar Iran, but Iran’s leadership, while privately curious, has publicly spurned it. The MOU that was supposed to open the Strait of Hormuz is a dead letter. So Trump has pushed the reset button, and we’re beginning what might be called “Iran Fiasco 2.0.” The tech investor Esther Dyson famously says “Always make new mistakes.” But Trump seems intent on repeating the same ones.”
7.14 The Washington Post: “Tax the Greedy Billionaires,” a progressive national advocacy campaign. . . is pushing Democrats to run on a Five & Dime tax plan that would impose a 5 percent tax on household net wealth over $50 million and 10 percent on net wealth over $250 million. The Tax Policy Center, a joint research project between the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution, has found that such a plan would raise $6.8 trillion in the first 10 years.

7.14 According to a note added to the online court docket, Trump has paid E. Jean Carroll the $5.6 million in damages he owed her.

7.13 Pat Oliphant dies at 90.

7.13 Sam Neill dies at 78.

7.12 1873: The Rothschilds, the First Great Depression, and the Making of the Modern World, by Liaquat Ahamed.

7.12 Steve Schmidt on Substack: “Lindsey Graham was a lonely and unprincipled man who betrayed his country for power and his decency for attention. Let it be known for all time that he knew exactly what Donald Trump was from the very beginning, and chose him over his country. . . .When Donald Trump attacked America, and tried to burn down the republic built by Washington, saved by Lincoln and redeemed by King, he was aided by Lindsey Graham who supported the lies, dismissed the insanity and sought personal gain from it all. Lindsey Graham was a pathetic man, a true cynic and a faithless servant of the Constitution.”

7.11 Lindsay Graham dies at 71.

7.10 Fareed Zakaria in the Washington Post: ``U.S. defense spending has never been determined only by the needs of NATO. It reflects America’s role as a global superpower, with bases, fleets and commitments across the world. Washington wants to deter Russia, counter China, project power in the Middle East, protect global sea-lanes, defend the homeland, maintain nuclear superiority, dominate space, lead in drones and artificial intelligence, and preserve the ability to fight far from home. In fact, the International Institute for Strategic Studies calculated in 2018 that direct spending on defense in Europe made up only about 5 percent of America’s total defense spending. As Europe’s spending increases, the continent will become less dependent on the U.S., and less deferential to it. For more than 75 years, America’s dominance within NATO has given Washington enormous advantages. The U.S. has more than 30 military bases across Europe, and these have allowed it to project power not just in Europe but in Africa, the Middle East and Asia. U.S. operations in the Middle East, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and more recently with Iran, have depended heavily on access, basing and overflight rights in Europe. Often NATO countries have allowed the U.S. to use their facilities even when they disagreed with the war being waged. But as Europeans see that America is unreliable or even hostile, they will feel less need to accommodate Washington.”
7.8 Bonnie Tyler dies at 75.

7.8 Trump says ceasefire with Iran is over, calls its leaders `scum’ only weeks after praising them.

7.7 Ryan O’Hearn of the Pirates homers three times and drives in 10, as Pittsburgh defeats Atlanta 12-4.

7.7 For the second straight game against the Rays, the Yankees strike out 17 times.

7.6 Paul Krugman: “What we’re witnessing is or has been a really enormous pump and dump scheme, I would argue, involving more or less all of crypto. It’s an extraordinary thing. There have been pump and dump schemes forever, probably going back to the Phoenicians or something. But this is on a scale we’ve never seen, and with the president of the United States in the center of it. Which I guess given everything else comes as no surprise.”                 7.6 Louise Lasser dies at 87.
7.5 Folarin Balogun, the leading scorer of the USMNT who had been suspended, is reinstated for Monday’s game. The action came after Trump urged FIFA President Gianni Infantino to reconsider the ban. Such an intervention from a head of state is highly unusual. Dan Gartland in SI: “The decision is an unwelcome reminder of the shady dealings that often cloud the World Cup. There has been no reporting to indicate that anything untoward happened to help grease the wheels for Balogun’s return, but when an organization as notoriously corrupt as FIFA and a president as blatantly corrupt as Trump collaborate to bend the rules, it’s hard not to wonder what might have happened behind the scenes.”

7.5 David Frum in The Atlantic:  The very first sentence of the document honored on July 4 invoked “a decent respect for the opinions of mankind.” Throughout their history, Americans have been highly conscious of the opinions of others about their experiment in republican government.  . . .Whoever wrote last night’s speech for Trump retained some memory of this ancient American rhetorical tradition. Like the aging actress Norma Desmond, Trump and his writing team replayed favorite scenes: the liberation of Europe from Nazi rule, the defeat of communism. And, as with the actress, those scenes—once so powerful—have become poignant, because they took place so long ago . . . Under Donald Trump, the United States has fought military conflicts in Venezuela and Iran. It nearly fought a war with Denmark to seize Greenland. It often speaks of annexing all or part of Canada. It has waged economic war on allies and partners in violation of international trade agreements and domestic law. Soon the United States may be engaged in a war in Cuba. Already, the U.S. has cut back aid to Ukraine as that country fights for its survival and freedom. Trump has repeatedly made clear that the goal of his wars is plunder: that he wishes to seize oil and other resources. In turn, the course of his most ambitious war, with Iran, appears to have been swayed by client states, which have made payments to him and his associates. Trump’s preferred rhetorical style on such occasions is to brag about the strength of the U.S. military, how nobody can equal it, how it crushes all before it.  Americans are accustomed to those fragments. When Trump rejects them, as he usually does, Trump’s domestic audiences may feel uneasy that something has been omitted that used to be important. But when Trump pronounces them, as he did on July 4, he reminds his global audience how he has jettisoned the generous principles and emancipatory ideals that once made America not only feared but trusted and admired. Trump’s speech demanded credit for a history that Trump regards as a sucker’s mistake. Trump is building an American future oriented toward authoritarian and corrupt states: Russia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia. Democratic allies are treated, at best, as subjects to be bullied and, at worst, as targets to be carved up into new American territories. To the extent the decision is up to Trump, the United States that his speech celebrated on July 4 will exist no more. ”