Saturday (7/18) News: “Why is Trump risking midterm disaster by resuming an already unpopular war with Iran?”; “Goddamn, Canada just makes them crazy”

by Lowell

Here are a few international, national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise (economic, environmental, etc.) for Saturday, July 13.

INTERNATIONAL

• Why Plastics Have Overtaken the Planet (“And what people just like you are doing about it.”)
• How Companies Have Abandoned Their Climate Goals and Let Themselves Off the Hook
• Clean energy still beats fossil fuels on cost, despite, well, everything
• The Ukraine-Russia War Reaches a New Phase
• Russian online retail warehouses hit by deadly Ukrainian strikes (“Seven people have been killed and 49 injured after Ukrainian drones struck two warehouses belonging to Russia’s biggest online retailer, Wildberries, according to Russian officials.”)
• Ukraine’s new prime minister takes office with a hard winter looming and protests on the streets (“Unlike many of Ukraine’s senior government officials, Koretskyi, 48, did not climb through political parties, parliament or the civil service. A trained engineer, he built his career in business, spending more than two decades managing fuel and food industries before being picked to run some of Ukraine’s most troubled state-owned energy companies.”)
• Ukraine’s Dr. Strangelove (“A rocket designer with a dubious past sets out to build a missile shield with Europe—and without America.”)
• Trump spares Beijing in probe of alleged Chinese election plot
• China slams Trump’s accusation of election meddling: ‘Entirely fabricated’
• Trump, not Iran, is the world’s greatest danger. He’s a one-man weapon of mass destruction
• The U.S. and Iran Creep Toward a Wider War With Escalating Attacks (“Strikes on more sensitive targets across the Persian Gulf risk setting off a spiral as neither side backs down”)
• Trump Faces the Limits of U.S. Firepower and the Lessons of Past Wars (“Like his predecessors, President Trump has struggled to turn battlefield successes into long-term victories.”)
• Scoop: U.S. sending dozens of refueling planes to Israel as Iran escalation looms
• The US and Iran have blown past red lines as they lurch back toward all-out war
• The U.S.-Iran battle over the Strait of Hormuz raises risks for global waterways
• Iran’s hardliners accuse leaders of staging ‘coup’ as US truce collapses (“New supreme leader remains hidden as radicals demand renewed war with Washington”)
• US-Iran conflict escalates further with strikes on desalination plants (“Iran and Kuwait both report hits to facilities — vital in many parts of the Middle East — after a week of exchanges left the ceasefire in tatters.”)
• Iran proves it can still inflict damage despite waves of US attacks (“Leaked US intelligence report concluded Iran retained 70% of missiles and launchers after 38-day spring campaign”)
• Why is Trump risking midterm disaster by resuming an already unpopular war with Iran?
• Israeli ministers announce plans for new illegal settlements in Gaza and West Bank (“Defence minister seeks three ‘Naha’ outposts in Gaza as top commander says Israel now controls 65% of the strip, violating Trump ceasefire deal” If we had a Democrat in the White House, they’d be pushing back against this illegal crap.)
• ‘Insane’: Republicans Push To Punish Canada For Wildfires (INSANE! In fact, we should be HELPING Canada fight the forest fires. We also should be doing everything we can to slash greenhouse gas emissions – on an emergency basis!)
• Trump fumes over Canadian wildfire smoke and issues tariff threat (Trump is an insane person.)
• Trump says Canada will face tariffs over wildfire smoke, claiming ‘willful negligence’ (Nutjob.)
• Trump threatens Canada over wildfire smoke choking U.S. cities
• A Senator Is Now Suggesting We Fine Canada for Catching on Fire (“Goddamn, Canada just makes them crazy.”)
• Trump praises Balogun decision, repeats 2020 election falsehoods in appearance with Infantino (If you’re being praised by Trump, you must be corrupt or whatever.)

NATIONAL

• Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatens states over elections (If we had a functional democracy, Mullin should be impeached immediately.)
• It Is Unacceptable That ICE Ever Hired a Man Like David Brouillette (“This is an American horror story.”)
• A Texas prosecutor reveals new details in an ICE killing of a Houston father
• They Were Charged With Assaulting ICE Agents. The Cases Are Crumbling. (“The Trump administration has lost or abandoned hundreds of criminal cases against protesters and immigrants, a Times investigation found.”)
• Trump’s Homeland Security Chief Threatens Election Officials With Prison Time (“Markwayne Mullin reiterated the president’s false claims about voting security while escalating the administration’s legally questionable attempts to control state elections.” Authoritarian/thug-like crap.)
• ICE shared Medicaid data it wasn’t supposed to have with Palantir (Rogue/criminal agency.)
• ICE makes arrests at NYC immigration court despite court ban
• ICE to Pay Thomson Reuters $125 Million to Find ‘Voter Fraud’ (That’s massively corrupt, f’ed-up, illegal…)
• ICE Contractor Arrested After Shooting Protester Who Was Walking Away (“Brandon Booth, 42, has been booked on suspicion of murder.”)
• Taylor Farms to Remove Some Products After Link to Cyclosporiasis Cases (“The California company grows produce in more than 12 states, and in Mexico and Canada. Taco Bell and food distributor Sysco have pulled Taylor Farms lettuce from supply chains.”)
• Trump has normalized crypto. Is it the path to the next financial collapse? (“Cheerleading by the president, who made $1.2bn last year off uninsured currency, does not bode well for US economy”)
• Anti-Trans Activists Know What the Supreme Court Will Let Them Do Next (“Brett Kavanaugh says that sports are just ‘different.’ The anti-trans activists he’s emboldening do not see things that way.”)
• Trump Brings Full Weight of Government to Bolster False Election Claims (“Intelligence agencies provided the White House with a trove of declassified documents that President Trump cited on Thursday as evidence of election vulnerabilities.”)
• Trump’s speech offered a preview of his next moves on elections (“Read the requests, demands and orders the president delivered to executive agencies during Thursday’s primetime address.”)
• Referring to Himself In Third Person, Trump Pushes ‘Big Lie’ in White House Address (“In a speech Thursday night, the president—“your president”—announced the declassification of intelligence while pushing wild claims of election interference. The intelligence showed that Russia helped propel Trump in 2020”)
• Trump’s election fraud speech was a weirdly good sign for American democracy (“Trump’s primetime speech accidentally exposed the limits of his campaign to undermine US elections.”)
• Trump says these documents prove his false claims of election fraud. Here’s what they really say
• How Trump’s SAVE America Act Would Change U.S. Elections
• Trump’s Primetime Speech Was a Dud. He Could Still Use it to Interfere in the Midterms. (“The allegations of foreign interference by China are intended to create a fake national emergency.”)
• Fox News buries Trump’s election denial address
• How Trump Abused the Power to Declassify America’s Secrets
• Trump’s Plan for November Is Failing (“His efforts to subvert the 2026 midterms have largely come up short.”)
• Trump’s War on Journalists (“The recent subpoenas of reporters make clear that the President is trying to threaten the press. Few protections are in place to stop him.”)
• Trump’s threats to revoke TV licenses get serious (“Brendan Carr is already scrutinizing TV broadcasters, but he may have to be careful echoing the president’s political grievances, legal experts say.”)
• Judge rules OMB can’t retroactively nix grants based on new rules
• Federal judge bars Trump administration from using obscure clause to make huge funding cuts
• It Could Always Be Worse—and That’s All Part of Trump’s Plan (“The president is getting awful nominees into powerful positions with an implicit threat: Approve his picks or his next ones will be more malevolent.”)
• Top Tax Official Pushed Out After Clashes With Trump Administration: Report (“Assistant Treasury Secretary Kenneth Kies will be leaving the administration after reportedly warning that it might be breaking the law.”)
• Latest Precipitation Models Still Seem to Underestimate Risk as ‘1,000-Year’ Rain Events Pummel Texas (“The Nueces River of South Texas flowed at twice the rate of Niagara Falls last week during the region’s second flood disaster in two years.”)
• Health experts warn of fertility risk over US military’s testosterone plan
• The White House is dictating access to frontier AI models, shifting power from tech giants, sources say
• Todd Blanche meeting leaves Epstein survivors stunned and angry (“Sources tell MS NOW the acting attorney general made false representations, refused to make commitments and seemed to have no interest in meeting with survivors.” So…Sen. Tillis is going to vote no, right? RIGHT???)
• To Win Their Races, Black Politicians Confront a New Landscape (“With the Voting Rights Act weakened, Black representation will depend less on Black voters and more on broad, multiracial appeal or on ideological outsider campaigns.” Such a weak headline; as usual, the NY Times pulls its punches, big time, presumably out of fear.)
• House GOP releases bill to fund government until after the midterm elections
• Energized voters could be key to Democratic victories in midterms, poll finds (“Voters favor Democrats by three points among registered voters overall, a Washington Post-Ipsos poll finds, but the margin grows among those who are most motivated to vote.”)
• Trump Voters Say JD Vance Gives Them the Willies
• Alan Dershowitz cancels on House Oversight ahead of planned Epstein interview
• How a Man Once Ordered to Pay Libel Damages Helped Launch an Investigation Into Islamic Private Schools
• AIPAC drops online donations to Dems who backed Israel aid cut
• AIPAC Closes Donor Portal to Democrats Who Voted to End Aid to Israel (“The pro-Israel lobbying group appeared to be punishing Democrats it had endorsed for re-election after they voted in favor of an amendment that would have cut off U.S. aid to Israel.”)
• Democrats’ Nebraska Senate Nominee Wants Off the Ballot. The State Might Not Let Her. (“Cindy Burbank ran for the seat in hopes of clearing a path for independent candidate Dan Osborn.”)
• DeSantis’ refusal to embrace Trump’s pick to replace him has fueled a bitter Florida GOP succession fight
• Trump backs Lindsey Graham’s sister in Senate special election
• Maine’s New Senate Candidates Sound a Lot Like Graham Platner (“At a debate on Thursday night, the eight Democratic candidates vying for the nomination all seemed to hold the same progressive policy positions that the disgraced ex-nominee did.”)
• Without Platner, Maine Democrats Scramble to Keep Grassroots Energy Alive (“Graham Platner’s campaign for Senate imploded last week. The activists who backed him are seeking a candidate to carry his populist message in the race against Republican Susan Collins.”)
• ‘Professional malpractice’: The Platner fallout engulfs the operatives who made him
• Congress could open Chesapeake Bay oyster sanctuaries for commercial harvest (Hell f’ing NO!)
• A year into a national guard deployment, DC residents say they live in ‘a city under siege’ (“Since Trump deployed troops last August, Washingtonians have banded together to resist and support one another”)

VIRGINIA

• Video: Sen. Tim Kaine Rips Doug Mastriano (Trump’s Nominee for Ambassador to the Slovak Republic) for Being Conspiracy Theorist, in Pro-Trump Mob on 1/6/21, etc. (“I look at your nomination and I have a real sense of sadness about it and I’m going to tell you why.”)
• Virginia Congressman discusses Trump’s election conspiracy speech
• Ben Cline is raising more money in Hollywood, but Beth Macy is holding her own in Virginia (Cline, who has been trying to cast Macy as the favored candidate of the “Hollywood elites,” got 39 percent of his money ($151,000) from PACs – and $19,375 from California. Macy’s FEC report shows her having raised $10,600 from donors in California. Who’s the real candidate of the ‘Hollywood elites’ here?” LOL)
• Video: Rep. James Walkinshaw (D-VA11) Says Todd Blanche’s Last-Minute, Pro-Forma Meeting with Epstein Survivors Is “insulting on its face” (“Blanche has taken on his boss Donald Trump’s habit, which is to restate a falsehood enough times that hopefully people will believe it.”)
• Virginia’s U.S. House Democrats Sign Letter to DHS Secretary, ICE Acting Director “calling for independent investigations into Lorenzo Salgado Araujo and Johan Sebastian Guerrero’s deaths”
• Interview: Can Adam Dunigan pull the upset of Don Beyer in the Eighth District primary? (Rep. Don Beyer is the overwhelming favorite to win this primary…probably by a wide margin.)
• Virginia lawmakers weigh ending state’s off-year elections
• Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s Press Release Marking Six Months in Office: Annotated! (Not that she’ll ever take this advice, but…lol)
• Six months with Spanberger
• Spanberger reflects on first six months in office
• Virginia disability advocates fear impact from new DOJ memo
• Bath Community among rural hospitals commission considers at risk of closure
• Water authority director says despite drought, reservoirs “are looking great” (“We’re at 18 feet down or 77.8%. So, doing what they’re supposed to be doing. Both of those are more than 400 days of available capacity.”)
• Virginia Beach denied all curfew financial loss claims filed by businesses, records show
• Charlottesville to begin ‘transition’ of residents from homeless encampment
• Canadian wildfire smoke wafts over Virginia, dirtying skies and posing health risks (“The Department of Enviromental Qualilty has issued an Air Quality Alert for most of the state as far west as the Roanoke Valley, as unhealthy levels of smoke are expected to reach the surface on this Friday.”)
• DC-area forecast: Smoky, then steamy, then stormy