At 3:23 this afternoon, sitting before the Senate Appropriations Committee for the first time since taking over as Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem's replacement was asked a simple question: Would he follow court orders? He refused to say yes. With that single exchange, the Department of Homeland Security found itself back in the headlines, because the man overseeing one of the most powerful agencies in the federal government would not commit to obeying the judiciary branch of our government. What happens when the people entrusted to enforce the law no longer believe they have to follow it?

Based on the events of 6-2-2026

The Breakdown:

• DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, who replaced Kristi Noem in March after Trump fired her, refused four times to commit to following court orders
• Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut built the question carefully, reading from a ruling by Chief Judge Patrick Schiltz of Minnesota
• Schiltz, who clerked for Antonin Scalia and was put on the bench by George W. Bush, wrote: "ICE has likely violated more court orders in January 2026 than some federal agencies have violated in their entire existence"
• Ninety-six court orders violated across seventy-four cases, in one state, in roughly a month
• Mullin's answer: "We will never break the Constitution and we're not going to break the law"
• Why that sounded like an answer but wasn't one. The courts decide whether the law is being broken, not the officials accused of violating it
• Mullin: "If we didn't think courts were politicized, then I would probably be able to answer that"
• "Not all judges are above the law, but sometimes they think they are"
• Murphy to the committee: members "should be really, really freaked out"
• "I think that's actually the end of our republic, if the administration willfully ignores a court order because they disagree with it or its motivation"
• The trick Mullin played: swapping in the words "the Constitution" and "the law" where "court order" belongs
• Alexander Hamilton warned about this more than two hundred years ago, calling the judiciary the weakest branch because it possesses "neither force nor will, but merely judgment"
• Courts depend on the executive branch to enforce their rulings. They have no army, no police forces
• Why this won't stop with DHS, and what happens when an election ends up before a court
• Why the most dangerous attacks on democratic institutions rarely come from chaos, but from people who know exactly what they are doing
• Why this is not really about Trump and Mullin, but about the people in Congress who are letting it happen
• Primary elections held tonight in California and five other states
• Real Americans standing in line and casting ballots, while one man in a hearing room said he might not honor a ruling he dislikes
• Votes counted. Results accepted, even by candidates who lost, even when the loser had the President's endorsement behind him

This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.

After days of hiding from the press, tucked away from the American people deep inside the White House, the President of the United States finally found a moment to emerge from seclusion when he took a phone call from a reporter earlier today. Asked about negotiations collapsing over the Iran war, Trump shrugged off the question entirely, saying, "I really don't care. I couldn't care less," because the discussions had "started to get very boring." This was the President of the United States discussing a deadly war that he started, and his response was that he didn't care anymore because it was boring.

Based on the events of 6-1-2026

The Breakdown:

• Trump told CNBC's Eamon Javers he "couldn't care less" about Iran negotiations because they had "started to get very boring"
• His only flash of energy on the subject was a threat to "blow them up to kingdom come"
• Hours earlier, Trump posted on Truth Social that talks were continuing "at a rapid pace"
• While he was posting reassurance, Iran was already moving to suspend its participation over Israel's escalation in Lebanon and threatening to block the Strait of Hormuz
• Trump told the reporter he was "going to ask" Netanyahu what was happening in Lebanon, while in the middle of a regional war his military helped start
• An hour later, Trump posted that he had a "very productive call" with Netanyahu and announced a ceasefire on every front
• Netanyahu publicly contradicted him, saying the IDF would "continue to operate in southern Lebanon as planned"
• Israel's defense minister Israel Katz denied there was any ceasefire in Lebanon at all
• According to CNN and The Times of Israel, the call was heated, with Trump reportedly telling Netanyahu, "you're f**king crazy" and "I'm saving your ass. Everybody hates you now"
• In private he was shouting. In public he was posting gratitude and "ETERNITY!"
• On gas prices, Trump claimed oil would soon be "dropping like a rock" with "1,700 boats right now that are loaded up with oil"
• Why this is a fairy tale told at our expense while families watch numbers climb at the pump
• How strongmen surround themselves with aides who manage them instead of informing them, until no one is left to say the true thing out loud
• Federal judge Leonie Brinkema in Virginia temporarily blocked the Anti-Weaponization Fund
• Republicans in Congress balked, with some signaling they would not move their own immigration and law enforcement funding package until the fund was dealt with
• After Trump met with Speaker Mike Johnson, the DOJ said it would "abide by" the court's ruling
• An administration official described the fund to Axios in three words: "Dead for now"
• A hearing on June 12 could decide the rest
• Why this is what friction looks like when the guardrails are made of people who still do their jobs

Donald Trump held nothing together today. But the rest of the country did. We watched a President treat a war like a chore and a fantasy like a strategy. But we also watched the machinery of accountability creak back to life, just a little, on the very same day. As long as there are people still pushing back, we are not finished. Not even close.

This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.

In the middle of the night, while most Americans were fast asleep, the President of the United States was awake inside the White House. At exactly 12:35 this morning, Donald Trump decided it was the perfect time to announce to the world that a cognitive screening exam, the kind doctors use to help identify signs of cognitive impairment and dementia, proved he possessed what he called "extreme intelligence." Healthy, confident leaders rarely spend their Saturday nights bragging that they successfully passed a basic cognitive screening exam. We are entering the most dangerous period of Trump's presidency yet.

Based on the events of 5-31-2026

The Breakdown:

• At 12:35 in the morning, Trump posted a rambling brag about scoring 30 out of 30 on what he called a "high difficulty" cognitive test
• What the MOCA test actually is: a dementia screening tool, not an IQ test
• Dr. Jonathan Reiner, who served as Dick Cheney's doctor: "a score of 26 or higher represents normal cognitive performance, not extreme intelligence. None of the questions are high difficulty"
• Why taking the same test over and over again is not useful, because the questions do not change much
• How the fake Mount Rushmore images and the test boast are the same story, an attempt to manufacture a version of himself that reality will not provide
• Why a person who has to keep insisting all night that he is great and brilliant usually feels underneath that he is not
• The one limit left, and why the midterms are the first real mechanism in eighteen months that could take some of his power away
• Why instability in a man approaching the loss of unchecked power is the most dangerous combination
• The lesson of January 6: when reality collides with the version of events Trump wants people to believe, reality is what he tries to destroy
• CNN published an investigation today using commercial satellite imagery on Iran's nuclear and missile sites
• Iran has already reopened at least 50 of 69 tunnel entrances at its underground missile bases
• They did it with bulldozers and dump trucks. The bombed roads have been repaired, in some places repaved
• Experts estimate Iran may still possess around a thousand missiles, stored deep inside facilities buried beneath hundreds of meters of rock
• Trump said the sites were obliterated. The evidence says they were not
• The same pattern from the cognitive test to the war: claims that do not survive contact with the facts
• What he is willing to do to make his claims true, and what he is willing to lie about when they fail
• Why if Democrats retake Congress, Trump will hear "no" constantly, with subpoenas, hearings, and the possibility of impeachment returning
• Why people who believe they are running out of time often stop thinking about tomorrow and start thinking only about survival
• What we should expect over the next five months: more chaos, spectacle, and manufactured crises designed to exhaust, divide, and distract us

The thing making him dangerous is also the thing making him vulnerable. The midterms are why he is spiraling. And the midterms are why we are not powerless. The one thing Donald Trump fears more than being told "no" is being told "no" by millions of Americans all at once. And that is still within our power.

This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.

At 8:15 this morning, the President of the United States began panicking in front of the entire world. For more than seven hours, he posted nearly 50 times. He complained that because China has a ballroom, he should have one too. He posted an image of a "Trump Peace Prize" bearing his own face. He repeatedly compared himself to George Washington. He shared a heroic fantasy image of himself depicted as the God of War. And most concerning of all, he repeatedly called for a federal judge to be investigated, impeached, and removed from the bench, placing both the judge and his wife in danger by putting a target on their backs before an already radicalized base of loyalists.

Based on the events of 5-30-2026

The Breakdown:

• Trump posted nearly 50 times in seven hours in one of the most revealing fits of rage of his presidency
• He repeatedly attacked federal Judge Christopher Cooper, who was confirmed unanimously by the Senate in 2014
• Cooper's only offense: reading the statute that created the Kennedy Center and applying it
• Trump wrote that Cooper "should be brought up on charges" and "like numerous other Crooked Judges on my cases, should be IMPEACHED"
• He went after Cooper's wife, Amy Jeffress, a former Justice Department lawyer who advised the Attorney General
• How authoritarian movements always begin by naming their enemies before they jail them
• The "FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT!" at the end of his post about a sitting judge and what it was for
• Trump posted himself carved into Mount Rushmore beside Washington and Lincoln, not once but twice
• An image of himself standing shoulder to shoulder with George Washington in front of the White House
• An image of the White House roof turned into a military "DronePort" with armed soldiers and combat drones
• A graphic titled "Excellent Health" with green checkmarks beside every line
• On Friday night, the White House released a physical claiming his cardiac age was 14 years younger than his real age and a perfect 30 out of 30 on a cognitive test
• Why a man with nothing to prove does not post a homemade scorecard of his own health to the internet
• What the report says versus what we have watched with our own eyes: falling asleep, going breathless, pursed-lip breathing
• Trump went back for another coronary scan, the kind of test healthy people his age do not get on this schedule
• Cruel memes splitting the screen between "Biden's Solution" and "Trump's Solution," with Trump's side showing people in cages
• The artists invited to the America 250 celebration keep walking out the door, saying they were misled
• Trump called them "Third Rate 'Artists'" and said they were getting "the yips"
• He nominated himself to replace them, claiming he gets "much larger audiences than Elvis in his prime"
• By afternoon, he called for the whole 250th anniversary celebration to be scrapped

The living people turned him down, and a federal judge told him he could not put his name on a building, so he spent the day surrounding himself with a country that exists only because he typed it into a machine, and threatening the one real person who told him the truth. We are closer tonight than we were yesterday to the end of these dark days, and we know that because of what he showed us with his own hands today.

This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.

Just after 5:31 pm this evening, Donald Trump finally broke. After a day of court losses, one after another, he opened his personal social media platform and unleashed a meltdown. He declared himself America's "favorite President," attacked a federal judge, and announced that if he wasn't given complete control, "I have no interest in continuing what could only be a hopeless journey into NEVER NEVER LAND." Three different judges in three different courtrooms looked at the most powerful man in the country and told him no.

Based on the events of 5-29-2026

The Breakdown:

• On what would have been John F. Kennedy's birthday, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper ruled that adding Trump's name to the Kennedy Center was unlawful
• Trump's name must come off the building within fourteen days, along with the website and every piece of official material
• Cooper's 94-page opinion: "Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it"
• The lettering installed on the building "literally reads: 'The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts'"
• Why Trump's name went literally in front of Kennedy's, and what the Kennedy name has always meant in this country
• Why Trump keeps RFK Jr. in his cabinet: if you cannot join the family, the next best thing is to make one of them serve you
• Trump fired members of the Kennedy Center board, named himself chairman, and stacked the board with loyalists including Susie Wiles, and still lost
• Rep. Joyce Beatty: "He has desecrated this sacred memorial for his own vanity"
• Cooper also blocked the plan to shut the Kennedy Center down for two years, calling the board's vote "ill-informed and seemingly preordained"
• In Virginia, U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema froze Trump's nearly $1.8 billion "anti-weaponization" fund
• Two Capitol police officers who defended the Capitol on January 6th sued to stop it
• CREW called the fund "a jaw-dropping act of presidential corruption"
• The administration reportedly floated that senators whose records had been secretly subpoenaed could apply for a payout to win their votes
• U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams in Miami reopened Trump's IRS case to investigate whether the settlement was "a fraud on the court"
• Thirty-five former federal judges, appointed by presidents of both parties, asked her to act
• Trump was on both sides of the table at once. Williams gave him until June 12th to explain himself
• Why authoritarian movements run on speed, and why every delay is a win
• The legal organizations doing the work: Democracy Forward, CREW, and Democracy Defenders Action
• The Freedom 250 concert has now lost close to 75% of its announced performers
• Why this weekend matters for California voters with the primary days away

Tonight is the proof. The courts are holding. Some of his loudest enablers have gone quiet. Democrats are no longer only reacting. The highs are starting to outnumber the lows. A name coming off a wall. A slush fund frozen. A fraudulent deal cracked open. Three judges who refused to look away.

Shortly before 10:00 this morning in Colorado Springs, the Vice President of the United States nervously stepped up to the podium to address the graduating class of the United States Air Force Academy. Within moments of taking the stage, J.D. Vance was already making extremely awkward jokes, telling the graduates, "Now, you can't boo me. I'm the vice president of the United States." But the real story was what he was there to do. A little over a year ago, he stood before a different graduating class and promised this administration was finished with "open-ended conflicts" and "undefined missions." Today, he told this class to prepare for "an entirely new era of warfare" and that within sixty days, they could be the ones enforcing the war in Iran.

Based on the events of 5-28-2026

The Breakdown:

• J.D. Vance addressed the Air Force Academy graduating class with awkward jokes and a complete reversal of his message from a year ago
• In 2025 at the Naval Academy, Vance promised the era of foreign entanglements was over
• Today, with the U.S. actively engaged in a war with Iran, he told the new graduates to prepare for war within sixty days
• "You can't boo me" reveals the instinct running through this entire administration
• CBS News carried out a brutal purge of its 60 Minutes newsroom under new editor-in-chief Bari Weiss
• Cecilia Vega and Sharyn Alfonsi were fired or had contracts not renewed. Two top executive producers were pushed out
• Tech journalist Nick Bilton, with no broadcast news experience, was installed in their place
• Vega: "Let's call this what it is: censorship, both imposed and self-driven. It is dangerous for the show and dangerous for democracy"
• Alfonsi's segment on CECOT, the El Salvador prison where this administration has been sending people, was pulled from a December broadcast by Weiss
• The Office of Personnel Management released a draft nondisclosure agreement that would bar federal employees from sharing information with journalists
• The NDA includes a strange clause asserting the government would be owed "royalties" on disclosed information
• Multiple sources reported the DOJ opened a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, the writer who won her sexual assault and defamation case against Trump
• Acting AG Todd Blanche had to recuse himself because he personally represented Trump in the Carroll appeals
• Why the most effective way to kill a free press is not soldiers at the doors, but making the newsroom do the work itself
• June 14 is Trump's 80th birthday and the next nationwide day of No Kings protests
• Trump's America 250 celebration is facing backlash, with upwards of 50% of scheduled artists declining to perform
• Country singer Martina McBride and rapper Young MC are among those who have walked away
• At the News and Documentary Emmy Awards, 18-year-old Santiago Campos accepted the Mike Wallace Memorial Scholarship and called out CBS
• Santiago: "As corporate elites take hold over the very pipes through which our information flows, journalism that serves the people becomes increasingly harder to come by"
• Scott Pelley after presenting the award: "God, we need young people like you right behind us"

Free and fair elections. A free press. Freedom of speech. If we completely lose any of those, the outlook for our country is bleak. We must rally around those risking everything to make sure the truth reaches us. We will get through this, and when we do, it will be because we refused to give up, and because we held one another up when it mattered.

This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.

An angry and physically deteriorating Donald Trump sat slumped forward at the head of the Cabinet Room table, his shoulders sagging and his eyes so swollen they struggled to stay open as live cameras aired his twelfth Cabinet meeting. Marco Rubio sat stiffly to his right while Pete Hegseth watched from his left, both men wearing the tense, uneasy expression of people realizing the president was once again slipping off course in front of the world. But today's meeting had one purpose only: to distract from the unraveling of his presidency and to serve as cover for the dangerous things his administration is doing away from the cameras.

Based on the events of 5-27-2026

The Breakdown:

• Trump slumped forward at his twelfth Cabinet meeting, with Rubio and Hegseth repeatedly trying to redirect him
• Asked about the economic pain Americans are feeling, Trump immediately brought up the midterms unprompted and snapped "I don't care about the midterms"
• WIRED published an investigation based on more than 1,000 pages of unpublished documents from DHS, the FBI, and fusion centers across the country
• The government has invented an entirely new category of domestic threat called "anti-tech violent extremism," a phrase that appears nowhere in publicly available DHS or FBI frameworks
• Fusion centers are now tracking ordinary people showing up at town halls to object to data centers being built in their neighborhoods
• A New York intelligence report predicted protests over AI and pre-labeled the people who might show up as extremists before anyone has done anything
• The behaviors flagged as suspicious include photography, observation, and "implied threats," the exact same conduct as peaceful, constitutionally protected protest
• How this sits on top of National Security Presidential Memorandum 7, signed in September, which instructs the DOJ to investigate networks built around "anti-American," "anti-Christian," and "anti-capitalism" beliefs
• Stephen Miller calling it the first all-of-government effort to dismantle "left-wing terrorism"
• Sebastian Gorka formally ranking left-wing extremists alongside narcoterrorists and foreign Islamist groups
• Why the dissent being criminalized is dissent against the very industry propping up this administration
• How the Soviet Union reclassified critics as psychiatric patients, and how the Stasi built files from who you talked to and where you stood
• Why regardless of how we feel about AI, we all need to take this seriously, because evil regimes never stop at their first targets
• Congressman Robert Garcia: "We've got a team on Epstein, we have a team on family corruption, we have a team on DHS and ICE"
• Congressman Joe Neguse: you have to go back to the Teapot Dome scandal of the 1920s to find an administration this immersed in corruption
• Every unanswered document request becomes a subpoena, hearing, and sworn deposition the day the gavel changes hands
• Governor Gavin Newsom announced California will tax 100% of any "anti-weaponization" fund proceeds received by Californians
• A wall built at the state level against a federal payout designed to reward loyalty to Trump

His presidency is crashing down, and the Democrats are standing by, waiting for us to do our part at the midterms. And when we do, they are going to make every single day after that politically unbearable for Trump and the people who enabled him.

This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.

The President of the United States woke up early this morning for his third "annual" physical exam in just the past 13 months. Before leaving the White House for Walter Reed, Donald Trump posted more than 20 times on Truth Social. But one post stood out from the rest because it crossed into something darker. Donald Trump shared an image of himself holding a shotgun as if he were personally threatening members of his own political party, whom he believes are not loyal enough to him.

Based on the events of 5-26-2026

The Breakdown:

• Trump posted an image of himself sitting on top of a rhinoceros holding a shotgun beside giant letters reading "NO RINOS!"
• Why this was the President of the United States using violent imagery to target members of his own party
• Senator John Cornyn, a four-term Republican first elected in 2002, lost his Texas primary runoff to Trump-endorsed Ken Paxton
• Cornyn even introduced legislation to name a 1,800-mile highway "Trump Interstate" trying to woo a Trump endorsement
• Why Trump knifed him: Cornyn "was not supportive of me when times were tough"
• Cornyn's own warning: "We will have an Election Day massacre" if Paxton is at the top of the ticket
• Paxton was impeached by his own GOP-dominated state legislature in 2023 on sixteen counts
• Why Trump will burn his own house down to settle a score
• Representative Thomas Massie lost his Kentucky primary just a week ago, after the most expensive House primary in American history at more than $32 million
• Massie's crime: pushing to release the Epstein files and voting against the budget bill
• Trump's pattern from his first term: Jeff Sessions, William Barr, Mike Pence, all loyal until loyalty required betraying the Constitution
• Even Elon Musk, who spent close to $300 million to put Trump back in office, discarded the moment he criticized the spending bill
• Trump's third "annual" physical in roughly 13 months and the announcement that everything checked out "PERFECTLY"
• Why a man turning 80 next month cannot tolerate even the appearance of weakness
• How the doctors covering for him are no different from Cornyn
• The Trump Mobile T1 phone collapse: 59 million dollars taken in deposits, "Made in the USA" promise quietly vanished, the few phones sent out appear to be relabeled overstock
• The promotional material even shows the wrong number of stripes on the American flag printed on the device
• How the same supporters being scammed are losing their healthcare under the largest Medicaid cuts in history
• South Carolina's Republican-led state Senate killed Trump's redistricting push to erase Jim Clyburn's majority-Black district
• Republican state Senator Richard Cash: "Neither my conscience nor my common sense will allow me to stop an election that is already begun"
• More than 32,000 South Carolinians cast ballots on day one of early voting, and that turnout gave Republicans the spine to stand up

On the same day Trump posted a meme about threatening disloyal Republicans, members of his own party did the brave thing so many others before them failed to do, and his people called it betrayal. But it was not betrayal. It was conscience. The very Republicans Trump despises most, the ones he threatened with violence just this morning, are the same people who just proved he can be stopped.

At noon yesterday, Donald Trump walked toward the wreath-laying ceremony, slapping his right hand against his thigh with almost every step. As he stood at attention with his hand raised in salute, he wobbled back and forth, unable to hold still. He looked exhausted, unsteady, and vacant. But today was Memorial Day, and the President of the United States was standing before the families of the fallen. He did not need to be eloquent. He only needed to be solemn and to give one sacred day the seriousness it deserved. And once again, he could not do it.

Based on the events of 5-25-2026

The Breakdown:

• Trump opened his Memorial Day remarks by talking about the weather, while Gold Star families stood in the pouring rain just feet in front of his dry, covered stage
• At 6:10 this morning, his first instinct on Memorial Day was a bitter rant about Iran, naming Republicans who crossed him as "losers"
• At 6:18, the thing that passed for a tribute: "Happy Memorial Day to all, including the Dumocrats, who disrespect our Military"
• At 6:26, he stopped marking the day at all and posted another attack on Democrats
• Awake before dawn for grievance, with nothing left for the fallen at noon
• During Secretary Hegseth's remarks, the President fell asleep, caught on the livestream for everyone to see
• Why none of this is new: Trump on John McCain in 2015, "I like people who weren't captured"
• His 2016 attack on the Gold Star Khan family
• John Kelly confirming Trump called Americans who died in war "suckers" and "losers"
• Trump standing at Robert Kelly's grave asking, "I don't get it. What was in it for them?"
• Trump in 2024 calling the civilian Medal of Freedom "much better" than the Medal of Honor
• His 2024 campaign filming footage in Section 60 at Arlington, where staff physically pushed aside a cemetery worker
• Why we have been sold a lie that Trump cares about the military, veterans, or sacrifice
• What it means to truly understand sacrifice, and the rows of white crosses at the American cemetery in Normandy
• Why the record has to be kept, with the dates, the quotes, and the timestamps
• Why so many people developed amnesia about his first term, and why we cannot let that happen again
• Why our service members swore an oath to the Constitution, not to a man, a party, or a flag waved for cameras

They are the patriots. They are the real Americans. They always have been. And they are the exact opposite of the man who spent today insulting the very meaning of sacrifice. If the day ever comes when this man, or the next man just like him, asks our military to choose between the Constitution and a would-be king, I still believe they will choose the Constitution.

This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.

Just after midnight last night, I was woken up by a loud sound outside. I was on my feet before I had even finished the thought, my brain immediately going to our family safety plan. A year or two ago, that same sound would have meant absolutely nothing to me. A noise in the middle of the night was just a noise. But that is not the country we are living in now. And when I woke up and reached for my phone, I saw that the President of the United States had woken up thinking about violence too. The difference is that I am horrified by it, and he is entertained by it.

Based on the events of 5-24-2026

The Breakdown:

• Trump posted a fake image of a plane carrying the American flag firing missiles into boats, bodies flying through the air, with "Adios" in giant red letters
• He posted a pretend movie poster called "The Shady Bunch," featuring fake mug shots of his political enemies in orange prison jumpsuits, including James Comey and Barack Obama
• The irony of a man convicted of 34 felony counts posting images of people who have not been convicted of anything
• An image captioned "China Loves Trump," followed by photos of him clasping hands with Xi Jinping
• A photo of himself with Xi under giant text reading "President Trump gets YOUNGER." He turns 80 next month
• What every one of these posts reveals about what Trump is most afraid of: his own decline, his own irrelevance, his own crimes catching up to him
• The real story underneath the memes: there is no Iran deal
• Trump admitted the negotiations are still proceeding, that nobody has seen it, and that it isn't even fully negotiated yet
• Why his version will likely be worse than the deal he tore up
• The White House has reportedly been urging Republicans to publicly tweet support for an Iran deal that nobody has seen
• Why authoritarian leaders manufacture spectacle when they have nothing real to offer, from Mussolini's parades to Soviet announcements of record harvests
• The psychological weight of living in a country where violence is the background hum of life
• How cruelty flows downhill when the man at the top treats violence as entertainment
• Congressman Thomas Massie said on Meet the Press he will read more names from the Epstein files
• Massie accused Acting AG Todd Blanche of violating the Epstein Files Transparency Act by sitting on millions of files
• Massie: "Even Melania doesn't believe" that Epstein acted alone
• How Trump ended Massie's House career by backing a challenger, and in doing so took the last restraint off a man with nothing left to lose
• Why the Transparency Act is the law and runs for years, so if this Justice Department won't release the files, the next one is legally obligated to

That is what his insecurity does. It makes him careless. It makes him lash out at the very people he most needs to keep quiet. He thought he was eliminating a problem. What he actually did was unleash it. He is on his way out, whether he understands that yet or not, and a cornered man making enemies he cannot afford is a gift to the rest of us.

*This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.