July 24, 2026 — Scott Johnson

Real friends of fake Dan

Featured image You may have read about the fake Dan Sullivan running in Alaska to confuse voters and undercut Republican incumbent Senator Dan Sullivan. The Free Beacon’s Alana Goodman and Collin Anderson have turned over a few rocks to find the stealthy hand of Chuck Schumer in the mix: Days after Chuck Schumer denied any involvement in the campaign of Dan J. Sullivan—the newly declared Republican known as “Decoy Dan” who is »
July 24, 2026 — Scott Johnson

Senator Sheehy has a few thoughts

Featured imageMontana Senator Tim Sheehy is a Minnesota native and alumnus of St. Paul Academy as well as the Naval Academy. After graduation from the Naval Academy in 2008, he “completed several deployments and hundreds of missions as a US Navy SEAL Officer and Team Leader, deploying to Iraq, Afghanistan, South America, and the Pacific region. Tim was honored to serve alongside many American heroes and was involved in dozens of »
July 24, 2026 — Scott Johnson

The J.D. Vance experience

Featured imageLast week the Wall Street Journal’s Kim Strassel devoted her weekly column — “Vance Goes AWOL” — to criticism of Vance by congressional Republicans. Strassel channeled the frustration of congressional Republicans for his scarcity on Capitol Hill in general and his cancellation of a scheduled meeting with them on Tuesday last week: “They instead were notified of a scheduling conflict as Air Force Two winged to Texas. Wednesday was spent »
July 24, 2026 — Scott Johnson

A gathering storm

Featured imageCentcom has announced the thirteenth straight night of strikes against Iran: “CENTCOM targeted Iranian military command centers, drone storage facilities, communication networks, coastal surveillance sites, and maritime capabilities to further diminish the threat Iran poses to civilian mariners and commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz.” With the limited set of targets so identified, it sounds the same as it ever was over the past two weeks. Centcom’s statement is »
July 23, 2026 — John Hinderaker

Exposed: The Establishment’s Love of Race Discrimination

Featured imageThere was a time this afternoon when more than half of my Instagram feed consisted of video clips of Congressman Brandon Gill questioning witnesses in committee hearings. Gill is the new hero of the conservative movement, largely because of his skill at questioning liberal witnesses. To be honest, it isn’t that hard: Gill’s secret is that, instead of giving speeches as most members of Congress do, he actually asks the »
July 23, 2026 — John Hinderaker

About Those USAID Cuts

Featured imageLiberals claimed, using made-up arithmetic assumptions, that many thousands of Africans would die as a result of the Trump administration’s cuts to hopelessly corrupt USAID programs. Not surprisingly, demographic statistics show that those projected deaths did not occur. But that doesn’t mean the USAID cuts had no effects. The Associated Press mourns the plight of a group to which you probably have given little thought: transsexuals in Nepal. We can »
July 23, 2026 — John Hinderaker

Red States Win, Going Away [Updated]

Featured imageI think it is generally understood that red states outperform blue states by any possible measure. The Committee to Unleash Prosperity offers a new analysis that reaches that conclusion. This approach is unique because it tries to eliminate other variables, and isolate the importance of political philosophy: [W]e needed to use more sophisticated statistical analysis to account for these other, non-political factors. We want to be able to say with »
July 23, 2026 — Scott Johnson

Sophie points the way

Featured imageESPN profiles WNBA Sophie Cunningham in “Love her or hate her, Sophie Cunningham won’t be ignored.” With her ostentatious defense of Indiana Fever teammmate, Caitlin Clark, I have been on the love side of that particular binary. In the ESPN profile I would point my finger this way: You say she’s a “MAGA Barbie,” as some corners of the internet have taken to calling her? Projection, she says, because of »
July 23, 2026 — Scott Johnson

Treating advanced breast cancer: An update

Featured imageThe home page of the Star Tribune currently features the story “With FDA approval, Celcuity sees big future for its new breast cancer drug.” My friend Brian Sullivan is the co-founder and chief executive officer of Celcuity. In 1998 Brian was the founder and CEO of Recovering Engineering, his first company. He also served as the chairman of our state Republican Party’s platform committee. Brian appointed John Hinderaker and me »
July 22, 2026 — John Hinderaker

Gavin Newsom, Juggernaut?

Featured imageGavin Newsom has been the presumptive Democratic nominee in the 2028 presidential race for some time, despite his abysmal record as Governor of California. Many have praised his political skills. But the Newsom train has been losing steam: Former Vice President Kamala Harris has a significant advantage over Newsom and the rest of the field by comfortable margins, in the most recent 14 major polls, suggesting she has the early »
July 22, 2026 — Scott Johnson

Co-presidents for life [With Comment by John]

Featured imageI vaguely recall reading Ron Radosh’s 2021 Quileette essay “Sandinista! The US Left and Nicaragua.” However, while my attention was turned elsewhere, Nicaragua’s National Assembly amended the constitution to allow the president to run for an unlimited number of five-year terms. Given the fact that Sandinista Commie Daniel Ortega was president, that was a bad sign. As I understand the relevant developments, it got worse in 2025 when the Constitution »
July 23, 2026 — John Hinderaker

No Deal?

Featured imageEarlier today, President Trump threw an apparent monkey wrench into the announced Saudi nuclear deal by adding a condition that the Saudis join the Abraham Accords, thus recognizing Israel. Not having followed this issue closely, I found the context in the linked article helpful: Negotiations for a Saudi nuclear power plant began in earnest under Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden, who envisaged it as part of a broader deal that would »
July 23, 2026 — Scott Johnson

The Lindell road to GOP ruin

Featured imageIt turns out that Trump-endorsed Minnesota gubernatorial candidate Mike Lindell has a plan. It’s a six-month amnesty plan for illegal aliens. The Washington Examiner reports: “Mike Lindell proposes six-month amnesty for illegal immigrants if elected Minnesota governor.” Fortunately, Mike Lindell will never be elected governor of Minnesota. Unfortunately, if he prevails in the August 11 primary, he may bring down Republicans in state and federal races all over the state. »
July 23, 2026 — Scott Johnson

Bloomberg vs. Bernie

Featured imagein yesterday’s Wall Street Journal Best of the Web column Bloomberg vs. Bernie, the Rematch,” James Freeman salutes Michael Bloomberg — for his effective needling of Bernie Sanders during the 2020 Democratic primaries. He writes that “many news consumers may recall Mr. Bloomberg’s 2020 campaign for president as an expensive failure, but he did an an enormous public service at a moment when Vermont’s socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders was leading »
July 22, 2026 — John Hinderaker

Trump’s New Iran Policy

Featured imagePresident Trump has been hitting Iran hard, following that country’s attacks on our troops and our allies. He has now announced a new policy on the Strait of Hormuz: I approve of this policy. In fact, not only do I approve of it, it is precisely the policy that I have been advocating for something like the last two months: every time they attack a ship, bomb a power plant »
July 22, 2026 — Scott Johnson

The Trump effect [With Comment by John]

Featured imageI decried President Trump’s endorsement of clown gubernatorial candidate Mike Lindell last week in “Put a MyPillow over it.” Lindell is running in a multicandidate primary field. According to a KSTP/SurveyUSA poll, Lindell now predictably appears to have extended his lead over competitors including endorsed candidate Kendall Qualls and House Speaker Lisa Demuth. That is a shame. Lindell is a joke. I would have said that before it was reported »
July 21, 2026 — John Hinderaker

What’s Affordable, What Isn’t

Featured imageThis graphic has been all over X for the last few days, and I have been meaning to get to it. It is similar to many other charts I have seen over the years. We all know that the cost of living has been rising, especially during the Biden administration. But many are not aware of how targeted those increasing costs actually are. Many goods and some services have gotten »