Posts on Monday, July 20, 2026

On Sunday, a new report came out that, among Saturday night's targets in Iran hit by American attacks, there was a strike against a nuclear facility under construction, that being what is called the Darkhovin facility. The Iranian government is said to be "furious." Good. This is a military target, no matter what Iran has to say about it. This is precisely the kind of target American forces should be razing to the ground. Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, in its outrage, is again dissembling; nothing this regime does is peaceful or has an entirely peaceful purpose. If this facility had been allowed to move to completion,

True Value hardware stores are, and have been, an American institution. They are scattered across the land, often run as small mom and pop shops; our tiny hardware store just up the road here in the Susitna Valley is a True Value. They're everywhere. And, for almost 80 years, they have maintained a primary company headquarters in Chicago. No longer. Now they are fleeing for greener pastures, and those more verdant habitats are right next door, in Indiana, a much lower-tax and more business-friendly environment. Now, some (in Illinois) will point this out as simply combining headquarters after an acquisition, which isn't at all uncommon.

Lettuce grown in central Mexico that was used by multiple Taco Bell locations has been identified as the source of a Cyclospora outbreak that has sickened Americans across the country. A recall of the lettuce was announced by Taylor Farms, which posted a notice on the website of the Food and Drug Administration. “The company has stopped receiving product from the implicated lot, suspended distribution of the iceberg lettuce from Central Mexico, notified our customers, and we are continuing to work with the FDA, CDC, and state authorities,” Taylor Farms wrote in its notice.

Do you know what the nation’s “top companies” are? Do you think, perhaps, that businesses like Tesla, which made Elon Musk a billionaire, or SpaceX, which made Musk a trillionaire, are among the finest? Does it make sense to you that Walmart, the largest retailer in the world, or ExxonMobil, the largest shareholder-owned energy company in the world, should, at the very least, crack the top 100 American companies? Conversely, has Disney—a company that has seen its stock price almost cut in half over the last five years, that has suffered from repeated leadership controversies,

Money is the mother’s milk of politics. —Jesse Unruh, the 26th California treasurer The debate over money in politics is defined by a core tension between the ideals of transparency, privacy, and mandated disclosure. Proponents of robust transparency and disclosure requirements (especially America Firsters) argue that voters have a fundamental right to know who is funding candidates, parties, and issue advocacy since undisclosed “dark money” from wealthy individuals, corporations, unions, or foreign-linked entities can distort democratic outcomes, enable corruption or undue influence and facilitate implementation of left-wing policies funded by U.S. taxpayers without authorization or scrutiny. They push for lower reporting thresholds, real-time disclosures,

George Orwell's 1984 was a warning, not an instruction manual. It was based on the very real concern of a government becoming a totalitarian surveillance state where all the people did was observed, recorded, and scrutinized for any sign of WrongThink. It was a terrifying glimpse into Orwell's fears should his own preferred ideology of socialism take hold and go too far, but it wasn't just about socialism, either. It was what the state could do when no one stopped it. And while we've often invoked the imagery of Big Brother to make a point about surveillance overreach, things are scarier now than ever before...and gun owners are especially concerned.

The United States conducted a new round of airstrikes early Monday targeting Iran after announcing the death of another American service member, hitting around a northwestern city believed to be home to underground missile bases. Iran responded by launching an attack targeting Bahrain, the home of the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet, and Kuwait. The latest attacks again showed how, step by step, the U.S. and Iran have inched closer to all-out war as last month’s interim deal meant to permanently end the fighting has crumbled and shipping traffic in the Strait of Hormuz has largely stalled. Both sides have targeted civilian infrastructure relied on by millions of people.

Hello and welcome to Sunday, July 19, 2026. Among other things, today is Ice Cream Day, Daiquiri Day, Raspberry Cake Day, New Friends Day, Stick Out Your Tongue Day, Sundae Sunday, Football Day, Flight Attendant Safety Professionals' Day, International Retainer Day, Lake Superior Day, and Flitch Day. I don't know what to make of that. Anything that floats in your root beer, I suppose.So let's look at what's actually going on between Trump and Rubio. A few things stand out: Rubio's portfolio keeps growing. As secretary of State, he's literally everywhere on foreign policy, and Trump keeps handing him the delicate diplomatic assignments nobody else gets.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is once again defending a criminal illegal immigrant who was deported by the Trump administration. In a press conference earlier this week, Walz said the deportation of Tou Lue Vang did not make Americans safer – despite recognizing he committed “horrific crimes.” “Did that make us any safer? Did that make the children that are left behind any more stable,” Walz asked. “Did it improve the idea that we can’t all be judged by our worst day?” (snip) The pardon was unanimously approved this spring by Minnesota’s Board of Pardons, which includes Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison, and state Supreme Court Chief Justice Natalie Hudson.

Mention the name Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14) in conservative circles, and the immediate response is far more often than not barely suppressed laughter. A bulging-eyed birdbrain, a nit lacking the intelligence to be witted featherweight, useful for mocking alone. Did you hear what she just said about her fellow progressives’ current pet fantasy regarding eliminating the Senate? Did you catch her trying to assume a Southern accent? And on and on. How can anyone take her seriously? Surely no serious political mind does.

After President Donald Trump’s disruptive primetime speech to the nation on July 16, he revealed that his administration had evidence that federal intelligence officials withheld intelligence about China’s involvement in election tampering in the U.S. For a U.S. president to make such a claim, he’d better have the receipts, and the president promised that he did.Now, reports are that Nikki Floris, a former FBI analyst and senior leader who was charged with oversight of election security in 2020, once wrote that she was “basically running a shadow government across the FBI.”

Most of the "Top 'O the Briefing" for Friday morning had already been written last Thursday night by the time President Trump was finished with his speech, which is why I didn't comment on it. Regulars here in Briefingland know that I don't think that we can talk about election integrity too much, especially in this most critical election year. While Senate Jellyfish Majority Leader John Thune keeps riding the Useless Wuss train rather than pass the SAVE America act, President Trump is making sure that discussions regarding shoring up our vulnerable election processes stay front and center.

Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a blow to President Donald Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship. Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, is still looking to take action, and he’s using a late Democrat Senate icon to do it. This past week Moreno introduced a bill to eliminate birthright citizenship, citing longtime Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, who introduced a similar bill in 1993. On Wednesday, Moreno introduced the Harry Reid Immigration Stabilization Act, which he previewed immediately following last month’s decision in Trump v. Barbara.

Another US service member has been killed in the Iran war, Central Command said Sunday — while adding that remains have been found in the area where an American soldier went missing in an earlier attack. The most recent tragic casualty occurred as US forces attempted a controlled detonation of unexploded devices from a downed Iranian attack drone in Iraq on Saturday, CENTCOM said. One service member was killed and another wounded, suffering minor injuries, during the detonation-turned-deadly, it said. The grim announcement came the day after two US service members were killed in Jordan in an Iranian airstrike and a third soldier reported to be missing in action.

In March of 2026 President Trump issued Executive Order 14399, “Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections,” directing the U.S. Postal Service to create a rule whereby any state that intends to send mail-in ballots to voters must provide a list of those eligible to participate in federal elections or the USPS “shall not transmit” those ballots. The obvious goal of the EO is to keep ballots from reaching people who are not eligible to vote. This predictably produced several lawsuits. On Friday, however, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a temporary stay on the lower court injunction.