A War in Iran Has Consequences for the U.S.

Although the U.S. is not involved in the Israel-Iran war (yet), the fighting underway there could still have consequences for U.S. politics.

First, it takes the spotlight off Gaza. That in itself is significant.

Second, it is hard to believe that Donald Trump will come down on the side of Iran, which means that ultimately he will back Israel. This could put Democrats in a bind. They don't want to be seen as backing Iran, but they also don't want to line up behind Trump. Reps. Steven Horsford (D-NV) and Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) have already come out backing Israel. On the other hand, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) are calling for immediate de-escalation. So what will the Democrats do, except make feeble calls for peace that both sides will ignore? Not taking any stand could make them look weak.

Third, a war in the Middle East that Trump has no control over—and not much influence with either belligerent—makes HIM look weak. He said he would get a nuclear deal with Israel and Iran, but that seems increasingly unlikely. He wants to be the center of attention all the time and hates to look weak. If Israel wiped out Iran's nuclear capability without Trump's help, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would look strong and Trump would look weak. If both Democrats and Republicans come to see Trump as weak, that could affect the rest of his presidency.

Fourth, at first, the official U.S. line was that Israel went at it alone, without the U.S. knowing about it in advance. Now Trump is trying to back out of that and is saying he knew about the Israeli attack all along. Not even knowing about something this big would make Trump look incompetent and out of the loop as well as weak. He certainly does not want that.

Fifth, the U.S. could get dragged into the war one way or another. This could put Trump in a bind, with isolationists like Tucker Carlson pulling him one way and hardliners like Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) pulling him the other way. Whatever he did would alienate some of Trump's allies and could fracture the Republicans.

Sixth, oil prices could spike, reigniting inflation and making it a political issue. If the war goes on for a while, that could spook the stock market and possibly lead to a recession.

These things aside, there could be even more impact depending on Israel's real goal here. Maybe that is just wiping out Iran's nuclear capacity. But maybe it is something much bigger: regime change. On Friday, Netanyahu said the attacks "will continue for as many days as it takes to remove the threat." But he didn't specify what "the threat" is. Is it Iran's potential nuclear weapons? Or is it the existence of the ayatollah-run Iranian government itself? If the latter, the war could certainly reshuffle the deck in the Middle East. Regime change might actually be the easier of the two. Much of Iran's nuclear infrastructure is deep under the ground where Israeli weapons can't hit it, but the leaders are above ground and easier targets. Trump supposedly told Netanyahu not to kill Iranian leaders, but that could well be a false flag to make Iranian leaders drop their guard and not be alert. Alternatively, it could be genuine, but Netanyahu might decline to take Trump's suggestion.

Reza Pahlavi, the son of the former Shah of Iran, is champing at the bit and would be quite pleased if all the ayatollahs could be killed or driven from the country and he could take their place as the new shah. Probably quite a few Iranians wouldn't mind that at all. Not to mention more than a few Arab leaders. If Israel pulled that off, the de facto leader of Saudi Arabia, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, would hop on his royal jet and zip off to Jerusalem to give Netanyahu a big hug. On the other hand, if the current regime fell, the new one could be even worse. Then the U.S. would have an even bigger problem with Iran than it has now. (V)

They Are All TACOs

All hat and no cattle. All bark and no bite. All sizzle and no steak. All foam and no beer. All fart and no turd. Or we could get Shakespearean and say: "It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." Republican senators Ron Johnson (WI), Mike Lee (UT), and Rick Scott (FL) have been condemning the megabill now wending its way through the Senate for weeks, wringing their hands and rending their garments, claiming the deficit will ruin the country for generations. But as the vote nears and push is about to become shove, they are all doing the TACO thing.

None of them have fully caved in public yet, but their colleagues expect all three of them to vote for the megabill when it comes up for a vote. Johnson has even toned down his criticism. He said: "We all want to see President Trump succeed." In other words, he is a coward and stands for nothing. Senate leaders threw Lee a couple of crumbs by putting some stuff on deregulation, something he cares about, in the bill. Now he can pretend he got a big victory. Scott now says the bill is important for Florida. And the same bill wasn't 2 weeks ago? Since Republicans have a 53-47 majority in the Senate, that means it is very likely to pass the Senate. Then the hard part happens: Getting the House on board. (V)

Trump Wins One and Loses One in Court

Last Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz ruled that the federal government must release pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil by last Friday. Then, last Friday, he caved to the administration and re-ruled that it was fine to keep Khalil locked up in Louisiana. The only thing that changed is the excuse the government is using. Now the charge is not that he is subverting U.S. foreign policy (which the judge found to be absurd), but that he didn't list all his former employers and memberships in his green card application.

The Judge even noted that people are rarely detained for small errors in filling out a government form. And this is certainly not a reason to hold someone in prison without trial far from where they live for 4 months. But these aren't normal times. Khalil also disputes the argument that he filled out his green card application incorrectly. He did an unpaid internship with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, which was part of his graduate studies, but it was not employment, so he did not list it on the part of the form asking about previous employment.

Farbiarz clearly gets it that Khalil is being kept in prison because Trump doesn't like pro-Palestinian activists and it has nothing to do with the trumped-up charge of omissions on his green card application. Nevertheless, he refused to order Khalil's release. However, the Judge did note that Khalil can seek a bond hearing from an immigration judge.

Trump won that one, for the time being, but he got another ruling that went against him and is potentially more important. On March 25, Trump signed an XO on elections. One part of it said that absentee voters must show proof of citizenship to register to vote. That lasted a month, until Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, a Bill Clinton appointee, struck it down as unconstitutional. In a 120-page ruling, she stated that since elections are run by the states, not the federal government, the president cannot order federal officials to do anything concerning election procedures. That is the exclusive province of the states. It seems to us that a one-sentence ruling ("The states run elections so the president has no authority to interfere with them") would have done the job and 120 pages is kind of overkill, but what do we know?

Now a second judge, Denise Casper, a Barack Obama appointee in Massachusetts, not only affirmed Kollar-Kotelly's opinion, but also struck down a second part of Trump's XO on voting. This one stated that absentee ballots postmarked before or on Election Day but received after Election Day may not be counted. Many states have a grace period of up to a week to allow ballots delayed in the mail to be counted. Casper based this on the same reasoning as Kollar-Kotelly: The states regulate elections and the president has no authority to dictate election procedures to the states.

Casper's decision also affected overseas voters, both military and civilian. The XO said that when anyone living overseas filed the official postcard to register to vote, they had to supply proof of citizenship along with it as well as proof of eligibility to vote in the state they last lived in. Again, Casper ruled the president has no power to tell the states how to run their elections. She also noted that the XO runs counter to the express wishes of Congress, which created the postcard registration form to make it easier for overseas Americans to vote. Congress did not impose Trump's requirements on the voters. It just standardized the form used and no states objected to the standardized form.

After Trump issued the XO, many state election officials immediately saw it as overreach, since they already knew that the states, not the federal government, run elections, and Trump had no business butting into state affairs. Something about federalism, a concept foreign to Trump's view of a unitary executive, where the president runs the country by fiat. (V)

Trump Is Popular on Immigration but His Policies Are Not

Politics is sometimes weird. Donald Trump's immigration policies, especially his execution of them, are wildly unpopular, but his broad goals have much broader support. Part of this is due to framing. Democrats want to frame the unrest in L.A. as a story about due process and government overreach. But Trump is framing (paywall) it as a story about crime and border security. On these issues, Trump is +9 and +4 with the voters, respectively. What he has done is convince voters that the people he is targeting are criminals who deserve what they are getting. In that way, he wins, even though his actual policies on immigration are not popular.

The desirability of deporting migrants changes radically when different questions are asked:

Trump voters want everyone deported and everyone wants to deport violent criminals. However, registered voters as a whole do not want to deport people who have lived in the U.S. for years without committing any crimes, or dreamers, either. When these numbers are broken down by race, Black and Latino voters are much more forgiving than white voters. Even on the dreamers, who get the most sympathy—74% of Latino, 72% of Black, but only 56% of white voters—want to allow them to stay. Also noteworthy is that across all groups, over 60% want undocumented immigrants married to U.S. citizens to be allowed to stay.

Trump doesn't need the poll results to understand that lying about the deportees all being violent criminals makes an otherwise unpopular argument popular. He understands intuitively the power of lying and does it constantly. Very few people are capable of understanding that if ICE enters a church or hospital and starts rounding up people, very few of those people are criminals and even fewer are violent criminals. But Trump's story line is persuasive. YouGov asked about that. Indeed, 53% of all voters, including 43% of Latinos and 46% of independents, think that Trump is prioritizing violent criminals, when in fact ICE is making no effort at all to locate violent criminals. It is much too difficult to find them, and locating one here and one there does not make for good television, which is what Trump wants. (V)

Trump Scrambles to Restore the Voice of America's Farsi Service

Some people have to learn things the hard way. When Donald Trump killed off the Voice of America (VOA), he didn't think that soft power or influencing people around the globe was worth anything. Now that there is a hot war going on in Iran, he has suddenly realized (or been told to realize by his staff), that countering the Iranian state propaganda with the truth might be a good idea. Maybe having the Voice of America broadcast the truth in Farsi (Persian) to the Iranian people as a counter to Iranian state radio and television wasn't waste or fraud after all. How could he have known?

Now that someone in the administration realizes that countering Iranian propaganda in Iran could be important, the Voice of America has rehired several dozen Farsi speakers who were put on administrative leave in March. Together they used to produce 4 hours of Farsi content every day. Staffers who speak some other languages have also been called back. Kari Lake runs what is left of VOA. When CNN asked Lake for a comment, her spokesperson had no comment.

About 50 full-time staff members work in the Farsi news service and another 50 are part timers. All of them have been recalled and told to report for work. Contractors who worked for the unit have not been told to restart work. Nevertheless, late Friday, the service was on the air reporting on the war between Israel and Iran. The VOA Farsi language Website was also back. The top headline yesterday evening was: "The Israeli army issued an 'urgent warning' to all Iranian citizens: immediately close down weapons factories and their support institutions." The headline under a photo of Trump says: "Trump warns Islamic Republic: If you attack America, there will be an unprecedented and complete military response you will encounter." We don't know if Google translate got this right, but it seems plausible.

Patsy Widakuswara, one of the VOA journalists who has been sidelined, did have a comment, though. She said: "VOA's role in providing independent, factual and authoritative news has been proven throughout countless times of crisis. But after months off the air, we've already lost a lot of audience and credibility. They should bring us all back so we can respond to breaking news in all parts of the world." A group of journalists have sued the government to get it to reverse the shutdown of the VOA, arguing that Congress created the VOA so only Congress can terminate it. VOA's annual budget is $267.5 million, which is a tiny drop in the bucket as compared to the overall federal budget. On the other hand, that's enough money for about 8 military parades, so continuing the funding is obviously a tough call. (V)

Trump Loses Another Appeal in the E. Jean Carroll Defamation Case

In case you have forgotten, in 2019 Elle columnist E. Jean Carroll accused Donald Trump of sexually assaulting her in a department store dressing room in Manhattan in the 1990s. He called her a liar and she sued him for defamation. In 2023, a jury found for her and ordered Trump to pay Carroll $5 million in damages. Not only did he not pay up, but he defamed her again and she sued again. This time a different jury awarded her an additional $83.3 million in damages. For a detailed play-by-play account of the legal case, see this Wikipedia article.

Trump appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and lost. Then he asked for an en banc ruling. On Friday, he got that one: It was 8-2 against him, with three judges recusing themselves. Judge Myrna Pérez, a Joe Biden appointee, wrote for the panel: "Simply re-litigating a case is not an appropriate use of the en banc procedure." The two circuit judges who voted in favor of Trump, Steven Menashi and Michael Park, were—wait for it—Trump appointees.

Trump's lawyers probably knew that from the outset, but he has an unusual legal strategy. He doesn't fight to win. He fights to delay resolution of all cases by continuous appeals until the other side gives up. However, Carroll's lawyer, Robbie Kaplan, is a human pitbull and never gives up. In a joint statement with Carroll, Kaplan said: "E. Jean Carroll is very pleased with today's decision."

Is the case over? Definitely not. Trump can appeal to the Supreme Court and almost certainly will. However, in his appeal to the Second Circuit, Trump's lawyers argued that the district judge should not have allowed as evidence Trump's bragging on the Access Hollywood tape that he grabs women by the pu**y, which is what Carroll accused him of doing. Her point was that he does this all the time and thinks it is normal. That kind of counters the defense argument that he would never do something like that. The Second Circuit had no problem with this evidence. Whether the Supremes will grant cert is an interesting question. The case doesn't raise any constitutional issues. It is a straightforward defamation case and not the kind of thing the Court normally takes on. Trump's lawyers will probably make a claim that the Constitution grants the president the right to defame anyone he wants to, thus making it a constitutional case. But will the Court buy it? (V)

Protester Killed at No Kings Rally in Utah

There were thousands of No Kings rallies all over the country on Saturday. All of them were peaceful, with no riots or clashes between protesters and police. However, there was one unfortunate incident in Salt Lake City.

Most protest rallies had a volunteer peacekeeping team whose job was to try to de-escalate the situation if things got out of hand. Some of the peacekeepers come with weapons but most don't. In Salt Lake City, 10,000 people peacefully marched to protest Donald Trump's actions on immigration. One of the peacekeepers saw a man, Arturo Gamboa, with an AR-15-style rifle, and fired three shots at him. One of them hit Gamboa and caused a minor injury. Another hit an innocent bystander, Arthur Folasa Ah Loo, and killed him. Protesters quickly scattered and there was no further violence.

Gamboa was quickly taken into custody, but the peacekeeper, who fully cooperated with the police, was not. He may have saved many lives. (V)

The Presidency Pays Off, Big Time

Why is Donald Trump even fighting piddling $88 million court findings? That's small potatoes to him. Last year he made over $600 million from his crypto, licensing, and merch, according to a new 230-page disclosure form he filed Friday. Why not just pay off the lady and make the news go away? The reason is that doing so would effectively admit he did sexually assault her and he cares about his image very much. But oddly enough, in the Access Hollywood tape interview, he wants people to know he sexually assaults women.

One of Trump's largest sources of income ($57 million) is from his crypto business. His love of crypto is new. During Trump v1.0, he said cryptocurrencies were highly volatile and based on thin air. He also said bitcoin "seems like a scam." Now that he found a way to make money from crypto, he is hugging it tightly. He even held a dinner for the top 25 investors in the $TRUMP coin, which meant that anyone with enough money could buy face-to-face time with Trump. He also has a stake in World Liberty Financial, another crypto project, which issues a stablecoin, USD1, and has gotten the United Arab Emirates to buy $2 billion worth of it. What they got in return has not been made public.

But this is only the start of Trump's use of crypto to make money. The Big Beautiful Bill now pending in the Senate would create a "superhighway for Donald Trump's corruption," according to Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). It would permit banks and private companies to issue stablecoins with minimal oversight (such as whether the fund actually had enough assets to cover all the coins issued). If people start getting statement enclosures with their bank statements touting "safe investment in stablecoins," many people are sure to sign up. The coins will shoot up in value, until they collapse in a blaze of glory, something that eventually happens with all Ponzi schemes when they run out of marks.

Another big moneymaker ($50 million) for Trump is his private club at Mar-a-Lago, where the initiation fee to join is $600,000, plus annual membership contributions and fees associated with its use as a resort and golf club. He also made money from licensing his name, for example $15 million from a Trump-branded property in Dubai.

At the other end of the scale, Trump made $1.3 million from the Bible he hawks, helped by his MAPA (Make America Pray Again) pitch on the campaign trail last year. He also made $2.5 million from Trump sneakers and $2.8 million from Trump "Swiss" watches (which are made by a small company located in the Wyoming part of Switzerland).

All in all, Trump has hundreds of irons in the fire with all manner of business ventures all over the world. It is surprising he has any time at all left over for presidenting. (V)

How Do People in Other Countries View the U.S.?

Americans don't seem to realize that big military parades are the stuff of dictatorships, like North Korea and Russia. People in other countries are more aware of what is going on in America than most Americans. Two new international polls bear this out. They also show that the attitude people in other countries have about the U.S. depends on who is president, with Democrats almost always more popular than Republicans. Here are graphs for 28 countries over time:

The top four countries, Nigeria, Israel, India, and Kenya, have always had faith in the U.S. but in European countries, like the Netherlands, France, Spain, Germany, and Sweden, confidence is very high during Democratic administrations and very low during Republican ones, with net scores of -55, -56, -61, -63, and -70 now during Trump v2.0.

Another question that was asked is whether U.S. democracy is working well. In Nigeria, Hungary, Israel, Kenya, and Poland, the overwhelming view is yes, but note that four of them are run by autocrats and the fifth one (Israel) has received massive support from the U.S. The scores here range from +67 (Nigeria) to Poland (+29). At the other end are countries that think U.S. democracy is working very poorly. The bottom six are France, the Netherlands, Canada, Germany, Australia, and Sweden, where the scores range from -24 (France) to -56 (Sweden). Roughly speaking, the more autocratic a country is, the more the people admire the U.S. now and the more democratic it is, the less they do.

Another dimension is how views differ on the left and the right in various countries. The gap is fairly consistent across countries. People on the right in most countries are about 30 points more positive about the U.S. than people on the left in the same country. But the more extreme the people were, the bigger the gap. For example, in Germany, people who support the AfD are wildly supportive of Trump. They see the U.S. as a test case for the idea of multiracial democracies and are overjoyed it is failing.

On one question, the U.S. comes out fairly well, namely, whether the country is better off with a strong leader who is willing to break the rules (technically: committing crimes). In South Korea, which is in turmoil, 75% think so. In the U.S. only 38% think that. In Germany, where some people have had negative personal experiences with leaders who broke the rules, only 24% want that, roughly equal to the AfD's vote share.

On immigration, however, Americans are split. 53% of Republicans are anti-immigrant, putting them between Peru and Hungary, but only 18% of Democrats are anti-immigrant, lower than the lowest country in the list (Sweden at 21%).

In short, the U.S. is not very popular in the world anymore. If something happens somewhere (say a terrorist attack) where the U.S. needs help from other countries to catch the perpetrator, that may not be forthcoming. (V)

Michael Bloomberg Donates to His Former Enemy Andrew Cuomo

Former three-term New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has a more-than-passing interest in who wins the mayoral election in NYC this year. When he was mayor and Andrew Cuomo was governor, they fought about many things and clearly disliked each other intensely. But on Friday, they sort of buried the hatchet when Bloomberg donated $5 million to a super PAC supporting Cuomo's comeback attempt (and stepping stone to running for president in 2028).

Does Bloomberg really admire Cuomo now? That is very unlikely. What is surely motivating Bloomberg is that in the polling, the #2 candidate, democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani, who is in his second term in the state Assembly, is closing in on Cuomo. His platform is free city buses, a rent freeze, nationalizing grocery stores in the city, and taxing the rich. He has called Israel's actions in Gaza "genocide."

Bloomberg knows what it takes to run NYC and he doesn't think a 33-year-old Palestinian activist who has never run anything is the right person to manage the fractious city and handle its $117 billion budget. Sloganeering won't do the job. Bloomberg also doubts that Mamdani has the chops to stand up to Donald Trump. There is little doubt that Cuomo would be a giant pain for Trump.

Cuomo, for his many faults, handled budgets twice as big as that and got a lot done during his time as governor, including legalizing same-sex marriage in the state, legalizing cannabis, raising the minimum wage, introducing 12-week paid family leave, and signing the toughest gun-control law in the country. He was also very good at big infrastructure projects, including the Second Avenue subway, a new Tappan Zee bridge over the Hudson (named for his father, Mario Cuomo), the Moynihan Train Hall, and the redevelopment of LaGuardia from the worst airport in the developed world to one of the best. Yes, he was a sleazeball and a jerk, but he was actually very good at governing and got a lot of stuff done. Mamdani has never done anything significant. Bloomberg knows better than most that mayors have to actually get stuff done.

Cuomo's super PAC has been raising and spending money since March. So far it has raised $18 million. Election Day is a week from tomorrow. One factor that makes polling difficult is that the primary will use ranked-choice voting. Neither Cuomo nor Mamdani is polling anywhere near 50%, so the second, third, and further choice votes cast with the votes for the other 9 Democrats will determine who wins. The Republican nominee in November will be conservative radio host Curtis Sliwa. Mayor Eric Adams is running as an independent. (V)

NY-17 Campaign Is in Full Swing Now

It is a bit early for campaigns for House seats to be going full blast. but the one for NY-17 is already at full boil. It is a D+1 district currently represented by Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY). Democrats smell blood in the Hudson. To make it even more interesting, Lawler is toying with the idea of running for governor, but the possible entrance of Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) might block him. Here is the district:

The very affluent (median household income of $119,000), but evenly balanced, district was formerly represented by Nita Lowey until she retired in 2020. She was succeeded by Mondaire Jones. To avoid getting into a primary fight with Sean Patrick Maloney, who moved into NY-17, Jones switched to NY-10 in 2022, had a primary fight anyway, and lost the primary to Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY). Maloney got the Democratic nomination in NY-17 but lost the election to Lawler. Many Democrats think they can win it back, especially if Lawler runs for governor. Consequently, the Democratic nomination is a valuable prize (paywall).

Seven Democrats are already formally running and three more are expected to join soon, although the primary is June 23, 2026, more than a year away. Candidates Army veteran and carpetbagger Cait Conley, nonprofit founder Jessica Reinmann, and New Castle Deputy Town Supervisor Jeremy Saland took part in a recent forum in Yorktown Heights. The main issue was the high cost of living, a salient issue even in a wealthy district. Other candidates include Peter Chatzky, former mayor of Briarcliff Manor, Beth Davidson, a Rockland County legislator, Effie Phillips-Staley, the daughter of an immigrant from El Salvador and currently a Tarrytown trustee, Mike Sacks, a journalist who has worked for both Fox 5-NY and the Huffington Post and who says he wants to unf*ck our country, and John Sullivan, another carpetbagger and former FBI intelligence analyst. None of these is widely known, so better-known candidates could yet jump in.

The field could be winnowed long before the primary. Phillips-Staley is hoping to mobilize Latino voters, who make up a fifth of the voters. Davidson, who is Jewish, is hoping to recapture the 30,000 orthodox Jews who live in Rockland County. She is also very good at fundraising. The Westchester County Democratic Committee doesn't want this to be the fish that got away. It is likely to put its thumb on the scale sooner or later and support the candidate with the best chance of winning the general election. One local strategist said that the voters want a fighter and winner and they don't care much about platforms, issues, or ideology. That goes double, maybe triple, if Lawler decides to forget the governorship and runs for reelection. (V)

Wedding News

There are a bunch of areas we don't cover too much over here, like art, fashion, and weddings. But once in a while we make an exception, like right now. On Saturday, Huma Abedin, who is a Muslim, and Alex Soros, who is Jewish, got married in Water Mill, NY, in an interfaith ceremony. The bride wore a dress. The groom wore a suit. There was a band. It played music. There was a cake. We don't quite have writing about weddings down pat yet, but we are working on it.

The guest list included everyone who is anyone in the Democratic Party orbit. Among others in attendance at the Soros estate in the Hamptons were Bill and Hillary Clinton, Kamala Harris, Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Anna Wintour, Susie Tompkins Buell, and a bunch of other Democratic and cultural celebrities. Many of the guests arrived by private jet. We are guessing, however, that Lee Greenwood did not perform.

OK, let's get to the point. Alex Soros is the son of Democratic megadonor George Soros, who is worth $7 billion. He is 94. Enter his son, Alex, who has a Ph.D. in history from UC Berkeley. Good choice. He is also chairman of his father's Open Society Foundation, which has $18 billion in the bank. Young Soros also has his own foundation. He says he is more political than his father. He is now married to Huma Abedin, one of Hillary Clinton's closest aides and her deputy chief of staff when Clinton was secretary of state. Abedin was also the vice chair of Clinton's 2016 campaign. Some people have described Abedin as Hillary's other daughter.

Many Democrats were worried sick about the possibility that when Soros père passed from the scene, the money spigot would be turned off and Soros fils would find some other hobby than politics to amuse himself. With this marriage, that seems unlikely. Pillow talk at the Soros-Abedin residence is likely to be about which Democratic candidate needs the most help right now. At the wedding, the collective sigh of relief could be heard as far away as Montauk Point. (V)

---

If you wish to contact us, please use one of these addresses. For the first two, please include your initials and city.

• questions@electoral-vote.com    For questions about politics, civics, history, etc. to be answered on a Saturday
• comments@electoral-vote.com   For "letters to the editor" for possible publication on a Sunday
• corrections@electoral-vote.com To tell us about typos or factual errors we should fix
• items@electoral-vote.com            For general suggestions, ideas, etc.

To download a poster about the site to hang up, please click here.

---

Email a link to a friend.

---The Votemaster and Zenger