Hours after Putin spoke to Trump
And a few days after the US announced it would cut supplies of Ukrainian air defense

Some use-cases are eternal.

White House stunned as Hegseth inquiry brings up illegal wiretap claims Exclusive: Trump advisers lose confidence in Pentagon leak investigation Hegseth used to justify firing three top aides

The White House has lost confidence in a Pentagon leak investigation that Pete Hegseth used to justify firing three top aides last month, after advisers were told that the aides had supposedly been outed by an illegal warrantless NSA wiretap.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Infographic titled “Judges reject Trump at an accelerating pace” with subtitle “Federal district court rulings against the administration.” The first bar chart, labeled “By month, %”, shows the percentage of federal district court rulings against the Trump administration: • February: 53.8% (7 out of 13) • March: 74.3% (26 out of 35) • April: 76.1% (51 out of 67) • May: 96.3% (26 out of 27) The second bar chart, labeled “By appointing party, %”, shows rulings against the Trump administration by the party of the judge’s appointing president: • Republican-appointed judges: 72.2% (26 out of 36) • Democratic-appointed judges: 80.4% (74 out of 92) Source: Bonica, Adam; Sen, Maya, 2025, “Common-space Measures of Judicial Ideology for Federal Judges (2024 update),” https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/CK3EEL Note: Coding scheme details available at data4democracy.substack.com/p/when-judges-become-targets-judicial

Stunning. May was brutal for Trump in federal court: 96% loss rate ⚖️. Even GOP-appointed judges have ruled against the admin 72% of the time. District courts are doing their job defending the Constitution. Soon the Supreme Court may be the only court unwilling to defend the rule of law.

Excellent visualization of the situation.

Bolton lays out how Putin has mobilized the dumbest administration in US history to be mere conduits of Russian lies about Ukraine.

Putin tells Witkoff>
Witkoff tells Trump>
Trump tells the world.

Wisconsin's Supreme Court race is now the most expensive court race in U.S. history — largely due to donations from out-of-state billionaires.

As Justice Louis Brandeis said, we can have great wealth in the hands of a few, or we can have democracy, but we can't have both.

I continue to be appalled at the lack of accountability around the SLAPP case that targeted me. If I can get sued for saying a warlord sanctioned by the EU, UK, and US for his role in Wagner is involved with Wagner then can we really say there's any protection for journalists in the UK from SLAPPs?

Allies Say US Retreating From Push to Enforce Russia Sanctions European officials say the Trump administration has pared back its engagement with efforts to enforce sanctions on Russia as the US pushes for an end to the war in Ukraine.

Your (Putin) wish is my (Trump) command. European officials say the Trump administration has scaled back its involvement in enforcing Russia sanctions, particularly in working groups aimed at stopping sanction circumvention.

www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Shot. Chaser.

Western intel contradicts Trump's, Putin's claims on Ukraine's encirclement in Kursk Oblast, Reuters reports According to sources who spoke with Reuters, U.S. intelligence agencies, including the CIA, briefed the White House, saying that while Ukrainian troops are facing intense pressure from Russian forces,...

⚡️ Western intel contradicts Trump's, Putin's claims on Ukraine's encirclement in Kursk Oblast, Reuters reports.

U.S. intelligence agencies, including the CIA, briefed the White House that while Ukrainian troops are facing pressure from Russian forces, they are not encircled, Reuters reported.

President Zelenskyy:

"Putin wants to conduct several offensives in the Zaporizhzhia direction, in the east, in the Kharkiv and Sumy directions to put maximum pressure on Ukraine. He will try to do all this in the coming months. And he doesn't care how many of his people die.

Picture of police guarding a Tesla dealership.

Too bad Uvalde Elementary didn’t sell Teslas.

Someone made a Wiley E. Coyote style painted wall to see if Tesla’s autopilot would detect it and well…

Wikipedia image of Major General (Ret.) Charles C. Rogers

Defense.gov google return: Medal of Honor Monday: Army Maj. Gen. Charles Calvin Rogers

Defense.gov 404 - Page Not Found

https://www.defense.gov/News/Feature-Stories/Story/Article/2824721/deimedal-of-honor-monday-army-maj-gen-charles-calvin-rogers/

This is blood-boiling. Charles Rogers was awarded the Medal of Honor in Vietnam after being wounded three times leading the defense of a position.

Google his name and the entry below comes up. When you click, you'll see the page has been deleted and the URL changed to include "DEI medal."

contrary to the intentions you have projected on to Trump. Not contrary to Trump's intentions.

Basically…

The whole thing is important, but listen until the end: the US depends a lot on the flow of capital into the country because it is perceived as the safest port in a storm. Once that is no longer true, a lot of things Americans take for granted go away.

Checkmate.

The stock market is not the economy. The stock market is not the economy. The stock market is not the economy.

Nonetheless, holy shit.

What’s remarkable is that there’s hardly any real news driving this. It’s just investors belatedly realizing that Trump is who he is, and always was.

We went from "I will end inflation and drive down prices on day 1" to "this recession isn't my fault" in 49 days.

CTV National News: A suspicious spike in Tesla sales in Canada There was a suspicious spike in Tesla sales in Canada ahead of the deadline for a federal rebate program for EVs. Adrian Ghobrial investigates.

This story is being throttled on twitter. Obviously.

www.ctvnews.ca/video/2025/0...

How to protect democracies from falsehoods? By empowering the young with open-source investigation skills “If anyone with a smartphone can publish, they should also be able to verify,” argue Bellingcat’s founder Eliot Higgins and Dr Natalie Martin in this piece.

How to protect democracies from falsehoods?

By empowering the young with open-source investigation skills, argue @bellingcat.com founder @eliothiggins.bsky.social and @drnataliemartin.bsky.social in this new piece
reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/news/how-pro...

J6 just getting erased from history by these people. The concern with this sort of discourse is that it's then used to justify state violence and persecution against any Trump-Musk labels a "liberal." In the current system, a slide towards authoritarianism is inevitable.

On average over the past 10 years 0.7% of the U.S. defence budget has been spent on Ukraine.

Never in military history has there been a better return on investment.

The Fox News - Dominion case is a great example of this. They platform people who are participating in disordered discourse about voting machines, until their audience demands it, and they have to keep broadcasting what they know are lies to keep people watching, feeding the cycle of discourse.

Donald Trump targeted AP and legacy media did nothing.

Donald Trump has now targeted two large law firms and Big Law is silent.

You all read Martin Niemöller's poem “First They Came.”

So, I ask you -- What are you doing?

Three UK-based Bulgarians found guilty of spying for Russia Jury convicts Katrin Ivanova, Vanya Gaberova and Tihomir Ivanchev over alleged plots around Europe

The 3 members of the Bulgarian spy ring that spied on Bellingcat and plead not guilty have just been found guilty at the Old Bailey. The spy ring was directed by Wirecard fraudster Jan Marsalek on the behalf of the Russian intelligence services. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...