“US federal agents have arrested the niece and grandniece of the late Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani after the Trump administration’s top diplomat, Marco Rubio, revoked their lawful permanent resident status, officials said on Saturday. ‘Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter are now in the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement,’ or ICE, the state department said in a statement. In his own statement on social media, Rubio, the US secretary of state, confirmed that the mother-daughter pair are ‘pending removal’ from the US, a development that came after the US and Israeli militaries began waging war on Iran in late February, in part citing an Iranian history of terrorism sponsorship.” (04/04/26)
“Since the founding generation, there has been a consistent and rational fear that the office of president was too powerful to be constrained by democratic institutions.” (04/03/26)
“The most sinister idea in modern politics has received a California jury’s endorsement, and much applause. It contradicts democracy’s foundational belief in individual agency. This concept presupposes that individuals can, in common parlance, ‘make up their minds.’ They can assemble and edit their beliefs and convictions. When this idea is diluted, government expands its ambition to curate the public’s consciousness. … The California jury weighed the claims of a now 20-year-old woman who began using YouTube at age 6 and Instagram when 9. She says her many emotional and social problems were caused not by her troubled family life but by those platforms. (Although one of her analysts said she did not talk about them.)” (04/03/26)
“The costs associated with this latest criminal war, measured in human lives; the misappropriation of national resources; and the erosion of the rule of law will only continue to mount. Yet there is also a less visible, less immediate price tag for such wars. If the history of American interventions in the region offers any guide, the full bill will likely not become apparent for months, years, or even decades. When it finally arrives, however, it will carry a familiar name: blowback.” (04/03/26)
“President Trump is seeking $1.5 trillion in [military] spending as part of the White House’s fiscal 2027 budget request, a roughly 40 percent increase from 2026 funding levels. The proposal released Friday said a base of $1.1 trillion will be specifically for the Department of Defense, while $350 billion will be requested through Congress’s budget reconciliation process for critical Administration priorities’ like more munitions and [military] industrial base expansions. It also mentions the president’s planned ‘Golden Dome’ missile defense system.” (04/03/26)
