Source: USA Today
by Rex Huppke
“Let’s take a moment to read some actual words posted on social media by the actual president of the United States of America. On Aug. 3, Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social: ‘My REAL Polling Numbers, not those made up by the Fake News Media, are the best they have ever been.’ It’s an insult to fiction to call that fiction. I’m not sure what you call something more fabricated than fiction – maybe ‘ludicriction’? – but that’s what Trump’s words are. … Trump isn’t living in reality. He’s not allowing real numbers or facts about war or struggling Americans or high food prices to permeate his bubble. He’s living in a world where everything is amazing, and he’s to thank for all of it, and any claim otherwise is fake news.” (08/04/26)
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnist/2026/08/04/trump-approval-polls-lies-truth-social/91156618007/
Source: Exiled Policy
by Jason Pye
“During a press conference yesterday, Trump had a Bush moment. An unidentified reporter asked Trump about the ‘record profits’ that Exxon and Chevron have supposedly seen. Trump complained that oil companies are ‘making too much money,’ while, in the next breath, touting himself as ‘a big free enterprise guy.’ … If Trump didn’t want oil and gas prices to rise, then he shouldn’t have started bombing Iran, the inevitable consequence of which would be to close the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint for roughly a fifth of global oil supply.” (08/04/26)
https://exiledpolicy.substack.com/p/trumps-whining-about-oil-companies
Source: Sky News [UK]
“At least 17 people have been killed and 44 injured in the latest Russian attacks targeting the Kyiv region. The number of dead continues to mount partly because of an air defence shortage in Ukraine. Speaking this morning, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that missile interceptors could have ‘saved the lives of those killed today’. … Russia’s latest attacks targeted civilian infrastructure, according to multiple voices in Ukraine, including Zelenskyy. Residential buildings, shops and warehouses were all hit. Russia said it targeted sites linked to the war effort, including warehouses storing drone components.” (08/05/26)
https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-war-latest-russia-warns-us-against-blatant-provocation-as-tanks-announcement-expected-as-soon-as-today-12541713
Source: Garrison Center
by Joel Schlosberg
“In the month celebrating 250 years of red, white and blue, Americans were seeing plenty of red — and not just as part of commemorative trifectas or midterm forecast maps.” (08/04/26)
https://thegarrisoncenter.org/archives/20786
Source: Cato Institute
“Iran: Schrodinger’s War.” (08/04/26)
https://www.cato.org/multimedia/cato-podcast/iran-schrodingers-war
Source: NBC News
“Abdul El-Sayed has won Michigan’s slugfest of a Democratic Senate primary, NBC News projects, clinching the nomination in a close race over Rep. Haley Stevens and establishing a Midwest beachhead for a progressive left on the march this midterm cycle. El-Sayed overcame a nearly $65 million onslaught of outside money and an establishment that had rallied around Stevens. Popular Gov. Gretchen Whitmer endorsed Stevens late last month — a move seen as a last-ditch effort to stop a rising El-Sayed. El-Sayed, a former public health official, goes on to face former Rep. Mike Rogers, who claimed the Republican nomination without opposition Tuesday. Their race in November is expected to be one of the most competitive in the country, and it could determine which party controls the Senate.” (08/05/26)
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/abdul-el-sayed-wins-michigans-democratic-senate-primary-notching-midwe-rcna589750
Source: Eunomia
by Daniel Larison
“The boat strikes haven’t made a dent in the flow of drugs into this country, nor was there ever any reason to believe that they would. Combating drug trafficking was the official excuse to start the killing, but it was always just an excuse. In the last ten months, the campaign has taken on a life of its own. It makes no difference to the president or Hegseth that the campaign is a failure on its own terms. They are killing these people at least in part to show their contempt for the law and to prove that they won’t be bound by it. They are testing to see how far they can go before they encounter serious opposition. There is no sign that the administration will stop killing civilians at sea unless it is forced to.” (08/04/26)
https://daniellarison.substack.com/p/a-murder-spree-without-end
Source: The Guardian [UK]
“A four-tonne piece of a discarded SpaceX rocket that has been floating in space since last year is believed to have unintentionally crashed into the moon at high speed, in a collision that poses no danger to Earth but was expected to blast out a new lunar crater. The object, the size of a building, is part of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that had launched a lunar lander from the US company Firefly Aerospace toward the moon in January 2025. The rocket body was due to hit the moon about 6.35am BST, crashing into its surface at 5,400mph (8,690 km/h). The impact was predicted to kick up a miles-long plume of lunar dust that, while illuminated by sunlight, would be difficult to spot with the naked eye from Earth.” (08/05/26)
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2026/aug/05/spacex-rocket-moon-crash-impact-falcon-9
Source: The Daily Economy
by Antón Chamberlin
“The Articles of Confederation are often remembered as a failure. But their limits on taxing and commercial power offered greater protection for economic freedom than the Constitution that replaced them.” (08/04/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/the-constitutions-forgotten-economic-tradeoffs/
Source: Reuters
“The U.S. Army has used up much of its stockpile of highly accurate long-range missiles during its five-month war with Iran, according to three people familiar with the data, raising concerns about the military’s readiness for future conflicts. The missiles are principally the Army’s surface-to-surface weapons, known as Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) and Precision Strike Missiles (PrSM). The U.S. has used ‘virtually all’ of these weapons, according to two of the sources. … The dramatic rundown in precision, long-range missiles means U.S. President Donald Trump may have to rely more on riskier, piloted bombing missions if he relaunches large-scale attacks on Iran.” (08/04/26)
https://www.reuters.com/world/us-has-used-virtually-all-its-long-range-precision-missiles-during-iran-war-2026-08-04/
