- Thursday April 23rd, 2026
- "It Is Not A Question of Who Is Right Or Wrong But What Is Right Or Wrong That Counts."
- --Geoff Metcalf
- Providing an on line Triage of the news since 1998
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World & Nation
GOP Blocks Yet Another Bid to Rein In Trump as Iran War Rolls On
Senate
Republicans voted largely in unison Wednesday to defeat yet another
Democrat-sponsored war powers resolution that would have prohibited
President Trump from continuing military operations against Iran,
according to The Hill.
The vote marked
the fifth time that Republicans have rejected an effort to rein in
Trump and bring about an end to the weeks-old conflict, The Hill
reported.
The Senate
voted 46-51 to defeat a motion to discharge the resolution from the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee, with only Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky.,
breaking ranks among Republicans to support advancing the measure,
according to The Hill.
Trump says he ordered Navy to ‘shoot and kill’ Iran mine-laying boats in Strait of Hormuz
President Trump
claimed Thursday he had ordered the US Navy to take lethal action
against Iranian mine-laying vessels attempting to obstruct trade
through the Strait of Hormuz — in another apparent blow to the recently
extended cease-fire between Washington and Tehran.
“I have ordered
the United States Navy to shoot and kill any boat, small boats though
they may be (Their naval ships are ALL, 159 of them, at the bottom of
the sea!), that is putting mines in the waters of the Strait of
Hormuz,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “There is to be no hesitation.
“Additionally,
our mine ‘sweepers’ are clearing the Strait right now. I am hereby
ordering that activity to continue, but at a tripled up level!”
Navy secretary fired after feud over Trump's 'Golden Fleet' with Pentagon leaders, including Hegseth
US forces stop, board another ship transporting oil from Iran
The Pentagon
released video Thursday showing U.S. forces carrying out "a maritime
interdiction and right-of-visit boarding of the sanctioned stateless
vessel M/T Majestic X transporting oil from Iran, in the Indian Ocean
within the INDOPACOM area of responsibility."
"We will
continue global maritime enforcement to disrupt illicit networks and
interdict vessels providing material support to Iran, wherever they
operate," the Department of War said.
"International
waters cannot be used as a shield by sanctioned actors. The Department
of War will continue to deny illicit actors and their vessels freedom
of maneuver in the maritime domain," it added.
Iran releases video purporting to show commandos seizing ships in Strait of Hormuz
Iran has released a video purportedly showing armed, masked commandos seizing two cargo vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.
The propaganda
clip was pumped out by state media Wednesday after the regime boasted
it had seized the Panama-flagged MSC Francesca and Liberia-flagged
Epaminondas vessels, just hours after the cease-fire was extended.
In the video,
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps soldiers are seen speeding toward a
container ship that had MSC emblazoned on the side before scaling a
ladder and boarding the vessel.
MN lawmaker takes action to get answers on Omar's alleged fraud ties after she skips key hearing: 'Ghosted us'
Omar did not respond to an invitation or show up to a fraud hearing in Minnesota this week
A Minnesota
Republican lawmaker is demanding answers from Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn.,
after the Democrat failed to appear at a state hearing examining her
potential connections to the sprawling pandemic-era fraud scandal.
State Rep.
Kristin Robbins, chair of the House Fraud Prevention and State Agency
Oversight Committee, sent a formal letter to Omar on April 22
criticizing her absence from a scheduled committee hearing she was
invited to and requesting extensive documentation related to the
"Feeding Our Future" investigation that has gained national attention
in recent months.
"Minnesotans
and the Members of the House Fraud Prevention & State Oversight
Committee were disappointed that you failed to appear before our
committee to answer questions," Robbins wrote in the letter, obtained
by Fox News Digital, referring to Omar’s no-show at a hearing focused
on the MEALS Act, a federal COVID-19 relief measure passed in 2020 and
sponsored by Omar.
Despite Omar’s
absence, Robbins said the committee still expects answers and is now
formally requesting records from the congresswoman’s office in addition
to several questions outlined in the letter.
Navy secretary fired after feud over Trump’s ‘Golden Fleet’ with Pentagon leaders, including Hegseth
Secretary of
the Navy John Phelan was fired Wednesday after months of feuding with
his Pentagon bosses, particularly over his handling of President
Trump’s “Golden Fleet” shipbuilding initiative.
Tensions among
Phelan, War Secretary Pete Hegseth and Deputy War Secretary Stephen
Feinberg had been simmering for months, according to the New York Times
and a Republican source.
Phelan didn’t
get along with Pentagon brass and his management and leadership style
were “incongruent” with Hegseth and Feinberg, one GOP source familiar
with the fired Navy secretary’s standing at the Pentagon told The Post.
“The
administration really wanted to accelerate the shipbuilding program
because of the president’s agenda … and the secretary seemed incapable
of accomplishing those goals, and he wasn’t well-liked,” the source
said. “When you combine incompetence with arrogance, it usually doesn’t
end well.”
How SPLC’s $520,000-per-year CEO helped turn civil rights group into a ‘partisan smear machine’
The ex-boss of
the Southern Poverty Law Center, Margaret Huang, helped oversee the
nonprofit’s shift from a respected civil rights group — into an alleged
“partisan smear machine.”
The Justice
Department indicted the group on Tuesday, alleging it paid millions to
members of hate groups to work as informants and “stoke racial hatred.”
Huang, whose
compensation totaled $522,000 in 2023, took over as President and CEO
in 2020 after the group’s co-founder, Morris Seligman Dees Jr., was
axed following accusations of sexual harassment and being “complicit”
in racial discrimination among the staff.
Senate GOP rams through blueprint to bankroll ICE, Border Patrol through end of Trump era
Schumer criticized the plan, saying nobody 'respects' ICE and Border Patrol as the GOP eyes billions in spending
Senate
Republicans pushed their immigration funding plan forward early
Thursday, adopting a budget blueprint after an all-night vote series
that sets up billions for ICE and Border Patrol while sidelining
Democrats.
Senate
Republicans adopted their budget resolution, which tees up funding for
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol, and
effectively cuts congressional Democrats out of the process entirely.
It’s the first
major step toward unlocking the budget reconciliation process, which
Republicans are diving into once again after Democrats refused to fund
ICE and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) without stringent reforms.
Trump Blasts 'Rigged' Virginia Redistricting Vote
President
Donald Trump on Wednesday blamed a "massive mail in ballot drop" for
giving Democrats a "rigged election" victory and the right to redraw
Virginia's congressional map.
Trump sharply
criticized the outcome of Tuesday's referendum, alleging that
Republicans had been leading until late-arriving ballots shifted the
result in Democrats' favor.
"All day long
Republicans were winning, the Spirit was unbelievable, until the very
end when, of course, there was a massive 'Mail In Ballot Drop!'" Trump
wrote on Truth Social, arguing the final outcome did not reflect the
will of voters.
EU Approves Massive Loan Package for Ukraine After Hungary Lifts Veto
The European
Union on Thursday approved a massive loan package to help Ukraine meet
its economic and military needs for the next two years, the bloc’s
Cypriot presidency said, after Hungary lifted its veto.
The EU also
approved a new raft of sanctions against Russia over its war on
Ukraine. The measures were prepared early this year and set to be
announced in February to mark the fourth anniversary of the conflict,
but Hungary and Slovakia opposed the move.
Hungary and
Slovakia have been locked in a feud with Ukraine since Russian oil
deliveries to the two EU countries were halted in January after a
pipeline was damaged. Ukrainian officials blamed the damage on Russian
drone attacks.
End the filibuster, pack the Court, kiss the Constitution goodbye
Adding five progressive justices would create an eight-vote bloc that could override all existing precedent
By Hugh Hewitt
The Democratic
Party wants to break the United States Senate’s legislative filibuster
in order to pack the Supreme Court with jurisprudential clones of
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who has quickly emerged as the most
radical of the nine justices. (Justice Jackson is also the most
loquacious, as Mollie Hemingway points out in her new bestseller,
"Alito: The Justice Who Reshaped the Supreme Court and Restored the
Constitution." Justice Jackson uttered 78,215 words from the bench in a
recent term. Justices Gorsuch and Kagan got the silver and bronze in
the spoken-word competition, but it wasn’t close, as they were both
around 50,000 words apiece.)
President Joe
Biden supported expanding the court to 14 members in April 2021.
Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey is one of many senators who have also
applauded the number 14. That’s no surprise, as adding five radicals to
Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor would
lock in an eight-vote bloc of justices who, after that revolution,
would simply be legislators in robes. Kiss the Constitution goodbye if
and when "the Nine" becomes "the Fourteen." Hard-left progressivism,
whatever the flavor of that day may be, will be in the saddle.
The Fifth and
14th Amendments to the Constitution guarantee every American "due
process of law." Do those guarantees stand between a left-wing Congress
and a left-wing president bent on torching the Constitution?
The left’s ‘Dignity Index’ is a weak attempt to disarm Republicans – and disguise their own hate
By Miranda Devine
The latest
effort to neuter conservatives and force Republicans to surrender comes
from a deceptively titled device called “The Dignity Index.”
The ruse is
fronted by Kennedy relative Tim Shriver, who appears on Fox News in the
guise of a perfectly reasonable moderate Democrat, the type we all wish
still existed.
His pitch is
for politicians to treat your opponents with respect, lower the
temperature of public debate and restore civility to public life.
Who could be against such laudable goals?
But who does the pitch not remind you of?
