"Trump’s presidential legacy will be littered with political failures, broken guardrails, and the normalization of lying with impunity to the American people. We can repair much of this, but the loss of our allies and the empowerment of our adversaries will be harder to fix.

And it didn’t have to be."

~ Dan Rather

#Trump #Iran #war #NATO #StraitofHormuz #oil #gas #economy
/1

https://steady.substack.com/p/bye-bye-bondi

Bye Bye Bondi

The distractions are adding up

Steady

"Was the war just another distraction from the Epstein files? Or the tariff fiasco? Or the economy as a whole? Or Minneapolis? Was the Bondi firing a hoped-for distraction from the unpopular war? We have come full circle with diversion after diversion, as a deeply flawed president continues his efforts to redirect the narrative away from his latest failures."

#Trump #Iran #war #NATO #StraitofHormuz #oil #gas #economy
/2

"The White House mistakenly uploaded Donald Trump’s remarks at an Easter lunch, which was supposed to be closed to the press, to YouTube Wednesday, before realizing its error and making the link private."

~ Hafiz Rashid

#Trump #Iran #war #NATO #StraitofHormuz #oil #gas #economy
/3

https://newrepublic.com/post/208535/white-house-accidentally-easter-lunch-trump-speech

White House Accidentally Uploads Quite a Damning Trump Speech

The White House made the video private after realizing its error.

The New Republic

"In the speech, which Business Insider’s Bryan Metzger uploaded to X in full, Trump fantasizes about being a king, admits there’s no money left for health care or childcare because of the war he started, and daydreams about seizing all of Iran’s oil."

#Trump #Iran #war #NATO #StraitofHormuz #oil #gas #economy
/4

"The war in Iran, which Israel and Saudi Arabia prosecuted for their own purposes, is a perfect example of the type of trap that someone like Trump and the idiots he surrounds himself with would fall into. Believing they know better than the people who came before them, they thought the operation would conclude as quickly as the kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro."

~ Jared Yates Sexton

#Trump #Iran #war #NATO #StraitofHormuz #oil #gas #economy #stupidity
/5

https://jaredyatessexton.substack.com/p/the-plot-is-lost-leaderless-at-the

The Plot is Lost: Leaderless at the Limits of Empire

Trump has never known what he was doing. Now, he knows even less.

Dispatches From A Collapsing State | Jared Yates Sexton

"Donald Trump last night vowed to bomb Iranians 'back to the Stone Ages, where they belong.'

That’s a phenomenally racist, crude and cruel thing to say.

But it’s also a promise to commit war crimes. It would require the mass destruction of civilian targets. …

Major news organizations are not covering this with the appropriate level of alarm or urgency."

~ Dan Froomkin

#Trump #Iran #war #StraitofHormuz #oil #gas #economy #WarCrimes #media
/6

https://criticalread.substack.com/p/are-you-ready-for-some-war-crimes

Are you ready for some war crimes?

Trump may be giving unlawful orders imminently. You’ve been warned.

Press Watch

"Stocks fell and oil prices soared, reaching $110 per barrel, on Trump’s vow 'to escalate attacks on Iran' in the words of the Associated Press. …

On Wednesday, Politico reported that the current price of oil (about $100 per barrel) is 'a baseline' for the White House."

~ John Stoehr

#Trump #Iran #war #StraitofHormuz #oil #gas #economy #markets #StockMarket
/7

https://www.editorialboard.com/trumps-lies-will-only-work-for-so-long/?ref=the-editorial-board-newsletter

Trump's lies will only work for so long

He will change the subject soon, perhaps with ground troops.

Editorial Board

"They expect it to keep going up. Politico said they are not 'ruling out the possibility of prices rising as high as $200 per barrel.' That would put the national average price of gas at around $8 (or diesel at $12). …

So far, the lies have been working. Markets have shown a stunning willingness to believe him when he says the end of the war is around the corner. But the lies may soon stop working."

#Trump #Iran #war #StraitofHormuz #oil #gas #economy #markets #StockMarket
/8

"Trump is reportedly preparing to release a fiscal year 2027 budget plan Friday built around a massive defense buildup, offset by cuts to domestic programs and health care entitlements. This tracks with what Trump said in a closed-press speech that was accidentally posted and then deleted by the White House:"

~ Ben Meiselas

#Trump #Iran #war #military #healthcare #Medicaid #Medicare #daycare
/9

https://www.meidasplus.com/p/thursday-afternoon-news-updates-bondi

Thursday Afternoon News Updates: Bondi FIRED + War Escalates — 4/2/26

Hi all, Ben here.

Meidas+

"that America simply can’t afford daycare, Medicaid, or Medicare because it’s 'fighting wars' and that money needs to go to the military."

#Trump #Iran #war #military #healthcare #Medicaid #Medicare #daycare
/10

"Almost 750 U.S. troops have been wounded or killed in the Middle East since October 2023, an analysis by The Intercept has found. But the Pentagon won’t acknowledge it."

~ Nick Turse

#Trump #Iran #war #casualties
/11

https://theintercept.com/2026/04/01/iran-war-us-casualty-numbers-trump-hegseth/

“Casualty Cover-Up”: The Pentagon Is Hiding U.S. Losses Under Trump in the Middle East

The Pentagon has sent outdated statements on the number of U.S. troops killed or wounded during the Iran War, resulting in undercounts.

The Intercept

@wdlindsy Remember how Richard Nixon signed the Environmental Protection Act into law, creating the EPA, saving the Bald Eagle from extinction, cleaning up or air and waterways (aided by the Clean Air Act, etc)? Despite all the bad he did, there was that.

Trump may be remembered for ending the fossil fuel industry and ushering in an era of renewable and environmentally friendly energy sources. He could possibly destroy the oil industry. Wouldn't that be a hoot?

@wdlindsy
Well, obviously, not on wednesday evening 🤔
@wdlindsy As of Trump hasn’t *already* committed war crimes.
@wdlindsy They want to send Iran Back to the Stone Age? Wait, I thought the US plan was to send Iran back to a pre-1945 world, the era in which no country had used nuclear weapons to kill, maime, burn, radiate & blast families.
@wdlindsy
I'm confused about this "war crimes" thing. My understanding of "crime" is that some body with jurisdiction has committed to imposing particular consequences for clearly defined bad acts. For 4 years I've heard that Russian behaviors are war crimes - but nobody seems able or willing to make consequences.
When Trump is threatening "war crimes" no one outlines for him or for us what the consequences will be.
Help me understand?