US Attorney General Pam Bondi will leave the Trump administration.

 

Pam Bondi and her replacement Todd Blanche. BBC/Getty.

US Attorney General Pam Bondi will leave the Trump administration and will be replaced by her deputy, Todd Blanche. BBC. Bondi's term had been dominated by the Jeffrey Epstein scandal, first promising the release of an "Epstein list" of clients of Epstein but then failing to deliver when no such list existed. Trump had praised her for a crackdown on crime that appears to have had results but the Epstein issue was a drag on his administration. Bondi also faced criticism from Trump for not competently prosecuting Democrats suspected of crimes. Bondi is only the third major Cabinet official to resign or be fired in Trump's 2nd term, along with Kristi Noem and Mike Waltz.

My Comment:

I've got mixed feelings on this one. There is an argument to be made that Bondi was more effective in her role than people give her credit for. After all, there was a major decrease in crime under President Trump and Bondi probably does deserve credit for it. And she has done a competent job of defending Trump's policies in court, but that could be due to the weaknesses of the cases.

Regardless, it's pretty obvious that Bondi made a massive error in how she handled to Epstein files. She made a promise that she couldn't keep and made the issue extremely damaging for the Trump administration. Her presentation that suggested the existence of a "client list" that simply didn't exist sent conspiracy theorists into a frenzy and when she couldn't deliver on that it had the appearance of a coverup. 

It was an own-goal because there really was not a client list. There were a few people that were accused of wrong doing but it was mostly figures that we already knew, like Bill Richardson, Marin Minsky, Jean-Luc Brunel and Prince Andrew. None of those cases were prosecutable and that lead to folks feeling like justice was not being done. 

This was damaging to President Trump. I get the feeling that the general public doesn't care, other than the few people out there that care about nothing else. But it did cause a few prominent Republicans to break with the President, most notable Thomas Massie and Marjorie Taylor Greene. I was never a fan of either of them, but still, it made enemies. 

Bondi was also having trouble prosecuting some prominent Democrats. Adam Schiff, James Comey and Laticia James should be awaiting trial right now, but Bondi wasn't able to secure an arrest in any of these cases. It's another point of contention with the Trump administration and the Republican base, we generally want to see these people in jail and Bondi wasn't able to get it done. 

So why did Bondi last so long? Like I said before, she did have some successes, but I am guessing it was because she was loyal to President Trump. Bondi helped to defend Trump during his 2020 impeachment and was seen as a personal friend to Trump. But that couldn't protect her forever. 

Will the United States leave NATO?

 

UK Prime Minster Kier Starmer. AP. 

President Donald Trump has stated that he is considering leaving NATO. AP. Trump has been a critic of NATO for a long time but his remarks were more explicit this time. Much of the criticism has been due to the actions of some of the European countries. Despite having some missiles launched at NATO allies like Turkey and a British base in Cyprus, much of Europe has not offered support to the conflict. Indeed, some states, such as Italy and Spain, have vetoed participation in the war and have banned US troops from operating at their bases. However, leaving NATO would be difficult due to US laws that would force leaving the alliance to go through Congress. 

My Comment:

In the short term, it's not really possible to leave NATO. Due to some laws put into place recently, President Trump is unable to unilaterally leave the alliance. He would need bipartisan support that simply doesn't exist even in his own party, let alone a Democrat party that would oppose him no matter what he does, even if it's the right thing to do. So, again, this is more about Trump venting frustration than an actual attempt to leave NATO in the short term. 

But Trump's frustration is more than justified. Europe isn't just not supporting this conflict, they are throwing monkey wrenches into it by banning use of bases. This is despite the fact that NATO allies, most notably the UK and Turkey, have come under direct attack from Iran and that NATO members outside of the United States benefit a lot more from what we are doing in Iran that we do. 

Indeed, Iran was pretty close to being able to threaten the capitals of much of Europe. I still don't think they were that close to nuclear weapons, but even a conventional ballistic attack on Europe's capitals would have been dangerous. If Iran had been able to create a nuclear weapon, after all North Korea was, all of Europe would have been threatened and we would have had a much more dangerous and high stakes conflict compared to the rather anemic one we have today. 

And they are also demanding that we open the Strait of Hormuz for them. We don't really benefit from that directly, and there would be actual risk there compared to the rest of the conflict, it would lower energy prices and ease some of the pain at the pump, but we are energy independent and not only have our own oil but Venezuela's as well. NATO doesn't have either and are refusing to buy oil from us as well. 

And it's not like we have asked Europe to do much. Indeed, Canada is off the hook here just because they supported the mission with words and not actions. All NATO had to do is let us use there bases and offer some words of support and they couldn't even do that. And it's threatening the alliance. 

Though the alliance was in trouble in the first place. The Russia-Ukraine war is a large part of it. Europe has largely depleted their weapons and bankrupted their economies in a war that is no longer necessary. Indeed, our goal now is to end the war and normalize relations with Russia. And, as critical as I am of Ukraine I have to note that they have done more to help in Iran than most of NATO, at this point I'd rather ally with them and Russia (were such a thing possible) than NATO. 

But the real problem is this question. Does it make sense to ally with people that don't have a future? As far as I can see it, much of Europe doesn't, and the US government agrees with me. Instead of focusing on their economy or military, they focused on social programs. Indeed, I am not impressed with much of NATO's military, again, Ukraine is a lot better than the majority and only Turkey, Poland and maybe France, are going to be useful in a military conflict. The UK is a joke and much of the rest are just as bad off. 

Immigration though is the elephant in the room. Europe brought in millions of military aged males in the last decade and its going to permanently change their demographics and future. It's to the point where I don't think they can make them leave without a conflict and I think that conflict is coming soon. I don't think Europe is going to be able to integrate their millions of Muslims the way America is able to do so with our immigrants and that means that NATO is likely doomed long term...