The negotiations about the proposed cease fire in the Iran war are expected to begin soon, but meanwhile the news in the U.S. is suddenly filled with scandalous stories.
Yesterday, Dakinikat wrote about Melania Trump’s mysterious announcement to the White House press; I have a bit more context to add to that. Then last night the news about serious accusations of sexual misconduct by Eric Swalwell broke. There’s also news about Kristy Noem’s husband and his identity crisis.
I’ll get to those items, but I want to begin with a feel-good story for once.
HOUSTON (AP) — Artemis II’s astronauts closed out humanity’s first lunar voyage in more than half a century with a Pacific splashdown on Friday, blazing new records near the moon with grace and joy.
It was a dramatic grand finale to a mission that revealed not only swaths of the lunar far side never seen before by human eyes, but a total solar eclipse and a parade of planets, most notably our own shimmering Earth against the endless black void of space.
With their flight now complete, the four astronauts have set NASA up for a moon landing by another crew in just two years and a full-blown moon base within the decade.
The triumphant moon-farers — commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Canada’s Jeremy Hansen — emerged from their bobbing capsule into the sunlight off the coast of San Diego.
In a scene reminiscent of NASA’s Apollo moonshots of yesteryear, military helicopters hoisted the astronauts one by one from an inflatable raft docked to the capsule, hauling them aboard for the short trip to the Navy’s awaiting recovery ship, the USS John P. Murtha.
“These were the ambassadors from humanity to the stars that we sent out there right now, and I can’t imagine a better crew,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said from the recovery ship.
NASA’s Mission Control erupted in celebration, with hundreds pouring in from the back support rooms. “We did it,” NASA’s Lori Glaze rejoiced at a news conference. “Welcome to our moonshot.”
Read more at the AP link.
Now for the feel-disgusted news about Eric Swalwell. Based on what I’ve read, it’s surprising that this didn’t come out sooner. Apparently, he’s been DM young women, sending dick picks, and sexually assaulting women for years.
A former staffer of Rep. Eric Swalwell, a leading Democratic candidate for California governor, says that the congressman raped her when she was heavily intoxicated and left her bruised and bleeding, an allegation Swalwell strongly denies.
“I was pushing him off of me, saying no,” the woman told CNN of the incident, which she said happened in 2024 after she had stopped working in Swalwell’s office. “He didn’t stop.”
By Francesca Strino
She said it was the second time Swalwell had nonconsensual sexual contact with her while she was drunk. In 2019, when she was still working for him, she said she woke up naked with him in a hotel room after a night of heavy drinking. She said she had no memory of what happened but could feel physically that they’d had sexual contact.
Three other women who spoke with CNN also alleged various kinds of sexual misconduct by the Democratic congressman – including Swalwell sending them unsolicited explicit messages or nude photos.
One woman who connected online with Swalwell over her interest in Democratic politics says she ended up extremely drunk inside his hotel room after a night out with the congressman, with little memory of what occurred. Earlier in the night at a bar, he kissed her and touched her leg without her consent, she said.
Another woman, who described receiving unsolicited nude messages from Swalwell, was social media creator Ally Sammarco. She said she initially reached out to the congressman on Twitter to discuss politics. “I truly never thought he would respond – I had like 1,000 followers at the time,” she said. “And he actually responded.”
Swalwell denied the women’s allegations.
“These allegations are false and come on the eve of an election against the front-runner for governor,” Swalwell said in a statement to CNN. “For nearly 20 years, I have served the public – as a prosecutor and a congressman and have always protected women. I will defend myself with the facts and where necessary bring legal action. My focus in the coming days is to be with my wife and children and defend our decades of service against these lies.”
I don’t think that’s going to work. These are not subtle accusations, and the women told others about their experiences at the time. Sammarco saved the messages she got from Swallwell. A bit more from CNN:
One member of Swalwell’s staff said they quit immediately after receiving CNN’s detailed list of questions about the allegations.
CNN found corroboration for key elements of each of the women’s claims, including the former staffer who said she was sexually assaulted. Two family members and a friend said in interviews with CNN that she told them about the alleged 2024 assault in the following days, and CNN also reviewed text messages she sent two friends describing her allegations at the same time. “I was sexually assaulted on Thursday,” she wrote to one of her friends, adding: “By Eric.”
The woman also shared medical records related to her receiving STD and pregnancy testing after the alleged assault.
For the woman who connected online with Swalwell over Democratic politics, a family member and two friends confirmed she told them last year about the incident where she ended up intoxicated in his hotel room. CNN also reviewed messages between her and Swalwell, including a photo he sent her that matches footage of him during a CNN interview in her city on the night they met in person.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi headlined a growing list of Democratic lawmakers called on Rep. Eric Swalwell Friday to withdraw his campaign for California governor amid allegations of sexual misconduct.
Lily Walton with Raminou, 1922, by Suzanne Valadon
“This extremely sensitive matter must be appropriately investigated with full transparency and accountability,” Pelosi said in a statement. “As I discussed with Congressman Swalwell, it is clear that is best done outside of a gubernatorial campaign.”
In a joint statement with other elected House Democratic leaders, Jeffries called for a “swift investigation” as well as the end of his pending campaign.
“This is unacceptable of anyone — certainly not an elected official — and must be taken seriously,” the leaders said.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported Friday that a former congressional aide accused the congressman of two sexual encounters without her consent, beginning in 2019. CNN later reported that four women allege that Swalwell has committed sexual misconduct, including one former staffer who accuses Swalwell of rape….
Key backers of Swalwell’s governor bid swiftly revoked their support after the Chronicle’s story was published, including Reps. Jimmy Gomez (D-Calif.) and Adam Gray (D-Calif.), who served as campaign co-chairs.
“Today’s reports about Eric Swalwell’s conduct while in office are deeply disturbing,” Gray said in a statement. “Harassment, abuse, and violence of any sort are unacceptable. Given these serious allegations, I am withdrawing my support and Eric Swalwell should end his campaign immediately.”
But nothing underscored the peril for Swalwell’s nearly two-decade political career as vividly as Pelosi’s statement. The former speaker included Swalwell in her inner circle of favored Democratic members for years, tapping him for junior leadership roles and to serve as a manager in Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial in 2021.
Read the rest at the link.
The Melania Trump story might have stayed on social media if she hadn’t decided to make a public statement at the lectern that is supposed to be reserved for the POTUS. But it’s out there now, and she will have to deal with it.
Last June, the man credited with introducing President Trump to his wife asked the administration for a favor.
Paolo Zampolli, a former modeling agent turned presidential special envoy, had learned that his Brazilian ex-girlfriend was in a Miami jail, arrested on charges of fraud at her workplace. They had been in a custody battle over their teenage son. Now he saw an opportunity.
Eduard Manet, Woman with a Cat, 1880
He reached out to a top official at Immigration and Customs Enforcement, explaining that his ex was in the country illegally, according to records obtained by The New York Times and a person familiar with the communications. Could she be put in ICE detention? That could help him get his son back.
The official, David Venturella, promptly called the agency’s Miami office to ensure that ICE agents would pick up the woman from the jail before she was released on bail, according to the records and a person with knowledge of the conversation who requested anonymity to discuss it. During the call, Mr. Venturella noted that the case was important to someone close to the White House.
The woman, Amanda Ungaro, was placed in ICE custody and ultimately deported, an outcome that may well have happened regardless of Mr. Zampolli’s meddling. But the ICE official’s willingness to spring into action for a Trump ally — even one in a low-level, largely ceremonial role — reflects a recurring theme of the second Trump administration: The levers of the federal government can be pulled to settle a personal score.
I read this story when it was published, but I didn’t make the connections I should have.
Amanda Ungaro is on X AKA Twitter, and she is fighting back. If you have access, you can read the many tweets she has been sending to Melania.
Melania is apparently sensitive about how she came to the U.S. In fact Zampolli is the one who brought her here and got her an H1-B visa. When she first arrived, she moved into a building occupied by other models who worked for Zampolli’s agency. It looks like Melania has really stepped in it. The Epstein files are back in the news.
The First Lady’s unprecedented public statement about Jeffrey Epstein yesterday raised a lot of questions about what, if anything, is about to be revealed about Donald and Melania Trump’s relationship with the late sex trafficker.
The Epstein case had quieted down in the wake of Trump’s decision to attack Iran — some critics allege that was one of Trump’s goals in launching a war in the first place — to cool the MAGA furor over DOJ’s inept release of the Epstein files.
Now it seems that plan, if true, has led to a Jack-In-The-Beanstalk effect — as in trading a cow for beans and climbing into danger without really thinking it through.
Because there is another story that I admit I missed when it ran in the New York Times a few weeks ago.
It appears that the Trump administration may have targeted Zampolli’s ex-girlfriend, a former Brazilian model named Amanda Ungaro, deporting her back to Brazil amid her custody battle with Zampolli over their teenage son.
As the NYT’s story notes: “The levers of the federal government can be pulled to settle a personal score.”
Self-Portrait with a Cat, created by Frida Konstantin
In this case, the score involved Paolo Zampolli, a former modeling agent who was appointed last year by Trump as special envoy for “global partnerships,” which allows him to travel the world to advance trade and other partnerships with the U.S.
Just days ago, he was in Hungary with Vice President Vance, supporting the re-election of Prime Minister Viktor Orban, an effort to publicly back the right-wing leader in the days running up to the election.
Zampolli, 56, was in Epstein’s orbit around the time that Trump met Melania in 1998. He was also friends with Epstein, as the two entertained a business deal over buying a modeling agency.
And Zampolli’s name is in the Epstein Files, with Epstein noting in one email that he was “trouble.”
Still all the drama surrounding Zampolli’s custody battle with his estranged girlfriend didn’t connect any dots, at least not for me, until the First Lady’s speech yesterday.
President Trump said Friday that he had known his wife wanted to speak about Jeffrey Epstein at some point, and that he “thought she had a right to talk about it,” even if he had not known what exactly she planned to say.
“It doesn’t bother me,” Mr. Trump said in a brief telephone interview, referring to the remarks Melania Trump made from the entrance hall of the White House a day earlier.
“I didn’t know what the statement was,” he said, “but I knew she was going to make a statement.”
The first lady’s comments certainly came as a surprise to many other people who work in the White House, according to two officials familiar with the situation who asked for anonymity to discuss the matter. It was not clear why she had chosen that moment to talk about Mr. Epstein. Absent any explanation, questions and feverish conspiracy theories swirled.
The president said his wife had been agonizing for a long time over her press coverage and rumors connecting her to Mr. Epstein. What was particularly upsetting to her, Mr. Trump explained, was one theory positing that it was Mr. Epstein who introduced her to her future husband. In her remarks on Thursday, Mrs. Trump recounted the story of meeting Mr. Trump “by chance at a New York City party in 1998.” She said she did not encounter Mr. Epstein for the first time until two years after that.
“She finds it very insulting,” Mr. Trump said of the rumors. “And I said, ‘If you want to do that, you can do that.’ I said if she wants to do it — I didn’t recommend it, but I said, I let it be her, I said, if you want to do it. …”
He added, “She didn’t meet me through Jeffrey Epstein. And I could understand her feelings. But I said, ‘If you want to do it, do it.’”
He would not say when exactly he had this discussion with the first lady, but said that “it wasn’t a big discussion. I’d say it lasted for about two minutes. I had no problem. I thought she actually did a good job.”
He’s lying, obviously. I doubt if she told him. Now she has revived interest in the Epstein files and Trump can’t be happy about that.
The Black Cat, by Carl Wilhelm Wilhelmson , 1922, Swedish, 1866-1928
The last scandal for today–the Kristi Noem story. The story was originally in the Daily Mail, but it’s behind a paywall.
Kristi Noem’s husband, Bryon Noem, has pushed back on a report that he insulted his wife in phone calls and online messages with a dominatrix and expressed a desire to become a woman.
Bryon Noem told The Independent the claims in the report were “not all true.” He did not elaborate when asked for more information.
The 56-year-old was reported to have been in an on-off relationship online with Shy Sotomayor, a 30-year-old sex worker known as Raelynn Riley, since 2016, she claimed in an interview with the Daily Mail, published Friday.
It is the latest in a series of exposés on the husband of the recently ousted Homeland Security Secretary, who has been keeping a low profile since the story broke last week.
Sotomayor shared recordings of phone calls and screenshots of messages she said she exchanged with Bryon Noem, where he said she was “so much better” than his wife. He also expressed wanting to transition to become a woman, the messages showed.
In one recent message, the South Dakota insurance boss said he wanted to change his name to Crystal “so bad,” and that he wanted plastic surgery. “I want to be your trans bimbo b****,” the messages showed.
The outlet linked Bryon Noem’s telephone number to the messages with Sotomayor, and it also corresponded to an email address under the pseudonym “Chrystalballz666.”
The messages reportedly from Bryon Noem appear in stark contrast to Kristi Noem’s opposition to transgender rights. As South Dakota governor, she signed an exclusionary bill to ban surgical and non-surgical gender-affirming treatments for children in the state, and barred transgender girls and women from playing on women’s sports teams.
Read the rest at The Independent.
There’s no news on the Iran talks yet, so I’ll end this with two disturbing Iran stories:
Iran has been unable to open the Strait of Hormuz to more shipping traffic because it cannot locate all of the mines it laid in the waterway and lacks the capability to remove them, according to U.S. officials.
The development is one reason Iran has not been able to quickly comply with the Trump administration’s admonitions to let more traffic pass through the strait. It is also potentially a complicating factor as Iranian negotiators and a U.S. delegation led by Vice President JD Vance meet in Pakistan this weekend for peace talks.
Woman with a cat, Pierre Bonnard
Iran used small boats to mine the strait last month, soon after the United States and Israel began their war against the country. The mines, plus the threat of Iranian drone and missile attacks, slowed the number of oil tankers and other vessels passing through the strait to a trickle, driving up energy prices and providing Iran with its best leverage in the war.
Iran left a path through the strait open, allowing ships that pay a toll to pass through.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps has issued warnings that ships could collide with sea mines, and semiofficial news organizations have published charts showing safe routes.
Those routes are limited in large part because Iran mined the strait haphazardly, U.S. officials said. It is not clear that Iran recorded where it put every mine. And even when the location was recorded, some mines were placed in a way that allowed them to drift or move, according to the officials.
As with land mines, removing nautical mines is far more difficult than placing them. The U.S. military lacks robust mine removal capabilities, relying on littoral combat ships equipped with mine sweeping capabilities. Iran also does not have the capability of quickly removing mines, even the ones it planted.
One of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s main defenses of the U.S. decision to negotiate a controversial ceasefire with Iran is that its ballistic missile program has been “functionally destroyed.”
But that claim has now been shot down by U.S. intelligence assessments, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
“Iran still has thousands of ballistic missiles in its arsenal that it could use by retrieving launchers from underground storage areas, according to American officials familiar with U.S. intelligence assessments,” said the report. “The assessments come as the U.S. is working to cement a cease-fire that would fully open the Strait of Hormuz and also insulate Iran, American troops and states in the region from further attacks. Some American officials said they are concerned that Iran will use the break in fighting to reconstitute some of its missile arsenal.”
The conflict has taken a toll on Iran, with around half of its missile stockpile lost, the assessment found — but “it retains thousands of medium- and short-range ballistic missiles that could be pulled out of hiding or retrieved from underground sites, said U.S. and Israeli officials.”
This comes as even a number of Republican and conservative analysts are crying foul about the terms of the ceasefire, which appear one-sidedly in favor of Iran.
That’s it for me today. I guess it’s okay to focus on salacious stuff on the weekend. Happy Caturday!
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So, let’s start with Melania Dearest, who insists she had no ties to Jeffrey Epstein, even though she was not under oath to tell the truth, you have to wonder if a Congressional Committee will ask for a repeat performance.. William Kristol, writing at The Bulwark, suggests she threw hubby under the bus. “What Melania Didn’t Say.”
Standing behind a podium bearing the presidential seal, speaking at the White House Cross Hall where so many presidents have addressed weighty matters of state, and where her husband last week spoke to the nation about Iran, the first lady read a six-minute statement about her and Jeffrey Epstein.
Melania’s focus was on . . . Melania. She began, “The lies linking me with the disgraceful Jeffrey Epstein need to end today.” Her purpose, she said, was to defend “my reputation,” to clear “my good name.” (Emphasis mine.)
And so she asserted that “I have never been friends with Epstein” and that “I . . . was never on Epstein’s plane.” She also claimed that “My email reply to [Epstein’s imprisoned accomplice Ghislaine] Maxwell cannot be categorized as anything more than casual correspondence.1My polite reply to her email doesn’t amount to anything more than a trivial note.”
Left unsaid, but not unimplied, was that none of these claims could be made about her husband. He was a pal of Epstein’s. He was on Epstein’s plane. His relationship with Epstein, as exemplified for example in his contribution to Epstein’s birthday book, was more than “casual” or “trivial.”
Melania also chose to express concern for Epstein’s victims, something her husband has conspicuously not done.
And she went on to say that
Now is the time for Congress to act. Epstein was not alone. Several prominent male executives resigned from their powerful positions after this matter became widely politicized. Of course, this doesn’t amount to guilt, but we still must work openly and transparently to uncover the truth.
So the Epstein investigation is not, as her husband has asserted, a “hoax.” Nor is it yet time, as her husband has said, to move on. The truth hasn’t yet been uncovered, and we need to uncover it. And if doing so leads more “prominent male executives” to resign, so be it. One wonders: Could Melania have one prominent male chief executive in mind?
Melania chose not to include in her statement any assertion of her husband’s innocence of complicity in the Epstein affair.
Melania is perhaps not a deep thinker, but she’s no fool. Since immigrating to the United States three decades ago, Melania Knauss has done well for herself. She’s shown that she has a shrewd sense of how to operate in her adopted country. She’s risen to the top, while mostly avoiding being directly engulfed in all the scandals that have raged around her.
There is surely a lot of evidence suggesting she knew him well. But, with the Iran War being waged like a lethal version of mud wrestling, let’s see if the due diligence will be done by the press. This topic really skates on Slut Slamming, but it’s hard to cover earnestly. Emptywheel has an interesting story on the mostly out-of-view First Lady. “Melania’s Immigration Witness, Paolo Zampolli, Asked to Get His Baby Mama Deported.” I wonder if she’s worthy of any Congressional questions.
The biggest denial may be this one:
I met my husband by chance at the [sic] New York City party in 1998. This initial encounter with my husband is documented in a detailed [sic] in my book, Melania.
The entire stunt seemed like a response to Michael Wolff. After all, when Melania listed the people who’ve had to retract claims — James Carville, The Daily Beast, and Harper Collins, in conjunction with a biography of the Andrew formerly known as Prince — she did not mention Wolff (or Hunter Biden), whom she has been threatening to sue for some time, with whom she has been stuck in litigation for months.
She has threatened Wolff in the past, who has made claims about how she met Trump, whether Epstein had fucked Melania before Donald did, and whether Donald and Melania first fucked on his plane. But thus far that litigation remains pending, and she didn’t mention him (or Hunter Biden, whom she also threatened to sue) in this appearance.
Wolff has many recordings about what Epstein told Wolff, whether Epstein’s claims were true or not.
But I’m more interested in another detail.
Melania cites her own book for the definitive account of how she met Donald (she has done this in past lawsuits).
Why would she do that? She has a witness to some of this: Paolo Zampolli, the agent who imported her on the same Einstein visa scam as Epstein used for his victims.
Zampolli not only remains in the Trump circle, but he flew to Hungary to do errands for Russia with JD Vance this week.
…
Epstein survivors had plenty to say about the performance. This is from The Guardian. Shrai Popat has the story. “Survivors of Epstein’s abuse accuse Melania Trump of ‘shifting burden’ onto victims, Outrage from survivors follows first lady’s statement calling on Congress to hold public hearings with victims of Epstein’s abuse.”
More than a dozen survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse have accused Melania Trump of “shifting the burden” onto them after she called on Congress to hold public hearings with victims of Epstein’s abuse.
“Survivors of Jeffrey Epstein have already shown extraordinary courage by coming forward, filing reports, and giving testimony,” said a group of 13 people and the brother and sister of the late Virginia Giuffre, who was one of the most vocal Epstein accusers, in a statement. “Asking more of them now is a deflection of responsibility not justice.”
Their response came after the first lady delivered a surprise statement in which she said denied that she ever had a relationship with Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell. She also said that she was not a victim of Epstein, had no knowledge of his crimes, and said that the late convicted sex offender did not introduce her to her husband, Donald Trump.
“The lies linking me with the disgraceful Jeffrey Epstein need to end today,” she said, adding that “numerous fake images and statements about Epstein and me have been calculating [sic] on social media for years now”.
It remains unclear what specific accusations prompted her remarks. Her senior adviser, Marc Beckman, told Reuters that she “spoke out now because enough is enough. The lies must stop”.
During her statement, the first lady also urged Congress to hold public hearings and take sworn testimony from survivors of Epstein’s crimes.
In their statement on Thursday evening, the group of Epstein survivors said the first lady “is now shifting the burden onto survivors under politicized conditions that protect those with power: the Department of Justice, law enforcement, prosecutors, and the Trump administration, which has still not fully complied with the Epstein Files Transparency Act”.
“It also diverts attention from Pam Bondi, who must answer for withheld files and the exposure of survivors’ identities,” they said. “Those failures continue to put lives at risk while shielding enablers.”
“Survivors have done their part,” the statement concluded. “Now it’s time for those in power to do theirs.”
It appears that the majority of the country is suffering under the impact of the Iran War. CNBC’s Jeff Cox has this headline. “Consumer sentiment hits record low, inflation fears rise amid Iran war.”
Consumer confidence plunged to a record low in April as fears mounted over rising energy prices and the broader impact of the Iran war, according to a University of Michigan survey Friday.
The university’s headline index of consumer sentiment tumbled to 47.6, down 10.7% from the March survey to its lowest on record. Current conditions and expectations indexes also saw double-digit monthly declines.
The drop in sentiment coincided with a sharp spike in inflation expectations, with respondents seeing prices up 4.8% in a year from now, a full percentage point rise from the March reading to its highest since August 2025. The one-year outlook in April 2025 was 6.5% following President Donald Trump’s “liberation day” tariff announcement.
Survey comments “show that many consumers blame the Iran conflict for unfavorable changes to the economy,” said the survey’s director, Joanne Hsu.
However, Hsu also noted that most of the interviews were completed before the April 7 ceasefire. The survey, then, primarily reflects conditions from March.
“Economic expectations will likely improve after consumers gain confidence that the supply disruptions stemming from the Iran conflict have ended and gas prices have moderated,” she said.
The ceasefire President Donald J. Trump announced Tuesday night fell apart almost immediately. Israel complained that it hadn’t been consulted, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted Israel did not accept an end to its bombardment of southern Lebanon as a way to dislodge Iran-backed Hezbollah militants. Steven Scheer of Reuters noted today that Israel has been under a state of emergency that halted the work of the judicial system, but with the end of the war, Netanyahu’s trial for corruption is scheduled to begin again on Saturday.
Iran has been permitting certain ships to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, but responded to Israel’s continued bombing by closing the strait again.
Vice President J.D. Vance said there was a “legitimate misunderstanding” about whether the ceasefire included Lebanon. “We never made that promise,” he said. But in fact, Pakistani prime minister Shehbaz Sharif, who posted the terms of the ceasefire on Tuesday, noted that the agreement did include a ceasefire in Lebanon. He tagged Vance in the post.
As more information about the achievement of the ceasefire became known, it reflected poorly on Trump. Humza Jilani, Abigail Hauslohner, and Demetri Sevastopulo of the Financial Times reported yesterday that while Trump claimed Iran was begging for a deal to end hostilities, it was actually the Trump administration that was pushing Pakistan to broker a deal with Iran. Tyler Pager and Katie Rogers of the New York Times reported that the White House was helping to craft Sharif’s social media statements, suggesting Trump “was actively looking for a way out of the crisis” as his own imposed deadline drew closer on Tuesday evening.
Although Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth claims the U.S. has had a “historic and overwhelming victory” that achieved “every single objective,” David S. Cloud of the Wall Street Journal wrote yesterday that Iran saw the ceasefire as a “triumph” because it had survived a 38-day barrage from the United States and Israel and because it had gained control over the Strait of Hormuz, inflicting deep damage on the U.S. economy. Iran claimed the U.S. had suffered “an undeniable, historic, and crushing defeat.” Iran’s new leadership is even more anti-Western than the previous leadership, killed in the early days of the U.S.-Israeli strikes.
Yesterday the president posted his own interpretation of the terms of the agreement, but they were aspirational and asked for Iran to agree to terms that were less advantageous for the U.S. than the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that President Barack Obama negotiated in 2015 and Trump tore up in 2018.
The actual terms of the ceasefire agreement were murky. On Wednesday, Iran released its version of the points of the agreement; the White House said those points weren’t the basis for the ceasefire.
Also yesterday, Trump suggested the U.S. was considering joining the Iranians in demanding tolls for ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz. “We’re thinking of doing it as a joint venture. It’s a way of securing it,” he told journalist Jonathan Karl. But today Trump posted: “There are reports that Iran is charging fees to tankers going through the Hormuz Strait—They better not be and, if they are, they better stop now!” Hours later, he added: “Iran is doing a very poor job, dishonorable some would say, of allowing Oil to go through the Strait of Hormuz. That is not the agreement we have!”
I’d like to think I have the vocabulary to describe how I feel about all these idiotic, powerplay antics, but I really don’t. We are clearly dealing with people who don’t have a clue and don’t care to understand our democratic republic. This article from The Guardian blew me away. “Pete Hegseth’s holy war: the militant Christian theology animating the US attack on Iran.” This article deserves a full read from us. We should never forget Hegseth’s weird diatribe.
Nine months and six days before a Tomahawk missile tore through the gaily decorated classrooms of the Shajareh Tayyebeh elementary school in Minab, Iran, ripping apart the bodies of schoolchildren, teachers, and parents, US defense secretary Pete Hegseth’s personal pastor delivered a sermon at the Pentagon.
“There’s a temptation to think that you’re actually in control and responsible for final outcomes, especially for those who issue the commands and do the aiming and the shooting,” preached Brooks Potteiger, Hegseth’s closest spiritual adviser, at the first of what have become monthly Christian worship services at the Department of Defense. “But you are not ultimately in charge of the world.”
Citing a verse from Matthew 10, Potteiger told the gathered leaders of the US military: “If our Lord is sovereign even over the sparrow’s fallings, you can be assured that he is sovereign over everything else that falls in this world, including Tomahawk and Minuteman missiles …
“Jesus has the final say over all of it.”
The available evidence and a preliminary investigation by the US military all suggest that the US was responsible for the 28 February school bombing that killed more than 175 people, most of them children, but neither Donald Trump nor Hegseth has taken any responsibility, nor have they expressed any remorse.
Instead, Hegseth has persisted in framing the war in Iran, which reached a temporary ceasefire on Tuesday after six weeks of fighting, as divinely sanctioned, repeatedly invoking “God’s almighty providence” and expressing surety that God is on the side of the US military. Amid boasts about the US’s superior firepower and theatrical disdain for “stupid rules of engagement”, the defense secretary has promised to give “no quarter” to the “barbaric savages” of the Iranian regime and called on the American people to pray for victory “in the name of Jesus Christ”.
Hegseth’s distinct combination of piety and bloodlust was most prominently on display at the 25 March worship service at the Pentagon, the first since the war in Iran began, when he prayed for “overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy”. The prayer was so shocking that it appears to have provoked a direct rebuke from Pope Leo, who preached on Palm Sunday that God ignores the prayers of those whose “hands are full of blood” from making war.
Hegseth will hardly mind harsh words from the head of the Catholic church, however. The 45-year-old US army veteran and former Fox News host is a member of an obscure, deeply Calvinist wing of evangelical Christianity – John Calvin broke from the Catholic church during the 16th-century Protestant Reformation – that rejects the pope’s authority and is rooted in a belief in predestination.
“They believe that nothing happens that isn’t in God’s will,” said Julie Ingersoll, a professor of religious studies at the University of North Florida, who researches this branch of Reformed Christianity. “They believe that God directs everything that happens.”
Even a bomb falling on an elementary school full of children?
I really just want to cry.
Have a good and peaceful weekend. Try not to give up hope.
What’s on your Reading, Action, and Blogging list today?
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Did the Pentagon actually threaten the Vatican and hint at establishing a counter papacy like the Avignon papacy of the 1300s?Why not? The United States is acting like a bandit power from the middle ages. The Pope has got the bandit's number. http://www.mediaite.com/media/news/p…
Following Pope Leo’s “state of the world” address this past January, the Pentagon invited Holy See ambassador to the U.S. Cardinal Christophe Pierre for a meeting. The move was characterized as “unprecedented” in the report, as “there is no public evidence of any Vatican official ever taking a meeting at the Pentagon.”
There, U.S. officials expressed their disapproval of the Pope’s speech. The report continued:
According to both Vatican and U.S. officials briefed on the meeting, Pentagon brass picked apart the pontiff’s January speech, reading it as a hostile message directed at Trump’s policies. What particularly enraged the Pentagon, one Vatican official said, was the passage in which Leo appeared to challenge the Donroe Doctrine—Trump’s update of the Monroe Doctrine, which asserts unchallenged American dominion over the Western Hemisphere.
In his speech, the Pope declared: “A diplomacy that promotes dialogue and seeks consensus among all parties is being replaced by a diplomacy based on force, by either individuals or groups of allies.”
At one point in the meeting, the report said, one U.S. official made mention of the Avignon Papacy of the 14th century. During this time, the French Crown used its military power to influence the papacy.
The pope is refusing to come to Trump’s Fourth of July trailer park bash…
Instead, on July 4, 2026, the American pope will visit Lampedusa, a tiny island in the Mediterranean that serves as a gateway for North African migrants risking everything to reach Europe. No pope has ever been more aware of what that date means, and Leo is too deliberate to have chosen July 4 by accident.
One Vatican official put it bluntly: “The Pope may well never visit the United States under this administration.”
Good.
Always exciting to see the Avignon Papacy in the news
Yesterday morning Trump threatened to wipe out Iran’s civilization beginning at 8:00 last night–the deadline he had set for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz. Here’s what he posted on Truth Social:
“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” he wrote. “I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS?”
The obvious implication was that he would use nuclear weapons. Of course it turned out to be another Taco Tuesday, as Trump backed down and the White House dictated a ceasefire agreement to Pakistan and then Trump said that Iran’s 10-point plan was a good starting point for negotiations.
*many people are saying* it sure looks like the White House wrote this for Pakistan’s PM, who posted it then quickly deleted the top part 😬
According to state media, Iran will only accept the war’s conclusion once details are finalised in line with a 10-point peace plan reportedly submitted to the White House via Pakistani intermediaries.
The list of 10 points, published by Iranian state media, include a number of conditions the US has rejected in the past. The plan requires:
The lifting of all primary and secondary sanctions on Iran.
Continued Iranian control over the strait of Hormuz.
US military withdrawal from the Middle East.
An end to attacks on Iran and its allies.
The release of frozen Iranian assets.
A UN security council resolution making any deal binding.
That certainly doesn’t sound like a great starting point for Trump. At the moment, Iran is still collecting tolls for ships to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, and they are demanding that the U.S. close all military bases in the Middle East, plus they want compensation for losses from the war and the return of frozen assets going back to the George W. Bush administration.
Iran, the United States and Israel agreed to a two-week ceasefire on Tuesday, an 11th-hour deal that headed off U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash a bombing campaign that would destroy Iranian civilization. Hours after the announcement, Iran and Gulf Arab countries reported new attacks Wednesday, though it was not clear if the strikes would scuttle the deal.
All sides have presented vastly different versions of the terms. Iran said the deal would allow it to formalize its new practice of charging ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz. Trump said the U.S. would work with Iran to remove buried enriched uranium, though Iran did not confirm that.
Pakistan and others said fighting would pause in Lebanon, which Israel has invaded to fight the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said early Wednesday that the deal doesn’t cover fighting against Hezbollah.Israeli strikes hit several dense commercial and residential areas in central Beirut Wednesday afternoon without warning, killing dozens and wounding hundreds of people.
The ceasefire may formalize a system of charging fees in the Strait of Hormuz that Iran instituted — and give it a new source of revenue. Iranian attacks and threats deterred many commercial ships from passing through the waterway, through which 20% of all traded oil and natural gas passes in peacetime.
Good Wednesday morning. This is Jack Blanchard, still slowly exhaling. It’s Day One of the ceasefire in Iran. Get in touch.
In today’s Playbook …
— The war in Iran is on hold for now. So who wins the peace? [….]
WHAT DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES: “A big day for World Peace!” Trump trumpeted on Truth Social at 12:01 a.m., a mere 16 hours after threatening to erase an entire civilization off the face of the planet. Iran has “had enough” of war, Trump said, and “so has everyone else.” Plenty of people will be nodding along with that.
So let the good times roll: “There will be lots of positive action!” Trump predicted. “Big money will be made. Iran can start the reconstruction process … This could be the Golden Age of the Middle East!!!” You don’t need to read too far past the hyperbole to get the crucial point: “Two-week” ceasefire or no, Trump is already moving on.
And let’s be clear: Given the unpopularity of this war in America, the devastating impact on oil prices, the rapidly worsening global economic outlook and Trump’s looming May 14 summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, it’s hard to imagine Trump reviving his bombing campaign. Oil prices have already plummeted below $100 a barrel following the ceasefire announcement. Stock markets are surging. He’s not going to want to go back.
So brace yourselves for the White House comms blitz. Your zone is about to be flooded with Trump world messages that America won the war, even before this two-week negotiation gets underway. This is “total and complete victory,” Trump told the AFP last night. “100 percent. No question about it.” It’s the first of what will surely be many “exclusive” calls with journalists today….
But here’s the problem: This “total victory” narrative looks tough to sell. Clearly these past few weeks have been painful for Tehran, and Hegseth and Caine will rattle off an astonishing number of military targets that U.S. and Israeli missiles flattened. But is the regime actually worse off?
The charge sheet: Iran’s leadership structures remain intact. Its hard-liners now have total control. Sanctions have been lifted, for now. Missiles can be rebuilt. The enriched uranium remains in Iran. And the discovery that even the full force of the American military cannot prevent Iran from turning one of the world’s most important shipping lanes into a de facto parking lot — with a hefty pay-to-leave barrier — will not be quickly forgotten.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi
Strait talking: Crucially, the ceasefire statement from Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi last night — reposted in full by Trump on Truth Social — states that even during this two-week period, safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will only be permitted “via coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces.” In other words, the U.S. has already accepted that Iran can impose limits on shipping in the Strait — limits that did not exist before the war began.
And there’s more: Iran is already charging punitive tolls for passage through the strait, and AP reports this will continue during the ceasefire. Trump’s description of Iran’s 10-point list of demands as “a workable basis on which to negotiate” suggests further concessions are entirely possible. Iran’s national security council is already taking a victory lap, though Trump railed angrily at CNN last night for reporThe ting it.
Much remains unclear. Pakistan — the central mediator — said the ceasefire includes Israeli attacks on Lebanon, but Israel said overnight it does not. There are reports Iran continued firing missiles at neighboring countries after the ceasefire was agreed. And there’s no clarity at all on what happens to Iran’s enriched uranium, though Trump told AFP it will be “perfectly taken care of.”
Just 90 minutes before President Donald Trump’s 8 p.m. deadline to wipe out “a whole civilization” with massive strikes on Iran’s energy infrastructure and bridges, he granted a two-week extension for diplomacy to continue.
“Subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump said Tuesday on social media, “I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks.”
“We have already met and exceeded all Military objectives,and are very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE with Iran,” Trump said. A 10-point proposal received from Tehran, he said, was a “workable basis on which to negotiate.”
Trump added, “This will be a double-sided CEASEFIRE!”
After Trump’s announcement, a statement posted by Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, which he attributed to the Supreme National Security Council, said it too was responding to Pakistan’s request and Trump’s “acceptance of the general Framework of Iran’s 10-point proposal for negotiations.”
“If attacks against Iran are halted,” it said, “our Powerful Armed Forces will cease their defensive operations.” For two weeks, it added, “safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination” with the Iranian military.
Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif
Trump said his ceasefire decision was in response to an appeal from Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and military chief Gen. Asim Munir. Pakistan has led a group of mediators, including Egypt and Turkey, that has been looking for an exit to the war that has destabilized the entire region. Trump has forged a particularly close relationship with Munir and, in an interview with Fox News before the extension announcement, described Sharif as “a highly respected man all over.”
In a statement following Trump’s announcement, Sharif said U.S. and Iranian delegations were invited to Islamabad on Friday “to further negotiate for a conclusive agreement to settle all disputes.” He said that the ceasefire would include Lebanon, where Israel is engaged in a massive bombing campaign against Iran-backed Hezbollah.
Unfortunately, Netanyahu didn’t agree to include Lebanon in the ceasefire.
In a brief statement issued in English by his office early Wednesday, local time, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he supported Trump’s “decision to suspend strikes against Iran for two weeks subject to Iran immediately opening the straits and stopping all attacks on the U.S., Israel and countries in the region.”
“Israel also supports the U.S. effort to ensure that Iran no longer poses a nuclear, missile and terror threat. … The United States has told Israel that it is committed to achieving these goals … in the upcoming negotiations,” Netanyahu said.
In a caveat that did not bode well for the negotiations, he added that the ceasefire “does not include Lebanon,” contradicting Sharif’s claims.
The Israel Defense Forces said Wednesday it had “ceased fire in the campaign against Iran” but would continue “its combat and ground operations” in Lebanon.
Mr. Trump’s tactic of escalating his rhetoric to astronomical levels certainly helped him find an offramp he had been seeking for weeks. That success alone may fuel his belief that the tactics he learned in the New York real estate world — ignore old conventions, make maximalist demands — works in geopolitics as well.
The Strait of Hormuz
Without question, it was a down-to-the-wire tactical victory, one that should, at least temporarily, get oil, fertilizer and helium flowing again through the Strait of Hormuz, and calm markets that feared a global energy shock would lead to a global recession.
But it resolved none of the fundamental issues that led to the war.
It leaves a theocratic government, backed by the vicious Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, in charge of a cowed population that has been pummeled by missiles and bombs, and finds itself still under the thumb of a familiar regime, even if under new management. It leaves Iran’s nuclear stockpile in place, including the 970 pounds of near-bomb-grade material that was, in theory, the casus belli of this war.
It left Gulf allies reeling, with the discovery that the glass skyscrapers of Dubai and the desalination plants that make wealthy enclaves in Kuwait livable can be taken out by Iranian missiles and drones. Gas prices have soared, and are about to test Mr. Trump’s promise that they will fall again to old levels as soon as the fighting stops.
And it has left Mr. Trump’s political base fractured, with onetime supporters now accusing the president and his loyalists, starting with Vice President JD Vance, with violating their promise not to get America tied up in unwinnable wars in the Middle East.
It all happened at a moment when Iran has demonstrated that it can absorb 13,000 targeted strikes and still conduct an impressive asymmetric war, choking off oil supplies and sending its cyber army to attack American infrastructure.
Now Mr. Trump faces the challenge not only of reaching a more permanent settlement but proving to the United States and the world that this conflict was worth fighting in the first place. And to do so, he will have to demonstrate that he has removed Iran’s death-grip on the 21-mile channel that makes up the strait, and its chances of ever building a nuclear weapon.
On that point there was an ominous-sounding element buried in the Iranian description of the deal. Shipping would proceed, the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, wrote, but under the control of “Iran’s Armed Forces,” who would determine who passes, and when.
And then there’s that 10-point list of demands.
“Iran remains in the control of the Strait, which was not the case before the war,” said Richard Fontaine, the chief executive of the Center for a New American Security, a Washington think tank. “I find it hard to believe that the United States and the world could accept a situation in which Iran remains in control of a key energy checkpoint indefinitely. That would be a materially worse outcome than existed before the war.”
So might a final agreement. Four weeks ago Mr. Trump was demanding Iran’s “unconditional surrender,’’ saying he would determine when the country had been completely defeated. On Tuesday evening his tone was different. He agreed to base the next two weeks of talks on a 10-point plan Iran submitted to the Pakistanis. Mr. Trump called it “a workable basis on which to negotiate.”
“Have you looked at Iran’s plan?” asked Mr. Fontaine. “It reads like a Tehran wish list from before the war, calling for a global recognition of Iran’s right to enrich uranium, the removal of all American forces from the region and a lifting of economic sanctions. And it calls for the payment of reparations to Iran for damage caused in the war.”
Use the gift link to read the rest, if you’re interested.
Officials in the U.S. and Israel learned of an intriguing development on Monday, with President Trump’s ultimatum looming: Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei had instructed his negotiators, for the first time since the war began, to move towards a deal, according to an Israeli official, a regional official and a third source with knowledge.
Iranian Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei
The big picture: As Trump was publicly threatening total annihilation, there were signs of diplomatic momentum behind the scenes — though even sources close to Trump didn’t know which outcome to expect right up until a ceasefire was announced….
Setting the scene: On Monday morning, as Trump worked the crowd at a White House Easter celebration, a “very angry” Steve Witkoff was working the phones.
The U.S. envoy told the mediators the 10-point counter-proposal the U.S. had just received from Iran was “a disaster, a catastrophe,” a source with direct knowledge said.
That began a “chaotic” day of amendments, with the Pakistani mediators passing new drafts between Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, and the Egyptian and Turkish foreign ministers trying to help bridge gaps.
By Monday night, the mediators had U.S. approval for an updated proposal for a two-week ceasefire. It was then up to Khamenei — whom the sources said was actively involved in the process on Monday and Tuesday — to make a decision.
The intrigue: The involvement of the new supreme leader was necessarily clandestine and laborious. Facing an active threat of assassination by Israel, Khamenei has been communicating primarily via runners passing notes.
Two sources described Khamenei’s blessing for his negotiators to cut a deal as a “breakthrough.”
The regional source said Araghchi also played a central role both in handling the negotiations and in pushing commanders from the Revolutionary Guards to accept a deal.
China was also advising Iran to seek an off-ramp.
But at the end of the day, all major decisions on Monday and Tuesday went through Khamenei. “Without his green light, there wouldn’t have been a deal,” the regional source said.
How it happened: It was clearby Tuesday morning that progress was being made, but that didn’t stop Trump from making his most harrowing threat: “A whole civilization will die tonight.”
Some U.S. media outlets reported Iran was breaking off talks in response. Sources involved in the negotiations told Axios that was not the case, and that there was actually some momentum.
Vice President Vance was working the phones from Hungary, dealing primarily with the Pakistanis.
Meanwhile Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was in frequent contact throughout the day with Trump and his team — though the Israelis were growing increasingly concerned that they’d lost control of the process.
By around noon ET on Tuesday, there was a general understanding that the parties were converging on a two-week ceasefire.
I’m old enough to remember when President Trump assured us, “There will be no deal with Iran except UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!”
That was a month ago.
Since then, Trump has bombed and blustered and caused all manner of damage to Iran, to its neighbors, to the United States, and to the world. But Iran hasn’t unconditionally surrendered. It hasn’t even conditionally surrendered. It’s agreed to a ceasefire followed by negotiations. These negotiations will be based not on Iranian surrender but, as Trump said last night, on a ten-point proposal from Iran that Trump believes “is a workable basis on which to negotiate.”
So we’re off to negotiations. Trump and the Iranian regime are making wildly contrasting claims and promises about what has been or will be agreed to. For now, as Gregg Carlstrom, Middle East correspondent of the Economist, put it:
So if you’re keeping score at home, the ceasefire includes Lebanon but also doesn’t include Lebanon, America has agreed to all of Iran’s demands and Iran has agreed to all of America’s demands, America will recognize Iran’s right to enrichment and also insist on zero enrichment, Hormuz is completely open but also Hormuz is subject to unclear limitations.
Oil market researcher Rory Johnston wittily called this “Schrödinger’s ceasefire.”
But the fog of ceasefire doesn’t mean that we don’t know anything. In fact, we know quite a lot already.
We know that the Iranian regime remains in place. The mullahs and the IRGC remain in control of Iran.
We know that the Iranian regime still has its enriched uranium (even if they can’t get to a lot of it right now). And we know that while its military capabilities have been much degraded, it still has functional missile and drone capabilities. We know there’s no reason not to expect Russia and China to be willing to rearm Iran.
We know that primary and secondary sanctions on Iran seem likely to be relaxed or even lifted.
We know that at least for now the Strait of Hormuz will be reopened. But it’s unclear whether it will remain an international waterway, as it was before, or whether Iran will be able to charge fees or tolls for passage. And we know that the fact that the Iranian regime was able to close the waterway, cause significant damage to the global economy, and live to boast about it, can’t be unseen. Whatever promises are now made, Iran will retain leverage with respect to the strait.
We know more generally that Trump’s war has further shaken any confidence our allies might still have in us. It will be seen as confirmation that Trump’s United States of America has become just another rogue nation in the international arena, if a less disciplined and cunning one than Putin’s Russia or Xi’s China. We know that the old international order with the United States as its anchor is gone.
What we know mocks Trump’s claim in an interview with AFP last night that the United States “won a total and complete victory. One hundred percent. No question about it.”
That’s about all I can handle for today. We have a fool as president, and I’m not sure we can survive the rest of his term. Our only hope is that Democrats can wind the House and Senate and impeach and remove him.
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Trump: After I'm finished with this, I can go to Venezuela. I will quickly learn Spanish. It won't take too long. I'm good at language, and I will go to Venezuela. I'm gonna run for president.
Trump's latest ravings:- Wants the USA to charge ships for permission to transit the Strait of Hormuz- Would like to seize Iran's oil- Threatens to destroy every power plant in Iran on Tuesday night- Says feud with NATO started because they refused to give him Greenland
Trump: "I did one other but this one was not picked up: Osama bin Laden. If you read my book, I said you gotta take him out one year before the World Trade Center came down. So you should read the book."
"What he’s threatening is not the kind of war that vaguely adheres to any rules or laws. He’s making openly terroristic threats."Yep. The Domestic Terrorist-in-Chief.
Trump actually said that PUTIN explained NATO to him…And that he has a very good relationship with Putin.Then Trump called NATO a "paper tiger."It's always been a concern that Trump values Putin's opinion, but even more so now when Putin is aiding Iran against the U.S.
The Sky Dancing banner headline uses a snippet from a work by artist Tashi Mannox called 'Rainbow Study'. The work is described as a" study of typical Tibetan rainbow clouds, that feature in Thanka painting, temple decoration and silk brocades". dakinikat was immediately drawn to the image when trying to find stylized Tibetan Clouds to represent Sky Dancing. It is probably because Tashi's practice is similar to her own. His updated take on the clouds that fill the collection of traditional thankas is quite special.
You can find his work at his website by clicking on his logo below. He is also a calligraphy artist that uses important vajrayana syllables. We encourage you to visit his on line studio.
o, let’s start with Melania Dearest, who insists she had no ties to Jeffrey Epstein, even though she was not under oath to tell the truth, you have to wonder if a Congressional Committee will ask for a repeat performance.. William Kristol, writing at 
There is surely a lot of evidence suggesting she knew him well. But, with the Iran War being waged like a lethal version of mud wrestling, let’s see if the due diligence will be done by the press. This topic really skates on Slut Slamming, but it’s hard to cover earnestly. 
Epstein survivors had plenty to say about the performance. This is from 
It appears that the majority of the country is suffering under the impact of the Iran War. 
There’s no good news coming out of the Iran War. This is 
I’d like to think I have the vocabulary to describe how I feel about all these idiotic, powerplay antics, but I really don’t. We are clearly dealing with people who don’t have a clue and don’t care to understand our democratic republic. This article from 
peej
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