I am now going to tell you something helpful. I have lived now for almost 81 years. For the last 40 years or so, my life has been guided by some words of Samuel Johnson. Among many other brilliant aperçus, he said that a good tavern was the best thing in life. For my time in Los Angeles, I had two main taverns: Morton’s on Melrose, close to me in Beverly Hills. It was run by Pam Morton and run beautifully. I saw many friends there every time I went in. My wife and I were treated like family. Then, it closed, by order of its owner, Peter Morton, the best restaurateur in history. He also founded the Hard Rock Cafes, in which I was privileged to invest. The other was Mister Chow, a glorious place on Camden, where I was also treated well by Mister Chow himself. It’s still open and it’s great, but it’s too noisy some nights. For the last five years, though, I have gone every day when I am well to the Cabana Cafe. It’s an open-air paradise next to the swimming pool at the Beverly Hills Hotel. It’s incredibly friendly and not at all expensive by 2025 standards. I just feel like I am in heaven when I walk in. PLEASE try it before you die. I especially love the milkshakes. My glorious father, Herbert Stein, in his last months on earth, said that his greatest regret in life was that he had not had more chocolate milkshakes. I am not going to make that mistake. Dick Cheney, RIP I awakened this morning to see that Dick Cheney had passed away. He was not a close friend, but I knew him on a first-name basis since 1970, when he and I worked together at the Office of Economic Opportunity, LBJ’s War on Poverty, a far better crusade than the evil Bolshevik “War on Drugs” which turned out to be a war on us old people. We were together in the Ford White House as well, when he worked under Donald Rumsfeld, a questionable person at best. I never understood why Dick rose so high and so fast, except that he made friends with ambitious, successful people. Anyway, he was always friendly to me when I saw him in D.C., after I had become a “movie star.” I wish his soul well, although he made many mistakes that cost good men and women their lives for no purpose. By the way, I am writing this after I talked to the most astute man I know here in LA — Judah Friedman. Judah had guarded hope about the New York mayoral election, and Judah is almost never wrong. Let us pray. READ MORE from Ben Stein: Liquidity Is Essential to Life The Almighty Power Return to Gunskirchen Lager and Col. Denman

WASHINGTON — In case you hadn’t noticed, former White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre is a Black woman, as she repeatedly reminds readers in her memoir, Independent: A Look Inside a Broken White House, Outside the Party Lines. Jean-Pierre also is “openly queer” — her words, not mine, scattered like breadcrumbs throughout her 177-page treatment of her two-plus years as former President Joe Biden’s top spokesperson. (RELATED: The Disastrous KJP New Yorker Interview) If it weren’t for identity politics, Jean-Pierre wouldn’t have any identity at all. She tosses around labels, not arguments. Jean-Pierre told The New Yorker that the “broken” White House in her book title refers not to the White House of her former boss, but that of current President Donald Trump. And yet, by her own account, KJP’s defection from the Democratic Party was a reaction to serving in an administration that was burdened with “racism, misogyny, and double standards.” If you want to know what it was like to work inside the Biden White House, prepare to be disappointed. The book is light on policy and heavy on score-settling. Jean-Pierre lashes out at the occasional in-house rival, and she never identifies by name then-National Security Communications Adviser John Kirby, who often shared the podium with her. That snub only makes Kirby look better. Again. “Some of my resentful colleagues,” KJP wrote, thought she was not “fit for the job.” And then there was the “belligerent press corps.” I’ve read a lot of so-called tell-all books from former political staffers. Everyone has an ax to grind somewhere, but it’s the pros who know how to land a blow and move on. In her book, 107 Days, about the high-speed 2024 campaign, former Vice President Kamala Harris writes that on the Sunday before Election Day, “I still believed our campaign of joy would triumph in two days.” Harris also revealed that she and husband Doug Emhoff were “so traumatized” by the reversal of fortune they faced on election night that the couple did not discuss that evening until she started to write her book. (RELATED: Kamala Finally Says Something True, And Now She’s Truly Cooked) Harris also wrote about stronger answers she should have given during interviews and other missed opportunities. Not KJP, who blames the world for things Team Biden could have handled better. Hunter Biden? Jean-Pierre writes he “had been a punching bag for the GOP for years as its members exploited his history of drug addiction, harped on his business relationships, and accused his father of unethically helping him land lucrative deals overseas.” Jean-Pierre conveniently forgets that Biden’s surviving son peddled his access to his then-vice president father, who was in charge of White House policy on Ukraine. Jean-Pierre should realize that the Yale law graduate walked away from a plea agreement on charges involving a gun purchase while addicted to drugs because he thought he could win, even though he was guilty. The former press secretary also neglects to mention that Hunter Biden’s legal problems could have been eliminated if Biden had pardoned his son — which candidate Biden promised he would not do but ended up doing anyway. After the election. I understand the pardon. Still, I’d love to get some insight into the former president’s oft-uttered claim, “My son did nothing wrong.” To Jean-Pierre, the worst offense is the Democrats’ “betrayal” of Biden. She does not seem to have figured out that Biden betrayed Democrats when he announced he would run for reelection for an office he probably would not have won in 2020 if he revealed he planned to run again in 2024. Biden didn’t make it to Election Day, so KJP decided to switch parties. Now she calls herself an Independent. But she’s not. She’s a political animal who picked the wrong horse and wound up in a ditch. And now she’s digging the hole deeper. READ MORE from Debra J. Saunders: Autopen Joe and the Gang That Couldn’t Spin Straight Trump’s White House Makeover Rankles Washington DOJ Files Charges Against Antifa Contact Review-Journal Washington columnist Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@reviewjournal.com. Follow @debrajsaunders on X. COPYRIGHT 2025 CREATORS.COM

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