What would taking apart the American government look like? The headline deck at Fox News read as follows:  Socialists launch radical platform to abolish the US Senate in bid to fundamentally transform America  The radical update also calls for amnesty for all immigrants and defunding the Department of War, sources say This jewel of a story reports:  “As many of its candidates notch electoral wins nationwide, the pre-eminent socialist political group in the U.S., the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), plans to roll out an updated platform that includes eliminating the Senate and replacing the president and the Supreme Court with an executive and judiciary chosen by Congress. According to a source familiar with the DSA’s planning, the organization plans to roll out an update next week to its long-term vision for a U.S. policy platform. The update includes eliminating the U.S. Senate and replacing the president and the Supreme Court with an executive branch and judiciary chosen by and subordinate to Congress. Additionally, the updated platform would include amnesty for all immigrants and defunding the Department of War.” Well now. Democrats have plans afoot to eliminate the United States Senate? Replace the elected president and the Supreme Court “with an executive and judiciary chosen by Congress”? And oh yes. There was this: "the updated platform would include amnesty for all immigrants and defunding the Department of War.” Not to be too obvious, but with all of that -- essentially a story about turning the Republic that is the good ole USA into a socialist dictatorship -- one would think this news would be all over the place. With the entire American media both reporting this and then analyzing and critiquing a story that is essentially about those who want to dismantle American democracy. Haven't the media endlessly worried about democracy being dismantled by MAGA? For some strange reason, presented by Fox with some pretty hard facts on a seriously big story about a growing faction inside the "Democratic" party, the rest of the American media has gone quieter than the proverbial church mouse. Why? There can only be one of two reasons. Either the rest of the “mainstream” media doesn’t believe the story and chooses to ignore it. Or, in fact, they do believe the story and have some quiet agreement with the “Democratic Socialists” and their scheme to turn the American Republic upside down and inside out, reshaping America beyond recognition. Either way, the media ain’t looking so good as this story emerges.  There’s more in all this. The DSA touts itself as “a “working-class alternative to the Democratic Party.” It added:  "Our newly elected leaders will fight for the working class — not for crumbs." Hmmm. Not to put too fine a point on it, but in the long ago of 1980, the media was certain GOP nominee Ronald Reagan was going to lose to Democrat President Jimmy Carter because, you know, the GOP was the party of the country club types. The election arrived. And to their absolute shock, the media learned Reagan’s landslide had come about thanks to what was called “Reagan Democrats” -- working class folk who hung their working hard hats at places like Detroit auto workers’ union halls.  The bottom line? The American media is all too frequently wrapped up in lefty politics -- not reality. The left wing version of reality is that working class Americans are all natural lefties, or close to it. The GOP is supposedly the sniffy party of the Country Club.  Even all these years after the appearance of the “Reagan Democrats” the media is still caught up in the once-upon- a-time political myth that said Democrats were the party of the working class and, as noted, the Republicans were the party of the Country Club. Once upon a time political eons ago -- in the days of Democrat working class hero Franklin D. Roosevelt -- that worldview was true. But in fact, Democrats gradually sold out their party to the world of intellectual, highly educated elites. To short hand it? Democrats became the party of Harvard and Ivy League university types. And it lost them the votes of working class, union-belonging workers. That transition was made a long time ago. And it amuses to see left-wing elites lose sight of the fact that President Trump, he who worked his way to billionaire status, began as the son of working class Queens, New York. And without doubt, to this day, Trump carries himself and thinks as the son of working class Queens. Which is exactly why the President is so popular with working Americans. It is very safe to say that those parading around as Democratic Socialists of America are clueless about working-class Americans, certainly those who are enthusiastic Trump supporters. In fact, it is easy to suspect that the members of the DSA look down their noses at working-class Trump supporters - the union members, the auto workers, the plumbers, electricians and all the others who exist and work in the blue-collar world. This is irrelevant at this point. Donald Trump has been elected twice. Come January 20th of 2029, President Trump will be flown back to Mar-a-Lago or wherever else he chooses to go.  The question will be, and is already being increasingly asked: Will the media be doing a deep dive on just who is the President’s successor? Vice President Vance? Secretary of State Rubio? An unknown Other? And there’s the other question. Will “Trumpism” as it could be called -- go on? Will the page of history be turned as always, with new ideas and policies in place to move the country forward in new ways or old? And will the media zero in to analyze and report? The first indicator of this next chapter in American history will take place with the 2026 mid-term elections. And with the media trying to make sense of it all. And to close on a historical note? In 1964, Democrats swept to power with liberal Democrat President Lyndon Johnson clobbering conservative Republican Barry Goldwater. I was (ahem!) a geeky kid reading the political news in the day. And I well remember the various media stories of the day that thought the GOP had met its end.  Yet a mere two years later in 1966, Republicans had a massive mid-term election win. And one of the conservative GOP leaders who appeared seemingly out of the blue - to the astonishment of the day’s media - was a supposed “B actor” named Ronald Reagan who won a landslide election as Governor of California.  And as they say, history records the rest of that story. Buckle in. Trump supporters and conservatives are on the march. Memo to the media? Try paying attention to what the DSA actually believes.

With there still being many unanswered questions around the death of 18-year old Nolan Wells, CNN First of All host Victor Blackwell appeared to understand on Saturday that baseless speculation was unhelpful. However, that still did not stop him from defending the assumption that race had something to do with as well as more far-reaching claims about the entire state of Mississippi and white people more generally. Blackwell began by laying out what is not known about the case before getting to the reaction, “His body was found on the island on Monday, and there's a lot we still don't know about what happened in between. He did not return on the boat with his friends. Why? At some point he got separated from his cell phone. Why? In the absence of facts, people are reacting to a photo. This photo. It's of Nolan and his friends that day. The disparity jumps out. Four friends. One is black. The three white friends made it home. Nolan did not.”   CNN's Victor Blackwell defends people making assumptions that Nolan Wells' disapearence had something to do with race and not trusting Misssissippi to investigate his death properly, "That simple fact led to a lot of people reacting to his death to make a few assumptions that by… pic.twitter.com/t8vd6COROk — Alex Christy (@alexchristy17) July 11, 2026   He admitted that as of the airing of his show, the attempts to make a narrative about racial malice are simply assumptions, but he still defended them, “And that simple fact led to a lot of people reacting to his death to make a few assumptions that by being the only black person in an all white space, his safety, their loyalty as friends were already in doubt. It's suspicion and speculation, but it does not come out of nowhere.” Blackwell also urged viewers to, “Look up his name on social media and you'll find so many people sharing their own stories online about how challenging it's been to be the only, or one of a few black people at a gathering. Maybe they've had these lived experiences themselves. Maybe they’re the parents of black boys or girls in that situation right now.” He then defended the family’s attorney, racial ambulance chaser Benjamin Crump, for not trusting Mississippi authorities as if it was still the 1960s, “Others who don't share that lived experience may say, ‘Well, let's just let the investigation play out.’ And let's be clear that should happen. And the investigation is very much still ongoing, but there's already distrust with that too. The family's legal team is quick to point out this happened in Mississippi, a state with fraught racial history, to say the least. To that point, the family has commissioned an independent autopsy. They say they want transparency and respect and answers.”   Later, Blackwell asks Wells's mother, Christine Wonsley, if she ever worried about his white friends' loyality, "As Ben said on the news conference, it looked like maybe he was the only black person on the island or in the video we've seen so far. And I wonder, was there ever a… pic.twitter.com/HnK3y16NTr — Alex Christy (@alexchristy17) July 11, 2026   Blackwell then introduced Wells’s parents and Crump. In that interview, he asked Wells’s mother, Christine Wonsley, if she ever worried about her son being the only black member of this particular friend group: Christine, you made a point a moment ago about telling your son that the love he gives out may not come back in return. And what a lot of people are responding to online are the images of your son being the only black person in this photo. As Ben said on the news conference, it looked like maybe he was the only black person on the island or in the video we've seen so far. And I wonder, was there ever a moment that you thought that if something went down, if your son needed these friends, that the loyalty would be questionable because he was the only black person in this circle that he was in this day. What a horrible question to ask: pushing racial distrust for the sake of a narrative with no evidence. It is unfortunately true that friends have murdered friends before, but if there was a racial component to Wells’s death then you have to wonder why they were friends to begin with. For her part, Wonsley was eager for her son to be remembered as somebody who got along with everybody.  Here is a transcript for the July 11 show: CNN First of All With Victor Blackwell 7/11/2026 8:01 AM ET VICTOR BLACKWELL: His body was found on the island on Monday, and there's a lot we still don't know about what happened in between. He did not return on the boat with his friends. Why? At some point he got separated from his cell phone. Why? In the absence of facts, people are reacting to a photo. This photo. It's of Nolan and his friends that day. The disparity jumps out. Four friends. One is black. The three white friends made it home. Nolan did not. And that simple fact led to a lot of people reacting to his death to make a few assumptions that by being the only black person in an all white space, his safety, their loyalty as friends were already in doubt. It's suspicion and speculation, but it does not come out of nowhere. Look up his name on social media, and you'll find so many people sharing their own stories online about how challenging it's been to be the only, or one of a few black people at a gathering. Maybe they've had these lived experiences themselves. Maybe they’re the parents of black boys or girls in that situation right now. Others who don't share that lived experience may say, “Well, let's just let the investigation play out.” And let's be clear that should happen. And the investigation is very much still ongoing, but there's already distrust with that too. The family's legal team is quick to point out this happened in Mississippi, a state with fraught racial history, to say the least. To that point, the family has commissioned an independent autopsy. They say they want transparency and respect and answers. Nolan's parents are with us now. … Christine, you made a point a moment ago about telling your son that the love he gives out may not come back in return. And what a lot of people are responding to online are the images of your son being the only black person in this photo. As Ben said on the news conference, it looked like maybe he was the only black person on the island or in the video we've seen so far. And I wonder, was there ever a moment that you thought that if something went down, if your son needed these friends, that the loyalty would be questionable because he was the only black person in this circle that he was in this day. CHRISTINE WONSLEY: So this is the thing. Regardless of the color of anyone's skin, your hope is that the people your children call friends will be there. Like, that is any parent's hope, right? Unfortunately, there are just so many patterns here in America. When you start to talk about the African community, we've seen this time and time again, which again, because I've seen the discourse about, “Oh my gosh, you know, how can these black parents just allow their son to be the token black boy of the group?” And that's the issue. Like Nolan was friends with everybody. When you look at all the messages, all of the people that are speaking out regarding Nolan, they are coming from all different backgrounds because and, you know, he just--he loved everybody. Nolan was a peacemaker. He wanted everybody to feel included. Again, he was just such a rare soul. And, you know, you always hope, like I said before, you always hope that your children's friends or even your friends as adults are going to step up and be by your side and help you when you're in need. But I can't fully answer that other than that.

MS NOW host Jonathan Capehart joined PBS News Hour on Friday to recap the week’s news, which naturally highlighted Graham Platner’s decision to exit the Maine Senate race after being accused of rape amid a long list of other scandals. In contrast to what he said a month ago after the first accusations of violence towards women came out, Capehart declared he was happy to see Platner go because he had become an electoral liability. Host Geoff Bennett began by wondering, “So, Democrats have this immediate challenge trying to replace Graham Platner in this critical Maine Senate race. The larger question is why these serious controversies increasingly fail to disqualify political candidates until the pressure becomes overwhelming. But, Jonathan, starting with the practical question, what do Democrats need to do now?” Capehart declared that Democrats “need to get a nominee who can best go up against Susan Collins.”   On PBS, MS NOW host Jonathan Capehart does a 180 on Graham Platner and throws him overboard, "They [Democrats] need to get a nominee who can best go up against Susan Collins. Now, with Graham Platner finally out of the race—I was happy to see that he submitted the papers to fully… pic.twitter.com/Emdo7QbVaL — Alex Christy (@alexchristy17) July 11, 2026   For Capehart, it was clear Platner is no longer that candidate, “Now, with Graham Platner finally out of the race—I was happy to see that he submitted the papers to fully get out of the race this afternoon. That is the first step that needed to happen. Now they have to have—the Democrats have to have the convention, and a bunch of people are going to jump into that race and be a part of the process to become the nominee.” A month ago, shortly after Lyndsey Fifield’s original allegations were published in The New York Times and on X, Capehart was asked on News Hour if Platner should drop out. He spent several words dodging the question before suggesting the answer is no because of accusations against Trump and that Democratic leaders would have no say in the matter anyway: But the issue here is, it's not going to be congressional — it's not going to be congressional Democrats, national Democrats who are going to tell Platner to get out of the race. Folks in Maine are still behind him. Some of the interviews that we have had on MS NOW, you have had folk — Mainers saying, he's not perfect, he's not this, he's not that, but we need a change. And so that's the one thing he has going for him. And, again, I look at Platner through the prism of where we are in terms of the Trump administration and the Trump world, given who Trump is, given the allegations against the president, given the way that lots and lots of people in the Republican Party just turned a blind eye and decided, we still want to vote for this guy. What did remain constant was Capehart’s warning to Democrats to take Collins seriously, “But, again, no matter who the nominee is, they are going up against a formidable candidate in Susan Collins. We have talked about this many times before. How many elections have we seen her either down in the polls, potentially losing to the Democrat, but, on Election Day, she blows the doors off the election?” He further warned, “That scenario is still at work. So, whoever becomes the Democratic nominee, whoever the Maine Democrats pick, they better pick the person and then circle the wagons around them to give that nominee the best possible shot they can to defeat Susan Collins.” That was Capehart’s main concern: defeating Susan Collins, the most liberal Republican senator. Before, Capehart thought the Nazi-communist fan/alleged abuser of women was the best shot at that. Now he thinks the Nazi-communist fan/alleged rapist is not. Hence, his shift. Here is a transcript for the July 10 show: PBS News Hour 7/10/2026 7:32 PM ET GEOFF BENNETT: So, Democrats have this immediate challenge trying to replace Graham Platner in this critical Maine Senate race. The larger question is why these serious controversies increasingly fail to disqualify political candidates until the pressure becomes overwhelming. But, Jonathan, starting with the practical question, what do Democrats need to do now? JONATHAN CAPEHART: They need to get a nominee who can best go up against Susan Collins. Now, with Graham Platner finally out of the race—I was happy to see that he submitted the papers to fully get out of the race this afternoon. That is the first step that needed to happen. Now they have to have—the Democrats have to have the convention, and a bunch of people are going to jump into that race and be a part of the process to become the nominee. But, again, no matter who the nominee is, they are going up against a formidable candidate in Susan Collins. We have talked about this many times before. How many elections have we seen her either down in the polls, potentially losing to the Democrat, but, on Election Day, she blows the doors off the election? That scenario is still at work. So, whoever becomes the Democratic nominee, whoever the Maine Democrats pick, they better pick the person and then circle the wagons around them to give that nominee the best possible shot they can to defeat Susan Collins.

When conservatives think of the National Endowment for the Arts, they think about government-funded outrages like Andres Serrano’s “Piss Christ,” featuring a crucifix pictured in a glass of the artist’s urine. On Friday's All Things Considered, NPR found a new subsidy scandal, that Trump’s NEA is funding patriotic art, including pro-Ronald Reagan material. The headline: Patriotic art gets the spotlight as NEA funding shifts. Cue 'The Ronald Reagan Overture' NPR arts reporter Chloe Veltman began at the Reagan Presidential Library, where “A regional group, the New West Symphony, created 'The Ronald Reagan Overture' with the help of a $25,000 Garden of American Heroes grant from the NEA.” Trump wants the NEA to honor heroic Americans. VELTMAN: The NEA funds far more than patriotic programming, but this being the 250th anniversary year, there's a particular emphasis on national pride. In 2025, the Trump administration rescinded about $21 million in NEA grants, according to advocacy nonprofit Americans for the Arts. The money was pulled from projects around the country that did not meet the administration's funding objectives, for example, if they were too focused on diversity and inclusion. The administration said it was prioritizing grants for more patriotic works, like military band performances. Horrors! But it wasn’t all terrible news. Juan Dies with the Mexican folk music group Sones De Mexico Ensemble figured he could use the new rules to get some money, with maybe a little DEI spirit in Espanol.  VELTMAN: He repitched the project to the NEA, this time using Trump administration-approved subjects like aviator Amelia Earhart and baseball star Roberto Clemente. The grant came through. SONES DE MEXICO ENSEMBLE: (Singing in Spanish). VELTMAN: Like other corridos, Dies' American Heroes ballads are celebratory, but they also don't shy away from darker details. For example, the racism Clemente faced as a high-profile Puerto Rican in the United States. SONES DE MEXICO ENSEMBLE: (Singing in Spanish). DIES: I don't feel like we're compromising our goals or mission. By playing with the rules, we are able to give our perspective on the lives of these American heroes. Ah, American racism! That’s a theme NPR can get behind. Patriotism, not so much. They found their art expert to explain the NPR view: DAVID LUBIN: There are two forms of patriotism. One is my country, right or wrong, that America is the greatest place on the face of the Earth. VELTMAN: This is David Lubin. The retired Wake Forest University professor has written books about American art, politics and cultural propaganda. LUBIN: And then the patriotic emotions of, we can do better and it's our mission in life to keep hewing to the ideals of the origins of the country. VELTMAN: Lubin says patriotic art is a useful tool for governments because it can unite people around policies and ideologies. But, he says, when a country is as politically divided as ours is today, patriotic art often only ends up reinforcing rifts. LUBIN: It feeds into thought patterns that are already prevalent among half the population. We know which "half" that is! It's appalling that lefties always think conservative patriotism is "my country, right or wrong," that it never qualifies as "love of country, and we can do better." They pretend their so-called "critical patriotism" -- endlessly obsessing over why America should never be proud -- is much more thoughtful. 

After Monday’s PBS News Hour dealt with breaking news about the red-flag festooned Democrat Graham Platner suspending his campaign for U.S. Senate in Maine (he would later drop out), guests Tamara Keith of NPR and Carrie Dann representing the Cook Political Report in place of Cook’s usual News Hour representative Amy Walter, who was out for the week. Dann, who previously reported from D.C. for NBC News, proved more partisan than Walter, chirpily optimistic on the prospects of radical Abdul el-Sayed, who’s running for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in Michigan. Co-anchor Amna Nawaz: Meanwhile, I know you're also tracking another big race in Michigan. This is the Democratic Senate primary race, a big moment this weekend when one of the candidates, Mallory McMorrow, decided to drop out. The race is now down to two people. There's a centrist candidate in Haley Stevens, and a progressive candidate in Abdul El-Sayed…. Dann answered Nawaz’s question about what the race revealed “about the direction of the Democratic Party” by pushing El-Sayed as a normal guy with “progressive ideas.” Carrie Dann of the Cook Political Report goes surprisingly partisan on the PBS News Hour for radical Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed: "He does these advertisements where he's waterskiing. I mean, he looks like a normal guy... that may be appealing to people." pic.twitter.com/pu8BpGPB0R — Clay Waters