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Trump Loses the Other Strait

The adverse impacts of the Felon's and Pete Hegseth's war of choice against Iran continue to multiply and it becomes increasingly clear to anyone not drinking the MAGA Kool-Aid that this war was extremely poorly planned and possible consequences never considered.  Now, the Houthis - Iranian allies - have more or less seized control of the Strait of Bab el-Mandeb and with the Iranians can hold a third of the world oil production hostage, pushing oil prices likely higher and leaving Saudi oil production more vulnerable. The potential for where the USA and by extension, the world, now finds itself should have been foreseen by anyone remotely competent, yet the Felon and his cheerleader Hegseth seemingly ignore anyone and everyone who had cautioned them against attacking Iran. With America's mid-term elections getting closer and closer, it is likely a safe bet that Iran and the Houthis will take actions to cause oil prices to soar and harm the Felon and Republican's political prospects. Again, ANYONE remotely competent should have foreseen the current mess, but not the Felon and his circle of sycophants.  A piece in The Atlantic look's at the Felon's self-created nightmare:

As recently as last week, the Iran war appeared to be turning slightly in America’s favor. The Houthis—the Yemen-based militia that is Iran’s most formidable remaining ally in the Middle East—were under pressure from their local rivals, and the Saudi air force was pounding them with air strikes. The president of Yemen’s internationally recognized government issued a triumphant statement declaring that the Houthis’ miscalculations “will open the door to their complete collapse.” With their Houthi partners wounded, Iran’s leaders would have one more reason to back down and agree to Donald Trump’s terms.

Yesterday morning, those delusions drifted away like smoke as Houthi forces broke through their enemies’ defenses and seized the towns and islands around the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, one of the most important maritime choke points in the world.

That loss leaves [the Felon] Trump, who had been hoping to win back control of the Strait of Hormuz from Iran, with a bitter surprise. His enemies now control both of the two important straits in the Middle East, through which a combined total of about a third of the world’s oil shipments pass every day.

It also underscores a stubborn fact: For all the setbacks suffered by Iran’s “Axis of Resistance” over the past year or two, its forces retain an ideological fervor and an esprit de corps that is sorely lacking on the other side. The Gulf states’ failure to work together against the Houthis has been catastrophic, and it echoes Trump’s own failure to devise a plausible or coordinated strategy against Iran.

Although the Houthis already had the ability to threaten shipping in the Red Sea, the capture of the Bab el-Mandeb “means you can literally sit on the coast and fire at passing ships,” April Longley Alley, a Yemen expert at the Washington Institute on Near East Policy and the former political adviser to the United Nations special envoy for Yemen, told me. “It makes it easier and cheaper, and it solidifies, from a military and political point of view, that they have a stranglehold on the strait.”

The United States might not be able to do much about this, even if the Pentagon launches a new round of air strikes on the Houthis. (The Saudi leader, Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, called Trump twice yesterday urging him to strike the Houthis, Axios reported.) Bombs and missiles would achieve little without a ground force to take advantage of them, and America’s Yemeni allies are now battered and divided.

The Houthi advance is even worse news for Saudi Arabia. For many years, the Saudis have been struggling to tamp down the Houthi threat on its border. Now the Houthis have inherited a great deal of Saudi and Emirati supplies left behind by the official Yemeni government’s retreating forces.

The mess that Saudi Arabia faces in Yemen is partly of its own making. The Houthis were born three decades ago in reaction to Saudi meddling in Yemen’s religious and political sphere. In December, tensions between the Saudi and Emirati leadership led Riyadh to demand that the Emiratis—their nominal allies—withdraw from Yemen, leaving the Saudis in charge of a patchwork of militias with divided loyalties. . . . “There was no coordination between commanders, between the intelligence and the drones, between the coast guard and the army—nothing,” Farea Al-Muslimi, a Yemen specialist at the think tank Chatham House, told me.

The Houthis, meanwhile, were disciplined and focused. “They sacrificed hundreds if not thousands of fighters,” a member of Yemen’s officially recognized government, who asked not to be identified for fear of repercussions, told me. “Our bullshit activists were putting out fake news about victories, while the Houthis were working in silence.”

With the momentum on their side, the Houthis could now go on to seize more terrain in other parts of Yemen, including Marib province, where much of Yemen’s oil is located. They could also extend their power bloodlessly, by cutting deals with tribal and regional leaders in the south and east. All of this would further consolidate their power and strengthen their Iranian patrons.

[U]nlike their enemies, the Houthis and the Iranians have a deep ideological bond, one that their soldiers willingly die for. And the Houthis do not need to win every battle. As long as they can sink an occasional oil tanker, they will hold a whip hand over their Saudi neighbors, and over the rest of the world too.

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Gas Prices, Mortgage Rates and Inflation Expose the Felon's/GOP's Economic Lies

You know Republicans are desperate when their main response to Democrat candidates is to describe them all with a broad brush as being "communists." Yet that is where the Felon's failed policies of tariffs and trade wars with one time allies and the ongoing Iran war - a war that may yet further restrict oil flow from the Middle East as the Saudis shut down a major pipeline - have revealed the Felon's lies about how he would fix the economy on "day one."  Gas prices are high and likely headed higher, mortgage rates are up and slowing an already cooling housing market, and inflation and other interest rates are putting further strain on American consumers and families.  Locally, we see incumbent Jen Kiggans - who lies as much as the Felon - claiming she gave everyday Virginians tax cuts and laughably claiming she focuses on bipartisan legislative efforts.  The truth is that the tax cuts she voted for largely benefited the very wealthy and votes close to 100% with the Felon. Kiggans is emblematic of many other Republicans who sold their souls to the Felon and now are left telling lies to constituents in the hope they can save their political careers. At some point even MAGA Kool-Aid drinkers cannot ignore the rising cost of virtually everything. A piece in the New York Times looks at economic reality:

With less than two months until the midterm elections, [the Felon] President Trump commenced a final push this week to preserve his Republican majority in Congress, arguing that the United States under G.O.P. control had brought prices “way, way down.”

But for many families and businesses, the economy appeared to be on far shakier footing by Friday. Fuel prices soared, mortgage costs climbed and inflation registered uncomfortably high, testing the public’s patience with Mr. Trump’s frequent assurances that the country is on the right track.

The contrast underscored the political and economic stakes for [the Felon] Mr. Trump, who may soon face the wrath of an electorate long spurned by promises in Washington to lower the cost of living. As November draws closer, prices have risen under the president’s leadership, driven largely by an agenda that has included two years of punishing trade brinkmanship and a prolonged war with Iran.

The consequences were evident in the latest gauge of the Consumer Price Index, released on Friday. The report showed that prices rose at an annual pace of 3.4 percent in August, which increased the odds of the Federal Reserve’s raising interest rates next week.

The data came on the same day that a separate, long-running survey from the University of Michigan found that consumer sentiment dropped sharply this month. In that report, Americans expressed new worries that the economy was sputtering, and that inflation would continue to rise.

Over two days of speeches at his party’s midterm convention in Dallas, the president labored to convince Americans that Republicans had achieved “tremendous economic success.”

For [the Felon] Mr. Trump, the fight with inflation has proved so pernicious that it has overshadowed even the few bright spots in the economy. Despite nearly two years of policy tumult, the labor market has remained strong, the economy is growing and the country is witnessing a boom around artificial intelligence, one that has generally delighted financial markets.

But those positives have not always been obvious or tangible to voters, who have suffered through years of compounding costs that peaked during the coronavirus pandemic. Those financial strains continued into August, when prices rose faster than hourly wages on a year-over-year basis for the fifth straight month.

“The economy is performing well, but this isn’t buoying consumer attitudes,” . . . “Rather, they’re squarely focused on rising prices and interest rates eating into purchasing power.” In an interview, Mr. Klachkin added that he did not see inflation “coming down at a meaningful pace any time soon.” He cited a range of risks, including uncertainty around the tariffs in Mr. Trump’s trade war and the war with Iran.

Both of those conflicts worsened this week, a period that was not captured in the latest inflation report. But Americans still felt the consequences. The return to hostilities in Iran, for example, sent the price of Brent crude, the global benchmark, to $110 per barrel briefly on Friday.

Nationally, gas averaged nearly $4.30 per gallon by Friday, according to AAA — well over a dollar more than a year ago. Still worse was the cost of diesel, which topped $6 per gallon, setting a record that could deeply affect shipping and transportation.

But there was no sign this week that the war with Iran was close to finished. Even [the Felon] Mr. Trump acknowledged at one point that high oil and gas prices could persist until “right after the election,” though he predicted costs would fall quickly, contrary to warnings from economists.

The renewed energy shock created more headaches for the Fed and its new chairman, Kevin M. Warsh. As the Fed eyes a rate increase to bring inflation into check, [the Felon] Mr. Trump has redoubled his demands for significant rate cuts. Absent a steep reduction, the president even threatened last week that he could cut off all trade with countries that sell more to the United States than they buy. Rates are now in a range of 3.25 to 3.75 percent.

On Wall Street, the economic headwinds also helped to push up the cost of the government’s own borrowing all week. That came in the form of higher yields, which topped 4.9 percent on 10-year bonds, the highest level seen since 2023.

The rise carried significant implications, particularly for homeowners, since mortgage rates closely track yields on those bonds. The average rate on a 30-year loan reached around 6.8 percent last week, according to Michael Fratantoni, the chief economist at the Mortgage Bankers Association, a 15-month high.

At the start of the year, Mr. Trump had promised an aggressive plan to lower housing costs. Since then, a confluence of factors has sent mortgage rates skyrocketing, and led Mr. Fratantoni to predict on Friday that it could reach “at or above 7 percent” soon.

Add to that [the Felon's] Mr. Trump’s new sales pitch to voters, promising $5,000 to Americans if Republicans prevail in the midterms — a plan that Mr. Loper estimated could cost $1.2 trillion.

That price tag, on top of existing fiscal woes, would probably “lead to greater inflation and higher interest rates,” he said.

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Trump’s Fantasy Dream World in Dallas

Attendance at the Republican mid-term convention was anything but a full house, but that did not stop the Felon from claiming convention hall was packed. As one would expect, the Felon lied more or less non-stop - CNN complied his 16 biggest lies - and the event was more or less a worship service for the Felon and his insatiable ego. The affair ignored the Felon's terrible poll numbers and the increased attacks in the ongoing war with Iran that have driven energy prices and gasoline prices at the pump to new highs.  Outside of the Kool-Aid drinking faithful and self-prostituting GOP elected officials, one has to wonder whether anyone else believes the endless lies.  For Democrats the event put the spotlight on the Felon and his unpopularity and the main task for Democrats is to turn out those who sat out the last two elections either out of laziness or an assumption that Democrats would win without their votes. The other wildcard will be whether the Iranians and their Houthis allies - who according to Reuters have gained control of the island of Perim in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait that is at the mouth of the Red Sea - will take further actions to drive oil and ga prices even higher as election day approaches.  A piece at The Atlantic looks at the fantasy world on display in Dallas:

[The Felon] President Trump began his midterm-convention address last night by casting his spell on the crowd in Dallas. “This place is packed,” he announced from the stage, pointing to the back of the American Airlines Center, where everyone could see hundreds of empty seats. Those who looked up saw thousands more, whole sections without any people at all. But the crowd cheered anyway. A deal had been struck. Reality would be ignored.

After more than a decade in politics, Trump is facing his last great electoral test—his popularity is waning, his party is down in the polls, Republicans could lose control in the U.S. House and maybe the Senate. He demanded greater complicity minutes later, seeming to invent a person in the back of the room. “He’s leaving for the bathroom. He’ll be back in two minutes,” he said, pointing. “They’ll take a picture of his seat while he’s gone. And they’ll say Trump did not fill up the arena.”

Laughter joined with the cheers for their political wizard. It was working. Trump could say that he had passed “the largest tax cut in the history of our country,” even if that was not the case. He could claim to have won the presidency three times, when he’s actually done so twice. He could describe the recent past as “the most successful two years financially and every other way in the history of the presidency,” despite six in 10 voters saying he had made the economy worse. He could promise to pay every adult U.S. citizen $5,000 if Republicans held both legislative houses, as if that sum did not amount to about 80 percent of the federal discretionary budget.

“I’m asking you to pretend that I’m on the ballot,” he said. “I’m on the ballot. I’m on the ballot. Just one more time.”

The night was all about Trump. He was the alpha and omega, the focus and the solution. Attendees wore pictures of the president on lanyards around their necks, the ticket for entry to the arena. VIP boxes were stocked with Trump was right about everything hats. Oversize photos of the president lined the hallways. . . . When each speaker dropped Trump’s name, it was cause for riotous celebration.

Until now, national political conventions have been held only during presidential-election years, when delegates from each state gather to select their nominee. In the 1970s, the gatherings shifted from smoke-filled rooms for party business to televised infomercials for the candidates. Trump this year created a simulation of a simulation.  . . . The convention-in-name-only was for, by, and about one man—who, importantly, cannot be a candidate for president again, according to the U.S. Constitution.

“The only way to keep dangerous, radical, weird out of the Senate is a united Republican Party standing with our president, Donald J. Trump,” Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, bellowed from the stage. “Stand for the president, Donald J. Trump. This is a battle for the heart of our nation.

No president has tried something like this before. None has had so much money to spend on themselves at this point in a presidency. None has chosen to make the midterms a referendum on themselves while polling so badly. . . . . The strategist in chief has bet that turning out Trump voters, the ones who typically stay home when he is not on the ballot, is the only path forward. This is why the first ads he bought for the cycle were not about any candidates who are running this year, but about himself. This was why his latest show was a celebration of the unlimited possibility of his incantations.

Outside Trump’s curated fantasy world, not everything has gone according to plan. Trump’s political strategist, James Blair, announced after the off-year elections in 2025 that the president would be “very, very focused on prices and cost of living.” White House aides told us in the new year that the pivot would come after Trump scratched his itch for another confrontation with Iran. By May, as that conflict dragged on, Trump advisers told us quietly that if it had not receded, along with gas prices, by Labor Day, there would be trouble.

Two weeks ago, multiple Trump advisers told us they expected the kinetic part of the Iran war to mostly cease in September, clearing the way for lower gas prices. None of that has happened. Missiles are still flying in the Strait of Hormuz. Since the 2025 elections, gas prices have risen 39 percent, from $3.08 to $4.28; 30-year mortgage rates have increased 8 percent; electricity prices have gone up more than 4 percent. Charlie Cook, a political analyst and the dean emeritus of legislative-election handicapping, says that Republicans should brace themselves for a tough result. “The worst-case scenario for the GOP and best for Democrats today would have sounded ludicrous eight months ago,” he wrote recently. “The most plausible today resembles Republicans’ nightmare scenario at the beginning of the year.”

[F]ew Republicans still pretend off-camera that they will be able to maintain control of the House. Narrow Democratic control of the Senate, once outlandish, could be within reach. On the sidelines of the convention in Dallas, strategists muttered about recent polling in House races that shows jump balls where Trump won by double digits in 2024.

The outstanding question is whether Democratic candidates can emerge from the dim shadow of President Biden. . . . .On the whole, Democrats are delighted by Trump’s strategy—to put front and center a man whose unpopularity fires up their voters and further alienates the newly skeptical. “If the Democrats have a great year, it will be because they got their base out to vote in large numbers,” Rich Thau, the moderator of the Swing Voter Project, told us. “It won’t be because they magically converted these swing voters into Democratic senatorial and gubernatorial voters.”

His economic approval rating this summer, according to Quinnipiac University, stood at 34 percent, down from 53 percent on the eve of the last midterm elections on his watch, in 2018. The 2024 presidential election hinged on the rising cost of living, and after Republicans won the trifecta—the White House and both chambers of Congress—the expectation was that Trump and his party would fix what many still view as Biden’s economy. “I want to emphasize that this wasn’t to just slightly improve things,” David Winston, a Republican strategist who works with congressional leadership, told us. “They viewed a substantive outcome as what they were looking for.” It has not come to pass.

But no comments mattered more than Trump’s. He talked for nearly two hours, a rolicking, weaving address that only occasionally stuck to the teleprompter. It ended where he began. “Please pretend that I’m running, and get out and vote on November 3 or sooner,” he said. “Because, in actuality, I really am running.” In actuality, he is not. Or maybe he is, in a way. His crowd remained in their seats to the end. The room, at times, felt packed to the rafters.

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