Hey everybody. Thanks for being here.
Our top story today: For seven months, the administration has told Americans that Iran’s military has been decimated and there is nothing to worry about. This week, the Pentagon’s own watchdog and the Congressional Budget Office told a much different story. We’ve lost dozens of aircraft, our bases have been hammered, and we’re burning through munitions faster than we can replace them. Even Republicans can’t look away anymore. Thomas Massie filed articles of impeachment against Pete Hegseth, and last night seven Republicans crossed over to vote with every Democrat to end the war.
We’ll also get into a new report revealing how DOGE really operated, Trump’s temper tantrum that shut down the Kennedy Center, Kash Patel’s rough Senate hearing, and Trump lashing out as the courts keep ruling against him.
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Let’s get to it.
1. Congress Turns on Trump's War
Two reports came out this week. One is from the Pentagon’s inspector general. It’s the first honest accounting of this war from inside the building, and it covers only the first four months. We’ll start with something I know well: aircraft.
Look at this list. Dozens destroyed or damaged in four months, and some of these cost hundreds of millions of dollars apiece. And it’s not just planes that have taken a hit.
Hundreds of buildings at our bases in the middle east have been hit by Iranian missiles and drones. And our stockpiles are dwindling: the Pentagon’s acquisition office reported massive strategic inventory shortfalls as a result of the war.
There’s been reporting on this for a while, but the President has always denied it. Just two weeks ago, he said we have virtually unlimited ammunition, far more than we could ever use. Unfortunately, that’s just more wishful thinking from a flailing president.
A second report came from the Congressional Budget Office, tallying up the other costs of the war. Direct costs through August came to 38 billion dollars. And that doesn’t even count base damage, diplomatic evacuations, and other expenses.
Also keep in mind that’s just what the government paid. According to the Wall Street Journal, Americans have spent about 100 billion dollars in fuel premiums. As much as Trump hates new taxes, that’s what this war has become.
Even some in the GOP can’t deny those numbers. Yesterday, Thomas Massie walked onto the House floor and read eight articles of impeachment against Pete Hegseth. Massie accused him of carrying out a war Congress never authorized and keeping it going even after war powers resolutions went through.
Not all Republicans see it that way. Massie couldn’t even tell GOP leadership about the articles because he figured they would change the schedule so he couldn’t bring them.
But some of his colleagues are clearly thinking the same thing. Last night when the house voted a third time to end the war, seven republicans crossed over. Is congress going to grow a backbone and turn on Trump anytime soon? Probably not. But Massie’s small act of rebellion means something. This disaster in Iran is becoming harder and harder to ignore, and the smart ones are starting to walk away. In November they’ll see Americans are right there with them.
2. DOGE Paid People Not to Work
Remember DOGE? Elon Musk with his big red chainsaw, promising to cut trillions in waste? Well, before it crashed and burned, Musk sent an email to every federal employee with the ominous subject line “Fork in the Road.” It was a simple buyout offer: quit working now and get paid through September.
That offer had consequences. In 2025, the federal government spent nine and a half billion dollars on paid administrative leave, about six times what it spends in a normal year. 6.7 billion went to buying out the employees that took DOGE’s offer. Almost 150,000 people across the federal workforce were paid to stay home in the name of efficiency.
If that’s not crazy enough, listen to this: OPM doesn’t even know whether any of this saved money. They don’t have the data. The administration will tell you the whole effort saved 200 billion dollars, but nobody has been able to confirm that, and DOGE has a history of blatant lies.
In any case, one thing is clear: for all the drama, DOGE did not reduce the deficit. Don’t take it from me. Here’s a former DOGE staffer:
There you have it. Now here’s the Vice President.
This administration wants you to believe it’s serious about the deficit while doing everything except being serious about the deficit. But the whole DOGE fiasco makes it clear that even if they were serious, the administration would still be too incompetent to reduce federal spending. They had a whole team dedicated to this for months, and the best idea they could come up with was paying people not to work. And of course, there’s no accountability. No sense of remorse at the pointless damage they caused. These people only know how to destroy. And that habit comes right from the top.
3. Trump Holds the Kennedy Center Hostage
As we all know by now, Trump took over the Kennedy Center board last year and packed it with MAGA cronies to back his renovations. In typical Trump fashion, he then put his name on the building. A Congresswoman on the board sued, and a federal judge ordered the change reversed. So the board went for a plaque instead, but that got shut down too.
Almost immediately, the board was on a call. And guess who dialed in. According to CNN, Trump screamed at the Congresswoman for getting the courts involved and told her she was personally responsible if the roof fell in. The Congresswoman countered, telling Trump his management had put the Kennedy Center into deep debt. Then the board voted to close the building, effective immediately.
In a very classy move, Trump is now holding the national performing arts center hostage. The renovation, he said, will not take place unless the court allows him to put his name on it. So the Kennedy Center is now closed, and it will stay closed until Donald Trump gets his plaque. You really can’t make this stuff up.
Is Trump on a mission to destroy Washington? The reflecting pool is dry after Trump’s hand-picked contractor botched the repair job. His arch is being built without real approval. And now the Kennedy Center is dark because Trump can’t steal the spotlight from a president actually worthy of a memorial.
Trump thinks of himself as a great developer to this day. But everything he touches in D.C. ends up behind a fence, under a lawsuit, or closed.
4. Kash Patel in the Hot Seat
Yesterday, Kash Patel was questioned by the Senate Judiciary Committee. Sen. Cory Booker immediately attacked the FBI Director, arguing that he wouldn’t even qualify as an agent. Patel hit back that Booker “just got his 20-second ad campaign.” That set the tone for the rest of the hearing.
But underneath the shouting, Democratic Senators asked real questions about his chaotic performance as director. Patel rarely offered compelling answers.
He repeatedly refused to say whether he would deploy agents to polling stations, which Senators warned would intimidate voters. And when pressed about the agency’s effectiveness, he pointed to arrests from his ‘Most Wanted Fraudsters’ list. I can think of a few names that should be on that list.
But Patel faced greater scrutiny about his decisions within the agency. Despite promising he would not seek political retribution, Patel has purged agents who worked on investigations into Trump and his allies. The bureau lost more than 1,100 special agents last year, either fired for doing their jobs or driven out by incompetent leadership. They averaged 22 years of experience.
So how has Patel replaced that experience? By lowering the bar. This summer, the FBI dropped hiring standards that have been in place for years. Offenses that used to disqualify you on the spot no longer do. When senators asked about the new standards, Patel didn’t have a good explanation.
To me, the answer is pretty clear. Patel had to lower the standards for qualification because nobody wants to work for him.
This isn’t an isolated incident. Across the government, experienced public servants are leaving or being forced out by Trump’s handpicked officials. And their replacements aren’t chosen for competence. They can’t be: nobody qualified wants these jobs anymore. So the only hiring standard left is loyalty.
5. Trump Melts Down Over SCOTUS
Yesterday, we talked about how the Supreme Court overwhelmingly voted to throw out Trump’s mail-in ballot rule. Three of the majority votes came from justices he had placed in the Court. As you can imagine, Trump wasn’t happy about that.
He responded by posting an angry tirade on Truth Social, stripping what little remains of the class and poise that is supposed to be held by the President of the United States.
Even by his standards, the post is a belligerent mess. So let me parse through some of the highlights.
Trump started off with the standard playbook. The Supreme Court has been “bullied and cajoled by the Radical Left.” Because forget the law. Conspiratorial radicals are behind every one of his illegal failures.
Then, the president accused them of betraying him. “These are not the people I interviewed,” he said, before adding that “they are merely a shell of their original selves.” Let me remind President Trump. Just because you handpicked justices, doesn’t mean they answer to you. They answer to the Constitution, which you have abused at every opportunity.
And finally, he bashed them for betraying the country. For “costing the United States Trillions of Dollars with shockingly bad rulings,” from which, “it won’t be easily possible for our Country to recover.”
Maybe Trump should take a look in the mirror. He says the country may never recover from these rulings. But the truth is, the country will be recovering from the damage he has inflicted long after he’s out of the White House. No matter how many angry paragraphs he posts about it.
Some other stories that caught my eye:
The European Union invited Canada on Wednesday to become the bloc’s first “associate member,” a unique offer that Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced alongside Prime Minister Mark Carney. Von der Leyen said the two must “urgently reimagine our partnerships” and framed the offer as “not a partnership against anyone else, but for our common strength.” The subtext is hard to miss. Both Canada and Europe are reeling from President Trump’s pullback from security alliances and his expansive trade wars. Trade talks between Washington and Ottawa notably collapsed last month. While the details are thin, the two sides are working toward cooperation on trade, technology regulation, critical minerals, and defense ahead of a summit in late October. The politics are favorable for Carney: polls show four out of five Canadians want closer ties with the EU, and more than half would support full membership. The EU, meanwhile, hopes that the partnership may bolster its economic growth, which has become well outpaced by the United States.
The Senate holds a confirmation hearing Wednesday for Dr. Nicole Saphier, President Trump’s third nominee for surgeon general, a post that has sat empty since he took office last year. Saphier is a radiologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering and a former Fox News contributor who has often publicly criticized Health Secretary Kennedy Jr., irritating parts of the MAHA movement. She notably called his firing of the CDC director “really embarrassing,” warning that “these shenanigans are taking us farther away” from rebuilding public trust. And she has publicly supported vaccines. Saphier brings stronger medical credentials than previous candidates. Trump’s first pick, Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, was withdrawn in May 2025, and his second, wellness influencer Dr. Casey Means, failed to win enough Senate support after questions about her qualifications. The White House says Saphier will fully comply with federal ethics requirements, as she plans to divest holdings in pharmaceutical, food, and tobacco companies. She is expected to be confirmed, and would lead the 6,000-member Public Health Service Commissioned Corps and issue national health advisories.
