Quick links for reading in the green room

I'm heading up to Ravinia Park today ahead of tonight's first performance in the completely-renovated pavilion. Sorry, the performance is for donors and staff only; the Pavilion opens to the public tomorrow night.

The chorus call is 1:30 pm, we're first to rehearse meaning we'll be done around 2:30, and the reception doesn't start until 6. I will be brining a book. Possibly two. And I will want to read these:

• Fareed Zakaria warns "the US will pay for the chain reaction [the OAFPOTUS] set off in NATO."
• Adam Kinzinger shows how the Graham Platner defenestration demonstrates a key difference between the parties: "[T]he answer isn’t for Democrats to lower their standards. It’s for Republicans to raise theirs again."
• Conservative writer David French shakes his head at the anti-American meltdown on the right after the Supreme Court upheld the black letter Constitutional law of birthright citizenship.
• Julia Ioffe checks in on Russia, finding a country in despair over the Ukraine war and their own leadership.
• The Post examines what the record-breaking El Niño could mean for this summer's and autumn's weather.
• Bruce Schneier argues that we can enact policies restricting AI surveillance to ensure future social progress.

Finally, Count Binface, aka comedian Jonathan Harvey, has jumped into the race in a by-election in Clacton, Essex against Nigel Micropeen¹ Farage, who might be the most-loathed person in Britain. Farage, you may recall, resigned from the seat so that he could win the seat back while suspending an investigation into why he accepted millions of pounds from a convicted Thai national fraudster. This did not go well in the House of Commons.

The thing is: Count Binface might actually win. Ipsos found that Britons would vote for Count Binface over Farage by a 12-point margin. Clacton, however, is perhaps the Reform UK Party's strongest stronghold, so Farage could get re-elected to the seat. We'll see; the by-election is on August 13th.

The key word in the Farage by-election is "suspended". If Farage is re-elected on 13 August, the investigation will resume, and it will now also examine donations to Farage by the mother of one of his closest allies, a man convicted of wire fraud in the U.S. The Metropolitan Police has recently questioned both mother and son under caution, so there may also be a criminal investigation underway, in addition to scrutiny by parliament. If Farage wanted to deflect attention from his finances, he has failed spectacularly.

As we have seen throughout history, narcissists and grifters _always_ over-reach. It's literally* a tragedy. (* I meant that literally.)