POTEMKIN FLEET: Russian Navy To Build Nuclear Powered Destroyer and New Aircraft Carrier.

Or perhaps not:

“The project will be developed by the Severnoye design bureau. The Russian Navy will undoubtedly have large surface ships with a nuclear propulsion unit. The Lider undoubtedly won’t be the sole one in the series,” Navy deputy commander-in-chief for armaments Vice-Admiral Viktor Bursuk told reporters at the International Maritime Defense Show (IMDS-2017) on Wednesday, June 28, according to the Moscow-based TASS News Agency.

The massive 15,000-ton warship is being designed to replace many of Russia’s existing Soviet-era surface warships including the Udaloy I (Project 1155 Fregat), Udaloy II (Project 1155.1 Fregat II) and the Sovremennyy-class (Project 956 Sarych) destroyers. The vessel might also partially replace the Kirov-class (Project 1144 Orlan) nuclear-power battlecruisers in Russian Navy service.

However, analysts both in the United States and in Russia—as well as defense industry officials—have doubts that the Lider-class will ever actually be built.

The Russian Navy does not really have a genuine need for the vessels and the ships are expected to be extremely expensive.

“So from the words of the admiral, it follows that the project is not yet finalized, and these are only ‘wishes’,” one Russian defense industry official told me.

“My opinion is that it will be another ‘white elephant’ in addition to the Project 1144 ships.”

And that planned carrier? Even if it is built, it won’t be deployed before 2030. And even then — and this has always been a kink in Russia’s plans to be maritime power — it would have to pass through narrow waters guarded by Western air bases before it ever reached the open seas.

THE BEST DEFENSE: Six held in Spain, UK and Germany in anti-jihadist raids.

The suspects are said to have produced and spread violent videos to recruit would-be jihadist Fighters online.

One was a 43-year-old Islamic preacher from Birmingham.

He was arrested in the city’s Sparkhill area under a European Arrest Warrant and later appeared in court in London.

The man was identified as Tarik Chadlioui, a Belgian-Moroccan father of eight children who arrived in the UK in 2015. As he challenged a Spanish extradition request, the judge told him he was alleged to be a member of a terrorist organisation who was actively engaged in terrorist activities.

Of course, six isn’t even a speck at the point on the tip of the iceberg.

On a related note, how many native Belgian fathers have eight children?

TRANSMIT THAT TO VLADIMIR: Mattis Says Russia Must Know ‘What We Will Not Tolerate.’

Mattis sounds somewhat less in Putin’s pocket than, say, someone promising “more flexibility” towards Moscow after his final election.

AN ELABORATE SHELL GAME: California lawmakers have tried for 50 years to fix the state’s housing crisis. Here’s why they’ve failed.

“Get the hell out of my way!” the wise man once said.

JOHN DANIEL DAVIDSON: Let’s Stop Pretending Medicaid Saves Lives.

Remember Deamonte Driver? He was the 12-year-old who died of a toothache in 2007. The boy lived in Maryland and was enrolled in that state’s Medicaid program, which covers dental care for children, as all Medicaid programs are required to do.

But Deamonte’s mother couldn’t find a dentist who would take Medicaid. At the time, only about 16 percent of Maryland dentists accepted Medicaid patients, and Deamonte was in dire need of basic dental care—as was his younger brother, DaShawn, who had six rotted teeth.

By the time Deamonte’s toothache got attention, bacteria from an abscessed tooth had spread to his brain. He underwent two emergency operations and six weeks of hospital care that cost more than $250,000. But it was too late, and Deamonte died. A routine, $80 tooth extraction could have saved his life.

Deamonte’s case prompted a national conversation about Medicaid. How had Maryland’s Medicaid program so thoroughly failed the Driver family? Why hadn’t they been able to find a dentist? And what is the point of being enrolled in Medicaid if there are no doctors or dentists willing to treat you?

Those questions were never really answered, but they’re as pertinent today as they were a decade ago—arguably more so, since we’re once again engaged in a national debate over health care reform and the fate of Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion. Then as now, the reality is that Medicaid doesn’t save lives. In some cases, like Deamonte Driver’s, it bars access to basic life-saving treatments.

It isn’t just that Medicaid doesn’t save lives, it’s that it has put Washington on a course to bankrupt the nation. But if you think of it as the world’s most expensive example of virtue signaling, it all makes sense.

RICK MANNING: Missed It By That Much – The Obamacare Enrollee Lie.

Opponents of changes to the failing Obamacare system are using the fairy tale assumptions of the Congressional Budget Office to contend that millions will be left without health insurance coverage next year, when in fact as many as one million more will likely have insurance.

Incredibly, the CBO even goes so far as to guess that seven million people will flee the Obamacare exchange if they are not compelled to use it through the threat of a punitive tax for not having health insurance.

For once their number might inadvertently be right, since seven million people is also their overestimation of how many people are going to be in the exchange at the end of 2017.

Only in the crazy world of Washington, D.C. math could someone wildly overestimate the number of people to use a program, creating a political firestorm that millions will be harmed, and then through their dire predictions actually get the number of Obamacare exchange users back to the real numbers.

An honest press corps would have dug into these numbers weeks ago.

Anyway, do read the whole thing.

COMPETITION: Amazon’s Whole Foods Deal Adds Pressure on Grocery Services to Deliver.

Now, with the e-commerce giant planning to buy Whole Foods WFM -0.31% Market Inc. for $13.7 billion, giving it a large foothold in the food retail industry, the stakes are all the higher for companies such as Instacart Inc., Peapod LLC, Shipt Inc. and FreshDirect LLC to deliver not only fresh food—but continued growth.

Midwestern grocery chain Schnucks Markets Inc. is expected Thursday to announce its partnership with Instacart for online delivery will extend to most of its 100 stores by next month. Ahold Delhaize’s Peapod is expanding its push into New York City, a key market, after spending more than $94 million on a warehouse in Jersey City, N.J., in 2014.

Shipt, which delivers food orders for retailers including Costco Wholesale Corp. COST 0.57% , Meijer Inc. and Whole Foods, intends to almost double its markets by next year, from 51 to 100. Founder Bill Smith says the company’s expansion is targeting suburban customers in less saturated regions like the South and the Midwest to gain an edge.

The largest U.S. food sellers, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. WMT 0.66% and Kroger Co. KR 2.55% , meanwhile, are testing delivery services using Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc.

My wife and I have been mostly happy ordering online for delivery (King Sooper) or for pickup (Walmart). We have only two complaints. One is that the quality of the produce is hit or miss, and if you need some meal-critical veggies or the ripest fruit, you’re still better off getting it yourself. The other is that their online ordering frontends are simply not very good, which seems like an area where competition from the online-shopping giant ought to force improvements.

But delivering only the best produce — reliably, affordably, and at a profit — is the Holy Grail of online grocery shopping. The first company to figure that one out stands to dominate.

HMM: OPEC, have no fear: The U.S. oil-shale output crash is here.

The energy industry is already suffering from the impact of spending cuts over the past several years, said Phil Flynn, senior market analyst at Price Futures Group, in a webinar held Tuesday afternoon.

“We’re losing investment in the energy industry,” he said. “It’s taking its toll.”

Global energy exploration and production capital expenditures are expected to fall by 22%, or $740 billion, between 2015 and 2020, he said, citing a report from Wood Mackenzie issued last year. Including cuts to conventional exploration investment, Wood Mackenzie said that figure increases to just over $1 trillion.

Discovery of new oil fields has already “plunged” to its lowest level since 1947, as exploration companies cut back in the wake of the drop in oil prices, Flynn said. Year to date, West Texas Intermediate crude CLQ7, +1.27% and Brent crude LCOQ7, +1.18% prices have dropped by roughly 18%.

Shale-oil production is climbing, but that growth is slowing down, said Flynn. He pointed out that while the number of U.S. rigs drilling for oil has grown for 23 weeks in a row, based on Baker Hughes BHI, +0.24% data, new-well oil production per rig among the shale plays has slowed.

A crash in shale-oil production is “starting now,” Flynn told MarketWatch in an email. “It will become more clear in a few months.”

Shale oil production rebounded very quickly after the last crash, and drove prices right back down. Is there some reason that can’t or wouldn’t happen again?

TEACH WOMEN NOT TO RAPE: Florida woman, 25, arrested for sex for 3 years with boy, 11, which led to a child.

PATRICK POOLE: Former UK Intel Official Says 23,000 Jihadists Living in Britain Is Probably ‘the Tip of the Iceberg.’

IT’S BRIEF, BUT IT’S FANTASTIC: Liz Sheld is stuck in a meeting, but she still managed to wrangle up all the links you need to get you going.

KICK ‘EM WHEN THEY’RE UP, KICK ‘EM WHEN THEY’RE DOWN: Trump Unloads on Media Again.

“The failing @nytimes writes false story after false story about me,” he said on Twitter. “They don’t even call to verify the facts of a story. A Fake News Joke!”

“Some of the Fake News Media likes to say that I am not totally engaged in healthcare,” he added. “Wrong, I know the subject well & want victory for U.S.”

The story that seemed to have angered him was published online Tuesday night and on the Times’ front page Wednesday morning, saying “if Republicans do manage to broker a deal … it is not likely to be because of Mr. Trump’s involvement.”

“Until Tuesday afternoon, the president was largely on the sidelines as the fate of one of his most important campaign pledges played out,” the Times reported.

Trump hasn’t exactly been leading the repeal reform restore effort in Congress, but the NYT — and all the major media outlets, really — doesn’t have much goodwill left to draw on no matter what they’re charged with. And that situation is one entirely of their own making.

BUSINESS CLASS REVOLT CIRCUMVENTED: Laptop ban on planes to US replaced by tighter security.

The US Homeland Security Department has decided not to expand a ban on laptops in the passenger cabins of planes flying to the States. Instead it’s requiring tighter security measures for all aircraft and airports.

The DHS made the announcement Wednesday, saying the enhanced security standards would apply to all commercial flights to the United States. The 10 airports in the Middle East and Africa affected by the current laptop ban will have that prohibition lifted if they implement the new standards.

We may have finally found a hard limit on security theater.

THIS USED TO SEEM SO FAR AWAY: Over 50 But Not Over the Hill — A Diet and Exercise Plan for People 50 and Over.

THE WORLD’S MOST POPULOUS NATION: Facebook has 2 billion monthly users.

GOOD LORD: Terminally ill baby Charlie Gard’s parents ‘utterly distraught’ after losing final appeal in European court – meaning their son’s life support WILL be switched off.

It gets worse:

Chris Gard, 32, and Connie Yates, 31, wanted to take their 10-month-old son – who suffers from a rare genetic condition and has brain damage – to the US to undergo a therapy trial.

Doctors at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children in London, where Charlie is being cared for, said they wanted him to be able to ‘die with dignity’.

But the couple, from Bedfont, west London, raised almost £1.4million so they could take their son to America but a series of courts ruled in favour of the British doctors.

It comes after specialists at Great Ormond Street said therapy in the US is experimental and will not help and added that life support should stop.

And after losing legal battles in the UK, Charlie’s parents were hoping judges in Strasbourg, France, would come to their aid.

But on Tuesday afternoon, the ECHR rejected a last-ditch plea and their ‘final’ decision means the baby’s life support machine will be switched off.

The ECHR announced the application to the court by the parents was ‘inadmissible’ and added that their decision was ‘final’.

The single payer calls the shots.

AND COUNTING: 17 VA Scandals Before Trump’s Reform Bill.

HMM: Antitrust Worries? Amazon Hires Former Justice Department Experts For Whole Foods Deal.

Before the Whole Foods deal, I could count on the fingers of one hand how many times I’d heard “Amazon” and “antitrust” in the same sentence. In the last week or so, I’ve lost count.

NICE GIG: Jason Chaffetz Officially Joins Fox News.

FAKE NEWS: CNN uses Elmo as source against Trump immigration action.

Maybe this week will be remembered as time when the wheels finally came off the media’s clown car.

MICHELLE MALKIN: The brutal battle against medical kidnappers.

On the day Boston Children’s Hospital celebrated being named “the number one pediatric hospital in the nation” by U.S. News & World Report, I was interviewing Dana Gottesfeld in nearby Somerville, Massachusetts. Dana is the young wife of Martin “Marty G” Gottesfeld, an imprisoned technology engineer/activist who used his skills to fight against medical child abuse committed at Boston’s Children’s Hospital.

“That is so Boston,” Dana observed Tuesday in response to the new ranking — which is already splashed in multiple gold medallions across the hospital’s website.

It’s all about power, prestige and pull in the top echelons of the Bay State’s medical community, many New Englanders have informed me. BCH’s teaching affiliate is Harvard Medical School. The ties between and among influential and wealthy alumni in the realms of health care, politics and the courts are innumerable.

It’s a network that’s “practically untouchable,” Dana explained.

And like the third rail, those who dare challenge these renowned institutions risk great danger to their freedom and their lives.

Read the whole thing.

Jury Awards Man $833,000 In Tea Party Libel Suit.

A jury in Georgia awarded James Lyle a total of $833,000 Monday in his libel lawsuit against Lee Martin and the Tea Party Patriots.

The long-standing case came to end in Cherokee County, Ga., when the jury found the Tea Party Patriots and Martin defamed Lyle, who is the partner of Amy Kremer, the former chairman of Tea Party Express.

The case began in 2011 after allegations surfaced that Martin made defamatory Facebook posts about Lyle under the pseudonym “Dale Butterworth,” stating essentially that Lyle molested the child of Amy Kremer, his girlfriend.

That molestation, it turns out, never took place. But what did take place before the accusations aired publicly on Facebook was intense interpersonal drama in the Tea Party Patriots, an organization that was initially founded by four individuals, among them Martin’s wife Jenny Beth Martin and Kremer.

In 2009, Kremer left the Tea Party Patriots and decided to align herself with a rival group called the Tea Party Express. Following the separation of Kremer from the Tea Party Patriots, Martin aka “Dale Butterworth” made a post alleging Lyle molested Kremer’s daughter.

Sad, what became of so much of the Tea Party.

MANSPLAINING: A Reporter Yelled at Sarah Huckabee Sanders for Insinuating That the Media Is Sometimes Wrong.

OH: Scientists ‘can’t rule out’ collision with asteroid flying by Earth in 2029.

DECIMATED AND ON THE RUN: Top US admiral warns ISIS-linked militants seek new fronts in Asia.