CULTURE OF CORRUPTION: Inside Bob Casey’s Troubling Relationship with Erdogan’s Best Friend in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. “Murat Güzel, a prolific Democratic donor, credits Bob Casey with helping him get a start in politics. Casey’s wife, Terese, recently thanked Güzel for a $100,000 donation to another Pennsylvania committee.”

AT AMAZON, Shop the Memorial Day Sale. #CommissionEarned

DON SURBER: The Summer of Correction: The political pendulum swings back like Miley Cyrus on a Wrecking Ball.

YOU KNOW, IF MY SHOCKED FACE GETS THESE MANY OUTINGS IT’S GOING TO NEED REPAIR:  NIH official finally admits taxpayers funded gain-of-function research in Wuhan — after years of denials.

UPDATE (FROM GLENN): A lot of modified limited hanging-out going on now while people’s attention is focused on other things. See, e.g., Exclusive: Former Top Public Health Official Admits Covid Origins Not Settled, No Science to Back Social-Distance Guidance.

MATTHEW SCHMITZ: The New Midlife Crisis.

Works of popular art have begun to document the new crisis. Barbie, the 2023 blockbuster directed by Greta Gerwig, is a modern Pinocchio story. Initially, Barbie is a deathless, sexless being—unconcerned with men or children, immune to thoughts of mortality. No mere doll, she is the model career woman. “She has her own money, her own house, her own car, her own career. Because Barbie can be anything, women can be anything.” She is living Betty Friedan’s dream. But when Barbie becomes human, she must come to terms with biological realities. The film ends with her visit to an ob-gyn. In real life, the visits are to IVF clinics.

Men have much more time on their clocks, a fact that allows millennial males now entering middle age to defer any deliberation about what they want out of life. Instead of a second adolescence, they seem determined to enjoy perpetual adolescence. (Is it any wonder that female millennial professionals are desperate when they wake up at age thirty-five and realize they want a husband?) But how long can men defer the reckoning? The Worst Person in the World, a 2021 film by the Norwegian director Joachim Trier, offers an answer. It features a man who suddenly learns he has cancer. He is the paragon of creative-class success, an underground comic-book artist whose most famous creation has been turned into a movie. But he never managed to have the children he wanted. He lost the woman he loved. All he has left are his collections of comic books and records.

Baby Boomers got married, owned homes, and had kids. The price was conformity. No doubt it could be stultifying. But for most people, the crisis was mild. You could waste money on a sports car and still have grandchildren someday. That was true even if your affairs led to a messy divorce. What of my generation?

They threw the baby out with the bathwater.

FASTER PLEASE: ‘Insubordination’: College President Suspended for Agreeing to Protesters.’

WELL, HE IS, OR AT LEAST THE PEOPLE BEHIND HIM ARE: Chaos Candidate: Voters increasingly view Joe Biden as the source of America’s unraveling. “Biden’s immigration and inflation policies have hit the working class hard. Poorer communities are less able to insulate themselves from the disruptions caused by mass migration, and inflation cuts deeper when you’re barely making ends meet. The polarizing identity politics favored by the administration serves as a signaling mechanism for the college-educated elite but alienates many blue-collar families.”

VICTORIA TAFT WITH ANOTHER TRIAL UPDATE: Trump’s Long-Time Nemesis Sends Love Notes to Michael Cohen During His Testimony.

ELECTION INTERFERENCE AND DISINFORMATION: “The nation was largely denied information about the Biden family business in 2020, thanks to a compliant press corps, the censorship of social media, and a partisan cabal of former intelligence officials.”

OH, COME ON, WHO AMONG US HASN’T WANTED TO DO THAT?  Pro-Trump artist releases 100 penis-shaped balloons with faces of Alvin Bragg, Judge Merchan on them.

WHO’RE YOU GONNA BELIEVE: TEH ‘SCIENCE’ OR YOUR OWN TWO EYES:  One lifetime, three different climates (allegedly).

POWERS THAT BE ARE DOING THEIR UTMOST TO SHIELD OUT ANY LIGHT:  Stuck in the Covid Dark Ages.

SHOW THEM THE MAN AND THEY’LL SHOW YOU THE CRIME:  Trump and the trial without a crime.

I’M NOT SURE IT WILL STAND UP IN COURT BUT I LOOK FORWARD TO THE ARGUMENT:  Breaking News: Ron DeSantis Makes “Climate Change Isn’t Real” Official Florida Law.

AS IF SUCH REMINDER IS NEEDED:  Rashida Tlaib’s Posts Remind Us She’s an Enemy of Israel.

THE MIDDLE EAST FIRES SPREADING?  Lebanon: far-right group ‘Soldiers of God’ is exploiting the country’s unsettled past to stir sectarian tension.

I WILL NOT EAT IT ON A RUG:  No, I will not eat the bug.

NO CONSPIRACY NEEDED:  Pelican Island Bridge in Texas Slammed by Barge, Causing Portion to Collapse.

For these results a simple crisis of competency and neglect of our infrastructure suffices and is enough.

GOOD:  U.S. Halts Funding to EcoHealth Alliance, the Organization Behind Infamous Wuhan Bat Virus Research.

A WIN:  Texas judge orders new election after GOP lawsuit challenged 2022 election result in Houston area.

AND AGAIN, BEHOLD HOW SHOCKED MY FACE IS:  Exclusive: Former NIH Head Francis Collins Admits Covid Origins Not Settled, No Science to Back Social-Distance Guidance.

SHOCKED, SHOCKED, SHOCKED:  Two “migrants” tried to break into a Marine Corps base in Virginia. One was a Jordanian national, the other was on the terror watchlist.

DEMOCRATS PRACTICE ELECTION CONTROL LIKE THEY DO BIRTH CONTROL: MULTIPLE METHODS. ILLEGALS VOTING, EXTRA BALLOTS, AND INSECURE ELECTRONIC VOTING MACHINES:  “Up to a third” of illegal immigrants are registered to vote, according to new study: “Potentially high enough to overturn the will of the American people.”

MY LATEST SUBSTACK ESSAY: Harrison Butker, Harbinger?

THIS NAKBA DAY MESSAGE IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY TRUTH: Also worth noting. Before the Palestinian cause became a thing, in the Arab world the “Nakba” or catastrophe wasn’t the displacement of Arabs from Palestine, but the failure of five Arab armies plus Palestinian Arab militias to wipe out the nascent state of Israel and kill or expel its Jewish residents.