Violent unrest broke out again in Israel on Wednesday as citizens took to the streets to protest dictator Benjamin Netanyahu’s plans to seize control of the country’s independent judiciary to protect himself from criminal liability and satisfy his extremist coalition members, Fox News reports.

Saying it was probably Hunter Biden is the easy, predictable joke, even though it’s virtually impossible it was him since why would Hunter use the West Wing visitor entrance to see his father at the White House. Saying it was Joe or Jack Smith is simply insane and turns what could have been potentially a minor political liability for the White House into just another crazy bullshit thing Trump said that Republicans have to pretend they didn’t see him post on Truth Social.

“Where are the White House SECURITY TAPES, like the ones I openly and happily gave to Deranged Jack Smith, which will quickly show where the Cocaine in the White House came from??? They already know the answer, but probably don’t like it!” Trump later posted to Truth Social.

Disgraced former President Trump’s 2024 campaign and political action committee raised more than $35 million in the second quarter of 2023, a period beginning just two days after he was indicted in New York State on March 30th and then encompassing his second indictment at the federal level on June 8th, showing that, crime in fact does pay pretty well for the fat bastard’s political ambitions.

It is however just a third of the massive Q2 2019 haul of $105 million for the Trump 2020 campaign and the RNC’s “Trump Victory” joint fundraising committee. We know the situations are not a 1-to-1 comparison because Trump obviously was the incumbent president and as such enjoyed the party’s full, official support at the time, but there’s definitely a shortfall somewhere in that $70 million delta.

Nevada “Stop the Steal” asshole and 2022 attorney general election loser Sigal Chattah last week filed a lawsuit challenging state Senate Bill 406, aka the Election Worker Protection Law, which was enacted in May to criminalize any “use or threaten or attempt to use any force, intimidation, coercion, violence, restraint or undue influence with the intent to: (a) Interfere with the performance of the duties of any elections official relating to an election, or (b) Retaliate against any elections official for performing duties relating to an election,” and also prohibiting the dissemination of “any personal identifying information or sensitive information of an elections official without the consent of the elections official,” according to Marc Elias’s Democracy Docket.

In the complaint, Chattah argues protecting election workers in such a manner is a violation of MAGA terrorists’ First Amendment rights, saying they’re “entitled to engage in conduct without criminal prosecution of basic First Amendment freedoms under a statute that should avoid chilling the exercise of First Amendment rights,” and that the “arbitrary inclusion of the terms ‘intimidation’ and ‘undue influence’ interferes with Plaintiffs’ rights and liberties.” Almost sounds like they’re offended that someone would ever even suggest that this law is necessary but it’s also their God-given right to threaten and intimidate election officials at their homes at night if a Republican loses.

A law enforcement source tells Politico that officials have concluded they’re unlikely to be able to positively identify the person who dropped a small bag of cocaine in the visitor check in area for the West Wing of the White House over the weekend given the high foot traffic there.

“It’s gonna be very difficult for us to do that because of where it was,” an official said, adding “Even if there were surveillance cameras, unless you were waving it around, it may not have been caught [on camera]. It’s a bit of a thoroughfare. People walk by there all the time.” It really does not sound like this is ever going to be tied to Hunter Biden, no matter how badly the right wing media want it.

Profusely sweating North Carolina Lt Governor and 2024 GOP gubernatorial nomination frontrunner Mark Robinson took the stage on Sunday at hate group Moms for Liberty’s annual summit to decry an Indiana chapter taking shit for featuring a Hitler quote in a recent newsletter, saying they’d merely been taken out of context or some other stupid excuse. “Whether you’re talking about Adolf Hitler, whether you’re talking about Chairman Mao, whether you’re talking about Stalin, whether you’re talking about Pol Pot, whether you’re talking about Castro in Cuba, or whether you’re talking about a dozen other despots all around the globe, it is time for us to get back and start reading some of those quotes,” said Robinson, while apparently clutching a towel to mop up his forehead sweat.

Note: We would have linked our June 22, 2023 story “Indiana Moms for Liberty group quotes Hitler in newsletter” if Google hadn’t flagged it as a “Publisher Policy Violation,” probably for quoting Hitler while reporting on these sick assholes. We don’t know because they never tell us specifically what the problem is, so we simply pulled the story rather than continue to tempt Google’s arbitrary and capricious wrath as enforced by algorithms incapable of parsing out context and intent.

In a motion opposing bail for Capitol rioter and attempted Obama assassin Taylor Taranto in custody pre-trial, federal prosecutors on Wednesday described the MAGA van-lifer’s movements and threats prior to his arrest last week in the Kalorama neighborhood of DC, including Taranto’s intent to detonate a bomb outside of the National Institute of Standards and Technology headquarters in Gaithersburg, Maryland. What Taranto’s specific axe to grind with the NIST was – as opposed to more conventional targets of right wing rage and paranoia like the FBI, Justice Department, CDC, National Institutes of Health, CIA, IRS, Federal Reserve, etc – was not made clear.

“[Taylor] made several statements indicating that he intended to blow up his vehicle at NIST that he was on a ‘one way mission,’ and that the vehicle was self-driving so he would not have to be anywhere near it when it ‘went off,'” the prosecutors wrote, just shortly after describing the van as a “2000 black Chevrolet Express G1500,” a model decades too old to have self-driving capability.

The motion then details Taranto’s movements just prior to his arrest the next day, that he had exited the non-self driving vehicle and was walking around Kalorama talking about “entrance points,” said he had “control” of the block and “had them surrounded,” with his next objective to find the “tunnels underneath their houses.” Secret Service agents then closed in on Taranto and he was arrested in a wooded area nearby after a brief chase. A search of his van by DC Metro police and FBI bomb squads found two guns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition, but no explosives.

Sources within the Australian government told the Sydney Morning Herald on Wednesday that Donald Trump Jr’s application for a visa to speak at a right wing event in the country this weekend had actually been granted, despite either Junior or his would-be host Turning Point Australia (a local offshoot of small-faced shitweasel Charlie Kirk’s fascist youth organization) falsely trying to portray it as access denied after thousands of Aussies signed a petition to block his entry.

“It seems America isn’t the only country that makes it difficult for the Trumps… 😂 Announcement and more info coming soon about the postponement of the tour. Hold onto your tickets, this is a short delay nothing more. #CancelCulture The dates will be changing for all shows to a later date. Apologies for any inconveniences especially those who had long travel plans!” wrote Turning Point Australia in a Facebook post a few hours before the Morning Herald story dropped. Meaning either Don Jr lied to them and told them he’d been denied or he told them he was canceling and on their own Turning Point AU tried to spin it as a denial by the Down Under Deep State.

“It’s [Deviated Septum Jr’s] choice whether he comes or not but there is no immigration impediment to him coming,” a spokesperson for Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil told the Morning Herald.

The Michigan and Arizona state Republican parties are seriously hurting for cash to pay for day-to-day operations as lack of donor interest and legal fees according to a review of filings by Reuters.

In Michigan, the state GOP led by MAGA-QAnon freak Kristina Karamo had $116,000 cash on hand as of March 31st, down from $867,000 for the same period in 2021. “I question whether the state party has the necessary expertise to spend the money well,” said most recent former chair Ron Weiser, who is pulling the plug after giving the party $4.5 million during the 2022 cycle.

The Arizona GOP is in even worse shape, with less than $50,000 in reserves as of the end of March, down from $770,000 in the same period in 2019. The party spent more than $300,000 on “legal consulting” fees in 2022 as then-chair “Chemtrails Kelli” Ward faced multiple subpoenas from both the House January 6th Select Committee and federal prosecutors investigating her role in the post-2020 election coup attempt. They also pissed away $500,000 on an election night party and bus tour for their losing slate of statewide candidates Kari Lake, Blake Masters, Mark Finchem, and Abe Hamadeh, unhinged MAGA assholes who lost the governor, US Senate, secretary of state, and attorney general races, respectively. “It’s too bad we let the right wing of our party take over the operations,” said longtime Grand Canyon State GOP donor Jim Click, who told Reuters he’s out.

Completely unhinged MAGA-QAnon lawyer Lin Wood on Tuesday sent a letter to the Georgia state Bar Association on Tuesday asking them to let him simply surrender his law license and retire rather than face ongoing misconduct proceedings over his batshit behavior surrounding the 2020 election.

“Pursuant to State Bar Rule 1-202(f), I hereby request that I be permitted to transfer to Retired Status effective immediately. I understand that this request is unqualified, irrevocable and permanent. I further understand and acknowledge that if granted Retired Status I am prohibited from practicing law in this State and in any other state or jurisdiction and that I may not apply for readmission. The State Bar of Georgia counsel has confirmed that I remain free to represent myself pro se now and in the future as long as I do not use my Bar number or the name L Lin Wood, PC, in any such matter,” Wood wrote to the Bar’s director and general counsel.

The former Illinois state senator turned Republican gubernatorial candidate who lost the 2022 election to incumbent Democrat J.D. Pritzker in a landslide, somehow along the way garnering the endorsement of indicted cult leader Donald Trump, has decided he’s going to take on another Trump-endorsed Republican for a House seat in a Deep Red district, Politico reports.

Darren Bailey filed paperwork to pursue the GOP nomination for 12th Congressional District, currently represented by NARAL-, NRA- and Trump-endorsed five-term Republican Congressman Mike Bost, who won reelection in 2022 with 74% of the vote in the general election.  Apparently, this race is going to come down to who can out brownnose Trump to get the endorsement in the Deep Red district.

While researching a potential counterpart to an observed gravitational wave event, astronomers identified the signal of an event never before identified:  the radio “glow” of a black hole cracking apart a sun or other major body that had wandered too close to it, IFLScience reports.

This black hole, about 10 billion light-years from Earth, is thought to be having a “tidal disruption event” where a sun, system or other stray collection of material reaches a point where the material structures of the bodies start breaking apart, casting off a signal.  It could turn into a larger “active galactic nucleus,” where a black hole at the center of a galaxy “turns on” a feeding frenzy after having been relatively dormant for a period.

The Kremlin and the Biden Administration have been in contact regarding a possible swap of an American journalist being held in a Russian prison for a Russian accused of cybercrime being held by the US, the Guardian reports.

A good sign something is afoot:  US consular officials met with Wall Street Journalist Evan Gershkovich in the prison at Lefortovo, and Russian officials met with Vladimir Dunaev at a federal detention facility in Ohio.  Dunaev has been in US custody since his extradition from South Korea in 2021 on the accusation that he helped release the ransomware Trickbot that targeted the western banking industry.

“We have said that there have been certain contacts on the subject, but we don’t want them to be discussed in public,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in a conference call with reporters. “They must be carried out and continue in complete silence.”

In National Zero’s sorta-annual coverage of American gluttony: the reigning champions of the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating… um… Spectacular (?) retained their titles, as Joey Chestnut at more than five dozen on the men’s side while Miki Sudo at 39.5 in the ten minute span, according to the New York Times.

Legendarily “held since 1916”–it was, in fact, started in the 1970s–the Coney Island contest was significantly disrupted as lightning and rain delayed the start of the men’s event by more than an hour and sent fans in metal grandstands scrambling for cover, with some crew being told to send the crowd home and break down the stage.

You know those commercials you see late-night on most networks (but pretty much ’round the clock on Fox’s cable propaganda network) for Silver Eagle coins?  Maybe we sussed out their seemingly endless supply:  Two precious metal trading companies owned by the same individual will pay nearly $150 million in fines and restitution after an audit found hundreds of thousands of collectible coins missing, the BBC reports.

An investigation by the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission–because, y’know, Big Government and everything–found First State Depository and Argent Asset Group, two companies owned by Robert Higgens ran “fraudulent leasing programs” during which he collected silver and more than $7 million in cash from 200 clients.  For all intents and purposes, it was a precious metals-based Ponzi scheme, where investors were told they would make more money on silver they loaned (or bought from and loaned back) to the two companies, who would then broker the metals back to new investors, but in fact, there were no precious metal coins purchased, as contracted, and it was all a scam.  (Coinweek does a better explanation for those inclined.)

Now Higgens et al are on the hook for $112.7 million in restitution and another $33 million in a civil penalty.  He and his companies are permanently barred from ever trading any CFTC-regulated commodity and from ever holding a commodity trading license.

What’s more American than a big, dumb summer action movie? Why, it’s the big, dumb summer action movie with America as the world’s savior against a powerful alien menace Independence Day.

Even though it preceded the MAGA era by 20 years, the 1996 summer hit from 20th Century Fox and Centropolis entertainment checks off a shit ton of boxes for the fantasy-prone America First patriots in the audience, and we might as well check through those boxes for National Zero’s audience.

Ooohhh, look!  The GOP used the Liberian flag in a tweet celebrating the Fourth of July, American Independence Day!  This is almost as bad as when the Trump campaign used images of Russian military equipment and soldiers in an ad urging people to “Support Our Troops.”  (Come to think of it, they probably were his troops.) Or when the GOP’s “Commitment to America” ad featured Russian children and oil rigs.

But look, we’re not petty.  We’re not going to make a big deal about using a stylized American flag–that just so happens to be stylized into a design more closely resembling the North African nation’s flag on the birthday of our great nation.   (And the imagery of conservatives using, even accidentally, the flag of a nation formed by freed Black slaves being repatriated back to Africa isn’t lost.) But we just ask for consistency:  Will Sean Hannity and other conservatives go apeshit crazy over this like they did when the US Olympic Committee changed a previously-stylized flag on its logo?  Yeah, I don’t think so, and that wasn’t even on Independence Day.

Editor’s note:  The story has been updated to include a screenshot after the GOP deleted the tweet about five hours after posting it.

Judge Terry Doughty, a Trump-appointed judge in the Western Louisiana District, ordered the Biden Administration to stop contacting social media companies about misinformation it identified about a number of topics, saying such contact is an attempt by the government to limit criticism, the New York Times reports.

Doughty mentioned the FBI and the Department of Health and Human Services–which oversees the CDC and FDA–specifically in issuing the ban on any contact for “the purpose of urging, encouraging, pressuring, or inducing in any manner the removal, deletion, suppression, or reduction of content containing protected free speech.”

The ruling–which will be appealed–cuts off any communication on subjects other than providing information on crimes, national security threats or foreign attempts to influence elections.  A common whine among conservatives is that The Government ordered social media companies to remove posts contrary to its authoritarian message–like the election wasn’t stolen or that vaccines work–even though Congressional testimony shows agencies used customer service processes available to verified users of the platforms.

Uniformed Secret Service officers on routine patrol found a white powder in the White House library Monday evening, prompting a brief evacuation of the building, but subsequent tests show the power to have been a form of cocaine, the Washington Post reports.

Around 9 p.m. Friday night, DC firefighters were called to the first floor scene to deal with the powder, and when tested found it to be cocaine hydrochloride.  The White House library is located on the floor below where the Oval Office is located, on the level where the kitchen and other support functions are located.  The amount of cocaine, described as a “yellow bar,” appears to be significantly less than the White House’s British counterparts enjoyed during a pandemic soiree at 10 Downing Street that ultimately led to the downfall of then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson.