Well it sure looks like

Trump has gravitated back to his notion of busting up NATO either by judicious neglect or else overt action whenever the coast is clear. Why else lecture the German's about the trade deficit & yet remain silent on Article Five of the NATO Covenant?
For all intents and purposes this is a de facto withdrawl of the formerly rock solid American Nuclear Guarantee from NATO, so it's no accident that virtually the day after the summit German Chancellor Merkel went straight to Dusseldorf and told all that they could no longer rely on the USA in all things.
THAT is not good news my friends, not with a proposal being bandied about in Brussels to arm the EU with nuclears weapons (French warheads on persumably German financed and sourced missiles)...for fifty plus years the US and NATO have kept the peace in Europe, dismantling said alliance largely at the behest of a Despot in Moscow has grave and immediate consequences for all of us.  Put it simply we don't want Germany to feel itself free to make its own way in Europe, either by capitulating to Moscow or deploying it's own cruise missiles, and we certianly don't want Paris and Berlin cooking up their own set of strategic rules in Central Europe. But as of last week we've all but gotten up from that table...I've said it before, ISIS has dynamite, Moscow has Nukes, which horde of "Barbarians" poses the closer threat?

You have to go a long ways in Massachusetts Politics

To find a politician more bereft of ideas than Charlie Baker.  Faced with a budget deficit, the usual infrastructure challenges, his mule-like status with the National GOP, looming cuts, revenue shortfalls, The Governor's Answer to EVERYTHING is raise 30 million for his reelection campaign, play to the center , leave the legislature unchallenged & run on his "Bipartisan Accomplishments"...

Its like Bill Weld Never Resigned....
If Charlie Baker was a sitcom he'd be "Thats so Weld!"....Nothing seems to echo in that cubed shaped head of Charlie's save the search for an opportunity to swan dive into the Charles River.
But ya know what its a proven model and it works, so far the democrats are underfunded and at loggerheads with the usual image problems, but then again a good part of Baker's plan on us doing exactly what he wants us to do....so lets at least agree not to do that eh?

4th Middlesex Special Election Forum....

The Arlington & Lexington Town Democratic Committee are hosting a candidate's forum, Monday June 5th at 7pm at Arlington Town Hall, 730 Mass Ave Arlington Ma. Doors will open at 6:30pm All three democratic candidates will be in attendance, Cindy Friedman, Sean Garballey & Mary Ann Stewart, the primary is June 27th, so this is a priceless opportunity for all three to outreach to the party's base.  Likely this will follow the standard non-League of Women Voters format, written questions from the audience and moderation regarding time limits. The forum itself will be moderated by Charlotte Golar-Richie...

Meanwhile someone spent some cashola this weekend on a phone poll in Arlington a legit phone poll at that...

Sources close to

both the Garballey & Friedman State Senate Campaigns tell me that no Republican has pulled papers or collected signatures to contest the special election for the Late Ken Donnelly's Seat. This means that no Republican will be on the General Election Ballot come July....
A couple of thoughts come to mind, this special election is pretty much "The Only Game in Town" for the GOP until next year, you'd think, given that Trump DID carry Billerica that they'd make a pro-forma effort at least even if its a notoriously safe democratic seat.
I assume that if Charlie Baker wanted a candidate in the 4th Middlesex, he'd a gotten one. Maybe he thought this meant he'd have to make a deal with some neophyte Trumpist...or else the Governor is defaulting to "Reelection Mode" and wants to discourage stirring up the democrats thus to encourage ticket-splitting come November of next year.
Of course this doesn't rule out some sort of write in campaign but those are doomed efforts in the Bay State and a pretty blatant confession of defeat.

Roger Ailes is dead

The Diabolical Founder of Fox News was seventy seven.  In his memory at 9pm at Fox News Headquarters there will be a "twenty two gam salute" with ceremonial short skirts and then a memorial women's dash around the late Political Pontiff's Desk.
Rest in Peace....

It'd be funny if James Comey...

simply concocted this story about a memorandum indicating Trump asked him to drop the Flynn Investigation....because he knows disproving said story would implicate the adminstration in an illegal wiretapping felony. Ironic given the President's irrational insistence Obama bugged his phones.
Besides the mere hint of said memorandum seems to have detonated the pyrobolts holding Trump's delicate psyche together...payback is a mother ain't it?
But truly these stories are moving very fast I don't expect the crisis to end soon either....so keeping up is gonna become arbitrary and capricious around here....

According to the Washington Post...

Alt Right PostBoy Richard Spencer (think of him as a sort of local "General Eon O'Duffy" sans brogue) led a march in Virginia this weekend decrying the iminent removal of a Confederate Statue. "Dozens" showed up to protest bearing torches and placards which read (among other things) "Russia is Our Friend!".
Didja read that one? The Racial Right in the USA suddenly has a hard on for Moscow, I don't doubt Vladimir Putin spends a nice chunk of the Russian Taxpayers Money on all sorts of noisy freaks like these in hopes to sparking something nasty.  So clearly, Putin's Russia is back playing the part of "European Reaction's Reserve Army", to quote Karl Marx, a status that predates the Crimean War and persisted as Russian Policy right up until Nicholas & Alexandra were placed under arrest.  Up until fairly recently the Racial Right in the USA had a burning hatred for the Russians in part out of CounterMarxist Frenzy as well as antipathy for the "Vile Slavic Hordes of Muscovy."  Signs like "Russia is Our Friend" at a Racial Right Rally just tells me, someone somewhere is spending big money to make twitchy weird friends in far off places....
And that dynamic "Russia as Reaction's Firewall" is something well worth keeping an eye on....I'd love to know how far something like this goes, if indeed it is happening at all.