Blame it all on my links, I showed up in tabs, and ruined your browser affair ...

Ed: This might be the political message of the week. In retrospect, the organizers might have thought to swap Ossoff and Bottoms on the poster, but in fairness, one would normally put the gubernatorial candidate ahead of the Senate incumbent. 

===

Axios: The Trump administration sued Alaska on Thursday to block certification of election results if incumbent Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan loses.

Why it matters: The race between incumbent Sullivan, Democrat Mary Peltola, and retired teacher Dan Sullivan has been marked by controversy, with Republicans accusing Democrats of trying to confuse voters by planting a candidate with the same name.

Alaska's use of ranked-choice voting complicates matters, eliminating candidates in rounds if no one gets 50% of the initial vote.

"An election result may be impacted by voter confusion if: (1) Senator Sullivan does not win the election; and (2) had all votes cast for Daniel J. Sullivan been cast instead for Senator Sullivan and Alaska's rank-choice process played out accordingly, Senator Sullivan would have won the election," the lawsuit, filed in Alaska District Court, states.

Ed: Don't get your hopes up. States run their own elections, and no federal law has yet passed to prohibit ranked-choice voting for federal offices. The SAVE America Act addresses this, I believe, but it is not yet federal law. Plus, one generally has to show harm has already taken place to get a court to intervene. A federal court is not going to intervene before a single ballot has been counted, and the prospects for success in case of a loss are almost as low. This issue belongs in state court, and the state Republican Party and the incumbent Senator can pursue this in an election challenge. 

===

Dig into his history and find out if he's an illegal! Should be deported regardless! 

Police caught Miguel Alonso Maldonado Soriano, 27, of Stafford, in the act around 10 PM Wednesday. They say the damage runs into the HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of dollars

The 9-foot limestone statue was carved by Felix de Weldon, the same sculptor behind the famous Marine Corps War Memorial in Arlington. It honors the Marines who raised the flag over Iwo Jima 🙏🏻

He's charged with felony destruction of property, trespassing, and felony injury to a monument, and he's being held without bond.

Ed: As a matter of fact ...

===

Fox News: The man arrested for allegedly using a sledgehammer to behead a Marine figure on an Iwo Jima monument near Quantico, Virginia, is a Mexican illegal alien and former Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipient who lost his status this year, federal sources told Fox News. ...

"This criminal illegal alien’s dream is over: Maldonado Soriano disrespected our brave service members and defaced a beautiful monument that honored their sacrifice," White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers said in a statement to Fox News. "President Trump has secured our border and is deporting illegal criminals who hate our country and our values. The socialist Democrats want to go back to open borders and flood our communities with dangerous criminal illegal aliens."

According to federal sources, Maldonado Soriano illegally crossed into the U.S. in December 1999. He was granted DACA by the Obama administration in 2014. It was recently extended by the Biden administration in 2024. Maldonado Soriano then lost his DACA status in August 2026 because it was not renewed by the Trump administration. 

Ed: He was a "Dreamer," eh? Quelle surprise. The hostility to the US isn't surprising, but the target certainly is. The Iwo Jima monument honors the thousands of Marines and soldiers that died in that battle while fighting Japanese imperialist fascism. It's not at all controversial. This is just nihilism for nihilism's sake, and a measure of how little pressure there has been to assimilate for immigrants of all kinds, especially illegal aliens. 

===

Ed: I'm astounded that six of the seventeen jurists think that illegal aliens are somehow more at liberty while getting administratively processed than American citizens under criminal indictments. I compared this issue to squatters, and it's becoming clear that this is how progressive jurists see the issue as well. 

===

David Mastio at NY Sun: Tesla and SpaceXAI employees are giving significantly less money to Democratic campaigns this year compared to what they donated in 2024 — even as polls show voters are poised to give the party wins in congressional elections across the country.

The withdrawal of support runs throughout Mr. Musk’s world, according to a database of Federal Election Commission records connected to Mr. Musk’s enterprises and reviewed by The New York Sun.

In 2024, the SpaceX PAC, funded by small donations taken out of SpaceX employees’ paychecks, mostly of $40 or less, spent $1.5 million, of which 30 percent went to Democrats. This year, only 3.5 percent of more than $2 million in donations has gone to Democrats. ...

In 2024, people who identified themselves as top executives at Musk companies split their donations but leaned Democratic. So far in the 2026 election cycle, none of the individuals identified by senior titles in federal records have given to Democrats.

Ed: Perhaps that has something to do with Democrats threatening their visionary leader and the innovator that keeps them employed. Hopefully those issues have Democrats outside of SpaceX/Tesla thinking about the end results of Democrats' demonization of Musk. 

===

Ed: Detroit voters have gotten the message. Abdul El-Sayed is for Gazans. Mike Rogers is for Michiganders. 

===

NY Post: Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) has denied allegations this week she fraudulently married second husband and alleged brother Ahmed Elmi — but when asked if they were related, cautiously replied “not to my knowledge.” 

The Minnesota congresswoman, who arrived in the US as a refugee from Somalia in 1995, has vehemently denied allegations she married Elmi for immigration purposes. 

But significant evidence has emerged which continues to fuel speculation that is not the case ...

However, from 2009 to 2017, Omar was legally married to Elmi. On their marriage application, both listed their marital address as a property in Columbia Heights, a suburb in Minneapolis. Hirsi also used that address for a business license.

Omar claims that she and Elmi split in 2011, but that it took a few years to finish the paperwork. It meant Omar had her third child with Hirsi while legally married to Elmi. 

On top of that, The Post has previously reported joint tax filings between Omar and Hirsi in 2014 and 2015, while she was legally married to Elmi. Those filings were later corrected. 

Ed: This is a pretty good roundup of the facts as known already. Scott Johnson has reported on all of it, including the marriage license, at Power Line for years. This is the most comprehensive coverage of the facts by a major media outlet, I believe.

===

Ed: 'Charu reads,' but apparently does not comprehend. The bookstore is Barnes & Noble, which should know better and which should be ashamed of these manipulative marketing practices. 

===

Cardinal News: In multiple places, the indictment references unnamed legislators who aren’t charged with crimes but could be in a position to squirm if their names ever come out.

Among those references: “On or about March 11 , 2026, Louise Lucas was involved in a telephone conference with two Virginia legislators and Lisa Lucas-Burke concerning recreational marijuana licenses. During the call Louise Lucas stated, ‘we trying to disqualify somebody until he pays me back my money.’” If true, that could qualify as an instance of a legislator trying to use her position to write a law to favor her — and disadvantage someone else. Who were the legislators who were aware of this? Did they, in fact, help write the law the way Lucas wanted?

Some law enforcement officials could also come in for some scrutiny. One is the unnamed “senior law enforcement officer” who allegedly told Lucas in 2022 that she shouldn’t be selling marijuana. According to the indictment, a legislator was present for that meeting. And then there is a reference to a March 11, 2026, phone conference where Lucas, her daughter and an unnamed legislator discussed an event Lucas organized in 2022 called the 420ish Unity Festival, a music festival in Portsmouth whose name references a slang term of marijuana use. According to the indictment, “Louise Lucas stated: ‘The whole police department protected us.’”

Ed: The whole overview is worth reading, but this is the most salient point. The RICO indictment puts anyone connected with Lucas' operation at risk of indictment, especially fellow legislators and law-enforcement officials who helped her avoid detection. This may still snowball into a much wider conspiracy, and that may put pressure on Lucas to cut a deal while she still can. 

===

Ed: The NYT seems to be arguing that anything obtained by fraud cannot be seized back. The law disagrees on that point. Again, this seems to be most analogous to squatting, and I'd also argue that we need to be much tougher on squatters than most states allow. David has more on the NYT's take here. 

===

Jhemima Sheilh at The Free Press: Only by understanding the answers to these questions will we be able to solve the problem. There is a hatred of the French Republic in large swaths of our population. But violence does not stem solely from poverty. It comes from far-left leaders who tell angry citizens that violence is the only answer to poverty or to any form of social demand. It also comes from the government’s laxity and from the erosion of parental authority.

Last Saturday’s riots left physical and psychological scars. Some businesses will never recover. The economic situation doesn’t help. France’s debt exceeds its gross domestic product, unemployment is rising, people can no longer make ends meet, and 70,000 businesses just failed in a single year.

These are real difficulties. But they do not excuse violence. I grew up in poverty. I lost my mother and my sister, arrived in a foreign country, and built myself up from nothing. Today, all of that may come crashing down. I refuse to tolerate the attempts at justification by people like Lola-Fleur Whittaker.

In the name of what political and social demands was my shop smashed and looted? None. All I see are the deliberate acts of people who reject any form of social contract. And because I fought back, I am now accused of being the darling of fascists. I’ll let the world judge who is right.

Ed: Be sure to read it all. 

===

===

Last night's lyric: "Do It Again" by Steely Dan.