Court ruling
United States courts v. Barack Obama. How the courts could do undo Obama’s legacy on, for starters, Obamacare, immigration, same-sex marriage and climate change. Some of the legal challenges may not end by the time Obama has left office in January 2017. Via The Washington Post.
Dried up
Looking for a way to exploit the California drought? Try immigrant bashing. Blaming immigrants for California’s water problems is the new thing, writes Michael Hiltzik in The Los Angeles Times. It’s wrong, he says, but that doesn’t mean it won’t work.
Uncertain shifts
Ruben Navarette writes in the San Diego Union-Tribune that the long history of Restrictionist Hillary makes him skeptical of what kind of follow through we could expect from Reform Hillary.
Second verse
Were you excited by Rand Paul’s last “filibuster”? Probably not. It got around one-tenth the Twitter traffic his first one did. And if you read his book, you may understand why. Dana Milbank says that it reads like a great campaign strategy — if he were running against Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination. It turns out, he isn’t. Via The Washington Post.
Two strikes
A Vox explainer: Why Secretary of Defense Ash Carter’s gaffe on ISIS and Iraq was even worse than you think. Not only was he wrong on the willingness of the Iraqi army to fight, writes Zach Beauchamp, but more than that, what he said was entirely counterproductive to American strategy.
Fox hole
Jack Shafer writes what liberals get wrong about Fox News, which, he insists, is just about everything. It’s not as powerful as they think. It’s not a GOP kingmaker. It doesn’t sway unsuspecting swing voters, who basically don’t watch. Self-described conservative Bruce Bartlett has written an influential paper saying Fox is bad for the GOP. Shafer says Bartlett has it wrong, too. Via Politico.
Death policy
Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts vetoed the bill that would abolish the state’s death penalty, and now the unicameral legislature will hold an override vote. The bill passed, on third reading, by 32-15, with 30 votes needed for an override. Via The New York Times.
Drill bill
Will the latest oil spill off the coast of Santa Barbara finally convince the California assembly to ban drilling there? They tried in 2014 — and failed. Via The New Yorker.
Photo credit: Cliff, Creative Commons, Flickr.
