“Now Trump’s influence in entertainment circles shows signs of waning.”

“That is earlier than their projection last year of 2033, partly because the fund expects to collect less revenue after President Trump’s new tax law. Passed last summer, the law gave senior citizens an extra deduction that reduced taxes on benefits for many Social Security recipients.”

“It’s a major test for House Speaker Mike Johnson as he tries to cement one of President Donald Trump’s top domestic priorities.”

“The candidates went to extraordinary lengths to earn Mr. Trump’s endorsement, many of them repeatedly posting photos of themselves with the president as if his nod had been secured.”

“Ultimately Mr. Trump put his weight behind Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette in Tuesday’s crowded Republican primary. But in interviews, voters appeared to be more concerned about who could steer the state — the fastest-growing in the country — through its growing pains and infrastructure woes. And many drew a distinction between state and federal leadership.”

“As a way to try to demonstrate her ignorance about Epstein’s wrongdoing, Lesley Groff, Epstein’s former executive assistant, said she believed the massage appointments she made for Epstein with young women and girls were with massage therapists.”

“A number of House Republicans — including those in leadership — are voicing concerns that including tax provisions would allow Democrats in the Senate to force floor votes on politically fraught health care amendments, putting vulnerable Republican senators in a difficult spot just before the midterms.”

“Alt5 Sigma’s stock has fallen more than 90% since just before the deal was announced.”

“Washington and Tehran — both neither fully victorious nor completely defeated in the war — badly want a deal. But they also need something they can present as favorable to the hawks and hard-liners back home.”

“Added to this fundamental dispute are the peculiarities of the two countries’ leaders. One of them is in hiding and slow to sign off on any proposal; the other is so unpredictable, his own envoys struggle to negotiate on his behalf.”

For such a young country — younger than the United States in its modern form — Germany has left an enormous imprint on the world.

It started two world wars. It committed atrocities so vast they still defy comprehension. And for 40 years, it sat at the center of the Cold War, divided between two hostile systems and two different visions of the future.

That history is everywhere in Berlin.

It’s in the Reichstag, where we climbed into the glass dome that now sits above the German parliament — a deliberate symbol of transparency after a century of catastrophe.

It’s in the remaining slabs of the Berlin Wall, still standing as a reminder of how quickly a country can be split in two.

It’s in the Jewish Museum, where the architecture itself seems designed to unsettle you.

And it’s most powerfully felt at the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, a vast field of concrete slabs that becomes more haunting the longer you walk through it.

Berlin is not a city that lets you look away. 

And now Germany is once again confronting its past.

With Russia’s war in Ukraine and growing doubts about whether the United States can still be counted on as a reliable ally, Germany is rearming itself. Quietly, reluctantly, but unmistakably.

Most Germans do not know when another war in Europe might come. But many now seem to believe it will come.

That was the most striking part of the visit: how much of Germany’s past suddenly felt relevant again.

And not just because of Europe.

But because so much of what we saw — the nationalism, the propaganda, the cult of power, the dehumanization of enemies, the steady erosion of democratic norms — echoed the increasingly fascist strains in our own politics back home.

Berlin is a fascinating city — but it’s also a warning.

“There’s no indication that’s any more true today than it was back on April 7. But Trump keeps saying it, either because he’s delusional, trying to calm the financial markets or thinking he can will it into existence.”

“The exact details of the request are in flux and the discussions are still preliminary, according to two congressional staffers and one industry representative. But the agency needs the money to pay for redesigning a moon landing spacecraft, and after a disastrous explosion on Blue Origin’s launchpad in Cape Canaveral jeopardized key lunar missions.”

“That’s the quickest timeline possible for Blanche, the acting attorney general and President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer. It also means the fight over Blanche’s nomination is a battle Senate Republicans will have to fight — and soon.”

“If that sounds familiar, it’s exactly how GOP leaders reacted when the Justice Department’s creation of an “anti-weaponization” fund delayed Senate passage of an ICE-and-CBP reconciliation bill for more than two weeks — and forced vulnerable Republican senators to take tough votes.”

“Now we’re once again just days away from the expiration of Section 702 authority, a controversial warrantless surveillance program targeting foreigners abroad. House and Senate GOP leaders appear completely in the dark about what the White House plans to do to get the bipartisan three-year 702 reauthorization back on track.”

“Yet that possibility was on just about everyone’s mind last week at the town’s main coffee shop, down the road from a sports club where Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, had set up campaign headquarters for his shot at a seat in Parliament.”

“If he wins a June 18 special election, Mr. Burnham is expected to challenge Prime Minister Keir Starmer for the leadership of the governing Labour Party and the country. Mr. Starmer is so unpopular that many of the town’s residents believe Mr. Burnham would have little trouble defeating him in an intraparty contest, which would also transfer control of Downing Street.”

“One hundred days after starting the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran on Feb. 28, Mr. Trump is grappling with his own version of the sort of Middle East military quagmire that beset his predecessors — and that he promised to avoid.”