Sun: To An Israeli With Hammer, Everything Looks Lile Hamas

Today's Hot Couple:  IRussia??  Russan?

From Tehran’s perspective, an informal alliance with Russia is ideologically and historically odd, but it is strategically enticing. Iran and Russia have been rivals for almost two centuries, and Iran’s former Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini hated the Soviet Union almost as much as he hated the United States, scorning godless communism and seeing the Soviet Union as an aggressive power that sought to undermine Iran’s revolutionary regime. But, today, the Islamic Republic needs a great power backer—and Russia fits their bill. Even if Russian arms are deficient compared with their Western counterparts, Moscow can provide the full range of weapons that Iran desperately needs. Add to this a friend on the UN Security Council that gives Iran diplomatic clout, as well as their mutual rejection of democracy and human rights, and Iran’s infatuation with Russia becomes even more understandable.

Moscow’s interest in Tehran is a bit harder to explain. It starts with a range of common interests that are generally anti-U.S., opposed to democratic values, and wary of Sunni Muslim fundamentalism. Indeed, the modern Iran-Russia relationship initially grew from cooperation between their respective intelligence services looking to keep an eye on various Sunni fundamentalist groups that emerged in the Caucasus and Central Asia after the collapse of the USSR. In the Middle East, they share a sense of fear and opportunism, worrying that regional unrest could topple anti-Western partners like Bashar al-Assad but hoping that the strife will allow them to undermine their enemies and expand their own influence. [...]

But then Russia invaded Ukraine. Suddenly, Vladimir Putin needed Iran in ways he never had before. In a shocking role reversal, it is now Iran supplying weapons to Russia, particularly its crude, but highly functional suicide drones, which have become the bane of Ukraine’s cities. Iran is also providing Russia some additional munitions, technicians (for its weaponry), diplomatic and moral support, and some sanctions relief. There have even been unconfirmed reports that Iran has offered to send members of its league of Middle Eastern Shiite militias to man the front lines in Ukraine.

All of a sudden, Russia seems to need Iran almost as much as Iran needs Russia.

Who Won the Week?

Infrastructure Week, as Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo unveils plans for job-producing "technology hubs" created with money from the infrastructure law in over 30 states and Puerto Rico

Michigan Democrats, for codifying into state law ACA rules prohibiting denial of care based on preexisting conditions, or kicking dependents off their parents' coverage before age 26

President Biden: steady hand on international developments; welcomes Australian Prime Minister Albanese; busts Trump's chops on Truth Social; and look at that 4.9% 3rd quarter GDP!

The vise of justice, as Fulton County, Georgia DA Fani Willis secures a guilty plea and more spilled beans from two more Trump lawyers: Jenna Ellis and Kenneth Cheeseburger

Voters in Franklin, Tennessee (with bonus hat tip to investigative reporter Phil Williams) for trouncing Nazi-coddling cultist Gabrielle Hanson in the mayor's election

The UAW, for winning a solid contract deal with Ford and GM, potentially ending the autoworkers' six-week strike

Judge Steve Jones, for ordering Georgia to draw a new majority-Black congressional district, two new Black-majority state Senate districts, and five new Black-majority state House districts

The power of intense heat, as Charlottesville’s Robert E. Lee statue, the focus of the racist 2017 MAGA riot, gets melted down in a 2,250-degree furnace and turned into public artwork

Second in Line to the Presidency

The wife of newly elected House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) runs a counseling business that advocates the belief that homosexuality is comparable to bestiality and incest, according to its operating documents.

It Works. Of Course, the QOP Hates It.

In the spring of 2022, Tydricka Lewis finally bought a car that started every time she asked it to and no longer left her stranded.

Her 2020 Nissan Rogue was essential to her new job as a peer-support specialist — helping people in mental-health crises required her to be able to get places reliably and fast. And it was essential to her new life outside prison, where she'd spent six years and four months for chasing fraudulent checks.

It was a car that Lewis, a 32-year-old single mother of three, would not otherwise have been able to afford. But when she was selected for Durham, North Carolina's guaranteed-income pilot program, she knew exactly where her $600 monthly stipend would be best spent.

In late 2020, then-Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey pledged $15 million to the national advocacy group Mayors for a Guaranteed Income to help select cities and towns across America kick-start basic-income programs. Durham was one of 25 recipients and received $500,000 from Dorsey and another $500,000 from local philanthropy and the city's coffers.

Durham's mayor pro tempore, Mark-Anthony Middleton, who helped oversee the program, had been advocating for his city to introduce a basic income for years. "We wanted to see what a stream of income, without any determination of virtue or vice attached to it, would do," he said.

Universal basic income is working — even in red states