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President Trump and his administration are advancing plans for their version of a homeland missile defense system, dubbed the “Golden Dome.” Proponents of the Golden Dome, such as Air Force Chief of Staff General David Allvin, claim that it is required to protect the US homeland. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth praised the project, arguing it is “a generational investment in the security of America and Americans,” and that the Golden Dome would be capable of intercepting “cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, hypersonic missiles, drones, whether they’re conventional or nuclear.” While this all sounds good, there are reasons to worry about the genesis of the idea, its cost, its feasibility and its risks.

If Donald Trump and Elon Musk really want to know if there is a “white genocide” happening in South Africa, as they claim, I’d suggest they start in a beer hall. Such speakeasies are common in the black townships around Jo’burg and in rural areas. Size varies from a shed to a small aircraft hangar, some are licensed, others not, and as a journalist, it’s where I read the pulse of the nation. The townships are where millions scrape by on next to nothing, crowded in shacks with few street lights and open sewers, while the political elite enjoy their mansions in the city.I am always the only white face in a sea of black. I don’t own a gun and move about engaging with drinkers who are mostly under the age of 30, the majority unemployed.

Elon Musk stood silently in the Oval Office, eyeballing the South African President while Donald Trump tore into the ANC leader for permitting “white genocide.” The exiting Department for Government Efficiency (DoGE) chief said nothing as the President dimmed the lights and required an unsuspecting Cyril Ramaphosa to watch a short film about white farmers being targeted and South African politicians chanting “kill the farmer.”As Donald Trump berated Ramaphosa, Trump didn’t call on Musk, standing just a few feet away. He didn’t need to intervene: according to Elon’s father, Errol Musk, his son – an outspoken critic of Ramaphosa's government – had already briefed the President about what he agrees is “white genocide”.

Few people can claim the mantle of being more identified with the anti-Deep State MAGA movement than Kash Patel and Dan Bongino, the Director and Deputy Director of the FBI, who sat down for a lengthy conversation with Maria Bartiromo this weekend. Yet they responded with surprisingly out of character language to the continued conspiracizing around the death of Jeffrey Epstein – the New York financier – and the possibility of a wider plot to assassinate Donald Trump. If anyone was going to reveal hidden secrets of the Deep State, it would be these two, who have railed against its excesses on media platforms for years before taking their posts.

Let's sit down and have a talk about James Comey, America's tallest teenage girl. Typically the conversation around the nation's most famous former FBI director focuses on political gripes – whether his grandstanding, poorly timed announcements that Democrats still blame for Hillary Clinton's loss, or his back-channeling conniving debriefings Republicans still blame for Russiagate. But nowadays, whenever Comey pops up in the algorithm, it seems to be because he's just so deeply weird. His latest debacle: a social media posting of seashells spelling out "86 47", a threat which prompted immediate controversy which Comey attempted to brush off as naivete. “I didn’t realize some folks associate those numbers with violence.

The election of the first American pope, Leo XIV, comes at a strange time when a Catholic establishment is running the show in his home country: vice president J.D. Vance, of course, as well as health secretary RFK Jr., border czar Tom Homan, press secretary Karoline Leavitt, secretary of state Marco Rubio, to name the most prominent few. Melania is allegedly one as well. They are American exceptionalists who want to Make America Great Again and, in the process, Make Catholicism Great Again too. MAGA and Catholicism seem like strange bedfellows at first glance. Donald Trump has been divorced twice and married thrice. The rich may have a difficult time entering the kingdom of God, but they’ve had no trouble finding roles within Trump’s administration, which hosts 13 billionaires.

There’s a nickname for House Speaker Mike Johnson shared among some Hill staffers and observers: “Deacon Mike,” a nod to his quiet Southern Baptist religious demeanor. But it also contains the idea that he is a man elevated beyond his expected station, charged with the monumental task of wrangling an extremely thin Republican House majority when he should rightly be in charge of keeping the worship center donuts fresh and the coffee hot.

Now more than ever, Donald Trump appears to be channeling his inner Lord Palmerston. It was the 19th-century prime minister, after all, who went down in the history books for his declaration that England had no permanent enemies or allies. Generations of statesmen have recited that gelid precept, but Trump is one of the few who actually seems prepared to act upon it. Speaking in Riyadh, he implored Iran – the longtime bugbear of Washington hawks, including Trump’s defenestrated national security advisor Mike Waltz – to strike out upon a new course, vowing that there are no “permanent enemies” for America.