Independent News Drop

KELI From Inkwell — the Independent News Drop. Keli here, with Hast.

HAST Heavy news cycle. Let's start with what Trump posted this morning.

KELI May twenty-ninth. Trump issued a pair of ultimatums on Truth Social — Iran must surrender its nuclear program, and the Strait of Hormuz must open immediately with no tolls for unrestricted shipping. He signed the post "your favorite President." The same thread included a blockade lift order. So policy, real-time, set in a feed. Coverage elsewhere called it confusing. It wasn't. It was straightforward: surrender nuclear capability and open the strait, or face what comes next.

HAST The counter-read here matters. You're going to see coverage frame this as social-media governance, informal, off-the-cuff. What you're actually watching is an administration treating Truth Social as the official channel for military and trade ultimatums — no press briefing, no cabinet statement, no deniability. The mechanism is speed and audience reach without filtration. What to watch: whether Iran responds on record within forty-eight hours, and whether the State Department or Defense Department publishes a formal statement that either confirms or walks back the specific language Trump used. If they don't, the post *is* the policy.

KELI Staying with confirmation votes and power. Senator Susan Collins announced she'll vote against Todd Blanche for Attorney General. Right-wing radio host John Fredericks went on air and explained her calculation — her team knows Blanche has the votes without her, so the no-vote lets her tell Maine voters she opposed the pick while the outcome stays locked. That's a structural read on how Senate theater works when the outcome is predetermined.

HAST In Texas, a two-year-old named Annelise Camp drowned in a hotel pool in May. Her family sued Texas Children's Hospital to block brain death testing. The hospital pursued it anyway under state law. Annelise died this week. The case exposed a collision between parental choice and hospital protocol when a child is declared brain-dead under Texas statute. Family rights versus institutional procedure — that stays unresolved.

KELI Thailand. A student opened fire inside a school. Eight dead, fifteen injured. It's the second mass shooting reported there in the same week. No motive has been confirmed yet.

HAST On the Senate floor, the chamber confirmed seventy-four Trump administration nominees on Friday. The Washington Times reported it as the fastest confirmation pace in a quarter-century — ninety-five percent of civilian nominees cleared. That's a measure of Senate coordination and no obstruction in the judicial review process.

KELI Before we close — a history note.

HAST August seventh, nineteen eighty-nine. U.S. Congressman Mickey Leland, Democrat from Texas, and fifteen others died in a plane crash in Ethiopia.

KELI That's the Independent News Drop. We'll be back this evening. From Inkwell.

KELI Before we close, a word from Inkwell. Gil's Intelligent Version has a new companion piece on how the Latter-day Saints read the Trinity — three distinct beings, one in purpose, rather than three persons of one substance.

HAST It's an evenhanded look at the same question, decided the other way. At inkwell dot wiki, slash godhead.