THE WAR ROOM: Iran’s attacks on two cargo ships in the Strait of Hormuz has choked traffic to zero, demonstrating that the militarily “defeated” country still has what minimal power it takes to control one of the world’s most critical waterways.

  Iran released a highly-produced video tracked with dramatic music showing its masked commandos boarding and taking over a ship. It’s a thumb in the eye to President Trump’s claims that they are militarily crippled.  

  Iran had been allowing some ships to pass but the US is now blocking Iran-linked ships to cut off the country’s oil sales.

  White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News that President Trump did not consider the attacks on those two ships to be in violation of the ceasefire. “These were not US ships. These were not Israeli ships,” she said.

  Leavitt also told reporters outside the White House not to believe mocking statements from Iranian state media claiming that Trump unilaterally announced an extension of the ceasefire without Iran asking for one. “What they say publicly is much different than what they concede to the United States and our negotiating team privately,” she said. “You should take our word for it.”

  With a different “word” coming from Trump and the White House every day, it’s difficult to accept anyone’s word for anything in this conflict.

INFINITE SCROLL:

— Navy Secretary John Phelan was fired yesterday after months of conflict inside the Pentagon. The billionaire who was a significant contributor to Donald Trump’s re-election campaign was on the job only 13 months.  

  Phelan had been a champion of Trump’s “Golden Fleet” plans for the Navy including the “Trump-class” battleship but he has been reported to have been feuding with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Deputy Defense Secretary Stephen Feinberg. 

  It’s clear that Hegseth does not tolerate disagreement. Earlier this month he fired Army Chief of Staff Randy George. 

— The FBI last month began investigating NY Times reporter Elizabeth Williamson following her unflattering stories about Director Kash Patel to determine whether she had broken federal stalking laws. Williamson had written about Patel using bureau personnel to provide his girlfriend with government security and transportation.

  The Times reports that the FBI now tells them “while investigators were concerned about how the aggressive reporting techniques crossed lines of stalking” they are not pursuing a case.

— The acting head of the Centers for Disease Control canceled publication of a study that found that the Covid vaccine sharply cut the odds of hospitalizations and emergency visits last winter. Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, who has been overseeing the agency in the absence of a director, said the study presented an inaccurate picture of the vaccine’s effectiveness.

  Also on the vaccine front, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a certified vaccine skeptic, testified before a Senate committee that every child should receive a measles vaccine, backing away from his longtime criticism of the standard MMR, measles, mumps, rubella shot. “We promote the MMR,” Kennedy told the Senate Finance Committee.

  Last year he advised parents to “Do your own research.” 

  But Kennedy also said yesterday, contrary to the research, that it has been better hygiene, not vaccines, that has dramatically reduced deaths from infectious disease.

FREE SPEECH: Utah Valley University, the site of the assassination of right wing organizer Charlie Kirk, retracted its invitation for their graduation speaker after looking at her social media posts.

  Author Sharon McMahon, who had spoken at the university before, cited several derogatory things Kirk had made about Black people, Muslims, and gay people. Then she said, “The murder that was horrific and should never have happened does not magically erase what was said or done” and that,  ‘if you were a Charlie Kirk fan, you might not realize why there is so much backlash to posts eulogizing his death.”

  Utah Sen. Mike Lee led a campaign over several days on Twitter/X to pressure the university to revoke McMahon’s invitation to speak.

THE OBIT PAGE: Alan Osmond, an original member and leader of the wholesome family band The  Osmonds that spawned the careers of siblings Donny and Marie, died Monday at home in Salt Lake City. He was 76.

  The cause was given as complications of multiple sclerosis.

  The group was at its peak from 1971-1975.

THE SPIN RACK: Spring wildfires have broken out in the drought-stricken southeast. Thousands of acres and dozens of homes have burned. — A massive ocean hot spot as much as 6 to 8 degrees above normal is stretching across 5,000 miles of the Pacific from Micronesia to coastal California. It could bring heat and tropical storms to the West this summer. — A chemical leak yesterday at a West Virginia silver recovery plant killed two people and sent 30 others to hospitals. — Britain’s King Charles has declined an invitation to meet with the victims of the late sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. Association with Epstein and his underage girls led to the royal defrocking of Charles’s brother Andrew. — Republicans in Washington are pressuring Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to continue the gerrymandering wars by having his state redraw its congressional districts to favor the party. — Elizabeth Smart, 36, who famously was kidnapped as a child by a religious fanatic, has become a bodybuilder with a slim and taught physique. She placed first in her fourth competition last weekend.

BELOW THE FOLD: Following the mad math of his boss, Health Secretary Robert Kennedy yesterday defended President Trump’s claims that he has reduced drug prices by as much as 600 percent. “If you have a $600 drug, and you reduce it to $10, that’s a 600 percent reduction,” Kennedy said.

  Actually Mr. Secretary, that’s 98 percent. And this is coming from a writer who failed algebra.

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