IT’S POLITICAL: Nikki Haley has been crisscrossing New Hampshire courting voters and hoping to punch a hole in Donald Trump’s political armor today in the state’s primary.

  “America doesn’t do coronations,” Haley said at her first event of the day ysterday in Franklin. “We believe in choices. We believe in democracy, and we believe in freedom. I have said I love the live-free-or-die state, but you know what? I want to make it a live-free-or-die-country.”

  If Haley can win the primary, or even come close, she stays alive. If she gets trounced, she’s close to the end and Trump will likely glide to the Republican presidential nomination. A Boston Globe poll yesterday had Trump at 57 percent of the New Hampshire vote and Haley at 38 percent with Ron DeSantis’s exit making little difference.

  Trump said in an interview aired on Newsmax that he will not ask Haley to quit if she loses New Hampshire. “I don’t ask people to drop out,” Trump said. “They drop out of their own volition.” But, he said, “Perhaps she should.”

  Political dirty tricks have become more sophisticated in the age of technology and artificial intelligence. New Hampshire voters were the target of robocall messages over the weekend in a voice that sounded like it was artificially generated to be President Biden, urging them not to vote today. The Biden robovoice told people that, “Voting this Tuesday only enables the Republicans in their quest to reelect Donald Trump again.” The voice says, “Your vote makes a difference in November, not this Tuesday.”

THE WAR ROOM: Israel sustained its worst day of losses yesterday with 24 soldiers killed, 21 of them in a single explosion. Most of the 21 were inside buildings in which the military had placed explosives to level them. 

  Israel has been destroying buildings close to the Israel/Gaza border and others they believe are useful to Hamas. They even blew up a University building.

  Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed regret for the losses yet despite growing internal divisions over the war he said, “We will not stop fighting until complete victory.”

  The US and Britain carried out major strikes yesterday against Houthi militant positions in Yemen.  It’s the eighth set of strikes in nearly two weeks indicating that the US appears to have settled into a sustained conflict with the Houthi that falls short of all-out war. 

  The Pentagon described the strikes as bigger than previous attacks against individual Houthi missiles just as they were being prepped for launching against shipping targets in the Red Sea. The strikes last night were aimed at radar, missile, and drone sites, but so far, nothing has blunted Houthi attacks on ships. They have vowed retaliation.

LOST AT SEA: The Navy has identified the two SEALS lost in the Arabian Sea during a nighttime intercept of a small ship carrying weapons to Houthi rebels in Yemen. They are Special Operator First Class Christopher J. Chambers, 37, and Special Operator Second Class Nathan Gage Ingram, 27, who was on his first operation.

  The Navy says one fell in the water and the other, following procedure, went in after him. It is suspected that the two sank immediately.

  Questions remain. The two SEALS should have been wearing flotation gear and Beacon lights to be found in the dark. Also in question, why it was a dangerous night operation against an unarmed target. 

THE OBIT PAGE: Norman Jewison, the movie director who made the socially significant “In the Heat of the Night” in 1967, as well the big-budget musical “Fiddler on the Roof” and the romantic comedy “Moonstruck,” has died at age 97.

  At a time of racial tensions in the country, the Oscar-winning “Heat” told the story of a Black Philadelphia detective teamed up with a white cracker Mississippi police chief who become friends breaking a murder mystery.

  His movies won 46 Oscars, but Jewison never won for Best Director. He once said, “The movies that address civil rights and social justice are the ones that are dearest to me.” 

THE SPIN RACK: The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to temporarily allow the US Border Patrol to continue removing razor wire installed as part of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s security initiative at the US-Mexico border while a legal fight plays out. — Dexter Scott King, the youngest son of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., died of prostate cancer at age 62. — The judge in writer E. Jean Carroll’s defamation suit against Donald Trump has put the case on temporary hold because one of his lawyers said she had been exposed to Covid and a juror became ill. — In a major setback to gun makers, a federal appeals panel in Boston ruled that Mexico’s $10 billion lawsuit may proceed against manufacturers whose weapons are used by drug cartels. Mexico claims that gun companies should be held liable for the half-million guns a year shipped across the border, feeding lawlessness and murder. — A deluge of rain brought flash flooding to the San Diego area yesterday, sweeping away cars and damaging homes. One video shows a car travelling at driving speed on water.

BELOW THE FOLD: A woman in Roseville, California was arrested and charged with stealing a trunk load of Stanley cups. Not the hockey trophy, because there’s only one of those, but $2,500 worth of Stanley brand drink bottles.

  Stanley thermoses, once the standard soup and coffee container for the working stiff, has become a multi-colored fashion item called a “Quencher,” coveted by the hip. Target quickly ran out of its stock of Cosmo Pink and Target Red Quenchers. Although most people pay for them.

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