Failed regimes are faltering while political and military reality is asserting itself with unmistakable force.

For more than 20 years, Robert J. Lurtsema (1931–2000) hosted a classical music radio show on the Boston station WGBH. He typically began the show with a bit of birdsong. He followed that soothing introit with a brief recap of the news, which he wrote up himself and delivered in his unmistakable, sonorous baritone (like “warm fudge,” said one admirer). I liked the timbre of his voice, at once calming and authoritative. I also liked Lurtsema’s good humor. Occasionally, when a paucity of noteworthy events warranted, he would declare that there really wasn’t any news that day and go straight to the music.

Those were good days. I wish other news outlets would follow Lurtsema’s lead and indulge us with an occasional moratorium on their blather masquerading as news.

That said, honesty requires that I point out that recent days are not good candidates for such studied omissions. A lot is happening. Here are just a few of many noteworthy items from the last few days.

In England, the Labour Party all but ceased to exist. “Shock By-Election Result Sends Political Shockwaves Across The UK” screamed one headline. As of this writing, the vote is still being counted. But it looks as if Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s party lost as many as 2,000 council seats (out of a total of 5,000) in the local elections on May 8. Congratulations, Keir! That’s a record. Labour also lost Wales for the first time in a century. “I’ve never seen anything like this in my life,” said one news commentator. Meanwhile, Nigel Farage’s Reform Party picked up more than 1,400 seats.

Stepping out of this bloodbath, Starmer tried to look defiant. I am “not going to walk away,” he said. The novelist J. K. Rowling spoke for many when she observed that “sprinting away would also be acceptable.” Starmer is not required to call a general election until August 2029. I suspect he will be hustled out of office by autumn.

There is some recent election news in the US as well. In last week’s primaries, Trump-endorsed MAGA candidates trounced their RINO opponents. In Ohio, Vivek Ramaswamy took some 85 percent of the vote, winning in every single county. “Oh, but that’s just the primary,” quote the brethren. “Just wait for the midterms. MAGA will be soundly beaten.” Want to bet? The Democrats thought that redistricting chicanery such as that practiced by Gov. Abigail Spanberger in Virginia would save the day. The thinking was, “If I can’t win honestly, I can at least squeeze into victory via geometrical gaslighting, aka that old chap Gerry Mander.”

Not so fast. In Virginia, the State Supreme Court said, “Nope. Your ‘redistricting’ wheeze won’t fly.” The ruling was, as NPR reported, tears in its eyes, a “major setback for Democrats.

Not as big as the setback just delivered by the Supreme Court of the United States, though. On April 29, the court ruled 6–3 in Louisiana v. Callais that the states may no longer use race to draw congressional and state legislative districts. The decision will have plenty of penumbras and emanations. Among other things, as James Piereson notes, the decision “signals the end of a six-decade experiment, going back to the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and the Voting Rights Act in 1965, during which judicial and administrative doctrines enforced racial and other preferences in nearly every area of national life.” I agree with those many commentators who reckon that the decision will net Republicans some 8–12 additional House seats in the midterms. In other words, Republicans will not only hold the House; they will also expand their majority.

What else? One tidbit from the lexicon of rhetorical subterfuge, division of politicized euphemism. CBS reported that a Frontier Airlines plane “fatally” hit a “pedestrian” on the runway of the Denver, Colorado, airport. “Pedestrian”? The comments were brutal about that, since the fellow in question was a trespasser, not a pedestrian in any normal sense of the word. CBS deployed the word in order to suggest that he was just an innocent bystander. In fact, the fellow had climbed the perimeter fence at the airport and then made for the runway. Not your common or garden variety “pedestrian” out for a stroll. The CBS story then went on to say that there was no news on the condition of said “pedestrian.” Since CBS also said that interaction with the airplane was of the “fatal” variety—some reports said that he had been sucked into an engine, making a mess—one didn’t need to be Sherlock Holmes to pronounce confidently about his condition. It was terminal, and I am not talking about the airport building.

Then there is Iran. I have several times echoed President Trump: The war is over. Janitorial work is tidying up the debris. Operation Epic Fury gave way to Project Freedom, which gave way to the cat-and-mouse game we see unfolding now. Donald Trump, for those keeping score, is the cat. The Iranian regime is fielding the mice. CENTCOM just reaffirmed that the US naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz “continues to be fully enforced.” “As of today [May 9],” their bulletin reports, “CENTCOM forces have redirected 58 commercial vessels and disabled 4 since April 13 to prevent the ships from entering or leaving Iranian ports.”

The cat is there, but the mice don’t care. They send speed boats, drones, and missiles to harass shipping and US vessels. In so doing, they expose a panoply of military assets from IRGC-linked positions on shore to drone and fast attack boat staging sites. ”For years,” one commentator observed, “the Islamic Republic relied on concealment, deniability, underground infrastructure, dispersed launch systems, and swarm tactics designed to complicate retaliation and avoid direct conventional confrontation.” This time, however, their attacks

exposed elements of that network in real time and allowed the U.S. to rapidly strike supporting infrastructure behind it without a prolonged escalation cycle.

This is modern military strategy at its most effective: force the enemy to reveal hidden systems through aggression, map operational networks instantly, and destroy critical nodes before they can reposition or disappear.

The cat has responded as cats and responsible dramatists always do. “If Iranian boats threaten Americans,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday, “they’re going to get blown up.”

The apparent hiatus in hostilities may seem like limbo. If you are part of the Iranian regime, it will seem like hell. The U.S.S. Missouri is anchored in Tokyo Bay. The surrender papers are laid out on the desk. The Iranians just need to find someone with authority to sign. “Is the ceasefire with Iran still on?” a reporter asked President Trump after the US Navy sunk several Iranian “fast boats” attacking them. “Yes,” he replied, “They trifled with us today. We blew ’em away.” Should the ceasefire end, POTUS continued, you won’t have to ask. “You’re just going to have to look at one big glow coming out of Iran. They better sign their agreement fast.” Good advice.