Fast Takes: FIFA’s foul red-card reversal, – Latest News
Foreign desk: Europe’s Internal NATO Problem
President Trump’s “hostility” to NATO “boiled over during his war with Iran,” when some alliance members “temporarily denied American forces access to their military bases,” notes The New York Times’ Massimo Calabresi, prompting Trump to ask: “Why should America stay in NATO?” Though NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has tried to stay “optimistic,” he retains butting towards “European shortcomings” which have “bedeviled the alliance,” together with “industrial protectionism, nationalist distrust and an instinct to blame America for everything.” Underspending” on protection has “tanked” Europe’s “military readiness.” Even confronted with threats of a US “drawdown,” European “leaders still struggle to overcome” native contracting preferences and “centuries of suspicion” of German or French domination. The query now’s “whether Europeans can be good allies for themselves.”
America 250: Mamdani’s Beef With the US
Far from being “grateful” or “celebratory” about America’s 250th birthday, Mayor Mamdani, “surrounded by a host of grim, unsmiling immigrants like himself,” gave a July 4 speech to “point out everything wrong with” the nation, sighs Batya Ungar-Sargon at her Substack. Mamdani insisted that “America isn’t the greatest, freest nation on earth,” however a place the place “children go hungry” and “undocumented neighbors” are disappeared by brokers in “unmarked vans.” Mamdani believes immigrants “will determine America’s future, America’s values, America’s nature,” as a result of they’ve a “special power.” According to him, “the only thing that makes America great, is that it can be fundamentally changed by people like him.” How pathetic: America’s greatness, he believes, lies solely in permitting itself to be “perfected” by immigrants.
Sports take: FIFA’s Foul Red-Card Reversal
After President Trump referred to as FIFA President Gianni Infantino, the group partially suspended the purple card for the US males’s soccer workforce striker Folarin Balogun, observes National Review’s Jim Geraghty. To Trump followers, that reveals the president’s “power,” whereas critics say it proves Trump “believes in breaking the rules.” Yet, notes ESPN’s Andy Davies, the call was “based on slow-motion and still replays” of Balogun stepping on Tarik Muharemović’s ankle, “which is not aligned with VAR protocols” on this case. Hmm, wonders Geraghty: “Do the parents upset about Balogun’s reinstatement notice they’re arguing that an exceptionally unhealthy call by the ref have to be saved in place, to guard the so-called integrity of the sport?
More From Post Editorial Board
Midterms beat: Court Followed 1st Amendment
“Can you believe it? The MAGA Supreme Court just rigged the November midterm election,” The Wall Street Journal’s Allysia Finlay snarks sarcastcally. “After a 6-3 majority struck down federal limits on the amount of money that party committees can spend in coordination with candidates,” the media determined the courtroom had handed the GOP a win — however they “spilled little ink on the majority’s legal analysis” of spending limits that violate the First Amendment.” “If money could buy elections,” Tom Steyer could be governor of California. In truth, “what has turbocharged political spending is the massive expansion of government,” in order that “businesses donate to curry favor with the overlords who can make or break them.” The left “lambastes corporate spending, but their socialist agenda will encourage more of it.”
Gotham watch: Don’t Buy Zo’s Socialist ‘Magic’
Mayor Mamdani “boasted” that New York City’s “$125.8 billion budget proves socialists ‘understand economics,’ ” however in actuality, the funds reveals “fiscal gimmickry” and “a huge bailout from Albany,” warn the Washington Examiner editors. Mamdani stated his “capitalist” predecessor Eric Adams “left the city with a $12 billion budget deficit,” which Mamdani fixed through “socialist magic” — like raising “taxes on the wealthiest New Yorkers.” True, he did raise taxes, however not practically enough to hit his promised haul of “$500 million a year.” And even when that quantity had been correct, it couldn’t “close a $12 billion budget” gap by itself. So he used the identical “budgeting tricks” and “gimmicks” he bashed. And the projected “gap next year is even higher, at $8.8 billion.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board
