Google WordPress is interfering with this blog by constantly hiding the arrow key. I am getting the impression that they are working with Iran instead of our country. Stop blocking me.
Sometimes, getting in the weeds and getting some dirt under your finger nails helps when you understand by working together rather than running to the media to cause friction. The same thing needs to be done on the bill to save our elections by passing the ‘SAVE OUR COUNTRY” with the VOTER ID BILL.
Anyone who doesn’t want to protect the integrity of our elections has to be voting with the left who has cheated so many years – 2020 election is certainly one of those years. It is the icing on the cake.
Senate Vote Flip: Senate Republicans blocked a war powers resolution on Iran after Trump pressured GOP senators, reversing a prior vote from 50-48 against to 50-47 in favor.
Trump Confrontations: Trump personally confronted senators like Bill Cassidy and Rand Paul, influencing their votes and celebrating the outcome on Truth Social.
Political Tensions: The dispute highlights growing rifts within the GOP, distracting from election-year issues like affordability and housing legislation.
Senate Republicans dramatically reversed course Wednesday night, blocking a war powers resolution over the conflict in Iran — just one day after a similar measure passed — following an intense pressure campaign from Donald Trump, who publicly and privately lashed out at GOP senators over their opposition.
The reversal came after Trump confronted Republican lawmakers face-to-face earlier Wednesday, furious over Tuesday’s vote to challenge his Iran war policy. The clash has deepened tensions inside the party, pulling attention away from election-year issues like affordability and bringing much of the Senate’s agenda to a standstill.
Trump quickly took to Truth Social to celebrate the buckling of Republican senators, saying, “Wow! The Senate just changed its vote on Iran from 50-48 against, to 50-47 for. Rand Paul and Bill Cassidy changed. Thank you to Leader John Thune, Lindsey Graham, Bernie Moreno, and all. This vote puts Iran on notice! President DJT.”
One of Trump’s sharpest exchanges came with Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of four Republicans who initially joined Democrats in supporting the war powers measure.
But hours after the confrontation, Cassidy was invited to the White House for a private briefing with Vice President JD Vance and special envoy Steve Witkoff. He returned to Capitol Hill and voted against the new, nearly identical resolution.
“I want to thank Vice President Vance and Special Envoy Witkoff for the thorough briefing this afternoon on Iran,” Cassidy posted on X, saying he appreciated the opportunity to address his concerns. The senator, who recently lost his reelection bid after Trump endorsed his challenger, said the briefing helped answer key questions.
Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, another Republican who has repeatedly voted with Democrats to limit the war, changed his approach by voting “present.” Paul said the move was intended “to give the President more space and leverage to negotiate a lasting peace.”
The resolution failed 47-50-1 shortly before midnight, sending the Senate into a two-week recess.
Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, a Republican who has repeatedly voted with Democrats to halt the war, voted present this time “to give the President more space and leverage to negotiate a lasting peace” (Reuters)
The vote appeared to be an effort by Republicans to ease tensions with Trump, who had previously branded GOP senators who opposed him “losers” and reportedly called Cassidy a “lunatic” during a heated luncheon meeting. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and other Republicans contacted Trump after the vote, with Thune saying the president was “pleased with the outcome.”
Trump later thanked Thune online, praised Cassidy and Paul for changing their votes, and declared: “This vote puts Iran on notice!”
The measure blocked Wednesday was separate from the war powers resolution approved Tuesday, which also passed the House. Both measures were largely symbolic and did not carry the force of law.
Residents swim in the waters of the Strait of Hormuz as a small motorboat passes cargo ships and other commercial vessels offshore near Bandar Abbas, Iran
During the closed-door Republican luncheon, Trump had been expected to push his proof-of-citizenship voting bill. Instead, the Iran vote dominated the meeting. While most senators stayed quiet, Cassidy defended his decision.
“I stood and said, ‘You have not told the American people what’s going on,’” Cassidy told reporters afterward. He argued the war had expanded beyond its original timeline, saying, “This was supposed to last four weeks, it’s lasted four months. Our original objectives have not been achieved.”
Cassidy said he matched Trump’s tone during the exchange but refused to be intimidated. “I am voting for war powers until I get a briefing,” he said afterward. According to a source familiar with the meeting, Trump repeatedly told Cassidy to sit down and insulted him during the confrontation. Trump later publicly described the meeting as “really great,” while acknowledging disagreements remained.
Senator Rick Scott, Republican from Florida, looks on as President Donald Trump speaks to the press after a lunch meeting with Senate Republicans (AFP/Getty)
The fight is part of a broader breakdown between Trump and Senate Republicans. The president recently canceled a signing ceremony for a major housing bill that passed both chambers after demanding Congress first send him the SAVE America Act, his proposal requiring proof of citizenship for voters.
North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis said he was confused about why Trump was holding the housing bill “hostage” over a voting measure that likely lacks enough support to pass. Thune called the housing legislation an “affordability issue” and said he hoped Trump would eventually sign it.
The dispute has fueled concerns among Republicans that internal battles are distracting from voter concerns ahead of the midterm elections. Texas Sen. John Cornyn warned, “If we’re going to win the midterm elections, we need to get on the same page. We’re not on the same page now.”
Trump has continued pushing Republicans to eliminate the Senate filibuster and advance his voting bill, but Thune has repeatedly said neither proposal has the necessary support (AFP/Getty)
Trump has continued pushing Republicans to eliminate the Senate filibuster and advance his voting bill, but Thune has repeatedly said neither proposal has the necessary support. With Democrats firmly opposed and the Senate requiring 60 votes to overcome a filibuster, Thune said lawmakers need to accept reality.
“I think people at some point have to come to grips with that,” he said.
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The American people want FREE AND FAIR ELECTIONS – not what the Obama/Biden offer which is stacking the vote after the election with fake votes.
A good example is the recent California election when a Republican was ahead and days and days later each day the left slowly added fake votes to the process, one by one.
That is why we need to put some teeth in the voting process so this cannot happen.
Trump’s new acting head of ODNI carries out mass firings at the intelligence agency while his DOJ subpoenas multiple reporters over their coverage of the Iran war. MS NOW legal analyst Mary McCord and Scott MacFarlane, chief Washington correspondent for Meidas Touch, join The Weeknight to respond to the latest chaos from the Trump administration.
(The lefties call an investigation, chaos.).
(What free press? Nothing but “boot lickers for Obama/Biden/Axelrod,” who hide in the shadows. How many trials have they put the President through? Has the FAKE lefties media been outed and exposed to the SUNSHINE? They reported favorably against the U.S.A. during the Iran war which highlights who they really are.)
(The voters have started the celebration of July 4th, the America AWAKENING! Take your hokey pokey and shall we tell them to stick it where the sun doesn’t shine?).
Now I call the following, “REAL TRUTH from the Heart.” Therefore, people in the U.S. aren’t the only ones who recognize the real TRUMP and that is why the left terrorists fight so hard to prove otherwise and lose. My recommendation is to buy a MAGA PILL prescription and change your world view.
The sun sets on clouds behind a sign for a Hooters restaurant and Longhorn Steakhouse on April 1, 2025, in Lakeland, Florida.Gary Hershorn—Getty Images
“Would you?” my best friend asked, gesturing toward our waitress, wearing the trademark orange and white Hooters short shorts and shirt.
“I would,” I replied, smirking under the crap ton of TV screens blasting basketball. It was our typical routine as we rubbernecked the all-female waitstaff, our eyes shooting away the moment someone saw us. The “would you” game hasn’t aged well, though I’m sure people still do it. Teenagers today probably objectify others in more politically correct terms. But the custom bonded us and gave us something to talk about, two awkward ‘90s teens trying to act grown.
Over the past year, Hooters locations began disappearing, dozens at a time, culminating in March, when the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, $376 million in debt. A casualty of inflation, rising food costs, a surge of competitors in the wing space, decreased interest in casual dining, and a string of perhaps not altogether unsurprising lawsuits and controversies precipitated the business troubles; on June 4 alone, more than 30 locations closed.
For anyone who hasn’t had the pleasure of trying Hooters wings, they’re a weird combination of fry, chicken, and sauce—way more crunch than the average buffalo wing. You can sometimes score drums made up of over 50% breading, which might sound disappointing but tastes massively delicious. Nostalgic curmudgeons will tell you the food’s gone downhill, but the wings taste better than ever. If anything has changed, it’s the customers. We come, now, weighed down with memories, in search of a drug whose power diminishes with every subsequent hit.
I graduated from high school in ’99, just as the “breastaurant” chain, which opened its first location back in 1983, peaked in popularity. I was a lanky nebbish who loved comics—the floppy ones, not the movies, which barely existed at that time. I knew nothing about sports and listened to Sarah McLachlan, not Nirvana. But after trudging through my entire school career essentially friendless, during my senior year, I mastered the art of self-mockery, winning “most changed” in senior superlatives at my upstate New York school.
For my generation of teens, getting invited to Hooters was a life milestone. For me, it was second in line to the bar mitzvah. It meant you were embraced by the dudes, some who had tongue-kissed girls before, some who even lifted weights—heavy ones, not just the bar.
The guys who embraced me were such dudes that many of them even played football. They weren’t quarterbacks or anything, I don’t think. I never asked them or cared. They were the other people on the team, whatever you’d call them. Defenders, maybe? Smashers? They would never date prom queens or be portrayed by James Van Der Beek in a movie, but being with them still felt like I was a minor character in Varsity Blues. In reality, I was probably Rachel Leigh Cook in She’s All That—given a glossy makeover, I suddenly looked like the belle of the ball. In a gaggle of goyim, I was the crew’s Jewish jester, their mascot.
Of course, when my friends and I played the “would you” game—which, to be clear, was about sex—I never had any interest in would-ing anyone. Not just because our waitress wanted nothing to do with a couple of drooling boys, but because I was pretty much asexual. Even thinking about a girl kissing me caused me panic. Would-ing someone was my nightmare. Still, I could appreciate a woman’s beauty, and I loved to look.
There was always a bet over who the waitress would sit next to when she got tired from all that serving. Serving food. Serving looks. We didn’t think about how the entire reason for the waitress sitting with us was because it meant she was scoring the entirety of our measly paychecks from whatever first jobs we had: stock boy at the local grocery store, or, in my case, at my dad’s wallpaper store.
Over the years, we graduated high school, attended college, left the grocery and wallpaper businesses, and all got jobs at the mall—for me, at the Watch Station, directly next to Hooters. It became easier to get a waitress to sit with me, especially since our crew diversified, with dudettes tagged along for the hijinks. Eventually one of my female buds got a job waiting tables there, and Hooters became less a place I went to watch pro-wrestling with the boys, and more a place I went during my shifts to visit her.
Everything felt right in the world when she and my best-dude friend began nearly dating. On weekends, we’d go to whoever’s-parents-weren’t-home’s house and down Bud Light and Mike’s Hard Lemonade, listening to City High asking what we would do. My best dude friend and best dudette friend would be getting their flirt on the entire time, sometimes behind closed doors, definitely tongue-kissing. Meanwhile, I’d be putting on a show in the family room—stumbling drunk, I’d hide my glasses in the couch cushion so I couldn’t find them in the morning: a little game I enjoyed playing with sober Jay.
I have no idea why my friends never full-on dated. They spent many nights lounging in his car and roaming the mall together, like all of us ‘90s kids did. They even jokingly played the “would you” game as guys and girls flooded past, making idle talk while taking note of the other’s interests. Even after the fling ended, they always spoke highly of each other, always cared. Maybe they just drifted off into other people’s arms. Maybe they were just too young. It was one of life’s biggest what-ifs for me. Maybe for them, too. But it’s too painful to discuss now.
He got married, had kids, and moved 20 minutes away, which felt like a different state. She had a kid and moved to a different state, which felt like another country. I kept going to Hooters, enjoying the wings, even after my friend stopped working there. That Hooters closed, and another opened nearby. I brought my girlfriend, who became my wife. We had kids and I brought them, too. Then, last year, my dude-friend died at 43 from Stage 4 Colorectal cancer—his family ordered wings at Hooters after his funeral—and at the end of May, my girl-dude friend was diagnosed with stage 4 inoperable cervical cancer at age 41.
It was rumored Hulk Hogan might buy Hooters, though that fantasy died when he did last month, and some locations are in the middle of a “re-Hooterization,” toning down the sleaze in favor of a more family-friendly vibe. This past Father’s Day, surrounded by my wife and four kids, I visited my local branch, which remains open, at least for now, and nearly began bawling into my plate.
In the song “The Difficult Kind,” by ‘90s icon Sheryl Crow, she sings that “there ain’t nothin’ like regret to remind you you’re alive.” For me, it’s not regret but loss.
I love my life, love my wife and my little sidekicks, but my happiness is laced with a nostalgia for a youth I can never return to. I am constantly mourning, the way every 40-something mourns. The wings today are just as good as yesterday; it’s our lives that have changed. While I don’t want to be that same boozed up, insecure, self-mocking boy, I want to feel the first flooding of acceptance I felt when I was originally invited to climb upon that skyscraping orange barstool. I want my friends back. I want to live at a time when the only people I knew who died seemed ancient, not the peers I love; it may be a quarter century since our Hooters days, but it still feels like we’re barely out of our teens, and death has stolen so much from us.
So I snapped a string of pictures of my family celebrating Father’s Day, including one with my wife feeding my youngest, only a month old. I texted them to my friend, making a joke about my wife’s hooters being out in Hooters. My friend was in the midst of “panic packing” as she prepared for chemo. She was losing weight. Soon, doctors would implant stents in her kidneys. Soon, she would move back in with her dad so he could care for her and her son.
In response to the pictures, I immediately score an “OMG I love it!!!!” She refers to me by my last name, something I haven’t been called since high school.
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