The Dictatorship

A revolution in warfare is happening right now — and not in Iran

Published

1 month ago

May 5, 2026

A revolution in warfare is happening right now — and not in Iran

This is the May 5, 2026, edition of “The Tea, Spilled by Morning Joe” newsletter.Subscribe hereto get it delivered straight to your inbox Monday through Friday.

JOE’S NOTE

A revolution in warfare is happening right now — and not in Iran.

The historic shift is occurring instead on the front lines of Ukraine’s war to push back its Russian invaders.

Fifteen months ago, President Donald Trump did his best to humiliate Volodymyr Zelenskyy inside the Oval Office, pressing the freedom fighter to make a bad deal with Trump‘s ally, Vladimir Putin.

“You have no cards left to play,” Trump bellowed to Ukraine’s president.

The American president promptly slashed U.S. military aid to the Ukrainians. His vice president — who yelled at Zelenskyy in the same White House meeting — later said his proudest achievement was abandoning the Ukrainians to Putin’s evil designs. And both Trump and JD Vance worked feverishly to pressure the Ukrainians to surrender land at the negotiating table the Russians could never win on the battlefield.

A year later, Ukraine is holding all the cards, striking down waves of Russian invaders with drone technology that is rewriting the rules of modern warfare.

Retired Gen. David Petraeus said recently, “The future of warfare is happening right now in Ukraine.”

As Russia’s economy teeters on the brink of collapse, it is now the former KGB agent who has holed himself up in secure bunkers — afraid of being assassinated by Russian oligarchs or Ukrainian drones.

Meanwhile, Zelenskyy strolls freely through the streets of European capitals once aligned with Russia — not as a refugee, but as a conquering hero.

European and Canadian leaders now line up to provide his warriors with more than $100 billion in military help in their war of liberation to permanently push Putin’s Russian invaders out of his sovereign land.

And in perhaps the most surreal twist of this still-unfolding historical drama, it was Zelenskyy on social media yesterday who assured the frightened Russian defense minister that Kyiv would not attack Moscow during its annual World War II victory parades held today and tomorrow in the Russian capital.

Zelenskyy does, in fact, have many cards left to play against Putin.

And recently, through true grit and technological superiority, Ukrainians have drawn an inside straight while Trump is left dealing with a strait of another kind — one keeping U.S. troops in Iran far longer than the commander in chief anticipated.

Putin and Trump thought they would easily prevail in quick wars against overmatched opponents. What they didn’t count on was a technological revolution in asymmetric warfare that has radically shifted power dynamics on the global stage — and left Putin’s dream of military success on the ash heap of history.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“It is time for Russian leaders to take real steps to end their war, especially since Russia’s Defense Ministry believes it cannot hold a parade in Moscow without Ukraine’s goodwill.”

— Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyyafter the Kremlin scaled back its Victory Day celebrations amid intensifying Ukrainian strikes deep inside Russia

CHART OF THE DAY

ON THIS DATE

In 1973, Secretariat won the Kentucky Derby, the first of his Triple Crown victories, in a time of 1:59.4 — a record that still stands.

Joe Dombroski/Newsday RM via Getty Images

A CONVERSATION ABOUT THE TECH RIGHT

Silicon Valley’s libertarian billionaires helped put Donald Trump back in the White House. Now, according to a sweeping new piece in The Atlantic, George Packer argues they’re running it — and selling out the president’s populist base to do it. He joined “Morning Joe” today to discuss “The Venture-Capital Populist” and whether the MAGA coalition can survive its own oligarchs.

JS: Talk about David Sacks, Elon Musk, and Peter Thiel — what do they actually believe?

GP: These men have been hardcore libertarians all their lives. Thiel famously said freedom and democracy are incompatible. But now they’ve come around to the view that government can actually be useful — as long as it serves them. As Trump’s AI and crypto adviser, Sacks worked to align government policy with the wishes of those industries, not the public interest.

JS: And what are they ultimately after?

GP: They are wielding this power to fit their financial interests and their sense that the world should be ruled by a small number of very smart, wealthy men — an oligarchy.

JS: Sacks has aligned himself with Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orbán and against liberal democracy. What’s driving that?

GP: Sacks is pretty ignorant about the history and politics of that region. But his view mimics his approach to business: There’s no moral calculation. Ukraine is a risky bet, so naturally you end up sympathizing with Putin — because morality has been replaced by a cold calculation of where your interests lie.

Claire McCaskill: A lot of powerful, wealthy people bent the knee to Donald Trump out of fear. These guys did it out of opportunity. Talk about how this romance is hurting the president with his base.

GP: Here’s an example: Just yesterday, the White House — after dismissing AI safety concerns as Biden-era wokeness — announced that AI models would have to report their safety tests to the government. Why? Because their working-class populist base is afraid of AI. The numbers make that clear: They don’t see it the way David Sacks and Peter Thiel do.

JS: These guys reject the idea of Western civilization as Winston Churchill and World War II leaders thought of it — and blame everybody in the fight for Western democracy except Vladimir Putin. Why?

GP: They use the phrase “Western civilization” as a kind of flag that they’re waving when they criticize European democracies. But what do they mean by it? That’s the real puzzle.

Because if Donald Trump — who tried to overthrow an elected government — is the embodiment of Western civilization, it doesn’t mean to them what it means to you and me.

This conversation has been condensed and edited for brevity and clarity.

0.1%

— The share of accounts on Polymarket making more than two-thirds of the platform’s profits.

ONE MORE SHOT

Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for The Met Museum/Vogue

Madonna poses at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the 2026 Met Gala, celebrating “Costume Art” on Monday.

CATCH UP ON MORNING JOE

The Dictatorship

Court denies request to immediately block DOJ ‘slush fund’

Published

7 hours ago

June 11, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Court denies request to immediately block DOJ ‘slush fund’

Jun. 10, 2026, 6:14 PM EDT

A federal judge in Washington has denied a bid Wednesday brought by a watchdog group to immediately block the Justice Department’s “anti-weaponization” fund, for now choosing to trust the department’s assertions that it is not moving forward with the fund.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled immediately, denying Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington’s request for a temporary restraining order that would have blocked the Department of Justice from taking steps to create the fund.

Throughout the 30-minute hearing, the DOJ reiterated that the administration was not moving forward with the nearly $1.8 billion fund, which seeks to compensate individuals who allege they have been politically targeted or victimized by the DOJ.

Andrew Block, the only lawyer present for the government, repeatedly cited Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s June 2 congressional testimonyin which he said the administration was “not moving forward” with plans to create the fund.

Leon indicated he agreed with the DOJ’s position that the case appeared to be moot, saying he was not persuaded there was an issue for the court to decide regarding the creation of the fund. He issued a stern warning to the DOJ, saying, “Don’t play possum with this court!” — meaning he does not want to be deceived.

The plaintiffs argued Blanche’s testimony did not amount to an official cancellation. Nikhel Sus, CREW’s attorney, said Blanche “refused to memorialize that rescission,” or in other words, put it in writing. Sus said that was “highly unusual.” Leon responded, “This whole case is highly unusual to say the least.”

Leon asked the government twice why they would not just rescind the order that established the fund. Block responded, “I don’t know,” and pointed again to Blanche’s public statements about the fund’s future.

Both Leon and Sus raised the issue of Trump’s continued public defense of the fund. “It can still be an important issue and also not moving forward,” Block said. “That isn’t a direction to move forward with the fund.”

Although Leon rejected CREW’s bid for an immediate block, he indicated he is still considering its request for a longer-term block against the fund.

A block order from a separate federal judge in Virginia remains in effect until at least Friday.

Fallon Gallagher is a legal affairs reporter for MS NOW.

The Dictatorship

Trump is accelerating our Social Security insolvency crisis

Published

7 hours ago

June 11, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Jun. 10, 2026, 5:50 PM EDT

The date when Social Security’s trust fund is expected to run out of money just got bumped up. The fund is now projected to empty in 2032according to a new report released by Social Security’s trustees.

The new depletion date isn’t an earth-shaking change — it’s only a quarter earlier than the estimate in last year’s report. But it illustrates how President Donald Trump’s policies are degrading a program he promised to never jeopardize — and accelerating an approaching crisis in how our government will assist the elderly and disabled.

The report names three factors that contributed to the earlier insolvency date. One is a declining fertility rate, but the other two drivers can be traced back to Trump: a drop in immigration into the country, and the “substantial effect” of the tax policies in the One Big Beautiful Bill he signed last summer.

Trump’s acceleration of the program’s insolvency comes atop his assaults on the program’s administrative capacities.

Reduced immigration during Trump’s second term — especially when coupled with a declining fertility rate — strains Social Security because the program is funded through payroll taxes. Those come out of people’s paychecks, and fewer workers supporting an aging population means the program receives less revenue. Indeed, Social Security already has been tapping its trust fund for the better part of the past two decades because the program’s costs have exceeded its cash income. And as the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities pointed out last yearlast year’s tax cuts were a boon to the rich but a bust for the solvency of the Social Security trust fund.

To be clear, if the fund is depleted, Social Security won’t go belly up. Benefits will continue to be paid out, but there will be a large drop in the amount. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that the “average monthly cut would total $500, which is more than what the average retired household spends on groceries each month.”

That would be a huge blow to the budgets of many older Americans. Social Security is a major source of income for most retirees, and roughly 40% of beneficiaries over the age of 65 rely on it for most of their income. And it would mark the destabilization of the sole source of retirement security for most Americans that is supposed to be insulated from ups and downs — unlike 401K plans. As the CBPP has pointed outSocial Security is “most workers’ only source of guaranteed retirement income that is not subject to investment risk or financial market fluctuations.”

Trump’s acceleration of the program’s insolvency comes atop his assaults on the program’s administrative capacities. His cuts to the Social Security Administration have left offices understaffedincreased wait timesand reduced quality of customer service.

Ultimately, Trump is exacerbating a colossal social safety net problem that predates him, and the trust fund will hit dire straits after he has left office. Democrats need to have clear plans for shoring up the program and making it robust for the future — which will require not being sheepish about taxes as a tool for renewing the social contract. And when Republicans try to claim that they, too, are champions of Social Security, all Democrats need to do is point to the truth.

Zeeshan Aleem is a writer and editor for MS NOW. He primarily writes about politics and foreign policy.

The Dictatorship

Wednesday’s Mini-Report, 6.10.26

Published

7 hours ago

June 11, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Today’s edition of quick hits.

* The latest from Northern Ireland: “The family of a man who lost an eye in a knife attack appealed for calm on Wednesday after the incident triggered a wave of anti-immigrant violence in Belfast overnight, with masked men burning families out of their homes and torching vehicles. The appeal ‌came as a Sudanese man appeared in court charged with attempted murder and as British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and politicians in Northern Ireland condemned the violence by ‘masked thugs’ that had targeted ethnic minorities.”

* In related news: “The British government hit out at X owner Elon Musk Wednesday, accusing him of whipping up tensions online ahead of disorder in Belfast.”

* The tenuous state of a dubious ceasefire: “Trump said the U.S. is going to hit Iran ‘hard’ today when pressed by reporters in the Oval Office about his statement earlier that Tehran will ‘pay the price’ for taking ‘too long’ to reach a peace agreement. ‘Well, we’re going to be attacking them and attacking them very hard, resuming bombing,’ he said.”

* The latest casualty figures from Lebanon: “Israel’s military offensive in Lebanon has killed at least 3,666 people, including 131 healthcare workers, and injured more than 11,300 since the U.S. and Israel began their war with Iran in late February, the Lebanese health ministry reported yesterday.”

* The changing nature of modern warfare: “Ukraine is wreaking havoc on unarmored trucks and trains in the battlefield’s rear, using drones with upgraded engines and batteries, integrated Starlink communication systems and new artificial-intelligence capabilities. The ramped-up attacks are causing fuel shortages, complicating troop rotations and reducing Russian military activity on the front.”

* This seems like a reasonable request: “Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee demanded Wednesday that Bill Pulte, President Donald Trump’s controversial pick for acting director of national intelligence, submit to a full security check before assuming the post, including an examination of his financial holdings and foreign contacts.”

* Some market trends can’t be stopped despite the White House’s best efforts: “Even as President Donald Trump boosts coal over clean energy, solar power is hitting new milestones in the U.S. and remains the leading source of new power. Data released Wednesday by global energy think tank Ember, along with a report by the Solar Energy Industries Association and analytics firm Wood Mackenzie, show the continued growth of solar and decline of coal in the United States despite federal policy. In May, for the first time, solar supplied more of the nation’s electricity than coal, or 12.8%, Ember said.”

* A bizarre schedule for a nonemergency vanity project: “Federal officials are laying more groundwork to begin construction on President Donald Trump’s planned 250-foot-tall triumphal arch, sharing additional documents that detail the project’s scope and an aggressive timetable for potentially completing work before Trump’s term ends. According to National Park Service documents posted this month, the administration envisions 20 hours per day of construction on the arch, year-round, in hopes of completing the project within two to three years.”

See you tomorrow.

Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”