Since it is a holiday (Happy Juneteenth!), I considered taking the day off. But rather than totally punt today, I thought I'd just run large excerpts from the official CBS transcript of this week's Face The Nation, since it was a rather extraordinary show.

I'm not usually a big fan of Face The Nation, in terms of the Sunday morning political chatfest lineup, but occasionally they manage to do a good job. This week we had Robert Costa guest-hosting, but it wasn't his presence so much as the guest list itself that made the program notable. The first two segments might have been subtitled: "Republicans Explaining Why Trump Is So Screwed" (if you'll forgive the language).

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President Joe Biden got some good economic news this week, as the official inflation rate fell to only 4.0 percent. This is down from last year's high of 9.1 percent, and is a significant achievement. Most economists will tell you that's still a bit too high and that 2.0 percent is the goal they're shooting for, but 4.0 percent is getting pretty close to that goal, you have to admit.

Even the Wall Street Journal had some good economic news as well, as they noted "Stocks Close At Highest Levels Since 2022."

Biden also touted some progress on a more microeconomic level for many Americans, as he hosted the leaders of some prominent companies who have not exactly gotten rid of their "junk fees" for consumers, but at least have voluntarily agreed not to hide the junk fees. They will now feature "up-front pricing," which is a fancy way of saying: "admitting what something actually costs instead of some fantasy of a lower price that nobody actually pays." The companies volunteering not to blatantly rip people off anymore included Ticketmaster, SeatGeek, and Airbnb. Biden called for getting rid of junk fees in his State Of The Union address, so it is good to see progress being made on the issue without Congress even acting.

What else was in the news? Biden endured a root canal, but it didn't involve general anesthesia, so we didn't have an "Acting President Kamala Harris" while he was under (for those who keep track of such historical footnotes). What wasn't in the news -- and hasn't been -- is a massive border crisis, since the gigantic surge the doomsayers were predicting after Title 42 was lifted never actually happened.

All in all, a good week for Joe Biden.

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I have to admit, in an otherwise rather extraordinary week in the presidential campaign, I learned an interesting factoid: there is already a convicted felon running for president from the inside of a jail cell. Amusingly, this is happening over on the Democratic side of things. The so-called "Tiger King," a.k.a. "Joe Exotic," is currently serving a 21-year sentence in a federal prison for a murder-for-hire scheme (as well as other lesser charges). He is currently also a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination. He's run for president before, in 2016 and 2020, but this is his first time running as a Democrat. Amusingly enough, an article about his campaign launch prominently featured one campaign promise from the Tiger King: "First of all, as soon as I'm sworn in, I have the right to pardon myself."

If I were President Joe Biden, I wouldn't be all that worried, to put it mildly. However, there is a different Democratic candidate who, while he almost certainly won't derail Biden's eventual renomination, might make a splash in the early primary news that could at least prove embarrassing for Biden. Here is what very well could happen, according to Axios (emphasis and gratuitous bullet point in original):

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That headline is my subtle way of letting everyone know I'm essentially taking today off. It's been an eventful week already, and there's nothing like a minor holiday to glom onto in order to take a break, right? So I'd like to wish everyone a Happy Flag Day today!

The flag is back in the news, also in a fairly minor way. The conservative fake-rage machine cranked up into high dudgeon mode this week over a celebration of Pride Month at the White House, which included a display of the current iteration of the "rainbow flag" that has long been a symbol of the struggle for L.G.B.T.Q. rights. They complained about the pride flag being displayed at all, and a subset of them got fake-irate over a "violation of the U.S. Flag Code" (which it actually wasn't, as there was another U.S. flag being flown above, on the roof of the White House).

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Scene Two of the "Donald Trump Indictment Circus" happened today, and things just keep getting more and more surreal. For instance, on the way from the courthouse to the airport, Trump made a quick campaign stop. You just can't make this stuff up, folks.

I must confess that I'm somewhat at a loss for words today, as I sit waiting to see whether the networks will cover Trump's "indictment party" speech live, when he gets back to his New Jersey golf club. He's not just going to give what he will see as a triumphant speech, he's also holding a fundraiser. Because Trump never misses a chance at grifting his rubes one more time.

It made me all wonder how long it would take before such an event was not treated as breaking news and became so mundane and unnewsworthy that the networks barely covered it at all. Instead of commercial-free hours of watching a pathetically small crowd outside a courthouse (since cameras aren't allowed inside), could Trump eventually instead just get a brief mention on the evening news? "In other news, Donald Trump sat through his twelfth arraignment today, on another 52 felony charges, bringing the total number of crimes he has been charged with up to 479. In the world of sports...."

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Donald Trump will be tried in two places. I am not speaking of the fact that he's now been indicted on two sets of felony criminal charges, one in New York and one in a federal court down in Florida, but rather of the two arenas where he will be making his own case: in a court of law and in the court of public opinion.

Politically, the fresh new round of indictments will boost Trump, at least in the short term. He's well aware of this, as he will be holding his first fundraiser for his presidential campaign tomorrow night -- right after his (second) arraignment in court. This is not backing away from his legal problems, it is instead leaning into it all in a big way. Trump will also most likely get a boost in Republican primary polling as well, as a "rally 'round the flag" effect -- which indeed also happened after his first indictment. The whole "Wahhhh! I'm the world's biggest victim!" schtick is going to pay off for Trump's campaign, once again.

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Program Note: We are pre-empting today's entire Friday Talking Points column because of the historic nature of what has happened yesterday and today. Truth be told, by the time we were finished reading this morning's news, we were exhausted. And the scoops just kept coming as the day wore on. The indictment was unsealed and publicly released. The special counsel made a very brief public statement. The full scope of the case was revealed, and the country is still processing the information. So although there were a few other minor political stories last week, none of them are even in the same ballpark as what is happening in South Florida right now. Which is why all we have to offer up today is a rather free-floating rant on where we as a nation now find ourselves. We will return to this column's regular format next week, but for now we just couldn't focus on anything other than this developing story.

For the first time in American history, a former president of the United States has been indicted on federal charges -- 37 individual felonies. That is an extraordinary statement to make, but that's not surprising, since nothing about Donald Trump can ever be called "ordinary."

At first glance, it sounds like a James Bond story: classified top-secret documents, information on nuclear secrets, a Pentagon attack plan against a foreign country. But when you dig a little deeper, it sounds not like Bond but rather Mr. Bean... or perhaps even the Three Stooges.

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There were two notable deaths in the world of politics today, both of which inspire such strong negative feelings within me that I have to step outside the norm of: "De mortuis nihil nisi bonum." Both of these men were odious creatures in their own right, with one of them far more odious than the other. But the more odious one -- Pat Robertson -- is being adequately vilified elsewhere today, and I had a column all ready to go for the other one anyway, so this (repeat) column is dedicated to the memory of President Ronald Reagan's secretary of the Interior, James Watt. This column was published eight years ago, and thankfully the nation has made great progress since then. It was written to celebrate only the third state (Alaska, after Colorado and Washington) and Washington D.C. legalizing the recreational usage of marijuana. Today, that tally stands at 23 states plus D.C.

But D.C. joining the ranks of fully-legalized states was memorable for me for a different reason, because it made me want to salute those who had fought -- right at the top -- for legalization, all the way back when newspapers actually (and non-ironically) would use the phrase: "[The protesters] used dope." Because a brave few souls would celebrate Independence Day each year by truckin' on down to the White House and firing up some weed within full view of the leader of the country -- at a time when doing so (on federal property, no less) could lead to serious jail time.

These "smoke-ins" (as they were called) were, for the most part, peaceful political protests. Also for the most part, they were mostly ignored by society at large, back when there were only three national television networks, and the print media was almost as constricted. But one year, all of a sudden the pot smokers indirectly caused a huge political screw-up. And the man responsible for that (self-inflicted) screw-up was James Watt. So in memoriam we decided to re-run the article we wrote about all of it eight years ago.

Originally published February 27, 2015

The 1960s gave birth to the concept of the "sit-in," as well as other related protest events such as "teach-ins" or even "die-ins." But today we're going to focus on one particular event which isn't all that well known outside of the Washington Beltway: the "smoke-in." Specifically, the annual D.C. Smoke-In held every year on July Fourth.

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[Editorial Note: OK, guilty as charged. Sometimes the temptation to run a double-meaning "...Is Revolting" headline is just too much for me to resist. Hence today's title. Mea culpa and all that sort of thing. Ahem.]

It's hard not to poke at least a little bit of fun at Speaker Kevin McCarthy's problems with the most fractious and unruly members of his caucus right now, since the whole episode is such weak tea compared to the strength the Freedom Caucus and the whole MAGA faction were supposed to have leveraged over McCarthy. They haven't exactly turned into paper tigers, but I've read more than one article in the past 24 hours which used the term "defanged," which seems about right.

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Seventy-nine years ago today, the forces of the free world attacked the fascist Nazi regime in northern France. This year, the Ukrainian military is marking the anniversary of D-Day by starting their own counteroffensive against occupying Russian forces. Back here at home, Chris Christie will be announcing his bid to take on Donald Trump for the Republican presidential nomination. There are obvious moral parallels that can be drawn between these events, but today we're going to leave that to others (for the most part).

Instead let's take a look at what Christie's chances are for either winning the nomination or at least successfully taking Donald Trump out of the running. Others are also examining this today, but from what I've read so far, most of them are getting a few things wrong in their analysis.

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