All Activity

Normally, in the Bible, Jesus, as well as the disciples, simply cast the demon out. If we find an exception to the norm, it is wise to ask "Why the exception?" instead of turning to the exception and see how we can make this the rule. If I recall correctly, there are two exceptions to the norm. The boy with the seizures and the one or two men where the pigs ran into the sea. Fundamentalists may not be happy with my comments here, but please take for your consideration. With the boy having the seizures; Jesus says that this kind does not come out except for fasting and prayer. While I am not an expert in language, from what I've read and heard in lectures from those who understand the language, the idea of fasting and prayer can be understood as say a doctor or scientist who is prayerfully studying and experimenting and so focused on their research that they often forget to eat and sleep. So could this boy simply have had a physical condition that gave seizures, and while Jesus could do the physical healing, that he was telling his disciples that this is not simply demons, but something that they really need to study to discover the cause and develop a cure? The second exception is the one or two men where the pigs ran into the sea. Ok, I confess that their breaking the chains is something that may indicate traditional demons. However, a couple of things to keep in mind, with another suggestion if you bear with me. This man/These men were pagans. He/They were gentiles. They lived in a Greek City State set up from the conquests of Greece to show people in the rest of the world how wonderful Greek life is to encourage the people living in the area to not only be Greek subjects by conquest, but to change their lives and embrace Greece life and thought in total. (The idea of a city set on a hill, but instead of a Christian faith, these cities were to draw everyone to Greece.) There were 10 of these cities just east of the Jordan in the hills. It would have been to one of these 10 cities that would have been the "far country" for the Prodigal Son went. This man/These men would have known little of the Jews who lived in small Jewish communities across the lake. So first of all, Jesus needed to work with the man/men, and their pagan/gentile/Greek background. This man/These men living in the Greek City State probably were raised from childhood in how special it was to be Greek and how they were to be examples for all the non-Greeks living around them of how wonderful Greek life and thought are. Yet, for some reason, this missionary mindset made them uncomfortable. Also, may I also wonder if he/they may have also suffered from what we call mental illness. Jesus did what he did to work with these people who were ignorant of the Bible and ignorant of Judaism. Even if they had traditional demons Jesus still needed to work with how this man/these men are. And if it is just the suffering in them suppose to be showing how wonderful Greek life is, and they just are uncomfortable with this idea, and/or mental illness; Jesus can heal the mind, but they might from time to time start thinking things that could lead back to problems. Seeing the pigs run into the sea and drown is always a reminder that if they start thinking the wrong way that they remember the pigs and they choose against the bad thought they were about to think. Jesus also needed to learn where these men were coming from, remembering they were getting views about the demonic not from the Bible and/or Judaism, but from a pagan background. Jesus could not make the same assumptions about the cause of this/these men's sufferings as he could in the Jewish communities. Jesus needed to do what was appropriate for their pagan/Greek background. And this personal care was important as this/these people born and raised to be missionaries of Greek life and thought, ended up becoming the first Christian missionaries to the gentiles.

Israel says it has serious concerns with Hamas disarmament deal Israel has shared “serious security concerns” with the White House regarding the proposed disarmament deal with Hamas, an Israeli official said as Israeli strikes overnight and into Sunday evening killed at least 17 people, including children, in Gaza. Read More.

Ken Martin hunkers down at the Democratic National Committee as a storm gathers around party leader Ken Martin is in survival mode. Read More.

Ukrainian drones kill 5 in Russia and set fire to Wildberries warehouse Ukrainian drone strikes killed at least five people across Russia, also hitting industrial sites and a further warehouse belonging to Russia’s e-commerce giant Wildberries, local officials said. Read More.

Ukrainian drones kill 5 in Russia and set fire to Wildberries warehouse Ukrainian drone strikes killed at least five people across Russia, also hitting industrial sites and a further warehouse belonging to Russia’s e-commerce giant Wildberries, local officials said. Read More.

Ok lets take a look. I go to Wednesday night service and worship and praise with the brethren. Is it the Sabbath, no. I have elders meeting on Tuesday and do worship and praise with the elders. Is it the Sabbath, no. I have church board meeting on or near the first of the month on a weekday and do worship and praise with the board. Is it the Sabbath, no. And then get this, I have mens ministry meeting on Sunday morning and do worship and praise with the men. Is it the Sabbath.. are you seeing the direction I am going with this...

Idaho fast food restaurant shooting leaves 3 dead and 7 injured, city spokesman says BOISE, Idaho (AP) — Three people were killed and seven more were injured, some critically, in a shooting at an In-N-Out Burger restaurant in southern Idaho on Saturday afternoon, a Twin Falls city spokesman said. https://apnews.com/article/shooting-idaho-twin-falls-15be31e5c532e7dfe4b7108d83dd47be? Suspect in shooting at Idaho fast-food restaurant died from self-inflicted gunshot wound, police say TWIN FALLS, Idaho (AP) — The suspect in a fatal shooting at a fast-food restaurant in Idaho died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, police said Sunday, crediting an off-duty officer and a citizen with firing shots that diverted him. https://apnews.com/article/twin-falls-idaho-shooting-fast-food-restaurant-2b1104d872124c2733faec0ddb89ffc4?

FACT FOCUS: Migrant crossing in Spain’s Ceuta breeds unsubstantiated claims BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — A crisis at the border in Ceuta, a tiny Spanish territory in North Africa, has resulted in unsubstantiated claims about Spain’s migration policies and the causes of the border surge at the territory’s frontier with Morocco. https://apnews.com/article/spain-migration-ceuta-morocco-facts-50baa964ecfb07a2d19223d7ec375b91?

🐶 1 for the road: Surfing pups A dog catches a wave during the World Dog Surfing Championships yesterday in Pacifica, Calif. Photo: Haven Daley/AP Top dogs were riding waves yesterday at the 10th annual World Dog Surfing Championships in Pacifica, Calif., about 14 miles south of San Francisco. Watch a video.

🚰 Iran suspected in Midwest water attacks Water tower in Plymouth, Minn., which was hit with a cyberattack. Photo: Ellen Schmidt/AP At least 40 municipal water systems in Minnesota and Michigan have been hit with cyberattacks, with Iran as the leading suspect. "Officials cautioned that they had not definitively determined that Iran was responsible for the attack and that the investigation was still preliminary," The New York Times reports. "But they said Iran had stepped up cyberattacks since the U.S. and Israel launched a war against the country five months ago, and had previously targeted similar water systems and other critical infrastructure in the U.S." Get the latest.

📝 AI's manifesto war Silicon Valley's AI moguls are flooding Washington with competing blueprints for superintelligence, clashing over a defining question: Does safety come from spreading powerful AI or containing it? Why it matters: Their fight will shape who gets access to the best models, how America competes with China, and whether the government can slow the race in an emergency, Axios' Andrew Kay and Zachary Basu write. 🫨 Alarming developments, seemingly by the day, have turned the manifestos from thought exercises into an urgent policy battle. OpenAI and Anthropic both disclosed that their advanced models went rogue and broke into external systems during cybersecurity evaluations. Kimi K3 delivered a double shock: The Chinese model not only reached frontier-level performance but did so with open weights that anyone can download, modify and deploy. The manifesto map: Each mogul's post offers a different theory of the danger — and a different prescription for containing it. 🏛️ July 14 — Set the standards: Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis proposed an industry-funded, federally overseen "Frontier AI Standards Body" to test models before release. Voluntary reviews could eventually harden into binding rules governing access to the most powerful systems. 🔑 July 24 — Open the defense: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang argued that open models give American developers and cybersecurity defenders more tools, and he rallied Meta, Microsoft, Google and OpenAI to sign a letter, "Open Weights and American AI Leadership," supporting the open AI ecosystem. 🚧 July 27 — Gate the danger: Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei called for "mandatory safety testing" and tighter controls on the chips and distillation techniques helping China develop powerful open-weight models. He stopped short of supporting a blanket ban. 🌐 July 28 — Spread access: Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg cast broadly available "personal superintelligence" as a safeguard against a future controlled by a handful of companies and governments. 🛑 July 28 — Build the brake: More than 1,200 frontier-lab employees signed "Pacing the Frontier," a petition asking Washington to create international tools for deliberately slowing development if AI begins advancing beyond human control. 🏛️ Behind the scenes: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's No. 1 topic in Hill, administration and White House meetings this past week was previewing the capabilities of the company's most powerful AI yet: Astra, the next major ChatGPT model family, as yet unreleased. OpenAI said yesterday that an internal version of Astra was behind research leaps in 10 major open mathematical problems in "high-dimensional geometry, coding theory, arithmetic circuit complexity, group theory, operator algebras, quantum complexity, lattice cryptography and extremal combinatorics."

🐘 Pre-Trump GOP is coming for Vance Photo illustration: Brendan Lynch/Axios. Photo: Roy Rochlin/Getty Images The Wall Street Journal opinion page tried to stop Donald Trump a decade ago and again in 2024. Now, the standard-bearer of traditional conservatism is making an early case against his presumed heir. Why it matters: Vice President JD Vance has the inside track for Trump's endorsement. But a GOP faction that never embraced Trump's overhaul of the party is already arguing against handing the reins to Vance, Axios' Mike Zapler writes. 🔎 The main arguments in the WSJ opinion pages: Vance is putting ambition ahead of governing. As congressional Republicans try to pass an agenda that might avoid a November wipeout, Kimberly Strassel wrote, "Mr. Vance is promoting a book." She was referring to Vance's media tour to promote his just-published bestseller, "Communion." According to Vance's office, he's been on Capitol Hill over two dozen times since he became VP. His personality rankles. Strassel wrote a follow-up after Vance's fans came after her for her earlier column. "One answer [for the aggressive response] is simply that Mr. Vance is a sensitive bunny," she wrote. He's naive. An unsigned WSJ editorial zeroed in on Vance's defense of the memorandum of understanding with Iran that quickly unraveled, as well as his claims that the Iranian regime had turned over a new leaf. "We promise that wasn't Mr. Obama or John Kerry speaking," the editorial board wrote dismissively. He cozies up to Carlson. "Mr. Vance has spent the Trump presidency trying to curry favor with Mr. Carlson as part of laying the ground for a 2028 presidential run," Allysia Finley wrote. 🥊 The other side: Allies say the Journal is fighting the last war — clinging to a vision of conservatism the Republican Party has left behind. If anything, his supporters say, the paper's criticism helps Vance politically — showing he's in tune with the grassroots and not heeding the old guard. "No one in Vance's orbit is concerned or surprised about being attacked by the literal beating heart of the pre-Trump GOP establishment," a top Vance ally told Axios. "When the Wall Street Journal ed board hits him, it only sends the exact signal to our base that we want. … These guys are doing our work for us." Keep reading.

2028: Trump's final act Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images A special look for AM readers at Axios CEO Jim VandeHei's political briefing, published first in his weekly Axios C-Suite newsletter: President Trump doesn't much care if Republicans lose the House and/or the Senate in November. Yes, he'd prefer a big win. But he seems indifferent to the election and the possibility of endless Democratic investigations of his family, wealth and policies, close advisers tell us. A big reason: Trump knows he'll emerge just as strong, or even stronger, heading into his final two years, at least among Republicans. The big picture: Trump is not a share-the-stage, pass-the-torch, groom-your-successor kind of guy. Instead, he'll exploit his leverage: 🏛️ A more MAGA Senate. Almost all of his critics will be gone through defeat or retirement. The incoming class is very Trumpy. If they keep the Senate, Trump loyalists like Mike Lee (Utah), Ron Johnson (Wis.) and Rick Scott (Fla.) will chair committees. 🗳️ A more MAGA House. Trump already serves as de facto speaker, but his few outspoken GOP critics — Rep. Thomas Massie (Ky.) and former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.) — will be gone, replaced by members who won because of him. 👑 A '28 kingmaker. Trump's firm hold on the base means he will dictate the GOP's nominee and shape their message. He wants a Vance-Rubio ticket and will likely get it if his mind doesn't change. Imagine any '28 hopeful, especially Marco Rubio or JD Vance, trying to break with the boss while working for the boss. 💰 Cashing in. Trump will use levers of power to keep raising money to expand his clout beyond the presidency. "He likes the fact that when he tells someone, 'Give me money,' they give him money," an adviser told us. 👓 3 dramas to watch post-November: Trump will flirt with running again in '28 until the bitter end, but it's all about PR and keeping Vance and Rubio in their place. As potential outside-the-walls competition in '28, the White House is watching Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas) and Sen. Josh Hawley (Mo.). A constitutional clash over congressional oversight, among the last and most vital powers lawmakers hold dear. What happens if Trump orders his entire administration, family and friends to just ignore Congress?

Trump, 80, Self-Soothes With Disturbing AI Slop Spree The president made dozens of bizarre posts on Saturday afternoon as he melted down over his Reflecting Pool humiliation. President Donald Trump spent his Saturday afternoon winding down in one of the few ways he seems to know how: by posting bizarre, AI-generated images of himself on Truth Social.Trump, 80, went on yet another disturbing posting blitz in which he imagined himself as Elvis Presley, mocked his political foes, daydreamed over his “Arc de Trump,” and laid claim to both Venezuela and Greenland.The president posted 43 times from Saturday morning to afternoon, in a session that included a mix of reposts and his usual AI slop.His standout post of the day was one in which he pictured himself in an Elvis Presley-inspired jumpsuit, complete with a bedazzled eagle next to his exposed chest. The image was posted with no caption or context. Trump also spent several posts self-soothing over his advanced age. One image of himself was captioned, “President Trump ages in reverse!” Another post sat current Trump and young Trump next to each other, accompanied by the caption, “Same Guy. Even more energy now!” The president bizarrely referred to himself in the third person in one post, writing, “President Trump is fixing our wonderful White House, just like he is fixing our Country!” Another image of him, taken in May 2024 as he arrived at a Manhattan courthouse for the Stormy Daniels hush money trial where he was found guilty of 34 felony counts, was captioned, “Only Trump.” A separate AI-generated post depicted Trump as a Revolutionary War general leading soldiers into battle, with a battered American flag waving behind him. In real life, Trump avoided the military draft five times. In another post, Trump shared a mock-up of this much-hyped triumphal arch project in Washington, D.C. He captioned the image, “The Triumphal Arch, prior to affixing the magnificent Statues and Artwork!” In two other posts, Trump attacked his perceived foes Bruce Springsteen and rising Democratic star James Talarico by mocking their appearances. The president also made clear that he’s still thinking about claiming Venezuela and Greenland, despite strong international opposition to the bonkers idea. In one image, captioned the “51st state,” Venezuela was overlaid with the American flag. In an even more bizarre photo, a gigantic Trump peeked over the mountains of Greenland with the caption, “Hello, Greenland!” Trump made a string of other posts without an apparent overarching theme, including two dedicated to Abraham Lincoln, a split-face composite of him and George Washington, an AI-generated photo of him kissing a golden Jesus Christ on the cross, and a Trump 2028 poster. The president also dedicated a throwback to an AI-generated photo he first posted in May that depicted him walking next to a shackled alien. The White House did not immediately return the Daily Beast’s request for comment. The confounding Truth Social posting sprees have become part of the aging president’s routine. He appears to delight in sharing these often nonsensical creations online. Trump’s flurry of posts also included one that lashed out at Jeanine Pirro, his pick for U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, over the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool fiasco. Trump raged at his own appointee for dropping a felony vandalism charge against a suspect in the damage to the pool, which prosecutors attributed to a poor job by the contractor and not to thugs. “I disagree 100% with Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, on the Reflecting Pool. I don’t know what she was thinking?” he wrote. “There may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!” https://www.thedailybeast.com/donald-trump-80-self-soothes-with-disturbing-ai-slop-spree/?

Trump’s Polls Hit New Low—With One Notable Exception Only one other president has bested Trump’s race to the bottom. President Donald Trump’s latest poll numbers have sunk to the lowest levels of his presidency—and are nearing historic lows for any second-term president. There’s one exception, however: a lone past president who ranked even lower. Trump has responded by repeatedly making false claims about his approval ratings. “The highest they’ve ever been,” he preened on Truth Social in June. Late last year, he boasted that his poll numbers were the highest of his entire political career when, in fact, they were the lowest of his second term. He has also claimed he won “all 50 states” in 2020. He didn’t. He lost the election. “He’s always going to project strength regardless of what the numbers are, and he’ll say they’re fake anyway,” Republican strategist Douglas Heye told The New York Times. The latest abysmal polls have found that only roughly a third of Americans—33 percent—support Trump amid his increasingly unpopular Iran war and climbing gas and grocery prices. The findings across a number of surveys are the lowest of his presidency and nearly as low as those of any second-term president since the 1940s, when polling began, the Times noted. Richard Nixon scored lower than Trump—with only 24 percent support—but that was just days before his resignation in the wake of the Watergate scandal. Trump previously scored nearly as low as he has in the current findings following the violent storming of the Capitol by Trump supporters on Jan. 6, 2021. Despite Trump’s inflated claims, while he has won a plurality of votes, he has never been elected by a majority of voters in the elections he has won—though he frequently insists he won in a landslide. He also has never been supported by a majority of respondents in Gallup polling. So many Democratic voters “strongly disapprove” of Trump that they’re more likely to vote this year, handing Republicans yet another headache. One sliver of support, however, is hanging on: Trump himself. He’s apparently convinced that Republicans have the midterms in the bag, thanks to him. He protects himself from the bad news by dismissing any and all damning surveys. “Polls are very dishonest, just like a lot of reporters,” he told journalists during the Group of 7 summit in France in June. Days later, he cited his own survey putting his approval rating at 50 percent. Then he arbitrarily boosted that figure by an additional 15 points. “Other Polls have my Approval Rating at 65 percent, and more!” he boasted. https://www.thedailybeast.com/donald-trumps-polls-hit-new-lowwith-one-notable-exception/?

MAGA Exiles Declare War on Trump: ‘He Betrayed Us All’ “There’s going to be a third party, and I’m going to do everything I can to bring that about,” Tucker Carlson vowed. More trouble is brewing for Republicans in the midterm elections as a crew of high-profile Donald Trump defectors announced they’re joining forces to launch a new political “movement” to oppose the current president and his supporters. Trump “betrayed us all,” former Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted on X Saturday, alongside a photo of the newly organized Trump opposition team meeting in Tucker Carlson’s hunting lodge-like Maine home. “We said no more foreign wars and we meant it and supported Donald Trump because he made that promise. But he’s betrayed us all,” Greene continued. “Our commitment is America First for all Americans, right, left, and center. The movement has begun.” The post was seen by more than 5.5 million people and racked up nearly 10,000 comments, with some defending Trump and others attacking him. Several comments wondered why Trump’s supporters could have been so delusional to begin with. “Everything Trump said was a lie,” noted one response. “The only good question is why anyone believed him in the first place??” “You’re a fraud… a terrible judge of character,” another tweeted to Greene. “Why should anyone listen to your assessments on anything now?” Kentucky GOP Rep. Thomas Massie, former director of the National Counterterrorism Center Joe Kent, and Greene’s conservative journalist husband, Brian Glenn—whom she married just days ago in Las Vegas—were among those at the gathering. Greene, who resigned from Congress in January following several high-profile clashes with Trump, had hinted earlier about starting a new political movement or party that would attract activists from both the “right and the left.” Carlson told the Columbia Journalism Review last month: “There’s going to be a third party, and I’m going to do everything I can to bring that about.” He has apologized to his followers for previously backing Trump. In a scathing Bloomberg interview with journalist Mishal Husain in July, Carlson blamed the “weak” president for tying the U.S. to a no-win war with Iran simply to serve Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s drive for regime change in the Middle East. Kent resigned his position in March because of Trump’s war, saying in a statement then: “Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.” Massie lost his primary race after clashing with Trump over the war and the administration’s refusal to release all the Epstein files. Trump has called Greene a “traitor,” Carlson a “low IQ person,” Kent a “sleazebag,” and Massie “weak and pathetic.” New movements challenging the two-party system typically struggle. Yet this new movement could siphon votes away from Republicans in the midterms, which are already expected to be difficult for the GOP. https://www.thedailybeast.com/maga-exiles-marjorie-taylor-greene-and-tucker-carlson-declare-war-on-trump-he-betrayed-us-all/?

August 2, 2026 SUPPORTED BY APPLE Good morning. President Trump said he had canceled a series of strikes on Iran because of unspecified progress on a deal. We have more news below. But first, let’s hit the road. Tom Wright-Piersanti/The New York Times Keep on truckin’ By Tom Wright-Piersanti I’m still recovering from my time at the wheel. Here’s a hypothetical: You plan a family vacation that ends with a three-day train ride across the United States. But a few hours into the train ride, a conductor announces that a train has derailed ahead of you. Amtrak says it’ll put everyone on buses, but those buses won’t arrive for hours. And it’s unclear whether they’ll take you all the way home or just to the next big city. Would you: A) Wait for the bus and ride it as far as it will take you, at no cost. Book plane tickets, for an eye-popping price. C) Rent a car and take a leisurely road trip, stopping along the way to enjoy local color and rest. D) Rent a car and drive virtually nonstop, as if you were in some sort of cross-country road race. Actually, this is not a hypothetical. It happened to me 10 days ago. My wife, 8-year-old son and I had spent a week in Tucson, Ariz., before being dumped off the train in El Paso, some 2,000 miles from our home in New Jersey. We unanimously chose Option D. We had packed plenty of snacks for the train ride. We had the Harry Potter audiobooks cued up. We’re cheapskates, and up for a challenge. Tom Wright-Piersanti Tom Wright-Piersanti/The New York Times By the time we secured a rental car (a black 2026 Hyundai Elantra), bought a cheap booster seat ($35) at Target and loaded our luggage, the sun was already setting. Google Maps said it would take us 32 hours to get home. Exhausted from the stress of the train debacle, we pulled off the road in Pecos, Texas, and got a room at the Hilton for the night ($127). It would be our last real stop. On the road Tom Wright-Piersanti/The New York Times Between the western and eastern ends of Texas, from El Paso to Texarkana, lie 812 miles of highway. The road cuts through the desert first, then into a vast flatness pocked by oil derricks. The surroundings eventually transform to scrubland, then prairies and finally forests in full summer bloom. Each passing hour — and there are lots of hours — seems to bring more green, more life, more breath. To state the obvious, and to out myself as a lifelong East Coaster, Texas is far too big. I was surprised, though, that it was never boring. The evolving landscape, the billboards, the enchanting narration of “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” — it all provoked the kind of endless chitchat that bonds loved ones. Arriving in Arkansas around 7 p.m., and not wanting to slow our momentum, we decided to pick up a pizza and eat in the car. The nearest Domino’s was a few minutes off the highway, in a town called Hope. As we neared the shop, I noticed a humble house surrounded by a fence, with a brown sign denoting a landmark: the birthplace of President Bill Clinton. Neat, I thought, and we slowed down enough to snap a picture out the window. No, we didn’t stop. Google Maps said we had 20 hours to go. Tom Wright-Piersanti/The New York Times A marathon road trip in 2026 means constantly confronting the clock. I’m reliant on my phone to guide me, and my phone insists that if I want to see the directions, I must also see how much time remains. I know, intellectually, that it takes 60 minutes — 3,600 seconds, I could count them if it’d help — for that travel time to tick down to 19 hours from 20. But when you stare at it, the number never seems to budge. We hit Tennessee around 11 p.m. I had agreed to drive through the night, and the Volunteer State’s 440-mile expanse ate up most of my eight hours at the wheel. Somewhere east of Nashville, twisting through the Cumberland Plateau, the population of tractor-trailers thinned out and I found myself alone on the road. With my wife and kid asleep, I blasted the Grateful Dead. My thoughts, artificially enhanced by a citrus-flavored Red Bull, seemed to merge with the trees and the sky and the white lines of the road blurring by. I didn’t even register Google’s E.T.A. By the time we passed into Virginia, with the sun cracking over the southern Appalachians, our drive time had dwindled to eight hours. We were in the homestretch; compared with 32 hours, eight is like a trip to the grocery store. We knew we were going to make it. Tom Wright-Piersanti/The New York Times Taking stock Twelve years ago, when my future wife and I had been dating for less than a year, we drove from New Jersey to the Grand Canyon and then up to Portland. Our relationship was solidified in the stress of marathon drives, of sharing the road with eighteen-wheelers, of having nothing but our playlists and conversation to occupy our minds. The trust required to close your eyes and recline your seat as someone else takes the wheel for the night, it seems to me, is connected to the trust it takes to share a life with someone. We saw some cool stuff on that drive, sure — the Gateway Arch, the Four Corners, the redwoods. But what we really saw was each other. In retrospect, I’m grateful for that derailed train, because it gave us a chance to see each other in this distinct way again. And our son, watching the country go by from the back seat, got to see us, too. Mom and Dad, trusty at the wheel, when he closed his eyes on a dark highway, and again when he opened them the next morning. Related (sort of): Stephen Hiltner, a Travel editor at The Times, took a road trip of his own, traversing 2,448 miles of Route 66 by motorcycle over 14 days (he made a lot more stops). See what he saw. A MESSAGE FROM APPLE MacBook Air takes top spot. Fact: MacBook Air has risen to the top to become the world's most popular laptop in business. Get the facts THE LATEST NEWS Trump Administration President Trump. Pete Marovich for The New York Times Trump said he would revive a proposal for a $1.8 billion fund that would compensate his supporters if the Senate does not confirm Todd Blanche as attorney general. Trump’s approval ratings are at or near the lowest they have ever been, according to several recent polls. After Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney in Washington, dropped vandalism charges over damage to the Reflecting Pool, Trump blasted her on social media. More on Politics “Where’s Mitch?” Senator Mitch McConnell, who has not been seen in public since mid-June, missed a signature Kentucky political event yesterday. Senator Susan Collins’s vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court has emerged as a major issue in her re-election campaign. The Middle East Israeli strikes in Gaza yesterday killed at least two people and damaged warehouses for medical supplies, Palestinian officials said, raising questions about a deal between Trump’s Board of Peace and Hamas. A Times visual investigation suggests that the United States struck a family home on Iran’s Qeshm Island with a 2,000-pound bomb. Iranian officials said the strike killed a husband and wife and their 2-year-old son. More International News Spain said it would install a floating barrier between Morocco and the Spanish territory of Ceuta after tens of thousands of migrants crossed into the territory. Ten people, including the renowned British Nepali climber Nirmal Purja, died after an avalanche struck Pakistan’s Broad Peak, one of the world’s highest mountains. An unsecured police database revealed how China uses vast amounts of private data like facial recognition and travel logs to track foreigners. Other Big Stories Wildfires burning in eastern Washington led forecasters to issue “a particularly dangerous situation” red-flag warning, the first one in the state’s history, according to officials. Three teenagers used Google Maps to plot a hike that was estimated to take around five hours. It lasted at least 12 and required the intervention of rescue crews. FROM OPINION Nicholas Kristof took a road trip to speak to some of the millions of Americans who are barely getting by. The Trump administration’s cuts to social programs are making many of their lives worse, he writes. Are you looking to find inner peace? A silent retreat in a contemplative community could add some unexpected relief and perspective, one novelist writes. Deeply reported journalism needs your support. The Times relies on subscribers to help fund our mission. Become a subscriber today. MORNING READS Photo illustration by Margeaux Walter for The New York Times We’ve made these links free for you. Baby’s first A.I. surveillance: Start-ups that track sleep and other data for young children are becoming popular with young parents who are used to tracking and analyzing their own health metrics. Dry nation: Americans are drinking less. By objective measures of health, it’s a good change. But are we also losing important social rituals? Selling burritos: As Chipotle expands into Mexico, it must persuade Mexicans to buy an Americanized take on their own cuisine. Caveman couture: Olga Soffer’s experience at a department store inspired her later work as an archaeologist, which led to startling revelations about ice age wardrobes and the role of women. She died at 83. A MESSAGE FROM APPLE MacBook Air takes top spot. Fact: MacBook Air has risen to the top to become the world's most popular laptop in business. Get the facts SPORTS M.L.B.: One of this season’s most anticipated deals appears to be done. The superstar pitcher Tarik Skubal is headed to the Los Angeles Dodgers from the Detroit Tigers. W.N.B.A.: It’s trade season in women’s basketball, too. The Los Angeles Sparks will send the five-time All-Star Kelsey Plum to the Phoenix Mercury in exchange for Monique Akoa Makani and two draft picks, league sources said. BOOK OF THE WEEK By Elisabeth Egan “Dogs, Boys and Other Things I’ve Cried About” by Isabel Klee: Klee’s heartfelt memoir returned to the best-seller list after she announced on social media that Simon, the rescue dog who inspired it, had been diagnosed with cancer. He later died. Klee, also known as @SimonSits, writes about dropping out of Ithaca College, building a life in New York City, fostering dogs and looking for love. Her tale (sorry) is full of lessons learned from resilient and feisty canines, the flotsam of the animal world to whom she has been tirelessly dedicated. In helping these pups find forever homes, she eventually finds one of her own. More New York-y reads: Here’s a guide to planning a bookstore crawl through Midtown Manhattan. These novels illuminate overlooked bits of New York history. THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE Read this week’s magazine. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Watch this extraordinary video of a humpback whale giving birth off Australia’s east coast. Slap your watermelon to make sure it’s perfectly ripe. (Yes, really.) Search for your ideal BLT recipe. Admire the dreamy, Art Nouveau-inspired streetscapes of Helsinki, Finland. MEAL PLAN Andrew Bui for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Kaitlin Wayne. Here’s a utilitarian dinner philosophy: Cook dishes that make for excellent leftovers. And better yet, if you can pull it off, opt for ones that are excellent without the need for reheating. Mia Leimkuhler, an editor for NYT Cooking, put together a catalog of easy, quick dinners that make even easier lunches. Dig into these recipes for tofu scramble, broccoli-walnut pesto pasta, paprika chicken and more. NOW TIME TO PLAY Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was brickbat. Can you put eight historical events — including Dante’s “Divine Comedy,” Benedict Arnold’s escape and Andy Warhol’s paintings — in chronological order? Take this week’s Flashback quiz. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Crossplay, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. P.S.: The Interview is off this weekend. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Host: Sam Sifton Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Evan Gorelick, Brent Lewis, Lara McCoy, Karl Russell Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Editorial Director, Newsletters: Jodi Rudoren

THIS DAY IN HISTORY August 2 1990 Iraq invades Kuwait On August 2, 1990, at about 2 a.m. local time, Iraqi forces invade Kuwait, Iraq’s tiny, oil-rich neighbor. Kuwait’s defense forces were rapidly overwhelmed, and those that were not destroyed retreated to Saudi Arabia. The emir of Kuwait, his family, and other government leaders fled to Saudi Arabia, and within hours Kuwait City had been […] read more Sponsored Content by REVCONTENT American Revolution 1776 Delegates sign Declaration of Independence Civil War 1865 CSS Shenandoah learns the war is over Cold War 1945 Potsdam Conference concludes Crime 1876 Wild Bill Hickok is murdered 1942 Man murdered near L.A. reservoir European History 1934 Hitler becomes dictator of Germany Natural Disasters & Environment 1985 Sudden thunderstorm causes plane crash Sports 1992 Jackie Joyner-Kersee wins gold in heptathlon, again U.S. Presidents 1923 President Warren G. Harding dies before scandals break World War I 1918 American troops land at Archangel 1917 Mutiny breaks out on German battleship World War II 1943 PT-109 sinks; Lieutenant Kennedy is instrumental in saving crew

Photos show the scenes after the latest Israeli strikes in Gaza Intense Israeli strikes Friday night and Saturday in central and northern Gaza killed several people and wounded dozens more, according to local health officials. Read More.

Trump stands to profit off US policy announcements by selling fast access to his social media posts President Donald Trump knows the world hangs on his every word. Now he wants you to pay for it. Read More. Trump blasts Pirro after she refutes his claim that Reflecting Pool was damaged by vandals President Donald Trump on Saturday sharply criticized U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro's assessment that damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was the result of shoddy construction and not the work of vandals, as he claims. Read More. ps:I guess she'll be the next to be thrown under the bus!!

🍿 1 for the road: Mega movie weekend Image: Sony Pictures via AP This weekend's box office could be one of the biggest of all time, Axios' Nathan Bomey writes. With "Spider-Man: Brand New Day" poised to go gangbusters, and "The Odyssey" still going strong, Rentrak analyst Paul Dergarabedian says a top three showing is a serious possibility. Data: Rentrak. Chart: Nathan Bomey/Axios The biggest showing of all time was the weekend of April 26, 2019, led by the megahit "Avengers: Endgame," at $402 million. Box-office analysts expect $260 million to $280 million for "Spider-Man." (Variety) "Spider-Man" trailer ... "Odyssey" trailer.

✈️ 22-hour flight A first-class suite designed for Project Sunrise. Photo: Qantas Qantas, Australia's flagship airline, is planning to launch the world's longest commercial flight in October 2027, connecting Sydney and London on specially built Airbus jets. It's dubbed Project Sunrise. Flight time is expected to be 22 hours. Tickets go on sale in February. 🧘 Zoom in: The plane will have a "well-being zone" where passengers can get snacks and stretch, The New York Times reports (gift link). The airline is also looking at ways to reduce jet lag: caffeine and chili in breakfast meals, along with brighter lights to help the body wake up. The customized Airbus jets can fly such long distances without refueling due to an additional rear center fuel tank, The Times notes. Airbus says the modification allows the jet to carry an extra 5,300 gallons of fuel and pushes its range to 10,000 miles. Dig in.

🌊 Spain's new barrier Map: Danielle Alberti/Axios Spain said migrant crossings into its North African enclave of Ceuta stopped overnight. Today, police have been installing a 1,640-foot floating barrier off Spain's border with Morocco following a mass rush that killed at least 67 people, Reuters reports. Spanish authorities said about 50,000 people — most of them young Moroccan men looking for work — crossed into Ceuta by land and sea beginning Thursday, an unprecedented surge at one of the European Union's only land borders with Africa. More than 48,000 of them returned to Morocco within 48 hours without major incident. Get the latest.

⚡ Power grid under pressure Illustration: Brendan Lynch/Axios A series of dangerous heat waves this summer — including one that left 17 states under an emergency federal order — are putting the electric grid under an intense real-world stress test, Axios' Rebecca Falconer writes. Why it matters: Heat waves drive up electricity demand for air conditioning while making some power plants less efficient. As waves become longer and more frequent, utilities are rethinking how they prepare the grid for extreme stress. 🤖 What to watch: Rapid growth in electricity demand from AI data centers is creating a new challenge. This month, the Public Utility Commission of Texas — which has become a proving ground for grid modernization since the deadly 2021 winter storm exposed major weaknesses — approved standards requiring large data centers to disconnect during grid disturbances to help keep it running. Read on.