Donald Trump cannot fool all of the people all of the time: Donald John Trump signed an Iran surrender MOU at Versailles

Failure of Iran war reveals Trump’s inability to deal with America’s security needs.  Echo opinion published in the Philadelphia Inquirer by Trudy Rubin.

Scary❗😱 Donald Trump's ego-based foreign policy is making the U.S. more vulnerable to our enemies at home and overseas.

“You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.” That maxim is often attributed to Abraham Lincoln, but it’s occasionally credited to the great American circus showman P.T. Barnum. It has special relevance when applied to Donald Trump, who has outdone Barnum in self-promotion.

Donald John Trump has had astonishing success in fooling some of the people all the time, from his foundational lie that the 2020, election was stolen through his daily blast of falsehoods about everything from the economy to the financing of his ballroom.

Yet, with his blatant efforts to bamboozle all the people about his Iran deal, Trump may have finally reached the point where most Americans realize he is (and always has been..."bone spurs"...) a fraud.

For starters, Trump’s claim that he has reached a “Great Deal [that] will bring Peace and Security to the whole Region” is flat out fraudulent. The Iran war has laid bare the incompetence of a U.S. leader who assumes that force alone produces victory.

The U.S. and Israel may have destroyed much of Iran’s military, but Tehran has denied them a geopolitical win, which all the world’s leaders (except for Trump) recognize.

And most Americans will soon see this for themselves.

Until the U.S. joined Israel in the February attack on Iran, Tehran’s religious and military leaders had never tried to close the Strait of Hormuz for fear of arousing American wrath. But after Trump openly called for regime change, they had nothing to lose.

Despite its military losses, Iran proved (as has Ukraine) that a smaller country using unconventional means (drones, mines, a willingness to absorb pain) can hold off a superpower.

Moreover, Tehran is still insisting it will charge ships fees for transiting the strait after the 60-day ceasefire extension expires, contrary to Trump’s claim that the strait will be “toll free.” And the world knows that, if pushed, Tehran can close the strait again.

Trump now looks like a chump.

Trump alienated Mideast allies, including Gulf states, which took the brunt of Iran’s military revenge. He encouraged America’s adversaries, including Russia and China, by revealing his lack of any long-term strategy.

Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping had only to watch as the U.S. military squandered huge numbers of precious missiles against Iranian drones, leaving them in such short supply that the U.S. military is exposed in the Indo-Pacific.

Moscow can only toast Trump’s blindness, as the U.S. cancels promised sales of mid- and long-range missiles to Europe for defense against Russia and to pass on to Ukraine. 

This horribly bad decision left Ukrainians defenseless against Russia’s rain of cruise missiles on civilians — and on a thousand-year center of Orthodox Christianity, the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra monastery and its golden-domed Dormition Cathedral.

Not a word of protest by Trump or MAGA’s white Christian nationalists who admire Putin’s religiosity. Instead, POTUS has bizarrely praised Putin’s help with Iran. Could he possibly be referring to Moscow’s sharing of intelligence on U.S. targets with Tehran❓

Donald John Trump signed the surrender MOU with Iran on June 17, 2026, at the Palace of Versailles in France, the same place where Germany surrendered after World War One.

But, never mind. Let’s get to the surrender MOU document Trump signed electronically* on Sunday. It was not a peace deal. Rather, it was a so-called Memorandum of Understanding — “about a page and half … a very general document,” according to Vice President JD Vance.

Contrary to Trump’s grandiose claims, this memorandum kicks all the main questions about dismantling Iran’s nuclear program down the road to future negotiations over the next 60 days.

By keeping the document secret at least until Friday, the president is relentlessly trying to frame his defeat as an astounding victory in hopes this will shape the thinking of the cult MAGA faithful.

From Trump’s own words, however, and those of his henchmen, it’s already clear he has abandoned most of the stated goals of this war.

Let’s look at what we already know.

1. There will be no regime change, as POTUS called for on the opening day of the war, urging the Iranians to rise up. Trump now bizarrely calls Iran’s new leadership pragmatists in a New York Times interview, labeling them “smarter” and more “rational” than those who were assassinated. Yet the Revolutionary Guard’s military commanders now running the show are more hardline and more confident about defying the U.S. president.

2. As so far revealed, the negotiating framework to end Iran’s nuclear program sounds no better than President Barack Obama’s 2015, agreement. POTUS bragged in the Times that the agreement would ensure Iran “cannot develop or purchase a nuclear weapon.” But Tehran has asserted for decades that it would not do so and made the same pledge on the first page of Obama’s deal, known as the JCPOA.

Trump Always Chickens Out

Although Trump promised to eliminate Iran’s nuclear program entirely, he appears to have backtracked significantly, (a.k.a. "TACO Trump) now saying that Iran “can never go beyond a certain amount” of enrichment that could be used for military purposes. Again, this echoes the JCPOA, which limited enrichment to 3.67%, an amount that can be used in power reactors, but not for a bomb.

As for how long Iran would have to limit enrichment, Trump hinted that he might settle for a 15-year suspension, which is the same time limit the JCPOA required❗ (But in a contradiction, he said the limit would be “forever,” although there is no sign Tehran would agree to this.)

If POTUS hadn’t pulled out of the JCPOA in 2015, the 15 years would have extended until 2030, and Iran would now have no highly enriched uranium.

The flaw in the JCPOA was the 15-year sunset, after which Iran could have restarted enrichment, but Trump seems headed toward a similar limitation.

As for the 11.5 tons of enriched uranium Iran produced since Trump junked the JCPOA — including a half ton of nearly bomb-grade nuclear fuel — the president has talked about reducing its purity level (known as downblending), possibly inside Iran. A far cry from previous demands for removing it entirely.

In the Obama deal, 97% of Iran’s stockpile was removed outside the country to Russia. No sign that Trump’s deal will do as well.

Moreover, the joint Israel/U.S. 12-day war against Iran in 2025 had buried Iran’s enriched uranium, and as Trump has recently admitted, U.S. satellites could see if the Iranians tried to remove it. Negotiations in February, mediated by Oman, were reportedly headed toward a better deal than Trump will ever achieve, if he achieves any deal at all.

Trump killed those talks by starting his choice to wage an illegal war.

So, if you parse Trump’s own admissions, there was no need for his four-month war, which has cost America 13 dead and hundreds of billions of dollars — not to mention 3,000 Iranian dead and severe damage to the global economy.

Yet the outpouring of Trump lies this week designed to disguise his failure roll on.

While the president insists that Iran will get no economic benefits until a deal is concluded, it appears that Tehran will be able to immediately restart exporting oil during negotiations. And there are reports that other Gulf states such as the United Arab Emirates or Qatar may release Iranian funds held in their banks immediately, enabling Iran to benefit economically before any nuclear deal.


Moreover, a future Trump deal doesn’t cover an end to Iran’s missile buildup, or the end of support for proxies, sins for which Trump never stops excoriating President Obama. Also, Israel and Hezbollah aren’t party to the deal and are likely to keep fighting.

When the details of Trump’s non-deal are revealed, he will try to paper over his failure with more prevarications. But as Barnum noted, “you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.”

*Donald John Trump signed the surrender MOU at Versailles on June 17, 2026.  

Donald Trump will destroy the American constitution for the purpose of preventing voters from taking back our democracy

Americans must rise up to protect our democracy against Trumpzism

Echo opinion letter:  Philadelphia Inquirer editorial about Donald Trump’s losses in the courts and elsewhere correctly described as historic the mounting damage caused by his cult of corruption, incompetence, and cruelty. In fact, The Inquirer also pointed out that Trump is never more dangerous than when he is losing. That said, I don’t think you went far enough by calling on readers to hold Trump and his GOP enablers accountable by voting in the midterms. What makes you think Trump will accept the November results if he is not completely successful in suppressing the vote? Here’s a more effective action plan: Impeach Trump for treason and remove him from office before he subverts the next election. Treason is specifically defined among the constitutional grounds for impeachment, and treason is what Trump has committed repeatedly.

Donald Trump instigated an attack on Congress on January 6, 2021, and indiscriminately pardoned hundreds of the criminal attackers. 

More recently Donald Trump even pardoned the former criminal president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernández, who was convicted by a jury of conspiring to smuggle hundreds of tons of cocaine into our country. These acts — giving aid comfort to the enemies of the United States — meet the definition of treason. Notably, Trump has ordered the summary execution of hundreds of noncombatants suspected of lesser crimes.

Americans must follow the Constitution and hold the wrongdoer-in-chief accountable, so we will be able to vote — and have our votes count.

From Peter Pinnola, in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania

Americans cannot keep up with Donald Trump's destructive campaign against American democracy: Let's review MAGA cult behaviors

Trump cult MAGA’s Foundational Lie

Echo essay by Jeffrey Goldberg published The Atlantic

Trump's evil cult movement claims to stand with the police. Trump’s decision to pardon the cop-beaters of January 6 exposed his movement for what it is.  By Jeffrey Goldberg

At 1:42 a.m. on December 19, 2020, Donald Trump—disturbed, humiliated, livid—posted the following message on Twitter: “Statistically impossible to have lost the 2020, Election. Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!”

In California, David Nicholas Dempsey, a 33-year-old man-child with multiple felony convictions and a profound cult affection for the president, answered the call. On January 6, wearing a tactical vest and an American-flag gaiter, Dempsey came to the Capitol. Shortly before he assaulted several police officers, he shared his perspectives in an interview given while standing near a gallows. The gallows had been erected as a reminder to Vice President Mike Pence to do, in Trump’s words, “the right thing.”

“Them worthless fucking shitholes like fucking Jerry Nadler, fucking Pelosi, Clapper, Comey, fucking all those pieces of garbage, you know, Obama, all these dudes, Clinton, fuck all these pieces of shit,” Dempsey said. “They don’t need a jail cell. They need to hang from these motherfuckers while everybody videotapes it and fucking spreads it on YouTube.”

Dempsey was not an organizer of the siege, but he was one of its most energetic participants. He assaulted Metropolitan Police Detective Phuson Nguyen with pepper spray. Nguyen was certain in that moment that he was “going to die,” he later testified. Dempsey assaulted another police officer with a metal crutch, cracking his protective shield and cutting his head. Dempsey, who was heard yelling “Fuck you, bitch-ass cops!,” assaulted other officers with broken pieces of furniture, crutches, and a flagpole. Prosecutors would later argue that “Dempsey’s violence reached such extremes that, at one point, he attacked a fellow rioter who was trying to disarm him.” All told, more than 140 police officers were injured in the riot, many seriously.

I attended the January 6 rally on the Ellipse, at which Trump told his supporters, “If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.” 

Then I walked with the crowd to the Capitol. One woman, a QAnon adherent dressed in a cat costume, told me, “We’re going to stop the steal. If Pence isn’t going to stop it, we have to.”

What I remember very well about that day was my own failure of imagination. I did not, to my knowledge, see Dempsey—he had positioned himself at the vanguard of the assault, and I had stayed near the White House to listen to Trump—but I did come across at least a dozen or more protesters dressed in similar tactical gear or wearing body armor, many of them carrying flex-cuffs. I particularly remember those plastic cuffs, but I understood them only as a performance of zealous commitment. Later we would learn that these men—some of whom were Proud Boys—believed that they would actually be arresting members of Congress in defense of the Constitution. I interviewed one of them. “It’s all in the Bible,” he said. “Everything is predicted. Donald Trump is in the Bible.” Grifters could not exist, of course, without a population primed to be grifted.

After the riot, Dempsey returned to California, where he was eventually arrested. In early 2024, he pleaded guilty to two felony counts of assaulting an officer with a dangerous weapon. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Six months later, in the summer of 2024, Trump, who would come to describe the January 6 insurrection as a “day of love,” said that, if reelected, he would pardon rioters, but only “if they’re innocent.” Dempsey was not innocent, but on January 20, 2025, shortly after being inaugurated, Trump pardoned him and roughly 1,500 others charged with or convicted of offenses related to the Capitol insurrection. (Fourteen people, mainly senior figures in the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys movements, saw their sentences commuted but did not receive pardons.)

Of the 1,500 or so offenders who received pardons, roughly 600 had been charged with assaulting or obstructing police officers, and 170 had been accused of using deadly weapons in the siege. Among those pardoned were Peter Schwartz, who had received a 14-year sentence for throwing a chair at police officers and repeatedly attacking them with pepper spray; Daniel Joseph Rodriguez, who was sentenced to 12.5 years for conspiracy and assaulting an officer with a stun gun (he sent a text message to a friend, “Tazzzzed the fuck out of the blue”); and Andrew Taake, who received a six-year sentence for attacking officers with bear spray and a metal whip.

A day after the pardons were announced, Trump said in a press conference, “I am a friend of police, more than any president who’s been in office.” He went on to describe the rioters. “These were people that actually love our country, so we thought a pardon would be appropriate.”

Trump had something else to say during that first press conference of his new term: “I think we’re going to do things that people will be shocked at.” This would turn out to be true, but unfortunately, shock does not last. Here is the emblematic inner struggle of our age: to preserve the ability to be shocked. “Man grows used to everything, the scoundrel!” Dostoyevsky wrote. A blessing that is also a curse.

I understand that a review—even a short and partial review—of the past year might seem dismally repetitive. But, repetition ensures that we remember, and perhaps even experience shock anew.

So, in brief: Trump dismantled America’s foreign-aid infrastructure and gutted a program, built by an earlier Republican president, that saved the lives of Africans infected with HIV; he has encouraged the United States military to commit war crimes; he has instituted radical cuts to U.S. science and medical funding and abetted a crusade against vaccines; he has appointed conspiracists, alcoholics, and idiots to key positions in his administration; he has destroyed the independence of the Justice Department; he has waged pitiless war on prosecutors, FBI agents, and others who previously investigated him, his family, and his friends; he has cast near-fatal doubt on America’s willingness to fulfill its treaty obligations to its democratic allies; he has applauded Vladimir Putin for his barbarism and castigated Ukraine for its unwillingness to commit suicide; he has led racist attacks on various groups of immigrants; he has employed unusually cruel tactics in pursuit of undocumented immigrants, most of whom have committed only one crime—illegally seeking refuge in a country that they believed represented the dream of a better life. Those are some of the actions Trump has taken. Here are a few of the things he has said since returning to office: He has referred to immigrants as “garbage”; he has called a female reporter “piggy” and other reporters “ugly,” “stupid,” “terrible,” and “nasty”; he has suggested that the murder of a Saudi journalist by his country’s government was justified; he has labeled a sitting governor “seriously retarded”; he has blamed the murder of Rob Reiner on the director’s anti-Trump politics; he has called the Democrats

Yet, even when weighed against this stunning record of degeneracy, the pardoning by Trump of his cop-beating foot soldiers represents the lowest moment of this presidency so far, because it was an act not only of naked despotism but also of outlandish hypocrisy. 

By pardoning these convicted criminals, he exposed a foundational lie of MAGA ideology: that it stands with the police and as a guarantor of law and order. The truth is exactly the opposite.

The power to pardon is a vestige of America’s pre-independence past. It is an unchecked monarchical power, an awesome power, and therefore it should be bestowed only on leaders blessed with self-restraint, civic-mindedness, and, most important, basic decency.

We have been watching indecency triumph in the public sphere on and off for more than 10 years now, since the moment Trump insulted John McCain’s war record. For reasons that are quite possibly too unbearable to contemplate, a large group of American voters was not repulsed by such slander—they were actually aroused by it—and our politics have not been the same. Much has been said, including by me, about Trump’s narcissism, his autocratic inclinations, his disconnection from reality, but not nearly enough has been said about his fundamental indecency, the characteristic that undergirds everything he says and does.

In an important essay, Andrew Sullivan noted this past fall that Trump’s indecency is comprehensive in style and substance. “It is one thing to be a realist in foreign policy, to accept the morally ambiguous in an immoral world; it is simply indecent to treat a country, Ukraine, invaded by another, Russia, as the actual aggressor and force it to accept a settlement on the invader’s terms,” Sullivan wrote. 

“It is one thing to find and arrest illegal immigrants; it is indecent to mock and ridicule them, and send them with no due process to a foreign gulag where torture is routine. It is one thing to enforce immigration laws; it is another to use masked, anonymous men to do it. It is one thing to cut foreign aid; it is simply indecent to do so abruptly and irrationally so that tens of thousands of children will needlessly die. We have slowly adjusted to this entirely new culture from the top, perhaps in the hope that it will somehow be sated soon—but then new indecencies happen.”

The subject of Trump’s indecency came up in a conversation I had with Barack Obama in 2017. I asked him to name the most norm-defying act of his successor to date. Somewhat to my surprise, Obama mentioned Trump’s speech at the Boy Scouts’ National Jamboree earlier that year. This appearance has been largely forgotten, but it was a festival of indecency. 

At one point, Trump told the scouts about a wealthy friend of his who, he suggested, did unmentionable things on his yacht.

Obama, a model of dignified presidential behavior (just like nearly all of his predecessors, Democratic and Republican), understood viscerally the importance of self-restraint and adherence to long-established norms. Which is why he was so troubled by Trump’s decadent performance. “You can stand in front of tens of thousands of teenage boys and encourage them to be good citizens and be helpful to their mothers,” Obama said, “or you can go Lord of the Flies. He went Lord of the Flies.”

We are in a long Lord of the Flies moment, led by a man who, to borrow from Psalm 10, possesses a mouth “full of cursing and deceit and fraud.” For many people—government scientists seeking cures for diseases; FBI agents investigating corruption and terrorism; military leaders trying to preserve respect for the rules of warfare; and, in particular, police officers who were brutalized by Trump’s army of deluded followers—these days can seem infernal. Trump’s term is one-quarter over; a piece of advice often attributed to Churchill has it best: When you’re going through hell, keep going.

Donald Trump forced to sign a memorandum of surrender with Iran because Iranians will forever control the Strait of Hormuz

New York Times analysis by Neil MacFarquhar

What Changed After Almost Four Months of War❓ Analysts Say Not Much.

A painting of Iran’s first two supreme leaders in Tehran, this month. The second, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed at the start of the U.S.-Israeli campaign against Iran this year. Credit...Arash Khamooshi/Polaris for The New York Times

Neither the war nor the agreement terminated the main threats emanating from Iran, many analysts said.

In igniting a war against Iran  on February 28, 2016, Donald Trump billed the U.S. campaign as an unprecedented step toward transforming the Middle East and terminating the threat from what he called a “wicked, radical dictatorship.”

Roughly 100 days later, as the United States and Iran have reached a somewhat vague memorandum of understanding (MOU) - a.k.a. "surrender", to end the war, skeptics are expressing bafflement over what exactly was transformed.

Neither the war nor the agreement ended what U.S. and Israeli officials regard as the main threats emanating from Iran. 

Although Iran's nuclear program was apparently heavily damaged, it was not eliminated — its fate punted 🏈🦶 to future negotiation.
Moreover, the same goes for Iran's ballistic missiles, which the deal does not address. Iran’s authoritarian regime endured, albeit with new leaders. Its proxies remain a threat to the region. Israel and Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militia in Lebanon, persisted in attacking each other.

By Saturday, even the most significant immediate result of the deal — Iran’s reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, which Trump had identified as essential — seemed at risk. 

Iran’s military said it was closing the waterway again, because the United States had failed to stop the fighting in Lebanon. The U.S. military contested that, saying the strait remained open as the agreement stipulated.

“This is not a document the United States agreed to because the war demonstrated a new U.S. military superiority,” said Caitlin Talmadge, a professor at M.I.T. who specializes in Persian Gulf security issues. “I think it’s a document that has resulted from the fact that the United States bit off more than it could chew and doesn’t want to escalate.”

That’s a worthy goal, she said. “But it really raises the question of what was achieved here, especially in comparison to the original Iran nuclear deal, negotiated by President Barack Obama.”

For its part, the Islamic Republic is set to receive potentially substantial financial rewards. (HELLO? Like 💲300 billion❗) That is one substantive change, although certainly not one in the United States’ favor. (Ugh....ya'think❓😕😒)

For Tehran, weathering the blistering assaults from the United States and Israel, and demonstrating the ability to retaliate and inflict damage, constituted a victory for them. 

Indeed, aside from the Trump administration, the people crowing most about what transpired were core members of Iran’s regime.

Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the speaker of Iran’s parliament and a lead negotiator, hailed a revelation that Iran had taken from the war: that it could exert leverage by controlling the Strait of Hormuz, the crucial transit point for one-fifth of the world’s oil supply.

“This was a potential capacity that had never been activated,” Mr. Ghalibaf said in an interview Wednesday with IRIB, the Iran state broadcaster. “But our enemies — God created them fools 🃏 🤡— turned that potential into reality.”

Although the memorandum allows for free passage of ships for two months, Tehran has threatened to implement transit fees for services, a system that did not exist before the war.

The heart of the memorandum is that Iran will abandon hostility toward the United States and its regional allies, a pillar of the revolution, in exchange for sweeping, if sometimes gradual, economic benefits. They include the lifting of the American naval blockade, a 💲300 billion❗ reconstruction fund to be created by the Gulf Arab states (as if...🙄 duh...like, believe it when we 👀see it), the release of billions of dollar💲 in frozen assets and an end to all American sanctions.

The deal’s ambition, as Vice President JD Vance portrayed it to reporters, went so far as the transformation of Iran’s hostile relations with the United States and much of the region since its 1979, revolution.

“People say the Iranians will never change their behavior. Well, maybe that’s true and if so, they don’t get any of the benefits of the bargain,” said Vance. “But, isn’t it worth trying❓”

Experts on the region are skeptical. Middle Eastern wars tend to breed more radicalization, not less, said Karim Haggag, director of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. “The reality is that the region in the aftermath of this conflict will be much more insecure,” he said.

Here is a look at how the memorandum left various countries:

The United States

Vance said the agreement maintained U.S. leverage over Iran and that it could turn financial rewards on and off like a spigot. Many experts were doubtful.

It’s true that Trump broke the American taboo against invading Iran, but in doing so analysts said that he squandered the most powerful tool that Washington had maintained since the Islamic Revolution: the threat of force. The United States used it, and didn’t achieve its goals — a lesson Iran is sure to internalize, analysts said.

In the initial, 12-day war last June, for example, the U.S. military managed to cast a shadow over the long-term viability of Iran’s nuclear program by dispatching long-range bombers to bury nuclear facilities under a mountain of rubble, said Ms. Talmadge of M.I.T.

The more recent war had the opposite effect, she added, since Trump backed off further escalation. “I think the U.S. in some ways undermined the leverage that it had,” Ms. Talmadge said.

At the same time, Iranian attacks on U.S. military bases in the region caused extensive damage, undermining another facet of American leverage, she said, by puncturing the sense that they were inviolable.

And the memorandum has a further stipulation: that unspecified American forces should withdraw from the “proximity” of Iran within 30 days.

“When did we ever negotiate with the Iranians about our force deployments going forward❓” asked Robert S. Ford, a former American ambassador in the region.

Iran

The war wrought widespread devastation, with a reported death toll of 1,700 civilians. Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed along with dozens of senior military commanders, and its air defenses proved porous. Reconstructing military and industrial infrastructure will cost hundreds of billions of dollars. Inflation is skyrocketing, and high unemployment could fuel public unrest.

But, the government’s tenacity served to “reinvigorate Iran’s perception of its own security,” said Afshon Ostovar, author of “Wars of Ambition: The United States, Iran, and the Struggle for the Middle East.”

The idea that it will trade its hostility toward the United States and its allies for improved prosperity is a gamble, since it had almost always chosen confrontation previously, analysts said.

Israel

Israel entered the war convinced that it would defang Iran for at least a generation.

Instead, Isreal found itself sidelined by its ally, the United States, in an agreement that ignored its goals, and worse, limited its freedom to attack in Lebanon. Trump has also repeatedly disparaged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, revealing rare disunity in American-Israeli relations at a fraught moment, with Israeli elections approaching.

From an Israeli standpoint, the memorandum is a catastrophe. “It is a collapse of all the strategy that we had regarding Iran,” said Danny Citrinowicz, a retired Israeli intelligence officer who specializes in Iran.

Lebanon

Lebanon is considered by analysts to be the soft underbelly of the memorandum. Hezbollah*alienated many of its mostly Shiite Muslim supporters by dragging the country into two devastating wars — one in support of Hamas in Gaza and the other when Israel attacked Iran. The violence has left thousands of people dead, including almost 4,000 civilians this year, according to the health ministry.

Lack of financial support from Iran for reconstruction augmented public anger. But Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps is working assiduously to restore Hezbollah’s military capacity,💥😔😟 analysts said, and some of the money💰 promised to Tehran for reconstruction could flow to the militia. That gives Hezbollah incentive to respect the agreement.

Both Trump and Vance acknowledged that some violence in Lebanon is likely to continue, but it is not clear how much it would take to trigger a strong American intervention.

The Gulf

The six Arab Gulf states hoped in vain to remain bystanders in the longstanding duel between Israel and Iran. Instead, Iran’s closure of the strait and attacks on their oil infrastructure brought economic turmoil.

Although American interceptors prevented the worst damage, the war has forced Gulf states to rethink their dependence on the United States for security.

Now, there is talk of a “golden bridge” to Iran: mutual investments that were impossible under sanctions. “We can benefit from one another, intertwine interests, to make the cost of returning to war higher,” said Bader Al-Saif, a historian at Kuwait University. “If I have an Iranian plant in Kuwait City, they’re going to think twice before hitting us, right❓”

Overall, though, the memorandum itself was widely seen as encompassing minimal concrete change.

“I’m skeptical that much progress will be made on the nuclear issue now that the U.S. has removed the main leverage that it has,” said Paul Salem, a Middle East analyst, speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “So in a way, this deal is a bit of a nothing burger at the end of this very long and devastating war.”

Shirin Hakim contributed reporting.

Neil MacFarquhar has been a New York Times reporter since 1995, writing about a range of topics from war to politics to the arts, both internationally and in the United States.

Maine Writer post script opinion about Hezbollah- this home grown terrorist organization will never go away and Israel is the organization's perennial enemy. Hezbollah is a Lebanese Shia Islamist political party with an active paramilitary wing. It has been banned by the Lebanese government since March 2026, amid Israel's war on Lebanon. Nevertheless, Iran continues to support the group's ongoing military campaign against Israel. Hezbollah fights Israel primarily to advance its foundational ideology to destroy the Israeli state.

Donald Trump surrendered to Iran because he had no other choice after his personal illegal war failed

Trump's war with Iran will end with a surrender:

New York Times echo report by Nicholas Kristof

Trump declared in March (2026) that a deal to end his war with Iran would require “unconditional surrender,” but that wasn’t quite right. The preliminary agreement he just reached with the Iranian regime was more like a conditional surrender — by the United States. Yes, Trump surrendered but the Iranian world war he started has not opened the Strait of Hormuz.

In the past few days, various Republicans and war hawks have emerged, seemingly bewildered, to criticize the deal. “Trump has surrendered to Iran,” wrote Erick Erickson, a conservative commentator. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas warned, “Giving billions of dollars to theocratic lunatics who want to murder us is not a good idea.”

The criticisms are correct: Trump's Iran deal is a major setback. It gives immediate relief to Iran, including the prompt unfreezing of billions of dollars of Iranian assets and later a 💲300 ❗ billion fund to help rebuild Iran. And it appears to open the door to Iran gaining at least partial control over the Strait of Hormuz, with the ability, 60 days hence, to charge fees of ships transiting the strait.

“This is the worst foreign policy blunder in decades,” 😠😞lamented Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana.

Nevertheless, these denunciations miss the most important point. Trump’s fundamental mistake was not ending the war but getting into it in the first place.

At this stage, Trump may have been right to retreat and surrender by signing the useless memo, because, otherwise, he had no good options and continuing his war will surely cost more peoples' lives.

In fact, Trump's failed war of choice with Iran has already shattered the global economy and severely diminished the Republicans’ chances for election wins in the 2026, midterms.

The unpalatable truth is that Iran has won the Trump war, and that’s why it won in the negotiation. Trump dawdled as long as he could, because he realized any deal he could hope to reach would be a humiliation — but the failure of the war had left him with no good exit.

The lesson to be learned from this debacle is to avoid starting needless wars, to temper our hubris that everything will work out perfectly and to rely far more on diplomacy to solve global problems.

In this case, the hawks who were most determined to destroy Iran have done the most to strengthen it, and that should be a cautionary tale.

We had a solution — a highly imperfect one — to the Iran nuclear problem back in 2015 with President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal. Iran shipped nearly all of its enriched uranium out of the country, limited enrichment and opened itself to rigorous inspections. But Trump, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and the hawks denounced it.

Obama’s Iran deal “was so bad,” Trump said in 2018, focusing on money that was returned to Iran as part of the agreement. Last year he said that he would “have never given them back the money” as part of a deal. He added, “I would have won that negotiation.”

Well, perhaps (obviously❗) not.

After Trump tore up the Obama deal eight years ago, Iran’s leaders predictably built up their nuclear program until they created a crisis. Trump probably could have secured a good bargain in February of this year (2026), on the eve of war, but instead he rashly began dropping bombs, without any exit strategy and, apparently, without calculating how he would respond to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

This lesson about avoiding needless wars is not a new one but apparently must be learned afresh by every generation. In the “Iliad,” Achilles lamented “this insane voyage” to wage the Trojan War, “fighting other soldiers to win their wives as prizes.”

Indeed, ever since Homer wrote about the Greeks’ attempted regime change in Troy, we’ve seen that the grander the military ambition, the more wary we should be.

The new (hmmmm....or,  is the old deal made new again❓) Iran deal punts serious questions ❓ (ahhh ya' think❓) about Iran’s nuclear capabilities into a further period of negotiations. 

Also, I fear one result of this Trump war is that Iran will be more likely to pursue nuclear weapons. In fact, my guess is that the 60-day negotiating period will be extended, that Iran will slow-walk nuclear negotiations and that Trump will be reluctant to accept anything that looks like the Obama accord. Then Trump will lose interest in the same way he seems to have forgotten about Gaza. 

There will be almost no appetite in America for another Iran war, and the newly empowered Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps will weigh whether to adopt North Korea’s strategy and try to build a nuclear arsenal to seal its regional primacy.

The cost of this war is a weakened America and thousands of lost lives, mostly Iranian and Lebanese but also those of 13 American service members. Linda Bilmes, a Harvard expert on war financing, tells me that she believes the eventual total bill for this war — including repair of bases, replacement of munitions and years of benefits to injured veterans — is very likely to be $1 trillion. Instead of paying for Medicaid, college, child care or humanitarian aid, vast sums were squandered in the Persian Gulf.

Those whom we have betrayed the most are ordinary Iranians. In January, after the Iranian regime massacred thousands of its own people, Trump said, “Help is on its way.” Instead we have left Iranians to suffer under a more oppressive government — and with less hope for change. As a tribute to American indifference, the Trump administration this month reportedly deported an Iranian woman to the Central African Republic, a war-ravaged country that the State Department advises not to visit “for any reason.”

So, okay, by all means, denounce this failed Iran war surrender MOU agreement. But, the tragedy here is not Trump’s exit from his war, but the Iran war itself. It is a history lesson, that when you see a cast of overconfident hawks promising painless victory, always beware.

Donald Trump signed a piece of paper at Versailles might as well have been a surrender to Iran: Another Trump failure

Germany signed a surrender document at Versailles on June 28, 1919. This failed surrender created the baseline cause for Adolf Hitler to create his Nazi government.

Echo opinion published in the Baltimore Sun:

A worthless memorandum with Iran | READER COMMENTARY

(In other words, a Trump surrender😕😓❗)

So we have this memorandum of understanding (MOU) for a deal with whichever Iranian hardliners are currently in charge over there (“The interim US-Iran deal leaves the fate of Tehran’s nuclear program still to be negotiated,” June 17). 

Basically, the deal is the Iranians will keep their development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles on the deep down low. We’ll give them some of their own money back.

If they don’t behave quietly, we’ll decapitate the current crop of hardliners and make the same deal with the next bunch that bubble up to the top. It’s all theater.

Making an actual binding deal with that suicidal, martyr-driven theocracy is like trying to sew a moonbeam to a waft of flatulence — it’s an exercise in silliness.

We waged this “war” of target practice depleting our stockpile of aged munitions. And it demonstrated mostly that Iran could and would shut down the Strait of Hormuz if annoyed sufficiently.

Obviously, the world needs to figure out a workaround for that potential inconvenience. This charade of an agreement can provide a few years cover for that necessary hard work.

From— Jon Ketzner, in Cumberland, Maryland

Donald Trump's failed war of choice against Iran and his MOU agreement is a U.S. failure.

Echo opinion by Thomas L. Friedman published in The New York Times. Trump Put His Own Selfish Interests Above All in the Failed Iran Deal

"Donald Trump pretends...."  

Surely something about this preliminary memorandum agreement between the United States and Iran must have felt familiar to America’s real-estate mogul president. After all, it reads like a real-estate bankruptcy filing — an act of financial capitulation.

It is a measure of how much Iran had Trump over a barrel, and how thoroughly it cleaned his clock, that Iran’s lead negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, told Iranian state TV after the details were announced: “The agreement is a record of U.S. failure. People will see it and judge.”

You don’t need to be a foreign policy expert to see what happened here. You need to be a domestic policy expert. Trump sold out America’s ally in the war, Israel, and the Arab Gulf states for the swing states of Pennsylvania, Georgia and Michigan. Trump knew that the food inflation and high gasoline prices triggered by this war were a prescription for a Republican wipeout in the midterms. He had to stop the war now to get prices down by November, because if the Democrats take the House and Senate, Trump will be looking at endless investigations into how he has used the presidency to enrich himself and his family — and possibly even impeachment.

So, Trump did what he always does: He abandoned all principle and all allies and put his personal interests above all other considerations.

He even prepared the terrain to set up his vice president, JD Vance, for a fall. “If it works out, I’m going to take the credit,” he said. “If it doesn’t work out, I’m blaming JD. You better be careful, JD.” People laughed — but nervously, because everyone knew it was a joke, but also not a joke. It was Trump’s inner voice speaking.

This was not a war I advocated, but once it started I was sure hoping Iran would lose. As such, I am shocked by the outcome so far — by the sheer cynicism with which Trump and Vance have gone from damning Iran, and telling its people to rise up because “help is on its way,” to praising its leaders, and how this deal has left Iran stronger and all its neighbors more vulnerable to Tehran’s whims.

I would have much more sympathy for Trump’s stress-filled handling of the wicked problem that is Iran if he had just once shown the same to President Obama or acknowledged that he couldn’t deliver now for the Iranian people as he promised. Instead, he just pretends that everything he did was perfect.
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Let us count the ways it is not perfect. 

• The deal not only puts off the question of the disposal of Iran’s near bomb-grade uranium to future negotiations — negotiations in which the Trump administration has already given up its military leverage — but also, 
• Most amazingly, it clearly leaves open the possibility that Iran will be able to charge a toll in the future to any ships that want to pass through the Strait of Hormuz.

Just read the cease-fire agreement: Upon the signing of this memorandum of understanding, “the Islamic Republic of Iran will make arrangements using its best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels with no charge for 60 days only …”

After billions of dollars 💲of bombs dropped on Iran, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner won from Tehran 60 days of toll-free passage through Hormuz. After that, oil tanker captains, bring your credit cards. Thank goodness we had these crack real-estate negotiators on the case, not wimpy diplomats.

In fact, the cease-fire deal not only is silent on any commitments by Iran to curb its development of long-range missiles and its support for proxies undermining the governments of Lebanon and Iraq, but it also makes the 60-day negotiation on Iran’s nuclear future contingent on Israel’s halting its military operations in Lebanon against Iran’s mercenary army there, Hezbollah. If Barack Obama had ever agreed to such a thing, Fox ((Fake❗) News would have interrupted its regular broadcasting to denounce it.

All of this is the result of the fact that Trump and Netanyahu never took seriously the idea that Iran would do the obvious: close the Strait of Hormuz in response to their attack. So in their attempt to stop Iran from developing a weapon of mass destruction that it was unlikely to ever use — since Israel would immediately use one on Iran — Trump and Netanyahu inspired Iran to develop a weapon of mass disruption, a chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz, which it can use anytime it feels too much pressure from the United States or Israel.

The message to America’s Gulf Arab allies — the U.A.E., Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait in particular — is that we are cutting and running, so you’d better make the best deals you can with Tehran to keep it at bay. This is the biggest geopolitical power shift in the Gulf since the start of the Iran-Iraq war. There is a new sheriff in town. Dial 1-800-Ayatollah.

In case they did not read that between the lines, Trump spelled it out in a news conference justifying why he did not try to curb Iran’s missile development: “What am I going to do❓ Am I going to let Saudi Arabia have missiles, but they can’t have them❓” he asked. “Doesn’t work that way, you know, it doesn’t work that way, and missiles aren’t the problem. Missiles, they hurt a little 😖 location, but they don’t blow up the planet.” (Wait❗wait - OMG ❗....Trump really said that❓).

If you are reading those words in Tel Aviv or Riyadh, a shiver just ran down your spine, along with the dawning awareness that Donald Trump is no longer playing with a full deck, in other words, he is incompetent and you are in danger, home alone.

For all of these reasons, it is simply impossible to listen to Trump and Vance without being reminded of Nick Carraway’s famous observation about Tom and Daisy Buchanan in “The Great Gatsby”: “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy — they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”

Indeed, shortly before Ghalibaf and his Iranian colleagues were boasting that they had imposed a “failure” on the United States, Trump was declaring the Iranian leaders to be “very rational people.” “They were nice to deal with, they were strong people, smart people,” he added. “They are not radicalized and they’re, you know, looking to help their country.” He called them “smarter” than past regime leaders.

Compare this also with how Trump (a.k.a., "bone spurs")  and Vance (a former Marine corporal, same rank Adolf Hitler held in World War One) talked to and about brave President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine — the leader of a heroic democracy that has been resisting a Russian invasion for four years: “You don’t have the cards,” Trump told him, urging Zelensky to cut a filthy deal with Vladimir Putin.

#ImpeachTrumpNow❗

That is how they talk about the leader of a people defending the frontier of freedom from its worst enemy. For Iranian leaders — part of a regime that just gunned down thousands of their own people who were seeking freedom — Trump says they are “nice.” 😠

Dual incompetent Trump and Vance “have no coherent view of U.S. interests, and they have absolutely no core commitment to democratic values of any kind,” Gautam Mukunda, the author of “Picking Presidents: How to Make the Most Consequential Decision in the World,” told me.

That’s the point. Trump loves to wrap himself in the American flag, but he is the least American president, in terms of his core values, in modern times.

You have to ask how Trump and Netanyahu could have miscalculated so badly as to think they could topple a regime that had been in power since 1979 by bombing it from the air. The same answer applies to both: It’s because they have surrounded themselves with sycophants and purged their parties of anyone who might challenge them.

“There are two ways to make sure your executive is a good leader — either by selecting people of good character or putting limits on what they can do — and America and Israel today have failed at both,” Mukunda said. “This war is the most perfect example of what happens when you disdain all forms of expertise, knowledge and principles, in favor of gut instincts.” Experts had predicted everything that went wrong in the Trump war.

But therein may lie a possible silver lining for both America and Israel: The failed Trump-Netanyahu endeavor to destroy Iran’s Islamofascist autocracy might end up saving American and Israeli democracy. Both countries are facing fateful elections — America’s midterms in November and Israel’s national election in the fall. Trump and Bibi, both sinking in the polls, were hoping that a quick win in Iran would propel each of them or their parties to victory

In fact, the whole world is worse off with a stronger Iran, but it will be triply worse off if Trump and Bibi win their elections. Because five more years of Netanyahu as prime minister would be the end of Israel as a Jewish democracy. And two more years of Trump controlling the White House, the Senate, the House and effectively the Supreme Court would pose the same danger to American democracy.

Is there any way Trump can salvage a good outcome in Iran? Yes, but it has nothing to do with the fate of its nuclear weapons. In the wake of this war, if there is a diminished threat from Israel and America, that might unlock politics in Iran as well. It might just create the space for an Iranian majority to ask: “What does this regime have to show for 47 years in power besides a multibillion-dollar waste of money to get a nuclear bomb and funding militias around the region with cash we Iranians desperately need for our own development and turning our country into a water-starved environmental disaster?”

Who knows what politics, what pressures for regime reform or regime change, would be unleashed in Tehran, if the Iranian leaders can no longer distract their people with war❓

Michelle Obama is a stunning lady and a wonderful feminine role model for all women

 'Hope is all we have': Read Michelle Obama's full speech at Obama Center grand opening (transcript published by Channel 5 in Chicago)

Mrs. Michelle (Robinson) Obama

She ticked off highlights from her husband's eight years in office, including ordering the raid that led to the killing of Osama bin Laden, “standing up for marriage equality” and “listening to science.”

Mrs. Michelle Obama spoke directly to her husband when she stepped up to the podium at the Obama Center grand opening ceremony -- then proceeded to bring him and members of the audience to tears.

And she didn't stop there.💗😇

She ticked off highlights from her husband's eight years in office, including ordering the raid that led to the killing of Osama bin Laden, “standing up for marriage equality” and “listening to science.”

President Barack Obama appeared to wipe away a tear as she praised him.

Michelle Obama also referenced the current “anxious and divisive times” and warned against being cynical or complacent as “everything feels so upside down.” She pitched the center as “a respite from all that.”

Well. My goodness. I got my tissue in hand. I don't know about all of you.❓😙💟

Wow. Hello, everyone, and what a beautiful day, right❓🌞 

Nothing like a project by my husband to bring out the sun.

Let me start by thanking Addison for that magnificent introduction, and for exemplifying the heart, excellence and determination that has blossomed right here on the South Side for a very long time.

I also want to send some love to everyone who made this day a reality. The construction workers, landscapers, designers, the architects, artists, chefs, our staff, our board members, our donors. Barack and I simply cannot thank you enough for the care and brilliance you poured into every square inch of this campus. I also want to recognize all of the elected officials and distinguished leaders from around the city, the state, the country, and, yes, the world. Thank you for being here to celebrate with us,

Especially to all of my fellow formers. To Joe and Jill, George and Laura, Bill and Hillary.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your service to our country over so many years and for your constant friendship and support of our family. We love you guys. Truly.

Oh, to our daughters, Malia and Sasha, who will always be my babies. Even though we're no longer playing hide and seek on the South Lawn with Beau or hosting sleepovers in the solarium - I see a lot of sleepover girls here -you both have grown into such brilliant and beautiful young women making your way out there in the world.

Thank you for bringing so much joy and spirit and energy to a life you had no voice in choosing. And for making us proud every step of the way. Love you babe.

Oh, so please indulge me for a moment, because I'm gonna take a little time to do something that I know my husband will not do today. And that is to fully sing his praises.

Barack, you gotta look at me.

I love that.

You told me all those years ago that you couldn't promise me the world. But you could promise me an interesting life.And of course, you outdid yourself and managed to give me both.

I know it hasn't always been easy, but there hasn't been a single second through this experience that standing by your side hasn't left me in awe.

Eight years in The Crucible and not once did you melt from the heat. Not once did you let it harden you. Instead, you used it to reveal your truest essence - your stubborn optimism and unflinching courage, your dazzling brilliance and unpretentious decency, your ferocious work ethic and absolutely unshakable moral fiber.

And to do it all as a first and the higher standard that comes with all that.

The claims that a US senator and constitutional law expert wasn't qualified for the job, the lies about your birthright, your faith, your patriotism, the outrage when you stated the biological fact that if you'd had a son that he too would be Black.

Yet you were unflappable at every turn. Always focused, always calm, always looking at the long view to how absurd it is to even imagine that you might have buckled under the pressure, even once, lashed out in frustration, lost your temper. How absurd it is to imagine that you might have done anything but make our family and this entire country proud.

No, you were too busy.

I'm not done. Y'all. Not done. So much to say.

You were doing the people's work, rescuing our economy, expanding health care, ending a war, ordering the bin laden raid, saving an auto industry, winning a peace prize. For keeping us safe from Ebola, regulating the banks, standing up for marriage equality, listening to science and comforting an entire nation in the face of unspeakable tragedies. And you did it all with such grace and class and cool that you made the hardest job in the world look like a walk in this beautiful park.

Your mother, Toot, Gramps - you are a tribute to their love. They are up there grinning and hugging today because you never forgot who you are and where you came from.

Single mother working hard to get by and get an education and show her son the world. Grandparents who didn't have much but they had the perfect recipe to nurture your flame.

You never forgot the folks in the union halls and church basements here in Chicago, where you first put your ideals to the test. You never forgot all the voters you've registered, and students who taught and neighbors you organized. You never fell for the temptation of a quick fix or an easy payday.

You never changed from that idealistic summer associate who showed up on that rainy day when we first met without an umbrella.

You always gave us the very best within you, and in doing so, you reminded the rest of us that we could, too.

Barack, there are no words to express how proud I am of the way you showed up and continue to show up every single day. It has been an honor to be by your side.

You have made me a better person and have given us all an example that we should strive to emulate. And I hope you know, oh, there is truly no higher calling than that. All right.

To all of you joining us today, our invited guests and everyone listening and watching from afar.

The Obama Presidential Center was created as a beacon of hope, a monument to our unshakable values. The ones my husband has exemplified his entire life: equality, empathy, honesty, inclusion, fairness. Especially during these anxious and divisive times, it is so important that we remember that those values are not unique to my husband.

They are the same ones that your husbands and wives, your parents and children, your friends and neighbors exhibit and pass on every single day. Millions of people in this country wake up doing their very best to live decent and purposeful lives.

Yet we're all tested in one way or another, and there are plenty of times we all fall short.

But deep down in our hearts and souls, we all know right from wrong. We know selflessness from greed, righteousness from injustice. We understand that we all rise and fall together, that every last one of us is an invaluable contributor to the greatness of America. And I'm talking about the workers living paycheck to paycheck, hoping to give their kids a better future. The teachers using their own money to take their students on field trips. The business owners struggling to meet payroll but refusing to close their doors. All those folks sweating over stoves to provide meals for their communities. Folks shivering in the freezing cold to deliver our packages. Picking up trash to keep our parks clean. Volunteers dedicating their weekends to coaching T-ball or directing the church choir, or mentoring a child.

That's where the truth of this country lies. Not in grabbing as much as we can get for ourselves, or knocking folks down to prop ourselves up, but in the overwhelming goodness, the relentless striving, the quiet dignity that is inside all of us, our greatest hope is that this center can reflect back just a fraction of that light, that it can capture the beauty of who we all are, no matter what we look like or where we come from, or how much money we earn, or how we pray or vote or speak or love.

It's why during our administration, we threw open the White House doors to all sorts of folks who don't usually get to meet the President or First Lady.

The families pinch and pennies to send their first child to college. The teenagers, who know that a hot afternoon means the bullets start flying. The military spouses and children serving and sacrificing just like their loved ones in uniform. The native kid showing us that resilience and pride can never be stolen. The foragers and FFA members with calluses on their hands from feeding livestock. The immigrants proving what it truly means to be a dreamer.

These folks, these folks aren't Americans too. They are America. They are the beating heart of this country. They are us and we are them.

And to ignore the simple truth, to refuse to respect the contributions and experiences of people who aren't exactly like us, y'all puts us all at risk.

Failing to see the humanity in all people puts us all on a slippery slope. And once that slide starts, there's no telling where it stops. A dangerous precedent that flies in the very face of our faith. And of the founding promise of this democracy that all of us, all of us are created equal, that each of us is a child of God with inherent value.

And no one, and I mean no one, has the right to sit in judgment of who's American enough.

And that's why, folks, we simply don't have the luxury or time to be cynical or complacent, to wring our hands in despair, to wait for someone else to fix the problem.

Y'all, hope is all we have.

Because hope is the essential spark that lights the fire of change. But hope is a choice. Whether or not we use our voices to speak up is a choice. Voting is a choice. Being a decent human being is a choice. Believing that we still hold the power to build a country that reflects us all is a choice.

The Obama Presidential Center is a living testament to the power of choice, y'all. The historic example that millions of you gave the world about what this imperfect democracy has strived for and achieved. And an urgent call to go out there and do it again.

So I hope that when you walk through this campus and bring your children here, you are reminded of the power of choice and the steady work of change. The arduous, unglamorous march march up that mountain one foot after another, day after day, generation after generation, but I also hope you fully absorb the elation of achieving something together.

You know that feeling when you clear the tree line and see a vista that takes your breath away? A feeling that can never be erased? And I know that can be hard to grasp right now when everything feels so upside down. When fact and fiction run together. When folks seek to stifle speech, limit access to education, devalue diversity, erase the inconvenient parts of our history. When our phones constantly buzz with the latest outrage.

So I hope that this place can offer a respite from all that, at least for a little while.

I hope it can reignite the optimism and empathy and ambition that has always powered this country's greatest change.

So we want you to come here and put away your phones and talk and laugh and cry, because you gonna cry and make new friends.

Get your hands dirty in my garden. Push your baby on a swing in the playground. Have a romantic picnic on the great lawn.

Because that's the work of democracy. To being neighborly, taking care of public spaces, having some fun, enjoying each other, shaking out of the isolation and division that have crept too deeply into our lives.

And to my fellow South Siders.

I want you all to make this campus a part of your lives, be inspired by the world class art, check out the books from our beautiful public library and bring them back on time, drop some beats in the recording studio, hit some corner threes at home court, hold birthday parties, jump start clothing drives, host citywide clean up dates. Here. Use this campus to show off this place we call home.

This joyful place where Marian and Fraser Robinson taught their two kids to dream big.

This hopeful place where an unknown guy with an unknown name took flight. This stubbornly optimistic place where family after family scrapes and claws and laughs and dances their way to a better tomorrow.

That's what this has always been about.

Barack and I have always said that this center is grounded in our stories, but it has never been about us. It's never been for us. And it's going to be here long after we're gone.

So what it becomes and how it's preserved, that work has to be done by all of us. Just like our democracy.

And thankfully, you have shown the world what we are capable of. You've proven that a lasting legacy isn't an award or a name on a building or number of zeros in a bank account, but the difference we make in one another's lives.

It's about seeing each other and showing up for each other and carrying each other. When we're weary or faltering or losing faith.

That's how you build something that endures. And that's what you all have done at every twist and turn of this extraordinary journey. You have protected and proclaimed the hope that beats within the heart of this campus. You've rekindled and renewed this untamable, unpredictable and unbreakable democracy.

And I know that you all are going to astonish us even more in the months and years ahead, because you all have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt, that when we truly see each other, when we strive to bring out the best in ourselves and one another, oh, there is no limit to how high we can go.

Thank you all. I love you all. God bless you and God bless this country we love.