Good morning! Today marks the 138th anniversary of the Battle of Little Bighorn, when veteran Indian-killer George Custer finally met his match in a bloody battle in Montana against Lakota Chiefs Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull. When gold was discovered in South Dakota’s Black Hills, the US government invaded, in violation of a treaty with the Lakota and Cheyenne. Native fighters rode to the side of the two defiant chiefs and massacred Custer’s 7th Cavalry.
Stat of the day: $2.6 trillion — the potential boost to the global economy that fighting global warming may yield, according to the World Bank.
Can tea partiers get angrier? –> We may soon find out after incumbent Mississippi Sen. Thad Cochran defeated Chris McDaniel in a runoff election last night — the culmination of a viciously contested primary campaign. McDaniel and his followers are outraged at the possibility that “liberal Democrats” helped push Cochran over the finish line, and Politico’s Anna Palmer reports that a “defiant” McDaniel isn’t conceding.
Everyone’s jumping in –> Jim Michaels reports for USA Today that the first of 300 US Special Forces operators have arrived in Iraq, as John Kerry met with Kurdish officials. ALSO: At least 57 civilians in Anbar Province were reportedly killed on Tuesday when Syrian jets attacked “markets and fuel stations in areas such as Rutba, al-Walid and Qaim,” according to CNN. AND: Michael Gordon and Eric Schmitt report for The New York Times that US officials say Iran “is flying unarmed surveillance drones over Iraq from an airfield in Baghdad and is secretly supplying Iraq with tons of military equipment, supplies and other assistance.” MEANWHILE: Matt Bradley and Ben Kesling report for The Wall Street Journal that Iraqi PM Nouri al-Maliki is refusing “to bend to international appeals to form a more broad-based government to curb the country’s swelling Sunni Muslim insurgency.”
GOP finally finds a real case of voter impersonation fraud –> Mike Ivey reports for the Madison Capital Times that a Milwaukee insurance executive has been charged in “one of the biggest cases of voter fraud ever in Wisconsin.” The man stands accused of “casting multiple votes for Republican candidates — including Gov. Scott Walker in the 2012 recall election.”
Litigious –> House Speaker John Boehner may sue to block the Obama administration’s executive orders, a move that Roll Call’s Daniel Newhauser says “could set up a significant test of constitutional checks and balances.”
You work too much –> At The New Republic, Bryce Covert writes that Americans are “working harder and for longer days” than people in other wealthy countries, and it’s not good for our health and well-being.
The fight is on –> At The Washington Post, Philip Bump writes that the “battle to be the ‘conservative’ in the Republican presidential field” for 2016 is under way — and he looks at who’s winning so far.
Lying is a sin, no? –> But that may not stop Michigan from awarding $800,000 to “a right-wing organization” that runs a network of “crisis pregnancy centers” which “lie to women” seeking abortions. Tara Culp-Ressler has the story at ThinkProgress.
We still have a soft spot for brutal military dictators –> So says Robert Scheer at Truthdig after three Al-Jazeera journalists were sentenced to draconian sentences on trumped-up charges in Egypt just a day after John Kerry met with its “now-elected dictator,” Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi.
Genius –> A burglar in St. Paul, Minnesota, is behind bars after breaking into and robbing a house, logging onto Facebook to check his feed and then forgetting to log off. “World’s dumbest criminal,” homeowner James Wood told the local CBS station. “I don’t know.”
