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1.) Building the case against Casey — TheDC’s Alex Pappas reports on the man who seeks to unseat Bob Casey, Jr. in Pennsylvania:
‘Tom Smith didn’t go to college and has little political experience, but Republicans in Pennsylvania are counting on this “old farm boy” to give the incumbent Democratic senator from a well-known political family a run for his money in November. “You can sum my life up in one sentence,” Smith recently told The Daily Caller. “I’m just an old farm boy that got in this place in the coal mines and wound up in business and did pretty well at it and now I’m running for the United States Senate.’
But if instead of winning, Smith loses by 17 percentage points, he could mount a serious challenge for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.
2.) Lazy Congress — The Supreme Court angered some vets when it struck down the Stolen Valor Act. But their real gripe is not with the high court, but Congress, reports TheDC’s Caroline May:
‘The Supreme Court struck down the Stolen Valor Act last week, overturning the law that criminalized lying about one’s military honors and angering many military veterans. The Supreme Court is not the lone target of veteran disappointment, however — for some, Congress is the real body to blame. “I am disappointed by the decision and put the blame on Congress for passing a law with no teeth,” said retired Col. Jack Jacobs, who received the Medal of Honor in 1967 for rescuing wounded soldiers under heavy fire, while suffering from a head wound, during the Vietnam War. “They could have written a law that would make it difficult for the Supreme Court to strike down over free speech,” he added.’
3.) Getting into the mind of Benjamin Netanyahu — While the greatest country on earth celebrated its Independence Day on Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mourned the loss of his brother on the thirty-sixth anniversary of his death in one of the greatest rescue operations in military history. TheDC’s Jamie Weinstein (ME!) writes that in order to understand Bibi, you have to understand the lessons his brother taught him, in life and in death:
Today, one of Jonathan’s younger brothers, Benjamin Netanyahu, occupies for the second time the office of Israel’s Prime Minister at a time of great peril for the Jewish state. Jonathan’s life and letters, immortalized in ‘The Letters of Jonathan Netanyahu,’ resonate from the grave. They remind his brother, who too was an elite officer in the IDF, that Israel’s position in the world is precarious, that it has enemies that seek its destruction, that Israel can depend on nobody but itself, that to win a fight you often have to strike first, that continual sacrifice is necessary in order to prevent Jews from becoming wanderers again, and that while it is important to strive for peace, Israel must always be ready to fight.
Read the whole story to learn about the remarkable life of Jonathan Netanyahu.
4.) Treach Sr. defends Bain Capitalism — TheDC’s Jim Treacher gave the keys of his blog to his pops to write a defense of Bain Capital. Drawing on the experience he had working for a company taken over by a Bain-like private equity firm, the senior Treach concludes that all-in-all, the changes firms like Bain impose are necessary to save some companies, if not always pretty:
I check on my old facility 3 or 4 times a year. Many of my buddies are still gainfully employed. Head count has actually gone up in the face of this dismal Obama economy. Is there bitching and grousing? Do they yearn for the good ol’ days? You bet. But every two weeks they get a paycheck.
6.) Tweet of Yesterday – Jesse Pearson: I pray that I’ll live long enough to see America’s first cat president.
VIDEO: WWII vet describes being adrift at sea after shipwreck