Welcome to the cruelest day: Tuesday, June 2, 2026 and National I Love My Dentist Day. Although I don’t love my dentist, he is honest, cautious, won’t do work that’s not needed, friendly, and loves to travel. He’s a pro, and is the official dentist of the Chicago Blackhawks hockey team. They have a clinic in the arena, and he has to attend every home game to repair any teeth that get broken, which is not infrequent. I asked him what could be done to prevent the frequent loss of teeth in hockey players, and he said it was easy: just make players wear plastic shields in front of their faces like the goalie does. I asked him why they don’t, and he responded that it was sort of a macho thing. Oy vey!
It’s also National Rocky Road Ice Cream Day, and National Rotisserie Chicken Day. The best deal for the latter is Costco, where the chickens are hot, bit (about four pounds), cheap ($4.99 for years), and fresh (they’re taken off the spit and used for other dishes if they’re not sold within two hours). I always get one when I go to Costco. They are loss leaders: the store loses money on every chicken sold. I can make at least four meals out of one.
Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the June 2 Wikipedia page.
Da Nooz:
*New strikes are being made by both Iran and the U.S. in the ongoing war. From the NYT (article archived here):
Iran launched two ballistic missiles targeting American forces based in Kuwait early Monday local time, the U.S. military said, further rattling the already shaky cease-fire in the Middle East.
Both missiles were intercepted and no American personnel were harmed, the U.S. military’s Central Command, which oversees the Middle East, said in a statement on social media. The episode followed days of low-level skirmishes between Iran and the United States that have raised fears of escalation, and have strained negotiations to end the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran that began in late February.
The U.S. military said late Sunday that it had attacked radar and command sites in southern Iran over the weekend, in retaliation for Iran shooting down an American drone over international waters. Less than an hour later, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on state media that its forces had targeted a military base from which a U.S. attack on a communications facility had originated.
While President Trump has claimed that the United States has obliterated Iran’s military capabilities, U.S. intelligence assessments suggest that Iran still has significant stockpiles of missiles and overall military power.
Talks to lift Iran’s effective blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway for oil and gas shipments, and end the war have advanced in fits and bursts. Last week, officials familiar with the negotiations said that U.S. and Iranian negotiators had agreed on a document that had been sent to the two countries’ leaders for approval.
It is unclear whether Mojtaba Khamenei, the Iranian supreme leader believed to be in hiding, responded to the proposal. But Mr. Trump has pushed to toughen the terms of the deal, sending a revised document to Iran, according to three officials who spoke anonymously because they could not discuss the matter publicly.
Drones are one thing, missiles another—and more serious. I suspect that Mojtaba Khamenei is dead (or in a coma) as he’s not made any videos or statements since he was injured. That means we’re dealing with IRGC hard-liners. I represent myself, not American as a whole, so though America is pushing Trump to end the war, I want him to do so in terms that let Iran know that it’s definitely lost, that they open the Strait of Hormuz without tolls or oversight, that they will enrich no uranium above levels needed for peaceful purposes, and that the U.S. bombs Kharg Island if Iran keeps trying to win.
Oh, and the fighting continues in Lebanon, though Netanyahu appears to have backed off his threat to strike Hezbollah in Beirut. This comes after Trump told Israel to back off and the UN security Council asked Israel to withdraw from southern Beirut.
*Over at the Free Press, Mitchell Robson tells us “What the spelling bee taught me about excellence.” (He participated in the Bee, and says it “may be the purest meritocracy America has left.”
This year’s competition, which featured nine finalists, was hosted by ESPN’s Mina Kimes, fresh off her recent Celebrity Jeopardy! victory. The winner of the night was California eighth-grader Shrey Parikh, who aced 18 rounds of regular spelling before shocking the crowd in the last lightning round by correctly spelling 32 words—including chikungunya and bromocriptine—in 90 seconds.
The lightning round, as well as Kimes’ role as host, are new additions to the spelling bee this year, made in an effort to boost viewership after years of declining audience numbers. It’s unclear if it worked—viewership last year was less than half of its 2012 peak of 1 million, and this year’s numbers haven’t been published—but those who did watch Parikh storm through the final round would find it hard to disagree with sports writer Rodger Sherman, who called it the “new greatest athletic accomplishment of 2026.” (Even if Bee purists, myself included, are critical of the newfangled lightning round.)
. . .Anyone who reaches the upper levels of competitive spelling knows that brute-force memorization of words is necessary, but nowhere near sufficient for success. Elite spellers must develop an understanding of roots, linguistics, and spelling conventions across dozens of languages of origin. Often, those patterns become the only lifeline available when confronting an unfamiliar word.
And that skill is just as vital—if not more so—in daily life as it has ever been.
. . .During this year’s finals, audience members gasped when Shrey correctly spelled the Welsh-derived word hwyl, pronounced “HOO-il.” But the spelling follows a recognizable linguistic pattern: In Welsh-derived words, the oo sound is frequently represented by the letter w. Once one knows that convention, hwyl becomes far less mysterious.
Why does any of this matter? In particular, why does it matter for someone like me, who later majored in physics and quantum engineering?
First, knowing the building blocks of language is relevant to every single field. In my college physics lectures, for example, the word bremsstrahlung might have sounded to others like an errant sneeze; I immediately recognized it as a type of radiation. That said, nowadays, medical or scientific terminology—along with words in virtually any knowledge sphere—can be defined or translated with a quick online search. Does this mean there is no utility in learning them?
. . .spelling bees offer no circumvention of merit. There are no referees making subjective judgment calls. No participation trophies. No second chances or mulligans. And no AI assistance. There are no points for almost getting a word right. There is only the contestant, the word, and his knowledge of the dictionary.
In other words, the Scripps National Spelling Bee may be one of the purest meritocracies American society has left.
The unforgiving structure of the Bee may sound harsh, but I have come to appreciate it deeply, gaining something much more enduring than a repository of obscure vocabulary and spelling skills. The Bee rewards preparation, composure, resilience, and intellectual curiosity in perhaps their most distilled forms. Because I maintain close friendships with some fellow competitors, I can speak for many of them by saying that these skills have proven endlessly valuable throughout the rest of our lives: in high school, college classes, and our now fledgling careers. Shrey Parikh, and the students who competed alongside him, will soon learn the same.
As the world tackles the academic, workforce, and societal changes brought on by artificial intelligence—as well as the generalized suppression of meritocracy—it is all the more critical to cling to arenas in which work ethic and curiosity remain foundational. The Scripps National Spelling Bee is one of those arenas. It teaches that meaningful achievement is forged not in moments of public recognition, but in long, mundane hours spent in silence and without applause, pursuing knowledge, rigor, and excellence.
I have mentioned this before, but if you look at this year’s contestants, or a list of past winners, you’ll see that since 2000 it’s been dominated by East Asians and East Asian Americans. I strongly suspect this reflects a cultural emphasis on diligence and study and not any genetic propensity for accurate spelling.
*Although Trump’s doctors pronounced him in “excellent health” after a recent physical, the WSJ reports that there are some mysterious gaps in the medical report., particularly about cardiovascular issues:
The White House memorandum describing President Trump’s recent physical examination lacks details of the results of tests to assess his cardiovascular health, according to physicians who read the report.
That is one of several areas of the report that doctors said stood out for its lack of specificity. Trump spent about three hours at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Tuesday, where he underwent a battery of tests as part of his annual medical examination.
The president’s physician, Navy Capt. Sean Barbabella, wrote in a memorandum released late Friday that Trump “remains in excellent health, demonstrating strong cardiac, pulmonary, neurological and overall physical function.”
Barbabella’s description of Trump’s cardiac health cites results from a coronary CT angiography, typically done to check for narrowed or blocked arteries in the heart; an echocardiogram, which makes an image of the heart using sound waves; and an artificial-intelligence-enhanced electrocardiogram analysis. He said the AI analysis estimated the president’s cardiac age at 14 years younger than his actual age of 79.
Yet the White House memo didn’t include crucial information typically yielded from such tests that would provide evidence for Barbabella’s finding that Trump’s cardiac function is normal. Barbabella also said an ultrasound of the carotid arteries showed normal results without providing specific metrics.
“If I was creating a report to send to another physician, I would have mentioned a little bit more about the carotid ultrasound,” said Dr. William Shutze, a Texas vascular surgeon. “What amount of plaque there is going to be—because almost all of us are going to have some buildup there.”
To fully assess the president’s cardiac health, other doctors said they would want to see a calcium score, a description of any plaque in the arteries, and a CAD-RADS score to assess narrowing in the arteries. The report simply stated there is “no arterial obstruction or structural abnormalities” in the heart or major blood vessels, which could simply mean there isn’t a blockage, physicians said.
Additional detail from the echocardiogram, such as the ejection fraction—the percentage of blood pumped with each heart contraction—would also provide a fuller picture of the president’s health. Trump’s 2018 report did include a measurement of his ejection fraction.
. . .The report lacked detail in other key areas where Trump is known to have had health problems. He went to Walter Reed three times last year, including a trip to address the swelling of his lower legs, which his doctor diagnosed as chronic venous insufficiency. It is a common condition in older patients where one-way valves inside the veins don’t work properly.
Trump’s most recent report describes that he has “slight lower leg swelling” and notes “improvement from last year” when the chronic venous insufficiency was diagnosed. The report gives no reason for the improvement. Trump told The Wall Street Journal several months ago that he balked at wearing compression stockings—a typical treatment. Doctors said it is unusual for the condition to improve without treatment.
Lordy, isn’t that enough information? Does the public deserve a complete account of his health? Is nothing private? The WSJ also quotes a doctor saying that his cholesterol numbers were good–too good!: “The report said Trump takes rosuvastatin and ezetimibe for cholesterol control. ‘He’s got like the best cholesterol numbers you’ll see,’ said Dr. Daniel Torrent, a Georgia vascular surgeon, who added that it is unusual for medication to achieve such favorable numbers. ‘We don’t usually manage people to the point where they’re that good’.” Doesn’t that imply that the doctor is releasing false information? In my view, what has been reported is sufficient to show that the man has no major medical problems or signs of dementia.
*The Jerusalem Post reports that a shareholder of the New York Times has demanded a “reckoning”:
A shareholder of The New York Times is demanding a full inspection of The New York Times’ Board and Audit Committee records, giving the outlet five days to respond or face court.
The National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR), a beneficial shareholder of the NYT Company, is requesting an inspection of certain books and records following the controversial May 11, 2026, Nicholas Kristof column, titled “The silence that meets the rape of Palestinians.”
The Kristof article claimed to report widespread sexual violence by Israeli prison guards against Palestinian prisoners, including the allegation that Israeli prison guards trained dogs to commit rape. Following publication, the Israeli government announced its intention to pursue a defamation lawsuit against The New York Times and Kristof.
The purpose of the demand is also to determine whether these programs were followed or bypassed with respect to the Kristof article. For example, following the publication, former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert, who was named as an on-the-record source, said that his statements were misrepresented. “When a columnist’s own quoted source publicly accuses the columnist of misrepresentation after publication, that is not a detail the company can wave away by noting the editors found no errors,” NJAC said.
It is worth noting that NJAC is not seeking reporter notes, unpublished drafts, confidential source identities, or attorney work. It is also not asking the NYT to justify its viewpoint (this is protected by the First Amendment). It is instead seeking to investigate possible corporate mismanagement, inadequate oversight, and incomplete public discourse. “The NYT said their biggest asset is trust. You can’t tell shareholders [that] credibility is your core asset and then hide records about your processes. We are just asking the board whether it did its job,” Mark Goldfeder, CEO of NJAC, told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday. In its most recent annual Form 10-K filing for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2025, submitted to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), The New York Times Company said, “Our brand and reputation are key assets; negative perceptions or publicity could adversely affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations.”
Note that this is not a request for the paper or Kristof to provide corrections, but to see if the paper is doing its fiduciary duty to shareholders, which is why a shareholder has standing to make such a demand. I’m curious to see what the NYT will do about this given that it’s stood firm on Kristof’s investigation that produced his controversial column. This will come to nothing as any shareholder could demand the same thing about any story they don’t like.
*Here’s a video from FB showing the nine times that Palestinians were offered a state, and refused. As anybody with two neurons to rub together knows, the Palestinians want only their own state and no Jewish state—i.e., the exterrmination of Israel.
And a chart put on FB by Andrzej. Both of these are presented without comment:
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili’s having a chinwag with the gardener:
Andrzej: What are you guys talking about?
Hili: About mowing the lawn, gnats, and music.
In Polish:
Ja: O czym rozmawiacie?
Hili: O koszeniu trawy, meszkach i muzyce.
*******************
Another gem of medieval letter interpretation from TherionArms:
From Funny and Strange Signs (probably not a real photo):
Some reader whose name I’ve forgotten has put my face into Edvard Munch’s “The Scream“:
Reposted by Masih. First, the translation from Farsi:
#Masoud Piahoh, a citizen who had posted this video as a story from the peaceful protest of a Deymah protester in front of Aladdin Passage and face-to-face with the special unit, has been sentenced to 10 years in prison.
#مسعود_پیاهو، شهروندی که این ویدیو را از اعتراض مسالمتآمیز یک معترض دی ماه جلوی پاساژ علاالدین و رو در روی یگان ویژه، استوری کرده بود، به ۱۰ سال حبس محکوم شده pic.twitter.com/g9gv1a2zLD
— Maryam Moqaddam مریم مقدم (@MaryamMoqaddam) May 31, 2026
From Luana; you can read more about this here. The name is Sam BRINTON, and according to Wikipedia Sam was “the deputy assistant secretary of Spent Fuel and Waste Disposition in the Office of Nuclear Energy from June to December 2022,” but dismissed from that post after luggage thefts.
Sam Britton’s luggage theft is still one of the weirdest & funniest political scandals of the last five years. I still chuckle at the thought of a Tanzanian lady recognizing her own handmade dress being worn by Sam.
Comical degrees of karma in play. Straight from an HBO sitcom pic.twitter.com/BMlk2kxCXo
— Narwitz (@SophiaNarwitz) May 30, 2026
The Number Ten Cat goes after Trump again:
The organisers are pleased to announce the following additions to the bill:
– The Crazy Frog
– The kid who mowed Trump’s lawn
– The KKK singers
– An Ed Sheeran lookalike
– Pete Hegseth playing the spoons https://t.co/vCZezk7K5d— Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) May 31, 2026
Two from my feed. First, yes, the proteins do walk (see here):
🚨: Whenever you feel sad, remember that there are tiny kinesin proteins doing their best to make you happy.pic.twitter.com/AtyXZvH3cq
— Night Sky Today (@NightSkyToday) June 1, 2026
I’m not a huge fan of d*gs, as everyone knows, but some I like, and the border collie is one of the best breeds. Look at what they can do!
One dog did this in two minutes.pic.twitter.com/KfCwLtJIcl
— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) June 1, 2026
One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:
This Dutch Jewish boy was gassed to death as soon as he arrived in Auschwitz. He was just 12 years old.
— Jerry Coyne (@evolutionistrue.bsky.social) 2026-06-02T10:19:22.237Z
And two from Dr. Cobb. He also gave the answer: “The answer in the linked tweet is from the Arxiv article – 10^8 bananas needed to power a 1000kg probe to 10% of light speed…
Fabulous. Using the antimatter in bananas (yes!) to power an interstellar craft. How many bananas would you need?
— Matthew Cobb (@matthewcobb.bsky.social) 2026-06-01T09:03:50.285Z
And LOOK AT THIS TRANSPARENT AMPHIPOD!:
This deep sea creature is as sharp & clear as broken class, & can grow as long as your hand. This giant amphipod, (Cystisoma) only has two colored body parts: the dense orange stomach/egg pouch, & two MASSIVE eyes, which are a glittering holographic orange layer completely covering its head.📽️ MBARI
— Rebecca R Helm (@rebeccarhelm.bsky.social) 2026-04-10T13:54:53.771Z
Regarding border collies:
At Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, there are large lawns along the shoreline, perfect for relaxing, and quite beautiful. For a long time, those large lawns were turned into one large toilet by the flocks of geese that competed for the lawns. (In addition, the geese were very aggressive, and did not want the humans on the lawn.) The lab tried a number of solutions (none which included harming the geese, of course), all of which failed. Then they found that one of the technicians had a couple of border collies, who he wanted to take to wrk with him so they could run around—but it was against the rules. The lab made an exception for the collies for a trial period—and the problem was solved. The dogs delighted in chasing the geese, not at all perturbed by the geese’s aggression—and never actually catching any of the geese. And so those border collies became a fixture of CSHL in those days.
When I was a teenager I had the chance to work with a neighbour’s Welsh collie on his sheep (the wily Welsh Mountain breed). Meg was very smart and a delight to work with, but she had been taught in Welsh so I had to learn some commands. Fortunately it was Welsh, not French, as I don’t doubt the dog would have pretended to not understand me if my French accent wasn’t perfect. Meg made my beagle look mentally handicapped (and to be fair, he probably was).
The six day war definitely started with an Israeli attack. In 1985 Israel invaded South Lebanon, so again, technically Israel initiated the conflict. Obviously, in both cases Israel had good reasons to do so, but it is still not accurate to say that Israel was attacked.
Note that in the Six Day War, fighting itself started with an Israeli attack, but Egypt had already committed what Israel had declared in advance was a “warlike act”:
From Grok:
And here’s Grok’s answer about Lebanon, which you sort of mischaracterize:
A good comparison of the similar precarious positions Israel found herself in leading up to the Six-day War and the Yom Kippur War can be assessed by reading Michael Oren’s “Six Days of War” and Abraham Rabinovich’s “The Yom Kippur War”. It was existential both times.
Mr. Linguist, though PCC(E) has addressed your errors herein pretty well, it is notable that Nasser’s intention to invade and annihilate Israel was not a secret at the time. The CIA station in Cairo reported a “circus atmosphere” in that city running up to the events.
There can be really little doubt that a defining characteristic of Nasser’s rule – and without argument at all – Palestinian and Shia Lebanese intentions – is the extermination of the Jewish state.
I cover some of it in an article for my column:
https://democracychronicles.org/so-what-of-gaza-trumps-plan-and-some-context/
The section “The Plan for “When We Win”” is particularly terrifying.
best,
D.A.
NYC🗽
Learning of walking proteins was one of the great highlights of a freshman college biochem course, “From Atoms to Cells”, that I audited in 2019. My only previous biology course had been in high school waaay back in 1964…when funghi were still classified as plants. Two useful books to me on visualizing the locomotion of proteins were Peter Hoffman’s “Life’s Ratchet” and David Goodsell’s “The Machinery of Life”.
PCC(E): “.. you’ll see that since 2000 it’s been dominated by East Asians and East Asian Americans. I strongly suspect this reflects a cultural emphasis on diligence and study ..”
and competitive training priorities.
I can’t personally think of any (living) entertainers that I would like to see perform as part of the 250th bash. I should have hoped, though, that performers would be able to see past Trump and be able to participate in the celebration. That is, of course, assuming that they see the survival of our country for 250 years as good thing.
I have tweeted and spoken about the “Israel vs Enemies” – (the one with flags) on the leaderboard above many times.
In interacting with the (western, often college educated) Pro-Pal crowd, online and in real life, I’ve found them to be impervious to facts in a similar way religious people don’t want to hear our atheist arguments of proof, evolution, etc. (sigh)
Border collies are great – the highest IQ dogs (Robert Sapolsky lately on his show) and I’m pleased they meet PCC(E)’s approval even as a non-dog person (not an unreasonable position)
– they’re genetically very close to Australian Shepherds, one of which is sitting on my lap now. Both breeds love to herd anything they can. 🙂
D.A.
NYC🗽
https://x.com/DavidandersonJd