Among the many questions on the table is what the authors of the Epstein Files Transparency Act intend to do next. The answer is quickly coming into focus. NBC News reported:

Reps. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and Thomas Massie, R-Ky., said Sunday they are committed to holding Justice Department officials accountable for their failure to release all eligible Jeffrey Epstein files by Friday’s deadline, saying they’re speaking with members of Congress about holding Attorney General Pam Bondi in contempt.

“The quickest way, and I think most expeditious way, to get justice for these victims is to bring inherent contempt against Pam Bondi,” the Kentucky Republican said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

While there’s some recent precedent for people facing contempt of Congress charges (see Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro, for example), “inherent contempt” isn’t quite the same thing.

In theory, Khanna and Massie could try pushing a resolution to hold the attorney general in contempt of Congress, but in practice, such an effort would almost certainly end in failure: Not only would the measure need approval from the Senate, but it would also go to the Justice Department for possible prosecution. The idea that Bondi would allow her own team to prosecute her is unrealistic.....

If inherent contempt resolutions sound unfamiliar, it’s because they’re quite rare. There was some talk among GOP lawmakers last year about targeting then-Attorney General Merrick Garland with such a measure — they wanted audio recordings of Joe Biden they could use in the presidential race — but the effort fell short.

To find an example of the House actually pulling the trigger on this maneuver, one has to go back to 1934, when the Senate sergeant at arms arrested William MacCracken, the first federal aviation regulator, who refused to participate in a congressional investigation. (It’s kind of a long story.)

As for whether the GOP-led House in the coming weeks might actually pass such a resolution against Trump’s attorney general, it’s too soon to say with confidence. Four House Republicans broke ranks on the discharge petition on the Epstein Files Transparency Act, but one (Georgia’s Marjorie Taylor Greene) is set to resign in two weeks, and it’s far from clear whether any GOP members, other than Massie, will endorse such a bold move against Bondi.

Podcast host Joe Rogan blasted President Donald Trump for distorting history with his so-called Presidential Walk of Fame.

During his Tuesday podcast, Rogan and comedian Tom Segura discussed recent changes at the White House.

"And he took out the Kennedy Rose Garden, and you're like, what?" Segura noted.

"There's nothing nuttier than the plaques underneath the presidents' names," Rogan offered. "Shane and I were just reading them the other day. How is this real? How are you allowed to do that? How is he allowed to write that?"

"They're gonna leave it like that forever," he continued. "Yeah, like a museum piece. They should have, like, the Trump wing. This is what happened when he was president."

Rogan argued that the Walk of Fame should include "facts" of the presidencies and that's all.

The Soviet Union abolished itself on this day in 1991, recognizing the independence of its constituent parts. In an obituary for “the late U.S.S.R.,” The Nation’s editors wrote:

In the halcyon hours of glasnost and perestroika, a leading Sovietologist, generally high on Mikhail Gorbachev, had a dark moment of doubt. What if it all didn’t work—the economic reforms, the popular democracy, the socialist renewal? “Let’s hope it does,” the expert told us. “Otherwise Gorbachev will be on a plane to the Hoover Institute and the Soviet Union will really be in trouble.”

Gorbachev, at this writing, is still in Moscow, but his term has been cut short and he will be a stateless president by the new year. And the Soviet Union is in the deepest trouble of all, on the verge of extinction. Many Americans, especially those on the right, greet that news as tidings of great joy, a victory for America, international capitalism and self-determination.

But history, and of course the erstwhile Soviet citizens, may come to see it quite differently. However cruelly it came together and developed, the union of peoples from Minsk to Vladivostok had the potential to improve the lives and realize the dreams of millions, as a confederacy of sovereign and unequal states cannot. Certainly the Soviet Union had imperialist and colonialist aspects, just as other continental unions of disparate sectors do. The United States, Brazil and China, to cite three examples, are paradigms of colonial development within their own borders. But democratic distribution of resources, participatory government and the institutional regulation of privilege are at least possible in a single state of many provinces, while they are virtually unthinkable in the motherland-overseas model perfected by the Spanish, the Portuguese, the English, the French and the Dutch.

Over three years, the U.S. Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee sifted through hundreds of ideas for commemorative coins to celebrate the 250th anniversary of America’s founding.

The group settled on five options, including quarters honoring abolitionist Frederick Douglass; Ruby Bridges, a 6-year-old girl who helped integrate public schools in New Orleans; and the women’s suffrage movement.

In a preview of the Trump administration’s approach to celebrating the country’s 250th birthday, Treasury Department officials announced earlier this month that the agency would ignore the committee’s recommendation and produce quarters that are far less diverse and more traditional. Instead of addressing the country’s racial history, the five coins will feature images of former presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Abraham Lincoln, as well as a Pilgrim couple.

The Biden administration was focused on diversity, equity and inclusion and critical race theory, U.S. Treasurer Brandon Beach told Fox News, but the “Trump administration is dedicated to fostering prosperity and patriotism.”

“The designs on these historic coins depict the story of America’s journey toward a ‘more perfect union,’ and celebrate America’s defining ideals of liberty,” Kristie McNally, acting director of the U.S. Mint, said in a statement.

The administration is also considering a commemorative dollar with President Donald Trump’s face on one side and his raised fist with the words “FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT” on the other, a reference to the widely circulated image of the president following an assassination attempt in 2024. Democratic senators have decried the idea as “un-American” and introduced legislation to prohibit “the likeness of a living or sitting president” from appearing on American currency.