Getting Past the Political Spin Regarding the Iran Deal; What It Means That This Is an El Niño Year–Coachella Valley Independent’s Indy Digest: June 15, 2026

Indy Digest: June 15, 2026

So the Trump administration has a deal with Iran, sort of, perhaps, to end the war (or whatever we’re calling it).

Let’s see how a right-wing media source is covering the deal …

OK. How’s a left-wing media source covering the news?

Yep, we live in different “realities” depending on the news sources we trust.

This is one of the reasons why I am a big fan of The Conversation. I’ve mentioned this news source in this space before, and I frequently link to stories from The Conversation in the “More News” section below, because the writers are experts in the fields pertinent to the news of the day.

Well, the Iran deal is big news, so The Conversation has a piece examining the specifics, penned by Farah N. Jan, from the University of Pennsylvania. Here’s Jan’s intro:

Shehbaz Sharif, the prime minister of Pakistan, which served as the key negotiator between the U.S. and Iran, announced on June 14, 2026, that the two sides had agreed on a deal to end the war. It will be officially signed on June 19 in Switzerland.

President Donald Trump announced it on Truth Social as a triumph, claiming that the Strait of Hormuz is open for everyone, the U.S. blockade has been lifted, and the oil is flowing again. What Trump did not mention was Iran’s nuclear program and what happens to its enriched uranium stockpile, one of the main reasons cited for starting the war.

The nuclear issue—along with core issues such as ballistic missiles and Iran’s proxies—has been deferred for 60 days.

This raises two important questions: What was the war actually for? And what did the U.S. achieve?

As an international and nuclear security expert, I believe the answer is nothing—and in the process the U.S. lost credibility as a negotiating partner.

Yikes.

But, hey, oil prices are coming down! Of course, they wouldn’t be so high if the Iran mess had never happened …

—Jimmy Boegle

More News

• The Justice Department is investigating Gov. Gavin Newsom and his wife. NBC News reports: “California Gov. Gavin Newsom said Monday that he and his wife are being investigated by the Justice Department and accused President Donald Trump of targeting him for political reasons. ‘Today, my wife & I joined Donald Trump’s hit list. He has directed his Department of Justice to investigate us,’ he said in a post on X, referring to his wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom. Agents have ‘knocked on the doors on family friends and former employees. Not because they’ve found a crime, but because they’re trying to find one,’ Newsom said in a video, posted on X. He said the investigators have demanded records and ‘random documents.’ … Bill Essayli, first assistant U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, has had an adversarial relationship with Newsom and has launched political attacks against the California governor on social media. But the investigation does not appear to have emerged from Essayli’s office, but rather is being run out of Sacramento, under the control of Eastern District of California U.S. Attorney Eric Grant, according to two sources familiar with the investigation.”

• You know how Trump allies have claimed No Kings protesters were paid or influenced by bad actors? Well, now some of those same people, and others, are making similar claims about opponents of data centers. Wired reports: “Right-wing officials and data center investors are increasingly claiming that data center protests are being funded and influenced by the Chinese government. OpenAI added to the discourse on Wednesday when it released a report describing a cluster of accounts originating in China that, the company said, had been spreading anti-data-center messages on social media. Experts who spoke to WIRED, however, are skeptical of the funding claims. They also say that it’s likely that any foreign interference is simply adding on to existing tensions over data centers and AI in the U.S. Local opposition to data centers in the US has skyrocketed in recent months. A poll released last week from climate outlet Heatmap shows that more than half of Americans support a moratorium on data center development. Separate polling released in early June from UK-based policy research agency Public First shows that support for data centers in the U.S. was the lowest of 15 countries surveyed.”

• From the Not Surprising but Nonetheless Infuriating news file comes this piece, from The Wall Street Journal, with the headline “Justice Department Decision to Allow Paramount Deal Surprised Staff Investigators: Career antitrust officials investigating Warner acquisition were leaning toward recommending a challenge to the merger, people familiar with the matter say” (gift link). The lede: “The Justice Department’s senior leadership closed an investigation of Paramount’s bid for Warner Bros. Discovery before career staffers who were concerned about the acquisition had an opportunity to object, according to people familiar with the matter. A team of career lawyers who had spent months scrutinizing the deal were leaning toward recommending a lawsuit challenging it on the grounds that the combination of the two movie studios would be anticompetitive and violate antitrust law, the people said. The staff investigators hadn’t yet made a final recommendation—a typical step in the deal-review process—and were told Friday that the department would close the investigation, effectively clearing the deal at the federal level, some of the people said. The Justice Department’s senior leaders believed that Paramount Chief Executive Officer David Ellison, son of Trump ally Larry Ellison, persuasively addressed many of the staff’s questions about the deal during a two-hour interview last month, according to people familiar with their thinking.”

• It’s an El Niño year. The Los Angeles Times explains what that means: “El Niño has arrived and it could become one of the largest on record, and California may be in for a bumpy ride. While the climate pattern is often linked with a higher chance of more rain in Southern California, it can affect the state—and its famous coastline—in numerous ways. That’s especially possible during a strong El Niño event, as this one is shaping up to be. In fact, there’s a 63% chance El Niño could be ‘very strong’ toward the end of the year, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center. And there’s an 88% chance El Niño will be either ‘very strong’ or ‘strong.’ ‘The recently observed and ongoing rapid escalation of conditions in the tropical Pacific, plus the consistently and increasingly extreme forward-looking model projections, truly do suggest that something extraordinary could unfold,’ Daniel Swain, a UC climate scientist, wrote in a blog post. ‘The upcoming El Niño event — which has a high likelihood of becoming very strong or even historic in magnitude — will likely lead to widespread and significant global impacts.’”

• Today’s recall news involves … baby formula—and this one is a big deal. The Associated Press, via ABC News, says: “Nara Organics recalled its organic baby formula sold nationwide in Target stores and online Saturday after a multistate outbreak of infant botulism, federal authorities said. Three babies between 2 and 5 months became ill in April and May in California, Pennsylvania and Washington after consuming Nara Organics Whole Milk Organic Powdered infant formula, which is also sold on Nara.com, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said. They were hospitalized and treated with the FDA-approved treatment for infant botulism, the agency said. Infant botulism is a rare but serious illness that occurs in babies under age 1, whose gut microbiomes are immature. It is caused when infants consume bacteria with spores that produce a toxin in the gut.”

• And finally … is “jetpack man” back? The Los Angeles Times reports that a pilot over the weekend reported seeing a person high in the air near LAX: “More than five years after a series of mysterious ‘jetpack man’ sightings in the airspace near LAX, another possible airborne human rattled air traffic controllers Sunday. Shortly before landing at LAX around 2:40 p.m. on Sunday, a military transport Gulfstream jet pilot told air traffic controllers that they ‘just had a potential skydiver around 4,000 feet,’ per audio from ATC.com. Air traffic control responded with evident surprise and asked for clarification. ‘We just had somebody cross above us around 4,000 feet in a wingsuit,’ the pilot responded. ‘Are you serious?’ the controller asked, before warning an American flight that was next in line to land. ‘We’re looking for him,’ the American pilot answered. In December 2020, a video purporting to show a person flying with a jetpack was captured by people taking part in an instructional flight out of Torrance airport. At that point, the FBI was already investigating two other possible jetpack sightings near LAX from August and October of that year.”

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