{"id":426,"date":"2026-08-06T16:37:48","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T16:37:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nationalconsumerreportss.com\/?p=426"},"modified":"2026-08-06T16:37:48","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T16:37:48","slug":"rational-security-the-live-from-moms-basement-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationalconsumerreportss.com\/?p=426","title":{"rendered":"Rational Security: The \u201cLive from Mom\u2019s Basement\u201d Edition"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>This week, Scott sat down with his colleagues <em>Lawfare<\/em> Executive Editor Natalie Orpett, <em>Lawfare<\/em> Public Service Fellow Julia Curlee, and <em>Lawfare<\/em> Contributing Editor and Vice President of Research, Security and Defense at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs Ariane Tabatabai, to talk through the week\u2019s big national security news stories, including:<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/nationalconsumerreportss.com\/?p=425\">A New Research Agenda for AI Constitutionalism<\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cLateral Thinking.\u201d Five months into Operation Epic Fury, the U.S.-Iran war has flared back to life\u2014and, more importantly, spread outward. Over the past two weeks, the fighting has jumped to new countries, actors, and domains in a textbook case of \u201chorizontal escalation\u201d: U.S. and Saudi jets opened a new front by striking Iranian-backed militias inside Iraq; Iran-aligned forces battered Kuwait\u2019s water and power infrastructure and Saudi oil facilities, with the Houthis apparently firing from Iraqi soil; and a wave of Iran-linked cyberattacks hit water utilities here at home. Then last Friday, President Trump threatened what he called the biggest attack since World War II\u2014before abruptly calling it off, with talks over reopening the Strait of Hormuz now said to be back on. What does this expanding aperture mean for the future of the Iran War?<\/li>\n<li>\u201cSquatter\u2019s Rights.\u201d The intelligence community has a new leader\u2014sort of. On July 28, the Senate confirmed Jay Clayton, the former SEC chair and Trump\u2019s U.S. attorney in Manhattan, as Director of National Intelligence on a 51-47 party-line vote, ending the rocky acting tenure of housing chief Bill Pulte. But in a nearly unheard-of move, the White House left Clayton unsworn for a week while Pulte stayed on\u2014using the extra days to run a fifth round of purges at an agency he\u2019d already cut nearly in half\u2014before Clayton was finally sworn in this Monday. The saga has reignited the fight over Section 702 surveillance authorities, which have now lapsed, and raised pointed legal questions about whether Pulte had any authority to keep acting at all. Where does the ODNI go from here, and what does it mean for U.S. national security?<\/li>\n<li>\u201cWeiss Guys.\u201d A sprawling New York Times investigation published over the weekend pulls back the curtain on how Paul, Weiss\u2014the first elite law firm to cut a deal with the Trump administration back in early 2025 to escape a punishing executive order\u2014actually made that fateful decision. The reporting details how then-chairman Brad Karp enlisted Patriots owner Robert Kraft to reach Trump, agreed to $40 million in pro bono work and to drop the firm\u2019s DEI policies, and was blindsided when Trump spun the deal his own way online. It lands after a wave of star litigators fled the firm, Karp\u2019s own ouster over his ties to Jeffrey Epstein, and fresh revelations about the quiet, multimillion-dollar exit of the firm\u2019s first openly transgender partner. What has this capitulation (if that\u2019s what to call it) cost Paul, Weiss? And what lessons should other law firms\u2014and the legal community as a whole\u2014draw?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div>\n<div><iframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"110px\" src=\"https:\/\/embed.acast.com\/60427f9d34b9a27f4b6e3a8d\/6a74aa832578a0c7e200838f\" width=\"100%\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>In object lessons, Ari has a message for competitive spouses: build something together and try Cozy Stickerville. Julia has a message for Secretary Hegseth with her 1950\u2019s CIA poster: \u201c We Are Looking for a Few Good Women.\u201d Scott has a message for the makers of By Jove to bring back a childhood classic. And Natalie has a message for litigators navigating uncertain waters: she sees you and appreciates you.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/nationalconsumerreportss.com\/?p=423\">Trafficking in Israel\u2019s War Crimes in a Midtown Manhattan Synagogue<\/a><\/p>\n<p>To receive ad-free podcasts, become a <em>Lawfare <\/em>Material Supporter at www.patreon.com\/lawfare. You can also support <em>Lawfare <\/em>by making a one-time donation at .<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/nationalconsumerreportss.com\/?p=421\">Lawfare Daily: The Court Against the Courts with Steve Vladeck and Kate Klonick<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Scott Anderson, Natalie Orpett, and Ariane Tabatabai talked through the week\u2019s big national security news stories.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,8,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-armed-conflict","category-executive-branch","category-intelligence"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Rational Security: The \u201cLive from Mom\u2019s Basement\u201d Edition - 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