In the before times, when a president wanted to make a change at the top of a department, he had a talk with that person or have an intermediary do so and explain it was time for a change. The secretary was allowed to make the decision on their own, even if it was usually known that it wasn’t really their choice. I was thinking about that this week as Pam Bondi’s ouster speedran from hint to certainty in … what? 24 hours? Why doesn’t she just step down on her own, I thought? But I quickly realized why, just on the basis of thinking about the pattern and about Trump. If Trump is getting ready to fire you and you quit, I strongly suspect this would enrage him. He’d see it as a major and perhaps unforgivable act of defiance. Trump gets to fire you. Period. I think he would see anything else the way others might see a subordinate announcing and claiming credit for a project the executive felt he owned.

Iran said today that after the war with the U.S. and Israel concludes that it will “oversee” transit through the Strait of Hormuz. It says it will do so in some kind of common arrangement with Oman. (Oman is the country on the other side of narrowest point of the Strait.) This was mixed with statements that this does not mean ships will be blocked. Basically Iran and Oman will try to make it a better cargo experience for everyone. The Times reports that Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister for legal and international affairs says that this oversight “will naturally not mean restrictions; rather, they are intended to facilitate and ensure safe passage and to provide better services to ships passing through this route.”