From the left: The Strength of White Nationalist Pride

Did the white nationalists who marched in Charlottesville prove their strength or their weakness? At Slate, Jamelle Bouie says it’s tempting to say weakness: “Hundreds came to march in support of white supremacy, but they were outnumbered by thousands of residents who turned out to oppose the rally. The rally was scheduled to last for five hours, but it was over after 15 minutes.” But that’s wrong. None wore a mask or hood; “They weren’t just unafraid; they were proud.” And the lack of a forceful response from the White House reinforced their gambit: No, they “couldn’t secure physical space in the city. But they can still claim a kind of victory. They revealed the extent to which they can threaten and intimidate with a certain amount of impunity.”

From the right: Harsh Rhetoric on N.K. Is What’s Needed

President Trump’s tough talk on North Korea is still eliciting handwringing from Democrats who want the president to tone it down. “To this, I say: brutal talk is just what a brutal dictator like Kim Jong-un needs to hear,” writes foreign-policy hand Alice Stewart at CNN. Indeed, “Democrats and their failed approach have contributed to the position we are in today.” There was the Obama administration’s “strategic patience,” but during the last eight years North Korea “conducted at least four nuclear tests, constructed a uranium enrichment facility at Yongbyon, worked to develop ballistic missiles that can deliver a nuclear warhead, and constructed an experimental light water reactor at Yongbyon.” Fact is, “Diplomacy has not worked with the madmen of Korea. It’s time to replace tepid talk with tough talk.”

Israeli intel chief: Nuke Deal Helping Iran Replace ISIS

ISIS is receding, but Iran and its terror proxies are filling the vacuum, warned Israel’s Mossad chief Yossi Cohen at a Cabinet meeting Sunday. And part of that is thanks to the Obama administration’s nuclear deal, which freed up Iranian cash with which to make mischief across the Middle East. The Times of Israel’s Judah Ari Gross sums up Cohen’s point: “The Mossad chief noted that in the two years since the signing of the Iran nuclear deal, known formally as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, Tehran has not abandoned its desire to develop nuclear weapons, and that the agreement ‘only reinforced that trend and strengthened Iranian aggression in the region.’ ” The deal did nothing to curb Iran’s regional ambitions, and “Cohen said Iran was now enjoying economic growth and international contracts in the deal’s wake.”

Dem senator: The Left’s Self-Defeating Hostility to Faith

“The vast majority of Americans — including the majority of Democrats — are people of faith,” noted Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.). But, he sighs, you wouldn’t know it from listening to an increasingly large swath of the Democratic Party: “According to a recent Pew study, more than one-third of Democrats — including 44 percent of self-described liberal Democrats — think churches and religious organizations actually have a ‘negative impact’ on the United States.” That’s a shame, because “progressive values aren’t just secular values. We can get to some of our most important public-policy priorities” — whether on the environment, taxes, immigration or criminal justice — “through both secular and scriptural routes.”

2020 Watch: The Rich-Basher Who’s Making Bank

Elizabeth Warren is cashing in: “Prayer candles. Action figures. Temporary tattoos. Coloring books.” As Politico’s Lauren Dezenski reports, Warren has become a cult figure on the left, and now she’s “a merchandising industry unto herself.” Warren officials are cagey about the size of the “Warren merchandising-industrial complex.” Online marketplaces like Etsy and the Warren campaign’s own online store host most of the business. And “it’s safe to say no other senator has anything like it.” A leading light of the Bernie Sanders wing of the Democratic Party who reflexively demagogues the supposed sins of the rich, Warren isn’t just building a war chest. With a possible 2020 presidential run ahead of her, the senator knows being a merch queen “helps build Warren’s brand on both a local and national level.”

— Compiled by Seth Mandel