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Wednesday

Jul312019

The Commentariat -- August 1, 2019

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Elijah Cummings is the pride of Baltimore.... The president -- this comes as no surprise -- really doesn't know what he's talking about. But maybe you could ask his son-in-law, who's a slumlord there, if he wants to talk about rodent infestations. -- Baltimore native Nancy Pelosi, Thursday

Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "President Trump escalated his trade war with China on Thursday, saying that the United States would impose a 10 percent tariff on an additional $300 billion worth of Chinese imports after China failed to keep its promise to buy more American agricultural products. Mr. Trump, who had agreed in June not to impose more tariffs while the two sides tried to reach a trade deal, said on Twitter that the new tariffs would go into effect on Sept. 1. Those new levies would be in addition to the 25 percent tariff that has already been imposed on $250 billion of imports and would essentially tax all Chinese products sent into the United States.... The president's comments hammered the stock market."

Burgess Everett & John Bresnahan of Politico: "The Senate has advanced a budget deal on a 67-27 vote, paving the way for final passage and ... Donald Trump's signature."

Not That We're Counting, But ... Kyle Cheney of Politico: "More than half of House Democrats say they would vote to launch impeachment proceedings against ... Donald Trump, a crucial threshold that backers say will require Speaker Nancy Pelosi to reconsider her steadfast opposition. 'The President's repeated abuses have brought American democracy to a perilous crossroads,' said Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who announced his support on Tuesday. 'Following the guidance of the Constitution -- which I have sworn to uphold -- is the only way to achieve justice.' Democrats who support impeachment proceedings eclipsed the halfway mark -- 118 out of 235 voting members -- on Thursday, when Rep. Ted Deutch of Florida announced his support. Deutch was also the 23rd Democratic lawmaker to support impeachment proceedings in the week since former special counsel Robert Mueller testified to Congress, affirming publicly his damning evidence that Trump attempted to obstruct justice."

Maggie Astor of the New York Times: "The Democratic National Committee has set stricter criteria for the third set of debates, which will be held on Sept. 12 and Sept. 13 in Houston. If 10 or fewer candidates qualify, the debate will take place on only one night. Candidates will need to have 130,000 unique donors and register at least 2 percent support in four polls. They have until Aug. 28 to reach those benchmarks.... Seven candidates have already met both qualification thresholds": Joe Biden, Cory Booker, Pete Buttigieg, Kamala Harris, Beto O'Rourke, Bernie Sanders & Elizabeth Warren.

BBC News: "... Donald Trump's trade war with China is backfiring and impacting the US economy, according to his former chief economic adviser. The tariff battle has had a 'dramatic impact' on US manufacturing and capital investment, Gary Cohn told the BBC. The trade war was 'a very convenient excuse' for China to slow down its overheated economy, he added. Mr Cohn, a free trade advocate, resigned from the Trump administration in March 2018. The 59-year-old former president of Goldman Sachs bank was an unusual hire for Mr Trump because he was a Democrat...."

Lauren Gardner of Politico: "The U.S. Senate on Wednesday confirmed Ambassador to Canada Kelly Craft to become the top American envoy to the United Nations, despite criticism from some Democrats that she lacks the experience needed for the key diplomatic position and was routinely absent from her post in Ottawa." Mrs. McC: Knowing Trump's opinion of the U.N., Craft should have no trouble treating this new gig as a second no-show job.

Trump's Brush with Death That Wasn't. Lee Moran of the Huffington Post: "... Donald Trump made up a story that he narrowly avoided boarding a helicopter that crashed and killed five people, according to a former longtime executive of the Trump Organization. Barbara Res, who was the company's vice president..., recalled to MSNBC's Ari Melber on Tuesday how three Trump casino executives and two crew members were killed in the October 1989 disaster. They were returning to Atlantic City from promoting a boxing match in New York City when the aircraft went down.... Res condemned Trump for 'making himself part of the story, a very important story and undermining the fact that three people died, just like he is undermining what happened in 9/11 by exploiting it.'"

Daniel Victor of the New York Times: "A Jordanian man once considered a financier for Al Qaeda and a 'henchman' of Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law was arrested in the Philippines in July, officials said on Thursday, reinforcing concerns that Islamist militants are making a base in the country. Mahmoud Afif Abdeljalil, 51, was arrested on July 4 in Zamboanga, a coastal city at the southwestern tip of Mindanao, the nation's second-largest island. Mr. Abdeljalil had false documents under an assumed name, Jaime Morente, the chief of the Bureau of Immigration, said in a statement. Mr. Abdeljalil, whom the authorities called 'a former henchman' connected to the bin Laden family, has been in government custody since the arrest.... The Islamic State has risen in the Philippines, even as its presence decreases in the Middle East."

~~~~~~~~~~

Presidential Race 2020

Alexander Burns & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. delivered a steadfast defense of his moderate policies in the Democratic primary debate on Wednesday, striking back at a familiar adversary, Senator Kamala Harris, but facing intensifying attacks on his record from liberal rivals including Senator Cory Booker and Julián Castro, the former housing secretary.... As he did at times in the first debate, he cut some of his answers short and stumbled over lines.... In the opening moments of the debate, Mr. Biden took particular aim at Ms. Harris, accusing her of peddling 'double talk' on health care.... Ms. Harris also came under fire and did not appear as steady as she did in the first debate...."

Jonathan Chait: "The most important development of the debate is that Joe Biden recovered.... If not for Biden's recovery, Cory Booker's performance might have emerged as a major storyline of the debate. Booker never stumbled and managed to deliver coherent answers with broad appeal within his party.... [Kamala] Harris and Booker have the same problem: they need Joe Biden to collapse, and for the moment, that isn't happening."

Benjamin Wallace-Wells of the New Yorker: "The trouble for Biden has been that you can't assemble a biography by pulling selectively from your own past. As the debate went on, his rivals poked deeper into his record, pushing Biden further from the Party's present progressive consensus.... The Democratic field looked stronger, if more quarrelsome, on Wednesday night than it did on Tuesday. The candidates drew clearer and more meaningful distinctions, the arguments were feistier and more specific, the wisdom of a sharp progressive turn challenged more directly."

When Biden Endorsed Booker. Adam Raymond of New York: "Roughly an hour into Wednesday's debate, [Joe] Biden and [Cory] Booker got their chance to square off. Booker called out Biden's criminal justice reform plan as an attempt to put out a house fire that he'd set himself. But Biden came with his own opposition file prepared, hitting Booker for 'hiring Rudy Guiliani's guy' when he was mayor of Newark and increasing stop and frisk. Booker's best moments came not when defending himself on the substance, but when he deployed some crowd-pleasing lines.... Booker also benefited from a Biden slip up. The former vice president accidentally called Booker the president, then jokingly called him the 'future president.'"

Food Fight. Adam Raymond: "Here are the most entertaining moments from the last of the debates with this ridiculously large field (qualifying for the next debate is much harder, thankfully).... As each candidate was brought to the stage, [Joe] Biden welcomed Kamala Harris with some good old-fashioned condescension. 'Go easy on me, kid,' Biden said to the 54-year-old United States senator.... Julián Castro ... wasn't so progressive on immigration a decade ago, Biden alleged. Castro didn't dispute the point, but he did point out his evolution on the issue: 'It looks like one of us has learned the lessons of the past, and one of us hasn't.'" And more.

New York Times reporters are liveblogging Wednesday night's Democratic presidential debate.

** Henry Grabar of Slate: "On Wednesday night, after Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet articulated the argument that the failure of impeachment in the Senate will only allow Trump to claim he's been cleared by Congress, former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro effectively demolished that case for an audience of millions: '... Senator, I think that too many folks in the Senate and in the Congress have been spooked by 1998. I believe that the times are different. And, in fact, I think that folks are making a mistake by not pursuing impeachment. The Mueller report clearly details that he deserves it, and what's going to happen in the fall of next year, of 2020, if they don't impeach him, is he's going to say, "You see. You see. The Democrats didn't go after me on impeachment. And you know why? Because I didn't do anything wrong. These folks that always investigate me -- they're always trying to go after me. When it came down to it, they didn't go after me there because I didn't do anything wrong." Conversely, if Mitch McConnell is the one that lets him off the look, we're going to be able to say, "Well, sure, they impeached him in the House, but his friend Mitch McConnell, Moscow Mitch, let him off the hook."'" ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: The so-called moderate Democrats like Bennet & Biden repeatedly remind us of why we need a more progressive candidate: the moderates hold tired, recycled opinions that can't even be called ideas because somebody else came up with them long ago & in some cases, they've become the conventional wisdom. Voters were not at all satisfied with conventional wisdom in 2016; there's no reason to think they will be in 2020. Candidates like Castro & Warren are able to think for themselves; their ideas might not always be the best, but they're pretty good, and they didn't buy them in the remainders bin.

... Click thru to Part 2.

Joshua Keating of Slate: White House uses Wednesday debate time to finally acknowledge Trump-Putin phone call. Worth reading every word. As usual, Trump is hilariously obtuse & White House staff abstruse -- until you consider the consequences.

Trump Attacks Another Black Man. Jessica Campisi of the Hill: "President Trump took aim at Don Lemon Wednesday, calling him 'the dumbest man on television' over a question the CNN host asked during Tuesday night's Democratic presidential debate. 'CNN's Don Lemon, the dumbest man on television, insinuated last night while asking a debate "question" that I was a racist, when in fact I am "the least racist person in the world." Perhaps someone should explain to Don that he is supposed to be neutral, unbiased & fair or is he too dumb (stupid} to understand that,' Trump tweeted." Mrs. McC: This is at least the third time Trump has called Lemon "dumb," consistent with his habit of disparaging the intelligence of black public figures and black voters. There were two white moderators at Tuesday night's debate -- Jake Tapper & Dana Bash -- asking dumb questions, too, but for some reason Trump gave them a pass.

Tim Ryan Might Not Be the Brightest Bulb on the Stage. Hanna Trudo of the Daily Beast: "Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) spent a good chunk of Tuesday night's presidential debate warning that Medicare for All would politically ruin Democrats. The day after, he predicted that the ambitious health care proposal would prompt an electoral bloodbath for the party in November 2020.... [Ryan is] currently [one of more than 100] co-sponsor[s] of a House bill pushing a single-payer health care system.... The bill would guarantee that the government picks up the cost of all medical expenses for Americans.... Notably, the plan states that private insurers would be prohibited from selling competing plans."

Jeff Cox of CNBC: "The Federal Reserve lowered its benchmark rate by a quarter point Wednesday as an insurance policy not against what's wrong with the economy now, but what could go wrong in the future. It was the first rate cut by the central bank in more than a decade. Amid ... Donald Trump's intense political pressure and persistent market expectations, the policymaking Federal Open Market Committee dropped the target range for its overnight lending rate to 2% to 2.25%, or 25 basis points from the previous level." ...

... Fed Tries to Protect Economy from Trump. Jeanna Smialek of the New York Times: "The widely expected quarter-point move, the Fed's first since it cut rates to near zero in 2008, is meant to protect the economy against the potentially harmful effects of a growth slowdown in China and Europe and uncertainty from President Trump's trade war." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Fred Imbert of CNBC: "Stocks fell to their lows of the day on Wednesday as the top Federal Reserve official dampened hopes for further rate cuts later this year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average traded 245 points lower, or 0.9%. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite slid 0.8% and 0.8%, respectively. Fed Chair Jerome Powell told reporters the central bank's rate cut was a mid-cycle adjustment,' hinting that further rate cuts later this year are not a sure thing." (Also linked yesterday.)

Peter Baker of the New York Times: "President Trump intervened Tuesday once again on behalf of a Navy SEAL who was charged but acquitted of war crimes in the death of a captured Islamic State fighter in Iraq, ordering the military to punish the prosecutors who tried the case in the first place. Mr. Trump angrily lashed out [on Twitter] at the Navy for awarding commendations to prosecutors in the murder trial of Edward Gallagher, a former special operations chief, and he publicly instructed Pentagon officials to strip them of the medals. His announcement was a remarkable rebuke by a president of his own Navy leadership.... Chief Gallagher's case had become a cause célèbre among Republican lawmakers and the conservative news media, eventually drawing the attention of Mr. Trump, who spoke out on his behalf.... The prosecution was troubled long before the verdict.... Other presidents have been dissatisfied with military prosecutors, but experts could not recall another instance in recent times when a commander in chief intervened so directly in a case like this."

Courtney Kube of NBC News: "The United States has obtained intelligence that the son and potential successor of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, Hamza bin Laden, is dead, according to three U.S. officials. The officials would no provide details of where or when Hamza bin Laden died or if the U.S. played a role in his death. Asked by reporters on Wednesday whether the U.S. had intelligence that Hamza is dead..., Donald Trump said, 'I don't want to comment on that.' Hamza bin Laden's last known public statement was released by al Qaeda's media arm in 2018. In that message, he threatened Saudi Arabia and called on the people of the Arabian peninsula to revolt." ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Either Trump just showed an appropriate refusal to discuss a matter of national security, or he didn't know the answer. ...

... Update. Julian Barnes, et al., of the New York Times: "Details of the strike that killed [Hamza bin Laden] were scarce, including when and where. The United States government played a role in the operation, but it was not clear how, according to the officials, who discussed his death on the condition of anonymity.... Mr. bin Laden was killed sometime during the first two years of the Trump administration, officials said."

AP: "The U.S. government on Wednesday imposed financial sanctions on Iran's foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, as part of its escalating campaign of pressure against the Islamic Republic. The highly unusual action of penalizing the top diplomat of another nation comes a month after ... Donald Trump signed an executive order placing sanctions on Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei."

Ken Dilanian of NBC News: "The Trump administration's intelligence watchdog has declined a request from four top Senate Democrats to investigate how the White House has handled security clearances for Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump and other employees, according to a letter obtained by NBC News. Michael Atkinson, the inspector general of the intelligence community, meaning the chief internal watchdog for the nation's intelligence agencies, wrote to the senators that he would be happy to conduct such an investigation, but could only do it if ... Donald Trump asks him. 'The authority over access to classified information ultimately rests with the President of the United States,' Atkinson wrote to Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, and the three other senators.... In response, the senators ... wrote a letter to Trump on Wednesday asking him to order an investigation." Mrs. McC: Fat chance." ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Looks as if Trump's Article II interpretation "I can do whatever I want" is working. The whole purpose of a government watchdog is to look into possible wrongdoing by officials. But according to Atkinson, he can't "watch" officials unless one of those officials allows him to do so. If a watchdog has to gain permission to "watch," he cannot do his job.

Baltimore Church Boots Ben Carson. Cristina Cabrera of TPM: "Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson and his staffers were shown the door on Wednesday when he tried to hold a press conference at Morning Star Baptist Church of Christ in Baltimore. Carson, who has a deep relationship with Johns Hopkins University and hospital in Baltimore, made the visit to the city on Wednesday amid the fallout over ... Donald Trump's racist comments directed at Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) and his district in Baltimore.... According to the Baltimore Sun, a church member... asked Carson to leave after he noticed the secretary setting up camp in the church's vacant lot without asking for permission. When the HUD secretary moved his team elsewhere and began the presser, he lamented the church's 'animosity' to reporters." Mrs. McC: Now that's chutzpah. You work for a man who has attacked the city of Baltimore, then you complain about "animosity" in Baltimore.

Moscow Mitch's Minions. Natasha Bertrand & Theodoric Meyer of Politco: "Two former top staffers to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have lobbied Congress and the Treasury Department on the development of a new Kentucky aluminum mill backed by the Russian aluminum giant Rusal, according to a new lobbying disclosure. The disclosure comes as Democrats are pushing the Trump administration to review Rusal's $200 million investment in the Kentucky project -- concerned that the mill will supply the Defense Department -- and as McConnell weathers criticism for helping block a congressional effort to stop the investment.... The Russian firm was only able to make the investment after it won sanctions relief from penalties the Treasury Department initially imposed in April 2018 on Rusal and other companies owned by Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch and Kremlin ally accused of facilitating Moscow's nefarious activities, such as seizing land in Ukraine, supplying arms for the Syrian regime and meddling in other countries' elections. Attention over the sanctions relief deal have specifically focused on McConnell, given his role in halting a bipartisan congressional effort to stop the penalties rollback. McConnell told reporters in May that his support for lifting the sanctions was 'completely unrelated to anything that might happen in my home state.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Maybe an Insanity Defense. James Stewart, et al., of the New York Times: "Jeffrey E. Epstein, the wealthy financier who is accused of sex trafficking..., hoped to seed the human race with his DNA by impregnating women at his vast New Mexico ranch. Mr. Epstein over the years confided to scientists and others about his scheme, according to four people familiar with his thinking, although there is no evidence that it ever came to fruition. Mr. Epstein's vision reflected his longstanding fascination with what has become known as transhumanism: the science of improving the human population through technologies like genetic engineering and artificial intelligence. Critics have likened transhumanism to a modern-day version of eugenics, the discredited field of improving the human race through controlled breeding." ...

... Anna North of Vox: Alan Dershowitz, who helped negotiate a 'non-prosecution agreement' for Jeffrey Epstein in the controversial South Florida case, & who is himself a defendant in a case in which the complainant alleges she was underaged when she had sex with Dershowitz at Epstein's behest, thought this week would be a good time to complain that the age of consent is too high.

Beyond the Beltway

North Carolina. Gunshop Incites Violence against Congresswomen. Bliss Zechman of WTVC North Carolina (July 30): "A new billboard advertising Cherokee Guns depicts Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, and Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts. The sign says above their photos, 'The 4 Horsemen ~~Cometh~~ are idiots,' and below says 'Signed, the Deplorables.' The store's owners say the billboard has been so successful that they have started selling a bumper sticker version...." ...

... Update. WTVC: The ad agency that owns the billboard -- Allison Outdoor Advertising -- is taking it down. "The billboard drew national attention..., with the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence sharing a Facebook post, calling it 'disgusting,' 'dangerous,' and condemning 'threats against members of Congress.'"

Ohio. Alex Johnson of NBC News: "Police in Columbus, Ohio, brought departmental charges on Wednesday against five officers who were involved in the arrest of Stormy Daniels at a strip club last year. Three of the five officers are named in a lawsuit Daniels brought against the city and the Columbus Police Department alleging that she was arrested in a political conspiracy to protect ... Donald Trump.... Daniels was arrested on July 11, 2018, at Sirens Gentlemen's Club on misdemeanor charges of inappropriately touching customers. The charges against Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, were dropped within hours, and charges against two other women who worked at the club were dropped within days. Police Chief Tom Quinlan said Wednesday that the officers were charged internally because they 'violated our rules of conduct.'"

Puerto Rico. Frances Robles & Patricia Mazzei of the New York Times: "The ousted governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo A. Rosselló, chose his successor on Wednesday, nominating Pedro R. Pierluisi, who formerly represented the island in Congress, to serve as secretary of state. The move positions Mr. Pierluisi to take over as governor when Mr. Rosselló's resignation becomes effective later this week.... If he is confirmed by the territory's House and Senate, Mr. Pierluisi's nomination would settle the complicated succession question that has thrown the island into uncertainty in the days since Mr. Rosselló's unprecedented resignation.... But Mr. Pierluisi's confirmation seems far from certain, as a tense power struggle continues inside the ruling New Progressive Party, which supports Puerto Rican statehood. The powerful Senate president, Thomas Rivera Schatz, a contender for the secretary of state job himself, let it be known before the nomination was even official -- by calling a well-known local radio host -- that Mr. Pierluisi would not have enough votes to win confirmation in the Senate." (Also linked yesterday.)

Texas. Cary Aspinwall & Dave Boucher of the Dallas Morning News: "The News obtained Dallas Police Department body camera footage after a three-year fight for records related to [Tony] Timpa's death [while in Dallas police custody]. A federal judge ruled Monday in favor of a motion by The News and NBC5 to release records from his death, saying 'the public has a compelling interest in understanding what truly took place during a fatal exchange between a citizen and law enforcement.... The newly obtained video and records, part of a lawsuit filed by Timpa's family in federal court alleging excessive force, contradict key claims Dallas police have made in defending the officers' actions.... Three officers -- Kevin Mansell, Danny Vasquez and Dustin Dillard -- were indicted by a grand jury in 2017 on charges of misdemeanor deadly conduct, three months after The News published its investigation into Timpa's death. Following two days of testimony, the grand jury's indictment stated that the 'officers engaged in reckless conduct that placed Timpa in imminent danger of serious bodily injury.' But in March, Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot dismissed the charges.'" ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: I didn't watch the video, but the report describes the officers' action in devastating detail. If you find yourself in trouble in Dallas, think twice before calling the cops. They might kill you. And think it was hilarious.

News Ledes

CBS News: "A regional gas pipeline ruptured early Thursday in Kentucky, causing a massive explosion that killed one person, hospitalized five others, destroyed railroad tracks and forced the evacuation of dozens of people from a nearby mobile home park, authorities said. Several structures caught fire in the area of the Indian Camp Trailer Park and were put out, CBS Lexington affiliate WKYT-TV reported. Emergency managers said some people were unaccounted for.... The explosion was so huge it showed up on radar, according to WKYT meteorologist Chris Bailey[.]... Lincoln County Emergency Management Director Don Gilliam said the flames reached about 300 feet in the air and could be seen throughout the county." Thanks to Ken W. for the link.

New York Times: "Hal Prince, the Broadway royal and prodigious Tony winner who produced or directed (and sometimes both) many of the most enduring musicals in theater history, including 'West Side Story,' 'Fiddler on the Roof,' 'Cabaret,' 'Sweeney Todd' and 'The Phantom of the Opera,' the longest-running show in Broadway history, died on Wednesday in Reykjavik, Iceland. He was 91." ...

... Frank Rich writes a remembrance.

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Tuesday

Jul302019

The Commentariat -- July 31, 2019

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Moscow Mitch's Minions. Natasha Bertrand & Theodoric Meyer of Politico: "Two former top staffers to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have lobbied Congress and the Treasury Department on the development of a new Kentucky aluminum mill backed by the Russian aluminum giant Rusal, according to a new lobbying disclosure. The disclosure comes as Democrats are pushing the Trump administration to review Rusal's $200 million investment in the Kentucky project -- concerned that the mill will supply the Defense Department -- and as McConnell weathers criticism for helping block a congressional effort to stop the investment.... The Russian firm was only able to make the investment after it won sanctions relief from penalties the Treasury Department initially imposed in April 2018 on Rusal and other companies owned by Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch and Kremlin ally accused of facilitating Moscow's nefarious activities, such as seizing land in Ukraine, supplying arms for the Syrian regime and meddling in other countries' elections. Attention over the sanctions relief deal have specifically focused on McConnell, given his role in halting a bipartisan congressional effort to stop the penalties rollback. McConnell told reporters in May that his support for lifting the sanctions was 'completely unrelated to anything that might happen in my home state.'"

Frances Robles & Patricia Mazzei of the New York Times: "The ousted governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo A. Rosselló, chose his successor on Wednesday, nominating Pedro R. Pierluisi, who formerly represented the island in Congress, to serve as secretary of state. The move positions Mr. Pierluisi to take over as governor when Mr. Rosselló's resignation becomes effective later this week.... If he is confirmed by the territory's House and Senate, Mr. Pierluisi's nomination would settle the complicated succession question that has thrown the island into uncertainty in the days since Mr. Rosselló's unprecedented resignation.... But Mr. Pierluisi's confirmation seems far from certain, as a tense power struggle continues inside the ruling New Progressive Party, which supports Puerto Rican statehood. The powerful Senate president, Thomas Rivera Schatz, a contender for the secretary of state job himself, let it be known before the nomination was even official -- by calling a well-known local radio host -- that Mr. Pierluisi would not have enough votes to win confirmation in the Senate."

~~~~~~~~~~

2020 Presidential Race

CNN will host the second of two Democratic presidential debates tonight. New York: "Airing from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m., [the debates tonight & Wednesday] will be available to stream online at CNN.com for free, no cable login required." Candidates debating tonight are Bennet, Biden, Booker, Castro, de Blasio, Gabbard, Gillibrand, Harris, Inslee & Yang.

... Click thru to Part 2.

Alexander Burns & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "The leading liberals in the Democratic presidential primary, Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, strenuously fought back on Tuesday against accusations of making fanciful promises and imperiling the party's prospects against President Trump, as a group of moderate underdogs sought to slow their momentum in the second round of debates.... Both [Bernie Sanders] and [Elizabeth] Warren depicted skeptics of single-payer health care as being in league with the G.O.P.: Mr. Sanders accused a CNN moderator, Jake Tapper, of using a 'Republican talking point' when raising questions about his plan, and noted that 'the health care industry will be advertising tonight on this program.' In a similar complaint, Ms. Warren urged Democrats to 'stop using Republican talking points' on the issue."

Bridget Read of New York: “The debate was plagued by unidentifiable moderate Guys -- John Hickenlooper, John Delaney, Steve Bullock, Tim Ryan, like the roll call at a Rotary Club meeting -- who came ready to pontificate vaguely about the dangers of socialism and 'radical politics' and, if you're Bullock, how you want to create a 'Machinery Officer' and 'dominate the battery market.' This left the politicians with visions beyond 'I'm not Trump,' like Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, to respond to their squabbling instead of focusing solely on where they stand on actual issues. And with moderators like Jake Tapper interrupting with curt 'Thank you's like an RA, even substantive discussions were largely cut off."

"Elizabeth Warren's Big Night." David Graham of the Atlantic: "As [Jake] Tapper noted, Democratic voters have told pollsters they prefer a candidate who will beat Donald Trump to a candidate they agree with ideologically. Warren argued that was a false choice":

I know how to fight and I know how to win.... I took on giant banks and I beat them. I took on Wall Street, and CEOs, and their lobbyists and their lawyers, and I beat them. I took on a popular Republican incumbent senator, and I beat him. I remember when people said Barack Obama couldn't get elected. Shoot, I remember when people said Donald Trump couldn't get elected.... There is a lot at stake, and people are scared. But we can't choose a candidate we don't believe in just because we're too scared to do anything else. And we can't ask other people to vote for a candidate we don't believe in. Democrats win when we figure out what is right and we get out there and fight for it. I am not afraid, and for Democrats to win, you can't be afraid either.

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Ashley Feinberg of Slate: "CNN, being the enterprising cable network that it is, wasn't about to let [the cumbersome debate format] stop it from actively making the night as dumb as humanly possible. And so the moderators peppered the candidates with questions that were evidently designed to produce bad answers in the short format. Question after question was framed up from the ideological perspective of a Heritage Foundation intern or otherwise crafted as a gotcha to generate a 15-second clip for Republican attack ads down the line." Feinberg "translates" some of the question, many of which boil down to "Why are you so far-left?"

New York Times reporters are liveblogging Tuesday's Democratic presidential debates.

Adam Raymond of New York: "Democratic presidential candidate and billionaire activist Tom Steyer will not be onstage at either of this week's primary debates. But that won't stop him from making sure his pet issue of impeachment gets attention. Need to Impeach, a group Steyer started before getting into the race, has purchased airtime on CNN and MSNBC before and after the debates, Politico reports. It will air a 30-second ad cut together from Robert Mueller's testimony to Congress last week. The ad shows Mueller providing quick answers (his hesitation was edited out) to a series of questions from Democratic House members": ...

Catherine Kim of Vox: "... Donald Trump is now required to release his tax records if he wants to be on the California primary ballot -- a regulation he'll most likely fight in court. California Gov. Gavin Newson signed a law on Tuesday that requires all presidential candidates to turn over five years' worth of income tax filings by November in order to secure a spot in the March 3 primary. The financial documents will then be posted online with sensitive, personal information redacted. One catch: The law technically does not bar a candidate from appearing on the general election ballot in 2020. (So Trump could theoretically avoid disclosing them or fighting a court battle over the law by forsaking California's delegates in an uncontested primary, knowing he'd still get the GOP's nomination.)... Although the bill doesn't specifically name Trump, lawmakers have made it clear that he's the target."

"Trade Wars Are Easy to Win." Ana Swanson & Jeanna Smialek of the New York Times: "As trade talks between the United States and China resumed on Tuesday in Shanghai, President Trump began playing down the likelihood of a deal before the 2020 election. The president's comments, which came as top negotiators from the two countries were sitting down to dinner at the Fairmont Peace Hotel, underscored the diminishing prospects for a transformative trade deal anytime soon and the extent to which the bilateral relationship has not unfolded in the way that Mr. Trump expected.... [Trump] seemed to veer between goading China to quickly accede to America's demands and suggesting the country could get a better deal if it waits and a Democrat wins the 2020 presidential election." ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: The contrast between Trump's boasts & his failures would be comical if those crashing failures did not hurt millions of Americans & others around the world.

Peter Baker & Katie Rogers of the New York Times: "President Trump resumed his attacks on Baltimore and its congressman on Tuesday as African-American state lawmakers from Virginia planned to boycott his scheduled speech commemorating the 400th anniversary of representative democracy in the Western Hemisphere. Mr. Trump again disparaged Representative Elijah E. Cummings.... 'Baltimore is an example of what corrupt government leads to,' Mr. Trump told reporters as he left the White House for the event in Virginia. 'I feel so sorry for the people of Baltimore, and if they ask me, we will get involved.' Mr. Trump offered no evidence of corruption nor did he explain on what he based such an accusation.... Facing questions about his apparent willingness to divide his supporters and opponents along racial lines in recent days, Mr. Trump insisted that he was the 'the least racist person there is anywhere in the world.' Then he called the Rev. Al Sharpton, another recent adversary, 'a racist.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Describing oneself (or someone else) as "the least racist person there is anywhere in the world" is, simply by the construction of the boast, a lie. ...

... All the African-Americans Are Calling the White House to Thank Trump. Steve Benen of MSNBC: President Trump said during a Q&A outside the White House Tuesday, "'What I've done for African Americans, no president, I would say, has done.' Unfortunately, Abraham Lincoln was unavailable for comment.... '... They are so happy, because I get the calls. They are so happy at what I've been able to do in Baltimore and other Democratic run corrupt cities. The money has been stolen.... And the African-American community is so thankful. They call me and they say, "Finally, somebody is telling the truth."'... This is, of course, the same president who recently denied the existence of 'racial tension' in the United States, adding that he has 'fantastic relationships with the African-American community' -- despite a 13% approval rating among black voters.... It's a safe bet that Trump was describing made-up conversations." ...

... Washington Cathedral: "This week, President Trump crossed another threshold. Not only did he insult a leader in the fight for racial justice and equality for all persons; not only did he savage the nations from which immigrants to this country have come; but now he has condemned the residents of an entire American city.... When such violent dehumanizing words come from the President of the United States, they are a clarion call, and give cover, to white supremacists who consider people of color a sub-human 'infestation' in America. They serve as a call to action from those people to keep America great by ridding it of such infestation. Violent words lead to violent actions. When does silence become complicity? What will it take for us all to say, with one voice, that we have had enough? The question is less about the president's sense of decency, but of ours.... We must boldly stand witness against the bigotry, hatred, intolerance, and xenophobia that is hurled at us, especially when it comes from the highest offices of this nation." ...

... Jamil Smith of Rolling Stone: "A white-nationalist presidency is untenable. Having to endure one while the man in the office has committed obvious crimes, such as obstruction of justice, is even worse.... The president reminded us that we are governed in part by a cable channel.... One of the high crimes and misdemeanors listed in the Constitution is 'dereliction of duty.' In his attack on Cummings, the president made it clear that, in violation of his oath of office, he doesn't want to be the president of Baltimore. Nor, one can presume, would he be the president of any urban area that was populated by people who didn't vote primarily for him." ...

... ** Our Racist Presidents. Tim Naftali in the Atlantic: "The day after the United Nations voted to recognize the People's Republic of China, then-California Governor Ronald Reagan phoned President Richard Nixon at the White House and vented his frustration at the delegates who had sided against the United States. 'Last night, I tell you, to watch that thing on television as I did,' Reagan said. 'Yeah,' Nixon interjected. Reagan forged ahead...: 'To see those, those monkeys from those African countries -- damn them, they're still uncomfortable wearing shoes!' Nixon gave a huge laugh.... [Later, Nixon called his Secretary of State William Rogers (twice) to relay Reagan's message:] '... he is, of course, outraged. And I found out what outraged him, and I find this is typical of a lot of people: They saw it on television and, he said, "These cannibals jumping up and down and all that."'... Reagan's comment about African leaders resonated with Nixon, because it reflected his warped thinking about African Americans." Includes audio. Read on. Naftali's point is that Nixon tried, unsuccessfully, to hide his own racist beliefs behind Reagan's, while Trump doesn't try to hide his.

Caleb Ecarma of Mediaite: "On Tuesday, Donald Trumppromoted two of his supporters on Twitter who are actively perpetuating the QAnon conspiracy -- a theory that alleges the president is secretly working with the military to unfurl a multinational cabal of elite, ritualistic pedophiles -- including one account that accused the Clintons of consuming the fluids of dead children. Shortly after Trump shared the Twitter handle of one crackpot supporter, he retweeted a post by user @LYNNTHO06607841 -- calling Democrats 'THE TRUE ENEMIES OF AMERICA' -- which is an account that has promoted QAnon and adjacent theories, including the belief that the Clintons are slowing their aging process by 'sacrificing children' and drinking from their adrenal glands." ...

... Betsy Woodruff & Kevin Poulsen of the Daily Beast: "Twitter has suspended a conspiracy-peddling account amplified by ... Donald Trump.... Trump retweeted the account, which used the display name 'LYNN THOMAS' and the handle @LYNNTHO06607841, on Tuesday afternoon. By early Tuesday evening, the account had been suspended. A source familiar with the matter told The Daily Beast that the account was suspended for violating the Twitter rule that bars users from using multiple accounts to artificially amplify or disrupt conversations.... Before the suspension, the account enthusiastically pushed Qanon conspiracy memes and bizarre theories about prominent Democrats murdering children to harvest their pineal glands.... Though Twitter recently announced it will affix warning labels to tweets from public figures that violate its rules, it didn't use that option on Trump's tweets about Cummings."

Sylvan Lane of the Hill: "President Trump on Tuesday boosted pressure on the Federal Reserve to slash interest rates this week, calling for a 'large cut' to counter a series of hikes in 2018. Trump continued his assault ahead of the independent central bank's policymaking meeting in Washington, which will start Tuesday. The Fed is expected to announce at least a modest reduction of interest rates Wednesday amid slowing global growth and fading U.S. business investment. Trump again accused the Fed and its chairman, Jerome Powell, [Mrs. McC: whom Trump appointed,] of hindering his economic agenda by raising rates seven times under his watch. 'The Fed moved, in my opinion, far too early and for too severely. It puts me at a somewhat of a disadvantage,' Trump said. 'Fortunately I've made the economy so strong that nothing's going to stop us. But the Fed could have made it much easier.' Trump has been quick to blame a recent slowdown in U.S. growth on the Fed while calling on the bank to cut rates. Even so, some of the Fed's rationale for cutting rates is based in economic threats exacerbated by Trump's trade agenda." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Another Remarkably Stupid Trump Trick: Jari Tanner of the AP: "American rapper A$AP Rocky pleaded not guilty to assault as his trial in Sweden opened Tuesday, a month after a street fight that landed him in jail and became a topic of U.S.-Swedish diplomacy. Rocky, whose real name is Rakim Mayers, is accused with two others of beating a 19-year-old man in Stockholm on June 30. Prosecutors played video footage in court that showed Mayers throwing a young man to the ground.... The Grammy-nominated artist's extended detention prompted ... Donald Trump to personally intervene on his behalf earlier this month Mayers nevertheless remained behind bars, angering Trump. Swedish news agency TT said Trump sent the U.S. special presidential envoy for hostage affairs [Robert O'Brien] to Stockholm to monitor the court proceedings and to show support for Mayers." Emphasis added. ...

... Mrs. McC: That Trump would send the envoy for hostage affairs to monitor a trial conducted in Sweden is beyond appalling. Unlike the U.S., Sweden has no recent history of human rights abuses, & there has been no suggestion that Mayers was treated differently from Swedish defendants accused of violent crimes. Sweden certainly was not holding him hostage. Trump's point was to offend another ally. Congrats, Donnie. You succeeded.

Presidunt* Snowflake. Asawin Suebsaeng & Maxwell Tani of The Daily Beast: "In recent weeks, those close to Donald Trump have noticed him routinely asking media figures, longtime friends, and his political advisers a new, very leading question, often asked in the exact same way: 'What the hell is going on at Fox?' According to three people who have independently spoken to Trump about Fox News over the past four weeks, the president has repeatedly asked that question.... The president ... sounded surprised and frustrated that he was seeing too many people to his liking on the network treating him 'unfairly' on their shows." --s

Miriam Jordan of the New York Times: "In the year since President Trump officially ended family separations at the southern border, immigration authorities have removed more than 900 migrant children from their families, sometimes for reasons as minor as a parent not changing a baby's diaper or having a traffic citation for driving without a license, according to new documents filed Tuesday in federal court.... Earlier this month, the acting Homeland Security secretary, Kevin McAleenan, said in testimony before the House Oversight and Reform Committee that separations were 'rare' and made only 'in the interest of the child.'... The new numbers were filed [by the ACLU] with Judge Dana M. Sabraw of the Federal District Court in San Diego as part of the court's continuing supervision of the family separation issue."

Ted Hesson & Josh Gerstein of Politico: "A decision issued Monday by Attorney General William Barr will restrict the ability of migrants to claim asylum based on their family relations. In a precedent-setting immigration court opinion, Barr said that simply being part of a nuclear family targeted for persecution doesn't qualify as a 'particular social group' eligible for asylum in the United States. 'The fact that a criminal group -- such as a drug cartel, gang, or guerrilla force -- targets a group of people does not, standing alone, transform those people into a particular social group,' the attorney general wrote.... To receive asylum in the U.S., applicants must prove they faced persecution in their home countries based on race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group. Barr's decision Monday will limit the ability of a familial relationship to qualify as 'membership in a particular social group.'" --s (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Here's Why Sexual Assault Victims Don't Come Forward. Helene Cooper of the New York Times: "With the female accuser looking on, two prominent women on Tuesday exerted their considerable influence on matters relating to sexual assault and the military, saying that they do not believe that President Trump's nominee for vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff sexually assaulted a subordinate multiple times in 2017. Both Heather A. Wilson, the former Air Force secretary, and Senator Martha McSally, Republican of Arizona and a self-described survivor of sexual assault in the military, strongly and unequivocally defended Gen. John E. Hyten of the Air Force during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee. Seated several rows behind the general was Col. Kathryn A. Spletstoser, a 28-year Army officer with four combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. In an interview last week with The New York Times, she described numerous instances of unwanted touching by the general, culminating in what she described as an assault in her hotel room in December 2017."

Alexander Mallin, et al., of ABC News: "... Donald Trump's pick for the next director of national intelligence, Rep. John Ratcliffe, R-Texas, has misrepresented his role in an anti-terrorism case that he's repeatedly cited among his credentials related to national security issues. The apparent embellishment is related to two anti-terrorism financing trials in a case known as the U.S. v. Holy Land Foundation, the second of which resulted in convictions for several individuals found to have illegally funneled charity money to the U.S.-designated terrorist group Hamas. In a 2015 press release, Ratcliffe's House website stated, 'When serving by special appointment in U.S. v. Holy Land Foundation, he convicted individuals who were funneling money to Hamas behind the front of a charitable organization.' His official campaign website, in a February 2016 post, also touted his 'special appointment as the prosecutor in U.S. v. Holy Land Foundation, one of the nation's largest terrorism financing cases.' But ABC News could find no public court records that connect Ratcliffe to either of the two trials for the case. Former officials directly involved in the decade-long Holy Land Foundation investigation could not recall Ratcliffe having any role, and four former defense attorneys who served on the cases told ABC News on Monday they had no recollection of Ratcliffe being involved with any of the proceedings that resulted in the convictions of their clients." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Will Sommer of the Daily Beast: John Ratcliffe "played a role last year in popularizing what briefly became one of the right's most easily debunked conspiracy theories about the investigation into the president and Russia, offering what he presented as evidence of an anti-Trump 'secret society' operating within the FBI.... One of Ratcliffe's biggest contributions to the Republican pushback on the investigation came in January 2018, when he claimed he had seen text messages between [FBI officials Lisa] Page and [Peter] Strzok that suggested the existence of a 'secret society' working against Trump. But Ratcliffe's claims, which were subsequently amplified by pro-Trump media outlets, fell apart when the fuller text exchanges became public.... ABC News published the full text message two days after Ratcliffe made his viral Fox appearance, revealing that the 'secret society' text referenced calendars of a 'beefcake' Vladimir Putin that Strzok was giving out as gifts to people who worked on the Russia investigation." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: So if you were wondering if Ratcliffe really would cherry-pick intelligence information to skew the facts, there's you're answer. This lie alone renders him unfit to serve as White House intelligence chief. Now that we know Ratcliffe lied about his supposed "intelligence experience" acquired while serving as a U.S. prosecutor, his only intelligence experience is sitting for 6 months or so on the House Intelligence Committee, an experience he used to lie about intelligence. All the best people, etc. ...

... David Priess of Lawfare: "The nomination-by-tweet of Republican Representative John Ratcliffe of Texas as Director of National Intelligence to replace outgoing DNI Dan Coats has drawn rapid and harsh condemnation from many political observers and even former intelligence officers for his apparent partisanship and lack of experience.... Ratcliffe ... came right out of central casting for Trump. But he looks quite differently when compared to the men and women who have led the nation's intelligence efforts for more than seven decades. Should his nomination go forward, senators have many valid questions to ask not only about his political tirades, but also about how he plans to overcome his relative lack of intelligence exposure and senior management experience."

Ben Tobin of the Louisville Courier Journal (July 29): "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell took to the Senate floor Monday to blast the 'hyperventilating hacks' who have accused him a being a Russian sympathizer. The Kentucky Republican compared the attacks to 'modern-day McCarthyism.'" ...

... Carl Hulse of the New York Times: Mitch McConnell “is incensed by the name 'Moscow Mitch,' and even more miffed that he has been called a 'Russian asset' by critics who accuse him of single-handedly blocking stronger election security measures after Russia's interference in 2016.... Mr. McConnell said Monday that he would not be intimidated into acting on election interference.... The hashtag #MoscowMitchMcTraitor was trending on Twitter, and Senate Republicans of all stripes were being asked about the blockade.... With the focus on the issue intensifying, Mr. McConnell and Senate Republicans will face more pressure to act."

Sarah Fitzpatrick, et al., of NBC News: "The organizations that should have protected young female gymnasts from sexual abuse by former Olympic gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar, including the U.S. Olympic Committee and the FBI, 'fundamentally failed' to do so for years, according to a new congressional report. In an interview with NBC News, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., the ranking member of the Senate subcommittee overseeing the Olympics, described the actions of the organizations as a 'cover-up.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Kevin Drum of Mother Jones: "Conservatives have been trying to enact a stealth cut in the capital gains tax via inflation indexing for as long as I can remember, but they've never been able to get it passed by Congress. So now, encouraged by President Trump's belief that the executive can do anything he wants, [Republican senators] decided to skip the whole tedious lawmaking thing and just ask Mnuchin to do it by fiat.... Only 21 Republican senators signed [a letter to Mnuchin urging him to eliminate inflationary gains]. This means that 32 Republicans declined to sign a letter in support of a tax cut. That probably shows just how bad an idea this is.... CBPP estimates that indexing capital gains would cut taxes on the rich by $100-200 billion over ten years. This actually isn't a huge sum, but in a way that makes this even worse. Are Republicans really this desperate to pander to the rich?"

Congressional Elections 2020

Al Weaver & Julia Manchester of the Hill: "The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) saw a mass departure of senior staff late Monday amid outcry over the lack of diversity within the committee's top ranks under Chairwoman Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.).... The exits come on the heels of the resignation of the committee's executive director, Allison Jaslow, which she announced at an all-staff meeting earlier on Monday." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Adiós. Melanie Zanona & Jake Sherman of Politico: "Rep. Mike Conaway of Texas will not seek reelection in 2020, according to multiple GOP sources, becoming the fifth Republican to announce their retirement over the past two weeks.... Conaway has served in Congress for 15 years, but stepped into the national spotlight in 2017 when he was tasked with leading the House Intelligence Committee's probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election." --s

Josh Gerstein of Politico: "A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit the Democratic National Committee filed against the Trump campaign, the Russian government, WikiLeaks and various Trump campaign officials over alleged involvement in the hacking of Democratic Party email accounts during the 2016 presidential race. U.S. District Judge John Koeltl rejected the central theory of the racketeering suit: that the Trump campaign, campaign aides and Trump allies abetted the theft of the emails by encouraging WikiLeaks to publish the messages and by urging they be released when they would be of maximum political benefit to then-candidate Donald Trump." Mrs. McC: Koeltl is a Clinton appointee. Koeltl said such actions were protected by the First Amendment when taken by people not involved in the actual hacking."

Emily Flitter & Karen Weise of the New York Times: "A software engineer in Seattle hacked into a server holding customer information for Capital One and obtained the personal data of over 100 million people, federal prosecutors said on Monday, in one of the largest thefts of data from a bank. The suspect, Paige Thompson, 33, left a trail online for investigators to follow as she boasted about the hacking, according to court documents in Seattle, where she was arrested and charged with one count of computer fraud and abuse." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Beyond the Beltway

Michigan. Jonathan Oosting of the Detroit News: "Republicans are suing to stop Michigan's new citizen redistricting commission before it begins, alleging the voter-approved amendment is 'blatantly unconstitutional' and discriminates against participants based on political service or family ties. The federal lawsuit, filed Tuesday morning with the U.S. District Court in Grand Rapids, seeks to invalidate Proposal 2, block implementation and prevent the independent commission from drawing new legislative and congressional district maps for the 2022 election cycle. Instead, whichever political party wins control of the state Legislature next year would lead that process in 2021. Republicans drew existing lines in 2011 and currently hold majorities in the Michigan House and Senate." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Mississippi. Michael Braga, et al. of GateHouse Media: "More than half of all rural hospitals in Mississippi, South Carolina, Georgia and Oklahoma lost money from 2011 through 2017.... What these states also have in common is that legislators voted against expanding Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, which would have provided coverage for hundreds of thousands of uninsured residents and bolstered rural hospital bottom lines.... In the meantime, residents of deep red rural America -- farmers and farm workers, small business owners and their employees, the old and infirm -- are seeing their hospitals founder and close." --s (Also linked yesterday.)

Way Beyond

Reuters: "North Korea has fired two short-range ballistic missiles off its east coast less than a week after a similar test launch, the South Korean military's joint chiefs of staff (JCS) said.... North Korea test-fired two new short-range ballistic missiles on 25 July, its first missile tests since Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump met in late June and agreed to revive stalled denuclearisation talks." --s

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Monday

Jul292019

The Commentariat -- July 30, 2019

Afternoon Update:

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Describing oneself (or someone else) as "the least racist person there is anywhere in the world" is, simply by the construction of the boast, a lie.

Congressional Elections 2020. Al Weaver & Julia Manchester of the Hill: "The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) saw a mass departure of senior staff late Monday amid outcry over the lack of diversity within the committee's top ranks under Chairwoman Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.).... The exits come on the heels of the resignation of the committee's executive director, Allison Jaslow, which she announced at an all-staff meeting earlier on Monday."

Jonathan Oosting of the Detroit News: "Republicans are suing to stop Michigan's new citizen redistricting commission before it begins, alleging the voter-approved amendment is 'blatantly unconstitutional' and discriminates against participants based on political service or family ties. The federal lawsuit, filed Tuesday morning with the U.S. District Court in Grand Rapids, seeks to invalidate Proposal 2, block implementation and prevent the independent commission from drawing new legislative and congressional district maps for the 2022 election cycle. Instead, whichever political party wins control of the state Legislature next year would lead that process in 2021. Republicans drew existing lines in 2011 and currently hold majorities in the Michigan House and Senate."

Michael Braga, et al. of GateHouse Media: "More than half of all rural hospitals in Mississippi, South Carolina, Georgia and Oklahoma lost money from 2011 through 2017.... What these states also have in common is that legislators voted against expanding Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, which would have provided coverage for hundreds of thousands of uninsured residents and bolstered rural hospital bottom lines.... In the meantime, residents of deep red rural America -- farmers and farm workers, small business owners and their employees, the old and infirm -- are seeing their hospitals founder and close." --s

~~~~~~~~~~

CNN will host the first of two Democratic presidential debates tonight. New York: "Airing from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m., [the debates tonight & Wednesday] will be available to stream online at CNN.com for free, no cable login required." Candidates debating tonight are Bullock, Buttigieg, Delaney, Hickenlooper, Klobuchar, O'Rourke, Ryan, Sanders, Warren & Williamson.

Cummings' Oversight Committee Nails Corrupt Trump & Friends. Benjamin Siegel & Matthew Mosk of ABC News: Thomas Barrack, "a longtime Trump insider, has been pushing a proposal to build dozens of nuclear power plants in Saudi Arabia while seeking to avoid restrictions on the transfer of U.S. nuclear technology and has at times stood to profit from the effort, according to an investigative report by the House Oversight Committee. Today's report reveals new and extensive evidence that corroborates Committee whistle-blowers and exposes how corporate and foreign interests are using their unique access to advocate for the transfer of U.S. nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia,' said Rep. Elijah Cummings, the Maryland Democrat who chairs the committee. The 50-page report, which relied on 60,000 documents and statements from whistle-blowers inside the administration, was made public Monday. It focuses on the actions of Thomas Barrack, a wealthy Los Angeles businessman who oversaw ... Donald Trump's inaugural committee, as well as earlier efforts by retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn to push a Saudi nuclear energy plan. Investigators said they found evidence that 'private parties with close ties to the President wield[ed] outsized influence over U.S. policy towards Saudi Arabia.'... The White House did not cooperate with the investigation, providing none of the documents requested.... The report alleges that Flynn and later Barrack helped push the proposal during the 2016 campaign, in the White House and later during briefings with senior White House officials including Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner[, Cabinet members] and ultimately President Trump." ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: President* Obvious clearly knew this damning report would be released this week when he began his racist Twitterstorm against Rep. Cummings. ...

... Benjamin Siegel of ABC News: "When candidate Donald Trump prepared to give a major energy speech during the 2016 campaign, one of his closest advisers [Thomas Barrack] provided a pre-speech review to senior United Arab Emirates officials, an unorthodox move that caught the attention of federal investigators, according to emails and text messages uncovered by a House Oversight Committee investigation.... [A UAE business] associate [of Barrack's] then told Barrack he shared [the draft speech] with UAE and Saudi government officials, after which Barrack arranged for language requested by the UAE officials to be added to the speech with the help of Trump's campaign manager at the time, Paul Manafort. [Manafort told Barrack he had inserted the UAE language into the speech, but in fact the final version was considerably watered-down.]... 'The Trump Administration has virtually obliterated the lines normally separating government policy making from corporate and foreign interests,' according to a report overseen by House Oversight Chairman Elijah Cummings, a Maryland Democrat, who commissioned the investigation into back channel business dealings between certain Trump aides and Middle Eastern countries." ...

... Erin Banco of the Daily Beast: Nuclear energy "executives have built an underground coalition along with academics, technology experts and well-connected politicos, including some lobbyists, to get the president and his administration to support -- even promote -- an American nuclear energy comeback.... But the coalition had a plan for a big return by way of exporting U.S. nuclear technology overseas. The comeback, as the coalition saw it, would come via Saudi Arabia and would rely on using President Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner's cozy relationship with the country's de facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.... The coalition's campaign is still being carried out, predominantly behind closed doors.... The ... secret campaign ... is concerning officials and Capitol Hill who are fearful that the plans for Saudi Arabia will move forward despite the fact that they raise legal concerns and could potentially threaten U.S. national security...." ...

... See too related New York Times report, also linked yesterday.

Peter Baker of the New York Times: "President Trump, after a weekend spent assailing a leading African-American congressman from Baltimore, widened his war on critics of color on Monday morning as he denounced the Rev. Al Sharpton as 'a con man' who 'Hates Whites & Cops!'... Mr. Sharpton fired back not much later. 'Trump says I'm a troublemaker & con man,' he wrote on Twitter. 'I do make trouble for bigots. If he really thought I was a con man he would want me in his cabinet.'... [Trump] went after [Rep. Elijah] Cummings again as well. 'Baltimore, under the leadership of Elijah Cummings, has the worst Crime Statistics in the Nation,' Mr. Trump wrote. '25 years of all talk, no action! So tired of listening to the same old Bull...Next, Reverend Al will show up to complain & protest. Nothing will get done for the people in need. Sad!'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Cummings is not a local official, so he has no control over city & county leaders' actions, though one would think he might have some influence on them. Also, Balto does not have "the worst Crime Statistics in the Nation." ...

... Jonathan Lemire & Zeke Miller of the AP: "The president has rid himself of many of the aides who once challenged him, either by attrition or replacement, and in doing so illustrated his preference for loyalty over know-how. He's inflamed racial tensions, betting that such divisions will help ease his path to victory in 2020. And he's replaced gut instinct and tweets for the sober analysis of professionals on matters of war and peace.... Like so many of Trump's political impulses, the president's attacks this weekend on Cummings, the powerful chairman of the House Oversight Committee, and the racist tweets he sent two weeks earlier were born not of strategy meetings with aides, but of cable television." ...

... As PD Pepe wrote yesterday, "If you had been told years ago that one day a President of the U.S. would get his marching orders from a T.V. network you'd have laughed, said how ridiculous, that could never happen here." The joke's on us.

... Paul Krugman: "... Trump's racism rests on a vision of America that is decades out of date.... Trump doesn't seem to be aware that times have changed. His vision of 'American carnage' is one of a nation whose principal social problem is inner-city violence, perpetrated by nonwhites.... Violent crime has fallen drastically since the early 1990s, especially in big cities.... On the other hand, the social state of rural America -- white rural America -- is deteriorating.... Less-educated whites, especially in rural areas..., are suffering from a surge in 'deaths of despair' from opioids, suicide and alcohol that has pushed their mortality rates above those of African-Americans.... The real irony [of Trump's attacks on Rep. Elijah Cummings & Baltimore] is that if you ask which congressional districts really are 'messes' in the sense of suffering from severe social problems, many -- probably most -- strongly supported Trump in 2016. And Trump is, of course, doing nothing to help those districts. All he has to offer is hate." ...

... Jamelle Bouie compares Trump to South Carolina Gov. & Sen. Bill "Pitchfork" Tillman, a 19th/early 20th-century plantation owner & extreme segregationist. Tillman "would use the language of populism and agrarian rebellion to build a constituency among white men who felt ignored and disadvantaged, angered, anxious and alienated." But at the same time he was oppressing blacks, he was an elitist, "skeptical that ordinary white men actually had the full capacity to govern." ...

... Kate Sullivan of CNN: "The House Republican retreat is scheduled to take place in Baltimore -- the same city in Maryland that ... Donald Trump denigrated over the weekend as a 'disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess....' House Republican leadership announced in April that their annual retreat would take place September 12-14 in Baltimore.... It is common for the President to speak at their party's annual congressional retreat." ...

... Philip Bailey of the Louisville Courier Journal: "Republican Sen. Rand Paul is offering to buy Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar a plane ticket to visit her home country of Somalia to learn to be more grateful for living in the United States.... 'I'm not saying we forcibly send her anywhere,' Paul said in an interview last week with Breitbart News, a conservative-leaning outlet. 'I'm willing to contribute to buy her a ticket to go visit Somalia. I think she can look and maybe learn a little bit about the disaster that is Somalia.'" Mrs. McC: This would be the same Rand Paul who had on his staff & co-authored a book with Jack Hunter, "the Southern Avenger," who is a white supremacist & advocate for secession. The suggestion that a refugee would have no idea what things were like in the country she fled but that an American would know better shows both profound ignorance & stunning hubris. (Also linked yesterday.)

Chris Cillizza of CNN: "... on Monday morning, in a speech to first responders and others impacted by the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, [Donald Trump] took his fantastical memory of himself to new and not-at-all-appropriate heights .'I was down there also, but I'm not considering myself a first responder,' Trump said. 'But I was down there. I spent a lot of time down there with you.'... It's also not the first time he's done it. 'Everyone who helped clear the rubble -- and I was there, and I watched, and I helped a little bit...,' Trump said in a speech in Buffalo in 2016. 'Clearing the rubble. Trying to find additional lives. You didn't know what was going to come down on all of us -- and they handled it.' He has also claimed that he helped pay for several hundred workers to help clean up the wreckage in the aftermath of 9/11. Independent fact-check sites have been unable to verify that claim." What Trump was really doing on 9/11, according to Cillizza, was watching from Trump Tower (Mrs. McC: which is about 4 miles from the World Trade Center) & bragging on the radio that now that the towers had fallen he owned the tallest building in Manhattan (40 Wall Street). He didn't. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Trump also was at the Alamo with Davy Crockett, led Teddy Roosevelt up San Juan Hill, & raised the flag at Iwo Jima. ...

... Katie Rogers of the New York Times: "The president repeated claims about his presence at ground zero during the signing ceremony for legislation to ensure health care funding for emergency workers who rushed to help.... According to Richard Alles, a retired deputy chief with the New York Fire Department, Mr. Trump was not a presence at ground zero. 'I spent many months there myself, and I never witnessed him,' Mr. Alles, who was at the Rose Garden event on Monday, said in an interview. 'He was a private citizen at the time. I don't know what kind of role he could have possibly played.'" Read the whole report. Trump has used a great American catastrophe for self-aggrandizement, & all of his claims to acts of heroim & generosity are fake, fake, fake. (Mrs. McC: Rudy Giuliani claimed at a Trump rally in 2016 that he'd never seen Hillary Clinton at Ground Zero, only to have to apologize when photos of her walking beside Giuliani at the site on September 12, the first moment she could get from D.C. to New York. Giuliani also claimed she lied about being there on September 11, but she never claimed to be there that day.)

[John Ratcliffe’s chief qualification is] his record of promoting Donald Trump's conspiracy theories. Congressman Ratcliffe is the most partisan and least qualified individual ever nominated to serve as director of national intelligence. -- Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) ...

... Julian Barnes, et al., of the New York Times: "Republicans hesitated on Monday to embrace President Trump's choice for the director of national intelligence, and some privately expressed doubts about his potential confirmation, echoing concerns of experts and Democrats that he was too inexperienced and too partisan. Mr. Trump's pick, Representative John Ratcliffe of Texas, could face an uphill battle, Senate Republicans said in private conversations. Several said they wanted to keep the intelligence post apolitical, and Mr. Ratcliffe will need to show he can move beyond the die-hard conservative persona that has made him a star in the House and on Fox News.... Republicans on the Senate Intelligence Committee, including its chairman, Richard M. Burr of North Carolina, said they were unfamiliar with the congressman.... Democrats also said they had concerns that Mr. Ratcliffe would not stand up to Mr. Trump when his views on Iran or North Korea were at odds with the assessment of intelligence analysts." ...

... Ted Barrett, et al., of CNN: "... Donald Trump's choice of Rep. John Ratcliffe to replace respected former Sen. Dan Coats as Director of National Intelligence in one of the most powerful and sensitive jobs in government, has gotten a tepid response to this point from Republican senators, signaling the Texas Republican, a Trump loyalist who lacks intelligence experience, could face a fight to be confirmed. The handful of GOP senators who initially put out public statements about the change mostly praised the professionalism and integrity of the departing Coats." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... No Expertise. Mrs. McCrabbie: As Akhilleus pointed out in yesterday's Comments, the National Security Act requires that the DNI "shall have extensive national security expertise." Dubya appointed Ratcliffe "Chief of Anti-Terrorism and National Security for the Eastern District of Texas," & Ratcliffe has been on the House Intelligence Committee for a few months. Doesn't sound like "extensive expertise" to me. (Also linked yesterday.)

... Update. Liar: According to MSNBC, Ratcliffe has been playing up his Bush II-era experience as a bold prosecutor of terrorists, claiming he had "put terrorists in jail." BUT there is no evidence Ratcliffe ever prosecuted a terrorism case." ...

... ** Nutty Conspiracy Theorist. David Rohde of the New Yorker: "Ratcliffe is a full-throated backer of Trump's practice of trafficking in conspiracy theories for political gain; he has joined the President's effort to claim that it wasn't the myriad contacts between Trump campaign aides and Russian officials that led to Mueller investigation but, rather, that the inquiry was part of a 'deep state' conspiracy. Ratcliffe has repeatedly claimed that Hillary Clinton, not Donald Trump, colluded with Russia and that a cabal of C.I.A. and F.B.I. officials, working with foreign intelligence services, carried out a global conspiracy to entrap Trump aides.... The bitter partisanship that Trump intentionally fuels is eroding a forty-year consensus in Washington regarding the need for apolitical intelligence."

... Toady. Fred Kaplan of Slate: "Among other things, the DNI gives the president his daily intelligence briefing, and in those reports, as well as in his testimony to Congress, Coats has concluded that Iran no longer had a nuclear weapons program, that North Korea was unlikely to get rid of its nuclear arsenal, that ISIS was still an active terrorist organization, and that top Russian officials interfered in the 2016 election -- all of which contradicted Trump's views. By contrast, Ratcliffe has been a hangdog defender of Trump during the various inquiries into Trump's collusion with Russia. In last week's hearing, he grilled Mueller on his legal theories and asserted that the real colluders were Hillary Clinton and the Democrats, claiming that the Steele dossier -- which Ratcliffe incorrectly said had triggered the Mueller probe -- was filled with misinformation planted by the Russians, with the intent of harming Trump's bid for the White House.... Ratcliffe's spirited criticism of special counsel Robert Mueller in last week's hearing -- including the recital of one of the more preposterous conspiracy theories ever unreeled on the subject -- demonstrated that he would embody everything this president wants in a Cabinet secretary: total loyalty to Trump." ...

... Kaplan also writes, "Attorney General William Barr will soon begin his 'investigation of the investigators' -- a probe to assess the political biases of the Mueller investigation -- and Trump has given him authority to declassify documents as he sees fit. Ratcliffe would be a natural enabler in a pursuit to cherry-pick material -- or, more to the point, to find material worth cherry-picking -- whereas Coats might have sided with the intel professionals in resisting such a blatantly political maneuver." David Rohde -- column linked above -- writes, "A senior intelligence official recently told me that Barr is personally convinced that there was something nefarious in how the F.B.I. started its investigation in 2016.... In a Sunday-morning interview on Fox News..., Ratcliffe ... praised an unprecedented review that ... Barr is conducting of the work of the F.B.I. and key intelligence agencies in the launch of the 2016 Trump-Russia investigation.... He said that Trump deserved a presumption of innocence, then added, 'What I do know, as a former federal prosecutor, is that it does appear that there were crimes committed during the Obama Administration.'" So there's that. ...

... AND, as Patrick wrote in yesterday's Comments, "Having Rep. Ratcliffe as ODNI will be bad bad bad, but not as bad as if he had a real intel agency like CIA, NSA etc. ODNI actually owns no assets and the intel agencies do not take orders from ODNI. The problem will be that he can have a public forum to speak for the intel community, even if no one else in any of the intel agencies agrees with what he has to say. So he can cause a lot of public confidence damage, but not really control what the agencies do." ...

... Otherwise, a great choice. All the best people, etc.

Jordain Carney of the Hill: "The Senate on Monday failed to override President Trump's vetoes of resolutions blocking his arms deal with Saudi Arabia, marking the latest setback for critics of Riyadh. Senators voted 45-40, 45-39 and 46-41 on the override attempts, falling well short of the two-thirds majority needed to nix Trump's veto."

#MoscowMitch. Cristina Cabrera of TPM: "Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) complained on Monday that he's a victim of 'modern-day McCarthyism' because he's being criticized for repeatedly killing election security bills. Before formally kicking off the week's Senate session, McConnell spent about a half hour on the Senate floor expressing his indignation over 'unhinged smears' against him.... McConnell then claimed the 'partisan' bill he blocked on Friday was a result of 'theatrical requests' by the Democrats.... However, even bipartisan election security bills haven't been spared: McConnell's refused to hold votes on those too." --s

Ian Millhiser of ThinkProgress: "Imagine the utter contempt that Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) must hold for the American people. 'Again and again, Democrats have refused to join Republicans in guaranteeing coverage for pre-existing conditions,' Cornyn tweeted Monday morning.... In 2010, President Barack Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.... Every single Senate Democrat voted for these protections for people with preexisting conditions. Every single Senate Republican opposed these protections.... There is no way to '#bothsides' this history: The Democratic Party spent the last decade enacting protections for people with preexisting conditions and then defending it against a multi-front partisan onslaught. The Republican Party led that onslaught. Remember Cornyn's tweet next time you hear a Republican politician rail against liberal elites who are supposedly condescending to salt-of-the-earth Americans in the heartland. Cornyn sent that tweet because he thinks you are stupid." --s

Presidential Race 2020. Danielle McLean of ThinkProgress: "Native American issues are rarely discussed on the presidential campaign trail, but for the first this year, a candidates' forum entirely on Native concerns will be held next month in Sioux City, Iowa. So far, five Democratic candidates have confirmed they will attend the August 19 and 20 discussion about the sovereign rights of tribes, housing, and the protection of Native land, among other issues. So far, the candidates who have confirmed that they plan to attend the forum are Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) Montana Gov. Steve Bullock (D-MT), author Marianne Williamson, U.S. Rep. John Delaney (D-MD), and President Barack Obama's former Housing Secretary Julian Castro." --s

Jeanna Smialek of the New York Times: "The Federal Reserve this week will most likely cut interest rates for the first time since 2008, when the economy was mired in a deep recession, as the central bank tries to keep a record economic expansion from petering out. The expected change, while likely to be small, will end an era of gradual rate increases intended to return the economy to a more 'normal' state in the wake of the Great Recession, when the Fed slashed rates to near zero as it tried to rescue the economy.... In cutting now, the Fed is effectively ending its campaign to put economic policy back to normal. The shift confirms that interest rates will be much lower from now on, leaving the economy in a much more fragile state." (Also linked yesterday.)

The GOP's Favorite State Budget Slasher. Matt Shuham of TPM: "The budget consultant [Donna Arduin] has served in several Republican-led governor's offices, slashing state expenses while cutting or resisting efforts to increase tax revenue. She's also one of three leaders of the right-wing consulting firm Arduin Laffer & Moore Econometrics. Her partners are 'Trumponomics' co-authors Arthur Laffer, the trickle-down economics evangelist, and Stephen Moore, who in May ruefully wished there was a 'statute of limitations on saying stupid things' so he could've had a shot at joining the Federal Reserve Board.... Arduin has crisscrossed the country slashing state budgets left and right. 'I have no sympathy for people who want handouts from the government,' Arduin told Duke Magazine for a 2006 profile. It shows." --s

Mark Lawson of the Guardian interviews Ken Burns on the complexities of America. --s

Kelly Weill & Audry McNamara of the Daily Beast. "The gunman who murdered three people at a food festival in Northern California on Sunday posted about a far-right book on Instagram moments before the attack.... Santino William Legan, 19..., posted a picture with a caption that told followers to read a 19th-century, proto-fascist book. The book, which is repeatedly recommended alongside works by Hitler and other fasicsts on forums like 8chan, is full of anti-Semitic, sexist and white supremacist ideology. The book glorifies 'Aryan' men, condemns inter-marriage between races and defends violence based on bogus eugenicist tropes.... Police said Legan legally purchased his assault-style rifle in Nevada this month." (Also linked yesterday.)

AP: "Federal officials say they've found a missile launcher in a man's luggage at the airport in Baltimore. The Transportation Security Administration said in a statement that the military grade weapon was located in the man's checked luggage at Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport.... The unidentified traveler said he was in the military and coming home from Kuwait. He said he wanted to keep the weapon as a souvenir." Mrs. McC: In fairness to the soldier, there may be nothing in TSA guidelines that specifically prohibits packing a missile launcher in your duffle bag.

Way Beyond the Beltway

China. Jamie Ross of The Daily Beast: "China claims it has released most detainees held in the government's mass internment program for ethnic minority Muslims, but provided no evidence for the announcement. According to The New York Times, Alken Tuniaz, vice government chairman in the region of Xinjiang, said 90 percent of people held in the camps have been returned to society." --s

El Salvador. Nina Lakhani of the Guardian: "[The country of El Salvador] is one of the most murderous in the world, plagued by warring gang factions and security forces who shoot to kill. Relentless bloodshed and chronic unemployment have driven wave after wave of migration as Salvadorans seek a better life. But in recent years, widespread water shortages are increasingly helping fuel unrest and forced displacement.... El Salvador...also has the region's lowest water reserves, which are depleting fast thanks to the climate crisis, pollution and unchecked commercial exploitation. According to one study, El Salvador will run out of water within 80 years unless radical action is taken to improve the way the country manages its dwindling water supplies. As in just about every aspect of life in El Salvador, the water problem is only exacerbated by corporate interests, corruption and the country's vicious street gangs." --s

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