The Commentariat -- August 5, 2019

Photo found on the Facebook page of the El Paso mass shooter.

Late Morning Update:

Michael Crowley, et al., of the New York Times: In a speech this morning, President* Trump said, "'In one voice our nation must condemn racism, bigotry and white supremacy''... But Mr. Trump stopped well short of supporting the kind of broad gun control measures that activists and Democrats have sought for years, instead calling for stronger action to address mental illness, violence in the media and in video games, as well as 'the perils of the internet and social media.'... Mr. Trump took no questions, and did not repeat his call on Twitter earlier in the morning for Republicans and Democrats to work together to strengthen background checks for prospective gun buyers, but his proposal to link new gun control measures with immigration restrictions is likely to leave Democrats sternly opposed." ...

     ... At the end of the speech, Trump asks God to bless "those who passed in Toledo," whoever they may be.

The Lonely Republican Truth-teller. Chris Rodrigo of the Hill: "A Republican state senator from Nebraska on Sunday accused the GOP of helping to enable white supremacy. 'The Republican Party is enabling white supremacy in our country,' state Sen. Kevin McCollister (R) tweeted. 'As a lifelong Republican, it pains me to say this, but it's the truth,' McCollister continued. 'I of course am not suggesting that all Republicans are white supremacists nor am I saying that the average Republican is even racist. What I am saying though is that the Republican Party is COMPLICIT to obvious racist and immoral activity inside our party.'"

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Devan Cole of CNN: "... Donald Trump on Monday suggested tying immigration reform to strengthening background checks following a weekend in which the alleged shooter in El Paso, Texas, is believed to have authored a racist, anti-immigrant document targeting Hispanics. Trump, who is scheduled to address the nation at 10 a.m. ET following two mass shootings that left at least 29 people dead, has previously expressed an openness to tougher action on gun control only to back away under pressure from Second Amendment activists and the gun lobby. He did not indicate in his tweets on Monday morning if he supported a sweeping gun control bill that passed the House with bipartisan support in February that requires universal background checks but has not been considered by the Senate. 'Republicans and Democrats must come together and get strong background checks, perhaps marrying this legislation with desperately needed immigration reform,' Trump wrote in a pair of tweets...." Thanks to Ken W. for the link. Mrs. McC: Consistent with Ken's comment below, my guess is that Trump wants to attach any gun-control measures to an immigration bill that McConnell won't bring up & Trump wouldn't sign if the bill did come to his desk.

Christina Zhao of Newsweek: "... Donald Trump has run roughly 2,200 Facebook advertisements using the word 'invasion' since May 2018[.]" --s ...

... Josh Marshall of TPM: "There's abundant evidence the [El Paso] shooter is a big fan of President Trump and certainly of his worldview. And yet [his] manifesto includes a sort of preemptive rebuttal of any claims that he is a Trump supporter or that Trump influenced [him]. He predicts that 'the media' will identify him as a white supremacist and blame President Trump's racist and xenophobic rhetoric for radicalizing him and provoking the attack. Such claims would be 'fake news' and such claims will indeed only prove that 'the media' is 'fake news.'... For someone who specifically denies Trump radicalized him, he's very focused protecting the President. He doth protest rather too much. The gaslighting is actually baked into the attack itself. He wants to be both the assailant and part of the post massacre spin and pro-Trump defense." --s ...

... ** Even the Gray Lady Goes There. Peter Baker & Michael Shear of the New York Times: "At campaign rallies before last year's midterm elections, President Trump repeatedly warned that America was under attack by immigrants heading for the border. 'You look at what i marching up, that is an invasion!' he declared at one rally. 'That is an invasion!' Nine months later, a 21-year-old white man is accused of opening fire in a Walmart in El Paso, killing 20 people and injuring dozens more after writing a manifesto railing against immigration and announcing that 'this attack is a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas.'... If Mr. Trump did not originally inspire the gunman, he has brought into the mainstream polarizing ideas and people once consigned to the fringes of American society. While other leaders have expressed concern about border security and the costs of illegal immigration, Mr. Trump has filled his public speeches and Twitter feed with sometimes false, fear-stoking language even as he welcomed to the White House a corps of hard-liners, demonizers and conspiracy theorists shunned by past presidents of both parties.... In televised remarks on Sunday afternoon..., Mr. Trump [said]..., 'Hate has no place in our country, and we're going to take care of it.'... He made no mention of white supremacy or the El Paso manifesto, but instead focused on what he called 'a mental illness problem.'" ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Baker & Shear are two of the leading practitioners of both-siderism. They do allow a couple of Trump toadies -- Mick Mulvaney & Kris Kobach -- brief defenses of Trump's hateful rhetoric, but by and large, this report is a recitation & condemnation of Trump's encouragement of white supremacy. Remarkable. ...

... Philip Rucker of the Washington Post covers the same territory: "Since the moment Trump rode down his gold-plated escalator four years ago to start his renegade run for the White House, us-against-them language about immigrants has been a consistent and defining feature of his campaign and now of his presidency. Absent from his repertoire has been a forceful repudiation of the white nationalism taking rise on his watch.... Trump throughout his presidency has stoked fear and hatred of the other, whether Latino immigrants or black people living in cities or Muslims.... [The author of the screed attributed to the El Paso shooter] is so aligned with the president's that he decided to conclude the manifesto by clarifying that his views predate Trump's 2016 campaign and arguing that blaming him would amount to 'fake news,' another Trump phrase.... Although a press pool traveled with Trump to New Jersey, the president opted not to address the nation Saturday. He did, however, find time to stop by a wedding reception being held at the Trump National Golf Club Bedminster...." ...

... Jonathan Lemire of the AP: "As the nation reeled from two mass shootings in less than a day, ... Donald Trump spent the first hours after the tragedies out of sight at his New Jersey golf course, sending out tweets of support awkwardly mixed in with those promoting a celebrity fight and attacking his political foes.... Not until Trump and the first lady prepared to fly back to Washington in the late afternoon Sunday did he appear before cameras.... While connecting 'hate' and mental illness to the shootings, Trump made no direct mention of gun laws, a factor brought up by Democratic officials and those seeking their party's [presidential] nomination.... 'We have done much more than most administrations,' he said, without elaboration. 'We have done actually a lot. But perhaps more has to be done.'"

Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: Beto O'Rourke, "Cory Booker and Julián Castro, placed blame on Trump for his rhetoric [that encouraged the El Paso shooter]. Mrs. McC: I heard Rep. Tim O'Ryan & Sen. Kamala Harris on MSNBC do the same. I'm surprised & heartened that at least some Democrats are speaking truth to the racist-in-chief. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Trump: A Racist AND a Deadbeat. Kolten Parker of KSAT (San Antonio): "... El Paso officials have been critical of the president in recent months for his refusal to pay a $470,000 debt owed to the city for transportation and security services during his February campaign rally. For six months, the city has sent Trump's campaign invoices for services provided by city departments -- including police, buses, the health department and others -- but has not gotten a response, according to local media.... A local TV station reported two weeks before the shooting that Trump still hadn't paid the debt." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Rebecca Klar of the Hill: "Federal authorities are treating the shooting at an El Paso, Texas, Walmart that killed 20 people and wounded 26 more as a case of domestic terrorism and will pursue federal hate crime and firearm charges in connection with the massacre, officials said at a press conference Sunday. Patrick Wood Crusius, 21, was booked into El Paso County Jail early Sunday on capital murder charge, the El Paso Times reported. At the same Sunday morning press conference El Paso County District Attorney Jaime Esparza said his office would seek the death penalty." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Wajahat Ali of The Atlantic: "Will America finally confront the violent death rattle of white supremacy? Or will it fail to inflict the coup de grâce, allowing the ideology of hate to revive itself into a global movement, with radicalized young men engaged in what they believe is a zero-sum war for survival? Last year, those opening lines might have been dismissed as alarmist rhetoric and hyperbole. We no longer have that luxury.... Hate that was once hidden has now been given permission to come out of the closet and drop its white robes and masks. This has real-life consequences for communities of color, Jews, and immigrants." --s

... Kevin Roose of the New York Times: "In recent months, 8chan has become a go-to resource for violent extremists.... [Fredrick] Brennan started the online message board as a free speech utopia. But now, 8chan is known as something else: a megaphone for mass shooters, and a recruiting platform for violent white nationalists.... Mr. Brennan, who stopped working with the site's current owner last year, called for it to be taken offline before it leads to further violence.... 8chan has been run out of the Philippines by Jim Watkins, a United States Army veteran, since 2015, when Mr. Brennan gave up control of the site.... Mr. Watkins, who runs 8chan along with his son, Ronald, has remained defiant in the face of criticism, and has resisted calls to moderate or shut down the site.... The site remained on the fringes until 2014, when some supporters of GamerGate -- a loose reactionary collection of anti-feminist video gamers -- flocked to 8chan after being kicked off 4chan. Since GamerGate, 8chan has become a catchall website for internet-based communities whose behavior gets them evicted from more mainstream sites. It hosts one of the largest gatherings of supporters of QAnon, who claim that there is an international bureaucracy plotting against the Trump administration. And it has been an online home for 'incels,' men who lament being 'involuntarily celibate,' and other fringe movements." ...

... Matthew Prince of Cloudflare: "8chan is among the more than 19 million Internet properties that use Cloudflare's service. We just sent notice that we are terminating 8chan as a customer effective at midnight tonight Pacific Time. The rationale is simple: they have proven themselves to be lawless and that lawlessness has caused multiple tragic deaths. Even if 8chan may not have violated the letter of the law in refusing to moderate their hate-filled community, they have created an environment that revels in violating its spirit." ...

... Kevin Roose of the NYT writes in the report linked above, "Another company, Tucows, which controls 8chan's domain name registration, had no plans as of Sunday evening to disable the site's web address."

Jessica McBride of Heavy: "Connor Betts, the Dayton, Ohio mass shooter, was a self-described 'leftist,' who wrote that he would happily vote for Democrat Elizabeth Warren, praised Satan, was upset about the 2016 presidential election results, and added, 'I want socialism, and i'll not wait for the idiots to finally come round to understanding.'... On Nov. 2, 2018, he wrote: 'Vote blue for gods sake.'... On Feb. 14, 2018, he tweeted this at Sen. Rob Portman: '@robportman hey rob. How much did they pay you to look the other way? 17 kids are dead. If not now, when?' That was the date of the mass shooting at a school in Parkland, Florida.... He also wrote that he enjoyed anime, railed against ICE and the industrial revolution, and made references to Satan.... He shared posts of people outed for possibly being at a KKK rally in Dayton and wrote, 'Know your enemies.'... He railed against the police, QAnon conspiracy theories, and white supremacists." ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: It would seem Betts has had violent fantasies for a long time: "Dayton 24/7 Now spoke with other classmates of Betts' who said he was expelled from school after officials found a notebook where he reportedly wrote a list of people who he wanted to rape, kill and skin their bodies. The classmate we spoke with said Betts was supposed to write a letter of apology to the people on the list. After being expelled, Betts was allowed back to school, according to the classmate. The classmate added Betts was not a loner, but had friends." Betts is reportedly 24 years old. I can't be certain because the reporting is crummy, but the context suggests the source was a high-school classmate of Betts'. Also, since one of the people he assassinated was his own sister, it's pretty hard to guess what his motives were, but it doesn't really seem, based on what we know at this point, they were political.

New York Post Editors urge passage of a federal assault-weapons ban & devote their screaming front page to it: "This ban would only be part of the response: Keep improving background checks, find wiser approaches to mental health, get every state to pass a red-flag law* (do a federal one, too, even if issuing these restraining orders is mainly the job of state courts). And by all means, do as Sen. Elizabeth Warren suggested in last week's Democratic debate and 'double down on the research and find out what really works.'" Yes, the New York Post, a Rupert Murdoch production.

     * "A red flag law is a gun violence prevention law that permits police or family members to petition a state court to order the temporary removal of firearms from a person who may present a danger to others or themselves." ...

... Guardian: "Philadelphia Union [pro soccer/football team] captain Alejandro Bedoya brought attention to this weekend's mass shootings in Ohio and Texas when he called out Congress after scoring for his team in Washington DC.... After Bedoya scored he ran over to a TV microphone and shouted: 'Hey Congress, do something now. End gun violence. Let's go!' The comment could be heard on Fox Sports' coverage of the game.... [Bedoya] is from Weston, Florida, close to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School...." --s ...

... David Frum of the Atlantic: A "menu of atrocities offers a wide range of political points to score, if that is your wish. You will find here immigrants and natives; whites and nonwhites; Muslims and Christians; right-wingers, left-wingers, and the nonpolitical. There is even a woman, Tashfeen Malik, who with her husband, Syed Rizwan Farook, targeted a Christmas party sponsored by the local Department of Public Health, where the husband worked. Despite their diversity, all these killers had one thing in common: their uniquely American access to firearms. In turn, these killers unite the country in a uniquely American determination to ignore the obvious.... America's uniquely bloodstained record of violence is a consequence of America's uniquely reckless attitudes toward weapons of mass death." ...

... Yeah But. Ian Millhiser of ThinkProgress: "[I]f President Donald Trump's most recent appointment to the Supreme Court gets his way, both assault rifles and high-capacity magazines will soon enjoy special constitutional protection. It is likely, moreover, that Justice Brett Kavanaugh has the five votes he needs to make this happen.... Regarding assault rifles, the future Trump appointee [had] argued that these weapons should enjoy the same nearly unassailable level of constitutional protection the Supreme Court afforded to handguns in its 2008 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller." --s

** David Li of NBC News: "Mexico on Sunday threatened to take legal action against the United States for failing to protect its citizens after this weekend's mass shooting in the border city of El Paso. Of the 20 people gunned down at a Walmart at the Cielo Vista Mall, at least seven were Mexican citizens, and Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard promised Mexico City will act. Ina statement, the Foreign Ministry called the attack in El Paso a 'terrorist act against innocent Mexicans.'... Of the 26 injured in the attack, at least nine were Mexican nationals, according to the government." ...

... Elisabeth Malkin & Azam Ahmed of the New York Times: "Mexican authorities could seek to extradite the gunman on a terrorism charge and were planning legal action against the seller who provided the shooter with his weapon, said the foreign minister.Marcelo Ebrard.... Tensions [between the U.S. & Mexico] are often fueled by President Trump in divisive invectives that target Mexicans, Central Americans and others, and speak of migrant caravans as 'an invasion of our country.' 'Xenophobic and racist discourse breeds hate crimes,' Martha Bárcena, the Mexican ambassador to the United States, said over Twitter."

A Convenient Slip & Fall. Ashley Killough & Paul LeBlanc of CNN: "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell fractured his shoulder Sunday after falling in his Kentucky home, his office said in a statement. 'This morning, Leader McConnell tripped at home on his outside patio and suffered a fractured shoulder,' David Popp, McConnell's communications director, said in a statement. 'He has been treated, released, and is working from home in Louisville.'McConnell's injury comes as Democrats demand he reconvenes the Senate to pass gun control legislation after a pair of mass shootings in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio this weekend left 29 people dead." Mrs. McC: Of course Mitch could still call the Senate back from recess; he doesn't have to show up himself. Let his second-in-command Sen. John Cornyn (Texas) try to explain why Republicans favor doing nothing or relatively nothing in the wake of the murders of 20 Texans.

Malcolm Scott, et al. of Bloomberg: "China responded to Donald Trump's tariff threat with another escalation of the trade war on Monday, letting the yuan tumble to the weakest level in more than a decade and asking state-owned companies to suspend imports of U.S. agricultural products.... Trump last week proposed adding 10% tariffs on another $300 billion in Chinese imports from Sept. 1.... Chinese bureaucrats were stunned by Trump's announcement, according to officials who've been involved in the negotiations." --s

Motoko Rich, et al., of the New York Times: "The long-simmering conflict [between Japan & South Korea] erupted into a full diplomatic crisis on Friday, when Japan threatened to slow down exports of materials essential to South Korean industries. By Saturday night, thousands of protesters marched in the streets of Seoul, accusing Japan of an 'economic invasion' and threatening an intelligence-sharing agreement that the United States considers crucial to monitoring North Korea's nuclear buildup. Washington has long relied on both countries to stand alongside it to help counter China's rise and the nuclear-armed North. But ... the Trump administration has been reluctant to get involved to repair the rift. President Trump said he might take some action if asked by both parties, but added that trying to referee the dispute would be 'like a full-time job.' And State Department officials had said they want the two countries to work it out on their own. Still, as tensions escalated in recent days, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo attempted on Friday to orchestrate a reconciliation at an Asian security conference attended by regional foreign ministers.... The two ministers stayed far apart, however, with Taro Kono, Japan's foreign minister, grimacing, and South Korea's, Kang Kyung-wha, turning away, stone-faced.... 'Trump has made it worse,' [said Michael] Green..., [director of Bush II's Asian affairs division of the National Security Council]. 'He himself has done nothing to create a sense that there is a team of allies in Asia.'"

Way Beyond the Beltway

BBC News: "Iran has seized another foreign tanker in the Gulf, state media reports claim. Iranian forces seized the Iraqi ship for 'smuggling fuel for some Arab countries' and detained seven sailors, according to the reports. Iraq's oil ministry has said it has no connection to the seized vessel and that it is working to gather information about it.... If confirmed, the Iraqi tanker would be the third foreign vessel to have been seized by Iran in recent weeks."

News Ledes

A Walk in the Park, American-Style. NBC 5 Chicago: "Seven people were wounded in a shooting Sunday as they gathered in Douglas Park on the West Side [of Chicago]. At about 1:20 a.m. Sunday, a group was standing in the park in the 2900 block of West Roosevelt Road when someone opened fire from a black Camaro, Chicago police said."

Fort Worth Star-Telegram: "A planned mass shooting at a Lubbock hotel was averted when a gunman's grandmother convinced him he needed to go to a hospital according to federal authorities. Authorities found an AK-47 in the suspect's hotel room, 17 magazines loaded with 7.62 ammunition, a black trench coat, multiple knives, black tactical pants, blac tactical gloves with the fingers cut off and a black T-shirt that said, 'Let 'Em Come.' William Patrick Williams, 19, of Lubbock, was arrested Thursday and charged on Friday with making false statements to a federally licensed firearms dealer."

The Commentariat -- August 4, 2019

Afternoon Update:

Rebecca Klar of the Hill: "Federal authorities are treating the shooting at an El Paso, Texas, Walmart that killed 20 people and wounded 26 more as a case of domestic terrorism and will pursue federal hate crime and firearm charges in connection with the massacre, officials said at a press conference Sunday. Patrick Wood Crusius, 21, was booked into El Paso County Jail early Sunday on capital murder charge, the El Paso Times reported. At the same Sunday morning press conference El Paso County District Attorney Jaime Esparza said his office would seek the death penalty." ...

... Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: Beto O'Rourke, "Cory Booker and Julián Castro, placed blame on Trump for his rhetoric [that encouraged the El Paso shooter]. Mrs. McC: I heard Rep. Tim O'Ryan on MSNBC do the same. I'm surprised & heartened that at least some Democrats are speaking truth to the racist-in-chief.

Trump: A Racist AND a Deadbeat. Kolten Parker of KSAT (San Antonio): "... El Paso officials have been critical of the president in recent months for his refusal to pay a $470,000 debt owed to the city for transportation and security services during his February campaign rally. For six months, the city has sent Trump's campaign invoices for services provided by city departments -- including police, buses, the health department and others -- but has not gotten a response, according to local media.... A local TV station reported two weeks before the shooting that Trump still hadn't paid the debt."

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Ben Collins of NBC News: "Investigators are examining a screed believed to have been posted online by the suspect in Saturday's fatal shooting at a Texas shopping mall an hour before the attack, senior law enforcement officials say. Investigators are 'reasonably confident' that the suspect, identified by police as Patrick Wood Crusius, 21, of Texas, posted the diatribe on the extremist online forum 8chan before the shooting.... The screed posted to an anonymous extremist message board railed against immigrants in Texas and pushed talking points about preserving European identity in America.... The writing presented itself as a low-cost, low preparation model for deadly attacks and envisioned the actions as part of a larger ideological war.... The author claimed to have developed those beliefs before Trump's presidency.... Law enforcement was already analyzing the document before the mass shooting began and had connected it to a person, but the writing didn't name a target, time, place, or use the suspect's name." ...

... Simon Romero, et al., of the New York Times: The authorities identified the gunman as Patrick Crusius, from a Dallas suburb. He was taken into custody after he surrendered to the police outside the Walmart. The authorities said they were investigating a manifesto Mr. Crusius, who is white, may have posted before the shooting, which described an attack in response to 'the Hispanic invasion of Texas.' 'Right now, we have a manifesto from this individual,' El Paso's police chief, Greg Allen, told reporters, though he said later that law enforcement officers were still not clear whether the gunman had posted the document. The manifesto the chief appeared to be referring to was an anti-immigrant online screed titled 'The Inconvenient Truth.' The post declares support for the gunman who killed 51 people in Christchurch, New Zealand; outlines fears about Hispanic people gaining power in the United States; and appears to discuss specific details about elements of the attack, including weapons.... 'Hispanics will take control of the local and state government of my beloved Texas, changing policy to better suit their needs,' the manifesto said. It added that politicians of both parties are to blame for the United States 'rotting from the inside out,' and that 'the heavy Hispanic population in Texas will make us a Democrat stronghold.'" ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Assuming investigators are right about the source of the screed, this mass murderer may or may not have harbored such ideas prior to 2015, but Trump certainly exacerbated the murderer's hate-filled belief system. Trump's fingerprints might not be on the rifle, but they're on Crusius' forehead. ...

... Mary Papenfuss of the Huffington Post: "'We've had a rise in hate crimes every single one of the last three years, during an administration where you have a president who's called Mexicans rapists and criminals,' said the former Texas congressman and El Paso native [Beto O'Rourke]. 'He is a racist, and he stokes racism in this country,' O'Rourke added. 'It does not just offend our sensibilities; it fundamentally changes the character of this country and it leads to violence.'" Thanks to PD Pepe for the link. ...

... David Atkins of the Washington Monthly: "While offering the usual thoughts, prayers and condemnations of the violence itself, Republicans have for the most part been remarkably quiet not only about the crisis of gun violence but also about the motives of the shooter.... Fox News tried to blame video games.... But of course, the only Republican politician who really matters is the one whose name spelled in firearms the killer's twitter account allegedly liked in a tweet: ... Donald Trump.... Trump's ... latest tweet (before issuing the usual pabulum 'thoughts and prayers') is as follows: 'Today's shooting in El Paso, Texas, was not only tragic, it was an act of cowardice. I know that I stand with everyone in this Country to condemn today's hateful act. There are no reasons or excuses that will ever justify killing innocent people.' These are not the words of a man disgusted with the terrorist's motives. These are the words of a man disappointed in his tactics. No one says 'there are no reasons or excuses that will ever justify' unless they sympathize with the frustrations of the individual.... Moreover, it's pretty obvious that these aren't Trump's authentic words at all. When Trump actually cares about something, he tweets about it authentically and spontaneously, usually with bizarre random capitalization, grammar errors and misspellings." ...

... Richard Parker of El Paso in a New York Times op-ed: "... the El Paso massacre ... was the inevitable byproduct of the Trump era's anti-immigrant, and anti-Latino invective, which with its pervasive, vile racism has poisoned our nation.... The Trump era ... has brought us walls, internment camps and children in cages. The massacre is the outcome I have feared for years now, and I can't help but feel that its genesis lies with the president of the United States." ...

... There Was This. "The Remark Drew a Chuckle from the President"* William Cummings of USA Today, May 9: "... Donald Trump was tickled Wednesday when an audience member at a Florida rally suggested shooting migrants arriving at the U.S.-Mexican border. Trump was bemoaning the legal protections afforded migrants and espousing the need for a border wall when he asked rhetorically, 'How do you stop these people?' 'Shoot them!' someone shouted from the Panama City Beach crowd.... The remark drew a chuckle from the president, who shook his head, pointed in the audience member's direction and said, 'Only in the Panhandle you can get away with that statement.' 'Only in the Panhandle,"' he repeated to laughs and cheers from the crowd." ...

... April Glaser of Slate: "The document [attributed to the El Paso shooter] had been uploaded to the notorious, unmoderated message board 8chan at 10:15 a.m. local time, and it included a request: 'Do your part and spread this brothers!'... Soon after it was first posted on 8chan, the manifesto could be found On 4chan, another message board with scant rules about what people can or cannot share. And not long after that, it was circulating as images on Twitter and Facebook and easily findable in a Google image search.... The involvement of 8chan is becoming a familiar detail in cases of white-supremacist violence. The El Paso shooting appears to be the second one since the Christchurch massacre to draw from that killer's playbook.... [The] shootings [in Christchurch, New Zealand, Poway, California, & El Paso] appeared to have been designed to go viral -- a horrific act would catch the world's attention, and a manifesto would deliver the hate-filled payload. An anonymous, meme-filled internet backwater, 8chan has long been a place for white supremacists to indoctrinate others -- mostly young white men -- into bigoted ideologies.... Whatever is too gruesome for 4chan finds a home on 8chan. That now includes enthusiasm for a white ethnostate.... Many people come to the politically incorrect boards of 4chan and 8chan from video-game communities, where players looking to laugh at an abasing joke or chat about violent games ... can find friends."

Cora Currier of The Intercept: "A principal goal of the Trump administration's policy at the U.S.-Mexico border -- and in Central America ... -- has been to get other governments to handle the increase in migrants seeking to enter the United States.... Another way to describe these efforts is what the U.S. security establishment has long referred to as 'pushing out the border.' It's not a project that's new to the Trump administration, and it's not one that's unique to the United States, as journalist Todd Miller expounds in his latest book, 'Empire of Borders: The Expansion of the U.S. Border Around the World.'" --s

This could be the headline of at least half the stories about Trump's tweets & chopper chatter: "Trump Defends His Recent Erratic Decision with Lies." Case in point: Tax Axelrod of the Hill reports on Trump's latest fantastical tweets defending his brilliant trade-war strategy against China. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Lee Moran of the Huffington Post: "Fox News' Neil Cavuto wasted no time in fact-checking ... Donald Trump's latest claims about the tariffs his administration has imposed (and has promised to ramp up) on products imported into the U.S. from China. Trump on Friday told White House reporters that 'the tariffs are not being paid for by our people' but 'by China' because 'of devaluation and because they're pumping money in.' 'Remember this, our country is taking in billions and billions of dollars from China,' the president added. 'We never took in 10 cents from China. And out of that many billions of dollars, we're taking a part of it and giving it to the farmers because they've been targeted by China. The farmers, they come out totally whole,' [Trump claimed.] 'I don't know where to begin here,' responded Cavuto.... 'But just to be clarifying, China isn't paying these tariffs. You are. You know, indirectly and sometimes directly,' he explained.... '... this latest round of tariffs that kick in on September 1, on $300 billion worth of goods at 10%, that will most directly be felt by consumers directly,' he added. 'Because that happens on almost entirely consumer items rather than industrial-related items.... Our governments don't pay these things, you do, one way or another.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Maureen Dowd: "White male privilege is out of fashion these days. Yet we are awash in nostalgia for it. Donald Trump has built a political ideology on nostalgia. And Quentin Tarantino has built a movie ideology on nostalgia. In The Los Angeles Times, Mary McNamara observed that the moral of Tarantino's new fairy tale, 'Once Upon A Time In -- Hollywood,' is, 'Who doesn't miss the good old days when cars had fins and white men were the heroes of everything?'... In The New Yorker, Richard Brody called the movie ... 'obscenely regressive,' a phrase that could easily be applied to the man in the Oval.... Both the Tarantino creation and the Trump creation feature scripted tough-guy dialogue, rough treatment of women and slurs against Mexicans. Trump's time machine is a vicious and vertiginous journey, all about punching down, pulpy fictions, making brown and black people scapegoats and casting women back into a crimped era of fewer reproductive rights. Trump has inverted all the old American ideals, soiling the image of our country in the world and reshaping it around his grievances and inadequacies. He is a faux tough guy who lets other people do the fighting for him, a needy brat who never accepts responsibility for his actions, an oaf with no trace of courage, class or chivalry." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: MoDo's attempts to find the nexus between cultural inflection points usually fall flat, but I think she got it right this time.

Another Embarrassing Trumpisode. In Which Trump Pretends He Has Black Friends. Linda Givetash of NBC News: "The U.S. government warned Sweden of 'negative consequences' as it advocated for rapper ASAP Rocky during his trial for assault charges in Stockholm this week, according to a pair of letters released by the Swedish Prosecution Authority. Rocky was released from jail on Friday pending the verdict, with ... Donald Trump celebrating the news on Twitter. 'It was a Rocky Week, get home ASAP A$AP!' Trump said. The rapper landed back on U.S. soil Saturday, leaving behind him the looming verdict in an episode that has led to unexpected tension between the U.S. and its European ally.... A final judgment in the case is expected to be reached Aug. 14."

Kyla Mandel of ThinkProgress: "Interior Secretary David Bernhardt's ethics recusal will expire on Saturday. The ethics pledge banned Bernhardt from decisions involving his former firm's clients for two years. Bernhardt was also not able to meet with these companies, unless five or more other stakeholders were present and nothing relating specifically to the companies was discussed.... Prior to joining the Interior Department in 2017, Bernhardt worked as a lobbyist for the oil and gas industry.... He has so many potential conflicts of interest to avoid that he carries around a card listing all of them so he doesn't forget. A recent analysis by the Center for American Progress found that Bernhardt has more conflicts of interest than any other Trump Cabinet nominee." --s

Ole MacNunes Had a Farm, E-I-E-I-O. Julia Arciga of the Daily Beast: "Rep. Devin Nunes' (R-CA) campaign is suing a group of people who called him a 'fake farmer', claiming the defendants were coordinating with 'dark money' groups to hurt his campaign.... Prior to the lawsuit, the group claimed Nunes couldn't call himself a farmer since he no longer farms -- but a state judge ruled that the representative can continue to use the designation. The campaign also claimed the group was working with various political groups and The Fresno Bee's parent company, McClatchy, in a campaign against him.... The lawsuit, filed Thursday, comes after the representative sued a parody Twitter account claiming to be his cow, and McClatchy."

Presidential Race 2020

** Jonathan Chait: "Of all the institutions and norms of American government, none is more rickety than the voting process. The system's legitimacy hangs on the public's willingness to trust the accuracy of a system that is hardly a system at all.... Even more alarming than the implied weaknesses in the voting system is the political context in which they exist. President Trump has frequently either minimized or outright denied Russia's culpability in the 2016 email hacks (which Trump himself was exploiting at the time).... Republican indifference to the Russian threat gives an indication of how the party would respond in the event of a compromised election.... [Mitch McConnell] has already proved that he would prefer for his party to win with Russian help than to lose without it." ...

    ... Mrs. McCrabbie: You might think Chait is making a Chicken Little argument here, but he presents too much GOP history to dismiss his concerns. I would be horrified, but not completely surprised, if armed U.S. marshalls, by order of President Harris, had to storm the White House in late January 2021 & remove the fat bastard by force.

Matthew Choi of Politico: "Sen. Bernie Sanders defended his rival 2020 Democratic hopeful Elizabeth Warren on Friday after Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyoming) went after Warren for advocating a no-first-strike nuclear policy.... Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, lambasted Warren the following morning for her remarks.... 'Which American cities and how many American citizens are you willing to sacrifice with your policy of forcing the US to absorb a nuclear attack before we can strike back?' Cheney wrote Wednesday on Twitter. Friday afternoon, Sanders shot back at Cheney, sparking a heated back and forth. 'Taking national security advice from a Cheney has already caused irreparable damage to our country,' Sanders tweeted. 'We don't need any more, thanks.' Cheney responded by calling Sanders a 'commie' who "is ok with U.S. getting attacked first.'... Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) also chimed in on Friday, tweeting a gif of her exasperated face and the message: [']My face when "*Liz Cheney* of all people tries to offer foreign policy takes, as if an entire generation hasn't lived through the Cheneys sending us into war since we were kids.'"

Marina Pitofsky of the Onion Hill: "Michael Avenatti is reportedly considering a White House bid after declaring that he would not join the slate of Democratic candidates running for president in 2020.... Earlier this year, Avenatti was arrested in New York for an alleged $20 million extortion scheme against Nike. In April, federal prosecutors in California indicted the lawyer on three dozen criminal counts, including allegedly stealing money from clients and lying about his income to regulators. Avenatti has pleaded not guilty to all charges." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Nancy Cook of the Onion Politico: "The Trump 2020 campaign has been quietly reaching out to prominent African Americans about joining its latest coalition, intended to boost Republican support in the black community. The effort comes just as the president capped off a month filled with racially divisive language and Twitter taunts aimed at House Oversight Chairman Elijah Cummings and four freshman congresswomen of color." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Mrs. McCrabbie: We have never had an American president whose last name was difficult for English-readers to spell. The toughest might be Roosevelt (Dutch) & Eisenhower (anglicized German).

Presidential Races 2016 & 2020. Danielle McLean of ThinkProgress: "Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) claimed during Wednesday night's presidential debate that President Donald Trump won Michigan in 2016 because Republicans and Russians worked to suppress the votes of African Americans. Election experts say he's onto something.... Trump won the state by 10,704 votes." --s

Steven Greenhouse in a New York Times op-ed: "... the United States suffers from what I call 'anti-worker exceptionalism.' Academics debate why American workers are in many ways worse off than their counterparts elsewhere, but there is overriding agreement on one reason: Labor unions are weaker in the United States than in other industrial nations.... In no other industrial nation do corporations fight so hard to keep out unions.... Numerous studies have found that an important cause of America's soaring income inequality is the decline of labor unions -- and the concomitant decline in workers' ability to extract more of the profit and prosperity from the corporations they work for.... The consequences are enormous, not only for wages and income inequality, but also for our politics and policymaking and for the many Americans who are mistreated at work.... The diminished power of unions and workers has skewed American politics, helping give billionaires and corporations inordinate sway over America's politics and policymaking." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Greenhouse doesn't mention the confederate Supremes, who exult in quashing union rights, making them the five old boys who have done the most to maintain income inequality.

Taylor Hatmaker of The Daily Beast: "As many tech giants grow skittish about cashing in on the surveillance boom, one company [Anduril Industries] helmed by an industry iconoclast [Palmer Luckey] seems custom-built for Big Brother. The 26-year-old is best known as the designer of the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset that shepherded the futuristic technology into the mainstream. In 2014, Luckey sold his 100-person virtual reality company to Facebook for $3 billion ... after The Daily Beast revealed that he was bankrolling an unofficial pro-Trump group dedicated to 'shitposting' and circulating anti-Clinton memes.... And far from shying away from politics post-Facebook, Luckey leaned into the #MAGA-friendly ideology -- donating big money to pro-Trump outfits, and meeting with Trump cabinet officials, all while his company quietly picks up military contracts and expands its work with border patrol." --s

Hannah Natanson of the Washington Post: "It was common knowledge that the founding nuns [of the Georgetown Visitation Convent school for girls in Washington, D.C.,] owned slaves, but school lore has held that the sisters allowed enslaved children to attend Saturday school and defied the law by teaching them how to read. The 65-page report, which the school has made available online, details the businesslike efficiency with which the nuns sold scores of enslaved people to pay off debts and fund new buildings. Georgetown Visitation sisters owned at least 107 enslaved people,including men, women and children, from a year after its founding until 1862, when the federal government made slavery illegal in the District, the report found.... News of the research and its findings was published Friday by New York University professor Rachel Swarns in an opinion piece for the New York Times. The Catholic Standard ran a story about the report in November." (Also linked yesterday.)

Damian Carrington of the Guardian: "Coal, oil and gas get more than $370bn (£305bn) a year in support, compared with $100bn for renewables, [an] International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) report found. Just 10-30% of the fossil fuel subsidies [switched to renewables] would pay for a global transition to clean energy, the IISD said.... 'Almost everywhere, renewables are so close to being competitive that [a 10-30% subsidy swap] tips the balance, and turns them from a technology that is slowly growing to one that is instantly the most viable and can replace really large amounts of generation,' said Richard Bridle of the IISD. 'It goes from being marginal to an absolute no-brainer.'" --s

You Too May Be an Unregistered Lobbyist. Vivan Wang of the New York Times: "When Kat Sullivan rented a billboard last year in upstate New York to call for stronger protections against child sex abusers, she believed she was engaging in the democratic process, using her own time and money to make her voice as an abuse survivor heard.So she was shocked when state regulators afterward sent her a letter ordering her to register as a lobbyist. New York State defines a lobbyist as, in part, someone who spends money to influence lawmakers. But Ms. Sullivan, a registered nurse, has argued that she was exercising her rights as a citizen.... The state's ethics commission ... has warned that she could be guilty of a misdemeanor and fined more than $40,000 if she continues to refuse to register.... Few unpaid advocates spend more than $5,000 on an issue, the annual threshold for registering as a lobbyist in New York. Ms. Sullivan has said that she spent $14,000 on three billboards, plus about $2,000 on a website.... Federal law defines lobbyists by the percentage of time that they spend contacting lawmakers; New York defines them by money earned and spent. Other states have lower or higher thresholds, or exclude volunteers.... 'Almost every jurisdiction I can think of is grappling at some level with how much is covered and at what threshold,' Beth Rotman, [of] Common Cause ... said...."

Way Beyond the Beltway

China. Nick Schager of The Daily Beast: "One Child Nation is a ... heartrending documentary [that] examines ... China's one-child policy, which functioned as a systematic attack on its female population -- and which resulted in collateral damage on an international scale. In effect from 1979 to 2015, China's policy placed strict guidelines on reproduction in order to curb population growth.... The law outlined strict punishment for non-compliance: the destruction of homes, forfeiture of property and valuables, and steep fines. Those who suffered those penalties, however, got off easy, since local Family Planning Officials -- empowered by the Nationalist Party -- also had the authority to abduct women, tie them up, and force them to undergo sterilizations and abortions as late as 8-9 months into their pregnancies." Attention: disturbing content. --s

Russia. AP: "Police cracked down hard on an unsanctioned demonstration in Moscow for a second weekend in a row, detaining about 600 people protesting the exclusion of some independent and opposition candidates from September city council elections. The issue taps growing dissatisfaction with a political environment dominated by the Kremlin-aligned United Russia party, in which dissenting voices are marginalized, ignored or repressed. An arrest-monitoring group, OVD-Info, said 685 people were detained Saturday. The Russian Interior Ministry said the number was about 600. The detentions came a week after authorities arrested nearly 1,400 people at a similar protest."

News Ledes

Mass Murder America. Guardian: "Nine people have been killed and at least 16 injured in a shooting early on Sunday in Dayton, Ohio, police have said. Police said the suspect was shot and killed by responding officers.... The shooting came hours after at least 20 people were killed in another mass shooting at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas." --s ...

... According to CNN, which is liveblogging developments, the motive for this mass murder is still unknown. In later updates, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said the shooter was "a young, white male," & Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley said police responded to the shooter "in less than one minute." Mrs. McC: So in less than a minute, this guy killed nine people & injured 27 others. There is no excuse for any civilian to have access to a weapon that can shoot 36 people in less than a minute. Update: "in 24 seconds." ...

     ... CNN Updates: "Authorities have found writings linked to Dayton, Ohio, shooting suspect Connor Betts that show he had an interest in killing people, two federal law enforcement sources told CNN. A preliminary assessment of the writings, found during the execution of a search warrant, did not indicate any racial or political motive, the sources said.... The City of Dayton has released the names of the nine deceased victims in the shooting early Sunday. Suspect Connor Betts' sister was identified as one of those killed."

The Commentariat -- August 3, 2019

Afternoon Update:

Marina Pitofsky of the Onion Hill: "Michael Avenatti is reportedly considering a White House bid after declaring that he would not join the slate of Democratic candidates running for president in 2020.... Earlier this year, Avenatti was arrested in New York for an alleged $20 million extortion scheme against Nike. In April, federal prosecutors in California indicted the lawyer on three dozen criminal counts, including allegedly stealing money from clients and lying about his income to regulators. Avenatti has pleaded not guilty to all charges."

Nancy Cook of the Onion Politico: "The Trump 2020 campaign has been quietly reaching out to prominent African Americans about joining its latest coalition, intended to boost Republican support in the black community. The effort comes just as th president capped off a month filled with racially divisive language and Twitter taunts aimed at House Oversight Chairman Elijah Cummings and four freshman congresswomen of color."

This could be the headline of half the stories about Trump's tweets & chopper chatter: "Trump Defends Recent Erratic Decision with Lies." Case in point: Tax Axelrod of the Hill reports on Trump's latest fantastical tweets defending his brilliant trade-war strategy against China. ...

... Lee Moran of the Huffington Post: "Fox News' Neil Cavuto wasted no time in fact-checking ... Donald Trump's latest claims about the tariffs his administration has imposed (and has promised to ramp up) on products imported into the U.S. from China. Trump on Friday told White House reporters that 'the tariffs are not being paid for by our people' but 'by China' because 'of devaluation and because they're pumping money in.' 'Remember this, our country is taking in billions and billions of dollars from China,' the president added. 'We never took in 10 cents from China. And out of that many billions of dollars, we're taking a part of it and giving it to the farmers because they've been targeted by China. The farmers, they come out totally whole,' [Trump claimed.] 'I don't know where to begin here,' responded Cavuto.... 'But just to be clarifying, China isn't paying these tariffs. You are. You know, indirectly and sometimes directly,' he explained.... '... this latest round of tariffs that kick in on September 1, on $300 billion worth of goods at 10%, that will most directly be felt by consumers directly,' he added. 'Because that happens on almost entirely consumer items rather than industrial-related items.... Our governments don't pay these things, you do, one way or another.'"

Hannah Natanson of the Washington Post: "It was common knowledge that the founding nuns [of the Georgetown Visitation Convent school for girls in Washington, D.C.,] owned slaves, but school lore has held that the sisters allowed enslaved children to attend Saturday school and defied the law by teaching them how to read. The 65-page report, which the school has made available online, details the businesslike efficiency with which the nuns sold scores of enslaved people to pay off debts and fund new buildings. Georgetown Visitation sisters owned at least 107 enslaved people, including men, women and children, from a year after its founding until 1862, when the federal government made slavery illegal in the District, the report found.... News of the research and its findings was published Friday by New York University professor Rachel Swarns in an opinion piece for the New York Times. The Catholic Standard ran a story about the report in November."

~~~~~~~~~~

This Is Not an Advertisement. I am definitely not trying to sell you anything here, but Amazon Prime offers subscriptions to access the digital version of the Washington Post that is half the price of the Post's online offer ($5 vs. $10 a month). I broke down & signed up yesterday. You have to be an Amazon Prime member ($13/month) to get the cut rate on the WashPo, so if you aren't going to use Amazon for other purchases or watch Prime TV, it's a loser. The student rate for Amazon Prime is half the standard rate. I will link to non-subscription alternatives to WashPo stories I link here when they are available. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie

Your Friday Afternoon Twitter Dump:

Our great Republican Congressman John Ratcliffe is being treated very unfairly by the LameStream Media. Rather than going through months of slander and libel, I explained to John how miserable it would be for him and his family to deal with these people.... ...John has therefore decided to stay in Congress where he has done such an outstanding job representing the people of Texas, and our Country. I will be announcing my nomination for DNI shortly. -- Donald Trump, in tweet today ...

... ** Another One of the Best Nominations Explodes. Charlie Savage, et al., of the New York Times: "President Trump on Friday abruptly dropped his plan to nominate Representative John Ratcliffe, Republican of Texas, as the nation's top intelligence official, following bipartisan questions about his qualifications and pushback over whether he had exaggerated his résumé. Mr. Ratcliffe, an outspoken supporter of Mr. Trump, has come under intense scrutiny since the president declared Sunday on Twitter that the lawmaker was his pick to succeed Dan Coats, who is stepping down as director of national intelligence on Aug. 15. The selection generated scant enthusiasm among senators of both parties who would have been decided whether to confirm him. Mr. Trump&'s announcement that Mr. Ratcliffe would not be his nominee after all, also made on Twitter, spoke bitterly of the attention Mr. Ratcliffe's claims about his experience as a federal prosecutor quickly received from the news media.... The backtrack leaves Mr. Trump without any obvious candidate to fill one of the country's most important national-security jobs, heightening scrutiny on what will happen with Sue Gordon, Mr. Coats's No. 2. Mr. Trump has already decided not to allow her to rise to the role of acting director of national intelligence when Mr. Coats steps down, according to people familiar with his plans." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: A normal president would have his potential nominees vetted before announcing their nominations. Trump, however, does no vetting & picks the Fox "News" denizen he likes best, leaving it to media to do the vetting his staff should have done. Then he complains that the "LameStreamMedia" treated his lame-stream nominee "very unfairly." But nothing is ever Trump's fault. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Several days ago, I wrote that Ratcliffe was the Chief of Anti-Terrorism and National Security for the Eastern District of Texas during the Bush II administration, a factoid I learned from Ratcliffe's Wikipedia page. According to Ali Velshi of MSNBC, that can't be true, as there was never any such position.

     ... Stupid Update. Later That Same Day ... Brett Samuels of the Hill: "President Trump on Friday defended the vetting process at the White House, telling the news media that he allows it to do much of the heavy lifting while simultaneously blaming it for the withdrawal of his nominee to lead intelligence agencies.... 'I get a name, I give it out to the press and you vet for me. A lot of time you do a very good job. Not always,' Trump told reporters. 'If you look at the vetting process for the White House, it is very good, but you are part of the vetting process. I give out a name to the press and you vet for me, we save a lot of money that way." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Especially for someone nominated for a high-level position in the intelligence apparatus, this makes no sense; that is, Trump's placing vetting responsibility on the press is just an excuse to cover for his chaotic "management" of the administration. Intel agencies, at least theoretically, know more about a person with (supposed) intel experience than is available to the public & the press. The agencies also have access to personal information that is not publicly available. ...

... Julian Barnes & Charlie Savage of the New York Times: "The White House is planning to block Sue Gordon, the nation's No. 2 intelligence official, from rising to the role of acting director of national intelligence when Dan Coats steps down this month, according to people familiar with the Trump administration's plans.... Mr. Trump did not allow Ms. Gordon to personally deliver a recent intelligence briefing after she arrived at the White House, according to a person familiar with the matter. A federal statute says that if the position of director of national intelligence becomes vacant, the deputy director -- currently Ms. Gordon -- shall serve as acting director. But there appears to be a loophole: The law gives the White House much more flexibility in choosing who to appoint as the acting deputy if the No. 2 position is vacant, said Robert M. Chesney, a law professor at the University of Texas.... On Friday, Senator Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia, who is the committee's vice chairman, said that the law was 'quite clear' that the acting role goes to the deputy when the director of national intelligence leaves and that Ms. Gordon had the Senate's confidence." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... digby writes a toljaso column in which she outlines the steps in the usual Trump nomination "process." "... as we have seen time and time again, this usually ends up hurting the person offered the position.... The White House non-vetting process reveals scandals candidates were involved in they hid before. Some might never had been uncovered until they were put in the spotlight.... When writing about this 5 whole days ago, I found out that over 60 people Trump nominated had to withdraw. There is a whole page dedicated to it. With photos and everything! List of Donald Trump nominees who have withdrawn" ...

... Betsy Woodruff & Erin Banco of the Daily Beast: "The Trump administration is taking inventory of many of America's top spies, The Daily Beast has learned. The White House recently asked the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) for a list of all its employees at the federal government's top pay scale who have worked there for 90 days or more, according to two sources familiar with the request. The request appears to be part of the White House's search for a temporary director of national intelligence -- a prospect that raises concerns in some quarters about political influence over the intelligence community."

Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "President Trump on Friday signed a sweeping budget deal that increases federal spending and lifts the nation's borrowing limit, the White House said. The new law suspends the debt ceiling through July 2021, removing the threat of a default during the 2020 elections, and raises domestic and military spending by more than $320 billion compared to existing law over the next two fiscal years. Trump signed the measure without fanfare at the White House one day after the Senate voted 67-28 to send it to his desk. The House last week passed the budget package by a vote of 284-149 before starting its August recess." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Brett Samuels of the Hill: President* "Trump on Friday morning reacted to reports that a Baltimore home owned by [Rep. Elijah] Cummings had been robbed following days of attacks from the president on the congressman and the city [of Baltimore]. 'Really bad news! The Baltimore house of Elijah Cummings was robbed. Too bad!' Trump [wrote in a tweet apparently meant to mock Cummings]. Cummings in a statement on Friday confirmed the incident and said he scared the intruder away by yelling before they were [Mrs. McC: s/b "he was"] able to enter the residence.... Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley on Friday pushed back against ... Trump's tweet...[: 'This is so unnecessary,' [she tweeted.]" (Also linked yesterday.)

Jonathan Chait: “When he was running for president, Donald Trump threatened to single out Amazon for retribution. 'If I become president, oh do they have problems,' he said.... He is carrying out that threat. The White House has ordered the Defense Department to reexamine a $10 billion cloud-computing contract 'because of concerns that the deal would go to Amazon,' the Washington Post reports. It's not yet possible to prove that Trump is directing this decision as punishment for Jeff Bezos's ownership of the Post.... Trump's Mafia style of management, which the Mueller report chronicles, is designed to avoid leaving a paper trail that would incriminate the boss.... But Trump ... has made it abundantly clear both that the Post is the source of his hatred of Amazon, and that his policy grounds for punishing Amazon are pretexts. Trump calls the paper the 'Amazon Washington Post,' and habitually intermingles attacks on Amazon with his periodic rants against the Post's reporting[.]... Trump is trying to grasp at of any lever he can use to punish Amazon for the Post';s reporting of him.... Trump's oligarchic methods are simply taken for granted to the point where it barely generates outrage any more when he uses the power of the federal government to punish owners of independent media."

Jerry Dunleavy of the Washington Examiner: "'Where we go one, we go all.' That popular slogan of the far-right QAnon conspiracy movement was said from the podium of Thursday's Trump rally by online personality and founder of the 'Walk Away Movement' Brandon Straka as he warmed up the crowd a few hours before President Trump took the stage in Cincinnati, Ohio. Earlier that day, a 15-page FBI memo from the Phoenix field office warning of possible dangers stemming from fringe online conspiracy theories specifically named QAnon as a source of concern.... Straka told the Washington Examiner he is not a supporter of the QAnon movement.... Straka complained about the media coverage of his speech, saying that 'the liberal media are blatant liars' for calling him a QAnon supporter." Mrs. McC: I saw video of Straka's rallying cry, and the crowd cheered. It's such a weird sentence construction, we can probably assume many of Trump's followers at the rally were QAnon enthusiasts.

Eliana Johnson of Politico: "... Donald Trump has signed an executive order imposing sanctions on Russia for its use of chemical weapons in the 2018 attack on the Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, according to two U.S. officials. The Trump administration imposed a round of sanctions last year, as required by a 1991 law. The same law requires the president to impose a second round of sanctions if he cannot determine that the state in question has stopped using chemical weapons -- and U.S. intelligence agencies were unable to make that determination with regard to Russia, which continues to deny responsibility for the attack on the Skripals. But the president, who has been loath to antagonize Russian President Vladimir Putin, dragged his feet on imposing the second round of sanctions. En route to a rally in Cincinnati on Thursday, he continued to minimize the threat of Russian interference in U.S. elections. Asked by a reporter whether Russia is continuing to meddle in American elections, Trump responded, 'You don't really believe this. Do you believe this?'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Asawin Suebsaeng of the Daily Beast: "Long before Donald Trump began his ongoing war of words with the 'corrupt city' of Baltimore, he hosted a pastor from there [-- the Rev. Donte Hickman, of Southern Baptist Church --] at the White House for a signing ceremony during which he promised to help rescue ailing, largely black urban areas around the country. Nearly a year later, the pastor is still waiting for the president to follow through on that pledge; or, as he put it, 'to put up or shut up.'... If Trump has done anything to help the city he's spent the past several days trashing, that would be news to the pastor who once stood beside him." Mrs. McC: On the other hand, Trump & GOP legislators did give Trump a huge tax cut & the U.S. a correspondingly huge deficit.

Rachel Frazin of the Hill: "The Trump administration is reportedly planning to withdraw thousands of troops from Afghanistan in a new deal negotiated with the Taliban Thursday. The Washington Post reported that the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan would be reduced to between 8,000 and 9,000 from the current 14,000, citing U.S. officials. In exchange, the Taliban would reportedly have to begin negotiating a peace deal with the Afghan government; the deal would also involve a cease-fire and a Taliban renunciation of al Qaeda. The proposal is the result of months of talks between the Taliban and Zalmay Khalilzad, an Afghan-born American diplomat, according to the Post." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Robin Wright of the New Yorker: "Last month, amid a rapid-fire escalation in tensions between Washington and Tehran, the Iranian Foreign Minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, received an unexpected invitation -- to meet ... Donald Trump in the Oval Office. The diplomatic overture was made by Senator Rand Paul.... During an hour-long conversation, Zarif offered Paul ideas about how to end the nuclear impasse and address Trump's concerns.... Paul proposed that the Iranian diplomat lay out the same ideas to Trump in person.... Zarif told Paul that the decision to meet Trump in the Oval Office was not his to make; he would have to consult with Tehran.... They did not approve a meeting -- at this time.... On July 31st, with no breakthrough on the horizon, the Trump Administration sanctioned Zarif for 'reprehensible' behavior, for having links to the Revolutionary Guard..., and for functioning 'as a propaganda minister, not a foreign minister.'... On his Twitter account..., [Paul] shared an Associated Press story about the Administration's move against Zarif, above which he wrote, 'If you sanction diplomats you'll have less diplomacy.'"

Jacqueline Thomsen of the Hill: "A federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled Friday against a Trump administration policy that would only allow migrants who enter the U.S. through legal ports of entry to claim asylum, the latest blow against the administration's agenda. U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss, an Obama appointee, threw out the policy, finding it to be 'inconsistent with' the Immigration and Nationality Act. The policy has been already blocked by a federal judge in San Francisco and is now being appealed before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Quinta Jurecic in a New York Times op-ed: "The [Mueller] report tells what is probably one of the biggest stories of our lifetimes -- and understanding that narrative as a narrative can help make sense of the confused political moment.... The first half of the report -- on efforts by the Russian government to interfere in the 2016 election -- is a spy thriller, a high-stakes caper with greed, dirty deals and intrigue straight out of a Cold War potboiler. The second half -- on President Trump's efforts to obstruct Mr. Mueller's investigation -- is a Shakespearean drama about deception and power. But at its core, the 448-page volume is a detective story.... [But] the Mueller report may turn out to be more of a film noir than anything else. The detective successfully uncovers the plot, only to discover that the society around him is too rotten to do anything about it."

Nick Miroff & Damian Paletta & of the Washington Post: Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) "... held up the confirmation of a White House budget official [Michael Wooten] this week in an attempt to obtain sensitive information about border wall contracts he has been trying to steer to a major donor, according to emails obtained by The Washington Post.... In recent months, Cramer has touted his preferred construction firm, North Dakota-based Fisher Industries, and campaign finance records show the senator has received thousands of dollars in contributions from company chief executive Tommy Fisher and his family members.... The North Dakota senator has repeatedly promoted Fisher, and Trump too has joined the effort, pitching the company in meetings at the White House and aboard Air Force One that have troubled military commanders and Department of Homeland Security officials.... Despite Cramer's efforts to influence and the president's endorsement, Fisher was not picked by the Army Corps in recent rounds of bidding.... During previous bids, the Army Corps said the company's design did not meet its requirements and lacked regulatory approvals. DHS officials also told the Army Corps in March that Fisher's work on a barrier project in San Diego came in late and over budget." The Hill has a summary of the WashPo report here.

Presidential Race 2020. Patrick Condon of the Minneapolis Star Tribune: "Sen. Amy Klobuchar's campaign said Friday that she has met the requirements to participate in the third and fourth Democratic presidential debates[.] The Democratic National Committee set both polling and fundraising thresholds that candidates must hit in order to make the debate stage in September and October. Klobuchar previously reached at least 2% support in four early-state or national polls; now, her campaign said, the Minnesota Democrat also has reached 130,000 individual donors to her campaign." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Thanks, Supremes! Tom McCarthy of the Guardian: "US election jurisdictions with histories of egregious voter discrimination have been purging voter rolls at a rate 40% beyond the national average, according to a watchdog report released on Thursday. At least 17 million voters were purged nationwide between 2016 and 2018, according to a study by the Brennan Center for Justice. The number was basically unchanged from the previous two-year period. While the rate of voter purges elsewhere has declined slowly, jurisdictions released from federal oversight by a watershed 2013 supreme court ruling had purge rates 'significantly higher' than jurisdictions not previously subjected to oversight, the Brennan Center found in a previous report. That trend has continued, the watchdog said, with the disproportionate purging of voters resulting in an estimated 1.1 million fewer voters between 2016 and 2018. Voter purges accelerated in the United States with the 2013 Shelby County v Holder ruling which released counties with histories of voter discrimination from federal oversight imposed by the 1965 Voting Rights Act." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: The voters' worst enemy is not the self-serving southern Republican legislator plotting to deprive Democratic-leaning voters of the franchise but the high-and-mighty Supreme Court confederates who are protecting the state legislator. The Robert Court is a shameful throwback to an anti-democratic status system.

Beyond the Beltway

California. Chelcey Adami & Kate Cimini of the Salinas Californian in USA Today: "The gunman who opened fire on unsuspecting festivalgoers in Gilroy on Sunday killed himself, the Santa Clara Coroner's Office found. The gunman shot himself in the mouth and died by suicide, a representative of the coroner's office said Friday. Earlier in the investigation, Gilroy police said they had "engaged" the shooter, Santino William Legan, and it was widely believed that police had shot and killed Legan. Legan gunned down three others at the festival before he died."

New York. Ashley Southall & William Rashbaum of the New York Times: "Five years after Eric Garner died in police custody and ignited a national outcry, a police administrative judge recommended on Friday that the officer who placed him in a chokehold during the botched arrest should be fired, according to a person with knowledge of the decision. The judge's decision sets in motion the final stage of a long legal and political battle over the fate of the officer, Daniel Pantaleo, who has become for many critics of the department an emblem of what they see as overly aggressive policing in black and Hispanic neighborhoods.... Mayor Bill de Blasio, a Democrat running for president, has resisted pushing for the officer's dismissal for years, saying he was respecting due process. He was heckled at a national debate on Wednesday night by protesters shouting 'Fire Pantaleo,' and vowed that Mr. Garner's family would soon receive justice. The judge's recommendation comes two weeks after Attorney General William P. Barr announced that the Justice Department would not seek a federal indictment against the officer on civil rights charges, ending five years of internal debate among federal prosecutors." It will be up to New York's police commissioner James O'Neil to decide Pantaleo's fate. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: The story has been updated, adding the byline of Ali Watkins, and including an account of a press conference Mayor de Blasio gave Friday in which he announced he could not say anything! “'Today, for the first time in these long five years, the system of justice is working,' Mr. de Blasio said. He continued, 'I want to remind everyone, this is an ongoing legal matter, so there's very little I can add.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Puerto Rico. Frances Robles & Patricia Mazzei of the New York Times: “As the clock ticked toward 5 p.m. on Friday, when Ricardo A. Rosselló was to step down as Puerto Rico's governor, no one knew who the next governor would be. Not the lawmakers inside the Capitol who had voted on his possible successor an hour earlier. Not the protesters who gathered outside the governor's mansion to celebrate Mr. Rosselló's departure. Only once Mr. Rosselló's resignation became effective did the outgoing governor reveal that Pedro R. Pierluisi, whom he had recently nominated to be the island's secretary of state, would take the oath of office as his successor.... But the announcement did little to resolve the turmoil that has roiled Puerto Rico for three weeks, following a popular rebellion that forced Mr. Rosselló out of office. Mr. Pierluisi's ascent to the governor's seat will probably be contested in court, thrusting the island into a period of constitutional uncertainty." The NPR story is here.

News Ledes

NBC News: "A shooting near a shopping mall in El Paso has resulted in multiple fatalities, with at least 18 people taken to local hospitals, law enforcement officials said. El Paso police also said at about 1 p.m. local time that one person is in custody and there was no imminent threat at tha point. Earlier Saturday, in several tweets, police urged people to stay away from the area near the Cielo Vista mall due to an 'active shooter.'" Apparently there were multiple casualties. ...

... New York Times Update: "A gunman who opened fire at a shopping mall in El Paso on Saturday killed at least 18 people, according to State Senator José Rodríguez, who represents El Paso. The death toll has not been officially confirmed by law enforcement, but Mr. Rodríguez said his information was based on a briefing from a state official. The number of fatalities was also reported by local media. The police said that one suspect, a white male in his 20s, was in custody, and that the gunman had fired a rifle into the crowded store, sending panicked shoppers fleeing for their lives. The office of the El Paso mayor, Dee Margo, said in a statement that the police had confirmed several fatalities. The police declined to elaborate on the number and status of the victims." This is a liveblog. ...

     ... NYT Update: "20 people were killed in the shooting, the governor said. Twenty-six others were injured in the attack." (Same link as above.)