The Commentariat -- August 21, 2018

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

** Matt Zapotosky, et al., of the Washington Post: "A jury has found former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort guilty after a three-week trial on tax and bank fraud charges -- a major if not complete victory for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III as he continues to investigate the president's associates. The jury convicted Manafort on eight of the 18 counts against him. The jury said it was deadlocked on the other 10. U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis declared a mistrial on those other charges. Manafort was convicted on five counts of filing false tax returns, one count of not filing a required IRS form, and two bank fraud counts." ...

... Earlier: MSNBC is reporting that the Manafort jury has sent a note to Judge Ellis asking how that should proceed if they can't come to consensus on one count. No link. Update: There's a possibility there is more than one count on which the jury can't agree. After getting the note from the jury, the judge gave them an "Allen charge," essentially instructing them to try again. ...

... Josh Gerstein, et al., of Politico: "Jurors on Tuesday indicated that they are struggling to reach a unanimous verdict on at least one count against Paul Manafort in his bank- and tax-fraud trial. They asked U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis III for help on what to do in this situation. He replied he would urge them to redouble their efforts. The jurors' note inquired about what the group should do if it can't come to a consensus on a single count and asked how they should fill out the verdict form. They also asked what their struggles would mean for the entire verdict. Addressing the court without the jury in the room, Ellis said the request was not unusual in a jury trial. The judge added that he could ask the jury where it was overall on the deliberations, but said he was not inclined to take that step now." ...

     ... Update: According to MSNBC, the jury has reached a verdict on only eight counts. Judge will declare a mistrial on 10 counts. The verdict on the eight counts is to be announced today. No link.

     ... Update: Manafort found guilty of five felony tax fraud charges. Also, two counts of bank fraud. Not sure the nature of the eighth charge on which the jury found Manafort guilty. Mrs. McC: I'll put up links to news stories as they become available.

** Devlin Barrett, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty Tuesday in a Manhattan courthouse to eight violations of banking, tax and campaign finance laws in a federal investigation that scrutinized his business dealings and efforts to silence women with negative stories about Trump. Cohen pleaded guilty to five counts of tax evasion, one count of making a false statement to a bank and two campaign finance violations: making an unlawful corporate campaign contribution and making an excessive campaign contribution.... His guilty plea follow a months-long grand-jury investigation into Cohen's activities, including his taxi business, as well as a hush-money payment that Cohen arranged to an adult-film actress, Stormy Daniels, who claimed to have had a tryst with Trump years ago.... Cable television played Cohen's plea in an extraordinary legal split screen, as a Virginia jury convicted Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort on eight counts in his bank and tax fraud trial.... Special-counsel investigators have indicated to federal law enforcement officials that the office does not require Cohen's cooperation for its probe, according to two people familiar with their work."

William Rashbaum, et al., of the New York Times: "Michael D. Cohen, President Trump's former fixer, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to campaign finance and other charges, making the extraordinary admission that he paid a pornographic actress during the 2016 presidential campaign to secure her silence about an affair she said she had with Mr. Trump. Mr. Cohen also pleaded guilty to multiple counts of bank and tax fraud, bringing to a close a monthslong investigation by Manhattan federal prosecutors who examined his personal business dealings and his role in helping to arrange financial deals with women connected to Mr. Trump. Mr. Cohen, dressed in a dark suit and a yellow tie, entered the courtroom in United States District Court in Manhattan at about 4 p.m., nodded his head at reporters and smiled. The plea agreement does not call for Mr. Cohen to cooperate with federal prosecutors in Manhattan, but it does not preclude him from providing information to the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, who is examining the Trump campaign's possible involvement in Russia's interference in the 2016 campaign." ...

     ... Michael Avenatti said he knew "for a fact" that Cohen has been cooperating with prosecutors. ...

     Update: Cohen has pled guilty to eight counts, two having to do with payments made for Donald Trump.

... Sarah Fitzpatrick, et al., of NBC News: "Michael Cohen, President Trump's former personal attorney, is discussing a possible guilty plea with federal prosecutors in Manhattan in connection with tax fraud and banking-related matters, multiple sources familiar with the matter tell NBC News. Those sources stress no deal has been reached but do say the potential deal could be reached as early as today."

     ... ** Update: MSNBC is reporting Michael Cohen (a/k/a "John Doe") will appear for a federal court hearing today at 4 pm ET for the purpose of entering a plea agreement.

Gabriel Sherman of Vanity Fair: "Since news broke of [White House counsel Don] McGahn's extensive cooperation with Mueller, Trump has been lashing out on Twitter.... Privately, Trump blames his precarious position on the people who work for him. Trump's fury at Attorney General Jeff Sessions, already raging, has been stoked thanks to Sessions's refusal to resign after months of public abuse. 'You can't talk to Trump without him bringing up Sessions,' one adviser said. Trump's frustration with Sessions has even caused him to turn on Giuliani. Over the weekend, Trump blamed Giuliani for the entire Russia probe. According to a person to whom the conversation was described, Trump loudly said to [Giuliani]: 'It's your fault! I offered you attorney general, but you insisted on being secretary of state. Had I picked you none of this would be happening.'... Another theory for what's motivating Trump's increasingly unhinged tweets is that Mueller may be closing in on his son Don Jr."

Jonathan Chait: "Trump's Craziest Climate Speech Ever Explains His New Dirty Energy Policy." Mrs. McC: You just have to read it. Here are the parts where Chait cites Trump's actual remarks: "Coal, Trump told his audience, is 'a tremendous form of energy in the sense that in a military way -- think of it -- coal is indestructible,' he declared....

You can blow up a pipeline, you can blow up the windmills. You know, the wind wheels, [mimics windmill noise, mimes shooting gun] 'Bing!' That's the end of that one. If the birds don't kill it first. The birds could kill it first. They kill so many birds. You look underneath some of those windmills, it's like a killing field, the birds. But uh, you know, that's what they were going to, they were going to windmills. And you know, don't worry about wind, when the wind doesn't blow, I said, 'What happens when the wind doesn't blow?' Well, then we have a problem. Okay good. They were putting him in areas where they didn't have much wind, too. And it's a subsidary [sic] -- you need subsidy for windmills. You need subsidy. Who wants to have energy where you need subsidy? So, uh, the coal is doing great.

... Trump Admin Plans to Kill 1,400 Americans a Year. Lisa Friedman of the New York Times: "The Trump administration on Tuesday made public the details of its new pollution rules governing coal-burning power plants, and the fine print includes an acknowledgment that the plan would increase carbon emissions and lead to up to 1,400 premature deaths annually. The proposal, the Affordable Clean Energy rule, is a replacement for the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, which was an aggressive effort to speed up the closures of coal-burning plants, one of the main producers of greenhouse gases, by setting national targets for cutting carbon dioxide emissions and encouraging utilities to use cleaner energy sources like wind and solar."

"Child's Play." River O'Connor in Politico Magazine: "It took me around 10 minutes to crash the upcoming midterm elections. Once I accessed the shockingly simple and vulnerable set of tables that make up the state election board's database, I was able to shut down the website that would tally the votes, bringing the election to a screeching halt. The data were lost completely. And just like that, tens of thousands of votes vanished into thin air, throwing an entire election, and potentially control of the House or Senate -- not to mention our already shaky confidence in the democratic process itself -- into even more confusion, doubt, and finger-pointing. I'm 17. And I'm not even a very good hacker."

She [Natalia Veselnitskaya] didn't represent the Russian government. She's a private citizen. I don't even know if they knew she was Russian at the time. All they had was her name.... They didn't know she was a representative of the Russian government. -- Rudolph W. Giuliani, appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press," August 19

... Veselnitskaya ... has insisted that she was not representing the Russian government in the meeting, but what's important is what Trump Jr. was told -- that she was working on behalf of the Russian government. Moreover, it later emerged that she worked closely with a top Kremlin official, Yuri Y. Chaika, the prosecutor general, to block a Justice Department fraud case against a Russian company.... There's no way to spin the fact that Trump Jr. was told repeatedly that he was meeting with a representative of the Russian government. -- Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post

*****

Generalissimo Trumpo Suggests He Could Replace Mueller -- with Himself. Both MSNBC & CNN are reporting that Trump, in an interview with Reuters reporters, said, "I could run the Russia investigation if I wanted to." At 6:30 pm ET Monday, the story is not online. ...

     ... Update. Naomi Lim of the Washington Examiner: "'I've decided to stay out,' Trump said, per Reuters White House correspondent Jeff Mason. 'Now, I don't have to stay out, as you know. I can go in and I could... do whatever. I could run it if I want.'" ...

... James Oliphant, et al., of Reuters: "In an interview with Reuters, Trump echoed the concerns of his top lawyer..., Rudy Giuliani, who has warned that any sit-down with Mueller could be a 'perjury trap.'... Trump did not comment on whether he would ultimately agree to an interview with Mueller.... Trump also declined to say whether he might strip Mueller of his security clearance...." ...

... Katie Rogers of the New York Times: "Under the banner of her 'Be Best' campaign, Melania Trump ... told a group of cyberbullying prevention experts on Monday that social media 'can be destructive and harmful when used incorrectly.' Just after she spoke, President Trump unleashed a barrage of tweets in which he called the former director of the C.I.A. a 'hack' and mocked the effectiveness of the Justice Department, among other digital insults on a day of dissonant messaging from the Trump White House.... The president's tweets were not discussed during the summit the first lady attended.... Another running theme at the cyberbullying summit was the importance of adults understanding how bad behavior on social media could affect children, and how adults can be good digital role models.... Mrs. Trump and her aides have repeatedly acknowledged the conflict between her messages and those of her husband." ...

... Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "President Trump on Monday dared former CIA Director John Brennan to sue him over his decision to revoke his security clearance. In a tweet, Trump [wrote,] 'I hope John Brennan, the worst CIA Director in our country's history, brings a lawsuit. It will then be very easy to get all of his records, texts, emails and documents to show not only the poor job he did, but how he was involved with the Mueller Rigged Witch Hunt. He won't sue!'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: "... Donald Trump tweeted Monday to ask why his attorney general had not fired a Justice Department official with ties to the firm behind a dossier alleging connections between Trump and Russia. 'Will Bruce Ohr, whose family received big money for helping to create the phony, dirty and discredited Dossier, ever be fired from the Jeff Sessions "Justice" Department? A total joke!' Trump wrote. It was the closest Trump had come to calling directly for Ohr, whose wife was a contractor for Fusion GPS, to lose his job. Ohr, who was demoted earlier this year, has come under fire from conservatives and now Trump over his connection to Fusion GPS." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

John Wagner of the Washington Post: "President Trump on Monday referred to lawyers working for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III as 'thugs' and accused them of trying to affect this year's elections, further ramping up his rhetoric against prosecutors probing Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. In morning tweets, Trump called Mueller 'disgraced and discredited' and said his team of prosecutors is 'a National Disgrace!' The tweets were the latest in a spate of complaints in recent days from the president about a probe into whether his campaign coordinated with Russia during the 2016 election and whether Trump has sought to obstruct the investigation. In Monday's outburst, Trump continued to attack a New York Times report over the weekend that White House lawyer Donald McGahn had participated in at least three interviews with Mueller's team that spanned 30 hours." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: One would think that a president* who had been on vacation for a couple of weeks would find some work to do when he showed up at the Oval on Monday. Apparently not. ...

He was impatient, overly aggressive, overly dramatic. He acted on impulse. He tended to sensationalize the evidence he had -- in order to draw attention to the rock-bottom seriousness of the situation. He would neglect to do important homework and consequently would, on occasion, make challengeable statements... He knew that he could never hope to convince anybody by delivering a dry, general-accounting-office type of presentation. In consequence, he stepped up circumstances a notch or two. -- Roy Cohn on Donald Trump Joe McCarthy ...

... John Avlon of CNN: "'Study the late Joseph McCarthy, because we are now in period with Mueller and his gang that make Joseph McCarthy look like a baby!'... Donald Trump tweeted from the final days of his golfing vacation at Bedminster, New Jersey. 'Rigged Witch Hunt!'... McCarthy and Trump shared an infamous aide, a widely reviled but nonetheless influential lawyer named Roy Cohn.... Cohn ... [saw McCarthy] as essentially a salesman, for whom accuracy was an obstacle to attention." Read on. The parallels Avlon draws between McCarthy & Trump are striking. The difference is that McCarthy failed largely because some Republicans (& the press) showed some backbone in opposing McCarthy & his destructive tactics.

... Kaitlan Collins, et al., of CNN: "White House counsel Don McGahn's 30 hours of conversations with special counsel Robert Mueller's team have unnerved ... Donald Trump, who didn't know the full extent of McGahn's discussions, two people familiar with his thinking said.... Trump did not know the conversations stretched for 30 hours or that his legal team didn't conduct a full debriefing with McGahn after the fact. Trump remained agitated for the rest of the weekend, the people said, believing the revelation made him look weak.... His declaration of a 'great relationship' [between McGahn & him] aside, Trump and McGahn have carried out a tortured partnership for more than a year, people familiar with the dynamic say. According to officials, Trump has at times seemed unclear on McGahn's role -- which is not as his personal lawyer, but as a lawyer for the White House and the presidency.... Trump and McGahn went weeks without speaking at the beginning of this year, and months without meeting one-on-one, people familiar with the matter said. During this period, along with telling people McGahn was 'a leaker,' Trump complained about McGahn's good relationship with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who oversees the special counsel investigation." ...

... Wherein McGahn Leaks to Keep His Job. Carol Leonnig, et al., of the Washington Post: "White House counsel Donald McGahn does not believe that he implicated President Trump in any legal wrongdoing in extensive interviews he has given the special counsel, McGahn's attorney told Trump';s legal team in recent days.... [Attorney Bill] Burck has assured Trump's lawyers that McGahn did not witness Trump engaged in any crime and would have resigned from his White House post if he had, according to people familiar with the conversations."

Youjin Shin of the Washington Post: "On Aug. 15, President Trump revoked former CIA director John Brennan's security clearance.... A bipartisan group of more than a dozen former intelligence directors, plus retired Adm. William H. McRaven, spoke out against the president's move. On Aug. 17, they were joined by another 60 officials, and over 170 added their names on Aug. 20. Here's an non-exhaustive list of major figures who have voiced their support for Brennan."

Jonathan Chait: "While [the media] have dug up an extraordinary amount of incriminating facts about Trump, reporters have also repeatedly leaned into the most exculpatory interpretations of those same facts.... It is striking that, for all the incriminating facts the news media have amassed about Trump, they have repeatedly given him the benefit of the doubt as to what those facts add up to." Chait offers numerous examples. As he points out, sometimes these innocent explanations for incriminating evidence come from "White House officials," but often they appear in the reporter's "voice."

Maegan Vazquez of CNN: "Rudy Giuliani on Monday attempted to clarify his weekend remark that 'truth isn't truth' as part of his explanation for why he doesn't believe that ... Donald Trump should testify with special counsel Robert Mueller. 'My statement was not meant as a pontification on moral theology but one referring to the situation where two people make precisely contradictory statements, the classic "he said,she said" puzzle. Sometimes further inquiry can reveal the truth other times it doesn't,' tweeted Giuliani...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Josh Gerstein & Darren Samuelsohn of Politico: "Late Monday, the jury [deliberating criminal charges against Paul Manafort] signaled that it still hadn't reached a verdict after saying that it would discuss the case until at least 6:15 p.m. That is the latest that jurors have deliberated since they began Thursday."

Chuck Todd, et al., of NBC News list the various lies Team Trump has told about the Trump Tower meeting. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

"I Miss Richard Nixon." Philip Allen Lacovara, a former president of the D.C. Bar, who served as counsel to the Watergate special prosecutor, in a Washington Post op-ed, contrasts Donald Trump and Richard Nixon, noting the ways in which Nixon was by far the better president.

David Sanger & Sheera Frenkel of the New York Times: "The Russian military intelligence unit that sought to influence the 2016 election appears to have a new target: conservative American think tanks that have broken with President Trump and are seeking continued sanctions against Moscow, exposing oligarchs or pressing for human rights. In a report scheduled for release on Tuesday, Microsoft Corporation said that it detected and seized websites that were created in recent weeks by hackers linked to the Russian unit formerly known as the G.R.U. The sites appeared meant to trick people into thinking they were clicking through links managed by the Hudson Institute and the International Republican Institute, but were secretly redirected to web pages created by the hackers to steal passwords and other credentials. Microsoft also found websites imitating the United States Senate, but not specific Senate offices or political campaigns. The shift to attacking conservative think tanks underscores the Russian intelligence agency's goals: to disrupt any institutions challengin Moscow and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: That last sentence, as seems obvious, should read, "... any institutions challenging President Trump, Moscow and President Vladimir V. Putin...." I'm not being snide here. And do I think it possible that Trump & Putin "colluded" on this latest hacking plan? Yes. Helsinki was not for nuthin.

Paul Krugman: "Truth isn't truth. Rudy Giuliani's latest bon mot is a reminder, if anyone needed it, that calling the Trump administration Orwellian isn’t hyperbole, it's just a statement of fact. Like the ruling party in '1984,' Donald Trump operates on the principle that truth -- whether it involves inauguration crowd sizes, immigrant crime or economic performance -- is what he says it is. And that truth can change at a moment's notice.... The Orwellification of the G.O.P. didn't start with Trump. On the contrary, the party has been moving in that direction for years.... Where have we seen something like that before? In Republican attacks on the evidence for climate change. Fifteen years have passed since Senator James Inhofe suggested that global warming is 'the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people.' This was ... not far short of Pizzagate or QAnon territory.... Yet this paranoid fantasy has in effect become the official position of the G.O.P.... For Republicans, ignorance has been strength for a long time."

Jim Tankersley & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "President Trump complained to wealthy donors at a fund-raiser in the Hamptons last week that the man he chose as chairman of the Federal Reserve, Jerome H. Powell, has disappointed him by raising interest rates, according to people who attended the event. In the midst of a long riff on the economy, Mr. Trump said that he had expected Mr. Powell to adhere to an easy-money monetary policy, by keeping interest rates low, when he nominated Mr. Powell in November to succeed Janet L. Yellen. Instead, Mr. Powell has continued Ms. Yellen's pace of gradual return to historically normal rates, by raising rates twice this year." ...

... Trump said the same thing to Reuters reporters Jeff Mason & Steve Holland: "'I'm not thrilled with his raising of interest rates, no. I'm not thrilled,' Trump said in the interview, referring to Powell.... American presidents have rarely criticized the Fed in recent decades because the independence of the Fed is seen as important for economic stability. U.S. stocks dipped after Trump's comments to Reuters and the dollar .DXY edged down against a basket of currencies."

Benjamin Hart of New York: "During a demagoguery-heavy White House event on Monday titled the 'Salute to the Heroes of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection' President Trump invited a Latino CBP officer to the podium and told the assembled crowd that he 'speaks perfect English.'... Trump's apparent surprise that a nonwhite officer could possibly master this skill was the most cringeworthy moment of the proceedings, but it wasn't the only extremely weird one.... The president also repeatedly referred to Customs and Border Protection as 'the CBC' -- which is the common abbreviation for the Congressional Black Caucus, a group with whom he does not have the world's greatest working relationship. Trump's repeated error came despite the fact that the teleprompter he was reading off clearly read 'CBP..'... The rest of the event ... featured the standard fearmongering Trump rhetoric." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: It would be an even biglier surprise if Trump spoke perfect English, which apparently he can't do even with the (mostly-perfect) English all typed out in big letters scrolling on a teleprompter.

Steve Holland & Jeff Mason: "... Donald Trump said on Monday that it is 'very dangerous' for social media companies like Twitter Inc ... and Facebook Inc ... to silence voices on their services.... 'I won't mention names but when they take certain people off of Twitter or Facebook and they're making that decision, that is really a dangerous thing because that could be you tomorrow,' said Trump.... Trump previously criticized the social media industry on Aug. 18, claiming without evidence in a series of tweets that unnamed companies were 'totally discriminating against Republican/Conservative voices.'... Those tweets followed actions taken by Apple Inc..., Alphabet Inc's ... YouTube and Facebook to remove some content posted by Infowars, a website run by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. Jones' own Twitter account was temporarily suspended on Aug. 15."

Maybe Melanie Really Has Joined the Resistance. Darlene Superville of the AP: "Melania Trump is planning her first big solo international swing with a trip through several African countries in October. The first lady told The Associated Press in a written statement Monday that she's looking forward to learning about the issues that children living on the continent face, as well as appreciating Africa's history and culture. She recently launched a U.S.-based effort focused on the well-being of children. Mrs. Trump plans to travel without ... Donald Trump, who was roundly criticized earlier this year after his private comment about 'shithole countries' in Africa was leaked to journalists.... Her spokeswoman, Stephanie Grisham, said the first lady chose Africa ... after she learned about some of the development programs that are underway in many of its countries."

Kerry Eleveld of Daily Kos: "Top Democrats are requesting information from the White House on the security clearance of Trump national security adviser John Bolton, who crossed paths with an indicted Russian spy while serving on the National Rifle Association's international affairs subcommittee. The ranking members of the House Oversight and Subcommittee on National Security, Reps. Elijah Cummings and Stephen Lynch, wrote to White House chief of staff John Kelly Monday: 'We are writing regarding recent reports that National Security Advisor John Bolton, in his former capacity as a top official with the National Rifle Association (NRA), worked directly with a Russian citizen who has now been charged by federal prosecutors with infiltrating that organization and spying against the United States for years.... We request that you produce documents relating to whether Mr. Bolton reported his previous work with this alleged Russian spy on his security clearance forms or other White House vetting materials prior to President Trump appointing him to his current position'... The Russian citizen referenced in the letter is Maria Butina, who was arrested for acting as a Russian agent in July."

You're No Scott Pruitt If -- you've never made a $43,000 phone call to a place down the street. Juliet Eilperin & Brady Dennis of the Washington Post: "The $43,000 phone booth that then-EPA administrator Scott Pruitt installed in his office may not have been worth all the headaches it caused him. He placed only one phone call to the White House, newly released records from the agency show. It lasted five minutes.... He made the five-minute call on Jan. 29, according to Verizon phone logs released in response to litigation filed by the Sierra Club, an environmental advocacy group.... The Government Accountability Office concluded that Pruitt violated federal spending laws when he built the phone booth, because he spent more than $5,000 without providing advance notice to Congress." The logs don't show whether or not Pruitt received incoming calls on the super-secret lines.

Michael Sisak, et al., of the AP: "The last Nazi war crimes suspect facing deportation from the U.S. was taken from his New York City home and spirited early Tuesday morning to Germany, following years of efforts to remove him from the United States. The deportation of the 95-year-old former Nazi camp guard, Jakiw Palij, came 25 years after investigators first confronted him about his World War II past and he admitted lying to get into the U.S., claimin he spent the war as a farmer and factory worker.... Because Germany, Poland, Ukraine, and other countries refused to take him, he continued living in limbo in the two-story, red brick home in Queens he shared with his wife, Maria, now 86.... The deportation came after weeks of diplomatic negotiations.... German prosecutors have previously said it does not appear that there's enough evidence to charge Palij with wartime crimes. Now that he is in Germany, Efraim Zuroff, the head Nazi-hunter at the Simon Wiesenthal Center, said he hoped prosecutors would revisit the case."

Henry Mance & Jim Brunsden of the Financial Times: Britain's Foreign Secretary "Jeremy Hunt has called for EU sanctions on Russia over the Salisbury nerve agent attack, a move likely to be met with resistance from Brussels. [Hunt] said the EU should 'ensure its sanctions against Russia are comprehensive' and should stand 'shoulder to shoulder with the US', which imposed sweeping sanctions in response to the attack that killed one British woman and put four other people in hospital. The US sanctions, which could limit Russia's access to some technologies, come into force on Wednesday.... Mr Hunt's call for joint EU action is juxtaposed with an attempt to press the European Commission to give ground in Brexit negotiations."

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "Brett M. Kavanaugh, President Trump's Supreme Court nominee, urged prosecutors investigating President Bill Clinton to question him in graphic detail about his sexual relationship with Monica Lewinsky, a White House intern, according to a memorandum released on Monday by the National Archives. Mr. Kavanaugh spent more than three years working for Ken Starr, the independent counsel who investigated a series of scandals during Mr. Clinton's presidency, and he worked on the report that led the House of Representatives to impeach Mr. Clinton.... The release of the two-page memo, dated August 15, 1998, adds details to earlier reports.... The memo confirms that Mr. Kavanaugh took a hard line that seemed driven by disgust with Mr. Clinton's behavior and the animosity that had developed between the White House and Mr. Starr's team." ...

     ... Here's the memo. World a read. "... it is our job to make his pattern of revolting behavior clear -- piece by painful piece...." Kavanaugh wrote. Evidently, he's less touchy about Donald Trump's revolting behavior. ...

Christamighty, it's a good thing he's a Really Nice Guy, or else I'd think he was a bed-sniffing hypocrite and a sanctimonious yahoo who's spent his entire career as a Republican hack. -- Charles Pierce

Lauren Clason of Roll Call: "Top Republican lawmakers have no plans to examine the alleged influence that a trio of ... Donald Trump's friends have at the Department of Veterans Affairs, even as Democrats call for an investigation.... On Monday, a handful of Senate Democrats on the Veterans' Affairs Committee, led by Sen. Mazie K. Hirono of Hawaii, petitioned Chairman Johnny Isakson of Georgia to hold a hearing on the matter.... House Veterans' Affairs Committee Ranking Member Tim Walz is also seeking details of correspondence from the department. But Republican leaders of both the House and Senate veterans committees don't agree the issue warrants congressional intervention.... The controversy peaked in recent weeks after reports that Marvel Entertainment Chairman Ike Perlmutter, Palm Beach doctor Bruce Moskowitz and D.C. lawyer Marc Sherman hold undue sway with VA leadership, including senior adviser Peter O'Rourke, who formerly served as acting secretary.... Isakson said the problem was largely solved after [Robert] Wilkie was sworn in [as VA Secretary] last month.... Liberal veterans group VoteVets filed a lawsuit against the administration last week, claiming the VA is violating federal protocol related to private influence in matters of federal policy."

Wisconsin Gubernatorial Race. Scott Bauer of the AP: "A second former top official with Gov. Scott Walker's administration has endorsed his Democratic opponent and cut a video criticizing the Republican incumbent. The latest online ad, released Monday, features former Department of Financial Institutions Secretary Peter Bildsten blasting Walker as only caring about pleasing donors and calling for administration officials to dodge the open records law. The spot comes after former Corrections Secretary Ed Wall also recorded a video backing Democrat Tony Evers and wrote a tell-all book making numerous allegations of mismanagement against Walker's administratio and others. Evers and Walker face off in the Nov. 6 election."

Beyond the Beltway

Jane Stancill of the Raleigh News & Observer: "Protesters toppled the Silent Sam Confederate statue on the campus of UNC-Chapel Hill on Monday night. The monument was ripped down after 9:15 p.m. Earlier in the evening, protesters covered the statue with tall, gray banners, erecting 'an alternative monument' that said, in part, 'For a world without white supremacy.' Protesters were apparently working behind the covering with ropes to bring the statue down, which happened more than two hours into a rally. It fell with a loud clanging sound, and the crowd erupted in cheers.... [The statue] had been erected in 1913 with donations from the United Daughters of the Confederacy.... UNC had installed surveillance cameras and spent $390,000 on security around the statue last year."

The Commentariat -- August 20, 2018

Late Morning Update:

Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "President Trump on Monday dared former CIA Director John Brennan to sue him over his decision to revoke his security clearance. In a tweet, Trump [wrote,] "I hope John Brennan, the worst CIA Director in our country's history, brings a lawsuit. It will then be very easy to get all of his records, texts, emails and documents to show not only the poor job he did, bu how he was involved with the Mueller Rigged Witch Hunt. He won't sue!"

Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: "... Donald Trump tweeted Monday to ask why his attorney general had not fired a Justice Department official with ties to the firm behind a dossier alleging connections between Trump and Russia. 'Will Bruce Ohr, whose family received big money for helping to create the phony, dirty and discredited Dossier, ever be fired from the Jeff Sessions "Justice" Department? A total joke!' Trump wrote. It was the closest Trump had come to calling directly for Ohr, whose wife was a contractor for Fusion GPS, to lose his job. Ohr, who was demoted earlier this year, has come under fire from conservatives and now Trump over his connection to Fusion GPS."

John Wagner of the Washington Post: "President Trump on Monday referred to lawyers working for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III as 'thugs' and accused them of trying to affect this year's elections, further ramping up his rhetoric against prosecutors probing Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. In morning tweets, Trump called Mueller 'disgraced and discredited' and said his team of prosecutors is 'a National Disgrace!' The tweets were the latest in a spate of complaints in recent days from the president about a probe into whether his campaign coordinated with Russia during the 2016 election and whether Trump has sought to obstruct the investigation. In Monday's outburst, Trump continued to attack a New York Times report over the weekend that White House lawyer Donald McGahn had participated in at least three interviews with Mueller's team that spanned 30 hours." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: One would think that a president* who had been on vacation for a couple of weeks would find some work to do when he showed up at the Oval on Monday. Apparently not.

If you want to know one of the many reasons Trump is such a lousy president*, see Akhilleus's sports analogy in today's Comments.

Maegan Vazquez of CNN: "Rudy Giuliani on Monday attempted to clarify his weekend remark that 'truth isn't truth' as part of his explanation for why he doesn't believe that ... Donald Trump should testify with special counsel Robert Mueller. 'My statement was not meant as a pontification on moral theology but one referring to the situation where two people make precisely contradictory statements, the classic "he said,she said" puzzle. Sometimes further inquiry can reveal the truth other times it doesn't,' tweeted Giuliani...."

Chuck Todd, et al., of NBC News list the various lies Team Trump has told about the Trump Tower meeting.

*****

This Russia Thing, Etc., Ctd.

The McGahn Saga, Part 2. Helter-Skelter. Maggie Haberman & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "President Trump's lawyers do not know just how much the White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, told the special counsel's investigators during months of interviews, a lapse that has contributed to a growing recognition that an early strategy of full cooperation with the inquiry was a potentially damaging mistake.... Mr. Trump's lawyers realized on Saturday that they had not been provided a full accounting after The New York Times published an article [also linked here yesterday] describing Mr. McGahn's extensive cooperation with Mr. Mueller's office.... The article set off a scramble on Saturday among Mr. Trump's lawyers and advisers. The president, sequestered at his private golf club in Bedminster, N.J., solicited opinions from a small group of advisers on the possible repercussions from the article. The president ordered Mr. Giuliani to tell reporters that the article was wrong, but Mr. Giuliani did not go that far in his television appearances.... Legal experts and former White House counsels said the president's lawyers had been careless in not asking Mr. McGahn what he had planned to tell Mr. Mueller's prosecutors. The experts said Mr. Trump's lawyers had the right to know the full extent of what Mr. McGahn was going to say." Oh, read on; it's delicious. ...

... Trump Mad at Maggie & Mike. David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "President Trump reacted angrily Sunday to a new report that the White House counsel has cooperated extensively in the Russia investigation without Trump's full knowledge, calling it a 'Fake Story' and comparing the probe to McCarthyism.In a series of tweets, the president lashed out at a New York Times report that White House lawyer Donald McGahn had participated in at least three interviews with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III that spanned 30 hours." Mrs. McC: Best way to get under Trump's skin: expose his ignorance & stupidity, as the NYT story does. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Julian Zelizer of the Atlantic: "Reacting to The New York Times' story that White House Counsel Don McGahn has been speaking with Robert Mueller’s team..., Donald Trump tweeted out that McGahn is not a 'John Dean type "RAT,"' and that the story was 'fake news.' It's odd that Trump should bring up John Dean this weekend, for it was only this week that we also learned Trump has an Enemies List, just like Richard Nixon did. Unlike Nixon, though, the president is hiding nothing -- using security clearances and his Twitter account as the chief weapons to go after his opponents.... In the early 1970s, the president and his advisers assumed that doing any of this out in the open would be devastating. There was still a sense of norms that restrained an administration from publicly abusing its power in this way.... The list made it into Article II of the impeachment charges drawn up against Nixon[.]... Trump is trying to create the same kind of toxic atmosphere that Nixon produced. His explicit goal is to silence opponents and to discredit them in the public eye. If this becomes acceptable, the next steps might be even worse." More on Dean below.

     ... digby: "I wonder if people remember that Don McGahn made his bones defending Tom DeLay in a major Russian money scandal in the late 90s? He did[.]... This scandal was obscured at the time by the much more important investigation into Bill Clinton's pants. Here's the full story of DeLay's Russia money scandal. Let's just say that Don McGahn had some very special experience in dealing with Russian money being funneled into Republican campaigns."

... Rudy Deconstructs Reality -- So Derrida! Rebecca Morin & David Cohen of Politico: "... Rudy Giuliani on Sunday claimed 'truth isn't truth' when trying to explain why the president should not testify for special counsel Robert Mueller.... 'When you tell me that, you know, he should testify because he's going to tell the truth and he shouldn't worry, well that's so silly because it's somebody's version of the truth. Not the truth,' Giuliani told Chuck Todd on NBC's 'Meet the Press' on Sunday morning. 'Truth is truth,' Todd responded. 'No, no, it isn't truth,' Giuliani said. 'Truth isn't truth. The President of the United States says, "I didn't ..."' A startled Todd answered: 'Truth isn't truth?' Giuliani: 'No, no, no.' Todd said: 'This is going to become a bad meme.'... Last week on CNN, he rejected Chris Cuomo's assertion that 'facts are not in the eye of the beholder.' 'Yes, they are,' Giuliani said. 'Nowadays they are.' In May, the former New York mayor pursued a similar line of thought in an interview with the Washington Post about the Mueller investigation: 'They may have a different version of the truth than we do.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Benjamin Hart of New York: "Alert: another half-chilling, half-laughable Trump administration mantra is ready to add to the trophy case, in the space just beside 'Alternative Facts' and 'What You're Seeing...Is Not What's Happening.'... Todd's wry prediction was, of course, immediately proven right. In the other noteworthy section of his interview, Giuliani once again changed the Trump administration's line on its fateful meeting with Russians at Trump Tower in 2016. He now claims, confusingly, that the sitdown was all about getting dirt on Hillary Clinton (not adoptions after all!), but that Trump officials had no idea that actual Russians would be involved (which is definitely not true). But then, what is truth, when you really think about it?" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Trumpbots are very good at magical thinking when it comes to religion, but I don't think that makes them ready for the deconstruction of conceptual systems. Just the opposite. Trumpbots deal in absolutes -- like there absolutely is a God & heaven has a lot of kitchen appliances. I don't think "Truth Isn't Truth" will go over well. Although as one wag -- Pat Shipp -- pointed out (Hart linked the Twitter feed), "I can see it now. 'TiT' hats. That ought to help capture females votes!" ...

... BUT. Steve M.: "In the eyes of the right, everyone connected to the Russia investigation is a liar. To them, it's obvious that Trump will tell the 100% scout's-honor truth if he ever testifies, and Mueller will twist it into a lie because he's pure evil, as are all his Deep State friends and associates. To right-wingers, the entire investigation is an exercise i bad faith (and a projection of guilt on the part of the Clinton campaign and the Justice Department, who are the true colluders with Russia). So, to the right, of course 'truth isn't truth,' because the people deciding what truth is are evil Democrat liars."

MEANWHILE. William Rashbaum, et al., of the New York Times: "Federal authorities investigating whether President Trump's former personal lawyer and fixer, Michael D. Cohen, committed bank and tax fraud have zeroed in on well over $20 million in loans obtained by taxi businesses that he and his family own, according to people familiar with the matter. Investigators are also examining whether Mr. Cohen violated campaign finance or other laws by helping to arrange financial deals to secure the silence of women who said they had affairs with Mr. Trump. The inquiry has entered the final stage and prosecutors are considering filing charges by the end of August, two of the people said.... A cooperation agreement [between Cohen & prosecutors] would likely include a provision that Mr. Cohen also provide information to the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III...." ...

... Daniel Lippman of Politico: "Lanny Davis, an attorney for ... Michael Cohen, said he has been reaching out regularly over the past few months to John Dean, the former White House counsel who helped bring down the presidency of Richard Nixon. Cohen has sent signals that he might cooperate in the investigations surrounding his former boss. The fact that his lawyer is talking frequently to Dean -- who was name-checked by Trump on Sunday in the context of recent reports that White House counsel Don McGahn is cooperating with investigators -- adds new hints that Cohen could be open to being a potential witness in any case against Trump."

Quinn Scanlan of ABC News: "... Donald Trump's National Security Adviser John Bolton floated the possibility of reviewing longstanding policy of maintaining security clearances of former government officials." In an ABC News interview, Bolton implied John Brennan abused his security clearance, but when ABC's Martha Raddatz pressed him, he could not cite any examples of Brennan doing so. Bolton maintained his own security clearance when he was on a corporate board & was a Fox "News" contributor. Bolton implied he used his clearance to obtain classified information for the company, which did classified contract work. IOKIYAR. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Felicia Sonmez & Carol Morello of the Washington Post: "Former CIA director John O. Brennan said Sunday that he is willing to take President Trump to court to prevent other current and former officials from having their security clearances revoked escalating a battle over whether the president is misusing the power of his office to retaliate against opponents. 'I am going to do whatever I can personally to try to prevent these abuses in the future, and if it means going to court, I will do that,' Brennan said ... on NBC News's 'Meet the Press.'" ...

... Maegan Vazquez of CNN: "Former CIA and National Security Agency Director Michael Hayden said Sunday that he'd be fine with having his security clearance revoked, as ... Donald Trump threatened to do to him and other former intelligence officials who have been critical of the President.... Asked by CNN's Jake Tapper if he too would be honored to lose his security clearance, Hayden said, 'Well, to be included in that group? Sure.... John [Brennan]'s situation is a proximate cause for all of us signing letters and protesting,' he continued. 'I think it's kind of one additional straw that's breaking the camel's back. Our complaint is not just about this. It's about the whole tone, tenor, and behavior of the administration.'"

"Slouching toward Autocracy." E.J. Dionne: "The list of ominous signs goes on and on: Trump invoking Stalin's phrase 'enemies of the people' to describe a free press; the firing, one after another, of public servants who moved to expose potential wrongdoing, starting with then-FBI Director James B. Comey; Trump's effusive praise of foreign despots; his extravagantly abusive (and often racially charged) language against opponents; and his refusal to abide by traditional practices about disclosing his own potential conflicts of interest and those of his family. Add to this the authoritarian's habit of institutionalizing lying as a routine aspect of governing, compressed into the astonishing credo Rudolph W. Giuliani blurted out ... Sunday: 'Truth isn't truth.' This is not business as usual. Yet our politics proceeds as if it is. Slowly, Trump has accustomed us to behavior that, at any other recent time and with just about any other politician, would in all probability have been career-ending."

Not sure if this is the same photo Heffernan saw, but it is Mueller & Kerry suited up in their St. Paul's hockey uniforms.Virginia Heffernan in the Los Angeles Times: "A black-and-white photograph from 1962 shows special counsel Robert S. Mueller III when he was a student at the [very toney] St. Paul's School in Concord, N.H. It's a hockey-team photo.... One of those smug boarding-school elites..., muscular little barons on ice who become Republicans and Purple Hearts and FBI counter-terrorism experts. Everyone they know from childhood becomes a senator -- oh look, former Secretary of State John F. Kerry is to Mueller's left in the hockey photo.... I hated the classic man-of-honor stuff. I hated it until, around autumn of 2016, it became gravely endangered.... must admit that I don't begrudge [Mueller] his maleness and privilege anymore.... Right now, American institutions are occupied by pretenders who may yet devastate them. We need white men like Mueller who speak without irony of justice and honor and the Marine Corps." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: I do get where Heffernan is coming from; I've occasionally felt the same resentment myself, but probably only when one of these patricians acts like a jackass. The truth is that the "values" pushed at elite schools are older than Greek civilization & have been restated, in similar form, in almost every culture. There is little difference between chivalric "virtues" & those we admire today. What separates the men and women from the Trumps is that we try to adhere to these high cultural norms while the Trumps either never learned them or prefer to flout them.

Another Trump Fox "Guarding" Henhouse. Eric Lipton of the New York Times: "As a corporate lawyer, William L. Wehrum worked for the better part of a decade to weaken air pollution rules by fighting the Environmental Protection Agency in court on behalf of chemical manufacturers, refineries, oil drillers and coal-burning power plants. Now, Mr. Wehrum is about to deliver one of the biggest victories yet for his industry clients -- this time from inside the Trump administration as the government's top air pollution official. On Tuesday, President Trump is expected to propose a vast rollback of regulations on emissions from coal plants, including many owned by members of a coal-burning trade association that had retained Mr. Wehrum and his firm as recently as last year to push for the changes." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

All the Best People, Ctd. Robert Costa of the Washington Post: "A White House speechwriter for President Trump was terminated last week after revelations that he had spoken at a conference attended by well-known white nationalists, according to three people familiar with the decision who were not authorized to speak publicly. Darren Beattie, who was a visiting instructor at Duke University before he joined the White House speechwriting team, was fired Friday after a media inquiry about his appearance at the 2016 H.L. Mencken Club conference, where Beattie spoke on a panel alongside Peter Brimelow. Brimelow, founder of the anti-immigrant website Vdare.com, is a white nationalist' and 'regularly publishes works by white supremacists, anti-Semites, and others on the radical right,' according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.... CNN's KFile ... published a report Sunday on Beattie and his appearance at the Mencken event.... Once White House officials were informed about CNN's pending report, Beattie reportedly was confronted and urged to step down immediately. But he apparently refused to resign..., [so] the White House terminated him." ...

... Andrew Kaczynski's report for CNN is here.

Andy Kroll of Rolling Stone: "Over the past two decades -- including five years serving on the Federal Election Commission -- [Don] McGahn has become an ideological warrior battling what he sees as the tyranny of the federal government.... Trump rewarded McGahn with the job of White House counsel, a perch from which McGahn has spearheaded the administration's unprecedented campaign to reshape the American judicial system, filling courts with judges who share Trump's goals of dismantling environmental protection, rolling back civil and reproductive rights, and gutting labor laws.... 'These efforts to reform the regulatory state begin with Congress and the executive branch,' McGahn said in his speech, 'but they ultimately depend on courts.'... As of this writing, Trump has put 26 new judges onto the appellate courts, more than any other chief executive at this point in the presidency. He has also nominated over 100 district-court judges and gotten 26 of those picks confirmed.... McGahn, [Leonard] Leo [of the Federalist Society] and Republican leaders including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have steadily filled the courts with future Clarence Thomases and Antonin Scalias."

Susan Ferriss of the Center for Public Integrity: "What allegedly happened [to school counsellor Tameika Lovell when U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers detained her at Kennedy Airport] is outlined in a harrowing civil lawsuit Lovell filled in March in federal court. And the assertions aren’t unique, based on allegations in similar suits filed not just in New York but also in California, Arizona, Texas, Michigan and Pennsylvania.... Lovell's lawsuit -- and 10 others since 2011 reviewed by the Center for Public Integrity -- raise timely and unsettling questions about how far border and other immigration officers can go with their considerable power to detain people at the nation's 328 ports of entry.... In these suits, innocent women -- including minor girls -- who were not found with any contraband say CBP officers subjected them to harsh interrogation that led to indignities that included unreasonable strip searches while menstruating to prohibited genital probing. Some women were also handcuffed and transported to hospitals where, against their will, they underwent pelvic exams, X-rays and in one case, drugging via IV, according to suits. Invasive medical procedures require a detainee's consent or a warrant. In two cases, women were billed for procedures." This article also appeared in the Washington Post.

Heather Richardson in the New Republic: Democrats -- led by women -- are finally starting to espouse a "new narrative" by redefining "patriotism" as a construct "built around service, community, and family loyalty."

Jennifer Bendery of the Huffington Post: "Four months after abruptly quitting Congress amid a sexual harassment scandal, former Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-Texas) still doesn't think he did anything wrong. In fact, the former GOP lawmaker says he 'took a bullet for the team' by resigning. He insists he's right not to repay $84,000 in taxpayer money he spent on a sexual harassment settlement. He ripped the House Ethics Committee for not caring about facts. And he blames f[uck]tards' and the Me Too movement for driving him out of a job.... And that's just a sample ofFarenthold's comments in an Aug. 1 deposition he gave in a lawsuit over his new job at a Texas port authority.... What's clear is that he blames everyone but himself for his downfall and that his reasons for not repaying the $84,000 are bonkers. You can read 79 pages of his deposition yourself, here...." Mrs. McC: Sadly, I have retired my Pajama Boy photos. I blame fucktards for that decision. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

AP: "Minnesota Democrats are standing behind U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison and his bid for state attorney general, with the state party giving him an endorsement Saturday amid an allegation of domestic abuse from an ex-girlfriend.... Ellison received 326 votes, or 82 percent of delegates on hand at the party's state executive committee meeting Saturday, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Chico Harlan of the Washington Post: "Pope Francis said in a letter released Monday by the Vatican that the Catholic Church has not dealt properly with 'crimes' against children and needs to prevent sexual abuses fro being 'covered up and perpetuated.' 'We showed no care for the little ones; we abandoned them,' Francis wrote. The 2,000-word letter ... marks one of Francis's most direct attempts to address the painful abuse cases that have eroded the Roman Catholic Church's credibility and prompted sharp calls from inside and outside the church for improved accountability. Francis did not lay out any concrete steps the Vatican would take, but he acknowledged that systemic change is needed."

Way Beyond the Beltway

Griff Witte of the Washington Post: In Poland, judges stand up to the Law & Justice party by refusing to apply for positions on the country's supreme court, which the party is attempting to turn into a rubber-stamp.

The Commentariat -- August 19, 2018

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Trump Mad at Maggie & Mike. David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "President Trump reacted angrily Sunday to a new report that the White House counsel has cooperated extensively in the Russia investigation without Trump's full knowledge, calling it a 'Fake Story' and comparing the probe to McCarthyism. In a series of tweets, the president lashed out at a New York Times report that White House lawyer Donald McGahn had participated in at least three interviews with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III that spanned 30 hours." Mrs. McC: Best way to get under Trump's skin: expose his ignorance & stupidity, as the NYT story does.

Rudy Deconstructs Reality -- So Derrida! Rebecca Morin & David Cohen of Politico: "... Rudy Giuliani on Sunday claimed 'truth isn't truth' when trying to explain why the president should not testify for special counsel Robert Mueller.... 'When you tell me that, you know, he should testify because he's going to tell the truth and he shouldn't worry, well that's so silly because it's somebody's version of the truth. Not the truth,' Giuliani told Chuck Todd on NBC's 'Meet the Press' on Sunday morning. 'Truth is truth,' Todd responded. 'No, no, it isn't truth,' Giuliani said. 'Truth isn't truth. The President of the United States says, "I didn't..."' A startled Todd answered: 'Truth isn't truth?' Giuliani: 'No, no, no.' Todd said: 'This is going to become a bad meme.'... Last week on CNN, he rejected Chris Cuomo's assertion that 'facts are not in the eye of the beholder.' 'Yes, they are,' Giuliani said. 'Nowadays they are.' In May, the former New York mayor pursued a similar line of thought in an interview with the Washington Post about the Mueller investigation: 'They may have a different version of the truth than we do.'" ...

... Benjamin Hart of New York: "Alert: another half-chilling, half-laughable Trump administration mantra is ready to add to the trophy case, in the space just beside 'Alternative Facts' and 'What You're Seeing ... Is Not What's Happening.'... Todd's wry prediction was, of course, immediately proven right. In the other noteworthy section of his interview, Giuliani once again changed the Trump administration's line on its fateful meeting with Russians at Trump Tower in 2016. He now claims, confusingly, that the sitdown was all about getting dirt on Hillary Clinton (not adoptions after all!), but that Trump officials had no idea that actual Russians would be involved (which is definitely not true). But then, what is truth, when you really think about it?" ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Trumpbots are very good at magical thinking when it comes to religion, but I don't think that makes them ready for the deconstruction of conceptual systems. Just the opposite. Trumpbots deal in absolutes -- like there absolutely is a God & heaven has a lot of kitchen appliances. I don't think "Truth Isn't Truth" will go over well. Although as one wag -- Pat Shipp -- pointed out (Hart linked the Twitter feed), "I can see it now. 'TiT' hats. That ought to help capture females votes!"

Quinn Scanlan of ABC News: "... Donald Trump's National Security Adviser John Bolton floated the possibility of reviewing longstanding policy of maintaining security clearances of former government officials." In an ABC News interview, Bolton implied John Brennan abused his security clearance, but when ABC's Martha Raddatz pressed him, he could not cite any examples of Brennan doing so. Bolton maintained his own security clearance when he was on a corporate board & was a Fox "News" contributor. Bolton implied he used his clearance to obtain classified information for the company, which did classified contract work. IOKIYAR.

Another Trump Fox "Guarding" Henhouse. Eric Lipton of the New York Times: "As a corporate lawyer, William L. Wehrum worked for the better part of a decade to weaken air pollution rules by fighting the Environmental Protection Agency in court on behalf of chemical manufacturers, refineries, oil drillers and coal-burning power plants. Now, Mr. Wehrum is about to deliver one of the biggest victories yet for his industry clients -- this time from inside the Trump administration as the government’s top air pollution official. On Tuesday, President Trump is expected to propose a vast rollback of regulations on emissions from coal plants, including many owned by members of a coal-burning trade association that had retained Mr. Wehrum and his firm as recently as last year to push for the changes."

Jennifer Bendery of the Huffington Post: "Four months after abruptly quitting Congress amid a sexual harassment scandal, former Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-Texas) still doesn't think he did anything wrong. In fact, the former GOP lawmaker says he 'took a bullet for the team' by resigning. He insists he's right not to repay $84,000 in taxpayer money he spent on a sexual harassment settlement. He ripped the House Ethics Committee for not caring about facts. And he blames f[uck]tards' and the Me Too movement for driving him out of a job.... And that's just a sample of Farenthold's comments in an Aug. 1 deposition he gave in a lawsuit over his new job at a Texas port authority.... What's clear is that he blames everyone but himself for his downfall and that his reasons for not repaying the $84,000 are bonkers. You can read 79 pages of his deposition yourself, here...." Mrs. McC: Sadly, I have retired my Pajama Boy photos. I blame fucktards for that decision.

AP: "Minnesota Democrats are standing behind U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison and his bid for state attorney general, with the state party giving him an endorsement Saturday amid an allegation of domestic abuse from an ex-girlfriend.... Ellison received 326 votes, or 82 percent of delegates on hand at the party's state executive committee meeting Saturday, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported."

*****

These are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand. -- Deep Throat, to Bob Woodward (thanks to Scott Lemieux) ...

Bad news for Old MacDonald.... Heigh-ho the Derry-o, McGahn Spills the Beans. Michael Schmidt & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "The White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, has cooperated extensively in the special counsel investigation, sharing detailed accounts about the episodes at the heart of the inquiry into whether President Trump obstructed justice, including some that investigators would not have learned of otherwise, according to a dozen current and former White House officials and others.... In at least three voluntary interviews with investigators that totaled 30 hours over the past nine months, Mr. McGahn described the president's furor toward the Russia investigation and the ways in which he urged Mr. McGahn to respond to it. He provided the investigators examining whether Mr. Trump obstructed justice a clear view of the president's most intimate moments with his lawyer.... Mr. McGahn laid out how Mr. Trump tried to ensure control of the investigation.... It is not clear that Mr. Trump appreciates the extent to which Mr. McGahn has cooperated with the special counsel. The president wrongly believed that Mr. McGahn would act as a personal lawyer...." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Chas Danner of New York: "... it sounds like there was no smoking gun, but McGahn's insight might prove useful [by allowing] Mueller [to build] an obstruction case based on a series of Trump's actions, rather than just one.... Trump responded to the story on Saturday night, characteristically tweeting that there was nothing to see here...: ... 'I allowed White House Counsel Don McGahn, and all other requested members of the White House Staff, to fully cooperate with the Special Counsel. In addition we readily gave over one million pages of documents. Most transparent in history. No Collusion, No Obstruction. Witch Hunt!'... White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders, meanwhile, released a statement stressing that everything was just fine between Trump and McGahn...." ...

... Bob Bauer (White House counsel to President Obama) in Lawfare: "A White House counsel is not in a position to reject or ignore a special prosecutor's request for information relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation.... The White House counsel is a government employee, not personal counsel to the president. Courts presented with the question have ruled that, in a criminal investigation, the attorney-client privilege does not shield a White House counsel from providing his or her evidence. Neither is executive privilege a safe harbor if the government can demonstrate need for the information and its unavailability from other sources.... This is the irony of the counsel's position: the very proximity to the Oval Office that distinguishes the role and accounts for so much of its value, can also present grave risks for a president in legal trouble." ...

... Tom Levenson of Balloon Juice: "... this whole thing reminded me of two deep truths. First: when wrongdoing starts to unravel in public view, any smart, or even mildly self-aware mooks entangled in the affairs of the principal miscreant, realize that their interests diverge from said brigand. Clearly that's happening all over Trump world. Second: the Manchurian president appears both to have committed the cardinal sin of all criminal clients -- lying to his legal team -- and to be represented by morons[.]" ...

... Marcy Wheeler of emptywheel: "Over two thousand words and over a dozen sources, and Maggie and Mike never get around to explaining whether Don McGahn has any exposure in or provided testimony for the investigation in chief, the conspiracy with Russia to win the election. Instead, along the way, Maggie and Mike repeat some version of 'obstruction' fourteen times ... perpetuating the grossly misleading myth, once again, that Trump and his cronies are only at risk for obstruction charges.... One bit of legal exposure that the NYT has provided evidence for -- but confused as yet more actual legal discussion -- is in McGahn's role in the Mike Flynn firing.... McGahn wrote an obviously misleading explanation for the Flynn firing, one that suppressed transition period emails that would undermine all the claims about Flynn deciding to lie about his discussion with Sergi Kislyak, and one which would conflict in material ways with the contemporaneous reports of Jim Comey, Sally Yates, and a number of othe DOJ witnesses.... The whole theme of [the NYT] story is that McGahn 'cooperated' with Mueller's inquiry. The word, in some legal contexts, may mean 'responded to legal requests in a way that limited a person's own criminal exposure' and in others may mean 'helped convict co-conspirators.'.... Because the story doesn't explain the difference in connotations, it makes McGahn look far more cooperative than he has necessarily been." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: I think the reason "Maggie & Mike" didn't get around to explaining the extent of McGahn's cooperation is that they don't know what-all he told the Mueller team. ...

... Wheeler has another excellent post (which is more readable than much of her stuff) about McGahn's real areas of expertise: campaign finance law & court-stacking. "Most Republicans, I suspect, will one day become willing to jettison Trump so long as they can continue stacking the courts. Trump, one day, may be expendable so long as McGahn’s expertise at stacking the court holds sway. At that level, McGahn's political fortunes may actually conflict with Trump's." ...

... digby: "It's pretty clear who has been behind the leaks over the past year and a half that make Don McGahn look very heroic. There's only one person who would have so much to gain by it.... McGahn has been covering his ass from the beginning. One imagines he's been safe from reprisals because the GOP backs him for their court packing project which, at this point, is their only serious strategy for future survival."

... David Atkins in the Washington Monthly: "Loyalty is not reciprocated in Trumpworld, and every underling expects to be the fall guy for their criminal superior.... [As Haberman & Schmidt write,] 'Mr. McGahn and his lawyer, William A. Burck ..., feared Mr. Trump was setting up Mr. McGahn to take the blame for any possible illegal acts of obstruction.... So he and Mr. Burck devised their own strategy to do as much as possible to cooperate with Mr. Mueller to demonstrate that Mr. McGahn did nothing wrong.'... Beyond its moral perversity, this is an unsustainable institutional culture.... When Trump's White House does fall, this is how it will do so: with each person looking to save their skin at the expense of the others, a den of thieves entirely without honor."

Jeremy Schulman of Mother Jones: "On Saturday, Trump tweeted that [John] Brennan would 'go down as easily the WORST [CIA director] in history & since getting out, he has become nothing less than a loudmouth, partisan, political hack.' Trump -- who last year revealed what the Washington Post described as 'highly classified information' to Russian officials during an Oval Office meeting -- added that Brennan 'cannot be trusted with the secrets to our country!'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Tyranny, TV-Style. Steve M. "I'm not sure Trump understands that Mueller and his team have security clearances.... But Fox has been telling him that the others on the [enemies] list are evil Deep State creatures who are abusing their security clearances. So he'll target them for clearance revocation. A true tyrant would conduct a sweeping, massive purge of critics. What Trump is doing is terrible, but he doesn't quite have a real tyrant's broad vision.... And Trump is revoking the clearances slowly because that's how you'd do it on reality TV -- you'd want to prolong the drama. No real tyrant would do that. But effective tyranny is bad television. So Trump is a slow-acting tyrant. That's why there's still a Mueller investigation at all." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: As usual, Steve lays an interesting perspective on the Trump presidency: it's tyrannical, all right, but it's a slow-rolling tyranny because that's the way Trump did it on the teevee. Whether or not Trump himself has figured this out, there does seem to be a "boiling frog" aspect to Trump's methodology: by pulling these undemocratic & sometimes unconstitutional stunts in small doses, the public becomes accustomed to them & Congressional Republicans can largely avoid oversight: I mean you can't hold hearings on every little thing, can you (unless they're little Democratic things)? (More on Congressional "oversight" linked below.)

Betsy Woodruff & Pervaiz Shallwani of the Daily Beast: "Maria Butina, the Russian national accused of acting as a Kremlin agent in the United States, was abruptly moved from a jail in Washington to a lockup in Alexandria, Virginia, according to her lawyer.... The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has accused American officials of mistreating Butina in jail." Mrs. McC: Oh, good. Maybe she can fraternize with Paul Manafort during rec time. (Also linked yesterday.)

Space Farce! David Cloud & Noah Bierman of the Los Angeles Times: "When President Trump spoke to Marines at the Miramar Air Station in San Diego on March 13, he threw out an idea that he suggested had just come to him. 'You know, I was saying it the other day, because we're doing a tremendous amount of work in space -- I said maybe we need a new force. We'll call it the "space force,"' he told the crowd. 'And I was not really serious. And then I said what a great idea -- maybe we'll have to do that.'... The concept had been pushed unsuccessfully since 2016 by a small group of current and former government officials, some with deep financial ties to the aerospace industry, who see creation of the sixth military service as a surefire way to hike Pentagon spending on satellite and other space systems.... When Trump abruptly embraced the idea at Miramar -- and began promoting it to wild applause at other rallies -- a moribund notion opposed by much of the Pentagon hierarchy and senior members of the Senate became a real possibility.... The story of how that happened is a window into the chaotic way Trump sometimes makes key decisions, often by bypassing traditional bureaucracy to tout ideas that work well as applause lines but aren't fully thought-out." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Paul Krugman: "The real news of the past few weeks isn't that Trump is a wannabe Mussolini who can't even make the trains run on time. It's the absence of any meaningful pushback from Congressional Republicans.... Is Trumpocracy what Republicans always wanted?... My guess is that most Republican politicians are spineless rather than sinister -- or, more accurately, sinister in their spinelessness.... The party has long been in the habit of rejecting awkward facts and attributing them to conspiracies: it's not a big jump from claiming that climate change is a giant hoax perpetrated by the entire scientific community to asserting that Trump is the blameless target of a vast deep state conspiracy.... So remember this moment. We're seeing, in real time, what the GOP is really made of." ...

... Ashley Parker, et al., of the Washington Post: "The Washington Post reached out to all 51 Republican senators and six House Republican leaders asking them to participate in a brief interview about Trump and race. Only three senators agreed to participate: Jeff Flake of Arizona, David Perdue of Georgia and Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only black Republican in the Senate.... As Trump immersed the nation in a new wave of fraught battles over race, most GOP lawmakers tried to ignore the topic altogether. The studied avoidance is a reflection of the enduring reluctance of Republicans to confront Trump's often divisive and inflammatory rhetoric, in part because the ­president remains deeply popular within a party dominated by older white voters. '[Trump] is trying to convince white people that the way to keep their long-term status is to keep out people of color, keep out immigrants, and keep blacks down, and they'll feel better off by doing so,' [Dianne] Pinderhughes [of the University of Notre Dame] said. 'In turn, some white people are excited and responsive. It's not all whites, but it's significant enough to be recognized by other Republicans, who decide to stay quiet about it.'" ...

... Amber Phillips of the Washington Post: "Compared to former national security officials criticizing President Trump in increasingly forceful ways, Congress has been reluctant to challenge him.... But every once in a while, Congress does do something to make itself stand apart from Trump's most controversial actions. It's usually in subtle ways, like Thursday's unanimous vote in the Senate to separate themselves from the president's attacks on the media.* Phillips looks at the times Congress has stood up and/or kinda sorta slightly stood up to Trump. ...

... * Mrs. McCrabbie: I missed this. Here's a story about it: Nicole Guadiano of USA Today (August 16): "The Senate unanimously passed a ['sense of the Senate'] resolution by Democrats on Thursday condemning attacks on the free press and affirming that 'the press is not the enemy of the people,' President Trump's label for the media. The move came as more than 300 newspapers and other media outlets joined The Boston Globe in publishing editorials Thursday promoting freedom of the press and refuting Trump's denouncements. 'We can't let statements by the president declaring the press is the enemy of the people go unchallenged,' said Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii.... Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., joined Schatz in introducing the resolution, which passed with unanimous consent by voice vote."

Benjamin Wallace-Wells of the New Yorker writes a glossy piece on John McCain's "romantic conservatism," as seen through the eyes of McCain's long-time aide & coauthor Mark Salter.

Matt Ford of the New Republic: "Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation process is turning into a mess.... Americans are less supportive of his elevation to the high court than any successful Supreme Court nominee in the past thirty years. The voluminous paper trail from his six-year tenure in the George W. Bush White House is turning into a political liability. And the GOP's haste to put him on the court before those records are available gives Democrats the chance to question the process's legitimacy. The Senate's narrow Republican majority means Kavanaugh is still more likely to be confirmed than not. But he's skating closer to thin ice than a nominee in his position should be.... According to The New York Times, [Mitch McConnell] warned White House Counsel Don McGahn that Kavanaugh's extensive paper trail would make things more difficult for the Senate compared to other potential selections."

The following linked story presents one of many reasons to oppose Brett Kavanaugh. Democrats must require Kavanaugh to give a straight (no pun intended) answer on this, but we pretty much know what an honest answer would reveal:

... A Couple Walks into a Retirement Community. Paula Span of the New York Times: A faith-based continued-care retirement community (CCRC) in Missouri rejected the application of a married couple -- because the couple were women. The couple, with the backing of the ACLU, has sued the facility."Faith organizations operate many retirement facilities. If a baker can refuse to make a wedding cake for a gay couple (and have the Supreme Court agree, albeit on narrow grounds), can a C.C.R.C. refuse admission to [a same-sex married couple]? With Attorney General Jeff Sessions announcing the creation of a 'religious liberty task force,' some facilities might try." Read the whole story. There is a lot of discrimination against LGBT seniors in CCCRs, including against those who are already in the facilities. This is really distressing.

Beyond the Beltway

Update to the story linked yesterday about ICE's detaining a man who was driving his pregnant wife to the hospital to give birth: Alex Horton of the Washington Post: "On Saturday afternoon, officials released previously undisclosed details about [Joel] Arrona-Lara’s arrest. He is a Mexican national wanted in Mexico under a warrant issued for homicide charges and has been detained pending removal proceedings, according to a statement by ICE spokeswoman Lori Haley.... Arrona-Lara's legal representative, Emilio Amaya García, told The Post he believed his client was not suspected of crimes within the United States, and denies criminal charges in Mexico. García questioned why Arrona-Lara is slated for removal but not extradition, where a more formal handoff to authorities would be made."

AND Georgia Cops Taze 87-Year-Old Woman Collecting Dandelions. Amy Wang of the Washington Post: "When Martha Al-Bishara went on a walk near her home in northern Georgia last week, she was on a quest for dandelions. The stroll would end in her getting stunned by a Taser and arrested by police officers. The 87-year-old woman often ventured outside -- with a kitchen knife and a plastic bag in hand -- to cut and collect the plants for cooking, her family said. She was doing just that last Friday afternoon when she crossed the street from her home in Chatsworth, Ga., and arrived at a partially fenced lot belonging to a branch of the Boys and Girls Club. There, she began gathering the plants she needed." Al-Bishara doesn't speak English & family members say she suffers from dementia. She made no threatening motions but did not put her steak knife down when officers ordered her to do so. So naturally, the three officers were skeert & one of them Tazed her. Then they carted her off to jail. Mrs. McC: Did I mention Al-Bishara is (probably) Muslim? (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Way Beyond

Putin Danced at Her Wedding. Griff Witte of the Washington Post: "When [Austrian] Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl tied the knot at a vineyard in the hills of southern Austria on Saturday afternoon, Russian President Vladimir Putin was on hand to give his blessing. He stayed for a little over an hour and briefly danced with the bride.... Kneissl married Wolfgang Meilinger, an entrepreneur.... The country's Foreign Ministry said the ceremony was private, with just 100 attendees. But with Putin among them, the personal event took on a very public meaning for Europe while generating a backlash in Austria.... In addition to Putin, the two most powerful figures in Austria -- Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache ... -- also attended Saturday's wedding.... The wedding gave Putin a highly symbolic platform to demonstrate his deepening ties with political leaders in Europe.... The timing is particularly apt for Putin given that Austria currently holds the rotating E.U. presidency."