The Commentariat -- March 4, 2016

Afternoon Update:

Nick Gass of Politico: "Ben Carson is suspending his bid for the presidency, the retired neurosurgeon announced Friday, speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Maryland. 'Even though I might be leaving the campaign trail, you know there's a lot of people who love me, they just won't vote for me. But I will still continue to be heavily involved in trying to save our nation,' he said." CW: Very reassuring.

Nick Gass: "Donald Trump has pulled out of the Conservative Political Action Conference on Saturday, opting to campaign in Kansas and Florida instead.... While Trump had spoken at past CPAC events, his speaking slot this time drew backlash from conservative critics who had accused event organizers of being in the tank for the Manhattan real-estate magnate.... Politico reported Wednesday that Trump has donated more than $100,000 to the ACU [which sponsors CPAC], including a $50,000 check in 2015.... On Thursday, National Review reported on efforts to stage a walkout during Trump's speech, coming from a tri-corn hat-wearing CPAC attendee from Georgia named William Temple."

Max Ehrenfreud of the Washington Post: "Whatever critics might say about failed presidential candidate Mitt Romney, everyone at least agrees that he has done well for himself as a businessman. There is no such consensus regarding Donald Trump.... A recent analysis suggests the extent of Trump's underperformance is vastly greater than previously recognized. The new results emphasize the degree to which Trump has relied on his family's wealth and connections in order to create his fortune."

... The quality of the GOP presidential debate last night was such that Charles Pierce thought it best to begin the discussion with a photo of some Klansmen on a Ferris wheel. ...

... Margaret Hartmann provides video of some of of the more newsworthy moments of the debate, with commentary. Here Marco shows he can be fast on his feet, riffing off Trump's answers to questions about his flipflopping wherein he extolled the importance of "flexibility":

TMZ: "A construction worker found a knife buried on the perimeter of the former O.J. Simpson estate ... and it's currently being tested by the LAPD in a top secret investigation ... law enforcement sources tell TMZ.... We're told a construction worker found the knife years ago.... The weapon is a folding buck knife. Our law enforcement sources say the construction worker took the knife to the street, where he saw an LAPD cop. He told the officer where he found the knife and the cop took it. Turns out the cop -- who worked in the traffic division -- was off duty at the time, working security for a movie shoot at a house across the street on Rockingham. Our sources say the officer took the knife home and kept it ... for years." Read on. Via New York.

*****

Presidential Race

The Big Dick Debate. Patrick Healy & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, fighting for their political lives, relentlessly demeaned and denounced Donald J. Trump at Thursday's debate, all but pleading with Republicans to reconsider nominating a candidate with a long history of business failures, deep ties to the Democratic Party and a taste for personal insults.... But the debate in Detroit also deteriorated at times into the kind of junior high school taunts that have startled many Republican elders but done little to dent Mr. Trump's broad appeal. At one point, as Mr. Trump and Mr. Rubio traded insults over their manhood, Mr. Trump recalled Mr. Rubio's innuendo that Mr. Trump's 'small hands' correlated with another part of his anatomy. Mr. Trump, who has boasted about his sexual exploits, insisted that nothing was small about him. 'I guarantee you,' Mr. Trump continued with little subtlety, 'there's no problem. I guarantee you.'" ...

History Timeout. [He is] a hideous hermaphroditical character, which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman. -- Thomas Jefferson, disparaging opponent John Adams' manhood, 1800 presidential election

The original intent of the Founders was to render dick jokes in elegant prose with references to Greek mythology. -- Constant Weader

... CW: Still, in my lifetime, I've never seen a headline akin to this one at CNN: "Donald Trump defends size of his penis." ...

... Greg Sargent argues that Trump's big schlong moment is the essence of his campaign -- and his success. ...

... Adam Peck of the New Republic: "The remaining candidates on stage -- who have openly begun plotting ways to derail Trump's campaign at a brokered convention -- all pledged to support the Republican nominee, even if that nominee is ultimately Trump." ...

... Nick Gass of Politico: "Donald Trump's GOP primary rivals on Thursday night said that the billionaire businessman is unfit to be president. Then they pledged they would support his run for president if he's the Republican nominee." ...

... Ed Kilgore: "For long, long minutes Rubio beat up on the Donald as a con man and Cruz savaged him as a crypto-Democrat, the two lines of attack regularly reinforced by the moderators and converging in the impression that Trump's a terrible gamble, even for the people who are most attracted to him. From long experience during this campaign, it would be foolish to assume the debate damaged Trump's standing significantly. But if it didn't, perhaps the man is indeed bulletproof. He did seem uncharacteristically flustered at times. It's unlikely Rubio -- who for the second debate in a row got into long insult-laden cross-talk exchanges with Trump -- or Cruz helped themselves that much.... Meanwhile, Kasich was either smart or lucky enough to ignore the carnage and speak for himself, though if he loses Ohio, he will be dumped from the convention cabal unceremoniously for failure to bring delegates to the table." ...

... Driftglass liveblogs the debate. Another classic. ...

... Here's the Guardian's liveblog of the Republican presidential debate. The New York Times' liveblog is here. ...

... Alan Rappeport of the New York Times on where you can watch/hear Thursday's GOP debate.

Donald Trump is a phony, a fraud. His promises are as worthless as a degree from Trump University. He's playing members of the American public for suckers: He gets a free ride to the White House, and all we get is a lousy hat. -- Mitt Romney, at the University of Utah, Thursday ...

... The Farce Be With Us. Steve M.: "Almost overnight, the response of Republican establishmentarians to the Donald Trump threat has changed from deer-in-the-headlights catatonia to bouncing-off-the-walls frenzy; denial wasn't working, so now, probably too late, the party insiders are going all in on a 'stop Trump by any means necessary' strategy.... I'm shocked that this seems to be the GOP plan -- not just because it's going to enrage the already angry (and occasionally violent) Trump mobs, but also because it would require the party to do something it couldn't do even though it needed doing months ago: make a freaking decision. So Trump is probably safe." ...

... John Cassidy of the New Yorker: "The dump-Trump movement has a clear and convincing message -- he's a dangerous charlatan -- but it doesn't have a candidate." Neither does it have a platform that can appeal to the pitchforks crowd drawn to Trump.

... Alexander Burns & Michael Barbaro of the New York Times: "A divided Republican Party erupted into open and bitter warfare on Thursday as its two previous presidential nominees delivered an extraordinary rebuke of its current front-runner, Donald J. Trump, warning that his election could put the United States and its democratic system in peril.... The mounting hostility between Mr. Trump and traditional party leaders has pushed the party to the edge of rupture.... [Mitt Romney] evoked the specter of totalitarianism, saying Mr. Trump embodied a 'brand of anger that has led other nations into the abyss.'" ...

... Ed O'Keefe of the Washington Post: "Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, delivered a sweeping point-by-point indictment of Donald Trump on Thursday and implored Republicans to reject the businessman's candidacy in an election 'that will have profound consequences for the Republican Party and, more importantly, for the country.'" ...

... The New York Times has the full text of Romney's speech, as delivered, here. If you want to watch the speech, PBS has video here. ...

... Jamie Gangel & Eric Bradner of CNN: "Mitt Romney has instructed his closest advisers to explore the possibility of stopping Donald Trump at the Republican National Convention, a source close to Romney's inner circle says.... 'It sounds like the plan is to lock the convention,' said the source." CW: The video that currently accompanies the story is good; it juxtaposes Romney's & Trump's remarks about each other in 2012 with their remarks today. ...

     ... Josh Marshall of TPM has the full video of "a gushing Mitt accepted Trump's endorsement and praised him to the stars" in 2012. ...

... They Just Don't Get It. Paul Waldman: "If Donald Trump could have asked for one person to attack him, the person whose criticism would reinforce all the arguments Trump makes for his own campaign, he could hardly have done better than Mitt Romney. Romney's speech today, no matter what the merits of its particulars, is a microcosm of the entire effort now underway by party insiders to find some way to get rid of Trump. Too little, too late, and offered by precisely the wrong people, it will probably produce the exact opposite of its intended effect." ...

... Shane Goldmacher of Politico: Romney "made startlingly clear how hopelessly divided the Republican Party remains in terms of actually slowing the Manhattan billionaire's march to the nomination.... [Romney] would not endorse any of Trump's three remaining opponents.... In failing to back a single Trump alternative, Romney essentially called for a Republican civil war to wage through this summer, a retrenchment for an irreparably divided GOP in hopes of outmaneuvering Trump at a contested convention where party elites still control some levers of power.... Moments after he finished speaking, Sen. John McCain, the 2008 Republican nominee, seconded Romney's speech. 'I share the concerns about Donald Trump that my friend and former Republican nominee, Mitt Romney, described,' McCain said in a statement." ...

     ... McCain's full statement is here. ...

... Clash of the Moguls. Charles Pierce: "Far be it from me to minimize the entertainment value inherent in watching two legacy multi-millionnaires going to the mattresses, each trying to out Common Man the other in the public square. And let me also say in fairness that most of what Willard Romney said about He, Trump in his Declaration of Disapproval Thursday morning was smack on the button. This is the speech that will launch 1000 attack ads from now until the first week in November." (CW: Also, too, John McCain, legacy Navy man, on accounta marrying up, couldn't remember how many houses he owned.) ...

... Jonathan Chait: "While depicting Trump’s business career as a fraud, Romney failed to mention or explain why he had solicited and accepted Trump's endorsement four years before. (If his business career was not the credential, then was it Trump's birtherism that attracted Romney?) More importantly and incoherently, Romney [[ even while assailing Trump as an authoritarian goon -- declined to rule out supporting him if he gets the nomination.... This is an awful prospect for the party -- professional Republicans conspiring to deny the nomination to the popular choice, who would storm out and bring his supporters with him." ...

... Paul Krugman: "Yes, [Trump is] a con man, but they all are. So why is this con job different from any other? The answer, I'd suggest, is that the establishment's problem with Mr. Trump isn't the con he brings; it's the cons he disrupts.... I find the prospect of a Trump administration terrifying, and so should you. But you should also be terrified by the prospect of a President Rubio, sitting in the White House with his circle of warmongers, or a President Cruz, whom one suspects would love to bring back the Spanish Inquisition." ...

... New York Times Editors: "Holy Mitt, what a meltdown. Add this one to Donald Trump's lengthening list of firsts: He's forced a Republican Party reckoning overdue for years, all in a few days. It took the Trump-dominated Super Tuesday contests to awaken Republican leaders to the fact that the darkest elements of the party's base, which many of them have embraced or exploited, are now threatening their party. Last week, Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, elected to the Senate partly on their appeal to extremists, seemed to realize that they weren't attractive enough to win Mr. Trump's crowd.... It is an excellent thing that the Republican leaders have noticed the problem they've fostered, now embodied in the Trump candidacy. But until they see the need to alter the views and policies they have promoted for years, removing Mr. Trump will not end the party's crisis." ...

... Danny Vinik of Politico: "'If Donald Trump's plans were ever implemented, the country would sink into a prolonged recession,' Romney said. He then rattled off a list of domestic policies, from Trump's tax plan to his health care proposals, that would hurt the economy.... But as a policy argument it is closer to surreal: the policies Romney is complaining about, if you look at them closely, are strikingly similar to a candidate the mainstream GOP proudly stood behind just 4 years ago. His name was Mitt Romney." ...

... Paul Waldman (at CNN): In 2012, "Romney ran a campaign that was utterly demagogic and dishonest. It may not have been quite as appalling as what Trump is doing now, but in many ways it was similar, the only difference being that Trump says out loud what Republicans such as Romney prefer to imply.... [Romney] may not have charged that Obama's birth certificate was fake, but he spent an awful lot of time trying to convince people that the President just wasn't really one of us.... Romney aired a stunningly dishonest ad charging falsely that Obama had removed work requirements from welfare.... ('You wouldn't have to work. They just send you your welfare check.')... That kind of rhetoric always has plausible deniability.... What they find so disturbing about Trump [is that] he doesn't bother with subtlety, or try to find ways to activate voters' prejudices while being able to claim he doesn't know what's going on." ...

... CW: What the GOP "establishment" & Trump's opponents really object to his style, not his "substance." It isn't just that he's crude; the calibre of attacks on President Obama & Secretary Clinton by Republicans across the board are evidence of that. It isn't just that he's a bigot; almost every elected Republican has his ways of signaling the bigot class that he's one of them. It isn't just that he's an outsider; Mitt was happy to embrace the Birther-in-Chief in 2012. It isn't just that from time-to-time he espouses some "liberal" ideas; when convenient, Republicans all pay lip service to ideals Democrats share -- look how riled they became (after a couple of days of hemming & hawing) over the Confederate flag in the wake of the mass murder of black South Carolinians. It isn't that they object to the few policy positions he has put in writing; these proposals are boilerplate-Republican. And so forth. Nope, it's that Trump portrays Republican values & policies in a manner that exposes them for what they are. He is a living, breathing cartoon of the GOP, a farcical, telltale personification of the heart of the party of Reagan. The Republican party is Dorian Gray, & Trump is the picture in the attic, dusted off & brought out into the light of day. ...

... ** Francis Wilkinson of Bloomberg: "Trump proves racism no longer needs to be subtle.... [Former Speaker of the House John] Boehner and other Republicans were not averse to stirring up racial resentment. But they did so in a manner that racially aggrieved whites had come to accept -- with a subtlety that implicitly respected the 'norm of equality' even as it undermined it. Trump's success may signal a new frontier.... Trump represents a clear preference for tribalism over outreach and integration. Yet much of the party's agenda appears to mimic that preference." ...

... Stephen Stromberg of the Washington Post: "... even though [Romney] said the right things about Trump, he dignified a series of Republican pathologies, many of which play into the Trump phenomenon.... Romney also essentially endorsed a strategy to defeat Trump.... Even if [the strategy] does work, however, Romney and everyone else in the GOP 'establishment' would not have washed away the moral stain that Trump has already left on the party. They would have to contemplate their role in encouraging the forces that have boosted him. Even as Romney condemned Trump as a fundamental threat to the nation, he gave credence to Republicans' wide-ranging hysteria about Hillary Clinton." ...

... McKay Coppins of BuzzFeed reports on what led Romney to decide to launch a major attack against Trump. ...

... Tom Levenson in Balloon Juice: "R-Money being who he is, the reason he gave for the urgency in stopping Trump was not for The Donald's sin of describing Republican views and gut-feelings accurately, but because it would ensure a Clinton presidency -- and that family is, of course, simply too gauche, too nouveau for true representatives of better-established dishonest money to accept. But thanks anyway, [former] Governor! Plenty of good stuff there for ads in the fall. Or, as the man said: please proceed." ...

... Tara Golshan of Vox: "Looking back to when Romney sought his endorsement in 2012, Trump quipped to a crowd in Maine on Thursday: 'I could've said, "Mitt, drop to your knees," and he would've dropped to his knees." ...

... CW: Several pundits, including one cited in Golshan's piece, called the "drop to your knees" remark "a blow job reference." It could be, but I don't think so. Trump said Mitt "begged" him for an endorsement in 2012. Dropping to one's knees is the gesture of a supplicant, consistent with begging. In the vernacular of people of a certain age (like Trump), it would not connote preparation for felatio. Trump is a straightforward vulgarian; we need not look for implied vulgarities. Update: A couple of minutes into the debate, Trump boasted that his penis was yuuuuge. ...

... Margot Sanger-Katz of the New York Times: "When Donald Trump talks about health care, he sounds as if he wants to do something different from the rest of the Republican field. But his health care plan, released Wednesday night, looks a lot like what his competitors have already presented.... [His] policies, which are quite similar to those proposed by Mr. Trump's rivals Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, would mean millions of Americans would lose their health insurance, especially the low-income people whom Mr. Trump talks about wanting to protect. There is no bullet point for helping the people who fall through the cracks, or for preventing Americans from dying 'on the sidewalk.'... He may describe himself as more compassionate and generous on health care than his rivals, but there's a huge gulf between that rhetoric and the practical consequences of his policies." ...

     ... CW: This is similar to his economic "plan," which is just as bad as all the other Republican candidates' "plans" & would devastate the economy. ...

     ... Update: Greg Sargent expands on Romney's unintended indictment of Republican economic plans: "Romney faulted Trump's plan for ballooning the deficit while 'refusing to reform entitlements.' This is apparently a reference to Trump's promise not to cut entitlements. Translating Romney's argument, what he's really doing is attacking Trump as irresponsible for promising deficit-busting tax cuts for the rich without proposing to pay for them by cutting social insurance for the elderly."

Tim Egan: "Trump has unleashed the beast that has long resided not far from the American hearth, from those who started a Civil War to preserve the right to enslave a fellow human to the Know-Nothing mobs who burned Irish-Catholic churches out of fear of immigrants.... Trump's people ... are sick and tired of tolerance." ...

... CW BTW: Trump now has a spokeswoman who goes by the name of Sarah Huckabee Sanders. I refuse to believe this is her real name. She must be a pseudonymic character in the manner of Dickens (a la Master Bates of Oliver Twist), whose nom-de-campaign is designed to portray the candidate as a person-of-the-people in the mold of Sarah Palin, an evangelical pop-politician following in the footsteps of Mike Huckabee, but, in the end, a true populist like Bernie Sanders. Nobody knows branding like Trump knows branding. ...

     ... Update/Correction: Contributor P.D. Pepe informs us Sarah Huckabee Sanders is not only a real person, she comes by the Huckabee honestly: she's Mike Huckabee's daughter. Here's more on that. Still, Dickens lives!

... Here's an anti-Trump ad produced by the conservative Our Principles superPac, launched & partially funded by the Ricketts family, owners of the Chicago Cubs. Trump has threatened to air the family's dirty linens.

Shane Goldmacher: "Marco Rubio's path to the Republican nomination short of a contested convention has narrowed to nearly nothing as his campaign and allies reboot their strategy to prepare for months of guerrilla warfare to deny Donald Trump a clean, pre-convention victory. The math for Rubio is daunting. After getting thoroughly routed on Super Tuesday, Rubio is in so deep a delegate hole that he would now need to win roughly two-thirds of all the remaining delegates to guarantee his nomination ahead of Cleveland...."

Hostage Crisis Resolved. Eric Levitz of New York: "Chris Christie said at a press conference Thursday that he is not being held hostage by Donald Trump.... Of course, when you think about it, isn't that exactly what a hostage would say?"

Nick Corasaniti of the New York Times: "A day before the Michigan primary on Tuesday, Senator Bernie Sanders will be the focus of a live one-hour, prime-time event in Detroit. The host? Fox News. Bret Baier announced ... on Thursday night that the Sanders campaign had agreed to the town-hall-style broadcast. The Clinton campaign was invited, but 'is unable to attend due to a conflict in her campaign schedule,' according to a release from the network."

Matt Zapotosky of the Washington Post: "The revelation that the Justice Department has granted immunity to a former State Department staff member who worked on Hillary Clinton's private email server is a likely indication that the investigation is nearing a conclusion, but should not be read as a sign that the leading Democratic presidential candidate is going to face criminal charges, legal experts said." ...

... Matt Apuzzo of the New York Times: "A former aide to Hillary Clinton has turned over to the F.B.I. computer security logs from Mrs. Clinton's private server, records that showed no evidence of foreign hacking, according to people close to a federal investigation.... The security logs bolster Mrs. Clinton's assertion that her use of a personal email account to conduct State Department business ... did not put American secrets into the hands of hackers or foreign governments."

Senate Race

Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "With Senator Charles E. Grassley [R-Iowa] under attack for his handling of the Supreme Court nomination process, a formidable Democratic challenger will run against him this November, the most significant sign yet that Democrats see the court and the candidacy of Donald J. Trump as twin liabilities for Republicans. Patty Judge, a former Iowa lieutenant governor and state agriculture secretary, is expected to announce her challenge this weekend to Mr. Grassley, who is seeking a seventh Senate term and had previously been seen as having little opposition to re-election." ...

... Jason Noble of the Des Moines Register: "Judge, 72, is a rural Democrat with a long electoral history in Iowa. She would enter what is expected to be a four-way Democratic primary, with the winner almost certain to face Grassley in the November general election.... Judge told The Des Moines Register late last week that she was considering a run, largely because of Grassley's stance on the court vacancy. 'I don't like this deliberate obstruction of the process,' she told the Register last week. 'I think Chuck Grassley owes us better. He's been with us a long time. Maybe he's been with us too long.'"

Other News & Views

Adam Liptak & Coral Davenport of the New York Times: "In a significant victory for the Obama administration, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. on Thursday refused to block an Environmental Protection Agency regulation limiting emissions of mercury and other toxic pollutants from coal-fired power plants. The decision comes three weeks after the full Supreme Court, in a highly unusual move, blocked another major Obama administration rule that would limit planet-warming greenhouse gas pollution from coal plants.... The order was issued solely by Chief Justice Roberts, who did not refer the question to the full court.... Thursday's decision is an indication that Justice Scalia's death has altered the balance of power on the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court had voted, 5 to 4, on the climate change stay, issued Feb. 9. Justice Scalia was in the majority, and his vote in that case was one of the last he cast before he died."

Joe Biden, in a New York Times op-ed: "... I was so surprised and saddened to see Republican leaders tell President Obama and me that they would not even consider a Supreme Court nominee this year. No meetings. No hearings. No votes. Nothing. It is an unprecedented act of obstruction.... If they love the Senate as much as I do, they need to act."

Tracy Wilkinson of the Chicago Tribune, in the Miami Herald: "Secretary of State John F. Kerry has canceled a trip to Cuba two weeks before President Barack Obama visits the communist-ruled nation as diplomats haggle over which Cuban dissidents the president will be allowed to meet."

History Timeout. Glenn Garvin of the Miami Herald: That time President Calvin Coolidge went to Cuba, a tale of "drunken debauchery, inebriated idiocy, salacious smuggling and even unnatural acts with Key lime pies." And botched diplomacy.

Greg Jaffe & Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post: "Over lunch with a small group in Milwaukee, President Obama on Thursday said he plans to stay in Washington for a couple of years after his presidency so that his youngest daughter can finish high school."

Tim Mak of the Daily Beast: "As Republican presidential hopefuls gather in Detroit for a critical post-Super Tuesday debate, Sen. Mike Lee [RTP-Utah] is stalling plans to alleviate [Flint, Michigan]'s drinking water crisis -- a disaster that has a disproportionate and devastating impact on the poor and the young. Lee is using a Senate tactic used to gum up the works known as a 'hold,' which is generally kept secret so the lawmaker can remain anonymous. But two senior Senate sources confirmed to The Daily Beast that Lee is behind the maneuver to stall an utterly uncontroversial provision." Thanks to Akhilleus for the link. As Akhilleus pointed out, Lee is Ted Cruz's only buddy in the Senate.

Michelle Boorstein & Julie Zauzmer of the Washington Post: "A Catholic diocese in Pennsylvania announced Thursday that it will post the names online of priests credibly accused of sexually abusing children, a decision that came two days after a dramatic grand jury report alleged a decades-long cover-up.... The report relied on a secret archive at the Altoona-Johnstown diocese, which dates back to the 1950s and was opened up this summer when authorities obtained a search warrant. The grand jury interviewed surviving priests and their alleged victims, and compiled a 147-page account detailing accusations against more than 50 religious leaders including priests and teachers."

Beyond the Beltway

Sam Levin of the Guardian: "The FBI escalated its investigation into Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy's 2014 standoff with the federal government Thursday with sweeping raids across the country that resulted in 12 arrests, including that of a Donald Trump campaign coalition co-chair in New Hampshire[: Jerry DeLemus]. Two of Bundy's sons were also among those arrested, amid signs that federal authorities are ramping up their efforts against the ultra-conservative, anti-government movement that also inspired the armed standoff in Oregon earlier this year.... The latest arrests mean five members of the Bundy family, Cliven included, are in jail awaiting trial." Thanks to Haley S. for the lead. ...

... CW: Jerry DeLemus, & his wife Susan, a state representative, are well-known New Hampshire kooks. No reputable candidate for state or national office would have anything to do with either of them.

Oliver Milman of the Guardian: "Oregon has become the first US state to pass laws to rid itself of coal, committing to eliminate the use of coal-fired power by 2035 and to double the amount of renewable energy in the state by 2040. Legislation passed by the state's assembly, which will need to be signed into law by Governor Kate Brown, will transition Oregon away from coal, which currently provides around a third of the state's electricity supply. At the same time, the state will also require its two largest utilities to increase their share of clean energy, such as solar and wind, to 50% by 2040. Combined with Oregon's current hydroelectric output, the state will be overwhelmingly powered by low-carbon alternatives to fossil fuels."

Michael Wines of the New York Times: "The poisoning of Flint[, Michigan]'s children outraged the nation. But too much lead in children's blood has long been an everyday fact in Cleveland[, Ohio,] and scores of other cities -- not because of bungled decisions about drinking water, but largely because a decades-long attack on lead in household paint has faltered. It is a tragic reminder that one of the great public health crusades of the 20th century remains unfinished.... In most cities, the lead threat is confined largely to poor neighborhoods with scant political clout. There is little official urgency -- and increasingly, little money -- to address it." New York City is a notable exception.

States of Execution. Mark Berman of the Washington Post: "Lawmakers in Florida voted on Thursday to revamp the state's death penalty statute, a move that came nearly two months after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down its current capital punishment statute as unconstitutional.... Meanwhile, a judge in Alabama also ruled that her state's capital sentencing setup was unconstitutional, citing the same Supreme Court ruling that struck down Florida's death penalty."

Educating Texans. Yanan Wang of the Washington Post: "A Texan who called [President] Obama a gay prostitute may soon control what goes in children's textbooks." Mary Lou Bruner, a retired teacher who has published many wacko views on her Facebook account, is likely to win election to the Texas State Board of Education.

News Lede

Bloomberg: "Employers added more workers in February than projected but wages unexpectedly declined, dashing hopes that reduced slack in the labor market was starting to benefit all Americans. The 242,000 gain followed a 172,000 rise in January that was larger than previously estimated, a Labor Department report showed Friday. The jobless rate held at 4.9 percent as people entered the labor force and found work. Average hourly earnings dropped, the first monthly decline in more than a year."

The Commentariat -- March 3, 2016

Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: "The Supreme Court's liberal justices united Wednesday to attack Texas's abortion regulations as an unconstitutional burden on a woman's rights, but the justice who holds the key vote [-- Anthony Kennedy --] left the court's ultimate resolution of the issue in doubt." ...

... Ian Millhiser of Think Progress: "There is a very real procedural complication in this case that could delay its ultimate resolution, possibly for a couple of years. But if he has to reach the merits of this case, Kennedy appeared inclined to strike down the law." ...

... ** Dahlia Lithwick of Slate provides a superb account of yesterday's proceedings: "It felt as if, for the first time in history, the gender playing field at the high court was finally leveled, and as a consequence the court's female justices were emboldened to just ignore the rules." Thanks to Victoria D. for the link. ...

... Mark Stern of Slate zeroes in on the exchange between Justice Ginsburg & Texas Solicitor General Scott Keller regarding the state's assertion that women seeking abortions in the El Paso area could zip over to New Mexico, which does not have the same requirements for abortion clinics that the Texas law imposes. CW: It must have been awfully sad to see Keller lose both his swagger & his fake drawl at the hands of a little old lady from New Yawk City. (Keller is a native of the Midwest. He used to work for Ted Cruz.)

... Dana Milbank: "If Wednesday's argument was an indication, the Republicans appeared to have fired up the other side more than their own with this revival of the culture wars. About 80 percent of the few thousand people braving the cold and wind outside the court were abortion rights supporters. Inside the courtroom, the liberal justices, who are now in a 4-to-4 tie with the conservatives, were unusually feisty as they considered abortion restrictions in Texas that cut the number of clinics nearly in half and the abortion capacity by about 80 percent.... Putting the court's composition to a popular referendum [-- as Republicans want to do --] will, inevitably, bring the atmosphere inside the court ever closer to the coarse displays outside." ...

... Linda Greenhouse: Absent Justice Scalia, the Supreme Court is a new and different institution now. Litigants are accommodating the change, & so are the justices themselves. ...

... Julie Davis & David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "President Obama is vetting Jane L. Kelly, a federal appellate judge in Iowa, as a potential nominee for the Supreme Court, weighing a selection that could pose an awkward dilemma for her home-state senator Charles E. Grassley, who has vowed to block the president from filling a vacancy.... In a Senate floor speech in 2013, Mr. Grassley effusively praised Judge Kelly, a longtime public defender, just before she won unanimous confirmation to her current post on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.... He said in an interview on Wednesday that he would not change his position even for a fellow Iowan." ...

... "The Party of Chaos." Greg Sargent ties the GOP's anti-Trump efforts to Senate Republicans' refusal to consider an Obama nominee to the Supreme Court. If TrumpsSoBad, why are Senate Republicans insisting they won't do their jobs to hear Obama's candidate only to allow Trump to pick the nominee replace Justice Scalia? CW: There's a teensy inconsistency in their stance that might make the skeptic suspect racism is part of the equation. ...

... Sam Biddle of Gawker (March 1): "According to some of [Justice Antonin Scalia's] former law students..., a younger Scalia also went out of his way to undermine young legal scholars, simply because they were black." ...

     ... CW: Although the allegations are shocking enough in their own right, it seems likely that Scalia would never have been confirmed had these stories come to light before or during Scalia's confirmation hearings. You could ask Judge Sen. Jefferson Beauregard Sessions about that. In 1986 -- the same year the Senate confirmed Scalia's nomination to the Supreme Court -- the Senate rejected Sessions' nomination to a District Court judgeship because of charges of less-blatant racial discrimination. P.S. Thanks, President Reagan!

Elana Schor of Politico: "Former Chesapeake Energy CEO Aubrey McClendon, one of the leading forces behind the nation's natural gas boom, died Wednesday in a one-vehicle car wreck, Oklahoma City police said -- one day after his indictment on federal conspiracy charges.... 'He pretty much drove straight into the wall,' police Capt. Paco Balderrama said, according to CNBC.... The Justice Department described the indictment -- involving an alleged scheme to rig competitive oil and gas leases in northwest Oklahoma -- as the first step in 'an ongoing federal antitrust investigation' into the petroleum industry."

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd.

James Poniewozik of the New York Times loved the CNN on-air battle between Van Jones & Jeffrey Lord, who called the KKK "the terrorist arm of the Democratic party" which killed people "to further the progressive agenda." When Jones pointed out that that was the Democratic party of a century ago, Lord argued that, no, it was "the Democratic party of today" which "divides people by race." Delusional. But, you know, riveting teevee. One does have to wonder why, if the KKK is a "liberal" organization, Lord's favored candidate has so much trouble denouncing it.

Frank Pallotta of CNN: "ESPN baseball analyst Curt Schilling appeared to violate the network's guidelines when he told a radio station that Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton should be 'buried under a jail.' ESPN said Wednesday, 'We are addressing it' and would not go into further details."

Presidential Race

Nicholas Confessore of the New York Times: "... buried beneath Mrs. Clinton's wide-ranging and commanding victories on Tuesday night were troubling signs of a party that has not yet rallied to her call. Democratic turnout has fallen drastically since 2008, the last time the party had a contested primary, with roughly three million fewer Democrats voting in the 15 states that have held caucuses or primaries through Tuesday.... It stands in sharp contrast to the flood of energized new voters showing up at the polls to vote for Donald J. Trump in the Republican contest.... And despite the seemingly inexorable demographic rise of Hispanic voters, the American electorate is still overwhelmingly white." ...

... Adam Goldman of the Washington Post: "The Justice Department has granted immunity to a former State Department staffer, who worked on Hillary Clinton's private email server, as part of a criminal investigation into the possible mishandling of classified information, according to a senior law enforcement official.... As the FBI looks to wrap up its investigation in the coming months, agents are likely to want to interview Clinton and her senior aides.... 'There was wrongdoing,' said a former senior law enforcement official. 'But was it criminal wrongdoing?'" CW: Just the kind of story a political candidate wants: a former employee is granted immunity from criminal prosecution so he can testify in a case involving your own "wrongdoing." ...

... Steven Myers & Matt Apuzzo of the New York Times: "As Hillary Clinton moves toward the Democratic presidential nomination, she faces legal hurdles from her use of a private computer server as secretary of state that could jar her campaign's momentum in the months ahead.... It is commonplace for the F.B.I. to try to interview key figures before closing an investigation, and doing so is not an indication the bureau thinks a person broke the law." CW: On the other hand, watching your candidate do the perp walk, handcuffed, is a bummer.

The Lineup. Marcobot Rubio, Don Stubby Fingers Trump, Ted Napoleon Cruz & John "How Am I Losing to These Guys?" Kasich. ... Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "Fresh off a Super Tuesday that reordered the Republican field of presidential hopefuls, the remaining four candidates will gather in Detroit Thursday at 9 p.m. ET for a debate that could prove to be the most consequential of the 2016 race.... It will be the first time this year that Mr. Trump will face Megyn Kelly, the Fox News anchor with whom he feuded last year.... Democrats will hold their own debate in Flint, Mich., on Sunday." CW: You know, when we'll all be watching the final episode of "Downton Abbey." Well done, Debbie!

Kevin Drum: "In the mysteriously mumbly style we've come to expect from him, Ben Carson has dropped out of the presidential race without actually saying that he's dropping out of the presidential race:"

... Back to Pyramid Theories & Pyramid Schemes. Trip Gabriel of the New York Times: "Ben Carson, the only Republican to have once threatened the lead of Donald J. Trump in national polls, said on Wednesday that he saw no path forward and would skip a debate on Thursday in his hometown, Detroit, signaling an end to his candidacy after paltry performances in the nominating contests. Mr. Carson stopped short of suspending his campaign and said he would provide more details in a speech on Friday, but after his dismal showing in the Super Tuesday states, his campaign is effectively over."

Adele Stan of the American Prospect: "Win or lose, Trump has unleashed a beast that has long lived in limited captivity amid the American electorate. Outward expression of contempt for those one resents -- whether through epithets, violence, or mere coarseness -- is no longer a pursuit reserved for those on the fringe of American politics. It's gone mainstream, thanks to Trump, each baldly stated prejudice now packaged as a legitimate political position." ...

... Brendan O'Connor of Gawker: "If Donald Trump Jr. had known that the radio host he was speaking to was pro-slavery, Bloomberg Politics reports, he would not have consented to the interview: 'This is clearly the mainstream media trying to turn a story into nothing,' he said. Pardon? The interview, recorded at a campaign event in Tennessee and to be aired this weekend, was conducted with the white supremacist James Edwards, who has said that 'slavery is the greatest thing that ever happened to' black Americans and that 'interracial sex is white genocide.' Edwards has received media credentials from the Trump campaign." ...

... Eric Levitz of New York: "The Trump campaign, however, denies that any such interview took place. The campaign told The Hill that Donald Jr. was not in attendance at Saturday's rally, and did not 'to his knowledge' grant Edwards an interview this past week." ...

... Joan McCarter of Daily Kos: "Trump rallies are now apparently a key feature for Edwards' program -- he and his colleagues have been to three rallies where they are fully credentialed and say they are treated as 'every bit as legit' as the traditional media. They are more legit, apparently, in the Trump campaign's eyes than the Huffington Post, the Des Moines Register, and Fusion which have all previously been denied credentials to Trump rallies. And yes, Edwards is really a white supremacist and his show is most definitely about white supremacy. The Anti-Defamation League has written ... that Edwards has used the platform to interview 'a variety of anti-Semites, white supremacists, Holocaust deniers, conspiracy theorists and anti-immigrant leaders.' The Southern Poverty Law Center adds 'James Edwards has probably done more than any of his contemporaries on the American radical right to publicly promote neo-Nazis, Holocaust deniers, raging anti-Semites and other extremists.' And he's a VIP in Trumpland."

Ah, Who Will Be the Third-Party Candidate?

Nolan McCaskill of Politico: "Donald Trump said Thursday he is being treated unfairly by the Republican establishment and may run as an independent. 'I am watching television and I am seeing ad after ad after ad put in by the establishment knocking the hell out of me, and it's really unfair,' Trump said on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe.' 'But if I leave, if I go, regardless of independent, which I may do -- I mean, may or may not. But if I go, I will tell you, these millions of people that joined, they're all coming with me'." ...

... Alexander Burns of the New York Times: "Spurred by Donald J. Trump's mounting victories, a small but influential -- and growing -- group of conservative leaders are calling for a third-party option to spare voters a wrenching general election choice between a Republican they consider completely unacceptable and Hillary Clinton.... Two top Republicans, Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Gov. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts, said this week that they would not vote for Mr. Trump in November." ...

     ... CW: If you're wondering how well this conspiracy of confederates will work, read on: "William Kristol, editor of the conservative Weekly Standard magazine, said he would work actively to put forward an 'independent Republican' ticket if Mr. Trump was the nominee, and floated Mr. Sasse as a recruit." Kristol has been on this horse for quite some time. His earlier choices for a third-party candidate, via Driftglass, who was not making this up: Dick Cheney or Tom Cotton. ...

... Alex Isenstadt of Politico: "... even as the anti-Trump groups begin to coordinate, some Republicans are throwing their hands in the air, convinced that a TV advertising campaign won't succeed; Trump is already carrying a double-digit lead over Rubio in Florida, where thousands of voters will have cast absentee ballots before election day. 'The "Stop Trump" campaign is now officially a fantasy, about as real as "the campaign to stop yesterday,"' said Alex Castellanos, a veteran Republican strategist who tried unsuccessfully to launch an anti-Trump group." ...

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Wednesday:

... Michael Bender & Justin Sink of Bloomberg: "The rapidly intensifying effort by the Republican establishment to dislodge Donald Trump from the top of the party's presidential nominating race will star 2012 nominee Mitt Romney, who is preparing a speech for Thursday when he'll lay out his case against the front-runner.... While making the case against Trump at the Hinckley Institute of Politics Student Forum at the University of Utah, Romney will not endorse one of his opponents...." ...

... Jonathan Stearns & Toluse Olorunnipa of Bloomberg: "Donald Trump took to the airwaves Thursday with a barrage of name-calling in response to news that ... Mitt Romney was trying to torpedo the billionaire real-estate developer's chances in this year's contest. 'Mitt Romney is a stiff,' Trump said on NBC's 'Today Show.'... Romney is planning a speech later Thursday in a bid to dislodge Trump from leading the party's presidential nominating race, branding the New York mogul as untrustworthy and saying he'd be a boon to Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. 'Donald Trump is a phony, a fraud,' Romney will say later Thursday at the University of Utah, according to a transcript provided to Bloomberg News by a person familiar with his remarks. 'He's playing the American public for suckers.'" ...

... Thomas Gibbons-Neff of the Washington Post: "In a last-ditch effort to stop Donald Trump's likely nomination as the Republican Party's candidate for president, a group of more than 50 conservative foreign policy experts have banded together in an open letter condemning the real estate magnate as unfit for the office.... The letter was published Wednesday night on the foreign policy site War on the Rocks." CW: Yeah, that really will get the attention of Trump voters, who are probably lifetime subscribers to War on the Rocks. Should stop Trump in his tracks. ...

... Michelle Conlin of Reuters: "The Koch brothers, the most powerful conservative mega donors in the United States, will not use their $400 million political arsenal to try to block Republican front-runner Donald Trump's path to the presidential nomination, a spokesman told Reuters on Wednesday. The decision by the billionaire industrialists is another setback to Republican establishment efforts to derail the New York real estate mogul's bid for the White House, and follows speculation the Kochs would soon launch a 'Trump Intervention.'"

An Academic Theory of Drumpf. Amanda Taub of Vox: "... authoritarianism -- not actual dictators, but rather a psychological profile of individual voters ... is characterized by a desire for order and a fear of outsiders. People who score high in authoritarianism, when they feel threatened, look for strong leaders who promise to take whatever action necessary to protect them from outsiders and prevent the changes they fear.... The GOP, by positioning itself as the party of traditional values and law and order, had unknowingly attracted what would turn out to be a vast and previously bipartisan population of Americans with authoritarian tendencies.... If you were to read every word these theorists ever wrote on authoritarians, and then try to design a hypothetical candidate to match their predictions of what would appeal to authoritarian voters, the result would look a lot like Donald Trump." ...

Welcome Back, Jim Crow. Brent Staples of the New York Times: "Donald Trump's flirtation with the Ku Klux Klan should come as no surprise. He has functioned for years as a rallying point for 'birthers,' conspiracy theorists, extremists and racists who are apoplectic about the fact that the country elected a black man president. These groups have driven the Republican Party steadily rightward, helping to create a national discourse that now permits a presidential candidate to court racist support without paying a political price.... The [era] that is still unfolding in the wake of Barack Obama's presidency bears a striking resemblance in tone to the reaction that swept the South after Reconstruction...." ...

... Gail Collins thinks "Mister Trump" and the other GOP presidential candidates are pretty hilarious. CW: I'm not laughing. For one reason, see today's Beyond the Beltway. ...

... CW: I read about this incident yesterday but wasn't able to find video until now. Here is video of white supremacists & other thugs at a Trump rally repeatedly shoving and roughing up a young black woman:

... Travis Gettys of the Raw Story: "White supremacists hurled racist and sexist slurs Tuesday afternoon as they pushed a black protester out of a Donald Trump rally in Kentucky.... 'I was called a n****r and a c*nt and got kicked out,' said Shiya Nwanguma, a University of Louisville student. 'They were pushing and shoving at me, cursing at me, yelling at me, called me every name in the book.... The hat-wearing Trump supporter appears to be white nationalist Matthew Heimbach, head of the Traditionalist Worker Party...."

... CW: That's right. The person who got kicked out of the rally was the victim of physical & verbal abuse. The white supremacists? They stayed on. Welcome to Trump's Amerika. It's great again. And remember, it's "liberals" who are "dividing people by race." Not funny, Gail. ...

     ... I'm with Collins' colleague, Charles Blow: "Stop thinking that it's all a joke, a hoax, a game. It's not. Maybe [Trump] began this quest as a branding exercise, but it has morphed into something quite real: a challenge to the collective moral character of the republic. The success of his candidacy so far calls into question the very definition and direction of America." ...

... Excuse of the Day. Eric Levitz of New York: "Donald Trump Says He Didn't Denounce the KKK on CNN Because He Didn't Want to Risk Offending Jewish Philanthropies." CW: Trump's concern, as I understand it, was that he was afraid "KKK" might stand for something like Kabbalah, Kibbutz & Knish.

Ken Vogel of Politico: "Donald Trump's speaking slot at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Saturday is prompting an acrimonious backlash from the conservative critics desperately trying to mount a last-ditch campaign to block the GOP presidential front-runner from winning the party's nomination. A top aide to Trump rival Marco Rubio has accused CPAC organizers of being in the tank for Trump and clearing the way for his acceptance into mainstream conservatism, while an anti-Trump super PAC is pressuring organizers to rescind their invitation to the surging GOP front-runner.... Sources tell Politico that Trump has made multiple donations totaling more than $100,000 ― including a $50,000 check last year ― to the American Conservative Union, the group that organizes CPAC. That dwarfs the amounts donated in recent years by allies of Trump's rivals...."

Adios, Marco. Gabriel Sherman of New York: "Throughout the primary, Fox provided Rubio with friendly interviews and key bookings, including the first prime-time response to Barack Obama's Oval Office address on ISIS.... But this alliance now seems to be over. According to three Fox sources, Fox chief Roger Ailes has told people he's lost confidence in Rubio's ability to win. 'We're finished with Rubio,' Ailes recently told a Fox host. 'We can't do the Rubio thing anymore.'" CW: Who now, Roger? ...

... BUT, the Miami Herald, probably Florida's most influential newspaper, has endorsed Rubio for the GOP nomination ahead of the state's primary.

Beyond the Beltway

Today in Republican Party Leadership. Jordan Rudner of the Texas Tribune: Robert Morrow, "the newly elected chair of the Republican Party in the county that includes the Texas Capitol, spent most of election night tweeting about former Gov. Rick Perry's sexual orientation and former President Bill Clinton's penis, and insisting that members of the Bush family should be in jail. He also found time to call Hillary Clinton an 'angry bull dyke' and accuse his county vice chair of betraying the values of the Republican Party." When told that other members of the Travis County party were plotting to unseat him, Morrow told the Tribune, "Tell them they can go fuck themselves." "Morrow, who's also tweeted that Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida is 'very likely a gayman who got married,' said he supports the brand of Republican politics he most closely associates with Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz.... Last week, he tweeted that the Republican National Committee was just a 'gay foam party.'... For years, he has alleged that Perry is secretly bisexual.... Though Morrow has tweeted often about sexually explicit acts involving Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton and his last several Facebook profile pictures were of scantily clad women, he said he denies any charge that he is sexist.... When the Tribune asked about the content of some of Morrow's social media posts, without using the specific racial slur Morrow had employed, Morrow seized on the omission as an example of corruption within the media." ...

... Eric Hananoki of Media Matters has a nice collection of Robert Morrow's "writings." Morrow bills himself as an "alternative historian." CW: So a gentleman AND a scholar. ...

... "Two Degrees of Separation from Trump." Steve M.: "... when Roger Stone -- dirty trickster, Nixon tattoo bearer, founder of the interestingly acronymed anti-Hillary 'organization' Citizens United Not Timid, and once (and future?) Donald Trump campaign surrogate -- wanted a co-author for his book The Clintons' War on Women, Morrow ... was his choice." ...

... CW: This information has been out there for a long time. Hananoki raised it last September as did Mother Jones & Daily Kos. And not one major media outlet, not one of Trump's rivals, brought it up in profiles or political attacks on Trump & Friends. AND CNN employed Stone until he attacked fellow commentators in racist, sexist tweets. But they hired him knowing he was "a Holocaust denier who blames a 'Jewish plot' for the 9/11 attacks. Stone's history includes forming an anti-Hillary Clinton group named 'C.U.N.T.' during the 2008 election." Sorry, but that's malpractice all around.

The Commentariat -- March 2, 2016

Presidential Race

The New York Times is liveblogging the primary elections.

Democrats

Patrick Healy & Amy Chozick of the New York Times: "Hillary Clinton took full command of the Democratic presidential race on Tuesday as she rolled to major victories over Bernie Sanders in Texas, Virginia and across the South and proved for the first time that she could build a national coalition of racially diverse voters that would be crucial in the November election. Based on results from Democratic primaries and caucuses in 11 states, Mrs. Clinton succeeded in containing Mr. Sanders to states he was expected to win, like Vermont and Oklahoma, and overpowering him in predominantly black and Hispanic areas that were rich in delegates needed for the Democratic nomination." ...

Alabama: The New York Times has projected Clinton to be the winner with less than one percent of the precincts reporting.

Arkansas: The New York Times has projected Clinton to be the winner with less than one percent of the precincts reporting.

Colorado: The Times has projected Sanders to be the winner with 35 percent of the precincts reporting.

Georgia: The New York Times has projected Clinton to be the winner with 3 percent of the precincts reporting.

Massachusetts: The Times had the state leaning Clinton; now, with 5 percent of the vote counted, they have it leaning Sanders. Oops! At 9:00 pm, the Times has Massachusetts leaning Clinton. Update: With 91 percent of the votes counted, the Times has projected Clinton as the winner.

Minnesota: The Times has projected Sanders to be the winner with 43 percent of the precincts reporting.

Oklahoma: The Times has projected Sanders to be the winner with 51 percent of the precincts reporting. Sanders currently has 52 percent of the vote; Clinton has 41 percent.

Tennessee: The Times has projected Clinton to be the winner with less than one percent of the precincts reporting.

Texas: The Times has projected Clinton to be the winner with 2 percent of the precincts reporting.

Vermont: The Times has projected Sanders to be the winner with 4 percent of the precincts reporting.

Virginia: The New York Times has projected Clinton to be the winner with 44 percent of the precincts reporting.

Ed Kilgore: "On Super Tuesday Hillary Clinton took some measured steps forward towards winning the Democratic presidential nominating contest. Meanwhile Bernie Sanders took some measured steps backwards towards his original role as a protest candidate trying to 'keep Hillary honest' and carry the torch for progressives dismayed by the last two Democratic presidents."

Steve Annear of the Boston Globe: "Bill Clinton’s presence inside a polling location in Boston on Super Tuesday raised concerns about whether the former president violated state rules on election campaigning.... A video clip showing Bill Clinton shaking hands with election clerks at Holy Name [school gym], alongside Mayor Martin J. Walsh, had some people on Twitter questioning the former president’s appearance indoors.... [Massachusetts] Secretary of State William F. Galvin told the New York Times that he had to remind election workers that 'even a president can’t go inside and work a polling place.'”

Republicans

Alexander Burns & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Donald J. Trump won sweeping victories across the South and in New England on Tuesday, a show of strength in the Republican primary campaign that underscored the breadth of his appeal and helped him begin to amass a wide delegate advantage despite growing resistance to his candidacy among party leaders. Mr. Trump’s political coalition — with his lopsided victories in Alabama, Georgia, Massachusetts and Tennessee, and narrower ones in Arkansas, Vermont and Virginia — appears to have transcended the regional and ideological divisions that have shaped the Republican Party in recent years." ...

Alaska: Polls close at midnight ET. at 1:00 am ET, with 10 percent of the voted counted, Alaska is leaning Trump. at 2:00 am, Cruz is up by 3, & the Times has the state leaning Cruz. Update: With all precincts reports, Cruz carried Alaska, 36 percent to Trump's 34 percent.

Alabama: The Washington Post has projected Trump to be the winner with 0 percent of the precincts reporting.

Arkansas: The Washington Post has projected Trump to be the winner with 28 percent of the precincts reporting.

Georgia: The New York Times has projected Trump to be the winner with 2 percent of the precincts reporting. 

Massachusetts: The Times has projected Trump to be the winner with 0 percent of the precincts reporting.

Minnesota: The Times has projected Rubio to be the winner with 53 percent of the precincts reporting.

Oklahoma: The Times has projected Cruz to be the winner with 51 percent of the precincts reporting. Cruz currently has 34 percent of the vote; Trump has 30 percent.

Tennessee: The Times has projected Trump to be the winner with less than one percent of the precincts reporting.

Texas: The Times has projected Cruz to be the winner with 2 percent of the precincts reporting.

Vermont: With 84 percent of precincts reporting, the Times says the state is leaning toward Trump, who has 33 percent of the vote. However, Kasich is close at 31 percent. Update: With 97 percent of the vote counted, the Times has declared Trump the winner.

Virginia: The New York Times has projected Trump to be the winner with 84 percent of the precincts reporting. Trump currently has 36 percent of the vote; Rubio has 31 percent. 

The Party of Drumpf. New York Times Editors: "... voters ... are leaning, in unbelievable numbers, toward a man whose quest for the presidency revolves around targeting religious and racial minorities and people with disabilities, who flirts with white supremacists and the Ku Klux Klan, who ridicules and slanders those who disagree with him.... Those who could challenge Mr. Trump — Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio — are not only to the right of Mr. Trump on many issues, but are embracing the same game of exclusion, bigotry and character assassination." ...

... CW: Perhaps the Grey Lady should remove her rose-colored blinders & read Driftglass's explanation of why those voters are "leaning in unbelievable numbers" toward a fascist who would dispense with freedom of the press & "sue them and win lots of money" because the paper is "one of the most dishonest media outlets I've ever seen in my life. The worst, the worst. The absolute worst. They have an agenda that you wouldn't believe. And they're run by incompetent people. Yes, yes, I know Driftglass is not now nor will he ever be a member of the club, but the Times is aware of outsider journalism (whence their reporters often get their leads), so it wouldn't hurt if they occasionally took a peek at an outsider's POV. ...

Ha Ha. M. J. Lee of CNN: "Disaffected Republicans are discussing everything from skipping the Republican National Convention in July to running a conservative candidate as an independent or third-party candidate -- with the ultimate goal of denying Trump the presidency. One of the names frequently mentioned in this hypothetical is Mitt Romney, the 2012 GOP presidential nominee, even though he has shown no desire to run another campaign but has shown a zest for attacking Trump."

Tim Alberta of the National Review: "It’s either Donald Trump or a contested convention.... Cruz emerged from Tuesday second in the delegate race and best positioned, at least mathematically, to challenge Trump for the nomination.... [But] southern, conservative, Evangelical-heavy areas were once thought to be hostile to the bombastic, thrice-married Manhattan billionaire. Instead, Trump turned the Bible Belt into his personal political playground. Now the race shifts to friendlier terrain. Come mid-March, the primaries will award delegates in chunks from states in the midwest, the mid-Atlantic, and the sun belt, with bigger, more-diverse electorates. After that, April sees the race move to Trump’s wheelhouse: the northeast." Via Greg Sargent. ...

... Greg Sargent scans the GOP "leadership"'s evolving attitudes toward a Trump nomination. There's no consensus, but there seems to be movement toward "At least he's not Hillary." Nice bumper-sticker material. ...

... The Trumpinator. Ben Kamisar of the Hill: "Donald Trump warned Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) that he'll have to pay the price if he doesn't get along with a President Trump after Ryan repudiated him for failing to disavow backing from David Duke. 'I'm going to get along great with Congress. Paul Ryan, I don't know him well, but I'm sure I'm going to get along great with him,' the front-runner for his party's nomination said during his Super Tuesday speech. 'And if I don't, he's going to have to pay a big price.'" CW: Are you missing Obama yet, Paul? ...

... Jennifer Jacobs for USA Today: "Donald Trump lashed out again at the news media — specifically the Des Moines Register, part of the USA Today Network —  for reporting on some black college students who said his campaign ejected them from his presidential rally in Georgia on the eve of the big Super Tuesday vote.... The police chief in Valdosta confirmed Tuesday that the students were correct when they said Trump aides ordered them out of the campus stadium. But Chief Brian Childress said Trump and his detail were justified in removing the students for disorderly behavior. The night before, Trump’s spokeswoman Hope Hicks had called USA Today’s article about the incident a 'false report,' saying neither Trump nor the campaign had anything to do with asking the students to leave. Trump kept up that narrative during his Super Tuesday stop in Columbus, targeting this reporter, who writes for The Des Moines Register and is a correspondent for USA Today.... The Trump campaign had earlier in the day refused to credential USA Today for the candidate's appearance in Palm Beach on Tuesday night. ...

     ... CW: I'd love to know what constitutes "disorderly" at a Trump rally. If you didn't watch the video I posted yesterday of snippets from Trump's rally in Virginia, you might want to take a look. Unless the black students were shooting people, they weren't "disorderly" by Trump rally standards. ...

... Olivia Nuzzi of the Daily Beast: "Donald Trump is paying himself to run for president. Between June 16, when he announced his candidacy from the lobby of Trump Tower, through the end of 2015, the Trump campaign spent $2.2 million patronizing Trump businesses. The majority — $2 million — was spent on Tag Air Inc., where Trump is CEO.... Whether or not this is legal is a tricky question. By law, candidates cannot profit from their own campaigns." ...

... CW: That's funny, because Trump doesn't care. He once bragged that "It’s very possible that I could be the first presidential candidate to run and make money on it.” I suppose President Trump will just disband the Federal Election Commission & declare the law null, void & unprosecutable.

Andrew Sprung has a very good piece titled "Trump the Incompetent." He uses the WashPo's reporting on Trump Mortgage to demonstrate the "distilled essence of Trump's art of the debacle:... 1. Ignore market signals.... 2. Fail.... 3. Blame surrogates.... 4. Stiff everyone.... 5. Lie about it when everyone's forgotten." Read the whole post. Via Paul Waldman.

Erik Wemple of the Washington Post: Sean Hannity & Bill O'Reilly of Fox "News" rescue Donald Trump from his know-nothing moments on his white supremacist supporters. ...

... Derek Thompson of the Atlantic profiles Trump supporters: white, undereducation, fearful, resentful, racist & receptive to authoritarian leadership.

Glenn Blain & Dareh Gregorian of the New York Daily News: "Super Tuesday has gotten off to a not-so-super start for Donald Trump - a state appeals court has denied his bid to toss out a lawsuit that charges his Trump University was a fraud. In a unanimous ruling, a four judge panel of the state Appellate Division said the state Attorney General's office is 'authorized to bring a cause of action for fraud' - despite the bloviating billionaire's claims to the contrary." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Justin Wolfers of the New York Times: "It’s unsurprising that 'Donald Trump' has been the most searched-for candidate in the United States over the past 24 hours. More surprising: The runner-up is neither Marco Rubio nor Ted Cruz. Instead, that honor goes to 'Donald Drumpf.' The comedian John Oliver mocked Mr. Trump by urging the audience of his HBO show Sunday night to adopt the candidate’s real family name.

... Jonathan Chait: "The fact that Trump threatens rather than promotes conservative interests has enabled conservative intellectuals to see certain truths that they once obscured: There are deep strands of racial resentment and anti-intellectualism running through the Republican electorate. But these angry spasms of half-recognition attempt to quarantine Trump from a political tradition of which he is very much a part." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

** Sam Biddle of Gawker: Ted Cruz celebrated his wins in Texas & Oklahoma at a bar called the Redneck Country Club. "This may or may not shock you, but the Redneck Country Club is owned by an extreme, open racist by the name of Michael Berry, who hosts a racist radio program that includes a blackface 'comedian' named 'Dr. Rev. Shirley Q Liquor,' who provides a routine of vile black stereotypes for Berry’s white listeners.... And Media Matters points out, Berry, a friend of Cruz’s for decades, has referred to blacks as 'jungle animals' and 'pack animals,' and tweeted in defense of a KKK billboard promoting white purity ('nothing wrong with it'). So remember: Donald Trump is the GOP candidate with a racist affiliation problem" ...

     ... CW: Seriously, this shocks me. Of course I know Ted is an asshole, but I didn't know he was a flagrant, flaming racist asshole. Earlier this week, he tweeted, "Really sad," in response to Trump's refusal to disavow the KKK & David Duke. "You're better than this," he wrote to Trump. "We should all agree, racism is wrong, KKK is abhorrent." Evidently just a teensy weensy bit wrong & a widdle biddy bit abhorrent.

"Goodbye, Rubio Tuesday." Jonathan Chait: "... it was only a few days, when Marco Rubio was poised to seize back the inside lane of the Republican nomination race.... In the days since, Rubio’s plan has come to pieces.... For all its struggles at vote-garnering, Rubio’s campaign has excelled at one thing: winning the nebulous 'expectations game.'... Tuesday, reports leaked that Rubio’s campaign was telling supporters it could win four states. This turned his 1-for-11 showing from a disappointment into an absolute debacle.... He is closer to becoming a joke than the front-runner.” ...

... Nate Cohn of the New York Times: "The night could not have gone much worse for Marco Rubio, perhaps the only Republican with a good chance to beat Mr. Trump in a one-on-one contest." ...

The Grifters. Steve M.: "What's the difference between [Rubio & Carson] right now? As far as can see, the only difference is that Carson is staying in the race so that the flow of small to medium-size checks from churchgoing heartlanders won't stop altogether, and Rubio is staying in the race so the flow of somewhat larger checks from Republican one-percenters won't dry up. They both like the money. They both like the attention. Carson's hoping to sell a million copies of a godly campaign memoir and Rubio's hoping to position himself for 2020. But it's still all about that grift. Everyone acknowledges that about Carson, but most people think Rubio operates on a higher plane. Remember, though, Rubio's the guy who charged lots of personal expenses on a GOP credit card. He's the guy who was in debt until a billionaire named Norman Braman bailed him out. They're two of a kind. Let's admit that, at least." ...

... Jonathan Easley of the Hill: "Ben Carson will not drop out of the GOP presidential race, even if he doesn’t take home any delegates on Super Tuesday, close friend and adviser Armstrong Williams told The Hill." ...

... Which is totally sensible because ... Al Weaver of the Washington Examiner: "... his campaign admits that it's not clear at all that Carson has a viable path to victory, and they don't have a plan to win." ...

... Scammer-in-Chief: CW: Of course if the main goal of your campaign is not the presidency but the jackpot, then it does make sense to stay to the bitter end. Send money, people. There's a God-fearing Christian who is pretending to run for president who needs your hard-earned cash to send on to his so-called consultants. And maybe take a kickback here & there. Who knows?

GOP Leaders Beat up on Last Nearly-Sane Guy Standing. Tarini Parti of BuzzFeed: "On Tuesday night as return after return came in and Marco Rubio failed to break through, many establishment Republicans grew angrier that John Kasich was still in the race. One of them was Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has become increasingly frustrated with Kasich behind closed doors, three sources told BuzzFeed News. In the coming days, McConnell will be urged to more aggressively try behind the scenes to push Kasich out, sources say." ...

     ... CW: I believe Kasich will drop out soon, without any pressure from the Turtle & other GOP "establishment leaders." BTW, if anybody feels sorry for these "leaders" (so leaderish they typically don't have the guts to be quoted on the record), get over it. Flacking for Marco is unconscionable. ...

... Charles Pierce: John Kasich is cranky but evidently not crazy: "I know that human beings affect the climate.... I know we need to develop all of the renewables, and we need to do it in an orderly way." CW: The next thing you know, he'll be saying science is a good thing. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Charles Pierce: "As near as I can tell, there's only one elected Republican who's out there being completely principled about what's happening to his party.... [Sen. Ben] Sasse [RTP-Neb.] is every bit the soul of wingnut chewiness that Ted Cruz is. His Tea Party street cred is unassailable." Sasse called for a third-party candidate if Trump wins the GOP nomination. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Michael Barbaro of the New York Times: "Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey is awkwardly adapting to a new role: Donald J. Trump’s yes man. During Mr. Trump’s victory news conference on Tuesday night in Florida, Mr. Christie stood behind him during the business mogul’s entire speech, offering the constant nods, a gaze of admiration and unrelenting affirmation usually reserved for a political spouse." ...

If you mute this Trump speech, it looks like they're holding a bachelor auction but no one will bid on Chris Christie. -- Chris Burke, on Twitter ...

Play it with the audio, which you can mute (lower right-hand corner):

https://t.co/SxcpUxkL45

— Ronan Farrow (@RonanFarrow) March 2, 2016

 ... Margaret Hartmann: "Just days after Trump appeared to kick Christie off his stage in Tennessee, directing him 'get on the plane and go home,' the governor elected to stand in Trump's shot. Twitter quickly went to work, attempting to determine if the troubled look on Christie's face was a sign that he's realized his political future is now in the hands of the guy from The Apprentice, or a desperate attempt to alert the media that Trump has taken his loved ones hostage." ...

... CW: If you also watch Christie's introduction of Trump at the victory party, you'll be even more convinced Trump is holding Christie hostage. Instead of the irrepressible glee that usually accompanies a big win, Christie delivers his words in a near monotone, a sober (or pained) expression on his face -- in the manner of a hostage delivering a videotaped speech his captors wrote & forced him to make for the folks back home.

... Paul Singer of USA Today: "Six New Jersey newspapers issued a joint editorial Tuesday calling on Gov. Chris Christie to resign in the wake of his failed presidential campaign and his subsequent endorsement of rival Donald Trump. The six newspapers including the Asbury Park Press, the Cherry Hill Courier-Post and the Morristown Daily Record — all Gannett-owned papers that are part of the USA Today Network — were apparently spurred to editorial outrage by a Monday press conference in which Christie refused to answer questions about anything other than his nomination of a state Supreme Court judge. Asked why, Christie replied, 'Because I don't want to.' 'We’re fed up with Gov. Chris Christie’s arrogance,' the papers wrote. 'We’re fed up with his opportunism. We’re fed up with his hypocrisy.'"

Other News & Opinion

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court on Wednesday will hear its first major abortion case in almost a decade, one that has the potential to revise constitutional standards and to affect millions of women. Justice Antonin Scalia’s death last month may have muted the prospect of truly bold action, but even a 4-to-4 tie would have enormous consequences because it would leave in place an appeals court decision that could drive down the number of abortion clinics in Texas to about 10, from roughly 40."

Tierney Sneed of TPM: "During a Tuesday meeting at the White House with President Obama, GOP Senate leaders remained unbowed in refusing to consider his nominee to the Supreme Court, according to top Democrats present. 'They were adamant. They said no, we are not going to do this at all. We are going to do what has never been done before,' Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) told reporters at a stakeout after Tuesday's meeting...." ...

... Oliver Knox of Yahoo! News: "One aide to a vulnerable Senate Republican, who requested anonymity, jokingly suggested that there might be another, very different source of pressure as early as Tuesday night. 'I’m not sure we want to be in the business of telling voters that we’d rather risk having Donald Trump nominate the next Supreme Court justice,' he said." ...

... Paul Waldman: "So on the one hand, people like McConnell are saying Trump is a lunatic who can’t be trusted, but on the other hand they’re saying he’s the one who ought to make this appointment. Got it." ...

... Of course he can be trusted, Paul. Eric Hananoki of Media Matters: "Donald Trump ally Roger Stone said that Fox News senior judicial analyst Andrew Napolitano is 'probably Trump's number one pick for the U.S. Supreme Court.' Napolitano believes in 9/11 conspiracy theories, is a 'contrarian' on President Abraham Lincoln's legacy, and doesn't believe 'the right to vote' is a 'fundamental right.'" CW: Also, too, Napolitano is 65 years old, so he'll be getting wackier soon.

Zach Carter of the Huffington Post: DNC Chair & Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) has joined Republicans' efforts to gut the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's regulation of payday lenders. "She's also attempting to gin up Democratic support for the legislation" that would curb the CFPB's rules. "The misleadingly titled Consumer Protection and Choice Act would delay the CFPB's payday lending rules by two years, and nullify its rules in any state with a payday lending law like the one adopted in Florida [which is a joke].... Consumer groups are appalled by the bill." CW: Thanks, Debbie. It's always great when a Democratic leader goes out of her way to stick it to the most helpless Americans. ...

     ... It would be super to have your BFF Hillary Clinton weigh in. Inquiring reporters???

Beyond the Beltway

Mitch Smith of the New York Times: "The Republican governor of South Dakota on Tuesday vetoed a bill that would have restricted bathroom access for transgender students and made the state the first to adopt such a measure. Gov. Dennis Daugaard put out a statement late in the day saying that the bill did 'not address any pressing issue' facing the state, and that it would have put schools in the 'difficult position of following state law while knowing it openly invites federal litigation.' The measure was pushed by conservative legislators who said it was an effort to protect the privacy of all students. But it appeared to conflict with the Obama administration’s interpretation of federal civil rights law and seemed likely to be headed for a court challenge.” CW: Well, good on Gov. Daugaard.

Laurel Andrews of the Alaska Dispatch News: "A Superior Court judge dismissed the Alaska Legislature’s lawsuit to halt Gov. Bill Walker’s Medicaid expansion Tuesday. In his decision and order, Superior Court Judge Frank Pfiffner concluded that the state acted within the bounds of the law when it expanded Medicaid.... Whether the Legislature would appeal the ruling was still being considered Tuesday, Senate Majority spokeswoman Michaela Goertzen said, but 'I know that’s something that (the Senate majority) has said in the past that they would likely do.'"