The Commentariat -- September 7, 2018
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Peter Baker of the New York Times: "Former President Barack Obama assailed President Trump on Friday as a 'threat to democracy' as he emerged from a period of political silence to kick off a campaign blitz intended to help Democrats take control of Congress in the November midterm elections. In a speech meant to frame his message on the campaign trail over the next two months, Mr. Obama offered a stinging indictment of his successor, sometimes by name, sometimes by inference, accusing him and his Republican supporters of practicing a 'politics of fear and resentment,' cozying up to Russia, emboldening white supremacists and politicizing law enforcement agencies." ...
Trump Takes Another Shot at the First Amendment. Mark Landler of the New York Times: "President Trump said on Friday that he wanted Attorney General Jeff Sessions to investigate the source of an anonymous Op-Ed essay published in The New York Times, intensifying his attack on an article he has characterized as an act of treason. Speaking to reporters on Air Force One as he traveled to Fargo, N.D., Mr. Trump said, 'I would say Jeff should be investigating who the author of that piece was because I really believe it's national security.' Mr. Trump said he was also considering action against The Times, though he did not elaborate.... In a statement on Friday, The New York Times said any such investigation would be an abuse of power.... Mr. Trump also escalated his attack on a new book by Bob Woodward, describing it as a 'total fraud' and arguing, 'I don't talk that way.' The president said libel laws should be toughened to go after Mr. Woodward for what Mr. Trump claimed was a pattern of falsehoods." ...
... Peter Baker & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "As President Trump tries to refute the portrayal in the latest attention-grabbing book, he has not only denied saying the things attributed to him, he has denied that he has ever said anything like them. The problem for Mr. Trump is that, in some cases at least, the record shows that he has. 'The Woodward book is a scam,' Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter on Friday morning.... 'I don&'t talk the way I am quoted. If I did I would not have been elected President. These quotes were made up.' In particular, Mr. Trump has denied that he called Attorney General Jeff Sessions 'mentally retarded' or a 'dumb Southerner,' as the book reports. 'I said NEITHER, never used those terms on anyone, including Jeff, and being a southerner is a GREAT thing,' the president wrote earlier this week. But, in fact, Mr. Trump has used the phrase 'mentally retarded' on recorded radio shows that have been unearthed this week. And in a previously unreported incident, a journalist who used to interact with Mr. Trump during his days as a real estate developer in New York said this week that he even used the phrase 'dumb southerner' to describe his own in-laws." He told New York Post gossip columnist Jeane MacIntosh that he was divorcing Marla Maples because "'she was constantly surrounded "by an entourage of dumb Southerners."' He even adopted a fake southern accent to mimic Ms. Maples's mother...."
This Should Go Well. Mark Landler & Maggie Haberman: "Three weeks from now, in New York, President Trump will find himself in the setting he most relishes: seated at the head of a polished table, calling on those seated around him, rewarding those he likes and cutting off those who displease him.... Mr. Trump will be presiding at the United Nations Security Council, a rotating role that falls to the United States this month. His star turn is prompting anxiety among people, inside and outside the administration, who worry that the president will bring reality-TV antics to the world stage."
Liar, Liar. Liar, Liar. "But His Emails." Jay Michaelson of the Daily Beast: "For over a month, Democrats (and this writer) have complained that the confirmation process of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh is fatally flawed because the records of Kavanaugh's White House tenure were being redacted by his former deputy, then redacted again by the Trump White House, then redacted a third time by Judiciary Committee chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa).... On Thursday, with the release of a half dozen emails by Grassley and several more by Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), the Democrats have been proven right. Brett Kavanaugh has misled the Senate at least four times [under oath], and the censored emails have been withheld not because of national security or executive privilege, but, at least in part, because they make Kavanaugh look bad." Do read on. ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Should a Supreme Court justice have a proven record of committing perjury at his confirmation hearings? Let me think. Maybe Republicans got used to it after the infamous Clarence Thomas hearings. Of course Thomas's lies were about sexual abuse, and boys will be boys, heh-heh. Kavanaugh's lies are about everything.
*****
Primary Election, Delaware.
The New York Times is reporting Delaware primary results here. ...
... Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Senator Tom Carper of Delaware fended off a primary challenge from his left on Thursday, dispatching a political newcomer, Kerri Evelyn Harris, in the latest test of strength between Democratic insurgents and the party establishment. The most successful statewide politician in Delaware history, Mr. Carper won renomination for a fourth Senate term and what will likely be his 14th consecutive general election victory. He had about 64 percent of the vote with 75 percent of the precincts reporting, according to The Associated Press. His deep connections in the state he has served since 1976 -- as treasurer, at-large congressman, governor and senator -- were enough for victory. But Mr. Carper, 71, had to work hard for the right to seek what he suggested could be his last term." Mrs. McC: Carper will face Republican Robert Arlett in the general election.
*****
"Trump Praises Congressman for [Physically] Assaulting a Reporter." Jonathan Chait: "Last night, at his rally in Billings, Montana, President Trump singled out the state's Republican member of Congress for praise. 'I'll tell you what,' said Trump, 'This man has fought' -- at this point, he lowered his voice into the slightly comic tone one uses to deliver an elbow-to-the-ribs punch line -- 'in more ways than one, for your state. He has fought for your state. Greg Gianforte. He is a fighter and a winner.' Last year, Gianforte was the brief focus of national attention as a candidate in a special election, after Gianforte was asked by Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs about his party's health-care plan, an issue he had dodged. Gianforte physically attacked Jacobs and slammed him to the ground. Later he lied to police about the incident." ...
... This man has lost it:
... Philip Rucker, et al., of the Washington Post: "This week's revelations of a purported 'resistance' force of senior government officials acting as guardrails against President Trump -- manipulating him, infantilizing him and ignoring his directives -- raised the specter of a shadow administration. 'Who's in charge at the White House?' a reporter shouted at Trump on Thursday as he departed for a rally in Montana. The president did not answer.... Senior officials have long acted to slow-walk or stymie some of the president's ideas and directives. When he was White House chief of staff, Reince Priebus had a favored strategy, according to his colleagues -- tell the president that he would execute an order, or a firing -- but not until 'next week.' By then, Trump often would have forgotten.... In his new book, [Bob] Woodward chronicles multiple episodes in which aides deployed subterfuge against their boss.... Thursday offered fresh evidence of the divergent courses set by the president and the Justice Department. In the morning, Trump tweeted praise for North Korea's leader: 'Kim Jong Un of North Korea proclaims "unwavering faith in President Trump." Thank you to Chairman Kim. We will get it done together!' Hours later, the Justice Department announced criminal charges against Park Jin Hyok for allegedly being part of a North Korean government hacking team that crippled Sony's computer systems, stole $81 million from a Bangladesh bank and unleashed far-reaching malware." ...
... Peter Baker, et al., of the New York Times: "In a spectacle that may be without precedent even for an administration that has seen many of those already, almost the entire cabinet and leadership team working for President Trump pleaded not guilty on Thursday to writing an extraordinary anonymous essay about plotting against him. The unnamed author of the essay published by The New York Times was the target of a mole hunt by an infuriated president and the subject of an obsessive public guessing game that played out on television, online and in social media.... Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, an ally of Mr. Trump's, recommended that the president force members of his administration to take polygraph examinations, and there was at least briefly some discussion of that among advisers to the president. Another option mentioned by people close to Mr. Trump was asking senior officials to sign sworn affidavits that could be used in court if necessary. One outside adviser said the White House had a list of about 12 suspects." ...
... Matt Flegenheimer of the New York Times: "What is a senior administration official? Who counts? Certainly cabinet secretaries would qualify, and top aides in the White House, like the chief of staff. But veterans of Washington recognized that the list was potentially far broader, and murkier.... At the very least, according to the working definition used by many journalists and sources, the universe of possible senior administration officials probably numbers in the hundreds, at a minimum -- deputies, under secretaries, special assistants.... 'I was quoted as one when I was an assistant White House press secretary making $57,500 per year. Is that really senior?' said Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the National Security Council under President Barack Obama." Mrs. McC: I came across this after I wrote my comment to MAG below, but Flegenheimer's piece is consistent with what I wrote. ...
... Rebels Without a Clue. Lachlan Markay, et al., of the Daily Beast: "Either Wednesday's explosive New York Times op-ed becomes the start of a bigger, public resistance to President Trump from inside his own administration, senior officials who agree Trump threatens the country tell The Daily Beast, or it will be nothing more than an exercise in moral vanity while America burns. Some officials interviewed by The Daily Beast cheered the underlying message of the anonymously written op-ed. But several worried about its lasting impact, beyond provoking a familiar Washington parlor game: outing a dissenter. There was even a fear that the op-ed would hand Trump a pretext to purge his administration of the very bureaucratic scapegoats the op-ed writer portrayed as being crucial to saving America from Trump.... Two officials inside the [Justice] department said they've been passively resisting the president since he took office in 2017. 'We see ourselves as rebels,' one official said laughing, adding that the op-ed marked a perfect time to celebrate. 'We even went around fist-bumping each other,' another official said. But a third, who feels similarly about Trump, sounded darker notes about where Trump's ire over public embarrassment could lead." ...
... Nancy Cook & Christopher Cadelago of Politico: "... Donald Trump put physical distance between himself and the mutiny he faces in Washington, jetting off Thursday for an unusual two-day Western swing amid rising questions about whether his own aides trust him to run the country.... The president left behind a White House seized with paranoia, as staffers worried that anything they say to colleagues or in meetings will become fodder for the next tell-all or leak, according to interviews with more than a half dozen White House officials and Republicans close to the administration." ...
... Denis Slattery of the New York Daily News: "White House officials reached out to a noted Yale University psychiatrist last fall out of concern over President Trump's increasingly erratic behavior. Dr. Bandy Lee, who edited the best-selling book 'The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President,' told the Daily News Thursday the staffers contacted her because the President was 'scaring' them.... Political psychologist Dr. Bart Rossi said it is clear that Trump has bee exhibiting narcissistic behavior and it has been getting worse as the pressures of the office mount and the federal Russia probe stretches on. 'The problem is he is narcissistic to the extreme. He's self-absorbed to the point where he's only concerned about himself. The other problem is that he has a thought disturbance,' Rossi added. 'When Donald Trump says something he expects others to believe it is reality even if it is completely fabricated.'" ...
... Anonymous, Multiplied. Jonathan Swan & Mike Allen of Axios: "President Trump is ... deeply suspicious of much of the government he oversees -- from the hordes of folks inside agencies, right up to some of the senior-most political appointees and even some handpicked aides inside his own White House, officials tell Axios.... In the hours after the New York Times published the anonymous Op-Ed from 'a senior official in the Trump administration'..., two senior administration officials reached out to Axios to say the author stole the words right out of their mouths.... One senior official said, 'A lot of us [were] wishing we'd been the writer, I suspect ... I hope he [Trump] knows -- maybe he does? -- that there are dozens and dozens of us.'... Several senior White House officials have described their roles to us as saving America and the world from this president. A good number of current White House officials have privately admitted to us they consider Trump unstable, and at times dangerously slow." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Manu Raju of CNN: "Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, seizing on an explosive op-ed from an anonymous administration official, said Thursday that it's time to use constitutional powers to remove ... Donald Trump office if top officials don't think he can do the job. 'If senior administration officials think the President of the United States is not able to do his job, then they should invoke the 25th Amendment,' Warren told CNN. 'The Constitution provides for a procedure whenever the Vice President and senior officials think the President can't do his job. It does not provide that senior officials go around the President -- take documents off his desk, write anonymous op-eds ... Everyone of these officials have sworn to uphold the Constitution of the United States. It's time for them to do their job.'" ...
... Vichy, American-Style. Frank Rich: "Mr. Anonymous is a coward so lacking a moral compass that he doesn't realize that the best way to 'preserve our democratic institutions' (as he claims to be doing) is to identify himself, resign, and report any criminal activity he has witnessed by the president or his colleagues." He or she is a collaborator, not a resister. Rich also talks about Kavanaugh & McCain: "But Mr. Anonymous's enlistment in the Trump White House mitigates his self-aggrandizing appropriation of McCain's final message much as McCain's empowering of Palin in 2008, which he never fully disowned, casts a shadow over his subsequent anti-Trumpism." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Susan Glasser of the New Yorker on Woodward's book & the Anonymous op-ed: "For twenty months, Washington has been asking, Is this the crisis? Is this finally the constitutional confrontation we have been waiting for? The Trump Presidency, to those closely watching it, and to many of those participating in it, has always seemed unsustainable. And yet it has gone on, and will keep going on, until and unless something seismic happens in our politics -- and our Congress -- to change it. We don't need to wonder when the crisis will hit; it already has. Every day since January 20, 2017, has been the crisis." Glasser says of the op-ed: "It was as if one of Woodward's sources had chosen to publish a real-time epilogue in the pages of the Times."
... ** Michelle Goldberg: “'We want the administration to succeed and think that many of its policies have already made America safer and more prosperous,' the official [Anonymous] wrote, adding, 'There are bright spots that the near-ceaseless negative coverage of the administration fails to capture: effective deregulation, historic tax reform, a more robust military and more.' This is the quintessence of the Trump-enabling Republican. He or she purports to be standing between us and the calamities that our ignorant and unstable president could unleash, while complaining, in the very same op-ed, that the media doesn't give the White House enough credit.... A vote for Kavanaugh is ... a vote to give Trump a measure of impunity. Republican senators who know the president is out of control have a choice -- they can maintain a check on his ill-considered autocratic inclinations, or solidify right-wing power on the Supreme Court for a generation. It's obvious which way they'll go."
These Are Not Very Bright Guys, Ctd. ... David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "It was supposed to be a quick photo op with President Trump. But the 44 sheriffs at the White House got a lot more than that when Trump conscripted them as unwitting bystanders in a withering assault Wednesday on a critical, anonymous essay about him in the New York Times. In a surreal setting, the president turned to the uniformed law enforcement officers, assembled on a small riser in the stately East Room, for explicit support as he attacked the 'dishonest media' as a 'disgrace.'... For the sheriffs..., it was a moment of truth: How would these elected officials -- frozen in place in the background of a live television shot -- react as Trump went on for another 840 words, slamming the anonymous author as 'gutless,' predicting that the 'phony media outlets' will go out of business and boasting of his accomplishments as if delivering a campaign speech?... They gave Trump several rounds of hearty applause.... Trump routinely rails against the press corps on Twitter and at his campaign rallies. But he has begun eliciting cheers of support during more-official settings and from audiences once thought to be more immune to naked partisanship."
In many ways this is the greatest economy in the HISTORY of America. -- President Trump, in a tweet, June 4
We have the strongest economy in the history of our nation. -- Trump, in remarks to reporters, June 15
We have the greatest economy in the history of our country. -- Trump, in an interview with Sean Hannity on Fox News, July 16
We're having the best economy we've ever had in the history of our country. -- Trump, in a speech at a steel plant in Illinois, July 26
This is the greatest economy that we've had in our history, the best. -- Trump, in a rally in Charleston, W.Va., Aug. 21
It's said now that our economy is the strongest it's ever been in the history of our country, and you just have to take a look at the numbers. -- Trump, in remarks on a White House vlog, Aug. 24
We have the best economy the country's ever had and it's getting better. -- Trump, in an interview with the Daily Caller, Sept. 3
Now, in 40 different venues over three months, according to our database of false and misleading claims, President Trump has declared that the economy is the greatest, the best or the strongest in U.S. history. That's a rate of every two days. In some cases, such as the rally in West Virginia -- a rally, that like all of his campaign rallies was aired without interruption on Fox News -- he repeated the statement as many as four times.... By just about any important measure, the economy today is not doing as well as it did under Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower, Lyndon B. Johnson and Bill Clinton -- and Ulysses S. Grant. -- Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post
Kessler fails to point out that the economy is great only for the haves; the vast majority of Americans are not reaping the benefits. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie
Margaret Hartmann: "... there]s more to add to the mounds of evidence that Trump's staff doesn't listen to him, and it has nothing to do with the op-ed or Bob Woodward's forthcoming book. Five months after Trump said the U.S. would be leaving Syria 'very soon,' and two months after he and Russia's Vladimir Putin suggested they could be partners in handling the situation in Syria, U.S. officials said the military effort there is being extended indefinitely, due partly to concerns about Russia. Back in March, President Trump seemed to announce a new Syria policy without notifying anyone else in government. 'We're coming out of Syria, like, very soon,' he said.... When top officials pushed back, saying they needed time to ensure that ISIS wouldn't reemerge in the region, Trump reportedly relented, saying they could have five or six months to wrap up the mission.... Trump shifted his public tone on Syria within a matter of weeks, as the U.S. and its allies launched missile strikes against Syria in April over a chemical attack against civilians in the city of Duoma. Yet the goal remained to have the roughly 2,200 U.S. troops in Syria exiting sometime this fall. On Thursday James Jeffrey, a retired senior Foreign Service officer who was recently named Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's 'representative for Syria engagement,' told reporters there's been a change of plans. 'The new policy is we're no longer pulling out by the end of the year,' he said. As the Washington Post explains, the Trump administration has adopted a broader mission that could keep troops in Syria indefinitely[.]"
Jonathan Lemire of the AP: "... Donald Trump will not answer federal investigators' questions, in writing or in person, about whether he tried to block the probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, one of the president's attorneys told The Associated Press on Thursday. Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani said questions about obstruction of justice were a 'no-go.' Giuliani's statement was the most definitive rejection yet of special counsel Robert Mueller's efforts to interview the president about any efforts to obstruct the investigation into possible coordination between his campaign and Russians. It signals the Trump's lawyers are committed to protecting the president from answering questions about actions the president took in office." ...
... Jonathan Swan & Mike Allen of Axios: "Giuliani later seemed to backtrack, telling NBC News that those questions are 'not ruled in or out.' Jonathan Swan reads between the lines: Giuliani is daring Mueller to issue a subpoena. The president's team is itching for the fight.Trump's lawyers are betting that Mueller won't have the heart for the multi-month court fight that would result from trying to compel the president to be interviewed. The White House bet: Mueller will blink and ultimately issue an incomplete report, avoiding the stakes of a court battle. The source close to the president's team explained: 'Mueller backed off from a demand for a face-to-face, to get to a compromise of written Q-and-A on Russia. And Rudy still says no. What is Mueller to do now?'" ...
... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Say, does a refusal to cooperate with investigators betray a consciousness of guilt?
Matthew Mosk of ABC News: "George Papadopoulos, the novice, unpaid foreign policy adviser to Donald Trump who rose to prominence when he became the first former campaign adviser arrested as part of special counsel Robert Mueller's Russian-influence probe, is scheduled to be sentenced Friday in Washington." ...
... Aidan McLaughlin of Mediaite: "George Papadopoulos, the former foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign and a figures at the center of the Russia investigation, will appear in his first-ever T.V. interview with CNN's Jake Tapper on Friday, following his sentencing for the charge of giving false statements to the FBI. CNN will air the exclusive hour-long special with Papadopoulos on Friday night at 10 p.m., sources told Mediaite. In the interview -- which has already been taped — Papadopoulos detailed to Tapper what he told Special Counsel Robert Mueller during his cooperation with the Russia probe, a CNN source said."
Friend of Vlad Helped Write Trump's Foreign Policy Speech. Betsy Woodruff of the Daily Beast: "In the morning of April 21, 2016, a staffer at the Center for the National Interest, a Washington D.C., think tank, wandered into the office of Dimitri Simes, the group's president. The staffer saw a pile of papers on the desk titled 'FOREIGN POLICY AND DEFENSE OUTLINE.' The staffer realized the papers were the detailed outline, in bullet-pointed paragraphs, of a major foreign-policy address that then-candidate Donald Trump was set to deliver six days later as a guest of the center. The staffer used a cellphone to snap pictures of all five pages of the document.... It isn't unusual for a think-tank chief to preview drafts of a speech presented at their invitation. But Simes' proximity to the speech shows that a person Vladimir Putin once called a 'friend and colleague' had an early view into the crafting of a speech that would have historic significance for American foreign policy. Democrats on the House intelligence committee tried to investigate Simes' relationship to Trump's campaign, but Republican committee chairman Devin Nunes blocked their efforts.... The pictures demonstrate that significant changes were made from the speech's detailed outline to its final version -- including the removal of lines condemning bigotry, praising legal immigration, and disparaging Russia." (Also linked yesterday.)
Hey, Some Important News from the Daily Mail!: "Four UFOs were spotted flying over ... Donald Trump's golf course in Scotland. A golf fan shared a picture of the mysterious objects, seen in the sky above a Scottish flag at Trump's Turnberry club in Ayshire. Alongside the snap on the UFO Stalker website, he revealed his niece had takenthe picture from the balcony of the room at the luxury resort at around 8pm on August 16." Includes photo! Mrs. McC: Probably just a deep-state convoy. (Also linked yesterday.)
Mrs. McCrabbie: Mitch McConnell, Chuck Grassley, other Senate Republicans & Donald Trump have accomplished something remarkable: they have delegitimized one of the three branches of government -- the judiciary. This began of course with McConnell & Grassley's decision not to consider President Obama's nominee Merrick Garland. It continued when Donald Trump nominated hard-right hack Neil Gorsuch & the Senate confirmed him, only after it eliminated the 60-vote cloture rule that applied to Supreme Court nominees. Now we're undergoing a sham confirmation hearing in which Grassley & other Republicans are hiding embarrassing and/or disqualifying documents in the nominee's record. The Supreme Court of the United States is no longer a legitimate check on the other two branches of government. Quite an accomplishment. ...
... ** Update. Krugman agrees: "A vote for Kavanaugh will be a vote to destroy the legitimacy of one of the last federal institutions standing." ...
Charlie Savage & Sheryl Stolberg of the New York Times: "The disclosure on Thursday of dozens of previously secret emails involving Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh provoked pointed new questions on the third day of his Supreme Court confirmation hearings, as Democrats pressed him to explain fresh disclosures on abortion rights, affirmative action and previous testimony to the Senate. Much of the tumult surrounded one quotation from an email that Judge Kavanaugh wrote as a lawyer in George W. Bush's White House concerning the landmark abortion decision Roe v. Wade: 'I am not sure that all legal scholars refer to Roe as the settled law of the land at the Supreme Court level since Court can always overrule its precedent, and three current Justices on the Court would do so.' To Democrats and abortion rights advocates, that March 2003 statement appeared to contradict testimony from the judge on Wednesday, when he said he considered Roe 'settled as a precedent of the Supreme Court.'" ...
... Seung Min Kim of the Washington Post: "The dramatic release Thursday of once-concealed documents from Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh's tenure in the George W. Bush White House spotlighted the simmering frustrations from Democrats over how Republicans have kept secret vast parts of Kavanaugh's voluminous paper trail. Tens of thousands of pages from Kavanaugh's records have been hidden from public view, only available to senators and certain congressional aides in advance of Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings this week. On Thursday, a small sample of the 'committee confidential' documents were disclosed after Democratic senators asked that they be approved for public release, raising questions about why the documents had been considered confidential in the first place. At the beginning of his confirmation hearings this week, nearly 200,000 pages of Kavanaugh's records from his tenure in the Bush White House had remained classified as 'committee confidential.'... A team of lawyers vetting the documents on Bush's behalf throughout the confirmation process had been giving them to the Senate Judiciary Committee on the condition that they remain 'committee confidential.'... A separate batch of more than 100,000 additional pages were withheld from the Senate Judiciary Committee altogether, because the Trump administration believes they would be covered by executive privilege." ...
... Seung Min Kim, et al., of the Washington Post: "The fight over access to Kavanaugh's records from his time in the Bush White House intensified in the opening moments of the hearing Thursday morning. Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) said he is prepared to violate Senate rules and release confidential committee documents -- and to risk the consequences.... 'I openly invite and accept the consequences of releasing that email right now,' Booker said. 'The emails being withheld from the public have nothing to do with national security.'" Under the committee's rules, Booker could be expelled from the Senate for releasing such records. Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Tex.) angrily responded to Booker and referred to his potential aspirations for higher office, saying 'running for president is no excuse for violating the rules of the Senate.'... After Booker said he was willing to violate Senate rules and release confidential documents, Senate Democrats on the committee appeared in open revolt as Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) read aloud from the rules on expulsion." This is part of the WashPo's liveblog of today's hearing. (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Update. Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) on Thursday released emails from Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's time as a White House counsel, escalating a heated fight over his documents. Booker released approximately 12 pages of emails tied to discussions Kavanaugh had on racial inequality including one email thread titled 'racial profiling.'... Tens of thousands of documents have been given to the committee under the label of committee confidential. Shortly after Booker released the documents, Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley's (R-Iowa) staff released a bulk of new emails, previously marked 'committee confidential,' that had been cleared for public release. Booker's emails were included in the document tranche." (Also linked yesterday.)
... Here's the New York Times' liveblog of the Thursday hearing. (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... of the Huffington Post: "On the third day of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee, he referred to contraception as 'abortion-inducing drugs.' Judge Kavanaugh was responding to a question from Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) on Thursday about his 2015 dissent in the Priests for Life v. HHS case. Kavanaugh had sided with the religious organization, which didn't want to provide employees with insurance coverage for contraceptives.... Dawn Laguens, executive vice president at the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, said it was 'no wonder' activists have been so emphatic in protesting his nomination. 'Kavanaugh referred to birth control ― something more than 95 percent of women use in their lifetime ― as an "abortion-inducing drug," which is not just flat-out wrong, but is anti-woman, anti-science propaganda,' Laguens told HuffPost.... 'Let me break it down for you, Brett,' she went on. 'Birth control is basic health care. Birth control allows women to plan their futures, participate in the economy, and ― for some women with health issues like endometriosis ― allows them to get through the day.'"
... Charlie Savage of the New York Times: "As a White House lawyer in the Bush administration, Judge Brett Kavanaugh challenged the accuracy of deeming the Supreme Court's landmark Roe v. Wade abortion rights decision to be 'settled law of the land,' according to a secret email obtained by The New York Times. The email, written in March 2003, is one of thousands of documents that a lawyer for President George W. Bush turned over to the Senate Judiciary Committee about the Supreme Court nominee but deemed 'committee confidential,' meaning it could not be made public or discussed by Democrats in questioning him in hearings this week. It was among several an unknown person provided to The New York Times late Wednesday. Judge Kavanaugh was considering a draft opinion piece.... It stated that 'it is widely accepted by legal scholars across the board that Roe v. Wade and its progeny are the settled law of the land.' Judge Kavanaugh proposed deleting that line, writing: 'I am not sure that all legal scholars refer to Roe as the settled law of the land at the Supreme Court level since Court can always overrule its precedent, and three current Justices on the Court would do so.'... The court now has four conservative justices who may be willing to overturn Roe ... and if he is confirmed, Judge Kavanaugh could provide the decisive fifth vote." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Brett's Application for Justice Job: Send Clear Signals He Would Overrule Roe. Irin Carmon of New York: "Leaked emails today from Brett Kavanaugh’s time in the Bush White House reveal what everyone already knew: that Trump's SCOTUS nominee will pose a threat to Roe v. Wade. To get Maine senator Susan Collins's vote, Kavanaugh called Roe v. Wade 'settled precedent,' but according to an email he wrote in 2003, 'the Court can always overrule its precedent.' In other words, though Kavanaugh recognizes that the Court has repeatedly found a right to abortion, he knows he can use his power as a justice to change that. Is Kavanaugh willing to make abortion illegal or impossible? We don't need emails to know. He wouldn't be at his third day of confirmation hearings if the Trump administration didn't think so; to get there, Kavanaugh had to send early signals to them to prove himself. He's already said everything they -- and we -- need to know about where he stands." Read on.
... Weasel Nominated to Supreme Court. Cristian Farias of New York: "When asked by Connecticut's Richard Blumenthal if he condemns questioning a judge's impartiality on the basis of his or her ethnicity, as Trump did with [District Judge Gonzalo] Curiel during the presidential campaign, Kavanaugh chose to dodge and save face rather than display judicial courage. 'The way we stand up is by deciding cases and controversies without fear or favor,' he replied. On this score, Kavanaugh is a notch below ... Neil Gorsuch, who drew Trump's ire when it came to light that he told Blumenthal privately that he found the president's attacks on the courts 'disheartening' and 'demoralizing.' The White House reportedly had to scramble to convince Trump to not pull Gorsuch's nomination. That slip of the tongue did not happen with Kavanaugh, who held steadfast to his view that commenting on a federal judiciary under siege is somehow commenting about politics. 'We stay out of politics, we don't comment on comments made by politicians,' he told Hawaii's Mazie Hirono, who had suggested that Kavanaugh was bending over backwards to not bite the hand that gave him the nomination." Read on. ...
... Ian Millhiser of ThinkProgress implies that Kavanaugh might have committed perjury in 2006 lying to Congress, based on info. gleaned from his recent email dump. "If Kavanaugh did, in fact, lie to Senator Leahy during his 2006 hearing, he could potentially have much bigger programs than his current confirmation fight." --safari ...
... What about that time Brett went sailing with some bros & there was gambling going on & maybe a masseuse ("rub-n-tug") & definitely something Brett & the amateur sailors didn't want to tell their wives? Want to tell the committee about that, Brett?
Julia Ainsley of NBC News: "The Trump administration announced a new rule Thursday that would allow immigrant children with their parents to be held in detention indefinitely, upending a ban on indefinite detention that has been in place for 20 years. The rule, proposed by the departments of Homeland Security and Health and Human Services, goes into effect in 60 days and will allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to keep children with their mothers in detention facilities while their cases for asylum play out in court. A DHS official speaking on the condition of anonymity said the purpose of the rulemaking is to terminate the 1997 Flores settlement agreement that said children could not be held in detention longer than 20 days. The result may mean the issue is taken to appellate courts or even the Supreme Court." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Nick Miroff & Maria Sacchetti of the Washington Post: "The Trump administration said Thursday it is preparing to circumvent limits on the government's ability to hold minors in immigration jails by withdrawing from the Flores Settlement Agreement, the federal consent decree that has shaped detention standards for underage migrants since 1997. The maneuver is almost certain to land the administration back in court, where U.S. District Court Judge Dolly M. Gee, who oversees the agreement, has ;rejected attempts to extend the amount of time migrant children can be held with their parents beyond the current limit of 20 days." (Also linked yesterday.)
E. A. Crunden of ThinkProgress: "The coal industry consultant [J. Steven Gardner] nominated by President Donald Trump to lead the Interior Department's mining agency has withdrawn his nomination after facing fierce backlash from green groups and environmental advocates, as well as a stalled confirmation process." --safari ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Apparently we can thank Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) -- at least in part -- for Gardner's withdrawal: "Gardner is one of several Interior Department candidates whose nomination has been stalled by the efforts of Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL). In January the Florida lawmaker placed a hold on at least three department nominees over offshore drilling concerns, a leading issue for his low-lying coastal state." Nelson is in a very tight race to keep his seat against a challenge by Gov. Lex Luthor Rick Scott.
Where Are They Now? Asawin Suebsaeng of The Daily Beast: "Just a couple years ago, [Scottie Nell] Hughes was one of the most nationally visible and hardcore Trumpworld luminaries.... Recently, Hughes updated her job description on her personal Facebook page to state that she works for RT America, a propagandistic, Kremlin-friendly news organization, previously known as Russia Today. Last year, RT had to register as a foreign agent following a protracted standoff with the U.S. Department of Justice." --safari
Carrie Johnson of NPR: "Prosecutors in Washington, D.C., have impaneled a grand jury to look into the case of former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, who was fired from the bureau after investigators found he 'lacked candor.' The Justice Department's internal watchdog referred McCabe to the U.S. attorney's office to determine whether he should face criminal charges in addition to having lost his job. Prosecutors and grand jurors are reaching that determination now." Mrs. McC: Evidently we'll find out soon if McCabe is a ham sandwich.
Amanda Gomez of ThinkProgress: "More than 4,500 low-income Arkansans lost their health insurance over the weekend because they did not report 80 hours of work online for three consecutive months, according state data. The three-strikes law took affect in June, making Arkansas the first state to implement Medicaid work requirements in the country. Critics warned the law wouldn't move Medicaid recipients 'out of poverty' as Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) contends, but instead would kick people off coverage. Early data, first reported by the Arkansas Democrat Gazette, indicates this is precisely the case." --safari
Sharon Otterman & Laurie Goodstein of the New York Times: "Attorneys general across the United States are taking a newly aggressive stance in investigating sexual abuse by Roman Catholic clergy, opening investigations into malfeasance and issuing subpoenas for documents. On Thursday alone, the New York State attorney general issued subpoenas to all eight Catholic dioceses in the state as part of a sweeping civil investigation into whether institutions covered up allegations of sexual abuse of children, officials said. The attorney general in New Jersey announced a criminal investigation. The new inquiries come several weeks after an explosive Pennsylvania grand jury report detailed the abuse of more than 1,000 children by hundreds of priests over decades.... In the three weeks since the release of the Pennsylvania report, the attorneys general of Illinois, Missouri, Nebraska and New Mexico have also said they will investigate sex abuse by Catholic priests in their states and have asked local dioceses for records."
Donie O'Sullivan of CNN: "Twitter banned far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his website InfoWars from its platform Thursday afternoon, a month after several of its Silicon Valley counterparts did so. Jones was suspended from Twitter for one week last month after he posted a video in which he said, 'Now is time to act on the enemy before they do a false flag.' But Twitter did not ban him from its platform then, even after YouTube, Apple and Facebook each kicked him off.... Twitter also said that it 'will take action' if in the future it discovers other accounts being used to get around the ban of Jones and InfoWars. The company made its decision a day after Jones accosted a CNN reporter, Oliver Darcy, on Capitol Hill, and livestreamed the encounter through Periscope, which Twitter owns.... Jones shouted at Darcy for more than ten minutes, accusing him of being in favor of censorship and insulting his appearance, comparing him to 'a rat' and told Darcy he was 'evil-looking.' Jones was live on Twitter's Periscope service the whole time.... Before accosting Darcy, Jones confronted Senator Marco Rubio in a hallway outside the room where Dorsey and [Facebook COO Sheryl] Sandberg were appearing for a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing."
Beyond the Beltway
Noor Al-Sibai of RawStory: "The Salt Lake City Tribune reported that a newly-unsealed federal indictment shows that Robert Glen Mouritsen — a 'stake president' or regional leader in the Kaysville, Utah Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1989 to 1997 -- stole the funds from multiple people under the guise of a secretive campaign he called 'The Project.'" --safari
Way Beyond
Luke Barnes of ThinkProgress: "Sweden is facing a widespread disinformation campaign ahead of its general election this weekend according to a new study, with a third of articles shared online coming from deliberately misleading sources. The study, conducted by researchers at Oxford University and first reported by Reuters, analyzed 275,000 tweets during a ten-day period in August. It found that a third of shared articles came from 'junk' websites that deliberately shared misleading information, most of them with a rightward tilt. Three of the most popular 'junk sites' employed former members of the Sweden Democrats, a far-right party currently riding high in the polls." --safari
Dom Phillips of the Guardian: "Jair Bolsonaro, the far-right frontrunner in next month's Brazilian presidential election, is in a serious condition in hospital after being stabbed while campaigning.... Bolsonaro's son Flávio -- himself a candidate for the Brazilian Senate -- tweeted that his father was 'almost dead' when he arrived at hospital, having lost a lot of blood.... A police spokesman confirmed that the alleged attacker – named as Adélio Bispo de Oliveira -- was in custody. Local media said he was beaten up by Bolsonaro supporters. The G1 news website printed a leaked extract from the suspect's police interview in which he said he had been ordered by God to carry out the attack."
News Lede
Bloomberg: "American wages unexpectedly climbed in August by the most since the recession ended in 2009 and hiring rose by more than forecast, keeping the Federal Reserve on track to lift interest rate this month and making another hike in December more likely. Average hourly earnings for private workers increased 2.9 percent from a year earlier, a Labor Department report showed Friday, exceeding all estimates in a Bloomberg survey and the median projection for 2.7 percent. Nonfarm payrolls rose 201,000 from the prior month, topping the median forecast for 190,000 jobs. The unemployment rate was unchanged at 3.9 percent, still near the lowest since the 1960s. Treasury yields and the dollar jumped after the report, while U.S. stocks opened lower as investors saw the data as encouraging FedChairman Jerome Powell to keep tightening monetary policy beyond this month."
Share Article 