The Commentariat -- September 28, 2019
Afternoon Update:
Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: So Friday night, I wrote this: "Nothing but prying the reins of power from [Trump's] tiny hands will keep him from engaging in more & more 'PERFECT' hijinks." Now I read this: ~~~
~~~ Michael Kranish of the Washington Post: "President Trump, who has alleged that Hunter Biden got the Chinese to put $1.5 billion into an investment fund, said during private remarks this week that he raised the matter with a U.S. executive who has served as his intermediary on trade talks with Beijing. Trump's comments could attract interest in light of the impeachment inquiry underway by House Democrats.... Given Trump's comments, investigators may want to learn whether the president similarly sought information about the Bidens in China. In remarks to the U.S. Mission to the United Nations on Thursday morning, Trump said he discussed Biden's China work with Stephen Schwarzman, the chief executive of the investment company Blackstone. 'I was with the head of Blackstone ... Steve Schwarzman,' Trump said, according to a video of the remarks.... After alleging that Hunter Biden got $1.5 billion from the Chinese, Trump said he asked Schwarzman, 'Steve, is that possible?'... The executive responded: 'Maybe I shouldn't get involved, you know it's very political.'" ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McC: The most amazing part is that Trump admitted that AFTER he learned he would be impeached for the very same behavior on the very same subject: Hunter Biden. Maybe his hands are so tiny because they're implants: he burned off the originals by repeatedly slapping them down on a hot stove.
Julian Borger of the Guardian: "Three days after his now infamous phone conversation with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Donald Trump abruptly fired his director of national intelligence [-- Dan Coats --] in favour of an inexperienced political loyalist. According to a New York Times report, the White House learned within days that the unorthodox call on 25 July with Zelenskiy had raised red flags among intelligence professionals and was likely to trigger an official complaint. That timeline has raised new questions over the timing of the Trump's dismissal by tweet of ... Coats, on 28 July and his insistence that the deputy DNI, Sue Gordon, a career intelligence professional, did not step into the role, even in an acting capacity. Instead, Trump tried to install a Republican congressman, John Ratcliffe, who had minimal national security credentials but had been a fierce defender of the president in Congress. Trump had to drop the nomination after it emerged that Ratcliffe had exaggerated his national security credentials.... Despite the collapse of the Ratcliffe nomination, Gordon was forced out. She was reported to have been holding a meeting on election security on 8 August when Coats interrupted to convince her that she would have to resign." ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: I've assumed from the get-go that Coats' firing & Gordon's resignation had something to do with the call to Zelensky. Coats & Gordon can both testify if they're called.
~~~~~~~~~~
"Treason, Bribery, or Other High Crimes," Ctd.
Kate Riga of TPM has a definitive timeline of the Trump-Ukraine scandal. --s ~~~
~~~ William Saletan of Slate outlines the timeline of the quid pro quo.
Stunning Confirmation of the Whistleblower's Revelations:
** Shane Harris, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Trump told two senior Russian officials in a 2017 Oval Office meeting that he was unconcerned about Moscow's interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election because the United States did the same in other countries, an assertion that prompted alarmed White House officials to limit access to the remarks to an unusually small number of people, according to three former officials with knowledge of the matter. The comments, which have not been previously reported, were part of a now-infamous meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, in which Trump revealed highly classified information that exposed a source of intelligence on the Islamic State. He also said during the meeting that firing FBI Director James B. Comey the previous day had relieved 'great pressure' on him.... According to [a] fourth former official, Trump lamented to Lavrov that 'all this Russia stuff' was detrimental to good relations. Trump also complained, 'I could have a great relationship with you guys, but you know, our press,' this former official said, characterizing the president's remarks.... H.R. McMaster, the president's then-national security adviser, repeatedly told Trump he could not trust the Russians, according to two former officials.... The president and his top aides seemed not to understand the difference between Voice of America, a U.S.-supported news organization that airs in foreign countries, with Russian efforts to persuade American voters by surreptitiously planting ads in social media, [a former official] said." It isn't clear if officials hid the notes on this meeting in the same "code-word classified system reserved for the most sensitive intelligence information" which the whistleblower asserted officials improperly used to conceal other communications in which Trump made politically-insenstive remarks. ~~~
~~~ Here's a Raw Story summary of the WashPo report. ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: There were four people who were willing to talk to the Washington Post about Trump's dismissal of Russia's election interference -- to the Russians themselves. Yet Robert Mueller's team, who presumably had access to all four of these people, either (1) never wrested these elements of Trump's remarks to the Russians or (2) didn't think Trump's blessing Russian interference was important enough to mention in their report. You know, Bob, we'd like our money back. ~~~
~~~ Pamela Brown, et al., of CNN: "White House efforts to limit access to ... Donald Trump's conversations with foreign leaders extended to phone calls with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Russian leader Vladimir Putin, according to people familiar with the matter. Those calls -- both with leaders who maintain controversial relationships with Trump -- were among the presidential conversations that aides took remarkable steps to keep from becoming public. In the case of Trump's call with Prince Mohammed, officials who ordinarily would have been given access to a rough transcript of the conversation never saw one, according to one of the sources. Instead, a transcript was never circulated at all, which the source said was highly unusual, particularly after a high-profile conversation. The call - which the person said contained no especially sensitive national security secrets -- came as the White House was confronting the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, which US intelligence assessments said came at the hand of the Saudi government.... It's not clear if aides took the additional step of placing the Saudi Arabia and Russia phone calls in the same highly secured electronic system that held a now-infamous phone call with Ukraine's president and which helped spark a whistleblower complaint made public this week...." ~~~
~~~ Update. Julian Barnes, et al., of the New York Times: "The White House put some reconstructed transcripts of delicate calls between President Trump and foreign officials, including President Vladimir V. Putin and the Saudi royal family, into a highly classified computer system after embarrassing leaks of his conversations, according to current and former officials.... In the case of the calls with the Saudi royal family, the restrictions were set beforehand, and the number of people allowed to listen was sharply restricted. The Saudi calls placed in the restricted system were with King Salman, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Prince Khalid bin Salman, who at the time was the Saudi ambassador to the United States.... The practice began after details of Mr. Trump's Oval Office discussion with the Russian foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, leaked to the news media, leading to questions of whether the president had released classified information, according to multiple current and former officials.... The White House had begun restricting access to information after initial leaks of Mr. Trump's calls with the leaders of Mexico and Australia. But the conversation with Mr. Lavrov and Sergey I. Kislyak, then the Russian ambassador to the United States, prompted tighter restrictions." ~~~
~~~ Pamela Brown of CNN: "The White House is acknowledging for the first time that officials did direct the Ukraine call transcript be filed in a separate classified system. In a statement provided to CNN, a senior White House official says it was under the direction of National Security Council attorneys: 'NSC lawyers directed that the classified document be handled appropriately.' The admission lends further credibility to the whistleblower complaint description of how the transcript with the Ukrainian president, among others, were kept out of wider circulation by using a system for highly sensitive documents." (Also linked yesterday.)
POTUS* Unable to Make Sense. Sounding more and more like the so-called Whistleblower isn't a Whistleblower at all. In addition, all second hand information that proved to be so inaccurate that there may not have even been somebody else, a leaker or spy, feeding it to him or her? A partisan operative? -- Donald Trump, in a tweet this morning
Just as a note, Donald, to the only part of your tweet I can understand, your own DNI said the whistleblower's assertions were "accurate," or in his words, "in alignment with" your little shakedown of President Zelensky. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie
Cristina Cabrera of TPM: "On Monday, Trump suggested he had withheld the aid to Ukraine only because he wanted to make sure the funds weren't going to a corrupt government.... But a letter from the Defense Department sent to Congress in May, first obtained by NPR, shows that the Pentagon had 'certified' that Ukraine had taken sufficient measures to combat corruption and was therefore was eligible for aid -- before Trump's call." --s
~~~ Roger Cohen of the New York Times: "President Trump is disturbed and growing more so. When he feels cornered, his symptoms run wild. As a narcissist, the thing he finds most intolerable is any suggestion that he cannot get away with whatever he wants. So he tweets: 'IT WAS A PERFECT CONVERSATION WITH UKRAINE PRESIDENT!'... The conversation was indeed perfect -- as a basis for impeachment, that is. It was so perfect that, according to the account of the whistle-blower disturbed by the insanity of the Trump White House, senior White House officials 'intervened to 'lock down' all records of the phone call.'...Now the shrieking maniac is shrieking louder, shrieking of spies and treason.... Trump also said: 'I didn't do anything. I don't know if I'm the most innocent person in the world.'" ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: "I didn't do anything." I suspect Trump really believes he did nothing wrong. Because "I have an Article II, where I have the right to do whatever I want as president." If he didn't think he was within his rights, he would not have released the transcript of the "PERFECT CONVERSATION." That's the most important reason to impeach & remove him from office. Nothing but prying the reins of power from his tiny hands will keep him from engaging in more & more "PERFECT" hijinks. (And, yeah, it may take U.S. marshals to escort him from the place.) ~~~
~~~ Tim Egan of the New York Times: "The first question I had after reading the White House reconstruction of the July 25 phone call ... was: How could they release this? 'It turned out to be a nothing call,' Trump said. He also described it as 'beautiful' and 'perfect' and asked for an apology from his critics. This was a 'nothing call' only to a man with nothing for a moral foundation.... This was 'beautiful' and 'perfect' only to someone who has crossed so many lines in his life that he has no idea where the boundaries are.... Trump sees this as no big deal because he's always gotten away with his many transgressions, floating above the law in a padded world of privilege and prevarication." ~~~
~~~ ** Jonathan Chait: "Trump has never recognized any distinction between his public and private life.... He treated the government as if it were his property. The Ukraine scandal is another case of Trump treating the executive branch as though it had been acquired by the Trump Organization. It ... would be perfectly fitting if, as now seems possible, it is ultimately the instrument of his demise.... But just as Watergate demystified the White House staff as bumblers, the Ukraine scandal has revealed Trump and his allies are suffering from Fox News poisoning. The bizarre conspiracy theories that the rest of us took to be devious propaganda had a profound impact on the president and his inner circle. They are not-very-bright guys who also happen to be genuinely nuts.... The formulation of moral concepts is not a function [Trump] can perform. His brain is no more capable of distinguishing right from wrong than your microwave oven can tell you what's on Netflix. No American president has more richly deserved impeachment."
Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times: "As soon as it was clear that the House would go after Trump for his actions regarding Ukraine, he panicked -- even trying to implicate his vice president in the scandal. 'I think you should ask for Vice President Pence's conversation, because he had a couple of conversations also,' Trump said at a news conference during the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York on Wednesday. Since then, he (along with personal lawyer and co-conspirator, Rudy Giuliani) has done little more than lash out, using Twitter to send angry messages about his political opponents.... Democrats don't actually have a choice. They have to impeach, regardless of the politics, regardless of where it leads.... And if I'm right, and impeachment sends Trump into new lows (he has already joked about executing spies), then Democrats might help themselves next November by taking this inquiry as far as it can go."
Rachel Frazin of the Hill: "The House Foreign Affairs Committee on Friday subpoenaed Secretary of State Mike Pompeo for documents relating to the Trump administration's dealings with Ukraine.... The subpoena notice, drafted in consultation with the Intelligence and Oversight committees, accuses Pompeo of refusing to turn over requested information to Congress amid the Democrats' nascent investigation into Trump's dealings with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. 'Your continued refusal to provide the requested documents not only prevents our Committees from fully investigating these matters, but impairs Congress' ability to fulfill its Constitutional responsibilities to protect our national security and the integrity of our democracy,' wrote Reps. Eliot L. Engel, head of Foreign Affairs; Adam Schiff, chairman of the Intelligence panel; and Elijah Cummings, who leads the Committee on Oversight and Reform." Here's the New York Times story. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Update: "The lawmakers also notified Pompeo in a separate letter that they had scheduled depositions for five State Department officials between Wednesday and Oct. 10. Those officials are Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine; Kurt Volker, a former NATO ambassador who is Trump's special representative for Ukraine negotiations; State Department Deputy Assistant Secretary George Kent; State Department counselor T. Ulrich Brechbuhl; and Gordon Sondland, U.S. ambassador to the European Union. Volker resigned from his role in the Trump administration on Friday. If he appears before Congress, he will do so as a private citizen." ~~~
~~~ ** Matthew Lee of the AP: "Kurt Volker, a former U.S. ambassador to NATO caught in the middle of a whistleblower complaint over the ... Donald Trump's dealings with Ukraine, resigned Friday from his post as special envoy to [Ukraine], according to a U.S. official. The official said Volker told Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday of his decision to leave the job, following disclosures that he had connected Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani with Ukrainian officials to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his family over allegedly corrupt business dealings. ~~~
~~~ Update. Peter Baker of the New York Times: "Mr. Volker ... offered no public explanation but a person informed about his decision said he concluded that it was impossible to be effective in his assignment given the developments of recent days. His departure was the first resignation since revelations about Mr. Trump's efforts to pressure Ukraine's president to investigate former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and other Democrats.... [Rudy] Giuliani has seized on Mr. Volker's [communications with] him to assert that he was acting at the behest of the State Department." The article describes in some detail how Volker figured into the Trump-Giuliani cash-for-dirt scheme. ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Volker is not a Trumpy. A couple of TV pundits opined last night that Volker likely resigned to give himself the freedom to testify before House committees without restrictions that the State Department might impose.
~~~ Sharon LaFraniere, et al., of the New York Times: "President Trump's words about Marie L. Yovanovitch, his former ambassador to Ukraine, were ominous.... He told Volodymyr Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, that she was 'bad news.' 'She's going to go through some things,' he added. In fact, she already has gone through quite a bit. Over the past several months, Ms. Yovanovitch, a decorated 33-year veteran of the State Department, has been vilified in the right-wing news media, denounced by the president's eldest son as a 'joker,' called a Democratic stooge by the president's personal lawyer and then abruptly recalled from Kiev this May, months ahead of schedule. Her supposed sin, never backed up by evidence, was that she had shown disloyalty to Mr. Trump, disparaging him behind his back. Her friends, who say her professionalism and history of diplomatic service make that highly unlikely, have another theory: She had turned into collateral damage in efforts by Mr. Trump and Rudolph W. Giuliani ... to damage the reputation of former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Jennifer Hansler of CNN: "Diplomats are rallying to the support of former US ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch after the release of a whistleblower complaint shed further light on the circumstances of her unexpected removal. The allegations raised in the complaint, in combination with ... Donald Trump's comments about the career diplomat revealed in the White House transcript of a call between Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, lend further credence to the claim that Yovanovitch's removal from her post last May was politically motivated." (Also linked yesterday.)
Rebecca Morin of USA Today: "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Friday accused Attorney General Bill Barr of going 'rogue' after earlier this month the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel determined not to share a bombshell whistleblower complaint with Congress.... 'I think where they are going is the cover up of the cover up, and that's really very sad for them,' Pelosi said. 'To have a Justice Department go so rogue, well they have been for a while, and now it just makes matters worse that the attorney general was mentioned..., and yet the Justice Department directed the director of national intelligence to take this to the White House.' Barr was referenced four times in the July call [between Trump & Zelensky], with the president repeatedly offering Zelensky to enlist Barr -- as well as the president's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani -- to help investigate a Ukrainian energy firm in an effort to try to damage Biden." (Also linked yesterday.)
Julia Davis of The Daily Beast: "Elements of the bombshell whistleblower report outlining various aims pursued by the Trump administration with respect to Ukraine keep connecting back to Russia. Several of the reported objectives of President Trump, his administration officials, and his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani would benefit the Kremlin, and not the United States or its national security." [Article is firewalled] --s ~~~
~~~ Kate Riga of TPM: "A spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed 'hope' Friday that the U.S. would not publish calls between Putin and President Donald Trump like it did with the call memo of Trump's conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky." --s
Rudy, Rudy, Rudy. Tom Hamburger, et al., of the Washington Post: "Rudolph W. Giuliani, whose actions as President Trump's personal lawyer have helped set in motion an impeachment inquiry, is set to appear as a paid speaker at a Kremlin-backed conference in Armenia on Tuesday -- an event expected to include the participation of Russian President Vladimir Putin and other top Russian officials.... According to an agenda for the event posted online, Giuliani is set to participate in a panel led by Sergey Glazyev, a longtime Putin adviser who has been under U.S. sanctions since Russia's invasion of Ukraine five years ago. Giuliani's decision to take part in the conference astounded national security experts..... The agenda for the Eurasian conference shows Giuliani is the only American scheduled to speak at the gathering." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ ** Hahahaha. Reversal of Fortunes. Update (about 20 minutes later!): "Rudolph W. Giuliani ... abruptly canceled his scheduled paid appearance at a Kremlin-backed conference in Armenia next week. Giuliani, who confirmed to The Washington Post on Friday morning that he would attend the event, reversed himself that evening after The Post reported on his participation in the meeting, which Russian President Vladimir Putin and other top Russian officials are expected to attend.... 'I didn't know Putin was going,' he said in a brief interview, adding in a text: 'Discretion is the better part of valor.'... In an interview Friday before canceling his plans, Giuliani angrily rejected questions about whether it would be appropriate for him to attend the event at which he also appeared last year. 'I will try to not knowingly talk to a Russian until this is all over,' he retorted." ~~~
Neil Vigdor of the New York Times: "Representative Mark Amodei of Nevada on Friday became the first Republican member of the House of Representatives to back the rapidly escalating impeachment inquiry -- but he said he was reserving judgment on whether President Trump should be impeached. Mr. Amodei, 61, a four-term congressman from Carson City, is the chairman of Trump's re-election campaign in Nevada...." The Nevada Independent story is here.
Hill: "A new Hill-HarrisX survey on Friday found support for impeachment proceedings against President Trump has risen 12 points compared to a similar poll conducted three months ago. The survey was conducted on Sept. 26-27, just days after House Democrats started a formal impeachment inquiry over a whistleblower complaint involving Trump's communications with Ukraine. The poll showed 47 percent of respondents support that decision, up 12 points from a similar survey in June, which asked whether Democrats should begin impeachment proceedings. Meanwhile, opposition to impeachment dipped 3 points to 42 percent, while 11 percent of those polled in the new survey said they weren't sure or didn't know." (Also linked yesterday.)
Adam Edelman of NBC News: "More than 300 former national security and foreign policy officials signed a letter released Friday labeling ... Donald Trump's growing Ukraine scandal a 'profound national security concern' and praising congressional Democrats for formally launching an impeachment inquiry. 'President Trump appears to have leveraged the authority and resources of the highest office in the land to invite additional foreign interference into our democratic processes. That would constitute an unconscionable abuse of power. It also would represent an effort to subordinate America's national interests -- and those of our closest allies and partners -- to the President's personal political interest,' the letter's authors wrote." The letter is here. (Also linked yesterday.)
Fred Kaplan of Slate argues that the House Intelligence Committee hearing questioning new acting DNI Joseph Maguire "was a shoddily run affair, an ill-prepared ramble through the maze of process and possible cover-ups rather than a laser-focused inquiry into the damning substance of the documents that lay before the committee, containing charges that have shocked even jaded observers. If one purpose of open hearings is to educate the public, much of which doesn't yet support impeachment, then this first salvo was at best a waste of airtime.... Before this inquiry goes much farther, the House committees need to hire lawyers to direct the questioning.... It's also time to haul out the Capitol Hill marshals and charge uncooperative witnesses with contempt. Certainly Lewandowski should have been charged, fined, maybe jailed." Mrs. McC: Amen, brother. (Also linked yesterday.)
Jonathan Easley of Politics USA: "FEC Chair Ellen L Weintraub had to tweet out the entire FEC weekly digest after Republicans blocked her from publishing it because it contained a draft rule banning foreign election interference. 'This week, I published a "Draft Interpretive Rule Concerning Prohibited Activities Involving Foreign Nationals" on the web site. GOP FEC Commissioner Caroline Hunter took the altogether unprecedented step of objecting to its being added to the Digest and blocked publication of the whole Digest as a result.' [-- Ellen Weintraub in two tweets]."
Mrs. McCrabbie: Two weeks ago, I linked this Friday night, Sept. 13, report by Kyle Cheney of Politico: "The nation's top intelligence official is illegally withholding a whistleblower complaint, possibly to protect ... Donald Trump or senior White House officials, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff alleged Friday. Schiff issued a subpoena for the complaint, accusing acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire of taking extraordinary steps to withhold the complaint from Congress, even after the intel community's inspector general characterized the complaint as credible and of 'urgent concern.'" My first thought was, "Boy, I hope this is about Trump, but it's probably about Wilbur Ross or some undersecretary I've never heard of." Even if the complaint was about Trump, I figured it would be along the lines of his spending too much money on gold-plated commemorative executive order pens. Sometimes I'm happy to be wrong.
Remembering Individual 1 -- Vestiges of Another Trump Scandal. Emily Rueb of the New York Times: "Stormy Daniels, the pornographic film actress who said she had an affair with Donald J. Trump before he became president, reached a $450,000 settlement on Friday with the City of Columbus, Ohio, after suing over her arrest at a strip club in July 2018. The arrest made headlines across the country, raising questions about whether politics had been at play and why it was a priority to send four vice detectives to a strip club. Within 24 hours, Ms. Daniels was charged with three misdemeanors, bailed out and released, and the charges were dropped. The Columbus police later said the arrest had been a mistake." The NBC News story is here.
A Trump-NRA Quid Pro Quo that Will Cost American Lives. Maggie Haberman & Annie Karni of the New York Times: "President Trump met in the White House on Friday with Wayne LaPierre, the chief executive of the National Rifle Association, and discussed prospective gun legislation and whether the N.R.A. could provide support for the president as he faces impeachment and a more difficult re-election campaign, according to two people familiar with the meeting.... In a statement Friday evening, an N.R.A. spokesman confirmed the meeting took place but insisted The Times's account of the meeting was 'inaccurate.' He pushed back on the account of some officials that any offer of support for the president was in exchange for opposition to gun laws."
Miriam Jordon of the New York Times: "A federal judge on Friday rejected new regulations that would allow the government to hold children and their parents in detention for indefinite periods, one of the Trump administration's signature efforts to curtail the large number of families arriving from Central America. Describing the government's defense of its proposed new policy as 'Kafkaesque' in some of its reasoning, Judge Dolly Gee of Federal District Court for the Central District of California said it was up to Congress, not the administration, to supplant a 20-year-old consent decree that requires children to be held in state-licensed facilities and released in most cases within 20 days." The AP story is here.
The Trump Kleptocracy, Ctd. Coral Davenport of the New York Times: "For years, the Interior Department resisted proposals to raise the height of its towering Shasta Dam in Northern California. The department's own scientists and researchers concluded that doing so would endanger rare plants and animals in the area, as well as the bald eagle, and devastate the West Coast's salmon industry downstream. But the project is going forward now, in a big win for a powerful consortium of California farmers that stands to profit substantially by gaining access to more irrigation water from a higher dam and has been trying to get the project approved for more than a decade. For much of the past decade, the chief lobbyist for the group was David Bernhardt. Today, Mr. Bernhardt is the Interior Secretary. It is not the first time that the Interior Department under Mr. Bernhardt's leadership has taken actions that benefit his former client, the Westlands Water District...."
Sarah Ferris of Politico: "The House on Friday voted to once again overturn ... Donald Trump's national emergency declaration to build a border wall, sending the legislation to Trump who is sure to veto it. Eleven Republicans and one Republican-turned-independent sided with every Democrat to block Trump's maneuver to circumvent Congress and divert billions in Pentagon funding to his wall.... The Senate approved the measure earlier this week after 11 Republicans joined Democrats, underscoring the somewhat bipartisan nature of the rebuke. Congress voted to terminate Trump's national emergency earlier this spring but failed to win enough support to override the president's veto. When Trump vetoes the measure again, it will mark the sixth veto of his presidency."
Presidential Race 2020
Peter Stone of the Guardian: "Leading coal, oil and gas CEOs and some industry lobbyists are ponying up millions of dollars to help Trump win in 2020, after reaping a regulatory windfall that has benefited some of their bottom lines during Trump's first term. However, many of these pro-fossil fuel victories came via executive orders and regulatory actions and could be reversed if a Democrat wins in 2020 -- perhaps showing why the fossil fuel industry is backing Trump's re-election so aggressively." --s
David Sanger & Neil Genzlinger of the New York Times: "Joseph C. Wilson, the long-serving American diplomat who undercut President George W. Bush's claim in 2003 that Iraq had been trying to build nuclear weapons, leading to the unmasking of his wife at the time, Valerie Plame, as a C.I.A. agent, died on Friday at his home in Santa Fe, N.M. He was 69."
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Reader Comments (6)
Here's Nancy paraphrasing some trumpspeak from a few years back:
"I moved on him like a bitch. I don't even ask, I just start impeaching.
And when you're Speaker of the House they let you do it."
You go, girl!
@forrest morris: That's kind of perfect!
Wonderful exchange by two intellectual giants about the state of our USA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxinX6i8cUY
Forrest,
Hahahahaha. I needed that.
Trump is apparently in need of a little love so he's going to take an official trip down to Florida next Thursday. His visit to the retirement communities known as "The Villages" will be an official, taxpayer paid trip because he will be signing an official document there.
Once the Sharpie has been put away Trump will then be free to frolic with one of the densest clots of GOP voters in the swing state.
Although McMaster purportedly warned Trump about trusting the Russians, yesterday @NatashaBertrand dug up this WH driveway clip in which McMasters characterized Trump's conversation with the Russian diplomats in the oval office as "wholly appropriate." He stated the WAPO story, at the time, was false. Good little sycophant General.
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/05/16/mcmaster-stands-by-earlier-statement-says-trump-never-put-national-security-at-risk.html