The Commentariat -- July 27, 2019
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
"Not Normal." David Nather of Axios "looked through all of [Trump's] public comments and tweets for this week, and found an avalanche of personal attacks, complaints, and statements at odds with reality. One came close to setting off a diplomatic crisis.... The sheer volume of incidents -- and the distance they've created from a normal presidency -- are definitely worth your attention." Read on.
... Nathan's list doesn't include today's entry: ...
... Nicholas Wu of USA Today: "On Saturday morning..., Donald Trump vented on Twitter about a political adversary, Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., and assailed an American city, Baltimore. 'Rep. Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men & women of Border Patrol at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous,' Trump wrote. Trump continued by saying conditions on the border were 'clean, efficient & well run, just very crowded,' whereas Cummings' district was 'a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess.' Trump did not present evidence for this claim about the district.... Trump made similar comments in January 2017 when attacking another black congressman, Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga. Trump had called the civil rights icon's district 'in horrible shape and falling apart (not to mention crime infested)' after Lewis said he would be skipping Trump's inauguration." Cummings' district includes part of Balto & part of the burbs. ...
... In a later tweet, Trump wrote of Baltimore, "No human being would want to live there." Mrs. McC: No doubt Trump is assuming that everyone who lives in Balto is black (which of course isn't true: Baltimore city is 30% white & Cummings' district is 35% white). Thus, he is implying that black people are not human beings. He means that.
** Roger Cohen of the New York Times: "... I cannot forget Trump's recent treatment of Nadia Murad, a Yazidi woman who won the Nobel Peace Prize last year for her campaign to end mass rape in war. The Islamic State, or ISIS, forced Murad into sexual slavery when it overran Yazidi villages in northern Iraq in 2014. Murad lost her mother and six brothers, slaughtered by ISIS.... Trump sits there at his desk, an uncomprehending, unsympathetic, uninterested cardboard dummy. He looks straight ahead for much of the time, not at her, his chin jutting in his best effort at a Mussolini pose.... He cannot look at her.... When Murad says, 'They killed my mom, my six brothers,' Trump responds: 'Where are they now?'... 'They are in the mass graves in Sinjar,' Murad says.... Murad is a woman, and she is brown, and he is incapable of empathy, and the Trump administration recently watered down a United Nations Security Council resolution on protecting victims of sexual violence in conflict.... [There's more, and it doesn't get better.] This president is inhuman. Something is missing. In his boundless self-absorption, he is capable of anything.” Thanks to P.D. Pepe for the link.
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Back in commission. Many thanks to safari, PD Pepe & Ken W. for linking to relevant stories & opinion pieces yesterday. BTW, if you watched the video of Stephen Colbert's monologue, which PD Pepe linked, you now know that during a speech introducing our brand-new Secretary of Defense this week, Trump also introduced two new words into the lexicon: "infantroopin" and "lawmurkers." Despite Colbert's best guess, I'd say "infantroopin" means "infantrymen" (which -- due to credit to Trump -- does sound pretty good in the original German), & "lawmurkers" means those elected officials whose place of business is the U.S. Capitol building (they do "murk," don't they?). -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie
"Impeachment" Just Became Official. Nicholas Fandos & Charlie Savage of the New York Times: "The House Judiciary Committee on Friday asked a federal judge to unseal grand jury secrets related to Robert S. Mueller III's investigation, using the court filing to declare that lawmakers have already in effect launched an impeachment investigation of President Trump. In a legal maneuver that carries significant political overtones, the committee told a judge that it needs access to the grand jury evidence collected by Mr. Mueller as special counsel -- such as witness testimony -- because it is 'investigating whether to recommend articles of impeachment' against the president.... By declaring that his committee was in effect conducting such an inquiry, [Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY)] was heading off a politically difficult vote in the committee or the full house to pursue impeachment.... 'We're now crossing a threshold with this filing, and we are now officially entering into an examination of whether or not to recommend articles of impeachment,' Representative Veronica Escobar, Democrat of Texas, declared." ...
... Dan Friedman of Mother Jones: "The House Judiciary Committee is 'in effect' already conducting an impeachment inquiry, the panel's chairman, Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), said during a press conference, referring to hearings it has conducted regarding former special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation. Nadler said that impeaching Trump is among the actions that Democrats are weighing to address the president's misconduct -- despite the fact that there has been no House vote to initiate an impeachment inquiry. Nearly 100 House Democrats have already said they support opening an impeachment inquiry...." ...
We are continuing an investigation of the president's malfeasances. And we will consider what we have to consider, including whether we should recommend articles of impeachment to the House. That's the job of our committee. -- House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerry Nadler (D-NY), Friday
We will proceed when we have what we need to proceed -- not one day sooner, the California Democrat said at her weekly press conference. -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Friday ...
... Sarah Ferris & Andrew Desiderio of Politico: "House Democrats on Friday took a major step forward in their legal fight against ... Donald Trump -- one that looks much like the beginning of impeachment, even as Speaker Nancy Pelosi continues to resist a formal inquiry. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler's announcement on Friday that the House is formally seeking special counsel Robert Mueller's grand-jury information complicates the far more cautious message on impeachment coming from Pelosi and her top deputies.... Seven lawmakers have come out in favor since Mueller's testimony, including House Democratic Caucus vice-chair Katherine Clark (D-Mass.). Reps. Ann Kuster (D-N.H.), a senior Democrat, and Mike Levin (D-Calif.), a freshman in a battleground district, both announced their support Friday afternoon." ...
... Reps. Mary Gay Scanlon, David Cicilline, Pramila Jayapal & Veronica Escobar in the Atlantic on "why we're moving forward with impeachment.... At this point, it is up to Congress to act on the evidence of multiple counts of obstruction of justice committed by the president, and to continue our investigation into whether he has committed other high crimes and misdemeanors.... We have now filed a petition in court to obtain the grand-jury documents referenced in the special counsel's report. In that filing, we have made clear that we will utilize our Article I powers to obtain the additional underlying evidence, as well as enforce subpoenas for key witness testimony, and broaden our investigations to include conflicts of interest and financial misconduct." ...
... Andrew Prokop of Vox summarizes the debate within the House over impeachment.
I watched Bob Mueller, and they have nothing. There's no collusion there's no obstruction they have nothing. It's a disgrace. -- Donald Trump, Friday
More than one lie here. The smaller one: Trump said Tuesday he wouldn't be watching the hearings. Now he says he did. The bigger one: even if Trump watched only "a little bit," as he said he might, he could not have missed Mueller's repeated confirmations that the report did not give Trump a pass on either conspiracy or obstruction. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie
We want to find out what happened with the last Democrat president. Let's look into Obama the way they looked at me from day one. They've looked into everything that we've done. They could look into the book deal that President Obama made. Let's subpoena all of his records. -- Donald Trump, Friday ...
... Air-Conditioning! Trump Goes off Deep End in Response to Impeachment Investigation. Bruce Haring of Deadline: "Frustrated by continued efforts by the Democratic congress to find a reason to impeach him, ... Donald Trump fought back [Friday], saying that an investigation should be mounted on the book deals signed by former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle. The $65 million in multiple book deals spawned a best-seller for Michelle Obama, with Barack Obama's memoir scheduled for some time next year. Trump, speaking in the White House Oval Office on Friday, also called for an investigation into the Clinton Foundation, and put in a jab against Obama for ruining the White House air conditioning system, which he says can't maintain a comfortable temperature." Mrs. McC: If you can't take the heat, Donnie, get the hell out of the kitchen. ...
... Jonathan Chait: "Like many criminals, Trump believes that everybody is a crook and views demands that he follow the law as mere hypocrisy. Here he pivots immediately from his rage that he is being asked to comply with basic ethical norms -- in this same interview Trump threatened to raise tariffs on French wine, a move that would benefit Trump's own winery -- to insinuations that President Obama probably committed financial crimes, too. Trump's claim that Republicans never investigated Obama is especially bizarre.... Trump, reaching for evidence that Obama probably did something just as unethical as Trump did, comes up with ... Obama's book. You can almost see the wheels turning in Trump's brain as he tries to summon some damning piece of evidence about his predecessor.... 'Writing books' has to be some kind of scam, right?"
Josh Kovensky of TPM: "... Calling [former White House counsel Don] McGahn 'the main fact witness' of former special counsel Robert Mueller's report, [Rep. Jerry] Nadler told CNN's Anderson Cooper that a lawsuit to enforce a subpoena for McGahn's testimony would be filed early next week."
Ted Hesson of Politico: "... Donald Trump said Friday that the United States had struck an asylum agreement with Guatemala. Speaking from the Oval Office, Trump told reporters he had reached a safe third country deal with the Central American nation.... Trump has railed at Guatemala in recent days for allegedly backing out of asylum negotiations with the U.S. The Guatemalan government earlier this month called off a meeting between Trump and Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales amid litigation in that country's top court challenging the asylum discussions. In a tweet this week, Trump said his administration was weighing retaliation against Guatemala that included a possible travel ban, tariffs, and a fee on remittances -- a significant source of economic activity in that country.... Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, ripped the pact as 'cruel and immoral' in a written statement. 'Simply put, Guatemala is not a safe country for refugees and asylum seekers,' he said, adding that he expected the move to be challenged in court.... Pro-migrant groups have blasted the idea that asylum seekers will be protected in Guatemala, which had a murder rate more than five times that of the U.S. in 2016." ...
... Liar, Liar. Obed Manuel of the Dallas Morning News (July 25): "A U.S. Border Patrol chief on Thursday testified before the House Judiciary Committee that 18-year-old Francisco Erwin Galicia never claimed to be a U.S. citizen when he was in Border Patrol custody for 23 days. But that contradicts a notice to appear in immigration court served to Galicia in which the Department of Homeland Security accused him of falsely claiming to be a U.S. citizen while in custody.... During the oversight hearing on family separations and short-term custody, Rep. Ted Lieu, D-California, asked [Brian Hastings, Chief of Law Enforcement at the U.S. Border Patrol,] why Galicia was held in custody for more than three weeks. Galicia was released less than 24 hours after The News broke the story. Lieu, citing The News' reporting in which Galicia said that he lost 26 pounds in 23 days and wasn't allowed a shower during that time, asked Hastings if he could explain why Galicia was detained. Hastings replied that at the Falfurrias checkpoint where Galicia and his younger brother Marlon Galicia were taken into custody, Francisco 'claimed to be a Mexican National who was born in Reynosa, Mexico.' 'Throughout the process, and while he was with Border Patrol, he claimed to be a citizen of Mexico with no immigration documents to be in or remain in the U.S.,' Hastings told the members of Congress.... '[Hastings'] statement is incorrect,' [Claudia Galan, Galicia's attorney,] said Thursday. 'At the moment he was stopped, he showed them his documents and he kept saying he was a U.S. citizen.'" ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: The House should give Hastings an opportunity to "clarify" his testimony. If he declines, or "clarifies" with another lie, the House should cite him for perjury. BTW, it wasn't clear to me until today that the Galicia brothers were detained while minding their own business inside the U.S., not while they were trying to re-enter from Mexico. ...
... Dennis Romero of NBC News: Francisco Galicia describes "inhumane" conditions in the U.S. Customs & Border Patrol facility where he was held. One quote (translated from Spanish: ""We were about 60 people in one small room." Mrs. McC: So if 60 people were concentrated in one small room, isn't it accurate to call the facility a "concentration camp"? I suppose a Trumpie might argue that a facility comprised of what look like permanent or semi-permanent buildings are not literally "camps," in which case I would settle for "concentration facility."
Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court on Friday gave President Trump a victory in his fight for a wall along the Mexican border by allowing the administration to begin using $2.5 billion in Pentagon money for the construction. In a 5-to-4 ruling, the court overturned an appellate decision and said that the administration could tap the money while litigation over the matter proceeds. But that will most likely take many months or longer, allowing Mr. Trump to move ahead before the case returns to the Supreme Court after further proceedings in the appeals court. While the order was only one paragraph long and unsigned, the Supreme Court said the groups challenging the administration did not appear to have a legal right to do so. That was an indication that the court's conservative majority was likely to side with the administration in the end." Thanks to Ken W. for the link. ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: You'll have to read the whole report, but it appears Liptak is right. The Court's confederates seem to accept the argument that the litigants, who are environmental advocates, don't have standing. But the House also has filed a suit, & another lower court judge ruled in that case that the judiciary "should generally resolve disputes between the other two branches as only a last resort." This seems to give a president* the power of appropriation, despite the Constitution's unambiguous language conveying that responsibility to the Congress. So forget Article I; Trump does "have Article II," as he has said, an article which he has repeatedly interpreted to mean, "I can do whatever I want."
When "Executive Time" Means "Sexual Assault." Helene Cooper of the New York Times: "Col. Kathryn A. Spletstoser says ... Air Force Gen. John E. Hyten, the commander of United States Strategic Command..., pulled her to him and kissed her on the lips while pressing himself against her, then ejaculated, getting semen on his sweatpants and on her yoga pants .... on the night of Dec. 2, 2017.... 'The two were attending the annual Reagan National Defense Forum in California." According to Spletstoser, Hyden knocked on her hotel room door because "he wanted to speak to her.... The military’s itinerary of General Hyten's movements that day in Simi Valley, which was viewed by The New York Times, said he was having 'executive time.'... In April, President Trump nominated General Hyten to be the next vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. If confirmed, he would become the country's No. 2 military officer.... An Air Force official charged with investigating her complaint declined in June to refer General Hyten to a court-martial."
Shane Croucher of Newsweek: "The hashtag #MoscowMitch was trending on Twitter on Friday morning after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked two election bills designed to deter interference by Russia and other states, claiming it was 'partisan legislation' by the Democratic Party.... Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough used the moniker 'Moscow Mitch' in reference to McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, multiple times during his MSNBC show on Friday, and tore into the congressional leader for several minutes." ...
... Nicole Goodkind of Newsweek: "McConnell said he wouldn't allow a vote on the bills because they were 'so partisan,' but, as previously reported, earlier this year McConnell received a slew of donations from four of the top voting machine lobbyists in the country.... The plans would likely burden the two largest electronic voting machine vendors in the United States, Election Systems & Software and Dominion Voting Systems, with new regulations and financial burdens.... McConnell's actions seemed even more out of balance with his party, as the Senate Intelligence Committee -- led by Republicans -- released a report later on Thursday claiming Russians have targeted voting systems in all 50 states in 2016. Though there was no evidence votes were changed, in Illinois 'Russian cyberactors were in a position to delete or change voter data.' In 2018, there were 14 states that used electronic voting systems in 2018 with no paper trail, that means that if votes were inaccurately tallied or machines malfunctioned, there would be no way to investigate or recover those votes. Voting machine companies are not currently subject to any federally-mandated security standards." ...
... Nancy LeTourneau of the Washington Monthly: "If the House bills are partisan, the question should be whether the majority leader is currently working on bipartisan efforts to secure our elections. We all know that the answer is 'no.' The fact that McConnell claims that mandating the use of paper ballots is an attempt 'to give Democrats the political upper hand' in 2020 is an outrageous assertion, demonstrating that the majority leader has no interest in fair elections, or even giving voters reason to believe that they are fair. It is also telling that McConnell assumes that having paper ballots that can be manually counted would give Democrats an advantage.... Just as we've seen with Trump, he is sending a message to Vladimir Putin that he welcomes another attack.... The invitation also goes out to other foreign adversaries.... You have to wonder why McConnell would be so confident that ... it would be to benefit Republicans. And if the only way for the GOP to survive politically is to invite foreign interference in our elections, the party of Lincoln has been completely corrupted."
... Tal Axelrod of the Hill: "Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank slammed Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Friday after the GOP leader blocked two election security measures this week. In an op-ed published by The Post, Milbank accused McConnell of 'doing Russian President Vladimir Putin's bidding' and labeled the GOP leader 'a Russian asset.'... 'Russia attacked our country in 2016. It is attacking us today. Its attacks will intensify in 2020. Yet each time we try to raise our defenses to repel the attack, McConnell, the Senate majority leader, blocks us from defending ourselves,' Milbank continued. Let's call this what it is: unpatriotic. The Kentucky Republican is, arguably more than any other American, doing Russian President Vladimir Putin's bidding,' he wrote.... The columnist accused McConnell of 'aiding and abetting Putin's dismantling of Americans' self-governance,' adding, 'A leader who won't protect our country from attack is no patriot.'"
Presidential Race 2020
David Jackson of USA Today: "A day after praising a Fox News poll that reflected confidence in his economic record, Trump attacked another Fox News poll that shows him losing the 2020 race to former Democratic Vice President Joe Biden. '@FoxNews is at it again,' Trump said in a tweet.... He added another barb: 'Now new Fox Polls, which have always been terrible to me (they had me losing BIG to Crooked Hillary), have me down to Sleepy Joe.'" ...
... Josh Feldman of Mediaite: "Fox News' Shepard Smith [Friday] afternoon fired back at ... Donald Trump after he blasted the network for their 'terrible' polls. The polling shows Joe Biden beating the president by 10%. As Smith put it, 'Same spread as last month and outside the margin of error.'... 'The Fox News poll did have President Trump losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton and the Fox News poll was accurate,' Smith said. 'The final survey was done November 3-6 of that year. Among both registered and likely voters, the poll predicted Hillary Clinton would beat Trump by 4 percentage points.... So Clinton would win the popular vote by a margin of between 1.5% and 6.5%. She did. Her margin of victory was 2.1%. Close to three million voters. The polls were accurate.'"
Big Setback for a Frivolous Lawsuit. Max Londberg & Cameron Knight of the Cincinnati Enquirer: "The $250 million lawsuit filed by Nick Sandmann against the Washington Post has been dismissed by a federal judge. U.S. District Judge William Bertelsman, who heard oral arguments earlier this month, issued the ruling on Friday in the case that garnered national attention. Nick became embroiled in a divisive response to an encounter between him, his Covington Catholic High classmates and Native Americans on the National Mall.... The Sandmann family plans to appeal Bertelsman's ruling, according to a statement sent to The Enquirer by Nick's attorneys...."
Why Do We Need "Medicare for All" When Things Are Going So Well? Phil McCausland of NBC News: "More than 10,000 people in Appalachia will sigh with relief this month after two donors from the region helped nonprofit RIP Medical Debt purchase and forgive $10 million of medical debt. But it's just a drop in the bucket of the $88 billion of medical debt racked up in the United States over the past year.... Antico said the $100,000 donation, which buys the $10 million debt for pennies on the dollar, came from two individuals -- Jim Branscome, a former journalist who became the managing director of Standard & Poor's Financial Services, and author and journalist Bill Bishop. The two men approached RIP Medical Debt in May and said they wanted to focus on Central Appalachia with their personal donation. The 10,000 people affected are sprawled across 70 counties in West Virginia, Virginia and Kentucky. The nonprofit is unable to pinpoint individuals, but is able to purchase groups of people's debt in bulk from the debt market, which they did in this case."
Beyond the Beltway
New York. Bridget Read of New York: "The battle over the outcome of last month's highly publicized Queens district attorney race between Tiffany Cabán and Melinda Katz is waging on.... Cabán ... declared victory, with their candidate ahead by 1,100 votes ... until Katz quietly pulled ahead by just 20 votes, as last-minute affidavit and absentee ballots were counted.... Since then, the razor-thin margin between contenders has remained too close to call, after Katz's narrow comeback prompted a manual recount. Volunteers from both camps had been counting roughly 91,000 paper ballots for two weeks before they finished yesterday, after which Katz was still ahead by only 60 votes. The Board of Elections plans to certify the results next week, and Cabán plans to challenge them in court."
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