The Commentariat -- March 4, 2018

Afternoon Update:

Anne Gearan & Karoun Demirjian of the Washington Post: "The Trump administration will not grant exemptions from its new aluminum and steel tariffs for allies such as Canada, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said Sunday, as he defended President Trump's sudden imposition of new trade premiums that are likely to hit Canada and Europe hardest."

... Luis Sanchez of the Hill: "British Prime Minister Theresa May on Sunday expressed 'deep concern' to President Trump over his announced plans to increase steel and aluminum tariffs. May told the president in a phone call that 'multilateral action was the only way to resolve the problem of global overcapacity in all parties' interests,' according to a ... spokesperson."

Everything Is Going So Smoothly. Kirk Semple, et al., of the New York Times: "The Trump International Hotel and Tower [in Panama City, Panama,] is President Trump's only hotel property in Latin America.... In recent days, guests have witnessed ... yelling and shoving matches involving security personnel and others, the presence of police in Kevlar helmets, and various interventions by Panamanian labor regulators, forensic specialists and a justice of the peace. The source of the drama? The businessman who recently purchased a majority stake in the hotel wants the Trumps out. And the Trumps, who have a long-term contract to manage the property, are refusing to go. In a letter ... to the hotel's other owners, the businessman, Orestes Fintiklis, likened the Trumps to leeches who had attached to the property, draining our last drops of blood.'... The Trump Organization, in turn, has accused Mr. Fintiklis of using 'thug-like, mob-style tactics.'... This past week, Panama's Public Ministry said it was looking into whether there had been any 'punishable conduct' in the dispute -- which means that an arm of a foreign government finds itself in the extraordinary position of investigating a business owned by the American president." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: The Trump Panama sounds just like the Trump White House to me: yelling & shoving involving security personnel (think, for instance, Omarosa's pounding on the residence door as John Kelly had security staff grab her & unceremoniously "escort" her from the premises), "thug-like, mob-style tactics" (Trump), "leeches" (Trump family), "investigating a business owned by the American president" (Mueller).

Quinn Scanlan & Andres Del Aguila of ABC News: Reince Priebus, "the former chief of staff to ... Donald Trump, said the president sees Attorney General Jeff Sessions' recusing himself from the Russia probe as 'the original sin' and he will never 'let it go.'"

Kailani Koenig of NBC News: "Former White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough on Sunday said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell 'watered down' a warning about Russia's attempts to interfere in the 2016 election and defended the Obama administration's response to foreign meddling in the campaign. The language in a September 2016 letter from congressional leaders to state election officials was drastically softened at McConnell's urging, McDonough said in an ... interview Sunday on NBC's 'Meet The Press.'... Asked if it was watered down at the insistence of McConnell and only McConnell, McDonough responded, 'yes.'"

Gina Colata & C.J. Chivers of the New York Times: "Perhaps no one knows the devastating wounds inflicted by assault-style rifles better than the trauma surgeons who struggle to repair them. The doctors say they are haunted by their experiences confronting injuries so dire they struggle to find words to describe them.... What follows are the recollections of five trauma surgeons. Three of them served in the military, and they emphasized that their opinions are their own and do not represent those of the armed forces. One has treated civilian victims of such weapons in American cities. And a pediatric surgeon treated victims of a Texas church shooting last year."

*****

Conservative Peter Wehner in a New York Times op-ed: "The Republican Party is learning what should have been obvious from the outset: Mr. Trump’s chaotic personality can't be contained. Indeed, combining it with the awesome power of the presidency virtually guaranteed he would become more volatile and transgressive. His presidency is infecting the entire party.... At the national level the Republican Party has become a destructive and anarchic political force in American life. The president and his acolytes are championing conspiracy theories and sweeping, uncalibrated, all-out assault on our institutions. There is reckless talk by Republicans about 'secret societies,' 'silent coups' and the 'deep state.'... Most Republicans are silent, their moral and civic reflexes seemingly dead. All of this is antithetical to conservatism.... [Trump]won't change, and neither will the Republican Party. That's how institutional corruption happens, from the top down." ...

Trade wars are good and easy to win. -- Donald Trump, in a tweet, Friday ...

... Emily Cochrane of the New York Times: "President Trump warned on Saturday that he would apply higher taxes on imported European cars if the European Union carried through on its threat to retaliate against his proposed stiff new tariffs on steel and aluminum. 'If the E.U. wants to further increase their already massive tariffs and barriers on U.S. companies doing business there, we will simply apply a Tax on their Cars which freely pour into the U.S.,' Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter from Florida.... 'They make it impossible for our cars (and more) to sell there. Big trade imbalance!' It was the latest indication that Mr. Trump, despite pressure from foreign allies and American business leaders, is standing by his decision to impose a 25 percent tariff on steel imports and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum imports from all countries. The action is likely to be signed this coming week.... The auto industry is a complex target for the president -- European automakers have plants in the United States and employ thousands of Americans.... Many economists warn that if Mr. Trump's actions lead to an international trade war, a global recession could follow." ...

... Steven Mufson & Damian Paletta of the Washington Post: "In his expanding war over global trade, President Trump has aimed his harshest rhetoric at an unlikely target -- the closest U.S. allies.... The new tariffs and the president's truculent rhetoric triggered angry responses among the countries that are closest to the United States and that are part of the World Trade Organization, which has for years helped reduce global tariffs.... The country that escaped Trump's tweeting ire was China, the very nation the president has wanted to hit hardest and the one that is largely responsible for flooding global markets with cheap steel. In return, China, which provides just 2 percent of U.S. steel imports, has been the most muted among leading trading partners in its response to Trump's tariff threats.... And while Trump has promoted his new tariffs as part of an 'America First' plan, any benefit in terms of jobs could be far outweighed by increased steel costs for U.S. automobiles, wind turbines, shale oil and gas drilling rigs and more -- in many cases doing unintended harm to some of his own strongest domestic constituencies.... Trade experts say the president has exaggerated and oversimplified the trade issues with Europe." ...

... New York Times Editors: "President Trump has been spoiling for a trade war since before his election. Now, he has taken the first meaningful step with his decision to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum imports. And, as with so many other policies he has supported, he appears to have little understanding of this one.... The steel and aluminum tariffs are ostensibly aimed at punishing China.... But Mr. Trump's move will have a limited effect on China because much of the steel and aluminum the United States imports actually comes from allies like Canada, Brazil, South Korea and Mexico.... If Mr. Trump were truly interested in getting China to reduce its excess production, he would have worked with the European Union, Canada, Japan, South Korea and other countries to put pressure on Beijing.... Top officials in Canada and the European Union are already threatening to retaliate forcefully against the new Trump tariffs.... Experts say for every new job at a steel mill or aluminum smelter that is created by this trade decision, the country could lose as many or more jobs at businesses that use those metals, which will now cost more." ...

... "Surpassingly Stupid." Paul Krugman: "... it's starting to look like we have a trade policy crisis on our hands. Trump has always had a thing about trade, which he sees the way he sees everything: as a test of power and masculinity. It's all about who sells more: if we run a trade surplus we win, if we run a trade deficit, we lose[.]... This is, of course, nonsense. Trade isn't a zero-sum game: it raises the productivity and wealth of the world economy.... A cycle of retaliation would shrink overall world trade, making the world as a whole, America very much included, poorer. Perhaps even more important in the near term, it would be highly disruptive.... So the idea that a trade war would be 'good' and 'easy to win' is surpassingly stupid.... In themselves, these tariffs aren't that big a deal. But if they're a sign of what future policy is going to look like, they're really, really bad." ...

... Zack Beauchamp of Vox: "... Trump's staff is disintegrating amid a series of mounting scandals....This has led to a weakening of the personnel wall between Trump and his more outlandish impulses. This whole mess played out in the tariff case: A piece in Politico suggests that Rob Porter -- the former White House staff secretary who resigned amid multiple allegations of domestic abuse -- had been organizing meetings designed to block imposition of new tariffs. 'Porter's resignation removed a fierce opponent of the tariffs from the West Wing and revived the chaotic policy review process that defined the early weeks of Trump's presidency,' Politico reports. White House staff chaos is letting Trump be Trump. That means feelings dictating outcomes, policymaking by pique -- consequences be damned. It's bad enough that this approach yielded dangerous tariffs. Imagine if the next time Trump is angry, he starts thinking about North Korea." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Philip Rucker, et al., of the Washington Post: "Inside the White House, aides over the past week have described an air of anxiety and volatility -- with an uncontrollable commander in chief at its center. These are the darkest days in at least half a year, they say, and they worry just how much farther President Trump and his administration may plunge into unrest and malaise.... 'Pure madness,' lamented one exasperated ally.... This portrait of Trump at a moment of crisis just over a year after taking office is based on interviews with 22 White House officials, friends and advisers.... Trump seethed with anger last Wednesday night over cable news coverage of a photo, obtained by Axios, showing [AG Jeff] Sessions at dinner with Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, who oversees the Russia investigation, and another top Justice Department prosecutor.... The next morning, Trump was still raging about the photo, venting to friends and allies about a dinner he viewed as an intentional show of disloyalty." ...

... BUT Trump's Golf Game Is Going Well. Lindsay Gibbs of ThinkProgress: "Almost fourteen months into his presidency, Donald Trump has reached a dubious milestone that none before him have achieved: He's spent his 100th day at a golf club bearing his own name. Considering he's only been in office for 408 days, that means he's spent almost 25 percent of his time at a Trump-branded golf club...." Mrs. McC: Free advertising for his golf resorts, too!

This Russia Thing -- Is Expanding

Mark Mazetti, et al., of the New York Times: "George Nader, a Lebanese-American businessman, has hovered on the fringes of international diplomacy for three decades. He was a back-channel negotiator with Syria during the Clinton administration, reinvented himself as an adviser to the de facto ruler of the United Arab Emirates, and last year was a frequent visitor to President Trump's White House. Mr. Nader is now a focus of the investigation by Robert S. Mueller III.... In recent weeks, Mr. Mueller's investigators have questioned Mr. Nader and have pressed witnesses for information about any possible attempts by the Emiratis to buy political influence by directing money to support Mr. Trump during the presidential campaign, according to people with knowledge of the discussions. The investigators have also asked about Mr. Nader's role in White House policymaking, those people said, suggesting that the special counsel investigation has broadened beyond Russian election meddling to include Emirati influence on the Trump administration.... In one example of Mr. Nader's influential connections, which has not been previously reported, last fall he received a detailed report from a top Trump fund-raiser, Elliott Broidy, about a private meeting with the president in the Oval Office.... Mr. Trump has closely allied himself with the Emiratis...." ...

     ... Jonathan Swan of Axios first reported on Mueller's interest in Nader on January 21. ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Here's a critical connection I missed in the Kushner News of the Week. Jed Shugerman in Slate: "A Qatari fund acquires major assets from Russia Kushner's business seeks money directly from Qatar. The nation, though, does not deliver to Kushner. The U.S. changes its political posture against Qatar at Kushner's urging, with the alarming possibility that the seemingly manufactured conflict could have escalated into war. (Fortunately, it did not.) Several months later, the Qatar-backed Apollo Group delivers $184 million to Kushner.... The Steele dossier alleges that Russians made a deal with Carter Page in the summer of 2016 to sell 19 percent of fossil fuel giant Rosneft, a multibillion dollar deal, and secretly transfer benefits to Trump officials.... On Dec. 9, 2016, a month after the election, Russia made a deal with Qatar to sell 19.5 percent of Rosneft.... The deal falls squarely in the middle of a time when Kushner, Michael Flynn, and Page were communicating with Russians.... All this new Kushner news connects more dots in the Steele dossier's core allegation: that there may have been a quid-pro-quo of Russian oil money for Trump policy change on sanctions.... In light of the Steele dossier and how Qatar might implicate Russia, Kushner and Trump have even more to answer for." ...

... Joel Gehrke of the Washington Examiner: "President Trump will face an obstruction of justice charge from special counsel Robert Mueller, former Attorney General Eric Holder predicted. 'You technically have an obstruction of justice case that already exists,' Holder, who served under then-President Obama, said on HBO's 'Real Time with Bill Maher.' 'I've known Bob Mueller for 20, 30 years; my guess is he's just trying to make the case as good as he possibly can. So, I think that we have to be patient in that regard.'"

Michael Shear & Michael Tackett of the New York Times: "On Saturday afternoon, President Trump took another swing at his favorite punching bag. 'Mainstream Media in U.S. is being mocked all over the world,' he tweeted. 'They've gone CRAZY! On Saturday night, however, Mr. Trump donned his tuxedo and joined the very journalists he loves to malign for an evening of humorous -- and sometimes uncomfortable -- verbal sparring at the 133rd annual Gridiron Club Dinner.... For Mr. Trump..., his participation in the dinner was striking because the club is the Washington embodiment of political correctness. Its credo is that the roasts at the dinner should 'singe but never burn.' This year, Mr. Trump leaned into the flame." Mrs. McC: Some of Trump's scripted jokes are actually pretty funny.

"Donald Trump's Know-Nothing Science Budget." Alan Burdick of the New Yorker: "Trump's newly proposed federal budget for 2019 continues the assault on knowledge and reason. Funding for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Geological Survey, and the E.P.A. would each be cut by eighteen per cent or more, compared with the final 2017 budget, which was drafted by the Obama Administration and amended by Trump. The Institutes of Health would see its funding remain flat while it absorbed the work of three agencies from the Department of Health and Human Services. The National Institute of Mental Health would see its budget slashed by thirty per cent, despite Trump's recent avowals that better mental-health treatment is the solution to gun violence. NASA's budget would stay roughly the same, but a number of important Earth-science missions would be eliminated, and Trump would attempt to defund and privatize the International Space Station by 2025."

About That "Einstein Visa." Miriam Jordan of the New York Times: "Each year, thousands of foreigners try to persuade government officials that they are among the best in their field. The prize if they succeed: a green card, and with it, the right to live permanently in the United States. Reports that the first lady, Melania Trump, received an immigrant visa reserved for 'individuals with extraordinary ability' in 2001, when she was a model, have thrust the EB-1 visa program into the spotlight. The news, first reported by The Washington Post [and linked here last week], raised questions about whether Mrs. Trump had truly qualified for the visa.... Mr. Trump has championed an immigration overhaul that would replace the current family-based system, which he derides as 'chain migration,' with one based on merit, emphasizing skill and educational level. His proposal would have made it impossible for the first lady to sponsor her parents for a green card, which she did after obtaining permanent legal residency herself."

Emily Holden & Alex Guillen of Politico: "Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt dismissed evolution as an unproven theory, lamented that 'minority religions' were pushing Christianity out of 'the public square' and advocated amending the Constitution to ban abortion, prohibit same-sex marriage and protect the Pledge of Allegiance and the Ten Commandments, according to a newly unearthed series of Oklahoma talk radio shows from 2005. Pruitt, who at the time was a state senator, also described the Second Amendment as divinely granted and condemned federal judges as a 'judicial monarchy' that is 'the most grievous threat that we have today.' And he did not object when the program's host described Islam as 'not so much a religion as it is a terrorist organization in many instances.'" Mrs. McC: Hey, at least he's not just a climate-change denier. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Perfect! Michael Biesecker of the AP: "... Donald Trump on Friday tapped a chemical industry insider to run the Environmental Protection Agency office that oversees emergency response to hazardous spills and cleanups of the nation's most toxic sites. The White House announced that Trump has nominated Peter C. Wright to serve as EPA's assistant administrator for Land and Emergency Management. Wright has worked as a corporate lawyer at Dow Chemical Co. since 1999. Despite Trump's campaign pledges to 'drain the swamp' in Washington, Wright's nomination is the latest example of the president appointing corporate lawyers or lobbyists to supervise federal offices that directly regulate their former employers." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Perfect! Anne Branigin of the Root: "William Otis, a former special counsel to President George H.W. Bush and a current professor at Georgetown University Law, was nominated by Donald Trump this week to serve on a federal commission that sets policy on how to punish criminals.... Otis is a staunch supporter of Attorney General Jeff Sessions' hard line approach of imposing mandatory minimum sentences and resurrecting the war on drugs. But Otis, thanks to his popular legal blog, 'Crime and Consequences,' has also made his racist beliefs both explicit easily searchable. As the Washington Post reports, Otis once defended a federal judge who was called out for saying black people and Latinx were more violent than white people."

Presidential Race 2020. Emily Stewart of Vox: "On Saturday, Trump is launching a fundraising initiative that mimics a tactic employed by former President George W. Bush to raise money, according to a report from Alex Isenstadt at Politico. Trump is appearing before Republican donors at Mar-a-Lago to kick off the plan that rewards donors who have 'bundled' thousands of dollars in contributions, meaning they gather campaign contributions from others.... This marks a new step in campaign fundraising for Trump's 2020 campaign, which has already been taking in millions of dollars in donations. His campaign committee ended 2017 with $22 million in cash, having brought in $6.9 million in the fourth quarter of the year alone. Per FEC data, his campaign committee raised $32 million in 2017.... A significant chunk of the reelection campaign's money has gone to legal fees -- about a quarter, according to the New York Times.... Trump has kicked off reelection efforts unusually early compared to his predecessors." ...

... Kevin Liptak of the CNN: "... Donald Trump bemoaned a decision not to investigate Hillary Clinton after the 2016 presidential election, decrying a 'rigged system' that still doesn't have the 'right people' in place to fix it, during a freewheeling speech to Republican donors in Florida on Saturday. In the closed-door remarks, a recording of which was obtained by CNN, Trump also praised China's President Xi Jinping for recently consolidating power and extending his potential tenure.... 'He's now president for life. President for life. And he's great,' Trump said. 'And look, he was able to do that. I think it's great. Maybe we'll give that a shot some day.' The remarks, delivered inside the ballroom at his Mar-a-Lago estate during a lunch and fundraiser, were upbeat, lengthy, and peppered with jokes and laughter. But Trump's words reflected his deeply felt resentment that his actions during the 2016 campaign remain under scrutiny while those of his former rival, Hillary Clinton, do not." ...

     ... Mrs. McC: Actually, this is yet another jab at Jeff Sessions. Looks as if the speech was one big fever dream of dictatorial powers.

     ... Thanks to unwashed for the link. Mrs. McC: Unwashed & I very much hope you'll show a little more sympathy for Devin now.

Beyond the Beltway

The Paradigm for Empty Gestures. Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "The Florida Senate on Saturday voted down a bill to ban assault weapons, then immediately pivoted to a moment of silence for victims of the shooting at a Parkland, Fla., high school last month."

The Paradigm for Meaningful Action. Michelle Krupa of CNN: "One by one. That's how Philando Castile, who was killed by a police officer during a 2016 traffic stop, used to help kids who couldn't afford lunch. The school nutrition supervisor would dip into his pocket and pay the bill. Now a charity run in his name has multiplied his mission by thousands, wiping out the lunch debt of every student at all 56 schools in Minnesota's St. Paul Public Schools, where Castile worked."

News Ledes

Washington Post: "Propelled by an ever-lengthening stride and extraordinary willpower, the lanky British medical student Roger Bannister became the first person to run a mile in less than four minutes. He pitched over the finish line at the University of Oxford's Iffley Road track on a dank, blustery day -- May 6, 1954 -- and electrified England during its post-World War II doldrums. Dr. Bannister, who died March 3 at age 88, became a national hero...." ...

     ... Bannister's New York Times obituary is here.

New York Times: "At east eight people died after heavy snow, rain and high winds ripped through the Northeast and the Mid-Atlantic on Friday, snarling travel and bringing major flooding to parts of Massachusetts. More than two million people in 17 states and Washington, D.C., were without power as of Friday night, the United States Energy Department said on its website. By about 9:30 p.m. Saturday, at least one million people were still dealing with electricity failure."

Entertainment Weekly: "M*A*S*H actor David Ogden Stiers died of cancer on Saturday, his agent confirmed. He was 75."

The Commentariat -- March 3, 2018

Afternoon Update:

Zack Beauchamp of Vox: "... Trump's staff is disintegrating amid a series of mounting scandals....This has led to a weakening of the personnel wall between Trump and his more outlandish impulses. This whole mess played out in the tariff case: A piece in Politico suggests that Rob Porter -- the former White House staff secretary who resigned amid multiple allegations of domestic abuse -- had been organizing meetings designed to block imposition of new tariffs. 'Porter's resignation removed a fierce opponent of the tariffs from the West Wing and revived the chaotic policy review process that defined the early weeks of Trump's presidency,' Politico reports. White House staff chaos is letting Trump be Trump. That means feelings dictating outcomes, policymaking by pique -- consequences be damned. It's bad enough that this approach yielded dangerous tariffs. Imagine if the next time Trump is angry, he starts thinking about North Korea."

Emily Holden & Alex Guillen of Politico: "Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt dismissed evolution as an unproven theory, lamented that 'minority religions' were pushing Christianity out of 'the public square' and advocated amending the Constitution to ban abortion, prohibit same-sex marriage and protect the Pledge of Allegiance and the Ten Commandments, according to a newly unearthed series of Oklahoma talk radio shows from 2005. Pruitt, who at the time was a state senator, also described the Second Amendment as divinely granted and condemned federal judges as a 'judicial monarchy' that is 'the most grievous threat that we have today.' And he did not object when the program's host described Islam as 'not so much a religion as it is a terrorist organization in many instances.'" Mrs. McC: Hey, at least he's not just a climate-change denier. ...

... Perfect! Michael Biesecker of the AP: "... Donald Trump on Friday tapped a chemical industry insider to run the Environmental Protection Agency office that oversees emergency response to hazardous spills and cleanups of the nation's most toxic sites. The White House announced that Trump has nominated Peter C. Wright to serve as EPA's assistant administrator for Land and Emergency Management. Wright has worked as a corporate lawyer at Dow Chemical Co. since 1999. Despite Trump's campaign pledges to 'drain the swamp' in Washington, Wright's nomination is the latest example of the president appointing corporate lawyers or lobbyists to supervise federal offices that directly regulate their former employers."

Reuters: "Sweden's Electrolux..., Europe's largest home appliance maker, said on Friday it would delay a planned $250 million investment in Tennessee, after ... Donald Trump announced tariffs on imported aluminum and steel.... 'We are putting it on hold. We believe that tariffs could cause a pretty significant increase in the price of steel on the U.S. market,' Electrolux spokesman Daniel Frykholm said. Electrolux buys all the steel it uses in its U.S. products domestically."

*****

Governance by Temper Tantrum

Ana Swanson of the New York Times: "A day after stunning markets, Republican lawmakers and even his own advisers by announcing stiff tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, President Trump doubled down on his approach on Friday, saying in a early morning tweet that 'Trade wars are good, and easy to win.' Mr. Trump appeared eager to defend his decision to levy sweeping tariffs on all imports of those metals, issuing a series of morning tweets explaining the need for tariffs. 'Our steel industry is in bad shape. IF YOU DON'T HAVE STEEL, YOU DON'T HAVE A COUNTRY!' he said in one tweet.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Alan Freeman of the Washington Post: "Canadians reacted with a mixture of anger, confusion and resignation this week to President Trump's promise to hit U.S. imports of steel and aluminum with hefty tariffs, upending decades of economic cooperation and integration.... Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the tariff proposal 'absolutely unacceptable,' using the same phrase as Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, who also threatened retaliatory measures if Canada isn't exempted from the trade actions.... Under the Trump policies announced Thursday, steel imported into the United States would be slapped with a 25 percent tariff and aluminum with a 10 percent tariff. The announcement sent shudders through world markets and prompted a global outcry, with European allies and others threatening retaliation.... Canada is the largest exporter of steel and aluminum to the United States, supplying $7.2 billion of aluminum and $4.3 billion of steel to the United States last year." ...

... Eric Levitz: "Jean-Claude Juncker, European Commission president, told the German press Tuesday that should Trump make good on his protectionist promise, the European Union would slap retaliatory tariffs on goods produced in the home states of top Republican officials -- including the bourbon prepared in Mitch McConnell's backyard and Harley-Davidson motorcycles manufactured in Paul Ryan's. 'None of this is reasonable, but reason is a sentiment that is very unevenly distributed in this world,' Juncker said." ...

... Peter Baker of the New York Times: "The week of wild policymaking has left lawmakers on Capitol Hill, investors on Wall Street and leaders around the world trying to make sense of it all. Republicans in Congress are wondering if Mr. Trump really intends to defy one of the party's most valued and powerful constituencies to push for gun restrictions that they say will never go anywhere in Congress. Corporate executives and foreign governments were guessing whether Mr. Trump will really follow through on his unscripted vow to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum and, if so, what that might mean.... On Thursday, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia announced the development of an 'invincible' nuclear missile and even showed animation of a potential strike on Florida, where Mr. Trump spends many weekends, including this one. But the president had no response to the implicit threat...." ...

... He's Come Unglued. Stephanie Ruhle & Peter Alexander of NBC News: Trump's "public show of confidence belies the fact that Trump's policy maneuver, which may ultimately harm U.S. companies and American consumers, was announced without any internal review by government lawyers or his own staff, according to a review of an internal White House document. According to two officials, Trump's decision to launch a potential trade war was born out of anger at other simmering issues and the result of a broken internal process that has failed to deliver him consensus views that represent the best advice of his team. On Wednesday evening, the president became 'unglued,' in the words of one official familiar with the president's state of mind. A trifecta of events had set him off in a way that two officials said they had not seen before: Hope Hicks' testimony to lawmakers investigating Russia's interference in the 2016 election, conduct by his embattled attorney general and the treatment of his son-in-law by his chief of staff. Trump, the two officials said, was angry and gunning for a fight, and he chose a trade war...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Gloria Borger of CNN: "Not since Richard Nixon started talking to the portraits on the walls of the West Wing has a president seemed so alone against the world. On source -- who is a presidential ally -- is worried, really worried. The source says this past week is 'different,' that advisers are scared the President is spiraling, lashing out, just out of control. For example: Demanding to hold a public session where he made promises on trade tariffs before his staff was ready, not to mention willing. 'This has real economic impact,' says the source, as the Dow dropped 420 points after the President's news Thursday. 'Something is very wrong.' Even by Trumpian standards, the chaos and the unraveling at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue are a stunning -- and recurring -- problem." (Also linked yesterday.)

Time for Some Traffic Problems.... Michael Shear & Patrick McGeehan of the New York Times: "President Trump is pressing congressional Republicans to oppose funding for a new rail tunnel between New York and New Jersey, using the power of his office to block a key priority for the region and his Democratic rivals, according to several people with knowledge of his actions. Mr. Trump urged Speaker Paul D. Ryan this week not to support funding for the $30 billion project, two people familiar with the conversation said. Th president's decision to weigh in forcefully against the so-called Gateway infrastructure project, which has been one of the United States' top transportation priorities for years, adds a significant obstacle to getting the project underway in the near future.... Mr. Trump has told Republicans that it makes no sense to give [Sen. Minority Leader Chuck] Schumer [D-N.Y.] something that he covets -- funding for the tunnels -- at a time that Mr. Schumer is routinely blocking Mr. Trump's nominees and other parts of his agenda, the person said." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: The principal difference between this stunt & Bridgegate is that we're finding out about the motivation earlier in the cycle.

Gail Collins: "... of all the stupid-to-terrifying things going on in the White House, one of the most depressing may be that Jeff Sessions is becoming a sympathetic figure. Not that he hasn't kept trying to reingratiate himself.... How long do you think he'll last? Well, he's made it clear he doesn't intend to go on his own volition, and despite the massive churn in the administration, most of the departed have resigned under their own power. Trump, who we're discovering is terrible at firing people, has actually canned only three -- the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, the acting attorney general and the F.B.I. director. Hmm, what do all those offices have in common?"

Mixing Business with "Public Service." Clayton Swisher & Ryan Grim of the Intercept: "The real estate firm tied to the family of presidential son-in-law and top White House adviser Jared Kushner made a direct pitch to Qatar's minister of finance in April 2017 in an attempt to secure investment in a critically distressed asset in the company's portfolio, according to two sources. At the previously unreported meeting, Jared Kushner's father Charles, who runs Kushner Companies, and Qatari Finance Minister Ali Sharif Al Emadi discussed financing for the Kushners' signature 666 Fifth Avenue property in New York City.... The failure to broker the deal would be followed only a month later by a Middle Eastern diplomatic row in which Jared Kushner provided critical support to Qatar's neighbors. Led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, a group of Middle Eastern countries, with Kushner's backing, led a diplomatic assault that culminated in a blockade of Qatar. Kushner, according to reports at the time, subsequently undermined efforts by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to bring an end to the standoff.... The crisis followed a May visit to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, by Kushner and ... Donald Trump, who subsequently took credit for Saudi Arabia and its allies' efforts against Qatar. The fallout has reshaped geopolitical alliances in the region...." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Eric Levitz: "The Gulf monarchies claimed that this act of aggression [against Qatar] was a response to Donald Trump's call for the Arab world to crack down on terrorists.... The United States had nothing to gain from a conflict between its Gulf allies. Qatar hosts one of America's largest and most strategically important air bases in the Middle East. Any development that pushes Doha away from Riyadh pulls it toward Tehran.... Donald Trump was more than happy to endorse the idea that his speech had moved mountains.... According to contemporary reports, his son-in-law was one of the only White House advisers to approve of this stance.... It's worth noting that the project the Qatari foreign minister refused to finance ... was Jared's baby -- his misbegotten, sickly, drowning baby ... -- 666 Fifth Avenue.... It looks like the president's son-in-law worked to sour relations with a key U.S. ally in the Middle East -- which has since drifted further into the orbit of a regime hostile to the United States -- because it refused to bail out his family's underwater real-estate investment." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Carol Lee, et al., of NBC News: "Special counsel Robert Mueller's team has asked witnesses about [Jared] Kushner's efforts to secure financing for his family's real estate properties, focusing specifically on his discussions during the transition with individuals from Qatar and Turkey, as well as Russia, China and the United Arab Emirates, according to witnesses who have been interviewed as part of the investigation into possible collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign to sway the 2016 election.... Qatari government officials visiting the U.S. in late January and early February considered turning over to Mueller what they believe is evidence of efforts by their country's Persian Gulf neighbors in coordination with Kushner to hurt their country, four people familiar with the matter said. The Qatari officials decided against cooperating with Mueller for now out of fear it would further strain the country's relations with the White House...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Margaret Hartmann: "While the idea that the president himself may be secretly plotting to oust his daughter and son-in-law from the White House [according the NYT report by Mark Landler & Maggie Haberman, linked yesterday] is quite a juicy plot twist, it's also one of Trump's more astute staffing decisions. Not the part where he's incapable of firing them himself, of course, but his recognition that Jared and Ivanka are massive liabilities who contribute very little to the success of his administration. Why didn't anyone try to tell him that the president shouldn't hire his own family members?" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... John Cassidy of the New Yorker summarizes how Jared Kushner has "managed" his blatant conflicts of interest. And he reminds us that, unlike the President*, Kushner can be prosecuted under conflict-of-interest laws. Mrs. McC: Under current circumstances, even though written law says that a smoking gun isn't necessary, I'm afraid it would be hard to prosecute Jared. I'm reminded of Justice Kennedy's ridiculous majority opinion on Citizens United: "... independent expenditures do not lead to, or create the appearance of, quid pro quo corruption," he wrote. That is, just because there's a quid & a quo doesn't mean there's a pro, in Kennedy's pollyannaish view. It's unlikely the prosecution in a case against Jared could find an e-mail from him reading, "I have to take this meeting with the CEO of Citigroup. He's going to lend me $325 million," or testimony from White House staffers that Jared announced, "It's payback time. Qatar wouldn't lend my father half a bil, so I'm going to bury those emirs."

** John Kelly Is a Serial Liar. Abby Phillip, et al., of CNN: "White House chief of staff John Kelly continued to misrepresent his handling of the dismissal of former top aide Rob Porter on Friday, defiantly obfuscating on exactly what he knew -- and when -- about the extent of the abuse allegations against Porter's two ex-wives. In some instances, Kelly even directly contradicted some of the White House's public statements delivered last month. In a rare gathering with reporters in his White House office, Kelly mostly defended his own conduct and insisted that he never considered resigning over the fallout.... The new timeline presented by Kelly doesn't conform with what Kelly told a roomful of White House staffers at the end of the grueling week when Porter left the White House.... One source with knowledge of the situation told CNN that people inside the White House ... stat[ed] flatly that the chief of staff was not telling the truth.... Kelly told reporters that he learned of 'a serious accusation' against Porter on February 6, the day Daily Mail reporters began asking the White House for reaction. He described what he first became aware of as 'just the accusation of a messy divorce and maybe ... emotional abuse.' That claim was refuted by David Martosko, political editor of the Daily Mail, the publication that first broke the news about abuse allegations against Porter. Martosko said the first claim he brought the White House was from Jennifer Willoughby, one of Porter's ex-wives, who claimed Porter 'physically dragged her, naked, out of a shower.'... The Daily Mail also asked about an incident in which Willoughby filed a protective order against Porter after he appeared to have punched a glass panel on her front door."

An A-Mazing "Coincidence." Judd Legum of Think Progress: "Billionaire investor and longtime Trump confidant Carl Icahn dumpe $31.3 million of stock in a company heavily dependent on steel last week, just days before Trump announced plans to impose steep tariffs on steel imports. In a little-noticed SEC filing submitted on February 22, 2018, Icahn disclosed that he systematically sold off nearly 1 million shares of Manitowoc Company Inc. Manitowoc is a 'is a leading global manufacturer of cranes and lifting solutions' and, therefore, heavily dependent on steel to make its products. Trump's announcement rattled the markets, with steel-dependent stocks hardest hit. Manitowoc stock plunged, losing about 6 percent of its value. Reuters attributed the drop to the fact that Manitowoc is a 'major consumer of steel.' As of 10:20 a.m. Friday, the stock had lost an additional 6 percent, trading at $26.21. Icahn was required to make the disclosure because of the large volume of his sale. The filing reveals that he began systematically selling the stock on February 12, when he was able to sell the stock for $32 to $34. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross publicly released a report on February 16 calling for a 24 percent tariff. But, as the chart in the SEC filing indicates, Icahn started selling his Manitowoc stock on February 12, prior to the public release of that report." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Beth Reinhard, et al., of the Washington Post: "The 2016 election was less than a month away, and Donald Trump's attorney had blown the deadline for paying Stormy Daniels to keep quiet about her alleged affair with the future president. In an Oct. 17 email, an attorney for Daniels -- a porn star whose real name is Stephanie Clifford -- threatened to cancel the nondisclosure agreement by the end of the day. That very morning, Trump's attorney, Michael Cohen, had created a limited liability company, public records show, that ultimately would serve as a vehicle for Daniels's payoff. But the money had not arrived. A second email to Cohen, a short time after the first, said Daniels was calling the deal off.... Ten days later, the $130,000 payment arrived, according to another email reviewed by The Post.... The timing of the Oct. 27 payment, 13 days after the initial deadline and just 12 days before the election, could be significant. Two complaints filed with the Federal Election Commission argue that the payment was intended to influence the Nov. 8 election and violated campaign finance law because it was not reported as an in-kind donation."

Trump's Wall Is Already Corrupt. Margery Beck of the AP: "A tiny Nebraska startup awarded the first border wall construction project under ... Donald Trump is the offshoot of a construction firm that was sued repeatedly for failing to pay subcontractors and accused in a 2016 government audit of shady billing practices. SWF Constructors, which lists just one employee in its Omaha office, won the $11 million federal contract in November as part of a project to replace a little more than 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) of a current fence with post-style barriers 30 feet (9.1 meters) high in Calexico, California." Mrs. McC: Huh. Failing to pay subs, shady billing practices: why does that sound familiar?

Matt Zapotosky of the Washington Post: "The FBI interviewed top Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin around the holidays last winter -- more than a month and a half after the politically charged investigation into Clinton's email practices had seemed to conclude for a second time, according to people familiar with the probe. Agents were focused on how Abedin's and Clinton's messages ended up on a laptop used by former congressman Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), Abedin's estranged husband, these people said. They considered their look at Clinton complete but still had questions about whether Abedin should have told them about the messages sooner, the people said.... The interview is important ... because it shows that even after the bureau had intimated publicly that its probe into Clinton was over, the FBI knew it still had work to do with one of her close aides." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Arthur Delaney of the Huffington Post: "Since ... Donald Trump signed the Republican tax bill in December, hundreds of retail companies have announced employee bonuses totaling more than $3 billion, which Republicans have said proves them right that the new law benefits regular Americans. But so far, companies have thrown a lot more money at their shareholders than at their workers. According to several estimates, firms have announced roughly $200 billion worth of stock buybacks this year, inflating the value of company shares by reducing their supply."

The Politicians on the Supreme Court. E.J. Dionne: "... Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, argued this week before the Supreme Court..., is an effort to overturn 41 years of settled precedent for the purpose of crippling the American labor movement. The claimant, Mark Janus, an Illinois state social worker, argues that his First Amendment liberties are violated because he has to pay an 'agency fee' to the union even though he is not a member and might disagree with its politics.... The anti-labor consortium sought to force the case up to the Supreme Court at a moment when it hoped a conservative majority would reflexively take its side. [Justice] Kennedy asked a pro-union lawyer: 'If you do not prevail in this case, the unions will have less political influence; yes or no?' The answer was yes.... To which Kennedy candidly commented: 'Isn't that the end of this case?' But in making a point of his own, Kennedy also underscored that a labor setback would clearly benefit the Republican Party.... A 5-to-4 anti-labor ruling would remind us why Senate Republicans refused even to consider Judge Merrick Garland's nomination for the seat now occupied by Justice Neil M. Gorsuch." ...

... Dahlia Lithwick: "As [Trump] explained, in an extremely twirly gun control meeting at the White House on Wednesday, due process in dealing with people who might have mental illnesses is, in fact, overrated.... '... Take the guns first, go through due process second....'... This is the same Trump who can't stop talking about executing suspected drug dealers. It's the same Trump who pardoned convicted former Sheriff Joe Arpaio and the same Trump who persistently threatened to jail his political opponents, including Hillary Clinton, if he won the presidency. This is the man who spent a small fortune taking out ads seeking the death penalty for the Central Park Five before they had even been tried and refused to acknowledge when they were exonerated.... Now consider the many times Trump has used the absence of 'due process' to justify his own action and inaction. The most famous recent example would be after his former staff secretary, Rob Porter, resigned following accusations by two ex-wives of domestic violence.... '... There is no recovery for someone falsely accused - life and career are gone. Is there no such thing any longer as Due Process?' 'Due process' to Trump, then, is mostly just something owed by newspapers, complaining women, or voters to his buddies."

... ** NRA = Bad Guy with Guns. Julia Belluz of Vox: "A brief, partial respite from gun injuries is expected when some 80,000 gun owners descend on Dallas for the annual National Rifle Association convention. That's because the convention has historically coincided with a temporary -- and dramatic -- drop in gun-related injuries, according to a new analysis published in the New England Journal of Medicine.... The gun injury rate actually fell by nearly 20 percent nationwide during NRA conventions." Emphasis added. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: NRA membership should come with a heavy tax to help pay for the high costs NRA members impose on law enforcement. The NRA claims to have nearly 5 million members, meaning the vast majority of NRA members don't go to the conventions. It is reasonable to posit, then, that an unknown but significant number of other card-carrying NRA members are responsible for the gun injuries that do occur during the convention. Any way you look at it, the NRA is a pox on the U.S. ...

... Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post: "The best available evidence suggests two major National Rifle Association gun policy prescriptions -- what are known as 'stand your ground' self-defense laws and permissive concealed carry laws -- increase homicides and violent crime. That is according to a massive new study by the RAND Corporation, an independent think tank." ...

... Bart Jansen of USA Today: "How many airline passengers does it take to kill a $40 million tax break for Delta Air Lines? Only 13. The Georgia legislature removed a jet-fuel tax break from a larger tax package Thursday. Lawmakers were upset that Delta, which is headquartered in Atlanta, dropped the National Rifle Association from a discount-fare program in an effort to appear neutral on gun policy. After the firestorm, Delta will review all its marketing programs to avoid those that might become political, CEO Ed Bastian announced Friday. But the airline said only 13 passengers ever bought tickets with an NRA discount. That translates into each discount costing the airline about $3 million in tax breaks."

Beyond the Beltway

Campbell Robertson & Jess Bidgood of the New York Times: "A statewide teacher strike in West Virginia entered its seventh day on Friday, with teachers defying efforts by the state's governor and union leaders to end the walkout with a deal to raise pay. Earlier this week, James C. Justice, the governor, announced a plan to raise teachers' salaries by 5 percent, and state union leaders said teachers would return to work on Thursday. But teachers across the state have refused, saying they will not return until the State Legislature completes the deal, and counties across the state have kept schools closed.... The walkout began last Thursday after months of simmering tension over myriad issues, including proposed changes to teachers' health insurance plans that would have raised monthly premiums for many."

"Please Send Money," -- Love, Roy. AP: "Former U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore is pleading for money to pay for his legal bills as he fights a lawsuit against a woman who says he molested her when she was 14. Moore said on a campaign Facebook page Thursday that his 'resources have been depleted.' The link indicated that Moore had raised just $32,000 of a $250,000 fundraising goal."

"It's Okay, I'm a Fireman." Rudy Harper of KCTV Kansas City: "Police say a racial slur was hurled at a child at a Hooters off Metcalf Avenue [in Kansas City, Kansas]. KCTV5 News spoke to a witness who was at the restaurant and he said he was dumbfounded by a statement the firefighter made to police. 'He basically said get that little "blank" up off the floor,' the witness recounted. 'The n-word started to get thrown around.'... [The man] spat at the child.... The witness said he was even more shocked when police came inside and interview the man in question, who told police he was a first responder. 'I didn't catch what the officer said to him, but his immediate response was "It's ok, I'm a fireman," like that was supposed to blanket cover everything for him,' the witness said." ...

     ... Mrs. McC: I guess we have to assume the fireman is white, which Harper doesn't bother to specify. This kind of reporting pisses me off: there are "people" and there are "black/Hispanic/Asian/Arabic, etc. people." I was going to assume Rudy Harper was white, too, but, but but sure looks as if he's black. C'mon, Rudy. you can do better.

Way Beyond

Isabel Kershner of the New York Times: "Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel was questioned by the police on Friday as a possible suspect in a third bribery case, the weightiest so far in a string of corruption investigations that are jeopardizing his political future. Officers questioned Mr. Netanyahu about a case involving Shaul Elovitch, an Israeli telecommunications tycoon accused of using his popular Hebrew news site to provide positive coverage of Mr. Netanyahu and his wife in return for regulatory and financial benefits worth tens of millions of dollars."

Rick Gladstone of the New York Times: "Uzbekistan has freed a reporter who was incarcerated for nearly two decades on sedition charges, the longest-known prison term served by a journalist, human rights advocates said Friday. The reporter, Yusuf Ruzimuradov, 64, who worked for a newspaper banned by the Uzbek authorities, had been held since 1999.... While human rights groups welcomed the news of Mr. Ruzimuradov's release, they said many antigovernment critics remained incarcerated, including some scheduled for trial next week."

Elisabetta Povoledo of the New York Times: "... stories -- told by sisters using pseudonyms -- were revealed Thursday in an exposé about how nuns are exploited by the leaders and institutions of the Roman Catholic Church. The article, by the French journalist Marie-Lucile Kubacki, was published in the March edition of Women Church World, the monthly magazine on women distributed alongside the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano. The stories amount to a distress signal about the unfair economic and social conditions many nuns experience, as well as the psychological and spiritual challenges that many face.... Though convents also depend on the money generated by the sisters living there, many nuns, unlike priests, are not paid, or are poorly paid, when they attend conferences or when they preach, she said. But the article, 'The (Nearly) Free Work of Sisters,' noted that it was not just a question of money. A bigger problem, the article pointed out, is that many sisters say that while male vocations are valued, the work of women is not."

News Ledes

Washington Post: "A man standing in a crowd of more than 100 people fatally shot himself along the north fence line of the White House at midday Saturday, according to witnesses. Philipos Melaku-Bello, who was manning a nearby peace vigil, said the gunman was standing just inside the sidewalk on Pennsylvania Avenue, across from Lafayette Square. The man fired several shots at 11:46 a.m., although none appeared to have been directed at the White House, according to the Secret Service. He then dropped to the ground as people fled the area.... President Trump and the first lady were at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida at the time of the shooting."

Weather Channel: "Residents along the New England coast were warned that additional flooding was possible Saturday, one day after Winter Storm Riley killed at least seven people and knocked out power to 2 million homes and businesses. Deaths have been reported in Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Maryland, and Virginia, where two people were killed. Two of the victims -- a 6-year-old boy in Chester, Virginia, and an 11-year-old boy in Putnam Valley, New York -- were children. The governors of Maryland and Virginia declared states of emergency due to the conditions. National Guard members were activated in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania to assist in the aftermath."

The Commentariat -- March 2, 2018

Afternoon Update:'

Ana Swanson of the New York Times: "A day after stunning markets, Republican lawmakers and even his own advisers by announcing stiff tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, President Trump doubled down on his approach on Friday, saying in an early morning tweet that 'Trade wars are good, and easy to win.' Mr. Trump appeared eager to defend his decision to levy sweeping tariffs on all imports of those metals, issuing a series of morning tweets explaining the need for tariffs. 'Our steel industry is in bad shape. IF YOU DON'T HAVE STEEL, YOU DON'T HAVE A COUNTRY!' he said in one tweet.'" ...

... He's Come Unglued. Stephanie Ruhle & Peter Alexander of NBC News: Trump's "public show of confidence belies the fact that Trump's policy maneuver, which may ultimately harm U.S. companies and American consumers, was announced without any internal review by government lawyers or his own staff, according to a review of an internal White House document. According to two officials, Trump's decision to launch a potential trade war was born out of anger at other simmering issues and the result of a broken internal process that has failed to deliver him consensus views that represent the best advice of his team. On Wednesday evening, the president became 'unglued,' in the words of one official familiar with the president's state of mind. A trifecta of events had set him off in a way that two officials said they had not seen before: Hope Hicks' testimony to lawmakers investigating Russia's interference in the 2016 election, conduct by his embattled attorney general and the treatment of his son-in-law by his chief of staff. Trump, the two officials said, was angry and gunning for a fight, and he chose a trade war...." ...

... Gloria Borger of CNN: "Not since Richard Nixon started talking to the portraits on the walls of the West Wing has a president seemed so alone against the world. On source -- who is a presidential ally -- is worried, really worried. The source says this past week is 'different,' that advisers are scared the President is spiraling, lashing out, just out of control. For example: Demanding to hold a public session where he made promises on trade tariffs before his staff was ready, not to mention willing. 'This has real economic impact,' says the source, as the Dow dropped 420 points after the President's news Thursday. 'Something is very wrong.' Even by Trumpian standards, the chaos and the unraveling at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue are a stunning -- and recurring -- problem."

An A-Mazing "Coincidence." Judd Legum of Think Progress: "Billionaire investor and longtime Trump confidant Carl Icahn dumped $31.3 million of stock in a company heavily dependent on steel last week, just days before Trump announced plans to impose steep tariffs on steel imports. In a little-noticed SEC filing submitted on February 22, 2018, Icahn disclosed that he systematically sold off nearly 1 million shares of Manitowoc Company Inc. Manitowoc is a 'is a leading global manufacturer of cranes and lifting solutions' and, therefore, heavily dependent on steel to make its products. Trump's announcement rattled the markets, with steel-dependent stocks hardest hit. Manitowoc stock plunged, losing about 6 percent of its value. Reuters attributed the drop to the fact that Manitowoc is a 'major consumer of steel.' As of 10:20 a.m. Friday, the stock had lost an additional 6 percent, trading at $26.21. Icahn was required to make the disclosure because of the large volume of his sale. The filing reveals that he began systematically selling the stock on February 12, when he was able to sell the stock for $32 to $34. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross publicly released a report on February 16 calling for a 24 percent tariff. But, as the chart in the SEC filing indicates, Icahn started selling his Manitowoc stock on February 12, prior to the public release of that report."

Mixing Business with "Public Service." Clayton Swisher & Ryan Grim of the Intercept: "The real estate firm tied to the family of presidential son-in-law and top White House adviser Jared Kushner made a direct pitch to Qatar's minister of finance in April 2017 in an attempt to secure investment in a critically distressed asset in the company's portfolio, according to two sources. At the previously unreported meeting, Jared Kushner's father Charles, who runs Kushner Companies, and Qatari Finance Minister Ali Sharif Al Emadi discussed financing for the Kushners' signature 666 Fifth Avenue property in New York City.... The failure to broker the deal would be followed only a month later by a Middle Eastern diplomatic row in which Jared Kushner provided critical support to Qatar's neighbors. Led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, a group of Middle Eastern countries, with Kushner's backing, led a diplomatic assault that culminated in a blockade of Qatar. Kushner, according to reports at the time, subsequently undermined efforts by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to bring an end to the standoff.... The crisis followed a May visit to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, by Kushner and ... Donald Trump, who subsequently took credit for Saudi Arabia and its allies' efforts against Qatar. The fallout has reshaped geopolitical alliances in the region...." ...

... Eric Levitz: "The Gulf monarchies claimed that this act of aggression [against Qatar] was a response to Donald Trump's call for the Arab world to crack down on terrorists.... The United States had nothing to gain from a conflict between its Gulf allies. Qatar hosts one of America's largest and most strategically important air bases in the Middle East. Any development that pushes Doha away from Riyadh pulls it toward Tehran.... Donald Trump was more than happy to endorse the idea that his speech had moved mountains.... According to contemporary reports, his son-in-law was one of the only White House advisers to approve of this stance.... It's worth noting that the project the Qatari foreign minister refused to finance ... was Jared's baby -- his misbegotten, sickly, drowning baby ... -- 666 Fifth Avenue.... It looks like the president's son-in-law worked to sour relations with a key U.S. ally in the Middle East -- which has since drifted further into the orbit of a regime hostile to the United States -- because it refused to bail out his family's underwater real-estate investment." ...

... Carol Lee, et al., of NBC News: "Special counsel Robert Mueller's team has asked witnesses about [Jared] Kushner's efforts to secure financing for his family's real estate properties, focusing specifically on his discussions during the transition with individuals from Qatar and Turkey, as well as Russia, China and the United Arab Emirates, according to witnesses who have been interviewed as part of the investigation into possible collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign to sway the 2016 election.... Qatari government officials visiting the U.S. in late January and early February considered turning over to Mueller what they believe is evidence of efforts by their country's Persian Gulf neighbors in coordination with Kushner to hurt their country, four people familiar with the matter said. The Qatari officials decided against cooperating with Mueller for now out of fear it would further strain the country's relations with the White House...."

Margaret Hartmann: "While the idea that the president himself may be secretly plotting to oust his daughter and son-in-law from the White House [according the NYT report by Mark Landler & Maggie Haberman, linked below] is quite a juicy plot twist, it's also one of Trump's more astute staffing decisions. Not the part where he's incapable of firing them himself, of course, but his recognition that Jared and Ivanka are massive liabilities who contribute very little to the success of his administration. Why didn't anyone try to tell him that the president shouldn't hire his own family members?"

** NRA = Bad Guy with Guns. Julia Belluz of Vox: "A brief, partial respite from gun injuries is expected when some 80,000 gun owners descend on Dallas for the annual National Rifle Association convention. That's because the convention has historically coincided with a temporary -- and dramatic -- drop in gun-related injuries, according to a new analysis published in the New England Journal of Medicine.... The gun injury rate actually fell by nearly 20 percent nationwide during NRA conventions." Emphasis added. ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: NRA membership should come with a heavy tax to help pay for the high costs NRA members impose on law enforcement. The NRA claims to have nearly 5 million members, meaning the vast majority of NRA members don't go to the conventions. It is reasonable to posit, then, that an unknown but significant number of other card-carrying NRA members are responsible for the gun injuries that do occur during the convention. Any way you look at it, the NRA is a pox on the U.S.

Matt Zapotosky of the Washington Post: "The FBI interviewed top Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin around the holidays last winter -- more than a month and a half after the politically charged investigation into Clinton's email practices had seemed to conclude for a second time, according to people familiar with the probe. Agents were focused on how Abedin's and Clinton's messages ended up on a laptop used by former congressman Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), Abedin's estranged husband, these people said. They considered their look at Clinton complete but still had questions about whether Abedin should have told them about the messages sooner, the people said.... The interview is important ... because it shows that even after the bureau had intimated publicly that its probe into Clinton was over, the FBI knew it still had work to do with one of her close aides."

*****

Ana Swanson of the New York Times: "President Trump said on Thursday that he would impose stiff tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum, making good on a key campaign promise and rattling stock markets as the prospect of a global trade fight appeared imminent. In a hastily arranged meeting with industry executives that stunned many inside the West Wing, Mr. Trump said he would formally sign the trad measures next week and promised they would be in effect 'for a long period of time.'... The announcement capped a frenetic and chaotic morning.... The action, which came against the wishes of Mr. Trump's pro-trade advisers, would impose tariffs of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum, effectively placing a tax on every foreign shipment of those metals into the United States.... Stocks fell in response to the potential tariffs, with declines in the industrial sector outpacing the overall market. The Standard & Poor's 500 industrial sector was down 1.9 percent, compared with a decline of about 1.3 percent in the overall benchmark index. Shares of American automakers, all large consumers of steel and aluminum, declined, as did shares of Boeing, a large exporter that could be hurt if other nations retaliate against United States tariffs." ...

... David Lynch & Caitlin Dewey of the Washington Post: "Trump’s move, under a little-used national security provision of U.S. trade law, is expected to trigger legal challenges by China, the European Union and Brazil at the World Trade Organization.... Canada, one of the United States' closest allies, blasted the step as 'absolutely unacceptable' and vowed to respond when the levies take effect. Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission... [said], 'We will not sit idly while our industry is hit with unfair measures that put thousands of European jobs at risk.'... [Trump's move] also prompted predictions that it will backfire on American farmers and other exporters. 'It's pretty much our worst fears,' said Rufus Yerxa, president of the National Foreign Trade Council, which represents multinationals such as Microsoft and Caterpillar. 'This is a pretty clear indication that the Trump administration cares more about the old economy than it does the new economy.'... Trump's statement followed hours of drama and confusion." ...

... Neil Irwin of the New York Times: "The real risk [of Trump's tariffs] isn't that steel and aluminum are a bit more expensive, though that is likely to be the case. It's that an entire system of global trade, which the United States helped build, might be undermined." ...

... "Man of Steel." Mike Allen & Jonathan Swan of Axios: "President Trump has long mused about doing what he wants, when he wants, how he wants. He wanted tariffs on steel and aluminum -- big ones -- now. He wanted to negotiate with Congress -- in public, on his court, surprise and shock, all for the cameras. He wanted to ditch any P.C. pretenses and consider Singapore-style death for all drug dealers. He wanted to play by his rules alone.... His staff at times managed to talk him off the ledge. No more. Tired of the restraints, tired of his staff, Trump is reveling in ticking off just about every person who serves him.... He has grown to especially hate [John] Kelly's rigid rules, so he purposely blew off Kelly's process and announced planned tariffs in a haphazard way.... The tariffs call was also a big middle finger to economic adviser Gary Cohn, who has fought for more than one year to kill tariffs that would provoke a trade war or higher prices for consumers, a de facto tax increase. Cohn, who stuck around to fight tariffs, now seems more likely to leave." ...

... Mark Landler & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "For 13 months in the Oval Office, and in an unorthodox business career before that, Donald J. Trump has thrived on chaos, using it as an organizing principle and even a management tool. Now the costs of that chaos are becoming starkly clear in the demoralized staff and policy disarray of a wayward White House. The dysfunction was on vivid display on Thursday in the president's introduction of tariffs on steel and aluminum imports. The previous day, Mr. Trump's chief economic adviser, Gary D. Cohn, warned the chief of staff, John F. Kelly, that he might resign if the president went ahead with the plan, according to people briefed on the discussion. Mr. Cohn, a former Goldman Sachs president, had lobbied fiercely against the measures. His threat to leave came during a tumultuous week in which Mr. Trump suffered the departure of his closest aide, Hope Hicks, and the effective demotion of his senior adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who was stripped of his top-secret security clearance. Mr. Trump was forced to deny, through an aide, that he was about to fire his national security adviser, Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster." ...

... Julie Pace, et al., of the AP: "Rattled by two weeks of muddled messages, departures and spitting matches between the president and his own top officials, Donald Trump is facing a shrinking circle of trusted advisers and a staff that's grim about any prospect of a reset. Even by the standards of Trump's often chaotic administration, the announcement of communications director Hope Hicks' imminent exit spread new levels of anxiety across the West Wing and cracked open disputes that had been building since the White House's botched handling of domestic violence allegations against a senior aide late last month." ...

... Tarini Parti & Matt Berman of BuzzFeed: "Even for this chaotic administration, the last few weeks have taken a toll on ... Donald Trump and his staff. A tragic mass shooting, big-name staff departures, and a series of scandals -- all in the growing shadow of the investigation into Russia's involvement in 2016 election -- has left the White House under a dark cloud of low morale and constant frustration. Many mid- and low-level staffers are anxious to leave and are actively looking for jobs elsewhere, sources close to the White House say. Those staffers saw the surprising resignation of Trump loyalist and communications director Hope Hicks on Wednesday as a sort of tipping point." ...

... Kevin Liptak of CNN: "The tumult of the past week has fueled a deep and seething anger within ... Donald Trump -- not an uncommon emotion for the insolent commander in chief -- but one that allies and aides say has escalated as he faces a new gauntlet of problems, including the encroaching Russia investigation. His soothing communications guru is leaving. His obstinate attorney general has turned openly defiant. His son-in-law and senior adviser was stripped of his security clearance at the behest of his chief of staff. His Cabinet secretaries keep spending an inordinate amount of taxpayer dollars on luxuries. His most loyal allies in Congress describe his meetings as 'surreal.' Allies of Trump's on Capitol Hill and elsewhere describe a sense of 'meltdown' at the White House as the series of unfortunate events unfold. Morale in the West Wing, already diminished following the domestic abuse scandal involving Trump's former staff secretary, has taken a downward turn, people inside and outside the building say. Staff departures are being announced on a near-daily basis as aides become fed up with the constant swirl of tension. And policy announcements ... -- including a long-awaited decision on steel and aluminum tariffs, gun control measures and an elusive immigration fix -- have been caught up in the swirl of uncertainty, leading to questions on how Trump will be able to govern amid the chaos." ...

... Nicolle Wallace of NBC News: "The White House is preparing to replace H.R. McMaster as national security adviser as early as next month in a move orchestrated by chief of staff John Kelly and Defense Secretary James Mattis, according to five people familiar with the discussions. The move would be the latest in a long string of staff shake-ups at the White House over the past year and comes after months of strained relations between the president and McMaster.... NSC spokesman Michael Anton responded by saying that he was just with the president and McMaster in the Oval Office. 'President Trump said that the NBC News story is "fake news," and told McMaster that he is doing a great job,' Anton said.... A leading candidate to become ... Donald Trump's third national security adviser is the auto industry executive Stephen Biegun, according to the officials." ...

... Eric Levitz of New York: "H.R. McMaster was an 'adult in the room' among adults in the room. The national security adviser was decorated war hero and Ph.D-wielding intellectual -- one whose dissertation was a treatise on the hazards of allowing a president's self-interested needs override the better judgement of military experts. After taking the reins from disgraced Turkish government agent Michael Flynn, McMaster evicted his predecessor's team of crackpot Islamophobes from the National Security Council, and won a war of attrition with Steve Bannon. McMaster also repeatedly debased himself -- and misled the public -- at the president's command; escalated American involvement in Afghanistan without offering anything resembling a plan for victory; and expressed a more fervent opposition to diplomacy with -- and openness to preemptive war against -- North Korea than any other senior member of the Trump administration.... Given the fact that he was apparently the 'adult' in the White House most open to pushing an emotionally volatile reality star into a war with nuclear state, it's hard to feel much concern at the thought of his exit."

The Russia Thing, Ctd.

John Harwood of CNBC: "... whatever the special counsel concludes legally about 'collusion,' evidence on public display already paints a jarring picture. It shows an American president who has embraced Russian money and illicit favors, while maintaining rhetoric and policies benefiting Russia and undercutting national security officials of his own country.... 'President Putin has clearly come to the conclusion that there's little price to pay,' Adm. Michael Rogers told Congress. Inescapably, the source of that conclusion is the president of the United States." This is a brief, but devastating, rundown of Trump's bad acts.

Ken Dilanian, et al., of NBC News: "Special counsel Robert Mueller is assembling a case for criminal charges against Russians who carried out the hacking and leaking of private information designed to hurt Democrats in the 2016 election, multiple current and former government officials familiar with the matter tell NBC News. Much like the indictment Mueller filed last month charging a different group of Russians in a social media trolling and illegal-ad-buying scheme, the possible new charges are expected to rely heavily on secret intelligence gathered by the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), several of the officials say.... The release of embarrassing Democratic emails through WikiLeaks became a prominent feature in the 2016 presidential election, cited at least 145 times by Republican candidate Donald Trump in the final month of the campaign."

Ryan Goodman of Just Security: "A significant recent revelation in the Russia investigation has been largely overlooked.... A nugget of information is contained in the memo written by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee (the so-called Schiff Memo), which was released on Saturday morning.... As Rep. Adam Schiff recently told Chris Hayes, 'our memo discloses for the first time that the Russians previewed to [George] Papadopoulos that they could help with disseminating these stolen emails.' Rep. Schiff added, 'When Donald Trump openly called on the Russians to hack Hillary Clinton's emails, they'd be richly rewarded if they released these to the press, his campaign had already been put on notice that the Russians were prepared to do just that and disseminate these stolen emails.'... This new revelation is legally important and, if true, could have exposed Papadopoulos and potentially other campaign officials to significant criminal liability."

Darren Samuelsohn & Eliana Johnson of Politico: "... Donald Trump's lawyers have urged him not to discuss details of the unfolding Russia investigation with anyone outside his legal team, warning of a conversational 'bright line' that could put aides and associates in legal jeopardy, according to current and former Trump aides. But Trump often ignores that legal advice in the presence of senior aides -- including his departing confidante and White House communications director, Hope Hicks. 'I think the president has put her in a very precarious position,' a senior Trump administration official said in a recent interview. Hicks is not alone. Current and former Trump aides describe a president who often fails to observe boundaries about the Russia probe and who calls staffers into his office and raises the subject without warning." ...

... Karoun Demirjian & Ellen Nakashima of the Washington Post: "In her nine-hour closed-door meeting with the House Intelligence Committee this week, White House communications director Hope Hicks refused to say whether she had lied for a number of senior White House and Trump campaign officials, even as she acknowledged telling 'white lies' for President Trump. A Democrat and a Republican on the panel said Thursday that Hicks refused to answer questions Tuesday about whether she had been asked to lie by White House aides and Trump's family members, including Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr., former White House adviser Stephen K. Bannon, and former campaign officials Corey Lewandowski and Paul Manafort.... 'If your response to the question "Have you ever lied for your boss?" is to pause and take two timeouts, then we already know the answer,' [Rep. Eric] Swalwell [D-Calif.] said, recapping his version of the exchange for The Washington Post.... 'What she was doing is what any honest human being would say.' [said Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.].... Hicks was angry after the Tuesday testimony, telling those close to her she left feeling 'abused' and 'accused,' according to a person familiar with the situation." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Yes, because when you daily aid & abet a corrupt president & his corrupt administration, interrogators should ask questions about hair styles & if Ivanka Trump is her favorite designer. ...

... Uh-Oh. Justin Baragona of Mediaite: "Talk about burying the lede. In a Daily Mail puff piece about White House communications director Hope Hicks and how she could be looking at a #10 million payday for a tell-all book about her time in the Trump administration, a White House insider told the publication that Hicks clandestinely kept a diary.... But if Hicks has a journal in which she kept track of all the activity within the White House, it won't just make a good basis for a political gossip book. That is something investigators are going to want to get their hands on, something former Obama White House Ethics Czar [Norm Eisen] noted Thursday night: 'Whoa!: "Hicks has been secretly keeping...a 'diary of her White House work, and her interactions w/Trump.'" If true, belongs to USG not her, must be preserved in WH under Pres Recds Act, raises issues about her handling of classified & WILL be subpoenaed.'"

Senators to Paul Ryan: "Get Your House in Order." Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "The Senate Intelligence Committee has concluded that Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee were behind the leak of private text messages between the Senate panel's top Democrat and a Russian-connected lawyer, according to two congressional officials briefed on the matter. Senator Richard M. Burr of North Carolina, the committee's Republican chairman, and Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat, were so perturbed by the leak that they demanded a rare meeting with Speaker Paul D. Ryan last month to inform him of their findings. They used the meeting with Mr. Ryan to raise broader concerns about the direction of the House Intelligence Committee under its chairman, Representative Devin Nunes of California, the officials said. To the senators..., the leak was a serious breach of protocol and a partisan attack by one intelligence committee against the other.... The texts were leaked just days after the same House Republicans had taken the extraordinary step of publicly releasing, over the objections of the F.B.I., a widely disputed memorandum based on sensitive government secrets. Taken together, the actions suggested a pattern of partisanship and unilateral action by the once-bipartisan House panel. Fox News published the texts, which were sent via a secure messaging application, in early February. President Trump and other Republicans loyal to him quickly jumped on the report to try to discredit Mr. Warner, suggesting that the senator was acting surreptitiously to try to talk to [Christopher] Steele."...

     ... UPDATE: Aaron Rupar of ThinkProgress: "On Thursday, the New York Times reported that House Intelligence Committee chair Devin Nunes (R-CA) leaked Senate Intelligence Committee ranking member Mark Warner's (D-VA) confidential text messages to Fox News.... In a statement provided to the Times, Nunes' camp didn't deny leaking the texts to Fox News. Instead, Nunes spokesman Jack Langer attacked the Times for writing about it in the first place.... While Nunes' leak bothered Republican Sen. Richard Burr (NC), chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, House Speaker Ryan seems disinterested." --safari

Linda Qiu of the New York Times: "President Trump signaled he was open to some proposals to curb gun violence on Wednesday during an hourlong televised meeting with a bipartisan group of lawmakers. But even as he voiced support for proposals generally backed by Democrats -- including expanded background checks and raising the age limit to 21 for some gun buyers -- the president peppered his remarks with inaccuracies about mass shootings and gun policy. And many of his comments hewed firmly to traditional Republican Party tenets." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Yes, That Would Be Yesterday. This Would Be Today:

... Michael Shear, et al., of the New York Times: "The top lobbyist for the National Rifle Association claimed late Thursday that President Trump had retreated from his surprising support a day earlier for gun control measures after a meeting with N.R.A. officials and Vice President Mike Pence in the Oval Office. The lobbyist, Chris Cox, posted on Twitter just after 9 p.m. that he met with Mr. Trump and Mr. Pence, saying that 'we all want safe schools, mental health reform and to keep guns away from dangerous people. POTUS & VPOTUS support the Second Amendment, support strong due process and don’t want gun control. #NRA #MAGA.' Mr. Trump tweeted about an hour later, 'Good (Great) meeting in the Oval Office tonight with the NRA!' Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, declined to provide details about the previously unannounced meeting." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Okay, everybody, all together now: "We're shocked!" ...

... GOP SOP. Sheryl Stolberg & Thomas Kaplan of the New York Times: "A day after President Trump ordered lawmakers to draft tough gun control legislation, few if any Republicans embraced the president's surprising stances and congressional leaders on Thursday showed little urgency in moving forward with even modest gun measures.... A number of Republicans who voted against the expanded background checks legislation in 2013 said Mr. Trump had said nothing that changed their minds. And several Republican newcomers, who were not present for the emotional debate prompted by the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., said they could not support such a bill." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Okay, everybody, all together now: "We're shocked!" ...

... Brandon Carter of the Hill: "L.L. Bean announced Thursday it will no longer sell guns or ammunition to anyone under 21 years of age.... CNN reports the company's flagship store in Freeport, Maine is its only store licensed to sell firearms. The company doesn't sell guns or ammunition on its website, but does sell certain firearm accessories, such as gun safes, cleaning kits and rifle cases."

Sara Murray, et al., of CNN: "US counterintelligence officials are scrutinizing one of Ivanka Trump's international business deals, according to two sources familiar with the matter. The FBI has been looking into the negotiations and financing surrounding Trump International Hotel and Tower in Vancouver, according to a US official and a former US official. The scrutiny could be a hurdle for the first daughter as she tries to obtain a full security clearance in her role as adviser to ... Donald Trump.... The development -- a 616-foot beacon dotting the Vancouver skyline and featuring a trademarked Ivanka Trump spa -- opened in February 2017, just after Trump took office. The Trump Organization does not own the building. Instead, like other Trump projects, it receives licensing and marketing fees from the developer, Joo Kim Tiah."...

... Quid Pro Quo. Danielle Mclean of ThinkProgress: "The equity firm magnate [Joshua Harris, founder of equity firm giant Apollo Global Management] that advised the Trump administration on infrastructure and whose company gave a $184 million loan to Kushner Companies also benefited from three rule changes relaxing pipeline safety regulations.... [According to] Stephen Spaulding, the chief of strategy at the government watchdog group, Common Cause.  'If you follow the money, you can see how the investment is paying off now that the rules are on hold.... They are getting a great return on their investment.'... Apollo also benefited from Trump's tax law that left intact a loophole allowing private equity managers to pay income taxes at a lower rate." --safari: So the public gets more pipeline spills, and Kushner gets a multi-million dollar loan. #MAGA ...

... ** February Is the Cruelest Month. Philip Rucker, et al., of the Washington Post: "They were the ascendant young couples of the Trump White House: Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, and Rob Porter and Hope Hicks.... They even double-dated once. But an unlikely cascade of events -- set in motion by paparazzi photos of Porter and Hicks published Feb. 1 in a British tabloid -- crashed down on Kushner this week. The shortest month of the year delivered 28 days of tumult that many inside and outside the White House say could mark the fall of the House of Kushner. Once the prince of Trump's Washington, Kushner is now stripped of his access to the nation's deepest secrets, isolated and badly weakened inside the administration, under scrutiny for his mixing of business and government work and facing the possibility of grave legal peril in the Russia probe.... [Donald Trump] mused this week that everything might be better for [Jared & Ivanka] if they simply gave up their government jobs and returned to New York...." ...

... Frank Rich: "... reading The Wall Street Journal's editorial page is a good way to read the White House's tea leaves. The page is in the tank for Trump, and its proprietor, Rupert Murdoch, is close to [Jared] Kushner besides. So when the Journal opined this morning, however gingerly, that the continued presence of both Kushner and Ivanka Trump in the White House is a political burden for Trump, it's safe to bet that they are goners. Please forgive me for breaking this heartbreaking news if you are among the several dozen people in America who thought Kushner would bring peace to the Middle East.... I am no shrink, but I remain convinced that at least an unconscious motive here is Jared's desire to repeat his father Charles's history as a convicted felon. One of the lesser-noted aspects of Jared Kushner's White House career i that in addition to engaging in foreign policy, he also has a domestic brief that includes, most prominently, running the administration's push for prison reform. He'd be wise to get cracking on that one fast." ...

... Tim Egan: "While burnished renditions of British royals dominate the small screen, and a super-powerful African king owns the big screen, the monarchal narcissism of the American president shows why we have a constitutional clause banning any title of nobility.... The closest thing to a throne will have to be the solid gold toilet that the Guggenheim Museum helpfully offered President Trump. If Trump were king, opponents would be jailed for failing to clap during his speeches. He calls that ageless act of defiance treason. The Constitution calls it something else. This president is also the nearest approximation of the mad king since the original sovereign to wear that title, George III, was booted from oversight of our shores. As the saying goes, King George lost the colonies, then lost his mind. Trump is doing it in reverse order, with a middle-aged democracy." ...

... Unsolved Mystery: How Did Melania Get That "Einstein Visa"? Mary Jordan of the Washington Post: "In March 2001, [Melania Knauss, who was then dating Donald Trump,] was granted a green card in the elite EB-1 program, which was designed for renowned academic researchers, multinational business executives or those in other fields, such as Olympic athletes and Oscar-winning actors, who demonstrated 'sustained national and international acclaim.'... To obtain an EB-1 under the extraordinary ability category, an immigrant has to provide evidence of a major award or meet at least three out of 10 criteria.... 'She was never a supermodel; she was a working model -- like so many others in New York,' said one person who knew her in the 1990s.... Melania Trump's ability to secure her green card not only set her on the path to U.S. citizenship, but put her in the position to sponsor the legal residency of her parents, Viktor and Amalija Knavs.... Immigration experts said the president's efforts to restrict legal immigration spotlight lingering questions about how the first lady and her family members obtained residency in the United States."

Neil MacFarquhar of the New York Times: "President Vladimir V. Putin used his annual state of the nation speech on Thursday to threaten Western nations with a battery of new weapons, including an intercontinental nuclear cruise missile, and to assure Russians that their lives would improve through enormous new social spending. The guns-and-butter speech came 17 days before the March 18 presidential election. It seemed intended to reassure ordinary Russians that a huge increase in social spending would help salve the economic problems of the past four years, while also evoking traditional fears that Russia could be invaded at any minute. Gleb O. Pavlovsky, a political analyst and former Kremlin consultant, wrote on Facebook that, 'From tales about progress, the speech flowed into an open-ended declaration of world war.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Howard Altman of the Tampa Bay Times: "During his annual state of Russia speech, President Vladimir Putin unveiled what he called a devastating new intercontinental ballistic missile. To illustrate how it works, he showed the audience a video that ended with warheads raining down on the United States -- specifically, what appears to be the Tampa Bay area.... Russia was recently singled out for criticism during congressional testimony by Army Gen. Joseph Votel, commander of CentCom, which is headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa.... According to Republic, a Russian media outlet, the video used by Putin is actually from a 2007 presentation that showed the first iteration of what is now known as the Satan 2 missile." ...

... Karen DeYoung of the Washington Post: "Few experts on either side believe that the new weapons, assuming they actually exist and are ever deployed, would change the balance of power between two nations that already have the ability to destroy each other many times over. At the same time, there is widespread agreement that the rhetorical attacks, stalled diplomacy and military escalation that increasingly characterize U.S.-Russia relations are counterproductive to global security.... Trump appears to be the only senior member of his administration who still believes in a thaw.... As he has failed to move relations forward, 'the Russians basically see the Trump administration as a lost cause,' said Andrew Weiss, who held senior Russia policy positions during both the Bill Clinton and George W. Bush administrations...." ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: If you are wondering why I've failed to post President* PutinPuppet's response to Putin's threat to the U.S. (and specifically to Tampa Bay) that's because he hasn't tweeted a word, nor -- as far as I know -- has he released a statement.

Eric Lipton & Lisa Friedman of the New York Times: "Even before President Trump officially opened his high-profile review last spring of federal lands protected as National Monuments, the Department of Interior was focused on the potential for oil and gas exploration at a protected Utah site, internal agency documents show. The debate started as early as March 2017, when an aide to Senator Orrin Hatch, Republican of Utah, asked a senior Interior Department official to consider reduced boundaries for Bears Ears National Monument in southeastern Utah to remove land that contained oil and natural gas deposits that had been set aside to help fund area public schools.... The map that Mr. Hatch's office provided, which was transmitted about a month before Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke publicly initiated his review of national monuments, was incorporated almost exactly into the much larger reductions President Trump announced in December, shrinking Bears Ears by 85 percent.... Most of the deliberations took place behind closed doors. The internal Interior Department emails -- more than 25,000 pages in total -- were obtained by The New York Times after it sued the agency in federal court...." ...

... AND Never Mind This: ...

** Joe Rommof ThinkProgress: "A new study finds that wind power and solar photovoltaics could by themselves meet 80 percent of all U.S. electricity demand.... It's especially encouraging for two additional reasons. First, the price of solar and wind have been dropping rapidly.... Second, the study ... still leaves 20 percent that could be provided by a variety of alternative types of carbon-free power.... [H]ydropower already provides 6.5 percent of U.S. power while geothermal and biomass together add another 2 percent. All of those can be expanded.... This latest finding should help resolve the debate as to whether the United States can have an affordable carbon-free grid by mid-century. We absolutely can." -- safari: In a normal world, this would be a "let's come together and fly to the moon" political moment. Instead, we have Scott Pruitt's turds. (Also linked yesterday.)

Matt Apuzzo & Adam Goldman of the New York Times: "A Justice Department review is expected to criticize the former F.B.I. deputy director, Andrew G. McCabe, for authorizing the disclosure of information about a continuing investigation to journalists, according to four people familiar with the inquiry. Such a damning report would give President Trump new ammunition to criticize Mr. McCabe, who is at the center of Mr. Trump's theory that 'deep state' actors inside the F.B.I. have been working to sabotage his presidency. But Mr. McCabe's disclosures to the news media do not fit neatly into that assumption: They contributed to a negative article about Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration's Justice Department — not Mr. Trump.... Mr. McCabe, under pressure from the F.B.I. director, Christopher A. Wray, stepped down as the deputy director in late January amid concerns over the coming report."

Jon Swaine of the Guardian: "Ben Carson, the US secretary for housing and urban development (Hud), has scrapped an order for a $31,000 dining set for his Washington office amid a growing ethics controversy.... The decision, first reported by CNN, followed a promise from Carson of 'full disclosure' over his use of public funds to buy expensive furniture, in his first public remarks since the Guardian revealed a senior Hud official's allegation that she was demoted for refusing to break a legal spending limit on redecoration. The pressure has been growing on Carson amid reports that the White House was angered by his spending." ...

... Rene Marsh & Ross Levitt of CNN have pictures & descriptions of the components of the set (or similar furniture). Mrs. McC: They are awfully nice pieces & not overpriced, IMO. Also, just right for Carson, his family (& occasionally a few lucky HUD staff) to sit around while dining on fine cuisine & disparaging the lazy poor.

John Bacon of USA Today: "EPA chief Scott Pruitt, under fire for flying first class along with his security detail, says his next flight will be coach. 'You're going to accommodate the security threats as they exist ... up to and including flying coach,' Pruitt said he told his security team. 'And that is what's going to happen on my very next flight. So those things are happening right away.' Pruitt told CBS News he has faced a 'legitimate security issue.'"

David Agren of the Guardian: "The US ambassador to Mexico is resigning from her post as the US-Mexico relationship sours and Donald Trump's discourtesies toward Mexico make diplomacy increasingly difficult. Veteran diplomat Roberta Jacobson told embassy staff in a note on Thursday that she was leaving at 'a critical moment' in the US-Mexico relationship. Jacobson's resignation will take effect on 5 May, two years to the day after she was sworn in as ambassador.... Jacobson previously served as assistant secretary of state for western hemisphere affairs.... Jacobson is the latest in a string senior diplomats to leave the state department after Donald Trump's election: the US has lost more than half its career ambassadors and many other senior diplomats since Trump took office.... José Díaz-Briseño, Washington correspondent for the newspaper Reforma, reported on Thursday that Trump would name the former General Motors CEO Ed Whitacre as ambassador to Mexico." ...

... Joshua Partlow & Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "As [Roberta Jacobson's] replacement, the Trump administration is looking to name Edward Whitacre Jr., a former chief executive of General Motors and AT&T, who also has worked with Carlos Slim, Mexico's richest man, according to U.S. and Mexican officials familiar with the decision. Whitacre's name was first reported by the Mexican newspaper Reforma.... If the new U.S. ambassador pushes harder on Trump's favorite themes -- including stopping illegal immigration from Central America -- the relationship [between the U.S. & Mexico] could deteriorate further, according to Mexican analysts."

Jonathan Blitzer of the New Yorker paints a grotesque portrait of new DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen: "Since its creation, in 2002, the Department of Homeland Security has had six different heads: two governors, a federal judge, the top lawyer at the Department of Defense, a four-star general, and Kirstjen Nielsen, who took over in December. Compared to her predecessors, Nielsen's résumé is conspicuously thin. Prior to joining the Trump Administration, she was a little-known cybersecurity consultant with no major management experience. 'In a normal Administration, there isn’t a chance in hell she would get nominated for anything above an undersecretary job,' a former national-security official, who served under George W. Bush, told me." Read on. This is a picture Nielsen will want to keep in the attic, a la Dorian Gray.

Paul Krugman Explains the Tax Heist to Dummies: "So you go out for dinner with a wealthy acquaintance. 'I'll take care of everything,' he says, and orders you a hamburger. Then he orders himself an expensive steak and a bottle of wine, which he doesn't share. And when the waiter comes with the check, he points at you and says, 'Charge it to his credit card.' Now you understand the essence of the Trump tax cut, signed into law a little over two months ago. The key thing you need to know is that right now the U.S. government has no business cutting taxes. We need more revenue, not less.... So the message to middle-class taxpayers is, if you think you were helped by the tax cut, think again. Donald Trump and his allies pretended to give you a gift, but they gave themselves and their wealthy patrons much bigger gifts -- and they're going to stick you with the bill. You've been scammed."

Melanie Schmitz of ThinkProgress: "Equifax announced this week that a widespread hack last year may have affected [2.4 million] more people than originally thought.... The update brings the total number of consumers affected by the Equifax breach to approximately 148 million.... In addition to waiting weeks before announcing the hack, several top executives within the company -- including CFO John Gamble -- sold off hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of stock ... shortly after the breach was discovered, earning a combined $1,780,000.... [T]he Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) later confirmed that the sales were not pre-planned." --safari

Samantha Schmidt of the Washington Post: "In a surprising reversal, the struggling film studio co-founded by Harvey Weinstein has reached a deal to sell its assets to an investor group led by a former Obama administration official, the company said Thursday night. The deal to sell the Weinstein Co. to the investor group, led by former Small Business Administration head Maria Contreras-Sweet and billionaire Ron Burkle 'provides a clear path for compensation for victims and protects the jobs of our employees,' the film studio said in a statement. The Weinstein Co. has been struggling to stay afloat since reports emerged in October in the New York Times and the New Yorker detailing allegations of sexual abuse by co-founder Harvey Weinstein spanning decades. More than 70 women have since accused him of sexual misconduct, including rape."

Ha! Cindy Watts & Dave Paulson of the Tennessean: "Less than one day after his appointment was announced, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee resigned Thursday from the CMA Foundation board of directors after criticism from multiple members of the country music industry. 'I genuinely regret that some in the industry were so outraged by my appointment that they bullied the CMA and the Foundation with economic threats and vowed to withhold support for the programs for students if I remained,' Huckabee wrote in his letter of resignation.... The announcement follows pointed criticism from members of the country music industry, as well as fans -- much of it stemming from Huckabee's stance on LGBT issues."

Beyond the Beltway

Richard Fausset of the New York Times: "Georgia lawmakers approved a bill on Thursday that stripped out a tax break proposal highly coveted by Delta Air Lines -- the most stinging punishment that America's pro-gun forces have leveled so far on one of the many corporations recalibrating their positions on firearms after the Florida high school massacre. The $50 million sales tax exemption on jet fuel that was sought by Delta, one of Georgia's biggest employers, had been included in a broader tax-relief bill. But this week, a number of Georgia Republicans, including Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, sought to remove the perk as retribution for Delta's decision to end a promotional discount for members of the National Rifle Association."

News Ledes

New York Times: "A fierce nor’easter toppled power lines, stranded thousands of travelers whose flights were canceled and inundated coastal roads with churning seawater on Friday. The storm’s effects were felt as far south as Georgia and as far north as Maine. In Rhode Island, the winds were so severe that officials shut down the Newport Bridge. In New York City, most flights were grounded for a time on Friday afternoon. And in the Washington suburbs, downed trees were strewn across the streets. More than 2,700 flights had been canceled and more than 1,700 delayed across the country on Friday, according to FlightAware, many at coastal airports in the storm's path. Amtrak suspended service along its Northeast Corridor and hundreds of thousands of people lost electricity. The National Weather Service warned of coastal flooding, dangerous storm surge and extraordinary winds, as well as snow and rain." It appears the Times is updating this story as events occur.

Hill: "Intense winds in the Washington area shuttered the federal government and several school districts on Friday as a powerful winter storm pounded the Northeast. Residents in the Washington region woke up Friday to howling winds, and the National Weather Service (NWS) issued forecasts of gusts of up to 70 miles per hour. The Office of Personnel Management, the federal agency charged with overseeing the government's civilian workforce, announced the government closure on its website Friday."