The Commentariat -- July 19, 2016

Afternoon Update:

Not-Ready-for-Prime-Time-Players Get Caught Plagiarizing Rival. Hilarity Ensues. Louis Nelson of Politico: "Trump campaign does damage control after Melania plagiarism charges." CW: Make that "damage control." The campaign put out several conflicting stories; e.g., Melania said she wrote the speech; the campaign said she didn't. Corey Lewandowski -- still being paid by the Trump campaign but also working for CNN -- shadowboxed with rival & current campaign mismanager Paul Manafort. Manafort, for his part, mounted a baldly ludicrous defense: "This is once again an example of when a woman threatens Hillary Clinton, how she seeks out to demean her and take her down." That is, when numerous reporters & some Republicans, including the RNC chair, point out that Mrs. Trump copied Mrs. Obama's speech, somehow Hillary Clinton masterminded the whole thing. Wow! Hillary would be a powerful president! Here's another funny defense: "Manafort said the similarities between the two speeches were limited to just three sections and 'fragments of words.'" Fragments of words? Like Michelle said "family" & Melania said "fam"? Or what?

MEANWHILE, in Today's Other Train Wreck. Gabriel Sherman of New York: "As a chorus of prominent Fox News women have gone public defending Roger Ailes against the wave of sexual-harassment allegations sparked by former Fox News host Gretchen Carlson's lawsuit, the network's biggest star, Megyn Kelly, has been conspicuously silent.... According to two sources briefed on parent company 21st Century Fox's outside probe of the Fox News executive..., Kelly has told investigators that Ailes made unwanted sexual advances toward her about ten years ago when she was a young correspondent at Fox. Kelly, according to the sources, has described her harassment by Ailes in detail." -- CW

CW: Following Marvin S.'s lead, I read David Brooks' column today. And, yes, Brooks asserts Trump appears to be going crazier & crazier. It does seem possible that this season's "October surprise" may be a brief series of incoherent Trump tweets, followed by the campaign's announcement that Mr. Trump is resting quietly in an undisclosed location.

Donald's Coalition. Brad Reed of Raw Story: "You can live stream the Republican National Convention on the RNC's official YouTube page, but you can't chat about it live anymore.... The Republicans have now disabled the live chat window on the page after it got overrun by anti-Semitic Trump supporters. As former Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle gave a speech promoting inroads that Republicans have made with Jewish voters, as well as ripping the Democrats for allegedly being more hostile to Israel, Trump's alt-right followers flooded the page with anti-Semitic vitriol." --safari

The Amazing Donaldo. He don't need no stinkin' money! Jay Newton-Small of Time reports: "On a bright sunny Tuesday morning, the Trump Leadership Council gathered at FirstEnergy Stadium for their second official meeting. The group of 40 CEOs and top executives had flown to Cleveland to attend the Republican National Convention and meet with ... Donald Trump...and Trump never showed...[underlining] to at least a few council members that he doesn't view meeting with them as a priority." -- Akhilleus

But who needs money if you can steal the election? Roxanna Hegeman of the Washington Post: "The American Civil Liberties Union filed a class-action lawsuit Tuesday seeking to block a two-tiered election system that would require Kansas election officials to throw out thousands of votes in state and local races from people who registered at motor vehicle offices or used a federal form without providing documents proving U.S. citizenship...The rule, sought by Secretary of State Kris Kobach, would remain in effect through Nov. 8, the date of the general election. If that action is allowed to stand, thousands of Kansas voters will be denied their right to vote in state and local elections in a year when all 165 seats of the Kansas Legislature are up for election, the ACLU argued."

...Akhilleus: All the hoopla surrounding the Daily Donaldo foibles conveniently draws attention from the fact that Republicans have been winding up their election rigging machine once again. Who needs money if you can screw with voters and deny them the chance to vote against your guy? Or in the case of Kansas, all your guys.

The speech that keeps on giving. David Frum in the Atlantic: "The incident throws a harpoon into the heart of the Trump campaign's racial politics. Trump's message: Non-white people are ripping off hard-working white Americans who play by the rules. 'They' cheat; 'we' lose. Could there be a sharper reversal of that racialized complaint than Melania Trump in her designer dress stealing Michelle Obama's heartfelt words?" And..."In 2008, Michelle Obama summed up the values that she had learned from her parents and that she and Barack Obama now tried to instill in their children: work hard; tell the truth; keep your promises; treat others with dignity and respect. Donald Trump epically does not tell the truth, does not keep his promises, and does not treat others with dignity and respect. A plagiarized speech (and the failure to detect the plagiarism) pretty strongly confirms that the Trumps do not much care about hard work, either."

...Akhilleus: As with another seemingly innocuous blunder years ago when a group of clowns were nabbed trying to break into a room at the Watergate Hotel, the Plagiarized Speech could have long-lasting--and historic--ramifications. At least we hope so.

*****

GOP Convention & Presidential Race

Jonathan Martin & Patrick Healy of the New York Times: "Rancor and hard-edged attacks dominated the start of the Republican National Convention on Monday as speakers branded Hillary Clinton as a liar who deserved to be in prison and two African-American Republicans ridiculed the Black Lives Matter movement.... Unusual jousting among Republicans at their own convention gave way to more traditional, fiery speeches aimed at Democratic leaders, Mrs. Clinton and President Obama. The most impassioned remarks came from former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani of New York...." -- CW ...

... Here's the Times' highlights video:

... Commenters can't decide whether Donald Trump's entrance was a hat-tip to alien films or Wrestlemania. CW: I think it was more of an end-times thing. I expect full-on classical deus ex machina Thursday night. ...

... Politico, apparently unmoved by the fog machine, call the whole event "Trump's Disastrous Day One." -- CW ...

... Nancy LeTourneau of the Washington Monthly on how last night's convention mirrored Trump & his campaign. -- CW ...

... Be Afraid. Nicholas Confessore of the New York Times: "... the first night of Donald J. Trump's coronation struck a dark and foreboding tone unmatched by any convention in recent history.... The lineup of speakers presented a United States in danger, threatened from abroad and from within, a once-proud nation on the very brink of chaos and dystopia.... [Mr. Trump] phoned in to Fox to attack Ohio's popular governor, John Kasich, for skipping the convention in Cleveland. Mr. Trump's tirade pre-empted the network's coverage from the convention stage, where two American survivors of the 2012 attack in Benghazi, Libya, were recounting their experience." -- CW ...

... John Cassidy of the New Yorker: "Rather than inviting the uncommitted on this first night of four, the G.O.P. presented to the nation a dystopian mélange of grieving parents, furious cops, lower-tier celebrities, and the former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani, who delivered a blistering speech, during which, several times, he worked his face into a furious snarl that about encapsulated the evening." -- CW ...

... Stephen Stromberg of the Washington Post: "The first night of the 2016 Republican National Convention ... was about portraying liberalism as an ideology of national betrayal. Speaker after speaker intimated that President Obama, Hillary Clinton or both are directly responsible for a variety of American deaths because they value the lives of foreigners over those of their countrymen.... In case you thought that Republicans were merely accusing Obama and Clinton of incompetence, Rep. Mike McCaul (R-Texas) encouraged the audience to see national tragedies as at least partially intentional." -- CW

... Where Have I Heard That Before? Philip Bump of the Washington Post: Melania Trump's speechwriter(s) cribbed her speech from Michelle Obama's 2008 convention speech. But, the campaign asserted, "Melania's team of writers ... in some instances included fragments that reflected her own thinking." -- CW ...

... Gregory Krieg & Eugene Scott of CNN: "At least one passage in Trump's speech Monday night plagiarized from Obama's address to the Democratic National Convention in 2008. Side-by-side comparisons of the transcripts show the text in Trump's address following, nearly to the word, the would-be future first lady's own from the first night of the Democratic convention in Denver nearly eight years ago." -- CW ...

... Brian Beutler: "Whether Melania knew she was reading plagiarized text or not (and I think it's quite likely she did not) it's just devastating to see a campaign premised on the imagined notion of Obama incompetence get caught stealing from Obama's own operation.... The plagiarized lines] amplify one (actually more than one) of the main knocks on Trump himself: That he's sloppy, erratic, in so many ways the opposite of the virtues he claims to embody. And, let's not gloss over it, this is a depiction of a campaign -- a campaign that nurtures white grievance and resentment -- trying to profit off the work of a black woman, from an African American family that Trump and his supporters regularly belittle. The fact that the plagiarized text in question was about the value of hard work just makes matters worse. A mortifying, calamitous, self-immolating moment." -- CW ...

... Greg Sargent: "What's galling about this is that Donald Trump's political career has been propelled to no small degree by an effort to deny the very legitimacy of those values and aspirations on the part of the Obamas, in service of the idea that they are basically imposters, or frauds, who don't actually harbor the values they claim and don't really deserve the success they've attained." -- CW ...

... CW: One of the strongest messages of the night was that women should STFU. Whether it was Donald Trump calling into Fox "News" to complain that John Kasich was mean to him while Patricia Smith, the mother of Sean Smith, who was killed in Benghazi, was making her heartrending, fact-averse accusations that Hillary Clinton killed her son, or Melania Trump's speechwriters stealing Michelle Obama's lines, or the unrelenting attacks on Hillary Clinton as a murderous, careless criminal, (or cunt, as convention speaker Scott Baio had put it in a recent tweet), the takeaway is that women's views are either inconsequential or so heinous they must be quashed & the speaker jailed. This is not a white people's convention. ...

... Wait! Wait! More, previously unreported plagiarism by Melania & the Ghostwriters. (And, yeah, if you click on the link, you've been rickrolled. Thanks, Patrick, for rickrolling me. -- CW)

This feed claims to be the Convention's official livestream:

Yoo-Ess-Ay! Yoo-Ess-Ay! Jeremy Peters & Alan Rappeport of the New York Times are covering the GOP convention, & it appears they are updating the story as events unfold. At 5:45 pm ET Monday, this was the lede: "The convention floor momentarily turned into a scene discord and boisterous dissent on Monday. Those who were opposing Donald J. Trump broke into booming jeers and chants of 'Roll call vote! Roll call vote!' in an attempt to demand a vote by all 2,472 delegates on a procedural motion that is required before the convention can formally get underway.... Delegates who opposed them ... responded with their own noisy shouts of 'U.S.A.! U.S.A.!' But after several minutes of confusion, and a couple of musical interludes by the band to kill time, the anti-Trump delegates appeared to have been stymied. When the chairman called for a voice vote on whether to have a roll-call vote, he ruled that the 'no' votes prevailed." -- CW ...

... The Washington Post is running live updates here. ...

... Here the pro-Trump & anti-Trump Republicans clash. Trump wins:

... Thomas Burr of the Salt Lake Tribune: "A Utah woman says she was threatened by Donald Trump supporters after a floor fight over the rules at the Republican National Convention. 'They said: "You should die. They should pull the protection from the Utah delegation. You should all die,'" at-large delegate Kera Birkeland said Monday night." -- CW ...

... AND former winger Sen. Gordon Humphrey (R-N.H.), a leader of one of the anti-Trump factions, said after the rules fight, "This is not a meeting of the Republican National Committee. This is a meeting of brownshirts." -- CW ...

... Jamelle Bouie of Slate: "But in forcing the question -- in generating enough heat to disrupt the proceedings, if only for a moment -- the anti-Trump delegates emphasized the degree to which this a Potemkin convention for a party that's torn and divided over its nominee. Look at the schedule of events here in Cleveland. If the speakers aren't from Trump's immediate family, they're third- and fourth-string Republican politicians.... The Republican Party is ... sick, worn down by its own pathologies and contradictions. And in its sickness, it's been overtaken by Donald Trump." -- CW ...

... Norm Ornstein & Thomas Mann in Vox: "Trumpism may have parallels in populist, nativist movements abroad, but it is also the culmination of a proud political party's steady descent into a deeply destructive and dysfunctional state.... The safe haven of false equivalence led the press to ignore one of the most consequential developments in contemporary American politics: the radicalization of the Republican Party." -- CW ...

... MEANWHILE, Michael Cavna of the Washington Post demonstrates how Garry Trudeau has been predicting & foreshadowing a Trump presidential candidacy for nearly 30 years. With "Doonesbury" strips. -- CW

Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: Paul Manafort, "Donald J. Trump's chief adviser, used the first day of the Republican National Convention on Monday to excoriate Gov. John R. Kasich for not endorsing Mr. Trump, touching off a remarkably bitter exchange between the campaign of the presumptive Republican nominee and advisers to Ohio's popular Republican governor.... Asked about the criticism, [Kasich strategist John] Weaver ... not only mocked Mr. Trump's rambling and at-times awkward introduction of Mike Pence as his running mate on Saturday, but also pointedly brought up Mr. Manafort's history of working with contentious foreign leaders." CW: Contentious? Weaver accurately called Manafort's clients "thugs and autocrats."

Jon Swaine of the Guardian: "A Donald Trump supporter with a primetime speaking slot at the Republican national convention, who is billed as a small business owner employing more than 100,000 people, is actually a 'multi-level marketer' [CW: i.e., Ponzi scheme] who does not employ anyone.... Michelle Van Etten... , 42, works on her own as an independent retailer of products supplied by Youngevity.... The Daily Beast first reported Van Etten's link to Youngevity on Monday, noting that some of the firm's nutritional products are sold by the conspiracy theorist and radio presenter Alex Jones...." --safari note: Donald Trump has the greatest connections to the greatest minds, and all he could do on the biggest stage was pull in a pyramid scheme artist who employs exactly zero people. Sounds appropriate.

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. CW: Margaret Sullivan, the Washington Post's media columnist, who was formerly the NYT's public editor, must have read my Krugman comment on Lesley Stahl's interview of Trumpence, because Sullivan calls out Stahl for exactly the same things I did (although I was constrained to 1,500 characters so I couldn't include specific fact-checks). (See my comment at the top of "Reader Picks.") ...

... CW: Steve Benen makes some of the same criticisms, but he concentrates on Trump's lies, he uses his own words & it's clear these are his own thoughts. Sullivan's critique is so close to mine, I wouldn't be surprised if she cribbed it.

CW: Here is an absolutely brilliant ad by Hillary Clinton's campaign:

... AND what makes it absolutely brilliant is this: Tyler Pager of Politico: "The ad, called 'Confessions of a Republican,' replicates an ad from the 1964 election with the same name in which a life-long Republican says he will vote for the Democratic nominee. In 1964, it was for Lyndon B. Johnson, and now the same actor, Bill Bogert, says in Monday's ad he will vote for Clinton in November." I ran the original ad some time back. In both cases, Bogert, though an actor, reportedly used his own words & sentiments. From the LBJ Library:

Other News & Views

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Gabriel Sherman of New York: "Rupert Murdoch and sons Lachlan and James -- co-chairmen and CEO, respectively, of parent company 21st Century Fox -- have settled on removing [Fox 'News' chief Roger Ailes]..., say two sources briefed on a sexual-harassment investigation of Ailes being conducted by New York law firm Paul, Weiss. After reviewing the initial findings of the probe, James Murdoch is said to be arguing that Ailes should be presented with a choice this week to resign or face being fired. Lachlan is more aligned with their father, who thinks that no action should be taken until after the GOP convention this week. Another source confirms that all three are in agreement that Ailes needs to go." CW: Yeah, & I'm pretty sure Fox "News" will become way more "fair and balanced" when Ailes leaves. Ha! ...

... Rebecca Traister of New York: "Over the course of a year, culminating one day -- [Mon]day -- we have seen the protective skin, the veneer of inclusivity and equality, being peeled back from the bones of both the modern Republican party and its media channel." -- CW

Beyond the Beltway

Ceylan Yeginsu of the New York Times: "Turkish authorities moved to widen their purge of perceived opponents on Monday by removing thousands of police officers from their posts, part of the crackdown that followed a failed military coup that was aimed at toppling the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The Interior Ministry fired nearly 9,000 police officers on Monday, Turkish officials said. That followed the arrests of 6,000 military personnel and 103 generals and admirals, and the suspensions of nearly 3,000 judges over the weekend." -- CW

The Commentariat -- July 18, 2016

See also yesterday's Afternoon Update, which is extensive.

Julie Bloom & Mike McPhate of the New York Times: "Three law enforcement officers were fatally shot and three others wounded on Sunday in Baton Rouge, La., the authorities said, less than two weeks after a black man was killed by the police here, sparking nightly protests. The gunman, who was identified as Gavin Long of Kansas City, Mo., was killed by the police. Mr. Long was a Marine who served six months in Iraq, according to his service record. He joined the corps in 2005, served five years and was made a sergeant in 2008. The police said initially that they were looking for other possible suspects, but the superintendent of the Louisiana State Police ... said at a news conference that the person who attacked the officers had been shot and killed at the scene." -- CW ...

... Matthew Teague of the Guardian: "Baton Rouge staggered into a new week of violence as a black separatist killed three police officers, including a black officer [-- Montrell Jackson --] who recently pleaded with friends online: 'Don't let hate infect your heart.'... By Monday, key details started to emerge about both the shooter, 29-year-old Gavin Long of Missouri, and his victims. Long's personal history is marked by radical twists: he was a military veteran who took a series of ideological turns, and eventually joined a fringe group called the Washitaw Nation of Mu'urs." -- CW ...

...Travis Gettys of RawStory: "The gunman who killed three Baton Rouge police officers Sunday apparently believed most laws did not apply to him because he'd declared himself a 'sovereign citizen.' Gavin Eugene Long ... filed documents last year near his Missouri home declaring himself a United Washitaw de Dugdahmoundyah Mu'ur Nation, Mid-West Washita Tribes, reported the Kansas City Star...The sovereign citizen belief system originated about 40 years ago in the deeply racist and anti-Semitic Posse Comitatus movement, which teaches that the government has authority over only those citizens who submit to a contract." --safari...

... Steve Hardy & Jim Mustian of the Baton Rouge Advocate: Montrell Jackson, "a Baton Rouge policeman who was once injured trying to save a toddler from a burning building and recently welcomed a son of his own, was one of the three officers killed in a Sunday morning shooting." --CW ...

... Wesley Lowery of the Washington Post: "Storied civil rights figures ... as well as the young leaders who make up the Black Lives Matter protest movement were quick to decry the violence against officers in Baton Rouge.... Shooting police is not a civil rights tactic,' said Jesse Jackson, a longtime civil rights leader. 'The shooting in Dallas had nothing to do with the civil rights struggle, and neither does the shooting in Baton Rouge.'" -- CW ...

... B.J. Lutz of WISN Milwaukee: "A Milwaukee police officer was shot in a 'vicious' attack early Sunday as he sat in his squad car while colleagues investigated a domestic disturbance call, an official said. The suspected shooter, identified by police as a 20-year-old West Allis man with two felonies on his record, was found dead in a nearby yard, they said." The officer, Brandon Baranowski, was saved by his bullet-proof vest.

Carol Morello of the Washington Post: "Secretary of State John F. Kerry cautioned Monday that Turkey's membership in NATO could be jeopardized if abandons democratic principles and the rule of law in a post-coup crackdown. 'NATO also has a requirement with respect to democracy,' Kerry told reporters after European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini warned Turkey not to execute coup plotters. She noted that countries with the death penalty cannot join the European Union, as Turkey has sought to do." -- CW ...

... Tim Arango & Ceylan Yeginsu of the New York Times: "The coup attempt [in Turkey] seems to have been decisively quashed, with nearly 6,000 military personnel in custody.... As the weekend progressed, it was becoming clearer that for [President Recep] Erdogan and his religiously conservative followers, the moment was a triumph of political Islam more than anything else.... As Turks waited to see in which direction their mercurial and powerful leader would steer..., Mr. Erdogan struck some conciliatory notes on Sunday. Yet he has also raised the possibility that Turkey would reinstate the death penalty, which it had abolished as a part of its pursuit to join the European Union." -- CW ...

... Gardiner Harris of the New York Times: "Signs of testy relations between Turkey's embattled government and the United States continued Sunday, as Secretary of State John Kerry denounced any suggestion of American involvement in Friday's coup. 'We think it's irresponsible to have accusations of American involvement,' Mr. Kerry told CNN Sunday. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey has accused Fethullah Gulen, a reclusive cleric now living in Pennsylvania, of orchestrating the violence, and Mr. Erdogan demanded that Mr. Gulen be extradited. Mr. Gulen has denied the charge, and Mr. Kerry said the Justice Department would examine any evidence Turkey presented as part of an extradition request." -- CW ...

... Dexter Filkins of the New Yorker: "With the coup attempt thwarted, [President Erdogan] will no doubt seize the moment. In recent months, Erdogan has made little secret of his desire to rewrite the constitution to give himself near total power. There will be no stopping him now." -- CW

... Erdağ Göknar, in Juan Cole's Informed Comment (originally published in Duke Today): "To those who claim this coup was a hoax, the evidence points to the contrary: The parliament has been bombed, the Turkish general staff headquarters were occupied, top military commanders were detained, TV stations were taken over, more than 200 are dead, more than 1000 are injured, and gruesome images continue to emerge." -- CW

Yes, the Supremes Are Politicians. Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: "The thing that separates all the smart lawyers who would like to become federal judges from the ones who actually become judges is most often political connections.... Involvement in ideological causes, political campaigns and conservative or liberal organizations acts as a sieve. It separates out those who are chosen by the political elite for lifetime appointments. And then Senate confirmation is supposed to instantly transform the recipient into a nonpartisan and objective trier of facts and interpreter of laws." -- CW

Presidential Race

John Wagner, et al., of the Washington Post: "The takeaway from interviews with dozens of Democrats is that [Hillary Clinton] has an array of options [in make her vice-presidential choice], and her ultimate choice will reveal a great deal about the president she intends to be. Clinton's interviews with the contenders have been short on chit-chat, instead homing in on each candidate's policy chops." -- CW

Another Sanderista comes around:

... If you've got sticker envy, looks like you can create your own, for a price. Thanks to Rob W. for the link.

AP: "A West Virginia Republican lawmaker said on Sunday his comments made on Twitter calling for Hillary Clinton's public execution were not meant to be taken literally.... In the tweet, [W.Va. House of Delegates member Mike] Folk said ... [she] 'should be tried for treason, murder, and crimes against the US Constitution ... then hung on the Mall in Washington DC'.' Folk defended his tweet against claims it was a death threat & says he has received death threats as a result of the tweet. CW: This is reassuring: "Folk is a United Airlines pilot. United Airlines said in a statement on Sunday that he had been removed from his schedule and was not flying, pending an investigation." So not exactly the "friendly skies." Your pilot is off his rocker, people.

I put lipstick on a pig. I feel a deep sense of remorse that I contributed to presenting Trump in a way that brought him wider attention and made him more appealing than he is. I genuinely believe that if Trump wins and gets the nuclear codes there is an excellent possibility it will lead to the end of civilization. -- Tony Schwartz, ghostwriter of The Art of the Deal, who says if he wrote the book today, he would title it The Sociopath ...

... ** Jane Mayer of the New Yorker interviews Tony Schwartz, who ghost-wrote The Art of the Deal. CW: Schwartz & Mayer reinforce everything you already knew or suspected about Trump. ...

... The Sociopath, Ctd.:

Your running mate ... voted for the [Iraq War]. -- Lesley Stahl

I don't care. -- Donald Trump

... Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "That's a remarkable comment.... He has repeatedly argued [that Hillary Clinton's vote for the war] shows his judgment is superior to [Clinton's]. But Pence casting the same vote? He doesn't care....

But I was against the war in Iraq from the beginning. -- Donald Trump

"This is the point at which we note that the only record of his having an opinion on the war in Iraq before it began was an interview in which he expressed support.... In Trump's mind, Pence gets a pass on that judgment, rooted in bad intelligence. Trump himself gets a pass on not being able to present any evidence that his judgment was any different. Clinton, however, is riddled with bad judgment because of her stance on the issue. This will cost him zero votes."

CW: Stahl just says, "Got it," when Trump says Pence is "allowed to make a mistake once in awhile," but Clinton is not. When is some interviewer going to respond, "That doesn't make sense. It's the kind of thing crazy people say"? ...

... All About Trump. Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump ... did most of the talking during the 21-minute ['60 Minutes'] segment that aired on Sunday night, while Pence sat beside him, gazing approvingly and allowing Trump to answer nearly all of the questions, even those directed at him. By the end, Trump had uttered more than 2,160 words while Pence's word count clocked in around 900. When Pence did get the chance to speak, Trump would often cut him off with a correction or answer of his own." -- CW

**141 Disqualifications. Chris Kirk, et al., of Slate: "[W]e have compiled a list of specific things that make Trump an unacceptable candidate for the presidency. Some are policy proposals that should be outside the bounds of debate, like punitive torture. Some are casual vulgarities, like his description of Rosie O'Donnell. You might not agree that each individual item on the list is disqualifying in isolation -- you can vote those down, and vote up the ones you find especially egregious-- but the list's cumulative weight makes its own statement." --safari

Daily Beast Editors: "Donald Trump implied Monday morning that President Obama was insincere when he spoke about the shooting deaths of three Baton Rouge police over the weekend. 'There's something going on,' the Republican presidential nominee kept repeating onFox & Friends. In the past, Trump has used the same phrase to imply that Obama secretly supports terror attacks. This time, The Donald suggested that the president might support cop-killing." --safari

'Tis Folly to Be Wise. -- D. Trump. Marc Fisher of the Washington Post: Donald Trump "appears to have an unusually light appetite for reading. He said in a series of interviews that he does not need to read extensively because he reaches the right decisions 'with very little knowledge other than the knowledge I [already] had, plus the words 'common sense,' because I have a lot of common sense and I have a lot of business ability.'" About all he reads is articles from newspapers & magazines -- about himself. ...

     ... CW: BTW, Jane Mayer's interview of Tony Schwartz backs up Fisher's report: "Schwartz believes that Trump's short attention span has left him with 'a stunning level of superficial knowledge and plain ignorance.... I seriously doubt that Trump has ever read a book straight through in his adult life.' During the eighteen months that he observed Trump, Schwartz said, he never saw a book on Trump's desk, or elsewhere in his office, or in his apartment." Then there's a collective anecdote in which we learn that Trump kept a copy of Hitler's collected speeches at his bedside, but that he never read so much as the title.

"The Normalization of Trump." Jonathan Chait (July 15): "... to look at Pence as a dissident from Trumpism is to misunderstand the nature both of Pence and his party. Pence didn't endorse free trade and oppose Trump's Muslim ban because liberal internationalism runs deep in his soul. He did it because he is a committed movement conservative and party operative, with deep ties to party funders like the Kochs. It served the party's interest to fight Trump during the primary, but it currently serves that interest to close ranks." -- CW

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Paul Krugman: Part of the reason Donald Trump is succeeding "is that too much of the news media still can't break with bothsidesism -- the almost pathological determination to portray politicians and their programs as being equally good or equally bad, no matter how ludicrous that pretense becomes.... Surveys show that Mrs. Clinton has, overall, received much more negative coverage than her opponent." -- CW

Gabriel Sherman of New York: Corey Lewandowski, crack independent CNN journalist, is still advising Donald Trump to be his stupid self.

Tabatha Abu El-Haj & of Slate: "Those coming to Cleveland to exercise their First Amendment rights, whatever their partisan persuasion, will leave frustrated and disappointed. Next week in Cleveland will likely prove to be a sad new low for First Amendment exercise in this country." --safari

Scammer in Chief. Oliver Laughland & Mae Ryan in the Guardian: "In Mount Pleasant [a neighborhood in Cleveland's East Side], where more than 15% of the neighbourhood's housing stock is currently vacant or abandoned, average property sale prices plunged [during the 2008 housing crisis] from an average of $84,000 in 2005 to just $14,837 in 2015.... At the height of Mount Pleasant's suffering, Trump sought to capitalise. In 2008, the billionaire Republican advised 'pupils' at ... Trump University, that they could make a million dollars within a year by targeting vulnerable communities with individuals desperate to offload their properties.... At the time, the real estate mogul had only recently shuttered a brokerage company, Trump Mortgages, which had, according to insider accounts, offered subprime mortgages to customers through cold calls. Trump is set to accept his party's nomination ... three miles down the road from Mount Pleasant on Thursday." A long read. --safari ...

...Allegra Kirkland of TPM: "Republican National Convention organizers on Sunday released the final schedule for what Donald Trump's campaign manager promised would be 'a Trump convention.'" CW: For those of you who want to plan your week around convention events, here's the schedule. ...

... The Guardian is liveblogging happenings leading up to the Republican convention, or what it calls the "Trump Family Circus." -- CW ...

... Benjamin Wallace-Wells of the New Yorker analyzes this year's GOP platform, a disturbing amalgam of Donald Trump's nationalism & Tony Perkins' Christianist sex-obsessed theology. "... it seems that Perkins [-- head of the Family Research Council --] has realized that Trumpism can be understood ... as an injunction against the usual concerns of political correctness or partisan tactics, against worrying about the way things might appear. It may be that what Trump has lent his Party is not so much a program but a prompt to conservatives, to feel themselves unconstrained." -- CW ...

... Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Jim Rutenberg of the New York Times: "... nothing will test the news media like the next few days in Cleveland.... Mr. Trump will have ... nearly full control of the national media stage for four straight evenings in prime time.... He has been planning to make full use of his time in his trademark way, with daily themes that will weave in staples of hot-button topics...: Bill Clinton's infidelity, Hillary Clinton's response to the attack on the American compound in Benghazi, and immigration.... The robust fact-checking industry that has sprung up over the past several years will have to work overtime during both conventions." -- CW

Beyond the Beltway

Organized "Religion". Luke O'Neil of The Daily Beast: "According to ex-members of [the] Twelve Tribes [religious sect] who spoke to The Daily Beast, children are regularly beaten and leaders preached 'slavery is necessary.' Now, an escapee has taken over the Facebook page of the Plymouth bakery run by the commune so he can broadcast its ills.... [The] former members... [say] [Elbert 'Gene'] Spriggs, [also preached] ... that homosexuals should be put to death.... The half-dozen former members who spoke to The Daily Beast also allege a culture of systematic child abuse, subjugation of women, and psychological torment." --safari

Kate Lyons of the Guardian: "The six wealthiest countries in the world, which between them account for almost 60% of the global economy, host less than 9% of the world's refugees, while poorer countries shoulder most of the burden, Oxfam has said. According to a report released by the charity on Monday, the US, China, Japan,Germany, France and the UK, which together make up 56.6% of global GDP, between them host just 2.1 million refugees: 8.9% of the world's total...In contrast, more than half of the world's refugees -- almost 12 million people -- live in Jordan, Turkey, Palestine, Pakistan, Lebanon and South Africa, despite the fact these places make up less than 2% of the world's economy." --safari

Sean Ingle of the Guardian: "A devastating and damning report into Russian sport has found that the country's government, security services and sporting authorities colluded to hide widespread doping across 'a vast majority' of winter and summer sports. The International Olympic Committee has promised it will not hesitate to take 'toughest sanctions available' against those implicated.... The IOC president Thomas Bach called the McLaren report 'a shocking and unprecedented attack on the integrity of sports and on the Olympic Games'. The IOC's executive board will meet via conference call on Tuesday to make initial decisions on possible sanctions for the Rio Games." --safari

The Commentariat -- July 17, 2016

Afternoonish Update:

President Obama addressed the Baton Rouge shootings Sunday at 4:30 pm ET:

     ... The President released this statement earlier. ...

... Jonathan Bullington of the New Orleans Times-Picayune: "Three police officers were killed, and more wounded, after being shot Sunday morning (July 17) in Baton Rouge, the city's mayor said.... The shooting comes in the midst of ongoing protests in Baton Rouge following the fatal officer-involved shooting of Alton Sterling...." -- CW ...

... CW: It appears the Baton Rouge Advocate has live updates here, but the page is crashed right now. ...

... The New York Times has live updates here. ...

... Peter Holley, et al., of the Washington Post: "The shooting unfolded early Sunday as police responded to reports of a man carrying a rifle in an area with grocery stores and other businesses, according to Colonel Michael D. Edmonson of the Louisiana State Police, the agency taking the lead on the investigation. Edmonson stressed that there was no active shooting situation and that police had killed the armed attacker, who died during a shootout with officers." -- CW ...

... Gregory Kreig of CNN: "The head of Cleveland's largest police union is calling on Ohio Gov. John Kasich to temporarily restrict the state's open carry gun laws during this week's Republican National Convention following Sunday's shooting in Louisiana that killed three officers and wounded at least three others." -- CW ...

     ... New York Times: "Gov. John Kasich of Ohio released a statement expressing grief at the attack in Baton Rouge, La., but a spokeswoman said he would not move to restrict the brandishing of guns around the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, which begins on Monday." -- CW ...

... Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: Donald Trump blamed the Baton Rouge shooting on "a lack of leadership in our country." "He followed up with a reminder of his '60 Minutes' appearance tonight with his running mate, Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana." -- CW 

Steve M. takes a look at some of the "soul-searching" among Republicans, along with a promised "rebellion" by some of the delegates to the Republican Convention. He concludes, "There isn't going to [be a] battle for the soul of the Republican Party after November. The party's just going to be what it was prior to Trump, which was already most of the way to Trumpism, except with a veneer of deniability. The only battle will be over how many coats of veneer should be reapplied now that Trump has stripped them off -- if any." -- CW  

Michael Grunwald in Politico Magazine: "In a head-to-head matchup with the ultimate wonk, Trump is betting voters will prefer his bravado to Clinton’s position papers." Thanks to Haley S. for the link. ...

     ... CW: Grunwald's piece is a good read. It reminds me of Stephen Colbert's recent comment to Ben Smith of BuzzFeed about Hillary Clinton: “She’s very serious — and when you’ve got a giant orange manatee to harpoon on the other side, you’re like — I don’t know if anybody [here] fishes, but fish go where the water is good, where you don’t have to work as hard.... [With Clinton,] you have to look for things to do, and when you find them, it’s a policy paper — you try making jokes about a fucking policy paper.” ...

     ... In the end, we have to hope that Hillary has an effective GOTV operation & that the majority of American voters actually care about the future of the country & will cast their votes for the boring wonkette instead of the insane carnival barker. Moreover, if Americans are half as fearful as Trump wants them to be, they almost have to vote for the stability of Clinton over the erraticism of Trump. Frankly, I think the Carnival Barker is hoping for that, too; he hasn't learned policy because he doesn't think he'll ever need to know it. His whole "presidential" campaign is just a rollout for the next series of Trump(TM) products. ...

... Alas, Driftglass interjects this reminder: "Of the Americans who can be bothered to haul their asses to the polls and vote, no matter what you or I say or do and no matter what Trump says or does, at least four in ten voters will affirmatively choose a fascist thug and a theocrat goon to lead this county." -- CW ...

... David Barstow in the New York Times: "... based on the mountain of court records churned out over the span of Mr. Trump’s career, it is hard to find a project he touched that did not produce allegations of broken promises, blatant lies or outright fraud.... Many of those allegations have already become familiar campaign fodder: the Trump University students and Trump condo buyers who say they were fleeced; the public servants from New Jersey to Scotland who now say they rue the zoning approvals, licenses or tax breaks they gave based on Mr. Trump’s promises; the small-time contractors who say Mr. Trump concocted complaints about their work to avoid paying them; the infuriated business partners who say Mr. Trump concealed profits or ignored contractual obligations; the business journalists and stock analysts who say Mr. Trump smeared them for critical coverage.... Taken as a whole, though, an examination of Mr. Trump’s business career reveals persistent patterns in the way Mr. Trump bends or breaks the truth...." -- CW 

*****

Patrick Kingsley of the Guardian: "Turkey’s hardline president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, unleashed a brutal purge of his enemies in the army and judiciary on Saturday after heading off an attempted military coup.... About 2,800 soldiers were arrested in a day of extraordinary drama that saw the putsch ruthlessly put down. More than 2,700 judges were summarily dismissed for their alleged links to the coup’s leaders, while warrants were issued for the arrest of 140 supreme court members." -- CW ...

Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post: "The defeat of a coup attempt launched by a faction of Turkey’s military has left relations between the United States and one of its most important allies in a state of uncertainty. President Obama called together his national security team for an unusual Saturday morning meeting to discuss events in Turkey and immediately followed it up with a conference call with foreign policy advisers." -- CW ...

... Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post: "The man that Turkey’s leaders have blamed for a failed coup attempt by a group of army officers is an Islamic scholar named Fethullah Gulen, who lives in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania and who has inspired a network said to include more than 160 charter schools in the United States. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says that the coup attempt Friday was the work of army officers who are followers of Gulen, who had once been an ally but whose movement has become critical of the increasingly authoritarian regime.... Secretary of State John F. Kerry on Saturday was quoted as saying the United States would support investigations to determine who instigated the attempted coup.... He said he anticipates questions will be raised about Gulen." -- CW ...

     ... Emily Cunningham, et al., of the Washington Post: Erdogan "called on the United States to extradite [Gulen].... The U.S. Embassy in Ankara meanwhile warned Americans to stay away from the Incirlik [NATO] base, which is in the city of Adana. It has been sealed off by local authorities, who also cut power to the base.... The U.S. Embassy warned citizens against heading to the airport amid reports of ongoing sporadic gunfire. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said it had barred American commercial aircraft from flying into or out of Turkey." -- CW ...

... Spencer Ackerman of the Guardian: "The coup attempt in Turkey has yielded its first tangible disruption to the war against Islamic State, as the Pentagon has temporarily lost access to the Turkish airfield it uses as its primary staging ground for its air campaign in Syria and Iraq." -- CW 

Martin Pengelly of the Guardian: "The western district of the United Methodist church (UMC) elected an openly gay bishop on Friday, despite its ban on same-sex relationships. The Rev Karen Oliveto was elected late in the evening at a meeting in Scottsdale, Arizona, of the church’s western jurisdiction." -- CW 

Presidential Race

Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "Hillary Clinton will call for a constitutional amendment to 'overturn Citizens United' in her first 30 days as president and plans to make that announcement today to progressive activists at the annual Netroots Nation conference. 'I will also appoint Supreme Court justices who understand that this decision was a disaster for our democracy,' Clinton will say in a video message, scheduled to run near the end of today's final keynote session.... Even though the case was fought over an anti-Hillary Clinton documentary, Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt.) became its most prominent critic in the 2016 primaries." CW News Flash: A Constitutional amendment ain't gonna happen.

Jonathan Swan & Harper Neidig of the Hill: "Donald Trump's campaign is still soliciting illegal donations from foreign individuals – including members of foreign governments at their official email addresses — weeks after the campaign was put on notice by watchdog groups. Foreign members of parliament from the United Kingdom and Australia confirmed to The Hill that they received fundraising solicitations from the Trump campaign as recently as July 12 — two weeks after a widely publicized FEC complaint issued on June 29 by non-partisan watchdogs...." CW: Chutzpah: (def.) calling your rival "criminal" & "crooked" even as you actively, openly & knowingly engage in criminal activities.

CW: You can take the boy out of Queens.... Trumpence sit down in Trump's New York apartment with Lesley Stahl for a "60 Minutes" interview in two of the more embarrassing chairs I've ever seen, although I had been thinking of hiding a boring toilet in a toned-down version -- as a joke:

Good Luck, Turkeys! So many friends in Turkey. Great people, amazing people. We wish them well. A lot of anguish last night, but hopefully it will all work out. -- Donald Trump, during his so-called "formal introduction of Mike Pence," in an example of how President Trump would help manage major crises around the world ...

... The Cheese Stands Alone. Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: Donald Trump's "introduction of Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana was a remarkable reminder that, ultimately, the Trump campaign is about one person.... Before the governor took the stage, Mr. Trump stood there alone and talked for 28 minutes, delivering a long and improvised riff that emulated his rallies instead of a traditional vice-presidential announcement.... After roughly 20 minutes, Mr. Trump reached for his notes. 'Back to Mike Pence!' he declared.... Then he used the reference to the Hoosier State to remind the 150 people in attendance that he trounced Mr. Pence’s endorsed candidate, Senator Ted Cruz, in the primary there." CW: Yeah, I may be using the pornologo a lot. ...

... (CW: Sadly, the campaign appears to have abandoned yesterday's logo for a new G-rated, non-penetration sign where TRUMP just hovers over pence. But I shall not be deterred.) ...

... Ezra Klein: "Trump emerged without Pence. He spoke, alone, at a podium adorned with Trump’s name, but not Pence’s. And then Trump proceeded to talk about himself for 28 minutes.... It was the single most bizarre, impulsive, narcissistic performance I have ever seen from a major politician.... Every five minutes or so, he seemed to remember, just for a moment...,  that he was there to introduce Mike Pence, and so he would say something like, 'now back to Mike Pence,' but then he would slip back again, and tell another anecdote about himself." -- CW 

... How Not to Choreograph a Major Media Event. Katy Tur, speaking on MSNBC: "This was a room not filled with Donald Trump supporters from rallies, but rather a number of GOP -- New York GOPers, some friends and family, and then just tourists who came in literally from off the street....That being said, it was typical in the way that Donald Trump spent a good portion of the time talking about, frankly, himself, relitigating the primaries, talking about all the deals he's made. Also, perpetuating this idea that he was against the Iraq war when he was not. He spent 29 minutes before he got to Governor Mike Pence [(R-IN)]. And he said part of the reason why he chose him -- and he admitted this -- was that he needed party unity, that he's an outsider and that he needed somebody who would smooth over relations in Washington." -- CW 

Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "... Mike Pence could make things even worse" for Donald Trump "with female, gay and minority voters.... Pence has endorsed controversial legislation on abortion, gay rights and immigration both in Indiana and while in Congress, where he was consistently ranked as one of the most right-leaning members of the House. He attempted to shut down the government over Planned Parenthood funding, supported a measure that made English the nation’s official language and signed one of the nation’s strictest abortion laws earlier this year." -- CW