The Ledes

Thursday, September 19, 2024

New York Times: “A body believed to be of the suspect in a Kentucky highway shooting that left five people seriously injured this month was found on Wednesday, the authorities said, ending a manhunt that stretched into a second week and set the local community on edge. The Kentucky State Police commissioner, Phillip Burnett Jr., said in a Wednesday night news conference that at approximately 3:30 p.m., two troopers and two civilians found an unidentified body in the brush behind the highway exit where the shooting occurred.... The police have identified the suspect of the shooting as Joseph A. Couch, 32. They said that on Sept. 7, Mr. Couch perched on a cliff overlooking Interstate 75 about eight miles north of London, Ky., and opened fire. One of the wounded was shot in the face, and another was shot in the chest. A dozen vehicles were riddled with gunfire.”

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The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

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Publisher & Editor: Marie Burns


Tuesday
Jul162019

The Commentariat -- July 17, 2019

Late Morning Update:

Jim VandeHei & Mike Allen of Axios: "It might seem like improvisational madness when President Trump tells American citizens in Congress to 'go back' where they came from, but those close to Trump say there's a lot of calculation behind his race-baiting.... It's central to his 2020 strategy, they say. Trump's associates predict more, not less, of the race-baiting madness.... Trump sees the four progressive women ... as perfect foils until he gets a Democratic nominee to run against." ...

... Qusay Speaks. Quint Forgey of Politico: "Eric Trump said Wednesday he supported his father's racist Twitter post, which the House formally condemned in a resolution the previous evening. He called the so-called squad of Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) an 'absolute clown show.' 'I love the tweet, "If you don't love our country, get out. Leave,"' Eric Trump said. 'You know, if you complain about our country, you know, go to somewhere -- go experience somewhere else in the world. I have seen a lot of the world, right? We have it so great in America. America is doing so well.'" ...

... Sanjana Karanth of the Huffington Post: "The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has written specific rules that protect people, mostly immigrants, against employment discrimination on the basis of their national origin.... 'Examples of potentially unlawful conduct include insults, taunting, or ethnic epithets, such as making fun of a person's foreign accent or comments like, "Go back to where you came from," whether made by supervisors or co-workers,' it [reads]."

Lifestyles of the Rich & Sleazy. Jack Bohrer of NBC News: A "November 1992 tape in the NBC archives shows Donald Trump partying with Jeffrey Epstein at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, now a private club, more than a decade before Epstein pleaded guilty to felony prostitution charges in Florida. At one point in the video, Trump is seen grabbing a woman toward him and patting her behind.... The future president was largely surrounded by cheerleaders for the Buffalo Bills, in town for a game against the Miami Dolphins.... Trump is seen talking to Epstein and another man while they watch the women on the dance floor. Trump noted the presence of an NBC camera to Epstein, and both point out women...." ...

... The old tape begins at about 3:05 min. in:

Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "Joaquín Guzmán Loera, the Mexican drug lord known as El Chapo, was sentenced on Wednesday to life in prison, ending one of modern history's most brutal and notorious criminal careers. The life sentence, mandated by law as a result of the severity of Mr. Guzmán's crimes, was handed down in the Federal District Court in Brooklyn, where the kingpin was convicted last winter of drug, murder and money laundering charges after a sprawling three-month trial. As some of the federal agents who had chased him for years looked on from the gallery, Judge Brian M. Cogan issued the life term and Mr. Guzmán, 62, was hauled away to prepare himself -- pending an appeal -- for spending the rest of his life behind bars."

Dan Spinelli of Mother Jones: "[Currently] Secretary of the Navy Richard Spencer ... runs the [defense] department temporarily while Trump's permanent choice [for Defense secretary], Army Secretary Mark Esper, awaits Senate confirmation. Meanwhile nearly two dozen senior civilian positions remain unfilled by Senate-confirmed appointees. Temporary officials like Spencer now occupy the most crucial roles at the Pentagon, including the top three positions: secretary of defense, deputy secretary of defense, and chief management officer. Twelve senior roles within the secretary's office are vacant in total...But the staffing problem is not isolated to the Defense Department's central division. The Army and Air Force lack permanent civilian leaders. Trump's choice to be chief of naval operations withdrew his nomination last week, creating another vacancy for the White House to fill...>. The wave of vacancies has left the Pentagon without relevant policy advisers or Senate-confirmed leaders during a time when the White House is responding to a myriad of foreign policy challenges[.]" --s ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Yes, but Pentagon leaders are superfluous. The main function of Trump's generals is to come to the White House to tell Trump, "Sir, you were right all along. Thank you for setting us straight, Sir." Then the toughest men you've ever seen openly weep with gratitude for the stable genius. (See Daniel Dale post, linked below, for context.)

~~~~~~~~~~

Although we may never know with complete certainty the identity of the winner of this year's Presidential election, the identity of the loser is perfectly clear. It is the Nation's confidence in the judge as an impartial guardian of the rule of law. -- John Paul Stevens, dissent, Bush v. Gore ...

** Linda Greenhouse of the New York Times: "John Paul Stevens, whose 35 years on the United States Supreme Court transformed him, improbably, from a Republican antitrust lawyer to the outspoken leader of the court's liberal wing, died Tuesday at a hospital in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. He was 99." ...

... Jeff Toobin of the New Yorker: Stevens' "death is more than just the vanishing of a generational landmark; it's his ideology, his understanding of the Constitution, that's disappearing, too. And that's the gravest loss to the country."

Julie Davis of the New York Times: "The House voted on Tuesday to condemn as racist President Trump's attacks against four congresswomen of color but only after the debate over the president's language devolved into a bitterly partisan brawl that showcased deep rifts over race, ethnicity and political ideology in the age of Trump. The measure passed nearly along party lines, 240-187, following one of the most polarizing exchanges on the House floor in recent memory. Only four Republicans and the House's lone independent, Representative Justin Amash of Michigan, voted with all Democrats to condemn Mr. Trump. I know racism when I see it, I know racism when I feel it, and at the highest level of government, there's no room for racism,' thundered Representative John Lewis, Democrat of Georgia, an icon of the civil rights movement who was nearly beaten to death in Alabama in 1965.... Among other things, the resolution declares that the House 'believes that immigrants and their descendants have made America stronger,' that 'those who take the oath of citizenship are every bit as American as those whose families have lived in the United States for many generations,' and that the House 'is committed to keeping America open to those lawfully seeking refuge and asylum from violence and oppression, and those who are willing to work hard to live the American Dream, no matter their race, ethnicity, faith, or country of origin.'" ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Appropriately enough, Republicans chose Steve Scalise (La.) to make their closing argument against the resolution. As Mehdi Hasan of the Intercept wrote this week, "... in 2002, Scalise, then a Louisiana state representative, attended and spoke at a convention of the white supremacist European American Unity and Rights Organization, a group founded by David Duke..., the Holocaust-denying former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan who has been described by the Anti-Defamation League as 'perhaps America's most well-known racist and anti-Semite.' Scalise later said he 'regretted' -- but did not technically apologize for -- attending the EURO event. When Louisiana-based political reporter Stephanie Grace first met Scalise, he likened himself to Duke. Grace recalled, 'He told me he was like David Duke without the baggage.'" The Democrats chose one of the great civil rights leaders of the 20th century. ...

... Meg Wagner, et al., of CNN: "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, speaking from the House floor today, called President Trump's continued defense of his remarks 'shameful' and added that the 'comments are racist.' While addressing the House of Representatives during the debate over a resolution calling for members to condemn Trump's racist tweets, she quoted former President Ronald Reagan: 'If we ever close the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost.' She added that the Democratic House caucus 'will continue to respond to the attacks on our members which reflect a fundamental disrespect for the beautiful diversity of America.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Juliegrace Brufke of the Hill: "Republicans on Tuesday demanded that Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) remarks blasting President Trump's comments about four minority congresswomen as racist be removed from the record, freezing action on the floor ahead of a House vote condemning Trump.... After [Rep. Doug] Collins [R-Ga.] asked Pelosi if she would like to rephrase her comments, Pelosi said she had cleared them with the parliamentarian in advance." Mayhem ensued. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Paul Blest of Splinter: "Welcome to the United States, where it's somehow considered more taboo to publicly describe a racist as a racist than actually saying something racist.... On Tuesday, Pelosi ... exposed one of the dumber and more pernicious rules of decorum in the House of Representatives.... Even before Pelosi finished her speech, GOP Rep. Doug Collins asked ... asked that Pelosi's comments be struck from the record.... After much commotion Rep. Emmanuel Cleaver -- who was presiding over the session -- essentially said 'fuck it' and left.... House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer took the gavel and ruled Pelosi's words out of order, but Democrats voted down an attempt from Collins to strike Pelosi's words from the record. According to GOP House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Pelosi has been barred from speaking on the floor for the rest of the day." ...

... Sheryl Stolberg of the New York Times makes note of some takeaways from the condemnation vote. ...

... Kellyanne Goes There. Matt Wilstein of the Daily Beast: Andrew “Feinberg, a reporter for the website BeltwayBreakfast.com, asked [Kellyanne Conway] which countries ... Donald Trump was referring to when he suggested Ayanna Pressley, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar -- all U.S. citizens — should 'go back' to where they came from. Instead of answering that question, Conway asked him, 'What's your ethnicity?'... After Conway shares that her ancestors are from Ireland and Italy, the reporter said, 'My ethnicity is not relevant to the question I'm asking you.'" Mrs. McC: In fairness to the lovely Kellyanne, she was having a bad day. Besides working for Trump, "In that same Fox interview, Conway distanced herself from her husband George Conway, whose latest Washington Post column is headlined: 'Trump is a racist president.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... looks like Trump's 'Lock Her Up' campaign slogan will be replaced with 'Go Back to Where You Came From.' -- MAG, in today's Comments

... Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "The president's latest defense of his tweets telling the lawmakers to 'go back' to their home countries, even though they are all U.S. citizens, came hours before the House is set to vote on a resolution condemning them as racist. 'Those Tweets were NOT Racist. I don't have a Racist bone in my body!' Trump tweeted. Trump condemned the 'so-called vote' on the resolution as a 'Democrat con game,' sending a message to Republicans to vote against the measure. 'Republicans should not show 'weakness' and fall into their trap. This should be a vote on the filthy language, statements and lies told by the Democrat,' he tweeted." Mrs. McC: Trump's assertion is partially true inasmuch as bones are not capable of harboring or expressing racist thoughts. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Aris Folley of the Hill: "Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), who was born in Taiwan and is a naturalized American citizen, shared Tuesday that despite the fact that he served in the U.S. military and has been a member of Congress since 2015, people still tell him to 'go back' to China. 'I served on active duty in the U.S. Air Force and currently serve in the U.S. House of Representatives,' Lieu said in an op-ed published in The Washington Post. 'Yet I still experience people telling me to "go back" to China or North Korea or Japan. Like many immigrants, I have learned to brush off this racist insult." ...

... Greg Sargent, via digby: "Trump just unleashed a new tweetstorm aimed at the four nonwhite congresswomen he has been targeting, accusing them of 'vile' and 'hateful' and 'pro-terrorist' rhetoric, and bashing the Democratic Party for refusing to take on the 'Radical Left.' Trump sees this as a winner, claiming that he cleverly forced the party to defend Ocasio-Cortez and 'the Squad,' and this is 'Not good for the Democrats!' Some pundits have endorsed this idea, suggesting this is the turf Trump wants 2020 fought upon. Similarly, Trump campaign operatives tell The Post's Jacqueline Alemany that this is brilliant politics. One claims Trump's attacks 'reinforced in the minds of many Americans that the Democratic Party is the party of AOC and Omar.' Trump advisers made this same boast in 2018[.]... Indeed, it's worth recalling that Trump allies made an almost identical boast in the runup to the 2018 elections." ...

     ... digby: Some of Trump's advisors "are trying to move him toward attacking socialism instead of women of color but it's not going to work. For him, it's all about racism --- because he's a racist and he believes his base voters are too. And sadly, he is right. They are. And now they expect their president to 'tell it like it is' which means dogwhistling is not going to be enough." ...

... Lili Loofbourow of Slate: "It's bad enough to suggest that loyal American citizens should leave the country they serve. It's uncomplicatedly racist to suggest that American citizens who aren't white are therefore not American. But this last point is in some ways scarier: Trump is comparing elected representation to foreign interference. For nonwhite Americans, wanting to improve your country is evidence that you hate it. For nonwhite Americans, criticizing America is anti-American.... For all that Trump wants to make this a story about Democrats embracing each other, this was actually the week Trump fully embraced white supremacy without hinting or hedging. Time will tell whether the 'people who agree with him' -- with white nationalists a group that he now cozily includes -- will be outnumbered by those who prize American dissent." --s ...

... Brendan Morrow of the Week: "House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Tuesday insisted that President Trump's tweets telling four minority congresswomen to 'go back' to where they came from were not racist. McCarthy in a press conference was asked whether Trump's weekend tweets were racist, to which he flatly responded, 'No,' saying that "this is about ideology" and criticizing the so-called 'squad' that Trump attacked while not offering a specific defense of the language used. McCarthy also said he will vote against the resolution condemning Trump's tweets...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Justin Baragona of The Daily Beast: "Republican Senate candidate Kris Kobach left CNN anchor Chris Cuomo gobsmacked Tuesday night when he had to seriously think about whether he'd continue to support Donald Trump for president if he openly admitted to being a racist, saying he'd have to weigh who Trump was running against." --s ...

... Katie Rogers of the New York Times: "Those who study language and rhetoric say the president's 'go back' comments -- or, at least, the sentiment behind them -- have roots beginning as far back as the 1600s, when dissidents were banished from American colonies for advocating total religious freedom. Later, a set of laws passed in 1798 allowed the deportation of noncitizens who were considered dangerous, were from hostile nations or had criticized the federal government.... More than 4,800 ... people who wrote to The New York Times to share their own experiences with the phrase...." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Eric Levitz of New York: "... the moment one examines what 'anti-American' means [to Trump & other Republicans]..., the true color of Trump's nationalism becomes plain. After all, none of the congresswomen in question have said that they 'hate America.' They've merely expressed dissatisfaction with its present state and challenged popular conceptions about its past -- prerogatives of citizenship in a free society that Donald Trump has never denied himself. The mogul centered his presidential campaign, after all, on the assertion that America was no longer great. He described the United States as 'the suckers of the world,' and said that 'we are like, in many cases, a Third World country.'... He has expressed contempt for American prisoners of war, said that George W. Bush did not keep us safe, questioned whether the U.S. government was more 'innocent' than Vladimir Putin's, and declared that America had done 'a tremendous disservice to humanity' in the Middle East. Clearly then, neither Trump nor his defenders believe that dissent is inherently unpatriotic.... Trump has made the color of conservative nationalism more plain to the naked eye. But a tacit faith in white Christian Americans' superlative claim to national belonging has always been native to the creed."

Fox "News" Sets White House Agenda. Again. Aaron Rupar of Vox: "... Donald Trump threatened to launch a treason investigation into Google in a Monday morning tweet for allegedly working with the Chinese government -- based on an 11-second Fox News clip containing no evidence whatsoever. The president cited unsubstantiated allegations made by billionaire investor and Facebook board member Peter Thiel on Monday's installment of Tucker Carlson's Fox News show. Thiel, it's worth noting, is a longtime Trump supporter and adviser.... At 7:46 a.m., Trump tweeted, '"Billionaire Tech Investor Peter Thiel believes Google should be investigated for treason. He accuses Google of working with the Chinese Government." @foxandfriends A great and brilliant guy who knows this subject better than anyone. The Trump Administration will take a look!' Trump's tweet was posted about an hour after a Fox & Friends news segment featured an 11-second clip of Thiel's interview with Carlson.... When Carlson lightly pushed Thiel for some evidence to back up his claim about Google being infiltrated, 'Thiel [said] he was just "asking questions."'... Thiel has been publicly critical of Google for years." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: So here's how your federal government works now: (1) A Fox "News" guest makes an unsubstantiated claim against a nemesis. (2) Trump tweets. (3) A Trump factotum jumps & initiates a multi-million-dollar investigation.

** The "Sir" Tell: Trump's Imaginary Minions. Daniel Dale of CNN: "I've fact-checked every word Trump has uttered since his inauguration. I can tell you that if this President relays an anecdote in which he has someone referring to him as 'sir,' then some major component of the anecdote is very likely to be wrong. Lots of people do call Trump 'sir,' of course. But the word seems to pop into his head more frequently when he is inventing or exaggerating a conversation than when he is faithfully relaying one. A 'sir' is a flashing red light that he is speaking from his imagination rather than his memory. In poker parlance, it's a tell. Trump has told false 'sir' stories on all manner of subjects: health care, the Middle East, the courts, unions and -- just last week -- both tariffs and social media. But no genre of Trump story is more reliably sir-heavy than his collection of suspiciously similar tales about macho men breaking into tears of gratitude in his presence." Dale cites several examples, then fact-checks them out of existence, making for a rather fun read.

Two Corinthians. Maggie Haberman & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Furious after he was criticized by evangelicals for stumbling in his reference to a book of the Bible during the 2016 campaign, Donald J. Trump lashed out at 'so-called Christians' and used an epithet in describing them to a party official, according to a new book. Mr. Trump's anger was aroused after he stumbled in an appearance at Liberty University by referring to Second Corinthians as 'Two Corinthians' as he was competing for the votes of evangelicals...." Mrs. McC: This story is a day old, but I decided not to link it yesterday because I was annoyed that Haberman & Martin refused to tell us what "epithet" -- or as they also referred to it, "the most vulgar of terms" -- Trump used. Fortunately, Lawrence O'Donnell said last night that Trump complained about "fucking evangelicals."

Jeremy Herb & Ashley Killough of CNN: "Democratic Rep. Al Green of Texas on Tuesday introduced his articles of impeachment against ... Donald Trump, which will force the House to take up the measure later this week. Green's resolution is unlikely to lead to an actual vote on impeachment in the House, but he can force the chamber to act on it under House rules within two legislative days, creating a dilemma for House Democratic leaders and the moderate Democrats who have largely tried to avoid the issue of impeachment. While Green said Tuesday that he wants an up-or-down vote on articles of impeachment, the House has several options to dispose of his effort, though they each have drawbacks."

Shut Yo' Mouth, Roger Stone. Zoe Tillman of BuzzFeed News: "A federal judge on Tuesday issued an order prohibiting Roger Stone ... from posting anything on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter after finding he violated her previous order limiting what he could say publicly about his case. Pointing to a series of Instagram posts and statements from Stone referring to his case and the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson found that Stone was 'determined to make himself the subject of the story.' Once again, the judge said, she was forced to address behavior that 'has more to do with middle school than with a court of law' -- an apparent nod to comments she made at a previous hearing in former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort's case." ...

      ... Rachel Maddow said that within two hours of the order, Roger Stone's wife got on Instagram to discuss the case.

Jacqueline Thomsen of the Hill: "A federal judge in New York on Tuesday signed an order permanently blocking the Trump administration from adding a citizenship question to the 2020 census, days after President Trump gave up on his efforts to get such a question on next year's census. The order, signed by Judge Jesse Furman, was jointly drafted by the parties opposing the citizenship question." ...

... Tucker Higgins of CNBC: "Three civil rights groups filed a lawsuit on Tuesday challenging the Trump administration's new asylum rule, which bars asylum claims from most noncitizens who travel through another country on their way to the United States. The rule was published in the federal register on Tuesday and was supposed to take effect immediately. The American Civil Liberties Union, Southern Poverty Law Center and Center for Constitutional Rights filed the suit in federal court in San Francisco. The suit alleges that the rule violates the Immigration and Nationality Act as well as federal laws governing administrative procedure."

"William Barr Is a More Subdued Version of Donald Trump." Nancy LeTourneau of the Washington Monthly: "It is Attorney General William Barr's job to ensure that all citizens in this country are treated equally, something we've never lived up to. Rather than take up that job responsibility, he just joined his boss in blaming those who are speaking up and fighting for our ideals. In doing so, Barr demonstrated what it means to engage in white identity politics, which is actually the breeding ground for hate and must be rejected. The danger posed by people like Barr is that they do so in a way that sounds reasonable, but conveys the same racist message we hear from Trump." LeTourneau cites a speech Barr gave Tuesday a Summit on Combatting Anti-Semitism at the Justice Department.

All the Best People, Ctd.

Eliana Johnson of Politico: "Secretary of State Mike Pompeo expressed concern about sending one of his top arms control negotiators, Andrea Thompson, to head a U.S. delegation meeting with Russia's deputy foreign minister this week after it was revealed that she had failed to disclose her [personal & financial] ties to the boyfriend [Paul Erickson] of Russian foreign agent Maria Butina. So Pompeo dispatched his deputy, John Sullivan, to lead the delegation instead..., which now includes Sullivan, Thompson and other senior U.S. officials ... attending the strategic security dialogue in Geneva ... to talk ... about arms control.... Thompson failed to alert her superiors that Erickson officiated her 2017 wedding ... and ... that her husband, David Gillian ... had wired Erickson $100,000 for an allegedly fraudulent investment scheme in which Gillian and others were allegedly defrauded by Erickson -- a transaction laid out by the FBI in court filings.... Thompson [is] one of the last remaining acolytes of the president's first national security adviser, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn[.]" --s

Caleb Ecarma of Mediaite: "Republican operative Jason Miller, the former communications chief for the Trump campaign and transition team, said he hired numerous prostitutes and visited 'hand job' massage parlors as recently as a few months ago in a new videotaped deposition. Miller made the admission while testifying on May 30 in Washington D.C. in connection to his lawsuit against the digital media company Gizmodo -- a case that is being litigated in Southern Florida's District Court. Despite Miller's counsel calling for a protective order to make the deposition confidential, a redacted version was made public on July 11." Mrs. McC: These encounters may or may not be illegal, depending upon the venue and, ah, circumstances of employment. In any event, they're not a good look.


Emily Holden of the Guardian: "Donald Trump's leases of public lands and waters for oil and gas drilling could lead to the production of more climate-warming pollution than the entire European Union contributes in a year, according to a new report. The Wilderness Society estimates heat-trapping emissions from extracting and burning those fossil fuels could range between 854m and 4.7bn metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent, depending on how much development companies pursue. The 28 nations in the European Union produced about 4bn metric tons of CO2 equivalent in 2014[.]" --s

Tierney Sneed of TPM: "The ACLU has won its legal war with the Trump administration over a census citizenship question, but it's not backing down from its demand that certain administration officials be sanctioned for allegedly false testimony in the case. In a court filing Tuesday evening, the ACLU alleged that top Trump administration officials in the Justice Department and Commerce Department 'engaged in litigation conduct that is nothing less than a fraud on the Court.' The ACLU is requesting that the court order 60 days of discovery -- or let the ACLU piggyback on the discovery that may move forward in a separate census case -- 'to determine the scope of potentially sanctionable conduct and the identities of the culpable parties.'" --safari: More of this please!

Josh Israel of ThinkProgress: "U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO) helped honor an Islamophobic former state lawmaker on Friday, at an event ... theme[d], 'Defending Religious Freedom and America's First Amendment.'... Gardner praised former Colorado state Senate President John Andrews (R) for teaching the public about limited government.... Andrews then delivered an 18-minute diatribe, warning that freedom of religion should not apply to devout Muslims and warning that Marxism and Islam are America's enemies." --s

Presidential Race 2020

Sanford on the Path from the Appalachian Trail to the White House. Caitlin Byrd of the (Charleston, S.C.) Post & Courier: "Almost a year after ... Donald Trump urged voters to reject Mark Sanford, the former South Carolina congressman [and governor] is considering a Republican presidential run of his own against Trump in 2020. Sanford, in an interview Tuesday with The Post and Courier, confirmed he will take the next month to formulate a potential run against Trump as a way of pushing a national debate about America's mounting debt, deficit and government spending."

Jason Lemon of Newsweek: Jess McIntosh, "a former adviser to 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, has said that 2020 hopeful Joe Biden is 'dangerously close to using Republican talking points' and sounds like ... Donald Trump when he discusses Medicare for All.... On Monday..., Biden announced his plan to add a public option to the ACA if he were elected president. This would expand Obamacare, and allow it to cover more Americans, but it would fall short of creating a universal healthcare system...." Mrs. McC: Biden is definitely stuck in a time warp. Last week, Biden told Chris Cuomo that scrapping ObamaCare and "starting over would be, I think, a sin." I found his view disqualifying, not because Yeah, Obamacare was a "big fucking deal," but digging in on a flawed system is just the kind of "that's the way we always did it" "reasoning" that marks a poor leader.


Shane Goldmacher of the New York Times: "Planned Parenthood on Tuesday removed its president after less than a year in the job, seeking new leadership at a time when abortion rights have come under increasing attack from statehouses and Republicans in Washington. The sudden ouster reflected a widening disagreement between the president, Leana Wen, and the board of directors over her management style and which direction to steer one of the nation's leading women's reproductive rights groups. Her departure followed a series of negotiations that appeared to end acrimoniously on Tuesday. In a Twitter post, Dr. Wen said her fate had been decided at a 'secret meeting,' which the organization disputed."

The Shelter/Concentration Camp Scam. Kim Barker, et al., of the New York Times: Juan Sanchez, "the leader of the nation's largest provider of migrant shelters for children [-- Southwest Key --] was paid $3.6 million during the charity's most recent tax year, even as the nonprofit organization came under intense scrutiny for its high compensation packages for executives and for its decision to accept children separated from their families by the Trump administration.... Over the past decade, Southwest Key has been awarded almost $1.9 billion in federal funds to care for unaccompanied minors." along with three other highly-paid executives, stepped down after the NYT ran an article in March about possible mismanagement of Southwest Key.

Katie Benner & William Rashbaum of the New York Times: "The Justice Department will not bring federal charges against a New York City police officer [Daniel Pantaleo] in the death of Eric Garner, ending a yearslong inquiry into a case that sharply divided officials and prompted national protests over excessive force by the police, according to three people briefed on the decision." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Pete Williams & Minyvonne Burke of NBC News: "According to a senior Justice Department official, U.S. Attorney General William Barr made the final decision not to charge Pantaleo, choosing to follow the recommendations of Brooklyn prosecutors.... A medical examiner ruled Garner's death a homicide, saying the chokehold was the cause. The chokehold is prohibited by the New York Police Department." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Alan Pyke of ThinkProgress: "Attorney General William Barr made the final decision not to charge [officer Daniel] Pantaleo personally, a DOJ spokesperson told ThinkProgress 'after being briefed by [Eastern District of New York staff] and the Civil Rights Division.' He sided with the office that routinely works with NYPD over the civil rights specialists in his own department who have steadily insisted that Pantaleo's conduct was criminal for years. The spokesperson referred further queries about the nature of Barr's thinking to the office that has opposed the charges, which the Washington Post reports won the argument in part by noting Pantaleo's chokehold of Garner only lasted seven seconds.... Though Pantaleo has faced no criminal consequences, the bystander who filmed [Eric] Garner's dying protestations that 'I can't breathe!' was later targeted by police and prosecutors for retaliation."

Pilar Melendez, et al., of the Daily Beast: "An attorney representing Jeffrey Epstein accusers said Tuesday that at least one woman has come forward to say she was abused while the financier was on work release as part of his lenient 2007 plea deal. Lawyer Brad Edwards said Epstein was allowed to have visitors while he was supposed to be working during the 13-month sentence. 'It was not for some business arrangement and it was for... improper sexual contact,' Edwards said, adding that the new accusers said they were under 21, though they may not have been minors."

E. A. Crunden of ThinkProgress: "New research shows that communities in coal country are at an increased risk of fiscal collapse. The data is the latest blow to President Donald Trump's ongoing but faltering efforts to rescue the industry and its workers. Local governments dependent on coal are failing to account for the financial implications of the industry's demise.... That trend is likely to worsen should the federal government take action to curb carbon emissions, which would be likely if a Democrat were to triumph in 2020." --s

Beyond the Beltway

Puerto Rico. Patricia Mazzei of the New York Times: "Facing intense pressure to resign, Gov. Ricardo A. Rosselló addressed Puerto Rico on Tuesday, the morning after tumultuous street protests shook the capital of San Juan, and refused to step down despite what he acknowledged was widespread public discontent.... Mr. Rosselló appeared to be buying time politically to try to remain in power, perhaps hoping the public furor would die down."

Way Beyond

U.K. Ayshaw Tull of Channel 4 News: "Brexit Party MEP Alexandra Phillips has admitted she secretly worked for Cambridge Analytica on its controversial 2017 election campaign in Kenya [after a secret recording of her surfaced]. Ms Phillips -- a prominent member of Nigel Farage's Brexit Party and former Head of Media for Ukip -- made the admission to Channel 4 News after initially strenuously denying any involvement with the disgraced data firm, and pressurising journalists to drop the story.... The controversial 2017 Kenyan election contest was marred by misinformation with fake news spread across the country via the Internet and on smartphones. President Kenyatta's opponent Raila Odinga was smeared with a series of viral videos, including one notoriously depicting apocalyptic scenes if he were to win the election. Cambridge Analytica strenuously denied any involvement with the content, and any role in negative political campaigning in Kenya." --s

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Monday
Jul152019

The Commentariat -- July 16, 2019

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

... Meg Wagner, et al., of CNN: "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, speaking from the House floor today, called President Trump's continued defense of his remarks 'shameful' and added that the 'comments are racist.' While addressing the House of Representatives during the debate over a resolution calling for members to condemn Trump's racist tweets, she quoted former President Ronald Reagan: 'If we ever close the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost.' She added that the Democratic House caucus 'will continue to respond to the attacks on our members which reflect a fundamental disrespect for the beautiful diversity of America.'" ...

     ... Juliegrace Brufke of the Hill: "Republicans on Tuesday demanded that Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) remarks blasting President Trump's comments about four minority congresswomen as racist be removed from the record, freezing action on the floor ahead of a House vote condemning Trump.... After [Rep. Doug] Collins [R-Ga.] asked Pelosi if she would like to rephrase her comments, Pelosi said she had cleared them with the parliamentarian in advance." Mayhem ensued.

Kellyanne Goes There. Matt Wilstein of the Daily Beast: Andrew "Feinberg, a reporter for the website BeltwayBreakfast.com, asked [Kellyanne Conway] which countries ... Donald Trump was referring to when he suggested Ayanna Pressley, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar -- all U.S. citizens -- should 'go back' to where they came from. Instead of answering that question, Conway asked him, 'What's your ethnicity?'... After Conway shares that her ancestors are from Ireland and Italy, the reporter said, 'My ethnicity is not relevant to the question I'm asking you.'" Mrs. McC: In fairness to the lovely Kellyanne, she was having a bad day. Besides working for Trump, "In that same Fox interview, Conway distanced herself from her husband George Conway, whose latest Washington Post column is headlined: 'Trump is a racist president.'"

Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "The president's latest defense of his tweets telling the lawmakers to 'go back' to their home countries, even though they are all U.S. citizens, came hours before the House is set to vote on a resolution condemning them as racist. 'Those Tweets were NOT Racist. I don't have a Racist bone in my body!' Trump tweeted. Trump condemned the 'so-called vote' on the resolution as a 'Democrat con game,' sending a message to Republicans to vote against the measure. 'Republicans should not show 'weakness' and fall into their trap. This should be a vote on the filthy language, statements and lies told by the Democrat,' he tweeted." Mrs. McC: Trump's assertion is partially true inasmuch as bones are not capable of harboring or expressing racist thoughts. ...

... Brendan Morrow of the Week: "House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Tuesday insisted that President Trump's tweets telling four minority congresswomen to 'go back' to where they came from were not racist. McCarthy in a press conference was asked whether Trump's weekend tweets were racist, to which he flatly responded, 'No,' saying that "this is about ideology" and criticizing the so-called 'squad' that Trump attacked while not offering a specific defense of the language used. McCarthy also said he will vote against the resolution condemning Trump's tweets...." ...

... Katie Rogers of the New York Times: "Those who study language and rhetoric say the president's 'go back' comments -- or, at least, the sentiment behind them -- have roots beginning as far back as the 1600s, when dissidents were banished from American colonies for advocating total religious freedom. Later, a set of laws passed in 1798 allowed the deportation of noncitizens who were considered dangerous, were from hostile nations or had criticized the federal government.... More than 4,800 ... people who wrote to The New York Times to share their own experiences with the phrase...."

Katie Benner & William Rashbaum of the New York Times: "The Justice Department will not bring federal charges against a New York City police officer [Daniel Pantaleo] in the death of Eric Garner, ending a yearslong inquiry into a case that sharply divided officials and prompted national protests over excessive force by the police, according to three people briefed on the decision." ...

... Pete Williams & Minyvonne Burke of NBC News: "According to a senior Justice Department official, U.S. Attorney General William Barr made the final decision not to charge Pantaleo, choosing to follow the recommendations of Brooklyn prosecutors.... A medical examiner ruled Garner's death a homicide, saying the chokehold was the cause. The chokehold is prohibited by the New York Police Department."

~~~~~~~~~~

The Great White Dope

Eileen Sullivan & Julie Davis of the New York Times: "President Trump on Monday accused Speaker Nancy Pelosi of using racist comments, escalating his attacks on four first-term Democratic congresswomen to the leader of the Democratic Party. Ms. Pelosi had criticized the president on Sunday for suggesting four lawmakers of color should 'go back' to their own countries, and she said that his slogan, '"Make America Great Again" has always been about making America white again.' Mr. Trump in turn accused her of racist remarks. 'So Speaker Pelosi said, "Make America white again." That's a very racist -- that's a very racist statement. I'm surprised she'd say that,' Mr. Trump said at an event celebrating American manufacturing at the White House." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

     ... The story has been updated: "Hours [after Trump's remarks to reporters], the four [Congresswomen] called a news conference to scathingly denounce Mr. Trump's latest remarks, which they argued were part of a pattern of hateful language designed to distract from what they said were brutal policies and misconduct in office.... In a blistering speech that culminated with a call to impeach him, [Rep. Ilhan] Omar recounted a litany of the president's most offensive comments about people of color, women and immigrants.... 'This is the agenda of white nationalists, whether it is happening in chat rooms, or it is happening on national TV, and now it is reached the White House garden.'... Even as the four spoke, [Trump] was online calling them 'radical Democrats' and Twitter-shouting, 'IF YOU ARE NOT HAPPY HERE, YOU CAN LEAVE!'"

... My Racist Tweets Are Okay Because Many People Agree with Me. Claudia Koerner of BuzzFeed News: "President Trump on Monday claimed his racist tweets attacking progressive congresswomen weren't racist, and he added that he's not concerned about backlash because 'many people' hold his same views.... 'Does it concern you that many people saw that tweet as racist and white nationalists are finding common cause with you on that point?' a reporter asked. 'It does not concern me because many people agree with me,' Trump said. 'And all I'm saying, they wanna leave, they can leave. It doesn't say leave forever. It says leave.'"(Also linked yesterday.) The AP reports that Trump added, "A lot of people love it, by the way." ...

Kathryn Krawczyk of the Week: "... in doubling down on [his] attack [on Rep. Ilhan Omar] Monday, Trump falsely accused Omar of 'speaking about how wonderful Al Qaeda is,' despite Omar having no ties to the terrorist group and Trump having no idea how to spell it.... The Washington Post's Jabin Botsford later shared ... photos he captured..., which show that Trump's notes were covered in black marker scribbles reminding him to bring up the mysterious 'alcaida' and the even vaguer 'some people.'" Mrs. McC: Actually, I think that's "Some Peopel"; you be the judge. ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: I'll never be able to spell "Al Qaeda" again. Anyhow, it's worth noting that Trump brought these notes knocking non-white Congresswomen to an event that was supposed to be the "Made in America Product Showcase." ...

... Linda Qiu of the New York Times fact-checks Trump's extended false claim that Omar has talked "about how great Al Qaeda is" and expressed "love ... for enemies like Al Qaeda." ...

... Heather Caygle & John Bresnahan of Politico: "House Democrats are drafting a resolution to condemn ... Donald Trump's racist tweets against Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other high-profile freshman congresswomen, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced Monday." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Inae Oh of Mother Jones: Trump "ratcheted up his [racist] attack on Monday by asserting that the congresswomen owe him an apology.... 'When will the Radical Left Congresswomen apologize to our Country, the people of Israel and even to the Office of the President, for the foul language they have used, and the terrible things they have said. So many people are angry at them & their horrible & disgusting actions!'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... ** Adam Serwer of the Atlantic: "When Trump told these women to 'go back,' he was not making a factual claim about where they were born. He was stating his ideological belief that American citizenship is fundamentally racial, that only white people can truly be citizens, and that people of color, immigrants in particular, are only conditionally American. This is a cornerstone of white nationalism, and one of the president's few closely held ideological beliefs. It is a moral conviction.... Trump today accused the women of 'foul language & racist hatred.' White nationalists in the United States have always asserted that they are, in fact, the true victims of racial hatred.... Trump's remarks about the representatives followed a week in which he unsuccessfully attempted to overturn a Supreme Court decision that hobbled an administration effort to use the census to expand white voting power. The president's remarks about Omar, Ocasio-Cortez, Pressley, and Tlaib are not only consistent with that effort; they provide its moral foundation." Read on. Thanks to Anonymous for the link. ...

... Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times: Trump's "theory of citizenship is an old one, brought back from the margins of American politics and expressed in his crude, demagogic style. And it has found a comfortable place in a Republican Party that elevates its narrow, shrinking base as the only authentic America and would rather restrict the electorate than persuade new voters. With that said, what's more striking than the president's blood-and-soil racism is how Democratic Party elites -- or at least one group of them -- are playing with similar assumptions. It helps explain the current feud between Pelosi and the four congresswomen.... Indeed, it is instructive -- and frankly disturbing -- that top Democrats leaked a poll to Axios showing broad dissatisfaction with Representatives Ocasio-Cortez and Omar. Not from the entire public or Democratic voters, but from '1,003 likely general-election voters who are white and have two years or less of college education.'" ...

... David Remnick of the New Yorker: "At a press conference Monday, Ocasio-Cortez said that when she visited Washington, D.C., as a girl, her father showed her the Capitol, the reflecting pool, the Lincoln Memorial, and other sites of American democracy and told her, 'This belongs to all of us.... This weekend that very notion was challenged.'... This was precisely the point: Trump was saying that these four women of color did not belong.... Trump can hardly run a reëlection campaign on policy triumphs.... And so he will sling as much filth as possible and hope his base comes out in sufficient numbers." ...

... "Racism Comes out of the Closet.' Paul Krugman: "Sorry, there's no way to both sides this, or claim that Trump didn't say what he said. This is racism, plain and simple -- nothing abstract about it. And Trump obviously isn't worried that it will backfire. This should be a moment of truth for anyone who describes Trump as a 'populist' or asserts that his support is based on 'economic anxiety.' He's not a populist, he's a white supremacist. His support rests not on economic anxiety, but on racism.... This isn't just about Trump; it's about his whole party.... Although most of the commentary focuses on Trump's demand that native-born Americans 'go back' to their home countries, his description of their imaginary homelands as 'crime infested' deserves some attention, too. For his fixation on crime is another manifestation of his racism."

... Steve M.: "If Trump is doing this now, 16 months before the election, how inflammatory will his rhetoric be by the fall of 2020? He thinks he's bulletproof. He thinks he's an expert on winning elections, based on sample set of one, and is certain that this (rather than Russian interference of James Comey's incompetence) is what worked for him." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Donie O'Sullivan of CNN: "President Trump's weekend tweets in which he used racist language to attack four progressive Democratic congresswomen are not against Twitter's rules, a company spokesperson told CNN Business Monday -- a conclusion apparently contradicted by Twitter's written policies.... Twitter's ... policy on hateful conduct prohibits 'targeting individuals with repeated slurs, tropes or other content that intends to dehumanize, degrade or reinforce negative or harmful stereotypes about a protected category.'... The episode represents a tough first test for a new stance Twitter announced less than a month ago, in which it will label and down-rank tweets from Trump and other world leaders that break its rules, rather than removing them." ...

... Jon Allsop of the Columbia Journalism Review runs down how the MSM avoided calling Trump's tweets racist. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Zack Ford of ThinkProgress: "Marc Short, chief of staff to ... Mike Pence, told Fox Business on Monday that ... Donald Trump can't be racist because his current transportation secretary [Elaine Chao] is an Asian immigrant.... Chao's Cabinet role, Short explained, was proof Trump couldn't possibly be racist.... The vast majority of Trump's Cabinet members are white men; Chao and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson are the two notable exceptions." --s ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: And of course Chao has a unique attribute: she's married to Mitch McConnell. Trump can't fire her. ...

... Lindsey Changes His Mind, Embraces McCarthy's Tactics. Josh Israel of ThinkProgress: "Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) ... attacked Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) by name and others by association during a Fox News interview, claiming they were' Communists' who 'hate our own country.'... In the 1950s, Sen. Joe McCarthy (R-WI) and others famously accused American citizens of secretly being Communists -- often without evidence.... Last year, he angrily denounced the women who had come forward with allegations of sexual predation against Trump's then-Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh. 'This is as close to McCarthyism as I hope we get in my lifetime,' he charged." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... If you scroll pretty far down the page, this Politico report by Quint Forgey & Caitlin Oprysko relays reactions from some Republican legislators. ...

... Alexander Bolton of the Hill: "Senate Republican Conference Vice Chairwoman Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) said Monday that she thinks President Trump';s tweets suggesting that minority Democratic lawmakers 'go back' to the countries they came from was racist.... Asked [by reporters] if she thought Trump's comments were specifically racist, Ernst acknowledged, 'Yeah, I do.' She reiterated that view when asked on another occasion by a CNN reporter if she found Trump's comments racist." ...

... Ron Brownstein at CNN: "... Donald Trump's openly racist and xenophobic attacks on four Democratic House women of color, like his threatened immigration enforcement raids in major cities and the sweeping proposed new restrictions on asylum seekers that he announced Monday, underscores his transformation of the Republican Party into a coalition centered on the voters and places in America most hostile to immigration in particular and demographic change in general. This latest flurry of activity continues the drive by Trump and other Republicans elected mostly from the parts of America least touched by immigration to impose a restrictionist agenda on migration over the nearly undivided opposition of Democrats elected by the areas where most immigrants, both undocumented and legal, actually live.... Hardly any Republicans at any level now represent urban constituencies with the large immigrant populations that Trump has threatened...." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: This is true for most of the country, but those redneck confederate senators from Southern states represent a helluva lot of rural minorites. ...

... Speaking of the Party of White People, Politico Magazine has published another excerpt of Tim Alberta's book, this one on the struggle between Trump & Paul Ryan for "the soul of the Republican party." As if the Republican party had a soul.


Marshall Cohen, et al., of CNN: "New documents obtained exclusively by CNN reveal that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange received in-person deliveries, potentially of hacked materials related to the 2016 US election, during a series of suspicious meetings at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. The documents build on the possibility, raised by special counsel Robert Mueller in his report on Russian meddling, that couriers brought hacked files to Assange at the embassy.The surveillance reports also describe how Assange turned the embassy into a command center and orchestrated a series of damaging disclosures that rocked the 2016 presidential campaign in the United States." Mrs. McC: CNN has produced a fascinating video report, which accompanies the article. Well worth watching.

Morgan Chalfant, et al., of the Hill: "The Trump administration is moving to end asylum protections for most Central American migrants, the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security announced Monday. According to text of the rule set to publish in the Federal Register on Tuesday, asylum seekers who pass through another country before reaching the United States will be ineligible for asylum when they reach the southern border.... The Departments of Homeland Security and Justice announced the Interim Final Rule (IFR) in a joint statement Monday. Under the rule, those who have been the victims of trafficking are granted exceptions. The rule also allows exceptions for migrants passing through countries that have not signed major international refugee treaties and for migrants who have been denied asylum in the countries they traveled through.... 'The Trump administration is trying to unilaterally reverse our country's legal and moral commitment to protect those fleeing danger,' Lee Gelernt, the deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project said in a statement. [']This new rule is patently unlawful and we will sue swiftly.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...

     ... The AP story, by Colleen Long, is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Daniella Silva of NBC News: "Immigrant rights advocates and attorneys denounced ... Donald Trump's latest move Monday to restrict asylum at the southern border as the 'most egregious' and 'extreme' policy targeting the form of protection by the administration yet.... Attorney General William Barr called the interim final rule a 'lawful exercise of authority provided by Congress to restrict eligibility for asylum.'... In Guatemala, the State Department's own human rights report in 2018 said 'identification and referral mechanisms for potential asylum-seekers were inadequate.... Both migration and police authorities lacked adequate training concerning the rules for establishing refugee status,' the report said." ...

... Maybe You Missed It. Caitlin Oprysko: "... Donald Trump on Monday asserted that the mass-deportation raids he confirmed and publicized last week took place, despite few signs of removals being carried out at the scale he promised. 'The ICE raids were very successful -- people came into our country illegally, illegally,' Trump told reporters during an event at the White House showcasing American-made products. 'Many, many were taken out on Sunday, you just didn't know about it.'" ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: That Made in America event was supposed to be a taxpayer-funded campaign promo, but the real campaign tactic was promoting racism.

Humeyra Pamuk & Sarah Lynch of Reuters: "In a court case that could further strain American relations with Turkey and weigh on the sentencing of former U.S. national security adviser Michael Flynn, a criminal trial began on Monday involving a former Iranian-American business partner of Flynn. Bijan Rafiekian's trial in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Virginia, turns on whether he conspired to lobby on Turkey's behalf to try to persuade the U.S. government to extradite Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen blamed by Turkey for a failed coup in July 2016." Mrs. McC: According to Wikipedia, "Kian was a partner of ... Michael Flynn in the Flynn Intel Group and worked with the incoming Trump administration's transition team on matters relating to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence." Rachel Maddow said that in his capacity on the transition team, Rafiekian's job was to vet potential CIA officials.

Demetri Sevastopulo & Sue-Lin Wong of the Financial Times (July 10): "Donald Trump told Chinese president Xi Jinping last month that the US would tone down criticism of Beijing's approach to Hong Kong following massive protests in the territory in order to revive trade talks with China. The US president made the commitment when the two leaders met at the G20 summit in Osaka, according to several people familiar with the meeting.... Following the Trump-Xi meeting, the state department told Kurt Tong, the departing US consul general in Hong Kong, to remove several critical comments about China from his final speech in the Asian financial hub.... [T]he veteran diplomat was forced to water down the July 2 address [about democratic erosions]." --s

Hans Nichols, et al., of NBC News: "... Donald Trump has told aides and allies that he is considering removing Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross after a stinging Supreme Court defeat on adding a citizenship question to the census, according to multiple people familiar with the conversations. While Trump has previously expressed frustration with Ross, 81, in particular over failed trade negotiations, Ross' long personal relationship with the president has allowed him to keep his job." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: If Trump were firing Ross because he lied to Congress, the move would be justified. But Trump is Trump, so he will have someone fire Ross for not lying well enough.

Julia Ainsley & Tim Stelloh of NBC News: "Seventy current and former U.S. Customs and Border Protection employees are under investigation for participating in a secret Facebook group in which users joked about dead migrants and made sexist, derogatory comments about Latino Congress members, officials said Monday. Speaking to reporters, Customs officials said that 62 are current employees and eight are former employees. The office of professional responsibility is conducting the investigations, the officials said. Investigations into two employees have been completed and handed over to CBP for a disciplinary decision."

Kate Morrissey of the San Diego Union Tribune, in Stars & Stripes: "A deported Marine Corps veteran who has been unable to come back to the U.S. for more than a decade was denied entry to the country Monday morning when he asked to be let in for a scheduled citizenship interview."

Marisa Fernandez of Axios: "Larry R. Felix, the director of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing from 2006 to 2015, said the probability of releasing a concept design [for the Harriet Tubman $20 bill] in 2020 had always been low due to security and fraud risks, despite then-Treasury Secretary Jack Lew's desire for an unveiling that coincided with the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment. Felix told the [Washington] Post: 'Those announcements were not grounded in reality. The U.S. had not at the time acquired the security features to redesign and protect the notes.'... A former Obama appointee told the Post that the new $20 bill had always been scheduled for release toward 2030, consistent with the Trump administration's claims." (Also linked yesterday.)

Catherine Garcia of the Week: "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Monday night said the House of Representatives will not raise the debt ceiling unless it is combined with a budget agreement. Earlier in the day, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told reporters that if a budget deal is not reached soon, Congress will have to raise the debt ceiling before its August recess, otherwise there won't be enough money to pay the government's bills. This idea, Pelosi said, is not 'acceptable to our caucus.'"

Twitter Diplomacy. Iain Marlow & Dandan Li of Bloomberg: "A senior Chinese diplomat [based in Islamabad] deleted a tweet that prompted former U.S. National Security Adviser Susan Rice to call him a 'racist disgrace' as China's diplomats become increasingly vocal on the social media platform. In a string of messages aimed at highlighting U.S. hypocrisy in criticizing China's human rights record, Lijian Zhao ... mentioned everything from school shootings and income inequality to racial segregation, adding that if 'you're in Washington, D.C., you know the white never go' to the Southeast part of the U.S. capital, home to historically African-American areas.... 'You are a racist disgrace. And shockingly ignorant too,' she tweeted at Zhao o Sunday.... [S]he also [wrongly] addressed the Chinese ambassador to the U.S., Cui Tiankai, who recently joined Twitter: 'Ambassador Cui, I expect better of you and your team. Please do the right thing and send him home.'" --s

Macron's Bastille Day parade bested Trump's July Fourth thing with this flyboard demonstration:

The Epstein Treasures. Tom Winter & David Li of NBC News: "Agents unearthed a 'pile of cash, diamonds' and 'a passport from a foreign country' in a safe belonging to Jeffrey Epstein, prosecutors told a judge Monday during a bail hearing for the wealthy financier and accused sex trafficker. Federal authorities are arguing for Epstein to be denied bail and to remain behind bars until he's tried for sex-crime charges in acts allegedly involving underage girls.... 'The passport was issued in the name of a foreign country, it was issued in the 1980s, it is expired, it shows a picture of Jeffrey Epstein, and another name,' [the prosecutor] said, adding the passport showed Epstein's residence as Saudi Arabia." The court will rule Thursday on the bail plea. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Julie Brown of the Miami Herald: "Jeffrey Epstein's arrest is reverberating in Israel, where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his right-wing Likud party are calling for a criminal probe into former prime minister Ehud Barak's personal and business ties with the accused sex trafficker, Israeli media is reporting. Barak, 77, served as prime minister from 1999 to 2001. This month he formed a new party to run for prime minister against Netanyahu, who called for new elections in September.... Netanyahu took to social media, writing: 'Investigate Ehud Barak immediately.'... Netanyahu is at the center of three criminal investigations into alleged corruption, which he denies." --s

Denise Lavoie of the AP: "An avowed white supremacist was sentenced to life in prison plus 419 years Monday for deliberately driving his car into a crowd of anti-racism protesters during a rally in Virginia, killing one woman and injuring dozens. James Alex Fields Jr., 22, remained stoic as Circuit Court Judge Richard Moore formally imposed the recommendation of a state jury that convicted him in December of murder and maliciou wounding charges for his actions in Charlottesville on Aug. 12, 2017. Fields showed no visible emotion as victims of the car attack described severe physical and psychological injuries - broken bones, post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression - inflicted by Fields when he plowed his car into them.... Last month, Fields received a life sentence on 29 federal hate crime charges."

Salvador Hernandez of BuzzFeed News: "A federal judge ruled more than $14 million should be awarded to a woman who was barraged with anti-Semitic and threatening messages online after a neo-Nazi blogger instructed his followers to target her and her family with a 'troll storm.' The ruling was handed down Monday against Andrew Anglin, a white supremacist and publisher of the website The Daily Stormer. In his decision, judge Jeremiah Lynch found that Anglin 'acted with actual malice' when he told followers: 'Let's Hit Em Up. Are y'all ready for an old fashioned Troll Storm? Because AYO - it's time, fam.' What followed were a series of racist and sometimes threatening messages to Montana real estate agent Tanya Gersh, her co-workers, an her family, including her 12-year-old son." Mrs. McC: Gersh lives & works in Whitefish, Montana, also the home of our one-time Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke.

Jessica Glenza of the Guardian: "Prominent anti-abortion campaigners in New York developed and funded the Femm app, which collects intimate information about women's sex lives and sows doubt about hormonal birth control methods. The app has been downloaded more than 400,000 times globally, according to its developers, and appears to be the first ideologically aligned fertility tracking app [supported by the Catholic Church]. But leaders of the organization are also promoting the app and teaching the 'Femm methods' of natural family planning in places such as rural Nigeria, where women are at high risk of HIV infection, child marriage and sexual violence.... Natural family planning methods have an up to 33% failure rate per 100 women per year, according to the most recent review in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology.... Abortion is illegal in Nigeria under almost all circumstances. These laws are 'a major contributor to the country's high levels of maternal death', according to the Guttmacher Institute." --s

Sarah Boseley of the Guardian: "The number of people with not enough to eat [820 million people worldwide] has risen for the third year in a row as the population increases, after a decade when real progress was made. The underlying trend is stabilisation, when global agencies had hoped it would fall." --s

Way Beyond the Beltway

Russia. Andrey Biryukov & Evgenia Pismennaya of Bloomberg: "Vladimir Putin's 20-trillion-ruble ($300 billion) weapons-buying binge over the last decade has ... left the country's defense industry with a massive hangover of debt that officials now say is suffocating the strategic sector. The industry 'is living from hand to mouth' and doesn't have enough money to invest in vital new technology, Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov told an industry conference earlier this month.... At the core of the problem is the way Russia funds its big weapons budget. The government doesn't release the funds for new systems until they're completed, forcing producers to borrow from commercial banks.... But the rates on those loans average about 10% a year..., leaving the companies with huge debt costs." --s

BBC: "Computer pioneer and codebreaker Alan Turing will feature on the new design of the Bank of England's £50 note. He is celebrated for his code-cracking work that proved vital to the Allies in World War Two. The £50 note will be the last of the Bank of England collection to switch from paper to polymer when it enters circulation by the end of 2021. The note was once described as the 'currency of corrupt elites' and is the least used in daily transactions." Mrs. McC: Maybe the £50 will become more popular in a couple of years. (Also linked yesterday.)

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Sunday
Jul142019

The Commentariat -- July 15, 2019

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Eileen Sullivan & Julie Davis of the New York Times: "President Trump on Monday accused Speaker Nancy Pelosi of using racist comments, escalating his attacks on four first-term Democratic congresswomen to the leader of the Democratic Party. Ms. Pelosi had criticized the president on Sunday for suggesting four lawmakers of color should 'go back' to their own countries, and she said that his slogan, '"Make America Great Again" has always been about making America white again.' Mr. Trump in turn accused her of racist remarks. 'So Speaker Pelosi said, "Make America white again." That's a very racist -- that's a very racist statement. I'm surprised she'd say that,' Mr. Trump said at an event celebrating American manufacturing at the White House." ...

... Racist Tweets Okay Because Many People Agree. Claudia Koerner of BuzzFeed News: "President Trump on Monday claimed his racist tweets attacking progressive congresswomen weren't racist, and he added that he's not concerned about backlash because 'many people' hold his same views.... 'Does it concern you that many people saw that tweet as racist and white nationalists are finding common cause with you on that point?' a reporter asked. 'It does not concern me because many people agree with me,' Trump said. 'And all I'm saying, they wanna leave, they can leave. It doesn't say leave forever. It says leave.'" ...

... Heather Caygle & John Bresnahan of Politico: "House Democrats are drafting a resolution to condemn ... Donald Trump's racist tweets against Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other high-profile freshman congresswomen, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced Monday." ...

... Lindsey Changes His Mind, Embraces McCarthy's Tactics. Josh Israel of ThinkProgress: "Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) ... attacked Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) by name and others by association during a Fox News interview, claiming they were' Communists' who 'hate our own country.'... In the 1950s, Sen. Joe McCarthy (R-WI) and others famously accused American citizens of secretly being Communists -- often without evidence.... Last year, he angrily denounced the women who had come forward with allegations of sexual predation against Trump's then-Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh. 'This is as close to McCarthyism as I hope we get in my lifetime,' he charged." ...

... Inae Oh of Mother Jones: Trump "ratcheted up his [racist] attack on Monday by asserting that the congresswomen owe him an apology.... 'When will the Radical Left Congresswomen apologize to our Country, the people of Israel and even to the Office of the President, for the foul language they have used, and the terrible things they have said. So many people are angry at them & their horrible & disgusting actions!'" ...

... Steve M.: "If Trump is doing this now, 16 months before the election, how inflammatory will his rhetoric be by the fall of 2020? He thinks he's bulletproof. He thinks he's an expert on winning elections, based on a sample set of one, and is certain that this (rather than Russian interference of James Comey's incompetence) is what worked for him." ...

... Jon Allsop of the Columbia Journalism Review runs down how the MSM avoided calling Trump's tweets racist.

The Epstein Treasures. Tom Winter & David Li of NBC News: "Agents unearthed a 'pile of cash, diamonds' and 'a passport from a foreign country' in a safe belonging to Jeffrey Epstein, prosecutors told a judge Monday during a bail hearing for the wealthy financier and accused sex trafficker. Federal authorities are arguing for Epstein to be denied bail and to remain behind bars until he's tried for sex-crime charges in acts allegedly involving underage girls.... 'The passport was issued in the name of a foreign country, it was issued in the 1980s, it is expired, it shows a picture of Jeffrey Epstein, and another name,' [the prosecutor] said, adding the passport showed Epstein's residence as Saudi Arabia." The court will rule Thursday on the bail plea.

Marisa Fernandez of Axios: "Larry R. Felix, the director of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing from 2006 to 2015, said the probability of releasing a concept design [for the Harriet Tubman $20 bill] in 2020 had always been low due to security and fraud risks, despite then-Treasury Secretary Jack Lew's desire for an unveiling that coincided with the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment. Felix told the [Washington] Post: 'Those announcements were not grounded in reality. The U.S. had not at the time acquired the security features to redesign and protect the notes.'... A former Obama appointee told the Post that the new $20 bill had always been scheduled for release toward 2030, consistent with the Trump administration's claims."

Hans Nichols, et al., of NBC News: "... Donald Trump has told aides and allies that he is considering removing Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross after a stinging Supreme Court defeat on adding a citizenship question to the census, according to multiple people familiar with the conversations.While Trump has previously expressed frustration with Ross, 81, in particular over failed trade negotiations, Ross' long personal relationship with the president has allowed him to keep his job." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: If Trump were firing Ross because he lied to Congress, the move would be justified. But Trump is Trump, so he will fire Ross for not lying well enough.

BBC: "Computer pioneer and codebreaker Alan Turing will feature on the new design of the Bank of England's £50 note. He is celebrated for his code-cracking work that proved vital to the Allies in World War Two. The £50 note will be the last of the Bank of England collection to switch from paper to polymer when it enters circulation by the end of 2021. The note was once described as the 'currency of corrupt elites' and is the least used in daily transactions." Mrs. McC: Maybe the £50 will become more popular in a couple of years.

Morgan Chalfant, et al., of the Hill: "The Trump administration is moving to end asylum protections for most Central American migrants, the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security announced Monday. According to text of the rule set to publish in the Federal Register on Tuesday, asylum seekers who pass through another country before reaching the United States will be ineligible for asylum when they reach the southern border.... The Departments of Homeland Security and Justice announced the Interim Final Rule (IFR) in a joint statement Monday. Under the rule, those who have been the victims of trafficking are granted exceptions. The rule also allows exceptions for migrants passing through countries that have not signed major international refugee treaties and for migrants who have been denied asylum in the countries they traveled through.... 'The Trump administration is trying to unilaterally reverse our country's legal and moral commitment to protect those fleeing danger,' Lee Gelernt, the deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project said in a statement. [']This new rule is patently unlawful and we will sue swiftly.'" ...

     ... The AP story, by Colleen Long, is here.

~~~~~~~~~~

What? Yet Another Trump Bluff. Bobby Allyn of NPR: "President Trump's threatened roundup of undocumented immigrant families this weekend that sent migrants in many communities on edge showed few signs of materializing on Sunday, the second time rumors of a large-scale immigration enforcement operation failed to come to fruition. Instead, in the cities where rumors of mass raids swirled, many immigrants stayed inside their homes, as jitters turned typically vibrant migrant markets and commercial corridors eerily quiet. Immigrant advocates across the country, meanwhile, took to the streets to demonstrate in protest of the promised roundup.... Before Sunday, there were weekend reports of attempted arrests by ICE in New York, New Jersey and Chicago, where The New York Times reported (also linked next) that a mother and her daughters were apprehended but the family was immediately released. But those actions appeared to be part of routine enforcement activity, not connected to a massive raid operation." ...

... Caitlin Dickerson, et al., of the New York Times: "Only a handful of arrests appeared to take place, and they were reported in just a few cities. That was much different than the nationwide show of force that had originally been planned, in which Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were expected to fan out in unison on Sunday morning across immigrant communities in major cities. But the authorities said that more arrests would follow through the week. The plans for the operation were changed at the last minute because of news reports that had tipped off immigrant communities about what to expect, according to several current and former Department of Homeland Security officials. Instead of a large simultaneous sweep, the authorities created a secondary plan for a smaller and more diffuse scale of apprehensions to roll out over roughly a week." Mrs. McC: It wasn't just "news report that ... tipped off immigrant communities"; it also was Donald Trump.

Bianca Quilantan & David Cohen of Politico: "... Donald Trump on Sunday called out progressive Democratic congresswomen in xenophobic terms, saying: 'Why don't they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.'... While the president didn't mention them by name in his tweets, it appears he was attacking Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), a native of Somalia, and possibly Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), whose family is Palestinian [Mrs. McC: Tlaib was born in Detroit]. Both have been outspoken when it comes to Trump's administration and the conditions of migrant detention centers on the border. 'So interesting to see "Progressive" Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful Nation on earth, how our government is to be run,' the president wrote on Twitter." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Katie Rogers & Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "Broadly, Mr. Trump's attack was meant for members of the so-called squad, a group engaged in an existential and generational war of words with Ms. Pelosi: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ayanna S. Pressley of Massachusetts.... Only one of the women, Ms. Omar, who is from Somalia, was born outside the United States. Ms. Ocasio-Cortez was born in the Bronx to parents of Puerto Rican descent. Ms. Pressley, who is black, was born in Cincinnati and raised in Chicago. And Ms. Tlaib was born in Detroit to Palestinian immigrants.... Mr. Trump's attack came after days of Fox News coverage that centered on Ms. Omar.... 'Like some of my Democratic colleagues, I'm young, from an immigrant family, also very critical of Trump,'[Rep. Brendan] Boyle [D-Pa.] wrote on Twitter. 'Funny thing though, he never tells me to "go back where I come from." Hmm I wonder why?'... He is white." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

     ... Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. So this is a sentence that Rogers & Fandos wrote: "His message was immediately seized upon by Democrats, who called it a racist trope." Yastreblyansky was not favorably impressed. AND Oliver Willis points out, "here's the ny times cleaning up trump's racism. his racism isn't racist. its just that democrats *called it* racism." AND Scott Lemieux in LG&$: "I wonder how racist Trump would have to be for Times reporter to just call the statement racist...."

... Matt Stieb of New York, on the other hand, does not mince words: "President Trump launched a white nationalist-themed attack on Sunday against four Democratic congresswomen of color who have been outspoken critics of his administration's war on immigrants and attention-earning proponents of more progressive government policies. The attack deployed one of the most obnoxious clichés of racist and xenophobic hate speech: telling an immigrant or descendent of immigrants to 'go back to your country.'" ...

     ... Justin Wise of the Hill: "Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Sunday condemned President Trump for telling a group of progressive lawmakers to go back to where they came from, saying the 'xenophobic' comments reaffirmed that Trump's plan is about 'making America white again.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Jonathan Lemire & Calvin Woodward of the AP: "Following a familiar script, Republicans remained largely silent after Trump's morning broadsides against the four women. But the president's nativist tweets caused Democrats to set aside their internal rifts to rise up in a united chorus against the president.... The attacks may have been meant to widen the divides within the Democrat caucus.... Instead, the president's tweets, which evoked the trope of telling black people to go back to Africa, brought Democrats together.... Trump appeared unbowed Sunday night when he returned [from golfing at his Virginia club] to Twitter to say it was 'so sad' to see Democrats sticking up for the women. 'If the Democrat Party wants to continue to condone such disgraceful behavior,' he tweeted, 'then we look even more forward to seeing you at the ballot box in 2020!'" ...

... Charles Blow of the New York Times: "On Sunday morning, the same day that the Trump administration earlier announced it would conduct raids to round up undocumented immigrants, Trump weighed in again on the conflict between four female freshmen congresswomen and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, tweeting a series of three of the most racist tweets he could produce[.]... The country Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib and Pressley 'originally came from' is this one. They were born in America. Omar was a refugee from Somalia. But, this is the most important fact: They aren't white, and they are women. They are 'other' in the framing of the white nationalists.... We are watching a very dark chapter in this nation's history unfold in real time. We are watching as a president returns naked racism to the White House. And we are watching as fellow citizens -- possibly a third of them -- reveal to us their open animus for us through their continued support of him." ...

... Goldie Taylor of the Daily Beast: “Trump's repugnant rebuke of American values did not come out of thin air. It unfolded days after 'The Squad' travelled with a delegation of congressional democrats to tour detention facilities in border states. What they found was deplorable. Reports of rampant abuse and neglect filled the airwaves, leading Trump to again dismiss accurate coverage as 'fake news.' Rather than focus on improving basic conditions and getting to work on bi-partisan, comprehensive reforms, the president basically said if immigrants didn't like how they were being treated, they should stay in their own country.... His words Sunday were not racially 'charged,' 'fueled,' or 'tinged.' They were unapologetically racist. And, if you support him, so are you." ...

... Peter Baker of the New York Times reprises some of Trump's greatest racist hits. (Of course he misses quite a few since he's writing a newspaper story, not a book.) "His attack on the Democratic congresswomen came on the same day his administration was threatening mass roundups of immigrants living in the country illegally. And it came just days after he hosted some of the most incendiary right-wing voices on the internet at the White House and vowed to find another way to count citizens separately from noncitizens despite a Supreme Court ruling that blocked him from adding a question to the once-a-decade census.... His assumption that the House Democrats must have been born in another country -- or that they did not belong here if they were -- fits an us-against-them political strategy that has been at the heart of Mr. Trump's presidency from the start.... 'Trump has not only always been a racist, but anyone around him who denies it, is lying,' [Jack] O'Donnell..., the former president of Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City..., said on Sunday. 'Donald Trump makes racist comments all the time....' Mr. Trump, he said, regularly trafficked in racial stereotypes.... 'White people are Americans to Trump; everyone else is from somewhere else,' Mr. O'Donnell said. 'He simply denies the reality of how we all immigrated to the United States.'" ...

... Annals of "Journalism," Ha Ha Ha. Tommy Christopher of Mediaite: "The hosts of Fox & Friends Sunday were greatly amused by Trump's tweets, reading them aloud and laughing audibly." Includes video.

Who Let the Trump Organization off the Hook? Mrs. McCrabbie: Josh Marshall of TPM is very good at conspiracy theories. The difference between his theories & those floated by the wingnut crowd is that Marshall's (a) make sense, (b) are based on bits & pieces of suggestive evidence, so (c) sometimes prove to be true. In a post published Sunday, Marshall provides evidence for a conspiracy theory that immediately came to my mind when I read that the Southern District of New York had decided not to bring charges (story also linked Saturday) against the Trump Organization for obvious campaign finance violations: that Big Bill Barr put his big fat thumb on the scale. Marshall runs a timeline & finds that right before Barr was confirmed, SDNY investigators requested interviews with Trump Org officials, but then they never conducted the interviews, according to the CNN report. Marshall writes, "... Bill Barr was sworn in about exactly five months ago -- which seems to be roughly the time of the last contact between the US Attorney's office and executives of the Trump Organization." So now, apparently without doing any investigating, they're dropping the case. Coincidence? Uh, no. Congress should investigate.

Harry Howard of the Daily Mail: "Britain's former ambassador to the U.S. vouched for the credibility of Christopher Steele, the author of the explosive dossier detailing Donald Trump's alleged ties to Russia. Sir Kim Darroch, who quit his post after leaked diplomatic cables revealed his outspoken criticism of President Trump's administration and personality, backed the former MI6 spy when asked by a U.S. official." Mrs. McC: Last week, Trump read (and retweeted) a tweet from Lindsey Graham which Graham -- who was friendly with Darroch -- characterized as a compliment: "Ambassador @KimDarroch always understood the strength of President Trump and referred to him as the 'Terminator' who is indestructible and will most likely be reelected." (What Darroch actually wrote was, "Trump may emerge from the flames, battered but intact, like Schwarzenegger in the final scene of the Terminator.") This supposed "compliment" caused Trump to tack back & wish Darroch well. I guess he'll take that back now & start blaming Darroch for the "Russia hoax."

What's Wrong with These People? Oh. They're Sociopaths. Kevin Fitzpatrick of Vanity Fair: "Speaking with Sunday Morning Futures host Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business Network, Senator Lindsey Graham vehemently disagreed with humanitarian concerns raised by Vice President Mike Pence's recent tour of a migrant detention facility in Texas. 'I don't care if they have to stay in these facilities for 400 days, we're not going to let those men go that I saw,' said Graham. 'It would be dangerous.' Graham was referring to now-viral footage of Pence's tour, which saw the vice president blithely overlooking a fenced room filled to capacity with migrants protesting unsanitary conditions. Pence subsequently claimed over Twitter that the men 'were in a temporary holding area because Democrats in Congress have refused to fund additional bed space,' and derided CNN for allegedly 'ignoring the excellent care being provided to families and children' in a separate facility.... Donald Trump likewise tweeted on Sunday that 'Friday's tour showed vividly, to politicians and the media, how well run and clean the children's detention centers are. Great reviews!'... Graham, meanwhile, emphasized that the facility was 'overwhelmed,' and claimed 'all of [the detained migrants] broke our law.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Sophie Weiner of Splinter: "That's right: Graham is casually implying that he can somehow tell the men he saw crammed into a cage were 'dangerous,' based on nothing other than the fact that they crossed the border, a misdemeanor on par with failing to appear in court or public intoxication." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Apparently there are several verses in the Winger Bible that teach as an article of faith that Republicans can "look into a person's eyes" & judge his character. So Dubya tells us he could see Putin's soul; Acting Border Patrol chief Mark Morgan claims he can look into an immigrant child's eyes and tell he will grow up to be an MS-13 gangster; and now Loathsome Lindsey says he can tell that men who have been locked in overcrowded cages for more than 40 days with no place to lie down & sleep are "dangerous." You know, if you locked me up cheek-by-jowl with a few hundred people who, like me, hadn't showered in more than a month or slept in a bed or brushed their teeth or were otherwise allowed any normal creature comforts, I might be "dangerous," too.

Maggie Miller of the Hill: "Lawmakers are zeroing in on the potential for foreign cyber attacks to take down the U.S. electric grid, with members in both chambers pushing hearings and a flurry of bills to address the issue. Congressional interest in the issue is growing following reports that Iran has stepped up its cyber attacks against U.S. critical infrastructure, and as Trump administration officials cite threats from Russia and China against the electric grid." ...

... Spencer Kimball of CNBC: "Con Edison apologized on Sunday for a blackout that left 72,000 customers without power for hours in large parts of Manhattan, but the root cause of the outage remained unclear. The power failure began after a 'significant electrical transmission disturbance' impacted multiple circuits,' according to a company statement. Con Edison said the blackout was not due to a power overload.... Mayor Bill de Blasio said Sunday that the blackout was not caused by an act of terrorism. 'This was not a cyber attack and this was not an act of physical terrorism,' de Blasio said[.]" ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Until further notice, I'll accept the non-explanation, BUT Amy Plitt of Curbed: "In one of those bizarre coincidences that's almost too strange to be true, the blackout that affected a large swath of Midtown Manhattan on Saturday happened on the 42nd anniversary of the massive citywide power outage of 1977.

Ian Millhiser of ThinkProgress: "A federal appeals court struck down Trump administration regulations on Friday that allow virtually any employer to exempt itself from federal rules requiring employer health plans to cover birth control. This decision is only limited cause for celebration among public health advocates. Judge Patty Shwartz, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit judge who wrote the opinion, is an Obama appointee. The two judges who joined her opinion in Pennsylvania v. President, United States of America are Clinton appointees. The Supreme Court, meanwhile, is dominated by Republicans.... Friday's victory for contraceptive care is likely to be temporary. Nevertheless, there are aspects of this case that may trouble even some Republican judges. As Judge Shwartz explains, the Trump administration bypassed the ordinary procedures agencies must nearly always follow when writing new regulations. It also wrote those regulations far more expansively than even a broad reading of federal 'religious liberty' laws could permit."

Presidential Race 2020

Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Inquirer: "She had them at 'hello.' No, seriously. After applauding performatively for anti-Trump red meat tossed out by New York Sen. Kirsten Gillbrand ... and former Cabinet secretary Julian Castro..., more than 3,000 politically left activists at the Convention Center went wild the instant that Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren took her first stride onto the Netroots Nation stage.... With her slam-dunk performance Saturday, Elizabeth Warren became president ... of the American progressive movement, anyway.... The current frontrunner, former Vice President Joe Biden, whose national headquarters is just a few blocks away in Center City, chose instead to campaign in New Hampshire rather than face what might have been tough questioning of his more moderate stances." (Also linked yesterday.)

Ed Kilgore of New York breaks down the "electability" factors that pundits attribute to Joe Biden & finds them all flawed.

Beyond the Beltway

Patricia Mazzei of the New York Times: "A political crisis engulfed Puerto Rico over the weekend, prompting the departure of two senior members of the government and threatening Gov. Ricardo A. Rosselló, who found himself increasingly isolated in office and no longer supported by leaders of his own [New Progressive] party. Mr. Rosselló's administration was rocked by the publication of a trove of derisive messages sent by the governor and some of his cabinet members and top aides in a private chat on the messaging app Telegram. The messages mocked political foes and allies alike, often with profanity. On Saturday, the governor tried to contain the fallout of the rapidly unfolding scandal by announcing that his chief financial officer and secretary of state had stepped down over their participation in the chat. But the high-profile exits proved insufficient to quell the widespread furor on the island that mushroomed in the hours after 889 pages of Telegram messages were published by Puerto Rico's Center for Investigative Journalism. Protesters gathered outside the governor's mansion, La Fortaleza, in San Juan late into the night on Saturday and demanded Mr. Rosselló's resignation, less than 18 months before the end of his term."

News Lede

CNN: "Communities in Louisiana are taking the first steps toward recovery after Hurricane Barry made landfall in the state as a Category 1 storm Saturday before being downgraded to a tropical storm.... Barry -- which weakened to a tropical depression Sunday as it moved slowly north across Louisiana and into Arkansas -- had put Louisiana on high alert for much of the weekend with a threat of epic flooding. Much of that threat failed to materialize. New Orleans, in particular, did not see the catastrophic storm surges that had been feared.... But the storm did dump significant rain on already inundated parishes, causing flooding, and authorities still warn that more water could be on the way.... Barry is forecast to produce an additional 3 to 6 inches of rain from the lower Mississippi River Valley through portions of Arkansas, west Tennessee and northwest Mississippi, said CNN meteorologist Michael Guy. Some areas in this region could see storm totals upward of 15 inches by the time the remnants of Barry push into the Ohio Valley by midweek."

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