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The Commentariat -- May 28, 2019
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Edward Helmore of the Guardian: "A new book from Fire and Fury author Michael Wolff says special counsel Robert Mueller drew up a three-count obstruction of justice indictment against Donald Trump before deciding to shelve it -- an explosive claim which a spokesman for Mueller flatly denied. The stunning revelation is contained in Siege: Trump Under Fire, which will be published a week from now, on 4 June. It is the sequel to Fire and Fury, Wolff's bestseller on the first year of the Trump presidency which was published in 2018.... In an author's note, Wolff states that his findings on the Mueller investigation are 'based on internal documents given to me by sources close to the Office of the Special Counsel'."
The Embarrassing Guest, Ctd. Annie Karni of the New York Times: "Mr. Trump traveled almost 7,000 miles to become the first foreign leader to meet with Emperor Naruhito since his enthronement this month. The president's closest ally on the world stage, [Prime Minister Shinzo] Abe, regaled him with golf, a sumo tournament, a cheeseburger lunch and a robatayaki dinner, hoping to cement what the prime minister described as their 'unshakable bond.' Throughout his visit, though, Mr. Trump acted like a man who could never be fully present. From start to finish, his stay in Japan was defined more by his focus on politics at home than diplomacy abroad, expressed as a running refrain posted online seemingly every time he was left alone with his screens. From his particular fixation on Mr. Biden to his constant castigation of Democrats over all, Mr. Trump underlined the reality that his 'unshakable bond' was with his Twitter megaphone. It was evident that his main interest was not where his hosts had gone to such lengths to direct it -- on security and trade in Asia -- but instead was on fighting with his perceived political enemies in Washington. American officials in the past have made a point of leaving domestic politics behind when traveling abroad."
Kevin Breuninger of CNBC: "Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao has held onto her shares of Vulcan Materials, a construction company she promised to divest from more than a year earlier, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday. Vulcan, the U.S.′ largest supplier of sand and gravel used in paving and building, has seen its stock price rise more than 12% since April 2018, when Chao said she would cash out her shares, according to a 2017 government ethics agreement. Chao's shares have risen in value by more than $40,000 since the month she said she would divest them, the Journal reported, citing corporate and government filings."
Kate Smith of CBS News: "The last remaining abortion clinic in Missouri says it expects to be shut down this week, effectively ending legal abortion in the state. In a statement to be released later Tuesday, Planned Parenthood said Missouri's health department is 'refusing to renew' its annual license to provide abortion in the state. If the license is not renewed by May 31, Missouri would become the first state without a functioning abortion clinic since 1973 when Roe v. Wade was decided. Planned Parenthood would still be able to provide non-abortion health services for women in Missouri. Planned Parenthood said it plans to sue the state 'in order to try to keep serving Missouri women.'"
Megan Graham of CNBC: "Netflix says it will continue to film in Georgia amid controversy surrounding the state's passage of an abortion law forbidding termination of a pregnancy after an indication of a heartbeat. But the company said it would rethink its investment in Georgia should the bill go into effect. The statement comes as some in the film and TV industry have said they will boycott working in the state because of the law."
Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld an Indiana state law that required fetal remains to be buried or cremated. But it sidestepped a larger abortion question, turning down an effort to reinstate the law's strict abortion limits. The court's decision, issued without briefing on the merits or oral arguments, was unsigned and just three pages long.... In the second part of the case, an appellate court had struck down a provision of the law that banned abortions being sought solely because of a fetal characteristic like sex or disability. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor said they would have denied review of both issues in the case. The case, Box v. Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky, No. 18-483, had been closely watched because it could have given the Supreme Court its first chance to consider the constitutionality of a state law restricting abortion since Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh replaced Justice Anthony M. Kennedy last year.... The Indiana law was enacted in 2016 and signed by Gov. Mike Pence...."
Nicole Guadiano & Caitlin Emma of Politico: "The Supreme Court declined on Tuesday to hear a case challenging a Pennsylvania school district's bathroom policy allowing transgender students to use bathrooms of their choice. The conservative Alliance Defending Freedom represented a group of students in the case, Doe v. Boyertown Area School District, alleging that the district's policy violates student privacy. ADF has represented students and school districts in similar lawsuits across the country. The Supreme Court's decision leaves standing the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals unanimous ruling last year that the Pennsylvania school district can continue allowing transgender students to use bathrooms that align with their gender identity. The court later revised its ruling, toning down language that said federal law protects that right."
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Of Course Trump Was an Embarrassing Guest. Annie Karni & Katie Rogers of the New York Times: At a joint press conference with Donald Trump, Japan's PM Shinzo "Abe declared that the friendship and alliance had been further cemented by a day on the golf course, inside the sumo arena and at a robatayaki dinner with their spouses. He said that he and Mr. Trump were 'completely on the same page' on issues like trade and North Korea. But Mr. Trump, after praising Japan's hospitality and ancient culture, as well as Mr. Abe's friendship, made it clear that he was there to put America, and in some cases his own grievances, first. During the 40-minute news conference, Mr. Trump again shrugged off North Korea's recent tests of short-range ballistic missiles, which, if fired at Japan, could kill thousands of civilians.... The president also bristled upon mention of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a hallmark of the Obama administration from which Mr. Trump withdrew the United States early in his presidency.... Additionally, Mr. Trump continued to nurse domestic grievances in front of his Japanese guests, taunting his Democratic enemies and reprising his denunciation of the special counsel's Russia investigation.... The president refused to back down from a Twitter post a day earlier in which he took aim at Joseph R. Biden...." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Anita Kumar of Politico: "... Donald Trump is isolating himself from allies and even his own advisers on North Korea, eager to insist that his denuclearization efforts will be successful going into a 2020 re-election bid. The widening gap was starkly apparent Monday morning, when Trump publicly disagreed with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during a joint press conference when asked about recent North Korean missile tests. Abe had previously [said] the tests of several short-range ballistic missiles ... violated a United Nation Security Council resolution, echoing language that Trump's own national security adviser, John Bolton, had used on Saturday. But the president on Monday, at the end of his short trip to Japan to meet the new emperor, insisted that he was not 'personally' bothered by the tests and was 'very happy with the way it's going' in his efforts to engage North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Notably, Trump said he did not think the tests violated the U.N. resolution." ...
... digby: "At some point, quite soon, allies like Japan are going to have to make other arrangements. They cannot afford to count on the US. Look what we've put in charge."
Luke Barnes of ThinkProgress: "More than seventy former senior national security officials, including retired admirals, generals and ambassadors, have written an open letter to President Donald Trump urging restraint towards Iran as tensions ratchet up again in the Middle East. The letter ... was first published on the website War on the Rocks and was coordinated by the American College of National Security Leaders[.]" --s (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
** Trump Attacks Earth. Coral Davenport & Mark Landler of the New York Times: "... after two years spent unraveling the [environmental] policies of his predecessors, Mr. Trump and his political appointees are launching a new assault. In the next few months, the White House will complete the rollback of the most significant federal effort to curb greenhouse-gas emissions, initiated during the Obama administration. It will expand its efforts to impose Mr. Trump's hard-line views on other nations, building on his retreat from the Paris accord and his recent refusal to sign a communiqué to protect the rapidly melting Arctic region unless it was stripped of any references to climate change. And, in what could be Mr. Trump's most consequential action yet, his administration will seek to undermine the very science on which climate change policy rests.... The attack on science is underway throughout the government."
Phil McCausland of NBC News: "The Trump administration's ban on goods produced by a Chinese tech giant would ... [adversely affect] rural cell service providers across the U.S., [who] are almost entirely dependent on the company, Huawei, which produces inexpensive wireless communications equipment. These small telecom companies now face billions of dollars in costs or the end of their businesses entirely after the Trump administration effectively banned the Chinese company last week over spying accusations. It is a prospect that could leave vast swaths of rural America with no cell service. In response, a bipartisan group of senators proposed legislation that would create a pool of $700 million to help local carriers replace their technology." ...
... It's a Series of Tubes. David Sanger of the New York Times: "... even if Mr. Trump is successful in isolating Huawei, billions of bits of data will flow through undersea fiber-optic lines -- many of which its subsidiary Huawei Marine is laying -- and through satellites connecting the two competing internet environments.... American intelligence officials and telecommunications executives and experts have begun to concede that the United States will be operating in a world where Huawei and other Chinese telecom companies most likely control 40 to 60 percent of the networks over which businesses, diplomats, spies and citizens do business.... So far, despite threats from the United States that any allies that side with Huawei and China will be cut off from American intelligence, man are trying desperately to straddle the wall."
Jordyn Phelps of ABC News reports on Trump's plans to "commandeer" Independence Day celebrations in Washington, D.C. Mrs. McC: The day is a little more than five weeks away, and naturally, even though "the administration said it's been engaged in months of planning for the event," nothing is finalized. So another slap-dash "plan" to aggrandize the President*.
Masha Gessen of the New Yorker is not impressed with Nancy Pelosi's policy of slow-walking impeachment: "... the premise of the argument that Trump is digging his own grave by doing more Trump is that the amount of Trump we have observed since January, 2017, is not yet enough to take action.... The logic is that the public must be shown how unfit Trump is to be President. As though the public hasn't seen enough -- as though, indeed, what the public has seen so far is a Presidency that we can live with. Worse, Pelosi's tactics, apparently designed to expose Trump's unfitness, affirm the Trumpian style of politics: vulgar, cruel, and value-free. Pelosi has become Trump's personal troll."
Nick Visser of the Huffington Post: "Lynne Patton, a regional administrator for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, wrote last week that she may have broken a federal law meant to prevent officials from politicizing their government positions, but said that ... she 'honestly' didn't care. 'Just retweeted this amazing tweet from both of my Twitter accounts -- professional and personal,' Patton wrote on Facebook last week, pointing to a message that championed her boss, HUD Secretary Ben Carson, but was critical of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.). 'It may be a Hatch Act violation. It may not be.'... CREW has singled out Patton for violating the Hatch Act before, including an instance in April when the official displayed Trump campaign material in her government office. The group notes that Patton is currently under investigation by the Office of Special Counsel for using her official Twitter account for partisan activity." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Visser forgot to mention that Patton, despite being a scofflaw, is highly-qualified to be a HUD administrator, having previously worked as Eric Trump's wedding planner. She also served as a GOP prop during Michael Cohen's House testimony in February, called into the committee room not to testify but to Stand Silently While Black after Cohen described Donald Trump as a racist.
Off with Their Heads. Regina Zilbermints of the Hill: "Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said on Sunday that statements by FBI agents investigating President Trump sounded 'an awful lot like a coup, and it could well be treason.'... White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in a separate interview on Sunday that the Trump administration 'already' knows that there was a high level of corruption at the FBI. 'We already know that there was an outrageous amount of corruption that took place at the F.B.I. They leaked information. They lied. They were specifically working trying to take down the president, trying to hurt the president,' Sanders said on NBC's 'Meet The Press.'"
GOP Senators Vow to Undermine Impeachment Trial. Alexander Bolton of the Hill: "GOP senators say that if the House passes articles of impeachment against President Trump they will quickly quash them in the Senate, where Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has broad authority to set the parameters of a trial. While McConnell is required to act on articles of impeachment, which require 67 votes -- or a two-thirds majority -- to convict the president, he and his Republican colleagues have the power to set the rules and ensure the briefest of trials. 'I think it would be disposed of very quickly,' said Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.)."
AFP: "As nuclear explosions go, the US 'Cactus' bomb test in May 1958 was relatively small -- but it has left a lasting legacy for the Marshall Islands in a dome-shaped radioactive dump.... The US military filled the bomb crater on Runit island with radioactive waste, capped it with concrete, and told displaced residents of the Pacific's remote Enewetak atoll they could safely return home. But Runit's 45-centimetre (18-inch) thick concrete dome has now developed cracks. And because the 115-metre wide crater was never lined, there are fears radioactive contaminants are leaching through the island's porous coral rock into the ocean. The concerns have intensified amid climate change. Rising seas, encroaching on the low-lying nation, are threatening to undermine the dome's structural integrity." --s (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Taylor Romine & Mimi Sun of CNN: "... artist Dano Wall ... has created a stamp that can be used to superimpose [abolitionist Harriet] Tubman's image over President Andrew Jackson's portrait. Wall created the stamp in 2017 with the intent of getting Tubman on the bill as soon as possible. In February of that year, he gave about 100 stamps to his friends before opening an Etsy shop to sustain the costs. But the stamp has soared in popularity in the last week after Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Wednesday during a House Financial Services Committee meeting that he hasn't made any decisions about the redesigning the bill. Mnuchin told the committee that decisions about the imagery on the $20 'will not be an issue that comes up until most likely 2026.'... Donald Trump previously slammed the move as 'pure political correctness.' And his administration has delayed plans to move forward with the redesign." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: I thought it was illegal to "deface" -- or in the case "reface" -- U.S. currency, but apparently not if you don't touch the numbers or advertise on them.
"When a Traffic Ticket Costs $13,000." Emily Dindial & Ronald Lampard in a New York Times op-ed: "... millions of drivers across the country have had their licenses suspended -- taking away their ability to drive to work, school, the grocery store or the doctor -- essentially because they are poor.... The criminal justice system too often produces a self-perpetuating cycle, particularly for the poorest people, who can't pay fines or hire lawyers to make charges go away. In 39 states, you can lose your driving privileges if you're unable to pay a court fine or fee, for things as minor as a traffic violation. But a bipartisan effort is growing to end the fundamentally unjust practice of wealth-based suspensions.... A handful of states, including [Montana,] California, Idaho, Maine, Mississippi and Virginia..., have recently stopped suspending driver's licenses for unpaid debt." Read on. Mrs. McC: This is something I alluded to last week.
Donie O'Sullivan & Paul Newton of CNN: "Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg will not attend a hearing in Ottawa later this week, despite receiving summonses from the Canadian parliament, Facebook confirmed on Monday. The decision could result in the executives being held in contempt of parliament, the senior Canadian politician who sent the summons told CNN. Both executives received formal requests from the Canadian Parliament earlier this month tied to a gathering of an international committee examining Silicon Valley's impact on privacy and democracy. Zuckerberg and Sandberg have testified before the United States Congress on the subject. Facebook said is it sending Kevin Chan, its head of public policy for Facebook Canada, and Neil Potts, its director of public policy, to the meeting instead." Mrs. McC: Sorry, Canada, you're a crappy little country & you just don't rate a visit from Fakebook's top dogs.
Daisuke Wakabayashi of the New York Times: "High-tech companies have long promoted the idea that they are egalitarian, idyllic workplaces. And Google, perhaps more than any other, has represented that image, with a reputation for enviable salaries and benefits and lavish perks. But the company's increasing reliance on temps and contractors has some Google employees wondering if management is undermining its carefully crafted culture. As of March, Google worked with roughly 121,000 temps and contractors around the world, compared with 102,000 full-time employees, according to an internal document obtained by The New York Times." P.S. You can be fired in a nanosecond if you don't accept your boss's sexual advances.
Olaf Storbeck of the Financial Times (May 22): "A software glitch at Deutsche Bank has for almost a decade prevented some potentially suspicious transactions from being flagged to law enforcement authorities, Germany's biggest bank has discovered.... Concerns about Deutsche's internal controls were heightened this week when the New York Times reported that the bank decided not to report to regulators potentially suspicious transactions on the accounts of Donald Trump and ... Jared Kushner that were flagged by an employee in 2016 and 2017." --s (Mrs. McC Note: The link is at the word "glitch" in the text. If you're not an FT subscriber, you can't get there from here.) (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Beyond the Beltway
Indiana. Claudia Koerner of BuzzFeed News: "An Indiana man who plead[ed] guilty to defacing a synagogue with Nazi symbolism detailed to federal agents his road to radicalization, including meeting with members of the far-right group Identity Evropa and being inspired by the writings of a former Breitbart editor and the Nazi propaganda site Stormfront. Nolan Brewer, 21..., plead[ed] guilty last week to conspiring to violate the civil rights of Congregation Shaarey Tefilla. He was sentenced to three years in prison.... Brewer told FBI agents he wanted to 'scare the hell out of them [the Jewish congregants],' prosecutors said, and send 'a message of like, get out I guess.'"
Texas. James Barragán & Lauren McGaughy of the Dallas Morning News: "Interim Secretary of State David Whitley - who oversaw a botched investigation that questioned the citizenship of nearly 100,000 Texas voters - is officially out of a job. Gov. Greg Abbott appointed Whitley, a former top aide, to the position in December after the previous secretary of state resigned. But just before lawmakers finished the 2019 session Monday afternoon without confirming him, the embattled elections chief resigned 'effective immediately.'"
Way Beyond
Melissa Eddy of the New York Times: "Chancellor Sebastian Kurz of Austria and his caretaker government were ousted from power on Monday with a no-confidence vote in Parliament as the ramifications of a secretly filmed video added to the political disarray in a European country normally known for stability. After about three hours of debate, a simple majority of lawmakers stood up in a demonstration of their withdrawal of trust from Mr. Kurz, 32, making him the first Austrian leader in more than seven decades to be removed from power by his peers in Parliament. The removal of Mr. Kurz, just 17 months after he became chancellor, came despite a gain of 8 percentage points for his conservative People's Party in the European Parliament elections." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
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