;)
The Commentariat -- August 31, 2018
Afternoon Update:
Daniel Dale of the Toronto Star: "High-stakes trade negotiations between Canada and the U.S. were dramatically upended on Friday morning by inflammatory secret remarks from ... Donald Trump, after the remarks were obtained by the Toronto Star. In remarks Trump wanted to be 'off the record,' Trump told Bloomberg News reporters on Thursday, according to a source, that he is not making any compromises at all in the talks with Canada -- but that he cannot say this publicly because 'it's going to be so insulting they're not going to be able to make a deal.'... In another remark he did not want published, Trump said, according to the source, that the possible deal with Canada would be 'totally on our terms.' He suggested he was scaring the Canadians into submission by repeatedly threatening to impose tariffs. 'Off the record, Canada's working their ass off. And every time we have a problem with a point, I just put up a picture of a Chevrolet Impala,' Trump said, according to the source."
Ellen Nakashima of the Washington Post: "The top Democrats on two House committees accused Republicans on Friday of selectively leaking to the press sensitive communications that could put a 'confidential human source' at risk. Rep. Elijah E. Cummings (D-Md.), ranking Democrat on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and his counterpart on the Judiciary Committee, Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), also accused Republicans of 'cherry-picking' portions of emails and text messages between former British spy Christopher Steele and Justice Department official Bruce Ohr to bolster a narrative that they were part of a conspiracy to undermine the Trump campaign in 2016. The Democrats' concerns, outlined in a letter to Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) and Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), arose out of an interview with Ohr that Republican members of the two panels conducted on Tuesday. The Justice Department originally provided the documents to the House Intelligence Committee. Some were marked 'law enforcement sensitive' because they contained details relating to a confidential source, the Democrats said.... Copies of portions of the documents have been published online by various media organizations." ...
... Eric Tucker & Chad Day of the AP: "A senior Justice Department lawyer says a former British spy told him at a breakfast meeting two years ago that Russian intelligence believed it had Donald Trump 'over a barrel,' according to multiple people familiar with the encounter. The lawyer, Bruce Ohr, also says he learned that a Trump campaign aide had met with higher-level Russian officials than [that??] the aide had acknowledged, the people said. The previously unreported details of the July 30, 2016, breakfast with Christopher Steele, which Ohr described to lawmakers this week in a private interview, reveal an exchange of potentially explosive information about Trump between two men the president has relentlessly sought to discredit." ...
... Natasha Bertrand of the Atlantic: "Bruce Ohr. Lisa Page. Andrew Weissmann. Andrew McCabe.... Donald Trump has relentlessly attacked these FBI and Justice Department officials as dishonest 'Democrats' engaged in a partisan 'witch hunt' led by the special counsel determined to tie his campaign to Russia. But Trump's attacks have also served to highlight another thread among these officials and others who have investigated his campaign: their extensive experience in probing money laundering and organized crime particularly as they pertain to Russia.... The president has denied having any business ties to Russia, and his dream of building a Trump Tower Moscow never materialized. But his links to Russian oligarchs and mobsters from the former Soviet Union have been documented.... Trump's attacks have shone a bright light on the experts inside and outside the government who have been investigating him -- individuals who share a deep expertise in organized crime, money laundering, fraud, and racketeering."
Andrew Harris, et al., of Bloomberg: "A former associate of Paul Manafort pleaded guilty to a lobbying violation and agreed to cooperate with the U.S., giving prosecutors access to insights from a longtime international political operative whose Russian business partner has already been indicted in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe. The lobbyist, Sam Patten, 47, admitted that he failed to register in the U.S. as a foreign agent for his work lobbying on behalf of a Ukrainian political party. The nature of his cooperation isn't clear. Patten worked with Manafort and on Ukrainian campaigns, and reportedly worked on microtargeting operations with Cambridge Analytica. Mueller's office referred the prosecution to U.S. Attorney Jessie Liu in the District of Columbia...."
Mariam Khan of ABC News: "As Sen. John McCain's casket was brought into the U.S. Capitol Rotunda Friday, Republican and Democratic colleagues of past and present stood in silence as he entered the iconic building where he made his legacy one final time." Leaders then made remarks about Sen. McCain. Sen. Mitch "McConnell thanked McCain's family, including his 106-year-old mother, Roberta, who was also in attendance.... The Capitol Rotunda will remain open throughout the day so that the public can pay their respects to McCain."
Emily Mahoney of the Tampa Bay Times: "On social media on Thursday, liberal groups and activists said that Congressman Ron DeSantis, the Republican nominee for Florida governor, was moderating a massive Facebook group with racist posts and conspiracy theories. DeSantis' membership in the group was first noted by American Ledger, which is run by the liberal group American Bridge.... DeSantis denied through a spokesman on Thursday that he ever led the group or even knew he had been added to it. He 'immediately' left it when notified of the controversy, the spokesman said." Mrs. McC: I linked to the original story this week & noted its provenance. ...
... ** Who Is a Hero? Jelani Cobb of the New Yorker on Beto O'Rourke, John McCain v. Ted Cruz & Donald Trump.
*****
Philip Rucker & Scott Clement of the Washington Post: "President Trump's disapproval rating has hit a high point of 60 percent, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll that also finds that clear majorities of Americans support the special counsel's Russia investigation and say the president should not fire Attorney General Jeff Sessions. At the dawn of the fall campaign sprint to the midterm elections..., the poll finds a majority of the public has turned against Trump and is on guard against his efforts to influence the Justice Department and ... Robert S. Mueller III's wide-ranging probe. Nearly half of Americans, 49 percent, say Congress should begin impeachment proceedings that could lead to Trump being removed from office, while 46 percent say Congress should not." Thanks to Marvin S. for the lead.
Ashley Parker of the Washington Post: "Over roughly the past day, President Trump has decried the 'totally dishonest' media, with its 'fake news' and 'fake books.' He has argued that Google is biased against conservatives. And he has accused NBC News of 'fudging' the tape of an interview with him that has been available online for more than a year. The president has even declared there is no chaos in his White House, which he claimed is a '"smooth running machine" with changing parts,' despite the tumult that emanates almost daily from within its walls. Trump's assertions -- all on Twitter, and all either false or without clear evidence -- come just over nine weeks before the midterm elections that could help determine his fate and are bound by one unifying theme: All of his perceived opponents are peddling false facts and only Trump can be trusted.... The recent objects of the president's ire are a host of familiar if disparate targets -- from special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's 'Rigged Russia Witch Hunt' investigation to cable news outlets to Silicon Valley -- and reflect Trump's ongoing effort to create a reality where he is firmly at the center and, perhaps more important, the arbiter of his own Trump-favorable truth."
Doha Madani of the Huffington Post: "... Donald Trump continued to rail against the press on Thursday night during a campaign rally for Republican Senate candidate Mike Braun in Indiana. Trump, speaking to an Evansville crowd, endorsed Braun, who is running against incumbent Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.). But he kept circling back to disparaging journalists and the media. The president's comments come amid his tweet storm against CNN and only hours after reports that a California man was arrested by the FBI for threatening to kill journalists at the Boston Globe [WashPo story linked below]. 'These are just dishonest, terrible people, I'm telling you that. Not all of them, honestly, not all of them. I'd say 85 percent,' Trump told the crowd. Trump named The New York Times, CNN and NBC specifically in his complaints against the media.... Later in the rally, Trump ... pointed to the cameras ... and accused the news outlets of turning off their cameras when media criticism began. 'They can't get enough, but when I start screaming "fake news," you see those red lights go off for a little while,' Trump said. 'You know, "Excuse me, we have technical difficulties," and then they go back.' There's no evidence to support Trump's claims that networks turn off their cameras purposefully during rallies. The Indiana crowd encouraged Trump's comments, cheering at the president's jabs at journalists. At one point Trump paused so the crowd could boo at his mention of CNN." ...
Always Looking Out for the Little Guy. Gregory Korte of USA Today: "... Donald Trump said he would freeze the pay of federal workers next year, saying the nation can't afford the 2.1% raises that would have gone into effect without presidential action. In a notice to Congress Thursday, Trump cited 'serious economic conditions' in cutting pay to civilian workers. 'We must maintain efforts to put our nation on a fiscally sustainable course, and federal agency budgets cannot sustain such increases,' Trump said.... Trump's pay freeze comes even as he touts a booming economy. 'The news from the Financial Markets is even better than anticipated,' Trump tweeted just hours before announcing the pay freeze. 'More good news is coming!' Under federal law, federal employees get cost-of-living raises every new year ... unless the president determines those raises would be 'inappropriate.'" Thanks to Akhilleus Bobby Lee for the heads-up. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: This is effectively a pay cut, since federal employees' paychecks next year won't go as far as they did this year. The whole idea of COL raises is to protect federal workers from diminishing purchase power. Why can Trump do this? Because, according to Korte, "Among the factors the president can consider: ... the budget deficit"; that is the ballooning deficit caused by Trump's tax cuts for rich people like himself. ...
... Eric Yoder of the Washington Post: "The House has passed legislation making no mention of a raise, effectively endorsing the freeze that Trump originally proposed in February. The Senate has passed a competing measure allowing a 1.9 percent increase, a dispute that adds another sticking point to already delicate budget talks on Capitol Hill." ...
... Paul Krugman: "This week [Senators Chuck Schumer and Martin Heinrich] introduced a bill that would direct the Bureau of Economic Analysis, which produces estimates of gross domestic product, to produce estimates telling us who benefits from growth -- for example, how much is going to the middle class. This is a really good idea.... The Washington Center for Equitable Growth, a progressive think tank, has been campaigning for something like the Schumer-Heinrich bill.... In modern America, knowing who actually benefits from economic growth is really, truly important. So let's make finding that out, and disseminating the results, part of the government's job."
Eric Levitz of New York: "Donald Trump has threatened to withdraw the United States from the World Trade Organization. In an interview with Bloomberg, the president warned that if that institution of global governance -- which America had engineered to serve its own enlightened interests -- continued its (largely imaginary) persecution of the U.S., then America would take its business elsewhere. 'If they don't shape up, I would withdraw from the WTO,' Trump declared.... But there's a strong case that Trump already nullified the WTO last March, when he impulsively imposed across-the-board tariffs on all steel imports. At first brush, this appeared to be a gross violation of WTO rules. But the administration insisted that it was merely availing itself of the trade organization's exemption for matters of national security: After all, Americans increasing reliance on Canadian steel threatened its very survival as a sovereign state." ...
... Jack Ewing, et al., of the New York Times: "President Trump's threat to impose tariffs on imported cars is working, sending foreign leaders from Mexico to Japan racing to the negotiating table to make deals. But their offers may not satisfy a president who has shown a willingness to embrace trade tensions in an effort to extract more from American trading partners. The European Union on Thursday made one of the most significant concessions, saying it would cut its existing penalties on automobiles to zero, provided the United States dropped its own tariffs. Although the president has called for something similar, Mr. Trump said he wanted Europe to go even further. 'It's not good enough,' Mr. Trump said in an interview with Bloomberg News. 'Their consumer habits are to buy their cars, not to buy our cars.'... Mexico, too, has been willing to deal.... Canadian officials responded [to a deal cut between Mexico & the U.S.] by cutting short a trip to Europe and rushing to Washington, where they are working to reach an agreement."
John Micklethwait, et al., of Bloomberg: "... Donald Trump insisted Thursday he properly honored John McCain following his death but wouldn't say whether he thought the Arizona Republican would have made a better president than Barack Obama. Trump ordered White House flags raised to full staff the day after McCain's death, angering many Americans and prompting a letter from the nation's largest veterans group asking him to keep the flags at half staff until the senator's burial, an honor that has been bestowed on some other senators who died in office. Asked if he missed an opportunity to unite the country and made a mistake, Trump disagreed. 'No, I don't think I did at all,' he said in an interview with Bloomberg News in the Oval Office. 'I've done everything that they requested....'" ...
... Jonathan Martin & Simon Romero of the New York Times: "Senator John McCain was remembered Thursday at a memorial service that evoked the one-time prisoner of war's unbreakable will, the Arizona senator’s devotion to his adopted state and the maverick Republican's willingness to break with his party to defend what he believed were his country's founding principles. While none of the friends, family members and fellow lawmakers who paid him tribute between song and scripture invoked the name of President Trump, who was not invited, they held up the political values of the man they honored to draw an unmistakable contrast. 'John understood that America was first and foremost an idea, audacious and risky, organized around not tribe but ideals,' said former Vice President Joseph R. Biden, Jr., speaking at a Baptist church here that included thousands of mourners and nearly a quarter of the Senate. Grant Woods, Mr. McCain's first congressional chief of staff and a former Arizona attorney general, was even blunter. 'He would not stand by as people try to trample the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, including the First Amendment,' said Mr. Woods, a Republican."
... CBS News: "Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina shared a close friendship with the late Sen. John McCain.... Graham said he found President Trump's response to the Arizona Republican's death 'disturbing,' with Mr. Trump ignoring reporters' questions about his passing in addition to the White House flag lapse. Graham also told 'CBS This Morning' co-host John Dickerson that while he's open to working with the president and will do 'everything' he can to help the commander-in-chief, Mr. Trump's past comments about the military hero bother him 'greatly.' 'It pisses me off to no end, and I let the president know it,' Graham said."
This Russia Thing, Etc., Ctd.
And Away We Go! Are You Going to Believe Me or Your Lying Ears? Paul Farhi of the Washington Post: "President Trump accused NBC News and its top anchor, Lester Holt, of 'fudging' elements of their interview last year in which Trump said he fired James B. Comey over his performance as FBI director, including his handling of an investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump, who made the allegation on Twitter, didn't specify what he believed was improperly altered in NBC's broadcast of the interview. He also provided no evidence for his claim.... 'What's going on at @CNN is happening, to different degrees, at other networks - with @NBCNews being the worst. The good news is that Andy Lack(y) is about to be fired(?) for incompetence, and much worse. When Lester Holt got caught fudging my tape on Russia, they were hurt badly!' It was the first time Trump has suggested any impropriety over his interview with Holt in the 15 months since it aired.... Trump's comment [to Holt] has raised questions about whether he sought to undercut and obstruct the investigation by removing the man in charge of it." (Also linked yesterday.)
Trump Rewrites Article I of the Constitution. John Micklethwait, et al., of Bloomberg: "'I don't think they can impeach somebody that's doing a great job,' Trump said Thursday in a White House interview with Bloomberg News. 'You look at the economy, you look at jobs, you look at foreign, what's going on with other countries. You look at trade deals. I'm doing a great job.... So you get elected as a Republican or a Democrat and the opposite party gets put into the House. That would mean, oh, let's impeach him. Can't do it,' Trump said. 'If you look at the definition of impeachment, that's a high bar and that would take a long time to fight that if you're doing a good job. And I'm doing a great job.'"
John Micklethwait, et al.: "... Donald Trump said Attorney General Jeff Sessions's job is safe at least until the midterm elections in November. But the president also blasted Sessions for failing to rein in what he called an 'illegal investigation' by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.... ' I just would love to have him do a great job,' Trump said Thursday in an Oval Office interview with Bloomberg News. Asked if he'd keep Sessions beyond November, he declined to comment. 'I'd love to have him look at the other side,' he said, reiterating calls for Sessions's Justice Department to investigate Democrat Hillary Clinton and the origins of the Russia probe. 'I do question what is Jeff doing,' Trump said."
Anna Beahm of al.com (the Alabama online news agency): "The president reportedly has told his aides [Jeff] Sessions is not capable of speaking on behalf of the president on television because he 'talks like he has marbles in his mouth, Politico reported. Trump also took issue with the fact that Sessons 'doesn't have the Ivy League pedigree the president prefers.' Sessions graduated from Huntingdon College in Montgomery and The University of Alabama School of Law." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Jonathan Chait: "Deep in a Politico report [linked below] about President Trump's attempt to build support for firing Attorney General Jeff Sessions ... is a striking artifact of Trumpism. The president's swelling complaints against Sessions include the fact that he 'doesn't have the Ivy League pedigree the president prefers' and that Trump 'can't stand his Southern accent.' Conservatives have spent decades depicting liberals as coastal snobs.... Trump has built a brand on attracting working-class strivers. But the relationship he cultivates is unidirectional admiration. Trump gives his supporters a lifestyle they can enjoy vicariously. He views them as suckers.... For all his vaunted populism, [Trump] is filled with contempt for average people in general and his own supporters in particular.... The most elemental feature of populist politics is to associate one's opponents with 'elite.' But Trump is unable to maintain the pose because he cannot stand the stink of the people upon him." (Also linked yesterday.)
Aaron Blake of the Washington Post: "'I am very excited about the person who will be taking the place of Don McGahn as White House Councel!' Trump tweeted [Thursday morning]. 'I liked Don, but he was NOT responsible for me not firing Bob Mueller or Jeff Sessions. So much Fake Reporting and Fake News!'... What's ... potentially troublesome -- is the idea that he just admitted he tried to fire both men.... There have been reports that McGahn threatened to resign when Trump ordered Mueller's firing. But The Washington Post's report this week on Trump rekindling the idea of firing Sessions made no mention of McGahn.... In Thursday's tweet, it is noteworthy that Trump didn't quibble with the premise that he tried to fire either or both men.... [The tweet] suggests either someone else was responsible or that Trump came to the conclusion himself...." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Two things. (1) Trump is never going to learn how to spell "counsel." (He used to spell it "council," so he's one letter closer now. Good work, Donnie! No gold star but you get a blue one. (2) This is an actual double-negative problem. I don't take it as an admission that Trump tried to fire Mueller & Sessions.
John Micklethwait, et al.: "... Donald Trump refused Thursday to say whether he knew before the 2016 election about his former lawyer's $130,000 payment to a porn star. 'I don't want to get into it because it's been covered so much,' Trump said Thursday in a White House interview with Bloomberg News. 'I can say this: There's no campaign violation whatsoever, and if you watch all of the good legal pundits you'll see that.'" ...
... Uh-oh. Jim Rutenberg & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: Donald Trump "and his lawyer at the time, Michael D. Cohen, devised a plan to buy up all the dirt on Mr. Trump that the National Enquirer and its parent company had collected on him, dating back to the 1980s, according to several of Mr. Trump's associates. The existence of the plan, which was never finalized, has not been reported before. But it was strongly hinted at in a recording that Mr. Cohen's lawyer released last month of a conversation about payoffs that Mr. Cohen had with Mr. Trump.... The move by Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen indicated just how concerned they were about all the information amassed by the company, American Media, and its chairman, David Pecker, a loyal Trump ally of two decades who has cooperated with investigators.... It is not known how much of the material on Mr. Trump is still in American Media's possession or whether American Media destroyed any of it after the campaign.... In 2016, [Mr. Pecker] kept his staff from going back through the old Trump tip and story files that dated to before Mr. Pecker became company chairman in 1999, several former staff members said in interviews with The New York Times.... Shortly after American Media completed the arrangement with [Karen] McDougal at Mr. Trump's behest..., Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen..., [began to worry]: What would happen to America Media's sensitive Trump files if Mr. Pecker were to leave the company?" (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Chris Hayes had a very good segment on this last night, but MSNBC does not yet have the video posted. Here's a pirated copy, which NBC might take down. I'll try to get up an NBC video when it becomes available. Update: MSNBC did not put up the video all day. ...
... Jeff Horwitz of the AP: "The National Enquirer has long explained its support for Donald Trump as a business decision based on the president's popularity among its readers. But private financial documents and circulation figures obtained by The Associated Press show that the tabloid's business was declining even as it published stories attacking Trump's political foes and, prosecutors claim, helped suppress stories about his alleged sexual affairs. The Enquirer's privately held parent company, American Media Inc., lost $72 million for the year ending in March.... And despite AMI chairman David Pecker's claims that the Enquirer's heavy focus on Trump sells magazines, the documents show that the Enquirer's average weekly circulation fell by 18 percent to 265,000 in its 2018 fiscal year from the same period the year before -- the greatest percentage loss of any AMI-owned publication. The slide follows the Enquirer's 15 percent circulation loss for the previous 12 months, a span that included the presidential election."
Josh Dawsey & Tom Hamburger of the Washington Post: "A letter that Rudolph W. Giuliani ... sent to Romanian officials opposing a corruption crackdown in that country has drawn the attention of the State Department and renewed questions about his continued work for foreign clients while representing the president.... [The letter] put him in opposition with the State Department, which has supported efforts to prosecute corruption in Romania.... 'Rudy Giuliani does not speak for the U.S. government on foreign policy,' [a State Department] official [said]. Giuliani said he was hired to send the letter by a global consulting firm run by former FBI director Louis Freeh. He declined to say on whose behalf Freeh's firm was working or how much he was paid." (Also linked yesterday.)
Paul Blumenthal of the Huffington Post: "If Democrats win control of the House in November they will finally have the votes to force an issue they've been hammering for nearly two years: Making ... Donald Trump disclose his tax returns. Since Trump took office, Democrats have forced 11 votes in the House of Representatives to require that the IRS hand over Trump's returns. These votes all failed because only one member of the Republican majority joined the Democrats in their request. If Democrats win 217 or more seats in the November election ― which they have a 74 percent chance to do, according to the polling aggregation site FiveThirtyEight ― they will have enough votes to get these documents." (Also linked yesterday.)
Adam Edelman of NBC News: "White House ethics lawyer Stefan Passantino is leaving the Trump administration, a senior White House official told NBC News on Thursday. His last day is Friday. Passantino -- who had been in charge of making sure White House officials complied with government ethics rules -- had helped several White House officials deal with a number of ethics controversies, including a notorious March 2017 incident in which Kellyanne Conway ... plugged the clothing line of ... Ivanka Trump, on national television. Passantino is just the latest lawyer to depart the Trump White House." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Yeah, Passantino's way of "dealing with ... ethics controversies" was to ignore them.
Karen DeYoung & Ruth Eglash of the Washington Post: "The Trump administration has decided to cancel all U.S. funding of the United Nations aid program for Palestinian refugees, part of its determination to put its money where its policy is as it seeks a recalculation of U.S. foreign aid spending and prepares its own Israeli-Palestinian peace plan. In an announcement to be made within the next several weeks, the administration plans to voice its disapproval of the way the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, or UNRWA, spends the funds and to call for a sharp reduction in the number of Palestinians recognized as refugees, dropping it from more than 5 million, including descendants, to fewer than a tenth of that number or less, comprised of those still alive from when the agency was created seven decades ago, according to officials familiar with the decision."
Erica Green of the New York Times: "Education Secretary Betsy DeVos is preparing new policies on campus sexual misconduct that would bolste the rights of students accused of assault, harassment or rape, reduce liability for institutions of higher education and encourage schools to provide more support for victims. The proposed rules, obtained by The New York Times, narrow the definition of sexual harassment, holding schools accountable only for formal complaints filed through proper authorities and for conduct said to have occurred on their campuses. They would also establish a higher legal standard to determine whether schools improperly addressed complaints.... The Trump administration's new rules will have the force of law and can go into force without an act of Congress, after a public comment period.... Advocates of victims rights condemned the proposals." (Also linked yesterday.)
Katie Benner of the New York Times: "The Justice Department lent its support on Friday to students who are suing Harvard University over affirmative action policies that they claim discriminate against Asian-American applicants, in a case that could have far-reaching consequences for the use of affirmative action in college admissions. In a so-called statement of interest, the department supported the claims of the plaintiffs, a group of Asian-Americans rejected by Harvard. They contend that Harvard has systematically discriminated against them by artificially capping the number of qualified Asian-Americans from attending the school in order to advance less qualified students of other races." (Also linked yesterday.)
Congressional Races
Amy Gardner, et al., of the Washington Post: A dilapidated "former gas station and country store on a rolling ribbon of rural highway in the Florida Panhandle, across the road from an endless vista of cotton fields, is a main character in Rep. Kyrsten Sinema's life story. The Arizona Democrat, a rising star and formidable campaigner who is giving up her House seat to run in one of the year's most-watched Senate races, lived there when she was a child after a sudden tumble out of the middle class. Sinema, now 42, talks about the experience frequently on the campaign trail, crediting those difficult years with forming her political philosophy: that people should 'work really hard and pull yourself up by your bootstraps' and be able to turn to the government for help when they are most vulnerable. It's a message she has used to position herself as a leader who can speak with authority to both disaffected voters who have had to rely on the social safety net and conservatives who oppose government aid." ...
Michael Tackett of the New York Times: "The Postal Service on Thursday said it 'deeply regrets our mistake in inappropriately releasing' the official personnel file of Abigail Spanberger, a former C.I.A. operative now running as a Democratic candidate for Congress, and requested that a Republican-aligned super PAC return the file.'We take full responsibility for this unfortunate error, and we have taken immediate steps to ensure this will not happen again,' David Partenheimer, a Postal Service spokesman, said in a statement.... The Postal Service also acknowledged the possibility of additional inappropriate disclosures.... America Rising, the Republican-aligned research group, had requested Ms. Spanberger's file under the Freedom of Information Act. After the Postal Service released the file, the group provided it to the Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC aligned with Speaker Paul D. Ryan, which then used some of the information about Ms. Spanberger's employment history for political purposes.... The Republican research firm had obtained the file in an uncharacteristically rapid fashion under the federal records law." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Wednesday night, Rachel Maddow suggested that the Trump administration was releasing secret applications of former or current national security officers for political purposes. Maddow said that the Democratic party had sent out a warning to "all candidates who have security clearances that they should be prepared for the Trump administraton to illegally leak their security clearances." Maddow repeated as fact, based partly on reporting by Spencer Ackerman of the Daily Beast, the charge that the Trump administration released Spanberger's file. We now know that is not true. USPS is an independent entity that is not part of the Trump administration. You might call Maddow's report "fake news." Of course the GOP political "research" group should never have filed a FOIA request, & Ryan's group should never have used the information when they obtained it. But Maddow also should never have accused the Trump administration of something it didn't do. After all, they do plenty of bad stuff that is worth reporting. She should issue a correction. Update: On Thursday, Maddow did not correct her Wednesday night misstatements even though she addressed at length the issue of exposing security applications.
** Michelle Goldberg: "On Tuesday, in the course of his morning rage-tweeting, Donald Trump denounced Google for having news results 'RIGGED' against him, 'so that almost all stories & news is BAD.' It was part of an escalating right-wing assault on various technology platforms, including Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, which conservatives are accusing, in timeworn fashion, of liberal bias. Trump appears to have gotten his information from the Fox Business Network host Lou Dobbs, who in turn was relying on a blog post from PJ Media titled, '96 Percent of Google Search Results for "Trump" News Are From Liberal Media Outlets.' The rub, here, is how the post defines 'liberal.' It includes a chart in which almost every mainstream, credible news organization is on the left -- not just The New York Times and The Washington Post, but Bloomberg, USA Today and The Associated Press. The chart puts Infowars, Alex Jones's conspiracy website, closer to the center than Time magazine. Essentially, conservatives want to create a world where objective information and right-wing disinformation are treated equally." Read on. ...
... Eli Rosenberg of the Washington Post: "Federal law enforcement officers arrested a man in California on Thursday after he made repeated threats of violence against the Boston Globe newspaper this month, which included echoing the catchphrase popularized by President Trump that the news media are 'the enemy of the people,' officials said.... Robert D. Chain, 68, of Encino... began making threatening calls to the newsroom immediately after the Globe's announcement [that it was]... organizing a campaign for newspapers to respond collectively to Trump's repeated attempts to demonize the media..., calling the Globe 'the enemy of the people,' lambasting 'fake news' and threatening to kill its employees. Many of the calls Chain made to the newspaper were recorded, the criminal complaint alleges. The majority came from a blocked number that officials said they traced to his home after they secured phone records from Verizon. On Aug. 13, he said over the phone, 'We are going to shoot you ... in the head,' using multiple expletives. 'Shoot every ... one of you.' And after the Globe published the coordinated editorial response..., Aug. 16, he threatened to shoot Globe staff in the head 'later today, at 4 o'clock,' the FBI said.
John Bowden of the Hill: "John Dean, who served as White House counsel during the Watergate scandal that ended Richard Nixon's presidency, is slated to testify next week at the confirmation hearing for Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.... Dean is among more than a dozen witnesses selected by Democrats on the Judiciary Committee. The former White House counsel 'will speak about the abuse of executive power' during his appearance, according to Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), the top Democrat on the panel. Kavanaugh ... faces a tough confirmation battle in the Senate amid questions over his views on whether a president can be investigated by a special counsel or held liable for criminal activity. Dean's appearance at the hearing will likely address those questions specifically, as many have drawn parallels between the ongoing special counsel investigation headed by Robert Mueller probing Russian interference in the 2016 election and the independent counsel investigation led by Archibald Cox during Watergate." ...
... Reuven Blau of the New York Daily News: "Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh wanted to cap the amount victims of 9/11 and their family members could receive from the federal government at $500,000, records obtained by the Daily News show. Kavanaugh, who served as associate White House Counsel during President George W. Bush's administration, sought to limit the federal government's liability following the terrorist attacks. Pushback from Sen. Chuck Schumer and other federal lawmakers squashed that proposal." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Linda Greenhouse: The Supreme Court [held] in Boumediene v. Bush (2008) that Guantánamo inmates had "a constitutional right -- not simply a statutory right ... to seek federal court review of the legality of their detention.... The author of the majority opinion in Boumediene was Justice [Anthony] Kennedy. The vote was 5 to 4, and the split was even more bitter than the vote count suggests." Since then, Judge Brett Kavanaugh, formerly Kennedy's law clerk, has voted with the majority in two cases that "left the promise of the Boumediene decision an empty one.... Guantánamo has always been a mirror that reflects back on ourselves. And the reflection in this instance gives us another hint of what the substitution of Brett Kavanaugh for Anthony Kennedy may mean for the future of the court and the country."
Annals of Journalism?, Ctd. John Koblin of the New York Times: "Rich McHugh, [a] producer [who worked closely with Ronan Farrow and] who recently left his job in the investigative unit of NBC News, is the first person affiliated with NBC to publicly charge that the network impeded his and Mr. Farrow's efforts to nail down the story of [Harvey] Weinstein's alleged sexual misconduct. He called the network's handling of the matter 'a massive breach of journalistic integrity.' NBC denied his characterization on Thursday, saying Mr. Farrow's work was not broadcast-ready when the reporter decided to take his reporting to The New Yorker.... Mr. McHugh, 43, described NBC as 'resistant' throughout the eight-month reporting process, a characterization disputed by the network. Last August, he said," the network ordered him not to interview a woman with a credible rape allegation against Weinstein, 'And to stand down on the story altogether.' McHuge said the order came from “the very highest levels of NBC." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Speaking of Weinstein, I kept running short of time to cover this story about sleazy Democrats (and every character whose name is highlighted in the story below is a sleazy Democrat) from earlier in the week:
... David Sirota & Jay Cassano in Capital & Main (August 29): "Last year, a political firestorm erupted when journalists revealed that Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein's lawyer David Boies gave $10,000 to Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. in the months after Vance declined to prosecute the movie producer on sexual assault charges. Now, less than a year later, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has halted an investigation into the handling of the Weinstein case just as Boies’ law firm gave Cuomo's campaign $25,000, according to state records reviewed by Capital & Main and Sludge. The controversies spotlight ongoing questions about whether law enforcement actions in New York are being inappropriately influenced by campaign donations." Mrs. McC: This is the Clinton wing of the party, and it is sleazy to the core.
News Lede
New York Times: "In a ceremony where she was to be praised by presidents and pop stars, eulogized by more than a dozen preachers, and feted with a fleet of pink Cadillacs, Aretha Franklin was celebrated on Friday as a musical titan, an empowering feminist and an American icon during a marathon goodbye that showcased a generation of talent who drew inspiration from her."
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