The Commentariat -- May 8, 2018

Afternoon Update:

Mark Landler of the New York Times: "President Trump told President Emmanuel Macron of France on Tuesday morning that he plans to announce the withdrawal of the United States from the Iran nuclear deal, according to a person briefed on the conversation. Mr. Trump's decision unravels the signature foreign policy achievement of his predecessor, Barack Obama, isolating the United States among its allies and leaving it at even greater odds with its adversaries in dealing with the Iranians. The United States is preparing to reinstate all sanctions it had waived as part of the nuclear accord -- and impose additional economic penalties as well, the person said.... Mr. Trump's decision, while long anticipated and widely telegraphed, plunges America's relations with European allies into deep uncertainty.... It also raises the prospect of increased tensions with Russia and China, which also are parties to the agreement." Mrs. McC: In other words, "Trump Threatens International Security in 2018 Campaign Move to Avoid Impeachment: Announcement at 2 pm ET." It's all about Donald. Always. ...

     ... New Lede: It's All Obama's Fault: "President Trump declared on Tuesday that he was pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal, unraveling the signature foreign policy achievement of his predecessor, Barack Obama, and isolating the United States among its Western allies. 'This was a horrible one-sided deal that should have never, ever been made,' Mr. Trump said at the White House in announcing his decision. 'It didn't bring calm, it didn't bring peace, and it never will.'"

*****

David Sanger of the New York Times: "President Trump said on Monday that he was ready to announce whether he would pull the United States out of the Iran nuclear deal, as European officials quietly indicated they had failed to convince the administration that dismantling the accord would be a huge diplomatic error. Diplomats who were familiar with the negotiations said Mr. Trump appeared inclined to scrap the deal and reimpose sanctions on Iran that were suspended in an accord reached in Vienna in July 2015." ...

     ... ** New Lede, with Steven Erlanger also on the byline: "President Trump is expected to announce on Tuesday that he is withdrawing the United States from the Iran nuclear deal, European diplomats said after concluding that they had failed to convince him that reneging on America's commitment to the pact could cast the West into new confrontation with Tehran." ...

... Michael Shear> & Ronen Bergman of the New York Times: "Now, just as President Trump appears likely to announce his decision to withdraw from the [Iran nuclear] deal, evidence has surfaced that the agreement's opponents engaged in a sophisticated effort to dig up dirt on [Benjamin] Rhodes..., a top national security aide to President Barack Obama..., and his family that continued well after the Obama administration left office. A detailed report about Mr. Rhodes, compiled by Black Cube, a private investigations firm established by former intelligence analysts from the Israeli Defense Forces, contains pictures of his apartment in Washington, telephone numbers and email addresses of members of his family, as well as unsubstantiated allegations of personal and ethical transgressions. In a separate case in 2017, the same firm was hired to gather dirt on women accusing Harvey Weinstein, the movie mogul, of multiple instances of sexual misconduct. It is unclear who hired Black Cube to prepare the report on Mr. Rhodes and a similar report on Colin Kahl, the national security adviser to Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.... The Guardian, which first published the existence of the reports on Mr. Rhodes and Mr. Kahl, said aides to Mr. Trump hired the firm, but there is no evidence ... that indicate any connection to anyone in Mr. Trump's administration." ...

Most explicit statement yet tying Trump circle and #BlackCube dirty tricks ops... @julianborger [of the Guardian]: 'our sourcing who are close to this private security firm said it was clear that, when the tasking for this went out, that the ultimate customer was the Trump team, the Trump camp.' -- Ryan Goodman, in a tweet ...

... Michelle Goldberg: "In a remotely normal America, Congress would immediately plan hearings into Black Cube.... Trita Parsi, head of the National Iranian American Council..., recently discovered, thanks to a reporter covering the Black Cube story, that he had been interviewed last year by a Black Cube operative posing as a journalist.... There are still a great many unknowns in this story, which, like so much of this administration, has a wild, dystopian implausibility.... It's grotesque that Black Cube ... target[ed] the spouses of former Obama administration officials. And if Trump's team had any role at all in using foreign spies against American citizens, it should end his presidency, even if it probably won't.... [Colin] Kahl emphasized that he has no idea who was behind the approach to his wife. But he points out that Trump officials were obsessed with him and [Ben] Rhodes; on Fox News, the former Trump aide Sebastian Gorka spoke darkly about the 'Ben Rhodes-Colin Kahl nexus.'" ...

... Ken W. suggests in today's Comments that to answer -- or further muddy -- the "great many unknowns" about the Black Cube affair, we should just ask Rudy. Seems like a plan.

This Russia Thing, Etc., Ctd.

Jonathan Lemire of the AP: "Trump has begun questioning whether [Rudy] Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, should be sidelined from television interviews, according to two people familiar with the president's thinking.... Trump also expressed annoyance that Giuliani's theatrics have breathed new life into the Daniels story and extended its lifespan. It's a concern shared by Trump allies who think Giuliani is only generating more legal and political trouble for the White House.... Trump, who has denied the affair with Daniels, was angry that Giuliani had given the impression that other women may make similar charges of infidelity.... Additionally, Trump has grown agitated in recent days by cable news replays of Giuliani's Wednesday interview with Sean Hannity, in which he first said that Trump knew about the payment but claimed it wouldn't be a campaign violation. A clearly surprised Hannity then asked, 'Because they funneled it through the law firm?' To which Giuliani responded, 'Funneled it through the law firm, and the president repaid him.' Trump snapped at both men in recent days, chiding Hannity for using the word 'funneled,' which he believes had illegal connotations, according to the people." ...

... Eliana Johnson, et al., of Politico: "The president has been griping to associates that Rudy Giuliani, his new personal attorney, has failed to shut down the Stormy Daniels hush money saga. And he has expressed frustration that Giuliani's media appearances are raising more questions than they are answering, turning the story into a days-long drama capped by the admission Sunday that the president may have made similar payments to other women.... Some aides said they expect the president to fire Giuliani if his behavior doesn't change.... In a phone interview Monday, Giuliani [told Politico.] 'If I'm not up to it, I don't know who is.... I know the Justice Department better than just about anyone.'"

CBS News: "... Rudy Giuliani ... told CBS News correspondent Paula Reid Monday afternoon that special counsel Robert Mueller's office has rejected proposals to allow Mr. Trump to answer questions from investigators in writing.... If negotiations are not successful and Mr. Trump is subpoenaed, he will fight it, Giuliani said. The case would likely end up at the Supreme Court." ...

Josh Feldman of Mediaite: "The Trump legal team is still deciding how to handle the possibility of President President Trump sitting down with Robert Mueller. Per The Wall Street Journal, the Trump legal team will make a final determination on whether to go ahead with it by next week -- May 17th.... And per the Journal, Trump's lawyers are apparently concerned about the prep process for a potential sit-down interview: 'Preparing Mr. Trump to testify would be a serious distraction to his work as president, eating into time he needs to deal with pressing global issues, Mr. Trump's lawyers contend. In an informal, four-hour practice session, Mr. Trump's lawyers were only able to walk him through two questions, given the frequent interruptions on national-security matters along with Mr. Trump's loquaciousness, one person familiar with the matter said.'"

Mallory Shelbourne of the Hill: "President Trump on Monday criticized the suggestion that he has obstructed justice in the Russia investigation, saying he is simply 'fighting back.' The Russia Witch Hunt is rapidly losing credibility. House Intelligence Committee found No Collusion, Coordination or anything else with Russia,' the president wrote on Twitter. 'So now the Probe says OK, what else is there? How about Obstruction for a made up, phony crime. There is no O, it's called Fighting Back.'... 'The 13 Angry Democrats in charge of the Russian Witch Hunt are starting to find out that there is a Court System in place that actually protects people from injustice...and just wait 'till the Courts get to see your unrevealed Conflicts of Interest!' Trump added Monday." (Also linked yesterday.)

New York Times Editors: "... let’s pause to remember what happened one year ago this week, when ... President Trump fired the F.B.I. director, James Comey. That shocking act remains the best distillation of the mind-set of this president: He considers himself answerable to no one.... He said of the firing, 'When I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said, 'You know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story.'... The day after he dumped Mr. Comey, Mr. Trump entertained top Russian officials in the Oval Office. 'I just fired the head of the F.B.I. He was crazy, a real nut job,' he told them. 'I faced great pressure because of Russia. That's taken off.' The president ... admitted, twice, that he [fired Comey] to shut down an investigation into his campaign, his top associates and possibly himself.... Like aspiring authoritarians everywhere, Mr. Trump sees law enforcement in intensely personal terms. When the law investigates you, it's a witch hunt; when it's used to punish your enemies, it's an essential tool.... Americans should remember May 9, 2017, as the beginning of one of the great tests of American democracy."

Rudy Who? Josh Lederman of the AP: "The Trump administration sought to distance itself Monday from Rudy Giuliani's dramatic public statements about Iran and North Korea, saying that ... Donald Trump's new lawyer does not speak for the president on matters of foreign policy.... Giuliani has raised eyebrows for a series of startling assertions not only about his legal strategy and the special counsel investigation, but also about global affairs and Trump's policies. That spurred widespread confusion over whether the former New York mayor, now on Trump's payroll, was disclosing information he'd been told by the president, stating U.S. government policy or merely describing his own impression of events. 'He speaks for himself and not on behalf of the administration on foreign policy,' State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauertsaid Monday.... 'We got Kim Jong Un impressed enough to be releasing three prisoners today,' Giuliani told Fox News [last week].... There has been no formal announcement by the U.S. government.... Then on Saturday, Giuliani caused another stir when he spoke to a group that supports the overthrow of Iran's government and said that the president was 'committed' to regime change in Iran.... [The Trump] administration has not called for overthrowing Iran's government."

Damian Paletta & Erica Werner of the Washington Post: "President Trump is sending a plan to Congress that calls for stripping more than $15 billion in previously approved spending, with the hope that it will temper conservative angst over ballooning budget deficits. Almost half of the proposed cuts would come from two accounts within the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) that White House officials said expired last year or are not expected to be drawn upon. An additional $800 million in cuts would come from money created by the Affordable Care Act in 2010 to test innovative payment and service delivery models. Those are just a handful of the more than 30 programs the White House is proposing to Congress for 'rescission,' a process of culling back money that was previously authorized. Once the White House sends the request to Congress, lawmakers have 45 days to vote on the plan ... through a simple majority vote. If approved by Congress, the reductions would represent less than 0.4 percent of total government spending this year.... '... President Trump and Republicans in Congress are looking to tear apart the bipartisan [CHIP], hurting middle-class families and low-income children, to appease the most conservative special interests and feel better about blowing up the deficit to give the wealthiest few and biggest corporations huge tax breaks,' Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Monday." ...

... Miriam Jordan & Ron Nixon of the New York Times: "The Trump administration announced Monday that it is dramatically stepping up prosecutions of those who illegally cross the Southwest border, ramping up a 'zero tolerance' policy intended to deter new migrants with the threat of jail sentences and separating immigrant children from their parents. 'If you cross the Southwest border unlawfully, then we will prosecute you. It's that simple,' Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in announcing a policy that will impose potential criminal penalties on border crossers who previously faced mainly civil deportation proceedings -- and in the process, force the separation of families crossing the border for months or longer.... The new policy strikes squarely at parents who have traveled with their children, some apparently with the expectation that they would face shorter periods of detention while their cases were heard. 'If you are smuggling a child then we will prosecute you, and that child will be separated from you as required by law,' Mr. Sessions said at a law enforcement conference in Scottsdale, Ariz." ...

... Melania Trolls Donald & JeffBo. Katie Rogers of the New York Times: "... Melania Trump stepped into the Rose Garden and said she would focus her official effort as first lady on teaching children to put kindness first in their lives, particularly on social media.... Mrs. Trump unveiled a program called 'Be Best,' which she said would tackle opioid abuse, social media pressures and mental health issues among young people.... Mrs. Trump's program will primarily repackage projects that already exist, including an initiative by the National Safety Council to encourage people to be proactive with talking to their doctors about opioid abuse, and guidelines distributed by the Federal Trade Commission on children's social media activity.... Mrs. Trump came up with the logo and program name herself, her aides said. Observers on social media seized on the event, noting that ... Mrs. Obama ... had delivered a speech last year urging men to 'be better.' During the 2016 campaign, Mrs. Trump took flack for a speech that appeared to be sourced, in part, from remarks Mrs. Obama made in 2008."

Louis Nelson of Politico: "... Donald Trump issued an online vote of confidence Monday for Gina Haspel, his pick to be the next director of the CIA, and chided Democrats who have been critical of her for her role in waterboarding terrorism suspects at a secret agency prison. 'My highly respected nominee for CIA Director, Gina Haspel, has come under fire because she was too tough on Terrorists,' the president wrote on Twitter. 'Think of that, in these very dangerous times, we have the most qualified person, a woman, who Democrats want OUT because she is too tough on terror. Win Gina!'" (Also linked yesterday.)

One of these men is Dr. Evil. The other is a Canadian actor. Thanks to a friend for sending the pic.Eric Lipton & Lisa Friedman of the New York Times: "... a new cache of emails offer a detailed look inside the [EPA's] aggressive efforts to conceal [Administrator Scott Pruitt's] activities as a public servant. The more than 10,000 documents, made public as part of a Freedom of Information lawsuit by the Sierra Club, show that the agency's close control of Mr. Pruitt's events is driven more by a desire to avoid tough questions from the public than by concerns about security, contradicting Mr. Pruitt's longstanding defense of his secretiveness. Time and again, the files show, decisions turn on limiting advance public knowledge of Mr. Pruitt's appearances in order to control the message. The emails, many of which are communications with Mr. Pruitt's schedulers, show an agency that divides people into 'friendly and 'unfriendly' camps.... 'The security aspect is smoke and mirrors,' said Kevin Chmielewski, Mr. Pruitt's former deputy chief of staff for operations, who is one of several former E.P.A. officials who have said that they were fired or sidelined for disagreeing with Mr. Pruitt's management practices. 'He didn't want anybody to question anything,' Mr. Chmielewski said, adding that Mr. Pruitt 'just doesn't understand what it's like to be a public figure.'... Three other current and former agency officials, who asked not to be identified because they still work for the government, expressed similar views." ...

Dear Scotty: I knocked myself out drawing that little mustache on your pic. But you don't have to fly first-class on my account. There is a difference between ridicule & death threats. That was ridicule. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbieZahra Hirji & Jason Leopold of BuzzFeed: "The Environmental Protection Agency's internal watchdog launched three investigations this year into potential threats against Scott Pruitt, the agency's administrator. All three cases were closed due to a lack of evidence that Pruitt had been seriously threatened, according to documents obtained by BuzzFeed News. One of the threats, made in March, consisted of someone drawing a mustache on Pruitt's face on the cover of Newsweek and taping the magazine inside of an elevator at an EPA building." ...

... Coral Davenport & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "Senior White House staff members are encouraging President Trump to fire Scott Pruitt.... While Mr. Trump has until now championed Mr. Pruitt, the officials say the president's enthusiasm may be cooling because of the ongoing cascade of alleged ethical and legal missteps.... Since last month's confirmation of Mr. Pruitt's deputy, the former coal lobbyist Andrew Wheeler, White House staff members say they believe that if Mr. Pruitt is fired or resigns, Mr. Wheeler will continue to effectively push through Mr. Trump's agenda to help the coal industry and roll back environmental regulations." ...

... Emily Holden & Anthony Adragna of Politico: "EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt placed a polluted California area on his personal priority list of Superfund sites targeted for 'immediate and intense' action after conservative radio and television host Hugh Hewitt brokered a meeting between him and lawyers for the water district that was seeking federal help to clean up the polluted Orange County site.... Hewitt [is] a resident of Orange County whose son James works in EPA's press office... Since then, Hewitt has been a robust defender of Pruitt, dismissing his recent controversies as 'nonsense scandals.'... Environmental advocates have worried Pruitt's efforts to identify Superfund priority sites would bypass the process set up by Congress to ensure cleanup resources are divided fairly, and that he could focus on sites seen as important to his political supporters." Mrs. McC: No kidding. Anyhow, if Sean Hannity can run the White House, I don't see why Hugh Hewitt can't run the EPA.

Tracy Jan of the Washington Post: "Fair-housing advocates planned to file a lawsuit early Tuesday against the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and HUD Secretary Ben Carson for suspending an Obama-era rule requiring communities to examine and address barriers to racial integration. The 2015 rule required more than 1,200 communities receiving billions of federal housing dollars to draft plans to desegregate their communities -- or risk losing federal funds. After nearly 50 years of inaction, the rule was seen as a belated effort by HUD to enforce the landmark civil rights legislation of the 1968 Fair Housing Act, which compelled communities to use federal dollars to end segregation in residential neighborhoods.... The lawsuit alleges Carson unlawfully suspended the 2015 rule by not providing advance public notice or opportunity for comment...."

Paul Krugman: "... conservatives hate Obamacare precisely because it works. It shows that government actually can help tens of millions of Americans lead better, more secure lives, and in so doing it threatens their low-tax, small-government ideology. But outright repeal failed, so now it's time for sabotage, which is taking place on two main fronts. One of these fronts involves the expansion of Medicaid, which probably accounted for more than half the gains in coverage under Obamacare. Now a number of Republican-controlled states are trying to make Medicaid harder to get, notably by imposing work requirements on recipients.... The other front involves trying to reduce the number of people signing up for private coverage."

Orrin Hatch Has an Unpresidented Amount of Gall. Ted Barrett of CNN: "Utah GOP Sen. Orrin Hatch said Monday it is 'ridiculous' that ailing Sen. John McCain, also a Republican, doesn't want ... Donald Trump to attend his funeral, as was reported over the weekend. 'I think that's ridiculous,' Hatch told CNN when asked about McCain's desire to keep Trump away. 'He's the President of the United States. He's a very good man. But it's up to John. I think John should have his wishes fulfilled with regard to who attends his funeral.'"

Congressional, Gubernatorial Races

There are primaries today in West Virginia, Indiana, North Carolina and Ohio. Politico reporters post a rundown of key races.

Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump intervened Monday in the West Virginia Republican Senate primary, pleading with voters a day before the election to oppose the former mine operator Don Blankenship, and suggesting that Mr. Blankenship's nomination would lead to a replay of the party's embarrassing loss last year in Alabama. Mr. Trump's decision to speak out on the race came after Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, whom Mr. Blankenship has targeted in a deeply personal manner, urged the president in a telephone call on Sunday to weigh in against the controversial former coal executive, according to a Republican official familiar with the conversation.... 'Don Blankenship currently running for Senate, can't win the General Election in your State...No way!' Mr. Trump wrote in a tweet. 'Remember Alabama. Vote Rep. Jenkins or A.G. Morrisey.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Christopher Cadelago & Darren Samuelsohn of Politico: "Trump has increasingly cautioned his party against allowing the House, and even the Senate, to fall into Democratic control, voicing fears about his certain impeachment if that happens. 'We have to keep the House because if we listen to Maxine Waters, she's going around saying, "We will impeach him,"' Trump said at a recent rally in Michigan, referring to the Democratic congresswoman from California.... Trump appears to believe victory in the November midterms depends on turning the contests into a referendum on his leadership, rather than risking a district-by-district slog over conventional messaging about the Republican tax overhaul and the upbeat economy." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... I'm Voting for the Racist. Dana Milbank: "Sooner or later, Donald Trump will be gone. Trumpism, however, is here to stay." Don Blankenship's recent surge in the West Virginia Senate polls followed his recent racist ads & comments. "... we have Blankenship, Roy Moore, Joe Arpaio and a proliferation of name-calling misfits and even felons on Republican ballots. They are monsters created by the GOP, or rather the power vacuum the GOP has become.... Trump didn't condemn such filth; he merely said Blankenship 'can't win' and cited the example of Moore -- who Trump unsuccessfully opposed in the Alabama GOP primary."

Jane Mayer & Ronan Farrow of the New Yorker: "Eric Schneiderman, New York's attorney general, has long been a liberal Democratic champion of women's rights, and recently he has become an outspoken figure in the #MeToo movement against sexual harassment.... As his prominence as a voice against sexual misconduct has risen, so, too, has the distress of four women with whom he has had romantic relationships or encounters. They accuse Schneiderman of having subjected them to nonconsensual physical violence.... They allege that he repeatedly hit them, often after drinking, frequently in bed and never with their consent.... two of the women, Michelle Manning Barish and Tanya Selvaratnam..., say that they eventually sought medical attention after having been slapped hard across the ear and face, and also choked. Selvaratnam says that Schneiderman warned her he could have her followed and her phones tapped, and both say that he threatened to kill them if they broke up with him." Read on. Details of the allegations are sickening, frightening & documented. Schneiderman denies the allegations. Mrs. McC: I believe the women. It would be hard not to. ...

... Danny Hakim & Vivian Wang of the New York Times: "Within hours after the allegations were made public, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who like Mr. Schneiderman is a Democrat, called for him to step down.... If Mr. Schneiderman does not resign, the Democratic-controlled Assembly could vote to impeach him. A trial would then be held in the Republican-controlled Senate, which would be joined by judges from the state's highest court, the Court of Appeals. A two-thirds vote would be required to remove him." ...

     ... ** New Lede: "Eric T. Schneiderman, the New York attorney general who rose to prominence as an antagonist of the Trump administration, abruptly resigned on Monday night, hours after four women accused him of physically assaulting them in an article published by The New Yorker." Emphasis added. ...

... Samantha Schmidt of the Washington Post: "It took three hours for New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to step down Monday night after he was accused by four women of physical abuse in a New Yorker article. Equally swift was the response from allies of President Trump, a longtime nemesis of the attorney general. While the president himself had not weighed in on the news as of early Tuesday morning, numerous Trump supporters from within and outside of the White House reveled in Schneiderman's resignation.... Meanwhile, critics of Trump fired back at those who were quick to condemn Schneiderman while defending a president accused by more than a dozen women of improper conduct or sexual assault."

Bill Saporito of the New York Times: "It's been sort of a revolving door for the perpetrators of the housing bust.... When it all went sideways, people like Steve 'I Take Great Offense to Anybody Who Calls Me the Foreclosure King' Mnuchin picked at the carcasses.... [Sean] Hannity joined this flock of vultures in 2012, buying distressed properties using limited liability corporations -- shell companies that are often used to hide the real ownership.... Rents went up an above-average 50 percent in five years at one of Hannity's Georgia housing complexes.... Not surprisingly, so did evictions -- although his company also renovated the properties. He's a bit of a trendsetter. Housing Secretary Ben Carson suggested tripling the rent of people getting federal subsidies, an interesting anti-poverty solution.... The Republican tax overhaul, which cuts taxes for the wealthy, will make it harder to afford a home.... Mr. Hannity may be a sideshow. But as investors like him profit off the housing collapse, millennials struggle to find homes they can afford. Once again, average Americans struggle, while guys like Mr. Hannity thrive."

NRA Chooses Former International Arms-Dealing Felon (Convictions Vacated) as New Prez. Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "Retired Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North, a central figure in the Iran-contra affair in the 1980s, has been named president of the National Rifle Association. The NRA's board of directors chose North to be the organization's president Monday morning after NRA President Pete Brownell decided not to seek a second term. 'This is the most exciting news for our members since Charlton Heston became president of our Association,' said NRA Executive Vice President and CEO Wayne LaPierre.... North will assume the presidency in the coming weeks and has retired from Fox News, where he was a commentator, effective immediately.... North was convicted in 1989 of charges including obstructing Congress, unlawfully mutilating government documents and taking an illegal gratuity. He was fined $150,000, given a three-year suspended sentence and two years' probation. A federal judge dropped the criminal charges against North in 1991." (Also linked yesterday.)

Mark Stern of Slate: "Ginni Thomas is at it again. On Saturday, the conservative activist and lobbyist -- and spouse of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas -- shared a meme on her Facebook page accusing Democrats of engaging in 'a silent coup, not just against Trump, but also against the very premises of our constitutional republic.' The meme, which came from the Citizens [sic] Mandate, featured an image of George Soros, the liberal donor often at the center of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about malign 'globalist' machinations.... In recent months, [Ginni Thomas has] escalated her rhetoric against perceived political enemies. She has alleged that President Barack Obama ' rigged' (unsuccessfully) the 2016 election for Hillary Clinton and that Robert Mueller is 'going to fabricate whatever fake scandals [are] needed to take down Trump.'"

Peggy McGlone of the Washington Post: "In a first for the Kennedy Center, the board of trustees voted to rescind the high-profile awards it has given [Bill Cosby], who was convicted on three counts of sexual assault last month. Cosby received a Kennedy Center Honor in 1998 for lifetime achievement in the performing arts. In 2009, he was the 12th recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor."

Beyond the Beltway

Gal Lotan of the Orlando Sentinel: "George Zimmerman has been charged with [misdemeanor] stalking a private investigator who contacted him about a documentary series on Trayvon Martin produced by the rapper Jay Z, court records show.... The private investigator told Seminole County deputies that he had contacted Zimmerman in September on behalf of the series' executive producer, Michael Gasparro.... Zimmerman soon called Gasparro and talked about the documentary series, which will be about 17-year-old Trayvon Martin's life and his 2012 death, for which Zimmerman was acquitted of second-degree murder. The private investigator told deputies he did not hear from Zimmerman again until December. Gasparro called him and said Zimmerman was 'extremely agitated' and sending Gasparro threatening messages, deputies wrote in the request for a warrant. Between Dec. 16, 2017, and Christmas Day, the private investigator told deputies he got 55 phone calls, 67 text messages, 36 voicemails and 27 emails from Zimmerman, records show. When the investigator asked him to stop, Zimmerman texted 'NO!' and then 'Pursue charges,' records show."

Way Beyond

Jane Perlez & Gerry Mullany of the New York Times: "President Xi Jinping of China met with Kim Jong-un, North Korea's leader, on Tuesday, for the second time in two months, continuing a flurry of diplomacy over the North's nuclear program. The meeting in the Chinese port city of Dalian near the North Korean border, came as China tries to regain a central role in the fast-moving diplomacy on the Korean Peninsula."

News Lede

Reuters: "Emergency crews said they were poised to evacuate more people as fissures kept spreading from Hawaii's erupting Kilauea volcano, five days after it started exploding. Around 1,700 people have already been ordered to leave their homes after lava crept into neighborhoods and deadly volcanic gases belched up through cracks in the earth. The evacuation zone could now grow as fissures are spreading into new areas on the eastern side of the Big Island, Hawaii Civic Defense Administrator Talmadge Magno told a community meeting[.]"

The Commentariat -- May 7, 2018

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

NRA Chooses Former International Arms-Dealing Felon (Convictions Vacated) as New Prez. Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "Retired Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North, a central figure in the Iran-contra affair in the 1980s, has been named president of the National Rifle Association. The NRA's board of directors chose North to be the organization's president Monday morning after NRA President Pete Brownell decided not to seek a second term. 'This is the most exciting news for our members since Charlton Heston became president of our Association,' said NRA Executive Vice President and CEO Wayne LaPierre.... North will assume the presidency in the coming weeks and has retired from Fox News, where he was a commentator, effective immediately.... North was convicted in 1989 of charges including obstructing Congress, unlawfully mutilating government documents and taking an illegal gratuity. He was fined $150,000, given a three-year suspended sentence and two years' probation. A federal judge dropped the criminal charges against North in 1991."

Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump intervened Monday in the West Virginia Republican Senate primary, pleading with voters a day before the election to oppose the former mine operator Don Blankenship, and suggesting that Mr. Blankenship's nomination would lead to a replay of the party's embarrassing loss last year in Alabama. Mr. Trump's decision to speak out on the race came after Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, whom Mr. Blankenship has targeted in a deeply personal manner, urged the president in a telephone call on Sunday to weigh in against the controversial former coal executive, according to a Republican official familiar with the conversation.... 'Don Blankenship currently running for Senate, can't win the General Election in your State...No way!' Mr. Trump wrote in a tweet. 'Remember Alabama. Vote Rep. Jenkins or A.G. Morrisey.'"

This is a classic. "John Oliver examines [Rudy Giuliani's] turbulent record as a lawyer, a politician, and an enemy to ferrets":

Mallory Shelbourne of the Hill: "President Trump on Monday criticized the suggestion that he has obstructed justice in the Russia investigation, saying he is simply 'fighting back.' The Russia Witch Hunt is rapidly losing credibility. House Intelligence Committee found No Collusion, Coordination or anything else with Russia,' the president wrote on Twitter. 'So now the Probe says OK, what else is there? How about Obstruction for a made up, phony crime. There is no O, it's called Fighting Back.'... 'The 13 Angry Democrats in charge of the Russian Witch Hunt are starting to find out that there is a Court System in place that actually protects people from injustice...and just wait 'till the Courts get to see your unrevealed Conflicts of Interest!' Trump added Monday." ...

... Christopher Cadelago & Darren Samuelsohn of Politico: "Trump has increasingly cautioned his party against allowing the House, and even the Senate, to fall into Democratic control, voicing fears about his certain impeachment if that happens. 'We have to keep the House because if we listen to Maxine Waters, she's going around saying, "We will impeach him,"' Trump said at a recent rally in Michigan, referring to the Democratic congresswoman from California.... Trump appears to believe victory in the November midterms depends on turning the contests into a referendum on his leadership, rather than risking a district-by-district slog over conventional messaging about the Republican tax overhaul and the upbeat economy."

Louis Nelson of Politico: "... Donald Trump issued an online vote of confidence Monday for Gina Haspel, his pick to be the next director of the CIA, and chided Democrats who have been critical of her for her role in waterboarding terrorism suspects at a secret agency prison. 'My highly respected nominee for CIA Director, Gina Haspel, has come under fire because she was too tough on Terrorists,' the president wrote on Twitter. 'Think of that, in these very dangerous times, we have the most qualified person, a woman, who Democrats want OUT because she is too tough on terror. Win Gina!'"

*****

This Russia Thing, Etc., Ctd.

Mark Landler & Noal Weiland of the New York Times: "Rudolph W. Giuliani, reeling after a chaotic first week as President Trump's lawyer, tried again on Sunday to straighten out his client's story. But Mr. Giuliani raised new questions about whether Mr. Trump had paid hush money to other women and suggested the president might invoke the Fifth Amendment to avoid testifying in the special counsel's Russia investigation. Mr. Giuliani, a former federal prosecutor and New York City mayor hired by Mr. Trump to smooth communication between the White House and the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, instead painted Mr. Mueller as an out-of-control prosecutor bent on trapping Mr. Trump into committing perjury. The president, he said, could defy a subpoena to testify." ...

... Rudy Continues to Be Very Helpful. Mallory Shelbourne of the Hill: "Rudy Giuliani on Sunday said while he has no knowledge of President Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, paying any women in addition to Stormy Daniels, he believes Cohen would have done so if he deemed it 'necessary.' 'I have no knowledge of that. But I would think if it was necessary, yes.' Giuliani, who recently joined Trump's team of lawyers, told ABC's 'This Week' when asked about Cohen making payments to other women." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Mallory Shelbourne: "Rudy Giuliani said Sunday that a potential pardon for President Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, is not a possibility at this point. 'Jay and I have made it clear, and -- and -- and Michael's lawyers all know that that obviously is not on the table,' Giuliani told ABC's 'This Week,' referring to Trump attorney Jay Sekulow and Cohen. 'That's not a decision to be made now, there's no reason to pardon anybody now.'" Mrs. McC: Apparently it's possible to reset the table. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Here's video of Rudy's latest disastrous performance:

     ... The transcript is here. ...

... Judd Legum of Think Progress: "The overall impression created by Giuliani's appearance ... was more Mr. Magoo than Perry Mason. Giuliani was confused, self-contradictory, and ignorant of key facts.... When a lawyer speaks on behalf of a client, their words typically carry the same legal force as if they'd been spoken by the client him or herself. So when Giuliani stated in Sunday's interview that the $130,000 payment to Daniels 'may have involved the campaign,' or when he suggested that Daniels had greater leverage over Trump because Trump was running for president, those are statements that run counter to the Trump legal team's larger narrative -- that the payment was irrelevant to the campaign. And they potentially could be turned against Trump in court." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Still, Giuliani's repeated assertions that the facts of the matter were irrelevant is a feature, not a bug, of Trump's defense on, well, everything. Contradictory statements sow confusion, and even when the contradictions themselves are unintentional, these contradictions are part of a strategy to hide the truth. Even if you've closely followed Giuliani's ramblings, I'll bet you don't know what his "position" is on the hush-money payments to Daniels & others any more than he does. We're all Mr. Magoo now.

A Teaching Moment for Jim Comey. Martin Cizmar of the Raw Story: "The Mueller probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election and associated crimes may have to 'go dark' during the mid-term elections or risk being shut down entirely, the Wall Street Journal reports. ...

... Kevin Drum: "Hahahaha. He [Mueller] doesn't want to appear to be trying to sway voters' decisions. Of course not. That would be at odds with DOJ guidelines. So very much at odds. Totally at odds. We can't have that, can we?"

Christopher Carbone of Fox "News": "House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes is going to push Congress to hold Attorney General Jeff Sessions in contempt of Congress. The Californian Republican's committee has been looking into allegations that the Justice Department and the FBI abused the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in their scrutiny of the Trump campaign. 'On Thursday we discovered that they are not going to comply with our subpoena,' Nunes said on 'Fox and Friends,' adding, 'The only thing left to do is we have to move quickly to hold the attorney general of the United States in contempt and that is what I will press for this week.' Two weeks ago, Nunes sent to Sessions a classified letter, which he said was not acknowledged, and then he sent a subpoena. However, the Justice Department said it responded to Nunes' letter.... 'The Department has determined that, consistent with applicable law and longstanding Executive Branch policy, it is not in a position to provide information responsive to your request regarding a specific individual,' Assistant Attorney General Stephen E. Boyd wrote in the signed letter." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: It would no doubt be reasonable to assume that the devilish Devin is making this move at the behest of JeffBo's boss.

Nick Visser of the Huffington Post: "Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee reportedly plan to release details about 3,000 Facebook ads linked to the Russian campaign to influence the last presidential election. According to The Wall Street Journal, the files could be released as early as this week and may show images of the promoted material, which demographic groups were targeted and how many people saw them.... In September, Facebook announced that it had been paid $100,000 to promote thousands of ads that were linked to the Russian-backed Internet Research Agency.... Facebook later said more than 126 million people potentially saw the ads purchased by the Russians."

Trump Black Ops

The Weinstein Connection. Josh Marshall: "We have a pretty stunning development about aides to Donald Trump apparently (though they deny it) hiring the same Israeli dirty ops/private intel firm [-- called 'Black Cube' --] that Harvey Weinstein used to cover up his history to mount an operation against public supporters of the Iran deal. We start with this story in The Guardian [also linked here yesterday]. It's very hedged and key details are not included. But the gist is that aides to Donald Trump hired an Israeli security firm to dig up dirt on two prominent supporters of the Iran nuclear deal. They are Ben Rhodes and Colin Kahl, both Obama administration national security hands who were involved in the negotiation.... Laura Rozen confirmed with Kahl that the purported firm which reached out to the Kahls [in an approach Kahl & his wife found "fishy"] was 'Reuben Capital Partners'. That's the same name used by Black Cube in the Weinstein operations.... It is very hard to believe that two separate operations would stumble on the same name for a front operation." ...

... Steve M. elaborates. There's even a Cambridge Analytica connection. ...

... Kevin Drum: "The worst part of this is yet to come. That will be when this gets more attention and all the usual slimeballs chime in to say that there was nothing wrong with this at all. Oppo research is a normal part of politics, and checking to see if the Iran negotiators had a personal stake in the deal is perfectly reasonable. Nothing to see here, folks." ...

... Update. Wait, Wait, There's More. Ronan Farrow of the New Yorker: Black Cube tried essentially the same trick they used against the Kahls on Ben Rhodes' wife Ann Norris, a former State Department official. However, one of Farrow's sources said that the campaign against Rhodes & Kahl was 'part of Black Cube's work for a private sector client pursuing commercial interests related to sanctions on Iran'; i.e., not necessarily Trump surrogates. Still, "Rhodes said that the campaign represented a troubling situation in which public servants were being targeted for their work in government. 'This just eviscerates any norm of how governments should operate or treat their predecessors and their families,' he said. 'It crosses a dangerous line.'" Mrs. McC: Yes, it does. ...

... Chas Danner & Margaret Hartmann of New York sum up what's known so far -- and not much is nailed down. Mrs. McC: It's certain possible -- in fact, likely -- that there's at least one degree of separation between Trump & Black Cube, just as, say, a GOTV effort funded by Organizing for America is not specifically President Obama's handiwork. ...

... Treason. Juan Cole: "There is only one word for a sitting US administration that deploys a foreign intelligence firm linked to that of a foreign government with a vested interest in shaping US intelligence to bamboozle Congress and the US public by smearing dedicated (and as it turns out upright) public servants. That word is treason." ...

Until this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness.... Let us not assassinate this lad further, senator. You have done enough. Have you no sense of decency? -- Attorney Joseph Welch to Joe McCarthy during the Army-McCarthy hearings

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Now ask yourself this: If a person would use a foreign-based black-ops outfit to compromise former federal employees & their families in order to scuttle an international treaty, would he do anything remotely like that for a much bigger prize -- say, the presidency? Would a person who recently wailed "Where's my Roy Cohn?" do such a thing? As for me, I hope we have found our Joseph Welch in Bob Mueller.

<
Isabel Kershner & Thomas Erdbrink of the New York Times: "With time running out before the May 12 deadline by which President Trump is to decide whether to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal, the leaders of Israel and Iran weighed in on Sunday, with one calling the agreement 'fatally flawed' and the other warning of 'historic regret' if the United States rips up the deal. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel repeated his call for the agreement to be 'fully fixed or fully nixed,' arguing that while it may have delayed the acquisition of Iran's first bomb, it paves the way for the country to build an entire nuclear arsenal soon after the deal expires. In Iran, President Hassan Rouhani, whose negotiating team reached the nuclear accord with six world powers in 2015, said the Trump administration would come to rue any decision to renounce the agreement."

More White House Chaos. Carol Leonnig, et al., of the Washington Post: "Gina Haspel, President Trump's nominee to become the next CIA director, sought to withdraw her nomination Friday after some White House officials worried that her role in the interrogation of terrorist suspects could prevent her confirmation by the Senate, according to four senior U.S. officials. Haspel told the White House she was interested in stepping aside if it avoided the spectacle of a brutal confirmation hearing on Wednesday and potential damage to the CIA's reputation and her own, the officials said. She was summoned to the White House on Friday for a meeting on her history in the CIA's controversial interrogation program -- which employed techniques such as waterboarding that are widely seen as torture -- and signaled that she was going to withdraw her nomination. She then returned to CIA headquarters, the officials said.... Senior White House aides, including legislative affairs head Marc Short and press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, rushed to Langley, Va., to meet with Haspel at her office late Friday afternoon. Trump learned of the drama Friday, calling officials from his trip to Dallas. He decided to push for Haspel to remain as the nominee after initially signaling he would support whatever decision was taken, administration officials said." ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: What's wrong with this picture? Haspel can repeatedly torture people as a means of interrogation but she can't endure five minutes of Dianne Feinstein's sharp questions?

... digby: "Personally, I think anyone who was involved in that hideous program should have been fired at the very least and in a just world, prosecuted.This was a war crime perpetrated by the United States and people should have been held accountable. I don't care how great a CIA operative any of them were. But my God --- making one of the torturers and a person involved in the destruction of evidence the Director of the CIA? It really could not be more of a signal that the US is no longer a civilized nation." ...

... Chas Danner: "... Sarah Huckabee Sanders was out defending Haspel over the weekend and trying to reframe her nomination along feminist -- rather than moral -- grounds: 'There is no one more qualified to be the first woman to lead the CIA than 30+ year CIA veteran Gina Haspel. Any Democrat who claims to support women's empowerment and our national security but opposes her nomination is a total hypocrite'" ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: While Mrs. Huckleberry knows how to be a "total hypocrite," I'm not sure she really understands the concept of hypocrisy. So let's respond in a way she might find helpful: "Any Republican who claims to support women's empowerment and our national security but opposes Hillary Clinton's presidency is a total hypocrite." No, that doesn't make sense, either, but it follows Mrs. Huckleberry's "logic."

Jonathan Swan of Axios: "President Trump is unhappy about a report in The Atlantic [linked here last week] which says a member of EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt's press team has been shopping negative stories about Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to multiple outlets.... Trump has been souring on Pruitt as the negative press about him piles up.... Trump's draining supply of goodwill towards Pruitt is the EPA administrator's lifeline. Most everyone else in the building wants him gone.... Pruitt has grown paranoid and isolated.... Over the last few months, Pruitt has walled himself off from all but five EPA political appointees: ​Millan Hupp, Sarah Greenwalt, Hayley Ford, Lincoln Ferguson, and [Jahan] Wilcox. Of those five, only Wilcox is over 30. Hupp, Greenwalt and Ferguson came with Pruitt from Oklahoma.... Pruitt's chief of staff, Ryan Jackson, runs the agency's operations but rarely knows where his boss is. Pruitt has frozen Jackson out of his inner circle.... Since his April 26 congressional testimony, senior staff outside his inner circle have had virtually no idea of his whereabouts...." ...

... Alex Guillen of Politico: "Top [political] aides to Scott Pruitt at the Environmental Protection Agency are screening public records requests related to the embattled administrator, slowing the flow of information released under the Freedom of Information Act -- at times beyond what the law allows. Internal emails obtained by Politico show that Pruitt's political appointees reviewed documents collected for most or all FOIA requests regarding his activities, even as he's drawn scrutiny for his use of first-class flights and undisclosed dealings with lobbyists.... The emails also show Pruitt's aides chastising career employees who released documents about the administrator without letting them screen the records first."

Haley Boasts She Tells off Trump. Luis Sanchez of the Hill: "U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said on Sunday that she won't defend President Trump's 'communication style.' 'First of all, he has his communication style,' Haley told CBS's 'Sunday Morning.' 'But you're not hearing me defend that.' 'What I will tell you is if there is anything that he communicates in a way that I'm uncomfortable with, I pick up the phone and call him, and I tell him that. And I think that's something that he deserves from me,' the former South Carolina governor said." ...

... MEANWHILE, It Appears Jim Mattis Is Not Heeding Putin's Puppet. Alex Horton of the Washington Post: "The U.S. Navy has reactivated a fleet responsible for overseeing the East Coast and North Atlantic -- an escalation of the Pentagon's focus on a resurgent Russia and its expanding military presence.... Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson ... invoked Defense Secretary Jim Mattis's national-defense strategy as key guidance to reestablish the fleet, which will extend halfway across the Atlantic until it meets the area of responsibility for the Italy-based 6th Fleet."

Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "At a rally in Michigan a little over a week ago, President Trump assured his supporters that he had kept his promise to abolish the Affordable Care Act -- even though Congress had failed to repeal the Obama-era health law. But ... many parts of the Affordable Care Act remain in place. And the Trump administration is even enforcing some of its provisions more aggressively than President Barack Obama did -- a reality that has enraged business groups and Republicans in Congress who still want the law officially repealed. While the individual mandate may be dead, the employer mandate -- the requirement that many companies offer health insurance to their workers or pay a penalty -- is very much alive. Under Mr. Trump, the Internal Revenue Service has been pursuing companies that fail to comply with the mandate and, according to the agency, was sending penalty notices to more than 30,000 businesses around the country." ...

... Washington Post Editors: "... the effects of the president's underinformed instincts, enabled by the ideologues in his administration, are beginning to show up.... The Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit foundation focused on health-care issues, announced last week that the rate of working-age Americans without health insurance in the group's annual survey rose to 15.5 percent, up about three percentage points since 2016. Things are worse in the 19 holdout states ... that have refused to expand their Medicaid programs: The rate of uninsured working-age Americans hit 21.9 percent in those areas, up nearly six percentage points over two years.... Obamacare critics regularly describe all problems as the inevitable result of a poorly designed law. But the numbers suggest that the critics' sabotage efforts are to blame.... During the campaign, Mr. Trump regularly complained that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) left too many Americans uncovered. The result of nearly a year and a half of Mr. Trump's leadership is 4 million people added to that group."

Amy Sorkin of the New Yorker argues that even if Trump is an idiot who doesn't understand DACA, as John Kelly has reportedly asserted, Democrats need to step up their game. "Trump turned his attention to the midterms last week, at a rally in Michigan [Mrs. McC: paid for by taxpayers], where he made it clear that he thinks border demagoguery will provide the Republican Party with another path to victory. 'Our laws are so corrupt and so stupid,' he said. 'I call them the dumbest immigration laws anywhere on earth.' He told the crowd, 'The liberal politicians who support criminal aliens, and they support them far over American citizens -- Nancy Pelosi and her gang -- they've got to be voted out of office!' The 2016 election showed that, if not adequately countered, bigotry and fearmongering can yield crowds, votes, and the power of high office. In that sense, Trump understands DACA very well."

Susan Glasser of the New Yorker: "Little more than fifteen months into his Presidency, the attention-seeking President has the rest of the world right where he wants it: hanging on his every word.... He is the indispensable man. Soon he will meet Kim Jong Un, of North Korea, in an unprecedented nuclear summit. Next week, in advance of a May 12th deadline, he may single-handedly decide whether to blow up the Iran nuclear deal.... The smart betting is that he will, but he may not. Nobody knows, and that's the point: all roads now lead through Trump.... L'état, c'est Trump.... There is one nation conspicuously missing from Trump's long list of upcoming deadlines and deals...: Russia.... Several former U.S. officials who follow Russia closely told me the believed that the President remained committed to [inviting Putin to the White House], despite little enthusiasm on his team." (Also linked yesterday.)

God called King David a man after God's own heart even though he was an adulterer and a murderer. I think evangelicals have found their dream president. -- Jerry Falwell, Jr. ...

... ** John Ehrenreich, in Slate, explains the psychology of white evangelical support for Trump.

Sheera Frenkel in the New York Times: "For more than a decade, professors, doctoral candidates and researchers from academic institutions around the world have harvested information from Facebook.... They have compiled hundreds of Facebook data sets that captured the behavior of a few thousand to hundreds of millions of individuals, according to interviews with more than a dozen scholars.... In many cases, the data was [sic.!] used for research or scholarly articles. The information was then sometimes left unsecured and stored on open servers that offered access to anyone. Some academics said the data could have been easily copied and sold to marketers or political consulting firms.... The Facebook data was [sic.!] typically amassed through scraper programs that crawled the social network to document what was posted, or through quiz apps that requested access to people's profiles. The results included users' locations, interests, political affiliations, Facebook interactions and even music preferences."

The Commentariat -- May 6, 2018

Late Morning Update:

Susan Glasser of the New Yorker: "Little more than fifteen months into his Presidency, the attention-seeking President has the rest of the world right where he wants it: hanging on his every word.... He is the indispensable man. Soon he will meet Kim Jong Un, of North Korea, in an unprecedented nuclear summit. Next week, in advance of a May 12th deadline, he may single-handedly decide whether to blow up the Iran nuclear deal.... The smart betting is that he will, but he may not. Nobody knows, and that's the point: all roads now lead through Trump.... L'état, c'est Trump.... There is one nation conspicuously missing from Trump's long list of upcoming deadlines and deals...: Russia.... Several former U.S. officials who follow Russia closely told me they believed that the President remained committed to [inviting Putin to the White House], despite little enthusiasm on his team."

Rudy Continues to Be Very Helpful. Mallory Shelbourne of the Hill: "Rudy Giuliani on Sunday said while he has no knowledge of President Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, paying any women in addition to Stormy Daniels, he believes Cohen would have done so if he deemed it 'necessary.' 'I have no knowledge of that. But I would think if it was necessary, yes.' Giuliani, who recently joined Trump's team of lawyers, told ABC's 'This Week' when asked about Cohen making payments to other women." ...

... Mallory Shelbourne: "Rudy Giuliani said Sunday that a potential pardon for President Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, is not a possibility at this point. 'Jay and I have made it clear, and -- and -- and Michael's lawyers all know that that obviously is not on the table,' Giuliani told ABC's 'This Week,' referring to Trump attorney Jay Sekulow and Cohen. 'That's not a decision to be made now, there's no reason to pardon anybody now.'" Mrs. McC: Apparently it's possible to reset the table.

*****

** How Low Can He Go? Mark Townsend & Julian Borger of the Guardian: "Aides to Donald Trump ... hired an Israeli private intelligence agency to orchestrate a 'dirty ops' campaign against key individuals from the Obama administration who helped negotiate the Iran nuclear deal, the Observer can reveal. People in the Trump camp contacted private investigators in May last year to 'get dirt' on Ben Rhodes, who had been one of Barack Obama's top national security advisers, and Colin Kahl, deputy assistant to Obama, as part of an elaborate attempt to discredit the deal. The extraordinary revelations come days before Trump's 12 May deadline to either scrap or continue to abide by the international deal limiting Iran's nuclear programme.... Sources said that officials linked to Trump's team contacted investigators days after Trump visited Tel Aviv a year ago.... A source with details of the 'dirty tricks campaign' said: 'The idea was that people acting for Trump would discredit those who were pivotal in selling the deal, making it easier to pull out of it.'" ...

... Yastreblyansky.: "This is pretty clearly Nixon-level skullduggery, reminiscent of the original Plumbers burglary when they attacked Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office, with the added weirdness of using a foreig agency, and similar to what the Trump people are alleged to have done with Russian agents and a British firm trying to 'get dirt' on Hillary Clinton in the campaign period. It's also similar in the tie-in of allowing foreign leaders to dictate US policy -- Netanyahu for the Iran deal, Putin for the Ukrainian and Syrian issues, not to mention old Flynn offering US cooperation to the Turkish authoritarian president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.... There's something especially Nixonian about this particular episode, too, in its narrow focus, in its concern with 'enemies' -- we all understand Trump's personal stake in abrogating the JCPOA is to wound Obama and undo his accomplishment, and we see how this project goes after the reputations of people who are loyal to Obama as well." P.S. As commenter emjayay asks, "Isn't this kinda big, like really big? Are we going to see it get to US media, or is it more complicated than lying about paying off a porn star so it will be ignored?" Good question.

Your Taxpayer Dollars at Work -- Covering Trump's Campaign Expenses. Afi Scruggs & Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "President Trump used a roundtable on taxes [in Cleveland, Ohio,] Saturday to campaign for a Republican Senate candidate and to assail undocumented immigrants for taking advantage of U.S. laws he derided as weak. Though billed as an official White House event, and therefore funded with taxpayer money, Trump was overtly political in his remarks ahead of Tuesday's primary election. He celebrated his own poll numbers, repeatedly attacked Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and urged Ohioans to elect Rep. James B. Renacci (R-Ohio), who is running against Brown. 'We need your vote, we need your help, so go out and help Jim,' Trump said, with Renacci seated by his side. 'Get it done.'... Reporters traveling with Trump requested access to hear the president's remarks to donors at the fundraiser, but were denied by White House officials."

Jonathan O'Connell, et al., of the Washington Post: "In the nine years before he ran for president, Donald Trump's company spent more than $400 million in cash on new properties -- including 14 transactions paid for in full, without borrowing from banks -- during a buying binge that defied real estate industry practices -- and Trump's own history as the self-described 'King of Debt.' Trump's vast outlay of cash, tracked through public records and totaled publicly here for the first time, provides a new window into the president's private company, which discloses few details about its finances. It shows that Trump had access to far more cash than previously known, despite his string of commercial bankruptcies and the Great Recession's hammering of the real estate industry." ...

... Also Too Emoluments! Jason Linkins of ThinkProgress: "Call it impeccable timing: A federal judge in January tossed a lawsuit claiming Donald Trump was in violation of a constitutional ban against using the presidency for financial gain from foreign governments. Less than a month later, Qatar shelled out a cool $6.5 million for new digs in the Trump World Tower in Manhattan. The January 17 real estate transaction focuses new attention on what the aforementioned lawsuit sought to prevent: violations of the constitution's emoluments clause.... ... Trump World Tower is mere steps away from the United Nations' Manhattan headquarters."

More Re-enactment than Parody:

William Rashbaum, et al., of the New York Times delve into the diverse business interests of Michael Cohen. "Before he joined the Trump Organization and became Mr. Trump's lawyer and do-it-all fixer, Michael D. Cohen was a hard-edge personal-injury attorney and businessman. Now a significant portion of his quarter-century business record is under the microscope of federal prosecutors -- posing a potential threat not just to Mr. Cohen but also to the president.... A New York Times review of thousands of pages of public records, and interviews with bankers, lawyers and businessmen who have interacted with Mr. Cohen, reveal the degree to which he has often operated in the backwaters of the financial and legal worlds. While he has not been charged with a crime, many of his associates have faced either criminal charges or stiff regulatory penalties." Terms like "Lucchese family," "forgery," & "pleaded guilty" -- dot the story.

Tom LoBianco, et al., of the AP: "Investigators working for special counsel Robert Mueller have interviewed one of ... Donald Trump's closest friends and confidants, California real estate investor Tom Barrack.... Barrack was interviewed as part of the federal investigation of possible coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia in the 2016 election, according to three people familiar with the matter.... Barrack played an integral role in the 2016 campaign as a top fundraiser at a time when many other Republicans were shunning the upstart candidate. Barrack later directed Trump's inauguration."

Actual Rudy & Donald:

... Annie Karni of Politico: "In private, according to a Republican close to the White House, [Rudy] Giuliani has ... blamed the negative view of him in the media, including the whispers about his mental health, on [Jared] Kushner and Ivanka Trump.... His mention of the president's son-in-law [as 'disposable']... was one of the comments he made on television that had White House aides watching his appearance on Hannity with mouths agape.... Some point to Giuliani's main ally in the White House as an explanation: Giuliani, according to people in the building, has aligned himself with Don McGahn, the White House counsel who has clashed repeatedly with Kushner." ...

... Maureen Dowd: "Trump distanced himself from his good friend [Rudy Giuliani], as he is wont to do, promising that Rudy will 'get his facts straight.' This prompted Vanity Fair to write the headline: 'Trump Assures Reporters He'll Make Giuliani a Better Liar.'... The gruesome twosome, whose reputations have grown darker since the days when they swanned around New York as larger-than-life figuras, didn't consult any top White House officials, even the counsel." ...

... Brent Griffiths of Politico: "Rudy Giuliani pushed for regime change in Iran on Saturday, saying ... Donald Trump is 'as committed to regime change as we are.' It's 'the only way to peace in the Middle East' and 'more important than an Israeli-Palestinian deal,' Trump's newest attorney in the ongoing Russia probe and former mayor of New York City told reporters after giving a speech to the Iran Freedom Convention for Democracy and Human Rights in Washington." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: You might think this is Rudy pretending to be secretary of state again & casually releasing secret intel about delicate international negotiations, right after he promised to cut that out, except Griffiths also reports, "As a congressman, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo wrote in a Fox News op-ed '... Congress must act to change Iranian behavior, and, ultimately, the Iranian regime.' His predecessor Rex Tillerson also voiced explicit support for regime change telling CNN 'we always support a peaceful transition of power.'" On the other hand, "A top State Department official later said that the administration was not pursuing regime change."

Wendy Siegelman of the Guardian: "The announcement that Cambridge Analytica is shutting has a certain inevitability to it.... But ... already there are some suggestions that those associated with Cambridge Analytica may re-emerge in another form.... Cambridge Analytica and [its parent company] SCL have at least 18 active companies, branches,and affiliates with similar names, based in the UK and the US.... The complex relationship among these companies makes it very difficult to understand how revenues, employment, and data are shared. It almost seems as though the business structure was created to make it impossible to track decision-making and funding." ...

... Carole Cadwalladr of the Guardian: "Cambridge Analytica has been ordered to hand over all the data and personal information it has on an American voter, including details of where it got the data and what it did with it, or face a criminal prosecution. The UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) served the enforcement notice to the company on Friday in a landmark legal decision that opens the way for up to 240 million other American voters to request their data back from the firm under British data protection laws. The test case was taken to the ICO by David Carroll, an associate professor at Parsons School of Design in New York. As a US citizen, he had no means of obtaining this information under US law, but in January 2016 he discovered Cambridge Analytica had processed US voter data in the UK and that this gave him rights under British laws.... The ICO ... has now told SCL Elections, which acted as the data controller for Cambridge Analytica, that it has 30 days to comply or appeal."

Adam Taylor of the Washington Post: "... despite the outward appearance of warm ties with Britain and France, traditionally two of America's strongest European allies, Trump managed to stoke outrage and anger in both London and Paris this weekend -- and he did so with a single speech. Speaking to the National Rifle Association convention in Dallas on Friday, the president had used the rising number of knife attacks in Britain while speaking in support of gun rights in the United States.... Trump's comments immediately drew a backlash from Londoners on social media.... In the same speech, Trump also took aim at France's strict gun laws -- describing them as the 'toughest gun laws in the world.' Trump then told the NRA audience said that as 'nobody has guns in Paris' and that terrorists were able to take their time to kill civilians 'one by one' in a November 2015 terrorist attack that left 130 dead.... The French Foreign Ministry released a statement on Saturday that expressed its 'firm disapproval' for Trump's remark about the attack and called 'for respect for the memory of the victims.'"

Caroline Orr of Shareblue: "As Trump and Pence took the stage at the NRA's annual convention Friday, a Kremlin-linked ammunition company with ties to sanctioned Russian entities set up an exhibit just down the hallway. The company, TulAmmo USA, is based in Texas, but the ammunition it sells is manufactured by the Tula Arms Plant (also known as Tula Cartridge Works) in Tula, Russia. TulAmmo is listed as an exhibitor at the NRA's Annual Meetings in Dallas, Texas, this weekend. TulAmmo USA and its Russian counterpart TulAmmo are part of a tangled web of corporations, subsidiaries, and holdings with close ties to the Kremlin and to other Russian entities -- many of which have been sanctioned for their role in producing munitions used by Russia against Ukraine and other eastern European countries."

Robert Costa & Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) called for a 'prompt' House ethics investigation into Rep. Tony Cárdenas (D-Calif.) on Saturday, following reports of allegations that he sexually abused a 16-year-old girl in 2006. Cárdenas has vehemently denied the allegations through his attorney."

Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: John McCain receives friends like Joe Biden at his Arizona ranch. "... the senator participated in a nearly two-hour HBO documentary and co-wrote what he acknowledges will be his last book, 'The Restless Wave,' both of which are set to be released this month.... His intimates have informed the White House that their current plan for his funeral is for Vice President Mike Pence to attend the service to be held in Washington's National Cathedral but not President Trump...."

Senate Race. Because "China Person"?? Alex Isenstadt of Politico: "There is growing concern among Republicans that Don Blankenship, a bombastic coal baron who has spent time in prison, is surging ahead of Tuesday's West Virginia Senate primary -- and a last-minute campaign is underway to stop him. As the tight contest hurtles to a close, four Republicans said they'd reviewed polling conducted in recent days showing Blankenship, who spent a year in jail following the 2010 explosion at his Upper Big Branch Mine that killed 29 workers, moving narrowly ahead of his more mainstream GOP rivals, Rep. Evan Jenkins and state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey." Mrs. McC: I'm guessing in West Virginia, it helps a GOP candidate to insist you can't be racist if you don't even say "nee-gro."