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

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

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

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

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

Click on photo to enlarge.

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

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

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

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

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

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Publisher & Editor: Marie Burns


Saturday
Jan202018

The Commentariat -- January 20, 2018

The Comments function appears to be working again. Those who signed up may continue to use their exalted "membership" status, or not, as they prefer. I don't intend to sign up anyone else as it's no longer necessary. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie

*****

Afternoon Update:

David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post on Trump's Celebration of Me event tonight: "By holding the event at his own club, Trump will be able to collect tens of thousands of dollars in fees for food, ballroom rental and other costs. In effect, he will have transformed his supporters' political donations into revenue for his business. Again."

*****

Sheryl Stolberg & Thomas Kaplan of the New York Times: "Much of the federal government officially shut down early Saturday morning after Senate Democrats, showing remarkable solidarity in the face of a clear political danger, blocked consideration of a stopgap spending measure to keep the government operating. The shutdown, coming one year to the day after President Trump took office, set off a new round of partisan recriminations and posed risks for both parties. It came after a fruitless last-minute negotiating session at the White House between Mr. Trump and Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader. With just 50 senators voting in favor, Senate Republican leaders fell well short of the 60 votes necessary to proceed on the spending measure, which had passed the House on Thursday. Five conservative state Democrats voted for the spending measure. Five Republicans voted against it, although one of those, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, did so for procedural reasons." (This is an update of a story linked yesterday.) ...

... Here's how every senator voted, via the New York Times. ...

... Trump & the Football, Déjà vu. Michael Shear & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "President Trump and Senator Chuck Schumer f New York ... came close to an agreement to avert a government shutdown over lunch on Friday. But their consensus broke down later in the day when the president and his chief of staff demanded more concessions on immigration.... A the meal progressed, an outline of an agreement was struck...: Mr. Schumer said yes to higher levels for military spending and discussed the possibility of fully funding the president's wall on the southern border with Mexico. In exchange, the president agreed to support legalizing young immigrants who were brought to the United States as children. Mr. Schumer left the White House believing he had persuaded the president to support a short, three to four-day spending extension to finalize an agreement, which would also include disaster funding and health care measures.... As the evening wore on, Mr. Schumer got a call from Mr. Kelly that dashed all hopes for a Trump-Schumer deal before the shutdown deadline.... Mr. Kelly, a hard-liner on immigration..., outlined a long list of White House objections to the deal." You'll have to read all of the first half of the report to see how the "agreement" "evolved," or rather, devolved. ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Let's hope we read a lot of stories headlined "Kelly Is New Unelected President," with a subhead that conveys the self-evident truth that a racist general engineered a coup over an unpopular, doddering president, bringing down the federal government. ...

... "Trump Whines: Shutdown Fight Could Make Me Miss 'My Party.'" Lacklan Markay & Asawin Suebsaeng of the Daily Beast: "On the eve of a ... government shutdown..., Donald Trump privately vented frustrations that the political impasse could possibly keep him from attending a glitzy inauguration anniversary bash and fundraiser set for Saturday at his Florida getaway Mar-a-Lago. Two sources close to the president ... told The Daily Beast how excited he was for the event and relayed his growing concern that the potential failure to strike a deal to keep the federal government open could keep him from 'my party,' as the president has said." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: For Reality Chex readers who had forked over $100K or more & bought new outfits to wear to "his party," I read someplace that President* Whiney Face is off to Mar-a-Lago today to celebrate himself at a fête à Donaldo. I could find a link to verify this, but I don't care enough. ...

     ... Also, never mind what your outdated calendar says. It's really 01/01/01, Anno Trvmpvs. The Trumpian calendar is a little different from the old-fashioned Gregorian one. The Trumpian calendar has 13 months of 28 days each, & each month has four 7-day weeks. This adds up to 364 days a year, which is a little short. But hey, like all science, astronomy is fake, so this should work. The names of the days of the week have changed: SunKingDay, MoneyDay,  AmericaFirstDay, BusinessDay, DonaldsDay, WhiteMansDay & TrumpsDay. ...

... Politico: "Some six hours after the federal government shut down..., Donald Trump tweeted, 'This is the One Year Anniversary of my Presidency and the Democrats wanted to give me a nice present. #DemocratShutdown.'..." ...

... Dana Milbank: "What on Earth does President Trump want? On Wednesday, the White House issued an official statement saying it supported a 30-day spending bill to avert a shutdown that included a six-year extension of the popular Children's Health Insurance Program, or CHIP. But Thursday dawned to see Trump declaring the opposite.... Exactly a week earlier, Trump ... rejected, in colorful fashion, a bipartisan immigration compromise he had said just two days earlier he would embrace. And this last week..., Trump was contradicting ... John F. Kelly, who said Trump had 'changed his attitude' and 'evolved' on the nature of a border wall. Trump replied that the wall 'has never changed or evolved.'... The president's mixed messages, more than anything, are what brought the government to the brink of a shutdown."

... Amber Phillips of the Washington Post: "... President Trump ... shares a sizable chunk of the blame [for the shutdown].... My colleagues reported in November he told confidants a shutdown could be good for him politically; a chance to flex his hard-line muscles on immigration. He's also tweeted stuff like this: 'either elect more Republican Senators in 2018 or change the rules now to 51%. Our country needs a good "shutdown" in September to fix mess!' ... May 2, 2017.... This week, Trump cast doubt on whether he would sign a short-term spending bill ... hours after his spokeswoman said he would. Hours before a precarious vote in the House of Representatives to avoid such a scenario, Trump pulled the rug out from under GOP leaders by seeming to take away their only leverage to get Democrats on board: funding the Children's Health Insurance Program.... Trump also pushed back on his chief of staff's statements by suggesting he had not backed off the notion of a border wall.... Trump has also been extraordinarily inconsistent on what he wants on an issue that is impossible to separate from this shutdown: preventing the deportation of immigrants who were brought to the country illegally as children.... With two words ['shithole countries,'] Trump caused an international stir and made it much mor difficult for Democrats to negotiate with the president...." ...

... The Party of Xenophobes & Racists. Sean Sullivan & Ed O'Keefe of the Washington Post: "Amid the chaos and confusion of Capitol Hill this week, one prevailing trend emerged: Republican leaders are embracing the party's hard-line position on illegal immigration. While the battle over spending continues, GOP lawmakers have chosen to align with the conservative posture that took root in the party with President Trump, a development that is causing consternation among some Republican dissenters. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and other GOP lawmakers repeatedly cast the spending fight as Democrats displaying more loyalty to undocumented immigrants than Americans -- a wager that the nativist leanings that propelled Trump to power will energize their political base in this year's midterm elections.... In McConnell's orbit, there is a sense that much of the Senate Republican Conference is closer to [Sen. Tom] Cotton [whom Sen. Lindsey Graham called 'the Steve King of the Senate'] and Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) on immigration than it is to Graham, even if they are not as vocal about it."

Glenn Kessler & Meg Kelly of the Washington Post: "One year after taking the oath of office, President Trump has made 2,140 false or misleading claims, according to The Fact Checker's database that analyzes, categorizes and tracks every suspect statement uttered by the president. That's an average of nearly 5.9 claims a day.... While the president is known to make outrageous claims on Twitter -- and that was certainly a major source of his falsehoods -- he made most of his false statements in unscripted remarks before reporters. Prepared speeches and interviews were other key sources of false claims. That's because the president relies on talking points or assertions that he had made in the past -- and continued to make, even though they had been fact-checked as wrong.... There were only 56 days -- or about 15 percent of the time -- on which we recorded no claims. These were often days when the president golfed. But there were also 12 days in which Trump made more than 30 claims. These were often days when he held campaign-style rallies, riffing without much of a script." Mrs. McC: Look for Trump to break 6.0/day during this election year.

Tamara Keith of NPR: "Turnover among top-level staff in the Trump White House was off the charts, according to a new Brookings Institution report. Turnover in Trump's first year was more than triple that in former President Barack Obama's first year, and double the rate in President Ronald Reagan's White House. A full 34 percent of high-level White House aides either resigned, were fired or moved into different positions in this first year of the Trump presidency. 'While some turnover is expected and possibly beneficial, excessive turnover portends problems,' writes Kathryn Dunn Tenpas, a nonresident senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution. '[President Trump] has valued loyalty over qualifications and suffered from a White House that has functioned in a chaotic manner. Both features have made it difficult to retain staff and have contributed to the governance difficulties he has encountered.'" (Also linked yesterday.)


Cap'n. Nunes Keystone Kops to the Rescue. Ryan Reilly of the Huffington Post: "House Republicans spent the end of the workweek telling everyone who would listen that the American people must be allowed to see a top-secret four-page document that could bring an end to special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.... The document, which alleges abuses of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act during the FBI's quiet counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign in the final months of the 2016 election, was actually compiled by Republican staffers on the House Intelligence Committee. That committee voted along partisan lines this week to allow any member of Congress to take a peek at the document themselves. Republican members soon flocked to a secure room to read the memo written by their allies -- and then ran to tell the press about it.... Overnight, #ReleaseTheMemo ― a hashtag reportedly given an additional boost by Russian-connected bots ― started trending on Twitter. In less than 24 hours, Donald Trump Jr. ... sent off more than 30 tweets and retweets about the memo t his nearly 2.5 million followers.... Democrats say the Republican-drafted classified memo is full of omissions and distortions intended to fuel efforts to run cover for President Trump." Emphasis added. ...

... Nunes & the RussiaBots. Natasha Bertrand in Business Insider: "Republican lawmakers are pushing for the House Intelligence Committee to release a memo written by the panel's chairman, Rep. Devin Nunes, that outlines purported surveillance during the transition period against ... Donald Trump by former President Barack Obama's administration. And Russia-linked Twitter bots have jumped on the bandwagon.... The frequency with which the [Russia-linked] accounts have been promoting the hashtag [#ReleaseTheMemo] has spiked by 233,000% over the past 48 hours.... The accounts' references to the "memo," meanwhile, have increased by 68,000%. The most-shared domain among the accounts has been WikiLeaks, and the most-shared URL has been a link to WikiLeaks' 'submit' page.... Several Republican congressmen -- many of whom have been highly critical of the special counsel Robert Mueller, the FBI, and the investigation into Trump's ties to Russia -- have released statements calling on the House Intelligence Committee to declassify and release Nunes' four-page memo.... A source with knowledge of the memo told Business Insider that it was 'a level of irresponsible stupidity that I cannot fathom,' adding that it 'purposefully misconstrues facts and leaves out important details.' [Rep. Adam] Schiff [D-Calif.] said the document 'may help carry White House water, but it is a deep disservice to our law enforcement professionals.'" ...

... One Reason Nunes & the RussiaBots Are Collaborating to Shut Down Mueller & the FBI. David Graham of the Atlantic: "Perhaps the most interesting thread [in Glenn Simpson's testimony before Congress] is Simpson's suggestion that the Trump Organization could have been used by Russians to launder money -- an arrangement that would have both allowed Kremlin-linked figures to scrub cash and would have created possible blackmail material over the now-president, since the Russian government would be aware that a crime had been committed.... But while Simpson saw disturbing patterns, he was unable to nail anything down, because he couldn't get the relevant records from banks and other financial institutions.... [Rep. Adam] Schiff told me Friday that the committee had been unable to follow [the] roadmap [to nail down the facts which Simpson suggested], because Republican members are not interested." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Of course Mueller does have the subpoena power -- and apparently he's using it -- to investigate Simpson's supposition. Holding evidence that Trump was money-laundering -- which is a crime -- is a far more potent form of blackmail than their outting anything like the supposed "golden shower" episode. Trump's consensual sexcapades are amusing & ew!-cringeworthy but they're not illegal. ...

... Here's the full In Touch interview of Stormy Daniels on her affair with Trump. We keep it classy here at Reality Chex. Just reporting on the President. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Jake Pearson of the AP: "A tabloid magazine held back from publishing an adult film star's 2011 account of an alleged affair with Donald Trump after the future president's personal lawyer threatened to sue, four former employees of the tabloid's publisher told The Associated Press. In Touch magazine published its 5,000-word interview with the pornographic actor Stormy Daniels on Friday -- more than six years after Trump's long-time attorney, Michael Cohen, sent an email to In Touch's general counsel saying Trump would aggressively pursue legal action if the story was printed, according to emails described to the AP by the former employees. At the time, Trump was a reality TV star on the NBC show 'The Apprentice.'" Mrs. McC: I toldja Cohen had practice bleaching Trump's dirty laundry. ...

... First Mistress? Matt Wilstein of the Daily Beast: In an interview with Bill Maher on last night's "Real Time," Fire & Fury author Michael "Wolff slyly teased a White House anecdote that he apparently didn't feel comfortable including. There was one story about Trump that he kept hearing, but couldn't confirm, even by his questionable standards. 'I didn't have the blue dress,' Wolff said.... 'It's about somebody's he's fucking right now?' Maher asked, excitedly. 'Yes,' Wolff replied, but he refused to elaborate. 'You just have to read between the lines,' he said, adding, 'Now that I've told you, when you hit that paragraph, you'll say bingo.'"

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Guess finding the name of the First Mistress will require some detective-reading. Assuming Wolff was referring to a woman (which Maher does not) & unable to scour his book, I'll go blindly with Omarosa. But since Kelly unceremoniously kicked her out of the White House, maybe Trump has moved on to Mrs. Huckleberry. She & Trump really are perfect for each other.

Russ Choma of Mother Jones: "A German business magazine is reporting that Deutsche Bank, the German financial giant which is a major lender to both Donald Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner, identified 'suspicious transactions' related to Kushner family accounts, and has reported them to German banking regulators. The bank is reportedly willing to provide the information to special prosecutor Robert Mueller's team of investigators. Manager Magazin, a respected German business magazine, reported in its latest print edition, which hit German newsstands on Friday, that Paul Achleitner, chairman of Deutsche Bank's board, had the bank conduct an internal investigation and the results were troubling. Those results have been turned over to the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority -- Germany's bank regulatory agency...." ...

Madison Kircher of New York: During the 2016 election cycle, "... some 677,775 American people retweeted content from [Twitter] 'accounts that were potentially connected to a propaganda effort by a Russian government-linked organization known as the Internet Research Agency (IRA).; Twitter has since emailed that group to say hi, just FYI that tweet you retweeted was from Russia and engineered to thwart our democracy. It has also suspended the accounts behind the tweets." ...

... Madison Kircher: "Facebook recently announced that it would be tweaking its News Feed algorithm -- now, you should be seeing more posts from friends, rather than from publishers.... [Friday], Mark Zuckerberg announced that this means your feed should now be just 4 percent news, rather than the previous 5 percent. Oh ... and he also announced that Facebook is going to let its users decide which news sources they trust the most. 'This update will not change the amount of news you see on Facebook. It will only shift the balance of news you see towards sources that are determined to be trusted by the community.' Zuckerberg calls this being 'objective.' You might call it 'asking for it.'... But, hey, now if you see some fake news floating around your News Feeds, the onus is off [Facebook]. Blame 'the community.'"


Time to Go, Bob. Nick Corasaniti of the New York Times: "The Justice Department announced on Friday that it intended to retry Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, two months after a jury deadlocked on federal corruption charges against him. The move means Mr. Menendez will have to defend himself again in a year when he is up for re-election. A new trial for Mr. Menendez, a Democrat, who has been in the Senate for 12 years, adds a wrinkle to the political map in this year's 2018 midterm elections. While the senator has not officially announced that he is running, he has given no indication he intends to retire.... So far, however, no strong Republican challenger has emerged."

Christopher Mele of the New York Times: "A neighbor of Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky intends to plead guilty to a federal felony charge after he tackled the senator in November in an assault set off by the placement of a pile of brush, the man's lawyer said on Friday. The neighbor, Rene A. Boucher, 58, of Bowling Green, Ky., was charged on Friday with assaulting a member of Congress resulting in personal injury, the United States attorney for the Southern District of Indiana, Josh J. Minkler, said in a news release.... Mr. Boucher saw Mr. Paul stack brush in a pile near their property line, and Mr. Boucher 'had enough,' according to the release. He ran onto Mr. Paul's property and tackled him.... Federal prosecutors will seek a prison sentence of up to 21 months, [Matthew Baker, Boucher's attorney] said, adding that he would seek probation for his client.... The attack against Mr. Paul, a Republican, was not politically motivated, Mr. Baker said...." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Good. Li'l Randy is an asshole & among other assholery, is apparently a sloppy neighbor, but that's no excuse for beating him to a pulp & likely causing permanent physical damage.

Evan Perez, et al., of CNN: "The FBI recently opened an inquiry into Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens [R]..., as he fights an allegation of blackmail and faces calls to resign just a year into his job. While the FBI has not commented on the existence of any inquiry or formal investigation into Greitens, the St. Louis circuit attorney's office announced last week that it is investigating Greitens' conduct following an explosive story that forced the Republican governor to acknowledge having had an extramarital affair and confront an allegation of blackmail.... Greitens has acknowledged having had an extramarital affair before he became governor, but has vehemently denied blackmail."


Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court announced on Friday that it would consider a challenge to President Trump's latest effort to limit travel from countries said to pose a threat to the nation's security, adding a major test of presidential power to a docket already crowded with blockbusters. The case concerns Mr. Trump;s third and most considered bid to make good on a campaign promise to secure the nation's borders. But challengers to the latest ban, issued as a presidential proclamation in September, said it was tainted by religious animus and not adequately justified by national security concerns." (Also linked yesterday.)

Sydney Ember of the New York Times: "Journalists at The Los Angeles Times voted overwhelmingly to form a union despite aggressive opposition from the paper's management team, reversing more than a century of anti-union sentiment at one of the biggest newspapers in the country. Shortly after the final vote count was announced on Friday, The Times's parent company said that the newspaper's publisher, Ross Levinsohn, was taking an unpaid leave of absence while a law firm investigated allegations of coarse workplace behavior while he was employed by other companies.... Out of the 292 employees who cast ballots, 248 voted in favor of joining the NewsGuild...."

Joe Coscarelli of the New York Times: "Tom Petty, the chart-topping singer and songwriter, died in October from an accidental drug overdose as a result of mixing medications that included opioids, the medical examiner-coroner for the county of Los Angeles announced on Friday, ending the mystery surrounding his sudden death last year. The coroner, Jonathan Lucas, said that Mr. Petty's system showed traces of the drugs fentanyl, oxycodone, temazepam, alprazolam, citalopram, acetyl fentanyl and despropionyl fentanyl."

Comments Off
Friday
Jan192018

The Commentariat -- January 19, 2018

Late Morning -- Early Evening Update:

Sheryl Stolberg & Thomas Kaplan of the New York Times: "President Trump and Senate leaders scrambled on Friday to avert a midnight shutdown of much of the government, with Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, declaring that progress had been made in a private meeting with the president at the White House. But with the clock ticking, no votes were even scheduled before federal funds are to run out at midnight. 'We had a long and detailed meeting,' Mr. Schumer told reporters at the Capitol after leaving the White House. 'We discussed all of the major outstanding issues. We made some progress, but we still have a good number of disagreements. The discussions will continue.'"

Here are Trump's "thoughts" on the shutdown, as expressed in his Twitter novel: "Government Funding Bill past last night in the House of Representatives. Now Democrats are needed if it is to pass in the Senate - but they want illegal immigration and weak borders. Shutdown coming? We need more Republican victories in 2018!" Trumptweets, the Book will need a quasi-literate copy editor to get past "past." The New York Times is kinda updating developments here. Sadly, we learn. "Mr. Trump canceled plans to travel to his Florida resort on Friday and will stay in Washington until a spending bill is passed, a White House official said Friday morning." ...

     ... Update: "Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, went to the White House to reopen budget and immigration negotiations after President Trump reached out to him."

Gene Robinson has a pretty good column today on how Trump treats his allies & friends. Robinson doesn't feel sorry for the allies & friends.

Tamara Keith of NPR: "Turnover among top-level staff in the Trump White House was off the charts, according to a new Brookings Institution report. Turnover in Trump's first year was more than triple that in former President Barack Obama's first year, and double the rate in President Ronald Reagan's White House. A full 34 percent of high-level White House aides either resigned, were fired or moved into different positions in this first year of the Trump presidency. 'While some turnover is expected and possibly beneficial, excessive turnover portends problems,' writes Kathryn Dunn Tenpas, a nonresident senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution. '[President Trump] has valued loyalty over qualifications and suffered from a White House that has functioned in a chaotic manner. Both features have made it difficult to retain staff and have contributed to the governance difficulties he has encountered.'"

Here's the full In Touch interview of Stormy Daniels on her affair with Trump. We keep it classy here at Reality Chex. Just reporting on the President.

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court announced on Friday that it would consider a challenge to President Trump's latest effort to limit travel from countries said t pose a threat to the nation's security, adding a major test of presidential power to a docket already crowded with blockbusters. The case concerns Mr. Trump's third and most considered bid to make good on a campaign promise to secure the nation's borders. But challengers to the latest ban, issued as a presidential proclamation in September, said it was tainted by religious animus and not adequately justified by national security concerns."

*****

The Comments function appears to be working again. Those who signed up may continue to use their exalted "membership" status, or not, as they prefer. I don't intend to sign up anyone else as it's no longer necessary. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie 

Thomas Kaplan & Sheryl Stolberg of the New York Times: "The House approved a stopgap spending bill on Thursday night to keep the government open past Friday, but Senate Democrats -- angered by President Trump's vulgar aspersions and a lack of progress on a broader budget and immigration deal -- appeared ready to block the measure. The House approved the measure 230 to 197, despite conflicting signals by President Trump sent throughout the day and a threatened rebellion from conservatives that ended up fizzling. But the bill, which would keep the government open through Feb. 16, provided only a faint glimmer of hope that a crisis could be averted before funding expires at midnight on Friday." ...

... Mike DeBonis, et al., of the Washington Post: "The House approved a short-term spending bill Thursday to avoid a government shutdown, sending the measure to the Senate where Democrats said they have enough votes to block its passage. House Republican leaders prevailed in lobbying the conservative House Freedom Caucus and defense hawks who demanded more money for the military in exchange for their votes. The bill passed 230-197. But a government shutdown on the anniversary of President Trump's inauguration appeared likely as Democrats signaled they had rallied enough opposition to stop the measure from passing in the upper chamber." (Also linked yesterday evening.) ...

... Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Senate Democrats say they have secured the votes to block a House plan to fund the government through mid-February. A Democratic aide confirmed that the caucus will be able to block Republicans from getting the 60 votes needed to overcome an initial procedural hurdle." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

Caring for children in need goes beyond party lines -- it's unfortunate House Democrats didn't see it this way today.... I look forward to the Senate ... getting this done. The most vulnerable depend on it. -- Paul Ryan, in a cynical statement, yesterday ...

... "The GOP's Doomsday-Machine Politics." Paul Krugman: "... a form of doomsday-machine politics -- in which you threaten to blow up things that you care about, because you think your rivals care about them more -- is playing out in Washington right now, courtesy of the Republican Party. Doomsday-machine politics made its first U.S. appearance in the 1990s, when Republicans shut down the federal government in an attempt to extract concessions from Bill Clinton.... Republicans tried again, with more success, in 2011, using the threat of refusing to raise the debt ceiling -- forcing the U.S. government into default, with possibly catastrophic effects on the world economy -- to win policy concessions from Barack Obama. And even though they now control the White House as well as Congress, Republicans are still in the doomsday-machine business -- and what they're currently threatening to blow up is health care for nearly nine million children.... This has to stop. And now is the time to draw the line." ...

... Brian Beutler of Crooked: "... if Democrats and Republicans team up to avoid [a government shutdown with a DACA bill], it is nearly certain that Republicans will quietly return to their longstanding but unstated opposition to protecting Dreamers, the Trump administration will begin deporting them, and Democrats will have no good answers for those caught up in the sweeps." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... The Dimwit at 1600 Pa. Ave, Ctd. Scott Wong & Melanie Zanona of the Hill: "President Trump undermined his own party's plan to avert a looming government shutdown on Thursday after tweeting that a key Democratic bargaining chip shouldn't be attached to the funding package. The 17-word tweet threw Capitol Hill into a state of confusion ahead of what is already expected to be a tight vote in the House Thursday night. Republicans on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue were trying to decipher what exactly the president meant by declaring a popular children's health-care program should be part of a 'long term solution' as opposed to a '30 Day, or short term, extension.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... A Minute Later. Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "The White House on Thursday reiterated that President Trump supports stopgap spending legislation backed by House GOP leaders, an effort to clear up confusion caused by Trump's early-morning tweet about the effort to prevent a government shutdown." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Sarah Kliff & Tara Golshan of Vox: "... some [Congressional Republicans] have already written ... off [Trump's tweet] as inconsequential, likely the result of a news segment the president may have seen." Mrs. McC Translation: They know he's an ignorant moron, but he's their ignorant moron. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Eliana Johnson & Burgess Everett of Politico: "Democrats, whom Republicans were trying to pressure into supporting a stopgap measure to fund the government, were incredulous over the president's apparent ignorance about legislative details. 'He didn't realize that it's a six-year reauthorization? I mean, think about the exchange we're having now!' Sen. Chris Coons (D-Conn.) said. 'How are we supposed to negotiate responsibly?'... Republicans expressed deep frustration with the situation.... 'Certainty is always better than chaos and uncertainty' Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) said of Trump's comments. Asked if Trump is being chaotic and uncertain, Shelby replied with a grin: 'I didn't say that.'... It is the second time in a week that a tweet from the president has threatened to undermine Republican-backed legislation on Capitol Hill and send GOP leaders and congressional aides into a frenzy." The writers try unsuccessfully to pinpoint just which Fox "News" "advisor" triggered Trump's tweet. ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: This is just part of ("oh yes, he has no dementia") Trump's pattern of remembering only the last thing he heard. No doubt someone in the White House had previously briefed him on Ryan's excellent plan to make pawns of sick children, but once Doocy or Kilmeade or some other Fox "Friend" misstated the terms of the plan, that's all Trump "knew." You see the same pattern in Haberman & Davis's NYT story, linked below. ...

... Lachlan Markay, et al., of the Daily Beast: "Trump's Shutdown Plan Is Pretty Much: Jesus, Take the Wheel. As the federal government gets dangerously close to the first shutdown of the Trump era, the president has remained relatively calm behind the scenes and, according to those around him, seemingly ambivalent in a time of political disarray.... His level of preparation for an increasingly possible government shutdown seems to be focused mainly on shoveling the blame onto Democrats on Capitol Hill.... Agencies that would take the lead in dealing with the significant logistical challenges posed by a shutdown are suffering from significant staffing challenges at the highest levels. The White House Office of Management and Budget coordinates administration-wide shutdown procedures, and each federal agency must submit its shutdown plans to OMB.... But the office is currently operating without a full-time chief executive.... Of the nearly 130 agencies and offices that submit contingency plans, 66 of them had not publicly updated their proposals since 2015.... The Office of Personnel Management, which oversees a federal workforce that would be hit with large furloughs, currently has no permanent director." ...

... For Example ... Lisa Rein & Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post: "With government funding set to expire at midnight Friday, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke was still working out details of a plan to permit the parks to function without rangers or other staff on site. With many parks in peak season, drawing thousands of visitors, the lack of finality was causing wide confusion across the park system. Officials from three sites said Thursday they were unsure how to proceed. 'We don't have a plan yet,' said Abby Wines, spokeswoman for Death Valley National Park in California, which is seeing 80,000 visitors a month. 'We just got a memo about this yesterday. Today's the first day we're seriously thinking about this.'... The shuttering of iconic parks proved to be a political flash point during government shutdowns in 1995 and 2013. On both occasions, Republicans controlled Congress and a Democratic president sat in the White House; both times, Republicans shouldered much of the blame for ruining people's vacations." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Say, here's some good news from the WashPo report: Although about 800,000 federal employees are expected to be furloughed, "... Robert S. Mueller III would continue his probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election uninterrupted, since it is funded with a permanent, indefinite, appropriation."


Rebecca Savransky of the Hill: "President Trump reportedly ordered that ... Stephen Bannon limit his testimony before the House Intelligence Committee. Trump's decision came after receiving advice from Uttam Dhillon, a deputy White House counsel, Foreign Policy reports. Dhillon reportedly thought the administration could have legitimate executive privilege claims in the situation, sources told Foreign Policy. But Dhillon also found the administration doesn't have legitimate executive privilege claims to limit the testimony of Bannon and other officials from giving information to special counsel Robert Mueller. Foreign Policy's findings come after it was reported earlier this week that an attorney for Bannon relayed questions to the White House in real time while his client was testifying before the House Intelligence Committee.... White House chief of staff John Kelly said Wednesday the White House didn't tell Bannon to invoke executive privilege and refuse to answer questions in Congress's investigation into Russia's election meddling." Mrs. McC: ... which is okay because we already know Kelly is a lying sacko'.

How to Hush up Hush Money. Bryan Logan of Business Insider: "Michael Cohen, one of ... Donald Trump's top lawyers reportedly organized a Delaware-based limited-liability company to transfer a $130,000 payment to the adult-film star 'Stormy Daniels,' who claimed that she had a sexual encounter with Trump, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.... To get that payment to a lawyer representing the porn actor, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, Cohen created the company, Essential Consultants LLC, on October 17, 2016 and used a bank account attached to the company to transfer the money. Delaware is a favored venue for limited-liability company transactions because it does not require that people connected to the entities be publicly identified. The Journal reported that Cohen also attached pseudonyms to Clifford in reference to the transaction. Cohen denies this, according to the newspaper." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: You might think this ruse makes Cohen look pretty smart, but he's been working for Trump for a long time, so you can bet he's honed his hush-money methods over years of practice. ...

... Dan Friedman of Mother Jones: "In early 2009, [Stormy] Daniels announced that she was considering challenging Sen. David Vitter, the Louisiana Republican who two years earlier had been snared in a sex scandal.... Vitter ... opposed abortion and gay marriage. Daniels, who grew up in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, told reporters she wanted to highlight his hypocrisy.... Daniels ... held discussions with local political consultants. According to a May 8, 2009, email written by an operative advising Daniels..., Daniels at one point scrolled through her cellphone contacts to provide her consultants with a list of [possible campaign contributors].... On the list: Donald Trump. This email was sent to Andrea Dubé, a Democratic political consultant based in New Orleans.... Dubé expressed surprise [to the other consultant] that Daniels was friendly with Trump. 'Yep,' the other consultant replied. 'She says one time he made her sit with him for three hours watching 'shark week.' Another time he had her spank him with a Forbes magazine.'... The campaign consultant who wrote the email to Dubé tells Mother Jones that Daniels said the spanking came during a series of sexual and romantic encounters with Trump and that it involved a copy of Forbes with Trump on the cover. A fall 2006 cover of Forbes does feature Trump and two of his children, Donald Jr. and Ivanka.... [Michael] Cohen told the Wall Street Journal there had been no affair between Trump and Daniels: 'These rumors have circulated time and again since 2011. President Trump once again vehemently denies any such occurrence as has Ms. Daniels.'" ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Daniels' claim -- substantiated by the contemporaneous Forbes cover -- takes the "golden shower" story from humorous to highly likely. As Jason Le Miere of Newsweek reminded us last October, "the [Steele] dossier claims that the Russian FSB spy agency possesses a video of Trump successfully requesting prostitutes to urinate on a bed while staying in a Moscow hotel room once occupied by the former president and first lady, Barack and Michelle Obama." Trump has repeatedly "vehemently denied" all of the contents of Christopher Steele's memos. But the Daniels & Moscow stories display the same type of symbolic sex play -- once using a magazine that touted him as one of the country's richest men & once using prostitutes to defile the Obamas. And yeah, it's likely Moscow has the videotape. ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Oh, I see Slate's Jacob Weisberg & MSNBC's Ari Melber agree with me. Former U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade carries it a step further:


... ** Russia, Russia, Russia. Mob, Mob. Mob. Natasha Bertrand of Business Insider: "The House Intelligence Committee on Thursday released the transcript of the panel's November interview with Glenn Simpson, the cofounder of the opposition research firm Fusion GPS.... Rather than home in on the nature of Simpson's relationship with Christopher Steele -- the former British intelligence officer hired by Fusion to research Trump's Russia ties -- [Ranking Member Adam] Schiff and his Democratic colleagues asked Simpson pointed questions about Russian money laundering, Russian organized crime, and whether Trump could be susceptible to Russian blackmail." Bertrand's report highlights many of the details & includes a full ScribD copy of the transcript. (An embedded link to the House's transcript leads to a "Page Not Found.") ...

     ... Update: The House links here to more-easily readable pdfs work. ...

... "This One Is Big." Josh Marshall: "Going back more than a year there have been a number of as yet uncorroborated claims that Russia funneled a vast sum of money into the NRA to support get out the vote activities to elect Donald Trump.... It's pretty clear that the NRA played a very important part in securing Trump's razor-thin victory.... There's little question that this effort (Russia courting the NRA and vice versa) is at some level an influence operation, an effort to cozy up to and develop relationships with a major right-wing organization in the US. Whether it goes beyond that into clearly illegal efforts on behalf of Russians or Americans is as yet a fact not in evidence." See also McClatchy's report, linked below & Jonathan Chait's commentary. Mrs. McC: As Marshall warns, these are claims at this point. But it matters that Mueller's team is taking these claims seriously. (Also linked yesterday.)

Jennifer Jacobs & Bill Allison of Bloomberg: "... Donald Trump will mark the government shutdown first anniversary of his inauguration on Saturday with a celebration at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, with tickets starting at $100,000 a pair. That amount, according to the invitation, will pay for dinner and a photograph with the president. For $250,000, a couple can also take part in a roundtable.... The event, hosted by Ronna Romney McDaniel, the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, and the casino mogul Steve Wynn, will benefit the Trump presidential campaign and the RNC. McDaniel's maiden name, Romney, is not written on the invitation. Trump has had testy relations with her uncle Mitt Romney. Wynn is the RNC's finance chairman." ...

... Surprise! Linley Sanders of Newsweek: "Almost one year after President Donald Trump took the oath of office, millions of dollars from his leftover inauguration funds have still not been donated to the charities they were promised to. Trump's inauguration committee raised a record-breaking $107 million as his administration prepared to assume the White House last year, but very little has been disclosed about where the remaining money was allocated. Nearing the one-year anniversary of Trump's inauguration, a government watchdog group is questioning why the funds disappeared." --safari (Also linked yesterday.)

When Tyrants Collide. Maggie Haberman & Julie Davis of the New York Times: "... early Wednesday evening, after learning from a White House aide that his chief of staff, John F. Kelly, had described his views about his signature, base-pleasing campaign pledge to build a wall on the Mexico border as 'not informed,' and his thinking as 'evolving,' the president was initially calm. It did not last. By Wednesday night, Mr. Trump had become convinced by a string of allies and friends he had talked to on the phone that Mr. Kelly had undermined him.... And by Thursday morning, after digesting accounts of Mr. Kelly's comments on cable news, the president was riled up. As the television blared, he typed out a series of tweets that rebutted Mr. Kelly without actually naming him. 'The Wall is the Wall, it has never changed or evolved from the first day I conceived of it,' Mr. Trump wrote at 6:15 a.m. Later in the morning, the president spoke to his chief of staff, and made his displeasure clear.... That kind of conflict has played out infrequently since Mr. Kelly replaced Reince Priebus as chief of staff in July. For different reasons, both Mr. Kelly and Mr. Trump have an interest in preserving their relationship, according to people close to both men.... Both Mr. Trump and Mr. Kelly are used to being in charge, and both are prone to dramatic outbursts of temper.... Both have a tendency to say different things to different audiences, and Mr. Kelly is ... strident about the need to restrict immigration .... They depart over management philosophy: Mr. Trump favors chaos, and Mr. Kelly believes in strict command and control." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Yesterday in the Comments section, we discussed the nature of "The Wall is the Wall," but perhaps we might have discussed other parts of Trump's claims, like his boast, "from the first day I conceived of it." Throughout the Obama administration, a number right-wing nut jobs like Michelle Bachmann proposed a Great Wall on the U.S.-Mexican border. Perhaps the best known is the design by former GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain who said, "Now, my fence might be part Great Wall and part electrical technology.... It will be a twenty foot wall, barbed wire, electrified on the top, and on this side of the fence, I'll have that moat that President Obama talked about. And I would put those alligators in that moat!" Obama's "moat" was a sarcastic jest, but Cain got the alligator idea from another nut, one-term Congressman Joe Walsh. But still. It looks like Trump's "conception" of a wall not only was nothing new, its best-known designer was a black guy. (Cain's presidential bid went down in flames when reports of his extra-marital dalliances surfaced; four years later, even worse stories about Trump didn't preclude his win. Even the right wing has "evolved.") ...

... As for Trump's claim that his conception of the wall "has never changed or evolved," Ron Nixon & Linda Qiu of the New York Times write that "a review of Mr. Trump's public statements on Twitter, in campaign speeches and during interviews shows that the president's views on the border wall have shifted repeatedly since he raised the idea nearly four years ago, on Aug. 5, 2014." They present the evidence to prove it, & some of that evidence is pretty comical.

Annie Gowan of the Washington Post: "Prospective buyers of luxury apartments in the new Trump Towers project outside India's capital are being lured with an unusual promise: If you buy a flat, we will fly you to the United States to meet Donald Trump Jr. The developers of the 600-foot high-rises unveiled a sleek sales office in the New Delhi suburb of Gurgaon last week, claiming they racked up $23 million in sales -- more than 20 units -- i the first day.... One of the developers, Pankaj Bansal, told the Press Trust of India that 'Donald Trump Jr. will host' the first 100 buyers in the United States.... he launch of the new towers comes amid rising concerns that President Trump's children -- including Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, who are running their father's business while he serves as president -- are using their names to profit from their father's presidency, and that foreign officials and others may stay in Trump hotels or buy Trump properties in attempts to curry favor or gain special access to the first family."

The Best People, Ctd. Andrew Kaczynski of CNN: "Trump administration appointee Carl Higbie resigned Thursday as chief of external affairs for the federal government's volunteer service organization after a CNN KFile review of racist, sexist, anti-Muslim and anti-LGBT comments he made on the radio.... Higbie, a former Navy SEAL and conservative media personality, was a surrogate for Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign, appearing on cable news and serving as the spokesman for the Trump-aligned Great America PAC." Kaczynski reports on many comments Higbie made. ...

     ... Mrs. McC: Higbie's views are all sickening & stupid, & a number of them suggest a vague grasp of the English language. For instance, it turns out that "the black race" has "a lax of morality." And his claim that he was "molested by a gay guy" when he was young "set the precedence for me," the "precedence" being extreme homophobia. In fairness to Higbie, his prejudices are wide-ranging. For instance, if you receive government assistance in any form, you shouldn't be allowed to vote. Since most of receive some kind of federal assistance -- that would include Higbie who had a gummit job up till yesterday -- that has to be the most extreme form of voter suppression on record.

Michael Grunwald of Politico: "Every quarter, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau formally requests its operating funds from the Federal Reserve. Last quarter, former director Richard Cordray asked for $217.1 million. Cordray, an appointee of President Barack Obama, needed just $86.6 million the quarter before that. And yesterday..., Donald Trump's acting CFPB director, Mick Mulvaney, sent his first request to the Fed. He requested zero." (Also linked yesterday.)

Another Negative Effect of the Tax Heist. Conor Dougherty of the New York Times: "The last time that Congress approved a sweeping overhaul of the federal tax code, in 1986, it created a tax credit meant to encourage the private sector to invest in affordable housing. It has grown into a $9 billion-a-year social program that has funded the construction of some three million apartments for low-income residents. But the Republican tax plan approved last month amounts to a vast cutback, making it much less likely that such construction will continue apace. Because the tax rate for corporations has been lowered, the value of the credits -- which corporations get in return for their investments -- is also lower.... According to an analysis by [an accounting] firm, the new tax law will reduce the growth of subsidized affordable housing by 235,000 units over the next decade, compounding an existing shortage."

Adam Liptak & Alan Blinder of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court on Thursday temporarily blocked a trial court's order requiring North Carolina lawmakers to produce a revised congressional voting map, making it likely that the midterm elections this year will be conducted using districts favorable to Republican candidates. The trial court had found that Republican legislators in the state had violated the Constitution by drawing congressional voting districts to hurt the electoral chances of Democratic candidates. The Supreme Court;s move was expected and not particularly telling. The court, which is considering two other major tests of partisan gerrymandering, has granted stays in similar settings. Its decisions in the pending cases, from Wisconsin and Maryland, are likely to effectively decide the North Carolina case, too. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor noted dissents from Thursday's order, which was brief and unsigned."

Trump & JeffBo Really Want Those Dreamers OUT. Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: "The Trump administration on Thursday night took the unusual step of asking the Supreme Court to immediately review and overturn a judge's ruling that said the administration may not dismantle a program that provides work permits to undocumented immigrants raised in the United States. Solicitor General Noel J. Francisco asked the court to add the case to its docket this term. That would be unusual because the justices usually wait for an appeals court to act before accepting a case, and because it is late in the game for the court to add cases to its oral argument calendar, which ends in April."

Chris Mooney of the Washington Post: "2017 was among the hottest years ever recorded, government scientists reported Thursday.... The 2017 results make the past four years the hottest period in their 138-year archive.... The renewed evidence of climate change, driven by human emissions of greenhouse gases, comes as the Trump administration moves to open new areas for oil drilling and rolls back regulations that sought to reduce global warming, most prominently by moving to repeal the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan. The administration said it would withdraw from the Paris climate agreement last year." Mrs. McC: Yes, but science at best is a series of evolving theories, but in fact is a total hoax, promulgated by a bunch of pointy-headed hucksters hustling for cushy research grants. (Also linked yesterday.)

David Folkenflik of NPR: "The Los Angeles Times has given prominent coverage to recent revelations of sexual harassment of women by prominent men, particularly in entertainment and media. Yet a review by NPR finds that the newspaper's own CEO and publisher, Ross Levinsohn, has been a defendant in two sexual harassment lawsuits and that his conduct in work settings over the past two decades has been called into question repeatedly by female colleagues.... The portrait that repeatedly emerges is one of a frat-boy executive, catapulting ever higher, even as he creates corporate climates that alienated some of the people who worked for and with him."

Beyond the Beltway

Elise Young of Bloomberg: "Meet Chris Christie, former New Jersey governor and current nobody at Newark Liberty International Airport. The two-term Republican, who left office on Jan. 16, was blocked from a VIP entrance he had used for eight years, and directed to stand in Transportation Security Administration screening lines at Terminal B like anyone else, according to a person familiar with the incident. The order came from police for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the airport." Mrs. McC: As you may recall, this is not the first time Christie has had a little trouble with the Port Authority, which as governor he controlled jointly with New York's governor.

Comments Off
Wednesday
Jan172018

The Commentariat -- January 18, 2018

Afternoon/Evening Update:

Mike DeBonis, et al., of the Washington Post: "The House approved a short-term spending bill Thursday to avoid a government shutdown, sending the measure to the Senate where Democrats said they have enough votes to block its passage. House Republican leaders prevailed in lobbying the conservative House Freedom Caucus and defense hawks who demanded more money for the military in exchange for their votes. The bill passed 230-197. But a government shutdown on the anniversary of President Trump's inauguration appeared likely as Democrats signaled they had rallied enough opposition to stop the measure from passing in the upper chamber."

... Mike Lillis & Melanie Zanona of the Hill: "The House Freedom Caucus has endorsed a deal with GOP leadership to support a short-term government funding bill, putting the House on track to pass the stopgap on Thursday night and send it to the Senate. The caucus endorsed the deal on Thursday night, after warning they had the votes to defeat it earlier in the day." ...

... Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Senate Democrats say they have secured the votes to block a House plan to fund the government through mid-February. A Democratic aide confirmed that the caucus will be able to block Republicans from getting the 60 votes needed to overcome an initial procedural hurdle."

Chris Mooney of the Washington Post: "2017 was among the hottest years ever recorded, government scientists reported Thursday.... The 2017 results make the past four years the hottest period in their 138-year archive.... The renewed evidence of climate change, driven by human emissions of greenhouse gases, comes as the Trump administration moves to open new areas for oil drilling and rolls back regulations that sought to reduce global warming, most prominently by moving to repeal the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan. The administration said it would withdraw from the Paris climate agreement last year." Mrs. McC: Yes, but science at best is a series of evolving theories, but in fact is a total hoax, promulgated by a bunch of pointy-headed hucksters hustling for cushy research grants.

The Dimwit at 1600 Pa. Ave, Ctd. Five Minutes Ago. Scott Wong & Melanie Zanona of the Hill: "President Trump undermined his own party's plan to avert a looming government shutdown on Thursday after tweeting that a key Democratic bargaining chip shouldn't be attached to the funding package. The 17-word tweet threw Capitol Hill into a state of confusion ahead of what is already expected to be a tight vote in the House Thursday night. Republicans on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue were trying to decipher what exactly the president meant by declaring a popular children's health-care program should be part of a 'long term solution' as opposed to a '30 Day, or short term, extension.'" ...

... Four Minutes Ago. Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "The White House on Thursday reiterated that President Trump supports stopgap spending legislation backed by House GOP leaders, an effort to clear up confusion caused by Trump's early-morning tweet about the effort to prevent a government shutdown." ...

... Sarah Kliff & Tara Golshan of Vox: "... some [Congressional Republicans] have already written ... off [Trump's tweet] as inconsequential, likely the result of a news segment the president may have seen." Mrs. McC Translation: They know he's an ignorant moron, but he's their ignorant moron. ...

... Brian Beutler of Crooked: "... if Democrats and Republicans team up to avoid [a government shutdown with a DACA bill], it is nearly certain that Republicans will quietly return to their longstanding but unstated opposition to protecting Dreamers, the Trump administration will begin deporting them, and Democrats will have no good answers for those caught up in the sweeps."

Surprise! Linley Sanders of Newsweek: "Almost one year after President Donald Trump took the oath of office, millions of dollars from his leftover inauguration funds have still not been donated to the charities they were promised to. Trump's inauguration committee raised a record-breaking $107 million as his administration prepared to assume the White House last year, but very little has been disclosed about where the remaining money was allocated. Nearing the one-year anniversary of Trump's inauguration, a government watchdog group is questioning why the funds disappeared." --safari

"This One Is Big." Josh Marshall: "Going back more than a year there have been a number of as yet uncorroborated claims that Russia funneled a vast sum of money into the NRA to support get out the vote activities to elect Donald Trump.... It's pretty clear that the NRA played a very important part in securing Trump's razor-thin victory.... There's little question that this effort (Russia courting the NRA and vice versa) is at some level an influence operation, an effort to cozy up to and develop relationships with a major right-wing organization in the US. Whether it goes beyond that into clearly illegal efforts on behalf of Russians or Americans is as yet a fact not in evidence." See also McClatchy's report, linked below & Jonathan Chait's commentary. Mrs. McC: As Marshall warns, these are claims at this point. But it matters that Mueller's team is taking these claims seriously.

Michael Grunwald of Politico: "Every quarter, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau formally requests its operating funds from the Federal Reserve. Last quarter, former director Richard Cordray asked for $217.1 million. Cordray, an appointee of President Barack Obama, needed just $86.6 million the quarter before that. And yesterday..., Donald Trump's acting CFPB director, Mick Mulvaney, sent his first request to the Fed. He requested zero."

*****

The Comments function appears to be working!! Those who signed up may continue to use their fabulous special status, or not, as they prefer. I don't intend to sign up anyone else, unless s/he claims s/he was unable to do so because s/he was staying in an Internetless TrumpHut in the Trump Nation of Nambia. ...

"The video [is] by the Gondwana Collection Namibia - which runs several game reserves in the southern African nation...."


John Bresnahan, et al., of Politico: "House Republicans are short of the votes they need to avoid a government shutdown, but Speaker Paul Ryan and GOP leaders remain confident they will pass a stopgap funding measure when it comes to the floor on Thursday.... President Donald Trump is personally leaning on GOP lawmakers to fall into line, especially hard-line conservatives who are opposed to virtually anything Ryan and his leadership team propose." ...

... Mike DeBonis, et al., of the Washington Post: "Bitter divisions in both parties threatened Wednesday to derail Congress's effort to keep the federal government fully operating past the end of the week. The shutdown threat emerged on two fronts: Republican defense hawks in the House said a short-term spending plan the party introduced late Tuesday did not devote enough money to the military. Meanwhile, Democrats, whose support would be critical for passage in the Senate, began lining up in opposition amid pressure from immigration activists to use the budget talks as leverage to legalize ... 'dreamers.' By Wednesday evening, the short-term bill was on the cusp of failure." ...

... Elise Viebeck of the Washington Post: "Republicans on Wednesday expressed cautious optimism about averting a government shutdown at midnight Friday, with rank-and-file members grudgingly accepting a short-term spending bill.... If Republican leaders can quell dissent among deficit and defense hawks and pass the measure with only GOP votes, House Democrats will lose the leverage they planned to exercise on behalf of dreamers during the current round of negotiations." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Ryan Grim of The Intercept: "The House spending bill released Wednesday would allow President Trump, or people under him, to secretly shift money to fund intelligence programs, a break with 70 years of governing tradition.... Since 1947, section 504 of the National Security Act has mandated that the administration inform Congress if it intends to shift money from one intelligence project to another, if the new project has not been authorized by Congress. That notification can be -- and almost always is -- done in secret, but it is at least a minimal check on executive power. The spending bill currently under consideration, known as a continuing resolution, or CR, breaks with that tradition." --safari...

... Aaron Blake of the Washington Post: "While talking about languishing discussions to attach a DACA compromise and border security to the government-funding bill that is due Friday, [Mitch] McConnell suggested that the White House had failed to even make its demands known. 'I'm looking for something that President Trump supports, and he has not yet indicated what measure he is willing to sign,' McConnell said. 'As soon as we figure out what he is for, then I would be convinced that we were not just spinning our wheels.'... Lawmakers proceeded with the bill anyway, but Senate GOP leaders indicated Wednesday they won't devote floor time to something Trump won't sign. In other words, it seems we're headed for another short-term extension that avoids a government shutdown but doesn't address the soon-to-expire Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals protections...." ...

... Ayesha Rascoe & Roberta Rampton of Reuters: "... Donald Trump on Wednesday aligned himself solidly with conservative Republicans on immigration, criticizing a proposed bipartisan deal as 'horrible' on U.S. border security and 'very, very weak' on reforms for the legal immigration system." ...

... The Wayback (to January 9, that is) Machine. I'll sign whatever immigration bill [Congress sends] me.... You guys are going to have to come up with a solution [for Dreamers] and I'm going to sign that solution.... I think my positions are going to be what the people in this room come up with. If they come to me with things I'm not in love with, I'm going to do it. Because I respect them. -- Donald Trump, January 9, at a televised meeting with Members of Congress ...

... Charles Blow: John Kelly's "hostility toward immigration has been evident from the beginning of his time in the administration. When Kelly was brought on as chief of staff in July, The Nation warned, 'John Kelly's promotion is a disaster for immigrants,' pointing out that in just six months as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, he turned it into 'a deportation machine.'... While at the D.H.S., Kelly even considered separating immigrant parents from their accompanying children if they enter the country illegally.... One of Kelly's primary targets has been the Temporary Protected Status program.... On this issue of Trump's racist immigration and deportation policy, he is not only complicit, he is a co-conspirator."

... Heather Caygle & Seung Min Kim of Politico: "House Democrats left a meeting with top White House officials Wednesday seemingly no closer to reaching a deal on immigration or government funding before a critical Friday deadline. Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus said their hour-long meeting with White House Chief of Staff John Kelly was 'positive' -- a dramatic change in tone from their contentious encounters with him in the past -- but mostly a rehashing of talking points that doesn't bring the two sides closer to an agreement." Mrs. McC: Maybe that's because Kelly is even more a racist than Trump. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Ed O'Keefe of the Washington Post: "White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly told Democratic lawmakers Wednesday that some of the hard-line immigration policies President Trump advocated during the campaign were 'uninformed,' that the United States will never construct a wall along its entire southern border and that Mexico will never pay for it, according to people familiar with the meeting. The comments were out of sync with remarks by Trump, who in recent days has reiterated his desire to build a border wall that would be funded by Mexico 'indirectly through NAFTA.'"...

... David Ferguson of RawStory: "[In the meeting, John Kelly] ... praise[d] the business acumen of Mexica’s drug cartels, saying that a physical border wall as Trump promised during his 2016 campaign is impractical because drug lords will get their wares into the country regardless. 'Drug cartels will always find a way to get their drugs in so long as there's demand in the U.S.,' Kelly said. He added that this is to be expected from people who 'are very smart and good businessmen.' The comment reportedly set of a murmur of disquiet in the room. Lawmakers later told the Post they 'found it odd that Kelly would credit cartel leaders who often authorize murders as smart or good businessmen.'" --safari ...

... SO THEN. Eileen Sullivan of the New York Times: "President Trump directly contradicted his own chief of staff on Thursday and said his position on building a wall between the United States and Mexico had not 'evolved. Mr. Trump's chief of staff, John F. Kelly, told some Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday that Mr. Trump had 'evolved' on the issue of the wall, and that the president was not 'fully informed' when he promised to build such a barrier last year. In an early-morning Twitter post, Mr. Trump took the unusual step of publicly pushing back against his own White House, signaling a disconnect between the president and his staff at a critical time of negotiations with Congress to avoid a government shutdown. 'The Wall is the Wall, it has never changed or evolved from the first day I conceived of it. Parts will be, of necessity, see through and it was never intended to be built in areas where there is natural protection such as mountains, wastelands or tough rivers or water..... ....The Wall will be paid for, directly or indirectly, or through longer term reimbursement, by Mexico, which has a ridiculous $71 billion dollar trade surplus with the U.S. The $20 billion dollar Wall is "peanuts" compared to what Mexico makes from the U.S. NAFTA is a bad joke!]'" ...

... Jonathan Blitzer of the New Yorker has a pretty good rundown of the "evolution" of DACA legislation -- up to Trump's latest pronouncement. Blitzer includes some insider wrangling & concentrates also on Sen. Lindsey Graham's up-and-down relationship with the Nutty President*. ...

... AND Jelani Cobb of the New Yorker traces the root of Trump's nativism to the Borough of Queens, "the most ethnically diverse urban area in the United States. (Some experts estimate that as many as eight hundred languages are spoken there.)" ...

... So that was insightful, but let's find out what Eric thinks. Aaron Rupar of ThinkProgress: "During an interview on his father's favorite TV show on Wednesday, Eric Trump dismissed racist comments his dad recently made about African countries, and claimed the only color President Trump cares about is 'green.' 'My father sees one color -- green,' Trump said on Fox & Friends. 'That is all he cares about. He cares about the economy. He does not see race. He is the least racist person I ever met in my entire life.'"


Michael Shear & Gina Kolata of the New York Times: "Cardiologists not associated with the White House said Wednesday that President Trump's physical exam revealed serious heart concerns, including very high levels of so-called bad cholesterol, which raises the risk that Mr. Trump could have a heart attack while in office.... Dr. David Maron, the director of preventive cardiology at Stanford University's medical school, said Wednesday that it was alarming that the president's LDL levels remain above 140 even though he is taking 10 milligrams of Crestor, a powerful drug that is used to lower cholesterol levels to well below 100. Dr. Maron said he would 'definitely' be worried about Mr. Trump's risk for having a heart attack if the president were one of his patients. Asked if Mr. Trump is in perfect health, Dr. Maron ...[said]: 'God, no.'" ...

... What's the Matter with Doc Jackson? Dana Milbank: "Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson was so effusive in extolling the totally amazing, surpassingly marvelous, superbly stupendous and extremely awesome health of the president that the doctor sounded almost Trumpian. 'The president's overall health is excellent,' he said, repeating 'excellent' eight times: 'Hands down, there's no question that he is in the excellent range. ... I put out in the statement that the president's health is excellent, because his overall health is excellent.... Overall, he has very, very good health. Excellent health.' And just how excellent is His Excellency's excellent health, doctor? 'Incredible cardiac fitness,' was Dr. Jackson's professional opinion. 'He has incredible genes.... He has incredibly good genes, and i's just the way God made him.'" Dr. Bandy Lee, a psychiatrist suggests Jackson is suffering from what I, Mrs. Bea McCrabbie, would call Stockholm Syndrome & what she calls "powerful sycophancy." ...

... Gail Collins: "Donald Trump has passed his mental test. This may come as either a relief or a shock.... Skeptics pointed out that the report's enthusiastic descriptions of the president's tiptop condition seemed inconsistent with some of the statistics on his weight, cholesterol and plaque buildup in the arteries. If the doctor had simply said 'good for an overweight 71-year-old guy,' everybody probably could have nodded and moved forward. But the big news was the mental test.... [the test] didn't measure judgment, and there was no score to indicate whether the test-taker would, if faced with a question of what to do about immigration policy, change his position 12 times in 24 hours. Whether he would confide to several million Twitter followers that the country 'needs a good shutdown'? Whether he thinks of himself as a 'very stable genius.'" ...

... "Trump Doesn't Have Dementia. He's Just a Moron." Jonathan Chait: "Trump's supporters have taken the news of his successful physical examination with a reputable doctor as vindication. Never has a president won such frenzied praise for being declared dementia-free.... But while Trump's behavior may not be medical symptoms of a debilitating mental disease, it is clear evidence of a mind that's totally unfit for the presidency. What excuse does he have for his behavior?"

Jessica Taylor of NPR: "A new NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll finds that by a 53-to-40-percent margin, Americans deemed Trump's first year a failure. And by an almost 2-to-1 margin (61 to 32 percent), Americans said they believe Trump has divided the country since his election. Americans give Trump relatively positive marks on his handling of ISIS and the state of the economy -- no small things. But on just about every other issue, they disapprove of his handling of them or they think things have gotten worse -- from their views of the tax plan to the state of race relations and women's rights to immigration, health care, the deficit and foreign policy, including his approach to North Korea. Seven-in-10 Americans are now concerned about the possibility of war breaking out with the rogue nuclear nation." ...

... "America Third" Has a Nice Ring to It. Julian Borger of the Guardian: "Global confidence in US leadership has fallen to a new low, and the country now ranks below China in worldwide approval ratings, according to a new Gallup poll. The survey of opinion in 134 countries showed a record collapse in approval for the US role in the world, from 48% under Obama to 30% after one year of Donald Trump -- the lowest level Gallup has recorded since beginning its global leadership poll over a decade ago.... Germany is now seen as a global leader by many more people (41% of the sample), with China in second place on 31%. Russia has 27% approval for its global role according to the poll. In just under half of the world's countries -- 65 out of 134 -- US standing collapsed, by 10 percentage points or more. Some of the biggest losses were among Washington's closest allies in western Europe, Australia, and Latin America." --safari ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: On the upside, the leader of the free world is a woman, after all.

Jen Kirby & Libby Nelson of Vox: "There was no red carpet, but ... Donald Trump tweeted a link to his 'highly anticipated' fake news award winners Wednesday night, as promised. The link itself -- to the official Republican National Committee website -- turned out to be a bit of a fake out. 'The site is temporarily offline, we are working to bring it back up. Please try back later,' the link read for many for at least an hour after the announcement.... But eventually, the website rebounded, revealing the 'winners' (or 'losers').... Trump's list is a collection of some of the biggest journalistic errors of the past year (and a lesson in the perils of aggregating viral videos or sending hasty tweets). The aftermath of the stories listed also shows news organizations' commitment to setting the record straight. In almost every case, media outlets issued corrections. When reporters made mistakes, they acknowledged them repeatedly. In one instance, the reporters and editors involved resigned. Below is an annotated list, to give some context to these 'awards.' The full list is (probably) available here.” Mrs. McC: BTW, Krugman -- who took top honors -- has several times admitted his prediction (not report) was a mistake. ...

... Jordain Carney of the Hill: "GOP Sen. Jeff Flake (Ariz.) rebuked President Trump's attacks on the press from the Senate floor on Wednesday, urging his colleagues to publicly push back against the rhetoric. 'The enemy of the people was how the president of the United States called the free press in 2017. ... It is a testament to the condition of our democracy that our own president used words infamously spoken by Josef Stalin to describe his enemies," Flake said.... Flake's speech marks one of the strongest Republican rebukes of Trump from the Senate floor." Mrs. McC: See also Flake's Arizona colleague John McCain's essay, linked yesterday. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Brian Stelter of CNN: "More than once a day, on average, [Trump] has publicly assailed 'fake news,' 'fake polls,' 'fake media,' and 'fake stories.' Over and over again, he has told the United States not to trust what reporters say. His allies have done the same thing. This repetition -- constantly labeling real news as 'fake' -- is what has made the slur so powerful. In the run-up to the 2016 election, 'fake news' was a term used by researchers and journalists to describe hoaxes that were designed to deceive people. These made-up stories are typically promoted via social media, either to make money or spread propaganda. But after Trump won the election, he almost single-handedly turned the definition on its head. Among his supporters, 'fake news' is now a catch-all criticism for any news that Trump doesn't like." ...

... Biggest Irony in Today's News ...

... Journalistic Standards & Hush Money Saved Trump. Paul Farhi of the Washington Post: Porn star "Stormy Daniels ... was on the radar of a number of mainstream news outlets in the waning days of the presidential campaign. Reporters from ABC, Fox News, the Daily Beast and Slate.com were pursuing a potentially explosive story: that Daniels had allegedly had an affair with Donald Trump in 2006, only months after Trump's wife, Melania, had given birth to their son, Barron. Yet no one went with the story.... (The Smoking Gun website had already published details of the alleged affair in mid-October, to little public notice or reaction.)... Journalists say they held back because they couldn't independently corroborate key elements of Daniels's account.... The story, in other words, failed to rise to journalistic standards, never mind that it involved a man who regularly attacks the news media for lacking standards.... The Daily Beast's executive editor, Noah Shachtman, said his publication decided not to go with a story despite having three sources confirming the affair, including one on the record, Daniels's friend Alana Evans.... Daniels herself was ready to confirm it as well, he said, but she backed out of an interview on Nov. 3, apparently after signing [a] nondisclosure agreement [in exchange for a payoff]. That defection was critical; Shachtman said the Daily Beast would have published if Daniels had confirmed what other sources were already claiming." ...

... Ben Jacobs of the Guardian: "In a newly published interview with Stephanie Clifford from 2011, the pornographic actor acknowledges an affair with Donald Trump -- contradicting a denial produced by the president's legal team last week. Clifford, who performs under the name Stormy Daniels, described her 2006 rendezvous with Trump in a Lake Tahoe hotel suite in detail to InTouch magazine. Her account was reportedly corroborated by her friend and supported by a polygraph test and her ex-husband." The interview is here. ...

     ... AND In Touch plans to release the whole 5,500-word interview.

... Judd Legum of ThinkProgress: "... the Stormy Daniels Trump story matters -- beyond allegations of an affair. Here's why.... Trump's lawyer is distributing a statement denying any sexual relationship between Daniels and Trump. But there is a mountain of evidence that suggests this statement is a lie.... The story has parallels to other women's claims of sexual assault by Trump.... The story suggests Trump is vulnerable to blackmail and extortion.... In the unverified Steele dossier, there is an allegation that Russian officials have information about Trump's interactions with sex workers in Moscow that Russian agents are using as leverage.... [The Daniels hush-money story indicates] Trump ... has things to hide and is willing to go to substantial lengths to hide them." ...

     ... digby: "Daniels says [Trump] didn't use protection.... I don't care what Trump does with porn stars and I really don't want to know the details. But it is important that he was worried enough about it that he paid them off. And it is important that his excuse that he couldn't have done anything untoward in Russia because he's a germophobe." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: There may be some poetic justice (not to mention more irony) here. Just as the Whitewatergate investigation (of trump rival Hillary Clinton et vir) eventually morphed from a real estate probe into a sex scandal, so may the Trump-Russia scandal prove out the famously "unverified" "golden rain" incident. That is, Mueller's team may be compelled, partly because of the Daniels payoff, to seek verification of Trump's romps with Russian sex workers. The team may never be able to verify whether or not Russian spies threatened Trump or made a pact with Trump, but it is fair to assume that the Russians retained evidence to embarrass -- and perhaps blackmail -- a high-profile American having sex in a hotel located in Moscow. We may yet be in for an updated version of breathless reporters cold-reading live on-air excerpts of the Starr report as it was still being to news organizations. One of the LOL moments of the whole debacle was the fastidious Bob Schieffer of CBS News reporting on "semen stains." ...


... Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "Stephen K. Bannon ... will be interviewed by investigators working for the special counsel in the Russia investigation instead of testifying before a grand jury, according to a person familiar with the matter, a sign that Mr. Bannon is cooperating with the inquiry. The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, had subpoenaed Mr. Bannon to appear before a grand jury this week. But Mr. Bannon has agreed to cooperate with Mr. Mueller's investigation and will be interviewed in the less formal setting of the special counsel's offices in downtown Washington." ...

... Jonathan Swan of Axios: "Steve Bannon made one conspicuous slip up in his closed-door hearing on Tuesday with the House Intelligence Committee, according to four sources with direct knowledge of the confidential proceedings. Bannon admitted that he'd had conversations with Reince Priebus, Sean Spicer and legal spokesman Mark Corallo about Don Junior's infamous meeting with the Russians in Trump Tower in June 2016." ...

... Eamon Javers of CNBC: "The White House believed it had an agreement with the House Intelligence Committee to limit questions for Steve Bannon only to events on the presidential campaign, and not during the ousted former chief strategist's time in the Trump administration, an official told CNBC. According to the White House official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, staffers for the committee and the White House on Friday discussed the parameters of Bannon's testimony.... Then, hours into Bannon's closed-door testimony on Tuesday, Bannon's lawyers informed the White House from Capitol Hill that the questions would extend beyond the scope of what the White House understood the agreement to be. At that point, the White House told Bannon not to answer any further." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Sonan Sheth of Business Insider: "Former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski testified before the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday, but refused to answer questions about events that took place during the campaign and his conversations with ... Donald Trump since then. Lewandowski is the latest official to stonewall the committee as it probes Russia's election interference and whether the Trump campaign colluded with Moscow. Lewandowski was present during a number of critical events that investigators are keenly focused on.... Ranking member Adam Schiff said Lewandowski's apparent refusal to answer questions about events that took place during the Trump campaign, as well as his conversations with Trump since then, was 'completely unacceptable.' He added, 'Yesterday, [Lewandowski] said on Fox that he would answer every question that we had. Today, however, he refused.'... Lewandowski's reluctance, NBC News reported, was not based on the possibility that Trump may claim executive privilege to prevent him from disclosing details about key events. Rather, Lewandowski said he was not prepared to answer certain questions and suggested returning at a later date." The cited NBC News report follows. ...

... Mike Memoli of NBC News: "A top Trump administration official answered a full range of questions from House investigators Wednesday, just one day after former White House strategist Steve Bannon told them he was under instructions from the West Wing to remain silent, sparking new negotiations between Congress and the White House that could lead President Trump to formally invoke executive privilege for the first time in the Russia probe. Though lawmakers described White House deputy chief of staff Rick Dearborn as fully cooperative with the House Intelligence Committee during more than four hours of questioning, the same could not be said of the day's second witness, former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski.... Lewandowski said he was simply not prepared to provide those answers Wednesday, offering to return at a later date." ...

...** Rachel Maddow posits some credible theories as to why Bannon clammed up during Congressional testimony. She links it to Mueller's investigation trying to preserve any evidence from falling into the hands of Trump Confederates like David Nunes & Trey Gowdy. You can speed the video up to around 16:30 to catch the gist of her argument. --safari

** Peter Stone & Greg Gordon of McClatchy News: "The FBI is investigating whether a top Russian banker with ties to the Kremlin illegally funneled money to the National Rifle Association to help Donald Trump win the presidency, two sources familiar with the matter have told McClatchy. FBI counterintelligence investigators have focused on the activities of Alexander Torshin, the deputy governor of Russia's central bank who is known for his close relationships with both Russian President Vladimir Putin and the NRA, the sources said.." ...

     ... Jonathan Chait has more on the NRA-Russia connection. Here's the kicker: "There is no more untouchable faction of the Republican Party than the NRA. Already, Trump's allies have coalesced behind him and used their investigative power to support his wild claims that the FBI is part of a sinister deep-state conspiracy against him. If the NRA is swept up in Robert Mueller's probe, the pressure on Republicans to fire or hamstring his investigation would ramp up to overwhelming levels."


** Summer Meza of Newsweek: "It's been one year since Jared Kushner ... assumed office, but he's yet to receive full security clearance for his role in the White House. The unprecedented delay in clearance represents a violation of security norms and suggests that Kushner continues to receive special treatment due to his relationship to President Donald Trump, according to legal experts familiar with the process." --safari

Julian Borger, et al. of the Guardian: "The US intends to maintain an open-ended military presence in Syria, not only to fight Isis and al-Qaida but also to provide a bulwark against Iranian influence, ensure the departure of the Assad regime and create conditions for the return of refugees, the secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, said on Wednesday." --safari ...

...Pentagon Puzzle Time. Elizabeth Preza of RawStory: "... Rex Tillerson on Wednesday provided stunning insight into how Donald Trump's executive branch functions, telling an audience at Stanford University he receives print-outs of the president's tweets and has to figure out how to 'use' them to craft the administration's foreign policy. Describing it as 'actually ... not a bad system,' Tillerson said he never gets a heads up about the latest topic on Trump's Twitter feed. 'There's not a whole lot I';m gonna do until it's out there,' the Secretary of State said." --safari: This is so embarrassing for everyone involved.

Propaganda Wars. Noor Al-Sibai of RawStory: "On Tuesday evening, reporter Yashar Ali pointed out that the Twitter accounts of former Fox News hosts Greta Van Susteren and Eric Bolling appear to have been hacked by pro-Turkish trolls. The connection, both Ali and The Hill pointed out, appears to be that both Van Susteren and Bolling are on the 45-person list of people President Donald Trump follows on Twitter. The hackers also released direct messages sent to Trump from Bolling's compromised account." --safari...

... Propaganda Wars. Sean Illing of Vox: "Last month, AP reported that Russian intelligence agencies were pursuing journalists around the world in the same way they typically target politicians and government employees from hostile states. Much of this activity, according to the report, was aimed at dissident journalists and bloggers who are perceived as threats to the Russian regime. But Aki Peritz, a former CIA analyst and current adjunct professor at American University, believes that certain foreign spy agencies are very likely targeting one specific private institution: Fox News.... I reached out to Peritz and asked him to lay out his case. A lightly edited transcript of our conversation follows." --safari

Choe Sang-Hun & Mark Landler of the New York Times: "North and South Korea reached an agreement Wednesday for their athletes to march together under one flag at the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics next month, a powerful gesture of reconciliation that further complicates President Trump's strategy for dealing with the nuclear-armed regime of Kim Jong-un. The budding détente scrambles its strategy of pressuring the North, with sanctions and threats of military action, to give up its nuclear arsenal. This latest gesture of unity, the most dramatic in a decade, could add to fears in Washington that Pyongyang is making progress on a more far-reaching agenda.... The prospect of crowds from North and South Korea cheering together would be a striking contrast to the threats of war from Mr. Trump.... The Olympic agreement could bolster President Moon Jae-in of South Korea, who has been pushing for dialogue with the North.... 'I'd sit down, but I'm not sure that sitting down will solve the problem,' Mr. Trump said in an interview with Reuters.... In the interview, Mr. Trump was uncharacteristically critical of Russia, saying it had weakened the global sanctions against North Korea, even as China was doing more."

Purifying the Race. Yeganeh Torbati of Reuters, via RawStory: "Haitians will no longer be eligible for U.S. visas given to low-skilled workers, the Trump administration said on Wednesday, bringing an end to a small-scale effort to employ Haitians in the United States after a catastrophic 2010 earthquake. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the change less than a week after President Donald Trump reportedly ... referring to [Haiti] as [a] 'shithole' countr[y]. Trump has denied using that word.... Belize and Samoa were also removed from the lists, for risks stemming from human trafficking and not taking back nationals ordered removed from the United States, respectively. Just a few dozen Haitians entered the United States on the visas each year since they were given permission to do so in 2012 by the Obama administration, according to DHS data." --safari ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: One reason this is a little odd: "Mar-a-Lago... reportedly hires more of its seasonal foreign workers from Haiti than it does from nearly any other country."

Ben Protess of the New York Times: "As a photographer for the Department of Energy, Simon Edelman regularly attended meetings with Secretary Rick Perry and snapped pictures for official purposes. Now he is out of a job and seeking whistle-blower protections after leaking photographs of Mr. Perry meeting with a major energy industry donor to President Trump. Late last year, Mr. Edelman said, he shared with journalists photos he shot at the private meeting between Mr. Perry and the campaign contributor, Robert E. Murray, the head of one of the country's largest coal mining companies, Murray Energy. One photo showed the two men embracing; another captured the cover sheet of a confidential 'action plan' that Mr. Murray brought to the meeting last March calling for policy and regulatory changes friendly to the coal industry.... Based on the 'action plan' and conversations he overheard, Mr. Edelman said, Mr. Perry had tilted the administration's energy policy to favor Murray Energy and other coal companies.... Mr. Murray [also] has been a financial backer of Mr. Perry...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... For more on that nice Bob Murray, let's ask John Oliver (at about 4:40 mins. in & at about 12:30 in):

... AND, yeah, Murray did sue Oliver .

"Alternative Facts". Aaron Rupar of ThinkProgress: "During a White House news briefing on Wednesday, Ed O'Callaghan, principal deputy assistant attorney general, struggled to defend a misleading Department of Justice report that claims three out of four individuals convicted in recent years of international terrorism or terrorism-related offenses were 'immigrants.'... On Wednesday, O'Callaghan was pressed about that issue -- and had no good answers." --safari ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: O'Callaghan needs to take lying lessons from Trump & Mrs. Huckleberry.

... Amanda Gomez of ThinkProgress: "Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) omitted key facts at a hearing Wednesday in his attempt to highlight Medicaid's role in fueling the opioid crisis. The Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which he chairs, released a report the same day, drawing connections between the public insurance program and opioid epidemic." --safari

Congressional Race

Jonathan Martin & Julie Bosman of the New York Times: "Republicans are scrambling to save a heavily conservative House seat in western Pennsylvania, dispatching President Trump to the district on Thursday while preparing a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign to stave off another embarrassing special election defeat in a district that was gerrymandered to stay Republican. When Representative Tim Murphy was pushed out of the House last year after the revelation that he encouraged a mistress to have an abortion, Republican leaders gave scant thought to his successor. The odd-shaped district in the southwestern corner of the state was drawn to skirt Democratic Pittsburgh and concentrate conservative-leaning, steel and coal country voters. Mr. Trump will appear at an industrial equipment sales and repair company to trumpet both Mr. Saccone and the recently passed tax overhaul. Vice President Mike Pence will follow on Feb. 2...."

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