The Commentariat -- November 9, 2017

Afternoon Update:

Let's see how things are going for ole Shalt-Not-Covet-Thy-Neighbors'-Daughters Roy Moore:

Stephanie McCrummen, et al., of the Washington Post: Four women who were then between the ages of 14 and 18 "interviewed by The Washington Post in recent weeks say [Roy] Moore [who is the GOP candidate for the U.S. Senate in an Alabama special election] pursued them when ... he was in his early 30s, episodes they say they found flattering at the time, but troubling as they got older. None of the women say that Moore forced them into any sort of relationship or sexual contact." However, he kissed them & one woman, who was 14 at the time, says Moore removed her close & engaged in sexual touching. All four women are named in the story. "In a written statement, Moore denied the allegations.'These allegations are completely false and are a desperate political attack by the National Democrat Party and the Washington Post on this campaign,' Moore, now 70, said. The campaign said in a subsequent statement that if the allegations were true they would have surfaced during his previous campaigns, adding 'this garbage is the very definition of fake news.'" ...

... MEANWHILE. Andrew Kaczynski & Chris Massie of CNN: "Roy Moore, the Republican nominee for Senate in Alabama, ruled in a 1990s divorce case that a woman who had a lesbian affair couldn't visit her children unsupervised or with her partner, writing that the 'minor children will be detrimentally affected by the present lifestyle' of the mother. Moore, then a circuit judge, was ultimately removed from the case by an Alabama appeals court after the woman and her attorneys argued that he couldn't be impartial because of his views on homosexuality, according to public court documents reviewed by CNN's KFile."

John Kelly Really Is a Nasty, Racist Prick. Nick Miroff of the Washington Post: "On Monday, as the Department of Homeland Security prepared to extend the residency permits of tens of thousands of Honduran immigrants living in the United States, White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly called Acting Secretary Elaine Duke to pressure her to expel them, according to current and former administration officials. Duke refused to reverse her decision and was angered by what she felt was a politically driven intrusion by Kelly and Tom Bossert, the White House homeland security adviser, who also called her about the matter, according to officials with knowledge of Monday's events, who spoke on the condition of anonymity...." Also worth reading is the part about DHS Secretary nominee Kirstjen Nielsen.

Damian Paletta & Mike DeBonis of the Washington Post: "Senate Republicans on Thursday plan to propose delaying a cut in the corporate tax rate ... until 2019, four people briefed on the planning said, a major departure from President Trump's insistence on immediate changes that he says are necessary to spur the economy.... The one-year delay would lower the cost of the tax cut bill by more than $100 billion, and negotiators are trying to preserve as much revenue as they can for other changes. But it could also delay decisions by companies to move back to the United States from overseas or have companies hold off on other decisions as they wait for the corporate rate to fall." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Remember that the reason Senate Republicans are trying to "lower the cost of the tax cut bill" is not that they're all concerned about balancing revenue & spending; rather, it's because the bill must be "revenue-neutral" -- that is, not raise the deficit -- if it's to pass under the majority-rule budget "reconciliation" law. A bill that raises the deficit would require 60 votes to get to the floor. ...

... Matt Yglesias of Vox: "Top White House economic adviser Gary Cohn's background as a Goldman Sachs executive leaves him more experienced in the art of talking to really rich people than communicating with the public. That ends up making this interview with CNBC's John Harwood, published this morning, an extraordinary document, because when Harwood pushes him on a few points, Cohn ends up basically surrendering and admitting the plain truth about the Republican tax plan: that it's a bonanza for big businesses and the rich, whose main benefit for normal people is a vague hope that prosperity will trickle down from those at the top." ...

... AND here's Gary Cohn telling John Harwood that repealing the estate tax "benefits a lot of different people." Mrs. McC: Yes, in that Gary Cohn and Donald Trump and (poor) Wilbur Ross and David Koch and Charles Koch are "a lot of different people." Cohn's assertion was in response to Harwood's question, "Are you seriously saying with a straight face that getting rid of the estate tax is about farmers and not about very wealthy families?" ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: Okay, so that and the trickle-down stuff has broken the last of my stash of finely-calibrated Bullshitometers, BUT then Cohn says to Harwood, "The most excited group out there are big CEOs, about our tax plan." "This," as Jonathan Chait admits, "is 100 percent true."

*****

More Election News:

Mary Jordan, et al., of the Washington Post: "Women racked up victories across the country on Tuesday, and are being credited with the Democrats' big night overall. It is a testament to the remarkable explosion of women candidates who have entered the political stage since Donald Trump was elected president one year ago. The wave is likely to continue. In 2018, 40 women are already planning to run for governor. Dozens more are considering congressional and other statewide office bids. And Tuesday's result has already become a rallying cry for activists.... It was a night of historic wins for women and minorities across the nation."

Virginia. Michael Martz of the Richmond Times-Dispatch: "Virginia Democrats are poised to claim at least a share of control of the House of Delegates after erasing a 32-seat Republican advantage in a 'tsunami election,' with control of the chamber likely to be ultimately decided by vote recounts." ...

... Ari Berman of Mother Jones: "Virginia was one of four states that blocked ex-felons from voting -- disenfranchising 1 in 5 black Virginians -- until Gov. Terry McAuliffe restored voting rights to 168,000 ex-felons over the past year and a half.... Republican gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie sharply criticized McAuliffe and his lieutenant governor, Ralph Northam, for this policy. But Northam's victory in the governor's race on Tuesday means that Virginia will continue to restore voting rights to ex-offenders. It's just one way that Democratic victories in Virginia, New Jersey, and Washington yesterday could lead to an expansion of access to the ballot." --safari ...

... Jonah Bromwich of the New York Times: "Two years after his 24-year-old girlfriend was shot and killed on live television, a Virginia Democrat on Tuesday defeated an opponent who was endorsed by the National Rifle Association for a seat in the State Legislature. Chris Hurst, a former news anchor whose girlfriend and colleague, Alison Parker, was killed on air in 2015, overtook Joseph Yost to win the 12th House District seat in the state's Legislature. He will be one of two Democrats to represent the state's deeply conservative southwest region in the House."

New Jersey. Freeholder Now Has Time to Cook His Own Damned Dinner. AP: "A New Jersey politician who shared a meme on Facebook during January's Women's March in Washington asking whether the protest would be 'over in time for them to cook dinner' is eating his words. Democrat Ashley Bennett, a first-time candidate who was angered by Republican John Carman's remarks, defeated him Tuesday as he tried to win a second term as an Atlantic County freeholder. The board oversees government in Atlantic County, a region of about 275,000 people that includes the struggling Atlantic City seaside gambling resort."

Montana. Thomas Plank of the Helena Independent Record: "Wilmot Collins will be Helena's new mayor, unseating incumbent Jim Smith in a close race Tuesday. Collins, 54, will be the city's first new mayor in 16 years after running a long campaign based in progressive principles."

Maine Update. Reuters, via RawStory: "Maine Republican Governor Paul LePage said on Wednesday he will not expand the state's Medicaid program under Obamacare, ignoring a ballot initiative widely backed by voters, calling it 'ruinous' for the state's budget. Maine looked set to become the first state in the nation to expand Medicaid by popular vote. About 60 percent of voters in Maine approved the ballot proposal in Tuesday's election, according to the Bangor Daily News newspaper.... LePage said he will not implement the expansion until it is fully funded by the Maine legislature." --safari

Philip Lewis & Willa Frej of the Huffington Post provide a list of "historic victories" in Tuesday's elections.

Annals of "Journalism," Ha Ha Ha. Fox "News" Goes Dark on Election Results. Ben Mathis-Lilley of Slate: "The biggest political story of the hour is that Republican gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie went down big in Virginia after running a Trump-esque campaign fixated on inflammatory culture-war issues, losing to Democrat Ralph Northam by what looks like it will end up as a ine-point margin. It's the biggest story of the hour, that is, unless you're watching Fox News: As observed by political writer Chris Hooks, Donald Trump's favorite network spent more than 90 minutes in prime time on Tuesday -- Election Night! -- between discussions of election results. Just before 9 p.m., Tucker Carlson read an update about the loss in Virginia and another Democratic gubernatorial win in New Jersey. At 9, Sean Hannity took over and slipped in a comment about why said Republican losses don't really count: 'Those results in New Jersey and Virginia -- not states Donald Trump won.'" ...

     ... Here's a chyron that ran on Fox "News" to explain Virginia's gubernatorial election results: "Republican Gillespie loses VA governor's race after failing to fully embrace Trump".

Time to Check in with Some Real Presidents:

Citizen Barack. Steve Schmadeke & Elvia Malagon of the Chicago Tribune: President "Obama was one of 168 people who showed up for jury duty [at the Daley Center in Chicago's Loop] and assigned to one of 16 panels. Eight of those panels, including Panel 6 which Obama sat on, were randomly selected to be sent home around lunchtime. A media scrum followed Obama's every move in the morning -- from departing from his South Side home in the Kenwood neighborhood to his 10 a.m. arrival at the downtown Chicago court complex.... Obama was a hit in the jury assembly room, shaking hands with would-be jurors and signing copies of his books that some brought, [Timothy] Evans, the chief judge, told reporters later."

Brett Samuels of the Hill: "Former President Bill Clinton on Wednesday expressed concern that President Trump's rhetoric reflects the same values as dictators around the world. Clinton said on the late night show 'Conan', that the world's dictators all want to blur the line between fact and fiction. 'They figure if you don't know what's true and you don't think you can ever know that, pretty soon everybody will accept the fact that democracy is no longer possible,' Clinton told host Conan O'Brien. 'Are you talking about foreign countries now or here?' O'Brien asked. 'That chilled me to the bone for a second.' Clinton hesitated. 'You just said a lot by saying nothing,' O'Brien said." With video.

Bully Grovels Before More Powerful World Leader. Mark Landler of the New York Times: "President Trump heaped praise on President Xi Jinping of China on Thursday, saying he was confident China would help defuse the threat from North Korea and reduce its trade deficits with the United States, which he blamed on his own predecessors, not the Chinese.... Congratulating Mr. Xi on his consolidation of power at a recent Communist Party congress, Mr. Trump said, 'Perhaps now more than ever we have an opportunity to strengthen our relationship.' Mr. Xi did not return the favor."

Jonathan Chait: Tuesday "President Trump spoke by phone with a dozen Democratic senators, in a bid to win their support for his tax-cut plan. You might think his private arguments would be at least marginally more sophisticated than the crude lies he has told in public. You would be wrong.... 'The deal is so bad for rich people, I had to throw in the estate tax just to give them something,' Trump said, per 'multiple people in the room who heard the president on the phone,' reports the Washington Post. This is a bizarre case to make, for several reasons. First, it is verifiably false.... Second, Trump is inviting questions about his own tax returns, which he refuses to disclose.... And third, there is the curious moral logic. Trump is arguing that a plan that forces rich people to pay more would be unfair.... Did he somehow think he was briefing the Koch Brothers?" ...

     ... MEANWHILE, Trump economic advisor Gary Cohn explains that the House bill is really a middle-class tax break because ... trickle-down!

Happy Anniversary, Donald. Hehehe. Gail Collins: "Donald Trump has been trying to celebrate his one-year anniversary as president, and all he gets is terrible political news. His party got skunked in Tuesday's elections, his associates keep getting tied to the Russians and the Republicans in Congress are flailing around like a bunch of panicked gerbils. Hehehehe."

** Make America Weak Again. Julian Borger of the Guardian: "The US has lost more than half its career ambassadors and a significant proportion of other senior diplomats since Donald Trump took office, the head of the foreign service association has said. Barbara Stephenson, a former ambassador to Panama and charge d’affaires in London, said that the top ranks of US diplomacy were being 'depleted at dizzying speed', and the state department was under 'mounting threats'. Stephenson pointed to a hiring freeze that has reduced the intake into the foreign service from 366 in 2016 to an expected 100 in 2018, and a cut in the number of promotions.... The depletion ... has been highlighted during Trump's Asia trip. Despite the urgency of the looming confrontation on the Korean peninsula, the administration has yet to nominate an ambassador to Seoul.... The administration has announced it wants to cut the state department and international aid budget by nearly a third. Congressional leaders have rejected that proposal and ordered spending to be sustained at last year's levels. But the secretary of state,Rex Tillerson, has gone ahead with his retrenchment plans." --safari

Michael de la Merced, et al., of the New York Times: "The Justice Department has called on AT&T and Time Warner to sell Turner Broadcasting, the group of cable channels that includes CNN, as a potential requirement for approving the companies' pending $85.4 billion deal.... The other possible way for the merger to win approval would be for AT&T to sell its DirecTV division, two of these people added.... If the Justice Department formally makes either demand a requisite for approval, AT&T and Time Warner would almost certainly take the matter to court to challenge the government's legal basis for blocking the transaction.... Because the proposed deal is a 'vertical' merger -- meaning that neither company competes directly against the other -- [the companies] believe there is little legal basis to block it. President Trump has long accused CNN of harboring a bias against him. Separately, Mr. Trump ... argued [during the campaign] that 'deals like this destroy democracy' and cited it as 'an example of the power structure' that he was fighting." ...

... Steven Overly of Politico: "Even critics of AT&T's proposed mega-merger with Time Warner expressed alarm Wednesday at allegations that ... Donald Trump's Justice Department is intervening in the deal for political reasons -- namely his oft-expressed complaints about CNN. 'Any indication that this administration is using its power to weaken media organizations it doesn't like would be a profoundly disturbing development,' Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) said.... Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) told Politico that the DOJ's reported actions 'merit investigation,' and that senators should ask Attorney General Jeff Sessions about it next week." ...

... Derek Thompson of the Atlantic: "There are two fishy details about the DOJ's objections. First, Makan Delrahim, Trump's hand-picked head of antitrust at the Justice Department, had previously announced that this merger would be acceptable.... Second, it's doubly startling for a Republican administration to suddenly reverse several decades of party leniency on just these sort of mergers, particularly with the president's favorite target, CNN, hanging in the balance.... For Trump to use the Justice Department to throttle his enemies would be a horrifying prospect, and it's one that he has publicly mused about. But ... another disconcerting possibility ... is that ... it could co-opt the news media's disgust toward the president to distribute a pro-merger narrative that would drown out the Justice Department's reasonable objections to its acquisition." ...

... Jim Rutenberg of the New York Times: "On Oct. 22, 2016, Donald J. Trump made his own history in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, where he was holding a campaign rally.... 'AT&T is buying Time Warner, and thus CNN,' he told his audience, calling the proposed merger an example of a media 'power structure' that was working to suppress his vote and the voices of his supporters. It was, he said, 'a deal we will not approve in my administration.' [The DOJ's move on AT&T] raised the chilling possibility that Mr. Trump was making good on his threatening statements.... Adding to the chill was the lack of a compelling legal justification for the department's conditions, which appeared to come out of the blue.... The tussle over the merger details brings a new level of seriousness to Mr. Trump's virulent, anti-press speech, raising fresh concerns that it could result in real-world, governmental action." ...

... Charles Pierce: "Is there anybody who doubts that the president* would tell his Department of Justice to knuckle CNN's parent company because Jake Tapper was mean to him? Or that Sessions would wag his tail -- thanks, Kate -- and go right to work on this?"

Linda Greenhouse: The Departments of Justice & Health & Human Services have become centers for anti-abortion policy. AND of course they pick on the most vulnerable victims.

** More Morons. Travis Gettys of RawStory: "Eric Trump's brother-in-law has been promoted to help oversee a Department of Energy agency that once carried out President Barack Obama's climate change agenda. Kyle Yunaska, whose sister is married to the president's son, is now chief of staff for the department's Office of Energy Policy and Systems Analysis, reported E&E News. He served as part of the transition team's 'beachhead' of temporary political appointees and stayed on in a permanent role starting in February. Yunaska doesn't appear to have a background in energy policy." --safari ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: No, no, safari. All the best people! This is another of Trump's "performance" appointments, his way of openly making farces of essential government functions. The nepotistic touch is a nice twist!

Dana Milbank: "President Trump's billionaire commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross ... is apparently not a billionaire. Forbes magazine, keeper of the Forbes 400 list of wealthiest Americans, reports that it dropped Ross from its list this year because of a 'phantom $2 billion' that Ross claimed he had but apparently does not exist. Instead of the $3.7 billion Ross claimed he was worth (Forbes last year put it at $2.9 billion), his financial disclosures showed -- gasp -- less than $700 million in assets.... Ross was disgraced, and mad. He claimed to Forbes that he transferred $2 billion into trusts for his children and others but offered no proof, and this claim was contradicted by his own staff.... It probably won't help that news of Ross's missing $2 billion comes just after the discovery from leaked documents that he invested some of the precious millions he does have in a venture with people very close to Vladimir Putin." Milbank figures Trump will fire Ross -- it's what he does to mere multi-millionaires. ...

... Reuters: "U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross has divested his interests in oil tanker company Diamond S Shipping and is in the process of selling off his holdings in another shipping firm, Navigator Holdings, a Trump administration official said on Tuesday. Ross had originally intended to retain his shipping interests following his confirmation in February." --safari: This limpdick needs to resign, not inconventiently divest.

Miles Weiss & Jennifer Dlouhy of Bloomberg: "Federal investigators have issued subpoenas for information on Carl Icahn's efforts to change biofuel policy while serving as an informal adviser to President Donald Trump, according to regulatory filings. The U.S. Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York is 'seeking production of information' pertaining to Icahn's activities regarding the Renewable Fuel Standard, according to a Form 10-Q that Icahn Enterprises LP filed on Friday with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The investigators also want information on Icahn's role as an adviser to the president." --safari

GOP: Party of Putin. Sam Stein & Betsy Woodruff of The Daily Beast: "Since last spring, Senate Democrats on the Foreign Relations Committee have been privately investigating Russian meddling in Eastern Europe without the assistance of committee Republicans. Their efforts have been spearheaded by Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD), the committee's ranking member, and have involved outreach to foreign diplomats from countries that have been targeted by the Kremlin.... It's unclear when the report will be formally released to the public. A sources told The Daily Beast that Republicans were asked to be involved in its crafting." --safari

** The Derp Is Strong. Duncan Campbell & James Risen of The Intercept: "CIA director Mike Pompeo met late last month with a former U.S. intelligence official [William Binney] who has become an advocate for a disputed theory that the theft of the Democratic National Committee's emails during the 2016 presidential campaign was an inside job, rather than a hack by Russian intelligence.... A senior intelligence source confirmed that Pompeo met with Binney to discuss his analysis, and that the CIA director held the meeting at Trump's urging.... Binney said that Pompeo asked whether he would be willing to meet with NSA and FBI officials to further discuss his analysis of the DNC data theft. Binney agreed and said Pompeo said he would contact him when he had arranged the meetings." --safari ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: I blame Donna Brazile!

Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post: "The federal judge overseeing the criminal trial of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and business partner Rick Gates imposed a gag order Wednesday in the case ordering all parties, including potential witnesses, not to make statements that might prejudice jurors.... U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson of Washington ... barred any prejudicial statements 'to the media or public settings' to safeguard the defendants receiving a fair trial, 'and to ensure that the Court has the ability to seat a jury that has not been tainted by pretrial publicity.'" ...

     ... Judge Jackson is a real card. You know she's just taunting President Shoots-off-Mouth. I see a contempt-of-court citation in Trump's future. ...

... George Papadopoulos, International Man of Mystery. Anthony Zurcher of the BBC: Besides meeting with Russians, George Papadopoulos also met a British Foreign Office official, two months before the US presidential election, for a 'working level' meeting.... The fact that Papadopoulos was presenting himself to the government of one of the US's closest allies as a representative of the Trump campaign undercuts the White House's recent assertion that Papadopoulos was a campaign volunteer of little importance.... Word of the Papadopoulos sit-down in London was first reported by Scott Stedman, a California university student, in a post on the website Medium. He writes that the Trump adviser met 'an unidentified, high-ranking member of the UK's department that handles foreign affairs'."

Cristiano Lima of Politico: "Former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said Tuesday night his 'memory has been refreshed' regarding his email exchange with Carter Page in which the former foreign policy adviser requested Lewandowski's permission to travel to Moscow.... 'To the best of my recollection, I don't know Carter Page. To the best of my knowledge, Carter Page ... had no formal role in the campaign,' Lewandowski said. The former Trump campaign manager had similarly told Fox News in March that he 'never met Carter Page.'" Mrs. McC: Amazing what a paper trail will do. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

     ... Lewandowski: I couldn't remember Carter Page because ... Father's Day. Also, it turns out I was about to get fired.

Adam Goldman, et al., of the New York Times: "The gunman who committed the massacre in a rural Texas church fired continuously for several minutes, methodically shooting his victims -- including small children -- in the head, execution-style, a law enforcement official briefed on the investigation said on Wednesday. A video camera captured the blood bath inside the church, which left 26 people dead and 20 wounded -- the worst mass shooting in Texas history -- and state and federal investigators have reviewed that gruesome footage. The official estimated that the shooting in the video lasted about seven minutes. The church routinely recorded its services, and often posted the resulting videos online." ...

... Shaila Dewan & Richard Oppel of the New York Times: "The case of [Devin Kelley, the Sutherland Springs shooter,] shows one of the [National Instant Criminal Background Check] system's biggest problems: a simple failure to forward records. At the Pentagon this week, the military services were scrambling to examine whether they had been reporting the convictions of military personnel of crimes like assault to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which maintains the three databases that make up the system. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis asked the Pentagon's inspector general's office to investigate the Air Force's failure to report Mr. Kelley's conviction. Mr. Mattis, traveling in Helsinki, Finland, said that the inspector general needed to 'define what the problem is.' The problem dates back decades. In 1996, the inspector general found that the Army, Navy and Air Force were failing to report the vast majority of convictions to the F.B.I. Federal agencies, unlike state and local ones, are required by law to report criminal records to the F.B.I. But in 2014, the inspector general found that the Defense Department still was not doing so.... In 2015, the inspector general found that the armed forces (the study excluded the Army) were still failing to report 30 percent of convictions."

Tom Roeder of the Colorado Springs Gazette: "An Air Force Academy cadet candidate once thought the victim of racial slurs at the preparatory school on campus was actually the vandal who scrawled the threatening messages across the note boards outside his room and the dwellings of classmates. The academy confirmed that finding Tuesday afternoon, and stood by a stern speech given by its top general in the wake of the incident. Lt. Gen. Jay Silveria gathered cadets and staff members for a speech that has gone viral in videos posted across the internet. He said that those who can't respect others 'need to get out.'... The cadet candidate involved, whose name was not released, is no longer enrolled at the school.... Several sources say the cadet candidate ... committed the act in a bizarre bid to get out of trouble he faced at the school for other misconduct." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: The incident was, to say the least, unfortunate, but it's good to know the academy isn't harboring a bunch of racist cadets. Anyway, this is a story for white supremacists to savor.

John Bowden of the Hill: "Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (R) released an update on his medical condition Wednesday via Twitter, writing that a new X-ray found six broken ribs and a buildup of fluid around his lungs. Paul has been in the hospital since Saturday, when he was assaulted while doing yard work." ...

... Thomas Novelly of the Louisville Courier Journal: "The history between U.S. Sen. Rand Paul and his accused attacker is filled with years of angst and petty arguments over misplaced lawn trimmings and branches, the neighborhood's developer said. 'I think this is something that has been festering,' said Jim Skaggs, the developer of the Rivergreen gated community in Bowling Green, where the two men live.... There have been disagreements in the past, Skaggs said, over lawn clippings or who should cut down a tree branch when it stretched over a property line.... Skaggs, a longtime Republican activist and a member of the GOP's state executive committee,& described [Pauls attacker Rene] Boucher as a 'near-perfect'" neighbor, but he said ... Paul 'was probably the hardest person to encourage to follow the (home owner's association regulations) of anyone out here because he has a strong belief in property rights.'... Even from the start of Paul's residence in Rivergreen, Skaggs said Paul has been difficult to work with." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: This doesn't surprise me one bit. Li'l Randy just does not play well with others. Someone who occasionally must work with him recently told me how Paul interacts with, well, everybody & described him as "the most thoroughly unlikable little shit." ...

... His Old Kentucky Home. Margaret Hartmann of New York: "... Breitbart and Washington Examiner articles Paul and [& his staffer Doug] Stafford posted dispute [the lawn maintenance] notion at length. No less than seven neighbors insist that the Pauls are actually exceptional neighbors and citizens, who hold their lawn to the very highest standards.... We still don't know why Boucher pummeled Paul, but this recent unpleasantness should not dissuade anyone looking to purchase a home in the most idyllic gated community in all of Kentucky." ...

... The photo below, via Bing maps, purports to be of Chez Paul. The front lawn looks to me as if it could use a little Weed 'n Feed. Just sayin'. See also Akhilleus' comment in today's thread.

There's another photo here, from 2010, in which the lawn appears to be unmowed & overgrowing the walk, & the foundation plantings pretty scrufty.

Ben Collins of the Daily Beast: "On Tuesday, Twitter gave its preferred status, a verified check mark, to Jason Kessler, the creator of the white supremacist Charlottesville rally in August that left one dead. Kessler's new verified status comes just 26 days after CEO Jack Dorsey again recommitted to eliminating 'hate symbols, violent groups, and tweets that glorifies violence' from its platform. Kessler previously deleted his Twitter account in August after he tweeted that Heather Heyer, the woman who was killed protesting the white nationalist rally he created, 'was a fat, disgusting Communist' and that her death 'was payback time.' Kessler blamed the tweet on taking too many prescription drugs mixed with alcohol." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: I've continued to use the Constant Weader's old Twitter account. I guess I'm going to have to rethink that.

Annals of "Journalism," Ha Ha Ha, Ctd. Erik Wemple of the Washington Post: "Bill O'Reilly's lawyers knew him well. According to testimony from an executive with 21st Century Fox, a contract for the fallen King of Cable News contained a helpful provision stating that he 'could not be dismissed on the basis of an allegation unless that allegation was proved in court.'... Analyses have shown that well above 90 percent of all civil cases are settled or dismissed before they reach a trial. Not only that, but a wealthy man like O'Reilly can use his assets to ensure that he'd never face a proven claim of sexual harassment.... Recent investigations have shown that sexual harassment is a media-wide phenomenon. The New Republic, NPR and ABC News are among the outlets where sexual harassment has taken place. Fox News stands apart, however, for the institutional sanction accorded to the creepy office pursuit of innocent and hard-working women." ...

AND. Cristiano Lima: "Fox News has hired Sebastian Gorka, the former Trump aide who left the administration earlier this year, two representatives for the network told Politico Wednesday. The move was first announced by Fox News host Sean Hannity on his daily radio program during an interview with Gorka, in which Hannity unveiled Gorka's new role as a 'national security strategist' for the network. Fox representatives did not confirm the title." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: I know Fox publishes some ultra-right-wing online rag called "Fox Nation," but do the powers-that-be actually think they're a sovereign nation which needs a national security strategist? Are they mounting an army? Who's the secretary of state? Hannity?

CBS News Boston: "Former Boston television news anchor Heather Unruh said actor Kevin Spacey sexually assaulted her teenage son ... in July 2016 on Nantucket when her son was drunk at the Club Car restaurant." ...

... Mike Fleming of Deadline: "In an unprecedented bold move, director Ridley Scott ... [has] decided to remove Kevin Spacey from their finished movie All The Money In The World. Christopher Plummer has been set to replace Spacey in the role of J Paul Getty. Re-shoots of the key scenes are expected to commence immediately. Scott is also determined to to keep the film's December 22 release date."

The Commentariat -- November 8, 2017

Late Morning Update:

The holidays come early to Reality Chex. Thanks, Patrick! (See today's Comments for context.)

James Hohmann of the Washington Post: "Tuesday was the best day for Democrats politically since Barack Obama won reelection in 2012.... Voters came out in droves. They braved the rain and the cold to send a message to President Trump. The results across the country represent nothing less than a stinging repudiation of Trump on the first anniversary of his election."

Cristiano Lima of Politico: "Former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said Tuesday night his 'memory has been refreshed' regarding his email exchange with Carter Page in which the former foreign policy adviser requested Lewandowski's permission to travel to Moscow.... 'To the best of my recollection, I don't know Carter Page. To the best of my knowledge, Carter Page ... had no formal role in the campaign,' Lewandowski said. The former Trump campaign manager had similarly told Fox News in March that he 'never met Carter Page.'" Mrs. McC: Amazing what a paper trail will do.

Election Results:

Virginia. The New York Times has live election results here for the Virginia gubernatorial race. At 7:45 pm ET the race is neck-and-neck with 30 percent reporting. Wahoo! The AP has called the race for Democrat Ralph Northam at 8:15 pm ET. At 9:00 pm ET, the AP called the race for lieutenant governor for Democrat Justin Fairfax. Democrat Mark Herring, an incumbent, has won the attorney general's race. ...

... Jonathan Martin & Alexander Burns of the New York Times: "Lt. Gov. Ralph S. Northam, an understated physician and Army veteran, was elected governor of Virginia Tuesday, according to the Associated Press, overcoming a racially charged campaign by his Republican opponent and cementing Virginia's transformation into a reliably Democratic state largely immune to Trump-style appeals. Mr. Northam was propelled to victory over Ed Gillespie, the Republican nominee, by liberal and moderate voters who were eager to send a message to President Trump in a state that rejected him in 2016 and where he is deeply unpopular." ...

... The Sorest Loser. Ben Kamisar of the Hill: "President Trump blasted GOP gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie in a tweet Tuesday evening in an effort to distance himself from the Republican's losing effort in Virginia. Trump's tweet knocking Gillespie came shortly after news outlets called the race for Democratic Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam, who looks to be on track for a comfortable victory. 'Ed Gillespie worked hard but did not embrace me or what I stand for. Don't forget, Republicans won 4 out of 4 House seats, and with the economy doing record numbers, we will continue to win, even bigger than before!' Trump said.... The tweet from Trump, who is in South Korea on a 13-day multination tour of Asia, came hours after reports emerged that he had recorded a late robocall urging Virginia voters to support Gillespie in the race, which has become a national flashpoint in politics." ...

... Patricia Sullivan of the Washington Post: "Virginia Democrats Justin Fairfax and Mark Herring won their hotly contested races for lieutenant governor and attorney general, respectively, on Tuesday, beating back strong challenges from two conservative Republicans and completing a sweep by their party at the top of the ticket." ...

... Antonio Olivo of the Washington Post: "Democrat Danica Roem ousted longtime incumbent Del. Robert G. Marshall (R) Tuesday, becoming the first openly transgender elected official in Virginia -- and one of very few in the nation. The race between Roem, 33, and Marshall, 73, focused on traffic and other local issues in Prince William County but also exposed the nation's fault lines over gender identity. It pitted a local journalist who began her physical gender transition four years ago against an outspoken social conservative who has referred to himself as Virginia's 'chief homophobe' earlier this year introduced a 'bathroom bill' that died in committee."

New Jersey. Brent Johnson of NJ.com: "Phil Murphy, a former Wall Street executive and diplomat with no previous elected experience but deep pockets and strong ties to the Democratic Party, beat Republican Kim Guadagno Tuesday to succeed Chris Christie as New Jersey's governor. CNN, ABC and NBC projected the win for Murphy at 8 p.m. Tuesday as the polls closed. The projection was based on exit polling. Murphy's victory over Guadagno, Christie's lieutenant governor, will usher in a new era of Democratic rule in the Garden State after eight years of Christie, a once-popular Republican who saw his approval rating plummet to historic lows.... When Murphy is sworn in Jan. 16, Democrats will control both the governor's office and the state Legislature for the first time since [Gov. Jon] Corzine's four-year term."

Washington State. Jennifer Bendery of the Huffington Post: "Democrat Manka Dhingra won Tuesday's special election to a Washington state Senate seat ― a race that most people wouldn't be paying attention to except that Dhingra just cemented her party's full control of the state government. Dhingra defeated Republican Jinyoung Lee Englund in a race that people poured millions of dollars into because of the significance of the seat. Democrats control the governorship and the state House in Washington, but until Tuesday, they've been one seat short of a majority in the Senate."

Georgia. Matt Yglesias of Vox: "As part of a larger wave of Democratic wins on Election Day 2017, Democrats picked up two seats in special elections held for Georgia's House of Delegates. Deborah Gonzales won House District 117 with 53 percent of the vote and Jonathan Wallace won House District 119 with 56 percent of the vote. Both seats are in the Athens area and both were vacant.... But not only were the two seats previously held by Republican incumbents, they were uncontested in the 2016 elections. Superior Democratic recruiting in these kind of races is both a cause and a consequence of a national political environment that is now Democratic leaning.... The uptick in recruiting is itself a result of Donald Trump's unpopularity. But it's also the case that no matter how unpopular Trump is, you can't win elections without fielding candidates."

New York. William Neuman & David Goodman of the New York Times: "Gliding to victory, Bill de Blasio was re-elected on Tuesday as the mayor of New York City, defeating his Republican challenger, Nicole Malliotakis, and a handful of independent candidates.... Mr. de Blasio, the first Democratic mayor to be re-elected in a generation, since Edward I. Koch captured his third term in 1985, now has four years to further his goal of reshaping the city in his progressive mold. But his ability to deliver may have far more to do with the winds blowing out of Washington and Albany than with circumstances in the five boroughs."

New Hampshire. Max Greenwood of the Hill: Democrat "Joyce Craig vanquished Republican incumbent Ted Gatsas in Manchester, N.H.'s closely watched mayoral race on Tuesday, making her the first woman to hold the position and putting a Democrat at the helm of the city for the first time in more than a decade. Craig won the race with 12,053 votes, while Gatsas had 10,580, according to vote tallies reported by WMUR-TV in Manchester. The race was the highest profile in the Granite State this year, pitting Gatsas, who has served as the city's mayor since 2010, against Craig, a former alderman, who unsuccessfully vied for the post in 2015."

North Carolina. Jim Morrill, et al., of the Charlotte Observer: "Casting herself as a unifier after two years of tumult, Democrat Vi Lyles easily defeated Republican Kenny Smith on Tuesday to become Charlotte's first African-American female mayor.... Despite being heavily outspent..., Lyles took about 58 percent to Smith'1s 42 percent in unofficial returns."

Massachusetts. AP: "Voters in Boston have re-elected Marty Walsh to a second term as mayor. Walsh defeated City Councilor Tito Jackson on Tuesday after a low-key campaign. Election officials reported relatively light voter turnout in most of the city's precincts in the nonpartisan contest."

Maine. Joe Lawlor of the Portland Press Herald: "A measure to expand Medicaid in Maine, which would give about 70,000 people health care coverage, held a solid and growing lead as votes were tallied Tuesday night. With more than 40 percent of Maine precincts reporting, the measure was favored by nearly 58 percent of the voters.... Maine is one of 19 states that has refused to expand Medicaid under the ACA and Gov. Paul LePage, a Republican, is a steadfast opponent who has vetoed five expansion bills that passed the Legislature." ...

     ... At 10:00 pm ET, the New York Times indicates a win for Medicaid expansion. The New York Times story, by Abby Goodnough, is here.

MEANWHILE, in Utah. Courtney Tanner of the Salt Lake Tribune: "... Provo Mayor John Curtis, a moderate Republican..., trounced an astonishingly well-funded Democrat [Kathie Allen] and a surprise third-party newcomer [Jim Bennett, son of the late three-term Sen. Bob Bennett] in the special election. He will serve the final year of former Rep. Jason Chaffetz's term after the congressman unexpectedly stepped down in June and joined Fox News as a contributor."

CBS News: "President Trump told North Korea to 'not underestimate us,' in a speech before the South Korea's National Assembly Wednesday morning local time. 'Do not underestimate us. Do not try us. We will defend our common security, our shared prosperity, and our sacred liberty,' Mr. Trump said. The president, who has softened his rhetoric on North Korea in recent days, urged other nations including Russia and China to sever economic ties with the rogue state. Mr. Trump, in the middle of his nearly two-week Asia trip, heads to Beijing next. 'The time for excuses is over,' Mr. Trump said. 'Now is the time for strength.'... Mr. Trump called North Korea, 'a country ruled as a cult' by Kim and his regime." ...

... Julie Davis, et al., of the New York Times: "President Trump, whose long-distance threats and insults toward North Korea have stoked fears of a nuclear confrontation, brought a message of reassurance to South Korea on Tuesday, moving to bolster an anxious ally as he came within 35 miles of one of the world's most dangerous borders. Gone were the threats to rain 'fire and fury' on North Korea and the derisive references to its leader, Kim Jong-un, as 'Little Rocket Man' as Mr. Trump said he saw progress in diplomatic efforts to counter the threat from the North, adding, 'Ultimately, it will all work out.' After a day of private meetings and public bonding with President Moon Jae-in of South Korea, who was elected promising a shift toward dialogue with the North, Mr. Trump -- who as recently as last month tweeted that direct talks were a 'waste of time' -- said on Tuesday that it would be in the North's interest to 'come to the table and to make a deal.'" ...

... Andrew Restuccia of Politico: "... Donald Trump was forced to abandon a surprise, unscheduled trip to the demilitarized zone between North Korea and South Korea on Wednesday because of inclement weather. Trump and his team and a small group of reporters began the trek to the DMZ in a group of helicopters, but turned back about 25 minutes into the journey because of low visibility. The president and his aides waited for nearly an hour for the weather to clear before finally deciding to scrap the trip. South Korean President Moon Jae-in had planned to join Trump for the visit. The White House had asked journalists traveling with the president not to report on his movements until after he returned to Seoul for security reasons."

David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "President Trump on Tuesday asserted that tougher gun laws would not have stopped the mass shooting in Sutherland Springs, Tex., last weekend and that 'hundreds more' would have died had another man not been able to 'neutralize' the alleged killer with a gun of his own. Asked during a news conference here whether he would entertain 'extreme vetting' on guns, Trump appeared irritated by the question and suggested it was not appropriate to talk about 'in the heart of South Korea.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: As many have pointed out, Trump's NRA rationale works only if you ignore the fact that the U.S. has more guns per person & more gun deaths than any other country. These are not two unrelated stats. ...

... Connor O'Brien of Politico: "... Donald Trump's pick to be the Pentagon's top health official today criticized as 'insane' a civilian's access to semi-automatic weapons like the one used Sunday in the Texas church shooting. 'I'd also like to -- and I may get in trouble with other members of the committee -- just say, you know, how insane it is that in the United States of America a civilian can go out and buy ... a semi-automatic assault rifle like an AR-15, which apparently was the weapon that was used,' Dean Winslow, a physician and retired Air Force colonel nominated to be the assistant secretary of Defense for health affairs, said during his Senate Armed Services confirmation hearing.... The statement drew a swift rebuke from the panel's chairman, John McCain (R-Ariz.). 'Dr. Winslow, I don't think that's in your area of responsibility or expertise,' McCain interjected." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Actually, Sen. Dr. Winslow there seems to be expressing the medical opinion that multiple gunshots are dangerous to one's health. ...

... Jordain Carney of the Hill: "The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on rules regulating firearm accessories and the national background check system in the wake of mass shootings in Texas and Las Vegas. Sen. Chuck Grassley's (R-Iowa) office announced on Tuesday that they will hold a hearing in one week on 'firearm accessory regulation and enforcing federal and state reporting to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS).' The formal announcement comes after a spokesman for the Iowa Republican told The Hill on Monday that the Senate panel would hold a hearing on bump stocks, a device that can simulate automatic gunfire with a semi-automatic weapon." Mrs. McC: A tiny crack in the NRA wall? ...

... Simon Romero, et al., of the New York Times: "The gunman behind the worst mass shooting in Texas history escaped from a psychiatric hospital while he was in the Air Force, and was caught a few miles away by the local police, who were told that he had made death threats against his superiors and tried to smuggle weapons onto his base, a 2012 police report showed. That episode, which came to light on Tuesday, was another in a series of red flags raised about the man, Devin P. Kelley, his instability and the threat he might pose to those around him. But none of the warnings stopped Mr. Kelley from legally purchasing several firearms, including the rifle he used to kill 26 people at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs on Sunday."

Now it's time for America to bind the wounds of division, I pledge to every citizen of our land that I will be president for all Americans, and this is so important to me. -- Donald Trump, in his victory speech, November 9, 2016, at about 3 am ...

... Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post: "... one year later, Trump finds himself the most unpopular president in modern times amid criticism that he has sought to divide more than unite. He has resumed his attacks on [Hillary] Clinton, barred most of those who criticized him during the campaign from working in his administration and seen rapid turnover in his White House. When he has felt under attack, he has aggressively punched back, going after members of his own party, media outlets, the intelligence community, the widow of a soldier killed in Niger, the cast of a Broadway show and minorities playing professional football who have knelt during the national anthem to protest racial inequality and police abuse. He has yet to introduce the sweeping infrastructure plan he promised or implement an economic plan.... He has repeatedly tried to implement bans on foreigners from several majority-Muslim countries, tried to get rid of the Affordable Care Act many of his supporters depend on for health insurance and commissioned prototypes for a massive wall along parts of the southern border despite a lack of funding."

Paige Cunningham of the Washington Post: "The government will give states broader leeway in running their Medicaid programs and allow them to impose work requirements on enrollees, a top federal health official said Tuesday in outlining how the Trump administration plans to put its mark on the insurance program for low-income Americans. Seema Verma, who heads the Health and Human Services Department's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, did not spare criticisms of the Obama administration and called its opposition to work requirements soft bigotry.'"

Moscow on the Potomac. Lorraine Woellert, et al., of Politico: "A top adviser to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross served on the board of Navigator Holdings, a shipping company whose clients include a Russian energy company with Kremlin ties, while she was working in the Trump administration. Wendy Teramoto retained her seat on Navigator's board after joining Commerce in mid-March as a part-time adviser to Ross.... She also continued to serve as an executive of Ross's private equity firm WL Ross & Co. after becoming a government employee. Teramoto didn't resign her seat on Navigator's board until July 17, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. She left WL Ross that same month. On Aug. 1, she was formally named Ross's chief of staff. Her role with Navigator is notable because Ross has come under scrutiny after the release of a cache of documents ... that showed him profiting from investments in Navigator, which does significant business with Sibur, an energy company partly owned by Russian President Vladimir Putin's son-in-law." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Kevin Poulsen of the Daily Beast: "As U.S. polling places opened last Nov. 8, Russian trolls in St. Petersburg began a final push on Twitter to elect Donald Trump. They used a combination of high-profile accounts with large and influential followings, and scores of lurking personas established years earlier with stolen photos and fabricated backgrounds. Those sleeper accounts dished out carefully metered tweets and retweets voicing praise for Trump and contempt for his opponent, from the early morning until the last polls closed in the United States." ...

... Kyle Cheney & Elana Schor of Politico: "Attorney General Jeff Sessions will appear before the House Judiciary Committee next week, and Democrats said Tuesday they're prepared to pepper him with questions about a campaign adviser who attempted to broker a meeting between then-candidate Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: I hope the House members practice up on the pronunciation of "Papadopoulos," because so far on-air personalities have had difficulty -- I keep hearing "Poppolopolis," which sounds like candy on a stick. Anyway, should be some fun clips. Watch for the Elf's studied outrage.

The Big Cheese Stands Alone. Brady Dennis of the Washington Post: "President Trump has put America at odds with the rest of the world, literally, when it comes to the goal of combating climate change. At an international climate conference in Bonn on Tuesday, Syria announced its plans to join the Paris climate accord -- an agreement forged in 2015 for nations to band together to slash global carbon emissions. That now leaves the United States as the only country to disavow the deal, after Trump this year announced intentions to withdraw from the agreement." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: But Trump sure showed that Obummer guy, didn't he?

"Perpetual War." Andrew Bacevich in the New Republic: "Since becoming president, [Trump] has largely ceded decision-making on the conduct of America's wars to the very generals he derided while running for office.... As with so many other aspects of the job, he occupies it on only an occasional basis and rarely with the requisite skill.... James Mattis, the general who fills the post of defense secretary; John Kelly, the general who is White House chief of staff; and H.R. McMaster, already the second general to serve Trump as national security advisor, are patriotic, seasoned, and not without intelligence. Yet they are military men, shaped by their decades of experience in uniform. They are, almost by definition, devoid of critical imagination.... The overarching, if unacknowledged, premise of the nation's military efforts remains what it has been ever since George W. Bush's grandiose, post -- September 11 dream of transforming the Islamic world collapsed: If we keep killing 'terrorists' in sufficient numbers, the jihadist threat will eventually subside.... Trump's generals have not devised a strategy to end a war, but an excuse for ensuring its further perpetuation.... This much is certain: With the commander-in-chief more or less AWOL, he won't be offering to bail them out. After all, it's their war, not his." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Oh, let's face it: war is good business for generals. Without war, they're the CEOs of nothing -- over-the-hill middle-aged men shuffling through the corridors of the Pentagon.

Lee Caldwell of NBC News: "... Donald Trump called 12 Senate Democrats Tuesday, hoping to sway them in favor of the Republican tax cut bill, and told them he would personally 'get killed' financially by the GOP bill. He said he would only benefit if it repealed the estate tax, according to multiple people who were present. 'My accountant called me and said 'you're going to get killed in this bill,'" the president said during a phone call from his trip in South Korea.... Many of those Democrats are from states Trump won in 2016. After the call with Trump ended, the meeting, which included his legislative affairs chief Marc Short and economics adviser Gary Cohn, turned into a sparring match between Democrats and White House officials over a politically broken Senate and who is to blame, multiple senators who attended the meeting said." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Either Trump's supposed accountant is a liar or Trump is. We can make an educated guess. ...

... Lyin' Ryan Sets a Record. Rachel Bade of Politico: "Paul Ryan vowed an end to the much-despised, top-down approach of his predecessor when he took the speaker's gavel in 2015, promising a House that's 'more open, more inclusive, more deliberative, more participatory.'... But two years later, the House Rules Committee, which is controlled by the speaker, just set a record for the most closed rules in a session -- barring lawmakers for the 49th time from offering amendments on a bill. Ryan has yet to allow a single piece of legislation to be governed by an open rule, which allows members to propose changes on the floor. That makes Ryan the only speaker in modern history to forgo the open process entirely so far, according to senior House Democratic sources. They argue such a strategy -- while politically expedient for Republicans eager to avoid toxic and divisive votes -- is bad for democracy because it stifles debate." ...

... Aargh! Rich People Made Me Do It! Cristina Marcos of the Hill: "A House Republican lawmaker acknowledged on Tuesday that he's facing pressure from donors to ensure the GOP tax-reform proposal gets done. Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) had been describing the flurry of lobbying from special interests seeking to protect favored tax provisions when a reporter asked if donors are happy with the tax-reform proposal. 'My donors are basically saying, "Get it done or don't ever call me again,"' Collins replied."

Dan Hopper, in the New Yorker, channels "Serious Conservative Writer Man": "Donald Trump is a boorish, uncouth embarrassment to the nation, and it's high time my colleagues in the Republican Party stood up to him once and for all: we must impeach this inurbane ruffian to restore the dignity of our party and our country. At which point, we can immediately resume doing the exact same things but, like, the regular way. Without bad tweets and stuff."

Juror a Little Hazy on the Basics. David Voreacos & Neil Weinberg of Bloomberg: "On their first full day of jury deliberations at the bribery trial of Senator Robert Menendez, a juror asked the judge a basic question: What is a senator? U.S. District Judge William Walls declined to answer the question, and he refused that juror's request for a transcript of Monday's closing argument by Menendez's attorney, Abbe Lowell. The panel had returned to the Newark, New Jersey, federal courthouse Tuesday after spending about 75 minutes deliberating the day before. Walls told jurors that they should rely on their individual and collective memories to determine how to define a senator."

Making America Great Again, via Bermuda Tax Havens. Ed Pilkington & Jon Swaine of the Guardian: "Seven Republican super-donors helped bankroll the conservative push for power in the 2016 election cycle, between them pumping more than $350m (£264m) into federal and state races. The Paradise Papers illuminate another aspect of these vastly wealthy men -- their propensity to nurture offshore some of their combined fortunes, estimated by Forbes at $142bn, largely beyond the reach of public scrutiny and tax authorities. The seven have their divisions, especially over Donald Trump. Warren Stephens was a major backer of the Stop Trump movement last year, while Geoff Palmer was among the then Republican nominee's biggest financial backers. But they share a presence in tax havens. In turn, they face a legitimate question as they wield influence by investing in Super Pacs with names including 'Rebuilding America now', 'Right to rise USA' and 'American unity': are their political principles undermined by their offshore practices?" The writers also name the Koch brothers, Sheldon Adelson, Steve Wynn & Paul Singer. ...

...AND Jon Swaine of the Guardian: Steve Bannon "produced a book in May 2015 accusing Hillary Clinton of trading favours for donations to her charitable foundation.... But the financial arrangements of another foundation, which bankrolled Bannon's creation of the book, Clinton Cash, have received less scrutiny. Leaked documents and newly obtained public filings show how the billionaire Mercer family built a $60m war chest for conservative causes inside their family foundation by using an offshore investment vehicle to avoid US tax. The offshore vehicle was part of a network of companies in the Atlantic tax haven of Bermuda led by Robert Mercer, the wealthy hedge-fund executive and Bannon patron whose spending helped put Trump in the White House and aided a resurgence of the Republican right. Mercer, 71, appears as a director of eight Bermuda companies in the Paradise Papers...."

The Commentariat -- November 7, 2017

Afternoon Update:

David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "President Trump on Tuesday asserted that tougher gun laws would not have stopped the mass shooting in Sutherland Springs, Tex., last weekend and that 'hundreds more' would have died had another man not been able to 'neutralize' the alleged killer with a gun of his own. Asked during a news conference here whether he would entertain 'extreme vetting' on guns, Trump appeared irritated by the question and suggested it was not appropriate to talk about 'in the heart of South Korea.'" ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: As many have pointed out, Trump's NRA rationale works only if you ignore the fact that the U.S. has more guns per person & more gun deaths than any other country. These are not two unrelated stats.

Moscow on the Potomac. Lorraine Woellert, et al., of Politico: "A top adviser to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross served on the board of Navigator Holdings, a shipping company whose clients include a Russian energy company with Kremlin ties, while she was working in the Trump administration. Wendy Teramoto retained her seat on Navigator's board after joining Commerce in mid-March as a part-time adviser to Ross.... She also continued to serve as an executive of Ross's private equity firm WL Ross & Co. after becoming a government employee. Teramoto didn't resign her seat on Navigator’s board until July 17, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. She left WL Ross that same month. On Aug. 1, she was formally named Ross's chief of staff. Her role with Navigator is notable because Ross has come under scrutiny after the release of a cache of documents ... that showed him profiting from investments in Navigator, which does significant business with Sibur, an energy company partly owned by Russian President Vladimir Putin's son-in-law."

Kyle Cheney & Elana Schor of Politico: "Attorney General Jeff Sessions will appear before the House Judiciary Committee next week, and Democrats said Tuesday they're prepared to pepper him with questions about a campaign adviser who attempted to broker a meeting between then-candidate Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: I hope the House members practice up on the pronunciation of "Papadopoulos," because so far on-air personalities have had difficulty -- I keep hearing "Poppolopolis," which sounds like candy on a stick. Anyway, should be some fun clips. Watch for the Elf's studied outrage.

*****

Election Day. Steven Shepard of Politico: "Gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia might be the marquee contests on ballots across the country on Tuesday, but there are plenty of other high-impact elections and referenda across the country with national implications. There are key big-city mayoral races, pivotal state legislative contests and even a special congressional election, all of them providing some degree of insight into the political climate in the first Election Day of Donald Trump's presidency." ...

... ** "Anniversary of the Apocalypse." Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times writes a "who would have believed?" column that reads like articles of impeachment. Mrs. McC: Goldberg is shocking in her bluntness. And it is an indictment of the Republican Congress, which has accepted and exploited the circumstance. ...

... Paul Krugman points to the reason for the party's reluctance to rid itself of Trump -- he's ruder and cruder, but otherwise not much different from other Republicans. Krugman looks for proof to the House tax bill which caters to the rich more than any before it & to Ed Gillespie, a Bush insider who is running for governor of Virginia on the KKK ticket. ...

... Benjamin Wallace-Wells of the New Yorker: Ed "Gillespie's closing messages have all taken up Trumpian themes. In late October, his campaign released an ad focussed entirely on Confederate monuments. 'I'm for keeping 'em up, and he's for takin' 'em down, and that's a big difference,' Gillespie said of [his opponent Ralph] Northam, in the ad. A direct-mail campaign featured images of football players kneeling during the national anthem to protest racial inequality. 'You'd never take a knee,' it read. 'So take a stand on Election Day. These things have widely been seen as marking a capitulation -- Republicans further embracing racial resentment. But how new are these tactics, really?" Wallace-Wells recalls elements of Dubya's dirty campaigns. Then supporters of Northam ran an equally incendiary ad.

David Montgomery, et al., of the New York Times: "A day after a gunman massacred parishioners in a small Texas church, the Air Force admitted on Monday that it had failed to enter the man's domestic violence court-martial into a federal database that could have blocked him from buying the rifle he used to kill 26 people. 'The Air Force has launched a review of how the service handled the criminal records of former Airman Devin P. Kelley following his 2012 domestic violence conviction,' the Air Force said in a statement. 'Federal law prohibited him from buying or possessing firearms after this conviction.'" ...

... David Philipps & Richard Oppel of the New York Times: "Before a gunman entered a rural Texas church with a ballistic vest and a military-style rifle, killing at least 26 people on Sunday, he was convicted of assaulting his wife and breaking his infant stepson's skull.... 'He assaulted his stepson severely enough that he fractured his skull, and he also assaulted his wife,' said Don Christensen, a retired colonel who was the chief prosecutor for the Air Force. 'He pled to intentionally doing it.'" ...

... Ashley Parker of the Washington Post: "President Trump declared that the shooting in Sutherland Springs, Tex., that left at least 26 people dead was not 'a guns situation,' saying instead he believed that 'mental health' was the problem. Trump's comments came at a news conference in Tokyo, when he was asked about the shooting at a South Texas church and if stricter gun laws were the answer.... Though the alleged shooter has been identified as Devin Kelley, 26, the full mental state of Kelley has yet to be determined. Kelley, a Texas man who enlisted in the Air Force in 2010, was court-martialed in 2012 for assaulting his wife and child, and received a bad conduct discharge from the military in 2014." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... David Leonhardt, et al., of the New York Times: The top ten Senate & top ten House recipients of NRA campaign funding all sent their thoughts & prayers (or some slight variation thereof) to the Sutherland Springs shooting victims & their loved ones -- except six of them, who couldn't be bothered with so much as a tweet. Mrs. McC: As contributor Marvin S.'s daughter wrote, "'Thoughts and prayers' is possibly the most mindless, laziest and hypocritical string of words ever assembled into a phrase."

Jack Holmes of Esquire: "... this president's ability to distinguish himself in the eyes of our Eastern allies is so potent he could start getting the job done before he even arrived. And so it emerged in The Japan Times, that nation's oldest English-language newspaper, that Trump has some intriguing views on the relationship between Japanese feudal history and North Korean ballistic missiles. '... Threats from North Korea's nuclear weapons and missile development programs were set to be high on the agenda in his talks with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday.... The U.S. president said he could not understand why a country of samurai warriors did not shoot down the missiles, the sources said....' Many have already sunk the slam-dunk snark-shot that katanas are a non-ideal weapon against cruise missiles." Do see Akhilleus' commentary below. (Also linked yesterday.)

L'état, C'est Moi. Jonathan Swan of Axios recounts a June 2017 meeting in which President Trump told Native American tribal leaders how to cut the red tape that accompanies energy exploration on their lands: 'Chief, chief, what are they going to do? Once you get it out of the ground are they going to make you put it back in there? I mean, once it's out of the ground it can't go back in there. You've just got to do it. I'm telling you, chief, you've just got to do it.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Our Far-Flung Adventures. Jeet Heer of the New Republic: "Last weekend, Jared Kushner, in his capacity as his father-in-law's viceroy in the Middle East, made an unexpected visit to Saudi Arabia and spent time with the country's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. 'The two princes are said to have stayed up until nearly 4 a.m. several nights, swapping stories and planning strategy,' David Ignatius wrote in The Washington Post, noting that the prince is 'emboldened by strong support from President Trump and his inner circle' and it 'was probably no accident' that this intimate meeting took place shortly before the prince arrested his political rivals in a sweeping effort to consolidate power.... Congress has oversight power on U.S. foreign policy. If the Republicans were responsible enough to exercise it, they'd be scheduling hearings on Saudi Arabia right now." Mrs. McC: BTW, where's Rex? ...

... Irony Alert! David Smith of the Guardian: "Donald Trump has thrown his weight behind an anti-corruption crackdown in Saudi Arabia, claiming that its targets have been 'milking' the kingdom for years.... 'I have great confidence in King Salman and the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, they know exactly what they are doing,' the US president, who is travelling in Asia, posted on Twitter. 'Some of those they are harshly treating have been 'milking' their country for years!'" --safari...

** Junior Promised Russian Lawyer Tit-for-Tat. Irina Reznik & Henry Meyer of Bloomberg: "A Russian lawyer who met with ... Donald Trump's oldest son last year says he indicated that a law targeting Russia could be re-examined if his father won the election and asked her for written evidence that illegal proceeds went to Hillary Clinton's campaign. The lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, said in a two-and-a-half-hour interview in Moscow that she would tell these and other things to the Senate Judiciary Committee on condition that her answers be made public, something it hasn't agreed to.... 'Looking ahead, if we come to power, we can return to this issue and think what to do about it,' Trump Jr. said of the 2012 law, she recalled. 'I understand our side may have messed up, but it'll take a long time to get to the bottom of it,' he added, according to her. Veselnitskaya also said Trump Jr. requested financial documents showing that money that allegedly evaded U.S. taxes had gone to Clinton's campaign." (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Greg Sargent: “We know now as a matter of fact ... that the June 2016 meeting was held for the explicit purpose of getting a dump-truck's worth of Russian 'dirt' on Clinton — Donald Trump Jr.'s email chain confirms it. And let's not forget, as The Post has reported, that Trump himself helped dictate an initial statement from Donald Trump Jr. that misleadingly claimed the meeting was 'primarily' about Russian adoptions. This was later proven false, which means Trump himself has been directly implicated in an effort to mislead the country about his own top campaign officials' eagerness to benefit from help from the Russian government. Whatever legal conclusions Mueller ends up reaching, we now know that Trump's top campaign officials were eager to collude with Russia to help him win the election and that Trump himself helped to cover that up." Sargent reminds us that Veselnitskaya is not the most reliable witness. But still. (Also linked yesterday.) ...

... Nancy LeTourneau of the Washington Monthly reminds us of how the Jared/Russia/social-media triangle worked during the campaign: "... Jared Kushner's major role in the campaign was to manage messaging on social media via data-mining and micro-targeting. All of those efforts are now under investigation by the Mueller team, especially the involvement of Cambridge Analytica. This latest report shows that a business partner of Kushner's, Yuri Milner, played a role in Russian investment in Twitter and Facebook, the social media giants that Russia used so effectively to spread divisions during the campaign.... Even the most cursory look at these stories tells us that there are deep connections between Russia and almost everyone associated with Donald Trump. It is impossible to imagine that it is all simply a coincidence." ...

Rosalind Helderman, et al., of the Washington Post: "Carter Page, a foreign policy adviser to President Trump's campaign... whose visit to Moscow during the election has drawn scrutiny, sent an email to fellow Trump aides during his trip describing 'a private conversation' with a senior Russian official who spoke favorably of the Republican candidate, according to records released late Monday by congressional investigators.... Page's email was read aloud by Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) when Page met behind closed doors last week with the House Intelligence Committee, which is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 president election. The committee released the transcript of the seven-hour session late Monday.... In a statement Monday, Schiff said that Page had failed to produce the email to the committee before his interview, despite receiving a subpoena for documents." ...

... Kyle Cheney & Randy Lemmerman of Politico summarize highlights of Page's testimony before the committee. ...

... Mrs. McCrabbie: All righty then. We've found another Nixon Connection. Stand aside, Roger Stone. Page testified, according to the Politico summary, that "the man who first connected him was New York State GOP Chairman Ed Cox." Ed Cox is Richard Nixon's son-in-law.

More from the Paradise Papers. Mike McIntire of the New York Times: "Bank of Utah has that all-American feel. Founded in the 1950s by a veteran of both world wars, it offers affordable mortgages and savings accounts, sponsors children's festivals and collects coats for the poor. But in addition to its mom-and-pop customers, the bank has a lesser-known clientele that includes Russia's richest oligarch, Leonid Mikhelson, an ally of the country's president, Vladimir V. Putin. The bank served as a stand-in so Mr. Mikhelson could secretly register a private jet in the United States, which requires American citizenship or residency. The work on behalf of Mr. Mikhelson, whose gas company is under United States sanctions, is part of a discreet niche business for Bank of Utah that allows wealthy foreigners to legally obtain American registrations for their aircraft while shielding their identities from public view. The bank does this through trust accounts, in its own name, that take the place of owners on plane registration records."...

... Jon Swaine of the Guardian: "Leaked documents and newly obtained public filings show how the billionaire Mercer family built a $60m war chest for conservative causes inside their family foundation by using an offshore investment vehicle to avoid US tax.... Mercer, 71, appears as a director of eight Bermuda companies in the Paradise Papers.... Mercer's foundation is barred from intervening in election campaigns. But over the past decade, it has given out $62m to conservative research groups and thinktanks.... From 2013 to 2015, the Mercer foundation gave $4.7m to [Steve] Bannon's Government Accountability Institute -- more than half its total funding in that time.... Bannon founded GAI in Florida in 2012 with Peter Schweizer, the conservative author of Clinton Cash.... Rebekah Mercer was a director of the group until 2014. It has continued assailing liberals since Trump's victory and says exposing the 'misuse of taxpayer monies' is central to its mission." --safari

All the Best People, Ctd. Dan Alexander of Forbes: Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross is a well-known fraud & liar. For one thing, he greatly inflated his assets in order to enhance business opportunities, then stiffed many of his investors. Hmm, that sounds familiar.

The New American Gilded Age

Darius Dixon & Eric Wolff of Politico: "A proposal by Energy Secretary Rick Perry to alter the nation's electricity markets would provide a windfall for a small group of companies -- most strikingly one owned by coal magnate Bob Murray, a prominent backer of ... Donald Trump. Perry's plan would force consumers to subsidize ailing coal-fired and nuclear power plants with billions of dollars, in what he calls an effort to ensure that the nation's power network can withstand threats like terrorist attacks or severe weather. But his narrowly written proposal would mostly affect plants in a stretch of the Midwest and Northeast where Murray's mining company, Murray Energy, is the predominant supplier...." ...

... ** Corporations Are Better People Than You Are, My Friend. Dana Milbank: "Room 1100 of the Longworth Building, with its ionic columns, gilt-fringed curtains and eagle-topped frieze, has for 80 years been the home of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee. But perhaps never before have corporations wielded their power as openly as they have here this week. As the panel moves to approve the Republican tax plan, this is the room ... where the rich will get richer, where everybody else will be forced to shoulder a greater share of the tax burden, and where a trillion dollars of tax breaks for corporations are being passed by lawmakers who work for these very corporations." Read on. The "quiz" Rep. Susan DelBene (D-Wash.) gave a tax expert present at the bill's mark-up is one for the ages. ...

... Heather Long of the Washington Post: "The Tax Policy Center on Monday retracted its assessment of House Republicans' tax bill after discovering an error in its model, a mistake that could complicate the effort to evaluate the legislation by an organization that has long enjoyed broad, bipartisan credibility."...

...John Larson (D-Conn.) minces no words in blasting the GOP's tax shenanigans. --safari

... David Dayen, in the New Republic: Republicans have slipped "chained CPI" into their tax "reform" bill to substantially reduce Social Security benefits ($230 billion over ten years) AND increase taxes on the working poor ($128BB over the next ten years & another $500BB in the next ten-year period). Whether or not you buy the argument that chained CPI is more accurate than the Consumer Price Index, the effect of applying chained CPI to determine the rate of inflation is fairly certain. And Republicans are counting on it to screw ordinary Americans.

Kasie Hunt & Dartunorro Clark of NBC News: "Disagreement between Rand Paul and his neighbor [Rene Boucher] over the senator's politics and his property line were possible motives in the attack that left the Kentucky lawmaker with five broken ribs, a source told NBC News on Monday." The neighbor's attorney denies there was a political motive. "Paul was wearing headphones while mowing his lawn in Bowling Green, Kentucky, when he was attacked from behind by Rene Boucher, 59, on Friday, two sources said.... The FBI is investigating the incident; assaulting a member of Congress is a federal crime." ...

... Charles Pierce thinks the story is weird. Mrs. McC: So do I. I think we're going to find out Boucher thought Paul was screwing his (Boucher's) wife. Or something like that. When civilized people have a property dispute, they either work it out or get lawyers to work it out. Our neighbor (who is a lawyer) accidentally had a treehouse built for her kids on our property. Medlar & I are concerned about liability in case some kid is injured on our lot. We're working it out with nobody getting in a huff. ...

... Update: Nicholas Fandos, et al., of the New York Times are on the case! They came upon some vague suggestions that Paul disregards neighborhood regulations in his gated community & spreads a lot of compost around. Mrs. McC: Well, that fits. Also, something about Randy's Great Pumpkin Patch. P.S. Paul was not pushing a lawnmower; he was just getting off his riding mower.

Ronan Farrow in the New Yorker: "In the fall of 2016, Harvey Weinstein set out to suppress allegations that he had sexually harassed or assaulted numerous women. He began to hire private security agencies to collect information on the women and the journalists trying to expose the allegations.... The explicit goal of the investigations ... was to stop the publication of the abuse allegations against Weinstein that eventually emerged in the New York Times and The New Yorker. Over the course of a year, Weinstein had the agencies 'target,' or collect information on, dozens of individuals, and compile psychological profiles that sometimes focussed on their personal or sexual histories.... In some cases, the investigative effort was run through Weinstein's lawyers, including David Boies, a celebrated attorney who represented Al Gore in the 2000 Presidential-election dispute and argued for marriage equality before the U.S. Supreme Court. Boies personally signed the contract directing [the agency] Black Cube to attempt to uncover information that would stop the publication of a Times story about Weinstein's abuses, while his firm was also representing the Times...."

Patricia Dvorak of the Washington Post: "It was the middle-finger salute seen around the world. Juli Briskman's protest aimed at the presidential motorcade that roared past her while she was on her cycling path in Northern Virginia last month became an instantly viral photo. Turns out it has now cost the 50-year-old marketing executive her job. On Halloween, after Briskman gave her bosses at Akima LLC, a government contracting firm, a heads-up that she was the unidentified cyclist in the photo, they took her into a room and fired her, she said, escorting her out of the building with a box of her things." Read on. Briskman did not ID her employer. It appears that if Briskman had been a man, the company would not have fired her. (Also linked yesterday.)

Civil War Revisionists: The brainwashing of generations --safari

Way Beyond the Beltway

David Kirkpatrick of the New York Times: "Saudi Arabia charged Monday that a missile fired at its capital from Yemen over the weekend was an 'act of war' by Iran, in the sharpest escalation in nearly three decades of mounting hostility between the two regional rivals."