The Commentariat -- Nov. 24, 2016

Jen Hayden of DailyKos posts an important message from ex-news anchor Dan Rather on the fascist tendencies of Trump's movement and sounds the alarm. Well worth the read. --safari

Brian Beutler: "What's needed is a single conceptual lens through which to view all of Trump's antics, whether they seem evil or dangerous or confused, and the one concept that encompasses all of them is impunity. Through luck and graft and privilege, Trump has gotten away with an incredible amount of chicanery in his life.... At the ... meeting with the Times, Trump didn't attempt to spin away concerns that he would use the presidency to enrich himself. To the contrary, he admitted he pressed the leader of a foreign political party to oppose offshore wind farms because he's worried about their effect on the view from one of his seaside golf courses. He boasted that his victory earlier this month probably increased the value of his new Washington, D.C., hotel. He hinted he might exploit presidential exemptions to federal corruption laws in the same way he's exploited tax loopholes that erased his income tax liability for years and years.... If Trump seems to be winging it through the early days of the transition, unperturbed by the potential for horror, this is why. He can't (or makes no effort to) distinguish between bumbling and purposefulness; ethics and corruption; normal and abnormal behavior -- because these distinctions have never been a lasting source of value to him.... This presidency is shaping up to be defined by a single maxim: that when the president does it, that means it is not illegal -- even if he had no idea what he was doing in the first place." -- CW ...

... Jim Tankersley of the Washington Post: "Some of America's biggest crusaders against crony capitalism warn Trump could use his position to pressure foreign leaders to accommodate his company, or to bend U.S. regulations to favor his interests over competitors. He might not even need to ask for those favors; they might just appear.... Writing in the Wall Street Journal's opinion pages this week, conservative columnist Holman W. Jenkins Jr. said Trump's administration could 'swirl down a drain of cronyism.'” CW: This is the "systemic corruption" Matt Yglesias warned about last week. As Tankersley notes, "Skewed government interests can, however, dampen an economy.... The diversion of resources to a president's businesses or his friends can chill competition; saddle consumers with fewer choices and higher prices; and erode incentives to work, innovate and invest." And now, as Brian Beutler (and others) have pointed out, Trump has embraced systemic corruption. -- CW ...

... Here's a blatant example:

     ... Trump Uses Pending Presidency to Boost His Turkish Licensing Deal. Paul Blumenthal of the Huffington Post: "When ... Donald Trump spoke to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Nov. 9, he mentioned one of his Turkish business partners as a 'close friend' and passed on his remarks that he is 'your great admirer.'... Norm Eisen, the former top ethics official for President Barack Obama..., called Trump's references to his business partner in his conversation with Erdogan 'entirely improper,' 'wrong' and 'reprehensible.'... In recent years, the Dogan Media Group [owned by the family of Trump's friend] has butted heads with the authoritarian Erdogan as he sought to punish dissenting media. '[Trump's support] will give them a layer of protection,' said Henri Barkey, director of the Middle East program at the Wilson Center, a nonpartisan policy forum. '... the Turkish government will think twice about going after them because the president of the United States is supporting them and, also, Erdogan is really looking for Trump to change many of Obama's policies, especially in Syria and with respect to Iran. So he's not going after anything that would upset or annoy Trump.'" -- CW

... CW: Even if you think Trump is great & you're thrilled he's making money off "foreigners," enhancing Trump's riches provide no economic advantage to the country (especially since he doesn't pay taxes, or at least doesn't pay his fair share of taxes, and he isn't building anything in the U.S., so he's not creating jobs). Putting more money in rich people's accounts does not improve the economy since they don't spend it the way the rest of us do. ...

... Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker: "The second week of the Trump transition brought several new appointments, the first specific policy pronouncements, and the most alarming statement about Presidential power since Richard Nixon declared, in 1977, 'When the President does it, that means that it is not illegal.'... Trump's ... picks over the past week fall into two categories: unqualified and extreme." CW: You can pretty much ignore Lizza's remarks on DeVos. Either that, or Lizza has kids in private school, & he would like Betsy to see that the local taxpayers help him with their tuition. ...

... Charles Blow. Memo to DJT: "You don't get a pat on the back for ratcheting down from rabid after exploiting that very radicalism to your advantage. Unrepentant opportunism belies a staggering lack of character and caring that can't simply be vanquished from memory. You did real harm to this country and many of its citizens, and I will never -- never -- forget that. As I read the transcript and then listened to the audio [of Trump's meeting with NYT execs, columnists & reporters], the slime factor was overwhelming.... Much of your campaign was an act of psychological projection, as we are now learning that many of the things you slammed Clinton for are things of which you may actually be guilty. You slammed Clinton for destroying emails, then Newsweek reported last month that your companies 'destroyed emails in defiance of court orders.' You slammed Clinton and the Clinton Foundation for paid speeches and conflicts of interest, then it turned out that, as BuzzFeed reported, the Trump Foundation received a $150,000 donation in exchange for your giving a 2015 speech made by video to a conference in Ukraine. You slammed Clinton about conflicts of interest while she was secretary of state, and now your possible conflicts of interest are popping up like mushrooms in a marsh." ...

     ... The audio of the meeting is here. ...

... Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post: "To ... Donald Trump, Breitbart News -- the racist, sexist and all-around offensive website once overseen by his campaign chairman and designated White House chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon -- is 'just a publication.' Breitbart's editors and writers, Trump told the New York Times, 'cover stories like you cover stories.'... No, no, no. That Trump would put it in the same category [with the NYT] exposes both his failure to understand the role of the media and his failure to recognize -- or to care about -- the offensiveness of what Breitbart, under the Bannon regime, represents.... Breitbart isn't 'just a publication.' It's a pestilence -- one whose repugnant views Trump has invited into his White House." -- CW

Donald Trump Is Way too Busy for Intelligence Briefings. Greg Miller of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump has received two classified intelligence briefings since his surprise election victory earlier this month, a frequency that is notably lower ... than that of his predecessors, current and former U.S. officials said. A team of intelligence analysts has been prepared to deliver daily briefings ... to Trump in the two weeks since he won.... Mike Pence, by contrast, has set aside time for intelligence briefings almost every day since the election, officials said. Officials involved in the Trump transition team ... not[e] that he has been immersed in the work of forming his administration...." CW: And what an excellent administration that "immersion" is yielding! ...

Ben Carson Is Still Crazy. Josh Feldman of Mediaite: "Ben Carson spoke out on Fox News [Wednesday night] about all the speculation surrounding whether he'll take a Cabinet position in Donald Trump's administration. There have been reports Carson has been offered the position of HUD Secretary, but there was some confusion earlier today over whether he'd accepted it. Carson told Kelly File guest host Sandra Smith that it's been 'amusing' to see what's being said in the press about him, explaining, 'Every job is very important, but in terms of complexity, I can guarantee you that very little comes close to neurosurgery.' He affirmed that yes, 'the offer is on the table.'" CW: Let's see if the Dear Leader can handle Dr. Ben's playing hard-to-get. I have a feeling Trump will give Ole Doc the middle finger & nominate his demolition contractor as HUD secretary. ...

... Yay! Another Billionaire! John Santucci & Alexander Mallin of ABC News: "... Donald Trump is expected to name investor Wilbur Ross as his pick for commerce secretary, two senior-level Trump transition sources tell ABC News. Ross, 78, is a billionaire who has made a fortune restructuring failed companies in the manufacturing and steel industries, among others." -- CW ...

... The Vulture King; Mitt, on Steroids. Adam Behsudi of Politico: "Admirers praise Wilbur Ross as 'the king of bankruptcy,' calling him a savior of failing U.S. industries. But his critics have a different name for the 78-year-old investor said to be Donald Trump's pick for Commerce secretary. They describe him as a 'vulture,' and say his restructuring of ailing industries has sometimes come at the expense of workers' safety -- in one egregious case, contributing to the deaths of 12 miners in Sago, West Virginia.... By all accounts, Ross is a savvy negotiator and a member of the same club of enormously successful billionaires as Trump: He has an estimated net worth of $2.9 billion and a house down the street from Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach.... His investments in steel, in particular, place him close to an industry that has waged an aggressive campaign of trade cases against foreign competitors. That could raise questions over whether he might benefit financially from favorable trade rulings.... Ross has also run into trouble with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In August, the SEC ordered Ross to pay a $2.3 million fine for failing to disclose certain fees to investors." -- CW

Look, I have an aged female friend, and I swear on my little cracker I am not grabbing her ass with my left hand. P.S. This is a good woman: she's rich (but not as rich as I am) and she's going to take your education tax dollars and give them all to the rich children.

... Well, This Is Horrible. Emma Brown of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump intends to name Betsy DeVos, a conservative activist and billionaire philanthropist who has pushed forcefully for private school voucher programs nationwide, as his nominee for education secretary, according to a person close to DeVos." -- CW (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Paul Waldman: "Nothing says you're shaking up the system and striking a blow against the establishment like a billionaire donor who wants to destroy public schools." -- CW ...

... Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post: "Seen by her supporters as a tireless, driven supporter of school choice, opponents say [DeVos] is the most ideological and anti-public education nominee ever to be put forward to run the the nearly 40-year-old department. They fear that Trump, along with DeVos, will push 'choice' programs that many see as draining resources from the traditional public school districts that educate most American schoolchildren.... School choice opponents say that 'choice' not only siphons resources from traditional systems but also promotes segregation, discriminates against students with the most severe disabilities, and fights against public oversight.... The preponderance of independent research shows that choice programs have failed to systemically improve student achievement and have harmed public school districts." -- CW ...

... Ed Kilgore: "DeVos has been called the 'four-star general of the pro-voucher movement.' She and her husband, Amway heir Dick DeVos, have devoted an enormous amount of time and money promoting voucher initiatives -- the use of public funds to finance private schools [[ around the country.... DeVos is devoted to the more radical vision of robust publicly funded private schools competing for parents' allegiances.... Trump has decisively associated himself with people who would be perfectly happy with a future in which the only thing 'public' about schools will be the taxpayer subsidies." -- CW ...

... Diane Ravitch: "... Not only does [DeVos] want all children to have vouchers (charters apparently are a fall-back form of privatization for her), she opposes any regulation or oversight for the private schools she supports. When the Michigan legislature made an attempt to create some oversight for charter schools, DeVos spent over $1 million to block the effort, and she won. In Michigan, 80% of the charters operate for-profit, without regulation or oversight...." -- CW ...

... Benjy Hansen-Bundy & Andy Kross, in Mother Jones, chart the DeVos family giving tree. It's horrendous: "Across four decades and two generations, the DeVos family has poured more than $200 million into the key institutions of the Christian right and the conservative movement.... We trace the family's many millions as they flow out of family foundations into the biggest-name think tanks and advocacy groups in American politics today. And for good measure, we've included Erik Prince, the founder of the private-security company Blackwater, who is the brother of Dick DeVos' wife, Betsy. What a small world." -- CW

Dana Priest, in the New Yorker on Michael Flynn, Trump's national security advisor: "The lifelong intelligence officer, who once valued tips gleaned from tribal reporters, has become a ready tweeter of hackneyed conspiracy theories. He reposts the vitriol of anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim commentators.... Whether Flynn now learns to bottle his rage, whether he reëmbraces fact over fiction, whether he's capable of playing the role of a contemplative counsellor, will determine the outcome of his most difficult and important mission yet." -- CW

Mad magazine cover illustration. MEANWHILE, Not-yet-President Trump seems to have sent his son Donny Boy to the Paris Ritz to chat up a group of wealthy supporters of Russia's solution to the Syrian civil war.

Jeff Spross of the Week: "U.S. stock indexes broke records Tuesday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 19,000, the S&P 500 closed over 2,200, and the NASDAQ closed over 5,300 -- all first-time highs. This wasn't supposed to happen." But what's going on is what already has been going on "over the last few decades.... Profits can go up without any accompanying growth in jobs or wages. In those cases, the economy isn't growing; companies are just extracting more of the wealth their workers create and distributing it to stock owners.... [Meanwhile,] inequality soared, GDP growth slowed, middle- and working-class wages stagnated, investment by companies in real economic activity collapsed, and productivity growth was reduced to a crawl. Yet corporate profits reached record highs, and [as a result,] the stock market just kept climbing. There's every reason to think Trump's policies will just exacerbate this trend.... So the scary possibility ... [is] that [the market] knows exactly what President Trump will do." -- CW

Trip Gabriel & David Sanger of the New York Times: "Hillary Clinton's lead in the popular vote is growing. She is roughly 30,000 votes behind Donald J. Trump in the key swing states of Michigan and Wisconsin -- a combined gap that is narrowing. Her impassioned supporters are now urging her to challenge the results in those two states and Pennsylvania, grasping at the last straws to reverse Mr. Trump's decisive majority in the Electoral College. In recent days, they have seized on a report by a respected computer scientist and other experts suggesting that Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, the keys to Mr. Trump's Electoral College victory, need to manually review paper ballots to assure the election was not hacked.... Tellingly, the pleas for recounts have gained no support from the Clinton campaign...." -- CW ...

... Eric Geller of Politico: "Jill Stein's presidential campaign announced Wednesday that it plans to file for recounts in three key states if it can raise enough money. 'After a divisive and painful presidential race,' the Green Party candidate said in a statement, 'reported hacks into voter and party databases and individual email accounts are causing many Americans to wonder if our election results are reliable.'" Stein wants to request recounts in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania -- states that were critical to President-elect Donald Trump's victory." -- CW ...

... Evelyn Rupert of the Hill: "Donald Trump is poised to win the state of Michigan after a razor-thin race, according to still-unofficial numbers released by the Michigan secretary of State Wednesday. Each of Michigan's 83 counties certified their vote tallies and submitted them to the secretary of State, showing Trump with a lead of about 10,700 total votes over Hillary Clinton. The vote totals, which still need to be approved by the Board of State Canvassers on Nov. 28, show Trump received 2,279,543 votes to Clinton's 2,268,839." -- CW ...

... Charles Pierce: "In the campaign just passed, racism and xenophobia and sexism were not 'the only reasons' Trump won. That's stupid. There is genuine economic anxiety and despair in the country. But they were the accelerant. They might not have been the biggest reason why he won, but they damn sure were a big part of filling his rally halls and getting his voters to the polls, and not just in the South, either. All American populism falls into the trap of scapegoating The Other eventually; if it didn't, Bernie Sanders would be picking his Cabinet right now." CW: Pierce might have added misogyny to his list of why people voted for Trump/against Clinton. But he didn't. Because he doesn't give a rat's ass about women.

Three Cheers for the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. I'm planning to make a small donation (contributions are not tax-deductible):

The Commentariat -- Nov. 23, 2016

Afternoon Update:

Look, I have an aged female friend, and I swear on my little cracker I am not grabbing her ass with my left hand. P.S. This is a good woman: she's rich (but not as rich as I am) and she's going to take your education tax dollars and give them all to the rich children.

... Well, This Is Horrible. Emma Brown of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump intends to name Betsy DeVos, a conservative activist and billionaire philanthropist who has pushed forcefully for private school voucher programs nationwide, as his nominee for education secretary, according to a person close to DeVos." -- CW

*****

Daniel Wiessner & Robert Iafolla of Reuters: "A federal judge on Tuesday blocked an Obama administration rule to extend mandatory overtime pay to more than 4 million salaried workers from taking effect, imperiling one of the outgoing president's signature achievements for boosting wages. U.S. District Judge Amos Mazzant, in Sherman, Texas, agreed with 21 states and a coalition of business groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, that the rule is unlawful and granted their motion for a nationwide injunction. The rule, issued by the Labor Department, was to take effect Dec. 1 and would have doubled to $47,500 the maximum salary a worker can earn and still be eligible for mandatory overtime pay.... Mazzant, who was appointed by President Barack Obama, ruled that the federal law governing overtime does not allow the Labor Department to decide which workers are eligible based on salary levels alone." -- CW

Sari Horwitz of the Washington Post: "President Obama granted commutations Tuesday to 79 federal drug offenders who were imprisoned under harsh and outdated sentencing laws, pushing to more than 1,000 the number of inmates who have received clemency from him. Obama's historic number of commutations -- more than the previous 11 presidents combined -- was announced as administration officials are moving quickly to rule on all the pending clemency applications before the end of the president's term. The Trump administration is not expected to keep in place Obama's initiative to provide relief to nonviolent drug offenders." -- CW

Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post: "The 21 men and women who stood awaiting the nation's highest civilian honor Tuesday in the White House East Room represented Barack Obama's particular vision of the United States: one where pioneering scientists, groundbreaking performers, crusading activists and unconventional artists chart America's destiny. President Obama has not stinted on handing out the Presidential Medal of Freedom during his time in office: He has bestowed it on at least 114 individuals, more than any of his predecessors.... Striking a nostalgic tone at the end of the ceremony, the president said: 'So, just on a personal note, part of the reason why these events are so special to me is because everybody on this stage has touched me in a very powerful, personal way, in ways that they probably couldn't imagine.'" -- CW ...

** Dangerous Times. Nancy Hemmer of US News: "At the moment the Trump team is a small group with a shared commitment to white nationalism, Islamophobia, draconian immigration restrictions and conspiracism.... But in order to fully understand the danger of this political moment, we need to look not overseas but to our own history.... Take Japanese internment. The history of internment has been front-and-center this week, thanks to a Trump surrogate who cited it as justification for a Muslim registry. Internment ... was ... an executive order issued by Franklin Roosevelt in 1942. Two years later..., the [Supreme C]ourt signed off on internment.... Despite the passage of the 15th Amendment, which guaranteed African-American men the right to vote, from the 1880s to the 1960s that right was essentially dead-letter in the American South.... Voting rights were not protected by the Constitution. They were protected by the willingness of the president, the Congress and the courts in the 1960s to throw the combined weight of the federal government into their defense.... The Voting Rights Act was gutted in 2013. State legislatures immediately began passing race-based restrictions, and a Trump administration will do everything in its power to continue rolling back access to the ballot for poor and minority voters.... Those of us who have grown up in this brief period of imperfect but improving liberal democracy have put our faith in safeguards that do not exist." -- CW

Mark Landler & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump moved swiftly to diversify his cabinet on Wednesday, announcing the nomination of Gov. Nikki R. Haley of South Carolina, a rising star in Republican politics, to be United States ambassador to the United Nations and offering the post of secretary of housing and urban development to Ben Carson, the retired neurosurgeon who ran an outsider's campaign for the Republican presidential nomination." -- CW ...

... Robert Costa of the Washington Post: "South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, a rising Republican star and daughter of Indian immigrants, has accepted ... Donald Trump's offer to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations in the coming administration, according to a person familiar with the selection process.... Haley, 44, who is serving her second term..., brings little foreign policy experience. Her views on various U.S. military and national security matters usually fall within the GOP's hawkish mainstream.... If confirmed, Haley would be replaced by South Carolina's Lt. Gov. Henry McMaster, a top Trump ally. His ascension is seen inside of Trump's inner circle as a welcome consequence of her departure...." -- CW

Trump the Unstable. Philip Rucker & Mark Fisher of the Washington Post: "In the space of just 24 hours this week, [Donald Trump] ... set off cyclones ... that preview the drama he seems likely to bring to the White House. Trump summoned two dozen television executives and news anchors to his offices Monday to berate them as dishonest and disobedient. He sought to strong-arm the British government to appoint his Brexit ally, Nigel Farage, as ambassador to the United States. He dropped his threat to prosecute ... Hillary Clinton. Then there was Tuesday's meeting with the New York Times, the newspaper Trump loves to mock as 'failing.' It was scheduled, then canceled, then rescheduled. And once the president-elect settled in at the Grey Lady's boardroom, he softened his position on climate change, floated the idea that his son-in-law could broker peace in the Middle East, voiced new doubts about the effectiveness of torturing terrorism suspects, savaged Republicans who wavered on his candidacy and left unresolved concerns about how -- or even whether -- he would disassociate himself from his global business holdings to avoid conflicts of interest. Whew.... This could become Washington's new normal...." -- CW ...

The law's totally on my side. The president can't have a conflict of interest. -- Donald Trump, claiming there is no prohibition against his profiting from the presidency, in a meeting with the New York Times Tuesday

When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal. -- Richard Nixon, interview with David Frost, May 1977

... Michael Shear, et al., of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump on Tuesday tempered some of his most extreme campaign promises, dropping his vow to jail Hillary Clinton, expressing doubt about the value of torturing terrorism suspects and pledging to have an open mind about climate change. But in a wide-ranging, hourlong interview with reporters and editors at The New York Times -- which was scheduled, canceled and then reinstated after a dispute over the ground rules -- Mr. Trump was fiercely unapologetic about repeatedly flouting the traditional ethical and political conventions that have long shaped the American presidency. He said he had no obligation to establish boundaries between his business empire and his White House, conceding that the Trump brand 'is certainly a hotter brand than it was before.' He defended Stephen K. Bannon, his chief strategist, against charges of racism, calling him a 'decent guy.'... [Trump's] turnabout on the need for torture as a tool in the fight against terrorism, which he repeatedly endorsed during the campaign, was remarkable. CW: Definitely read the whole story. ...

... Here's the full transcript of the meeting. ...

... Sydney Ember of the New York Times: "The strained relationship between Donald J. Trump and The New York Times took an odd path on Tuesday when a planned meeting between the president-elect and the newspaper was abruptly canceled by Mr. Trump and then quickly rescheduled. After a morning of back-and-forth statements and Twitter posts, Mr. Trump arrived at midday for a meeting with Times representatives at the paper's Midtown headquarters. Seated next to the publisher, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., in the paper's Churchill Room, he said he had great respect for the paper but thought its treatment of him had been 'very rough.'" CW: Spoiled schoolchildren aren't this flighty. What a disaster! (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

...Eric Levitz of New York: "On Tuesday,Trump offered incautious optimists cause for comfort. In a sit-down interview with the New York Times..., [Trump] waxed moderate on the subjects of climate change, President Obama, military torture, and press freedom. And yet, even as he played the reasonable Republican, Trump repeatedly deployed the reasoning of an authoritarian kleptocrat...As Trump moves from room to room and decade to decade, his political views shift radically. But through it all, he has consistently displayed an affinity for authoritarianism and exploiting public trust for personal profit. If you want to know how he will govern, best to keep those core commitments in mind." --safari...

... Jeremy Peters of the New York Times: "Mr. Trump has taken the staid task of preparing to assume the presidency and turned it into an exercise in conspicuous self-promotion and carefully choreographed branding.... The venues he has picked to conduct his official transition planning attest to his success as a real estate developer... Mr. Trump especially liked the Bedminster[, N.J.,] setting, he told his aides, because the images of him receiving potential cabinet appointees at the front door of the clubhouse resembled 10 Downing Street in London.... 'It stinks,' said Norman Eisen, who was the chief White House ethics lawyer for President Obama from 2009 to 2011. Because there is no specific law prohibiting public officeholders from financially beneficial self-promotion, what Mr. Trump is doing is probably not illegal, Mr. Eisen added. 'But that doesn't make it right,' he said. 'It's part and parcel of the unsavory marketing of his brands that he also did during the campaign.'" -- CW ...

... Josh Gerstein of Politico: "When ... Donald Trump touts his exemption from federal conflict-of-interest laws, he might want to offer a word of thanks to those who made it possible: PresidentGeorge H.W. Bush and the U.S. Congress. As Trump faces a flood of stories about how his businesses could complicate his work as president, he made clear Tuesday that he's well aware that that the key federal legislation aimed at separating personal interests from official responsibilities does not apply to the president.... The carve-out Trump alludes to became law in November 1989 as part of ethics legislation that also granted members of Congress -- and other government officials -- a pay raise they had long sought. The exemption -- walling off the president, vice president, lawmakers and judges from conflict-of-interest provisions -- was contained in a proposed bill that Bush sent to Congress in April of that year." --safari...

... Trump Loads the Impeachment Gun. Jeet Heer of the New Republic: "... impeachment is a political process, not a legal one. If Congress wants to, it can take up the issue of Trump's likely violation of the emolument clause based on the evidence in the public record and Trump's own admissions. Of course, a newly victorious Republican Congress is unlikely to challenge Trump. But the constitutional gun is now loaded if anyone wants to pick it up in the future." -- CW ...

... Nolan McCaskill & Louis Nelson of Politico: "... Donald Trump conceded Tuesday that he probably won't make good on his campaign pledge to pursue a new criminal investigation into ... Hillary Clinton.... Trump did, however, suggest he wasn't taking potential investigations into Clinton off the table, while still remarking that he doesn't want to 'hurt the Clintons.'... Breitbart News, the alt-right news organization formerly run by Steve Bannon, Trump's chief strategist, headlined the lead story on its home page 'BROKEN PROMISE.' And Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog agency that sued to get more of Clinton's State Department emails released, urged Trump on Tuesday to 'commit his administration' to investigating Clinton, while promising to continue its own litigation and investigations to help uncover possible scandals.... Matt Miller, a former spokesman with the Department of Justice, tweeted Tuesday morning that Trump would be violating the Justice Department's independence if he ordered his attorney general to pursue an investigation." But Jeff Sessions, Trump's nominee for AG, said in an interview last month "that there was 'sufficient evidence to bring a charge' and argued that Attorney General Loretta Lynch abandoned her responsibility by simply accepting FBI Director James Comey's recommendation not to pursue charges." -- CW ...

... Here's the follow-up to Joe Scarborough's scoop-o'the-day, linked yesterday:

... "Never Mind." Michael Shear of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump repeatedly said Hillary Clinton's '"lies and deception' rivaled Watergate. He called her 'Crooked Hillary.' His most rabid fans chanted it over and over again at huge campaign rallies: 'Lock her up!' But on Tuesday, Mr. Trump essentially said: 'never mind,' signaling that he does not intend to pursue investigations into his rival's use of a private email server or the financial operations at the Clinton family's global foundation. In an appearance on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe' program, Kellyanne Conway, the former Trump campaign manager and a senior adviser to his transition, said ... [Trump] wanted to 'move beyond the issues of the campaign' and confirmed that Mr. Trump did not want his promised Clinton investigations to take place." -- CW (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... CW: Look for sales of sweaty, used, extra-large-sized "Lock Her Up!" T-shirts on e-bay. P.S. to Obama: You might want to issue a quiet blanket pardon to Clinton anyway. Not that Trump would ever lie to gain an advantage. ...

... Dara Lind of Vox: "Much of the meeting [between Trump & the NYT] ... was typical Trump bluster and whining; Trump reportedly started the meeting with four solid minutes of complaints about how 'unfair' the Times had been to him. It's also tough to tell at times whether Trump was saying what he believes or, as he often does, was just trying to get his audience to like him. Still, even Trump's self-serving comments can be a useful window into what he wants, and he offered some glimpses into how he sees his presidency -- and how little he takes responsibility for pretty much anything he said during the campaign." Read the whole post, but here's a taste: "... Trump's idea of what a better relationship with the press would look like involves two rich men solving their disagreements in private, without anyone needing to do anything so gauche as blaring it on the front page." ...

... Deplorables Confused & Surprised Trump Dumped Them for the NYT. Nicky Woolf of the Guardian: "... Donald Trump's disavowal of Richard Spencer and his far-right ... National Policy Institute, a day after video of Spencer's supporters giving the Nazi salute at an event in Washington DC surfaced, has dismayed some of his supporters on the 'alt-right'.... They also objected to his visiting of the New York Times for an on-the-record meeting on Tuesday, at which Trump described the news organization as a 'world jewel'." -- CW ...

... Margaret Sullivan of the Washington Post: "On Monday, some of the biggest names in TV news trooped into Trump Tower for an off-the-record meeting with [Donald Trump].... Brandon Friedman, a Virginia-based public relations executive, offered his theory on Twitter: 'They walked into an ambush, agreed not to talk about it, then Trump went straight to the Post with his version.'... On Tuesday..., the Times played it right. Despite a tweet attack from [Trump]..., editors refused to go the off-the-record route with Trump.... The paper successfully called Trump's bluff.... [Trump] has masterfully manipulated the media for the past 18 months -- bullying reporters, garnering billions in free publicity and portraying journalists as part of the corporate structure that must be brought down so that the people can triumph.... In fact, U.S. citizens need an independent press more than ever." -- CW ...

Fuck him! I know I am being emotional about it.... I really am offended. This was unprecedented. Outrageous! -- A Target of Trump's TV media slaughter ...

He truly doesn't seem to understand the First Amendment. He doesn't. He thinks we are supposed to say what he says and that's it. -- Another Target at the meeting ...

... David Remnick of the New Yorker has interviewed a number of participants in Trump's meeting Monday with TV network execs & on-air anchors. "Participants said that Trump did not seem entirely rational about his criticism of the media, nor did he appear any more informed about policy than he had been during the campaign.

... Dana Milbank: "It was a pathetic spectacle: TV news executives and anchors filing in to Trump Tower on Monday to be [Trump]'s whipping boys. Donald Trump had summoned them for a talk, but it turned out to be part tongue-lashing, part perp walk. The TV news people had foolishly agreed that the session was 'off the record,' leaving Trump and his aides free to characterize the media representatives as groveling while Trump berated them as liars.... Trump singled out for abuse CNN -- the outlet that, with its endless live broadcasts of Trump speeches, did more than any other to win Trump the GOP nomination.... Ominously, [many media outlets are] taking to heart the criticism that the media were too tough on him, and talking about recalibrating their approach to him to regain public approval.... Journalists need to recognize that we're not going to win a popularity contest with Trump, and we shouldn't try.... We're not here to be popular." -- CW

David I-Told-You-Trump-Was-a-Crook Fahrenthold of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump's charitable foundation has admitted to the IRS that it violated a legal prohibition against 'self-dealing,' which bars nonprofit leaders from using their charity's money to help themselves, their businesses or their families. That admission was contained in the Donald J. Trump Foundation's IRS tax filings for 2015, which were recently posted online at the nonprofit-tracking site GuideStar. A GuideStar spokesman said the forms were uploaded by the Trump Foundation's law firm, Morgan, Lewis and Bockius.... Such violations can carry penalties including excise taxes, and the charity leaders can be required to repay money that the charity spent on their behalf. During the presidential campaign, The Washington Post reported on several instances in which Trump appeared to use the Trump Foundation's money to buy items for himself or to help one of his for-profit businesses. But the new Trump Foundation tax filings provided little detail so it was unclear if these admissions were connected to the instances reported in The Post." -- CW (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Lee Fang of The Intercept: "Donald Trump, implementing what one news outlet called a 'tough lobbying ban', swept several registered lobbyists out of his transition team last week -- only to replace them on Monday with new officials heavily involved with lobbying for the same industry interests.... The Trump transition team ethics standards requires officials to deregister as lobbyists and agree to a five-year lobbying ban. But the rules do not preclude officials who have recently worked in the lobbying industry or currently work in the lobbying industry without having explicitly registered as lobbyists." --safari ...

     ... CW: Major media & Democrats must follow up Fang's reporting. The silence from Democrats, and from the DNC, during Trump's transition is deafening. And they wonder why they're the minority party. ...

... Kate Zernike of the New York Times: Everybody on Trump's team thinks Chris Christie is an incompetent, faithless, self-centered jerk. And other reasons Christie will not be veep, chief-of-staff, AG or under-secretary of the White House mailroom. -- CW

Brent Griffiths of Politico: "Retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson said on Tuesday that he'd had multiple 'offers on the table' for positions in the incoming Trump administration, including secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. 'I would say that was one of the offers that is on the table,' the retired neurosurgeon told Fox News' Neil Cavuto of the possibility that he is being considered for the the top job at HUD." -- CW

Naomi LaChance of The Intercept: "Jeff Sessions, Trump's choice for attorney general, said in a 2014 radio interview that he does not think undocumented immigrants should serve in the military, and that immigrants in the military in general are more likely to be spies. 'I just think in terms of who's going to be most likely to be a spy: somebody from Cullman, Alabama, or somebody from Kenya?' Sessions asked.... Sessions ... has been a vocal opponent of most immigration measures, and has often said that immigrants take jobs away from Americans....The U.S. has a long record of immigrants serving in the military, and the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Actallows immigrants who served in the U.S. military during periods of conflict to apply for naturalization." --safari

** Drumpf Hypocrisy, Ctd. Gideon Resnick & Brandy Zadrozny of The Daily Beast: "Almost $600,000 per hour. That's the fee Donald Trump's charity got for recording a video on behalf of a Ukrainian oligarch. It's a payment that could be in violation of tax laws, legal experts told The Daily Beast. When Hillary Clinton's foundation received money from the very same billionaire, Donald Trump blasted her as 'crooked.' Ukrainian steel magnate Victor Pinchuk's foundation was the single largest outside donor to Donald Trump's private charity in 2015, according to new IRS filings filed by the organization.... Pinchuk's gift was given in conjunction with a short video Trump made for the Yalta European Strategy annual meeting, held in Kiev in September of 2015...[Trump] was hired by Pinchuk in 2011 to advance the steel magnate's interests in the United States.... The question and answer session, billed as 'How New Ukraine's Fate Affects Europe and the World,' was given at a time when Trump was already a presidential candidate." Read on. --safari ...

... Yay! Steve Bannon Has a Fake Charity, Too. Robert O'Harrow of the Washington Post: Donald Trump's chief White House strategist Stephen K. Bannon accepted $376,000 in pay over four years for working 30 hours a week at a tiny tax-exempt charity in Tallahassee while also serving as the hands-on executive chairman of Breitbart News Network. During the same four-year period, the charity paid about $1.3 million in salaries to two other journalists who said they put in 40 hours a week there while also working for the politically conservative news outlet, according to publicly available documents filed with the Internal Revenue Service.... The ties between the Government Accountability Institute (GAI) and Breitbart call into question the assertions the institute made in filings to the IRS that it is an independent, nonpartisan operation, according to philanthropic specialists and former IRS officials." CW Rule of the Right: You are not a real confederate mover-and-shaker unless you have your own fake charity/think tank.

** Gabriel Sherman of New York: "Hillary Clinton is being urged by a group of prominent computer scientists and election lawyers to call for a recount in three swing states won by Donald Trump, New York has learned. The group, which includes voting-rights attorney John Bonifaz and J. Alex Halderman, the director of the University of Michigan Center for Computer Security and Society, believes they've found persuasive evidence that results in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania may have been manipulated or hacked. The group is so far not speaking on the record about their findings and is focused on lobbying the Clinton team in private.... The Clinton camp is running out of time to challenge the election. According to one of the activists, the deadline in Wisconsin to file for a recount is Friday; in Pennsylvania, it's Monday; and Michigan is next Wednesday. Whether Clinton will call for a recount remains unclear. The academics so far have only a circumstantial case that would require not just a recount but a forensic audit of voting machines." -- CW ...

... Rick Hasen: "Halderman is very credible, and if he says there are anomalies that deserve investigation, they should be investigated. But the fact that this group has gone to Elias and Podesta, and so far the campaign has said nothing since learning of it last Thursday, should give you pause." -- CW ...

... Andrew Prokop of Vox: "... be skeptical. Maybe this group of 'prominent computer scientists and election lawyers' is sitting on more persuasive evidence than this. If so, they should post it publicly and let their claims be analyzed, rather than letting vague rumors swirl. But you definitely shouldn't believe a vague, fantastic-sounding claim about a stolen election unless serious, solid evidence emerges to back it up, and independent experts validate how that evidence is being analyzed." -- CW

Think Progress Editors: "ThinkProgress will no longer treat 'alt-right' as an accurate descriptor of either a movement or its members.... We will use terms we consider more accurate, such as 'white nationalist' or 'white supremacist.'... You might wonder what, if anything, distinguishes the alt-right from more hidebound racist movements such as the American Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan. The answer is very little.... The term is flexible enough that Steve Bannon ... can boast that he turned Breitbart News into 'a platform for the alt-right' while simultaneously denying any association with white nationalist movements.... The point here is not to call people names, but simply to describe them as they are. We won't do racists' public relations work for them. Nor should other news outlets." -- CW ...

... Dylan Byers of CNN: "Michael Hirsh, an editor with Politico, has resigned from the company after publishing the home addresses of a white supremacist leader [Richard Spencer] and encouraging people to go to his home.... In a statement, Politico editor-in-chief John Harris and editor Carrie Budoff Brown called Hirsh's post indefensible." -- CW ...

Michael Tomasky of the Daily Beast: "The Democratic Party, as an actually existing thing, has four main parts to it: one, the elected officials; two, the money people; three, the people (a few thousand) who work in the trenches for the various progressive causes; four, the energized base (as opposed to people who just vote once every four years). The four parts don't really talk to each other. That must change. Elected officials have to see that they need to take the idea of energizing the base seriously." Tomasky writes that the parts need funding, too. ...

     ... CW: But Tomasky doesn't address the need to get out the message of what Trump & his Republican Congress is proposing/doing. It does no good, voter-wise, for Democrats to save Medicare or Social Security or whatever, if voters don't know which party made sure they got coverage. It's the Message, Stupid.

Mike Isaac of the New York Times: Facebook "has quietly developed software to suppress posts from appearing in people's news feeds in specific geographic areas, according to three current and former Facebook employees.... The feature was created to help Facebook get into China, a market where the social network has been blocked, these people said. [Mark] Zuckerberg has supported and defended the effort, the people added.... Facebook does not intend to suppress the posts itself. Instead, it would offer the software to enable a third party -- in this case, most likely a partner Chinese company -- to monitor popular stories and topics...." -- CW

Beyond the Beltway

Caitlin MacNeal of TPM: "North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R), along with the Republican candidate for state auditor, on Tuesday filed for a statewide recount as McCrory trails Democratic state Attorney General Roy Cooper by more than 6,000 votes.... The McCrory campaign acknowledged that a recount cannot occur until all counties have certified their votes, but the campaign said it filed for a recount on the original legal deadline to do so. The deadline for counties to finish canvassing their votes was last Friday, but several counties have been delayed by Republican-filed complaints of alleged voter fraud and challenges over determining which provisional ballots to count." -- CW ...

... How to Nullify an Election. Paul Waldman: "Watch this race -- there's a provision under which the Republican legislature can just give the office to whoever they like no matter what happened in the election, and they're actually thinking of using it to just put McCrory back in office." -- CW

Lisa Ryan of New York: "[A]t the age of 26, [Sarah Weddington became the youngest person ever to argue in front of the U.S. Supreme Court, when she represented Norma McCorvey -- otherwise known as Jane Roe -- in the landmark 1973 case Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion across the country. Now, at age 71, she finds herself in a precarious position.... [S]he's dedicated her entire adult life to being a champion of women's rights -- only now, so much of what she's accomplished is under threat.... Donald Trump has said that he will appoint pro-life justices to the Supreme Court, who will potentially overturn Roe v. Wade and allow states to again set their own abortion laws. It's the first time that Weddington has seen such a severe threat to the abortion rights she fought to secure." --safari

Julia Wong of the Guardian: "A 21-year-old woman was severely injured and may lose her arm after being hit by a projectile when North Dakota law enforcement officers turned a water cannon on Dakota Access pipeline protesters and threw 'less-than-lethal' weapons, according to the woman's father. Sophia Wilansky was one of several hundred protesters injured during the standoff with police on Sunday on a bridge near the site where the pipeline is planned to cross under the Missouri river. Graphic photographs of her injured arm with broken bones visible were circulated on social media." -- CW

Way Beyond

Rod Nordland & Safak Timur of the New York Times: "The Turkish government on Tuesday expanded its crackdown on political opponents, dismissing an additional 15,000 civil servants from their jobs and shutting down 375 organizations, including nine more news outlets. More than 100,000 public workers, including police officers, teachers, soldiers and others, had already been fired for what the authorities said were connections to a failed coup on July 15 or to terrorists.The new wave of dismissals came on a morning when the European Parliament was scheduled to debate freezing accession talks for Turkey to join the European Union. It was one of several recent indicators that the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was abandoning hope of success in that process, which has dragged on for 11 years." -- CW

The Commentariat -- Nov. 22, 2016

... President John F. Kennedy, Report to the American People on Civil Rights, June 11, 1963 ...

... CW: There is a direct line from Kennedy's speech to Trump's election. Trump is the anti-Kennedy; just ask those white supremacists featured in the video near the end of today's Commentariat.

Afternoonish Update:

Sydney Ember of the New York Times: "The strained relationship between Donald J. Trump and The New York Times took an odd path on Tuesday when a planned meeting between the president-elect and the newspaper was abruptly canceled by Mr. Trump and then quickly rescheduled. After a morning of back-and-forth statements and Twitter posts, Mr. Trump arrived at midday for a meeting with Times representatives at the paper's Midtown headquarters. Seated next to the publisher, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., in the paper's Churchill Room, he said he had great respect for the paper but thought its treatment of him had been 'very rough.'" CW: Spoiled schoolchildren aren't this flighty. What a disaster!

Here's the follow-up to Joe Scarborough's scoop-o'the-day, linked below:

... "Never Mind." Michael Shear of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump repeatedly said Hillary Clinton's '"lies and deception' rivaled Watergate. He called her 'Crooked Hillary.' His most rabid fans chanted it over and over again at huge campaign rallies: 'Lock her up!' But on Tuesday, Mr. Trump essentially said: 'never mind,' signaling that he does not intend to pursue investigations into his rival's use of a private email server or the financial operations at the Clinton family's global foundation. In an appearance on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe' program, Kellyanne Conway, the former Trump campaign manager and a senior adviser to his transition, said ... [Trump] wanted to 'move beyond the issues of the campaign' and confirmed that Mr. Trump did not want his promised Clinton investigations to take place." -- CW ...

... CW: Look for sales of sweaty, used, extra-large-sized "Lock Her Up!" T-shirts on e-bay. P.S. to Obama: You might want to issue a quiet blanket pardon to Clinton anyway. Not that Trump would ever lie to gain an advantage.

David I-Told-You-Trump-Was-a-Crook Fahrenthold of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump's charitable foundation has admitted to the IRS that it violated a legal prohibition against 'self-dealing,' which bars nonprofit leaders from using their charity's money to help themselves, their businesses or their families. That admission was contained in the Donald J. Trump Foundation's IRS tax filings for 2015, which were recently posted online at the nonprofit-tracking site GuideStar. A GuideStar spokesman said the forms were uploaded by the Trump Foundation's law firm, Morgan, Lewis and Bockius.... Such violations can carry penalties including excise taxes, and the charity leaders can be required to repay money that the charity spent on their behalf. During the presidential campaign, The Washington Post reported on several instances in which Trump appeared to use the Trump Foundation's money to buy items for himself or to help one of his for-profit businesses. But the new Trump Foundation tax filings provided little detail so it was unclear if these admissions were connected to the instances reported in The Post." -- CW

*****

Michael Shear of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump released a two-and-a-half minute infomercial-style video on Monday that largely steered clear of his most inflammatory campaign promises to deport immigrants, track Muslims and repeal President Obama's health law. Instead, Mr. Trump offered what he called an update on his transition, which he said was working 'very smoothly, efficiently and effectively.' Reading from a script and looking into the camera, Mr. Trump vowed to focus on creating jobs, reducing regulations and combating corruption once in office." -- CW ...

... Nicky Woolf, et al., of the Guardian: Trump "said [in the video] that he was going to issue a note of intent to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, calling it 'a potential disaster for our country'. Instead he said he would 'negotiate fair bilateral trade deals that bring jobs and industry back'. Hours before Trump's announcement, Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, warned that the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) would be 'meaningless' without US participation.... be, a vocal supporter of the 12-nation agreement, appears to have failed in his recent attempts to coax Trump out of his 'America first', protectionism." -- CW

Incoming POTUS Connects with Major Media Honchos. Emily Smith & Daniel Halper of the New York Post: "Donald Trump scolded media big shots during an off-the-record Trump Tower sitdown on Monday, sources told The Post. 'It was like a f[uck]ing firing squad,' one source said of the encounter. 'Trump started with [CNN chief] Jeff Zucker and said "I hate your network, everyone at CNN is a liar and you should be ashamed,'" the source said. 'The meeting was a total disaster. The TV execs and anchors went in there thinking they would be discussing the access they would get to the Trump administration, but instead they got a Trump-style dressing down,' the source added. A second source confirmed the fireworks. 'The meeting took place in a big board room and there were about 30 or 40 people, including the big news anchors from all the networks,' the other source said.... 'Trump didn't say [NBC reporter] Katy Tur by name, but talked about an NBC female correspondent who got it wrong, then he referred to a horrible network correspondent who cried when Hillary lost who hosted a debate -- which was Martha Raddatz who was also in the room.'... Trump spokeswoman Kellyanne Conway told reporters the gathering went well." -- CW ...

... Hadas Gold of Politico: "The source who spoke with Politico characterized the meeting as less intense, and said the discussion included Trump expressing the possibility of a 'reset' of the tumultuous relationship between ... [Trump] and the media and that all he wants is 'fairness.'... He ... was effusive in his praise of President Barack Obama, the source added, telling the media assembled that after their White House meeting the two have spoken by phone at least twice.... Conway later on Monday hit back at the New York Post report. 'He did not explode in anger,' she said." -- CW ...

... Michael Grynbaum & Sydney Ember of the New York Times: "... after details of Mr. Trump's hectoring leaked on Monday in The New York Post, it seemed the meeting was being used as a political prop, especially after Trump-friendly news outlets trumpeted the session as a take-no-prisoners move by a brave president-elect. 'Trump Slams Media Elite, Face to Face,' blared the Drudge Report. 'Trump Eats Press,' wrote Breitbart News." -- CW ...

... Paul Farhi of the Washington Post: "... he repeatedly used the words 'unfair' and 'dishonest' to describe the coverage, participants said.... The participants variously described Trump as 'combative,' 'proud,' and 'dismissive' toward the news organizations present. He also shrugged off the need for a constant pool covering him, the people said, though he did not delve into specifics. Trump has repeatedly shirked his pool, upending a long-standing tradition of the president and president-elect." -- CW ...

... CW: In other words, this was a warning to the media: Trump is the top dog, and if they don't praise him "fairly," they'll pay. BTW, the media should get over any notion the Trump administration will abide by the Federal Records Act, or fill FOIA requests. Trump's notion of federal record-keeping will be a scrapbook filled with rave reviews from Breitbart "News." ...

... Update: Reports on Trump's dressing-down of electronic media bigwigs all noted that he would meet with New York Times editors and reporters today. Not any more. Kyle Balluck of the Hill: "... Donald Trump said early Tuesday morning that he cancelled a meeting with the 'failing' New York Times. Trump said in a tweet that the meeting's 'terms and conditions' were changed at the last moment. 'Not nice,' he added.... 'Perhaps a new meeting will be set up with the @nytimes. In the meantime they continue to cover me inaccurately and with a nasty tone!' [Trump tweeted later.]... The Times ... released a statement saying it did not change any of the meeting's terms, and only refused to agree to Trump's request to squash an on-the-record sessions." ...

     ... CW: That is, the "last-moment change" was Trump's, not the Times'. But this is not a complete lie on Trump's part; he used the passive voice -- "the terms and conditions of the meeting were changed at the last moment. Not nice." -- to strongly imply it was the Times, not he, who changed the terms. Are we supposed to see this new "Art of the Lie" as an improvement over his usual bald-faced lies?

Annie Gowen of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump's company has partnered with Indian developers to create more business ventures than in any other foreign nation or territory, a Washington Post analysis of financial filings shows. In doing so, the Trump Organization has forged deals with leading moguls here, and with a billionaire politician. One Trump-branded project is under investigation for land-acquisition irregularities, among several projects in India now prompting conflict-of-interest concerns.... [Trump] is involved in at least 16 partnerships or corporations here. Those business interests -- and the financial relationship with a leading member of the governing party -- will be a significant backdrop to Trump administration policy toward the world's most populous democracy -- and toward its warily hostile neighbor, Pakistan." -- CW ...

... "The Greatest Grift of All." Paul Waldman explains how Trump & the Family Unit will use the presidency to really strike it rich. It all sounds "like a modern version of the way medieval kings would expect all the landowners to come to the castle bearing trunks of gold to pay proper respect, lest they incur his wrath. And you may be wondering: Does Trump really think he can get away with this? Yes he does.... If people are saying it's unprecedented and inappropriate and vulgar for him to be using the White House to enrich himself, is Donald Trump going to care? Why should he? He got away with everything else, didn't he?" See also Lisa's comment at the top of today's thread. -- CW ...

... AND Trump started his foreign ops grift immediately ...

Josh Marshall & Catherine Thompson of TPM: "For a number of years, Trump and his Argentine partners have been trying to build a major office building in Buenos Aires. The project has been held up by a series of complications tied to financing, importation of building materials and various permitting requirements. According to a report out of Argentina, when Argentine President Mauricio Macri called ... Trump to congratulate him on his election, Trump asked Macri to deal with the permitting issues that are currently holding up the project. This comes from one of Argentina's most prominent journalists, Jorge Lanata, in a recent TV appearance." Trump & the Argentine Embassy have both denied Trump & Macri discussed his Buernos Aires project. -- CW ...

     ... CW: We'll never know for certain, since Trump failed to follow protocol, or even contact the State Department about taking calls from world leaders until a number of days after the election, so no one provided a readout of the Trump-Macri conversation. In general, whenever Trump mentions another country, he's quick to boast about his business interests there. So at the very least, Trump reminded Macri that he had a project pending in Buenos Aires. AND, as Ben Walsh, et al., of the HuffPost report, "Macri's father, Franco, was a construction magnate and worked with Trump in New York in the 1980s. Macri ... told Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun on Monday that Trump's daughter (presumably Ivanka) was also on his congratulatory call." Given all that, we'd be silly to think Trump did not mention the Buenos Aires project to Macri. Of course he (or Ivanka) did. I'll bet Trump & his partners get those permits pronto. ...

... In a follow-up post, Josh Marshall notes that President Macri also has denied discussing the permitting issue with Trump. "Macri's denial is important. But we should bear in mind that Macri has about as much interest in confirming such a conversation as Trump himself does." To give you a better idea of what people who know Trump think of him, Marshall adds this aside:

As TPM's Catherine Thompson noted back in August, Macri's father Franco had dealings with Trump in the early 1980s when the elder Macri (a construction tycoon) tried to break into the New York real estate business. Indeed, things got so intense between Franco Macri and Trump that when Mauricio (the current President) was kidnapped and thrown into a coffin by unknown kidnappers, Franco Macri at first thought Trump was responsible for the kidnapping.... To be clear, the kidnappers were later captured and there is no evidence whatsoever that Trump was involved in anyway. (Emphasis added.)

... THEN, there's this ...

... Danny Hakim & Eric Lipton of the New York Times: "When ... Donald J. Trump met with the British politician Nigel Farage ... shortly after the election..., he encouraged Mr. Farage and his entourage to oppose the kind of offshore wind farms that Mr. Trump believes will mar the pristine view from one of his two Scottish golf courses, according to one person present. The meeting ... raises new questions about Mr. Trump's willingness to use the power of the presidency to advance his business interests.... 'He did not say he hated wind farms as a concept; he just did not like them spoiling the views,' said Andy Wigmore, the media consultant who was present at the meeting.... [Wigmore said] Mr. Trump 'did suggest that we should campaign on it' and 'spurred us in and we will be going for it.'" Trump's spokesperson Hope Hicks first denied the conversation took place; then, when presented with Wigmore's assertions, "declined repeated requests for comment." -- CW ...

... The Audacity of Spin. Laurel Raymond of Think Progress: "Kellyanne Conway, a Senior Advisor to ... Trump, said people should focus less on Trump's conflict-of-interest and more on the 'sacrifice' he's making to his business career by becoming president." -- CW ...

... Adam Liptak of the New York Times reports on the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution. A useful read, since we're going to be hearing more about this. ...

... Harper Neidig of the Hill: "A Republican congressman is criticizing Donald Trump over apparent conflicts of interest stemming from the president-elect's business empire, likening them to accusations made against Hillary Clinton on the campaign trail. 'You rightly criticized Hillary for Clinton Foundation,' wrote Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) on Twitter Monday night. 'If you have contracts w/foreign govts, it's certainly a big deal, too.'... The message was in response to a tweet from Trump complaining about coverage of his business ties in foreign countries and how they could present a conflict of interest while he's in office. 'Prior to the election it was well known that I have interests in properties all over the world,' Trump tweeted. 'Only the crooked media makes this a big deal!'" -- CW ...

... Margaret Hartmann: With that tweet, "Trump has confirmed that he doesn't actually care about creating a clear line between his business and the presidency -- which means that there will likely be no line.... As New York's Eric Levitz put it, 'The only constraints on Trump's freedom to leverage his public power for private profit is political disapproval and his own sense of shame.' And suffice it to say the man who presented himself as a major donor to a charity for children with AIDS, though he hadn't given a dime, doesn't have a lot of shame." -- CW ...

... ** Josh Marshall (Nov. 21): "At a minimum, we use this construct ['conflict of interest'] on the assumption that people are acting in good faith and not advancing their private interests with the powers of their office.... The concept simply doesn't apply well when you are talking is a public official who is by design using their public office for profit. Everything we've seen from ... Trump so far suggests this all comes so naturally to him that at some level he doesn't even see anything wrong with it. Indeed, this shouldn't be surprising since it matches with his entire career, in which he has used every angle on offer - publicity, stardom, connections with government officials, etc. - to make money or as tools he can leverage to make money for his private businesses." -- CW

Road to the West Wing Is a Heritage Trail.  Katie Glueck of Politico: "A year ago, the political arm of the conservative Heritage Foundation dismissed Donald Trump as a big-government enthusiast and left-wing sympathizer. Now, the Heritage Foundation has emerged as one of the most influential forces shaping ... Donald Trump's transition team, embedding the veteran Washington group into the operation of a candidate who ran loudly against the Beltway." -- CW

Harper Neidig: "MSNBC's 'Morning Joe' is reporting that ... Donald Trump will not pursue investigations intoHillary Clinton's use of a private e-mail server or her family's charity foundation. 'Source tells @Morning_Joe @realDonaldTrump won't pursue investigations into @HillaryClinton for private email server use/Clinton Foundation, Joe Scarborough's show tweeted Tuesday morning." CW:: Don't give up, Hillary haters; you still have Jason Chaffetz! ...

... Oh, And Judicial Watch. Josh Gerstein of Politico: "Lawyers for Hillary Clinton are opposing a conservative group's demand that she provide more details about the creation of the private server that hosted her email account while she was secretary of state. Last month, Clinton answered written questions that a federal judge authorized Judicial Watch to ask in connection with a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit related to her email set-up." Judicial Watch didn't like her answers. -- CW

New York Times Editors: "Mr. Trump raged on Twitter, falsely accusing the cast [of 'Hamilton'] of harassing Mr. Pence and demanding an apology. Mr. Trump's itchy Twitter finger, however, fell silent when 200 or so white nationalists of the 'alt-right' movement gathered on Saturday ... a few blocks from the White House -- to celebrate his election with a very public coming-out party filled with racist and anti-Semitic filth.... Given the danger of violence and bigotry these groups pose, why would Mr. Trump, who was so offended by the 'Hamilton' cast's plea for tolerance, remain silent?" CW: Obviously because Trump's heart is with his white supremacist supporters. He is what they are, if somewhat more circumspect -- so far.

William Cohen & Gary Hart in a New York Times op-ed: "Predictably, much of the focus [on Trump's "plans"] is on the domestic changes his election may bring. But serious foreign policy experts and institutions must process the implications of his victory and the Brexit vote and place them within the lessons of the post-World War II world." -- CW ...

... SO, there's this:

... Trump Already Needling Conservative British Government. Nicky Woolf & Jessica Elgot of the Guardian: "... Donald Trump, has suggested that the Ukip leader, Nigel Farage, should be the UK's ambassador to the US. 'Many people would like to see [@Nigel_Farage] represent Great Britain as their Ambassador to the United States,' Trump tweeted on Monday evening. 'He would do a great job!'... But a Downing Street spokesman said: 'There is no vacancy. We already have an excellent ambassador to the US.'... It is unprecedented for an incoming US president to ask a world leader to appoint an opposing party leader as ambassador, and the statement puts [PM Theresa] May in a difficult position.... Sir Christopher Meyer, the former British ambassador to Washington, said [in a tweet]..., 'UK ambassador in DC exists to defend UK interests in US, not US interests in UK.... Can't have foreign presidents deciding who our [ambassador] should be.'" CW: And Queen Elizabeth has to be gracious to our Dictator-in-Waiting.

Chris Isidore, et al., of CNN: "Protecting ... Donald Trump and his family is costing New York City more than $1 million a day, according to three city officials. And those costs won't necessarily drop significantly once he moves to the White House. That's because Melania Trump and their 10-year old son Barron expect to stay at their home at Trump Tower in midtown Manhattan, at least until the end of the school year. And Donald Trump has indicated he plans to return home regularly, especially while they're still here. Adding to the expense is the cost of police assigned to Trump's adult children and his grandchildren, who are also receiving Secret Service protection, John Miller, NYPD's deputy commissioner of intelligence & counterterrorism, told WCBS Monday. All of them live in the city, and all are entitled to receive Secret Service protection." -- CW

Tom LoBianco of CNN: "The Federal Election Commission is asking the campaign of Donald Trump to correct more than 1,000 errors in its latest financial filing. The FEC determined that the Trump campaign accepted close to 1,100 donations, which amounted to roughly $1.3 million, that violated one of a handful of campaign finance laws. In some cases, the Trump campaign accepted donations from groups that had not registered properly with the FEC. But in the majority, donors blew right past legal donation limits, the commission wrote in a letter to the Trump campaign sent Monday." -- CW

Bernie Finally Reads Donald's "Infrastructure Plan," Discovers It's a Scam. Yousef Saba of Politico: "Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders blasted ... Donald Trump's proposed infrastructure plan on Monday, calling it a 'scam' and 'corporate welfare.' 'Trump's plan to repair our infrastructure is a scam that gives massive tax breaks to large companies & billionaires,' Sanders wrote on Twitter, embedding a link to an article he published on Medium.com. 'Trump would allow corporations that have stashed their profits overseas to pay just a fraction of what the companies owe in federal taxes,' Sanders continued in another tweet, adding, 'And then he would allow the companies to 'invest' in infrastructure projects in exchange for even more tax breaks.'" -- CW

Jeet Heer of the New Republic: "It's been less than two weeks since [Donald Trump] won the election, and already he's entangled himself in a series of conflicts of interest that could easily rise to the level of a constitutional crisis.... But the solutions being bandied about all have a fatal hurdle in common: They'd require a Republican Congress to take a stand against Trump.... Democrats will have to mount a sustained campaign to expose Trump's corruption in a way they failed to do throughout the 2016 campaign.... Creating wedges that separate Trump from his base is one of the Democrats' most urgent tasks going forward, and a fresh argument about corruption is the way forward.... What the opposition needs is a strong, ongoing argument that his corruption is integrally linked to policies that go against ordinary people." ...

     ... CW: Heer's argument is similar to one Steve M. made last week: that Clinton's campaign was so busy painting Trump as a bad person, they forgot to point out he would be a bad president. ...

... OR Democrats could follow Tulsi Gabbard's lead. Jessie Hellmann of the Hill: "Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) vowed to work with Donald Trump on the issues that matter to the American people, following a meeting between the two Monday at Trump Tower.... Gabbard and Trump met in New York City to discuss U.S. policy in Syria, she said in a statement, though some have speculated she is under consideration to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations." She supported Bernie Sanders in the primary. -- CW ...

... More Beknighted Democrats Emerge. Kyle Cheney of Politico: "At least a half-dozen Democratic electors have signed onto an attempt to block Donald Trump from winning an Electoral College majority, an effort designed not only to deny Trump the presidency but also to undermine the legitimacy of the institution. The presidential electors, mostly former Bernie Sanders supporters who hail from Washington state and Colorado, are now lobbying their Republican counterparts in other states to reject their oaths -- and in some cases, state law -- to vote against Trump when the Electoral College meets on Dec. 19. Even the most optimistic among the Democratic electors acknowledges they're unlikely to convince the necessary 37 Republican electors to reject Trump -- the number they'd likely need to deny him the presidency and send the final decision to the House of Representatives. And even if they do, the Republican-run House might simply elect Trump anyway. But the Democratic electors are convinced that even in defeat, their efforts would erode confidence in the Electoral College and fuel efforts to eliminate it.... The group is also contemplating encouraging Democratic electors to oppose Hillary Clinton and partner with Republicans in support of a consensus pick like Mitt Romney or John Kasich." -- CW ...

... Hamilton! Peter Beinart of the Atlantic doesn't see the Electoral College as those Democratic electors do: "Americans say they revere democracy. Yet they also revere those rights -- freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to bear arms -- that the government's least democratic institutions protect. Americans rarely contemplate these contradictions. If they did, they might be more open to preventing Donald Trump from becoming the next president, the kind of democratic catastrophe that the Constitution, and the Electoral College in particular, were in part designed to prevent.... It is 'desirable,' Alexander Hamilton wrote in Federalist 68, 'that the sense of the people should operate in the choice of' president. But is 'equally desirable, that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station.' These ... electors would be 'most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to such complicated investigations.' And because of their discernment ... 'the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications.'... The framers were particularly afraid of the people choosing a demagogue." -- CW ...

... ** The USA Is Not a Democracy. Ed Kilgore: "... the overall partisan imbalance between the party that keeps winning the presidential popular vote and the party that keeps winning everything else is entirely the product of a system that systematically violates the supposedly sacrosanct principle of voter equality. As right-wing talk-radio types love to insist, the United States is a republic, not a democracy. And that has created an abiding problem for the Democratic Party." CW: BTW, Clinton's lead in the popular vote is now more than 1.6MM & counting. AND, per the Cook Report, Clinton is on track to garner some 2.5MM more votes than Trump, putting her about even, at 65MM votes, with Obama 2012. Democrats should not whine about it; rather, they should tout it every time Trump claims he has a "mandate" for one of his draconian plans.

The Bavarian Prince Who Sealed Our Fate. AP: "A handwritten letter has been found in a German archive in which ... Donald Trump's grandfather unsuccessfully fought his expulsion from the country for failing to perform mandatory military service. Bild newspaper on Monday printed the 1905 letter located by an historian, in which Friedrich Trump wrote Bavarian Prince Luitpold begging the 'well-loved, noble, wise and just' leader not to deport him. Luitpold rejected the 'most subservient request.' Trump's grandfather was born in Kallstadt, then part of Bavaria, and immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager without performing his military service. It was after he'd made his fortune there and tried to resettle in Germany that he was ordered expelled...." CW: So draft-dodging for profit is a family tradition.

Helaine Olen of Slate: "It was just this spring that millions of Americans learned they were in for a big raise courtesy of the Obama administration's long-awaited updating of the federal rules for overtime pay. They can enjoy it while it lasts -- if they even receive it at all. It's looking increasingly likely that a rollback of the overtime rules are squarely in the sites of congressional Republicans and the incoming Trump administration." Olen explains how the rule works & why the Obama administration was remiss in not implementing it sooner. ...

     ... CW: This is one more GOP dirty trick that Democrats should advertise, but -- other than a few impassioned floor speeches by Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, et al., I doubt the party will bother. Democrats lose not because their policies are bad but because their strategies are. The voting public will have no idea what hit them because Democrats won't tell them.

Here's a video of Richard Spencer's speech at the alt-right convention in Washington, D.C. At the top, many in the audience raise their arms in Nazi salutes when Spencer calls on them to "Hail Trump":

KDKA Pittsburgh: "According to a new study from Stanford University, about 82% of middle schoolers couldn't distinguish between an ad labeled 'sponsored content' and a real news story on a website. That percentage is based on 7,804 students from middle school through college. Many students judged the credibility of news tweets based on how much detail they contained or whether a large photo was attached, rather than on the source." ...

     ... CW: If you wonder how Americans could vote for Trump, therein lies your answer. Partly because of a deficient public education system, adults aren't much more savvy than those clueless kids. I have no idea how I learned that the NYT, for all its lapses, is more reliably accurate than conspiracy nutjob Alex Jones, but it is a fundamental something you & I know that half of Americans don't.

Beyond the Beltway

Bull Connor Methods Come to North Dakota. Julia Wong of the Guardian: "Twenty-six people were hospitalized and more than 300 injured after North Dakota law enforcement officers trained water cannons, teargas, and other 'less-than-lethal' weapons on unarmed activists protesting against the Dakota Access pipeline in below-freezing weather on Sunday night, according to a group of medical professionals supporting the anti-pipeline movement. The Standing Rock Medic & Healer Council said that injuries from the 'mass casualty incident' included multiple bone fractures from projectiles fired by police, a man with internal bleeding from a rubber bullet injury, a man who suffered a grand mal seizure, and a woman who was struck in the face with a rubber bullet and whose vision was compromised. The majority of the patients suffered hypothermia, a result of being soaked by water cannons, the group said. Civil rights groups are decrying the use of water cannons in below-freezing weather." ...

     ... CW: I'm just speculating, but I suspect that the majority of the injured were Sioux. For those of you clinging to the hope that the U.S. cannot become like Nazi Germany, there's this from the report:

The use of water cannons against protesters invokes images of African Americans being bombarded with fire hoses during the civil rights movement, but the crowd control tactic was developed in Germany in the 1930s, according to the ACLU. ...

... Alleen Brown of the Intercept has more on police attacks on protesters. CW: President Obama should get the National Guard, under his control, to disperse local "law enforcement."

Carrying Jobs to New Castle. David Leonhardt of the New York Times: Delaware's Democratic governor, Jack Markell, has been working with some success to keep & create jobs for the state's blue-collar workers. One way he's done so is through innovative programs at New Castle's William Penn High. CW: It all sounds fine, but if Penn's grads can't pass the U.S. citizenship test, then Markell is not doing his whole job. If I were the Education Goddess, I would give students who couldn't pass the test provisional diplomas, and I'd keep night school classes open year-round for those who wanted to clean up their ignorant-citizen status.

Voters should be able to choose their representatives, not the other way around. -- Wisconsin Assembly Minority Leader Peter Barca, Monday ...

... Todd Richmond of the AP: "Federal judges struck down Wisconsin's Republican-drawn legislative districts as unconstitutional on Monday, marking a victory for minority Democrats that could force the Legislature to redraw the maps. The three-judge panel didn't order any immediate changes to district boundaries, instead saying they would give state attorneys and the voters who challenged the old maps 45 days to offer suggestions. State lawyers plan to appeal the 2-1 ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court, but for now the decision offers hope for Democrats who have been in the minority for six years and lost more ground in this month's elections.... The U.S. Supreme Court has yet to come up with a legal standard for deciding when redistricting becomes unconstitutional gerrymandering." -- CW

Mark Berman of the Washington Post: "Police in San Antonio said Monday that they had arrested a man wanted in the ambush killing of an officer fatally shot a day earlier. San Antonio Police Chief William McManus said during a briefing that a SWAT team had arrested Otis Tyrone McCain. According to McManus, McCain was arrested without incident following a sprawling manhunt sparked by the killing of Detective Benjamin Marconi, who was slain while writing a traffic ticket in front of police headquarters on Sunday morning." -- CW