The Commentariat -- July 30, 2016

Presidential Race

Eric Lichtblau of the New York Times: "Computer systems used by the campaign of Hillary Clinton ... were hacked in an attack that appears to have come from Russia's intelligence services, a federal law enforcement official said on Friday. The F.B.I. said that it was examining reports of 'cyberintrusions involving multiple political entities' but did not identify the targets of the attacks. That statement came on the same day that the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the House Democrats' fund-raising arm, said its computer systems had been hacked." -- CW ...

... Ellen Nakashima & Tom Hamburger of the Washington Post: "The Clinton presidential campaign said Friday that an 'analytics data program' maintained by the Democratic National Committee had been hacked but that its computer system had not been compromised, denying news reports Friday that the campaign had become the third Democratic Party organization whose systems had been penetrated." -- CW

Ann Gearan, et al., of the Washington Post: "Hillary Clinton kicked off a three-day, swing-state bus tour on Friday with a rally ... in the same city [Philadelphia] where she accepted the Democratic party's presidential nomination Thursday night.... Clinton and [Tim] Kaine will now travel by bus through Pennsylvania and Ohio, two states that are critical battlegrounds in the November election." -- CW ...

     ... CW: I thought both Kaine & Clinton did a good job. Worries about Kaine's speaking style seem much overwrought.

James Downie of the Washington Post: "... Clinton's [convention] speech got the job done. It was -- and I mean this as a compliment -- a competent speech, with the surprisingly controversial argument that a president needs to be competent.... In raising the issue of competence, Clinton's speech made the general election less like a contest of Republicans and Democrats and more a fight between intelligence and irrationality." -- CW ...

... Frank Rich on Clinton, Trump & Kaine. Always a good read. -- CW ...

... Gail Collins & Arthur Brooks discuss the Democratic convention. You might want to skip Brooks' entries. -- CW ...

Cristiano Lima of Politico: "Khizr Khan, the father of a fallen Muslim American war hero who powerfully denounced Donald Trump's rhetoric and policies at the Democratic National Convention..., Friday night urge[d] Republican leadership to distance themselves from the GOP nominee.... Delivering what he described as 'the other half' of his Thursday address on MSNBC's 'The Last Word,' Khan ... tearfully singled out House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in a plea to 'repudiate' the rhetoric and policies of Trump." -- CW ...

... Richard Oppel of the New York Times writes another story on Democratic-convention speaker Khizr Khan. Khan's speech "electrified the convention and turned Mr. Khan into a social media and cable news sensation." Khan, who holds as advanced degree from Harvard Law, wrote his own speech without assistance from a speechwriter or Michelle Obama:

... CW: Speaking of Michelle Obama, somebody should explain plagiarism to confederates. Mark Hensch of the Hill: In a tweet,Sean Spicer, the chief strategist of the Republican National Committee (RNC), accused Hillary Clinton of plagiarizing Alexis de Toqueville in her convention speech when she repeated the bromide, "America is great because it is good." I'm all surprised that Spicer hasn't called for a cease-and-desist from Donald Trump for plagiarizing Ronald Reagan's widely-used campaign slogan, "Let's make America great again." Dan L., in a comment he made here a couple of days ago, may have provided the best lesson on plagiarism, though his quip was probably way too subtle for the boneheads of Right Wing World: "Loved Michelle's speech.... I do question her claim of growing up on a goat farm in southern Slovenia though." ...

... Conservative Josh Barro of Business Insider: "Khan demanded to know whether Donald Trump had even read the Constitution, pulled out his pocket copy, and offered to lend it to Trump. I watched this moment live and was awed by it. I watched it again Friday morning, and I cried ... because it was even necessary for someone to stand up at a party convention and explain why that candidate is wrong. I am angry at Donald Trump, and I am angry at the people who voted for him. But most of all I am angry at the senior Republicans who are standing by and acting as if this is fine -- endorsing him in the belief that he will lose but that standing together will stem the loss of congressional seats, or endorsing him in the hope that he will grow up if he wins." ...

... CW: Why, Josh, of course Trump has read the Constitution -- all twelve articles of it, which is five more than Khan or anyone else has read.

Adam Nagourney of the New York Times compares the Democratic & Republican conventions: "Democrats were more polished.... Mr. Trump's sloppy convention was a missed opportunity, and sent up warning flares for Republicans already concerned about his capacity to grapple with the basic mechanics of American politics.... High contrast? Try night and day.... When were Americans last presented with two such starkly different views of the country as Mr. Trump's bleak portrayal of a country under siege, and Mrs. Clinton's 'best days are ahead of us' optimism?... Cleveland and Philadelphia proved [conventions] can still be riveting and influential.... [Hillary is] on her own now.... [Democrats] managed to seize what for many years have been the defining symbols of the Republican Party: God and country.... Mrs. Clinton has her party mostly behind her.... Mr. Trump's convention had the absence of prominent Republicans.... Finally, with apologies to George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, George Bush and even Bill Clinton, this convention showed once and for all that when it comes to pure political talent -- the ability to move a crowd, seize a moment, and deliver a speech that rises to a challenge -- Barack Obama laps the field." -- CW ...

... Ben Kamisar of the Hill: "... Donald Trump distanced himself from the planning of last week's Republican National Convention after the Democrats' event, which ended Thursday, posted higher television ratings for three of the four nights. 'I didn't produce the show -- I just showed up for the final speech on Thursday,' the Republican presidential nominee told The New York Times when asked about the differences between the two parties' conventions." -- CW

Fred Kaplan: Don't worry about those intelligence briefings the presidential candidates are about to get. "... according to former senior intelligence officials who have helped prepare them in the past, these briefings contain no material classified higher than Secret. And, as anyone familiar with such matters knows, nothing very sensitive is revealed in documents marked Confidential or Secret. Retired Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, former director of the CIA and the NSA, told me in an email that these briefings are 'very generalized treatments' designed to give nominees a broad-brush view of the global threats as the intelligence community sees them.... The director of national intelligence, currently James Clapper, prepares the briefings, though the president can set further limits on what they can and cannot reveal." -- CW ...

... Sarah Wheaton of Politico: "White House chief of staff Denis McDonough kicked off the official coordination for handing off power with a call to both presidential campaigns on Friday. President Barack Obama said on Wednesday that he's 'ready to pass the baton' to Hillary Clinton. But passing the bureaucracy is a much more complicated undertaking, and now that she and Donald Trump have become their respective parties' official nominees, their campaigns are eligible for new government resources to help them prepare for transition -- even though only one of them will actually complete the process." -- CW

Maureen Dowd does a "lightning round" interview of Donald Trump. He likes President Obama -- "He's got some quality going" -- Michelle Obama & Chelsea Clinton.

Cristiano Lima: "Donald Trump late Friday accused Hillary Clinton of intentionally stacking debates against primetime programming to 'rig' the election process, despite the fact that ... the non-partisan Commission on Presidential Debates ... set the schedule ... last September.... The schedule includes a Sunday night debate on Oct. 9 that will air concurrently with an NFL game between the Green Bay Packers and the North Carolina Panthers." CW: This could be the first of many Hillary-rigged-debates excuses Whiney Man uses to back out of debating her. He thinks he's a great debater, but surely his campaign staff knows better. See also Marvin S.'s comment in today's yesterday's thread.

Jessie Hellman of the Hill: "Donald Trump said Friday he's 'taking the gloves off' in his general election fight against Hillary Clinton after she railed against him in her acceptance speech for the Democratic presidential nomination. 'You know, it's interesting, every time I mention her, everyone screams 'lock her up,' and you know what? I've been nice but after that performance last night, I don't have to be so nice anymore. I'm taking the gloves off," the Republican presidential nominee said at a rally in Colorado." ...

     ... Here's a list, dated July 5, of some of the "nice" things Trump has said about Hillary Clinton. They include, "erratic," "bad temperament," "dangerous," "looking very bad," "should star in a reboot of 'Liar, Liar,'" "no strength, no stamina," "totally flawed." And of course, "crooked." ...

... Louis Nelson & Nolan McCaskill of Politico: "Donald Trump launched a fresh takedown of Hillary Clinton on Friday, with the Republican presidential nominee leading the effort and dispatching his surrogates to join the attack." -- CW ...

... Aaron Blake of the Washington Post: "... Mike Pence ... Friday morning cr[ied] foul over President Obama alluding to Donald Trump as a 'homegrown demagogue.' 'I don't think name-calling has any place in public life,' Pence said.... 'And I thought that was unfortunate that the president of the United States would use a term like that.' At almost exactly the same time as the Pence transcript was being sent out to reporters, here's what Trump was tweeting: 'Crooked Hillary Clinton mentioned me 22 times in her very long and very boring speech. Many of her statements were lies and fabrications!... "Little" Michael Bloomberg, who never had the guts to run for president, knows nothing about me. His last term as Mayor was a disaster!... Crooked Hillary said that I "couldn't handle the rough and tumble of a political campaign." Really,I just beat 16 people and am beating her!'" CW: IOKIYAR. ...

... Ben Jacobs of the Guardian: "Donald Trump used Twitter, as per his habit, to respond to Hillary Clinton's acceptance speech on Thursday night. In a brief series of tweets, the Republican nominee started by attacking 'Hillary's refusal to mention radical Islam' in her speech. Trump also bashed Clinton as 'owned by Wall Street' and claimed her 'vision is a borderless world where working people have no power, no jobs, no safety'. Trump eventually concluded with 'no one has worse judgement [sic] than Hillary Clinton -- corruption and devastation follows her wherever she goes.'" -- CW ...

... Josh Voorhees of Slate: "Trump's fans can't get enough of his macho act, and the clear pleasure they derive from this particular show comes from the double meaning of the word hit.... The overarching narrative of the DNC criticism of Trump was that he is a thin-skinned bully who can't be trusted to keep his cool when provoked. And here was Trump, in effect, saying the very same thing -- to cheers." See also yesterday's Commentariat. -- CW

Ken Vogel of Politico: "Top Donald Trump donors tried to set up a meeting between the GOP presidential nominee and Charles Koch in Colorado Springs on Friday, but Koch aides rejected the entreaties, according to two Republicans with knowledge of the outreach." CW: So it would seem that Charles Koch is more principled than McConnell, Ryan, & most of the rest of the GOP establishment.

Show Me the Returns! Judd Legum of Think Progress: "ThinkProgress conducted an analysis of coverage of Trump's tax returns in major newspapers during 2016 and compared them to the coverage of Mitt Romney's tax returns in 2012.... In January 2012, under pressure from the media Romney released his 2010 tax return and a summary of his 2011 return. It was less than any other major party candidate in decades.... Nevertheless, in the first seven months of his election year, Romney generated more than twice the coverage of his tax returns -- almost all of it critical -- than Trump has generated this year.... Among those critical of Romney's failure to disclose his returns was Donald Trump himself. In a January 2012 appearance on Fox News, Trump said that Romney was being 'hurt really very badly' by refusing to release his tax returns. He implored Romney to 'release them now.'" ...

     ... CW: Clinton has released 15 years of her returns. Her campaign should attack Trump relentlessly on this. Every day in every way, Clinton should be asking, What is Donald hiding? She & her surrogates should speculate, too, on what-all might be revealed in the secret returns. Ties to Russia? Mob connections? Zero income? Huge business losses? Zero charitable contributions? Just make up stuff, the wilder the better. The Clinton campaign should needle the hell out of Trump. He'll take the bait.

Nancy Benac of the AP: "Donald Trump's flurry of offhand remarks and abrupt zingers on Russia -- praising Vladimir Putin, dismissing NATO -- have jolted the world, not to mention the U.S. presidential campaign.... The idea of fostering U.S.-Russian cooperation isn't outlandish.... It's what Trump is willing to do to achieve those goals and the way he expresses his views that have shocked many foreign policy experts. The notion of refusing to defend NATO allies who don't pay their bills, for example, or of buddying up to Putin despite his aggressive stances is jarring to Democrats and Republicans alike. And it's on the minds of foreign leaders." -- CW ...

... Tim Egan makes the case against having a despotic traitor as president. (Yes, it has come to that.) "Trump is now a national security risk, actively rooting for a foreign adversary to tamper with an American election. And very soon, he will start receiving classified briefings on that adversary. Ehhhhhcellent!" -- CW (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Gail Collins has a quiz on the conventions. CW: I missed two, both of which had to do with things Donald Trump said, not that I don't hang on his every word. If you want to get all the answers right, pick the ones that have Trump ludicrously blaming somebody else for his screw-ups & potential failures. (Yeah, that should have been obvious to me. My bad.)

Other News & Views

Nolan McCaskill of Politico: "The Obama Presidential Library will be built in Chicago's Jackson Park, the Obama Foundation announced Friday. 'Jackson Park will be the site of the Obama Presidential Center,' the Obama Foundation said in a statement. 'The center will be located in the heart of the South Side, which has been the home to the First Family for many years.'" -- CW ...

... Here's President Obama's statement on the selection of Jackson Park. -- CW ...

... CW: We should appreciate the irony of the first black American president's locating his library in a park named for an earlier American president who made his livelihood entirely on the backs of slaves:

In all reality, slavery was the source of Andrew Jackson's wealth. The Hermitage was a 1,000 acre, self-sustaining plantation that relied completely on the labor of enslaved African American men, women, and children. They performed the hard labor that produced The Hermitage's cash crop, cotton. The more land Andrew Jackson accrued, the more slaves he procured to work it. -- Andrew Jackson Foundation, on the official Website for the Hermitage, the Jackson family plantation

... CW: I move that Chicago rename Jackson Park "Barack and Michelle Obama Park."

Paul Blake of ABC News: "A bill that creates a federal labeling standard for foods containing genetically modified ingredients (commonly called GMOs) was signed into law by President Barack Obama today." -- CW

Peter Sullivan of the Hill: "Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid (Nev.) on Friday called on Congress to return from its summer recess early to provide funding to fight the Zika virus. The call comes after officials in Florida announced earlier in the day that there is a high likelihood that the first cases of the virus being transmitted in the continental United States by mosquitoes have occurred." See also Friday's News Ledes. -- CW

Robert Barnes & Ann Marimow of the Washington Post: "Voting rights activists scored legal victories in key presidential election states Friday, with the most important being a federal appeals court ruling that North Carolina's Republican-led legislature enacted new voting restrictions in 2013 to intentionally blunt the growing clout of African American voters. The unanimous decision by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit was an overwhelming victory for the Justice Department and civil rights groups.... In Wisconsin, where one federal judge already had eased restrictions on voter-ID requirements, another struck additional elements of the law passed by the legislature and signed by Gov. Scott Walker (R-Wis.). U.S. District Judge James D. Peterson said he would strike more of the law if he were not bound by the Supreme Court's decision that states may use properly written voter-ID laws to guard against voter fraud." CW: Peterson is an Obama appointee. Elections matter. (CW Note: This is an update of a WashPo story on the North Carolina decision, linked yesterday.) ...

... The New York Times story on the North Carolina decision, by Alan Blinder & Michael Wines, is here. Update: The Times story now also includes reporting on the Wisconsin decision. -- CW

Gabriel Sherman of New York: Fox "News"' former booking director "Laurie Luhn told the lawyers at Paul, Weiss..., the New York law firm hired by 21st Century Fox to investigate sexual-harassment allegations against [Fox 'News' CEO Roger] Ailes..., that she had been harassed by Ailes for more than 20 years, that executives at Fox News had known about it and helped cover it up, and that it had ruined her life. 'It was psychological torture,' she later told me.... New York was able to independently corroborate key details in her account, including that she was sexually involved with Ailes for many years, from sources who worked at Fox at the same time she did. Additionally, I viewed documents Luhn retained, including a copy of the $3.15 million severance agreement she signed in 2011 that includes iron-clad nondisclosure provisions." CW: Luhn's story, in Sherman's recounting, is just awful.

Beyond the Beltway

Pauline Repard, et al., of the San Diego Union Tribune: One San Diego police officer was shot dead & another critically wounded by at least two suspects whom police have captured & jailed. "Police said [the officers] had been shot several times. Investigators did not know if they had been ambushed." -- CW

John Wisely of the Detroit Free Press: "Six more state employees were charged with crimes today for their roles in the Flint Water Crisis because of negligence and arrogance, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette said. 'Some people failed to act, others minimized harm done and arrogantly chose to ignore data, some intentionally altered figures ... and covered up significant health risks,' he said at a news conference today. The result, Schuette said, 'was water was poisoned.' Charged today were three employees of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality Liane Shekter Smith, Adam Rosenthal, and Patrick Cook, as well as three others from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services; Nancy Peeler, Corinne Miller, Robert Scott." -- CW (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

The Commentariat -- July 29, 2016

Afternoonish Update:

At 1:10 pm ET, Hillary Clinton & Tim Kaine are about to speak (or something) in Philadelphia. MSNBC appears to be going to air their remarks.

Ann Marimow of the Washington Post: "A federal appeals court on Friday struck down North Carolina's requirement that voters show identification before casting ballots and reinstated an additional week of early voting. The decision by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit was an overwhelming victory for civil rights groups and the Justice Department that argued the voting law was designed to dampen the growing political clout of African American voters, who participated in record numbers in elections in 2008 and 2012. 'We can only conclude that the North Carolina General Assembly enacted the challenged provisions of the law with discriminatory intent,' Judge Diana Gribbon Motz wrote for the panel." CW: Motz is a Clinton appointee. Elections matter.

John Wisely of the Detroit Free Press: "Six more state employees were charged with crimes today for their roles in the Flint Water Crisis because of negligence and arrogance, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette said. 'Some people failed to act, others minimized harm done and arrogantly chose to ignore data, some intentionally altered figures ... and covered up significant health risks,' he said at a news conference today. The result, Schuette said, 'was water was poisoned.' Charged today were three employees of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality; Liane Shekter Smith, Adam Rosenthal, and Patrick Cook, as well as three others from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services; Nancy Peeler, Corinne Miller, Robert Scott." -- CW

Tim Egan makes the case against having a despotic traitor as president. (Yes, it has come to that.) "Trump is now a national security risk, actively rooting for a foreign adversary to tamper with an American election. And very soon, he will start receiving classified briefings on that adversary. Ehhhhhcellent!" -- CW

CW P.S.: If you hated my comment (below) on Chelsea's speech, as I 'm sure many of you did, there's more on it in the comments under "Tale Told by an Idiot" where a writer made an implied complaint & I responded.

*****

Democratic Convention & Presidential Race

New York Times photo.Patrick Healy & Amy Chozick of the New York Times: "Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton, who sacrificed personal ambition for her husband's political career and then rose to be a globally influential figure, became the first woman to accept a major party's presidential nomination on Thursday night.... Declaring that the nation was at 'a moment of reckoning,' Mrs. Clinton, 68, urged voters to reject the divisive policy ideas and combative politics of ... Donald J. Trump. She offered herself as a steady and patriotic American who would stand up for citizens of all races and creeds and unite the country to persevere against Islamic terrorists, economic troubles, and the chaos of gun violence." -- CW ...

... Politico has the full text of Clinton's speech, as prepared. -- CW ...

... Jonathan Chait: "... protesters began shouting on the first day [of the Democratic convention], and despite urgent efforts to mollify them, their effect never fully disappeared.... On the other hand, having unhinged extremists screaming at the stage beats having unhinged extremists screaming from the stage, as was the case in Cleveland. And that, of course, is the whole nub of the election. Clinton finds herself in a situation where her ordinariness and familiarity can work to her advantage. She is the one and only sane, competent candidate in the race, and her address underscored those qualities." -- CW ...

... Greg Sargent: "... because of Trump's uniquely troubling temperament and his explicitly xenophobic campaign, there is space here for Clinton to both reaffirm the party's commitment to American values of pluralism and tolerance while simultaneously becoming the candidate of unity and stability.... If she succeeds in both moving to the left while simultaneously expanding the Democratic Party's appeal among GOP-leaning voter groups -- Trump's unique unsuitability for the job may be why." -- CW ...

... Katherine Krueger of TPM: "After the GOP nominee lambasted the Democrats on Twitter for displaying what he viewed as too few American flags, there was a sea of waving flags as far as the eye could see when Hillary Clinton became the first woman to accept a major party's nomination on Thursday.... The evening also hammered home the stark tonal difference between the two conventions. After Trump painted America as a downcast country in need of a billionaire savior, night after night of all-star DNC speakers preached a sermon of American exceptionalism, with values that unify us all -- talking points once exclusively owned by Republicans." Krueger reproduces tweets of conservatives "praising the DNC and bemoaning the state of affairs in their own party." -- CW

CW: I know Donald Trump had to get his kids to speak on his behalf because nobody else would, but the Clintons' decision to have Chelsea introduce Hillary was unnecessary & foolish. Chelsea's speech was not only embarrassingly ineffectual & cloying, it was also a high-profile testimony to what is wrong with legacy politics, therefore a reminder of why we should feel uncomfortable about the nominee herself. Just stupid.

Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump was speaking at an event in Iowa, complaining that America was not allowed to waterboard terrorists, when Khizr Khan and his wife walked up to the microphone at the Democratic convention.... Khan's son, Humayun, was a captain in the U.S. Army. When a vehicle packed with explosives approached his compound in Iraq in 2004, he instructed his men to seek cover as he ran toward it. The car exploded, killing Khan instantly.... [Khizr Khan] spoke of his son's dreams ... and how Hillary Clinton had referred to his son as 'the best of America'... 'If it was up to Donald Trump, [Humayun] never would have been in America,' Khan said. 'Donald Trump consistently smears the character of Muslims. He disrespects other minorities, women, judges, even his own party leadership. He vows to build walls and ban us from this country.'... In Iowa..., Trump was talking about polls." Includes video. -- CW

Janell Ross of the Washington Post: "... what the Rev. William Barber II stopped by the Democratic National Convention Thursday night to tell you was just about the most engaging version of everything that every other speaker touched on over the course of the four day event. What he delivered -- eight years after this brand of liberation theology took a beating from uninformed corners of the conservative commentariat -- was evidence of a long tradition of liberal, religious patriotism":

... The New York Times' live briefings are here. -- CW ...

... Brian Stelter of CNN: "President Obama's prime time speech lifted the Democratic convention to its third straight night of ratings wins over the Republican convention last week -- and now the Trump campaign is exhorting supporters not to watch the Democrats' final night." --

How would the CIA and the other intelligence agencies brief this guy? How could they do that? I would suggest to the intelligence agencies, if you're forced to brief this guy, don't tell him anything, just fake it, because this man is dangerous. Fake it, pretend you're doing a briefing, but you can't give the guy any information. This guy, he's part of a foreign power. We knew he liked Putin before this, but this is quite ridiculous. -- Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Minority Leader, on Donald Trump, in a Huff Post interview ...

... Sam Stein & Amanda Terkel of the Huffington Post: "The chairman of Hillary Clinton's campaign urged U.S. intelligence agencies on Wednesday to get an ironclad agreement from Donald Trump that he would not leak information to the Russians before providing him with presidential candidate briefings. 'I think it's an issue that ... Jim Clapper's going to have to come to grips with,' John Podesta said in an interview with The Huffington Post, referring to the director of national intelligence. 'And I think they'll have to find a way to negotiate with him and with his campaign to get ... more than assurances ― sort of some proof that they can be able to hold on to that information.'" ...

... CW: In all seriousness, the national security team should dispense with the presidential briefings this year. Donald Trump cannot be trusted with any "secret" information, & his campaign guru Paul Manafort almost certainly would share any relevant secrets with some of his despotic clients. Hillary Clinton pretty much already knows what she needs to know, and what she doesn't, she likely can learn from sources still inside the State Department & elsewhere. ...

... Update. CW: Boo-hoo-hoo, Nobody Ever Listens to Me. Greg Miller of the Washington Post: "U.S. spy agencies are preparing to deliver a classified briefing to ... Donald Trump, the nation's intelligence director said Thursday, despite deep unease among many spy officials with the real estate mogul's pro-Russian rhetoric. National Intelligence Director James R. Clapper Jr. indicated that Trump and ... Hillary Clinton are eligible to receive intelligence briefings within days of the conclusion of the Democratic National Convention.... But Clapper's remarks came amid new signs of deep discomfort with Trump among the upper ranks of the intelligence community.... One senior intelligence official said Wednesday that he would decline to participate in any session with Trump.... Clapper said that the White House in the coming days would contact the Trump and Clinton campaigns, offering 'fairly general' overviews on issues including the threat posed by the Islamic State and other terror groups." -- CW ...

... Welcome to the U.S.S.R. Ashley Parker of the New York Times: "Donald J. Trump called President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia 'a better leader' than President Obama, offering the praise in an interview with 'Fox and Friends' on Thursday.... Mr. Trump also tried to walk back, in part, comments he made Wednesday about Russia hacking Mrs. Clinton's emails.... 'Of course, I'm being sarcastic'" Mr. Trump said in the interview taped Wednesday.... 'But you have 33,000 emails deleted, and the real problem is what was said in those emails from the Democratic National Committee. You take a look at what was said in those emails, it's disgraceful. It's disgraceful.' Mr. Trump seemed to be conflating the roughly 30,000 emails on Mrs. Clinton's private server during her time as secretary of state, which her lawyers deleted as personal, and the roughly 20,000 emails Democratic National Committee emails that had been hacked." ...

     ... CW: That is, Trump thinks "a better leader" is one who offs, jails or otherwise suppresses his critics, who controls the press & takes over foreign countries (or parts thereof) because he can. Trump would model his presidency on the acts & styles of despots. ...

     ... Paul Waldman agrees: "If only Obama would order some journalists murdered, that would really bump him up in the leadership category." -- CW

... Aaron Blake of the Washington Post: "Here's why this sarcasm explanation doesn't hold water: 1. Trump campaign officials never said he was joking on Wednesday. They mounted a robust defense, mind you, but they didn't say it was a joke.... 2. Trump doubled down. In a tweet after the comments exploded on social media, Trump ... [made] no mention of joking around.... 3. He said it twice.... He initially said he hoped the Russians had the emails, and then he returned later to say that if they didn't have them, he hoped they would obtain them.... 4. A reporter gave him an out -- that he didn't take. NBC's Katy Tur, later in Wednesday's press conference, basically asked Trump twice if he was serious. In response, Trump indicated he had no qualms about, in Tur's words, 'asking a foreign government -- Russia, China, anybody -- to interfere, to hack into the system of anybody's in this country.'... 5. He's mentioned it before.... Last month he said he thought 'our enemies' already had them." CW: As Blake points out, Trump regularly makes changing & noncredible excuses for his bizarre comments. ...

... Max Fisher in the New York Times: "Nations pursue their interests, whether other countries like it or not. Great powers in particular, including the United States, often meddle in foreign elections. But such operations are conducted in secret because they are hostile acts, meant to subvert the will of the targeted country's population and the sanctity of its institutions. Mr. Trump, in openly inviting such foreign interference, was undercutting one of the most fundamental national interests of a democratic state.... Mr. Trump ... solicit[ed] an adversary, and encourag[ed] it to violate United States law on his behalf." -- CW

Michael Hayden of ABC News: "Donald Trump said Thursday afternoon he wanted to 'hit' some of the Democratic National Convention speakers 'so hard' while watching them.... 'You know what I wanted to. I wanted to hit a couple of those speakers so hard,' Trump said. "I would have hit them. No, no. I was going to hit them, I was all set and then I got a call from a highly respected governor.' Trump didn't immediately clarify what he meant.... 'I was gonna hit one guy in particular, a very little guy,' he said. 'I was gonna hit this guy so hard his head would spin and he wouldn't know what the hell happened.'" ...

     ... CW: The one "very little guy" who spoke Wednesday night was Ryan Moore, who suffers from spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia dwarfism & who spoke about how Hillary Clinton had helped him & kept in touch with him since 1994. Trump's remark was apparently designed to live up to his record of saying or tweeting something vile & disqualifying every day. ...

     ... Update: Greg Sargent thinks the "very little guy" Trump wants "to hit so hard his head would spin" was former NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg. He might be right.

Alex Zielinski of Think Progress: "... Donald Trump used his company's compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act as the sole example of how he's respectful to people with disabilities. 'I spend millions of dollars making buildings good for people that are disabled,' Trump told reporter Brian Kilmeade in a Fox & Friends interview.... This isn't the first time Trump's talked about his compliance with a federal law like it's an act of charity.... Trump also claimed he's 'given more money to the ADA' than anyone else. The ADA, however, is a law -- not something you can donate money to.... However, Trump hasn't even consistently followed this federal law." Individuals have sued Trump properties for noncompliance, & Trump's Taj Mahal had to settle with the DOJ after it cited the hotel for noncompliance. -- CW

Jessica Garrison, et al., of BuzzFeed: "Donald Trump has made restoring American jobs a centerpiece of his campaign, a pledge he reiterated last week when he accepted the Republican nomination for president.... This month, Trump ... looks to hire 78 servers, housekeepers, and cooks at his Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach and the nearby Trump National Golf Club, Jupiter. But instead of making sure those jobs go to Americans, he is seeking to import foreign workers for the positions.... He filed applications this month claiming he couldn't find enough Americans to do that work.... Tom Veenstra, a senior director at Palm Beach's career services center, told BuzzFeed News ... his agency ... has a database of 1,327 Palm Beach County residents interested in server, cook, and chef positions." -- CW ...

... Eric Levitz of New York: "Trump isn't even willing to temporarily increase his company's labor costs, for the sake of maintaining his campaign's central narrative." -- CW

I'm honored that POTUS would plagiarize a line from my speech last week. Where's the outrage? -- Donald Trump, Jr., in a tweet ...

... Aaron Blake: "Obama said at one point in his speech on Wednesday night, 'That is not the America I know.' And Donald Trump Jr. used that exact same line just a week prior -- albeit with -- a contraction: '... That's not the America I know.' Case closed. It's plagiarism. The media's double standard at work, yet again. Except that, by this standard, Obama didn't plagiarize the line from Trump Jr. until Trump Jr. had already plagiarized it from him. Obama, after all, has said this phrase on several occasions. And that wasn't even its first bout of plagiarizing; none other than George W. Bush used it before Obama." So did many people before him. CW: Junior is so thoroughly stupid he doesn't know that repeating common sayings & idioms is not plagiarism. Who is a politician supposed to credit when s/he says "God bless America" at the end of every speech? Irving Berlin? Richard Nixon? ...

     ... Aaron Rupar of Think Progress with an Update: Junior "now says he was just joking with the plagiarism accusation." CW: Sound familiar? Yup, still a chip off the old blockhead. ...

... MEANWHILE, it turns out the Trump-Family-Plagiarizer-in-Chief is also a Résumé-Inflator: Christina Wilkie of the Huffington Post: "The professional website of Melania Trump ... has apparently been deleted from the internet as of Wednesday afternoon. The disappearance of Trump's elaborate website comes just days after news outlets, including The Huffington Post, raised serious questions about whether she actually earned an undergraduate degree in architecture from the University of Ljubljana, which is in Trump's native Slovenia. Her online biography claimed she had, but a book about her life published earlier this year says she left the university after one year so she could pursue a modeling career." -- CW ...

     ... CW P.S. When are we going to hear more from Donald's classmates at U. Penn? ...

     ... Update: Oh, look. I'm not the only one skeptical about Trump's vaunted education. Dan Spinelli of Politico: Speaking in primetime [at the Democratic convention, Rep. Xavier] Becerra of California called out the Republican nominee for refusing to disclose his Wharton transcript while having urged President Barack Obama to do the same with his undergraduate grades at Columbia University." Funny how Trump claims his U. Penn education proves he's "like, very, very smart" but he won't share his transcripts, & how he boasts he's "very, very rich," but he won't release his tax returns. Cynics might think he's scamming us.

Wanted: President of the United States. No Experience Required. Steve Benen: Not only aren't Republicans very concerned about Donald Trump asking Russia to spy on Hillary Clinton, they're not concerned about his appalling lack of experience. In fact, Marco Rubio thinks he'll do fine by learning on the job: "And then there was Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla), making the case yesterday that Trump will become more competent eventually. BuzzFeed reported: 'I view the Senate as a place that can always act as a check and balance on whoever the next president is,' Rubio said ...on Wednesday." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Akhilleus: So does it worry any Republican, voter or pol or pundit or apparatchik, that they are all lining up to give a big thumbs up to a guy most of them realize couldn't start a car with the keys in the ignition? ...

     ... CW: Hard to believe, but Marco must not read Reality Chex. As I wrote yesterday, "Jokers like Mitch McConnell [& now, make that Marco Rubio,] obviously are kidding themselves -- and us -- when they claim the Congress, the Pentagon & other governmental agencies would keep Trump in check. Nixon used loons, losers & bunglers like the Watergate burglars & the 'plumbers' to carry out his dirty tricks. If American institutions defy Trump, he will turn to sophisticated foreign operators to do his dirty work.

Shame, Shame, Shame ... Oh, Wait a Minute. Maybe Not. The AP, through the Washington Post: "Republicans from North Carolina have apologized to Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine for mistakenly critiquing him for wearing a foreign flag during his acceptance speech. The state GOP sent out a tweet Wednesday night saying it was 'shameful' for Kaine to wear a Honduras flag during his speech at the Democratic National Convention.... Kaine's pin was actually the symbol for families with a member serving in the military. Kaine's son, a Marine, is currently deployed." Akhilleus: Honduran flag, Marine symbol, eh, it's all the same. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... CW P.S." Thanks, North Carolina GOP for pointing out to all Americans that Kaine's son is serving in the military. I did not know that.

Jonathan Chait: "Jill Stein Explains Her Plan to Stop Trump by Electing Him President." CW: I'll let Chait do his best at parsing what he calls Stein's "gibberish." But if you're contemplating voting Green party, and if you have all your marbles, reading Chait will be helpful.

Other News & Views

** Paul Krugman: "If what bothers you about America is ... the fact that it doesn't look exactly the way it did in the past (or the way you imagine it looked in the past), then you don't love your country -- you care only about your tribe. And all too many influential figures on the right are tribalists, not patriots.... If it seems strange to you that these days Democrats are sounding patriotic while Republicans aren't, you just weren't paying attention. The people who now seem to love America always did; the people who suddenly no longer sound like patriots never were." -- CW

Ellen Nakashima of the Washington Post: "Russian government hackers have breached the computers of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, according to individuals familiar with the matter. The intrusion appeared to be carried out by the same Russian intelligence service that hacked the Democratic National Committee earlier this year, the individuals said. The FBI is investigating this breach as part of a broader probe into hacking of political organizations." -- CW ...

     ... The report by Joseph Menn & others of Reuters, who broke the story, is here. "The newly disclosed breach at the DCCC may have been intended to gather information about donors, rather than to steal money, the sources said on Thursday. It was not clear what data was exposed, although donors typically submit a variety of personal information including names, email addresses and credit card details when making a contribution." -- CW ...

... Tom Hamburger of the Washington Post: "Two dozen Republican national security experts signed a letter to congressional leaders Thursday asking for an immediate investigation into the cyberattack on the Democratic National Committee, writing that 'this is not a partisan issue' but rather 'an assault on the integrity of the entire American political process.'" -- CW

Christian Davenport of the Washington Post: "The Air Force is close to certifying that the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is ready for combat, a declaration that would become one of the most significant milestones in the long and tortured history of the Pentagon's most expensive weapons program ever. After years of delays, cost overruns and controversy, top Pentagon officials could make the decision as early as next week, some 15 years after the program began." -- CW

Sam LaGrone of U.S. Naval Institute News: "The Navy is set to name a ship after the gay rights icon and San Francisco politician Harvey Milk, according to a Congressional notification obtained by USNI News.... Milk came from a Navy family and commissioned in the service in 1951. He served as a diving officer in San Diego during the Korean War on the submarine rescue ship Kittiwake until 1955." -- CW ...

... MEANWHILE.... ACLU: "Imprisoned whistleblower Chelsea Manning received a document from Army officials [Thursday] informing her that she is being investigated for serious new charges related to her July 5^th attempt to take her own life. If convicted of these 'administrative offenses,' she could be placed in indefinite solitary confinement for the remainder of her decades-long sentence.... Since she was first taken into custody in 2010, Chelsea, a transgender woman being forced to serve out her sentence in an all-male prison, has been subjected to long stretches of solitary confinement and denied medical treatment related to her gender dysphoria." -- CW

Lynh Bui, et al., of the Washington Post: Prosecutors have dropped all charges against Ingmar Guandique, the man convicted of killing Congressional intern Chandra Levy, after the prosecution's chief witness Armando Morales reportedly said in secret tapes recorded by an acquaintance that he had lied when he testified in an earlier trial that Guandique had confessed to him that he had murdered Levy. Guandique was up for a retrial set to begin this fall.

News Ledes

New York Times: "Tesla Motors has told Senate investigators that its crash-prevention system failed to work properly in a fatal crash, but said its Autopilot technology was not at fault, according to a Senate staff member. Instead, Tesla told members of the Senate Commerce Committee staff on Thursday that the problem involved the car's automatic braking system, said the staff member...." -- CW

New York Times: "The American economy barely rebounded last quarter from its winter doldrums, weighed down by anemic business spending, overstocked shelves at factories and warehouses, and a surprisingly weak housing sector. Consumer spending remained healthy but it was swamped by the poor showing in other sectors of the economy." -- CW

Guardian: "Florida likely has the first cases of Zika virus transmitted by mosquitoes on US soil, the state's governor said on Friday." ...

     ... CW: According to the CDC, that isn't true. In this July 24 report, the CDC warns, "Local mosquito transmission of Zika virus infection (Zika) has been reported in Puerto Rico."

A Tale Told by an Idiot

Standing before thousands of supporters who frequently broke into chants of 'USA! USA! USA!' on Wednesday night, Donald Trump explained why the United States cannot trust illegal immigrants or refugees from war-torn Middle Eastern countries by reading a poem about a 'tender-hearted woman' who cared for a half-frozen snake and nursed him back to health.

'But instead of saying thank you, that snake gave her a vicious bite,' Trump said, dramatically extending his arm in front of him as if it were the snake. "'I saved you," cried the woman. "And you bit me. Heavens why? You know your bite is poisonous, and now I'm going to die." "Oh, shut up, silly woman," said the reptile with a grin. You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in.'" -- Jenna Johnson, Washington Post

By Akhilleus

The story Trumpy tells his adoring audience of cheering simpletons, is an old one, usually told in a much different version involving a scorpion. Trump could have changed it to a snake because he's not sure of what a scorpion is, but I think there was a different reason for the switch.

Trump's story involves a nice, but obviously outlandishly naive woman who takes in a nearly frozen snake and cares for it and nurses it back to health. When it recovers its strength, the snake bites the woman, killing her. Before she dies she asks the snake why he did that since she had been so kind to him and saved his life. In Trump's version, the snake is evil. He tells the woman to shut up and grins at her as she dies saying "Silly woman, you knew I was a snake when you took me in!" Bwah-hah-hah-hah.

This, of course is Trump's rationale for never helping other people, especially ones who don't look like you.

The less juvenile version is the story of the scorpion and the frog. You all have heard this no doubt, but the quick version has a scorpion asking the frog to give him a lift across a rushing stream. The frog, thinking this might not be a great idea, he being a scorpion and all, demurs. The scorpion, sensing reluctance tries to reassure the frog by telling him not to worry, he wouldn't sting him because if he did, they would both drown. Of course, mid-stream, the frog is stung. He asks the scorpion why he did that, because now they will both drown. The scorpion's valediction is "I can't help it. That's my nature."

The stories are somewhat similar except the second is a much more interesting one in terms of how we are wed to our natures, even to the extent that we can allow our worst impulses to destroy us, and others along for the ride.

The first is a simple tale, "told by an idiot" to evoke a sense of outrage and a desire for vengeance since the snake, unlike the scorpion, slithers away unharmed. Also because the snake revels in the woman's death and finds it funny. There is also the feeling that the narrator agrees with the snake's conclusion that the woman was stupid for trying to help someone else, a tale that encompasses many values that are near and dear to Trump: outrage at victimization, hatred of "the other". a desire for vengeance, and a need to humiliate those who aren't "tough" or as "smart" as he is at being able to smoke out an enemy.

But, I guess he can't help being such a cynical, hateful, paranoid asswipe.

That's his nature.

CW Note: As it turns out, there is a Muslim version of "The Scorpion & the Frog," and it seems to be the only one that also incorporates a snake: "An Arab variant is found in a Sufi source that illustrates divine providence with the tale of a scorpion that crosses the Nile on a frog's back in order to save a sleeping drunkard from being bitten by a snake." No doubt Trump, who is easily confused (Tim Kaine, Tom Kean), misremembered one of the ancient stories his old nanny read to little Donnie. Of course, Trump gleaned entirely the wrong lesson from the story. But that's his nature.