Fitness and Characters

Don Jr Goes to Washington: Yesterday, little Donny met with the staff of the Senate Judiciary Committee and provided still another explanation for his meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya. He now says that he attended the meeting because he was intrigued that she might have damaging information about Hillary Clinton’s “fitness, character or qualifications” to be president. Having grown up with a father who is neither fit nor qualified but who is a character, Donny Jr thought that he was the right person to evaluate Hillary.  He didn’t seek legal advice before the meeting because he figured he could always check in with the lawyers after the fact and didn’t want to run the risk that they would tell him that attending the meeting was a very bad idea.  Also, though he earlier claimed that his communication about the meeting was limited to a series of emails with English promoter Goldstone, he fessed up to three phone calls with his Russian buddy and friend of Putin, Emin Agalarov, although for some reason he can’t remember the calls, what they discussed or many other related things because he was immersed in the “maelstrom” of the campaign and was too inexperienced to recognize criminal activity anyway. He also said that his father knew nothing about the meeting and that his coincidentally timed promise to release explosive information about the Clintons was just “the way he talks.”  The committee staff spent five hours grilling Don Jr about the meeting, his father’s involvement, the misstatement that was crafted about the meeting on Air Force One and whether or not he wanted to admit now or later that he colluded with the Russians.  Democratic Senator Coons, one of the Senators who sat in on the session, reacted to Don Jr’s performance by emailing out the US Statue outlining punishments for lying or withholding information from Congress after the meeting because though lying in public isn’t illegal, lying to Congress is, even if you’re not under oath.  To the extent that anything Donny said is ultimately proven false he will be in bigly trouble, at least until Daddy Don grants him the Sheriff Arpaio treatment.  After the meeting Don Jr released a statement thanking the committee for its professionalism, leaving the impression that his testifying days are now behind him.  He is wrong about that.  The committee expects him to come back and testify at a public hearing.  So do the intelligence committees.  And no doubt Special Counsel Mueller will speak to him too, but only after he’s had a chance to scrupulously review and compare everything that Don Jr said to statements provided by others who attended the Natalia Vesilnitskaya meeting.  For his part, Mueller now plans to interview all the members of Trump’s team who were on the Air Force One flight to find out what they know about the misleading statement that was prepared during the trip, the one that Trump Sr had a hand in drafting.              

Legislative Progress:  Republicans spent yesterday grousing about Trump’s debt ceiling, budget extension, hurricane funding deal with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer.  Despite press comments and a lot of right wing criticism that he was taken for a ride by those sly tricksters Pelosi and Schumer, Trump is thrilled about his decision to leave the persnickety Republicans out in the cold, at least for now.  Yesterday, the Senate passed the agreed upon debt ceiling package, which also reauthorizes the government flood insurance program, by a vote of  80 to 17.  All Democratic Senators voted yes except for New Jersey’s Senator Menendez who was otherwise occupied at his corruption trial.  Texas Senators Cruz and Cornyn who’ve never met an aid package they like voted yes because this time their constituencies were the chief beneficiaries.  Senators Paul, Graham, McCain, Corker, Flake, Sasse and Johnson all voted no.  Florida Senator Rubio, who voted no for Super Storm Sandy relief and who will no doubt be seeking aid after Irma sweeps through Florida, was notably absent.  The legislation now moves on to the House where it will pass, but only because Nancy Pelosi will make sure that the Democrats do the heavy lifting. Chief of Staff Kelly must be doing a remarkable job editing Trump’s morning news feed.  Yesterday morning Trump called Schumer and Pelosi to rave about all the positive press reports he’d seen.  He was so jovial that when Pelosi asked him to reassure the DACA kids that they would be left alone for the next six months, Trump followed up by tweeting “For all of those (DACA) that are concerned about your status during the 6 month period, you have nothing to worry about – No action!”  Earlier in the year, a Trump spokesperson said that his tweets count as official policy statements, hopefully that’s still true and the DACA kids can bank on this one.  Together with long term DACA advocate Senator Durbin, Pelosi and Schumer plan to  introduce new Dreamer legislation as soon as possible.  It’s not clear how long the Pelosi, Schumer, Trump ménage a trois will last, so they’d better act fast.  Schumer and Trump are also talking about a plan to permanently remove the requirement that Congress repeatedly raise the debt ceiling.  The US and Denmark are the only democratic countries with debt ceilings so their plan isn’t farfetched but it’s unlikely to get any Republican support.  

Wingmen and Wingnuts:  In an interview scheduled to air on 60 Minutes, former Trump advisor Steve Bannon, who describes himself as Trump’s outside wingman, told Charlie Rose that the Catholic Church only supports DACA because they need illegal aliens to fill their churches going on to say that the Church’s interest in “unlimited illegal” immigration is purely economic.  An outraged Cardinal Dolan called those comments insulting and ridiculous.  Apparently, Bannon, a Catholic who aligns himself with conservative elements in the church and opposes Pope Francis’ progressive leanings, must have skipped Catechism class the day they explained that whole love thy neighbor thing. Bannon is still waging his war against the White House “globalists,” particularly economic advisor Gary Cohn. Bannon, who has no problem with Trump calling neo-Nazis fine people, said that if Cohn has a problem with the way that Trump responded to Charlottesville, he should keep it to himself or quit.   Bannon is not the only person saying ridiculous things.  Alex Jones, the Infowars conspiracy theorist who, according to Trump, has an amazing reputation, believes that the deep state is using its weather weapon to amplify disastrous hurricanes like Harvey and Irma in order to “stoke fear about climate change and promote a liberal agenda.” He also says that the “conveniently” planned October release of Geostorm, a new sci-fi movie proves his point.  Rush Limbaugh told his listeners that weather forecasters are hyping Irma to increase sales of emergency merchandise.  Most people wouldn’t mind if he was right and their purchases turned out to be unnecessary.  Sadly, people following his guidance may be putting their lives at risk.

Footnotes:  A federal appeals court rejected Trump’s most recent attempt to limit the types of family members and refugees who can enter the country under Trump’s contested travel ban. The travel ban, which expires soon, is due to be reviewed by the Supreme Court during its upcoming session.  A last ditch effort by Senators Lindsay Graham and Bill Cassidy to push their Obamacare repeal plan through the Senate is also about to expire, even though Senator McCain said that he would support the effort to turn Obamacare into a state block grant program. The Sessions led Justice Department has decided to side with the baker who claimed making a wedding cake for a gay couple violated his religious beliefs.  Like Bannon, Sessions and the baker also missed the class on loving your neighbor.