It's Lonely Out in Space

Climate Change Change:  The flip flop Don may have pulled another one.  On Saturday the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump is reconsidering his decision to pull out of the Paris Climate Accords.  Moments after the article appeared, White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that “there was no change in the US position on the Paris Agreement” but by Sunday a number of Trump officials, including Security Advisor McMaster and Secretary of State Tillerson, provided more nuanced answers when asked about the possibility of the US staying in the climate agreement.  According to Tillerson, economic advisor Gary Cohn has been tasked to “consider other ways in which we can work with partners in the Paris climate accord.  We want to be productive.  We want to be helpful.”  Cohn’s deputy Everett Eissenstat led a US delegation to Montreal this weekend where the US, China, Canada and thirty other countries discussed the accords.  After the meeting the EU’s climate chief might have gotten over his skis by saying that the US had signaled that it wanted to reengage before Trump was ready for the announcement or he’s just being overly optimistic.  Only time will tell.  Unrelated to the Paris Accords, Huckabee Sanders is now facing an ethics violations complaint.  A law bans certain federal employees, including the White House press secretary, from influencing employment decisions of a private company on the basis of partisan political affiliation.  By calling for ESPN’s Jemele Hill to be fired for her “Trump’s a white supremacist” tweet, Sanders may have violated this law, which is punishable by a fine, up to 15 years in prison or both.  Good thing her boss has the power of the pardon.  As to DACA, Trump’s other flip flop, it remains up in the air.  In an effort to promote the RAISE Act, his harsh plan to limit immigration, Senator Tom Cotton was out on Sunday saying that Trump promised him that there is no deal yet on DACA.  The RAISE Act would impose strict limits on immigration and would advantage “merit” based immigrants.  Cotton is either unaware or has elected to ignore that the DACA kids are the type of well educated, contributors to the economy who should qualify for admission under the Raise Act.     

Rocket Man:  As evidenced by the traffic jams, frozen zones and helicopters flying overhead, it’s UN Week in New York City so Trump spent the weekend practicing his speech to the General Assembly, engaging in twitter diplomacy and proving that he still hasn’t gotten over losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton.  He disclosed the content of his conversation with South Korea’s President Moon by tweeting that he “asked him how Rocket Man is doing.  Long gas lines forming in North Korea.  Too bad!” By Rocket Man he means volatile North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, the guy least likely to appreciate public ridicule and who could react by sending off one of those “rockets.”  In any case despite sanctions there are no gas lines in North Korea and security advisor McMaster says that Kim Jong Un’s rocket capability is something we shouldn’t be laughing about.  Trump then retweeted a GIF of himself hitting a golf ball into a plane, hitting and knocking down Clinton because the presidency is the right platform to use to depict violence against women.  Already stretched, Trump’s diplomatic skills will be further tested this week when he speaks in front of the General Assembly.  He doesn’t bash the UN as much as he did when he was campaigning but his America first mantra probably won’t go over well with the assembled diplomats nor will his spot on criticisms that the UN is a bloated institution in need of reform that provides unwarranted deferential treatment to some of the world’s worst players. UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, who has criticized some UN practices, tempered Trump’s expected message by saying that the UN is already incorporating some of the reforms that Trump wants to see.  Little seen Secretary of State Tillerson’s star continues to fall, there are rumors that he may be replaced by Haley.  He is out of favor with Trump for vocally disagreeing on a number of things including Qatar, Charlottesville, climate change and, most recently, for trying to claw back a $75 million Congressional allocation to Israel, a move that was quickly rebutted by the administration.  Tillerson, who is way behind hiring undersecretaries and assistants for troubled parts of the world, released his plans to reorganize and cut staff and budget at the State Department this week.  He will have to rethink this plan, the Senate Appropriations committee allocated $51 billion to the State Department, $11 billion more than Trump’s budget request because they were outraged by the planned cuts in spending on diplomacy.      

Russia, Russia, Russia:  Michael Cohen, Trump’s confidante and long-time real estate lawyer, is scheduled to testify in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday.  Cohen should have lots to say about the ill-fated Trump Tower Moscow project, the effort that was ongoing when Trump was claiming to have no involvement in Russia.  However, in the past he’s said that he “would take a bullet for Trump” so it’s unclear if he will come clean. Cohen is not the only one with reservations about sharing informaiton, last night the New York Times reported that Trump’s lawyers are fighting about how much they should cooperate with Special Counsel Mueller’s requests for emails and files.  Ty Cobb, Trump’s in house lawyer for all things Russian, wants to be as cooperative as possible to speed the investigation process, but White House counsel Don McGahn, who is expected to be called to testify about former FBI Director Comey’s dismissal, has been arguing for pushing back against Mueller’s requests because he thinks sharing sets a bad precedent, or it could be that he knows something that he doesn’t want to share.  We know about their argument not from a leak but because Ty Cobb was overheard discussing it at a popular steak house. In addition to seeking White House files and focusing on social media’s role propagating false news, Mueller is following the money.  He recently added Kyle Freeney, a Justice Department lawyer with experience pursuing money laundering cases, to his team bringing his lawyer count to seventeen.  

Health Care for All or Some:  Bernie Sanders defended his universal health care plan over the weekend.  Sometime Republican candidate for President Rick Santorum called the plan an admission that Obamacare isn’t working, said it’s prohibitively expensive and generally dissed it because Republicans don’t believe that everyone deserves or wants health coverage.  Bernie hit back pointing out that any financial analysis has to consider premium savings, the transfer of high insurance profits and salaries to health care consumers, dramatic reductions in drug costs and more efficient administration.  On its surface Bernie’s plan appears radical, but parts of it are fairly mainstream.  Allowing those fifty-five years and older to buy into Medicare is a provision that almost made it into Obamacare and would solve many of the Obamacare exchange problems. Allowing Medicare to negotiate drug pricing makes compelling economic sense.  Meantime the Graham-Cassidy Obamacare repeal bill is closing in on getting the fifty votes it needs to pass through the Senate. Though no scoring report has been released yet for the Graham-Cassidy plan, OMB did release a report saying that the Trump administration’s failure to commit to funding Obamacare insurance subsidy payments is contributing to the increase in Obamacare premiums.  Republican Senator Lamar Alexander, who has been working across the aisle to solve Obamacare’s subsidy problem has infuriated some of his Republican colleagues, particularly Lindsey Graham because fixing Obamacare doesn’t achieve their repeal effort.  As to the Graham-Cassidy plan, when released, its scoring report will say that it would result in even more individuals being dropped from the insurance rolls than previous Obamacare repeal efforts.  So much for universal coverage.    

Til Touchdown Brings Me Round:  Interior Secretary Zinke’s report is out, it recommends that Trump modify ten national monuments (i.e. parks) by shrinking the boundaries of at least four western sites and permitting grazing, logging, coal mining and commercial fishing within the parks.  Zinke argues that previous administrations overreached by preserving nature and natural resources when exploitation was possible.  Though not the fault of anyone in the Trump administration, Cassini’s thirteen year Saturn Mission has ended.  With its time running out, NASA directed it to plunge into Saturn. National monuments may be getting more congested but it’s still lonely out in space.