Out With Al

Franken Out, Trump Still In:  Eighteen named women have come forward with credible allegations against Trump, nineteen if you count Ivana Trump’s one time assertion that he raped her, Trump insists that all of the women are lying, cops to some “locker room talk” but nothing more and is still president.  Eight women, some anonymous, have come forward with allegations about being harassed by Al Franken, he’s admitted to some  forced kissing and possible tushy pinching but has not admitted to all of the allegations.  Though he had hoped to go in front of the Ethics Committee, yesterday facing condemnation by his colleagues, he announced in an emotional speech that he will be departing the Senate over the next few weeks saying "I, of all people, am aware that there is some irony in the fact that I am leaving while a man who has bragged on tape about his history of sexual assault sits in the Oval Office and a man who has repeatedly preyed on young girls campaigns for the Senate with the full support of his party.”  It is likely that Franken will be replaced by Minnesota’s Lieutenant Governor Tina Smith who will serve as a place holder until a special election can be held for a longer term replacement.  Hillary Clinton only carried Minnesota by one and a half points in 2016 and Franken’s predecessor was a Republican so the outcome of that election is by no means certain and it may turn out that throwing a popular but flawed colleague under the bus in order to achieve moral superiority will come at a steep price for Democrats. Since some people don’t want to admit that they are voting for a pedophile and others won’t admit voting for a Democrat, pollsters are having a hard time predicting the outcome of next week’s Alabama special election, but if things go his way, Republican candidate Roy Moore might pass a departing Franken as he slithers into his Senate seat. To help that outcome along, Trump is on his way to Pensacola ostensibly for a rally, but in reality to campaign for Moore in the media market that also covers Alabama. Late yesterday Arizona Congressman Trent Franks, who tried to press two of his female staff members into surrogacy to help him with his fertility problems, announced that he will be joining Franken on the off ramp. He comes from a reliably safe Republican district, so his ouster is not expected to have any consequences for Republicans but it does provide them the opportunity to look like they are taking harassment seriously.  Republican Texas Congressman Blake Farenthold, who has already settled a harassment claim, is holding on to his seat pending an ethics review. Former Democratic Congressman and sometime MSNBC pundit Harold Ford Jr was fired by Morgan Stanley and benched by MSNBC after a woman accused him of harassment and intimidation.  Ford denies the claim and has announced plans to pursue legal action against her. The week’s not over yet so who knows who will join the list by day’s end.  With most of the focus on harassment claims, it would have been easy to miss that the Ethics Committee just cleared Representative Devon Nunes of charges that he had revealed confidential information to the public while trying to undermine the investigation into the Trump Russia investigation.  Nunes, one of Trump’s favorite stooges, may seek to regain his role chairing the House Intelligence Committee Russian collusion investigation.

Russia, Russia, Russia:  Last summer after the Donald Jr meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya became public, Donny Jr told his good friend Fox’s Sean Hannity that “there wasn’t really follow-up because there was nothing there to follow-up.”  Yesterday CNN reported that there was follow-up, after the meeting  Rob Goldstone, the British publicist who set up the meeting, sent several emails to at least one of the Russians and members of the Trump team.  The emails were brought up on Wednesday during Donald Jr’s testimony in front of the House Intelligence Committee but since they fall into the category of things that the memory impaired Donny can’t recall he had nothing to say about them.  One of the emails was sent to Dan Scavino, now the White House director of social media and keeper of the Trump Twitter feed, it encouraged Scavino to get Trump Sr to set up a page on VK, a Russian social networking site, an idea that Goldstone said was supported by “Don and Paul” as in Donny Jr and Paul Manafort, because when running for US President it’s important to have a presence on Russian social media, particularly if you are looking for creative ways to communicate with Kremlin cut outs.  The email chain provides another example of how the campaign that Trump claimed had nothing to do with Russia and had no Russian contacts had plenty of those contacts, more than any other campaign in history.  Hope Hicks, Trump’s former Girl Friday, current Communications Director and the person responsible for pressing his pants while he is wearing them, is getting further drawn into the Russia mess.  During his testimony, Donny Jr reported that some of his conversations about the statement he ultimately released concerning the Russia lawyer meeting were with Hicks.  The word on Hicks is that she is basically Trump’s intermediary, her responsibilities do not include independent thought, so it’s fair to assume that she was acting as nothing more than Trump’s mouthpiece, she will have an opportunity to discuss her role further when she meets with Mueller, unless she already has.  Hick is very pretty and fashionable but it’s not clear that she will look all that good in stripes. Fearing more guilty pleas, indictments and damning evidence of collusion and obstruction, Trump’s surrogates are seeking to discredit Special Counsel Mueller, his investigation and his team of FBI agents and lawyers.  Conservative media is calling for Mueller to be fired, with Fox News demanding that the probe be shut down. Republicans have seized on the revelation that Peter Strzok, one of Mueller’s FBI investigators, sent anti Trump text messages to his then girlfriend and even though Strzok was cut from the Mueller team months ago, they are citing his texts as proof that the whole investigation is tainted.  Earlier this week during a press conference, House Freedom Caucus chairman Mark Meadows advanced the bias claim by asking “If Mueller was doing such a great job investigating collusion, why could he not have found the conflict of interest within his own agency?” Apparently uncovering and removing Strzok from the team doesn’t count. Yesterday during a Judiciary Committee FBI oversight meeting, many of the Republican members of the committee were more interested in relitigating the Hillary Clinton email scandal than focusing on the more immediate concern of Russian election meddling. During his testimony, a calm but visibly frustrated FBI Director Wray defended the FBI against claims of bias and allegations that his agents were tainted.   

Healthiest President Ever:  The healthiest man ever to serve as president may not be all that healthy.  Towards the end of his speech recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Trump slurred and mispronounced his words inspiring a twitter frenzy about his health.  When asked about his speaking difficulties Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that he was suffering from an acute case of dry mouth. The clueless Sanders also attacked the media as ridiculous for even suggesting that Trump’s health wasn’t tip top, because commenting on someone’s health was something that Trump, who help spread rumors about Clinton’s impending death, would never do.  Before calling it a day, Sanders said that Trump will be having a physical examination early in the new year, this one by real doctors at Walter Reade, not by Trump’s usual NY physician the, doctor who earlier pronounced that he would be the healthiest president ever.  It may turn out that a few high cholesterol pills can’t do much to combat the effects of a diet consisting of MacDonald’s burgers, fish-o-fillet sandwiches, fries and ice cream combined with an aversion to what Trump calls “battery draining” exercise.

Financial Update:  The government is still open for business today because Congress passed a very short term budget resolution kicking the possibility of a government shutdown forward two weeks.  Democrats and Republicans are still talking, are still miles apart and now have to sit down again right before Christmas. The usual issues remain on the table, DACA, defense spending, the Wall, social services spending and health care.  Republicans have their plate full, they are busy trying to fix their tax plan, the alternative minimum tax language has unintended consequences, the state and local tax elimination is causing heartburn, the corporate tax cut may be too steep and the public is focusing more and more on the regressive nature of the plan, particularly the part that raises taxes for high state tax residents by 5%.  And no one is even considering adding the provisions that were promised to Senator Susan Collins.  It turns out that reforming the tax code is hard and that tax cuts are only popular if you are among the select few actually getting a cut.