Bumpy Roads Ahead

Kerplunk:  When the Dow Jones stock index broke through 25,000 points, Trump took all the credit, attributing market gains to his brilliant stewardship of the US economy, going so far as to suggest that if Hillary Clinton had become president the market would have dropped by 50%.  Yesterday, the market didn’t drop by that much but it did break records, plunging by more than 1100 points, not the largest percentage drop ever but still a hair raising move.  The White House avoided acknowledging the drop instead saying that Trump’s focus is on long-term economic fundamentals, at least until the market recovers as which point he’ll be back to taking credit for short term gains.  While the market was falling Trump was in Ohio giving a speech that was supposed to highlight the economic benefits of his tax cuts and though he did get a few words in on that subject, he spent most of his time bashing the media, slamming Democrats and griping about the “deep state” that was out to get him.  Notably he called those Democrats treasonous for failing to stand and applaud him during last week’s State of the Union address, because failing to cheer the great leader is now a crime punishable by death.  As to the market, the  drop may be a technical correction, a response to increasing interest rates, a reflection of concerns about the increasing deficit and the government’s failure to pass a long term budget, fears of political instability or all of the above.  Further feeding those fears about government instability, last night the New York Times reported that most of Trump’s legal team including John Dowd and his deputy Jay Sekulow do not want him to meet with Special Counsel Mueller because they believe that given his history of lying there is no reason to believe that he would stick to the truth during his interview. Most of Trump’s outside advisors, including his former lawyer Marc Kasowitz, former NJ Governor Chris Christie and former Congressman Newt Gingrich also believe that speaking with Mueller would be risky for the prevaricating Trump.  At least at this point, the only two people who think Trump should meet with Mueller are his other lawyer, Ty Cobb, who is still advocating cooperation with the investigation, and Trump himself who is confident that he can talk himself out of any tough situation.  To the extent that Trump refuses to agree to a voluntary interview, Mueller could subpoena him in an effort to force his appearance though Trump’s lawyers are hoping that he won’t have the guts to actually send that subpoena. To the extent that the intrepid Mueller does issue a subpoena, Trump’s legal team is likely to argue that Mueller hasn’t reached the high threshold needed for Mueller to command Trump’s appearance.  In any case, Trump’s legal team denies that any final decision about Trump’s cooperation has been made. However, if Trump tries to duck an appearance with Mueller, the fight could end up at the Supreme Court, where if the Nixon precedent stands, Trump would likely lose.  In the meantime Trump will stay busy trying to influence that other court, the court of public opinion, the one where he gets to lie as much as he wants while referring to Democrats as treasonous and the Mueller investigation as tainted at the same time that he asserts that he had nothing to do with collusion or obstruction.  Sadly, he’s very effective in that court.             

The Rebuttal Memo:  Yesterday evening the House Intelligence Committee voted unanimously to declassify the ten page Democratic rebuttal of the four page Nunes memo, the memo that claims that the Mueller investigation is illegitimate because of “abuses” committed by the FBI and the Justice department in their application for a FISA warrant to surveil Trump campaign advisor Carter Page. The decision to release the rebuttal memo to the public now lies with Trump who gets five days to decide whether or not he will let the public hear what the Democrats, the FBI and the Justice Department really did to obtain the disputed warrant.  Trump, who had been all in on releasing the Nunes memo even before he’d read it, says that he’ll have to examine the rebuttal memo before he gives his final decision. In the meantime, he is doing his best to attack Adam Schiff the House Intelligence Committee’s ranking member who authored the rebuttal memo.  Yesterday he slammed “Little Adam Schiff” for “being one of the biggest liars and leakers.” Schiff may be shorter than Trump but he’s fairly good at twitter warfare, he responded by suggesting that Trump should be given a time out by his Chief of Staff for his misuse of his “executive time.”  While Trump was fighting with Schiff, his favorite toady Devin Nunes was out trying to further tarnish the legitimacy of the Mueller investigation, this time targeting George Papadopoulos, the “coffee boy” who triggered the FBI’s investigation into the Trump team’s affinity for Russians by bragging about his Hillary email “get” to an Australian diplomat.  Nunes told Fox TV that Papadopoulos was so insignificant that Trump never actually met him, an assertion that was quickly disproven when virtually every news source responded by posting the picture of Trump sitting at a table with Papadopoulos and replayed sound of Trump bragging about adding him to his foreign affairs advisory team.  As to the rebuttal memo, even if Trump tries to squash it, it could still see the light of day if the whole House votes for its release.        

Pennsylvania Redistricting:  Yesterday the Supreme Court declined a request from Pennsylvania Republicans to block a lower court ruling that ordered the state to redraw its congressional lines. The lower court decision requires that the lines be drawn by February 15, well in advance of November’s mid-term election.  As a result of the redistricting, Democrats are likely to gain a few more seats in Congress at the expense of Republicans who had been the beneficiaries of Pennsylvania’s gerrymandering.  With Democrats fighting to regain control of Congress, the added Pennsylvania seats could prove the tipping point they need.  Market volatility, court decisions on presidential subpoenas and gerrymandering, something’s in the air.  Hold onto your seats, bumpy roads ahead.