Boxers or Briefs

And So It Begins: The Jerry Nadler Chaired House Judiciary Committee launched its investigation into Trump’s abuses of power yesterday, sending requests for documents to eighty-one individuals and entities, twenty more than the sixty that Nadler had mentioned on Sunday.  The list of recipients includes such notables as one time Communications Director Hope Hicks, Trump Finance guy Alan Weisselberg, Michael Flynn Jr, one time assistant security advisor KT McFarland, Trump Organization personal assistant Rhona Graff and the cast of characters associated with the Trump Tower meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya (although she is not on the list possibly because she’s been separately indicted).  Jared Kushner,  Don Jr and Eric are on the list too but, so far, Ivanka is not, however her time may still come, more requests are expected.  The Committee is focusing on three main topics: obstruction of justice and cover-ups;  corruption in areas including violations of the Constitution's emoluments clause and other criminal misuses of official positions for personal gain; and abuses of power, such as attacking the press and misusing the presidential pardon power.  As to pardons, yesterday the Wall Street Journal reported that a lawyer for Trump’s one time fixer/lawyer Michael Cohen initiated a conversation with Trump’s lawyers about getting one right after his offices were raided by the FBI.  Cohen’s lawyer was told that the timing wasn’t right for a pardon but Rudy Giuliani left things open, dangling the possibility that one could be granted at a future date.  With his problems mounting, Cohen switched to new lawyers and turned on Trump, ruling out the possibility that he would ever be the beneficiary of one of those Trump “get out of jail free” cards but the mere dangling of a future pardon could become a problem for Rudy and Trump. Back to Nadler and the Judiciary Committee’s rocket launch, Trump said that he plans to cooperate with all the “requests” because he is “always cooperative”  but later in the day Press Secretary Sanders issued a statement reflective of Trump’s real views, she called Nadler’s investigation “disgraceful and abusive” adding that the Democrats have “embarked on this fishing expedition because they are terrified that their two-year false narrative of ‘Russia collusion’ is crumbling. Their intimidation and abuse of American citizens is shameful. Democrats are harassing the President to distract from their radical agenda of making American a socialist country, killing babies after they’re born, and pushing a ‘green new deal’ that would destroy jobs and bankrupt America. The American people deserve a Congress that works with the President to address serious issues like immigration, healthcare and infrastructure. The Democrats are more interested in pathetic political games and catering a radical, leftist base than on producing results for citizens. The Democrats are not after the truth, they are after the President.”  So much for cooperation. 

Unholy Alliance:  Around the same time that Nadler launched his ballistic missile,  The New Yorker launched a Molotov cocktail of its own, publishing an article by investigative reporter Jane Mayer entitled “The Making of the Fox News White House.”  That Fox and Trump have an unhealthy and unprecedented relationship is sadly not new news, after all these days many refer to Fox as the official Trump News station, the administration is littered with former Fox  people including one time Fox president Bill Shine who currently serves as Communication Director and not only is Sean Hannity one of Trump’s closest advisors, he’s crossed the line and now appears at Trump rallies as a special invited guest.  That said some of the details included in the article are still surprising.  Among other things Mayer reveals that Fox News reporter Diana Falzone uncovered the Stormy Daniels story before the 2016 election at a time that it could have influenced the election outcome but that her story was squashed at the direction of Fox owner Rupert Murdoch after she was specifically told that her reporting was good “But Rupert wants Donald Trump to win. So just let it go.” The article also alleges that Trump ordered then Economic Advisor Gary Cohn and Chief of Staff Kelly to pressure the Justice Department into blocking AT&T’s purchase of Time Warner as retribution for the unfavorable news coverage that he gets from the Time Warner owned CNN.  Recognizing the impropriety of Trump’s demand, Cohn told Kelly not to call Justice, in fact he said “Don’t you f-cking dare call the Justice Department. We are not going to do business that way.” Ultimately Justice did try to interfere with the merger, at one point pressuring AT&T to agree to sell off CNN as a condition of approval and then going to court to prevent the merger all together.  Despite Trump and the Justice Department’s efforts, AT&T continues to prevail in the courts.   My favorite “reveal” concerns Kimberly Guilfoyle, the former Fox “The Five” pundit who is  Donald Jr’s current girlfriend.  Apparently to prepare for her show she frequently called David Townsend, a Fox viewer in Georgia who was active on the far right social media site Gab, for tips that she then passed off as real news.  Mayer reported that while some national security analysts have worried about foreign influences infiltrating Fox, “the reality is actually much dumber”…. “it was just a guy in his underwear in Georgia who had influence over Fox News! And Fox News influences” Trump!    

Odds and Ends:  Last week we learned that Trump granted top secret security clearance to Jared Kushner despite FBI concerns and over the objections of then Chief of Staff Kelly and White House Counsel McGahn. Because Trump hasn’t overridden the CIA, yet,  Kushner still doesn’t have the even higher “code word” (sensitive compartmented information) clearance that someone in charge of Middle East peace negotiations would ordinarily need.  Though Trump’s action goes against norms, there’s nothing illegal about him opting to ignore the FBI’s recommendation. What makes this story odd is that both Trump and Ivanka lied about it, Trump to the NY Times and Ivanka to ABC’s Abby Huntsman. Late Friday, we learned that the Kushner’s even lied to their lawyer, Abbe Lowell, after his office released three separate statements walking back his earlier assertions that his clients hadn’t received any special treatment. So far we don’t know who turned the NY Times onto this story in the first place. Maybe the anonymous Op-Ed writer who still hasn’t been outed is still active? Maybe it was someone at the CIA, who concluded that a good leak was the best way to make sure that Trump doesn’t grant “code word” clearance to Jared?  In any case, Kushner who visited his good friend Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman last weekend for a chat and maybe some secret swapping is still in charge of Middle East peace, a job further complicated by the upcoming Israeli elections and Prime Minister Netanyahu’s own impending indictment part of what he, taking a page from the Trump script, calls a witch hunt.

People Moves: One time Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker, who is still due back in front of Congress to explain the misleading statements he made during his earlier testimony, resigned over the weekend.  He plans to stay in Washington because “that’s where the jobs are” which could mean that he’s about to end up at one of the Trump related campaign committees.  To no one’s surprise his replacement Attorney General Bill Barr has decided not to recuse himself from overseeing the Mueller investigation.  Neither Hillary Clinton nor former Obama Attorney General Eric Holder are running for president, or so they both said yesterday.  And, to the extent that anyone cares, HUD Secretary Ben Carson announced that he plans to leave at the end of Trump’s first, and let’s hope only, term.  Lastly, in response to a series of anti-Semitic statements made by newbie Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, who has herself been subject to some nasty anti-Muslim treatment in a poster hung in the West Virginia statehouse, Democratic leadership plans to introduce a resolution condemning anti-Semitism this week, an effort to counter Republican assertions that the Democratic party is turning into the anti-Israel party, a particularly ironic argument from the party of white Supremacist Steve King.