Art of the Danish 

Rinse and Repeat:  With little new to report, the press, with the help of the agitator in chief, managed to repeat last week’s news this weekend,  beating a few items to death.  Israel remained the focus of attention and not in a good way.  Late Friday, after Israel granted her permission to visit her elderly grandmother on the West Bank Congresswoman Tlaib, who had written a letter promising to stay away from politics during her visit in exchange for that permission, rejected the offer allegedly because of those restrictions, but more likely because she was more interested in poking Israel than seeing her “ailing” grandmother. Trump responded by again dissing Tlaib and her fellow pack member Ilhan Omar.  Additionally a number of Democrats, including Bernie Sanders suggested a reconsideration of aid to Israel and/or some kind of formal reprimand of Ron Dermer, Israel’s ambassador to the US and/or David Friedman, US’s ambassador to Israel. Although it’s not clear how much, if at all, any of this will impact the outcome of elections in either the US or Israel, one thing is certain, none of it did anything to calm regional tensions, on Saturday Hamas shot three missiles into Israel and Israel responded in kind.  Still Trump got what he wanted, his base appears to be buying into the argument that Democrats hate Israel and that Tlaib and Omar are the face of the Democratic party and the Israel fracas deflected attention, temporarily at least, from the issue that has Trump very worried: the state of the economy and the possibility that a recession will hit just in time for the 2020 election.  To that end he sent economic advisor Larry Kudlow, who back before he became a card carrying member of the Trump administration talked up the stupidity of trade tariffs, out to the morning news shows to assert that “there’s no recession on the horizon” that things are as good as they can be, that tariffs were working and that people just need to show some “optimism.”  The content of Kudlow’s presentation got significantly less attention than the fact that he was bleary eyed and slurring his words, possibly drunk or suffering another cardiac related crisis.  Either explanation is possible because working for Trump and spewing things you know aren’t true are both deleterious to one’s health, particularly for someone like Kudlow who has a history of both heart disease and substance abuse.  Peter Navarro, Trump’s  trade advisor, took a different tack, he just dismissed concerns that the yield curve, the predictor of recessions, had inverted last week by saying that everyone but him had misinterpreted the curve.  As to Trump he mumbled some of his usual incomprehensible nonsense on his way back to Washington yesterday conceding that economies across the world are "not doing well like we are doing, the rest of the world, if you look at Germany, if you look at European Union, frankly, look at the UK, look at a lot of the countries, they are not doing well."  Then he added that "most economists actually say we are not going to have a recession," another lie but who besides the Washington Post is counting?  All of that was a variation on the spiel he pushed at his New Hampshire rally where he warned his supporters, most of whom don’t have 401ks or IRAs of note, that the market would tank even more if they voted for one of those socialist Democrats. After that rally, he bragged that the crowd size had been the bigliest ever held in the New Hampshire space, not true as evidenced by the pictures of all of the empty seats in the arena but at least his New Hampshire crowd was made up of voluntary attendees.  Apparently, last Tuesday the plant workers at a Royal Dutch Shell’s manufacturing facility in western Pennsylvania were told that they had to attend a Trump speech and smile or forfeit the day’s pay, no joke.  Trump’s interest in purchasing Greenland from Denmark is also not a joke, or at least not a joke to Trump.  Though most viewed  reports that Trump had asked his staff to investigate the possibility of taking Greenland off of Denmark’s hands as another attempt to divert attention from economic headwinds and stock market volatility, Trump doubled down this weekend saying that he really does want to purchase Greenland something that the possibly inebriated Kudlow repeated as well.  Trump plans to pitch the purchase during his scheduled September meeting in Denmark with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen who continues to insist that Greenland is not for sale.  Who knows maybe that’s because Frederiksen has read the “Art of the Deal” and is holding out for a higher price?

Miller Time:  Stephen Miller, Trump’s immigration guru was featured in both the NY Times and the Washington Post this weekend, a notable bifecta for such a curiously evil character. His life trajectory from a liberal upbringing in Santa Monica, California to Duke University to key roles as an aide to both former Congresswoman/one time presidential candidate Michele Bachmann and former Senator/Attorney General Jeff Sessions and then onto the White House would be much more impressive if only any of those positions involved working for ethical intellects and he hadn’t used his positions to effectively advance his white supremacist/anti-immigrant views.  Speaking of white supremacists, the right wing, Trump supporting Proud Boys faced off against some members of the extreme left wing Intifa crowd in Portland, Oregon this weekend at an alt right rally, one of many that the Proud Boys plan to organize going forward.  Trump had no problem with the Proud Boys or their message but did say that he was considering designating Antifa as an “organization of terror,” because in case you missed it, terror only lives on the left, on the right it’s okay, or okay with Trump.  Apparently, the FBI isn’t on board with Trump’s message that only Antifa is the problem, over the weekend they arrested a white nationalist for threatening to shoot up another Jewish community center, this one in Ohio.  They seized an arsenal of weapons from his parent’s home that included two AR-15 style rifles, bulletproof armor and a “ton” of ammunition.  As to guns, the dialogue continues with Trump blaming “mental issues” and calling for the opening of more loony bins and Republicans like Senator Lindsey Graham sounding, with the emphasis on “sounding,” like they’re interested in doing something, possibly passing a really weak red flag law, and Democrats calling the House Judiciary Committee back to Washington early to address more gun legislation, nice but nothing happens in Washington without Moscow/NRA Mitch McConnell’s support and he appears to be stalling while “recuperating” from shoulder surgery in Kentucky.  By the way his surgery was paid for by his really good health insurance, insurance that he appreciates but wants taken away from millions.   Axios  reports that the general sentiment is that If new gun legislation doesn't pass in September, it won't get done before the 2020 election.  As to Moscow Mitch earlier reports that he pushed for the lifting of sanctions against Russian Oligarch Oleg Deripaska in exchange for an investment in the building of a $1 billion plus aluminum plant in Kentucky continue to reverberate and that should matter but won’t because Mitch like Trump seems to be coated in Teflon or aluminum or whatever.