Dead Poets Society

Poetry in Action:  It turns out Ken Cuccinelli, the former Attorney General of Virginia, who was selected by Trump to serve as the Acting Director of Citizenship and Immigration Services because of their shared disdain for immigrants of color is also an aspiring poet.  Yesterday, during an interview with NPR when he was asked again about the classic Emma Lazarus poem on the Statue of Liberty he offered up his own rewrite to one of the poem’s more famous lines suggesting it should say “Give me your tired, your poor ‘who can stand on their own two feet and who will not become a public charge’,” pointing out that the plaque with the poem was “put on the Statue of Liberty at almost the first time the first public charge law was passed."  Later in the day, during an interview with CNN he denied that he was “writing poetry” but doubled down on his justification of the administration’s new policy to root out poorer immigrants by saying that Lazarus’ poem was only referencing people coming from Europe, i.e. white people. In case you’re wondering Cuccinelli is of Italian descent and his great grandparents Dominic Cucciniello and Fortuna Preziosi were quite poor when they sailed to the US and though by today’s standards Italians are white, back in the day they were considered undesirable people of color.  Joyce Vance, the former US Attorney from the Northern District of Alabama tweeted out that her grandparents were survivors of the Eastern European pogroms and that her family now includes, lawyers, quite a few dentists, teachers and businessmen.  She asked others to tweet back their families’ stories.  The responses were awesome, suffice it to say that if Vance’s twitter feed is any indication, depriving  poor people from attaining citizenship would eliminate a huge pool of future scientists, doctors, inventors, and job creators.  By the way  population statisticians project that the country will become “minority white” by 2045, Trump and his cronies are hoping their policy changes will stop that from happening because the idea that the country won’t look like them tortures what remains of their souls.

Missiles and Laptops:  We now know more about what happened in Russia over the weekend, and it’s not pretty.  Apparently Putin’s nuclear weaponry wizards have been working on a new kind of missile, one that would be powered by its own nuclear reactor.  One of those new reactors went kaboom, killing seven people, irradiating many more, including the medical teams called in to help the injured, and raising the radioactivity levels at nearby villages.  At first the Russians tried to calm the fears of nearby residents by saying that nothing bigly happened, then they called for the evacuation of a nearby town.  Now it appears that they’ve called off the evacuation possibly part of an effort to minimize the bad press they’re getting for what appears to be the most serious nuclear accident since Chernobyl.  Trump’s response was of course a tweet with a brag “The United States is learning much from the failed missile explosion in Russia, We have similar, though more advanced, technology. The Russian 'Skyfall' explosion has people worried about the air around the facility, and far beyond. Not good!"  The tweeter in chief also responded to the escalating unrest and mass demonstrations in Hong Kong first by saying “The Hong Kong thing is a very tough situation. Very tough. We’ll see what happens. But I’m sure it’ll work out.” He added: “I hope it works out for everybody, including China. I hope it works out peacefully. I hope nobody gets hurt. I hope nobody gets killed.” He later tweeted that intelligence reports indicated that China’s government “is moving troops to the Border with Hong Kong.”  In contrast, former VP Joe Biden tweeted “The brave protestors in Hong Kong are demanding the rights and freedoms promised to them.  The US should be leading the free world to rally support behind them and, with one voice, defend our shared democratic ideals and the desire for liberty that beats in every heart.  As the day wore on a number of other prominent politicians including Speaker Pelosi, Republican Minority leader Kevin McCarthy and many of the other Democratic candidates for president weighed in with tweets more similar to Biden’s than to Trump’s whose comments were criticized, by those willing to criticize, as more of that “both sides” stuff.  As to Trump he did postpone some of his planned tariffs on Chinese goods, an admission that tariffs are essentially taxes on US consumers and he doesn’t want “his” consumers paying more for the types of things they are likely to buy for Christmas.  By pushing tariffs off for a while he’s ensuring that the prices for items  like video games, laptops, toys and cell phones stay put until after the holiday season.

2020:  As of now Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, Kamala Harris, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, Beto O’Rourke, Amy Klobuchar and Andrew Yang have qualified for the September presidential debates with Julian Castro, Tom Steyer, and Tulsi Gabbard getting closer to meeting the polling and money raising criteria.  Many Democrats, including most notably Montana Governor Steve Bullock, are criticizing the DNC’s debate qualification criteria, pointing out that allowing billionaire candidates to game the system by spending huge amounts of money buying the necessary small ticket donations required is preposterous.  Bullock has a point but as of now there is no indication that the DNC plans to make any changes.  As to those candidates, reports are that former Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper is seriously considering dropping out of the presidential race to run for the Senate against vulnerable Colorado Republican Cory Gardner.  Additionally, though he’s still in the presidential race and has qualified for the September debate, the Houston Chronicle ran an editorial calling for Beto O’Rourke to run for John Cornyn’s Texas Senate seat saying that since he has no chance at winning the Democratic nomination the “Democratic star should end his presidential campaign and focus on running for Senate...again. The reason? Texas needs you."  They have a point, the Democrats need to loosen Mitch McConnell’s reins and the only way to do that is by winning back the Senate.  In other Democratic news, Georgia’s Stacey Abrams has finally ruled out a presidential run, instead she’s focusing her efforts on countering voter suppression, and no one knows more about voter suppression than Abrams.

Epstein Saga:  Attorney General Barr has replaced the warden overseeing the Manhattan Detention facility and has had the two guards who were sleeping while on duty instead of keeping their eyes on Jeffrey Epstein put on temporary suspension.  Nevertheless Barr who should recuse himself from the investigation has not.

Statue of Liberty No More

Tired and Poor:  So much for those huddled masses yearning to be free.  Yesterday, the Trump administration made it clear that they’re not just against illegal immigration, they’re against all immigration, or at least immigration by people who aren’t rich and white.  None of this should be all that surprising to anyone who has paid any attention to Trump immigration guru Stephen Miller or to Trump himself who previously stated that he would prefer that most if not all immigrants come from Norway.  Under the new rule, which will almost certainly be immediately litigated, poor immigrants will be denied permanent status and green cards if they are deemed likely to use government benefit programs such as food stamps and subsidized housing. Wealthier immigrants, who are designated as less likely to require public assistance, will be able to obtain a green card.  The rule would not apply to people who already have their green cards, to certain members of the military, to refugees and asylum-seekers, to pregnant women and children, or to beneficiaries of CHIP, the children’s health program used by the “working poor.”  The CHIP exemption was a last minute add-in, part of an attempt to make the new rule more palatable. The bottom line, is that if you are hoping to ever become a citizen but run into hard times while you’re climbing out of poverty, you’d better stay away from using most of the safety net programs because if you do, you’ll jeopardize your chances of ever getting a green card, and if that involves you or your kids going hungry or staying sick, so be it.  When asked by a CBS reporter if Emma Lazarus’ poem would be removed from the base of the Statue of Liberty, a stone faced Ken Cuccinelli, the hard line Acting Director of US Citizenship and Immigration, responded  “I do not think by any means we are ready to take anything off the Statue of Liberty,” but that didn’t stop a very gleeful Stephen Miller from running off in search of a really big eraser. Proving that rich people are still welcome, despite pushback from some members of congress from both parties, the administration is likely to advocate for the renewal of the EB-5 visa program, which allows rich foreigners, largely investors from China, Taiwan and South Korea,  to get a permanent visa in exchange for making an investment of at least $500,000 in an American business. Yesterday, Vanity Fair reported that Stephen Ross’ Related Companies businesses are among the largest users of the EB-5 program,  a cheap source of capital for his large real estate projects, which may well explain how he justified throwing that big Hamptons fund raiser for Trump last week despite his assertion that he isn’t always in agreement with Trump and his policies.  The Trump administration didn’t just go after undesirable immigrants yesterday, it also decided that the time was right to change how it implements the Endangered Species Act, making it easier for oil companies, real estate interests and the agriculture industry to develop land inhabited by vulnerable wildlife.  The revisions which were the brainchild of Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, who previously lobbied on behalf of oil and agriculture sectors, are intended to prevent the Fish and Wildlife Service from automatically offering endangered species protections to wildlife classified as “threatened” and minimizing its consideration of climate change when analyzing a species. Because who cares about extinction anyway and climate change is just one of those socialist/liberal myths, right?

The Epstein Saga:  Despite Q Anon conspiracy theorists claims that Jeffrey Epstein is now hiding out with Elvis and JFK Jr, however he got there, he’s still very much dead.  That said the investigation into all things Epstein remains very much alive.  Though he failed to mention that as Attorney General he is actually in charge of the Bureau of Prisons,  William Barr told a law enforcement group in New Orleans that he was “appalled and frankly angry to learn of the Metropolitan Correctional Center’s failure to adequately secure” Epstein.  Moving to the royal we, he went on to say that “we are now learning of serious irregularities at this facility that are deeply concerning and demand a thorough investigation."  It turns out that due to a Trump administration imposed hiring freeze and funding cuts the facility was woefully underfunded and lacked adequate staffing. That could explain why one of the people who was supposed to, but didn’t, regularly check in on Epstein wasn’t even a prison guard but had been detailed from his regular job to work a mandated extra shift and the other was a guard who had worked five double shifts in a row. Referring to the Epstein case, Barr also said that "this sex trafficking case was very important to DOJ and me personally, the FBI and office of DOJ Inspector General will get to the bottom of what happened and there will be accountability," and we know how reliable Barr can be, right?  Anyway, to that end, yesterday a team of FBI agents were seen landing at Epstein’s Virgin Island hideaway, it’s anyone’s guess what they’ll find there but James Stewart, the investigative journalist, not the long dead “It’s a Wonderful Life” actor, thinks they’ll find “dirt on powerful people,” at least that’s what Epstein told him during a meeting the two had at Epstein’s NY mansion last year.  During that meeting, in a room covered with pictures of him with such notables as Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Bill Clinton, Epstein refused to talk about whether or not he was advising Tesla’s Elon Musk, which was the purported reason for the meeting, but instead the unrepentant Epstein defended his behavior saying that “criminalizing sex with teenage girls was a cultural aberration and that at times in history it was perfectly acceptable. He pointed out that homosexuality had long been considered a crime and was still punishable by death in some parts of the world.”  With Epstein out of the picture, the focus will now shift to his posse, the women, most notably Ghislaine Maxwell, who helped him recruit young girls into his lair, and his finances. Due to his death, the non-disclosure agreements signed by Epstein’s employees and some of his victims are no longer valid so more details regarding his seedy life and his compatriots are likely to come out.  Additionally, some more victims are expected to come forward, helped by a new law due to go into effect in New York this week.  That law provides a one year window allowing adults who were sexually abused as children to file lawsuits against their abusers even if the statue of limitations for their cases had previously expired.  Anyone and everyone with a case against Epstein is expected to try to get a share of his substantial assets.  A number of people who hung with Epstein appear to be very concerned, it’s reported that L Brands billionaire Leslie Wexner has hired prominent criminal defense attorney Mary Jo White, once the chair of the SEC and now at Debevoise & Plimpton, and that two of Epstein’s long term lawyers, Darren Indyke and Jeffrey Schantz who were responsible for setting up his complicated financial arrangements have recently hired criminal defense lawyers of their own.  Epstein is dead but he is most certainly not forgotten.

Fred and Barney?

BINGO:  If you had Jeffrey Epstein committing suicide on your Trump Bingo Card, you’re a winner.  I’ll admit that I was one of those people who thought that Epstein’s first attempt was just his way of trying to get himself out on bail or at the very least into a less awful prison setting than a genuine attempt to off himself, still it’s unimaginable that prison authorities didn’t have him under twenty-four hour watch given his prior attempt, the incidence of suicide among accused pedophiles, the prominence of the people who he could have implicated and the arrangement agreed to between the Justice officials overseeing his case and prison authorities.  That deal mandated that Epstein have a cellmate and that he be checked on every thirty minutes.  Well, he didn’t have a cellmate nor was he checked in on regularly.  The Epstein saga is prime grist for conspiracy theorists abound, so while it’s despicable, it’s not all that surprising that Trump, the conspiracist-in-chief, retweeted one particularly noxious one assigning the blame for Epstein’s demise on Bill Clinton, who like Trump is rumored to have been a beneficiary of Epstein’s “largesse.” It is worth noting that the 2000 pages of previously sealed testimony released late last week included a statement by Virginia Giuffre, one of Epstein’s accusers, that though she had been “gifted out” to a number of Epstein’s friends, including among others Prince Andrew, Alan Dershowitz, former New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell and Hedge Fund master of the universe Glenn Dubin, who is now married to one of Jeff Epstein’s former girlfriends, she never had any physical contact with either Trump or Clinton. Of course Kellyanne Conway, the Trump spokesperson who continues to decline further and further into the pits of Hell defended Trump’s Clinton accusation, saying that he merely wants “everything to be investigated” and if that involves throwing mud at a Clinton or two, even better.  As to that investigation, we should all take great solace in knowing that Attorney General Barr whose father advanced Epstein’s career by hiring him to teach at the prestigious Dalton School even though he was a college dropout was “appalled” by Epstein’s apparent suicide and is now overseeing an inquiry into his death.  Senator Ben Sasse, who when he isn’t voting for Trump’s judicial nominees and tax cuts pretends to be outraged about Trump’s contribution to the country’s moral decline demanded that Barr’s investigation be thorough saying that heads should roll and that people should be be fired for allowing the Epstein suicide to take place. In any case though the criminal case against Epstein is now kaput, the civil cases will continue and a conspiracy case against one or more of Epstein’s abettors is expected to continue as well.  Though it’s highly likely that she’ll conclude that Epstein did commit suicide, late yesterday the medical examiner responsible for Epstein’s autopsy said that she wasn’t ready to state the official cause of death yet likely because she is still waiting for some lab results.  As to those conspiracy theories, forget about the Clintons, there are so many other places to point the finger including Trump who tends to blame others for things he’s done, MI 6 on behalf of the Royal family who can’t be all that happy about the very credible Prince Andrew stories, or even a rogue Mossad agent on behalf of former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, another one of those people who has been caught up in the Epstein web. The list goes on and on.  As to hateful retweets, Trump who is supposedly upset about all those commentators and candidates calling him a racist hasn’t just been busy on the Epstein front, he’s also been actively retweeting missives from Katie Hopkins, a far-right British commentator who has made denunciations of migrants and Muslims a “staple of her public discourse.” British headlines routinely label Hopkins a “racist” and a “bigot” for her views about immigrants and if you want to convince people that you’re not a racist, you should retweet racist stuff, right? As to that whole racist thing, as well as Trump’s sanity or lack thereof, he appears to have lost the support or the support for now of communication director for eleven days Anthony Scaramucci.  Over the weekend the Mooch, who really should be irrelevant but for some inexplicable reason isn’t, told Axios that said the current state of affairs in Washington is like "the early episodes of 'Chernobyl' on HBO, where the reactor is melting down and the apparatchiks are trying to figure out whether to cover it up or start the clean-up process." He added that he and other Republican supporters would consider finding a replacement candidate ahead of the presidential elections if Trump "doesn't reform his behavior."  Nice, but makes one wonder why it took Scaramucci so long to realize that “eventually” Trump “turns on everyone and soon it will be you and then the entire country.”

Cruelty Update:  Trump admitted that the raids on the Mississippi plants, the ones that resulted in the round up of 680 undocumented migrants, a few of whom were actually legal and many others who were already wearing INS issued ankle bracelets, were done mostly to scare the crap out of other “illegals” around the country.  Despite the number of children who were terrorized by the raids, Trump was pleased with the way they were carried out and wants everyone to know that many more similar raids are in the works.  Last week the Washington Post’s David Farenthold reported that Trump’s various real estate businesses continue to knowingly rely on the services of a number of undocumented migrants who make up a skilled group of workers known as the Los Picapiedros (the Flintstones) because they  build and repair fountains and waterfalls, sidewalks and rock walls at the company’s winery and its golf courses.  When asked why neither the Trump family businesses nor the Mississippi businesses were being targeted for employing “illegals” both Mark Morgan, the acting head of Border Patrol, and Kevin McAleenan, the acting head of Homeland Security hedged and hawed and said that maybe there were investigations going on that the public doesn’t know about, pretty much an admission that no one in the Homeland universe really cares about what’s going on in Trump’s businesses nor do they have much of an interest in going after any of the businesses employing undocumented migrants because if they do, how will they be able to justify ignoring Trump’s violations?  Both officials defended the Mississippi raids and claimed that the press was exaggerating the impact of the raids on the affected children because who cares if little Latino kids are terrorized anyway?  Mark Morgan saw nothing wrong with the raids going forward while El Paso was still burying those killed in the Latino targeted murder spree but Kevin McAleenan acknowledged the timing was “unfortunate.” He’ll probably be fired for that admission shortly.

Other News:  Trump raised $12 million during his Hamptons sojourn.  While hobnobbing with the Republican elites, he made fun of Stephen Ross’ Equinox “problem,” dissed South Koreans but talked again about his fine relationship with pen pal Kim Jong un of North Korea who despite their close friendship continues to shoot off missiles.  Trump also asserted that he is for background checks for gun owners, something that he’s promised before but then reneged on.  Something awful is going on in Russia beyond the crackdown on dissidents.  Apparently they had some kind of radiation leak after work on their newest nuclear weaponry went awry, we know that because a few scientists have died, people in the affected area are lining up to buy iodine and the government kind of admitted that something happened.  Things aren’t going all that well in Hong Kong either where residents continue to demonstrate against Chinese oversight.  This morning all flights into and out of Hong Kong’s busy airport were cancelled.  Not to worry about any of this though, Trump who is now on vacation, is focused on more important things like tweet slamming the Mooch and complaining about “Little” Donny Deutsche’s newish MSNBC program that he claims he only accidentally watched.

Soulless

Human Resources:  Former Acting FBI Head Andrew McCabe who was fired by the Trump administration just hours before he would have qualified for his pension is now suing the FBI and the Justice Department for wrongful dismissal. McCabe who authorized the investigation into Trump, his ties to Russia and his obstruction of justice, alleges he was illegally demoted and fired as part of a plot by Trump to remove those who were not politically loyal to him. The suit singles out former Attorney General Sessions and FBI Director Christopher Wray, who it claims “knowingly acted in furtherance of Trump’s plan and scheme, with knowledge that they were implementing Trump’s unconstitutional motivations for removing Plaintiff from the civil service.”  Given that virtually all of the senior members of the FBI team responsible for the Russia investigation have been removed, McCabe’s claims are not farfetched, it’s not clear that he will has any chance of winning but the lawsuit could get very interesting especially if certain people named Trump are called in to testify. Peter Strzok, the “sexting” FBI agent who was also forced out of the FBI filed his own wrongful dismissal suit earlier this week.  Though she isn’t suing, Sue Gordon, the highly respected Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence who has served in the CIA and in other intelligence positions for more than thirty years submitted her resignation to Trump yesterday.  She plans to depart on August 15, the same day that her boss Dan Coats, the current Director of National Intelligence, will be leaving his post.  She delivered a respectful handwritten note to Trump that acknowledged that she’s being pushed out by saying that she was resigning “out of respect and patriotism, not preference.” By law Gordon was supposed to be elevated to the acting Director of National Intelligence position while Trump seeks a replacement for Coats however since Trump views her as a part of the deep state, someone actually bold enough to speak truth to power, he had made it clear that he didn’t want her moving into that role, even temporarily, because among other things he doesn’t want to hear that North Korea continues to amass nukes or that Russia is continuing to engage in election interference. Gordon’s forced departure is quite concerning to those who actually care more about national security than pleasing Trump.  Senator Burr, the Republican head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, who helped put the kibosh on the nomination of Trump’s first choice to replace Coats, the woefully underqualified Trump toady, Congressman Ratcliffe, called her departure a significant loss.  House Intelligence Chair Adam Schiff went further, calling her departure a “devastating loss.” For the time being Trump has appointed Joseph Maguire, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, as the acting director. Maguire is credible but has far less relevant experience.  Tucker Carlson probably still has his job at Fox but he’s gone fishing, really gone fishing.  Though he claims that his vacation had been previously planned, he may have been asked to get lost for a while in response to a few too many nightly diatribes in which he asserted that the whole white supremacy thing is a hoax, particularly offensive in light of the El Paso murder spree committed by an assailant with stated views about all those brown “replacement” people, views that closely mirror Trump’s campaign rally speeches.  Planned or not, Fox does have a tendency to push its commentators to take vacations when their punditry goes too far off their very broad rails; last year Laura Ingraham was send on a temporary hiatus after mocking a Parkland survivor and the year before Sean Hannity was forced into a penalty vacation for propagating the false Seth Rich conspiracy theory, the one where he knowingly pushed the phony narrative that the young DNC worker had been killed by a Hillary hired assassin, a claim that tortured his already distraught parents.  Sadly, with the exception of Bill O’Reilly, Fox’s vacationers tend to return.  Though he has no plans to return to Washington during August, Senate Majority Leader Moscow/NRA/Mitch signaled that he might be open to some kind of gun control legislation by telling a Kentucky radio host that a measure expanding background checks to all gun purchasers would be “front and center” when the Senate comes back into session next month.  He went on to say that “There is a lot of support for that,” he also said that the discussion would also encompass so-called red flag legislation that would make it easier to seize firearms from people deemed dangerous. Still this is Mitch McConnell, he’s a wizard of manipulation, the words “front and center” are far from a commitment so he might just be lifting hopes for progress that he will later quash.  In any case he cites concerns that Democrats would use an August session for grandstanding as one of the reasons that he has no plans to cancel his summer vacation.  In other news, yesterday, a man with a loaded rifle and 100 rounds of ammunition walked into a Walmart in Missouri, “alarming” shoppers before he was arrested.

The Road to Impeachment:  Yesterday House Judiciary Chair Jerry Nadler confirmed that the Judiciary Committee is conducting an impeachment inquiry adding that a decision will be made by the end of the year on whether to refer articles of impeachment to the House floor.  His statement is consistent with the contents of a lawsuit that the Judiciary Committee filed on Wednesday in an attempt to force former White House counsel Donald McGahn to testify before Congress. That lawsuit asks a federal judge to strike down the Trump administration’s claim that top presidential aides are “absolutely immune” from its subpoenas. The court filing identifies McGahn as “the most important witness, other than Trump, to the key events” at the center of the investigation into obstruction of justice going on to say that “The Judiciary Committee is now determining whether to recommend articles of impeachment against the president based on the obstructive conduct described by the special counsel but it cannot fulfill this most solemn constitutional responsibility without hearing testimony from a crucial witness to these events.” Impeachment is a process and the process is underway.  

Mississippi Burning:  Around 300 of the 680 workers rounded up by the INS at several Mississippi manufacturing plants have been released, some with ankle bracelets to insure that they show up for future immigration hearings.  At least one of the workers hauled in was actually an American citizen, but no matter, he was tasered when he tried to point that out to the INS agents.  As of now no one  from any of the companies that hired the workers has been arrested even though it’s clear that they knew that their workers were undocumented and may well have turned them in in exchange for leniency for illegally hiring them in the first place.  It’s also not clear why anyone at the Department of Homeland Security thought it was okay to proceed with the “pre-planned” raids just days after the targeted murder of Hispanic Americans in El Paso.  Yesterday a truly heart wrenching video of eleven year old Magdalena Gomez sobbing while begging for the release of her parents went viral.  In it she is shaking convulsively while calling out Mr. Trump “my dad is not a criminal.”  Makes you wonder if real estate investor, Equinox/SoulCycle owner Stephen Ross, who reportedly is upset about all the attention that he’s been getting but still plans to host his Hamptons fundraiser for Trump today anyway, has a soul. I think we know the answer to that.      

Soul Recycling

Split Screens:  The consoler in chief went to Dayton and El Paso yesterday but failed to do much consoling.  Trump was greeted a little more warmly in Dayton than in El Paso, where none of the hospitalized victims had any interest in meeting him although two released ones did come to the hospital to shake his hand.  Although Trump had promised to behave, of course he didn’t.  He started his day by slamming Beto O’Rourke and by the time the day ended he had trashed Ohio’s Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown, Mayor Nan Whaley of Dayton, the Castro Brothers, and assortment of people from El Paso, Joe Biden and Democrats in general.  Trump’s snide comments about Brown and Whaley were particularly unwarranted since the two actually complimented his and Melania’s respectful treatment of the Ohio patients and said that he had been well received.  Press Secretary for now Stephanie Grisham’s chief complaint about Brown and Whaley’s comments was that they hadn’t adequately described how happy the patients were to meet her exalted leader.  Doubling down Dan Scavino Trump’s Director of Social Media, tweeted “Very SAD to see Ohio Senator Brown, & Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley - LYING & completely mischaracterizing what took place w/ the President’s visit to Miami Valley Hospital today. They are disgraceful politicians, doing nothing but politicizing a mass shooting, at every turn they can..”.  He then went on to insist that Trump had been treated like a “rock star,” his way of confirming what we all know, the day was about Trump and not about the victims of the two traumatic mass shootings.  That was further confirmed after Trump’s team released a video of him meeting and greeting “fans” in Ohio.  As to the twin Castro brothers, presidential candidate Julian and his Congressman brother Joaquin, they came in for particular criticism after Joaquin tweeted out some public information listing the names of several of Trump’s large San Antonio area donors, his message to them was that given Trump’s anti-Hispanic messaging they should think twice before donating to his campaign. He was accused of doxing the donors even though he included no phone numbers or addresses and was just retweeting data collated and previously released by the progressive advocacy group Indivisible. During the day a number of Democratic candidates took to the airwaves and/or delivered some previously planned speeches, all of which were retooled to incorporate references to the weekend’s murder sprees and Trump’s racist tendencies, well the racist stuff had probably already been baked in to their speeches.  Cory Booker spoke in Charleston at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, the site where a white supremacist shot and killed nine black worshippers in 2015.  During his speech he blamed Trump for “sowing” the kind of hatred that inspires white supremacists to murder, citing Trump and the El Paso shooter’s not so coincidental  use of the term invasion to describe migrants crossing into the US from Mexico.  In a speech delivered in Iowa former VP Joe Biden accused Trump of fanning the “flames of white supremacy” going on to say that though he “eagerly attacks Islamic terrorism, he can barely bring himself to use the words ‘white supremacy.’ And even when he says it, he doesn’t appear to believe it. He seems more concerned about losing their votes than beating back this hateful ideology.” Biden was spot on, in both content and delivery, so much better he’s been during his somewhat anemic debate performances.  A number of other candidates including Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Amy Klobuchar and Ohio Congressman Tim Ryan also spoke out but not before Trump and his echo chamber questioned why Bernie and Warren weren’t being blamed for the Dayton shooting citing some reports that the Dayton shooter was a fan but failing to note that neither Bernie nor Warren espouse racial hatred.  Ryan is now participating in a caravan heading towards neighboring state Kentucky, toward the home of Moscow/NRA Mitch McConnell, to press the case for gun control legislation.  As to gun control legislation, though a number of Republican politicians seem to be waking up to the need to do something and Mike DeWine, the Republican Governor of Ohio, has revealed his 17 point plan, few seem all that interested in passing anything more substantive than “red flag” laws.  At the end of the day even the background check legislation previously proposed by Senators Manchin and Toomey which is now back on the table will probably go nowhere because despite all the rhetoric, Trump is still listening to his NRA friends and Mitch McConnell remains firmly in the pocket of gun advocates.  As a side note,  the embattled NRA Chief Wayne LaPierre who appears to be coated in some of that very protective Trump Teflon, came under fire again yesterday after records uncovered by New York State’s Attorney General, who has been investigating the NRA’s tax exempt status, revealed that he tried to get Ackerman McQueen, the  NRA’s former advertising firm to finagle the purchase of a $6 million mansion in a highly desirable gated golf resort community on his behalf to protect him from all of those angry Parkland protestors, you know those “irrational” students and families who lost their classmates and children to an automatic gun toting murderer.  While Trump was on the road pretending to be caring and unbiased, INS authorities arrested nearly 700 peopole at seven agricultural processing plants across Mississippi in what officials described as the largest worksite enforcement operation in a single state.  Yesterday was the first day of school in Mississippi, it’s not clear why anyone thought that arresting parents, few if any of whom had criminal records, on the first day of school so that their children could arrive home to empty homes was a good idea, particularly following last week’s racially motivated El Paso shooting.  In other deportation news, Jimmy Aldaoud, a 41 year old man that the Trump administration had forcefully deported to Iraq a couple of months ago died on Tuesday. He was born in Greece, had been in the US since early childhood and had never been to Iraq. He knew no one there. He did not speak Arabic.  It appears that he died because he had been unable to obtain insulin to treat his diabetes in Iraq. The cruelty is the point.

Namaste:  Earlier in the week Jon Huntsman, the US Ambassador to Russia, announced that he is jumping ship something we knew was coming because Trump reportedly discussed the need for a new ambassador during his last call with his buddy Putin.  Kimberly Breier, who has served as the assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere since October, has resigned, leaving a key vacancy at the top of the diplomatic office in charge of efforts to control immigration from Mexico and Central America and to build stronger partnerships in South America.  Though the official reason for Beier’s departure is that perenial favorite “personal reasons,” that’s just more Trumpian bunk, the word is that she’s leaving because she’s fed up with dealing with Stephen Miller, Trump’s not so charming immigration guru. Lastly, Stephen Ross, the wealthy real estate developer and majority owner of The Related Companies, who also owns the Miami Dolphins and the Equinox/SoulCycle/Pure Yoga gym conglomerate, is hosting a high end fundraiser for his good buddy Trump tomorrow in Bridgehampton because though he hates Trump’s racist rhetoric and wants us all to know that he’s “never been bashful about expressing” his opinions to Trump he really loves the way Trump’s tax code treats real estate assets and you know money trumps morality.  

The Replacements

Road Trip:  Trump is off to El Paso and Dayton today to embrace law enforcements officials for their bravery and to express his condolences to the families of those who died in last week’s murder sprees.  To put it mildly, neither cities’ leaders seem all that enthused about his visit. Dayton’s Democratic Mayor Nan Whaley has been pretty outspoken about her views and though El Paso’s Republican Mayor Dee Margo (yesterday I mislabeled him as a Democrat) has been a little more muted, he too has expressed reservations.  Also, he’s still waiting for Trump’s campaign team to reimburse the city for the $500,000 they owe from their last visit.  After the White House rebuffed her efforts to speak directly to Trump, Veronica Escobar, El Paso’s Congresswoman, declined an invitation  to participate in Trump’s visit saying that she refuses “to be an accessory” and “to join without a dialogue about the pain his racist and hateful words and actions have caused our community and country.” As to those hateful messages, the diatribe posted on the 8Chain website by the El Paso shooter included a lot of Trump’s usual talking points about invading hordes and other such things.  The shooter appears to be a believer in the white supremacist, anti-Semitic  “replacement theory,” that claims Jews are conspiring to replace white people with brown people in part by funding all those “Mexican caravans”  that Trump cites when he’s in fearmongering mode.  The replacement theory crap is the source of the hateful “Jews will not replace us” mantra that was chanted by those neo-Nazis and “other fine people” during their march through Charlottesville, the march that ended with the murder of Heather Styer.  Trump has already gone off message, last night he tweet attacked former Congressman El Paso, current presidential Beto O’Rourke saying “Beto (phony name to indicate Hispanic heritage) O’Rourke, who is embarrassed by my last visit to the Great State of Texas, where I trounced him, and is now even more embarrassed by polling at 1% in the Democrat Primary, should respect the victims & law enforcement - & be quiet!” For the record, O’Rourke has been called Beto since he was a child to distinguish him from his father, both of whom are named Robert.  On the gun control front,Trump insists that by backing a minor fix to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System and administratively banning bump stocks his administration has done ”much more than most” to help curb mass shootings, however, that’s just more bunk. The reality is that his administration has actually eased gun restrictions, implementing more than half a dozen policy changes that expand access to guns by lifting firearms bans in certain locations and limiting the names on the national database.  Additionally, his administration has asked the Supreme Court to overturn NYC’s restrictions on transporting handguns outside of home and it pushed to allow US gunmakers to more easily sell guns including automatic weapons overseas. On the Congressional front since last weekend’s shootings there’s been a lot of talk but still no action.  Moscow/NRA Mitch continues to refuse to bring the Senate back from its August break, Lindsey Graham, the Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, continues to insist that assault weapons and oversized magazines aren’t the problem and is instead focused on “red flag” legislation that would help states keep guns out of the hands of those who present an imminent threat to themselves or others and Mike Turner, the Republican Congressman representing the Dayton area now says that he backs a ban on sales of military style guns, magazine limits and “red flag” legislation, notable because last year Turner, who has, or at least until now had a prized NRA “A” rating, opposed any restrictions on assault weapons.  As to that “red flag” legislation, its mostly just low hanging fruit, better than nothing but hard to administer and won’t do much to keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of dangerous people, although, if passed the legislation will allow all those NRA fearing politicians to say that they did something. It would be nice to believe that we’ve finally reached an inflection point on gun legislation, but don’t count on it.   

2020:  The post-debate polls are in and despite a few better than average performances nothing much has changed.  According to Quinnipiac former VP Joe Biden is hanging in the lead with 32 percent of Democratic voters, followed by Elizabeth Warren, who has moved up a little to 21 percent, Bernie at 14 percent and Kamala who’s slipped back to 7 percent.  They’re followed by Mayor Pete with 5 percent and Beto and Cory Booker each with 2 percent. Senator Amy Klobuchar, Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, former HUD Secretary Julian Castro and entrepreneur Andrew Yang register at 1 percent – with everybody else at less than one percent.  So far Biden, Booker, Buttigieg, Harris, Klobuchar, O’Rourke, Sanders, and Warren have qualified  to participate in the next round of debates.  Yang, Castro, and Gabbard, who appears to be getting some of her  contributions from Republican donors and the social media support of a number of Russian bots, have reached the September debate fundraising threshold but still need to do better in a few more polls to qualify for the stage.  Though he’s still running for president, Colorado’s John Hickenlooper, is hedging his bets by positioning himself for a Colorado Senate run, a good thing because winning the Senate and displacing Moscow Mitch is almost as important as winning the presidency.     

Litigation:  Peter Strzok, the “sexting” FBI agent with the otherwise impressive record of service who was fired last year is now suing the FBI and the Justice Department for  violating his First and Fifth Amendment rights by firing him over the texts and then depriving him of due process to challenge his expulsion. Further Strzok argues that the Justice Department’s decision to release his texts to reporters before handing them to Congress, generated “blaring headlines” and was “deliberate and unlawful,” a violation of the Privacy Act.  His lawyers also point out that despite recommendations that she be fired over her multiple Hatch Act violation, that Kellyanne Conway still has her job is proof of his unfair treatment.  The Barr/Trump Justice Department has weighed in on Trump’s side by filing a friend of the court brief that argues that the House Oversight Committee hasn’t adequately clarified why they need the Trump Organization financials that they are seeking from the Mazars accounting firm.  Lastly, yesterday the Trump campaign and the Republican Party sued California over a new law requiring presidential candidates to release their tax returns to run in the state's primary.  What is in those tax returns?

Supremacist in Chief Speaks

Gunsmoke:  Teleprompter Trump stepped to the podium yesterday to deliver one of his more somber speeches, his response to the weekend shootings in El Paso and Dayton only he erroneously referred instead to Toledo, a mistake that anyone could make because how many coast denizens are all that up on Ohio geography anyway and one that would have been easier to forgive if he had only given up that Sunday golf game in a show of real concern.  As to the speech, despite his early morning tweet calling for stronger background checks in exchange for immigration legislation, Trump avoided both issues and instead stuck to the usual NRA approved talking points.  Ignoring his campaign’s own divisive internet ad campaign, the one that’s been amplifying claims of an invasion from Mexico, Trump blamed the weekend shootings on the perils of internet and social media and then went on to site “gruesome and grisly” video games, a “culture that celebrates violence” and called for taking firearms away from people found to be mentally ill even going so far as to call for the involuntary confinement of people at risk of committing violence because “Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun” and who cares about civil rights anyway? For the record, virtually everyone in Japan is into video games, yet almost no one dies from gun violence there because Japan has strict gun control laws and other countries have just as many people who suffer from mental illness but again, since most countries have strict restrictions against gun ownership and few of the mentally ill are actually homicidal maniacs mass murder rates abroad are dramatically lower than ours.  For the record, last year Trump and the Republican controlled House and Senate loosened restrictions that kept people with records of mental illness from buying guns but who’s counting.  Trump also called for a bipartisan effort to do something, but only a little, his way of ignoring that Speaker Pelosi’s House has already passed two gun control bills, bills that Senate Majority Leader McConnell, A/K/A NRA Mitch, has refused to bring to the Senate floor.  In response to Trump’s newest mandate NRA Mitch dialed in from Kentucky where he is recovering from his shoulder injury alongside Kentucky’s other Senator Rand Paul who is recovering from the removal of a section of his lung, a consequence of having been beaten to smithereens by his neighbor. What is it with Kentucky?  McConnell ignored calls to cancel the Senate’s August recess but did appoint three Republican Senators, Tennessee’s Lamar Alexander, South Carolina’s Lindsey Graham and Mississippi’s Roger Wicker to “engage in bipartisan discussions of potential solutions to help protect our communities without infringing on Americans’ constitutional rights” whatever that means.  Oh, and for good measure, Trump, who white supremacists and racists everywhere see as their guiding light, also disingenuously condemned white supremacism, at least for now, mostly because a few aides including first daughter Ivanka and son in law Jared thought it would be a good idea for him to do that.  Most Republicans remained in witness protection mode though Senators Susan Collins of Maine, Mike Braun of Indiana and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania all said that an already proposed bill to expand background checks for gun purchases should be brought to a vote.  Democrats remained outraged, especially the ones running for President.  Beto O’Rourke, the most personally affected by the increasing death toll in El Paso, showed some of that genuine emotion that almost propelled him to a Texas Senate win last year.  When he was asked another question by the press about what Trump could do now, he responded “What do you think? You know the sh-t that he’s been saying. He’s been calling Mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. I don’t know, like, members of the press: What the f-ck?”  Kamala Harris called Trump out for playing golf while “blood was streaming” and while mangling the locations of the two murder sprees Joe Biden still managed to exude enough genuine heartfelt compassion to compensate for his flub. He also called for a national gun buyback program.  As to McConnell though he’s in too much “pain” to travel to Washington, his Senate campaign operation has been very busy showing off his true evil nature.  For some reason they thought it was a good time to send out a picture of a graveyard with tombstones including the names of Amy McGrath, one of his potential opponents, and Merrick Garland, the justice whose nomination to the Supreme Court he proudly thwarted.  That picture came to light on the same day that another one depicting several very white young men wearing Team Mitch T’s and mauling a life-sized cut out of Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez went viral on twitter.  That Moscow Mitch is such a charmer. Trump plans to visit both El Paso and Dayton (or maybe Toledo) later this week despite indications from both cities’ Democratic mayors that few of their residents are all that eager to meet him right now. FlightAware reported that a White House plane headed out to El Paso on Sunday night to start prepping for the visit, the advance team assignment probably includes busing in some Trump supporters from neighboring towns.  Maybe Diamond and Silk will be asked to show up as well?  It’s not just Trump who’s taking heat right now, after the NY Times print editor tweeted out an early preview of today’s edition with the headline “Trump Urges Unity Against Racism,” the paper was subjected to so much criticism for mischaracterizing both Trump’s speech and the actual content of their story by readers who called for them to do better “because people are actually dying” that they changed the headline to  “Assailing Hate But Not Guns.”           

      

Free Falling:  Escalating the trade war with the US, China devalued its currency yesterday, which explains yesterday’s bigly stock market drop. China also suspended all US agricultural imports.  Echoing warnings from many economic prognosticators,  Bloomberg News warned that the “eruption in the U.S.-China trade” dispute has now pushed a widely watched Treasury-market recession indicator, the yield-curve inversion (when long term interest rates are lower than short term rates), to the highest alert since 2007.  In other news, the US announced a total economic embargo against Venezuela, freezing all of the government’s assets as part of Trump’s continued push for regime change, things continue to deteriorate in Hong Kong, India is playing with fire in Kashmir and I think North Korea shot off a few more missiles, it’s hard to keep count.