Wednesday, June 07, 2017 9:27:54 PM
Republican Congressman on Suspected Islamic Radicals: "Kill Them All"
Rep. Clay Higgins declares, "All of Christendom…is at war with Islamic horror."
Jun. 5, 2017
In response to the London terror attack, Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) had an extreme proposal: kill anyone suspected of being an Islamic radical.
On his campaign Faceboook page, Higgins, a former police officer, posted this message:
"The free world…all of Christendom…is at war with Islamic horror. Not one penny of American treasure should be granted to any nation who harbors these heathen animals. Not a single radicalized Islamic suspect should be granted any measure of quarter. Their intended entry to the American homeland should be summarily denied. Every conceivable measure should be engaged to hunt them down. Hunt them, identity them, and kill them. Kill them all. For the sake of all that is good and righteous. Kill them all."
[...]
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/06/republican-congressman-clay-higgins-suspected-islamic-radicals-kill-them-all [with comments]
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London Bridge attacker Khuram Butt had argued with anti-extremist Muslims
Khuram Butt in the Channel 4 documentary The Jihadis Next Door.
Islamist agitator abused campaigners as ‘traitors’ and ‘apostates’ while mosque secretary reported him at least three times over violent views
6 June 2017
The London Bridge killer Khuram Butt [ https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/05/london-bridge-attacker-named-as-khuram-butt ] was embroiled in two heated confrontations with fellow Muslims who challenged his extremist mindset, it has emerged.
Butt called a community cohesion campaigner a “traitor” and had a “violent scuffle” with a member of an anti-extremism campaign group, while the secretary of a mosque said the Muslim community in east London had reported him to authorities at least three times.
As a clearer picture of Butt as an Islamist agitator emerged so did details of his childhood, with some reports suggesting the sudden death of his father could have propelled him towards radicalisation.
Mohammed Shafiq, the chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, said on Tuesday he was verbally abused by Butt in 2013 the day after the soldier Lee Rigby was murdered in broad daylight [ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/29/2013-eyewitness-account-lee-rigby-murder ] by two Islamists also linked to al-Muhajiroun [ https://www.theguardian.com/uk/al-muhajiroun ].
“Khuram Butt was with Anjem Choudary, the well-known extremist and terrorist sympathiser [ https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/aug/16/anjem-choudary-convicted-of-supporting-islamic-state ],” Shafiq said.
“Khuram Butt called me a murtad, which means ‘traitor’ in Arabic, and accused me of being a government stooge when I confronted Anjem Choudary about him supporting terrorism and my public campaign against Lee Rigby’s murder.”
The 27-year-old was involved in a “violent scuffle” with the Quilliam Foundation’s Dr Usama Hasan [ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/mar/06/usama-hasan-london-imam-death-threats-evolution ] at a July 2016 event to mark Eid, the end of Ramadan.
Quilliam, the anti-extremism group, said Butt attended the event with his wife and young son and approached Hasan, who was with his family, and accused him of being an apostate who took “government money to spy on Muslims”. He also attacked Hasan for supporting gay marriage and the idea that “we come from apes”.
When other people tried to intervene, a scuffle broke out, the organisation said, but when staff reported Butt they were told he “was already known to intelligence”.
Ash Siddique, the secretary of Al Madina mosque in Barking, said concerns were raised about Butt on three occasions. “What’s emerging is that on three occasions the community highlighted concerns about this individual,” he said.
“He was on tape in a documentary made by Channel 4 several years ago. So those concerns I think were in the public domain and highlighted as they should have been. The failings were not on the part of the community - the community has done what it is supposed to do.”
On Monday, the Guardian learned the 27-year-old was born in Pakistan but brought up in Britain, where he married and had two children. He was a keen supporter of Arsenal football club and had featured in the Channel 4 documentary [ https://www.theguardian.com/global/video/2017/jun/05/terror-suspect-featured-in-channel-4-documentary-video ] The Jihadis Next Door [ https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2016/jan/20/jihadis-next-door-review-channel-4-isis-abu-rumaysah ]. He also associated with al-Muhajiroun, the banned extremist group whose leader, Choudary [ https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/aug/16/anjem-choudary-hate-preacher-spread-terror-uk-europe ], has been linked to the recruitment of more than 100 British terrorism suspects.
[...]
His brother Saad Butt campaigned against extremism, according to the Times [ https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/killers-brother-given-money-by-police-to-fight-extremism-0fbqjjght ]. He was one of 23 members of the Young Muslims Advisory Group, after applying for the role in 2009 and going through background security checks.
[...]
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/06/london-bridge-attacker-khuram-butt-had-argued-with-anti-extremist-muslims
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Trump’s Selective Responses to Terror
Jonathan Ernst/Reuters
The president is vocal when violence is perpetrated in the name of Islam—but remains mostly quiet when it comes from other corners.
By Alex Wagner
Jun 6, 2017
It is no secret that the President of the United States is a quick draw when it comes to expressing indignation or anger in response to news of the day. This is especially true when it comes to certain acts of terror—in the immediate aftermath of the Paris, Manchester and London attacks, Trump expressed his feelings within hours. And indeed, the American public has seen its commander in chief at turns combative, sneering, dyspeptic and outraged when extremists maim and kill in the name of Islam.
Very often there is some policy prescription laced in his responses, as well—a push for “extreme vetting [ http://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871679061847879682 ]” or a renewed call for his original and apparently not-politically correct version [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871675245043888128 ] of a ban targeting Muslim travelers. These are Trump’s targeted solutions to what he calls the problem of “Islamic extremism,” dished out with the same munificence and gusto as his often emotional responses.
And yet in other, equally horrific instances, when innocents have been attacked or killed in the name of a different sort of extremism, President Trump has remained mostly quiet. Either he has said nothing at all, or he has waited days to respond—and when the responses have been issued, they are missing Trump’s signature fury and attendant solutions. Sometimes, these responses don’t even sound like the president.
What makes these acts of terror different, what renders them presumably less urgent and immediately offensive to America’s commander in chief, is that they have involved assailants raging under the banner of white supremacy or violent nationalism. The discrepancy in these responses says a great deal about Trump: not simply his own values, but his fundamental understanding of what it means to govern this country.
In the wake of an attack at the Champs Elysees that killed one police officer, Trump immediately addressed the situation in a bilateral press conference, then tweeted:
Another terrorist attack in Paris. The people of France will not take much more of this. Will have a big effect on presidential election!
5:32 AM - 21 Apr 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/855368516920332289 ]
Less than 24 hours after the Manchester attack that killed 22, Trump animatedly and repeatedly declared the perpetrators “losers [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/05/23/in-wake-of-manchester-blast-trump-decries-terrorist-losers/ ].” And in the wake of the London attacks that killed seven on Saturday evening, Trump was on his preferred medium of Twitter by early Monday morning—issuing a spate of angry responses.
There was a message of solidarity:
Whatever the United States can do to help out in London and the U. K., we will be there - WE ARE WITH YOU. GOD BLESS!
6:24 PM - 3 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871145660036378624 ]
There was an extended push for the renewal of his controversial Muslim ban...
People, the lawyers and the courts can call it whatever they want, but I am calling it what we need and what it is, a TRAVEL BAN!
5:25 AM - 5 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871674214356484096 ]
The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original Travel Ban, not the watered down, politically correct version they submitted to S.C.
5:29 AM - 5 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871675245043888128 ]
And there were a series of controversial tweets directed at the (Muslim) mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, and his calls to remain calm.
At least 7 dead and 48 wounded in terror attack and Mayor of London says there is "no reason to be alarmed!"
7:31 AM - 4 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871328428963901440 ]
Pathetic excuse by London Mayor Sadiq Khan who had to think fast on his "no reason to be alarmed" statement. MSM is working hard to sell it!
8:49 AM - 5 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871725780535062528 ]
In short: President Trump had a lot to say about these attacks.
Yet a little over two weeks ago, he had nothing to tweet when a white man in Maryland with ties to an online group called “Alt Reich: Nation” fatally stabbed a black student named Richard W. Collins III. Collins had just been commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army, and, according to the New York Times [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/22/us/black-student-stabbed-maryland.html ], “was preparing to move to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, for training in defending the country against chemical attacks.” There was no response to his murder from America’s Commander-in-Chief.
Just over a week ago, when a knife-wielding white supremacist killed two men and maimed another in Portland, Oregon as they sought to defend two women—one black, the other in a hijab—President Trump waited three days before commenting. In the interim, as Eliot Hanon points out [ http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/05/29/donald_trump_tweeted_21_times_while_not_condemning_white_supremacist_portland.html ], he tweeted about the “fake news media,” the deadness of Obamacare, and the coming benefits of his massive (and thus far unseen and uncertain [ https://www.wsj.com/articles/gops-proposed-tax-changes-are-no-match-for-status-quo-1496055605 ]) tax reform package.
When Trump finally did weigh in on the Portland terror act, on his official @POTUS feed and not his personal one, the tweet was relatively boilerplate:
The violent attacks in Portland on Friday are unacceptable. The victims were standing up to hate and intolerance. Our prayers are w/ them.
9:51 AM - 29 May 2017
[ https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/869204433418280961 ]
There was nothing in the way of follow-up, no suggestion that Americans needed to band together in some fashion, no policy aimed at tackling the (increasing [ http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/u-s-hate-crimes-20-percent-2016-fueled-election-campaign-n733306 ]) problem of hate crimes here in the United States. If you weren’t familiar with Trump’s history on this strain of white nationalist terrorism, it would have been surprising—but given his behavior over the last four months, it was not.
Trump was silent in February, when three Indian-born men, working for an American company in Kansas, were attacked at a bar—one was killed, the others injured—by a white assailant screaming, “Get out of my country.” For six days, the president was mute on the subject, long enough for the editorial board of the Kansas City Star to deem his silence “disquieting [ http://www.kansascity.com/opinion/editorials/article135323049.html ]:”
“Surely the White House team could have cobbled together a statement of some sort, a response to at least address growing fears that the U.S. is unwelcoming of immigrants, or worse, that the foreign-born need to fear for their lives here….
During such moments of crisis, people look to the president for strength and guidance.
They need to hear their moral outrage articulated, the condemnation of a possible hate crime and the affirmation that the U.S. values everyone’s contributions, whether you’re an immigrant or native-born. For Trump, this was a crucial opportunity to condemn such hateful acts and to forcefully declare that this is not who we are.”
It was not until the president spoke to a joint session of Congress, seven days after the slaying, that he addressed the incident [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2017/live-updates/trump-white-house/real-time-fact-checking-and-analysis-of-trumps-address-to-congress/trump-opens-speech-responding-to-anti-semitism-kansas-shooting/ ]:
“Recent threats targeting Jewish Community Centers and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries, as well as last week’s shooting in Kansas City, remind us that while we may be a nation divided on policies, we are a country that stands united in condemning hate and evil in all its forms,” Trump said.
Those scripted lines were the only comments Trump would make on the topic.
When Alexandre Bissonnette, a Canadian with ties to the white supremacist movement, opened fire [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/world/canada/quebec-mosque-shooting.html ] on Muslims worshipping at an Islamic center in Canada in late January, killing six and wounding eight, Trump was nowhere to be heard. Senior White House Advisor KellyAnne Conway offered an anemic defense [ http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/02/donald-trump-quebec-mosque-terrorist-attack-seth-meyers-twitter ]: “He doesn’t tweet about everything,” she said. “He doesn’t make a comment about everything.”
Conway’s comments were revealing then and remain so, especially today: for the Trump White House, there are the issues that matter enough for comment, and then there is “everything” else. Apparently, terror inflicted upon innocent civilians falls in to the former category (things that matter) if the perpetrators are tied to extremist ideologies rooted in Islam. But terror inflicted upon innocent civilians falls into the latter category (“everything” else) if the perpetrators are tied to extremist ideologies rooted in white nationalism.
For Trump and his defenders, there is no apparent hypocrisy in this duality, but it is an important indicator as to how the president sees the American landscape: irrevocably and perhaps existentially divided into certain tribes and cultures, with a chasm among its citizens so deep that the murders of Americans for certain political reasons do not always warrant outrage (or even a tweet). Donald Trump is the president of the United States, but in moments like these, his attitude calls into question whether he is not, in fact, more the president of certain states—certain people—than others.
In announcing his withdrawal from the Paris climate change accords, Trump (tellingly) declared [ https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/6/1/15726656/pittsburgh-mayor-trump-paris ], “I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris,” but if you have listened carefully enough to Trump and his line of reasoning, “Paris” is really a placeholder for the values of liberalism and progressivism, blue state sacraments about tolerance and globalism.
His response in the wake of the terror attacks of the last two weeks mirrors this worldview: he is the president when a certain set of values are threatened, but not others. Victims who were Muslim, foreign-born or progressively-minded and preaching tolerance, would seem to have been citizens of Trump’s mythic (and maligned) “Paris”—he was not elected to represent their interests, he was not placed in office to empathize with their sorrows and tragic ends.
Nor does he serve to necessarily rebuke their tormentors. I spoke with Heidi Beirich—the Director of Intelligence at the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate crimes in America—about the asymmetry in Trump’s responses.
“It doesn’t seem like Trump cares about hate crimes against these populations,” she said, speaking of the attacks in Kansas and Quebec and Portland. “When it comes to extremism bred from our own culture, he says nothing—or very, very little. It makes you wonder whether the alt right and the extremists who supported him during the campaign—whether he’s somehow afraid of offending them. The [victims] are fellow citizens—he should care about them.”
Trump is unlikely to be swayed by any arguments dictating what he “should” do in any instance—his whole political career has effectively been a campaign against expectations, after all—but this is a clear break from what Americans, until now, have expected of their presidents. And not simply because sympathy and empathy are expected emotional responses from any leader in a time of grief, but also, more urgently, because presidents have an actual role to play in staving off future horrors.
Beirich recalled the days after 9/11, when then-president George W. Bush addressed a shattered and angry nation and said [ https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010917-11.html ]:
“These acts of violence against innocents violate the fundamental tenets of the Islamic faith. And it’s important for my fellow Americans to understand that.
The English translation is not as eloquent as the original Arabic, but let me quote from the Koran, itself: In the long run, evil in the extreme will be the end of those who do evil. For that they rejected the signs of Allah and held them up to ridicule.
The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam. That's not what Islam is all about. Islam is peace. These terrorists don't represent peace. They represent evil and war.”
Beirich explained, “There was a lot of violence, but the murder sprees in the weeks after 9/11 came to a full stop after Bush’s comments. And the following years saw the [hate crimes] numbers going back to pre-9/11 stats. I think it matters that he said something. It’s not purely coincidental that these things happened in parallel.”
President Trump is eager to offer solutions when the terror emanates from extremism tied to fundamentalist Islamic ideologies, but his suggestions are often ethically questionable or legally complicated. If he chose to act more forcefully against terror driven by white nationalism, one powerful solution—public condemnation—would be readily available to him, without much complication.
And yet, at this moment, it is hard to imagine him using it.
Copyright © 2017 by The Atlantic Monthly Group
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/trumps-selective-responses-to-terror/529218/ [with comments]
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5 People Were Just Shot To Death In Florida. But Don’t Worry, It Wasn’t Terrorism.
One of the deadliest mass shootings of 2017 happened on Monday, and you might not have even heard about it.
06/05/2017
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/orlando-shooting-terrorism_us_5935854fe4b013c48169c043 [with embedded video, and comments]
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Kindergartner, his mom & gunman killed, two children injured in Sandy shooting
June 6, 2017
SANDY, Utah — A kindergarten boy, his mother and the gunman were killed and two other children were injured in a shooting in a Sandy neighborhood Tuesday afternoon.
The shooting occurred around 3:45 p.m. on a street outside a residential area near 2300 E Alta Canyon Dr., according to Sandy Police.
"Preceding this event, what appears to have took place is a good Samaritan saw a female with two juveniles, stopped to help them, to transport them out of the area. During that time, the suspect actually rammed the good Samaritan's vehicle, bringing it to a stop in the roadway," said Sgt. Jason Nielsen, Sandy City Police Department. "[The] suspect exited his vehicle and [began] shooting."
"There's another juvenile male who's been transported to the hospital in critical condition and one juvenile female transported in stable [condition]," Nielsen said.
[...]
http://fox13now.com/2017/06/06/emergency-officials-respond-to-shooting-in-sandy/ [with embedded videos]
Utah tries to fathom suburb shooting that killed mom, son
Community members look on as police officers investigate the scene of a shooting in Sandy, Utah, Tuesday, June 6, 2017. Utah police say the shooter in a suburban Salt Lake City neighborhood is among several people who died in the incident and two others injured were children. The shooting took place on a neighborhood street in the suburb of Sandy, about 20 miles southeast of Salt Lake City.
Jun 7, 2017
https://www.apnews.com/de27ea398a544d75b2d0599405b56d2d/Utah-tries-to-fathom-suburb-shooting-that-killed-mom,-son
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Why Trump Criticized a London Under Attack
Peter Nicholls / Reuters
The president believes that globalism costs jobs and lives—and that what makes America exceptional is its resistance to global integration.
By Peter Beinart
Jun 4, 2017
The narcissism generally comes first. Early Saturday evening, an hour after first retweeting [ https://twitter.com/DRUDGE_REPORT/status/871126902467051520 ] a Drudge Report alert about the London terrorist attack, Donald Trump declared [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871143765473406976 ] that, “We need to be smart, vigilant and tough. We need the courts to give us back our rights. We need the Travel Ban as an extra level of safety!” In other words, London proves him right. Everything does. When Omar Mateen murdered 49 people at an Orlando nightclub last June, Trump tweeted [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/742034549232766976 ], “Appreciate the congrats for being right on radical Islamic terrorism.” That same month, when The Wall Street Journal reported [ https://www.wsj.com/articles/nato-considers-new-intelligence-chief-post-1464968453 ] that NATO was considering creating a new intelligence coordinator to assist in the fight against terrorism, Trump—who wasn’t even yet the Republican presidential nominee—explained [ https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-06-08/trump-says-no-reason-to-raise-1-billion-for-campaign ], “It’s all because of me.”
After the self-glorification came a slap at London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who, according [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871328428963901440 ] to Trump, had responded to the terrorist attack by claiming there was “no reason to be alarmed!” (That’s wrong. Khan had actually [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/04/us/politics/britain-attack-trump-twitter-storm.html ] told Londoners not to be alarmed by the increased police presence on their streets). On its face, this Trump tweet was more puzzling. Khan is a mayor, not a prime minister, and most Americans have no idea who he is. Why raise his profile?
The answer is that Khan helps Trump articulate his new, and still not widely understood, brand of American exceptionalism.
As I’ve suggested earlier [ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/02/how-trump-wants-to-make-america-exceptional-again/515406/ ], “American exceptionalism” is not an enduring set of American values. It’s an enduring method of American contrast, a way of distinguishing the United States from Europe. The nature of that contrast has changed radically over time. Until World War II, many Americans thought that what distinguished the two continents was Europe’s proclivity for war, which the peace-loving, commercial-minded United States, should avoid. After the Russian revolution, Americans often said that what made their country exceptional was its lack a strong socialist or communist movement.
Barack Obama often suggested what made America exceptional was its capacity for inclusion. After recounting his Kansan-Kenyan ancestry, he frequently claimed that, “In no other country is my story even possible.” In 2015, he told [ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/02/how-trump-wants-to-make-america-exceptional-again/515406/ ] British Prime Minister David Cameron that “Our Muslim populations, they feel themselves to be Americans. There is, you know, this incredible process of immigration and assimilation that is part of our tradition that is probably our greatest strength. There are parts of Europe in which that’s not the case, and that’s probably the greatest danger that Europe faces.”
Trump has turned that on its head. Like previous presidents, he defines America in contrast to Europe. But for Trump, what makes America exceptional is not its peacefulness or inclusiveness or resistance to socialism. It is its resistance to globalism. America is the opposite of the European Union. It is the place where borders and national identity remains king. During the Cold War, hawks often said that what distinguished America from Europe was America’s willingness to resist the Kremlin. For Trump, what distinguishes America from Europe is America’s willingness to resist Davos and Turtle Bay.
For Trump and his supporters, globalism kills jobs and it kills people. And it does the latter, in large measure, by allowing Muslims into the West. Keeping America exceptional, therefore, means ensuring that Muslims never gain the same foothold in the U.S. than they’ve gained on the other side of the Atlantic. This idea has obsessed Steve Bannon for years. He’s explained [ http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/stephen-bannon-donald-trump-muslims-fear-loathing ] that one of the reasons he opened a Breitbart office in London was to show Americans that “all these Shariah courts were starting under British law.” In December 2015, he warned [ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2017/01/31/bannon-odds-islam-china-decades-us-foreign-policy-doctrine/97292068/ ] that if America doesn’t “hit the pause button today … we’re going to be importing at least a couple of million Muslims” per year. In a Fox interview this February about Trump’s travel ban, senior White House aide Stephen Miller brought up Europe unprompted. “The most important thing to discuss right now,” he said [ http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2017/01/30/stephen_miller_no_citizen_from_a_foreign_land_has_a_constitutional_right_to_enter_us.html ], “is how do we keep this country from falling into the same trap as happened to parts of Europe to places like Germany, to places like France, where you have a permanent intergenerational problem of Islamic radicalism that becomes a routine feature of life in those countries, a new normal. How do we keep that from happening in America?”
That’s what makes Sadiq Khan, London’s first Muslim mayor, such a useful foil. He personifies Muslims’ growing prominence in European life. He undermines Obama’s argument: that what distinguishes America from Europe is its ability to integrate Muslims. But he perfectly illustrates Trump’s: that what distinguishes America from Europe is that America’s Muslim population remains numerically small and politically weak.
This helps explain why Trump and his aides [ https://twitter.com/Scavino45/status/871362496308936704 ] and family [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/04/us/politics/britain-attack-trump-twitter-storm.html ] have been attacking Khan for more than a year now. And it helps explain their insistence that Khan is soft on jihadist terror. It fits their exceptionalist narrative: That virtually all Western Muslims, even the ones who appear to be culturally integrated and politically moderate, secretly abet the terrorist threat.
When Breitbart calls Huma Abedin [ http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/stephen-bannon-donald-trump-muslims-fear-loathing ] and Khizr Khan [ http://www.breitbart.com/radio/2016/08/03/paul-sperry-khzir-khan-a-world-renowned-expert-on-sharia-not-the-constitution/ ] stealth Islamists, it’s peddling the same message. And it’s issuing a warning to any aspiring Muslim politician who harbors dreams of becoming America’s Sadiq Khan: Trump’s allies will relentlessly tar you as an agent of ISIS. The apparent goal is to keep American Muslims too isolated and fearful to use the democratic process to secure their rights. Which, as it happens, is what ISIS wants, too.
Copyright © 2017 by The Atlantic Monthly Group
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/trump-american-exceptionalism/529119/ [with comments]
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A Brief History of Trump's Feud With Sadiq Khan
It spans 18 months, an op-ed, several interviews and, of course, Twitter.
Jun 5, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/06/khan-trump/529191/ [with comments]
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Donald Trump’s long-running feud with London Mayor Sadiq Khan, explained
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/55115667/headshots_1496764603724.0.jpg)
Trump v. Khan: Dawn of Transatlantic Justice.
The war of words shows how a global anti-Trump backlash could start.
https://www.vox.com/world/2017/6/6/15745058/donald-trump-sadiq-khan-london-explained [with (another) embedded video], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9qaPnpoI0M [embedded; with comments]
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Trump puts strain on special relationship
President Trump has unleashed another Twitter storm, infuriating officials in London. This has posed special challenges for the US-UK relationship.
5 June 2017
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40128304
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Trump's Twitter attacks on Sadiq Khan reveal how pitiful the president is
Trump effectively lowers our expectations of what presidential communication should look like.’
We shouldn’t be passive onlookers to Trump’s pantomime presidency any longer. It’s time to look through the theatrics to understand what he is doing.
6 June 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/06/trumps-twitter-attacks-sadiq-khan-pitiful-president
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What Trump's latest Twitter tirade tells us
The London Bridge attacks set Donald Trump off on an extended Twitter rant over the past few days, reviving his calls for sweeping immigration action and renewing old feuds with Democrats, gun-control advocates and even the mayor of London.
5 June 2017
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40138441
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Cancel Donald Trump state visit, says Sadiq Khan, after London attack tweets
Donald Trump at the annual gala at the Ford Theatre. ‘People, I am calling it what we need and what it is: a travel ban!’
London mayor says US president is wrong about many things and that state visit to Britain should not go ahead.
6 June 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jun/05/donald-trump-attack-courts-travel-ban-london
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If Trump visits, let’s greet him with the chorus of mocking middle fingers he deserves
Both of these men are left-wing British Mayors who had their cities attacked by terror. Trump attacked one but not the other. Guess which.
[ https://twitter.com/hourlyterrier/status/871733115470962689 ]
Benny Hill music, inflatable chodes, kazoos? Now Trump’s insulted Sadiq Khan, let’s get truly British and welcome the US president with a festival of piss-taking.
6 June 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/06/donald-trump-visit-chorus-mocking-middle-fingers-insult-sadiq-khan
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It's Time to Demand Donald Trump's Resignation
This weekend, Trump attacked London Mayor Sadiq Khan on Twitter, taking out of context a quote urging citizens not to be alarmed by increased police presence.
Look at the man's tweets – he cannot continue to serve as president
June 6, 2017
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/its-time-to-demand-donald-trumps-resignation-w486080 [with comments]
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Trump Promotes Original ‘Travel Ban,’ Eroding His Legal Case
President Trump at the White House last week. In a series of Twitter posts early Monday, he argued that it had been a mistake to revise the first targeted travel ban he had signed and suggested that his administration should return to a “much tougher version.”
JUNE 5, 2017
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-travel-ban.html [with comments]
Trump’s latest tweets will probably hurt effort to restore travel ban
June 5, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trumps-latest-tweets-could-hurt-effort-to-restore-travel-ban/2017/06/05/c8eb5940-49e8-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html [with embedded video, and (over 4,000) comments]
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Trump Grows Discontented With Attorney General Jeff Sessions
President Trump with Attorney General Jeff Sessions at an event on Capitol Hill last month.
JUNE 5, 2017
WASHINGTON — Few Republicans were quicker to embrace President Trump’s campaign last year than Jeff Sessions, and his reward was one of the most prestigious jobs in America. But more than four months into his presidency, Mr. Trump has grown sour on Mr. Sessions, now his attorney general, blaming him for various troubles that have plagued the White House.
The discontent was on display on Monday in a series of stark early-morning postings on Twitter [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-travel-ban.html ] in which the president faulted his own Justice Department for its defense of his travel ban [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/02/us/politics/travel-ban-supreme-court-trump.html ] on visitors from certain predominantly Muslim countries. Mr. Trump accused Mr. Sessions’s department of devising a “politically correct” version of the ban — as if the president had nothing to do with it.
In private, the president’s exasperation has been even sharper. He has intermittently fumed for months over Mr. Sessions’s decision to recuse himself from the investigation into Russian meddling in last year’s election, according to people close to Mr. Trump who insisted on anonymity to describe internal conversations. In Mr. Trump’s view, they said, it was that recusal that eventually led to the appointment of a special counsel who took over the investigation.
[...]
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-discontent-attorney-general-jeff-sessions.html?_r=0
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Kellyanne Conway had a lousy Monday. Sean Spicer’s wasn’t much better.
June 5, 2017
If the White House is trying to embarrass Kellyanne Conway and Sean Spicer, it is doing a terrific job.
In a media briefing Monday, deputy White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders first made Conway appear out of the loop and then contradicted the counselor to the president. Later in the session, Sanders did little to counter the appearance that Spicer, the White House press secretary, is being marginalized.
About six hours before the briefing, Conway appeared on the “Today” show and was unable to answer questions about whether President Trump will invoke his executive privilege [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/whitehouse/qanda-could-executive-privilege-block-comey-testimony/2017/06/02/4add6776-47d8-11e7-8de1-cec59a9bf4b1_story.html ] to stop former FBI director James B. Comey from testifying Thursday before the Senate Intelligence Committee.
“The president will make that final decision, but if Mr. Comey does testify, we'll be watching with everyone else,” Conway said. When “Today” host Savannah Guthrie asked whether it was even an “open possibility” that Trump would try to block Comey, Conway repeated herself: “The president will make that final decision.”
Sanders, however, knew the answer when asked the same question during the briefing.
“The president's power to assert executive privilege is very well established,” she said. “However, to facilitate a swift and thorough examination of the facts sought by the Senate Intelligence Committee, President Trump will not assert executive privilege regarding James B. Comey's scheduled testimony.”
[...]
At another point in her appearance on “Today,” Conway complained about “this obsession with covering everything [the president] says on Twitter.”
“But that's his preferred method of communication with the American people,” replied Craig Melvin, who was filling in for Matt Lauer.
“That's not true,” Conway shot back.
Well, it sure seems true, based on what Sanders said in the briefing. Asked whether Trump's tweets are vetted by an attorney, Sanders answered: “Not that I'm aware of.” Then she volunteered this: “I think social media for the president is extremely important. It gives him the ability to speak directly to the people without the bias of the media filtering those types of communications. He, at this point, has over 100-plus million contacts through social media, on all those platforms. I think it's a very important tool for him to be able to utilize.”
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/05/kellyanne-conway-had-a-lousy-monday-sean-spicers-wasnt-much-better/ [with embedded videos, and comments]
Kellyanne Conway's husband mocks Trump's tweets on travel ban
06/05/2017
George Conway, the husband of White House adviser Kellyanne Conway who was under consideration for multiple positions in President Donald Trump’s administration, mocked the president on Monday for targeting his own Justice Department.
In a series of tweets, Trump rebuffed his top aides and other administration officials, who had insisted that the administration’s executive order suspending visa issuance from six majority-Muslim countries was not a travel ban.
“People, the lawyers and the courts can call it whatever they want, but I am calling it what we need and what it is, a TRAVEL BAN!” Trump tweeted Monday morning.
“The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original Travel Ban, not the watered down, politically correct version they submitted to S.C.” the president added. “The Justice Dept. should ask for an expedited hearing of the watered down Travel Ban before the Supreme Court - & seek much tougher version!”
Conway derided Trump’s tweets, criticizing the president in a post that concluded with his trademark “Sad.”
“These tweets may make some ppl feel better, but they certainly won't help OSG get 5 votes in SCOTUS, which is what actually matters. Sad,” Conway wrote, referring to the Office of the Solicitor General, which argues before the Supreme Court on behalf of the Trump administration.
Conway, a partner at the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, was a candidate for the solicitor general post and the front-runner to head DOJ’s Civil Division until he withdrew his name from consideration last week.
[...]
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/05/george-conway-mock-trump-tweet-239143 [with embedded video, and comments]
Kellyanne Conway's husband swipes at Trump on Twitter
June 05, 2017
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/06/05/kellyanne-conways-husband-swipes-at-trump-on-twitter.html [with embedded video, and comments]
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Vet Trump Tweets? Aides Say ‘LMFAO.’
President Trump’s aides are trying to talk the media—and everyone who will listen—out of taking the president’s tweets at face value.
06.05.17
http://www.thedailybeast.com/vet-trump-tweets-aides-say-lmfao
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The viral bot that gives Trump’s tweets ‘the honor that they deserve’
June 5, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2017/06/05/the-viral-bot-that-gives-trumps-tweets-the-honor-that-they-deserve/ [with comments]
Bot Turns Trump’s Tweets Into Official-Looking Presidential Statements
Meet Sean Spicer’s replacement.
06/04/2017
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/a-bot-turns-trumps-tweets-into-official-looking-presidential-statements_us_59348e5be4b075bff0f4b63b [with comments]
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Trump blocked some people from his Twitter account. Is that unconstitutional?
President Trump speaks during a meeting at the White House on Tuesday.
June 7, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/06/07/trump-blocked-some-people-from-his-twitter-account-is-that-unconstitutional-as-they-say/ [with embedded videos, and comments]
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Trump National Security Team Blindsided by NATO Speech
They thought the president would commit to the principle of collective defense. They were wrong.
June 05, 2017
When President Donald Trump addressed NATO leaders during his debut overseas trip little more than a week ago, he surprised and disappointed European allies who hoped—and expected—he would use his speech to explicitly reaffirm America’s commitment to mutual defense of the alliance’s members, a one-for-all, all-for-one provision that looks increasingly urgent as Eastern European members worry about the threat from a resurgent Russia on their borders.
That part of the Trump visit is known.
What’s not is that the president also disappointed—and surprised—his own top national security officials by failing to include the language reaffirming the so-called Article 5 provision in his speech. National security adviser H.R. McMaster, Defense Secretary James Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson all supported Trump doing so and had worked in the weeks leading up to the trip to make sure it was included in the speech, according to five sources familiar with the episode. They thought it was, and a White House aide even told The New York Times the day before the line was definitely included.
It was not until the next day, Thursday, May 25, when Trump started talking at an opening ceremony for NATO’s new Brussels headquarters, that the president’s national security team realized their boss had made a decision with major consequences—without consulting or even informing them in advance of the change.
“They had the right speech and it was cleared through McMaster,” said a source briefed by National Security Council officials in the immediate aftermath of the NATO meeting. “As late as that same morning, it was the right one.”
Added a senior White House official, “There was a fully coordinated other speech everybody else had worked on”—and it wasn’t the one Trump gave. “They didn’t know it had been removed,” said a third source of the Trump national security officials on hand for the ceremony. “It was only upon delivery.”
The president appears to have deleted it himself, according to one version making the rounds inside the government, reflecting his personal skepticism about NATO and insistence on lecturing NATO allies about spending more on defense rather than offering reassurances of any sort; another version relayed to others by several White House aides is that Trump’s nationalist chief strategist Steve Bannon and policy aide Stephen Miller played a role in the deletion. (According to NSC spokesman Michael Anton, who did not dispute this account, “The president attended the summit to show his support for the NATO alliance, including Article 5. His continued effort to secure greater defense commitments from other nations is making our alliance stronger.”)
Either way, the episode suggests that what has been portrayed—correctly—as a major rift within the 70-year-old Atlantic alliance is also a significant moment of rupture inside the Trump administration, with the president withholding crucial information from his top national security officials—and then embarrassing them by forcing them to go out in public with awkward, unconvincing, after-the-fact claims that the speech really did amount to a commitment they knew it did not make.
The frantic, last-minute maneuvering over the speech, I’m told, included “MM&T,” as some now refer to the trio of Mattis, McMaster and Tillerson, lobbying in the days leading up to it to get a copy of the president’s planned remarks and then pushing hard once they obtained the draft to get the Article 5 language in it, only to see it removed again. All of which further confirms a level of White House dysfunction that veterans of both parties I’ve talked with in recent months say is beyond anything they can recall.
[...]
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/06/05/trump-nato-speech-national-security-team-215227 [with embedded audio ("The Global Politico - Episode 18: A master class on Putin & Trump from legendary Russia hand, Strobe Talbott", https://soundcloud.com/global-politico/strobe-talbott ), and comments]
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Trump Said He Would “Unite the Muslim World.” Then This Happened.
In a shocking twist, the world’s problems were not solved by the leaders of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United States placing their hands on a glowing orb.
A major shake-up in the Middle East presents fresh worries for the war against ISIS.
June 5, 2017
n May 21, President Donald Trump delivered a speech aimed at bringing together the nations of the Middle East against Iran and terrorism. Two days later, the administration claimed Trump had, indeed, “united the Muslim world in a way that it really hasn’t been in many years.” Two weeks later, five Arab countries have broken ties with Qatar, which hosts the biggest U.S. military base in the Middle East. Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen not only recalled their diplomats, but suspended all travel [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/world/middleeast/qatar-saudi-arabia-egypt-bahrain-united-arab-emirates.html ] between their homelands and Qatar, and went so far as to demand their citizens leave the Persian Gulf country.
The sudden shake-up underscores the multiple fault lines running through what Trump has clumsily referred to as “the Muslim world,” and makes clear that Trump’s much-praised trip to Saudi Arabia was not a panacea for longstanding tensions and competing interests among Gulf countries. The five Arab nations are reportedly incensed over Qatar’s continued patronage of Al Jazeera, the news network headquartered in Doha, as well as Qatar’s support of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. The nations also allege that Qatar condones fundraising for terrorist networks and militant groups in Syria. (Saudi Arabia and several other Sunni nations have faced similar allegations for years.)
As is often the case in the region, Iran figures prominently, too. Qatar’s state media last month published comments by the country’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, in which he cautioned against fully uniting against Iran. Qatar has since claimed [ http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/05/cyberattack-qatar-puts-fake-news-focus-170525190113354.html ] the report was the result of a hack, but state media outlets in other Arab countries continued to run it [ http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/1.792993 ]. (Saudi Arabia’s claim that Qatar is too pro-Iran is undercut by Qatar’s involvement in two fights against Iran’s interests. Qatar is fighting alongside Saudi Arabia against the Houthi in Yemen, who are seen as connected to Iran, and figures largely in the campaign against Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, an ally of Iran.)
Later on Monday, the Financial Times reported [ https://www.ft.com/content/dd033082-49e9-11e7-a3f4-c742b9791d43 ] that the Qatari government had paid a staggering ransom payment to Islamist and Iran-backed groups. The figure, which was reportedly as high as $1 billion, was allegedly handed over in exchange for members of the Qatari royal family, who had been kidnapped during a falconry trip to southern Iraq. Qatar told FT that it could not immediately respond to comment regarding the claim, which an observer quoted by the paper regrettably described as “the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
The escalating tensions have immediate consequences for Qatar, which, as The New York Times notes, imports 40 percent of its food from neighboring Saudi Arabia. In Qatar—the richest country on the planet, per capita—news of the severed ties resulted in crowded food markets, as citizens feared for the worst. But such conflicts also directly imperil the interests of the United States. Qatar hosts the Al Udeid Air Base, which is home to 11,000 United States military personnel—the largest concentration of American troops in the Middle East—and serves as the central command post for the coalition’s air mission against ISIS. It was not immediately clear how the five Arab nations would continue to carry out airstrikes against the Islamic State if their personnel were pulled from Qatar.
[...]
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/06/qatar-trump-muslim-world [with embedded video]
What Just Happened With Qatar?
Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, severed relations with Doha over its alleged support of terrorism.
Jun 5, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/news/archive/2017/06/what-just-happened-with-qatar/529128/ [with comments]
Trump jumps into worsening dispute between Qatar and powerful bloc of Arab countries
June 6, 2017
President Trump jumped headlong Tuesday into a fast-worsening dispute between Qatar and a powerful bloc of Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia, posting Twitter messages congratulating the Saudis for cracking down on the neighboring kingdom and himself for sparking the breach over alleged Qatari funding for terrorism.
“During my recent trip to the Middle East, I stated that there can no longer be funding of Radical Ideology,” Trump said in a series of morning tweets. “Leaders pointed to Qatar - look!
“So good to see the Saudi Arabia visit with the King and 50 countries already paying off,” he tweeted. “They said they would take a hard line on funding extremism, and all reference was pointing to Qatar.”
Trump’s intervention came as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, speaking in New Zealand, took a somewhat different tack, noting that “all” countries in the Persian Gulf “have work to do” in ending their support for extremism, and encouraging them to “resolve this through dialogue.”
The regional crisis began on Monday, when Qatar’s Persian Gulf neighbors — Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Bahrain — were joined by Egypt and smaller nations in severing diplomatic ties with Qatar, claiming it supports terrorists across the region. The eruption of the dispute shocked the neighborhood and threatened deeply intertwined regional trade links and air routes.
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/turkey-and-kuwait-move-to-mediate-middle-east-rift-over-qatar/2017/06/06/3fc3b070-4a8a-11e7-a186-60c031eab644_story.html [with embedded video, and comments]
Saudis spent $270K at Trump hotel amid lobbying efforts: report
06/05/17
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/336444-saudis-spent270000-at-trump-hotel-as-part-of-lobbying-efforts-report [with comments]
CNN Exclusive: US suspects Russian hackers planted fake news behind Qatar crisis
June 6, 2017 Updated June 6, 2017
Washington (CNN) — US investigators believe Russian hackers breached Qatar's state news agency and planted a fake news report that contributed to a crisis among the US' closest Gulf allies, according to US officials briefed on the investigation.
The FBI recently sent a team of investigators to Doha to help the Qatari government investigate the alleged hacking incident, Qatari and US government officials say.
Intelligence gathered by the US security agencies indicates that Russian hackers were behind the intrusion first reported by the Qatari government two weeks ago, US officials say. Qatar hosts one of the largest US military bases in the region.
The alleged involvement of Russian hackers intensifies concerns by US intelligence and law enforcement agencies that Russia continues to try some of the same cyber-hacking measures on US allies that intelligence agencies believe it used to meddle in the 2016 elections.
US officials say the Russian goal appears to be to cause rifts among the US and its allies. In recent months, suspected Russian cyber activities, including the use of fake news stories, have turned up amid elections in France, Germany and other countries.
It's not yet clear whether the US has tracked the hackers in the Qatar incident to Russian criminal organizations or to the Russian security services blamed for the US election hacks. One official noted that based on past intelligence, "not much happens in that country without the blessing of the government."
[...]
http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/06/politics/russian-hackers-planted-fake-news-qatar-crisis/ [with embedded video]
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Some U.S. Diplomats Stage Quiet Revolt Amid Tensions With Trump
Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson, second from left, with his Australian counterpart, Julie Bishop, and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, right, with his counterpart, Marise Payne, in Sydney on Monday.
JUNE 5, 2017
WASHINGTON — As President Trump strains alliances and relationships around the world, some of the nation’s top career diplomats are breaking publicly with him, in what amounts to a quiet revolt by a cadre of public servants known for their professional discretion.
On Monday, the chargé d’affaires at the American Embassy in Beijing, David H. Rank, announced his resignation after telling his staff he could not defend the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/01/climate/trump-paris-climate-agreement.html ] from the Paris climate accord.
A day earlier, the acting ambassador to Britain, Lewis A. Lukens, tweeted his support [ https://twitter.com/USAinUK/status/871435629569212416 ] of London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, in the wake of a deadly terrorist attack there. On Sunday morning, President Trump had picked a fight with the mayor on Twitter.
Last month, the ambassador to Qatar, Dana Shell Smith, reacted to Mr. Trump’s dismissal of the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, by tweeting, “Increasingly difficult to wake up overseas to news from home, knowing I will spend today explaining our democracy and institutions.”
The State Department has been a hotbed of resistance to the Trump administration’s policies from the start. About 1,000 staff members signed a cable protesting the temporary ban on visas for visitors from seven predominantly Muslim countries the administration tried to impose in January. There has been a small exodus of senior diplomats, which, combined with the slow pace of appointments, has left the State Department’s headquarters noticeably depleted.
But the tensions between the White House and the diplomatic corps are now flaring up more publicly, and at a more senior level. Mr. Lukens, Mr. Rank, and Ms. Smith have all spent decades in the Foreign Service, rising to posts at or close to the ambassadorial level.
“It’s an extraordinarily unusual situation for the Foreign Service,” said R. Nicholas Burns, who served as undersecretary of state for political affairs in the George W. Bush administration, traditionally the top-ranking position for career diplomats. “They pride themselves on being nonpartisan. You serve each president 150 percent.”
[...]
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/diplomats-quiet-revolt-donald-trump-tensions.html
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Full Show - Donald Trump Is Devastating The New World Order - 06/05/2017
Published on Jun 5, 2017 by The Alex Jones Channel [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvsye7V9psc-APX6wV1twLg / https://www.youtube.com/user/TheAlexJonesChannel , https://www.youtube.com/user/TheAlexJonesChannel/videos ]
Monday, June 5th 2017: Trump Renews Calls for Travel Ban - President Trump doubled down on his calls for a travel ban. Meanwhile, NBC mocks a Trump retweet from the Drudge Report, which broke news. Also, a 'Fake News' CNN host apologizes for labeling the president a "piece of sh*t" following the Kathy Griffin controversy, as the network is caught staging a protest. On today's show, we'll speak with Mark Antro, the man who filmed CNN's staged protest, White House correspondent Mike Cernovich, author of No Campus for White Men, Scott Greer, and President of the Eagle Forum Ed Martin. We'll also talk Bilderberg 2017 with David Knight and Owen Shroyer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZexALH3Ujw [with comments] [also at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkdMGVlN7QI (additional text adapted from; with comments]
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How the Six-Day War Transformed Religion
Tara Todras-Whitehill / Muhammed Muheisen / Kathy Willens / AP
Six perspectives on how the 1967 Arab-Israeli conflict changed Islam, Judaism, Christianity, and Mormonism
By Sigal Samuel
Jun 5, 2017
Fifty years ago this week, the Six-Day War dramatically altered geographic borders and political fortunes in the Middle East. For Israelis, the stunning 1967 victory meant an expanded country that suddenly included East Jerusalem, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights, and the Sinai Peninsula; for Palestinians, it meant occupation and more displacement; for surrounding Arab countries, it meant crushing military and reputational defeat.
But the Six-Day War didn’t only transform Middle East politics: It also transformed religion—in ways that would reverberate far beyond the region. The war’s outcome impacted the way Islam is expressed in the West Bank and Gaza, and it created new openings for political Islamism in the Arab world. It strengthened a messianic strain in Israeli Judaism, and it changed the focal point of American Judaism. It forced an internal reckoning among evangelical Christians, and even among Mormons, in the United States.
I asked writers with expertise and experience in each of these contexts to discuss how 1967 changed religion, broadly interpreted. Religion is often thought of as a force that drives conflict; I invited them to think instead about how conflict impacts religion. The six writers’ responses, which I’ve edited and included below, touch on everything from fashion to theology, demonstrating the many ways religion inflects people’s lives.
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The Palestine of Miniskirts and Tank Tops
Maysoon Zayid, Palestinian-American comedian, writer, and disability advocate
Fifty years ago, the Six-Day War changed the course of Palestinian history. Also 50 years ago, my mother and father got married in Deir Debwan, a West Bank village on the outskirts of Ramallah. My mom was a recent graduate of Mar Yousef, a girls’ school run by nuns. My dad had been living in America since 1959 and had come back home to marry the girl of his dreams. My Muslim parents wed three months before the Six-Day War.
My mother wore a short cocktail dress to her engagement party. In 1967, it wasn’t odd to see women strolling in miniskirts in Palestine. It also wasn’t odd to see my grandmother standing next to her wearing a floor-length, long-sleeved, cross-stitched dress and a long silky veil covering her hair.
Some say that Palestinians have become more religious than they were when they were first occupied. And in the half-century since the Six-Day War, it’s true that Palestinian religiosity has changed in some ways. The sense that shrines like the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem and the Church of the Nativity [ http://www.newsweek.com/bethlehem-easter-church-nativity-jesus-israel-palestinians-war-christians-584908 ] in Bethlehem are under siege has, it seems, strengthened some Palestinians’ religious enthusiasm. Ramadan and Christmas have always been a big deal, but as Palestinians fight for their existence, the festivities have gotten even grander. This is a marker of resistance, a signal that Palestinians refuse to disappear.
Israel occupied the Gaza Strip in 1967, handed over governmental control to the Palestinian Authority in 1993, and removed its soldiers and settlers in 2005. This whole process culminated in the Palestinian Authority calling an election in 2006. Hamas won a parliamentary majority, not because Palestinians wanted a theocracy, but because they were fed up with the corruption of the rival Fatah party. In the decade since its win, Hamas has tried [ http://www.thedailybeast.com/dont-tread-on-my-hair-hamas ] to impose Saudi-like laws on its trapped citizens. What “religious” looks like in Gaza has been severely constrained by Hamas. But Hamas has also met with resistance, and its popularity has declined due to the blockade and the repeated bloodshed Gazans have had to endure on its watch.
In some places, Palestinian religion has not changed at all. To this day, in my parents’ village, different women in the same family will cover up differently. You will see one sister with her hair flowing out in the open and the other choosing to wear hijab. You will also see Muslim men with beards down to their belly buttons and others drinking beer (forbidden in Islam) regardless of the length of their beards.
My three sisters and I do not cover our hair. My sisters-in-law have no other choice. They come from a conservative Muslim family that lives in a refugee camp outside Bethlehem. In their home, the men gave up on God long ago and the women must cover up. To be clear, they would not be harmed if they didn’t, just nagged to death by my mother-in-law. I, on the other hand, roam around the refugee camp in tank tops with no fear. I will not deny that there are Palestinian Muslim women who are forced to cover, but the majority I have met choose to do so.
How Palestinians’ religion gets expressed can be shaped by many factors, including who their family is, where they live, and how much money they make; some, including young Palestinians [ http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/03/palestinian-youth-unemloyment.html ], have suggested a link between the spread of poverty and an intensifying religiosity. Ramallah, a city whose name translates to “City of God,” is basically one big bar. It’s party central for the haves, and the have-nots come to watch. Meanwhile, in cities like Hebron, it’s all about the masjid (mosque). But regardless of their faith and level of religiosity, when it comes to the fight against Israeli occupation, Palestinians stand side by side, hijab or not, halal or not, Santa or not.
* * *
The Crisis of Arab Nationalism and the Rise of Islamism
Hussein Ibish, senior resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute
One of the principal but often underappreciated effects of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war was its role in setting the stage for the rise of political Islam in the Arab world—including the terrorist extremism that now plagues the region and the globe.
The war was a devastating blow to the credibility of Arab nationalism (particularly as defined by Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser), which presented itself as secular and progressive. The speed and scope of the Arab debacle in 1967 knocked the legs out from under the profoundly exaggerated claims of Arab nationalism to be leading the region into a new and brighter future.
By the late 1960s, the social and economic failure of these systems, and their repressive nature, were already readily apparent. Egypt, Syria, and Iraq, which all gained independence in the 1940s with relatively robust civil societies and promising economies, were being profoundly mismanaged and intellectually suffocated by these narrow regimes. Underneath dreams of resurgence and glory lay clear patterns of atrophy and decay. But the militarism of Arab nationalism, particularly in Egypt, with its strident anti-Western and anti-Israeli rhetoric, conjured a beguiling mirage that obscured grim realities for large majorities who were cajoled into a collective denial.
The 1967 war called this bluff completely. Most Arabs had been beyond confident in victory, yet the defeat was virtually instantaneous and total. In the aftermath, the political credibility of this version of Arab nationalism was mortally wounded, and its long-term viability was as effectively destroyed as the Egyptian Air Force had been by Israel’s surprise early morning attack on June 5.
As the Lebanese scholar Fawaz Gerges has pointed out, the rise of Islamism as a political force was neither an immediate nor an inevitable consequence of the crisis of Arab nationalism resulting from the 1967 war. Many other factors fed into the rise of an ultraconservative, reactionary, and revolutionary (in the Leninist sense) Islamist movement, its radicalization in the 1970s and 1980s, and its proliferation—including in the form of violent transnational terrorist movements like al-Qaeda and ISIS—since the late 1990s.
Things could have turned out differently. Secular Arab nationalism could have been revived, especially in a strikingly different form. Islamism could have developed differently, or thrived to the point of becoming the ideology of ruling factions in much of the Arab world (now only really the case in Gaza).
So, the connection between the 1967 fiasco and the rise of ultraconservative Islam and political Islamism is both direct, insofar as nothing did more to discredit its primary ideological antagonists (secularism and nationalism), and indirect, insofar as innumerable other factors and contingencies shaped our present realities. But it’s worth noting that these two supposedly polar opposites continue to share an underlying framework of political attitudes that remain hegemonic among Islamists and Arab nationalists alike.
During the 1950s and ’60s, Arab nationalism presented itself as entirely at odds with the socially reactionary, and politically and intellectually retrograde, Islamist movement defined at the time by the Muslim Brotherhood. Though it now seems ironic, during this period it was the Islamists who were perceived as retrograde, reactionary, pro-Western, anti-nationalist and essentially traitorous, while the mostly secular nationalist governments were the revolutionaries confronting power in the name of Arab identity, values, and dignity. In much Arab rhetoric today, these ideas have flipped: State nationalism is now frequently cast as pro-Western and retrograde, while Islamism is often cast as revolutionary and patriotic.
For example, it’s instructive that Qatar is comfortable promoting both Muslim Brotherhood Islamism and what remains of left-wing Arab nationalism simultaneously. This isn’t as incoherent as it might seem. Underlying both discourses are the same sets of enemies, the same sense of grievances, the same empty promises, and many of the same essential touchstones of what was and remains a stultifying, unrealistic, and intellectually crippling Arab political orthodoxy.
* * *
When Israel’s Religious Zionists Got Their Big Break
Einat Wilf, writer and former member of the Israeli Knesset
At its core, early Zionism was a secular, even militantly atheist, movement. For the Jewish people to change the course of their history, reclaim their homeland, and establish a modern state in it, they had to rebel against God and Messiah. They had to emerge from two millennia of passivity to become their own messiahs, vehicles of their own redemption.
Many Jews of faith rejected Zionism on account of its rebellion, warning their brethren to keep waiting for God to redeem them in His own good time. But one group attempted to provide a religious context for Zionism. Attracted to the revolutionary nature of the Zionist movement but baffled by the fact that the return of the Jewish people to the Promised Land was carried out by a group of atheists, religious Zionists argued that the godless communists of early Zionism were doing God’s work even if they claimed otherwise, and that the process of redemption had begun.
For many decades, religious Zionism remained a marginal, and quite meek, movement in Zionism—and in Judaism. But 1967 changed that. In six short days, Israel swung from the fear of annihilation to the euphoria of an astounding victory. The tiny country tripled its size to include not just the Golan Heights and Sinai Peninsula, but the cradles of Jewish civilization, including the Temple Mount, East Jerusalem (the Zion of Zionism, home of holy sites), and the West Bank (the territory of Judea, home of the ancient Judeans).
For those who believed that God works in mysterious ways to bring about the redemption of the Jewish people, 1967 was proof. From that moment on, religious Zionism and the settler movement took off to become a dominant form of Zionism and Israeli Judaism, and a powerful political player in shaping the modern state. In the process, these Jews shed the meekness of their predecessors. They were certain that the power of the State of Israel would now serve to redeem the entire Land of Israel between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.
Yet, even after decades of growth in political power and confidence, the flourishing of hundreds of thousands of settlers, and the appearance of dominance, religious Zionism failed to erase the fundamental premise of secular Zionism: that at any critical juncture, securing the sovereignty of the Jewish people is more important than securing every square inch of land to which the Jewish people can lay claim.
Most Jews, even when powerful and armed, are keenly cognizant of the one true reality of their condition: They are a minuscule minority. They acknowledge that as much as the Jewish people have an emotional and historical connection to much more land than is included within Israel’s pre-1967 lines, they are a small minority in a hostile region, and have to make do with much less than what they might think is their due.
Since 1967, religious Zionism as a political movement has been pushing the Jewish people to take it all, claiming that this is God’s will and that He will intervene to manage the consequences of such territorial maximalism. But it is still painfully clear to the majority of Jews that, given their size and place in the world, in trying to take it all they are very likely to remain with nothing. Whether one is a believer or not, suicide cannot be God’s wish for His people.
Israeli soldiers celebrate during the 1967 Six-Day War.
(Israeli Defense Ministry / Reuters)
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How “Israelotry” Became an American Religion
Dov Waxman, professor at Northeastern University, and author, Trouble in the Tribe: The American Jewish Conflict Over Israel
The Six-Day War was a quasi-religious experience for many Jews, both in Israel and the Diaspora. The speed with which Israel vanquished its enemies, paralleling the biblical story of creation; its conquest of places sacred to the Jewish religion, especially Jerusalem and its holy sites; and the popular Jewish narrative of the war as one of deliverance from the brink of a second holocaust to a miraculous victory—all these evoked a collective euphoria and sense of awe across the Jewish world.
In Israel, this ushered in a religious revival among Jews who had previously been staunchly secular, and galvanized a messianic religious Zionism that has gradually come to challenge, if not displace, secular Zionism as the most powerful ideological force in the Jewish state today. But while the 1967 war revitalized and transformed Israeli Judaism, it had the opposite effect on American Judaism. Unlike their Israeli counterparts who turned toward Judaism in the decades following the 1967 war, American Jews have, for the most part, turned away.
To be sure, increasing secularism and assimilation into the American melting pot was already well underway among American Jews long before 1967. Afterwards, however, this process was accelerated by the rise of pro-Israelism in the American Jewish community. As ardent support for Israel came to dominate American Jewish public life and politics, growing numbers of American Jews effectively worshipped Israel and abandoned Judaism.
“Israelotry,” as the scholar Daniel J. Elazar put it, became the new civil religion of American Jewry. Like any religion, it had its own rituals, commandments, myths, and dogmas, and it often insisted on blind obedience, or at least passive acquiescence—“Israel, right or wrong!” American Jewish critics of Israel, who dissented from this new orthodoxy, were frequently branded as heretics, and risked excommunication from the community.
The replacement of Judaism with pro-Israelism in the beliefs and practices of many American Jews has been a huge boon to Israel. The Jewish state has been the beneficiary of an outpouring of American Jewish financial and political support (but not nearly as much immigration), which has contributed to Israel’s economic, social, and military accomplishments over the years.
But for the American Jewish community itself, the mass adoption of pro-Israelism as a surrogate form of religion has been a mixed blessing. On the one hand, it has enabled many American Jews who might otherwise have assimilated into oblivion to maintain a Jewish identity and remain part of the Jewish community, and it has provided them with a common cause and rallying cry in a period of religious and social fragmentation.
On the other hand, it has led to the relative neglect of American Judaism, as support for Israel has consumed much of the Jewish community’s attention and resources. It has also sowed deepening divisions among American Jews over Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians living under Israeli occupation, and led some American Jews, especially younger ones, to dissociate themselves from the Jewish community, and even from Judaism itself, in silent protest.
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Evangelical Zeal for 1967 Wasn’t Really About Jews
Gary Burge, former professor at Wheaton College and current faculty at Calvin Theological Seminary
Following the Six-Day War of 1967, many evangelicals were ecstatic. For 50 years, they had interpreted the tragedies of the 20th century as markers of human decline and divine judgment. Preachers pointed to World War I, the catastrophic flu epidemic that followed, economic collapse in the 1930s, and World War II. Millions had died, and a new threat—communism—was the long arm of Satan’s reach into the 1950s and 1960s. Then there was the upending of moral sensibilities in the 1960s: drugs, sex, and yes, “that music.” These were Signs of the End.
Tent meetings and revivals swept these churches mid-century and they found a comforting eschatological solution to public despair: Jesus was coming.
And then there were the Jews. Prophetic preachers like Dwight Moody announced that the return of the Jews to the Holy Land was the signal that biblical prophecy was being fulfilled. This was an old idea, but it had gained new potency in the itinerant Irish preacher John Nelson Darby (1800-1882) and in the prophecy-based tradition that followed.
When Israel was born in 1948, these “prophecy-evangelicals” celebrated joyously. This was the fulfillment of God’s promise and a sure sign that Earth’s final generation was near. But in 1967, something really miraculous happened: Israel took over the biblical Promised Land and Jerusalem returned to Jewish control after 2,000 years. Preachers told stories of angels defending Israeli troops and guiding Israeli artillery. A six-day war was a miracle in itself, the brevity being proof of God’s work in the Middle East.
Within three years, Hal Lindsey became the great interpreter of this event, proclaiming in his book The Late Great Planet Earth that the Six-Day War was the final key to God’s plan to consummate history. By 1990, 28 million copies had been sold.
Oddly enough, the evangelical zeal for 1967 (and 1948) had little to do with compensating Jewish suffering or Jewish history. It was pure eschatology. Jews were pieces in a larger puzzle that culminated with Jesus’s Second Coming.
This prophecy-interpretation of 1967 also divided evangelicals. Many were simply incredulous and saw these theological views as unsupportable. Academics (like myself) delivered fulsome critiques, but they barely affected preachers, whose message of fear and hope drew large crowds. For some evangelicals, sympathies that had led them to support Israel’s nationhood in 1948 now evaporated: They feared that Israel had created injustices that tarnished the gleam of victory, because 1967 was the beginning of the occupation for millions of Palestinians.
Today, evangelicals still debate the meaning of 1967; some debate the meaning of Israel itself. Was 1967 a prophetic event? Was 1967 mere conquest and occupation? After 50 years, Lindsey’s book seems quaint, and zeal for prophecy fulfillment has diminished considerably. For younger generations of evangelicals today, ethics is surpassing end-time eschatology as the litmus test of abiding in God’s will.
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Should Mormons Take Sides? With Whom?
Amber Taylor, doctoral candidate in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University
Mormons have long been fond of Jews. Ever since 1840, when the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith sent one of his foremost apostles to Jerusalem to dedicate that land for the return of the Jewish people, Mormons eagerly watched the growth of Zionism from their own Utah Zion. In 1948, many Mormon leaders hailed the creation of the Jewish state as nothing less than miraculous fulfillment of prophecy, both ancient and modern. Little was said about the meaning of that event for the land’s non-Jewish inhabitants.
But even as Mormon leadership contemplated the miracle of the State of Israel, the Church worked more quietly throughout the 1950s and 60s to support the Arab Development Society, an organization that helped Palestinian villages. In 1949, the Society instituted a ranch near Jericho to which Arab boys orphaned in 1948 could go to study agriculture. In 1958, the Mormons contributed to the building of a dairy on the ranch, purchasing cows, a bull, and modern dairy equipment for the project. Unfortunately, due to the Six-Day War, the ranch and the dairy closed in 1967.
Before 1967, these two notes sounded simultaneously—Mormon enthusiasm for the State of Israel, and Mormon concern for Palestinian refugees—but the enthusiasm for Israel sounded louder. After 1967, that began to change, at least among Mormon leaders, as many felt compelled to promote a more neutral view of the conflict.
In 1979, Mormon apostle Howard W. Hunter [ https://www.lds.org/ensign/1979/06/all-are-alike-unto-god?lang=eng ] chided church membership for its “personal prejudices,” insisting that “both the Jews and the Arabs are children of our Father. They are both children of promise, and as a church we do not take sides.” Some years later, two prominent Jerusalemite Mormons [ https://www.lds.org/liahona/1997/12/peace-in-the-holy-land?lang=eng ] offered further commentary: “To the extent that we look with sympathy and understanding at both sides, we can be an influence to help bring about a just and lasting peace.”
In the early 1960s, the Mormon-affiliated Brigham Young University had begun discussing a possible semester abroad program in Israel, with a mandate that “half of the program be in Arab territory and half in Israel.” Its opening was disrupted by the 1967 war and the program did not get off the ground until the following year. When it did, its policy for neutrality in the region remained fixed.
My own interest in Israel began through this program. In the summer of 2000, I attended a semester abroad program at the BYU Jerusalem Center for Near Eastern Studies (locally known as the “Mormon University”), an outgrowth of the earlier travel study program. I was taught, in equal measure, by both Jewish and Palestinian instructors. I interacted with the local population as much as I could, both Jewish and Palestinian, and I came away sympathetic to both.
Soon after I returned home from the program, the Second Intifada erupted. I was devastated that people for whom I felt enormous empathy were now attacking each other. Most of my Mormon friends could not understand how I felt so torn. To them, the aggressor was clear, and our Mormon sympathies, historically and in this instance, obviously lay with the Jewish Israelis. Like these friends, most modern Mormons still embrace the notion of Jews as God’s Chosen People.
And yet, Mormonism’s official stance of neutrality after 1967 reflects the worldview that compelled its first prophet to send an apostle to Jerusalem: the conviction that Mormons’ presence there will positively influence history and bless the lives of all God’s children.
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Amber Taylor’s response was adapted from her essay for the 50 Voices 50 Years [ https://www.50voices50years.com/ ] project, a collaboration between the Anti-Defamation League, BICOM and Fathom Journal. 50 Voices 50 Years is a platform created to invite a diversity of viewpoints to reflect on the legacy of this watershed event.
Copyright © 2017 by The Atlantic Monthly Group
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/06/how-the-six-day-war-changed-religion/528981/ [with comments] [and see also in particular (linked in) http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=12186433 and preceding and following]
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Flint, Mich., Official Resigns After Being Caught on Tape Blaming Water Crisis on ‘Fucking Niggers’ Who ‘Don’t Pay Their Bills’
“Flint has the same problems as Detroit ... fucking niggers don’t pay their bills; believe me, I deal with them,” Stair is heard saying on the recording, which was made May 26.
http://www.theroot.com/flint-official-resigns-after-being-caught-on-tape-blami-1795825870 [with comments], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trn3ZDp4StQ [embedded; with comments], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qATnd3y1Rk [embedded; with comments]
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Texas Middle School Says Student Called ‘Ape’ And ‘Slave’ Wasn’t Bullied
“I can excuse children for being ignorant, but this was a missed opportunity,” the girl’s father said.
06/05/2017
A Texas middle school where white students subjected a 12-year-old African American girl to months of racist insults failed to appropriately discipline the offenders or use the opportunity to teach tolerance, the girl’s father said.
The incidents at Tippit Middle School [ http://www.georgetownisd.org/Page/19 ] in Georgetown, Texas, which school officials deemed “racially harassing,” according to a report obtained by HuffPost, included students calling the girl an “ape” and a “slave” and pretending to whip her.
“It was horrifying that her friends would say and do these terrible things and not think twice about it,” Robert Ranco, a civil rights lawyer who is the girl’s father, told HuffPost. “We raised our daughter with the understanding that no one deserves to be treated badly by anybody.”
The harassment, first reported Saturday by The Austin American-Statesman [ http://www.mystatesman.com/news/local/georgetown-middle-school-girl-called-ape-slave-fellow-students/r3OVdWpibgshQNNdgv9COI/ ], began in early March and continued until last month. Ranco said he learned of it in a May 5 text from his daughter.
[...]
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/texas-middle-school-racist-bullying_us_5935ceeae4b0099e7fae816b [with comments]
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White Las Vegas officer charged in chokehold death of black man
Officer Kenneth Lopera, charged with involuntary manslaughter in the death of a black man, is seen in this booking photo released by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S., June 5, 2017.
Jun 5, 2017
A white police officer in Las Vegas was arrested on Monday and charged with involuntary manslaughter in the death of a black man held in a chokehold for more than a minute, officials said.
Officer Kenneth Lopera was charged on the same day the Clark County Coroner's Office ruled the May 14 death of Tashii Farmer, 40, near the Las Vegas Strip was a homicide due to police restraint.
[...]
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nevada-police-idUSKBN18X08R
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North Carolina's General Assembly Districts Are Unconstitutional Gerrymanders, Too
The Supreme Court struck down the 2011 state legislative maps, but also blocked a court order to hold special elections.
Jun 5, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/north-carolinas-general-assembly-districts-are-unconstitutional-gerrymanders-too/529212/ [with comments]
The Supreme Court just made it easier to get away with gerrymandering
If you can’t fix the problem quickly, it’s not fixed.
Jun 5, 2017
https://thinkprogress.org/supreme-court-easier-gerrymandering-e6c986056e62 [with comments]
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Pat McCrory Is Still Mad He Wasn’t Re-elected Governor Of North Carolina
Let the butthurt go, beloved.
06/06/2017
If anybody can hold a grudge, it’s former North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R).
During a speech at the state Republican Party’s annual convention on Saturday, McCrory took the opportunity to once again claim that he lost his re-election bid in November because of voter fraud.
“I know for a fact that we had a lot of non-citizens that were voting,” McCrory said, according to the Raleigh News & Observer [ http://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article154239819.html ]. “Ladies and gentlemen, voter ID would have stopped it. Keep it a clean bill, stay with a voter ID law and get that passed.”
Of the 508 ineligible voters who cast ballots in North Carolina during the 2016 election, only 41 were non-citizens with legal status [ https://s3.amazonaws.com/dl.ncsbe.gov/sboe/Post-Election%20Audit%20Report_2016%20General%20Election/Post-Election_Audit_Report.pdf ], according to an investigation by the state Board of Elections.
Roy Cooper, a Democrat, defeated McCrory in the election by 10,277 votes [ http://er.ncsbe.gov/?election_dt=11/08/2016&county_id=0&office=COS&contest=0 ].
[...]
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/pat-mccrory-voter-fraud_us_5936dda4e4b0cfcda9181c4b [with comments]
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Supreme Court limits SEC's power to recover ill-gotten gains
Jun 5, 2017
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday scaled back the Securities and Exchange Commission's power to recover ill-gotten profits from defendants' misconduct, handing Wall Street firms a victory and dealing another blow to the regulator's enforcement powers.
In a 9-0 ruling, the Supreme Court found that the SEC's recovery remedy known as "disgorgement" is subject to a five-year statute of limitations. The justices sided with New Mexico-based investment adviser Charles Kokesh, who previously was ordered by a judge to pay $2.4 million in penalties plus $34.9 million in disgorgement of illegal profits after the SEC sued him.
The decision marked the second time since 2013 that the Supreme Court has reined in the SEC's enforcement powers. In the prior case, called Gabelli v. SEC, the justices unanimously ruled that civil monetary penalties are also subject to a five-year time bar.
The ruling represented a major victory for Wall Street firms, whose Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association trade group had urged the justices to curb the SEC's powers in order to provide more certainty and predictability to the enforcement process.
[...]
Kokesh was sued by the SEC in 2009 for misappropriating investors' money. His penalties covered conduct within the five-year statute of limitations, but the disgorgement covered conduct that largely occurred outside that time frame.
Kokesh appealed to the Supreme Court after losing at the Denver-based 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Kokesh's attorney argued that a disgorgement in the case constituted a punitive "forfeiture" that is time-barred.
The Justice Department argued that disgorgement is equitable relief that is not considered a punishment, but merely restores the defendant to the same position he was in prior to when the misconduct occurred.
Nick Morgan, a Los Angeles-based lawyer with the Paul Hastings law firm who represents clients being investigated by the SEC, said the ruling will especially affect complicated cases that require more time for the SEC to investigate.
"For the more complex cases, this will be a sea change for them, they will have to move more quickly," Morgan said.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-sec-idUSKBN18W1UQ
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If He Were Doing Any Other Job, Donald Trump Would Have Been Fired by Now | The Resistance | GQ
Published on Jun 5, 2017 by GQ [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsEukrAd64fqA7FjwkmZ_Dw / https://www.youtube.com/user/GQVideos , https://www.youtube.com/user/GQVideos/videos , https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0hKMB1-xkc-XWNf9VL-LxVYysdHpjyMF ]
Donald Trump's behavior isn't fit for running a middle school lunchroom let alone the oval office.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCJPd6C4vss [with comments]
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As Trump lashes out, Republicans grow uneasy
President Trump walks in to speak at a Air Traffic Control Reform Initiative announcement in the East Room at the White House on Monday, June 5, 2017.
June 5, 2017
President Trump, after days of lashing out angrily at the London mayor and federal courts in the wake of the London Bridge terrorist attack, faces a convergence of challenges this week that threatens to exacerbate the fury that has gripped him — and that could further hobble a Republican agenda that has slowed to a crawl on Capitol Hill.
Instead of hunkering down and delicately navigating the legal and political thicket — as some White House aides have suggested — Trump spent much of Monday launching volleys on Twitter, unable to resist continuing, in effect, as his own lawyer, spokesman, cheerleader and media watchdog.
Trump escalated his criticism of London Mayor Sadiq Khan, incorrectly stating that Khan had told Londoners to not be “alarmed” about terrorism. He vented about the Justice Department, which he said pushed a “politically correct” version of his policy to block immigration from six predominantly Muslim countries, which Trump signed before it was halted in court. He also complained that Senate Democrats are “taking forever to approve” his appointees and ambassadors.
Inside the White House, top officials have in various ways gently suggested to Trump over the past week that he should leave the feuding to surrogates, according to two people who were not authorized to speak publicly. But Trump has repeatedly shrugged off that advice, these people said.
“Not that I’m aware of,” White House principal deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Monday at a news conference when asked if the president’s tweets were being vetted by lawyers or aides.
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/as-trump-lashes-out-republicans-grow-uneasy/2017/06/05/d5dc3608-4a09-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html [with embedded video, and comments]
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Trump: The Presidency in Peril
Donald Trump; drawing by Pancho
By Elizabeth Drew
June 22, 2017 Issue
If Donald Trump leaves office before four years are up, history will likely show the middle weeks of May 2017 as the turning point. Chief among his mounting problems are new revelations surrounding the question of whether Trump and his campaign colluded with Russia in its effort to tip the 2016 election. If Trump has nothing to hide, he is certainly jumpy whenever the subject comes up and his evident worry about it has caused him to make some big mistakes. The president’s troubles will continue to grow as the investigators keep on investigating and the increasingly appalled leakers keep on leaking.
Two especially damaging disclosures occurred on Friday, May 19, the day Trump departed on his first foreign trip. That afternoon, while Air Force One was in the air, The Washington Post broke an ominous story that law enforcement investigators had under scrutiny a “person of interest” on the White House staff, described as “close to the president.” No longer was the focus on a small number of people at some distance from Trump, such as his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, longtime adviser and political troublemaker Roger Stone, or Carter Page, briefly Trump’s national security adviser during the campaign. The indications are that the “person of interest” is Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law.
Though younger and more composed, Kushner is a lot more like Trump than is generally understood. Both of them moved their father’s businesses from the New York periphery to Manhattan. Like his father-in-law, Kushner came to Washington knowing a lot about real estate deals but almost nothing about government. Both entered the campaign and the White House unfamiliar with the rules and laws and evidently disinclined to check them before acting. Thus, Kushner has reinforced some of Trump’s critical weaknesses. Trump has thrust project after project upon him (the only top aide he could trust), and Kushner, who has a high self-regard, has taken on a preposterous list of assignments. He was able somehow (likely through his own leaks) to gain a reputation—along with his wife, Ivanka Trump—as someone who could keep the president calm and prevent him from acting impulsively or unwisely.
In the days before Trump’s foreign trip, however, others on the White House staff, by now not fans of Kushner, leaked that he had encouraged Trump to make the shortsighted decision in early May to fire FBI Director James Comey. By getting rid of the man who was overseeing the investigation into the Trump campaign’s relationship with the Russian government, the president stirred widespread outrage and reinforced suspicions that he had something to hide. (Richard Nixon, who was a lot smarter than Trump is, similarly misread the way the public would react when he arranged for the firing of his special prosecutor, Archibald Cox.) One concrete and dangerous result was that Trump was quickly confronted with something worse: a special counsel—Robert Mueller, Comey’s predecessor as FBI director—who is respected by both parties and, unlike Comey, can focus on this one assignment and will be much harder to fire.
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But the widely applauded decision to name a special counsel won’t resolve some momentous matters raised by the Russia affair. Mueller’s investigation is limited to considering criminal acts. His purview doesn’t include determining whether Trump should be held to account for serious noncriminal misdeeds he or his associates may have committed with regard to his election, or violations of his constitutional duties as president. The point that largely got lost in the excitement over the appointment is that there are presidential actions that aren’t crimes but that can constitute impeachable offenses, which the Constitution defines as “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”
When it was considering the impeachment of Richard Nixon, the House Judiciary Committee concluded that “high crimes” meant something broader than offenses listed in the criminal code. The concept of impeachment was largely lifted by the Founders from English law, which Edmund Burke explained to Parliament meant that “statesmen, who abuse their power” will be accused and tried by fellow statesmen “not upon the niceties of a narrow jurisprudence, but upon the enlarged and solid principles of state morality [Discussed in my book Washington Journal: Reporting Watergate and Richard Nixon’s Downfall (Overlook, 2014) ( https://www.amazon.com/Washington-Journal-Reporting-Watergate-Downfall/dp/1468309994 )].”
Among the crimes that the Watergate defendants were convicted of and that might be applicable to the more recent misadventure are bribery, subornation of perjury, criminal obstruction of justice, money laundering, tax evasion, witness tampering, and violations of election laws including campaign finance laws. Other crimes that might have occurred in the Russia affair are violations of the foreign agent registration laws and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, perjury itself (including lying to federal investigators), plus espionage and even treason.
Unlike ordinary crimes, impeachable offenses are “political” questions—ones that deeply affect the polity. Alexander Hamilton said that impeachable offenses were political, “as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself.” For example, of the three articles of impeachment adopted by the Judiciary Committee against Richard Nixon in 1974, the most important was for “abuse of power.” The critical holding by the committee was that a president can be held accountable for the acts of subordinates as well as for actions that aren’t, strictly speaking, crimes. In the end, an impeachment of a president is grounded in the theory that the holder of that office has failed to fulfill his responsibility, set out in Article II of the Constitution, to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” Unless a single act is itself sufficiently grave to warrant impeachment—for example, treason—a pattern of behavior needs to be found. That could involve, for example, emoluments or obstruction of justice.
This concept of accountability is critical to preventing a president from setting a tone in the White House, or dropping hints that can’t be traced, that lead to a pattern of acts by his aides that amount to, as in the case of Watergate, a violation of constitutional government. Many of what seemed disparate acts—well beyond the famous break-in in the Watergate complex and the cover-up—were carried out in order to assure Nixon’s reelection in 1972, and they amounted to the party in power interfering with the nominating process of the opposition party. That way lay fascism.
Similarly, in the case of the Russia affair, even if the president’s fingerprints aren’t found on any single act, misdeeds committed by Trump’s aides and close associates could amount to an impeachable offense on the part of the president. By definition, impeachable offenses would appear to concern conduct only during a presidency. But a number of constitutional law scholars, including the Harvard Law professor Laurence Tribe, who was dubious at first, believe that if a president or his associates working on his behalf acted corruptly and secretly to rig the election, then the preinaugural period should be included.
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Michael T. Flynn; drawing by James Ferguson
Mike Flynn, Trump’s former campaign adviser and dismissed national security adviser, is obviously a problem for the president, who has acted toward him in a most bizarre way. Trump ignored the warnings of Obama and Chris Christie not to hire Flynn. Then he resisted firing him even though, six days after the inauguration, then-acting attorney general Sally Yates warned the White House that Flynn had been “compromised” by Russia, and that Flynn had lied to Vice President Mike Pence about his conversations with the Russian ambassador, Sergey Kislyak, in late December 2016. Yates also alluded to what she called Flynn’s “underlying conduct.”
Trump asked for Flynn’s resignation only on February 13, after stories about Yates’s warning appeared in the press—and then, two days after he fired him, the president called Flynn “a wonderful man.” Ignoring admonitions not to be in touch with someone under investigation, Trump has done so and, weirdly, recently told aides that he’d like to have Flynn back in the White House. Trump’s conduct has the unmistakable ring of a man concerned about what the other man has on him.
More recently, the McClatchy news organization reported that Flynn, in conversations with outgoing national security adviser Susan Rice during the transition, asked that the Obama administration hold off on its plan to arm Kurdish forces to help the effort to retake Raqqa, the ISIS capital in Syria. Since Flynn was a paid lobbyist for the Turkish government, which strongly opposed the plan, this action could possibly lead to a charge of treason.
In late May, it was reported that Flynn had told Kislyak that it would be preferable if Russia didn’t retaliate against sanctions imposed by the Obama administration in response to Russia’s meddling in the election. Flynn was leading the Russians to believe that they’d receive much better treatment under a President Trump and the Russians went along. (They’ve been disappointed because once Russia’s behavior in the election became known it was clear that Congress wouldn’t allow Trump to lift the sanctions.) A big question is whether Flynn discussed such important policy matters with the Russians without the knowledge of the president-elect. Once it became clear that Russia wasn’t retaliating, Trump tweeted: “Great move on delay (by V. Putin)—I always knew he was very smart!”
Another major question is how far the Russians got in recruiting allies in the Trump campaign. Recently, former CIA director John Brennan testified that last summer he’d become concerned about the number of contacts between Russians and people involved in the campaign, so much so that he told a bipartisan group of congressional leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, neither of whom has yet to show any sign of being perturbed. (But they are people to watch closely for any sign of movement away from Trump.)
Brennan testified he was worried that the Russians may even have recruited some Americans to cooperate with their effort to tilt the election. Intelligence analysts picked up conversations by Russians in which they bragged that they’d cultivated Flynn and Manafort and believed they would be useful for influencing Trump. (This doesn’t prove guilt on the part of either man.) According to CNN, some Obama administration officials viewed Flynn as a security risk.
While Mueller’s investigation could preempt some congressional inquiries, it still leaves them important work to do. It doesn’t fall to the special counsel to consider the enormous and pressing question of how to prevent a foreign power from interfering in our elections again. It’s up to Congress to determine what new laws to write to deal with that. Conflicts are likely to arise between what Mueller says he needs by way of secrecy and not subjecting witnesses to self-incrimination, and the committees’ desire to remain involved; these will have to be negotiated.
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Laurence Tribe is gathering what he believes are impeachable offenses committed by Trump [See Laurence H. Tribe, “Trump Must Be Impeached. Here’s Why,” The Washington Post, May 13, 2017 ( https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-must-be-impeached-heres-why/2017/05/13/82ce2ea4-374d-11e7-b4ee-434b6d506b37_story.html )]. Going back to the first days of the Trump presidency and continuing up to the present, Tribe sees Trump flouting the constitutional ban on accepting “emoluments”—payments by foreign governments that might compromise the president’s presumably undivided commitment to US interests. Examples include accepting money paid by foreign governments to Trump’s luxury hotel just down the street from the White House in order to curry favor with its owner, and Trump’s failure to cut himself off from ownership of a business that has projects all over the world.
Also, Trump may be held to have attempted to impede the FBI’s Russia investigation. In addition to his request to Comey that he “let…go” his investigation of Flynn, this could include Trump’s firing of Comey for, as he ultimately admitted, “this Russia thing.” Or Trump’s saying to Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov and to Ambassador Kislyak, of firing Comey: “I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.” Collectively, these acts could amount to the impeachable offense of covering up other potential, substantive misdeeds. There were also Trump’s efforts very early in the administration to get Comey to pledge “loyalty” to him (Comey dodged, saying he’d give him his “honesty”). In another form of pressure, Trump asked Comey when the FBI would announce that he wasn’t under investigation. Comey didn’t respond.
Before it was revealed that Comey had taken notes of their conversations, Trump made a not-very-veiled threat that Comey “better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations.” Whether this was a feint or Trump had actually taped some conversations is as yet unknown, but by now Trump’s habitual lying has put him in a difficult spot when it is his word against Comey’s—or pretty much anyone’s. Whether or not Trump has recognized it—after all, he deals in threats—the revelation that Comey had notes of Trump asking him to drop the Flynn investigation was a clear sign that Comey wasn’t going to simply go away.
* * *
Where are all the leaks coming from? Many Republicans want to make this the issue rather than what the leaks reveal, but the fact that they keep coming is a sign of the state of near collapse of the White House staff. It’s not an exaggeration to say that Trump has the most unhappy staff ever, with some feeling a higher duty to warn the public about what they see as a danger to the country.
From the stories that emanate from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue the impression one gets is that Trump is a nearly impossible person to work for: he screams at his staff when they tell him something he doesn’t want to hear; he screams at them as he watches television news for hours on end and sees stories about himself that he doesn’t like, which is most of them. Some White House staff are polishing their résumés. Leaks are also being made by the intelligence community, many of whom see Trump as a national menace.
People who have been to the Oval Office have come away stunned by Trump’s minimal attention span, his appalling lack of information, his tendency to say more than he knows. (Intelligence officials have been instructed to put as much of his daily briefing as possible in the form of pictures.) Aides have been subjected to public embarrassment by his propensity for changing his story.
Trump sullies the reputation of people who have signed on with him. The respected general H.R. McMaster, now the national security adviser, humiliated himself by trying—presumably under orders—to combat the Washington Post story on May 15 that Trump had revealed highly classified intelligence about ISIS to Lavrov and Kislyak. What made this even worse was that the intelligence had been passed on to the US by Israel under a strict international concordat that classified information shared between allies is not to be revealed to anyone else. McMaster has yet to recover his reputation from having emphatically refuted things the Post story didn’t say. Over and over, McMaster characterized the president’s passing along to the Russian officials the most sensitive information as “wholly appropriate.”
Trump’s reckless act is believed to have endangered the life of an Israeli intelligence asset who had been planted among ISIS forces, something extremely hard to pull off. Trump’s mishandling of the intelligence provoked dismay in Washington. During his visit to Jerusalem on May 22, Trump claimed that the press stories about it were wrong because he hadn’t mentioned Israel; but the reports didn’t say he did.
That same day, The Washington Post disclosed that Trump had asked the heads of two major intelligence agencies to announce that there had been no collusion between his campaign and Russia. Both declined. Some Trump defenders will argue that he didn’t know enough to understand that he shouldn’t have made those calls, or to try to get Comey to back off investigating Flynn—what might be called the ignorance defense. But while ignorance of the facts might be an acceptable defense in criminal or impeachment proceedings, ignorance of the law isn’t.
* * *
The particular challenges of serving in the Trump administration have led some people to make compromises that outsiders are prone to judge. In very short order, the same person can be almost rapturously admired as a hero and then scorned as a coward and a loser. Consider Rod Rosenstein, a career government prosecutor with a reputation for integrity who became deputy attorney general in April. Within a couple of weeks Rosenstein found himself in a meeting with Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions (who had supposedly recused himself from any dealings on the campaign and the Russia matter) and under pressure to write a memo expressing his own strong negative views of how Comey had handled Hillary Clinton’s e-mail case. The choices before Rosenstein were to write the report, knowing that Comey was going to be fired anyway, or refuse to and resign or be fired. Then what use could he be?
Trump had reportedly thought that Democrats, still unhappy over Clinton’s loss, would be pleased with his firing of Comey if his rationale was Comey’s handling of her case. But that made no sense; the timing was inexplicable; Democrats were incredulous that Trump was now suddenly sympathetic to Clinton. While Trump was within his legal rights to fire Comey, his doing so risked politicizing the FBI and set a terrible precedent.
Now Rosenstein was the goat. But despite numerous Democrats’ harsh condemnation of it, Rosenstein’s memo reads as if it had been written by any number of the Democrats or experienced prosecutors appalled by Comey’s behavior in the Clinton case. The memo set forth views widely expressed at the time that Comey had made a number of prosecutorial misjudgments. These included his tough public comments about Clinton’s handling of classified material even though he said there weren’t grounds for prosecuting her—this isn’t done—and his letter to Republican committee chairmen, which he had to know would be made public, eleven days before the election, saying that the inquiry into her handling of classified e-mails was being reopened, breaking a long-standing rule that prosecutors don’t comment on the status of continuing cases.
Comey’s problem was that in trying to protect his reputation he kept doing things that further damaged it. In his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on May 3 he spoke melodramatically of his anguish in having to decide between two choices: to “speak” or to “conceal.” But many observers believed that he had a third choice: quietly to get a warrant and check out some of the e-mails that had traveled from Clinton’s laptop to her close aide Huma Abedin’s to that of Abedin’s then-husband Anthony Weiner before reopening an investigation, much less announcing one and perhaps affect the outcome of the election. Comey’s testimony also angered Democrats by wildly exaggerating the number of Clinton’s e-mails that had landed on Weiner’s laptop—“hundreds and thousands,” he said, when actually there had been just a handful. Comey’s comment that the thought that his actions may have affected the election made him “mildly nauseous” enraged Trump.
Rosenstein was at the least naive if he didn’t understand that his report would be used as the rationale for the firing, but when that ensued, drawing intense criticism of him, he indicated he might quit. That Trump changed his story two days later, now saying that when he fired Comey he was thinking about “this Russia thing,” showed how exasperating and even damaging it could be to work for him. Everyone who hewed to the White House line that the firing had been based on Rosenstein’s memo, including Pence, was now embarrassed and lost credibility with the press and the public. And then Rosenstein was the hero again when just over a week later he appointed Mueller as special counsel.
* * *
The survival of Trump’s presidency may depend most of all on congressional Republicans. Unless the Democrats take both chambers in the midterms, the Republicans will decide his fate. At what point might their patience with Trump be exhausted? How will they respond if high presidential associates or even the president himself are indicted and he chooses to fight it out rather than resign? Is it possible that a Congress in which the Republicans control both or even one chamber would consider impeaching Trump? The impeachment proceedings against Nixon were accepted by the country because they were bipartisan and considered fair. Too many different unknowns are in play to predict the outcome of the midterms, though the respected Cook Report anticipates substantial Republican losses in the House. Republicans are starting to panic.
Their challenge is how to overcome the twin blights of Trump’s chaotic governing and his lack of achievements on Capitol Hill (the exception is the confirmation of the very conservative Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court). Trump’s sole substantive accomplishment thus far is the House’s approval of a health care overhaul that required all but a few of them to vote to throw tens of millions of people off of health insurance. (It was followed by a grand celebration at the White House.)
The Republicans are in a bit of a spot: they don’t particularly like Trump and to them he’s an interloper. One reason many of them, especially Ryan, allied themselves with Trump was that they thought he would get their programs, especially tax cuts, through Congress, but prospects for major legislation are receding. (And there’s no reason to think that a President Mike Pence wouldn’t back the same programs.)
The problem with much of the predicting about what will or might happen in Washington is that it proceeds from an assumption of stasis—as if things won’t happen that could change the politicians’ calculations. When it comes to how long Trump will remain in office, one possibility often discussed is that things might get so bad for him that he’ll decide to return to his much easier life in New York. But he insists that he’s not “a quitter.” (There’s also a question about the corpulent Trump’s health, but that’s not considered a proper topic of conversation.)
Politicians are pragmatists. Republican leaders urged Nixon to leave office rather than have to vote on his impeachment. Similarly, it’s possible that when Trump becomes too politically expensive for them, the current Republicans might be ready to dump him by one means or another. But the Republicans of today are quite different from those in the early 1970s: there are few moderates now and the party is the prisoner of conservative forces that didn’t exist in Nixon’s day.
Trump, like Nixon, depends on the strength of his core supporters, but unlike Nixon, he can also make use of social media, Fox News, and friendly talk shows to keep them loyal. Cracking Trump’s base could be a lot harder than watching Nixon’s diminish as he appeared increasingly like a cornered rat, perspiring as he tried to talk his way out of trouble (“I am not a crook”) or firing his most loyal aides as if that would fix the situation. Moreover, Trump is, for all his deep flaws, in some ways a cannier politician than Nixon; he knows how to lie to his people to keep them behind him.
The critical question is: When, or will, Trump’s voters realize that he isn’t delivering on his promises, that his health care and tax proposals will help the wealthy at their expense, that he isn’t producing the jobs he claims? His proposed budget would slash numerous domestic programs, such as food stamps, that his supporters have relied on heavily. (One wonders if he’s aware of this part of his constituency.)
People can have a hard time recognizing that they’ve been conned. And Trump is skilled at flimflam, creating illusions. But how long can he keep blaming his failures to deliver on others—Democrats, the “dishonest media,” the Washington “swamp”? None of this is knowable yet. What is knowable is that an increasingly agitated Donald Trump’s hold on the presidency is beginning to slip.
—May 25, 2017
© 2017 NYREV, Inc.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/06/22/trump-presidency-in-peril/
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Infowars Nightly News Breakdown Of The Terror Threat: 6/5/17 Full Show
Streamed live on Jun 5, 2017 by The Alex Jones Channel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JB00ZcHdFeo [with comments]
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Christian VS Muslim
Published on Sep 26, 2014 by DarkMatter2525 http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLhtZqdkjshgq8TqwIjMdCQ / http://www.youtube.com/user/DarkMatter2525 , http://www.youtube.com/user/DarkMatter2525/videos ]
What could possibly go wrong?
This bird has two right wings. Basically, it ain't gonna fly.
This video is mainly addressed to people I would define as ultra right wing radical Christians in America. Some people tell me that Islam is worse, because at least the Christians aren't beheading people who don't respect their religion. The whole point of this video is "beware what you wish for". The reason certain Christians don't do such things is simply because they live in a secular society that won't allow such things, but they want that to change. They want the theocracy. They want people like me to be punished. They are the Taliban that is not allowed to act like the Taliban. This video is a cautionary comparison, and it is absolutely valid. Furthermore, far more Muslims have been killed by Christians, than the other way around, today and throughout history. It's just that we tend to label it differently.
I've often been told by Christians, "Hey, if you were in a Muslim country, making fun of religion, you'd be dead by now," (John Lennox has said stuff like this). Basically, that means "At least we Christians let you live." Um...thanks. Those are some mighty low standards you have there. I don't trust radicals on either side. I'm alive because the secular government won't allow you to kill me - not because there's a shortage of Christians who would be ready, willing, and able to do it. Of that, I have no doubt.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYV7KWQ-fY4 [with (currently nearly 8,000, earlier over 14,000) comments] [and see also in particular (linked in) http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=131610811 and preceding and following]
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Sen. Cardin: Trump tweets on London mayor 'outrageous'
All In with Chris Hayes
6/5/17
'I would hope the president would reflect before he sends out a tweet which is totally inaccurate.' Duration: 4:16
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/sen-cardin-trump-tweets-on-london-mayor-outrageous-960800835856
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Earnest: Trump is 'intentionally sowing fear and chaos'
All In with Chris Hayes
6/5/17
Former White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest says the president's rhetoric on terror may help him politically. But it's still cynical and dangerous. Duration: 3:11
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/earnest-trump-is-intentionally-sowing-fear-and-chaos-960804419785
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White House finally reveals if Trump filed tax returns this year
All In with Chris Hayes
6/5/17
For weeks, the White House has refused to confirm whether or not the President filed his tax returns this year. Duration: 1:56
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/white-house-finally-reveals-if-trump-filed-tax-returns-this-year-960811587579
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Trump rash behavior hurts US interests, alliances
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Laura Kennedy, former deputy assistant secretary for European and Eurasian affairs, talks about the damage Donald Trump has done to U.S. relations with allies in Europe. Duration: 9:26
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-rash-behavior-hurts-us-interests-alliances-960877635786 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkciZ6xBWY4 [with comments]
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White House staff fails to restrain Trump from damaging self, US
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Michael Beschloss, NBC News presidential historian, talks about times in history when a struggling president has been steadied by able staff members, and notes that Donald Trump lacks such support. Duration: 5:15
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/white-house-staff-fails-to-restrain-trump-from-damaging-self-us-960887875695
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Leaked docs show new depth of US voting system hacking by Russia
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Ken Delanian, NBC News national security reporter, talks about new revelations of Russian efforts to hack U.S. voting systems in 2016 and the arrest of the NSA contractor who shared secret documents with the news media. Duration: 8:08
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/leaked-docs-show-new-depth-of-us-voting-system-hacking-by-russia-960893507774
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Trump ranting corrodes executive credibility
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Neal Katyal, former acting U.S. solicitor general, talks about how Donald Trump's online ranting has undercut his lawyers' legal defense of his Muslim ban, and shattered the credibility of the executive branch. Duration: 11:01
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-ranting-corrodes-executive-credibility-960899139841
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London mayor: Disinvite Trump from UK visit
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Joy-Ann Reid relays remarks by London Mayor Sadiq Khan calling for Donald Trump's state visit to the UK to be cancelled in light of Trump's attacks on the mayor in the midst of a terror attack and antagonism of NATO allies. Duration: 1:11
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/london-mayor-disinvite-trump-from-uk-visit-960904771625 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN_ZOKZfhiw [with comments]
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Lawrence: Trump's miscalculation with Comey's testimony
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/5/17
The White House says Donald Trump won't invoke executive privilege to block James Comey from testifying before the Senate Intel Cmte. Lawrence O'Donnell argues that's a critical mistake for the president. Jill Wine-Banks, John Heilemann, and David Frum join. Duration: 16:53
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/lawrence-trump-s-miscalculation-with-comey-s-testimony-960876099656 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnUpjZUpDng [with comments]
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Trump advisors surprised by NATO speech
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/5/17
Fmr. NATO Supreme Allied Commander in Europe Adm. James Stavridis says "it was a big miss" that Trump removed language reaffirming Article 5. He says "it would break my heart to have to go out and perform that kind of Kabuki dance" to defend Trump's actions. Duration: 4:09
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/trump-advisors-surprised-by-nato-speech-960887875633
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Trump's tweets torpedo Trump administration's message
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
Calling for the Supreme Court to bring back his 'travel ban' & criticizing London's mayor in the wake of that city's terror attack on Twitter, Trump is stepping all over his own message. Duration: 7:59
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/trump-s-tweets-torpedo-trump-administration-s-message-960906307578
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Report: NSA doc shows Russia tried to hack U.S. voting systems
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
MSNBC's Brian Williams & Peter Baker of The New York Times discuss the report, citing a top secret NSA document, that the Russians tried to attack U.S. voting systems days before Election Day. Duration: 2:00
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/report-nsa-doc-shows-russia-tried-to-hack-u-s-voting-systems-960908867763
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Fmr. Watergate prosecutor: Trump tweets will destroy travel ban
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
Fmr. Watergate prosecutor Nick Akerman and fmr. ethics attorney for Pres. George W. Bush Richard Painter discuss how the Supreme Court will react to Trump's travel ban tweets. Duration: 5:37
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/fmr-watergate-prosecutor-trump-tweets-will-destroy-travel-ban-960899139942 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1B58n5zdoI [with comments]
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House Democrat: No brake between Trump's brain & his mouth
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
Rep. Dan Kildee (D-MI) responds to Pres. Trump's tweets and comments about the 'travel ban' and the Mayor of London, saying it's 'dangerous' for the president to say whatever he thinks. Duration: 2:02
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/house-democrat-no-brake-between-trump-s-brain-his-mouth-960918595614 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLMNiv30DeU [with comments]
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Report: Trump's own team caught off guard by Trump's NATO speech
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
MSNBC's Brian Williams, former U.S. Ambassador Christopher Hill, & Peter Baker of NY Times discuss the new report showing Trump's own team was caught off guard by his NATO speech. Duration: 2:12
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/report-trump-s-own-team-caught-off-guard-by-trump-s-nato-speech-960920131815
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Vladimir Putin & Megyn Kelly: Slimy Public Manipulators: The Daily Show
Published on Jun 5, 2017 by The Daily Show with Trevor Noah [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwWhs_6x42TyRM4Wstoq8HA , https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwWhs_6x42TyRM4Wstoq8HA/videos ]
Megyn Kelly makes her NBC News debut facing off against Russian President Vladimir Putin, but Michelle Wolf isn't buying the former Fox News host as a serious journalist.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOh6nOcyvyM [with comments]
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Aquaman Applauds Trump's Paris Agreement Decision
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMtFAi84ehTSYSE9XoHefig , https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMtFAi84ehTSYSE9XoHefig/videos ]
Remember, rising sea levels are only bad news for those of us that live on land.
[originally aired June 5, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tW6F4os-KdU [with comments]
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Stephen Raises Money For Less Fortunate Airplanes
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
Infrastructure Week 2017 gets off to a bang courtesy of Donald Trump and the alt-Wright Brothers.
[originally aired June 5, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H45XTqombz8 [with comments]
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Stephen Finally Gets To Covfefe About Covfefe
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
Stephen was away on vacation but can pretty much sum up last week in a single word, albeit imaginary.
[originally aired June 5, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5rC8uAtiBc [with comments]
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Trump Decides On The Paris Agreement And The Russia Agreement
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
It's becoming clear that President Trump's desire to go green is superseded by his desire to go red.
[originally aired June 5, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zz2d4wDzWl0 [with comments]
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Trump Picks Fights on Twitter, Pisses Off World: A Closer Look
Published on Jun 5, 2017 by Late Night with Seth Meyers [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVTyTA7-g9nopHeHbeuvpRA / https://www.youtube.com/user/LateNightSeth , https://www.youtube.com/user/LateNightSeth/videos ]
Seth takes a closer look at the latest fights President Trump has picked with the rest of the world as his approval ratings hit new lows.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIRm1rY4nF4 [with comments]
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Can America's Farms Survive the Threat of Deportations?
In upstate New York, both workers and the farmers who employ them fear more aggressive immigration enforcement.
Jun 6, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/06/can-americas-farms-survive-the-threat-of-deportations/529008/ [with embedded audio version ( https://soundcloud.com/user-154380542/can-americas-farms-survive-the-threat-of-deportations-the-atlantic-michael-frank ), and comments]
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Education Sec. Betsy DeVos speaks at Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing
Streamed live on Jun 6, 2017 by PBS NewsHour [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6ZFN9Tx6xh-skXCuRHCDpQ / https://www.youtube.com/user/PBSNewsHour , https://www.youtube.com/user/PBSNewsHour/videos ]
Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos testifies on the Department of Education budget before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies.
What we just learned from Betsy DeVos’s painful appearance before Congress
June 6, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/06/06/what-we-just-learned-from-betsy-devoss-painful-appearance-before-congress/ [with embedded video, and comments]
Betsy DeVos: It Is Not The Education Department’s Job To Protect LGBTQ Students
The education secretary faced intense questioning in a Senate hearing about whether she would stand up for the civil rights of students.
Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos prepares to testify before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education on Tuesday morning.
06/06/2017
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/betsy-devos-lgbtq-students_us_5936c878e4b013c4816b4ebc [with embedded video, and comments]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5aq6u0kpeCw [comments disabled]
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How Donald Trump Shifted Kids-Cancer Charity Money Into His Business
Jun 6, 2017
LIKE AUTUMN LEAVES, sponsored Cadillacs, Ferraris and Maseratis descend on the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, New York, in September for the Eric Trump Foundation golf invitational. Year after year, the formula is consistent: 18 holes of perfectly trimmed fairways with a dose of Trumpian tackiness, including Hooters waitresses and cigar spreads, followed by a clubhouse dinner, dates encouraged. The crowd leans toward real estate insiders, family friends and C-list celebrities, such as former baseball slugger Darryl Strawberry and reality housewife (and bankruptcy-fraud felon) Teresa Giudice.
The real star of the day is Eric Trump, the president's second son and now the co-head of the Trump Organization, who has hosted this event for ten years on behalf of the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis. He's done a ton of good: To date, he's directed more than $11 million there, the vast majority of it via this annual golf event. He has also helped raise another $5 million through events with other organizations.
The best part about all this, according to Eric Trump, is the charity's efficiency: Because he can get his family's golf course for free and have most of the other costs donated, virtually all the money contributed will go toward helping kids with cancer. "We get to use our assets 100% free of charge," Trump tells Forbes.
That's not the case. In reviewing filings from the Eric Trump Foundation and other charities, it's clear that the course wasn't free--that the Trump Organization received payments for its use, part of more than $1.2 million that has no documented recipients past the Trump Organization. Golf charity experts say the listed expenses defy any reasonable cost justification for a one-day golf tournament.
Additionally, the Donald J. Trump Foundation, which has come under previous scrutiny for self-dealing and advancing the interests of its namesake rather than those of charity, apparently used the Eric Trump Foundation to funnel $100,000 in donations into revenue for the Trump Organization.
And while donors to the Eric Trump Foundation were told their money was going to help sick kids, more than $500,000 was re-donated to other charities, many of which were connected to Trump family members or interests, including at least four groups that subsequently paid to hold golf tournaments at Trump courses.
All of this seems to defy federal tax rules and state laws that ban self-dealing and misleading donors. It also raises larger questions about the Trump family dynamics and whether Eric and his brother, Don Jr., can be truly independent of their father.
Especially since the person who specifically commanded that the for-profit Trump Organization start billing hundreds of thousands of dollars to the nonprofit Eric Trump Foundation, according to two people directly involved, was none other than the current president of the United States, Donald Trump.
[...]
https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2017/06/06/how-donald-trump-shifted-kids-cancer-charity-money-into-his-business/
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Trump’s sons recommend the high road they usually don’t [sic - never] take
By Callum Borchers
June 7, 2017
President Trump's adult sons think it is time for everyone to take the high road in political discourse. Just don't expect them to lead the way.
“Morals have flown out the window,” Eric Trump lamented on Sean Hannity's Fox News show Tuesday night. “We deserve so much better than this as a country, and, you know, it's so sad.”
Apparently not sad enough for him to set an example, however. In the same interview, Eric Trump said this of his father's critics: “To me, they're not even people.”
Classy, right?
In an interview that aired earlier Tuesday on ABC's “Good Morning America,” Donald Trump Jr. said Kathy Griffin “deserves everything that's coming to her,” after she posed for a photograph with a bloody mask meant to simulate the president's severed head.
For the record, death threats [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/06/02/kathy-griffin-will-talk-about-bullying-from-the-trump-family-at-presser-friday/ ] are what's “coming to her.”
So, to summarize: The president's detractors are subhuman, and at least one of them deserves to have her subhuman life threatened by the president's supporters. Golly, the state of politics in this country is so sad, isn't it?
On some level, the sentiments of Eric and Don Jr. are understandable. We're talking about their father, after all, so a little righteous indignation is to be expected. If all they did was lash out, they might be entitled to a pass.
But their moralizing about over-the-line rhetoric is jaw-droppingly hypocritical.
There is another major disconnect in the Trumps' thinking: They seem to be under the impression that because they do some good things, they ought to be immune to criticism for doing bad things.
“I've raised $16.3 million for the greatest hospital in the world — that's St. Jude,” Eric Trump told Hannity. “And I get attacked for it.”
By “attacked,” he meant scrutinized by Forbes magazine, which reported [ https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2017/06/06/how-donald-trump-shifted-kids-cancer-charity-money-into-his-business/ (excerpted/linked just above)] Tuesday that Eric Trump's annual charity golf tournament doubles as a revenue stream for Trump family businesses. Although Eric Trump claimed that his family donates use of the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, N.Y., public records show that the club has accepted $1.2 million in payments over the years.
“Golf charity experts say the listed expenses defy any reasonable cost justification for a one-day golf tournament,” Forbes reported. More:
And while donors to the Eric Trump Foundation were told their money was going to help sick kids, more than $500,000 was re-donated to other charities, many of which were connected to Trump family members or interests, including at least four groups that subsequently paid to hold golf tournaments at Trump courses.
All of this seems to defy federal tax rules and state laws that ban self-dealing and misleading donors.
Two things can be true at once: The Trumps can do good charitable work and put money in their own pockets. They can be targets of unacceptable rhetoric and dispense some of their own.
What they want, however, is all the praise and sympathy that comes with the first half of those equations and none of the criticism that comes with the second.
Read more:
Eric Trump calls father’s critics ‘not even people’
June 7, 2017
[...]
Eric Trump took special aim at the Democratic Party, which he says is “imploding.” He calls Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez “a total wackjob.” Trump says Democrats “have no message of their own” and are trying to obstruct “a great man” in his father and his family.
In a statement Wednesday, Perez responded: “Democrats are people. So are Muslims, immigrants, women, people with pre-existing conditions, and everyone else Trump is hurting.”
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/eric-trump-calls-fathers-critics-not-even-people/2017/06/07/332d52f2-4b71-11e7-987c-42ab5745db2e_story.html [original at https://www.apnews.com/0560034948154b8c85d5baf77696bfa4/Eric-Trump-calls-father's-critics-'not-even-people' ]
© 2017 The Washington Post (emphasis in original)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/07/trumps-sons-recommend-the-high-road-they-usually-dont-take/ [with comments], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVFi779GROk [as embedded; with comments], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1wQuU66n6A [as embedded; with comments]
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The White House Exaggerated the Growth of Coal Jobs by About 5,000 Percent
Donald Trump’s EPA head is touting bad statistics in defense of a foolish policy.
Jun 6, 2017
On Sunday’s “Meet the Press,” Scott Pruitt, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, claimed [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/06/06/pruitts-claim-that-almost-50000-jobs-have-been-gained-in-coal/ ] that the U.S. has created 50,000 jobs in the coal sector since the fourth quarter of 2016. The statistic carries an important message for the White House. Trump has brought extraordinary attention to the decline of coal jobs, for which he’s blamed Obama-imposed regulations. Coal’s immediate bounce-back would represent a major early win for a president who has made promises to revive the economy of the 1950s, when mining was more dominant.
But Pruitt’s statistic wasn’t just flagrantly incorrect. It’s being used to support a nonsensical argument that the United States should orient its global policy based on a sector employing 0.03 percent of the economy, as there are fewer coal mining workers than there are people employed at Carl's Jr. [ http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jan/23/andy-puzder/ceo-carls-jr-says-obamacare-has-caused-millions-fu/ ] franchises or Disney World [ http://www.today.com/parents/10-crazy-things-you-never-knew-about-walt-disney-world-t73881 ].
Quite simply, the coal sector has added about 1,000 jobs since October 2016—not 50,000. Coal could not have added 50,000 jobs in the last eight months, since that is essentially the size of the entire coal industry, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics [ https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/naics4_212100.htm ]. Pruitt’s statistic would otherwise imply that entire coal mining industry started in October. (Perhaps he meant 50,000 total mining jobs, but the vast majority of those positions have nothing to do with coal jobs [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/06/06/pruitts-claim-that-almost-50000-jobs-have-been-gained-in-coal/ ]; indeed, natural gas-mining workers might even be replacing them.)
[...]
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/06/pruitt-epa-coal-jobs-exaggerate/529311/ [with comments]
*
Kansas Republicans raise taxes, ending their GOP governor’s ‘real live experiment’ in conservative policy
Gov. Sam Brownback vetoes a tax bill in February.
(Thad Allton /The Topeka Capital-Journal via AP)
By Max Ehrenfreund
June 7, 2017
Republicans in Kansas broke ranks with the state's conservative governor Tuesday night, voting to raise tax rates and put an end to a series of cuts.
The GOP revolt is a defeat for Gov. Sam Brownback, who overhauled the state's tax system beginning in 2012, part of what called a "real-live experiment" in conservative governance. Yet the economic boom Brownback promised has not materialized, leaving the state government perennially short on money and forced to reduce basic services.
Kansas's legislature is overwhelmingly Republican, but moderate GOP lawmakers joined with Democrats to override Brownback's veto of the bill to increase taxes. Eighteen of the state's 31 GOP senators and 49 of the 85 Republican members of the House voted against the governor.
Tuesday's vote was a rebuke not only for Brownback, but also for Republicans in Washington who have advocated similar cuts in taxes at the national level -- including President Trump. Although Republicans in Kansas are giving up on the experiment, Trump and his allies are hoping to try again.
The principles Trump endorsed during the campaign and in the early stages of his presidency are broadly similar to those enacted in Kansas. As Brownback did, Trump has proposed bringing down marginal rates, getting rid of brackets and giving a new break to small businesses.
That is no coincidence, since Brownback is well connected to the Republican policymaking establishment in Washington. Trump and Brownback have shared economic advisers, and when Brownback was a U.S. senator, Rep. Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.), now the speaker of the House, served as his legislative director.
The victory for Brownback's opponents resulted in part from their gains in last year's election. Voters -- frustrated that public schools were closing early and the state's highways were in visible disrepair -- rejected Brownback's allies in favor of more moderate Republicans or Democrats.
"It was a hard vote for a lot of people to make last night," said Rep. Melissa Rooker, a moderate Republican who represents a suburb of Kansas City. "Kansas has had a turn to the far right, and we seem to be centering ourselves."
The legislation undoes the essential components of Brownback's reforms. The governor had reduced the number of brackets for the state's marginal rates on income from three to two. The legislature will restore the third bracket, increasing taxes on the state's wealthiest residents from 4.6 percent to 5.2 percent this year and 5.7 percent next year.
Marginal rates on less affluent Kansan households will increase as well, from 4.6 percent to 5.25 percent by next year for married taxpayers making between $30,000 and $60,000 a year and from 2.7 percent to 3.1 percent for those earning less than that.
The legislation also scraps a plan to bring those rates down even more in future years, one of Brownback's promises to conservative supporters.
Finally, the legislature eliminated a cut Brownback had put in place to help small businesses. Analysts said that the provision had become a loophole, as many Kansans were able to avoid paying taxes entirely by pretending to be small businesses.
Initially, the state forecast that about 200,000 small businesses would take advantage of the break. As it turned out, about 330,000 entities would use Kansas's new rule. That discrepancy suggests that tens of thousands of workers claimed that their incomes were from businesses they owned rather than from salaries.
State budget analysts project the tax increase will raise an additional $600 million annually.
"What we were able to do in the last 24 hours can allow us to start down that road, to begin repairing all the damage done after living with Gov. Brownback's failed tax experiment for five years," said Annie McKay, who is the president of Kansas Action for Children, an advocacy group in Topeka.
Proponents argued that reducing taxes would stimulate the state's economy. "We have worked hard in Kansas to move our tax policy to a pro-growth orientation," Brownback said in a statement [ https://governor.kansas.gov/governor-sam-brownback-issues-statement-on-legislative-tax-hike/ ] on vetoing the legislation. "This bill undoes much of that progress. It will substantially damage job creation and leave our citizens poorer in the future."
Since 2012, however, the pace of economic expansion in Kansas has consistently lagged behind that of the rest of the country.
Last year, Kansas's gross domestic product increased just 0.2 percent, federal data show, compared to 1.6 percent nationally. That was an improvement for Kansas, though: At the end of 2015, the state was in what many economists would describe as a recession, with the economy contracting two quarters in a row.
Last year's election substantially weakened Brownback's support in the legislature. In November, Democrats picked up a seat in the Senate, which has 40 members, and 12 seats in the House, which has 125. In primary elections in August, Republican voters had forced out 14 incumbent allies of the governor, replacing them with more moderate candidates.
Other GOP lawmakers who supported Brownback retired last year, and moderate Republicans won a few of those seats as well. Rooker, the GOP legislator, said her former colleagues were not eager to confront frustrated voters in another campaign, or to deal with the fiscal headaches Brownback's policies had created if they did win reelection.
The legislature began this year's session with the government in a deficit of $350 million.
"People expect us to take care of business efficiently and appropriately," Rooker said. "I just think it was the pressure building. Something had to be done."
"The elections reflected a mood in Kansas that possibly Kansas politics had shifted too far to the right," said Rep. Don Hineman, a moderate Republican who represents a rural district in western Kansas. "It was time to return to a more centrist position, which is where Kansas has traditionally been governed from."
For the past several years, legislative sessions have been protracted as lawmakers have struggled to find solutions to the state's fiscal woes. That pattern continued this year, and Hineman hopes that with the tax increase enacted, lawmakers can finally leave Topeka this weekend.
On Saturday, he hopes to head back to his family's farm, which his son operates. This week, they are putting in grain sorghum. "I’m anxious to get back home, and my son is anxious for me to be home, because he would like to have me on the tractor," Hineman said.
© 2017 The Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/06/07/kansas-republicans-raise-taxes-rebuking-their-gop-governors-real-live-experiment-in-conservative-policy/ [with embedded videos, and comments]
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Full Show - Islam Launches Global Jihad - Megan Kelly Visits Infowars - 06/06/2017
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by Ron Gibson [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYv-5LsUyc_P8KMo7YGPFPA / https://www.youtube.com/user/RonGibsonCF , https://www.youtube.com/user/RonGibsonCF/videos ]
Tuesday, June 6th 2017[, with Paul Joseph Watson hosting the fourth hour]: Londonistan Mayor Cancels Trump Visit - London's Mayor Sadiq Khan has cancelled Donald Trump's scheduled state visit. Rebel Media's Tommy Robinson will join today's program to explain how Britain is dealing with the aftermath of the latest terror attack. Also, political cartoonist Ben Garrison shares his take on leaks coming out of the Trump administration and the most recent terror attack in Paris where a man attacked police with a hammer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9s6xYiTrEKY [with comments] [the somewhat edited Alex Jones original at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmsspaf2C48 (title taken from; with comments)] [a must-watch]
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Putin: I don't have bad days because I'm 'not a woman'
By John Bowden
06/06/17
Russian President Vladimir Putin told controversial filmmaker Oliver Stone that he doesn't have bad days because he is a man, according to new footage provided [ https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2017-06-06/macho-putin-in-driver-s-seat-as-he-takes-oliver-stone-for-a-ride , https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-01/putin-interviewed-by-oliver-stone-in-documentary-for-showtime ] to Bloomberg.
While touring the Kremlin's gilded throne room, Stone asked Putin if he ever had "off days."
“I am not a woman, so I don’t have bad days,” Putin responded. "I am not trying to insult anyone. That's just the nature of things. There are certain natural cycles."
In the newly-released footage, the Russian president also denies that his administration is pursuing a campaign against homosexuality in Russia. Critics have blasted a reported ally of Putin, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, for allegedly detaining and torturing more than 100 gay men in Chechnya.
“There are no restrictions whatsoever,” Putin said of homosexuals in Russia.
In April, former Vice President Joe Biden [ http://thehill.com/people/joe-biden ] called on President Trump to confront Putin about human rights abuses in Chechnya.
“I am disgusted and appalled by reports from both the Russian media and non-governmental organizations that authorities in the Russian republic of Chechnya have rounded up, tortured and even murdered individuals who are believed to be gay. I hope that the current administration lives up to the promises it has made to advance human rights for everyone by raising this issue directly with Russia’s leaders,” Biden said at the time.
©2017 Capitol Hill Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of News Communications, Inc.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/336650-putin-i-dont-have-bad-days-because-im-not-a-woman [with comments]
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Did Trump Himself Meet With the Russian Ambassador? | The Resistance with Keith Olbermann | GQ
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by GQ
Have we got a giant new tentacle to the Trump/Russia octopus?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-aJD1a8xzU [with comments]
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Liberal Redneck - Midnight in Paris (on the Damn Doomsday Clock)
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by Trae Crowder [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTHsQd-vRXK1bp4vpifl6yA , https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTHsQd-vRXK1bp4vpifl6yA/videos ]
We done screwed the pooch with this Paris Climate shit yall. I would say Trump's fiddlin while the world burns but it ain't no way he can work a fiddle with those stupid tiny baby hands. Anyway we all gone die. Love ye.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOcVk6WRUaM [with comments]
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To Be Sick Without Obamacare
As the Senate debates the health law’s repeal, a look back at how insurers treated preexisting conditions before the Affordable Care Act
Jun 6, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/06/to-be-sick-without-obamacare/529317/ [with comments]
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Four top law firms turned down requests to represent Trump
By Michael Isikoff
June 06, 2017
Top lawyers with at least four major law firms rebuffed White House overtures to represent President Trump in the Russia investigations, in part over concerns that the president would be unwilling to listen to their advice, according to five sources familiar with discussions about the matter.
The unwillingness of some of the country’s most prestigious attorneys and their law firms to represent Trump has complicated the administration’s efforts to mount a coherent defense strategy to deal with probes being conducted by four congressional committees [ https://www.yahoo.com/news/told-trump-clear-not-us-key-senators-say-202928995.html ] as well as Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller [ https://www.yahoo.com/news/ten-things-know-robert-mueller-030120729.html ].
The president’s chief lawyer now in charge of the case is Marc E. Kasowitz, a tough New York civil litigator [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/business/dealbook/sorkin-marc-kasowitz-trump-lawyer.html ] who for years has aggressively represented Trump in multiple business and public relations disputes — often with threats [ https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/us/politics/donald-trump-lawsuit-threat.html ] of countersuits and menacing public statements — but who has little experience dealing with complex congressional and Justice Department investigations that are inevitably influenced by media coverage and public opinion.
Before Kasowitz was retained, however, some of the biggest law firms and their best-known attorneys turned down overtures when they were sounded out by White House officials to see if they would be willing to represent the president, the sources said.
Among them, sources said, were some of the most high-profile names in the legal profession, including Brendan Sullivan of Williams & Connolly; Ted Olson of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher; Paul Clement and Mark Filip of Kirkland & Ellis; and Robert Giuffra of Sullivan & Cromwell.
The lawyers and their firms cited a variety of factors in choosing not to take on the president as a client. Some, like Brendan Sullivan, said they had upcoming trials or existing commitments that would make it impossible for them to devote the necessary time and resources to Trump’s defense.
Others mentioned potential conflicts with clients of their firms, such as financial institutions that have already received subpoenas relating to potential money-laundering issues that are part of the investigation.
But a consistent theme, the sources said, was the concern about whether the president would accept the advice of his lawyers and refrain from public statements and tweets that have consistently undercut his position.
“The concerns were, ‘The guy won’t pay and he won’t listen,’” said one lawyer close to the White House who is familiar with some of the discussions between the firms and the administration, as well as deliberations within the firms themselves.
Other factors, the lawyer said, were that it would “kill recruitment” for the firms to be publicly associated with representing the polarizing president and jeopardize the firms’ relationships with other clients.
Another lawyer briefed on some of the discussions agreed that the firms were worried about the reputational risk of representing the president. One issue that arose, this lawyer said, was “Do I want to be associated with this president and his policies?” In addition, the lawyer said, there were concerns that if they took on the case, “Who’s in charge?” and “Would he listen?”
None of the lawyers who turned down the White House overtures responded to requests for comment by Yahoo News.
The White House began discreetly reaching out to assemble an outside legal team several weeks ago, after the public uproar over the firing of FBI Director James Comey — who is due to testify before the Senate intelligence committee on Thursday — followed by the appointment of Mueller as Justice Department special counsel.
Among those who began calling around on the president’s behalf were White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, senior counselor Kellyanne Conway and White House counsel Don McGahn. In some cases, the discussions led to meetings or phone calls between the lawyers who were approached and the president himself.
Some of the sources who spoke to Yahoo News said the top lawyers and the four firms that rejected the overtures were not exhaustive of the list of firms approached by the White House. Among those who also were reportedly approached [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-close-to-choosing-outside-counsel-for-russia-investigation/2017/05/22/8709f62e-3f22-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html ] were Reid Weingarten of Steptoe & Johnson and A.B. Culvahouse Jr. of O’Melveny & Myers.
The hiring of Kasowitz has been criticized by some who view the New York lawyer as a pit-bull litigator who lacks the finesse to represent the president in probes that involve the public arena. Among the cases on which he has represented Trump over the years were lawsuits involving Trump University and divorce proceedings.
But one of the sources said that Kasowitz has been reaching out to Washington legal veterans to solicit ideas and suggestions about how to craft an overall defense strategy, including how and when to publicly release information that might be helpful to the president’s defense, the source said.
Copyright 2017 Yahoo! News
https://www.yahoo.com/news/four-top-law-firms-turned-requests-represent-trump-122423972.html [with embedded video, and (over 7,000) comments]
*
Trump, furious and frustrated, gears up to punch back at Comey testimony
President Trump takes his seat during a meeting with the House and Senate leadership in the White House Tuesday.
(Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
By Robert Costa, Ashley Parker and Philip Rucker
June 6, 2017
Alone in the White House in recent days, President Trump — frustrated and defiant — has been spoiling for a fight, according to his confidants and associates.
Glued even more than usual to the cable news shows that blare from the televisions in his private living quarters, or from the 60-inch flat screen he had installed in his cramped study off the Oval Office, he has fumed about “fake news.” Trump has seethed as his agenda has stalled in Congress and the courts. He has chafed against the pleas for caution from his lawyers and political advisers, tweeting whatever he wants, whenever he wants.
And on Thursday, the president will come screen-to-screen with the FBI director he fired, James B. Comey, thoughts of whom have consumed, haunted and antagonized Trump since Comey launched an expanding Russia investigation that the president slammed as a “witch hunt.”
Comey’s testimony is a political Super Bowl — with television networks interrupting regular programming to air it, and some Washington offices and bars making plans for special viewings.
Trump is keen to be a participant rather than just another viewer, two senior White House officials said, including the possibility of taking to Twitter to offer acerbic commentary during the hearing.
“I wish him luck,” the president told reporters on Tuesday.
“He’s infuriated at a deep-gut, personal level that the elite media has tolerated [the Russia story] and praised Comey,” former House speaker Newt Gingrich said. “He’s not going to let some guy like that smear him without punching him as hard as he can.”
This account of Trump’s mind-set and the preparations of his team in the run-up to Comey’s testimony is based on interviews with 20 White House officials, Trump friends and other well-connected Republicans, many of whom spoke only on the condition of anonymity to offer candid perspectives.
The president’s lawyers and aides have been urging him to resist engaging, and they hope to keep him busy Thursday with other events meant to compete for his — and the news media’s — attention.
“The president’s going to have a very, very busy day,” White House press secretary Sean Spicer said. “I think his focus is going to be on pursuing the agenda and the priorities that he was elected to do.”
As of now, Trump’s Thursday morning — when Comey is scheduled to start testifying — is open. He plans to deliver a 12:30 p.m. speech at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s conference in Washington, followed by a 3:30 p.m. meeting with governors and mayors on infrastructure projects.
Jay Sekulow, a high-profile conservative lawyer in Washington, has met several times recently with Trump and said he found the president to have his attention squarely on his proposals.
“He’s been very much in control and in command,” Sekulow said. “I don’t sense any siege or panic at all. ... I’ve been there a lot, and I don’t see the president in any context distracted or flustered by any of this. I just don’t see it.”
But privately, Trump’s advisers said they are bracing for a worst-case scenario: that he ignores their advice and tweets his mind.
“He’s not going to take an attack by James Comey laying down,” said Roger Stone, a longtime Trump friend and former political adviser. “Trump is a fighter, he’s a brawler and he’s the best counterpuncher in American politics.”
The president increasingly has come to see Twitter as his preferred method of communicating with his supporters, no matter the pitfalls.
“The FAKE MSM is working so hard trying to get me not to use Social Media. They hate that I can get the honest and unfiltered message out,” Trump tweeted [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/872059997429022722 ] on Tuesday morning, making a reference to the “mainstream media.”
The West Wing, meanwhile, has taken on an atmosphere of legal uncertainty. White House counsel Donald F. McGahn has told staff to hold onto emails, documents and phone records, officials said, a move of caution designed to prepare the staff for future legal requests, should they come. McGahn has specifically advised staffers to avoid what are known as the “burn bags” in the executive branch that are often used to discard papers.
While people familiar with the White House counsel’s office described McGahn’s moves as appropriate steps because of the ongoing probes, they said many junior staffers are increasingly skittish and fearful of their communications eventually finding their way into the hands of investigators.
Some staffers nervous about their own personal liability are contemplating hiring lawyers and have become more rigorous about not putting things in text messages or emails that they would not want to be subpoenaed, one person familiar with the situation said.
Attempting to invoke executive privilege to restrict Comey’s testimony was never seriously considered by Trump or his legal team, said one senior White House official. But, this official added, the White House liked floating the possibility as a distraction.
In the weeks leading up to Comey’s testimony, the White House had privately tried to erect a war room that would handle the communications and legal strategies for responding to the Russia matter. Former Trump campaign aides Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie were in discussions to lead it.
But the plan was scuttled, as with so much else in Trump’s administration, because of internal disagreements, according to multiple officials. Arguments included whether the war room would be run from inside or outside the gates of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.; who would staff it; whether they could be trusted by the president’s high-ranking advisers, or even trust one another; and whether Marc Kasowitz, Trump’s outside counsel, would ultimately control the message.
Kasowitz, who has a long-standing relationship with Trump, has been operating as an island of sorts in Trump world. He has been meeting regularly with the president and has a nascent relationship with McGahn, but he has not widely shared his legal strategy within the West Wing, according to two officials involved.
Kasowitz, whose combative personality mirrors Trump’s, has not found it easy to entice other big-name lawyers with Washington experience to join the cause because many prominent attorneys are reluctant to have him giving them direction and wonder whether he will be able to keep Trump from stumbling, one official said.
In the absence of a war room — and with the departure of communications director Michael Dubke — planning for the White House’s response to the Comey hearing has fallen largely to Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and his lieutenants.
Trump’s team is preparing a campaign-style line of attack aimed at undercutting Comey’s reputation. They plan to portray him as a “showboat” and to bring up past controversies from his career, including his handling of the Hillary Clinton email investigation in 2016, according to people involved in the planning.
The Republican National Committee has lined up a roster of surrogates to appear on conservative news stations nationwide to defend Trump. But a list the RNC distributed on Tuesday could hardly be described as star-studded: The names include Bob Paduchik, an RNC co-chair who worked on Trump’s Ohio campaign; Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi (R); and Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge (R).
Trump so far has been unable to recruit reinforcements for his beleaguered senior staff. Conversations about former Trump campaign official David Urban possibly joining the White House have stalled, although he remains in contact with several Trump advisers, officials said.
The White House has long struggled with its communications team, with Trump both privately and publicly voicing displeasure with his current staff. Press secretary Sean Spicer has started appearing less frequently on camera, and Trump and several top advisers, including son-in-law Jared Kushner, are considering a range of options to revamp the structure.
The White House recently approached Geoff Morrell — who served as the Pentagon press secretary for more than four years under former defense secretary Robert Gates — about coming inside the administration and overhauling the communications operation, according to three people with knowledge of the overture.
Morrell declined to comment, but BP announced last month that Morrell would be moving to London this summer to run government relations and communications for the company globally.
Scott Reed, senior political strategist at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, was also approached about taking a communications role within the White House, according to two people familiar with the outreach. Reed declined to comment.
In addition, Laura Ingraham, a conservative talk-radio host and Trump friend, discussed joining the White House but made clear to officials that she is more comfortable remaining outside as a vocal Trump ally because of her many broadcasting and media commitments, officials said.
Some Trump loyalists outside the White House who are preparing to go on television news shows Thursday to defend the president and undermine Comey’s testimony said they have been given no talking points, nor seen any evidence of a strategy taking shape. One such loyalist said external supporters are afraid to coordinate too closely with the White House because they fear they could be accused of obstructing justice.
Trump is personally reaching out to some allies on the Senate Intelligence Committee ahead of their questioning of Comey. He was scheduled to have dinner Tuesday night at the White House with Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), both committee members, along with a few other lawmakers. The dinner had been long scheduled for the president to offer a debrief on his foreign trip, a senior White House official said.
In the West Wing, people close to the president and junior aides fear that the president’s erratic behavior could have sweeping legal and political consequences, and they are beleaguered by how he has not proved able to concentrate fully on his agenda — this was supposed to be “infrastructure week,” for instance. Many are also resigned to the idea that there is little they can do to moderate or thwart Trump’s moves, so instead they are focused on managing the fallout.
One Republican close to the White House summed up the staff’s mantra as: “Please, don’t, you’re not helping things.”
But Trump and several political intimates see a political advantage to the president personally engaging, however unseemly it may appear to traditionalists.
“He believes in the long run there is an enormous premium on being the person who stands there fighting,” said Gingrich, author of “Understanding Trump,” an upcoming book. “People respond to that and wonder if he’s fighting this hard, maybe he’s right and the other guys are wrong. It’s the core of how he operates.”
Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard Law School professor and criminal law expert whose television commentary on the Russia probe has caught the White House’s attention, said he understands why the president would be motivated to speak out to counter Comey’s testimony.
“Every lawyer would tell the president not to tweet, not to react,” Dershowitz said. “But he’s not listening. This is typical. I tell my clients all the time not to talk and they simply disregard it. It’d be very hard to tell a very wealthy, very powerful man not to tweet. He thinks, ‘I tweeted my way to the presidency,’ and he’s determined to tweet.”
Mary Jordan and Amber Phillips contributed to this report.
Read more:
All eyes will be on James Comey this Thursday — again
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/all-eyes-on-comey---again/2017/06/06/407be404-4ae6-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html
The broadcast networks will air Comey’s hearing live. That’s a big deal.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/06/its-a-big-deal-that-broadcast-networks-will-air-the-comey-hearing-live/
Trump’s legal team falters as D.C. heavyweights take a pass
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trumps-legal-dream-team-falters-as-dc-heavyweights-take-a-pass/2017/06/06/a6eb6e9a-4aea-11e7-a186-60c031eab644_story.html
Trump undercuts his aides by contradicting their statements
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-undercuts-his-aides-by-contradicting-their-statements/2017/06/06/1ae3155a-4ad2-11e7-9669-250d0b15f83b_story.html
The Trump administration has a recruiting problem
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/06/06/the-trump-administration-has-a-recruiting-problem/
Sessions offered in recent months to resign as attorney general
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/sessions-offered-in-recent-months-to-resign-as-attorney-general/2017/06/06/030366fc-4b17-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html
Our president is simply unpresidented
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/our-president-is-simply-unpresidented/2017/06/05/5e5c35b6-4a2b-11e7-9669-250d0b15f83b_story.html
© 2017 The Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-furious-and-frustrated-will-join-allies-in-attacking-comey-testimony/2017/06/06/171e6d00-4acf-11e7-9669-250d0b15f83b_story.html [with embedded videos, and comments]
--
Top intelligence official told associates Trump asked him if he could intervene with Comey on FBI Russia probe
Then-Indiana Sen. Dan Coats on Capitol Hill last November.
June 6, 2017
The nation’s top intelligence official told associates in March that President Trump asked him if he could intervene with then-FBI Director James B. Comey to get the bureau to back off its focus on former national security adviser Michael Flynn in its Russia probe, according to officials.
On March 22, less than a week after being confirmed by the Senate, Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats attended a briefing at the White House together with officials from several government agencies. As the briefing was wrapping up, Trump asked everyone to leave the room except for Coats and CIA Director Mike Pompeo.
The president then started complaining about the FBI investigation and Comey’s handling of it, said officials familiar with the account Coats gave to associates. Two days earlier, Comey had confirmed [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/fbi-director-to-testify-on-russian-interference-in-the-presidential-election/2017/03/20/cdea86ca-0ce2-11e7-9d5a-a83e627dc120_story.html ] in a congressional hearing that the bureau was probing whether Trump’s campaign coordinated with Russia during the 2016 race.
After the encounter, Coats discussed the conversation with other officials and decided that intervening with Comey as Trump had suggested would be inappropriate, according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal matters.
The events involving Coats show the president went further than just asking intelligence officials to deny publicly the existence of any evidence showing collusion during the 2016 election, as The Washington Post reported [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-asked-intelligence-chiefs-to-push-back-against-fbi-collusion-probe-after-comey-revealed-its-existence/2017/05/22/394933bc-3f10-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html ] in May. The interaction with Coats indicates that Trump aimed to enlist top officials to have Comey curtail the bureau’s probe.
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/top-intelligence-official-told-associates-trump-asked-him-if-he-could-intervene-with-comey-to-get-fbi-to-back-off-flynn/2017/06/06/cc879f14-4ace-11e7-9669-250d0b15f83b_story.html [with embedded video, and (over 5,000) comments]
*
Comey Told Sessions: Don’t Leave Me Alone With Trump
James B. Comey, then the F.B.I. director, with Attorney General Jeff Sessions during a meeting at the Justice Department in February.
JUNE 6, 2017
WASHINGTON — The day after President Trump asked James B. Comey, the F.B.I. [ http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/f/federal_bureau_of_investigation/index.html ] director, to end an investigation into his former national security adviser, Mr. Comey confronted Attorney General Jeff Sessions and said he did not want to be left alone again with the president, according to current and former law enforcement officials.
Mr. Comey believed Mr. Sessions should protect the F.B.I. from White House influence, the officials said, and pulled him aside after a meeting in February to tell him that private interactions between the F.B.I. director and the president were inappropriate. But Mr. Sessions could not guarantee that the president would not try to talk to Mr. Comey alone again, the officials said.
Mr. Comey did not reveal, however, what had so unnerved him about his Oval Office meeting with the president: Mr. Trump’s request that the F.B.I. director end the investigation [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/16/us/politics/james-comey-trump-flynn-russia-investigation.html ] into the former national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, who had just been fired [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/13/us/politics/donald-trump-national-security-adviser-michael-flynn.html ]. By the time Mr. Trump fired Mr. Comey [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/us/politics/james-comey-fired-fbi.html ] last month, Mr. Comey had disclosed the meeting to a few of his closest advisers but nobody at the Justice Department, according to the officials, who did not want to be identified discussing Mr. Comey’s interactions with Mr. Trump and Mr. Sessions.
Mr. Comey will be the center of attention on Thursday during testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-will-not-block-comey-from-testifying-white-house-says.html ], where he is expected to be quizzed intensely about his interactions with Mr. Trump and why he decided to keep secret the president’s request to end the Flynn investigation.
Mr. Comey’s unwillingness to be alone with the president reflected how deeply Mr. Comey distrusted Mr. Trump, who Mr. Comey believed was trying to undermine the F.B.I.’s independence as it conducted a highly sensitive investigation into links between Mr. Trump’s associates and Russia, the officials said. By comparison, Mr. Comey met alone at least twice with President Obama.
A spokesman for the F.B.I. declined to comment on Mr. Comey’s request. A Justice Department spokesman, Ian Prior, said that “the attorney general doesn’t believe it’s appropriate to respond to media inquiries on matters that may be related to ongoing investigations.”
Yet according to two people who were briefed on the discussions, Mr. Sessions offered to resign in recent weeks as he told Mr. Trump he needed the freedom to do his job.
On Tuesday, the White House declined to say whether Mr. Trump still had confidence in his attorney general.
[...]
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/06/us/politics/comey-sessions-trump.html [with comments]
*
Why the latest Russia news paints an increasingly grim picture for Trump
June 7, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/07/why-the-latest-russia-news-paints-an-increasingly-grim-picture-for-trump/ [with embedded videos, and comments]
--
Infowars Nightly News LIVE - Are White House Leaks A Staged Psy Op?
Streamed live on Jun 6, 2017 by The Alex Jones Channel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPJGg47Nc4I [with comments]
--
Rep. Lieu: ‘Incredible disrespect’ for rule of law by Trump admin
All In with Chris Hayes
6/6/17
Rep. Ted Lieu weighs in on new reporting from the Washington Post that a top intel official told associates the President asked him to intervene with fired FBI Director Comey about the Russia probe. Duration: 5:46
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/rep-lieu-incredible-disrespect-for-rule-of-law-by-trump-admin-961671235732 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V01J3ZyK3q8 [with comments]
*
President Trump's curious relationship with time
All In with Chris Hayes
6/6/17
The president so often says things are coming in ‘two weeks,’ you'd think the ‘fortnight’ was his favorite time frame. But here at All In we're paying much closer attention, and we've noticed there's another unit of time measurement he prefers above all others. Duration: 2:14
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/president-trump-s-curious-relationship-with-time-961670211991
*
How Trump skimmed money meant for sick kids
All In with Chris Hayes
6/6/17
Eric Trump said he was raising money for cancer research at a golf course donated by his dad. But it turns out Donald Trump was charging. Duration: 7:31
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/how-trump-skimmed-money-meant-for-sick-kids-961677891630 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIqw9BvGPzA [with comments]
--
Trump pressed Coats for way to stop Russia investigation: WaPo
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Adam Entous, national security reporter for The Washington Post, talks with Rachel Maddow about new reporting that DNI Dan Coats told associates that Donald Trump had pressed him on ways to get James Comey to stop the Trump-Russia investigation. Duration: 18:00
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-pressed-coats-for-way-to-stop-russia-investigation-wapo-961739843911
*
Trump's deadbeat past hurts him in search for scandal lawyers
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Rachel Maddow reviews Donald Trump's history of not paying his debts and notes how that is a contributing factor as he is reportedly facing rejection from outside law firms as he seeks to bolster his defense in the face of mounting scandals. Duration: 6:51
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-s-deadbeat-past-hurts-him-in-search-for-scandal-lawyers-961747523966 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_qhrnXo4Ek [with comments]
*
Trump being Trump worries prospective lawyers
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Michael Isikoff, chief investigative correspondent for Yahoo News, talks with Rachel Maddow about why top law firms are turning down the opportunity to work on Donald Trump's defense as scandals continue to pile up. Duration: 6:56
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-being-trump-worries-prospective-lawyers-961756227728
*
Mueller adds heavy hitter prosecutor to Trump investigation team
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Rachel Maddow reports on some of the prosecutorial accomplishments of Andrew Weissmann, who has left the fraud section of the criminal division of the Justice Department to join Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of the Trump-Russia affair. Duration: 9:48
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/mueller-adds-heavy-hitter-prosecutor-to-trump-investigation-team-961779267902
*
Mueller would gain resources as scope of Trump probe widens
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Rachel Maddow reports that in the event that Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation takes on the Paul Manafort and/or Mike Flynn cases, he would also inherit the considerable resources devotes to those investigations. Duration: 2:08
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/mueller-would-gain-resources-as-scope-of-trump-probe-widens-961769539978 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4VKq_XCWEA [with comments]
*
Comey firing probe could mean new role for DoJ's third in line
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Rachel Maddow explains how Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of the firing of James Comey would force recusals of Jeff Sessions and Rod Rosenstein in the matter, elevating the DoJ's third in line, Rachel Brand. Duration: 5:23
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/comey-firing-probe-could-mean-new-role-for-doj-s-third-in-line-961796163735
--
Lawrence on new Trump revelations: 'This is Watergate'
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/6/17
New reports suggest Donald Trump asked DNI Coats to intervene with James Comey to stop the FBI's Russia probe. Lawrence O'Donnell argues why it's the clearest comparison to Watergate – and the clearest sign of obstruction of justice – yet. Duration: 9:08
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/lawrence-on-new-trump-revelations-this-is-watergate-961746499997 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXJ960JbELg [with comments]
*
Revelations about Trump and Intel Director worsen crisis
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/6/17
New revelations suggest Trump may have obstructed justice when he asked DNI Coats to intervene with Comey on the FBI's Russia probe. Asking the CIA to intervene is what led to Nixon's impeachment. Matt Miller, Ron Klain, and Renato Mariotti join Lawrence O'Donnell. Duration: 8:52
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/revelations-about-trump-and-intel-director-worsen-crisis-961749571963
*
Trump agenda 'dead in the water' as Russia probe widens
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/6/17
Are Republicans tired of winning yet? Trump's agenda has stalled amid the widening FBI probe, making legislative progress on health care, tax cuts, and infrastructure increasingly unlikely. Fmr. Rep. David Jolly and columnist Jennifer Rubin join Lawrence O'Donnell. Duration: 5:01
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/trump-agenda-dead-in-the-water-as-russia-probe-widens-961751619850
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Comey asked Sessions Not to Leave Him Alone with Trump
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/6/17
The New York Times’ Michael Schmidt joins Brian Williams with new reporting on James Comey’s fear of being left alone with the president. Plus, Steve Schmidt, the AP's Vivian Salama and Eugene Robinson weigh in on the night's breaking Russia investigation headlines. Duration: 16:35
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/comey-asked-sessions-not-to-leave-him-alone-with-trump-961797699686
*
The Post-JFK Legacy of Robert F. Kennedy
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/6/17
49 Years to the day after Bobby Kennedy’s death, author John Bohrer and Brian Williams discuss how RFK would fare in modern day politics amid the social media craze. Duration: 3:49
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/the-post-jfk-legacy-of-robert-f-kennedy-961798723898
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Trump Touts More Phony Accomplishments: The Daily Show
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Daily Show with Trevor Noah
Just like with his arms deal with Saudi Arabia and his tax reform push, President Trump makes a show of signing an infrastructure plan without actually accomplishing anything.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FY5IwndHDLQ [with comments]
--
The Trump Administration Gets A 'Reality' Check
Published on Jun 7, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
NSA employee Reality Winner was arrested for leaking classified information regarding a 2016 Russian cyberattack.
[originally aired June 6, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yivc6XbODNI [with comments]
*
Cartoon Donald Trump Can't Stop Tweeting
Published on Jun 7, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
Washington's looniest toon just can't seem to cut tweeting cold turkey.
[originally aired June 6, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAPqNZK7Xms [with comments]
--
Reality Winner Leaks Classified Info, Atheist Pride Day - Monologue
Published on Jun 7, 2017 by Late Night with Seth Meyers
Seth Meyers' monologue from Tuesday, June 6.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfjupwQVtx0 [with comments]
--
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Rep. Clay Higgins declares, "All of Christendom…is at war with Islamic horror."
Jun. 5, 2017
In response to the London terror attack, Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) had an extreme proposal: kill anyone suspected of being an Islamic radical.
On his campaign Faceboook page, Higgins, a former police officer, posted this message:
"The free world…all of Christendom…is at war with Islamic horror. Not one penny of American treasure should be granted to any nation who harbors these heathen animals. Not a single radicalized Islamic suspect should be granted any measure of quarter. Their intended entry to the American homeland should be summarily denied. Every conceivable measure should be engaged to hunt them down. Hunt them, identity them, and kill them. Kill them all. For the sake of all that is good and righteous. Kill them all."
[...]
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/06/republican-congressman-clay-higgins-suspected-islamic-radicals-kill-them-all [with comments]
*
London Bridge attacker Khuram Butt had argued with anti-extremist Muslims
Khuram Butt in the Channel 4 documentary The Jihadis Next Door.
Islamist agitator abused campaigners as ‘traitors’ and ‘apostates’ while mosque secretary reported him at least three times over violent views
6 June 2017
The London Bridge killer Khuram Butt [ https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/05/london-bridge-attacker-named-as-khuram-butt ] was embroiled in two heated confrontations with fellow Muslims who challenged his extremist mindset, it has emerged.
Butt called a community cohesion campaigner a “traitor” and had a “violent scuffle” with a member of an anti-extremism campaign group, while the secretary of a mosque said the Muslim community in east London had reported him to authorities at least three times.
As a clearer picture of Butt as an Islamist agitator emerged so did details of his childhood, with some reports suggesting the sudden death of his father could have propelled him towards radicalisation.
Mohammed Shafiq, the chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, said on Tuesday he was verbally abused by Butt in 2013 the day after the soldier Lee Rigby was murdered in broad daylight [ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/29/2013-eyewitness-account-lee-rigby-murder ] by two Islamists also linked to al-Muhajiroun [ https://www.theguardian.com/uk/al-muhajiroun ].
“Khuram Butt was with Anjem Choudary, the well-known extremist and terrorist sympathiser [ https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/aug/16/anjem-choudary-convicted-of-supporting-islamic-state ],” Shafiq said.
“Khuram Butt called me a murtad, which means ‘traitor’ in Arabic, and accused me of being a government stooge when I confronted Anjem Choudary about him supporting terrorism and my public campaign against Lee Rigby’s murder.”
The 27-year-old was involved in a “violent scuffle” with the Quilliam Foundation’s Dr Usama Hasan [ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/mar/06/usama-hasan-london-imam-death-threats-evolution ] at a July 2016 event to mark Eid, the end of Ramadan.
Quilliam, the anti-extremism group, said Butt attended the event with his wife and young son and approached Hasan, who was with his family, and accused him of being an apostate who took “government money to spy on Muslims”. He also attacked Hasan for supporting gay marriage and the idea that “we come from apes”.
When other people tried to intervene, a scuffle broke out, the organisation said, but when staff reported Butt they were told he “was already known to intelligence”.
Ash Siddique, the secretary of Al Madina mosque in Barking, said concerns were raised about Butt on three occasions. “What’s emerging is that on three occasions the community highlighted concerns about this individual,” he said.
“He was on tape in a documentary made by Channel 4 several years ago. So those concerns I think were in the public domain and highlighted as they should have been. The failings were not on the part of the community - the community has done what it is supposed to do.”
On Monday, the Guardian learned the 27-year-old was born in Pakistan but brought up in Britain, where he married and had two children. He was a keen supporter of Arsenal football club and had featured in the Channel 4 documentary [ https://www.theguardian.com/global/video/2017/jun/05/terror-suspect-featured-in-channel-4-documentary-video ] The Jihadis Next Door [ https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2016/jan/20/jihadis-next-door-review-channel-4-isis-abu-rumaysah ]. He also associated with al-Muhajiroun, the banned extremist group whose leader, Choudary [ https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/aug/16/anjem-choudary-hate-preacher-spread-terror-uk-europe ], has been linked to the recruitment of more than 100 British terrorism suspects.
[...]
His brother Saad Butt campaigned against extremism, according to the Times [ https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/killers-brother-given-money-by-police-to-fight-extremism-0fbqjjght ]. He was one of 23 members of the Young Muslims Advisory Group, after applying for the role in 2009 and going through background security checks.
[...]
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/06/london-bridge-attacker-khuram-butt-had-argued-with-anti-extremist-muslims
*
Trump’s Selective Responses to Terror
Jonathan Ernst/Reuters
The president is vocal when violence is perpetrated in the name of Islam—but remains mostly quiet when it comes from other corners.
By Alex Wagner
Jun 6, 2017
It is no secret that the President of the United States is a quick draw when it comes to expressing indignation or anger in response to news of the day. This is especially true when it comes to certain acts of terror—in the immediate aftermath of the Paris, Manchester and London attacks, Trump expressed his feelings within hours. And indeed, the American public has seen its commander in chief at turns combative, sneering, dyspeptic and outraged when extremists maim and kill in the name of Islam.
Very often there is some policy prescription laced in his responses, as well—a push for “extreme vetting [ http://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871679061847879682 ]” or a renewed call for his original and apparently not-politically correct version [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871675245043888128 ] of a ban targeting Muslim travelers. These are Trump’s targeted solutions to what he calls the problem of “Islamic extremism,” dished out with the same munificence and gusto as his often emotional responses.
And yet in other, equally horrific instances, when innocents have been attacked or killed in the name of a different sort of extremism, President Trump has remained mostly quiet. Either he has said nothing at all, or he has waited days to respond—and when the responses have been issued, they are missing Trump’s signature fury and attendant solutions. Sometimes, these responses don’t even sound like the president.
What makes these acts of terror different, what renders them presumably less urgent and immediately offensive to America’s commander in chief, is that they have involved assailants raging under the banner of white supremacy or violent nationalism. The discrepancy in these responses says a great deal about Trump: not simply his own values, but his fundamental understanding of what it means to govern this country.
In the wake of an attack at the Champs Elysees that killed one police officer, Trump immediately addressed the situation in a bilateral press conference, then tweeted:
Another terrorist attack in Paris. The people of France will not take much more of this. Will have a big effect on presidential election!
5:32 AM - 21 Apr 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/855368516920332289 ]
Less than 24 hours after the Manchester attack that killed 22, Trump animatedly and repeatedly declared the perpetrators “losers [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/05/23/in-wake-of-manchester-blast-trump-decries-terrorist-losers/ ].” And in the wake of the London attacks that killed seven on Saturday evening, Trump was on his preferred medium of Twitter by early Monday morning—issuing a spate of angry responses.
There was a message of solidarity:
Whatever the United States can do to help out in London and the U. K., we will be there - WE ARE WITH YOU. GOD BLESS!
6:24 PM - 3 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871145660036378624 ]
There was an extended push for the renewal of his controversial Muslim ban...
People, the lawyers and the courts can call it whatever they want, but I am calling it what we need and what it is, a TRAVEL BAN!
5:25 AM - 5 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871674214356484096 ]
The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original Travel Ban, not the watered down, politically correct version they submitted to S.C.
5:29 AM - 5 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871675245043888128 ]
And there were a series of controversial tweets directed at the (Muslim) mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, and his calls to remain calm.
At least 7 dead and 48 wounded in terror attack and Mayor of London says there is "no reason to be alarmed!"
7:31 AM - 4 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871328428963901440 ]
Pathetic excuse by London Mayor Sadiq Khan who had to think fast on his "no reason to be alarmed" statement. MSM is working hard to sell it!
8:49 AM - 5 Jun 2017
[ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871725780535062528 ]
In short: President Trump had a lot to say about these attacks.
Yet a little over two weeks ago, he had nothing to tweet when a white man in Maryland with ties to an online group called “Alt Reich: Nation” fatally stabbed a black student named Richard W. Collins III. Collins had just been commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army, and, according to the New York Times [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/22/us/black-student-stabbed-maryland.html ], “was preparing to move to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, for training in defending the country against chemical attacks.” There was no response to his murder from America’s Commander-in-Chief.
Just over a week ago, when a knife-wielding white supremacist killed two men and maimed another in Portland, Oregon as they sought to defend two women—one black, the other in a hijab—President Trump waited three days before commenting. In the interim, as Eliot Hanon points out [ http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/05/29/donald_trump_tweeted_21_times_while_not_condemning_white_supremacist_portland.html ], he tweeted about the “fake news media,” the deadness of Obamacare, and the coming benefits of his massive (and thus far unseen and uncertain [ https://www.wsj.com/articles/gops-proposed-tax-changes-are-no-match-for-status-quo-1496055605 ]) tax reform package.
When Trump finally did weigh in on the Portland terror act, on his official @POTUS feed and not his personal one, the tweet was relatively boilerplate:
The violent attacks in Portland on Friday are unacceptable. The victims were standing up to hate and intolerance. Our prayers are w/ them.
9:51 AM - 29 May 2017
[ https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/869204433418280961 ]
There was nothing in the way of follow-up, no suggestion that Americans needed to band together in some fashion, no policy aimed at tackling the (increasing [ http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/u-s-hate-crimes-20-percent-2016-fueled-election-campaign-n733306 ]) problem of hate crimes here in the United States. If you weren’t familiar with Trump’s history on this strain of white nationalist terrorism, it would have been surprising—but given his behavior over the last four months, it was not.
Trump was silent in February, when three Indian-born men, working for an American company in Kansas, were attacked at a bar—one was killed, the others injured—by a white assailant screaming, “Get out of my country.” For six days, the president was mute on the subject, long enough for the editorial board of the Kansas City Star to deem his silence “disquieting [ http://www.kansascity.com/opinion/editorials/article135323049.html ]:”
“Surely the White House team could have cobbled together a statement of some sort, a response to at least address growing fears that the U.S. is unwelcoming of immigrants, or worse, that the foreign-born need to fear for their lives here….
During such moments of crisis, people look to the president for strength and guidance.
They need to hear their moral outrage articulated, the condemnation of a possible hate crime and the affirmation that the U.S. values everyone’s contributions, whether you’re an immigrant or native-born. For Trump, this was a crucial opportunity to condemn such hateful acts and to forcefully declare that this is not who we are.”
It was not until the president spoke to a joint session of Congress, seven days after the slaying, that he addressed the incident [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2017/live-updates/trump-white-house/real-time-fact-checking-and-analysis-of-trumps-address-to-congress/trump-opens-speech-responding-to-anti-semitism-kansas-shooting/ ]:
“Recent threats targeting Jewish Community Centers and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries, as well as last week’s shooting in Kansas City, remind us that while we may be a nation divided on policies, we are a country that stands united in condemning hate and evil in all its forms,” Trump said.
Those scripted lines were the only comments Trump would make on the topic.
When Alexandre Bissonnette, a Canadian with ties to the white supremacist movement, opened fire [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/world/canada/quebec-mosque-shooting.html ] on Muslims worshipping at an Islamic center in Canada in late January, killing six and wounding eight, Trump was nowhere to be heard. Senior White House Advisor KellyAnne Conway offered an anemic defense [ http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/02/donald-trump-quebec-mosque-terrorist-attack-seth-meyers-twitter ]: “He doesn’t tweet about everything,” she said. “He doesn’t make a comment about everything.”
Conway’s comments were revealing then and remain so, especially today: for the Trump White House, there are the issues that matter enough for comment, and then there is “everything” else. Apparently, terror inflicted upon innocent civilians falls in to the former category (things that matter) if the perpetrators are tied to extremist ideologies rooted in Islam. But terror inflicted upon innocent civilians falls into the latter category (“everything” else) if the perpetrators are tied to extremist ideologies rooted in white nationalism.
For Trump and his defenders, there is no apparent hypocrisy in this duality, but it is an important indicator as to how the president sees the American landscape: irrevocably and perhaps existentially divided into certain tribes and cultures, with a chasm among its citizens so deep that the murders of Americans for certain political reasons do not always warrant outrage (or even a tweet). Donald Trump is the president of the United States, but in moments like these, his attitude calls into question whether he is not, in fact, more the president of certain states—certain people—than others.
In announcing his withdrawal from the Paris climate change accords, Trump (tellingly) declared [ https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/6/1/15726656/pittsburgh-mayor-trump-paris ], “I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris,” but if you have listened carefully enough to Trump and his line of reasoning, “Paris” is really a placeholder for the values of liberalism and progressivism, blue state sacraments about tolerance and globalism.
His response in the wake of the terror attacks of the last two weeks mirrors this worldview: he is the president when a certain set of values are threatened, but not others. Victims who were Muslim, foreign-born or progressively-minded and preaching tolerance, would seem to have been citizens of Trump’s mythic (and maligned) “Paris”—he was not elected to represent their interests, he was not placed in office to empathize with their sorrows and tragic ends.
Nor does he serve to necessarily rebuke their tormentors. I spoke with Heidi Beirich—the Director of Intelligence at the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate crimes in America—about the asymmetry in Trump’s responses.
“It doesn’t seem like Trump cares about hate crimes against these populations,” she said, speaking of the attacks in Kansas and Quebec and Portland. “When it comes to extremism bred from our own culture, he says nothing—or very, very little. It makes you wonder whether the alt right and the extremists who supported him during the campaign—whether he’s somehow afraid of offending them. The [victims] are fellow citizens—he should care about them.”
Trump is unlikely to be swayed by any arguments dictating what he “should” do in any instance—his whole political career has effectively been a campaign against expectations, after all—but this is a clear break from what Americans, until now, have expected of their presidents. And not simply because sympathy and empathy are expected emotional responses from any leader in a time of grief, but also, more urgently, because presidents have an actual role to play in staving off future horrors.
Beirich recalled the days after 9/11, when then-president George W. Bush addressed a shattered and angry nation and said [ https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010917-11.html ]:
“These acts of violence against innocents violate the fundamental tenets of the Islamic faith. And it’s important for my fellow Americans to understand that.
The English translation is not as eloquent as the original Arabic, but let me quote from the Koran, itself: In the long run, evil in the extreme will be the end of those who do evil. For that they rejected the signs of Allah and held them up to ridicule.
The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam. That's not what Islam is all about. Islam is peace. These terrorists don't represent peace. They represent evil and war.”
Beirich explained, “There was a lot of violence, but the murder sprees in the weeks after 9/11 came to a full stop after Bush’s comments. And the following years saw the [hate crimes] numbers going back to pre-9/11 stats. I think it matters that he said something. It’s not purely coincidental that these things happened in parallel.”
President Trump is eager to offer solutions when the terror emanates from extremism tied to fundamentalist Islamic ideologies, but his suggestions are often ethically questionable or legally complicated. If he chose to act more forcefully against terror driven by white nationalism, one powerful solution—public condemnation—would be readily available to him, without much complication.
And yet, at this moment, it is hard to imagine him using it.
Copyright © 2017 by The Atlantic Monthly Group
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/trumps-selective-responses-to-terror/529218/ [with comments]
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5 People Were Just Shot To Death In Florida. But Don’t Worry, It Wasn’t Terrorism.
One of the deadliest mass shootings of 2017 happened on Monday, and you might not have even heard about it.
06/05/2017
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/orlando-shooting-terrorism_us_5935854fe4b013c48169c043 [with embedded video, and comments]
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Kindergartner, his mom & gunman killed, two children injured in Sandy shooting
June 6, 2017
SANDY, Utah — A kindergarten boy, his mother and the gunman were killed and two other children were injured in a shooting in a Sandy neighborhood Tuesday afternoon.
The shooting occurred around 3:45 p.m. on a street outside a residential area near 2300 E Alta Canyon Dr., according to Sandy Police.
"Preceding this event, what appears to have took place is a good Samaritan saw a female with two juveniles, stopped to help them, to transport them out of the area. During that time, the suspect actually rammed the good Samaritan's vehicle, bringing it to a stop in the roadway," said Sgt. Jason Nielsen, Sandy City Police Department. "[The] suspect exited his vehicle and [began] shooting."
"There's another juvenile male who's been transported to the hospital in critical condition and one juvenile female transported in stable [condition]," Nielsen said.
[...]
http://fox13now.com/2017/06/06/emergency-officials-respond-to-shooting-in-sandy/ [with embedded videos]
Utah tries to fathom suburb shooting that killed mom, son
Community members look on as police officers investigate the scene of a shooting in Sandy, Utah, Tuesday, June 6, 2017. Utah police say the shooter in a suburban Salt Lake City neighborhood is among several people who died in the incident and two others injured were children. The shooting took place on a neighborhood street in the suburb of Sandy, about 20 miles southeast of Salt Lake City.
Jun 7, 2017
https://www.apnews.com/de27ea398a544d75b2d0599405b56d2d/Utah-tries-to-fathom-suburb-shooting-that-killed-mom,-son
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Why Trump Criticized a London Under Attack
Peter Nicholls / Reuters
The president believes that globalism costs jobs and lives—and that what makes America exceptional is its resistance to global integration.
By Peter Beinart
Jun 4, 2017
The narcissism generally comes first. Early Saturday evening, an hour after first retweeting [ https://twitter.com/DRUDGE_REPORT/status/871126902467051520 ] a Drudge Report alert about the London terrorist attack, Donald Trump declared [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871143765473406976 ] that, “We need to be smart, vigilant and tough. We need the courts to give us back our rights. We need the Travel Ban as an extra level of safety!” In other words, London proves him right. Everything does. When Omar Mateen murdered 49 people at an Orlando nightclub last June, Trump tweeted [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/742034549232766976 ], “Appreciate the congrats for being right on radical Islamic terrorism.” That same month, when The Wall Street Journal reported [ https://www.wsj.com/articles/nato-considers-new-intelligence-chief-post-1464968453 ] that NATO was considering creating a new intelligence coordinator to assist in the fight against terrorism, Trump—who wasn’t even yet the Republican presidential nominee—explained [ https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-06-08/trump-says-no-reason-to-raise-1-billion-for-campaign ], “It’s all because of me.”
After the self-glorification came a slap at London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who, according [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/871328428963901440 ] to Trump, had responded to the terrorist attack by claiming there was “no reason to be alarmed!” (That’s wrong. Khan had actually [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/04/us/politics/britain-attack-trump-twitter-storm.html ] told Londoners not to be alarmed by the increased police presence on their streets). On its face, this Trump tweet was more puzzling. Khan is a mayor, not a prime minister, and most Americans have no idea who he is. Why raise his profile?
The answer is that Khan helps Trump articulate his new, and still not widely understood, brand of American exceptionalism.
As I’ve suggested earlier [ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/02/how-trump-wants-to-make-america-exceptional-again/515406/ ], “American exceptionalism” is not an enduring set of American values. It’s an enduring method of American contrast, a way of distinguishing the United States from Europe. The nature of that contrast has changed radically over time. Until World War II, many Americans thought that what distinguished the two continents was Europe’s proclivity for war, which the peace-loving, commercial-minded United States, should avoid. After the Russian revolution, Americans often said that what made their country exceptional was its lack a strong socialist or communist movement.
Barack Obama often suggested what made America exceptional was its capacity for inclusion. After recounting his Kansan-Kenyan ancestry, he frequently claimed that, “In no other country is my story even possible.” In 2015, he told [ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/02/how-trump-wants-to-make-america-exceptional-again/515406/ ] British Prime Minister David Cameron that “Our Muslim populations, they feel themselves to be Americans. There is, you know, this incredible process of immigration and assimilation that is part of our tradition that is probably our greatest strength. There are parts of Europe in which that’s not the case, and that’s probably the greatest danger that Europe faces.”
Trump has turned that on its head. Like previous presidents, he defines America in contrast to Europe. But for Trump, what makes America exceptional is not its peacefulness or inclusiveness or resistance to socialism. It is its resistance to globalism. America is the opposite of the European Union. It is the place where borders and national identity remains king. During the Cold War, hawks often said that what distinguished America from Europe was America’s willingness to resist the Kremlin. For Trump, what distinguishes America from Europe is America’s willingness to resist Davos and Turtle Bay.
For Trump and his supporters, globalism kills jobs and it kills people. And it does the latter, in large measure, by allowing Muslims into the West. Keeping America exceptional, therefore, means ensuring that Muslims never gain the same foothold in the U.S. than they’ve gained on the other side of the Atlantic. This idea has obsessed Steve Bannon for years. He’s explained [ http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/stephen-bannon-donald-trump-muslims-fear-loathing ] that one of the reasons he opened a Breitbart office in London was to show Americans that “all these Shariah courts were starting under British law.” In December 2015, he warned [ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2017/01/31/bannon-odds-islam-china-decades-us-foreign-policy-doctrine/97292068/ ] that if America doesn’t “hit the pause button today … we’re going to be importing at least a couple of million Muslims” per year. In a Fox interview this February about Trump’s travel ban, senior White House aide Stephen Miller brought up Europe unprompted. “The most important thing to discuss right now,” he said [ http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2017/01/30/stephen_miller_no_citizen_from_a_foreign_land_has_a_constitutional_right_to_enter_us.html ], “is how do we keep this country from falling into the same trap as happened to parts of Europe to places like Germany, to places like France, where you have a permanent intergenerational problem of Islamic radicalism that becomes a routine feature of life in those countries, a new normal. How do we keep that from happening in America?”
That’s what makes Sadiq Khan, London’s first Muslim mayor, such a useful foil. He personifies Muslims’ growing prominence in European life. He undermines Obama’s argument: that what distinguishes America from Europe is its ability to integrate Muslims. But he perfectly illustrates Trump’s: that what distinguishes America from Europe is that America’s Muslim population remains numerically small and politically weak.
This helps explain why Trump and his aides [ https://twitter.com/Scavino45/status/871362496308936704 ] and family [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/04/us/politics/britain-attack-trump-twitter-storm.html ] have been attacking Khan for more than a year now. And it helps explain their insistence that Khan is soft on jihadist terror. It fits their exceptionalist narrative: That virtually all Western Muslims, even the ones who appear to be culturally integrated and politically moderate, secretly abet the terrorist threat.
When Breitbart calls Huma Abedin [ http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/stephen-bannon-donald-trump-muslims-fear-loathing ] and Khizr Khan [ http://www.breitbart.com/radio/2016/08/03/paul-sperry-khzir-khan-a-world-renowned-expert-on-sharia-not-the-constitution/ ] stealth Islamists, it’s peddling the same message. And it’s issuing a warning to any aspiring Muslim politician who harbors dreams of becoming America’s Sadiq Khan: Trump’s allies will relentlessly tar you as an agent of ISIS. The apparent goal is to keep American Muslims too isolated and fearful to use the democratic process to secure their rights. Which, as it happens, is what ISIS wants, too.
Copyright © 2017 by The Atlantic Monthly Group
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/trump-american-exceptionalism/529119/ [with comments]
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A Brief History of Trump's Feud With Sadiq Khan
It spans 18 months, an op-ed, several interviews and, of course, Twitter.
Jun 5, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/06/khan-trump/529191/ [with comments]
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Donald Trump’s long-running feud with London Mayor Sadiq Khan, explained
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/55115667/headshots_1496764603724.0.jpg)
Trump v. Khan: Dawn of Transatlantic Justice.
The war of words shows how a global anti-Trump backlash could start.
Jun 6, 2017 Updated Jun 6, 2017
https://www.vox.com/world/2017/6/6/15745058/donald-trump-sadiq-khan-london-explained [with (another) embedded video], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9qaPnpoI0M [embedded; with comments]
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Trump puts strain on special relationship
President Trump has unleashed another Twitter storm, infuriating officials in London. This has posed special challenges for the US-UK relationship.
5 June 2017
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40128304
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Trump's Twitter attacks on Sadiq Khan reveal how pitiful the president is
Trump effectively lowers our expectations of what presidential communication should look like.’
We shouldn’t be passive onlookers to Trump’s pantomime presidency any longer. It’s time to look through the theatrics to understand what he is doing.
6 June 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/06/trumps-twitter-attacks-sadiq-khan-pitiful-president
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What Trump's latest Twitter tirade tells us
The London Bridge attacks set Donald Trump off on an extended Twitter rant over the past few days, reviving his calls for sweeping immigration action and renewing old feuds with Democrats, gun-control advocates and even the mayor of London.
5 June 2017
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40138441
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Cancel Donald Trump state visit, says Sadiq Khan, after London attack tweets
Donald Trump at the annual gala at the Ford Theatre. ‘People, I am calling it what we need and what it is: a travel ban!’
London mayor says US president is wrong about many things and that state visit to Britain should not go ahead.
6 June 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jun/05/donald-trump-attack-courts-travel-ban-london
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If Trump visits, let’s greet him with the chorus of mocking middle fingers he deserves
Both of these men are left-wing British Mayors who had their cities attacked by terror. Trump attacked one but not the other. Guess which.
[ https://twitter.com/hourlyterrier/status/871733115470962689 ]
Benny Hill music, inflatable chodes, kazoos? Now Trump’s insulted Sadiq Khan, let’s get truly British and welcome the US president with a festival of piss-taking.
6 June 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/06/donald-trump-visit-chorus-mocking-middle-fingers-insult-sadiq-khan
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It's Time to Demand Donald Trump's Resignation
This weekend, Trump attacked London Mayor Sadiq Khan on Twitter, taking out of context a quote urging citizens not to be alarmed by increased police presence.
Look at the man's tweets – he cannot continue to serve as president
June 6, 2017
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/its-time-to-demand-donald-trumps-resignation-w486080 [with comments]
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Trump Promotes Original ‘Travel Ban,’ Eroding His Legal Case
President Trump at the White House last week. In a series of Twitter posts early Monday, he argued that it had been a mistake to revise the first targeted travel ban he had signed and suggested that his administration should return to a “much tougher version.”
JUNE 5, 2017
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-travel-ban.html [with comments]
Trump’s latest tweets will probably hurt effort to restore travel ban
June 5, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trumps-latest-tweets-could-hurt-effort-to-restore-travel-ban/2017/06/05/c8eb5940-49e8-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html [with embedded video, and (over 4,000) comments]
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Trump Grows Discontented With Attorney General Jeff Sessions
President Trump with Attorney General Jeff Sessions at an event on Capitol Hill last month.
JUNE 5, 2017
WASHINGTON — Few Republicans were quicker to embrace President Trump’s campaign last year than Jeff Sessions, and his reward was one of the most prestigious jobs in America. But more than four months into his presidency, Mr. Trump has grown sour on Mr. Sessions, now his attorney general, blaming him for various troubles that have plagued the White House.
The discontent was on display on Monday in a series of stark early-morning postings on Twitter [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-travel-ban.html ] in which the president faulted his own Justice Department for its defense of his travel ban [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/02/us/politics/travel-ban-supreme-court-trump.html ] on visitors from certain predominantly Muslim countries. Mr. Trump accused Mr. Sessions’s department of devising a “politically correct” version of the ban — as if the president had nothing to do with it.
In private, the president’s exasperation has been even sharper. He has intermittently fumed for months over Mr. Sessions’s decision to recuse himself from the investigation into Russian meddling in last year’s election, according to people close to Mr. Trump who insisted on anonymity to describe internal conversations. In Mr. Trump’s view, they said, it was that recusal that eventually led to the appointment of a special counsel who took over the investigation.
[...]
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-discontent-attorney-general-jeff-sessions.html?_r=0
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Kellyanne Conway had a lousy Monday. Sean Spicer’s wasn’t much better.
June 5, 2017
If the White House is trying to embarrass Kellyanne Conway and Sean Spicer, it is doing a terrific job.
In a media briefing Monday, deputy White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders first made Conway appear out of the loop and then contradicted the counselor to the president. Later in the session, Sanders did little to counter the appearance that Spicer, the White House press secretary, is being marginalized.
About six hours before the briefing, Conway appeared on the “Today” show and was unable to answer questions about whether President Trump will invoke his executive privilege [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/whitehouse/qanda-could-executive-privilege-block-comey-testimony/2017/06/02/4add6776-47d8-11e7-8de1-cec59a9bf4b1_story.html ] to stop former FBI director James B. Comey from testifying Thursday before the Senate Intelligence Committee.
“The president will make that final decision, but if Mr. Comey does testify, we'll be watching with everyone else,” Conway said. When “Today” host Savannah Guthrie asked whether it was even an “open possibility” that Trump would try to block Comey, Conway repeated herself: “The president will make that final decision.”
Sanders, however, knew the answer when asked the same question during the briefing.
“The president's power to assert executive privilege is very well established,” she said. “However, to facilitate a swift and thorough examination of the facts sought by the Senate Intelligence Committee, President Trump will not assert executive privilege regarding James B. Comey's scheduled testimony.”
[...]
At another point in her appearance on “Today,” Conway complained about “this obsession with covering everything [the president] says on Twitter.”
“But that's his preferred method of communication with the American people,” replied Craig Melvin, who was filling in for Matt Lauer.
“That's not true,” Conway shot back.
Well, it sure seems true, based on what Sanders said in the briefing. Asked whether Trump's tweets are vetted by an attorney, Sanders answered: “Not that I'm aware of.” Then she volunteered this: “I think social media for the president is extremely important. It gives him the ability to speak directly to the people without the bias of the media filtering those types of communications. He, at this point, has over 100-plus million contacts through social media, on all those platforms. I think it's a very important tool for him to be able to utilize.”
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/05/kellyanne-conway-had-a-lousy-monday-sean-spicers-wasnt-much-better/ [with embedded videos, and comments]
Kellyanne Conway's husband mocks Trump's tweets on travel ban
06/05/2017
George Conway, the husband of White House adviser Kellyanne Conway who was under consideration for multiple positions in President Donald Trump’s administration, mocked the president on Monday for targeting his own Justice Department.
In a series of tweets, Trump rebuffed his top aides and other administration officials, who had insisted that the administration’s executive order suspending visa issuance from six majority-Muslim countries was not a travel ban.
“People, the lawyers and the courts can call it whatever they want, but I am calling it what we need and what it is, a TRAVEL BAN!” Trump tweeted Monday morning.
“The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original Travel Ban, not the watered down, politically correct version they submitted to S.C.” the president added. “The Justice Dept. should ask for an expedited hearing of the watered down Travel Ban before the Supreme Court - & seek much tougher version!”
Conway derided Trump’s tweets, criticizing the president in a post that concluded with his trademark “Sad.”
“These tweets may make some ppl feel better, but they certainly won't help OSG get 5 votes in SCOTUS, which is what actually matters. Sad,” Conway wrote, referring to the Office of the Solicitor General, which argues before the Supreme Court on behalf of the Trump administration.
Conway, a partner at the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, was a candidate for the solicitor general post and the front-runner to head DOJ’s Civil Division until he withdrew his name from consideration last week.
[...]
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/05/george-conway-mock-trump-tweet-239143 [with embedded video, and comments]
Kellyanne Conway's husband swipes at Trump on Twitter
June 05, 2017
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/06/05/kellyanne-conways-husband-swipes-at-trump-on-twitter.html [with embedded video, and comments]
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Vet Trump Tweets? Aides Say ‘LMFAO.’
President Trump’s aides are trying to talk the media—and everyone who will listen—out of taking the president’s tweets at face value.
06.05.17
http://www.thedailybeast.com/vet-trump-tweets-aides-say-lmfao
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The viral bot that gives Trump’s tweets ‘the honor that they deserve’
June 5, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2017/06/05/the-viral-bot-that-gives-trumps-tweets-the-honor-that-they-deserve/ [with comments]
Bot Turns Trump’s Tweets Into Official-Looking Presidential Statements
Meet Sean Spicer’s replacement.
06/04/2017
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/a-bot-turns-trumps-tweets-into-official-looking-presidential-statements_us_59348e5be4b075bff0f4b63b [with comments]
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Trump blocked some people from his Twitter account. Is that unconstitutional?
President Trump speaks during a meeting at the White House on Tuesday.
June 7, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/06/07/trump-blocked-some-people-from-his-twitter-account-is-that-unconstitutional-as-they-say/ [with embedded videos, and comments]
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Trump National Security Team Blindsided by NATO Speech
They thought the president would commit to the principle of collective defense. They were wrong.
June 05, 2017
When President Donald Trump addressed NATO leaders during his debut overseas trip little more than a week ago, he surprised and disappointed European allies who hoped—and expected—he would use his speech to explicitly reaffirm America’s commitment to mutual defense of the alliance’s members, a one-for-all, all-for-one provision that looks increasingly urgent as Eastern European members worry about the threat from a resurgent Russia on their borders.
That part of the Trump visit is known.
What’s not is that the president also disappointed—and surprised—his own top national security officials by failing to include the language reaffirming the so-called Article 5 provision in his speech. National security adviser H.R. McMaster, Defense Secretary James Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson all supported Trump doing so and had worked in the weeks leading up to the trip to make sure it was included in the speech, according to five sources familiar with the episode. They thought it was, and a White House aide even told The New York Times the day before the line was definitely included.
It was not until the next day, Thursday, May 25, when Trump started talking at an opening ceremony for NATO’s new Brussels headquarters, that the president’s national security team realized their boss had made a decision with major consequences—without consulting or even informing them in advance of the change.
“They had the right speech and it was cleared through McMaster,” said a source briefed by National Security Council officials in the immediate aftermath of the NATO meeting. “As late as that same morning, it was the right one.”
Added a senior White House official, “There was a fully coordinated other speech everybody else had worked on”—and it wasn’t the one Trump gave. “They didn’t know it had been removed,” said a third source of the Trump national security officials on hand for the ceremony. “It was only upon delivery.”
The president appears to have deleted it himself, according to one version making the rounds inside the government, reflecting his personal skepticism about NATO and insistence on lecturing NATO allies about spending more on defense rather than offering reassurances of any sort; another version relayed to others by several White House aides is that Trump’s nationalist chief strategist Steve Bannon and policy aide Stephen Miller played a role in the deletion. (According to NSC spokesman Michael Anton, who did not dispute this account, “The president attended the summit to show his support for the NATO alliance, including Article 5. His continued effort to secure greater defense commitments from other nations is making our alliance stronger.”)
Either way, the episode suggests that what has been portrayed—correctly—as a major rift within the 70-year-old Atlantic alliance is also a significant moment of rupture inside the Trump administration, with the president withholding crucial information from his top national security officials—and then embarrassing them by forcing them to go out in public with awkward, unconvincing, after-the-fact claims that the speech really did amount to a commitment they knew it did not make.
The frantic, last-minute maneuvering over the speech, I’m told, included “MM&T,” as some now refer to the trio of Mattis, McMaster and Tillerson, lobbying in the days leading up to it to get a copy of the president’s planned remarks and then pushing hard once they obtained the draft to get the Article 5 language in it, only to see it removed again. All of which further confirms a level of White House dysfunction that veterans of both parties I’ve talked with in recent months say is beyond anything they can recall.
[...]
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/06/05/trump-nato-speech-national-security-team-215227 [with embedded audio ("The Global Politico - Episode 18: A master class on Putin & Trump from legendary Russia hand, Strobe Talbott", https://soundcloud.com/global-politico/strobe-talbott ), and comments]
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Trump Said He Would “Unite the Muslim World.” Then This Happened.
In a shocking twist, the world’s problems were not solved by the leaders of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United States placing their hands on a glowing orb.
A major shake-up in the Middle East presents fresh worries for the war against ISIS.
June 5, 2017
n May 21, President Donald Trump delivered a speech aimed at bringing together the nations of the Middle East against Iran and terrorism. Two days later, the administration claimed Trump had, indeed, “united the Muslim world in a way that it really hasn’t been in many years.” Two weeks later, five Arab countries have broken ties with Qatar, which hosts the biggest U.S. military base in the Middle East. Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen not only recalled their diplomats, but suspended all travel [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/world/middleeast/qatar-saudi-arabia-egypt-bahrain-united-arab-emirates.html ] between their homelands and Qatar, and went so far as to demand their citizens leave the Persian Gulf country.
The sudden shake-up underscores the multiple fault lines running through what Trump has clumsily referred to as “the Muslim world,” and makes clear that Trump’s much-praised trip to Saudi Arabia was not a panacea for longstanding tensions and competing interests among Gulf countries. The five Arab nations are reportedly incensed over Qatar’s continued patronage of Al Jazeera, the news network headquartered in Doha, as well as Qatar’s support of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. The nations also allege that Qatar condones fundraising for terrorist networks and militant groups in Syria. (Saudi Arabia and several other Sunni nations have faced similar allegations for years.)
As is often the case in the region, Iran figures prominently, too. Qatar’s state media last month published comments by the country’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, in which he cautioned against fully uniting against Iran. Qatar has since claimed [ http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/05/cyberattack-qatar-puts-fake-news-focus-170525190113354.html ] the report was the result of a hack, but state media outlets in other Arab countries continued to run it [ http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/1.792993 ]. (Saudi Arabia’s claim that Qatar is too pro-Iran is undercut by Qatar’s involvement in two fights against Iran’s interests. Qatar is fighting alongside Saudi Arabia against the Houthi in Yemen, who are seen as connected to Iran, and figures largely in the campaign against Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, an ally of Iran.)
Later on Monday, the Financial Times reported [ https://www.ft.com/content/dd033082-49e9-11e7-a3f4-c742b9791d43 ] that the Qatari government had paid a staggering ransom payment to Islamist and Iran-backed groups. The figure, which was reportedly as high as $1 billion, was allegedly handed over in exchange for members of the Qatari royal family, who had been kidnapped during a falconry trip to southern Iraq. Qatar told FT that it could not immediately respond to comment regarding the claim, which an observer quoted by the paper regrettably described as “the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
The escalating tensions have immediate consequences for Qatar, which, as The New York Times notes, imports 40 percent of its food from neighboring Saudi Arabia. In Qatar—the richest country on the planet, per capita—news of the severed ties resulted in crowded food markets, as citizens feared for the worst. But such conflicts also directly imperil the interests of the United States. Qatar hosts the Al Udeid Air Base, which is home to 11,000 United States military personnel—the largest concentration of American troops in the Middle East—and serves as the central command post for the coalition’s air mission against ISIS. It was not immediately clear how the five Arab nations would continue to carry out airstrikes against the Islamic State if their personnel were pulled from Qatar.
[...]
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/06/qatar-trump-muslim-world [with embedded video]
What Just Happened With Qatar?
Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, severed relations with Doha over its alleged support of terrorism.
Jun 5, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/news/archive/2017/06/what-just-happened-with-qatar/529128/ [with comments]
Trump jumps into worsening dispute between Qatar and powerful bloc of Arab countries
June 6, 2017
President Trump jumped headlong Tuesday into a fast-worsening dispute between Qatar and a powerful bloc of Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia, posting Twitter messages congratulating the Saudis for cracking down on the neighboring kingdom and himself for sparking the breach over alleged Qatari funding for terrorism.
“During my recent trip to the Middle East, I stated that there can no longer be funding of Radical Ideology,” Trump said in a series of morning tweets. “Leaders pointed to Qatar - look!
“So good to see the Saudi Arabia visit with the King and 50 countries already paying off,” he tweeted. “They said they would take a hard line on funding extremism, and all reference was pointing to Qatar.”
Trump’s intervention came as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, speaking in New Zealand, took a somewhat different tack, noting that “all” countries in the Persian Gulf “have work to do” in ending their support for extremism, and encouraging them to “resolve this through dialogue.”
The regional crisis began on Monday, when Qatar’s Persian Gulf neighbors — Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Bahrain — were joined by Egypt and smaller nations in severing diplomatic ties with Qatar, claiming it supports terrorists across the region. The eruption of the dispute shocked the neighborhood and threatened deeply intertwined regional trade links and air routes.
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/turkey-and-kuwait-move-to-mediate-middle-east-rift-over-qatar/2017/06/06/3fc3b070-4a8a-11e7-a186-60c031eab644_story.html [with embedded video, and comments]
Saudis spent $270K at Trump hotel amid lobbying efforts: report
06/05/17
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/336444-saudis-spent270000-at-trump-hotel-as-part-of-lobbying-efforts-report [with comments]
CNN Exclusive: US suspects Russian hackers planted fake news behind Qatar crisis
June 6, 2017 Updated June 6, 2017
Washington (CNN) — US investigators believe Russian hackers breached Qatar's state news agency and planted a fake news report that contributed to a crisis among the US' closest Gulf allies, according to US officials briefed on the investigation.
The FBI recently sent a team of investigators to Doha to help the Qatari government investigate the alleged hacking incident, Qatari and US government officials say.
Intelligence gathered by the US security agencies indicates that Russian hackers were behind the intrusion first reported by the Qatari government two weeks ago, US officials say. Qatar hosts one of the largest US military bases in the region.
The alleged involvement of Russian hackers intensifies concerns by US intelligence and law enforcement agencies that Russia continues to try some of the same cyber-hacking measures on US allies that intelligence agencies believe it used to meddle in the 2016 elections.
US officials say the Russian goal appears to be to cause rifts among the US and its allies. In recent months, suspected Russian cyber activities, including the use of fake news stories, have turned up amid elections in France, Germany and other countries.
It's not yet clear whether the US has tracked the hackers in the Qatar incident to Russian criminal organizations or to the Russian security services blamed for the US election hacks. One official noted that based on past intelligence, "not much happens in that country without the blessing of the government."
[...]
http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/06/politics/russian-hackers-planted-fake-news-qatar-crisis/ [with embedded video]
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Some U.S. Diplomats Stage Quiet Revolt Amid Tensions With Trump
Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson, second from left, with his Australian counterpart, Julie Bishop, and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, right, with his counterpart, Marise Payne, in Sydney on Monday.
JUNE 5, 2017
WASHINGTON — As President Trump strains alliances and relationships around the world, some of the nation’s top career diplomats are breaking publicly with him, in what amounts to a quiet revolt by a cadre of public servants known for their professional discretion.
On Monday, the chargé d’affaires at the American Embassy in Beijing, David H. Rank, announced his resignation after telling his staff he could not defend the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/01/climate/trump-paris-climate-agreement.html ] from the Paris climate accord.
A day earlier, the acting ambassador to Britain, Lewis A. Lukens, tweeted his support [ https://twitter.com/USAinUK/status/871435629569212416 ] of London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, in the wake of a deadly terrorist attack there. On Sunday morning, President Trump had picked a fight with the mayor on Twitter.
Last month, the ambassador to Qatar, Dana Shell Smith, reacted to Mr. Trump’s dismissal of the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, by tweeting, “Increasingly difficult to wake up overseas to news from home, knowing I will spend today explaining our democracy and institutions.”
The State Department has been a hotbed of resistance to the Trump administration’s policies from the start. About 1,000 staff members signed a cable protesting the temporary ban on visas for visitors from seven predominantly Muslim countries the administration tried to impose in January. There has been a small exodus of senior diplomats, which, combined with the slow pace of appointments, has left the State Department’s headquarters noticeably depleted.
But the tensions between the White House and the diplomatic corps are now flaring up more publicly, and at a more senior level. Mr. Lukens, Mr. Rank, and Ms. Smith have all spent decades in the Foreign Service, rising to posts at or close to the ambassadorial level.
“It’s an extraordinarily unusual situation for the Foreign Service,” said R. Nicholas Burns, who served as undersecretary of state for political affairs in the George W. Bush administration, traditionally the top-ranking position for career diplomats. “They pride themselves on being nonpartisan. You serve each president 150 percent.”
[...]
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/diplomats-quiet-revolt-donald-trump-tensions.html
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Full Show - Donald Trump Is Devastating The New World Order - 06/05/2017
Published on Jun 5, 2017 by The Alex Jones Channel [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvsye7V9psc-APX6wV1twLg / https://www.youtube.com/user/TheAlexJonesChannel , https://www.youtube.com/user/TheAlexJonesChannel/videos ]
Monday, June 5th 2017: Trump Renews Calls for Travel Ban - President Trump doubled down on his calls for a travel ban. Meanwhile, NBC mocks a Trump retweet from the Drudge Report, which broke news. Also, a 'Fake News' CNN host apologizes for labeling the president a "piece of sh*t" following the Kathy Griffin controversy, as the network is caught staging a protest. On today's show, we'll speak with Mark Antro, the man who filmed CNN's staged protest, White House correspondent Mike Cernovich, author of No Campus for White Men, Scott Greer, and President of the Eagle Forum Ed Martin. We'll also talk Bilderberg 2017 with David Knight and Owen Shroyer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZexALH3Ujw [with comments] [also at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkdMGVlN7QI (additional text adapted from; with comments]
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How the Six-Day War Transformed Religion
Tara Todras-Whitehill / Muhammed Muheisen / Kathy Willens / AP
Six perspectives on how the 1967 Arab-Israeli conflict changed Islam, Judaism, Christianity, and Mormonism
By Sigal Samuel
Jun 5, 2017
Fifty years ago this week, the Six-Day War dramatically altered geographic borders and political fortunes in the Middle East. For Israelis, the stunning 1967 victory meant an expanded country that suddenly included East Jerusalem, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights, and the Sinai Peninsula; for Palestinians, it meant occupation and more displacement; for surrounding Arab countries, it meant crushing military and reputational defeat.
But the Six-Day War didn’t only transform Middle East politics: It also transformed religion—in ways that would reverberate far beyond the region. The war’s outcome impacted the way Islam is expressed in the West Bank and Gaza, and it created new openings for political Islamism in the Arab world. It strengthened a messianic strain in Israeli Judaism, and it changed the focal point of American Judaism. It forced an internal reckoning among evangelical Christians, and even among Mormons, in the United States.
I asked writers with expertise and experience in each of these contexts to discuss how 1967 changed religion, broadly interpreted. Religion is often thought of as a force that drives conflict; I invited them to think instead about how conflict impacts religion. The six writers’ responses, which I’ve edited and included below, touch on everything from fashion to theology, demonstrating the many ways religion inflects people’s lives.
* * *
The Palestine of Miniskirts and Tank Tops
Maysoon Zayid, Palestinian-American comedian, writer, and disability advocate
Fifty years ago, the Six-Day War changed the course of Palestinian history. Also 50 years ago, my mother and father got married in Deir Debwan, a West Bank village on the outskirts of Ramallah. My mom was a recent graduate of Mar Yousef, a girls’ school run by nuns. My dad had been living in America since 1959 and had come back home to marry the girl of his dreams. My Muslim parents wed three months before the Six-Day War.
My mother wore a short cocktail dress to her engagement party. In 1967, it wasn’t odd to see women strolling in miniskirts in Palestine. It also wasn’t odd to see my grandmother standing next to her wearing a floor-length, long-sleeved, cross-stitched dress and a long silky veil covering her hair.
Some say that Palestinians have become more religious than they were when they were first occupied. And in the half-century since the Six-Day War, it’s true that Palestinian religiosity has changed in some ways. The sense that shrines like the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem and the Church of the Nativity [ http://www.newsweek.com/bethlehem-easter-church-nativity-jesus-israel-palestinians-war-christians-584908 ] in Bethlehem are under siege has, it seems, strengthened some Palestinians’ religious enthusiasm. Ramadan and Christmas have always been a big deal, but as Palestinians fight for their existence, the festivities have gotten even grander. This is a marker of resistance, a signal that Palestinians refuse to disappear.
Israel occupied the Gaza Strip in 1967, handed over governmental control to the Palestinian Authority in 1993, and removed its soldiers and settlers in 2005. This whole process culminated in the Palestinian Authority calling an election in 2006. Hamas won a parliamentary majority, not because Palestinians wanted a theocracy, but because they were fed up with the corruption of the rival Fatah party. In the decade since its win, Hamas has tried [ http://www.thedailybeast.com/dont-tread-on-my-hair-hamas ] to impose Saudi-like laws on its trapped citizens. What “religious” looks like in Gaza has been severely constrained by Hamas. But Hamas has also met with resistance, and its popularity has declined due to the blockade and the repeated bloodshed Gazans have had to endure on its watch.
In some places, Palestinian religion has not changed at all. To this day, in my parents’ village, different women in the same family will cover up differently. You will see one sister with her hair flowing out in the open and the other choosing to wear hijab. You will also see Muslim men with beards down to their belly buttons and others drinking beer (forbidden in Islam) regardless of the length of their beards.
My three sisters and I do not cover our hair. My sisters-in-law have no other choice. They come from a conservative Muslim family that lives in a refugee camp outside Bethlehem. In their home, the men gave up on God long ago and the women must cover up. To be clear, they would not be harmed if they didn’t, just nagged to death by my mother-in-law. I, on the other hand, roam around the refugee camp in tank tops with no fear. I will not deny that there are Palestinian Muslim women who are forced to cover, but the majority I have met choose to do so.
How Palestinians’ religion gets expressed can be shaped by many factors, including who their family is, where they live, and how much money they make; some, including young Palestinians [ http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/03/palestinian-youth-unemloyment.html ], have suggested a link between the spread of poverty and an intensifying religiosity. Ramallah, a city whose name translates to “City of God,” is basically one big bar. It’s party central for the haves, and the have-nots come to watch. Meanwhile, in cities like Hebron, it’s all about the masjid (mosque). But regardless of their faith and level of religiosity, when it comes to the fight against Israeli occupation, Palestinians stand side by side, hijab or not, halal or not, Santa or not.
* * *
The Crisis of Arab Nationalism and the Rise of Islamism
Hussein Ibish, senior resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute
One of the principal but often underappreciated effects of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war was its role in setting the stage for the rise of political Islam in the Arab world—including the terrorist extremism that now plagues the region and the globe.
The war was a devastating blow to the credibility of Arab nationalism (particularly as defined by Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser), which presented itself as secular and progressive. The speed and scope of the Arab debacle in 1967 knocked the legs out from under the profoundly exaggerated claims of Arab nationalism to be leading the region into a new and brighter future.
By the late 1960s, the social and economic failure of these systems, and their repressive nature, were already readily apparent. Egypt, Syria, and Iraq, which all gained independence in the 1940s with relatively robust civil societies and promising economies, were being profoundly mismanaged and intellectually suffocated by these narrow regimes. Underneath dreams of resurgence and glory lay clear patterns of atrophy and decay. But the militarism of Arab nationalism, particularly in Egypt, with its strident anti-Western and anti-Israeli rhetoric, conjured a beguiling mirage that obscured grim realities for large majorities who were cajoled into a collective denial.
The 1967 war called this bluff completely. Most Arabs had been beyond confident in victory, yet the defeat was virtually instantaneous and total. In the aftermath, the political credibility of this version of Arab nationalism was mortally wounded, and its long-term viability was as effectively destroyed as the Egyptian Air Force had been by Israel’s surprise early morning attack on June 5.
As the Lebanese scholar Fawaz Gerges has pointed out, the rise of Islamism as a political force was neither an immediate nor an inevitable consequence of the crisis of Arab nationalism resulting from the 1967 war. Many other factors fed into the rise of an ultraconservative, reactionary, and revolutionary (in the Leninist sense) Islamist movement, its radicalization in the 1970s and 1980s, and its proliferation—including in the form of violent transnational terrorist movements like al-Qaeda and ISIS—since the late 1990s.
Things could have turned out differently. Secular Arab nationalism could have been revived, especially in a strikingly different form. Islamism could have developed differently, or thrived to the point of becoming the ideology of ruling factions in much of the Arab world (now only really the case in Gaza).
So, the connection between the 1967 fiasco and the rise of ultraconservative Islam and political Islamism is both direct, insofar as nothing did more to discredit its primary ideological antagonists (secularism and nationalism), and indirect, insofar as innumerable other factors and contingencies shaped our present realities. But it’s worth noting that these two supposedly polar opposites continue to share an underlying framework of political attitudes that remain hegemonic among Islamists and Arab nationalists alike.
During the 1950s and ’60s, Arab nationalism presented itself as entirely at odds with the socially reactionary, and politically and intellectually retrograde, Islamist movement defined at the time by the Muslim Brotherhood. Though it now seems ironic, during this period it was the Islamists who were perceived as retrograde, reactionary, pro-Western, anti-nationalist and essentially traitorous, while the mostly secular nationalist governments were the revolutionaries confronting power in the name of Arab identity, values, and dignity. In much Arab rhetoric today, these ideas have flipped: State nationalism is now frequently cast as pro-Western and retrograde, while Islamism is often cast as revolutionary and patriotic.
For example, it’s instructive that Qatar is comfortable promoting both Muslim Brotherhood Islamism and what remains of left-wing Arab nationalism simultaneously. This isn’t as incoherent as it might seem. Underlying both discourses are the same sets of enemies, the same sense of grievances, the same empty promises, and many of the same essential touchstones of what was and remains a stultifying, unrealistic, and intellectually crippling Arab political orthodoxy.
* * *
When Israel’s Religious Zionists Got Their Big Break
Einat Wilf, writer and former member of the Israeli Knesset
At its core, early Zionism was a secular, even militantly atheist, movement. For the Jewish people to change the course of their history, reclaim their homeland, and establish a modern state in it, they had to rebel against God and Messiah. They had to emerge from two millennia of passivity to become their own messiahs, vehicles of their own redemption.
Many Jews of faith rejected Zionism on account of its rebellion, warning their brethren to keep waiting for God to redeem them in His own good time. But one group attempted to provide a religious context for Zionism. Attracted to the revolutionary nature of the Zionist movement but baffled by the fact that the return of the Jewish people to the Promised Land was carried out by a group of atheists, religious Zionists argued that the godless communists of early Zionism were doing God’s work even if they claimed otherwise, and that the process of redemption had begun.
For many decades, religious Zionism remained a marginal, and quite meek, movement in Zionism—and in Judaism. But 1967 changed that. In six short days, Israel swung from the fear of annihilation to the euphoria of an astounding victory. The tiny country tripled its size to include not just the Golan Heights and Sinai Peninsula, but the cradles of Jewish civilization, including the Temple Mount, East Jerusalem (the Zion of Zionism, home of holy sites), and the West Bank (the territory of Judea, home of the ancient Judeans).
For those who believed that God works in mysterious ways to bring about the redemption of the Jewish people, 1967 was proof. From that moment on, religious Zionism and the settler movement took off to become a dominant form of Zionism and Israeli Judaism, and a powerful political player in shaping the modern state. In the process, these Jews shed the meekness of their predecessors. They were certain that the power of the State of Israel would now serve to redeem the entire Land of Israel between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.
Yet, even after decades of growth in political power and confidence, the flourishing of hundreds of thousands of settlers, and the appearance of dominance, religious Zionism failed to erase the fundamental premise of secular Zionism: that at any critical juncture, securing the sovereignty of the Jewish people is more important than securing every square inch of land to which the Jewish people can lay claim.
Most Jews, even when powerful and armed, are keenly cognizant of the one true reality of their condition: They are a minuscule minority. They acknowledge that as much as the Jewish people have an emotional and historical connection to much more land than is included within Israel’s pre-1967 lines, they are a small minority in a hostile region, and have to make do with much less than what they might think is their due.
Since 1967, religious Zionism as a political movement has been pushing the Jewish people to take it all, claiming that this is God’s will and that He will intervene to manage the consequences of such territorial maximalism. But it is still painfully clear to the majority of Jews that, given their size and place in the world, in trying to take it all they are very likely to remain with nothing. Whether one is a believer or not, suicide cannot be God’s wish for His people.
Israeli soldiers celebrate during the 1967 Six-Day War.
(Israeli Defense Ministry / Reuters)
* * *
How “Israelotry” Became an American Religion
Dov Waxman, professor at Northeastern University, and author, Trouble in the Tribe: The American Jewish Conflict Over Israel
The Six-Day War was a quasi-religious experience for many Jews, both in Israel and the Diaspora. The speed with which Israel vanquished its enemies, paralleling the biblical story of creation; its conquest of places sacred to the Jewish religion, especially Jerusalem and its holy sites; and the popular Jewish narrative of the war as one of deliverance from the brink of a second holocaust to a miraculous victory—all these evoked a collective euphoria and sense of awe across the Jewish world.
In Israel, this ushered in a religious revival among Jews who had previously been staunchly secular, and galvanized a messianic religious Zionism that has gradually come to challenge, if not displace, secular Zionism as the most powerful ideological force in the Jewish state today. But while the 1967 war revitalized and transformed Israeli Judaism, it had the opposite effect on American Judaism. Unlike their Israeli counterparts who turned toward Judaism in the decades following the 1967 war, American Jews have, for the most part, turned away.
To be sure, increasing secularism and assimilation into the American melting pot was already well underway among American Jews long before 1967. Afterwards, however, this process was accelerated by the rise of pro-Israelism in the American Jewish community. As ardent support for Israel came to dominate American Jewish public life and politics, growing numbers of American Jews effectively worshipped Israel and abandoned Judaism.
“Israelotry,” as the scholar Daniel J. Elazar put it, became the new civil religion of American Jewry. Like any religion, it had its own rituals, commandments, myths, and dogmas, and it often insisted on blind obedience, or at least passive acquiescence—“Israel, right or wrong!” American Jewish critics of Israel, who dissented from this new orthodoxy, were frequently branded as heretics, and risked excommunication from the community.
The replacement of Judaism with pro-Israelism in the beliefs and practices of many American Jews has been a huge boon to Israel. The Jewish state has been the beneficiary of an outpouring of American Jewish financial and political support (but not nearly as much immigration), which has contributed to Israel’s economic, social, and military accomplishments over the years.
But for the American Jewish community itself, the mass adoption of pro-Israelism as a surrogate form of religion has been a mixed blessing. On the one hand, it has enabled many American Jews who might otherwise have assimilated into oblivion to maintain a Jewish identity and remain part of the Jewish community, and it has provided them with a common cause and rallying cry in a period of religious and social fragmentation.
On the other hand, it has led to the relative neglect of American Judaism, as support for Israel has consumed much of the Jewish community’s attention and resources. It has also sowed deepening divisions among American Jews over Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians living under Israeli occupation, and led some American Jews, especially younger ones, to dissociate themselves from the Jewish community, and even from Judaism itself, in silent protest.
* * *
Evangelical Zeal for 1967 Wasn’t Really About Jews
Gary Burge, former professor at Wheaton College and current faculty at Calvin Theological Seminary
Following the Six-Day War of 1967, many evangelicals were ecstatic. For 50 years, they had interpreted the tragedies of the 20th century as markers of human decline and divine judgment. Preachers pointed to World War I, the catastrophic flu epidemic that followed, economic collapse in the 1930s, and World War II. Millions had died, and a new threat—communism—was the long arm of Satan’s reach into the 1950s and 1960s. Then there was the upending of moral sensibilities in the 1960s: drugs, sex, and yes, “that music.” These were Signs of the End.
Tent meetings and revivals swept these churches mid-century and they found a comforting eschatological solution to public despair: Jesus was coming.
And then there were the Jews. Prophetic preachers like Dwight Moody announced that the return of the Jews to the Holy Land was the signal that biblical prophecy was being fulfilled. This was an old idea, but it had gained new potency in the itinerant Irish preacher John Nelson Darby (1800-1882) and in the prophecy-based tradition that followed.
When Israel was born in 1948, these “prophecy-evangelicals” celebrated joyously. This was the fulfillment of God’s promise and a sure sign that Earth’s final generation was near. But in 1967, something really miraculous happened: Israel took over the biblical Promised Land and Jerusalem returned to Jewish control after 2,000 years. Preachers told stories of angels defending Israeli troops and guiding Israeli artillery. A six-day war was a miracle in itself, the brevity being proof of God’s work in the Middle East.
Within three years, Hal Lindsey became the great interpreter of this event, proclaiming in his book The Late Great Planet Earth that the Six-Day War was the final key to God’s plan to consummate history. By 1990, 28 million copies had been sold.
Oddly enough, the evangelical zeal for 1967 (and 1948) had little to do with compensating Jewish suffering or Jewish history. It was pure eschatology. Jews were pieces in a larger puzzle that culminated with Jesus’s Second Coming.
This prophecy-interpretation of 1967 also divided evangelicals. Many were simply incredulous and saw these theological views as unsupportable. Academics (like myself) delivered fulsome critiques, but they barely affected preachers, whose message of fear and hope drew large crowds. For some evangelicals, sympathies that had led them to support Israel’s nationhood in 1948 now evaporated: They feared that Israel had created injustices that tarnished the gleam of victory, because 1967 was the beginning of the occupation for millions of Palestinians.
Today, evangelicals still debate the meaning of 1967; some debate the meaning of Israel itself. Was 1967 a prophetic event? Was 1967 mere conquest and occupation? After 50 years, Lindsey’s book seems quaint, and zeal for prophecy fulfillment has diminished considerably. For younger generations of evangelicals today, ethics is surpassing end-time eschatology as the litmus test of abiding in God’s will.
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Should Mormons Take Sides? With Whom?
Amber Taylor, doctoral candidate in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University
Mormons have long been fond of Jews. Ever since 1840, when the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith sent one of his foremost apostles to Jerusalem to dedicate that land for the return of the Jewish people, Mormons eagerly watched the growth of Zionism from their own Utah Zion. In 1948, many Mormon leaders hailed the creation of the Jewish state as nothing less than miraculous fulfillment of prophecy, both ancient and modern. Little was said about the meaning of that event for the land’s non-Jewish inhabitants.
But even as Mormon leadership contemplated the miracle of the State of Israel, the Church worked more quietly throughout the 1950s and 60s to support the Arab Development Society, an organization that helped Palestinian villages. In 1949, the Society instituted a ranch near Jericho to which Arab boys orphaned in 1948 could go to study agriculture. In 1958, the Mormons contributed to the building of a dairy on the ranch, purchasing cows, a bull, and modern dairy equipment for the project. Unfortunately, due to the Six-Day War, the ranch and the dairy closed in 1967.
Before 1967, these two notes sounded simultaneously—Mormon enthusiasm for the State of Israel, and Mormon concern for Palestinian refugees—but the enthusiasm for Israel sounded louder. After 1967, that began to change, at least among Mormon leaders, as many felt compelled to promote a more neutral view of the conflict.
In 1979, Mormon apostle Howard W. Hunter [ https://www.lds.org/ensign/1979/06/all-are-alike-unto-god?lang=eng ] chided church membership for its “personal prejudices,” insisting that “both the Jews and the Arabs are children of our Father. They are both children of promise, and as a church we do not take sides.” Some years later, two prominent Jerusalemite Mormons [ https://www.lds.org/liahona/1997/12/peace-in-the-holy-land?lang=eng ] offered further commentary: “To the extent that we look with sympathy and understanding at both sides, we can be an influence to help bring about a just and lasting peace.”
In the early 1960s, the Mormon-affiliated Brigham Young University had begun discussing a possible semester abroad program in Israel, with a mandate that “half of the program be in Arab territory and half in Israel.” Its opening was disrupted by the 1967 war and the program did not get off the ground until the following year. When it did, its policy for neutrality in the region remained fixed.
My own interest in Israel began through this program. In the summer of 2000, I attended a semester abroad program at the BYU Jerusalem Center for Near Eastern Studies (locally known as the “Mormon University”), an outgrowth of the earlier travel study program. I was taught, in equal measure, by both Jewish and Palestinian instructors. I interacted with the local population as much as I could, both Jewish and Palestinian, and I came away sympathetic to both.
Soon after I returned home from the program, the Second Intifada erupted. I was devastated that people for whom I felt enormous empathy were now attacking each other. Most of my Mormon friends could not understand how I felt so torn. To them, the aggressor was clear, and our Mormon sympathies, historically and in this instance, obviously lay with the Jewish Israelis. Like these friends, most modern Mormons still embrace the notion of Jews as God’s Chosen People.
And yet, Mormonism’s official stance of neutrality after 1967 reflects the worldview that compelled its first prophet to send an apostle to Jerusalem: the conviction that Mormons’ presence there will positively influence history and bless the lives of all God’s children.
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Amber Taylor’s response was adapted from her essay for the 50 Voices 50 Years [ https://www.50voices50years.com/ ] project, a collaboration between the Anti-Defamation League, BICOM and Fathom Journal. 50 Voices 50 Years is a platform created to invite a diversity of viewpoints to reflect on the legacy of this watershed event.
Copyright © 2017 by The Atlantic Monthly Group
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/06/how-the-six-day-war-changed-religion/528981/ [with comments] [and see also in particular (linked in) http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=12186433 and preceding and following]
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Flint, Mich., Official Resigns After Being Caught on Tape Blaming Water Crisis on ‘Fucking Niggers’ Who ‘Don’t Pay Their Bills’
“Flint has the same problems as Detroit ... fucking niggers don’t pay their bills; believe me, I deal with them,” Stair is heard saying on the recording, which was made May 26.
6/5/17
http://www.theroot.com/flint-official-resigns-after-being-caught-on-tape-blami-1795825870 [with comments], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trn3ZDp4StQ [embedded; with comments], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qATnd3y1Rk [embedded; with comments]
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Texas Middle School Says Student Called ‘Ape’ And ‘Slave’ Wasn’t Bullied
“I can excuse children for being ignorant, but this was a missed opportunity,” the girl’s father said.
06/05/2017
A Texas middle school where white students subjected a 12-year-old African American girl to months of racist insults failed to appropriately discipline the offenders or use the opportunity to teach tolerance, the girl’s father said.
The incidents at Tippit Middle School [ http://www.georgetownisd.org/Page/19 ] in Georgetown, Texas, which school officials deemed “racially harassing,” according to a report obtained by HuffPost, included students calling the girl an “ape” and a “slave” and pretending to whip her.
“It was horrifying that her friends would say and do these terrible things and not think twice about it,” Robert Ranco, a civil rights lawyer who is the girl’s father, told HuffPost. “We raised our daughter with the understanding that no one deserves to be treated badly by anybody.”
The harassment, first reported Saturday by The Austin American-Statesman [ http://www.mystatesman.com/news/local/georgetown-middle-school-girl-called-ape-slave-fellow-students/r3OVdWpibgshQNNdgv9COI/ ], began in early March and continued until last month. Ranco said he learned of it in a May 5 text from his daughter.
[...]
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/texas-middle-school-racist-bullying_us_5935ceeae4b0099e7fae816b [with comments]
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White Las Vegas officer charged in chokehold death of black man
Officer Kenneth Lopera, charged with involuntary manslaughter in the death of a black man, is seen in this booking photo released by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S., June 5, 2017.
Jun 5, 2017
A white police officer in Las Vegas was arrested on Monday and charged with involuntary manslaughter in the death of a black man held in a chokehold for more than a minute, officials said.
Officer Kenneth Lopera was charged on the same day the Clark County Coroner's Office ruled the May 14 death of Tashii Farmer, 40, near the Las Vegas Strip was a homicide due to police restraint.
[...]
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nevada-police-idUSKBN18X08R
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North Carolina's General Assembly Districts Are Unconstitutional Gerrymanders, Too
The Supreme Court struck down the 2011 state legislative maps, but also blocked a court order to hold special elections.
Jun 5, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/north-carolinas-general-assembly-districts-are-unconstitutional-gerrymanders-too/529212/ [with comments]
The Supreme Court just made it easier to get away with gerrymandering
If you can’t fix the problem quickly, it’s not fixed.
Jun 5, 2017
https://thinkprogress.org/supreme-court-easier-gerrymandering-e6c986056e62 [with comments]
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Pat McCrory Is Still Mad He Wasn’t Re-elected Governor Of North Carolina
Let the butthurt go, beloved.
06/06/2017
If anybody can hold a grudge, it’s former North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R).
During a speech at the state Republican Party’s annual convention on Saturday, McCrory took the opportunity to once again claim that he lost his re-election bid in November because of voter fraud.
“I know for a fact that we had a lot of non-citizens that were voting,” McCrory said, according to the Raleigh News & Observer [ http://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article154239819.html ]. “Ladies and gentlemen, voter ID would have stopped it. Keep it a clean bill, stay with a voter ID law and get that passed.”
Of the 508 ineligible voters who cast ballots in North Carolina during the 2016 election, only 41 were non-citizens with legal status [ https://s3.amazonaws.com/dl.ncsbe.gov/sboe/Post-Election%20Audit%20Report_2016%20General%20Election/Post-Election_Audit_Report.pdf ], according to an investigation by the state Board of Elections.
Roy Cooper, a Democrat, defeated McCrory in the election by 10,277 votes [ http://er.ncsbe.gov/?election_dt=11/08/2016&county_id=0&office=COS&contest=0 ].
[...]
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/pat-mccrory-voter-fraud_us_5936dda4e4b0cfcda9181c4b [with comments]
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Supreme Court limits SEC's power to recover ill-gotten gains
Jun 5, 2017
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday scaled back the Securities and Exchange Commission's power to recover ill-gotten profits from defendants' misconduct, handing Wall Street firms a victory and dealing another blow to the regulator's enforcement powers.
In a 9-0 ruling, the Supreme Court found that the SEC's recovery remedy known as "disgorgement" is subject to a five-year statute of limitations. The justices sided with New Mexico-based investment adviser Charles Kokesh, who previously was ordered by a judge to pay $2.4 million in penalties plus $34.9 million in disgorgement of illegal profits after the SEC sued him.
The decision marked the second time since 2013 that the Supreme Court has reined in the SEC's enforcement powers. In the prior case, called Gabelli v. SEC, the justices unanimously ruled that civil monetary penalties are also subject to a five-year time bar.
The ruling represented a major victory for Wall Street firms, whose Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association trade group had urged the justices to curb the SEC's powers in order to provide more certainty and predictability to the enforcement process.
[...]
Kokesh was sued by the SEC in 2009 for misappropriating investors' money. His penalties covered conduct within the five-year statute of limitations, but the disgorgement covered conduct that largely occurred outside that time frame.
Kokesh appealed to the Supreme Court after losing at the Denver-based 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Kokesh's attorney argued that a disgorgement in the case constituted a punitive "forfeiture" that is time-barred.
The Justice Department argued that disgorgement is equitable relief that is not considered a punishment, but merely restores the defendant to the same position he was in prior to when the misconduct occurred.
Nick Morgan, a Los Angeles-based lawyer with the Paul Hastings law firm who represents clients being investigated by the SEC, said the ruling will especially affect complicated cases that require more time for the SEC to investigate.
"For the more complex cases, this will be a sea change for them, they will have to move more quickly," Morgan said.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-sec-idUSKBN18W1UQ
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If He Were Doing Any Other Job, Donald Trump Would Have Been Fired by Now | The Resistance | GQ
Published on Jun 5, 2017 by GQ [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsEukrAd64fqA7FjwkmZ_Dw / https://www.youtube.com/user/GQVideos , https://www.youtube.com/user/GQVideos/videos , https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0hKMB1-xkc-XWNf9VL-LxVYysdHpjyMF ]
Donald Trump's behavior isn't fit for running a middle school lunchroom let alone the oval office.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCJPd6C4vss [with comments]
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As Trump lashes out, Republicans grow uneasy
President Trump walks in to speak at a Air Traffic Control Reform Initiative announcement in the East Room at the White House on Monday, June 5, 2017.
June 5, 2017
President Trump, after days of lashing out angrily at the London mayor and federal courts in the wake of the London Bridge terrorist attack, faces a convergence of challenges this week that threatens to exacerbate the fury that has gripped him — and that could further hobble a Republican agenda that has slowed to a crawl on Capitol Hill.
Instead of hunkering down and delicately navigating the legal and political thicket — as some White House aides have suggested — Trump spent much of Monday launching volleys on Twitter, unable to resist continuing, in effect, as his own lawyer, spokesman, cheerleader and media watchdog.
Trump escalated his criticism of London Mayor Sadiq Khan, incorrectly stating that Khan had told Londoners to not be “alarmed” about terrorism. He vented about the Justice Department, which he said pushed a “politically correct” version of his policy to block immigration from six predominantly Muslim countries, which Trump signed before it was halted in court. He also complained that Senate Democrats are “taking forever to approve” his appointees and ambassadors.
Inside the White House, top officials have in various ways gently suggested to Trump over the past week that he should leave the feuding to surrogates, according to two people who were not authorized to speak publicly. But Trump has repeatedly shrugged off that advice, these people said.
“Not that I’m aware of,” White House principal deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Monday at a news conference when asked if the president’s tweets were being vetted by lawyers or aides.
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/as-trump-lashes-out-republicans-grow-uneasy/2017/06/05/d5dc3608-4a09-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html [with embedded video, and comments]
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Trump: The Presidency in Peril
Donald Trump; drawing by Pancho
By Elizabeth Drew
June 22, 2017 Issue
If Donald Trump leaves office before four years are up, history will likely show the middle weeks of May 2017 as the turning point. Chief among his mounting problems are new revelations surrounding the question of whether Trump and his campaign colluded with Russia in its effort to tip the 2016 election. If Trump has nothing to hide, he is certainly jumpy whenever the subject comes up and his evident worry about it has caused him to make some big mistakes. The president’s troubles will continue to grow as the investigators keep on investigating and the increasingly appalled leakers keep on leaking.
Two especially damaging disclosures occurred on Friday, May 19, the day Trump departed on his first foreign trip. That afternoon, while Air Force One was in the air, The Washington Post broke an ominous story that law enforcement investigators had under scrutiny a “person of interest” on the White House staff, described as “close to the president.” No longer was the focus on a small number of people at some distance from Trump, such as his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, longtime adviser and political troublemaker Roger Stone, or Carter Page, briefly Trump’s national security adviser during the campaign. The indications are that the “person of interest” is Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law.
Though younger and more composed, Kushner is a lot more like Trump than is generally understood. Both of them moved their father’s businesses from the New York periphery to Manhattan. Like his father-in-law, Kushner came to Washington knowing a lot about real estate deals but almost nothing about government. Both entered the campaign and the White House unfamiliar with the rules and laws and evidently disinclined to check them before acting. Thus, Kushner has reinforced some of Trump’s critical weaknesses. Trump has thrust project after project upon him (the only top aide he could trust), and Kushner, who has a high self-regard, has taken on a preposterous list of assignments. He was able somehow (likely through his own leaks) to gain a reputation—along with his wife, Ivanka Trump—as someone who could keep the president calm and prevent him from acting impulsively or unwisely.
In the days before Trump’s foreign trip, however, others on the White House staff, by now not fans of Kushner, leaked that he had encouraged Trump to make the shortsighted decision in early May to fire FBI Director James Comey. By getting rid of the man who was overseeing the investigation into the Trump campaign’s relationship with the Russian government, the president stirred widespread outrage and reinforced suspicions that he had something to hide. (Richard Nixon, who was a lot smarter than Trump is, similarly misread the way the public would react when he arranged for the firing of his special prosecutor, Archibald Cox.) One concrete and dangerous result was that Trump was quickly confronted with something worse: a special counsel—Robert Mueller, Comey’s predecessor as FBI director—who is respected by both parties and, unlike Comey, can focus on this one assignment and will be much harder to fire.
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But the widely applauded decision to name a special counsel won’t resolve some momentous matters raised by the Russia affair. Mueller’s investigation is limited to considering criminal acts. His purview doesn’t include determining whether Trump should be held to account for serious noncriminal misdeeds he or his associates may have committed with regard to his election, or violations of his constitutional duties as president. The point that largely got lost in the excitement over the appointment is that there are presidential actions that aren’t crimes but that can constitute impeachable offenses, which the Constitution defines as “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”
When it was considering the impeachment of Richard Nixon, the House Judiciary Committee concluded that “high crimes” meant something broader than offenses listed in the criminal code. The concept of impeachment was largely lifted by the Founders from English law, which Edmund Burke explained to Parliament meant that “statesmen, who abuse their power” will be accused and tried by fellow statesmen “not upon the niceties of a narrow jurisprudence, but upon the enlarged and solid principles of state morality [Discussed in my book Washington Journal: Reporting Watergate and Richard Nixon’s Downfall (Overlook, 2014) ( https://www.amazon.com/Washington-Journal-Reporting-Watergate-Downfall/dp/1468309994 )].”
Among the crimes that the Watergate defendants were convicted of and that might be applicable to the more recent misadventure are bribery, subornation of perjury, criminal obstruction of justice, money laundering, tax evasion, witness tampering, and violations of election laws including campaign finance laws. Other crimes that might have occurred in the Russia affair are violations of the foreign agent registration laws and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, perjury itself (including lying to federal investigators), plus espionage and even treason.
Unlike ordinary crimes, impeachable offenses are “political” questions—ones that deeply affect the polity. Alexander Hamilton said that impeachable offenses were political, “as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself.” For example, of the three articles of impeachment adopted by the Judiciary Committee against Richard Nixon in 1974, the most important was for “abuse of power.” The critical holding by the committee was that a president can be held accountable for the acts of subordinates as well as for actions that aren’t, strictly speaking, crimes. In the end, an impeachment of a president is grounded in the theory that the holder of that office has failed to fulfill his responsibility, set out in Article II of the Constitution, to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” Unless a single act is itself sufficiently grave to warrant impeachment—for example, treason—a pattern of behavior needs to be found. That could involve, for example, emoluments or obstruction of justice.
This concept of accountability is critical to preventing a president from setting a tone in the White House, or dropping hints that can’t be traced, that lead to a pattern of acts by his aides that amount to, as in the case of Watergate, a violation of constitutional government. Many of what seemed disparate acts—well beyond the famous break-in in the Watergate complex and the cover-up—were carried out in order to assure Nixon’s reelection in 1972, and they amounted to the party in power interfering with the nominating process of the opposition party. That way lay fascism.
Similarly, in the case of the Russia affair, even if the president’s fingerprints aren’t found on any single act, misdeeds committed by Trump’s aides and close associates could amount to an impeachable offense on the part of the president. By definition, impeachable offenses would appear to concern conduct only during a presidency. But a number of constitutional law scholars, including the Harvard Law professor Laurence Tribe, who was dubious at first, believe that if a president or his associates working on his behalf acted corruptly and secretly to rig the election, then the preinaugural period should be included.
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Michael T. Flynn; drawing by James Ferguson
Mike Flynn, Trump’s former campaign adviser and dismissed national security adviser, is obviously a problem for the president, who has acted toward him in a most bizarre way. Trump ignored the warnings of Obama and Chris Christie not to hire Flynn. Then he resisted firing him even though, six days after the inauguration, then-acting attorney general Sally Yates warned the White House that Flynn had been “compromised” by Russia, and that Flynn had lied to Vice President Mike Pence about his conversations with the Russian ambassador, Sergey Kislyak, in late December 2016. Yates also alluded to what she called Flynn’s “underlying conduct.”
Trump asked for Flynn’s resignation only on February 13, after stories about Yates’s warning appeared in the press—and then, two days after he fired him, the president called Flynn “a wonderful man.” Ignoring admonitions not to be in touch with someone under investigation, Trump has done so and, weirdly, recently told aides that he’d like to have Flynn back in the White House. Trump’s conduct has the unmistakable ring of a man concerned about what the other man has on him.
More recently, the McClatchy news organization reported that Flynn, in conversations with outgoing national security adviser Susan Rice during the transition, asked that the Obama administration hold off on its plan to arm Kurdish forces to help the effort to retake Raqqa, the ISIS capital in Syria. Since Flynn was a paid lobbyist for the Turkish government, which strongly opposed the plan, this action could possibly lead to a charge of treason.
In late May, it was reported that Flynn had told Kislyak that it would be preferable if Russia didn’t retaliate against sanctions imposed by the Obama administration in response to Russia’s meddling in the election. Flynn was leading the Russians to believe that they’d receive much better treatment under a President Trump and the Russians went along. (They’ve been disappointed because once Russia’s behavior in the election became known it was clear that Congress wouldn’t allow Trump to lift the sanctions.) A big question is whether Flynn discussed such important policy matters with the Russians without the knowledge of the president-elect. Once it became clear that Russia wasn’t retaliating, Trump tweeted: “Great move on delay (by V. Putin)—I always knew he was very smart!”
Another major question is how far the Russians got in recruiting allies in the Trump campaign. Recently, former CIA director John Brennan testified that last summer he’d become concerned about the number of contacts between Russians and people involved in the campaign, so much so that he told a bipartisan group of congressional leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, neither of whom has yet to show any sign of being perturbed. (But they are people to watch closely for any sign of movement away from Trump.)
Brennan testified he was worried that the Russians may even have recruited some Americans to cooperate with their effort to tilt the election. Intelligence analysts picked up conversations by Russians in which they bragged that they’d cultivated Flynn and Manafort and believed they would be useful for influencing Trump. (This doesn’t prove guilt on the part of either man.) According to CNN, some Obama administration officials viewed Flynn as a security risk.
While Mueller’s investigation could preempt some congressional inquiries, it still leaves them important work to do. It doesn’t fall to the special counsel to consider the enormous and pressing question of how to prevent a foreign power from interfering in our elections again. It’s up to Congress to determine what new laws to write to deal with that. Conflicts are likely to arise between what Mueller says he needs by way of secrecy and not subjecting witnesses to self-incrimination, and the committees’ desire to remain involved; these will have to be negotiated.
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Laurence Tribe is gathering what he believes are impeachable offenses committed by Trump [See Laurence H. Tribe, “Trump Must Be Impeached. Here’s Why,” The Washington Post, May 13, 2017 ( https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-must-be-impeached-heres-why/2017/05/13/82ce2ea4-374d-11e7-b4ee-434b6d506b37_story.html )]. Going back to the first days of the Trump presidency and continuing up to the present, Tribe sees Trump flouting the constitutional ban on accepting “emoluments”—payments by foreign governments that might compromise the president’s presumably undivided commitment to US interests. Examples include accepting money paid by foreign governments to Trump’s luxury hotel just down the street from the White House in order to curry favor with its owner, and Trump’s failure to cut himself off from ownership of a business that has projects all over the world.
Also, Trump may be held to have attempted to impede the FBI’s Russia investigation. In addition to his request to Comey that he “let…go” his investigation of Flynn, this could include Trump’s firing of Comey for, as he ultimately admitted, “this Russia thing.” Or Trump’s saying to Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov and to Ambassador Kislyak, of firing Comey: “I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.” Collectively, these acts could amount to the impeachable offense of covering up other potential, substantive misdeeds. There were also Trump’s efforts very early in the administration to get Comey to pledge “loyalty” to him (Comey dodged, saying he’d give him his “honesty”). In another form of pressure, Trump asked Comey when the FBI would announce that he wasn’t under investigation. Comey didn’t respond.
Before it was revealed that Comey had taken notes of their conversations, Trump made a not-very-veiled threat that Comey “better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations.” Whether this was a feint or Trump had actually taped some conversations is as yet unknown, but by now Trump’s habitual lying has put him in a difficult spot when it is his word against Comey’s—or pretty much anyone’s. Whether or not Trump has recognized it—after all, he deals in threats—the revelation that Comey had notes of Trump asking him to drop the Flynn investigation was a clear sign that Comey wasn’t going to simply go away.
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Where are all the leaks coming from? Many Republicans want to make this the issue rather than what the leaks reveal, but the fact that they keep coming is a sign of the state of near collapse of the White House staff. It’s not an exaggeration to say that Trump has the most unhappy staff ever, with some feeling a higher duty to warn the public about what they see as a danger to the country.
From the stories that emanate from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue the impression one gets is that Trump is a nearly impossible person to work for: he screams at his staff when they tell him something he doesn’t want to hear; he screams at them as he watches television news for hours on end and sees stories about himself that he doesn’t like, which is most of them. Some White House staff are polishing their résumés. Leaks are also being made by the intelligence community, many of whom see Trump as a national menace.
People who have been to the Oval Office have come away stunned by Trump’s minimal attention span, his appalling lack of information, his tendency to say more than he knows. (Intelligence officials have been instructed to put as much of his daily briefing as possible in the form of pictures.) Aides have been subjected to public embarrassment by his propensity for changing his story.
Trump sullies the reputation of people who have signed on with him. The respected general H.R. McMaster, now the national security adviser, humiliated himself by trying—presumably under orders—to combat the Washington Post story on May 15 that Trump had revealed highly classified intelligence about ISIS to Lavrov and Kislyak. What made this even worse was that the intelligence had been passed on to the US by Israel under a strict international concordat that classified information shared between allies is not to be revealed to anyone else. McMaster has yet to recover his reputation from having emphatically refuted things the Post story didn’t say. Over and over, McMaster characterized the president’s passing along to the Russian officials the most sensitive information as “wholly appropriate.”
Trump’s reckless act is believed to have endangered the life of an Israeli intelligence asset who had been planted among ISIS forces, something extremely hard to pull off. Trump’s mishandling of the intelligence provoked dismay in Washington. During his visit to Jerusalem on May 22, Trump claimed that the press stories about it were wrong because he hadn’t mentioned Israel; but the reports didn’t say he did.
That same day, The Washington Post disclosed that Trump had asked the heads of two major intelligence agencies to announce that there had been no collusion between his campaign and Russia. Both declined. Some Trump defenders will argue that he didn’t know enough to understand that he shouldn’t have made those calls, or to try to get Comey to back off investigating Flynn—what might be called the ignorance defense. But while ignorance of the facts might be an acceptable defense in criminal or impeachment proceedings, ignorance of the law isn’t.
* * *
The particular challenges of serving in the Trump administration have led some people to make compromises that outsiders are prone to judge. In very short order, the same person can be almost rapturously admired as a hero and then scorned as a coward and a loser. Consider Rod Rosenstein, a career government prosecutor with a reputation for integrity who became deputy attorney general in April. Within a couple of weeks Rosenstein found himself in a meeting with Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions (who had supposedly recused himself from any dealings on the campaign and the Russia matter) and under pressure to write a memo expressing his own strong negative views of how Comey had handled Hillary Clinton’s e-mail case. The choices before Rosenstein were to write the report, knowing that Comey was going to be fired anyway, or refuse to and resign or be fired. Then what use could he be?
Trump had reportedly thought that Democrats, still unhappy over Clinton’s loss, would be pleased with his firing of Comey if his rationale was Comey’s handling of her case. But that made no sense; the timing was inexplicable; Democrats were incredulous that Trump was now suddenly sympathetic to Clinton. While Trump was within his legal rights to fire Comey, his doing so risked politicizing the FBI and set a terrible precedent.
Now Rosenstein was the goat. But despite numerous Democrats’ harsh condemnation of it, Rosenstein’s memo reads as if it had been written by any number of the Democrats or experienced prosecutors appalled by Comey’s behavior in the Clinton case. The memo set forth views widely expressed at the time that Comey had made a number of prosecutorial misjudgments. These included his tough public comments about Clinton’s handling of classified material even though he said there weren’t grounds for prosecuting her—this isn’t done—and his letter to Republican committee chairmen, which he had to know would be made public, eleven days before the election, saying that the inquiry into her handling of classified e-mails was being reopened, breaking a long-standing rule that prosecutors don’t comment on the status of continuing cases.
Comey’s problem was that in trying to protect his reputation he kept doing things that further damaged it. In his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on May 3 he spoke melodramatically of his anguish in having to decide between two choices: to “speak” or to “conceal.” But many observers believed that he had a third choice: quietly to get a warrant and check out some of the e-mails that had traveled from Clinton’s laptop to her close aide Huma Abedin’s to that of Abedin’s then-husband Anthony Weiner before reopening an investigation, much less announcing one and perhaps affect the outcome of the election. Comey’s testimony also angered Democrats by wildly exaggerating the number of Clinton’s e-mails that had landed on Weiner’s laptop—“hundreds and thousands,” he said, when actually there had been just a handful. Comey’s comment that the thought that his actions may have affected the election made him “mildly nauseous” enraged Trump.
Rosenstein was at the least naive if he didn’t understand that his report would be used as the rationale for the firing, but when that ensued, drawing intense criticism of him, he indicated he might quit. That Trump changed his story two days later, now saying that when he fired Comey he was thinking about “this Russia thing,” showed how exasperating and even damaging it could be to work for him. Everyone who hewed to the White House line that the firing had been based on Rosenstein’s memo, including Pence, was now embarrassed and lost credibility with the press and the public. And then Rosenstein was the hero again when just over a week later he appointed Mueller as special counsel.
* * *
The survival of Trump’s presidency may depend most of all on congressional Republicans. Unless the Democrats take both chambers in the midterms, the Republicans will decide his fate. At what point might their patience with Trump be exhausted? How will they respond if high presidential associates or even the president himself are indicted and he chooses to fight it out rather than resign? Is it possible that a Congress in which the Republicans control both or even one chamber would consider impeaching Trump? The impeachment proceedings against Nixon were accepted by the country because they were bipartisan and considered fair. Too many different unknowns are in play to predict the outcome of the midterms, though the respected Cook Report anticipates substantial Republican losses in the House. Republicans are starting to panic.
Their challenge is how to overcome the twin blights of Trump’s chaotic governing and his lack of achievements on Capitol Hill (the exception is the confirmation of the very conservative Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court). Trump’s sole substantive accomplishment thus far is the House’s approval of a health care overhaul that required all but a few of them to vote to throw tens of millions of people off of health insurance. (It was followed by a grand celebration at the White House.)
The Republicans are in a bit of a spot: they don’t particularly like Trump and to them he’s an interloper. One reason many of them, especially Ryan, allied themselves with Trump was that they thought he would get their programs, especially tax cuts, through Congress, but prospects for major legislation are receding. (And there’s no reason to think that a President Mike Pence wouldn’t back the same programs.)
The problem with much of the predicting about what will or might happen in Washington is that it proceeds from an assumption of stasis—as if things won’t happen that could change the politicians’ calculations. When it comes to how long Trump will remain in office, one possibility often discussed is that things might get so bad for him that he’ll decide to return to his much easier life in New York. But he insists that he’s not “a quitter.” (There’s also a question about the corpulent Trump’s health, but that’s not considered a proper topic of conversation.)
Politicians are pragmatists. Republican leaders urged Nixon to leave office rather than have to vote on his impeachment. Similarly, it’s possible that when Trump becomes too politically expensive for them, the current Republicans might be ready to dump him by one means or another. But the Republicans of today are quite different from those in the early 1970s: there are few moderates now and the party is the prisoner of conservative forces that didn’t exist in Nixon’s day.
Trump, like Nixon, depends on the strength of his core supporters, but unlike Nixon, he can also make use of social media, Fox News, and friendly talk shows to keep them loyal. Cracking Trump’s base could be a lot harder than watching Nixon’s diminish as he appeared increasingly like a cornered rat, perspiring as he tried to talk his way out of trouble (“I am not a crook”) or firing his most loyal aides as if that would fix the situation. Moreover, Trump is, for all his deep flaws, in some ways a cannier politician than Nixon; he knows how to lie to his people to keep them behind him.
The critical question is: When, or will, Trump’s voters realize that he isn’t delivering on his promises, that his health care and tax proposals will help the wealthy at their expense, that he isn’t producing the jobs he claims? His proposed budget would slash numerous domestic programs, such as food stamps, that his supporters have relied on heavily. (One wonders if he’s aware of this part of his constituency.)
People can have a hard time recognizing that they’ve been conned. And Trump is skilled at flimflam, creating illusions. But how long can he keep blaming his failures to deliver on others—Democrats, the “dishonest media,” the Washington “swamp”? None of this is knowable yet. What is knowable is that an increasingly agitated Donald Trump’s hold on the presidency is beginning to slip.
—May 25, 2017
© 2017 NYREV, Inc.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/06/22/trump-presidency-in-peril/
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Infowars Nightly News Breakdown Of The Terror Threat: 6/5/17 Full Show
Streamed live on Jun 5, 2017 by The Alex Jones Channel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JB00ZcHdFeo [with comments]
*
Christian VS Muslim
Published on Sep 26, 2014 by DarkMatter2525 http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLhtZqdkjshgq8TqwIjMdCQ / http://www.youtube.com/user/DarkMatter2525 , http://www.youtube.com/user/DarkMatter2525/videos ]
What could possibly go wrong?
This bird has two right wings. Basically, it ain't gonna fly.
This video is mainly addressed to people I would define as ultra right wing radical Christians in America. Some people tell me that Islam is worse, because at least the Christians aren't beheading people who don't respect their religion. The whole point of this video is "beware what you wish for". The reason certain Christians don't do such things is simply because they live in a secular society that won't allow such things, but they want that to change. They want the theocracy. They want people like me to be punished. They are the Taliban that is not allowed to act like the Taliban. This video is a cautionary comparison, and it is absolutely valid. Furthermore, far more Muslims have been killed by Christians, than the other way around, today and throughout history. It's just that we tend to label it differently.
I've often been told by Christians, "Hey, if you were in a Muslim country, making fun of religion, you'd be dead by now," (John Lennox has said stuff like this). Basically, that means "At least we Christians let you live." Um...thanks. Those are some mighty low standards you have there. I don't trust radicals on either side. I'm alive because the secular government won't allow you to kill me - not because there's a shortage of Christians who would be ready, willing, and able to do it. Of that, I have no doubt.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYV7KWQ-fY4 [with (currently nearly 8,000, earlier over 14,000) comments] [and see also in particular (linked in) http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=131610811 and preceding and following]
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Sen. Cardin: Trump tweets on London mayor 'outrageous'
All In with Chris Hayes
6/5/17
'I would hope the president would reflect before he sends out a tweet which is totally inaccurate.' Duration: 4:16
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/sen-cardin-trump-tweets-on-london-mayor-outrageous-960800835856
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Earnest: Trump is 'intentionally sowing fear and chaos'
All In with Chris Hayes
6/5/17
Former White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest says the president's rhetoric on terror may help him politically. But it's still cynical and dangerous. Duration: 3:11
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/earnest-trump-is-intentionally-sowing-fear-and-chaos-960804419785
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White House finally reveals if Trump filed tax returns this year
All In with Chris Hayes
6/5/17
For weeks, the White House has refused to confirm whether or not the President filed his tax returns this year. Duration: 1:56
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/white-house-finally-reveals-if-trump-filed-tax-returns-this-year-960811587579
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Trump rash behavior hurts US interests, alliances
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Laura Kennedy, former deputy assistant secretary for European and Eurasian affairs, talks about the damage Donald Trump has done to U.S. relations with allies in Europe. Duration: 9:26
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-rash-behavior-hurts-us-interests-alliances-960877635786 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkciZ6xBWY4 [with comments]
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White House staff fails to restrain Trump from damaging self, US
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Michael Beschloss, NBC News presidential historian, talks about times in history when a struggling president has been steadied by able staff members, and notes that Donald Trump lacks such support. Duration: 5:15
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/white-house-staff-fails-to-restrain-trump-from-damaging-self-us-960887875695
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Leaked docs show new depth of US voting system hacking by Russia
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Ken Delanian, NBC News national security reporter, talks about new revelations of Russian efforts to hack U.S. voting systems in 2016 and the arrest of the NSA contractor who shared secret documents with the news media. Duration: 8:08
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/leaked-docs-show-new-depth-of-us-voting-system-hacking-by-russia-960893507774
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Trump ranting corrodes executive credibility
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Neal Katyal, former acting U.S. solicitor general, talks about how Donald Trump's online ranting has undercut his lawyers' legal defense of his Muslim ban, and shattered the credibility of the executive branch. Duration: 11:01
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-ranting-corrodes-executive-credibility-960899139841
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London mayor: Disinvite Trump from UK visit
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/5/17
Joy-Ann Reid relays remarks by London Mayor Sadiq Khan calling for Donald Trump's state visit to the UK to be cancelled in light of Trump's attacks on the mayor in the midst of a terror attack and antagonism of NATO allies. Duration: 1:11
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/london-mayor-disinvite-trump-from-uk-visit-960904771625 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN_ZOKZfhiw [with comments]
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Lawrence: Trump's miscalculation with Comey's testimony
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/5/17
The White House says Donald Trump won't invoke executive privilege to block James Comey from testifying before the Senate Intel Cmte. Lawrence O'Donnell argues that's a critical mistake for the president. Jill Wine-Banks, John Heilemann, and David Frum join. Duration: 16:53
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/lawrence-trump-s-miscalculation-with-comey-s-testimony-960876099656 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnUpjZUpDng [with comments]
*
Trump advisors surprised by NATO speech
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/5/17
Fmr. NATO Supreme Allied Commander in Europe Adm. James Stavridis says "it was a big miss" that Trump removed language reaffirming Article 5. He says "it would break my heart to have to go out and perform that kind of Kabuki dance" to defend Trump's actions. Duration: 4:09
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/trump-advisors-surprised-by-nato-speech-960887875633
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Trump's tweets torpedo Trump administration's message
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
Calling for the Supreme Court to bring back his 'travel ban' & criticizing London's mayor in the wake of that city's terror attack on Twitter, Trump is stepping all over his own message. Duration: 7:59
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/trump-s-tweets-torpedo-trump-administration-s-message-960906307578
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Report: NSA doc shows Russia tried to hack U.S. voting systems
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
MSNBC's Brian Williams & Peter Baker of The New York Times discuss the report, citing a top secret NSA document, that the Russians tried to attack U.S. voting systems days before Election Day. Duration: 2:00
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/report-nsa-doc-shows-russia-tried-to-hack-u-s-voting-systems-960908867763
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Fmr. Watergate prosecutor: Trump tweets will destroy travel ban
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
Fmr. Watergate prosecutor Nick Akerman and fmr. ethics attorney for Pres. George W. Bush Richard Painter discuss how the Supreme Court will react to Trump's travel ban tweets. Duration: 5:37
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/fmr-watergate-prosecutor-trump-tweets-will-destroy-travel-ban-960899139942 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1B58n5zdoI [with comments]
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House Democrat: No brake between Trump's brain & his mouth
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
Rep. Dan Kildee (D-MI) responds to Pres. Trump's tweets and comments about the 'travel ban' and the Mayor of London, saying it's 'dangerous' for the president to say whatever he thinks. Duration: 2:02
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/house-democrat-no-brake-between-trump-s-brain-his-mouth-960918595614 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLMNiv30DeU [with comments]
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Report: Trump's own team caught off guard by Trump's NATO speech
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/5/17
MSNBC's Brian Williams, former U.S. Ambassador Christopher Hill, & Peter Baker of NY Times discuss the new report showing Trump's own team was caught off guard by his NATO speech. Duration: 2:12
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/report-trump-s-own-team-caught-off-guard-by-trump-s-nato-speech-960920131815
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Vladimir Putin & Megyn Kelly: Slimy Public Manipulators: The Daily Show
Published on Jun 5, 2017 by The Daily Show with Trevor Noah [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwWhs_6x42TyRM4Wstoq8HA , https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwWhs_6x42TyRM4Wstoq8HA/videos ]
Megyn Kelly makes her NBC News debut facing off against Russian President Vladimir Putin, but Michelle Wolf isn't buying the former Fox News host as a serious journalist.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOh6nOcyvyM [with comments]
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Aquaman Applauds Trump's Paris Agreement Decision
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMtFAi84ehTSYSE9XoHefig , https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMtFAi84ehTSYSE9XoHefig/videos ]
Remember, rising sea levels are only bad news for those of us that live on land.
[originally aired June 5, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tW6F4os-KdU [with comments]
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Stephen Raises Money For Less Fortunate Airplanes
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
Infrastructure Week 2017 gets off to a bang courtesy of Donald Trump and the alt-Wright Brothers.
[originally aired June 5, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H45XTqombz8 [with comments]
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Stephen Finally Gets To Covfefe About Covfefe
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
Stephen was away on vacation but can pretty much sum up last week in a single word, albeit imaginary.
[originally aired June 5, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5rC8uAtiBc [with comments]
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Trump Decides On The Paris Agreement And The Russia Agreement
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
It's becoming clear that President Trump's desire to go green is superseded by his desire to go red.
[originally aired June 5, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zz2d4wDzWl0 [with comments]
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Trump Picks Fights on Twitter, Pisses Off World: A Closer Look
Published on Jun 5, 2017 by Late Night with Seth Meyers [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVTyTA7-g9nopHeHbeuvpRA / https://www.youtube.com/user/LateNightSeth , https://www.youtube.com/user/LateNightSeth/videos ]
Seth takes a closer look at the latest fights President Trump has picked with the rest of the world as his approval ratings hit new lows.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIRm1rY4nF4 [with comments]
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Can America's Farms Survive the Threat of Deportations?
In upstate New York, both workers and the farmers who employ them fear more aggressive immigration enforcement.
Jun 6, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/06/can-americas-farms-survive-the-threat-of-deportations/529008/ [with embedded audio version ( https://soundcloud.com/user-154380542/can-americas-farms-survive-the-threat-of-deportations-the-atlantic-michael-frank ), and comments]
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Education Sec. Betsy DeVos speaks at Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing
Streamed live on Jun 6, 2017 by PBS NewsHour [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6ZFN9Tx6xh-skXCuRHCDpQ / https://www.youtube.com/user/PBSNewsHour , https://www.youtube.com/user/PBSNewsHour/videos ]
Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos testifies on the Department of Education budget before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies.
What we just learned from Betsy DeVos’s painful appearance before Congress
June 6, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/06/06/what-we-just-learned-from-betsy-devoss-painful-appearance-before-congress/ [with embedded video, and comments]
Betsy DeVos: It Is Not The Education Department’s Job To Protect LGBTQ Students
The education secretary faced intense questioning in a Senate hearing about whether she would stand up for the civil rights of students.
Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos prepares to testify before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education on Tuesday morning.
06/06/2017
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/betsy-devos-lgbtq-students_us_5936c878e4b013c4816b4ebc [with embedded video, and comments]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5aq6u0kpeCw [comments disabled]
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How Donald Trump Shifted Kids-Cancer Charity Money Into His Business
Jun 6, 2017
LIKE AUTUMN LEAVES, sponsored Cadillacs, Ferraris and Maseratis descend on the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, New York, in September for the Eric Trump Foundation golf invitational. Year after year, the formula is consistent: 18 holes of perfectly trimmed fairways with a dose of Trumpian tackiness, including Hooters waitresses and cigar spreads, followed by a clubhouse dinner, dates encouraged. The crowd leans toward real estate insiders, family friends and C-list celebrities, such as former baseball slugger Darryl Strawberry and reality housewife (and bankruptcy-fraud felon) Teresa Giudice.
The real star of the day is Eric Trump, the president's second son and now the co-head of the Trump Organization, who has hosted this event for ten years on behalf of the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis. He's done a ton of good: To date, he's directed more than $11 million there, the vast majority of it via this annual golf event. He has also helped raise another $5 million through events with other organizations.
The best part about all this, according to Eric Trump, is the charity's efficiency: Because he can get his family's golf course for free and have most of the other costs donated, virtually all the money contributed will go toward helping kids with cancer. "We get to use our assets 100% free of charge," Trump tells Forbes.
That's not the case. In reviewing filings from the Eric Trump Foundation and other charities, it's clear that the course wasn't free--that the Trump Organization received payments for its use, part of more than $1.2 million that has no documented recipients past the Trump Organization. Golf charity experts say the listed expenses defy any reasonable cost justification for a one-day golf tournament.
Additionally, the Donald J. Trump Foundation, which has come under previous scrutiny for self-dealing and advancing the interests of its namesake rather than those of charity, apparently used the Eric Trump Foundation to funnel $100,000 in donations into revenue for the Trump Organization.
And while donors to the Eric Trump Foundation were told their money was going to help sick kids, more than $500,000 was re-donated to other charities, many of which were connected to Trump family members or interests, including at least four groups that subsequently paid to hold golf tournaments at Trump courses.
All of this seems to defy federal tax rules and state laws that ban self-dealing and misleading donors. It also raises larger questions about the Trump family dynamics and whether Eric and his brother, Don Jr., can be truly independent of their father.
Especially since the person who specifically commanded that the for-profit Trump Organization start billing hundreds of thousands of dollars to the nonprofit Eric Trump Foundation, according to two people directly involved, was none other than the current president of the United States, Donald Trump.
[...]
https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2017/06/06/how-donald-trump-shifted-kids-cancer-charity-money-into-his-business/
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Trump’s sons recommend the high road they usually don’t [sic - never] take
By Callum Borchers
June 7, 2017
President Trump's adult sons think it is time for everyone to take the high road in political discourse. Just don't expect them to lead the way.
“Morals have flown out the window,” Eric Trump lamented on Sean Hannity's Fox News show Tuesday night. “We deserve so much better than this as a country, and, you know, it's so sad.”
Apparently not sad enough for him to set an example, however. In the same interview, Eric Trump said this of his father's critics: “To me, they're not even people.”
Classy, right?
In an interview that aired earlier Tuesday on ABC's “Good Morning America,” Donald Trump Jr. said Kathy Griffin “deserves everything that's coming to her,” after she posed for a photograph with a bloody mask meant to simulate the president's severed head.
For the record, death threats [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/06/02/kathy-griffin-will-talk-about-bullying-from-the-trump-family-at-presser-friday/ ] are what's “coming to her.”
So, to summarize: The president's detractors are subhuman, and at least one of them deserves to have her subhuman life threatened by the president's supporters. Golly, the state of politics in this country is so sad, isn't it?
On some level, the sentiments of Eric and Don Jr. are understandable. We're talking about their father, after all, so a little righteous indignation is to be expected. If all they did was lash out, they might be entitled to a pass.
But their moralizing about over-the-line rhetoric is jaw-droppingly hypocritical.
There is another major disconnect in the Trumps' thinking: They seem to be under the impression that because they do some good things, they ought to be immune to criticism for doing bad things.
“I've raised $16.3 million for the greatest hospital in the world — that's St. Jude,” Eric Trump told Hannity. “And I get attacked for it.”
By “attacked,” he meant scrutinized by Forbes magazine, which reported [ https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2017/06/06/how-donald-trump-shifted-kids-cancer-charity-money-into-his-business/ (excerpted/linked just above)] Tuesday that Eric Trump's annual charity golf tournament doubles as a revenue stream for Trump family businesses. Although Eric Trump claimed that his family donates use of the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, N.Y., public records show that the club has accepted $1.2 million in payments over the years.
“Golf charity experts say the listed expenses defy any reasonable cost justification for a one-day golf tournament,” Forbes reported. More:
And while donors to the Eric Trump Foundation were told their money was going to help sick kids, more than $500,000 was re-donated to other charities, many of which were connected to Trump family members or interests, including at least four groups that subsequently paid to hold golf tournaments at Trump courses.
All of this seems to defy federal tax rules and state laws that ban self-dealing and misleading donors.
Two things can be true at once: The Trumps can do good charitable work and put money in their own pockets. They can be targets of unacceptable rhetoric and dispense some of their own.
What they want, however, is all the praise and sympathy that comes with the first half of those equations and none of the criticism that comes with the second.
Read more:
Eric Trump calls father’s critics ‘not even people’
June 7, 2017
[...]
Eric Trump took special aim at the Democratic Party, which he says is “imploding.” He calls Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez “a total wackjob.” Trump says Democrats “have no message of their own” and are trying to obstruct “a great man” in his father and his family.
In a statement Wednesday, Perez responded: “Democrats are people. So are Muslims, immigrants, women, people with pre-existing conditions, and everyone else Trump is hurting.”
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/eric-trump-calls-fathers-critics-not-even-people/2017/06/07/332d52f2-4b71-11e7-987c-42ab5745db2e_story.html [original at https://www.apnews.com/0560034948154b8c85d5baf77696bfa4/Eric-Trump-calls-father's-critics-'not-even-people' ]
© 2017 The Washington Post (emphasis in original)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/07/trumps-sons-recommend-the-high-road-they-usually-dont-take/ [with comments], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVFi779GROk [as embedded; with comments], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1wQuU66n6A [as embedded; with comments]
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The White House Exaggerated the Growth of Coal Jobs by About 5,000 Percent
Donald Trump’s EPA head is touting bad statistics in defense of a foolish policy.
Jun 6, 2017
On Sunday’s “Meet the Press,” Scott Pruitt, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, claimed [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/06/06/pruitts-claim-that-almost-50000-jobs-have-been-gained-in-coal/ ] that the U.S. has created 50,000 jobs in the coal sector since the fourth quarter of 2016. The statistic carries an important message for the White House. Trump has brought extraordinary attention to the decline of coal jobs, for which he’s blamed Obama-imposed regulations. Coal’s immediate bounce-back would represent a major early win for a president who has made promises to revive the economy of the 1950s, when mining was more dominant.
But Pruitt’s statistic wasn’t just flagrantly incorrect. It’s being used to support a nonsensical argument that the United States should orient its global policy based on a sector employing 0.03 percent of the economy, as there are fewer coal mining workers than there are people employed at Carl's Jr. [ http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jan/23/andy-puzder/ceo-carls-jr-says-obamacare-has-caused-millions-fu/ ] franchises or Disney World [ http://www.today.com/parents/10-crazy-things-you-never-knew-about-walt-disney-world-t73881 ].
Quite simply, the coal sector has added about 1,000 jobs since October 2016—not 50,000. Coal could not have added 50,000 jobs in the last eight months, since that is essentially the size of the entire coal industry, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics [ https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/naics4_212100.htm ]. Pruitt’s statistic would otherwise imply that entire coal mining industry started in October. (Perhaps he meant 50,000 total mining jobs, but the vast majority of those positions have nothing to do with coal jobs [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/06/06/pruitts-claim-that-almost-50000-jobs-have-been-gained-in-coal/ ]; indeed, natural gas-mining workers might even be replacing them.)
[...]
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/06/pruitt-epa-coal-jobs-exaggerate/529311/ [with comments]
*
Kansas Republicans raise taxes, ending their GOP governor’s ‘real live experiment’ in conservative policy
Gov. Sam Brownback vetoes a tax bill in February.
(Thad Allton /The Topeka Capital-Journal via AP)
By Max Ehrenfreund
June 7, 2017
Republicans in Kansas broke ranks with the state's conservative governor Tuesday night, voting to raise tax rates and put an end to a series of cuts.
The GOP revolt is a defeat for Gov. Sam Brownback, who overhauled the state's tax system beginning in 2012, part of what called a "real-live experiment" in conservative governance. Yet the economic boom Brownback promised has not materialized, leaving the state government perennially short on money and forced to reduce basic services.
Kansas's legislature is overwhelmingly Republican, but moderate GOP lawmakers joined with Democrats to override Brownback's veto of the bill to increase taxes. Eighteen of the state's 31 GOP senators and 49 of the 85 Republican members of the House voted against the governor.
Tuesday's vote was a rebuke not only for Brownback, but also for Republicans in Washington who have advocated similar cuts in taxes at the national level -- including President Trump. Although Republicans in Kansas are giving up on the experiment, Trump and his allies are hoping to try again.
The principles Trump endorsed during the campaign and in the early stages of his presidency are broadly similar to those enacted in Kansas. As Brownback did, Trump has proposed bringing down marginal rates, getting rid of brackets and giving a new break to small businesses.
That is no coincidence, since Brownback is well connected to the Republican policymaking establishment in Washington. Trump and Brownback have shared economic advisers, and when Brownback was a U.S. senator, Rep. Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.), now the speaker of the House, served as his legislative director.
The victory for Brownback's opponents resulted in part from their gains in last year's election. Voters -- frustrated that public schools were closing early and the state's highways were in visible disrepair -- rejected Brownback's allies in favor of more moderate Republicans or Democrats.
"It was a hard vote for a lot of people to make last night," said Rep. Melissa Rooker, a moderate Republican who represents a suburb of Kansas City. "Kansas has had a turn to the far right, and we seem to be centering ourselves."
The legislation undoes the essential components of Brownback's reforms. The governor had reduced the number of brackets for the state's marginal rates on income from three to two. The legislature will restore the third bracket, increasing taxes on the state's wealthiest residents from 4.6 percent to 5.2 percent this year and 5.7 percent next year.
Marginal rates on less affluent Kansan households will increase as well, from 4.6 percent to 5.25 percent by next year for married taxpayers making between $30,000 and $60,000 a year and from 2.7 percent to 3.1 percent for those earning less than that.
The legislation also scraps a plan to bring those rates down even more in future years, one of Brownback's promises to conservative supporters.
Finally, the legislature eliminated a cut Brownback had put in place to help small businesses. Analysts said that the provision had become a loophole, as many Kansans were able to avoid paying taxes entirely by pretending to be small businesses.
Initially, the state forecast that about 200,000 small businesses would take advantage of the break. As it turned out, about 330,000 entities would use Kansas's new rule. That discrepancy suggests that tens of thousands of workers claimed that their incomes were from businesses they owned rather than from salaries.
State budget analysts project the tax increase will raise an additional $600 million annually.
"What we were able to do in the last 24 hours can allow us to start down that road, to begin repairing all the damage done after living with Gov. Brownback's failed tax experiment for five years," said Annie McKay, who is the president of Kansas Action for Children, an advocacy group in Topeka.
Proponents argued that reducing taxes would stimulate the state's economy. "We have worked hard in Kansas to move our tax policy to a pro-growth orientation," Brownback said in a statement [ https://governor.kansas.gov/governor-sam-brownback-issues-statement-on-legislative-tax-hike/ ] on vetoing the legislation. "This bill undoes much of that progress. It will substantially damage job creation and leave our citizens poorer in the future."
Since 2012, however, the pace of economic expansion in Kansas has consistently lagged behind that of the rest of the country.
Last year, Kansas's gross domestic product increased just 0.2 percent, federal data show, compared to 1.6 percent nationally. That was an improvement for Kansas, though: At the end of 2015, the state was in what many economists would describe as a recession, with the economy contracting two quarters in a row.
Last year's election substantially weakened Brownback's support in the legislature. In November, Democrats picked up a seat in the Senate, which has 40 members, and 12 seats in the House, which has 125. In primary elections in August, Republican voters had forced out 14 incumbent allies of the governor, replacing them with more moderate candidates.
Other GOP lawmakers who supported Brownback retired last year, and moderate Republicans won a few of those seats as well. Rooker, the GOP legislator, said her former colleagues were not eager to confront frustrated voters in another campaign, or to deal with the fiscal headaches Brownback's policies had created if they did win reelection.
The legislature began this year's session with the government in a deficit of $350 million.
"People expect us to take care of business efficiently and appropriately," Rooker said. "I just think it was the pressure building. Something had to be done."
"The elections reflected a mood in Kansas that possibly Kansas politics had shifted too far to the right," said Rep. Don Hineman, a moderate Republican who represents a rural district in western Kansas. "It was time to return to a more centrist position, which is where Kansas has traditionally been governed from."
For the past several years, legislative sessions have been protracted as lawmakers have struggled to find solutions to the state's fiscal woes. That pattern continued this year, and Hineman hopes that with the tax increase enacted, lawmakers can finally leave Topeka this weekend.
On Saturday, he hopes to head back to his family's farm, which his son operates. This week, they are putting in grain sorghum. "I’m anxious to get back home, and my son is anxious for me to be home, because he would like to have me on the tractor," Hineman said.
© 2017 The Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/06/07/kansas-republicans-raise-taxes-rebuking-their-gop-governors-real-live-experiment-in-conservative-policy/ [with embedded videos, and comments]
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Full Show - Islam Launches Global Jihad - Megan Kelly Visits Infowars - 06/06/2017
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by Ron Gibson [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYv-5LsUyc_P8KMo7YGPFPA / https://www.youtube.com/user/RonGibsonCF , https://www.youtube.com/user/RonGibsonCF/videos ]
Tuesday, June 6th 2017[, with Paul Joseph Watson hosting the fourth hour]: Londonistan Mayor Cancels Trump Visit - London's Mayor Sadiq Khan has cancelled Donald Trump's scheduled state visit. Rebel Media's Tommy Robinson will join today's program to explain how Britain is dealing with the aftermath of the latest terror attack. Also, political cartoonist Ben Garrison shares his take on leaks coming out of the Trump administration and the most recent terror attack in Paris where a man attacked police with a hammer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9s6xYiTrEKY [with comments] [the somewhat edited Alex Jones original at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmsspaf2C48 (title taken from; with comments)] [a must-watch]
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Putin: I don't have bad days because I'm 'not a woman'
By John Bowden
06/06/17
Russian President Vladimir Putin told controversial filmmaker Oliver Stone that he doesn't have bad days because he is a man, according to new footage provided [ https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2017-06-06/macho-putin-in-driver-s-seat-as-he-takes-oliver-stone-for-a-ride , https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-01/putin-interviewed-by-oliver-stone-in-documentary-for-showtime ] to Bloomberg.
While touring the Kremlin's gilded throne room, Stone asked Putin if he ever had "off days."
“I am not a woman, so I don’t have bad days,” Putin responded. "I am not trying to insult anyone. That's just the nature of things. There are certain natural cycles."
In the newly-released footage, the Russian president also denies that his administration is pursuing a campaign against homosexuality in Russia. Critics have blasted a reported ally of Putin, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, for allegedly detaining and torturing more than 100 gay men in Chechnya.
“There are no restrictions whatsoever,” Putin said of homosexuals in Russia.
In April, former Vice President Joe Biden [ http://thehill.com/people/joe-biden ] called on President Trump to confront Putin about human rights abuses in Chechnya.
“I am disgusted and appalled by reports from both the Russian media and non-governmental organizations that authorities in the Russian republic of Chechnya have rounded up, tortured and even murdered individuals who are believed to be gay. I hope that the current administration lives up to the promises it has made to advance human rights for everyone by raising this issue directly with Russia’s leaders,” Biden said at the time.
©2017 Capitol Hill Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of News Communications, Inc.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/336650-putin-i-dont-have-bad-days-because-im-not-a-woman [with comments]
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Did Trump Himself Meet With the Russian Ambassador? | The Resistance with Keith Olbermann | GQ
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by GQ
Have we got a giant new tentacle to the Trump/Russia octopus?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-aJD1a8xzU [with comments]
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Liberal Redneck - Midnight in Paris (on the Damn Doomsday Clock)
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by Trae Crowder [ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTHsQd-vRXK1bp4vpifl6yA , https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTHsQd-vRXK1bp4vpifl6yA/videos ]
We done screwed the pooch with this Paris Climate shit yall. I would say Trump's fiddlin while the world burns but it ain't no way he can work a fiddle with those stupid tiny baby hands. Anyway we all gone die. Love ye.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOcVk6WRUaM [with comments]
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To Be Sick Without Obamacare
As the Senate debates the health law’s repeal, a look back at how insurers treated preexisting conditions before the Affordable Care Act
Jun 6, 2017
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/06/to-be-sick-without-obamacare/529317/ [with comments]
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Four top law firms turned down requests to represent Trump
By Michael Isikoff
June 06, 2017
Top lawyers with at least four major law firms rebuffed White House overtures to represent President Trump in the Russia investigations, in part over concerns that the president would be unwilling to listen to their advice, according to five sources familiar with discussions about the matter.
The unwillingness of some of the country’s most prestigious attorneys and their law firms to represent Trump has complicated the administration’s efforts to mount a coherent defense strategy to deal with probes being conducted by four congressional committees [ https://www.yahoo.com/news/told-trump-clear-not-us-key-senators-say-202928995.html ] as well as Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller [ https://www.yahoo.com/news/ten-things-know-robert-mueller-030120729.html ].
The president’s chief lawyer now in charge of the case is Marc E. Kasowitz, a tough New York civil litigator [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/business/dealbook/sorkin-marc-kasowitz-trump-lawyer.html ] who for years has aggressively represented Trump in multiple business and public relations disputes — often with threats [ https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/us/politics/donald-trump-lawsuit-threat.html ] of countersuits and menacing public statements — but who has little experience dealing with complex congressional and Justice Department investigations that are inevitably influenced by media coverage and public opinion.
Before Kasowitz was retained, however, some of the biggest law firms and their best-known attorneys turned down overtures when they were sounded out by White House officials to see if they would be willing to represent the president, the sources said.
Among them, sources said, were some of the most high-profile names in the legal profession, including Brendan Sullivan of Williams & Connolly; Ted Olson of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher; Paul Clement and Mark Filip of Kirkland & Ellis; and Robert Giuffra of Sullivan & Cromwell.
The lawyers and their firms cited a variety of factors in choosing not to take on the president as a client. Some, like Brendan Sullivan, said they had upcoming trials or existing commitments that would make it impossible for them to devote the necessary time and resources to Trump’s defense.
Others mentioned potential conflicts with clients of their firms, such as financial institutions that have already received subpoenas relating to potential money-laundering issues that are part of the investigation.
But a consistent theme, the sources said, was the concern about whether the president would accept the advice of his lawyers and refrain from public statements and tweets that have consistently undercut his position.
“The concerns were, ‘The guy won’t pay and he won’t listen,’” said one lawyer close to the White House who is familiar with some of the discussions between the firms and the administration, as well as deliberations within the firms themselves.
Other factors, the lawyer said, were that it would “kill recruitment” for the firms to be publicly associated with representing the polarizing president and jeopardize the firms’ relationships with other clients.
Another lawyer briefed on some of the discussions agreed that the firms were worried about the reputational risk of representing the president. One issue that arose, this lawyer said, was “Do I want to be associated with this president and his policies?” In addition, the lawyer said, there were concerns that if they took on the case, “Who’s in charge?” and “Would he listen?”
None of the lawyers who turned down the White House overtures responded to requests for comment by Yahoo News.
The White House began discreetly reaching out to assemble an outside legal team several weeks ago, after the public uproar over the firing of FBI Director James Comey — who is due to testify before the Senate intelligence committee on Thursday — followed by the appointment of Mueller as Justice Department special counsel.
Among those who began calling around on the president’s behalf were White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, senior counselor Kellyanne Conway and White House counsel Don McGahn. In some cases, the discussions led to meetings or phone calls between the lawyers who were approached and the president himself.
Some of the sources who spoke to Yahoo News said the top lawyers and the four firms that rejected the overtures were not exhaustive of the list of firms approached by the White House. Among those who also were reportedly approached [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-close-to-choosing-outside-counsel-for-russia-investigation/2017/05/22/8709f62e-3f22-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html ] were Reid Weingarten of Steptoe & Johnson and A.B. Culvahouse Jr. of O’Melveny & Myers.
The hiring of Kasowitz has been criticized by some who view the New York lawyer as a pit-bull litigator who lacks the finesse to represent the president in probes that involve the public arena. Among the cases on which he has represented Trump over the years were lawsuits involving Trump University and divorce proceedings.
But one of the sources said that Kasowitz has been reaching out to Washington legal veterans to solicit ideas and suggestions about how to craft an overall defense strategy, including how and when to publicly release information that might be helpful to the president’s defense, the source said.
Copyright 2017 Yahoo! News
https://www.yahoo.com/news/four-top-law-firms-turned-requests-represent-trump-122423972.html [with embedded video, and (over 7,000) comments]
*
Trump, furious and frustrated, gears up to punch back at Comey testimony
President Trump takes his seat during a meeting with the House and Senate leadership in the White House Tuesday.
(Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
By Robert Costa, Ashley Parker and Philip Rucker
June 6, 2017
Alone in the White House in recent days, President Trump — frustrated and defiant — has been spoiling for a fight, according to his confidants and associates.
Glued even more than usual to the cable news shows that blare from the televisions in his private living quarters, or from the 60-inch flat screen he had installed in his cramped study off the Oval Office, he has fumed about “fake news.” Trump has seethed as his agenda has stalled in Congress and the courts. He has chafed against the pleas for caution from his lawyers and political advisers, tweeting whatever he wants, whenever he wants.
And on Thursday, the president will come screen-to-screen with the FBI director he fired, James B. Comey, thoughts of whom have consumed, haunted and antagonized Trump since Comey launched an expanding Russia investigation that the president slammed as a “witch hunt.”
Comey’s testimony is a political Super Bowl — with television networks interrupting regular programming to air it, and some Washington offices and bars making plans for special viewings.
Trump is keen to be a participant rather than just another viewer, two senior White House officials said, including the possibility of taking to Twitter to offer acerbic commentary during the hearing.
“I wish him luck,” the president told reporters on Tuesday.
“He’s infuriated at a deep-gut, personal level that the elite media has tolerated [the Russia story] and praised Comey,” former House speaker Newt Gingrich said. “He’s not going to let some guy like that smear him without punching him as hard as he can.”
This account of Trump’s mind-set and the preparations of his team in the run-up to Comey’s testimony is based on interviews with 20 White House officials, Trump friends and other well-connected Republicans, many of whom spoke only on the condition of anonymity to offer candid perspectives.
The president’s lawyers and aides have been urging him to resist engaging, and they hope to keep him busy Thursday with other events meant to compete for his — and the news media’s — attention.
“The president’s going to have a very, very busy day,” White House press secretary Sean Spicer said. “I think his focus is going to be on pursuing the agenda and the priorities that he was elected to do.”
As of now, Trump’s Thursday morning — when Comey is scheduled to start testifying — is open. He plans to deliver a 12:30 p.m. speech at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s conference in Washington, followed by a 3:30 p.m. meeting with governors and mayors on infrastructure projects.
Jay Sekulow, a high-profile conservative lawyer in Washington, has met several times recently with Trump and said he found the president to have his attention squarely on his proposals.
“He’s been very much in control and in command,” Sekulow said. “I don’t sense any siege or panic at all. ... I’ve been there a lot, and I don’t see the president in any context distracted or flustered by any of this. I just don’t see it.”
But privately, Trump’s advisers said they are bracing for a worst-case scenario: that he ignores their advice and tweets his mind.
“He’s not going to take an attack by James Comey laying down,” said Roger Stone, a longtime Trump friend and former political adviser. “Trump is a fighter, he’s a brawler and he’s the best counterpuncher in American politics.”
The president increasingly has come to see Twitter as his preferred method of communicating with his supporters, no matter the pitfalls.
“The FAKE MSM is working so hard trying to get me not to use Social Media. They hate that I can get the honest and unfiltered message out,” Trump tweeted [ https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/872059997429022722 ] on Tuesday morning, making a reference to the “mainstream media.”
The West Wing, meanwhile, has taken on an atmosphere of legal uncertainty. White House counsel Donald F. McGahn has told staff to hold onto emails, documents and phone records, officials said, a move of caution designed to prepare the staff for future legal requests, should they come. McGahn has specifically advised staffers to avoid what are known as the “burn bags” in the executive branch that are often used to discard papers.
While people familiar with the White House counsel’s office described McGahn’s moves as appropriate steps because of the ongoing probes, they said many junior staffers are increasingly skittish and fearful of their communications eventually finding their way into the hands of investigators.
Some staffers nervous about their own personal liability are contemplating hiring lawyers and have become more rigorous about not putting things in text messages or emails that they would not want to be subpoenaed, one person familiar with the situation said.
Attempting to invoke executive privilege to restrict Comey’s testimony was never seriously considered by Trump or his legal team, said one senior White House official. But, this official added, the White House liked floating the possibility as a distraction.
In the weeks leading up to Comey’s testimony, the White House had privately tried to erect a war room that would handle the communications and legal strategies for responding to the Russia matter. Former Trump campaign aides Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie were in discussions to lead it.
But the plan was scuttled, as with so much else in Trump’s administration, because of internal disagreements, according to multiple officials. Arguments included whether the war room would be run from inside or outside the gates of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.; who would staff it; whether they could be trusted by the president’s high-ranking advisers, or even trust one another; and whether Marc Kasowitz, Trump’s outside counsel, would ultimately control the message.
Kasowitz, who has a long-standing relationship with Trump, has been operating as an island of sorts in Trump world. He has been meeting regularly with the president and has a nascent relationship with McGahn, but he has not widely shared his legal strategy within the West Wing, according to two officials involved.
Kasowitz, whose combative personality mirrors Trump’s, has not found it easy to entice other big-name lawyers with Washington experience to join the cause because many prominent attorneys are reluctant to have him giving them direction and wonder whether he will be able to keep Trump from stumbling, one official said.
In the absence of a war room — and with the departure of communications director Michael Dubke — planning for the White House’s response to the Comey hearing has fallen largely to Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and his lieutenants.
Trump’s team is preparing a campaign-style line of attack aimed at undercutting Comey’s reputation. They plan to portray him as a “showboat” and to bring up past controversies from his career, including his handling of the Hillary Clinton email investigation in 2016, according to people involved in the planning.
The Republican National Committee has lined up a roster of surrogates to appear on conservative news stations nationwide to defend Trump. But a list the RNC distributed on Tuesday could hardly be described as star-studded: The names include Bob Paduchik, an RNC co-chair who worked on Trump’s Ohio campaign; Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi (R); and Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge (R).
Trump so far has been unable to recruit reinforcements for his beleaguered senior staff. Conversations about former Trump campaign official David Urban possibly joining the White House have stalled, although he remains in contact with several Trump advisers, officials said.
The White House has long struggled with its communications team, with Trump both privately and publicly voicing displeasure with his current staff. Press secretary Sean Spicer has started appearing less frequently on camera, and Trump and several top advisers, including son-in-law Jared Kushner, are considering a range of options to revamp the structure.
The White House recently approached Geoff Morrell — who served as the Pentagon press secretary for more than four years under former defense secretary Robert Gates — about coming inside the administration and overhauling the communications operation, according to three people with knowledge of the overture.
Morrell declined to comment, but BP announced last month that Morrell would be moving to London this summer to run government relations and communications for the company globally.
Scott Reed, senior political strategist at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, was also approached about taking a communications role within the White House, according to two people familiar with the outreach. Reed declined to comment.
In addition, Laura Ingraham, a conservative talk-radio host and Trump friend, discussed joining the White House but made clear to officials that she is more comfortable remaining outside as a vocal Trump ally because of her many broadcasting and media commitments, officials said.
Some Trump loyalists outside the White House who are preparing to go on television news shows Thursday to defend the president and undermine Comey’s testimony said they have been given no talking points, nor seen any evidence of a strategy taking shape. One such loyalist said external supporters are afraid to coordinate too closely with the White House because they fear they could be accused of obstructing justice.
Trump is personally reaching out to some allies on the Senate Intelligence Committee ahead of their questioning of Comey. He was scheduled to have dinner Tuesday night at the White House with Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), both committee members, along with a few other lawmakers. The dinner had been long scheduled for the president to offer a debrief on his foreign trip, a senior White House official said.
In the West Wing, people close to the president and junior aides fear that the president’s erratic behavior could have sweeping legal and political consequences, and they are beleaguered by how he has not proved able to concentrate fully on his agenda — this was supposed to be “infrastructure week,” for instance. Many are also resigned to the idea that there is little they can do to moderate or thwart Trump’s moves, so instead they are focused on managing the fallout.
One Republican close to the White House summed up the staff’s mantra as: “Please, don’t, you’re not helping things.”
But Trump and several political intimates see a political advantage to the president personally engaging, however unseemly it may appear to traditionalists.
“He believes in the long run there is an enormous premium on being the person who stands there fighting,” said Gingrich, author of “Understanding Trump,” an upcoming book. “People respond to that and wonder if he’s fighting this hard, maybe he’s right and the other guys are wrong. It’s the core of how he operates.”
Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard Law School professor and criminal law expert whose television commentary on the Russia probe has caught the White House’s attention, said he understands why the president would be motivated to speak out to counter Comey’s testimony.
“Every lawyer would tell the president not to tweet, not to react,” Dershowitz said. “But he’s not listening. This is typical. I tell my clients all the time not to talk and they simply disregard it. It’d be very hard to tell a very wealthy, very powerful man not to tweet. He thinks, ‘I tweeted my way to the presidency,’ and he’s determined to tweet.”
Mary Jordan and Amber Phillips contributed to this report.
Read more:
All eyes will be on James Comey this Thursday — again
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/all-eyes-on-comey---again/2017/06/06/407be404-4ae6-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html
The broadcast networks will air Comey’s hearing live. That’s a big deal.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/06/its-a-big-deal-that-broadcast-networks-will-air-the-comey-hearing-live/
Trump’s legal team falters as D.C. heavyweights take a pass
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trumps-legal-dream-team-falters-as-dc-heavyweights-take-a-pass/2017/06/06/a6eb6e9a-4aea-11e7-a186-60c031eab644_story.html
Trump undercuts his aides by contradicting their statements
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-undercuts-his-aides-by-contradicting-their-statements/2017/06/06/1ae3155a-4ad2-11e7-9669-250d0b15f83b_story.html
The Trump administration has a recruiting problem
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/06/06/the-trump-administration-has-a-recruiting-problem/
Sessions offered in recent months to resign as attorney general
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/sessions-offered-in-recent-months-to-resign-as-attorney-general/2017/06/06/030366fc-4b17-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html
Our president is simply unpresidented
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/our-president-is-simply-unpresidented/2017/06/05/5e5c35b6-4a2b-11e7-9669-250d0b15f83b_story.html
© 2017 The Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-furious-and-frustrated-will-join-allies-in-attacking-comey-testimony/2017/06/06/171e6d00-4acf-11e7-9669-250d0b15f83b_story.html [with embedded videos, and comments]
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Top intelligence official told associates Trump asked him if he could intervene with Comey on FBI Russia probe
Then-Indiana Sen. Dan Coats on Capitol Hill last November.
June 6, 2017
The nation’s top intelligence official told associates in March that President Trump asked him if he could intervene with then-FBI Director James B. Comey to get the bureau to back off its focus on former national security adviser Michael Flynn in its Russia probe, according to officials.
On March 22, less than a week after being confirmed by the Senate, Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats attended a briefing at the White House together with officials from several government agencies. As the briefing was wrapping up, Trump asked everyone to leave the room except for Coats and CIA Director Mike Pompeo.
The president then started complaining about the FBI investigation and Comey’s handling of it, said officials familiar with the account Coats gave to associates. Two days earlier, Comey had confirmed [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/fbi-director-to-testify-on-russian-interference-in-the-presidential-election/2017/03/20/cdea86ca-0ce2-11e7-9d5a-a83e627dc120_story.html ] in a congressional hearing that the bureau was probing whether Trump’s campaign coordinated with Russia during the 2016 race.
After the encounter, Coats discussed the conversation with other officials and decided that intervening with Comey as Trump had suggested would be inappropriate, according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal matters.
The events involving Coats show the president went further than just asking intelligence officials to deny publicly the existence of any evidence showing collusion during the 2016 election, as The Washington Post reported [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-asked-intelligence-chiefs-to-push-back-against-fbi-collusion-probe-after-comey-revealed-its-existence/2017/05/22/394933bc-3f10-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html ] in May. The interaction with Coats indicates that Trump aimed to enlist top officials to have Comey curtail the bureau’s probe.
[...]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/top-intelligence-official-told-associates-trump-asked-him-if-he-could-intervene-with-comey-to-get-fbi-to-back-off-flynn/2017/06/06/cc879f14-4ace-11e7-9669-250d0b15f83b_story.html [with embedded video, and (over 5,000) comments]
*
Comey Told Sessions: Don’t Leave Me Alone With Trump
James B. Comey, then the F.B.I. director, with Attorney General Jeff Sessions during a meeting at the Justice Department in February.
JUNE 6, 2017
WASHINGTON — The day after President Trump asked James B. Comey, the F.B.I. [ http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/f/federal_bureau_of_investigation/index.html ] director, to end an investigation into his former national security adviser, Mr. Comey confronted Attorney General Jeff Sessions and said he did not want to be left alone again with the president, according to current and former law enforcement officials.
Mr. Comey believed Mr. Sessions should protect the F.B.I. from White House influence, the officials said, and pulled him aside after a meeting in February to tell him that private interactions between the F.B.I. director and the president were inappropriate. But Mr. Sessions could not guarantee that the president would not try to talk to Mr. Comey alone again, the officials said.
Mr. Comey did not reveal, however, what had so unnerved him about his Oval Office meeting with the president: Mr. Trump’s request that the F.B.I. director end the investigation [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/16/us/politics/james-comey-trump-flynn-russia-investigation.html ] into the former national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, who had just been fired [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/13/us/politics/donald-trump-national-security-adviser-michael-flynn.html ]. By the time Mr. Trump fired Mr. Comey [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/us/politics/james-comey-fired-fbi.html ] last month, Mr. Comey had disclosed the meeting to a few of his closest advisers but nobody at the Justice Department, according to the officials, who did not want to be identified discussing Mr. Comey’s interactions with Mr. Trump and Mr. Sessions.
Mr. Comey will be the center of attention on Thursday during testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-will-not-block-comey-from-testifying-white-house-says.html ], where he is expected to be quizzed intensely about his interactions with Mr. Trump and why he decided to keep secret the president’s request to end the Flynn investigation.
Mr. Comey’s unwillingness to be alone with the president reflected how deeply Mr. Comey distrusted Mr. Trump, who Mr. Comey believed was trying to undermine the F.B.I.’s independence as it conducted a highly sensitive investigation into links between Mr. Trump’s associates and Russia, the officials said. By comparison, Mr. Comey met alone at least twice with President Obama.
A spokesman for the F.B.I. declined to comment on Mr. Comey’s request. A Justice Department spokesman, Ian Prior, said that “the attorney general doesn’t believe it’s appropriate to respond to media inquiries on matters that may be related to ongoing investigations.”
Yet according to two people who were briefed on the discussions, Mr. Sessions offered to resign in recent weeks as he told Mr. Trump he needed the freedom to do his job.
On Tuesday, the White House declined to say whether Mr. Trump still had confidence in his attorney general.
[...]
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/06/us/politics/comey-sessions-trump.html [with comments]
*
Why the latest Russia news paints an increasingly grim picture for Trump
June 7, 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/07/why-the-latest-russia-news-paints-an-increasingly-grim-picture-for-trump/ [with embedded videos, and comments]
--
Infowars Nightly News LIVE - Are White House Leaks A Staged Psy Op?
Streamed live on Jun 6, 2017 by The Alex Jones Channel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPJGg47Nc4I [with comments]
--
Rep. Lieu: ‘Incredible disrespect’ for rule of law by Trump admin
All In with Chris Hayes
6/6/17
Rep. Ted Lieu weighs in on new reporting from the Washington Post that a top intel official told associates the President asked him to intervene with fired FBI Director Comey about the Russia probe. Duration: 5:46
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/rep-lieu-incredible-disrespect-for-rule-of-law-by-trump-admin-961671235732 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V01J3ZyK3q8 [with comments]
*
President Trump's curious relationship with time
All In with Chris Hayes
6/6/17
The president so often says things are coming in ‘two weeks,’ you'd think the ‘fortnight’ was his favorite time frame. But here at All In we're paying much closer attention, and we've noticed there's another unit of time measurement he prefers above all others. Duration: 2:14
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/president-trump-s-curious-relationship-with-time-961670211991
*
How Trump skimmed money meant for sick kids
All In with Chris Hayes
6/6/17
Eric Trump said he was raising money for cancer research at a golf course donated by his dad. But it turns out Donald Trump was charging. Duration: 7:31
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/how-trump-skimmed-money-meant-for-sick-kids-961677891630 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIqw9BvGPzA [with comments]
--
Trump pressed Coats for way to stop Russia investigation: WaPo
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Adam Entous, national security reporter for The Washington Post, talks with Rachel Maddow about new reporting that DNI Dan Coats told associates that Donald Trump had pressed him on ways to get James Comey to stop the Trump-Russia investigation. Duration: 18:00
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-pressed-coats-for-way-to-stop-russia-investigation-wapo-961739843911
*
Trump's deadbeat past hurts him in search for scandal lawyers
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Rachel Maddow reviews Donald Trump's history of not paying his debts and notes how that is a contributing factor as he is reportedly facing rejection from outside law firms as he seeks to bolster his defense in the face of mounting scandals. Duration: 6:51
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-s-deadbeat-past-hurts-him-in-search-for-scandal-lawyers-961747523966 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_qhrnXo4Ek [with comments]
*
Trump being Trump worries prospective lawyers
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Michael Isikoff, chief investigative correspondent for Yahoo News, talks with Rachel Maddow about why top law firms are turning down the opportunity to work on Donald Trump's defense as scandals continue to pile up. Duration: 6:56
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/trump-being-trump-worries-prospective-lawyers-961756227728
*
Mueller adds heavy hitter prosecutor to Trump investigation team
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Rachel Maddow reports on some of the prosecutorial accomplishments of Andrew Weissmann, who has left the fraud section of the criminal division of the Justice Department to join Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of the Trump-Russia affair. Duration: 9:48
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/mueller-adds-heavy-hitter-prosecutor-to-trump-investigation-team-961779267902
*
Mueller would gain resources as scope of Trump probe widens
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Rachel Maddow reports that in the event that Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation takes on the Paul Manafort and/or Mike Flynn cases, he would also inherit the considerable resources devotes to those investigations. Duration: 2:08
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/mueller-would-gain-resources-as-scope-of-trump-probe-widens-961769539978 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4VKq_XCWEA [with comments]
*
Comey firing probe could mean new role for DoJ's third in line
The Rachel Maddow Show
6/6/17
Rachel Maddow explains how Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of the firing of James Comey would force recusals of Jeff Sessions and Rod Rosenstein in the matter, elevating the DoJ's third in line, Rachel Brand. Duration: 5:23
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/comey-firing-probe-could-mean-new-role-for-doj-s-third-in-line-961796163735
--
Lawrence on new Trump revelations: 'This is Watergate'
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/6/17
New reports suggest Donald Trump asked DNI Coats to intervene with James Comey to stop the FBI's Russia probe. Lawrence O'Donnell argues why it's the clearest comparison to Watergate – and the clearest sign of obstruction of justice – yet. Duration: 9:08
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/lawrence-on-new-trump-revelations-this-is-watergate-961746499997 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXJ960JbELg [with comments]
*
Revelations about Trump and Intel Director worsen crisis
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/6/17
New revelations suggest Trump may have obstructed justice when he asked DNI Coats to intervene with Comey on the FBI's Russia probe. Asking the CIA to intervene is what led to Nixon's impeachment. Matt Miller, Ron Klain, and Renato Mariotti join Lawrence O'Donnell. Duration: 8:52
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/revelations-about-trump-and-intel-director-worsen-crisis-961749571963
*
Trump agenda 'dead in the water' as Russia probe widens
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell
6/6/17
Are Republicans tired of winning yet? Trump's agenda has stalled amid the widening FBI probe, making legislative progress on health care, tax cuts, and infrastructure increasingly unlikely. Fmr. Rep. David Jolly and columnist Jennifer Rubin join Lawrence O'Donnell. Duration: 5:01
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/trump-agenda-dead-in-the-water-as-russia-probe-widens-961751619850
--
Comey asked Sessions Not to Leave Him Alone with Trump
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/6/17
The New York Times’ Michael Schmidt joins Brian Williams with new reporting on James Comey’s fear of being left alone with the president. Plus, Steve Schmidt, the AP's Vivian Salama and Eugene Robinson weigh in on the night's breaking Russia investigation headlines. Duration: 16:35
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/comey-asked-sessions-not-to-leave-him-alone-with-trump-961797699686
*
The Post-JFK Legacy of Robert F. Kennedy
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
6/6/17
49 Years to the day after Bobby Kennedy’s death, author John Bohrer and Brian Williams discuss how RFK would fare in modern day politics amid the social media craze. Duration: 3:49
©2017 NBCNews.com
http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/the-post-jfk-legacy-of-robert-f-kennedy-961798723898
--
Trump Touts More Phony Accomplishments: The Daily Show
Published on Jun 6, 2017 by The Daily Show with Trevor Noah
Just like with his arms deal with Saudi Arabia and his tax reform push, President Trump makes a show of signing an infrastructure plan without actually accomplishing anything.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FY5IwndHDLQ [with comments]
--
The Trump Administration Gets A 'Reality' Check
Published on Jun 7, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
NSA employee Reality Winner was arrested for leaking classified information regarding a 2016 Russian cyberattack.
[originally aired June 6, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yivc6XbODNI [with comments]
*
Cartoon Donald Trump Can't Stop Tweeting
Published on Jun 7, 2017 by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
Washington's looniest toon just can't seem to cut tweeting cold turkey.
[originally aired June 6, 2017]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAPqNZK7Xms [with comments]
--
Reality Winner Leaks Classified Info, Atheist Pride Day - Monologue
Published on Jun 7, 2017 by Late Night with Seth Meyers
Seth Meyers' monologue from Tuesday, June 6.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfjupwQVtx0 [with comments]
--
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Greensburg, KS - 5/4/07
"Eternal vigilance is the price of Liberty."
from John Philpot Curran, Speech
upon the Right of Election, 1790
F6
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