The Conversation -- August 28, 2024

"The Audacity of Taupe." For you history buffs, today is the ten-year anniversary of one of the most consequential days in American presidential history: the day Barack Obama wore a tan suit to a news conference.

Donald Trump could not figure out how to show more disrespect for military service and the men and women who have paid the ultimate price. Until he did: ~~~

⭐ ~~~ Dan Lamothe, et al., of the Washington Post: "The Trump campaign posted a video Wednesday that was recorded at Arlington National Cemetery, two days after an alleged altercation in which defense officials said a cemetery staff member sought to enforce guidelines the campaign had received not to take photos and videos near the graves of U.S. service members killed in recent years. The campaign video, which was posted to TikTok, showed former president Donald Trump appearing during a third anniversary ceremony Monday memorializing 13 U.S. troops who were killed in a suicide bombing in Kabul during the U.S. evacuation from Afghanistan. Trump is seen in the video at the Tomb of the Unknowns and walking among marble headstones as soft guitar music plays and Trump is heard criticizing the Biden administration's handling of the withdrawal." Related stories linked below. See also commentary in today's thread.

Nevada. Isabelle Taft of the New York Times: "A former county official was found guilty on Wednesday of murdering a longtime Las Vegas reporter who wrote articles critical of him. The highly unusual case had raised fears about press freedom in the United States and in particular the risks facing local journalists. The reporter, Jeff German, was stabbed to death outside his home in September 2022. Police investigators, and now a Clark County jury, concluded that his attacker was Robert Telles, who ran a county office that handles the estates of those who die without apparent heirs. A few months before his death, Mr. German wrote an article for The Las Vegas Review-Journal describing employees' complaints that Mr. Telles had created a toxic work environment, demonstrated favoritism and had an improper relationship with a staff member. Mr. Telles denied the allegations. He lost his re-election bid a month after the article came out, and Mr. German kept reporting."

Devan Cole of CNN: "The Supreme Court declined on Wednesday to lift a sweeping block on President Joe Biden's student loan repayment plan that aims to slash monthly payments and quicken the path to loan forgiveness. The high court turned down a request from the Biden administration to put the plan back in play after lower courts blocked it this summer in a legal challenge brought by GOP-led states to the plan. There were no noted dissents in the brief order." At 2:30 pm ET, this is a breaking news story.

Here's a snippet of Alexandra Pelosi's video, which HBO released to Jungle Gym (story linked below): ~~~

Eric Hananoki of Media Matters: "... Donald Trump ... 'retruthed' a supporter's meme calling for the imprisonment of Vice President Kamala Harris, President Joe Biden, and other prominent figures. A review of that supporter's account also found numerous calls for Trump's political opponents to be killed. This isn't an aberration. Media Matters recently documented that Trump promoted an account which spews the N-word, praises Hitler as a hero, and denies the Holocaust. Trump has also frequently interacted with the account Patriot4Life, including this month. That account has repeatedly promoted calls for political killings, including recently retruthing an image calling for Harris and Gov. Tim Walz to be killed. Trump has promoted another Truth Social account that calls for Democrats to be executed."

OMG! Look what the NYT just published. AG Sulzberger must be off at his vacation home: ~~~

     ~~~ Tim Balk of the New York Times: "The alliance between Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and ... Donald J. Trump, which was fortified on Tuesday with Mr. Kennedy's appointment to Mr. Trump's transition team, is a sharp turnabout in a long-combative relationship. Mr. Kennedy had spent the better part of a decade lobbing attacks at Mr. Trump, portraying him as a buffoonish, anti-democratic bully who led a feckless administration.... Here's a look back at 12 times Mr. Kennedy ridiculed Mr. Trump and his policies."

When two crazy guys get together: ~~~

~~~ Marin Scotten of Salon: "'If Jesus Christ came down and was the vote counter, I would win California, OK?' Trump said Tuesday in an interview with Dr. Phil McGraw. He criticized California's mail-in voting system, falsely claiming it leads to more voter fraud. Without it, he said he would win the deep-blue state, which has consistently been won by Democratic presidential candidates since 1992. 'In other words, if we had an honest vote counter, a really honest vote counter, I do great with the Hispanics, great, I mean I had a level that no other Republican's ever done, but if we had an honest vote counter, I would win California,' the former president told Dr. Phil, himself a Trump supporter.... In 2020, Trump lost California, Vice President Kamala Harris' homestate, by over 30 points.... The Harris campaign said in a statement that Trump has 'reached a level of delusion difficult for even Dr. Phil to diagnose.'" More on the conversation linked below.

Edgar Chen & Dan Ross, both immigration legal counselors, in Just Security: "In our years of assisting refugees, asylees, and others through the legal immigration process, we have never encountered an immigrant with anywhere close to Trump's long record of indictments, arrests, convictions, criticisms of the United States' constitutional order, and well-documented allegations of sexual misconduct and incitement to violence. Those we help are overwhelmingly law-abiding. Even those who have had brushes with the law must admit what they've done.... We believe Trump should be held to the same high standards as the immigrants he constantly vilifies."

Zoe Richards of NBC News: "Sen. JD Vance of Ohio ... attacked teachers who don't have children in remarks in 2021 that resurfaced Tuesday. In his public comments, he reserved specific criticism for Randi Weingarten, the head of the American Federation of Teachers. 'You know, so many of the leaders of the left, and I hate to be so personal about this, but they're people without kids, trying to brainwash the minds of our children,' Vance said at a Center for Christian Virtue leadership forum.... Vance took aim at Weingarten, who has described herself as 'a mother by marriage,' by saying she 'doesn't have a single child.'"

She's Ba-a-a-ack! Andrew Katersky of ABC News: "A federal appeals court on Wednesday revived Sarah Palin's defamation lawsuit against The New York Times, finding several major issues 'impugn the reliability' of the original outcome. The Second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals faulted the trial judge for dismissing the case before the jury had reached a verdict. The jury was allowed to continue deliberating before ultimately finding the newspaper not liable in February 2022. 'Unfortunately, several major issues at trial -- specifically, the erroneous exclusion of evidence, an inaccurate jury instruction, a legally erroneous response to a mid-deliberation jury question, and jurors learning during deliberations of the district court's Rule 50 dismissal ruling -- impugn the reliability of that verdict,' the opinion said."

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Presidential Race

Maegan Vazquez of the Washington Post: "Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, will participate in a sit-down interview with CNN's Dana Bash on Thursday, the network announced on Tuesday. The broadcast will mark the first joint interview with Harris and Walz since he joined the campaign and the first time Harris will sit for an in-depth, on-the-record conversation since President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 race and endorsed her to be the Democratic presidential nominee.' CNN's story is here. The interview will air at 9 pm ET Thursday.

Latest from Whiney Baby: I Will Debate. Patrick Svitek of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump said Tuesday he will participate in a debate next month against Vice President Kamala Harris, two days after he suggested he could skip it. 'I have reached an agreement with the Radical Left Democrats for a Debate with Comrade Kamala Harris,' Trump said on his Truth Social platform, confirming the debate will be Sept. 10 in Philadelphia. Trump agreed earlier this month to take part in the ABC News debate, which will be his first debate against Harris since she replaced President Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential nominee. But Trump threw the debate into uncertainty Sunday when he criticized ABC as biased in a social media post and suggested people should 'stay tuned' about his participation. The campaigns spent Monday sparring over whether to preserve a rule from Trump's June debate against Biden where the candidates' microphones were muted when it was not their turn to speak.... Trump himself sent mixed messages [about the mic disagreement]...." (Also linked yesterday.) CNN's story is here.

Marianne LeVine of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump leveled partial blame against President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for the assassination attempt against him, suggesting without evidence that they personally made it more difficult for the Secret Service to better protect him. 'When this happened, people would ask, whose fault is it?' Trump said in an interview that aired Tuesday night with Phil McGraw ... (Dr. Phil). 'I think to a certain extent it's Biden's fault and Harris's fault. And I'm the opponent. Look, they were weaponizing government against me, they brought in the whole DOJ to try and get me, they weren't too interested in my health and safety,' he added.... 'They were making it very difficult to have proper staffing in terms of Secret Service,' Trump said.... Biden has said he has never involved himself in decisions about charging individuals.... Some members of Biden's protective detail have been dispatched to Trump and Harris ahead of the November election.... No public evidence has emerged that Biden or Harris were personally involved in decisions about Trump's protection." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Fortunately, there is a good chance you have never come across anyone as horrible as Donald Trump.

Trump Campaign Runs Vanity Ads. Sam Stein in the Bulwark: "Donald Trump's campaign is set to run cable news ads this week so they can be seen at the ex-president's Mar-a-Lago club and surrounding environs. The South Florida expense is likely to have no impact on the course of the election. Palm Beach County is a Democratic stronghold in a Republican state that Trump has little chance of losing. But Trump's staff is at some risk of incurring his wrath if he -- and his Palm Beach pals -- don't see his ads at Mar-a-Lago, a factor that insiders say compelled the purchase." Thanks to Akhilleus for the link. Also see his commentary in yesterday's thread. (Also linked yesterday.)

Charles Pierce of Esquire: "Well, luckily for the former president*'s campaign, it wasn't raining on Monday, when he grotesquely used Arlington National Cemetery as a campaign prop because, as we know, he gets a little nervous around soldiers' graves in the rain, and he says things that require him to lie his ass off later. Most recently, of course, he devalued the Congressional Medal of Honor in favor of a bauble he draped on Rush Limbaugh and the wife of one of the sleaziest of his sleazy donors.... As a citizen of the United States, and therefore someone with a stake in places like Arlington, I choose to look upon his presence there as obscene." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Oh, my. It turns Pierce has some official support for his disgust: ~~~

~~~ Chris Cameron, et al., of the New York Times: "Members of Donald J. Trump's campaign team and an official at Arlington National Cemetery confronted each other during the former president's visit to the cemetery on Monday, the military cemetery said in a statement on Tuesday. The altercation was prompted, according to Trump campaign officials, by the presence of a photographer in a section of the cemetery where American troops who were killed in recent wars are buried.... An official with the cemetery tried to 'physically block' members of Mr. Trump's team, Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesman, said in a statement. Mr. Cheung added that the cemetery official was 'clearly suffering from a mental health episode' and that the campaign was prepared to release footage of the confrontation to support its account of the clash. The campaign did not provide that footage after several requests....

"Cemetery officials did not provide their own account of the encounter, saying instead that 'there was an incident, and a report was filed.' The cemetery added that it had 'reinforced and widely shared' to the Trump campaign the federal laws prohibiting campaign activities by photographers 'or any other persons attending for purposes, or in direct support of a partisan political candidate's campaign.'... Mr. Trump had visited the cemetery for a wreath-laying ceremony honoring 13 American troops who were killed in a suicide bombing at Abbey Gate ... during the United States' withdrawal from [Afghanistan] three years ago." Trump has blamed President Biden & Vice President Harris for the chaotic withdrawal.

     ~~~ Marie: The Times reports, "Chris LaCivita, a top Trump campaign adviser, added in a separate statement that the cemetery official was 'a disgrace and does not deserve to represent the hollowed grounds of Arlington National Cemetery.'" I suppose when one digs a grave, he "hollows" the ground. But no, Chris, no. Just STFU. Please. (If Lincoln had said, "But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hollow this ground," the Gettysburg address would be a joke, not the iconic, quintessential expression of patriotism it is.) BTW, the Times publishes a jarring photo of Trump & others grinning & giving thumbs-up as they cluster around the grave of a fallen soldier. Gov. Spencer Cox (R-Utah) shared the photo on X. Looks like a good time was had by all. ~~~

     ~~~ Quil Lawrence & Tom Bowman of NPR: "When the cemetery official tried to prevent Trump campaign staff from entering Section 60 [where Abbey Gate soldier are buried], campaign staff verbally abused and pushed the official aside, according to the source."

Patricia Cohen of the New York Times writes one of those fair & balanced analyses of Trump's plans for tariffs on everything, and alas, she seems stuck with the conclusion that Trump's ideas, if employed would be disastrous for the U.S. & for the world economy.

Looneytoons for Trump Join Transition Team. Patrick Svitek of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump announced Tuesday he has added Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard to his transition team, giving key roles to two former Democrats who endorsed his comeback campaign in recent days.... 'We're working on policy issues together,' Kennedy told former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. 'I've been asked to come onto the transition team, to help pick the people who will be running the government.'" The Hill's story is here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Mark Jacob of Stop the Presses on the growing irrelevance of the mainstream media: "... with Trump's successful campaign of lies eight years ago should have come an aggressive reassessment by the media. Only in limited cases has that happened. Networks are still letting a deranged criminal traitor tell outrageous falsehoods on live television with no pushback. They're amplifying disinformation and pretending that amounts to 'fairness.'" Thanks to RAS for the link. ~~~

~~~ Jonathan Last of the Bulwark points out an egregious example of the New York Times' "fairness": its decision to run, in the form of an op-ed, a fact-free "memo" from "conservative sad-sack" Rich Lowry to the Trump campaign. (We linked Lowry's op-ed yesterday.)

⭐ Tierney Sneed of CNN: "Special counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday filed a superseding indictment in the election interference case against ... Donald Trump, slimming down the allegations against the 2024 presidential nominee in light of the Supreme Court's immunity ruling. Prosecutors have not dropped any of the four charges that they initially brought against the former president. However, the newly retooled indictment has carved out some of Trump's alleged conduct, including allegations about the attempts to use the Justice Department to promote his false claims of election fraud. It also adjusts how prosecutors describe the allegations they are continuing to bring about Trump's election subversion schemes. 'The superseding indictment, which was presented to a new grand jury that had not previously heard evidence in this case, reflects the Government's efforts to respect and implement the Supreme Court's holdings and remand instructions in Trump v. United States,' the special counsel's office said." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's story is here. Politico's report is here. The new indictment, via the court, is here. The original indictment filed about a year ago, also via the court, is here. As Kyle Cheney & Josh Gerstein of Politico write, "The new document also eliminates a long list of top government officials who had informed Trump that his claims about election fraud and anomalies were false, including top intelligence, Justice Department, homeland security officials and White House lawyers. Smith's original 45-page indictment, unveiled last August, included claims that Trump sought to use the Justice Department to advance what prosecutors contend was an unlawful and fraudulent effort to overturn Joe Biden's victory. Those details, which the Supreme Court described as largely outside the reach of prosecutors, have been omitted from the new, shorter charging document." (Also linked yesterday.)

⭐  Kyle Cheney of Politico: "Nancy Pelosi spent the duration of the Jan. 6 Capitol attack focused on ensuring Joe Biden would be certified president as soon as possible. Then she turned her attention to Donald Trump. 'I just feel sick about what he did to the Capitol and the country today,' Pelosi said as she slumped, visibly exhausted, in the back of her SUV in the pre-dawn hours of Jan. 7. 'He's got to pay a price for that.' Pelosi's comment was included in about 50 minutes of unaired footage captured by her daughter, filmmaker Alexandra Pelosi, who was at the former speaker's side at key moments on Jan. 5, 6 and 7 in 2021. Politico has reviewed the footage, which HBO turned over this week to the Republican-led House Committee on Administration. The panel is conducting an investigation aimed at undermining the findings of the Jan. 6 select committee...." MB: Yeah, good luck with that. A compelling read of a rare close glimpse of history.

Ryan Reilly of NBC News: "The very first rioter to breach the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6 attack was sentenced to more than four years in federal prison Tuesday after he told a judge he still believes Donald Trump's lies about the 2020 election 'to this day.' Michael Sparks, who spent the weeks leading up to the Capitol attack consuming and regurgitating right-wing lies about the last presidential election, was sentenced to 53 months in federal prison at a hearing before U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Kelly, who also oversaw the seditious conspiracy trial of members of the Proud Boys." The New York Times story is here.

Adam Estes of Vox explains probably all you need to know about Mark Zuckerberg's decision to knock President Biden for picking on him: "... there are fewer guardrails for misinformation in place on major social media platforms, and writing a letter [to Gym Jordan] about the Biden administration and censorship, Zuckerberg seems to be throwing Republicans a political grenade, something that can fire up the base and use to get mad about Democrats. In reality, though, Zuckerberg is probably just trying to keep his company out of more hot water and to continue revamping his own public image." ~~~

     ~~~ Well, okay, there's this: Donald Trump, who is senile, either does not know who was president* in 2020 or he blames himself for rigging the 2020 election: ~~~

     ~~~ Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "'Zuckerberg admits that the White House pushed to SUPPRESS HUNTER BIDEN LAPTOP STORY (& much more!),' [Trump] wrote [on his social media platform].... 'IN OTHER WORDS, THE 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION WAS RIGGED.'... When the laptop story broke in October 2020, the president was Donald Trump."

Austyn Gaffney of the New York Times: "As dangerous heat bears down on the central and eastern United States this week, a new study shows heat-related deaths across the country are on the rise. While 2023 was the hottest year on record and led to at least 2,325 heat-related deaths in the U.S., more than 21,518 people have died from heat since 1999, according to a study published Monday in JAMA, the journal of the American Medical Association.... Heat kills more people in the United States than any other type of extreme weather, according to researchers. The study noted a 117 percent increase in heat-related deaths over the past 24 years, with a significant upswing since 2016."

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Arkansas. Annie Gowen of the Washington Post: "In a state that touts itself as 'the most pro-life state in the country,' where abortion is prohibited except to save the life of the mother, timber country in southeast Arkansas is an especially dangerous place to give birth. Arkansas already has one of the nation's worst maternal mortality rates, and mothers in this area die at a rate exceeding the state average. Ninety-two percent of recent maternal deaths were preventable, a state review committee found." (Also linked yesterday.)

Marie: Here's something I mentioned the other day that I had heard on the teevee and has since made it into print: ~~~

~~~ Georgia. Katie Hawkinson of the Independent: "Georgia's governor has asked his attorney general if he can remove state election board members after three right-wing members approved a series of alarming new rules. Republican Governor Brian Kemp asked Attorney General Christopher Carr for 'guidance' on whether he can remove members of the state election board, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports."

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Israel/Palestine, et al. John Hudson & Frances Vinall of the Washington Post: "Israel launched a major operation in multiple cities in the West Bank on Wednesday involving hundreds of troops. The troops were sent in with air support and bulldozers, according to an Israeli military official speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive military operation. Eyewitnesses cited drones scanning the skies and armored personnel carriers carrying troops on the ground."

News Lede

Washington Post: "Ofra Bikel, a documentary filmmaker whose work for PBS's 'Frontline' investigative series exposed frailties in the U.S. criminal justice system -- the coercive use of plea bargains, the failure to consider DNA evidence, the reliance on informants to prosecute drug cases -- and helped free 13 people who had been wrongly charged or convicted, died Aug. 11 at her home in Tel Aviv. She was 94.... She settled in New York in the mid-1950s, when she was briefly married to Theodore Bikel...."

The Conversation -- August 27, 2024

⭐ Tierney Sneed of CNN: "Special counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday filed a superseding indictment in the election interference case against ... Donald Trump, slimming down the allegations against the 2024 presidential nominee in light of the Supreme Court's immunity ruling. Prosecutors have not dropped any of the four charges that they initially brought against the former president. However, the newly retooled indictment has carved out some of Trump's alleged conduct, including allegations about the attempts to use the Justice Department to promote his false claims of election fraud. It also adjusts how prosecutors describe the allegations they are continuing to bring about Trump's election subversion schemes. 'The superseding indictment, which was presented to a new grand jury that had not previously heard evidence in this case, reflects the Government's efforts to respect and implement the Supreme Court's holdings and remand instructions in Trump v. United States,' the special counsel's office said." ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's story is here. Politico's report is here. The new indictment, via the court, is here. The original indictment filed about a year ago, also via the court, is here. As Kyle Cheney & Josh Gerstein of Politico write, "The new document also eliminates a long list of top government officials who had informed Trump that his claims about election fraud and anomalies were false, including top intelligence, Justice Department, homeland security officials and White House lawyers. Smith's original 45-page indictment, unveiled last August, included claims that Trump sought to use the Justice Department to advance ... an unlawful and fraudulent effort to overturn Joe Biden's victory. Those details, which the Supreme Court described as largely outside the reach of prosecutors, have been omitted from the new, shorter charging document."

Looneytoons for Trump Join Transition Team. Patrick Svitek of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump announced Tuesday he has added Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard to his transition team, giving key roles to two former Democrats who endorsed his comeback campaign in recent days.... 'We're working on policy issues together,' Kennedy told former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. 'I've been asked to come onto the transition team, to help pick the people who will be running the government.'" The Hill's story is here.

Latest from Whiney Baby: I Will Debate. Patrick Svitek of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump said Tuesday he will participate in a debate next month against Vice President Kamala Harris, two days after he suggested he could skip it. 'I have reached an agreement with the Radical Left Democrats for a Debate with Comrade Kamala Harris,' Trump said on his Truth Social platform, confirming the debate will be Sept. 10 in Philadelphia. Trump agreed earlier this month to take part in the ABC News debate, which will be his first debate against Harris since she replaced President Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential nominee. But Trump threw the debate into uncertainty Sunday when he criticized ABC as biased in a social media post and suggested people should 'stay tuned' about his participation. The campaigns spent Monday sparring over whether to preserve a rule from Trump's June debate against Biden where the candidates' microphones were muted when it was not their turn to speak.... Trump himself sent mixed messages [about the mic disagreement]...."

Trump Campaign Runs Vanity Ads. Sam Stein in the Bulwark: "Donald Trump's campaign is set to run cable news ads this week so they can be seen at the ex-president's Mar-a-Lago club and surrounding environs. The South Florida expense is likely to have no impact on the course of the election. Palm Beach County is a Democratic stronghold in a Republican state that Trump has little chance of losing. But Trump's staff is at some risk of incurring his wrath if he -- and his Palm Beach pals -- don't see his ads at Mar-a-Lago, a factor that insiders say compelled the purchase." Thanks to Akhilleus for the link. Also see his commentary in today's thread.

Charles Pierce of Esquire: "Well, luckily for the former president*'s campaign, it wasn't raining on Monday, when he grotesquely used Arlington National Cemetery as a campaign prop because, as we know, he gets a little nervous around soldiers' graves in the rain, and he says things that require him to lie his ass off later. Most recently, of course, he devalued the Congressional Medal of Honor in favor of a bauble he draped on Rush Limbaugh and the wife of one of the sleaziest of his sleazy donors.... As a citizen of the United States, and therefore someone with a stake in places like Arlington, I choose to look upon his presence there as obscene."

Arkansas. Annie Gowen of the Washington Post: "In a state that touts itself as 'the most pro-life state in the country,' where abortion is prohibited except to save the life of the mother, timber country in southeast Arkansas is an especially dangerous place to give birth. Arkansas already has one of the nation's worst maternal mortality rates, and mothers in this area die at a rate exceeding the state average. Ninety-two percent of recent maternal deaths were preventable, a state review committee found."

In today's Comments, RAS provides us with a handy rapid response to Trump's complaint that Biden & Harris flubbed the Afghanistan withdrawal. See Michael Gold's NYT story linked below; see also NiskyGuy's commentary in today's thread: ~~~

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Presidential Race

Don't get too excited, by Kamala Harris's poll numbers keep getting better. Domenico Montanaro of NPR reports.

Mariana Alfaro & Niha Masih of the Washington Post: "More than 200 Republicans who worked for President George W. Bush, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) or the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) have endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris, warning in a letter that a second Trump presidency 'will hurt real, everyday people and weaken our sacred institutions.'... The letter is not only supportive of Harris but critical of Trump. In it, the Republican alumni say Trump presents a threat to the United States and countries around the world, saying that he and his 'acolyte,' running mate Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), 'kowtow to dictators like [Russian President] Vladimir Putin while turning their backs on our allies....'" ~~~

     ~~~ Selena Wang of ABC News: "General Larry Ellis, a retired four-star general who served in that rank under George W. Bush's administration, is endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris in a letter exclusively obtained by ABC News. This is the first time Ellis, who served as the commander of the U.S. Army Forces Command, has endorsed a presidential candidate, writing that 'this is not a decision I take lightly, but one I believe necessary.... Donald Trump has demonstrated that he is wholly and dangerously unfit for Commander-in-Chief. He praises and emboldens our enemies that seek to weaken our country. He has denigrated our brave men and women in uniform,' Ellis writes."

Eugene Daniels of Politico: "With just 15 days left until the scheduled Sept. 10 presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and ... Donald Trump, negotiations between their two campaigns have hit an impasse over whether the candidates' microphones will be muted when it is not their turn to speak, according to four people familiar with the issue." MB: CNN played (11:20 am ET Monday) some sound of Trump's saying he didn't care whether the mics were on or off during Harris' remarks. IOW: Whatever passes from his very good brain to his motor mouth at any given moment. Daniels' story has been updated to reflect Trump's remarks. (Also linked yesterday.) And here's a print report by Kristen Holmes of CNN and others about Trump's "debate" with his own campaign about the rules of the debate. ~~~

~~~ Say, here's an issue the unfair moderators could ask Trump during the debate: ~~~

~~~ Show Us the Money. Steve Benen of MSNBC is wondering, "Shouldn't Trump release his latest tax returns right about now?... In May 2014 ... Trump promised to release his tax returns if he became a candidate.... In the years that followed, Trump ignored the modern bipartisan tradition, kept his tax returns hidden, broke a variety of promises related to transparency, and fought tooth and nail to keep the information from the public.... To simply not ask Trump about his recent tax returns -- putting him to peddle yet another round of dubious claims about IRS audits that are probably imaginary -- is to go easy on a major-party nominee for no reason. Indeed, the partisan asymmetry matters. On July 21, President Joe Biden announced that he would end his re-election campaign, and one week later, Vice President Kamala Harris released her tax returns from the previous 20 years."

Sahil Kapur of NBC News: "Kamala Harris is endorsing trillions of dollars in new tax revenues to fund her new policy plans, and her campaign is attacking Donald Trump for failing to outline how he'd pay for the multitrillion-dollar agenda he's campaigning on. Harris campaign spokesperson James Singer labeled Trump's agenda 'an inflation and deficit bomb'..., sparking a Trump campaign response blaming her for a 'Biden-Harris inflation tax.' According to nonpartisan estimates, Harris is proposing to spend about $2 trillion and raise $5 trillion in tax revenues over a decade. Trump is calling for about $5 trillion in tax breaks and spending while raising less than $3 trillion in revenue through tariffs. 'Hands down, VP Harris is being much more fiscally disciplined than President Trump,' said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics."~~~

     ~~~ Marie: When I was in first grade or before, I learned that if -- like Harris -- you had five apples and you ate two of your apples, you'd still have three apples. I don't think it was till I was in junior high that I was confronted with the complexity & curiosity of negative numbers: what if -- like Trump -- you had only three apples; could you eat five apples? Maybe Trump is just a more sophisticated mathematician than Harris, or maybe he's a macroeconomics whiz (his uncle taught engineering at MIT, which Trump has repeatedly cited as proof of his own very good brain), or maybe all those bankruptcies of his have caused him to think negative numbers are just fine.

Tom Sullivan of Hullabaloo: "Donald Trump has grumbled his entire adult life that 'the world' is laughing at 'us' (meaning the United States). Mr. Bundle of Insecurities harbors deep anxieties about being laughed at himself. He's not very bright. He's undereducated. He's overweight. He's a 'tycoon' who sucks at business and cheats at golf. He got where he is with daddy's money. Underneath the bluster and bullying in recesses of his psyche he dare not explore (self-examination is for the weak), he knows it.... Michael Tomasky at The New Republic [writes]: 'Harris's campaign so far has been a work of genius on several levels, but maybe the most ingenious stroke of all has been the decision to mock Trump -- to present him not only as someone to fear, but also to ridicule....' Trump the Cowardly Bully needs to be respected and feared. Calling him a fascist or an authoritarian empowers him, feeds his ego;. In his mind, it brings him one step closer to admission to the brotherhood of dictators whose acceptance he most desperately desires. 'Sustained ridicule has the potential to reinforce the downward spiral Trump is now in,' Tomasky writes. He fears being laughed at? Pummel him with guffaws." (Also linked yesterday.)

Michael Gold of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump wrapped himself in military imagery on Monday, attacking the Biden administration over its withdrawal from Afghanistan. Observing the third anniversary of a deadly suicide bombing in Kabul, the Afghan capital, he visited Arlington National Cemetery, then later spoke in Detroit to a gathering of National Guard members. During his remarks in Detroit, at a conference for the National Guard Association of the United States, Mr. Trump blamed President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for the bombing and America's chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, which he argued led to the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine.... He repeated his promise to demand the resignations of senior military officials involved in the withdrawal. He also repeated his insistence that he could bring the wars in Ukraine and Gaza to an end immediately after being elected, though he has yet to offer specific plans for doing so."

Amanda Marcotte of Salon: "Despite much of the press carrying Donald Trump's water by accepting his feeble attempts to pretend to be 'moderate' on abortion, he showed his true colors again last week. In an interview with CBS News, the GOP candidate insisted he had 'no regrets' about ending abortion rights by appointing three justices hand-picked by the Federalist Society to overturn Roe v. Wade.... Democrats offer Republicans one chance after another to vote for birth control rights, and every time, Republicans vote against it. Increasingly, major MAGA leaders are admitting out loud that they are coming for birth control.... [JD] Vance's comments about 'cat ladies' must be understood through this anti-contraception lens. One in 4 women will have an abortion at some point in life, but contraception use is near-universal. Over 99% of sexually experienced women have used birth control.... The Harris campaign is going hard on the reproductive rights issue this election, forefronting both the ongoing health crisis caused by abortion bans and warning the public the Republicans are just getting started."

Don't let Kamala Harris fool you. Not only does Harris support taxing service workers' tips, news reports confirm Biden and Harris have weaponized the IRS to confiscate your tip money. Biden and Harris have literally unleashed the IRS to harass workers who receive tips. -- Voiceover in Trump campaign ad released Sunday

... the Trump campaign claims Harris can't be trusted on her no-tax tip plan because the IRS proposed a plan to streamline three programs to help employers calculate tip income. But the proposal has been shelved. So, leaving aside the exaggerations about what the proposal would do, it's simply false to claim Harris 'literally unleashed the IRS to harass workers who receive tips.' -- Glenn Kessler, Washington Post

Rich Lowry, editor of the right-wing National Review, infamous for writing a New York Times op-ed about getting a hard-on (okay, he described "little starbursts" on account of the Gray Lady) when Sarah Palin spoke at the 2008 RNC, has written another hilarious op-ed for the Times, this time arguing that Donald Trump can win the election on character; that is, on which candidate is "qualified, trustworthy and strong, and does he or she care about average Americans[.]... Everything has to be connected to the deeper case that Ms. Harris is weak and a phony and doesn't truly care about the country or the middle class." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Perhaps in our infinite universe, there is a sort-of parallel planet out there where (a) Republicans are the serious people, (b) Donald Trump is indeed a man renowned for his fine character, and (c) Rich Lowry is a beloved stand-up comedian. Clearly, there is no possibility of (a) or (b) here on Earth I, but as for (c) -- Lowry has potential. What a card!

Amy Wang of the Washington Post: Robert "Kennedy [Jr.]'s latest bizarre story involving a dead animal has prompted a push by one environmental group to look into whether Kennedy committed felonies if he did indeed saw off a whale's head and strap it to the roof of his car. In a letter Monday to government officials, the Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund requested that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) open an investigation into whether Kennedy violated the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act.... According to Town & Country magazine, Kennedy once heard that a dead whale had washed up on Squaw Island in Hyannis Port and 'ran down to the beach with a chainsaw, cut off the whale's head, and then bungee-corded it to the roof of the family minivan for the five-hour haul back to Mount Kisco, New York.' 'Every time we accelerated on the highway, whale juice would pour into the windows of the car, and it was the rankest thing on the planet,' Kick Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy's daughter, told the magazine then. 'We all had plastic bags over our heads with mouth holes cut out, and people on the highway were giving us the finger, but that was just normal day-to-day stuff for us.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "Members of the newly formed House task force on the attempted assassination of ... Donald J. Trump took one of their first investigative steps on Monday, traveling to the site of the shooting in Butler, Pa., to scrutinize the scene.... But even as the Republicans and Democrats said they were pushing ahead on their bipartisan investigation, authorized last month by a unanimous vote of the House, a small but vocal band of right-wing lawmakers who have circulated conspiracy theories about the shooting said they were conducting their own simultaneous inquiry.... [Rep. Eli] Crane [R-Az.] has made the baseless suggestion that the shooting was part of a coordinated campaign by Democrats or shadowy government actors to stop Mr. Trump from being re-elected. [Rep. Cory] Mills [R-Fla.] has said that he had a hard time believing the security breaches that preceded the assassination attempt were not 'intentional as opposed to fecklessness.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: This reminds me of my childhood when on the Saturday morning kiddies' movie show at our local theater, cartoons accompanied every feature.

Juliegrace Brufke of Axios: House Republicans, including leadership, are upset that one of their wingier wingnuts, like Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.), Andy Biggs (Az.), or Anna Luna (Fla.), will force a vote on impeaching President Biden. To spare House members in toss-up districts, Republicans tell Axios the impeachment vote will be a massive fail. ~~~

~~~ Besides, House Republicans are very, very busy with other urgent matters: ~~~

~~~ Rebecca Beitsch & Emily Brooks of the Hill: "House Republicans, who had spent much of the past 3 1/2 years investigating President Biden..., have launched a series of investigations into Vice President Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.... [They] are now re-aiming their congressional firepower at Harris's limited role in migration and border policy and Walz's China ties.... In the weeks since Biden dropped his reelection bid, some GOP committees have made a noticeable stylistic change to their press releases and letters, adding '-Harris' to many products that previously criticized only the 'Biden administration.'"

Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "Federal prosecutors began their bid to resurrect the moribund classified documents case against ... Donald J. Trump on Monday, telling an appeals court in Atlanta that the trial judge had improperly thrown out the charges. In a filing to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, the prosecutors argued that the judge, Aileen M. Cannon, erred last month when she handed down a bombshell ruling that dismissed the case on the grounds that Jack Smith, the special counsel who brought it, had been appointed to his job illegally. The ruling by Judge Cannon, who was placed on the bench by Mr. Trump, stunned many legal experts for the way that it upended 25 years of Justice Department practice and flew in the face of previous court decisions about the appointments of special prosecutors reaching back to the Watergate era.

"Issued on the first day of the Republican National Convention..., Judge Cannon's ruling also gave him a major legal victory at an auspicious political moment.... 'The district court's contrary view conflicts with an otherwise unbroken course of decisions, including by the Supreme Court, that the attorney general has such authority,' the prosecutors wrote, 'and it is at odds with widespread and longstanding appointment practices in the Department of Justice and across the government.'" Politico's report, by Josh Gerstein & Kyle Cheney, is here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Holly Bailey of the Washington Post: "Attorneys for Donald Trump pressed a Georgia appellate court to remove Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis (D) from the 2020 election interference case, accusing her of 'repeated public display of racial animus' toward the former president and his co-defendants, which they contend has jeopardized Trump's right to a fair trial.... Trump's attorneys ... accused Willis of using [a January 2024] speech [at a historic Black church in Atlanta,] and other public remarks to falsely depict Trump, his co-defendants and their attorneys as racists." (Also linked yesterday.)

Zachary Cohen of CNN: "An Arizona judge has set a trial date of January 5, 2026, for allies of ... Donald Trump charged for a criminal conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election.... The Arizona case is now the only criminal case related to the 2020 election -- at either the state or federal level -- to currently have a trial date on the calendar as other separate efforts to similarly prosecute Trump and his allies in other jurisdictions all face uncertain futures. Several defendants, including conservative attorney John Eastman and multiple Arizona Republicans who served as fake electors, were present in the courtroom for a hearing Monday. Former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, former Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and Christina Bobb..., the top lawyer for the RNC on election integrity, joined the hearing virtually."

Miriam Jordan, et al., of the New York Times: "A federal judge in Texas temporarily blocked on Monday a Biden administration program that could offer a path to citizenship for up to half a million undocumented immigrants who are married to U.S. citizens, ruling in favor of 16 Republican-led states that sued the administration. Judge J. Campbell Barker of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas [-- a Trump appointee --] issued an administrative stay that stops the administration from approving applications, which it started accepting last week, while the court considers the merits of the case. In suspending the initiative, Judge Barker said that the 67-page complaint filed on Friday by the coalition of states, led by Attorney General Ken Paxton of Texas, raised legitimate questions about the authority of the executive branch to bypass Congress and set immigration policy.... The administration can continue to accept applications for the program, but can no longer approve them, according to the order. The suspension initially remains in place for 14 days while the parties submit arguments in the case; it could be extended." The CBS News story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: You can bet that if Trump is elected, his administration will use these applications to round up the applicants and deport them, tearing them away from their families.

Brad Dress of the Hill: "U.S. Army Pvt. Travis King is expected to plead guilty to several charges the military has brought against him, according to his lawyer. King was deployed to South Korea but expected to return home in July 2023, when he ran into North Korea during a tour of a town on the border. King, who is charged with 14 counts for an array of alleged offenses, will plead guilty to five of those charges on Sept. 20 before a military judge in Fort Bliss, Texas, according to his attorney, Franklin Rosenblatt. After pleading guilty at a general court-martial to those counts, which include desertion, the Army will drop the other charges he is accused of, Rosenblatt added."

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Georgia Elections. Nick Corasaniti of the New York Times: "Democrats sued the Georgia state election board on Monday, arguing that measures approved by the board this month seeking to alter the election certification process in the state were illegal and could create chaos on Election Day. The lawsuit claims that the board intended to give local election officials a broad license to 'hunt for purported election irregularities of any kind, potentially delaying certification and displacing longstanding (and court-supervised) processes for addressing fraud.' The lawsuit was filed in state court by local election officials, political candidates, the Democratic National Committee and the Democratic Party of Georgia with support from Vice President Kamala Harris's presidential campaign.... In a statement announcing the lawsuit, Democrats pointed to praise that members of the state election board received from Mr. Trump, and recalled the Trump effort to overturn the result in Georgia in 2020.... Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state, chastised the state election board this month, stating that the last-minute changes were undermining confidence in elections and risking the integrity of the election." ~~~

     ~~~ Rachel Maddow said last night that Georgia's governor, Brian Kemp (R), has asked the state's attorney general to determine whether or not he, Kemp, has the power to replace members of the state's board of elections.

Texas Elections. Crystal Hill of Democracy Docket: "Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) announced Monday the state has removed over [more than!] one million people from its voter rolls since Republican legislators passed a sweeping voter suppression law three years ago.... In 2021, Abbott signed Senate Bill 1, a package of anti-voting measures including one that criminalizes ballot harvesting and another that requires the Secretary of State to conduct audits of elections every two years. The laws, passed in the wake of the 2020 election, were met with fierce opposition from pro-voting groups and Democratic Texas legislators. A lawsuit filed against Abbott over the legislation in September of 2021 is ongoing." MB: In February 2024, the Texas Secretary of State reported that Texas had almost 18 million voters on its rolls.

Texas Elections, Ctd. Marie: I linked this New York Times story yesterday, about Ken Paxton's brownshirts "voter integrity unit" raiding the homes of Latino voting activists, most of whom were Democrats. Here's one case worth highlighting: ~~~

     ~~~ Brad Reed of the Raw Story: "An 87-year-old Texas woman who complained about local seniors not being sent mail-in ballots had her house raided by officers for the state's election integrity unit. The New York Times reported that Lidia Martinez, a retired educator who lives in San Antonio, was shocked last week when officers came to her house at 6 a.m. and informed her that they were searching her residence because she had filed a complaint about residents in her area [not] getting their mail-in ballots. Martinez says she's spent decades volunteering with the League of United Latin American Citizens to help seniors in the Latino community register themselves to vote.... The officers at her house asked to see the voter registration cards that she had collected. After informing them that she didn't have them at her house, they proceeded to search the property and left with her laptop, her phone and some documents."

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Israel/Palestine, et al. The New York Times' live updates of developments Tuesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.

Ukraine, et al. Marc Santora of the New York Times: "There are many ways to kill and be killed in Russia's war with Ukraine, but Ukrainian soldiers say that glide bombs are perhaps the most terrifying. They are free-fall bombs, many left over from the Soviet era, but now outfitted with pop-out wings that feature satellite navigation, turning them into guided munitions. Referred to alternatively as 'KABs' or 'FABs,' they weigh between 500 and 6,000 pounds and are packed with hundreds of pounds explosives. A single blast can reduce a high-rise apartment building to rubble and obliterate even concrete fortifications.... In recent months, Russia has used the bombs to devastating effect, tilting the balance of fighting in eastern Ukraine in Moscow's favor and allowing Russia to continue to make steady gains in Donetsk region. The bombs have also allowed Russian forces to raze whole towns and villages with ever greater speed."

News Lede

New York Times: "Italian authorities have opened a formal investigation into the actions of James Cutfield, the captain of the superyacht that sank last Monday off the coast of Sicily, killing seven of the 22 people on board, including British tech billionaire Mike Lynch. Mr. Cutfield is under investigation for possible manslaughter and to determine whether his actions negligently caused the shipwreck, said his lawyer, Aldo Mordiglia."

The Conversation -- August 26, 2024

Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "Federal prosecutors began their bid to resurrect the moribund classified documents case against ... Donald J. Trump on Monday, telling an appeals court in Atlanta that the trial judge had improperly thrown out the charges. In a filing to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, the prosecutors argued that the judge, Aileen M. Cannon, erred last month when she handed down a bombshell ruling that dismissed the case on the grounds that Jack Smith, the special counsel who brought it, had been appointed to his job illegally. The ruling by Judge Cannon, who was placed on the bench by Mr. Trump, stunned many legal experts for the way that it upended 25 years of Justice Department practice and flew in the face of previous court decisions about the appointments of special prosecutors reaching back to the Watergate era.

"Issued on the first day of the Republican National Convention..., Judge Cannon's ruling also gave him a major legal victory at an auspicious political moment.... 'The district court's contrary view conflicts with an otherwise unbroken course of decisions, including by the Supreme Court, that the attorney general has such authority,' the prosecutors wrote, 'and it is at odds with widespread and longstanding appointment practices in the Department of Justice and across the government.'" Politico's report, by Josh Gerstein & Kyle Cheney, is here.

Holly Bailey of the Washington Post: "Attorneys for Donald Trump pressed a Georgia appellate court to remove Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis (D) from the 2020 election interference case, accusing her of 'repeated public display of racial animus' toward the former president and his co-defendants, which they contend has jeopardized Trump's right to a fair trial.... Trump's attorneys ... accused Willis of using [a January 2024] speech [at a historic Black church in Atlanta,] and other public remarks to falsely depict Trump, his co-defendants and their attorneys as racists."

Amy Wang of the Washington Post: Robert "Kennedy [Jr.]'s latest bizarre story involving a dead animal has prompted a push by one environmental group to look into whether Kennedy committed felonies if he did indeed saw off a whale's head and strap it to the roof of his car. In a letter Monday to government officials, the Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund requested that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) open an investigation into whether Kennedy violated the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act.... According to Town & Country magazine, Kennedy once heard that a dead whale had washed up on Squaw Island in Hyannis Port and 'ran down to the beach with a chainsaw, cut off the whale's head, and then bungee-corded it to the roof of the family minivan for the five-hour haul back to Mount Kisco, New York.' 'Every time we accelerated on the highway, whale juice would pour into the windows of the car, and it was the rankest thing on the planet,' Kick Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy's daughter, told the magazine then. 'We all had plastic bags over our heads with mouth holes cut out, and people on the highway were giving us the finger, but that was just normal day-to-day stuff for us.'"

Eugene Daniels of Politico: "With just 15 days left until the scheduled Sept. 10 presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and ... Donald Trump, negotiations between their two campaigns have hit an impasse over whether the candidates' microphones will be muted when it is not their turn to speak, according to four people familiar with the issue." MB: CNN just played (11:20 am ET) some sound of Trump's saying he didn't care whether the mics were on or off during Harris' remarks. IOW: Whatever passes from his very good brain to his motor mouth at any given moment.

Tom Sullivan of Hullabaloo: "Donald Trump has grumbled his entire adult life that 'the world' is laughing at 'us' (meaning the United States). Mr. Bundle of Insecurities harbors deep anxieties about being laughed at himself. He's not very bright. He's undereducated. He's overweight. He's a 'tycoon' who sucks at business and cheats at golf. He got where he is with daddy's money. Underneath the bluster and bullying in recesses of his psyche he dare not explore (self-examination is for the weak), he knows it.... Michael Tomasky at The New Republic [writes]: 'Harris's campaign so far has been a work of genius on several levels, but maybe the most ingenious stroke of all has been the decision to mock Trump -- to present him not only as someone to fear, but also to ridicule....' Trump the Cowardly Bully needs to be respected and feared. Calling him a fascist or an authoritarian empowers him, feeds his ego;. In his mind, it brings him one step closer to admission to the brotherhood of dictators whose acceptance he most desperately desires. 'Sustained ridicule has the potential to reinforce the downward spiral Trump is now in,' Tomasky writes. He fears being laughed at? Pummel him with guffaws."

Presidential Race

If It Talks Like a Chicken... Marianne LeVine of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump suggested Sunday evening that he might skip a Sept. 10 ABC News debate with Vice President Kamala Harris (D), after agreeing to participate ... earlier this month. 'I watched ABC FAKE NEWS this morning, both lightweight reporter Jonathan Carl's (K?) ridiculous and biased interview of Tom Cotton (who was fantastic!), and their so-called Panel of Trump Haters, and I ask, why would I do the Debate against Kamala Harris on that network?' Trump asked in a social media post Sunday evening. The Sept. 10 debate is the only one that both campaigns have officially committed to with a network."

⭐The Biggest, Lyingest Buffoon in American History. Isaac Arnsdorf, et al., of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump came [to the border near Montezuma Pass, Arizona,] on Thursday to heap praise on the structure standing to his right -- 'the Rolls-Royce of walls,' he called it -- and lament the unused segments lying to his left. Joining him there, Border Patrol union leader Paul A. Perez called the standing fence 'Trump wall' and [the unused pieces] 'Kamala wall.'... Those labels were inaccurate. This section of 20-foot steel slats was actually built during the administration of President Barack Obama. Trump added the unfinished extension up the hillside, an engineering challenge that cost at least $35 million a mile. The unused panels of 30-foot beams were procured during the Trump administration and never erected." (Also linked yesterday.)

Tom Boggioni of the Raw Story: "Moments after Vice President Kamala Harris concluded her acceptance speech..., Trump was on the phone with [Bret Baier] of Fox News taking potshots at [his] November opponent. That phone call was marred by what appeared to be the former president fumbling with his phone and dragged on to the point where the Fox hosts ended the call which, in turn, had other Fox personalities laughing.... [Sunday] on Truth Social, [Trump] wrote: 'Bret Baier of FoxNews called me, I didn't call him, just prior to the Kamala Convention speech, and asked me if I would like to critique her after she is finished. I agreed to do so!...' He then claimed he is much in demand and labeled himself a 'Ratings Machine.'"

Peter Bergen of CNN: "In his blistering, insightful [new book about] his time in the Trump White House, [Lt. Gen. H.R.] McMaster describes meetings in the Oval Office as 'exercises in competitive sycophancy' during which Trump's advisers would flatter the president by saying stuff like, 'Your instincts are always right' or, 'No one has ever been treated so badly by the press.' Meanwhile, Trump would say 'outlandish' things like, 'Why don't we just bomb the drugs?' in Mexico or, 'Why don't we take out the whole North Korean Army during one of their parades?'... McMaster writes that [Secretary of State Rex] Tillerson and [Secretary of Defense James] Mattis viewed Trump as 'dangerous' and seemed to construe their roles as if 'Trump was an emergency and that anyone abetting him was an adversary.' Trump himself also contributed to the dysfunction: 'He enjoyed and contributed to interpersonal drama in the White House and across the administration.'... McMaster does give Trump his due for some sound foreign policy decisions [on Syria and China].:

Trump Angers His Base. Jessica Piper of Politico: "Donald Trump attempted to strike a new tone on the issue of abortion this week, saying he would be 'great for women and their reproductive rights' -- to the frustration of anti-abortion advocates. The former president invoked the phrase in a post on Truth Social on Friday, reflecting his campaig's frenzied attempt to reset the narrative in the race against Vice President Kamala Harris.... Democrats frequently use the phrase "reproductive rights' as a stand-in for abortion but also to refer more broadly to a range of medical practices related to child-bearing, such as birth control and in vitro fertilization.... In contrast, Republicans rarely talk about abortion in that way.... Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life Action, said on X that the Truth Social post had 'understandably upset many within the pro-life movement.' National Review editor Philip Klein wrote that, in the battle over abortion, it 'increasingly looks like Trump is joining the other side.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Lila Rose, who founded the anti-abortion group Live Action, called Trump's statement :not principled." Donald Trump has never suffered a principled moment in his life. Only an idiot would -- after all these years -- suddenly complain about his being "not principled."

The Big Grifter. Juleanna Glover, a GOP consultant, in a New York Times op-ed: "Federal Election Commission campaign disclosure reports from 2020 show that much of the money donated to the Trump campaign went into a legal and financial black hole reportedly controlled by Trump family members and close associates. This year's campaign disclosures are shaping up to be the same.... During the 2020 election, almost $516 million of the over $780 million spent by the Trump campaign was directed to American Made Media Consultants, a Delaware-based private company.... How A.M.M.C. spent the money was a mystery even to Mr. Trump's campaign team.... None of the expenses were itemized or otherwise explained aside from anodyne descriptions, including 'placed media.'...: Two of the people involved in setting up & running the scam media consultancy? Jared Kushner & Lara Trump.

Marie: You may recall Gail Collins' concerns about Mitt Romney's putting the family dog in a carrier on the roof of the car for a 12-hour drive to their vacation cottage on Lake Huron. The poor setter was so distraught, it got diarrhea, first detected when the kids noticed, ah, something, dribbling down the vehicle's back window. Collins mentioned the dog-on-the-roof-of-the-car at least 70 times during the 2008 & 2012 election cycles. Well, RAS has found a similar but BETTER! election-season story. Suddenly, you begin to appreciate Romney as the most "normal/not weird" GOP presidential candidate of the century. (Also linked yesterday.)

Ben Blanchet of the Huffington Post: "Kerry Kennedy, sister of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., declared that her father would've 'detested almost everything' Donald Trump represents as she slammed her brother for endorsing the former president on Friday. 'I'm outraged and disgusted by my brother's gaudy and obscene embrace of Donald Trump,' she told MSNBC host Jen Psaki on Sunday.... She told Psaki that a number of Kennedy family members are backing Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz whereas Trump is a 'threat to most basic freedoms that are core to who we are' as Americans." ~~~

~~~ Michael Sainato of the Guardian: "Max Kennedy, the brother of Robert F Kennedy Jr, has implored the public to ignore his sibling’s decision to drop out of the 2024 presidential election and endorse Donald Trump's campaign to return to the White House. In an op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, Max Kennedy said 'Trump was exactly the kind of arrogant, entitled bully' that his father, former US senator and attorney general Robert F Kennedy, stood against before he was assassinated in 1968 as he pursued the Democratic presidential nomination. Max Kennedy predicted his father would have admired the Democratic nominee for November's election, Vice-President Kamala Harris, because she was a former prosecutor as well. 'Her career, like his, has been all about decency, dignity, equality, democracy and justice for all,' Max Kennedy wrote."

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I checked with Dante & Virgil, and there is a special place in hell for Ken Paxton. ~~~

~~~ Texas. Edgar Sandoval of the New York Times: "A Latino civil rights group is asking the Department of Justice to open an investigation into a series of raids conducted on Latino voting activists and political operatives as part of sprawling voter fraud inquiry by the Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton. The League of United Latin American Citizens, one of the nation's oldest Latino civil rights organizations, said that many of those targeted were Democratic leaders and election volunteers, and that some were older residents. Gabriel Rosales, the director of the group's Texas chapter, said that officers conducting the raids took cellphones, computers and documents. He called the raids 'alarming' and said they were an effort to suppress Latino voters. In a statement last week, Mr. Paxton, a Republican, described the raids, carried out in counties near San Antonio and South Texas, as part of an 'ongoing election integrity investigation' that began two years ago to look into allegations of election fraud and vote harvesting."

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Venezuela. Julie Turkewitz of the New York Times: "One of Venezuela's top election officials, in a declaration sure to jolt the crisis-weary nation, said in an interview that he had no proof that Venezuela's authoritarian president won last month's election. Since the July 28 vote, governments around the world have expressed skepticism, and even outright disbelief, over President Nicolás Maduro's claim to victory. But the statement by Juan Carlos Delpino -- a member of the government body that announced Mr. Maduro's win -- represents the first major criticism from inside the electoral system. Speaking on the record to a reporter for the first time since the vote, Mr. Delpino said he 'had not received any evidence' that Mr. Maduro actually won a majority of the vote."