Trump is trying to rewrite economics
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1167435723823341568
[Trump] The Euro is dropping against the Dollar “like crazy,” giving them a big export and manufacturing advantage...and the Fed does NOTHING! Our Dollar is now the strongest in history. Sounds good, doesn’t it? Except to those (manufacturers) that make product for sale outside the U.S. We don’t have a Tariff problem (we are reigning in bad and/or unfair players), we have a Fed problem.
January 2018: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/25/trump-says-dollar-to-get-stronger-and-stronger.html
President Donald Trump told CNBC on Thursday the dollar will strengthen over time under his leadership . . . “The dollar is going to get stronger and stronger, and ultimately I want to see a strong dollar,” Trump said
[NB: Trump is simpleminded and loves words like "strong" -- in fact, especially "strong" and "strongly":
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/03/how-to-talk-trump/550934/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgoIajELUds]
Trump attacks GM
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/30/donald-trump-general-motors-1478880
More: https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/trump-says-weak-companies-blaming-tariffs-as-excuse/
President Trump tweeted that “badly run and weak companies” have blamed his trade war with China for flagging business in order to mask “bad management.”
[NB: Here again we see two of Trump's values come into conflict, and we know which one wins. He is a great champion of U.S. companies, except when they question his policies. Then they become enemies, to be attacked. Of course.]
The standard conservative line is that business hates regulation. That's not actually true
https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2019/8/30/20840224/businesses-oppose-trump-deregulatory-agenda-rules
[NB: Smart capitalists have always understood that some regulation helps correct the natural excesses of capitalism, and in that sense helps to PRESERVE capitalism. Regulations help prevent corruption, preserve the conditions for fair market competition, avoid unnecessary and destructive "externalities," and more.]
Trump is pissing off the farmers. That's ominous for him with an election coming up
https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/nebraska-corn-farmers-outraged-at-trump/
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/national-farmers-union-roger-johnson-trump-trade-war-china_n_5d68b124e4b0488c0d122b1c
https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/trump-shared-photo-from-intelligence-briefing/
“A U.S. defense official told CNBC that the picture in Trump’s tweet, which appeared to be a snapshot of a physical copy of the satellite image, was included in a Friday intelligence briefing. Experts told CNBC that the shot was likely never meant for public view.”
https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-trump-used-classified-intel-to-troll-iran
How Trump Used Classified Intel to Troll Iran
More: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-tweet-image-iran-launch_n_5d69afece4b09bbc9eef2a1e
Trump told reporters late Friday that he had an “absolute right” to release the photo he had tweeted earlier . . .
[NB: There's that phrase again. He's been using it a lot lately. That's a lot of "absolute rights."]
Netanyahu doesn't want a Trump/Iran meeting to take place
https://www.axios.com/netanyahu-macron-phone-call-trump-iran-summit-37882df9-aa8f-4fca-a183-33e0abecdaa7.html
Looks like John Bolton is already on the outs with his boss
https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/john-bolton-sidelined-by-trump/
Defense officials don't want to give up their funds to build Trump's stupid Wall™
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/8/30/1882433/-Trump-is-still-trying-to-get-his-emergency-funds-from-the-military-to-build-his-big-fence
CNN reports that the money that Trump is going after now was originally slated to build hospitals, schools, and housing on military bases. . . .
The new line from Trump's defenders: he NEVER lies. This is what tells you it's propaganda -- it's not only demonstrably, laughably untrue, but it's a ridiculous defense to start with, because every politician lies. It's an occupational requirement
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/stuart-varney-joe-walsh-trump-lie
“Stuart, do you believe this president lies? Walsh asked Varney.
“No,” Varney replied.
“You don’t believe he’s ever lied?” Walsh asked again.
“He exaggerates and spins,” Varney said.
More: https://crooksandliars.com/2019/08/aides-admit-trump-lied-and-manipulated
Aides Admit Trump Lied To Manipulate The Stock Markets
https://slate.com/business/2019/08/trump-phone-call-china-trade.html
It Is Very Bad That Our President Reportedly Lied About Trade Negotiations With China
[NB: And, yes, exaggerating and spinning ARE lying.]
https://crooksandliars.com/2019/08/ky-governor-bevin-event-brings-sparse
Trump Jr says he partly grew up in the rust belt because he went to a boarding school in Pottstown, PA, understands working class issues . . .
[NB: Yep, nothing says "working class" like "boarding school."]
More ridicule: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-jr-saddest-rally_n_5d68ab82e4b0488c0d122731
[NB: Yep, nothing says "working class" like "boarding school."]
More ridicule: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-jr-saddest-rally_n_5d68ab82e4b0488c0d122731
In investigation
news . . .
Trump thinks AG Bill Barr did James Comey a favor by not charging him. Here's why he SHOULDN'T have been charged
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/30/donald-trump-bill-barr-report-james-comey-1478881
Trump thinks AG Bill Barr did James Comey a favor by not charging him. Here's why he SHOULDN'T have been charged
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/30/donald-trump-bill-barr-report-james-comey-1478881
More: https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2019/08/is-james-comey-a-leaker-or-a-whistleblower/
Is James Comey a Leaker or a Whistleblower?
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/08/30/a-barr-conspiracy-theory-is-rebuked-by-the-inspector-general/
And there it is: the inspector general of the United States Department of Justice taking the position that a witness to gross misconduct by the president of the United States has a duty to keep his mouth shut about what he saw. Remember, after all, that Comey was a witness here as well as the former FBI director. That’s an extraordinary position for a law enforcement organization to take. . . . [read on]
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/of-course-comey-was-right-to-share-the-memos
Of Course Comey Was Right to Share the Memos
[NB: And what does THIS mean?] “The disastrous IG Report on James Comey shows, in the strongest of terms, how unfairly I, and tens of millions of great people who support me, were treated. . . . We should be given our stolen time back?” Trump wrote.
[NB: Trump has hinted before that his term of office should be EXTENDED as a compensation for lost time due to the "phony witch hunt!" investigation. This just raises more questions about what he might do if (when) he loses in 2020.]
The Office of Legal Council (OLC) is a very important (and often very secret) way of establishing new law, or new interpretation of law. It was Bush's OLC, for example, that produced the infamous memos justifying torture. Here's why the OLC matters
https://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2019/08/weve-got-your-deep-state-for-you-right.html
More: https://www.justsecurity.org/43253/office-legal-counsel-secret-law/
This will be fascinating
https://www.axios.com/911-plotters-trial-date-khalid-sheikh-mohammed-2021-cef37078-c7a3-4708-97a8-27b54c15da83.html
Military judge sets 2021 trial date for alleged 9/11 plotter
In other news . .
.
Madeleine Westerhout, Trump's Executive Assistant, got booted for talking to the press. The backstory is interesting
https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/it-was-only-a-matter-of-time/
The former Mitt Romney 2012 campaign staffer was “inconsolable” on Election Night 2016 because Trump had won the election. “To the amusement of her RNC peers, she was later chosen as the president’s executive assistant and now sits just outside the Oval Office.”
More: https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/29/trump-madeleine-westerhout-white-house-1478767
In the past six months, Westerhout had tried to expand the boundaries of her job to encompass a broader set of tasks and to include foreign travel, said one adviser close to the White House, who suggested Westerhout had tried to act like a de facto chief of staff. This irked several White House officials and Cabinet secretaries who thought she should stick to her primary task of serving as the president’s personal secretary with a desk just outside the Oval Office . . .The White House was buzzing for most of the day on Thursday about her potential departure — especially after officials learned that she had attended an off-the-record dinner with reporters in Bedminster, N.J., where she was said to have shared overly personal details about the president’s life. The close White House adviser called this “the final straw” for someone who did not have many allies left in the building. . . Many Trump 2016 campaign officials had always been wary of Westerhout, who joined the Trump transition from the Republican National Committee and was not an original Trump loyalist.
Now we know why she got fired, and you know what? I would have fired her too
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/30/trumps-personal-assistant-fired-ivanka-tiffany-1479226
Madeleine Westerhout, who left her White House job suddenly on Thursday as President Trump’s personal assistant, was fired after bragging to reporters that she had a better relationship with Trump than his own daughters, Ivanka and Tiffany Trump, and that the president did not like being in pictures with Tiffany because he perceived her as overweight. . .
Oh, ho, ho. Turns out she DOESN'T have an NDA, but it looks like she will have a book contract . . . soon
https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/trumps-fired-assistant-had-no-non-disclosure-agreement/
[NB: Dangerous to fire people who hold so much dirt on you.]
Watch this: Trump 2015, versus Trump 2019
https://crooksandliars.com/2019/08/trump-2015-versus-today-shows-yuge
Madeleine Westerhout, Trump's Executive Assistant, got booted for talking to the press. The backstory is interesting https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/it-was-only-a-matter-of-time/
The former Mitt Romney 2012 campaign staffer was “inconsolable” on Election Night 2016 because Trump had won the election. “To the amusement of her RNC peers, she was later chosen as the president’s executive assistant and now sits just outside the Oval Office.”
More: https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/29/trump-madeleine-westerhout-white-house-1478767
In the past six months, Westerhout had tried to expand the boundaries of her job to encompass a broader set of tasks and to include foreign travel, said one adviser close to the White House, who suggested Westerhout had tried to act like a de facto chief of staff. This irked several White House officials and Cabinet secretaries who thought she should stick to her primary task of serving as the president’s personal secretary with a desk just outside the Oval Office . . .The White House was buzzing for most of the day on Thursday about her potential departure — especially after officials learned that she had attended an off-the-record dinner with reporters in Bedminster, N.J., where she was said to have shared overly personal details about the president’s life. The close White House adviser called this “the final straw” for someone who did not have many allies left in the building. . . Many Trump 2016 campaign officials had always been wary of Westerhout, who joined the Trump transition from the Republican National Committee and was not an original Trump loyalist.
Now we know why she got fired, and you know what? I would have fired her too
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/30/trumps-personal-assistant-fired-ivanka-tiffany-1479226
Madeleine Westerhout, who left her White House job suddenly on Thursday as President Trump’s personal assistant, was fired after bragging to reporters that she had a better relationship with Trump than his own daughters, Ivanka and Tiffany Trump, and that the president did not like being in pictures with Tiffany because he perceived her as overweight. . .
Oh, ho, ho. Turns out she DOESN'T have an NDA, but it looks like she will have a book contract . . . soon
https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/trumps-fired-assistant-had-no-non-disclosure-agreement/
[NB: Dangerous to fire people who hold so much dirt on you.]
Watch this: Trump 2015, versus Trump 2019
https://crooksandliars.com/2019/08/trump-2015-versus-today-shows-yuge
This could be one of those "be careful what you ask for" situations
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/8/30/1882427/-Trump-keeps-pushing-mental-institutions-as-an-answer-to-mass-shootings-They-re-not
Mental illness is not what’s driving high rates of mass shootings in the U.S., but Donald Trump thinks it is and wants more institutions . . . [read on]
Apparently Trump thinks he's still running against Hillary (should we tell him?)
https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/trump-campaign-website-mocks-hillary-clinton/
Fox World is trying to protect what's left of its credibility as a news organization -- and Trump doesn't like that
https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/fox-news-anchor-rips-trump/
The two ladies, Diamond and Silk, are two of the clownier clowns in the Trump Traveling Clown Show. Last year they were whining to Congress that Facebook was "censoring" their free speech. Now they're lawyering up, trying to silence other voices who have criticized them
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/26/diamond-and-silk-congress-hearing-1116887
https://www.thedailybeast.com/diamond-and-silk-lawyer-up
Isn't it funny (not funny) how it always turns out this way?
https://www.salon.com/2019/08/30/probe-of-missing-georgia-votes-finds-extreme-irregularities-in-black-districts-and/
Probe of missing Georgia votes finds "extreme" irregularities in black districts
Another GOP Rep retires
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/john-shimkus-retiring
Iowa and Nevada wanted to host "virtual caucuses." The DNC said no. Now they're pissed
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/dnc-recommends-rejecting-iowa-and-nevada-virtual-caucus-over-security-concerns_n_5d697161e4b01108044ead80
https://www.thedailybeast.com/iowa-dems-furious-with-dnc-for-killing-virtual-caucus-plan
When you start to rise as a candidate, your opponents try to pull you down. Now it's Elizabeth Warren's turn
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/30/elizabeth-warren-2020-competitors-1477953
The Elizabeth Warren honeymoon may be coming to an end. . . . with the Massachusetts senator now drawing massive crowds and surging in national polls, competing campaigns are starting to refocus on Warren, looking to blunt her momentum. Democrats are already opening up new lines of attack: calling her celebrated policy proposals a “fraud,” challenging her to say how she’d pay for a massive health care plan, highlighting a lack of diversity in her supporters and dropping reminders of Warren’s long span as a Republican. . . .
More: https://politicalwire.com/2019/08/30/warren-once-wrote-a-book-on-how-to-get-rich/
Warren Once Wrote a Book on How to Get Rich
I liked Kirsten Gillibrand, but I never took her very seriously as a presidential candidate. Maybe this is why, from one of her SUPPORTERS
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/08/30/on-bidens-success-and-gillibrands-failure/
I found her lack of traction in the campaign somewhat perplexing. She’s smart, charismatic, relatively youthful and energetic, experienced, physically attractive, and from a big state with lots of wealthy donors. . . .
More: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/08/why-couldnt-i-make-myself-like-kirsten-gillibrand.html
Why Couldn’t I Make Myself Like Kirsten Gillibrand?
I believe this: one way or the other, women voters will decide this election
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/459354-women-voters-spell-trouble-for-trump-in-2020
Bonus item: Ellen on unnecessarily gendered productshttps://crooksandliars.com/2019/08/ellen-reviews-products-made-women
Lots more: https://www.buzzfeed.com/erinchack/pointlessly-gendered-products
Riley! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CU040Hqbas
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