BERNIE SANDERS DAY BY DAY

THIS WILL BE A CONTINUING FILE, WITH SOME STORIES ABOUT HOW THE DEMS ARE FARING IN GENERAL. WHEN I HAVE AN UPDATE, I’LL RE POST IT. THE NEWEST WILL BE AT THE TOP OF THE FILE.


BERNIE TODAY


MARCH 31, 2018

READ THESE TWO ARTICLES, THE FIRST ON THE KILLING OF OVER 300 PALESTINIANS IN GAZA AND THE OTHER ON THE BDS MOVEMENT.

http://thehill.com/policy/international/381125-sanders-condemns-killing-of-palestinian-protesters
Sanders condemns killing of Palestinian protesters
BY JOHN BOWDEN - 03/31/18 04:39 PM EDT

Photograph – Speaking © Greg Nash

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Saturday condemned the deaths of Palestinian protesters during demonstrations on Israel's southern border.

At least 17 Palestinians were killed by both live ammunition and rubber bullets fired by Israeli troops in Gaza after tens of thousands of Palestinians marched along the Israel-Gaza border Friday, CNN reported.

Sanders issued a statement Saturday afternoon condemning the deaths and declaring that Palestinians should be free to protest without fear in a series of tweets.


"The killing of Palestinian demonstrators by Israeli forces in Gaza is tragic. It is the right of all people to protest for a better future without a violent response," the Vermont senator wrote.

"Meanwhile, the situation in Gaza remains a humanitarian disaster. The U.S. must play a more positive role in ending the Gaza blockade and helping Palestinians and Israelis build a future that works for all," he added.


Sanders's remarks make him among the first U.S. politicians to speak out publicly against Friday's violence.

His tweets came after video of the confrontations between Israeli troops and Palestinian protesters gained attention on social media, including a graphic clip apparently showing a 19-year-old Palestinian teen been fired upon by sniper bullets.

Sanders has criticized Israel in the past, in particular for the country's 2014 response to terrorist attacks committed by pro-Palestinian armed groups, while also defending Israel's right to defeat terrorism.

“As somebody who spent many months of my life when I was a kid in Israel, who has family in Israel, of course Israel has a right not only to defend themselves but to live in peace and security without fear of a terrorist attack,” Sanders said in 2016. “That is not a debate.”

Sanders is also an opponent of Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS), an international anti-Israel boycott meant to protest treatment of Palestinians by Israeli authorities.



JUST A REFRESHER ON WHAT BDS IS....

https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/01/boycott-divestment-sanctions-bds-170110165203991.html
Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions: What is BDS?
Everything you need to know about the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, and what's being done to combat BDS.
Hilary Aked by Hilary Aked
11 Jan 2017

Photograph -- File: Israeli border police and soldiers block Palestinian protesters in the occupied West Bank [EPA]

What is BDS?
BDS stands for Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (and not, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed, for "bigotry, dishonesty and shame").

The BDS movement's three aims are grounded in international law and fundamental rights.

It seeks to end the occupation and dismantle Israel's illegal wall and settlements, demands full equality for Palestinian citizens of Israel, and calls for the rights of Palestinian refugees to be upheld.

When did it start and why?
The BDS movement began when a coalition of 170 Palestinian civil society groups issued a call to "people of conscience" around the world on July 9, 2005.

Palestinians argue that a global citizens' movement is necessary because - despite decades of "peace process" facade - political leaders have failed to end Israel's settler-colonialism, ethnic cleansing and apartheid practices. In fact, they continue to enable them.

Therefore, only bottom-up pressure from ordinary people will force governments to end Israel's impunity and help create a just peace based on freedom, justice and equality.

What has the BDS movement achieved?
In the decade since its launch, the BDS movement has gradually accumulated successes around the world, from US churches to UK campuses, Egyptian trade unions to the Bolivian government.

In the economic sphere, Veolia and G4S - multinational corporations involved in Israel's oppression of Palestinians - lost billions of dollars due to BDS campaigns and announced withdrawals from Israel. Foreign direct investment into Israel dropped 46 percent in 2014.

Tens of thousands of students globally have pushed forward the academic boycott, backed by figures such as Stephen Hawking, Angela Davis and Judith Butler. Meanwhile, the likes of author Alice Walker, ex-Pink Floyd musician Roger Waters and critically acclaimed filmmaker Ken Loach have lent their support to the cultural boycott.

Importantly, the BDS movement has also been endorsed by anti-colonial Israelis and other Jewish groups, as well as Black Lives Matter.

Is BDS racist?
Some of Israel's defenders claim that BDS is racist. In fact, quite the opposite is true.

Far from targeting individuals on the grounds of ethnicity or nationality, BDS targets institutions on the grounds of complicity in human rights violations and explicitly opposes all forms of racism. That's precisely why it seeks to end Israel's entrenched system of racial discrimination and ethnic privilege.

In this sense, BDS is comparable with - and takes direct inspiration from - the historic anti-apartheid movement which helped to isolate South Africa globally and end white rule.

Who opposes BDS?
Since around 2010, Israel has stepped up its fight against BDS and so-called "de-legitimisation". In 2011, the Knesset passed a draconian law against advocating boycotts within Israel. But internationally, this was counterproductive.

By mid-2015, panicky Israeli leaders were calling the non-violent movement a "strategic threat". Minister of Strategic Affairs Gilad Erdan was given the task of leading the counter-boycott effort, with an annual budget of $25m and supported by military intelligence agencies.

Erdan stresses the need for cooperation with a network of Zionist groups abroad, because ostensibly independent groups are more credible messengers in civil society. He explained: "It's not necessarily good that the government is at the front of this battle."

Because of this, Israeli embassies - many of which have dedicated anti-BDS staff - work closely with Israel lobby groups behind the scenes, as Al Jazeera's investigation "The Lobby" shows. The investigation also confirms another official tactic: establishing front groups and bodies which appear to be grassroots but are actually "astroturf".

Wealthy supporters of Israel such as Sheldon Adelson and Haim Saban in the United States and Trevor Pears in the UK have pumped large sums of money into a plethora of anti-boycott initiatives. And increasingly, the Israeli government and pro-Israel groups team up to create global public-private partnerships against BDS.

What has the counter-BDS movement achieved?
Unable to win the argument politically, Israel and its allies are waging an aggressive "lawfare" campaign.

Thanks to friends in high places, they have had considerable success promoting laws to criminalise BDS, with about 20 US states considering anti-boycott bills. Another dimension has been prosecutions of activists, everywhere from Australia to France.

However, BDS continues to grow rapidly. Legal experts and the European Union have defended the right to boycott as a free speech issue. And several pro-Israel lawfare cases - for example in the UK where attempts to suppress BDS are also facing a legal challenge - have failed spectacularly.

What does the future hold?
Can a voluntary grassroots movement facing off against a well-funded, state-led, and elite-driven counterattack really hope to survive?

Expect to see the fight get even nastier with more lawsuits, McCarthyism, "black ops" and smear tactics, covert intelligence gathering and restrictions on BDS activists' freedom of movement. As Amnesty International has noted with concern, there have even calls for "targeted civil eliminations".

But Israel's forte has always been the hard power of military coercion. Indeed, its diplomats appear unable to comprehend the BDS movement without comparing it with a war. It is clueless about how to deal with a non-hierarchical social movement waging a struggle on the terrain of moral persuasion.

As long as Israel flouts international law, no amount of money, repression or "Brand Israel" propaganda will stop the BDS movement continuing to grow and make crucial contributions to Palestinians' struggle for justice.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA

March 30, 2018


News and Views


I WONDER WHEN AND HOW THE NATO COUNTRIES WILL START TO TALK TO RUSSIA AGAIN? AUSTRIA HAS VOLUNTEERED TO HELP. I HOPE THAT’S GOING TO BE ENOUGH.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/29/europe/yulia-skripal-health-improves-russian-spy-intl/index.html
Yulia Skripal's health 'improving rapidly' after nerve agent attack
Laura Smith Spark-Profile-ImagePeter Wilkinson-Profile-Image
By Laura Smith-Spark and Peter Wilkinson, CNN
Updated 11:11 PM ET, Thu March 29, 2018

Photograph -- Yulia Skripal, 33, and her father were found slumped on a bench near a shopping center in Salisbury.

London (CNN)The health of the daughter of a former Russian double agent poisoned in a nerve agent attack in the UK is "improving rapidly," according to the hospital treating her.

Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, 33, were poisoned on March 4 after being exposed to what the British government says was a military-grade nerve agent. They had been hospitalized in a critical condition since the attack.

These are all the countries that are expelling Russian diplomats

"I'm pleased to be able to report an improvement in the condition of Yulia Skripal. She has responded well to treatment but continues to receive expert clinical care 24 hours a day," Dr. Christine Blanshard, Medical Director for Salisbury District Hospital, said in a statement.

Sergei Skripal, 66, remains in a critical but stable condition but Yulia is "improving rapidly," the statement said.

The Skripals were found slumped on a bench in an outdoor shopping complex in Salisbury, England. They had no visible injuries, according to police.

The update on Yulia's condition comes a day after police said they believed the Skripals first came into contact with the nerve agent at Sergei Skripal's home in Salisbury.

Front door pinpointed

Police have identified the highest concentration of the nerve agent to date as being on the property's front door, London's Metropolitan Police said.

"Traces of the nerve agent have been found at some of the other scenes detectives have been working at over the past few weeks, but at lower concentrations to that found at the home address," the police statement said.

Police believe the Skripals first came into contact with the nerve agent at Sergei Skripal's home in Salisbury, pictured on March 6.

Detectives plan to focus their investigation around Sergei Skripal's Salisbury home for the coming weeks and possibly months, the statement said. Yulia was visiting her father at the time they were poisoned.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Thursday again demanded the UK give Russian diplomats access to Yulia as he announced that the country will shut down the US consulate in St Petersburg and expel 60 US diplomats.

The tit-for-tat move came after more than 20 countries, including Canada and 18 EU member states, joined the United States in expelling more than 100 Russian diplomats over the nerve agent attack.

The UK has expelled 23 Russian diplomats over the attack, which it blames on Moscow. Russia denies it was involved and has suggested the UK could be behind it.

UK Prime Minister Theresa May called the worldwide backlash the "the largest collective expulsion of Russian intelligence officers in history."

Russian Foreign Minister spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters in Moscow that Britain is breaking the international law by refusing to provide information on the case.

"We are witnessing obvious prevention of access for Russian representatives to Russian victims," she said.

Russia: 'Absurd position'

Russia again denied any involvement in the poisoning on Thursday. Zakharova accused the UK government of seeking to "bring about a totally absurd situation."

How Vladimir Putin's arrogance handed Theresa May a diplomatic coup

Zakharova said the countries which had ordered expulsions had been subject to intense pressure to show "solidarity" with Britain despite there being no evidence implicating Russia.

Zakharova also repeated a Russian complaint that its requests for information in the Skripal case have been ignored. "London is not giving us information and they cannot prove their innocence," she said.

UK officials believe the Skripals were exposed to a Soviet-era nerve agent known as Novichok.

But Zakharova said nerve agents have been produced in countries outside of Russia and pointed towards the United Kingdom, United States and the Czech Republic as countries which have invested in this type of research.

Meanwhile, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that Russia welcomed reports that Austria -- which has not ordered the expulsion of Russian diplomats -- had offered to mediate between Russia and the United Kingdom in the Skripal case.

"In the situation with the UK any role, any voice that will spur the British vis-a-vis to, let's say, adequacy in this matter, is in demand, of course," Peskov said, when asked about Austria's reported offer to mediate.

Thomas Schnoll, spokesman for Austria Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl, told CNN that Austria condemned the Skripal poisoning but wanted to keep channels of communication with Russia open. "We see Austria as a bridge builder between the West and the East," he said.

CNN's Zahra Ullah, Carol Jordan, Darya Tarasova and Lorenzo D'Agostino contributed to this report.




THE CURRENT CONDITION OF THE TWO RUSSIANS

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-43588450
Russian spy: Yulia Skripal 'conscious and talking'
29 March 2018

Photograph -- Sergei Skripal, 66, and his daughter Yulia, 33 were poisoned by a nerve agent called Novichok

Yulia Skripal, the daughter of ex-spy Sergei Skripal, is improving rapidly and no longer in a critical condition, says the hospital treating her.

She and her father were admitted nearly four weeks ago after being exposed to a nerve agent in Salisbury.

The BBC understands from separate sources that Ms Skripal is conscious and talking.

However Mr Skripal remains in a critical but stable condition, Salisbury District Hospital said.

Doctors said Ms Skripal, "has responded well to treatment but continues to receive expert clinical care 24 hours a day".

Were people properly protected in the incident aftermath?

"I want to take this opportunity to once again thank the staff of Salisbury District Hospital for delivering such high quality care to these patients over the last few weeks," said Dr Christine Blanshard, Medical Director for Salisbury District Hospital.

"I am very proud both of our front-line staff and all those who support them."

BBC correspondent Duncan Kennedy says a corner appears to have been turned for Yulia Skripal, who is now in a stable condition.

However there is no news on what the long-term damage might be, he adds.

Meanwhile the police have placed cordons round a children's play area at Montgomery Gardens near Mr Skripal's home.

"Officers will be searching it as a precautionary measure," said Deputy Assistant Commissioner Dean Haydon.

The Skripals were admitted to hospital on 4 March after being found collapsed on a bench at the Maltings shopping centre in Salisbury.

Russian spy: What we know so far
Nato slashes Russia staff after poisoning
Spy's front door focus of poisoning probe

Police have been treating the case as attempted murder.

On Wednesday, police said the Skripals first came into contact with the nerve agent at the former Russian spy's home in Salisbury.

Image copyrightEPA
Image caption -- Police stand outside the house believed to be the home of Sergei Skripal

Forensic tests show the highest concentration was found on the front door.

The nerve agent was found at other locations in the town but in lower concentrations, the Metropolitan Police said.

A police officer who fell seriously ill after responding to the attack - Det Sgt Nick Bailey - was treated in hospital but was discharged on 22 March.

Russian spy: What are Novichok agents?
What the diplomat expulsions tell us
What next for Russia’s spy networks?

DS Bailey, who is believed to have visited Mr Skripal's house after the incident has spoken of his ordeal, saying: "Normal life for me will probably never be the same."

The British government has accused the Russian state of involvement in the attack - a claim Moscow has denied.

Prime Minister Theresa May said the chemical used had been identified as being part of a group of nerve agents developed by Russia known as Novichok.

Get news from the BBC in your inbox, each weekday morning

In response to the incident, Mrs May announced a series of sanctions including the expulsion of 23 Russian diplomats.

As a counter-measure the Kremlin said it would expel an equal number of British diplomats from Russia and close down the country's British Council.

Then - in what is believed to be the largest collective expulsion of Russian intelligence officers in history - more than 20 governments expelled diplomats in their countries, including the US, which removed 60.

In reply, Russia will expel 60 US diplomats and the US consulate general in St Petersburg is to be closed.


**************************************************************


TEARING UP THE VA SYSTEM AND BUILDING A REPLACEMENT MIGHT BE AS DIFFICULT AS SWITCHING FROM SOCIAL SECURITY TO SOME OTHER WAY TO SUPPORT PEOPLE IN THEIR ELDER YEARS. PRIVATIZING WOULD MEAN NO MORE PRICE CONTROLS AND PROBABLY FEWER DOCTORS WHO ARE WILLING TO SEE PATIENTS ON THE GOVERNMENT INSURANCE FOR THE MILITARY, TRICARE. THE VA IS ESTABLISHED, IT AND SEEMS TO SUIT SOME OF THESE PEOPLE IN THE ARTICLE WELL ENOUGH.

THERE HAVE BEEN PROBLEMS IN THE NEWS JUST IN THE LAST FEW YEARS. THE WORST THING I SAW WAS ON TV NEWS MAYBE TEN YEARS AGO OF A VA HOSPITAL WITH A ROACH AND MOLD PROBLEM. THERE ARE ISSUES WITH LONG WAITS FOR SERVICE, I THINK. ONE THING THAT I FEAR MOST ABOUT REPUBLICANS IN GENERAL, NOT JUST TRUMP, IS THAT IN ORDER TO “SHRINK” THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT THEY ARE QUITE WILLING TO DESTROY STRUCTURES THAT ARE BADLY NEEDED BY THOSE WHO AREN’T EVEN MIDDLE CLASS, MUCH LESS WEALTHY. I FEAR THEIR WHOLESALE DESTRUCTION OF WHAT IS, WHILE NOT PERFECT, STILL EFFECTIVE ENOUGH.

http://www.wcax.com/content/news/Sanders-warns-against-privatization-of-Veterans-Affairs-478300083.html
Sanders against privatizing Veterans Affairs; local vets split on idea
By Dom Amato | Posted: Thu 12:00 PM, Mar 29, 2018 | Updated: Thu 5:57 PM, Mar 29, 2018

WHITE RIVER JUNCTION, Vt. (WCAX) Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is warning against the privatization of Veterans Affairs. But veterans we spoke to in our region are divided on whether the government should be less involved in their health care.

President Donald Trump tweeted Wednesday that he was firing Secretary of Veterans Affairs David Shulkin and nominating his White House physician to head the VA. With that announcement came reports the Trump administration could seek to privatize the VA.

Sanders sits on the Veterans' Affairs Committee and is against privatizing.

"I think that is a disastrous idea," said Sanders, I-Vermont.

Sanders spoke with veterans Thursday in White River Junction about the possibility of their health care being privatized.

"Strength of the VA has been its ability to provide holistic integrated care, covering all of the needs of Vermont vets or vets throughout the country. And to the degree we dismember the VA, we send people over here or over there, you lose the ability of the VA to provide that cost-effective holistic care," Sanders said.

Privatizing care could mean veterans might have to find their own health care providers.

"I'm not objected to it at all," Craig Lavigne said.

Lavigne served as a part of the Air Force during the Vietnam War and is the Quartermaster at the Winooski VFW. He says it's difficult for some veterans to get to the VA hospital in White River Junction.

"There's a lot more specialists in the private field," he said.

Still, Lavigne is satisfied with his care at the VA. He takes advantage of a program for vets who can't make it south. He's able to do rehab for his neck in Winooski.

"It's very difficult to drive all the way down to White River Junction or one of the other facilities and back and have it not turn into an entire day process," said Jennifer Simpson, a physical therapist at Timberlane in Winooski.

Simpson has a family member in the military and worries how much more will have to be done by vets to receive the care they need.

"As soon as somebody is making money and it's not structured there's always the question of who really benefits," Simpson said.

"I wouldn't want to go from doctor to doctor when everybody is at the hospital here. If one doctor recognizes a problem I have, I get an appointment that day and might even see someone that day," David Brothers said.

Brothers served in the Marine Corps in the U.S. and Vietnam and is concerned his benefits could change. He says the thought of private businesses profiting off veterans' health care is disturbing.

"It's just too bad if it does get privatized, you're going to see a lot of people in deep trouble," Brothers said.

Lavigne says the VA Hospital in White River Junction has done a lot for him but believes it's understaffed and employees are overworked.

"Not privatize the whole system but help the system," Lavigne said.

Along with the VA hospital in White River Junction, there are VA clinics in Burlington, Bennington, Brattleboro, Newport and Rutland.



THIS ARTICLE IS TOO LONG FOR ME TO READ ALL THE WAY THROUGH, AND NOT TERRIBLY EXCITING; AND IT’ CREATIVE WRITING RATHER THAN INFORMATIONAL NEWS, BUT IT DOES HAVE SOME HOPEFUL POINTS IN IT. IT SEEMS THAT LOTS OF VETERANS, BOTH MEN AND WOMEN, ARE RUNNING FOR OFFICE NOW.

ABOUT 51% OF THEM ARE DEMOCRATS, THE ARTICLE SAYS. I THINK IN TIMES PAST MORE VETERANS WOULD BE REPUBLICANS, DUE TO THE GUNG HO SPIRIT THAT IS DRILLED INTO THEM. IT INCLUDES PERSONAL STORIES AND VIEWPOINTS, AND SPEAKS OF AN INFLUX OF NEW FACES, MOST OF WHOM SEEM TO WANT GOVERNMENT TO GET THINGS DONE RATHER THAN PLAY HEAD GAMES ON EACH OTHER AND ON THE PUBLIC. SOMETHING LIKE THAT COULD BE A GOOD THING. IT’S LIKE FRESH AIR. IT MAY BE CHILLY, AND IT MAY GIVE ME HAY FEVER, BUT IT’S DEFINITELY REFRESHING.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/03/28/midterms-veterans-millennial-democrats-gop-districts-217714
How Veterans Are Powering the Democrats’ 2018 Hopes
From Staten Island to San Diego suburbs, millennials with military résumés are making GOP districts competitive.
By MICHAEL KRUSE March 28, 2018

Photograph -- Sarah Blesener for Politico Magazine

NEW YORK—“Ma’am,” said the soldier in suit slacks and a collar-popped pea coat, “my name is Max Rose, and I’m running for Congress as a Democrat.”

The woman behind the glass front door in the semi-suburban neighborhood on Staten Island in this state’s Republican-leaning 11th Congressional District looked him over. She asked what he was “all about.”

“Sure, sure—here’s a little information,” he said, showing her his “walk card.” On one side was a picture of Rose smiling while sitting at a table wearing a tie. “A Healthcare Expert with Solutions,” it said. “An Economic Champion.” On the other, though, was an image of him in his military fatigues, a long, black M4 carbine assault rifle hanging off his shoulder. This side had different language: “Combat Infantry Captain in the U.S. Army,” “the courage to lead.” This was the side Rose presented to her first.

The door opened a little.

“I’m the first post-9/11 combat veteran to run for office in New York City history,” Rose said.

The door opened a little more.

“I’m a Staten Islander,” he continued. “I deployed to Afghanistan about five years ago. I was an infantry platoon leader.” He said he was a Purple Heart recipient. Bronze Star, too. “And now we’re fighting this fight,” Rose said.

The door opened all the way.

Photograph -- Max Rose campaigns around Staten Island, his home borough. |Sarah Blesener for Politico Magazine

Rose, a 5-foot-6 power pack with an upbeat, shoulders-back gait, is near the forefront of a surge of a certain sort of candidate in the 2018 election cycle. Veterans who are Democrats are vying for Congress in numbers not seen in decades. With Honor, a “cross-partisan” organization that aims to “help elect principled next-generation veterans in order to solve our biggest problems and fix a Congress that is dysfunctional,” counts approximately 300 veterans who have run for Congress during this cycle—roughly half of whom chose to serve after, and in many cases because of, September 11, 2001. Although specific numbers are hard to come by, the spike is stark—“a substantial increase,” With Honor co-founder and CEO Rye Barcott told me, “from any prior cycle” in modern memory. While the perception might exist that most veterans lean Republican, some 51 percent of the veterans who are or have been 2018 candidates, based on With Honor’s tally, are actually Democrats. And some are proving to be competitive in places once considered safe GOP districts. Witness Conor Lamb’s win in western Pennsylvania earlier this month. Polling suggests former Army Ranger Jason Crow could do the same in Colorado’s 6th District in the suburbs of Denver. Backed by members of Congress like Representative Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) and organizations like VoteVets and New Politics, this roster of aspirants is a key to Democrats reclaiming control of the House of Representatives in November’s midterms, party strategists believe.

It is not a coincidence that this wave of veterans is hitting at a moment when a five-time draft-deferring president occupies the White House and toxic partisanship has ground Capitol Hill to a virtual halt. The candidates are presenting themselves both as a moral rebuke to what they see as Donald Trump’s self-promoting divisiveness and also as a practical solution to the failure of the nation’s highest legislative body to get anything done. In short, the reputation of the national institution with by far the highest approval rating, the military, is being offered as an antidote to the woes of a schismatic president and a Congress whose approval ratings have never been worse.

Top: Jason Crow; bottom: Seth Moulton. | AP; Getty
Top: Jason Crow; bottom: Seth Moulton. | AP; Getty

“They’re all people who served the country without worrying about who’s a Democrat and who’s a Republican—let’s just get the damn thing done,” longtime national Democratic strategist Joe Trippi said in an interview. “In this Washington, in this divisive, chaotic cycle, you have these people who’ve proven they can rise above party and actually accomplish a mission.”

And out on the campaign trail, many of them have versions of Max Rose’s experience with opening doors, I heard in conversations with a dozen of these kinds of candidates.

Mikie Sherrill, a former Navy pilot and federal prosecutor running in New Jersey’s Republican-leaning but open 11th District, sees it when she stops in at diners. It usually happens with older men. “I’ll go up and say, ‘Hi, my name’s Mikie Sherrill and I’m running for Congress,‘” she told me, and she’ll gauge mostly disinterest. “And I’ll say, ‘Yeah, you know, I was a Navy helicopter pilot and a federal prosecutor,’ and then I kind of start to walk away—and they go, ‘Wait a minute, wait a minute …’”

. . . . GO TO THE WEBSITE TO CONTINUE THIS STORY IF YOU WANT TO READ IT ALL.



I REALLY ENJOYED THIS STORY OF A PEEP INSIDE THE FOX NEWS WORLD.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/why-i-left-fox-news/2018/03/30/d1224648-32bb-11e8-8bdd-cdb33a5eef83_story.html
Outlook Perspective
Why I left Fox News
By Ralph Peters March 30, 2018 at 6:00 AM
Ralph Peters is a retired Army officer, a former enlisted man and a prize-winning author of historical fiction.

Image -- An ad for “Fox and Friends” outside the Fox News Channel studio in New York. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

You could measure the decline of Fox News by the drop in the quality of guests waiting in the green room. A year and a half ago, you might have heard George Will discussing policy with a senator while a former Cabinet member listened in. Today, you would meet a Republican commissar with a steakhouse waistline and an eager young woman wearing too little fabric and too much makeup, immersed in memorizing her talking points.

This wasn’t a case of the rats leaving a sinking ship. The best sailors were driven overboard by the rodents.

As I wrote in an internal Fox memo, leaked and widely disseminated, I declined to renew my contract as Fox News’s strategic analyst because of the network’s propagandizing for the Trump administration. Today’s Fox prime-time lineup preaches paranoia, attacking processes and institutions vital to our republic and challenging the rule of law.

Four decades ago, as a U.S. Army second lieutenant, I took an oath to “support and defend the Constitution.” In moral and ethical terms, that oath never expires. As Fox’s assault on our constitutional order intensified, spearheaded by its after-dinner demagogues, I had no choice but to leave.

My error was waiting so long to walk away. The chance to speak to millions of Americans is seductive, and, with the infinite human capacity for self-delusion, I rationalized that I could make a difference by remaining at Fox and speaking honestly.

I was wrong.

As early as the fall of 2016, and especially as doubts mounted about the new Trump administration’s national security vulnerabilities, I increasingly was blocked from speaking on the issues about which I could offer real expertise: Russian affairs and our intelligence community. I did not hide my views at Fox and, as word spread that I would not unswervingly support President Trump and, worse, that I believed an investigation into Russian interference was essential to our national security, I was excluded from segments that touched on Vladimir Putin’s possible influence on an American president, his campaign or his administration.

I was the one person on the Fox payroll who, trained in Russian studies and the Russian language, had been face to face with Russian intelligence officers in the Kremlin and in far-flung provinces. I have traveled widely in and written extensively about the region. Yet I could only rarely and briefly comment on the paramount security question of our time: whether Putin and his security services ensnared the man who would become our president. Trump’s behavior patterns and evident weaknesses (financial entanglements, lack of self-control and sense of sexual entitlement) would have made him an ideal blackmail target — and the Russian security apparatus plays a long game.

As indictments piled up, though, I could not even discuss the mechanics of how the Russians work on either Fox News or Fox Business. (Asked by a Washington Post editor for a comment, Fox’s public relations department sent this statement: “There is no truth to the notion that Ralph Peters was ‘blocked’ from appearing on the network to talk about the major headlines, including discussing Russia, North Korea and even gun control recently. In fact, he appeared across both networks multiple times in just the past three weeks.”)

All Americans, whatever their politics, should want to know, with certainty, whether a hostile power has our president and those close to him in thrall. This isn’t about party but about our security at the most profound level. Every so often, I could work in a comment on the air, but even the best-disposed hosts were wary of transgressing the party line.

Fox never tried to put words in my mouth, nor was I told explicitly that I was taboo on Trump-Putin matters. I simply was no longer called on for topics central to my expertise. I was relegated to Groundhog Day analysis of North Korea and the Middle East, or to Russia-related news that didn’t touch the administration. Listening to political hacks with no knowledge of things Russian tell the vast Fox audience that the special counsel’s investigation was a “witch hunt,” while I could not respond, became too much to bear. There is indeed a witch hunt, and it’s led by Fox against Robert Mueller.

The cascade of revelations about the Russia-related crimes of Trump associates was dismissed, adamantly, as “fake news” by prime-time hosts who themselves generate fake news blithely.

Then there was Fox’s assault on our intelligence community — in which I had served, from the dirty-boots tactical level to strategic work in the Pentagon (with forays that stretched from Russia through Pakistan to Burma and Bolivia and elsewhere). Opportunities to explain how the system actually works, how stringent the safeguards are and that intelligence personnel are responsible public servants — sometimes heroes — dried up after an on-air confrontation shortly before Trump’s inauguration with a popular (and populist) host, Lou Dobbs.

Dobbs has no experience with the intelligence system. Yet he ranted about its reputed assaults on our privacy and other alleged misdeeds (if you want to know who spies on you, it’s the FGA — Facebook, Google and Amazon — not the NSA). When I insisted that the men and women who work in our intelligence agencies are patriots who keep us safe, the host reddened and demanded, “Patriotism is the last refuge of the — you fill in the blank.” As I sought to explain that, no, the NSA isn’t listening to our pillow talk, Dobbs kept repeating, “Patriotism is the last refuge of the — fill in the blank.”

Because I’d had a long, positive history with Dobbs, I refrained from replying: “Patriotism is the last refuge of the talk-show host.”

I became a disgruntled employee, limited to topics on which I agreed with the Trump administration, such as loosened targeting restrictions on terrorists and a tough line with North Korea. Over the past few months, it reached the point where I hated walking into the Fox studio. Friends and family encouraged me to leave, convinced that I embarrassed myself by remaining with the network (to be fair, I’m perfectly capable of embarrassing myself without assistance from Fox).

During my 10 years at Fox News and Fox Business, I did my best to be a forthright voice. I angered left and right. I criticized President Barack Obama fiercely (one infelicity resulted in a two-week suspension), but I also argued for sensible gun-control measures and environmental protections. I made mistakes, but they were honest mistakes. I took the opportunity to speak to millions of Americans seriously and — still that earnest young second lieutenant to some degree — could not imagine lying to them.

With my Soviet-studies background, the cult of Trump unnerves me. For our society’s health, no one, not even a president, can be above criticism — or the law.

I must stress that there are many honorable and talented professionals at the Fox channels, superb reporters, some gutsy hosts, and adept technicians and staff. But Trump idolaters and the merrily hypocritical prime-time hosts are destroying the network — no matter how profitable it may remain.

The day my memo leaked, a journalist asked me how I felt. Usually quick with a reply, I struggled, amid a cyclone of emotions, to think of the right words. After perhaps 30 seconds of silence, I said, “Free.”


Read more from Outlook and follow our updates on Facebook and Twitter.
Ralph Peters is a retired Army officer, a former enlisted man and a prize-winning author of historical fiction.


ANOTHER NORTHERN CITY HAS A DANGEROUSLY HIGH NUMBER OF LEAD POISONING CASES, THIS TIME IT’S MILWAUKEE. WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW IS WHAT BUSINESSES ARE DUMPING THEIR INDUSTRIAL WASTE WATER INTO THE RIVERS.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/milwaukee-parents-concerned-lead-levels-after-troubling-report/
CBS NEWS March 30, 2018, 7:45 AM
Milwaukee's slow response to troubling lead level reports sparks outrage

Parents in Milwaukee say city leaders aren't doing enough to protect their kids from lead. While the national average for lead poisoning is about three percent, more than 11 percent of Milwaukee's children in 2016 suffered from it. Wisconsin health officials are reviewing Milwaukee's lead prevention program after several reports highlighted deficiencies in keeping lead away from kids.

Milwaukee's mayor said lead from paint is the city's primary concern, since lead-based paint is in at least 100,000 homes. Some residents are also worried about lead pipes, even though the water is treated to keep the lead out, reports CBS News' Adriana Diaz. One of those residents is Aminah Al-Mujaahid, who painstakingly prepares water for her family, filtering it pitcher by pitcher.

e10-diaz-wisconsin-lead-frame-1227.jpg
Nazir and Aminah Al-Mujaahid CBS NEWS

Last year her youngest son Shu'aib had a blood lead level of 11.4 – more than double what is considered lead poisoning. Lead can affect IQ, and Aminah and her husband Nazir believe it's stunted their five-year-old son's brain development.

"In my assessment he's operating more on a three, three-and-a-half-year-old level," he said. "I'll say 'hey what's your name' or 'how old are you'….He'll look at you, he'll look at you like he's trying to decipher and figure it out."

Milwaukee health officials say lead from paint poses the greatest risk to local families, but the Al-Mujaahid's believe it's in their water after recently learning they have lead service lines, which supply water to their home. The city says its water meets federal lead standards and it's treated to prevent lead from leaching from the pipes.

Improperly treated water in Flint, Michigan, caused widespread lead contamination there three years ago. Up to 10 million homes nationwide still have lead service lines, even though Congress banned lead plumbing supplies more than 30 years ago. About 74,000 are in Milwaukee, where the city has a program to split the cost of replacing lead pipes with homeowners but so far only one percent has been done.

"Any time they touch the water, it's alarming for me because I'm thinking about the exposure, their lives are important to us and….But it's difficult to see the city, not care," Aminah said.

e10-diaz-wisconsin-lead-frame-4459.jpg
Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett CBS NEWS

The family says they tried to get a free water filter under the city's lead program, but when they went, none were left. That fits in with a recent review of the city's lead prevention program ordered by the mayor, which found insufficient staffing, under-funding, and claims of mismanagement.

The Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program doesn't have records of investigating about 100 addresses where kids blood lead levels reached 20 or higher. Health officials also don't know if 4,500 families received follow-up letters with children's lead test results.

"Well, a big part of this we don't know the answer to," Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett said. "I was told by my staff, that we did not have the documentation that established with certainty that all the kids had received this letter. That was enough for me to say, well then we're gonna send out another reminder."

Wisconsin congresswoman Gwen Moore wants the federal government to investigate and has raised concerns over the funding and effectiveness of Milwaukee's lead removal programs.

"The problem is devastating," Moore said. "It's really important to have this independent audit done by the Centers for Disease Control."

Mayor Barrett is not against the idea of an audit by the CDC.

"I welcome the CDC, I welcome the housing and urban development. I think that over a couple-year period we didn't do what we needed to do. I want to get back to the basic blocking and tackling," Barrett said.

Aminah says her family has had to pay the price for the city's dysfunction.

"We're supposed to protect our children but I can't do anything with people that don't wanna meet us halfway. We had to do our own research and do what we can in our house and buy what we need to clean our water."

Shu'aib's blood level is now down from an 11.4 to a five. His family said they're looking for a specialist to help with developmental delays, but there are long wait lists. The city's health department did offer to test the water supply, but so far the city has not followed up.

© 2018 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.


THE RECENT CELL PHONE SHOOTING BY POLICE IS IN THE NEWS WITH HIS FUNERAL. AUTOPSY SAYS HE WAS SHOT IN THE BACK, AN ACT LONG CONSIDERED COWARDLY.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2018/03/30/stephon-clark-independent-autopsy-results-announced-friday/472507002/?csp=chromepush
Stephon Clark was shot eight times from behind, independent autopsy finds
Christal Hayes and Marco della Cava, USA TODAY Published 9:24 a.m. ET March 30, 2018 | Updated 2:21 p.m. ET March 30, 2018

VIDEO -- Sharpton gave the eulogy for Clark, 22, to the overflowing Bayside of South Sacramento Church as he held tightly to Stephon's distraught brother, Stevante, who frequently grabbed the microphone. USA TODAY

Photograph -- Demonstrators protest at the John M. Price District Attorney Center after the funeral of Stephon Clark.
(Photo: John Hefti, USA TODAY Sports) (Photo: John Hefti, USA TODAY Sports)

Stephon Clark was shot eight times from behind, according to an independent autopsy that was released Friday in amid growing tensions in Sacramento, Calif., and across the nation.

Clark's shooting death by two Sacramento police officers reignited the familiar anger and calls for justice after similar shootings of unarmed black men in the United States. The official coroner's report hasn't been released but officers, who falsely thought Clark was holding a gun, say 20 rounds were fired at him.

Clark was found only with a cell phone.

Dr. Bennet Omalu, who conducted the autopsy, said Clark was clearly shot from behind.

Six of the bullets hit the back of his body. He said the two others hit him in the side, adding all results pointed to Clark being shot from behind.

The first bullet hit him in the side, Omalu said, which caused his body to turn. His back was turned to officers when a barrage of six bullets hit him.

One hit his neck, the others hit his back and shoulder.

The last gunshot hit his thigh, Omalu said, explaining Clark was either shot while on the ground or as he was falling.
"He was shot from the back," said Omalu, who is known for his work on the affects concussions have on the brains of athletes.

The independent autopsy results were released during a Friday news conference, just one day after Clark's funeral. His family hired attorney Ben Crump, a high-profile civil rights lawyer who has also represented the families of Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice and Michael Brown.

More: Police killings of black men in the U.S. and what happened to the officers

More: Sacramento hopes to set national example after Stephon Clark shooting

More: 'Not a local matter': Al Sharpton, at funeral for Stephon Clark, blasts White House, says death 'woke up the nation'

On Friday, Clark's funeral drew hundreds and spurred protests throughout the city. Since his death on March 18, mostly non-violent protests have stopped traffic, blocked access to two NBA basketball games and disrupted a local city council meeting.

Other Black Lives Matter protests, including one in New York, led to some arrests.

Activist Al Sharpton gave the eulogy for Clark, 22, and derided the White House for dismissing the killing as a "local matter."

"This is not a local matter," Sharpton shouted during his remarks. "They have been killing young black men all over the country, and we are here to say that we are going to stand with Stephon Clark and his family."

Clark’s death is far from the first police interaction turned tragic, as the local chapter of Black Lives Matter lists a dozen violent encounters last year alone.

Demonstrators protest in the streets of Sacramento.
Demonstrators protest in the streets of Sacramento. (Photo: JOHN HEFTI, USA TODAY Sports)

Some want police to face criminal charges and donned black shirts calling for justice, a common sentiment after similar high-profile cases, such as Michael Brown in Ferguson, Philando Castile in Saint Paul and Eric Garner on Staten Island.

There is hope, however, that Clark's death could bring the moment for change.

“It could be up to us to affect change, and we can do it because fundamentally we are a highly diverse, integrated community,” said Joany Titherington, president of the Oak Park Neighborhood Association, home to a large part of the city’s African-American population.

“We have black, brown and white people all living next to each other, so what this really is is a police training issue, where people shoot first and ask questions later,” she said. “It’s a systemic problem national politicians don’t seem to want to deal with, even though no town in America is immune to this.”

Many point to Sacramento's new police chief, Daniel Hahn – the first African-American to lead the department.

Lindsay Williams, a member of the local Black Lives Matter movement, thinks systemic changes in how police officers treat minorities will take time.

"There’s an amazing solidarity among our community that cuts across races and agendas," said Williams. "Now, I’m 27, so based on what I’ve lived through I really don’t expect changes. This country has not given me much to have faith in."

Williams then looked at the chanting crowd and smiled. “But,” she said, “these people do.”

Contributing: KXTV


POLICE OFFICER FIRED OVER FATAL SHOOTING – THOUGH THE BRASS KEPT HIM OFF DUTY WITH PAY FOR TWO YEARS -- NOT A PUNISHMENT.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/baton-rouge-officers-deadly-shooting-may-disciplined-163404539.html?soc_trk=gcm&soc_src=6d5f98a9-30da-3e21-bf79-2d16fde5d3d4&.tsrc=notification-brknews
1 Baton Rouge officer fired, 1 suspended in deadly shooting
Associated Press
MICHAEL KUNZELMAN
Associated Press • March 30, 2018

Video image -- 1 / 2
FILE - In this July 5, 2016 image made from video provided by Arthur Reed, Alton Sterling is restrained by two Baton Rouge police officers, one holding a gun, outside a convenience store in Baton Rouge, La. Moments later, one of the officers shot and killed Sterling, a black man who had been selling CDs outside the store, while he was on the ground. The investigation of the deadly police shooting that inflamed racial tensions in Louisiana’s capital city has ended without criminal charges against two white officers who confronted Sterling. . Experts in police tactics think the bloodshed could have been avoided if the Baton Rouge officers had done more to defuse the encounter with Sterling. (Arthur Reed via AP, File

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — A Louisiana police chief said Friday he has fired the white officer who fatally shot a black man during a struggle outside a convenience store nearly two years ago, a killing that set off widespread protests.

Baton Rouge Police Chief Murphy Paul announced officer Blane Salamoni's firing less than a week after Louisiana's attorney general ruled out criminal charges in Alton Sterling's July 2016 shooting death.

Paul also suspended officer Howie Lake II, the other officer involved in the deadly confrontation, for three days. Lake helped wrestle Sterling to the ground but did not fire his weapon that night.

"My decision was not based on politics," Paul said during a news conference. "It was not based on emotions. It was based on the facts of the case."

Both officers had remained on paid administrative leave since the shooting.

Police also released body camera footage and other videos of the officers' deadly encounter with Sterling.

In the body camera footage of the encounter, an officer can be heard repeatedly using profanity as he shouts at Sterling and at one point threatens to shoot him in the head as Sterling asks what he did.

Salamoni shot Sterling six times during a struggle outside the Triple S Food Mart, where the 37-year-old black man was selling homemade CDs. Lake helped wrestle Sterling to the ground but didn't fire his weapon.

The officers recovered a loaded revolver from Sterling's pocket. As a convicted felon, Sterling could not legally carry a gun.

L. Chris Stewart, a lawyer representing two of Sterling's five children, said the newly released videos show officer Salamoni attacked Sterling without provocation "like a wild dog."

"The most obvious thing that stands out is Alton wasn't fighting back at all," Stewart said. "He's trying to defuse it the whole time."

Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry announced Tuesday that his office isn't charging either officer with state crimes. The Justice Department ruled out federal criminal charges last May.

Sterling's death inflamed racial tensions in the state's capital city and led to protests where nearly 200 people were arrested.

In June 2017, Baton Rouge Mayor Sharon Weston Broome called on Paul's predecessor, Carl Dabadie Jr., to fire Salamoni. Dabadie refused, saying it would be improper and premature because the shooting remained under investigation.

Paul said Tuesday that he and three deputy chiefs would preside over a disciplinary hearing — closed to the public — before imposing any punishment. He detailed the results of that hearing at a news conference.

Salamoni's attorney, John McLindon, had said Tuesday that he expected the officer to be fired. He called it "grossly unfair" that a disciplinary hearing was planned less than a week after the end of the criminal investigations. Lake's lawyer, Kyle Kershaw, said his client's actions complied with department procedures.

Salamoni had served as a Baton Rouge police officer for four years before the shooting; Lake was a three-year veteran of the force.

Two cellphone videos of the incident quickly spread on social media after the shooting. Paul said Tuesday that he will release other videos of the incident, including footage from the officers' body cameras and the store's surveillance camera, after he makes a disciplinary decision.



“... SHEETED IN COPPER, AND THAT CREWS FOUND ROMAN NUMERALS CARVED ON ITS WOODEN RIBS.” OF COURSE, WHO KNOWS HOW MANY COUNTRIES SINCE ROMAN TIMES HAVE USED ROMAN NUMERALS – LATIN WAS THE LANGUAGE OF SCHOLARSHIP AND GOVERNMENT FOR OVER A THOUSAND YEARS. THE MOST INTERESTING QUESTION, THOUGH, IS WHAT WAS THE SHIP’S POINT OF ORIGIN AND HOW OLD DOES SCIENTIFIC TESTING OF WOOD INDICATE IT TO BE? IT IS, OF COURSE, PROBABLY SPANISH, AND THE CHURCH USED LATIN UP UNTIL RECENTLY. RESEARCHERS HAVE ESTIMATED IT’S AGE AS BEING “AS FAR BACK AS THE 1700S.” STILL, IT’S A WONDERFUL FIND.

“WJAX-TV REPORTS IT'S UP TO THE STATE TO DECIDE WHAT TO DO WITH THE WRECKAGE.” IF THEY DON’T PUT IT IN A FLORIDA MUSEUM, I WILL BE VERY UNHAPPY.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ponte-vedra-beach-centuries-old-shipwreck-washes-ashore-florida/
CBS/AP March 30, 2018, 8:45 AM
"Holy grail of shipwrecks": Centuries-old sailing ship found on Florida beach

VIDEO -- News video

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. -- A 48-foot section of an old sailing ship has washed ashore on a Florida beach, thrilling researchers who are rushing to study it before it's reclaimed by the sea. The Florida Times-Union reports the well-preserved section of a wooden ship's hull washed ashore overnight Tuesday on Florida's northeastern coast.

According to CBS News affiliate WJAX-TV, Julie Turner and her 8-year-old son found the wreckage on Ponte Vedra Beach Wednesday morning. At first, Turner thought it was a piece of a pier or fence, but then, she realized it was a centuries-old ship that had washed ashore.

"We walked and checked it out and immediately knew it was a historical piece of [sic] artifact," she told WJAX-TV.

Researchers with the St. Augustine Lighthouse and Maritime Museum have been documenting the artifact and say it could date back as far as the 1700s. Marc Anthony, who owns Spanish Main Antiques, told WJAX-TV it's extremely rare for wreckage to wash ashore.

"To actually see this survive and come ashore. This is very, very rare. This is the holy grail of shipwrecks," Anthony said.

Museum historian Brendan Burke told the newspaper that evidence suggests the vessel was once sheeted in copper, and that crews found Roman numerals carved on its wooden ribs.

Researchers rushed to photograph and measure the wreckage. The photos will be used to create a 3-D model.

WJAX-TV reports it's up to the state to decide what to do with the wreckage.

© 2018 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.


NOW THIS IS AN ODD STORY. PARANOIA, SUBTERFUGE OR MAYBE JUST A CAUTIOUS MOVE TO PREVENT INTERFERENCE. THE REAL PROBLEM IS THAT SO MANY OF US DON’T TRUST TRUMP MUCH MORE THAN WE DO THE RUSSIANS, AND WE WANT TO KNOW WHAT HIS INTERACTIONS ARE ABOUT WITH RUSSIA, IN PARTICULAR.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-tells-aides-not-talk-publicly-about-russia-policy-moves-n861256
Trump tells aides not to talk publicly about Russia policy moves
But Trump, irked by Putin's nuclear buildup, told him last week: "If you want to have an arms race we can do that, but I'll win."
by Carol E. Lee, Courtney Kube and Kristen Welker / Mar.29.2018 / 5:15 PM ET

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump's national security advisers spent months trying to convince him to sign off on a plan to supply new U.S. weapons to Ukraine to aid in the country's fight against Russian-backed separatists, according to multiple senior administration officials.

Yet when the president finally authorized the major policy shift, he told his aides not to publicly tout his decision, officials said. Doing so, Trump argued, might agitate Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to the officials.

"He doesn't want us to bring it up," one White House official said. "It is not something he wants to talk about."

The White House declined to comment.

Officials said the increasingly puzzling divide between Trump's policy decisions and public posture on Russia stems from his continued hope for warmer relations with Putin and stubborn refusal to be seen as appeasing the media or critics who question his silence or kind words for the Russian leader.

Trump makes White House aides tiptoe around Russia, Putin policy
04:28

Critics have suggested that Trump's soft approach to Putin has nefarious roots that are somehow entwined with Russia's interference in the 2016 election and the federal investigation into whether the president's campaign colluded in that effort, something the president has repeatedly denied.

Behind the scenes, however, Trump has recently taken a sharper tone on Putin, administration officials said, but the shift seems more a reaction to the Russian leader challenging the president's strength than a new belief that he's an adversary. Putin's claim earlier this month that Russia has new nuclear-capable weapons that could hit the U.S., a threat he underscored with video simulating an attack, "really got under the president's skin," one official said.

So much so that after hearing Putin’s speech, Trump called the leaders of France, Germany and the U.K. to say the Russian leader sounded dangerous, so the four of them needed to stick together, according to a White House official familiar with the calls.

Is the threat real after Putin's big nuclear missile reveal?
03:51

Two officials said Trump told Putin during a phone call last week after Putin's re-election: "If you want to have an arms race we can do that, but I'll win." Trump added that he hoped that Putin’s comments were just election rhetoric and bragged that he’d just secured a $700 billion defense budget, the largest the U.S. has ever had, he said, according to one of the officials.

Afterward the president gave no hint of tensions when he told reporters that the two leaders had "a very good call" and that he plans to meet with Putin soon to discuss curtailing an arms race.

Within days, the split between Trump's Russia policy and public rhetoric was again on display.

The White House announced Monday that the U.S. would expel 60 Russian diplomats — the largest number since the Cold War — in response to Moscow's alleged nerve-agent attack in the U.K. on a former spy. It was the brashest U.S. brushback of Russia since Trump took office, yet the president didn't comment on it. And he insisted the White House's message include the idea that he "still wants to work with Russia."

Trump was similarly silent Thursday after Russia announced it would expel U.S. diplomats and close the American consulate in St. Petersburg in response to U.S. moves earlier this week.

"If you want to have an arms race we can do that, but I'll win."

A now familiar back-and-forth also played out behind the scenes over Trump's decision two weeks ago to levy new sanctions against Russia in response to Moscow's 2016 election meddling and costly worldwide cyberattack last year.

One official involved in the discussions said Trump pushed back on the sanctions proposals by saying Russia's meddling didn't affect the election, but began to relent after Putin's boast about nuclear weapons.

Since approving the sanctions, officials said Trump has given White House officials conflicting messages on whether they should showcase the move publicly. In some instances, Trump says he's fine with it, while at other times he's directed aides not to talk about it, they said.

The president's aides have begun to choose their battles or shape their advice to his approach. While the phrase "DO NOT CONGRATULATE" was written on Trump's briefing materials for his call with Putin last week — as first reported by The Washington Post — the president's senior advisers also chose not to orally brief him on the talking point because they didn't think it would make a difference, officials said.

"He'd say what he wants anyway," one official said.

Trump tweets about 'coming Arms Race,' says Russia 'can help'
04:47
Trump did congratulate Putin, to the dismay — though not surprise — of some of his top national security advisers. Aides said it's unclear if a meeting with Putin will happen because Trump suggests a meeting during nearly all of his calls with foreign leaders as a routine pleasantry.

An argument the president's national security advisers have found to be successful in trying to persuade Trump to adopt aggressive Russia policies is that Putin responds to strength and the way to achieve better relations is to be tougher on him, officials said.

One official described it as a way to "motivate" Trump on Russia.

"He digs in his heels," the official said. "He thinks a better relationship with Russia is good for the U.S., and he really believes he can deliver it."

Moreover, the official said, Trump wants a better U.S. relationship with Russia to prove he can accomplish it.

One official said Trump believes a stable U.S. relationship with Russia is important if the U.S. is going to find resolutions to other crisis, such as the conflict in Syria.

Rex Tillerson, Trump's outgoing secretary of state, led the effort to convince Trump to approve the new arms for Ukraine, officials said. The plan, which Russia opposed, included the sale of U.S.-made Javelin anti-tank missiles that Kiev has for years requested from Washington. President Barack Obama had repeatedly refused to approve Ukraine's request out of concern it would escalate U.S. tensions with Russia.

Tillerson scheduled a meeting with the president to discuss the plan shortly after the national security team approved it last summer, and he raised the issue with Trump in their regular meetings over the next few months, officials said.

As the policy sat on his desk awaiting his signature, the president expressed concern that it would escalate tensions with Russia and lead to a broader conflict, officials said. They said he also saw Ukraine as a problem for Europe and questioned why he should have to do something about it. And he insisted Ukraine purchase the arms from the U.S., not receive them for free, officials said, before signing off on the policy in December.


"Tillerson just wore him down," a White House official said.

President Donald Trump and President Vladimir Putin talk during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders' summit in Danang, Vietnam on November 11, 2017. Jorge Silva / AFP - Getty Images
But Trump's ambivalence didn't end, officials said. In one instance afterward, Trump complained to his national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, that his decision could really escalate the situation in Ukraine to a war. McMaster, who was recently ousted, responded by telling the president there already is a war there, to which Trump shot back that the U.S. is not in it, an official said.

Last week, as the president's national security team finalized options for a response to the Russian nerve agent attack in the U.K., Trump voiced a now-familiar complaint. He said he wasn't going to take dramatic steps against Russia unless they were met with equal responses from America's European allies, aides said. His edict helped corral a response that included expulsions of more than 100 Russian diplomats in more than two dozen countries.

Trump was presented with three options last Friday during a meeting with his national security team, officials said. He chose the middle option, persuaded most by the idea that if Russia changed its behavior he wouldn't have needed the most strident measures and if it doesn't he has additional actions he can take, officials said.



THE THEORY HERE IS THAT THE EMPTYING OF THE SEATTLE RUSSIAN CONSULATE IS PERHAPS A STRATEGIC MOVE RATHER THAN JUST DIPLOMATIC DANCING. IT’S AN INTERESTING STORY, AND VERY LIKELY TRUE.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/03/29/what-really-went-on-at-russias-seattle-consulate-217761
What Really Went on at Russia’s Seattle Consulate?
The closure of the facility could limit military and tech-industry espionage—and leaves Russia with no diplomatic presence on the West Coast.
By ZACH DORFMAN March 29, 2018

Among the 27 countries that have retaliated for what is believed to be a Kremlin-ordered chemical-weapon attack on an ex-Russian intelligence officer and his daughter in Britain earlier this month, the United States took by far the most dramatic steps: ousting 60 diplomats in total, including 15 suspected intelligence operatives based at Russia’s United Nations Mission alone—the most significant action of its type since the Reagan administration. (The move prompted Russia, on Thursday, to announce the expulsion of 60 U.S. diplomats and the closure of the U.S. consulate in Saint Petersburg.) But it was the Trump administration’s announcement of the shuttering of Russia’s consulate in Seattle that turned heads. Why Seattle? What was going on there? Would the closure matter?

While Seattle is an important city for Russian intelligence collection efforts domestically, its consulate’s profile has generally been quieter than San Francisco’s or New York’s, according to two former U.S. intelligence officials who asked to remain anonymous but have knowledge of Russian activities in these areas. But the closure of the consulate is noteworthy nonetheless: Along with the administration’s shuttering of the San Francisco consulate in 2017, Russia will now lack a diplomatic facility west of Houston, or any diplomatic presence on the West Coast for the first time since 1971. Russian intelligence officers—at least those under diplomatic cover—will no longer operate in easy proximity to America’s two great tech capitals. Indeed, at least in Seattle, suspected Russia spies have already been caught attempting to infiltrate local tech companies.

“Certainly, there were enough issues that were important to the Russians in Seattle—the naval bases, Microsoft, Boeing, Amazon,” says John Sipher, a former CIA officer who worked closely with the FBI on counterespionage issues. “There was always nervousness within the national security agencies that the sheer number of ethnic Russians in these industries was something the Russians could take advantage of. I don’t know if closing Seattle was a strategic choice; nonetheless, the concentration of high-tech and military resources makes it a sensible target.”

After the closure of the Russian consulate in San Francisco, former senior U.S. intel officials told me that facility had, for decades, functioned as the primary hub for Russian intelligence-gathering in the Western United States. It featured key classified communications systems, and was a crucial collection center in Russia’s long-running effort to map out America’s fiber-optic cable network.

One of the two anonymous former intelligence officials I spoke with called Seattle a top-five U.S. city for Russian counterintelligence work, but a “smaller operation” than San Francisco. Seattle did not have the same type of communications facilities as San Francisco, the two former officials said. In fact, Russian diplomats used to regularly drive a van with protected diplomatic information from San Francisco to Seattle, said a second official, though the frequency of those trips decreased over time, when U.S. officials suspected the Russians had begun to move their communications to encrypted channels online.

Still, the Seattle area has some rich espionage targets. Firms like Boeing and Microsoft have long been of interest to Russian operatives, the former intel officials said. So have the many military bases in the area, including, pre-eminently, Naval Base Kitsap, located just across the Puget Sound from Seattle and home to eight nuclear-armed submarines. Administration officials have openly cited the Seattle consulate’s proximity to Boeing, and sensitive military bases, as reasons for its closure.

Because there is a seven-hour float from Kitsap to these nuclear-armed submarines’ dive point, the two former officials said, there are numerous opportunities to track the subs’ movements—a longstanding concern for U.S. intelligence and military officials. Knowing when a submarine is headed out to sea or how many submarines are running patrols at a given time, and potentially identifying new technologies on these vessels, are all valuable pieces of intelligence, these officials said. Moreover, U.S. intel officials have worried that in a worst-case-scenario—actual armed hostilities between the two countries—information gleaned from Russian operatives in the Pacific Northwest could be used to identify “choke points.” For instance, they might know the ideal places to fire a rocket-propelled grenade at a fishing boat in a narrow channel, which could prevent military vessels from deploying.

In the past, suspected intel operatives based at Russia’s Seattle consulate were observed engaging in the same sorts of behavior as their counterparts in San Francisco, the two former intel officials said, including tracking down potential fiber-optic nodes (as part of Russia’s long-term effort to map where data were being transferred), or Cold War-era intelligence-collection sites, in Northwestern forests. U.S. officials also believed Russian operatives were traveling to remote beaches in the area in order to “signal,” or cryptically transmit and receive data, with interlocutors offshore. (There was a specific beach in Oregon these individuals would favor, the two former officials said.)

More recently, however, these activities appeared to die down, these individuals said, an event one of the former intel officials attributes to Edward Snowden’s 2013 disclosures, which some in the intelligence community believe led Russia to overhaul its strategies for domestic intelligence-gathering. Generally, this person said, Seattle seemed like a “proving ground” for junior Russian intelligence officers, a place to send less-experienced operatives to acclimate them to the United States. After Snowden, U.S. intel officials started seeing more “travelers” in the Seattle area—suspected intelligence operatives working under both diplomatic and nonofficial cover—flying in remotely to meet with individuals, the two former officials said.

The biggest Russia-related concern in Seattle was “cyber-related activities,” which were separate from the consulate, the two former officials said—including those of the local Kaspersky Labs affiliate. In July 2017, U.S. officials banned Moscow-based Kaspersky, which produces anti-virus software, from being used on any government computers, over fears about the company’s connections to Russian intelligence. U.S. counterintelligence officials were concerned that Kaspersky was being used as a tool for Russian covert communications, the two former officials said, and were also examining whether individuals affiliated with Kaspersky were actual engaging in cyber-espionage domestically. “As a private company, Kaspersky Lab does not have inappropriate ties to any government, including Russia, and the company has never helped, nor will help, any government in the world with its cyber espionage efforts,” a spokesperson for Kaspersky said. “The U.S. government actions against Kaspersky Lab lack sufficient basis, are unconstitutional, have been taken without any evidence of wrongdoing by the company, and rely upon subjective, non-technical public sources, such as uncorroborated and often anonymously sourced media reports, related claims, and rumors, which is why the company has challenged the validity of these actions in federal court.“

“Was Kaspersky looking at Microsoft or Boeing as opportunities to exploit? Was it just business development? Or were they actually engaged in trying to penetrate these enterprises?” asked one of the former officials. “The suspicions on Kaspersky have pretty much been borne out … when you look at the recent U.S. government decision, and what has been publicly reported on what the Israelis have been able to find out.” In 2017 the New York Times reported that Israeli intelligence had hacked into a Russian espionage operation, observing Russian operatives using back doors in Kaspersky software to scan for, and purloin, U.S. intelligence documents.

Russia’s interest in Microsoft is also well-documented. In 2010, U.S. officials deported Alexey Karetnikov, a 23-year-old Russian national, from the Seattle area, where he had been working at Microsoft as a software tester. U.S. officials believed he was actually a Russian intelligence officer, and linked him to the ring of 10 “illegals”—Russian deep-cover operatives who had been living in the United States—that U.S. officials had arrested and deported earlier that year. Two of those undercover operatives, Michael Zottoli and Patricia Mills (whose real names are Mikhail Kutsik and Natalia Pereverzeva), had lived in Seattle for years, even starting a family there. In Seattle, Kutsik worked at a telecommunications firm, and both operatives took finance classes at the University of Washington. In a 2017 article in Seattle Met Magazine, Kutsik and Pereverzeva’s former investments professor said he believed the Russians were interested in his class because many of his students went on to work for Amazon, Boeing or Microsoft. Kutsik, Pereverzeva and Karetnikov were not known to have been coordinating their activities with the Seattle consulate, one of the former officials said.

Even as Russian espionage continues to migrate outside consular facilities—to travelers, and individuals working locally under nonofficial cover—it is “no coincidence” that both shuttered diplomatic outposts were on the West Coast, said one of the former officials. No matter when—or if—these two consulates are reopened, Russian interest in the West Coast is likely to continue far into the foreseeable future.

Zach Dorfman is senior fellow at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.

March 29, 2018


News and Views


ABOUT THE DANGER TO SOCIETY, THE SEVERITY OF THE SITUATION IS OBVIOUS FROM WATCHING THE NEWS. THE FOLLOWING QUOTATION SAYS IT ALL: “AN EXAMINATION OF 28 ATTACKS, WHICH CLAIMED NEARLY 150 LIVES AND WOUNDED HUNDREDS OF OTHERS ....” THE NUMBER OF CASUALTIES FROM ONLY 28 ATTACKS IS SHOCKING.

“MENTAL HEALTH AWARENESS” IS THE AREA IN WHICH WE FAIL PEOPLE MOST WHO HAVE TROUBLE IN DAILY LIFE. WHAT DO WE TOO OFTEN DO? MAKE FUN OF THEM, PUNISH THEM, DEMEAN THEM, FAIL TO GIVE THEM AN HONORABLE PLACE IN THE FAMILY CIRCLE, BULLY THEM, FAIL TO BE A HELPER TO THEM, FAIL TO LISTEN TO THEM, FAIL TO RESPECT THEM, FAIL TO REALLY CARE ABOUT THEM AND LET THEM KNOW THAT WE DO.

THEN THEY GO OUT INTO THE WORLD WITH A HEAVY LOAD OF GRIEF AND LOW SELF-ESTEEM, AND THEY FAIL MENTALLY. THEY MAY NOT BE “PSYCHOTIC,” “INTELLECTUALLY CHALLENGED,” OR EVEN “MENTALLY ILL,” (THE DEFINITION OF THOSE CHANGES CONSTANTLY AS NEW SCHOLARLY ARTICLES ARE WRITTEN), BUT THEY ARE STILL CAPABLE OF BREAKING DOWN MENTALLY AND EMOTIONALLY. IN MY YOUNGER YEARS, THE COMMON TERM WAS “NERVOUS BREAKDOWN.” IF IT’S A WOMAN WHO IS “DEPRESSED,” SHE IS LIKELY TO CUT HERSELF OR EVEN ATTEMPT SUICIDE, BUT IF IT’S A MAN, HE IS NOTICEABLY MORE LIKELY THAN WOMEN TO KILL SOMEONE ELSE -- OR DOZENS OF OTHERS -- AND THEN, AFTER THAT, HIMSELF. AT LEAST THAT’S THE WAY THE NEWS REPORTS SEEM TO TREND. I HAVE NEVER SEEN A REPORT OF A WOMAN TAKING AN AR-15 AND SHOOTING FIFTY OR A HUNDRED PEOPLE. I THINK WOMEN ARE MORE LIKELY TO KILL OUT OF A DEEP AND LONG-HELD AGGRIEVEMENT AGAINST SOMEONE WHO IS WELL-KNOWN TO THEM; IN OTHER WORDS, IT’S PERSONAL.

A FRIEND OF MINE IN WASHINGTON, DC TOLD ME THAT SHE HAD A BROTHER WHO WAS THE BRUNT OF EVERYONE’S “HUMOR” IN THE FAMILY, BECAUSE HE SEEMED INCOMPETENT TO THEM, AND UNDOUBTEDLY ALSO BECAUSE THE PARENTS ALLOWED THEM TO DO IT. AS HE GOT INTO HIS TEENAGED YEARS, THEY TOOK HIM TO A PSYCHOLOGIST FOR EXAMINATION. THEY ASKED THE DOCTOR WHAT WAS WRONG WITH THE BOY, AND HE SAID: “THERE’S NOTHING WRONG WITH HIM. HE’S JUST A PERFECTLY NICE PERSON IN A HIGHLY COMPETITIVE FAMILY.”

SOMETIMES LOVE IS HARD TO ACHIEVE, BUT DECENCY SHOULD BE POSSIBLE. OF COURSE, IF A FAMILY MEMBER, FRIEND, NEIGHBOR REALLY IS SERIOUSLY DISTURBED, THOSE CLOSE TO HIM DO NEED TO MAKE AN EFFORT TO INTERVENE, WITH CARING AND KINDNESS, AND BY CALLING AN AMBULANCE IF NECESSARY. DON’T TRY TO “HANDLE IT YOURSELF.”

FROM MY READING OF SO MANY NEWS ARTICLES, IT IS BETTER NOT TO CALL THE POLICE. THEY WILL COME WITH GUNS DRAWN AND IF THEY “FEAR FOR THEIR LIVES,” THEY WILL SHOOT TO KILL. THANK GOD, POLICE DEPARTMENTS IN SOME CITIES HAVE TAKEN THIS ISSUE SERIOUSLY, AND NOW BRING ANOTHER OFFICER WITH SPECIFIC TRAINING TO DETECT AND DEAL WITH MENTAL ILLNESS, “TALK THE PERSON DOWN.” THEY WILL THEN TAKE HIM TO A HOSPITAL. SOCIETY REALLY IS IMPROVING. IT JUST TAKES AWHILE.

IN THOSE CASES WHEN THE PERSON DOES BECOME DANGEROUS, A HANDFUL OF PILLS AND A PSYCHOLOGICAL APPOINTMENT EVERY TWO WEEKS PROBABLY WON’T BE ENOUGH. MANY HOSPITALS THESE DAYS DON’T KEEP A PATIENT IN THEIR FACILITY FOR LONGER THAN 30 DAYS OR SO (OFTEN THAT’S WHEN THE INSURANCE RUNS OUT), AND THEY PROBABLY WON’T BE “WELL” IN THAT TIME PERIOD. IT ISN’T JUST FAMILY AND COMMUNITY WHO FAIL, BUT THE TREATMENT SYSTEM, ALSO. AS A LOGICAL SOCIETY, WE NEED TO TAKE CARE OF MENTAL ILLNESS, OF COURSE, BUT ALSO REINFORCE OUR MANDATORY GUN BACKGROUND CHECKS THAT PREVENT HOSPITALIZED OR DEPRESSIVE INDIVIDUALS FROM GETTING A WEAPON. THOSE THINGS ARE OF EQUAL IMPORTANCE.

PRESIDENT TRUMP RECENTLY SAID THE OLD APHORISM THAT IT ISN’T THE GUN THAT IS THE PROBLEM, BUT THE MENTAL ILLNESS. I AGREE WITH HIM, SO I THINK EVERYONE WHO IS AT LEAST 21 YEARS OLD, AND WHO HAS NOT HAD A MENTAL ILLNESS OR A JAIL OR PRISON TERM SHOULD BE ABLE TO GET ONE PISTOL TO DEFEND HIMSELF, AND ONE LONG GUN TO SHOOT BUNNY RABBITS AND BAMBI IF THEY WILL EAT THE MEAT. JUST KILLING THEM BECAUSE THEY RUN FAST AND MAKE AN EXCITING TARGET IS INHUMANE. PUTTING THEIR HEAD UP ON THE WALL IS DISGUSTING.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/03/29/secret-service-mental-illness-stalks-many-suspects-mass-attacks/466251002/?csp=chromepush
64% of assailants in mass attacks suffered from symptoms of mental illness, Secret Service report finds
Kevin Johnson, USA TODAY Published 8:00 a.m. ET March 29, 2018 | Updated 8:57 a.m. ET March 29, 2018

Photograph -- Neurologist Dr. Jay Lombard and a group of high school students discuss the importance of mental health awareness in schools and methods for coping with stress. USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — A striking number of suspects linked to violent attacks in schools and other public places last year were stalked by symptoms of mental illness and nearly half were motivated by real or perceived personal grievances, a new Secret Service report has found.

An examination of 28 attacks, which claimed nearly 150 lives and wounded hundreds of others — from Orlando to Las Vegas — also found that more than three-quarters of the assailants engaged in suspicious communications or conduct that raised concerns from others in advance of the assaults, according to the report due for release Thursday.

The analysis, prepared by the Secret Service's National Threat Assessment Center, had been underway months before the Feb. 14 massacre at a Parkland, Fla., high school, but its findings are likely to further fuel concerns about the untreated mentally ill and their access to high-powered firearms.

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., greets Capitol Police special agent Crystal Griner as special agent David Bailey looks on during a Medal of Honor ceremony on Capitol Hill on Nov. 9, 2017. (Photo: Susan Walsh, AP)

In the Parkland case, which has reinvigorated a national debate on gun safety, social workers, mental health counselors, school administrators and law enforcement were all warned about Nikolas Cruz's deteriorating mental state and risk of violence before he allegedly launched the attack that left 17 dead.

The new Secret Service review builds on a lengthy, prior examination issued by the agency in 2015, which found that more than half of suspects involved in 43 attacks targeting government facilities or federal officials between 2001 and 2013 suffered symptoms of mental illness, including paranoia, delusions and suicidal thoughts.

In the new report, authorities found that 64% of suspects suffered from symptoms of mental illness. And in 25% of the cases, attackers had been "hospitalized or prescribed psychiatric medications" prior to the assaults.


Among the most glaring of those cases involved Devin Kelley, whose stunning November attack on a Texas church left 26 dead and 20 others wounded.

In the years leading up to the assault, Kelley battered his young stepson, menaced his former wife, was accused of sexual assault, had a history of stalking former girlfriends and in 2012 escaped from a mental health facility.

According to a police report related to Kelley's escape, the gunman — then a member of the U.S. Air Force — was hospitalized after he was charged by military authorities with fracturing the skull of his 1-year-old stepson.

The Air Force later acknowledged that it failed to flag Kelley as banned from buying the weapons he used in the attack because of his record of domestic violence. Using the same weapons, Kelley killed himself following the November church shooting.

The Sutherland Springs’ First Baptist Church massacre was one of two church shootings examined in the Secret Service report. Four school attacks also analyzed, along with 13 assaults involving places of business.

"These acts violated the safety of the places where we work, learn, shop, relax and otherwise conduct our day-to-day lives," the report stated. "The resulting loss of 147 lives and injury to nearly 700 others had a devastating impact on our nation as a whole."

One the incidents sent a shiver through the nation's capital last June when an Illinois man opened fire on Republican lawmakers with a modified assault rifle and handgun at northern Virginia baseball field.

Shortly after the attack, which left House Majority Whip Steve Scalise critically wounded and four others injured, the FBI described gunman James Hodgkinson as adrift and struggling to cope with an array of personal problems.

Plagued by financial difficulties, 66-year-old man who ultimately died in a shootout with police, had anger management problems and abruptly left a strained marriage in Belleville, Ill., more than month before the shooting to take up residence in a van on the outskirts of the nation's capital — along with his weapons.

He was prone to rage against the politics of President Trump and was carrying the names of six lawmakers in his pocket at the time he was fatally wounded.

"He was struggling in all kinds of different ways,'' FBI Assistant Director Tim Slater said a week after the attack.



THIS IS AN ARTICLE ON THE LOCK STEP BELIEF SYSTEM OF SO MANY REPUBLICANS, ESPECIALLY IN REGARD TO TRUMP. READ THE ARTICLE. SEVERAL OF THE COMMENTS ARE VERY FUNNY. SADLY THOSE WHO SEEM MOST INTELLIGENT TO ME, SUCH AS JEFF FLAKE OR JOHN KASICH HAVE A NUMBER OF TIMES BEEN HARASSED BY MEMBERS OF THEIR OWN PARTY AND POSSIBLE BLACKBALLED, SO THAT THEY LEAVE PUBLIC SERVICE; MOST REPUBLICANS CAN BE HEARD SPEAKING THE PARTY LINE ALMOST WORD FOR WORD. THIS VOW TO DIE FOR HIM IS EXTREME, HOWEVER.

“.... The central rationale of his campaign is that the incumbent, Dan Donovan, has not backed up the president enough on health care, taxes, “sanctuary cities” and the border wall. Grimm even said during an appearance on Fox in January that he’s “willing to die” for Trump.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2018/03/29/daily-202-loyalty-to-trump-emerges-as-a-top-issue-in-republican-primary-campaign-commercials/5abc494530fb042a378a2f32/?tid=pm_politics_pop
PowerPost Analysis
The Daily 202: Loyalty to Trump emerges as a top issue in Republican primary campaign commercials
By James Hohmann
March 29, 2018 at 7:57 AM
With Breanne Deppisch and Joanie Greve.

THE BIG IDEA:

Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette is running two commercials right now. One highlights the endorsement he’s received from President Trump in the race for governor. The other attacks his Republican primary opponent, Lt. Gov. Brian Calley, for calling on Trump to drop out after the “Access Hollywood” tape emerged in October 2016.

“With the White House and the Supreme Court hanging on the line, Brian Calley deserted Donald Trump — helping Hillary Clinton’s campaign,” a narrator says.

In the 2005 tape, Trump boasted in lewd terms about being able to get away with groping and kissing women. He also discussed an effort to seduce a married woman by taking her furniture shopping. “When you’re a star, they let you do it,” the future president said on a hot mic. “You can do anything.”

At the time, Calley said he’d write in Mike Pence’s name on his ballot if Trump didn’t step aside. “This is not a decision I take lightly because I still believe that a Hillary Clinton presidency represents a disastrous alternative,” he said then. Schuette also condemned Trump but didn’t withdraw his endorsement.

Naturally, none of that nuance comes through in the 30-second commercial. Calley has the strong endorsement of outgoing Gov. Rick Snyder (R), who also declined to vote for Trump in 2016, ahead of the Aug. 7 primary.

The escalation in Michigan’s air war mirrors what’s happening in other gubernatorial, House and Senate primaries across the country. Fealty to Trump has become more of a litmus test than ever for Republicans. Emboldened by private polling and focus groups that show the president is incredibly popular with the base, GOP candidates are stepping up attacks on their rivals over any daylight they’ve shown with Trump, even if it stemmed from his personal conduct toward women or apostasy on traditional conservative orthodoxy. It’s another illustration of the degree to which Trumpism has come to define the Republican Party. This is no longer the party of Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush. It’s the party of Donald J. Trump.

Support for Trump has also become one of the biggest flash points in the Ohio Republican primary for governor. Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor has intensified her attacks on Attorney General Mike DeWine, the heavy favorite in the May 8 contest to succeed outgoing Gov. John Kasich.

The pro-Taylor super PAC, Onward Ohio, has spent heavily over the past week to run a commercial contrasting DeWine with Trump. “If you like President Trump, then you won’t like Mike DeWine,” a narrator says. “In the Senate, DeWine voted with Hillary Clinton to let illegal immigrants receive Social Security. And in Ohio, DeWine allowed illegal immigrants to receive drivers’ licenses. … DeWine backs unfair trade with China and received an F from the NRA. President Trump is right on immigration, guns, and China. Mike DeWine wrong on all three.”

OH-Gov: Onward Ohio (Pro-Mary Taylor group) is up on TV today with this spot attacking Mike DeWine. We've tracked nearly $700K in spending behind it pic.twitter.com/BWVictcBTt

— Medium Buying (@MediumBuying) March 20, 2018
The pro-DeWine super PAC, Ohio Conservatives for a Change, has been sending mailers highlighting Taylor’s endorsement of Kasich during the 2016 Republican primaries. (Never mind that DeWine and Taylor endorsed Kasich together in September 2015!) “Ohio Can’t Afford a 3rd Kasich Term,” the mailer says.

.@MaryTaylorOH supported John Kasich’s bid for president and touted her experience working “hand in hand” with him. Taylor wanted Kasich in the White House, not President Trump. #OHGov pic.twitter.com/gJIrh2NbSn

— Ohio Conservatives (@ConservativesOH) March 26, 2018
Taylor has distanced herself from Kasich, who she’s served under over the past eight years, as he continues to flirt with a potential run against the president in 2020. The outgoing governor will hold a “fireside chat” in New Hampshire at New England College on April 3. A poll published last week by Baldwin Wallace University showed Trump crushing Kasich in Ohio, 62 percent to 27 percent, in a hypothetical 2020 head-to-head matchup.

One reason Republican candidates are leaning so hard into the Trump loyalty issue is that it proved quite potent last year in Virginia. Corey Stewart, despite having no real establishment support and being dramatically outraised, came within about a point of toppling former Republican National Committee chairman Ed Gillespie in the June 2017 primary for governor. Stewart chaired Trump’s 2016 campaign in Virginia and referred to Gillespie as “anti-Trump” in his ads.

In Tennessee, where there’s a four-way race for the GOP gubernatorial nomination, Rep. Diane Black has been on the air this month with a spot built around footage of Trump praising her at the signing ceremony for the tax cut bill in December. “Diane? Come on up. Diane Black, thank you,” Trump said in the Rose Garden. “Helping write the president’s tax cut was one of my proudest moments,” the congresswoman says.

In South Carolina, Republican Gov. Henry McMaster — who got the job when Nikki Haley resigned to become ambassador to the United Nations — just launched a web video touting Trump’s endorsement in the face of a primary challenge. It features a clip of Trump saying, “He’s going to be, for many years, a great governor.” Then McMaster says to camera, “We finally have a president in the White House who believes in the people of our country. … We must do the same in South Carolina.”

Challenger Catherine Templeton has downplayed McMaster’s sway with Trump backers. “Like Trump, (Templeton) is an outsider willing to shake up the do-nothing establishment career politicians,” her spokeswoman said when the governor recently touted his ties to the White House.

In Pennsylvania, the two GOP candidates for governor are trying to outdo each other in who can praise Trump more. State Sen. Scott Wagner, a wealthy businessman, paid for 20,000 Trump lawn signs during the summer of 2016. “While many political leaders refused to support Donald Trump, Scott Wagner was leading the charge,” says a Wagner mailer that’s been going to Republican households.

Businessman Paul Mango, who spent his career at McKinsey and hasn’t run for office before, says “there’s a lot of similarity between the president’s agenda and my agenda.”

“I absolutely love the president and what he's doing,” he said in a radio interview last fall. “I just have to give the guy all the credit in the world for fighting these Democrats.”

The Trump loyalty test is also taking center stage in Senate GOP primaries.

Indiana Rep. Todd Rokita released a web video on Tuesday attacking his opponent, Rep. Luke Messer, as a “Never Trump lobbyist.” The narrator describes Rokita as “a pro-Trump conservative.” They are vying to take on Sen. Joe Donnelly (D) in a state Trump carried by 19 points.

Arizona Rep. Martha McSally, the establishment favorite for the Republican nomination to replace retiring Sen. Jeff Flake (R), has been under fire for months from two primary challengers for refusing to say whether she voted for Trump. “Not your business,” she snapped at a Los Angeles Times reporter who asked at a Republican banquet in Phoenix. “I made a couple of, a very small number of, statements about particular statements that were made, and on the spectrum of things, it was very measured compared with a lot of other Republicans.”

In fact, this is what she said after the “Access Hollywood” tape:

Trump's comments are disgusting. Joking about sexual assault is unacceptable. I'm appalled.

— Martha McSally (@MarthaMcSally) October 8, 2016

But McSally has gone out of her way on the stump recently to link herself with Trump and talk up the face time she’s had with him. “Like our president, I'm tired of PC politicians and their BS excuses,” she says in a web video. Joe Arpaio, the former county sheriff who was pardoned by Trump, and Kelli Ward, a former state senator, have both called her pro-Trump comments disingenuous.

Nevada Sen. Dean Heller (R) declined to say who he voted for in 2016 until after he drew a primary challenge from Danny Tarkanian last summer. Then, within a week, he disclosed that he had backed Trump. The White House cleared the field for him two weeks ago by having Trump endorse Tarkanian for House and Heller for Senate. (The Nevada Democratic Party prepared a memo on the ways Heller embraced Trump to shore up base support before locking down the nomination.)

Mississippi Sen. Roger Wicker (R) launched an attack ad early this month against primary challenger Chris McDaniel over Facebook posts he wrote back in 2016, when he initially endorsed Ted Cruz for the nomination. The commercial claimed that McDaniel called Trump supporters delusional based on this quote: “Donald Trump is a strong candidate who will do well in Mississippi. But the inclination of some of his supporters to promote wild-eyed conspiracy theories and flat out lies is incredibly disturbing.” A week after the spot went up, McDaniel switched from running against Wicker to running for the seat that opened with the resignation of Sen. Thad Cochran (R) for health reasons.

In House primaries, Republicans are also using TV ads to emphasize their devotion to Trump.

The North Carolina rematch between Rep. Robert Pittenger and Mark Harris has become one of the most acrimonious in the country. Both men are accusing the other of exaggerating their support for Trump. Harris lost by just 134 votes in 2016, so he decided to run again. Last month, Pittenger ran a commercial that said, “Mark Harris worked to stop a Trump presidency.” The citation was an interview he gave supporting Cruz before the convention in Cleveland. This week, Harris released a response ad decrying it as “more lies” from “just another Washington politician.” The response notes that Pittenger falsely claimed Trump had endorsed him on Twitter when he had not.

In the New Jersey Republican primary to succeed the retiring GOP Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen, assemblyman Jay Webber has gone after first-time candidate Tony Ghee for declining to say who he voted for in 2016. Ghee has also been attacked for retweeting criticism last year of Trump’s response to the white supremacist rally, and ensuing violence, in Charlottesville.

Katie Arrington, a state representative, is challenging Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.) on the grounds he’s been too critical of Trump. “Too many Washington politicians only want to attack our president,” she said in her debut commercial last month, referring to Sanford. “I am running for Congress to help pass President Trump’s bold, conservative agenda.” Arrington's campaign consultant, Michael Mule, said the spot’s goal was to depict Sanford as “an anti-Trumper.” “You'll see it on Fox News quite a bit,” he told the Charleston Post & Courier.

On Staten Island, felon and former congressman Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.) — who served time in prison for tax evasion — is trying to win back his old seat by waging a primary challenge against his successor. The central rationale of his campaign is that the incumbent, Dan Donovan, has not backed up the president enough on health care, taxes, “sanctuary cities” and the border wall. Grimm even said during an appearance on Fox in January that he’s “willing to die” for Trump.



LAURA INGRAHAM WENT ON THE ATTACK YESTERDAY, BUT FOLLOWED IT UP TODAY WITH AN APOLOGY. I DO BELIEVE THAT THE SPIRIT OF AMERICA THE BEAUTIFUL HAS BEEN AROUSED BY MANY OF THE TRUMP FOLLOWERS’ BEHAVIOR. THOSE OF US WHO ARE OLD ENOUGH TO REMEMBER, WANT TO KEEP WHAT WE HAD IN THIS COUNTRY.

“WE DO NOT … CONDONE THE INAPPROPRIATE COMMENTS MADE BY THIS BROADCASTER,” TRIPADVISOR SAID IN A STATEMENT. “IN OUR VIEW, THESE STATEMENTS FOCUSED ON A HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT, CROSS THE LINE OF DECENCY.”

I DO BELIEVE THAT IN THIS AGE OF MONEY, MONEY, AND MORE MONEY, THE POWER OF THE BOYCOTT IS STRONGER THAN THAT OF STREET MARCHES, EXCEPT WHEN THE RULING CLASS KNOWS VERY WELL THAT THE MARCH IS A MERCIFUL SUBSTITUTE FOR BLOODY RIOTING. IN THE CASE OF THESE STUDENTS, IT’S A LITTLE OF BOTH. I WISH THEM WELL. P.S. THANK YOU ALL FOR STANDING UP TO LAURA INGRAHAM, BECAUSE SHE’S AN A#1 AH. (SORRY, LAURA. THAT WAS UNKIND.)

THE FOLLOWING IS HER DISGUSTING REFERENCE TO CHRISTIANITY IN THIS CONTEXT: “... IN THE SPIRIT OF HOLY WEEK, I APOLOGIZE...” SOMEBODY SHOULD EXPLAIN TO HER THAT SUCH A STATEMENT IS SACRILEGE. SHE REMINDS ME OF JOAN RIVERS -- SOMETIMES FUNNY, BUT ALWAYS UNKIND. WE DON’T NEED THAT IN THIS COUNTRY. THAT ISN’T WHAT FREEDOM OF SPEECH IS FOR.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2018/03/29/laura-ingraham-savaged-for-taunting-parkland-activist-over-college-rejections/
Morning Mix
Facing boycott, Laura Ingraham apologizes for taunting Parkland teen over college rejections
By Amy B Wang and Allyson Chiu
March 29, 2018 at 3:45 PM


Fox News host Laura Ingraham has apologized a day after taunting Parkland shooting survivor David Hogg over his college rejections.

On Wednesday morning, the “Ingraham Angle” host had tweeted a story from a conservative news site that described Hogg as a “Gun Rights Provocateur” who had not gained acceptance to four University of California schools.

“David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it,” Ingraham tweeted. “(Dinged by UCLA with a 4.1 GPA…totally predictable given acceptance rates.)”

Ingraham appeared to take back her comments Thursday afternoon, hours after Hogg sent a tweet calling for advertisers to boycott her Fox News show. Hogg’s widely shared tweet resulted in at least three brands promising to sever their relationships with Ingraham before she apologized.

“On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland,” Ingraham tweeted. She also tried to curtail the damage by noting Hogg had appeared on her show after the shooting.

Any student should be proud of a 4.2 GPA —incl. @DavidHogg111. On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland. For the record, I believe my show was the first to feature David...(1/2)

— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 29, 2018
... immediately after that horrific shooting and even noted how "poised" he was given the tragedy. As always, he’s welcome to return to the show anytime for a productive discussion. WATCH: https://t.co/5wcd00wWpd (2/2)

— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 29, 2018
Hogg said he felt the apology was merely an effort to save her advertisers.

“I will only accept your apology only if you denounce the way your network has treated my friends and I in this fight,” Hogg tweeted Thursday. “It’s time to love thy neighbor, not mudsling at children.”

Ingraham had faced immediate backlash over her original tweet from those shocked she would attack a 17-year-old student who had survived the Feb. 14 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. Among the outraged were people who reminded Ingraham, simply, that she was a mother, and Hogg’s 14-year-old sister, who accused the Fox News host of stooping to a “real low” to boost her ratings.

How low are your ratings @IngrahamAngle that you have to start attacking my brother’s grades to get attention? If you ask me, he is more articulate than you and has far better character. Man, that’s real low even for you. Coming from a 14 year old, please grow up. #NeverAgain https://t.co/CgUVeGRfxP

— Lauren Hogg (@lauren_hoggs) March 28, 2018

The shooting in Florida — already one of several to take place at a school in 2018 — left 17 students and staff members dead, and galvanized a new generation of activists, including many teenagers from Parkland.

Hogg has been one of the most vocal, speaking at the March for Our Lives rally against gun violence in Washington, D.C. Since the shooting, the teen has frequently appeared on television and rallied his growing number of Twitter followers to become civically engaged if they are frustrated with the status quo.

On Wednesday, however, Hogg remained silent — at first.

Hours later, though, he emerged with a tweet directed at the “Ingraham Angle” host. Who were her biggest advertisers? He wondered rhetorically.

Soooo @IngrahamAngle what are your biggest advertisers ... Asking for a friend. #BoycottIngramAdverts

— David Hogg (@davidhogg111) March 29, 2018

Shortly afterward, he tweeted to his nearly 600,000 followers a list of 12 companies that were reportedly the top advertisers on “The Ingraham Angle.”

Pick a number at random, Hogg suggested, and contact the company next to it.

Pick a number 1-12 contact the company next to that #

Top Laura Ingraham Advertisers
1. @sleepnumber
2. @ATT
3. Nutrish
4. @Allstate & @esurance
5. @Bayer
6. @RocketMortgage Mortgage
7. @LibertyMutual
8. @Arbys
9. @TripAdvisor
10. @Nestle
11. @hulu
12. @Wayfair

— David Hogg (@davidhogg111) March 29, 2018

Before long, the tweet was flooded with replies from Hogg’s supporters, some of whom pasted images of their messages to the companies in question, as well as those who accused Hogg of “bullying” Ingraham.

At this writing, several companies had responded to Hogg’s boycott call.

“We are in the process of removing our ads from Laura Ingraham’s program,” Nutrish tweeted Thursday morning.

TripAdvisor pointed to one of its company values — “We are better together” — in its decision to stop advertising with Ingraham’s show.

“We do not … condone the inappropriate comments made by this broadcaster,” TripAdvisor said in a statement. “In our view, these statements focused on a high school student, cross the line of decency.”

Online home goods retailer Wayfair told the Hill that Ingraham’s personal criticism of Hogg was “not consistent with our values.”

Nestle told ThinkProgress it had no plans to buy future ads on the show.

It was unclear if any of the brands would change their minds following Ingraham’s apology Thursday afternoon.

[ The extraordinary number of kids who have endured school shootings since Columbine ]

Since the 2016 election, calls to boycott retailers have become frequent: The #GrabYourWallet campaign began as a way to protest President Trump and identified companies that carried merchandise bearing the Trump name. Those calls have been met with some equally passionate responses by Trump’s supporters on the right, who say they are determined to support the president and his family with their buying power.

On Thursday, #GrabYourWallet co-founder Shannon Coulter said she hadn’t spoken to Hogg directly but had seen his boycott call go viral the night before. To her, the campaign wasn’t a matter of politics so much as it was a response to “really egregious violations of basic human decency,” Coulter said, referring to Ingraham’s tweet about Hogg’s college rejections.

“Corporate America has a really positive role to play in preventing that kind of targeted harassment,” Coulter told The Washington Post. “It’s not just that one tweet. It’s that [Ingraham’s] signaling to her large audience that it’s okay to do that. Particularly when minors are concerned I think there’s a line that corporations can draw that apparently Laura Ingraham’s parents didn’t draw.”

Hogg was not immediately available for comment Thursday morning. Despite the backlash, Ingraham’s original tweet about Hogg’s college rejections has remained online.

In an interview with TMZ on Tuesday, Hogg had spoken about receiving rejection letters from California colleges and in doing so sparked derision from conservatives — including Ingraham.

David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it. (Dinged by UCLA with a 4.1 GPA...totally predictable given acceptance rates.) https://t.co/wflA4hWHXY

— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) March 28, 2018
Hogg, who has a 4.2 GPA and a SAT score of 1270, was accepted to Florida Atlantic University, California Polytechnic State University and California State University San Marcos, TMZ reported.

During the TMZ interview he expressed disappointment about the rejections but said it has been difficult to focus on college lately.

“We’re changing the world,” he said.

Since the tweet was posted, Ingraham has received backlash on social media. Ingraham was previously criticized for telling professional basketball players to “shut up and dribble.”

Many have viewed her recent actions — the latest in a slew of right-wing attacks against the Parkland survivors — as particularly appalling, given that she is a parent.

You’re a mother.

— Bess Kalb (@bessbell) March 28, 2018
Journalist David Corn described Ingraham’s tweet as “deplorable.”

Laura, you're a parent. This is pretty deplorable. https://t.co/nLXrgmZhm0

— David Corn (@DavidCornDC) March 28, 2018
Others were shocked that she was “picking on” a student who survived a school shooting.

Are you really picking on a teenager who just watched his classmates die in pools of their own blood less than two months ago?

— Brooke Binkowski (@brooklynmarie) March 28, 2018
While Ingraham has been the most recent target of criticism, she is not the only adult who has faced backlash for attacking the high school students.

Just days ago, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) and his campaign team came under fire for posting a meme on Facebook about Emma González, another Parkland student and activist, The Washington Post’s Samantha Schmidt reported. The meme was criticized as attacking González’s Cuban heritage.

The Parkland survivors have been fiercely targeted since they first spoke out after the shooting, and the attacks have only continued, as The Post’s Abby Ohlheiser reported.

On Twitter, civil rights attorney Lisa Bloom said Ingraham’s tweet may be a sign that Hogg has “really gotten under Fox News’ skin.”

More from Morning Mix:

This high school rejected NRA ‘blood money’ for rifle team. Locals donated instead.

The horns were so loud they wrecked the violist’s hearing — and his career

Rick Santorum: ‘I did misspeak’ in telling kids to learn CPR instead of marching for gun control

Walmart pulls Cosmopolitan from checkout aisles after pressure from anti-porn group

Amy B Wang is a general assignment reporter covering national and breaking news for The Washington Post. She joined The Post in 2016 after seven years with the Arizona Republic. Follow @amybwang

FOR FUN, LOOK AT THESE PHOTOGRAPHS: https://www.google.com/search?q=Gun+Rights+Provocateur&tbm=isch&source=iu&ictx=1&fir=fsmNCvfgiRGMMM%253A%252CDTyi9uC4XqcQ1M%252C_&usg=__592JcDZv2QWHM1o3BYiwA_TNKk8%3D&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiIs6zMw5LaAhUEv1MKHezLCUkQ9QEIWzAK#imgdii=SgfnNvNdBYxa4M:&imgrc=fsmNCvfgiRGMMM:


A NEW TRUMP SCANDAL

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/exclusive-cabinet-trouble-trump-epa-chief-lived-condo/story?id=54095310
EXCLUSIVE: More Cabinet trouble for Trump? EPA chief lived in condo tied to lobbyist 'power couple'
By JOHN SANTUCCI, MATTHEW MOSK STEPHANIE EBBS
Mar 29, 2018, 4:22 PM ET

COMING UP -- Scott Pruitt: Everything you need to know

For much of his first year in Washington, President Trump’s EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt occupied prime real estate in a townhouse near the U.S. Capitol that is co-owned by the wife of a top energy lobbyist, property records from 2017 show.

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Neither the EPA nor the lobbyist, J. Steven Hart, would say how much Pruitt paid to live at the prime Capitol Hill address, though Hart said he believed it to be the market rate. The price tag on Pruitt’s rental arrangement is one key question when determining if it constitutes an improper gift, ethics experts told ABC News.

PHOTO: A townhouse near the U.S. Capitol where EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt is said to have stayed. The building is co-owned by the wife of a top energy lobbyist, property records from 2017 show. ABC News
A townhouse near the U.S. Capitol where EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt is said to have stayed. The building is co-owned by the wife of a top energy lobbyist, property records from 2017 show. more +

“I think it certainly creates a perception problem, especially if Mr. Hart is seeking to influence the agency,” said Bryson Morgan, the former investigative counsel at the U.S. House of Representatives Office of Congressional Ethics. “That’s why there is a gift rule.”

Hart confirmed to ABC News in a brief interview that Pruitt had lived in the flat, which is owned by a limited liability company that links to an address listed to Hart and his wife Vicki Hart, a lobbyist with expertise in the healthcare arena. Steven Hart said Vicki Hart co-owns the condo. He said his wife was not the majority owner, but would not identify her partners.

“I have no ownership interest,” he said. “Obviously, I know the owners.”

Vicki Hart does no lobbying involving the EPA, her husband said. Her website says she previously worked as a senior health policy advisor for two Senate Majority Leaders before establishing her firm in 2002.

Steven Hart served in the Reagan Justice Department and became, according to his website, is one of the nation’s top fundraisers, donating more than $110,000 to Republican political candidates and committees last election cycle, records show.

In 2010, the newspaper Roll Call referred to the Harts as a “lobbyist power couple.”

PHOTO: From left, Rep. John Dingell, Steve Hart, Debbie Dingell, and Vicki Hart at an event at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., April 16, 2013.Tony Powell/Washington Life Magazine, FILE

From left, Rep. John Dingell, Steve Hart, Debbie Dingell, and Vicki Hart at an event at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., April 16, 2013.more

Mr. Hart is the chairman and CEO of Williams and Jensen, a firm that reported more than $16 million in federal lobbying income in 2017, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Among his many clients are the NRA, for whom he serves as outside legal counsel.

Just last year, Cheniere Energy Inc. reported paying Hart’s firm $80,000.

Hart’s firm specifically lobbied on “issues related to the export of liquefied natural gas (LNG), approval of LNG exports and export facilities.” The firm also lists on its website that it lobbies on other EPA policies like the Clean Air Act.

EPA spent almost $118,000 on Scott Pruitt's flights, many of them first class
Environmental groups launch ads on Fox & Friends to 'boot Pruitt'
EPA chief Scott Pruitt defends Italy trip after increased scrutiny of travel costs
Cheniere Energy Inc. owned the only active Liquid Natural Gas export plant in the United States at the time. Liquid natural gas exports was on the agenda for discussion during Pruitt’s December 2017 trip to Morocco, according to an agency press release.

On the trip, Pruitt pitched “the potential benefit of liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports on Morocco’s economy,” the release said.

PHOTO: EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, right, meets with Moroccan Minister of Energy, Mines and Sustainable Development, Aziz Rabbah during a trip to Morocco in December of 2017.Environmental Protection Agency
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, right, meets with Moroccan Minister of Energy, Mines and Sustainable Development, Aziz Rabbah during a trip to Morocco in December of 2017.more +

The revelations about Pruitt’s living situation come as more questions are being raised by members of Congress about his travel habits. The Morocco trip was one of Pruitt’s most expensive. ABC News has learned that Pruitt, his head of security, and an additional member of his staff, Samantha Dravis, all flew first class on the trip.

The EPA inspector general expanded an audit of Pruitt's travel to include the Morocco trip in response to a request from Sen. Tom Carper, the ranking Democrat on a committee with oversight of EPA. Carper specifically asked the agency watchdog to look into whether Pruitt's activities on the trip were “in line with EPA's mission 'to protect human health and the environment.”

Both environmental groups and members of Congress pointed out that the jurisdiction over natural gas exports typically falls to the Department of Energy - not the EPA.

PHOTO: A photo obtained by ABC News shows EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt deplaning a military-owned plane in June 2017 at New Yorks John F. Kennedy International Airport.Obtained by ABC News

A photo obtained by ABC News shows EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt deplaning a military-owned plane in June 2017 at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport.

Cheniere Energy spokeswoman Rachel Carmichel told ABC News the company ended its relationship with Hart’s firm in December 2017. The spokeswoman went on to say Cheniere was unaware of the relationship and had not used Hart’s firm to have conversations with the EPA.

Another lobbying client of Hart’s, the railroad Norfolk Southern, spent $160,000 last year on lobbying Congress on “issues affecting coal usage, oil production, and transportation, including EPA regulation.”

Norfolk Southern also declined to comment when reached by ABC News.

Morgan, an ethics expert in private practice in Washington, D.C., said the lobbying connection only further muddies the living arrangement. He said the rental agreement could create ethics problems for Pruitt even if he did reimburse his landlord for rent.

“What are the terms of the rental agreement?” Morgan asked. “It’s not just a question if he is paying market rent. Was he given the ability to end it immediately? Would someone come after him if he were not to pay rent?”

Morgan said the most recent guidance from the Office of Government Ethics “emphasized that executive branch officials should decline even a permissible gift if it could cause the public to question their integrity or impartiality.”

EPA spokesman Jahan Wilcox declined to answer questions about the arrangement.

Vicki Hart reached on her cell phone, said she would call back to discuss the matter but never did.

Steven Hart declined to address details of the rental agreement, saying it was a private matter and up to Pruitt to decide whether they should be made public.

The White House has not responded to a request for comment from ABC News.

ABC News' Katherine Faulders and Ali Dukakis contributed to this report


“THERE IS SO MUCH MUELLER KNOWS THAT WE SIMPLY DON'T; THIS COULD BE THE TIP OF AN ICEBERG OR AN EXTRANEOUS FACT. BUT THOSE SIX WORDS DO SEEM AT LEAST A LITTLE CONSPICUOUS.” THIS WOULD BE THE PERFECT ENDING TO A CHAPTER IN A SPY OR MURDER MYSTERY, WOULDN’T IT?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2018/03/28/mueller-just-drew-the-most-direct-line-to-date-between-the-trump-campaign-and-russia/
Mueller just drew his most direct line to date between the Trump campaign and Russia
By Aaron Blake March 28, 2018

Photograph -- Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III departs after a meeting on Capitol Hill on June 21. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)

Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's investigation just drew what appears to be its most direct line to date between President Trump's 2016 campaign and Russia.

That line is drawn in a new court filing related to the upcoming sentencing of London attorney Alex van der Zwaan. Van der Zwaan has pleaded guilty to lying about his contacts with deputy Trump campaign manager Rick Gates and a person identified in the document only as "Person A." Person A appears to be a former Ukraine-based aide to Gates and former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort named Konstantin Kilimnik.

Here's the paragraph:

Fourth, the lies and withholding of documents were material to the Special Counsel’s Office’s investigation. That Gates and Person A were directly communicating in September and October 2016 was pertinent to the investigation. Federal Bureau of Investigation Special Agents assisting the Special Counsel’s Office assess that Person A has ties to Russian intelligence service and had such ties in 2016. During his first interview with the Special Counsel’s Office, van der Zwaan admitted that he knew of that connection, stating that Gates told him Person A was a former Russian Intelligence Officer with GRU.

That Person A has had ties to Russian intelligence is not terribly surprising. Kilimnik's personal history has been examined extensively by the media, including The Washington Post. He has denied being involved in Russian intelligence, but he served in the Russian military and attended a Russian military foreign language university that is seen as a breeding ground for intelligence agents.

What's particularly significant in the Mueller filing, though, are six words: “and had such ties in 2016.” Prosecutors have said previously that a longtime Manafort and Gates associate had ties to Russian intelligence, but they have never said those ties remained during the 2016 campaign. In December, they said this associate was “a longtime Russian colleague . . . who is currently based in Russia and assessed to have ties to a Russian intelligence service.” Why those six words were added in this filing when they didn't appear in the previous filing is the $64,000 question.

As Philip Bump details here, this is hardly the first public indication of a link between the Trump campaign and Russia, but it is the closest connection Mueller has made in a filing to this point. Mueller hasn't weighed in on the alleged Kremlin ties of the Russian lawyer Donald Trump Jr. met with, for instance, nor has he filed anything involving Roger Stone's contacts with hackers who have been linked to Russia.

The other new piece here is that Mueller's team says Gates described Person A (again, apparently Kilimnik) as “a former Russian Intelligence Officer with GRU.” (GRU is Russia's military intelligence organization.) So according to van der Zwaan, Gates talked openly about Person A's ties to Russian intelligence. Kilimnik told The Post in June that he has “no relation to the Russian or any other intelligence service.” Mueller is now apparently directly disputing that using Gates's own words, via van der Zwaan.

Ever since his guilty plea last month, van der Zwaan's relation to the case has been unclear. We know he is the son-in-law of a prominent Russian Ukrainian banker, but as with other figures in this case, we have no idea why he lied to investigators. Was it an honest mistake, or was he covering something up?

The new van der Zwaan filing doesn't shed a whole bunch of new light on that, but it does suggest that Mueller views Kilimnik as a possible link between the Trump campaign and Russia, and that he believes Kilimnik hasn't been forthcoming about his ties to Russian intelligence. We also know that Manafort had been in contact with Kilimnik during the 2016 campaign, meeting him at least twice and asking him to provide private briefings about the 2016 election to Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch who is closely tied to Vladimir Putin.

Whether that's pertinent to the broader collusion investigation is something we'll have to wait to find out. There is so much Mueller knows that we simply don't; this could be the tip of an iceberg or an extraneous fact. But those six words do seem at least a little conspicuous.



I’M NOT BIG ON PURE ECONOMICS, BUT IT OFTEN DOES HIGHLIGHT SOCIAL ISSUES AS WELL AS MONEY MATTERS. THIS IS A GREAT STORY FROM THAT ANGLE. IT IS A DISCUSSION ON THE RISE OF SUPPORT FOR DEMOCRATS, WHICH ALONG WITH THE AMAZING PERFORMANCE OF BERNIE SANDERS AND HIS PLANS FOR THE USA, ARE SHOWING A DRIFT TOWARD THE LIGHT AND AWAY FROM THE DARKNESS OF MONEY OVER PEOPLE, IN MY VIEW, OR AT LEAST I HOPE SO.

IT’S HAPPENING PARTLY BECAUSE VOTERS HAVE BEEN GETTING POORER AND POORER LATELY, AND THERE IS A DANGEROUS TREND TOWARD AN INCREASING LOSS OF TRACTION BY THOSE WHO’S FAMILY INCOME IS LESS THAN $50,000 A YEAR. LOSING OUR HOUSES DUE TO A MEDICAL BILL IS MORE AND MORE LIKELY NOW. LIKEWISE, TRUMP’S ATTEMPT TO BAN MANY NEWCOMERS TO THE USA WHO MAY BE OF ISLAMIC BACKGROUND -- AND SIMILAR STRIKES AGAINST AN OPEN AND FREE AMERICA -- ARE TRULY DISTURBING TO MANY AMERICANS.

PLACES LIKE WASHINGTON DC ARE DISTRESSING TO SOME BECAUSE THERE MAY BE A HIGHER INCIDENCE OF CRIME THAN IN A SMALL CITY OF 20,000, BUT THERE IS ALSO A MUCH WIDER RANGE OF THINGS TO DO WHEN WE AREN’T AT WORK, MORE PEOPLE OF BEAUTIFUL DIFFERENCES SUCH AS SARIS IN GORGEOUS COLORS, VENDORS ON THE STREET WHERE YOU CAN BUY FOOD OR SMALL ITEMS FOR CHRISTMAS GIFTS, ETC. I LOVE JACKSONVILLE, BUT I MISS WASHINGTON AND CHAPEL HILL VERY MUCH.

IN OTHER WORDS, LOVING WAR AND ALL-WHITE SOCIETY IS NOT THE ONLY WAY TO BE PATRIOTIC. WHAT WE’RE SEEING, I THINK, IS A BACKLASH AGAINST THE FAR RIGHT. THEIR VIEW OF LIFE IS OPPRESSIVE TO OTHERS WHO DO NOT SHARE IT, AND THERE ARE OPEN AND OUTSPOKEN LIBERALS ALSO FOR COMPANIONSHIP. ADD IN THOSE SPOOKY-LOOKING TINFOIL HATS, WHICH STRIKE SOME OF US AS BEING DANGEROUSLY BORDERLINE PSYCHOTIC, AND THE FAR RIGHT ARE LOSING GROUND LITTLE BY LITTLE IN THE ESTEEM OF A LARGER AND LARGER PROPORTION OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. I WILL POINT ALSO POLITICAL POLLS SINCE THE ELECTION. BEFORE TRUMP WAS ELECTED, HIS NUMBERS WERE RISING, BUT NOW THAT HE’S BEEN IN FOR A YEAR, THEY ARE GOING DOWN. ALL IN ALL, THAT ISN’T SURPRISING TO ME.

https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/316785/in-slow-shift-walmart-tilting-democrat.html
In Slow Shift, Walmart Tilting Democrat
by Sarah Mahoney @mahoney_sarah, Yesterday
March 29, 2018

In an era when consumers are increasingly scrutinizing brands for their political leanings, Walmart has always been a sure bet as a red state stalwart. Just as Starbucks is cast as the beverage of choice for those lefty, latte-sipping elitists, Walmart has seemed the safest haven for gun-totin’ ’mericans.

Not so fast. New data from the YouGov BrandIndex shows that Walmart has been steadily creeping into the hearts of Democrats. More say they would consider purchasing something at Walmart, moving from negative five years ago to positive, and surpassing the purchase consideration of Independents. And perhaps most remarkably, it seems to have pulled off this feat without losing favor among Republican shoppers. YouGov CEO Ted Marzilli tells Marketing Daily what the new data means.

Q. So this is a big change. In early 2013, 43% of Democrats said they’d consider buying something from Walmart they time they went shopping, and now it’s 52%. And they’ve closed the gap from a 22 percentage point difference with Republicans five years ago to just 3 percentage points now. What’s happening?

A. Over the last five years, Walmart seems to have made inroads with consumers who identify as Democrats. In April 2015, for instance, it sided with companies like Apple in protesting religious freedom laws, which might have opened the doors to LGBT discrimination. It’s raised the minimum wage for workers, a cause Democrats identify with most. And last month, it increased the minimum age for gun buyers to 21 years old. And it hasn’t given up much to Republican consumers. It seems like it’s been able to walk that fine line, appealing to Democratic consumers without alienating their conservative consumers.

Q. Walmart seems to be good at taking these steps in quiet ways, so that conservatives either don’t notice or object. It did protest religious freedom laws, for example, but it didn’t take the bold step Target did of creating gender-neutral bathrooms. And as you say, it did raise the age for gun purchases from 18 to 21, but not until Dick’s Sporting Goods did so, and hence drew the most social media a fire. Do you think this kind of tip-toeing is part of the Walmart strategy?

A. I think you’re onto something. We find, with brands in crises, it’s often better to be going through the crisis second or third—those brands tend to get less attention. Is it intentional, or serendipitous? I don’t know. If it is their strategy, the data suggest it is a good one.

Q. An announcement made by the National Center on Sexual Exploitation said the magazine contributes to the hyper-sexualization of women. Many people might have expected it to make such a decision based on a Christian family-values group. Can that alter perception?

A. That just happened, so we don’t have data on it. That Walmart is sympathetic to what would seem to be a more left-leaning group is interesting. But in general, the magnitude and breadth of the #MeToo movement in recent months have made it less of a political issue—Republicans and Democrats are saying, “There’s a problem here.”

Q. Can brands be apolitical these days?

A. To a degree. Take Amazon. I expected it to skew more Democratic, in part because of Jeff Bezos’ political activity. There is a difference in how consumers who identify as Democrats versus Republicans see it, but it’s small. I wouldn’t call it a polarized brand. Starbucks is a different story. Starbucks has become part of the lexicon. It’s political-speak for the right to deride the liberals who drink high-priced coffees, like Starbucks. That does show up in the data. Chick-fil-A is another polarized brand.

Q. How do class differences affect this research? Once, Walmart was seen as a brand targeting low-income shoppers. Now, it’s changing its profile with acquisitions and e-commerce. And now Amazon is actively courting low-income shoppers, offering special Prime deals for people on public assistance, for example.

A. I don’t know if that would hurt Amazon with Republicans, but it could help them with Democrats. In different income groups, people who earn household incomes of $100,000 or more consider Amazon for purchase more than Walmart. And at the low end, with household incomes of $20,000 or less, they are neck and neck.


TODAY’S NEWS IS JUST FULL OF INTERESTING STUFF, AND THIS IS NOT THE LEAST OF THEM. THIS ONE BRINGS ME JOY.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-a-suspicious-facebook-message-from-liberia-sparked-an-unlikely-partnership/
By STEVE HARTMAN CBS NEWS March 29, 2018, 6:56 PM
How a suspicious Facebook message from Liberia sparked an unlikely partnership

MONROVIA, LIBERIA -- No one likes internet scammers, but in Ogden, Utah, we found a guy with a most profound distaste. Just wait until you hear how 33-year-old Ben Taylor responded to one random Facebook message: "My name is Joel from Liberia, West Africa. I need some assistance from you. Business or financial assistance dat (sic) will help empower me."

Ben insincerely responded, "How can I help?"

message.png
Ben Taylor decided to respond to a suspicious message he got online CBS NEWS

"I just wanted to go down this rabbit hole and see what were the tricks that they use to get people," Ben said.

But there's no way he would have guessed what happened next. The journey began when Joel, in Africa, proposed a business partnership. He asked Ben to mail used electronics to an address in New Jersey.

"I looked it up on Google Earth," Ben said. "There were broken down cars all over the place."

Ben wasn't falling for that. Instead, he proposed a different partnership. He lied to Joel, and told him he owned a photography business and could use some pretty pictures.

"So how about a sunset? How about a nice Liberian sunset?" Ben asked.

We asked Ben if he planned on paying for any photos once he got them.

"I said, 'Yeah, if it's good. If I like it, sure,'" Ben replied. "I figured the more time of theirs that I can waste, the less time that they'd have to spend ripping me or other people off."

Eventually, Joel sent two sunset photos -- we think. Turns out scenic photography wasn't exactly Joel's strong suit, not that it mattered.

ben-taylor.png
Ben Taylor CBS NEWS

"I told him, 'Hey, this was great," Ben said. "I told him, 'This is a good job, but I think you need a little bit better of a camera.'"

So Ben actually spent $60 to buy and mail him a shiny red one.

"Yeah, so I'm investing my money," Ben said. "My family thinks I'm crazy because I'm interacting with this guy in Liberia."

But Joel didn't think it was crazy at all. He wrote, "I've decided 2 really commit n devote myself 2 dis business, what other pictures you want me 2 take?" Ben replied, "We've gotta work on your photography."

Eventually, Joel did get better, which posed a big problem.

"When he put in the work I thought, 'Oh no, now I've got to figure out a way to compensate Joel for these pictures or I'm going to be the scammer,'" Ben said.

So Ben took to YouTube to sell a booklet he made using the pictures. He called it "By D Grace of God," a phrase borrowed from Joel's messages. The plan was to sell a few dozen copies to friends and family, until sales exploded.

"People from around the world and places that I've never even heard of were buying Joel's book," Ben said.

Soon they raised $1,000. Ben told Joel he could have half, and the rest, well, Joel would get that too, but with a catch. Ben told him he had to donate that $500 to charity.

With that intention in mind, Ben wired the money. At this point you need to know that $500 is close to a year's salary in Liberia. So really, it's kind of ridiculous to expect an unemployed, impoverished hustler to just give all that money away. Fact is, Ben never thought he would. Until another batch of pictures arrived.

There were book bags and notebooks. He cleaned out a market, rented a cab to hall the loot and blessed five schools with abundance. Joel lived up to be more savior than scammer.

"He came through," Ben said. "He showed me that there was a different side to him. So here we are."

Here we are, at the beginning of an unlikely partnership. Forged from doubt and distrust, but destined to change the world, and bring it a whole lot closer together.

Watch the rest of this story Friday, March 30th on the "CBS Evening News" 6:30-7:00 PM, ET.

© 2018 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.



MADDOW TIME
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show

THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 3/28/18
Trump shops for new hires from TV and small, familiar circle
Rachel Maddow looks at how Donald Trump's recent hires have come from people he is immediately familiar with or has seen on Fox News, which is not a good strategy for putting together a legal team as Robert Mueller's investigation appears to be heating up. Duration: 17:10