House Republican has unfortunate words for 'some female senators'

Sometimes, a quote is so misguided, it's hard to know where to start.

A Texas Republican congressman says it's "absolutely repugnant" that the GOP-led Senate hasn't acted on repealing the health care law and he singled out "some female senators from the Northeast."

In a radio interview with "1440 Keys," Rep. Blake Farenthold said the Senate has failed to show the courage to dismantle the health care law. The Senate is expected to vote Tuesday on whether to move ahead on legislation.

According to the Associated Press' report, Farenthold added, in apparent reference to Sens. Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and Shelley Moore Capito, "If it was a guy from south Texas, I might ask him to step outside and settle this Aaron Burr-style."

In other words, Farenthold is so upset about the state of the health care debate, he can imagine a duel with members of his own party who see the issue differently.

Oh my.

read more

Monday's Campaign Round-Up, 7.22.17

Today's installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.

* In an unusually classless display, Kelli Ward, who lost to John McCain in a primary last year, has called on the longtime senator to resign his seat in light of his illness. She also wants Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) to appoint her to fill the vacancy.

* Congressional Democratic leaders are rolling out their new "Better Deal" economic agenda today, with some events on Capitol Hill, and new op-eds in the New York Times and the Washington Post.

* Gallup found that Donald Trump's support is still above 50% in 17 states. He's also below 40% in the same number of states.

* There was reportedly a staff shake-up at the Republican National Committee late last week that led to, among other things, Katie Walsh returning to the RNC. Walsh, a longtime colleague of White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, had worked at the White House for about three months, before joining a pro-Trump group called America First Policies. Walsh has, in other words, had three jobs in four months.

* Bolstering rumors that Scott Pruitt, Trump's far-right EPA administrator, is planning to run for office in his home state of Oklahoma, the New York Times found that he made 10 trips to the state over three months this year, "largely at taxpayer expense."

* In Maine, Gov. Paul LePage (R) has already said he doesn't intend to run against Sen. Angus King (I) next year, but he said he's been unimpressed with the top GOP candidate, state Sen. Eric Brakey. "I'm going to watch what Eric Brakey's doing and if he doesn't start resonating pretty quick, there's a possibility I might change my mind," LePage said on Thursday.

read more

Trump still wants a federal investigation into Hillary Clinton

Since taking office six months ago, Donald Trump has periodically called for assorted investigations, though in nearly every instance, the president seemed to more or less blurt out the idea without any real thought or planning.

Trump has, for example, said he wants Barack Obama investigated for "wiretapping" Trump Tower during the election. The president also demanded an investigation into "voter fraud" in the 2016 presidential election. Trump, at one point, even said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) should be investigated for his claims about his military service.

This morning, the president added to his list in rather dramatic fashion. Trump tweeted:

"So why aren't the Committees and investigators, and of course our beleaguered A.G., looking into Crooked Hillarys crimes & Russia relations?"

Note, since becoming president, every investigation Trump has called for has been ... how do I put this gently ... quite bonkers.

Indeed, while we've all become quite accustomed to Trump saying deeply strange things, especially via social media, this morning's missive was quite a bit worse than his usual fare.

read more

Trump's communications director has a secret source: Trump

The New York Times reported yesterday that when Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin recently met in Germany, the American president was impressed by an argument from his Russian counterpart: "Moscow's cyberoperators are so good at covert computer-network operations that if they had dipped into the Democratic National Committee's systems, they would not have been caught."

In a rather literal sense, the White House has adopted Putin's talking points. Here, for example, was Anthony Scaramucci, Trump's new communications director, echoing the line on CNN yesterday:

"You know, somebody said to me yesterday -- I won't tell you who -- that if the Russians actually hacked this situation and spilled out those emails, you would have never seen it. You would have never had any evidence of them, meaning that they're super confident in their deception skills and hacking."

Moments later, Scaramucci conceded his source -- the one whom he didn't want to identify just seconds earlier -- was Donald Trump himself, who'd called him a day earlier.

Even for this White House, this was exceedingly strange. As part of a defense against the Russia scandal, the president's communications director echoed Vladimir Putin's talking points, citing a secret source, who happened to be the president, who directly reminded him of Putin's talking points.

Making matters quite a bit worse, all of this was intended to undermine confidence in the findings of American intelligence agencies, which the president still chooses not to believe. Indeed, the White House's broader point seems to be that Russia's espionage operations are so skillful and clever, American intelligence professionals couldn't possibly be expected to keep up.

One might expect to hear something like this from the Kremlin, not the White House.

read more

Trump presses troops for political help in lobbying Congress

Donald Trump headlined an event over the weekend, commissioning the USS Gerald Ford, which wouldn't have been especially notable, were it not for one important aspect of his remarks. As the Huffington Post noted:

Trump urged the crowd of about 6,500 people, including uniformed naval officers, to call Congress and ask lawmakers to pass the budget, in which he seeks an additional $54 billion for defense spending in 2018.

"I don't mind getting a little hand, so call that congressman and call that senator and make sure you get it," he told the crowd, before plugging another item on his agenda. "And by the way, you can also call those senators to make sure you get health care."

As a Washington Post report added, Trump’s brief appeal "created a potentially awkward tableau at a commissioning event intended to be ceremonial -- a commander in chief offering political remarks, and what could even be construed as an order, to the naval officers he commands."

It's entirely possible that Trump, new to public service and the structures of government, doesn't really know anything about the unique relationship between a president and active-duty military personnel. He may not understand, for example, that when a commander in chief asks troops to do something, they're expected to do it.

Which is why we're not accustomed to American leaders trying to recruit servicemen and women into lobbying campaigns in support of the White House's priorities. There are certain norms that our presidents are supposed to honor and protect, and Donald Trump either doesn't know or doesn't care where those lines are drawn.

read more