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President Donald Trump spent his Saturday morning posting a series of tweets ranging from healthcare to the New York Times possibly foiling an attempt to kill a member of ISIS.

The President said the newspaper has a "sick agenda" and referenced ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who has been suspected to be dead for months.

"The Failing New York Times foiled U.S. attempt to kill the single most wanted terrorist, Al-Baghdadi.Their sick agenda over National Security," Trump tweeted.

On Friday, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis also casted doubt on al-Baghdadi's death, saying that he believes the terror leader is still alive, The Hill reported.

"I think Baghdadi's alive," Mattis told reporters at the Pentagon, according to The Hill. "Until I see his body, I am going to assume he is alive."

It is unclear what story or report Trump was referring to. TIME has reached out to the Times for a comment, but did not receive an immediate response.

Politico reporter Hadas Gold tweeted that the Times has asked the White House to clarify the tweet.

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Donald Trump Accuses New York Times of Foiling Attempt to Kill ISIS Leader - TIME

(NORFOLK, Va.) President Donald Trump helped commission the USS Gerald R. Ford on Saturday and declared that the most advanced aircraft carrier to join the Navy will cause America's enemies to "shake with fear" whenever they see its form cutting across the horizon.

"I hereby place United States Ship Gerald R. Ford in commission," Trump said after delivering a speech in which he praised the U.S. military and the American labor that went into building the 100,000 ton, $12.9 billion warship.

"May God bless and guide this warship and all who shall sail in her," Trump said.

He was followed shortly by Susan Ford Bales, the ship's sponsor and daughter of the 38th president, whom the ship honors.

"There is no one, absolutely no one, who would be prouder of the commissioning of this mighty ship than the president of the United States, Gerald R. Ford," she said. "I am honored to give the command: 'Officers and crew of the United States Gerald R. Ford, man our ship and bring her to life.'"

And with those few words, the ship was brought to life. "Anchors Aweigh" played and sailors who stood in formation in their crisp, white uniforms began filing off to their stations.

Sirens and bells sounds. Horns blared. The U.S. flag was raised to full mast.

Within minutes, the captain was informed that "the ship is manned and ready and reports for duty to the fleet."

Trump arrived aboard the carrier's steamy flight deck by the Marine One presidential helicopter and was greeted by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and other officials.

Trump, who visited the carrier in March to promote his plans for a military buildup, told Time magazine this year that the Navy should revert to using steam catapults to launch fighter jets because some of the state-of-the-art systems and technology aboard the USS Ford "costs hundreds of millions of dollars more money and it's no good."

Construction on the USS Ford started in 2009 and was to be completed by September 2015 at a cost of $10.5 billion. The Navy has attributed the delays and budget overruns to the ship's state-of-the-art systems and technology, including electromagnetic launch systems for jets and drones that will replace steam catapults.

The warship also has a smaller island that sits farther back on the ship to make it easier and quicker to refuel, re-arm and relaunch planes, and a nuclear power plant designed to allow cruising speeds of more than 30 knots and operation for 20 years without refueling.

The vessel completed sea trials in April but still will go through a battery of tests and workups at sea before becoming operational and ready for deployment, work that is expected to cost nearly $780 million and take more than four years to complete, congressional auditors said in a report this month.

The USS Ford is named after the country's 38th president, who rose to the rank of lieutenant commander in the Navy during World War II. After military service, Ford was elected to the House of Representatives, serving Michigan until he was tapped by President Richard M. Nixon to become vice president.

Ford became president after Nixon resigned during the Watergate scandal.

Docked at Naval Station Norfolk, the USS Ford eventually will house about 2,600 sailors, 600 fewer than the previous generation of aircraft carriers. The Navy says that will save more than $4 billion over the ship's 50-year lifespan.

The air wing to support the Ford could add more personnel to the ship, which is designed to house more than 4,600 crew members.

"I was with you four months ago and I knew that I had to be here today and I told you I'd be back to congratulate you and the crew and everybody involved in commissioning the newest, largest and most advanced aircraft carrier in the history of this world," Trump said Saturday. "That's a big achievement."

The return visit Saturday fell during what the White House has coined as "Made in America" week, during which Trump and other administration officials highlighted a wide assortment of products ranging from trucks and helicopters to baseball bats and glass bottles for pharmaceuticals that are manufactured in the United States.

"This is American craftsmanship at its biggest, at its best, at its finest," Trump said aboard the carrier during his previous visit. "American workers are the greatest anywhere in the world. This warship, and all who serve on it, should be a source of shared pride for our nation."

The Ford was built at Newport News Shipbuilding, the giant Navy contractor in Virginia. Trump tweeted before departing Saturday for the ceremony that the Ford is the largest aircraft carrier in the world.

See more here:
Donald Trump Says USS Gerald Ford Will Make Enemies 'Shake With Fear' - TIME

There are many ways to evaluate the Trump presidency at the six-month mark. What I am struck by is the path not taken, the lost opportunity. During the campaign, it was clear that Donald Trump had many flaws, but he tapped into a real set of problems facing the United States and a deep frustration with the political system. Additionally, he embraced and expressed somewhat inconsistently a populism that went beyond the traditional left-right divide. What would things look like at this point if President Trump had governed in the manner of a pragmatic, jobs-oriented reformer relentlessly focused on the forgotten Americans of whom he often speaks?

We have an interesting template to assist our imagination. After Trumps election, a small group of pro-Trump intellectuals, from both left and right, banded together to launch a journal, American Affairs, that promised the discussion of new policies that are outside of the conventional dogmas. Its the best forum for the articulation of the ideology behind Trumps rise, and there has been so much interest in the journals views on various subjects that the editors opened the second issue with a brief summary of their editorial stance.

On trade, immigration and foreign policy, the editors endorse modest changes to standard U.S. policies, some of which the administration is pursuing. But on the central questions of domestic economic policy, American Affairs seems markedly different and genuinely populist. Taking on the subject at the center of Republican ideology, taxes, the editors profess to be quite skeptical of the conservative orthodoxy that reflexively prescribes tax cuts as the cure-all for every ill. Although corporate tax reform is warranted, the editors say, reducing upper-income tax rates is unlikely to address core economic challenges in any significant way. Instead, they recommend eliminating mechanisms by which the rich evade taxation. In addition, the journal denounces financial deregulation and calls for higher taxes on hedge-fund and private-equity managers. It embraces large and direct government expenditures on infrastructure, warning against relying heavily on the private sector. On health care, the editors come out openly in favor of universal coverage and suggest two options, a single-payer system or a version of the Swiss system, which is basically Obamacare with a real mandate.

Needless to say, this has not been the Trump agenda. But reading these intelligent ideas raises the interesting question, why not? All of the policies proposed above would have helped the forgotten people whose cause Trump champions.

There have been two cardinal features of the Trump presidency so far. The first is that, far from being a populist breakout, it has followed a fairly traditional Republican agenda repeal Obamacare, weaken Dodd-Frank, cut taxes, deregulate industry. Trumps anemic infrastructure plan is little more than tax credits for private investors. The only real break with Republican tradition has been on foreign policy, where Trump is pursuing a truly bizarre and mercurial agenda that seems to be inspired by his own personal passions and peeves instituting the travel ban, demanding payment from allies, embracing autocrats who flatter him and his family.

(Bastien Inzaurralde/The Washington Post)

The second defining feature of the Trump administration has been incompetence. As many have pointed out, had Trump chosen to begin his presidency with a large infrastructure bill, he would have put the Democrats in a terrible bind. They would have had to support him, even though this would have enraged the partys base. Instead, Trump chose health care, a complicated, difficult issue sure to unite his opposition and divide Republicans. Consequently, very little has actually been done. Obamacare has not been repealed, no money has been appropriated for the border wall, NAFTA is still standing, and there is no tax reform bill, nor an agreement to raise the debt ceiling. Even in deregulation, an area of broad presidential authority, little of substance has been accomplished. Many of Trumps executive actions have been to review various measures. An environmental activist told me that he has tried to cheer up his staff by pointing out that the Trump administrations words have rarely been followed by successful deeds.

Trump could have quickly begun reshaping American politics. He discerned voices that others didnt, understood what those people wanted to hear and articulated much of it. But when it came time to deliver, it turned out that he had no serious idea or policies, nor even the desire to search for them. He just wanted to be president, meeting world leaders, having Oval Office photo ops and flying on Air Force One, while delegating the actual public policy to House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) or Vice President Pence. So far, Trump has turned out to be something far less revolutionary than expected a standard-issue, big-business Republican, albeit an incompetent one, wrapped in populist clothing.

Read more from Fareed Zakarias archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook.

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Donald Trump's lost opportunity - Washington Post

What that staff shuffle tells us about President Donald Trump is a lot more than you might think.

Spicer, remember, is not and never has been a "Trump guy." He was brought into the White House at the urging of Reince Priebus, the Republican National Committee chairman-turned-White House chief of staff. Prior to his time at the RNC, Spicer kicked around a number of party committees and campaigns. He was a creature of Washington, not a creature of Trump.

The move from Spicer to Scaramucci reflects a decision by Trump to surround himself almost entirely with people loyal first and foremost to him -- as opposed to the Republican Party or the Washington establishment.

And it comes as Trump hunkers down for what appears to be an inevitable collision with Robert Mueller, the former FBI director who is leading the special counsel's investigation into Russia's meddling in the 2016 campaign and possible collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians.

Trump has always kept his inner circle small -- in his business life and in politics. And that inner circle shrinks down to family and friends when the chips are down. The chips -- whether the Trump administration wants to admit it or not -- are very much down at the moment. And so, Trump is turning to the people he trusts most -- his immediate family and friends that he has known for a very long time.

There is also an element of the Scaramucci move that speaks to the President's oft-stated desire to have a staff who lets him be himself.

Scaramucci, in his first appearance at the White House briefing podium Friday afternoon, said that in his conversation in the Oval Office with the President on Friday there was an emphasis on "letting him be himself." Scaramucci added that part of his job is to allow Trump to "express his full identity."

"I think it is very important for us to let him express his personality," he later added.

It's not immediately clear how a "Let Trump be Trump" strategy would differ from the first six months of this presidency.

Trump has, occasionally, spent a day or even a few days allowing himself -- and his Twitter feed -- to be managed. He has delivered a speech straight off the teleprompter on occasion. He has passed on chances to take a swing at someone who has taken a swing at him.

But, inevitably and inexorably, Trump returns back to the brash provocateur which he has been for almost every moment of his 71 years on Earth. He is not someone who likes to be managed -- or tolerates it for very long. What Trump seems to prefer is to surround himself with a group of people with whom he can kibbitz rather than a group of people telling him what to do.

Scaramucci seems to fit that mold perfectly -- in a way Spicer never did.

With the hiring of Scaramucci (among other moves of late), Trump is doing what almost anyone would: Going back to what -- and who -- he knows. In doing so, Trump appears to be willing to live or die, politically speaking, by leaning as hard as he can into doing exactly what he wants to do.

Read more here:
What Anthony Scaramucci tells us about Donald Trump's White House - CNN

Donald Trumps name is linked to steaks, hotels, vodka, and an isolationist political platform. Some of these ventures have succeeded, many have failed, and the last one has put him in the White House. Less known, however, is the time he tried to clone Kickstarter. The site was called FundAnything, and despite its supposedly ambitious beginnings, its now literally a facade.

FundAnything was founded by Bill Zanker, also a founder of the Learning Annex online education company and co-author of Trumps 2007 book Think Big and Kick Ass in Business and Life. Trump didnt put his name on the site, but he was supposed to be deeply involved. In addition to investing in FundAnything, he promised to promote selected campaigns on his Twitter feed and personally donate money, including a $1 million prize to the first person who beat Kickstarters record-setting $10 million Pebble campaign.

And from the beginning, the site had Trumps populist edge. Zanker boasted that the reign of Kickstarters Brooklyn hipsters is over, referring to Kickstarters New York headquarters. Crowdfunding got traction with creatives and tech, but you go anywhere but the coasts and they dont get it yet, he told AllThingsD. (Apparently, creative and technical people dont live in flyover country.) Trump himself was more dramatic. Peoples lives have been destroyed by this economy and they feel hopeless, he said. FundAnything is a real solution.

FundAnything more or less cloned Indiegogos flexible funding program: people could set a goal and pay a 5 percent fee if they met it, or a 9 percent fee if they didnt. Its most distinctive feature was that instead of focusing on either donation campaigns or creative projects, FundAnything true to its name would fund almost anything. Trump officially launched it by giving suitcases of money to a family funding medical bills, a woman with a small business, and an aspiring singer. (He then filled an aquarium with cash and had visitors grab bills from it.)

FundAnythings site is almost entirely gone today, and its difficult to judge its scale. But it appears to have had a small number of high-profile campaigns: Magician Penn Jillette and comedian Adam Carolla, the most highly publicized users, raised over a million dollars apiece for their respective films Directors Cut and Road Hard. While FundAnything promised to make crowdfunding appealing to the masses, however, Jillette and Carolla already had ties with Trump, since theyd been competitors on Trumps Celebrity Apprentice. Carollas campaign in particular was equally a publicity campaign for FundAnything, which Carolla said offered him a special, lower pricing rate.

Trump all but promoted the site as his personal charity

What might draw a small-time user to FundAnything? Basically, the prospect of getting money and publicity from Trump, who Zanker described as a genius businessman. One press release all but described it as a Trump charity foundation, and Trump promised to tweet about campaigns every week to his 2.2 million (at that point) followers. But his support was, at best, lackadaisical. A few months after launch, Forbes reported that hed only endorsed five campaigns since launch (FundAnything added three more after being contacted) and tweeted about FundAnything a handful of times, mostly with generic promotions for the site.

Trump finally cut ties with the site in late 2014, saying it took too much of my time and too much time to raise the money. Hed posted 27 tweets over the course of eight months, only six of which mentioned specific campaigns besides Jillettes and Carollas. At the time of Forbes article hed put around $92,000 toward campaigns in increments between $2,000 and $40,000 a lot of money for individual recipients, but very little for an entire platform.

FundAnything stuck around for a while after Trumps departure, although its purpose wasnt clear. PC Magazine reviewed it in 2016, praising the platforms flexibility but calling it bare-bones and dated. (In a particularly weird detail, it noted that one of the funding categories was simply called Oklahoma.) But as of today, its a Potemkin website. What appear to be menu buttons and campaign thumbnails are actually part of a large single image, hyperlinked to itself.

Economic anxiety, Kickstarter edition

I emailed and tweeted at several people and organizations who used FundAnything, including Carolla. Only one wrote back: Free the Nipple, which raised $45,000 of its $250,000 goal on the site. At the time, FundAnything was affiliated with Donald Trump. Thus, Free the Nipple declines to comment! Sorry, a representative told me. At publication, Zanker also had not responded to an email asking about his future plans for the site.

Gawker referred to FundAnything as a new crowdfunding scam back in 2013. But unlike some of Trumps other ventures, FundAnything doesnt seem necessarily underhanded or fraudulent, although users might have been more successful on another platform.

It is, however, a striking microcosm of Trumps path to the White House. FundAnything was supposed to take crowdfunding beyond coastal elites (or Brooklyn hipsters) who had, in Trump and Zankers estimation, failed ordinary Americans. It played on real economic fears and Trumps reputation as a brilliant dealmaker, although it wasnt clear how his skills applied to crowdfunding. It appears to have ended up most greatly enriching Trumps associates, albeit perhaps unintentionally. And like his political campaign, Trump launched it with a lot of big promises only to lose interest once the real work started.

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Donald Trump's terrible crowdfunding site was a microcosm of his political career - The Verge