New York Times | Donald Trump, Gavin Grimm, Oscars: Your Friday Briefing New York Times Stephen K. Bannon, Mr. Trump's chief strategist, told the audience that the deconstruction of the administrative state was underway, and Vice President Mike Pence said the Trump victory had led to the most important time in the history of our ... |
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Donald Trump, Gavin Grimm, Oscars: Your Friday Briefing - New York Times
TRUMP AGENDA: Caitlin Jenner vs. Trump
Vice President Mike Pence told conservatives at CPAC Thursday that the "Obamacare nightmare is about to end" and that the policy will be rolled back "despite the best efforts of liberal activists at town halls across the country."
Caitlin Jenner is taking on Trump over his withdrawal of federal guidance regarding school bathrooms for transgender youth.
From the New York Times: "Reduced to their weakest state in a generation, Democratic Party leaders will gather in two cities this weekend to plot strategy and select a new national chairman with the daunting task of rebuilding the party's depleted organization. But senior Democratic officials concede that the blueprint has already been chosen for them by an incensed army of liberals demanding no less than total war against President Trump."
Here's Alex Seitz-Wald's primer on how the DNC chair race will work.
From the AP: "White House chief of staff Reince Priebus asked a top FBI official to dispute media reports that President Donald Trump's campaign advisers were frequently in touch with Russian intelligence agents during the election, a White House official says. Priebus' discussion with FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe sparked outrage among some Democrats, who said that the chief of staff was violating policies intended to limit communications between the law enforcement agency and the White House on pending investigations."
The New York Times, on Betsy DeVos: "[P]eople who have known and watched Ms. DeVos through the years as a leading advocate of charter schools and school vouchers, a former Michigan Republican Party chairwoman and a major Republican donor warn against thinking that she will be a meek team player. She may be publicly gracious, even in the face of setbacks, they say. But in her home state, she earned a reputation as a driven, relentless and effective political fighter, using her family's vast fortune to reward allies and punish foes, and working behind the scenes to pass legislation and unseat lawmakers who opposed her."
The Washington Post lays out the ongoing war over town halls - and how Gabby Giffords' name was invoked.
Another Jared/Ivanka leak about their influence to help save an Obama policy, from the Wall Street Journal: "At the request of President Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and his wife, Ivanka Trump, language critical of a global climate deal was struck from an executive order that Mr. Trump is planning to sign soon, according to multiple people familiar with the move."
"With each passing day, Donald Trump's Cabinet looks more like a clean-up crew," writes POLITICO. "The president's undiplomatic comments are repeatedly forcing his foreign policy and national security appointees into the awkward position of telling an anxious world that, basically, their boss didn't really mean what he said."
From NBC's Benjy Sarlin: "Reince Priebus and Stephen Bannon, the White House's much-scrutinized top two aides, lavished each other with praise on Thursday in a friendly panel discussion at the Conservative Political Action Conference where Bannon laid out President Donald Trump's "new political order."
POLITICO: "[A]nalysts now caution that Trumphoria in the stock market could soon crash into a harsh Washington reality."
The Wall Street Journal: "President Donald Trump's new strategy to accelerate the fight against Islamic State will, at least initially, tweak and add a little more muscle to the existing plan, U.S. officials said. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is expected to provide to Mr. Trump a series of recommendations for that plan in the coming days. Mr. Trump on Jan. 28 signed an order directing his new Pentagon chief to come up with a preliminary draft of the plan to fight Islamic State within 30 days."
Ruth Bader Ginsburg said last night that "I will do this job as long as I can do it full steam."
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First Read's Morning Clips: Caitlin Jenner v. Donald Trump - NBCNews.com
By Pedro Gerson By Pedro Gerson February 23 at 3:51 PM
Pedro Gerson is a professor of law and economics at the Ibero-American University and the Mexico Autonomous Institute of Technology (ITAM), both in Mexico City.
Over the past few months both as a candidate and in his new capacity as U.S. president Donald Trump has issued a series of provocations that have brought U.S.-Mexico relations to their lowest point since the Mexican-American War of 1846. His brash Twitter diplomacy moved Mexican President Enrique Pea Nieto to take the unprecedented step of canceling a trip to the United States. Stepped-up raids by U.S. immigration authorities have stirred deportation fears in the Mexican immigrant community, and expressions of anti-Mexican sentiment have become so common that even a top Mexican diplomat recently endured public harassment. Last but not least, Trump has continued to vilify the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), raising doubts about its durability.
It would seem that there could be no bleaker scenario for the Mexican president. And yet Trump may actually turn out to be a blessing in disguise for Pea Nieto. In fact, Trump may offer Pea Nietos only chance of salvaging his partys chances in next years general election and potentially even his own legacy.
At 12 percent, Pea Nieto has the lowest approval rating of any Mexican president in history. Since 2013 the administration has committed one blunder after another. Most notably, the president has borne the brunt of a major corruption scandal involving his wife and a lavish home, managed to mishandle the largest human rights tragedy in recent Mexican history and, perhaps most unbelievably, legitimized candidate Trump by inviting him to Mexico on what looked like a state visit. Pea Nietos responses to all of these cases and crises has seemed at best incompetent, in some cases downright negligent.
In a televised address Jan. 25, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto said that Mexico will not pay for President Trump's border wall. (Reuters)
Nevertheless, Trump offers Pea Nieto a welcome distraction and, more importantly, an opportunity. On the first point, the existence of a new villain, if nothing else, has given Pea Nieto a break from the negative headlines ofthe past few weeks. An unscientific survey of the four most-read newspapers in Mexico showed that, since his inauguration, Trump has been mentioned almost three times more often than Pea Nieto.
[Mexico may strike back. Heres how.]
Now Pea Nieto is well positioned to strike back, and his options are many. Mexicans all along thepolitical spectrum are offering the president suggestions on how to do this. A leftist collective called on the government to start accepting refugees in defiance of Trumps Muslim ban. Jorge Castaeda, a former minister of foreign affairs, has said that Pea Nieto should accept deported migrants from the United States only if they can prove that they are Mexican citizens. Given that many immigrants lack any identification, this measure would severely hamper deportation efforts. Others have recommended that Pea Nieto should collaborate with officials in the United States who are openly pro-immigration, appearing in public with figures such as California Gov. Jerry Brown. Finally, some have even argued that Pea Nietoshould refuse discussions on NAFTA in order to avoid a potentially devastating period of economic uncertainty during the renegotiation. If this were to happen, Trump would have an answer for NAFTAs demise to the largely Republican constituency that benefits from it.
Policies like these would represent a total reversal of the Mexican administrations current timid approach. Rather than responding to Trumps bravado with strength, Pea Nieto dumped his minister of foreign affairs in favor of someone with ties to Trumps inner circle. He also vacillated on the cancellation of his trip to the United States even after Trump issued an executive order mandating the border wall construction. Finally, Pea Nieto continues to insist on having an open dialogue with Washington.
Politically, confronting Trump may be Pea Nietos last shot at securing a win for his party in the 2018 presidential election. Currently, the presidents Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) would seem to have no chance against Andres Manuel Lpez Obrador, the lefts candidate. Nevertheless, the PRI has a strong machinery that can guarantee25 to 30 percent of the vote. If Pea Nieto stands up to Trump, he may be able to tap into nationalist sentiment to win the hearts of that 5to 10 percent of the electorate that his party will need to win the election.
Also, it is likely that such actions turn out to be better policy options than the continuance of Pea Nietos overtures. Trump has demonstrated that he will not budge regardless of the number of olive branches that are thrown at him. A firmer stance may in fact be the only way to protect Mexicans abroad and to give Pea Nieto room to negotiate with Trump.
If Pea Nieto were to pursue a more confrontational route, he would be returning to some of his partys foundational ideas. The PRI was founded in the 1920s in the wake of the Mexican Revolution, and gained traction over the next decades by enacting nationalistic policies such as the nationalization of oil and the glorification of the Mexican race. The boogeyman of the story was, of course, the United States, a country that had unjustly taken a large chunk of Mexican territory. Eventually the party and the country shifted their tunes, opening Mexico to the United States and the world. Even so, suspicion of the gringos has never really ended.
[Ernesto Zedillo: Mexico can thrive without Trump]
Pea Nieto could thus leverage the same nativist sentiments that Trump and the Brexiters have exploited. The difference is that he must temper his nationalism with a commitment to openness to all those who seek collaboration with Mexico. And promises wont suffice he will have to follow up his rhetoric with policy measures that stand in contrast to Trumps: commitment to free trade, openness to immigration at home and defense of Mexican citizens in the United States. Given Pea Nietos current unpopularity, however, even this strategy may not be enough to make voters change their minds about him and his party.
Adopting such a confrontational stance undoubtedly runs counter to the Mexican presidents own nature, which favors caution and compromise. Yet the realization that he has nothing to lose may persuade him, in the end, to stand up to Trump. Pea Nieto and Mexico can only benefit.
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Donald Trump has given the Mexican president the biggest gift he could wish for - Washington Post
During the Oscars this Sunday, there will be at least one person in your Twitter feed who believes their opinions on the proceedings to be of the utmost importance. You know, the one who offers unsolicited criticisms of everything, from the stage design to the speeches to the actual films, as though the world were waiting with bated breath to hear their take.
US president Donald Trump has been among these self-appointed Twitter pundits in years past. Before he controlled the nuclear codes, he blessed his followers with non-stop analysis during the Oscars telecast and then did the same for viewers of the morning talk shows the next day.
This year, now that hes the president, Trump will not be watching the Oscarsat least according to White House press secretary Sean Spicer. That may or may not not stop him from offering his pronouncements.
Comedian Jimmy Kimmel hosts the Academy Awards on Sunday (Feb. 26) at 8:30pm US Eastern time on ABC. Lets take a look back at some memorable tidbits of Trumps Oscars analysis:
On the red carpet in 2012, TV host Ryan Seacrest was interviewing comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, who was in character promoting his movie The Dictator, when Cohen pretended to accidentally spill an urn filled with the ashes of recently deceased North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il all over Seacrest. Always a professional, Seacrest played it cool and shrugged off the prank, but Donald Trump would not so quickly forget it.
Trump posted a video onto his YouTube channel attacking the disgraceful Cohen, and also apparently taking issue with how the security guard responded to the situation. Trumps rant quickly devolves into a violent fantasy about Cohen being punched in the face so many times that hes sent to the hospital.
In that same video, Trump offers his thoughts on Vanity Fairs post-Oscars party, which he did not attend. Trump says it was boring and that people were sleeping and there was no good feeling.
He then contends that the boring party was symblomatic (which is not a word) of the magazines declining stature.
After the 2013 ceremony, Trump phoned into the daily morning Fox News program Fox & Friends to gift the world his thoughts on the Oscars telecast the night before.
Trumps chief criticism was that Quentin Tarantinos slavery revenge film Django Unchained was probably one of the most racist movies Ive ever seen. Trump does not explain what he found racist in the film.
But Trump doesnt just review the Oscar-nominated filmshe reviews the event as a whole. Also in that appearance on Fox & Friends, Trump calls the 2013 telecast and its set: very average, okay, tacky, and terrible.
In subsequent years, Trump lambasted everything from the stage design to the singing to the annual In Memoriam segment.
Hidden among Trumps years of piping hot Oscars takes is one criticism that actually made some sense. Trump was very upset that Ben Affleck, who acted in and directed Argo, did not receive a nomination for best director, despite his film winning best picture. Its fairly sound logicdid Argo direct itself?and Trump is not the only one who felt Affleck was snubbed.
Trump is at his xenophobic best when talking about the Oscars. He was highly critical of English actor Daniel Day-Lewiss performance as US president Abraham Lincoln in Steven Spielbergs Lincoln, mostly because he thought the actors accent was detectable.
Hes not from this country, Trump complained on Fox & Friends in 2012. I dont think Lincoln had an English accent, to the best of my knowledge.
And then Trump went from pundit to historian: Lincoln never sounded like that, he said. I just dont think that Lincoln behaved like that. He talked very, very slowly. Lincoln, of course, died several years before humans created the ability to record sound, but Trump seemed pretty certain about the presidents vocal cadence. Actual historians arent so sure.
A few years later, in 2015, Trump expressed his resentment at people from foreign countries winning awards. Birdman director Alejandro Gonzlez Irritu took home three awards, a fact that caused Trump some annoyance.
It was a great night for Mexico, as usual, Trump said, again on Fox & Friends the morning after the Oscars that year. Was it that good? I dont hear that.
Trumps only suggestion for improving the Oscars? He should host the event himself.
Who knows? Perhaps in an alternate reality, Trump is hosting the Academy Awards on Sunday, instead of being the president of the United States.
Read more:
Donald Trump on the Oscars: They're just terrible and should be hosted by Donald Trump - Quartz
Donald Trump won the White House by promising his white voters that they would soon be able to put their feet on the necks of their fellow Americans with impunity and without consequence. This is Trumps promise to end political correctness translated into plain speech.
Make America Great Again was always more than a slogan. It was a threat and a promise that the wages of whiteness those unearned psychological and material privileges that come with being white in American would be redoubled under President Trump. To that end, Hispanic and Latino illegal immigrants would be punished for taking jobs from real Americans (i.e. white people). African-Americans would be disciplined by law and order. Arabs and Muslims would be made to cower in the face of American power. The homeland would be secured by building walls and through mass deportations. One side of the color line would be further oppressed; the other side of the color line would be elevated.
Trumpism is not a new story in American history. In many ways, it is a return to form and to the racialized Herrenvolk democracy created at the time of the founding.
This is a two-way transaction. While Trumps supporters would like to pretend that such is not the case, his promises do not come without a price. The pain that Trumps voters wanted to inflict on their fellow Americans is not unidirectional regardless of how much they wish it to be. Trump has been president of the United States for 30 days. The butchers bill has come due and the first payment has been tallied.
As I shared in an earlier piece forSalon, I will watch how Donald Trumps supporters are hurt by his policies, and I will make no apologies for my Schadenfreude. To that end, I have been keeping a list of the policies already enacted or promised by Trump that will hurt red state America as well as the so-called white working-class voters whoconstitute his base.
Donald Trump has already gutted financial regulationssuch as the Dodd-Frank Act. These protections were put in place to help prevent another financial disaster such as the Great Recession of 2008. Trump and the Republican Party have also removed guidelines that force retirement fund managers to work in the best interests of their clients. These acts are a gift to Trumps plutocrats and other gangster capitalists who he claims cant borrow money. These changes will also imperil the financial safety and security of the working-class and middle-class Americans who voted for him.
Donald Trump has plans to privatize the Freddie Mae and Fannie Mac home loan programs. This would likely eliminate the 30-year home mortgage loan thatis one of the primary paths to homeownership for working- and middle-class Americans. This is a direct assault on the ability of Americans who are not already rich to accrue intergenerational wealth, economic stability and upward mobility. This move will also further empower the financier and banking class that Trump disingenuously promised to rein in during his presidential campaign.
Trump has issued an executive order designed to destroy the Affordable Care Act by making it financially insolvent and otherwise unworkable. Ending the ACA will increase the likelihood of bankruptcy, mortgage foreclosure and auto repossession and increase human suffering across the United States by denying many people access to preventive and long-term health services. It has beenestimated that at least 43,000 people will die annuallyfrom lack of adequate health care if the ACA is repealed. The Republican war on the Affordable Care Actbeing felt acutely in many parts of rural and Rust Belt America that overwhelmingly voted for Trump.
Trumps plan to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border will be paid for, at least in theory, by a tax on imported goods. This is likely to cost the average American thousands of dollars. Trumps proposed deportation plans will also raise the costs of goods and services. Red state America is less economically prosperous and secure than more liberal and cosmopolitan blue state America. As such, regions that supported Trump are less well equipped to weather the economic storm that the presidentwill soon unleash.
Trump has attempted to enact an unconstitutional de facto ban on Muslims entering the United States. This will affect health care professionals many of whom work in underserved white rural and Rust Belt communities.Trumps Muslim ban is quite literally making his most enthusiastic voters sick.
Trump has also, by fiat, permitted coal and other companies to poison local water supplies with toxic pollutants. Again, he is literally making his most enthusiastic supporters sick with carcinogens and other lethal poisons.
There are many right-wing and liberal voices who demand that Trumps voters be understood and empathized with for their decision to support an authoritarian demagogue because they were scared and wanted to shake things up. In interviews and profiles since the November presidential election, Trumps voters have expressed how happy they are with his administration and how unfairly they feel they are being judged by liberals and the media.
As P.T. Barnum is said to have famously observed, a sucker is born every minute. Donald Trump, the clown king and ruler of a plutocratic kakistocracy, will make his supporters suffer while they smile and ask for more. Sadism as political strategy is the guiding principle of the modern Republican Party. I will continue to add up the entries on Trumps butchers bill. Ultimately, the American people need to be protected from his machinations. As for his supporters? Im afraid they deserve everything they receive, and more.
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First installment on the butcher's bill: Donald Trump's supporters will be made to pay - Salon