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But if Republicans abandon their efforts to take health insurance from millions of people as they seem close to doing Democrats should begin confirming more nominees. They made some progress yesterday, approving eight Pentagon nominees.

I understand the instinct that some Democrats have to oppose the Trump administration in every conceivable way. And if Democrats want to hold up some specific nominations to protest Trumps disdain for the rule of law, Id be all for it.

Yet the current level of obstruction should not continue indefinitely.

It would be a mistake for Democrats to set a precedent that would rob future presidents of the ability to staff their own administration.

On the news. The Wall Street Journal refused to publish a transcript of its own interview with the president, apparently to avoid embarrassing both Trump and Gerard Baker, the Journals editor. But Politicos Josh Dawsey and Hadas Gold got the transcript and published it. (I wrote about the battles between Baker and his staff in a February column.)

The Senate confirmed Christopher Wray as the new F.B.I. director yesterday. Lawfares Susan Hennessey and Benjamin Wittes have argued that Wray deserves confirmation but doesnt deserve to serve out his 10-year term: To give Wray his ten years would send a message to all future presidents that there is no cost for removing the FBI director and replacing him or her with your own person.

Kenya, which is holding a presidential campaign, has its own fake news problem, Nanjala Nyabola writes in Foreign Policy: A timid media self-censors political news, opening the door to alternative information sources that arent always truthful.

Reader response. Several of you wrote or tweeted with the names of other people and organizations that helped save health insurance in addition to those I mentioned in yesterdays column.

Among those you mentioned: Adapt and other disability rights activists, including those who were arrested in their wheelchairs; MoveOn; the Protect Our Care coalition; and Planned Parenthood. I know there are many others too.

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Meet Republicans Halfway - New York Times

Republicans are questioning their ability to govern following seven months of constant turmoil capped by the dramatic failure in the Senate to advance ObamaCare repeal.

GOP lawmakers already face serious divisions over the two biggest items left on the agenda: raising the debt ceiling and reforming the tax code.

The problems underscore how moving on from healthcare wont necessarily solve the GOPs problems.

What we have to be able to do is demonstrate that were capable of doing hard things, said Senate Republican Conference Chairman John ThuneJohn ThuneGOP lawmakers, Trump at odds over insurance payments White House: Infrastructure bill remains Trump priority Not in the big city? Your pilot may have less training, thanks to Sen. Thune MORE (S.D.).

Healthcare reform is hard. Tax reform is hard. Weve got to pivot now to tax reform and get an outcome.

The party has no easy way out on the debt-ceiling dilemma. With Republicans in charge of Congress and the White House, the party will get the full blame if it fails to hike the borrowing limit and financial problems ensue.

On tax reform, veteran party voices such as former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) already are saying it would be smarter to lower ambitions and settle for a simpler package of tax cuts.

Emerging from a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnellMitch McConnellDem ad maker cuts new ad in Kentucky for Amy McGrath Dems express interest in working with GOP on bipartisan tax reform McConnell faces questions, but no test to his leadership MORE (R-Ky.) and other Republican senators on Tuesday morning, Gingrich said the best way to demonstrate an ability to govern is to pass something that matters.

Tax cuts are the most important single thing theyre going to do this year, and they need to get them done by Thanksgiving so they can affect the economy by 2018, he told The Hill.

The ObamaCare repeal failure was a jarring experience for many Republican lawmakers who have campaigned on the issue since 2010.

I have all kinds of concerns. Im not going to defend this process or this place. Weve got to keep working at it, said Sen. Ron JohnsonRon JohnsonSen. Johnson: 'We cant move on' because ObamaCare is a mess McConnell faces questions, but no test to his leadership Senate Republicans brush off Trump's healthcare demands MORE (R-Wis.), who was critical throughout the healthcare debate of what he viewed as a haphazard process.

Coming from the business world, having solved many problems, theres a process you follow. That seems to be quite foreign to Washington, D.C., he added. Its a more political process as opposed to a problem-solving process.

In public, Republican lawmakers for the most part have sought to avoid blaming the steady stream of White House distractions and controversies for their legislative record.

Privately, staff and members are more forthcoming.

Its August, we havent gotten anything big done and theres chaos at the White House. Yes, its a concern, said a senior Senate GOP aide.

If we have a crisis over the debt limit, concerns over our ability to govern will intensify, the source added.

The healthcare bill collapsed hours after The New Yorker published a bombshell interview with former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci that blew the lid off of infighting within President Trumps circle of advisers.

Were horrified by the drama coming out of the White House, said a Republican senator who requested anonymity to comment frankly on the administration.

The lawmaker said the failure of the healthcare bill is a wakeup call and a kick in the butt for Republican senators to get organized or risk falling into what that person described as the disarray of the White House.

We dont want to fall into the same soup, the lawmaker said.

Signs that the GOP infighting is rapidly extending beyond the White House are now evident, suggesting mounting frustration.

Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.), a member of the far-right Freedom Caucus, issued a scathing rebuke of his GOP colleagues this week, declaring, The Republican Party is dead.

In an op-ed in The Denver Post, Buck wrote that Republicans had offered voters a vision for a better America ObamaCare repeal, tax reform, a balanced budget but, so far, have fulfilled none of those conservative promises.

[W]hat have we done? Congress passed an omnibus spending bill that betrays our values. A replacement for Obamacare lies dead on the Senate floor. Weve heard about tax reform but seen nothing yet. Immigration reform is talked about more on Fox News than it is on the House floor, wrote Buck, the former GOP freshman class president who was first elected in 2014.

Buck ended his diatribe with one final insult: calling the GOPs current leaders a B-team of messengers who distract the nation with frivolities.

A senior GOP aide argued that the House has been productive and that the problem is Democratic obstruction in the Senate, where 60 votes are needed to pass most controversial legislation.

Our chamber has been busy passing bills this year, many of which go with little coverage or fanfare, including major ones like the [Department of Veterans Affairs] reform bill and Dodd-Frank repeal, the aide said.

The House is racking and stacking bills for the Senate to act on. We cant control the upper chambers agenda.

Some Republicans are calling on McConnell and other GOP leaders to work more closely with Democrats on big issues such as healthcare and tax reform, making the case that trying to push through major bills on partisan votes is futile when the party is divided between conservatives and moderates.

Some House Republicans say its time to work across the aisle, particularly on issues like the debt ceiling and reauthorization of the Childrens Health Insurance Program, which need to be done by the end of September.

Im predisposed toward getting reforms done in a number of different areas, and if theres a potential for bipartisanship, I think thats the preferred avenue, said Rep. Ryan Costello (R-Pa.), a member of the moderate Tuesday Group whose swing district includes affluent suburbs outside of Philadelphia.

You need 60 votes in the Senate for most things, and I think working backward from that premise can yield more legislative successes.

But conservatives are skeptical that working with Democrats will yield any worthwhile results, laying bare another divide GOP leaders will have to wrestle with in the weeks ahead.

I would welcome working with Democrats. Sadly, Im not optimistic that Democrats have any willingness to work together to get anything done, said conservative Sen. Ted CruzTed CruzEx-Cruz aide: Now Bannon is establishment voice in Trump White House McConnell faces questions, but no test to his leadership Senate Republicans brush off Trump's healthcare demands MORE (R-Texas). The modern Democratic Party is captured by the radical far left.

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Republicans wonder: Can we govern? - The Hill

By Win McNamee/Getty Images.

After their latest attempt to repeal Obamacare died with John McCains knife in its back, Republicans are ready to move on. Theyre officially tuning out Donald Trumps ongoing Twitter tirades about going back to the drawing board, and talking about focusing on the one thing they care about more than slashing Medicaid: slashing tax rates.

Theres plenty riding on the tax-reform effort, for both the G.O.P. and for Trump. For Republican lawmakers, it would mean that having held their noses through the p---y tape, the Russian scandal, Sessionsgate, and Moochghazi might all have been worth it in the end. For Trump, successfully bringing down rates would not only mean putting a win on a scoreboard noticeably devoid of wins, but proving to the business community that he could come through in the clutch.

Of course, there are several monumental obstacles in their way. For starters, theres a reason nobody has re-written the tax code in a meaningful way in 30 years: tax reform is hard. Every tax break, loophole, deduction, subsidy, and credit has a constituency willing to douse Congress in lobbying money to keep their benefits. And thats to say nothing of actual American voters who depend on dozens of tax provisions to pay their mortgages, reduce their liabilities, and put their kids through college. Making matters worse, as always, is the White House itself, which isdespite Trumps tweet yesterday that there is No WH chaos!absolutely plagued by chaos. (So long, Mooch!) There is also the small fact that the president, himself, seems oddly determined to continue tilting at the Obamacare repeal windmill, even though Republican lawmakers are signaling forcefully that theyre ready to let it go.

The biggest obstacle of all, however, is the Democratic Party, which is as committed as ever to seeing the Trump agenda ground to a screeching halt. Worse, theyre effectively taunting Republicans by claiming theyre ready to work together on a bipartisan tax-reform dealessentially calling the G.O.P.s bluff.

In an August 1 letter to the president and G.O.P. leaders, signed by 45 Senate Democrats, Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer wrote, We are writing to express our interest in working with you on bipartisan tax reform. For Republicans who believe they were put on earth to cut taxes, this line must have been music to their ears! Doves must have started singing, storm clouds must have been replaced by blue skies, and they would later tell people they could have sworn the framed photo of Ronald Reagan hanging over their desk smiled and winked. Unfortunately, this line represented the high point of the letter. Because Chuck Schumer was about to drop a bomb:

[The Democratic lawmakers ] made two blunt demands on taxes: They will not back any bill that gives new breaks to the wealthiest individuals and will not back any legislation that adds to the deficit.

Tax reform cannot be a cover story for delivering tax cuts to the wealthiest, the senators wrote. We will not support any tax plan that includes tax cuts for the top 1 percent. The Democrats added that they will not support any effort to pass deficit-financed tax cuts, which would endanger critical programs like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and other public investments in the future.

Of course, the plan that was put forth by the White House in April expressly delivers tax cuts to the wealthiest, by bringing the top tax rate to 35 percent and eliminating the inheritance tax, to say nothing of the people who will rush to reorganize their businesses as LLCs so that they can pay the corporate tax rate, which Team Trump wants slashed to 15 percent. And when we last checked in, the officials working hard on tax reform still hadnt figured out how to pay for all of their proposed tax cuts, with some people in the White House reportedly happy [to] just blow out the deficit. So yes, Schumer & Co. are totally ready and willing to team up with Republicans to get tax reform done, so long as tax reform looks literally nothing like what Republicans want.

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Chuck Schumer Trolls Republicans with Impossible Tax-Reform Offer - Vanity Fair

Ad will collapse in seconds CLOSE August 2, 2017 08/02/2017 11:41 am By Jen Kirby Share Tom Cotton. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Senate Republicans are helping President Donald Trump make good on one of his campaign promises to lower legal immigration. Tom Cotton of Arkansas and David Perdue of Georgia are set to unveil the Reforming American Immigration for Strong Employment Act, or RAISE Act, on Wednesday alongside Trump, whose administration has been working to help the senators shape the legislation, reports the Washington Post.

Cotton and Perdue first presented the bill in February, which would trim the number of green-card recipients that is, people that did it the right way by about half over the next ten years. To achieve this, the proposed legislation would tighten visa eligibility for family members, limiting it primarily to children under the age of 21 and spouses. Grandparents, for example, could get screwed for real this time.

That also reflects the bills goal to help shift the U.S. immigration system toward a more merit-based model, and away from the chain system, which focuses on family unification. While the details on this arent exactly clear, the proposed legislation would decrease the number of temporary visas for lower-skilled workers, while making some changes to attract more people with specialized skills.

Finally, the bill reportedly includes a refugee cap of 50,000, and would scrap the diversity lottery, which accounts for about 50,000 visas from countries that tend to have lower immigration rates to the United States.

While theres broad consensus that the U.S. immigration system should be reformed and updated, the question of how is where all agreement breaks down. Democrats are almost certainly going to oppose the RAISE Act in its current form, and as New Yorks Ed Kilgore pointed out earlier this year, it may be a tough sell for business-oriented Republicans, or more moderate GOPers who represent more diverse constituencies though, as the health-care battle made clear, you really never know.

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This complex in the Rockaways was rebuilt and is clean, well-maintained, and safe.

Two senators, alongside Trump, will propose halving the rate over the next ten years.

After Kellys first 48 hours on the job, even Trump is on his best behavior for his new chief of staff.

She only reports real (a.k.a. positive) stories about the White House.

The civil-rights division is preparing to tackle discrimination against white people.

The Trump administration and Ed Butowsky, the conservative commentator at the center of a new lawsuit, cant seem to agree.

Legally, it may have been on the record, but the spirit of it was off.

The tax reform ruse has been blown.

The newspaper didnt release the full transcript of this curious conversation with Trump, so Politico did.

Out of the spotlight, HHS secretary Tom Price has been busily dismantling regulations that hold his fellow physicians accountable for results.

The Senate overwhelmingly approved his appointment, 92 to 5.

Kelly Roberts is also a GOP donor and the mother of two reality-TV stars. Native Slovenian Melania Trump had a strong hand in the choice.

For a long time Dean Heller looked likely to thwart his partys drive for health-care legislation. Then he flipped back, but the GOP failed anyway.

Hawaiis Mazie Hirono on the ongoing health-care fight, the fumbling Trump administration, and John McCains dramatic 11th-hour vote.

The head of the Coast Guard has also come out against Trumps announced ban on transgender people in the military.

The problem with arguments against a Democratic litmus test on abortion is the habit of disrespectfully treating reproductive rights as disposable.

How paranoia took over the Republican Party.

He also addressed those Dancing With the Stars rumors.

Bill Shine, who was accused of abetting Roger Ailess sexual harassment, may soon have a job in White House communications.

The leader is defiant over his controversial vote as two opposition leaders are reportedly arrested.

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Senate Republicans Have a Plan to Lower Legal Immigration - New York Magazine

A key moment came in the 1970s, when Irving Kristol, the godfather of neoconservatism, embraced supply-side economics the claim, refuted by all available evidence and experience, that tax cuts pay for themselves by boosting economic growth. Writing years later, he actually boasted about valuing political expediency over intellectual integrity: I was not certain of its economic merits but quickly saw its political possibilities. In another essay, he cheerfully conceded to having had a cavalier attitude toward the budget deficit, because it was all about creating a Republican majority so political effectiveness was the priority, not the accounting deficiencies of government.

The problem is that once you accept the principle that its O.K. to lie if it helps you win elections, it gets ever harder to limit the extent of the lying or even to remember what its like to seek the truth.

The rights intellectual and moral collapse didnt happen all at once. For a while, conservatives still tried to grapple with real problems. In 1989, for example, The Heritage Foundation offered a health care plan strongly resembling Obamacare. That same year, George H. W. Bush proposed a cap-and-trade system to control acid rain, a proposal that eventually became law.

But looking back, its easy to see the rot spreading. Compared with Donald Trump, the elder Bush looks like a paragon but his administration lied relentlessly about rising inequality. His sons administration lied consistently about its tax cuts, pretending that they were targeted on the middle class, and in case youve forgotten took us to war on false pretenses.

And almost the entire G.O.P. either endorsed or refused to condemn the death panels slander against Obamacare.

Given this history, the Republican health care disaster was entirely predictable. You cant expect good or even coherent policy proposals from a party that has spent decades embracing politically useful lies and denigrating expertise.

And lets be clear: were talking about Republicans here, not the political system.

Democrats arent above cutting a few intellectual corners in pursuit of electoral advantage. But the Obama administration was, when all is said and done, remarkably clearheaded and honest about its policies. In particular, it was always clear what the A.C.A. was supposed to do and how it was supposed to do it and it has, for the most part, worked as advertised.

Now what? Maybe, just maybe, Republicans will work with Democrats to make the health system work better after all, polls suggest that voters will, rightly, blame them for any future problems. But it wouldnt be easy for them to face reality even if their president wasnt a bloviating bully.

And its hard to imagine anything good happening on other policy fronts, either. Republicans have spent decades losing their ability to think straight, and theyre not going to get it back anytime soon.

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Who Ate Republicans' Brains? - New York Times