No tweet tariffs yet, sadly
BY PRIYANKA ARIBINDI, BRIAN BEUTLER
& CROOKED MEDIA
Thursday, March 22, 2018 | | |
After months of speculation about his impending departure, Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster is out as Trump’s national security adviser. He’s being replaced by John Bolton—a hardline conservative who formerly served as the U.S. Ambassador to the UN under President George W. Bush. This follows Trump’s replacement of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, in what sources say is an effort to fill up his national security team before meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un later this year. Bolton is scheduled to take office on April 9. Leaks about how poorly it’s going are scheduled to begin shortly thereafter. From Tommy: This is a disaster. The National Security Advisor’s job is to provide advice to the president and to oversee the National Security Council process, ensuring that all views are given a fair hearing and presented to the President. Bolton will suck at both. He still thinks invading Iraq was the right decision. He thinks we should bomb Iran, and has even argued that Israel should NUKE them. He thinks it’s perfectly fine and legal for us to bomb North Korea. Bolton is a right-wing zealot with fringe views that have been proven disastrously wrong time and time again. But he’s unrepentant about those mistakes and likely to make new ones because when he worked for Bush, Bolton tried to punish those who offered dissenting opinions. And he’s a verbally abusive asshole. Trump campaigned against the Iraq war and just hired one of its architects. I was genuinely worried this would bring us closer to (another) war until I read that a source said he promised Trump he wouldn’t start any wars. Haha, silly me! | Trump’s lead criminal lawyer John Dowd has resigned, after concluding that Trump “was increasingly ignoring his advice.” We noticed! With Dowd out, sources are now saying Trump feels “liberated” and ready to go on the offensive (a departure from his usual by-the-book caution). Trump is reportedly also considering tossing Ty Cobb, another member of his legal team who keeps telling him the investigation is almost over, perhaps to calm him down and prevent him from doing more damage on Twitter. Small bullseye on that one. What was Dowd’s advice? The Times reported that Dowd wanted Trump to be less aggressive towards Mueller, but they also noted that Dowd thinks it’s a “bad idea” for Trump to sit down for an interview with Mueller. Seems contradictory, unless Trump’s sweet spot is that he wants to talk to Mueller under oath (or claim he’ll do it) while reserving the right to say mean things about him on Twitter. Meanwhile the Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee released a summary of their forthcoming report on Russian election meddling which essentially concludes that Trump is genetically incapable of doing crimes. We should all hope to have loved ones in our lives who support us the way Devin Nunes supports Donald Trump. Nunes only needs a law degree to make his role as Trump’s de facto defense attorney official. | | |
TARIFF-IED OF A TRADE WAR | Today Trump announced tariffs on $50 billion worth of Chinese imports. These tariffs follow a seven-month investigation into Chinese theft of American intellectual property, as well as Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs, which are set to take effect tomorrow. China responded by saying it may raise their tariffs on U.S. pork, aluminum and other goods. No tweet tariffs yet, sadly. Speaking of the steel and aluminum tariffs, the Trump administration announced that four more countries—Australia, Argentina, Brazil and South Korea—will be exempt from the import tariffs, joining the European Union, Canada, and Mexico. | This morning the House passed a $1.3 million omnibus spending package in order to keep the government funded through September, but it’s hit a snag in the Senate. Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) is holding up the vote, and live-tweeting himself as he makes his way through the 2,000+ page bill. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has scheduled a vote for 1 a.m. Saturday (an hour past when the government would shut down), which will only be necessary under Senate rules if the senators can’t agree on allowing a vote before then. Even if the government ends up shutting down for a few hours, this thing will pass by this weekend. The House Energy and Commerce Committee will become the first Congressional committee to call Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify about Cambridge Analytica following the revelation that Trump’s data firm used improperly obtained Facebook user information to target voters. House Republicans on the Intelligence Committee, however, voted down a proposal from committee Democrats to hold a similar hearing with Zuckerberg, and voted instead to end their Russia investigation. This all comes after Zuckerberg himself suggested Facebook might deserve stricter regulation. Like and share. A Wisconsin judge ordered GOP Governor Scott Walker to call special elections to fill two seats in the state legislature vacated by Republicans—something Walker had refused to do for the very legitimate reason that Democrats might win. A big victory for Friend of the Pod Eric Holder, who led the suit on behalf of voters in those districts. On Monday, Sacramento police shot and killed 22-year-old Stephon Clark—an unarmed black man—in his own backyard, after saying they mistook his cell phone for a weapon. The two officers each fired 10 rounds and the department released bodycam footage of the shooting last night. The “lone” DNC hacker who communicated with Roger Stone during the 2016 election was found to be a Russian intelligence officer. Cool! Stone previously defended Russia as not being behind the hacks because “Guccifer 2.0” was responsible. George Nader, a cooperating witness in the Mueller investigation, has fled the U.S., like any innocent man would do. The president threatened to fight Joe Biden on Twitter. Trump said he’d win such a fight. And Mike Pence, who is obsessed with Trump’s “broad shoulders” backed him up. Is it Friday yet? | | |
On Pod Save America: Jon and Dan press Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) on his support for the banking bill. | | |
“Eat the ice cream. Have the French fry. Don't buy the street drug. Believe me, it all works out." —Kellyanne Conway, the Trump administration’s opioid czar, speaking about fentanyl It’s lovely to see that Conway, the administration’s point person on the opioid crisis, which killed 42,000 people in 2016, has thought so deeply about the causes of addiction. | Yesterday, the Associated Press ran a headline (which has since been updated) about a school shooting in Maryland, characterizing the shooter as a “lovesick teenager.” Also yesterday, The New York Times ran a slew of sympathetic details about the Austin bombing suspect—who, in addition to committing murder, compared homosexuality to bestiality—calling him a “quiet, ‘nerdy’ young man who came from a ‘tight-knit, godly family.’” Textbook “criming while white.” | According to a new Quinnipiac poll, 71% of voters oppose Trump’s death penalty for drug dealers idea—even the majority of Republicans (57%). Seems like people decided to think about it for five seconds. | | |
