8.31 Hugh Grant denounces Boris Johnson on Twitter: “You will not fuck with my children’s future. You will not destroy the freedoms my grandfather fought two world wars to defend. Fuck off you over-promoted rubber bath toy. Britain is revolted by you and you little gang of masturbatory prefects.”
8.28 Frank Bruni in the New York Times: “I wouldn’t be surprised if voters consciously or subconsciously conclude that they just can’t continue to live like this and that four more years would be ruinous, if not to the country as a whole, then to our individual psyches. By the time Election Day rolls around, they may crave nothing more electric than stability and serenity. That wouldn’t be a bad Democratic bumper sticker. It’s essentially the message of Joe Biden’s campaign.”
8.28 Boris Johnson asks Queen to suspend Parliament. It is normal for a new prime minister to ask the monarch to prorogue Parliament so that the government can set out a new legislative agenda. It usually happens every year, resulting in the State Opening of Parliament, which is something akin to the State of the Union, only it involves the queen and a carriage ride and a speech given from a throne. That’s normal here. What isn’t normal is the length of time that Johnson is suspending Parliament. The five-week break that Johnson asked for is the longest prorogation since 1945.
8.25 Andrew Luck announces his retirement
8.26 Greg Sargent in the Washington Post: It took three days, but amid President Trump’s wild gyrations in his trade wars, his erratic efforts to spread confusion and lies about the utterances of other world leaders, and his unstable lapses of attention into matters unrelated to the Group of Seven summit, we have finally sighted one bedrock principle, one unshakable constant in Trump’s conduct, from which he will never waver. We’re talking, of course, about Trump’s absolute, unfaltering devotion to using the powers of the presidency to serve his own financial self-interest. With the G-7 winding down, Trump just disclosed that he’s seriously considering hosting next year’s G-7 gathering at his Doral resort in Florida. Trump extolled his resort for its location (right near the airport!), size (tremendous acreage!) and amenities (great conference rooms!).
8.24 Washington Post: President Trump stands to save millions of dollars annually in interest on outstanding loans on his hotels and resorts if the Federal Reserve lowers rates as he has been demanding, according to public filings and financial experts. In the five years before he became president, Trump borrowed more than $360 million via four loans from Deutsche Bank for his hotels in Washington, D.C., and Chicago, as well his 643-room Doral golf resort in South Florida. The payments on all four properties vary with interest rate changes, according to Trump’s official financial disclosures. That means he has already benefited from falling interest rates that were spurred in part by a cut the Federal Reserve announced in July, the first in more than a decade — and his payments could drop by millions of dollars more annually if the central bank grants Trump’s wish and further lowers short-term rates, experts said.
8.25 With Ginny and Cara at Boscobel
8.24 Professor Sherri Burr says that Aaron Burr fathered two children, John Pierre and Louisa Charlotte, with a woman of color named Mary Emmons, who hailed from Kolkata, India, and worked as a servant in the Burrs’ home for several years.
8.24 European Council President Donald Tusk: “This may be the last moment to restore our political community.”
8.23 Trump orders American companies to stop trading with China; Dow drops 693 points. My only question is who is our bigger enemy,” Trump tweets, “Jay Powell or Chairman Xi?”
8.23 President Trump on Tuesday abruptly called off a trip to Denmark, announcing in a tweet that he was postponing the visit because the country’s leader was not interested in selling him Greenland. The move comes two days after Trump told reporters that owning Greenland, a self-governing country that is part of the kingdom of Denmark, “would be nice” for the United States from a strategic perspective.
8.23 Megan McArdle in the Post: “This is a president who canceled a state visit because the prime minister of Denmark declined to sell part of Danish territory to the United States. Can you really look at that sort of behavior and think Trump’s critics have the derangement problem?”
8.23 Jennifer Rubin in the Post: The irony of this, of course, is that Republicans could get the very same policy results with Vice President Pence as president, without the crackpottery and without putting the country at risk. They’re too afraid of Trump to call him out, and perfectly fine leaving him in power and signing on for four more years of this insanity. Presidential candidates should be saying what we know to be true about Trump — and putting the spotlight squarely on Republican sycophants who indulge his bizarrely abnormal behavior.
8.23 David Koch dies at 79. Of the Koch brothers, Columbia University political scientist Alexander Hertel-Fernandez has said, “It’s hard to think of another set of individuals who have had such an impact on our political system who haven’t been elected officials.”
8.21 Gov. Cuomo: There is no substitute for quality and substance and effort. A well done speech is still an art form. Even if a dying one. U guys did a magnificent job on a really important issue. U should be proud of the effort. I am. Thank you.
8.20 Albany
8.20 Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post: Once upon a time, during a period of our distant past (okay, it was January 2009 through January 2017), Republicans deplored a president who was insufficiently vocal on human rights abuses in China; who thought “reset” with Russia was possible; who failed to understand that we don’t unilaterally end wars (rather, the enemy gets a vote, as we saw following the 2011 withdrawal from Iraq); who set dates certain for an exit of forces, thereby encouraging intransigence in the enemy; who would make one-sided deals with authoritarians without securing human rights guarantees (e.g., Cuba), and that Republicans claimed gave tyrants propaganda wins; who seemed to put his thumb on the scale in Israel’s parliamentary elections; and who didn’t take terrorism seriously enough. Now, if you think it’s unfair to hold Donald Trump to the same standard as they afforded Barack Obama, I confess that Trump is much, much worse.
8.19 Francisco Toro in the Post: If tomorrow a drug was developed that transformed the lives of the world’s extreme poor as efficiently as direct cash transfers, it would be considered a revolution in the world of aid. Well, guess what: It already exists. Study after study shows cash improves the lives of the poorest with next to no negative side effects. A recent review of 19 separate studies shows that, despite early fears, cash transfers very seldom increase spending on temptation goods like alcohol or gambling. Nor do they induce people to work fewer hours.
8.19 Steph Curry will make a seven-figure donation to create competitive golf programs at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
8.19 181 of the nation’s top CEOs, members of the Business Roundtable, agreed that driving shareholder value is no longer their sole business objective. Why this matters: They expanded their mission beyond mere wealth creation to include everything from taking care of employees to helping their communities. This shift, spearheaded by BRT Chairman and JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, reflects the growing pressure from employees, social media and customers to do more than increase stock prices.
8.18 A basketball jersey believed to have been worn by former President Obama as a guard on the 1979 Hawaii state championship high school team was auctioned for $120,000 in Dallas this weekend.
8.18 Tweet by Newt Gingrich: The NY Times 1619 Project should make its slogan “All the Propaganda we want to brainwash you with”.it is a repudiation of the original NY Times motto.
8.18 Nikole Hannah-Jones in the New York Times: The United States is a nation founded on both an ideal and a lie. Our Declaration of Independence, approved on July 4, 1776, proclaims that “all men are created equal” and “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” But the white men who drafted those words did not believe them to be true for the hundreds of thousands of black people in their midst. “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” did not apply to fully one-fifth of the country. Yet despite being violently denied the freedom and justice promised to all, black Americans believed fervently in the American creed. Through centuries of black resistance and protest, we have helped the country live up to its founding ideals. And not only for ourselves — black rights struggles paved the way for every other rights struggle, including women’s and gay rights, immigrant and disability rights Without the idealistic, strenuous and patriotic efforts of black Americans, our democracy today would most likely look very different — it might not be a democracy at all. The very first person to die for this country in the American Revolution was a black man who himself was not free. Crispus Attucks was a fugitive from slavery, yet he gave his life for a new nation in which his own people would not enjoy the liberties laid out in the Declaration for another century. In every war this nation has waged since that first one, black Americans have fought — today we are the most likely of all racial groups to serve in the United States military.
8.16 Peter Fonda dies at 79
8.13 Workers at a Royal Dutch Shell plant in Monaca, Pa., were forced to choose between attending a speech by President Trump or forgoing overtime pay that their co-workers would earn. Attendance was optional, but contract workers who chose not to stand in the crowd would not qualify for time-and-a-half pay when they arrived at work Friday.
8.16 Washington DC–Claire Jerry, Smithsonian. Here’s the portable desk on which Thomas Jefferson wrote the most important sentence in American history: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” TJ’s laptop, as it were.
8.15 Washington DC — Claire Jerry, Smithsonain
8.15 Governor Cuomo proposed first in the nation Hate Crime Domestic Terrorism Act: When Abraham Lincoln asked “whether a nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure,” he was asking the fundamental question that every generation of Americans must answer. It was answered at Gettysburg, it was answered on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, it was answered on 9/11. And today the American people are calling on us to answer that question once more.
8.16 After a day-long shootout in which six Philadelphia police officers were wounded, a suspect succumbs to tear gas and surrenders.
8.16 At Trump‘s request, Israel bans Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar. Later, Israel reassesses, and permits Tlaib to visit her grandmother on humanitarian grounds. She refuses.
8.15 The Wall Street Journal reports that the president has repeatedly expressed interest in acquiring Greenland, the autonomous Danish territory situated between the Arctic and North Atlantic oceans. Denmark says it is not for sale
8.14 Albany
8.13 Albany
8.12 In a video that spread across the web, CNN’s Chris Cuomo unleashed a spate of profanity-laced insults and threatened to throw a man down some stairs after the man apparently called him Fredo. “I’ll f***ing ruin your shit. I’ll f***ing throw you down these stairs like a f***ing punk.”
8.12 Harry Reid in the Times: The Senate is now a place where the most pressing issues facing our country are disregarded, along with the will of the American people overwhelmingly calling for action. The future of our country is sacrificed at the altar of the filibuster. Something must change. That is why I am now calling on the Senate to abolish the filibuster in all its forms. And I am calling on candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for president to do the same. If a Democratic president wants to tackle the most important issues facing our country, then he or she must have the ability to do so — and that means curtailing Republicans’ ability to stifle the will of the American people. It’s time to allow a simple majority vote instead of the 60-vote threshold now required for legislation. When the American people demand change and elect a new Senate, a new majority leader must be able to respond to that call and pass legislation.
8.10 Jeffrey Epstein dies in his cell, a suicide
8.9 Anthony Scaramucci mildly criticized Trump, who lashed out. In turn, Scaramucci calls for the GOP to select a new nominee
8.7 Biden: American presidents have stepped up in the past. George H W Bush renouncing his membership in the NRA. President Clinton after Oklahoma City. George W. Bush going to a mosque after 9/11, President Obama after Charleston. Presidents who led, who oppose, chose to fight for what the best of American character is about. There’s deafening silence now. Sadly, we don’t have that today. Our president has aligned himself with the darkest forces in this nation and it makes winning this battle for the soul of our nation that much tougher, harder. Trump doesn’t understand what Franklin D Roosevelt did. Roosevelt said, the presidency is quote, “preeminently a place of moral leadership”. You don’t see what JFK did when he said “only the president represents the national interest”. He’s blind. Lyndon Baines Johnson said of the office when he said, quote, “nothing makes a man come to grips more directly with his conscience than the presidency.” Trump offers no moral leadership and seems to have no interest in unifying this nation. No evidence that the presidency has awakened his conscience in the least. Indeed, we have a president with a toxic tongue who has publicly and unapologetically embraced a political strategy of hate, racism, and division. So it’s up to us as it was in the 20s, it’s up to us. We’re living through a rare moment in this nation’s history where our president isn’t up to the moment, where our president lacks the moral authority to lead, where our president has more in common with George Wallace than he does with George Washington. You know, we are almost 330 million Americans. We’ll have to do what our president can’t, stand together, stand against hate, stand up for what’s best, our nation’s best. When we’re the best. In this nation, we believe, when we’re at our best, we believe in honesty, decency, treating everyone with respect, giving everyone a fair shot, leaving nobody behind, giving hate no safe harbor, demonizing no one, not the poor, the powerless, the immigrant or the other, leading by the power of our example, not by the example of our power. That’s allowed us to stand as a beacon to the world, being part of something bigger than ourselves. It’s a code. It’s uniquely American code. It’s who we are, but Donald Trump doesn’t get it. What this president doesn’t understand is that like every other nation on earth, we’re unable to define what constitutes America by religion, by ethnicity, or by tribe. You can’t do it. America’s an idea. An idea stronger than any army, bigger than any ocean, more powerful than any dictator or tyrant. It gives hope to the most destitute people on earth. It’s not only our values that are under assault, our democracy is as well. Free press, new independent judiciary, legislature. There’s a co-equal branch of government. These are the guard rails of our democracy. They’re written into our Constitution, and if you’ve noticed for the last two plus years, they’ve been under attack. Phrases like fake news, enemy of the people. They’re no joke. They’re insidious. They’re corrosion. Just look around the world. The worst despots are now using Trump’s language to justify their own abuses of power. Trump is trying to weaken our institutions, the press, the courts, the congress, precisely because they are the only checks on his power. That’s what this is all about. The abuse of power. There’s one thing I can’t stand and I know you can’t, is the abuse of power, whether it’s a boss taking advantage of his or her workers or a man raising his hand to a woman or a child or president who’s running rough shot over everything this country believes.”
8.7 Trump in El Paso: “We had an amazing day. As you know, we left Ohio. The love, the respect for the office of the presidency.”
8.7 Trump leaving for Dayton, per The Washington Post: “There is a great appetite, and I mean a very strong appetite, for background checks,” he said. But Trump said there is “no political appetite” for banning assault-style weapons, despite public polling that indicates otherwise. Trump also denied that his rhetoric had anything to do with the El Paso shootings. “I think my rhetoric brings people together,” Trump said. He said he was concerned about “the rise of any group of hate … whether it’s white supremacy, any type of supremacy, antifa.”
8.7 Albany
8.7 Last month 75 bison escaped from a Schoharie County bison ranch. 64 remain at large
8.6 Toni Morrison dies at 88
8.3 After 20 people were killed by a racist mass murdered in El Paso, nine were killed in a second shooting in Dayton.
8.2 Albany
8.2 The Wall Street Journal: “Median household income in the U.S. was $61,372 at the end of 2017, according to the Census Bureau. When inflation is taken into account, that is just above the 1999 level. Over a longer stretch — the three decades through 2017 — incomes are up 14% in inflation-adjusted terms.” “Average housing prices, however, swelled 290% over those three decades in inflation-adjusted terms, according to an analysis by Adam Levitin, a Georgetown Law professor.” “Average tuition at public four-year colleges went up 311%, adjusted for inflation, by his calculation. And average per capita personal health-care expenditures rose about 51% in real terms over a slightly shorter period, 1990 to 2017.”
8.2 July was Earth’s hottest month ever recorded, “on a par with, and possibly marginally higher” than the previous warmest month, which was July 2016, according to provisional data from the Copernicus Climate Change Service. . . . The monthly global average temperature anomaly was 2.16 degrees (1.2 Celsius) above preindustrial levels
8.1 Max Boot in the Washington Post: A recent NPR-PBS NewsHour-Marist poll suggests how Democrats can appeal to these moderate swing voters. It’s not by providing reparations for slavery (which has the support of 27 percent of all voters surveyed), decriminalizing illegal border crossings (27 percent), providing free health care to undocumented immigrants (33 percent), replacing private health insurance with Medicare-for-all (41 percent) or getting rid of the electoral college (42 percent). The Democrats would be better advised to focus on background checks for gun buyers (89 percent support), banning assault-style weapons (57 percent), Medicare for everyone who wants it (70 percent), offering a pathway for citizenship to undocumented immigrants (64 percent), investing in green technology (63 percent), rejoining the Paris climate accord (53 percent), legalizing marijuana (63 percent) and raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour (56 percent). Increasing taxes on those making more than $1 million is popular (62 percent support), but, as I’ve previously argued, the Sanders-Warren wish list will require raising taxes on the middle class.
