Last Call For Meat The Press, Con't

The Trump regime is now gearing up to intimidate members of the press directly with paid political attack ads if they dare to challenge the Trump regime's narrative that Democrats are conspiratorial traitors that created the "lie" of Russian collusion.

Trump allies see Barr’s letter as a kind of Swiss Army knife—a tool useful in all kinds of situations. Not only is it exculpatory, they say, but it also implicitly rebukes the press for its coverage of the Russia investigation, inoculating Trump from any future scandal that reporters might unearth. According to a source familiar with internal discussions at the Republican National Committee and the pro-Trump super PAC America First, both organizations are “geared up for any nonsense to come.”

They’re already prepared to attack reporters. “Any reporter who tries that will be hit with 30-second spots of all their ridiculous claims about collusion,” said the source, who, like others interviewed for this story, requested anonymity to describe private conversations. “Their tweets have all been screencapped. It’s all ready to go.” (“It's the same thing we've been doing the last two years. We're going to hold the media accountable when we see fit,” an RNC official clarified, adding that this would include digital clips shared on social media.)

Earlier this week, Trump’s campaign previewed the in-your-face tactics they have in mind. A campaign official sent a letter to TV producers cautioning them against booking certain guests who had alleged that Trump colluded with Russia, including Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Democratic Representative Adam Schiff of California, and Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez.

“It’s not hard to figure where we’re going to go with this,” a current campaign official told The Atlantic. “We’re still in victory-lap mode, but it will turn into a message that [Democrats] will say or do anything to stop us from making America great again, including making up lies about the president and ruining a lot of people’s lives.”

White House officials suggested that the president has no plans to move on from the report because Democrats aren’t moving on. Instead, “they are doubling and tripling down,” says the White House spokesman Hogan Gidley.

At some level, letting go would be out of character. From the first, Trump has personalized the presidency. He still obsesses over the crowd size at his inauguration, along with perceived betrayals from Senator John McCain of Arizona, who died last summer. The Mueller investigation shadowed Trump for nearly two years. Now that it’s over, he is indulging in a bit of triumphalism.

Again, and I can't stress this enough, in an America where journalists have been gunned down by Trump supporters, the Trump regime is ready to weaponize their base by directly and specifically targeting journalists and Democrats as traitors who must be dealt with.

This goes well beyond attacking political opponents.  This is targeting journalists with political-style attack ads in order to stoke rage, rage that could very well be acted upon by an already wound-up group of people.

Trump is going to get more journalists hurt and killed until they stop criticizing him.

Trump Cards, Con't

Again, I keep hearing how Donald Trump is all talk and no action on things.  At the same time, I keep seeing Trump continually violating presidential norms to do whatever he wants.  18 months ago Trump was obsessed with North Korea, and apparently he made it clear that while he was visiting Puerto Rico to survey damage from Hurricane Maria that he can start a nuclear war anytime he feels like it.

He was there to survey the path of destruction left by Hurricane Maria. But when President Donald Trump visited Puerto Rico in October 2017, the island's dire predicament was hardly the only topic on his mind. 

People familiar with the visit said the President was distracted by other matters -- including his then-devolving war of words with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un -- as he toured devastated neighborhoods and took an aerial tour of the damage. 

At one point, Trump pointed to the "nuclear football" -- a briefcase always in the President's vicinity that can be used to authorize a nuclear attack -- and claimed he could use it on Kim whenever he felt. 

"This is what I have for Kim," he said, according to three people familiar who witnessed the remark.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the incident. 

So why are we only hearing about this now?  Guess.

The episode came amid an increasingly acrimonious period that saw Trump boast of the size of his "nuclear button" and threaten to rain "fire and fury" on North Korea. Since then, he and Kim have developed a warm friendship and met for two summits. 

But at the time, the casual reference to his nuclear capabilities was another sign of the spiraling rhetoric that marked his early interactions with Kim. 

And, to some officials, it was an indication of Trump's disinterest in the plight of Puerto Ricans, who suffered for months without power and limited resources as their island recovered from the walloping storm. 

"There were other topics that were being discussed and my view is that the sole focus of that trip should have been on Puerto Rico," said Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rosselló in an exclusive interview on Thursday.

Trump had made life hell for Puerto Rico, abandoning Americans because Trump hates them so much for being Americans when he doesn't think they count.

Now Gov. Rossello has returned the favor.

Deportation Nation, Con't

Just a reminder that Trump regime refuses to process migrants crossing into the US and is keeping them in camps in order to create a border crisis and a humanitarian crisis that will of course require "extraordinary emergency measures" to resolve.

The nation’s top border official warned that the U.S. immigration enforcement system along the nation’s southern boundary is at “the breaking point” and said Wednesday that authorities are having to release migrants into the country after cursory background checks because of a crush of asylum-seeking families with children.

Kevin McAleenan, the commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, said that for the first time in more than a decade, his agency is “reluctantly” performing direct releases of migrants, meaning they are not turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, they are not detained, they are not given ankle bracelets to track their movements and they are allowed to leave with just a notice to appear in court at a later date.

He said that this is a “negative outcome” but that it is “the only current option we have” because of overcrowding at detention facilities as Central Americans stream to the border knowing they will be able to gain entry with asylum claims.

The number of migrant families coming to the border has reached new highs month after month, a trend that dramatically accelerated after President Trump announced parents and children would no longer be separated, reversing course on his “zero tolerance” crackdown.

McAleenan said the agency detained more than 4,100 migrants Tuesday, the highest one-day total at the border in more than a decade, and agency projections have border apprehensions on pace to exceed 100,000 this month — an increase of more than 30 percent. By comparison, at the height of the last border crisis, in May 2014, agents apprehended more than 68,800 migrants that month.

The massive influx of families seeking asylum has strained almost every aspect of U.S. operations on the border, McAleenan said, nowhere more evident than here, along the Rio Grande. Crossings have been overwhelmed with hundreds of migrants seeking asylum daily; Border Patrol stations are crammed and have no space for detainees; the immigration court system is backed up with hundreds of thousands of cases; and health services are having to triage batches of patients who have a variety of ailments and communicable diseases.

“That breaking point has arrived this week,” McAleenan said, standing in front of a border fence. “CBP is facing an unprecedented humanitarian and border security crisis all along our southwest border, and nowhere has that crisis manifested more acutely than here in El Paso.” 

Again, everything here from Trump's false "end" the child separation to "reluctantly" releasing migrants without processing them is designed to visibly create a crisis, and if you don't believe me, note this is being done on purpose in El Paso.

Beto O' Rourke's congressional district.

Everything is calculated revenge, and Trump doesn't care how many human lives are destroyed in the process. And now, as I have told you for more than a year, Deportation Nation is almost here.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen will ask Congress for the authority to deport unaccompanied migrant children more quickly, to hold families seeking asylum in detention until their cases are decided and to allow immigrants to apply for asylum from their home countries, according to a copy of the request obtained by NBC News.

In a letter to Congress, Nielsen said she will be seeking a legislative proposal in the coming days to address what she called the "root causes of the emergency" that has led to a spike in border crossings in recent weeks. The letter has not yet been sent.

The legislative proposal would have to clear the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives, which is likely to respond with strong opposition.

The trap is simple: make Democrats vote on keeping migrant kids in cages versus mass deportations of migrant kids without their parents and blast them for whatever happens as 100% their fault.

While that won't be true, Democrats got maneuvered into this trap more than a year ago, and now it is closing around their necks.

Thousands of kids will suffer as a result.

StupidiNews!

• A federal judge has ordered the Trump regime to turn over all of former FBI Director James Comey's contemporaneous memos, the judge says the unredacted memos will be kept under seal.
• Donald Trump attacked House Democrats for over an hour last night at a campaign rally in Michigan, calling them "traitors" and "sick, sick people" who will soon be on "artificial respiration".
• Banking giant Wells Fargo CEO Tim Sloan has stepped down, Sloan is the second CEO to leave the bank in light of continuing sales practices scandals involving fabricated bank accounts.
• Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro is barring Senate opposition leader Juan Guaido from office for 15 years, the country's comptroller is accusing Guaido of falsifying tax statements.
• Former NSA contractor Harold Martin has pleaded guilty to one count of willful retention of National Security information, prosecutors are dropping 19 other charges and seeking a nine-year sentence.