What Would President Reagan Have Done That Donald Trump Will Not?

No way to claim this is normal……..or good for the nation. One has to ask why Trump is acting in this fashion?  And what would President Reagan has done?

After nearly two years of calling Russian election interference a hoax and its investigation a witch hunt, on Friday afternoon Donald Trump is scheduled to preside over the first National Security Council meeting devoted to defending American democracy from foreign manipulation.

But 19 months into his sitting in the Oval Office, there is no coherent Trump administration strategy to combat foreign election interference — and no single person or agency in charge, current and former officials tell NBC News.

Interesting And Unexpected Photo

Special counsel Robert Mueller and Donald Trump Jr. were spotted both waiting for their flights this morning at the 35X gate at DCA. This image first appeared in POLITICO Playbook PM.

Before Popping Champagne Over Economy Lets Recall What President Obama Achieved

Donald Trump is not very good with facts.  Or giving any credit to our nation’s first African-American president. But the fact is the United States has seen stronger GDP growth before.  It was President  Obama who delivered better than 4.1% quarterly annualized gains FOUR times.

Friday’s figures were pumped up by a surge in exports, which accounted for a quarter of the total growth for the quarter. Paradoxically, the export boom was driven in part by mounting trade tensions, which led foreign buyers to stock up on American products before their governments imposed tariffs. The trend is particularly clear in exports of soybeans, which were up more than 50 percent in May from a year earlier. Those buyers presumably didn’t want more soybeans than usual — they just wanted them sooner. Exports will almost certainly slump in the third and fourth quarters, and will turn into a drag on overall G.D.P. growth.

What Crazy Thing Will Trump Do Today In Attempt At Diversion From His Traitorous Presidential Campaign?

There is never a good time to sleep as the corruption from Donald Trump and his crime family keeps making headlines.  (It is 1:36 A.M. and your blogger is still at his desk.)

Late Thursday night it was reported that Michael Cohen, who was Donald Trump’s personal attorney, claims that then-candidate Trump knew in advance about the June 2016 meeting in Trump Tower.  That was the meeting in which adoption was the topic—oh, no, that was lie manufactured by Trump as he was heading back to the United States.   The reality of the meeting is that Russians were expected to offer the Trump campaign dirt on Hillary Clinton.

What will make Trump need the toilet often today is the report that Cohen is willing to make that assertion to special counsel Robert Mueller.

Why this is rich revolves around Cohen’s claim grandly contradicting the bold face lies made by Trump.  Many strongly suspect that perjury was committed by Trump Jr., who tired to spin the yarn that the Orange Man knew nothing about the Trump Tower meeting until he was approached about it by The New York Times in July 2017.

To make this news reporting even more damaging is that it has been verified by multiple news operations.  Cohen alleges that he was present, along with several others, when Trump was informed of the Russians’ offer by Trump Jr.  By Cohen’s account, Trump approved going ahead with the meeting with the Russians.

This reporting is what the American public has long suspected. No one is shocked to find that the mentally unstable man in the Oval Office has no morals, is a traitor, and has a family as void of  souls as he does.   The lot of stinking mess should be sent to some far-flung penal colony.

The other major report tonight is that the Grand Jury in New York is making progress on what we also new from the start.

We knew the heart of the criminal matter were the business dealings and loans to Trump businesses from foreign interests. That is the reason for the mess this nation is now facing. That is why presidential candidates need to release their tax returns.  Now the reporting from the Wall Street Journal about the New York Grand jury is taking us closer to the center of the crimes.

Allen Weisselberg, a longtime financial gatekeeper for President Donald Trump, has been subpoenaed to testify before a federal grand jury in the criminal probe of Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, according to people familiar with the investigation.

Mr. Weisselberg is considered a witness in the investigation, the people said. It isn’t known whether he has already appeared before the grand jury or what questions prosecutors of New York’s Southern District have had for him. The date of the subpoena couldn’t be determined.

For decades, Mr. Weisselberg has served as executive vice president and chief financial officer at the Trump Organization, and was once described by a person close to the company as “the most senior person in the organization that’s not a Trump.” After Mr. Trump was elected, he handed control of his financial assets and business interests to his two adult sons and Mr. Weisselberg.

A spokeswoman for the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office declined to comment. Mr. Weisselberg and a spokeswoman for the Trump Organization didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The subpoena illustrates that investigators are seeking input from Mr. Trump’s closest colleagues in the Trump Organization, particularly those with knowledge of the company’s financial dealings.

Incredibly Detailed, Interactive Map Of 2016 Presidential Election Results

No matter who you voted for this map is AMAZING.

Type in your zip code…..wow!   Use you mouse to zoom in and out. The New York Times has published an incredibly detailed, interactive map of 2016 presidential election results.

Country Star Eric Church Blames NRA For Las Vegas Gun Massacre

Spot on.

The soulless NRA do not care.   They are out to make money on bloodshed.

In a new interview with Rolling Stone, Church discussed the Vegas shooting and placed blame on the National Rifle Association and gun lobbyists for being a “roadblock” to safety.

“There are some things we can’t stop,” he said. “Like the disgruntled kid who takes his dad’s shotgun and walks into a high school. But we could have stopped the guy in Vegas.”

He added: “I blame the lobbyists. And the biggest in the gun world is the NRA.”

Church, who paid tribute to the victims of the shooting in a moving performance at the Grand Ole Opry in October, days after the shooting, told Rolling Stone that he is not a member of the NRA, but that he considers himself “a Second Amendment guy.”

“I feel like they’ve been a bit of a roadblock,” Church said of the NRA. “I don’t care who you are – you shouldn’t have that kind of power over elected officials. To me it’s cut-and-dried: The gun-show [loophole] would not exist if it weren’t for the NRA, so at this point in time, if I was an NRA member, I would think I had more of a problem than the solution. I would question myself real hard about what I wanted to be in the next three, four, five years.”

White House Must Not Ban Reporters

It is not possible for his blogger to make comment on every pressing issue that makes the news.  For instance, the need to make sure Ukraine is not subjugated by Russia was part of the dialogue this week as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spent more than three hours before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.  Ukraine is a huge concern and though I care about the nation, I find summer days draw me outside and away from my home office.  So posts on important issues get delayed.

But there was one story yesterday which demands a few minutes to blog about as it impact freedom of the press and the ability of citizens to have facts about what their government is doing.

The Trump administration made what can only be described as a jackass decision when it escalated their ongoing conflict with CNN.   This time they barred White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins from covering an open press event which took place yesterday in the Rose Garden.

In a statement released by CNN they said that after Collins asked questions of President Trump as a pool reporter, she was ushered into a meeting with White House deputy chief of staff for communications Bill Shine and press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders in Shine’s office.  At the meeting, the two officials told Collins she was “disinvited” from a press event.

What took place was simply Stalin-like–and there is no way to deny or refute it.

The fact that action by the White House was so outrageous is underscored by the reaction form other journalists.  And even from the ones who play journalists at Fox News.  On his show Wednesday, Bret Baier made it clear that Fox News is standing with CNN.

“As a member of the White House press pool, Fox stands firmly with CNN on this issue of access,” Baier said, before noting the White House had not responded to a request for comment.

I have stated many times when it comes to the press corps that the reporters and journalists need to display solidarity.  There is no way for any thinking person to react other than with utter dismay when the Trump administration barred  a reporter from attending a presidential event in the Rose Garden–because she has asked questions at another event Trump did not like.

Well too bad forTrump!

If Trump does not like questions which embarrasses him there is a remedy to that matter.  Keep your zipper up, stay out of bed with strippers and hookers, and go home to your wife at night.  Stop making money deals to hide your actions.   And also do not cozy around with Russian autocrats.

Collins was doing her job.  A job, by the way, which is more important to our republic than any other–gathering facts and reporting them to the citizenry.  (Recall what Thomas Jefferson said.) Trump will do stupid things and can also ignore reporter’s questions.  But the White House must NEVER punish reporters for inquiries they don’t like.

House Conservatives Always Play Political Games At This Time Of Year

Parents know how it is with kids at this point of the summer.  The young ones have been home for a number of weeks from school and have become bored with too much free time.  So they start to put blasting caps in the mailbox and think paints balls might be their future outlet for stress.

That is much like the conservatives in congress who have taken to the impeachment road.  They have filed articles of impeachment in an effort to oust Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, the overseer of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

It should be noted that these partisan tools have always done something like this right before the August recess. They tried to take down John Boehner, they tried to push out the IRS commissioner, they tried to force a repeal of Obamacare and this year, they are trying to push out the deputy attorney general.  They are eager beavers, but short of common sense and political clout in the real sense of the term.

Now they say the need for ousting Rosenstein is due to legitimate issues.  That smacks of  a lack of candor by a mile.  These conservatives desire is to raise money and split Republicans for the all-important election for them—the one for House Speaker.

They care not one bit for the needs of the nation.    Or law and order.