memeorandum: Trump rewrites his playbook (Axios)

1:15 PM ET, March 26, 2017

Top Items:

Jennifer Haberkorn / Politico:

How a secret Freedom Caucus pact brought down Obamacare repeal — Speaker Paul Ryan and House leaders had been toiling behind closed doors for weeks assembling their Obamacare repeal bill as suspicion on the far-right simmered to a boil. — So on March 7, just hours after Ryan unveiled …

Discussion: Raw Story and The Hill

Katherine Faulders / ABC News:

Trump shifts blame to conservatives on health care bill failure — President Donald Trump took to Twitter on Sunday morning to call out the House Freedom Caucus, saying Democrats are “smiling” because the group of conservative lawmakers' opposition to the Republican proposal on health care “saved” Obamacare and Planned Parenthood.

Discussion: The Hill, Associated Press, RedState, Washington Post, Politico, Fox News, New York Times, Talking Points Memo, CBS New York and CNBC

Axios:

Trump rewrites his playbook — Amid high-stakes postmortems that include conversations with President Trump about White House staffing and operations, aides are rewriting their plans for the next legislative fight — with a weakened president and speaker, emboldened House hardliners, and a party at war with itself.

Discussion: Politico

The Times & The Sunday Times:

Germany slams ‘intimidating’ £300bn White House bill — Donald Trump handed the German chancellor Angela Merkel a bill — thought to be for more than £300bn — for money her country “owed” Nato for defending it when they met last weekend, German government sources have revealed.

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Political Wire, Raw Story and Axios

Krissah Thompson / Washington Post:

Two months out of office, Barack Obama is having a post-presidency like no other — The first cocktail party at Barack Obama's new office last month was certainly more casual than any he had hosted in recent years. The wine bore a random assortment of labels, as if assembled potluck-style.

Discussion: Axios

WLWT Digital / WLWT-TV:

Police: At least 15 shot, 1 fatally, at Cincinnati nightclub — News conference expected at 11 a.m. — CINCINNATI — A shooting that left one person dead and at least 14 others wounded stemmed from a conflict earlier in the day, Cincinnati police said.

Discussion: Fox News, ThinkProgress, Associated Press, John Hawkins' Right Wing News, Bearing Arms, BizPac Review and Mediaite

CNN:

Cincinnati nightclub shooting: One killed, 14 injured — (CNN)One person was killed and 14 injured in a shooting at a crowded hip-hop nightclub about 1 a.m. Sunday in Cincinnati. — Several victims are undergoing surgery, Cincinnati Police Sgt. Eric Franz told CNN.

Discussion: USA Today, The Root, New York Magazine, The FADER, CBS New York and IJR

Cameron Knight / Cincinnati.com: At least 14 shot, 1 killed at Cameo nightclub

Stan Collender / Forbes:

Passing Tax Reform Will Be As Difficult As Repealing Obamacare — As you switch your attention from this past week's spectacularly-failed effort by House Republicans and the Trump administration to repeal and replace Obamacare to the GOP's next big legislative priority of corporate tax reform …

Andrea Ruth / RedState: Lo & Behold: A Replica of the Successful 2015 Obamacare Repeal Is Languishing in Committee

Robert Draper / New York Times:

Trump vs. Congress: Now What? — After the president suffered his first defeat on Capitol Hill, can the White House still make good on its legislative promises? — On Monday, Jan. 9, less than two weeks before President Trump's inauguration, the House speaker, Paul Ryan …

Discussion: Axios and NBC News

Hollywood Reporter:

Trump Urges Followers to Watch Fox News Host Who Demands Paul Ryan Resign — Judge Jeanine Pirro opened her show demanding that Ryan step down for his “failure” over Trump's health care bill. — President Donald Trump tweeted a message on Saturday encouraging his followers …

Discussion: No More Mister Nice Blog, Shareblue, The Daily Caller, Mother Jones, RedState, Mashable, The FADER, The Gateway Pundit, BizPac Review and Political Wire

Maureen Dowd / New York Times:

Donald, This I Will Tell You — We've known each other a long time, so I think I can be blunt. — You know how you said at campaign rallies that you did not like being identified as a politician? — Don't worry. No one will ever mistake you for a politician.

Discussion: The Moderate Voice

Katherine Miller / BuzzFeed:

President Trump And America's National Nervous Breakdown — There's an old Sprite commercial, from the 1990s, in which it's a hot summer day on a city basketball court. Someone cracks open a Sprite, then jumps and cannonballs into the blacktop. It's OK, though, because the asphalt has become a swimming pool.

Dana Schuster / New York Post:

Huma Abedin ‘working hard’ on marriage with Anthony Weiner — Huma Abedin and Anthony Weiner in May of 2016. — Getty Images — Fool me once, shame on you. Fool Huma Abedin four times, and she'll still take you back. — After years of public humiliation by her sext-a-holic husband …

Discussion: New York Magazine, The Gateway Pundit, BizPac Review, twitchy.com and SARAH PALIN

Joe Concha / The Hill:

Maher on London attack: You never hear ‘Merry Christmas’ before bomb goes off — HBO's Bill Maher clashed with his “Real Time” panel Friday in a heated debate over Islam's role in this week's London terror attack. — A man rammed a truck into people on Westminster Bridge before stabbing …

Discussion: RedState

Maggie Haberman / New York Times:

Boris Epshteyn, Trump TV Surrogate, Is Leaving White House Job — Boris Epshteyn, an official in the White House press office who had a contentious relationship with television producers and was once a frequent presence on TV himself, is leaving his job, according to three people with knowledge of the move.

Discussion: CANNONFIRE, Deadline and Washington Post, more at Mediagazer »

Josh Dawsey / Politico:
Top Trump TV surrogate to leave high-profile post

Discussion: ABC News and Raw Story

Daily Mail:

Three people are arrested after Trump supporters are doused with pepper spray as they clash with protesters during Make America Great Again march in Huntington Beach — A man in a black mask reportedly pepper sprayed Trump supporters at a Make American Great Again March

Discussion: Vox Popoli and The Last Tradition

Cindy Carcamo / Los Angeles Times:
Violence erupts at pro-Trump rally in Huntington Beach

Discussion: Breitbart, BizPac Review, John Hawkins' Right Wing News, twitchy.com, Heat Street, RedState, Mediaite, KTLA and AOL

Andrew C. McCarthy / National Review:

Islam and the Jihad in London — It's not non-Western. It's anti-Western. — It was a careful choice of words, Bernard Lewis being nothing if not careful. In 2004, the West audibly gasped when its preeminent scholar of Islam famously told the German newspaper Die Welt …

Discussion: Daily Mail and Power Line