Top Items:
Peter Baker / New York Times:
Trump Defends McMaster as Conservatives Seek His Dismissal — President Trump defended Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, his embattled national security adviser, on Friday in the face of a full-bore campaign by the nationalist wing of his political coalition accusing him of undermining the president's agenda and calling for his dismissal.
Discussion:
Breitbart, The Guardian, Axios, Fox News Insider, Occidental Dissent, TheBlaze, AOL, The Gateway Pundit and Washington Post
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Amir Tibon / Haaretz:
Far-right Bannon Affiliates Attack McMaster for Being ‘Controlled by Jews’ and ‘Hostile to Israel’ — Campaign against McMaster intensified after he fired a number of mid-level officials from the National Security Council, who were considered loyal to Bannon and to the former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn
CNN:
H.R. McMaster faces attacks from conservatives
H.R. McMaster faces attacks from conservatives
Discussion:
The National Interest and The Gateway Pundit
Rosie Gray / The Atlantic:
The War Against H.R. McMaster
The War Against H.R. McMaster
Discussion:
creepingsharia.wordpress.com, The Week, Washington Free Beacon, The Gateway Pundit and ThinkProgress
Karen Ocamb / Los Angeles Blade:
Trump's Trans Military Ban Now Policy — President Donald Trump may be on a 17- day vacation but his White House has been scrambling to hand him a “win” by the time he returns. Trump's tweets last week announcing a ban on transgender individuals serving openly in the U.S. military was turned into a …
Discussion:
The New Civil Rights Movement
RELATED:
Rebecca Kheel / The Hill:
Dems to Mattis: Don't comply with Trump's ‘unconstitutional’ transgender ban
Dems to Mattis: Don't comply with Trump's ‘unconstitutional’ transgender ban
Discussion:
ThinkProgress, AOL and TheBlaze
Josh Dawsey / Politico:
John Kelly's big challenge: Controlling the tweeter in chief
John Kelly's big challenge: Controlling the tweeter in chief
Discussion:
RedState and Joe.My.God.
Yashar Ali / HuffPost:
Fox News Host Sent Unsolicited Lewd Text Messages To Colleagues, Sources Say — Eric Bolling, a co-host of “The Specialists,” said through an attorney that he “does not believe he sent any such communications.” — Eric Bolling, a longtime Fox News host, sent an unsolicited photo …
Discussion:
USA Today, Talking Points Memo, Business Insider, NBC News, Balloon Juice, Splinter, Mediaite, The Hill, The Washington Journal, Raw Story, IJR, TheBlaze and Joe.My.God.
New York Times:
Mueller Seeks White House Documents on Flynn — Investigators working for the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, recently asked the White House for documents related to former national security adviser Michael T. Flynn, and have questioned witnesses about whether he was secretly paid …
Discussion:
New York Magazine, The Guardian, The Week, The Gateway Pundit, Daily Kos, twitchy.com, Raw Story, Axios and Mediaite
Louise Matsakis / Motherboard:
Google Employee's Anti-Diversity Manifesto Goes ‘Internally Viral’ — At least eight Google employees tweeted Friday about a document that was circulated within the company calling for replacing Google's diversity initiatives with policies that encourage “ideological diversity” instead.
George F. Will / Washington Post:
The GOP has become the party of the grotesque — Southern Gothic is a literary genre and, occasionally, a political style that, like the genre, blends strangeness and irony. Consider the current primary campaign to pick the Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Jeff Sessions.
Discussion:
Outside the Beltway
US Department of State:
Communication Regarding Intent To Withdraw From Paris Agreement — Media Note — Office of the Spokesperson — Washington, DC — Today, the United States submitted a communication to the United Nations, in its capacity as depositary for the Paris Agreement, regarding the U.S. intent …
Discussion:
ThinkProgress, The Daily Caller, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, AOL, Politico and UPI
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Jonathan Chait / New York Magazine:
Trump's Fledgling Presidency Has Already Collapsed — President Trump's approval rating has dropped by about one percentage point per month and now sits in the mid-30s. At the current rate, it would hit zero in September 2020. (A highly unlikely possibility, though with Donald Trump, anything is possible.)
Ryan Lizza / New Yorker:
What the Trump-Russia Grand Jury Means — Hours after news broke that Robert Mueller, the special counsel in the Russia probe, has impanelled a grand jury as part of his investigation, President Trump declared at a rally in West Virginia that “the Russia story is a total fabrication.
RELATED:
Mmejido / WABC-AM | Cumulus:
Alan Dershowitz Tells Rita Cosby New Mueller D.C. Grand Jury Racially and Ethnically Stacked Against Trump
Alan Dershowitz Tells Rita Cosby New Mueller D.C. Grand Jury Racially and Ethnically Stacked Against Trump
Discussion:
Raw Story, ThinkProgress, Washington Free Beacon, CANNONFIRE, The Last Tradition and The Daily Caller
Kevin Johnson / USA Today:
Special counsel Robert Mueller using multiple grand juries in Russia inquiry
Special counsel Robert Mueller using multiple grand juries in Russia inquiry
Discussion:
RedState, Boing Boing, The Last Tradition and The Gateway Pundit
Jordan Sekulow / American Center for Law and Justice:
DOJ Document Dump to ACLJ on Clinton Lynch Meeting: Comey FBI Lied, Media Collusion, Spin, and Illegality — We have just obtained hundreds of pages in our ongoing investigation and federal lawsuit on former Attorney General Loretta Lynch's tarmac meeting with former President Bill Clinton …
Discussion:
RedState, Power Line, The Daily Caller, The Gateway Pundit, Infowars and John Hawkins' Right Wing News
RELATED:
Kel McClanahan / Politico:
Jeff Sessions' Attack on the Media Is Worse Than You Think — Equating the free press to spies is dark and dangerous. — Attorney General Jeff Sessions held a press conference to announce how avidly the Department of Justice was going to investigate and prosecute leakers of classified national security information.
Discussion:
Axios, U.S. Department of Justice, Techdirt, Liberty Blitzkrieg and RedState
Mike Allen / Axios:
The Mooch's replacement could be Stephen Miller — Stephen Miller, the Trump senior policy adviser who just tangled on-camera with CNN's Jim Acosta, is under consideration for White House communications director, top Trump sources tell me. — The effort to find a Mooch successor is still …
Discussion:
The Gateway Pundit
Bill Scher / Politico:
Memo to Mark Zuckerberg: So You Want to Be President ... You've road tripped to meet with real Americans in a quest to visit all 50 states. You've hired Barack Obama's pollster along with his first campaign manager to advise your philanthropic fund. You've given a flat “no” …
Discussion:
Althouse
New York Times:
Republican Shadow Campaign for 2020 Takes Shape as Trump Doubts Grow — WASHINGTON — Senators Tom Cotton and Ben Sasse have already been to Iowa this year, Gov. John Kasich is eyeing a return visit to New Hampshire, and Mike Pence's schedule is so full of political events that Republicans joke …
Greg P. / twitchy.com:
Keep deleting, morons: Everyone who thinks Dana Loesch said ‘fist’ owes her an apology — A bunch of blue-checkmarked journalists are busy deleting tweets right now after wrongly accusing NRA spox Dana Loesch of saying she and the NRA were going to “fist” the New York Times over the paper's horrible coverage of guns in the past.
Discussion:
The Guardian, No More Mister Nice Blog, Dana Loesch, Joe.My.God., VICE News, RedState, Talking Points Memo and IJR
RELATED:
Ruth May / Dallas Morning News:
Tangled web connects Russian oligarch money to GOP campaigns — Party loyalty is often cited as the reason that GOP leaders have not been more outspoken in their criticism of President Donald Trump and his refusal to condemn Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election.
Discussion:
The Washington Journal
David Siders / Politico:
Democrats fear Russia probe blowback — ALISO VIEJO, Calif. — Democrats are increasingly conflicted about how forcefully to press the issue of possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. — Fearful of alienating voters who appear more concerned about the economy and health care …