memeorandum: Poisoned Russian spy Sergei Skripal was close to consultant who was linked to the Trump dossier (Robert Mendick/Telegraph)

3:55 PM ET, March 8, 2018

Top Items:

Rebecca Berg / CNN:

Amid renewed scrutiny, Erik Prince to host fundraiser for Russia-friendly congressman — (CNN)Blackwater founder Erik Prince will host a fundraiser this month for Russia-friendly Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, as Prince faces new questions over a 2017 meeting currently being investigated by special counsel Robert Mueller.

Discussion: The Hill, RedState, Talking Points Memo, Political Wire, Shareblue Media and The Gateway Pundit

Washington Post:

Mueller gathers evidence that 2017 Seychelles meeting was effort to establish back channel to Kremlin … Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III has gathered evidence that a secret meeting in the Seychelles just before the inauguration of Donald Trump was an effort to establish a back channel between …

New York Times:
Trump Spoke to Witnesses About Matters They Discussed With Special Counsel

Jennifer Rubin / Washington Post:
If Trump isn't hiding anything, why all the covering up?

Discussion: Daily Kos, Hullabaloo, Politicus USA and Raw Story

Alex Pareene / Splinter:

If You Truly Care About Speech, You Will Invite Me to Your Office to Personally Call You a Dipshit — Civil society requires the toleration of the expression of opposing viewpoints, no matter how personally discomforting you may find them. Therefore, it would be profoundly hypocritical …

Discussion: The Intercept, Gizmodo, Mediaite, Lawyers, Guns & Money, Betsy's Page, twitchy.com, The Daily Caller, No More Mister Nice Blog, The College Fix, Instapundit and New York Times

CNN:

Trump upset with Sanders over Stormy Daniels response — Washington (CNN)President Donald Trump is upset with White House press secretary Sarah Sanders over her responses Wednesday regarding his alleged affair with porn star Stormy Daniels, a source close to the White House tells CNN.

Discussion: CNNMoney, twitchy.com, Raw Story, Talking Points Memo, CBS Los Angeles, Jamie Dupree - AJC, JONATHAN TURLEY, KTLA and Bustle

Sarah Fitzpatrick / NBC News:
Trump lawyer Michael Cohen tries to silence adult-film star Stormy Daniels

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Talking Points Memo, Washington Post, Raw Story, Fox News, The Guardian, New York Times, The Daily Caller, Mediaite, Bustle, Daily Wire, Towleroad, ABC News, The Daily Beast, Politico, NBC News, Vox and Shareblue Media

Associated Press:
The Latest: Trump to meet with aluminum, steel execs

Discussion: Politico, One America News Network and Breitbart

Jennifer Rubin / Washington Post:
Three potential calamities for Trump — aside from Mueller

Discussion: CNBC

Axios:

Exclusive polls: Big warning signs for Senate Democrats — Five Senate Democrats would lose to a Republican candidate if the election were held today and three have approval ratings under 50%, according to new Axios/SurveyMonkey polls. — Keep reading — 352 WORDS

Discussion: Townhall.com, Politico, CNBC, New York Times, National Review, Front Page Magazine, New York Magazine, RedState, Breitbart, The Daily Caller, Power Line, Washington Free Beacon, twitchy.com, IJR, Political Wire and The Gateway Pundit

Yahoo:

Miss Universe in Moscow: How Trump's beauty contest spawned a business deal with Russians and a bond with Putin — This is the first of two excerpts adapted from — Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin's War on America and the Election of Donald Trump (Twelve Books), by Michael Isikoff …

Discussion: Refinery29, Bustle, Raw Story, thecut and Axios

Travis Gettys / Raw Story:
Trump partied with Russian oligarchs at Vegas nightclub shut down over ‘lewd’ acts involving women and urine: report

Discussion: Daily Kos and Political Wire

Brad Reed / Raw Story:
Trump vetoed Miss Universe contestants for being ‘too ethnic’ or ‘too dark-skinned’: report

Discussion: Mother Jones

HuffPost:

This Anti-Semitic Term Was Casually Used During A White House Briefing — Its use came a day after it was used to describe a Jewish White House official, sparking concern on social media. — There's perhaps never a bad time to stretch or rethink one's vocabulary.

Discussion: Vox, ThinkProgress, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Salon, The Gateway Pundit, AOL, The Week and Shakesville

Jonathan Swan / Axios:

Peter Navarro wants Gary Cohn's job, terrifying D.C. — President Trump's spirit animal Peter Navarro is telling associates he wants Gary Cohn's job as the president's chief economic adviser. — What we're hearing: Publicly, Navarro has been coy, telling Bloomberg TV he's not in the running for the job.

Discussion: Washington Post, Bloomberg, Political Wire and Dealbreaker

Howard Kurtz / Fox News:
Tiff over tariffs: Gary Cohn gets a hero's sendoff from the media

Discussion: Vox, New York Times, Washington Post, DownWithTyranny! and The Atlantic

Wall Street Journal:

Russian Trolls Tried to Torpedo Mitt Romney's Shot at Secretary of State — Online campaign targeted the ex-GOP nominee as Donald Trump considered him in late 2016 — Weeks after Donald Trump was elected president, Russia-backed online “trolls” flooded social media to try to block Mitt Romney …

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Politicus USA, Power Line and Front Page Magazine, more at Mediagazer »

Mike Florio / ProFootballTalk:

A team asked Derrius Guice if he likes men — The calendar says 2018. Some NFL locker rooms remain trapped in 1960. — Running back Derrius Guice said in a Wednesday night appearance on SiriusXM NFL Radio that a team asked him at the Scouting Combine if he likes men.

Discussion: USA Today, The Daily Caller, The Root, Towleroad, The Guardian, LGBTQ Nation, Bleacher Report, Daily Wire, TheBlaze and CBS Detroit

Science:

The spread of true and false news online — 1Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the Media Lab, E14-526, 75 Amherst Street, Cambridge, MA 02142, USA. — 2MIT, E62-364, 100 Main Street, Cambridge, MA 02142, USA. — See all authors and affiliations — Vol. 359, Issue 6380, pp.

Discussion: NBC News, Science News, Watts Up With That?, Bangor Daily News, Mashable, Engadget, The Verge, VICE News and Gizmodo, more at Mediagazer »

Robinson Meyer / The Atlantic:
The Grim Conclusions of the Largest-Ever Study of Fake News

Discussion: TechCrunch

Kyle Kondik / Sabato's Crystal Ball:

House 2018: 26 Ratings Changes, All in Favor of Democrats — PA-18 special now a Toss-up; Democratic incumbents in strong position; and what about Paul Ryan? — KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — With less than a week to go, the PA-18 special election moves from Leans Republican to Toss-up.

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Shareblue Media, Politico and Daily Kos

Monmouth University Polling Institute:

Trump Down, Dems Up, Russia Bad, Kushner Out — Opinion on tax reform remains stable — West Long Branch, NJ - Donald Trump's job approval rating has slipped over the past month, but remains higher than the historic low recorded by the Monmouth University Poll at the end of last year.

Discussion: New York Times, Washington Post and New York Magazine

CNN:
Marist poll: Trump's job approval at the highest since taking office

Discussion: Washington Press

CNNMoney:

Russians released anti-Clinton video game weeks before election — Russians created an anti-Hillary Clinton video game called “Hilltendo” and tried to make it go viral in the weeks before the 2016 U.S. presidential election, CNN has determined through a review of internet records and computer code.

Discussion: Mediaite

New York Times:

Women We Overlooked in 167 Years of New York Times Obituaries — The poet Sylvia Plath and the novelist Charlotte Brontë. Ida B. Wells, the anti-lynching activist. These extraordinary women — and so many others — did not have obituaries in The New York Times. Until now.

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Bustle, Althouse, Mashable and Digiday, more at Mediagazer »

Carol Rosenberg / miamiherald:

Now we know why defense attorneys quit the USS Cole case. They found a microphone. — Lawyers for the alleged USS Cole bombing mastermind quit the capital case after discovering a microphone in their special client meeting room and were denied the opportunity to either talk about or investigate it, the Miami Herald has learned.

Discussion: Outside the Beltway, Hit & Run, Shakesville and VICE News

Associated Press:

Judge to Trump: Muting, not blocking followers, may end suit — NEW YORK (AP) — A judge is recommending that President Donald Trump mute rather than block some Twitter followers to resolve a First Amendment lawsuit. — Manhattan federal Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald (rees BUHK'-wahld) …

Discussion: Political Wire

John Santucci / ABC News:

Several White House staffers terminated or reassigned for security clearance issues: Sources — Several White House staffers have been terminated or reassigned for issues related to their security clearances — with at least one individual employed in the Office of the First Lady relieved of duty …

Discussion: Outside the Beltway, Raw Story, AOL, Shareblue Media, Little Green Footballs, Political Wire and Daily Kos

New York Times:

Kushner Meets With Mexican President, Underscoring Shift in U.S. Diplomacy — MEXICO CITY — Jared Kushner, President Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser, met with Mexico's president on Wednesday, arriving just weeks after a planned meeting between the nations' leaders fell apart …

Discussion: New York Magazine, twitchy.com and Political Wire

Brandon Carter / The Hill:
Kushner leaves US ambassador to Mexico out of meeting with Mexico president: report

Discussion: RedState

Tennessean.com:

House Republicans effectively kill anti-child marriage bill, cite possible case against gay marriage — Donna Pollard describes getting married at 16 to a 29-year-old man who was her counselor. She is behind Senate Bill 48 to raise the legal age of marriage in Kentucky to 18 years old.

Discussion: Right Wing Watch, LGBTQ Nation, Outside the Beltway and Daily Kos

Cheddar:

Exclusive: Snap Plans Biggest Round of Layoffs Yet Totaling 120 Engineers — Snap Inc. is preparing its largest round of layoffs to date, Cheddar has learned. — The Snapchat-maker plans to announce the cuts internally in the next couple days, according to people familiar with the matter …

Discussion: The Verge, TechCrunch, GeekWire, Breitbart, CBS Los Angeles and CNBC, more at Mediagazer »

Carol Robinson / al.com:

Huffman High School shooting: Courtlin Arrington killed; Birmingham police question injured teen — A Huffman High School senior was killed and another injured when gunfire erupted inside a classroom at the east Birmingham school Wednesday afternoon. — Killed was a 17-year-old girl …

Discussion: Washington Post, Associated Press, The Daily Caller, Outside the Beltway, Washington Press and Bustle

Robert Mendick / Telegraph:

Poisoned Russian spy Sergei Skripal was close to consultant who was linked to the Trump dossier — A security consultant who has worked for the company that compiled the controversial dossier on Donald Trump was close to the Russian double agent poisoned last weekend, it has been claimed.

Discussion: BBC, Defense One and Raw Story

Brookings:

Macroeconomic effects of the 2017 tax reform — DOWNLOAD — Editor's Note: — This paper is part of the Spring 2018 edition of the Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, the leading conference series and journal in economics for timely, cutting-edge research about real-world policy issues.

Discussion: Vox, Wall Street Journal and Splinter

Lingling Wei / Wall Street Journal:

Trump Tweet on China Trade Understates U.S. Demand — by $99 Billion — President asked Beijing to cut U.S. trade deficit with China by $1 billion—less than 0.3% of the countries' annual trade gap — BEIJING—President Donald Trump tweeted Wednesday that Washington had asked Beijing …

Discussion: Mother Jones, Washington Post, Forbes, East Bay Times, CNBC, New York Times, Cafe Hayek, Dealbreaker, IJR, Axios, New York Magazine, Roll Call, Vox, Politico and Eschaton

Ian Schwartz / RealClearPolitics:

Kamala Harris On Immigration: Sessions Wants To Roll Back The Clock, “California Represents The Future” — Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) appeared on MSNBC's All In with host Chris Hayes Wednesday night to discuss Attorney General Jeff Sessions' speech on California ignoring the nation's immigration laws and likening it to nullification.

Discussion: Washington Post, Vox, Front Page Magazine, Los Angeles Times, Hit & Run and The Daily Caller

Mike Fleming / Deadline:

David Chase Revives ‘The Sopranos’ With New Line Prequel Movie ‘The Many Saints Of Newark’ — EXCLUSIVE: David Chase is finally ready to return to the New Jersey turf of his iconic creation The Sopranos. New Line has purchased the screenplay The Many Saints of Newark …

Discussion: The Guardian, Mediaite and IndieWire

Danielle Paquette / Washington Post:

Why a white town paid for a class called ‘Hispanics 101’ … BRANSON, Mo. — In a ballroom with antlers on the wall and hoof prints on the carpet, diversity coach Miguel Joey Aviles asked whether anyone knew how to merengue. — “Lord have mercy,” he said, counting hands. “Only two?”

Discussion: Splinter and Raw Story

Brad Reed / Raw Story:

Trump's video game violence panel features police trainer who says lethal force leads to ‘the best sex’ — President Donald Trump is hosting a discussion on violence in video games on Thursday — and it features a controversial police trainer who encourages cops to be more willing to use lethal force.

Discussion: ThinkProgress and USA Today

Dave Sherwood / Reuters:

Eleven nations - but not U.S. - to sign Trans-Pacific trade deal — SANTIAGO (Reuters) - Eleven countries are expected to sign a landmark Asia-Pacific trade agreement in Santiago on Thursday as an antidote to the increasingly protectionist bent of the United States, which pulled out of the pact last year.