Rudy Giuliani just obliterated the goal posts on Trump-Russia collusion  —  President Trump's defense in the Russia investigation has been a study in goal-post moving — constantly watering down previous denials and raising the standard for what would constitute actual wrongdoing.

Study: ‘Medicare for all’ projected to cost $32.6 trillion  —  WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Bernie Sanders' “Medicare for all” plan would increase government health care spending by $32.6 trillion over 10 years, according to a study by a university-based libertarian policy center.  —  That's trillion with a “T.”

99 Days to Go, and the 2018 Midterm Battleground Is Not What Was Expected  —  The most competitive districts are only somewhat better educated and somewhat more suburban than the country as a whole.  —  The battleground in the fight for control of the House is starting to come into focus with 99 days to go until the November election.

How to Talk to a Racist  —  White liberals, you're doing it all wrong.  —  NASHVILLE — There are still white Southerners who honestly believe that American culture worked better for everyone, white and black alike, under segregation.  There are still white Southerners who question how bad slavery really was.

‘Eye-popping’ payouts for CEOs follow Trump's tax cuts  —  The insider sales feed the narrative that corporate tax cuts enrich executives in the short term while yielding less clear long-term benefits for workers.  —  Some of the biggest winners from President Donald Trump's new tax law …

At Law Firms, Rainmakers Accused of Harassment Can Switch Jobs With Ease  —  Opaque hiring practices in legal industry often make prior sexual-harassment complaints easy to leave behind  —  The flowers arrived at Mayer Brown days after a prized new hire started at the law firm's New York office.

How John Kelly became ‘chief in name only’  —  The retired Marine general was brought in to tame the president, but in the end Trump boxed him in.  —  John Kelly got the official news of his promotion a year ago the same way a select few in the Trump administration have — by presidential tweet.

The Abortions We Don't Talk About  —  When Justice Anthony Kennedy, the Supreme Court's crucial swing vote on many matters, announced his plan to retire last month, it was suddenly clear that Roe v. Wade, the decision guaranteeing a woman's right to abortion, could be substantially eroded or even overturned.

Ginsburg suggests she has at least five more years on the Supreme Court  —  New York (CNN)Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said she hopes to stay on the Supreme Court until the age of 90.  —  “I'm now 85,” Ginsburg said on Sunday.  “My senior colleague, Justice John Paul Stevens …

G.O.P. Faces Another Midterm Threat as Trump Plays the Shutdown Card  —  WASHINGTON — Congressional Republicans, already facing a difficult election landscape, confronted a prospect on Sunday they had worked feverishly to avoid: a threat by President Trump to shut down the government over funding for a border wall.

Why Are So Many Leftists Skeptical of the Russia Investigation?  —  As you move from the right to the left of the ideological spectrum, skepticism of the Russia scandal gives way to suspicions that it covers up something serious.  But somewhere on the left, right around the fault line …

Why Dean Baquet Skipped The New York Times' Meeting With Trump  —  When President Trump broke an off-the-record agreement after he met with New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger, some wondered why Dean Baquet, the executive editor in charge of the journalism Trump has openly criticized …

Bannon to Kochs: ‘Shut up and get with the program’  —  'And here's the program: Ground game to support Trump's presidency,' Bannon said in an interview.  —  Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon tore into the powerful Koch political network Sunday, accusing it of undermining …

‘The map is different now’: Trump blows the 2020 race wide open  —  The next presidential campaign is going to be fought on unfamiliar battlegrounds.  —  For years, presidential campaigns followed relatively predictable lines of trench warfare, with the outcome decided in a handful of battleground states.

Former Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums dies  —  Former Bay Area Congressman and former Mayor of Oakland Ron Dellums has died.  —  Dellums died last night of an illness.  —  He was widely known for his social activism.  —  Dellums served in Congress from 1971 until the late 1990s.

More Drama, A Bloody Nose And Another Brawl At Donald Trump's Walk Of Fame Star  —  HOLLYWOOD (CBSLA) — President Donald Trump brings out those feelings in people — they love him or they hate him.  —  And his fans and his ... well, not fans have been clashing more and more at places like the former …

Scoop: 20 ways Democrats could crack down on Big Tech  —  In a policy paper obtained by Axios, Sen. Mark Warner's office laid out 20 different paths to address problems posed by Big Tech platforms — ranging from putting a price on individual users' data to funding media literacy programs.

What's going on with Donald Trump?  Psychologist explains the president's lies, reversals  —  Trump's lies and reversals are not due to mental illness but because he reacts to people and situations in the moment, with no thought of future or past.  —  CONNECT

GOP Candidate Corey Stewart's Spokesperson Called Majority-Black Cities ‘Shitholes’ … Corey Stewart, the Republican candidate for Senate in Virginia, has been shunned by his own party over his ties with neo-Confederate groups and his refusal to condemn white supremacist violence.

Whatever happened to the ‘unmaskings’ probe?  —  Every day brings new stories about Russian interference in the 2016 election, whether Donald Trump  —  played a role, and alleged abuses by our intelligence agencies.  —  One of the deepest, darkest, most important issues in the whole mess …

White threat in a browning America  —  How demographic change is fracturing our politics.  —  In 2008, Barack Obama held up change as a beacon, attaching to it another word, a word that channeled everything his young and diverse coalition saw in his rise and their newfound political power: hope.

The Decline and Fall of the American Empire  —  Even if you don't think it's likely, it's always best to be prepared.  —  So what would the decline of America look like?  I don't ask the question because I think it's happening (yet?), but because even the most inveterate optimist …

How Trump Lost Re-election in 2020  —  A sneak peek at The Times's news analysis from Nov. 4, 2020. … In the end, it was a lot simpler than it often seemed.  —  Donald J. Trump, who spent much of the past four years as a historically unpopular president, lost his bid for re-election Tuesday.

This Republican could hold onto his blue-district seat even if Dems sweep  —  HOMESTEAD, FLA.  —  Carlos Curbelo was fuming.  —  It was a sticky Friday afternoon in early July, and the Republican congressman had spent the last hour traipsing through a University of Florida research center …

Centrist Democrats are out of ideas  —  Notes of political caution can be valuable, but caution is not a policy vision.  —  Centrist Democrats are bringing a knife to a gunfight.  —  The Democratic Party is on a progressive trajectory.  It's moved leftward on policies from health care …

Dana Rohrabacher Says Anyone “In This Town” Would Meet With Russians Peddling Political Dirt  —  And, says “Putin's favorite congressman,” the Maria Butina case is “B.S.” … On Capitol Hill Friday evening, I ran into Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.), who has earned the moniker “Putin's favorite congressman.”

Robert Mueller Targeted Two Lobbying Firms.  One Is Thriving in Trump's D.C. … When special counsel Robert Mueller indicted Donald Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort in the fall of 2017, he implicated two prominent Washington, D.C. lobbying powerhouses as being complicit …

Rename Austin?  A report suggests taking a closer look at city's Confederate legacy  —  Confederate monuments that still exist in the US  —  (CNN)The city of Austin was named after Stephen F. Austin, who is referred to as the “Father of Texas.”  But a report released last week …