Conservatives mount a whisper campaign smearing Khashoggi in defense of Trump  —  Hard-line Republicans and conservative commentators are mounting a dark whisper campaign against Jamal Khashoggi that is designed to protect President Trump from criticism of his handling of the dissident …

Kelly, Bolton Get in Profane Shouting Match Outside the Oval Office  —  President Donald Trump's chief of staff and his national security adviser engaged in a profanity-laced argument outside the Oval Office on Thursday, according to three people familiar with the episode.

A President Who Believes He Is Entitled to His Own Facts  —  WASHINGTON — He accepts less-than-credible denials from autocratic heads of state about nefarious acts.  He disputes the existence of man-made climate change and insists that photographic evidence of the crowd at his inauguration is fake, part of a media plot to harm him.

Trump administration does about-face on announcement that top HUD aide would lead Interior watchdog  —  Interior Department officials said Thursday that they did not approve the hiring of a political appointee as the agency's acting watchdog, calling the announcement of her move by Housing …

Fake intern who recorded McCaskill campaign had access to voter info, campaign says  —  A conservative activist with Project Veritas posed as an intern with U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill's campaign and had access to voter information, according to a stack of documents McCaskill's lawyer delivered …

Vladimir Putin uses speech to herald end of US hegemony  —  Russian president Vladimir Putin shrugged off worsening relations with the west and talked up Moscow's burgeoning diplomatic friendships in Asia and the Middle East, as he hailed the end of a US-dominated unipolar world.

Beto O'Rourke takes questions at CNN town hall … Transfer your debt and pay no interest until 2020  —  Getting approved for 1 of these cards means you have excellent credit  —  7 cards that generate serious amounts of cash back  —  5 cards charging 0% interest until 2020

HBO's ‘Veep’ gag and new Joe Donnelly political ad are basically the same  —  Dwight Adams, dwight.adams@indystar.com  —  Many Hoosiers who saw the latest Joe Donnelly ad entitled “Axe” may have viewed it and thought, “well, there's a fella who likes to chop his own wood!”

Paul Manafort is spending A LOT of time with Robert Mueller these days  —  (CNN)Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and special counsel Robert Mueller have been spending a whole lot of time together of late, according to CNN's Katelyn Polantz and Evan Perez.  The duo write:

Rihanna Declined Super Bowl LIII Halftime Show Offer in Support of Colin Kaepernick … Rihanna stands with Kap.  The “Work” singer declined an offer to headline the Super Bowl LIII Halftime Show because she “supports Colin Kaepernick,” a source tells Us Weekly exclusively.

A Defector From Conservatism With a Clear Vision of Trump's Rise  —  When Max Boot was a young conservative apparatchik on the make, the key moment in his career occurred when he got a meeting with Robert Bartley, editor of The Wall Street Journal editorial page, one of the movement's most prestigious and influential organs.

Burlington police chief reacts to Madelyn Ellen Linsenmeir obituary: ‘I have a problem’  —  Burlington police Chief Brandon del Pozo posted this to his Facebook account on Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2018.  —  I have a problem with this obituary.  —  Born here in Burlington, Madelyn was the 30-year old mother of a toddler.

Your Real Biological Clock Is You're Going to Die  —  In April, in a small town on a small island in a small string of islands trailing down from the main part of Japan, the world's then-oldest person died.  Nabi Tajima was 117 years old—the last surviving human being born in the 19th century.

Trump Closely Involved In Killing FBI's Move Out Of Washington, Emails Show  —  Opening up the FBI's Pennsylvania Avenue location for redevelopment would have created competition for Trump International Hotel.  —  WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump personally intervened to stop the FBI …

A day in the life of an HSBC exec who wakes up at 5:30 a.m. to work out, always eats green, and studies at Stanford in her free time  —  Melania Edwards is always on the move.  —  The HSBC exec, who's part of the bank's Global Venture Capital Coverage Group, works from two Northern California offices an hour apart.

Ex-Trump Adviser Jason Miller Sues Will Menaker of ‘Chapo Trap House’ Over Tweet  —  First, he sued Gizmodo Media and a reporter over a claim he gave an abortion pill to a stripper.  Now he is suing the reporter's boyfriend over a tweet.  —  Jason Miller, a former senior campaign aide to Donald Trump …

Texas Dems ask noncitizens to register to vote, send applications with citizenship box pre-checked  —  The Texas Democratic Party asked non-citizens to register to vote, sending out applications to immigrants with the box citizenship already checked “Yes,” according to new complaints filed …

How Trump frames the 2018 election choice: “Democrats create mobs.  Republicans create jobs”  —  From CNN's Betsy Klein and Kevin Liptak  —  President Trump, at his rally in Missoula, Montana, framed the midterms as “an election of Kavanaugh, the caravan, law and order, and common sense.

Court in Finland finds pro-Kremlin trolls guilty of harassing journalist  —  In a major ruling that exceeded prosecutors' requests, a court in Finland sentenced a man to prison for harassing journalist Jessikka Aro.  She had been targeted for years by pro-Russian trolls over her reporting.

FBI agents raid San Juan government offices as part of investigation into fraud, corruption  —  FBI agents this week raided the municipal offices in San Juan, Puerto Rico - rooting through documents and seizing digital records as part of a widespread investigation into fraud and obstruction …

Cory Booker: Canada Is More American Than America  —  “Canada - I can't stand how they're out-Americaning us in Canada.  Trudeau - give me a break.”  —  Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), a possible 2020 candidate for president, said that he “can't stand how they're out-Americaning us in Canada” …

Former FBI Agent Sentenced for Leaking Classified Information  —  Terry J. Albury, 39, a former Special Agent of the FBI, was sentenced today to 48 months in the District of Minnesota in connection with his unauthorized disclosure and retention of classified national defense information.

A Conservative Group's Closed-Door ‘Training’ of Judicial Clerks Draws Concern  —  The conservative legal movement has long cultivated law students and young lawyers, partly to ensure a deep bench of potential judicial nominees  —  A bipartisan Senate truce has fallen apart as Republicans renew …

Amazon's Jeff Bezos ranks No. 1 among S&P 500 CEOs in political spending  —  His $10 million gift to a nonpartisan, veterans-focused fund ‘could be seen as an act of goodwill’  —  There's political giving by the S&P 500 CEOs, and then there's Jeff Bezos's giving.