memeorandum: How McKinsey Has Helped Raise the Stature of Authoritarian Governments (New York Times)

10:30 PM ET, December 15, 2018

Top Items:

Interior Secretary Zinke resigns amid investigations — Interior Department Secretary Ryan Zinke submitted his resignation to the White House Saturday, facing intense pressure from the White House amid multiple probes tied to his real estate dealings in Montana and conduct while in office.

Discussion: Raw Story, Splinter and Talking Points Memo

Bloomberg:
Trump's Interior Chief Zinke to Step Down Amid Ethics Probes

Lisa Friedman / New York Times:
A Guide to the Ryan Zinke Investigations

Discussion: BuzzFeed News and Mediaite

New York Times:
Ryan Zinke, Face of Trump Environmental Rollbacks, Is Leaving Interior Department

Discussion: The Atlantic, HuffPost, Outside the Beltway, CBS Denver, RedState, Chicks On The Right, Washington Press, The Verge, Common Dreams and Vox

Ben Lefebvre / Politico:
Zinke to leave Interior amid scandals

Discussion: Associated Press, SARAH PALIN, Raw Story, Axios and The Daily Caller

CNN:
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to leave Trump administration at end of the year

Discussion: Earther, Grist and Raw Story

Washington Post:

Mounting legal threats surround Trump as nearly every organization he has led is under investigation — Two years after Donald Trump won the presidency, nearly every organization he has led in the past decade is under investigation. — Trump's private company is contending with civil suits digging …

Discussion: Daily Kos, Raw Story, Splinter, Patterico's Pontifications, Talking Points Memo, Politico, ThinkProgress and The Guardian, more at Mediagazer »

Dan Balz / Washington Post: As Trump prepares for his holiday respite in Florida, he is more isolated than ever

Seung Min Kim / Washington Post:
‘Stop,’ 'I wasn't there,' 'I don't know anything about that': Republicans dodge or dismiss Trump's legal woes

Discussion: Hullabaloo and Raw Story

Shirley Wang / WBUR:

My Dad's Friendship With Charles Barkley 14:24 … Play — When Charles Barkley's mother, Charcey Glenn, passed away in June 2015, Barkley's hometown of Leeds, Alabama, came to the funeral to pay respects. But there was also an unexpected guest. — Barkley's friends couldn't quite place him.

Discussion: Only A Game, Full Feed, AOL, Chicks On The Right, Mashable, twitchy.com, USA Today, emptywheel and The Comeback

David Brooks / New York Times:

Who Killed The Weekly Standard? — The bureaucratic mind has a temporary triumph. — I've only been around Phil Anschutz a few times. My impressions on those occasions was that he was a run-of-the-mill arrogant billionaire. He was used to people courting him and he addressed …

Discussion: Outside the Beltway, Mediaite and Power Line, more at Mediagazer »

Ace of Spades HQ:

Weekly Standard Shuts Down — There's a lot of whining by NeverTrumpers that this is terrible because we need dissenting voices in media, and the closing of the Weekly Standard means that we must all “kneel” to one rich arrogant man's ego. — Well, you know who might agree with that?

Lloyd Grove / The Daily Beast:
How The Anti-Trump, Conservative ‘Weekly Standard’ Bit The Dust

Discussion: Patterico's Pontifications and New York Post

New York Times:

As the Trumps Dodged Taxes, Their Tenants Paid a Price — They were collateral damage as Donald J. Trump and his siblings dodged inheritance taxes and gained control of their father's fortune: thousands of renters in an empire of unassuming red-brick buildings scattered across Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island.

Discussion: Raw Story and Vox

Michael S. Schmidt / New York Times:

The Special Counsel Is Fighting a Witness in Court. Who Is It? — WASHINGTON — For the past several months, journalists, legal experts and close followers of the special counsel's investigation have been trying to uncover one particular secret about the inquiry: Is the special counsel …

Discussion: Raw Story, Talking Points Memo, Law & Crime, Jamie Dupree - AJC and Politico

Brianne Pfannenstiel / Des Moines Register:

Iowa Poll: Biden, Sanders top early look at possible Democratic hopefuls in 2020 caucuses — Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders top the list of potential presidential candidates preferred by Iowa's likely Democratic caucusgoers, reflecting their belief that it will take political experience to defeat President Donald Trump in 2020.

Discussion: Townhall

Stephanie Grisham / CNN:

Melania Trump's spokeswoman speaks out — Stephanie Grisham is first lady Melania Trump's deputy chief of staff for communications. Formerly a deputy press secretary in the West Wing, Stephanie has been with the President and Mrs. Trump since July 2015, right after he announced his candidacy for president of the United States.

Discussion: Politico and Breitbart

New York Times:

How McKinsey Has Helped Raise the Stature of Authoritarian Governments — This year's McKinsey & Company retreat in China was one to remember. — Hundreds of the company's consultants frolicked in the desert, riding camels over sand dunes and mingling in tents linked by red carpets.

New York Times:

What the Lawless Obamacare Ruling Means — It's not based on a solid legal argument. It's an exercise in raw judicial power. — Mr. Adler is a professor of law at the Case Western Reserve University School of Law. Abbe R. Gluck is a professor of law and the faculty director …

Discussion: Power Line, Reason, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Balkinization, Wonkette, ACA Signups and The Incidental Economist

David Nather / Axios:
You should take the Obamacare ruling seriously

Discussion: New York Times, Washington Post, Politico, NPR, The Mahablog and Breitbart

Josh Dawsey / Washington Post:

Trump makes unannounced visit to Arlington National Cemetery — President Trump made an unscheduled visit to Arlington National Cemetery on a rainy Saturday, following weeks of criticism for skipping ceremonial visits in the United States and abroad that other presidents have made and for his lack …

Quint Forgey / Politico:
Trump makes first trip to Arlington National Cemetery since Veterans Day criticism

Discussion: Townhall, Breitbart and The Daily Caller

Alan Judd / myajc:

AJC INVESTIGATION: How Brian Kemp turned warning of election system vulnerability against Democrats — In a dead heat with Stacey Abrams, Brian Kemp created a diversion from computer security breakdown — Brian Kemp, the Republican candidate for governor, had a problem.

Philip Ewing / NPR:

The Russia Investigations: An Unfinished Case Looks Weaker Than Ever — This week in the Russia investigations: Michael Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison ... Maria Butina pleaded guilty ... but the finish line looks no closer — The shifting sands

Cleve R. Wootson Jr / Washington Post:

After a petition called Gandhi ‘racist,’ his statue was removed from the University of Ghana — Another marker has been felled in the intense argument over whether historic figures with racist histories should be honored. The University of Ghana in Accra no longer has a statue of India independence leader Mohandas K. Gandhi.

Discussion: Al Jazeera, Sputnik International and RT

Brad Plumer / New York Times:

Climate Negotiators Reach an Overtime Deal to Keep Paris Pact Alive — KATOWICE, Poland — Diplomats from nearly 200 countries reached a deal on Saturday to keep the Paris climate agreement alive by adopting a detailed set of rules to implement the pact. — The deal, struck …

Discussion: Vox and kottke.org