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2:15 PM ET, December 12, 2019

memeorandum

 Top Items: 
Eric Holder / Washington Post:
William Barr is unfit to be attorney general  —  Eric H. Holder Jr., a Democrat, was U.S. attorney general from 2009 to 2015.  —  As a former U.S. attorney general, I am reluctant to publicly criticize my successors.  I respect the office and understand just how tough the job can be.
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Byron York / Washington Examiner:
Of course the FBI spied on the Trump campaign  —  The great debate about whether the FBI spied on the Trump campaign continues.  The question is why there is still any argument.  The newly-released report from Justice Department inspector general Michael Horowitz shows that by any definition the FBI did indeed spy.
CNN:
FBI agents warn of ‘chilling effect’ from Trump and Barr attacks
Discussion: Redstate
Jonathan Chait / New York Magazine:
Report: Trump's Ukraine Extortion Scheme Was Financed by Russia  —  President Trump is facing impeachment primarily for abusing his power for political gain, extorting a foreign country to discredit his political rivals.  The secondary aspect of the plot is that the target of his extortion is hardly random.
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Jennifer Rubin / Washington Post:
Nothing could be more conclusive proof of Trump's guilt
Discussion: Bloomberg
Burgess Everett / Politico:   Trump tightens grips on judges as McConnell wins 50th Circuit pick
Jonathan Allen / NBC News:
Inside the jockeying to prosecute Donald Trump's impeachment  —  Behind the scenes, House Democrats battle to influence Speaker Nancy Pelosi's picks for the team that will take the case to the Senate.  —  WASHINGTON — In furtive conversations with senior colleagues on the House floor …
Discussion: ABC News and Breitbart
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Melanie Zanona / Politico:
Republican lawmaker asks Lindsey Graham to ‘rethink’ Senate's impeachment strategy
Discussion: Instapundit
David Smith / The Guardian:
Fox host lambasts Trump over ‘most sustained assault on press freedom in US history’  —  Chris Wallace, admired for breaking ranks with some in the conservative network, drew applause with most stinging critique yet  —  A leading host on Fox News, a conservative network notorious for its loyalty …
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Aidan McLaughlin / Mediaite:   Fox's Chris Wallace: Trump is ‘Engaged in the Most Direct, Sustained Assault on Freedom of the Press in Our History’
Tim Miller / The Bulwark:
If Trump Is a Unique Danger Why Aren't Democrats Acting Like It?  —  Crisis.  An existential threat to our democracy.  A mortal danger.  A White Supremacist.  Emergency  —  This is what President Trump's opponents on the left say they believe about the current administration.
Discussion: National Review and Raw Story
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Rebecca Traister / The Cut:
Can You Spot the Fake? Hint: Look at the pundits.
Discussion: Washington Post
Jonathan V. Last / The Bulwark:
Why Is Everyone Sleeping on Joe Biden?
Discussion: Washington Post
Allan Smith / NBC News:
Trump mocks Greta Thunberg after she wins Time Person of the Year  —  “So ridiculous,” Trump tweeted.  “Greta must work on her Anger Management problem, then go to a good old fashioned movie with a friend!  Chill Greta, Chill!”  —  Trump mocks Time's Person of the Year on Twitter
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Karen Tumulty / Washington Post:
The most depressing thing about Trump's attack on Greta Thunberg
Discussion: Vox, Los Angeles Times and CNN
John Wagner / Washington Post:
Trump mocks 16-year-old Greta Thunberg a day after she is named Time's Person of the Year
Wall Street Journal:
Giuliani's Partnership With Fraud Guarantee Revealed in Letter  —  A 2018 investor letter offers new clues about the work Rudy Giuliani was hired to do for Fraud Guarantee, a company founded by his now-indicted associates Lev Parnas and David Correia.  The letter has been handed over to the U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan.
Discussion: Raw Story
Alexander Mallin / ABC News:
DOJ charges 10 former NFL players in alleged health care fraud scheme  —  The scheme involved over $3.9 million in false health care claims.  —  The Department of Justice announced charges Thursday against 10 former NFL players over an alleged scheme to defraud millions of dollars from the league's health care benefits program.
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The Economist:
A plurality of Americans—but not of states—want Donald Trump impeached  —  The president continues to benefit from the constitution's pro-rural bias  —  Donald trump owes his presidency to America's quaint system of electing leaders.  Despite losing the popular vote …
Courier-Journal:
Bevin pardons include convicted killer whose brother hosted campaign fundraiser for him  —  The family of a man pardoned by Gov. Matt Bevin for a homicide and other crimes in a fatal 2014 Knox County home invasion raised $21,500 at a political fundraiser last year to retire debt from Bevin's 2015 gubernatorial campaign.
NBC News:
Pentagon watchdog plans to review award of $400M border wall contract to firm touted by Trump  —  Fisher Sand & Gravel has been publicly and privately endorsed to build the wall by members of the Trump administration, including the president himself.  —  WASHINGTON — The Defense Department's …
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Elizabeth Findell / Wall Street Journal:   Construction of Texas Border Wall Stalls Over Fights With Landowners
Sebastian Murdock / HuffPost:
Paul Watson Throws Alex Jones Under The Bus In Sandy Hook Case  —  “This Sandy Hook stuff is killing us,” the far-right Infowars editor said in a 2015 email.  —  Far-right personality and longtime Infowars editor Paul Joseph Watson warned Alex Jones to stop pushing the lie …
Paul Steinhauser / Fox News:
Booker says he won't make stage at next week's Democratic primary debate  —  Presidential candidate Sen. Cory Booker acknowledged Thursday he won't qualify for next week's Democratic nomination debate.  —  This would be the first primary debate that Booker, who made the stage at the first five debates, won't make.
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New York Times:   Democrats Will Debate Four More Times in January and February
Christine Stapleton / USA Today:
Mongolian ambassador visited Mar-a-Lago before Trump Jr. got coveted permit to hunt rare sheep  —  PALM BEACH, Fla. - About four months before Donald Trump Jr. went to Mongolia in August, where he reportedly managed to get a coveted permit to kill a threatened-species of sheep after he shot …
Discussion: Daily Kos, HuffPost, The Guardian and VICE
Astead W. Herndon / New York Times:
Elizabeth Warren Draws Sharp Contrasts With Rivals in New Hampshire Speech  —  Ms. Warren, who has ramped up her criticism of her presidential opponents after months of avoiding conflict, issued another rebuke Thursday in a speech about the economy and corruption.
New York Times:
Trump's Executive Order and the Rise of Anti-Semitism  —  The president's campus intervention ignores the bigger threat of anti-Semitism and threatens speech.  —  The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values.
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Ed Mazza / HuffPost:
Pastor Who Says Jews Are Going To Hell Speaks At Trump's Hanukkah Party  —  Robert Jeffress has also made inflammatory comments about Muslims, Mormons and Hindus.  —  President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at tackling anti-Semitism on college campuses on Wednesday ― …
Discussion: MSNBC, Vanity Fair, ABC News and The Root
Wall Street Journal:
GOP Poll: Kobach Would Win Kansas Senate Primary, Unless Pompeo Jumps In  —  Internal Republican polling shows Kris Kobach trouncing the current GOP primary field for an open U.S. Senate seat Kansas, but losing by double digits to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, should he jump into the race.
Katherine Clarke / Wall Street Journal:
Lachlan Murdoch Sets L.A. Record by Paying $150 Million for a Château-Style Mansion  —  Once listed for $350 million, the Bel-Air estate of late media tycoon A. Jerrold Perenchio is the second priciest home ever to have traded in the U.S.  —  Lachlan Murdoch, media executive and son …
Discussion: FiveThirtyEight and Mediaite
Joe Roberts / Metro.co.uk:
‘Longest queues ever’ as people stand in line around the block to vote  —  It's been dubbed the most important election in a generation, and if the queues at polling stations this morning are anything to go by, that message has sunk in.  —  The polls have only been open for two hours …
Discussion: Power Line and Common Dreams
Mariko Paulson / Issues:
Senator Elizabeth Warren's Wealth Tax: Projected Budgetary and Economic Effects  —  Print to PDF Summary: Penn Wharton Budget Model (PWBM) projects that Senator Warren's proposed wealth tax, if implemented in 2021, would raise between $2.3 trillion (including macroeconomic effects) …
Associated Press:
UK voters choose a new government to resolve Brexit impasse  —  LONDON (AP) — Britons who have endured more than three years of wrangling over their country's messy divorce from the European Union cast ballots Thursday in an election billed as a way out of the Brexit stalemate in the deeply divided nation.
Amanda Connolly / globalnews.ca:
Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer is resigning  —  Conservative Party Leader Andrew Scheer is resigning.  —  But he says he will stay on as leader until his replacement is chosen and continue to serve as MP for Regina—Qu'Appelle.  —  His resignation comes as a direct result of new revelations …
Anne Applebaum / The Atlantic:
The False Romance of Russia  —  Sherwood Eddy was a prominent American missionary as well as that now rare thing, a Christian socialist.  In the 1920s and '30s, he made more than a dozen trips to the Soviet Union.  He was not blind to the problems of the U.S.S.R., but he also found much to like.
Discussion: Raw Story
 
 
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 More Items: 
The Guardian:
Why is this top Democrat absent from the fight against toxic pollution in Cancer Alley?
Holly Otterbein / Politico:
Liberal groups to spend $7 million to flip state houses
Discussion: Raw Story
Maryan Abdulkarim / Politico:
Finland is no feminist utopia
Guy Taylor / Washington Times:
North Korea defector warns Donald Trump on Kim Jong-un, nuclear weapons
New York Times:
Immense amounts of methane are escaping from oil and gas sites nationwide, worsening global warming …
Lawrence Hurley / Reuters:
Trump poised for Supreme Court battle over financial records
Jake Sherman / Politico:
POLITICO Playbook: Do Democrats have a Plan B?
more at Mediagazer »
 Earlier Items: 
New York Times:
An Inside Look at the Impeachment Case's Most Intriguing Moments
Michael Wines / New York Times:
In a Turnabout, Kentucky to Give Voting Rights to 100,000 Former Felons
John F. Harris / Politico:
What if Trump Weren't Nuts?
Nikki Haley / Washington Post:
My position on the Confederate flag has been constant. Our country's culture has changed.
Washington Post:
In new legal memo, White House budget office defends withholding aid to Ukraine
 

 
From Techmeme:

Jody Godoy / Reuters:
Filing: Apple asks to participate in the remedial phase of Google's US antitrust case, saying it can't rely on Google to defend their revenue-sharing agreements

Bloomberg:
Iran's Supreme Council of Cyberspace approves lifting its ban on “certain widely used foreign platforms”, naming WhatsApp and Google Play as the first two apps

Tharin Pillay / Time:
A look at the more challenging AI evaluations emerging in response to the rapid progress of models, including FrontierMath, Humanity's Last Exam, and RE-Bench
 
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