memeorandum: Joe Biden, grilled on Obama-era record of putting children in ‘cages,’ argues ‘we kept them safe’ (Adam Shaw/Fox News)

6:55 PM ET, February 15, 2020

Top Items:

Michael Kranish / Washington Post:

Mike Bloomberg for years has battled women's allegations of profane, sexist comments — NEW YORK — As Mike Bloomberg celebrated his 48th birthday in 1990, a top aide at the company he founded presented him with a booklet of profane, sexist quotes she attributed to him.

Discussion: Vox, CNN, Fox News, HuffPost, POLITICUSUSA, Law & Crime, TheBlaze and Althouse

Rachel Sharp / Daily Mail:

BREAKING: Mike Bloomberg ‘wants Hillary Clinton as his running mate’, sources close to his campaign tell Drudge — Mike Bloomberg is considering Hillary Clinton as his running mate, source says Polling found the Bloomberg-Clinton combination would be a formidable force to take on Trump …

Discussion: Power Line, New York Post, The Last Refuge, TheBlaze and Twitchy

New York Times:

Bloomberg's Billions: How the Candidate Built an Empire of Influence — In the fall of 2018, Emily's List had a dilemma. With congressional elections approaching and the Supreme Court confirmation battle over Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh underway, the Democratic women's group was hosting a major fund-raising luncheon in New York.

Discussion: Mother Jones, Common Dreams, The Week and Eschaton

Isaac Chotiner / New Yorker:

Why D.C.'s Mayor Endorsed Michael Bloomberg — Michael Bloomberg, who will enter the Democratic Presidential primaries on Super Tuesday, on March 3rd, and has already spent more than three hundred million dollars on his campaign, has risen to third place in an average of national polls of Democratic primary voters.

Discussion: Washington Post and The Atlantic

Washington Post:
The Portable Bloomberg: The Wit & Wisdom of Michael Bloomberg

Discussion: The Daily Beast, Raw Story, Vanity Fair and The Guardian

New York Times:

Trump's Prying Becomes Source of Distress for Justice Department Lawyers — After a week of tumult, some career prosecutors expressed concerns about political interference and the attorney general's response to the president weighing in on the prosecution of an associate.

Discussion: Washington Post

CNN:

Attorney general's actions spark outrage and unease among US prosecutors — What exactly is going on with Trump, Stone and the DOJ? — New York (CNN)As the clash between Justice Department leaders and career prosecutors in the case of President Donald Trump's longtime friend Roger Stone spilled …

Discussion: Mother Jones, Law & Crime, New York Times, emptywheel and Washington Post

The Boston Globe:

William Barr must go — No one is as good at hiring an unscrupulous lawyer as Donald Trump. And now it seems that the worst of the bunch, the late Roy Cohn — the lying, cheating, and eventually disbarred attorney who represented both the red-baiting Joseph McCarthy and the president …

Discussion: CNN

Max Boot / Washington Post:
This is how democracy dies — in full view of a public that couldn't care less

Discussion: NBC News, RealClearPolitics and Power Line

Shan Wu / The Daily Beast:
Bill Barr Is Wrecking the Justice Department, And It May Never Recover

Discussion: One America News Network, Palmer Report, Raw Story, Breitbart and Letters from an American

Maya King / Politico:

Deep cracks emerge in Biden's firewall — CHARLESTON, S.C. — His message is uninspiring. His ground game is flawed. After Iowa and New Hampshire, they're no longer convinced he can beat Donald Trump. — Interviews with two dozen South Carolina lawmakers, consultants and voters …

Discussion: Associated Press, The Hill, The Week and The Mind Shield

Dan Balz / Washington Post:
The Democratic nomination contest doesn't look like any from the past

Discussion: Associated Press

Associated Press: Sanders' bond with Latinos gets first test of many in Nevada

Associated Press:
Klobuchar shifts on immigration before Nevada caucuses

Discussion: Townhall, Axios, 24Ahead, Breitbart and The Hill

Colby Itkowitz / Washington Post:

Trump eliminates funding for program in honor of Ambassador Stevens who was killed in Benghazi — The Trump administration has zeroed out of the State Department budget a request from a nonprofit set up in honor of J. Christopher Stevens, the ambassador killed in Benghazi, Libya, in a 2012 terrorist attack.

Discussion: One America News Network

David M. Herszenhorn / Politico:
State Department keeps quiet as Pompeo meets Lavrov in Munich

Discussion: Raw Story, The Mahablog, Talking Points Memo, One America News Network and Maria Zakharova

Maya Gebeily / Agence France-Presse: Irked US squeezes Iraq with cash delays, short waivers

New York Times:

A Presidency Increasingly Guided by Suspicion and Distrust — Presidential paranoia is not a new phenomenon but Mr. Trump, burned by impeachment, seems to have elevated it to a governing philosophy of his White House. — WASHINGTON — President Trump suggested in recent days that he had …

Ross Douthat / New York Times:

The Bloomberg Temptation — Will the Democrats try to replace Donald Trump with a power-hungry plutocrat? — For a long time the notion of a Michael Bloomberg presidential candidacy seemed like a Manhattan fancy, a conceit with elite appeal but no mass constituency, a fantasy for Acela riders …

Discussion: Jacobin and BizPac Review

Tal Axelrod / The Hill:

GOP governor endorses Weld in Vermont primary — Vermont Gov. Phil Scott (R) has endorsed GOP presidential candidate Bill Weld ahead of the state's GOP primary next month, a move intended as a rebuke of President Trump. — “I've met with him before, I think a lot of him and his platform …

WPTZ:
Gov. Scott gives endorsement in Presidential race

Discussion: Politico, Joe.My.God., TheBlaze and New York Post

Mike DeBonis / Washington Post:

Ted Cruz once called Trump ‘utterly amoral’ and a ‘sniveling coward.’ Then he worked to save his presidency. — Donald Trump called him “Lyin' Ted” Cruz, mocked his wife's appearance and falsely suggested his father was involved in President John F. Kennedy's assassination.

Discussion: Raw Story

Eric Levitz / New York Magazine:

This One Chart Explains Why the Kids Back Bernie — The kids are all left. Or, almost all Democratic voters under 30 are, anyway. — Blue America's gaping chasm of a generation gap has been a - if not the - defining feature of the Democratic primary race thus far.

USA Today:

This college was accredited by a DeVos-sanctioned group. We couldn't find evidence of students or faculty. — Chris Quintana Shelly ConlonUSA TODAY — SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — Reagan National University was supposed to be a place of higher learning in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

Discussion: Joe.My.God.

Courtney Subramanian / USA Today:

USA TODAY/Ipsos poll: For voters, Bernie Sanders outranks other Democrats - and Trump - on values, empathy — WASHINGTON - Is Democratic candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders likable enough to win the White House? A new USA TODAY/Ipsos poll released Friday suggests a lot of voters think so.

Discussion: New York Post

Adam Shaw / Fox News:

Joe Biden, grilled on Obama-era record of putting children in ‘cages,’ argues ‘we kept them safe’ — Former Vice President Joe Biden was grilled Friday about the Obama administration's record of detaining migrant children in what some lawmakers and activists have described as “cages” …

Discussion: Associated Press, The Hill and The Daily Caller

Minyvonne Burke / NBC News:

Black college swimmer on team trip had gun pointed at his head by police — Jaylan Butler of Eastern Illinois University said officers threatened to blow his head off before it became clear they mistook him for a suspect. — A black student at Eastern Illinois University returning …

Christopher Caldwell / New York Times:

Bloomberg Is Right About the 2008 Financial Crash — It was brought about by a flawed attempt to use credit markets to broaden access to housing. — Mr. Caldwell is the author of “The Age of Entitlement: America Since the Sixties.” — You would have thought that Michael Bloomberg …

Discussion: The Week and Washington Post

Pat Rynard / Iowa Starting Line:

Mark Smith Elected As New Chair Of Iowa Democrats — Iowa Democrats have a new state party chair: State Rep. Mark Smith of Marshalltown. — The party's state central committee members gathered today in Des Moines and over the phone to elect Smith as the interim chair following Troy Price's resignation …

David Knowles / Yahoo News:

Trump budget zeroes out funding for Stars and Stripes, the military's newspaper — pulled funding in its 2021 budget for Stars and Stripes, the U.S. military news organization that has published a daily newspaper continuously since World War II for troops stationed around the world.

Discussion: Columbia Journalism Review, more at Mediagazer »

Terrence McCoy / Washington Post:

He showed me a lawless border town. Then masked gunmen killed him in front of his family. — RIO DE JANEIRO — What do you say about a death as horrific as this? What do you say about a man who was murdered by two masked intruders inside his home, in front of his family, while they ate dinner?