by Lowell
Here are a few national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise, for Friday, June 30.
- A new report raises some big questions about Michael Flynn and Russian hackers (“The Wall Street Journal describes how one Trump supporter reached out to hackers — and dropped Flynn’s name.”)
- Medicaid Projections Raise Hurdle for G.O.P. Health Bill
- Krugman: Understanding Republican Cruelty (“Republicans start from a sort of baseline of cruelty toward the less fortunate, of hostility toward anything that protects families against catastrophe.”)
- GOP reworking health bill, trying to appease centrists, conservatives
- The Blood on a Tax Cut (“Such is the bargain — your health care for my tax cut — that Republicans have proposed with their overhaul of the Affordable Care Act. The toxic Senate bill does nothing to fix a struggling system. But it is bold and quite daring: for this is the broadest attack on working Americans by a governing political party in our lifetime.”)
- ‘It is really not normal’: Both sides condemn Trump for vulgar tweet about Mika Brzezinski (Ah yes, the corporate media’s favorite, “both sides.” In fact, Republicans are inextricably tied to Trump at this point, and the fact that a few Republicans told Trump to cut it out doesn’t change that fact.)
- Donald Trump is not well (“It would be better for everyone if he stopped watching our show.”)
- There Trump goes again (“What happens if there is an international crisis and Trump’s delicate ego is threatened?” Trump is the ultimate “special snowflake.”)
- The Democrats’ problem is not the economy, stupid (“They need to convey to a large swath of the country that they understand and respect their lives, their values and their worth.”)
- America is hacking away at its own democratic limb (“Civility, compromise and moderation are not weaknesses or faults. They are crucial for a successful democracy.”)
- There’s no sugarcoating it: Republicans are taking a sledgehammer to Medicaid (“The proposed legislation will reduce health care for millions of poor children.” Immoral, cruel, stupid, you name it.)
- Authoritarianism creeps up on you. This is how. (“Publicity without accountability is the antithesis of democracy.”)
- It turns out the liberal caricature of conservatism is correct (“It’s depressing. But it’s true.”)
- Trump’s barrage of lies is nothing new: Lying has been at the heart of Republican politics for 50 years (“Conservatives have totally lost the ability to govern, so they attack the press to distract the public”)
- GOP Operative Attempted to Collude With Hackers He Thought Were Russian to Get Hacked Clinton Emails
- Delegitimizing his presidency, one tweet at a time
- House passes ‘Kate’s Law’ and bill declaring war on sanctuary cities
- The ugly American President: Donald Trump’s tweet-rant against Mika and Joe reaches new low
- GOP scrambles to win centrist votes on ObamaCare repeal
- Trump names former FEC member to voter fraud probe (“Spakovsky is also a former Justice Department official and a top critic of former President Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder. In 2014, he wrote a book titled ‘Obama’s Enforcer: Eric Holder’s Justice Department.’ The guy’s an absolute disaster, as is this entire “Election Integrity” initiative. No state should cooperate.)
- Breaking: MSNBC and Greta Van Susteren Agree to Part Ways (MSNBC needs to fire a bunch of people.)
- Bret Stephens and MSNBC’s hiring spree: The network keeps moving right (Start by bagging the Bret Stephens hiring.)
- Trump’s Mika tweets were gruesome — but the “resistance” needs to stop fainting every time he says something inflammatory (“Trump’s Twitter abuse of Mika Brzezinski was just daily outrage fodder — and as usual we all took the bait”)
- In surprising rebuke to Trump, GOP committee votes to repeal authorization for use of military force (“The authorization has been in place since 2001.”)
- Trump’s voter fraud commission is ‘laying the groundwork for voter suppression’ (“Vice chair Kris Kobach plans to use Kansas’ disastrous voter purge as a national model.”)
- Trump’s road to ‘energy dominance’ excludes clean energy (“Environmental advocates call president’s speech a fitting end to ‘dirty energy week.'” Or call it “destroy the environment week.”)
- ISIS’s Caliphate Is Collapsing, But Don’t Celebrate Just Yet (“The loss of its Iraqi and Syrian territories may be a huge setback for ISIS’s leadership and core members, but the group has expanded well beyond its base in the Islamic heartland, taking advantage of the proliferation of failed states and effectively ungoverned territory in the greater Muslim world.”)
- Stop Assuming Trump Is Innocent of Russian Collusion
- With Nasty Tweets, Trump Steps on His Immigration Message
- Donald Trump Will Go Down in History as the Troll-in-Chief
- Ted Cruz has a big idea that just might unlock a Senate health care deal (This can’t be good…)
- Why Republicans Might Be Forced To Oppose Tax Cuts
- CBO: Congress Has October Deadline To Avoid Devastating Economic Default
- ‘Most Sinister’ Propaganda: Examining The NRA’s Ominous New Ad (Definitely a “nutjob, extremist organization,” as Tom Perriello correctly put it.)
- Economic development is a top concern for Southwest Virginia county officials (Uh guys? You misspelled that name of your own newspaper as “BRISTOL HERARD COURIER.”)
- Libertarian candidate for Virginia governor qualifies for November ballot
- McAuliffe spurns Trump panel’s request for information on Virginia voters
- State Supreme Court rules against Daily Press on access to court records
- Advocates deliver 31,000 petition signatures to Gov. McAuliffe urging clemency for death row inmate Morva
- Virginia’s governor still has time to save a mentally ill man from execution
- Salary boost for Va. workers, $100 fines for left lane dawdlers highlight new laws that take effect Saturday
- Dominion Energy bills go up Saturday due to fuel rate increase
- Editorial: Let’s put offshore drilling into context (The context is that it’s 100% the wrong way to go, for a whole host of economic and environmental reasons.)
- For Metro, a coupon for a cup of coffee brings out the passion — good and bad (“Metro officials reached out to riders in an effort to say thanks for sticking with them. In person, the response was civil. Online, the gesture was met with mockery.”)
- Washington Redskins win trademark fight over the team’s name
- Editorial: A new Coliseum for Richmond? (“Word has leaked about plans — inchoate and unofficial at the moment — to replace Richmond’s aging Coliseum. The new one would form the centerpiece of downtown revitalization. Or at least that is the hope.”)
- After numerous water rescues, officials ask visitors to ‘use caution’ when visiting new Outer Banks island
- Heat and humidity build today, persist through Independence Day
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