Thursday News: “Warnings From Antarctica”; “Gollum” Read Trump’s Tweets; “Scions and Scoundrels”; Neo-Confederate for Senate?

by Lowell

Here are a few national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise, for Thursday, July 13. Also check out Andy Serkis reading Donald Trump’s tweets, in character as Gollum.

• Warnings From Antarctica (“Icebergs routinely break off Antarctica’s glaciers, but rarely are they as large as Delaware.”)
• Russian Officials Overheard Discussing Trump Associates Before Campaign Began
• McConnell Faces Increasing Pressure Over Health Bill as Timetable Tightens (“Senate GOP to unveil latest draft on Thursday as internal squabbling imperils path forward”)
• Conspiracy or Coincidence? A Timeline Open for Interpreting
• Writing Health Bill, Republicans Have No Votes to Spare (“With two Republican senators all but locked in against it and President Trump exerting pressure on them to pass it, Senate leaders cannot lose another vote on the bill they plan to unveil Thursday.”)
• Kristof: All Roads Lead to Kushner (“Kushner attended a secret meeting whose stated purpose was to advance a Kremlin effort to interfere in the U.S. election, he then failed to report it, and finally he sought a secret channel to communicate with the Kremlin. One next step is clear: Take away Jared Kushner’s security clearance immediately.”)
• Blow: Scions and Scoundrels (“The America that I know and love is hanging by a thread, and Trump’s scandalous camarilla is playing with the shears…Donald Trump is president because American sexism, misogyny and patriarchy know no bounds…You only have to remember this: These people are not to be trusted. Their greatest interest is in their own enrichment. They believe that they exist in a space above the law and outside the rules…Trump is not only a disgrace but also an assault on the culture and the country.”)
• The lights go out on the Republican Party (“Surely GOP leaders will move with dispatch to disavow Team Trump’s behavior, right? Wrong.”)
• Get off the Trump train before it crashes (“Vice President Pence and congressional leaders should disembark from the Trump train.”)
• Exclusive: Trump says he does not fault son for meeting Russian lawyer (Trump’s lips are moving? That means he’s lying.)
• Senate moderates sidelined in new Obamacare repeal bill (“Centrist Republicans are still opposed to deep Medicaid cuts, potentially dooming the GOP effort to gut the health law.” The meaningless words “centrist Republicans” and “moderate Republicans” need to be banned from the English language.)
• Despite doomsday rhetoric, Obamacare markets are stabilizing (“First quarter results suggest insurers are on a path to profitability.”)
• GOP base asks, ‘What Russia scandal?’ (“Local Republican leaders say the only collusion going on is between Democrats and the media.” The problem, in other words, isn’t Trump per se, it’s his voters, supporters, enablers…)
• The Memo: White House searches for strategy on Russia
• Donald Trump Jr.’s Free Speech Defense (“It’s as bogus as it sounds”)
• The Trumps Are Enriching Themselves With Taxpayer Money by Promoting Their Hotels (I’ve been calling Don Jr. and Eric “Uday and Qusay” for many months now for a bunch of reasons…)
• Donald Trump Jr.’s emails won’t change anything: His dad’s supporters will stay loyal no matter how much collusion is exposed (“These are important revelations — but they won’t sway Trump’s base, and may only worsen our national crisis”)
• Trump Jr., Russian collusion, and the pro-Trump media’s bad-faith attack on the press
• Trump meets Macron, shadowed by Putin
• Exclusive: Video shows Trump with associates tied to email controversy
• House Republican threatens new Clinton investigations unless Democrats stop talking about Russia (“That means go back all the way to the 650,000 emails of Anthony Weiner.”)
• The White House’s exceedingly dishonest attack on the Congressional Budget Office (“The Trumpcare misinformation campaign continues.”)
• The blackmail factor: Trumpworld’s Russia lies are a major risk to national security (“The Russians know the truth and Trump knows they know.” And Republicans don’t care.)
• Republicans Matter Most, And They Don’t Seem To Care Much About Trump Jr. (“This doesn’t mean Republicans will back Trump forever, particularly if the special counsel or the congressional committees unearth more unflattering evidence. And if Democrats win control of the House or the Senate in 2018, that will change the tenor of Congress’s Russia debate. But for now, Republicans are in charge, and they don’t seem to be abandoning Trump yet.”)
• Short Tempers And Mass Confusion: O’care Repeal Is Going Awesome
• Fear and Loathing Consume the White House
• Watching the Downfall of a Presidency in Real Time
• Trump Administration Eager to Start Crack Down on Legal Immigration
• Republicans Still Can’t Design a Workable Health-Care Plan (“And the deadline looms.”)
• Void the Corrupted November Election
• Corey Stewart to announce run for U.S. Senate on Thursday, sources say
• After near miss in Va. governor’s race, Corey Stewart says he will challenge Sen. Tim Kaine in 2018
• Gillespie’s primary scare has White House, others urging ‘Trump world’ hires (“’He’s surrounded himself with ‘Never Trumpers’ and they don’t know how to navigate this new dynamic in the party,’ GOP insider says.” Pathetic.)
• Ed Gillespie touts Portman effort to add opioid funding to Senate health-care bill (But what does Gillespie think of screwing over tens of millions of Americans and trashing the U.S. health care system?)
• Call for additional DEQ public hearings on pipeline falls flat (“A chorus of regional voices contends that a plan by Virginia’s environmental agency to hold just two public hearings about the proposed, deeply controversial Mountain Valley Pipeline fails to adequately serve a key constituency: the public.”)
• Legislator proposes exempting poorest Virginia localities from some taxes
• Virginia ends fiscal year with $132 million surplus
• Texas lawmaker pushing to change flight rules at Reagan National Airport
• Editorial: Good news for the Port – and Virginia
• Lawsuit filed to halt Dominion transmission line over James River
• Norfolk law would require Airbnb hosts to register or face a $500 fine
• D.C.-area forecast: Steamy hot today, Friday stormy, and the weekend drier with much less heat