Articles chosen with care. Comments welcomed. Linked articles in bold purple
◆ Healthcare bill:
- Another Republican Senator says no (that’s 5).
- The Democrats go all in on vitriolic criticism.
- Warren calls it “blood money,” etc.
- Even Joe Manchin, the most conservative Democrat, will vote against the bill.
The conventional wisdom is that the R’s cannot get it through the Senate and that the D’s will escape all blame from voters.
Comment: I don’t think the Democrats are home free on this.
The Republicans will get a lot of the blame, to be sure, if they can’t pass a bill. They should. They have both Houses and the Presidency.
But the Democrats’ entire strategy on everything in both Houses and in the streets is to resist and obstruct.
It remains to be seen if voters will endorse that. I don’t think it appeals beyond the base in NY, CA, and university towns.
Republicans will surely say, “It’s our bill versus Obamacare. The Democrats love Obamacare and won’t do anything but small changes. So now we’re all stuck with it.”
That stance is reinforced by former Pres. Obama coming out so forcefully against the Republican bill.
What happens when voters get the bad news from insurance companies in November about next year?
Ultimately, the electoral question comes down to this: Which do you hate more? Obamacare or the Republicans’ failure to repeal and replace it?
◆ Suicide bomber in Saudi Arabia blows himself up, but fails to reach his main target in Mecca: the Grand Mosque (Washington Post)
The [Saudi Interior] ministry did not name the group involved in the attack. The ultraconservative Sunni kingdom battled an al-Qaida insurgency for years and more recently has faced attacks from a local branch of the Islamic State group.
Neither group immediately claimed those arrested, though Islamic State sympathizers online have urged more attacks as an offensive in Iraq slowly squeezes the extremists out of Mosul and their de facto capital of Raqqa in Syria comes under daily bombing from a U.S.-led coalition. –Washington Post
Comment: Remember, bringing down Saudi Arabia was the major goal of Al Qaeda all along. So far, not much progress.
My guess is that the real political risk is related to Saudi efforts to liberalize the economy, which requires freer information and freer women.
◆ Loretta Lynch, Attorney General in Obama’s final years, is now being investigated by the Senate. Hacked emails from a Democratic campaign official said Lynch “would not to let the Clinton investigation go too far.” That doesn’t look good. Nor does Comey’s testimony that Lynch ordered him to falsely characterize the investigation in public. (USA Today story here)
Another email, now public,
indicated that Lynch had privately assured Clinton campaign staffer Amanda Renteria that the FBI’s investigation wouldn’t “go too far.” –USA Today
The Congressional letter asking Lynch to provide documents was bipartisan, and Lynch has promised to cooperate.
Comment: First, the Senate has to determine if these emails are real or fake. If they are real, Ms. Lynch may be be able to dance around them. For example, “I only meant I didn’t want it to go too far afield” or that she was simply guessing what the FBI would do. (Why would she be talking about such a secret matter to staffers for the person being investigated?) Or that the staffer misunderstood, etc.
The fact that Democrats signed the letter to Lynch indicates the Senate committee, led by Grassley and Feinstein, is operating in a bipartisanship fashion, although it could also indicate that Lynch has reassured Democrats she can defend her position.
Still, the documents now publicly available reek of political interference in a criminal investigation if they are real, not faked by the Russians. As this investigation moves forward, remember, the Democrats refused to allow the FBI to look into their computers after the Russian hack. They haven’t said why.
◆ When corruption stinks. Literally. The White Plains, NY, city council gave a $175k judgeship to someone who cannot work because she is too fat to climb the three steps to the bench (Daily Caller) Judge Eliz. Shollenberger is chair of the local Democratic Party and all council members are Democrats.
It actually gets worse. Judge Shollenberger comes to the court house with what we will delicately call “gastrointestinal issues,” which leave the place looking and smelling terrible.
Shollenberger further dismayed her colleagues by displaying “complete arrogance” following the embarrassing incidents.
“She would just say, ‘There is a mess over there. I think someone should clean it up,’” a court source told the NY Post. –NY Post, quoted in the Daily Caller
Comment: The over/under on how long it takes for Judge Shollenberger to play the victim here: 2 minutes. “I’m sick” “This is fat shaming.” Etc.
Meanwhile, the public has to pay for a non-working judge and a hard-working janitorial crew.
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Give up this charge that the friendship between Mueller and Comey represents a “conflict of interest,” 
His comments appeared to take the White House by surprise.
Ex-FBI Director James Comey has privately told members of Congress that he had a frosty exchange with Obama Attorney General Loretta Lynch last year when he confronted her about possible political interference in the Hillary Clinton email investigation after showing Lynch a sensitive document she was unaware the FBI possessed, according to sources who were directly briefed on the matter. –Circa
The Democrats are in attack mode.
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Israel has approved a request by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to cut by roughly a third the electricity it provides to the Gaza Strip.
The growing tension between the party’s ascendant militant wing and Democrats competing in conservative-leaning terrain, was on vivid, split-screen display over the weekend. In Chicago, Senator Bernie Sanders led a revival-style meeting of his progressive devotees, while in Atlanta, Democrats made a final push to seize a traditionally Republican congressional district. –New York Times
Raza’s verdict comes at a time when officials are increasingly pounding down on blasphemy claims across the country. At least 15 Pakistanis are said to have been arrested by the counterterrorism department under the umbrella of blasphemy, according to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. Four other people were sentenced to death for the crime in 2016 alone. . . .
Some attack her publicly; others hide behind anonymity, proving the know what zip code they live in.
In the media world, that means ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Boston Globe, Los Angeles Times and others will see it one way.
Effectively stirred up the Russia issue again without offering anything substantive
Claimed his leaks were done for an explicitly political reason: to get a special counsel appointed. An extraordinary admission
Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis slammed Iran as a destabilizing influence, particularly in Yemen, during a visit to Saudi Arabia. “Everywhere you look, if there’s trouble in the region, you find Iran,” Mattis told reporters.
The sheer fun of reading a slash-and-burn column. 
Kori Ali Muhammad has admitted killing three people–he was caught in the act–and said he wanted to kill more “white people.”
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In the US, the risk for Republicans is continued alienation of Hispanic voters, a growing segment of the population. Although they generally vote Democratic, some state parties, like Texas Republicans, have won significant Hispanic support and will be very edgy about a deteriorating relationship.
◆ Do the emails on the Abedin/Weiner computer pose serious legal problems for Abedin? Yes, says Daniel John Sobieski, since she signed deadly-serious federal forms saying she had returned all docs and materials to the government when she left. 
◆ Reports that Pres. Obama and his key adviser, Valerie Jarrett, are furious at FBI director James Comey and want him out.
◆ CBS reports: FBI finds emails related to Hillary Clinton’s State Department tenure on laptop shared by Huma Abedin and her estranged (and strange) husband, Anthony Weiner
◆ Prof. Michael Rectenwald: “Here’s what happened when I challenged the PC campus culture at NYU”
◆ The professional who built the Chicago Cubs team: Theo Epstein. After the cheering for Chicago Cubs’ championship players subsides, the cheering for Theo will continue. He is the head of baseball operations for the Cubs, after playing a similar role for the Boston Red Sox. This photo from CBS Sports says it all.
◆ Today in Stupid Criminality: Idiot Steals Cop Car, Streams Chase on Facebook Live