Tuesday Reads

Good Morning!!

Trump came up with another shiny object for his fans today. He told Axios that he plans to issue an executive order ending birthright citizenship. That would involve invalidating the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. There would be legal challenges and the question would end up in the Supreme Court. Would the Kavanaugh court go along with Trump? The New York Times:

President Trump said he was preparing an executive order to end birthright citizenship in the United States, his latest attention-grabbing maneuver days before midterm congressional elections, during which he has sought to activate his base by vowing to clamp down on immigrants and immigration.

“We’re the only country in the world where a person comes in and has a baby, and the baby is essentially a citizen of the United States for 85 years, with all of those benefits,” Mr. Trump told Axios during an interview that was released in part on Tuesday. “It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous. And it has to end.”

In fact, dozens of other countries, including Canada, Mexico and many others in the Western Hemisphere, grant automatic birthright citizenship, according to a study by the Center for Immigration Studies, an organization that supports restricting immigration and whose work Mr. Trump’s advisers often cite.

Um . . . no.

Doing away with birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants was an idea Mr. Trump pitched as a presidential candidate, but there is no clear indication that he would be able to do so unilaterally, and attempting to would be certain to prompt legal challenges….

To accomplish the idea he floated on Tuesday, Mr. Trump would have to find a way around the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which states, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

The amendment means that any child born in the United States is considered a citizen. Amendments to the Constitution cannot be overridden by presidential action, and can be changed or undone only by overwhelming majorities in Congress or the states, with a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress or through a constitutional convention called for by two-thirds of state legislatures.

Hillary Clinton predicted in 2016 that Trump would try this.

https://twitter.com/scarylawyerguy/status/1057277661809127425

Trump is really going all out with the hate leading up to November 6. This is just one more disgusting example of his pandering to the far right while trying to get the media to stop talking about violence attacks that he has contributed to with his rhetoric at his vile Hitler rallies.

Despite pleas from Pittsburgh’s Mayor and members of the Jewish community, Trump plans to go to visit the grieving city this afternoon. NPR: Trump To Visit Pittsburgh Despite Objections From Mayor, Jewish Leaders.

President Trump plans to travel to Pittsburgh on Tuesday afternoon, as the city continues to mourn Saturday’s massacre that claimed the lives of 11 worshippers at a synagogue.

When Trump arrives, he is expected to meet with members of the local Jewish community. But the visit comes despite the wishes of some political and religious leaders who felt that the president should come at a later date — or not at all.

The visit is the same day of the first funerals for those killed at the Tree of Life synagogue.

The city’s Democratic mayor, Bill Peduto, urged the president not to come while friends and families were burying their loved ones.

“I do believe that it would be best to put the attention on families this week and if he were to visit, choose a different time to do it,” Peduto told CNN.

CNN: Local, national officials decline to appear with Trump in Pittsburgh.

Local and national officials are declining to appear with President Donald Trump on Tuesday when he visits a grieving Pittsburgh, where funerals for slain congregants at the Tree of Life synagogue are set to begin.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Speaker Paul Ryan, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi were all invited to join the President on his visit but declined, according to two congressional sources.

Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pennsylvania, was also invited to join Trump in Pittsburgh but declined, according to a spokesman, citing previous commitments in another part of the state.

A spate of local and state officials also said they would not appear with Trump when he visits a hospital and pays respects to the 11 victims of Saturday’s massacre.

The White House has declined to say who the President will meet with when he travels to Pittsburgh on Tuesday afternoon. One official described the visit as “understated.” He’ll be joined by the first lady, as well as daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner, who are Jewish.

You’d think Trump would postpone this trip when even Mitch McConnell declined to accompany him. I wonder what he’s up to?

And then there’s Mike Pence and his fake rabbi. Pence asked a “rabbi” from “Jews for Jesus” to speak at an event he held in Michigan. The Jewish News: ‘Jews for Jesus’ Rabbi Speaks at Campaign Rally with VP Pence, Lena Epstein

An invocation from messianic Christian rabbi Loren Jacobs at a campaign rally in Waterford for Republican congressional candidate Lena Epstein has sparked outrage mere days after 11 Jews were murdered in Pittsburgh because of their faith.

Vice President Mike Pence, a devout Christian, was at the rally for Epstein. A spokesperson for Pence said he did not know Loren Jacobs of the Messianic congregation Shema Yisrael when he invited him to offer a prayer for the Tree of Life synagogue victims gunned down by an anti-Semite last weekend.

“God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, God and Father of my Lord and Savior Yeshua, Jesus the Messiah, and my God and Father too,” Jacobs, wearing a tallit, said. Jacobs was ordained at an evangelical seminary and uses the title “rabbi.” As Pence stood next to him, Jacobs ended his prayer by saying, “in the name of Jesus.”

Jews for Jesus, as many call messianic Christians, are not accepted in mainstream Judaism as one of their main missions is the conversion of Jews to Christianity. After Jacobs’ prayer, many took to social media to express their anger that a Jewish rabbi had not been asked to give the invocation.

A Pence aide told the Associated Press that Jacobs was invited to pray at the event by GOP congressional candidate Lena Epstein…..Rabbi Jason Miller said on Facebook that Epstein could have chosen any one of at least 60 rabbis on a directory of Michigan rabbis. “Yet the only rabbi they could find to offer a prayer for the 11 Jewish victims in Pittsburgh at the Mike Pence rally was a local Jews for Jesus rabbi? That’s pathetic!”

Epstein attempted to justify her recommendation–you can read her statement at the link. It certainly appears that Trump and Pence are trying to signal to their followers that more anti-Semitic violence will be met with shrugs from the administration.

Please check out this Twitter thread by Rafael Shiminov.

Shiminov writes that Jacobs (the fake rabbi) offered prayers for Republican candidates and the Republican Party and did not even pray for the victims of the massacre in Pittsburgh until Pence brought him up after the event to amend his remarks! Shiminov says this sends a clear message to Trumpists.

One final depressing story before I end this depressing post (h/t Delphyne).

The New York Times: 2 Sisters Were Found Dead in the River, Duct-Taped Together. Police Have Few Answers.

A person strolling through Riverside Park last Wednesday afternoon spotted something jarring on the riverbank and called the police.

There, below a small pier that juts out from the park at 68th Street, lay the bodies of two young women, bound together by duct tape at their waists and ankles. They had not been in the water long, the police said. Clad in similar black leggings and black jackets with fur trim, their bodies bore no obvious signs of trauma.

The police initially had trouble identifying the young women. Hints that they might be related surfaced a day after they were found when police sketches revealed striking similarities: the same curly dark hair, the same build, the same skin tone.

By Friday, detectives had learned the women were sisters from Saudi Arabia who lived in Fairfax, Va.

Rotana Farea was 22; Tala Farea was 16. They had a history of going missing, and they had recently requested asylum in the United States, the police said.

But beyond that, the circumstances of their deaths have remained a mystery. Investigators have struggled to piece together how two young women from a city more than 250 miles away turned up along Manhattan’s Hudson River shoreline.

The police are investigating the possibility that the sisters may have carried out a suicide pact, taping themselves together and throwing themselves in the river. But detectives have not ruled out murder. The medical examiner’s office has yet to determine the cause of death. No one has claimed the bodies.

Here’s Twitter thread about this story by Mona Eltahawy.

That’s about all I can handle for today. Please post your own thoughts and links in the comment thread below.

Thursday Reads: Snuggling Cats, Dogs, and Bunnies (and the News)

Good Morning!!

On Monday, someone put a bomb in Democratic donor George Soros’ mailbox. Yesterday authorities discovered more mail bombs, and it became clear that someone had attempted to assassinate two former presidents, a former secretary of state, a former vice president, and a former attorney general, and two sitting U.S. Congresswomen, all Democrats and all targets of Trump’s verbal attacks. In addition, a bomb was sent to CNN, addressed to former CIA director John Brennan. Today another bomb was discovered, this one sent to actor and Trump critic Robert De Niro.

FBI Press Release: Statement on the FBI’s Investigation of Suspicious Packages.

Between October 22 and 24, 2018, suspicious packages were received at multiple locations in the New York and Washington, D.C., areas and Florida. The packages are being sent for analysis at the FBI Laboratory in Quantico, Virginia.

“This investigation is of the highest priority for the FBI. We have committed the full strength of the FBI’s resources and, together with our partners on our Joint Terrorism Task Forces, we will continue to work to identify and arrest whoever is responsible for sending these packages,” said FBI Director Christopher Wray. “We ask anyone who may have information to contact the FBI. Do not hesitate to call; no piece of information is too small to help us in this investigation.”

The packages are similar in appearance, as depicted in the below photograph, and contain potentially destructive devices.

[….]

The FBI will continue to work with our federal law enforcement partners at the United States Secret Service, United States Postal Inspection Service, and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, as well as our state and local law enforcement partners, to identify and arrest the person or people responsible for sending these packages.

It is possible that additional packages were mailed to other locations. The FBI advises the public to remain vigilant and not touch, move or handle any suspicious or unknown packages.

If you have information about these packages, please contact the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI or tips.fbi.gov. If you observe any suspicious activity that requires an immediate response, please call 911 or contact your local law enforcement.

Trump declined to cancel his Hitler rally in Wisconsin last night, and during the rally, he again attacked the “mainstream media.” Before Trump came on stage, the audience chanted “lock her up” as a Republican politician grinned ear to ear. The Cut:

On the same day bombs were discovered in packages addressed to Hillary Clinton and several other top Democrats, supporters of President Donald Trump packed onto the tarmac at Central Wisconsin Airport in Mosinee, Wisconsin began shouting “lock her up” at the mention of Clinton’s name….

The rally was part of Trump’s national midterm campaign tour to bolster support for Republican candidates. It was during Senate Republican candidate Leah Vukmir’s address to the crowd, before Trump’s arrival, that the chants began. She paused as the crowd yelled Trump’s infamous line several times, before continuing her speech….

When Trump came onstage, he limited his usual attacks on Democrats, and there were no “lock her up” chants during his remarks. He did not mention senators Dianne Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi, nor did he mention Representative Maxine Waters, who was sent three of the seven bombs discovered this week. He instead shaped his speech around what he read from a teleprompter, and asked politicians to “stop treating political opponents as being morally defective.” He also asked the media to help unify people.

“The media also has a responsibility to set a civil tone and to stop the endless hostility and constant negative and oftentimes false attacks and stories,” said Trump at one point. “They’ve got to stop. Bring people together.”

Trump did not reach out in any way to any of the people who were targeted by mail bombs, and this morning he suggested that the media are responsible for the attacks.

The Washington Post this morning: Trump doubles down on blaming media as suspicious packages continue to surface.

President Trump doubled down Thursday on blaming the media for the nation’s incivility, as suspicious packages sent by a suspected serial bomber continued to target Trump’s outspoken critics.

“A very big part of the Anger we see today in our society is caused by the purposely false and inaccurate reporting of the Mainstream Media that I refer to as Fake News,” the president said in a morning tweet. “It has gotten so bad and hateful that it is beyond description. Mainstream Media must clean up its act, FAST!”

Trump’s tweet — which prompted sharp criticism from Democrats — was sent amid television coverage of police in New York swarming a block in Lower Manhattan after receiving reports of a suspicious package at a building where actor Robert De Niro has offices. The package was addressed to De Niro, who attacked Trump in June during a profane presentation at the Tony Awards.

The Post notes that while Trump was “relatively subdued” at last night’s rally, he still attacked the media and Democrats.

During the rally, Trump was relatively subdued as he spoke, interrupted himself several times to point out that he was “trying to be nice” and took no responsibility for his own role in contributing to the country’s degraded civic discourse.

“The media also has a responsibility to set a civil tone and to stop the endless hostility and constant negative — and oftentimes, false — attacks and stories,” Trump said at the rally.

In an apparent swipe at Democrats, Trump also denounced those who “carelessly compare political opponents to historical villains” and who “mob people in public places or destroy public property.”

Illustration by Irina Garmashova

Yesterday we learned that Trump is still using unsecured cell phones even though he has been warned that China, Russia, and likely other countries are monitoring his conversations.

The New York Times: When Trump Phones Friends, the Chinese and the Russians Listen and Learn.

When President Trump calls old friends on one of his iPhones to gossip, gripe or solicit their latest take on how he is doing, American intelligence reports indicate that Chinese spies are often listening — and putting to use invaluable insights into how to best work the president and affect administration policy, current and former American officials said.

Mr. Trump’s aides have repeatedly warned him that his cellphone calls are not secure, and they have told him that Russian spies are routinely eavesdropping on the calls, as well. But aides say the voluble president, who has been pressured into using his secure White House landline more often these days, has still refused to give up his iPhones. White House officials say they can only hope he refrains from discussing classified information when he is on them….

American spy agencies, the officials said, had learned that China and Russia were eavesdropping on the president’s cellphone calls from human sources inside foreign governments and intercepting communications between foreign officials….

The current and former officials said they have also determined that China is seeking to use what it is learning from the calls — how Mr. Trump thinks, what arguments tend to sway him and to whom he is inclined to listen — to keep a trade war with the United States from escalating further. In what amounts to a marriage of lobbying and espionage, the Chinese have pieced together a list of the people with whom Mr. Trump regularly speaks in hopes of using them to influence the president, the officials said.

The “good news,” according to these officials is that Trump is a moron who doesn’t really focus on his intelligence briefings–so they can only hope he isn’t giving away state secrets.

Administration officials said Mr. Trump’s longtime paranoia about surveillance — well before coming to the White House he believed that his phone conversations were often being recorded — gave them some comfort that he was not disclosing classified information on the calls. They said they had further confidence he was not spilling secrets because he rarely digs into the details of the intelligence he is shown and is not well versed in the operational specifics of military or covert activities.

How is this not a crime? Surely any other government official who did this would be investigated.

Sleeping bunnies

Fast Company: Trump’s tapped phone may be the largest White House breach ever: former official.

“This stunning revelation by the NYT is one that has sweeping ramifications for intelligence and the security of the American people,” says former White House chief information officer Theresa Payton in an email to Fast Company.

Trump reportedly has three iPhones, but only two of them are equipped with security features that have been added by the National Security Agency. One of the secure phones is strictly intended for tweeting, and only over Wi-Fi networks.

His third phone is said to be as unsecured as any regular iPhone. Former administration officials said that in spite of their repeated warnings that spies might listen into his calls, Trump refused to give up the phone, and kept using it as usual. The president likes to keep his personal iPhone around reportedly because “he can store his contacts in it.” [….]

“If true, this may be the largest, most significant breach of White House communications in history,” says Payton, who served in the George W. Bush administration and is now CEO of security firm Fortalice Solutions. “America’s most sophisticated peer competitor now has a direct line into the president’s confidential thinking and conversations.”

As the “president” endangers the lives of multiple prominent Americans with his public rhetoric and threats, while blithely ignoring warnings that he’s also endangering national security through his use of unsecured cell phones, Robert Muller is still plugging away on his investigation of Russia’s attack on the 2016 election and possible cooperation by the Trump campaign.

NBC News: Mueller has evidence suggesting Stone associate knew Clinton emails would be leaked.

More snuggling bunnies

Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office has obtained communications suggesting that a right-wing conspiracy theorist might have had advance knowledge that the emails of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman had been stolen and handed to WikiLeaks, a source familiar with the investigation told NBC News.

Mueller’s team has spent months investigating whether the conspiracy theorist, Jerome Corsi, learned before the public did that WikiLeaks had obtained emails hacked by Russian intelligence officers — and whether he passed information about the stolen emails to Donald Trump associate Roger Stone, multiple sources said.

Mueller’s investigators have reviewed messages to members of the Trump team in which Stone and Corsi seem to take credit for the release of Democratic emails, said a person with direct knowledge of the emails.

The source and other people familiar with the matter say they have seen no evidence suggesting either man played any role in the hacking or release of the emails. Stone adamantly denies doing anything but passing on information already in the public domain.

One more story: NBC News finally begins to recognize that hiring former Fox News personalities ia a losing proposition. CNN Business: Megyn Kelly is off her 9 a.m. show, and may not be back.

“Megyn Kelly Today” is not over yet. But it’s a matter of when, not if.

Kelly’s exit from the 9 a.m. hour of the “Today” show appears to be imminent, according to sources with knowledge of the matter.

Kelly will not be hosting her program on Thursday, and she is unlikely to return later, one of the sources said. Friday episodes of her show are usually pre-taped.

“Given the circumstances, Megyn Kelly Today will be on tape the rest of the week,” an NBC News spokeswoman said Thursday morning.

Another source said that Kelly’s show will be ending, but negotiations about the end date and other details are still underway.

Kelly is under fire for defending the use of blackface in Halloween costumes.

The talks about dropping Kelly’s 9 a.m. show pre-dated this week’s controversy about her offensive comments about blackface Halloween costumes.

NBC News staffers were calling her show a “disaster” well before this latest controversy.

Kelly has been dropped by her talent agency. Hollywood Reporter:

CAA is no longer working with Kelly, The Hollywood Reporter learned on Wednesday. CAA declined to give a reason for the split, but a source says the Megyn Kelly Today host sought new representation because the agency also reps NBC News president Noah Oppenheim.

To replace CAA, UTA co-president Jay Sures had been in talks to sign Kelly and had been courting her before Tuesday’s blackface backlash, in which Kelly said on her 9 a.m. show that she didn’t understand why people couldn’t wear blackface on Halloween. Sures is said to have backed out of representing Kelly on Wednesday amid the controversy. A source close to the situation says Sures’ decision came after he made at least one call to NBC News president Noah Oppenheim and had set a meeting with NBC for Friday on Kelly’s behalf.

Then later on Wednesday, Kelly hired attorney Bryan Freedman, one of Hollywood’s top talent-side litigators. The move is a sign that she is gearing up for a fight with NBC that could lead to her exit. She will not appear on the Thursday or Friday episodes of her show, according to sources.

The drama comes a day after the host of Today’s 9 o’clock hour defended blackface during a segment on Halloween costumes, claiming that the practice, which finds its roots in 19th century racist minstrel shows, was acceptable when she was a kid. Online reaction was swift, with Hollywood figures from many races, including Padma Lakshmi, Patton Oswalt and Roy Wood Jr., criticizing the stance.

A few hours later on Tuesday, Kelly sent an internal e-mail to the company, explaining that she had now learned that “the history of blackface in our culture is abhorrent.” Her NBC colleagues did not shy away from the subject, covering the incident both on NBC Nightly News With Lester Holt and in late night. “Say what you want about Megyn Kelly, but she looks great for being 200 years old,” cracked Late Night host Seth Meyers, while writer Amber Ruffin added, “For someone with a morning show, Megyn Kelly, you sure are late as hell.”

So . . . what stories are you following today?

Lazy Caturday Reads

Young Woman With Cat, by Amy Hill

Good Afternoon!!

Tonight is the 45th anniversary of Nixon’s Saturday Night Massacre. I’ll never forget waking up on Sunday morning to the shocking news that Nixon had fired Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox. It was mindblowing.

What was shocking in 1973 seems almost quaint now after two years of Trump as “president.” Back then, we had a Democratic Congress and there were some moderate Republicans who eventually stepped up. Today, we really can’t be sure that today’s Congress will be willing or able to check Trump’s power grabs.

A lot is riding on the midterm elections a little more than two weeks away. But as Dakinikat wrote yesterday voters face election interference from Russia and from Republicans determined to suppress our votes.

For now, we still have Robert Mueller and Rod Rosenstein. We know Trump will try to get rid of them after the elections. Will democracy survive? Is it even still alive?

Fortunately, Mueller is still keeping busy, even though Republicans thought the investigation should be halted during election season.

The Wall Street Journal: Mueller Probes WikiLeaks’ Contacts With Conservative Activists.

Mr. Mueller’s team has recently questioned witnesses about the activities of longtime Trump confidante Roger Stone, including his contacts with WikiLeaks, and has obtained telephone records, according to the people familiar with the matter.

Carel Willink (1900-1983) — Wilma with the Cat

Investigators also have evidence that the late GOP activist Peter W. Smith may have had advance knowledge of details about the release of emails from a top Hillary Clinton campaign official by WikiLeaks, one person familiar with the matter said. They have questioned Mr. Smith’s associates, the person said.

Right-wing pundit Jerome Corsi was also questioned by investigators about his interactions with Mr. Stone and WikiLeaks before a grand jury in September, according to a person familiar with the matter. Mr. Corsi declined to comment. A lawyer for Mr. Stone said he hasn’t been contacted by the special counsel. Mr. Smith died last year….

Throughout 2016, Messrs. Stone, Smith and Corsi, who long worked on the margins of Republican politics, tried to dig up incriminating information about Mrs. Clinton, the Democratic nominee for president, according to emails and some public comments. A lawyer for President Trump didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Sam Nunberg, a former Trump campaign staffer who interacted with Mr. Stone, said he also was questioned by Mr. Mueller’s team about communications he had with Mr. Stone regarding WikiLeaks. New York radio host Randy Credico also said the special counsel asked about his communications with Mr. Stone and WikiLeaks. Mr. Credico interviewed WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in 2016 and has known Mr. Stone for years.

The role WikiLeaks and Mr. Assange played during the 2016 election as the chief publisher of stolen Democratic emails has been of enduring interest to investigators probing Russian election interference in 2016 and whether there was collusion with Trump associates.

Lots more detail at the link. I don’t think the story is behind the firewall; I got in from Memeorandum.

At Politico, Connor O’Brien and Wesley Morgan write about another problem we may face soon: Newest security worry: Trump without Mattis.

National security leaders fear that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is on his way out — and that Donald Trump’s next Pentagon chief will be far more subservient to the president’s unilateral and bombastic whims.

By Dee Nickerson

Mattis was instrumental in pulling back on Trump’s vow to “carpet bomb” ISIS or pull troops from Afghanistan. He moderated the U.S. military response to Syria’s use of chemical weapons and openly opposed Trump’s withdrawal from the Iranian nuclear deal.

Now Trump’s reverence for the retired four-star general has worn thin, and Mattis is widely expected to depart his post sometime after the November elections, according to multiple Pentagon and administration officials with knowledge of personnel discussions. And that’s fueling anxiety among officials of both parties who have viewed him for almost two years as a force for stability.

“Secretary Mattis is one of the only reassuring figures in the Trump administration, and I don’t mean that as a Democratic partisan,” said Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), a member of the Appropriations Committee’s defense panel. “I mean when our partners and our adversaries think about the United States and the Department of Defense, knowing that Secretary Mattis is there strengthens our hand.”

Current and former government officials say they worry about a repeat of what happened when Trump replaced former National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster with leading hawk John Bolton, and then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson with conservative stalwart Mike Pompeo.

Much more at the link.

Right now, Trump is dealing with an international crisis around the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi by making every effort to cover for the Saudi Arabian murderers. To use one of Trump’s favorite words, he is a national disgrace.

Nicholas Kristof: More Insulting Lies From Saudi Arabia. What we face now is a test for President Trump and America itself.

The Saudi government on Friday issued a statement claiming that Jamal was killed when a fistfight went bad in its consulate in Istanbul. Really? This is a fistfight to which the Saudi goons reportedly brought a bone saw so that they could dismember him afterward; by some accounts, they began the dismemberment while he was still alive.

It’s also grotesque for the Saudi authorities to claim that a journalist whose fingers they reportedly amputated as part of their torture somehow managed to engage in a fistfight. Jamal had no fists left….

By Albert Anker, 1831-1910, Swiss painter

Saudi Arabia even announced that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who almost everybody believes must have approved this operation — his initials, M.B.S., are now said to stand for “Mr. Bone Saw” — will lead an investigation into what happened. That’s like appointing O.J. Simpson to investigate the murder of Nicole Brown Simpson.

These lies are so blatant and implausible that they underscore how out of touch M.B.S. is, and also suggest M.B.S. believes that he will have the backing of the United States in this cover-up. That’s a good bet, since Trump has lately celebrated the assault on a journalist by a Montana congressman and previously suggested that maybe a rogue killer was responsible for killing Jamal.

But M.B.S. has already gotten away with kidnapping Lebanon’s prime minister and starving eight million Yemenis; if he also gets away with murdering Jamal, who was an American resident and Washington Post columnist, as many believe happened, then that’s a green light to him and any other autocrat who wants to make a troublesome journalist disappear. Journalists and democracy activists all over the world will have targets on their backs.

Here’s what Trump had to say yesterday about this ridiculous explanation from the Saudis, according to The New York Times:

Asked during a visit to an Air Force base in Arizona whether he viewed the Saudi explanation as credible, Mr. Trump said, “I do.” [….]

On Friday evening, the president praised the statement issued by the Saudi government, which confirmed Mr. Khashoggi’s death, as a “good first step” and a “big step.” Earlier, the prince and other senior Saudi officials had denied any role in Mr. Khashoggi’s disappearance.

Girl with Cat by Jana Predikantová

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke with Prince Mohammed by phone on Friday evening and then briefed Mr. Trump and his national security adviser, John R. Bolton, according to a White House spokesman.

“I think we’re getting close to solving a big problem,” Mr. Trump told reporters at the Luke Air Force Base, where he was shown an Apache helicopter, an F-35 fighter jet and an array of bombs.

Seriously? I don’t think so. For one thing, the CIA has already heard the audiotape of the murder, according to Shane Harris at The Washington Post:

CIA officials have listened to an audio recording that Turkish officials say proves the journalist was killed and dismembered by a team of Saudi agents inside the consulate, according to people familiar with the matter. If verified, the recording would make it difficult for the White House to accept the Saudi version that Khashoggi’s death was effectively an accident. A CIA spokeswoman declined to comment.

At The Atlantic, Hassan Hassan, Senior research fellow at George Washington University’s Program on Extremism, wrrites: What’s Missing From the Saudis’ Khashoggi Story.

Seventeen days after the disappearance of U.S.-based Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, authorities in Riyadh finally confirmed his death. According to the Saudi version of what happened, Khashoggi died after a fist fight between him and several men at the consulate in Istanbul. Authorities announced the arrest of 18 Saudi nationals, as well as the dismissal of top officials, including an adviser to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

The gaps in this story are as significant as the announcement itself.

Saudi authorities did not reveal the location of  Khashoggi’s body, which lends credence to the narrative attributed to Turkish officials over the past two weeks. Even before Turkish authorities were allowed to search the consulate and the residence of the consul general, they suggested that Khashoggi was killed and dismembered inside the consulate. They reached this conclusion based on video footage that showed Khashoggi entered the building but never came out. In an interview with Bloomberg, the crown prince, widely known as MbS, insisted that Khashoggi left the consulate—but if that were true the Saudis could have produced a body.

By Nelly Tsenova (b.1961)

The spontaneous scuffle theory also does not explain the dismissal of the adviser, Saud al-Qahtani, who was perceived as MbS’s right-hand man and thought by some to encourage his worst instincts. Dubbed “the father of electronic flies” by his critics, he’s been accused of using social media bots and trolls to lead smear campaigns against government opponents, especially in the wake of the Qatar crisis. Al-Qahtani oversaw public relations efforts abroad, and was known for combative language online. At the time of this writing, his pinned tweet read: “Some brothers blame me for what they view as harshness. But everything has its time, and talk these days requires such language.”

It’s difficult to understand al-Qahtani’s removal as anything other than a soft rebuke to MbS and his heavy-handedness by King Salman, who stepped in some days ago to manage the fallout from Khashoggi’s murder. A Saudi official told me that the king’s orders could perhaps alter the aggressive way that authorities deal with dissidents.

Turkish investigators say they expect to learn what happened to Kashoggi’s body soon. Reuters:

“We’ll find out what happened to the body before long,” the senior official said. “The DNA is being procured from within Turkey. It seems there will be no need to ask Saudi Arabia at the moment.”

Khashoggi’s killers may have dumped his remains in Belgrad Forest adjacent to Istanbul, and at a rural location near the city of Yalova, a 90-kme (55 mile) drive south of Istanbul, officials told Reuters on Thursday.

Investigators were still focused on the Yalova and Belgrad Forest areas, and were looking at CCTV footage from near Belgrad Forest, the senior official said.

Investigators were also still examining traffic records of every car that went in and out of the Saudi Consulate on Oct.2, the day Khashoggi entered the consulate, the senior official said.

Members of the Saudi royal family are increasingly concerned about whether MBS is competent to lead the kingdom. It’s difficult not to draw parallels between MBS and his American BFF Jared Kushner. A couple articles in this vein:

The New York Times: Uproar Over Dissident Rattles Saudi Royal Family.

Saudi Arabia is facing perhaps its greatest international crisis since the revelation that its citizens planned and carried out the attacks on September 11, 2001.

Robert Braithwaite Martineau – A Girl with a Cat, 1860

Members of the ruling family are increasingly worried about the direction of the country under the leadership of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the 33-year-old favorite son of King Salman and the kingdom’s day-to-day ruler.

But unlike 2001, when the royal family came together to protect its collective interests, this time that may not be possible. Instead, there is deep concern, as royals search, so far in vain, for a way to contain the crown prince, who has consolidated power so completely that nearly everyone else is marginalized.

At The Washington Post, David Von Drehle suggests that MBS “could bring his kingdom crumbling down.”

Among advisers to family-owned businesses there’s a widely known adage : “Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations.” Difficult as it is to build a successful enterprise, it is more difficult to raise children with the ability and desire to keep it going. Producing one grandchild among a potentially rivalrous set of cousins with the right talent and interests and force and tact — is more challenging still.

Observers of Saudi Arabia have been mulling this problem for many years, as the strongest among founding king Abdul Aziz ibn Saud’s 45 sons passed the crown from one to another. Now, the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a Post contributing columnist lured to the Saudi Consulate in Turkey, chillingly tells us that generational succession is no longer a future problem. It is a present crisis.

Admittedly, thanks to the ocean of oil discovered beneath the sands of Saud’s realm, there’s no risk of his grandchildren reverting to the nomadic life from which the kingdom was built nearly a century ago. Instead, the risk is that the third generation — lacking its grandfather’s cunning and the caution of its fathers — will drag the kingdom into a spiral of treachery, backstabbing and recklessness. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has shown himself to be steeped in all three.

Read the rest at the link.

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