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Daily Bread for 7.21.17

Good morning.

Friday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy, with an even chance of afternoon thunderstorms, and a high of eighty-eight. Sunrise is 5:36 AM and sunset 8:26 PM, for 14h 49m 43s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 4.8% of its visible disk illuminated. Today is the {tooltip}two hundred fifty-fourth day.{end-texte}Days since Trump’s election, with 11.9.16 as the first day.{end-tooltip}

On this day in 1949, the U.S. Senate advised Pres. Truman that it favored the North Atlantic Treaty. On this day in 1921, Gen. Billy Mitchell offers confirmation of his theory that “development of military air power was not outlandish. He flew his De Havilland DH-4B fighter, leading a bombing demonstration that proved a naval ship could be sunk by air bombardment. Mitchell’s ideas for developing military air power were innovative but largely ignored by those who favored development of military sea power. Mitchell zealously advocated his views and was eventually court martialed for speaking out against the United States’ organization of its forces. [Source: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Division of Archives & Special Collections].”

Recommended for reading in full — 

Carol D. Leonnig, Ashley Parker, Rosalind S. Helderman and Tom Hamburger report that Trump team seeks to control, block Mueller’s Russia investigation:

Some of President Trump’s lawyers are exploring ways to limit or undercut special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s Russia investigation, building a case against what they allege are his conflicts of interest and discussing the president’s authority to grant pardons, according to people familiar with the effort.

Trump has asked his advisers about his power to pardon aides, family members and even himself in connection with the probe, according to one of those people. A second person said Trump’s lawyers have been discussing the president’s pardoning powers among themselves.

(All of this is predictable, first as a futile effort to intimidate Robert Mueller, and if effectuated then as a lawless pardon of Trump, by Trump, for Trump.)

Congressmen Elijah E. Cummings & John Conyers contend that An unchecked presidency is a danger to the Republic:

In the absence of any meaningful investigation by House Republicans, Democratic members have sent requests for information on our own. Our efforts have been met with months of stonewalling. The Trump White House recently told government agencies “not to cooperate [with any oversight] requests from Democrats,” and issued a contrived Justice Department legal opinion that such queries are “not properly considered to be oversight requests.”

We will continue to press for answers because the information we seek goes to the central question of the Trump presidency: Is the administration acting in the public interest, or merely to benefit the private interests of President Trump?

….An unchecked presidency — such as that of Richard Nixon or Donald Trump — represents a clear and present danger to the Republic. We have taken this series of steps in an attempt to provide at least a measure of independent scrutiny and to mark how Republicans in Congress have repeatedly failed in this responsibility. We do not have the right to remain silent. Our investigations must continue separate from, and in addition to, the special counsel’s work.

James Fallows observes that Trump’s Latest Interview [NYT] Highlights Four of His Greatest Flaws (with details for each element):

And what makes this exposure to Trump’s mind and mood different from what we’ve seen over his past two years in political life and his previous decades in the public eye? For me it’s the accumulation of these elements:

A rare degree of deluded self-regard….

The unselfconscious display of gaping, consequential holes in his general knowledge….

The meaning of the Constitution….

Absolutes….

Emily Badger and Kevin Quealey write that Trump Seems Much Better at Branding Opponents Than Marketing Policies:

He has promised “great healthcare,” “truly great healthcare,” “a great plan” and health care that “will soon be great.” But for a politician who has shown remarkable skill distilling his arguments into compact slogans — “fake news,” “witch hunt,” “Crooked Hillary” — those health care pitches have fallen far short of the kind of sharp, memorable refrain that can influence how millions of Americans interpret news in Washington.

Analyzing two years of his tweets highlights a pair of lessons about his messaging prowess that were equally on display as the Republican health care bill, weakly supported by even Republican voters, collapsed again in Congress on Monday. Mr. Trump is much better at branding enemies than policies. And he expends far more effort mocking targetsthan promoting items on his agenda.

Both patterns point to the limits of the president’s branding powers when it comes to waging policy fights. He hasn’t proved particularly adept at selling his party’s ideas — or shown much inclination to turn his Twitter megaphone toward them. He seemed effective in branding his immigration policy during the primary campaign — #BuildTheWall — but even that subject has occupied less of Mr. Trump’s attention on Twitter since he became president than, say, CNN.

Google Maps now has an interactive map far above the planet’s surface, of the International Space Station:

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