Good morning.
Wednesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a likelihood of snow this evening, and a high of thirty-seven. Sunrise is 6:06 AM and sunset 7:41 PM, for 13h 34m 28s of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 8% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Parks & Rec Board meets at 5:30 PM.
On this day in 1938, eighty years ago today, Superman makes his debut in Action Comics #1:
(During the Depression, with Europe and Asia facing encroaching tyranny, Americans still had optimism, hope in the face of adversity (with far worse to come). These present times are difficult for us, of course, but as they were resilient then, we are resilient now.)
More about Action Comics #1 is available at Wikipedia:
Cover of Action Comics 1 (June 1938). Art by Joe Shuster. Via Wikipedia. Published on April 18, 1938 (cover-dated June),[4] by National Allied Publications,[5] a corporate predecessor of DC Comics, it is considered the first true superhero comic; and though today Action Comics is a monthly title devoted to Superman, it began, like many early comics, as an anthology.[6]
Action Comics was started by publisher Jack Liebowitz. The first issue had a print run of 200,000 copies, which promptly sold out, although it took some time for National to realize that the “Superman” strip was responsible[7] for sales of the series that would soon approach 1,000,000 a month.[8] Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were paid $10 per page, for a total of $130 for their work on this issue. Liebowitz would later say that selecting Superman to run in Action Comics #1 was “pure accident” based on deadline pressure and that he selected a “thrilling” cover, depicting Superman lifting a car over his head.[9]
Recommended for reading in full —
➤ Robert Costa, Sarah Ellison and Josh Dawsey report Hannity’s rising role in Trump’s world: ‘He basically has a desk in the place’:
The phone calls between President Trump and Sean Hannity come early in the morning or late at night, after the Fox News host goes off the air. They discuss ideas for Hannity’s show, Trump’s frustration with the ongoing special counsel probe and even, at times, what the president should tweet, according to people familiar with the conversations. When he’s off the phone, Trump is known to cite Hannity when he talks with White House advisers.
The revelation this week that the two men share an attorney is just the latest sign of how Hannity is intertwined with Trump’s world — an increasingly powerful confidant who offers the media-driven president a sympathetic ear and shared grievances. The conservative commentator is so close to Trump that some White House aides have dubbed him the unofficial chief of staff.
This portrait of the interactions between the president and the talk-show host is based on interviews with more than a dozen friends, advisers and associates of the two men, some of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations.
➤ Nicholas Confessore and David Gelles report Facebook Fallout Deals Blow to Mercers’ Political Clout:
Last month, a friend of the wealthy conservative donor Rebekah Mercer arrived at Facebook’s Silicon Valley headquarters. His task: Find out what — if anything — could repair relations between Facebook, the world’s biggest social media company, and Cambridge Analytica, the voter-profiling firm co-founded by her father and used by the Trump campaign.
The revelation last month that Cambridge Analytica improperly acquired the private Facebook data of millions of users has set off government inquiries in Washington and London, plunging Facebook into crisis. But it has also battered the nascent political network overseen by Ms. Mercer, 44, and financed by her father, Robert Mercer, 71, a hard-line conservative billionaire.
Ms. Mercer’s standing in Mr. Trump’s circle had already declined following the departure last year of Stephen K. Bannon, her family’s former adviser and President Trump’s former chief strategist, according to Republicans with close ties to the president’s political operation. A pro-Trump advocacy group controlled by Ms. Mercer has gone silent following strategic disputes between her and other top donors. Plans to wage a civil war against the Republican establishment in the 2018 midterms have been derailed.
➤ Ken White considers Why the F.B.I. Raid Is Perilous for Michael Cohen — and Trump:
What does this tell us? First, it reflects that numerous officials — not just Mr. Mueller — concluded that there was probable cause to believe that Mr. Cohen’s law office, home and hotel room contained evidence of a federal crime. A search warrant for a lawyer’s office implicates the attorney-client privilege and core constitutional rights, so the Department of Justice requires unusual levels of approval to seek one. Prosecutors must seek the approval of the United States attorney of the district — in this case the office of Geoffrey Berman, the interim United States attorney appointed by President Trump.
Prosecutors must also consult with the criminal division of the Justice Department in Washington. Finally, prosecutors must convince a United States magistrate judge that there’s probable cause to support the search. Faced with a warrant application destined for immediate worldwide publicity, the judge surely took unusual pains to examine it. This search was not the result of Mr. Mueller or his staff “going rogue.”
Second, the search demonstrates that federal prosecutors and supervisors in the Justice Department concluded that Mr. Cohen could not be trusted to preserve and turn over documents voluntarily. The same regulations that require prosecutors to seek high-level approval for a warrant to search a law office also instruct them to use the least intrusive means to obtain evidence from a lawyer, and to consider requesting voluntary cooperation or serving a subpoena. Mr. Cohen’s lawyer has loudly protested that he had been cooperating. This search warrant means that prosecutors — including the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, and the criminal division at the Justice Department — believed that Mr. Cohen could not be trusted to respond fully to a subpoena or might destroy documents.
Third, the search suggests that prosecutors most likely believe that Mr. Cohen’s clients used his legal services for the purpose of engaging in crime or fraud. Attorney-client communications are privileged, which is why it’s so unusual and difficult for prosecutors to get approval to search a law office. Justice Department regulations require federal prosecutors to set up a system to have a separate group — a so-called dirty team — review the files and separate out attorney-client communications so that the investigators and prosecutors won’t see anything protected by the privilege.
➤ Zach Epstein has 10 hidden tricks that’ll make life with your iPhone X so much easier:
Apple’s iPhone X represents a massive departure from the company’s earlier smartphone models. The tenth-anniversary iPhone is a reimagining of Apple’s smartphone in so many ways, from the look and feel of the hardware to the new gesture-based navigation users must learn in order to use an iPhone with no home button. It takes a bit of getting used to, but most Apple fans seem to enjoy the new user experience a great deal. Of course, there’s more to the iPhone X then just a few new gestures, and most users seem to be unaware of all the nifty hidden tricks that make using the iPhone X so much easier.
In this post, we’ve collected 10 lesser-known tricks that are going to be big eye-openers for many iPhone X users out there. iPhone newcomers are going to be wowed, but even advanced users are going to learn something in this post. [List of tips follows in article.]
➤ This is Taking Birdwatching to the Extreme:
In 2016, Arjan Dwarshuis took his love for birdwatching to extreme lengths. He boarded over 140 flights to 40 different countries, journeying through jungles and forests in search of the birds of the world. During his 366-day trip, he smashed the world record, observing 6,856 species of birds—that’s 65% of the global bird population. Now, he’s using his epic adventure as a way to raise awareness for conservation efforts via http://arjandwarshuis.com/donate/..