Good morning.

Sunday in Whitewater will see occasional showers with a high of sixty-two.  Sunrise is 6:25 AM and sunset 7:28 PM, for 13h 03m 04s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 4.5% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1945, American aircraft destroy the Japanese battleship Yamato, the largest battleship ever constructed:

During 1944, the balance of naval power in the Pacific decisively turned against Japan, and by early 1945, its fleet was much depleted and badly hobbled by critical fuel shortages in the home islands. In a desperate attempt to slow the Allied advance, Yamato was dispatched on a one-way mission to Okinawa in April 1945, with orders to beach herself and fight until destroyed protecting the island. The task force was spotted south of Kyushu by US submarines and aircraft, and on 7 April 1945 she was sunk by American carrier-based bombers and torpedo bombers with the loss of most of her crew.

Recommended for reading in full:

Roger Lowenstein writes How Trump would make the Fed a partisan tool:

Like Nixon, Trump is unhappy with the Fed for raising rates. He has tried to browbeat the Federal Reserve Board into submission through Twitter attacks on the Fed and on Powell, personally.

It’s hard to imagine that, if approved, Moore will be a voice for independence. Moore has pandered to the president by repeating Trump’s criticisms of the Fed. He has groveled to Trump by suggesting he deserves the Nobel Prize. With Arthur Laffer, he has written a fawning book, “Trumponomics.” Moore is also good friends with Larry Kudlow, Trump’s economic adviser.

Moore thus bids to become a new of kind of board member — a presidential lackey. Greg Mankiw, a Harvard economist who had Kudlow’s job in the Bush administration, said, in reviewing “Trumponomics,” that it was written in the voice “of the rah-rah partisan.” Were Trump to fill the board with partisans, the Fed’s prestige would collapse, and so would its ability to implement policy.

Heather Long reports Trump’s Fed nominee Stephen Moore was found in contempt of court for failing to pay ex-wife more than $333,000:

Stephen Moore, President Trump’s planned nominee for the Federal Reserve Board, was found in contempt of court in 2013 for failing to pay his ex-wife more than $330,000 in alimony and child support, court documents show.

A court in Fairfax County, Va., ordered Stephen Moore to sell his home in order to pay his ex-wife, Allison Moore, the money he legally owed her but had failed to pay for months. Stephen Moore ended up paying $217,000, although only after the court sent several police officers, two real estate agents and a locksmith to his home to change the locks and prepare the property for sale, records show.

(Moore: unfit professionally and personally.)

The Difference Between the Stock Market and the Economy:

Good morning.

Saturday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of sixty-six.  Sunrise is 6:26 AM and sunset 7:27 PM, for 13h 00m 13s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 1.3% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1917, the United States Congress approves a declaration of war against Germany.

Recommended for reading in full:

David Dayen writes Nothing Trump Said Was True:

“We have compiled the accompanying statement of financial condition of Donald J. Trump,” reads part of a two-page disclaimer from the accounting firm Mazars USA. “We have not audited or reviewed the accompanying financial statement and, accordingly, do not express an opinion or provide any assurance about whether the financial statement is in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America.”

This notice, routinely attached to financial statements that Trump used to secure loans and insurance before he became president, amounted to a dry warning that nothing the businessman said was necessarily true.

As detailed in The Washington Post, Trump’s statements of financial condition for the years 2002, 2004, 2011, 2012, and 2013 contained numerous exaggerations and falsehoods. Trump claimed that his golf course in California had 55 lots ready to sell; it had 31. He said his Virginia vineyard sat on 2,000 acres; it sat on about 1,200. He added 10 stories to Trump Tower in New York. He might as well have added an aside about “my wife … Morgan Fairchild.”

Susan B. Glasser asks Is America Becoming Trump’s Banana Republic?:

“You have to look at everything through the prism of his narcissism,” [George] Conway told me. “This is all about him exercising his authority and power to be at the center of attention, and, for whatever reason, he’s decided he’s going to get the most juice out of exercising this decree on this day in this way. That’s the way he makes himself important and special; there’s an arbitrariness to it.” Isn’t that pretty much the definition of a “banana republic”? I asked.

“Yes,” Conway responded. “It would make it a banana republic.” But he went on to offer an important caveat to the remarks he made at Georgetown. “If it were not for the inherent checks and balances of the U.S. Constitution,” Conway said, “we would have a banana republic. But that also makes him an inherently weak President, because the office requires you to have the power to persuade. Ultimately, you become a powerful President only if you are able to persuade others to go along with you. His narcissism means he has to retreat to the people who worship him. He cannot reach out and persuade, like every other President tries to do. His narcissism causes him to be a weak President, and the checks and balances mean he is a weak President. And that’s why we don’t have a banana republic.”

 Giant multicolored squirrels from India:

Good morning.

Friday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of fifty-eight.  Sunrise is 6:28 AM and sunset 7:26 PM, for 12h 57m 21s of daytime.  The moon is new with almost none of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1860, a Wisconsin congressman is challenged to a duel:

John F. Potter, a Wisconsin representative in Congress, was challenged to a duel by Virgina representative Roger Pryor. Potter, a Northern Republican, had become a target of Southerners during heated debates over slavery. After one exchange, Pryor challenged Potter to a duel and Potter, as the one challenged, specified that bowie knives be used at a distance of four feet. Pryor refused and Potter became famous in the anti-slavery movement. Two years later, when Republicans convened in Chicago, Potter was given a seven foot blade as a tribute; the knife hung with pride during all the sessions of the convention.  Before his death, Potter remembered the duel and proclaimed, “I felt it was a national matter – not any private quarrel – and I was willing to make sacrifices.”

Recommended for reading in full:

Craig Silverman writes Old, Online, And Fed On Lies: How An Aging Population Will Reshape The Internet (“Older people play an outsized role in civic life. They also are more likely to be online targets for misinformation and hyperpartisan rhetoric”):

Although many older Americans have, like the rest of us, embraced the tools and playthings of the technology industry, a growing body of research shows they have disproportionately fallen prey to the dangers of internet misinformation and risk being further polarized by their online habits. While that matters much to them, it’s also a massive challenge for society given the outsize role older generations play in civic life, and demographic changes that are increasing their power and influence.

People 65 and older will soon make up the largest single age group in the United States, and will remain that way for decades to come, according to the US Census. This massive demographic shift is occurring when this age group is moving online and onto Facebook in droves, deeply struggling with digital literacy, and being targeted by a wide range of online bad actors who try to feed them fake news, infect their devices with malware, and steal their money in scams. Yet older people are largely being left out of what has become something of a golden age for digital literacy efforts.

Since the 2016 election, funding for digital literacy programs has skyrocketed. Apple just announced a major donation to the News Literacy Project and two related initiatives, and Facebook partners with similar organizations. But they primarily focus on younger demographics, even as the next presidential election grows closer.

(Older Americans needn’t succumb to the depredations of Trump’s lies and manipulations, and many don’t – they are active in opposition. And yet, some are now lost.  Outreach to those now enmired in bias & error will produce civic gains far beyond the next election. )

Using Hollywood Special Effects to Save Lives:

Good morning.

Thursday in Whitewater will see occasional showers with a high of forty-four.  Sunrise is 6:30 AM and sunset 7:24 PM, for 12h 54m 29s of daytime.  The moon is new with 0.8% of its visible disk illuminated.

Whitewater’s Landmarks Commission meets at 5:45 PM, the Whitewater Common Council at 6:30 PM, and the Whitewater Fire Department Board of Directors Meeting also at 6:30 PM.

On this day in 1968, Dr. King is assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee.

Recommended for reading in full:

Kimberly Kindy, Felicia Sonmez, and Lisa Rein report Acosta confronted by lawmakers over plea deal in Jeffrey Epstein sexual misconduct case:

Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta was confronted by Democratic lawmakers Wednesday over his decision as a federal prosecutor to sign off on a plea deal in a sex trafficking case involving multimillionaire Jeffrey Epstein.

The exchange at a House Appropriations subcommittee hearing marked the first time Acosta has been questioned publicly about the case since a judge ruled in February that the 2008 arrangement he oversaw as a U.S. attorney in South Florida had broken the law because his office failed to properly notify victims.

“You chose wealthy and well-connected people, child rapists, over the victims in this case,” said Rep. Katherine M. Clark (D-Mass.), who noted that “the hideous truth has come out” about Acosta’s role in the case.

Clark cited the Epstein case as she questioned Acosta on his department’s decision to propose cutting the budget for one of its divisions tasked with combating human trafficking from $68 million to $18.5 million.

….

The 2008 plea deal stemmed from a federal investigation of Epstein focused on alleged sex trafficking and molestation of dozens of underage girls. Before the deal, prosecutors drafted a 53-page federal indictment that included sex trafficking charges, which could have placed Epstein in prison for life.

Epstein’s plea agreement allowed him to instead plead guilty to two state felony solicitation charges, casting the victims as prostitutes. The deal led to a 13-month stay in county jail during which Epstein was allowed to leave custody six days a week, 12 hours a day, for work.

Acosta, 50, has received support from his boss, President Trump, who in February called him a “fantastic labor secretary.”

(Emphasis added.)

Jennifer Rubin writes Trump is unraveling before our eyes. He isn’t fit for reelection:

In the past 24 hours, Trump — who will be 74 in November 2020 and is “tired,” according to aides — has:

• Falsely declared multiple times that his father was born in Germany. (Fred Trump was born in New York.)
• Declared that wind turbines cause cancer.
• Confused “origins” and “oranges” in asking reporters to look into the “oranges of the Mueller report.”
• Told Republicans to be more “paranoid” about vote-counting.

Immune cells tackle a human obstacle course:

Good morning.

Wednesday in Whitewater will see occasional showers with a high of fifty-five.  Sunrise is 6:32 AM and sunset 7:23 PM, for 12h 51m 36s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 3.4% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1860, the Pony Express begins service.

Recommended for reading in full:

The Associated Press reports Federal Court Allows Wisconsin To Leave Health Care Lawsuit:

A federal judge has granted Wisconsin’s request to withdraw from a multistate lawsuit seeking repeal of the Affordable Care Act.

The judge on Tuesday granted the state’s request made by Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul at the order of Democratic Gov. Tony Evers. The judge also allowed Wisconsin to withdraw in a second case also related to the health care law, which opponents sometimes call Obamacare.

Kaul moved to withdraw Wisconsin after a law passed in a lame-duck legislative session taking away that power was repealed by a Wisconsin judge.

Former Republican Gov. Scott Walker had Wisconsin join the multistate effort to repeal the health care law. Both Evers and Kaul ran last year in opposition to that move and said they would withdraw the state. They were temporarily blocked from doing that by the law passed in the lame-duck session.

Molly O’Toole, Noah Bierman, and Eli Stokols report As Trump threatens to close border, experts warn of billions in economic damage:

When the Trump administration abruptly shuttered the San Ysidro border crossing for five hours on the Sunday after Thanksgiving following a skirmish with a group of migrants, holiday traffic snarled for hours south of San Diego.

Businesses on the U.S. side of the border lost about $5.3 million in sales, local officials said. Tens of thousands of people were temporarily stuck on both sides of the border, creating chaos in nearby areas.

President Trump now is threatening to exponentially increase the scale of that disruption, vowing to indefinitely close the U.S. border with Mexico to show his resolve — and his pique — as tens of thousands of Central American migrants continue to jam legal entry points and unguarded remote areas.

Squeezing ports of entry almost certainly would put more strain on the officers and Border Patrol agents who are dealing with the crisis, however. Administration efforts to hire 15,000 new border agents and immigration officers have largely flopped — the agencies face thousands of vacancies instead.

If trucks carrying farm produce and car parts are barred from crossing the border, the economic impact would quickly spread.

Nearly $13.7 million in agricultural products move through the port of entry at Nogales, Ariz., every day, for example, said Veronica Nigh, an economist with the American Farm Bureau Federation in Washington. Because those products are perishable, even a short closure could hurt farmers and consumers on both sides.

How Instagram And Facebook Make Money:

Good morning.

Tuesday in Whitewater will see occasional showers with a high of forty-nine.  Sunrise is 6:33 AM and sunset 7:22 PM, for 12h 48m 43s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 7.8% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1917, Pres. Wilson asks Congress for a declaration of war against Germany.

Recommended for reading in full:

Danny Hakim, Roni Caryn Rabin, and William K. Rashbaum report Lawsuits Lay Bare Sackler Family’s Role in Opioid Crisis:

The Sacklers had a new plan.

It was 2014, and the company the family had controlled for two generations, Purdue Pharma, had been hit with years of investigations and lawsuits over its marketing of the highly addictive opioid painkiller OxyContin, at one point pleading guilty to a federal felony and paying more than $600 million in criminal and civil penalties.

But as the country’s addiction crisis worsened, the Sacklers spied another business opportunity. They could increase their profits by selling treatments for the very problem their company had helped to create: addiction to opioids.

Details of the effort, named Project Tango, have come to light in lawsuits filed by the attorneys general of Massachusetts and New York. Together, the cases lay out the extensive involvement of a family that has largely escaped personal legal consequences for Purdue Pharma’s role in an epidemic that has led to hundreds of thousands of overdose deaths in the past two decades.

The filings cite numerous records, emails and other documents showing that members of the family continued to push aggressively to expand the market for OxyContin and other opioids for years after the company admitted in a 2007 plea deal that it had misrepresented the drug’s addictive qualities and potential for abuse.

Sheri Fink reports Migrant Girl’s Autopsy Shows She Would Have Been Visibly Sick for Hours, Doctors Say:

A 7-year-old Guatemalan girl who died in United States custody last December was suffering from a bacterial infection that was so advanced she probably would have been visibly sick for many hours, said several physicians who reviewed a newly released autopsy report of her death.

By the time the girl, Jakelin Caal Maquin, arrived at a children’s hospital in El Paso with seizures and difficulty breathing, she already had severe blood abnormalities, according to a part of the report that summarized her condition in the emergency room of the Children’s Hospital at the Hospitals of Providence Memorial Campus.

The new findings were released on Friday by the El Paso County Office of the Medical Examiner. Customs and Border Protection officials and lawyers for the girl’s family have sparred over whether the severity of her infection — with a common streptococcus bacteria — should have been recognized and whether she should have been taken for medical care more quickly.

“Something like that takes hours to progress,” said Dr. Lee Sanders, the chief of general pediatrics at Stanford University.

The Wine Lover Meltdown that Changed the Wine World Forever:

Good morning.

Monday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of forty-nine.  Sunrise is 6:35 AM and sunset 7:21 PM, for 12h 45m 50s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 13.6% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1970, the Milwaukee Brewers are founded:

On this date the Milwaukee Brewers, Inc., an organization formed by Allan H. “Bud” Selig and Edmund Fitzgerald, acquired the Seattle Pilots franchise. The team was renamed the Milwaukee Brewers, a tribute to the city’s long association with brewing industry.

Recommended for reading in full:

Robert J. Samuelson explains Why Moore is less: 

The real reason that Stephen Moore does not belong on the Federal Reserve Board is not that he is unqualified for the job, though he is. Nor is it that he has been a highly partisan and divisive figure for many years, though he has been. The real reason is that, if confirmed by the Senate, Moore could become the Fed chairman — and that is a scary possibility. It could spawn a global financial calamity.

Just a decade ago, the U.S. and world economies suffered the worst slumps since World War II. What saved us then were the skilled interventions of the Fed under Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and the Treasury Department under Secretaries Henry Paulson and Timothy F. Geithner. Do we really want Moore to serve as the last bulkhead against an economic breakdown?

As one of the 12 voting members of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), Moore’s influence in ordinary times would be modest. But, in a crisis, everything changes. Decisions must be made quickly. Power gravitates to the Fed chair, who faces a double challenge: to bolster confidence and to devise a strategy to end the crisis. The idea of Moore playing this role is terrifying.

….

For further proof, please read the stinging and well-reported columns from my Post colleague Catherine Rampell. They show that Moore twists his facts to fit the political occasion. A long and somewhat technical essay from economist George Selgin of the libertarian Cato Institute makes a similar point.

James Rowen writes Foxconn’s Water Rights Still at Issue:

The public-interest law firm Midwest Environmental Advocates (MEA), has filed with an administrative law judge a comprehensive and convincing brief that challenges the Wisconsin DNR’s approval last year of a substantial diversion of Lake Michigan water to serve the Foxconn project. The MEA challenged the approval on behalf of six clients — including the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin, Milwaukee Riverkeeper, Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, and River Alliance of Wisconsin — who assert that DNR unreasonably interpreted a statute that requires that all water transferred out of the Great Lakes Basin must be used for public water supply purposes. The case is still pending.

Tonight’s Sky for April 2019: