This week began on a very sad note for President @realDonaldTrump, with the mass murder of Jews in Pittsburgh unfairly robbing him of his "tremendous momentum."
On the bright side, Trump's (unwelcome) visit to the crime scene gave him the perfect backdrop for a propaganda video.
Hoping to regain his mojo, he then took a page (several, actually) straight out of the Nazi playbook—not to be confused with the book of Hitler's speeches that he used to keep near his bed.
Deploying increasingly hateful rhetoric about the migrant caravan that is slowly making its way to the U.S. border, Trump ordered the military to send thousands of troops (at untold costs) to greet the asylum seekers with lethal force.
He also suggested doing away with the 14th Amendment—which guarantees birthright citizenship—via executive order.
When both of these ideas were roundly rejected as being "shockingly unconstitutional," Trump settled on his (for lack of a better term) final solution—indefinitely detaining immigrants in concentration camps.
Morning lineup:
Meet the Press: Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD); Georgia Gubernatorial Nominee Stacey Abrams (D); Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam (R); Missouri Senate Nominee Josh Hawley (R); Roundtable: TBA.
Face The Nation: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo; Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA); RNC Chair Ronna Romney McDaniel; Roundtable: Shawna Thomas (VICE News), Amy Walter (Cook Political Report), Amy Walter (CBS News) & Ben Domenech (The Federalist).
This Week: Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD); RNC Chair Ronna Romney McDaniel; Roundtable: Nate Silver FiveThirtyEight), "Independent" Strategist Matthew Dowd, Democratic Strategist Donna Brazile & Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R).
Fox News Sunday: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo; Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD); Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC); Roundtable: Brit Hume (Fox News), Republican Strategist Karl Rove, Marie Harf (Fox News) & Juan Williams (Fox News).
State of the Union: DNC Chair Tom Perez; RNC Chair Ronna Romney McDaniel; Roundtable: Former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), Former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D), Mary Katherine Ham (The Federalist) & Van Jones (CNN).
Evening lineup:
60 Minutes will feature: a report on how American first responders, doctors and even civilians are learning battlefield first-aid to deal with mass shootings (preview); inerview with Texas Senate candidates Beto O-Rourke and Ted Cruz (preview); and, an interview with surfer Garrett McNamara (preview).
Late night shows:
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
Monday: Actor Jude Law; Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN); Chef Flynn McGarry.
Tuesday: Journalist John Heilemann; Journalist Alex Wagner; Comedian Hasan Minhaj.
Wednesday: Actor Chris Pine; Major Garrett (CBS News).
Thursday: Actor Billy Crystal (Fox News); Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY); Musical Artist Big Red Machine.
Friday: Actor Alexander Skarsgard.
The Daily Show with Trevor Noah
Monday: Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R); Tuesday: Jamil Smith (Rolling Stone); Wednesday: Rebecca Traister (New York Magazine); Thursday: Record Producer Swizz Beatz.
Elsewhere...
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke compared Martin Luther King, Jr. with Confederate General Robert E. Lee.
Ryan Zinke, the embattled secretary of the Interior Department, suggested in a confused comparison that Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general who fought to preserve slavery, was as much an American hero as civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. during a speech on Saturday, drawing renewed scrutiny of Zinke's record on racial issues.
The secretary was speaking at a ceremony designating Camp Nelson, a Union recruitment and training depot in Kentucky for black soldiers during the Civil War, as a national monument. He compared the placement of the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial to that of Arlington National Cemetery, the military burial ground located on Lee’s former plantation, and that of the Lincoln Memorial.
"I like to think that Lincoln doesn’t have his back to General Lee. He’s in front of him. There’s a difference. Similar to Martin Luther King doesn't have his back to Lincoln. He's in front of Lincoln as we march together to form a more perfect union," Zinke said at the start of a 25-minute speech. "That's a great story, and so is Camp Nelson."
Civil rights groups condemned the remark ― which American Bridge 21st Century, a Democratic political action committee, first uncovered and which HuffPost confirmed with video posted to Facebook by a local newspaper ― as offensive and ahistorical.
"To attempt to link Lee's achievements for the Confederacy which embraced White Supremacy to that of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. is not a slight oversight but a huge historical misappropriation that the descendants of enslaved Africans cannot accept or tolerate," Malik Russell, an NAACP spokesman, said in an email. "Dr. King's work united our nation and bent the moral arc toward justice, while General Lee acquiesced to the ignoble norms of his time."
And, in other news...
A Republican Washington state representative outlined his plans for a holy civil war.
A Washington state GOP politician is facing fallout after he authored a "Biblical Basis for War" manifesto that allegedly calls for a post-apocalypse theocracy with no abortion or same-sex marriage.
Matt Shea, a four-term rep from Spokane who wants the eastern half of Washington to join a 51st state called Liberty, recently admitted in a Facebook Live video that he created the document.
The four-page document, leaked online by Spokane resident Tanner Rowe, includes multiple biblical citations and says vanquished enemies must "stop all abortions," disavow Communism, prohibit same-sex marriage and “obey Biblical law.”
"If they do not yield – kill all males," the document reads.
"This document is not a sermon, this is a 'how to' manual for what they plan to do if there's ever civil war or a government collapse. These people are focused on the apocalypse. And quite frankly, they're happy to push that into happening," Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich told the Daily News.
Vote or die.
– Trix
