Idiocracy

The Hill reports: LG Electronics is planning to raise prices on some of its washer and dryer models in response to President Trump’s decision this week to impose hefty new tariffs on imported washing machines. The president on Monday levied tariffs on washers made by LG and Samsung as part of an effort to help U.S. based Whirlpool. “As a …

The Hill reports: President Trump appeared to call out Korean electronics manufacturer Samsung for a missing trove of text messages between two senior FBI officials that was not retained by the agency. The text messages between the two FBI employees, Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, are among a larger trove of messages that were not saved by the FBI because …

The Daily Beast reports: Asked whether shutdowns should be used as political leverage, Cruz bafflingly replied, “We should not be shutting the government down. I have consistently opposed shutdowns. In 2013, I said we shouldn’t shut the government down; I went to the floor asking unanimous consent to reopen the government.” When Hunt noted that he actually “stood in the …

The New York Daily News reports: President Trump privately admitted he shouldn’t have sent former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer to argue over the crowd size at his inauguration, according to a new book. The commander-in-chief reportedly fumed over reports and photos comparing his crowd to the one eight years earlier for President Obama. Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the …

Incoming victory lap. PBS reports: The White House says President Donald Trump is focused on minimizing the harm Democrats are causing through the government shutdown. Spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Monday that managing the shutdown is the “biggest part of the process” for Trump. She says the president is taking the “absolute opposite approach” from President Barack Obama’s administration, which …

The Washington Post reports: The White House — and the politerati diaspora — has just barely stopped reeling from author Michael Wolff’s account of life in Trump’s West Wing, “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,” and now another life-in-the-White-House book is about to drop, this one from Fox News host Howard Kurtz. Like the books that came before …

“I’m sure you’re all aware of what’s happening in Washington, D.C. Despite bipartisan support for a budget resolution, a minority in the Senate has decided to play politics with military pay. But you deserve better. You and your families shouldn’t have to worry for one minute about whether you’re going to get paid as you serve in the uniform of …

Splinter reports: A brazen effort is underway to make the White House no longer the people’s house. The Trump Organization should just go ahead and slap a big ole TRUMP sign on the front of it. In response to the government shutdown over a funding impasse, someone has recorded an automated voice mail greeting on a public White House phone …

The New York Times reports: One year to the day after taking office with vows to bring the dysfunction of Washington to heel, President Trump on Saturday found himself thrust into the most perennial of political crises, bitterly casting blame on Democrats for a government shutdown he said they had orchestrated to mar the anniversary. Mr. Trump had planned to …

The Hill reports: The White House on Saturday released photos of President Trump working on the first day of the government shutdown and the one-year anniversary of his inauguration. One photo shows the president walking through a hallway wearing a white “Make America Great Again” hat, while another shows Trump sitting at his desk on the phone. The third photo …

Mother Jones reports: One year after millions of people took to the streets to protest the inauguration of President Donald Trump, activists this weekend are gathering to continue the momentum sparked by the historic Women’s March with new rallies in New York, Washington D.C., Los Angeles, and beyond. Trump weighed in on the nationwide marches with a trolling tweet that …

The Hill reports: Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (N.Y.) on Saturday blasted President Trump as an unreliable negotiating partner, fuming that working with him is “like negotiating with jello” after a failure to secure a deal to avert a government shutdown. “I told the president we Democrats were willing to fund the military at the highest levels in history, far …

Here’s what really happened around 1AM: Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) would not allow military pay to be left unmolested by the Republican Party’s decision to shut down the federal government. Once again, Donald Trump and congressional Republicans have made the military suffer as a result of their political gamesmanship. The move, occurring at night as the Senate debated …

Reuters reports: The world’s most powerful government shut down on Saturday after President Donald Trump and the U.S. Congress failed to reach a deal on funding for federal agencies, highlighting the country’s deep political divisions. For the first time since October 2013 – when a similar standoff that lasted 16 days kept only essential agency operations intact – federal workers …

The Tampa Bay Times reports: In a 2011 interview with In Touch, five years before the payment but just published this week, Daniels talked about her interactions with Trump, which included a promise of a condo in Trump Tower Tampa. “I was talking about how I was going to be moving to Tampa at the time and he told me …

Mashable reports: There’s a lot to fear with Donald Trump in the White House — but his worst fear? Sharks, apparently. Which isn’t sitting well with Discovery Channel. Mashable reached out to the Shark Week network after reading a report alleging that Trump once said, “I hope all sharks die.” Its response was measured. “Shark Week celebrates the wonder of …

Mediaite reports: Following a segment where he went back and forth with a Phoenix mayoral candidate over the value of immigrants to American society, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson brought on frequent guest Mark Steyn to weigh in on the matter. And boy, did he. “Chris Cuomo went on to say that the real problem is white supremacists in America,” Steyn …

Reuters reports: Republican leaders in the U.S. Congress stepped up their efforts to pass a temporary extension in funding government operations and avert a shutdown, scheduling a vote on the measure for later Thursday. For months, the Republican-controlled Congress has been struggling to fund the government, which is now operating on its third temporary funding extension since the 2018 fiscal …

CNN reports: President Donald Trump insisted Thursday that he has remained consistent in his plans for a border wall, a day after his chief of staff, John Kelly, said he has “changed his attitude” on it. “The Wall is the Wall, it has never changed or evolved from the first day I conceived of it. Parts will be, of necessity, …

The New York Times reports: President Trump — who gleefully questioned President Barack Obama’s birthplace for years without evidence, long insisted on the guilt of the Central Park Five despite exonerating proof and claimed that millions of illegal ballots cost him the popular vote in 2016 — wanted to have a word with the American public about accuracy in reporting. …