Earlier today President Trump announced a program for federal grants to combat opioid addiction.  Following the announcement the President took questions from the assembled media pool. [Video and Transcript Below]

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[Transcript] – THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much, everybody. And thank you very much for being here with us, at the White House, for a very important announcement — something we’ve worked extremely hard on.
Today, the Department of Health and Human Services is awarding $1.8 billion in new grant money to fight the opioid epidemic — something we’ve had quite a bit of success on and we’re continuing. And I think you’ll be amazed at the results. We’ve been doing this from pretty much the beginning, but really emphasis over the last year and a half.
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An August 2018 release from the FBI Vault on the Hillary Clinton email investigation revealed the Anthony Weiner/Huma Abedin laptop containing Clinton emails (350,000) and Blackberry communications (344,000) was never reviewed for intrusion prior to the 2016 election.
Does anyone at the DOJ/FBI even care about this issue any longer? … or was the can-kicking operation successful?
First, the frustrating context:
From the Boston Marathon bombing investigation through the San Bernardino terrorist attack; passing the Garland, Texas cartoon terror shooting; and continuing through Orlando’s Pulse Nightclub; and then through the Parkland shooting and into Las Vegas -via the Mandalay Bay- we always knew something was wrong with the apparatus, the institutional apparatus, of the FBI… but it wasn’t until 2017 with James Comey, Andrew McCabe and the transparently corrupt Clinton exoneration and candidate Trump set-up scheme that we fully grasped the scale and scope of the corruption.
It is disconcerting to accept that the institution of the FBI is corrupt, soup-to-nuts, including every aforementioned field office and participant therein. But reality doesn’t care about our feelings; it just stares us in the face – until we accept it.
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Greg Craig was accused by special counsel Robert Mueller and lead litigator Andrew Weissman of  FARA (Foreign Agent Registration Act) lobbying violations; and later charges he lied when questioned about them.
The Greg Craig FARA pursuit was similar to special counsel accusations made against Paul Manafort and Michael Flynn, and special counsel threats toward the same objective against George Papadopoulos.
The sketchy use of potential FARA violations to capture targets was a specific technique deployed by Weissmann.  However, the difference between Manafort and Flynn was Greg Craig decided to fight (including fighting claims he lied about the lobbying construct) instead of taking a high-pressure DOJ plea deal.  Today a jury rejected the accusations.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Prominent Washington lawyer Greg Craig was found not guilty Wednesday of lying to the Justice Department about work he did for the government of Ukraine in a case that arose from the special counsel’s Russia investigation and that centered on the lucrative world of foreign lobbying.

The jury deliberated for less than a day before clearing Craig, a White House counsel in the Obama administration, of a single count of making false statements to federal investigators.

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Earlier today President Trump delivered remarks on updated Hurricane Dorian preparations from the Oval Office.  In addition to the hurricane updates, President Trump held an an impromptu press conference. [Video and Transcript Below]

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[Transcript] Oval Office – THE PRESIDENT: We thought we’d give you an update on the hurricane. We got lucky in Florida — very, very lucky indeed. We had — actually, our original chart was that it was going to be hit — hitting Florida directly. Maybe I could just see that, Kevin. It was going to be hitting directly, and that would have affected a lot of other states. But that was the original chart.
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Remember when former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe said he was “not politically motivated”?   Well, the Pennsylvania Democrat Party has announced McCabe as the keynote speaker for their fundraiser on September 21st:

(Source Link)

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In an effort to keep the Daily Open Thread a little more open topic we are going to start a new daily thread for “Presidential Politics”. Please use this thread to post anything relating to the Donald Trump Administration and Presidency.

This thread will refresh daily and appear above the Open Discussion Thread.

President Trump Twitter @POTUS / Vice President Pence Twitter @VP

Stephanie Grisham Twitter @StephGrisham45

There is a lot of understandable Dorian fatigue; however, that can be problematic if residents near the coastal areas of North Florida, Georgia, South and North Carolina don’t stay alert.  Despite it’s duration the hurricane is holding 110 mph winds sixty miles from center, and pushing a very strong storm surge.
At 1100 PM EDT (0300 UTC), the center of Hurricane Dorian was located near latitude 28.4 North, longitude 79.0 West. Dorian is moving toward the north-northwest near 8 mph (13 km/h) and a slightly faster motion toward the northwest or north-northwest is
expected through early Wednesday. A turn toward the north is forecast by Wednesday evening, followed by a turn toward the north-northeast on Thursday morning.

On this track, the core of Hurricane Dorian will move dangerously close to the Florida east coast and the Georgia coast through Wednesday night. The center of Dorian is forecast to move near or over the coast of South Carolina and North Carolina Thursday through Friday morning.
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Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL. For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen †

Tonight Lou Dobbs, admitting his own frustration, asked former Acting AG Matthew Whitaker “where are the scope memos”? And a conversation began; and within that conversation, Dobbs mentions the number of the scope memos… To wit, Whitaker had a very curious and deflective response. WATCH:

Focusing only on the ‘scope memo’ aspect, why do you think Matthew Whitaker deferred from responding about them?… wouldn’t even put a number to them?
It’s a straightforward, curiously overlooked (until Dobbs) and seemingly inconsequential part of the overall issue.  The Mueller investigation is long-since over; so why haven’t we been permitted to see the memos, which Rod Rosenstein created, that authorized the targeting within the investigation by Robert Mueller?
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President Trump tweets about the importance of the DOJ declassifying the material that will show just how horridly corrupt the DOJ and FBI was.  Trump wants transparency:

Former FBI Director James Comey tweets a response to Christopher Wray, David Bowditch and Dana Boente telling them to keep up the fight, and “stay true”: