Senator Amy Klobuchar has suspended her campaign for President ahead of tomorrows big super-tuesday vote.   The timing tells a story here…. Quitting the race today means Klobuchar’s internal polling showed she was going to lose her home state of Minnesota tomorrow to Bernie Sanders.
It’s likely Bernie Sanders is going to crush Klobuchar and the rest of the field in Minnesota.  Quitting today allows Klobuchar to avoid the embarrassment of a big defeat.

Following the Club strategy, Klobuchar is expected to endorse Joe Biden.
 

Eight years ago today we lost Andrew Breitbart.  Three weeks before his death he delivered a message that still resonates today.

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HPSCI Ranking Member Devin Nunes appears on Fox News to discuss his upcoming lawsuit against the Washington Post, the nomination of John Ratcliffe as DNI, and the opportunity for a peaceful resolution provided to the Taliban.

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Pete Buttigieg, aka Alfred E. Newman, has suspended his bid for the Presidency.

…”a person briefed on Mr. Buttigieg’s plans said on Sunday, following a crushing loss in the South Carolina primary where his poor performance with black Democrats signaled an inability to build a broad coalition of voters.” (link)

The move to drop out makes sense within the most likely Club pattern to support Joe Biden.  Buttigieg drops out now ahead of Super-Tuesday allowing less fragmentation of the vote.  It will be interesting to see if he follows a Club plan to endorse Joe Biden because Buttigieg previously wrote high praise for Bernie Sanders.
Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar will stay-in to block Bernie’s delegate count in Massachusetts and Minnesota respectively (both states vote on Super Tuesday).  Klobuchar will likely drop-out after Tuesday.  Warren might follow.

Coronavirus As An Economic Contagion

Steve Bannon discusses the Chinese Coronavirus as an economic contagion and how the Trump economic security doctrine applies to the current downstream impacts.  Even before the Coronavirus surfaced in China there was lower manufacturing factory activity within the Chinese economy.  The necessary response within China to control the spread of the Coronavirus was to shut down most commerce.  Factories, schools &  businesses throughout China were impacted as various containment measures took hold.

Economic Nationalism -vs- Economic Globalism

Despite the intense doomsayer predictions surrounding the ‘Coronavirus as an economic contagion’ narrative, the U.S. economy remains strong. When evaluating economic impacts for the USA it is important to remember 80 percent of all activity within the U.S. is internal. We create and consume eighty percent of our own production.
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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo appears on Face The Nation with Margaret Brennan to discuss the negotiated peace agreement between the U.S. and Taliban in Afghanistan.

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The media is initiating panic about the Coronavirus in 2020 the same way the media attempted to manufacture panic about an upcoming U.S. recession in 2019.
Everything about Coronavirus is hyped with purpose. The CDC official who lit the fuse to create the panic was Dr. Nancy Messonnier who read a script handed to her by resistance operatives inside government.  Dr. Messonnier is Rod Rosenstein’s sister.
Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar appears on Fox News to discuss Coronavirus (COVID-19) while a gleeful Chris Wallace excitedly questions Azar about “millions of people hoarding food”, and  how the virus will eliminate all life on planet Earth by Tuesday.

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The United States and the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (Taliban) have signed a peace agreement to end the nineteen-year war in Afghanistan.  [Details Here]  During the signing ceremony Secretary of State Mike Pompeo delivered the following remarks.
[Video and Transcript]

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[Transcript] – SECRETARY POMPEO: Good afternoon. I want to start by thanking His Highness Sheikh Tamim for Qatar’s invaluable role as host of these historic talks. His unstinting support, and yours foreign minister, have supported both sides and allowed them to reach this momentous day.
The United States and the Taliban have endured decades of hostility and mistrust. Previous talks have faltered. This effort only became real for the United States when the Taliban signaled interest in pursuing peace and ending their relationship with al-Qaida and other foreign terrorist groups. They also recognized that military victory was impossible. I then asked Ambassador Khalilzad to serve as our lead negotiator to gauge the Taliban’s sincerity.
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Quite a bit to unpack here, and most of it is very good news.  First, this re-nomination was almost predictable when you look at the totality of the landscape:

President Trump needed to generate an official DNI nomination in order to retain the current acting DNI authorities for Richard “Ric” Grenell; so that’s one aspect.
However, beyond the procedural move there’s the larger background of the FISA reauthorization; and, in my opinion, that larger dynamic is the majority consideration.
The FISA reauthorization and the need for President Trump to support any type of reauthorization that eventually gets through the complex political dynamics within congress; and considering Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell traveled to the White House to discuss this issue yesterday; the outcome is considerable leverage for Trump.
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In the background of the impeachment effort the House Judiciary Committee (HJC) led by Chairman Jerry Nadler was seeking: (1) Mueller grand jury material; (2) a deposition by former White House counsel Don McGahn; and less importantly (3) Trump financial and tax records.  Each of these cases were then argued in federal court, appellate courts (6e and McGahn) and the supreme court (financials/taxes).
In November 2019 activist Federal District Court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson ruled Don McGahn must appear before Congress; however, she also ruled McGahn retained the ability to “invoke executive privilege where appropriate” during his appearance.
The White House appealed the ruling to the DC appellate court on constitutional grounds.  Today a three judge panel from the DC circuit agreed with the White House position.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump scored a major legal victory on Friday when a federal appeals court panel ruled Democrats have no right to hear testimony from former White House counsel Don McGahn.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit’s ruling overturned a lower court decision requiring McGahn’s testimony and told the judge presiding over the case to dismiss it outright. The ruling is a blow to House Democrats’ attempts to break the Trump administration’s intransigent stance that it can block Congress from talking to witnesses. (link)

This ruling also undermines the ridiculous “obstruction” article of impeachment because it shows the White House had a justifiable and constitutional argument to make against the House in the judicial branch.  The issue at stake was  whether the legislative branch can penetrate the constitutional firewall which exists within the separation of powers.
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