Finally today we see a significant loss for the “Big Club”. Speaker Paul Ryan, the GOPe professional business class, Wall Street and the U.S. CoC accept the Border Adjustment Tax is not going to be a part of any larger tax reform agenda under the Trump administration.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and President Trump win the policy argument with the removal of the B.A.T.
In a joint statement outlining the forward plans for tax reform the “Big Six” tax negotiators (Speaker Paul Ryan, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady), announce the consumer punishing BAT will not be included.

[…] “While we have debated the pro-growth benefits of border adjustability, we appreciate that there are many unknowns associated with it and have decided to set this policy aside in order to advance tax reform.” (more)

The B.A.T was to revenue collection on imported products and impact on consumers – what the Obamacare mandate was to revenue collection on healthcare and impact on consumers.
The B.A.T  was simply a scheme to embed the cost of renegotiated trade import tariffs, directly onto the consumer, isolated away from any responsibility on the corporation to reduce their own internal efficiencies as a method to keep the price down. It was a dubious and manipulative effort.
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The swamp fights back.  Predictable Flak and Countermeasures deployed, right on time, by the UniParty. You can almost set your watch to it.  Once you see the strings on the marionettes you can never go back to a time when you didn’t see them.
House Intelligence Committee member Trey Gowdy discusses Jared Kushner, the controversy with attorney general Jeff Sessions and the ongoing Trump-Russia probe. etc.

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The backstory to the Awan brothers is a story within congress where three Democrat staffers within various House committees, including the House Intelligence Committee, were suspected of a variety of unlawful actions including accessing highly classified information under suspicious circumstances. – More Here –

Yesterday FBI agents seized computer equipment from the home of the aide to congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz who was one of the parties employing the Awans.  And now last night Imran Awan was arrested by the FBI at Dulles airport.

(Via Daily Caller)  Florida GOP Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s right-hand information technology (IT) aide was arrested attempting to leave the country just a few hours after The Daily Caller News Foundation’s Investigative Group revealed that he is the target of an FBI investigation.

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Well, this is all kinds of creepy when carried out to its logical and unintended consequences.   Would you allow yourself to have a microchip installed in your hand?
(Via Fox Business) A Wisconsin tech company says they are about to become the first business in the U.S. to offer microchip implants to its employees.
Three Square Market (32M), a River Falls-based software design company, says starting August 1st, it will be offering microchips to all their employees. The chips will be implanted underneath the skin between the thumb and forefinger, which will allow employees to pay for food and drinks in the company’s break room, open security doors, and login into their computers without any special cards—or passwords.
“Eventually, this technology will become standardized allowing you to use this as your passport, public transit, all purchasing opportunities, etc.,” Todd Westby, 32M CEO said in a company press release.
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President Trump’s MAGAnomic and foreign policy agenda is jaw-dropping in scale, scope and consequence. There are multiple simultaneous aspects to each policy objective; they have been outlined for a long time even before the election victory in November ’16.
If you get too far into the weeds the larger picture can be lost. CTH objective is to continue pointing focus toward the larger horizon, and then at specific inflection points to dive into the topic and explain how each moment is connected to the larger strategy.
Today we dive into how MAGAnomic policy interacts with Wall Street, the stock market, the U.S. financial system and perhaps your personal financial value.  Again, the ongoing reference and source material is included at the end of the outline.
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Everything is proceeding according to a natural and predictable path.  Mr. Scaramucci is now in charge of White House messaging, the focus can now look toward the Capitol and go on offense; the “Big Ugly” is very clearly on the horizon.

Anxious Trump voters have been understandably frustrated by the lack of speed with which President Trump is able to force the MAGA agenda onto an unwilling DC political apparatus.  However, if you step back and look at the scope of the challenge, the situation is entirely understandable.
Donald Trump was a 100% pure political outsider, a citizen politician.  There was never any underlying organizational apparatus to support victory.  There was Dan, Hope, Michael and Corey; later Paul then Kellyanne and Steve. Everything else needed to be constructed from scratch and even the party apparatus didn’t support candidate Trump.
On November 9th 2016 President-elect Trump did not wake up with a staff of 50 political career employees sitting at Trump desks with Rolodexes filled with a network of affiliate political allies, personnel and associates to call upon to create the Trump administration.  Consequently President Trump needed to import the entire administrative personnel architecture to support the move to the White House. (more…)

Anthony Scaramucci was appointed to the position of White House Communications Director yesterday. Earlier today Scaramucci gave his first interview to Breitbart News Media to discuss his communication objectives.
In his first interview Breitbart reporter Matthew Boyle asks Scaramucci if he actually understands the Trump voter and the middle-class base of support for President Trump.  Scaramucci outlines his outlook and what he views as the greatest challenge in getting the America-First message and Trump agenda to remain the focus of policy and messaging (click the orange arrow to listen):
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The “Big Ugly” Preparation – President Trump has announced Anthony Scaramucci as the new White House Communications Director. Mrs. Sarah Huckabee Sanders is also announced as the permanent White House Press Secretary. Former Press Secretary Sean Spicer is released from his duties; Spicer will finish out August and then exit the White House.
Video from today’s Press Briefing follows:

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This communications transition must be considered against the backdrop of an executive office accepting the intransigent nature of the DC Administrative State, the Deep State and financial interests, has finally reached a point where direct conflict is unavoidable.
President Trump’s election was the disruption the American electorate voted for. The DC based Administrative state will not allow this disruption.
The middle-class economic agenda, the primary focus of the Trump administration, is now being intentionally blocked by the UniParty and their lobbying financiers in the professional political community.
The UniParty decision to impede healthcare reform is, necessarily, also carrying the motive of specific intent to derail the sequential tax reform policy.
The down-stream budgetary impact from retaining ObamaCare will destroy the U.S. economy. The multinational corporations and multinational banks are positioned favorably toward this endeavor.  They have built this position over decades.
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Short interview with Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Mick Mulvaney discussing ObamaCare and the potential for Tax Reform.  Unfortunately, one of the key budgetary issues with the failure of ObamaCare reform is the downstream effect on any middle-class tax reform.
Within ObamaCare’s current -mostly political- structure, the expansive growth of Medicaid means tax-paying workers will pay more for insurance premiums and will also be held captive to the need for additional revenue to pay for medicaid; a double whammy.

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President Trump gave an in interesting interview to three New York Times reporters,  Peter Baker, Michael S. Schmidt and Maggie Haberman, on Wednesday.   President Trump’s assistant Ms. Hope Hicks also sat in on the interview.
It is interesting President Trump allowed/chose Michael Schmidt as one of the interviewers in that Schmidt is the primary recipient of leaks provided by fired FBI Director James Comey.   Michael Schmidt is the primary contact source for Comey’s allies within the FBI when they decide to leak information intended to damage the office of the President.
The New York Times article is HERE.

The following are excerpts from that conversation, transcribed by The Times. It has been lightly edited for content and clarity, and omits several off-the-record comments and asides. Additional excerpts will be added as they are compiled.

(Transcript – Via New York Times) TRUMP: Look, [Attorney General Jeff] Sessions gets the job. Right after he gets the job, he recuses himself.

BAKER: Was that a mistake?

TRUMP: Well, Sessions should have never recused himself, and if he was going to recuse himself, he should have told me before he took the job, and I would have picked somebody else.

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