Health Groups Prepare To Fight New Repeal Bill, Discord Among Trump's Lawyers, And Why McCain Fumbled Comey Hearing

September 18th, 2017 Top Stories --------------------------------------------------------------- [Health Advocacy Groups Hit The Panic Button On GOP’s Last-Ditch Repeal Effort]( The Gist: Republicans’ last-ditch effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act before the clock runs out on their ability to do it with a simple majority does not have a CBO score, does not have the enthusiastic support of GOP leadership, and most importantly, does not have 50 votes. But the same health advocacy groups that mobilized in opposition to Obamacare repeal bills this spring are treating the distant prospect that the bill could come to the floor in the next two weeks as an emergency—blasting out press releases and urging their networks to once again pack GOP town halls and tie up Congress’ phone lines until the bill is dead for good. [NYT: Trump Lawyers At Odds Over How Many Documents To Turn Over To Mueller]( The Gist: As special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe intensifies, President Donald Trump’s attorneys have butted heads over how many documents the Trump team should turn over to Mueller’s investigation, the New York Times reported Sunday. [McCain: I Fumbled My Inquiry During Comey Hearing Because Of Graham’ Reasons]( The Gist: Calling his line of questioning during former FBI Director James Comey’s June 8 testimony in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee “a colossal screw-up,” Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said he got distracted by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) just minutes before it was his turn to question Comey. From The Reporter's Notebook --------------------------------------------------------------- Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, on Sunday said Donald Trump Jr. will publicly testify before the panel “this fall,” but said “people have to be patient” with the committee’s investigation. “Things keep changing, not by design, but by just the press of other business on the committee,” Feinstein said, [according to TPM’s Esme Cribb](. “This could take a year, a year and a half, if not more.” Agree Or Disagree? --------------------------------------------------------------- Josh Marshall: "Race has been a central organizing feature of American life – specifically the binary subordination of enslaved people of African ancestry to white Europeans – since the middle and late decades of the 17th century when African slaves first became a core feature of the economic order in the emerging commodity export colonies of what we now call the South. As the late Edmund Morgan explained forty years ago, the dignity and standing of middling whites – something like what we’d today call the ‘white working class’ – was not only buttressed by but was in many ways manufactured out of the subordination and degradation of African slaves. But [no unitary explanation can ever capture]( the fullness or messiness or simply the complexity of human societies. There are exceptions and contradictions and complexities that get crushed by any totalizing narrative, perhaps especially by those which are largely true, precisely because they have so much accuracy, coherence and emotive and explanatory force." Say What?! --------------------------------------------------------------- "I spoke with President Moon of South Korea last night. Asked him how Rocket Man is doing. Long gas lines forming in North Korea. Too bad!" - President Donald Trump on Sunday [tweeting]( about North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, whom Trump has dubbed “Rocket Man.” BUZZING: Today in the Hive --------------------------------------------------------------- From a TPM Prime member: "I think Schiff is right here, and it's great the Dems are finally realising this. It's quite positive, because I think what Trump ultimately wants - more than anything - is to be viewed as a successful President." Related: [Congress’ Schiff: Trump ‘Has No Ideology’ Except ‘His Own Personal Interests’]( Have something to add? Become a [Prime]( member and join the discussion [here](. What We're Reading --------------------------------------------------------------- William Howard Taft Is Still Stuck In The Tub ([The New York Times]( Google Allowed Advertisers To Target People Searching Racist Phrases ([BuzzFeed News]( [unsubscribe from this list]( | [update subscription preferences]( | [view email in browser](