Just dropped · Trial Balloon · Ep. 193
The Magnificent Seven
Just published: The Political Supreme Court: A Forgotten History (W. Hodding Carter III Books) by Rachel A. Shelden.
“Today’s Supreme Court justices bristle at the label ‘politicians in robes,’ insisting that they operate above the fray of partisan politics. But for the first century of the nation’s history, the Court was unmistakably a political institution, both by design and in practice.”
On my reading list for after the midterms: The Age of Acrimony: How Americans Fought to Fix Their Democracy, 1865-1915 by Jon Grinspan.
“This is the origin story of the ‘normal’ politics of the 20th century.”
“Jared Kushner was allegedly paid $50 million by a foreign government to get former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson fired,” the New Republic reports.
“In the new book Princes and Thieves: Jared Kushner and Mohamed bin Zayed’s Secret Plot to Remake the Middle East, author Matthew Cole reported that the United Arab Emirates paid Kushner millions to oust Tillerson, who had allegedly become extremely cozy with the Qataris.”
Coming soon: The Normalcy Paradox: Why Americans Crave Political Stability but Get Chaos by Sean Trende.
“For the past 25 years, our politics have become increasingly unhinged and destabilized, even though most Americans want boring politics where they can mind their own business and the government runs competently and quietly in the background. That disposition hasn’t gone anywhere. What has gone missing is the machinery that translated those impulses into stable government.”
“It is hard to know where to look. Donald Trump’s two presidential terms generate so many outrages and depredations that they become a giant kaleidoscope of ever-changing distractions. In Princes and Thieves, his startling and important book alleging previously unreported activities by Jared Kushner during the first Trump administration, the investigative journalist Matthew Cole, a veteran reporter on national security, asks us to focus our eyes on the collection of oil-rich sheikhdoms known as the United Arab Emirates,” the New York Times reports.
“If Cole’s claims are accurate, Kushner’s political and financial relationship with the U.A.E.’s president, Mohammed bin Zayed (widely known as M.B.Z.), constitutes what must surely be the worst case of U.S. foreign policy being conducted outside the law and democratic oversight since the Iran-contra scandal during the Reagan administration in the 1980s.”
New York Times: “While he says Mr. Bezos has not interfered in news stories, Mr. Woodward writes that the billionaire owner’s sweeping staff cuts, reorientation of the editorial page and personal ingratiation to the president have betrayed the legacy of a newspaper known for courageous coverage.”
“The condemnation of Mr. Bezos by his most famous employee is one of the headlines from Secrets, the long-awaited memoir of his 55 years in journalism to be published Nov. 24 by Mr. Woodward, who still holds the title of associate editor at the paper.”
“For 55 years, Bob Woodward has unearthed some of Washington’s deepest secrets. Now the legendary reporter is exposing a trove of his own,” the Washington Post reports.
“During his long career as a Washington Post journalist and blockbuster author, Woodward zealously protected many confidential sources who helped him uncover the Watergate scandal and penetrate the enigmatic sides of every president since Richard M. Nixon. For three decades, Woodward famously safeguarded the identity of Deep Throat, the most guessed-about anonymous source ever, until former deputy FBI director Mark Felt outed himself at his family’s urging in a 2005 Vanity Fair article.”
“Today, with many of Woodward’s other key sources deceased, the 83-year-old writer has decided to pull back the curtain and reveal who helped him score many of his monumental scoops. In doing so, he draws on a vast hoard of notes, memos, transcripts and other documents that he collected over the years.”
Simon & Schuster called Jared Kushner’s bluff in threatening legal action and quietly released Matthew Cole’s blockbuster book two days early, Status reports.
“The explosive allegations read like a spy novel, featuring a hacked iPhone, international spies, and billion-dollar ‘slush funds’ from foreign governments, all tied to Donald Trump’s son-in-law. Jared Kushner, Cole wrote, had access to $2 billion in secret foreign bank accounts from Middle Eastern countries attempting to influence U.S. foreign policy during Trump’s first term.”
“The claims, if they hold up, would be among the most serious ever leveled at a presidential family member—and one who had served in an official government role, to boot.”
“Chad Mizelle, an attorney representing Jared Kushner, demanded that Vanity Fair take down a recently published book excerpt alleging that President Donald Trump’s son-in-law had access to secret foreign bank accounts during his first term,” The Wrap reports.
A Shadow Over the World: Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Rise of Fascism, and the Making of America's World War II by William I Hitchcock.
“When he took office in 1933, Roosevelt was determined to avoid foreign entanglements that would harm his ambitious domestic agenda of the New Deal. But over the course of his first two terms, a network of journalists, activists, advisers, and diplomats gradually awakened him to the global dangers of fascism.”
“Jared Kushner is pushing back on a report involving a hacked iPhone, international spies and billion-dollar transfers from foreign governments,” CBS News reports.
“An upcoming book by journalist Matthew Cole claims Kushner, who is President Trump’s son-in-law, had access to more than $2 billion in ‘slush money funds’ from Middle Eastern leaders in an attempt to influence U.S. foreign policy.”
Coming soon: Princes and Thieves: Jared Kushner and Mohamed bin Zayed's Secret Plot to Remake the Middle East by Matthew Cole.
Vanity Fair has an excerpt: “The Dutch government had hacked into Jared Kushner’s phone and monitored him as he accessed a Dubai-based bank account. What was odd, the source said, was that the money in the account—hundreds of millions of dollars—had come from a bank in Azerbaijan.”
“Most importantly, Kushner appeared to have transferred significant amounts of money from the Dubai account to other individuals, including a warlord, a mercenary and a one-time hit man.”
“The chair of the El Paso County Republican Party has said he intends to sue Sacha Baron Cohen over footage of the local politician used in new satirical comedy Ali G: Who Iz I?” The Guardian reports.
“In the film, Michael Aboud is shown taking part in a training program with another Cohen character, ex-Mossad terrorist expert Col Erran Morad, who instructs Aboud and fellow MAGA sympathizers in self-defense techniques including the wearing, over clothes, of protective plastic buttocks. He also schools them in how to fire bullets from the middle of these buttocks by the repeated up and down manipulation of a rubber penis.”
Redwood: The Untold Story of the Cold War's Most Extraordinary Spy by Ben Macintyre.
“In 1981, KGB Major Vladimir Kuzichkin, codenamed ‘Redwood,’ was the best Soviet officer in Iran, running spies in the wake of the Islamic revolution and working with a hidden network of Iranian communists to undermine the new regime. But Kuzichkin had a problem, a sexual secret that, if revealed, would humiliate him with his colleagues, cost him his job, and send him into exile. Desperate for a solution, he reached out to the only place he believed could help: Britain’s MI6.”
Just published: The Strategist: How to Think About War and Politics by Eliot A. Cohen.
The definitive guide to the use of military means to achieve political ends.
How Russia Won: Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and the Fight for America by David Corn.
“The little-understood yet crucial story of how Vladimir Putin has waged a secret campaign to subvert and weaken the United States—and how Trump, his MAGA movement, the Republican Party, and right-wing media have served as useful idiots.”
Coming soon: The East Wing: Power, Intrigue, and the Untold Story of America's First Ladies by Azadeh Moaveni.
Vanity Fair runs an excerpt: “Biden’s performance during the debate with Trump on June 27, 2024, at CNN’s Atlanta studio, was a historic disaster. Later that evening, at a debate watch party, Jill took the mike. ‘Joe, you did such a great job! You answered every question, you knew all the facts,’ she said. ‘And what did Trump do?’ She led the crowd with a shout of, ‘Lieee!'”
“Jill swiftly became a key focal point for the blame. Surely she had known how diminished he was, and if she knew, why had she not persuaded him to step down? That question could have been leveled against any number of people in the Biden orbit: top campaign aides, Kamala Harris, cabinet members. But as First Lady, she was the most intimate, public face of the campaign persuading Americans that he was fit to serve another term.”
Taegan Goddard
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.
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