Things I'm not talking about.

1. Susan Rice.

2. Mamdani's snow shovelers and the 2-ID requirement. 

3. Trump's re-tariffing gimmick.

4. Our war with Iran.

5. Photograph of Prince Andrew.

I'm not judging these stories to be inconsequential. I just have nothing to add, nothing that fits my approach to blogging anyway. I like them as items to list. The list signifies that I feel some pressure. They're nagging at me. But I'm resisting. Feel free to talk about them in the comments. They're actually all good topics. I'm just not feeling the value of my own yammering on them. Maybe you think I've already said too much, what with that one word.

"Gimmick" is "Originally U.S. slang," according to the OED, which defines it like this: "A gadget; spec. a contrivance for dishonestly regulating a gambling game, or an article used in a conjuring trick; now usually a tricky or ingenious device, gadget, idea, etc., esp. one adopted for the purpose of attracting attention or publicity."

The oldest appearance of the word is an entry in the 1926 "Wise-crack Dictionary": "Gimmick, device used for making a fair game crooked." 

Susan Rice talks about doing Sunday show appearances after the Benghazi attack — She was "a team player."

From an interview in The Atlantic with Edward-Isaac Dovere:

Dovere: The Sunday-show appearances around the Benghazi attack have become so much of your public identity. Your mother actually warned you not to do it, and thought Hillary Clinton should have instead. In the end, that became an issue getting in your way to be Obama’s secretary of state, and continues to be an issue Republicans attack you over now.

Rice: She said, “Why you?” And I said, “The White House asked me to do it.” And she’s like, “Well, where’s Hillary?” And I said that she’d been asked, but declined. And I presumed—I hadn’t had this conversation with her—that she had had an extraordinarily draining week, having lost four Americans in an American overseas facility, and all the pain and trauma that that entails for the people of the State Department, for the families, for everybody. But I agreed, as a team player. And her instinct was, “I smell a rat. You shouldn’t do it.” And I said, “Mom, don’t be ridiculous. I’ve done this many times before.” She was absolutely right.

Dovere: What did that experience teach you about the way that politics, and at least cable news, political media work?

The confidante.

Did you know that's called a "confidante"?

I ran across that bit of furniture arcana after reading the headline "Biden confidants see VP choices narrowing to Harris and Rice" (at AXIOS). Maybe you're fascinated by the endless discussion of Biden's VP choice — it is interesting that it's between Harris and Rice, but didn't you already know that? — but I got distracted by the spelling "confidants." Is it "confidant" or "confidante"? Seems like the "e" belongs... or is that just something you add when the person is female?

"Confidant" is correct. The OED says it originated after 1700, although the noun "confident" — with the same meaning and an accent on the first syllable — had already been in use for a century. The "-ant" ending — as opposed to the "-ent" — comes from French. And it's because of French that you get the separate female form, adding an "e." It's what they do in France.

The female version — "confidante" — has a second meaning: "A name given by the English designer George Hepplewhite (d. 1786) to a species of settee.... 'an upholstered settee with somewhat triangular seats beyond the arms at each end.'" That strange item you see pictured above. It can also refer to "Two chairs coupled on an s-plan" or "three chairs, joined like the spokes of a wheel."

It's hard to come up with new ideas in seating! Once you invent the chair and the sofa and maybe the lounge and the stool, there really isn't much left that anyone is really going to want.

Kamala Harris allies do a conference call with Joe Biden campaign staff and we get to read about it...

... at Politico. So embarrassing! Can't he at least look like he's in command, seeing what's good and bad in the people he knows, making his own decision? Why am I able to see that there's a "vetting unit" that includes Christopher Dodd, who's said something about Harris having "no remorse" for her "little girl was me" remark at a debate last year? I'm seeing the names of all these people on the conference call who were pitching Kamala Harris to Biden's people:

The conference call included several of the state’s highest-ranking elected officials and labor and business leaders, including Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis, Secretary of State Alex Padilla, San Francisco Mayor London Breed, state schools chief Tony Thurmond, state Treasurer Fiona Ma and Chad Griffin, a Democratic consultant and former head of Human Rights campaign, according to organizers. Representing the Biden campaign were the four main members of his vetting team: Dodd, Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti; and Biden's former White House and Senate counsel, Cynthia Hogan....

Somebody leaked all that. How messy!

A person on the call said Harris’ allies wanted the campaign to hear from people who know her best.... "This was about us sharing how much Kamala would be a stellar vice president," said one official who participated on the call, referencing Dodd’s earlier remarks. 'He spoke at length about her and said very nice things," the person said of Dodd’s comments about Harris on the conference call.... Dodd said “very supportive things” about Harris during the call, according to Kounalakis.... Critics suggested that Dodd was questioning a woman for being ambitious....

I don't think hearing about this call helps Harris! The call was intended to help Harris, and the leaker seems to want to help Harris, but now I'd be surprised if it's Harris.

Meanwhile, at the Washington Post, Dana Milbank is doing all he can to stomp on Susan Rice: "Why would Biden pick a human lightning rod as VP?"

"Republicans have seized on the document as potential evidence that the outgoing president had ordered the FBI to spy on the new administration..."

"... as Trump has alleged. And they have raised questions about the 'unusual' nature of Rice memorializing the conversation in an email to herself, suggesting that in warning Comey to proceed 'by the book,' Obama was implying that top law enforcement officials had done the opposite. Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Rice said it shows the Obama administration handled the Flynn situation appropriately. The email, most of which was already declassified, describes a Jan. 5, 2017, Oval Office meeting that followed up on an intelligence briefing about Russian interference in the 2016 election. Attendees included then-President Barack Obama; Comey; Sally Yates, who was the acting attorney general; Vice President Joe Biden; and Rice, who was Flynn's predecessor in the job. The email, which memorialized the meeting two weeks after it happened, said Obama wanted to be sure 'every aspect of this issue is handled by the Intelligence and law enforcement communities "by the book."' 'The president stressed that he is not asking about, initiating or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective,' the email continued. 'He reiterated that our law enforcement team needs to proceed as it normally would by the book.'"

From "Trump administration declassifies full Susan Rice email sent on Inauguration Day/The email describes a Jan. 5, 2017, Oval Office meeting about Michael Flynn and Russian interference in the 2016 election" (Politico).

MORE:

"Trump is very much the 'wartime commander' of his nation. His voters still adore him. They'll do anything for him..."

"... including defying calls to shelter in place and taking quack medical 'cures' for the pandemic. He is very much their 'wartime commander.' But Ms. Rice needs to understand that we are no longer one nation. We are two peoples inhabiting one geographic space. And the slight majority of us who are sickened by this 'president' have no leader, wartime or otherwise.' But make no mistake - Trump is very much leading his nation. This pandemic is placing the rift between Red and Blue states in sharp relief - and underscoring that we no longer share any common values.... Trump understands that he is the president for only half the country. He has never made any pretense about representing all of us. We Democrats believe in affordable health care, good quality public schools, affordable higher education, and equal opportunities in employment and education for all Americans, regardless of gender, race, ethnicity, or religion. We also believe in facts, science and evidence, and separation of church and state. Trump's voters want none of this. So where does that leave the rest of us? We are now nothing more than hostages here, in our own country."

That's the top-rated comment at "Trump Is the Wartime President We Have (Not the One We Need)/He should start leading with the decency and resolve that we deserve. I’m not holding my breath" by Susan Rice (at the NYT).

"I’m not holding my breath" was a bad figure of speech to use as the coronavirus imposes real breathing difficulty on thousands of victims.

Susan Rice was President Obama's national security adviser from 2013 to 2017.

"But [Susan] Rice did not write her email to cover Barack Obama’s rear end."

"If she or anyone else had wanted to document the claim that Obama said to proceed 'by the book,' the appropriate course would have been an official memo that copied others who were present and would have gone into the file... [S]he was C’ing her own A. Rice was nervous about the fact that, at the president’s direction, she had failed to 'share information fully as it relates to Russia' with President Trump’s incoming national security team. This violated longstanding American tradition. Outgoing administrations have always cooperated in the transition to a new administration, whether of the same or the opposing party, especially on matters relating to national security....  CYA memos are rarely a good idea. Most often, they reveal what the author was trying to conceal...."

From "Why Susan Rice Wrote and Email to Herself" by John Hinderaker at Power Line.

"[I]t sure looks like members of an incoming Republican administration were spied on by a Democratic political operative who happened to find a meeting suspicious."

"Some of us troglodytes might view this kind of thing as an abuse of power. So it’ll be interesting to hear Gowdy and others explain why it wasn’t."

Writes David Harsanyi in "Reminder: Susan Rice Lied About Her Role In The Obama Admin Unmasking Scandal."

"Trump Says Susan Rice May Have Committed a Crime."

The NYT reports.

“I think it’s going to be the biggest story,” Mr. Trump said in an interview in the Oval Office, declining repeated requests for evidence for his allegations or the names of other Obama administration officials. “It’s such an important story for our country and the world. It is one of the big stories of our time.”

He declined to say if he had personally reviewed new intelligence to bolster his claim but pledged to explain himself “at the right time.”

When asked if Ms. Rice, who has denied leaking the names of Trump associates under surveillance by United States intelligence agencies, had committed a crime, the president said, “Do I think? Yes, I think.”

"You know, everybody's lying and the news is now about how everybody's lying."

That's what I said out loud after glancing at the front page of The Washington Post, which looked like this at the time.

(Click image to make it larger and clearer.) 



And now I'm looking at that one headline — "Don Lemon to Bill O’Reilly: 'I did cover your sexual harassment allegations. Did you?'" — and noticing the double and contradictory meanings to the word "cover." It can mean both to expose and to cloak.

ADDED SONG LYRIC: "This whole world is out there just trying to score/I've seen enough I don't want to see any more...."

AND:Sexual meaning of the word noted.

"I hope Susan Rice was keeping tabs on Trump’s Russia ties."

By Michelle Goldberg at Slate.

I love the way the messaging turns on a dime.

One minute it's ridiculous to think that the Obama administration was doing surveillance on the Trump campaign. The next minute the Obama administration was doing the right thing if it did surveillance on the Trump campaign.

"White House lawyers last month learned that the former national security adviser Susan Rice requested the identities of U.S. persons in raw intelligence reports on dozens of occasions that connect to the Donald Trump transition and campaign..."

Writes Eli Lake at Bloomberg, citing "U.S. officials familiar with the matter."

The pattern of Rice's requests was discovered in a National Security Council review of the government's policy on "unmasking" the identities of individuals in the U.S. who are not targets of electronic eavesdropping, but whose communications are collected incidentally. Normally those names are redacted from summaries of monitored conversations and appear in reports as something like "U.S. Person One."...

The news about Rice also sheds light on the strange behavior of Nunes in the last two weeks. It emerged last week that he traveled to the White House last month, the night before he made an explosive allegation about Trump transition officials caught up in incidental surveillance. At the time he said he needed to go to the White House because the reports were only on a database for the executive branch. It now appears that he needed to view computer systems within the National Security Council that would include the logs of Rice's requests to unmask U.S. persons....

"I think the Dems and their media pals have gone tantrum-tilt because Trump wants Steve Bannon to serve on the NSC."

"During the campaign Dems and the mainstream media committed themselves to the narrative that Bannon is Rasputin and Hitler and etc. Is he a political adviser? Yes. However, Bannon was also a naval officer. The UPI release mentions that George W. Bush barred Karl Rove from attending NSC meetings. OK. Rove was a political adviser but he never served in the military. Bush was a USAF reserve pilot. Bush combined political experience and military experience. Like Obama, Trump has no personal military experience. Bannon has political savvy and military experience. In this light Bannon very likely meets a need Trump perceives. So Trump hires him. Did Obama perceive a similar inadequacy in himself? Of course he didn’t. Obama, the purveyor of Smart Diplomacy, was always the smartest guy in the room. Obama’s national security record? Why, it’s dismal. Perhaps he could have used a Steve Bannon."

Writes Austin Bay. He also links to this, by Glenn Reynolds:

OUCH:

Susan Rice, policy wonk and former Dukakis & Clinton aide, who had no military experience whatsoever* before getting tapped as National Security Advisor by the Obama administration in 2013, blasts Trump’s decision to “remove military advice” from the National Security Council.

Conveniently not mentioned is that Rice was replaced as National Security Advisor by LTG Michael T. “Mike” Flynn, USA (Ret).

I swear, Susan, self awareness is so rare these days it should be considered a f$cking super power.

The troika made up of Susan Rice, Samantha Power, and Hillary Clinton was perhaps the most disastrous foreign policy crew in American history. She’s got no room to talk.

Here's the Susan Rice tweet referenced above:

This is stone cold crazy. After a week of crazy. Who needs military advice or intell to make policy on ISIL, Syria, Afghanistan, DPRK?

Hillary's communications director Jen Palmieri sounded utterly terrified facing questions from George Stephanopoulos.

Palmieri should have been perfectly prepared. She's the communications director so she should be an ace at communications. She knew the precise issue she would be asked to address: Hillary's statement, in the previous night's debate, that Donald Trump is "ISIS's best recruiter" and that ISIS is "going to people showing videos of Donald Trump insulting Islam and Muslims in order to recruit more radical jihadists." Palmieri knew everyone was demanding to know whether there were actual videos. All she needed was a packaged answer, the best answer under the circumstances, and to deliver that answer with confidence. Here's the video. Here's the transcript.

Why did she fumble, look scared, and speak in a trembling voice?! 

Palmieri's segment followed a phone interview with Donald Trump, Donald Trump had just totally overwhelmed Stephanopoulos, and Stephanopoulos's first question to Palmieri incorporated the formidible Trump: "Your response to Donald Trump?" Maybe she was prepared, but Donald Trump unnerved her. She began:

Susan Rice on "Meet the Press"... Does that sound right to you?

On "Meet the Press" this morning, Chuck Todd announced that he had an "exclusive interview with Susan Rice," and we were wondering if everyone had been clamoring for an interview with Susan Rice. Then, we kept talking over her and pausing to substitute translations, often, comically, involving a heinous and offensive video.

There has been no recommendation for... military commanders, either on the ground, nor here in Washington, that the United States put any ground combat forces into Iraq. That has not come up the chain to anybody at the White House. And I don't anticipate that it will, Chuck. I mean, let's be clear here....

So it's down somewhere in the chain, but it won't get up the chain?

The president has been very plain that this is not a campaign that requires or even would benefit from American ground troops in combat again. The Iraqi prime minister, the government of Iraq have said very plainly, they don't want American troops in combat. We are there to help build up the Iraqi capacity to sustain their territory and to hold their ground.... It's not going to happen overnight. But if it isn't achieved, nothing is going to be sustainable.... 

Sustainable! 

Strategy's very clear....

So the strategy's not clear, right? Or the strategy is clearly something else?

We'll do what we can from the air. We will support the Iraqi security forces, the Kurds, and ultimately over time, the moderate opposition in Syria to be able to control territory and take the fight to ISIL. We'll do our part from the air and in many other respects in terms of building up the capacity of the Iraqis and the Syrian opposition, the moderates.

But we are not going to be in a ground war again in Iraq. 

Oh! So we are going to be in a ground war in Iraq....

It's not what is required by the circumstances that we face and even if one were to take that step, which the president has made clear we're not going to do, it wouldn't be sustainable. We've got to do this in a sustainable way.

She keeps saying "sustainable," so I guess that means it's not sustainable.

Then, we watched "Face the Nation," and Bob Schieffer — who was one of the Sunday morning talk show moderators Susan Rice lied to about Benghazi — was talking with Leon Panetta and brought up what Susan Rice was saying on the other network's show:

BOB SCHIEFFER: The President's national security advisor Susan Rice was on television this morning and she said if I understand it there has been no recommendation from military commanders that the United States would combat troops in Iraq. Does that sound right to you?

We laughed because the tone of that Does that sound right to you? exactly expressed the dubiousness we'd just been expressing.

Jane Harman recited not the talking points, but the opposite of talking points on Benghazi.

The former Democratic Congresswoman went too far on "Fox News Sunday" yesterday. She intended, I think, to present the Democrats' talking points on Benghazi, but at one point — in just a few words — she let us see the way Democratic Party strategists are talking to each other behind the scenes about the effect the talking points are supposed to have on the public mind. I'm visualizing a memo that has bullet points of what one ought to say out loud and a narrative section of things you don't want to say.

The host Chris Wallace turned to Harman for discussion of the new efforts to investigate what happened 2 years ago in Benghazi, and she quickly got to the declaration "This is a circus" and the suggestion that the idea is "to get Hillary Clinton or some way to embarrass her during the election season."

There's some talk about the Rhodes memo (with Harman saying that maybe it only came out when it did because there was "some claim of executive privilege") and assertions that there was "legitimate confusion" when Susan Rice received her preparation to go on all the Sunday shows and to attribute the Benghazi attack to spontaneous protests over the "Innocence of Muslims" video. It was "an intelligence failure." And on saying that phrase "intelligence failure," and just before saying "it's time to move on and focus on the real problems," she wedges this in:

And, by the way, this was an intelligence failure. But it wasn't a conspiracy. And there aren't aliens in Area 51 and Vince Foster wasn't murdered.

And there aren't aliens in Area 51 and Vince Foster wasn't murdered. That was too revealing! I suspect... Look, I realize I can be accused of "conspiracy" thinking to suspect something and to speak as if I know what they're saying behind our back... but here's the kind of thing Harman's Area-51-Vince-Foster remark made me feel they are saying in private:

We need people to hear the word "Benghazi" as a buzzword of nuts. Somebody says "Benghazi" and the reflex reaction is "Oh, no, here we go again with the conspiracy theories." It should be like when somebody brings up Area 51 or Vince Foster was murdered. A normal person is like "Ugh! Leave me alone." That's the way "Benghazi" should feel. Somebody says "Benghazi" and all anybody thinks is "conspiracy nutcase." Nobody who wants to be considered mainstream in this election should be able to say "Benghazi" anymore. Case closed, and you've built in the respect for Hillary saying "What difference at this point does it make?" Everybody decent — if we get this idea across — will react to Benghazi with a Hillary-esque exasperated "What difference does it make?" If it makes a difference to you, you're crazy. This is a circus. You're a clown. A scary clown. Boo! Aliens! Benghazi! Vince Foster!

"Newly released emails on the Benghazi terror attack suggest a senior White House aide played a central role..."

"... in preparing former U.N. ambassador Susan Rice for her controversial Sunday show appearances -- where she wrongly blamed protests over an Internet video."

The email [from Ben Rhodes, an assistant to the president and deputy national security adviser for strategic communications] lists the following two goals, among others:

"To underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, and not a broader failure of policy."

"To reinforce the President and Administration's strength and steadiness in dealing with difficult challenges."

Susan Rice and the single-earner household.

From the "60 Minutes" piece on Susan Rice, who is "not the first woman to be national security advisor, or the first African American. But she is the first mother. She has two kids: Jake, 16 and Maris, 11."

Her husband, Ian Cameron, used to be an executive producer at ABC News....

Lesley Stahl: Ian, you actually have stopped working.

Ian Cameron: Yeah.

Lesley Stahl: To take care of the kids?

Ian Cameron: Yeah. Well we were in a situation, you know, financially that one of us could step out of the working world.

"Aboard Air Force One, former President Bush shows photos of his paintings to... First Lady Michelle Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton..."

"... Valerie Jarrett, National Security Advisor Susan E. Rice, Attorney General Eric Holder and former First Lady Laura Bush, Dec. 9, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)"

"What caused NBC’s Meet the Press to fall behind Face the Nation and This Week?"

Jennifer Rubin tries to answer the question. She's got a list of 8 things, and I especially like:

2. Bob Schieffer has gotten feisty. He zings administration guests, asks probing questions, and gives snappy commentary. Given the choice between a Schieffer and a Gregory interview, I’d watch the former every time.

I agree! I think Schieffer got angry about Susan Rice lying on all the talk shows about Benghazi. He's been on fire since then. He's so old, so I was assuming he was coasting, but he woke up.

Something Rubin doesn't have on her list is: David Gregory is too concerned about being nice. He's always smiling and getting along with the guests. That is not what Tim Russert did. Russert intimidated the guests. He cornered them, often using a brilliant sequence of quotes displayed on screen. Very entertaining! Russert seemed to be directing the show toward us, the audience. Gregory seems more to be letting us watch while he socializes with his Washington friends.