monitoring Trump and relevant contemporary events

US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order authorising sanctions against any countries or individuals found interfering in US elections.

The order instructs the intelligence community to monitor and report on attempts to disrupt election infrastructure as well as propaganda.

The directive itself is not a sanction, but imposes bans or restrictions on suspected culprits.

Mr Trump has been criticised for his response to alleged Russian meddling.

There is some frustration among lawmakers that Mr Trump's executive order could undercut congressional efforts to deter any election meddling in the US by foreign powers, according to CBS News.

At a press briefing following the executive order, National Security Adviser John Bolton said the move was "intended to be a very broad effort to prevent foreign manipulation" of US politics, US media reported.

National Intelligence Director Dan Coats said the directive was in response to alleged Kremlin interference in the 2016 presidential election.

It is understood that Russia is not mentioned by name in the text, but US officials named that country along with China, North Korea and Iran as most likely to try to sway US elections.

"We're taking nothing for granted here," Mr Coats said.

Turnout is part of an integral question facing the Democrats: How should they position themselves ahead of the midterms and 2020? While the Democratic National Committee has focused on turning districts from “red to blue,” progressives say they’d rather focus on mobilizing new voters, especially young people and people of color. Because there aren’t usually exit polls conducted in state- and district-level primary elections, it’s hard to draw firm conclusions about who voted for this year’s insurgent candidates. But the pollsters I spoke with said all signs point to increased turnout and increased involvement by young and nonwhite voters.

The Democratic Party hits a fork in the road.

In Florida, for example, primary turnout eclipsed numbers from the 2014 midterm elections, and it’s likely that pollsters just didn’t get an accurate sample of Gillum’s base, Jewett said. “Anecdotally, it seems like there was a big surge in black turnout,” Jewett said, explaining that the progressive African American candidate did “extraordinarily well” in urban areas and small counties with high black populations. “Younger voters anecdotally seem like they may have turned out at higher levels as well.”

In Massachusetts’s Seventh District, where Pressley ran, more than 100,000 voters came to the polls—twice as many people as those who showed up in the past three primary elections in the district. Preliminary results show that Pressley did especially well in precincts with young voters and people of color. Precinct-level data also suggests that, although turnout was low in New York’s Fourteenth District, Ocasio-Cortez defeated Crowley by turning out young progressives.

Dems have 14 point edge in midterm generic ballot

young and nonwhite

my favourite voters (and politicians Smile )

Now, not all of these pollsters show the same drop. Trump's 6-point decline in CNN's poll is the largest. When you take an average of their latest two tracking polls compared with their prior two, Gallup has Trump dipping just a percentage point.

You'd expect such differences though given sampling error.

An average 3-point decline is rather remarkable for a President whose approval rating has been one of the steadiest on record. It would suggest that something the President did had a real impact on public perception.
House Republicans should worry about Trump's approval rating drop, if it holds through November. Voter opinions of the president have been increasingly tied up with how they vote in midterm elections.

CNN polling has regularly found that more than 80% of voters who approve of Trump are voting for Republican House candidates, compared with more than 80% of voters who disapprove of Trump voting for Democratic House candidates.

As I noted last week:
For Republicans to have a realistic (i.e. within the margin of error) shot of maintaining control of the House in 2018, Trump's approval rating must remain at least in the low 40s nationally.

For them to have a 50% chance of holding on to power in the House, Trump's approval rating will likely need to rise into the mid-40s.

There is little public support for the campaign by some conservative religious leaders, backed by President Donald Trump, to allow clergy and religious organizations to endorse political candidates while retaining their tax exempt status. Such a change is opposed by 53 percent of Americans and supported by 13 percent. The rest expressed no opinion.

Trump's stance on political endorsements by clergy is one of many reasons he has retained strong support among white evangelical Christians, despite aspects of his behavior and personal life that don't neatly align with Christian values. The AP-NORC poll found that 7 in 10 white evangelical Protestants say they approve of Trump, a Republican.

The importance of a candidate's religious faith varied across religious and political groups.

Among white evangelical Protestants, 51 percent consider it very or extremely important that a candidate has strong religious beliefs. An additional 25 percent think it's moderately important. Far fewer Catholics and white mainline Protestants considered this important.

Roughly two-thirds of Republicans said it's at least moderately important that a candidate has strong religious beliefs, compared with 37 percent of Democrats.

Jack Kane, an accountant from Key West, Florida, was among the Republican-leaning poll participants who said it wasn't important to him whether a candidate was deeply religious.

"I'd much rather have a guy run the government and not spend all our money, instead of sounding off on what's going on in the church or on things like abortion," said Kane, 65, who describes himself as nonreligious. "Who is Catholic, Jewish, Southern Baptist — I could care less, as long as they're going to carry the torch of freedom."

Kent Jaquette, a Republican-turned-independent and a former United Methodist pastor who lives near San Antonio, said he does not base his choice of candidates on their religious faith.

"In politics, you need to look at a person where their morals are, where their values are," he said. "It may or may not have anything to do with their religion."

Jaquette also questioned the motives of evangelicals who support Trump.

"To me, it's supporting someone who gives no indication he intends to live a Christian life," said Jaquette, 63. "I believe that Christians should do things that Christ taught — feed the hungry, visit people in jail, help immigrants."

Veronica Irving, a 55-year-old Roman Catholic Republican who lives near Chicago, says it's extremely important to her that a politician has strong religious beliefs. She's disappointed that Trump doesn't demonstrate this more clearly through his behaviors and actions.

"It's not about what faith you come from — it's just important that you have faith," she said.

At the highest levels of political office, it's still rare for a politician to profess that he or she is an atheist; surveys indicate that roughly 10 percent of Americans do not believe in a higher power. In recent years, only a small handful of members of Congress have identified themselves as nonbelievers.

However, there is some evidence of increasing acceptance of religious diversity — for example, the recent victories by Muslim-American women in Democratic congressional primaries in Michigan and Minnesota.

The AP-NORC poll found broad interest in religion having at least some influence on a range of policy issues.

In addition to the concern about poverty, 49 percent of Americans want to see religion have some influence on education, 44 percent on health care policy, 43 percent on immigration, 38 percent on gun policy, 36 percent on income inequality, 34 percent on foreign policy and 32 percent on climate change.

great links in here on the history of SC judges/popularity/interest etc

Washington (CNN)Despite some murmurs that former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort could try to avoid his upcoming trial, special counsel Robert Mueller's team is pressing forward.

Wednesday morning, prosecutors filed a list of evidence they'd like to present at the trial, such as charts, photographs, memos for his Ukrainian oligarch employers and phone records.

Manafort faces seven charges in DC, including failing to register as a lobbyist for a foreign country and witness tampering. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges. Kilimnik, a Russian, is also charged in the witness tampering allegations but has not appeared in US court.

Paul Manafort, the former campaign chairman for President Trump, is in talks with special counsel Robert Mueller’s prosecutors for a possible plea deal just days before his second federal trial is set to kick off, according to a report.

The negotiations between Manafort, who was convicted in federal court in Alexandria, Va., last month on bank and tax fraud charges, and the feds may not result in a deal, the Washington Post cautioned in its Monday report, citing several anonymous sources close to the conversations.

The newspaper said it signaled a change in strategy for Manafort, who opted to go to trial in Virginia and who ridiculed former business partner Rick Gates for accepting a deal for leniency in exchange for testifying against Manafort.