Trump recognizes exactly what a good con is worth.

By Matthew Yglesias @ Vox.com, Aug. 21

[....] The media, for understandable reasons, likes to cover controversy more than consensus. But attention to controversy can in its own way be misleading. And the extent of expert consensus on the economic impact of both trade and immigration is important to understand [....]

I thought they’d let me be a real journalist at Sputnik news. I was wrong.

By Andrew Feinberg @ Global Politico @ Politico Magazine, Aug. 21

A two-week campaign through Rust Belt states will ask why the administration hasn’t done more and why it is undoing Obama-era regulations labor groups support, as union leaders increasingly suspect that the White House will squander economic gains by ignoring actions that could increase wages.

By Dave Wiegel @ WashingtonPost.com, Aug. 19

Labor leaders, once courted by President Trump, are stepping up their campaign to turn workers against the White House if it does not deliver more on jobs and trade — and if it does not stop undoing Obama-era regulations.

The most visible effort, which starts in Indianapolis on Monday afternoon, is a two-week tour organized by the coalition Good Jobs Nation that ropes in labor-friendly politicians. The coalition, launched in 2013 to pressure Barack Obama’s White House on trade and wage issues, is organizing rallies throughout the Midwest through Labor Day.

“Trump ran as a working-class hero, so let’s look at the results,” said Joseph Geevarghese, Good Jobs Nation’s executive director. “We’re seven months into his administration, and wages are flat. People are still getting pink slips.”

The Indianapolis rally, which will feature Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) [....]

By Matthew Continetti @ Washington Free Beacon, Aug. 18

[....] When political scientist Lee Drutman analyzed voter data from last year's election, he found that the Republican Party is divided by ideology: "By making questions of national identity more salient, Donald Trump succeeded in winning over ‘populists' (socially conservative, economically liberal voters) who had previously voted for Democrats."

Trump's emphasis on social issues broadly construed—on abortion, guns, judges, crime, drugs, immigration, terrorism—and his rejection of orthodox GOP support for free trade and entitlement reform transformed the Republican makeup. What Drutman describes as a "split in the Republican Party between populists and conservatives" can also be interpreted as a division between the party of Trump and the Grand Old Party. The two parties may agree on some issues, but they differ in tone and outlook and on crucial policy questions. It is difficult for them to function as a coalition government. Trump's health care reform is stalled in Congress, his tax reform is inchoate, and his infrastructure plan is nonexistent. The two parties are able to unite against the left, but have trouble finding common legislative ground.

Making things more complicated is the fact that there are more than these two parties. Drutman also found divisions within the Democrats. "To the extent that the Democratic Party is divided, these divisions are more about faith in the political system and general disaffection than they are about issue positions." The Democratic Party of Barack Obama and Bill and Hillary Clinton is satisfied with the status quo, and uses identity politics as a veneer for economic policies that benefit Wall Street, Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and multinational corporations. What we might call the party of Bernie Sanders, on the other hand, is both more radical on questions of political correctness and identity and hostile to the established order. The party of Sanders wants radical change. Beginning with Medicare for all.

Recent events have brought to light the distinction between the party of Trump and the GOP. But it would be foolish for Democrats to believe that they are out of the woods, that America has settled, for the moment, on a three-party system. What we have are four parties: The mainstream Republicans, the party of Trump, the mainstream Democrats, and the party of Sanders. White House chief strategist Steve Bannon's bizarre call to the editor of the liberal American Prospect magazine can be seen as a clumsy attempt to forge a new majority by rejecting the mainstream Republicans and aligning with the party of Sanders on trade, entitlements, and infrastructure spending. But the effort is doomed to fail. In twenty-first century America culture and identity take precedence over economics, and it is in regards to culture and identity that the true break between left and right is found. [....]

By Sabrina Tavernise @ nytimes.com, Aug. 19

[.....] “Let’s be honest, the people who are currently outraged are the same people who have always been outraged,” said Ms. Hicks, 35, a lifelong Republican who lives in Boston. “The media makes it seem like something has changed, when in reality nothing has.” [....]

From Ms. Hicks’s perspective, the president simply pointed out a fact: Leftists bore some responsibility for the violence, too. Of course, Nazis and white supremacists are bad, she said. But she does not believe Mr. Trump has any affinity for them. He said so himself. But she is exasperated that a significant part of the country seems to think otherwise. The week’s frenzied headlines read to her like bulletins from another planet. “I feel like I am in a bizarro universe where no one but me is thinking logically,” she said. “We have gone so off the rails of what this conversation is about.”

Ms. Hicks, who is black and grew up in Charlotte, N.C., welcomes the public soul-searching on the meaning of Confederate monuments. She believes that the statues were erected to intimidate black people and that they should be taken down. But instead of focusing on that, she sees opponents of Mr. Trump focusing on Mr. Trump.“This is not about me as a black person, and my history,” she said. “This is about this president and wanting to take him down because you don’t like him.”

Mr. Bannon’s departure was more noise that didn’t mean much, she said. “The show is going to go on.”

Much of what powers the love for Mr. Trump among his core supporters is his boxer’s approach to the political class in Washington and to the news media, a group that in their eyes has approached them with a double standard and a sneering sense of superiority for years.

Larry Laughlin, a retired businessman from a Minneapolis suburb, compares Mr. Trump to [....]

Saudi Arabia (along with its partners in the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain) is not the only party in the region to exploit an anti-Iran theme as a basis for retaining U.S. support, and it certainly is not the most influential one in shaping U.S. policy.

The president spent Thursday evening with some of his wealthiest supporters, trying to regain momentum after criticism over his response to violence in Virginia.

By Maggie Haberman & Kenneth P. Vogel @ NYTimes.com, 6:45 pm

BEDMINSTER, N.J. — President Trump dined on Thursday night at his Bedminster golf club with a handful of the right’s most generous donors, as he tried to build support for his hobbled legislative agenda amid mounting criticism from within his own party, three people briefed on the dinner said.

The dinner was scheduled weeks ago as part of a donor-outreach initiative by the Trump administration as it prepares an overhaul of the tax code, according to several people involved in the planning [....]

It’s unclear to what extent the Charlottesville rally and its aftermath were discussed at the Thursday dinner.

The invited donors and their families have combined to donate millions of dollars to committees supporting Mr. Trump’s campaign and inauguration, and Mr. Trump’s team hopes they will contribute millions more to groups pushing his legislative agenda. They included the New York investor Robert Mercer, the Kentucky coal executive Joseph W. Craft and the Wisconsin roofing magnate Diane Hendricks, according to people familiar with the dinner [....]

By Maggie Haberman @ NYTimes.com, a few minutes ago

President Trump has told senior aides that he has decided to remove Stephen K. Bannon, the embattled White House chief strategist who helped Mr. Trump win the 2016 election, according to two administration officials briefed on the discussion.

The president and senior White House officials were debating when and how to dismiss Mr. Bannon. The two administration officials cautioned that Mr. Trump is known to be averse to confrontation within his inner circle, and could decide to keep on Mr. Bannon for some time.

As of Friday morning, the two men were still discussing Mr. Bannon’s future, the officials said [....]

By Brad Plumer @ NYTimes.com, Aug. 18

Grid operators will scramble when solar panels go dark — a rare trial run for a future in which the nation will be more reliant on renewable energy.