* “We didn’t get anything. We gave up a very big stage to Russia, and we got nothing. It was a good day for Russia.” That was the former president, who, as we know, granted the big-stage treatment (including a joint press conference) to Putin and (in Helsinki in 2018) proceeded to declare that he trusted Putin more than America’s intelligence agencies when it came to Russian interference in the 2016 election—the one that helped bring Trump to the White House.
* The recent Faith and Freedom Coalition conference in Kissimmee drew the expected crowd of conservative Christian voters and conservative-Christian-voter-courting GOPsters—from Marco Rubio and Rick Scott to Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham and Mike Pence. The sectarian bottom line: No, hypocrisy is really not a sin.
* Speculation is rising again on the possibility of Georgia football legend Herschel Walker entering the Georgia GOP Senate primary for a chance to run against the Rev. Raphael G. Warnock, the Democratic incumbent and a fellow African-American. It matters to GOPsters that Walker is a friend of color of Trump and once played for Trump’s pro football team, the New Jersey Generals of the short-lived United States Football League.
* “Donald Trump thought America should have the same restrictive admittance protocol as his country clubs.”–Ruben Navarrette, WaPo.
* There’s a quaint sort of White House tradition where a first-term president hosts a ceremony for the unveiling of his predecessor’s official portrait. Trump, of course, didn’t follow that tradition with his predecessor, Barack Obama. President Joe Biden, however, plans to host a White House ceremony—likely this fall—for the unveiling of former President Obama’s portrait.
As for Trump agreeing to his portrait being unveiled in an East Room event hosted by his successor—who he has accused of stealing the 2020 election—no way. BTW, there’s another presidential precedent that was broken earlier this year. Trump declined to attend Biden’s inauguration.