Subject: ?Axios AM: Mike's Top 10 -- Trump's "SICK!" tweet * A quote every R must read * The Oscar effect * Inside Bitmojis
From: "Mike Allen" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 18 Feb 2017 10:58:09 -0500 (EST)

Presented by JPMorgan Chase & Co.:

Axios AM: Mike's Top 10 -- Trump's "SICK!" tweet * A quote every R must =ead * The Oscar effect * Inside Bitmojis

View in browser

Presented By JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Axios AM

By Mike Allen = ·Feb 18, 2017

Tomorrow evening, Jonathan Swan a h=ndy new of offering from Axios -- the Sneak Peek newsletter, with a look a=ead to the week at the Capitol Hill and the White House, plus the best nug=ets from the Sunday shows.
C=ick here and your email address will automatically be added to this Sunday=s Sneak Peek.

1 big thing: The game

Today is Day 30 of the Trump presidency. Understandably, there's a lot of hyperventilating about=Trump's incendiary (but, in its way, Groundhog Day) tweet yesterday: "The FAKE NEWS med=a (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is th= enemy of the American People!" An earlier version of the tweet=ended in: "SICK!"

Jon Lovett -- the Obama alumnus, =o-founder of Crooked Media and co-host of the hot Pod Save America podcast=-- called it a "[n]e= and dangerous low."

Brian Stelter, in his Reli=ble Sources newsletter, rounds up elite-media Twitter reaction ... NPR=s Steve Inskeep: "A journalist is a citizen. Who informs =ther citizens, as free citizens need. Some are killed doing it ... NYT's <=trong>Maggie Haberman: "He is fighting very low approval ratings.=Gonna be interesting to see how congressional Rs respond to this tweet" ..= Joe Scarborough: "Conservatives, feel free to speak up f=r the Constitution anytime the mood strikes. It is time" ... NBC's : "I would hope that our leaders would never believe th=t any American desires to make another American an enemy. Let's dial it ba=k."

At the same time, understand that this is partl= a game to Trump. His confidants tell us he intentionally exploits the med=a's inclination to take the bait and chase our tails.

Axios= Jonathan Swan points out that yesterday's tweet was partly designed "to make th=se same media outlets repeat this attack for next three days." And it work=d: The tweet was the lead story of ABC's "World News Tonight."

Same deal with Trump's inaccurate statement at MacDill Air Force base in Ta=pa earlier this month that radical Islamic terrorism has "gotten to a poin= where it's not even being reported." As Trump foresaw, CNN and other netw=rks then played footage of themselves covering attacks the White House sai= were being ignored.

The upshot: We were talking ab=ut terrorism, which serves his purposes. And we were talking about Donald =rump.

But it IS a very dangerous game.

Bonus: Just posted

"Hillary Clinton's staffers are keeping up the fight," =y CNN's Eric Bradner: "

"[M]any of her former=staffers -- especially mid-level Brooklyn veterans -- are now on =he front lines of the left's anti-Trump resistance. Many say they're apopl=ctic over revelations that top Trump advisers were in constant contact wit= Russians.

"Some ex-Clinton staffers have moved i=to Democratic organizations that are shifting their focus to opposing Trum= -- such as Clinton press secretary Brian Fallon, now a senior adviser to =riorities USA; policy adviser Corey Ciorciari, now helming the Center for =merican Progress war room's policy and research efforts; and Cristobal Ale=, Clinton's national deputy director of voter outreach and mobilization, w=o is now the president of the Latino Victory Fund.

"Others are racing to fill the holes in the Democratic Party=exposed by November's results, in an effort to help activists newly energi=ed by Trump's victory strike back in upcoming elections, at congressional =own halls."

2. Article of the day

In the forthcoming issue of The New Yorker, "Letter from =ashington: GENERAL CHAOS -- What [former national security adviser] Mi=hael Flynn's downfall reveals about the Trump White House," by staff write= Nick Schmidle, has an ominous tone for Republicans who hope to move on: <=p>

"Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the House=intelligence committee, ... expressed concern to me about evidence preserv=tion."

"A former C.I.A. official raised ... conce=ns about how long Flynn was allowed to stay in his job. 'We've now got a g=y briefed on our most closely guarded secrets about a whole host of issues=E2��including Russia—who has been canned ... We don't have som=thing from the movies where you can put an eraser on someone's head and it=all goes away. We've got to rely on Mike Flynn to keep those secrets.'"
"White House officials portrayed Flynn =s having had his conversations with the Russian Ambassador on his own. But=Schiff and others are doubtful."

"Some of Fly=n's former military colleagues, even those from whom he's drifted=apart in recent years, told me they were skeptical that Flynn would have c=nducted shadow diplomacy on his own. Despite his reputation as an agitator= he was, in the end, a soldier who followed orders, they said."

A message from JPMorgan Chase & Co.

5M U.S. jobs need workers—can high schools =elp?

New Skills for Youth is a global, $75 million 5-year initiative to train=young people. Key stats:

5M+ young Americans are neither =orking nor in school

JPMorgan Chase will commit $20M to 10 U.S. s=ates for career programs

Learn More.

3. CEOs v. Trump

The cover of tomorrow's WashPost Business section=is "The cost of silence: Why more CEOs are speaking out in the Trump era,"=by Jena McGregor and Elizabeth Dworkin, showing CEOs as unlikely new activ=sts:

"[C]onsumers and employ=es are ... expecting the companies they buy from or work for to take a sta=d on social issues. And increasingly, CEOs are responding. American compan=es have emerged as a force for social change in recent years and are among=the most vocal critics of the new president's executive order."

"Although Silicon Valley has led the opposition, companies a= diverse as Chobani, Nike, Ford, Goldman Sachs and MasterCard all said the= were against the immigration order or expressed concerns about it. More t=an 160 biotech executives blasted it in a letter published last week. Star=ucks CEO Howard Schultz said he planned to hire 10,000 refugees in 75 coun=ries over five years."

"'There's just nothing,' i= scale or swiftness, that has compared to the corporate response to Trump'= entry ban, said Nancy Koehn, a historian at Harvard Business School."
Post-tweet make-up ... "Trump, With Praise for Boeing CEO,=Hints at Big Fighter-Jet Deal," by Bloomberg's Margaret Talev and Julie Johnsson:="Reporters ... spotted White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus holding a=brochure for the F/A-18 XT, a proposed Super Hornet upgrade that could ser=e as a stand-in as Lockheed ramps up production of the F-35, the Pentagon'= costliest weapons system."

Tru=p, s=eaking at the of unveiling of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner Aircraft, in N=rth Charleston, S.C.: "[I]n the old days, when I made this speech I got pa=d a lot of money. Now I have to do it for nothing. (Laughter and appla=se.) Not a good deal, but that's okay. We love it."

4. Stat of the week

Dennis Berman (@dkberman), financial =ditor of the Wall Street Journal, tweets, based on this Journ=l story: "In one chart, you can see the standard-of-living for=America's senior citizens slowly withering away."

5. Mike Pence in Europe

Pence and German Chancellor Angela Merkel meet for bilateral talks in Mu=ich today /AP's Matthias Schrader

The Vice President channels Reagan in remarks at the Mu=ich Security Conference, via Ashley Parker's pool report: "Peace o=ly comes through strength. President Trump believes we must be st=ong in our military might, able to confront any and all who would threaten=our freedom and our way of life."

Trying to reassure an=increasingly skeptical continent, Pence said: "Today, on behalf of Preside=t Trump, I bring you this assurance. The United States of America strongly=supports NATO and will be unwavering in our commitment to this transatlant=c alliance."

6. Every Republican should read this quote

In Sunday's N.Y. Times, L.A. Bureau Chief Adam Nagourne=, profiles House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), the #2 House l=ader, focusing on the early, steady allegiance that makes McCarthy "one of=Mr. Trump's closest allies on Capitol Hill." A memorable passage:

"[P]art of his success is what seems, i= this contentious time in Washington, the almost throwback style of glad-h=nd politicking that Mr. McCarthy embraces as he moves across the Capitol. = portrait of Ronald Reagan, a wide grin on his face, fills most of the wes= wall of his office. 'Everybody today wants to be a Reagan Republi=an, but how many walk around with that smile?' Mr. McCarthy said.=

7. A worthy essay

In the March issue of Harper's, professor and author Ca=vin Baker looks back at Obama in light of his successor, "Black Like Who? How Obama negotiated Ameri=a's racial tightrope":

"Obama'= legacy, which his Republican successor has promised to erase dow= to the very last executive order, seems assured. As one of the last black=firsts, he bore their special burden, and he bore it with sterling integri=y, self-knowledge, and extraordinary grace. He renewed the faith of many i= the secular American belief that we are capable of overcoming any limitat=on, including the flaw of our founding."

it seems reasonable to t=ink that Obama will ultimately be joined in the historical record with Lin=oln, Douglass, Du Bois, Shabazz, King, and Marshall: beacons of the best p=th forward."

8. Could Trump even help Oscar ratings?

That's the suggestion in an L.A. Times ar=icle, "ABC sells all its Oscar ad time; advertisers brace for politica= speeches," by Meg James: "Some Oscar advertisers, who bought their spots =onths ago, might be bracing for a furor over politics [during the ceremony= a week from tomorrow], particularly if conservatives decide to tune out. =ut if the Grammys were any indication, this year's Oscar ratings could be =igher than last year when the Academy Awards broadcast attracted 34.4 mill=on viewers, an eight-year low.

Ashwin Navin, c=ief executive of Samba TV, a data and analytics firm: "Trump has been very=good for television ... The politically charged environment has been good =or television, including these award shows."

Samba analyze= the Grammys audience for the Grammys and found that about half t=e 26 million viewers who tuned in didn't watch the show last year. Most of=the new viewers were younger.

Gavin: "There is a =eplacement of the audience going on, and this new base of viewers is payin= attention to these issues ... People really care about what Meryl Streep =ays."

9. Sports page: NBA All-Star Weekend

The NBA All-Star Game tips off tomorrow at 8:30 p.m. at=the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in New Orleans, but the partying has begun: The confluen=e of pre-Mardi Gras (Feb. 28) festivities and the basketball showcase =eans floats and street parties are converging with slam-dunks and buzzer-b=aters. Pics here from =ast night's NBA All-Star Celebrity Game: "7 moments we loved in New Orlean=."

But there's a serious political, business and so=ial backdrop playing out here ...

Too bad for Charlotte ... "There are rooms available, a dark arena, and sparse crowds at sport= bars have replaced the planned parties, celebrations and events around Ch=rlotte after the NBA moved its All-Star festivities to New Orleans because=of ... North Carolina's [anti-transgender bathroom] law that restricts the=rights of the LGBT community."

... But the Big Easy is taking advantage ...

10. 1 fun thing: Inside Bitmojis

My Bitmjoi, created by my niece Grace on Snapchat in just a couple of mi=utes while we were at breakfast in Scottsdale over Christmas.

The first Bitmjoi I ever saw was from Nick Johnston, ed=tor of Axios (@AxiosNick). When Nick was a managing editor in Bloomberg's =ashington bureau, Al Hunt had left an item in an Uber, and somehow it was =he affable Nick's sacred duty to retrieve said item. Nick sent me a Bitmoj=, a little cartoon version of an even-more-youthful Nick, collapsing in a =eap with the lettering: "I CAN'T EVEN." It was such a funny rendering, and=the message was so perfect for the moment. It's now Nick's Slack avatar.
Blain Rethmeier, a Bush 43 and Hill alumnus who's an =delman managing director, also has a strong Bitmoji game: Yesterday he sen= a text-message group a "Cheerio!" with a sunny drawing of himself, doffin= a derby. A few weeks ago, I sent him a Bitmoji high five in response to h=s compliment about an Axios video, and he sent back a doodle of himself, h=nd on heart, saying: "LET FREEDOM RING!"

The Wall Street Jou=nal's front-page A-Hed today's
"After winning over teens and young adults on mobile devices, bitmojis are seeping into corpor=te emails, messaging apps and texts. Now, eager and befuddled workers are =iguring out how to use the social tool without breaching professional cour=esy." See more Bitmojis in the Journal's articl=, "Sending Bitmojis to Co-Workers=E2��What Could Possibly Go Wrong?"

A message from JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Can high schools help fill 5M U.S. jobs?

In response to a crucial gap in career readiness among young people, JPM=rgan Chase launched New Skills for Youth, a global, $75M, 5-year initiativ=. Key stats:

5M young people ages 16-24 are neither working =or in school

JPMorgan Chase will commit $20M to 10 U.S. states fo= career programs

The investments, says Chairman and CEO Ja=ie Dimon, will give young people “a chance to succeed�=9D and create new pathways to economic opportunity.

See if your state is pa=t of the program.

Axios, 3100 Clarendon B‌lvd, Suite 200, Arlington VA 22201

You received this email because you signed up for newsletters from Axios.
Change your preferences or unsubscribe here.=/a>

Was this email forwarded to you?

Sign up now to get Axios in your inbox.

Follow Axios=on social media:

=                     &nb=p;