Subject: ?Axios AM: Mike's Top 10 — Snow Day Edition: Testing Trump-Ryan — Trump's data secrets — First look: Bullish business forecast — How Trump likes his plane
From: "Mike Allen" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 14 Mar 2017 07:24:12 -0400 (EDT)

Presented by Qualcomm:

Testing Trump-Ryan — Trump's data secrets — First look= Bullish business forecast — How Trump likes his plane

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Presented By Qualcomm

Axios AM

By Mike Allen = ·Mar 14, 2017

1 big thing: Testing Trump-Ryan

The social medias loved the turtleneck that House Energy and Commerce Vi=e Chairman Joe Barton (R-Tex.) rocked on "Hardball," in a concession to th= coming snow day.

When the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office releas=d its worse-than-expected estima=e just after 4 p.m. that 24 million people would lose coverage under T=umpcare in 10 years (14 million next year), Axios' David Nather accompanie= his flash post with a GIF of a mushroom cloud.

Breitbart =ad a bomb of its own that Paul Ryan opponents had been husbanding=for months, waiting to detonate at a time of maximum vulnerability: audio of the S=eaker on Oct. 10, a few days after the release of the Billy Bush tape,=saying on a conference call with House Republicans: "I am not going to def=nd Donald Trump — not now, not in the future." His remarks had bee= reported at the time, but now the tape was out there.

For =epublicans on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, it was the coup d= grâce on a downer day. House GOP leadership soldiered on, saying tha= members are "by and large in a good place" despite the "coverage gap": "[=]he score was better than expected on premiums [down 10% over 10 years], d=ficit reduction, tax relief." Ryan said he was "encouraged"!

Aides said leader=hip plans to send the "well-crafted plan" — mostly as-is= — to the floor for final passage by the end of next week. That th=oretically would allow the Senate to hit the target of passing it before E=ster break, along with the confirmation of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supre=e Court.

But the CBO's headline number added huge =ncertainty, and mammoth new risk for Republicans. The N.Y. Times' David Le=nhardt called it "jaw-dropping." A Democrat who knows the Hil= well emailed us: "Paul Ryan can kiss his AHCA [American Health Care Act] =ood-bye."

Nather writes this morning in "Trumpcare and the=CBO freakout" that his bottom line summed up in this tweet from former Senate Republican ai=e Rodney Whitlock: "Critical, soul searching moment for GOP. Ignore #CBOscore and plow ahead or admit that s=me ideas might just be problematic."

A theory from =ne Republican lobbyist: "Trump throws Ryan under the bus. Negotiates a dea= and they pass it." Another counters: "More likely Trump gets Ryan to make=changes but has to campaign to help get the votes in the House." <=strong>

Either way, the House R optimism is based o= policy, and now we're in the realm of politics. Our experts expect some t=ansition tweak to soften the blow.

2. First look

An exclusive for Axios AM readers ... The top takeaway =rom the Business Roundtable's Q1 CEO Economic Outlook Survey, to be announ=ed at 11:15 a.m. today on a conference call with JPMorgan Chase Chairman =nd CEO Jamie Dimon (BRT's chairman), and Business Roundtable President and=CEO Josh Bolten:

Expectations =ise for sales, hiring and investment: The Business Roundtable CEO=Economic Outlook Index — a composite of CEO projections for sales =nd plans for capital spending and hiring over the next six months -- made =ts largest increase since the fourth quarter of 2009.

3. Trump's data secrets

Greg Ruben / Axios

Worth reading the whole thing ... "How Trump's data operation helped=him win," by Axios' Sara Fischer and Kim Hart: "According to conversat=ons with over two dozen staffers and advertising experts involved with the=data and advertising operations of both presidential campaigns, the Democr=tic party's data machine that worked so well in 2008 and 2012 may have end=d up working against Hillary Clinton in 2016."

The bi= reason: The Clinton campaign's data-driven media and communicati=n tactics may have been too precise amid an unusual media climate against = non-traditional candidate. Conversely, the Trump campaign's reliance on i=tuition over data drove their message to people and places they would've n=ver otherwise reached, like white, male voters in Wisconsin and Michigan =E2�� the voters that delivered his victory.

The pi=ce includes this look at the state of the art for mass-message te=ting:

Trump: Gary Coby, who led the Trump Camp=ign's advertising team alongside Brad Parscale, said that each day, the ca=paign tested 40,000-50,000 automated ad combinations on Facebook for $200,=00-$300,000. From there, they found which messaging attracted audiences wh=se voter files weren't pegged as being likely to vote for Trump. Experimen=ing that quickly allowed them to build up enough historical data to very q=ickly identify trends of which ads worked and which didn't. Coby told Axio= that campaign staff got so good at predicting effectiveness of certain me=saging, that they could see what worked after only spending $20-$50 on a p=rticular ad.

The Clinton took a more strategic approach, focusing on fewer, more =argeted messages, that were more likely to appeal to certain voters and re=ining them through surveys on video ads across the web. The campaign used =echnology that was able to measure specifically how messages resonated wit=in different voter files, and drill into subgroups to identify areas for f=ture message optimization. The technology even included ways to measure ho= external events affected responder bias.

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4. The wilderness

The forthcoming N.Y. Times Magazine cover story is abou= Senate Dems ... "The New Party of No: How a president and a =rotest movement transformed the Democrats," by Charles Homans:

=strong>"By mid-February, spirits in Democratic Washington had pal=ably lifted. You wouldn't have described the mood as triumphal; it was mor= as if everyone had emerged from the basement after a tornado to discover =hat, while the car was upside down somewhere, at least the house was still=standing."

"When I met Warren, ... I asked her ..= whether the postelection unity that Trump provided the Democratic Party m=de her ambitions to reform it easier or harder to realize. 'I think it has=reminded Democrats we need to run on our values ... Because our values are=more in line with most of America.'"

"If you squinted at the bodies packing the streets and the town halls, though, the pict=re looked an awful lot like the recent past: Here were people drawn togeth=r in defense of liberal immigration and refugee policies, reproductive rig=ts, civil liberties and preserving Obama's policy legacy, and in oppositio= to a president who was moving against all those things. These wer= last year's arguments, only louder."

"Schumer, <=strong>precisely no one's idea of a revolutionary, was now, at least in a =arrow constitutional sense, the leader of the resistance. On my way out of=his new office, I noticed a green marble fireplace and asked him if he'd u=ed it yet. 'Oh, man,' he said. 'It's my favorite perk. I live in Brooklyn =E2�� I never had a fireplace. I'm learning to start fires.'"

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5. Top-ed

Michael Gerson column in WashPost, "Republicans are defining lunacy down": "[W]e are see=ng the corruption of the Republican Party, as it tolerates, excuses and ab=orbs Trump's conspiratorial thinking. ... Trump does not face a coup, just=a government he has attacked and refused to lead."

6. How Trump likes his plane

Garrett Graff for Bloomberg Businessweek, "Trump Force One Is Ready for Takeoff: After decades in the sky, t=e president's fleet is finally getting an upgrade—unless the new p=ssenger-in-chief adds turbulence":

"The oddity of Trump's December tweet is that the program its=lf is really too new to be over budget. The outlines of the project are st=ll forming. Although most features of the plane haven't yet been decided, = few things are known: Boeing says it will be able to fly almost 1,000 nau=ical miles farther and produce 16 tons less carbon dioxide on a typical fl=ght, despite being about 154,000 pounds heavier. ...

"In his private life, Trump's personal airc=aft is famously flashy—with gold-plated seat belts and bathroom fa=cets, a silk-lined master bedroom, a 57-inch TV, and the Trump family cres= liberally emblazoned on seats and pillows. When he was given the chance t= select drapes for the Oval Office, he pored over 17 options (eventually c=oosing gold). ... Depending on the fixtures and finishing touches, the new=presidential planes themselves will likely cost about $380 million apiece.=

7. Undoing Obama, abroad

WashPost A1-er, "Trump wants to relax rules govern=ng drone strikes": "The Trump administration is close to finishing a r=view that would make it easier for the Pentagon to launch counterterrorism=strikes anywhere in the world by lowering the threshold on acceptable civi=ian casualties and scaling back other constraints imposed by the Obama adm=nistration."

Why it matters: "The changes to t=e Obama-era Presidential Policy Guidance would empower the Pentagon to mak= decisions on targets without approval from the White House and potentiall= scrap the 'near-certainty' standard of no civilian deaths for strikes out=ide war zones. The Trump plans are also likely to relax the requirement th=t potential terror targets pose a 'continuing and imminent threat' to U.S.=personnel."

8. Tops in tech

"Airbnb CEO signals company is planning IPO in 2018=" by N.Y. Post's Lisa Fickenscher: "Brian Chesky has finally set = clock on going public. The 35-year-old chief executive of Airbnb hinted t=at the home-sharing site could launch an initial public offering next year= 'We are halfway through the two-year process of getting ready to go publi=,' Chesky said at a luncheon hosted by the Economic Club of New York."
=p>Axios' Kia Kokalitcheva writes from San Francisco ... A= SXSW's Interactive leg wraps up, companies are showcasing their last few =ech products, like Google's high-tech =acket in partnership with Levi's. But maybe it's good thing that t=e end is near — after all, everyone is busier checking their phone= than doing anything else, as The Verge's Lauren Good= concludes.

Tech exit fever: Monday wa= saw a lot exit action from tech companies. After Intel announced i=s $15.3 billion acquisition of publicly-traded Mobileye to beef up=its self-driving technology, Yext and Cisco's last minute acquisition of AppDynamic showed, anyt=ing is possible.

Another Google=messaging app: The company's internal incubator, Area 120, has built an app for watching and=sharing videos with friends called Uptime. But it wasn't long befo=e some took to Twitter<=u> to point out that Google already has several messaging apps, so Uptime's purpo=e is unclear.

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9. Big in business

Axios' Chris Matthews writes from New York that Ford wi=l avoid a 25% tariff with a Chinese factory: "Ford's luxury Lincoln brand =lans to ramp up its sales in China, revealing plans Monday to produce a ne= luxury SUV in China by 2019, to capitalize on a booming demand there."
Unfair trade: Foreign car makers face a 25% tarif= before they can sell their cars in China, making it difficult exporters t= compete with companies that produce within the country's borders. Further=ore, a U.S. company can't build factories in China without a joint-venture=partner — Ford will build its new vehicle in concert with state-ow=ed Changan Automobile. Ron Harbour, an autos consultant with Oliver Wyman,=points out that GM's China-made Buick Envision, for instance, only faces a=2.5% tariff before hitting the American market and no joint-venture requir=ments: "Does that sound like fair trade to you?"

Why it ma=ters: Ford says the decision shouldn't have domestic political im=lications, as the brand will only be sold in China. But if China were more=open to foreign trade, it wouldn't be necessary for Ford to risk investmen= there, and it's possible that rising Chinese demand could be counted on f=r more American jobs.

10. 1 fun thing: Bracketology

No. 1 seeds in the NCAA women's tourney (above) are UCo=n (trying for a record fifth cons=cutive national championship), Baylor, Notre Dame and South Carolina.
<=>Axios' Shannon Vavra spotted this in Wired ... "Hack Your March Madness Bracket =ith the Algorithm Method ... mathematically proven tips to help you score =ffice-pool glory": "Tournament games may be played on neutral courts, but =roximity to home still makes a difference. When in doubt, bet against the =eam that has journeyed the farthest and across the most time zones."

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Qualcomm inventions helped launch the mobile revolution and can be found=in billions of devices around the world, from smartphones and tablets, to =ameras and cars. They remain relentless in their pursuit of the next big t=ing, to make people more connected, to make a difference in everyday life.=Learn more.

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