What could possibly go wrong?
On this Memorial Day, our national security seems more at risk than ever.
Not on the battlefield, but rather right in front of us and right at the heart of what makes us a democracy: our free elections and rule of law.
President Donald Trump makes it clearer every day that he respects authoritarian governments with strongman autocrats and has little regard for America's democratic and long-time allies.
He has seemed especially enamored with Russia's Vladimir Putin, who ordered a massive cyber and election interference attack on America.
And why not? Putin surrounds himself - in fact, creates - oligarchs who are happy to be fellow Putin billionaires with a great deal of political power. Those oligarchs, in turn, do Putin's bidding and support him.
It's easy to see, then, why Putin was interested in helping Trump get elected and why Trump has lavished praise on all things Putin: Putin seeks to expand his store of loyal oligarchs, and Trump is nothing if not ambitious.
Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum put her finger on it way back in August:.
"The real problem with Trump isn't that he is sympathetic to Russian oligarchs, it's that he is a Russian oligarch, albeit one who happens to be American. He is, rather, an oligarch in the Russian style - a rich man who aspires to combine business with politics and has an entirely cynical and instrumental attitude toward both. The Kremlin actively seeks to buy politicians all across Europe."
Applebaum also drew a corollary using Paul Manafort, the then-recently ousted boss of Trump's campaign. Over a long career, Manafort had helped a number of oligarchs come to power. He worked for Ferdinand Marcos and Angola's Jonas Savimbi. In Ukraine, Manafort helped transform an ex-convict, Viktor Yanukovych, into a corrupt president who fired on demonstrators and eventually was forced to flee Ukraine and is now living in exile in Russia.
Fast forward several months and a presidential election later. Now several probes are underway about Russia's meddling in our election, Trump and Russia links, as well as the Trump administration's possible obstruction to those investigations.
The latest shoe to drop is that the probe has expanded to Trump's son-in-law and closest White House adviser Jared Kushner. FBI investigators are focusing on meetings Kushner held in December with the Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak and Sergey Gorkov, the head of the Russian bank, Vnesheconombank, which has been the subject of U.S. sanctions following Russia's annexation of Crimea and its support of separatists in eastern Ukraine.
There is no longer any doubt that Putin ordered hacking and interference in our election and favored Donald Trump. What still must determined is exactly how and through whom. What part, if any, did the Trump team play?
The sanctity of our elections - and the integrity of our presidency - are as much a matter of homeland security as any battlefield where shots are fired.
Let us honor that certainty today and protect it - in the names of the many fallen soldiers and patriots who died to defend our free elections.
A shove here, a slight there
Never, ever get between President Donald Trump and a camera. Especially when he's grandstanding at NATO.
But Trump didn't count on the video that would go viral when he grabbed the shoulder of Montenegro's Prime Minister Dusko Markovic and shoved him aside so Trump could vault himself to the front as world leaders lined up for a traditional Brussels summit "family photo" last week.
The other leaders nearby looked at each other awkwardly as they realized what just happened. A woman at Trump's side appeared gave him a stern look, but our president gave her the same dust-off look he used when he refused to shake hands recently with Andrea Merkel. He squared his shoulders and posed, camera-ready.
Once-Trump-fan Joe Scarborough, of "Morning Joe," tweeted: "What a thug."
Election violence and regrets
"To his credit, he apologized."
That was the comment Friday from Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., about about the victory the night before of Republican Greg Gianforte in Montana's special congressional election, barely a day after Gianforte body-slammed a journalist to the ground and was charged with misdemeanor assault.
Gianforte brought a new element to campaigning: Resorting to violence when asked a question about the unpopular health care bill pending in Congress to replace the Affordable Care Act.
Gianforte had been favored to win. About 70 percent of Montana voters had voted early, so his poor judgment and ridiculous action on the eve of the election had little impact on the final vote. The state's three major newspapers had reversed their endorsements of Gianforte, and pundits wondered aloud if his reaction mirrored the new Trump coarseness of politics.
A Gianforte spokesman, in a statement, accused Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs of having been the aggressor, however, a Fox News Channel reporter who witnessed the confrontation backed Jacobs' version of events. The Fox reporter said at no time was Jacobs aggressive. She said Gianforte grabbed Jacobs by the neck, threw him to the floor, jumped on him and pommeled him - yelling all the while.
You might recall Donald Trump's campaign when he used his bully pulpit to tell supporters and security to punch protesters and he'd pay their legal fees. And we can't forget how his campaign staff manhandled reporters at their events.
It's not enough to apologize for being unfit to lead our states and nation.
But Rep. Cole was right about one thing: To Gianforte's credit, he did apologize. Not so, for Trump - our nation's punch-'em-and-shove-'em-out-of-the-way political role model.