Trees...

Steam...

At his first rally since the episode just two and a half weeks ago, he reveled in one of the most coveted endorsements in the Democratic Party, from Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.     

Mr. Sanders declared himself “so delighted” that Ms. Ocasio-Cortez had thrown her support behind his campaign, hailing her as “an inspiration to millions of young people not just here in New York.”

Mr. Sanders also briefly and somewhat indirectly, addressed his health. “I am happy to report to you that I am more than ready, more ready than ever, to carry on with you the epic struggle that we face today,” he said. “I am more than ready to assume the office of president of the United States.”

The meeting took place by the Largest Public Housing in New York City. Sanders refer to it as needed 20 Billion Dollars.

The campaign is loosing steam right at the Cortez point.

Hunter...

Hunter Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden, said in an interview that he met, married and got matching "shalom" tattoos in less than a week after laying eyes on his current wife Melissa Cohen Biden, a filmmaker from South Africa.

Their wedding at Melissa's apartment six days later was so hastily thrown together that neither had their families in attendance and their wedding photos were taken by a friend on his cellphone.

Biden, who said he's still in the "honeymoon phase" of his marriage, said he's come clean with Melissa about his rocky past that includes his yearslong struggle with sobriety, getting kicked out of the Navy Reserve and dating his dead brother's wife Hallie.

His ex-wife Kathleen Biden, whom he married in 1993, filed a motion in D.C. Superior Court on Feb. 23, 2017 seeking to freeze Biden's assets.  

 She claimed that Biden had put the family on the brink of financial ruin by spending massive amounts of money in strip clubs and on drugs, alcohol and prostitutes. 

The one week marriage deal is something. Love is really blind, unless you see something...

Labeled...

What is this horrible thing that Hillary said about you?" one person asked Gabbard at a house party in West Branch.

Gabbard responded that "it revealed the truth that I have been experiencing for a long time now — which is that, because I have been trying to bring about an end to our country's long-held foreign policy of waging one regime-change war after the next . I am labeled as a traitor."

"This is a message that is being sent to every single American . who speaks out for peace," she said. Clinton appeared on a podcast where she did not mention the Hawaii congresswoman by name, but said she believes the Russians have "got their eye on somebody who's currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third party candidate." There was no mistaking whom she meant. Shameful, just a thought.

Breaking News...

Earlier this week, CNBC reported that Kasich had been in talks with his advisors to join a major cable news network, pointing to either CNN or MSNBC. Jan. 2019.

Former Republican Gov. John Kasich of Ohio will join CNN as a senior political commentator, where he will appear as a guest on a number of platforms, CNN announced.

Kasich's move to CNN is notable because he is one of the most prominent critics of President Trump within the Republican Party. He has declined to rule out a 2020 primary bid against Trump.

CNN sounded the "breaking news" alarm Friday after Republican John Kasich -- a CNN contributor and frequent critic of President Trump -- bucked the GOP and expressed his support for impeachment.

"And I say it with great sadness," Kasich, a former governor of Ohio, explained after confirming his stand against the president. Oct. 2019.    

Just a thought.

Warmonger...

Presidential candidate Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) did not hold back Friday when responding to 2016 nominee Hilary Clinton's suggestion that she is the "favorite of the Russians" for 2020, excoriating the former secretary of State as 

"the queen of warmongers" and "personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party."

While the former first lady and New York senator didn't refer to Gabbard by name, it was clear that she was going after the Hawaii congresswoman, who has had to repeatedly deny accusations of being a Russian asset.

Through a series of tweets, Gabbard went right at Clinton, calling her the

 "embodiment of corruption" among the Democratic Party establishment.

"From the day I announced my candidacy, there has been a concerted campaign to destroy my reputation," Gabbard said.

Avoiding...

The government reporting that the nation’s economy had grown at an unexpectedly fast pace in the first quarter of the year. While Trump took credit for the surging economy, Democratic presidential contenders were immersing themselves in the Mueller report and debating whether incarcerated felons should be allowed to vote.

Later they were revisiting the violence at a white supremacist rally in 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia. In his own campaign announcement video, Biden did not explicitly mention jobs or the economy once.

“We don’t really have a robust national message on the economy, said Celinda Lake, a leading Democratic strategist and pollster.      

 “We will tend to talk about things like paid leave and equal pay — and those things are all very popular policies. But they don’t add up to an economic message that is robust enough to win the presidency ”

 That’s a recipe for disaster in 2020.”

Kent...

A career State Department official told congressional investigators this week that he raised concerns in 2015 with a senior official at the White House about then-Vice President Joe Biden’s son being on the board of a Ukrainian natural-gas company because of concerns about the potential optics of a conflict of interest, a person familiar with the matter said.

The State Department official, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent, told lawmakers behind closed doors that he raised the issue in January 2015 and expressed reservations about Hunter Biden’s position at Burisma Holdings because it could add to the challenges to convey to Ukraine the importance of cleaning up corruption and avoiding even potential conflicts of interest, this person said.

“Regardless of whether anything is wrong, it looks terrible,” Mr. Kent told lawmakers that he told the official who worked in Mr. Biden’s office at the time,  

Stuff...

Struggle...

 A veteran police officer was shot and killed in New York City just after midnight during a physical struggle with an armed suspect.  The 27-year-old suspect was also shot and killed, police said.

Mulkeen and the suspect got into a prolonged struggle on the ground with the officer shouting, "He's reaching for it, he's reaching for it," according to audio from the body-camera footage, police said.

"Numerous shots" were fired by five separate police officers and Mulkeen was struck three times, police said. It's unclear who fired the fatal shots.

Police said a .32 caliber revolver, believed to have been wielded by the suspect, was recovered at the scene.