The Morning Briefing: Drone Strike on Maduro and Much, Much More

Good Monday morning.

Here is what’s on the president’s agenda today:

The president has dinner with supporters in Bedminster, New Jersey

Maduro assassination attempt

Over the weekend, there was an assassination attempt on Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro. At least six people have been arrested in connection with the attempt.

Interior Minister Nestor Luis Reverol called the attempt on Maduro’s life during a televised speech to the military a terrorist attack — and said more people could be detained.

Security officers were able to disable one of the drones flying toward the stage where Maduro was standing with high-ranking officials, Reverol said.

The other machine collided into a nearby building and exploded, he said.

The Trump administration has denied any involvement in the assassination attempt.

Two top Trump administration officials have now denied U.S. involvement in the apparent assassination attempt of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Saturday night.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo echoed the comments made by National Security Adviser John Bolton earlier in the day as he returned from an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) conference Sunday night.

“Ambassador Bolton said this morning there wasn’t an American connection,” Pompeo told reporters. “We don’t really have a lot of detail about what took place beyond what you’ve seen and what the — I think the White House has put out so far.”

Bolton told Fox News’ Chris Wallace Sunday morning, “Well, I can say unequivocally there is no U.S. government involvement in this at all. Just within the past couple of hours, I have spoken with our charge in Caracas, the head diplomatic official down there. He and his staff were up much of the night making sure that Americans in Venezuela were safe.”

I’ll go out on a limb and say there are probably plenty of people who have it in for Maduro, who has starved and murdered his people.

Candace Owens suspended from Twitter for…

…tweeting racist Sarah Jeong’s old tweets but switching the races around. Jeong, a new employee at the New York Times, found herself in a bit of a controversy when a bunch of her disgusting, anti-white, racist tweets were discovered. The Times defended Jeong, and she’ll be staying at the paper since the Times is comfortable with anti-white racism. We should all be happy that the mainstream media is finally acknowledging that racism is acceptable provided it is directed against the proper targets: white people. Who even knows what “white people” means? I’m white, but I’m also Jewish. Normally that would place me somewhere on the left’s victim continuum, however, I’m a conservative libertarian, which voids my victim membership since I don’t share the progressives’ political orientation. So it’s complicated.

Owens, illustrating this point, tweeted out some of Jeong’s greatest Twitter hits but changed “white” to “Jewish” and “black” and was suspended from Twitter for doing so.

Owens, the communications director for conservative activist group Turning Points USA, on Saturday sent out a pair of tweets quoting Jeong’s anti-white statements — which did not earn her a Twitter suspension — but swapped out the word “white” with “Jewish” and “black.”

Owens was reinstated following a strong backlash.

“Twitter takes reports of violations of the Twitter Rules very seriously,” Twitter’s team wrote in an email to Owens, who shared it with TheDCNF. “After reviewing your account, it looks like we made an error.”

“This was our mistake and we’ve apologized to the account owner for the error,” a spokeswoman for Twitter told TheDCNF. Of course.

“The thing is, I wouldn’t have minded if I was locked out, because I actually agree with Twitter that that language is inappropriate,” Owens said.

“My point in tweeting that and replacing the word with black and Jewish yesterday was to show how different that mentality is when you see it in that context and you see talking about Jewish people and people predisposed to burning under the sun or black people saying they should live underground,” she said.

“It’s horrifically racist, but somehow we’ve gotten to a point in society where it’s OK to say the exact same thing about white people, and that’s problematic.”

It certainly is. It’s hard to take seriously the media’s “concern” about the danger of a white identity politics movement when it encourages and excuses other identity politics movements. What did they think was going to happen when groups of people are turned against the designated racial villain? White folks respond to this racial cage match with “hey, wait a minute,” and the media/progressives say, “shut up, Hitler.” What a mess we’ve made of our culture. How about we just treat all people with dignity and respect?

Newseum pulls “fake news” shirts

Another media-generated crisis claims a victim: the “fake news” T-shirts sold in the Newseum gift shop.

Newseum selling "Fake News," Trump MAGA merchandise https://t.co/ZcPd2b5xP2 pic.twitter.com/keLe4cjjlD

— The Hill (@thehill) August 3, 2018

The Newseum pulled the shirts after the humorless media went crazy and started howling about how noble their vocation is and how they should be above mockery of any kind. Lighten up, guys.

“The Newseum has removed the “You Are Very Fake News” T-shirts from the gift shop and online,” a statement posted on the Newseum website read. “We made a mistake and we apologize. A free press is an essential part of our democracy and journalists are not the enemy of the people.”

Fortunately, I ordered two immediately before they pulled the shirts. I will wear my shirt to next year’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Just kidding, I don’t get invited.

Gunroundupp

At least 40 shot and four killed in a night of Chicago gun violence

Shooter Targets Back To School Event — Runs Into A Good Guy With A Gun

Hardline U.S. ‘gundamentalists’ pressure NRA from within

OH HELLO THERE Suspect accused of threatening House GOP leaders had ammo, gun receipts, affidavit says

Berkeley police arrest 20, seize ‘dozens of weapons’ at opposing protests

Gun rights group pulls endorsement for GOP candidate over criticism of 3D-printed guns

Your daily WTFs:

Broadway Performers and Rosie O’Donnell to Stage a Musical Protest Outside the White House

New stage production of ‘Diary Of Anne Frank’ replaces Nazis with ICE agents hunting for illegal immigrants

Historical picture of the day:

One of the U. S. Air Forces most famous war planes, the Boeing B29 Super fortress Enola Gay, lands at its Tinian Base after the historic atomic bombing mission against the Japanese city of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. (AP Photo/Max Desfor )

Other morsels:

Charlotte Rae — Mrs. Garrett from TV’s ‘The Facts of Life,’ ‘Diff’rent Strokes’ — dies at 92

Trump Claims ‘Fake News’ Media Is At It Again With Reports About Trump Jr. Meetings

Anti-semitic graffiti on Auschwitz survivor Elie Wiesel’s house

White House approves Carr Fire disaster declaration, California governor says

Iran receives more airplanes ahead of renewed US sanctions

Eleven children found at squalid New Mexico compound, two arrested

WAT Steven Seagal Appointed by Russia as Special Envoy to the U.S.

5 Killed After Plane Crashes in Strip Mall Parking Lot in California

New York Spent $5 Million On Wind Turbines That Don’t Even Work

“60 Minutes” chief Jeff Fager to “stay on vacation” amid investigation into sexual misconduct

LOVE THIS Watch Patrick Stewart on ‘Star Trek’ return