Today’s edition of quick hits:
* A serious threat: “Tropical Storm Harvey rapidly intensified into a hurricane on Thursday as it hurtled toward Texas, with meteorologists forecasting the storm could be a ‘major hurricane’ when it makes landfall. NOAA’s National Hurricane Center said early afternoon that Harvey had become a hurricane with 80 mph sustained winds.”
* USS McCain: “After more than 80 hours of searching thousands of miles of open sea, the U.S. Navy now hopes only to recover the bodies lost from the USS John S. McCain after it collided with an oil tanker near Singapore.”
* Let the lawsuits begin: “Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke recommended Thursday that President Trump alter at least three national monuments established by his immediate predecessors, including two in Utah, a move expected to reshape federal land and water protections and certain to trigger major legal fights.”
* Good idea: “Sen. Chuck Schumer called on President Donald Trump on Thursday to dissolve his controversial vote fraud commission, blasting it as a voter suppression tool pushing the agenda of the same white supremacists who violently protested in Charlottesville.”
* The slow-motion backlash continues: “A Florida hospital’s foundation said Thursday that it had canceled plans to hold a fundraiser luncheon at President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club this November, becoming the 18th charity to cut ties with the club after Trump’s comments on the violent protests in Charlottesville.”
* Middle East: “Qatar restored full diplomatic relations with Iran on Thursday, the latest volley in an 11-week-old geopolitical feud that has set the tiny yet fabulously wealthy Persian Gulf nation against its neighbors and rattled a previously placid part of the Middle East.” * That’s a lot of premature deaths: “Russia’s ambassador to Sudan, a career diplomat with decades of service, was found dead at his Khartoum home on Wednesday, Russian and Sudanese officials reported. The death of the ambassador, Mirgayas Shirinsky, who was in his early 60s, was at least the fourth time since December that a senior Kremlin envoy has died prematurely overseas.” * Again with Colombia? “The U.S. Army detail assigned to Vice President Mike Pence’s communications team has been re-assigned for bringing women back to their hotel in Colombia, according to three U.S. defense officials. The soldiers didn’t register the women when they brought them in, the officials said.” (Update: NBC News, which originally published the report, has updated its piece to say the hotel was in Panama, not Colombia.) Anything to add? Consider this an open thread.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past." Recommended
