HMM: White House Opens Door to Democrats in Wake of Health-Bill Failure.

Days after the House GOP health bill collapsed due to a lack of support from Republicans, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus brought up the idea of working with Democrats multiple times, leaving little doubt that the White House intended to send a message to the hard-line Republican flank.

“This president is not going to be a partisan president,” Mr. Priebus said on “Fox News Sunday.” He said that while “I think it’s time for our folks to come together, I also think it’s time to potentially get a few moderate Democrats on board as well.”

President Donald Trump could face hurdles in enacting his agenda if he can’t broaden his coalition, even though Republicans control both chambers of Congress. Markets have rallied since his election on the prospects that he would drive through tax cuts, boost infrastructure spending and cut regulations, giving a jolt to the economy.

The unraveling of the health bill last week calls into question how easily that broader agenda will be achieved, and could lead some investors to moderate their enthusiasm.

Why would the White House keep pushing on ObamaCare when there are so many other conservative legislative actions on its agenda?

ANDREW MALCOLM: The GOP’s Obamacare retreat: Another circular firing squad.

Coming one day after the troubled plan’s seventh anniversary, the legislative retreat appeared to be a major victory for minority House Democrats, though they did absolutely nothing to bring it about.

It will likely turn out to be a most compelling piece of evidence that the GOP’s current political dominance in Washington will not last long. Since 2010 the House staged dozens of symbolic Obamacare repeal votes, which they knew full well were futile as long as what’s-his-name had his feet up on the Oval Office desk.

Repeal was torpedoed by a rump pack of Republicans themselves who’ve shown a keen interest in policy-strutting but none in the actual teamwork of governing.

It’s worse than embarrassing. After seven long years of Obamacare opposition, Republicans couldn’t agree on what to repeal and what to substitute. Seriously?

To a candidate, Trump down to the smallest-minded GOP House member, made “Repeal and Replace” the premier political promise of 2016. Trump himself with characteristic emphasis promised it would be, “Immediate. Immediate!”

Democrats spent 14 months putting ObamaCare together and — this should be in a book called Legislation for Dummies marketed to Republicans — putting together the votes to get it passed.

It should also be noted that Democrats were perfectly willing to sacrifice their majority to get ObamaCare passed, knowing that they had a once-in-a-generation opportunity to concentrate more money and power in Washington.

The has GOP has shown no such dedication to its stated principle of returning money and power to the people.

VIDEO: Bill Maher’s Classic Putdown of Islamist Apologists. “Every time some bomb goes off, before it goes off, somebody yells ‘Allahu Akbar!’ I never hear anybody go ‘Merry Christmas! This one’s for the flying nun!’”

Indeed.

IF AT FIRST YOU DON’T SUCCEED: White House fence jumper from Everett arrested again.

Thirty-eight-year-old Marci Anderson Wahl of Everett, Washington, was arrested after an alarm sounded about 2:15 a.m. Sunday. Officials say she scaled a fence at the Treasury Building, next to the White House. She was charged with unlawful entry and contempt of court.

Wahl was first arrested Tuesday after trying to jump the White House fence. She was charged with unlawful entry and released on her own recognizance after being ordered to stay away from the area.

She was rearrested Friday after officers saw her near Lafayette Park. She was released again on her own recognizance after a Saturday court appearance.

It doesn’t appear that the courts are wising up any faster than Wahl is.

JOE BIDEN: ‘Do I Regret Not Being President? Yes’

ANDREW MCCARTHY: The Question Is Not Whether Trump Associates Were Monitored.

The reported intelligence collection efforts raise four separate questions that are too often conflated in the commentary:

1) Should the communications of Trump associates (all of whom are U.S. citizens, so far as we know) have been intercepted in the first place?

2) Regardless of whether the interception was proper, should the identities of the American citizens have been “masked” in order to protect them from, among other things, being smeared as subjects of government investigations?

3) Regardless of whether masking was called for, should the fact that the American citizens’ communications had been collected and reviewed in connection with investigations — presumably, intelligence investigations, not criminal probes — have been disclosed throughout the “community” of U.S. intelligence agencies?

4) Should that fact have been publicly disclosed, including in leaks to the media? (Spoiler alert: As my use of “leaked” indicates, public disclosure is a major no-no. In fact, it’s a felony no-no.)

Read the whole thing.

YOU DON’T SAY: A Replica Of The Successful 2015 Obamacare Repeal Is Languishing In Committee.

AND ANOTHER ONE DOWN: US drone strike kills man behind Marriott Hotel bombing, Pentagon says.

Qari Yasin was killed in a drone strike in Paktika Province on March 19, the Pentagon said late Saturday.

The September 2008 suicide truck bombing at the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad killed more than 50 people, including two US service members. It sparked a fire that charred the hotel, which is near the diplomatic section of Islamabad.

Yasin is responsible for other carnage, including an attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team, which was visiting Lahore, Pakistan, in March 2009. In that incident, gunmen sprayed the team’s tour bus with bullets as it neared the stadium, killing eight people — six police officers and two civilians — and leaving several visiting players wounded.

Faster, please.

MICHAEL LEDEEN: Does Trump Have a Strategy to Win the Global War?

Read the whole thing.

GET ‘EM WHILE THEY’RE YOUNG: Teen Vogue Writer Tweets ‘All White People Are Evil’

MIKE ALLEN: Inside the Trumpcare meltdown.

When the balky hardliners of the House Freedom Caucus visited the White House earlier this week, this was Steve Bannon’s opening line, according to people in the conference room in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building:

Guys, look. This is not a discussion. This is not a debate. You have no choice but to vote for this bill.

Bannon’s point was: This is the Republican platform. You’re the conservative wing of the Republican Party. But people in the room were put off by the dictatorial mindset.

One of the members replied: “You know, the last time someone ordered me to something, I was 18 years old. And it was my daddy. And I didn’t listen to him, either.”

Started on the wrong foot: Repeal-and-replace was always snakebit. Ryan had begun the process before Trump’s inauguration. “He boxed us in,” said one person close to the fight. “We didn’t have any choice.”

Was always wobbly: Trump relied too long on assurances from Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and HHS Secretary Tom Price that they had the process in hand. And “Ryan was telling him it was fine, and they’d bring it together at the end.” Instead, the bottom fell out.

What a mess.

AL HUNT: Democrats Have a Gorsuch Problem.

SCIENCE! Student Discovers Previously Unknown Form of Oppression.

FRACTURED CAUCUS: House Cancels Vote on GOP Health-Care Bill.

Mr. Trump asked Paul Ryan to pull the health care bill from the floor, an aide to the House GOP leadership said.

Mr. Ryan is scheduled to hold a news conference shortly.

And:

The House has postponed the health-care vote, a, Republican leadership aide said.

The House unexpectedly went into recess ahead of the planned vote, and is now holding an emergency GOP caucus meeting. Speaker Paul Ryan plans a press conference shortly.

Developing…

WELL, GOOD: The Harvard Crimson Condemns Campus Riots.

HMM:

BREAKING: OUTLOOK LOOKING BLEAK FOR GOP ON ‘OBAMACARE’ REPEAL BILL.

WSJ has a liveblog going, and the no votes are still trending up.

CLAIM: Peak oil? Sooner than you think.

To be clear, this is about peak oil demand rather than peak oil supply.

You don’t seem to read much these days about peak oil supply.

FREEDOM OF SPEECH FOR ME BUT NOT FOR THEE: Bus Denying Transgender Identity Vandalized in New York City.

WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: Synthetic Neurons Are Advancing Computing Power.

DAVID BOAZ: 25 Years Later, Is It Still the Hayek Century?

THAT’S REAL MONEY: $15,000 a month offered to ‘A Teams’ to fight Trump agenda.

Fight for the Future, started in 2011 as a digital activist group, on Monday issued the offer with this eye-catching opening: “Terrified about Trump? Quit your job, start an A-Team. We’ll fund it.”

“We’re currently taking applications for an initial launch of the project, and will be providing a few select teams with funding, guidance, and support,” said Evan Greer, campaign director for Fight for the Future.

Who funds the funders?

According to WikiPedia, Fight for the Future got its initial funding from the Media Democracy Fund, which the Capital Research Center says is backed by George Soros.

PATRICK POOLE: Accused Killer Nasser Hamad Invokes ‘Islamophobia’ Defense in Double Homicide.

Pre-emptive murder?

THIS IS THE PART OF OBAMACARE THE GOP “CAN’T” REPEAL: Obamacare Regulations Drove Up Premium Costs By Up to 68%.

CHALK ONE UP FOR THE PRESS: The Mayor Will Now Take Your Questions. Wait, Where’d He Go?

Mayor Bill de Blasio walked out on his own news conference on Thursday without answering any questions, irked that reporters were not asking what he wanted them to ask.

In an extraordinary test of wills with the City Hall press corps, Mr. de Blasio refused to respond to questions that might ordinarily be considered well within the bounds of what the mayor of New York City would be expected to address. He was asked about the murder of a black man who police said was stabbed to death in Manhattan by a white man who had come to the city to harm black people, and the arrest in Israel of a man accused of making a string of telephone threats against Jewish community centers and other sites in the United States.

The mayor had called reporters to a chilly block of East 56th Street to make a pitch about his proposal for a so-called mansion tax on the sale of apartments or houses of more than $2 million, to pay for rent relief for older New Yorkers. The plan would need approval by the state legislature and is seen as having little hope of success in a State Senate that has generally responded with hostility to both new taxes and the mayor’s initiatives.

Against the backdrop of a luxury high-rise (with a handwritten sign in one window reading, “De Blasio doesn’t care about the working middle class”), the mayor spoke about the tax over the din of construction, passing trucks and a heckler who shouted, “Everyone hates you, de Blasio!”

Then he said he would take questions on the tax proposal.

Reporters didn’t oblige — and good for them.