Someone is willing to step forward and do the hard thing do the dangerous thing. Because despite the risk its the right thing to do. When people put themselves out there and put themselves on the line, in order to do what they think must be done. We tend to call that bravery. I dont know exactly what you call it when somebody does the hard thing does the dangerous thing. Because its something that needs to be done. They believe its necessary for the good of the country. I dont know what you call it when a person does that thing, but they do it in secret. Under a cloak of bh somebody does the brave thing but they go out of their way to make sure nobody can find out it was them who did it. Its still bravery. But its like the cat burglary subset of bravery. I dont know what you call it. Its like everybody steps forward and says i am sparta. Its the opposite of that. Wasnt me. Not me. Instead of people volunteering themselves and putting themselves out there on the line. Somebody does the right thing but nobody is willing to admit it was them. I dont know what you call that. That just happened. On russia sanctions. Its weird. You will notice were not having a federal government shut down. Thats because once again they were able to get a big federal Government Spending bill passed and signed at the very last minute. Thus averting what would have been a government shut down. Its a big long bill. Theres one section in the bill that nobody in Congress Nobody in either house and nobody in either party in congress. Nobody will admit that they wrote it. Quote in a five page section titled countering russian influence and aggression. This big spending bill that got passed into law today. Habz a bunch of new specific prohibitions on american taxpayer dollars going to russia. The bill adds 250 million to the countering russian influence fund. In our own government. It directs a bunch of money towards supporting democracy programs in russia. Significant new sanctions against russia. And it quote bans the use of federal funds for entering into new contracts or new agreements to provide federal assistance to the russian federation. This is not just something thats been proposed. This was signed into law today. By the president. But nobody knows who put it in the bill. Andrew wrote this up for the daily beast. They did a super headline over this headline. Shh. As in dont tell anybody this happened. Quote the origin of the russia measures and spending bill remain a mystery. Lawmakers are unsure as to who exactly inserted the measures into the spending bill. I am not sparta. Nobody here is sparta. None of us did this. Wasnt us. I mean, this is some very specific kind of bravery that we need a new word for. This anonymous congress appears to have worked. We got new russia sanctions today. Thanks to anonymous someone. It worked. For a minute it locked like it wasnt going to work. The president woke everybody up with a random curve ball. What a big win it was for him. And the president said this morning ill veto it. He then didnt veto it. He signed it at the strange event that he announced would be a press conference but it wasnt. Because he signed it we didnt get a government shutdown. We got a bunch of russia sanctions written into law. And i dont know who did that. Neither do you. Who knows if well ever find out. But its not hard to recognize the reason for the secrecy on that. When the history of this moment and this administration is written, the record will show the last public remarks from secretary of state tillerson before he was fired and the last public remarks from hr mcmaster many both cases the last public thing they said as government officials before the president fired them and removed them from the posts, in both cases. The last thing they said were comments that were very critical of russia. Now tonight cnn ronts beyond his public remarks. The last action mcmaster took as National Security adviser in the white house before he was fired he over saw a National Security counsel process that resulted in a recommendation to the president that the United States should expel Russian Diplomats from the u. S. Once again. This time because of the russia nerve agent assassination attempt carried out in great britain. National security adviser reportedly over saw that process at the National Security counsel. He and the National Security counsel recommended to the president he expel Russian Diplomats. On wednesday. And then trump fired him thursday. Now raise your hand if you think President Trump will follow that recommendation and expel Russian Diplomats from the United States as punishment for the nerve agent poisoning he was too afraid to bring up person to person. When he spoke to vladimir putin. Think hes going kick out diplomats . Even if he doesnt follow that recommendation from the counsel. If he doesnt do that, past peerngs suggests he wont. Hed never the less is going to have to implement these sanctions. And these new funding restrictions against russia. And thats because some anonymous member of congress put on a ski mask and pried open the window and snuck it into the bill and got away without anybody knowing who did it. Courage. So, things are weird. Even more than usual. Its been a helterskelter news cycle. Major headline today was trump aids are at their wits end. Reports that in the middle of President Trump threatening that he was going to veto the spending bill and shult down the government. Reporters were calling the white house to find out if he meant this. If he was serious. Whether it was going to happen. White house officials had no idea what to tell reporters. Because they were completely blind sided. By the president s behavior today. Ask friday whether he was serious about vetoing the bill. One white house official said simply who knows. Thats a white house official. Who knows . We also learned today that part of the surprise of the mcmaster firing last night was that white house chief of staff and other senior officials were hard at work planning an announcement that not only was mcmaster going to be fired but a bunch of other officials as well. Including multiple cabinet officials. Part of the surprise was that they were planning on announcing the firings at once. When all of a sudden the president got on twitter and fired mcmaster. I dont know if that makes you foal bert or worse about stability in the government. It was a shock to everybody the National Security adviser was fired. But only because a whole bunch of other people at senior levels were also supposed to be fired at the same time. And those other people havent been fired. Yet. So were still waiting for those firings to happen. Do those shoes still drop . Even among white house. The firing and hiring of john bolten was timed by the president to distract from one particular interview that aired last night on cnn. In Karen Mcdougal discussed in detail what she says was a serious ten month long extramarital affair with the president. Capped off during the president ial campaign. With a hush money deal facilitied by the president s friend. A significant Campaign Finance violation and it was illegal fraud by the president s personal lawyer. Michael cohen. Acting on the president s behalf. That interview was last night in the 8 00 hour. 90 minutes before air time is when the president announced he was firing the National Security adviser. That timing a surprise both to the National Security adviser and to the guy who he announced would be getting the job next. And if the speculation even tr within the white house is correct, that that is what drove that timing. And effort to distract from that interview. If the speculation is true. That the National Security adviser to the president of the United States was fired to distract from Karen Mcdougal interview. Heaven help us. For whatever this president and this white house are going to do to distract us this weekend. The Stormy Daniels is due to air sunday night on 60 minutes. What do you do to distract from the second interview . In the you have to buy me tacos staff betting pool on this. My pick is mike flynn early pardon. Pardon on early sunday afternoon. I do really love tacos. It doesnt mean im rooting for that out come. Im expecting thats what well get. I have a square. Mike flynn pardon and my timing early sunday afternoon flt well see. The dow dropped another 424 points today after plunging 724 points yesterday. This latest plunge appears to be due to the president s actions. Due to the president s new economic attacks on china. China saying that it will rialuate launching its own economic attacks on u. S. Manufacturers and farmers. Who export key products that china singling out for retaliation. Pork and apples and steel pipe. All the business reporting is china is gerding for a full scale trade war. With the United States. Due to the president s actions. If so well look back at today as the initial vol lvolley of te war. The dow dropped 1,400 points. I mention this weekend is expected to be newsier than usual. Thats in part because of the Stormy Daniels interview scheduled sunday night. Its also because of the expectation that the president or the white house might do Something Weird or dramatic to try to distract from the interview sunday night. It is also expected to be a very news weekend because tomorrow is expected to be a big freaking march in washington d. C. And around the country. The march against gun violence. The biggest march willing in washington. Hundreds of thousands of people. 800 marchs are expected around the country and the word. In solidarity with the Florida School shooting survivors. On the occasion of the march the boston globe has done something interesting. This wrap around front edge op ed. I think this is very interesting. In keeping with the way the kids who survived the shooting have recentered the debate on guns and made things seem possible that six weeks ago wouldnt even worth considering. This wrap around in the globe also makes a case for basically not just recalibrating the debate. But recalibrating what we consider to be Central Information for the National Debate about guns and gun violence. The boston globe is specifically important. Massachusetts should be seen as americas gun violence success story. And central about approaching gun violence as a country. Massachusetts has the lowest gun death rate in the country. 3 and a half gun deaths per 100,000 people. Which is a lot. But less than the United States. If the rest of the country emlated massachusetts and brought their rates down to massachusetts. That would save 27,000 american lives per year. 27,000 people wouldnt die. If other states were able to do what massachusetts has done. With their gun violence rate. So its an interesting approach. The globe with this op ed section is trying to put at center of the debate what massachusetts has done right. Lt kinds of policy in place in massachusetts that have resulted in this best out come. In the whole country. So other states and the federal government should think about copying it. As a best case scenario. Best practice example. On the occasion of tomorrows march whether or not you are participating in d. C. Or your home state. Or whether or not you know anybody going to this thing. I think it is helpful to approach the challenge being posed by the parkland survivors from base of information. Framing that isnt necessarily something that it defined by the nra. They have been such a driving force in how we talk about guns in the country. That they have shaped the terms on which we think about it. Think about it from the massachusetts success. On this subject instead. As the globe notes in there wrap around op ed tomorrow. 78 of American Adults dont own a gun. Statistically speaking it is way more normal in america to not own a gun. 78 of American Adults dont own a gun. Half of guns nationwide are owned by 3 of americans. Even among american gun owners. Most american gun owners support fairly serious reform. On gun policy designed to reduce gun violence. I think thats why people will be surprised by the number of people who turn out in the streets tomorrow. The people will turn out in dc and the number of people in these hundreds of events around the country. And there have been some small changes. There were modest gun reforms signed spoo law in the nra friendly state of florida. Where the shooting happened. In the big spending bill the president got weird about. But signed today. There is a provision in the bill to undo the prohibition that has stopped the centers for Disease Control from studying gun violence. That enforced ignorance provision in u. S. Law is it the most important thing in term of gun safety but it is something. People have been complaining about it. Nobody was able to change it before now. It just changed. The president has decided part he wants to work on is bump stocks. An after market accessory you can attach to the rifle to fire faster. The Justice Department will pursue regulations to ban or more strictly regulate those accessories. So, the nra would have you believe that any new gun regulation, any gun safety reform is end of the constitution. Impossible and imagine. Impossible to hope for. Were about to find out what is possible if you stop listening to them. Sdp start listening to literally everybody else who is affected by gun violence in the country. And tomorrow is a big part of that. And on that subject a sort of strange thing emerged. Concerning john bolten. The man who President Trump announced yesterday as the new National Security adviser. Since that announcement reporter tim mac turned up a strange video. This video from 2013. Featuring john bolten. Can we drop the lower third on the screen. Thank you. I want to play a tiny bit. You have to see the subtitles. While hes talking. Thank you for this opportunity. To address the russian people on the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the russian constitution. Today, youre engaged in historic debate about the possible expansion of your freedom. Should the russian people have the right to bear arms . You see the subtitles in russian. Npr reporting today on what theyre calling boltens curious appearance in a russian gun rights video. This video from 2013. He is associated with the nra. At one point he was a member of the nra International Affairs subcommittee. 2013 he appeared in this video. That was directed to a russian audience. Not jus a generic video supporting the concept of gun rights in russia. It was a video made on behalf of a russian group. Called the right to bear arms. It was founed by a russian politician. He has spent several years cultivating strong and sketchy ties with the nra in the United States. Including Deputy Speaker of the russian parliament. And internal security services. And according to to reporting by several weeks ago the fbi is investigating whether this russian politician and his group the right to bear arms somehow illegally funneled russian money into the Trump Campaign. In 2016. Using the nra as their conduit. Now, as you know we have already had one trump National Security adviser end up in an fbi investigation into russian influence in the Trump Campaign. That didnt end well. Now it appears we have another. And its not just the gun thing. He may find himself in the middle of that investigation. Not just on the nra russia money side. Also because of this. This is an ad that john bolten made for his super pack. Imaginatively named the john bolten superpack. Between spring 2014 and fall of 2016 bolten superpack received 5 million from robert mercer. The biggest of the trump donors and funder behind steve bannon projects including breitbart. And Cambridge Analytica. He got 5 million from mercer. What did he spend that on . Well, more than a Million Dollars he vovled back to robert mercer. Shovelled back to Cambridge Analytica. He used mersers money to hire Cambridge Analytica. Which is also funded by robert mercer. Hes taking money from mercer and spending it at another mercer funded entity. The reason Cambridge Analytica is so controversial right now. They fired their ceo this week and under investigation and sparked facebook and this country. Is because of new revelations from a Cambridge Analytica whistle blower. Who says the firm used e listly e quired facebook data from tens of millions americans to run the core business of the operation. In the case of john boltens superpack. Cambridge analytica reportedly used that american facebook data to make ads for candidates who bolten supported. But also appear to have used boltens pack as a way to try to get more americans data off of facebook. The times reviews the agenda of a 2014 meeting. Where the company explained the company wanted to use the voter contact list to direct people toward the facebook app. That would be the facebook app that Cambridge Analytica used to rip off personal data from 50 million americans. Who never consented to their facebook stuff being used in that way. The Associated Press