“Amid public concern over spiking drug prices, a powerful middleman is suing a tiny drugmaker over unpaid rebates and fees. The maker calls the suit baseless; analysts say the suit offers a window into an opaque world.” More …
Hacker, Banker, Soldier, Spy: A Guide to the Key Players in the Trump-Russia Scandal
“Keeping track of the relentless news on the widening Trump-Russia investigation—from revelations about the president’s inner circle to the role of Russian oligarchs and other assorted players—isn’t easy. As part of our project to cover this scandal, we’ve assembled dossiers on the sprawling cast of characters who populate this stranger-than-fiction controversy threatening to engulf the presidency. Will be updated as needed. ” More …
Robert Mueller Knows the Russia-Trump Investigation Is All About the Money
“Robert Mueller is not fooling around and, for all the bizarre behavior concerning secure comms and Russian ambassadors, he seems to have homed in already on the key to the whole sorry mess. Somewhere, at the heart of it, there’s nothing more or less banal than the classic American hunger for a quick and easy buck. That’s where this whole thing is headed.” More …
Why FBI and Robert Mueller Are Looking at Jared Kushner
“Federal investigators homing in on Jared Kushner’s connections to powerful Russians and his multiple roles in last year’s presidential campaign have identified at least three lines of inquiry into Donald Trump’s son-in-law. From a meeting with a former Russian intelligence official-turned-banker allied with Vladimir Putin and Kushner’s failure to report it, to his push to have the president fire James Comey at the FBI, investigators see the 36-year-old’s fingerprints on several questionable actions.” More …
Hotline Bling: Trump’s Use of Private Cellphone Raises Security Concerns
“President Donald Trump has been handing out his cellphone number to world leaders and urging them to call him directly, an unusual invitation that breaks diplomatic protocol and is raising concerns about the security and secrecy of the U.S. commander in chief’s communications.” More …
The Loneliness of Donald Trump
“On the corrosive privilege of the most mocked man in the world.” More …
Trump’s Budget: Making America Less Great
“Drastic cuts proposed by the administration threaten scientific R&D that provides incredible economic and societal value, and which have always enjoyed bipartisan support.” More …
Trump Turned International Diplomacy Into a Fistfight—and Lost
“President Trump’s performance in the last leg of his first international trip has European leaders fuming—and American diplomats likening him to a ‘drunk tourist.’” More …
General McMaster, Step Down—and Let Trump Be Trump
Thomas Ricks pens an open letter to General McMaster: “Save your reputation while you still can… I no longer believe in the ‘adults in the room’ theory of containing President Trump and the similarly erratic and ignorant people around him.” More …
No, the “Grown-Ups” Won’t Save Us: A Favorite Beltway Fantasy Bites the Dust Again
“Donald Trump’s supposedly respectable advisers have become enablers to a regime of lies, incompetence and idiocy.” More …