In other news, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is getting what he wants, again. The U.S. has canceled a military exercise involving American bombers and South Korean planes to please him according to the Wall Street Journal.
Meanwhile, the Washington Post reports that Trump personally asked the Postmaster General to raise rates for delivering packages for Amazon. Postmaster General Megan Brennan told him she can't do that because it's bound by contract.
Finally, Trump nominated another VA secretary on a whim. Acting VA secretary Robert Wilkie apparently didn't know Trump would pick him before this morning's "surprise" announcement. Axios reports that Trump ran the choice by a Fox News host before the announcement.
Extreme vetting.
Here's a handful of other stories I didn't get to this week:
Including today's school shooting, more schoolchildren than military service members have been killed so far in 2018.
Special prosecutor Robert Mueller has subpoenaed another person close to Trump's longtime henchman Roger Stone.
The Trump regime has drafted a rule that would prohibit federally funded clinics including Planned Parenthood from even providing referrals for abortion services. I'm sure this is unconstitutional under the First Amendment.
The House Appropriations Committee voted unanimously to prevent Trump from helping China's ZTE telecommunications company.
Trump's batshit trade representative Robert Lighthizer says the US, Mexico, and Canada are nowhere close to a deal on NAFTA. No shit?
Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner is getting bailed out by the Qataris. Again. There's a pretty good Jared Kushner joke in Deadpool 2.
Internal documents show the Interior Department had already decided the public would not give them useful information on the plan to shrink the Bears Ears National Monument before the period of public comment even started.
A Pentagon assessment sent to lawmakers this week says they don't expect North Korea will ever give up its nuclear weapons, or its aggressive stance toward America, because the Kim dynasty depends on external threats to maintain their rule. The Pentagon also believes Kim Jong Un wants to use nuclear weapons to prevent other nations from intervening if he tries to reunify the peninsula "through force or coercion."
At its heart, Kim’s regime “embraces the worldview of a garrison state, cultivating fears of an imminent threat and external hostility, which serves to justify draconian internal security controls, vast expenditures on the military, and the continued unchallenged rule by the Kim dynasty, which it portrays as uniquely able to defend Korea,” according to the report.
Quartz reports that Trump is looking for replacements for Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen.
Lumber prices are skyrocketing because of Trump's tariffs on Canadian lumber. The cost of a single-family home is expected to increase by at least $1,360 this year because of the tariffs.
The Scotsman reports that officials have been enjoying taxpayer-funded VIP visits to Trump's golf resort in Scotland.
The upper chamber of British parliament has voted to maintain the European Union's environmental standards after the Brexit. At this point, kingdom lawmakers have voted to maintain almost all of the EU's standards and remain in the customs union. It's possible the only major difference after the Brexit vote will be Britain no longer has a vote in the EU. They'll finally be great again, just like us.
Have a good weekend.