Good morning everyone! Happy Thursday to you!

Joining today's show are Mike Barnicle, Harold Ford Jr., Mark Halperin, Jon Meacham, Steve Rattner, Chuck Todd, Ben Smith, Fmr. Gov. Haley Barbour, Bianna Golodryga, Gov. Greg Abbott, Sen. Bob Corker, Fmr. PM Tony Blair and in Taiji, Japan, today marks 14 consecutive BLUE COVE days! 2016-25-2 10:00am ‪#‎tweet4dolphins‬ ‪#‎dolphinproject‬.
What a week! What a week...Could Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton in a general election?

If Trump and Clinton are the nominees, then Clinton wins in a historic landslide, a la LBJ in 1964.

Except ... perhaps it would be really stupid, after all that’s happened, to write him off.

According to RCP’s average of polls, Clinton enjoys only a slim lead over Trump in a head-to-head match-up. You have to think that her lead will climb once the Democratic Party revs up the Trump attack machine, which the GOP has so far mysteriously declined to use.


But at the same time, in a polarized, nearly evenly divided electorate, there’s only so much the Democratic Party can do to expand its coalition. It’s unlikely that the editors of National Review and other anti-Trumpists will flock to Clinton. The real question is whether Trump can consolidate the GOP and perhaps even make inroads with blue-collar workers who have traditionally voted Democratic. As Noam Scheiber reported, even labor unions are interested in Trump, given his idiosyncratic position on trade.

Marco Rubio Attacks Donald Trump By Name Ahead of Debate.

In an abrupt about-face in strategy, Marco Rubio on Wednesday night attacked Donald Trump on policy by name from the stump, drawing the battle lines for a certain showdown with the GOP front-runner on the eve of Thursday's debate.

At an energetic rally in Houston, Rubio targeted Trump on Obamacare and Israel, charging Trump "thinks parts of Obamacare are pretty good" and that he's refused to come to Israel's defense.

"The front-runner in this race, Donald Trump, has said he's not going to take sides on Israel versus the Palestinians because he wants to be an honest broker," Rubio said. "Well, there is no such thing as an honest broker in that. Because the Palestinian Authority, which has strong links to terror, they teach little kids that it's a glorious thing to kill Jews."

Rubio also alluded to Trump's claim that he can leave foreign policy details murky because he'll simply bring in the best advisers, telling the crowd, "We cannot have a commander-in-chief that is not ready the first day in office."

"You can't just say, the way some people in this race have said — you'll probably know what I'm talking about in a moment — you can't just say, 'Well, when I get there I'll hire the smartest people and they're going to tell me what to do,'" Rubio said.

"The smartest people are already there. They're already telling the president what he should be doing. He's ignoring it. You deserve to know exactly what the next commander-in-chief is going to do," Rubio said.

Rubio's efforts to dismantle parts of Obamacare and his experience on foreign policy in comparison to the rest of the field are key selling points in his pitch to voters, and it appears they'll become flashpoints in his clash with Trump.

On Wednesday night, Rubio's communications team took the fight to Trump off-stage as well, with spokesman Joe Pounder suggesting Trump is complicit in the same "dirty tricks" he and Rubio have been attacking the Ted Cruz campaign for over the past few weeks.

Pounder called on Trump to repudiate a robocall reportedly telling voters in Vermont and Montana to not vote for "a Cuban, vote for Donald Trump."

"This is the lowest form of campaigning, and is the exact same type of dirty tricks Donald Trump has been decrying for weeks now," Pounder said.

The decision to take on Trump is a notable shift from just hours earlier, when Rubio was pressed on the "Today" show Wednesday morning about why he had, for weeks now, avoided a direct confrontation with the GOP front-runner.

"I didn't run for office to tear up other Republicans," Rubio said, adding that he had only been attacking Cruz because "I'm responding to Ted Cruz," who has been clashing with Rubio for weeks on immigration reform and other policy issues.

"If I'm attacked, I'm going to respond and set the record straight," Rubio said.

But Trump didn't unleash the first attack — speaking after Rubio on the Today show, Trump said of Cruz: "So far, he's been very nice and I've been very nice to him." But Trump warned "that could change."

And Rubio's decision to take aim at Trump Wednesday is all but certain to ensure that does change, and the two will likely clash on the debate stage Thursday.

It's the final GOP debate before voters head to the polls for the Super Tuesday primaries. Although Trump holds a lead in most Super Tuesday states for which there's reliable public polling, Rubio's been executing a carefully calibrated strategy to gather delegates where he can carve out support in states that award them proportionally.

Up until now, that strategy saw Rubio largely training his fire on Cruz, with whom he's been competing to emerge as the alternative to Trump.

But on Wednesday, Rubio campaign manager Terry Sullivan said in a fundraising email that "the race looks even more like a two-man race now than it did this past weekend in South Carolina." Rubio finished second behind Trump in Tuesday's Nevada caucuses.

And Rubio's attacks on Wednesday night are further evidence that the campaign sees Cruz as a waning threat and Trump a necessary target — although whether Rubio can survive the clash remains to be seen. Every candidate that's attempted to take Trump down has so far fared the worse for it, seeing their support in the polls drop precipitously after Trump hits back.


Adding to the stakes for Thursday night's debate is the fact that last time Rubio came under heavy fire from an opponent on the debate stage — when Chris Christie hammered him as "robotic" during the debate before the New Hampshire primary — Rubio folded in a performance so disappointing it cost him at the polls. 

Cruz, Rubio prep for brutal debate night. In final show before Super Tuesday, the senators are poised to unleash a nasty assault and emerge the anti-Trump.
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For Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, this might be their last best chance.

The final Republican presidential debate before the Super Tuesday contests has the potential to be an epic display of anger and rhetorical aggression, with Rubio and Cruz going after one another on everything from policy to character as each struggles to emerge as the single alternative to Donald Trump.

At this a critical juncture in the race, with Trump on a three-state win streak and Republican operatives questioning whether time is running out to stop the New York billionaire, tonight’s fireworks-filled forum will provide a window into the contenders’ end-game strategies.

Rubio’s playbook
Rubio has yet to aggressively engage Trump – and those briefed on his strategy say he’s unlikely to on Thursday night.
The Florida senator has concluded that going after Trump would accomplish little, given that the businessman’s supporters are deeply committed and unlikely to swing Rubio’s way. Inciting a confrontation with Trump onstage would create drama but wouldn’t help the senator gain voters, something he badly needs as he looks for his first primary win.

Instead, Rubio’s team has decided his best bet is to focus fire on Cruz. They think the Texas senator’s voters are less locked in and could swing Rubio’s way should Cruz fade. The only way to dislodge Trump, Rubio’s advisers say, is to turn it into a two-man race – meaning that they first need to get Cruz out of the way.

Of course, if Trump chooses to engage Rubio – something he hasn’t yet done in a debate – Rubio will have to respond. And while Rubio may not directly take on Trump, he may do so implicitly.

Rubio will also be playing to the more mainstream, establishment Republican donors and supporters, arguing as he has in recent days that he is the only candidate who can unite the party and win the general election.

It’s a line that appeals to the profoundly worried Republican Party hierarchy that Rubio is aggressively courting. Last week, Karl Rove delivered a presentation during a gathering of the Republican Governors Association at the posh Fairmont Hotel in Washington and warned that Trump would hurt the GOP’s prospects in the race for the White House and in down-ballot contests for House, Senate, and governor. 

The speech, according to two sources present, was attended by a number of Republican governors, including Rick Scott of Florida, Pat McCrory of North Carolina, and Phil Bryant of Mississippi.

The Cruz comeback plan
For Cruz, the stakes couldn’t be higher. After winning the Iowa caucuses, the senator has suffered three consecutive third place finishes. And after spending a year courting the religious vote, Cruz has seen his pristine image blemished by charges – directed at him by Trump and Rubio – that his campaign plays rough.

On Thursday evening, Priority Number One will be to push back.

“He’s got to beat back the narrative that he and his campaign are masters of the dirty trick,” said Brett O’Donnell, a longtime Republican debate coach who advised Lindsey Graham.

The debate precedes a slate of Southern Super Tuesday primaries that been Cruz’s focus – and where, without a good showing, it may be hard for him to recover. That means he’ll reinforce his pitch that he is a conservative-minded Southerner that voters in states like Tennessee, Oklahoma and Arkansas can relate to. He’ll also be tailoring his message for his home state of Texas, which also votes on March 1 – and where anything short of a victory would be devastating.

“The fact that Texas is a must win for Cruz makes me suspect a lot of his strategy will be aimed at fortifying his position there by really demonstrating knowledge and key issues for Texas voters,” said Phil Musser, a former Republican Governors Association executive director. “Home state appeal - and a win - is a must.”

In the lead-up to Super Tuesday, Cruz is seeking other ways to reinforce his Southern credentials. In recent weeks, he has been aggressively appealing to Rand Paul for an endorsement. Yet three sources close to the Kentucky senator said Paul had rebuffed Cruz, saying that he had no intention to endorse anyone anytime soon. A Cruz spokesperson declined to comment.

A calmer, nicer Trump?
On the debate stage, Trump has been everything you’d expect him to be – loud, swaggering, and always on the attack.

Yet in Houston, some wonder if he’ll take a more low-key approach.

While Trump’s style has enabled him to win the backing of a wide swath of primary voters, he has yet to secure a majority of the vote in any nominating contest – a circumstance that has led some to wonder if the real estate developer has a ceiling. Should the field winnow into a two-person race, he might be vulnerable to a rival who is capable of uniting the rest of the primary electorate behind them.

To expand his support, Trump may need to adjust his style – and appear more traditionally presidential.

“He’s got a tightrope to walk,” O’Donnell said. “He’s got to show that he can fortify his voters and bring others behind him.”

Then again, Trump has proven himself to be an unpredictable figure – one who throws caution and restraint to the wind. In recent days, the mogul has intensified his criticism of Cruz, calling him a “liar” and “sick.”

“I suspect he just continues rolling along per usual. Why change what’s working?” Musser said. “I don’t expect too much deviation from the norm.”

If Trump does choose to keep up his attacks, he’ll likely have an ally in the cause: Rubio.

In the final days leading up to the South Carolina primary, Trump and Rubio were something of a duo. The two echoed their attacks on Cruz, branding him a dishonest pol who didn’t play by the rules. It worked.

The Kasich question mark
The greatest uncertainty surrounds Kasich, who has stubbornly remained in the race despite mounting pressure from Republican establishment figures who want him to exit.
The Ohio governor, who has tapped longtime adviser Bob Klaffky to lead his debate prep, has mostly been a low-profile figure onstage. He rarely interjects during skirmishes, and even when attacked he doesn’t typically respond in kind.
But with growing questions about his viability, Kasich needs to stand out – and some wonder if he’ll go after his mainstream GOP rival, Rubio.

Over the last several days, the Kasich campaign – which has made a point of not targeting its rivals – has turned up the heat on the senator. On Tuesday and Wednesday, it released a pair of memos, both of which branded Rubio as a Beltway insider. And Kasich’s chief strategist, John Weaver, has launched into a Twitter tear against Rubio labeling the senator “slick and pretty.”

To some, the offensive highlights the urgency confronting Kasich.

“He’s got to own the establishment lane better than Rubio does,” O’Donnell said.

Kasich isn't the only low-key candidate who will be on stage. Ben Carson has pledged to continue fighting on, despite getting blown out in the first four contests. Like Kasich, the retired surgeon is under pressure to make something happen in Houston. A disappointing performance on Super Tuesday, some believe, will spell the end of the road.

Ted Cruz: 'Who knows what the heck Donald Trump would do as president?' Absent Trump still the focus at Fox News voter summit, as Republican rivals vie to cast themselves as best bet to beat the frontrunner.
Marco Rubio, Donald Trump and Ted Cruz: Rubio says the Republican nomination is a three-way race.
Once again, Donald Trump stole the show without actually appearing on the show.

During Fox News’ two-hour voter summit on Wednesday night, the four Republican hopefuls working frantically to keep pace with Trump took turns pitching themselves as the best alternative to the billionaire frontrunner.

Texas senator Ted Cruz positioned himself as the best general election candidate, citing polling that showed he would beat former secretary of state Hillary Clinton should she capture the Democratic nomination.

“Donald consistently loses to Hillary. I consistently beat Hillary,” Cruz told Fox News’ Megyn Kelly during the live interview in Houston.

“And so the question right now is how do we prevent nominating a candidate who loses the general election – or, for that matter, if Donald wins the general election, who the heck knows what he’d do as president?”
Cruz also reminded voters that he is the only candidate so far to prove he can beat Trump, having won the Iowa caucuses with the strong support of evangelical Christians.

Trump is riding high after winning easily in Nevada – his third consecutive victory in an early-state nominating contest – and strengthening his position heading into the multi-state Super Tuesday elections.

Florida senator Marco Rubio, who has yet to win a nominating contest, cast himself as a party unifier with the appeal to grow its base.

“I can win. I can unify this party. I can grow this party, and I will win this election,” Rubio told Kelly via satellite. “The Democrats desperately do not want to run against me. That’s why they attack me more than anyone else in this race.”
Cruz said he believed it was now a “three-person” race between himself, Trump and Rubio. The two senators have clashed fiercely in recent days as they try to establish themselves as Trump’s strongest challengers.

Ohio governor John Kasich and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson were pressed to defend the legitimacy of their campaigns as some Republicans have accused them of siphoning away votes from the senators.

“If I were to get out, Donald Trump would win Ohio and that would be the end of it,” Kasich said, expressing confidence that he would win his home state despite a recent poll that showed Trump edging him out of first.

“We intend to keep going, Megyn, we’re not stopping and I’m not giving up,” Kasich reiterated. “That’s just the end of it.”

Carson took a different tack, arguing that he is the only candidate not beholden to political and media elites, the two least popular groups in the 2016 elections.

“Why do I stay here?” he asked rhetorically. “It’s like losing a child … It’s a horrendous thing. You would do anything to keep it from happening.

“Well, I feel like we’re in the process of losing our country. It’s in critical condition right now.”

At the start of the show, Kelly said Trump was unable to attend as he had a “conflicting campaign event”, prompting snickers from the audience.

Kelly laughed. “He does!” she exclaimed, to more laugher from the audience.

Trump had previously skipped a Fox News debate co-moderated by Kelly after he accused her of adversarial questioning in the first debate.


On Thursday, the Republican candidates, including Trump, will face off on a debate stage in Houston, just five days before Super Tuesday.

New poll shows Cruz and Trump tied in TexasNot good for Cruz, notwithstanding the fact that he leads narrowly. To refresh your memory, Texas is winner-take-all with a huge windfall of delegates (155) if the winner takes a clear majority of the vote. If he doesn’t, it’s proportional. Which means, if these numbers are close to accurate, Cruz is likely to barely dent Trump’s delegate lead even if he wins his home state. And these numbers probably are close to accurate, in the sense that Cruz hasn’t approached 50 percent in any of the recent polls of Texas. The best he’s done is 37 percent, good for an eight-point lead over Trump. But that was before last night’s humiliation in Nevada and the creeping sense that Trump is inevitable. It’s not nuts to think that Trump will end up edging past Cruz, and even if he falls short, it’s not unlikely that a proportional win in Texas is Cruz’s only win next Tuesday.

That’s the tough case for Cruz. If he shocks everyone with a 50 percent win, he’ll say he’s right back in the hunt and continue his campaign. What does he do if he wins the state with less than 50, though, and loses everywhere else? (A second poll of Texas today has him ahead 35/20 over Trump.) All of his “strong” states will have passed. He’d have no obvious path to the nomination and would essentially be running to try to assure a brokered convention. Is he prepared to endure months of finishing behind Trump and, sometimes, Rubio for the slim chance that he’ll get to play kingmaker in Cleveland?

With less than a week until the Texas GOP presidential primary, Senator Ted Cruz is edging out his two chief rivals, with Cruz having 29% of the vote followed by Donald Trump at 28% and Marco Rubio at 25%, according to an Emerson College tracking poll released today. Ohio’s John Kasich is at 9%, and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson comes in fifth, with 4%…

Of the three GOP leaders, Rubio is seen most positively, with 64% of likely GOP primaryvoters rating him favorably compared to 29% who view him unfavorably. Cruz’s rating is 56% favorable to 41% unfavorable. Of all the GOP candidates, Trump is the only one under water with a 45% favorable to 50% unfavorable opinion. Clinton (79% favorable to 20% unfavorable) and Sanders (68% to 27%) are both well regarded by likely Democratic primary voters…

As the GOP candidates continue to argue over each other’s honesty, 37% of survey respondents said Cruz is the candidate who has been least honest about his own record and that of his Republican rivals. Trump is a close second for “least honest,” chosen by 35%.

Cruz leads the field when Republicans are asked which candidate is the most dishonest — in Texas. That’s one striking result here. Another, which we’ve seen before, is Trump somehow contending for first place with a favorable rating that’s normally associated with also-rans. He had polls in New Hampshire and South Carolina that pegged him with favorables that were only mildly favorable — 50/43 or thereabouts — but this is the first time I’ve seen him net negative and still in the running for first place somewhere. Trump skeptics would tell you that that’s proof he can’t win a two-man race with Rubio. Perhaps, but (a) he’s still net positive in most states and (b) by the time Rubio finally gets his two-man race with Trump, Trump will be uncatchable.

The most striking result, though, is Rubio’s numbers. The last poll of Texas, conducted between February 12th and the 19th, had Rubio a distant third at 15 percent. His second-place finish in South Carolina came on the 20th, followed by days of buzz that he was the last man capable of stopping Trump. Now, suddenly, he’s hot on Cruz’s and Trump’s heels in Texas, and it’s quite possible that if Kasich’s votes were reassigned to their second choice, Rubio would catch Cruz here. (It’s a cinch that Cruz would slip to second place or worse in this poll without Kasich in the race to pull centrist votes from Rubio and Trump. That’s another bad sign for Ted.) Maybe this is an outlier, but maybe it’s early evidence that some Cruz fans and undecideds are abandoning Cruz and tilting now towards Rubio as the last Anti-Trump standing. We’ll need more polls to judge that, but if Cruz somehow finished third to Rubio and Trump in Texas, I think he really would drop out. That might be the only scenario in which he does, in fact.

This isn’t a poll of Texas but it’s the next best thing. Hoo boy:
David Harsanyi argues at The Federalist today that a Rubio/Cruz unity ticket is the only hope now of stopping Trump. Perhaps, but according to Marco Rubio himself, it ain’t happening. For a simple reason: Both Rubio and Cruz value their personal ambitions more highly than they value having a conservative nominee. It really is that simple when you cut through it. Same goes for Duncan Hunter and all of the other “conservatives” in Congress who are quietly planning to jump aboard the Trump bandwagon now that his nomination is assured. It’s fashionable to say that Trump “broke the GOP” — I’m sure I’ve said it myself as shorthand for the disaster that’s upon us — but that’s not true at all. The GOP will slog on with nearly all of the same personnel. What Trump broke is the dual illusion that the conservative movement drives the Republican Party and that the conservative movement is composed mostly of people who believe devoutly in conservatism as an ideology. It isn’t. They may identify as “conservative” as a way to signal that they hate the left and political correctness, or simply because claiming you’re “conservative” has been a vehicle for instant respectability within the GOP ever since the Reagan revolution, but give them someone like Trump who’ll loudly defend some of the cultural impulses that drive conservatism while shrugging at policy and they’ll happily take that. That’s why movement conservatives are so traumatized by Trumpism — it’s not that he’s killing the GOP, about which no one really cares, but that he’s exposing that movement conservatism for many, many supposed adherents is an inch deep. Stroke people’s amygdalas with enough garbage about being an alpha male and standing up for yourself and bombing the sh*t out of your enemies and how many really care about the size of government?

We’ll see how firmly Cruz and Rubio oppose Trump in their post-candidate incarnations. I’m positive that they’re both ideological conservatives on most issues, but they might not spend much energy highlighting that fact in their disagreements with Trump going forward. Here’s Amanda Carpenter, a former spokesman for Cruz, pleading with him to drop his “true conservative” stump speech and talk more directly to people about the issues without all the ideological claptrap, which obviously isn’t working. That’s good advice, but it’s good advice only because Cruz’s baseline assumption about the Republican electorate and its commitment to conservatism has proved egregiously wrong. Cruz thought he could win a primary by being the most conservative of ’em all. Turns out most “conservatives” don’t care about conservatism. What now?
Trump expands lead in Oklahoma.
Republican primary front-runner Donald Trump has widened his lead in Oklahoma, according to a new poll. 

The poll by Cole Hargrave Snodgrass and Associates finds Trump leading the state with 29 percent support, followed by Marco Rubio with 21 percent and Ted Cruz with 20 percent.

Ben Carson places fourth in the poll with 6 percent, followed by John Kasich with 5 percent.

Trump is up 5 points since the last version the poll two weeks ago, while Cruz has dropped 5 points over that same span.

The poll comes a week ahead of the state’s March 1 primary.

Pollster Pat McFerron told NewsOK that the top three candidates are in a statistical tie among reliable GOP primary voters, but Trump wins among voters who have rarely voted in previous Republican primaries.

“Trump performs best among lower income households, those over 45 and those with a history of rarely voting in Republican primaries, though there is a statistical tie among the top three candidates among the most reliable primary voters,” McFerron said.

There are 43 delegates up for grabs in Oklahoma, which will be allocated proportionally.


The poll surveyed 400 likely Republican voters from Feb. 22–23 and has a margin of error of 4.9 percent.

Iran arrests Baquer Namazi, father of imprisoned American businessman.

Before his father's arrest, he was the last confirmed U.S. prisoner detained in Iran

Washington (CNN)Six weeks after freeing U.S. citizens in a prisoner swap with the United States, Iran appears to have arrested yet another man whom Washington may take an interest in seeing freed.

Baquer Namazi, 80, is the father of American businessman Siamak Namazi, who was detained in October and was not part of last month's exchange. Before his father's arrest, he was the last confirmed U.S. prisoner still being held in Iran.

Baquer Namazi, a former UNICEF official, was arrested on Monday, his wife Effie Namazi said on Facebook.

"I must share the shocking and sad news that Baquer was arrested in Tehran late evening of 22 February 2016 and as far as I have been told by those who took him taken to Evin prison," she wrote. "Now both my innocent son Siamak and my Baquer are in prison for no reason. This is a nightmare I can't describe."
My dear family and friends,

You have been calling me for the past few days asking about Baquer. I must share the shocking and sad news that Baquer was arrested in Tehran late evening of 22 February 2016 and as far as I have been told by those who took him taken to Evin prison. Now both my innocent son Siamak and my Baquer are in prison for no reason. This is a nightmare I can’t describe.

I have been trying to find out more information but have been unable to do so and the lawyer also couldn’t get any information or get to see him.

I am extremely concerned and worried sick for Baquer’s health since he is an 80 year old man and has a serious heart and other conditions which requires him to take special heart and other medicine.


I pray to God that my Siamak and Baquer return home to me and that they are released. Please keep them in your prayers.

Mum on details
CNN has reached out to Iranian authorities, who have not confirmed Baquer Namazi's arrest.

Effie Namazi complained in her Facebook post that she has been unable to get further details about her husband and that a lawyer for the family has not been allowed to see him.

"I am extremely concerned and worried sick for Baquer's health since he is an 80 year old man and has a serious heart and other conditions which requires him to take special heart and other medicine," Effie Namazi wrote.

Bargaining chips
After last month's prisoner swap, Iranian-American groups wrote to Secretary of State John Kerry, urging the United States to do more to secure Siamak Namazi's release.

But America's intelligence chief James Clapper suspected Iran has an interest in holding on to Americans.

Iran "might attempt to use any additional U.S. citizens" held in Iran "as bargaining chips for U.S. concessions," Clapper, the director of national intelligence, wrote in a worldwide threat summary submitted to Congress on Tuesday.

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei sparked a crackdown on journalists and businessmen with suspected ties to the West after publicly claiming the United States was using the recent nuclear deal reached with Iran to "infiltrate and penetrate" Iran, according to Clapper's testimony.

"The crackdown was intended by hardliners to demonstrate to (Iranian) President (Hassan) Rouhani and to Washington that a broader opening to the West ... would not be tolerated."

Namazi not freed
Siamak Namazi was arrested the same month the nuclear agreement was reached and was incarcerated in Evin prison, which became notorious for torture allegations during the street marches of Iran's Green Movement in 2009.

Among the U.S. citizens released last month in the wake of the nuclear deal were Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, Christian pastor Saeed Abedini and Marine veteran Amir Hekmati. Namazi remained behind bars.

Another man, who was previously unknown to U.S. authorities, was also released. He did not go to the United States but stayed in Iran.


A former FBI agent, Robert Levinson, went missing in Iran in 2007, but his whereabouts have been a mystery, and Iran has denied holding him.

Exclusive: Apple CEO Tim Cook Says iPhone-Cracking Software ‘Equivalent of Cancer’.
PHOTO: Apple CEO Tim Cook sat down with ABC News anchor David Muir for an exclusive interview addressing the tech giants objection to unlocking an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino, California, shooters.
In an exclusive interview with ABC News today, Apple CEO Tim Cook told "World News Tonight" anchor David Muir that what the U.S. government was asking of the tech giant -- to essentially create software enabling the FBI to unlock an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino, California, shooters -- amounted to the "software equivalent of cancer."

"The only way to get information -- at least currently, the only way we know -- would be to write a piece of software that we view as sort of the equivalent of cancer. We think it's bad news to write. We would never write it. We have never written it -- and that is what is at stake here," he said. "We believe that is a very dangerous operating system."

The interview will also air on "Nightline" at 12:35 a.m. and Thursday on "Good Morning America."

The FBI has called on Apple to help crack into the iPhone of Syed Farook, who along with wife Tashfeen Malik killed 14 and injured 22 at a training session and holiday party in December. The FBI attempted to crack the pass code but failed because Apple phone systems have a function that automatically erases the access key and renders the phone "permanently inaccessible" after 10 failed attempts.

Last week, at the request of the Justice Department, a federal judge told Apple to assist law enforcement. However, the tech giant refused and vowed to fight the order, sparking a continuing fight between federal authorities and Silicon Valley. Cook today called the issue "complex" but said the creation of such software would put hundreds of millions of customers at risk and "trample" civil liberties.

"If a court can ask us to write this piece of software, think about what else they could ask us to write -- maybe it's an operating system for surveillance, maybe the ability for the law enforcement to turn on the camera," Cook said. "I don't know where this stops. But I do know that this is not what should be happening in this country."

Apple Slams Judge's Order to Unlock Shooter's Phone
This week, FBI director James Comey urged Apple in an open letter to comply with its investigation into the massacre.

Comey wrote that the FBI wanted the chance to try to guess the pass code without the phone self-destructing and without it taking a decade to guess correctly. The FBI director said he understood the case highlights the serious tension between privacy and security. And today, CIA Director John Brennan weighed in on the side of the FBI, saying that the agency has a "legitimate basis to try to understand" what is on the San Bernardino shooter's cellphone.

In a message to customers last week, Cook said that Apple had helped the FBI, but would not create a so-called backdoor that would have the potential to unlock any iPhone, not just the one that belonged to Farook. Apple decision was hailed by some of the biggest names in Silicon Valley, including Google CEO Sundar Pichai and WhatsApp CEO Jan Koum.

Cook told ABC News today that Apple had cooperated fully with the FBI.

"We gave everything that we had," he told Muir today. "We don't know that there's any information on the phone. We don't know whether there is or there isn't. And the FBI doesn't know. ... What we do know is we passed all of the information that we have on the phone and to get additional information on it or at least what the FBI would like us to do now would expose hundreds of millions of people to issues."

Cook said that the issue was not just about privacy, but also about the public's safety.

"This case is not about one phone," Cook said today. "This case is about the future. ... If we knew a way to get the information on the phone -- that we haven't already given -- if we knew a way to do this, that would not expose hundreds of millions of other people to issues, we would obviously do it. ... Our job is to protect our customers." ABC News' Enjoli Francis, Alyssa Newcomb, Julia Jacobo, Kelly Stevenson, Mike Levine and Jim Hill contributed to this report.

Rick Perry's Abuse-of-Powers Charges Dropped. Lawyer: 'This case should have never been brought'

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals dropped charges of abuse of power against former governor Rick Perry on Wednesday.

Perry had been indicted in August 2014 by a grand jury for defunding a public integrity outfit as part of his fight against a district attorney he was trying to force from office because of her driving under the influence conviction. The district attorney, Rosemary Lehmberg, refused to leave and instead fought back.

The ‘Stop Hillary’ campaign is on fire! Join the surging response to this theme: ‘Clinton for prosecution, not president’

Perry was originally indicted on two charges, one of which was tossed by a court in July. Just this week, he was cleared of the second charge as well.

“Appeals court clears @GovernorPerry of all charges,” a tweet from his staffers read, CNN found. “Thank you for your thoughts and prayers. #StandWithRick.”

Perry, who served as governor of Texas for 15 years, was the state’s longest serving executive.

Can the Republican Party save itself? Richard Viguerie has the prescription in “Takeover.”

He also ran twice, unsuccessfully, for president.

Perry’s charges stemmed from 2013 when he attempted to force Lehmberg from her office via his veto authority to defund her Public Integrity Unit. Perry was seeking her departure from office because she was arrested and convicted of driving while intoxicated. After she refused to leave office, Perry used his veto power to cut her agency’s $7.5 million in the state budget.

He was then accused of improperly using his veto power and of wrongfully trying to coerce a public official.

“It was a long time coming,” said Perry’s lawyer, Tony Buzbee, in the Statesman. “This case should have never be brought and I’m glad the court put its foot down and ended it. It is troubling when a non-elected ‘special prosecutor’ can obtain an indictment and then pursue it in front of the very judge that appointed him. I said all along this case was foolishness and would be dismissed.”

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Clinton Event Interrupted By 'Black Lives Matter' Supporters. Hillary Clinton vowed to take executive action to "ban the box" at a rally in Atlanta Friday, where she was met with the biggest protest yet by "Black Lives Matter" activists at one of her events.

About a dozen protesters interrupted Clinton's speech, singing and chanting for at least ten minutes before being escorted out. Banning the box refers to removing questions about criminal convictions from job applications.

Clinton acknowledged protesters' "Black Lives Matter" chants, saying "yes, they do," but kept talking, although much of the audience couldn't hear what she way saying over the noise.

The crowd eventually erupted, "Let her talk! Let her talk! Let her talk!" and the activists left the Clark University gymnasium.

U.S. Rep. John Lewis, who introduced Clinton, tried to get the protesters to stop shouting and eventually re-joined Clinton on stage in a show of support.

Clinton continued with her speech and said she would, if elected, prevent the government and employers from discriminating against individuals who have served time in prison.

Clinton said of the protesters: "I'm sorry they didn't listen, because some of what they've been demanding, I am offering."

Banning the box would help job applicants with a criminal record get through further stages of the job application process, Clinton argued at the campaign's first "African Americans for Hillary" event.

Several major retailers have already done so, including Target, Walmart, Starbucks, Bed Bath & Beyond and Home Depot.

This is one part of Clinton's plan to reform the criminal justice system, which the campaign will roll out over the next few days. Clinton is also calling for an end to racial profiling by federal, state and local law enforcement and for the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine to be eliminated.

On previous occasions, Clinton has proposed that all police departments use body cameras.

The Democratic front-runner's first major policy speech of her campaign focused on criminal justice reform and she called for an end to "the era of mass incarceration."

Clinton met with "Black Lives Matter" activists earlier this month in Washington, D.C. and promised to keep the conversation going.

Earlier Friday at a luncheon hosted by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, Clinton spoke about the need to band together on criminal justice reform.

"We have to create those channels of opportunity so that you go from childhood to adulthood pursuing your dreams instead of from cradle to prison and seeing them die and it will be absolutely critical that we all work together on this," she said.

In August, Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders had a rally in Seattle halted by "Black Lives Matter" protesters.

Brian Sandoval: Obama’s GOP Trojan Horse for the Supreme Court. The Wall Street Journal reports that the White House is vetting Nevada’s Republican governor Brian Sandoval for the Supreme Court. On Sunday night, Governor Sandoval sat at the president’s head table at a White House dinner in Washington. The next day, the governor requested and secured a meeting with Harry Reid, the Democratic Senate minority leader from his home state. Reid has put Sandoval on the short list of recommended candidates he has sent to the White House. The fix may be in, and it would be horrific news for conservatives: Sandoval is the most liberal of the country’s 29 Republican governors. On Tuesday, Senator Reid pledged to reporters that Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell would be under great pressure to hold hearings on President Obama’s nominee for the Court. “He hasn’t seen the pressure that’s going to build. It’s going to build in all the facets of the political constituencies in the country,” Reid said. How better to apply pressure than to appoint a Hispanic Republican — and former federal judge — who might fracture the united front of GOP senators who have come out against an Obama nomination? The mainstream media would no doubt paint GOP opposition to Sandoval as largely based on his clear pro-choice views on abortion. Last year, the governor pressured legislators not to send him an abortion parental-notification bill for minors even though he had campaigned in favor of the concept. Look for Republicans to contrast Sandoval’s stance on abortion with the fact that he has signed bills requiring parental notification for minors deciding to be organ donors or for anyone under the age of 18 who wants to use a tanning booth. But Sandoval’s record clearly demonstrates that his liberal leanings transcend abortion. 

“There’s way more opposition to the governor within the Republican legislative caucus than the Democratic one,” David Damore, a professor of political science at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, told Politico. The mainstream media would no doubt paint GOP opposition to Sandoval as largely based on his clear pro-choice views on abortion. “He has been a consistent barrier to reform measures in Nevada,” one state legislator told me. “We asked him during his first term in 2012 why he couldn’t be more like Scott Walker, and he pointed to the Democratic legislature and said things would be different if the GOP had a majority. Well, in 2014 we gave him a majority in both houses for the first time since the Great Depression and he went to war with conservatives.” A prime example is tort reform, an area where Sandoval has given lip service to supporting reform. But as governor he vetoed bills limiting punitive damages in civil cases and limiting the inclusion of third parties in product-liability lawsuits. Moreover, his judicial appointments have been lackluster, and one of his appointments to the new state court of appeals had a clear liberal track record and was a former staffer for Harry Reid. 

On taxes, he has been the moving force behind the largest tax increase in Nevada’s history. In 2014, a stunning 79 percent of Silver State voters rejected a gross-receipts tax applying to business with over $1 million in revenue. Sandoval didn’t back the tax, but as soon as he won reelection that year, he proposed a similar tax with a threshold of $4 million in business revenue and rammed it though the legislature. “He traded away every kind of conservative reform measure on the table in order to get Democratic votes to pass his billion-dollar-plus tax increase,” conservative activist Chuck Muth told me. And Sandoval made clear to GOP legislative leaders that he wouldn’t sign bills that included popular measures to require voter ID at the polls or collective-bargaining reform for state employees. In 2013, he signed a bill allowing undocumented aliens to obtain a driver’s license. Nor does the governor’s conservative apostasy end there. Sandoval is the only GOP governor who both expanded Medicaid in his state and set up a federal health-care exchange. (John Kasich famously expanded Medicaid but balked at an exchange.) Sandoval is the only GOP governor who both expanded Medicaid in his state and set up a federal health-care exchange. “There’s been this dramatic betrayal,” Republican assemblyman Ira Hansen, a Ted Cruz backer, told Politico. “Sandoval went totally moderate liberal on us. If there was a referendum tomorrow, you’d find a dramatically different result among the Republican-party base.” Indeed, Cruz took a shot at Sandoval during a rally in Reno on Monday, when he called out the governor’s support for tax increases after saying he would oppose them. Other conservatives shudder at the notion of Sandoval on the Supreme Court. “He was an undistinguished district-court judge for four years, and that’s the sum total of his judicial experience,” one of the state’s most respected lawyers told me. “He’s a politician who bends with the political winds but would make liberals far more happy than not, from campaign-finance issues to immigration.” 

Even on the one issue where Sandoval earns conservative praise — his signing of an expansive program of education savings accounts to provide choice for Nevada students — there is a huge caveat: When the ACLU asked the courts to halt the state’s implementation of ESAs, Sandoval publicly called for a robust defense of the law. But behind the scenes he opposed the state’s attorney general partnering with former U.S. solicitor general Paul Clement to fight the suit. Since 2000, Clement has argued more cases before the U.S. Supreme Court than any other lawyer; he represented the plaintiffs in the high-profile Obamacare and Hobby Lobby cases. According to a source close to Nevada’s Board of Examiners, a body that includes Sandoval as a member and had to approve the contract with Clement, “The governor’s office didn’t want the Clement contract, but the governor publicly supported it when it became clear he didn’t have the votes.” The sources I’ve spoken to in Nevada tell me that, if Sandoval is appointed by President Obama, you can expect him to be a master politician if any confirmation hearings are held. “He will say things that please both sides, just as he has in Nevada,” one state legislator told me. “He will fuzz up his judicial philosophy and say he has an open mind. But the record on how he has governed in Nevada speaks volumes.” John Fund is the national-affairs columnist at National Review Online.
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There's a 'bombshell' in Trump's tax returns.
Mitt Romney is going after Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump for not yet releasing his taxes. 

"Frankly, I think we have a good reason to believe that there's a bombshell in Donald Trump's taxes," the 2012 GOP nominee told Fox News on Wednesday.

"I think there's something there. Either he's not anywhere near as wealthy as he says he is or he hasn't been paying the kind of taxes we would expect him to pay, or perhaps he hasn't been giving money to the vets or to the disabled like he's been telling us he's doing."

Romney said it's suspicious that every time Trump is asked about his taxes, he "dodges" and "delays." 

He added that Trump likes to "tell people how well he's done," but has not yet let people look at his taxes.

"We're talking about taxes already filed, back taxes. And my back taxes, when I ran in 2012, my back taxes I put out in January of 2012," he said.

Trump shot back on Twitter, mocking Romney’s defeat in the 2012 election.
Mitt Romney,who totally blew an election that should have been won and whose tax returns made him look like a fool, is now playing tough guy
Romney said he is sensitive to the tax issue because it affected his own run for the White House.

"They were all over me for my taxes, became a big issue, but I put my taxes out in January of 2012 and that gave people a chance to digest it and decide whether I was going to be the nominee or not," he said. 

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) lobbed similar attacks at Romney during his 2012 campaign.

Reid insinuated that Romney wasn't releasing his tax returns because they showed him paying a very low effective tax rate.

Romney was criticized during his campaign for not releasing his pre-2010 tax returns. He ultimately gave two years of information and a "summary of tax rates from the Romney's tax returns" since 1990. 

Reid said last year he didn't regret the attacks and he did what he "felt" he had to.

Romney also criticized Trump's rivals Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz for not releasing their taxes yet. 

Romney said the candidates should get their taxes out in the public so voters can see whether there are any issues, noting they will give voters a sense of whether the candidates have been telling the truth about themselves.

"The voters have a right to see those tax returns before they decide who our nominee ought to be," he said.


"People have a right to know if there's a problem in those taxes before they decide who our nominee is going to be."

Donald Trump rejects Mitt Romney's ironic tax attack. Donald Trump is leaving the door open to not releasing his tax returns, just hours after Mitt Romney warned Wednesday that the billionaire's tax documents could contain a "bombshell."

The GOP front-runner said in an interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper that he will "make a determination over the next couple of months" as to whether he will release his tax returns.

Trump rejected Romney's accusation out of hand, saying "there is no bombshell at all other than I pay a lot of tax and the government wastes the money."

And Trump also slammed Romney, whom the real estate mogul endorsed in the 2012 GOP presidential nominating contest, as "yesterday's news."

Romney's biting attack hinted at clear signs of alarm in the Republican establishment at the billionaire's tightening grip on the party's presidential race.

"We have good reason to believe that there's a bombshell in Donald Trump's taxes," Romney told Fox News, and also called on the top anti-Trump contenders Sens. Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio to disclose their tax information as well.

"Either he's not anywhere near as wealthy as he says he is, or he hasn't been paying taxes we would expect him to pay or perhaps he hasn't been giving money to vets or to the disabled like he's been telling us he's been doing," Romney added.

The 2012 Republican nominee's broadside followed Trump's thumping victories in three of the first four GOP nominating contests, including in Nevada on Tuesday night, which have established the billionaire businessman as the party's undisputed front-runner.

It was also an attack steeped in irony, since Romney was on the receiving end of similar claims by then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, when Democrats eviscerated him over his fortune and business record during the 2012 campaign. Reid zeroed in on his taxes, saying he hadn't paid any in a decade without offering any evidence to support the claim.

Romney, who decided against a third presidential run last year after initially considering jumping in to the race, uncorked his attack on Trump, ahead of next week's Super Tuesday contests that could further cement the billionaire's strong front-runner status in the GOP presidential race.

Romney's move appeared to not just be a sign of concern that Trump -- after defying pundits and political logic since he launched his "outsider" campaign last summer -- could actually go on to claim the Republican nomination.

It was also a sign of skittishness about the damage the Democrats will try to inflict on Trump, who has a long and sometimes controversial business record, in a general election, if he does indeed emerge as the GOP nominee.

"They were all over me for my taxes," Romney told Fox.

While Cruz and Rubio have yet to release their tax returns this campaign season, years of tax returns from both candidates are already publicly available from the time when they ran for Senate.

Reid ignited a firestorm in the 2012 presidential race by claiming on the Senate floor, without presenting any evidence, that "the word's out that he hasn't paid any taxes in 10 years." His attack was part of a fierce effort by the Obama re-election campaign to portray Romney as an out of touch and heartless businessman unable to understand the economic problems afflicting the middle class. Reid later told CNN that he did not regret his move, noting archly that Romney did not win the election.

The irony of the moment struck one key member of Obama's re-election campaign.

"Did Mitt Romney just do to Donald Trump on tax returns what he was so mad at Harry Reid for doing to him?" said former Obama political adviser and current CNN commentator Dan Pfeiffer on Twitter.

Under intense pressure, Romney did finally release his tax returns during the campaign, but when it emerged that he had paid around 14% taxes on his 2010 return, there was political uproar that played into the hands of the Obama campaign.

The former Massachusetts governor was taking advantage of rules in the tax code under which income derived from dividends and capital gains is taxed at lower rates than traditional wages.

Trump last summer released his personal financial disclosure shortly after announcing his presidential run and has consistently touted the fact that he released his financial numbers ahead of schedule.

Trump said he was worth $8 billion, a figure he and his accountants later revised to $10 billion when he officially released his personal financial disclosure. Forbes has estimated Trump's net worth at $4.5 billion, a figure Trump has disputed.

On Wednesday, Trump also stressed that his tax returns "are extremely complex," which Romney has rejected given that Trump would only need to publish several years of past tax returns which he has already filed.

Trump stressed as he has in the past that he pays "as little as possible because it's an expense and it's not one I'm happy paying because frankly the United States government wastes a lot of money."


Watch CNN's Republican debate live on Thursday at 8:30 p.m. ET.
Sunset Daily News & Sports
Published by
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25 February 2016
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