The Justice Files: Strange things are happening at the Justice Department under the watchful eyes and Twitter thumbs of President Trump. The NY Times reports that Attorney Gen. William Barr has appointed a team to review “politically sensitive” cases. 

  Barr sent an outside prosecutor to examine the criminal case against President Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn. This comes even though Flynn pleaded guilty in December 2017 to lying to the FBI about his dealings with the Russian ambassador and other diplomats during the presidential transition in 2016 and 2017.

  The problem is that Flynn was prosecuted by the Office of Special Counsel under Robert Mueller, who Trump has always claimed was running a “witch hunt.” 

  At the same time, the DOJ announced it is not  bringing charges against former FBI deputy Director Andrew McCabe, one of Trump’s favorite targets. McCabe is the man who authorized a personal investigation of Trump related to Russia and the 2016 election. He had been accused of lying about being the source of a leak to the press, fired, and subjected to a long investigation.

  The McCabe dismissal is reported to have enraged Trump. The Washington Post reports that an official said Trump “believes very strongly that action should be taken.”

  Barr has claimed that Trump never leaned on him about criminal cases, but Trump said in a tweet that he could if he wanted to.” This doesn’t mean that I do not have, as President, the legal right to do so,” Trump wrote, “I do, but I have so far chosen not to!”

  The President may not have spoken directly to Barr, although it’s hard to believe either of them, but Trump’s tweets on the subject of his friend Roger Stone and his impending sentence have spoken loudly.

  What’s curious is how these two men appear to be communicating; Trump through Twitter, and Barr through television interviews. That’s how this government is running right now.

Brokered Deal: It’s not unusual for political prognosticators to talk about “brokered” party nominating conventions during a tight primary season  — it would be fun to cover one —  but the Democrats have heated up the discussion.

  With so many Democrats running, and a bunch of them likely to stay in it until the bars close, it’s going to be hard for any of them to win just over 50 percent of the delegates and take the nomination with the first vote.

  Nate Silver’s Five-Thirty-Eight blog, the site for numbers nerds, rates the top candidates’ chances of breaking 50 percent as follows:

     Bernie Sanders, 1 in 3

     Joe Biden, 1 in 8

     Mike Bloomberg, 1 in 12

     Pete Buttigieg, 1 in 25

     Elizabeth Warren, 1 in 50

     Amy Klobuchar, 1 in 100

Outbreak: As the coronavirus epidemic begins to weigh on the  European economy, France has reported the first death from the coronavirus outside of China. It was an 80-year-old Chinese tourist.

  Meanwhile, the US plans to evacuate Americans trapped on a cruise ship quarantined in Japan.

Deal with the Devil: The US has negotiated a one-week “reduction in violence”  agreement with the Taliban that the Trump administration hopes could be the first step in getting out of the country’s longest-running war.  

  The next step would be the signing of an agreement between the US and the Taliban that would then lead to talks between Afghan leaders and the Taliban about what role the extremists will have in the country’s future. 

  What isn’t clear about this is why the Taliban would give up its quest to control the whole country once again. They take the long view of things and might just wait until America leaves.

In the Grip: Former ABC News Correspondent Sam Donaldson, who was a pit bull covering the White House, yesterday endorsed former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg for president during an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper.

   Donaldson has never been a politician’s friend, but he said he felt compelled to act because “we are in the grip” of a “sick, ignorant man.” 

  The veteran political reporter said, “He’s mean, he’s corrupt and if we don’t get this right, we may lose the things that have made this country the best place to live in the world and that shining city on the hill that Ronald Reagan used to talk about which was the envy of the world.” 

The Obit Page: Charles “Chuckie” O’Brien,  a close associate of Teamsters president Jimmy Hoffa, who was believed to have been the man who drove the car that took Hoffa to his disappearance in July 1975, has died in Florida at age 86.

  O’Brien was a constant companion and always claimed to have been like a son to Hoffa, but he was a prime suspect in Hoffa’s unsolved murder. No one was ever charged, but O’Brien carried the stigma for the rest of his life. 

  He was portrayed in last year’s interminably-long movie “The Irishman,” and said it twisted the facts of Hoffa’s life and disappearance. It makes you wonder, if Chuckie wasn’t involved, how does he know the movie twisted the facts?

War of Words: One of the tests for a Democratic presidential candidate is going to be how they trade barbs with the President.

  New York’s Mike Bloomberg made a good showing this week after Trump attacked his short stature and mild demeanor. Bloomberg, who Trump calls “L’il Mike,” is a “5’4” mass of dead energy who does not want to be on the debate stage with these professional politicians,” according to the President. Trump claims Bloomberg wants to be able to stand on a box when he appears in a debate.

  Bloomberg, who’s believed to be actually 5’8”, countered that, “where I come from we measure your height from your neck up.”

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