Nyet:Not since President Richard Nixon said “I’m not a crook” has a President had to make such a stunning denial as Donald Trump did yesterday when he said, “I never worked for Russia.”

  Answering a reporter he said, “I think that it’s a disgrace that you even asked that question, because it’s a whole big fat hoax. It’s just a hoax.”

  Trump was forced to make the denial after a NY Timesstory  said the FBI suspected he may have been working for Russia when he fired FBI Director James Comey and opened an investigation. Robert Mueller took over that investigation and so far no finding against the President has been made.

  Trump said of the agents who opened the investigation, “The people doing that investigation were people that have been caught that are known scoundrels. I guess you could say they are dirty cops.”

  The President made the denial yesterday in the White House driveway after failing to make a direct denial over the weekend on Fox Newswhen he said only,

“I think it’s the most insulting thing I’ve ever been asked.”

   Trump is under further scrutiny following the revelation that there has been no official record kept of his meetings with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The NY Times says Trump even confiscated notes from a translator. Those notes and the translator could end up being subpoenaed by House investigators.

  Former CIA Director John Brennan says the translator should be asked whether Trump and Putin exchanged paper notes.

  Despite Trump’s assaults on the Mueller investigation, his nominee for attorney general is expected to testify today that he would let the investigation come to its natural conclusion. “It is in the best interest of everyone — the president, Congress, and, most importantly, the American people — that this matter be resolved by allowing the special counsel to complete his work,” William Barr said in a statement to be delivered in his confirmation hearing.

  This comes although Barr wrote an unsolicited memo last year criticizing the theory that Trump committed obstruction of justice by freeing the FBI director. Barr argues in the memo that to have obstructed justice, Trump would have had to destroy evidence rather than just fire the man seeking it. 

Day 25:President Trump admits that he spurned a proposal by Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham to re-open the government for three weeks while the parties negotiate over paying for Trump’s border wall.

  “I did reject it,” Trump told reporters.

 Graham had suggested that if Trump could not reach an agreement with Democratic leaders by the end of the tree weeks that the President could then go on to declare a national emergency to build his wall.

  Trump continues to argue the greatness of his leadership via twitter. He wrote yesterday, “For decades, politicians promised to secure the border, fix our trade deals, bring back our factories, get tough on China, move the Embassy to Jerusalem, make NATO pay their fair share, and so much else – only to do NOTHING (or worse)…. ….I am doing exactly what I pledged to do, and what I was elected to do by the citizens of our great Country. Just as I promised, I am fighting for YOU!”

Stripped: Following cluelessly racist comments he made to TheNY Times, Republican Rep. Steve King of Iowa has been stripped of his  committee assignments. King has been a member of the judiciary and agriculture committees.

  His punishment suggest that Republican leaders are worried about the image of their party under Donald Trump. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said King should find “another line of work” and Sen. Mitt Romney said he should quit.

  King told the Times last week, “White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization — how did that language become offensive?” He’s said this kind of thing for years.

  King later said in his defense that he’s not a racist, he’s an “American nationalist.”

China Syndrome:In an escalating diplomatic battle, Chinese authorities have condemned a Canadian man to death following his conviction for drug smuggling. The Chinese say Robert Schellenberg orchestrated the smuggling of nearly 500 pounds of methamphetamines from China to Australia.

 Relations between China and Australia have been strained following the arrest of a senior executive from the Chinese tech firm Huawei in Vancouver last month.

The Obit Page:Actress Carol Channing, who starred in the Broadway hit “Hello Dolly!” in 1964 has died at age 97. — Writer Francine du Plessix Gray died at age 88. Gray was a woman of privilege raised by emotionally distant parents. Her first book, “Them: A Memoir of Parents,” won the National Book Award.

  She wrote long profiles of the anti-war  Berrigan brothers and the status of women in the old Soviet Union.

  Gray established herself as a novelist in the mid-1970s with “Lovers and Tyrants,” a semi-autobiographical story of a young French-American woman trying to understand her life.

The Big Cheese:President Trump welcomed the national champion Clemson Tigers to the White House yesterday and offered them what he considered to be a feast; mounds of fast food. There were pizzas, Big Macs, Wendy’s, and Burger King artery cloggers. All piled under candelabra in the dining room where state dinners are held. One football player said he thought it was a joke.

  The President wore his overcoat. 

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