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John Roberts leaves Trump’s Circle of Trust

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Today's Agenda

President Donald Trump and Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, in happier times (February).

Photographer: Pool/Getty Images North America

How to Lose Friends and Not Influence People

President Donald Trump's circle of people he once considered key allies has shrunk by at least three.

First, there are Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Neil Gorsuch, both conservatives, the latter of whom Trump put on the high court. Roberts voted against Trump in two key cases this week, including today's ruling that Trump can't end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which would have exposed 700,000 children of immigrants to being deported to countries that were never truly their own. Roberts also joined Gorsuch's opinion defeating Trump efforts to strip LGBT workers of workplace rights.

This inspired Trump to tweet, at the start of several angry posts about the high court, "Do you get the impression the Supreme Court doesn't like me?" In fact, if Trump would put down the phone and take a few deep breaths, Francis Wilkinson writes, he'll recognize Roberts has done him a favor by ending his wildly unpopular attack on the children of immigrants, known as "Dreamers." The court actually gave Trump an avenue to try again. But he'd be wise not to take it.

Roberts once seemed willing to meet Trump halfway as long as he respected the judicial branch, writes Noah Feldman. That didn't work out so well, so the chief justice has lately been pushing back at Trump's especially sloppy power grabs. "Trump has earned his distrust, if not his dislike," Noah writes.

Then, there's John Bolton, Trump's former national security adviser. Trump never really trusted him, on account of the mustache. Now he's furious over Bolton's book describing Trump as selfish and unfit for office, a description familiar from every account of the Trump presidency published since January 2017. The book doesn't exactly describe offenses as obviously impeachable as the Ukraine quid pro quo, writes Jonathan Bernstein. It simply reminds us once again that the president makes terrible decisions and gets manipulated by authoritarians.

But that weakness has real consequences, undermining everything the government tries to do, writes Eli Lake, including keeping China's Uighur minority out of concentration camps. Little wonder Trump is losing friends among voters too.

Further Court-Ruling Reading: The DACA decision is a needed curb on agency power. — Cass Sunstein

Geopolitics Just Keeps Happening

If the importance of strong leadership in the White House isn't obvious, just take a look around the world right now. It's dangerous all over. China and India this week came to blows over their border in the Himalayas, raising the risk of deadlier confrontations. This is a very old feud, but this latest flare-up is evidence China is mishandling its neighbor's rising economic power, writes Mihir Sharma. It's driving India toward the U.S., though Trump seems unable to capitalize. China, meanwhile, would be better off helping India thrive economically, drawing it into its own orbit, writes David Fickling.

Did we mention both China and India, and also neighboring Pakistan, have nuclear weapons? In fact, nuclear powers around the world are rebuilding arsenals, disarmament treaties are falling by the wayside, and new countries are scrambling to get their own weapons as diplomacy lays dying, writes Andreas Kluth. It's another one of those minor things American presidents once considered important.

But Trump's primary concern seems to be relieving petty grievances, no matter the consequences. His arbitrary pullout of troops from Germany because Angela Merkel gave him the sads is the latest example, warns Bloomberg's editorial board. This is a huge mistake, weakening key European alliances and emboldening Russia. But Vladimir Putin has pretended to be nice to Trump, so …

Further Geopolitical Nightmare Reading: Trump shouldn't abandon the fight against Islamic State; without American leadership that mission will fall apart. — Seth Frantzman

Laws? Where the Fed's Going, It Won't Need Laws

Look, this pandemic is an emergency, OK? And everybody's been doing the best they can, as quickly as possible, to avert disaster. Congress passed the $2.2 trillion CARES Act to pump a ton of much-needed money into the economy. The Federal Reserve made the money printer go brrr. The economy needed this, and much more. But at some point we might want to think about whether it's all being put to its best use.

Oversight has been poor to very poor. And recently the Fed described plans to straight-up buy corporate bonds. This may not be the worst thing, even if it is unnecessary. But in giving itself permission to London Whale the bond market, Brian Chappatta writes, the Fed seems to ignore the CARES Act's commandment to limit its largesse to companies with "significant operations in and a majority of its employees based in the United States." Instead, it has found a way to buy the biggest companies' bonds, CARES Act be damned. This will squash interest rates. But it will also add to that whole Wall Street vs. Main Street conflict.

Telltale Charts

There's evidence the fear of coronavirus infection hurt the economy more than lockdowns did, writes Noah Smith, and that subsequent lockdowns don't have to be quite so restrictive to curb infections.

Breakfast may be the most important thing, but restaurant breakfast offerings are suffering the most from our new WFH culture, writes Sarah Halzack.

 

Further Reading

Timing a bubble is an incredibly dangerous trick, but many investors are doing it now. — John Authers

Blame zero-fee brokerages, not the Fed, for the frenzy of retail traders in the stock market. — Jared Dillian

It takes a village to beat remote-work burnout. — Sarah Green Carmichael

ICYMI

The U.S. is ranked worst for workers' rights among major economies.

Nikola Corp.'s founder overstated his electric truck's abilities.

Football may not happen this year.

Kickers

New Oregon park memorializes that time people blew up a whale.

Scientists grow mini-brains with Neanderthal DNA. (h/t Mike Smedley for the first two kickers)

Platypuses rescued from Australia wildfires finally return home. (h/t Alistair Lowe)

Mosquitoes genetically modified to control Aedes aegypti will soon be released in Florida.

Note: Please send Neanderthal DNA and complaints to Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.net.

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