White House Watch: Ronny Jackson Withdraws

Quote of the Day— “He has received more vetting than most nominees.” —Sarah Huckabee Sanders, White House press secretary, on Ronny Jackson, April 25, 2018

Meanwhile, a current member of Trump's Cabinet has his own day of reckoning on Capitol Hill Thursday. EPA administrator Scott Pruitt will appear at a House hearing and is expected to get tough questions about the numerous allegations he has abused his office for personal reasons. There's reason to think the president may be tuning in to listen to some of Pruitt's testimony live—the only public event listed on his calendar is a speech to wounded warriors visiting the White House, at 10:30 a.m.

In his Wednesday address to a joint session of Congress, French president Emmanuel Macron cast the American involvement in the broader military conflict in Syria—an operation President Trump wants to end sooner rather than later—as an ongoing battle between the western Democratic world and the forces of terror.

“In recent years, our nations have suffered wrenching losses simply because of our values and our taste for freedom—because these values are the very ones those terrorists precisely hate,” Macron said. “It is a horrific price to pay for freedom, for democracy. That is why we stand together in Syria and in Sahel today, to fight together against these terrorist groups who seek to destroy everything for which we stand.”

North Korea Watch—White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said again Wednesday that the North Korea has been “open in their willingness to denuclearize,” one day after President Trump said Korean denuclearization “means they get rid of their nukes.”

“We think the maximum pressure campaign is working, but we’re not going to let up on that campaign until we’ve seen some of the words they’ve made go into concrete action,” Sanders said. “But they’re moving in the right direction.”

The White House may have discussed denuclearization with North Korea behind the scenes, but Kim Jong-un has not yet publicly indicated a willingness to denuclearize in either actions or words.

Suicide Watch—My colleague Adam Keiper has a review of Jonah Goldberg’s big new book, Suicide of the West, in the upcoming issue of the magazine, available online now. Here’s an excerpt:

Goldberg’s book is a big, baggy, sometimes frustrating, often brilliant combination of intellectual history and political essay. He says that the original manuscript was twice as long as the final product; it certainly should have been much further pruned. But at its best, the book makes a simple, vitally important argument about gratitude and perpetuation. And it synthesizes the research and theories of dozens of sociologists, historians, and economists in a new and helpful way. If Suicide of the West—like Goldberg’s first book, the bestseller Liberal Fascism—comes to be so widely read and debated that it shapes the public understanding of its subject, we will be much better off for it.

One More Thing—Goldberg, by the way, will be a guest at this year’s Weekly Standard Summit in Colorado Springs, where he will talk about Suicide of the West and other politics of the day.

There are still a few rooms available for the event, May 17-20, so sign up here if you’re interested in seeing Goldberg and our other guests—Bret Baier, A.B. Stoddard, Senator Tim Scott, Congressman Trey Gowdy, and White House adviser Michael Anton—join me and several of my WEEKLY STANDARD colleagues for panel discussions about politics at the beautiful Broadmoor Resort.