Here are my observations and opinions on selected news of the day.

THE FACTS ON THE ECONOMY – If you missed the appearance of Kevin Hassett, the president’s chief economic advisor, on Monday’s White House press briefing, you missed a concise briefing with charts that clearly shot down former President Obama’s claim last Friday that the economy was beginning to improve under his watch. Each chart showed a distinct downward trend that turned upward after President Trump took office. It’s a must see. Click here to see it.

CRAZY JOE SCARBOROUGH, the co-host of MSNBC’s Morning Joe, who definitely suffers from Trump Derangement Syndrome, wrote @JoeNBC that “Trump is damaging the dream of America more than any terrorist attack ever could.” Oh, my … it’s a toss-up on who’s wackier, Joe or Mika Brzezinski.

WITH APLOGIES TO DOROTHY HAMILL, you’ve got to say that Hillary Clinton is the Dorothy Hamill of politics … she continues to skate free of indictments. The Benghazi “dereliction of duty” (my words) and the flagrant mishandling of classified documents come to mind immediately, but former independent counsel Ken Starr reveals others dating back to 1995 in his new book, “Contempt: A Memoir of the Clinton Investigation.”

“I was upset over Mrs. Clinton’s performance, and was even considering bringing the matter before the Washington grand jury for possible indictment on perjury,” he writes, “In the space of three hours, she claimed by our count, over a hundred times that she ‘did not recall’ or ‘did not remember.’

“This suggested outright mendacity. To be sure, human memory is notoriously fallible, but her strained performance struck us as preposterous.”

AN ASIDE: Kramerontheright believes that her performance before FBI agents during their July 2016 questioning of her e-mail handling was similar. You will recall that we have been told that the session was not recorded and there are no transcripts. How convenient.

Interestingly, Starr surfaces the mysterious death of Deputy White House Counsel Vince Foster in his memoir. Foster was found dead in a Washington park shortly after the Washington Post reported that he had filed three years of delinquent Whitewater corporate tax returns.

You may recall that federal investigators were not allowed access to Foster’s office after the discovery of his body, leading to speculation that someone close to Clinton removed files from his office.

Ryan Saavedra, writing @realsaavedra relates a story from a piece in the Free Beacon in 1996 that “Hillary Clinton relentlessly browbeat her clinically depressed former law partner Vince Foster shortly before he committed suicide,” a story derived from a jailhouse interview with a former close business partner of the Clintons.

SPEAKING OF BOOKS – I don’t intend to read Bob Woodward’s tale, “Fear,” released today. Those given pre-release copies of the book have panned it.

Not Jill Abramson, who in a review for Woodward’s paper, The Washington Post, wrote “Fear” is an important book, not only because it raises questions about the president’s basic fitness for office, but … are you ready for this? …. also because of who the author is.”

I am currently reading and highly recommend Gregg Jarrett’s book, “Hoax: The Illicit Scheme to Clear Hillary Clinton and Frame Donald Trump,” in which the author extensively annotates his sources.

THREE CHEERS FOR MOLLIE HEMINGWAY – I have long been impressed with the writing of Mollie Hemingway in The Federalist, but equally because of the credibility and professionalism she adds to Bret Baier’s Special Report on Fox, where she is a frequent panelist.

For the benefit of those who may not have viewed her recent take down of Charles Lane of The Washington Post when she disputed his comment that President Obama treated members of the media fairly and championed free speech, she reinforced her response in The Federalist.

“That is not my recollection of the eight years under President Obama,” she said. “He blamed many bad things in the country on people watching Fox News. He claimed it was on in every bar in the country and why Democrats were hurt. He tried to freeze out Fox News in multiple instances. He spied on reporters. He’s one of the worst presidents when it comes to actual actions when it comes to the media.”

While Hemingway concedes that President Trump speaks against the press, he hasn’t taken the overt actions against them that Obama used to do.

“LEAK STRATEGY” was the subject of newly obtained text messages and documents obtained by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and prove that senior members of the FBI and DOJ led a coordinated effort to leak information to the press regarding alleged collusion with Russia with the intent to damage the Trump administration.

In a letter to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, Rep. Mark Meadows cites a text exchange that should lead a reasonable person to question whether there was a sincere desire to investigate wrongdoing or to place derogatory information in the media.

Note that these texts were exchanged three months into the Trump presidency.

April 10, 2017: Peter Strzok contacts Lisa Page to discuss a “media leak strategy.” “I had literally just gone to find this phone to tell you I want to talk to you about media lead strategy with DOJ before you go.”

April 12, 2017: Peter Strzok congratulates Lisa Page on a job well done while referring to two derogatory articles about Carter Page (no relation). In the text, Strozk “tells” Page two articles are coming out, one (of) which is “worse” than the other about Lisa’s “namesake.” Strzok added “Well done, Page.”

Paul Mirengoff, writing in the Power Line, says “It seems clear that the FBI and DOJ engaged in a coordinated campaign with articles suggesting connections between President Trump and Russia.” Regarding Carter Page, Mirengoff notes that Carter Page has not been charged for any wrongdoing after a year and a half of accusations.

Rosenstein, who has his own conflict of interest issues, will likely continue stonewalling in the DOJ.

LAUGH OF THE DAY – New York gubernatorial candidate Cynthia Nixon ordered a cinnamon raisin bagel with lox, red onions, capers and plain cream cheese. That tops John Kerry’s order of a Philly Cheesesteak sandwich with Cheez Whiz.

          May God bless the United States of America.