Midday Open Thread

“Donald Trump’s political operation raised more than $76 million in April, campaign officials told donors on Saturday,” Politico reports. “Trump advisers revealed the number, up from $65.6 million in March, during a presentation at a private Trump campaign and Republican National Committee-hosted donor retreat.”

Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) became the latest Republican to hit Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) over her plan to oust Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), The Hill reports. Said Crenshaw: “She needs her time in the spotlight, you know, and it’s been a while, and I think it’s one last ditch effort to get attention, is what she’s looking for.”

“Charlie Spies, the Republican National Committee’s chief counsel, was pushed out of his new role just two months after taking the job, amid a storm of controversy over conflicts involving other clients at the firm where he still works,“ the New York Times reports. “Mr. Spies, a veteran election-law lawyer whom the R.

“On his first visit to Europe in five years, the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, appears intent on seizing opportunities to loosen the continent’s bonds with the United States and forge a world freed of American dominance,” the New York Times reports.. “The Chinese leader has chosen three countries to visit — France, Serbia and Hungary — that each, to a greater or lesser degree, look askance at America’s postwar ordering of the world, see China as a necessary counterweight and are eager to bolster economic ties.”

Donald Trump’s former communications director Hope Hicks, 35, is engaged to Goldman Sachs boss Jim Donovan, 58, Page Six reports.

Gary Moore is one of the least talked about guitarists of his time, but man could he rock. Still Got the Blues For You is in my mind his signature track. Music Radar conducted an excellent interview with Moore and he discussed his music and guitar playing in general. Moore also has some advice for the prolix guitar player, and we have surely all been one, coming down with acute case of fretboard diarrhoea and using too many notes in our solos. Take a phrase, says Moore, and work on it, playing around with all the different permutations, accenting the first, second, or maybe the last notes, working on the dynamics – these are all ways of workshopping your phrasing and learning how to make more out of something simple and familiar.