 Donald Trump will be far away from New York City when he heads to Alabama on Friday for a rally, which is expected to be the biggest event so far in the 2016 race. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images) THE BIG IDEA by Robert Costa: Donald Trump is going to pack a college football stadium in Alabama on Friday night. The scene will be part Lynyrd Skynyrd concert, part tea-party rally. It'll also likely be the biggest event so far in the 2016 race. And there is nothing GOP leaders or his rivals can do about it. Ladd-Peebles Stadium in Mobile, Ala., is one of the last places you'd expect a Republican presidential candidate to appear in late August before the primaries. This chapter of the contest is usually devoted to sleepy getting-to-know-you huddles at the Pizza Ranch in Pella, Iowa. But the sloped steel bowl near the Gulf Coast, just a short drive from the vote-rich Florida panhandle, is where the billionaire is planning to host more than 30,000 people. Corey Lewandowski, Trump's campaign manager, called The Washington Post on Thursday to preview the event. He said Trump's goal is to start laying the groundwork for the swing of Southern primaries in March and for what could be a drawn-out nomination fight. "That's where we're looking," he said. "Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, and then be ready for the rest of the way." The gathering under the Friday night lights, however, is not only a strategic move to round up signatures and e-mail addresses in the parking lot and in the bleachers. It is a sweaty political moment — the latest and largest spectacle in what has become the most colorful and bombastic campaign in American politics. Trump, at least for now, has become an unstoppable force, hurtling through a field of 16 opponents with unbridled candor, brushing back swirling controversies and relishing the daily affection of top-flight network television bookers who have him on speed dial. No one in the GOP seems to be able to figure how to deal with his staying power. In recent weeks, they've crossed their fingers and assured skittish donors that Trump would be a summer fling. Yet he still leads the polls and his numbers are rising in key states, all as others struggle mightily to get attention and hope to be recognized when they're strolling through the Iowa State Fair. As Phil Rucker and I write today, the non-Trump candidates are falling into three categories: Those who are emulating and befriending him in an effort to win over his supporters; those who are assailing his background or calling him out for his views and rhetoric; and those who prefer to stay silent, as if hunkering down in the basement to ride out the tornado. Tonight, that tornado comes to Alabama. Programming note: James Hohmann is on vacation this week. Stay tuned for one more guest Big Idea from fellow Postie Paul Kane. WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING: — President Obama wrote a letter to Congress asserting that the United State would unilaterally maintain economic pressure and reserve the option of military force against Iran if necessary, if his landmark nuclear accord with the country is implemented, the New York Times reported. The Aug. 19 letter is the first time that Obama has personally put such promises in writing as his administration aggressively sells the deal to lawmakers. Among the pledges is a separate office inside the State Department to implement the deal. Meanwhile, a Post analysis showed that deal supporters are very unlikely to override a veto if Congress sends a disapproval resolution to the president’s desk. Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill (Mo.) was the latest to throw her vote to the president on Thursday. Check out this handy interactive chart listing all the lawmakers’ positions. But deal foes aren’t giving up: a mad TV ad rush is on, with spots running in at least 23 states and all over social media.  Jeb Bush sparked controversy by using the term “anchor babies” on Wednesday. (Photo by Melina Mara/The Washington Post) GET SMART FAST: - Hundreds of federal government employees – including in “sensitive” jobs in the White House and Congress – used their work computers to access and pay membership dues to the cheating website Ashley Madison, the Associated Press reported. Two dozen agencies were involved, including accounts traced to two assistant U.S. attorneys; a White House information technology officer; and a Homeland Security Department counter-terrorism aide.
- U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan told State Department attorneys they should be working with the FBI to see if Hillary Clinton had retained any federal records on the private email server she used as secretary of state. Appointed by Bill Clinton, Sullivan said it wouldn’t be an issue if Hillary "had followed government policy."
- July 2015 was the hottest month on record for planet Earth since the 1800s, and we’re well on our way toward the hottest year on record globally.
- A new study by Columbia University’s Earth Institute found that human-caused global warming increased the California drought by 25 percent. The state’s drought is the worst in its history, and 2014 was also the state’s hottest year.
- Greece will hold new elections on Sept. 20, as Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras attempts to consolidate his power and implement the harsh bailout plan, despite internal backlash.
POWER PLAYERS IN THE NEWS: - Pols sent their prayers and well wishes to Jimmy Carter after he disclosed Thursday that cancer in his liver had spread to his brain. He started radiation treatment yesterday.
- A “feistier” Jeb Bush said he doesn’t think the term “anchor babies” is offensive — Bush used the term for the first time on Wednesday. “What I said is that it’s commonly referred to that. I didn’t use it as my own language. You want to get to the policy for a second? I think that people born in this country ought to be American citizens.” By contrast, Marco Rubio said in an interview that children born in the U.S. to illegal immigrant are “human beings.”
- And Rand Paul joined the chorus of Republicans who want to end birthright citizenship — except that he had the idea way before Donald Trump. Paul sponsored a 2011 resolution that would have changed the law to limit birthright citizenship to only those kids born to at least one parent who is a legal U.S. citizen, resident alien or member of the Armed Forces. It went nowhere.
- Trump’s one-hour CNN interview on Wednesday night gave the network it’s biggest ratings at 9p.m. since anti-police riots in Baltimore on April 28.
- Former presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton will visit New Orleans, along with President Obama, during the week-long commemoration of the 10-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Obama visits on Aug. 27, Bush goes on the 28th and Clinton on the 29th.
- Retired basketball star Charles Barkley said he’s looking at John Kasich at this point in the race.
- It’s looking increasingly likely that Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) will go to prison while awaiting his appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. McDonnell can appeal to SCOTUS to stay out of jail during the appeals process, but it’s more likely he’ll be given a date to report to prison within a week.
- Carly Fiorina’s dad, Thomas Sneed, was on the three-judge panel that picked a Whitewater special counsel — it was Sneed who recommended Kenneth Starr for the job, our Loop colleague Colby Itkowitz reports.
 President Obama played golf on Aug. 15 at Farm Neck Golf Club during his vacation on Martha’s Vineyard (Steve Senne/AP) WAPO HIGHLIGHTS: –“Obama’s ever-shrinking, nearly invisible Martha’s Vineyard vacation,” by Greg Jaffe: “For almost two weeks here, Obama has brought that same minimalist ethic to his vacation. Now in his sixth year of visits to the island — he took one year off to run for reelection – the president is the equivalent of a vacationing Yeti. Many have had near brushes with the leader of the free world, but only a precious few have actually laid eyes on him. For some on the Vineyard, who insist that the island is simply too sophisticated for celebrity spotting, Obama's near-invisibility is a point of pride…The reality, though, is that the president's vacation has — with each passing year — grown smaller and smaller. So small, in fact, that it can barely be seen. Early in his presidency Obama made regular visits with his wife and daughters to the Bunch of Grapes bookstore in Tisbury to load up on reading. But those brief jaunts fell off the schedule a couple of years ago.” —“For Carly Fiorina, just ‘press one’ to solve the nation’s problems,” by Jenna Johnson: “The former Hewlett-Packard chief executive has been telling audiences in Iowa and elsewhere on the campaign trail recently that a mix of common sense — combined with her business know-how — would yield solutions to issues ranging from securing the border to simplifying tax rates to defeating the Islamic State terrorist group. ‘A lot of this isn't complicated,’ Fiorina said at a recent town hall [in Iowa], adding: ‘Pretty basic.'” She explained to a veteran who complained he was having trouble scheduling a Veterans Administration doctor’s appointment that she’d fix the problem by gathering a bunch of veterans in a room and vetting their solutions through a telephone poll. She said: “You know how to solve these problems. So I'm going to ask you." —“FAA records detail hundreds of close calls between airplanes and drones,” by Craig Whitlock: “Before last year, close encounters with rogue drones were unheard of. But as a result of a sales boom, small, largely unregulated remote-control aircraft are clogging U.S. airspace, snarling air traffic and giving the FAA fits. Pilots have reported a surge in close calls with drones: nearly 700 incidents so far this year, according to FAA statistics, about triple the number recorded for all of 2014. The agency has acknowledged growing concern about the problem and its inability to do much to tame it…documents show that remote-control planes are penetrating some of the most guarded airspace in the country.” SOCIAL MEDIA SPEED READ: — ZIGNAL VISUAL: Jeb Bush’s day was dominated by something he probably didn’t want to talk about, according to our analytics partner Zignal Labs: “anchor babies,” the term used by some for undocumented immigrants who come to the U.S. to have babies who then gain U.S. citizenship. 
Pictures of the day: An early evening storm produced beautiful and dramatic skies around Washington:  (@JimHavard)  (@WamsleyNWSHQ) Lawmakers circulated the image below after President Carter said cancer has spread to his brain:  (@cbrangel) James Carter, President Carter’s grandson, posted this photo from Plains, Ga.:  (@JECarter4) And Donald Trump made the cover of Time magazine:  (@TIME) Tweets of the day: “Anchor babies” should be called babies, children or citizens, Hillary Clinton tweeted: Bobby Jindal announced plans to screen the Planned Parenthood videos outside the governor’s mansion: Martin O’Malley tweeted that the presidential race needs more debates, “Jon Stewart moderating or not”:  (@MartinOMalley) Instagrams of the day: Jeb Bush stopped at Dunkin Donuts in New Hampshire:  (jebbush) Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) posted a photo with one of Rep. Devin Nunes’s (R-Calif.) daughters:  (speakerboehner) Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) shared a personal photo from the late 1980s for #ThrowbackThursday:  (elisestefanik) GOOD READS FROM ELSEWHERE:  U.S. Army Army 1st Lt. Shaye Haver speaks with reporters, Thursday at Fort Benning, Ga., where she is scheduled to graduate Friday from the Army's elite Ranger School. Haver and Army Capt. Kristen Griest are the first two women to complete the notoriously grueling Ranger course, which the Army opened to women this spring as it studies whether to open more combat jobs to female soldiers. (Mike Haskey /Ledger-Enquirer via AP) –USAToday, “Female Ranger students refused to give up,” by Jim Michaels: “First Lt. Shaye Haver will make history Friday when she and another female soldier (Capt. Kristen Geist) become the first women to graduate from Ranger School, the Army's most physically demanding course. The 25-year-old helicopter pilot wasn't out to make a statement. What motivated her was winning the respect of her Ranger teammates by meeting the same challenges they did. ‘We kind of were winning hearts and minds as we went,’ Hayer said Thursday, explaining that they won the respect of other students by carrying their own weight on grueling patrols and meeting the tough physical standards.” –New York Times, “Western wildfires consume manpower and acreage,” by Kirk Johnson and Fernanda Santos: “The nation entered its eighth day on Thursday on what is officially known as Preparedness Level 5, which signifies that fire managers are struggling to find enough crews and commanders for the fires that are burning, most of them in parched Northwestern states and in Northern California. It is the highest such classification and also the first time since 2013 that it has been applied. In 2013, it was in effect for seven days. More acres have burned so far this year — about 7.2 million by Thursday, an area almost five times the size of the state of Delaware — than in each of the previous 10 years, according to statistics compiled by the National Interagency Fire Center. Two-thirds of those acres are in Alaska, which is having a particularly punishing fire season and is contending with mudslides caused by torrential rains on the denuded land.” HOT ON THE LEFT McCaskill: Ex-senator Scott Brown would 'do anything to show his body.' From New York Magazine: “‘What’s Scott Brown up to these days?’ [asks Sen. Claire McCaskill] … ‘Do people even know who he is? Wow. He will do anything to show his body. It was so surreal, all of the women in the Senate used to talk about how he would figure out some way, every time he had a conversation, to work in something about his body. Like, ‘I was on the treadmill in the gym this morning and I saw you on MSNBC,’ or ‘You know, I was running at lunch today and’ — and he did it to all of us! We all compared notes.'” | | | HOT ON THE RIGHT Islamic leaders want a jihad against global warming. From the Daily Caller: “A group of influential Muslims is calling on others of their faith to wage a jihad on global warming, and is calling on Islamic governments to reduce their use of fossil fuels ahead of the United Nations climate summit in Paris this year. ‘Excessive pollution from fossil fuels threatens to destroy the gifts bestowed on us by God, whom we know as Allah – gifts such as a functioning climate, healthy air to breathe, regular seasons, and living oceans,’ wrote Islamic leaders from 20 countries after attending a summit in Istanbul, Turkey.” | | | DAYBOOK: –What’s happening today on the campaign trail: Ted Cruz will speak at the Des Moines Register's soapbox at the Iowa State Fair and hold a rally in Des Moines. Jeb Bush and Bobby Jindal will speak at an Americans for Prosperity conference in Columbus. Donald Trump will hold a rally in Mobile, Ala. Lindsey Graham will begin a four-day swing through New Hampshire with a house party in Salem. Marco Rubio will hold a town hall meeting in Valley View, Ohio. Bernie Sanders will campaign in Greenville and Columbia, S.C. –On the Hill: Both chambers are in recess. –At the White House: President Obama is on vacation in Martha’s Vineyard. QUOTE OF THE DAY: "I'm perfectly at ease with whatever comes," Jimmy Carter said at a news conference Thursday, explaining the spread of liver cancer to his brain. ” "I do have a deep religious faith, which I'm very grateful for." | NEWS YOU CAN USE IF YOU LIVE IN D.C.: —“It's hard to complain about slowly clearing skies and comfortable conditions today through much of the weekend. We even got some rain to dampen much of the area last night. At least Mother Nature is trying to give a little something to everyone,” the Capital Weather Gang reports. —The Nationals lost to the Colorado Rockies, 3-2, ending a road trip with a losing record: 3-7.
VIDEO OF THE DAY: Go behind the scenes of the Time photo shoot with Donald Trump and a real live eagle named Uncle Sam:  (realdonaldtrump) Which rival does Rand Paul think he can beat at soccer? Find out here. Watch Jimmy Carter’s complete news conference on his cancer diagnosis here. Finally, check out Conan O’Brien’s comedic and musical efforts to boost Lincoln Chafee in the polls:  (Credit: TBS) | 
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