Comments

  1. says

    Anti-LGBT dunderhead North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory finds himself in hot water again. He is catching a lot of flak for a law he signed that is designed to keep police camera recordings out of the public eye.

    […] The state branch of the ACLU has also condemned the law as “shameful,” saying it reduces “any potential this technology had to make law enforcement more accountable to community members.”

    House Bill 972, formerly known as the Body Cam bill, stipulates that only individuals whose image or audio appears in a police dashboard or body camera recording can request to view that file. Even those individuals who do appear in the footage cannot make a copy of it, and law enforcement can deny their requests to view it in the name of safety, reputation protection or an ongoing investigation. Denied requests to access the footage would then be left to the discretion of a superior court judge. […]

    Link

  2. says

    With no background check at all, the guy who shot five Dallas police officers bought an AK-47 rifle through Facebook, and then finalized the deal in a retail store parking lot.

    Micah Johnson used an Izhmash-Saiga 5.45 mm rifle, an AK-style variant, during the Dallas shooting, but he had a much larger arsenal of firearms, including the AK-47 he bought through Facebook.

    […] In January, Facebook banned users from coordinating unregulated gun sales, but it has left the enforcement of the ban entirely to users who report violators. […]

    Mother Jones link

  3. says

    Oh FFS. Ultra rightwing nutjob and lawyer Larry Klayman is suing a lot of black people for endangering his life.

    […] America’s worst lawyer has filed a lawsuit against President Barack Obama, Louis Farrakhan, Eric Holder, Al Sharpton and Black Lives Matter for supposedly starting a race war, causing the murder of five Dallas cops, and endangering the life of Larry […].

    The gist of the suit,[…] is that allllllllllllllllllllllll of the black people in the country are lying about racism existing for no apparent reason, when Larry Klayman is absolutely sure it does not. And by mentioning this, and being mad about it, and saying it is a problem, they are making the world an unsafe place for Larry Klayman to live in. Mentioning that racism exists, he says, encourages “anti-white” hatred. […]

    For a long time, as a law enforcement officer myself – I am a former federal prosecutor for the U.S. Department of Justice when it still had an ounce of integrity, and the founder of both Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch, as well as a former candidate for the U.S. Senate in Florida – I have been contemplating when and how to bring legal actions against white, Jewish and Christian haters like Obama, Farrakhan, Sharpton and Black Lives Matter. […]

    These vigilantes are not cut from the same virtuous cloth as a well-intentioned and genuine reverend, Martin Luther King, who used peaceful non-violence to further freedom for African-Americans and others. […]

    It is no wonder some cops, fearing for their lives in this anti-white, anti-Semitic and anti-Christian environment, sometimes are prone to literally pull the trigger too quickly. With the hateful mood created by Obama and company, they understandably think that armed blacks who refuse to recognize their law enforcement powers may be out to off them.

    That is why We the People must now act on our own, as we did in 1776 against another despot king. But like the real king, Martin Luther King, I have advocated peaceful means to effect change. To this end, I am filing in the next day a lawsuit, with myself as the initial plaintiff, against Obama, Black Lives Matter, Farrakhan and Sharpton for endangering not just my life, as a white law enforcement person of Jewish origin, but also for all Americans, […] It is hoped that other law enforcement persons, including the cops in the Dallas Police Department, will later join me as plaintiffs. The case will be filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, which is where Dallas is located. […]

    Wonkette link

  4. Brother Ogvorbis, Fully Defenestrated Emperor of Steam, Fire and Absurdity says

    Oi am so sucking fick of the radical right wing embrace Dr. King as ‘a good black man’, holding him up as the one and only way to work towards equal rights, especially when these same asshats, back in the day, would have been condemning Dr. King, and all he stood for/stands for, as Un-American, as a commie plot, as trying to gin up a race war.

  5. says

    Brother Ogvorbis, comment 5, ditto. I agree. Dr. King is “a good black man” in part because he is dead.

    Cross posted from the “don’t have to think twice” thread.

    The first night of the Republican convention will have a “Benghazi Focus,” and that tells you that Republicans have decided to live in fantasy land; and that, in reality, they’ve got nothing. All of Trump’s conspiracy theories about the attack in 2012 have been debunked.

    The first night of the convention will be devoted to the 2012 terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya, and the Times reported that an entire presentation will be dedicated to detailing the sexual dalliances of former President Bill Clinton.

    Link

    One other detail about the Republican convention: six of the people with speaking slots have the last name “Trump.” There’s the candidate himself, his wife, and four of his kids. Other speakers:
    – pro golfer Natalie Gulbis
    – former Calvin Kein underwear model Antonio Sabato Jr.
    – former fotball star Tim Tebow
    – Peter Thiel
    – Ultimate Fighting Champ president Dana White
    – Mary Fallin, governor of Oklahoma
    – Scott Walker, governor of Wisconsin
    – Rick Scott, governor of Florida
    – Mitch McConnell, Senate Majority Leader
    – Paul Ryan, House Speaker
    – Kevin McCarthy, House Majority Leader
    Sarah Palin won’t be there. Sad!

  6. says

    President Obama and his diplomatic team deserve some kudos for the nuclear deal with Iran. Despite dire warnings from Republicans, and scorn from Donald Trump, the deal is actually working.

    From coverage in the NY Times:

    We now have a score sheet on Iran’s compliance with its nuclear commitments from the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is responsible for monitoring Iran’s nuclear activities, and from American officials.

    Since the deal was reached last July, Iran has, as required, removed and placed in I.A.E.A.-monitored storage two-thirds of the 19,000 centrifuges it used for uranium enrichment at a facility at Natanz.

    [Iran] has ended all uranium enrichment, a process that can be used to produce nuclear bomb-grade fuel, and removed all nuclear material from its once-secret facility at Fordow.

    Iran has reduced its stockpile of enriched uranium from 12,000 kilograms, with a purity as high as 5 percent, to 300 kilograms, with a purity of no more than 3.67 percent and hence less usable as weapons fuel.

    The core of a heavy-water reactor at Arak has been filled with concrete.

    The bottom line: If Iranian officials decided to produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon, it would take at least one year; without the deal, it would have taken just two or three months. That has won over some critics of the agreement, like Moshe Ya’alon, who was until recently defense minister of Israel. Last month, he effectively endorsed it and said Iran no longer presented “an existential threat to Israel.”

    Lots of challenges remain, but this proves that when congressional Republicans sent a letter to Iranian leaders telling them not to trust President Obama, and making other claims intended to sabotage American foreign policy, they were wrong. They were stupid.

    Trump has vowed to revoke the agreement if he is elected President. If he tears up the Iran deal, the consequences could be bad for everyone on planet earth. Now who looks like a dangerous guy whose actions just might lead to nuclear war? It’s not Clinton. It’s Trump.

  7. says

    Think Progress posted mini-biographies of some of the speakers who will appear at the Republican convention.

    Anti-immigration activists, “prosperity gospel” preachers, anti-LGBT politicians, and the NRA’s top lobbyist will headline Donald Trump’s 2016 Republican National Convention.

    Details at the link.

  8. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    The latest campaign ad from the Clinton campaign: Daily Kos link. Scroll down for the 1-minute video.

    Moar like it!

  9. says

  10. Gregory Greenwood says

    A truck has driven at speed into a crowd in Nice, France. There have been reports that it is a terrorist attack, with claims that the police shot the driver dead at the scene, that several people observing Bastille Day celebrations have been killed in the collision, and that additional gunshots have been heard leading some to speculate that accomplices may be loose in the city.

  11. says

    Representative Marsha Blackburn, a Republican from Tennessee, is the head of a House panel that is investigating fetal tissue sales by Planned Parenthood. The issue is bogus, and is based on the deceptive videos distributed about a year ago. The panel has made numerous errors, including making the names and addresses of scientific researchers public.

    Despite all this, the investigation rolls on. Today, more than fifty organizations sent an appeal to House Speaker Paul Ryan, asking him to disband the panel.

    […] This demand came hours after the Select Investigative Panel on Infant Lives announced it would continue its investigation until the end of the year — at the least.

    “Members of your caucus on the panel have continued their fishing expedition with no regard for the safety of providers and researchers,” reads one letter to Ryan signed by the American Civil Liberties Union, Center for Reproductive Rights, National Women’s Law Center, and 27 other rights organizations. “We urge you to disband the panel and end this thinly-veiled attempt to restrict access to abortion care.” […]

    This panel was created to investigate something that doesn’t exist: Planned Parenthood employees profiting off of fetal tissue. This assumption was based on videos made by an anti-abortion group that appeared to show Planned Parenthood doctors discussing the sale of abortion remains. However, more than a dozen investigations across the country have discredited these videos due to their highly edited content — a Texas court even indicted two of the videographers involved. […]

    Republican members of the panel, led by Panel Chair Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-KY), decided to instead subpoena medical companies, asking them to share the names of medical researchers, graduate students, laboratory technicians, and administrative staff who are in any way involved in fetal tissue research. This research is crucial to developing cures for a handful of fatal diseases, including Parkinson’s, HIV, and — ironically — Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. […]

    “In one case, the Chair issued ten subpoenas to investigate one doctor, including naming his family members, other doctors in the practice, and sending subpoenas to two hospitals, two small businesses, and three local emergency response entities,” reads one [letter], signed by another collection of organizations that support reproductive rights. “The Chair went so far as to vilify the doctor in an accompanying media statement for performing abortions –- a completely legal medical procedure.” […]

    http://thinkprogress.org/health/2016/07/14/3798399/50-orgs-infant-lives/

  12. says

    Gregory @13 and 14, one report lists 30 people killed and 100 injured. Early reports in situations like this are subject to revision, so we’ll see what the official reports say. It sounds really bad. Some reports say as many as 60 people are dead.

    No doubt, Trump will try to turn this to his advantage.

  13. says

    Trump and two of his kids are in more legal trouble, this time over a tax evasion scheme.

    Four Donald Trump-licensed real estate developments are at the center of a huge income tax evasion scheme, according to a lawsuit unsealed Thursday afternoon by a judge in Manhattan.

    The presumptive Republican nominee is not personally accused. He is described as a “material witness” in the evasion of taxes on as much as $250 million in income. According to the court papers, that includes $100 million in profits and $65 million in real estate transfer taxes from a Manhattan high rise project bearing his familiar name.

    However, his status [as a material witness] may change, according to the lawyers who filed the lawsuit, Richard Lerner and Frederick M. Oberlander, citing Trump’s testimony about Felix Sater, a convicted stock swindler at the center of the alleged scheme.

    Trump received tens of millions of dollars in fees and partnership interests in one of the four projects, the Trump Soho New York, a luxury high rise in lower Manhattan. His son Donald Junior and his daughter Ivanka also were paid in fees and partnership interests, the lawyers said, and are also material witnesses in the case.

    Trump and Sater traveled extensively together and were photographed and interviewed in Denver and Loveland, Colo., Phoenix, Fort Lauderdale and New York. The two Trump children were also with Sater in Moscow, Alan Garten, the Trump Organization general counsel, has said.

    Trump has testified about Sater in a Florida lawsuit accusing the two of them of fraud in a failed high-rise project. Trump testified that he had a glancing knowledge of Sater and would not recognize him if he were sitting in the room.

    That “I don’t know him” defense is something we’ve heard before from Trump.

    […] Sater carried a business card, issued by the Trump Organization, identifying him as a “senior adviser” to Trump.

    The tax fraud lawsuit included 212 pages of documents, among them a flow chart showing how the scheme worked. The lawsuit describes the tax fraud scheme as simple, telling the judge “there need be no fear of complexity, for there is none.” […]

    The Daily Beast link.

  14. Gregory Greenwood says

    Lynna, OM @ 16;

    Gregory @13 and 14, one report lists 30 people killed and 100 injured. Early reports in situations like this are subject to revision, so we’ll see what the official reports say. It sounds really bad. Some reports say as many as 60 people are dead.

    I agree completely that all early reports on incidents like this can be chaotic and thus potentially misleading, but early indications are that this is bad as you say.

    No doubt, Trump will try to turn this to his advantage.

    It is sadly inevitable – Trump and the other political scavengers won’t be slow to try to capitalize on this.

  15. Saad says

    Trump’s fellow white supremacist Newt Gingrich proposes a “sharia test” for all Muslims who immigrated to the U.S.

    “Western civilization is in a war. We should frankly test every person here who is of a Muslim background and if they believe in sharia they should be deported,” Gingrich told Fox News’ Sean Hannity.

    “Sharia is incompatible with western civilization. Modern Muslims who have given up sharia — glad to have them as citizens. Perfectly happy to have them next door,” he added. Further, he said: “Anybody who goes on a website favoring ISIS or al Qaeda or other terrorist groups, that should be a felony, and they should go to jail. Any organization which hosts such a website should be engaged in a felony. It should be closed down immediately.”

    Gingrich also said that the attack in Nice is the “fault of Western elites who lack the guts to do what is right, to do what is necessary,” and suggested that mosques in America need to be monitored.

    Apart from being horribly discriminatory, it’s also the most stupid plan I’ve ever heard. It’s literally asking a terrorist, “Are you a terrorist?”

  16. Saad says

    And now he’s offended the media is criticizing him for it

    Gingrich in several tweets commented on “amazing distortions” of his remarks, indicating he’d take to Facebook Live, a preferred medium for the former Speaker, to explain his comments.

    Gingrich on Twitter:

    The hysteria of the media overreaction to my comments on the Nice attack is very http://revealing.watch my facebook live later today

    Gingrich’s comments have prompted criticism. Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), one of two Muslims in Congress, said Friday that Gingrich “does know better.”

    That’s the sad thing about Newt Gingrich, he’s a very smart man, it’s just calculating, pandering and it’s really sad,” Ellison said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”

    “He’s talking about violent attacks on innocent people. That is what we all must condemn,” Ellison said, mentioning people of different faiths. “We have to confront it together.”

    The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) on Thursday night condemned the deadly attack in Nice, France, while slamming Gingrich’s call to “test” Muslims in the U.S. and deport those who believe in Shariah law.

    “When former House Speaker Newt Gingrich suggests that American Muslims be subjected to an Inquisition-style religious test and then expelled from their homes and nation, he plays into the hands of terror recruiters and betrays the American values he purports to uphold,” said Nihad Awad, the group’s executive director.

  17. Brother Ogvorbis, Fully Defenestrated Emperor of Steam, Fire and Absurdity says

    Maybe Gingrich thinks that Sharia is like Midichlorians — just check the blood sample.

  18. says

    Oh, FFS. I think I have whiplash after trying to keep up with the on-again, off-again announcements about Trump’s V.P. pick.

    Trump said,

    “I’m a very stable person,” he said. “I’m so stable you wouldn’t believe it.”

    Then he utterly failed to appear stable during the announcement melodrama surroundingf his V.P. pick.

    […] Consider the chain of events over the last 24 hours or so. First, Trump settled on Pence and scheduled an event for 11 a.m. (ET) Friday. Soon after, Trump became “irritated” by the media leaks and decided the deliberations would continue. After last night’s attack in Nice, France, Trump impulsively announced that Friday’s event would be postponed, out of respect for the victims, though he nevertheless attended a fundraiser and made multiple media appearances last night. Trump added that the “final, final” decision about his running had not yet been made.

    After telling donors he’d make the formal announcement on Saturday, Trump instead decided to break the news on Twitter this morning — right around the time of the postponed event. (Why Trump would could make an announcement at 10:50 a.m., but not host an event at 11 a.m. is unclear.) […]

    Maddow Blog link.

    NBC News link that includes Trump being irritated.

    Sources tell NBC News that Donald Trump was watching news coverage from his Beverly Hills home Thursday and was described as surprised and “irritated” that news organizations were identifying Pence as his choice early in the day.

  19. says

    This is a followup to comment 6.

    After Trump’s campaign and Republican organizers announced the list of people who have speaking slots at the convention, Tim Tebow denied that he would appear.

    So, it looks to me like the Trumpsters made a sort of wish list, released it to the media, and did not confirm the engagement with each listed speaker. Bad management!

    https://twitter.com/HallieJackson/status/753752493490831361

  20. says

    A two-day old Quinnipiac poll had everyone rattled because it showed a very close race between Clinton and Trump. It even showed Trump leading in Florida and Pennsylvania. The poll turned out to be an outlier.

    Here are the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll results.

    In Colorado: Clinton leads Trump, 43% to 35%.

    In Florida: Clinton leads Trump, 44% to 37%.

    In North Carolina, Clinton leads Trump, 44% to 38%.

    In Virginia, Clinton leads Trump, 44% to 35%.

    The media only gets into a repetitive tizzy when polls show Trump doing sort of well. When polls show Clinton leading, they don’t even report it.

    In general, it is still too early to trust polling results. An average of polls, or a long-term trend in the polls is slightly more meaningful. The tizzies are not needed.

    The latest polling average shows Clinton leading in Colorado, Florida, and Virginia.

  21. says

    The Republican Convention is in financial trouble.

    […] Politico reported yesterday that Republican National Convention officials have turned to billionaire casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, looking for a $6 million bailout.

    In a letter addressed to the Adelsons, obtained by POLITICO, the Cleveland 2016 Host Committee revealed the names of more than two dozen prominent corporations and individuals who have reneged on a collective $8.1 million in pledged donations.

    The letter represents the most public acknowledgement to date that Donald Trump has directly cost convention organizers millions of fundraising dollars.

    The letter, dated Tuesday, said “negative publicity” surrounding Trump led a variety of sponsors to back out from their financial commitments to the convention. […]

    Link

  22. says

    Elizabeth Warren is endorsing some female candidates for elected office. She takes a swipe at Donald Trump while doing so. Here are some excerpts from her endorsement:

    […] Donald Trump has a woman problem. Nine women, to be specific. We have nine – yes, NINE – incredible Democratic women running for the Senate in 2016. Nine smart, tough, experienced Democratic women who can take back the Democratic majority in the Senate […]

    Over the past two days, EMILY’s List – a terrific organization that helps elect pro-choice Democratic women – has set a goal to raise $125,000 for our nine Democratic women Senate candidates by midnight tonight. Can we do our part and raise $25,000? […]

    Patty Murray (Washington): Only one Democratic woman senator is running for re-election this year: Washington Senator Patty Murray. […]

    Tammy Duckworth (Illinois): Tammy Duckworth fought for our country as a Black Hawk helicopter pilot in Iraq – and now she fights for Illinois families in Congress. […]

    Kamala Harris (California): Senator Barbara Boxer is retiring this year, and we need another progressive fighter to fill that Senate seat in California. […]

    Maggie Hassan (New Hampshire): Governor Maggie Hassan has done a terrific job in New Hampshire – she’s got a strong and popular record of freezing college tuition rates, investing in basic infrastructure, and expanding access to health care. The polls are tight, and Republican Kelly Ayotte and the right-wing Super PACs are throwing the kitchen sink at Maggie because they know that she can win this race.

    Patty Judge (Iowa): […] We can count on Patty to put Iowa families first – not petty, partisan politics.

    Ann Kirkpatrick (Arizona): Ann Kirkpatrick is a tough, strong, and independent member of Congress – and right now she’s polling neck and neck with Arizona Senator John McCain. […]

    Catherine Cortez Masto (Nevada): Democratic Leader Harry Reid is retiring this year, and we have a tough, smart candidate running for the open seat: Former Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto. […]

    Katie McGinty (Pennsylvania): […] Katie McGinty is a proven leader on clean energy and environmental policies […]

    Deborah Ross (North Carolina): Democrat Deborah Ross is a law professor – just my kind of candidate! […] served as Executive Director of the ACLU of North Carolina. Not only does Deborah fight for fairness and opportunity – but she’s running a terrific campaign. […]

    Patty, Tammy, Kamala, Maggie, Patty, Ann, Catherine, Katie and Deborah can win in November, take back the Democratic majority in the Senate, and stop Donald Trump – but they need your help right now to fight. Please donate now to help us raise $25,000 for the EMILY’s list “flip the Senate” push. Even $5 makes a big difference. When I was traveling across Massachusetts during our campaign, I would tell all the little girls I’d meet the same thing. We would pinky swear, and I’d tell them: “I’m Elizabeth Warren and I’m running for the United States Senate, because that’s what girls do.”

    Sorry, Donald. That’s what girls do – and no matter what you say, you can’t stop us.

    Thanks for being a part of this,

    Elizabeth

    Link

  23. says

    So far, 84 people died in the attack in Nice, France. So many critical patients are in the hospital that we may see that number rise.

  24. says

    We’ve talked about this plank of the Republican platform before, but now we have more detail. The GOP wants to get rid of National Parks and National Forests:

    […] “Congress shall immediately pass universal legislation providing a timely and orderly mechanism requiring the federal government to convey certain federally controlled public lands to the states,” reads the adopted language. “We call upon all national and state leaders and representatives to exert their utmost power and influence to urge the transfer of those lands identified.”

    The provision calls for an immediate full-scale disposal of “certain” public lands, without defining which lands it would apply to, leaving national parks, wilderness areas, wildlife refuges, and national forests apparently up for grabs and vulnerable to development, privatization, or transfer to state ownership. […]

    Link

  25. says

    Well, yikes! This doesn’t sound good. We have very little information at this point, but it looks like a coup is underway in Turkey.

    […] Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said Friday evening that an attempted military coup was underway. In Istanbul, bridges were immediately blocked and jets were flying low above Ankara. Reports indicated that Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube were shut down in the country.

    Link

  26. Vivec says

    @32
    Oh shit! Well, I don’t mean to victim blame, but Erdogan was looking more and more like a “eternal president” fascist and I can’t say I’ll be sad if they have him out of there before too long. At some point, you just attack and imprison too many protesters and journalists for the people to stand.

  27. dianne says

    So many critical patients are in the hospital that we may see that number rise.

    Most likely, some of them are basically dead already, with brain damage too severe to recover. But if you can get someone who has suffered severe trauma to the hospital with their brain still intact and their heart not irrecoverably stopped, most of the time they’ll make it. So I expect more deaths, but hopefully not too many more.

  28. Nick Gotts says

    Vivec@33,
    True enough that Erdogan is a highly repressive and near-theocratic ruler, but a military coup is not going to improve matters, whether it succeeds or not. Just look at Egypt.

  29. says

    I’ve been planning to post about Manbij and how the Kurdish forces in Syria were likely being obstructed or slowed in taking it from ISIS because of interference by the Turkish government. Yesterday, I read that John Kerry had just met with Putin about coordinating efforts against ISIS in Syria, and I thought that was interesting (both the meeting itself and the lack of attention to it). The MSNBC talking heads are now saying no one at the Pentagon saw this coming because that’s what they’ve been told. How are these people journalists? It never occurs to them to question what they’re being told? They have to know they’re disinformed constantly, and that the relationship of the information provided by the government to the truth is incidental. It’s possible this came as a complete surprise, but there’s not even the slightest raising of a question. It’s embarrassing.

  30. says

    Now Nicholas Burns is talking about all of the important concerns of the US government in responding to this, including – in all seriousness – what’s the “right thing to do in terms of our democratic values.” Chuck Todd is nodding away. Embarrassing.

  31. Vivec says

    True enough that Erdogan is a highly repressive and near-theocratic ruler, but a military coup is not going to improve matters, whether it succeeds or not. Just look at Egypt.

    I’m not sure what else you can really do to get rid of someone that is perfectly willing to subvert the political process to stay in power. How many politicians get found face-down in the Bosporus and how many protesters disappear before you look to a means other than the one he has bought and paid for?

  32. Sili says

    but a military coup is not going to improve matters, whether it succeeds or not. Just look at Egypt.

    Hasn’t the military traditionally been the secularising force in Turkey, ‘upholding the legacy of Atatürk’?

    Not that that’s a great argument for dispensing with democracy, of course …

  33. says

    More proof that Trump is a bad manager. It’s called bad management. (Riffing on Trump’s reply to how he would build a wall, or how he would deport undocumented immigrants: “It’s called good management!”) It’s called incompetence. Trump can’t even properly choose and announce a V.P. pick.

    No, he was not really delaying his new conference out of respect for those killed in Nice, France. He was delaying because he had messed up, or feared he had messed up:

    […] Donald Trump “was so unsure about” Gov. Mike Pence as his running mate “that around midnight last night he asked top aides if he could get out of it,” CNN reports.

    NBC News confirmed the report.

    Washington Post: “If anything, this leak is just the latest proof of how poorly the whole thing has been handled. And that poor handling, in turn, makes the rumor seem quite plausible.”

    Needless to say, having rumors out there that you thought about dumping your vice presidential pick 12 hours after his name started leaking is a bad thing. If you’re Mike Pence, you just affixed your brand to Trump’s for the next four months — and perhaps the rest of your career — and the botched handling of the VP rollout has now culminated in this. Not exactly a confidence-booster.

    If anything, this leak is just the latest proof of how poorly the whole thing has been handled. And that poor handling, in turn, makes the rumor seem quite plausible.

    Also making it believable: Basically everything the Trump campaign said on Thursday. Here’s a sampling (with a big assist from The Post’s Robert Costa). All of this came after Pence’s name emerged as the likely pick late Thursday morning.

    Washington Post link

    Other sources reported that:
    – The Trump/Pence logo looks amateurish, and perhaps like the giant “T” is fucking the “P.”
    – The campaign did not register the proper URLs for necessary domain names
    – The convention’s finances and speaker’s list are still a mess
    – The Trump field operations on the ground are almost non-existent.

  34. Nick Gotts says

    Vivec@39,

    I’m not sure what else you can really do to get rid of someone that is perfectly willing to subvert the political process to stay in power.

    Mass demonstrations, use of social media, civil disobedience, strikes, occupations, pressure for disinvestment… All these means have, in various combinations, been successful in removing repressive and unpopular regimes. The fundamental problem in Turkey is that so far, Erdogan has a lot of popular support. In such a position, what must be done is to build a political alternative; and despite the repression, there is still room in Turkey to do that, as the HDP’s success in entering parliament shows.

    We have seen what happens when a repressive, Islamist regime with a lot of popular support is overthrown by a military coup: the military in Egypt have imprisoned, tortured and killed far more peoiple than Morsi did, and show absolutely no sign of wishing to restore democracy. Posturing purblind Marxoids like Maryam Namazie, unable to recognise what was very clearly a counter-revolutionary putsch, welcomed Al-Sisi’s coup, which has left the Egyptian people – including the foolish Egyptian secularists who called for army intervention – in a worse position than under either Mubarak or Morsi.

  35. says

    Hopeful news:

    More American voters than ever say they are not religious, making the religiously unaffiliated the nation’s biggest voting bloc by faith for the first time in a presidential election year. This marks a dramatic shift from just eight years ago, when the non-religious were roundly outnumbered by Catholics, white mainline Protestants and white evangelical Protestants.

    These numbers come from a new Pew Research Center survey, which finds that “religious ‘nones,’ who have been growing rapidly as a share of the U.S. population, now constitute one-fifth of all registered voters and more than a quarter of Democratic and Democratic-leaning registered voters.” That represents a 50 percent increase in the proportion of non-religious voters compared with eight years ago, when they made up just 14 percent of the overall electorate.

    Washington Post link.

    Definition: “nones” for the purposes of the Pew poll meant religiously unaffiliated voters who consider themselves atheists, agnostics, or “nothing in particular.”

    Bad news: voters that identify as secular go to the polls less than do religious people. They don’t participate in elections, even if they prefer Democratic candidates by a two-to-one margin.

  36. says

    Former Congress critter Michele Bachmann is an advisor to Donald Trump. She advises him on religious matters. Here is one of her recent pronouncements:

    He [Trump] even said, “I don’t understand, when I was growing up, everybody said Merry Christmas. Even my Jews would say Merry Christmas ’New York City, there are a lot of Jews, and they would even say Merry Christmas. Why can’t we even say Merry Christmas anymore?”

    So Bachmann is making the point that when Trump is president, all faiths, including Jews, will be free to say, “Merry Christmas.” It will be so wonderful.

    Huff Po link

  37. says

    Elizabeth Warren’s take on the Trump/Pence ticket:

    .@realDonaldTrump & @mike_pence are a perfect match: Two small, insecure, weak men who use hate & fear to divide our country & our people.

    Of COURSE @realDonaldTrump – a guy who calls women fat pigs & bimbos – picked a VP who is famous for trying to control women’s bodies.

    And OF COURSE @realDonaldTrump – a guy who “[doesn’t] feel good” about marriage equality – picked a VP famous for LGBT discrimination.

    The @GOP platform even says that children not from “natural marriage” are more likely to be drug addicts. Hateful AND disgusting.

    Terrifying to think of @mike_pence being a heartbeat from presidency – but the direction @GOP wants to take our country is MORE terrifying.

  38. says

    Trump engages in over-simplification and hyperbole … again.

    We’re seeing unrest in Turkey, a further demonstration of the failures of Obama-Clinton. You just have to look, every single thing they’ve touched has turned to horrible, horrible death-defying problems.

    No matter where you look, and now it’s happening more and more and it’s never going to stop. We need new leadership, we need new thinking, we need strength, we need in our country law and order, and if I’m elected president, that will happen. […]

    Link

  39. says

    I watched the clock this morning during Trump’s introduction of of Pence. Took him more than 34 minutes to get to Pence, even during the time he talked about Pence he would drift off topic, and I think he only dedicated about two minutes to Pence (I left the room briefly and when I returned Pence was already onstage).

    There were many false and debunked claims. There was also one statement about which I’m very skeptical. Trump was talking about how religious people are so oppressed and fearful of speaking their minds, and said that he’d met with several religious leaders (I think he said at Trump Tower) – “the top, top Evangelicals” and other Christians, Jews…and even some Muslim leaders. He said something like “Many people would be surprised to hear that, but there were some Muslim leaders, too.” It could be true – authoritarians of all stripes do gravitate towards one another, and there’s no shortage of authoritarian Muslim leaders. But it had the feeling of a lie he made up on the spot to try to appear less bigoted. I’m curious who these Muslim leaders are who met with Trump and what their take was. I see he was asked to meet with Muslim leaders on a couple of occasions back in December, but I don’t remember reading anything about a meeting actually taking place.

  40. says

    SC @ 49, that speech meant to introduce Pence was a long rant of the usual type from Trump. In fact, at one point, he said he would get to Mike Pence soon, and then he talked for twenty more minutes. It was like Trump had to keep reminding himself why he was there … and he didn’t really like why he was there.

    Trump didn’t want to share the stage, didn’t want to relinquish the microphone, had to refer to notes when he finally did get around to Pence, and generally exhibited a reluctance to announce his V.P. pick. It was awful to watch.

  41. says

    From The New Yorker, here is more background on Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, the murderous truck driver in Nice, France:

    […] Bouhlel was born in Tunisia, and he moved to Nice in 2005, where he eventually became a French citizen. Reports describe him as a troubled, unstable man who had recently been fired from his job and was undergoing a second divorce. He had three children; for all he knew, their schoolmates might have been in the crowd. He had a history of domestic abuse, and a criminal record, with charges ranging from vandalism to assault.

    […] Bouhlel had never appeared on a terrorism watch list in either France or Tunisia. François Molins, the Paris prosecutor, told a crowd of reporters that Bouhlel was “completely unknown to intelligence services, as much on a national level as on a local one.” Individuals who knew Bouhlel have told various news outlets that he drank alcohol, smoked weed, ate pork, and rarely—if ever—prayed at a mosque. Bouhlel’s neighbors said that he didn’t fast during the holy month of Ramadan.

    […] Bouhlel’s impiety would only further expose ISIS as a group that, above all else, aspires to an ideology of indiscriminate murder. […] the group is poised to accept credit for any atrocity, at any opportunity, as it did for the attack by Omar Mateen, in Orlando, after reporters uncovered that Mateen had professed his affiliation during a phone call to the police. Mateen’s claim was largely incoherent—he, too, was a violent, unstable man with little understanding of Islam and a history of domestic abuse. But, because his claim was newsworthy, it was reported, and, because it was reported, his deranged slaughter was afforded undeserved ideological significance.

    ISIS has created a framework for any mass killer to attain posthumous membership and notoriety. Linking atrocities to ISIS also provides us all a tempting narrative thread, a facile way to make some sense of horror. Whatever emerges out of the investigation in Nice, that temptation should be resisted.

    Ben Taub wrote the article.

  42. says

    Democratic Party leaders are focusing on voter registration, a wise move.

    […] congressional Democrats are […] introducing the most comprehensive federal automatic-voter-registration bills in the House and Senate. The Automatic Voter Registration Act of 2016 is sponsored by Representative Bob Brady and Senators Patrick Leahy, Dick Durbin, and Amy Klobuchar. (A similar bill was introduced in the House last year by Rhode Island Democrat David Cicilline with 100 co-sponsors.) No Republicans have signed on to the House or Senate version. […]

    This [the legislation] will make voter registration far easier, cheaper, and more accurate. “There is no reason why every eligible citizen cannot have the option of automatic registration when they visit the DMV, sign up for healthcare, or sign up for classes in college,” says Leahy, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee. “We live in a modern world, and we should strive to have a registration system that reflects that.”

    The Nation link

  43. says

    A followup to comment 52: Oregon registered 120,000 new voters in the first six months of their automatic registration system. If more people vote, Trump loses.

    More followup to comment 49: Pence told lies as well. He claimed that Donald Trump is going to reduced taxes. Reducing taxes by a lot for the top .01% and by very little for others does not merit a claim that Trump is reducing taxes for “small businesses, farmers and workers.” Bullshit.

    […] An analysis of the plan by the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center found that the Trump plan was disproportionately beneficial to the wealthy, and would greatly increase the national debt.

    “His proposal would cut taxes at all income levels, although the largest benefits, in dollar and percentage terms, would go to the highest-income households,” the TPC analysis found. “The plan would reduce federal revenues by $9.5 trillion over its first decade before accounting for added interest costs or considering macroeconomic feedback effects.[…] unless it is accompanied by very large spending cuts, it could increase the national debt by nearly 80 percent of gross domestic product by 2036, offsetting some or all of the incentive effects of the tax cuts.”

  44. says

    More followup to SC’s comment 49, and my subsequent comments: The music playing as Trump was about to take the stage to introduce Pence was “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” by the Rolling Stones.

  45. says

    Hillary Clinton pledged today to push for a constitutional amendment to overturn the Citizens United ruling. Previews of Clinton’s speech at the Netroots Nation conference later today, revealed the pledge.

    […] “The amendment would allow Americans to establish common sense rules to protect against the undue influence of billionaires and special interests and to restore the role of average voters in elections.” […]

    She also said she wanted more stringent political spending disclosure rules, and a new public matching regime so that presidential and congressional campaigns could more easily solicit small donations.

    Politico link

    In other Clinton news, Hillary will announce her V.P. pick on Friday.

  46. says

    A telling excerpt from Trump’s speech during which he failed repeatedly to properly introduce Mike Pence:

    Back to Mike Pence. So one of the primary reasons I chose Mike was I looked at Indiana, and I won Indiana big. Remember, Indiana was going to be the firewall. That’s where Trump was going to — they agreed I’d win New York, I’d win Pennsylvania, I’d win all these places. But Indiana was going to be the firewall. So I got to study Indiana, and I got to study New York and a lot of other places, and I saw how NAFTA, signed by Bill Clinton, has drained our manufacturing jobs, just drained us like we’ve never been drained before. NAFTA, again, signed by Bill Clinton. NAFTA is the worst economic deal in the history of our country. Manufacturing down in some states 55 percent, 60 percent. It’s a horror show, moving to Mexico, moving to other places.

    Mike Pence enthusiastically supported NAFTA.

    Trump also repeated the brazen lie that he was against the war in Iraq from the beginning. Pence was also an enthusiastic supporter of that war.

  47. Ice Swimmer says

    Two wrongs (and it was wrong in a fundamental sense in *both* cases) do not make a _____! (Fill in the blank.)

  48. Ice Swimmer says

    However, it is the (time-honoured) task of the state to de-escalate the violence. The vengeance is a pendulum, it isn’t going to slow down if you hit it back, but when you introduce friction and attenuate the forces on both sides (equitable justice, good procedures, building trust and jail for the perpetrators) you may slow it down and eventually stop it.

  49. says

    This is a followup to comment 46.

    Elizabeth Warren posted several tweets critical of Trump and of his V.P. pick, Mike Pence.

    Trump fired back in his usual manner:

    Goofy Elizabeth Warren, who may be the least productive Senator in the U.S. Senate, must prove she is not a fraud. Without the con it’s over

    I hope that Crooked Hillary picks Goofy Elizabeth Warren, sometimes referred to as Pocahontas, as her V.P. Then we can litigate her fraud!

    If Goofy Elizabeth Warren, a very weak Senator, didn’t lie about her heritage (being Native American) she would be nothing today. Pick her H

  50. says

    Some news about hangers-on who are one step removed from the official Republican convention roster of events, but who are indicative of the fringe elements drawn to Trump’s campaign:

    Supporters of presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump will be holding an “America First Unity Rally” on July 18. […]

    The “Unity” rally is slated to feature speakers and hosts with incendiary histories befitting of their support for Trump. The scheduled speakers have lobbed racist and sexist attacks against opponents; called for Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders’ executions; openly discriminated against minorities; led the movement that claims the 9/11 attacks were an “inside job”; and alleged that President Obama and Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) are not American citizens. […]

    Roger Stone is co-hosting the event and been heavily promoting it on Alex Jones’ conspiracy show ([…] Stone is a longtime friend and ally of Trump and conducted a press gaggle at the July 16 Trump event that introduced running mate Mike Pence. He has a decades-long history of employing political dirty tricks, and regularly spouts violent, racist, and sexist rhetoric, including calling Hillary Clinton a “cunt” and advocating for her and Bernie Sanders’ executions. […]

    Conspiracy theorist radio host Alex Jones is speaking at the rally and […] Jones’ website Infowars.com is sponsoring the event. Jones is a 9/11 truther who said after the terrorist attacks: “Those were controlled demolitions. You just watched the government blow up the World Trade Center.” […]

    Jones also believes the government was behind national tragedies like the Oklahoma City bombing, Boston Marathon bombing, Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, and mass shootings in Aurora, CO, and Newtown, CT. […]

    The white nationalist website Eternal Sentry previously sponsored the event. Eternal Sentry […] warns about “White Genocide,” and is produced by former Citizens for Trump staffer Paul Chambers, who said whites need to “fight back” against African-Americans and “send them back to the mud-huts they so desperately and obviously desire.” […]

    Jan Morgan is a rally speaker and national spokesperson for Citizens for Trump. Morgan owns an Arkansas gun range that bans Muslim customers, explaining, “why would I hand a loaded gun to a muslim and allow him to shoot lethal weapons next to people his koran commands him to kill?” […]

    Media Matters link

  51. says

    Cleveland Police Union President Steve Loomis asked Ohio Gov. John Kasich to suspend the open carry laws in Cuyahoga County for the Republican National Convention this week.

    In light of recent events, and taking into account the number of people who have said they will be coming to Cleveland bearing arms, that sounds reasonable to me. Yes, the open carry laws should not be in effect anywhere near the convention or its buffer zone.

    If the open carry laws are suspended during convention week, it will not be the Governor who does so:

    “Ohio governors do not have the power to arbitrarily suspend federal and state constitutional rights or state laws as suggested,” Kasich said in the statement. “The bonds between our communities and police must be reset and rebuilt — as we’re doing in Ohio — so our communities and officers can both be safe. Everyone has an important role to play in that renewal.”

    Yeah, yeah. Blah, blah. Who, exactly, can play the important role of not allowing people to carry weapons into the area surrounding the convention center?

  52. says

    President Obama spoke to the nation today in response to the killing of three police officers in Baton Rouge. In addition to condolences and other reasonable statements, Obama specifically called for political leaders and other leaders to refrain from inflammatory rhetoric.

    […] We need to temper our words and open our hearts. All of us.

    We have our divisions and they’re not new. Everyone right now focus on words and actions that can unite this country rather than divide it. […]

    Trump posted this today on Twitter and on Facebook:

    We grieve for the officers killed in Baton Rouge today. How many law enforcement and people have to die because of a lack of leadership in our country. We demand law and order.

  53. tomh says

    For once, Kasich is right about something. If the governor can just suspend laws, what’s to stop him from suspending civil rights laws, or the right to an abortion, just because protesters might show up and there would be a danger to the community. If Ohio wants open carry laws, they should have to live with the results.

  54. says

    Yikes and yikes again concerning the Unity Rally livestream. I tried. I just can’t watch it. Too awful. I’ll look for a summary later. Thanks, SC, for the link anyway. I’m just not up to stomaching that much nonsense today.

    From the comments associated with the Unity Rally:

    Sure doesn’t look like a “progressive liberal” gathering. No looting, riots, police interaction. Nice job!

    Pay attention BLM, Black Panthers, etc, this is what a peaceful rally looks like.

    The only way to unite our country is to bring Jesus Christ back into the center of everything!

    Hillary for prison!

    Speaking of nonsense, Republicans far and wide are blaming President Obama and Hillary Clinton for the unrest in Turkey. Mike Pence said:

    I truly do believe that history teaches that weakness arouses evil and whether it be the horrific attack in France, the inspired attacks here in the United States, the instability in Turkey that led to a coup. I think that is all a result of a foreign policy of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama that has led from behind and that has sent an inexact, unclear message about American resolve.

    I’m not buying that nonsensical swill. And neither is Steve Benen:

    […] Pence pushed the same line on Friday night, as did assorted conservative media personalities. Trump himself seemed to clumsily make the case over the weekend.

    […] Turkey is its own country, with its own complex domestic politics, its own internal divisions, and its own long history. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has become a very controversial figure in his country for a variety of reasons, which have contributed to instability.

    To think that this has anything to do with the Obama administration and American “weakness” is bonkers. Jenny White, a professor at Stockholm University’s Institute for Turkish Studies, explained to Slate over the weekend, “Pretty much every 10 years or so since 1960, there has been a coup through which the military took over and threw out the existing government, either because it was too religious or not seen as capable of running the country. In the case of the 1980 coup, there was a civil war that preceded it.”

    I’ll look forward to Republicans explaining how American “weakness” and “unclear resolve” are responsible for this cycle. Will they start with blaming Eisenhower for “leading from behind”? […]

    http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/blaming-obama-turkeys-attempted-coup-bonkers

  55. says

    Here’s another instance of Trump stoking divisiveness while dissing President Obama. Speaking on Fox News this morning, Trump gave this critique of Obama’s response to the shooting of police officers in Baton Rouge:

    Obama’s rhetoric about law enforcement is “OK,” Trump said, but the president’s body language suggests “there’s something going on.”

    On Twitter, Trump added:

    President Obama just had a news conference, but he doesn’t have a clue. Our country is a divided crime scene, and it will only get worse!

    Trump’s top aide, Paul Manafort backed his candidate up by saying that the Obama administration is responsible for the racial tensions in cities. Manafort also said that disrespect for law enforcement starts at the top, with Obama.

    So, that’s the approach the Republicans are taking, all the while claiming to unite the country.

    Here’s part of what Obama said:

    We as a nation have to be loud and clear that nothing justifies violence against law enforcement. Attacks on police are an attack on all of us, and the rule of law that makes society possible. We don’t need inflammatory rhetoric. We don’t need careless accusations thrown around to score political points or to advance an agenda. […]

    The death of these three police officers underscore the danger that police across the country confront every single day. […]

    I’ve spent a lot of time with law enforcement this past week. I’m surrounded by the best of the best every single day. And I know whenever this happens, wherever this happens, you feel it. Your families feel it. But what I want you to know today is the respect and the gratitude of the American people for everything that you do for us. […]

    Here is part of what Hillary Clinton said:

    Today’s devastating assault on police officers in Baton Rouge is an assault on all of us. There is no justification for violence, for hate, for attacks on men and women who put their lives on the line every day in service of our families and communities.

    We must not turn our backs on each other. We must not be indifferent to each other. We must all stand together to reject violence and strengthen our communities. […]

    Still, Trump can cite “body language” to claim that “there’s something going on.”

  56. says

    Yikes and yikes again concerning the Unity Rally livestream. I tried. I just can’t watch it. Too awful. I’ll look for a summary later. Thanks, SC, for the link anyway. I’m just not up to stomaching that much nonsense today.

    I know! The livestream mercifully cut out after a while, so I was only able to see one speaker, but that was enough. And the comments! It is interesting that the corporate media don’t even seem to be mentioning it.

    I’m not up on convention protocol enough to understand what exactly is happening at the RNC.

  57. says

    The RNC rules committee is having a helluva time. They are supposed to vote on rule governing the way the convention is run. Right now they are running under the temporary regime of rules voted for in 2012. Many people want to make changes to those rules.

    The Secretary (head) of the rules committee seems to be hiding in a closet somewhere. Who knows what will happen? Not the Trump campaign, that’s for sure.

  58. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Gavin Long, the person who shot the Baton Rouge Police, appears to be a “Sovereign Citizen”, beyond the law.

    Long expressed his intention to legally change his name to Cosmo Setepenra in a non-binding document filed in May 2015 with the Jackson County Recorder of Deeds Office. He never made the name-change request in court as is required, Jackson County spokeswoman Brenda Hill said.
    In the document, he also says he belongs to the Washitaw de Dugdahmoundyah, also known as the Washitaw Nation.
    The Southern Poverty Law Center said on its blog that the Washitaw Nation is a black anti-government group whose members believe they are indigenous to the United States and beyond the federal government’s reach.
    In the document filed in Jackson County, Long writes: “Under common law, an adult or emancipated person has the right to change his or her name without legal formality or permission of court to any name he or she lawfully chooses.”

    Some attitude.

  59. says

    Holy shit – they just called it on a voice vote, which wasn’t at all clear, ignoring the petitions completely. Now stop-Trump delegates are chanting “Roll call vote!”

  60. says

    Gordon Humphrey, former NH Senator, just called the pro-Trump forces brownshirts and said they’re acting like fascists, which “isn’t far from Trump himself.”

  61. says

    As far as I can tell, the Republicans just ignored their own rules regarding the petitions that had been filed so that a roll-call vote would be held instead of the Ayes/Nays voice vote they pushed through.

    So much for the “law and order” party. That did look like a fascist move.

  62. says

    Explanation of the current ruckus on the floor of the Republican Convention (from Hunter of Daily Kos):

    After the initial uproar, the Colorado and Iowa delegations walking out, the chair left the podium for 5 or 10 minutes. Meanwhile, there was a lot of lobbying happening apparently. The Chair came back, declared that three of the 9 states that had petitioned for a roll call vote on the rules—their chance to basically “vote their conscience” on Trump—had withdrawn their petitions, and the minimum number of states is six. Sen. Mike Lee of Utah disputes that. He says he heard there are 10 or 11 states with petitions, so there should still be enough states to order the roll call.

    Which states supposedly withdrew? Nobody knows. Did any states really withdraw? Were there six or seven states who did not withdraw their petitions? It looks like it, and therefore the roll call vote should have been held.

    Reince Priebus was totally absent during the kerfuffle. He’s supposed to be in charge.

    Iowa and Colorado delegates walked out.

  63. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    yeah, that 2nd voice vote during the RNC, had loud “I”s, and loud “nay”s. To my untrained ear, watching over the cnn boobtube, it sounded to me like the nays had it, which the Chairdude immediately declared “ayes have it!!!”(I think it was also just as the cnn commentator was about to say the nays were louder).
    I just harrumphed that the RNC would blatantly avoid any challenge to there written rules, even when their constituency is vocally demanding it.
    – dinosaurs locked in amber — is my foregone reaction, (rather than shouting at the TV screen.)

  64. says

    Which states supposedly withdrew? Nobody knows. Did any states really withdraw?

    Ben Ginsberg was saying that as soon as the petitions were submitted, the whips were going around and pushing the signers to sign a petition withdrawing their signatures. But they won’t provide any information about which states then had to be withdrawn. Mike Lee said he was calling for a point of information but was being ignored. Update: they’re saying the states withdrawn are Minnesota, Iowa, DC, and Maine.

    I don’t know whether the claim about sufficient withdrawals is true, but it’s quite telling how they would treat dissenters in their own party.

  65. says

    SC @81, thanks for the info.

    I think the Republican convention organizers would have been better off if they had let the roll call vote take place. Some states would have been able to voice their opinion that the “vote their conscience” rule should have been adopted. That, most likely, would have been defeated, but the petitioners would have been heard.

    Refusing to hear them is the fascist part. And now everyone’s feelings are hurt. Plus, the petitioners have a plan B and C. The opportunity to let dissenters be heard and then move on has been lost. They are trying instead to silence the dissenters. Expect more dissent.

  66. says

    We all know how much Trump touts his “Art of the Deal” book as the best book ever, second only to the bible. The book was written by Tony Schwartz, Trump’s ghostwriter. Jane Mayer of The New Yorker interviewed Schwartz and wrote a full-length piece that provides details of how the book was written and what insights Schwartz has to offer after working so closely with Trump.

    The entire article is well worth reading. Here are a few excerpts:

    […] Trump, facing a crowd that had gathered in the lobby of Trump Tower, on Fifth Avenue, laid out his qualifications, saying, “We need a leader that wrote ‘The Art of the Deal.’ ” If that was so, [Tony] Schwartz thought, then he, not Trump, should be running. Schwartz dashed off a tweet: “Many thanks Donald Trump for suggesting I run for President, based on the fact that I wrote ‘The Art of the Deal.’ ”

    That book spent 48 weeks on the best-seller list. The book made Trump look like the successful tycoon he imagines himself to be. Schwarz is now feeling some guilt.

    […] “Trump has been written about a thousand ways from Sunday, but this fundamental aspect of who he is doesn’t seem to be fully understood,” Schwartz told me. “[…] it’s impossible to keep him focussed on any topic, other than his own self-aggrandizement, for more than a few minutes, and even then . . . ” Schwartz trailed off, shaking his head in amazement. He regards Trump’s inability to concentrate as alarming in a Presidential candidate. […]

    After hearing Trump’s discussions about business on the phone, Schwartz asked him brief follow-up questions. He then tried to amplify the material he got from Trump by calling others involved in the deals. But their accounts often directly conflicted with Trump’s. “Lying is second nature to him,” Schwartz said. “More than anyone else I have ever met, Trump has the ability to convince himself that whatever he is saying at any given moment is true, or sort of true, or at least ought to be true.” […]

    Schwartz says of Trump, “He lied strategically. He had a complete lack of conscience about it.” Since most people are “constrained by the truth,” Trump’s indifference to it “gave him a strange advantage.” […]

    The other key myth perpetuated by “The Art of the Deal” was that Trump’s intuitions about business were almost flawless. […] unbeknown to Schwartz and the public, by late 1987, when the book came out, Trump was heading toward what Barrett calls “simultaneous personal and professional self-destruction.” […] The divorce from Ivana reportedly cost him twenty-five million dollars. Meanwhile, he was in the midst of what O’Brien calls “a crazy shopping spree that resulted in unmanageable debt.” He was buying the Plaza Hotel and also planning to erect “the tallest building in the world,” on the former rail yards that he had bought on the West Side. (…….) “He was on a total run of complete and utter self-absorption,” Barrett says, adding, “It’s kind of like now.” […]

  67. says

    Staffers could be seen fanning across the floor, pulling aside delegates and coordinating their counter-efforts, and top Trump delegate wrangler Rick Gates said he was confident they can repeat their success last week when the Rules Committee met and blocked efforts to unbind the delegates.

    “Our goal is to destroy them,” Gates said.

    Just wanted this noted. (Source)

  68. says

    Oh – MSNBC did do a short report from the Unity Rally, and noted more than once how small the crowd was – a couple hundred people. (The reporter said that when the organizers had originally applied for a permit, they estimated attendance at 10,000; when that was denied, they revised it down to 5,000.)

  69. says

    SC @86, so glad to see that the Unity Rally was shunned by almost everyone. About 200 people attended? That’s good news.

    In other news, here’s another excerpt from comments by Tony Schwartz (see comment 84):

    […] “I put lipstick on a pig,” he said. “I feel a deep sense of remorse that I contributed to presenting Trump in a way that brought him wider attention and made him more appealing than he is.” He went on, “I genuinely believe that if Trump wins and gets the nuclear codes there is an excellent possibility it will lead to the end of civilization.”

    If he were writing “The Art of the Deal” today, Schwartz said, it would be a very different book with a very different title. Asked what he would call it, he answered, “The Sociopath.” […]

  70. says

    In addition to Melania Trump, who will be speaking at the Republican convention tonight? Sheriff David Clarke, for one.

    […] Following the high-profile deaths of black men and women at the hands of law enforcement since Ferguson, Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke has criticized these victims of police brutality and the movement they’ve helped generate. He’s referred to Black Lives Matter as “black slime” and “garbage,” and he’s called Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Freddie Gray, and Trayvon Martin “goons,” “criminal creep(s),” “criminals” and “co-conspirators in their own demise.”

    The frequent Fox News commentator, who is African American, will command a prime-time spot tonight at Donald Trump’s Republican National Convention, where the evening’s theme is “Make American Safe Again” […]

    Clarke appeared on CNN to discuss the killings of three Baton Rouge police officers. “This hateful ideology called Black Lives Matter has fueled this rage against the American police officer,” he said. “I predicted this two years ago.” […] Clarke’s criticisms of the BLM movement include President Barack Obama, whom he has referred to as a “heartless, soulless bastard” for sticking up for some victims of the violence. Clarke also called both Obama and Hillary Clinton “straight-up cop-haters” for their support of BLM. […]

    Link

  71. says

    Who else is speaking at the Republican convention? Michelle Van Etten, purveyor of pills that claim to improve health and fight cancer. Van Etten peddles her pseudoscience via a pyramid scheme, and based on unreliable “research” from Clemson University.

    […] “The whole basis of the products and the claims are pseudoscience,” said Janet Helm, a nutritionist and registered dietitian who writes frequently about diet myths, nutrition trends, and misinformation. […]

    While the convention did not indicate what Van Etten’s business involves, her Facebook profile, where she posted excitedly about her convention speaking slot—“I am speaking at 8:49 Wednesday night,” she writes—indicates that she works at a company called Youngevity. The Youngevity website lists her biography under the title Senior Vice Chairman Marketing Director,[…]

    Youngevity is a multi-level marketing system focusing on selling nutritional supplements and other products. […]

    “The company certainly appears to be a pyramid scheme, advertising unique opportunities through a ‘world class marketing system.’ Rather, it seems like a world-class scam to me,” said Britt Hermes, a former naturopathic doctor and author of The Naturopathic Diaries, a blog aimed at contextualizing the false information proliferated by the naturopathic profession. […]

    Link

  72. says

    One Republican delegate was angry enough about the forced voice vote on the floor today that he resigned. And the guy is a top fundraiser as well, so that doesn’t look good.

    A top donor raising money for Donald Trump and the Republican National Committee says he has resigned in disgust after the party muscled through a vote on the convention floor that squashed the “Free the Delegates” movement.

    Gary Emineth, the former North Dakota GOP chairman who joined the Trump-RNC joint finance committee earlier month, says he was disgusted by the floor vote and immediately texted his resignation to Priebus.

    “I was on the Trump finance committee and I just resigned because that bully tactic is absurd,” Emineth said. “I just texted them right now. Why can’t the people be heard? I’ve been texting Reince for 10 minutes. He said we didn’t have the votes. We had 10, 11 states. They peeled people back. They were calling delegations asking people to step off the committee. You don’t do this in America. You do this in other countries.” […]

    Link

  73. says

    Jane Mayer of The New Yorker interviewed Schwartz and wrote a full-length piece that provides details of how the book was written and what insights Schwartz has to offer after working so closely with Trump.

    That article needs to be shared far and wide.

  74. says

    And there was the rickroll

    “If you want someone to fight for your country, I assure you, he is your guy. He will never give up. And most importantly, he will never let you down.”

    which almost suggests sabotage.

  75. says

    Yep, parts of the speech Melania delivered were plagiarized from a speech given by the current First Lady.

    It will be interesting to see how Trump handles this.

  76. KG says

    It will be interesting to see how Trump handles this. – Lynna, OM@97

    He’ll probably just claim repeatedly that it was MIchelle Obama who plagiarised Melania Trump. ignoring the fact that Obama’s speech was given 8 years earlier. He knows that if he repeats a lie often enough, his supporters believe it, and the media just report it as “Democrats say… Republicans say”.

  77. dianne says

    Pence wants to suspend the open carry law during the convention. Quite apart from the whole issue of whether a governor can do that or not, isn’t that a flat out admission that open carry laws make society more, not less, dangerous?

  78. says

    Trump’s right hand man, Paul Manafort, said:

    […] there is no cribbing of Michelle Obama’s speech.

    These were common words and values, and she cares about her family.

    This is, once again, an example of when a woman threatens Hillary Clinton, how she seeks out to demean her and take her down.

    The order of those “common words,” the phrasing, was cribbed from Michelle Obama’s speech.

    The knee-jerk reaction to blame Hillary Clinton is just ridiculous.

    Rather than admit that a mistake was made, the Trump campaign is lying, further divorcing themselves from reality, and insuring that this negative story lasts more than a couple of days.

    Not on the same page in Republican land:
    – Manafort makes excuses and apparently doesn’t know what plagiarism is.
    – RNC Chairman Reince Priebus joins MSNBC’s Chris Matthews in suggesting that the speech writer (or writers) be fired.
    – Chris Christie brushes the whole thing off because it was just a tiny, itty bit of plagiarism. Could have been worse, so let’s just forget it.
    – Vice President Biden plagiarized some stuff in 1988, so both sides do it, so it is all okay (Biden was forced to drop out of the presidential race. Nobody pretended it was not really plagiarism.)

    Trump’s campaign is a mess.

  79. says

    This is, once again, an example of when a woman threatens Hillary Clinton, how she seeks out to demean her and take her down.

    I don’t know if that’s a paraphrase or from earlier remarks, but what he said in the video I saw a bit ago was “When Hillary is threatened by a female, the first thing she does is try to destroy the person…”

    A female.

  80. says

    One of the worst aspects of last night’s Republican convention reality show was the blatant manipulation of people grieving for lost loved ones. For example, Pat Smith, whose son was killed during the 2012 attack in Benghazi, cried on stage as she blamed Hillary Clinton.

    […] She deserves to be in stripes,” [Pat] Smith said of Clinton…. “I personally blame Hillary Clinton for the death of my son.

    Yes, we experience empathy when we see her grief. Her raw and emotional presentation was memorable. It was also inappropriate for a political convention. She was manipulated by the RNC and the Trump campaign. Her claims about the circumstances, however, were not true. Republican-led investigations (multiple investigations) all concluded that she is wrong on the facts. Yes, it is a tragedy that her son died. No, her grief does not suddenly make all of the conspiracy theories true.

    NBC News’ Richard Engel explained on the air last night that the Republican convention appears to have offered “a manipulation of someone’s grief,” which meant “going to a very dark place.”

    Maddow Blog link

    In case this wasn’t quite baffling enough, Donald Trump appeared on Fox News via phone during Pat Smith’s dishonest remarks. In other words, the presumptive GOP nominee competed for attention with his own nominating convention, encouraging at least some viewers to listen to him instead of the person on the stage. I’ve honestly never seen anything like this.

    Video segment in which Richard Engel discusses the Benghazi presentation with Rachel Maddow.

  81. says

    More explanation, or really a non-explanation from the Trump campaign, for the plagiarized portions of Melania Trump’s speech:

    In writing her beautiful speech, Melania’s team of writers took notes on her life’s inspirations, and in some instances included fragments that reflected her own thinking. Melania’s immigrant experience and love for America shone through in her speech, which made it such a success.

    Referring to the speech, Melania Trump told Matt Lauer:

    I read once over it, and that’s all. Because I wrote it … with as little help as possible.

    Response from Brian Beutler, who writes for The New Republic:

    It’s just devastating to see a campaign premised on the imagined notion of Obama incompetence get caught stealing from Obama’s own operation. […] Let’s not gloss over it, this is a depiction of a campaign – a campaign that nurtures white grievance and resentment – trying to profit off the work of a black woman, from an African American family that Trump and his supporters regularly belittle. The fact that the plagiarized text in question was about the value of hard work just makes matters worse. A mortifying, calamitous, self-immolating moment.

  82. says

    SC @102, Manafort is repeating the same or similar comments.

    The Trump Institute was based on plagiarized text. I think the Trump campaign, and all of Trump’s endeavors, have a quality control problem, a management problem, and an attitude problem.

  83. says

    Journalist Matt Pearce (National reporter for the Los Angeles Times) summarized the issue of Melania’s speech:

    AHHHH IT’S LITERALLY A PLAGIARIZED PASSAGE ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF HARD WORK

    Response from Katrina Pierson, Trump’s spokeswoman:

    This concept that Michelle Obama invented the English language is absurd.

    Not sure they need more trouble than they already have, but it looks like norovirus has made an appearance at the Republican National Convention.
    Los Angeles Times link

  84. says

    Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo posted his take on the first night of the Republican Convention:

    […] In substantive terms, the much bigger story from last night was a hastily thrown together program focused on violence, bloodshed and betrayal by political enemies. We’ve become so inured to Trump’s brand of incitement that it’s barely gotten any notice that Trump had three parents whose children had been killed by illegal/undocumented immigrants to tell their stories and whip up outrage and fear about the brown menace to the South. These were either brutal murders or killings with extreme negligence. The pain of these parents is unfathomable.

    But whatever you think about undocumented immigrants there’s no evidence they are more violent or more prone to murder than others in American society. One could just as easily get three people who’s children had been killed by African-Americans or Jews, people whose pain and anguish would be no less harrowing. This isn’t illustration; it’s incitement. When Trump first did this in California a couple months ago people were aghast. Now it’s normal.

    Even more disturbing, numerous speakers from the dais, including some of the top speakers of the evening, called for Hillary Clinton to be imprisoned. At least two – and I think more – actually led the crowd in chants of “lock her up!” There has never been any evidence of criminal activity on Clinton’s part. An investigation with a lot of pressure to find something amiss concluded that no charges should be recommended against her and that no prosecutor would bring charges against Clinton for anything connected to her private email server.

    It goes without saying that it is a highly dangerous development when one presidential nominee and his supporters make into a rallying cry that their opposing candidate should be imprisoned. […] For all our failings and foibles this is not a path we’ve ever gone down.

    This is not a disagreement about a matter of law: it is a demand for vengeance and punishment, one rooted in the pathologies of the current Trumpite right and inevitably to some extent about the fact that Clinton is a woman. If you have a chance rewatch the speeches by Rudy Giuliani or even more ret. Gen Michael Flynn. These are not normal convention speeches. It is only a small skip and a jump to the state legislator in West Virginia who demanded Clinton by executed by hanging on the National Mall. In such a climate, don’t fool yourself: worse can happen. […]

  85. says

    Nice detail from Jon Favreau, former Obama speechwriter:

    Sarah Hurwitz, Michelle’s head speechwriter, used to be Hillary’s. So the Trump campaign plagiarized from a Hillary speechwriter.

    Should also say that, like her husband, Michelle wrote a lot of that 2008 campaign speech herself.

    And there’s this:

    According to Turnitin, a plagiarism-checking website that examines 200,000 papers a day, the “likelihood that a 16-word match is ‘just a coincidence’ is less than 1 in a trillion.” Melania Trump’s longest match? 23 words.

  86. says

    Queen’s Brian May released a statement in response to the Trump campaign using Queen’s music:

    I’ve had an avalanche of complaints – some of which you can see in our ‘LETTERS’ page – about Donald Trump using our We Are The Champions track as his ‘theme’ song on USA TV. This is not an official Queen statement, but I can confirm that permission to use the track was neither sought nor given. We are taking advice on what steps we can take to ensure this use does not continue. Regardless of our views on Mr Trump’s platform, it has always been against our policy to allow Queen music to be used as a political campaigning tool. Our music embodies our own dreams and beliefs, but it is for all who care to listen and enjoy.

  87. says

    Wait a minute. Maybe Melania did play a big part in adding a plagiarized passage to her speech.

    A new report out Tuesday suggests the blame for Melania Trump’s plagiarized convention speech could fall more squarely on the former model and complicates the narrative that a speechwriter or other staffers were to blame for the high-profile embarrassment.

    Two anonymous sources briefed on the matter told the New York Times that Matthew Scully, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush working on contract, wrote an early draft of Trump’s speech several weeks ago.

    But [Melania] Trump made substantial changes to the draft, with help from a Trump Organization employee, once she got her hands on Scully’s text, one anonymous source told the newspaper. […]

    Link

    I wonder if this explains why Trump himself has not weighed in concerning the plagiarism: because he knows his wife played a major role.

  88. says

    From the GOP platform:

    That God bestows certain inalienable rights on every individual, thus producing human equality; that government exists first and foremost to protect those inalienable rights; that man-made law must be consistent with God-given, natural rights; and that if God-given, natural, inalienable rights come in conflict with government, court, or human-granted rights God-given, natural, inalienable rights always prevail. […]

    The government cannot use subsequent amendments to limit First Amendment rights.

    What is the logical conclusion?

    The Platform does not simply interpret the First Amendment in ways that are agreeable to conservatives and anathema to liberals, it proclaims that the Republican interpretation of the First Amendment is impervious even to a new constitutional amendment that repudiates this interpretation!

    If Congress were to propose, and the states were to ratify, a constitutional amendment overruling the Supreme Court’s campaign finance decision in Citizens United v. FEC, the Republican Party’s position is that this amendment would be null and void. The text of the Constitution itself must yield to the natural rights theory laid out in the Republican Party’s 2016 Platform.

    Think Progress link

  89. says

    He lies about everything. Trump lies even when he doesn’t gain anything from the lie:

    Last night on the O’Reilly Factor, Trump suggested he played a role in choosing the location for the 2016 Republican National Convention. “I wanted it to be here. And, we had lots of choices,” he said. “I wanted it to be in Ohio. I recommended Ohio.”

    In reality, the Republican National Committee’s site selection committee chose Cleveland for the convention back in 2014, without any input from Trump. […]

    Trump had absolutely no reason to lie about his role in the selection of Cleveland as the site of the Republican convention. There was no reason for him to be involved and the fact that he was not involved is completely inconsequential.

    But Trump chose to lie about it anyway and that’s important in understanding Trump’s relationship with the truth.

    Trump doesn’t lie because he’s a political candidate seeking to score a political advantage. Presented with any topic, he imputes a narrative that inflates his importance and abilities. He uses this approach whether he’s talking about nuclear weapons or the taco bowls at Trump Tower.

    Think Progress link

    Maybe he does gain something. He gets to indulge over and over again is self-aggrandizement. That makes him feel good.

  90. says

    Another in the never-ending textbook controversies in Texas:

    A proposed textbook about Mexican-American history that would be read by Texas high school students is filled with inaccuracies and stereotypes about Mexican Americans, said a coalition of educators opposing the publication of the textbook.

    […] when excerpts from the textbook were released, it became clear to advocates for more inclusion of Latino American history that the book was far more harmful than helpful.

    […] The coalition, called The Responsible Ethnic Studies Textbook Coalition, includes the ACLU of Texas, Texas Latino Education Coalition, and Mexican American School Board Members Association. On Monday, this newly formed coalition criticized what they called “offensive cultural stereotypes,” according to The Washington Post, that were found in excerpts that called Industrialists “driven” but said Mexican laborers “were not reared to put in a full day’s work so vigorously.”

    Link

  91. says

    Donald Trump is now officially the presidential nominee of the Republican Party.

    So Trump ran for a long time on the claim that he was self-funding his campaign. Even had he made donations to the campaign rather than loans, the claim would have been false: there was a donation button on the campaign site and he took in millions of dollars in donations (which, incidentally, he downplayed in an amazing display of ingratitude). But his self-funding claim was always undercut at its core by the fact that he’d actually loaned the campaign money, and could use future donations to pay it back. He repeatedly said he had no intention of recouping the loans (which he consistently publicly valued at $55 million while they were at the time around $46 million), but never formally moved to convert them to donations.

    After the pitiful fundraising totals and the fact that a significant portion of the money had gone back into Trump’s and his family’s pockets were revealed last month, Trump was pushed about the loans. The campaign, in an official statement, claimed that he had converted the loans to gifts. That turned out to be a lie – there was no form submitted to the FEC to that effect. When questioned, Hope Hicks said the form would be submitted by the end of the day – this was in late June – but it wasn’t. Then they said it would appear in the next FEC filing. If Trump had always intended for these loans to be converted into gifts as the self-funding hype required, and if he had the financial wherewithal to convert them, the lies and delays are mysterious.

    In any case, the next FEC filing deadline is tomorrow. Fundraising professionals have already raised questions about the June fundraising claims the Trump campaign has made – both the figures claimed and the impressiveness of the amount raised even if the figures do turn out to be true. The fundraising operation appears still to be a total mess. They’ll also have to release their expenditures, which should be interesting.

    But what will be the result if the filing doesn’t contain the official conversion of the loans? Evidently, even if Trump doesn’t convert the loans, they automatically convert 20 days after the end of the convention. And he can only use money raised before his official nomination to pay them off. So there’s a real possibility they won’t even have the money to pay back the loans, in addition to the ire it would provoke if he actually used donations to pay them back. Again, this makes the delays and lies concerning the loans suspicious and strange. The only explanations I can think of are that he really didn’t have the money to spare and/or continued to hope sufficient donations would come in this month to recoup them and that no one would be paying attention to the FEC filing.

    Trump has told repeated lies about the use of his own money. And more generally, a campaign whose popularity was based in large part on the idea of self-funding has turned to the most traditional money sources, including courting the richest donors and even turning to illegal tactics like soliciting donations from foreigners. So it seems likely that Trump will actually have to pay out tens of millions of dollars. But regardless, it’s a campaign with a starting premise that’s now plainly gone – it’ll be funded by the same agenda-driven superrich people who’ve always been behind Republicans, or it won’t be funded.

  92. says

    SC @65, Wired covered the appearance of Milo Yiannopoulos at the America First Unity Rally.

    […] “Political correctness is a disease that is now killing people,” said Yiannopoulos, dressed all in black under the powerful July sun. “I try to fight it by being as outrageous as possible, as offensive as possible.”

    He went on to illustrate the point by saying that transgender people have “a brain disease;” that “it’s perfectly rational to be terrified” of Islamic people; and that “the left is a cancer that you need to eradicate.” When one eager fan near the front yelled out, “You need to die on your feet or live on your knees,” Yiannopoulos, who is openly gay, replied, “Well, I do live on my knees. But that’s all right, as long as I’m not facing Mecca.” […]

  93. says

    SC @114, Trump lies about his finances, just as he lies about everything. He is not as rich as he claims. He does not have as much cash on hand as he claims. He will pocket as much as he can of any donations that come in.

    Meanwhile, he and his team are also bad managers. The bad management showed up in the convention again today. Chuck Todd and Rachel Maddow discussed the “errors and delays,” the lack of preparation, and the “run on a shoestring” nature of the convention. Link.

  94. says

    David Frum summarizes the problems with the convention, and with Melania Trump’s speech:

    […] 3) Since Sunday, every journalist at this convention has been collecting examples of the Trump campaign’s failures and incompetence: the quarrel with Ohio Governor John Kasich, the absent senators and governors, the no-show donors, the convention’s financial embarrassments, the floor fight over rules, the lack of a proper schedule, and the defective apps and other technology. Suddenly, there is one easy-to-understand incident that encapsulates in one grim joke all this convention’s cavalcade of derp. […]

    5) Trump has just vividly demonstrated that his campaign—never mind the campaign, he himself—have zero skill at crisis management. Confronted with this comically absurd failure, their instinct is not only to lie, shift blame, and refuse responsibility, but to do so in laughably unbelievable ways. It’s all a big joke when the crisis in question is a plagiarized speech by a would-be first lady. It won’t be so funny when a President Trump tries to manage a truly life-and-death crisis in the same blundering, dopey, and cowardly way. […]

    9) Plagiarism draws attention to content of the passage plagiarized. In 2008, Michelle Obama summed up the values that she had learned from her parents and that she and Barack Obama now tried to instill in their children: work hard; tell the truth; keep your promises; treat others with dignity and respect. Donald Trump epically does not tell the truth, does not keep his promises, and does not treat others with dignity and respect. A plagiarized speech (and the failure to detect the plagiarism) pretty strongly confirms that the Trumps do not much care about hard work, either. “Thine own mouth condemneth thee, and not I: yea, thine own lips testify against thee.” […]

    http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/07/melania-trumps-speech-matters/492038/

  95. says

    From Frum:

    To this point, the Hillary Clinton campaign has been unsure how to attack Donald Trump. There has been noticeable hesitation, uncertainty, and even mutually refuting contradictions in its early attacks. How can Trump both be a cynical con man and a dangerous extremist hate-monger? Now at last the script writes itself: Trump as doofus, the guy who went broke running a casino—and can’t even find someone to write an ordinarily competent speech for his wife’s big self-introduction to the American public.

    Amazingly, he’s all three.

    The Frum article links to one at Politico about fundraising. It confirms a lot of what I just said above, but has two irritating qualities: First, it simply switches to covering Trump’s like any other campaign, as though the professed hostility to big donors and professions of self-funding weren’t significant claims made for almost a year and noted by many supporters. And this is at the same time it reports on the change:

    Doddridge, Great America PAC’s founder, conceded in an interview before Monday’s event at The Hideaway that Trump’s primary campaign hurt his prospects with big donors. “The problem with Trump’s primary is that he was bashing big money and he wasn’t overtly supporting any PACs. Now he’s changed his strategy, which I think that was always his plan,” said Doddridge, who met with Trump last week in Los Angeles.

    Yes. That’s the story. Not just “how do Trump’s big-donor fundraising prospects line up with Clinton’s?” FFS. Second, it parrots some of the spin:

    During the primary, the billionaire

    Evidence, please.

    real estate mogul largely spent his own money

    Looks like that will be the case in the end, but only by default – not by plan. (And it could be mostly borrowed to begin with, for all we know.)

    and boasted that he didn’t need — or want — cash from big donors, who he bashed as puppet masters controlling his rivals.

    And who his campaign is now assiduously courting. Again – the story. Especially because he continues to use the attacks about Clinton being beholden to rich special interests.

  96. says

    Donald Trump Jr. is certainly a chip off the old block. He does one thing better than his father, he reads from the teleprompter more skillfully.

    He also reads lies, like that Hillary Clinton wants to appoint Supreme Court Justices that will repeal the Second Amendment.

    Donald Trump Junior has five kids. He looks and sounds like a wolf, a wolf that has been impeccably groomed. He is also an avid big game hunter.

    Don Jr. says that the Democrats created the problem of inequality. If we get rid of all the Democrats, inequality will disappear, implies the wolf. “We are going to put Americans first, all Americans, not a special class of crony elites at the top of the heap.”

    Don Jr. denounced the crony class of favored elites. Has he looked in the mirror lately? I think Don Jr. is running for future president.

    Trump’s daughter Tiffany said that she saved all of her report cards, going back to kindergarten because Daddy Trump wrote sweet things on them. Sounds like the desperate act of a girl who only saw her father for two weeks per year. Tiffany is the daughter of short-term wife Marla Maples

    Surreal moment: the general manager of Trump Winery spoke.

    Chris Christie conducted a call-and-response session during which he had the audience declare Hillary Clinton “GUILTY!” for a series of supposed crimes.

  97. says

    The Hispanic Chamber of Commerce endorsed Hillary Clinton for president. This is a first for that organization, their first endorsement.

    In other news, the plagiarism behind Melania Trump’s speech has finally been explained.

    An employee of the Trump Organization, Meredith McIver, took responsibility Wednesday afternoon for lifting lines from Michelle Obama’s 2008 Democratic convention speech to use in Melania Trump’s Monday night speech at the Republican convention in Cleveland. […]

    “Over the phone, she read me some passages from Mrs. Obama’s speech as examples. I wrote them down and later included some of the phrasing in the draft that ultimately became the final speech. I did not check Mrs. Obama’s speeches,” McIver said in the statement. “This was my mistake, and I feel terrible for the chaos I have caused Melania and the Trumps, as well as to Mrs. Obama. No harm was meant.” […]

    “I asked to put out this statement because I did not like seeing the way this was distracting from Mr. Trump’s historic campaign for president and Melania’s beautiful message and presentation,” she said in the statement. “I apologize for the confusion and hysteria my mistake has caused. Today, more than ever, I am honored to work for such a great family. I personally admire the way Mr. Trump has handled this situation and I am grateful for his understanding.”

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/meredith-mciver-melania-trump-speech

    Melania Trump received a draft of a speech from a professional speech writer, Matthew Scully, but she rejected that. The speech Scully submitted to Trump’s campaign did not include the plagiarized phrases Melania used. Then Melania and a writer who helped Trump with his book, “Think Like a Billionaire,” proceeded in an amateurish fashion to craft a speech that was not properly vetted.

    Paul Manafort was wrong when he claimed that no plagiarism was committed and that only “common words” were used. Other Trump spokespeople were wrong when they quoted My Little Pony characters saying something different, but with a vaguely similar idea, to prove that Melania had not stolen bits of her speech from Michelle Obama. The spokespeople were not coordinated with the Trump family story. It was a mess.

    Trump is happy about the whole thing:

    Good news is Melania’s speech got more publicity than any in the history of politics especially if you believe that all press is good press! The media is spending more time doing a forensic analysis of Melania’s speech than the FBI spent on Hillary’s emails.

  98. says

    This is despicable. One of Trump’s advisors suggested that Hillary Clinton should be shot.

    After Donald Trump called for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States,” New Hampshire state Rep. Al Baldasaro (R), the co-chair of Trump’s state veterans coalition, did his best to defend the candidate’s proposal. “What he’s saying is no different than the situation during World War II,” Baldasaro said, “when we put the Japanese in camps.”

    The New Hampshire Republican intended this as a defense.

    And while those comments certainly made a stir, the Republican activist’s latest tirade are probably even more noteworthy. The Boston Globe reports today:

    A New Hampshire state representative who advises Donald Trump on veterans’ issues called Tuesday for Hillary Clinton to be “put in the firing line and shot for treason” for her handling of the Benghazi terror attack.

    Appearing on WRKO radio from the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, state Representative Al Baldasaro, a Londonderry Republican, called the presumptive Democratic nominee “a piece of garbage.”

    Note, Baldasaro’s comments, which are obviously indefensible, are built entirely around conspiracy theories surrounding Benghazi — all of which congressional Republicans have already debunked. […]

    In November, Donald Trump personally referred to his Baldasaro as his “favorite vet.” […]

    Baldasaro is third GOP official in the last five days to call for violence against Hillary Clinton, […]

    Link

    The other threats of violence:

    Delegate Michael Folk tweeted Friday that Hillary Clinton “should be tried for treason, murder, and crimes against the US Constitution… then hung on the Mall in Washington, DC.”

    Duane Flowers of New Jersey said in a public meeting, “Hillary, she should be hanging from a tree.”
    Newark Advocate link

  99. says

    A few more details related to the plagiarism scandal (see comment 210):

    As Max Temkin pointed out: “Trump Organization letterhead & employees are corporate resources which may not be legally used in campaigns.” A Trump employee was used to help Melania write her speech. When that employee issued an apology and offered to resign, she did so on Trump letterhead.

    In addition to praising Donald Trump, which, apparently, all of his employees do, Meredith McIver said this, “A person she [Melania] has always liked is Michelle Obama.” Praise for Michelle Obama from inside the Trump family. Hmmm. Mixed messages.

  100. says

    Trump’s sons have killed animals that are included in lists of endangered species.
    Link

    Back in 2012, photos surfaced of the elder Trump’s sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, proudly posing with the carcasses of dead animals they hunted while on a big-game hunting expedition in Africa. The photos showed Donald and Eric posing with a lifeless cheetah, Donald clenching a knife along with the bloody, sawed-off tail of an elephant, and the pair posing next to a crocodile hanging from a noose off of a tree.

  101. says

    Donald Trump loves people from the sports world. We’ve heard him tell his audiences at rallies how great Bobby Knight is, for example.

    Back in early May, Trump tweeted: “Honored to have received the endorsement of Lou Holtz – a great guy!” Holtz is a former Notre Dame football coach. He is also an anti-immigrant, racist dunderhead.

    Yesterday, at a Republican National Coalition for Life luncheon, Holtz ranted about immigrants, calling the number of immigrants in the USA an “invasion.” He went on to say: “I don’t want to become you, I don’t want to speak your language, I don’t want to celebrate your holidays, I sure as hell don’t want to cheer for your soccer team!”

    Holtz was forced to resign a position as coach in 1983 after he participated in advertisements for the infamously racist Senator Jesse Helms. Holtz praised Hilter in 2008, calling him “a great leader.”

    In his speech yesterday, Holtz criticized people receiving any kind of government assistance. His words echoes Mitt Romney: “Forty-seven percent of people make a living by the way they vote. They can make a living by the way they vote … but they can’t make a life.”

    Sounds like a Trump supporter.

  102. KG says

    An update on what’s happening in the UK Labour Party:
    1) The party’s National Executive Committee (NEC) decided by 18-14 that Jeremy Corbyn did not need to get the endorsement of 20% of Labour MPs and MEPs to be on the ballot paper. A legal challenge has been mounted to this, but I’d be very surprised if it gets anywhere: the courts are very wary of being seen to interfere in politics, and the wording of the rules, if not completely unambiguous, certainly allows the interpretation the NEC chose. Owen Smith (see below) has publicly welcomed the NEC decision.
    2) However, the NEC also decided (apparently after several Corbyn supporters had left) that only members who joined before 12th January can vote automatically – despite the fact that advertisements for membership promise a vote in leadership elections. Those who joined since (or, as far as I can tell, anyone else) could get a vote by registering as a Labour supporter for £25 in a two-day window that ended this afternoon. Some members of Labour-affiliated trades unions (those who pay the “political levy” which goes to the party) also get a vote. This restriction on which members can vote is a transparent attempt to damage Corbyn’s chances – 130,000 have joined since the Brexit vote alone, and are thought to be mainly Corbyn supporters.
    3) However, 183,000 people have actually paid the £25! This is quite astonishing. Expect their bona fides to be scrutinised sceptically. (I should say I did actually meet one member of another party who had registered for £3 to vote for Corbyn last time – but he won an overwhelming victory, and a very clear one among actual members.)
    4) One of the two challengers to Corbyn, Angela Eagle, has dropped out in favour of the other, Owen Smith (or “Owen Who?” as he is more widely known outside Westminster). Smith got more nominations from Labour MPs, and he and Eagle had agreed that whoever got fewer would drop out. Eagle carries the baggage of having voted for the Iraq war, while Smith was only elected in 2010 – post-Blair, in other words.
    5) Smith is presenting himself as a left-winger, in an attempt to lure Corbyn supporters to vote for him. However, the Corbyn camp are labelling him “Blair-lite”, pointing to his abstention in a vote on Tory welfare cuts, comments he made while a professional lobbyist working for Pfizer, about the advantages of “competition” in the NHS (widely considered Blairite code for privatization – and what sort of leftist takes an £80,000 job lobbying for Big Pharma anyway?), support for PFI (Private Finance Initiative) deals – a disastrous Blairite wheeze to pay private companies vast sums to build and maintain schools and hospitals rather than borrowing at historically low rates – and for Academies (schools funded by the state, but run by private companies or trusts), his actual comments on Iraq in 2005-6, when he said he didn’t know which way he’d have voted in 2003, and his vote just on Monday to replace the Trident nuclear weapons system with new and improved WDMs.

    My conclusion: Corbyn is likely but not certain to win the vote. If he does, the party will split, with probably more than half of Labour MPs breaking away – although Smith has promised to support Corbyn if he wins. If Smith wins, any left-wing breakaway will be much smaller, although some members and supporters will go to the Greens, or in Scotland to the SNP and in Wales to Plaid Cymru.

  103. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    In a comic aside, a miniature wall appears around Donald Trump’s star in Hollywood.

    On the day Donald Trump secured the Republican nomination for president, a miniature wall appeared around the former reality TV host’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
    Tourists stopped Tuesday to snap photos of the 6-inch gray wall that was topped with razor wire and plastered with “keep out” signs. The tiny wall was gone by Wednesday morning.
    It was the work of an artist who calls himself Plastic Jesus, known for posting “No Trump Anytime” signs on street corners earlier this year. His web site says his art is influenced by news and culture.
    During his campaign Trump drew cheers by vowing to build a single wall along the U.S.-Mexico border to stem illegal immigration and drug

    Minimalist art. The Redhead will not be impressed (I typed a couple of her papers in college). But I like it, but it should be about 25 km tall. Then the Redhead might be impressed.

  104. says

    As part of his Salem Witch Trial/Spanish Inquisition/Mob Rule presentation in which he “prosecuted” Hillary Clinton and had the audience lustily declare her “GUILTY!” over and over again, Chris Christie presented some “facts” later shown to be false. Here is just one example:

    Christie said that Clinton “fought” to keep the radical Islamist group Boko Haram off an official State Department terrorism watch list before she left government in 2012. In 2014, the group abducted hundreds of young women and girls who are still missing. Clinton, Christie concluded in perhaps his most explosive allegation, was “an apologist for an al Qaeda affiliate in Nigeria resulting in the capture of hundreds of young women.”

    It’s true that Clinton opposed designating Boko Haram a Foreign Terrorist Organization,[…] While that may be hard to understand […] she was heeding the advice of numerous regional experts who argued in an open letter that doing so could elevate the group’s prestige. The Nigerian government also opposed the designation.

    John Kerry did name Boko Haram a terrorist organization after succeeding Clinton in 2013. But the girls were kidnapped the following year, raising the question of whether the designation could have prevented their abduction.

    Finally, Christie described Boko Haram as “al Qaeda affiliate.” It is not clear that the group ever pledged formal allegiance to al Qaeda, and the two groups were sometimes described as rivals. (Boko Haram publicly pledged allegiance to ISIS last year.) [Politico, 7/20/16]

    Notice the timeline. The girls were kidnapped two years after Clinton had resigned her post as Secretary of State. CNN made a bigger point of this:

    […] The department eventually labeled the group a terrorist organization while under Kerry in December 2013. […]

    The kidnapping of the 200 Nigerian school girls occurred in April 2014.

    While Clinton was head of the State Department at the time, Christie says she “fought” to keep them off the list and there is no evidence that she herself was personally responsible for the delay in the designation. Our verdict: false. [CNN.com, 7/20/16]

    From the Washington Post:

    Christie grossly simplifies a complex debate at the State Department — which actually did not involve Clinton personally.

    In 2014, the Fact Checker closely examined this issue, concluding that claims that Clinton was responsible for the decision betrays a misunderstanding of how the State Department works. Yes, Clinton was secretary of state in 2012. Designations of foreign terrorist groups are ultimately issued by the secretary of state. But the decision on how to handle the group was resolved before it ever reached her level, according to officials familiar with the deliberations.

    State Department officials in 2012 vigorously debated how to treat Boko Haram, with the Bureau of Counterterrorism, headed then by Assistant Secretary Daniel Benjamin, leaning toward designation, and the Africa bureau, headed then by Assistant Secretary Johnnie Carson, urging caution. One big issue was that Nigeria was a government close to the United States — and Nigeria was adamantly opposed to the designation, arguing it risked entrenching Boko Haram. Nigerian officials also argued that a terrorist designation — which halts any flow of funds to the entity or people associated with it — would make it difficult for humanitarian aid to continue in the region where Boko Haram operated.

    There was another, complicating issue: U.S. officials thought the Nigerian army had engaged in brutal human rights abuses in its efforts to fight Boko Haram. So a compromise was reached internally: The administration would name three leaders of Boko Haram as specially designated global terrorists while holding out the possibly of a broader designation of the entire group […]

    […] there is no evidence that Clinton played a role or “fought” to keep Boko Haram off the list. The internal debate did not rise to her level; it was handled by the deputy secretary of state.

    There is no evidence that a terrorist designation any sooner would have prevented the kidnapping of the girls. As for the hashtag campaign, that came after Clinton had left the State Department. [The Washington Post, 7/19/16]>/blockquote>
    Chris Christie misled the audience of Republicans at the convention, and he encouraged in that audience a vigilante mob mentality.

  105. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Bernie Sanders is meeting with 1900 of his supporters prior to the Democratic Convention. Guidance will be provided on issues and how to support Clinton.

    Bernie Sanders plans to meet with 1,900 of his delegates right before the start of the Democratic National Convention on Monday, part of a series of meetings aimed at providing direction to his undecided supporters after he endorsed Hillary Clinton.
    In an email Wednesday, the Sanders campaign promises his delegates a “very special meeting with Bernie himself.” It will follow a series of morning briefings hosted by the campaign on some of Sanders’ core causes — single-payer health care, the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement and criminal justice. One session with senior Sanders staff will offer instruction to delegates “on how to keep the political revolution going strong.”
    “We can’t wait to see you in Philly,” according to the email, which was obtained by The Associated Press.
    The planned closed-door meeting comes as many of his delegates are expressing disappointment and some uncertainty as they prepare to descend on Philadelphia for a weeklong convention in which Clinton will be formally nominated as the party’s standard-bearer. Sanders endorsed Clinton last week, but he also did not release his delegates and made it clear he planned to continue promoting his liberal agenda.
    The meeting will precede the 3 p.m. start of the convention. That day, delegates are expected to vote to finalize the party platform and rules. First lady Michelle Obama and Sanders were scheduled to address the convention that evening.
    “At this point with Sen. Sanders coming out to support Hillary Clinton but also not dropping out, it puts us delegates in a difficult position to try and read between the lines about what to do,” said Oscar Mata, a delegate from Utah who intends to support the Democratic nominee.
    In recent weeks, hundreds of Sanders delegates have loosely organized by email and social media as a way of keeping tabs and to discuss ways to show support for Sanders during the convention. At the least, many want to see a traditional roll call vote of states, while others were considering mass sit-ins or even walkouts if delegates feel their views are not being respected or acknowledged, said Karen Bernal, a delegate from Sacramento, California, who helps lead the Bernie Delegates Network, which include more than 1,100 delegates.
    Heading into the convention, Sanders has 1,894 delegates to Clinton’s 2,807 when including superdelegates, or party officials who can support the candidate of their choice. It takes 2,383 to win, a threshold Clinton crossed in early June to become the presumptive nominee.
    A spokesman for Sanders declined to comment.

  106. says

    This a followup to comments 84 and 93.

    Donald Trump is suing, or threatening to sue, Tony Schwartz, Trump’s ghostwriter for the book “Art of the Deal.” Well, of course he is. Schwartz told the truth and The New Yorker published it.

    Trump had his lawyers send Schwartz a cease-and-desist letter that also demanded that Schwartz repay all of the royalties he had earned on the book. Ridiculous. Rachel Maddow interviewed Schwartz. I’ll be able to post a link to that later, when MSNBC posts it.

  107. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Apparently the 5th US Court of Appeals saw through the Texas attempt to require a picture ID for voting.

    Texas’ strict voter ID law discriminates against minorities and the poor and must be weakened before the November elections, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday, giving more than a half-million registered voters a likely easier path to casting a ballot.
    The ruling was a striking election-year victory for the administration of President Barack Obama, which took the unusual step of bringing the U.S. Justice Department into Texas to fight the case. U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said the ruling affirmed that the 2011 law — which Texas enforced in three elections — abridged the right to vote based on race or color.
    Republicans were dealt a second blow in as many days to a new breed of strict voter ID measures that limits the kind of photo identifications that are valid. On Tuesday, a federal judge in Wisconsin ruled that residents without a photo ID in that state will still be allowed to vote in November.
    Elections experts widely agree that the Texas law, which accepted concealed handgun licenses but not college IDs, was the toughest in the nation.
    Voters must still show identification at the polls in Texas under the decision by the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is regarded as one of the most conservative panels in the country. But a lower court is now instructed to devise a way for Texas to accommodate those who cannot.

    Gee Texas, maybe if you could have been able to show actual (not imagined) voter fraud, you might have won….

  108. says

    This is a followup to comment 121.

    The Republican that called for the execution of Hillary Clinton has done so again! And this time he did it in even more troubling circumstances:

    That Trump Veterans Advisor and New Hampshire state representative Al Baldasaro would today issue a second call […] for the execution of presumptive Democratic Party presidential nominee Hillary Clinton is hardly a surprise given that he had already called for her execution on Tuesday.

    What’s surprising is the venue on which Baldasaro made his second call for Clinton to be executed by a firing squad, for alleged treason : a white nationalist radio show that is currently broadcasting from inside the Republican National Convention.

    […] the Trump campaign had previously granted VIP press credentials so Edwards could broadcast his white supremacist Political Cesspool radio show from inside a Memphis Trump rally.

    Edwards is a close personal friend and protege of former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke […]

    This Wednesday, Broadcasting live from inside the RNC in Cleveland, for the third day running has been Liberty Roundtable radio, a nationally syndicated far-right radio show that goes out via the Liberty Radio News Network. […]

    In a November 2015 post at the Liberty Roundtable website, Edwards described a vast conspiracy involving Jews that had “the stated and apparent agenda to reduce not only the influence of White Christians, but also the numbers of White Christians — via our genocide.”

    Edwards is arguably one of the rising stars among a new generation of young public relations-savvy white supremacist leaders in America, and his Political Cesspool radio show is, according to the SPLC “tailored for a Southern, neo-Confederate, white nationalist audience”. […]

    The show’s mission statement supports the right of secession and includes, “Since family is the foundation of any strong society, we reject abortion, feminism, and homosexuality” and declares,

    “America would not be a prosperous land of opportunity if the founding stock were not Europeans. Therefore, we advocate for an America First immigration policy.” […]

    Edwards is also a board member of the crudely racist Council of Conservative Citizens, whose website material has been widely credited with inspiring Dylan Roof, who is accused of having executed nine members of a Charleston, South Carolina church prayer group. […]

    Link

  109. says

    This is a followup to comment 133.

    […] Secret Service spokesman Robert Hobackis said the agency is aware of Baldasaro’s statement and will “conduct the appropriate investigation.”

    This is the Trump Republican Party.

  110. says

    Nerd @131, I was glad to see the court strike down the latest attempt by the state of Texas to disenfranchise voters. I am also disheartened by how frequently these attempts to restrict voting rights have to be fought in the courts.

    In other news, Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo pointed out that many of the people speaking on Trump’s behalf at the convention are involved in (manage or run) multi-level marketing schemes. They are all scammers. This seems to be the actual Trump economic plan: start your own MLM. Become a scam artist. And, preferably, pay Trump for the use of his name while you’re at it.

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/amazing–22

    Not all of the scammers onstage at the RNC were introduced by noting their connection to MLMs. You have to look into their backgrounds to find the facts.

  111. militantagnostic says

    Lynna @135

    This seems to be the actual Trump economic plan: start your own MLM.

    and get Mexico to pay for it.

    and @134

    This is the Trump Republican Party.

    At this point they have jumped the entire Sharknado.

  112. se habla espol says

    More copypasta, possibly the right lines (numbers are this period, then cycle to date, then zero):
    17. Contributions (other than loans) From:
    (a) Individuals/Persons Other than Political Committees
    (i) itemized 7784849.48 12361022.78 0.00
    (ii) unitemized 12109361.92 24598834.93 0.00
    (iii) Total contributions 19894211.40 36959857.71 0.00
    (b) Political Party Commitees 0.00 57.62 0.00
    (c) Other Political Committees 0.00 0.00 0.00
    (d) The Candidate 2046629.75 2442137.97 0.0

    19. Loans Received:
    (a) Loans Received From or Guaranteed By Candidate 1805320.00 47508505.39 0.00

    Perhaps someone who understands this stuff can explain it, but I don’t see anything that hints of $47.5 million in loans being converted to a like amount of donations.

  113. KG says

    Minor correction to #125: I wasn’t accurate about which trades union members can vote in the Labour leadership contest. According to the BBC:

    Affiliated trade union or socialist society supporters can sign up for less than £25, with rates depending on the organisation they belong to, but they have to have joined an affiliated organisation before 12 January, and then need to register before 8 August

  114. says

    Now that everybody, even Republicans, know that parts of Melania Trump’s speech were plagiarized, Trump supporters have come up with a new way to push the issue into the background … or so they think.

    Newt Gingrich said that the plagiarism won’t matter because Melania is “stunningly attractive.”

    Senator Mark Kirk offered a similar reason to skip past the issue of plagiarism: “Melania is a very pretty woman with that foreign accent of hers.”

  115. says

    Vladimir Putin must be smiling even in his sleep. Trump is trashing NATO again.

    […] When the New York Times asked if he’d honor the NATO treaty, and defend allied nations if attacked, Trump balked – saying he’d check first to see if he’s satisfied with their contributions to the alliance.

    Last night, Republican vice presidential nominee Mike Pence assured the nation that a President Trump would “stand with our allies.” This came just hours after Trump himself told the New York Times that he won’t stand with our allies. […]

    Link

    Mike Pence is not going to be able to reassure other nations when it comes to Trump.

    Trump is also trashing the USA as if he were a foreign leader who is trying to make points against the U.S.

    […] When the world looks at how bad the United States is, and then we go and talk about civil liberties, I don’t think we’re a very good messenger. I don’t know that we have a right to lecture. Just look about what’s happening with our country. How are we going to lecture when people are shooting our policemen in cold blood?

    Link

    Jeffrey Goldberg, writing for the Atlantic, sees some serious consequences for loose talk that comes from Trump:

    Trump is making it clear that, as president, he would allow Russia to advance its hegemonic interests across Europe and the Middle East. Donald Trump, should he be elected president, would bring an end to the postwar international order, and liberate dictators, first and foremost his ally Vladimir Putin, to advance their own interests….. We are truly in uncharted waters.

    Link

    I don’t think Trump understands or considers the consequences.

  116. says

    This is a followup to comments 84, 87, 93, and 130.

    This is an excerpt from an interview Tony Schwartz gave to MSNBC:

    This notion that I didn’t write the book is so preposterous. You know, I am not certain that Donald Trump read every word, but I’m sure certain that I wrote every word. And he made a few red marks on the manuscript and sent it back to me, and the rest was history. The idea that he would dispute that is part of why I felt I had to come forward. The notion that if he could lie about that he could lie about anything.

  117. says

    Mike Pence’s speech, and the introduction of him as the V.P. pick, was overshadowed at the Republican National Convention by the raucous booing that accompanied Ted Cruz’s speech.

    Donald Trump paid a steep price for his brutal insults and outrageous innuendo against his Republican primary rivals Wednesday when Ted Cruz, who placed second behind Trump in the delegate count, refused to endorse the GOP nominee during his nationally televised speech to the party’s convention.

    The arena rained boos, chants, and jeers on Cruz, widening the Republican Party’s cracks into a chasm and completely overshadowing the rollout of Trump’s running mate, Mike Pence.

    Link

    Here is what Cruz said in lieu of endorsing Trump:

    If you love our country and love your children as much as I know that you do, stand, and speak, and vote your conscience.

    It was scary moment, with mob violence in the air. Security people escorted Heidi Cruz out of the building. Republican delegates taunted her and shouted at her. Classy all the way.

  118. says

    More white supremacy and misogyny at the Republican National Convention:

    Matt Forney, a pro-Trump white supremacist who claims women “want” to be “raped” and “beat[en],” attended the second day of the Republican National Convention with a guest pass and reported live from inside the convention arena for a racist radio program. […]

    Forney has claimed that “Blacks do nothing but murder cops, rob and rape people, and bring death and destruction wherever they go” and argued that America needs “strict black control.” He’s also written misogynistic pieces claiming that women want to be raped and beaten and shouldn’t be educated. […]

    Forney has written that blacks and Muslims “can’t be trusted” and must be brought under control, “Mexicans are a fifth column in the U.S.,” “The children of interracial marriages are almost always fucked in the head,” and Jewish and Mormon people “work to undermine their host cultures.” Here is a sample of his white supremacist writings:

    “White men built America, and without them, America will die.” [MattForney.com, 4/5/16] […]

    “White people can handle their guns. Blacks and Muslims can’t. Bring them under control and end the violence. #PrayForFlorida #Orlando.” [Twitter, 6/12/16] […]

    “Jews support gun control because their limp wrists make it impossible for them to shoot straight.” [Twitter, 2/8/16] […]

    “Let’s just be honest: everyone hates blacks.” [alternative-right.blogspot.com, 1/3/15, via Slate] […]

    “How Donald Trump Is Inspiring A Masculine Renaissance In America.” [posted on Return of the Kings] […]

    He regularly writes virulently anti-women posts. His website includes posts with headlines like “How to Beat Your Girlfriend or Wife and Get Away with It.” Forney advocates “weekly whippings,” claiming: “Since most girls want to be spanked, it’s extremely unlikely that she will ever consider your weekly whippings to be ‘domestic violence.’ Even if she doesn’t like the sting of your palm, her sense of shame will keep her from reporting you to the police.”

    Other headlines include: “Why Feminists Want Men to Rape Them” […]; “Hurt Your Wife to Show Her You Love Her”; “The Case Against Female Education”; “The Myth of Female Intelligence”; “Who Cares What Women Think?”; “The Inevitability of Female Submission”; “The Case Against Female Self-Esteem”; and “Why Fat Girls Don’t Deserve to Be Loved.”

    Forney is also anti-gay and uses his Twitter account to call opponents “faggot.” […]

    Media Matters link

  119. says

    Christiane Amanpour weighed in on Trump’s “frightening” NATO position. Here is an excerpt from a longer interview:

    […] the most, most frightening thing was what he said about NATO. And he used the NATO alliance almost as a transactional business alliance, saying, “If you don’t pay up, you x number of NATO members, then we’re not going to come to your support. So that’s a complete break with American policy, because NATO is an American-led alliance, a security alliance, the trans-Atlantic security alliance, that was never about a marriage of equals. America is the biggest, most powerful economy and military in the world. And to think that the Baltics, or even Czechoslovakia or whatever, could pay up that kind of money for protection is simply, was never in the cards. Why does America want NATO to exist? Because, since World War II, it has stopped a war in Europe. Why does America want those alliances in Asia, Japan, Korea? To stop any further war on that continent. So this is in America’s interest, in the world’s interest, and it’s not about a business deal. […]

    If I might be so bold, Nigel Farage is espousing a certain policy that Donald Trump agrees with as well, […] that there are spheres of interests, that Russia should have its way in its traditional sphere of interest, and that certainly Donald Trump views leaders like President Putin, even President Erdogan in Turkey, as strong and doing their thing, and we should not interfere in what they do, right? So it’s this sort of authoritarian, autocratic bent towards letting other countries do what they think is best in their interest, and America should stay out of it while America, quote-unquote, “cleans up its own house.” […]

    NATO is a defensive and, if necessary — an attack on one is an attack on all. […] this is the American-led security guarantee for all of Europe. And anything that messes with that and treats that as a purely dollars and cents transactional deal, which it was never envisaged as, and you’re right, some countries have started to come forth with paying up the two percent of their GDP, but to break up NATO is — and to say we’re not coming to our allies’ defense unless they pay us the money is a complete break. And it retrenches America into a less safe America. So America is going to retrench, what, behind fortress Atlantic and watch the rest of the world go to hell? It’s not possible for American security. […]

  120. says

    Trump taunted the GOP during a private donor meeting in Cleveland.

    […] During a luncheon with 300 top donors, just blocks from the convention center here, Trump said the Republican National Committee wanted him to sign the loyalty pledge last year because they were afraid he’d run as an independent and that they knew he would beat them. Four people in the room relayed his remarks— though two thought he was joking. […]

    Trump also remarked that the RNC “better do a good job at getting out the vote. You better hire good people. I’m spending a lot of money and raising this for the party.” […]

    Politico link

    Yes, that sounds like Trump. Threaten people with whom you are supposed to be working closely.

  121. says

    A summary of the Republican Convention so far, from New York Times’ David Leonhardt:

    […] Screaming matches between delegates. Past nominees who refused to attend. Speakers who seem allergic to mentioning the nominee’s name — or policies. The runner-up refusing to endorse the winner.

    Plagiarism. Lies about plagiarism. Talk of Lucifer from the stage. Humanizing stories about the nominee relegated to obscure time slots. Multiple speakers calling for the jailing of the opposing nominee. A prominent delegate calling for that nominee’s execution by firing squad. […]

  122. tomh says

    An interesting development in the North Carolina law aimed the state’s LGBT community. The NBA (National Basketball Association) has pulled the scheduled 2017 All-Star game from Charlotte because of the law. This may not mean much to non-sports fans, but the economic impact of hosting the four day weekend event in recent years, runs about $70-$100 million for the host city. The 2016 game in Toronto brought in about $110M to the city. Plus the international publicity, as it is televised world-wide. Now it will bring a shining light on the discriminatory law.

  123. says

    Well, that’s that then. Roger Ailes is out.

    New York, NY – July 21, 2016 – 21st Century Fox today announced that Roger Ailes, Chairman and CEO of Fox News Channel and Fox Business Network, and Chairman of Fox Television Stations, has resigned from his role effective immediately.

    Rupert Murdoch will assume the role of Chairman and acting CEO of Fox News Channel and Fox Business Network. […]

    Link

    The press release about Ailes’ resignation does not mention the charges of sexual harassment filed by female employees.

  124. says

    This is a followup to comments 142 and 146.

    The office of House Speaker Paul Ryan responded to Trump’s remarks concerning NATO:
    “The speaker believes the U.S. should defend our NATO allies.”

    A growing list of Republicans have criticized Trump’s comments, including:
    Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
    Senator Lindsey Graham
    John Bolton, former ambassador to the United Nations under President George W. Bush

  125. says

    Trump got caught retaliating against workers who wanted to unionize. He agreed to pay a $11,200 fine, which I think is too low.

    Just a few hours before he officially accepts the presidential nomination of the Republican party, Donald Trump agreed to pay a $11,200 federal settlement for retaliating against workers who voted to unionize at his eponymous Las Vegas hotel.

    Trump, who claims he “never settles” when sued, agreed to pay the workers after the National Labor Relations Board found that Trump’s corporation had unfairly challenged the union vote and illegally retaliated against the workers who led the organization effort. […] Under the terms of the settlement, Trump did not admit breaking federal labor laws.

    Workers at the hotel also told ThinkProgress that the Trump corporation threatened and intimidated them in the lead up to the union vote.

    Trump co-owns the Vegas hotel with mogul Phil Ruffin, who took the podium Wednesday night at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland to extol Trump’s virtues as a boss. […]

    Throughout his campaign, Trump has pitched himself as a friend of the working class, mainly by promising to stop the outsourcing of jobs to other countries. […]

    “We’ve all heard Mr. Trump’s appeals to working people,” said Mike Kilbane, a lifelong Cleveland resident and construction worker. “But it’s a ruse, a smokescreen. It’s faux populism, a sad attempt to divide the working class in this country.”

    Citing Trump’s dealings with his workers in Las Vegas and elsewhere, Kilbane continued: “This man is a card-carrying member of the ruling class, someone who has known privilege and entitlement his entire life. He puts his own personal gain and profit over any other consideration, and he’ll do anything to make sure it continues.”

    http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2016/07/21/3800770/trump-settlement-vegas/

  126. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    AP fact check of Trump’s speech. As is expected by now, full of untruths. The summary:

    Despite promising “the truth, and nothing else” in his convention speech, Donald Trump presented the nation with a series of previously debunked claims and some new ones Thursday night — about the U.S. tax burden, the perils facing police, Hillary Clinton’s record and more.

    Benghazi, the e-mail servers, immigrants, and hispanics loomed large in his truthiness. He showed no context for the police killed on the job either.

    TRUMP: “The number of police officers killed in the line of duty has risen by almost 50 percent compared to this point last year.”
    THE FACTS: Not according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, which tracks police fatalities daily. The group found that the number of police officers who died as of July 20 is up just slightly this year, at 67, compared with 62 through the same period last year. That includes deaths in the line of duty from all causes, including traffic fatalities.
    It is true that there has been a spike in police deaths from intentional shootings, 32 this year compared with 18 last year, largely attributable to the recent mass shootings in Dallas and Baton Rouge. But that was not his claim.
    And overall, police are statistically safer on America’s streets now than at any time in recent decades.
    For example, the 109 law enforcement fatalities in 2013 were the lowest since 1956.

    The Obama administration making the streets safer for policemen…

  127. says

    I was very pleased MSNBC had Tony Schwartz return yesterday evening just before the speeches (I haven’t found the video yet – maybe later today). He called out what I had been fuming about all day: this ridiculous line the media were taking that Trump could “salvage” the convention and move ahead if could just stay on message and deliver a great speech last night. Schwartz was as dumbfounded as I was at the idea that a speech read from teleprompters – or an improvised one, for that matter – would change anything about who Trump is or what his candidacy represents.

    This morning, Trump gave even more evidence of his narcissism, foolishness, mendacity, and inability to focus or complete a thought. I think the Democratic Convention might prove almost impossible for him. Clinton’s set to announce her running mate soon, and attention is already shifting to Philadelphia and the DNC. I expect it will be virtually unbearable for him to lose the spotlight, and that he’ll lash out in a variety of disgusting ways over the next several days trying to draw it back to himself. I hope the media won’t give in to it, but my expectations aren’t high.

  128. says

    David Duke has announced that he will run for the US Senate from Louisiana:

    “I’m overjoyed to see Donald Trump and most Americans embrace most of the issues that I’ve championed for years. My slogan remains America first.”

    (He applauded Trump’s RNC speech.)

  129. says

    Listening to Trump’s speech last night made me so weary I could barely move. Wait, that might be depression.

    I see PZ posted a separate thread for discussion of Trump’s trumpism, so I’ll mostly just leave the eyebrow raising at Trump’s “facts” over there.

    Trump is not done with Cruz. You will remember that back in May Trump said,

    His father was with Lee Harvey Oswald prior to Oswald’s being – you know, shot. I mean, the whole thing is ridiculous. What is this, right prior to his being shot, and nobody even brings it up. They don’t even talk about that…. I mean, what was he doing with Lee Harvey Oswald shortly before the death? Before the shooting? It’s horrible.

    Miami Herald link.

    He continued to cast aspersions on Trump’s family this morning:

    All I did was point out that on the cover of the National Enquirer there was a picture of him and crazy Lee Harvey Oswald having breakfast. Now, Ted never denied that it was his father…. This was a magazine that frankly, in many respects, should be very respected. They got OJ, they got Edwards. If that was the New York Times, they would’ve gotten Pulitzer Prizes for their reporting. I’ve always said, ‘Why didn’t the National Enquirer get the Pulitzer Prize for Edwards, and OJ Simpson, and all of these things?’

    But anyway, so they have a picture, an old picture, having breakfast with Lee Harvey Oswald. Now, I’m not saying anything. Here’s how the press takes that story. This had nothing to do with me. Except I might have pointed it out, but it had nothing to do with me, I have no control over anything. I might have pointed it out. But nobody ever denied — did anyone ever deny that it was his father? It’s a little hard to do, because it looks like him.

    Vox link.

    Trump uttered that drivel at an event in Ohio.

    Trump thinks he can count on the “credibility” of the National Enquirer. This, my friends, is day #1 of Trump’s official campaign as the Republican nominee. He is no longer the presumptive nominee.

    The facts:

    […]For the record, the photo in question does not show Oswald and anybody “having breakfast.” It shows them distributing pamphlets in New Orleans.

    There’s no evidence beyond slight physical resemblance that the man is Cruz’s father. The man is referred to by JFK assassination experts as the “unidentified Cuban”; it’s known that one of the pamphleteers was Charles Hall Steele Jr., a young man Oswald met at an unemployment office, but the shorter man hasn’t been definitively identified. […]

    Wayne Madsen, the conspiracy theorist most responsible for spreading the Cruz theory and a firm believer that Barack Obama is gay and the government invented swine flu […]

    The sole evidence the Enquirer presents for the contention that Cruz Sr. is in the photo is the testimony of two self-styled experts: Carole Lieberman, a celebrity psychiatrist/expert witness who brags about her “star-studded practice in Beverly Hills,” and Mitch Goldstone, CEO of ScanMyPhotos, a digitizing photo service. Lieberman said the photos “seem to match,” and Goldstone commented, “There’s more similarity than dissimilarity.”

    These are not exactly ringing endorsements, and they come from two people it’s hard to fairly characterize as facial recognition experts. […]

    The pamphleteers were hired for a few minutes’ work, and weren’t involved in Oswald’s political activities at all, let alone his assassination planning. […]

  130. says

    Remember the time Trump retweeted a graphic showing a Star of David, a pile of money, and a photo of Hillary Clinton? Well, the guy responsible for Star of David image, Dan Scavino, joined Trump onstage at an event in Ohio today.

    In other white supremacist, anti-semitic, racist news associated with Trump, a person posting as user @Western_Triumph posted from the convention floor last night as Trump accepted the GOP presidential nomination. Western Triumph’s bio makes use of white supremacist slogans, and of the following hashtags: #AltRight, #RaceRealist, #LoveYourRace, and #ProWhite.

    “Tonight I’m with you, I will fight for you, and I will WIN for you!”
    -Donald J Trump

    It’s time to start WINNING again!

    Hillary says whites should “recognize our privilege”.

    I say whites should recognize (((the traitors))), and begin the Great Purge! […]

    The user’s timeline was filled with tweets praising Trump for making nationalism “popular again,” labeling Muslim immigrants “rapefugees,” and calling for the “Great Purge” of non-white “traitors.” Another claims that blacks “destroy” what white Americans “build.” […]

    This wasn’t the only white nationalist tweet to be featured on the RNC’s curated ticker during the convention. On Tuesday, a tweet from anti-immigrant hate group Virginia Dare was highlighted on the giant screens hanging in the convention hall. […]

    Link

    Far from dissociating himself from these white supremacists, Trump brings one of them up on stage (Dan Scavino) when he thinks he can get away with it. His campaign team gives some of them passes to get into rallies and into the convention. (See comment 133)

  131. says

    The Vox fact check of Trump’s speech.

    One of Trump’s first lies? “I am humbled…” Nope. Doesn’t look like it. doesn’t sound like it.

    One of Trump’s other lies told at the beginning of the speech: “I will present the facts plainly and honestly.” [painful laughter mixed with eye rolling]

    Excerpt:

    Trump says: “Decades of progress made in bringing down crime are now being reversed by this administration’s rollback of criminal enforcement.”

    In fact: Crime has indeed plummeted for decades — a fact to keep in mind throughout Trump’s speech. The murder rate, for example, fell by more than half from a peak in 1980 (10.2 per 100,000 people) to a decade low in 2014 (4.5 per 100,000 people).

    But there’s simply no evidence that a federal “rollback of criminal enforcement” has led to a reversal of those trends. The murder rate was at historic lows in 2014, and there aren’t full nationwide statistics for all of 2015 or even part of 2016 yet.

    It’s also not clear that there’s been any rollback in law enforcement at all (Trump doesn’t name any specific policies), or whether any policy changes by the Obama administration would make any difference, since the overwhelming majority of policing is done at the local and state level. Research has found that shifts in policing were only a partial cause for the violent crime drop over the past 25 years, making it unlikely that any Obama policies would have a huge impact on the crime drop. —German Lopez

    Ruling: Baseless […]

    Trump says: “Another 14 million people have left the workforce entirely.”

    In fact: In January 2009, the civilian labor force participation rate was 65.7 percent. In June 2016, it was 62.7 percent. That’s a real decline, one driven by a mixture of population aging, economic weakness, and a long-running trend of lower labor force participation for older men.

    But Trump’s literal claim is that 14 million people have left the workforce. In January 2008, there were 154 million people in the US labor force. Last month, there were 158.9 million. Close to 5 million people have been added to the labor force. —Dylan Matthews

    Ruling: False […]

    Trump says: “Our trade deficit in goods reached — think of this — our trade deficit is $800 billion last year alone.”

    In fact: This is just false. The manufacturing trade deficit is large, but it was $681 billion in 2015, not “nearly $800 billion.” It’s also worth noting that many economists do not consider high trade deficits to be inherently bad. —Dylan Matthews

    Ruling: False […]

    Trump says: “The Iran deal … gave back to Iran $150 billion and gave us nothing – it will go down in history as one of the worst deals ever made.”

    In fact: Experts say the value of Iranian assets that have become “unfrozen” as a result of the nuclear agreement is probably closer to $100 billion than $150 billion, and much of that won’t immediately be available to Iran because it is tied up in other debts. Thus, experts estimate the actual amount that Iran is able to access is somewhere in the $35 billion to $60 billion range.

    Furthermore, the United States does in fact get something out of the deal: In exchange for unfreezing these assets, Iran is complying with the requirements of the nuclear agreement that makes it much harder for the country to build a nuclear weapon. —Jennifer Williams

    Ruling: False […]

    Trump says: “Iran is on a path to nuclear weapons.”

    In fact: According to experts such as Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, Iran is basically complying with the core parts of the nuclear agreement — such as limiting the number of centrifuges it has and eliminating its stockpile of highly enriched uranium that could quickly be converted to weapons-grade material — that make it harder for the country to make a nuclear weapon. There is no evidence that Iran is currently pursuing a nuclear weapon in contravention of the deal’s terms. —Zack Beauchamp

    Ruling: False […]

    Trump says: “We are going to lift the restrictions on the production of American energy. This will produce more than $20 trillion in job-creating economic activity over the next four decades.”

    In fact: As president, Trump could relax various restrictions on oil and gas drilling that Obama has put in place on federal lands. But adding $500 billion a year to GDP via these actions would be incredibly difficult. That number comes from a paper by the Institute for Energy Research, which envisions a scenario in which all federal lands currently off limits to oil and gas production are opened up and companies start drilling.

    This scenario is far from assured. It would require states like California to agree to open up protected coasts, which seems unlikely. More importantly, with oil prices so low right now, it’s doubtful that companies would choose to go drill in many of these newly opened areas, many of which are costly and technically challenging (such as the ultra-deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico). David Victor, an energy expert at the University of California San Diego, has called Trump’s $20 trillion number “a fantasy” and “off by an order of magnitude.” —Brad Plumer

    Ruling: Disputed […]

  132. says

    The Trump campaign and the RNC used music from the Rolling Stones without permission … again.

    The Rolling Stones do not endorse Donald Trump. You Can’t Always Get What You Want was used without the band’s permission.

    Daily Kos posted the video segment in which Jon Stewart returned to The Late Show to spend ten minutes excoriating events and speakers from the Republican National Convention.

  133. says

    George Harrison’s estate condemned Donald Trump for using Harrison’s music without authorization.

    “The unauthorized use of ‘Here Comes the Sun’ at the [convention] is offensive and against the wishes of the George Harrison estate,” the estate’s official Twitter account said.

    “If it had been ‘Beware of Darkness,’ we might have approved it!” the estate quipped in a follow-up Tweet.

  134. says

    Bernie Sanders took to Twitter to condemn Trump during Trump’s speech:

    THOSE WHO VOTED FOR ME WILL NOT SUPPORT TRUMP WHO HAS MADE BIGOTRY AND DIVISIVENESS THE CORNERSTONE OF HIS CAMPAIGN. #RNCWITHBERNIE

    LOOKS LIKE TED CRUZ WAS RIGHT ABOUT ONE THING. TRUMP DOES NOT UNDERSTAND WHAT THE CONSTITUTION IS ABOUT. #RNCWITHBERNIE

    TRUMP: “I ALONE CAN FIX THIS.” IS THIS GUY RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT OR DICTATOR? #RNCWITHBERNIE

    TRUMP’S SUPREME COURT NOMINEES WOULD, LIKE SCALIA, OPPOSE A WOMAN’S RIGHT TO CHOOSE, SUPPORT CITIZENS UNITED AND GUT THE VOTING RIGHTS ACT.

    TRUMP’S ECONOMIC PLAN: LET STATES LOWER THE FEDERAL MINIMUM WAGE OF $7.25 AN HOUR, ALREADY A STARVATION WAGE.

    TRUMP’S ECONOMIC PLAN: SAME OLD, SAME OLD TRICKLE-DOWN ECONOMICS. PATHETIC.

    WHAT A HYPOCRITE! IF TRUMP WANTS TO “FIX” TRADE HE CAN START BY MAKING HIS PRODUCTS IN THE US, NOT LOW-WAGE COUNTRIES ABROAD.

    TRUMP’S ECONOMIC PLAN: $3.2 TRILLION IN TAX BREAKS FOR MILLIONAIRES, CUT PROGRAMS FOR LOW-INCOME AMERICANS.

    THOSE WHO VOTED FOR ME WILL NOT SUPPORT TRUMP WHO HAS MADE BIGOTRY AND DIVISIVENESS THE CORNERSTONE OF HIS CAMPAIGN.

  135. says

    President Obama participated this morning in a joint press conference with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto.

    Obama used the opportunity to dispute the claims Trump made about rising crime rates:

    […] Obama said that the GOP nominee’s fear-mongering claims “just don’t jive (sic) with the facts.”

    “When it comes to crime, the violent crime rate in America has been lower during my presidency than any time in the last three, four decades,” Obama went on. “The fact of the matter is that the murder rate today, the violence rate today, is far lower than it was when Ronald Reagan was president, and lower than when I took office.”

    He referenced recent shootings in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and Minnesota, as well as the fatal shooting of five law enforcement officers in Dallas.

    “We’ve just gone through a tragic period,” Obama acknowledged. “But the fact is that the rate of intentional killings of police officers is also significantly lower than it was when Ronald Reagan was president. Now those are facts. That’s data.”

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/obama-refutes-trump-claim-rising-crime-rates

  136. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    not to derail, but am I the only one to notice that Drumph spent his whole speech shouting, as if it was an open auditorium? Did he not notice that thing in front of him called a microphone and the huge speakers all around him? I only bring this up to highlight yet more of his hypocrisy after ranting about Hillary’s voice being so shrill during her speeches.(and to compare to Bern’s loud voice).
    I know tone-of-voice is the least of our Drumph concerns. I still needed to rant: about it, as well.

  137. says

    slithey tove @165, I noticed that. Also, Drumph has made disparaging comments about Hillary Clinton shouting and/or having an irritating voice. He is worse, and his speech was way too long. I kept thinking he was going to shout himself into a heart attack. The shouting may have been his attempt to overcome the inevitable impression that, in reading from the teleprompter, it was not really his speech but more of a collaborative effort of multiple speech writers and consultants.

    In other news, this is a followup to comment 158: In addition to white supremacists, other special guests in the convention hall included Alex Jones. We’ve run into him before. He is Trump’s buddy that pushes an amazing array of paranoid conspiracy theories.

    […] Jones sells paranoia. He is a 9/11 truther who claims that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney were in on the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. He has promoted the idea that dissidents in America will be rounded up and placed in FEMA camps. His website maintains that the tragic Sandy Hook shooting was a hoax orchestrated so gun safety advocates could demonize gun owners. Jones tells his followers that the world is controlled by a global cabal—a coven of elites […]

    And in Cleveland this week, Jones was a celebrity. […]

    Corrupt and tyrannical evildoers are in charge, and they must be removed—by death, if necessary. The existence of the United States is threatened by enemies at home, and extreme measures are called for. […]

    The most prominent chant at the convention was “lock her up!”—a reference to Hillary Clinton. The delegates laughed as they shouted this line, but this was an ugly development. In modern times, there has been no convention where the opposing candidate was treated in such a manner. And Trump and his people did nothing to tamp this down. […]

    Politics is no longer the processing of policy disagreements. […] The foe must be derided, eviscerated, and placed in chains, because he (Barack Obama) or she (Hillary Clinton) has usurped power through underhanded means to implement a covert agenda to undermine the nation. […]

    Not too long before Trump was to hit the stage on the final night, a Texas delegate for Trump explained what was at stake. Tom Mathis, a 38-year-old out-of-work oil worker now attending college, told me that Trump was needed now “to take back the country from our enemies who have taken away our freedom and liberty.” […]

    Trump gave a large wink to Alex Jones and his crowd: “Americanism, not globalism, will be our credo.” He went on: “Big business, elite media, and major donors are lining up behind the campaign of my opponent because they know she will keep our rigged system in place.” […]

    […] he has laid down a dangerous marker: If Clinton wins, that’s proof that the system is rotten. So then what? […]

    Link

  138. says

    SC @164, I think you are right. The President said “jibe.”

    More quotes from President Obama’s statement at the press conference in Mexico:

    We have far fewer undocumented workers crossing the border today than we did in the ’80s or the ’90s, or when George Bush was president. That’s a fact.

    […] we’re not going to make good decisions based on fears that don’t have a basis in fact. And that, I think, is something that, I hope all Americans pay attention to. America is much less violent than it was 20, 30 years ago and immigration is much less a problem than it was, not just 20, 30 years ago, but when I came in as president. That doesn’t mean we haven’t solved those problems, but those are facts.

  139. says

    Trump lies … again … about petty stuff that doesn’t really matter. It doesn’t matter, except for this: it is more proof that he is a compulsive liar. He cannot stop himself.

    Donald Trump boasted that the Republican National Convention hall was so “packed” during his prime time address that people were even selling convention tickets on eBay.

    “Those seats were selling for a lot of money on eBay. They were going for big numbers,” he said on Friday morning.

    […] a search of convention tickets sold on eBay, found that no tickets were actually sold. […] there was no proof that extra tickets had been on the market.

    “I was thinking about taking 10 or 12 tickets and saying let’s go. But they were selling for a lot of money,” he told a crowd of supporters.

    Link

    No, Drumph, that was not a rock concert you attended. It was not a reality show. It was a political convention that you perverted.

    That tickets were for sale on eBay is a fantasy, one that Drumph concocted in his doesn’t-work-properly mind.

  140. says

    Trump did not mention climate change during his speech, but he did mention a related issue: energy policy. In doing so, he presented “facts” that were not “facts,” and out-of-context facts that were completely misleading.

    […] “Excessive regulation is costing our country as much as $2 trillion a year, and we will end it.”

    […] source for this figure is the National Association of Manufacturers, a conservative business lobbying organization that is fiercely opposed to regulations. The group’s $2 trillion estimate calculates only the cost of regulatory compliance and not the cost savings that result from government rules. So the fact that environmental and workplace safety regulations prevent health care expenses and missed work days, for example, is simply ignored in this calculation. When you do account for the benefits of regulations, they often end up saving far more money than they cost. […] Office of Management and Budget in calling the kind of methodology used “inherently flawed.” No unbiased, empirical cost-benefit analysis would come up with anything close to the number Trump cites.

    “We are going to lift the restrictions on the production of American energy. This will produce more than $20 trillion in job-creating economic activity over the next four decades.”

    The source for this $20 trillion figure is the Institute for Energy Research, an organization funded by the Koch brothers. As the New York Times has previously noted, “economic reality” contradicts this projection. Additional fossil fuel production has diminishing returns because increased supply means lower prices. […] the number is wildly exaggerated.

    “My opponent, on the other hand, wants to put the great miners and steelworkers of our country out of work—that will never happen when I am president.”

    Hillary Clinton’s admission that coal workers will be put out of work in the years ahead was not a statement of what she wants; it was a statement of reality. The coal industry is shedding jobs because of mechanization, tapped-out mountains, and increasing competition from natural gas and renewables. […] Trump can’t actually reverse coal’s decline just by rolling back regulations. In any case, Clinton, unlike Trump, has a plan to put laid-off workers from this dying industry back to work in growing sectors—including, but not limited to, wind and solar energy production. […]

    Slate link to article by Ben Adler

  141. says

    Another thing Trump lied about … to no apparent end, for no apparent reason:

    Almost 14 million votes,” Trump said, although he received 12 million votes while Hillary Clinton received 14 million, “the most in the history of the Republican Party… Who would’ve believed?”

    Link

    Don’t believe a word that guy says.

  142. says

    Climate news:

    The temperature in Mitribah, Kuwait, surged Thursday to a blistering 129.2 degrees (54 Celsius). And on Friday in Basra, Iraq, the mercury soared to 129.0 degrees (53.9 Celsius). If confirmed, these incredible measurements would represent the two hottest temperatures ever recorded in the Eastern Hemisphere, according to Weather Underground meteorologist Jeff Masters and weather historian Christopher Burt, who broke the news.

    It’s also possible that Mitribah’s 129.2-degree reading matches the hottest ever reliably measured anywhere in the world. Both Mitribah and Basra’s readings are likely the highest ever recorded outside of Death Valley, Calif.

    Death Valley currently holds the record for the world’s hottest temperature of 134.1 degrees (56.7 Celsius), set July 10, 1913. But Weather Underground’s Burt does not believe it is a credible measurement: “The record has been scrutinized perhaps more than any other in the United States,” Burt wrote. “I don’t have much more to add to the debate aside from my belief it is most likely not a valid reading when one looks at all the evidence.” […]

    Washington Post link.

  143. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    Hillary Clinton’s admission that coal workers will be put out of work in the years ahead was not a statement of what she wants; it was a statement of reality

    — @169
    I refer to think she said that kinda sloppily. Like saying only half of her intention.

    Let me share the version of what I consider she was trying to say:
    Millions of coal workers will no longer be working in the coal industry, being redistributed among renewable, alternative, energy, and resource industries. Coal industry, is on the way out, leaving room for alternatives to replace it.; or so I like to optimistically think.

  144. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Saw my first presidential bumper sticker today. For Johnson, the Libertarian candidate. The driver of the car was overly aggressive for the traffic level. Wonder if there is a correlation?

  145. says

    The Washington Post featured a full-page editorial titled, “Donald Trump is a unique threat to American democracy.”

    Excerpt:

    He is mounting a campaign of snarl and sneer, not substance. To the extent he has views, they are wrong in their diagnosis of America’s problems and dangerous in their proposed solutions. Mr. Trump’s politics of denigration and division could strain the bonds that have held a diverse nation together. His contempt for constitutional norms might reveal the nation’s two-century-old experiment in checks and balances to be more fragile than we knew. […]

    Link

  146. says

    I guess I missed this article by Adam Gopnik at the time, probably because of the Nice attack. Apologies if you’ve already posted and/or commented on it, Lynna.

    …A certain number of the disengaged insist that Trump isn’t really as bad as all that. And there may indeed be another universe in which Donald Trump is one more blowhard billionaire* with mixed-up politics but a basically benevolent heart, a Ross Perot type, or perhaps more like Arnold Schwarzenegger, preaching some confused combination of populism and self-help and doomed to flounder when he comes to power. This would not be the worst thing imaginable. Unfortunately, that universe is not this one. Trump is unstable, a liar, narcissistic, contemptuous of the basic norms of political life, and deeply embedded among the most paranoid and irrational of conspiracy theorists.

    What all forms of fascism have in common is the glorification of the nation, and the exaggeration of its humiliations, with violence promised to its enemies, at home and abroad; the worship of power wherever it appears and whoever holds it; contempt for the rule of law and for reason; unashamed employment of repeated lies as a rhetorical strategy; and a promise of vengeance for those who feel themselves disempowered by history. It promises to turn back time and take no prisoners. That it can appeal to those who do not understand its consequences is doubtless true. But the first job of those who do understand is to state what those consequences invariably are. Those who think that the underlying institutions of American government are immunized against it fail to understand history. In every historical situation where a leader of Trump’s kind comes to power, normal safeguards collapse. Ours are older and therefore stronger? Watching the rapid collapse of the Republican Party is not an encouraging rehearsal. Donald Trump has a chance to seize power.

    Hillary Clinton is an ordinary liberal politician. She has her faults, easily described, often documented—though, for the most part, the worst accusations against her have turned out to be fiction. No reasonable person, no matter how opposed to her politics, can believe for a second that Clinton’s accession to power would be a threat to the Constitution or the continuation of American democracy. No reasonable person can believe that Trump’s accession to power would not be….

    * Evidence, please.

  147. says

    not to derail, but am I the only one to notice that Drumph spent his whole speech shouting, as if it was an open auditorium? Did he not notice that thing in front of him called a microphone and the huge speakers all around him? I only bring this up to highlight yet more of his hypocrisy after ranting about Hillary’s voice being so shrill during her speeches.(and to compare to Bern’s loud voice).
    I know tone-of-voice is the least of our Drumph concerns. I still needed to rant: about it, as well.

    Oh, he shouted. And he does that awful gurgle-yell thing – “lghghghghghgyin’ Ted.” I often can’t take it, and have to mute. And that can be even worse; seriously, try watching one of his speeches with no sound – scary. The only voice I dislike more is Chris Matthews’.

    Actually, Trump’s is the worst, but none of the major candidates this year have had voices I like. Clinton’s is the best of them, but that’s not saying much. I like Barack and Michelle Obamas’ voices. I like Rachel Maddow’s voice, which has a certain clarity of tone, and Joy Reid’s voice. Elizabeth Warren’s voice, at its best, can be sharp but still sort of sing-songy…

    It seems I pay excessive attention to voices. :)

  148. Pierce R. Butler says

    Lynna, OM, @ # 170: Don’t believe a word that guy says.

    Yes, but more specifically: never believe a number that guy says.

  149. says

    Trump was just ordered to pay $300,000 in attorney’s fees because he cheated a painting contractor in Miami.

    Instead of Donald Trump honoring the painting contract he signed and paying this local Miami business the remaining $34,863 balance he owed them, his company just took it upon itself to say that they had been “paid enough”.

    The company slapped a lien on his Doral resort and that woke the old Trumpster up. Judge awards attorney’s fees totaling nearly $300,000. Trump still hasn’t paid the local painting business the remaining balance. […]

    Link

    Circuit Court Judge Jorge Cueto, presiding over a lawsuit related to unpaid bills brought by a local paint store against the Trump National Doral Miami golf resort, ordered the billionaire politician’s company to pay the Doral-based mom-and-pop shop nearly $300,000 in attorney’s fees.

    All because, according to the lawsuit, Trump allegedly tried to stiff The Paint Spot on its last payment of $34,863 on a $200,000 contract for paint used in the renovation of the home of golf’s famed Blue Monster two years ago.

    Trump National’s insistence that it had “paid enough” for the paint despite a contract, according to the lawsuit, caused The Paint Spot to slap a lien on the property and Cueto to order the foreclosure sale of the resort. […]

    “I’m happy I have a judgment,” said Juan Carlos Enriquez, owner of The Paint Spot. “But he [Trump] hasn’t paid yet.

    “You know how he says he’ll surround himself with the greatest people if he is president? In this case, he might not be surrounded by the right people.”

    Miami Herald link

    I agree with SC @177, Rachel Maddow and Joy Reid both have great voices. Clear, easy to understand, and capable of expressing passion without screaming. Love listening to those women. You can hear the intelligence behind the voice.

    If I had to give as many speeches as Hillary Clinton does, my voice would be rough, would have a raspy edge. I don’t know how she does it.

  150. says

    The leaked emails showing that some officials at the DNC criticized Sanders and made fun of him are upsetting. That’s despicable behavior. I think that the DNC is going to have to clean house.

  151. says

    Trump is using Clinton’s V.P. pick, Tim Kaine, to make another play for Bernie Sanders’ supporters. Trump still thinks that Sanders’ supporters will vote for him, despite what Bernie has been saying. (See comment 162 for some of Bernie’s comments.)

    Here are some of the comments Trump posted today:

    Is it the same Kaine that took hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts while Governor of Virginia and didn’t get indicted while Bob M did?

    The Bernie Sanders supporters are furious with the choice of Tim Kaine, who represents the opposite of what Bernie stands for. Philly fight?

    Tim Kaine is, and always has been, owned by the banks. Bernie supporters are outraged, was their last choice. Bernie fought for nothing!

  152. says

    A few more details about Tim Kaine:

    […] Kaine has a solid record on many core Democratic issues. He supports President Obama’s Affordable Care Act and has long been opposed to the use of the death penalty. Kaine is a strong supporter of comprehensive immigration reform, favoring a pathway to citizenship for immigrants. As governor, he pushed to offer universal pre-kindargarten and also signed a bill to ban smoking in Virginia bars and restaurants.

    Additionally, Kaine has spoken out strongly about the need to address global climate change. In 2012, he said “humans have a responsibility to do something” about climate change. He has a lifetime score of 91 percent from the League of Conservation Voters, opposed the Keystone XL pipeline and protected 400,000 acres of land from being developed when he was governor of Virginia.

    However, Kaine’s climate record does come with a couple caveats. He has supported offshore drilling in the Atlantic Ocean and also supported a measure that fast-tracked the building of natural gas terminals.

    Kaine has a strong pro-gun control record. While running for the Senate in 2012, he received an “F” from the National Rifle Association. As a governor, he vetoed a bill that would have allowed the carrying of guns in vehicles and has introduced gun control bills in the Senate. […]

    His views on reproductive rights seem to have evolved, […] and as a senator he’s received a perfect score from Planned Parenthood for his pro-choice voting record. […]

    He has supported same-sex marriage since 2013. And as governor, Kaine campaigned against Virginia’s 2006 referendum to prohibit same-sex marriage. He banned discrimination in state employment on the basis of sexual orientation on his first day in office.

    http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2016/07/22/3801047/tim-kaine-hillary-vp/

    It looks to me like progressives will find quite a bit to complain about in Tim Kaine’s past records of governing and voting, but less to claim about if you look at his record in the last few years. I hope this means that he is a man capable of learning. I’m reserving judgement for now.

  153. says

    Michael Tomasky of The Daily Beast offers a review of Tim Kaine’s speech today.

    […] He spoke Spanish to the cheering crowds and delivered a healthy dose of humility in a diseased election year. In other words, Tim Kaine just took America by storm.

    Holy crap. He killed it.

    I’m not trying to spin you. I’m sitting here in shock. Shock. Tim Kaine was unbelievable.

    He was natural. He was smart. He was relaxed and funny, and he was serious. He was proud of himself and his wife and family but never arrogant. He was humble without ever being cloying in that way the politically humble can often be. He was genuine. He was unbelievable. […]

    How can I sum up the speech? Oh, he attacked Donald Trump here and there, including a funny hit on him about his tax returns (“raise your hand if you think those returns are going to show that he paid his fair share”). He made sure to cover his progressive bona fides and was great in the way he relayed his biography—his civil-rights law work, his time in Honduras, his dedication to education and integration.

    He did a wonderful job of communicating his values—my creed, he said, was “do all the good you can.”

    He had a couple powerful serious moments, notably when he talked about the Virginia Tech massacre, which happened while he was governor, telling the story of one professor who’d come to the United States from central Europe many years ago. Can you imagine, he asked; a man “who could survive the Holocaust? Who could survive the Soviet takeover of his country? But who fell victim to the horror of American gun violence because he blocked the door and told his students to go out the window?”

    He spoke just enough Spanish (and yes, he’s fluent all right), saying that he and Clinton will be “compañeros del alma”—companions of the soul. And the way he talked about Clinton was fantastic and really smart. Most Americans aren’t really associating Clinton with the word “character” right about now, but Kaine went at that—character, he said, is commitment to a set of issues and goals over the course of one’s life, even as one faces constant attack.

    […] he made an even stronger case that he represents the antidote to savage Trumpism and Uriah Heep-grim Pence-ism. Yes, there are problems in the country and world, obviously. But we don’t confront them by insulting people and pumping fear into people and calling our military a disaster and trying to pass severe discrimination laws. We confront them by heeding the words of Harry Truman: “America was not built on fear. It was built on courage, imagination, and an unbeatable determination to do the job at hand.”

    And he did it all without an ounce of ego. That maybe was what was most refreshing of all. […]

    Short excerpts from the speeches available here:
    NBC News link

    Full speech not yet posted.

  154. says

    Debbie Wassermai-Schulz has been disinvited from speaking at the Democratic National Convention. As head of the Democratic National Committee, she will still gavel the convention into session, and she will officially end the convention.

    The head of the Democratic National Committee will not speak at the party’s convention next week, a decision reached by party officials Saturday after emails surfaced that raised questions about the committee’s impartiality during the Democratic primary.

    Debbie Wasserman Schultz, whose stewardship of the DNC has been under fire through most of the presidential primary process, will not have a major speaking role in an effort “to keep the peace” in the party, a Democrat familiar with the decision said. The revelation comes following the release of nearly 20,000 emails […]

    The Democrat familiar with the decision said it was done in hopes of preventing chaos on the convention floor among Sanders supporters.

    The decision was blessed by Clinton and Sanders officials, this Democrat said.

    http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/22/politics/dnc-wikileaks-emails/

    That sounds like the right way to handle this.

  155. says

    Russian hackers trying to help Trump?

    Robby Mook, Hillary campaign manager, stated on CNN today that experts have reported to them, Russian state actors are responsible for hacking into the DNC emails and it’s no coincidence that this occurred on the eve of the Democratic National Convention.

    This information raises grave concerns in context of the fact Trump has long standing relationships with Russian oligarchs, one of his biggest investors. The new evidence suggests that Russian state actors are actively working to help elect Donald Trump as President. When this is viewed in conjunction with Trump’s recent statements on NATO and his changes to the Republican platform, a picture is beginning to emerge about a potential deal being struck between Trump and Putin.

    The terms of this deal may involve Putin’s goal to retake the Baltic states which he began with the military invasion of Ukraine; this was possible only because Ukraine was not yet a NATO ally. Trump has already signaled that he may not honor the NATO agreement to defend states under the treaty which helps to pave the way for Putin to retake the Baltic states. […]

    Link

    Need more evidence. And we also need Trump to release his tax returns.

  156. says

    Trump explains that he is even worse than we thought he was when it comes to banning Muslims:

    […] NBC News’ “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd asked Trump about a line in his speech at the Republican National Convention, in which he said that the United States should, “immediately suspend immigration from any nation that has been compromised by terrorism.”

    Todd noted that it seemed like a “rollback” when compared to the “complete and total shutdown” of Muslims from entering the country, which he proposed earlier this year.

    “I actually don’t think it’s a rollback. In fact, you could say it’s an expansion. I’m looking now at territory,” Trump said. “People were so upset when I used the word Muslim. Oh, you can’t use the word Muslim. Remember this. And I’m okay with that, because I’m talking territory instead of Muslim.”

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/trump-muslim-ban-expansion

  157. Pierce R. Butler says

    Lynna, OM, quoting DailyKos @ # 185: … Putin’s goal to retake the Baltic states which he began with the military invasion of Ukraine…

    Count on DK to get part of the story right, and leave out enough to bungle the rest. Ftr: Putin acted primarily in response to the US destabilization and coup of Ukraine, and continues to confront US-driven NATO military maneuvers and missile emplacements in eastern Europe.

    None of which makes Vladimir P any less of a nickel-plated bastard, but it irks me when under-informed Democratic Party sock puppets parrot the government/corporate media line of Cold War II aggressive disinformation.

  158. says

    Pierce @187, Thanks for the additional information and perspective.

    In other news, Donald Trump said some stupid stuff about Roger Ailes.

    Trump said on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” that, at first, he didn’t want to comment on Ailes. Ailes announced he was leaving Fox last week amid sexual harassment allegations.

    “But he’s been a friend of mine for a long time. And I can tell you that some of the women that are complaining, I know how much he’s helped them. And even recently. And when they write books that are fairly recently released, and they say wonderful things about him,” Trump said.

    “And now all of a sudden they’re saying these horrible things about him. It’s very sad. Because he’s a very good person. I’ve always found him to be just a very, very good person,” Trump continued. “And by the way, a very, very talented person. Look what he’s done. So I feel very badly. But a lot of people are thinking he’s going to run my campaign.” […]

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/trump-ailes-campaign-run

  159. says

    Former NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg is endorsing Hillary Clinton.

    Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg will endorse Hillary Clinton during his speech at the Democratic National Convention, a Bloomberg advisor told the New York Times […].

    Here is some of what Bloomberg said about Trump:

    Threatening to bar foreign Muslims from entering the country is a direct assault on two of the core values that gave rise to our nation: religious tolerance and the separation of church and state. Attacking and promising to deport millions of Mexicans, feigning ignorance of white supremacists, and threatening China and Japan with a trade war are all dangerously wrong, too. These moves would divide us at home and compromise our moral leadership around the world. The end result would be to embolden our enemies, threaten the security of our allies, and put our own men and women in uniform at greater risk. […]

    We cannot “make America great again” by turning our backs on the values that made us the world’s greatest nation in the first place. I love our country too much to play a role in electing a candidate who would weaken our unity and darken our future […]

    He is accurate about Trump. Some Republicans have been calling their fellow Republican, Bloomberg, a Democrat for some time. He is not a Democrat. He did, however, take more progressive positions on checking the spread of assault weapons, on addressing climate change, and on immigration reform.

    Meanwhile, some progressive Democrats see the Bloomberg endorsement as proof that Hillary Clinton is not a progressive. I see it more as Bloomberg joining the “stop Trump” forces. It will be interesting to see what he has to say at the convention.

  160. says

    Donald Trump thinks he prevented his supporters from beating up Ted Cruz:

    Still smarting from his Wednesday night humiliation at the hands of Ted Cruz, Donald Trump is now insisting that had he not come into the arena just before the end of Cruz’s speech, intensified unified Republican delegates would have dragged Cruz from the podium. “I walked in and the arena went crazy. Because there’s great unity in the Republican Party, and people don’t know it. Had I not walked in, I think that audience would have ripped him off the stage. I think I did him a big favor.”

    Link

    However, several news reporters who had a view of the entryway where Trump was waiting in the wings saw handlers signal him to enter when the booing of Ted Cruz was peaking. Looked staged, and planned.

  161. says

    This is a followup to comment 184. Debbie Wassermai-Schulz has stepped down. she is no longer head of the Democratic National Committee.

  162. says

    Now that he has failed to get Bernie Sanders to withdraw his endorsement of Hillary Clinton, Trump has turned to insulting Sanders:

    There is no longer a Bernie Sanders “political revolution.” He is turning out to be a weak and somewhat pathetic figure,wants it all to end!

    Sorry folks, but Bernie Sanders is exhausted, just can’t go on any longer. He is trying to dismiss the new e-mails and DNC disrespect. SAD!

    The quotes are from Trump’s Twitter feed.

  163. says

    This is a correction to comment 191. Debbie Wasserman Schulz’s resignation will not take effect until after the end of the Democratic Convention … later this week. Donna Brazile will serve as the interim chairperson.

    In other news, cyber experts are agreeing with DNC spokespeople that the email leak was orchestrated by Russian hackers.

    A top official with Hillary Clinton’s campaign on Sunday accused the Russian government of orchestrating the release of damaging Democratic Party records in order to help the campaign of Republican Donald Trump — and some cyber security experts in the U.S. and overseas agree.

    The extraordinary charge came as some national security officials have been growing increasingly concerned about possible efforts by Russia to meddle in the election, according to several individuals familiar with the situation.

    Late last week, hours before the records were released by the website Wikileaks, the White House convened a high-level security meeting to discuss reports that Russia had hacked into systems at the Democratic National Committee. […]

    Washington Post link

    I would still like to see more proof.

  164. says

    Statement from Debbie Wasserman Schultz:

    […] Going forward, the best way for me to accomplish those goals is to step down as Party Chair at the end of this convention,” Wasserman Schultz said in a lengthy statement Sunday announcing her resignation. “I will open and close the Convention and I will address our delegates about the stakes involved in this election not only for Democrats, but for all Americans.

    NBC News link

  165. says

    Daniel Kelly said this:

    Affirmative action and slavery differ, obviously, in significant ways, but it’s more a question of degree than principle, for they both spring from the same taproot. Neither can exist without the foundational principle that it is acceptable to force someone into an unwanted economic relationship. Morally, and as a matter of law, they are the same.

    Nevertheless, Governor Scott Walker appointed Daniel Kelly to the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

    Ian Millhiser of Think Progress took a closer look at this appointment and made some interesting comments:

    […] there was a time about a century ago when Kelly’s views dominated the Supreme Court of the United States. In its since-overruled 1908 decision in Adair v. United States, the Supreme Court held that “it is not within the functions of government . . .to compel any person in the course of his business and against his will to accept or retain the personal services of another, or to compel any person, against his will, to perform personal services for another.” Kelly’s statement about unwanted economic relationships is largely just a restatement of this conclusion in Adair.

    Notably, Adair held specifically that employers may forbid their employees from unionizing — potentially under pain of termination. Given Gov. Walker’s well-known hostility towards unions, that may explain why he chose this obscure lawyer with highly idiosyncratic views for Wisconsin’s highest court.

    Yes, that’s right. This is yet another anti-union, über conservative move by Scott Walker. That guy has been and continues to be a disaster for Wisconsin.

  166. says

    This is a followup to comment 192.

    In addition to insulting Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump has mounted an insult campaign against Tim Kaine. One of Trump’s insults is based on a lie, that Kaine took more undisclosed personal gifts than former Governor Bob McDonnell.

    […] McDonnell and his wife were convicted in 2014 on 11 counts of corruption after being accused of taking “undisclosed” gifts from businessman Jonnie Williams in exchange for connecting him to state officials, including $120,000 in loans, a Rolex watch and the use of Williams’ vacation home. The Supreme Court later overturned the conviction, saying it was unclear that McDonnell had acted inappropriately on Williams’ behalf. Virginia Sen.

    Tim Kaine also took gifts from several companies, including Barr Pharmaceuticals, Dominion Resources and McCandlish Holton PC, but CNN’s Chris Frates explained that Kaine complied with the state law and “disclosed his gifts” while McDonnell did not.

    PolitiFact noted that, contrary to Trump’s claim, McDonnell actually accepted almost three times as much in gifts as Kaine and that all of Kaine’s gifts were “disclosed as required by state law.” Fiske called Trump’s remark “dead wrong” and gave him PolitiFact’s highest rating of “Pants on Fire.” […]

    Here is one of Trump’s lies:

    Bob McDonnell took a fraction of what Kaine took. And I think, to me, it’s a big problem. Now, how do you take all these gifts? Hundreds of thousands of dollars.

  167. says

    Donald Trump Jr. is doing his chip-off-the-old-block thing again. This time his subject is the unemployment rate. Trump Jr. said:

    These are artificial numbers, Jake. These are numbers that are massaged to make the existing economy to look good, to make this administration look good, when in fact it’s a total disaster.

    Here is economist Christine Romans debunking Junior’s claim:

    […] I’ve been looking at these numbers for 20 years now. Nine million jobs have been created in the past four years. And the jobless rate, you look at the chart, it has dropped from above 10 percent during the great recession to 4.9 percent now. It’s not tampered with. It’s all very transparent. That headline number, that 4.9 percent, it is the standard.

    It is the standard economists and presidents of both parties use as an overall measure for joblessness. What is that number? It counts the people who are out of work, and the people who are out of work and looking for a new job. That, by definition, is what we’re talking about here. The labor market, people who are looking for work or are working. The unemployment rate measures people in that labor market. It’s all right there. It’s all transparent.

    The Labor Department releases pages and pages of tables and numbers every month, breaking those numbers down by jobless rate, the jobless rate by education, by race, by time spent unemployed.

    […] Trump has claimed it’s really 25 percent — not 5 percent […]t. He has said it really is depression-era unemployment. That is just not true. What is true: Millions of Americans are not even in the labor market any more. That is true and you can see that in this number. This is the labor force participation rate. This is a number that has been moving down, down, down, down, about 62.7 percent. Some of this is because of baby boomers, they are retiring, 10,000 of them every day turn 65. Other people are at home with their kids. Some people are not looking for a job because it costs too much for daycare. Some people are on disability, some people are going to college, some people just aren’t working. […]

    not everybody who’s out of the labor market is unemployed. So, you’re going to hear these accusations of massaging the numbers. It’s not a scandal, Chris, it’s statistics. And it’s all right there.

    Link

  168. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    re 198:
    Like Newt Gingrich says: numbers don’t matter. only thing worth discussing is the feels.
    ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    trying to Interpret Newt, he might mean: that he isn’t just denying facts; in politics, the only important thing is how the people feel regardless of the facts. [Monty Python’s comedic phrase of “She turned me into a newt!!!!” is currently a prescient curse]

    Looks like Trump Jr is following Newt’s lead. Just make everyone FEEL the unemployment is TOO high, and they will vote for the guy that says he FEELS he’ll fix it. — actual facts and plans unimportant.

  169. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    News for Trump Jr. I not unemployed. I was employed for 39 years. I am now retired, and not looking for work. The Redhead and I are on Medicare, only the Redhead is on SSA at the moment, and I paid into both funds for my entire career. I’m not looking for work as I am the primary caretaker for a partially paralyzed person. We’re living off my IRA, which I contributed to while I was employed.
    Now Trump Jr., why do you consider me unemployed, and not retired?
    /rhetorical

  170. says

    The Democratic National Convention has not yet officially started. There are, however, some speeches and rallies going on.

    Debbie Wasserman Schultz spoke at a breakfast meeting of the Florida delegation. She was booed off the stage by Bernie Sanders’ supporters. That looked bad, and as a result she will not gavel in the Democratic Convention.

    I have decided that in the interest of making sure that we can start the Democratic convention on a high note that I am not going to gavel in the convention. […]

    Smart move.

    Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, the mayor of Baltimore and the DNC secretary will gavel the convention to order.

    Speakers tonight include Elizabeth Warren, Michelle Obama, Cory Booker, and Bernie Sanders.

  171. says

    Nerd @200, you’re doing lots of work every day, but Trump would count you as unemployed. Sometimes he also counts part-time workers as unemployed. Not all part-time worker consider themselves underemployed, let alone unemployed.

    Anyway, there is a standard for measuring unemployment, and the Obama Administration has stuck to that standard. I think Donald Jr. is like his father in another way, he does not know how to vet his sources.

  172. says

    More details on the hack of the DNC network:

    The FBI suspects that Russian government hackers breached the networks of the Democratic National Committee and stole emails that were posted to the anti-secrecy site WikiLeaks on Friday. It’s an operation that several U.S. officials now suspect was a deliberate attempt to influence the presidential election in favor of Donald Trump, according to five individuals familiar with the investigation of the breach.

    The theory that Moscow orchestrated the leaks to help Trump, who has repeatedly praised Russian President Vladimir Putin and practically called for the end of NATO, is fast gaining currency within the Obama administration because of the timing of the leaks and Trump’s own connections to the Russian government, the sources said on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing and developing quickly. […]

    Link

  173. says

    Bernie Sanders’ supporters booed Bernie Sanders before the convention got under way. Bernie was speaking to a crowd of his supporters at another venue. When he got to the part of his speech where he repeated his endorsement of Hillary Clinton the crowd booed. When he talked about “unity,” about backing Hillary, etc. the crowd booed.

    In addition to booing Debbie Wasserman Schultz, an earlier crowd of Florida delegates also booed Nancy Pelosi.

    The convention is now underway. Dr. Cynthia L. Hale had to pause during the invocation and wait until chants of “Bernie” died down.

    The Rev. Cynthia Hale led the opening prayer shortly after the convention was gaveled into order.

    “We have a responsibility to you to be a party that celebrates diversity, values all people and treats everyone with dignity and respect,” Hale said. “We have a platform that seeks to address the ills of our nation, right the wrongs and help us be a just and equitable society … by nominating Hillary Rodham Clinton.”

    Much of the crowd cheered loudly, but jeering was audible. As the cheers subsided, a large contingent chanted “Bernie!,” forcing Hale to pause her invocation for about 15 seconds.

    Link

    This whole convention thing is looking a little rough around the edges.

  174. says

    Sanders has emailed his supporters asking that they don’t disrupt the convention. I can’t find a link to the whole text yet, but some is quoted here:

    Bernie Sanders is urging his supporters to back his push for party unity behind Hillary Clinton — but it’s not clear his supporters are listening.

    The Vermont senator sent an email to his supporters Monday afternoon asking, as a “personal courtesy to me,” that they not protest or demonstrate on the floor of the Democratic National Convention.

    “Our credibility as a movement will be damaged by booing, turning of backs, walking out or other similar displays,” he wrote in the email. “That’s what corporate media wants. That’s what [GOP presidential nominee] Donald Trump wants.”

  175. says

    Nerd @206: the 3.6 million vote difference, with Hillary getting that much over Sanders, is a larger gap than we saw between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in an earlier election season. There really is no reason to doubt the definitive win that Clinton racked up.

    Sanders’ supporters should be angry about comments made by DNC leaders regarding his religion, etc., but that was the result of a limited, narrow group of people doing wrong. One of those DNC leaders has already been ousted. The theory that the whole system was so rigged that Bernie was ripped off just doesn’t hold water. Look at the facts. Add up all of the supposedly “rigged” parts and you still have a Clinton win and a Sanders loss.

    Clinton and Sanders worked together on the Democratic platform. That’s a win for the Sanders campaign. Sanders is now a national figure, one who will be more powerful in the Senate. That’s a win.

    Meanwhile, some Sanders supporters booed Elijah Cummings. Elijah Cummings! That’s a WTF moment. That’s jumping the shark. Wonkette link.

    Elijah Cummings! Wonkette’s legislative badass of the year! THAT Elijah Cummings! A fuckin’ HERO!

    I like Bernie. Every Wonker does, it is the law. But some of his delegates are being horrifying, and if you want to talk about “privilege” (which, face it, I usually don’t!) then the white children drowning out the black lady congressman and the black congressman need to take a look in the fucking mirror.

    It’s not funny, it’s not cute, and if YOUR democracy “looks like” this, go be a fucking Trumpkin and you can be the anti-democratic authoritarian you so clearly wish to be while shouting down your fucking betters. You know you want to, you fucking little pricks.

    The irrationality behind part (not all) of the protests in Bernie’s name smells too much like the irrationality of Trump supporters. I hope they work past that.

    Sanders sent out a message to his supporters asking that, as a courtesy to him, they do not protest on the floor of the convention. Didn’t work.

  176. says

    From the Wonkette link:

    “Bernie basically fed us a bunch of Mountain Dew and now he wants us to go to bed,” Iowa delegate Chris Laursen told the Des Moines Register. “It’s not going to happen.”

    a) Are they five?
    b) No, Bernie Sanders didn’t in fact demonize Hillary Clinton during the primaries (though his campaign didn’t speak out strongly against the demonization by many of his followers). And he didn’t just endorse her today (just before bedtime, in that metaphor).

  177. says

    Michelle Obama delivered a magnificent speech. One for the ages. Unfortunately, the tension between Sanders and Clinton supporters is the only news story on constant replay/repeat in most of the media.

    Coverage of Michelle Obama’s speech by Rolling Stone. Video available at the link.

  178. says

    Here is coverage of Michelle Obama’s speech on MSNBC News. Video excerpts also available at the link, but not the whole speech.

    SC referenced Sarah Silverman. Eugene Robinson, Rachel Maddow, etc. discussed it:
    Link

  179. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    One of the CNN reporters focused on the convention focusing on partitioning the constituency into various groups, such as: straight, gay, black, white, rich, poor, etc etc. To which the other reporter replied “such an argument refutes itself. Saying that various groups want to be recognized, is very different than saying all these groups should be hated”.

  180. dianne says

    Now that the Bernie or bust people are actually booing Bernie, can we admit that it was never about Bernie, it was always about keeping a woman out of power?

  181. a_ray_in_dilbert_space says

    The basic problem with the far left in the US is that they cannot be bothered to learn how democracy actually works. They seem to feel entitled to their way regardless of whether their vote can be counted upon or not–indeed whether they vote or not. So for their benefit, here’s a Politics 101 primer: Do you want Mrs. Clinton (or Barrack Obama or any other politician) to move to the left? Then support them from the left–not just in Presidential election years, but in off years. Elect their allies to congress, to governorships, state legislators… Have policies you support? Then fucking work to convince politicians that they aren’t committing political suicide by supporting your positions.

    It’s politics. Is it too dirty a game for you? Then go play Pokemon Go and let the adults play.

  182. says

    While in North Carolina yesterday, Donald Trump said that the latest polls show him receiving the “largest bump in the history of conventions.” Nope. Not factual.

    In the YouGov/Economist poll, Clinton gained by a small amount after the GOP convention. The NBC News/Survey Monkey poll shows Trump with no post-convention bounce. That poll shows Clinton at 46% and Trump at 45%, which is exactly what that poll showed before the Republican convention. So, no change. Definitely not the “largest bump in the history of conventions.”

    There are some post-GOP-convention polls that show Trump got a modest bounce. Link

    […] This is a volatile time when it comes to public opinion polling. A CNN/ORC survey released early on Monday has Donald Trump leading Hillary Clinton by three points in a head-to-head match-up.

    Another poll – this one from CBS News – shows the race essentially tied between the two candidates – unchanged from their pre-convention survey.

    Two other polls released later in the day – one from Economist/YouGov and a second from the University of Delaware – give Clinton leads of five points and four points, respectively.

    What’s going on?

    The truth is that conducting public opinion polls between the two conventions is a fool’s errand. It’s hardly ever accurate given the fact that one candidate – in this case, Trump – is experiencing a temporary uptick in the polls. […]

    Real Clear Politics link, with stats that show Trump with a 0.9% bump after the convention.

  183. says

    This is a followup to comments 185, 193, and 203.

    We now have evidence that, yes, it was state-sponsored Russian hackers who stole those emails from the Democratic National Committee. The emails were released just before the Democratic convention, which looks like an attempt to disrupt the Dems in order to help Trump.
    Details from NBC News.

    Excerpt:

    […] GEOGRAPHY: At least one of the hacker groups attacking the DNC appeared to cease operations on Russian holidays, and its work hours aligned with a Russian time zone, cybersecurity company FireEye concluded in a report.

    LANGUAGE: The hackers also left an obvious digital fingerprint, one cybersecurity expert said, perhaps on purpose: a signature in Russia’s Cyrillic alphabet.

    FORENSIC EVIDENCE: After a different batch of hacked Democratic emails was released last month, a wide spectrum of cyber-security experts concluded that it was the work of Russian intelligence agencies through previously known proxy groups known as COZY BEAR or APT 29, and FANCY BEAR or APT 28. “We’ve had lots of experience with both of these actors … and know them well,” according to the DNC’s own contract cybersecurity firm, Crowdstrike, which blogged that one of the two groups had already gained illegal access to the White House, State Department and even the military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff.

    MOTIVE: Given their mutual and very public bromance, Putin would much prefer a Trump presidency to a Clinton one, and the timing suggests the leak was timed for maximum embarrassment to the Democrats and their presumptive nominee. Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook said the campaign was told by cyber experts that Russian hackers stole and released the emails to help Trump. “I don’t think it’s coincidental that these emails were released on the eve of our convention here,” said Mook, “and I think that’s disturbing.” […]

    Additional links:

    https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/848-DID-242/images/rpt-apt29-hammertoss.pdf

    https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/

  184. says

    During yesterday’s Democratic Convention, who was booing and who was heckling? What were they chanting?

    Among other things, they chanted “No TPP” when Elijah Cummings was talking about his parents, who were sharecroppers.

    They chanted “Goldman Sachs” during Elizabeth Warren’s speech.

    They chanted “Bernie, Bernie” and “Feel the Bern” at almost everyone.

    Most of the sustained booing came from the California section, and they were still at it this morning:

    During a breakfast meeting with California delegates, attendees booed when Sanders said that they need to elect Clinton and defeat Trump. The senator then told the crowd that their jeers aren’t helpful.

    “It is easy to boo, but it’s harder to look your kids in the face who would be living under Donald Trump,” he said.

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/sanders-easy-to-boo

  185. says

    Part of tonight’s roster of speakers at the Democratic Convention includes: Gwen Carr, mother of Eric Garner. Maria Hamilton, mother of Dontre Hamilton. Lezley McSpadden, mother of Michael Brown. Geneva Reed-Veal, mother of Sandra Bland. Sybrina Fulton, mother of Trayvon Martin. Lucia McBath, mother of Jordan Davis. Cleopatra Pendleton-Cowley, mother of Hadiya Pendleton.

    Some Republicans are already frothing at the mouth over this part of the Dem program:

    Remember that charming sheriff who spoke at the Republican National Convention, describing protests against police killing people as “a collapse of social order”? (The social order is that police get to kill people without protest, dammit!) The one whose sheriff uniform looked like he’d come out of a high-level meeting at the Pentagon? Anyway, that guy. Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke. Ever vigilant in his quest to stay in the spotlight, Clarke Has Some Thoughts on Tuesday night’s planned Democratic convention appearance by the Mothers of the Movement.

    “Donald Trump is the law and order candidate, and this DNC seems to be about embracing criminality and criminal behavior, trying to mainstream criminal behavior, hold these individuals up as if they’re martyrs of the civil rights movement,” Clarke told Fox’s Megyn Kelly.

    Link

    Sherriff Clarke seems to be saying that being stopped for a minor traffic violation may result in you being shot by police, but that’s okay because it is the way law enforcement in the USA fights “mainstream criminal behavior.” Talk about a warped perspective.

  186. says

    Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor, posted a list that connects Donald Trump more firmly to Vladimir Putin:

    1. Trump’s debt load has grown dramatically over the last year, from $350 million to $630 million. At the same time, he’s been blackballed by all major US banks.

    Some people object to the term “blackballed,” preferring to say that major banks in the USA are unwilling to loan Trump money because of past bad experiences with him.

    2. Post-bankruptcy, Trump has become highly reliant on money from Russia — most of which has over the years become increasingly concentrated among oligarchs close to Vladimir Putin.

    3. Paul Manafort, Trump’s campaign manager and top advisor, spent most of the last decade as top campaign and communications advisor to Viktor Yanukovych, the pro-Russian Ukrainian Prime Minister and then President whose ouster in 2014 led to the on-going crisis and proxy war in Ukraine. Yanukovych was and remains a close ally of Putin.

    4. Trump’s foreign policy advisor on Russia and Europe is Carter Page, a man whose entire professional career has revolved around investments in Russia and who has deep and continuing financial and employment ties to Gazprom, which, in turn, is part of Putin’s financial empire.

    5. Over the course of the last year, Putin has aligned all Russian state controlled media behind Trump.

    6. The Trump Camp was totally indifferent to the Republican Party platform, with one exception: They changed the party platform to eliminate assistance to Ukraine against Russian military operations in eastern Ukraine. Not incidentally, this is the single most important issue to Putin.

    7. Trump is also suggesting the US and thus NATO might not come to the defense of NATO member states in the Baltics in the case of a Russian invasion — another important issue to Putin.

    http://robertreich.org

  187. says

    Robert Reich also carefully detailed his reasons to conclude that Hillary is trustworthy.

    […] What explains this underlying distrust? […]

    I saw her be accused of conspiracy in the tragic suicide of Vince Foster, her friend and former colleague, who, not incidentally, wrote shortly before his death that “here [in Washington] ruining people is considered sport.“

    Rush Limbaugh claimed that “Vince Foster was murdered in an apartment owned by Hillary Clinton,” and the New York Post reported that administration officials “frantically scrambled” to remove from Foster’s office safe a previously unreported set of files, some of them related to Whitewater.

    I saw Kennth Starr’s Whitewater investigation metastasize into the soap opera of Bill Clinton’s second term, featuring Monica Lewinsky, Paula Jones, and Juanita Broaddrick, among others – culminating in Bill Clinton’s impeachment and Hillary’s very public (and, presumably, intensely private) humiliation.

    Then, more recently, came the storm over Benghazi, which led to inquiries about her email server, followed by the questions about whether or how the Clinton Foundation charitable work and the Clintons’ own for-profit speeches might have intersected with her work at the State Department.

    It is worth noting that despite all the stories, allegations, accusations, insinuations, and investigations spread over a quarter century – there has never been any finding that Hillary Clinton engaged in illegal behavior.

    But it’s understandable why someone who has been under such relentless attack for a large portion of her adult life might be reluctant to expose every minor error or misstep that could be blown up into another “scandal,” another media circus, another interminable set of investigations generating half-baked conspiracy theories and seemingly endless implications of wrongdoing.

    Given this history, any sane person might reflexively seek to minimize small oversights, play down innocent acts of carelessness, or not fully disclose mistakes of no apparent consequence, for fear of cutting loose the next attack dogs. Such a person might even be reluctant to let their guard down and engage in impromptu news conferences or veer too far off script.

    Yet that reflexive impulse can itself generate distrust when such responses eventually come to light, as they often do – as when, for example, Hillary was shown to be less than forthright over her emails. The cumulative effect can create the impression of someone who, at worst, is guilty of serial cover-ups, or, at best, shades the truth.

    So while Hillary Clinton’s impulse is understandable, it is also self-defeating, as now evidenced by the growing portion of the public that doesn’t trust her.

    It is critically important that she recognizes this, that she fight her understandable impulse to keep potential attackers at bay, and that from here on she makes herself far more open and accessible – and clearly and fearlessly tells all.

    I’m not sure I entirely agree with Reich here. Ken Starr and his ilk, (including Trump), will turn any nothing burger into a feast of misleading repetition of lies and innuendo. This is what they do. I think Hillary Clinton’s best defense is to continue to place her detailed policy positions in the public eye, and to let people like Michelle Obama attest to her character.

  188. says

    Do you remember the three girls who sang and danced in a strangely propagandistic and somewhat awkward way at one of Donald Trump’s rallies? Those girls, USA Freedom Kids, and their management team are now suing Donald Trump. Why? Trump didn’t pay them, nor did he provide agreed-upon opportunities to sell USA Freedom Kids albums, etc.

    Link

  189. says

    More people jumping on the news that Trump is financially connected to oligarchs in Russia, this time from the right:

    Fox News contributor George Will says GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump will not release his tax returns because they may show “he is deeply involved in dealing with Russia oligarchs.” […]

    The Hill link

  190. says

    Hillary Clinton has given several speeches in which she talked about foreign policy. She also posted policy papers on her official campaign website.

    So, what do the Republicans do in response? They trot out former “Apprentice” star, Omarosa Manigault, to address the media on foreign policy per the Trump Campaign. [Cue eyebrow-raising, laughter, and ridicule.]
    Link

    A few responses to Omarosa’s role:

    [from Seth Mandel]: You guys, just want to make sure you all noticed that the RNC just had Omarosa give a pre-buttal to Hillary on foreign policy. So.

    [from Jesse Berney]: hmm yes noted foreign policy hand omarosa

    [from Bill Lawrence]: Not a day in my life goes by that I don’t think, “Hey, I wonder what that reality star Omarosa thinks about how the country is doing”.

    [from Christopher Ingraham]: Can’t wait for Clinton to discuss Omarosa’s failure to win Season 1 of The Apprentice

    [from Keith Olbermann]: Because Gary Busey wasn’t available?

  191. says

    Some Trump’s tweets in response to the Democratic Convention:

    Elizabeth Warren, often referred to as Pocahontas, just misrepresented me and spoke glowingly about Crooked Hillary, who she always hated!

    Why aren’t the Democrats speaking about ISIS, bad trade deals, broken borders, police and law and order. The Republican Convention was great

    If Cory Booker is the future of the Democratic Party, they have no future! I know more about Cory than he knows about himself.

    Cory Booker responded to Trump’s strange comment:

    […] I don’t want to answer his hate with hate. I’m going to answer it with love. I’m not going to answer his darkness with darkness. […]

    I love you, Donald. […] I hope that you find some kindness in your heart, that you’re not going to be somebody that spews out insults to your political opposition, that you’re going to start finding some ways to love. I’m going to elevate him. I love you, I just don’t want you to be my president. I don’t want to you have the White House to be spewing that kind of mean-spirited hate that doesn’t even belong on a playground sandbox.

    The reality is, I’m sorry, I’m just going to keep loving on him. I’m going to tell the truth about him, but I’m going to keep loving on him,[…] That kind of vitriol, that kind of meanness, has no place in the presidency. Bring it on, Donald. Show your truth. I’m going to show mine. Love you, brother.

    Donald Trump did not respond to Booker’s brotherly love.

  192. says

    More journalists (and even leaders in the defense world) are pointing out that the Russian hacking of the Democratic National Committee emails brings the issue of Donald Trump’s tax returns back into the spotlight.

    […] These new developments underscore the importance of an old, familiar point: now, more than ever, Donald Trump must release his tax returns. To put it differently, the press should no longer “normalize” his stonewalling on this issue.

    As another veteran figure in the defense world and political affairs wrote to me this morning: “In normal times, this [the Russian hacking] would be the lead on all network news. But these are not normal times. I am having trouble getting through to some people that this is a real thing. The very people who always say “follow the money” with regard to the Pentagon [or other boondoggle bureaucracies] don’t see that (a) Trump has been kept afloat for about 15 years by Russian oligarchs; and (b) Russia has a powerful incentive to see a US president who will end economic sanctions. […]

    The quoted text is from an article by James Fallows, writing for The Atlantic.

    Emphasis mine.

  193. says

    Tonight’s schedule for the Democratic Convention includes some well-known entertainers. (No, not Scott Baio.)

    Meryl Streep will introduce a film about Hillary Clinton that will be shown in prime time.

    Alicia Keys will perform.

  194. says

    Wonkette commented on the lawsuit being filed by the U.S.A Freedom Kids band:

    […] Do you remember that creepy-ass U.S.A. Freedom kids band that opened for Donald Trump at a few of his campaign stops? Of course you do, because they scarred you for life and now you have nightmares all the time and your therapist is sick of hearing about it. But here! Let us refresh your memory anyway!
    [video at the link]

    Well! It looks as though they won’t be doing any more Trump rallies in the future, as Dad-ager Jeff Popick is suing the Trump campaign’s butts for not giving them their due compensation for performing their song “I’ve Written A Letter To Daddy” “Freedom’s Call” at the two rallies.

    The group had originally asked for 2,500 American Dollars in exchange for their thrilling performance at a rally in Pensacola, Florida, but Corey Lewandowski instead offered them a merch table at which to sell their CDs and other fine goods. They agreed to this, and all was good! BUT, when it finally came time to perform, there was not a table to be found! Whoops! […]

    More details at the link. More nefarious and unfair treatment came from the Trump campaign.

  195. says

    History.

    1) I had heart palpitations. Wasn’t expecting that.
    2) Bernie Sanders is true class. It had to have been so hard to do that, and he emerged as a real champion.

  196. says

    Occasionally, friends or family fall prey to conspiracy theories, and then they send those wild fantasies to me … usually in a huge font size and with many exclamation marks. Here are some excerpts from the conspiracy theory sent to me yesterday:

    The Doe Run Lead plant is closing due to over regulated EPA rulings. Save your lead!!

    All lead for bullets will have to come from overseas! […]

    There are reasons why the US government and the military have been buying up all the ammo. Here’s one of them.

    Obama and the EPA just shut down the last lead smelting plant in the US.

    They raised the EPA regulations by 10 fold and it would have cost the plant $100 million to comply. You can own all the guns you want, but if you can’t get ammo, you are out of luck.

    Remember when Obama promised his minions that he was working on gun control behind the scenes? […]

    And ponder this. There is an excellent chance that Obama will rig the market to where all ammo has to be purchased from a government entity instituting de facto ammo registration.

    So much for the Second Amendment. There has not been a peep about this in the major news outlets and it is done. […]

    Marxists will do or die and are doubling down on the destruction of energy in America, our way of life and the Constitution. […]

    So, back door gun control is moving forward and while we are all distracted with shiny stuff, our Second Amendment rights are just about gone. Obama is one Marxist dictator who is savvy at political chess. He has flanked the Second Amendment. Now it’s our move. […]

  197. says

    In full agreement with SC in comment 239, and 240. I love Andra Day’s voice. Great performance.

    The close of the day, when there was a video presentation of all the men who have been president … and then Hillary was there. Dramatic and slightly cheesy special effects, but really effective. I liked that.

  198. dianne says

    Among other things, they chanted “No TPP” when Elijah Cummings was talking about his parents, who were sharecroppers.

    Apart from the complete inappropriateness of the moment, does it strike anyone else as strange that the current radical leftist movement is essentially an isolationist, protectionist movement? The argument is not, as far as I can tell, that TPP is a bad treaty and a better one needs to be made or that NAFTA was a bad treaty poorly implemented and needs to be reformed, but rather that treaties such as NAFTA and TPP are inherently bad and that, by extension, promoting international trade is inherently bad.

  199. dianne says

    Instead of demanding “no TPP” why not add a condition to the TPP that free flow of goods only happens if there is also free flow of people? In short, something like the demand that the EU is making on Britain if they intend to leave but want to keep market access. No free market without open borders.

  200. says

    In a typically absurd press conference, Trump just encouraged the Russian government to obtain and release Clinton’s emails – “Russia if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing.” Katie Tur asked if he has any qualms about doing this, and after he told her to “be quiet” he said that he doesn’t. He’s actively calling on Putin to criminally break into US servers and interfere with US elections.

  201. says

    SC @245, I saw that. Incredible.

    In the same press conference, Trump said that we don’t really know who hacked the DNC. Other sources say we do know.

    From the New York Times: “American intelligence agencies have told the White House they now have ‘high confidence’ that the Russian government was behind the theft of emails and documents from the Democratic National Committee, according to federal officials who have been briefed on the evidence.”

    From Fidelis Cybersecurity: “I come from a law enforcement background, and it’s [about being] beyond a reasonable doubt. And I would say it’s beyond a reasonable doubt that Russians stole the DNC materials.”

    The New York Times also reported:

    Six weeks before the anti-secrecy organization WikiLeaks published an archive of hacked Democratic National Committee emails ahead of the Democratic convention, the organization’s founder, Julian Assange, foreshadowed the release – and made it clear that he hoped to harm Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning the presidency.

    Mr. Assange’s remarks in a June 12 interview underscored that for all the drama of the discord that the disclosures have sown among supporters of Bernie Sanders – and of the unproven speculation that the Russian government provided the hacked data to WikiLeaks in order to help Donald J. Trump – the disclosures are also the latest chapter in the long-running tale of Mr. Assange’s battles with the Obama administration.

    In the interview, Mr. Assange told a British television host, Robert Peston of the ITV network, that his organization had obtained “emails related to Hillary Clinton which are pending publication,” which he pronounced “great.” He also suggested that he not only opposed her candidacy on policy grounds, but also saw her as a personal foe.

    Motive?

    Anyway, a candidate for president of the USA inviting Russia to hack organizations here is mind boggling.

    The Clinton campaign issued this statement:

    This has to be the first time that a major presidential candidate has actively encouraged a foreign power to conduct espionage against his political opponent. That’s not hyperbole, those are just the facts. This has gone from being a matter of curiosity, and a matter of politics, to being a national security issue.

    I suppose that Trump will tell us that he was joking after he gets enough negative feedback. His own V.P. pick, Mike Pence, came out and said that if the FBI investigation shows that foreign governments are hacking U.S. institutions that he would expect appropriate measures to be taken. Pence and Trump are on different tracks entirely.

    “If it is Russia and they are interfering in our elections, I can assure you both parties and the United States government will ensure there are serious consequences,” the Indiana governor and Donald Trump’s running mate said in a statement.

  202. says

    And Trump’s interpretation (to use the word loosely) of the hacking is so perfectly clownish: He claims that if it is the Russians it shows Putin’s lack of respect for Obama’s government and for Clinton. In contrast, he said, Putin respects him. Right – Putin wants to see him elected because he respects Trump so much, not because he sees him as an easily manipulable stooge and fears Clinton.

    Russian intelligence must find it hilarious – in today’s press conference, he yet again falsely claimed that Putin had called him a “genius” and said he hoped Putin would like him. His desperate, pathological need for affirmation, attention, and a reputation for “toughness” would make him ridiculously easy to manipulate.

  203. says

    Pushback against Trump’s stupid comments encouraging Russia to attack his political opponent is also coming from conservatives. Steve Benen noted:

    […] The Weekly Standard’s Stephen Hayes, a conservative Fox News contributor, asked this morning, “How can any Republican support a candidate who openly hopes for foreign cyberattacks on a political opponent?” […]

    Remember, as far as Trump is concerned, those Clinton emails contain sensitive intelligence. In other words, the Republican nominee this morning said he “hopes” Putin’s government gains access to classified government materials because it might help advance Trump’s personal ambitions. […]

    Also consider what we’re learning about Trump’s perspective on intelligence. As far as he’s concerned, there’s nothing wrong with urging an unfriendly foreign state to commit a cybercrime against an American for political purposes. If Trump heads the U.S. executive branch, and has some authority over the CIA and NSA, is anyone prepared to argue that he’ll be restrained and responsible? […]

  204. says

    In the same press conference Trump also claimed that “they” are saying he received the biggest post-convention poll bounce “in memory.” No one is saying that because it is not true. Well, Trump is saying that.

    See comment 220 for some details regarding polls.

  205. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    and Putin is rigorously denying Russian involvement in hacking the DNC. surprise surprise, what else is there.

  206. says

    When Bill Clinton took on the task of reintroducing Hillary Clinton to the nation last night, he said one thing that really struck me as true.

    After presenting a long (rather overlong) litany of Hillary’s achievements and examples of her work ethic, Bill asked how anyone could reconcile that record with the picture Republicans paint of Hillary. His answer: “You can’t. One is real, the other is made up.” Bill went on to say:

    The real one had done more positive change-making before she was 30 than many public officials do in a lifetime in office. […]

    The real one has earned the loyalty, the respect and the fervent support of people who have worked with her in every stage of her life, including leaders around the world who know her to be able, straightforward and completely trustworthy.

    The real one calls you when you’re sick, when your kid’s in trouble or when there’s a death in the family. The real one repeatedly drew praise from prominent Republicans when she was a senator and secretary of state.

    So what’s up with it? Well, if you win elections on the theory that government is always bad and will mess up a two-car parade, a real change-maker represents a real threat. So your only option is to create a cartoon, a cartoon alternative, then run against the cartoon. Cartoons are two- dimensional, they’re easy to absorb. Life in the real world is complicated and real change is hard.

  207. says

    Anyway, a candidate for president of the USA inviting Russia to hack organizations here is mind boggling.

    Yes, commentators were calling it “breathtaking” and “staggering.” It’s all of these things. Truly unbelievable. As I predicted last Friday: “I expect it will be virtually unbearable for him to lose the spotlight, and that he’ll lash out in a variety of disgusting ways over the next several days trying to draw it back to himself.” He’s predictably compulsive. The Russians would play him like a harp.

  208. says

    About that email hacking thing, no need to worry. According to some right-wingers it is a false flag operation. Of course it is. (/sarcasm)

    Dr. Ada Fisher, a member of the Republican National Committee representing North Carolina, has an interesting theory about the hack of Democratic National Committee emails.

    At Trump’s rally in North Carolina on Tuesday, Fisher told The Guardian that the controversy over the DNC hack is “a false flag to cover up [Clinton]’s transgressions” and “probably the biggest lie I’ve seen.” […]

    Questions about Russia’s involvement and its potential interest in influencing the 2016 election have put the Donald Trump campaign on the defensive. During a Wednesday morning interview on CBS’ “This Morning,” Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort said that questions about Russia’s involvement in the hack are “an absurd attempt by the Clinton campaign to try to get the focus off of” Clinton’s private email server. […]

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ada-fisher-dnc-hack-false-flag

  209. says

    Donald Trump just took three different positions on the minimum wage within about 30 seconds.

    […] When O’Reilly said to Trump, “There has to be a federal minimum wage. What would you set the federal minimum wage at?” Trump’s immediate response was, “There doesn’t have to be,” suggesting that he believes there doesn’t have to be a federal minimum wage at all.

    But with his very next breath Trump went on to say, “I would leave it and raise it somewhat. You need to help people, and I know it’s not very Republican to say.” That would indicate that he believes that the wage needs to be raised because wages are too low.

    And yet when Bill O’Reilly asked specifically what Trump thought of a $10 federal minimum wage, Trump responded, “I would say ten. I would say ten… But the thing is we’ll let the states do it.” […]

    O’Reilly himself tried to pin down Trump’s position on the minimum wage toward the end of their exchange, to no avail. “So we have you on the record as $10 minimum wage federally and states can do whatever they want?” he said. “No,” Trump replied. “You have me on the record as saying the states are going to raise it higher than that.”

    Trump’s contradictions continued on Wednesday morning. In a press conference, he said, “The minimum wage has to go up… At least $10. But it has to go up… Federal.”

    Yet in the very next moment he said, “But I think that states should really call the shots.” Those two ideas are at odds: if the states are left to their own devices, that won’t mean a federal increase, and some states will very likely choose not to increase their wages. […]

    Think Progress link

  210. says

    More from the Steve Benen piece Lynna linked to above:

    …Let’s be very clear about what happened this morning. The Republican candidate for president held a press conference in which he urged Vladimir Putin’s espionage services to help sabotage the American election and put Trump in the White House.

    No, seriously. That’s the level of genuine insanity that we’ve reached. Against the backdrop of allegations that Russia is already trying to intervene in the U.S. presidential race on Trump’s behalf, Donald J. Trump took the next step towards true madness today, publicly calling on a foreign government to commit a felony against his American rival on his behalf.

    There is literally nothing in the American tradition that’s similar to this. Nothing….

    …What more could Trump do to convince people about the dangers of his candidacy? How is this not a disqualifying moment?

    Try to imagine – no, really, take a moment to think about – how significant a scandal it would be if Hillary Clinton publicly urged Russia to do her a favor, target a GOP rival, and help her win an election. How quickly would her career in public life end? How many congressional hearings and investigations would Republicans demand?

    I’ve been watching this bizarre presidential race every day since it began. It’s never been scarier than it is right now.

  211. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    *dreaming*
    The spirit of Leonard Nimoy would come out of death, and go In Search of and find Donald Trump’s Tax Forms.
    /*dreaming*

  212. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    CNN included a Trump-troll covering the Democrat Convention. He spoke the expected conundrum of how the Democrats were so against voting rights, enacting Jim Crow, against women’s vote, etc. (and Republicans were the abolitionists, etc) to which the more reasonable panelist pointed out, “yeah that’s true, recognize (dipshit). They got past that, you’re talking history, not current events, sheesh” [a little paraphrasing included].
    And of course the Trumptroll objected to the list of women leaders omitting a few prominent republican women, and that Hillary is not the first woman to be nominated to a major office, remember Palin?? *eyebrows*.
    The reasonable guy didn’t even have to point out that being asked to be on McCain’s ticket is not actually nomination by the voting public.
    They politely avoided (while eyerolling) calling Palin the word-kaleidoscope she frequently appears to be without being victimized by secondary sources jumbling up her speeches into word salad to mock her.
    Trumptroll was very tu quoque [sic]. meaning repeatedly spouting, “Democrats were just as racist as they accuse Trump as being;” *eyebrows* so why should we believe democrats spew?” *more eyebrows*
    ..
    other than the single troll, the panel, with more than just Cooper360, seemed to be quite appreciative, and informed by, the background the speakers were giving about Hillary. Filling in all the details easily left out of news stories.

  213. says

    Yep, it has already happened: Fox News Anchor Bret Baier says that Donald Trump was joking about calling for Russia to hack Hillary Clinton.

    Meanwhile, MSNBC played back to back clips of Trump claiming to “know Putin very well” back in November, and of his claiming not to know Putin “at all” today.

    Here is a bit more reaction to Trump’s comments:

    DAVID GREGORY: I’ve run out of words to express my shock and how completely beyond the pale that Donald Trump is as a potential leader of the free world, the commander in chief of our country. […] I mean, he is encouraging Russia, which by all accounts was behind the leak of one of our major political parties, to do more, to go beyond, to try to hack into Hillary Clinton’s server to find missing emails to kind of get in the middle of the scandal. It’s as if this is a child playing with matches who doesn’t understand how badly he and the country can get burned. […] Vladimir Putin is dangerous. He’s been dangerous to a Democratic president, to a Republican president, President George W. Bush who thought he had a better relationship with him. And now this nominee of the Republican Party wants a closer relationship with Vladimir Putin which is what he said. And he thinks that he has the ability to have a better relationship. There’s no evidence to believe that’s the case. [CNN, At This Hour with Berman and Bolduan, 7/27/16] (Emphasis mine.)

    From Binyamin Applebaum: So Trump’s position is that he’s not collaborating with Russia, but he would really like to.

    From Benjy Sarlin: Remember the 50,000 times you heard GOP candidates say weakness invites attacks? What do embossed invitations to attack invite?

    From Maggie Haberman: Trump went from saying the Clinton team is outrageous to accuse him of colluding w Putin to calling on Russia to find her emails

    From Kurt Eichenwald: I would talk about Trump inviting Russia to interfere with election by hacking HRC, but my mouth really hurts. Because my jaw hit the floor.

  214. says

    Nerd @256, I thought it might be more useful for the Russians to find Trump’s tax forms and then release those.

    Trump’s top aide, Paul Manafort, repeated again today that Trump is not going to release his tax returns.

  215. says

    Bill O’Reilly is one of the few right wing doofuses that have criticized Michelle Obama after she gave that great speech on Monday night.

    O’Reilly responded to this part of Michelle Obama’s speech:

    […] That is the story of this country, the story that has brought me to this stage tonight, the story of generations of people who felt the lash of bondage, the shame of servitude, the sting of segregation, but who kept on striving and hoping and doing what needed to be done so that today I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves.

    And I watch my daughters, two beautiful, intelligent, black young women playing with their dogs on the White House lawn. And because of Hillary Clinton, my daughters and all our sons and daughters now take for granted that a woman can be president of the United States.”

    O’Reilly said, among other offensive things that the slaves who built the White House were “well-fed and had decent lodgings.” Here are some excerpts from O’Reilly’s on-air rant:

    […] Slaves did participate in the construction of the White House. Records show about 400 payments made to slave masters between [1795] and 1801. In addition, free blacks, whites, and immigrants also worked on the massive building. There were no illegal immigrants at that time. If you could make it here, you could stay here. […]

    Slaves that worked there were well-fed and had decent lodgings provided by the government, which stopped hiring slave labor in 1802. However, the feds did not forbid subcontractors from using slave labor. So, Michelle Obama is essentially correct in citing slaves as builders of the White House, but there were others working as well. Got it all? There will be a quiz. […] [Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor, 7/26/16]

    As Jay Bookman said, “We have an eyewitness, First Lady Abigail Adams, who said those slaves were ‘half fed, and destitute of clothing’.”

    Quest Love of The Roots band really went after Bill O’Reilly. Quest Love posted a photo of a slave with a terribly scarred back to go with this comment:

    Slavery was inhumane. Slavery was sadistic. Slavery was uncomfortable. Slavery was unjust. Slavery was a nightmare. Slavery was a despicable act. Slavery is the pebble whose ripple in the river still resonates on and on and on and on.

    I’d like to think most of you have common sense. But there is nothing more dangerous than a man in a suit pretending to be a journalist giving revisionist history on the ugliness that was slavery. […] being flogged? being malnourished? living in high stress conditions? forced to lay in your own feces? being sold in a heartbeat?

    suppressing ANY emotion (with the surprising exception of singing it was illegal —lashes or death–to read, write, “talk back” or “sass”, cry […], get angry, or even more surprising LAUGHING (a plantation barrel of water was always in proximity to dunk ones head in so one could express emotions and suppress the sound as to not alert your overseer of your “sassing”—

    deep history I just learned about laughing and the slave period—the first recorded song “The Laughing Song” was the defiant “F%^k Tha Police” of its day (also where the term “Barrel Of Laughs” gets its origin)—I’m getting beside the point.

    I dunno if that man’s (never say his name) point is to troll at any cost whatsoever but his entire existence is a 5 steps backwards for any progress made in humanity. My dismay is the percentage of people who get their news from memes/headlines/& sources to whom they have 0 clue is feeding them false information. Human Trafficking in any form from today’s underage prostitution, to the private Prison System we exercise here in the US, to the Holocaust to 500 years of Slavery–and all other examples I’ve not mentioned is INHUMANE & Evil. —watch where you get your information from and the company you keep people.

  216. says

    A few more reactions to Bill O’Reilly’s comments about slaves who built the White House being “well-fed [etc.]”:

    From Shonda Rhimes: “Bill: Chat about cuisine after they steal ur name, homeland, family then beat u, breed u and make u work for free.”

    From Rabia Chaudry: “I will provide decent lodging and food to Bill O’Reilly if he becomes my slave. Need a shed built.”

    From Ken Jennings: “Persistent wage gap between slaves and non-slaves largely a result of the slaves’ lifestyle and family choices”

    From Leon Wolf: “For his next hot historical take, Bill O’Reilly will tell us about the free dental care at Auschwitz.”

    From Paul Krugman: “Sometimes they’re worse than you could imagine, even taking into account that they’re worse than you can imagine.”

  217. Crip Dyke, Right Reverend Feminist FuckToy of Death & Her Handmaiden says

    @Lynna, #260, quoting O’RLY:

    There were no illegal immigrants at that time. If you could make it here, you could stay here.

    Bwahahahahahahhahaahahahahahahahahhahahahaha. That alone would give some very compelling evidence of O’RLY’s neural incapacity, even if we didn’t have all the other evidence.

  218. says

    Hillary Clinton made history last night when she became the first woman to be nominated by a major party for president. Nevertheless, several major news outlets did not feature a photo of her on their front page. Instead, they featured photos of men.

    The Wall Street Journal showed a photo of Bernie Sanders, under the headline “Clinton Wins Historic Nomination.” The Wall Street Journal also featured a photo of Bill Clinton in another version of their paper, under the headline “Hillary Clinton Wins Nomination.”

    The Chicago Tribune showed a photo of Bill Clinton, under the headline “Clinton claims nomination.”

    Inside pages were often no better.

    Media Matters link.

  219. says

    Right-wing media is seizing on the story of the Russians hacking the Democratic National Committee network to claim that that means the Russians also hacked Hillary Clinton’s private email server.

    There is no evidence that Clinton’s server was hacked by anyone. There is no evidence it was hacked by the Russians. Donald Trump seems to also be conflating the two, conflating the DNC network with Clinton’s private server.

    Hugh Hewitt:

    I think the Russians are sending a message that they’ve got her personal emails from her private server. What do you think the Russians are doing with this […]

    Dick Morris:

    If the Russians had the DNC emails, do they also have Hillary’s secretary of state emails on her private server? And if they released them to WikiLeaks, which proves that the Russians hacked her server, and therefore probably the Chinese, the Iranians, the North Koreans did too? Proving that she violated national security in a fundamental way? That could really be the end of her candidacy.

    National Review’s Jonah Goldberg:

    Because Hillary’s private server was almost certainly hacked by the Russians, we should assume that they know literally everything Hillary has sent or received over it.

    Rush Limbaugh:

    If they were able to hack the DNC server, then they no doubt hacked her Chappaqua server.

    Paul Manafort:

    The real issue isn’t even the Democratic National Committee server being hacked. The real issue is her server that was sitting in a closet in her home in New York that was unsecured. So you can imagine if it was so easy to do the DNC server, what the likelihood is that — how many countries have hacked into that server? And that one had national security documents in it that are probably floating all over the world now.

  220. says

    On the schedule for today/tonight’s Democratic convention (not a complete list):

    President Barack Obama
    Vice President Joe Biden
    Vice Presidential nominee Tim Kaine
    Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (an independent, not a Democrat)
    Daniel Driffin, an HIV/AIDS activist
    Representative Eleanor Holmes Norton
    Representative Maxine Waters
    Several other U.S. Representatives
    President of NARAL Ilyse Hogue
    A female tech entrepreneur, Books Bell
    New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio
    Jesse Jackson
    California Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom
    Representative Ruben Gallego from Arizona
    Martin O’Malley
    Sigourney Weaver
    California Governor Jerry Brown
    Advocates for gun violence prevention measures, including Erica Smegielski
    Angela Bassett
    Gabby Giffords and her husband Mark Kelly
    Leon Panetta
    Senator Sherrod Brown
    Dr. Jill Biden
    Lenny Kravitz

  221. says

    This article quotes Trump from 2014:

    Trump also said during a National Press Club luncheon in 2014 that he was in Moscow and he spoke “directly and indirectly with President Putin who could not have been nicer.”

    They link to the video of the NPC event, and he does in fact say just that (so no one has to watch the whole thing – he’s asked the question at around 47:50 in).

  222. Arren ›‹ neverbound says

    SC (#252):

    The Russians would play him like a harp.

    Trump’s more of a vuvuzela, if you ask me.

  223. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Lynna #259. I didn’t say who the spirit of LN should give a copy of the tax forms to…
    I suspect that another source than the Russians would be needed to get it published.

  224. says

    In September 2014, during his peak Birther period, Donald Trump also appealed to hackers:

    Attention all hackers: You are hacking everything else so please hack Obama’s college records (destroyed?) and check “place of birth”

    Snowdon is a spy who should be executed-but if it and he could reveal Obama’s records, I might become a major fan

  225. says

    Nerd @268, you are correct. The Russian hackers would not be a good source for Trump’s tax returns. They might get their hands on them, but they wouldn’t release them publicly. They might use them to pressure already-gullible, Putin-loving Trump to take more actions favorable to Russia.

    In other news, Trump announced that he thinks the Geneva Convention is “out of date.” Trump added:

    I am a person that believes in enhanced interrogation, yes. And by the way, it works.

    Trup also said that the European Union was created to “beat the United States.”

  226. says

    Oh, my, Trump is going to hate this. This will hit him where it hurts. The ratings for the Democratic convention are higher than the ratings for the Republican convention.

    At least 24.3 million people watched the Democratic Convention on Tuesday night, which is about 25% more people than watched day two of the RNC.

  227. says

    blf @271. I’m not buying that excuse. Hillary Clinton appeared, looking rather resplendent, by video link. Editors could have used an image snipped from that video link, preferably the glass-breaking. They could have used an image of Clinton from the DNC live feed of that night. They could have used any photo of Clinton that they have on file (which is what they often do for famous white men).

  228. blf says

    Lynna, editors did every one of those things you mentioned. Try reading the fecking link rather than just the excerpt. It even has examples for feck’s sake.

  229. says

    blf @274, I think we may be misunderstanding each other. I was focusing only on newspapers that did not feature Hillary Clinton on their covers.

  230. says

    For the third straight night in a row, the Democratic convention racked up higher ratings than last week’s Republican convention.

    Donald Trump’s response to losing in the ratings is to tell his supporters not to watch the final night of the Democratic convention.

    Last week Trump was so happy with the ratings for the Republican convention that he bragged about them. He even predicted that no one would watch the Democratic convention. Now his campaign is sending fund-raising emails that tell supporters not to watch as Clinton accepts the Democratic nomination.

    Unless you want to be lied to, belittled, and attacked for your beliefs, don’t watch Hillary’s DNC speech tonight. Instead, help Donald Trump hold her accountable, call out her lies and fight back against her nasty attacks.

    Watching the first woman nominated for the presidency accept that nomination is likely to get high ratings. Trump having his undies in a bunch, not so much.

    This 2016 Democratic convention has higher ratings than the Dem convention in 2012.

    The numbers for 2016:
    Monday, 26 million viewers versus 23 million for night one of the RNC
    Tuesday, 24 million, versus 19 million for night two of the RNC
    Wednesday, Democratic convention viewership about 15% higher than viewership for night three of the RNC

    Views from live streaming sources such as PBS and C-SPAN are not counted in those ratings.

  231. says

    Another long-time Republican just quit the Republican Party.

    The Republican Party nominated Donald Trump as its candidate for president of the United States – and I responded by ending my 44-year GOP membership.

    Here’s why I bailed, quit, and jumped ship:

    First, Trump’s boorish, selfish, puerile, and repulsive character, combined with his prideful ignorance, his off-the-cuff policy making, and his neo-fascistic tendencies make him the most divisive and scary of any serious presidential candidate in American history. He is precisely “the man the founders feared,” in Peter Wehner’s memorable phrase. I want to be no part of this. […]

    GOP committee chairman Reince Priebus, House Speaker Paul Ryan, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell wrongly acquiesced to Trump. As columnist Michael Gerson wryly notes, Trump “attacked the Republican establishment as low-energy, cowering weaklings. Now Republican leaders are lining up to surrender to him – like low-energy, cowering weaklings.” […]

    Finally, Trump is “an ignorant, amoral, dishonest and manipulative, misogynistic, philandering, hyper-litigious, isolationist, protectionist blowhard” in the words of Republican donor Michael K. Vlock. That charming list of qualities means supporting Trump translates into never again being able to criticize a Democrat on the basis of character. Or, in personal terms: How can one look at oneself in the mirror? […]

    Philly link

  232. says

    The organization VoteVets called for the GOP to remove Trump from the ticket. Here is the statement from VoteVets Chairman Jon Soltz:

    It is horrifying to see a major candidate for president make a direct appeal to a foreign authoritarian regime to hack the United States. If not treason, encouraging cyberwarfare against the United States constitutes what would be considered a high crime or misdemeanor that would cause impeachment and removal from office, for violating the oath to protect and defend the United States from all enemies.

    We cannot allow a commander in chief who works to undermine our current military operations in Eastern Europe, by sending conflicting signals about our seriousness in keeping the Russians in check. And we absolutely cannot have a president who directly encourages cyberwarfare against us.

    The Republican Party must use all means available to remove Donald Trump from their ticket.

    VoteVets link

  233. says

    To defend himself against videos showing him making fun of disabled people, Trump made this argument:

    I spend millions of dollars making buildings good for people that are disabled. Millions and millions of dollars. Do you think I’d ever do a thing like that?

    Well, yes. I think you would do that because the law requires you to do so. The law is the Americans with Disabilities Act.

    Trump also denied, again, that he was making fun of disabled journalist Serge Kovaleski. Everyone can see him making fun of Kovaleski. It’s on video.

    To make matters worse for Trump, his compliance with the ADA has not been stellar:

    His properties have been sued a number of times for violations of the Americans With Disabilities Act, including one instance where a man claimed that the buses to his Atlantic City casino were virtually impossible to access in a wheelchair. […]

    In the most egregious case, the U.S. Department of Justice had to intervene because the Trump Taj Mahal was nearly inaccessible for people with disabilities.

    In 2011, the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey conducted a compliance review of Trump’s Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City. They discovered an extensive list of problems. […]

    That’s just a partial list. You can read about more instances of Trump’s non-compliance in an article by Gideon Resnick.

  234. says

    Kansas is facing another credit downgrade.

    State Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley (D) told the Kansas Associated Press, “It’s just the fundamental, ongoing budget crisis that’s been caused by Sam Brownback’s failed tax experiment. The sooner they acknowledge that, the better off this state will be.”

    Topeka Capital-Journal link

  235. says

    Many people have suggested that Donald Trump should not receive intelligence briefings prior to the election in November. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper dismissed that idea.

    A few people have also said that Hillary Clinton should not receive intelligence briefings. Clapper dismissed that idea too.

    Donald Trump just came up with a new reason why he thinks Hillary Clinton should not receive intelligence briefings:

    [Clinton’s top aide, Huma Abedin] is married to Anthony Weiner, who’s a sleazeball and a pervert…. I don’t like Huma going home at night and telling Anthony Weiner all of these secrets, OK?

    Trump said that publicly.

    Meanwhile, Representative David Cicilline, a Democrat from Rhode Island, formally requested that the executive branch “withhold classified materials and briefings from Donald Trump.”

    The Republican nominee’s call for hostile foreign action represents a step beyond mere partisan politics and represents a threat to the republic itself. It suggests that he is unfit to receive sensitive intelligence, and may willingly compromise our national security if he is permitted to do so. With this in mind, I respectfully ask that you withhold the intelligence briefing to Mr. Trump in the interests of national security. […]

  236. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    re 270: sorry I’m late:

    Trup also said that the European Union was created to “beat the United States.”

    delusion from the deluded turnip, no surprise.
    I guess I’m deceived to think EU was inspired by the US and modeled after us, imitating the US success at joining a collection of independent States into a unified economic system. I guess I take US exceptionalism for granted tsk tsk.

  237. says

    Trump has been saying for some time that President Obama is not really an American (the whole Birther thing), and that he doesn’t know what it means to be an American. It was interesting to see President Obama turn the tables on Trump at the Democratic convention last night. Obama effectively turned Trump into the epitome of an un-American individual.

    Here are some excerpts from Obama’s speech:

    Ronald Reagan called America “a shining city on a hill.” Donald Trump calls it “a divided crime scene” that only he can fix…. He’s just offering slogans, and he’s offering fear. He’s betting that if he scares enough people, he might score just enough votes to win this election.

    And that’s another bet that Donald Trump will lose. And the reason he’ll lose it is because he’s selling the American people short. We’re not a fragile people. We’re not a frightful people. Our power doesn’t come from some self-declared savior promising that he alone can restore order as long as we do things his way. We don’t look to be ruled. Our power comes from those immortal declarations first put to paper right here in Philadelphia all those years ago: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal; that We the People, can form a more perfect union.”

    That’s who we are. That’s our birthright – the capacity to shape our own destiny.

    A]nyone who threatens our values, whether fascists or communists or jihadists or homegrown demagogues, will always fail in the end.

    That is America. That is America. Those bonds of affection; that common creed. We don’t fear the future; we shape it. We embrace it, as one people, stronger together than we are on our own. That’s what Hillary Clinton understands – this fighter, this stateswoman, this mother and grandmother, this public servant, this patriot – that’s the America she’s fighting for. […]

    Full text of President Obama’s DNC speech.

  238. says

    Another excerpt from President Obama’s speech:

    […] what we heard in Cleveland last week wasn’t particularly Republican – and it sure wasn’t conservative. What we heard was a deeply pessimistic vision of a country where we turn against each other, and turn away from the rest of the world. There were no serious solutions to pressing problems – just the fanning of resentment, and blame, and anger, and hate.[…]

    Now, eight years ago, Hillary and I were rivals for the Democratic nomination. We battled for a year and a half. Let me tell you, it was tough, because Hillary’s tough. Every time I thought I might have that race won, Hillary just came back stronger.

    But after it was all over, I asked Hillary to join my team. She was a little surprised, but ultimately said yes – because she knew that what was at stake was bigger than either of us. And for four years, I had a front-row seat to her intelligence, her judgment, and her discipline. I came to realize that her unbelievable work ethic wasn’t for praise or attention – that she was in this for everyone who needs a champion. I understood that after all these years, she has never forgotten just who she’s fighting for. […]

    Hillary has real plans to address the concerns she’s heard from you on the campaign trail. She’s got specific ideas to invest in new jobs, to help workers share in their company’s profits, to help put kids in preschool, and put students through college without taking on a ton of debt. That’s what leaders do.

    And then there’s Donald Trump. He’s not really a plans guy. Not really a facts guy, either. He calls himself a business guy, which is true, but I have to say, I know plenty of businessmen and women who’ve achieved success without leaving a trail of lawsuits, and unpaid workers, and people feeling like they got cheated. […]

  239. says

    Rush Limbaugh, being as classy as ever, made these comments about Hillary Clinton’s acceptance speech which will be delivered at the Democratic convention tonight:

    […] can she do tonight without a seizure? Can she do tonight without a coughing spasm? Can she do tonight — look at what she’s got to live up to. From Biden talking about all these great things she’s done with children, to her husband talking about all these great things — what? How in the world is she going to live up to all of this? […] She’s not good at this. She has to go almost monotone in order to keep from falling into that shrieking second-wife persona. […]

  240. says

    Remember ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council? That’s the rightwing organization that writes so-called “model legislation” for rightwing legislators. That way, the legislators don’t have do any work at all before they submit bills that weaken unions, that take money away from public schools, and that weaken environmental protections and regulations, (to name just a few of their despicable goals). The model legislation that ALEC churns out is corporate-funded, and often written by corporate personnel and/or lobbyists.

    Trump’s V.P. pick, Mike Pence, is making an effort to strengthen ties between ALEC and the Trump campaign. Pence’s emphasis is on education. He wants more “academic freedom,” which in conservative-speak means taking more money out of the public school system and putting more money into a private school system with fewer means of oversight. Religiously-based private schools love this approach. Corporations who want to make a lot of money by sucking up state and federal funds while offering substandard education … they love this approach.

    The Koch brothers and other private entities are backing this. There’s a chart showing more of the right-wing corporate backers of the education reform echo chamber in a Media Matters article.

  241. says

    This is hilarious in a dark-comedy way: Donald Trump Jr. has accused Barack Obama of plagiarizing a line from his RNC speech.

    I’m honored that POTUS would plagiarize a line from my speech last week. Where’s the outrage?

    Junior said:

    There’s so much work to do. We will not accept the current state of our country because it’s too hard to change. That’s not the America I know. We’re going to unleash the creative spirit and energy of all Americans. We’re going to make our schools the best in the world for every single American of every single ethnicity and background.

    President Obama said:

    What we heard in Cleveland last week wasn’t particularly Republican, and it sure wasn’t conservative. What we heard was a deeply pessimistic vision of a country where we turn against each other and turn away from the rest of the world. There were no serious solutions to pressing problems, just the fanning of resentment and blame and anger and hate. And that is not the America I know. The America I know is full of courage, and optimism, and ingenuity. The America I know is decent and generous.

    Uh, yeah, that doesn’t qualify as plagiarism, Junior. For one thing, if we look at some of Obama’s past speeches, it might be said that you lifted some lines from him. Or perhaps you stole your line from former president George Bush.

    Both men did use the line “This is not the America I know” in their respective convention speeches.

    But as NBC News pointed out, Obama has used versions of this line in several past speeches. In a 2010 speech, he used the line, “That is not the America we believe in.” And in addresses delivered in 2012 and 2016, he used the line, “That’s the America I know.”

    Former President George W. Bush also once used the line, “That’s not the America I know,” as NBC News noted.

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/trump-jr-obama-plagiarism

    Junior is still really upset about media reports showing that parts of Melania Trump’s speech were cribbed from Michelle Obama’s 2008 DNC speech.

  242. says

    Trump and immigrant labor, a tale of hypocrisy: he says one thing and does another.

    […] between 2013 and 2015 Mar-a-Lago posted 250 seasonal job openings. Of those, 246 went to foreign workers and four went to Americans.

    Now that Trump has based a good deal of his presidential bid on hating illegal immigration and the labor force that comes with it, though, will that reliance on foreign labor change in 2016? No, no it will not.

    […] Mar-a-Lago Club and the nearby Trump National Golf Club, Jupiter, are seeking to fill 78 server, housekeeper, and cook positions with foreign laborers under H-2 guest worker visa applications because Trump’s organizations claim they couldn’t find Americans to do the work.

    […] Trump has gotten permission from the Labor Department to hire 149 other foreign guest workers [since his presidential campaign began], again under the auspices that there aren’t enough qualified American workers available to do the jobs. […]

    Reporting has shown that there are at least some such workers in existence in southern Florida, though. […] Tom Veenstra, a senior director at Palm Beach’s career services center, said that his agency has a database of 1,327 Palm Beach County residents interested in server, cook, and chef positions. Veenstra has said in the past that “we have hundreds of qualified applicants for jobs like those” for which Trump is hiring.

    Mar-a-Lago has only used his agency once, though, to fill just one position. In the past, the resort has done “the bare minimum required by law” to attempt to fill these jobs with American workers before seeking foreign visas, CNN reported in March. […]

    Slate link

    Trump prefers his employees to be similar to indentured servants, and that’s why he is still using H-2Bs to bring laborers into the country. Here’s quote from David Seminara, a fellow with the Center for Immigration Studies:

    The H-2B program is more or less despised by both sides of the immigration debate. The human-rights community considers the program legalized slavery, and those who advocate stricter immigration enforcement believe that H-2B workers contribute to unemployment and wage stagnation for U.S. workers. But the business community loves this program because it brings them cheap, reliable labor—people who can’t quit or demand better working conditions.

    National Review article

    Here’s a quote from Danny Fontenot, the director of the hospitality program at Palm Beach State College:

    You almost have them as indentured servants. And they affect everyone else’s wages. You can make a lot of money by never having to give your employees raises.

    The Fontenot quote comes from a New York Times article written in February.

  243. says

    This report is from yesterday. It is the latest incident showing Trump to be a guy who suppresses access for media outlets he does not like:

    […] reporter Jose A. DelReal was banned from entering the event at the Waukesha County Exposition Center outside Milwaukee after a security official, who refused to give his name, had him patted down by police for a cellphone that wasn’t there. The newspaper has been blacklisted from receiving credentials by the Trump campaign but has continued to cover his events by attending via general admission.

    First, DelReal was rejected for a credential and was denied entry through the press table, which would adhere to Trump’s despicable policy of First Amendment suppression of media outlets he doesn’t like.

    But that suppression was taken to a new level when DelReal attempted to enter via general admission. First, a private security official told him he couldn’t enter with his laptop and cellphone.

    In the past, the Trump general admission policy has been this: “No posters, banners, or signs may be brought into the event. There is no dress code. No professional cameras with a detachable lens are permitted. No tripods, monopods, selfie sticks, or GoPros. ID is not required for entry.” Cellphones are not on the list.

    DelReal said he asked the security official if others were allowed to enter with cellphones and the official responded, “Not if they work for the Washington Post.”

    When the reporter returned without his cellphone or computer, the security official called over county sheriff’s office Deputy John Lappley and Capt. Michelle Larsuel to pat him down and search for the phone. When the sheriff’s deputies didn’t find a phone, the security official then denied DelReal entry anyway. […]

    “First, press credentials for the Washington Post were revoked by Donald Trump,” Post executive editor Martin Baron told the paper. “Now, law enforcement officers, in collusion with private security officials, subjected a reporter to bullying treatment that no ordinary citizen has to endure. All of this took place in a public facility no less. The harassment of an independent press isn’t coming to an end. It’s getting worse.” […]

    Slate link

    Retribution, suppression, despicable tactics. That’s Trump.

  244. says

    Tonight’s DNC schedule features several U.S. Representatives, several civil rights leaders (notably, Dolores Huerta), some Governors, some mayors, and some senators.

    Family members of fallen law enforcement officers will speak.

    The head of Republican Women for Hillary will speak.

    Musical performances include Carole King, Sheila E + Family, and Katy Perry.

    Other celebrities include: Chloe Grace Moritz, Ted Danson, Mary Steenburgen, and Kareem Adbul Jabaar.

    Chelsea Clinton will introduce her mother.

  245. says

    SC @296, That speech by Trump in Davenport, Iowa was disturbing. He went on and on about how he wanted to punch people, about how hard he wanted to hit them, especially “a little guy.” The “little guy” is probably a reference to Michael Bloomberg, a real billionaire who is richer than Trump, and a guy who said that, as a New Yorker he knows “a con when I see one.” The “con” details were all related to Donald Trump.

    “I was going to hit this guy so hard his head would spin” etc. That’s a YouTube link to a video segment.

  246. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Interesting article from Reuters about the Progressive wing of the Democrats.

    Twelve years ago, Barack Obama’s electrifying speech at the Democratic National Convention brought tears to Andrew Gillum’s eyes.
    Now mayor of Tallahassee, Florida, and viewed as a rising star in that state, Gillum did not hesitate when asked to name his political role model.
    “Elizabeth Warren,” he replied, referring to the firebrand U.S. senator from Massachusetts….
    “There is an energy that’s coming from the folks that were brought to the process by the Sanders campaign,” said Sarah Lloyd, 44, a congressional candidate in Wisconsin who supported Sanders. “That can only be a positive thing for the party.”
    More than Sanders, Warren has taken the lead in shaping the Democrats’ next generation. Formerly a professor of law, Warren conceived and set up the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau formed in 2011 under President Obama.
    She launched a political action committee to back Democratic candidates and inspired other advocacy groups, such as the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, to solicit donations to a bloc it terms the party’s “Warren wing.”
    A speaker at the convention, Florida’s Gillum was frustrated by Sanders because he seemed disinterested in helping other Democratic candidates, in contrast with Warren.
    “Senator Sanders was content to be a movement by himself,” Gillum said. “It’s a revolution when you bring people along with you.”
    Warren’s committee has donated to the campaigns of U.S. Senate hopefuls such as Kamala Harris, 51, of California, Jason Kander, 35, of Missouri, and Catherine Cortez Masto, 52, of Nevada. They and Wisconsin’s Lloyd oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the global trade deal that has split the progressive and moderate elements of the party.
    The PCCC’s slate of “Warren wing” candidates supports a $15-an-hour minimum wage, campaign-finance reform and tighter rules for Wall Street.
    One of those on the slate is Zephyr Teachout, a candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives in New York, who has campaigned in a T-shirt that reads, “I’m from the Elizabeth Warren wing of the party” and who has been endorsed by Sanders.
    “There is a rising and very important populism, talking about money in politics, talking about trade, talking about economic issues,” Teachout, 44, told Reuters. “Within the party, and across the board, there has been a serious rethinking of trade, rethinking of big banks, rethinking of monopolies that have too much power.”
    Tulsi Gabbard, a U.S. representative from Hawaii, is often mentioned by Sanders supporters as one who could assume his mantle. A cable-news regular, Gabbard, 35, was one of a few Sanders supporters offered a convention speaking slot. Onstage she formally nominated Sanders for president, saying he had become a “voice for millions, connecting seamlessly with laborers in the Rust Belt and environmentalists in the West.”
    Other rising Democratic progressives frequently cited by strategists include Julian Castro, 41, the U.S. housing secretary, and his twin brother, Representative Joaquin Castro of Texas, former Ohio state senator Nina Turner, 48, U.S. Senate candidate Pramila Jayapal, 50, of Washington, and former South Carolina lawmaker Bakari Sellers, 31.
    BRIGHTER THAN THE REST?
    Harris might be the one to shine the brightest. As California’s attorney general, Harris has been mentioned as a potential U.S. presidential candidate or U.S. Supreme Court justice should she win her Senate race in November.
    She enjoys the support of Warren, Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and former New York City Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, a Republican-turned-independent, suggesting she can appeal to both the party’s liberal and moderate flanks.
    She joined forces with Bloomberg in his crusade for tighter gun laws, bonded with Warren over helping homeowners struggling through the foreclosure crisis of the late 2000s and joined Obama’s efforts to overhaul a criminal justice system that tends to treat black citizens more harshly than white ones.
    In one campaign ad, Warren is viewed saying, “Kamala Harris was fearless.”
    Harris, in turn, has backed Clinton. In an interview, she rejected the idea that the party is leaving Clinton behind even as it nominates her for president.
    “I strongly believe that these two generations have much more in common than what separates them in terms of fundamental values,” Harris said.

  247. says

    There’s a movement from the rightwing to boycott the films or other performances of Academy Award winning actor Bradley Cooper. Why? Cooper was spotted in the audience at the Democratic National Convention.

    This was considered a betrayal by right-wingers because Cooper had a leading role (“American hero Chris Kyle) in the movie “American Sniper,” a favorite of conservatives.

    Cooper has been a Democrat for a couple of decades.

    The backlash and proposed boycott include statements like this:

    I have a list of celebrities that support Socialism. I refuse to spend another $ on. […] Boycott them all.

  248. says

    SC @296, That speech by Trump in Davenport, Iowa was disturbing. He went on and on about how he wanted to punch people, about how hard he wanted to hit them, especially “a little guy.”

    Yes. I hate the response that runs “This guy’s been rich and pampered all his life. He’s probably never been in a fistfight.” He was raised by an authoritarian father, and when he started acting out aggressively and cruelly he was sent to an authoritarian institution. New York Military Academy was a violent, miserable place and educated him further in authoritarianism. Wealth doesn’t shield kids from having damaging childhoods. He’s a 70 year-old man whose response to criticism is bluster and threats of physical violence. It’s tragic.

  249. says

    A new Gallup poll that Trump will not like:

    … Trump’s speech got the least positive reviews of any speech we have tested after the fact: 35% of Americans interviewed last weekend said it was excellent or good. Of the nine previous speeches we have rated, the top one was Barack Obama’s in August 2008, which 58% of Americans rated as excellent or good. […]

    The self-reported net impact of the GOP convention was also negative. Overall, 51% of Americans say the convention made them less likely to vote for Trump, while 36% said it made them more likely to vote for him. This is the highest “less likely to vote” percentage for a candidate in the 15 times Gallup has asked this question after a convention.

    Here are some results from an NBC News poll:

    Trump’s convention speech, which was received well by Republicans watching the event, did not sit as well with Independents. Just 30 percent of Independents who watched the speech said it was excellent or good, 29 percent said it was “just okay” and a 40 percent plurality said it was poor or terrible.

  250. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    9:03pm EDT.
    Rev. William Barber II speaking at DNC.
    for a Conservative Evangelical Preacher, he is making a lot of sense that is usually so absent of religio people.

    to quote: “disgusting how some speak so much about what the bible says so little and say so little about what the bible says so much…” without having to fill in the obvious blanks.
    Also significant that he focused attention back to the opening paragraph of the Constitution. “estalblish Justice, provide for Common defense…” (emphasis in his voice).
    Unlike the NRA infested Rethuglicans who focus on a single amendment to the Constitution propagating the myth that it is soon to be stolen (by those idiots who are afraid of getting shot [paraphrasing their propaganda]).
    as an atheist I hesitate to make this recommendation: seek out the transcript of his DNC address.

  251. militantagnostic says

    Bill Bogert, a “lifelong Republican” who did an Anti-Goldwater ad in 1968, has now recorded an Anti-Trump ad. CBC Radio One’s As it Happens interviewed him.

    In 1964, a Republican actor starred in an ad, sharing his fears that the GOP had lost its way — and in 2016, that same actor tells us how he ended up delivering that old message in a new commercial.

    He considers Trump to be far worse than Goldwater – the latter was at least competent. He is not big fan of Hillary Clinton, preferring Elizabeth Warren, bu he will vote for her. He has harsh words for those who won’t vote.

    http://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-thursday-edition-1.3699151

  252. says

    Prosecutor in Michigan announcing felony charges against several individuals in Michigan health and environmental departments related to the lead poisoning in Flint. So far, they’ve charged nine people and filed a civil suit against two companies. Their investigation isn’t over.

  253. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    The trumptroll on CNN accused Hil of plagiarizing “like you (falsely *wink*wink*) accuse Melania of”, for using a common 4 word phrase in Hil’s acceptance speech. The troll raised his eyebrows, saying “…she didn’t even acknowledge her use of it; so you’ll just give HER a pass?????? [shrug]
    totally avoiding the fact that Melania plagiarized entire sentences from Michelle’s speech, that were constructed significantly different than common phrases. Not noticing that Hil also motioned slightly indicating the use of a common phrase in her speech. Not so, Melania.

    and then, Troll attacked Hil for her husband’s transgressions. Noting a single Democrat woman accusing Bill of raping female staff during his presidency; in response to a list of many Republican women that are migrating to Dem, away from the treasonousTrumpit.
    The troll was trying, and failing, to play the tu quoque card.

  254. says

    In his speech at the Democratic National Convention, President Obama indirectly referred to Trump as a “demagogue.”

    Mike Pence, Trump’s V.P. pick, responded by saying, “I don’t think name calling has any place in public life.” [loud laughter] Does Governor Pence remember that Trump is the presidential nominee to whom he is tied?

  255. says

    Here’s what Donald trump said about he Republican National Convention last week:

    One of the best produced, including the incredible stage & set, in the history of conventions. Great unity! Big T.V. ratings!

    Here’s what Trump said about the Republican National Convention today:

    Asked about the differences [between the RNC and the DNC], Mr. Trump said he could not speak to them with much specificity, because “I didn’t produce our show — I just showed up for the final speech on Thursday.”

  256. says

    One of the most powerful speeches given at the Democratic convention was delivered by Khizr Khan.

    Scroll down to view an excerpt from the video on NBC News.

    Excerpt from coverage of this speech:

    U.S. Army Capt. Humayun Khan’s infantry unit was guarding the gates to their base in Iraq 12 years ago when a suspicious vehicle approached. Khan, a Muslim-American soldier, took 10 steps toward the car before it exploded, killing him.

    Khan’s sacrifice, posthumously awarded with a Bronze Star and Purple Heart, was on full display at the fourth and final night of the Democratic National Convention.

    “Hillary Clinton was right when she called my son, ‘the best of America,'” Khizr Khan, Humayun Khan’s father, said before a packed Wells Fargo Center Thursday night. “If it was up to Donald Trump, he never would have been in America.” […]

    Let me ask you,” Khan said, addressing Trump, as delegates and attendees cheered, “Have you even read the United States Constitution? I will gladly lend you my copy. ” […]

    “Have you ever been to Arlington Cemetery? Go look at the graves of the brave patriots who died defending America — you will see all faiths, genders, and ethnicities.You have sacrificed nothing and no one.”

    While Mr. Khan was delivering his speech, Donald Trump was in Iowa complaining again that America was not allowed to waterboard suspects.

  257. says

    A section of Hillary Clinton’s acceptance speech that I liked:

    It’s true, I sweat the details of policy — whether we’re talking about the exact level of lead in the drinking water in Flint, Michigan, the number of mental health facilities in Iowa, or the cost of your prescription drugs. Because it’s not just a detail if it’s your kid, if it’s your family. […]

    [Trump] offered zero solutions. He doesn’t like talking about his plans. You might have noticed, I love talking about mine. […]

  258. Saad says

    From Lynna’s #317

    Trump: “Great unity! Big T.V. ratings!”

    Such voters! Wow! Many patriotism!

  259. says

    Sounding very much like the retired four-star marine general he is, John Allen shouted at the Democratic audience like they were his troops. Allen was backed up by a stage full of fellow generals, admirals and Iraq/Afghanistan veterans. One of the vets wore a turban.

    General John Allen made a lot of sense. He said that the U.S. military would not carry out the illegal orders that Donald Trump proposed. He was the epitome of indignation at the thought of Trump as Commander in Chief.

    C-SPAN video and text

    Reaction comment:

    As Paul Begala put it, he [General Allen] opened up a huge can of whup-ass on Donald Trump. Allen’s speech came right after a very good speech from the father of a Muslim soldier who died in Iraq, and right before a speech by a Medal of Honor winner. The convention floor was practically shaking for all three.

  260. says

    Before he decided to distance himself from the not-so-good Republican Convention, claiming he only showed up to give a speech on the last night (not true), Trump had previously claimed to have provided criticism of the RC stage set, and to have “decided” on or approved every aspect of the schedule. Sad!

    When he saw the drawings for the stage he would speak on, Mr. Trump sent them back. “I didn’t like the shape,” he said. “Too straight. Too nothing. Didn’t have the drama.” So far, much of the programming Mr. Trump has decided on is safe.

  261. says

    Donald Trump’s reaction to General Allen’s speech (see comment 321):

    General John Allen, who I never met but spoke against me last night, failed badly in his fight against ISIS. His record = BAD

  262. says

    Doug Elmets, a life-long Republican, and a guy who worked with President Ronald Reagan, delivered a speech at the Democratic National Convention.

    Video on Daily Kos.

    Excerpts from his speech:

    […] President Reagan famously said tear down this wall. Trump says, build a wall, because that will make America great again? Reagan saw nuance and Trump sees the world as us verses them, where somebody with brown skin or a foreign sounding name is likely to blame for our troubles.

    Reagan knew that a leader needs diplomacy to steer us safe . Donald Trump is a petulant, dangerously unbalanced reality star. He will coddle tyrants and alienate allies. [Cheers] […]

    While Hillary holds many policy positions that differ from my own, her qualifications are indisputable. Hillary knows that our strength as a nation lies in uniting, not dividing. This year’s Republican platform is the most alarming I’ve ever seen. It is laced with anti-immigrant, anti-gay, anti-women positions that do not represent the views of most Americans.

    That is why this year, I will vote for a Democrat for the first time. [Cheers]

    To my fellow Republicans, if you believe like I do, if you believe that loyalty to our country is more important than loyalty to a party. If you want a president with good judgment, a steady hand and a temperament to represent our nation to the world, and our children, I ask is that you join me in voting for Hillary Clinton as president of the United States. [Cheers]”

    Thank you.

  263. says

    North Carolina Republican legislators have been defeated by the courts … again. This is good news for voting rights in that state.

    A three-judge panel of the U.S Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit has found North Carolina’s controversial GOP-backed voting restrictions were intended to discriminate against African American voters.

    The appeals court reversed the ruling of a district court siding with the state. […]

    In the opinion, the panel of judges said that the law restricted voting in ways that “disproportionately affected African Americans” and that its provisions targeted “African Americans with almost surgical precision.” It said the state’s defense of the law was “meager.” […]

    The judges said that the law’s provisions singled out the practices disproportionately popular among African Americans, such as preregisteration and provisional voting.

    “The district court found that not only did SL 2013-381 eliminate or restrict these voting mechanisms used disproportionately by African Americans, and require IDs that African Americans disproportionately lacked, but also that African Americans were more likely to ‘experience socioeconomic factors that may hinder their political participation,'” the opinion said. […]

    Talking Points Memo link.

  264. says

    Moody’s analytics took a look at Hillary Clinton’s economic proposals, and the news is mostly good.

    […] The independent firm ran the numbers on a variety of proposals that Democratic nominee Clinton has put forward, and it concluded that her plans would boost GDP growth and create more jobs, increase incomes particularly at the middle and bottom of the income scale, and would not end up being costly or significantly increasing the deficit.

    Moody’s looked at what would happen if her plans were fully or partially implemented through the year 2026. Some of it is standard fare: it found that her proposals to spend government resources on infrastructure would stimulate the economy and that financing the spending by levying more taxes on the wealthy would not have a significant economic impact. […]

    the economy would also benefit greatly, according to Moody’s, from more unique aspects of Clinton’s agenda. Long-term growth would be particularly fueled by expanding the country’s workforce and giving people access to better education and skills. That would be accomplished in large part through a national guarantee of paid family leave — which has been shown to keep people in the labor force — and investments in expanding preschool to all four-year-olds and making college more affordable.

    Moody’s also notes that immigration reform would be a significant factor for increasing the workforce and thus boosting productivity.

    All told, Moody’s finds that if Clinton implemented all of her policy prescriptions, the economy would be 1.7 percent larger than its current projected course, there would be 3.2 million more jobs, and the average American household would have $2,000 more in after-tax income. The poor and middle class would benefit the most, keeping their tax bills about the same but getting far more in government assistance, while the wealthy would pay “much more” in taxes.

    […] her plans would cause a “modest” increase in budget deficits. In fact, if she didn’t propose undoing the sequester — the automatic budget cuts that were put in place in 2013 as part of a budget deal — her proposals would be deficit neutral, with the new government spending all but covered by increases in taxes on the rich.

    The analysis stands in stark contrast to what Moody’s found would happen if Republican nominee Donald Trump wins the election. Last month it released an analysis that concluded that his policies would plunge the country back into a recession, cost millions of jobs, fail to improve Americans’ incomes, and increase the deficit by $1 trillion.

    In response, an adviser to Trump’s campaign released a report saying that the nominee’s plans wouldn’t increase the deficit because he has said they won’t.

    Think Progress link

  265. says

    This is a followup to comment 318.

    Right-wingers did not like, nor did they believe Khizr Khan:

    On her radio show today, Sandy Rios of the American Family Association (AFA) questioned the patriotism of Khizr Khan, the father of U.S. Army Capt. Humayun Khan, who died while serving in Iraq. Khan gave a rousing speech at the Democratic National Convention yesterday, in which he criticized Donald Trump’s proposal to ban Muslims from entering the U.S.

    Rios, who serves as the AFA’s director of governmental affairs, said that because of his Muslim faith, Khan may be lying to Americans about his true beliefs, arguing that “supporters of Islam and the Quran cannot embrace the Constitution” and that it’s Khan’s “responsibility” to publicly “condemn Islamists” to prove his allegiance to the country. […]

    Right Wing Watch link

  266. says

    This is a followup to comments 318 and 328.

    During Khizr Khan’s speech, Fox News played a Benghazi, anti-Clinton ad. Link

    Here are the other speeches Fox News ignored. They did not air these speeches, and they did not discuss them on air:

    Speeches that addressed gun violence:
    – Mother Whose Son Was Killed In The Orlando Nightclub Massacre Advocated “Common Sense” Gun Safety Laws.
    – Daughter Of Sandy Hook Victim Called Out Politicians Who “Cower Behind The Gun Lobby.”
    – Former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords Advocated “Stand[ing] Up To The Gun Lobby.”
    – Charleston Church Shooting Survivors Lauded Clinton For Pushing To “Close The Charleston Loophole.”
    – Former Philadelphia Police Commissioner Called For “Common Sense Measures To Reduce Gun Violence.”

    Equality and Civil Liberties
    – Sarah McBride, The First Openly Transgender Person To Speak At A Major Party Convention, Called For Transgender Equality.
    – Father Of An American Muslim Soldier Killed In Iraq: Trump “Consistently Smears The Character Of Muslims.”
    – Disability Rights Advocate: Trump “Bullies And Profits Off Of The Vulnerable Americans.”

    Immigration
    – Eleven-Year-Old Girl Spoke About Her Fear Her Parents Could Be Deported.
    – DREAMER: Clinton “Will Fight To Keep Our Families Together.” Astrid Silva

    Policing and Criminal Justice Reform
    – Mothers Of The Movement Urge “Common Sense Gun Legislation” And Criminal Justice Reform.
    – Pittsburgh Police Chief: “We Can Respect And Support Our Police Officers While At The Same Time Pushing For These Important Criminal Justice Reform.”
    – Former NYPD Detective: Clinton Is The “Toughest Champion” For 9/11 First Responders

    National Security
    – Former CIA Chief Leon Panetta: Electing Trump Would Put “An Erratic Finger On Our Nuclear Weapons.”
    – Retired Admiral Slammed Trump For Endorsing Torture, Praising Dictators, And Calling For Russia To Hack Clinton.

    Reproductive Rights
    – NARAL President Ilyse Hogue Recounted Her Decision To Have An Abortion, Noting That “About One In Three American Women Have Abortions.”
    – Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards Was The First Speaker To Say The Word “Abortion” On The Convention Stage.

    The above list of speeches ignored by Fox News is my summary of information presented by Media Matters.

    In other news, Rush Limbaugh intimated that if Sanders had not endorsed Hillary Clinton, she would have had him killed:

    […] they couldn’t find Bernie Sanders today if he had done that [refused to endorse Clinton]. Nobody would know where he happened to go, they wouldn’t be able to find him. […] he’d ave gotten off the stage, but that would have been the last anybody saw of Bernie Sanders.

    Link

  267. says

    One speech that conservative radio hosts did discuss briefly was that of transgender rights activist, Sarah McBride. Steve Deace called McBride a “freak show,” and went on to call her “the cross-dressing dude.”
    Link

  268. says

    This is a followup to comment 300.

    Senate Democrats called on Congress to cancel or cut short the seven-week recess they are currently enjoying in order to deal with the Zika virus emergency.

    “Zika is public health emergency that requires immediate bipartisan action,” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) tweeted. “Americans can’t afford to wait until Congress’ vacation is over.”

  269. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    speaking of biased commercials during the DNC. before Hil’s acceptance there was a gun fearmonger ad saying Hil was set to remove the 2nd amendment and shortly confiscate guns. message from NRA [surprise!! /sarc]
    (surprise being that it was CNN showing the ad and not the unsurprising NRA shill of FauxNoise)
    the actual shocking* moment was when Hil forthrightly told the public “I am NOT against the 2nd Amendment. I am NOT trying to confiscate guns from the public. I want to keep our children safe. By passing common sense laws about thorough background checks.” [ * — meaning shockingly pleased]
    It seemed as though she saw that ad and addressed it directly.

  270. says

    Jill Stein is still hurting her case by pandering to anti-vaxxers:

    Jill Stein, the Harvard-educated doctor and Green Party candidate for president, was given yet another opportunity to clarify her position on whether vaccines are safe for children during an interview with the Washington Post published Friday. And yet again, she delivered an answer that no-so-subtly pandered to immunization skeptics.

    “As a medical doctor, there was a time where I looked very closely at those issues, and not all those issues were completely resolved,” Stein said. “There were concerns among physicians about what the vaccination schedule meant, the toxic substances like mercury which used to be rampant in vaccines. There were real questions that needed to be addressed. I think some of them at least have been addressed. I don’t know if all of them have been addressed.”

    Let’s consider this statement carefully. Stein is invoking her authority as a medical professional to say that there were legitimate reasons to be concerned about the toxicity of vaccines, and that she doesn’t know if those issues have been resolved. Stein is not saying vaccines are necessarily unsafe. But for all she knows, they might be—some way, somehow. She is leaving open the possibility.

    Back here on earth, there is no evidence that vaccines pose a danger to children’s health. Doctors know this. […]

    Slate link

  271. says

    Stephen Colbert covers the last night of the Democratic National Convention, with an emphasis on the speeches, and on the Bernie Sanders’ supporters “fart-in” protest.

    Scroll down to view the video.

  272. says

    More hacking reports:

    The computer network used by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign was hacked as part of a broad cyber attack on Democratic political organizations, people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

    Reuters link

    Another Democratic Party group confirmed Friday it has been hacked and said the breach was ‘similar’ to a cyber strike on the Democratic National Committee, which has been blamed on the Russians.

    NBC News link

  273. says

    This is a followup to comment 289.

    Some teachers in Indiana are calling Mike Pence out for his association with ALEC.

    Members of the Indiana State Teachers Association will rally near the annual convention of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in Indianapolis […] where Republican vice presidential nominee Indiana Gov. Mike Pence is speaking […].

    Teachers are protesting ALEC because it promotes school vouchers, which many public school teachers say diverts money from public education to private schools, and supports collective bargaining restrictions and high-stakes teacher evaluations.

    Pence has a record of embracing school vouchers and supported a school funding formula for the 2016-2017 year that would allow only 12 of 25 of schools with the lowest-income families to receive an increase in funding, while all 25 schools in higher income areas would see a rise in funding.

    “ALEC has driven the privatization of public education in Indiana,” ISTA President Teresa Meredith said in a statement released to ThinkProgress. “Our state is a leader in funding private school vouchers and charter schools with taxpayer money to the detriment of the more than 90 percent of Hoosier kids attending public schools.” […]

    As of 2014, ALEC had an increase of 40 percent in legislative members from Indiana, including Pence, who has keynoted conventions and hired an ALEC staff member as his policy director, according to IndyStar. […]

    Link

  274. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Good news from the courts about the GOP voter laws.
    http://my.xfinity.com/articles/news-politics/20160730/US–Voting.Rights-Rulings/

    Courts dealt setbacks on Friday to Republican efforts in three states to restrict voting, blocking a North Carolina law requiring photo identification, loosening a similar measure in Wisconsin and halting strict citizenship requirements in Kansas.
    The rulings came as the 2016 election moves into its final phase, with Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton locked in a high-stakes presidential race and control of the U.S. Senate possibly hanging in the balance. North Carolina is one of about a dozen swing states in the presidential race, while Wisconsin has voted Democratic in recent presidential elections and Kansas has been solidly Republican.
    The decisions followed a similar blow earlier this month to what critics said was one of the nation’s most restrictive voting laws in Texas. The New Orleans-based U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals said Texas’ voter ID law is discriminatory and must be weakened before the November election.
    On Friday, a three-judge panel of the Virginia-based 4th Circuit Court of Appeals blocked North Carolina’s law that limited to six the number of acceptable photo IDs. The law also curtailed early voting and eliminated same-day registration.
    The court said the North Carolina provisions targeted African Americans with “almost surgical precision.”
    Critics of photo ID requirements say they fall disproportionately on minority voters and the poor, who are less likely to have an ID such as a driver’s license and tend to vote Democratic. Supporters say they photo IDs are needed to combat voter fraud…
    In the Kansas ruling, a county judge said the state must count thousands of votes in local and state elections from people who did not provide proof of U.S. citizenship when they registered. Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, a national leader in Republican voter restriction efforts, had pushed through a rule that would have set those votes aside, perhaps up to 50,000 by the November election.
    The Kansas ruling just four days before the state primary election means that about 17,000 voters will have their ballots counted in races for the state Legislature and other local contests…
    In Wisconsin, a federal judge threw out a host of election laws, while allowing the state’s voter ID law to remain in place with substantial limitations. U.S. District Judge James Peterson ordered the state to quickly issue credentials valid for voting to anyone trying to obtain a free photo ID but lacking underlying documents such as birth certificates.
    He struck down restrictions on absentee and early voting, saying they discriminated against blacks. He also struck down an increase in residency requirements from 10 to 28 days, a prohibition on using expired but otherwise qualifying student IDs to vote and a prohibition on distributing absentee ballots by fax or email.

    Applause, applause, applause.

  275. says

    SC @337, Donald Trump Jr. is freaking me out. He is a confederate-flag-loving doofus with a lot of similarities to his father. But here’s the real problem: he’s young. Junior is going to be around for what seems like forever.

    In other news, the Houston Chronicle endorsed Hillary Clinton for president.

    The Chronicle editorial page does not typically endorse early in an election cycle; we prefer waiting for the campaign to play out and for issues to emerge and be addressed. We make an exception in the 2016 presidential race, because the choice between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump is not merely political. It is something much more basic than party preference.

    Any one of Trump’s less-than-sterling qualities – his erratic temperament, his dodgy business practices, his racism, his Putin-like strongman inclinations and faux-populist demagoguery, his contempt for the rule of law, his ignorance – is enough to be disqualifying. His convention-speech comment, “I alone can fix it,” should make every American shudder. He is, we believe, a danger to the Republic. […]

    http://www.chron.com/opinion/recommendations/article/For-Hillary-Clinton-8650345.php

  276. says

    SC @340, Maddow did a great job in that segment. There’s no one else who ties history, politics, civil rights, and emotion together like she does.

    We are close to the anniversary of the day when the remains of civil rights heroes Goodman, Chaney and Schwerner were discovered in 1964. Donald Trump Jr. went to the scene of that crime in Mississippi to campaign to a mostly white audience in a state that is already mostly conservative and mostly Republican. I assume that being there, and putting in a plug for confederate flags, made him feel very comfortable.

  277. says

    Rachel Maddow also covered the way that Trump’s campaign completely ignored the Republican Party platform with the sole exception of insisting on a concession to Russia that involved Ukraine.

    For a nice bit of humor, watch this Maddow presentation of the way in which Donald Trump confused Tom Kean with Tim Kaine. More delightful history married to current events. The joke is on Trump … again.

  278. says

    I was wondering when Trump would start weaseling out of the upcoming presidential debates. Guess what, he’s already laying the groundwork.

    As usual, Hillary & the Dems are trying to rig the debates so 2 are up against major NFL games. Same as last time w/ Bernie. Unacceptable!

    Trump still has his don’t-like-the-moderators, and his media-not-treating-me-fairly excuses in his back pocket.

    The idea of debating Hillary Clinton probably scares him.

  279. says

    Ah, this incident is just so Trumpish. The self-proclaimed greatest builder in the world was giving a speech at a rally in Colorado. The fire marshal in charge of the venue stopped letting people in once the room reached its capacity. Trump didn’t like that. He didn’t like that one bit.

    [….] “So I have to tell you this. This is why our country doesn’t work. We have plenty of space here. We have thousands of people outside trying to get in. And we have a fire marshal that said, ‘Oh we can’t allow more people.’” […]

    “The reason they won’t let them in is because they don’t know what the hell they’re doing,” he said. “That’s why, okay? Too bad. That’s why our country has — hey, maybe they’re a Hillary person. Could that be possible? Probably. I don’t think there are too many of them. I don’t think there are too many of them.”

    Trump continued his rant by tying this restriction to why the country needs limited government.

    “This is the kind of thing we have in federal government also, by the way, folks. Then you wonder why we’re going to hell,” he said. “That’s why we’re going to hell. You know what it is? It’s a thought process, right.”

    Lacey [Brett Lacey, the fire marshal] did not speak publicly following Trump’s attack, but The Hill reported that he was named “Civilian of the Year” in February for his work after the shooting at the Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood clinic, citing a local newspaper report.

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/trump-fire-marshall-clinton-voter-accusation

  280. says

    Oh, please. Really?

    […] During a rally in Colorado Springs, Trump said he tuned in to Clinton’s speech “out of curiosity” to see if Clinton would mention his name and was disappointed she didn’t congratulate him for winning the GOP nomination.

    “I was curious to see whether she’d do a class act and not mention my name,” Trump said. “Or mention it with respect, like, say, ‘I’d like to congratulate my Republican opponent for having done something that nobody has ever done in the history of politics in this nation.'”

    Trump went on to say that he has been the more civil one in campaigning against Clinton because he does not join in on chants of “lock her up” when people yell them at his rallies, but that his kindness has run out.

    “Every time I mention her, everyone screams ‘lock her up, lock her up’,” he said. “And you know what I do? I’ve been nice. But after watching that performance last night, such lies, I don’t have to be so nice anymore. I’m taking the gloves off, right? Yes? Take the gloves off. Take the gloves off. Right? Taking the gloves off. Just remember this, Trump is going to be no more Mr. Nice guy.”

    Link

    Trump wants love and appreciation from Hillary Clinton. He thinks she should have said, “I’d like to congratulate my Republican opponent for having done something that nobody has ever done in the history of politics in this nation.”

    I get a laugh out of the way that Trump tells people what wording they should use when showering him with praise.

  281. says

    Incompetence on display again. Remember when the Trump campaign sent out email fundraising requests to lots of foreign dignitaries and elected officials? They are, unbelievably, doing it again … or still doing it. Sad!

    For crying out loud! The kinds of e-mails I get from @realDonaldTrump-team. Please, just a little bit of dignity. [Tweet from Alexander Stubb]

    An image of the actual fund-raising email is available here.

    Trump sent the email out after the close of the Democratic convention.

  282. says

    This is a followup to comments 318, 328 and 329.

    For just once, Trump could have taken the high road. But, no, he is incapable of that.

    In his first response to a searing charge from bereaved Army father Khizr Khan that he’d “sacrificed nothing” for his country, Donald Trump claimed that he had in fact sacrificed by employing “thousands and thousands of people.” He also suggested that Khan’s wife didn’t speak because she was forbidden to as a Muslim and questioned whether Khan’s words were his own. […]

    Trump also said, “If you look at his wife, she was standing there. She had nothing to say. She probably, maybe she wasn’t allowed to have anything to say. You tell me.”

    Pressed by Stephanopoulos to name the sacrifices he’d made for his country, Trump said: “I think I’ve made a lot of sacrifices. I work very, very hard. I’ve created thousands and thousands of jobs, tens of thousands of jobs, built great structures. I’ve had tremendous success. I think I’ve done a lot.”

    ABC News link

    Trump should have watched the segment on Lawrence O’Donnell’s show to which SC provided a link in comment 340. He would have learned that Mrs. Khan did not speak because her emotional pain was so great that she didn’t think she could deliver a speech in that setting.

    What Mrs. Khan did manage to say on the Lawrence O’Donnell show:

    I begged my son, I begged him, do not come back a hero, come back to me a son. He came back a hero.”

  283. says

    Trevor Noah’s take on statements Trump made after the Democratic Convention: Scroll down to watch the 12:33 minute video.

    Excerpt:

    […] he [Noah] played some highlights from Michael Bloomberg’s Donald Trump “diss track.” In his speech, the former New York City mayor said, “Trump says he wants to run the nation like he’s running his business? God help us” and later “The richest thing about Donald Trump is his hypocrisy.”

    “One of the biggest discussions this election year has been, does Donald Trump have the temperament to be president?” Noah asked. “Because being a president, especially of a nation in control of nuclear weapons, requires that you have measured responses.”

    “As a leader of democracy, you can’t just lose your shit at the slightest provocation,” the host continued. “It appears, though, Cinnamon Hitler didn’t get the memo.”

    Noah proceeded to play some disturbing clips from a press conference Trump gave in Iowa that better resembled the “old Trump,” the one his most delusional supporters believe he left behind months ago. Trump ranted about “wanting to hit a couple of those speakers so hard,” adding that he wanted to “hit one guy in particular, a very little guy.” It was in that same presser that Trump practically joined the “Lock her up!” chants coming from his biggest fans.

    “You can bait Donald Trump into doing practically anything,” Noah said. For instance, he said if you say, “Hey, Donald, I bet your hands are too small to give me a handjob,” the candidate would reply, “Oh yeah? Drop those pants!” […]

  284. says

    Trump should have watched the segment on Lawrence O’Donnell’s show to which SC provided a link in comment 340. He would have learned that Mrs. Khan did not speak because her emotional pain was so great that she didn’t think she could deliver a speech in that setting.

    Mr. Khan also said that they had gone over the speech together, and she was the one who thought he should say what he did and leave out the part telling Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan they have a moral responsibility to speak out.

    Trump should also have watched the segment that followed, with Tony Schwartz. When O’Donnell asked if he thought Trump would hear Khan and say something like “I don’t mean Muslims like you and your son,” Schwartz said Trump is such a damaged human being that he could have watched Khan’s speech and not have been moved. He imagined (I’m paraphrasing) that Trump’s response would have been to be composing a tweet that would try to discount Khan’s comments, with a bunch of campaign staffers behind him with straitjackets preventing him from publishing it. I thought he was right at the time, and Trump’s now proved him right.

  285. says

    “This is the kind of thing we have in federal government also, by the way, folks. Then you wonder why we’re going to hell,” he said.

    You know what would be hell? Thousands of people packed into a hall fighting to escape during a fire.

    Doesn’t give you much confidence his properties are up to code, does it?

  286. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Doesn’t give you much confidence his properties are up to code, does it?

    Yep, I bet his fire codes are up to his ADA standards. I bet he just doesn’t get the need for anything other than what his ego says, much less safety regulations.

  287. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    Trump’s reply to Khan:
    I think I’ve made a lot of sacrifices. I work very, very hard. I’ve created thousands and thousands of jobs, tens of thousands of jobs, built great structures. I’ve had tremendous success. I think I’ve done a lot.

    All of his assertions are appended with “I think” or “Believe me”.
    Believe me, that is a sure sign of conman.
    Seriously, I threw his phrase into my observation to mock him as the asshat mongoose toupee he is.
    factually, he didn’t create those jobs, he hired people to do those jobs then refused to pay them. His only sacrifice was declaring Chapter 11 to keep the money scheduled to pay those jobs.

  288. says

    More quotes:

    Her husband added that she served as his “coach” while writing the speech and said she gave him the strength to speak on stage.

    “Forty years of marriage has brought us in a position where we are strength for one another,” Khan said. “Her being there was the strength so I could hold my composure. I am much weaker than she is in such matters.”

    I’m sure Donald would say the same thing about Melania (Marla, Ivana,…).

    “I’d like to hear his wife say something,” Trump said.

    Trump expanded on that sentiment in an interview with ABC News Saturday.

    “If you look at his wife, she was standing there,” Trump said. “Maybe she wasn’t allowed to have anything to say, you tell me.”

    I’d like to hear his current and former wives speak freely – no NDAs. If the freedom of women’s (and all) voices is so important to Trump, he can get rid of any such restrictions.

  289. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Trump’s only a few years older than me. Trump, what was your draft status back during the ‘Nam War? Daddy buy you your deferments?

  290. says

    Mr. Khan made the point that his wife was his partner in drafting his speech, and that he needed her standing next him in order to deliver it.

    You would think that Trump would know this by now and would stop making disparaging remarks about her not being allowed to speak. As SC pointed out, Trump repeated the disparaging remarks in other venues.

    More evidence that Trump is incapable of learning. Maybe it is also evidence that he lives in a bubble of his own making.

  291. says

    Putin already invaded Ukraine. What does doofus Trump say about this?

    Well, look, you know, I have my own ideas. He’s not going into Ukraine, OK? Just so you understand. He’s not going to go into Ukraine, all right? You can mark it down and you can put it down, you can take it anywhere you want.

    Link

    That’s not an old quote from Trump. It is current. It aired today as part of an interview conducted by George Stephanopoulos.

  292. says

    In the same interview with George Stephanopoulos (comment 356), Trump claimed:

    I got a letter from the NFL saying, “This is ridiculous. Why are the debates against prime time games?”

    Nope. He did not get a letter. He is lying.

    Here is the NFL’s response:

    While we’d obviously wish the Debate Commission could find another night, we did not send a letter to Mr Trump.

  293. says

    This is a followup to comment 344.

    Remember that fire marshall that Trump insulted in Colorado for enforcing the rules about the number of people allowed into a venue? Well, the fire department to which that fire marshall is attached had to to rescue Trump from an elevator earlier.

    The Colorado Springs Fire Department says that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump had to be rescued from an elevator that was stuck between the first and second floors of a resort.

    In a statement released Saturday, the department says that it was called at 1:30 p.m. Friday to rescue about 10 people, including Trump, trapped inside the elevator at The Mining Exchange resort.

    The rescue happened at around 1:30 p.m. Trump was scheduled to speak at 2 p.m.

    Firefighters say they were able to secure the elevator, open the top hatch and lower a ladder, which allowed everyone – including Trump – to climb out.

    9 News link, Colorado

    Trump still went on stage and insulted the fire department.

  294. says

    Khizr Khan’s response to Donald Trump dissing both Mrs. Khan and Muslim culture:

    In his first response to a searing charge from bereaved Army father Khizr Khan at the Democratic National Convention that he’d “sacrificed nothing” for his country, Trump told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos that he had in fact sacrificed by employing “thousands and thousands of people.” He also suggested that Khan’s wife Ghazala didn’t speak at the DNC because she was forbidden to as a Muslim and questioned whether Khan’s words were his own.

    “Sacrifice — I don’t think he knows the meaning of sacrifice, the meaning of the word,” Ghazala Khan, mother of slain Army Captain Humayun Kahn said. “Because when I was standing there, all America felt my pain. Without saying a single word. Everybody felt that pain.”

    While Ghazala Khan grew visibly upset, her husband, Khizr Khan was livid, urging Trump’s children to “tell him to learn to behave, learn to be decent.”

    “Running for president is not an entitlement to disrespect Gold Star families and [a] Gold Star mother not realizing her pain. Shame on him! Shame on his family!” Khizr Khan said, struggling to hold back his anger. “He is not worthy of our comments. He has no decency. He is void of decency, he has a dark heart.”

    In response to Trump’s suggestion that Ghazala Khan did not speak at the DNC because it was forbidden by her religion, she said today the real reason she remained silent was her all-consuming grief.

    “I didn’t feel anything except the pain,” she said through tears, before pleading: “Mr. Trump feel that pain and you will feel better. Please. I am very upset when I heard when he said that I didn’t say anything. I was in pain. If you were in pain you fight or you don’t say anything, I’m not a fighter, I can’t fight. So the best thing I do was quiet.”

    Khizr Khan said he asked his wife of 42 years to speak, but she declined, knowing she would be too emotional.

    “I invited her, would you like to say something on the stage when the invitation came, and she said, ‘You know how it is with me, how upset I get,'” he said.

    Ghazala Khan went on to say that she’s sorry Trump doesn’t understand their faith.

    “I don’t know what type of Islam he has read or heard. I’m so sorry about that, that he has not had any idea what the Islam is,” she said.

    “My faith, Islam, has given us strength, all the woman and man are equal in God’s eyes. We are equal, we are the part of our husbands, they are the part of us. We can tell them what to do, they can tell us what to do,” she said, noting she was trying to calm her husband down during his speech at the DNC.

    Link

  295. says

    A lot of people, including Republican leaders, do not agree with Trump’s bashing of Mr. and Mrs. Khan. Who does agree with Trump? ISIS does.

    ISIS joined Donald Trump on Sunday in dishonoring the sacrifice of U.S. Army Capt. Humayun Khan.

    The newest issue of the so-called Islamic State’s propaganda magazine Dabiq said the Muslim war hero died as an “apostate” when he was killed by a car bomb in Iraq in 2004 after ordering soldiers under his command to stand back as he moved foward to investigate the vehicle.

    Khan was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star and Purple Heart and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. ISIS published a picture of his headstone and captioned it, “Beware of dying as an apostate.” […]

    Trump first responded in a statement where he said the Khans had “no right” to criticize him.

    “Captain Humayun Khan was a hero to our country and we should honor all who have made the ultimate sacrifice to keep our country safe,” he said. “While I feel deeply for the loss of his son, Mr. Khan, who has never met me, has no right to stand in front of millions of people and claim I have never read the Constitution, which is false, and say many other inaccurate things.”[…]

    “Did Hillary’s script writer write it?” Trump asked in the Stephanopolous interview, which taped on Friday.

    In fact, Khan spoke extemporaneously. […]

    The same issue of Dabiq […] took a jab at Hillary Clinton while saying nothing about Trump. The magazine rails about the “extinction” of Western women because of the West’s war on human nature, which dictates that “woman does not imitate man.”

    “For this reason, when the daughter of a Persian king became ruler of Persia, the Prophet said, ‘A people who give their authority to a woman will never prosper,’” it said.

    Link

  296. says

    Consequences: a weatherman in Dallas was asked to retire after he posted on Facebook some criticism of the Mothers of the Movement who spoke about their slain sons at the DNC.

    Dallas Morning News link

    Here is Bob Goosmann’s post:

    As many of you have probably noticed, I’ve stayed away from politics on FB. The NC parading the mothers of slain thugs around on their stage has me furious.

    And here is Bob Goodman’s explanation:

    I used the word thugs in my post, but I thought a thug was just a violent person. The definition of thug does not mention any race. I will say I talked with an African American acquaintance and he told me that he feels like when he hears the word, it is in reference to an African American individual. I had NO IDEA.

    A lot of people in Dallas agree with Bob Goosmann, and they have posted their bile in the comments section on the Dallas News website, and well as in other venues.

    hillary pandering deep into racist blacks for their vote .

    Hillary is White she is creating a stereotype enslavement of the black people by whites. when in fact Democrats enslave people .

    SHE DID this purely for the gains of votes by the black community. THINK!

    Plenty of non-white people are doing pretty well and some are doing very well. Sounds like someone has sour grapes because they are lazy or unwilling to put in the effort it takes to make a good living.

    Only minorities have freedom speech in this country anymore.

    it seems reverse racism has become more prevalent than what we think of as traditional racism in society. I condemn all racism including Black Lives Matter.

    The democrats and their sick convention were a disgrace to this country.

  297. says

    More details to debunk Trump’s claim that Hillary Clinton’s campaign had a hand in setting up a debate schedule that would disadvantage him:

    In his first effort to scuttle the Fall presidential debates Donald Trump has suggested that Hillary Clinton is trying to rig the debates by scheduling them during must-watch NFL games. […]

    1. Did Hillary Clinton do this?

    No, of course not. The Commission on Presidential debates has overseen all presidential debates going back to the 1980s. The commission is bipartisan (co-chaired by one Republican and one Democrat) and announced the dates for this year’s debates on September 23rd, 2015. This year’s NFL schedule was announced in April 2016.

    2. How many days are there in a week?

    Well, seven of course. But some have suggested that even though the exact schedule wasn’t known until April, the commission knew what days and nights the NFL schedules games. Here’s where calendar knowledge comes in. Friday and Saturday are historically low TV viewership nights. If the debate commission wanted high viewership those two nights are out. Since 2006, the NFL has scheduled games on three nights a week, in addition to the main Sunday afternoon play: Sunday, Monday and Thursday. If the commission wants to work around the NFL schedule they are limited to two days out of the week: Tuesday and Wednesday.

    3. Has the debate commission ever done this before?

    Of course it has. The four 2012 debates were held on a Wednesday, Tuesday, Thursday and Monday. The four 2008 debates included two Thursdays Fridays, one Monday Wednesday and one Tuesday.

    4. Did Donald Trump get a letter from the NFL complaining about the schedule?

    No. […] [See comment 357]

    Talking Points Memo link

  298. says

    Donald Trump is not going to let his ill-conceived fight with the Khan family go. Mr. and Mrs. Khan must be really getting under his skin.

    Here are the Trumpish tweets from this morning:

    Mr. Khan, who does not know me, viciously attacked me from the stage of the DNC and is now all over T.V. doing the same – Nice!

    This story is not about Mr. Khan, who is all over the place doing interviews, but rather RADICAL ISLAMIC TERRORISM and the U.S. Get smart!

  299. says

    Mark Cuban (a very rich guy who is known for his appearances on the TV show “Shark Tank”) endorsed Hillary Clinton. What is more interesting is what he said about Trump:

    […] Donald, initially, I really hoped he would be something different, that as a businessperson, I thought there was opportunity there. But then he went off the reservation and went bat-shit crazy. I told him directly, at some point you have to learn, at some point you have to read […] that job [the presidency] is all about uncertainty and if you don’t do the work, that is not good for this country […] He just doesn’t do the work.

  300. says

    Trump demonstrates that he can’t spell:

    Hillary Clinton should not be given national security briefings in that she is a lose cannon with extraordinarily bad judgement & insticts.

    All errors are in the original.

    In other news, some Trump donors tried to set up a meeting between Trump and Charles Koch. Koch refused to meet with Trump. Now Trump claims that the Koch brothers reached out to him, but that he turned them down. Yeah, Donald, that’s really likely. Not.

    I turned down a meeting with Charles and David Koch. Much better for them to meet with the puppets of politics, they will do much better!

    Politico documented the Koch’s rejection of The Donald.

  301. says

    Trump got a modest bump in the polls after the Republican convention. After the Democratic convention, Hillary Clinton erased Trump’s bump. She is ahead in most polls.

    From CBS News:

    Forty-six percent of voters nationwide say they’ll vote for Clinton in November, while 39 percent say they’ll back Trump. The race was tied last week after the Republican convention. Clinton led by a similar margin in June.

    Clinton got a four-point bounce after her party’s convention, compared to a two-point bump for Trump after his convention. When compared to previous Democratic presidential nominees, Clinton’s bounce is similar to those President Obama got in 2012 and 2008, […].

    In reports from Public Policy Polling, Clinton leads Trump 50% to 45%. The five-point advantage still holds when third party candidates are added to the polling.

    The margins are still far too slim to engender confidence.

  302. says

    The Veterans of Foreign Wars organization is adding its voice to many that are condemning Donald Trump:

    “Election year or not, the VFW will not tolerate anyone berating a Gold Star family member for exercising his or her right of speech or expression,” said Brian Duffy, of Louisville, Ky., who was elected July 27 to lead the nation’s oldest and largest major war veterans organization.

    “There are certain sacrosanct subjects that no amount of wordsmithing can repair once crossed,” he said. “Giving one’s life to nation is the greatest sacrifice, followed closely by all Gold Star families, who have a right to make their voices heard.”

  303. says

    Here is an excerpt from a letter addressed to Trump from 17 Gold Star families:

    Your recent comments regarding the Khan family were repugnant, and personally offensive to us. When you question a mother’s pain, by implying that her religion, not her grief, kept her from addressing an arena of people, you are attacking us. When you say your job building buildings is akin to our sacrifice, you are attacking our sacrifice.

    You are not just attacking us, you are cheapening the sacrifice made by those we lost. […]

    We feel we must speak out and demand you apologize to the Khans, to all Gold Star families, and to all Americans for your offensive, and frankly anti-American, comments.

    http://www.votevets.org/press/gold-star-letter

  304. says

    This is a followup to comments 227, 342, and 356.

    Trump is so far off the rails that he has the Ukrainian ambassador to the U.S. worried:

    Valeriy Chaly, the Ukrainian ambassador to the United States, said Monday that Donald Trump’s recent comments about Russia and Ukraine are worrisome. […]

    Chaly noted on CNN that the Trump campaign’s efforts to soften language in the platform contradicts the stance on protecting Ukraine widely held by Republicans.

    He said that the Trump campaign has a “lack of strategy,” and said he hoped that the U.S. will “have a predictable leadership, and predictable foreign policy.”

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ukraine-ambassador-trump-russia

  305. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Is Donald Trump a tool of ISIS?
    ISIS agrees with Trump about Capt. Khan.

    ISIS joined Donald Trump on Sunday in dishonoring the sacrifice of U.S. Army Capt. Humayun Khan.
    The newest issue of the so-called Islamic State’s propaganda magazine Dabiq said the Muslim war hero died as an “apostate” when he was killed by a car bomb in Iraq in 2004 after ordering soldiers under his command to stand back as he moved foward to investigate the vehicle.
    Khan was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star and Purple Heart and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. ISIS published a picture of his headstone and captioned it, “Beware of dying as an apostate.”
    The terrorist group calls all Muslims who don’t adhere to its narrow ideology apostates and reserves particular ire for those who live and participate in Western democracies.
    Like ISIS, Trump made the issue Islam instead of Khan.

    Donald the Trump, you are being Trumped by ISIS. Reign in your hate, which is what they are using to get YOU to do their bidding.

  306. says

    Nerd @370, yes. We see that the dictator of North Korea, a whole bunch of white supremacists, and ISIS side with Donald Trump. The company he keeps.

    Who else? Well Trump’ adviser for Veterans affairs agrees with Trump when it comes to attacking a Muslim family whose son died serving in the U.S. military.

    […] The adviser, Al Baldasaro, tweeted a link to an article from Shoebat.com, a fringe anti-Islam conspiracy website. The article also suggests (without any evidence) that Humayun Khan, who was awarded a Purple Heart and Bronze, was a jihadist who joined the military to kill Americans. […]

    Oh, FFS.

    Link

    I’m beginning to wonder if Khizr Khan will be able to sustain his good opinion of his adopted country, the USA. Donald Trump and rightwing conspiracy theorists are certainly going to test his resolve.

    […] The piece, written by Theodore and Walid Shoebat, is less of an article and more of a fever dream of conspiracies strung together. It is all based on a 1983 law review article on Islamic Law published in the Houston Journal Of International Law. From there, the Shoebats are off to the races, accusing Khan of being a “a Muslim plant working with the Hillary Clinton campaign” and suggesting his son was a double agent “working for the US and Al-Qaeda… killed before his Islamist mission was accomplished.”

    The piece also revives discredited attacks linking Huma Abedin, a top adviser to Hillary Clinton, to the Muslim Brotherhood.

    In recent days, Theodore Shoebat has also called on the government to execute gay people for sodomy and Hillary Clinton for witchcraft. He also said women who have abortions should be lined up and shot by firing squad.

    He is now a trusted source of information by members of the Trump campaign.

    The article was also promoted by Roger Stone, one of Trump’s oldest and most influential advisers. Stone left the campaign in 2015 but is still in regular contact with Trump, providing political advice.

  307. says

    Here is what former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said in reference to the war of words between Trump and the Khan family:

    Look, Capt. Khan is a hero. The difference is, if Donald Trump were the president, Capt. Khan would still be alive today because we never would have entered the Iraq war in the first place.

    WTF?

    What he [Trump] said was that this is something the Khan family decided to engage in by going to the Democratic convention and telling their story. They’re welcome to do that. But Mr. Trump has the ability to respond.

  308. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Trump’s paranoia is starting to get the better of him.
    He suggests the general election may be rigged.

    Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump suggested Monday that he fears that the general election “is going to be rigged.”
    Trump, speaking in Ohio, said he felt the Democrats had fixed their primary system so Hillary Clinton could defeat Bernie Sanders. He claimed that the Republican nomination would have been stolen from him had he not won by significant margins.
    Trump then asserted that November’s general election may not be on the up-and-up.
    “I’m afraid the election is going to be rigged, I have to be honest,” the Republican nominee told a town hall crowd in Columbus. He said he hears “more and more” that the election may not be contested fairly.
    Trump did not elaborate on his contention and a request to his campaign for additional explanation was not immediately returned. If Trump were to lose in November and publicly declare that the election results were bogus, he would break with general election tradition, yielding unpredictable reactions from his supporters and fellow Republicans.
    Trump has not been shy of asserting that the electoral process has been “rigged.”

    Gee Donald, if the populace doesn’t elect you because you are such an unlikeable know-nothing, the voting must be rigged, as you must always win.
    I’d say to check his ego, but even the Apollo Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center isn’t big enough to hold his ego.

  309. says

    Nerd @373, yeah, Trump is looking for excuses now. He is likely to lose and he knows it.

    It gets worse, Trump surrogates like Roger Stone are promoting the idea that there will be civil unrest if Trump loses:

    If there’s voter fraud, this election will be illegitimate, the election of the winner will be illegitimate, we will have a constitutional crisis, widespread civil disobedience, and the government will no longer be the government.

  310. says

    Warren Buffett joined Hillary Clinton on the campaign trail today. He spoke in Omaha, Nebraska. In addition to saying lots of laudatory things about Clinton, Buffett challenged Trump to release his tax returns.

    […] as someone who’s filled out financial statements and someone who has filled out an income tax return, I call tell you, they are two very different animals. You will learn a whole lot more about Donald Trump if he produces his income tax return.

    [I would like to] like to make [Trump] an offer, an offer I hope he can’t refuse.

    I’ve got news for him, I’m under audit too. I would be delighted to meet him any time, any place before the election.

    I’ll bring my tax return. He can bring his tax return. Nobody is going to arrest us. There are no rules against showing your tax returns and just let[ting] people ask questions about the items that are on there. How many of you would be afraid to have your tax return made public?

    You’re only afraid if you got something to be afraid about. He’s not afraid of the IRS. He’s afraid because of you. I will meet him in Omaha or Mar-a-Lago or he can pick the place. We’re both under audit. And believe me, nobody will stop us from talking about what’s on those returns. Send the word to him, if you will.

    Link

  311. says

    Here’s what Warren Buffet had to say about Trump’s recent criticism of the Khan family:

    No member of the Buffett family has gone to Iraq or Afghanistan. No member of the Trump family has gone to Iraq or Afghanistan. We have both done extremely well during this period and our families haven’t sacrificed anything, and Donald Trump and I haven’t sacrificed anything, but how in the world can you stand up to a couple of parents who have lost a son and talk about sacrificing because you were building a bunch of buildings?

    When I heard that, my mind went back — and this goes back before most of you were born — but they went back to the McCarthy hearings. And at the time of the McCarthy hearings, at the time of the McCarthy hearings with the Army, Joe Welch had a young assistant of his maligned by Sen. [Joseph] McCarthy, and McCarthy went on and on, implying this guy was a communist and doing all kinds of things. And finally, Joe Welch couldn’t take it anymore and he said and I’ll quote him, “Have you no sense of decency, sir?” I ask Donald Trump: “Have you no sense of decency, sir?”

    I might add, just add one thing: McCarthy’s career went straight downhill after that. It did.

  312. says

    Trump then asserted that November’s general election may not be on the up-and-up. “I’m afraid the election is going to be rigged, I have to be honest,” the Republican nominee told a town hall crowd in Columbus. He said he hears “more and more” that the election may not be contested fairly.

    Translation: “I’m now afraid I’m going to lose, based on recent polls.” He said the primary was rigged until he won, and then he actually said outright that now that he’d won he didn’t care and wasn’t saying that anymore. Just like his “Ted Cruz is no longer a liar, we don’t say Lyin’ Ted anymore. We love Ted, we love him, right? We love him. Now we don’t want to say Lyin’ Ted. I’d love to pull it out and just use it on lying, crooked Hillary because she is a liar.” It’s all in his head.

  313. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Another judge declaring a state’s ID laws unconstitutional.

    A federal judge on Monday blocked North Dakota’s state’s voter identification law after it was challenged by a group of American Indians, who alleged it unfairly burdened their right to vote.
    U.S. District Judge Daniel Hovland issued a temporary restraining order and criticized the state for its 2013 repeal of provisions that let people without valid IDs vote if someone vouched for them or if they signed an affidavit swearing they were a qualified voter.
    “The public interest in protecting the most cherished right to vote for thousands of Native Americans who currently lack a qualifying ID and cannot obtain one, outweighs the purported interest and arguments of the State,” Hovland wrote.
    He added: “There are a multitude of easy remedies that most states have adopted in some form to alleviate this burden.”/blockquote>

  314. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Dang, deleted the left point for the close blockquote in #378. My bad.

  315. says

    Donald Trump at today’s rally (shown on Maddow):

    “…Takes guts to do this, believe me. And everybody said – …no, it takes guts! I could be having a very nice life right now. I don’t have to be with you people, ranting and raving, right? Could have a very nice life.”

  316. logicalcat says

    Also my previous post @380. Would it be OK to link it on other threads on this site? I dont want to get accused of spamming, but I do want enough people to see it and read it. I value peoples thoughts on these things, including for or against voting a third party.

  317. says

    You know what struck me just now?

    Y’all remember the PUMAs and hillaryis44? The “organised” berniebros(tm)(r) remind me a lot of those persons of… dubious arguments against Obama. But, more importantly, they remind me of Trumpites.

    At the time, I believe the consensus was that the major voices in that whole PUMA and H44 thing were “republican plants” and trying to stir up shit against Obama and his campaign.

    (http://www.hillaryis44.org/ currently proudly waving the trump flags, fyi)

    I just never thought Donald Trump would be the hill they will die on.

    I guess I’m getting a nice preview of what it’s like to sit at the throne in the middle of chaos; a mad god pipped to dreams by the stir of thousands of undying flutists.

  318. says

    Rachel Maddow hosted a segment in which she interviewed Garry Trudeau, Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist and author of the new book “Yuge!” Trudeau say the Trump presidency coming a couple of decades ago. Video, about 9.5 minutes long.

    The segment begins by showing the recent episode of The Simpsons, in which Donald Trump takes a 3AM phone call. Quite funny.

    The Trudeau portion of the segment highlights the fact that Trump has always been Trump. No change folks. He is consistently a narcissistic blowhard.

  319. says

    At least one congressional Republican has decided that he can’t stomach Trump:

    Rep. Richard Hanna becomes first congressional Republican to say he will vote for Hillary Clinton on Tuesday.

    “For me, it is not enough to simply denounce his comments: He is unfit to serve our party and cannot lead this country,” Hanna wrote in an oped for Syracuse.com. “While I disagree with her on many issues, I will vote for Mrs. Clinton.”

    Hanna is retiring at the end of his term this year.

    http://www.nbcnews.com/card/gop-congressman-im-voting-clinton-trump-unfit-n621536

  320. says

    President Obama was blunt when asked about Trump during a press conference this morning:

    I think what’s been interesting is the repeated denunciations of his statements by leading Republicans. The question I think they have to ask themselves is, if you are repeatedly having to say in very strong terms that what he has said is unacceptable, why are you still endorsing him? What does this say about your party that this is your standard-bearer? This isn’t a situation where you have an episodic gaffe. This is daily and weekly where they are distancing themselves from statements he’s making. […]

    There has to be a point in which you say this is not somebody I can support for President of the United States, even if he purports to be a member of my party. The fact that that has not yet happened makes some of these denunciations ring hollow. […]

    Yes, I think the Republican nominee is unfit to serve as president. I said so last week. And he keeps on proving it. The notion that he would attack a Gold Star family that had made such extraordinary sacrifices on behalf of our country, the fact that he doesn’t appear to have basic knowledge around critical issues in Europe, in the middle east, in Asia means that he’s woefully unprepared to do this job.

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/obama-trump-unfit-gop-endorsements

  321. says

    Trump flip-flopped on his feelings toward crying babies today. At a rally in Virginia, he said a few tolerant things and then he went full Trump on the baby: “You can get the baby out of here.”

    “Don’t worry about that baby,” Trump said after a crying infant could be heard on a broadcast of the speech. “I love babies, I hear that baby crying, I like it! What a baby! What a beautiful baby.”

    “Don’t worry, the mom’s running around, don’t worry about it! It’s young and beautiful and healthy, that’s what we want,” he continued.

    The New York businessman went on talking about China’s “devaluation” of its currency.

    “Actually, I was only kidding. You can get the baby out of here,” he then said to laughs from the crowd. “I think she really believed me that I love having a baby crying while I’m speaking.”

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/donald-trump-baby-get-him-outta-here

    Video available at the link.

  322. says

    Hillary Clinton’s campaign raised “nearly $90 million” in July. The campaign heads into August with $58 million on hand. They are using some of the money to fund efforts to make sure people are registered to vote. Some states and local election boards are still doing things like purging voters who haven’t voted in two years off the rolls. Nerd documented some of the voter-restriction battles in comments up-thread.

  323. says

    This is a followup to comments 220 and 356.

    Hillary Clinton’s post-convention rise in the polls is increasing. What does Trump have to say about it?

    I think these polls — I don’t know — there’s something about these polls, there’s something phony

    Trump was particularly angry at CNN for posting a poll in which he trails Clinton by 8 points. About CNN, Trump said:

    Their ratings are going down and their ratings are gonna start to go down big because I don’t do interviews for them.

    http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/how-big-is-hillary-clintons-convention-bounce-226545

  324. says

    SC @386, thank you for those links.

    The material presented at the first link looks like a case of forming a conclusion and then looking for cherry-picked or misleading data to back it up.

    The second link leads to an article that presents more reasoned arguments. Here are some excerpts:

    […] If you go to Election Justice USA’s website, you will find nothing on the officers of this group, nothing about their methodology, nothing about their funding. […] What you will find is a whole section of them in the “news”, which consists entirely of their many frivolous lawsuits […]

    claims they did a “Study” that proves Bernie won. Interesting that even conspiracy-laden sites who hate Hillary, like Breitbart, don’t touch this “Study”. This paper is 99 pages long and filled with mumbo jumbo. If you google “Chewbacca defense”, you’ll understand their strategy. It’s to overwhelm you with legal/analytical mumbo jumbo. Legitimate studies don’t do that—nor do they have predetermined outcomes. […]

    By every metric, Hillary won the nomination. She won the most states. She won millions of more votes. She won the most delegates: pledged and super, each. There weren’t armed gangs of Hillary supporters forcing people to vote for her or any other such conspiracy. Nor did Hillary have some sort of master control over all of the voting apparatuses in all of the states, nor did all of these Secretaries of States, of both parties apparently, conspire to help her cheat. […]

  325. says

    In a comprehensive article, Newsweek writers exposed Trump as a business fraud. Being a good businessman is the foundation of Trump’s campaign for the presidency. Now we can dispense with that reason altogether.

    The entire article is worth reading. Here are a few excerpts:

    […] Lost contracts, bankruptcies, defaults, deceptions and indifference to investors—Trump’s business career is a long, long list of such troubles, according to regulatory, corporate and court records, as well as sworn testimony and government investigative reports. Call it the art of the bad deal, one created by the arrogance and recklessness of a businessman whose main talent is self-promotion.

    He is also pretty good at self-deception, and plain old deception. Trump is willing to claim success even when it is not there, according to his own statements. “I’m just telling you, you wouldn’t say that you’re failing,” he said in a 2007 deposition when asked to explain why he would give an upbeat assessment of his business even if it was in trouble. “If somebody said, ‘How you doing?’ you’re going to say you’re doing good.” Perhaps such dissembling is fine in polite cocktail party conversation, but in the business world it’s called lying. […]

    Trump is quick to boast that his purported billions prove his business acumen, his net worth is almost unknowable given the loose standards and numerous outright misrepresentations he has made over the years. In that 2007 deposition, Trump said he based estimates of his net worth at times on “psychology” and “my own feelings.” But those feelings are often wrong—in 2004, he presented unaudited financials to Deutsche Bank while seeking a loan, claiming he was worth $3.5 billion. The bank concluded Trump was, to say the least, puffing; it put his net worth at $788 million, records show. (Trump personally guaranteed $40 million of the loan to his company, so Deutsche coughed up the money. He later defaulted on that commitment.) […]

    while Trump has had a few successes in business, most of his ventures have been disasters.[…]

  326. says

    Donald Trump campaigned in Pennsylvania yesterday. He said some dumb stuff, some incorrect stuff, and some narcissistic stuff … all while supposedly making points about green sources of energy.
    Think Progress link

    […] “It’s so expensive,” Trump said. “And honestly, it’s not working so good. I know a lot about solar.” […]

    No, Donald, you do not. You are praising yourself, but there’s no backup for that praise.

    […] I love solar. But the payback is what, 18 years? Oh great, let me do it. Eighteen years.”

    No, Donald, the payback is not 18 years, and the cost has declined dramatically.

    […] In fact, the cost of solar has declined 70 percent since 2008, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association, and the return on investment for a homeowner in California, say, is nine years. In New Jersey, it is seven years.

    Solar is also the fastest-growing source of electricity generation, accounting for 64 percent of new capacity in the first three months of the year. […]

    Not content with being wrong about solar, Trump went on to be wrong about wind.

    […] “The wind kills all your birds. All your birds, killed. You know, the environmentalists never talk about that,” Trump said.

    In fact, environmentalists often talk about wind turbine’s impact on birds, but many believe the relatively small number of bird deaths is worth transitioning to a clean energy economy.

    The American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) was quick to hit back on Twitter. […]

    At the link, see charts showing bird deaths. Cats, building windows, automobiles and power lines all kill more birds than wind turbines.

    Trump also made some incorrect claims about regulations and inspection regimes killing the coal industry:

    […] “I have friends that own the mines. I mean, they can’t live,” he said. “The restrictions environmentally are so unbelievable where inspectors come two and three times a day and they can’t afford it any longer and they’re closing all the mines … It’s not going to happen anymore, folks. We’re going to use our heads.” […]

    In fact, much of the world is shifting away from coal-fired power generation, while, in the United States, the industry has become increasingly automated, decreasing jobs, even as the available coal is more difficult and expensive to access.

    ThinkProgress was unable to confirm any instances of multiple mine inspections in a single day. [Translation: Trump lied.]

    Mountaintop removal coal mining has also been tied to the near-extinction of some kinds of American songbirds. Trump did not address those bird deaths.

  327. says

    Hillary Clinton posted the details of her plan to increase spending on infrastructure. The plan includes ways to pay for the infrastructure spending.

    Donald Trump made a yuge, blustering claim for which he has no backup whatsoever. On Fox Business News today, Trump said that he would “at least double” whatever Clinton says she will spend on infrastructure. How would he pay for that?

    We’re going to have to go out with a fund, we’ll get a fund. We’ll make a phenomenal deal with a low interest rate. And we’re going to have to rebuild our infrastructure. We have no choice. […] people, investors, citizens would put money into the fund and we will rebuild our infrastructure with that fund.

    He’s talking about $550 billion.

    In the same interview, Trump said he would reduce taxes.

    Paul Lewis, vice president of policy and finance at the Eno Center for Transportation, said:

    I was not entirely clear how he would make this happen on either end. And there wasn’t a lot of clarity there. I think he mentioned they would be sold as infrastructure bonds or something to that effect, so I think that obviously we need a little clarity as to what this actually means and what plan he may actually have.

    While talking about the need to rebuild infrastructure, Trump claimed that 61% of bridges in the U.S. are structurally deficient. The actual number is about 10%, a percentage that climbs to 24% if all of the functionally obsolete bridges are included. Not 61%.

  328. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Hmm. Reminded of the phrase from Babylon 5 TV Series, “and so it begins”.
    Trump is refusing to endorse those republicans who have criticized him for his Kahn Family travesty.

    Donald Trump on Tuesday declined to endorse two fellow Republicans, U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan and U.S. Senator John McCain, in their upcoming re-election battles after both Republicans criticized his remarks about the family of a slain Muslim U.S. Army captain.
    Mirroring the language Ryan used about supporting Trump before his eventual endorsement, Trump told The Washington Post he’s “not quite there yet” on supporting the congressman in Tuesday’s primary in Wisconsin.

    Looks like the implosion is beginning.

  329. logicalcat says

    @386

    Thanks for the links. Reading the comments in those links it seems this study was just a collection of bullshit from around the internet now collected in something like a trade paperback, to use comic book terms. But I haven’t read it yet. A snippet from the comment section:

    The report is emotionally persuasive, as it intends to be, but it is a data MESS. It reports unsubstantiated rumor as fact (particularly in the case of Reid’s actions in Nevada) and shifts delegates based on that. It repeatedly cites anecdotal evidence as scientific proof, and then extrapolates policy from anecdote, and shifts delegates based on *that*.

    The article is saying that ElectionJusticeUSA is a sham site? I see that its only a couple months old but the rest I dont get it.

  330. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Did a little bit of digging, and found that my US Senator, Mark Kirk (R), isn’t endorsing Trump, nor is my Congress Critter, Bob Dold (R). Both are in tight elections in a democrat leaning state during Presidential election years. Neither lack of endorsement will effect my vote for for a democrat for both positions.
    (We have a rethug businessman Governor who can’t understand that his best option for the desired balanced budget is to RAISE TAXES, since he was elected in the non-Presidential even year election.) I liked the old “fiscal conservative” republicans (Country Club Republicans), which meant balanced budget. Not like the present Governors like Brownback and Rauner who try to make the state unworkable via spending cuts due to ideology.

  331. says

    French President Francois Hollande said a few things about Trump.

    His excesses make you want to retch, even in the United States, especially when — as was Donald Trump’s case — he speaks ill of a soldier, of the memory of a soldier.

    In related news, Captain Khan’s commander in Iraq speaks out, along with other military personnel with whom Captain Khan served:

    General Pittard:
    “The Khan family is our family”
    Khan was an “American Patriot”
    “Trump does not understand how deeply the military feels about its gold star families and how much all military families have given over these past 15 years of war.”

    Army Pfc. Vanessa Brenes-Ramirez
    “He was American. That’s what he was. All the colors we saw were green.”
    “I felt like he was my protector”
    All I can tell you is I’ve never seen so many people cry,” she would say. “Grown people. I mean hitting the floor crying.”
    “He told everybody, ‘Get down!’” she would say. “He sacrificed himself.”
    ”He was our hero”.

    Sgt. Laci Walker
    “All the soldiers loved him,” she would later say. “He was just so good, and everybody looked up to him.”
    “I liked to be on guard duty when he was in charge,” “I knew it would be safer. I knew he would be the one looking out for me.”​
    ​​​Walker would add, “I didn’t even know he was a Muslim.”
    “He would not want to be remembered as ‘that Muslim solider.’ He would want to be known as the soldier who died for his country.”

    Link

    Excerpt from Army Pfc. Vanessa Brenes-Remirez’s statement:

    A sergeant had ordered her to dig a foxhole after she had been on guard duty all night. She was already exhausted, but she had set to digging when Khan happened past.

    “What are you doing?” Khan asked by her recollection “You just did guard duty. Go sit down.”

    “Sir?” a stunned Brenes-Ramirez asked.

    “Go sit down,” Khan said. “That’s an order.”

    The 19-year-old private found herself sitting and watching an officer work the shovel. The sergeant returned.

    “What are you doing, sir?” the sergeant asked Khan.

    “I’m helping,” Khan replied.

    In other words, Captain Khan was nothing like Donald Trump.

  332. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    More Trump paranoia: The Latest: Trump: People without ID will ‘vote 10 times’

    7:45 p.m.
    Donald Trump is reiterating his concerns that the November election will be “rigged” against him, speculating that people without proper identification “are going to vote 10 times.”
    Trump is discussing voter ID during an interview Tuesday on Fox News Channel’s “The O’Reilly Factor.”
    The Republican presidential nominee says, “You don’t have to have voter ID to now go in and vote and it’s a little bit scary.”
    Over the last two weeks, courts have dealt setbacks to voter ID laws in several states. Critics of photo ID requirements say they fall disproportionately on minority voters and the poor.
    Trump says without voter ID, “people are going to walk in, they are going to vote 10 times maybe. Who knows?”

    Funny how ANY state enacting photo ID laws did not show evidence of voter fraud without photo ID. They just presupposed it.

  333. says

    @397

    I can find many more applicable B5 quotes for Trump.

    “How will it end?”
    “In Fire.”

    “Do you really want to know what I want? Do you really want to know the truth? I want my people to reclaim their rightful place in the galaxy. I want to see the Centauri stretch forth their hand again and command the stars. I want a rebirth of glory, a renaissance of power! I want to stop running through my life like a man late for an appointment, afraid to look back or look forward. I want us to be what we used to be! I want… I want it all back the way it was. Does that answer your question?”

    “It’s like being nibbled to death by cats”

  334. says

    [blockquote]A sergeant had ordered her to dig a foxhole after she had been on guard duty all night. She was already exhausted, but she had set to digging when Khan happened past.
    “What are you doing?” Khan asked by her recollection “You just did guard duty. Go sit down.”
    “Sir?” a stunned Brenes-Ramirez asked.
    “Go sit down,” Khan said. “That’s an order.”
    The 19-year-old private found herself sitting and watching an officer work the shovel. The sergeant returned.
    “What are you doing, sir?” the sergeant asked Khan.
    “I’m helping,” Khan replied.[/blockquote]

    Forget the rank he had on his collar (which often tells you nothing at all), this man was a fucking leader.

  335. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Interesting news from the Kansas Primary Election.
    A Teabagger, Rep. Tim Huelskamp, who has been a thorn in side of House Speakers Boenhner and Ryan was defeated in the primary. Huelskamp had lost his seat on the Agricultural Committee, which proved fatal.

    The contest was unusual because GOP primary challengers usually accuse incumbents of being insufficiently conservative. Marshall, an obstetrician from Great Bend, cast himself as a conservative willing to reach across the aisle, saying after his win that he wasn’t sure the House Freedom Caucus would even have him. He will be the heavy favorite in November, when he’ll square off against only an independent challenger — the Democrats aren’t fielding a candidate.

    The primary contest, which Marshall won with 56.5 percent of the vote, became a proxy battle between GOP conservatives and pragmatists. The anti-tax Club for Growth spent $400,000 to help Huelskamp and members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus campaigned for him. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Ending Spending Action Fund, which wants to curb federal expenditures, spent big dollars against him.

    Kansans also defeated at least 11 staunch Brownback lost their primaries to candidates who want to fund education, and reach across the aisle to the Democrats.

    A top Senate leader and at least 10 other conservative Kansas legislators have lost their seats as moderate Republicans made GOP primary races a referendum on education funding and the state’s persistent budget woes.

  336. says

    Idaho legislators have chosen a sneaky, craven way to mislead women seeking abortions in that state.

    Idaho’s health agency is now legally obliged to post a list of places where women can receive free ultrasounds. While seemingly harmless […] the new requirement is actually deeply rooted in the state’s fiercely anti-abortion legislature.

    The list, posted on the state’s health department website, is geared toward women seeking abortions. However, every single facility listed is a anti-abortion advocacy center. Often called “crisis pregnancy centers” or CPCs, these centers often lack medically-trained staff and are tied to religious organizations. […]

    Anti-abortion state lawmakers appeared to applaud the bill specifically for its ability to control women’s decision-making. “This informs the mother that the ‘piece of tissue’ inside her has hands, feet, eyes, looks like a baby and has a heartbeat,” said state Rep. Heather Scott.

    Idaho’s health agency has not inspected or certified any of the centers on the list. Republican members of the GOP-led legislature ignored demands by its Democratic members to confirm the listed providers offered medically accurate information. […]

    http://thinkprogress.org/health/2016/08/03/3804651/idaho-ultrasound-list/

  337. says

    Trump is remarkably resistant to doing the prep work he actually needs to do in order to stick to relevant facts when he is giving a speech. Apparently, Trump’s prep/research team is equally resistant to doing their job well.

    Trump went to Loudoun County in Virginia to hold a rally. He got nearly everything he said wrong, mostly because he presented the-sky-is-falling information that is not relevant to Loudoun.

    […] Loudoun is the richest county in America. That’s due in part to the enormous amount of money the federal government spent on the War on Terror in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. The place is replete with defense contractors, engineers, and rocket scientists. And it’s recession-proof […]

    But Trump seems to think it’s part of the Rust Belt. Toward the end of his speech—to an atypically preppy, professional, clean-cut audience—the candidate bashed the county economy.

    “You’re doing lousy over here, by the way, I hate to tell you,” he said.

    That is empirically false.

    He then listed a number of factory closures, including Ball Corp., which was five hours away in Bristol, as far from Loudoun as you can get without leaving the state. And he mentioned the closure of a Smithfield Foods Inc. […] The Smithfield plant that closed was in Hampton Roads, Virginia—three hours from Ashburn, in the southeast corner of the state. […]

    “Stanley Furniture closed its plant,” he continued.

    Stanley Furniture did indeed recently close a plant, in 2014. That plant was in North Carolina.

    He also mentioned the closure of a plant owned by Invista, a Koch Industries company that produces fabric and carpeting. That plant was two hours from Ashburn, and it closed eight years ago.

    Then Trump discussed job losses in North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. […]

    Link

  338. says

    This is the only way to accomplish criminal justice reform right now, with Congress on another vacation, and with the Republican-dominated legislative branch still in obstructionist mode.

    President Obama on Wednesday commuted the sentences of 214 inmates, the largest single-day batch since at least 1900, according to the White House.

    It’s part of Obama’s ramped-up effort to free prisoners slapped with lengthy sentences during the government’s war on drugs. Among those freed on Wednesday were 67 people serving life sentences, mostly for nonviolent drug crimes. […]

    Link

  339. says

    Reporters from the New York Times who have followed the Trump campaign from the beginning compiled examples of some of the most vitriolic and/or violent language used by Trump supporters.

    The 3:11-minute video is available on the Salon website.

    Excerpt from some of the chants:

    “Kill her.”

    “Trump that bitch!”

    “Build a wall — kill them all.” […]

    If you think that some of these supporters will not engage in violence when Trump loses the election, you will be proven wrong … unfortunately.

  340. says

    Trump’s spokesperson Katrina Pierson thinks that being gay is not normal:

    I fight against the “choice” vs. born that way. I studied the science being genetic or hormonal. Either way, it’s an aberration.

    Link

    Pierson posted that in February of 2012, so it is not current. Still, this counts as another entry in “the company he keeps” category that condemns Trump.

  341. says

    Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican from Wisconsin, is displaying his ignorance and his love of conspiracy theories … again.

    The whole climate change debate gives, and there are all kinds of quotes from adherents of and promoters of climate change, the reason they’re doing it is it’s such a great opportunity to control, you know, pretty much, government, and control your lives. There’s an arrogance of power there that they’re utopians, that they really think they can create heaven on earth, and where it’s failed in the past, those people like Stalin and Chavez and the Castros, the nutcases in North Korea–by the way, if you want equal results, go to North Korea, you have equal misery.

    First of all, the climate hasn’t warmed in quite a few years. I mean, that is proven scientifically. So, that’s why they’ve changed the terminology from global warming to climate change–that covers everything.

    Link

  342. says

    Newt Gingrich seems to have jumped off the Trump train.

    The current race is which of these two is the more unacceptable, because right now neither of them is acceptable. Trump is helping her to win by proving he is more unacceptable than she is. He cannot win the presidency operating the way he is now. She can’t be bad enough to elect him if he’s determined to make this many mistakes.

    Daily Beast link.

  343. says

    Former Trump campaign manager, and current CNN shill for Trump, Corey Lewandowski, revised the Birther nonsense today. Here’s Wonkette’s take on this development:

    In what we are hypothesizing may be part of a coordinated effort to set a Guinness Record for most insane political news week since Richard Nixon’s Saturday Night Massacre in 1973, […] Corey Lewandowski […] decided it was time to ask — again — whether Barack Obama was admitted to Harvard as a U.S. citizen or as a filthy foreigner, because after all, Obama started it by saying Donald Trump is unfit to be president. […]

    Lewandowski: Did he ever release his transcripts from Harvard?

    Rye: By the way, tell me about those tax returns, while you’re at it.

    Lewandowski: Well you raised the issue, I’m just asking. You raised the issue, did he ever release his transcripts or his admission to Harvard University? You raised the issue, so just “yes,” or “no.” […] Don’t raise the issue if you don’t want to address it.

    Rye: Two words, tax returns. Tax returns.

    Lewandowski: Harvard University transcripts. You raised the issue, did he ever release them?

    Don Lemon: OK, let me ask you something. Let me ask you something — What is the importance of Barack Obama’s Harvard transcript?

    Lewandowski: It’s not, she brought the issue up.

    Lemon: I’m asking you, how is — hold on. How is it germane to the election, and the American people?

    Lewandowski: Look, the only reason it’s germane is because she brought the issue up, and said Donald Trump raised the issue of his Harvard transcripts. And I just simply said “have those transcripts ever been released?” And the question was “did he get in as a U.S. citizen, or was he brought into Harvard University as a citizen who wasn’t from this country?”

    Rye: Oh my God (laughter)

  344. tomh says

    @ #410

    First of all, the climate hasn’t warmed in quite a few years.

    Well, sure, if you ignore the fact that last year was the warmest year on record, according to NASA and the NOAA. And that 15 of the 16 warmest years on record have occurred since 2001. If you ignore those details, then I guess you could prove “scientifically” that it’s not getting any warmer.

  345. says

    toms @413, exactly. Apparently, some Republicans think those facts are just part of a giant conspiracy perpetrated by liberals. Dunderheads.

    In other news, (news in which Republicans choose to ignore facts again), Trump’s campaign said, among other boneheaded things, that Zika is an insignificant issue.

    Twelve babies have already been born in the U.S. with brain damage due to the Zika virus. And the virus is spreading in Florida, as health officials confirmed yesterday.

    […] Juan Fiol, Trump’s vice chairman for Miami-Dade County, is betting most voters don’t care enough about Zika to warrant Trump’s attention.

    “We have bigger mosquitoes to squash than Zika — like ISIS, the national debt, Iraq, and Afghanistan,” Fiol said, pounding his fist on the bar during an interview at a Trump party in downtown Miami. “We have a wall to build to keep the illegals out. We have so many other issues that are more important than this.”

    He called Clinton “sophomoric” for “taking on such an insignificant issue.” […]

    Link

  346. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Hillary Clinton set up a transition team in case she is elected in November.
    Background:

    Bipartisan legislation signed in 2010 requires the government to provide office space, computers and technological support for both candidates.
    Four years ago, Republican nominee Mitt Romney began his transition planning in early June, installing hundreds of people in a multi-floor office a few blocks from the White House and raising several million dollars in private contributions to fund the effort. Romney, the first candidate to take advantage of the new law, spent $8.9 million on the effort.

    Needless to say, Mitt Romney wasted his money.
    Actually, both candidates have been looking into the transition.

    Hillary Clinton officially began planning for her White House on Wednesday, tapping campaign chairman John Podesta and long-time aide Minyon Moore to prepare her transition planning effort.
    In paperwork filed with the District of Columbia, Clinton formed a new non-profit, called the Clinton-Kaine Transition Fund, taking one of the first formal steps to plan for the possibility of becoming president. The filing comes after weeks of meetings between the White House and representatives of Trump and Clinton’s campaigns.
    On Friday, White House chief of staff Denis McDonough informed the campaigns that that Trump and Clinton are now eligible to receive intelligence briefings from the government and government-provided workspace for transition planning. Traditionally, the outgoing administration helps potential successors with their planning to ensure a smooth transition.
    In May, Trump tapped New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to lead his transition team. Podesta will be president of Clinton’s effort and Moore will be secretary, though she has not yet named a chair of her transition operation. Instead, she has dispatched campaign policy aides Ed Meier, Ann OLeary and Sara Latham, Podesta’s chief of staff, to the White House meetings.
    Much of Clinton’s transition team’s effort will be focused on creating lists of potential administration appointees and developing a roadmap for her policy agenda.

    Sounds like Clinton is ahead of Trump, more ways than one, as Gov. Christie just criticized Trump for his Khan family remarks.

  347. tomh says

    If you really want to be depressed, check out this NYT article, “Voices From Donald Trump’s Rallies, Uncensored,” a compilation of video from reporters who followed Trump rallies for a year.

    “New York Times reporters have spent over a year covering Donald J. Trump’s rallies, witnessing so many provocations and heated confrontations at them that the cumulative effect can be numbing”… “But what struck us was the frequency with which some Trump supporters use coarse, vitriolic, even violent language — in the epithets they shout and chant, the signs they carry, the T-shirts they wear — a pattern not seen in connection with any other recent political candidate, in any party.”

    “hang the bitch” and, “build a wall — kill them all,” are typical chants you hear at a rally.

  348. says

    OMG, this approach is not going to help Trump climb out of the hole he has dug in the past few days. He is going after Megyn Kelly again. Digging into ancient history from the primary debates:

    The GOP nominee took up re-litigating that one-sided feud on Wednesday, saying he was referring to Kelly’s nose, ears, or mouth when he said she had “blood coming out of her whatever.” Anyone who disagrees is “perverted,” Trump told attendees at a Daytona Beach, Florida town hall.

    Link

    Yes, that’s from today. Trump talked about Megyn Kelly, and he also offered excuses for making fun of a disabled reporter by claiming that he was “acting out ‘groveling'” Nobody is buying that.

    As an aside, why can’t Trump let these old controversies go?

  349. tomh says

    If you really want to be depressed, check out this NYT article, “Voices From Donald Trump’s Rallies, Uncensored,” a compilation of video from reporters who followed Trump rallies for a year.

    “New York Times reporters have spent over a year covering Donald J. Trump’s rallies, witnessing so many provocations and heated confrontations at them that the cumulative effect can be numbing”… “But what struck us was the frequency with which some Trump supporters use coarse, vitriolic, even violent language — in the epithets they shout and chant, the signs they carry, the T-shirts they wear — a pattern not seen in connection with any other recent political candidate, in any party.”

    “Kill her” and, “Build a wall — kill them all,” are typical chants you hear at a rally.

  350. says

    Thank you for posting that, tomh. I’ve read several of their (and others’) articles about the rallies, and hoped that someone was recording the shouts and chants. The montage is very effective.

  351. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    The Redhead has several Jewish friends. The Donald’s rhetoric reminds them of a fascist from the ’30s. Same cadence, same vile, same hatred, same “trust me”. Which means I don’t trust him.

  352. says

    Anyone manage to get into Raw Story tonight? All I’m getting at the moment is a 404, and that’s using both Internet Explorer and Google Chrome.

  353. says

    Cross posted from the “Mike Pence, creationist” thread.

    Mike Pence used his biblical approach to all things to bash marriage equality as well. Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton’s vice presidential pick, has been hammering away at Pence.

    Kaine spoke at a rally in Greensboro, North Carolina yesterday. He spoke in support of LBGT issues, and against the discriminatory HB2 law. Here is an excerpt from coverage at that rally:

    “Now, I know in North Carolina, there’s been some pain over this issue. They snuck through in the legislature this HB 2, and they tried to introduce it kind of in the dead of night,” [Kaine] said. “You all have stood up in a major way and you’ve said this is not who we are. This is not who North Carolina is. These are not our values. And that’s one of the reasons why North Carolina is so intensely focused on this race.” […]

    Kaine recalled a 2006 speech that Mike Pence delivered supporting a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman, in which the then-congressman suggested that “societal collapse” would follow the “deterioration of marriage and family.”

    Link

  354. says

    I’m sure Trump thinks running for the presidency will strengthen his brand, however, new data shows that his campaign is not helping the Trump brand. It’s hurting.

    Donald Trump’s increasingly polarized run for the presidency has had a clear, negative effect on the businesses in Trump’s namesake empire, according to data published Thursday by the location-tracking technology company Foursquare.

    […] Foursquare found that foot traffic to Trump hotels, golf courses and casinos is down since he announced his candidacy, particularly among women in blue states.

    The big data tells an interesting story. Before Trump launched his campaign, infamously calling some Mexicans “rapists,” in June 2015, Foursquare data shows foot traffic had been steady year-over-year and potentially saw an uptick.

    […] by August 2015, the share of people hoofing it to all Trump properties was down 17 percent from the same period in 2014. After stabilizing to single-digit losses, the start of primary season primetime in March 2016 saw a 17 percent drop in share of people at Trump properties.

    […] Across Trump locations in New York, New Jersey, Illinois, and Hawaii, foot traffic started to take a hit in March 2016, with the year-on-year share losses widening to 20 percent in July.

    The losses were even worse among women, whose visits sustained double-digit losses. In blue states, Foursquare found visits from women to Trump properties were down 29 percent in July. […]

    […] The company compared visits to Trump properties with visits to competitors in the area to analyze changes in market share. Foursquare also said it compared the market share numbers to absolute visits in order to rule out the possibility that its data was skewed by a sudden boost in foot traffic to Trump’s competitors for unrelated reasons – but the downward trend still held.

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/trump-properties-foursquare-data-visits-down

    Trump is going down in flames.

  355. Akira MacKenzie says

    After reading about Eastwood’s comments about Trump’s racism and the “pussification” of America, I ironically point to a line from one his better-known films:

    “Endeavor to persevere.”

    Same attitude, Clint. Same arrogant, dismissive, racist attitude.

  356. says

    Trump got caught lying again. After top aides in his campaign admitted that the video Trump described did not exist, Trump proceeded to repeat the lie.

    At yesterday’s rally in Florida, Donald Trump went into great detail in describing a video he watched. According to Trump the video was a “perfect” shot from a “perfect angle, nice and steady.” The video was of Iranian officials offloading millions of dollars delivered by the United States.

    Link

    There is no such video.

    Where did doofus Trump watch something he misinterpreted and then expanded into a lie? He got it from watching Fox News.

    As Fox News reported on the controversial transfer of $400 million in cash to Iran in January, it repeatedly played dark, grainy footage of shadowy figures walking off a small private plane with bags with hand. The video is often labeled as being from Jan. 17 in Geneva where three Americans first landed after being released from prison in Tehran.

    Republican nominee Donald Trump watched this sort of footage, according to his spokeswoman, and concluded that it showed the controversial money transfer that was described in detail for the first time this week by the Wall Street Journal.

    Link

    Moreover, Trump falsely claimed that he watched the video at a security briefing. He called it “top secret.” WTF?

    Over there, where that plane landed, top secret, they don’t have a lot of paparazzi, you know. The paparazzi doesn’t do so well over there. They have a perfect tape, obviously done by a government camera, and the tape is of the people taking the money off the plane. It’s a military tape. It’s a tape that was a perfect angle, nice and steady.

    President Obama addressed this issue during a press conference at the Pentagon today. The press conference was an update that included successful forays against ISIS in Iraq, but reporters asked him about Trump’s claim that the U.S. had paid ransom money for four hostages. Obama made the point that the non-secret, non-ransom transfer of money to Iran was not what Trump described at all. U.S. News & World Report link.

    The B-roll (or file footage used as background) that Trump saw included a large title identifying “Geneva, Switzerland” as the location.

    Meanwhile, lots of security experts are making fun of Trump. There’s loud laughter. Daily Beast link.

    U.S. national security officials are literally laughing at Donald Trump’s claim that he watched a “top secret” Iranian military-produced video showing its government scurrying to grab pallets filled with hundreds of millions of dollars.

    “It didn’t happen,” one U.S. official said. “That was not part of any briefing.”

    The other just chuckled at the proposition. […]

    Trump’s explanation for why the fantasy video he concocted in his head was given to the USA by Iran:

    You know why the tape was given to us? Because they want to embarrass our country. They want to embarrass our country. They want to embarrass our president. Because we have a president who’s incompetent. They want to embarrass our president.

  357. says

    Ben Carson is still on Trump’s side, and he is still campaigning for Trump. Here is the latest stupid thing Carson said to explain away the fact that we don’t hear stories about Trump helping people:

    I’m–then hopeful that he will begin to put–to put out many of the stories that I am very familiar with, of things that he has done to help people who have been in very, very difficult situations. You know, he–he feels that, you know, that’s self-praising, he doesn’t want to do it.

    [ha, ha, ha, ha, ….]

  358. says

    This is a followup to comment 425.

    Here are few more details from President Obama’s press conference:

    […] “Some of you may recall we announced these payments in January, many months ago,” Obama said. “This wasn’t some nefarious deal.” […]

    “It was the assessment of our lawyers that we were now at a point where there was a significant litigation risk and we could end up costing ourselves billions of dollars,” the President said. “It was their advice and suggestion that we settle, and that’s what these payments represent.”

    He went on to cite pessimistic predictions about the deal’s [the Iran nuclear deal] effectiveness, saying: “Why not have some of these folks who were predicting disaster say, you know what, this thing actually worked. Now that would be a shock. That would be impressive.”

    “But of course that wasn’t going to happen,” Obama continued. “Instead what we have is the manufacturing of outrage in a story that we disclosed in January.”

    The President then stressed that the payment shouldn’t be construed as a ransom.

    “We’ve got a number of Americans being held all around the world, and I meet with their families, and it is heartbreaking,” Obama said. “And the notion that we would somehow start now in this high-profile way and announce it to the world, even as we’re looking into the faces of other families whose loved ones are being held hostage and say to them that we don’t pay ransom, defies logic.” […]

    Link

  359. says

    We are seeing more and more stupidity from the rightwing in describing the $400 million repayment to Iran, payment of Iran’s own money, that was part of the nuclear deal. This comes from Representative Lee Zeldin, a Republican from New York:

    When deals like this are cut, one has to truly wonder whether the President has no idea what he is doing, or if he knows exactly what he is doing and is playing for some other team.

    Notice how Zeldin snuck in an implication that President Obama is supporting Iran, is playing for Iran, instead of the interests of the USA.

  360. says

    At a Trump rally held at Cumberland Valley High School in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania on Monday, Trump supporters beat up a protestor. The supporters punched and shoved the protestor over and over again. The protestor was bleeding.

    What did the protestor do? He waved a sign.
    Wonkette link.

  361. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Clinton sees a potential group of voters for the General Election. Republicans, especially republican women who object to the The Donald.

    Hoping to capitalize on the criticism battering Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton has begun portraying support for her candidacy as a patriotic duty of voters. She’s broadening her message and appealing directly to Republicans to keep him out of the White House.
    It’s a twist for a Democratic presidential candidate who has some of the highest unpopularity ratings in history. But aides believe Trump’s controversial campaign and the chaos it’s caused within the Republican Party offers a unique opportunity.
    In Ohio recently, Clinton urged Republicans “to pick country over party.” She told several thousand at a union hall in Las Vegas on Thursday, “I want to be the president for all Americans. Democrats, Republicans independents. We’re going to pull America together again.”…
    As she’s campaigned across the country this week, Clinton has framed the election as a choice between economic growth and “demagoguery” and “insults.” And she’s making a point of acknowledging the deep economic anxiety that helped fuel Trump’s rise in the primary polls.
    “I know people are angry and frustrated,” she said in a speech on a factory floor in Hatfield, Pennsylvania. “I’m not going into this with some kind of rose colored glasses.”…
    Clinton’s campaign doesn’t anticipate a mass movement of what they call “common sense Republican” voters or elected officials to her candidacy, according to a pair of aides. They spoke on condition of anonymity, because they were not authorized to publicly discuss campaign strategy.
    Rather, the target is moderates, particularly women, in the crucial swing counties surrounding cities such as Richmond, Virginia, Columbus, Ohio, and Philadelphia.
    Jennifer Pierotti Lim, who heads a group called Republican Women for Hillary, said they have heard from nearly 100 women since the party conventions concluded. “I think Trump doubling down on these things gives people an extra push to come forward,” she said.

    Good idea if she doesn’t forget the the core supporters.

  362. says

    Moreover, Trump falsely claimed that he watched the video at a security briefing. He called it “top secret.” WTF?

    I know they couldn’t actually do this, but wouldn’t it be funny if they showed him a fake video and told him it was “top secret,” just to see what he’d do?

  363. says

    An apolitical guy who never endorsed a presidential candidate before has endorsed Hillary Clinton.

    Former head of the CIA Michael Morell issued a statement along with his endorsement:

    Two strongly held beliefs have brought me to this decision. First, Mrs. Clinton is highly qualified to be commander in chief. I trust she will deliver on the most important duty of a president — keeping our nation safe. Second, Donald J. Trump is not only unqualified for the job, but he may well pose a threat to our national security.

    Morell went on to say:

    [Trump’s] obvious need for self-aggrandizement, his overreaction to perceived slights, his tendency to make decisions based on intuition, his refusal to change his views based on new information, his routine carelessness with the facts, his unwillingness to listen to others and his lack of respect for the rule of law.

    Morell closed his statement with the most memorable condemnation of Donald Trump:

    The dangers that flow from Mr. Trump’s character are not just risks that would emerge if he became president. It is already damaging our national security.

    President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia was a career intelligence officer, trained to identify vulnerabilities in an individual and to exploit them. That is exactly what he did early in the primaries. Mr. Putin played upon Mr. Trump’s vulnerabilities by complimenting him. He responded just as Mr. Putin had calculated. […]

    In the intelligence business, we would say that Mr. Putin had recruited Mr. Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.

    NY Times link.

  364. says

    Trump’s surrogates and aides are pushing the idea that if Trump loses it will be because the system is rigged. Do these people know they are setting the stage for unrest and possibly violence?

    Here’s what Paul Manafort said today:

    Frankly, we think that the situation in the country – just like with the Democratic National Committee’s primaries – is a situation where if you’re relying on the Justice Department to ensure the security of the elections, we have to be worried.

  365. says

    Donald Trump has selected economic policy team. Thirteen white men, none of whom have a degree in economics, make up this roster of rascals.

    Steve Roth, a fellow real estate investor and the billioanire CEO of Vorando Reality. […]

    Harold Hamm, an oil and gas billionaire and chairman and CEO of Continental Resources. […]

    Howard Lorber, president and CEO of Vector Group — a company that owns both real estate and tobacco companies.

    Steven Mnuchin, a hedge fund investor and co-CEO and chairman of Dune Capital Management […]

    Tom Barrack, another real estate investor and CEO of Colony Capital. He founded Rebuild America Now, a pro-Trump super PAC. […]

    Stephen M. Calk, CEO and chairman of Federal Savings Bank. He has been a critic of the Obama administration’s banking regulations.

    John Paulson, another billionaire hedge fund manager and president of Paulson & Co. Paulson, made billions of dollars in profit from shorting the market during the 2007 housing bubble.

    Andy Beal, a billionaire investor and founder of Beal Bank. In addition to making a huge profit buying up undervalued assets during the 2008 recession, he has made waves as a mathematician and high-stakes poker player.

    Steve Feinberg, the secretive CEO of Ceberus Capital Management, a private investment firm which specializes in “distressed investing.” Among the firm’s assets: Remington, the manufacturer of the AR-15.

    David Malpass, founder and president of Encima Global, an economic consulting and research firm. […]

    Peter Navarro, a business school professor and anti-China author. […]

    Stephen Moore, the Heritage Foundation scholar, former Wall Street Journal columnist and founder of the anti-tax Club for Growth. His economic predictions have been wildly inaccurate.

    Dan DiMicco, the former president and CEO of steel giant Nucor Corporation. […]

    Think Progress link

  366. says

    Carl Paladino is a Trump surrogate. He is also honorary co-chair of the Trump campaign. Yesterday, Carl Paladino said this:

    In the mind of the average American, there is no doubt he [President Obama] is a Muslim. He is not a Christian.

  367. says

    The Trump campaign is circulating a video in which Hillary Clinton says that she will not raise taxes on the middle class … but the Trump campaign claims that in the video Clinton “vows to raise taxes on the middle class.”

    Here’s what Clinton actually says in the video:

    I’m telling you right now, we’re going to write fairer rules for the middle class. We aren’t going to raise taxes on the middle class.

    The Trump campaign claims that “aren’t” is “are” in the video. Nope wrong.

    Trump’s lackeys could have checked dozens of other videos of Clinton’s speeches in which she repeats her plan to not raise taxes on the middle class.

    […] Clinton has backed those promises up with a detailed tax plan. The conservative Tax Foundation found in its analysis that her proposal would only raise taxes on the the wealthiest 10 percent of the country without raising them on the middle class, while the centrist Tax Policy Center found her plan would very modestly increase taxes on the middle of the income distribution, by $60 over a decade, while the wealthiest fifth of the country would pay $6,739 more. Moody’s Analytics concluded that taken together, Clinton’s economic proposals would increase incomes for the poor and middle class. […]

    Link

  368. says

    Uh-oh. If anyone sets up a recurring political contribution on Donald Trump’s website, they will be make donations (via their credit card) until the end of time, or until they reach the legal limit of $2,700 per person.

    On the Hillary Clinton website you can “remove card” to cancel recurring payments. Not so for scam artist Donald Trump.

    Just like his Trump University, his investments in Atlantic City, his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, and basically his entire presidential campaign, it turns out that Donald Trump’s campaign website looks like just another scam. […]

    Slate link

  369. says

    Akira @424, Clint Eastwood and Donald Trump have this in common: they both think about the government as if it were a corporation. It isn’t.

    Excerpt from what Eastwood said in the Esquire interview:

    That’s Obama. He doesn’t go to work. He doesn’t go down to Congress and make a deal. What the hell’s he doing sitting in the White House? If I were in that job, I’d get down there and make a deal. Sure, Congress are lazy bastards, but so what? You’re the top guy. You’re the president of the company. It’s your responsibility to make sure everybody does well. It’s the same with every company in this country, whether it’s a two-man company or a two-hundred-man company.

    Excerpt from analysis by journalist Gary Legum:

    What this theory of governance misses, as anyone remotely familiar with basic civics can tell you, is that Congress is a co-equal branch of government. It is not subservient to the president, nor are its members dependent on him for employment. It is an institution with its own rules and codes that allow it to function. If members decide to blow up many of the old norms that have traditionally allowed Congress and the president to work together, as many of its members have done over the last couple of decades, there is not much Obama could have said or done to change that. Though he did in fact try, at least in his first term, before he got tired of John Boehner and Mitch McConnell slapping away his hand every time he extended it. […]

    Salon link

    Neither Trump nor Eastwood understands how the government works on any level.

  370. says

    Oh, dear (sarcasm), Trump’s poll numbers are giving him a headache (“I don’t know about the accuracy of these polls.). That goes for all of the Trumpster’s followers too. What to do? They’ll make up their own poll numbers! Great idea.

    The polls don’t look good at all for Donald Trump right now. The RealClearPolitics average of the polls has Hillary Clinton up by 6.7 points. The Huffington Post Pollster has Clinton up by 7.4 points. The New York Times gives Clinton an 80 percent chance of winning the election, and FiveThirtyEight gives her an 81.7 percent chance.

    In the face of all this bad news, some Trump supporters have taken it upon themselves to, essentially, make up poll numbers that look favorable for Trump. This is Long Room, the website dedicated to changing poll numbers so they’re “unbiased”: [clipped chart from Long Room with its bogus “Polling Informatics”.]

    These poll numbers are total bullshit. The website’s methodology page claims that the tracker incorporates state data to accurately reflect the demographics of voters. But it seems that, in reality, if a pollster consistently gets results that favor Clinton, it’s deemed more “biased” — and Long Room changes the number further in Trump’s direction. […]

    http://www.vox.com/2016/8/5/12386128/trump-clinton-biased-polls

    Sounds like a throwback to the Romney campaign.

  371. says

    This is a followup to comment 437.

    Wonkette has great coverage of the Trump campaign releasing the “laziest dumbass ad of the 2016 campaign.”

    There’s nothing surprising about the idea that the Donald Trump campaign would lie in an ad, since Donald Trump needs falsehoods like the freaky misshapen mutant koala atop his head needs a steady supply of eucalyptus leaves and human blood.

    The only surprise about this one is that it’s such a stupid, obvious lie: a clip from a Hillary Clinton speech in which Clinton says, “Trump wants to cut taxes for the super rich. Well, we’re not going there, my friends. I’m telling you right now, we’re going to write fairer rules for the middle class…” and then, in a slightly muddy bit of audio, follows that with “…and we aren’t going to raise taxes on the middle class!”

    The audio — and yeah, Clinton’s inflection — are just unclear enough that the Trump campaign (and about 40 jillion rightwing websites) thought it sounded like Clinton said “and we are going to raise taxes on the middle class!” That’s it. Hell, to hear it the right way, all you have to do is listen to it with the volume up a little bit — the n’t is quite clearly audible. Or maybe if you slow the audio way down as the ad does, you can make the n’t vanish altogether. […]

  372. says

    Professional liar and video provocateur, James O’Keefe, made a video to back up Republican claims that voter fraud is a real thing, and we should be super worried. O’Keefe failed miserably. But the Drudge Report is pushing his bogus video anyway.

    More details on Talking Points Memo.

  373. says

    Donald Trump is holding a rally in Green Bay, Wisconsin today. Journalists from Talking Points Memo mingled with Trump supporters and recorded these hateful comments, posters, and T-shirts:

    – I wish Hillary had married O.J.
    – Jesus died for you. Trump lives for you.
    – Hillary Clinton satanized America

    etc.

  374. KG says

    Donald Trump has selected economic policy team… Steven Mnuchin, a hedge fund investor and co-CEO and chairman of Dune Capital Management – Lynna, OM@435 [emphasis added]

    Well, the spice must flow!

  375. says

    During a speech he gave at a rally yesterday evening in Wisconsin, Donald Trump finally endorsed Paul Ryan, John McCain and Kelly Ayotte. Somehow someone got to Trump and forced him to behave like a slightly more reasonable candidate who is supposedly uniting the Republican party.

    During the endorsement section of the speech, Trump read from a piece of paper like a person taken hostage.

    In our shared mission to make America great again, I support and endorse our Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan. He’s a good man, and he’s a good guy. And we may disagree on a couple of things, but mostly we agree, and we’re gonna get it done. We’re going to do a lot of wonderful things.

    The “good guy” and “we’re going to do a lot of wonderful things” were Trump’s ad libs he added to the text he was reading.

    Regarding John McCain, Trump read from his piece of paper a message that included the lie that he holds McCain “in the highest esteem for his service to our country in uniform and in public office.”

  376. says

    During the endorsement section of the speech, Trump read from a piece of paper like a person taken hostage.

    Most unconvincing, coerced endorsements ever. It was hilarious. You could almost see the resentment and peevishness brewing within.

  377. says

    SC @447, thanks for that link. The Olympic team(s) made up of refugees is the most inspiring thing I’ve seen in a while. I appreciated the story behind the female swimmer who escaped from Syria.

    SC @448, I think Trump was in “let’s just get this over with” mode when he was reading those endorsements. He threw in a few ad libs, but it was obvious that it was not his choice to endorse those three Republicans.

    In other news, here is a nice contrast between the way Joe Biden treats people who work for him, and the way that the Trump family treats people that work for them:

    To my wonderful staff,

    I would like to take a moment and make something clear to everyone. I do not expect, nor do I want any of you to miss or sacrifice important family obligations for work. Family obligations include, but are not limited to family birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, any religious ceremonies such as first communions and bar mitzvahs, graduations and times of need such as an illness or a loss in the family. This is very important to me. In fact I will go so far as to say that if I find out you are working with me while missing important family responsibilities, it will disappoint me greatly. This has be an unwritten rule sine my days in the Senate.

    Thank you for all the hard work.

    Sincerely,

    Joe.

    And here is a tweet from Donald Trump Jr.:

    At dinner w our greenskeeper who missed his sister’s wedding 2 work (luv loyalty 2 us) “No big deal hopefully she’ll have another someday”:)

    Link