Halloween with Warren Zevon

HARRY REID: FBI director should face criminal charges

From Veterans Today:


Breaking/Exclusive: Comey Lied: FBI “Synced” Weiner Laptop Under Misused Terror Warrant – Updated 

Constitutional Crisis: FBI used prohibited FISA domestic terror warrant in Clinton-Weiner email search








"In a surprise announcement, the Department of Justice just admitted that there was no legal authorization in place to access email accounts of Hillary Clinton aide, Huma Abedin, estranged wife of accused sex offender former Congressman Anthony Weiner. Additionally, it has now been learned that the FBI had accessed Huma Abedin’s cloud based email account as early as September 22 and certainly by the beginning of October, according to CNN.

As the revelations are hitting every few minutes, the background and the basic legalities are being obscured, that and some serious questions such as the one just raised, not only why did the FBI director Comey wait but why did the FBI sit on these files for weeks, only releasing them when it is now too late to get the truth out, a truth that most likely will prove Hillary Clinton free of any criminal wrongdoing. What has driven this FBI ploy and what procedures and even laws have they broken leading to this state of affairs that, as Presidential candidate Donald Trump noted, rivals Watergate, though maybe in not in ways he had foreseen."

[skip]

"FBI Director James Comey is under assault for what is being perceived as more than simply partisan behavior. Former presidential advisor, Lanny Davis writes for The Hill: 

 “Comey as FBI director — an investigative agency, not a prosecution agency — (does not) have any authority to send a report to Congress in the middle of an investigation about the past or present subject of an investigation. He appears to be in violation of the limits on his authority as FBI director by disclosing investigation information — or possible investigation information — directly to Congress with obtaining permission from the attorney general or someone else delegated authority by her.  His decision to reveal the results of an ongoing investigation, before a published criminal indictment, violates due process principles and pre-indictment secrecy rules and guidelines of the Justice Department.” 

Adding to the barrage against Comey is the latest from Senator Harry Reid of Utah[sic], who says the FBI director should face criminal charges. From Huffington Post: 

 “Reid argued that Comey’s “partisan actions… may have broken the law,” citing the Hatch Act, which, however, requires someone to act with the intent of interfering with an election. Reid also said Comey’s actions showed “a disturbing double standard for the treatment of sensitive information.” He wrote that he believes the FBI possesses “explosive information about close ties and coordination between Donald Trump, his top advisors, and the Russian government,” although he offered no proof."

Former Attorney General Eric Holder: FBI Director James Comey ‘Violated’ Justice Department Policies 

And the first member of Congress called on the FBI director to resign.


In an op-ed for The Washington Post, former attorney general Eric Holder charged that Comey’s letter had “violated long-standing Justice Department policies and tradition,” and he called on the FBI director to “dispel the uncertainty he has created before Election Day.”

 Prior to resigning as attorney general last year, Holder directly oversaw Comey’s work as FBI director, a relationship Holder referenced in his op-ed. “I served with Jim Comey and I know him well,” he wrote. “This is a very difficult piece for me to write. He is a man of integrity and honor. I respect him. But good men make mistakes. In this instance, he has committed a serious error with potentially severe implications.” 

 Also on Sunday evening, Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) became the first member of Congress to call on Comey to step down.

Sunday Science Blog

Scientists have found a lake under the sea - those who swim there won't come back alive




Scientists have discovered a 'lake' in the Gulf of Mexico. Everyone, who enters this pool at the bottom of the sea will suffer horribly. Erik Cordes, associate professor of biology at Temple University, has researched the pool and described his findings in the journal Oceanography.

"It was one of the most amazing things in the deep sea. You go down into the bottom of the ocean and you are looking at a lake or a river flowing. It feels like you are not on this world", Cordes told Seeker. The water in the 'lake within the sea' is about five times as salty as the water surrounding it. It also contains highly toxic concentrations of methane and hydrogen sulphide and can thus not mix with the surrounding sea. For animals (and people) who swim into it, these toxic concentrations can be deadly. Only bacterial life, tube worms, and shrimp can survive those circumstances.


 For scientists, this lake is like a playground for their research. They can explore how certain organisms can survive in extreme habitats. "There's a lot of people looking at these extreme habitats on Earth as models for what we might discover when we go to other planets," Cordes told Seeker.




 

Saturday Night Dancing

Trump Shoots Off His Mouth and Makes a Fool of Himself -- AGAIN!

Donald Trump irresponsibly shot off his repulsive mouth last night before all the facts were in, and he made a fool of himself, as usual, proving he is the most unfit candidate to ever run for POTUS: 

 Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, said the development showed his opponent had engaged in corruption “on a scale we have never seen before,’’ while Clinton called for the FBI to release all of the information it has, saying the American people have a right to know everything.


 Kurt Eichenwald of Newsweek gives us the facts:


"There is no indication the emails in question were withheld by Clinton during the investigation, the law enforcement official told Newsweek, nor does the discovery suggest she did anything illegal. Also, none of the emails were to or from Clinton, the official said. Moreover, despite the widespread claims in the media that this development had prompted the FBI to “reopen” of the case, it did not; such investigations are never actually closed, and it is common for law enforcement to discover new information that needs to be examined."




Updated | "The disclosure by the Federal Bureau of Investigation late on Friday, October 28 that it had discovered potential new evidence in its inquiry into Hillary Clinton’s handling of her personal email when she was Secretary of State has virtually nothing to do with any actions taken by the Democratic nominee, according to government records and an official with knowledge of the investigation, who spoke to Newsweek on condition of anonymity. 

 The revelation that the FBI has discovered additional emails convulsed the political world, and led to widespread (and erroneous) claims and speculation. Many Republicans proclaimed that the discovery suggests Clinton may have broken the law, while Democrats condemned FBI Director James Comey for disclosing this information less than two weeks before the election, claiming he did it for political purposes."

Imagine if Hillary -- or any normal person -- said this as a candidate for the presidency

But Donald Trump is not a normal candidate or person -- he's obviously out of his mind:


“I’m just thinking to myself right now, we should just cancel the election and just give it to Trump, right?” Trump asked the crowd. “What are we even having it for? … Her policies are so bad.”


The above statement, uttered from the 

who's been telling his supporters that the election is RIGGED! But now, out of the other side of his mouth, he's saying Hillary's so bad that we should cancel the election and give it to him.

Trump then changed the subject to "the blacks," and promised to "work on our ghettos."

"We’re gonna work on our ghettos … take a look at what’s going on where you have pockets of, areas of land, where you have the inner cities, and you have so many things, so many problems, so many horrible, horrible problems – the violence, the death, the lack of education, no jobs. We’re gonna work with the African-American community and we’re going to solve the problem of the inner city … You can’t walk out the street. You buy a loaf of bread and you end up getting shot. "




Even Donnie himself must not believe the B.S. he's telling his supporters because he hasn't contributed the $100 million to his campaign that he promised he would.

And the braggart hasn't raised any money for his own party and the down-ticket candidates. Because, well, it's all about Trump, the supreme narcissist.





Trump is reduced to nothing more than a scam artist and babbling idiot saying nothing and making even less sense.

I can't wait for it all to be over. 

Newest AP-GfK Poll Released

(Still busy with our French visitors.  Light posting.)





More good news for us anti-Trumpistas:



NEW YORK (AP) — Hillary Clinton appears on the cusp of a potentially commanding victory over Donald Trump, fueled by solid Democratic turnout in early voting, massive operational advantages and increasing enthusiasm among her supporters.

 A new Associated Press-GfK poll released Wednesday finds the Democratic nominee has grabbed significant advantages over her Republican rival with just 12 days left before Election Day. Among them: consolidating the support of her party and even winning some Republicans.

[skip]


Overall, the poll shows Clinton leading Trump nationally by a staggering 14 percentage points among likely voters, 51-37. While that is one of her largest margins among recent national surveys, most show the former secretary of state with a substantial national lead over the billionaire businessman.


The AP-GfK poll finds that Clinton has secured the support of 90 percent of likely Democratic voters, and also has the backing of 15 percent of more moderate Republicans. Just 79 percent of all Republicans surveyed say they are voting for their party's nominee. 

 With voting already underway in 37 states, Trump's opportunities to overtake Clinton are quickly evaporating — and voters appear to know it. The AP-GfK poll found that 74 percent of likely voters believe Clinton will win, up from 63 percent in September.

Trump Thugs Planned to Intimidate Minority Voters

From the campaign where candidate Trump calls Hillary "crooked" at every rally:






Trump Loyalists Planned Voter Intimidation Using Fake ID Badges, Fake Exit Polling — Until HuffPost Asked Them About It

The “Vote Protectors” are affiliated with Trump adviser Roger Stone.


Vote Protectors, the anti-voter-fraud group hosted by Donald Trump ally and political dirty trickster Roger Stone, plans to send volunteers to monitor polling places in nine cities with high minority populations on Election Day, Stone said last week. Untrained poll-watchers have intimidated voters in previous elections. But Vote Protectors is going further than its predecessors. 

 Stone’s group created an official-looking ID badge for its volunteers to wear, and its volunteers planned to videotape voters and conduct fake “exit polls,” efforts that election experts say risks intimidating and confusing voters. 

Or at least that’s what the group was planning to do before The Huffington Post asked Stone about it on Tuesday. The controversial Trump ally, long known for his bare-knuckled political tactics, said that key proposals on his group’s websites were there without his knowledge, and assured HuffPost that he would operate within the confines of election law.

And this from David Leonhardt of the NYTimes:


Trump is scarier than Goldwater. He is scarier because he resembles a double agent dreamed up by liberal screenwriters. He embodies almost every left-wing caricature of Republicans that Republicans despise. He is a racist and a sexist — having refused to rent apartments to African-Americans, retweeted neo-Nazis, besmirched Muslims and Latinos and boastfully molested women. 

For years, Republicans have been frustrated by liberal sensitivity on race and gender. Comes now Trump, spewing bigotry. He is also an unrepentant denier of reality. Do you remember that Al Franken wrote a jeremiad against conservatives called “Lies: And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them”? I imagine the book’s title offends you. Yet it now feels like a preview of a candidate who almost every day makes immediately disprovable claims. [...] 

 The best path is the hardest one. Only an unambiguous rejection of Trump will banish Trumpism for 2020 and beyond. Only a lopsided loss, with millions of Republicans so repelled by him that they vote for someone they never imagined they would, sends the message that bigotry, lying and authoritarianism violate Republican values — your values.

And Ross Douthat, conservative NYTimes columnist, does some soul searching and writes this truth:


"Some conservatives told themselves that Fox and Drudge and Breitbart were just the evolving right-of-center alternative to the liberal mainstream media, when in reality they were more fact-averse and irresponsible. Others (myself included) told ourselves that this irresponsibility could be mitigated by effective statesmanship, when in reality political conservatism’s leaders — including high-minded figures like Paul Ryan — turned out to have no strategy save self-preservation."

Eight Years Ago Almost To The Day

POLITICS

November 12, 2008

How the religious right embraced Trump and lost its moral authority

Christian Conservative, Russell Moore:


“For years, secular progressives have said that evangelical social action in America is not about religious conviction but all about power.”

 “They have implied that the goal of the Religious Right is to cynically use the ‘moral’ to get to the ‘majority,’ not the other way around. This year, a group of high-profile old-guard evangelicals has proven these critics right.”



HOW THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT EMBRACED TRUMP AND LOST ITS MORAL AUTHORITY


I have been commenting on this subject all during the Trump phenomenon. How the religious right could embrace a man that is so morally repugnant was mystifying,  If, say, Barack Obama, for example, had trotted out his five children by three wives during the DNC convention in 2008, or had we read about his boasting that he had affairs with many married women, or if we had heard an audio tape of Obama bragging about being able to grab women's genitals because he was a star, had anything like that been revealed about Barack Obama, people like Ralph Reed or Jerry Falwell, Jr., would have burst  blood vessels while bellowing about the moral disintegration of our precious country by allowing that sort of man near the White House. Hadn't this country suffered enough through the sexual exploits  during Bill Clinton's administration? And yet the same people who couldn't heap enough condemnation during the Clinton scandals are justifying their support of a sexual predator who had no problem with a radio shock jock calling his young daughter "a piece of ass." 

Jeff Jacoby, the long-time Boston Globe's conservative columnist, expresses the same astonishment over how those people who were shocked by l'affaire Clinton have nothing negative to say about Trump.  They have traded their moral authority for political ideology. 




By Jeff Jacoby 

IT WILL TAKE a long time to assess the full extent of the damage wrought by Donald Trump on the Republican Party and American conservatism. But this much is already clear: Buried under the post-election wreckage will be the moral credibility of the religious right. Hypocrisy and politics have gone hand in hand since time immemorial. But the embrace of Trump by influential religious conservatives — who have always insisted that they, like Hebrew National, answer to a higher authority — is orders of magnitude worse than the customary flip-flopping and sail-trimming of a presidential campaign.

 [skip] 

 You didn’t have to sympathize with the Christian right’s political platform to understand why so many evangelical leaders were appalled by the sexual scandals that trailed Bill Clinton into the White House. It was no mystery, for example, why Ralph Reed, an early leader of the Christian Coalition, would insist vehemently, in 1998, as pressure was growing for Clinton’s impeachment, that “we care about the conduct of our leaders, and we will not rest until we have leaders of good moral character.” Or why the formidable televangelist Pat Robertson would blast Clinton as a “debauched, debased, and defamed” politician who turned the Oval Office into a “playpen for the sexual freedom of . . . the 1960s.” 

 [skip] 

 Equally intolerable is the willingness to ignore a candidate’s brazen moral offenses because you like his stands on public policy. Such ends-justify-the-means arguments are “Nixonian,” said Bennett. “Moral precepts are real; they are not like warm candle wax, easily shaped to fit the ends of this or that president, or this or that cause.” When Trump backers downplay their candidate’s scandalous conduct on the grounds that Supreme Court appointments matter more, they are as bad as Clinton backers who downplayed the president’s Oval Office debauchery because they liked his position on abortion rights. Yet Bennett now exemplifies the phenomenon he excoriated. 

When it came to Clinton’s depravity, Bennett was unsparing. Trump’s depravity he doesn’t mind so much. In August, Bennett accused anti-Trump conservatives of “put[ting] their own vanity and taste above the interest of the country.” Not everyone on the religious right has sacrificed their principles for Trump’s sake. A coalition of Liberty University students issued an eloquent statement Wednesday rebuking Falwell for endorsing the GOP nominee. 

“Donald Trump does not represent our values and we want nothing to do with him,” they wrote. Albert Mohler, a deeply respected Baptist theologian, remains as steadfast in opposing Trump as he was in opposing Bill Clinton. But they and other honorable exceptions will not undo the damage caused by the pro-Trump leaders of the evangelical right. What started as Christian witness ended in hypocritical partisanship. Religious conservatives shed their principles, and thereby dismantled their influence. 

Wingnuts of the Weekend

Thank You, Unions and Liberals

Today, October 24, 1940, marks the 76th anniversary of the 8-hour day and the 40-hour work week, brought to you by Liberals and unions. 

You're welcome.

And speaking of Liberals...

via Daily Kos:


If by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people---their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights and their civil liberties---someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a Liberal. ---John F. Kennedy


“I believe in a relatively equal society, supported by institutions that limit extremes of wealth and poverty. I believe in democracy, civil liberties, and the rule of law. That makes me a liberal, and I’m proud of it.” ---Paul Krugman

 "Reality has a well-known liberal bias." ---Stephen Colbert


“Today’s so-called ‘conservatives’ don’t even know what the word means. They think I’ve turned liberal because I believe a woman has a right to an abortion. That’s a decision that’s up to the pregnant woman, not up to the pope or some do-gooders or the Religious Right. It’s not a conservative issue at all.” ---Barry Goldwater 

 "Everybody knows God is nonpartisan, but I swear Jesus was a liberal---the best, the biggest, the original bleeding heart---the one who embraced the outcasts, the model for us all. Just read the stuff in the New Testament written in red." ---Molly Ivins


And Happy Birthday to a special someone who often visits here.

THIS IS HOW AMERICA AND THE REST OF THE WORLD SEES DONALD J. TRUMP

"This hideous little man..."

From the brilliant PM Carpenter on Donald Trump's disastrous appearance at the Al Smith dinner on Thursday evening:



Thus did Donald J. Trump vulgarize the one, theretofore-unmolested institution of American politics — the congenial Al Smith Dinner, a "presidential campaign ritual." (The one truly humorous moment of the evening came when Hillary ridiculed Rudy Giuliani for having called The Donald a "genius." I have never seen such a scowling, stone-set face in reaction. But what did I expect? Members of brownshirted gangs aren't known for their sense of humor.) 

 So, to repeat, no Trumpian vulgarization has been left undone. And the words of President Obama are worth repeating as well: Trump "is not a joking matter." Obama was speaking specifically yesterday about the charlatan's vulgar "suggestion" of a rigged election "without a shred of evidence" — "the first major party nominee in American history" to do so — and yet that is but one example among many of the transcendent harm this hideous little man is doing to the traditional political system I, you, Obama, and every sane American loves. 

 It is to be hoped the harm is as temporary as it is prodigious. Indeed I, for one, am confident of that. My confidence, however, doesn't write coming history. Trump has vulgarized, disgraced and debauched the finest political system ever known to humanity. This hideous little man is just that, and what I trust is Trump's inevitable and dispositive end, 18 days from now, cannot come soon enough. With every passing day, he vulgarizes American politics a bit more — and though he is doomed, with the smallest of successes, the lowest of bars have a way of lingering.




Fox News Poll Shows That White Men Support Hillary Clinton – If They’re Educated 

 The latest Fox News poll shows that education may actually be playing a bigger role in this election than gender.

Donald Trump: Predicts He Will Be A Sore Loser

Trump said today that the only outcome of this election that he will accept is if he wins. (hahahaha!)

A perfect description of a SORE LOSER.

Here's candidate Trump:

"I'll Keep You In Suspense."

Donald Trump Confirms At Third Debate He Is A Domestic Insurrectionist 
By Jonathan Chait





"I'll keep you in suspense."

Donald Trump's  answer to the question of whether or not he'd accept the results of the November presidential election.

First time in America's history a candidate refused to say he'd accept the outcome of our presidential election.

Sorry, Donnie, you just threw 240 years of our American heritage in the toilet.

The voters will remember.

And women voters will remember the moment when you leaned into the mic and called Hillary "Such a nasty woman."

Donald Trump continued his championship lying when he lied about knowing Vladimir Putin.

Hillary was clearly the winner. She had substantive answers, was dignified, and knew what she was talking about.

Trump confirmed once again that he is unfit to be POTUS.

 PM Carpenter:

"Trump and the proverbial whimper, not a bang 

There is nothing else left to say (although that won't stop me). Last night was also the last little flicker of Trump's magic lamp; the finishing bamboozlement of a dying party; the closing and dimmest breach of respectable American politics since the demagogic rot of antebellum Democrats. No fat lady need sing on November 8th, for last night's operatic tragicomedy was dispositive."
[skip]

"Was it shocking — or "breathtaking," as the Washington Post's editorial board frames it this morning — that this infantile clown again refused to endorse democracy's upcoming verdict? Of course not. This was but another tantrum of the toddler Trump, who has never exceeded the political unseriousness of his developmentally arrested followers. And so Trump & Friends flickers out, the GOP dies, and a fresh Lost Cause is born unto the walking dead."    

via GIPHY

The Fury and Failure of Donald Trump by Matt Taibbi

(As this post is published, cable news is reporting that Georgia and Texas are turning purple and could be in play for Hillary Clinton!)





As we continue to suffer through the execrable droppings coming from the tiny mouth of the Short-Fingered Vulgarian over the next few weeks until the election, I highly recommend this fine piece by Matt Taibbi so that you will understand that the revulsion you feel every time you hear and see Trump is not a partisan reaction, but the normal reaction of sane, decent people when they're confronted with "a globally despised cross of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Charlie Sheen, and Satan."







The Fury and Failure of Donald Trump 

 Win, lose or drop out, the Republican nominee has laid waste to the American political system. On the trail for the last gasp of the ugliest campaign in our nation's history

Think about this.

Never, in our American history, has this ever happened.  

That's how awful Donald Trump is:

Light posting for a while as we welcome our French family for their annual visit

And here's a typical, hypocritical TeaPublican pol showing everyone that he believes his party should be given the duties and privileges of the presidency even when a Democrat is in the White House: 



 "The main pretext Republican senators have offered for leaving open the Supreme Court seat of the late Justice Antonin Scalia is that the next president, not Barack Obama, should be the one to fill it. 

 But now that his party’s nominee, Donald Trump, seems headed for a loss in November, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) appears to be changing his tune ― and may be signaling that more unprecedented obstruction is on the horizon if Hillary Clinton wins the White House. "

 “I promise you that we will be united against any Supreme Court nominee that Hillary Clinton, if she were president, would put up. I promise you,” McCain said Monday, according to CNN.

Donald Trump and Putin's Russia

A Break From Politics -- Here's a Lynx to Admire

THE LYNX

Saturday Night Dancing

Michelle Obama vs. Donald Trump

Another British publication praises Michelle Obama for her moving speech:



Michelle Obama has dragged this US election out of the gutter 
by Anne Perkins, The Guardian 

"Michelle Obama may have done the seemingly impossible. She may just have rescued the US elections from the grotesque and demeaning mire into which they have descended. She did something even more remarkable, and just as badly needed. With the touch of a poet, her speech last night shamed the tat and the tawdry of populism and held out the possibility of something better. She lent her extraordinary ability to say what people are feeling to every English-speaking woman in the world."




FLOTUS Michelle Obama is the antidote to the toxic, poisonous rhetoric that pervades everything Trump screams at his ever decreasing support mobs.

Trump is telling his hordes that the election is rigged, and if he loses, it's not because, as everyone with a functioning intellect has said, he's an ignorant dirtbag, but because Hillary controls the media, the banks, the stock market, the DoJ, and every lever of power on the planet. He is suggesting that our democracy is rotten, and ONLY HE can fix it. Exactly what a totalitarian demagogue, ready to place his boot on his gullible followers' necks says in order to gain access to power.

Trump is not just a dirtbag, he's a dangerous dirtbag.

From Digby


"And if Trump doesn’t win, some are even openly talking about violent rebellion and assassination, as fantastical and unhinged as that may seem.

 “If she’s in office, I hope we can start a coup. She should be in prison or shot. That’s how I feel about it,” Dan Bowman, a 50-year-old contractor, said of Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee. “We’re going to have a revolution and take them out of office if that’s what it takes. There’s going to be a lot of bloodshed. But that’s what it’s going to take. . . . I would do whatever I can for my country.” 

 He then placed a Trump mask on his face and posed for pictures. [...] 

Above all, Trump is now using the prospect of his loss to undermine faith in democratic institutions. 

“It’s one big fix,’’ Trump said Friday afternoon in Greensboro, N.C. “This whole election is being rigged.’’ 

 He saved some of his harshest criticism for the media, which he said is in league with Clinton to steal the election. 

 “The media is indeed sick, and it’s making our country sick, and we’re going to stop it,” he said."


I hope President Obama has the National Guard ready for Trump's blood-thirsty mobs.

Here's how Trump is making America Great Again!

This is Trump's gift to every grandchild in America: Grandpa and Grandma are proud to say, "F**k Your Feelings!"

And she's proud to be a Trump "girl," ready for sexual assault.

This beauty wants Trump to talk "dirty" to her. Isn't that every mother and father's dream for their daughter ?

Seen at a British newsstand...

I've heard people claim that Trump has no character. I disagree. Trump has the character of a swinish lout, an uncouth, aggressive pig-man. And he proves this observation is accurate every day: 

 Trump ridicules accusers and warns Obama could be targeted by false allegations 

Donald Trump openly mocked his female sex-abuse accusers on Friday, suggesting to an outdoor rally crowd that some of them are unattractive and desperate for sexual partners. And in denying all the allegations as false and ‘made-up,’ he warned that other politicians – including President Barack Obama – could become the victims of false smears.

[skip]


On Friday he criticized Obama for weighing in on the controversy during campaign stops benefiting Clinton. The same kind of accusers who have targeted him, he said, could just as easily target the president. 

 ‘He’s talking about me like he knows me. I don’t know him. He doesn’t know me,’ Trump said. 


 "I don't know him," said the swinish lout, who spent five years telling the world that President Obama's birth certificate was a fake and that President Obama probably wasn't an American citizen.

Oh happy is the day when this swinish lout goes down in ignominious defeat!

Friday Night Funnies

First Lady of the United States of America, Michelle Obama

 Michelle Obama Just Delivered the Most Powerful Speech of the 2016 CampaignSpeaking of how she has been “shaken…to my core” by Trump’s predatory language, the first lady declares: “This is intolerable.”



There remains a moral high ground in American politics, and on Thursday Michelle Obama spoke from it.



"Because consider this: If all of this is painful to us as grown women, what do you think this is doing to our children? What messages are our little girls hearing about who they should look like, how they should act? What lessons are they learning about their value as professionals, as human beings, about their dreams and aspirations? 

And how is this affecting men and boys in this country? Because I can tell you that the men in my life do not talk about women like this. And I know that my family is not unusual. And to dismiss this as everyday locker-room talk is an insult to decent men everywhere. The men that you and I know don't treat women this way. 

They are loving fathers who are sickened by the thought of their daughters being exposed to this kind of vicious language about women. They are husbands and brothers and sons who don't tolerate women being treated and demeaned and disrespected. And like us, these men are worried about the impact this election is having on our boys who are looking for role models of what it means to be a man."

********************

NOTE: Trump says his opponent "is the devil," he says — "hate her with all your heart." Forget about the rule of law. "Lock her up!" [..]

2016 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE -- BOB DYLAN

Bob Dylan has won the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature. In doing so, the prolific musician became the first American to win the prize in more than two decades. 

Not since novelist Toni Morrison won in 1993 has an American claimed the prize. Dylan won the prize "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition," according to the citation by the Swedish Academy, the committee that annually decides the recipient of the Nobel Prize. The academy's permanent secretary, Sara Danius, announced the news Thursday.

For the past two days...

(The fighting GOP elephants post will be up again later.)


BREAKING NEWS:  The Salt Lake Tribune Endorses Hillary to be President.


I have received in several emails and seen on facebook the following meme:

Those two photos are not a comparison.

Why?

This is why:

Men's naked buttocks are not obscene. They're natural. In fact every single male reading this has naked buttocks inside his underwear (that's if he's wearing any). On any given summer's day on any beach in Europe, in various South American or even North American beaches, a male's bare buttocks, and even a female's bare buttocks can be seen. It's not disgusting, it natural. 

A grown man bragging about grabbing a woman's genitals is not "banter," it's bragging about sexual assault.  Donald Trump bragged and admitted to Billy Bush that he does this whenever he's around beautiful women because he can't help himself. Trump said he sexually assaults women, and Billy Bush thought that was hilarious. IMO, that's obscene.

Men walking in a parade with thongs on that show off their buttocks is not the same as a 59 year old man talking about how he likes to grab women's "pussies" against their will.

The outrage is not because Trump used the word "pussy," the outrage comes from Trump's casual boast that he can get away with sexually assaulting women because he's a star.

The Psychotic Rage of Alex Jones, a Right Wing Darling

This is who the fringe right Trumpistas listen to and who whips them up into frenzies of rage and insanity so that they cheer when Trump threatens to jail Hillary. This is the sort of trash they listen to and believe, and you can read almost the same sort of malignant rhetoric against Hillary, President Obama, and "libtards" on certain right wing blogs every day of the week.  

This is the sort of psychotic rage they feed on, and they vote :




ALEX JONES (HOST): I'm never a lesser of two evils person, but with Hillary, there's not even the same universe. She is an abject, psychopathic, demon from Hell that as soon as she gets into power is going to try to destroy the planet. I'm sure of that, and people around her say she's so dark now, and so evil, and so possessed that they are having nightmares, they're freaking out. Folks let me just tell you something, and if media wants to go with this, that's fine. There are dozens of videos and photos of Obama having flies land on him, indoors, at all times of year, and he'll be next to a hundred people and no one has flies on them. Hillary, reportedly, I mean, I was told by people around her that they think she's demon-possessed, okay?

I'm just going to go ahead and say it, okay? They said that they're scared. That's why when I see her when kids are by her, I actually get scared myself, with a child -- with that big rubber face and that -- I mean this woman is dangerous, ladies and gentleman. I'm telling you, she is a demon. This is Biblical. She's going to launch a nuclear war. The Russians are scared of her.

 [...]

 Imagine how bad she smells, man? I'm told her and Obama, just stink, stink, stink, stink. You can't wash that evil off, man. Told there's a rotten smell around Hillary. I'm not kidding, people say, they say -- folks, I've been told this by high up folks. They say listen, Obama and Hillary both smell like sulfur. I never said this because the media will go crazy with it, but I've talked to people that are in protective details, they're scared of her. And they say listen, she's a frickin' demon and she stinks and so does Obama. I go, like what? Sulfur. They smell like Hell.


Infidel753 has a terrific post up about intra wingnut warfare.  

Bring popcorn.

TRUMP'S VISION FOR AMERICA: THROW POLITICAL OPPONENTS IN JAIL

via The Washington Post:



"HAS THERE been a more disturbing low in presidential politics?

 'If I win, I am going to instruct my attorney general to get a special prosecutor to look into your situation,' Republican nominee Donald Trump threatened in the course of the second presidential debate Sunday night.

 'It’s just awfully good that someone with the temperament of Donald Trump is not in charge of the law in our country,' Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton responded.

 'Because you’d be in jail,' Mr. Trump shot back. 

 Mark the moment.

A major-party presidential nominee is officially promising to lock up his political opponent, despite the fact that an impartial federal investigation concluded that no fair prosecutor would have charged Ms. Clinton in the matter of her e-mails.

If anyone needed any more proof that Mr. Trump does not understand the meaning of rule of law as opposed to arbitrary rule of autocrat — that he would use the levers of the federal government in a vindictive, self-serving and corrupt manner — Mr. Trump provided it."

************************

Skip around the internet and read the usual rabid right news sites and blogs and understand that a large section of the American people are okay with Trump's promise to act like a tin-pot dictator.

I've been astounded at how a man like Trump was able to get this far in American politics -- right up to the door of the White House. But when one reads the excuses his supporters give after each revelation about Trump's lurid sexual exploits and his dictatorial ambitions for America, that frightens and depresses me even more. When Trump is mercifully gone from presidential politics, those people with their lust for authoritarian strongmen will still be around, and they'll still have the power of the voting booth.  A horrible thought.




Talking Points Memo:

(TPM) "I don't think we can discuss this debate as citizens, take stock of it as a country, without noting that this is certainly the first time one candidate has openly threatened to jail the other candidate. Trump said openly that he would instruct the Justice Department to open a new investigation of Clinton and that he'd make sure it ended with her imprisonment. That's something we expect it kleptocracies and thin democracies where electoral defeat can mean exile, imprisonment or death. Such a ferocious claim, one that puts our whole constitutional order on its head, is not something that can be easily undone. That's the ranting threat of a would-be strongman and dictator."

Ryan Dumps Trump

Republican Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, today told his fellow Republicans who are running for re-election to do what they have to do to distance themselves from Trump-- IOW, save your own hides and forget the embarrassment we, the GOP, endorsed for POTUS.

So what Trump has left is his rabid base who, just today at a Trump rally, were screaming at the top of their bloody throats, "LOCK HER UP!" -- a follow-up to Trump's insane promise at last night's debate to put Hillary in jail.

Trump has lost the support of dozens of Republicans from his own party, and now Speaker Ryan is all but letting him twist in the wind.

Not one major newspaper has endorsed Trump, and many newspapers that have never endorsed a Democrat have endorsed Hillary.



From Talking Points Memo:


It Begins: Trump Takes Swipe At Ryan After He Essentially Concedes To Clinton 

It was clear. Trump's campaign was on its own as congressional Republicans just tried to stem the bleeding.

 Ryan explicitly said during a call with members Monday that he was not unendorsing Trump; however, he also said he was not going to be campaigning with the nominee. Instead, he was going to invest his resources in ensuring the Republicans kept control of the House of Representatives.

Ryan spoke on the call with members after a tape from 2005 surfaced Friday recording Trump talking about grabbing women's genitals. Ryan subsequently uninvited Trump to appear with him at a rally Saturday in Wisconsin, but Ryan said little about the tape aside from admonishing Trump for it. 

Monday was the first time Ryan spoke about the state of his endorsement. While Ryan has said that he isn't taking his endorsement away at the moment, the Republican conference is divided over how Ryan has handled Trump's tape. During the call Monday morning, one Republican congressman who spoke to TPM on background said that some members were criticizing Ryan openly for not standing by Trump.

 One member, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) blasted Ryan for essentially ceding the election to Hillary Clinton.

Another Low in American Politics Brought to US by Trump

Richard Wolffe at The Guardian writes—The nicest thing you could say about Trump’s performance was that it was bonkers:

We can understand a totalitarian like Putin threatening to jail his opponent, but I've never heard an American politician threaten his opponent with that in my lifetime. But that's just what the Republican candidate for POTUS did last night, when he wasn't stalking Secretary Clinton as she gave her answers to the questions being asked by the audience.

Another performance by the Short Fingered Vulgarian proved he knows nothing about foreign or domestic issues and that he is the consummate liar that the fact checkers all over the country have said he is.

Trump's performance last night and the revelations about his sexual predations last Friday makes him unfit to be the POTUS, and that's not just my opinion, that's the opinion of an avalanche of Republican politicians and the American people.




PM Carpenter:


And we're all blessed that Trump performed as well he did last night. I was getting a trifle nervous, wondering if Reince Priebus & Co. might come to its senses and somehow figure a way to dump its absolute horror of a nominee. Thus I reveled upon reading this in the Times this morning: "Trump’s performance was sure-footed enough that no more Republican officials disavowed him in the immediate aftermath of the debate." 

In declaring that Clinton has "tremendous hate in her heart," that she "should be ashamed of herself," that she is "the devil," and that as a banana-republic dictator he would put her "in jail," Trump reinvigorated his malevolent base and guaranteed its imperishable presence in GOP Politics 2016. Which is to say, he's untouchable. He also guaranteed that his party will suffer a bloody split in 2017, as saner Republican pols flee the calamitous contours of November's Trumpian antecedent. A devastating performance last night might have pushed Mr. Priebus to do something sane straightaway, and that would have been a real pity. Trump's devastation is much better left for November.

*******************

Never forget that Trump, who insisted last night that he "respects" women, said this to Howard Stern about his (at the time) young daughter, Ivanka:

TRUMP: "My daughter is beautiful, Ivanka."

STERN: "By the way, your daughter."

TRUMP: "She's beautiful."

STERN: "Can I say this? A piece of ass."

TRUMP: "Yeah."

Every man I know knows what "a piece of ass" means when speaking about a female - it means "she's 'f***able." And Donald Trump let the shock jock, Howard Stern, say that about Ivanka.

That's Trump's idea of  "respecting" women. 

His own daughter.