This and That Thursday

As Americans continue to vote early and as others head to the polls next Tuesday, keep in mind that the GOP candidate, Donald J. Trump, is scheduled to face court proceedings in child rape and racketeering cases while he is supported by an American terrorist organization. 

Unprecedented in American history. 

Trump faces two court proceedings while he enjoys the support of an American terrorist organization:



Donald Trump’s KKK stamp of approval: The Klan gives a de facto endorsement to the Trump campaign on the front page of its newspaper The Klan's paper was effusive about "Make America Great Again," as a hopeful return to "a White Christian Republic"





Trump's child rape civil suit is scheduled for December 16:

A federal judge in New York has ordered counsel for Donald Trump and the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein to appear in court along with the attorney for a woman referred to only as “Jane Doe” who alleges the Republican presidential nominee raped her when she was 13. 

 Judge Ronnie Abrams has slated an initial status conference in the civil lawsuit for 16 December in a New York district court. 

The order raises the extraordinary prospect, were Trump to win the 8 November battle for the White House, of counsel for a US president-elect being called into federal court in proceedings relating to allegations of rape of an underage girl.


Federal Judge Rules Trump Must Face Fraud Trial in Trump University Suit

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has been ordered to stand trial in an investigation over fraud and racketeering charges related to Trump University. Federal Judge Gonzalo Curiel — the same judge whom Trump said was biased against him due to the Indiana native’s Mexican ancestry and Trump’s controversial positions on border security — is ordering Trump to stand trial immediately after the election in November as part of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) investigation surrounding Trump University. Judge Curiel denied Trump’s motion for summary judgment in the Cohen v. Trump case, which alleges Trump University was part of a massive racketeering scheme.


Donald Trump and His Russian Pals: 


There is basically conclusive evidence that Russia is interfering in the US election, and that this interference has been designed to damage Hillary Clinton’s campaign. There is strong evidence linking Trump’s foreign policy advisers to Russia, and Trump’s stated policy ideas are extremely favorable to Russian interests. You don’t need to construct poorly evidenced conspiracy theories to explain this. There is a confluence of interests between the Kremlin and Donald Trump, and they are, in effect, helping each other. 

That is the man the modern Republican Party has chosen to represent them.

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

Libertarian vice president praises Hillary Clinton:

Bill Weld: "I know her well personally. I know her to be a person of high moral character"

Libertarian vice presidential nominee Bill Weld defended Hillary Clinton Tuesday night, acknowledging an explicit split with his running mate Gary Johnson. Weld, in an interview with MSNBC's Rachel Maddow, said he disagreed with FBI Director James Comey's decision to announce publicly the agency was looking into more Clinton emails just days before the election and defended the Democratic presidential nominee whom he has known for decades. "I'm here vouching for Mrs. Clinton, and I think it's high time somebody did," Weld said.



Clinton leads Trump by 6 points, same as before FBI announcement: Reuters/Ipsos


Hillary Clinton led Republican Donald Trump by 6 percentage points among likely voters, according to a Reuters/Ipsos daily tracking poll released on Wednesday, the same advantage the Democratic presidential nominee held before an FBI announcement that reignited the controversy about her email practices. The Oct. 28-Nov. 1 opinion poll was conducted almost entirely after FBI Director James Comey notified Congress last Friday his agency would examine newly discovered emails that might pertain to Clinton's use of a private email server while she was secretary of state.



WINNERS! 

Congrats to the Chicago Cubs!

Trump vs. Clinton

Clinton emails. Trump admitting sexual assault. 
Clinton emails. Trump charity fraud. 
Clinton emails. Trump calls for nuclear proliferation. 
Clinton emails. Trump calls for national stop and frisk. 
Clinton emails. Trump violates trade embargo with Cuba. 
Clinton emails. Trump sued over Trump U fraud. 
Clinton emails. Trump bribes DA. 
Clinton emails. Trump doesn't pay taxes for 20 years. 
Clinton emails. Trump employs campaign manager involved in illegal corruption with Russia. Clinton emails. Trump calls for ban of an entire religion from entering US. 
Clinton emails. Trump lied about support for Iraq War over and over in debate. 
Clinton emails. Trump in court for rape of a minor. 
Clinton emails. Trump unaware of Russia's Crimea occupation. 
Clinton emails. Trump unaware of situation in Syria. 
Clinton emails. Trump penalized for racist housing discrimination. 
Clinton emails. Trump files for bankruptcy 6 times. 
Clinton emails. Trump goes 0-3 in debates by showing scant knowledge of world politics. 
Clinton emails. Trump slams people for being POWs. 
Clinton emails. Trump calls mexicans rapists. 
Clinton emails. Trump questions judge's integrity because of parent's heritage. 
Clinton emails. Trump deletes emails involved in casino scandal. 
Clinton emails. Trump commits insurance fraud after florida hurricane. 
Clinton emails. Trump has dozens of assault victims and witnesses come forward with allegations of abuse. 
Clinton emails. Trump attacks former Ms America for being overweight. 
Clinton emails. Trump tweets about sex tapes at 3am. 
Clinton emails. Trump calls for US citizens to be sent to Gitmo. 
Clinton emails. Trump calls for more extreme forms of torture to be used. 
Clinton emails. Trump asks why cant we use our nukes if we have them. 
Clinton emails. Trump calls for offensive bombing attack on sovereign nations because someone gave the middle finger.
Clinton emails. Trump calls to kill women and children of suspected terrorists. 
Clinton emails. Trump says women should be punished for having abortions. 
Clinton emails. Trump makes fun of disabled people.
Clinton emails. Trump calls for end of freedom of the press.
Clinton emails. Trump calls global warming a Chinese hoax. 
Clinton emails. Trump praises Putin and Kim Jong Un's strong leadership. 
Clinton emails. Trump openly admits to not paying his employees during debate. 
Clinton emails. Trump calls Obama an illegitimate noncitizen hundreds of times over 7 years. 
Clinton emails. Trump uses campaign donations to enrich his own businesses. 
Clinton emails. Trump says Ted Cruz involved in JFK assassination unironically citing National Enquirer. 
Clinton emails. Trump says laziness is an inherent trait in black people. 
Clinton emails."

Florida: 28% of Registered Republicans Have Voted For Hillary Clinton In Early Voting

BREAKING… 

 As...reported [last night] on the Lawrence O’Donnell show, a College of William & Mary-TargetSmart poll, which will be released in full [Wednesday], shows Hillary Clinton has an 8 point lead in Florida. 

Interestingly, according to this poll, 28% of registered Republicans have voted for Hillary. Trump in contrast, is winning only 6% of registered Democrats. 

There is about an equal number of Democrats to Republicans who have voted but it is the crossover Republicans that are giving Hillary the wide lead. 

 Florida is a make or break state for Trump. It is impossible for him to win without Florida.




Reuters:
Tue Nov 1, 2016 | 6:40pm EDT
Moody's Analytics election model predicts Clinton win


 Low gas prices and President Barack Obama's high approval ratings are key factors that favor Democrat Hillary Clinton winning the White House in next week's election, according to a model from Moody's Analytics that has accurately predicted the last nine U.S. presidential contests. 

Clinton is forecast to pick up 332 Electoral College votes against 206 for Republican Donald Trump, Moody's Analytics predicted on Tuesday in the final update of its model before Election Day on Nov. 8. That would match Obama's margin of victory over Republican challenger Mitt Romney in 2012. 

The Reuters-Ipsos States of the Nation project also predicts a Clinton win, with a 95 percent probability of her winning at least 278 electoral votes. 

A candidate needs to win at least 270 electoral votes to be elected president. The Moody's Analytics model is based on a combination of state-level economic conditions and political history, and has correctly called the outcome of each presidential election since Republican Ronald Reagan unseated Democrat Jimmy Carter in 1980. 

 Rather than focus on the individual candidates in a race, the model instead centers on whether current economic and political conditions favor the incumbent party in the White House. This year those factors point to Clinton becoming the 45th U.S. president.


ATTENTION LIBERTARIANS:

Libertarian Vice Presidential candidate, Bill Weld, praised Hillary Clinton on Rachel Maddow's show last night and said she is honest and would make a fine president:

From USAToday:

"For Clinton, on the other hand, he had nothing but kind words. This was a clear break with his running mate, Gary Johnson, who has attacked both candidates. 

"I've known her for 40 years. I've worked with her. I know her well, professionally," Weld said. "I know her well personally. I know her to be a person of high moral character, a reliable person and an honest person, however so much Mr. Trump may rant and rave to the contrary. So, I'm happy to say that, and people can make their own choices."

Trump Supporters Intimidate Hillary Voters at West Palm Beach

Watch the video in the link below -- Trump's gift to America.


YOUR MODERN REPUBLITRUMP PARTY:

Voter Intimidation

West Palm Beach Trump Supporters Use Bullhorns, Scream at Clinton Supporters Outside Poll 

Supporters of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump continue to gather in front of the West Palm Beach, Florida, supervisor of elections’ office and shout at Hillary Clinton supporters and voters through bullhorns as they use the early voting location, videos show. 

 “How many Syrian refugees, Muslim refugees, are you taking into your home?” yelled one Trump supporter in a video filmed Sunday afternoon at Clinton supporters across a parking lot. 

Later she said, “You hypocrites! Separate the people! Over here we have the LGBT, over here we have the blacks, and then over here we have the Hispanics. But I’m going to tell you something, the hard working American people that served in the armed forces support Donald Trump!”


November 01, 2016, 03:19 pm

Clinton raises more than $11M in wake of FBI letter

A Reminder...

to all the Clinton haters who call her the most corrupt candidate for the presidency in the history of America:



Donald Trump due in court after Election Day on child rape and racketeering charges



Think about that. 

When was the last time Americans were poised to vote for a candidate who is facing child rape and racketeering charges?

But look over there!  Emails! 


"Donald Trump would like voters to focus on the FBI’s continuing investigation of Hillary Clinton’s email server — but instead questions about his own legal troubles have been raised again. 

 Author Salman Rushdie reminded voters that Trump will stand trial later this month in a racketeering lawsuit and then again next month as part of a lawsuit filed by a woman who claims the Republican presidential nominee raped her when she was 13 years old. “He is a sexual predator, hasn’t released his tax returns, and has used his foundation’s money to pay his legal fees,” 

Rushdie posted Sunday on his Facebook page. “He has abused the family of a war hero and … oh, but let’s talk about some emails Hillary didn’t send from someone else’s computer, that weren’t a crime anyway, because that’s how to choose a president. "

Come on, America. Focus.”








Meanwhile, continuing with his habit of stiffing people who do work for him, Trump is refusing to pay a pollster hired by his campaign in May:


Donald Trump is stiffing the first pollster his presidential campaign hired – to the tune of almost $1 million.FEC filings show that the Trump campaign is disputing a payment of more than $766,700 to pollster Tony Fabrizio's firm, as the Washington Post reported Monday afternoon. The Trump campaign also owes Fabrizio another payment of $55,300, which the campaign is not disputing, according to filings. 


And this:


 Trump policy staffers quit after not being paid

THE DEPLORABLE GOOPERS:

 (From a U.S. Senator!): 

Sen. Richard Burr privately mused over the weekend that gun owners may want to put a "bullseye" on Hillary Clinton, according to audio obtained by CNN. 

The North Carolina Republican, locked in a tight race for reelection, quipped that as he walked into a gun shop "nothing made me feel better" than seeing a magazine about rifles "with a picture of Hillary Clinton on the front of it." 

 "I was a little bit shocked at that -- it didn't have a bullseye on it," he said Saturday to GOP volunteers, prompting laughter from the crowd in Mooresville, North Carolina. 

"But on the bottom right (of the magazine), it had everybody for federal office in this particular state that they should vote for. So let me assure you, there's an army of support out there right now for our candidates."

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.