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Trump Busted For Huge Lie About Helping To Build The Vietnam War Memorial
Trump Busted For Huge Lie About Helping To Build The Vietnam War Memorial
By Jason Easley on Sat, Jul 30th, 2016 at 3:26 pm
Donald Trump is claiming that he helped to build the Vietnam War Memorial, but a newspaper account from 1984 reveals that Trump is lying.
Кандидат в президенты США Дональд Трамп в случае победы на выборах будет ограничен в своих действиях институтами государственной власти. По этой причине он не сможет реализовать в полной мере свой "популизм гитлеровского типа". Такое мнение в комментарии "Обозревателю" высказал экс-советник посольства Украины в США, ученый-американист, доктор исторических наук Александр Потехин.
"Думаю, Трамп не станет президентом", — заявил он.
В то же время эксперт объяснил: "Трамп ведет предвыборную кампанию, в которой есть свои законы. Его задача – получить номинацию в качестве кандидата от Республиканской партии на президентских выборах. И он, используя нетрадиционные и, в общем и целом, запрещенные в американской политической жизни приемы, ведет эту борьбу. Сейчас это популизм гитлеровского типа. Что я имею в виду? Рабочим Гитлер обещал, что придушит капиталистов, капиталистам он обещал, что он придушит рабочих. А во всем виноваты евреи. Трамп – мошенник, это его основное занятие".
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Trump Says Taking Down Anti-Semitic Tweet Was A Mistake: ‘Should Have Left It Up’
UPDATE: After Donald Trump's supporters virulently denied
the shape of the star had anything to do with the Star of David,
internet sleuths have found that the internet graphic the
Trumpster tweeted out actually came from a neo-Nazi/white
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At the center of the "rigged economy," Trump argues, are "powerful corporations, media elites and political dynasties" and his likely general election opponent, Hillary Clinton.
Trump vs. the global elite
Getty
By Vicki Needham - 07/03/16 06:00 AM EDT
Donald Trump has found a new enemy in his quest for the White House: the global elite.
In a series of economic speeches, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee has railed against the forces of globalization, arguing that changes in the economy have betrayed workers and wiped out the middle class.
"Hillary Clinton and her friends in global finance want to scare America into thinking small — and they want to scare the American people out of voting for a better future," Trump said Tuesday in a speech near Pittsburgh.
“I want you to imagine how much better our future can be if we declare independence from the elites who've led us to one financial and foreign policy disaster after another.”
Trump’s rhetoric is unusual for a presumptive Republican nominee for president, placing him in direct conflict with Washington business groups who have traditionally been allies of the GOP.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which doesn’t endorse presidential candidates, unloaded on Trump during the jobs speech, rebutting him point by point on his criticism of trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
In an op-ed in The Washington Post, the Chamber’s President and CEO, Thomas Donohue, said both Clinton and Trump are wrong on trade.
“Let’s get one thing straight — ripping up our trade agreements, as presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump suggests, and raising a tariff wall around the U.S. economy wouldn’t bring those jobs home,” Donohue wrote.
“Instead, it would decimate millions of high-wage American jobs and slam families trying to make ends meet.”
Trump has treated such criticism as validation of his argument that business leaders are selling out American interests.
“The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is totally controlled by the special interest groups,” Trump said in defense of his plan to possibly pull the United States out of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the TPP.
“They want to have TPP, one of the worst deals, it will be the worst deal since NAFTA,” Trump said.
Trump tweeted that the Chamber should fight harder for the American workers because “China, and many others, are taking advantage of the U.S. with our terrible trade pacts.”
Tony Fratto, a former George W. Bush administration official and head of Hamilton Place Strategies who has advised businesses on trade, called Trump’s attacks “destructive” and “wrong-headed."
“To trash TPP the way he does is really upsetting,” Fratto said.
“He’s not serious at all, and he’s only interested in selling in false promises,” he added.
Kim Jong-un backs Donald Trump for president urging US voters to reject 'dull Hillary'
The country’s state media has praised the billionaire describing him as a “wise politician” and “far-sighted candidate” who could help unify the Korean peninsula.
In an editorial published by DPRK it said “there are many positive aspects to Trump’s ‘inflammatory policies".
Th piece also dismissed Hillary Clinton , Trump's likely Democrat rival in the presidential race, calling her "dull" and warning that she hopes to use the "Iranian model to resolve nuclear issues on the Korean Peninsula.”
Lisa Bloom Legal analyst for NBC News and Avvo, attorney and bestselling author
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Yet Another GOP Senator Goes #NeverTrump, Or At Least Pretty Darn Close
“Today, I’m opposed to his campaign,” said Sen. Dean Heller of Nevada. “He did a lot of damage. It’s very difficult for him, as far as I’m concerned, to recover from his previous comments. I’ll give him a chance, but at this point, I have no intentions of voting for him.”
Trump skepticism hardens in GOP
“Hey look, Steve, I get it. You want me to endorse Trump,” Lee (R-Utah) told NewsMaxTV host Steve Malzberg. “We can get into that if you want. We can get into the fact that he accused my best friend’s father of conspiring to kill JFK. We can go through the fact that he’s made statements that some have identified correctly as religiously intolerant. We can get into the fact that he’s wildly unpopular in my state, in part because my state consists of people who are members of a religious minority church. A people who were ordered exterminated by the governor of Missouri in 1838. And, statements like that make them nervous.”
Malzberg pushed back, suggesting that the FBI’s investigation of Hillary Clinton and her charity’s connections to foreign governments should far outweigh any issues with Trump.
The host pointed specifically to Trump’s insinuation that Sen. Ted Cruz’s father was somehow involved in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy as relatively trivial in comparison to Clinton’s scandals, but Lee didn’t see it that way.
“Right, right. He said that. He actually said that. He said that without any scintilla, without a scintilla of evidence. Now that concerns me,” Lee said. “Again I hope I can get over this, because I can’t vote for Hillary. I know there’s no possibility of that. What I am saying is that Donald Trump can still get a lot of votes from a lot of conservatives like me, but I would like some assurances on where he’s going to stand his ground. I’d like some assurances that he’s going to be a vigorous defender for the U.S. Constitution.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” Lee continued. “But that is not an unreasonable demand.”
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Bush World goes for Clinton, but will a former president?
Hank Paulson. Richard Armitage. Brent Scowcroft.
They represent the cadre of Bush World alums who have openly endorsed Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump for president and say they will be choosing “country over party” this fall.
A handful of other top political appointees and aides from the George W. Bush and George H.W. Bush administrations are expected to buck their party and back Clinton in the coming months amid growing anxiety about what Trump might mean for fiscal policy and national security if he wins the White House.
“I live in D.C. so my vote is kind of irrelevant. But if I was the last vote, if my vote was going to make a difference, I’d prefer to have Hillary Clinton in the White House than Donald Trump,” Tony Fratto, a former deputy assistant and deputy press secretary to President George W. Bush, told The Hill.
“I think that’s an easy call. I think it’s really easy: [Trump] is not fit for office,” Fratto added.
Many other former Bush officials will privately vote for Clinton this fall, even if they don’t publicly broadcast it in a speech, op-ed or tweet.
“For me, the answer is no. I can’t support Trump. He has proven he has very little ability to learn. I don’t care if we were on Day One, but now we’re on Day 365 and he doesn’t seem to know much,” said another top George W. Bush appointee who requested anonymity to speak candidly about the nominee.
“I will probably hold my nose and vote for Hillary Clinton with no joy or enthusiasm.”
It’s unclear if anyone in the immediate Bush dynasty will cast a vote for Clinton.
The 41st and 43rd presidents and Jeb Bush, Trump’s one-time primary foe, all have taken the unprecedented step of declining to endorse the presumptive GOP nominee. And they’re joining the long list of establishment Republicans who are skipping the nominating convention in Cleveland next month.
For the Bush clan, it’s become personal.
Trump blamed George W. Bush for failing to keep the country safe because the 9/11 attacks happened on his watch.
And during a raucous campaign debate in February, Trump accused Bush of deliberately mislead the public about weapons of mass destruction to boost support for the U.S. invasion of Iraq. In 2008, the Manhattan billionaire had called for Bush to be impeached over his handling of the war.
“Obviously, the war in Iraq was a big, fat mistake, all right?” Trump roared at the debate in South Carolina. “They lied. They said there were weapons of mass destruction. There were none, and they knew there were none.”
The Bushes could deal with Trump taunting Jeb as “low energy” on the campaign trail, but they believe his attacks on Bush 43 crossed the line.
“This was a very personal attack on the president, that he lied to start a war with Iraq. [Trump] has the exact same view as MoveOn.org. That’s his view,” Fratto said.
The Bushes “are troubled by a guy who has really bizarre conspiracy theories as our party’s nominee,” Fratto said.
Spokesman Jim McGrath said George H.W. and Barbara Bush backed their son, Jeb, in the primary but are now “letting the process play out without commenting or intervening.”
It’s also worth noting that the elder Bush had become extremely close with President Bill Clinton, even though they had once been bitter political foes.
So far, the group of pro-Hillary Republicans is small but comprised of some big names.
Paulson, the former Treasury secretary who oversaw the financial bailout at the end of the President George W. Bush’s administration, is the highest-ranking former GOP official to back Clinton over Trump.
“The GOP, in putting Trump at the top of the ticket, is endorsing a brand of populism rooted in ignorance, prejudice, fear and isolationism,” Paulson wrote in a scathing op-ed in The Washington Post. “Enough is enough. It’s time to put country before party and say it together: Never Trump.”
Then there’s Armitage, George W. Bush’s deputy secretary of State and a former Reagan appointee, who told Politico that Trump “doesn’t appear to be a Republican” or want to learn about policy issues.
Scowcroft, national security adviser to Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush, heaped praise on Clinton, saying the former secretary of State, senator and first lady has the “wisdom and experience to lead our country at this critical time.”
GOP strategist Steve Schmidt, a White House aide to George W. Bush who later ran Sen. John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign, hasn’t endorsed Clinton. But he’s previously said there will be a concerted effort by the Clinton campaign to recruit top Republican national security and foreign policy officials who align with her more hawkish positions.
That could include former Secretary of State Colin Powell, former CIA Director David Petraeus, and retired General Ray Odierno. Fratto said it makes sense that the pro-Hillary GOP voices have served in the top rungs of government, where they lived through things like the 2008 financial crisis and 9/11 terrorist attacks.
“Anyone who spent time in and around the White House, especially on national security issues, is appropriately frightened at the idea that you would put that responsibility and authority in the hands of Trump,” Fratto said. “You know how dangerous it would be to have someone that erratic and extreme heading up American policy?”
Of course, there are also top Bush officials who’ve thrown their support behind Trump.
George W. Bush’s vice president, Dick Cheney, said he always supports the GOP nominee. Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who launched the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq under Bush 43, called Trump a “known unknown” but is endorsing him anyway because Clinton is “unacceptable.”
Kevin Kellems, a top aide to both Cheney and Rumsfeld, joined the Trump campaign this month to help manage campaign surrogates.
But the vast majority of Bush Republicans are still grappling with the question of whom to vote for in November.
Tim Miller, the former top spokesman for Jeb Bush’s presidential campaign, went on to become a leading voice in the “Never Trump” movement. But he can’t bring himself to vote for Clinton either.
“I literally wrote a book about how terrible she is,” said Miller, who previously ran the anti-Clinton PAC called America Rising. “That said, Trump is a threat to our party and our republic, so my focus is on stopping him.
“I do think 43 and Jeb have carried themselves with dignity and have a great appreciation for the office,” Miller continued, “and made very clear cases for why Trump does not meet that standard.”
A close friend of Jeb Bush, GOP strategist Ana Navarro has become one of the fiercest critics of Trump on cable TV. But with more than four months to go until Election Day, she said she’s also not yet ready for Hillary.
“Everyone has to wrestle with the question of what supporting Trump means vis-a-vis loyalty to the Republican Party and to America. It's a process. People are coming to different conclusions,” Navarro said. “Right now, Trump has definitely lost my vote. No turning back. That bridge is burnt.
Still, Navarro added: “Hillary has not earned my vote.”
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"There's an old adage about a vat of wine standing next to a vat of sewage. Add a cup of wine to the sewage, and it is still sewage. But add a cup of sewage to the wine, and it is no longer wine but sewage. Is this what Donald Trump has
done to our politics?"
— Martha Bayles, in the Claremont Review of Books
Yes, as Republicans should remember when their convention opens in less than a month, on the one-year anniversary of Donald Trump's disparagement of John McCain as unheroic because he was "captured." McCain was captured (with a broken leg and two broken arms) when North Vietnamese shot down his plane. He chose extra years of torture, refusing to leave when his torturers wanted to release him because he was an admiral's son.
Trump says, however, that he, too, has been "very brave" by ignoring the danger of venereal disease during his sexual adventures: "It is a dangerous world out there — it's scary, like Vietnam. Sort of like the Vietnam era. It is my personal Vietnam, I feel like a great and very brave soldier." He was serious; irony is not in this narcissist's repertoire. And there is a reason Britain's staid Economist magazine refers to Trump's "look of a roue gone to seed."
"Every republic," writes Charles Kesler, professor of government at Claremont McKenna College, "eventually faces what might be called the Weimar problem." It arrives when a nation's civic culture has become so debased that the nation no longer has "the virtues necessary to sustain republican government." Do not dwell on what came after the Weimar Republic. But do consider the sufficiency of virtue that the Constitution's framers presupposed.
Kesler recalls that James Madison's notes on the Constitutional Convention contain this from the July 17, 1787, debate on the proposal to have presidents chosen by Congress: Rather than making the president a "creature of the legislature," Gouverneur Morris favored election by the people. Rejecting the criticism that the people will be "uninformed," he said: "They will never fail to prefer some man of distinguished character or services; some man of continental reputation."
In Trump, Republicans have someone whose reputation is continental only in being broadly known. He illustrates Daniel Boorstin's definition of a celebrity as someone well-known for his well-knownness. It will be wonderful if Trump tries to translate notoriety into fulfillment of his vow — as carefully considered as anything else about his candidacy — to carry New York and California. He should be taunted into putting his meager campaign funds where his ample mouth is. Every dime or day he squanders on those states will contribute to a redemptive outcome, a defeat so humiliating — so continental — that even Republicans will be edified by it.
Trump's campaign has less cash ($1.3 million) than some congressional candidates have, so Republican donors have never been more important than they are at this moment. They can save their party by not aiding its nominee.
Events already have called his bluff about funding himself and thereby being uniquely his own man. His wealth is insufficient. Only he knows what he is hiding by being the first presidential nominee in two generations not to release his tax returns. It is reasonable to assume that the returns would refute many of his assertions about his net worth, his charitableness and his supposed business wizardry. They might also reveal some awkwardly small tax payments.
If his fear of speculation about his secrecy becomes greater than his fear of embarrassment from what he is being secretive about, he will release the returns. He should attach to them a copy of his University of Pennsylvania transcript, to confirm his claim that he got the "highest grades possible." There are skeptics.
Various Republican moral contortionists continue their semantic somersaults about "supporting" but not "endorsing" Trump. In Cleveland, they will point him toward the highest elective office in a country they profess to love but that he calls "a hellhole." When asked in a 1990 Playboy interview about his historical role models, he mentioned Winston Churchill but enthused about others who led "the ultimate life":
"I've always thought that Louis B. Mayer led the ultimate life, that Flo Ziegfeld led the ultimate life, that men like Darryl Zanuck and Harry Cohn did some creative and beautiful things. The ultimate job for me would have been running MGM in the '30s and '40s — pre-television." Yes, that job, not the one he seeks.
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A bit about Larry Pressler, the three term Republican Senator who has endorsed Hillary Clinton for President, which speaks volumes about this man's integrity:
"Thanks to the FBI's undercover "sting" operation, there now exists incontrovertible evidence that one senator would not be bought. Preserved among the videotape footage that may be used as bribery evidence against a number of members of Congress, there is a special moment in which Sen. Larry Pressler (R-SD) tells the undercover agents, in effect, to take their sting and stick it. Pressler, according to law enforcement sources was the one approached member of Congress who flatly refused to consider financial favors in exchange for legislative favors, as suggested by undercover agents posing as Arabs. At the time he said he was not aware that he was doing anything quite so heroic." - from "Sen. Pressler: He Spurned the 'Arabs'," in the Washington Post, February 4, 1980"
In an over-all review of the Abscam cases, Judge J. Pratt had the highest praise for Senator Pressler. "Pressler, particularly, acted as citizens have a right to expect their elected representatives to act. He showed a clear awareness of the line between proper and improper conduct, and despite his confessed need for campaign money, and despite the additional attractiveness to him of the payment offered, he nevertheless refused to cross into impropriety." - "Excerpts from Ruling by Federal Judge Upholding the ABSCAM Convictions," in the New York Times, July 25, 1981.
Brent Scowcroft, the national security advisor to President George H.W. Bush and one of the leading figures of the Republican national security establishment, endorsed Hillary Clinton for president Wednesday.
His backing follows that of another prominent Republican in national security circles. Richard Armitage, who served in the State and Defense Departments under George W. Bush and President Ronald Reagan, announced last week that he will vote for Clinton over Trump.
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Donald Trump’s Money Is A Myth – Will He Bankrupt the RNC Too?
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[A mild, nuanced conservative analysis on National Review]
["There is a simple formula for descriptions of Donald Trump: add together a qualification, a hyphen, and the word “fascist.” The sum may be crypto-fascist, neo-fascist, latent fascist, proto-fascist, or American-variety fascist—one of that kind, all the same. Future political scientists will analyze (let us hope in amused retrospect, rather than in exile in New Zealand or Alberta) the precise elements of Poujadisme, Peronism and Huck Finn’s Pap that compound in Trump’s “ideology.” But his personality and his program belong exclusively to the same dark strain of modern politics: an incoherent program of national revenge led by a strongman; a contempt for parliamentary government and procedures; an insistence that the existing, democratically elected government, whether Léon Blum’s or Barack Obama’s, is in league with evil outsiders and has been secretly trying to undermine the nation; a hysterical militarism designed to no particular end than the sheer spectacle of strength; an equally hysterical sense of beleaguerment and victimization; and a supposed suspicion of big capitalism entirely reconciled to the worship of wealth and “success.” It is always alike, and always leads inexorably to the same place: failure, met not by self-correction but by an inflation of the original program of grievances, and so then on to catastrophe. The idea that it can be bounded in by honest conservatives in a Cabinet or restrained by normal constitutional limits is, to put it mildly, unsupported by history."]
["Fascism is about the most powerful epithet one can use -- but it fits with Donald Trump.
A historian explains why."]
["Since World War II, the ideology he represents has usually lived in dark corners, and we don’t even have a name for it anymore. The right name, the correct name, the historically accurate name, is fascism. I don’t use that word as an insult only. It is accurate."]
J.K. Rowling: Trump 'fascist in all but name'
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"I understand that Americans are angry and frustrated but we do not need someone in the Oval Office who mirrors and inflames our anger and frustration" (George W. Bush)
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Thursday, June 16
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Trump's unfavorables spike in poll
By Jesse Byrnes
AddThis Sharing Buttons
Getty Images
Donald Trump is viewed unfavorably by 7 in 10 Americans in a new national poll.
Seventy percent of U.S. adults have an unfavorable view of the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, according to the ABC News/Washington Post poll released Wednesday, a 10-point increase since last month.
That's his highest unfavorable rating since the launch of his presidential campaign and is close to Trump's highest-ever unfavorable rating in the poll, 71 percent, from May 2015. Since then it's hovered closer to 60 percent and had fallen toward the end of the GOP primary season.
Hillary Clinton is also viewed unfavorably by a majority of Americans, 55 percent, a new high in the poll for her. Forty-three percent view her favorably.
Those numbers come shortly after Clinton won enough delegates to become the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. Still, national polls asking voters whom they plan to support in November have shown Clinton pulling ahead.
Clinton has higher favorability among members of her party than Trump does among his in the ABC poll: 75 percent of Democrats view Clinton favorably, and 65 percent of Republicans view Trump favorably.
Independents, which both candidates are seeking to win over, are tepid on both: 68 percent hold unfavorable views of Trump, and 63 percent hold unfavorable views of Clinton.
Republican leaders roundly criticized Trump last week after he accused a judge of being biased because of his Mexican heritage, and the businessman has this week feuded with President Obama, accusing him of prioritizing the nation's enemies over its allies.
The survey of 1,000 U.S. adults was conducted June 8–12 via landlines and cellphones with an overall margin of error of 3.5 percentage points.
Republican donor Meg Whitman, the high-profile Hewlett PackardEnterprise president and CEO, indicated at Mitt Romney's closed-door summit on Friday that she would likely be supporting Hillary Clinton in November, according to multiple sources who were in the room.
High-Profile GOP Donor Meg Whitman Indicates She Is Likely to Support Hillary Clinton
Compares Donald To Hitler, Mussolini...
Republican donor Meg Whitman, the high-profile Hewlett PackardEnterprise president and CEO, indicated at Mitt Romney's closed-door summit on Friday that she would likely be supporting Hillary Clinton in November, according to multiple sources who were in the room.
Team Hillary Clinton v. Team Donald Trump Fundraising (Through April)
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Despite His Pledge of Support, Rubio Still Considers Trump “Unfit”
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Is Donald Trump Really A Perennial Deadbeat And Bully?
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House Hispanics call on Ryan to withdraw Trump endorsement
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Fearing Trump, greens run to Clinton
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Today's Trump Apocalypse Watch: Nothing but Bad News for Donald
Donald Trump’s bad week just got worse: His first endorsed candidate got destroyed
Donald Trump’s bad week just got worse: His first endorsed candidate got de...
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THE END IS NIGH: Sanders Puts Affairs In Order, Promises To Work With Hillary To Stop Trump
Senator Bernie Sanders Met With President Obama Today And Held A Press Conference Afterward Where He Definitely Sounded Like He Is Making Peace With Hillary's Nomination. He Still Hasn't Said He's Going To Drop Out, But He Obviously Knows The Situation. Here's The Video, From PBS:
Needless to say I am going to do everything in my power, and I will work as hard as I can, to make sure that Donald Trump does not become president of hte united states. I will of course be competing in the D.C. primary, which will be held on next Tuesday. This is the last primary of the Democratic nominating process. The major point that I will be making to the citizens of the District of Columbia is that I am strongly in favor of D.C. statehood.
Senator Sanders also says he is looking forward to the full counting of votes in California, "which I suspect," he says, "will show a much closer vote than the current vote tally." He also explains that he spoke with Clinton on Tuesday.
I spoke briefly to Secretary Clinton on Tuesday night, and I congratulated her on her very strong campaign. I look forward to meeting with her in the near future to see how we can work together to defeat Donald Trump and to create a government that represents all of us and not just the one percent.
Surely the President and Secretary Clinton had hoped for a concession, as Leon noted earlier, but Bernie is doing exactly what his voters want. With only a few days left until the very last vote, he's wringing every single bit of mileage out of this as he can. Every additional vote, every minute more of his dedicated base feeling that the fight goes on is one more ounce of power, one more fork he brings to the supper table when the food is on.
But he didn't in any way indicate a fight going on. There's been a lot of talk about trying to sway the super delegates and really push for a win. That was not there in his remarks. It was all about coming together, finishing the race, and defeating Trump. That's the writing on the wall, folks.
He's exiting, but he's doing it the best way he can, and the only way his fans might allow it. Hillary better hope it works.
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KOCH SHUNS TRUMP: 'TAKING COUNTRY IN
WRONG DIRECTION'
“It’s either racist or it’s stereotyping,” Koch said of Trump’s comments. “It’s unacceptable, and it’s taking the country in the wrong direction.”
Asked whether he thought Trump was fit to be president, Koch said: “I don’t know the answer to that.”
Koch said it would require a major shift in tone and policy for him to back Trump. Koch said he would need to be convinced that Trump supported his top causes “in a way ... wasn’t just hype,” ticking off as conditions: support for free trade, "free speech," eliminating “corporate welfare” and “trying to find common ground with people.”
Is that likely to happen? “No,” Koch said. “But we want to be open.”
“It’s either racist or it’s stereotyping,” Koch said of Trump’s comments. “It’s unacceptable, and it’s taking the country in the wrong direction.”
Asked whether he thought Trump was fit to be president, Koch said: “I don’t know the answer to that.”
Koch said it would require a major shift in tone and policy for him to back Trump. Koch said he would need to be convinced that Trump supported his top causes “in a way ... wasn’t just hype,” ticking off as conditions: support for free trade, "free speech," eliminating “corporate welfare” and “trying to find common ground with people.”
Is that likely to happen? “No,” Koch said. “But we want to be open.”
GOP Senators Finally Starting To Realize Their Party Nominated A Total Racist
A lot of people had the hope that Donald Trump would reform his ways after winning the Primary. I won’t say that was a reasonable hope, but I don’t begrudge anyone for holding it. We all have our moments of cockeyed optimism.
There was definitely a reason you could believe that Trump was just cynically playing to right-wing stereotypes in order to win the primary, and that when he pivoted to the general, he would become more refined and less of an uncouth jackass.
By now, even the most cockeyed optimist on earth must realize that dream is well and thoroughly dead. If Trump’s braying performance at his press conference last week did not convince you, his public meltdown over the judge assigned to his Trump University case has convinced all reasonable people: Trump is beyond control. The way he acted in the primary was not an act. This is really how he is, and he will not change.
The Curiel fracas has been without a doubt, the worst of his campaign, as even Newt Gingrich has acknowledged. Trump’s behavior and rhetoric have been ugly and getting progressively worse. While left wing blogs have been calling Trump a racist for months, pretty much the entire media has now joined the chorus, and for good reason: there is no non-racist way to spin Trump’s remarks. Calling them anything else is a disservice to the word racism.
The second he uttered them, prominent Republicans who jumped on the Trump train in a fit of optimism began to signal Trump that he was in trouble. First Paul Ryan rebuked him, unprompted, on a radio show. Then Mitch McConnell refused to say that the remarks were not racist and said that he disagreed with them as strongly as possible. Newt Gingrich, who has been basically prostrate before Trump for months, roused his critical thinking skills to claim that Trump’s remarks were “inexcusable.”
None of this moved Trump in the slightest. In fact, in his interview with John Dickerson, he doubled down and suggested that Curiel (who was born in this country to two United States citizens) was not like the Mexicans who came here legally, all of whom love Trump.
So now here you are. The cat is out of the bag. Trump has said it, and he’s not taking it back. And you have to know by now that this will not be nearly the only damaging thing he will say between now and November. He’s going to be every bit as offensive – if not more so – than he was in the primary. And no amount of begging and pleading on your part will stop that.
This is what it means if you stand behind him even after this weekend. You know Trump’s remarks display clear and open bigotry towards those of Mexican heritage – not one of you can say they don’t with a straight face. If you stand behind him now, you are saying to everyone that you know Trump is a racist but you still stand behind him because that’s what being a good Republican requires.
Now, you tell me: how do you expect any Hispanic person who sees the Republican party lining up behind this stance ever voting for a Republican again? “Hey, if our nominee hates you because of who your parents are, we will still support him – all of us, to a man. Sorry.”
Contrary to what you might have been told by people who get rich off of selling books to racist idiots, the Hispanic share of the vote will continue to increase in this country even if illegal immigration is ended tomorrow. And by most estimates, it will be at least 13% of the electorate in 2016. The Republican party can at least theoretically survive if we win 30-40% of the Hispanic vote. If the Hispanic vote starts to look like the black vote (90/10 Democrat or worse), and is motivated to turn out by the threat of overt racist attack from the Party of Trump, then we might well be looking at a scenario where almost 30% of the population splits 90/10 for the Democrats. In other words, a scenario where the Republican Presidential candidate is 25% in the hole before a single white person casts a vote.
And by the way, you know who else doesn’t like people who pal around with racists? A whole lot of white people. Myself included.
No Republican will ever be elected President again. We’ll be lucky to maintain 30 seats in the Senate and 200 in the House. Huge numbers of you will be washed away in the tide, and those who remain will have little or no influence over anything.
Probably, it’s already too late to do anything about any of this. You all had your chance and you refused to rally behind Ted Cruz, the only person with a shot at stopping Trump. So it’s not really my problem. But the one and only chance you have is to make it crystal clear that Trump is running for President alone, without the blessing of literally any elected Republican. Treat him as a one time aberration who is not with you. But the window of opportunity on having a genuine change of heart on Trump is rapidly closing. If you wait until Trump is already behind 15-20% in the polls (and he is heading there), it will ring false and hollow and a generation will be gone forever.
Your choice. Maybe that’s what needs to happen, after all.
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Too Sick to Lead: The Lethal Personality Disorder of Donald Trump
Too Sick to Lead: The Lethal Personality Disorder of Donald Trump
/.../In 1991, Sue Carswell, a reporter for People, experienced a phenomenon familiar to her peers: calls from supposed PR guys named “John Miller” or “John Barron”, gratuitously boasting about Trump’s wealth, business success and romantic prowess. Most bizarre, all agreed, was that the caller spoke and sounded exactly like Trump himself. But this particular call was immortalized on tape.
As others had, Carswell recognized the distinctive voice and accent. Distinctive, too, was the callousness and narcissism of an abysmal — and unbalanced — human being.
Trump was 44 then, and living with his future second wife Marla Maples. Nonetheless, his boastful “representative” shared for public consumption that “Trump” had “three other girlfriends”, detailing at length his alleged romance with Nicholas Sarkozy’s future wife Carla Bruni. But not all women were so lucky — for the benefit of People’s readers “Miller” described how Madonna stalked Trump at a charity ball before facing the ultimate devastation: “He’s got zero interest that night.”
But “Miller” could not stop over-sharing. Among the other women desperately seeking Donald, it turned out, was Kim Basinger. So at least for the moment, Carswell’s caller confided, Marla Maples was out of luck — Trump’s gift of a ring did not suggest that he would marry her. But Trump believed in “the marriage concept”, his alter ego added, making sure that People’s readers understood the stakes: “When he makes a decision, that will be a very lucky woman.”
Trump being Trump, Carswell also learned that “Trump” was doing “tremendously well financially.” On one level, this incredible performance evokes being trapped in a bar with a twenty-something blowhard of a salesman, whose braggadocio becomes more appalling and preposterous with every rum and Coke.
But here’s the thing which takes his performance from odious to pathological — Trump wanted a larger audience for his particular brand of self-aggrandizing swill, one in the millions, and was willing to assume a false identity to get it. It didn’t matter if he was lying; he didn’t care who got hurt. All that counted is what he needed in the moment.
Carswell played the tape for Maples who, after bursting into tears, confirmed that the voice was Trump’s. But the reporter need not have bothered .
Trump’s signature was in his words: gratuitously cruel, heedless of all but self, reckless in his lust for attention. Were he, say, Anthony Weiner, the call would have been another media-driven nail in the cross of his public career, fresh evidence of an emotional disorder which rendered him unfit to be a third-tier Congressman — let alone mayor of New York.
To meet his needs, Donald Trump wants us to make him president. To meet its own needs, the media — particularly cable news — is helping him.
It has been three weeks since this damning tape surfaced. The story vanished in a day. Confronted with the tape on Today, Trump told an obvious lie — “it was not me on the phone” — wrapped in his ineradicable narcissism : “I have many many people who are trying to imitate my voice and... you can imagine that... Let’s get on to more current subjects.”
The media complied.
But there is nothing more “current” or important than Donald Trump’s psychological fitness to be president. All the hyperventilation of the media — parsing his “positions”, pontificating on his “strategy” and intuition — is a poisonous form of the “political correctness” he otherwise deplores, normalizing the abnormal by shoehorning him into the usual analytic boxes. And what it yields is, in great part, rubbish.
There is only one organizing principle which makes sense of his wildly oscillating utterances and behavior — the clinical definition of narcissistic personality disorder.
The Mayo Clinic describes it as “a mental disorder in which people have an inflated sense of their own importance, a deep need for admiration and a lack of empathy for others.” This is bad enough in selecting a spouse or a friend. But when applied to a prospective president, the symptoms are disqualifying.
With Trump ever in mind, try these. An exaggerated sense of self-importance. An unwarranted belief in your own superiority. A preoccupation with fantasies of your own success, power and brilliance. A craving for constant admiration. A consuming sense of entitlement. An expectation of special favors and unquestioning compliance.
A penchant for exploiting or disparaging others. A total inability to recognize the needs of anyone else. An incapacity to see those you meet as separate human beings. An unreasoning fury at people you perceive as thwarting your wishes or desires. A tendency to act on impulse. A superficial charm deployed to disguise a gift for manipulation.
A need to always be right. A refusal to acknowledge error. An inability to tolerate criticism or critics. A compulsion to conform your ever-shifting sense of “reality” to satisfy your inner requirements . A tendency to lie so frequently and routinely that objective truth loses all meaning.
A belief that you are above the rules. An array of inconsistent statements and behaviors driven by your needs in the moment. An inability to assess the consequences of your actions in new or complex situations. In sum, a total incapacity to separate the world from your own psychodrama.
Recognize anyone?
Then how, his admirers say, do you account for Trump’s “success” in building a business and branding his persona? That’s simple enough: in some areas of life, at least to a point, narcissism and self-aggrandizement serve success. All that is required is a certain intelligence and a sense of how a lack of behavioral constraints can overwhelm more normal folk.
Thus Donald Trump. If your life’s work is building hotels and casinos, this pathology can work for you — especially if your dad has started you out with a few million dollars in chips. You can bully subcontractors, sue your enemies, and bury your misjudgments in a slew of bankruptcies and self-glorification. You can make Trump University sound like Harvard. You can use the media to create your own reality and sell it to the credulous. You can leverage your money to make your own rules.
The annals of business are filled with such people, some of whom wind up in jail, others of whom die rich. But however puissant they become in their chosen realm, their sickness of mind and spirit cannot ruin a country. That power is reserved for presidents.
Indeed, Trump’s rise simply swells his unwarranted belief that he can stride the world like a colossus — naked of judgment, knowledge, temperament or preparation. This reflects a fatal deficit in those who suffer this disorder — they cannot see themselves as they are.
To the contrary, their grandiosity is a defense against feelings of inadequacy too deep and painful to acknowledge. By the consensus of mental health experts, this emotional impairment has a last fatal ingredient — there is no cure. For a man like Donald Trump, life offers no lessons, no path forward save to continue as you have until, like Icarus, you fly too close to the sun.
This disability involves far more than a set of discrete character flaws, however grave, including those which suggest a lack of trustworthiness. We survived the dishonesty and paranoia of Richard Nixon, after all, albeit at considerable cost and only after forcing him from office.
But in many ways Nixon was well-equipped for the presidency, capable of navigating the larger world and understanding complex situations and people — as in China and its leaders. He did not reflexively substitute a grossly inflated sense of self for knowledge, strategy or preparation. His tragedy, and ours, was that his crippling inner wounds outstripped his proven strengths.
Donald Trump is altogether different — and infinitely more dangerous. He is afflicted with a comprehensive and profound character disorder which leaves no corner of his psyche whole. And this dictates — and explains — every aspect of his behavior.
Take his recourse to bullying and slander. “I’m a counterpuncher,” he rationalizes. “[I]’ve been responding to what they did to me.” Now we understand, Donald — your enemies made you do it.
Really? So Heidi Cruz made him ridicule her looks on Twitter? That handicapped reporter made him imitate his disabilities at a rally? His mockery of John Kasich’s table manners was payback for opposing him? And who can forget Marco Rubio sweat glands — “Little Marco” deserved it, after all, for standing in the way.
Or Megan Kelly, whose question about sexist behavior forced him to accuse her of menstrual moodiness. Or the Ricketts family, who he threatened with reprisal for funding his opposition. Or the Republican governor of New Mexico — an Hispanic woman — who he trashed for failing to appear with him.
Or any other Republican who won’t climb on his bandwagon. “That choker” Mitt Romney, a “stupid” man who “walks like a penguin.” Or Nikki Haley, or the long-since defeated Jeb Bush — both recent subjects of Trump’s gratuitous ridicule. And on and on — the list of enemies he must demean is infinite.
A recent example typifies his psychological imbalance. Speaking at a rally in San Diego, he tried to shame an otherwise obscure federal judge in the city, who is presiding over a lawsuit against Trump University. Trump called the Indiana-born judge a “Mexican,” a “hater of Donald Trump” and a “very hostile person” who had “railroaded” him. Heedless of his position or his audience, Trump wallowed in his personal grievances so long that his listeners grew restive. And so, yet again, the campaign for president descended into the poisonous murk of Trump’s inner world.
This astoundingly graceless and unpresidential behavior is far too pointless and indiscriminate to qualify as strategy or tactics. The common thread in all this lashing out — often at those who can’t fight back — is that it has nothing to do with issues, or anything else one would expect from a normal candidate. It is another symptom of Trump’s pathology — the visceral reflex to humiliate and degrade anyone who displeases him, no matter the context or situation.
Take the media. Where, one might ask, would Trump be without its constant and credulous attentions? But, like everyone else, the media can never do enough to feed his needs. He threatens the owners of newspapers with reprisals by the federal government, talks of changing libel laws to facilitate lawsuits for statements which affront him , proposes revoking FCC licenses for media which ruffle him. CNN is “very unprofessional”; like so many others, Fox has treated him “very unfairly.”
He refers to the media which cover him as “scum.” He singles out by name reporters who dare to challenge him. At rallies, he pens up journalists in areas they are not permitted to leave. A week ago, he used rally to abuse reporters who had raised legitimate questions about his self- proclaimed contributions to veterans causes, calling one a “sleaze”, and expressing anger that the media did not praise him. After all, Trump says, he’s “fighting for survival” — ever victimized by hostile forces who fail to recognize his innate superiority.
Opposition of any kind enrages him. He incites reprisals against protesters. He threatened violence in Cleveland as payback for the GOP’s “unfairness.” He fuels anger against Hispanics, Muslims, and other minorities whom he perceives as inimical. And never — not once — does he take any responsibility for stirring these toxic pots. For one of the symptoms of his disability is an absence of conscience or accountability.
So what did women do to him, one wonders? The offense was obviously grave, for his misogyny is endless and, it seems, uncontrollable. One can but identify the same symptoms which drive his comprehensive impulse to demean- the need to dominate, displeasure at feeling thwarted and, of course, a profound lack of empathy for anyone but himself.
But for “Trump”, ever beset, his empathy is boundless. His view of others vacillates wildly based solely on their deference — or lack of it. One hesitates to consider what would happen should Vladimir Putin, who Trump elevates for flattering him, challenge Trump as president.
Which brings us to a central problem of Trump’s warped psychology — he believes that filling the presidency requires nothing but the wonder of himself. This gives the lie to the GOP’s most craven rationalization of its own capitulation: that a suddenly docile Trump will, as president, defer to a cadre of wise and experienced advisors drawn from the party establishment.
This is pernicious nonsense. Consistent with his character disorder, Trump proudly insists that his chief advisor is himself. Even were he so inclined, in order to learn from others he must know enough to discern good advice from bad. But such is his pathology that he feels no need to learn much of anything from anyone. And so, from the beginning, he has plunged us down the bottomless rabbit hole of his intellectual emptiness.
His ignorance and grandiosity form a lethal compound. He disowns NATO, unaware that he is playing into Putin’s hands; blithely proposes nuclear proliferation in Asia; muses aloud about using nuclear weapons; and imagines negotiating one-on-one with North Korea’s psychotic leader. He proposes a trade war potentially ruinous to the world economy. He abets ISIS and Al Qaeda by scapegoating all Muslims at home and abroad. Oblivious to the appalled reaction around the globe, he promises to compel the respect of world leaders through “ the aura of personality.”
His equally spurious domestic “proposals,” such as they may be, reflect nothing but the unreality of his own self-concept. His tax plan is absurd on its face. His astonishing proposal to trash America’s credit by defaulting on our debt reveals an inability to differentiate between running a casino and a country. His posturing for the NRA is as dangerous as it is dishonest.
But to talk of Trump in terms of issues is to flatter him. Most of what he says is provisional, ever subject to change, and based on nothing but his needs at the moment. After all, he tells us, “Everything is subject to negotiation, but I can’t and won’t be changing much, because voters support me because of what I’m saying and how I’m saying it.”
Such is his imbalance that he cannot distinguish between a real issue, like combating ISIS, and exhuming the hoary and discredited conspiracy theories surrounding the death of Vincent Foster. When it comes to protecting the planet, global warming is a “hoax”; when it comes to protecting his seaside Scottish golf course, he cites climate change as the reason for demanding that the locals stem the rising tides with, naturally, a wall.
Disclose his tax returns? That’s for lesser beings — like every other candidate in the modern era. Never mind that he excoriated Mitt Romney for not disclosing his; for Trump himself, it’s “none of your business.” Once again the unifying factor is the symptoms of this pathology: his need for adulation — for sure Trump is not nearly as rich as he claims; his lack of empathy — his charitable giving is no doubt paltry; and his compulsive rule bending — he likely paid little or no tax.
As for his excuse for nondisclosure — an audit — this is a transparent lie. But Trump lies and changes stories so routinely that we are becoming numb. The only constant is the gnawing hunger of Trump’s misshapen psyche. What is most terrible to contemplate is investing his pathology with the power of the presidency.
One can forecast the inevitable day-to-day damage to our country — the lashings out, the abuses of power, the mercurial and confidence-destroying lies and changes of mind, the havoc his distorted lens would wreak upon our institutions and our spirit. But most dangerous of all is the collision between a volatile world, a leader unable to perceive external reality, and the often unbearable pressures of the presidency. That Trump’s judgment would crack time and again is certain — the only question is how dangerous the moment.
So how have we fallen prey to a man who, by the damning evidence of his own behavior, is psychologically unfit to be president? When did boasting top coherence; mindless posturing become strength; a talent for ridicule supplant experience or judgement; a gift for scapegoating surpass wisdom or generosity? Why must we even contemplate someone with this stunted inner landscape as the world’s most powerful man?
Much of the answer lies in a failure of our institutions — governmental, economic, political and social — to maintain our trust. This has bred a popular flailing born of frustration and despair: the desire to tear down those structures which, all too many feel, have betrayed us. We can see it in the refusal of Trump’s followers to accept any criticism of their leader; see it, too, in the cadre of Sanders supporters who insist that electing Trump will unleash the chaos from which revolution springs. For all too many, anger has drowned reason.
Much of the answer lies in a failure of our institutions — governmental, economic, political and social — to maintain our trust. This has bred a popular flailing born of frustration and despair: the desire to tear down those structures which, all too many feel, have betrayed us. We can see it in the refusal of Trump’s followers to accept any criticism of their leader; see it, too, in the cadre of Sanders supporters who insist that electing Trump will unleash the chaos from which revolution springs. For all too many, anger has drowned reason.
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Hillary Clinton Eviscerates Donald Trump In Her Best Speech Yet
She called his foreign policy “dangerously incoherent” and said he was “temperamentally unfit” to serve as president.
[Abridged]
MIKE BLAKE/REUTERS
Hillary Clinton gave a litany of reasons why Donald Trump would make poor foreign policy decisions as president in a speech Thursday in San Diego.
Clinton made the case that a Trump administration would pursue a risky and unpredictable foreign policy agenda, one that would threaten the United States’ relationships with its allies.
“Donald Trump’s ideas aren’t just different, they are dangerously incoherent,” she said. “They’re not even really ideas, just a series of bizarre rants, personal feuds and outright lies. He is not just unprepared, he is temperamentally unfit to hold an office that requires knowledge, stability and immense responsibility.”
The election, Clinton added, presented “a choice between a fearful America that’s less secure and less engaged with the world and a strong, confident America that leads to keep our country safe and our economy growing.”
Clinton had a lot of material to get through. She recited some of Trump’s past statements on foreign policy, provoking laughter from the audience when she noted that he said he understands Russia because he held the Miss Universe pageant there. She also mentioned his past support for increased nuclear proliferation,taking out the families of terrorists and defaulting on the national debt, and mocked his remark that his primary consultant on foreign policy issues is himself, because he has a “very good brain.”
“This is not someone who should ever have the nuclear codes, because it’s not hard to imagine Donald Trump leading us into a war just because someone got under his very thin skin,” Clinton said. “We cannot put the security of our children and grandchildren in Donald Trump’s hands, we cannot let him roll the dice with America.”
Clinton noted that Trump has praised leaders like Russian President Vladimir Putinand North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un, declaring he has a “bizarre fascination with dictators and strongmen.”
“I will leave it to the psychiatrists to explain his affection for tyrants,” she said.
She also criticized Trump for his suggestion that the United States should scale back its involvement in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
“If Donald gets his way, they’ll be celebrating in the Kremlin,” she said. “We cannot let that happen.”
Clinton had to balance the temptation to spend her entire speech mocking Trump with her desire to appear presidential, which is perhaps why she spoke in front of a backdrop of American flags in San Diego, a city that has a strong connection to the military.
She already has an edge against Trump when it comes to national security. A NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found that 56 percent of Americans believe she would be better at handling foreign policy, compared to 29 percent who thought Trump would be better. She also led Trump by 10 points on the question of who would be a better commander-in-chief.
Trump has attempted to walk back some of his past statements while simultaneously arguing that Clinton is misrepresenting them. On Wednesday, for instance, he claimed that he had never said Japan should have nuclear weapons, though he said exactly that, arguing that Japan would be better off if it had nuclear weapons to defend itself against North Korea.
The reality television star and presumptive GOP nominee frequently calls Clinton’s judgment into question by noting that she supported the United States’ invasion of Iraq and intervention in Libya, even though he supported both of those endeavors as well. His claim that he was prophetically opposed to the Iraq War “from the very beginning” has been thoroughly debunked by numerous news and fact-checking outlets.
Trump didn’t respond substantively to Clinton’s remarks, but tweeted that she didn’t look presidential.
Bad performance by Crooked Hillary Clinton! Reading poorly from the telepromter! She doesn't even look presidential!
...
Clinton is only about 70 pledged delegates away from reaching the 2,383 she needs to secure the Democratic nomination.
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MIKE BLAKE/REUTERS
Hillary Clinton gave a litany of reasons why Donald Trump would make poor foreign policy decisions as president in a speech Thursday in San Diego.
Clinton made the case that a Trump administration would pursue a risky and unpredictable foreign policy agenda, one that would threaten the United States’ relationships with its allies.
“Donald Trump’s ideas aren’t just different, they are dangerously incoherent,” she said. “They’re not even really ideas, just a series of bizarre rants, personal feuds and outright lies. He is not just unprepared, he is temperamentally unfit to hold an office that requires knowledge, stability and immense responsibility.”
The election, Clinton added, presented “a choice between a fearful America that’s less secure and less engaged with the world and a strong, confident America that leads to keep our country safe and our economy growing.”
Clinton had a lot of material to get through. She recited some of Trump’s past statements on foreign policy, provoking laughter from the audience when she noted that he said he understands Russia because he held the Miss Universe pageant there. She also mentioned his past support for increased nuclear proliferation,taking out the families of terrorists and defaulting on the national debt, and mocked his remark that his primary consultant on foreign policy issues is himself, because he has a “very good brain.”
“This is not someone who should ever have the nuclear codes, because it’s not hard to imagine Donald Trump leading us into a war just because someone got under his very thin skin,” Clinton said. “We cannot put the security of our children and grandchildren in Donald Trump’s hands, we cannot let him roll the dice with America.”
Clinton noted that Trump has praised leaders like Russian President Vladimir Putinand North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un, declaring he has a “bizarre fascination with dictators and strongmen.”
“I will leave it to the psychiatrists to explain his affection for tyrants,” she said.
She also criticized Trump for his suggestion that the United States should scale back its involvement in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
“If Donald gets his way, they’ll be celebrating in the Kremlin,” she said. “We cannot let that happen.”
Clinton had to balance the temptation to spend her entire speech mocking Trump with her desire to appear presidential, which is perhaps why she spoke in front of a backdrop of American flags in San Diego, a city that has a strong connection to the military.
She already has an edge against Trump when it comes to national security. A NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found that 56 percent of Americans believe she would be better at handling foreign policy, compared to 29 percent who thought Trump would be better. She also led Trump by 10 points on the question of who would be a better commander-in-chief.
Trump has attempted to walk back some of his past statements while simultaneously arguing that Clinton is misrepresenting them. On Wednesday, for instance, he claimed that he had never said Japan should have nuclear weapons, though he said exactly that, arguing that Japan would be better off if it had nuclear weapons to defend itself against North Korea.
The reality television star and presumptive GOP nominee frequently calls Clinton’s judgment into question by noting that she supported the United States’ invasion of Iraq and intervention in Libya, even though he supported both of those endeavors as well. His claim that he was prophetically opposed to the Iraq War “from the very beginning” has been thoroughly debunked by numerous news and fact-checking outlets.
Trump didn’t respond substantively to Clinton’s remarks, but tweeted that she didn’t look presidential.
Bad performance by Crooked Hillary Clinton! Reading poorly from the telepromter! She doesn't even look presidential!
...
Clinton is only about 70 pledged delegates away from reaching the 2,383 she needs to secure the Democratic nomination.
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Last updated: 2:55AM EDT on Jun 03, 2016
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Hillary Clinton Just Kicked Trump in the Shins
And showed that she’s certainly tough enough for the long haul.
Not two minutes into the speech, she calmly and coolly delivered this broadside:
Donald Trump’s ideas aren’t just different; they are dangerously incoherent. They’re not even really ideas, just a series of bizarre rants, personal feuds, and outright lies. He is not just unprepared, he is temperamentally unfit to hold an office that requires knowledge, stability, and immense responsibility. This is not someone who should ever have the nuclear codes, because it’s not hard to imagine Donald Trump leading us into a war just because someone got under his very thin skin.
The audience gasped at hearing “bizarre,” tittered at “personal feuds,” and burst into laughter and applause at “very thin skin.” They hadn’t heard any presidential candidate talk like this—they certainly hadn’t heard Clinton talk like this. It was a full takedown of Trump, but in an anti-Trump manner, spoken not in vague adolescent epithets (“stupid,” “idiotic,” “crooked,” “goofy”), but in an itemized checklist of his utter, almost laughable unsuitability for the job.
“I will leave it to the psychiatrists,” she said later, to explain Trump’s “bizarre fascination with dictators and strongmen who have no love for America,” not least Vladimir Putin, for whom Trump shows not the slightest understanding and who, because of that, she reminded Trump—“will eat your lunch.”
Reciting her own experience as first lady, senator, and secretary of state (as she sometimes does with a bit too much self-indulgence, but it was completely fitting here), she said, “Every president makes hard choices every day with imperfect information and conflicting imperatives. … Making the right call takes a cool head and respect for the facts. … It also takes humility, knowing you don’t know everything, because if you’re convinced you’re always right, you’ll never ask the hard questions.” Recalling President Obama’s hard choices the night of the Osama Bin Laden raid, she said, elevating her voice a bit, “Imagine Donald Trump sitting in the Situation Room, making life-or-death decisions for the United States”—prompting the audience, by this time secure in her palm, to laugh and howl, “No-o-o-o-o-oo” in protest.
She flung forth the entire litany of his shortcomings: his proposals to default on the national debt (treating the economy “like one of his casinos”), his pronouncement that he knows more about ISIS than the generals, his advocacy of torture and of murdering the relatives of suspected terrorists, his demonization of Muslims (“playing right into the hands of ISIS”), his dismissiveness toward America’s allies and their importance to U.S. security, his opposition to the Iran nuclear deal (“Donald Trump doesn’t know the first thing about Iran or its nuclear program—ask him; it will become very clear, very quickly”), his persistent mockery and nastiness (“He has no sense of what it takes to deal with multiple countries with competing interests and reaching a solution that everyone can get behind”), his paucity of ideas about how to solve the world’s real problems (“He doesn’t have a clue what he’s talking about”).
On each point, she contrasted his flimsy prejudices not only with her own experience and thought-out views but also with the long-standing, bipartisan traditions of American diplomacy.
Then she kicked Trump in the shins. Pointing to his claims that “the world is laughing at us,” she scoffed, “He’s been saying this for decades. He bought full-page ads in newspapers across America back in 1987, when Ronald Reagan was president, saying America lacked a backbone and the world was laughing at us. He was wrong then, and he’s wrong now. And you’ve got to wonder why somebody who has so little confidence in America—and has felt that way for at least 30 years—wants to be our president.”
This election suddenly got a little bit fun.
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Dodgin’ Donald knows a legitimate presidential candidate must release tax returns. Every major party candidate since 1976 has done it. Richard Nixon even did it while under IRS audit. Hillary Clinton released forms for every year back to 1977 – 39 of them.
When the last Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, dragged his feet, probably because he knew his returns would expose him to be a quarter-billionaire paying an unacceptably paltry 14 percent, Donald Trump went on Fox News to prod him. “Mitt has to get those tax returns out,” Trump said.
But what was good for Mitt apparently is not for Donald. Maybe that’s because Donald’s more than 10 times richer, so he feels like he can break 10 times the presidential campaign rules.
..
On the stump, Trump contends he’s a candidate of the people, cussing out CEOs for exploiting tax loopholes. “They make a fortune. They pay no tax,” he told CBS, “It’s ridiculous, okay?”
But the only Trump federal tax returns that are public show that he made a fortune and paid no tax. For two years, 1978 and 1979.
Donald has been nothing but dodgy on tax transparency for years now. Way back in 2011, he said he’d hand over his tax returns if President Barack Obama released his long form birth certificate. President Obama came through. America’s still waiting on Trump. But, remember, there are special rules for billionaires like Dodgin’ Donald.
In February, after Trump won the New Hampshire primary, he said he planned to release his tax returns “probably over the next few months.” Like everything else about Trump, he assured the public that his returns were oversized. “They’re very big tax returns,” he said. But, he cautioned, that didn’t mean he paid his fair share as a billionaire, assuring the audience they would be surprised by how low his tax bill was.
When it was clear that Trump would be the Republican nominee, reporters began to press Trump to fulfill his promise to disclose the returns. Then he conjured the excuse that he couldn’t do it because he was being audited – even though Nixon had unveiled returns while audited, and the IRS said it was fine to publicize returns during the accounting process.
Unable to get the documents, “Good Morning America” host George Stephanopoulos asked Trump to divulge the most basic bit of information, his tax rate.
“It’s none of your business,” Trump replied.
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Tech Firm Offers to Pay Trump’s Ransom for Sanders Debate, as Internet Trolls #ChickenTrump
It’s probably a safe bet to look at this all as a prophetic glimpse into the future of what a President Trump’s foreign policy would consist of:
He calls out some dangerous dictator. They call his bluff. He retreats. We’re screwed.
At least at this level, it’s still manageable and no one gets hurt.
Calling his bluff is exactly what has happened. When the gilded toad opened his big yap and said he would debate Senator Bernie Sanders for $10 million for charity, I doubt he thought anybody would come up with the money. After all, who charges for debates?
Sanders was all for the debate. This could only help him.
That Trump suggested Planned Parenthood should get the proceeds from the pay-per-view debate probably won’t sway the minds of the loyal Trumpanzee tribe, either.
Trump didn’t tarry in backing out. This was another of his “suggestions,” much like his Supreme Court picks and every other lie policy plan he’s laid out.
Some aren’t just letting this idea go. It was offered. It was accepted, and there are people with the money willing to pay to make it so.
From USUncut.com:
Tech industry investment firm Traction and Scale (T&S) wants to host the Sanders / Trump debate, and is willing to donate Donald Trump’s ransom of $10 million to charity in return. T&S CEO Richie Hecker told BuzzFeed News that he aims to host the debate in California on Monday, June 6, one day before California voters cast their ballots in the state’s primary, which is seen as Bernie Sanders’ last stand to remain competitive with Hillary Clinton.
Boxing promoter, Bob Arum, has also offered to pledge $20 million to charity, in order to promote the event.
In doing his backwards dance away from the subject, Trump has insisted that it would be counter-productive and improper for the nominee of one party to debate the likely loser of the other party.
Then why bring it up in the first place, Donnie?
The internet, being the wonderful, magical place it is, immediately responded with mockery. The hashtag #ChickenTrump began to trend.
It’s probably a safe bet to look at this all as a prophetic glimpse into the future of what a President Trump’s foreign policy would consist of:
He calls out some dangerous dictator. They call his bluff. He retreats. We’re screwed.
At least at this level, it’s still manageable and no one gets hurt.
Calling his bluff is exactly what has happened. When the gilded toad opened his big yap and said he would debate Senator Bernie Sanders for $10 million for charity, I doubt he thought anybody would come up with the money. After all, who charges for debates?
Sanders was all for the debate. This could only help him.
That Trump suggested Planned Parenthood should get the proceeds from the pay-per-view debate probably won’t sway the minds of the loyal Trumpanzee tribe, either.
Trump didn’t tarry in backing out. This was another of his “suggestions,” much like his Supreme Court picks and every other lie policy plan he’s laid out.
Some aren’t just letting this idea go. It was offered. It was accepted, and there are people with the money willing to pay to make it so.
From USUncut.com:
Tech industry investment firm Traction and Scale (T&S) wants to host the Sanders / Trump debate, and is willing to donate Donald Trump’s ransom of $10 million to charity in return. T&S CEO Richie Hecker told BuzzFeed News that he aims to host the debate in California on Monday, June 6, one day before California voters cast their ballots in the state’s primary, which is seen as Bernie Sanders’ last stand to remain competitive with Hillary Clinton.
Boxing promoter, Bob Arum, has also offered to pledge $20 million to charity, in order to promote the event.
In doing his backwards dance away from the subject, Trump has insisted that it would be counter-productive and improper for the nominee of one party to debate the likely loser of the other party.
Then why bring it up in the first place, Donnie?
The internet, being the wonderful, magical place it is, immediately responded with mockery. The hashtag #ChickenTrump began to trend.
One of Russia’s leading opposition activists Wednesday decried the rise of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump as the United States’ own version of “Putinism,” saying the New York real estate mogul’s election would be the “best hope” for Russian President Vladimir Putin and his dictatorial regime.
Garry Kasparov, the former world chess champion and democratic political activist, said he’s committed to “preventing the rise of Putinism, whether it is in Russia or this country.”
“I wish it would be a joke,” he told the Aspen Institute during a Washington forum. “It is not. What we are seeing in this election cycle is it’s an attack on the American way of life and democracy.”
Kasparov said he sees an assault on American ideals coming from both ends of the political spectrum.
“The fact is that in both parties you have very powerful trends that are pushing it to the opposite sides, sort of creating not a consensus but a conflicting field. It worries me. Economically, [it is] from [Bernie] Sanders’ supporters, you know, reviving the socialism,” he said of the Vermont senator’s surprisingly successful insurgent campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination.
“As someone raised in a communist country, it is anathema,” Kasparov said. “People seem to forget what socialism was. They don’t seem to realize that the luxury of talking about socialism was paid for by capitalism.”
“On the other side,” he continued, “you have, of course, the rise of Donald Trump,” who has made admiring statements about the Russian leader. “That is an attack on liberty.”
Trump’s so-called “America First” foreign policy, in Kasparov’s view, would be a disaster and only embolden Putin.
“Putin’s biggest hope? Donald Trump,” Kasparov said. “This is the way to weaken American democracy and the trans-Atlantic relations.”
Kasparov, who lives in New York, was in Washington to discuss his new book, “Winter is Coming: Why Vladimir Putin and the Enemies of the Free World Must be Stopped.”
He said the world desperately needs the kind of American leadership that was provided from both major political parties during the Cold War.
“Recently I watched again this Kennedy-Nixon debate, in 1960, when candidates could disagree on means but they could agree on goals,” Kasparov said. “Now, I am afraid we will be entering a very different kind of debate where substance will be totally trumped.”
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Clinton mocks Trump’s bankruptcies:
‘How can anybody lose money running a casino?’
Hillary Clinton Mocks Donald Trump Over Not Releasing Tax Returns
Clinton mocks Trump for being all talk
Clinton mocks Trump in hypothetical debate - YouTube
Clinton mocks Trump, warns of 'deportation forces' | TheHill
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