Keith Olbermann for GQ Links Trump To Joseph McCarthy, George Wallace, Jefferson Davis & Other American Firsters

Why Donald Trump gets a pass Politico


There is no doubt that Trump voters have a different set of expectations for their candidate, and it's politically correct to be quiet about it. They love his being a renegade who wants to build walls and say Hillary Clinton could shoot people in the heart and not be arrested. They love Trump's fist-in-your face attitude, saying he would blow up Iran in their serious and concerning skirmishes with the American navy. Trump is the ultimate macho f#ck you candidate, and Trumpsters love him for it. I disagree with Politico that the press is blameless because they made Trump a hero for ratings and profits. But based on the extensive polling and behavior of Trump supporters, he accurately represents the attitudes of large numbers of his supporters -- every poll we read DOES have numbers in the 45-70% approve scale on issues Clinton supporters vehemently disagree with like illegal immigrants are moochers. There was a 50 pt difference between Trump and Clinton supporters on data we posted last night. 
Let's start talking -- not only about the candidates -- but the values of the supporters of both presidential candidates. They are REAL and the press shouldn't be scooping them under the carpet every day. ~ Anne


“We’d show voters stupid things he’s said, and they’d just shrug and say, ‘That’s just Trump being Trump,’” said one Democratic operative who has observed Clinton campaign focus groups. “It was a fairly common response, and it was horrifying.”

"People are willing to give him a pass because he doesn’t have a career in service. I think it’s the wrong approach because you should be assessing the candidate’s readiness to do the job,” said Lanhee Chen, an adviser to Mitt Romney’s 2012 campaign who recalls how Romney was excoriated for “gaffes” during his Europe trip that, by comparison to Trump’s behavior on an almost daily basis, would now be considered as minor mistakes. “People have such low expectations because his campaign has been so dysfunctional that when they run like a normal campaign should run, people tend to give them a lot of credit. There’s a relativism there.”
Indeed, Trump’s turn to scripted speeches, delivered via teleprompter in the last month since bringing in his third campaign manager to date, have been widely characterized as a much-awaited “pivot” into a “more presidential” mode — even though the candidate’s message hasn’t changed much. During one such speech before a raucous crowd in Pensacola on Friday night, Trump returned went off-script and told the crowd that Clinton could literally get away with murder.

“She could walk into this arena right now and shoot somebody with 20,000 people watching, right smack in the middle of the heart, and she wouldn’t be prosecuted,” Trump said. “OK? That’s what’s happening.”

In the same speech, Trump drew loud applause with even more provocative bluster as he referenced an incident earlier this year in which Iran seized U.S. Navy patrol boats on suspicions the American personnel were spying. If he were president, Trump said, the Iranians “will be shot out of the water.” But on the front page of Saturday morning’s Pensacola News Journal, a banner headline read “TRUMP WOWS AGAIN” while one of two stories covering the rally declared “Supporters: Trump more ‘presidential’ in second local speech.”'

Kaine: Clinton's 'Deplorables' Characterizations Doesn't Merit An Apology Washington Post

“She said, 'Look, I’m generalizing here, but a lot of his support is coming from this odd place, that he’s given a platform to the alt-right and white nationalists,’” Kaine said in an interview with The Washington Post. “But then she went on to say, ‘Look, there’s also a number of his supporters that have economic anxieties, and we’ve got to speak to those.’”
(....)
He noted Saturday that “I was just seeing this morning there’s some press event in D.C. today by a white nationalist group that’s talking about how they’ve received a higher profile because of the Trump campaign. We’ve seen (former Ku Klux Klan leader) David Duke do robo-calls encouraging people to vote for Donald Trump last week. So there is an odd way in which [Trump’s] campaign has elevated the profile of some of these groups that are very, I think, dangerous.”
Kaine said he doesn’t think the Democratic tickets needs to “chase after” voters aligned with those kind of groups.

176 Reasons Donald Trump Shouldn't Be President GQ

Count me out as a fan of Keith Olbermann and his shoe-pounding, testosterone-rich approach to political commentary. However, all the yelling and screaming in this campaign makes me receptive to the main message of Olbermann's first podcast for GQ. 

As a young girl, my first boyfriend was the grandson of Wisc. senator Wiley, who was Sen. McCarthy's right-hand man. I learned fact moving to New York years later, sitting on a brownstone stoop with my landlord, a playwright who was imprisoned during McCarthy's 1950's roundup of writers, artists and all the educated thinkers and progressives, who were labeled Communists. McCarthy's young lawyer during those ghastly proceedings was Roy Cohn, who became one of Donald Trump's closest advisers before dying of AIDS. 

Within this context that touched my own life, Olbermann's words resonate:

Every few generations, we Americans are called upon to defend our country. To defend it not so much from foreign dictators or war or terrorism, but from those here who have no commitment to progress or democracy or representative government—no commitment to anything except their own out-of-control minds and the bottomless pits of their egos.
Our society has thrown up these people before: Joseph McCarthy. George Wallace. Father Coughlin. Jefferson Davis. Aaron Burr. The Know-Nothings. The Blacklisters. The America-Firsters. And we have always thrown them out.
And now our generation has its own: the most dangerous individual ever nominated by a major party for the highest office in this country.
His base wants few details and fewer facts; they just want to burn it down and blame their failures on the collective other. And Donald John Trump is their demonic messiah in Oompa Loompa's clothing.
We must stop him.

There Were Five Phantom Donations in the Files of Donald Trump's Foundation. Here's What We Know. Washington Post

It is DEPLORABLE to have your name on a foundation, but you haven't contributed to it since 2008, as HWN has previously reported, thanks to WaPo. It is DEPLORABLE and CONTEMPTIBLE to take money that people have donated to your foundation and buy a statue of yourself for $20,000 and also buy yourself a $12,000 helmet. In our playbook, this is called STEALING.

WaPo reports that the Trump foundation has reported five donations that when queries with the organization, have never existed. We know about one of the 5: the illegal $25,000 donation to LA Attorney General Pam Bondi.

We already know -- that just like his campaign -- Trump used donations from others including business to hold charity events in his hotels and business properties. Using other peoples' money, did he pay himself above the going rate, as he does his presidential campaign, when far cheaper events could be help in luxury hotels in the same city?

Dear media. How about you give equal airtime going forward to focus on both the Clinton Foundation and the Trump Foundation. That's all we ask. Oh -- and please tell us that neither Trump or members of his family take salary for the Trump Foundation???? We'll be waiting. ~ Anne

Hillary Clinton Headlines September 12, 2016

Why Clinton's bad weekend won't rewrite the race Politico

Chuck Schumer discloses pneumonia diagnosis Politico

Clinton Flies Into 737 Blue Skies 'Stronger Together' But With A Dour Press Onboard

Clinton Speaks Briefly with Press on Her New Plane Politico

Hillary kept her sense of humor this morning, as the press joined on on the maiden flight of her new campaign plane. Clinton greeted the 40 or so journalists traveling with her on the Boeing 737 emblazoned with the campaign's 'H' logo and campaign message 'Stronger Together' covering a large space of the aircraft.

The press corps -- having bitterly complained about her lack of press conferences -- didn't know how to respond when Hillary walked to the back of the plane to welcome them.

"I'm thrilled," our candidate said. "No really!f I wanted to welcome you onto the plane. I think it's pretty cool, don't you?"

Not knowing how to casually respond to Clinton, the plane was quiet. "You're supposed to say yes," Hillary smiled.

Hillary Clinton Gets Gored by Paul Krugman New York Times

With Hillary Clinton packing up her new jet plane today -- with press and herself together -- she and her aides should use the opportunity to educate and inquire of the press how they determine stories. The double standard in press coverage is becoming downright alarming. 

Increasingly,  it’s hard to escape the impression that Donald Trump is  being graded on a curve. As Krugman points out, if the Republican blowhard manages to read from a TelePrompter without going off script, the press pronounces that Trump is being presidential. If he flips twice in one day, suddenly suggesting that he wouldn’t send a police force to round up all 11 million undocumented immigrants right away -- deciding to focus on the first 3 million - he’s now moving into the mainstream, even though new polls say over 70% of Americans believe in immigration reform and a legal path for the undocumented to come out of the shadows. The press cares little about what appear to be clear payoffs to state attorneys general to back off investigating Trump University. 

Simultaneously, the press assumes that anything Hillary Clinton does must be corrupt, most spectacularly illustrated by the increasingly bizarre coverage of the Clinton Foundation, as AOC has noted.

"Step back for a moment, and think about what that foundation is about", writes Krugman. "When Bill Clinton left office, he was a popular, globally respected figure. What should he have done with that reputation? Raising large sums for a charity that saves the lives of poor children sounds like a pretty reasonable, virtuous course of action. And the Clinton Foundation is, by all accounts, a big force for good in the world. For example, Charity Watch, an independent watchdog, gives it an “A” rating — better than the American Red Cross."'

The situation is so bad that yesterday moderator of NBC's 'Meet the Press' Chuck Todd let a Trump spokesman allege the thoroughly debunked assertion that the Clinton Foundation only donates about 20% of its contributions to charity. The truth about anything Clinton has no place in a media that generally has disliked Hillary Clinton for decades. It's just her reality, and we the voters hear more lies than truth about Hillary Clinton from mainstream media. 

Same Day | Two Realities

On Labor Day, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton begin Final Sprint New York Times

Some days, a picture is worth a thousand words. I give you the Hillary Clinton plane and Donald Trump's. Now Hillary is back with the press and Trump is speaking to a couple media embeds. Still, Trump is white boys club all the way in this shot Hillary is of the people. Huma was on board in the front, along with other members of the Clinton team -- judged the most diverse and balanced by skin color, gender and sexual identity than any campaign team in history. And they know her for years -- decades in some cases. Hillary doesn't have to shop for people to fill any quotas. She has staffed her organizations this way for decades.

Trump Says He Would Have Left G-20 Summit in China Over Obama Staircase Flap Washington Post

 If you've traveled the world on business for decades with legendary business relations with people in other countries, this Trump comment reminds me of why the man would be an international embarrassment truly capable of launching WWIII. PS: I was considered to be very tough, too. But not stupid and not an ugly American who thinks he is the center of the universe -- the king. ~ Anne

Young Blacks Voice Skepticism on Hillary Clinton, Worrying Democrats New York Times

This is indeed a potentially very serious situation, one exacerbated by the ferocious Democratic primary campaign. I'm struggling that young African Americans really think there is no major difference between Hillary Clinton and Trump. There is absolutely NO comparison about the future of people of color in a Republican Supreme Court. The Black community really needs to have some serious dialogue between older and younger. This is a conversation that needs to happen outside of HWN. We are not qualified -- not having the direct life experience, although Anne did represent inmate interests at Attica prison in a post-riot world -- to attempt the dialogue on this topic. But young African Americans are being very short-sighted in equating Trump and Clinton. 

Hillary Clinton Headlines September 5, 2016

Trump Denies He Talked With Florida Attorney General About Donation Washington Post

African Americans worry Trump has awoken a resentment that won't go away Washington Post

The Cowardice of Donald Trump The Atlantic

14 excerpts from the FBI's report on Hillary Clinton Mother Jones