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You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Hail to the Hairpiece / Open Thread: Donald Trump NEVER Misspeaks!!! (ISIS Edition)

Open Thread: Donald Trump NEVER Misspeaks!!! (ISIS Edition)

by Anne Laurie|  August 12, 20169:55 am| 240 Comments

This post is in: Hail to the Hairpiece, Open Threads, War

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But sometimes us LESSER INTELLECTS fail to comprehend his SARCASM. Bigly!

Rough timeline…

Trump: "ISIS is honoring President Obama. He is the founder of ISIS. He is the founder of ISIS. He’s the founder! He founded ISIS!"

— Sopan Deb (@SopanDeb) August 11, 2016

Crowd cheers Trump calling Obama "the founder of ISIS," then immediately boos mention of Syrian refugees coming to US–who are fleeing ISIS.

— David Harris-Gershon (@David_EHG) August 11, 2016

If Obama was the founder of ISIS Republicans might actually find a way to stop it

— Alan Scherstuhl (@studiesincrap) August 11, 2016

The only reason I believe @realDonaldTrump didn't found ISIS is because ISIS is still around.

— Jena Friedman (@JenaFriedman) August 11, 2016

I fear that this campaign has broken @TalKopan. https://t.co/Haq3Y6nl9o

— Daniel Drezner (@dandrezner) August 11, 2016

Donald Trump said Thursday that he meant exactly what he said when he called President Barack Obama the “founder of ISIS” and objected when a conservative radio show host tried to clarify the GOP nominee’s position.

Trump was asked by host Hugh Hewitt about the comments Trump made Wednesday night in Florida, and Hewitt said he understood Trump to mean “that he (Obama) created the vacuum, he lost the peace.”

Trump objected.

“No, I meant he’s the founder of ISIS,” Trump said. “I do. He was the most valuable player. I give him the most valuable player award. I give her, too, by the way, Hillary Clinton.”

Hewitt pushed back again, saying that Obama is “not sympathetic” to ISIS and “hates” and is “trying to kill them.”

“I don’t care,” Trump said, according to a show transcript. “He was the founder. His, the way he got out of Iraq was that that was the founding of ISIS, okay?”

Hewitt and Trump went back and forth after that, with Hewitt warning Trump that his critics would seize on his use of “founder” as more example of Trump being loose with words…

But the GOP nominee remained steadfast, saying it was “no mistake” what he said, standing by his labeling of the Democratic opponent as a “co-founder.”

“Do you not like that?” Trump asked Hewitt.

“I think I would say they created, they lost the peace. They created the Libyan vacuum, they created the vacuum into which ISIS came, but they didn’t create ISIS. That’s what I would say,” Hewitt said.

“Well, I disagree,” Trump replied, and Hewitt moved on…

Moving right along — key Hugh Hewitt skill.

ISIS was actually founded by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. #factcheck

— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) August 11, 2016

BTW, Trumps line that Obama founded ISIS echoes exactly a myth propagated by Russian state-controlled media and bloggers.

— Michael McFaul (@McFaul) August 11, 2016

Today…

Ratings challenged @CNN reports so seriously that I call President Obama (and Clinton) "the founder" of ISIS, & MVP. THEY DON'T GET SARCASM?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 12, 2016

I know sarcasm. Sarcasm is a very good friend of mine. And you, sir, we're not being sarcastic. https://t.co/keZY6J8Nxk

— Daniel Drezner (@dandrezner) August 12, 2016

Trump’s “base”, of course, will continue to believe President Obama founded ISIS. They saw Trump say so, on the teevee! — ya can’t say stuff on the teevee if it’s not true, can ya?

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Reader Interactions

240Comments

  1. 1.

    r€nato

    August 12, 2016 at 10:06 am

    Hmm, sarcasm… oh how I wish Jon Stewart was still around to educate him on what sarcasm is, and what it is not.

    Good thing we have Sam Bee for that duty.

  2. 2.

    dedc79

    August 12, 2016 at 10:06 am

    The KKK is honoring Donald Trump. He is the founder of the KKK. He is the founder of the KKK. He’s the founder! He founded the KKK! #TheTruth #IMeanIt #Sarcasm #MaybeNot?

  3. 3.

    Peale

    August 12, 2016 at 10:12 am

    Well, you have to admit that the U.S. Activities in Iraq these past few years clearly indicate that the U.S. Has a great deal of sympathy Isis that’s best explained by the radical Islamic beliefs of the pretend commander and chief.

  4. 4.

    r€nato

    August 12, 2016 at 10:13 am

    …incidentally, aren’t we at war? Conservatives sure like to remind us that WE ARE AT WAR WITH ISIS, DAMMIT!!!

    I seem to recall that during the previous president’s tenure, these same conservatives constantly reminded us that it was the duty of all Americans to stand behind their president unquestioningly because WE ARE AT WAR, DAMMIT!!!

  5. 5.

    NorthLeft12

    August 12, 2016 at 10:16 am

    What the hell reason do people have to hate refugees? These are people who have lost virtually everything and are forced to survive in the worst conditions. They are generally [IMO] resourceful, brave, adaptable, and determined people. Pretty much exactly the kind of citizens any sane person would want in their country/neighbourhood.
    To those that boo and scorn them; Fuck your bigoted and ignorant asses.

    BTW, Trump is an ignorant and pathetic loser.

  6. 6.

    nonynony

    August 12, 2016 at 10:18 am

    @r€nato: Obama doesn’t wrap himself up in the fetishistic mantle of WAR PRESIDENT so he doesn’t have the invisible force field to deflect those attacks.

    More importantly, he’s not a Republican. Republican presidents are the only ones who get this benefit. You should read the rules text more closely.

  7. 7.

    r€nato

    August 12, 2016 at 10:18 am

    I like Trump because he’s not afraid to tell it how it is, right up until the moment he and/or his surrogates have to explain what he really meant or walk back what he said.

  8. 8.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    August 12, 2016 at 10:19 am

    So, the Los Angeles news station (KNX, not KFI, which is talk) reported this morning that the FBI is launching an investigation into the Clinton Foundation.

    Their source?

    A post on the “Daily Caller”. I shit you not.

    I give up.

  9. 9.

    Tokyokie

    August 12, 2016 at 10:19 am

    Trump’s “reasoning” reminds me of the idiot winger who was student body president of my high school. When our world history class was spending a few days on Russian history, and the teacher was discussing Peter the Great’s reign, this guy suggested that Peter the Great’s expansion of the Russian empire was all part of the same commie plot that we’d been witnessing to the present day. I loudly pointed out that Peter the Great died in 1725 and Karl Marx did not publish Das Kapital until 1867, facts the teacher confirmed.

    It did not alter his argument whatsoever.

  10. 10.

    Roger Moore

    August 12, 2016 at 10:19 am

    @r€nato:

    I seem to recall that during the previous president’s tenure, these same conservatives constantly reminded us that it was the duty of all Americans to stand behind their president unquestioningly because WE ARE AT WAR, DAMMIT!!! *

    *Offer does not apply to Democrats.

  11. 11.

    Roger Moore

    August 12, 2016 at 10:21 am

    @NorthLeft12:

    What the hell reason do people have to hate refugees?

    They’re Those People. SATSQ.

  12. 12.

    Patricia Kayden

    August 12, 2016 at 10:21 am

    @r€nato: Which is pretty amazing since Trump has told us that he has the “best words”.

  13. 13.

    amk

    August 12, 2016 at 10:21 am

    the guy is plain nutz. no need to parse what he spews every fucking day.

  14. 14.

    dedc79

    August 12, 2016 at 10:22 am

    @Tokyokie: Had Marx been alive and in Russia during Peter the Great’s reign, he would probably have been knouted to death.

  15. 15.

    StringOnAStick

    August 12, 2016 at 10:24 am

    Our ability to point and laugh each day is about the only thing I can thank tRump for, but his daily outrage quota has done a fine job of taking the press off the scent of his Russian connections. It may be the whole damned point actually.

  16. 16.

    Xenos

    August 12, 2016 at 10:25 am

    Is he throwing the election? Is this just a variation on the old Pat & Bay Buchanan election scam where you raise money, make a fuss and commotion but never spend any money, and then lose the election and try to keep the leftover contributions?

    It is the only theory that accounts for the the three-day cycle of outrageous statements and the refusal to actually spend any money on ads or field operations – those things cut into the profit!

  17. 17.

    oldgold

    August 12, 2016 at 10:25 am

    At the end of this week will the lasting impression be what I hope:

    Trump is a madman that should never be within a country mile of the Oval office;

    or, what I fear:

    Hillary wants to eviscerate the Second Amendment and is largely responsible for the creation of ISIS?

    Also, this week Hillary set forth a very thoughtful plan for the future of our economy. No one heard it.

    There is, unfortunately, a method to Trump’s madness.

  18. 18.

    ET

    August 12, 2016 at 10:26 am

    If (and that is a big, broad if that I don’t believe is really an if) that was sarcasm then Don the Realtor either doesn’t actually know what sarcasm is or is really, really bad at it.

  19. 19.

    Dadadadadadada

    August 12, 2016 at 10:30 am

    @NorthLeft12: The haters hate just that kind of people, because the haters can’t compete with them, and the refugees make the haters look and feel bad.
    Mildly unrelated note, can we stop calling Trump’s minions “Trumpkins”? Trumpkin is a beloved character from the Narnia books, a noble, brave, upstanding and competent good guy. The exact opposite of Trump or anyone who supports him.

  20. 20.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    August 12, 2016 at 10:32 am

    What the hell reason do people have to hate refugees?

    @NorthLeft12: The people who hate refugees usually aren’t doing so good themselves. And they know that those folks are competition for their own, unskilled labor.

    Give you an example. Here in SoCal, whites worked construction until the late 80s/early 1990s. Decent jobs. Then the owners of the construction companies started hiring Hispanics – they were simply cheaper. A LOT cheaper. The result? Wages crashed and you probably left as you couldn’t support a family any more. If you’re one of the very, very few whites working construction here in SoCal, you’re a site boss and you speak fluent Spanish…and you probably don’t make any more money than you did 20 years ago. And you likely vote Republican because you hate the people who took the jobs, plus your bosses told you the reason you don’t make any more money is “Democrat regulations” and that the laws forced them to hire Mexicans instead of whites (I’m serious).

    I don’t mean this personally but it will probably cross a few of you the wrong way: it takes a LOT of privilege to “not understand why people hate refugees”. Refugees do a lot of long term good for a nation and a lot of short-term damage. Look to the only somewhat successful integration of East and West Germany for an example. East Germans still make about 25% less money. West Germans won’t live near them.

  21. 21.

    Ridnik Chrome

    August 12, 2016 at 10:42 am

    @Roger Moore: They’re losers. And if there’s one thing a wingnut hates more than anything else, it’s a loser.

  22. 22.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 10:42 am

    @Tokyokie: I loudly pointed out that Peter the Great died in 1725 and Karl Marx did not publish Das Kapital until 1867, facts the teacher confirmed.

    It did not alter his argument whatsoever.

    That is the most frustrating thing about wingers. Minds like a cement block.

  23. 23.

    kindness

    August 12, 2016 at 10:42 am

    I’m seriously beginning to think the Donald is just trolling us all.

    I didn’t used to think that. But, you know, even he knows he’s so far over the top that it’s working against him and yet he continues to do it.

  24. 24.

    bystander

    August 12, 2016 at 10:45 am

    @NorthLeft12:

    What the hell reason do people have to hate refugees? These are people who have lost virtually everything and are forced to survive in the worst conditions.

    Brownness + mooslim? Just guessing.

    We can assume they’re all potential terrorists the same way we can assume that if Hillary Clinton had anything to do with it, there’s criminal activity involved and must be investigated.

  25. 25.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 12, 2016 at 10:46 am

    @CONGRATULATIONS!: You are conflating, refugee and immigrant. Yeah all furriners are bad and they are here to steal your jobs.

  26. 26.

    Mnemosyne

    August 12, 2016 at 10:48 am

    @CONGRATULATIONS!:

    Then the owners of the construction companies started hiring Hispanics – they were simply cheaper. A LOT cheaper.

    You’re leaving out one of the reasons it was (and often still is) a lot cheaper to hire Latinos: the bosses pay sub-minimum wages under the table to illegal workers. In fact, they seek those workers out specifically so they can drive down wages. So I think you’re mixing cause and effect up a bit. The problem wasn’t that you had a sudden influx of immigrant labor who were willing to work for less money. The problem was that you had bosses who were willing to hire illegal workers so they didn’t have to follow wage laws.

    And then what happens? The workers get caught and deported and the bosses just hire more, because there’s no real penalty for them if they get caught with illegal workers on their job site.

  27. 27.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    August 12, 2016 at 10:49 am

    By now, it’s obvious to everyone with open eyes that Donald Trump is an ignorant, wildly dishonest, erratic, immature, bullying egomaniac. On the other hand, he’s a terrible person.

    Krugman rarely disappoints.

    He goes on to say that establishment Republicans are really no better, just less loud and crude.

  28. 28.

    J R in WV

    August 12, 2016 at 10:51 am

    Trump is, in his unique way, way stupid about some things. Communications a little, politics, bigly/hyugely stupid. The things he is saying, in many nations, would get him arrested for sedition/treason.

    You can’t tell outrageous libelous slanderous lies about the nation’s leader and still hold you head up in society. I am using the word society here to mean the culture of larger America, not to mean society as in a NYC debutante ball or fund-raiser cocktail party.

    Trump is an unAmerican uneducated illiterate racist greedy boor. His stupidity is enhanced by his racist evil nature. If he was middle-income instead of pseudo-wealthy, he would be the racist monster next door, hated by the whole neighborhood.

    ETA: He is trying to use the big lie in politics, as so successfully implemented by Goering back in the 1930s, and his kids are helping out with this evil plan.

    FSM help us if he doesn’t go away soon.

  29. 29.

    scav

    August 12, 2016 at 10:51 am

    @CONGRATULATIONS!: It’d make more sense if you were discussing immigration — I don’t quite remember the housing construction industry being flooded with refugees. The 90s? Former Yugoslavians, Russian Jews, Rwandans. And was the iconic and still worshipped Elián González going to be kept out of employment after being refugeed by diktat?

  30. 30.

    Punchy

    August 12, 2016 at 10:54 am

    TPM has both Ohio and FL back in the toss-up category. Gunna need the GOTV efforts in South FL to turn this state blue. How GA can be a toss-up but also OH and IA are as well is mind-boggling.

  31. 31.

    shomi

    August 12, 2016 at 10:54 am

    @Peale: I totally agree with you that G. Dubya the Texas sized dummy was a pretend commander in chief.

  32. 32.

    Waldo

    August 12, 2016 at 10:54 am

    @r€nato:

    I seem to recall that during the previous president’s tenure, these same conservatives constantly reminded us that it was the duty of all Americans to stand behind their president unquestioningly because WE ARE AT WAR, DAMMIT!!!

    I’ve given up trying to imagine the reaction if a Dem had done even one of the outrageous things Trump does 10 times a day before lunch.

  33. 33.

    Mnemosyne

    August 12, 2016 at 10:54 am

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    The category error that a lot of people make is that they blame the workers for “stealing jobs” when it’s actually the bosses who seek out those illegal or immigrant workers and deliberately underpay them. It’s not like it’s a free market where workers can demand their preferred wage and bosses are choosing between equal employees.

    The problem with the current H-1B situation isn’t that people in other countries want to come here to work — it’s that employers exploit those workers by paying them less than they would have to pay a citizen worker. Plus the workers who do come here are basically indentured servants who are tied to that employer and are vulnerable to threats of being deported if they don’t accept whatever shit the employer wants to dump on them. It’s a really crappy system, but unfortunately a lot of the complaints about it blame the workers when it’s really the companies who use the visas that have created the problem.

  34. 34.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 12, 2016 at 10:55 am

    @Mnemosyne: If you want to stop illegal immigration, H1-B abuse, J-1 abuse, prosecute the employers who abuse these visas instead of just going after the employees. Funny how Trump never talks about that.

  35. 35.

    lurker dean

    August 12, 2016 at 10:58 am

    non-stop trump is getting exhausting. we need a post about the doj’s report on the baltimore police, as suggested by maryg. of course, the walter posts are always good.

  36. 36.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    August 12, 2016 at 10:59 am

    The category error that a lot of people make is that they blame the workers for “stealing jobs” when it’s actually the bosses who seek out those illegal or immigrant workers and deliberately underpay them. It’s not like it’s a free market where workers can demand their preferred wage and bosses are choosing between equal employees.

    @Mnemosyne: That was kind of my whole point. Thanks for saying it better.

    Also, said situation fucked our hospitals here but good because, of course, these poor bastards didn’t have health insurance so if you had an on-the-job accident, your “insurance” was getting dumped out the door of an F-150 as they drove by the ER entrance.

  37. 37.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 12, 2016 at 11:00 am

    @Mnemosyne: About H1-B abuse, it varies widely from employer to employer. IT firms have been the worst offenders. H1-B visas are awarded by a lottery these days. The entire system is insane and exploitative.

  38. 38.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 11:02 am

    @schrodinger’s cat: The entire system is insane and exploitative.

    Just the way Republicans like it.

  39. 39.

    Chris

    August 12, 2016 at 11:02 am

    You can’t give a Most Valuable Player award to two people, numb nuts.

  40. 40.

    geg6

    August 12, 2016 at 11:04 am

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    Probably because his current wife was one of those visa abusers.

  41. 41.

    Punchy

    August 12, 2016 at 11:05 am

    What the hell reason do people have to hate refugees?

    Too simplistic a summary. It’s nuanced, like this:
    1) Brown refugee — Bad; terrorist and/or moocher
    2) White refugee — Good; suffering and requiring a new start
    3) Hispanic refugee — Dirty Illegal; needs deportation or start picking strawberries for $0.10/hr.

  42. 42.

    Chris

    August 12, 2016 at 11:05 am

    @NorthLeft12:

    Conservatives get a high out of kicking the most vulnerable people in society in the gutter. Poor people, minorities. Prisoners. Women who have miscarried. Etc. This is just more of the same.

  43. 43.

    SiubhanDuinne

    August 12, 2016 at 11:07 am

    @kindness:

    I’m seriously beginning to think the Donald is just t̸r̸o̸l̸l̸i̸n̸g̸ u̸s̸ a̸l̸l̸ DougJ.

    FTFY

  44. 44.

    coin operated

    August 12, 2016 at 11:08 am

    @Mnemosyne:

    The category error that a lot of people make is that they blame the workers for “stealing jobs” when it’s actually the bosses who seek out those illegal or immigrant workers and deliberately underpay them. It’s not like it’s a free market where workers can demand their preferred wage and bosses are choosing between equal employees.

    THIS!!!

  45. 45.

    amorphous

    August 12, 2016 at 11:12 am

    Is no one in the media simply going to point out (again) that Trump doesn’t even have the timing right? ISIS was founded while Obama was a Senator.

    The media should just point out that these attacks are tacky. Literally that is the only word that may shame Trump and the Trumplodytes. Tacky still brands people in a way they don’t want.

  46. 46.

    Enhanced Voting Techinques

    August 12, 2016 at 11:12 am

    El Donaldo muy Faboliouso “the way he got out of Iraq was ”

    So Trump thinks we should still be in Iraq and killing anyone who doesn’t want FREEDOM!!!

    McFual “BTW, Trumps line that Obama founded ISIS echoes exactly a myth propagated by Russian state-controlled media and bloggers.”

    So Trump is using dog whistles even is own base can’t hear. That suggests, like with his back loans, Trump real grift is with foreign white racists.

  47. 47.

    Anoniminous

    August 12, 2016 at 11:12 am

    FWYP

  48. 48.

    Ceci n'est pas mon nym

    August 12, 2016 at 11:13 am

    @coin operated: I seem to remember John Steinbeck covering this ground in 1939 in “Grapes of Wrath”. The job-stealers were Dust Bowl refugees. And you could always find somebody hungrier to accept 10 cents/day (or whatever) and “steal the jobs” from the people who had been getting 15.

    It’s depressing how little ground we’ve gained.

  49. 49.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 11:13 am

    @ET: Yes, somebody in the previous thread pointed out that if I sarcastically said that Obama was the founder of ISIS, it would actually mean that he was the opposite of that.

    Or, after someone says that “A double negative actually means yes, but there are no double positives that mean ‘no'”.
    I respond “Yeah, right”

  50. 50.

    Anoniminous

    August 12, 2016 at 11:14 am

    2016 Democratic Party Platform.

  51. 51.

    Roger Moore

    August 12, 2016 at 11:16 am

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    About H1-B abuse, it varies widely from employer to employer. IT firms have been the worst offenders.

    Only because academia is free to abuse J-1 visas as well as H-1.

  52. 52.

    bupalos

    August 12, 2016 at 11:16 am

    @J R in WV:

    Trump is an unAmerican uneducated illiterate racist greedy boor. His stupidity is enhanced by his racist evil nature. If he was middle-income instead of pseudo-wealthy, he would be the racist monster next door, hated by the whole neighborhood.

    The problem is “the whole neighborhood” doesn’t necessarily hate that guy. And there is definitely a method to Trump’s madness that (while I’ll continue to say has a really tiny chance of actually producing win) works in a certain way. Trump is running on two tracks- straight racism, and double-reverse racism. There aren’t that many actual “straight racist” white nationalist sympathizers, probably less than 15%. Obviously they love him, but they just kind of form his floor. But there are a lot of people for whom the whole meaning of the term “racism” or “misogyny” is simply “something that doesn’t really exist but which I might be accused of.” Every time Trump says something that normalizes insensitive speech or behavior, or gets people to call him explicitly racist or misogynist, he reaches towards his ceiling by adding a chunk of these voters. He provides these people with the same strange kind of security you feel when you’re speeding at 71 and someone flies by you at 95. I feel like Democrats need to be a little more careful about how we combat this, and I feel the right way is to call it out for what it primarily is- not an expression of personal racist beliefs, but a cunning political trick to capture voters on a much broader spectrum. Trump should be spoken of primarily as a huckster and someone who repackages and rebrands fundamentally crappy or fraudulent products.

  53. 53.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 11:18 am

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    Funny how Trump never talks about that.

    Neither does the rest of the GOP. As long as there are jobs here, no fence will be high enough, but if you actually jail those employers, the jobs will go away.

  54. 54.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 12, 2016 at 11:19 am

    @SiubhanDuinne: Nah. DougJ is intelligent, Donald is as dumb as box of rocks and cruel to boot.

  55. 55.

    bupalos

    August 12, 2016 at 11:21 am

    @amorphous: Agree. Tacky, fraudulent, huckster… I’d like these terms to get a little more relative play. Especially since I think we need to be looking towards the next iteration of Trump as well.

  56. 56.

    Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)

    August 12, 2016 at 11:22 am

    So Judicial Watch has found some supposedly corrupt shit that Clinton did. Because, of course, they did. It’s nothing, really, some e-mails that people who worked for Clinton when she was Secretary of State sent asking somebody to get so and so a job, some back and forth with the Clinton Foundation, that kind of shit. They got 30,000-odd e-mails through FOIA, and they’ve been whacking off to them ever since.

    And there are a few things that piss me off about that. One is that, yeah, this is something everybody does. You don’t even have to be a politician to try to get your friend a job through somebody you know. I know that. But the other thing that pisses me off is that Clinton knows that she has to be better than everybody else. She’s like Jackie Robinson. She can’t be just as good as everybody else, she has to be better. She can’t make those calls to get the kid of somebody who gave money to the Clinton Foundation a job, because the standards are different for her, and they always have been. The people who work for her know this, too.

    We’re lucky that she’s running against Trump this year, since in any other year, this dumb shit would be what everybody would be talking about for a week. What drives me around the bend with the Clintons isn’t that they’re corrupt or untrustworthy, because they aren’t; it’s that they walk right into shit like this, over and over. It’s unfair. I know, and I’m not saying that this is even a real story, or that it should be. It’s that they know how unfair the standards people in the press hold them to, and they still do shit like this.

    Maybe it’s inevitable. It must be hard to be three times better than everybody else all the fucking time. But when this shit does happen, it still peeves me. I’ll be so happy when this campaign is over at last. Of course, then again, all that means is that we can begin gearing up for the 70,000 Congressional investigations into how Hillary Clinton sorts her underwear drawer.

  57. 57.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 12, 2016 at 11:23 am

    @Roger Moore: Academia too abuses H1-B, but not any more so than they abuse native born by making them work for poverty level wages as post-docs. Or did you mean F1 as in the student visas.

  58. 58.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 12, 2016 at 11:25 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techinques: Has any major news organization investigated Trump’s Russian connection in depth?

  59. 59.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 11:25 am

    At this point, I think Trump is really Andy Kaufman.

    Think about it! Did we ever see them together in public?

    There you go.

  60. 60.

    Shalimar

    August 12, 2016 at 11:26 am

    @Xenos: It explains the lack of advertising and field operations, but it doesn’t really explain why they don’t have a 1000-person staff of volunteers spread around all the Trump properties working for free room and board, which the campaign graciously pays for to Trump’s various companies. If you’re a hotel magnate, that is the quickest way to put money into your own pocket from a campaign.

  61. 61.

    sigaba

    August 12, 2016 at 11:26 am

    Some commenter on NyMag made an prediction I would give good odds on, goes something like this:

    “The time will come, probably sometime after Thanksgiving, when Donald Trump will go on Hannity or call in to CNBC and tell the assembled with a straight face and utter conviction that he never ran for president.”

  62. 62.

    Aleta

    August 12, 2016 at 11:27 am

    Expecting to see new ‘statistics’ come out of The Mouth based on this questionnaire. The link goes to site. Would be fun to skew the survey with honest answers, but it would just put me on his mailing list I guess.

  63. 63.

    sigaba

    August 12, 2016 at 11:28 am

    @Shalimar: If we’ve learned anything Trump would probably provide room and board if the RNC was paying market rate for it.

  64. 64.

    bemused

    August 12, 2016 at 11:28 am

    @Mnemosyne:

    Randi Rhodes put it well. She was talking about an essay on Americans barely hanging to middle class who resent and look down on those who are struggling even more. She pointed out that Americans in poverty or on the edge don’t have power. (I’ve always thought it didn’t sense to resent people who are just trying to take care of their families and the majority of them don’t want to be dependent on government assistance). Anyway, Randi said the angry, resentful Americans shouldn’t be looking down, they should be looking up at those with the power who have negatively changed their lives.

  65. 65.

    Aleta

    August 12, 2016 at 11:30 am

    @Aleta: Oh, here’s the altered link to the survey https colon slash slash action dot trump2016 dot com/trump-mms-survey/

  66. 66.

    Redshift

    August 12, 2016 at 11:31 am

    @Mnemosyne:

    The category error that a lot of people make is that they blame the workers for “stealing jobs” when it’s actually the bosses who seek out those illegal or immigrant workers and deliberately underpay them.

    Weird how CEOs are “job creators” who should get all the credit for giving people jobs purely out of the goodness of their hearts, but undocumented immigrants manage to steal your job without them being involved at all!

  67. 67.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 11:31 am

    @bemused: Anyway, Randi said the angry, resentful Americans shouldn’t be looking down, they should be looking up at those with the power who have negatively changed their lives.

    She is correct. BUT it is scary to challenge power. The cowards prefer to kiss ass and kick down.

  68. 68.

    Bobby Thomson

    August 12, 2016 at 11:36 am

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.): it really grinds my gears that people whose conduct will always be held to impossibly unfair standards continue to do things.

  69. 69.

    Redshift

    August 12, 2016 at 11:36 am

    Stop twisting your brains trying to figure out some way it makes sense what Trump is doing. This is who he is, and who he has been for decades. He thinks he’s “winning” if he’s getting attention and drawing crowds. He doesn’t know how to win an election, and he can’t learn because he’s never hired anyone but yes-men, and if any are foisted on him by the RNC, he won’t listen to them if they try to tell him he’s wrong about anything.

  70. 70.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    August 12, 2016 at 11:39 am

    @bemused:

    One of my favorite passages for some time now:

    But actual rich people can’t ever be the target. It’s a classic peasant mentality: going into fits of groveling and bowing whenever the master’s carriage rides by, then fuming against the Turks in Crimea or the Jews in the Pale or whoever after spending fifteen hard hours in the fields. You know you’re a peasant when you worship the very people who are right now, this minute, conning you and taking your shit. Whatever the master does, you’re on board. When you get frisky, he sticks a big cross in the middle of your village, and you spend the rest of your life praying to it with big googly eyes. Or he puts out newspapers full of innuendo about this or that faraway group and you immediately salute and rush off to join the hate squad. A good peasant is loyal, simpleminded, and full of misdirected anger.

    If ever there was a textbook case of peasant thinking, it’s struggling middle-class Americans burned up in defense of taxpayer-funded bonuses to millionaires. It’s really weird stuff. And bound to get weirder, I imagine, as this crisis gets worse and more complicated.

    This is all Matt Taibbi, and he wrote that in 2009.

  71. 71.

    Mike J

    August 12, 2016 at 11:39 am

    Within 2%:

    (((Harry Enten))) ‏@ForecasterEnten 3 minutes ago
    Trump pulling in 29% in Colorado in the four-way. 29%.

  72. 72.

    Enhanced Voting Techinques

    August 12, 2016 at 11:40 am

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    Has any major news organization investigated Trump’s Russian connection in depth?

    Not as far as I know, but I am thinking Trump is grifting the white racists the world over.

    Off Shoring Wingnuttery, if you will.

    And it makes sense. Trump is an entertainer at the end of the day and he knows the domestic carpet chewer audience is tapped out. The real growth is in Eurasia. He loses, none of the donations get reported plus he can go on world tours.

  73. 73.

    Applejinx

    August 12, 2016 at 11:43 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techinques: Wow. That escalated quickly.

    ‘Obama founded ISIS’ is RUSSIAN propaganda?

    I am stunned by the world I live in, but sometimes more than others.

  74. 74.

    Aleta

    August 12, 2016 at 11:43 am

    @Aleta:
    A question that comes after “do you trust F News?”
    “On which issues does the mainstream media do the worst job of representing Republicans? (Select as many that apply.)”

  75. 75.

    artem1s

    August 12, 2016 at 11:45 am

    @Punchy:
    Ohio derp is due to NRA hacking racists and militia sentiments in rural areas of the state. been going on since 1980s. also, the systematic attacks on public education by charter and for profit education businesses means that anyone who has half a brain flees the state as soon as they can. we some excellent universities but graduates have nothing to stay for except jobs with Wendy’s or Nationwide. Recent funding for high tech sectors in NE OH have started to turn that around but the Ohio river town section of the state is still flounder and clinging to gods and guns.

  76. 76.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 11:45 am

    still awaiting moderation over on the previous thread. Hellllloooo?

  77. 77.

    Aleta

    August 12, 2016 at 11:48 am

    @Aleta: From the true or false section of the survey: ” If Donald Trump said or did half of the things Hillary Clinton has, the media would effectively end his candidacy.”

  78. 78.

    Matt McIrvin

    August 12, 2016 at 11:50 am

    @NorthLeft12: My understanding is that Germany actually has had some trouble with obnoxious/violent radicals stirring up trouble among the Syrian and Iraqi refugees living in their refugee camps. But… keep in mind… they’ve been dealing with such a huge flood of refugees that they’re living in camps. It’s a high-stress situation for everyone and these people are desperate. It’s so different from the tiny settlement efforts that have been riling people up in the US.

  79. 79.

    jl

    August 12, 2016 at 11:54 am

    The primary was a winner show, great production. Trump could just say fun shit and get lots of applause, punk the straight man and get a big laugh and roar. What is this crap with having to explain what he means, and connect his skits to facts?

    It is documented fact that Trump is bald face straight up lying about his opposition to the Iraq invasion. His doubts started a year in when it occurred to him that it was costing a lot of money, and the US wasn’t seeing a good return on the investment. Josh Marshall says he supported Obama’s withdrawal from Iraq (which, BTW, followed the agreement Bush II made with Iraq). But that info was from a Marshall tweet.

    Anyone know of documentation of what Trump was saying at the time Obama followed through on the Bush II withdrawal agreement? Is there slam dunk documentation that Trump is bald face lying about that, just like there is documentation of his bald face lies about his opposition to the Iraq invasion?

  80. 80.

    Punchy

    August 12, 2016 at 11:55 am

    @Punchy: And just like that, TPM completely flips that so that OH, FL, and NC are now Lean Dem. Literally just happened. Comments on the state of the race go stale in less than 30 minutes.

  81. 81.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 11:55 am

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.): Hey! I’ve got a great idea! Let’s blame immigrants for the fact that employers are going to use them when they can over proper MURKIN workers, and let’s blame HRC for the appearance of “corruption” for doing what EVERYONE ELSE IN THE WORLD DOES, because right-wingers WANT us to see her as corrupt!

    Jesus, I just can’t.even.today.

    ETA: Here’s a thought: maybe, instead of doing the right-wing’s job for them and blaming the victim, you could be lavishing some of that energy into BLAMING THE VICTIMIZERS?

  82. 82.

    bemused

    August 12, 2016 at 11:55 am

    @WereBear:

    Yes and the GOP and RW media has been working the misdirection game for decades, making sure they always look down and never up.

  83. 83.

    Omnes Omnibus

    August 12, 2016 at 11:56 am

    @CONGRATULATIONS!: Why don’t you figure out what the word refugee means and then revisit this topic.

  84. 84.

    Mai.naem.mobile

    August 12, 2016 at 11:56 am

    I so do wish Obama could run against Trumpy Dumpy. Trumpy would explode into a million little pieces during the concession speech and Obama would get a ’64 like landslide.

  85. 85.

    burnspbesq

    August 12, 2016 at 11:57 am

    Heh.

    Sanders Staffers Bail on Canova

  86. 86.

    StringOnAStick

    August 12, 2016 at 11:59 am

    @Applejinx: Putin has funded Le Pen in France and Wilders in the Nederlands; he’s funding right wing political movements everywhere he can, including tRump no doubt.

  87. 87.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 12:03 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.):

    But when this shit does happen, it still peeves me.

    Of course, it happened in 2009 – 7 years ago, but please continue to get peeved.

  88. 88.

    smintheus

    August 12, 2016 at 12:03 pm

    Trump is infallible. He’s yet another Republican candidate whom God has called to become president and savior of America.

    God always does seem to want his chosen candidates to lose, but that can happen.

  89. 89.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 12, 2016 at 12:04 pm

    @burnspbesq: Revolutioning is hard work.

  90. 90.

    Peale

    August 12, 2016 at 12:05 pm

    @NorthLeft12: They hate refugees because they are another element that is altering the demographic mix that must be catered to economically and politically. You see someone fleeing the war, they see a potential non-Republican voter who will start demanding that companies offer products they want in languages that they speak. I wouldn’t be surprised that if I started a conspiracy that Obama purposefully destroyed the Middle East to create refugees whose children will vote Democrat that I wouldn’t have a large subscription base for my newsletter in a few days.

  91. 91.

    Mike J

    August 12, 2016 at 12:05 pm

    @burnspbesq:

    Sanders Staffers Bail on Canova

    Already enough loser stink on them for one season.

  92. 92.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 12:06 pm

    @jl: Yes. There was a response in one of yesterday’s threads that had Trump in 2008 saying he was hugely militaristic. I am not sure how to search for it.

  93. 93.

    Patricia Kayden

    August 12, 2016 at 12:06 pm

    @oldgold:

    Hillary wants to eviscerate the Second Amendment and is largely responsible for the creation of ISIS?

    The people who believe that already believed that before the end of this week.

  94. 94.

    bemused

    August 12, 2016 at 12:06 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    I had forgotten this. When Taibbi is good, he nails it.

  95. 95.

    ted mills

    August 12, 2016 at 12:07 pm

    The delivery of “ISIS is honoring President Obama. He is the founder of ISIS. He is the founder of ISIS. He’s the founder! He founded ISIS!” shows he’s literally saying whatever pops in his head. First sentence: not clear enough. Second sentence: He’s clearer. Third: He realizes what he just said, says it again, realizes it’s pure red meat and with that adulation. Fourth: Saying it again is the “evidence” that the previous statement is true. Fifth: And in summation, people, A=A.

  96. 96.

    Kay

    August 12, 2016 at 12:07 pm

    @Mike J:

    There’s a lot of denial, though. I had a sane Republican who voted for Kasich in the primary telling me about “secret voters” yesterday. It may take a while to trickle down.

    IMO, Republican voters like to win, a lot, so they will discard Trump MORE as he looks like a loser, as it becomes conventional wisdom. The appearance of winning is more important to them than it is to Democratic voters. This is one thing Trump understands.

  97. 97.

    dmsilev

    August 12, 2016 at 12:08 pm

    @Punchy: TPM’s swing-state designations are very twitchy, often often changing status with just a single poll. You can get a somewhat calmer view of things looking at the individual state graphs at Pollster.

  98. 98.

    Matt McIrvin

    August 12, 2016 at 12:09 pm

    @Punchy: Race. (And a bit of socioeconomics.) For the most part, Hillary is running behind Obama in the whiter swing states, and ahead of Obama in the least-white ones. Black Americans are actually more for Clinton (vs. Trump, at least) than they were for Obama. She does better with richer, college-educated whites too, which helps her in places like Virginia and NC.

    The Obama-twice state that Clinton is most likely to lose is Iowa, a relatively white state. NC is leaning blue, Georgia is a battleground state, and Trump’s margin is dizzyingly small in Mississippi.

  99. 99.

    smintheus

    August 12, 2016 at 12:09 pm

    Remember when Trump claim to the presidency was that he was so rich he’d be beholden to nobody? Trump yesterday begging for help:

    Trump told the assembled evangelicals that he desperately needed their help in order to win the White House in November, calling on the pastors to get out the vote in their congregation. He said he needed the help especially in swing states like Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, where Trump said religious voters could swing the entire election his way.

    And yes there’s an explicit quid pro quo:

    Trump spent the first half of his roughly 40-minute speech pledging to undo the Johnson Amendment, a rule that the real estate mogul said “silenced” religious leaders politically by threatening to revoke their tax exempt status. In addition to offering a political voice, Trump told the assembled pastors that with the Johnson Amendment removed, church attendance would grow.

  100. 100.

    JPL

    August 12, 2016 at 12:09 pm

    Trump has a rally in PA this afternoon. If he uses a teleprompter, that will indicate to me that the meeting with the big wigs this morning worked.

  101. 101.

    Villago Delenda Est

    August 12, 2016 at 12:11 pm

    @schrodinger’s cat: Drumpf is one of the exploiters of labor. Of course he doesn’t talk about that.

  102. 102.

    Calouste

    August 12, 2016 at 12:11 pm

    @Punchy:

    And just like that, TPM completely flips that so that OH, FL, and NC are now Lean Dem. Literally just happened. Comments on the state of the race go stale in less than 30 minutes. TPM prediction model sucks donkey balls, but hey, click-bait.

    FTFY

    Sam Wang is the only polling predictor I really pay attention to. He said in March that he might as well take a break until the convention, because the primary race was done at that point.

  103. 103.

    Woodrowfan

    August 12, 2016 at 12:11 pm

    here’s a link to the video of the old man yelling at reporters. (“My name is American Patriot, your name is traitor!”)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uyWfL8P1Lk

    Found it on the Blue Virginia blog..

  104. 104.

    JPL

    August 12, 2016 at 12:12 pm

    @smintheus: He also wanted them to help with the Mormons. It’s an interesting strategy, but I doubt it works.

  105. 105.

    Kay

    August 12, 2016 at 12:14 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.):

    Because, of course, they did. It’s nothing, really, some e-mails that people who worked for Clinton when she was Secretary of State sent asking somebody to get so and so a job, some back and forth with the Clinton Foundation, that kind of shit. They got 30,000-odd e-mails through FOIA, and they’ve been whacking off to them ever since.

    I’m more and more impressed with Hillary Clinton the more I see of her, but I disagree. She should have kept a wall between the foundation and her government work. This idea that conflicts don’t matter because they are “good people” doing “good work” is just bullshit. It’s the height of arrogance and elitism. Follow the rules. There are basic norms on appearance of conflicts. The idea is we DON’T have to rely on their belief they are “good people”. Use the process.

    This seems to be a particular failing of these foundations, BTW. “Nonprofit” isn’t a free pass. I don’t care if they’re good or bad people and I shouldn’t have to parse what they do to figure it out. Do they not have ethical norms written down somewhere if for some reason grown up business people don’t already know this? If not, why not?

  106. 106.

    Chris

    August 12, 2016 at 12:15 pm

    @bemused:

    His article on the teabaggers is still one of my favorite reads of the Obama era.

    @smintheus:

    They’ll get behind him.

  107. 107.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 12:15 pm

    @jl:

    Anyone know of documentation of what Trump was saying at the time Obama followed through on the Bush II withdrawal agreement? Is there slam dunk documentation that Trump is bald face lying about that, just like there is documentation of his bald face lies about his opposition to the Iraq invasion?

    yes:

    But lost in Trump’s immediate comments is that, for years, he pushed passionately and forcefully for the same immediate troop withdrawal from Iraq. In interview after interview in the later 2000s, Trump said American forces should be removed from Iraq.

    “First, I’d get out of Iraq right now,” Trump said to British GQ in a 2008 interview. “And by the way, I am the greatest hawk who ever lived, a far greater hawk even than Bush. I am the most militant military human being who ever lived. I’d rebuild our military arsenal, and make sure we had the finest weapons in the world. Because countries such as Russia have no respect for us, they laugh at us. Look at what happened in Georgia, a place we were supposed to be protecting.”

  108. 108.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 12:17 pm

    @catclub: Trump: “And by the way, I am the greatest hawk who ever lived”

    Some people say such things for emphasis. But Trump means it.

  109. 109.

    Matt McIrvin

    August 12, 2016 at 12:19 pm

    @Calouste: The most interesting and heretical thing about Sam Wang’s site is that he seems to think the House is flippable (and has for some time). His track record in these things is not as good as with presidential elections, though.

  110. 110.

    smintheus

    August 12, 2016 at 12:19 pm

    @JPL: Trump actually spent a lot of time slagging off Mormons. Maybe he thinks they don’t have newspapers and stuff reporting what he says.

  111. 111.

    jl

    August 12, 2016 at 12:19 pm

    @catclub: Thanks. But I don’t see a link. Where is that quote from?

  112. 112.

    Major Major Major Major

    August 12, 2016 at 12:19 pm

    @Calouste: I liked what he said about Silver’s ‘now-cast’ the other day. Something along the lines of “a predictive model that changes this much is no predictive model at all.”

  113. 113.

    scav

    August 12, 2016 at 12:20 pm

    @JPL: I’m not sure a publicized come to jebus intervention before every single speech Cheeto Raccoon makes so that he sticks to the teleprompter is going to be feasible.

  114. 114.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 12:20 pm

    @Kay: um…is there any ACTUAL evidence, at this point, that HRC or the Clinton Foundation didn’t “follow the rules”? Or is it all innuendo?

  115. 115.

    smintheus

    August 12, 2016 at 12:22 pm

    @Chris: They already are. For months Trump’s support among fundies has been huge. More proof, if needed, that they don’t care what’s in their scriptures.

  116. 116.

    Peale

    August 12, 2016 at 12:22 pm

    @Kay: yeah. I’m actually surprised the foundation hasn’t come up more since when asked during a debate what they would go after Clinton for in the Fall, all of the Republican candidates said “the foundation.” Maybe Trump (who has a foundation that doesn’t give any money to anyone) can’t because his foundation really is a place to park assets tax free, whereas at least the Clintons do use theirs to give money to various causes.

    I figured that there would be one or two programs that they supported that turned out to have bad actors involved, or that they were hashing around some idea that turned out to have bad results (I know! Let’s put asbestos in third world schools to save children from fires! – Something like that. Means well, kind, of, but not really a good idea). I thought that there would be evidence that they had a tough time distinguishing between their personal assets and the foundation assets. Or that the board was filled with relatives paying themselves handsomely. Lots of foundations have problems like that.

    But so far, there hasn’t been very much going on.

  117. 117.

    Cat48

    August 12, 2016 at 12:23 pm

    @CONGRATULATIONS!:

    Don’t give up, but I read the article bc they broke the exact day that Clinton was meeting with the FBI to answer questions. They also leaked info,on,the # of investigators which was wrong. I don’t know what to think. I would like an attorney to read it if what they have set up is plausible. The Pollock guy who writes for them worked for Good Morning America & Fox News as inv reporter. I don’t know what to believe.

  118. 118.

    JPL

    August 12, 2016 at 12:23 pm

    In case this hasn’t been posted
    New NBC/WSJ/Marist polls
    CO: HRC 46, Trump 32 (+14)
    FL: HRC 44, Trump 39 (+5)
    NC: HRC 48, Trump 39 (+9)
    VA: HRC 46, Trump 33 (+13)

    Aug 4-10

  119. 119.

    jonas

    August 12, 2016 at 12:23 pm

    What’s this — the third or fourth time — Trump has pwned Hewitt on his own show? The guy’s a glutton for punishment.

  120. 120.

    Chris

    August 12, 2016 at 12:24 pm

    @catclub:

    Because countries such as Russia have no respect for us, they laugh at us. Look at what happened in Georgia, a place we were supposed to be protecting

    Even though this is a bogus argument, it’s nice that somebody was there to throw it at George W. Bush.

    Back when Putin kept moving on Ukraine, I was hearing even liberals around me wonder if “you know, Bush was crazy and an asshole but I wonder if he’d been in office if Putin would’ve dared…” It was like the whole Georgia 2008 thing had never happened.

    The “Republicans, strong on defense!” script is incredibly well implanted in a painful number of people’s heads.

  121. 121.

    Chris

    August 12, 2016 at 12:27 pm

    @smintheus:

    If I had any doubts about this, McCain-2008 would’ve cured me. I still remember James Dobson, who’d sworn to all who would listen that he wouldn’t vote for McCain “as a matter of conscience,” then doing so anyway because I can haz seat at table of power plz?

  122. 122.

    jonas

    August 12, 2016 at 12:28 pm

    @smintheus: I’m sure Trump would be surprised to learn that there are also a lot of Mormons in states like NV, AZ and ID. Idaho isn’t going to be in contention for HRC, but NV and AZ certainly are. Will this be the tipping point?

  123. 123.

    Mike J

    August 12, 2016 at 12:28 pm

    @Kay:

    The appearance of winning is more important to them than it is to Democratic voters.

    I always find it weird that when a poll shows a Democrat ahead, the first response on the Democratic side is, “don’t get cocky”. Republicans assume that looking like a winner brings people to your side and drives turnout. Democrats assume the same thing about losing.

  124. 124.

    Kay

    August 12, 2016 at 12:29 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    No, but that “personal assistant” to Bill Clinton was pretty clearly wearing two hats, and he changes them at his own discretion. It’s just too clever by half. Keep it simple. No one is that essential. No dual roles.

    There’s a reason for studiously avoiding even the appearance of a conflict- it’s trust. The public has to trust them.

  125. 125.

    MattF

    August 12, 2016 at 12:29 pm

    From what this guy writes, he’s a no-kidding RWNJ, and he’s predicting an ‘extinction-level’ defeat for Rs.

  126. 126.

    randy khan

    August 12, 2016 at 12:29 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.):

    As I understand it, most of this is about State Department staffers acting on their own. Even to the extent you’re saying that Clinton has to be behave differently than anybody else because she’ll be tarred unfairly, there’s not much she can do about that sort of thing.

  127. 127.

    jl

    August 12, 2016 at 12:30 pm

    @Miss Bianca: I agree with Kay. I don’t think there is any strong evidence of corruption or influence peddling, and I think HRC has reasonable explanations. but I think the sad fact is that we have to take HRC’s word for some of it right now. Hopefully, HRC or State Dept. can produce some good evidence that they are telling the truth.

    Some of the charges are total BS, people mentioned in emails are not anyone who would be involved in influence peddling, and the whole charge rests on the mis-identification. But some of the charges can’t be debunked so easily.

    I think the HRC/Clinton foundation stories and other email crap would be big stories, but Trump doesn’t want to share the headlines, seems to me.
    I don;t think HRC is any more corrupt that any other standard politician, but the long smear campaign against her has primed the media and the public to blow this stuff out of proportion.

  128. 128.

    Cat48

    August 12, 2016 at 12:30 pm

    @Calouste

    New NBC Marist polls came out after 11:00 on all those states.

  129. 129.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 12:30 pm

    @Chris: The “Republicans, strong on defense!” script is incredibly well implanted in a painful number of people’s heads.

    Especially since, if we listened to them, we would have lost World War II.

    They hate it when I point that out to them. So I do it a lot.

  130. 130.

    liberal

    August 12, 2016 at 12:31 pm

    @CONGRATULATIONS!:

    The result? Wages crashed and you probably left as you couldn’t support a family any more.

    Your problem is you don’t understand economics. More immigrants = a bigger economy = everyone better off. This is well supported by international comparisons showing that bigger countries have a higher GDP/capita than smaller countries. /snark

  131. 131.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 12:33 pm

    @MattF: The guy wanted Ted Cruz. The first human being since Nixon to trigger my instinctive mistrust so strongly.

    Thanks, I loved reading it :)

  132. 132.

    RaflW

    August 12, 2016 at 12:35 pm

    I think we have to pound away at that Russian connection. It sounds like Donnie’s FSB handler has gotten to him on the Obama-ISIS-founder stuff.

  133. 133.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 12:35 pm

    @MattF: OMG. From the article:

    Trump is making his problems worse. He’s doing nothing to win the votes of Hispanics, African-Americans, millennials or college-educated women.

    That is because the Republican Party platform offers these folks only poverty and degradation, maybe?

  134. 134.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 12:36 pm

    @WereBear:

    Especially since, if we listened to them, we would have lost World War II.

    Not true. We would have been on Hitler’s side.

  135. 135.

    smintheus

    August 12, 2016 at 12:37 pm

    @Peale: Trump hasn’t given any money to his own foundation in years, and he’s used it several times we know of to make illegal donations or purchases. He can’t afford to have voters reminded of that.

  136. 136.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 12:38 pm

    @RaflW: Also on the taxes. People are saying – great people, influential people – that Trump donated to NAMBLA and wants to hide it by not disclosing his tax forms.

  137. 137.

    Kay

    August 12, 2016 at 12:38 pm

    @Mike J:

    Republicans assume that looking like a winner brings people to your side and drives turnout. Democrats assume the same thing about losing.

    I actually don’t believe at all in the Democrats’ favorite “complacency” theory. I don’t think my personal weather- my feelings– matter at all on election day :)

  138. 138.

    liberal

    August 12, 2016 at 12:39 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    Let’s blame immigrants for the fact that employers are going to use them when they can over proper MURKIN workers…

    Sure. Let’s pass draconian laws with huge fines and long jail terms for employers that hire illegal immigrants, and stop badgering the immigrants. It would be the most effective way to stop illegal immigration (well, really, the only effective way) and would reduce it to practically nothing.

  139. 139.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 12:39 pm

    @MattF: This article keeps on giving!

    Republican voters need to be reminded how much they loathe Clinton, but they can’t while Trump dominates the news every single day.

    Bwahahahaha! This is your Creature, Republicans: Just like Victor Frankenstein, you meddled with stuff you were not competent to control, and here we are. Mobs, torches, burning windmills: the works!

  140. 140.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    August 12, 2016 at 12:41 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: And, as usual for Taibbi, it drips contempt for people he doesn’t understand. In this case, peasants.

  141. 141.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 12:41 pm

    @jl: it is from this article.

    also, I read that bit in the Bee thread from yesterday.

  142. 142.

    Kay

    August 12, 2016 at 12:41 pm

    @Peale:

    yeah. I’m actually surprised the foundation hasn’t come up more since when asked during a debate what they would go after Clinton for in the Fall, all of the Republican candidates said “the foundation.” Maybe Trump (who has a foundation that doesn’t give any money to anyone) can’t because his foundation really is a place to park assets tax free, whereas at least the Clintons do use theirs to give money to various causes.

    I think most people believe foundations are good and they don’t think about it any further than that. I think there are real questions about how foundations act in quasi-government roles with no outside oversight or democratic process, but I accept that it’s a minority view.

  143. 143.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    August 12, 2016 at 12:43 pm

    Don’t give up, but I read the article bc they broke the exact day that Clinton was meeting with the FBI to answer questions. They also leaked info,on,the # of investigators which was wrong. I don’t know what to think. I would like an attorney to read it if what they have set up is plausible. The Pollock guy who writes for them worked for Good Morning America & Fox News as inv reporter. I don’t know what to believe.

    @Cat48: Really? I do. The Caller article is full of shit. End of story.

  144. 144.

    different-church-lady

    August 12, 2016 at 12:44 pm

    @NorthLeft12:

    What the hell reason do people have to hate refugees?

    What makes you think their hatred needs a reason?

  145. 145.

    Brachiator

    August 12, 2016 at 12:48 pm

    A couple of radio talk show hosts suggested that Trump is just spouting verbal diarrhea when he accuses Obama of founding ISIS. But Trump knows exactly what he is doing. He gets free air time for his outrageous statements, the more outrageous the better. And it’s like throwing raw meat to his supporters. They eat it up and roar for more. This is the Trump that they want. The man who is not politically correct. The man who will say anything. The man who will speak truth to power, rightwing nutjob style.

    Yes. It is all lies and bullshit. But it is exactly what his supporters yearn to hear. And it gets him a ton of free publicity.

    And while some folks continue to whine about the “mainstream media,” Trump gleefully exploits his relationship with the owner of the National Enquirer, who happily spits out more lies and obviously false innuendo about Hillary Clinton. Elsewhere, Trump falls back on twitter and friendly interviews on right wing media, a very cost-effective counter strategy. It’s even better than stiffing suppliers.

    This is Trump’s campaign strategy and he is going to ride or die with it. No pivots. No major effort to appear “more presidential.”

    What was it Michelle Obama said? “When they go low, we go high.” Trump is delighted to go low. The GOP bosses may be appalled (or pretend to be), but they will do nothing to stop him. It got him where he is. He is betting heavily that it will take him over the top.

    The funny thing is that it is NOT totally working for him. But he is desperately hoping that he will come up with some negative nickname, some nasty label that will stick.

  146. 146.

    Peale

    August 12, 2016 at 12:49 pm

    @smintheus: Yeah. But these are Republicans, so projection is what is on the plate each and every day. Somehow even liberals have convinced themselves that Hillary is the most bloodthirsty hawk running, which kind of ignores that Trump may be the most belligerent candidate we’ve ever had running for almost any office. Heck he’d threaten our allies and start fights where we currently have none. So attacking her for shameless misuse of a foundation while expecting voters to forget his own problems is par for the course.

  147. 147.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    August 12, 2016 at 12:49 pm

    @liberal: lulz

  148. 148.

    Matt McIrvin

    August 12, 2016 at 12:51 pm

    @catclub: If we’re on Hitler’s side, we probably get no atom bomb (no Jewish scientists), and we have to fight Stalin. Who maybe does get one. I’m not at all sure a US-allied Axis would win the war.

  149. 149.

    Kay

    August 12, 2016 at 12:51 pm

    @Peale:

    The thing about trust that they don’t get, government people, is we have no choice. We have to do other things- we have to work and raise our families and NOT be public employees :)

    We can’t provide granular oversight. We would do nothing else. It’s too big and complex.

    It’s like hiring a physician. I can’t check their work. I don’t have time. I have a different job. That’s why they can’t also be working for a pharma company. Now I still have to trust them and I can’t.

  150. 150.

    Cat48

    August 12, 2016 at 12:53 pm

    @Kay:

    They’re running a Clinton Foundation ad. McConnell says the Senate is “iffy” so they have to go after Clinton hard.

  151. 151.

    Captain C

    August 12, 2016 at 12:53 pm

    @JPL: Because there’s nothing that Mormons like more than being told what to do by people who don’t consider them (Mormons) to be legitimately Christian.

  152. 152.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 12:53 pm

    @MattF: Good heavens, I’m rolling on the floor here!

    My fear is that this will get worse before it gets better.

    The campaign doesn’t exist. They can’t control the candidate. The candidate isn’t learning or growing. And he thinks he’s winning, despite all evidence to the contrary.

    I’m at the end of my rope.

    It would be sad… if he were not a Republican.

    I really got started in the work world in 1980, when Ronald Reagan became President. And ever since, it has been one goddamned slippery slope after another; tax decisions that put a special burden on the middle class, rapacious credit card companies “losing” payments and moving due dates, rules rigged to favor corporations and trip up small business owners, lack of health insurance, sky high student loans, gutting wages; on and on and on.

    Now my own retirement is looming on the horizon, and a pathetic creature it is, but it could be worse; I could have wage-slaved for a corporation and gotten my pension stolen, which I’ve been seeing since I got into the workforce.

    I actually lived long enough to see the End Game. That, at least, is something.

  153. 153.

    jl

    August 12, 2016 at 12:54 pm

    @Brachiator: Trump seems to like the primary show better than the general, and he is sticking with the primary campaign act. It’s fun, he gets the kind of attention he likes, he can do his best schtick. Why change? I hope current trends continue.

  154. 154.

    sukabi

    August 12, 2016 at 12:55 pm

    @scav: they’ll stop publicizing it when it’s Pubis that draws the short straw and has to inject the thorazine to keep drumpf under control.

  155. 155.

    Kay

    August 12, 2016 at 12:58 pm

    @Cat48:

    I don’t know if it will work, because as I said if you object at all to a foundation there’s this immediate response that you’re sort of ungrateful and ungenerous. I think that’s a bad way to look at it, but that’s how people look at it.

    If I’m in Haiti and you want to contract out my water system you have to get some kind of democratic consent. I don’t care if it’s a “gift”. I’m not a beggar. I’m a citizen. Fuck off with your “gift”. You don’t get to buy decision-making power.

  156. 156.

    scav

    August 12, 2016 at 1:00 pm

    @sukabi: There’s an additional opportunity for the keeping it within the family grifting: have his sons take him down daily with the bespoke tranquilizer guns and pay them mightily. Can’t you see their selfies already holding up the severed hairpiece?

  157. 157.

    Captain C

    August 12, 2016 at 1:00 pm

    @JPL: Given the states she already has pretty much in the bag, if she wins those four she won’t need Pennsylvania, Ohio, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, or Nevada, let alone Arizona and Florida.

  158. 158.

    WereBear

    August 12, 2016 at 1:02 pm

    @Kay: My wake-up call was the Susan Komen Foundation jumping on the right wing bandwagon. They are raking in corporate donations and paying themselves large salaries. And they wanted to gut Planned Parenthood — who does low cost screenings.

    Maybe they are raising money for breast cancer research. But that’s in like, fourth place or something, in their priorities. Screw them.

  159. 159.

    MJS

    August 12, 2016 at 1:04 pm

    @Mai.naem.mobile: You believe there’s going to be a concession speech if Trump loses? Why do you think that will happen?

  160. 160.

    p.a.

    August 12, 2016 at 1:04 pm

    Think of the schlockiest, cheap, self-produced late night used car dealer commercial you’ve seen. I think those dealers could have done a better job as a candidate (at least post-primary) than Donny. At least they might listen to advice.

  161. 161.

    p.a.

    August 12, 2016 at 1:06 pm

    @WereBear: I used to give them $ too; pink ribbons! until I saw what they were about. There are myriad ‘rate the charity’ sites out there now.

  162. 162.

    smintheus

    August 12, 2016 at 1:06 pm

    @Peale: My point is just that everyone expected the Clinton Foundation to be prime material for Trump, but instead he has mostly avoided using it. I think the explanation could be he doesn’t want his own sleazy foundation to be in the news.

    And I’m with Kay, I think Clinton failed to erect the kind of wall between her office and her foundation that she promised when she was nominated. We shouldn’t have to trust in the good intentions of public officials; integrity and the appearance of integrity are both important.

  163. 163.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    August 12, 2016 at 1:08 pm

    You believe there’s going to be a concession speech if Trump loses?

    @MJS: I got an advance copy:

    “Ivanka, release the hounds. Uday and Qusay, let’s all go get lunch as soon as Ivanka’s done with the dogs and reporters, I wanna see this.”

  164. 164.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 1:08 pm

    @jl: And my point is, that by choosing to credit these stories ourselves, in the absence of any *actual* evidence to the contrary – or even by not crediting them but just wringing our hands over them – we are contributing to the smear. In other words, we’re part of the problem.

    Every.single.goddamn.time the Clintons get investigated – and, finally, exonerated because except for Blow Job City, it turned out that there was no “there” there – or some breathless reportage on some new “scandal” comes up, a certain number of us on the left are willing and eager to be useful stooges.

    How many of us are so squeaky clean that, in the course of 30 years of relentless persecution, nothing would come up that could be made to look damning, however innocuous it might actually be? It would have driven me into being a recluse – or into a convent or psych ward. Fuck this “Caesar’s wife” shit.

  165. 165.

    Rob in CT

    August 12, 2016 at 1:10 pm

    @Matt McIrvin:

    How does the UK and for that matter the SU survive without US supplies, let alone survive us actually entering the war on the side of the Axis?

  166. 166.

    Emma

    August 12, 2016 at 1:11 pm

    I don;t think HRC is any more corrupt that any other standard politician, but the long smear campaign against her has primed the media and the public to blow this stuff out of proportion.

    And we’re so afraid of them that we’ll let them get away with it and crucify Hillary one more time. It’s what Democrats do. Say what you will about Republicans but they stick up for their own, Trump notwithstanding.

    @Miss Bianca: You said it better than I could.

  167. 167.

    Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)

    August 12, 2016 at 1:12 pm

    @Kay: This is even more true in this case. Republicans have spent 25 years trying to make people mistrust Hillary Clinton, and they’ve done good work. It’s all lies, but that doesn’t change the outcome of what they’ve done. It’s unfair and vicious and nasty, but it’s a fact she has to live with. She has to be twice as good as everybody else.

  168. 168.

    JPL

    August 12, 2016 at 1:14 pm

    Every Senator needs to release the emails sent to the top aides. There are probably more signs that they are bought and paid for. The Clinton Foundation has helped a lot of people and that is what is important.

  169. 169.

    Emma

    August 12, 2016 at 1:16 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.):

    She has to be twice as good as everybody else.

    Wouldn’t you know it? The victim has to accept her victimization. Sounds so bloody familiar. Don’t wear those clothes, you know what they’ll say. Don’t act too confident, they’ll hate you for it.

    What Hillary needs is people to shout as loud as Republicans do.

  170. 170.

    Mai.naem.mobile

    August 12, 2016 at 1:16 pm

    @Captain C: yes,but you work on AZ and NV and maybe keep Reids seat and kick out McCain and possibly pick up 2 House seats. McSallys House seat in AZ was won by around 200 votes.

  171. 171.

    Omnes Omnibus

    August 12, 2016 at 1:17 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.): Sure. Fine. But Democrats don’t need to join in. It is, IMO, foolish and counterproductive.

  172. 172.

    smintheus

    August 12, 2016 at 1:19 pm

    @Chris: Yes, McCain whose personal behavior was so repellent even the Reagans turned against him. And Dobson & Co. were spitting venom against Obama. I posted just after the 2008 election that Dobson was sending out emails comparing Obama to Hitler.

    Dear Friend,

    The spirit of Winston Churchill was alive and well on Tuesday night at Focus on the Family Action headquarters.

    You may recall that in the most desperate days of World War II – when Great Britain was being pounded daily by Hitler’s Luftwaffe – that Winston Churchill called on his countrymen not to despair from danger but to rise to the challenge.

  173. 173.

    Uncle Cosmo

    August 12, 2016 at 1:19 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: The best line on Krugman’s page is just below it: David Brooks is off today. In point of fact, David Brooks is off every fucking day.

  174. 174.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 1:20 pm

    @Matt McIrvin: Nope. Britain unsupported by the US has no chance, so there is no two front war in Eurasia.
    Stalin needed our support to hold on against Germany.

  175. 175.

    Kay

    August 12, 2016 at 1:21 pm

    @WereBear:

    It isn’t just scams. The Dell people gave a big donation to Cleveland Public Schools to put in a school ranking system. By doing this, they were able to skip any democratic process or debate that would have gone along with an expenditure like that. It gets worse. It’s a start-up grant. The funding shifts to the public after X number of years. Pretty slick, right? Half a million dollars and the Dell Foundation just set a policy priority for a school district for years.

    I’m not grateful for that. It’s not a “gift”- it’s a transaction. We gave them agency in return for 500k. At least let’s look at it like a transaction.

  176. 176.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    August 12, 2016 at 1:21 pm

    @Uncle Cosmo: Not as a criticism but what you wrote is the single most common line I’ve seen in comment threads on Krugman’s columns, when he’s slotted in instead of Brooks or Douthat at least. Think of it as GMTA.

    Variations have included “David Brooks is off today? I’ll say, he sounds like Paul Krugman!”. And so on.

  177. 177.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 1:24 pm

    @Emma: @Omnes Omnibus: thank you.

    Yeah, I detest the Republicans for a lot of things, but one thing I do (sometimes grudgingly) admire about them is their tendency to stick together and stick up for their own. Party discipline.

    In their case, they end up excusing a lot of genuinely heinous shit in their candidates and politicos. In our case, we willingly and eagerly pile on our own at the slightest whiff of anything that the opposition is making hay of. Because appearances MATTER to us. They MATTER so much that we grab the guns away from the Republicans and say, “here, let me!” – and start shooting at any available foot we can find.

  178. 178.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    August 12, 2016 at 1:26 pm

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym: I knew someone here would hate on Taibbi because he’s been critical of Obama.

    How does he not understand peasants, pray tell?

  179. 179.

    Omnes Omnibus

    August 12, 2016 at 1:29 pm

    @Miss Bianca: The other thing here is that our side has a big lead right now, a good shot at getting the senate back, and the odds on the taking the house are are improving. So why is there any hand-wringing going on? I am not suggesting complacency is in order, but recognizing that we are in a good position and trying to build on that might be a nice thing to try. For once.

  180. 180.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 1:30 pm

    OT: “Michael Phelps’ Comeback Reveals a Wiser, Stronger, and More Talented Athlete” is at Slate.

    Didn’t they say the same about Lance Armstrong?

  181. 181.

    sigaba

    August 12, 2016 at 1:30 pm

    @smintheus: Isn’t the whole point of the presidency to have someone with broad international experience who can draw on a deep pool of talent, like say, a foundation?

    I mean this isn’t Tammany Hall we’re talking about, though that seems to be the implication I keep hearing.

    (I don’t think I’ve ever NOT gotten a job in the manner the people in Hillz’s emails got theirs so I admit I don’t even begin the understand the controversy.

    Work is about connections and relationships.)

  182. 182.

    Ryan

    August 12, 2016 at 1:31 pm

    No putting lipstick on that pig Hewitt.

  183. 183.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 1:33 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: That last bit of quote makes less sense than the peasants being enraged by things like mortgage relief (that would have gone to other peasants) – when it would have helped. Being enraged at the millionaires who get protected by bailouts AND get their bonuses is sensible.

  184. 184.

    Calouste

    August 12, 2016 at 1:34 pm

    @Cat48: And? A good prediction model shouldn’t swing wildly on a few polls.

  185. 185.

    Villago Delenda Est

    August 12, 2016 at 1:34 pm

    The most merciful course of action in regards to Shortbus is to simply put him to sleep.

  186. 186.

    Villago Delenda Est

    August 12, 2016 at 1:36 pm

    @Miss Bianca: The never ask what the cost of “party discipline” is, though. It turns out, it’s their souls.

  187. 187.

    raven

    August 12, 2016 at 1:36 pm

    @catclub: back off

  188. 188.

    Mnemosyne

    August 12, 2016 at 1:38 pm

    @p.a.:

    Cal Worthington would have brought his “pet” tiger Spot to press conferences.

    Now I’m said we’ll never see that (Mr. Worthington, a local So Cal legend, died at least a decade ago).

  189. 189.

    hovercraft

    August 12, 2016 at 1:39 pm

    From Greg Sargent at WaPo.

    Presidential campaigns can run into trouble for a variety of reasons. Sometimes there are external events over which they have no control that put them at a disadvantage, such as an economic downturn that makes it hard for the party in power to resist calls for change. Sometimes there’s a scandal that engulfs the candidate, or a string of campaign-trail mistakes. There may be fundamental demographic patterns working against the candidates that are hard to overcome. Or one campaign might just be doing its job better than the other, building a better organization to turn out voters, managing the media better and raising more money.

    And sometimes, everything goes south at once. That’s what’s happening to Donald Trump right now.

    One of Trump’s interesting quirks is that he doesn’t use a computer, even though he’s obsessed with reading news about himself. “Every morning, staffers print out 30 to 50 Google News results for ‘Donald J. Trump,’ ” as Olivia Nuzzi recently described his routine. “He then goes at the sheaf with a marker, making circles and arrows and annotating things he likes or doesn’t like.” So imagine how things look this morning, as he’s reading headlines such as “GOP Insiders: Trump can’t win,” or “GOP donors, fearful of Trump-fueled electoral rout, direct big money down-ballot,” or “As Trump struggles, Clinton goes on offense to win over GOP,” or “Team Clinton tasting victory.”

    So now even the supremely confident Trump is wondering what he has to do to turn things around. And he’s looking for help:

    Donald Trump’s campaign and top Republican Party officials plan what one person called a “come to Jesus” meeting on Friday in Orlando to discuss the Republican nominee’s struggling campaign, according to multiple sources familiar with the scheduled sit-down.

    Though a campaign source dismissed it as a “typical” gathering, others described it as a more serious meeting, with one calling it an “emergency meeting.” It comes at a time of mounting tension between the campaign and the Republican National Committee, which is facing pressure to pull the plug on Trump’s campaign and redirect party funds down ballot to protect congressional majorities endangered by Trump’s candidacy.

    The request for the Orlando Ritz Carlton meeting originated with Trump’s campaign, according to a source familiar with the broad details, and is being viewed by RNC officials as a sign that the campaign has come to grips with the difficulty it is having in maintaining a message and running a ground game.

    “They want to patch up a rift that just keeps unfolding,” one source said. “They finally realize they need the RNC for their campaign because, let’s face it, there is no campaign.”

    When that person says “there is no campaign,” what they’re referring to is Trump’s skeletal operation, not only at his headquarters but even more critically in the field. To take just one example, Trump has one field office in Florida, the largest swing state in the country. One. Less than three months from Election Day, he ought to have dozens. And understand, if Trump loses Florida, it will be essentially impossible for him to win the electoral college under any plausible scenario.

    Last week, I offered a somewhat tongue-in-cheek description of eight things Trump could do to turn around his campaign. My point was that everything that would be necessary is something Trump either can’t do or won’t do. So one has to wonder, what are they going to talk about at that “come to Jesus” meeting? Even if Trump’s aides could convince him that things are going badly, what could they change? They might put in a crash program to assemble a genuine field effort, but it would be so far behind Hillary Clinton’s that it could mitigate only some of the damage. They might hire some more communication staff to work with the journalists assigned to his campaign, perhaps not treating them with such naked contempt. But most important, can they change Trump himself?

  190. 190.

    D58826

    August 12, 2016 at 1:39 pm

    @Kay: While I agree in principle, I just wonder how you do it in practice. When the government of Saudi Arabia gives 10 million dollars to the CGF and then the ambassador to the US is a half brother to the king it’s hard to build a wall.

    And did anyone dig thru the Bush family business connections when 41 and 43 were POTUS? Or is it only a Clinton thing? (I know the answer to that one).

  191. 191.

    JPL

    August 12, 2016 at 1:39 pm

    @Ryan: I’m amazed that Hewitt thinks Merrick Garland is scarier than Donald Trump. Hewitt must live underground in a cave.

  192. 192.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 1:39 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: IKR? It’s like we can’t stand to be winning. Winning somehow compromises our moral purity.

    @Villago Delenda Est: Whereas for the Rs, winning is a *vindication* of their moral purity. Proof that they are of God’s elect.

  193. 193.

    Chris

    August 12, 2016 at 1:40 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    It’s not just that appearances matter, it’s that we’re not the totalitarian cult the GOP is.

  194. 194.

    JPL

    August 12, 2016 at 1:41 pm

    @D58826: IOKIYR…

  195. 195.

    D58826

    August 12, 2016 at 1:42 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    So why is there any hand-wringing going on

    Heavens without the topic of hand-wringing the only thing to talks about would be Steve and Walter. On second thought that might be a good thing on a hot Friday afternoon

  196. 196.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 1:44 pm

    @hovercraft:

    They want to patch up a rift that just keeps unfolding,” one source said. “They finally realize they need the RNC for their campaign because, let’s face it, there is no campaign.”

    and still, Trump threatens to stop doing any fundraising for the GOP if they cut off his support. Democrats in disarray.

  197. 197.

    ? Martin

    August 12, 2016 at 1:46 pm

    @JPL: He doesn’t think that. He needs his audience to think that.

  198. 198.

    ruemara

    August 12, 2016 at 1:46 pm

    @D58826: Anne could post the San Diego Juicer pics I sent, with the gorgeous, sexy talented crew down there. Just a thought.

  199. 199.

    Mnemosyne

    August 12, 2016 at 1:46 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    Every.single.goddamn.time the Clintons get investigated – and, finally, exonerated because except for Blow Job City, it turned out that there was no “there” there – or some breathless reportage on some new “scandal” comes up, a certain number of us on the left are willing and eager to be useful stooges.

    All of this. We know that Republicans have been running a smoke machine for almost 25 years, but damned if some Democrats aren’t still convinced there’s an actual fire in there somewhere.

  200. 200.

    LongHairedWeirdo

    August 12, 2016 at 1:46 pm

    Obama is literally the founder of ISIS. Great.
    Literally now means itself, it’s opposite-but-emphasizing-the-analogy, and “whatever the hell is most advantageous to me from any given listener”.

    Donald Trump must not become President – the Republican party is damn close to forcing dictionaries to add that third definition, and Trump would seal the deal!

    (NB: remember a dictionary is suppose to tell a person how to understand a word. So, “literally” has to list as possible uses “as written – a person who dies as a result of a fright was literally scared to death.
    “the user wishes to emphasize the aptness of the analogy – “I was literally scared to death!” merely emphasizes how apt the user considers “scared to death” to best express his or her state”

    That makes dictionaries bad enough. But don’t let the Trumpster crotchfire and the Republican Merkin Party do even more damage!

  201. 201.

    scav

    August 12, 2016 at 1:48 pm

    Another reason for the regular one, two, three day pattern “O! it was all a joke in the best words you benighted idiots” game might also be the sheer joy Trump gets at watching the tethered Repub spokesman (including his own VP) fall over themselves in nodding sagely along with the outrageous stuff, rolling it a bit further along, and then be left hanging mid-air when the comedic card gets played. And the Charlie Browns keep running at his football.

  202. 202.

    TriassicSands

    August 12, 2016 at 1:48 pm

    For the sake of argument let’s just accept that Trump was being sarcastic. Who is he trying to communicate with? If there is any audience that won’t have a clue — ever — that Trump is being sarcastic, it’s the people who attend his rallies and support his candidacy.

    Trump may be trying to tell us that nothing he says should be taken seriously. If that is the case, I wholeheartedly agree.

  203. 203.

    Matt McIrvin

    August 12, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    @Miss Bianca: I think the two decades from 1968 to 1988 scarred the Democratic Party on a deep, fundamental level. The idea that the Democratic Party will always find a way to lose, and the people are fundamentally against us, became part of our self-image. Also part of the conventional story about Democrats in the news media. We still haven’t shaken it, in part because the Reagan coalition is still out there winning midterm and odd-year elections.

  204. 204.

    mr_gravity

    August 12, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    @Aleta: That survey is bogus. I quit halfway because I couldn’t figure out which response supported the assertion. Also too, the bulk of the questions suggested “the media” is a single entity with an agenda as opposed to an ephemera of constantly shifting positions whose only agenda is attention seeking.

    “More time is spent covering fake “scandals” involving Trump than real scandals involving Hillary and our national security.” Yes? No? WTF?

    That’s like asking people for their opinion of world history.

  205. 205.

    raven

    August 12, 2016 at 1:51 pm

    @TriassicSands: So you don’t get that the drooling half-wit motherfuckers who make up his base love it no matter what?

    eta Sure you do.

  206. 206.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 1:52 pm

    @Chris: No, we’re not a “totalitarian cult” – but all too many of us are so ready, willing, and eager to swallow the same shit that the “totalitarian cult” peddles. What’s the name for that – “spineless”? “dupes?” “Vichyists?”

  207. 207.

    JPL

    August 12, 2016 at 1:54 pm

    @? Martin: So he’s just a hypocrite.

  208. 208.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 1:54 pm

    @Matt McIrvin:

    The idea that the Democratic Party will always find a way to lose, and the people are fundamentally against us, became part of our self-image. Also part of the conventional story about Democrats in the news media. We still haven’t shaken it, in part because the Reagan coalition is still out there winning midterm and odd-year elections.

    I think you’ve hit on something there.

  209. 209.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 1:57 pm

    @mr_gravity:

    That’s like asking people for their opinion of world history.

    When asked his opinion of western civilization, Gandhi said it would be a good thing.

  210. 210.

    ? Martin

    August 12, 2016 at 2:00 pm

    PPP puts South Carolina Trump 41, Clinton 39. Recent poll puts Missouri Trump 44, Clinton 42. She may start moving resources to these states. Recent Texas poll is +10 Trump, but Dixie Strategies, so take with grain of salt until a confirming poll arrives.

  211. 211.

    Chris

    August 12, 2016 at 2:00 pm

    @Matt McIrvin:

    This contributes to the “both sides do it but liberals are worse” Village centrist phenomenon too, I think. Even those pundits et al who do lean liberal have absorbed the notion that the Silent Majority thinks they’re too liberal and elitist and that it’s important to disprove that notion.

  212. 212.

    Just One More Canuck

    August 12, 2016 at 2:01 pm

    OT (sort of) but I see Hillary has released her 2015 tax return – she’s just jabbing in the early rounds

  213. 213.

    Mnemosyne

    August 12, 2016 at 2:01 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    After 25 years of the same shit, I would at least like to see a little skepticism when Judicial Watch — JUDICIAL WATCH! — claims they have the goods, FFS.

  214. 214.

    Cat48

    August 12, 2016 at 2:02 pm

    @Calouste:
    Ok

  215. 215.

    Uncle Cosmo

    August 12, 2016 at 2:03 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: You can probably surmise that I don’t read the comments chez Krugthulu & noticed that note at the bottom of the column for the first time today. Chalk it up as an independent discovery.

  216. 216.

    hovercraft

    August 12, 2016 at 2:04 pm

    @JPL:
    He’s a Scalia absolutist, the only worthy justice on the court right now is Thomas. So to him Garland is just as extreme as Ginsberg. It’s the liberal Roberts and Kennedy are barley keeping us faithful to the constitution.

  217. 217.

    Major Major Major Major

    August 12, 2016 at 2:04 pm

    @Just One More Canuck: It’s funny, she’s not “jabbing in the early rounds” or whatever, she’s doing what every other presidential candidate traditionally does, and right around the same time, too. It just feels like a dig at Trump because everything is so crazy that normal feels intentional.

  218. 218.

    D58826

    August 12, 2016 at 2:06 pm

    @Mnemosyne: If Judicial watch claimed the sun was coming up tomorrow I would stock up on batteries and winter clothes

  219. 219.

    Miss Bianca

    August 12, 2016 at 2:06 pm

    @Mnemosyne: the words “Judicial Watch” should immediately signal “game over” to anyone paying attention.

    @D58826: got there before me, didn’t ya?

  220. 220.

    Brachiator

    August 12, 2016 at 2:06 pm

    @hovercraft:

    Donald Trump’s campaign and top Republican Party officials plan what one person called a “come to Jesus” meeting on Friday in Orlando to discuss the Republican nominee’s struggling campaign, according to multiple sources familiar with the scheduled sit-down.

    Yawn.

    Republican Party hitches its future to a blowhard political neophyte. Wonders what is going wrong. Details at 11.

    But, who knows. Letting Trump be Trump has worked out so far with the Republicans. I keep hearing his hard core supporters, and even weary Republicans insist, “I don’t care how crazy Trump is, I can never vote for Hillary.”

    The Republicans only chance lies in hoping that decades of demonizing the Clintons can work for them by election day.

  221. 221.

    JMG

    August 12, 2016 at 2:08 pm

    @Chris: Don’t overthink it. Village TV pundits make high six figure or low seven figure salaries. Even the print wretches who do national politics for the Times, Post, LA Times, etc., make low six figure salaries. They are Republican-leaning centrists because they want lower taxes on themselves. No different from the damn PGA golfers.

  222. 222.

    Shana

    August 12, 2016 at 2:13 pm

    @WereBear: “minds like a cement block” indeed. The WaPo article today about the idiot from Virginia who climbed Trump Tower in NYC the other day talked to a bunch of his high school classmates (BTW he dropped out in his senior year and didn’t graduate). They all said he was anti-muslim even then and would argue persistently with classmates and teachers from his RW perspective. Facts could not penetrate.

  223. 223.

    Brachiator

    August 12, 2016 at 2:14 pm

    @jl:

    Trump seems to like the primary show better than the general, and he is sticking with the primary campaign act. It’s fun, he gets the kind of attention he likes, he can do his best schtick. Why change? I hope current trends continue.

    Political geeks see a difference between the primary and the general election. Trump doesn’t care about the distinction.

    Or, if anything, he is ramping up the insults and the gratuitous “say anything” outbursts. It gets him attention and it’s cheap. I keep hearing that he has spent practically nothing on national political ads. But he gets the publicity and the media spin.

  224. 224.

    Arclite

    August 12, 2016 at 2:16 pm

    Always thought Bush founded ISIS myself. If there had been no unnecessary invasion of Iraq, no ISIS would exist.

  225. 225.

    Ruckus

    August 12, 2016 at 2:20 pm

    @schrodinger’s cat:
    The bosses friend Ronnie tried that in the 80s. When we had the immigration amnesty. Employers had to check documents and fill out paperwork for each employee. And there were penalties for hiring illegal workers. Problem was the papers. In LA there was, and probably still is, a booming business in illegal paper. So I could get penalized for hiring someone here illegally, even though they had papers that looked legit. There was no mechanism for checking. Probably no mechanism for prosecuting employers either but how do you know that? So of course the people with money and power, the business owners, got the law thrown out. It was like the seat belt interlock. My feeling was that lasted until the first congressperson got a new car that year and couldn’t start it because no one is going to tell them they have to click it or walk. It took, if I remember correctly less than 2 weeks for that regulation to be thrown out by congress.

  226. 226.

    Frankensteinbeck

    August 12, 2016 at 2:21 pm

    @CONGRATULATIONS!:
    I’m sorry, but no. The people you are describing exist and have real problems, but the people who usually hate immigrants and especially refugees are under no visible job pressure from either. I have lived most of my life with these people, in Kentucky and South Carolina. They hate refugees because they find brown people scary, hate anything different from them, and are absolutely god damn terrified that a Muslim is coming to kill them personally. These folks drown in numbers the workers who are under visible economic pressure from immigrants and have an understandable resentment.

  227. 227.

    Brachiator

    August 12, 2016 at 2:21 pm

    @JMG:

    Even the print wretches who do national politics for the Times, Post, LA Times, etc., make low six figure salaries. They are Republican-leaning centrists because they want lower taxes on themselves. No different from the damn PGA golfers.

    This is not true or even necessarily relevant. Democrats keep screaming about the conservative bias of the right wing media. Republicans keep screaming about the liberal bias. There is bias in places, but it ain’t monolithic.

  228. 228.

    Just One More Canuck

    August 12, 2016 at 2:22 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: yes you’re right. She’s just doing the right thing, but it has the added benefit of ng under his skin and making him and his spokesfolks play defense

  229. 229.

    D58826

    August 12, 2016 at 2:22 pm

    With ISIS on the run, new wars could erupt in Iraq

    From today’s WAPO. Very depressing and still gets back to the simple statement – ‘no invasion in 2003 then no DAESH in 2016.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/with-isis-on-the-run-new-conflicts-could-erupt-among-the-militants-opponents/2016/08/11/ead5ca88-5829-11e6-8b48-0cb344221131_story.html

  230. 230.

    Matt McIrvin

    August 12, 2016 at 2:24 pm

    @Chris: The political media of the time really got blindsided by the coming of Reagan, the Religious Right, the direct-mail-driven conservative movement, etc. They honestly didn’t see any of it coming, and they’ve been overcompensating ever since, to the point that they could make the same mistake from the opposite direction.

  231. 231.

    Dadadadadadada

    August 12, 2016 at 2:29 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck: But even the understandable resentment is mis-aimed and out of bounds.
    Shortest answer: people hate refugees/immigrants because they, the haters, are hateful and/or misinformed.

  232. 232.

    ? Martin

    August 12, 2016 at 2:32 pm

    @JPL: Matt Damon isn’t a hypocrite because he didn’t really believe he was marooned on Mars even though his job was to convince us he was.

    Look, Hewitt isn’t a politician. He doesn’t govern. He’s not accountable to the public. He’s an entertainer and his job is to get ratings and sell ads. That we mistake him for a reporter is our failing and the failing of the broader media for treating him like a reporter. For what it’s worth, Trump is exactly the same – he’s an entertainer trying to get ratings, and instead of selling ads, he’s collecting donations. He doesn’t believe half the shit that comes out of his mouth – he even says so during that Hewitt interview:

    HH: I’ve got two more questions. Last night, you said the President was the founder of ISIS. I know what you meant. You meant that he created the vacuum, he lost the peace.
    DT: No, I meant he’s the founder of ISIS. I do. He was the most valuable player. I give him the most valuable player award. I give her, too, by the way, Hillary Clinton.
    HH: But he’s not sympathetic to them. He hates them. He’s trying to kill them.
    DT: I don’t care. He was the founder. His, the way he got out of Iraq was that that was the founding of ISIS, okay?
    HH: Well, that, you know, I have a saying, Donald Trump, the mnemonic device I use is Every Liberal Really Seems So, So Sad. E is for Egypt, L is for Libya, S is for Syria, R is for Russia reset. They screwed everything up. You don’t get any argument from me. But by using the term founder, they’re hitting with you on this again. Mistake?
    DT: No, it’s no mistake. Everyone’s liking it. I think they’re liking it. I give him the most valuable player award. And I give it to him, and I give it to, I gave the co-founder to Hillary. I don’t know if you heard that.
    HH: I did. I did. I played it.
    DT: I gave her the co-founder.
    HH: I know what you’re arguing…
    DT: You’re not, and let me ask you, do you not like that?
    HH: I don’t. I think I would say they created, they lost the peace. They created the Libyan vacuum, they created the vacuum into which ISIS came, but they didn’t create ISIS. That’s what I would say.
    DT: Well, I disagree.
    HH: All right, that’s okay.
    DT: I mean, with his bad policies, that’s why ISIS came about.
    HH: That’s…
    DT: If he would have done things properly, you wouldn’t have had ISIS.
    HH: That’s true.
    DT: Therefore, he was the founder of ISIS.
    HH: And that’s, I’d just use different language to communicate it, but let me close with this, because I know I’m keeping you long, and Hope’s going to kill me.
    DT: But they wouldn’t talk about your language, and they do talk about my language, right?
    HH: Well, good point. Good point.

    That exchange there at the very end is the give-away. It’s where they switch from discussing what they are saying to how they are saying it. Up to that point Hewitt is arguing policy and then Trump comes in and says policy doesn’t matter here, what matters is what gets heard – that Hewitt’s presentation doesn’t get heard, whether it is more accurate or not, but Trump’s does, and Hewitt acknowledges that. Trump is signaling that the ratings are more important than the content, and Hewitt ultimately acknowledges that and changes the subject. At this point it’s clear neither party believes Trump’s presentation, but they both recognize its purpose and both are okay with that.

    Hewitt’s job is to entertain you and like a comedian or an actor that involves lying to you if that’s how you want to be entertained. That’s not Trumps job, but he seems to not be aware of that. He doesn’t get that the rules are different for him and for Hewitt. Hewitt does (per that exchange), but isn’t willing to stand up to that point.

    If you want to know where the fracture point in the GOP is right now, it’s between those people whose moral compass is sufficiently busted that they can’t recognize that our elected leaders can’t behave like our pundits. Not because of media bias, but because it will destroy the very underpinnings of how a democracy works. Some people understand that trust in elected leaders, in electoral processes are necessary to a stable society. Others don’t. And between these groups are a bunch of people that recognize that difference but refuse to stand up for it. The rally attendees are clearly those people who are fully on board with authoritarianism and don’t recognize that this is destructive to democracy. This is obviously true of Trump as well. Then you have guys like Hewitt that seem to recognize the contradiction but value their job more and sign on. This is also Ryan and McConnell and probably every other Republican in Congress. Then you have those that are actively opposing Trump that seem as a group to recognize it and are not willing to go along.

    So blast Hewitt for how he earns his ratings, but never forget that he’s just Will Ferrell playing a different character. And feel free to go after CNN or anyone else for treating him as something other than an entertainer.

  233. 233.

    The Czar of All the Stupids

    August 12, 2016 at 2:37 pm

    If Obama was the founder of ISIS Republicans might actually find a way to stop it

    Right… they could vote to defund it… 50 or 60 times…

  234. 234.

    waysel

    August 12, 2016 at 3:03 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Word.

  235. 235.

    Matt McIrvin

    August 12, 2016 at 3:08 pm

    @? Martin:

    If you want to know where the fracture point in the GOP is right now, it’s between those people whose moral compass is sufficiently busted that they can’t recognize that our elected leaders can’t behave like our pundits

    We have some of this on the left too–there’s this idea that Obama could have somehow gotten all these amazing laws passed if he’d been more like Michael Moore or Jon Stewart.

  236. 236.

    catclub

    August 12, 2016 at 3:39 pm

    @? Martin:

    Some people understand that trust in elected leaders, in electoral processes are necessary to a stable society. Others don’t.

    Peaceful transition from Democratic to Republican Presidents (and versa visa) is a norm that can be broken. Gore understood this.

  237. 237.

    philadelphialawyer

    August 12, 2016 at 5:07 pm

    HH: I’ve got two more questions. Last night, you said the President was the founder of ISIS. I know what you meant. You meant that he created the vacuum, he lost the peace.
    DT: No, I meant he’s the founder of ISIS. I do. He was the most valuable player. I give him the most valuable player award. I give her, too, by the way, Hillary Clinton.
    HH: But he’s not sympathetic to them. He hates them. He’s trying to kill them.
    DT: I don’t care. He was the founder. His, the way he got out of Iraq was that that was the founding of ISIS, okay?
    HH: Well, that, you know, I have a saying, Donald Trump, the mnemonic device I use is Every Liberal Really Seems So, So Sad. E is for Egypt, L is for Libya, S is for Syria, R is for Russia reset. They screwed everything up. You don’t get any argument from me. But by using the term founder, they’re hitting with you on this again. Mistake?
    DT: No, it’s no mistake. Everyone’s liking it. I think they’re liking it. I give him the most valuable player award. And I give it to him, and I give it to, I gave the co-founder to Hillary. I don’t know if you heard that.
    HH: I did. I did. I played it.
    DT: I gave her the co-founder.
    HH: I know what you’re arguing…
    DT: You’re not, and let me ask you, do you not like that?
    HH: I don’t. I think I would say they created, they lost the peace. They created the Libyan vacuum, they created the vacuum into which ISIS came, but they didn’t create ISIS. That’s what I would say.
    DT: Well, I disagree.
    HH: All right, that’s okay.
    DT: I mean, with his bad policies, that’s why ISIS came about.
    HH: That’s…
    DT: If he would have done things properly, you wouldn’t have had ISIS.
    HH: That’s true.
    DT: Therefore, he was the founder of ISIS.
    HH: And that’s, I’d just use different language to communicate it, but let me close with this, because I know I’m keeping you long, and Hope’s going to kill me.
    DT: But they wouldn’t talk about your language, and they do talk about my language, right?
    HH: Well, good point. Good point.

    What it really shows is that Trump thinks that if folks at his rally “like” something he says, it is a successful statement (“Everyone’s liking it. I think they’re liking it.”). “Everyone” means his in-person fans. They like it, so it is good, and he can’t understand why the interviewer doesn’t get that ( “Let me ask you, do you not like that?”). Trump also thinks that if “they” (ie the media) are talking about his “language,” he wins.

    Trump actually does know that Obama is not “the founder” of ISIS. His claim (which is bogus as well, only not quite as much, and which he has no right to make anyway, as he was calling for total withdrawal from Iraq by, at the latest, 2007), really IS, as the interviewer implores him to concede, the standard, RW notion that Obama abandoned the successfully reconstituted Iraq, which led to a power vacuum, which led in turn to ISIS. But he intentionally claims that this is literally true because it gets his marks’ juices flowing (many of them probably do think it is literally true), and because it gets him the media spotlight.

    Trump may or may not get that what his fans think is not only not indicative of what most likely voters think, but is probably actually contraindicative. And I think Trump genuinely doesn’t understand that any and all publicity is not necessarily good publicity in the setting of a general POTUS election. He showed that with his reaction to media frenzy regarding Melania’s plagiarized speech.

  238. 238.

    philadelphialawyer

    August 12, 2016 at 5:13 pm

    I see @? Martin: already made this point.

  239. 239.

    kimp

    August 12, 2016 at 11:25 pm

    @schrodinger’s cat: Exactly.

  240. 240.

    SWMBO

    August 13, 2016 at 8:53 pm

    @bupalos: How about being marked down? Like this:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38Y_ev4fg-E

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