.
Summer’s over (despite the weather), time to return to the “real world”. The Washington Post (company paper in the town where the monopoly industry is national politics) reports WhatWeDidn’tDoOnOurSummerVacation “Here’s what Hillary Clinton told the traveling press corps aboard her campaign plane”:
… After months of not engaging with the traveling press that follows her across the country, Hillary Clinton ventured to the back of her new campaign plane three times on Monday — once just to say hello and twice to start and complete what resembled a news conference in the air (albeit in cramped quarters and with a television reporter sitting directly in front of her in the aisle).
The Democratic presidential nominee appeared relaxed and engaged as she fielded about a dozen questions from the media on a wide range of subjects, calling several reporters by name and leaning in to hear some queries better…
For data completists, Ed Kilgore at NYMag has a good “Labor Day Reset” roundup:
… At the moment, the RealClearPolitics polling average has Clinton up 41/38 in four-way polls (with Johnson at 8% and Stein at 3%) and 46/42 in two-way polls. There is a distinct difference overall in results from live-interview polls, which tend (relatively speaking) to favor Clinton, and automated or online polls, which tend to favor Trump. The Trump campaign claims the non-live surveys are more accurate because of social pressure to oppose the mogul when a human is on the phone; some poll analysts suggest the live surveys are simply more accurate from a methodological point of view.
Polls-only forecasters unsurprisingly project Clinton as the favorite. FiveThirtyEight’s polls-only projection has Clinton’s win probability at 71%; The Upshot’s has it at an overwhelming 86%…
What’s on the agenda as we buckle down towards the final election grind?
.
Mustang Bobby
Greetings from the sun and fun capital of the world, Miami. (BYO insect repellent.) Glad to see the press on the plane with Ms. Clinton; maybe she can test out the new ejector seats.
Guam guy
It could be worse. Here on Guam, the island’s 4 biggest power plants are down, so we get to enjoy rolling blackouts for 2-3 hours at a time. Sad!
satby
Good morning! I have to meet with the Dr. about my new job today. I was pretty sure I got a firm offer, now I’m preparing in case it was an invitation to interview. I was kind of over eager ?
At least I was able to find my nicer clothes.
Phylllis
@Mustang Bobby: Made me snicker, you did.
rikyrah
Good Morning ?, Everyone ?
OzarkHillbilly
@satby: good luck.
OzarkHillbilly
phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead. phyllis schlafly is dead…..
no matter how many times i say it, it still brings a smile to my face.
Amir Khalid
Oh noes. Now the press will have to find something new to complain about.
JPL
@OzarkHillbilly: Good luck at the doctor’s today.
Mustang Bobby
@OzarkHillbilly: I don’t believe in a whatever-after, but if there is one, I hope she’s greeted at the gates by Matthew Shepard and Divine.
Chyron HR
So there’s NO WAY OF KNOWING who’s right!
Central Planning
If the election were held today, PEC has Clinton at 341 EVs, with Trump at 197. The probability the random drift win percentage is 91%, and the Bayesian probability at 95%. You can click on the results over there to get the math and meanings behind the probabilities (polls-only, no “magic sauce” and unskewing)
OzarkHillbilly
@Mustang Bobby: Hasn’t matthew shepard suffered enough?
@JPL: if i get there- fingers crossed this will be my first day since I tore it that my wife can’t tell me not to do this, that, or the other. a relief of sorts.
Mustang Bobby
@Central Planning: I don’t want Trump to win any states. I want this to be a total humiliation election of the likes of Goldwater in ’64 and Mondale in ’84 (not that I have any beef with good ole Fritz, but he got his ass handed to him and no mistake). I want this to be an election where Trump can’t claim it was rigged and that he becomes not just the laughingstock but turned into the Edsel of candidates. And I want his stink on any candidate that supports him. I want him to be the wet dog at the wedding, the turd in the punchbowl, the squirrel in the woodchipper. So there.
Immanentize
Hello, All!
@satby: Good luck with the Doctor Boss. You look great!
@OzarkHillbilly: Good luck with the Doctor if you get there today.
First day of 10th grade for my son. He still is stuck in bed….
rikyrah
@satby:
Congratulations!
Have a good day ?
rikyrah
@OzarkHillbilly:
Sending positive thoughts for your appointment.
Mustang Bobby
@satby: Go get ’em. You got this.
Comrade Scrutinizer
And yet… BREAKING!… CNN is telling me Trump 45%, Clinton 43%!! ZOMG! It’s a horserace!
Central Planning
@Comrade Scrutinizer: At the bottom of their article about another Trump flip-flop on immigration, they have a link to a poll that shows Hillary up by 9 points in Florida.
Schlemazel
@Mustang Bobby:
Why would those two be in hell to greet that awful woman? Perhaps they could give her the “Donald Trump” treatment, like the NYC bridge workers did & ‘rain’ on her parade through the streets of hell from above.
gogol's wife
@Amir Khalid:
My reaction exactly!
shomi
Clearly Clinton has something to hide with her emails now that she is treating the press like they are all special snowflakes. That’s what I hear. Just asking the question. The public has a right to know what she is hiding don’t they?
There must be something to these persistent rumors because she is ‘engaging’ the press on the plane now. And no matter what she does next it will undoubtedly mean she is hiding something. So we all need to be asking the question at all times.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Central Planning: No, no, no! Dead even! Neck and neck! Says so in the article!
Schlemazel
@satby:
and
@OzarkHillbilly:
Good luck to both of you with your different doctor dealings
Kay
@Comrade Scrutinizer:
Republicans were always going to come home. They always do. They just needed a nudge, a reason to say Clinton is disqualified. The fake email scandal gives them a fig leaf. All he needed was GOP voters to get in line and we’re back to the usual D v R split. They needed to surrender to Trumpism “with dignity” and media gave them an out.
Schlemazel
@Mustang Bobby:
Having just spent a week in the Keys I saw the fun part but not so much the sun part of the ‘Sunshine State”!
Our youngest moved back home 6-7 weeks ago because of a job change. He needed time to set up a rental with a couple of friends. On the ride home yesterday he informed me today is his move in day (good thing I took an extra day off to unwind). So, of course, we are getting a lot of Florida ‘sunshine’ falling from the sky today.
JMG
For whatever methodological reason, the polling company used by CNN has shown bigger swings in the race both ways than the other large media pollsters this year.
Hal
Stein received .5% of the popular vote in 2012 after polling up to 2%. Hopefully she’ll do similarly well this year. Gary Johnson on the other hand makes me a little nervous. I hope he pulls more from Trump than Clinton.
Kay
Day 543 of the Clinton email scandal and we still don’t have a single records release from Donald Trump.
We have the letter from his doctor, his own telling of his biography and some court records that came about when he was sued. That’s it. On the person who could be President of the United States in 60 days.
Unprecedented in modern times, the lack of substantiated or documented information on this person.
Turns out there’s a real flaw in the ‘ol vetting process. All one needs is absolutely no experience or record in public office and you get a complete pass.
shomi
@Hal: Pffft. Whatever. Dems….always worried they are losing.
It’s not about winning. It’s about winning big. Always has been.
Mustang Bobby
@Schlemazel: We have two seasons: Wet and Dry. You visited during the height of the Wet, both in terms of precipitation and humidity. They throw the switch to Dry on October 15 or Canadian Thanksgiving, whichever comes later, and then back to Wet around Memorial Day.
I wish I’d known you were going to the Keys. I could have recommended some places to eat that are off the tourist track but well worth it.
debbie
@satby:
Good luck!
Central Planning
@shomi: It’s customary to let people know you edited your post after you wrote it.
Prove she’s hiding things. You can’t? Must be proof she’s hiding something.
rikyrah
@Central Planning:
Anytime someone mentions Florida, I must go back to the NYT interactive map of possible ways to 270.
Last time I checked, Hillary had over 900 ways to 270.
Ferret Head – less than 80.
If Hillary wins Florida?
Ferret Head is down to One.
O-N-E
debbie
@Kay:
Has there been an investigation of Trump’s doctor? Lennox Hill has more than its fair share of vanity appointments.
rikyrah
@Kay:
You do mean White people, because the Non-Whites of this country are quite clear about him.
Kay
I’m genuinely curious how this plays out. What if Trump continues to refuse to release anything on his income, assets, debt, associations, etc.? There’s no way to compel him to release anything- the Right wing operatives who are releasing docs to media on Clinton are getting those because they have the process and procedure that covers public office holders. Trump’s releases are wholly voluntary- at his discretion- and he’s released nothing in response to the (few) media demands.
We could actually have a President no one knows anything about. They know what he tells them, and he lies constantly.
shomi
@Central Planning: No no, that means all the usual suspects around here will have nothing to ‘worry’ about.
No, focus on the polls posted on right wing propaganda sites that do not even take into account electoral college. That way you can worry and post here how you are worried and then DougJ and MarkyMux can post about how Clinton is like totally in trouble and will be thrown in jail and impeached even.
Then wrong way Cole will post something about his dogs doing something stupid.
Ben Cisco
I see our Vichy media is still a bunch of whiny bastards. They well and truly suck.@Amir Khalid: And they will, it’s what they do.
Kay
@rikyrah:
Well, character and bigotry, but I’m talking about documents that show his history. We haven’t even seen interviews of people who know him, other than his family or people he pays.
It’s amazing really. There’s no modern historical precedent. Every single other Presidential candidate had served in public office and was governed by rules about records, several campaigns where things were revealed, etc.
Trump’s a one-off. He’ll be the least investigated and substantiated President in the modern era.
debbie
@rikyrah:
Despite all that outreach?!?
kd bart
According to polls released this morning, Trump is simultaneously leading nationally while trailing in Texas & Georgia and being tied in Mississippi. Disregard them all.
Kay
@rikyrah:
That’s why I thought the Russian connection was much more important with Donald Trump than with an experienced candidate or one who had been vetted. The truth is we don’t know jack shit about Donald Trump. I have no earthly idea who his associates are and either does anyone in media. It’s not at all conspiracy theory stuff- it’s a simple fact. They don’t know. They have nothing. They can’t even find out if his wife worked here with the wrong visa. They have no mechanism to demand that information because he’s never been subject to the regulation public officials have to comply with.
Iowa Old Lady
@satby: Sounds good. I hope the interview/explanation of work/whatever goes well.
Schlemazel
@Mustang Bobby:
Damn! I wish I had thought to ask. We stayed in a beach house on Summerland and only dipped down to Key West a few times. Like Disney on meth.
I didn’t know you got the winter break. We lived in Brevard a few years & got that same change. Didn’t have much choice in the dates as it was our daughters wedding & their honeymoon is to see MLB games in 7 different stadiums on their way home. They chose the dates to maximize the number. The only upside was that it was definitely NOT tourist season so our rental was cheaper & we did not have to fight crowds.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay: I’m sure anyone who’s ever had anything at all to do with diamond donnie had to sign a non-disclosure agreement.
JPL
@kd bart: Actually I’m choosing the parts of the polls that I agree with. You might think that’s magical thinking, but I find it necessary for my mental health. The idea that Trump can win the presidency horrifies me.
Kay
@rikyrah:
I genuinely believe that Trump shows the necessity for some kind of federal sunshine law regarding Presidential candidates. Like a discovery request. It doesn’t have to be complicated. We really shouldn’t be relying on this market theory wherein Trump voluntarily releases records due the invisible hand of political markets. That’s never going to happen. They don’t know who works on his campaign. They’re guessing. I read yesterday that Chris Christie is stuffing the Trump Team with Christie loyalists. Chris Christie got killed in the primary. This isn’t “markets”.
Mustang Bobby
@Schlemazel: KW is like every other resort community — Aspen, Santa Fe, Miami Beach — rolled into one. During Spring Break you are entertained by 10,000 vomiting frat boys on Duval Street.
I interviewed for a job down there in June. It would have been a 25% increase in salary and I still couldn’t have afforded to live on the island itself. The closest I could afford were up in Summerland or even Marathon. Happy to be where I am.
Did the honeymooners stop by Marlins “Your Tax Dollars At Work” Park in Miami? Nice place with a lousy team.
Shalimar
@Kay: No experience or record to vet has worked out great for Republican Supreme Court nominees. Why not presidential nominees too? They figured out long ago that they can eventually get what they want just from outrage fatigue. They do so much shit all the time that there is only so often you can get pissed off. The people with no record skate through the ennui.
Kay
@OzarkHillbilly:
Exactly. It’s all private sector. Trump is completely unregulated. It’s funny in a horrible sort of way, right? It’s the natural end point to extreme Right wing ideology. They’re solely relying on markets. The new county clerk has more documented background than this Presidential candidate. She’s a CPA.
Betty Cracker
On a local level, the tightening polls will bring disgruntled Bernie Bros like NR bobbing to the surface like inadequately plunged turds to bemoan the coming Trumpocalypse and blame Clinton supporters for failing to nominate their hero, who totally would have emerged from the GOP/Beltway media slime machine unscathed and be 20 points up right now. So we’ve got that going for us…
JMG
@Kay: Oh, it can get worse. If elected, Trump would be subject to disclosure laws, and he still won’t do it. And a Republican Congress would be cool with it. As night follows day, more and more elected officials would then refuse to comply.
Betty Cracker
@Shalimar:
Excellent point.
Kay
@Shalimar:
I think Clinton will win so I don’t mean this as a dire warning, but think how catastrophic that could be. Christ almighty, they are ACTUALLY putting a reality tv show grifter in the Oval Office. It’s developing country stuff.
It’s like all the mechanisms failed one by one, in sequence. They allowed him to rise on birtherism and then the GOP primary electorate failed, the institutional Republican Party failed, and now media is failing. It’s like he’s falling thru a series of safety nets. I didn’t know I was this vulnerable, just as a citizen.
Joel
@Mustang Bobby: Are there good parts to the Keys? I’ve always wanted to head down that way. Los Cabos kind of suck too, but Baja Sur (Todos Santos especially) has a lot of nice parts.
Kay
@Shalimar:
When this started I was confident that there would be some kind of disclosure on Trump. I didn’t think it thru though. I didn’t know how that would come about. I can’t think of a way it comes out, how it’s compelled. If he just refuses there’s not a thing anyone can do about it. They’re now saying that the debates will “work”- Trump will have to reveal something, but they said that at every point in this process- that there would be some intervening, outside event. It’s like wishing for good weather, or good luck. Mind-blowing.
JMG
As a matter of tactics, Clinton cannot attack Trump directly on this stuff in the debates. Her best tack is to ignore Trump as much as possible (sure to set him off) and speak directly to the audience about what she’ll do as President. And you know the moderators won’t bring it up.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay: I can see the Clinton ad now: a series of former business associates being asked “Who is Donald Trump?” and replying, “My lawyer says I can’t talk to you.”
Mustang Bobby
@Joel: Depends on what you want. US 1 is pretty much hotels, resorts, and souvenir shops mixed in with the usual small-town businesses the entire way, but off the beaten track in the Upper Keys (Key Largo to Marathon) there are little places that still evoke the Keys of the olden days. The closer you get to KW the more expensive and upscale it gets. I rarely venture beyond the Seven Mile Bridge after Marathon and find plenty of places to get away from it all. Restaurants are usually good because they cater to the locals or long-time seasonal visitors.
There are out-of-the-way places in KW, too, but it’s still a zoo and parking is impossible. Most people who drive down there find a place to park, leave it, and walk.
Kay
Just a reminderhow this all started:
No one in the GOP or media had the balls to call him out on this, and he rose from there. You know what he said to a local Philadelphia reporter who asked him about this? “I don’t talk about that anymore”. :Ladies and Gentleman, the President of the United States. A moronic conspiracy theorist with an incredibly sketchy past.
Betty Cracker
@Kay: Totally agree about the failure of presumed safety nets. I thought if none of the candidates proved up to the challenge, the GOP money men would take Trump down during the primaries out of self interest. I was wrong. That such a person has a non-zero chance to be POTUS exposes the fragility of our system in a way I personally find incredibly alarming.
Kay
@OzarkHillbilly:
IMO, the only way they’ll get any real information is when he brushes up against a regulated public official. Apparently he’s had interactions with several state AGs and also Christie and Rudy G. That’s where I’d look. They have to rely on an intersection between Trump and a regulated person and then check records related to the regulated person. That’s the only way to reach him.
kd bart
Different polls this morning show Trump leading nationally but Clinton leading in states like Texas and Georgia. Find it hard to believe both are true. The important question is which one does the media focused their attention on? My money, and I’m sure yours, is on Trump leading nationally because it plays into their horse race narrative.
Kathleen
@Amir Khalid: Their bagels weren’t toasted enough and creamer was store brand.
JPL
@Kay: Since Trump relies on the internet for his news, it’d be interesting which white supremacist site, he got the info.
Shalimar
@Kay: Karl Rove was right 12 years ago. Republicans have created an alternate reality and the media has dutifully reported everything they say with no consequence for lying.
This allows Trump to challenge Clinton to release more detailed medical information even though he is the one who hasn’t released anything of substance. “Both sides want more info out there. We can’t tell the difference, and certainly can’t report that Trump would go back on his word and still release nothing even if Clinton was thoroughly examined in public for days by doctors of his choosing. It would be uncouth to assume a major party nominee lies about everything.”
Kay
@Betty Cracker:
Thanks. I know I’m harping on it but doesn’t it seem like a really fundamental omission in the analysis of Trump? They have no documents or records or paper trail on this person. None. I heard one of the dopes on NPR compare him to Reagan. Reagan was a governor. There’s no comparison. How could they miss this? They know nothing.
JMG
@kd bart: Tbe way it works is, the poll the media outlet pays for is the one they cite as reality. Therefore, it’s a ding-dong battle on CNN, while on MSNBC, where the NBC News poll still has it Clinton 48-42, she’s still ahead. This accounts for much distortion of coverage. These chumps can’t even get their beloved horse race right.
Kathleen
@OzarkHillbilly: Hope all is well at docotor’s.@satby: Good luck today.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay: I was wondering about the bankruptcies. Those should be accessible, shouldn’t they?
Shalimar
@Kay: The Washington Post report Sunday on the donation to Bondi’s PAC was revealing about the way Trump does business. The only way to find the record was looking at that specific PAC. It was disguised by donating from a seldom-used Trump Foundation, then the records of that foundation illegally had the donation going to 2 separate incorrect PACs in other states on different reports. No matter where you looked from the Trump end, you weren’t going to find a Bondi connection, nor would you find a contribution in her campaign records.
Edit: Also, too, If he had named the seldom-used foundation “The Orange-Faced Asshole Foundation” instead of “The Donald J. Trump Foundation”, it would have taken even more effort to figure it out from Bondi’s PAC records.
MomSense
@satby:
Good luck today.
@OzarkHillbilly:
Hope you get in to see the surgeon today and all goes well.
Morning everyone.
Shalimar
@Kay: There are paper trails, though. We know how many lawsuits he has been involved in over the decades. We know details about many of the contractors, employees and creditors he has screwed over. Just what we know should have been disqualifying enough for all of the Republican debaters put together this year. None of it hurts Trump.
I think it’s a good idea from his point of view to keep his tax and medical records out of public view at this point. It can’t help him to have the info out there. But I also doubt it would hurt him at all if he was fully vetted and his entire life history was public. People who are going to vote for him just don’t care.
kd bart
@JMG: It really doesn’t matter. According to the MSM, Clinton will be dead from consumption by mid October.
shomi
The fact Clinton is ‘engaging’ clearly means she has something to hide. Time to look more closely at what was going on with her email server.
Eric S.
@Kay: some months back Kevin Drum (I think it was him) speculated that Trump had no friends or close business partners. That there is no one to interview would be the implication. As I recall Drum wad surprised hours no one had voluntarily come forward.
Micheline
@kd bart: Only the CNN poll shows Trump leading.
Kay
@Shalimar:
Okay, but this actually matters. Here’s a scenario that is not at all unimaginable. Trump puts his name on all kind of shit overseas. He lied to the good people of Scotland, for example. One can break US law overseas- Wal Mart executives had a huge scandal on this very issue a couple of years ago. Say Trump broke a law and that comes out after he’s elected. He can’t be a felon and be President. He resigns or they impeach and what happens? They get Pence.
That’s close to a goddamned coup. They put up a candidate who was impossible to vet and they win either way.
They have no idea what Trump Inc holds or owns or owes or does overseas. None. It would take months, years maybe, to find out. They have 60-some days.
satby
@OzarkHillbilly: and back at you when you get to your doctor!
OzarkHillbilly
@efgoldman: Why you botha? Why you botha?
Schlemazel
@Joel:
Having just spent most of our week in the lower keys I was not joking much, Disneyland on Meth – particularly Key West. Summerland was a very quiet place to stay (though the house we rented for a week requires a minimum of 1 month rental (at $10k a month) from Labor day til Easter – we got a hell of a deal because the rentals were all empty the week before Labor day. If you want to party hardy and just do tourist stuff you could get a hotel on KW and forget the care entirely, the place is not made to drive. If you want a calmer time Summerland had beautiful water, it was quiet and on 35 minutes from Duval St. Parking is expensive, $2/hr meter when you can find them, $15 lot (off-season) but if you look you might find spots a few blocks away and walk, I did that once.
Also, as Bobby said, lower is much more expensive. As an example gas was $2.6x south of the 7-mile bridge & $2.2x north of it!
Kay
@Eric S.:
I don’t think he’s ever applied for a job. Think about that for a minute. They know nothing. If they were submitting what they “know” to a court or some other fact-finder it would be 4 pages. Know. Backed up. Not guess or assume.
Clinton’s disclosure? The candidate the press have labeled non-transparent and secretive? There are ROOMS of docs on Hillary Clinton. She’s had at least 3 security clearances.
There’s no comparison on “disclosure”. She wins by a mile, simply by operation of law.
shomi
@JMG: Then locust.
You people are hilarious with your doom and gloom porn that you all seem to lust after.
Kay
@Eric S.:
The “transparency” libertarians make me laugh. Dopes. They busy screeching about the candidate who has been subject to transparency laws her entire working life and they missed Mr. Trump, who is not now and has never been subject to ANY disclosure rules or regs or law or process.
Fucking geniuses. They’re horrible lawyers let alone “public advocates”. How do lawyers miss that there’s no discovery mechanism?
satby
@rikyrah: Thanks! I’m excited.
OzarkHillbilly
@efgoldman: I’m an old grumpy angry white guy too, and never polite when somebody says something incredibly stupid, but that one is just a troll trying to get a rise out of grumpy old guys, gals and anyone else they can.
Feathers
@Schlemazel: FYI – the reason for the one month minimum rental is that Key West approved the building of “affordable” housing, intended for residents, which was then bought by outsiders and turned into rental units. So… the only thing they could do after the fact was to ban weekly rentals, make them monthly only. So apparently that has only annoyed the visitors, not created more housing for locals.
I know about this because a relative bought a condo in Key West, which they turned into a rental. They were really pissed to learn several years later that their “bargain” had restrictions which they had been ignoring, and were now going to have to rent monthly, rather than weekly. Much complaint about government overreach involved.
shomi
@kd bart: Like where? This obsession around here on polls and the ability to interpret them in the most pessimistic way is always good for a laugh.
Princeton Election Consortium vote histogram hasn’t changed at all and that is about as accurate and unbiased as you will find anywhere. I would post the link but this site is retarded when it comes to putting posts in purgatory over links.
Peale
@Eric S.: Karl Icahn. That’s about it.
Kay
When this is all over we should all boycott CNN.
Everyone bitches about the NYTimes but CNN has been uniquely awful. Fox is apparently a dysfunctional sewer of sexual harassment and threats with gross old men roaming the halls groping employees, so those employees have an excuse. They’re traumatized. Shell-shocked. What’s CNN’s? That they’re venal hacks?
rikyrah
Uh huh
Uh huh
…………………………………….
The New York Times Is Picking on the Wrong Candidate’s Charitable Organization
The Clinton Foundation is squeaky clean, while the Donald J. Trump Foundation is a scam.
by Martin Longman
September 5, 2016 1:47 PM
Paul Krugman is clearly correct that the reporting on the Clinton Foundation has been terrible, filled with innuendo, and has, to date, found nothing untoward or unethical. He’s also right to get a sinking feeling that we’re seeing a repeat of what happened to Al Gore in 2000, when he somehow came off as the dishonest candidate when matched up against an opponent whose entire platform was based on “fuzzy math,” with predictable catastrophic consequences once he became president.
Krugman is also disturbingly correct about this:
That story on the payoffs can be followed in the pages of the Washington Post, but it doesn’t seem to interest Krugman’s own New York Times. It might shock you to learn that Trump even has a charitable organization since he gives almost no money to charity, but the Donald J. Trump Foundation does in fact exist, and it was fined by the IRS this year for making an illegal political contribution to Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi. At the time, Bondi was supposed to be investigating claims that Trump University was a fraudulent organization designed to bilk people out of their money. After receiving the contribution (which she had solicited), Bondi decided to do nothing, effectively giving Trump impunity for ripping off unsuspecting Floridians.
rikyrah
What Vladimir Putin Learned From Roger Ailes
by Nancy LeTourneau
September 6, 2016 9:07 AM
A couple of weeks ago, Josh Marshall wrote about “how Russia’s new defense doctrine is like Fox News.” He pointed out that because of Russia’s economic weakness, they can’t engage in the world via military muscle and have, instead, focused on the asymmetric warfare of psy-ops and disruption campaigns.
As Neil MacFarquhar writes, this goes beyond the possible hacking of the server at the DNC that we heard so much about just before the Democratic Convention. He begins with an example about how Sweden was bombarded with “a flood of distorted and outright false information on social media” as the country was considering whether to enter into a military partnership with NATO. We also know that the same kind of campaign was launched in Britain to spread misinformation about membership in the EU. He points out that Russia uses both conventional media sources – Sputnik and RT – as well as covert channels that are hard to trace.
When it comes to covert channels, you’ll want to read this fascinating piece by Adrian Chen titled simply, “The Agency” to get a picture of what is happening. Chen went to St. Petersburg, Russia to track down one of the locations that seemed to be the source of bizarre stories here in the U.S. about a non-existent Ebola outbreak and a refinery natural disaster. In the end, Chen’s digging into this story wound up leading to him being an actual target of a misinformation campaign.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay: Won’t do any good. I have boycotted all tv news for decades and you people are still afflicted with it. ;-)
Kay
Now that the journalist has settled for 20 million, maybe someone on the crack FOX reporting team could tell us more about how they were running a GOP election operation from their desks.
I think it’s great she got paid, but shouldn’t the public know more about what goes on in that high dollar sewer?
They should also stop saying “Ailes downfall”. He’s currently busy attempting to install donald Trump. he’s lost nothing.
hovercraft
Morning Joe was all over the place this morning, Hillary’s responses to the FBI were a joke, (he should know about jokes). And then as of today, Comey is a joke. He interviewed her on the Saturday of 4th of July weekend, and them he released the notes on Labor Day Friday. This is a pathetic attempt to bury the news, the questions were a joke and pathetic, they let Cheryl Mills sit in on the interview, malpractice. He should never have held that press conference, or released the notes, he should have handled it like any other case and simply announced no indictment. Hillary was careless, destroying two devices and losing ten. Comey is the issue here, he has been unprofessional and has lost all respect.
Trump is gaining and has put himself in excellent position to win the debates, he has saved up all his money, and can now start advertising and bury her, and at the debate all he has to do is show up and not be crazy and he will win. He is tied in the polls, so she is very weak, and Tim Kaine is weak for not taking over for her when she had a coughing fit. Why isn’t she leading b more, why isn’t she trusted? The conclusion is that Hillary is weak, Trump ha a real shot, and Comey is terrible.
hovercraft
@Kay:
It’s Trump central, between the Trump hacks (Jeffrey Lord and Corey are the worst,) they have on as regulars and the “straight” analysts they simple parrot his talking points and rip Clinton. They are uniformly terrible. All the cable channels are terrible, msnbc is just slightly less so.
Major Major Major Major
@shomi: You just use the little ‘link’ button.
Major Major Major Major
@hovercraft: I would recommend not watching Morning Joe.
hovercraft
@Major Major Major Major:
It’s background as I get ready in the morning, and it also helps drive me out of the house so I can escape it.
OzarkHillbilly
@Major Major Major Major: speaking of retarded….
shomi
@Major Major Major Major: Ya think.
rikyrah
@Kay:
The thing is, Kay…they have all the questions TO ASK…they just are NOT asking them, and this is where you and I are in complete agreement. Melania is an immigrant. I have friends whose spouses are immigrants..don’t tell me that there isn’t a paper trail, when their entire lives are paper trails.
IF they wanted to ask the questions, they could get the answers.
SenyorDave
@rikyrah: @Shalimar: I think it’s a good idea from his point of view to keep his tax and medical records out of public view at this point. It can’t help him to have the info out there. But I also doubt it would hurt him at all if he was fully vetted and his entire life history was public. People who are going to vote for him just don’t care.
Independents might care. He should be hammered constantly on the taxes issue. Polls don’t mean everything, but Clinton has seen a 12 point reversal in two weeks in the CNN poll. That’s way beyond the margin of error. The media obviously will not do the work on Trump. Clinton will have to. I’m guessing that Clinton will start going negative soon, what else is left? You have a candidate who hasn’t been vetted, it should play to your advantage.
Major Major Major Major
@shomi: Well, you were obviously having a hard time finding it.
Major Major Major Major
@SenyorDave: The race has reverted to its natural state of Clinton up between 4 and 6. All the rest is a little bit of movement in squishy voters but mostly the pollsters tweaking their likely voter screens. There are not really very many undecided voters.
SiubhanDuinne
@Major Major Major Major:
@shomi:
Pretty much everyone else who comments here can figure it out, shomi. Why can’t you?
(Edited to make it clear I was directing my comment to shomi, not the quadruple Major.)
rikyrah
@Betty Cracker:
See, the problem with this, is that they couldn’t say…
Well, Donald Trump’s positions DO NOT FIT within the Republican Party.
OF COURSE THEY DID.
When all you are fighting about is how your hatred is sold….
You don’t have a leg to stand on to try and eliminate someone.
There was NO POLICY differences for them…..
It was all about him not using dogwhistles….and, in order for them to admit that..then they’d have to admit pedaling in dogwhistles to begin with…which is something they deny.
Ian
@Central Planning:
If this is true it will sink Rubio too!
JR in WV
@shomi:
If this was an attempt at snark, you missed.
JR in WV
@shomi:
Your ignorance is – somewhat, a little – amusing, too.
No, not really.
JR in WV
@Kay:
Wasn’t The Donald owner/operator of a casino in New Jersey?
Isn’t that pretty well vetted?
Is disclosure to the NJ gambling commission shielded from FOIA?
I seem to recall that The Donald was refused a casino license in Las Vegas, NV, so that his hotel there is only a hotel. Is that true?
Being refused a casino license in Las Vegas, NV, doesn’t that strongly imply that The Donald is mobbed up past the standards of Las Vegas? Which is a pretty mobbed up town, isn’t it?
So many questions, so few solid answers!!! but you said that already, din’t ya?
rikyrah
@Kay:
Amen
Soledad laid it out this weekend on their normalization of White Supremacists.