You could glean from Chuck Todd's emphatic "If it's Sunday..." that he didn't like it one bit that Sunday's edition of "Meet The Press" had been preempted twice during the Olympics, but this is what happens when the Sunday political 'Program of Record' has a weekday edition. And it was a crucial week to be back given the recent political commentary, one that we have rarely if ever witnessed.
There is no doubt that this year's campaign season reeks a God-awful stench brought on by name calling, charges of racism, mental and physical health prognostications, and the absence of any meaningful discussion of policy. Policy, what's that? On today's very show, former senior advisor to President Obama, David Plouffe, called Donald Trump a 'psychopath.' There's a label for you.
The only policy that we can think of on the docket was immigration so if we're going to put labels on someone, like Donald Trump for instance, we would say 'schizo,' because he's changed or nuanced his stance on immigration so many times in one week that we really have no idea where he stands on this issue. Hugh Hewlitt said it didn't matter as long as Mr. Trump didn't give up on what Hewlitt called his 'north star' of immigration policy proposals, which is building the wall. A bad analogy from Mr. Hewlitt to say the least. Mr. Trump is due to give a 'major' speech on immigration on Wednesday to clarify his position, which in and of itself illustrates that he's in fact changed at least some of his positions, hence the need for clarification.
But here's the rub: The North Star is real, look up and you'll see it. The wall that Mr. Trump wants to build is pure fiction. It will not happen. Will not.
And as nonsensical or offensive you think Mr. Trump is, can or could be, he's not the most infuriating person in politics. That distinction belongs to today's interview guest RNC Chair Reince Priebus, who squarely gives you answers he knows are intellectually and sensibly dishonest. He knows better. However, we understand why he defends Mr. Trump... Because he's been the architect of him getting the Republican nomination. For that fact alone, he should go because he's been a disaster lacking leadership of that political party.
Mr. Priebus agreed that the immigration issue is not a simple question and that Mr. Trump is reflecting on it. But he also assured that Mr. Trump's policy would be tough, fair and humane. Tough like in rounding people up out of their homes? Fair, as in breaking with the Constitution and giving people a religious test to stay in this country? Humane, as in breaking families apart?
And if Mr. Trump's position reflects anything close to what the 'gang of 8' in the Senate proposed with even a path to legal status, his core will blow a gasket. When asked about birth right citizenship, Mr. Priebus didn't really give a definitive answer in the context of the immigration discussion. And he doesn't know where Mr. Trump is on the issue.
It's clear that Mr. Trump has left the entire Republican party twisting in the wind and Reince Priebus let it happen. It's difficult to listen to because we can not believe that he believes what he says. He said that he's really proud of what the party was doing in Mr. Priebus's home state of Wisconsin and that Mr. Trump was very in tune with what is going on in the state. Mr. Trump has no idea what's going on in Wisconsin and Priebus knows it. So he's reduced to making false accusations about Sec. Clinton giving away state secrets, and that's his argument.
But in politics, and here is where Mr. Trump gets it wrong, is that it's not just about the argument, it's about the positive messaged solution that you deliver. And his immigration speech will not be that. What kind of message is "what do you have to lose" when reaching out to the African-American community? That kind of message is hopeless and in effect turns more people away than it would ever convert.
You go around the panel and the discussion is how innuendo has been mainstreamed, that it's a resentment election (maybe), and the banality of how 'provocateurs are entrepreneurs.' Joy-Ann Reid described the week as one long continuous 'Sarah Palin rally' (just punch us in the gut). The governor of Maine, Paul LePage, went off the rails with expletives in a voicemail to a state representative, who called him a racist. On the other side of the coin (kinda), Illinois Senator Mark Kirk (R) called the president, our president, a drug dealer. Andrea Mitchell, who's seen it all, is herself astonished to use words coarse and vulgar to describe the presidential race, but that's where we are.
We've been doing the limbo underneath the lowest common denominator successfully for some time now, but now this is ridiculous.
Panel: Joy-Ann Reid and Andrea Mitchell, NBC News; Hugh Hewlitt, Salem Radio Network; Robert Costa, The Washington Post
Tuesday, August 30, 2016
Sunday, August 21, 2016
8.21.16: State of the Candidates and the Race
While "Meet The Press" is still being preempted by Olympics coverage and the fact that we're in the midst of a steamy August, we thought we'd weight with a short post on the state of the candidates and the race.
And the prognosis is negative.
Sec. Clinton's email troubles are just getting worse with judges ordering written answers, the FBI impartiality under attack, politically sophomoric comparisons to Colin Powell, and the Republicans gearing up for another 'juicy' hearing. Not to mention the political debacle that is now the Clinton Foundation providing more smoke surrounding the notion of the 'pay for play' politics that Mr. Trump is barking about. And where there's smoke, there's a Republican hoping for fire.
And the prognosis is negative.
Sec. Clinton's email troubles are just getting worse with judges ordering written answers, the FBI impartiality under attack, politically sophomoric comparisons to Colin Powell, and the Republicans gearing up for another 'juicy' hearing. Not to mention the political debacle that is now the Clinton Foundation providing more smoke surrounding the notion of the 'pay for play' politics that Mr. Trump is barking about. And where there's smoke, there's a Republican hoping for fire.
Judge: Clinton must answer written questions from Judicial Watch about use of private emails
Judge orders Clinton to answer questions on email use
And this opinion piece...
Hillary Clinton shouldn’t drag Colin Powell into her email mess
Worsening troubles in the worst kind of problem because it involves email and servers. With already all the hacking we know about, this kind of political (at the least) vulnerability leaves you open to an embarrassing information drop at any moment by an agent you can not chase. But we'll also say this, in their typical short-sighted approach, Republicans think the hacking of the DNC is a political win, not ever collectively stopping and thinking that this is an attack on all of us. The sad thing is that establishment Republicans do understand this, but the conservative constituency doesn't want to hear about it.
Compounding this will be the inevitable multi-committee hearings by a Republican-controlled House thus straggling the effort to get any meaningful legislation passed in a would-be first term of a Clinton presidency.
However, within the political world we currently reside, any reasonable person will also excuse all of this (do you believe?) because her opponent is Donald Trump. Simply stated, The Republican Party should be ashamed of themselves for nominating Mr. Trump. The candidate has demonstrated in his rhetoric that he embraces the worst of our American values. With Mr. Trump, we're disgusted with what we know (what he's said) and we're also disgusted with what he hasn't said. And we're talking about his businesses.
And this opinion piece...
Mr. Trump needs to disclose his tax returns because with his businesses hundreds of millions of dollars in debt to the Bank of China, the resignation of his campaign manager Paul Manafort over his ties to Russian oligarchs and other foreign dictators, and Mr. Trump's own alleged business ties to Russian. Only his tax returns will shed light on any doubt of Donald Trump acting as president not in the best interest of the country but his business first.
Between what he's said and what we know he willfully doesn't choose to tell us or disclose and on top of the fact that we know he knows nothing about foreign policy, we feel that Mrs. Clinton can change (hopefully, has changed) the way she uses her email. In other words, we'd rather deal with the hearings.
Ugh.
Sunday, August 07, 2016
8.7.16: Running Away From The Big "Buts"
The big "but."
It's the big "but" that keeps collective rationality in a constant state of anxiety.
Hillary Clinton leads in the polls by 8 or 9 points depending on which one you read because of her obvious superiority in knowledge and the ever more important, temperament. But, she's behind Donald Trump - a candidate, it had been calculated, tells a lie approximately every five minutes in his public speeches - in polls focused on "trustworthiness and straightforwardness."
To reinforce this notion, Sec. Clinton, herself, gave an inexplicable answer to Fox News's Chris Wallace when she said, " My answers were truthful, and what I've said is consistent with what I have told the American people..." Simply, not true. Sec. Clinton was not truthful with the American people, and it became a situation that required the FBI to come in and get the truth. So was Mrs. Clinton truthful with them. Director Comey has said as much.
Essentially, Mrs. Clinton wasn't truthful with the public not because of something technically illegal or unprecedented but because she fully well knew that it would be politically damaging and also play into a well established negative narrative about her and her family.
It begs the valid question of if something like this will happen when she's in office, and for all Republicans it's not a matter of if but when - a valid concern.
However, there's another "but [a huge one]," and that is Donald Trump who in our estimation is no better than Sec. Clinton on this front. And all things being equal on this, heading into the presidency, we have more faith in the fact that if a President Clinton was found to do something illegal, was impeached, and hence driven from office that she would leave the scene. We have no faith in Donald Trump accepting the penalty of an impeachable offense. How twisted is that?
Admittedly, that's a bit of hyperbole, but there is some truth in it. What is really happening - slowly and frustratingly - is that the American electorate is still wrapping its collective head around the fact that this is how our politicians are, right now [this election]. As difficult as it is to look beyond it, you see the other factors of knowledge and temperament acting as the deciding ones, in which again Sec. Clinton handily leads.
A telling reflection of this is that Republicans are clearly in an "every man/woman for him/herself" mode when it comes to dealing with Donald Trump's presidential candidacy, especially if you're up for reelection in the fall. Late week, Donald Trump formally endorsed House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH), but the problem is that it was completely unconvincing given Mr. Trump's initial vindictive refusal of withholding these very endorsements at the beginning of the week. And what a disastrous week it was for Trump.
Even in the hard-hitting politics game, The Trump campaign has consistently been blowing it. Sec. Clinton in response to a poor answer to Chris Wallace followed it by using phrases like "I short-circuited" and "I need to clarify better," in response to her email troubles, which is inexcusable a year after all this scrutiny began as noted by Yamiche Alcindor of The New York Times. To know all of Donald Trump's idiotic self-inflicted wounding statements of this without having to list them is clearly a blown opportunity to turn the press's attention squarely toward your opponent. At best, Mr. Trump could possible concede a draw, but in reality he lost the week, one in which he should have won but instead turned it into a week that probably lost him the election. We tend to agree more with Joy Reid that over the 'Olympic break' these awful, but accurate, perceptions of Mr. Trump will further become 'baked in.' Conversely, Hugh Hewlitt's nicely amusing assessment that Mr. Trump has to begin 'season two' of his campaign after Labor Day; however, the certainty of that happening is highly doubtful.
With all of Mr. Trump's bi-polarity in what he says - saying one thing now and another later - it's enough to fear putting the nuclear launch codes in his hands, and issue that should never be when discussing presidential candidates, but here we are.
It's not surprising to hear Republicans yell, "Runaway, runaway!"
Panel: Joy-Ann Reid, NBC News, Yamiche Alcindor, The New York Times; Hugh Hewlitt, conservative radio show host; Mark Halperin, Bloomberg Politics
A Couple More Things...
We really didn't touch on the interviews of the day and we'd be remiss and negligent if we didn't make a few comments.
With regard to Senator Tim Kaine, the entire point that he's on the ticket is to fill the trustworthy void for Sec. Clinton. In the colloquial sense, he's a "true boy scout." He gave a cogent answer on his TPP stance, one that the Clinton campaign should stick to which was that he was for it, only if the labor and environmental protections could be and would be enforced. They were fixed so he no longer supports it - delivered reasonably.
Counter that with Retired Lt. General Michael Flynn who if you listened carefully argued for something very dangerous, which was the none disclosure of what America is doing militarily - numbers of troop deployments, target cities, etc. However, with troop numbers, in particular the American public has the right to know because it's being done in our name. Lt. Gen. Flynn supported Mr. Trump's argument that NATO members have to pay their bills, but only a more tepid stance in affirming that the United States would stand by its collective commitments to the treaty [i.e. having another country's back if it's attacked]. It was not reassuring given Mr. Trump's insinuations that the United States wouldn't honor those commitments.
And as for Governor Rick Scott (R) of Florida - inadequately handling the Zika crisis and running a pro-Donald SuperPAC - what else is new?
Rick Scott in charge on the front lines of this nation's collective health protection against a virus we haven't stopped - scary to say the least.
It's the big "but" that keeps collective rationality in a constant state of anxiety.
Hillary Clinton leads in the polls by 8 or 9 points depending on which one you read because of her obvious superiority in knowledge and the ever more important, temperament. But, she's behind Donald Trump - a candidate, it had been calculated, tells a lie approximately every five minutes in his public speeches - in polls focused on "trustworthiness and straightforwardness."
To reinforce this notion, Sec. Clinton, herself, gave an inexplicable answer to Fox News's Chris Wallace when she said, " My answers were truthful, and what I've said is consistent with what I have told the American people..." Simply, not true. Sec. Clinton was not truthful with the American people, and it became a situation that required the FBI to come in and get the truth. So was Mrs. Clinton truthful with them. Director Comey has said as much.
Essentially, Mrs. Clinton wasn't truthful with the public not because of something technically illegal or unprecedented but because she fully well knew that it would be politically damaging and also play into a well established negative narrative about her and her family.
It begs the valid question of if something like this will happen when she's in office, and for all Republicans it's not a matter of if but when - a valid concern.
However, there's another "but [a huge one]," and that is Donald Trump who in our estimation is no better than Sec. Clinton on this front. And all things being equal on this, heading into the presidency, we have more faith in the fact that if a President Clinton was found to do something illegal, was impeached, and hence driven from office that she would leave the scene. We have no faith in Donald Trump accepting the penalty of an impeachable offense. How twisted is that?
Admittedly, that's a bit of hyperbole, but there is some truth in it. What is really happening - slowly and frustratingly - is that the American electorate is still wrapping its collective head around the fact that this is how our politicians are, right now [this election]. As difficult as it is to look beyond it, you see the other factors of knowledge and temperament acting as the deciding ones, in which again Sec. Clinton handily leads.
A telling reflection of this is that Republicans are clearly in an "every man/woman for him/herself" mode when it comes to dealing with Donald Trump's presidential candidacy, especially if you're up for reelection in the fall. Late week, Donald Trump formally endorsed House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH), but the problem is that it was completely unconvincing given Mr. Trump's initial vindictive refusal of withholding these very endorsements at the beginning of the week. And what a disastrous week it was for Trump.
Even in the hard-hitting politics game, The Trump campaign has consistently been blowing it. Sec. Clinton in response to a poor answer to Chris Wallace followed it by using phrases like "I short-circuited" and "I need to clarify better," in response to her email troubles, which is inexcusable a year after all this scrutiny began as noted by Yamiche Alcindor of The New York Times. To know all of Donald Trump's idiotic self-inflicted wounding statements of this without having to list them is clearly a blown opportunity to turn the press's attention squarely toward your opponent. At best, Mr. Trump could possible concede a draw, but in reality he lost the week, one in which he should have won but instead turned it into a week that probably lost him the election. We tend to agree more with Joy Reid that over the 'Olympic break' these awful, but accurate, perceptions of Mr. Trump will further become 'baked in.' Conversely, Hugh Hewlitt's nicely amusing assessment that Mr. Trump has to begin 'season two' of his campaign after Labor Day; however, the certainty of that happening is highly doubtful.
With all of Mr. Trump's bi-polarity in what he says - saying one thing now and another later - it's enough to fear putting the nuclear launch codes in his hands, and issue that should never be when discussing presidential candidates, but here we are.
It's not surprising to hear Republicans yell, "Runaway, runaway!"
Panel: Joy-Ann Reid, NBC News, Yamiche Alcindor, The New York Times; Hugh Hewlitt, conservative radio show host; Mark Halperin, Bloomberg Politics
A Couple More Things...
We really didn't touch on the interviews of the day and we'd be remiss and negligent if we didn't make a few comments.
With regard to Senator Tim Kaine, the entire point that he's on the ticket is to fill the trustworthy void for Sec. Clinton. In the colloquial sense, he's a "true boy scout." He gave a cogent answer on his TPP stance, one that the Clinton campaign should stick to which was that he was for it, only if the labor and environmental protections could be and would be enforced. They were fixed so he no longer supports it - delivered reasonably.
Counter that with Retired Lt. General Michael Flynn who if you listened carefully argued for something very dangerous, which was the none disclosure of what America is doing militarily - numbers of troop deployments, target cities, etc. However, with troop numbers, in particular the American public has the right to know because it's being done in our name. Lt. Gen. Flynn supported Mr. Trump's argument that NATO members have to pay their bills, but only a more tepid stance in affirming that the United States would stand by its collective commitments to the treaty [i.e. having another country's back if it's attacked]. It was not reassuring given Mr. Trump's insinuations that the United States wouldn't honor those commitments.
And as for Governor Rick Scott (R) of Florida - inadequately handling the Zika crisis and running a pro-Donald SuperPAC - what else is new?
Rick Scott in charge on the front lines of this nation's collective health protection against a virus we haven't stopped - scary to say the least.
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