Sunday, October 02, 2016

10.2.16: Suspending Belief Is Dangerous

It's difficult to listen to Rudy Giuliani talk.

The former District Attorney and Mayor of New York now sounds like a sleazy celebrity defense attorney in every answer he gives. You're talking about something offensive? Let me tell you something more offensive. Completely devoid of fact.

He's throwing stones at the Clintons for extramarital affairs then turns around and self-righteously condemns Chuck Todd for asking if he is qualified to level such a charge due to his own affairs.

In terms of Donald Trump and his taxes, or more accurately the lack of his payment of them, everyone is going to put his or her own spin on it. Whether you think he's smart because he legally avoided paying any taxes over an 18 year period or you think he should be disqualified because it shows that he's clearly not being honest about his finances, this much is clear:

He's running on his business acumen and he's a businessman that lost $916 million.

Why would I hire him to run my company? Or run my country? We don't equate the two because anyone who says that the federal government should be run like a business doesn't know enough about government. And point in fact is on foreign policy, to which Mr. Giuliani equally offensively said that Mr. Trump "displayed a better understanding of radical Islamic terrorism," with which wee would strongly object. Not only has Sec. Clinton shown a better understanding of terrorism in general, but the most comprehensive knowledge on all things that comprise international relations. Love her or hate her, you have to conclude that she's far superior in this field than her opponent. For Mr. Giuliani's part, he just doesn't understand that there is more to foreign policy than terrorism. We know he's made his living on it, but for him to even imply that Donald Trump would be better representing United States' foreign policy than Hillary Clinton is demented thinking.

Now having said that, we would concur with what Michael Moore and Glenn Beck agreed upon today that in middle America, voters are really angry with politicians and they feel that Donald Trump is their voice. One must point out that the anger comes from politicians promising things and not delivering, e.g. the repeal of Obamacare. But the irony is that Donald Trump represents the very Republican party that made these promises and didn't keep them.

Donald Trump is dangerous because he would have you suspend belief on all things and think that only he alone can fix what ails our country, like the tax code that he admits to expertly exploiting for his own enrichment, when we all know that's not how it works in the United States.  

But all no matter, right?

Today's panel basically concluded that Trump's unhinged reconkulous (beyond 'ridiculous') 3AM Twitter rant or his completely unfounded accusations that Mrs. Clinton herself had an affair to the revelations about his incredible income tax facts (all just this week) will have no effect on how people will vote and that he still has a chance of being elected president of the United States. The scary and sad part for us is that we don't disagree.

They discussed how the party elites and the media no longer hold sway over the masses yet have only themselves to blame, which is mostly true. Think about it for half a second. On the conservative side, Fox News told their viewers that Mitt Romney was ahead and going to win - he didn't and about Obamacare repeals which never happened. On the liberal side of things, we would agree with Samantha Bee of Comedy Central that NBC has been an enabler of Trump's legitimacy as a candidate.  Let's face it, those Jimmy Fallon interviews were like, "Wow, look at how my funny racist uncle can behave well on television."

With regard to the declining influence of newspaper's editorial boards, this column is fine in respecting what they have to say and thinking seriously about it. It's not our problem if other people have a problem with that. However, when a number of noted conservative newspapers (The Arizona Republic, New Hampshire Union Leader, The Dallas Morning News, and The Cincinnati Enquirer) are not endorsing the Republican candidate for president, in more than 100 years for a few, and in some instances endorsing the Democratic candidate who is Hillary Clinton then you listen. Gary Johnson, whose running mate Bill Weld said that Hillary Clinton was the most qualified to be president (not Gary Johnson), has more newspaper endorsements than Donald Trump.

 If you suspend belief and disagree, fine, but unqualified Trump's on you.


Panel: Amy Walter, The Cook Political Report; Mark Halperin, Bloomberg News; Maria Teresa Kumar, President of Voto Latino; Rich Lowry, The National Review


One More Thing...
Glenn Beck has said many things that this column strongly disagrees with, opinions and what not - one that is unforgivable, which was calling President Obama a racist. However, today he did say that in a way we're losing our neighbors and family because we're not focused on reconciliation just winning, a seemingly clear shot at Donald Trump. Whatever his particular motivations are behind that don't matter for the sake of that on it's face, we agree with the sentiment.

Weird times...

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