Category Archives: political news

Here’s a fantasy for the political ages

donald-trump

Someone once told me that if you reveal your dreams they won’t come true.

I don’t really and truly believe that, but it sounds logical. I wonder, though, if the same thing applies to fantasies that race through one’s mind.

Well, in this political season — and given that I’m something of a political junkie — I’ve been having this recurring fantasy about Donald J. Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.

Will it come true if I disclose it here? Aww, what the hey. I’ll do it anyway and hope for the best, whatever that turns out to be.

The fantasy goes something like this:

Trump is going to limp into the GOP convention in a couple of weeks. He’ll have named his vice-presidential running mate. They will have made a few campaign stops together, hoisting each other’s arms in the air and proclaiming their desire to beat the daylights out of Hillary Clinton and the Democrats.

Then it dawns on Trump: His poll numbers stink. He can’t keep any senior campaign staffers. No one with any standing wants to speak at his convention. Many of the party luminaries are staying away. Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus cannot stand him. Neither can House Speaker Paul Ryan. Or Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

He’s out of money. The big donors are keeping their hands on their wallets. Hillary Clinton has tons of cash in the bank and she’s savaging this guy like he’s never been savaged in his life.

Trump is facing the prospect of losing big this fall.

Then he decides, why do I want to plunder what’s left of my reputation?

He bails out. He quits.

He says, “I’ve had enough of this betrayal. I’ve tried to take the Republican Party into a new direction, but the ‘special interests’ are having none of it. And I get it: They run the show.”

Once you stop laughing at this scenario, I shall remind you that this campaign — particularly on the Republican side — has defied every logical theory imaginable. Trump never should have been a serious candidate, let alone the frontrunner and now presumptive nominee. But here he is — on the cusp of a major-party presidential nomination.

He brings not a scintilla of public service experience to this campaign.

What’s more, Trump is about to get trounced by a woman, of all people, in the race for the presidency. We know pretty well — yes? — what he thinks of women.

Will any of this happen? Oh, probably not.

Then again …

So much for principle, yes, Mr. Speaker?

trade

I guess you could have predicted this switcheroo.

Former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Newt Gingrich has performed a 180-degree flip on free trade. He now agrees with the Republican presumptive presidential nominee Donald J. Trump.

Free trade is a bad thing, Trump says. It steals jobs from American workers and ships them out to places like China and Mexico, he says.

Gingrich, though, was one of the architects of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which opened the door wide to free trade among the United States, Canada and Mexico.

Then the party’s presumed nominee came calling with a possible vice-presidential selection in mind.

Now it’s the former speaker who says he agrees with Trump on trade.

This kind of switch isn’t new, of course. Politicians do it all the time.

My favorite switch involved one of my favorite Republicans, a man I admire very much. George H.W. Bush once was considered a tried-and-true pro-choice Republican on abortion. Then the party’s nominee tapped him on the shoulder in 1980 and said, in effect, “If you want to run on our ticket, you have to become a pro-life guy on abortion.”

Bush did and he joined Ronald Reagan on the GOP’s winning 1980 ticket.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/newt-gingrich-trump-trade-vice-president-225035

Trump has accused U.S. political and business leaders of “stupidity” in allowing free trade to pilfer U.S. jobs. Does that include Gingrich?

I guess not.

It’s interesting nevertheless because Gingrich always has struck me as a politician dedicated to core principles and to partisan orthodoxy. Free trade is part of the Republican mantra, while Trump’s view of GOP trade policy has angered many within the party’s establishment mainstream.

Go figure.

Let’s be sure to check in with Gingrich if Trump picks someone else to run with him.

Memo to former president: Stay away from the action

clintonbillclintonhillary_072815getty

Bill Clinton hasn’t blown his wife’s presidential candidacy apart.

But, oh man, he has stepped right into the middle of a place where he didn’t belong.

For that matter, the U.S. attorney general — Loretta Lynch — didn’t help matters one bit by agreeing to a brief, allegedly strictly “social” chat with the 42nd president of the United States.

The ex-POTUS and the AG met recently aboard Lynch’s airplane at Phoenix’s airport. They had a few laughs and chatted each other up about this and/or that.

But the ex-president has handed Republican candidate Donald J. Trump a gold-plated gift in the form of ammo to fire at Hillary Rodham Clinton. The ammo well might include accusations that her husband sought to “influence” an FBI investigation into that nagging e-mail controversy … the one involving Hillary Clinton’s use of her private e-mail account to send and receive State Department messages while she ran that huge federal agency.

The FBI is probing the matter and is expected to interview Democratic presidential nominee-in-waiting Hillary Clinton soon, presumably to get some answers to the Big Question: Did she compromise national security while using that e-mail service?

Lynch said immediately she would accept whatever recommendation the FBI makes regarding Hillary Clinton’s liability in this matter. She has all but recused herself from the investigation, even though the Justice Department still oversees the FBI and that FBI Director James Comey is her direct subordinate.

As for the former president, he needs to take his political antennae into whatever shop there is to fix it.

Until then, he needs to keep as low a profile as possible.

This e-mail mess is muddy enough as it is. The former president needs to — how do I say this clearly? — stay far, far away from it.

Mike Pence becomes new VP favorite

mike-pence

Mike Pence has stormed out of Indiana to become the latest possible selection for Donald J. Trump’s presidential ticket.

The Republican presumptive nominee is now “vetting” Pence, the two-term Indiana governor and former House member as a possible vice-presidential selection.

The chatter this morning is quite interesting. According to those in the know, Pence would bring Washington experience, executive government experience, good standing with the evangelical base of the GOP, and strong conservative political credentials … allegedly.

Pence would be a solid pick … for any other presidential nominee in the party.

But not this one, from where I sit.

I’m trying to imagine a Vice President Pence scolding a President Trump about his insistence that we toss out free-trade policies. I’m trying to conjure up the image of these two haggling in private over whether it really is wise to ban Muslims from entering the country solely because of their religious faith.

Would the GOP’s presidential nominee actually listen to anything his VP running mate — whoever he is — has to say about anything?

I believe Trump’s stated declaration that he’s his own man and that he intends to “go it alone” if need be is what likely might be scaring off potential running mates.

Sure, reports indicate Trump’s “team,” such as it is, is vetting New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich for the No. 2 spot. Think about what either of those two gents bring to the ticket: Christie is wildly unpopular in his home state; meanwhile, Gingrich is lugging around his own “family values” baggage based on his three marriages and the affair he was having with a staffer while he was screaming for Bill Clinton’s impeachment based on an affair the then-president was having with a White House intern.

Now it’s Pence’s turn to be examined by the political punditry.

This is more fun than I ever imagined.

Hey, at least Gov. Pence looks good on TV.

Is Trump’s campaign unraveling

donald-trump-angry-caricature-flickr-cc

So, where do we stand on the eve of the Republican National Convention that is set to nominate Donald J. Trump for president?

* The presumptive nominee has about 1/40th of the money on hand that his Democratic opponent has.

* He is losing senior staff members.

* Trump’s “short list” of prospective vice-presidential picks hasn’t been winnowed much from anything resembling a long list.

* Key congressional Republicans are still declining to sing the nominee’s virtues.

* The five previous Republican presidential nominees are not going to attend the convention.

Hmmm. How’s it going for the nominee? Not good.

I’m having difficulty grasping how this major-party presidential nominee is going to keep his campaign from unraveling.

Who’s going to give the keynote speech at the GOP convention? That’s the speech that’s supposed to set the tone for the campaign to follow. These assignments usually go to up-and-coming political stars. Sometimes a shining-light governor gets to deliver the speech.

Who’s lining up for that task in Cleveland?

With so few actual GOP luminaries even committing to being present at the convention, I am left to wonder: How in the world is this event going to unfold?

The guy with the toughest job of all surely has to be House Speaker Paul Ryan, the convention chairman who has to figure out a way to manage the mayhem that seems set to ensue.

Ryan cannot even bring himself to speak with any sort of enthusiasm about the nominee he has “endorsed.” And to my ears, his “endorsement” is one of those you hear from politicians giving it through gritted teeth.

I’ve seen the polling that puts Trump within striking distance of Democratic candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton. I’ve seen the surveys that suggest Clinton has a much broader path toward election than Trump, but with Trump still being able to trumpet some success.

But the GOP nominee has little campaign money, virtually no organization, no apparent strategy to win those so-called “battleground states.”

Trump has promised an unconventional campaign for the presidency.

Boy howdy! He’s delivering on that promise.

In spades.

AG to let the FBI do its job … great!

loretta-lynch

U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch was party to one of the more, um, awkward political moments in recent memory.

She’s now seeking to remove whatever stain remains from that moment by declaring she intends to let the career legal eagles at the FBI do their job — without interference from her — in their probe of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s e-mail controversy.

Lynch ought to perhaps take it a step further and recuse herself completely from the investigation.

She met recently on an airport tarmac with former President Bill Clinton. They reportedly talked about “social” matters: grandkids, golf, the weather and whatever else. Lynch said the former president didn’t mention the investigation into whether his wife — the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee — did anything wrong while using her private e-mail account while serving as secretary of state.

Still, the encounter was awkward in the extreme. It never should have happened.

President Clinton shouldn’t have gone near the AG while they were in the airport in Phoenix and Lynch never should have allowed the conversation to occur, no matter how innocent it was.

It has fed an ongoing narrative about the former president and Mrs. Clinton, that they are tone-deaf to how their actions appear and that they play by their own set of rules.

It’s good that Lynch has declared her intention to let the FBI pursue the e-mail probe without any interference from her.

As for the former president … stay as far away from the principals in this matter as possible.

Bill Clinton chats up AG Loretta Lynch … oops

email-marketing

Many of us always have thought that former President Bill Clinton’s political instincts were second to none.

He knows the importance of “optics,” and of timing, and of  perception. Isn’t that right?

Apparently not.

President Clinton and U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch happened to be at an airport in Phoenix. What, then, did the former president do? He boarded the AG’s airplane to just, oh, chat her up.

They reportedly exchanged small talk. Clinton wanted to talk about his grandchildren. Lynch and her husband just talked about small stuff.

What’s wrong with that?

Everything!

You see, the FBI — which is an arm of the Attorney General’s Office — is investigating whether Hillary Clinton violated federal law when she used her private e-mail account while she was serving as secretary of state.

Why is it so wrong for Bill Clinton to meet privately with Loretta Lynch? Because it sends out a message that Bill and Hillary Clinton don’t play by the same rules as everyone else. It feeds a longtime narrative that the Clintons’ critics have been saying since Bill Clinton ran for president in 1992.

Lynch said she and Clinton did not discuss the FBI probe into Hillary Clinton’s e-mail matter. She said the former president never brought it up and neither did she.

Hillary Clinton’s Democratic presidential campaign, though, has yet to speak about the meeting.

There had better be some explanation offered … and soon.

Incoherence on trade policy …

Free-Trade

Donald J. Trump’s campaign rally today in Bangor, Maine featured a remarkably incoherent riff on trade policy.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee was ranting about trade agreements. He opposes free trade. Or does he?

He launched into a strange and utterly nonsensical series of descriptions of what constitutes a “good” trade agreement.

He began his trade tirade by saying he was “all for free trade.” Then he said he was opposed to it. Huh? What … ?

He didn’t care if it was “horrible.” He didn’t care if it was “fair.” He didn’t care if it was “great.”

Trump then said something about negotiating trade agreements differently than the way they’ve been negotiated previously.

Horrible, fair, great, bad? Donald Trump doesn’t care about any of those aspects of a trade agreement.

I need help understanding how any of that makes sense.

And this guy wants to be president of the United States of America?

This is how you ‘unify’ the GOP? Hardly

don trump

I just heard Donald J. Trump say two things during his rambling stream-of-consciousness rant in Bangor, Maine that tell me he’s declaring war on his political party.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee said (a) that he’s going to tear up the Trans-Pacific Partnership and will renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement and (b) that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a gang of goons run by special interests.

Wow!

Standard GOP orthodoxy endorses free trade. Trump does not.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has been a traditional, deep-pocketed ally of Republican presidential candidates. Trump has no use for the Chamber.

So, what does this mean?

To me it means that Trump is kicking dirt in the face of the very political infrastructure he will need if he is going to have a prayer of defeating Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton.

What about this am I missing?

If the GOP’s presidential nominee is going to adhere to party philosophy, isn’t it time for him to at least give some lip service that endorses the views of the architects of that philosophy?

Well, hey, he said he could “go it alone” if he needed to.

It looks to me  as though the nominee is going to have a lonely march toward political oblivion.

 

An actual rapist asked to speak at GOP gathering?

tyson

This one is too good to let pass without comment.

Donald J. Trump threw out the term “rape” this week while commenting on the trade agreements he vows to toss aside if he’s elected president of the United States later this year.

The United States, he said, has been “raped” by nations with which we’ve have dealt through NAFTA, CAFTA and whatever other international trade agreements we’ve signed.

So, who did the presumptive Republican presidential nominee reportedly invite to speak at the GOP convention this summer in Cleveland?

Mike Tyson, an actual convicted rapist felon. That’s who.

Trump has denied formally inviting Tyson, but said the former boxer would do a “good job” if he gets to speak at the convention. Really? We’ll see.

Tyson is the former heavyweight boxing champion who got thrown into prison after a jury convicted him of raping a beauty pageant contestant.

On one level, I’m glad that Tyson seems to be turning his life around.

However, his prison record will be there for the ages. Indeed, his obituary likely will mention it somewhere near the very top of the text.

These reports about Tyson do seem to have this air of believability to them, no matter what Trump says to the contrary. Given the reportedly sparse list of GOP dignitaries willing to speak at the Republican nominating convention, Trump well might need to dig deeply to find enough celebrities to fill all that valuable prime broadcast time.

Irony, though, can be a real booger… you know?