Tag Archives: 2016 election

national news, political news

Democrats becoming the new ‘Party of No’

Accuracy is the first rule of journalism.

Fairness, arguably, is the second rule.

I always sought to be accurate and fair during my nearly 37 years toiling in daily print journalism. Therefore, my sense of fairness compels me to suggest that the Democratic Party should refrain from becoming the new Party of No.

Democrats were poised to seize control of the federal government once the ballots were counted during the 2016 presidential election. Then the unthinkable happened: Donald J. Trump defeated Hillary Rodham Clinton, the Senate didn’t flip to Democratic control and the House remained solidly in Republican hands.

Democrats found themselves, quite unexpectedly, in the political wilderness.

I was one of those commentators — using this blog as my forum — to rail, rant and rave against Republicans’ obstruction of every damn thing that Democratic President Barack Obama sought to do. Health care reform, economic stimulus, you name it. If Obama wanted, Republicans were sure to oppose it.

The GOP proved their obstructionist mettle with the president’s nomination of Merrick Garland to join the Supreme Court after Antonin Scalia’s death a year ago.

So, what are Democrats supposed to do?

Do they return the “favor” and become the new Party of No?

I hope not.

Don’t misunderstand me. I detest the idea that Donald Trump is president as much as many millions of other Americans. However, he is the president. He won the Electoral College majority he needed.

Just as I always have believed that “good government” requires compromise and cooperation between the two major parties, I believe that principle still can apply as Democrats do battle with the Republican in the White House and the Republicans who control both chambers of Congress.

Should they sacrifice whatever principles for which they stand? No more than anyone should expect Republicans to sacrifice their own principles.

I understand the anger that many in Washington are feeling right now. Just two months in the presidency of Donald Trump, Democrats still cannot get past the idea that they managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

Is that Republicans’ fault? Democratic chieftains need to own it.

They have their agenda, although to be honest, I’m not yet entirely sure what it is. They’ve just elected a new party chairman and they need to get their ducks lined up. They need to dust off their policy books.

They need to argue their point with Republicans. Somehow there needs to be some common ground. Health care overhaul? Federal budgeting? Environmental regulations? The myriad foreign policy trouble spots?

Party of No

It’s not enough to just say “no” to everything Republicans want to do. Good government requires a loyal opposition to perform in a manner that the very term defines: to oppose the party in power, but to be loyal to the government they all take an oath to uphold.

I dislike this Party of No business that’s beginning to take form in Washington. Republicans played the part badly when we had a Democrat in the White House. I don’t envision Democrats doing so with any more grace now that a Republican has taken his seat behind that big desk in the Oval Office.

legal news

Get ready for hot seat, Mr. Deputy AG-designate

Rod Rosenstein.

That name, right there, well might become the most-watched in Washington, D.C., behind — quite naturally — the name of the president of the United States.

Rosenstein has been picked by Donald J. Trump to become the deputy U.S. attorney general.

Why is this fellow so important right now? Because his boss, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, has recused himself from anything to do with an investigation into whether Trump was too cozy with Russian government officials. That means Rosenstein, by all accounts a hard-nosed prosecutor, will get to decide whether to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the Trump-Russia matter.

Rosenstein’s confirmation hearing focused almost exclusively on Sessions, Trump and the Russians. Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats sought to pin him down, trying to get him to commit to picking a special prosecutor. Rosenstein didn’t give that one up — to no one’s surprise.

Unlike Senate and House Republicans who say it’s “too early” to determine whether there’s a need for a special counsel, I happen to believe one should get the call. There needs to be a thorough investigation of what the president knew about the Russian effort to influence the 2016 presidential election, when he knew it, whether he colluded with the Russians. We also need to know whether Trump or someone from his campaign staff sought to renegotiate sanctions leveled against Russia by the Obama administration over the Russians’ meddling in our electoral process.

Rosenstein isn’t your ordinary, run-of-the-mill deputy AG. Folks in that job usually blend into the woodwork, never to be seen or heard from again once they take office.

Not this guy.

Assuming the Senate confirms him — and it should — Rosenstein is about to settle into one of the hottest seats in Washington.

Do the right thing, sir. Pick that special counsel.

national news, political news

Trump no more believable now than before

Donald J. Trump has leveled a patently preposterous notion that Barack Obama “ordered” a wiretap at Trump Tower in New York City.

The president wants us to believe him. He’s a truth-teller. He’s the man now. He says it’s a “fact” that the former president broke the law, committed a felony. Does this individual — Trump — have a record of believability?

How about a quick review. Donald Trump has said:

* Thousands of Muslims cheered the collapse of the Twin Towers during the 9/11 terrorist attack. They didn’t.

* President Obama was born in Kenya and was not qualified to serve in the office to which he was elected twice. Another falsehood.

* U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz’s father might have been complicit in the murder of President Kennedy. False.

* “Millions of illegal immigrants” voted for Hillary Clinton, providing her with her significant popular vote plurality over Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Didn’t happen.

Must I add that at no time did the candidate-turned-president offer a shred of proof for any of the things he had uttered out loud? Yet many voters believed him. Trump “tells it like it is,” they insisted. No, he made it up. He fabricated it. He lied through his teeth.

I also should remind you that when he said during his press conference three weeks ago that he scored the biggest Electoral College victory “since Ronald Reagan,” he said that it was something “I was told.” That was the defense he mounted after being challenged directly by “enemy of the people” media reps that his assertion about his electoral vote victory was patently false.

With that string of prevarications and lies, we now are being told to believe this latest whopper, that Barack Obama “ordered” wiretaps.

I cannot believe to this very moment that Donald John Trump was actually elected president of the United States.

But he was.

And no … I won’t “get over it.”

national news, political news

By all means, let’s investigate this wiretap malarkey

I just answered “yes” to one of those “online polls” posted on MSN.com’s home page.

The question was this: Should there be an investigation of Trump’s allegation of wiretapping by the Obama administration?

Why “yes”? Why endorse the idea of a probe?

It’s simple. I don’t believe for an instant, a nanosecond, that President Obama was in any way responsible for any kind of wiretap of Trump Tower. I believe that Donald J. Trump made it up. He fabricated an allegation to divert attention from other matters plaguing his administration.

This is the president’s modus operandi, as he’s demonstrated time and again since announcing his candidacy in the summer of 2015. The heat gets too warm under his backside, he fires off a tweet making an outrageous declaration.

He did so again this past weekend with that ridiculous tweet accusing President Obama — with zero evidence — of “ordering” a wiretap, which of course he cannot do legally. Someone, according to Trump, tapped his Trump Tower offices looking for evidence that his campaign had inappropriate or illegal contact with the Russian government, which intelligence authorities have concluded sought to influence the 2016 election, to help Trump get elected.

I realize a congressional investigation — which Trump is seeking — would be costly. I also realize it would divert members of Congress from the myriad other tasks that await them, and for which the public already is paying them good money to address.

You know, things like the budget, national defense, public education — not to mention the many individual concerns that can be found that are unique to each of 435 congressional districts and in each of the 50 states.

If such a probe is done in a bipartisan manner, then I truly believe it would expose Trump to be the fraudulent, petulant liar many millions of us believe him to be.

Not that it would dampen Trumpkins’ enthusiasm for their guy.

Just get it on the record.

legal news, national news, political news

Sessions needs to talk once more to Senate Judiciary panel

That’s it? The U.S. attorney general won’t have to testify any more to the Senate Judiciary Committee?

That’s the decision of Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who said he has no plans to call AG Jeff Sessions back to Capitol Hill to explain himself.

It seems to me that the attorney general has some serious ‘splainin to do.

He told Judiciary Committee members during his confirmation hearing that he didn’t have any meetings with Russian government officials. Then, later, he thought differently about it said, yep, he did talk to the Russian ambassador to the United States.

This ought to be fleshed out a little bit.

What did he discuss? Did he talk to him about big things, such as, oh, whether the Russians were trying to influence the presidential election? Or how about whether the incoming Donald J. Trump administration would take back the sanctions that the Obama administration had leveled against the Russians for — that’s right — trying to influence the election.

Or … maybe it was just a casual conversation. “How’s the weather in Moscow in these days, Mr. Ambassador?”

Sen. Al Franken, a Minnesota Democrat and one of the Judiciary panel members, wants Sessions to come back to The Hill to testify.

I think he should, too. Chairman Grassley surely cannot believe he’s heard all there is to hear from the attorney general.

legal news, national news, political news

Are the wheels flying off Trump’s ‘fine-tuned machine’?

“A fine-tuned machine” does not experience the kind of malfunctions we are witnessing within Donald J. Trump’s administration.

For instance, it doesn’t produce an FBI director asking the Justice Department to dismiss an explosive allegation coming from the president of the United States against his immediate predecessor.

FBI Director James Comey wants the Justice Department to toss out Trump’s allegation — delivered this weekend in a tweet — that Barack Obama ordered spooks to wiretap Trump’s offices in Trump Tower.

Why would they do such a thing, which they have denied doing? It would be to look for evidence that Trump’s campaign was colluding with Russian officials to interfere with the U.S. presidential election.

Trump calls it a “fact” that such a thing occurred. Comey, in an apparent act of open rebellion against the president, says, um, no it isn’t. It didn’t happen. At this moment, DOJ officials haven’t done as Comey has asked.

Ladies and gents, we are witnessing perhaps the first shots of open warfare within the Trump administration. It might be Trump v. Comey in this fight.

Ex-DNI denies wiretap allegation.

Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said on “Meet the Press” this morning that any such order to wiretap Trump’s office would have had to come from a federal judge, who would have determined probable cause to issue such an order. The DNI, said Clapper, would be made aware of it.

Clapper said it never occurred during his time as DNI.

Comey has taken up Clapper’s side in this fight.

The “fine-tuned machine” — which is how the president described his administration during that infamous press conference a couple of weeks ago — appears set to explode in flames.

What happens now? The president might fire Comey. What do you suppose would be the public reaction to such an event?

The president, moreover, is reportedly furious at Attorney General Jeff Sessions for recusing himself from an investigation into Russia’s alleged effort to influence the presidential election.

Does that sound to you like a “fine-tuned machine” that is humming along on all cylinders? Me neither.

My … goodness.

***

Comey’s request of the DOJ to drop this wiretap nonsense is fascinating at another level as well. The FBI director heaved that political grenade into Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign 11 days before Election Day informing her of a letter he had sent to Congress asking for a re-examination of that e-mail controversy that dogged her all along the way.

Clinton blames that letter for stopping her momentum and for giving Trump the ammo he needed to blast her presidential campaign to smithereens.

Now he turns on the individual he supposedly helped get elected?

Lock ‘n load!

national news

Proof, Donald, we need proof … yet again!

It’s helpful to keep everything that flies out of Donald J. Trump’s mouth — or shows up on his Twitter feed — in their proper perspective.

It is that the president of the United States is likely to say or tweet whatever the hell pops into his noggin at any time of the day or night.

He now accuses President Obama of wiretapping his Trump Tower offices, allegedly to determine if he had held unauthorized talks with Russian officials before he became president.

Proof? Pffft! Who needs it? Trump seems to ask.

Let us review for a moment a couple of other specious claims that Trump has made.

* He said “thousands and thousands of Muslims cheered” the collapse of the World Trade Center during the 9/11 attacks. They didn’t.

* The president said that “millions of illegal immigrants voted for Hillary Clinton” in the 2016 presidential election, giving her the comfortable popular vote margin she scored over Trump while losing the Electoral College. He has yet to prove that, either.

Now this.

Obama had his staff wiretap his office, according to Trump.

No proof has come forward.

How on God’s Earth can we believe anything that this clown keeps saying?

I cannot.

media news, national news, political news

It’s official: Trump has blown himself apart

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After the latest and “greatest” Donald J. Trump tweet-storm — this time regarding his immediate predecessor as president of the United States — I am compelled to ask a simple question.

Can someone explain to me as if I’m a 5-year-old why in the name of all that is holy did 62 million Americans vote for Trump as president?

Trump now says Barack Obama wiretapped the new president’s offices at Trump Tower in New York. He once again offered no evidence. No proof. Nothing to substantiate a single idiotic word he sent out via Twitter.

What’s more, then we get U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican — and former GOP presidential opponent of Trump, saying he is “worried” about the president’s moronic accusation.

What the hell does that mean, senator? Worried? About what?

I can’t tell if he’s worried that the president would resort to such idiocy or he’s worried that there might be something to what he has alleged.

“Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!” Trump said in one of his tweets.

President Obama, of course, has denied any such thing ever occurred.

At issue, in case you’ve forgotten, is whether the Trump campaign had any improper or illegal contact with Russian government officials during the campaign or immediately afterward — and before Trump took office. Did they talk about the sanctions that the Obama administration had leveled against the Russians because 17 U.S. intelligence agencies believe they sought to influence the outcome of the election?

Trump now has flipped his beanie. His butter has slipped off his noodles.

Some of us out here warned about Trump’s temperament, his judgment, his fitness for the job he won. The very idea that the president of the United States would launch this Twitter tirade and accuse his predecessor of breaking the law is — all by itself — enough to disqualify this individual from holding any public office.

Then again, I thought so way back when he said Sen. John McCain was a “war hero only because he was captured” by the North Vietnamese and beaten to within an inch of his life while being held captive during the Vietnam War.

My question still stands: How did this clown win a presidential election?

political news

Robby Mook: campaign loser lands on his feet

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I occasionally become amazed at how failed political operatives have this way of continuing to land on their feet.

They lose national elections and yet the TV news networks — cable and broadcast — seek them out for their “expert analysis” on all things political.

Robby Mook is the latest such example of that.

It puzzles me a bit.

Mook managed Hillary Rodham Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign. Clinton was the prohibitive favorite to win that election. Every pundit from coast to coast to coast said she’d clobber Donald J. Trump. Some of them predicted a landslide … for Hillary!

Well, it didn’t happen. She lost, albeit narrowly. Sure, she won the popular vote and finished ahead of Trump by about 2 percentage points, which is about where the polls had pegged it.

However, the campaign missed a number of key strategic opportunities in critical Rust Belt states. Trump captured those traditional Democratic strongholds.

Who’s to blame for all of that? You’ve got to lay it squarely in the lap of the campaign manager. Mook called the shots. He ran the show. He was supposed to ensure his candidate won. It was his job to make sure Hillary spent her time where it counted the most.

He blew it, bigly.

How does this guy hold up as an expert?

Oh, wait! He’s “telegenic.” That’s got to be it.

International news, media news, national news, political news

Here comes another ‘gate’ scandal

The “gate” suffix no doubt is going to be attached to the brewing controversy boiling up out of the Trump administration.

Russiagate? Flynngate? Hackinggate?

I grew annoyed long ago at this media concoction to put the “gate” suffix at the end of every scandal that comes down the pike.

The Watergate scandal that brought down a president in August 1974 stands alone. It began with a “third-rate burglary” at the Democratic National Committee offices in the Watergate office complex. It morphed into something, well, much bigger than the metro desk crime story that the Washington Post considered it initially.

However, the controversy involving Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, and his alleged contacts with Russian government officials smells like a story that could rival Watergate in its gravity.

Some veteran journalists who covered the Watergate scandal are beginning to pick up the scent of something quite serious. Flynn’s contacts with Russian officials during the 2016 presidential campaign could involve collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin to, um, influence the election.

We’re a long way from drawing such conclusions. There needs to be a thorough, aggressive and independent investigation into what Flynn did and what he told those Russians. Congressional Republicans have joined their Democratic colleagues in calling for such a probe.

Let it commence, but please — no “gate” references.