Tag Archives: MSNBC

national news, political news

Paging Kellyanne Conway; hello, Kellyanne?

Is it me or has Kellyanne Conway gone missing?

Is she MIA? Do we need to call out an all-points bulletin to find her?

Immediately after Donald J. Trump was elected president, you couldn’t escape Conway. She was everywhere. Conway was able to make appearances on every cable and broadcast news show on the air. She was seemingly being interviewed by news anchors all at once.

A lot of media talking heads spoke kindly of Conway. She seemed to be on first-name bases with Chuck, George, Sean, Chris, Robin, Jake, Wolf … all of ’em! They welcomed her with open arms.

I used to joke that former Amarillo Mayor Debra McCartt defied the laws of physics by being everywhere at once. The same thing might have been said of Conway, who after the 2016 presidential election  was appointed senior policy adviser to the new president.

Then she spoke of “alternative facts.” She had this way of saying that the president was “100 percent behind me” after she spoke about a terror attack that didn’t occur, the fictitious attack in Bowling Green, Ky.

Oops! “Morning Joe” hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski disinvited her from future appearances on their MSNBC show. Why? She had lost her credibility with them.

Reports abounded that Trump had reeled her in. The White House denied it.

Then again …

Conway has been virtually absent over the past, oh, two weeks.

Hello? Kellyanne? Are you out there? Somewhere?

International news

Trump continues to diss U.S. intelligence agencies

My head is spinning.

Republicans at one time used to condemn Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, for revealing U.S. national secrets to the rest of the world.

Now some of them — including the president-elect of the United States — believe him more than they believe U.S. intelligence officials who contend that Russian spooks hacked into the American electoral system.

What in the world has happened here?

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-cites-assange-claim-about-russia-hacking/ar-BBxT4NI?li=BBnb7Kz

“Julian Assange said ‘a 14 year old could have hacked Podesta’ – why was DNC so careless? Also said Russians did not give him the info!” Trump tweeted Wednesday.

As USA Today reports: “Podesta is the Hillary Clinton campaign chairman whose emails were released by WikiLeaks during the campaign, part of an effort that U.S. intelligence officials attributed to the Russians, perhaps in order to help Trump win the election.”

Trump continues to disparage the intelligence agencies who will be charged with providing him information about our foreign adversaries. Will the president continue to disparage them even as they seek to brief him potential crises?

Presidential historian Michael Beschloss wondered today on MSNBC what might have happened in 1962 had the CIA presented to President Kennedy pictures of “something being built” in Cuba that turned out to be ballistic missile launchers. What if the president had disregarded them? Beschloss asked.

Trump now has sided with someone who has been scorned by politicians within his political party, someone who’s been defending the Russians’ denial of doing anything wrong.

Julian Assange is no friend of the American intelligence network.

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., said that “I have a lot more faith in our intelligence officers” than in “people like Julian Assange.”

For the ever-loving life of me I cannot figure out what’s happening here. The president-elect of the United States of America is taking the word of a reputed national security threat over the word of those assigned to protecting our national interests?

I need to take something for my spinning head.

media news, national news, political news

‘Media bias’ is a non-starter, Rep. Kingston

newspapers

Jack Kingston today made arguably the most absurd assertion I’ve ever heard about alleged “media bias” in covering the 2016 presidential election.

The former Republican congressman from Georgia — who supports Donald J. Trump’s election to the presidency — actually said the lack of newspaper endorsements illustrates the point that the media are biased against his candidate.

Kingston took  that leap today on MSBNC. He was reminded immediately, however, that many of the newspapers that have endorsed Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton have adhered to historically conservative editorial policies. Thus, the papers’ aren’t traditionally “liberal” organs.

UNITED STATES - Dec 12: Rep. Jack Kingston, R-GA., address the media during a press conference in the House Studio B in the U.S. Capitol on December 12, 2013. (Photo By Douglas Graham/CQ Roll Call)

Kingston stuck to his mantra. The media are biased, he said, continuing the line that Trump, VP nominee Mike Pence and campaign manager Kellyanne Conway have been reciting whenever possible.

Oh … my.

The media always are a convenient target for losing political campaigns. That part of this tactic from Trump isn’t particularly new or original. I’ve heard it for decades.

Trump’s floundering campaign has revealed only the profound failure of the candidate. It has shown us this man’s unfitness for the job he seeks. His lack of knowledge of anything speaks volumes. His desperate tactics as the campaign draws to a close only affirm the wisdom of the newspapers’ editorial positions.

Donald Trump is losing this campaign. Moreover, he is acting like someone who has lost his mind.

As for former Rep. Kingston, he is smarter than he demonstrated today with that ridiculous assertion about media bias.

national news, political news

Gary, we hardly knew ye

johnson

Pity poor Gary Johnson.

He (almost) had me, then he lost me.

The former New Mexico governor is running for president as a Libertarian. His running mate is former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld. They’re both Republicans, actually.

Johnson’s main claim to notoriety has been his long-standing belief that we should legalize marijuana.

He’s now known as a presidential candidate who, in short order, froze up when asked about Aleppo. “What’s Aleppo?” he asked when quizzed about the largest city in Syria, the epicenter of the refugee crisis that has erupted in the Middle East and Europe.

Then, when he was asked this week by MSNBC commentator Chris Matthews to name his “favorite world leader,” he couldn’t come up with a single world leader who he admires. Oh, he finally blurted out “Shimon Peres,” the former Israeli prime minister and president — who died this week of a stroke.

I had considered backing this guy for president, hoping he might exhibit some semblance of knowledge of issues other than legalizing grass. Alas, it’s not to be.

media news, national news, political news

Temperament, man … it’s the temperament

ecf305473b9b613c82db81e4bfeba584

Hillary Rodham Clinton keeps harping on an aspect of Donald J. Trump’s emotional makeup.

She contends in her stump speeches that the Republican Party’s presidential nominee lacks the temperament to be president.

Others have joined the chorus. Republicans echo Democrats in saying that Trump’s emotional outbursts bode ill for someone who seeks to become the next head of state, head of government and commander in chief of the world’s greatest military machine.

So … how’s Trump responding lately?

He’s launched into another Tweet-storm, this time hurling insults and invective at — are you ready? — two cable TV news talk show hosts! Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski — co-hosts of the MSBNC “Morning Joe” talk show — now are in Trump’s sights.

He calls them “unstable.” He hurls insults at them. Oh, and he’s also suggested out loud that the two of them are — gasp! – dating each other. Which makes me say: B … F … D, dude.

They’re both single.

Whatever.

The issue that Clinton keeps raising, though, seems to ring a bit truer today as Trump assails two TV talk show hosts.

Temperament? Sure, Trump’s got it.

national news, political news

Trump needs to say he’s sorry … if he has a chance

here-are-the-top-vice-president-picks-for-donald-trump-and-hillary-clinton_1

This isn’t an original thought, but it’s one that I wish I’d have thought of saying out loud long ago.

It comes from Donnie Deutch, an MSNBC commentator, while discussing just how Donald J. Trump turns his floundering presidential campaign around.

Deutch today said the only way the Republican presidential nominee gets back into the game is to say he is sorry for all the hateful things he has said.

It’s not enough, Deutch said, for Trump to simply start sounding more “presidential.” He’ll have to tell America that he was “trying to make some kind of point” during the primary, and that he didn’t really mean it when he called for a ban on Muslims, or denigrated John McCain’s war record, or said women needed to punished if they obtained an abortion, or a Mexican-American judge couldn’t preside over a case involving Trump University.

There’s more. You get the point.

Deutch said Trump has to take “two steps back” before marching forward.

Will it happen? Will the candidate take up Deutch’s advice?

No. He’s likely a goner.

national news, political news

Trump is every bit the politician

Donald Trump speaks during the National Rifle Association's annual meeting in Nashville, Tennessee April 10, 2015. REUTERS/Harrison McClary - RTR4WVBQ

Donald J. Trump’s surrogates and fans keep repeating the same inaccurate mantra about the Republican presidential nominee.

One of them repeated it this morning to MSNBC anchor Kate Snow.

They say he “is not a politician.”

I beg to differ. Vehemently.

Here’s why.

Trump became a politician the moment a year ago when he announced his candidacy for the presidency of the United States. Was he a politician before that moment? Well, no. You know his story: real estate mogul, business owner, reality TV celebrity, beauty pageant operator … and some other stuff that has nothing to do with running a country.

But the dictionary defines politicians as those individuals who seek or hold political office.

There. That settles it for me.

Trump is a politician.

Now, will the Trumpkins stop repeating an untruth about their candidate?

Oh, wait …

media news, national news

‘Talk show’ becomes ‘scream show’

hardball-with-chris-matthews

Chris Matthews is a loud, sometimes-abrasive TV commentator who opines for MSNBC.

He often, though, has learned guests on his nightly cable TV talk show “Hardball,” in which individuals are invited to make their cases with knowledge and a healthy dose of respect for others’ points of view.

Matthews invited Donald Trump economic adviser Peter Navarro and Hillary Clinton economic guru Jared Bernstein to discuss Trump’s economic plan for the nation.

It didn’t go well.

I now will let the video speak — or scream — for itself.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2016/08/08/hardball_fireworks_jared_bernstein_vs_trump_economist_peter_navarro_on_trumps_tax_plan.html

 

national news, political news

Now … let’s measure the bounce

th1WB6RMI3

Steve Schmidt is a dedicated Republican strategist and smart fellow who helped manage Sen. John McCain’s campaign for the presidency in 2008.

I believe he has laid out with clarity what American political junkies need to wait for in the next few days.

It is that Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton needs a significant post-convention “bounce” to put her in a position to make history by becoming the first woman elected president of the United States.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/clintons-pledge-steady-hand-at-moment-of-reckoning/ar-BBuZdrd?li=BBnb7Kz

Schmidt said on MSNBC tonight that Clinton must lead GOP nominee Donald Trump by a large margin by the “middle of next week” or else “Democrats are going to be in trouble.”

So, we’ll wait for the public opinion surveys that well might tell us where this campaign is heading.

For my money, I thought Clinton’s acceptance of her party’s nomination did what she wanted it to do. I believe she wanted to cast herself as the anti-Trump. She did continue the brightness vs. darkness theme, painting the country in much more vivid hues than the Republicans did at their convention this past week.

Here we go.

Let’s hold on — with both hands — for what looks like will be a wild ride to the finish.

national news, political news

Trump’s dark picture turns on beacon for Democrats

Biden-1

Vice President Joe Biden just finished speaking to the Democratic National Convention crowd.

I now shall echo something that MSNBC’s Chris Matthews just said about Biden’s speech. It is that Republican presidential nominee Donald J. Trump’s dark, foreboding and gloomy picture of America has given Democrats license to yell “USA! USA!” at their national convention.

It’s “cool to be corny,” said Matthews, who added that Trump has “opened the door” for Democrats to cheer their country.

What does all — or any — of this mean to the outcome of the election?

I haven’t a clue.

All of what we’re hearing tonight and likely Thursday at the DNC is that the nation that Republicans have described — a country in decline, with a military that’s a “disaster” — is one that I do not recognize.