Tag Archives: 2016 GOP primary

national news

Yep, Trump’s lying is ‘pathological’

I think it was one or more of his 2016 Republican Party presidential primary foes who called Donald Trump’s penchant for prevarication a “pathological” condition.

That is, he can’t help himself. He has some sort of liar’s disease that guides him toward the telling of outright falsehoods, even when they serve no purpose — at all!

Such as what transpired this week in an Oval Office meeting the Liar in Chief had with the NATO secretary-general.

Trump went on a brief riff about how he gets along so well with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Then he blurted out something about his late father, Fred Trump, being born in Germany.

Hold on! He wasn’t born in Germany! He was born in 1905 — in New York City, New York, U.S.A.!

We all looked it up. It’s right there, all over every Internet platform you can find. Just Google “Fred Trump” and it pops up. Place of birth: New York, New York. 

OK, this is a little thing. It doesn’t matter all by itself. It’s just one of those examples Trump critics keep noticing, that he cannot tell the truth about anything. Not ever!

So it’s fair to wonder: If he’s going to lie about something as inconsequential as that, what other truths is he keeping from the rest of the world?

Hmm, I’m thinking . . . probably a lot!

political news, State news

Beto backs off from an attack line against Cruz

As a former colleague and friend was fond of saying, “You can’t unhonk the horn.”

Beto O’Rourke is trying to unhonk the rhetorical horn by telling a CNN correspondent that his use of the “Lyin’ Ted” epithet against Ted Cruz perhaps is a step too far. He now sounds as if he regrets going quite so negative in his most recent debate with the Republican U.S. senator.

There’s a bit of charm in hearing the Democratic challenger acknowledge a case of weak knees in using the tag first hung on Cruz by Donald Trump when the men were competing in 2016 for the GOP presidential nomination.

Trump called him “Lyin’ Ted” and got huge laughs from campaign crowds. O’Rourke said in the men’s debate that the negative moniker sounded true to him, so he used it against Cruz.

Meeting in a town hall in McAllen with CNN’s Dana Bash, O’Rourke said he doesn’t feel “totally comfortable” taking what he called “a step too far.”

O’Rourke has second thoughts

The midterm campaign is drawing to a close. Cruz appears to be clinging to a lead of about 6 to 8 percentage points. O’Rourke is looking for any edge he can find. He has gone negative in his TV ad campaign in recent days. Indeed, he now joins Cruz, who’s been firing shots at O’Rourke for several weeks. We likely won’t hear any utterances of regret from The Cruz Missile over the tactics he has used to (mis)characterize O’Rourke’s policy pronouncements.

Do I believe O’Rourke went too far with the “Lyin’ Ted” reference? Aww … no. He didn’t. However, I don’t have to deal with any blowback from campaign rhetoric. O’Rourke believes he “may” have gone too far.

I would prefer O’Rourke to stay on the high road.

And … by the way … I still plan to vote for Beto.

national news

Cruz was right about Trump the first time

A longtime friend of mine has dug up an interesting body of remarks from one Republican U.S. senator about a man, a fellow Republican, who was running for the presidency.

The senator is Ted Cruz of Texas; the presidential candidate is Donald J. Trump.

My friend, Beaumont Enterprise editorial page editor Tom Taschinger, took note of how Cruz’s tone toward Trump has changed since he ran against the president for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination.

Here is what Cruz said two years about the guy who defeated a large GOP field to win the nomination and ultimately the presidency; I encourage you to read it carefully:

“This man is a pathological liar. … He lies practically every word that comes out of his mouth. And in a pattern that I think is straight out of a psychology textbook, his response is to accuse everyone else of lying. … The man cannot tell the truth, but he combines it with being a narcissist. A narcissist at a level I don’t think this country has ever seen. Donald Trump is such a narcissist that Barack Obama looks at him and goes, ‘Dude, what’s your problem?’ … If you hooked him up to a lie detector test, he could say one thing in the morning, one thing at noon and one thing in the evening, all contradictory, and he’d pass the lie detector test each time. Whatever lie he’s telling, at that minute he believes it. … He is proud of being a serial philanderer. … He describes his own battles with venereal diseases as his own personal Vietnam.”

Wow, eh? Sure thing.

Has the president changed fundamentally since then? Heavens no! A 70-something-year-old man doesn’t turn miraculously from what the Cruz Missile described above into a paragon of virtue.

I get that Cruz was running for the same office that Trump eventually won when he offered the blistering critique. Still, Sen. Cruz was right the first time. To think this guy — Trump — got elected president of the United States of America.

Ugghh!

national news, political news, State news

No 'oops' for Perry next time around

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is soon to be a “former” governor — and a likely current candidate for the president of the United States.

He vows there will be no repeat of the infamous “oops” moment in late 2011 when he couldn’t name all three of the federal agencies he said he would cut from the federal government.

In an interview with CNBC’s John Harwood, Perry said he’ll be better prepared if he decides to run again for the White House.

He’s also got that felony indictment alleging abuse of power to get worked out one way or the other.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/rick-perry-oops-wont-be-my-obituary/ar-BBgD52T

The most interesting element in the story attached to this blog post is how Harwood sizes up the potential 2016 GOP field with the 2012 cast of characters. The next Republican field is likely to include some serious politicians with serious ideas about how to solve serious problems.

That clearly wasn’t the case in 2012. The GOP field included a cabal of clowns: Herman “9-9-9” Cain? Michelle “Democrats are Communists” Bachmann? Rick “Say ‘No’ to Contraception” Santorum? Newt “I Impeached an Unfaithful President While I was Cheating On My Wife” Gingrich?

The next field, which might include Mitt Romney, the 2012 GOP nominee, is much more credible than the previous field of candidates.

Perry will have to do battle with a much more serious band of GOP brothers (and maybe) sisters.

Oh, but he says he’ll be ready.

We’ll see about that.