2016 Presidential

[Crafty_Dog]

Even for those who disagree with Trump on rigged elections

Trump’s ‘Rigged’ Election—and Bernie’s
Donald is wrong, but where do you think he got the idea?
0:00 / 0:00
Editorial Page Editor Paul Gigot on Donald Trump’s warnings about voter fraud and media bias. Photo credit: Reuters.
Oct. 17, 2016 7:01 p.m. ET
631 COMMENTS

Donald Trump recently declared himself “unshackled,” and now we know what he meant: The businessman is in full Steve Bannon-Breitbart mode, invoking an international conspiracy to steal the election and maybe fluoridate the water. As demagogic as this rhetoric is, his critics sure are selective in their outrage.

“The election is absolutely being rigged by the dishonest and distorted media pushing Crooked Hillary - but also at many polling places - SAD,” Mr. Trump posted on Twitter Sunday night. He followed up Monday morning that “of course” there is “large scale voter fraud,” and the plot against him is now a regular line at his rallies. This is Mr. Trump’s response to the oppo-research hits about his personal misconduct and sexual ethics, though he tends to conflate his two “rigging” claims about electoral fraud and media bias.

No presidential candidate should portray U.S. elections as illegitimate, and Mike Pence was right to say Sunday that the GOP will “absolutely” abide by November’s results. Hillary Clinton is not going to steal the White House like Lyndon Johnson stole a Texas Senate seat in 1948. Voting irregularities are real, and cheating sometimes happens, especially in machine cities, but voters should have confidence in the electoral system. There’s zero evidence that the process is compromised across multiple states and precincts.

But the liberal freak-out over Mr. Trump’s allegedly “unprecedented” and “dangerous” remarks could use some perspective. Where would Mr. Trump possibly get the idea that the system is rigged?

Well, maybe he listened to Bernie Sanders, who in January described his “message, which says that the economy today is rigged, that it benefits the wealthy and the powerful at the expense of everybody else, that the campaign finance system that exists today is corrupt and undermining American democracy.” Or maybe Mr. Trump caught Elizabeth Warren at the Democratic convention saying “the system is rigged” or “the rigged system” five times in one speech.

President Obama and Eric Holder also regularly push the canard that voter-identification laws are attempts at racially motivated disenfranchisement. As recently as 2014, Democrats attempting to keep the Senate tried to motivate minority turnout with ads that explicitly played on black fears of intimidation.

African-American registration and voting increased, and at a faster rate than white participation, after allegedly racist North Carolina and Georgia recently passed voter ID laws, but that’s not the point. Democrats can’t sauce this goose and then complain when Mr. Trump adopts their tactics for his purposes.

As it happens, David Remnick reported in the New Yorker last year that John Kerry is convinced that the George W. Bush campaign manipulated the voting machines in 2004 to carry Ohio. The Secretary of State even used this “very personal experience” to reassure Afghans that free and fair elections are hard, even in advanced countries. We can’t recall the media assault on the top U.S. diplomat for subverting U.S. democracy with such baseless speculation, and where Mr. Trump does have a point is when he says the press corps is nearly unanimous against him.

This is usually the case with Republicans, though the difference this year is that journalists say openly that Mr. Trump is a unique threat to democracy. The First Amendment stalwarts would have more credibility if they hadn’t portrayed Mitt Romney as a plundering executive with retrograde family values, or tried to take down John McCain in 2008 with innuendo about philandering. GOP voters understand that it doesn’t matter how admirable their nominee is, the press will still trash him.
***

The question for the media this year is that if Mr. Trump poses a threat to the American way, where were they during the GOP primaries? Back then, progresssive partisans who now say Mr. Trump will end civilization turned out columns like “Why Liberals Should Support a Trump Republican Nomination” or “Why I’m more worried about Marco Rubio than Donald Trump.”

Many in the media cheered on Mr. Trump when it appeared that he might oppose the GOP’s traditional free-market agenda. NBC’s “Access Hollywood” tape with Mr. Trump and Billy Bush is 11 years old, and weren’t Howard Stern’s greatest hits as relevant last autumn as they are said to be now? It’s not a conspiracy theory to think that the stories coming out in late October are no accident.

Disqualifying Mr. Trump with a dump of sleazy passes at women was sure to enrage his supporters who know the history of Bill and Hillary Clinton. Mr. Trump always overreacts and thus he’s on a path to lose—and if he keeps raving about “the illusion of democracy,” as he did last week in West Palm Beach, he’ll deserve to. But in winning ugly, Mrs. Clinton and the left will pay a steep price in even more polarized and divisive politics.

[DDF]

In which people that aren't citizens can be registered to vote, denying American's their right to sovereignty.

[youtube]hDc8PVCvfKs[/youtube]

[DDF]

I grew up playing chess, with a master chess player.

If I'm Trump tomorrow, I would tell Hillary Clinton that she needs to withdraw from the election. Between the DNC and Sanders, the corruption, the fact that she can't remember, and now this, there's a very good case to be made.

It is obvious that Clinton will not withdraw, but with the mountains of evidence from Wikileaks, from her servers, from the DNC, from the presidential election, being racist, voting machines, Democratic resistance to voter Id's, labeling Americans as "deplorables," all of which show a callous disregard for the guaranteed rights of every American, and Trump can use it to guarantee at least a stalemate should Clinton be "declared" the victor.

There is no denying Democratic resistance to voter Id's and poll rosters being purged.

There is no denying that voter machines are flawed and controlled by outsiders.

There is no denying that Clinton, at every turn, has been inundated with controversies.

There is no denying that her honesty or memory (one or the other), are faulty.

There is no denying that she is pandering to Hispanics in Spanish.

There is n denying that even after Wasserman-Schultz was found to be lacking morals, she still hired her... immediately.

There is no denying the media sent 96% of their contributions to Democrats and are bought, as are the polls.



If I'm Trump, tomorrow night is the night I try to win it all, or fracture the country (and it may well need to be fractured at this point).

The worst he can walk away with is a stalemate and half of the country under his leadership, and with the amount of doubt in the voting machines and the dishonesty shown by the Democrats, calling the election results into question, at this point, isn't unreasonable.

[Crafty_Dog]

Trump is failing to close the deal on his gravitas ("presidential-ness").  Everything else is secondary to that.

He should delegate the muck and the wonkery to his extremely capable team-- i.e. who would be doing what under a President Trump:

Gen Flynn for geopolitics, war with Islamo Fascism, Russia, Cyberwar
Christie for the indictment
Carson for Obamacare
Giuliani for Homeland Security and Law & Order
Gingrich for political tactics, dealing with Congress legislation
Team with Paul Ryan on specifics for enabling development of underclass neighborhoods.  Ryan is a true student of this under Jack Kemp and should have a bunch of stuff ready to go.
Ivanka for interface on women's issues

[ccp]

"Christie for the indictment"

Christie is in real trouble here in NJ and may himself get indicted.
Witnesses are lining up against him as the Democratic machine sharpens there arrows.

Ivanka's recent statement was very good.  Has anyone EVER heard Chelsea say her father was in appropriate.    She is the same as her mother.  Ignore the questions, change the subject , blame the right, lie and just smile with that Web Hubbell smile of hers. 

"Trump is failing to close the deal on his gravitas ("presidential-ness").  Everything else is secondary to that."

7 billion people know this except one.   

[DougMacG]

Trump is failing to close the deal on his gravitas ("presidential-ness").  Everything else is secondary to that.

He should delegate the muck and the wonkery to his extremely capable team-- i.e. who would be doing what under a President Trump:

Gen Flynn for geopolitics, war with Islamo Fascism, Russia, Cyberwar
Christie for the indictment
Carson for Obamacare
Giuliani for Homeland Security and Law & Order
Gingrich for political tactics, dealing with Congress legislation
Team with Paul Ryan on specifics for enabling development of underclass neighborhoods.  Ryan is a true student of this under Jack Kemp and should have a bunch of stuff ready to go.
Ivanka for interface on women's issues

I agree.  A full team in place could show he is serious about winning and governing and allow people to envision a Trump administration.  Releasing his Supreme Court list helped him, made him look serious, and conservative.  The Pence pick was instrumental, showed wisdom on Trump's part.  Grow the team now.  Add gravitas.  Or lose.

[G M]

http://dailycaller.com/2016/10/18/exposed-dem-operative-who-oversaw-trump-rally-agitators-visited-white-house-342-times/

Just a guy from Obama's neighborhood. Nothing to see here, move along.

[ccp]

GM wrote,

"http://dailycaller.com/2016/10/18/exposed-dem-operative-who-oversaw-trump-rally-agitators-visited-white-house-342-times/

Just a guy from Obama's neighborhood. Nothing to see here, move along."


Rivals the WH visits of both ERic Schmidt, and Al Sharpton of race baiting fame.  I wonder if O has some girls on the side when he is not on airplanes? 

No collusion suspected.  No biggie.  Just friends.  

Rush tried to explain today why Obama has a 55% approval rating while the majority of the people think the country is in the wrong direction.

He says it is because people do not link him to all the things goin wrong.

Another problems is the Republican Party ceased being the opposition party around 10 to 15 years ago.

I don't think he mentioned also that the media is simply not doing its watch dog job like it used to.   I am sure he would agree with this as well.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://graphics.latimes.com/usc-presidential-poll-dashboard/#perceived-vote

[ccp]

Trump set up again with the would you accept the election results question.  He justifiably set he will look at it at the time.  And the media are like bison running from wolves falling all over themselves to make THAT the all important headline.  totally ignoring multiple reports of election fraud including a Dem operative who visited the WH hundreds of times admitting they commit election fraud all the time.

I agree with Joe Scarborough on this:

https://mediamatters.org/video/2016/10/20/joe-scarborough-lashes-out-media-defends-trumps-refusal-say-whether-hed-accept-election-results/213978

I don't know why so many Republicans talk like LEFTISTS on this and other matters and jump on the me too bandwagon agreeing with the LEFT media onslaught that is trying to make THIS the Trump outrage de jour to diminish his very good debate performance and deflect from their girl.

They just don't get it do they?  Or they refuse to accept it.  Or they are just protecting their personal interests in money and power. 

[ccp]

Here is the synopsis of AlGORe who would not concede the election for 45 days:

https://www.conservativereview.com/commentary/2016/10/why-trumps-election-results-comments-are-no-different-than-what-al-gore-did-in-2000

But Axelrod spins it around calling Gore a hero for conceding (not mentioned - 45 days after election day and trying every trick he could to change the result).

Yet the MSM and Never Trumpers state he should be willing to concede the election results 'up front'

[DDF]

It doesn't matter who wins at this point.

The United States has suffered a marital argument from which, there is no recovery.

Vote rigging in terms of machines, lack of paper ballots and resistance from the Left everytime voter ID comes up.

There is no fixing this, this time around. Smart people already know it.

Whoever wins, the other side (just as Gore has), will contest the vote, feel cheated (and with good reason, congressional hearings on the matter not being the least of them), and will never accept the other side as their leader.

This ends in either a divided republic or a Trump presidency, and even if Trump wins, the country is so balkanized, that it cannot be fixed, due to the disparity in political ideology.

Whether that division is peaceful or not is another matter.

[DougMacG]

1.  Heller wasn't about toddlers.  It was about the right or lack of a right of a 66 year old retired policeman to own a gun in Washington DC where the local government had banned guns in defiance of the 2nd amendment.  .0001 of gun deaths are toddlers.  Hillary lied.  She opposes the second amendment and is too dishonest and expedient to just propose its repeal.

2. What is 'difficult' about Roe-Wade, pro-life, "pro-choice' and difficult, personal healthcare decisions is that it takes a life.  She can blather with the best about cancer screening, as if only an abortion house can do that, and NEVER mention why the "choice" is difficult. It takes a life, 98% of abortions are for convenience reasons and support for partial birth abortions puts you in the furthest left of the left beyond even her own party.  Hillary lied by omission.

3. Hillary does not support open borders?  But that is exactly what she said and she supports the status quo that every reasonable person categorizes as open borders.  She explicitly supported everything that failed in Reagan's reform and the 2006 border act.

Her Brazilian comment about her dream of open borders was about energy.  Really?  Energy borders??

4. Hillary's described her economic plan only in terms of government making 'investments' in things that used to be private sector.  Distinguished it in NO way from the Obama plan that brought $10 trillion more debt and 1% growth.

5. TPP, She was for it before she was against it.  He will negotiate a better one.  She will do what?  Didn't say.  Just spewing what her pollsters and political advisers wrote.

6. Hillary defended the good work of the Foundation without denying or addressing the question about pay to play that has  been documented and proven.

7.  Hillary blamed Bush for the Obama economy.  Seriously??  What Bush did wrong is fail to oppose Democratic policies she STILL supports.

8.  Most noteworthy are all the things not mentioned.  Number one in my mind, This Clinton opposes all the policies that unleashed private sector growth in the Clinton I administration and supports all the policies that held back growth, income and wages in the Obama and Chavez-Maduro administrations.

The fallout from this is unknown.  Not many are moved on either side no matter what they say but so many undecideds have yet to make their decision.  Hillary looks the readiest to settle in and work with the existing establishment in both parties, the bureaucracy, the media, the allies and the adversaries.  She will be crooked but she is a known crook.  She will steal more furniture, raise the cost of healthcare and government and shrink real wages.  The verdict if she wins is 'more of the same', not 'the first woman' as media will declare.

If Trump wins it will be American Brexit.  The country that polls more than 2:1 wrong track over right direction will have spoken by giving the establishment of both parties and the status quo the back of their hand or worse.  Like Brexit, the country and the new administration will have to pick up the pieces from scratch.  There will be a new tax code.  A deletion of thousands of unconstitutional regulations and a re-opening of all international agreements with an eye toward protecting American interests.  Like or hate Trump personally, that possibility has to be at least tempting for a majority of the people.

[ccp]

Doug,


I also had to do five of these 

when Hillary said her policies will help small businesses!

That is absurd.   

[DougMacG]

Doug,

I also had to do five of these  

when Hillary said her policies will help small businesses!

That is absurd.  

Right and she will also add not a cent to the deficit - by expanding on exactly what caused the last $10 trillion.

For the low hanging curve balls that Trump missed, I wonder if enough viewers get it anyway.

[DougMacG]

Let’s try a thought experiment. Suppose that during one of the October 2000 presidential debates, Vice President Al Gore had been asked the following question: “Do you make the . . . commitment that you’ll absolutely accept the result of the election?” Moderator Chris Wallace put that query to Donald Trump last night.

Now for the experimental part: Imagine Gore giving a completely truthful answer—that is, an answer that not only reflected his honest intent but accurately anticipated how he would respond to various scenarios, including the one that actually obtained.

It seems to us that Gore’s hypothetical answer would be similar to Trump’s actual one—not the long back-and-forth in which Trump enumerated complaints including media bias, FBI corruption and poorly maintained voter roles, but the prospective bottom line, to wit: “I will look at it at the time. I’m not looking at anything now, I’ll look at it at the time. . . . What I’m saying is that I will tell you at the time. I’ll keep you in suspense, OK?”

Gore probably wouldn’t have said “I’ll keep you in suspense, OK?”—that’s a distinctly Trumpian bit of showmanship—but if he were being completely truthful, he would say, as Trump did, that he would keep his options open and respond to circumstances as they arose. And did they ever arise. True, Gore delivered a gracious concession speech, but not until Dec. 13, more than a month after Election Day.

It isn’t hard to imagine a counterfactual scenario in which Gore would have conceded on the normal schedule. If George W. Bush’s initial margin in Florida had been, say, 60,000 votes (just over 1% of the total) instead of around 2,000, there would have been nothing to contest. But the narrow margin in a decisive state led to weeks of lawsuits and selective recounts—and, even after Gore’s concession, to years of bitter claims that he wuz robbed.

Among those bitterly clinging to the myth of the stolen election—or at least propagating it for political purposes—was Hillary Clinton.

[DougMacG]

"When the president gives the order to launch a nuclear weapon, that’s it. The officer has to launch. It can take as little as four minutes."

   - Wouldn't this information be strategic, if not classified?  Snopes denial that it is classified (they don;t know) makes me think it is classified.
http://www.snopes.com/clinton-four-minute-nuclear/


"We have 17 intelligence agencies, civilian and military, who have all concluded that these espionage attacks, these cyberattacks, come from the highest levels of the Kremlin, and they are designed to influence our election."

PolitiFact says they don't know, therefore true.  Sounds like they made a requested, political determination, subject to change.  Was she also going to reveal methods? 

Same 17 agencies think sending and received classified material of the highest order, like the location of our Ambassador in a war zone, in an unsecured manner, is treason.

[Crafty_Dog]

    Opinion Review & Outlook

Hillary’s New Constitution
Clinton explains how she’ll gut the First and Second Amendments.
BakerHostetler Partner David Rivkin on what the final debate revealed about Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton’s vastly different plans for the Supreme Court.
Oct. 20, 2016 7:26 p.m. ET


Donald Trump is no legal scholar, but at Wednesday’s presidential debate he showed a superior grasp of the U.S. Constitution than did Hillary Clinton. Amid the overwrought liberal fainting about Mr. Trump’s bluster over accepting the election result (see below), Mrs. Clinton revealed a view of the Supreme Court that is far more threatening to American liberty.

Start with her answer to moderator Chris Wallace’s question about the role of the courts. “The Supreme Court should represent all of us. That’s how I see the Court,” she said. “And the kind of people that I would be looking to nominate to the court would be in the great tradition of standing up to the powerful, standing up on our behalf of our rights as Americans.”

Where to begin with that one? The Supreme Court doesn’t—or shouldn’t—“represent” anyone. In the U.S. system that’s the job of the elected branches. The courts are appointed, not elected, so they can be nonpartisan adjudicators of competing legal claims.

Mrs. Clinton is suggesting that the Court should be a super-legislature that vindicates the will of what she calls “the American people,” which apparently excludes “the powerful.” But last we checked, the Constitution protects everyone, even the powerful. The law is supposed to protect individual rights, not an abstraction called “the people.”

The Democrat went downhill from there, promising to appoint judges who would essentially rewrite the First and Second Amendments. Asked about the 2008 Heller decision that upheld an individual right to bear arms, Mrs. Clinton claimed to support “reasonable regulation.” She said she criticized Heller because it overturned a District of Columbia law intended merely “to protect toddlers from guns and so they wanted people with guns to safely store them.”

Toddlers had nothing to do with it. What Mrs. Clinton calls “reasonable” was an outright ban on handguns. The D.C. law allowed the city’s police chief to award some temporary licenses—but not even the police officer plaintiff in the case could persuade the District to let him register a handgun to be kept at his home.

Anyone who did lawfully possess a gun had to keep it unloaded and either disassembled or bound by a trigger lock at all times, ensuring it would be inoperable and perhaps useless for self-defense. As Antonin Scalia wrote for the Heller majority, “Few laws in the history of our Nation have come close to the severe restriction of the District’s handgun ban.”

If Mrs. Clinton supports such gun restrictions, then she thinks an individual’s right to bear arms is meaningless. If the Justices she appoints agree with her, then they can gradually turn Heller into a shell of a right, restriction by restriction, even without overturning the precedent.

Then there’s the First Amendment, which Mrs. Clinton wants to rewrite by appointing Justices she said would “stand up and say no to Citizens United, a decision that has undermined the election system in our country because of the way it permits dark, unaccountable money to come into our electoral system.”

Citizens United is the 2010 Supreme Court decision that found that unions and corporations can spend money on political speech—in that specific case for a movie that was critical of Mrs. Clinton. The Democrat seems to take the different view that while atomized individuals might have the right to criticize politicians, heaven forbid if they want to band together to do it as a political interest group.

As for “dark” money, she certainly knows that territory. Does money get any darker than undisclosed Clinton Foundation donations from foreign business magnates tied to uranium concessions in Kazakhstan?

There is at least one right that Mrs. Clinton did suggest she believes to be absolute—to an abortion, at any time during pregnancy right up until birth. She claimed merely to oppose the repeal of Roe v. Wade, which allows some regulation of late-term abortions. But she somehow overlooked Gonzales v. Carhart , the 2007 decision that upheld a legislative ban on so-called partial-birth abortion.

Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the Carhart opinion that ruled such restrictions are consistent with Roe and the Constitution. Mrs. Clinton kept invoking “the life and the health of the mother” to justify her opposition to any limit on abortion, but Carhart found the life of the mother can be sufficient.

To put all this another way, Mrs. Clinton believes there is no restriction on abortion she would ever support, and there is no restriction on gun rights she would ever oppose. Carhart, Citizens United and Heller were 5-4 decisions, and Mrs. Clinton wants each of them to be litmus tests for her Supreme Court appointments. She mocks Mr. Trump for saying he won’t abide by the election result, but she wants to rewrite the Constitution to fit her own political views.

[ccp]

Hilary can get up on stage and proclaim she and most of America are so glad election is almost over.

I can only think that 8 years of her will be much worse to endure.   Especially after 8 years of Obama.   

Perhaps a good analogy is the remnants of the Republican party is making its way back from Moscow like the French in 1812.

Sure we may come off the island of Elba from one more battle but the end game is assured.

Perhaps I am too dire.  No one can predict the future but this is just the way it appears to me.

[DougMacG]

Gallup Poll, October 22, 2012: Romney 52, Obama 45
http://www.cnbc.com/id/49502664
(outlier poll, didn't help Romney's result)

Gallup Poll: Jimmy Carter 47 -- Ronald Reagan 39   09/20/2012
http://lubbockonline.com/interact/blog-post/may/2012-09-20/gallop-poll-jimmy-carter-47-ronald-reagan-39#

Pollsters only get their accuracy checked on their final poll.  Will that cause them to close the gap?  

Trump will close strong, and the race will be closer than the current Oval Office drape measurers think.
Steve Hayward, Powerline.

Trump needs authentic, positive polling give supporters and undecideds reason to think upset is possible.
IBD, Rasmussen and LATimes today have Trump leading.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/latest_polls/

Is there a shy-Trump vote, where they won't say it but will vote it?  Also, is there a structural polling problem where households as we knew them are no longer reachable?

[ccp]

Problem is he can't get his message out anymore.  It is buried within the LEFT onslaught of picking and choosing the "news" they wish to release.  CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, NY and LA TIMES, WASH Post, Google, Facebook, and Associated Press......

Compare this to Drudge, Breitbart, partially Fox, and National and Conservative Reviews, and some talk radio.   

[DDF]

I wonder how many times Stalin was brought up on charges while Lenin was in power.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/latest_polls/

http://thefederalistpapers.org/us/poll-shows-trump-5-points-behind-in-az-just-one-huge-problem?utm_source=FBLC&utm_medium=FB&utm_campaign=LC

[DougMacG]

The answer to that is PERSUASION.  Elections matter and elections have consequences.  People ARE influenced by people close to them even though the process is so slow that it seems impossible.

To all the people we all know, especially women and including my daughter and my girlfriend, those from the moderate middle or reasonably persuadable left or even from the right, the answer to their objection to Trump:

IF Trump is a despicable human being, then Hillary is too.  Launching a campaign to DESTROY her husband's accusers only to find out what they all were saying was true, and never repent or try to make these wrongs right makes her a personally despicable human being, a rapist and a groper no further removed from it than the husband she enabled to do it - over a period of DECADES.  She blamed the "right wing conspiracy" for the "attacks on her husband" when all of the accusers were Democrats and supporters of his.  On policy, she lies to the country more often than she tells the truth - and in private, she admits it! You CANNOT base your choice on some kind of personal or political morals and then pull the lever for Hillary.  If you can't cross that moral line to vote Trump, then you can't vote for Hillary either - or else you HAVE crossed it!

For leftists that want to see leftism, loss of sovereignty, declining incomes, absent borders continue, for those 43% or so according to the polls who buy that, HRC is the right choice for them and no amount of last minute persuasion is going to change that.  This is not the time to argue with pure leftists.

For those in the middle and the right who want a change of direction - for the good, Trump-Pence is your only valid choice.  It doesn't mean you endorse his private comments or like his personality.  It means you recognize the republic is in big trouble and if you don't make this choice for change of direction, right now, someone else will make the choice for you.

A friend known to be Republican has already voted absentee.  He told to a group of friends, mostly Democrats, he held his nose and voted.

Hold you nose and vote. 

And spread the word.  We all reach only a relatively small number of people for a relatively short period of time.  Use what influence you have on others wisely.

If Trump is elected and then becomes deserving of removal from office, he can be removed and we end up with President Mike Pence, highly qualified and fully ready.

Hillary cannot be removed from office no matter what laws she breaks.  Democrats have proven that over and over.

Funny that rule of law favors the guy who took advantage of private takings, out-sourced labor, used liberal bankruptcy laws, depreciation, carried interest and loss deductions.  On all these examples  he was complying with the laws as bad as they are.  It's time to change a few laws - and then enforce them for a change.  Hold leaders accountable.  Voting established power out is the only remedy left.

[DougMacG]

"We have lost unless by some miracle Trump pulls this out."

Outlier polls that had Trump leading today have Hillary by one.  This is still soooo winnable based on all fundamentals - except the quality of our candidate.  The Obamacare crisis should be filling the news from now until election day.  The failures emerging from our foreign policy and economic woes too.  Trump is connecting on some points with some people.  Now it's a matter of numbers.  I wish this underfunded billionaire would use the last two weeks to put his positive message out in a creative way and reach people.

[DDF]

"We have lost unless by some miracle Trump pulls this out."

Far from the truth. Even with the machines in Cook County, Illinois, and Counties in Texas, switching votes to Democratic picks, due to "calibration errors," Hillary has only half the support Trump does.

Anything other than that is a bold faced lie and media misrepresentation.

[ccp]

If Clinton wins the election there appear little recourse.   She could not even be impeached for crimes committed prior to being President.  She could and certainly would if she had to pardon herself.
There is ZERO chance of her ever willfully stepping down as one of these scenarios suggest.  So unless Trump wins justice will not be served.  Say Trump wins.  Then Obama will pardon her prior to leaving office.

http://lawnewz.com/high-profile/heres-what-could-happen-if-hillary-clinton-is-indicted-or-steps-down/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/11/01/us/politics/fbi-russia-election-donald-trump.html?referer=http%3A%2F%2Fhotair.com%2Fheadlines%2Farchives%2F2016%2F10%2F31%2Fu-s-officials-doubt-trump-has-any-direct-ties-to-russia%2F

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.lewrockwell.com/political-theatre/hillary-arrested-2/

[G M]

https://www.lewrockwell.com/political-theatre/hillary-arrested-2/

That actually makes sense.

[ccp]

It also fits into the somewhat surprising response from the WH that Obama feels that Comey is honorable and not partisan.

OTOH bamster did appoint him and would look bad criticizing Comey  now.

OTOH it ain't smart to criticize some one who is investigating just outside your house.

[DDF]

https://www.lewrockwell.com/political-theatre/hillary-arrested-2/

Should have been filed under "Things That Make You Warm With Happiness."

[DougMacG]

I have been silent on DDF's prediction of a Trump landslide only because of the failure of my own predictions, that Hillary won't run, won't win the nomination if she does run and won't win if nominated.  That bet seemed well hedged yet I already lost on 2 counts, owing significant meal tabs (canned food from my bunker?) to my friend ccp.

The analysis of this election outside of DDF has focused on what will come of the Republicans Party if they lose it all this year.  20 million new Democrat voters will change things forever.  So will the Court.  The pendulum won't swing back and forth again when we keep adding large weights to one side.

Not mentioned it seems is that the Republicans could win it all next week.

Yes Trump could win.  RCP says Trump already has more than 260 electoral votes if the average of recent polls equal the result.  He has the momentum.  She has disaster, has lost momentum and offense, but has not fully imploded.

Black Vote:  Democrat weakness is reaching critical mass.  When 98% of everyone you know or identify with thinks and votes one way, you don't consider it necessary to think through your own position.  When a number of people whose opinions you respect start to turn the other way, it frees people to consider alternatives and make a different choice.  It may start in the privacy of the polling booth, not in what people tell family, friends and pollsters.  

A 20 point collapse on Hillary's side and a 20 point surge on Trump side of a significant group is a big deal.
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2016/09/democrats-scrambling-black-vote-surges-trump/
Bigger than that is that it frees other to make a free choice.  Democrat policies have brought failure after failure.  What have you got to lose is a weak argument, but hey, what have you got to lose by re-shuffling the deck and dealing again?  (Meanwhile he polls worse with Hispanics and needs to soften that.)

Women Vote:  Nearly all women I know were disgusted by Trump's words on the secret recording.  Maybe Hillary and the Times or Post came out with that too early.  Now people have had time to consider that it was mostly talk.  Putting someone in the White House who is not disgusting is not the alternative to Trump.  A criminal married to a rapist or a guy who talked dirty years ago in private?  Call it a draw and go back to policy, failed policies versus real change and drain the swamp.  Wong direction outpolls right course by more than 2 to 1.

Never Trumpers:  Conservatives who can't make this choice are crazy and wrong.  I expected most of them to come around.  I still do.  Kasich did a write in.  George W Bush will abstain.  That is two votes lost.  Losing the vote of Republican establishment power has been a net-positive for Trump.  He didn't choose a conventional path.

House and Senate:  The distance between the Republican House and the Republican presidential nominee is also turning into a good thing.  They can work together on policy yet would feel quite free to buck him or even impeach him if warranted.  The removes the need to split the ballot which centrist voters often do to hedge their bet.

Senate race polling has been very close to 50-50 all along.  At 50-50, the Presidential win controls the Senate.  More likely the Presidential win will comes with a surge that also carries one or two Senators the same way, hopefully to the right from my point of view.

Hillary Clinton wins this election in a tie with the big blue wall of electoral votes.  (Gore was the last exception.)  I have believed all along that the Republican needs nearly a 3 point win in the national popular vote to decisively win the electoral college.  That is still possible.  Trump needs to run the table on ALL the swing states and take one or two more that were not believed to be in play about a minute ago.  But that is what happens in a late, national surge.  It is still possible but I make no prediction.

IF IF IF Republicans win the White House, Senate and House of Representatives, which is possible...  Where does that leave
the Democratic Party?  Their last two DNC chairs lost in scandal, wrongly steered the nomination to a crook, liar and a loser.  Both Clintons done.  Obama leaving, and leaving on a loss and with repeal of his agenda coming and also possible investigations into his governance.  Pelosi likely out.  Reid out.  Biden out.  No outside of Washington Dem governors elevated.  Control of state legislatures lost.  Border security in.  Citizenship for illegals out.  Tax reform in.  Economic growth returning.  TPP style sovereignty losses out.  New security agreements with allies coming.  Peace through strength, back.  Respect for law enforcement returns.  Individual responsibility back.  This is a disaster if you are a Democrat who makes a living telling people they are nothing without big government.

[G M]

I still expect the dem fraud machine to win. What is a pyrrhic victory for 1000, Alex?

[Crafty_Dog]

 By Holman W. Jenkins, Jr.
Nov. 1, 2016 7:15 p.m. ET
884 COMMENTS

It’s hard to generalize about Hillary Clinton’s email situation except that she tried to afford herself an extraordinary privilege as a high-ranking official, and then caused for herself exactly the problems (and worse) that she presumably was trying to avoid.

It’s the White House Travel Office, the Rose Law Firm billing records, the Seth Ward option (don’t ask), the health-care task force, etc., all over again.

Mrs. Clinton is a screw-up. And when a trait takes such trouble to announce itself, note must be taken.

Complicating the legal question, of course, is the fact that she didn’t exactly hide her behavior. The State Department knew she was conducting business on a private server. Her boss, the president, exchanged emails with her via what was self-evidently a private email account.

All this being so, many Americans probably would have been happy to see the difficulties bypassed by Mrs. Clinton simply returning all her emails and devices intact to the State Department. This she did not do. In response to reasonable and unavoidable questions about whether her arrangement and subsequent actions violated the law, the Obama administration had no choice but to launch a criminal investigation.
More Business World

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Now a simple home truth is that Mr. Obama and his attorney general, Loretta Lynch, from day one, were hardly indifferent, objective observers of the process. They did not want Mrs. Clinton charged.

In our imperfect world, most will understand the dilemma before FBI Director James Comey: Would it be more damaging for the country, FBI and personal reputation to actively intervene in the election by indicting Mrs. Clinton or to passively intervene in the election by giving her a pass?

A non-act is somehow easier to pass off than an act. Yet events of the last few days point to the absurdity of him clearing Mrs. Clinton when he still hadn’t seen 33,000 pieces of evidence. By definition, unless the FBI is full of remarkably unsuspicious cops, the emails that Mrs. Clinton and her aides deleted would seem the ones most likely to contain evidence of improper activity.

Mr. Comey perhaps failed also to foresee how the server issue would become entangled with the WikiLeaks theft of Clinton Foundation emails, contributing to a rather more multidimensional view of the back-scratching and buck-raking world the Clinton entourage inhabited.

He failed to foresee how the boodle of now-invigorated investigations would probably kill off the happy scenario in which a strong Mrs. Clinton can cut deals with Republicans to move the country ahead despite the ankle-biting of the Elizabeth Warren left.

What a mess. It pays to recall that the federal machinery trying so hard to give her a pass is the same federal machinery that writes millions of rules for the rest of us. It doesn’t give us a pass. The IRS can’t make sense of its own regulations yet expects us to abide by them under pain of criminal prosecution.

Mrs. Clinton’s every plan involves only complicating America’s life with more rules, more legal pitfalls for citizens, more mandates for business. The tax code is not complicated enough for her. ObamaCare is just a down payment on fixing health care with more regulation and government mandates.

Donald Trump (or any candidate) may not be a solution in himself, but an outsider at least can be an instrument to dislodge an elite and replace it, for a while, with an elite less habituated to using public power to favor and enrich itself. With Mrs. Clinton, as with Mr. Obama, a voter naturally struggles to understand what the overarching vision is. There isn’t one. They exist to deliver the wish-list of Democratic lobby groups for more power over the people of the United States. Period.

A few weeks ago Mrs. Clinton was the “safe hands” candidate. If she wins, it now appears hers will be an embattled and investigated presidency from day one. Moderates will flee. Republicans will find it hard to cooperate with her.

She will be forced back on the hard left of her party. The same who already are drawing up “blacklists” of potential appointees suspected of sympathy for the private sector. The same who hesitate least about using government power to attack enemies (see Exxon). The same who are most comfortable relying on administrative diktat to impose policies the public doesn’t support and never voted for.

Her party’s most ferocious warriors will run the Clinton administration because they’re the ones willing to be most unhinged in savaging her enemies. It might seem far-fetched now that President Obama, after Election Day, would try to clear President Clinton’s path by issuing a pardon for offenses committed while secretary of state, but crazier miscalculations have been made by the players in this drama.

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0e05Yz59og

[DougMacG]

There are so many truths in that Holman Jenkins piece:


"Mrs. Clinton is a screw-up. And when a trait takes such trouble to announce itself, note must be taken."

"The emails that Mrs. Clinton and her aides deleted would seem the ones most likely to contain evidence of improper activity."

"The federal machinery trying so hard to give her a pass is the same federal machinery that writes millions of rules for the rest of us. It doesn’t give us a pass."


Yes, yes and yes.  The whole apparatus of Obamacare restructures America with a system of rules and punishment that applies to all the rest of us just as we watch them clearly operate outside the rules and without punishment.  Does the government ever give us a pass?

Does one have to be a political opponent to recognize and be offended by all this?

[DougMacG]

Trump at 265 on 'No Toss up' map.  (Needs 270 to win and 269 to put it in the House of Representatives.)  http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/2016_elections_electoral_college_map_no_toss_ups.html

He needs to win all of his plus steal ONE of hers, New Mexico or Colorado or Virginia or Pennsylvania or NH/Maine2, or Michigan or Wisconsin.  None of these are low hurdles to clear, and several of his are well within the margin of error.

America, this is not over until the fat (corrupt, socialist) lady sings.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I must admit, Trump sounds Presidential in the final stretch and Hillary sounds like an angry defendant.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Trump objectifies women but this (below) passes for acceptable, family entertainment from Hillary's invited guest (J-Lo)performing at her rally:
http://i1.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2016/11/nintchdbpict000278550253-e1477824344470.jpg?w=763

Too explicit to post in our Presidential thread.  

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2016/11/bums-for-hillary.php

[ccp]

"canned food from my bunker?"

 

It may as well be.  If she wins the greatest meal in the world would not make up for the disaster.

Asked

"What is going to happen if Trump wins?"  Good question ......

It will be bad for the Democrats but with all the pending serious problems internally and externally in the world and the US  I can only say one thing - God help us!  He won't likely unite us.  And whatever he does he will be blamed for any less the outstanding outcomes or events.  God forbid an Earthquake in So Cal but say that happens,  Trump will be blamed for not being gung ho about the Climate Change agenda.

I would be willing to forfeit the meals for a small corner in your bunker.  I can pay rent.   

[ccp]

Here it comes.  This sounds like total BS:

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/donald-trump-rape-accuser-lawsuits-230647

[Crafty_Dog]

It is my understanding that her "coach" in all this came from the Jerry Springer show.

[DDF]

I have been silent on DDF's prediction of a Trump landslide only because of the failure of my own predictions, that Hillary won't run, won't win the nomination if she does run and won't win if nominated.  That bet seemed well hedged yet I already lost on 2 counts, owing significant meal tabs (canned food from my bunker?) to my friend ccp.

The analysis of this election outside of DDF has focused on what will come of the Republicans Party if they lose it all this year.  20 million new Democrat voters will change things forever.  So will the Court.  The pendulum won't swing back and forth again when we keep adding large weights to one side.

Trump - 63,500,000
Clinton - 55,640,000
Stein - 5,469,000 (counting her .5 million from 2012)
Johnson - 3,775,000 (counting the 1.27 mil he had from 2012)

Trump 52%

Hillary 44%

Needless to say, these aren't electoral college votes, nor are they swing state votes.

So let's cover the swing state votes now... I thought I had a while ago, but can't find it here.

Politico tabulated polls in what they view to be 11 swing states: http://www.politico.com/2016-election/swing-states

Clinton winning - NV, CO, WI, MI, NH, PA, VA, and NC or 93 electoral votes
Trump winning - Florida, Ohio, and Iowa or 53 electoral votes

****Just going to say it now.... Politico, a known Clinton hack job is smoking crack****



270toWin, has Clinton ahead 258 to Trump's 157 as of this writing (the owner does a good job at hiding his party affiliation, but his wife donates to the Left). http://www.270towin.com/maps/2016-election-toss-up-states

Their appraisal?

Blue States: WA, OR, CA, CO, NM, MN, IL, MI, NY, PA, VA, VT, HI, MD, RI, CT, NJ, DE, MA, DC, and 3/4's of ME = 258 (20.75 states + DC)

Red States: ID, MT, WY, SD, ND, KS, OK, TX, MO, AR, LA, IN, KY, TN, MS, AL, WV, SC, AK, and 4/5's of NE = 157 (19.8 states)

Split States: NV, UT, AZ, WI, IA, OH, NC, GA, FL, NH, 1/5 of NE, and 1/4 of ME = 123 (10.45 states)



Also, to be fair, we should include 538's by Nate Silver (also a liberal hack - I've posted evidence about him and 270 previously)
has called it:
http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/

Clinton - 295
Trump - 241

Broken down accordingly:

Blue States - WA, OR, CA, NV, CO, NM, MN, WI, IL, MI, ME, NH, VT, NY, MA, RI, CT, NJ, DE, MD, PA, VA, HI, NC & DC (24 states + DC)(NV & NC to Clinton by  <1%)

Red States - ID, UT, AZ, AK, MT, WY, ND, SD, NE, IA, KS, OK, TX, MO, AR, LA, MS, AL, IN, KY, TN, GA, SC, WV, OH, & FL (26 states)(FL to Trump by 1.6%)


Glaring Defects:

Arizona, Iowa and Utah - 538 shows them thoroughly red. 270 shows them split, so doesn't count them against Trump.

Nebraska and Maine - the split states, 538 gives one to each, 270 almost does the same, favoring Clinton by 1 vote from Maine.

Ohio - 270 counts it as a split, 538 has it going thoroughly red.

NC - 538 has it going blue by .2%, 270 doesn't factor it, Politico says Clinton barely wins it.

Florida - Politico and 538 give it to Trump. 270 doesn't factor it.

Virginia, Pennsylvania and Colorado - all three give them to Clinton, and by several points.



Where they're wrong:

The electoral college, will go like this (assuming GM didn't call the voter fraud correctly - I myself am an ID and paper ballot kind of guy, but I'll stand by this):

Red States: AK, UT, NV, AZ, ID, MT, WY, ND, SD, NE, KS, OK, TX, IA, MO, AR, LA, AL, MS, IN, OH, TN, KY, WV, GA, SC, FL, NC, MI, WI, PA, and 1/2 of Maine. (31 states, each devoid of people that need safe spaces).

I also think that NH and CO stand a good chance of going Trump's way as well.

So, I'm calling Trump with at least 311 electoral votes, knowing full well.... that Clinton has a supporter population between L.A., NYC, Chicago, and Seattle (80 million people between the four states - a major portion of her voting age supporters, and the FULL BULK of her hispanic voters that aren't in Texas), and Trump is STILL going to smash her in the electoral college and popular vote.


To recap:

Trump 52%

Hillary 44%

Trump with a minimum of 311 electoral votes.

If I'm wrong, I'll let you hit me at a gathering.

[Crafty_Dog]

After this evening's news all bets are off!!! 

[DDF]

After this evening's news all bets are off!!!  

PGC, of any student you've ever had, few, if any, like to wager more than I do.

How about them Cubs?? Wow!!!

Edit: I used to live down the street from Wrigley Field, and I never even imagined.... wow.

[ccp]

No question you are dishonest Pharrell and everyone else in the music industry which is a criminal organization similar to the Hillary mob.   (you f'n lyin prick who does not write your lyrics):

http://www.breitbart.com/big-hollywood/2016/11/03/pharrell-williams-begs-women-vote-dishonest-hillary/

[ccp]

It is hard to believe it has been over 5 yrs ago but this is it.

Read this and feel ready to send the worst smart ass President a big message on Tuesday:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/05/01/president-s-speech-white-house-correspondents-dinner

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.facebook.com/notes/the-2016-committee/the-surprising-realignment-of-african-american-voters/1290094361052791

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/how-macedonia-became-a-global-hub-for-pro-trump-misinfo?utm_term=.kuyddBeon#.ckmllzb3B

[Crafty_Dog]

http://dailycaller.com/2016/11/06/exclusive-virginia-gov-pardons-60000-felons-enough-to-swing-election/?utm_campaign=thedcmainpage&utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social

[G M]

http://dailycaller.com/2016/11/06/exclusive-virginia-gov-pardons-60000-felons-enough-to-swing-election/?utm_campaign=thedcmainpage&utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social

Understand that there are no limits to what they will do to drag Hillary's evil carcass over the finish line. No limits.