That's a little ironic considering the source.
Trump Unstoppable?
There is no debate about it!
"Rubio, Cruz tear into Trump during debate" by Matt Viser Globe Staff February 26, 2016
HOUSTON — The debate in Houston was one of the last opportunities for Donald Trump’s rivals to slow his momentum before Super Tuesday next week, when a sweep of the states would mean Trump would be nearly unstoppable in the march toward the Republican presidential nomination. Not coincidentally, it was the most ferocious debate thus far.
Marco Rubio has emerged as the GOP establishment’s favored candidate.
Did Trump really tell Ted Cruz, “You get along with nobody. . . . You don’t have the endorsement of one Republican senator, and you work with them. You should be ashamed of yourself?”
Trump at times seemed flummoxed, standing in the middle of aggressive candidates.
That's when I feel a little sorry for him.
The debate came amid intensifying concern among more moderate Republicans that Trump was on the verge of steamrolling to the nomination. Having won three of the first four contests, he also leads in many of the 12 states, including Massachusetts, that are set to vote on Super Tuesday. If his momentum is not halted by mid-March, he will be in position to amass enough delegates to put the nomination out of reach of his opponents.
The debate took place at the University of Houston, in Cruz’s home state. Texas is the biggest prize on Super Tuesday, with 155 delegates at stake. Recent polls have showed a close race between Trump and Cruz, with Rubio a distant third.
In previous debates, Trump often has been able to float above the fray of the other candidates, who have largely focused on one another rather than attempting to take Trump down. But with a much smaller stage — just five candidates remain — Trump became the central figure.
They took out the Bush not there reference while noting his parents were in the audience!
Love ya' for that, Trump. You stood up to and took out the Bushes!
Cruz won the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 1. But he is coming off a dismal week, in which he finished third in South Carolina and was besieged by attacks from both Trump and Rubio, who called him a liar and a cheat.
The biggest problem for Rubio is he has yet to win a state. He is eager to establish himself as the main alternative to Trump, having narrowly beaten Cruz in both South Carolina and Nevada, and he desperately needs victories on Tuesday.
Hispanics are a rapidly growing portion of the American electorate and, polls show, are disenchanted by some of the hardline immigration Trump mentions at almost every campaign stop....
That's rather a negative way to end it.
--more--"
"Marco Rubio continues to slam Donald Trump" by Tracy Jan and Matt Viser Globe Staff February 26, 2016
WASHINGTON — The Republican establishment has begun to find its voice with the resurgence of Florida Senator Marco Rubio, but even as Rubio latched onto Trump’s own schoolyard bullying tactics in an effort to counter Trump’s seemingly unfettered romp through the Republican primary field, Trump scored a new coup with a surprising endorsement from New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.
Christie on Friday said Trump has outsider credentials to bring change to Washington. ‘‘We don’t need any more of these Washington, D.C., acts,’’ Christie said.
Also Friday, Maine Governor Paul LePage offered his endorsement of Trump.
The famously pugnacious governor said Trump owes him for paving the way when it comes to being outspoken. ‘‘I was Donald Trump before Donald Trump became popular, so I think I should support him since we are one of the same cloth,’’ LePage said.
No, but.... (LePage rose from grinding poverty and homelessness)
The battle for the Republican nomination — largely between Rubio and Trump — intensified with just four days to go until Super Tuesday, when Trump, if he maintains his current lead in polls, could rack up enough victories to make him difficult, if not impossible, to stop.
Rubio on Thursday night had the breakout debate performance against Trump that many in the Republican Party have wanted to see for months. He was forceful, relentless, and showed no hesitancy at interrupting the brash businessman, who appeared knocked off kilter several times.
Rubio on Friday continued to ramp up his attacks on Trump, calling him a “con artist” and vowing to pressure the business mogul into releasing his tax returns.
“He’s a con artist. It’s a fraud,” Rubio said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “We’re going to expose him.”
Rubio's been exposed as gay, but....
At a campaign rally in Dallas Friday, Rubio read Trump’s tweets from the stage and recalled a backstage moment from Thursday’s debate: He said Trump asked for a full-length mirror during a break. “Maybe to make sure his pants weren’t wet,” Rubio quipped, adding that backstage, Trump was applying makeup to his upper lip “because he had one of those sweat mustaches.”
Many in the party establishment who want to stop Trump worried: Has Rubio’s newly aggressive strategy come too late? Trump has leads in nearly all of the 11 states that vote in the Super Tuesday primary, and he has won three states in a row — New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada.
The prospect of a Trump nomination is becoming increasingly real.
Just have good security at your elbow, Don.
“I’m very fearful — one, of him being president, and two, of our ability to hold on to the Senate,” Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona said in an interview on his way to a Republican Senate lunch this week. “It’s become more worrisome all the time.”
Flake, who threw his support behind Rubio on Monday, said he does not believe Trump will appeal to the broader electorate.
“I’m afraid he’s got a lower ceiling than we’re going to need to win the election,” Flake said, referring to the vote Trump would attract in a general election. “Some of the statements he’s made.”
Yeah.
Senator Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican who dropped out of the presidential race in December after never gaining traction, told the Globe that Republicans would have to rebuild the party if Trump becomes the nominee.
GOOD!
“We’ll get slaughtered in November. We’ll lose Hispanics in large numbers. Our problems with young women will get worse,” Graham said. “We’re in a world of hurt.”
A-HA!
As for how their Democratic colleagues are feeling about Trump?
“Giddy!” said Senator Chris Murphy, a Connecticut Democrat. “There’s no way that he could survive a general election environment.”
That's how they felt about REAGAN and you see what happened?!
Btw, did you know all the presidential briefings for the next eight years were sent over to George W. Bush's office after Hinckley popped off a couple of shots?
Reagan really was out of the loop.
Indeed, Rubio’s attacks in the Thursday debate also served as a not-so-subtle warning about Trump’s electability, with a list of negative issues that a Democratic nominee could use against him in the general election. Rubio dredged up Trump’s record of illegally hiring Polish immigrants to prepare the site for Trump Tower in New York; he mentioned news coverage about Trump hiring legal immigrants to work at a resort in Florida; he slammed Trump for lawsuits against Trump University that alleged fraud.
He also called on Trump to release his tax returns. Rubio’s campaign plans to keep pushing the tax issue in the final days before Super Tuesday.
That's not going to do it. We don't care like we did 4 years ago with Mitt.
Rubio’s campaign is increasingly concerned that with Ohio Governor John Kasich and Senator Ted Cruz still in the race, Rubio will have a tougher challenge in attempting to consolidate the party against Trump.
Kasich shows no signs of backing down and recently captured several new big-money donors who can keep his campaign alive. His campaign believes he can win the race by being the responsible governor who stays above the fray....
All of them hoping for a brokered convention.
--more--"
Related: Baker won’t join Christie in Trump endorsement
"Baker needs to back a new horse" February 26, 2016
Charlie Baker hasn’t made a second pick.
That’s too bad. Baker could make a difference at a critical time. The governor ought to use some of his carefully amassed political capital to convince Republicans and unenrolled voters to back one of Donald J. Trump’s opponents, with the goal of keeping the New York businessman’s delegate haul from Massachusetts as small as possible.
All that is going to do is make me more apt to vote for him.
Baker clearly doesn’t like Trump, and if Baker actively campaigned for Ohio governor John Kasich. Under the Republican primary rules in Massachusetts, unenrolled voters can vote in the GOP primary. That’s the constituency that Baker won over in 2014, and may have the credibility to rally for a Trump opponent.
No.
Baker would do a service to the party just by chipping away at Trump’s margin of victory.
The Globe is admitting Trump is going to win here.
Direct appeals to unenrolled voters during primaries can make some politicians antsy. Hard-core partisans may bristle if Baker asks outsiders to vote in their primary.
But the law allows it. And, who knows: if thousands of unenrolled voters participate in a Republican primary for the first time on Tuesday, some of them might even get into the habit. In a state where one-party rule has been the norm in the Legislature for decades, the state party could use the exposure.
Baker has plenty of other things to worry about, and an understandable reluctance to wade into the demolition derby of national politics. But inaction sends a message, too, and Baker shouldn’t let Trump win Massachusetts without a fight.
As if he had more than one vote and the "fight" was his.
--more--"
They don't have a clue:
"Mass. GOP leaders have no idea how to stop Donald Trump" by Adrian Walker Globe Columnist February 26, 2016
Donald Trump is expected to win the Massachusetts primary in a landslide. One Emerson College poll predicts he will receive 50 percent of the vote. If that’s exaggerated — other polls project a slightly lower vote — it’s not inconceivable, given the very cool reaction here to the rest of the field. So much for the power of endorsements.
Obviously, Trump is — to be more polite than the candidate himself — a problematic standard-bearer. He is called racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic. Those aren’t words I’d use to describe Massachusetts Republicans.
Mitt Romney seems eager to position himself as a party elder, an adult above the fray, but he jumped into the fray in the weirdest way imaginable Wednesday, declaring that Trump’s unreleased tax returns probably contain a “bombshell.” The odd part was that Romney immediately conceded he has no idea what is in Trump’s tax returns.
Not to defend the devil here, but Romney threw a kitchen sink of allegations, with nary a fact in support of them. A fuller explanation would have been welcome.
Also, Romney — whose presidential bid in 2012 was dogged for ages by his refusal to release tax returns — is the wrong person to launch this attack. He stonewalled every attempt to determine his net worth. Trump was sure to win that exchange, and he did.
As anxiety about stopping Trump accelerates, Massachusetts would seem to be fertile ground for his opponents, especially a moderate like Ohio Governor John Kasich. Even Marco Rubio would seem a better fit for a Massachusetts race than Trump. But they haven’t caught fire here. As Massachusetts officials have learned, belatedly, conservative voters here are as angry as they are everywhere else. It’s left the state GOP in a quandary.
“You’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t with Trump on the ballot,” former governor Jane Swift told the Globe’s Jim O’Sullivan. “If you don’t endorse Trump, clearly there is a strong cohort in your base that is passionate about his candidacy.” As is the case elsewhere, Massachusetts Republican leaders are loath to take him on.
If Tuesday’s results go the way they appear to be headed, Massachusetts will be added to the roster of states where Trump scored an easy victory. That will create a misleading impression, because his politics do not represent this state at all. But he has seized the moment, and Massachusetts Republicans have no idea how to stop him....
--more--"
Here is one:
"Ted Cruz’s delegate math problem" by James Pindell Globe Staff February 26, 2016
US Senator Ted Cruz has a math problem that could doom any chance he has of winning the GOP nomination.
Following the Nevada caucuses, Donald Trump has 66 percent of the nominating delegates that have been doled out so far. To win the nomination, Cruz will somehow have to go from having 13 percent of the delegates to a majority of them in the next three months.
The question: Mathematically, how can Cruz pull it off? The answer: It is nearly impossible, largely due to the rules of the GOP nomination system.
On the night of the Nevada caucuses, where Cruz came in third, he declared March 1 would be the most important date in the primary season. That’s up for debate, but this Tuesday is certainly the most important day in his campaign.
On March 1, a large swath of Southern states — from Georgia to Cruz’s home state of Texas — will vote in the so-called SEC primary, named for the Southeastern college athletic conferences with teams in many of the states that vote that day.
On the surface, these states are filled with potential Cruz supporters who are evangelical and conservative — states like Alabama, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Georgia. In theory, this would be the date when Cruz grabs so many delegates he could overtake Trump. But the Republican National Committee stipulated these 11 states must award delegates proportionally (instead of the winner taking all of the delegates). This makes it nearly impossible for Cruz to get ahead in the count.
US Senator Marco Rubio has a problem finding a state primary or caucus that he can win outright. But at least his strongest states, in theory, are winner-take-all contests, although they come later on the calendar. Even if Rubio barely wins the Florida primary on March 15, he doesn’t have to share the state’s 99 delegates with anyone.
For this same reason, the delegate count doesn’t get much better for Cruz later in March. After Super Tuesday, the list of states voting — Michigan on March 8, Illinois and Ohio on March 15, for example — are less friendly to his politics.
One way to read this is to say that it is better, mathematically, to be an establishment lane candidate like Rubio than Cruz. But it’s more complicated.
Rubio needs to quickly raise money to compete with Cruz and Trump in the large number of states (and media markets) voting in March. Rubio will also have to maintain some political argument about why he should be a viable candidate if he doesn’t win his first state outright until March 15.
Republicans did not intend for it to work this way. The Southern states voting March 1 wanted to be in a cluster early on the calendar to help a more conservative candidate clinch the nomination. But in a three-person contest, where the front-runner isn’t the social conservative, their attempt has appeared to backfire.
Unless Cruz pulls off the most impressive Super Tuesday victories in the history of competitive primaries, he will be severely disadvantaged in the delegate race this spring....
--more--"
Not a good idea?
"Poll shows huge lead for Trump among Mass. GOP voters" by Jim O’Sullivan Globe Staff February 27, 2016
Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump has opened up a broad lead in Massachusetts before Tuesday’s GOP primary, getting double the support of his closest competitor, according to a new poll.
With 43 percent support among likely Republican voters, Trump shows strength across a range of demographics that reflects his performance in states that have already voted. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida is running second with 20 percent, and Ohio Governor John Kasich a close third with 17 percent, according to the Suffolk University survey.
Trump has drawn almost no institutional support from Massachusetts Republicans, but the state appears on the verge of handing him his most lopsided victory yet. The billionaire leads in all regions of the state and across all age cohorts, and commands majority support in self-described union households.
Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who won the Iowa caucuses before Trump went on a spree of three straight victories, lagged in fourth place, at 9 percent, while retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson captured just 4 percent. Only 7 percent said they were undecided.
“He’s got a unique blend of strength, leadership, independence, and anti-Washington that’s resonating among Republican primary voters in Massachusetts, and it’s different than in other states, because Cruz is not a factor,” said Suffolk pollster David Paleologos. “The end result is you’ve got this big lead, this big landslide lead.”
I'm usually one.
The results show more moderate Republican and unenrolled voters split between Rubio and Kasich, echoing the party’s inability nationally to coalesce firmly behind an alternative to Trump. At 60 percent, Kasich drew the survey’s highest favorability ratings.
Fully half of those polled said they expect Trump will become the next president, while 18 percent said they expect Democrat Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state, to win the White House. Just 5 percent thought Rubio would prevail in November.
With primaries across the country, more delegates are at stake on Super Tuesday than in any other day of the nominating contest, and Trump’s dominance in states that voted previously have positioned him to consolidate an already hefty delegate lead. Trump’s largest victory margin came in the most recent contest, a 22-point win over Rubio in the Feb. 23 Nevada caucuses.
While the nominating contest tops the ticket, GOP primary voters will also vote for state committee candidates Tuesday. Governor Charlie Baker, seeking to wrest seats away from conservatives and increase control of the party apparatus, has launched a slate of more moderate challengers.
Oh, that explains the flier I received in the mail from the religious conservative out here.
Baker draws a favorability rating of 78 percent in the GOP poll, with just 9 percent disapproving. Nearly three-quarters of those with an unfavorable view of the governor say they will vote for Trump.
Baker has occasionally criticized Trump and has said he does not expect to vote for him. But his chosen candidate, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, rocked the Republican Party on Friday by endorsing Trump, after dropping out because of his disappointing finish in New Hampshire.
Baker’s effort to pull out moderate voters could change the jockeying for second place here, Paleologos said.
“If Baker’s revolution that he’s waging in all these state committee districts is successful, he’s going to draw out more [voters] against the core state committee Republicans, and that could help Kasich. I don’t know if that’s going to get him to second place,” he said.
Baker's revolution?
As if I needed encouragement to vote for a wing nut.
Trump is viewed favorably by 56 percent of those polled, with 35 percent reporting unfavorable opinions. Cruz is “under water” in public opinion, with just 37 percent holding favorable opinions of the first term-senator, and nearly half viewing him negatively.
Trump leads among both male and female voters, though he does better with men. Kasich performs better with women, while Rubio is even, according to the poll.
The survey of 500 likely Massachusetts Republican primary voters was conducted Wednesday through Friday and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points.
--more--"
Also see:
"Republican candidates firing insults at each other from Super Tuesday states. Donald Trump, working to build an insurmountable lead, was campaigning in Arkansas with former rival Chris Christie and calling Marco Rubio a ‘‘light little nothing;’’ Ted Cruz was asking parents in Atlanta if they would be pleased if their children spouted profanities like the brash billionaire, and Rubio was mocking Trump as a ‘‘con artist’’ with ‘‘the worst spray tan in America.’’
Related:
What does Rubio’s Senate run tell us?
It tells us the Globe has now latched onto him in trying to boost his prospects.
Cruz, Rubio escalate case against Trump
Kasich won the endorsement of former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.
I don't see how that helps him.
Gotta try and hurt Trump.
"Trump wavers on disavowing David Duke" by Alan Rappeport New York Times February 28, 2016
The first thing I thought when I saw it was the screeching desperation of the e$tabli$ment.
NEW YORK — David Duke, the white nationalist and ex-Ku Klux Klansman, has not formally endorsed Donald Trump, but he has embraced the Republican presidential candidate’s cause wholeheartedly.
“Voting against Donald Trump at this point is really treason to your heritage,” Duke told his radio audience recently. Duke expanded on his support of Trump in a Facebook post over the weekend.
“I think he deserves a close look by those who believe the era of political correctness needs to come to an end,” Duke said, calling for a leader who would secure the border and dismantle the “Jewish controlled” financial industry.
You can decide for yourself regarding him, but you can't argue with the media.
The discussion of Trump’s support among white supremacists comes on a day when he also reposted a tweet quoting Benito Mussolini, the founder of the fascist movement, and called for libel laws to be weakened so that he could more easily sue the press when it covers him critically.
Was the Mussolini quote the one about the melding of corporations and government being the ultimate form of fa$ci$m?
The campaigns of Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz pounced on Trump for failing to distance himself from Duke. Some civil rights groups also expressed concern about a mainstream politician failing to denounce white supremacist ideology.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, a Mossad front, called Pat Buchanans a Nazi and Lenora Fulani, the former standard-bearer of the New Alliance Party and an advocate of Marxist-Leninist politics, a communist.
Also Sunday, Trump tried to deflect attention from a class-action civil lawsuit involving the former Trump University by pointing to the ethnic background of the judge in the case.
Asked on “Fox News Sunday” what US District Judge Gonzalo Curiel’s ethnicity has to do with the lawsuit against him, Trump replied: ‘‘I think it has to do perhaps with the fact that I'm very, very strong on the border, very, very strong at the border, and he has been extremely hostile to me.”
According to the California class-action complaint in front of Curiel, a one-year apprenticeship that Trump University students were promised ended after students paid for a three-day seminar. Attendees who were promised a personal photo with Trump received only the chance to take a photo with a cardboard cutout. And many instructors were bankrupt real estate investors.
Trump University emerged as a campaign issue at Thursday’s GOP debate.
At a rally in Arkansas on Saturday, Trump took a break from his standard campaign speech to downplay the lawsuit pending against the business, which was founded by Trump and offered students instruction on real estate investments.
“It’s a small deal, very small,” Trump said of the suit, which could force him to take the stand this summer.
Trump specifically railed against the judge in the case, and at one point noted the judge’s Hispanic ethnicity.
--more--"
Yeah, it all raises "questions about his judgment and fitness to be president."
Related:
3 stabbed when violence erupts at KKK rally in California
KKK members linked to violent brawl released
The KKK wants to adopt a highway in Georgia
Any coincidence those stories are turning up now?
For those not in the know, btw, the white supremacist organizations are all government fronts for the purposes of fallback from flogging Islamic terrorists -- which are also a self-created enemy by the U.S. government. They need "bad guys" to justify their repression.
"Trump, Rubio trade taunts right up to Super Tuesday deadline" by Matt Viser Globe Staff March 01, 2016
WASHINGTON — As GOP voters in 11 states prepared to go to the polls on Super Tuesday, many Republicans are increasingly worried that opportunities to stop Donald Trump are evaporating. The Manhattan maverick won three of the first four nominating contests, and leads in almost every state voting Tuesday — including Massachusetts.
In a campaign of petty barbs, Marco Rubio, a Florida senator, ridiculed Trump’s small hands, and portrayed him as unelectable in the fall.
That's all he's got? The size of his hands?
HA-HA-HAHAHAHAHA!
Almost as funny as the Soros-backed stirrer-uppers that disrupted Trump's rally.
So “desperate” are they!
Rubio and Senator Ted Cruz, who is battling Trump to win his home state of Texas, are the only candidates remotely within striking distance of Trump in most polls. They want to pick up enough delegates in the party’s proportional system of rewards Tuesday to remain viable longer into March, even if Trump wins the popular votes in the majority of Super Tuesday states.
The voters will dictate whether their only remaining strategy will be to try to prevent Trump from amassing a majority of delegates before the July nominating convention in Cleveland. In that case, they could try to force a brokered convention.
Rubio has yet to win a state and is currently trailing in his home state of Florida, which votes March 15. His plan to hang on until mid-March and win Florida had the feel Monday of a basketball team that’s down by 12 points with two minutes to go. They can still come back, but they need their opponent to make some mistakes and they need to do everything right — including the bank shot from half court at the buzzer.
I could do without that kind of metaphor, thanks.
Besides, Rubio's game is football.
While both Rubio and Cruz argued Monday that Trump would be defeated by Clinton, presuming she is the Democratic nominee, it is far from clear that Trump’s supporters will be swayed by electability.
It's an argument that carries no weight, and it is argued the other way on the other side.
I don't know about you, but I sick of the mixed muddle of conventional wisdom and the pre$$ narrative.
They are angry about the status quo and eager to send a message to Washington.
That's me.
Then it's more of Duke and the KKK.
Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker grew testy when asked whether he would support Trump in the general election if he is the party’s nominee.
“Why is everybody giving up on the idea that anybody else might actually pull off this election?” he said. “I’m not willing to give that one up. Let the other candidates fight this out, and let’s see where it goes.”
So naive!
Rubio and Trump have increasingly launched vitriolic attacks in the last week. Rubio has adopted Trump’s style of hurling personal insults, mocking Trump’s tan, the size of his hands, and his face. Trump picks on Rubio for his big ears, small stature, and sweatiness.
You know, those critical issues facing our country.
What an absolute f***ing joke!!!
Cruz, after a disappointing loss in South Carolina, is fighting for his political life. He needs a win in his home state of Texas — the only state where Trump trails — but also needs to perform well in states across the South. Cruz has worked over the past year to knit together a coalition of evangelicals and conservatives and has long said that his breakout moment would come in the South.
Yeah, it was looking like a big day for delegates for him, but not now.
Still, if he wins Texas he will still be the only one to beat Trump.
The math ain't working for him, though.
That claim will be tested on Tuesday. If Cruz ends up dropping out of the race, it could reshape the final act of the campaign, with his supporters up for grabs.
Gee, they already have him dropping out despite previous reporting by the Globe showed Trump as Cruz voters' second choice, and vice-versa.
Ben Carson has not been a major factor in the campaign for several months, and could face calls to end his candidacy.
Who?
In a new national poll released on Monday, Trump had surged to a 49 percent lead among Republicans. Rubio trailed with 16 percent, followed by Cruz with 15 percent. The candidates are planning to meet in Detroit on Thursday night for their next debate.
Mainstream Republicans are increasingly worried about the prospect of Trump becoming their standard-bearer. Not only do they think he would lose the presidency, Senate candidates in tight races in states such as New Hampshire and Ohio would be at risk. The party could undergo a fundamental transition.
GOOD!
Senator Ben Sasse on Sunday night became the first sitting senator to say he would not support Trump if he is the party’s nominee.
“If Trump becomes the Republican nominee my expectation is that I’ll look for some third candidate — a conservative option, a constitutionalist,” Sasse, a Nebraska Republican, wrote on Twitter.
He looks like a Cruz supporter anyway.
--more--"
How sad is it that the e$tabli$hment in Ma$$achu$etts is latching on to Sasse with such desperation?
"Baker needs to dump Trump" by Joan Vennochi Globe Columnist March 01, 2016
As Trump stands ready to score big on Super Tuesday, Governor Charlie Baker of Massachusetts — the governor with the highest approval rating in America — seems stymied by the mogul’s dominance, and the polls that show him headed for a huge victory here in Massachusetts. Baker has no plans to endorse a last-minute antidote to Trump, spokesman Tim Buckley said, even as the words out of Trump’s mouth grow more poisonous every day.
As if what Baker says would influence me (if anything, I'm influenced to go the other way).
Of course, Baker was badly burned in his first attempt to stop Trump. When Baker endorsed Governor Chris Christie right before the New Hampshire primary, he said he was choosing him as the sane alternative to Trump — although payback for Christie’s support for Baker’s gubernatorial bid no doubt also figured in.
So much for sanity and loyalty. Christie dropped out of the race after a poor New Hampshire showing. Then, last week, the New Jersey governor backed Trump. While some other Republicans expressed shock and outrage at Christie’s move, Baker only said he was “surprised”; he wouldn’t even acknowledge disappointment.
He should have been ripping mad.
Like us?
Meg Whitman, who served as Christie’s national finance cochair, lambasted Christie’s embrace of Trump as “an astonishing display of political opportunism.” But Baker just said Christie was his own man.
By nature, Governor Fix-It is more inclined to stick his head under a broken-down Red Line train and try to repair it than to throw himself in front of the Trump Express and try to heal the Republican party.
I'd rather he deal with the Red Line and the rest, thanks.
But maybe something else is going on here? Baker was recently caught trying to replace conservative members of the Republican state committee with moderate Republicans. In doing so, he has riled up the conservative base in Massachusetts, which is all-in for Trump. Tiny as that group is, it can cause headaches for Baker — if he lets it.
As if "we" needed any more riling.
He shouldn’t. There’s a much bigger political headache ahead if Trump captures the nomination, and in Massachusetts, Baker needs continued support from Democrats and unenrolled voters. They won’t like any wavering on Trump and what he represents. Walking the line between presidential and local politics will only get harder for Baker.
OMG!
Like his stand on Trump is going to matter as we evaluate the only important thing, his performance running this state!!
Better to draw a clear line now and keep Trump on the other side of it.
It’s not just the politically right thing to do. It’s the right thing to do, period....
That's where I dumped this.
--more--"
So what other anchor can the propaganda pre$$ lung for as it drowns?
"Even as he rises, Trump entertains conspiracy theories" by Maggie Haberman New York Times March 01, 2016
NEW YORK — Donald J. Trump does not shrink from addressing, and in some ways legitimizing, the wildest of hypotheticals.
He has declared on a presidential debate stage that he knew a 2-year-old who immediately developed autism from a vaccination. He has appeared on the radio show of the noted conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who has suggested the government played a role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings.
Aaaaaaaaaah!
Related: 'ALEX JONES WORKS FOR THE ELITE'
Globe just confirmed it.
Part hair-salon gossip, part purveyor of forwarded conspiracy e-mails, Trump has exploited the news cycles of an Internet era in which rumors explode like fireworks and often take a long time to burn out. Trump’s willingness to touch on what passes for fact on fringe websites puts him in a unique class for a national major party front-runner.
It's where you find the truth.
“It’s like a walking, talking Enquirer magazine,” said Erick Erickson, former editor in chief of the conservative website RedState, referring to the popular supermarket tabloid National Enquirer. Erickson often shut down interest in conspiracy theories on his website, such as the so-called birther rumors that Obama was born in Kenya.
The birther thing is a red herring and straw man.
Such supermarket tabloids “do very well — people do like the stories of aliens meeting with presidents,” said Erickson, who has often clashed with Trump.
There you go.
The preponderance of extraterrestrial alien stuff in the ma$$ media is proof of its fraud to me.
It is not a total surprise that Trump is the candidate most likely to use the phrase “I hear” before stating something as fact, no matter how flimsy the information he passes along.
Look who is talking!!
The lead purveyor of Iraq WMD stories!!
A man who reveled in his presence in the New York tabloid pages for decades, he saw firsthand the power of stories, especially those that shock people, to command attention. But the expectations for what a presidential standard-bearer would pass along have typically been higher.
It was the “birther” theories that Trump used to stoke interest in his own potential candidacy in 2011. That year, he repeatedly demanded that Obama produce his Hawaiian birth certificate.
In April of that year, he claimed to have sent investigators to the state: “They can’t believe what they’re finding,” he said, although he has never made public any such findings, and Obama later released his birth certificate.
Trump has since tried to steer clear of the birthplace claims about Obama. But he used similar questions to try to inject doubt about Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who was born in Canada to a US citizen.
The candidate has used his Twitter feed to pass along other dubious theories, including false crime statistics about blacks and questions about Senator Marco Rubio’s eligibility to be president. Rubio was born in the United States.
Pressed about passing along such conjecture by the ABC News host George Stephanopoulos on Feb. 21, Trump gave a response he frequently uses to deflect responsibility for sharing inaccurate information. “Somebody said he’s not, and I retweeted it,” Trump said. “We start a dialogue, and it’s very interesting.”
--more--"
So who do you think he will choose as veep?
And what would it matter?
Former CIA director: Military may refuse to follow Trump’s orders if he becomes president
via occurrences (much more good campaign coverage there; I'm reading it now).
Can you say MILITARY COUP!??
".... It really doesn’t matter what you call them—the 1%, the elite, the controllers, the masterminds, the shadow government, the police state, the surveillance state, the military industrial complex—so long as you understand that no matter which party occupies the White House in 2017, the unelected bureaucracy that actually calls the shots will continue to do so.
When all is said and done, each American will have to decide for themselves whether they prefer dangerous freedom to peaceful slavery. One thing is for sure: the reassurance ritual of voting is not going to advance freedom one iota.
Consider the following a much-needed reality check, an antidote if you will, against an overdose of overhyped campaign announcements, lofty electoral promises and meaningless patriotic sentiments that land us right back in the same prison cell....
--MORE--"
SIXTEEN FACTS THERE for you to consider.
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Being unenrolled I should at least look at the other side of the aisle:
"Clinton leads Sanders in new Mass. poll" by Jim O’Sullivan Globe Staff February 28, 2016
Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton holds an eight-point lead over Bernie Sanders in a new poll of Massachusetts Democratic primary voters, suggesting that the Vermont senator needs to attract significant support during the final push to eke out a much-needed win in Tuesday’s Massachusetts presidential primary.
He might be getting a little shove here.
Clinton draws 50 percent of the vote, while Sanders picks up 42 percent and eight percent remain undecided, according to the Suffolk University poll released Sunday. The poll was conducted Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.
Both candidates are scheduled to visit Massachusetts Monday — a signal of the state’s importance in the nominating contest and an anticipated close outcome. Clinton is throwing rallies in Springfield and Boston, and Sanders is headlining an evening event in Milton.
Tuesday’s primary vote in Massachusetts is one of a dozen Super Tuesday contests around the country.
Clinton has shown strength in recent days with a landslide win in South Carolina’s primary. Massachusetts is viewed as a vital test of Clinton’s durability as the party favorite, and her success here could prove a major blow to Sanders’ hopes for an upset.
But it is Sanders who has attracted more voters in recent months, as doubts about Clinton have persisted.
“She’s not growing at all,” said David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, referring to Clinton’s relatively static showing in primary polling. “Sanders is growing, but he’s not catching her. He hasn’t closed the deal. If she beats him here, if the lead holds up, I think this is one of those states he was counting on to win. It still could happen, but it’s going to be a challenge.”
Paleologos called the primary a “tough-to-poll race” because unenrolled voters can vote in either the Democratic or Republican contest. Among registered Democrats, Clinton enjoys a solid 22-point advantage. Sanders has a 17-point lead among unenrolled voters.
“It really depends on a decision that independent voters are going to make on Monday night,” he said. “People could jump out of the Republican primary and say ‘I’m going to send a message to Hillary Clinton and vote for Bernie.’ ”
That's ME!
This is the way I see it: I would have voted to stop Bush but he's out (thank you, Trump). Now I'm feeling I need to stop Clinton.
That's what voting has come to for me. I'm not voting for anything or anybody, I'm voting against.
The state’s Democratic establishment also has a lot on the line Tuesday, having almost universally lined up behind Clinton. The party’s left-leaning activists have largely sided with Sanders, who, like GOP front-runner Donald Trump, has also attracted independent and more irregular voters.
The Suffolk poll roughly echoes a WBUR Democratic primary survey released last week showing Clinton with a lead of five percentage points over Sanders.
Roughly half of those Democrats polled think Clinton will win the White House, while just 12 percent expect Sanders to, and 16 percent think Trump will.
Despite Democratic support for Clinton, Sanders remains well-liked overall among Democrats: Seventy-one percent viewed him favorably, compared with 67 percent for Clinton.
On the Republican side, unenrolled voters likely to vote in the Democratic primary see Trump in a harshly negative light: More than three-quarters said they hold unfavorable opinions of him. In fact, the only GOP contender to receive a favorable rating is Ohio Governor John Kasich, who enjoys approval from two-thirds of likely Democratic primary voters.
Not this one, not when the e$tabli$hment and pre$$ see him that way.
Doesn't mean I'm voting for him.
That fondness could shape results for the Clinton-Sanders match-up, as independents decide in which primary they want to vote Tuesday.
I still haven't decided, but I see it like this: if they tell me I have to vote in the Republican primary, it's Trump; if I have to vote in Democrats, it's Sanders; if they don't let me vote, fine; if I have to choose a ballot..... I dunno yet. Will have to decide then and there, I guess. Will depend on my mood.
In November, Suffolk tested Democrats’ views on the race and found that Clinton held a commanding, 25-point lead. Sanders has gained ground largely thanks to undecided voters leery of the former senator and first lady but do not yet appear to be sufficient to catch the longtime front-runner.
“He’s made up a lot of ground and Clinton hasn’t grown since November,” Paleologos said.
Massachusetts has long been a Clinton family stronghold. In 2008, the state served as a bright spot for Hillary Clinton when she won the primary here despite several of the state’s top Democrats backing then-Senator Barack Obama.
Much of Sanders’ support stems from voters who were not yet old enough to participate in that 2008 race. Among voters aged 18 to 45, he leads, 50 percent to 42 percent. But among the younger subset of 18-to-35-year-olds, his lead is 17 points. Voters in the older subset of that group are split evenly, according to the poll, rendering them a key bloc Tuesday night.
Clinton continues to face a gender gap, winning easily among women with 55 percent of the vote but trailing Sanders among men by eight points. Paleologos said women will probably account for between 56 percent and 60 percent of Tuesday’s primary electorate.
Then she wins going away.
See:
"In her New Hampshire defeat, Clinton lost the overall women’s vote by 11 points. In her Nevada caucus victory, she won it, 57 to 41. But appeals to women to support Clinton on gender are running into resistance, especially from younger voters."
Bye-bye, Bernie!
The only region of the state where Sanders leads is Worcester and the western counties.
Oh, Sanders is winning out here, huh?
I swear to God we should secede and join Vermont.
Clinton beats him everywhere else, most dominantly in Suffolk County, where the poll puts her 18 points ahead.
White voters prefer Clinton by a narrow margin, but nonwhites break her way by 22 percentage points. She also leads among those without children, while Sanders holds a small edge among those with children.
Interesting that Sanders leads among those with children.
That punctures Hillary's whole image.
Of the 21 percent of likely voters whose household includes a union member, Sanders holds a small edge.
Conducted Feb. 25 through Feb. 27 among 500 likely Democratic primary voters, the poll carries a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points.
--more--"
So what are the young women saying?
"Despite ties to Clinton, Wellesley College is divided" by Evan Allen Globe Staff February 29, 2016
When Hillary Clinton arrived at Wellesley in 1965, she was a Republican. She graduated a Democrat. On the campus that helped shape her politics, students are split on whether she deserves the nomination, or whether it should go to democratic socialist Bernie Sanders.
Recent polls suggest that the Wellesley campus may well be a microcosm of the state, with Clinton and Sanders locked in a close battle in Massachusetts. Both campaigns sent canvassers out across the state this weekend, and both candidates will be in Boston on Monday, one day before a dozen states hold presidential nominating contests on Super Tuesday.
“I went to a party the other weekend where people started arguing about it, and it was just like, ‘Guys, can we not?’ ” said Hope Garcia, a junior who said she will support either Democrat. “One girl started going off about how Bernie Sanders just isn’t a viable candidate, and there was this really die-hard girl who was like ‘feeling the Bern,’ who was not down with that — it was a whole thing. I just stayed in the corner and sipped my wine.”
Republicans are a muted presence on campus, students said.
“My roommate is one, which is like — What?” quipped one young woman. Students said most on campus are supporting a Democrat, or are undecided.
Students who support Clinton and those who don’t said their decision is based on policy, not gender or alma mater — though several pointed out that from a practical standpoint, going to the college attended by the president might have its perks.
For some, however, the questions from reporters about which candidate they favor were perplexing....
--more--"
You gotta follow the money.
Sanders gunning for lasting change
The Boston Globe-12 hours ago
Gunning for it?
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Globe took it off the front page?
WASHINGTON -- Even before Bernie Sanders' resounding loss to Hillary Clinton in South Carolina Saturday night, some of his supporters where shifting strategy -- acknowledging states where victories are unlikely, and instead focusing on delegate counts as a way to empower their candidate's liberal philosophy within the Democratic coalition.
Sanders on Sunday readily acknowledged his drubbing in South Carolina: "We got decimated," he said on NBC's "Meet the Press" of his nearly 50-point loss. "Among older African-Americans it was pathetic from our perspective."
See: Clinton Set to Win South Carolina
With more such states ahead, particularly in the South, Sanders' supporters maintain that victory -- while nice -- is not the only point of the insurgent Vermont's senator's campaign.
There is that damn word again.
"Our party is broken," said Connie Johnson, a former Democratic nominee for Senate from Oklahoma. She wants to see changes in her red state where there's not a single Democrat elected statewide and the GOP has supermajorities in both houses of the state legislature.
"We've got Democrats who don't want to take a stand," she said. A Sanders victory in her state would mean "the true base of the Democratic party is showing its face again," said Johnson.
Sanders' insurgent campaign caught fire after massively beating expectations in the first two nomination contests, where he nearly bested Clinton in Iowa and trounced her in New Hampshire.
But Clinton's five-point victory in Nevada showed that she kept firm support from black voters who make up a large chunk of the Democratic electorate.
See: Clinton Stole Nevada
"If you can not connect with the non-white community you can not be the nominee," said Joe Trippi, a Democratic strategist. "Sooner or later it will be clear that he is a protest candidate."
Now I see Democrats losing in November.
Candidates around the country report a Sanders effect on their races -- suggesting his attempt to capture the White House has some impact even if he is unable to advance.
At that point I wrote F*** OFF and stopped reading.
Then it is on to the Kansas and Nebraska caucuses:
"The suit is the latest to take direct aim at a 3-year-old measure ushered into law by Secretary of State Kris W. Kobach, who has lobbied heavily over the years for measures that he said were needed to prevent noncitizens from casting ballots."
"In a twist, GOP-led Nebraska may give up redistricting power" by Grant Schulte and Scott McFetridge Associated Press February 25, 2016
LINCOLN, Neb. — In 2008, for the first time in 44 years, red-state Nebraska awarded one of its Electoral College votes to the Democratic presidential candidate, and aghast Republican Party leaders decided they wouldn’t let it happen again.
They redrew the state’s political lines so the congressional district that favored Barack Obama and included the state’s largest black community would take in more Republican voters. Then they pushed the change through the Legislature despite Democrats’ complaints.
The doctoring worked: When Obama ran for re-election, the new district went to Republican Mitt Romney by a comfortable margin. In most states, that would be the end of the story — a naked but predictable case of gerrymandering for political advantage.
But in Nebraska, a state with a different slant on partisanship, the episode didn’t sit well. This year, a number of Republicans, including the Legislature’s speaker, are joining with the outnumbered Democrats to back an idea that’s almost unthinkable in the current hyperpolarized climate: turning over political map drawing to a new independent commission and lessening the role of politics in the process....
Does it le$$en the role of money?
--more--"
"Democrats focus on Mass. ahead of Super Tuesday" by Jim O’Sullivan Globe Staff March 01, 2016
As soon as I saw "Bernie Sanders insurgent campaign" I soured on this.
With polls showing Clinton ahead of Sanders in a state widely regarded as vital for his hopes to secure the nomination, both campaigns expended valuable final hours before Super Tuesday in a reliably Democratic state that has taken on outsized importance in an unexpectedly close race.
The state’s battleground status also drew former president Bill Clinton, who headlined a late-night rally for his wife in Worcester.
Ugh!
To know that he was in state!
I need a shower!
He recalled how the area has given the couple widespread support in prior elections.
“You have been so good to me and to Hillary,” he said. ”You gave her an overwhelming victory before.”
It shouldn't be this time.... unless....
Clinton did not mention Sanders but he took a couple swipes at businessman Donald Trump, especially his often-repeated plan to build a wall along the Mexican border.
“It’s a good way to do something unethical and collapse the economy overnight,” he said of Trump’s plan.
Yeah, illegal immigrant labor is on what corporations and AmeriKan business run, Bill.
About 400 people crowded into a basement-level room at Crompton Collective, a downtown Worcester marketplace, and raucously cheered the former president’s arrival late Monday night.
They should be ashamed of themselves.
The intense focus on Massachusetts came as Hillary Clinton has amassed a delegate lead and, coming off a solid victory in the South Carolina primary, is poised to perform well in the other Super Tuesday states. Sanders, who has acknowledged that he is an underdog in the Democratic contest, has pinned his hopes on states like Massachusetts to fuel his progressive cause.
Massachusetts is one of 11 states voting in Democratic primaries Tuesday, the single day when the most convention delegates will be awarded. Sanders’ campaign acknowledges that the state is one of just five it could win Tuesday, and Massachusetts dangles the day’s largest share of delegates.
Isn't Virginia another?
“Momentum, as fickle as it can be, is really firmly behind her, and Massachusetts is really a place he had to win, or has to win, to get to the next set of primaries,” said Daniel F. Cence, a veteran Democratic strategist. “With its high level of unenrolled voters and, at this point in time, huge population of student voters, it should be fertile ground for him.”
Therefore, if he can't win here....
Polls show Clinton with a lead over Sanders in the single digits, greatly diminished from last year when the Vermont senator began gaining ground on her. A Suffolk University poll released Sunday among likely Democratic primary voters here pegged Clinton with 50 percent and Sanders with 42 percent. A University of Massachusetts Amherst/WBZ poll out Monday gave Clinton a three-point edge.
It will be close, but like in Iowa, Sanders will just lose out.
The state has long been friendly to the Clintons. It provided a refuge for President Clinton when he was engulfed in an Oval Office scandal and a bright spot in 2008 for Hillary Clinton, when she won the state’s primary despite opposition from top Democrats Deval Patrick, Edward M. Kennedy, and John F. Kerry.
That was then.
This year, the state’s Democratic establishment is nearly monolithic in its backing of Clinton, including every member of the Washington delegation except for Senator Elizabeth Warren. Mayor Martin J. Walsh, after openly speculating about backing Vice President Joe Biden in a bid that never materialized, has heavily supported Clinton, sending volunteers to New Hampshire and activating his political organization in the capital.
I can't think of a better reason to vote Sanders then.
But Sanders has excited the party’s progressive base, which embraces his hard-line stance against Wall Street and overtures toward single-payer health care and tuition-free higher education.
I hardly consider myself a "progre$$ive," whatever that means.
The only choice these days is freedom or the fa$ci$m we live under.
Secretary of State William F. Galvin said Monday that he expected high and potentially record-breaking overall turnout Tuesday, with the contentious Republican primary driving much of the enthusiasm. Galvin, a Democrat, said nearly 20,000 voters have unenrolled from the Democratic Party since Jan. 1, registering either as a Republican or an independent.
Related:
"It’s impossible to know whether the voters who recently left the Democratic Party intend to support frontrunner Donald Trump — or if they’re actually planning to cast an anti-Trump vote."
That will be the narrative if this state is stolen from Trump.
In a Globe interview, Sanders brushed aside concerns that the country is not ripe for dramatic change.
“The political revolution is happening,” Sanders said. “Millions of people are beginning to become involved in politics. That was not the case previously. We will see what happens tomorrow. I can’t predict, but we think we have a chance to do well and win a number of states and do better than people think in other states. We’re going to continue this campaign until the convention, and we’re feeling pretty good.”
At Milton High School, a line of hundreds snaked through the parking lot hours before Sanders was set to take the gymnasium stage.
Meanwhile, the Clintons collect a handful of hundreds.
Hmmmmm.
Sanders also trained his fire on Trump, promising he would beat the billionaire “badly” in a general election and arguing that most Americans do not want a president who insults women, Mexicans, Muslims, and former prisoners of war such as Senator John McCain of Arizona.
“Most of all, we will defeat Donald Trump because we know that love trumps hatred,” he said.
It used to, and maybe it still does.
Clinton spoke in Boston to a capacity audience of 650 supporters and press packed into the historic venue, as another 1,000 people listened outside.
Addressing an estimated crowd of 700 in Springfield, Clinton peppered her remarks with references to her history with Western Massachusetts issues and Democratic politicians. She used a new stump-speech line jabbing at Trump’s campaign slogan.
“I don’t think America has ever stopped being great,” Clinton said. “What we need to do is make America whole again.”
Clinton addressed the Springfield crowd for about 30 minutes, repeatedly suggesting that she is the Democratic Party’s best hope to defeat a Republican in November.
Then they lose.
“One advantage I have is they’ve been after me for 25 years and I’m still standing,” she said....
--more--"
"Sanders looks to white working class for bounce beyond Tuesday" by Arit John Bloomberg News March 01, 2016
NEW YORK — Bernie Sanders is pinning his hopes for staying in the Democratic presidential race on working-class white voters, the same constituency that helped Hillary Clinton extend her 2008 campaign.
Of course, NONE OF THEM are KLAN RACISTS like Trump's, right?
I mean, Bernie is Jewish so there can be no bigotry or sexism there, right?
Sanders is trailing far behind Clinton in nine of the 11 states that are holding primaries or caucuses on Tuesday. Now he is looking further down the road to a set of states where minority voters who helped Clinton swamp him in South Carolina on Saturday will have a more diluted influence.
By then he's in the breakdown lane.
Along with Oklahoma, Minnesota, and Massachusetts, Sanders’ campaign has been zeroing in on Michigan, which votes March 8, and the March 15 states of Illinois, Missouri, and Ohio. All of them have a substantially higher proportion of white voters than the swath of the southern states that vote Tuesday.
But time and history aren’t on Sanders’ side.
‘‘He’s running a March 15 campaign, hoping that she’s not so far ahead,’’ said Alfred Tuchfarber, a professor of political science at the University of Cincinnati in Ohio. ‘‘That’s where he’s kind of drawing his defense line, but it’s going to be too late [after Super Tuesday].”
To be sure, Sanders has made direct and explicit appeals to minority voters and argues his main economic message — the system is rigged in favor of the wealthy at the expense of the poor and middle-class — resonates with voters of all races.
They just don't show up to do it is all.
As he campaigned outside of the South this week, he continued to talk about black youth unemployment and criminal justice reform, and held events in Flint, Mich., and at a predominantly black public university in Chicago. He’s also drawn in prominent black supporters, including director Spike Lee, actor Danny Glover, and former NAACP chairman Ben Jealous.
‘‘This campaign is listening to the African-American community,’’ Sanders said Saturday night in Rochester, Minn.
But that hasn’t been enough to close the gap with Clinton among black and Hispanic voters.
That is where I was going to end the print version.
The breadth of Clinton’s victory in the Palmetto State — winning majorities of both the white and black vote and spanning all income categories — shows the steep hill Sanders has to climb.
‘‘We’ve got a number of states coming up that we’re going to do extremely well and possibly win,’’ including California, Michigan, and New York, Sanders said Sunday on CBS’s ‘‘Face the Nation’’ program. ‘‘I think we do have a path to victory.’’
There are some opportunities for him. In West Virginia, for example, where Clinton won in 2008 thanks to her 46-point lead with white voters, a MetroNews poll released Feb. 22 showed Sanders ahead of Clinton 57 percent to 29 percent.
For other contests, making the math work is tougher. Tuchfarber said blacks are about a fifth of the Democratic electorate in Ohio and that he expects Clinton to win 70 percent of their votes. The two candidates are likely to split the rest, Tuchfarber said. That would leave Sanders with 46 percent of the total vote to Clinton’s 54 percent.
The decision to focus on states where minority voters make up less than a quarter of the Democratic electorate implies the Sanders campaign believes it will have better luck chipping at Clinton’s smaller lead among white voters.
‘‘You go through this process and you see all the opportunities that he has,’’ said Tad Devine, Sanders’ senior adviser. ‘‘If we can string together some big wins as we go through it I think there’s going to be a huge internal debate in the Democratic Party about who would be the strongest candidate.’’
Devine said the campaign’s decision to focus on states like Missouri and Ohio was not made ‘‘purely on the basis of race,’’ and the campaign is optimistic about its chances with black voters in later states.
There was a time when I would have been.
--more--"
"It is fucking hilarious that Sanders has an exemplary human rights record over decades, up to and including putting himself in physical harm's way fifty years (!) ago (when Hil was a Goldwater Girl!), and Hillary is responsible for the 'reforms' which led to the end of much of the welfare system, the effect of which fell disproportionately on blacks, and the intentionally directed mass incarceration of black males, not to mention the cost of her warmongering for all the Wars For The Jews which has left the country destitute and unable to pay for social programs or infrastructure, not to mention her relationship with the worst of the banksters, yet Hillary is successfully gaining black votes on a backasswards portrayal of herself as the identity politics champion. Wow! It is hard to feel sorry for voters who make that profound a mistake." -- xymphora
********&&&&********
Here is your general election already taking shape:
"Clinton allies forge strategy to undermine Trump" by Ken Thomas Associated Press February 29, 2016
COLUMBIA, S.C. — While party leaders see Hillary Clinton in a favorable position against Republican front-runner Donald Trump, they caution that the real estate mogul has shown a mastery of the media and an ability to stay on offense throughout the GOP primaries. And they acknowledge Trump has successfully tapped into a deep vein of economic insecurity running through the electorate.
Related:
"Both Sanders and Clinton have reached new favorability highs and lows respectively in matchups with GOP contenders. Sanders outpolls Trump 48 – 42 percent; and tops the rest by wide 8-10% margins, whereas Clinton only edges past Trump by a slight 1% margin and it’s downhill after that, losing out to Cruz, Rubio, Bush and Kasich." .... Sanders is the only candidate tested in the poll for whom a plurality -- 50 percent -- says they feel comfortable with as president."
But don't let that spoil the narrative!
Clinton aides and allies also worry that Trump’s unorthodox constituency of working-class white voters might allow him to put more states in play compared with past nominees Mitt Romney and John McCain. And they note large voter turnouts in GOP primaries won by Trump.
That doesn't make sense given the conventional wisdom extolled by the Globe!
But Democrats predict a Trump nomination could have a splintering effect on the Republican Party and are looking for ways to exacerbate it.
A survey of 800 likely Republican voters commissioned by a Democratic firm led by Stan Greenberg, who served as President Bill Clinton’s pollster, found that 20 percent of Republicans are ‘‘uncertain’’ whether they would back Trump or Clinton in a head-to-head match-up.
Grain of salt, please.
"If people are fearful that you can't trust Trump with nuclear weapons, and other Republicans in the foreign policy establishment saying they can't trust Trump, there's a potential for a splintering off of huge Republican base voters," Greenberg said."
Woa! How did we get there!?
Talk about fear-mongering!
In a recent fund-raising appeal, Clinton said Trump was ‘‘looking more and more likely to be the Republican nominee. The man who riles up his crowds by calling Mexican-Americans criminals and suggesting Muslims should be banned from entering this country has limitless resources to run his campaign.’’
Ever hear of a thing called free speech?
Her message underscored Democrats' interest in holding Trump below 30 percent support among Hispanics, a level few think would allow the businessman to win the White House.
While Trump spends far more time assailing his Republican rivals, he has previewed some attack lines he would likely use against Clinton, describing her as a liar and failed secretary of state who would have been indicted over her e-mail scandal were she not so cozy with President Obama.
He has made it clear he’s ready to take personal shots at Clinton, bringing up her husband’s past infidelities and suggesting she was complicit in what Trump described as Bill Clinton’s abuse of women.
But he did get an invite and did attend Chelsea's wedding.
He also knows Jeffrey Epstein, too.
--more--"
‘‘Is this the guy you would trust?’’ might not be the best strategy for her!
Related: The 2016 US Presidential Election: Produced for Your Viewing Satisfaction
Enjoy tonight's show, folks.
Time for me to go perform the perfunctory ritual for all the good it will do.
UPDATE:
As I hemmed and hawed the line behind me grew.... and then I asked for a Democrat ballot (and they gave me the red one; blue is for Republicans. That's Ma$$achu$etts all over, isn't it?).
Sticking with the philosophy, I voted Sanders. The attitude was stop Clinton, and I didn't want to be identified with bringing Trump to power.
Who knows about the general.
