Day of Rest

This awoke me when I logged on:

Active shooter situation reported in Austin, Texas

Just throwing the scheduled crisis drills at you left and right, aren't they?

Now gun violence will lead the discussion of the week. The debate will turn away from wars and Russia and e-mails and, well, no one is really talking Turkey.

Until further notice, all these mass casualty events of terror and shooting that are trumpeted by the pre$$ are suspect until they can actually be proven to be that. That's the level we have gotten with the -- forgive me -- Gulf of Tonkin, babies thrown out of incubators in Kuwait, Iraq WMD (boy those Bushes are born liars) pre$$ and its claims. Shoe is on the other foot because this psyop prop stuff has become so translucent it sickening.

Okay, on to my printed pos.

I will shortly be making the pain stop. I let the Globe do the numbers and nothing changes (that kind of story has been popping up the entire 10 years I've done this; always a lot of rigamarole, they flail arms on Beacon Hill, some "reform" is passed, and then we find out all bu$ine$$ as u$ual).

Under the fold I find my will to continue quickly receding, and at this time (7:45 a.m.) the rest of the paper isn't ready to go. Sure makes things easy on me.

Have a good day.

UPDATE:

I've $old my soul for the last time. Time to leave Syria, God help them, where activists reported airstrikes on several towns and villages -- although the Globe is strangely silent on the most recent U.S. slaughter of civilians. That's not counting the scores killed days earlier during the increase in U.S. bombing but you know, circumstances change. Was the Syria government anyway, right?

Sidebar briefs:

Turkey 64 staffers at high court suspended
Belgium Man charged with terrorist plotting
Pakistan Cleric questioned in ‘honor’ killing of Qandeel Baloch

Yeah, that's it for my world section. One f***ing page.

As Zika rages in Puerto Rico, action falters

Told you they had other problems now, and if you read between the lines it is at bottom what people have feared. This is a population reduction program designed to increase abortions. The limited hangout cover are the GMO mosquitoes, likely culprit of delivery were vaccines, and now money can be dumped into pharmaceuticals while the population is culled. That's a reluctant conclusion on my part, and one I either denied or didn't want to believe for so long.

No apparent survivors in Texas balloon crash

You know who else likes balloons?

Speaking of hot air....

"In a talk Friday evening at the Aspen Security Forum, an annual gathering that draws many of the nation’s top intelligence and military officials, CIA director John O. Brennan made clear that while spying on each other’s political institutions is fair game, making data public — in true or altered form — to influence an election is a new level of malicious activity, far different from ordinary spy vs. spy maneuvers. “Obviously, interference in the US election process is a very, very serious matter.”

After what his agency has been doing around the planet for the last 60 years?

Did his tongue turn to sand and fall out of his mouth after he said that? But it's a serious matter when someone -- other than Israel and AIPAC-- interferes with a U.S. election.

The conflict between religious freedom and gay rights has a new battleground, but not here. Nor will I get into an argument regarding the semantics of sacrifice (my print piece was AP, so.... and now that the Globe is back up....).

Now the Globe is defending criminals, and what else is new? She can start in her own office.

As for the rest of the pellets of poop “as we are well on the way to runaway global warming,”  I'm going to put out that fire right now. To be brief is my goal, and I think I'm nicely moving along. Next stop the statehouse!

One quick check of the doctor, and the diagnosis is bad idea. It sure is quite a trick to watch globali$t fa$ci$ts warn against fascism.

Turkey is just paranoid, I'm told, and I can't help but wonder if the writer as in Aspen as well.

Then it is back to tarring Trump. You think the writer would know better being in a same-sex marriage and all. Is he not familiar with the Donald's position on that and bathroom use?

I wouldn't look up in Bo$ton if I were you. 

Glad I've cleaned up the language and that might be a good idea for the rest of the day. Yesterday it was Lord of the Rings, today maybe stoner movies.

The flag waving is the Globe's last call. 

Last Call

It's late and my heart is breaking so let's get off and running:

Upon the flip I find the Globe already playing the woman card, telling me that the alternative media reporting is true. There was a Trump bounce after both conventions, and media is simply laying the groundwork for an election whereby Hillary will squeak by in the electoral map somehow with some well-placed fraud here and there. That's not to say I'm for Trump, either. I'm a completely nonpartisan observer looking for fairness and integrity in the election process based on decades of past history.

Underneath that is the scandal at Suffolk with "a letter obtained by the Globe on Friday saying the president was terminated for “cause,” but in the end it turned out to be the "meeting with the Boston Globe’s editorial board that was apparently a no-no." The Regan P.R. guy behind it all has receded.

Beside that is the Conigliaro conspiracy regarding the meningitis murders, and at least they got their money.

The rest is a test of principal and I'm up against the odds. There is always hope and heroes to come to the rescue. It was “like a death camp there,” but at least the children were saved and all that talk of suicide....I've no longer the energy so I am going to overlook it.

I think I'll give a gentle snub to the first item of Jewish war propaganda. The Russians are handling it much better than I would have, and have you seen Russia lately?

I know that work will set me free. That was a value I was raised with. Hard work, you work hard!

The side strip includes a swath of land in Japan, the dropping of Turkish lawsuits, and Brazil moving forward with the Olympics despite all the problems down there.

What is noteworthy, or should be, is the U.S. being told to leave Japan; the loss of Turkey through Obama administration policy, something that has consequences far into the future with the potential removal of all U.S. troops to be replaced by Russians. Word on the internet is the Russian intelligence tipped Erdogan off regarding the coup, and ruling class folk don't forget such things.

Then it is on to the Nation. Avoid Florida at all costs. Screw the tourism industry and Disney. With all the shootings down there anyway.... you should vaca in North Carolina. That's what I'd vote for. No need to hack a thing. Telling you straight out, and if you can't choke it down, well.... back to business.

Schilling may be outspoken, but that is no crime -- yet.

I'm tired of wading through the same old bull$h** (never you mind those declining tax collections).

I mean, this is the guy who said  “the story for the Massachusetts economy, if you ignore high levels of unemployment and inequality, is the economy has been performing very well,” so why should we put any stock in what he's spewing?

The fact is, this state is starting to look wor$e than Brazil despite all the flowery rhetoric of the convention.

Looks like the Irish got the right idea: ‘‘Saving the bank isn’t everything,’’ although for some that's all there is, the stock prices are Seres business, and you may have a heart attack when Facing up to tho$e facts.

Did you just hear a scream or is it only me turning in?

Awwwwww, Cluckit, here's one for the road:

"Bar owner who admitted taking incentives won’t face penalty" by Dan Adams Globe Staff  July 29, 2016

Massachusetts alcohol regulators on Friday declined to punish a bar whose owner admitted taking $20,000 in payments from a beer distributor, dealing a setback to state investigators who had vowed to crack down on so-called “pay-to-play” in the state’s beer industry.

Investigators at the Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission had cited a now-closed South End restaurant, Estelle’s, after its owner, the Wilcox Group, admitted that it took $20,000 from the Craft Brewers Guild to reserve 20 tap lines at its bars for the distributor’s beers.

The Wilcox Group owns a number of popular Boston-area bars, including The Lower Depths, Bukowski Tavern, and the Rattlesnake Bar & Grille. Estelle’s was the only Wilcox establishment cited by investigators.

But in their ruling Friday, two ABCC commissioners said there was not enough evidence proving the payments were specifically for tap lines at Estelle’s.

“Obviously, [they]’re pleased with the decision.”

Inducements like those paid to Wilcox, while common and legal in grocery stores and other industries, are generally prohibited under the unique regulations governing the alcohol business.

The ABCC investigation began in late 2014 after Dann Paquette, cofounder of the Pretty Things brewery, posted on Twitter about the prevalence of pay-to-play, and singled out bars owned by the Wilcox Group as the recipients of such payments. The company’s owner, Gordon Wilcox, fired back, accusing Paquette of making middling, overpriced beer.

Estelle’s closed over a year ago. It was briefly rebranded as Cluckit, a chicken restaurant, but Wilcox closed that venture last October.

Officials said they would now move ahead with approving a transfer of the Cluckit liquor license to Douglass Williams, an up-and-coming chef and restaurateur who plans to open an Italian-influenced restaurant dubbed MIDA in the space later this year....

--more--"

As I hit the road for a long make-or-break trip, I toast to you the Good Life and hope I have left a decent legacy.

Farewell....

Final Friday

After ten years of fighting the “good fight against entrenched interests,” I'm giving my final address. It's been a Sampson vs. Goliath effort and I've left a lot undone, but it is time to call it an end.

I'm off to summer camp, and I know leaving children in the care of strangers is nerve-wracking, but I'm sure it's safe (I checked the weather) where they are going (counselors have been vetted).

I mean, what could possibly happen to them?

They have God on their side and wouldn't dare go down under.

Yeah, maybe a few people don't like them but the war is over and the war crimes trials are about to begin. Things start to come into focus when you add things up (Syria lost, Turks make friendly with Russia, coup attempt).

So who released anthrax in Russia?

You don't think I'm buying the dead reindeer carcass, do you?

That's like buying the limited hangout of mosquitoes causing Zika when it was likely a vaccine, and now the thing is showing the biowarfare properties of AIDS (whose treatment has morphed into a boon for pharmaceuticals).

"Chancellor Angela Merkel described a new veil of fear gripping Europe yet stood by her determination to offer asylum to those truly in need. The welcome-mat policies of Merkel’s government have come under increasing criticism and even some former supporters of the policies have raised questions after four assaults in the span of two weeks. ‘‘I didn’t say this was a going to be simple. That we could just do it. But I am still convinced that we can do it. This is a historic test in a time of globalization. Fear cannot be the guide for political action,’’ Merkel said."

Unless you need to lie your people into endless wars of conquest and control, and her comments show you that the globalist pukes -- against worldwide resistance by the people -- are moving on the agenda fast and in a big way as I sit here and type.

Time to grab my tube, hop in the car, (just drive through the protest line) and take a ride on the river. Think I'll grab a hamburger for lunch and then at night there is a casino to go to, or you can curl up with a good book (as recommended by Globe critics) if you are out of money.

Time to pray to God ( I know there is something I forgot) and abandon ship!

Clinton's Coronation

I'm glad I did not watch a minute:

"‘America’s destiny is ours to choose,’ Clinton says" by Annie Linskey and Victoria McGrane Globe Staff  July 29, 2016

PHILADELPHIA — Hillary Clinton became the first woman in America’s 240-year history to accept the presidential nomination from a major political party Thursday night, a pinnacle for Clinton personally, but a landmark advance for women generally. Less than 100 years ago, women didn’t have the right to vote in the United States, much less compete to lead the nation. 

It is, but it distracts from the cla$$ she is from. That's the real divide in AmeriKa.

Before Clinton took the stage Katy Perry performed “Rise” and her hit “Roar.”

By Katy. 

Matt Damon is everywhere, and his hypocritical movie is projected to be the summer's hottest hit (costarring Mila Kunis?). 

Good to see Edelman getting the cheers, although I think Lindsay Lohan got it right. 

So how was the concert?

Audience members held up their cellphones with the flashlight on causing the arena to sparkle. It was part of a presentation that included choreography and stagecraft that far surpassed the final night of the Republican National Convention.

That is because as repugnant as was the Trump convention, it was somewhat real and unscripted. Probably why I didn't watch any of this one. I relied on the Globe's seat in the delegation. 

The energy built particularly as the program turned to the military, which typically isn’t an area Democrats highlight.

Oh, no. The party of peace has gone militaristic.

Several dozen military leaders stood on stage as retired General John Allen, who led troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, delivered a resounding endorsement of Clinton.

That's all the more reason to reject her.

“With her as our commander in chief, our international relations will not be reduced to a business transaction,” said the retired four-star general, as the crowd chanted U-S-A and a giant American flag waved. 

It's the AmeriKan version of "Sieg Heil," and it comes from both parties. 

I'm neutral, folks. I'm a human being. I'm sick of this war shit, and when the pre$$ frames it that way -- a business transaction or WAR -- well, you know what I'm for. 

How can we do business and not fight?

“Our armed forces will not become an instrument of torture,” he said, a direct rebuke to Trump, who has proposed restoring enhanced interrogation techniques for terror suspects.

Already have, and while on the subject.... 

Officers rally in Somerville over Black Lives Matter banner

I'd be more worried about the pay cut, guys.

So once again white lives do matter to the Globe as they embrace black militancy.

At Vigil, Biden Tries to Comfort Relatives of Slain Officers

After the BLM hollered out during the moment of silence for police officers?

Experts confront multiple explanations for surge of killings

And they all have a single answer after the clips have been emptied: pushing the gun control agenda and keeping the populace divided and in a constant state of fear so the looting the warring can continue and continue and continue.

Good thing Globe cleaned up scene.

Earlier in the evening, the audience heard from Jennifer Pierotti Lim, director of health policy at the US Chamber of Commerce, one of the most powerful business lobbies in Washington. The group has spent tens of millions in recent cycles to elect Republicans to Congress.

“In Donald Trump’s America, it doesn’t matter what I’ve accomplished as an attorney and policy expert. All that matters is how attractive I am on a scale of one to 10,” said Lim, who in May cofounded a “Republican Women for Hillary” group.

Democratic women in the Senate each took a turn at a podium, with Senator Elizabeth Warren speaking last in the group.

How appropriate that she was last.

“Hillary Clinton knows how to fight back against dangerous, loudmouth bullies,” Warren said. “For 25 years she’s been on the receiving end of one attack after another. She doesn’t back down, she doesn’t whine.’’

Shut up, you party hack.

Sanders supporters also offered a visible reminder of their strength. Many wore yellow neon T-shirts that stood out in the sea of Clinton boosters.

More on them later.

But even some of Sanders’ longtime backers acknowledged the significance of Clinton’s moment Thursday.

“As a woman, I fully appreciate what she did regardless of how she did it,” said Oklahoma state Senator Connie Johnson, one of the few superdelegates who supports Sanders. “She pulled it off. I have to give her props for that.”

I'm sorry, but I never consider the gender or race. 

For me, it's all the policies and all the person.  

So the major partie$ finally nominated a woman, and they had to find the worst one they could? 

We should rejoice over that as a win for women?

Sparks flew off the stands on the sides of the stage after she finished her remarks, a pyrotechnic display designed to electrify the crowd of thousands packed into the Wells Fargo Center in south Philadelphia. Then thousands of red, white, and blue balloons slowly floated from the ceiling, marking the traditional end of the convention.

Despite the late hour of Clinton’s speech, there were a notable number of children on convention floor brought by their parents to witness the historic event. Clinton seemed to savor her entrance, waving to supporters sitting close and far, repeatedly placing her hand to her heart. Members of the audience waved thousands of American flags, creating a patriotic backdrop.

A smattering of people who supported Senator Bernie Sanders, her chief rival for the nomination, held up small signs supporting Jill Stein, a Lexington, Mass., physician running for president as a Green Party candidate. The sea of waving American flags and “Hillary” placards made them hard to pick out.

I think I may have found my candidate. 

Early in the address Clinton reached out to these supporters as the Vermont senator sat stone-faced in the audience. “Bernie, your campaign inspired millions of Americans, particularly the young people who threw their hearts and souls into our primary,” Clinton said. “You’ve put economic and social justice issues front and center, where they belong.”

At least until the general election is over. Then it will be back to bu$ine$$ as usual. 

Yeah, Bernie knows the nomination was stolen from him. In fact, all Democrats and independents that voted for him do; even Hitlery people do unless they have willfully deluded themselves and are blinded by gender. 

And she took aim at Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, who is running on the idea that he would return America to a time of previous strength.

“Don’t let anyone tell you that our country is weak,” Clinton said. “We’re not. Don’t let anyone tell you we don’t have what it takes. We do. And most of all, don’t believe anyone who says: ‘I alone can fix it.’ ” 

Oh, that's rich! She is saying not to believe someone else. 

Those in glass houses, lady!!

“Those were actually Donald Trump’s words in Cleveland,” she said. “And they should set off alarm bells for all of us.”

Clinton also addressed the uncertain times, of repeated terror attacks and gun violence, and contrasted herself with Trump.

“Imagine him in the Oval Office facing a real crisis,’’ she said. “A man you can bait with a tweet is not a man we can trust with nuclear weapons.”  

That is absolutely frightening coming from her. I'm more worried about a horrific false flag and a woman in the office needing to prove she has balls.

Trump fired off a series of tweets after the convention ended, saying that Clinton won’t live up to her promise of Wall Street reform, doesn’t understand the threats the nation faces from foreign actors, and would hurt working people.

“Hillary’s vision is a borderless world where working people have no power, no jobs, no safety,” he wrote. 

He's on to something there.

During the speech Clinton, who is known for her self-confidence and pride, described herself as somebody who will “sweat the details of policy,” casting her love of diving into the weeds of legislation as a crucial part of being a leader.

“It’s not just a detail if it’s your kid, if it’s your family,” she said. “It’s a big deal. And it should be a big deal to your president.” 

Then you were not out of loop when serving in the administration. 

That means crimes committed.

--more--"

Also see:

Hillary Clinton did what she needed to do
Clinton proves she is the woman ‘in the arena’

Do you REALLY think you can TRUST her?

"Convention focused on fixing Hillary Clinton trust deficit" by Victoria McGrane and Annie Linskey Globe Staff  July 29, 2016

PHILADELPHIA — Clinton has provided abundant reasons for voters to be wary: her decision to use a private e-mail server for her correspondence when she was secretary of state (which she now says was a mistake); accepting millions of dollars on the paid speaking circuit; and failing to disclose foreign donations to her family’s foundation while she was the country’s top diplomat.

That's the top one right there.

In her acceptance speech Thursday, Clinton addressed her image problems subtlely. “The truth is, through all these years of public service, the ‘service’ part has always come easier to me than the ‘public’ part,” Clinton said, before launching into her blue-collar family history and motivations for entering public service. “I get it that some people just don’t know what to make of me.” 

I know what to make of her, and she has nothing to do with the truth.

The candidate’s high-level endorsers acknowledged her shortcomings. “I know Hillary Clinton is not flawless,” said businessman Michael Bloomberg, the independent billionaire who appealed to those outside the Democratic base struggling to pick between two unpopular candidates. “But she is the right choice and the responsible choice in this election.”

See: Clinton Convention Bloom(berg)ing!

Younger Americans “hate Donald Trump with a passion and they love Barack Obama much more than the American population as a whole,” said Democratic pollster Peter Hart, who polled young people’s attitudes toward the election for the The Horatio Alger Association, a nonprofit focused on encouraging young people to pursue higher education. 

Oh, really? 

You think they are still buying after eight years and that crappy college loan deal from Congre$$?

A different man was tapped to appeal to the middle-of-the-road Democrats, Republicans, and independents: centrist Virginia Senator Tim Kaine, Clinton’s pick for vice president. Hart said Kaine attracts women who “are still not convinced” by Clinton.

(Blog editor's eyes went wide, he held palm up to ceiling, and shook head???!!!!)

In Kaine, polls show, they see a man who “has their values,” Hart said. “He’s lived their lives, and you feel the solidity of what he brings.” The folksy, at times just corny running mate played his role to perfection in his speech Wednesday night.

OMG!!!! 

The sports jocks in the morning said he was boring as sh**.

Complicating the job of selling Clinton this week were events that unfolded outside the convention hall. Hacked Democratic National Committee e-mails showed Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s team was rooting for Clinton over Bernie Sanders. Wasserman Schultz never took the stage at the convention and was set to step down from her post when it concluded. But the episode reinforced worries stoked by Sanders supporters, as well as Trump, that the Democratic primary was rigged.

We know; it's party bosses now and no longer a democratic republic.

Then a close Clinton ally and confidante, Governor Terry McAuliffe of Virginia, blew up the carefully crafted script Tuesday, casting serious doubt on Clinton’s opposition to the Trans Pacific Partnership trade accord between the United States and 11 other countries. 

Fortunately, the terrorist didn't anywhere near the place, and this is the first I've seen of the TPP all week!

Opposing the TPP has been a core cause for Democratic liberals. As Secretary of State, Clinton was a booster for the trade deal. After Sanders’ insurgent campaign started to gain traction, she announced she would not support it.

That's it. I've had it with the insults.

“I worry that if we don’t do TPP, at some point China’s going to break the rules. But Hillary understands this,” McAuliffe said in a convention-floor interview with Politico after delivering a speech. “Once the election’s over, and we sit down on trade, people understand a couple things we want to fix on it, but going forward we got to build a global economy.”

Not only did she pick Kaine, but felons have been added to Virginia voting rolls.

The comments drew an immediate response from Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta, who said McAuliffe was “flat wrong.”

It was hardly enough to contain the damage.

“There’s very, very little faith that she’s going to follow through on being anti-TPP,” said Emilie Mitcham, a Sanders delegate from Colorado. “That really feels like something that was just lip service. . . . We will have to see.”

I took it to be just that.

Related: Elizabeth Warren trusts Clinton on TPP

Not only is she a party hack, she is naive at best and disingenuous at worst.

Underscoring those concerns, the US Chamber of Commerce, the home of big business Republicans, had kind words for Kaine, with the organization declaring he has a “great record” on trade issues.

Republican women up above loving Hillary, too!

But in other areas, the Clinton campaign worked hard to build bridges with the Sanders team. The Sanders campaign’s top staff was touched by how Clinton’s organization handled the stagecraft leading into his big speech Monday.

The Sanders campaign had printed up about 1,500 pro-Sanders signs to distribute to their delegates in the convention hall. Then Clinton’s operation asked if they, too, could make up pro-Sanders signs. They produced 10,000. When the Vermont senator took the stage Monday, he was greeted by an ocean of waving “Bernie’’ signs, printed in the Clinton campaign’s font.

The “i” on the signs was even dotted with a bird, a reference to a rally in Portland, Ore., where a finch landed on Sanders’ podium mid-speech and became an iconic moment of hope in his longshot campaign.

It was a small but symbolic gesture, sown in a bid for trust.

Here is my symbolic answer.

--more--"

Why not end things the way they began.

"Antics of Sanders’ backers rankles some black delegates" by Kathleen Ronayne Associated Press  July 29, 2016

PHILADELPHIA — As most Democrats rally around Hillary Clinton, the lingering ‘‘Bernie or Bust’’ movement is stirring frustration at the party’s convention among delegates of color, who say they’re upset at the refusal of the Vermont senator’s most fervent backers to fall in line.

‘‘I am so exhausted by it,’’ said Danielle Adams, a black Clinton delegate from North Carolina. ‘‘I think there are undercuts of privilege that concern me.’’

Adams is among those who say the ‘‘Never Hillary’’ crowd, a group that is largely younger and white, isn’t considering the struggles black Americans still face every day. And, they argue, how the nation’s ethnic and racial minorities may be affected by a Donald Trump presidency.

This after 8 years Obama with all the policies they are complaining about having been set up by President Bill Clinton and Democrat governors and mayors in the 1990s!

They go for Clinton and they bring it on themselves and deserve what they get.

Cheryl Brown, a California delegate from San Bernardino who is black, condemned what she called the aggressive behavior of some Sanders delegates, saying they jumped on tables and shoved people at the state’s hotel the night that Sanders moved that the convention nominate Clinton by acclamation.

Maybe the bros were drunk?

‘‘I think here at the convention, it’s been exacerbated by the way they are treating people,’’ she said. ‘‘I haven’t had that happen with any of the African-American Bernie supporters.’’ 

Are there any?

Representative Elijah Cummings of Maryland, an African-American and close ally of Clinton, was telling the story of his late father — a share-cropper in South Carolina — on the convention’s first day when Sanders supporters started chanting ‘‘No TPP’’ and holding up signs opposing the trade pact.

‘‘It was downright disrespectful,’’ said Kweisi Mfume, a Clinton delegate and former head of the NAACP, who called it a ‘‘a low point’’ of the four-day summer meeting. ‘‘I think it does not necessarily help the relations that Bernie’s people may have with the larger African-American community.’’

Time to form your own party or vote Stein, guys.

To be sure, many black delegates at the convention said they don’t view the ‘‘Bernie or Bust’’ movement through a racial lens. Count Cummings among them. He said that as a veteran of many civil rights protests, he understands the passions that drove the mostly young delegates to shout over his speech.

BUUUUUUT....!

‘‘The optics were not pretty, but I couldn’t be upset with them. Two or three years ago, they would have been outside politics,’’ he said, adding that more than 100 people have since apologized for the outbursts. ‘‘I am so glad these people are under our tent.’’

Others, meanwhile, are frustrated by Sanders backers who contend the nomination was stolen from the Vermont senator. They say those delegates are ignoring the fact Sanders lost the nomination to Clinton, in part, because he didn’t appeal strongly enough to African-American voters.

‘‘They haven’t considered the perspective of minorities,’’ said Kenneth Williams, a black Clinton delegate from Texas. ‘‘I don’t think there was enough there to bridge to that community.’’

Clinton undoubtedly has far more appeal than Sanders among black voters, a critical voting bloc in Democratic primaries. The former secretary of state won more than three out of four black votes in 25 primary states where exit polling was conducted and, by the end of the primary season, she had swept the 15 states with the largest black populations. 

Then why were the exit polls, on average, 13 points off in her favor in most of those states?

‘‘At the end of the day, [Sanders’] coalition looked too much like a modern day Woodstock, and not enough like the Obama coalition it takes to win the primaries and the general,’’ said Boyd Brown, a Democratic National Committeeman from South Carolina who supported former Maryland governor Martin O’Malley.

O'Malley is one of those guys I mentioned above. He was mayor of Baltimore and governor of Maryland, but he never had a chance. He ran as a sacrificial lamb.

Michelle Bryant, a radio talk host in Milwaukee who is attending the convention, said she’s heard similar concerns from some people who call in to her show. She said Clinton has a decades-long history of fighting for racial and economic justice that some Sanders supporters seem willing to dismiss — even as they promote Sanders’ civil rights advocacy.

WHERE? 

HERE?  

The wealth divide has yawned since she and hers has arrived!

‘‘You wouldn’t have expected this stuff to kind of break out along racial lines,’’ Bryant said.

No, you wouldn't; you would expect cla$$, but consider what pre$$ I'm reading!!!

--more--"

Nothing about Panetta being booed, 'eh?

Also see: 

Clinton's Freeway to Philly
Clinton Chooses Kaine
Clinton's Convention
Disunity on Display at Democratic Convention
Ladies Night at the DNC
Clinton Convention Bloom(berg)ing!
Clinton Approved Honduran Coup

Democratic Party Platform 

Let's pick things up there:

"Trump again raises Putin’s leadership, saying it’s better than Obama’s"by Ashley Parker New York Times  July 29, 2016

NEW YORK — Donald Trump tried to walk back, in part, comments he made Wednesday about Russia hacking Clinton’s e-mails — an extraordinary moment in which the Republican nominee basically urged Russia, an adversary, to conduct cyberespionage against a former secretary of state.

“Of course, I’m being sarcastic,” Trump said in the interview taped Wednesday that aired Thursday.

That's the way I took it. 

Sarcasm is all we are left with here.

Some Republicans have stepped forward to defend Trump.

On Thursday, Rudolph Giuliani, the former New York mayor, defended Trump in a radio interview, saying, “The Russians have those e-mails, they’ve had them for some time.”

“If they could get into that DNC server, they owned her server in Poughkeepsie,” Giuliani said. “And not only did they own it, but so did the Russians, possibly the Israelis, maybe a couple of other allies. And by the way, we do the same thing to them so don’t get all upset.” 

WOA, WOA, WOA! 

RUDY, RUDY, RUDY! 

Freudian slip!

In a radio interview with Laura Ingraham on Thursday morning, Ingraham asked Governor Mike Pence of Indiana, Trump’s running mate, “Should Americans be concerned that the Republican nominee is inviting a foreign government to hack into government e-mails?”

Pence, echoing the campaign’s public posture, said several times that Trump was just being “sarcastic” and he sought to reframe Trump’s remarks.

“Well it’s absolutely not what he said,” Pence said. “What he said — what I said — was, clearly if Russia or any foreign country was interfering or intervening or engaging in illegal activity in the United States, in our elections or otherwise, that there be serious consequences.”

Unless it's AIPAC and Zioni$t Jew money. Then not a peep from the pre$$.

--more--"

Time to look forward to the general:

Clinton shows she’s ready to slug it out on the ground

Clinton’s risky embrace of Obama

Oh, puke!

"For Clinton, beating Trump remains in doubt" by Eric Fehrnstrom   June 29, 2016

My new favorite political image is of Hillary Clinton sighing, in a speech at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds. And I don’t mean sighing like you or I might when letting go of a long audible breath to express sadness or relief. But actually reading the word “sigh” off her teleprompter.

It's that scripted, huh?

Now when people ask me if Clinton can blow this election, I have a new story to illustrate my case that, yes, she definitely can. She’s more wooden than a Charlie McCarthy doll.

Here’s another bit of information I like to share: As the Brexit campaign was getting underway last fall, the Remain camp was ahead of Leave, 51-37 percent. On the day that Britons were voting, the Dow closed up 230 points, and the British pound was near its year-to-date high, so confident was the feeling that the United Kingdom would never leave the European Union.

That’s something to keep in mind as Democrats celebrate early polls that show Clinton leading Donald Trump. 

He's actually caught up and is ahead now; there WAS NO CLINTON BOUNCE, but we will be told there was one.

Trump is in better shape at this stage of the race than Vice President George H.W. Bush in 1988, when former governor Michael Dukakis led by 15 points in the polls. Overconfident Dukakis aides spent that summer checking out real estate in Maryland and Virginia, only to see their candidate’s lead evaporate into an eight-point loss on Election Day.

Trump’s problems are well known. Voters don’t think he’s qualified. They don’t trust him with his finger on the button. He lacks the right temperament.

Since wrapping up the nomination, Trump’s campaign has been monstrously inept. Clinton is burying him in fund-raising, with $42 million cash on hand compared to Trump’s $1.3 million at the end of May. The campaign manager position remains vacant following the sacking of Corey Lewandowski. Trump jetted off to Scotland last week to visit one of his golf courses instead of spending time in key battleground states. That he survived an alleged assassination attempt has been a hostile media’s only positive coverage, and that was scarcely mentioned at all.

And yet, the good news for Republicans is that Clinton’s not getting any more popular. Her negatives have never been higher. Sift through recent polling and you find that voters generally believe Trump is a stronger leader, that he’s more honest and trustworthy, that he can handle ISIS better, and that he would be more effective at bringing change to Washington.

Clinton seems paralyzed by the populist forces that gave rise to Trump and Bernie Sanders. When Brexit passed, her instinct was to mock Trump. Trump responded with a speech attacking bad trade deals agreed to by “a leadership class that worships globalism over Americanism.”

This week’s NBC/Wall Street Journal poll showed Trump trailing Clinton, 46-41 percent, a drop of just two points since May. When third-party candidates are included, Trump and Clinton are essentially tied. As pollster Bill McInturff noted, “Donald Trump has had the worst month one can imagine, but Clinton’s negatives are so high the net impact on the ballot is almost invisible.”

Adding to Clinton’s woes is the newly released House report on Benghazi that found she failed, as secretary of state, to act on security risks ahead of the 2012 terror attack that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans in Libya. Still to come are the results of the FBI investigation into the mishandling of classified information related to her unsecure e-mail server.

Is it any wonder that Sanders still refuses to concede?

As unpopular as Trump is, the Democrats are on the verge of nominating someone nearly as unpopular, and that’s the only reason this campaign remains suspenseful at all.

--more--"

Related:

How 2016 could look a lot like Dukakis ‘88

Only if you flip the candidates!  

PFFFFT!!!

In Clinton, Americans don’t trust

So she assails Trump, calls him names, and mark my words will be hollering Supreme Court as a campaign issue (making Scalia's death even more suspicious; what if Trump wins and we get a repeat of 2000?)

The Great Trump Debate 

Had to slip them in somewhere.

Can Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton?

Of course he can, and not only that, he should, but let's a take a look at the electoral map:

"Electoral map is a reality check for Trump’s presidential hopes" by Jonathan Martin and Nate Cohn New York Times  April 02, 2016

That's the NYT's NARRATIVE! 

What would they know about reality?!!

Donald Trump’s presidential candidacy has stunned the Republican Party. But if he survives a late revolt by his rivals and other leaders to become the party’s standard-bearer in the general election, the electoral map now coming into view is positively forbidding.

In recent head-to-head polls with one Democrat whom Trump may face in the fall, Hillary Clinton, he trails in every key state, including Florida and Ohio, despite her soaring unpopularity ratings with swing voters.

In Democratic-leaning states across the Rust Belt, which Trump has vowed to return to the Republican column for the first time in nearly 30 years, his deficit is even worse: Clinton leads him by double digits in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.

Actually, we have a new, fresh set of polls for you. 

All of a sudden, Hillary Clinton and the Democrats need white men!

Trump is so negatively viewed, polls suggest, that he could turn otherwise safe Republican states, usually political afterthoughts because of their strong conservative tilt, into tight contests. In Utah, his deep unpopularity with Mormon voters suggests that a state that has gone Republican every election for a half-century could wind up in play. Republicans there pointed to a much-discussed Deseret News poll last month, showing Clinton with a narrow lead over Trump, to argue that the state would be difficult for him.

Horse-race polls this early are poor predictors of election results, and candidates have turned around public opinion before. And the country’s politics have become so sharply polarized that no major-party contender is likely to come near the 49-state defeats suffered by Democrats in 1972 and 1984.

But without an extraordinary reversal — or the total collapse of whoever becomes his general-election opponent — Trump could be hard-pressed to win more than 200 electoral votes.

That was then, this is now, and the NYT is a joke with egg on its face!

Trump has become unacceptable, perhaps irreversibly so, with broad swaths of Americans, including large majorities of women, people of color, Hispanics, voters under 30, and those with college degrees — the voters who powered President Obama’s two victories and represent the country’s demographic future. All view him unfavorably by a 2-1 ratio, according to a recent New York Times/CBS News poll.

This agenda-pushing rot is LAUGHABLE, and it shreds the credibility the NYT lost years ago!

In some states, Trump has surprised establishment-aligned Republicans with his breadth of support beyond the less-educated men who form his base. Even so, his support in the nominating process, in which some 30 million people may ultimately vote, would be swamped in a general election, when turnout is likely to be four times that.

“We’re talking about somebody who has the passionate devotion of a minority and alternately scares, appalls, angers — or all of the above — a majority of the country,” said Henry Olsen, a conservative analyst. “This isn’t anything but a historic election defeat just waiting to happen.” 

That's CRAZY!

What could ensure a humiliating loss for Trump in November are his troubles with constituencies that have favored Republicans in recent elections. Among independents, a group that Mitt Romney carried even as he lost to Obama in 2012, Trump would begin the fall campaign at a considerable disadvantage: 19 percent have a favorable opinion of him, but 57 percent view him unfavorably, the Times/CBS survey found. Given his loathed standing among Democrats and the possibility that many in his own party would spurn him, Trump would need to invert his numbers among independents to even be competitive in November.

With white women, a bloc Romney easily won even in defeat, Trump is nearly as unpopular: 23 percent view him favorably, while 54 percent have an unfavorable opinion of him. And that was before Trump attacked Senator Ted Cruz’s wife, ridiculed a female reporter against whom Trump’s campaign manager was charged with committing battery, and suggested that women who have abortions should face criminal punishment before reversing himself. 

I'm sick of the MONOLITHIC IDENTITY POLITICS of the DIVISIVE and AGENDA-PUSHING PRE$$. 

SORRY! 

So how many times have the polls been wrong this year?

Trump’s penchant to offend and his household-name celebrity are a potentially lethal combination, as most voters have both firm and deeply negative opinions of him. His incendiary comments about Hispanic people and people with disabilities, and proposals to bar Muslims from entering the United States or to force Mexico to pay for a wall on the southern border, have resounded so widely that half of all voters said they would be scared if he were elected president, according to the Times/CBS poll.

“There is no precedent for this,” said Neil Newhouse, a veteran Republican pollster. “In the modern polling era, since around World War II, there hasn’t been a more unpopular potential presidential nominee than Donald Trump.” 

Except for his opponent!

Stan Greenberg, a longtime Democratic pollster, released a survey Friday summing up Trump’s vulnerabilities under the headline, “Earthquake?” Trump trails Clinton by 23 points among women in Greenberg’s poll, suggesting the possibility of a gender gap of historic proportions. (The Times survey last month had Clinton leading by 20 points among women.) The largest gender gap in the last 36 years was the 11-point loss Bob Dole suffered among women against Bill Clinton in 1996.

Where is the wastepaper basket?

“His gains with men have been neutralized with women,” Greenberg said of Trump. “There’s no play here. The math just doesn’t work.”

Nationally, Clinton leads Trump by about 10 percentage points in most head-to-head polls — the widest margin at this point in a presidential campaign in 16 years.

If Clinton somehow loses the Democratic race — unlikely given her delegate advantage — Trump could fare even worse in a general election against Bernie Sanders, who has higher margins than Clinton in head-to-head polling against Trump in most swing states.

We will never know, will we?

Even among the working-class whites, who have been the foundation of his success in the Republican primaries, Trump would enter the general election with substantial difficulties. He is viewed unfavorably by a majority of whites without college degrees, according to an ABC News/Washington Post poll early last month. 

Then how did he win the primaries? That's supposed to be his base!

C'mon, New York Times! Stop shoveling shit!

It is possible that Trump could improve his standing with blue-collar voters who are crucial in Rust Belt states like Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, where polls now show him faring worse than Romney did in 2012. But doing so would not be cost-free. 

Used to be called Reagan Democrats, and the Clintons give them reason to be again.

“By leaning into white grievance politics, you give back whatever gains you made as you move up the economic scale,” said Liam Donovan, a Republican strategist who has written extensively on Trump’s vulnerabilities. “There just aren’t enough votes left in the places where Trump could be strong, like rural areas, to offset the vote-rich places where Trump repels.”

Or, as Olsen put it, referring to Michigan: “If you bring in 30,000 blue-collar voters from Flint, but you lose 50,000 from suburban Detroit, you’ve not helped yourself very much.”

This losing trade-off has been largely overlooked because of Trump’s success so far and the failure of more affluent Republican primary voters to unite behind any of his rivals.

But the general-election universe is vastly larger and more diverse than the Republican primary electorate. There are likely to be around 30 million votes in this year’s Republican primary once all 56 states and territories finish voting in June. In the 2012 contest between Obama and Romney, about 129 million voters cast ballots.

“You’re talking about a significantly more conservative, partisan, older, and whiter group of voters than the general electorate,” Newhouse said. “It’s like night and day.”

Trump’s hopes rest largely on his energizing a coalition of the disaffected: millions of people who have not voted in recent elections but who have found in Trump someone giving voice to their anger. High primary turnouts have fed speculation that Trump could lure back the so-called missing white voters — populist-minded Americans thought to have skipped the 2012 presidential election, and who, depending on their numbers, offer a glimmer of hope for many conservatives in an era of unfavorable demographic shifts.

But Trump cannot count on such a surge. The actual number of missing white voters is quite low in the closely contested states, where turnout remained high or even rose in 2012.

Moreover, there is scant evidence that white voters who did stay home would be inclined to support Trump. In fact, they were far younger and much more likely to be registered Democrats than the white voters who did turn out, according to the census and data from L2, a nonpartisan voter file vendor.

--more--"

Related:

 "A “Blue Wall” of 18 states, totaling 242 of the 270 electoral votes needed to win, have gone Democratic in the last six presidential elections. This line of thinking could generate a dangerous over-confidence that Clinton will win the presidency. Too many still underestimate Trump’s potential to push past supposed “ceilings” in opinion polls and to draw support from unlikely groups, such as evangelicals. Demographics and regional electoral factors do matter in the general election. But deep and emotional judgments about candidates ultimately drive Americans’ choice of a president.... and  the vast majority of Americans — 71 percent — still think the country is headed in the wrong direction."

Can we see a new map, please?

Trump-Clinton battle could upend electoral map

He wins the Reagan Democrats, and somehow Michigan and Pennsylvania end up red on election night.

Trump, chasing campaign cash, veers from battleground states

He's in North Carolina and not Florida?

"A recent Quinnipiac University poll showed Democrat Hillary Clinton leading Trump by 8 points, 47 percent to 39 percent, confirming what many political operatives were seeing in private polling for campaigns and interest groups. Trump’s problems are largely a matter of demographics."

I'm told Florida may be slipping away from Donald Trump when he's now even in the polls!

Looks like Clinton  takes the early lead and wins Ohio while Trump takes Texas.

Dorchester native is DNC’s technology wizard 

So that is how they intend to steal the election.

If only I could see into the future....

Time to panic; Trump is already planning for the transition.

Looking like a one-term presidency, though, when looking ahead-- this after they revamped the rules for the e$tabli$hment types under Romney!

The Trump Cabinet and VP, and the hypocri$y on the environment has been duly noted. What the pre$$ fails to understand is it doesn't matter if you believe him or not.

"There’s no track record on what it’s like to live in a community governed by Donald Trump. But you can stay in one of the Republican presidential front-runner’s hotels. Hotels have security, borders, and walls to keep out undesirables. Surely staying in a Trump hotel might offer some insight into how he might govern a sovereign nation. To find out, the Globe spent a night at Trump SoHo New York."

Ain't reporting for the pre$$ just one hell of a time, and maybe Trump could keep us safe if he ran the country like his hotels?

*********

And now, a special look at the Trump presidency, brought to you by the Bo$ton Globe:

Trump calls Globe ‘stupid, worthless’

He was referring to their ideas section (even uglier the next week) and editorial!

Let's go around the Cabinet table and see what each one of you thinks: 

"I’ve been a Globe subscriber for decades. I tend to lean right, and sometimes I have difficulty with the liberal slant, but I still consider the Globe a world-class newspaper, far superior to other offerings in New England. I was shocked to see the mock front page in the Sunday Globe imagining life under a Donald Trump presidency. I would expect something like this from a college newspaper or a tabloid, but The Boston Globe? I am not a Trump supporter, and I would feel the same if any other candidate had been targeted in this way. Perhaps you thought this was cute or, even worse, informative. I see it as sophomoric and am embarrassed that my newspaper would stoop to this level." -- Ben Hyde, North Andover

He and I differ regarding the regional flag$hit of a paper.

"I’m disappointed to see you acting like a shock tabloid instead of a serious news institution. If that’s what you want, think about some other political headlines. For Bernie Sanders: “Fed government takes over GE.” For Hillary Clinton: “Clinton Foundation raises $1b in first month of new administration.” For Ted Cruz: “Christianity the official religion of the USA.” -- Gary Conroy, East Harwich

I wasn't disappointed. It's something I expect from them.

"I write to comment on the dire prophesy over what might happen if Donald Trump is elected president, as imagined in your April 10 Ideas section. You presented the headline “Deportations to begin” across a faux front page reflecting how the first few months of a Trump presidency might look. In fact, deportations are already underway, and President Obama has the dubious distinction of deporting more people than were deported under the administration of George W. Bush. In addition, US drones have killed many families in multiple nations — at wedding parties and funeral gatherings — and just a few days ago a tribal elder on his way to resolve a land dispute in Afghanistan reportedly was killed by a drone. As people came out to collect bodies, two additional drone passes were made that killed first responders. These events are already happening, but have been ignored by the media. There are certainly things to be concerned about in regard to Trump — in particular, his affinity for hate speech, which can be used to incite violence against those who are considered “other.” However, it is dishonest to portray him as committing sins that were chosen for the Sunday Ideas section — deportations and killings of families — when these terrible acts have been taking place with little public outcry for some years." -- Thea Paneth, Arlington

I like that person.

"I disagree with the April 10 editorial, which states that it’s the responsibility of the Republican Party to stop Donald Trump (“GOP must stop Trump”). On the contrary, it’s the party’s responsibility to represent the will of the people. This isn’t China. The United States doesn’t have party rule. This year, it’s possible that both the Democratic and Republican nominees will be chosen by party elites because, as the Globe editorial states, “the rules are the rules.” The nominees should be chosen by the people, and not by unelected superdelegates or insider manipulation at a brokered convention. The real problem is that the two-party system is obsolete. More parties are needed to represent the new American diversity and to break the legislative deadlock that is strangling our country." -- John Hughes, Methuen

I second that motion.

"“Stop Trump” is the wrong theme; it will be inevitably seen as thwarting voters (“The GOP must stop Trump”). A better theme is the more general one of stopping a candidate with high disapproval from winning a presidential nomination. For 2016, the only way to do that is a contested convention, but looking beyond that, we need a system that prevents a disapproved candidate from being the front-runner in the first place. The reform of using “approval voting” would accomplish this. Instead of voting for one top choice from as many as 17 candidates, you vote for all candidates that you approve. A candidate such as Trump, with a low ceiling on approval, wouldn’t do well. Our Founders designed an indirect way of electing a president. We’ve moved to a more direct system of voting, but it has a major problem. We need to fix this problem by using approval voting in presidential primaries." -- Michael Segal, Chestnut Hill

We don't have a direct system; it's still the electoral college.

"To suggest, in the editorial “GOP must stop Trump,” that the choice of about 40 percent of the Republican primary electorate — Donald Trump — should be discounted, is one thing. To go on in the final paragraph and say that the choices of as many as 75 percent of these voters — Trump and Ted Cruz — should be set aside is breathtakingly elitist, and undermines everything that went before." -- Jacob Bergman, Lexington 

Looks like the ma$k is at long la$t finally off the Globe.

"I read your satirical edition blasting Donald Trump. I’m fine with it, but I also think it is a great illustration of the lack of balance by the liberal press. Where was your satirical piece on Barack Obama “fundamentally changing America”? How about one of the following headlines: “America downgrades the military and chooses to lead from behind while the Middle East burns” or “Free speech under attack as Obama administration jails climate change deniers” or “America now run by bureaucrats and executive order.” I realize the editorial page department wrote the satire. Your paper would be a lot more valuable if it had more conservative voices on staff." -- Guy Randolph, Savannah, Ga.

Not even that would give it value.

"While you were predicting the future for April 9, 2017, regarding the Trump presidency, at least you could have given us the winning lottery numbers for that day. Ridiculous!" -- Steven Kostegan, Winthrop

You did hit the lottery because here is the Obama satire.

Also see: My Boston Globe fake front page on Hillary

Were Trump to be allowed to win the presidency, he will find a filibustering Senate against him:

"McConnell bids to shelter GOP senators from Trump upheaval" by Erica Werner Associated Press  June 30, 2016

Did you ever think he would coattails, or is McConnell one of the ones who'd be swept out (answer: he is)?

WASHINGTON — Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell is wrestling with an unenviable, arguably impossible task this election year: protecting Senate Republicans from the political upheaval caused by Donald Trump’s presidential candidacy.

If he fails it won’t be for lack of preparation, hard work, and cold-blooded calculation.

In many ways Trump’s polar opposite, the close-mouthed, deliberate, uncharismatic McConnell maneuvered into his dream job as majority leader just last year, and has been working every angle to ensure he hangs onto it even if a backlash against Trump provokes a Democratic tidal wave. If they keep the presidency, Democrats need to pick up four Senate seats to take back the majority.

On Clinton coattails? I don't think so!

For McConnell, 74, avoiding that outcome means running a Senate schedule designed to assist a handful of vulnerable GOP incumbents in states such as Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, and Ohio. He’s allowing them to take votes and stack up accomplishments on issues like opioid addiction that they can brag about to voters back home. ‘‘It’s certainly helped me,’’ said one of those lawmakers, Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin.

ALL INCUMBENTS are VULNERABLE, and they need to be tossed so Trump can get a decent start!

It means having the foresight to push for an independent super PAC run by allies that is focused solely on Senate Republicans, built on a model that helped McConnell himself to a resounding reelection win in Kentucky two years ago. The Senate Leadership Fund, run by his former chief of staff Steven Law, announced this week it was reserving nearly $40 million in air time for the fall in five states.

And it means a delicate dance with Trump, whom he was quick to endorse in May, declaring that Trump had ‘‘won the old-fashioned way — he got more votes than anybody else.’’ The approach was markedly different from that of House Speaker Paul Ryan, whose hesitation before finally backing Trump provoked weeks of headlines on GOP infighting, and private grumbling from some Republicans who thought Ryan should have acted more like McConnell.

Since then McConnell has picked his moments on Trump. This week, in a series of interviews to promote his new memoir, ‘‘The Long Game,’’ McConnell has mostly answered directly and offered frank criticisms, declaring that Trump can’t win without improving his measly fund-raising numbers, needs to stop criticizing people, start reading off a script, and in short behave like a ‘‘serious candidate.’’

The two men have spoken privately on a number of occasions, and McConnell himself notes that Trump has started to become more scripted.

In his new book McConnell recounts overcoming childhood polio with his mother’s help, being ordered by his father to beat up the neighborhood bully, and locking down endorsements from the popular kids to become president of his high school class. Slightly bug-eyed with multiple chins, McConnell has a demeanor that can at times be so staid as to seem comical. His staff is extremely devoted, generally a marker of a lawmaker’s character.

McConnell was personally involved in getting former GOP presidential candidate Marco Rubio to agree to run for reelection to his Senate seat in Florida, urging fellow senators to lean on Rubio, who had pledged repeatedly to retire. Rubio changed his mind, a decision Republicans believe will all but ensure they hang on to his Florida seat. McConnell allies also got involved in the May GOP primary in Indiana to ensure a winner, Representative Todd Young, heavily favored to prevail in the general election.

Allies give McConnell credit for Republicans’ success this year in avoiding self-destructive primaries that resulted in fatally weak candidates for Senate, something that happened repeatedly in 2010 and 2012.

This year, Republicans face a daunting Senate map that has them defending 24 seats, including highly vulnerable incumbents around the country.

Incumbents win 90% of the time we are told.

--more--"

Related: Man arrested for threatening US senators on Twitter

The tweets were not serious threats but satirical and ‘‘it wasn’t him as a real person.’’

So, who will be the next liberal lion in the Senate, and does it even matter?

NDUs:  

The show has already started.

"Trump is hoping women aren’t a lost cause" by Tracy Jan Globe Staff  July 29, 2016

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump plans to deploy the successful businesswoman and mother of three young children to swing states with a special mission: find a way to sell him to independent female voters after months of his harsh rhetoric.

“Ivanka Trump is a great combination of message, messenger, and delivery. You will see her in the swing states speaking to women, both on her own and by his side,” said Kellyanne Conway, a Republican strategist who joined Trump’s campaign this month as a senior adviser and pollster.

But even some Republicans say Ivanka Trump faces a Sisyphean task. Her father’s poll numbers among women are historically bad, although one survey conducted in the days immediately after the Republican National Convention in Cleveland showed improvement. He has picked fights with female TV personalities, belittled women’s appearance and weight, and made a variety of misogynist comments. 

For some it is a strictly gender issue on this; however, sad to say they are selective and hypocritical at times.

Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, captured a wave of positive news when she made history as the country’s first woman to become the presidential nominee of a major political party.

Bill and Chelsea Clinton waxed at length in their Democratic National Convention speeches this week on Hillary Clinton’s specific qualities as a wife, mother, and grandmother. Clinton and her running mate, Tim Kaine, embarked on a bus tour Friday of two crucial swing states, bringing a message of economic empowerment to Pennsylvania and Ohio.

This when the wealth gap has yawned under them and the trade deals sold us out.

“Hillary is not as popular as you would think with women, but by comparison [to Trump], she looks better and better among independent women, soft Democrats, and soft Republicans,” said Katie Packer, a Republican strategist who helped manage Mitt Romney’s 2012 campaign and who ran an anti-Trump super PAC during the primaries.

It's not me talking to myself, it the ma$$ media and pre$$. My hits are at all time highs. 

Well, as long as the elite of Bo$ton are reassured, it's worth it.

A key constituency that could tip the election are white college-educated women, especially in Colorado, North Carolina, Florida, Virginia, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, according to an analysis by William Frey, a demographer and senior fellow at The Brookings Institution. 

I guess you can put those in blue, huh?

“Gender voting will be a key factor in this year’s election,” Frey said. Trump’s strategy so far of relying heavily on the support of white working-class men could fall apart, he said, if white college-educated women turn toward Clinton in large numbers.

Then why did the Globe tell me Hillary Clinton went moderate to win back the new minority voting block, white men? Bill Richardson is out there saying Obama has destroyed the Democratic Party and they need to woo back white men.

Even Ivanka Trump fans who consider her Donald Trump’s most appealing ambassador to millennial women doubt her ability to push them over the line and vote for him.

“I love Ivanka Trump. I follow her on Instagram. I buy her shoes. I wish it were Ivanka running rather than Donald. How could she be his daughter?” said Melissa Richmond, who attended both the Republican and Democratic conventions as vice president of Running Start, a nonpartisan organization that encourages young women to enter politics.

The 29-year-old Republican from the swing state of Virginia said Ivanka Trump’s speech was the highlight of the Republican convention. But, she said, “I don’t think people’s adoration for her will affect their opinion of her dad.”

Ivanka Trump, 34, is a strong force within her father’s campaign and has urged him in the past to soften his tone, to act more presidential. She’s credited with moderating his views on Planned Parenthood, shaping his vocal support for its work in women’s health and not solely focusing on abortion like most conservatives. She reportedly implored him to dump former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, months after he had been charged with battery for grabbing a female reporter’s arm.

Voters can expect to see more of Ivanka Trump in a mix of television, radio, and print interviews as well as campaign ads, in addition to making more personal appearances on the campaign trail, Conway said.

Conway said she could not yet share a schedule for Ivanka Trump’s future appearances or specify in which states the campaign will focus. Ivanka Trump declined a Globe interview request via her representative, citing her busy schedule, but some voters feel Ivanka Trump should not even bother because Donald Trump’s history of misogynistic statements cancels out her appeal to women.

That's good advice. 

He’s called pregnancy an “inconvenience for a business” and “putting a wife to work” a “very dangerous thing.” And Democrats have dredged up a 1997 letter to the editor by his running mate, Indiana Governor Mike Pence, about working mothers stunting children’s emotional growth.

“I don’t know if it’s possible to put that genie back in the bottle,” said Christine Matthews, a Republican consultant from Virginia. “It’s not really fair to put the weight of the Trump campaign’s outreach to women on Ivanka’s shoulders.”

Trump himself asserted during a North Carolina campaign rally Monday that he — and Ivanka — are “doing well with the women.”

Contrary to popular perception, recent polls give Trump some hope in making inroads with women.

A new CNN/ORC poll taken following last week’s Republican National Convention shows 52 percent of registered female voters hold an unfavorable view of Trump, down from 73 percent in March.

That is one hell of a drop! 

His zig-zag convention was seen as real! 

Clinton’s unpopularity in that poll rivaled Trump’s, with 53 percent of female voters holding an unfavorable view of her, but that could very well improve in the wake of her convention.

Oh, I'm sure the ma$$ media narrative will be she surged upwards of 15-20 points coming out, and I don't believe any of their polls anymore. What you do is you take the cited approval rating for some pol or Congre$$ and halve it. That's the real rating. Then you halve the disapproval and add that to the actual disapproval. There is your real mood of the country.

A Pew Survey Center poll taken in June found that 59 percent of women voters say they would support Clinton over Trump, compared with 43 percent of men.

In addition to promoting a feminist agenda in her speech, Ivanka Trump vouched during the Republican convention for her father’s history of hiring and promoting women, paying them equally as men, and supporting mothers within his company.

She said as president, Donald Trump would “change the labor laws” and “focus on making quality child care affordable and accessible for all.”

“He will fight for equal pay for equal work, and I will fight for this, too, right alongside of him,” she said.

Somehow that gets lost in the shuffle, same way him paying women better than the Clinton Foundation workers (except those handful at the top).

At a Democratic National Convention event in Philadelphia this week, Chelsea Clinton (who has maintained a friendship with Ivanka Trump in New York) directly questioned Ivanka Trump’s claims.

“How would your father do that?” Clinton said during a Facebook Live discussion with Glamour magazine. “Given it’s not something he’s spoken about. There are no policies on any of those fronts that you just mentioned on his website. Not last week, not this week.”

The Republican Party platform, passed just days earlier, makes no mention of gender equality when it comes to pay or other women’s rights. In fact, the GOP platform officially opposes the UN Convention on Women’s Rights, along with abortion.

Why does the pre$$ constantly define women by their views on abortion? 

Banks didn't rip them off? Wars haven't affected them?

Conway, who had previously headed a Ted Cruz super PAC before joining Trump’s campaign, said Ivanka Trump’s message resonates with a wide swath of working mothers. “She gave voice and visibility to one of the most gnawing challenges to American families,” Conway said. Conway said Trump will at a later date announce specific policies related to the ideas his daughter has proposed. “That wasn’t her role,” she said. “This will be a priority. She elevated it at his convention as a preview of the solutions and specifics that will be front and center in his administration.”

If he is allowed to even have one, or allowed a honeymoon before other forces opposed start hammering away and obstructing him. 

That is not to say I'm going to endorse all or even any of his proposals and programs. That will be decided when I see them, and what kind of Congre$$ he will have to clear things through.

Let's face it, if he tries to be a dictator like the fear-mongering Chicken Little's, the pre$$ and political puppets they cover will be squawking like mad!

--more--"

At list Hillary cares about the kids (please kindly look away from the stacked corpses accumulated during and after her time as SecofState):

"Tracing Clinton’s brief time in New Bedford" by Stephanie Ebbert Globe Staff  July 30, 2016

Hillary Clinton’s ties to the Children’s Defense Fund continued for years, as she served on its board. But her relationship with its founder — a woman often described as her mentor, Marian Wright Edelman — was severely strained after her husband, President Bill Clinton, enacted a welfare reform package that Edelman loudly protested.

You ladies just forget all about that, forget about the record, forget about policies, forget about everything and just see sex!

The former president also caused problems for his wife in her Democratic primary race in New Bedford.

And will continue to do so.

Bill Clinton appeared at a polling place, shouting through a bullhorn and trying to turn out the vote for his wife.

It's called electioneering, and it's illegal, but as we say with the FBI and the e-mails, the Clinton's are above the law.

The event, which New Bedford’s Mayor Jon Mitchell also attended, caused such a commotion that critics claimed he was getting too close to the polling places and violating state election law.

“It was the talk of the town for a couple of days,” said Mitchell.

Clinton still won New Bedford in the March primary, beating Vermont US Senator Bernie Sanders by 10 points. Eight years ago, she defeated Barack Obama there by 43 points.

That is one hell of a drop in margin.

Her 2016 New Bedford vote nearly tripled the number of votes claimed by the Republican winner, now-GOP nominee Donald J. Trump.

Yeah, we all know Mass. is going to be blue.... right?

The shoutout came as a surprise to Mitchell, who was attending the convention but not expecting the nod.

“I personally cheered louder than when Malcolm Butler intercepted the pass at the Super Bowl,” said Mitchell.... 

Isn't that some sort of sacrilege up here?

--more--"

The Children’s Defense Fund worked on behalf of children with disabilities who were denied the chance to go to school, and I know some teachers that complained about it afterward. Handicapped kids in the classroom essentially. Being big Clinton supporters they don't make the connection. The myths and illusion of female empowerment are more comforting than the realities of cla$$ and betrayal. 

Also see: Disabled Lives Matter 

I'm as guilty as the rest I guess. The pre$$ has channeled me into the racial canal despite my best efforts.

So what's her latest flip-flop?

"FBI probes another hack tied to Russia" by Ellen Nakashima The Washington Post News Service  July 29, 2016

Russian government hackers breached the computers of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, according to individuals familiar with the matter.

The intrusion appeared to be carried out by the same Russian intelligence service that hacked the Democratic National Committee earlier this year, the individuals said.

The FBI is treating the DNC and DCCC breaches as one investigation now, said one person briefed on the matter. At the same time, the bureau is doing a broader probe of Russian hackers targeting political organizations, including the Clinton campaign, the campaign of GOP nominee Donald Trump, and Republican PACs.

The revelation of the DCCC breach came on the same night Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton made her acceptance speech.

‘‘It’s definitely part of a much, much broader campaign that is yet to fully be publicly revealed,’’ said one of the sources, a cybersecurity expert familiar with the matter.

Hackers working for Russia’s military intelligence service, the GRU, were traced to the DCCC intrusion, the sources said. "

They give Clinton a pass for breaking the law (ignorance is no excuse, nor should it be for public officials -- although it's a good argument to throw at the cops like a kid to his parents. But I didn't know!) but are track down the bad Russkies helping Trump, ha-ha-ha. 

Can an administration be any more Nixonian? 

Forget siccing the IRS on political opponents already?

Beyond that, if it turns out to be a self-inflicted false flag for all the reasons mentioned -- taking attention of her server, laying groundwork for stolen election if Trump's win is so overwhelming it can't be denied, demonizing Russia -- they will never catch them. Probably the Jewish mafia in Eastern Europe trying to help Clinton so she can peddle victimization to election.

Also see: 

Reflections on the Schizophrenic unDNC Convention: Scratchy McScreachalot and her Balloons

Scoop Jackson Has Possessed the unDemocratic Party as Hillary Clinton Courts the Neocons for the Win