Month: July 2016

Americans Seek Experience in a President

Buck Banks

55% to 41%

Margin by which American voters prefer a president with “experience in how the political system works” over “someone from outside the existing political establishment,” according to a new ABC News/Washington Post poll. Most Democrats want experience, while independents are split and most Republicans prefer an outsider. Key detail: “Among those who prefer experience, moreover, 78% call it extremely or very important to them. Among those who prefer an outsider, fewer, 54%, call it highly important.”

GOP Remains the Whitest of Parties

Buck Banks

18

Number of blacks among the 2,472 delegates at this week’s Republican National Convention, reports the Washington Post: “Although that handful includes some of Trump’s most vociferous backers, the overall lack of ethnic diversity at the convention illustrates one of his greatest challenges: how to court black voters after four decades of controversy over his racial views, including campaign-trail rhetoric that has alienated many minorities.”

Trump Represents a Three-Decade Decline of the GOP

Buck Banks

Trumpism may have parallels in populist, nativist movements abroad, but it is also the culmination of a proud political party’s steady descent into a deeply destructive and dysfunctional state. … While that descent has been underway for a long time, it has accelerated its pace in recent years. We noted four years ago the dysfunction of the Republican Party, arguing that its obstructionism, anti-intellectualism, and attacks on American institutions were making responsible governance impossible. The rise of Trump completes the script, confirming our thesis in explicit fashion.

— Norm Ornstein and Thomas Mann, on Vox.

King: Whites Have Contributed More to Civilization

Buck Banks

This whole business does get a little tired… I would ask you to go back through history and figure out where are these contributions that have been made by these other categories of people that you are talking about, where did any other subgroup of people contribute more to civilization?

— Rep. Steve King (R-IA), challenging MSNBC panelists to name a “subgroup” that contributed more to civilization than white people.

Trump Family’s Latest Crime: Plagiarism

Jon Ponder

It’s the story of the day. In her speech at the Republican Convention last night, Melania Trump plagiarized a section of a speech that Michelle Obama delivered at the Democratic Convention in 2008.

The Trump campaign is responding by denying reality, blaming others for their own mendacity and ineptitude and by trying desperately to make the whole story go away.

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