Month: August 2016
GOP Insiders Don’t Think Trump Campaign Shakeup Will Help
1/3
Of Republican members of the Politico Caucus — a panel of activists, strategists and operatives in 11 key battleground states — believe Trump’s reshuffling will move the campaign in the right direction. Just as many, 31 percent, say the installation of Breitbart News executive Stephen Bannon as campaign CEO and pollster Kellyanne Conway as campaign manager, represent a turn for the worse.
Trump Can’t Stop Lying about Opposing the Iraq War
In his speech on terrorism last week Donald Trump repeated the lie that he opposed the Bush-Cheney invasion of Iraq in 2003.
“I was an opponent of the Iraq War from the beginning – a major difference between me and my opponent,” Trump said, reading prepared remarks from a teleprompter.”Though I was a private citizen,whose personal opinions on such matters were really not sought,I nonetheless publicly expressed my private doubts about the invasion. I was against it, believe me. Three months before the invasion I said, in an interview with Neil Cavuto, to whom I offer my best wishes for a speedy recovery, that quote, perhaps we shouldn’t be doing it yet and that the economy is a much bigger problem.”
Factcheck.org, the rigorously nonpartisan fact checking organization, says this statement is not true:
Republicans Need a New Drunk Guy
“You can keep moving people in and out of the car, but so long as the drunk guy is driving it while blindfolded, the ride probably isn’t going to get any smoother.”
— Anonymous Virginia Republican member of the Politico Caucus, “a panel of activists, strategists and operatives in 11 key battleground states,” commenting on Donald Trump’s latest campaign staff overhaul.
Oodles of Rubles
Paul Manafort’s tenure as Trump’s guy is done.
His departure will go unmourned by anyone.
We can’t express joy
That he’s unemployed,
Because we know he still has his Russian slush fund.
Trump’s First TV Ad Shows No Sign of a Pivot
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mKzYPt0Bu4
Florida Is a State, Not a Place
On his blog, Steve Shale, a veteran of decades of Florida politics, nails why Florida is a battleground state in this presidential election and why it’s especially problematic for pollsters and political insiders this year:
Most states are places. Think about Texas, or even a state like Iowa, there is a sense of place to it, a commonality of experience – or as marketers might say, almost a brand. Most states have it. Florida really doesn’t.”
“Florida isn’t a place in the same sense. It is a political circle, drawing 20 million people from vast, and I mean vast experiences and cultures into one spot. And almost everyone here has come from somewhere else.”
“Florida is the new Ellis Island, except our ships come as cars and planes, from inside the borders of the country, and outside. Over the next 15 years, we might add as many as 5 million more residents, grow to as much as 30% Hispanic, with a total population of well more than 50% coming from what are typically considered ethnic minorities.
