Trump Accuses President Obama of Siding with Terrorists, And the News Media Shrugs it Off? That is a new LOW.

What is happening in our country?
The presumptive nominee of one of our major political parties, Donald Trump, following the worst mass shooting in US history in Orlando, has accused President Obama of sympathizing with terrorists.   Amazingly, the reaction to Trump's remarks has been relatively mild.


Trump had, unmistakably, questioned Obama's intentions to combat terrorism and where his loyalties really were.
Trump told FOX earlier this week that Obama "gets it better than anybody understands" and "has something else in mind...There's something going on.  It's inconceivable."  Trump, questioned separately on NBC about what he meant by "something," and he said "...there are people that think maybe he doesn't want to get it.."
Trump added to his remarks on Tuesday when he told a crowd in North Carolina that Obama "was more angry at me than he was at the shooter."  (Obama had harshly and somberly criticized Trump regarding Trump's comments about Orlando).  Trump provided not a single fact to support his accusations against Obama.


For nearly a year, I've been hearing journalists and politicians, on television, marvel at Trump's remarkable capacity to survive after being in one controversy after another of his own making.
I've watched the news media choose to not substantively, rigorously cover many, many of Trump's remarks and actions, thereby allowing  him to march to his current position as presumptive nominee.


Without reviewing Trump's record as a candidate, I believe his accusations against Obama about
siding with terrorists - alone - disqualify him to serve as President.  You simply do NOT make such an accusation unless you have irrefutable facts and the President faces incredibly unique circumstances (historically).
You don't make an accusation of "treason" lightly! 


Yet, we've gotten to such a sick, dysfunctional point that members of our media sit around and chat about how "unusual" and amazing Trump is without doing any tough, truth-seeking reporting on him.  Had they done much better reporting, Trump would have never gotten to the embarrassing position he's in now.


I haven't heard any US senator or representative call for Trump's disqualification based on his allegations vs. Obama.   It seems politicians have the same outlook as cable television media and that is to do nothing but shake their heads and act "surprised" or "amazed" by Trump's outrageousness. 


Trump, clearly - indisputably - is not fit to be President or to receive a nomination from one of our major parties.


Does anyone have the principle, common sense or guts to stand up and say so?


Apparently not - so far.  

Hillary Called Herself a "Moderate," But Blames Sanders for Questioning If She's "Progressive"?

Wow.  I cannot believe how Hillary Clinton so grossly misled the press about the recent campaign "issue" regarding whether she is a "progressive" or not. 


The controversy of whether the "progressive" label should be applied to Clinton reached a new, higher level several days ago when MSNBC reporter Kasie Hunt asked Sanders a
question shortly after he arrived in New Hampshire to campaign before the NH Primary.  Hunt asked Sanders if  he thought Clinton was a "progressive."  Sanders replied, "Some days, yeah...except when she announces that she's a proud moderate.  And then I guess she's not a progressive." 


At that moment, surrounded by media and people, Sanders didn't explain the source of his reference to Clinton saying she was a moderate. (He did this later) Last September, at an event in Columbus, Ohio, Clinton said the following:


"You know, I get accused of being kind of moderate and center," she told the audience at a "Women for Hillary" event.  "I plead guilty"


The remark was viewed then by some as a response to the campaign of Sanders, who was running as more left-leaning than Clinton.  A September 10, 2015 article for CNN said that Clinton "argued at the Columbus event that being in the "center" is a positive, not a negative."
So, a few months ago, Clinton  called herself a "moderate."
Yet, Clinton, in response to Sanders' comment, said she thought it was "a low blow."
Think about it:  Clinton was saying it was a "low blow" for Sanders to refer to how she had
defined herself before an audience in Ohio in September.
That is the clearest definition of deceit.  Clinton was trying, in the most extreme fashion, to badly mislead voters -- create the most false, out-of-context impression possible about the issue in front of her.  Hillary, for the next few days and during the Feb. 4th debate with Sanders, started a whole new, false narrative about what had happened.  She said Sanders was trying to be a "gatekeeper" for what defined a "progressive" and by Sanders' standards, virtually no leading Democrats - from President Obama to the late Paul Wellstone - would be defined as a "progressive."
She made it sound like Sanders himself had initiated the entire discussion of how she labled herself. Hillary is the one who doesn't seem to know what she wants to call herself.  Additionally, her record has often resembled that of a "moderate" more than a liberal or progressive. 
For Hillary, the truth often doesn't matter.  All she seems to care about is her self-interest, which, right now, is warding off Sanders' challenge and winning the White House.
What is truly pathetic is that only a couple of reporters even referred to Clinton's September remark about herself being "a moderate."   And, when Clinton said that Sanders had engaged in "cherry-picking" by citing her remark in September, I didn't hear anyone in the press question or criticize her false characterization. No, in fact, Clinton, in September, appeared to be trying to develop her strategy for competing with Sanders.  She decided, quickly, that she'd try, instead, to compete with Sanders by calling herself a "progressive."
Sanders should have done much more to identify this "deceit" by Clinton.  He should have objected to it and noted how foolish and phony it was for Hillary to complain about something she had brought on  herself.  Sanders' campaign has not been nearly aggressive enough about pointing out to reporters and voters when Clinton is lying or misleading.
Of course, it's not an easy task because Clinton and her campaign have made more and more false or sleazy statements every day. 

Hillary Clinton Lied About Bernie Sanders in Iowa - and Deserves More Criticism for It

Let the record show that Hillary Clinton told a lot of lies, half-truths and distortions about Bernie Sanders in her campaign to win the Iowa caucuses.  (If she wins, her lies might end up making the difference). 
Hillary, of course, was way ahead of Bernie for many months in Iowa, and, then, in January, Bernie gained momentum and eventually caught up to Hillary in the polls.
So, when Hillary suddenly found herself in a real fight, what did she do?
The answer:  She showed her old, true colors.  She began a full-fledged, sleazy, negative campaign against Sanders aimed to deliberately mislead voters and hurt his standing.
Hillary Clinton, in the first state to vote in 2016, was back to her old deceitful habits - which she displayed for much of her 2008 campaign against Barack Obama - and, which she engaged in for her eight years in the White House in the 1990s when she and her husband, then-President Bill Clinton, spent much of their time denying or trying to avoid charges and criticisms associated with various scandals.
Hillary's choice to attack Sanders, and, how she did so, was telling:
Several prominent examples:
*  Hillary kept attacking Sanders for his record on gun control.  She tried to portray him as an opponent of gun safety and a supporter of the NRA.  In essence, she painted him as such an extreme opponent of gun control, one might have thought he was a Republican who had opposed any and all proposed controls on guns control forever.  In fact, while Sanders has had several votes - some many years ago - when he opposed gun control measures, he's had other votes or positions that indicated his support for gun control.  As Sanders said, the NRA has given him a D- rating. 
* Hillary kept saying - falsely - that Sanders wanted to "tear apart" Obamacare.  She tried to characterize his support to move to a single-payer system as a desire to "start all over" in terms of developing a new health care system.  This sweeping, completely inaccurate, baseless fictitious statement was particularly outrageous given that Clinton knew she was alleging large, disturbing things about Sanders that were ridiculously false.
*  Hillary made a very big deal out of a Sanders' remark after Planned Parenthood decided to endorse Hillary.  Sanders, who was disappointed by the endorsement, remarked that Planned Parenthood was "a part of the Establishment."  It was an un-thoughtful quote that didn't seem to represent a rejection of Planned Parenthood, but, rather, some sentiment Sanders had about the endorsement process.
Clinton pounced on it and kept ripping Sanders for his attacking Planned Parenthood.  She painted Sanders as being unsupportive or unfriendly to Planned Parenthood. Sanders has been a longtime supporter of Planned Parenthood.  He later backtracked on his remark and said he knew the "Clinton people will try to spin these things."
*  Sanders said he supported the ongoing talks led by Secretary of State John Kerry to attempt to bring a group of countries together to discuss ideas for resolving the crises impacting Syria.  He said, on at least one occasion, that he thought Iran might be one of the countries included in those talks.
Clinton attacked Sanders for advocating for the inclusion of Iran and went on to discuss how reckless and dangerous a country Iran was.  She seemed to grossly distort Sanders' remarks about Iran and suggesting he was being too positive toward Iran, when, he didn't indicate his overall view of Iran.

I could go on.  Anyone watching the campaign closely noticed that Clinton repeatedly spewed out falsehoods and distortions about Sanders.

What's so disturbing about Hillary's deceit is that the print and television media appeared to do very, very little reporting that illustrated her lies and mis-statements.  So, she used her sleazy approach to win votes and got away with most of it.

What's also upsetting is that Hillary has had a reputation for dishonesty from the beginning of the 2016 campaign until now.  More than half of the American people believe she is dishonest, according to polls.   Yet, despite the media's awareness of Clinton's "problem" with her trustworthiness, most members of the media seemed to disregard or ignore Hillary's dishonesty in her Iowa campaign.

It makes one lose a bit of hope about our political process.  Hillary Clinton, known for her failures in honesty - in 2008 and in the White House - chose to lie again in her first state of the 2016 presidential campaign.  Win or lose in the future, Hillary Clinton lost something important in Iowa, and, that is a chance to be more honest and build the public's trust in her as a candidate.

Hillary Returns to Her Sleazy Campaign Tactics

It's taken quite a while for Hillary Clinton, in her 2016 presidential run, to remind me of her most deceitful, dishonest moments of her 2008 presidential campaign against Barack Obama.
Yet, within the past several days, the "old" Clinton has re-emerged in her Democratic primary battle against Bernie Sanders.  What happened? Sanders, simply, began to catch up to Clinton in a couple of polls in Iowa and closed the gap significantly in a national poll.  The resulting pressure prompted Hillary to begin using her more sleazy approaches, which we saw in 2008.
Yes, Hillary has reasons to be more worried about losing Iowa now.  That would hurt her campaign and embarrass her and remind people of her 2008 experience - when Obama came back and defeated her in the Iowa caucuses.
But....Hillary still has the same huge advantages in her race with Sanders.  She still is very equipped to win Iowa and New Hampshire.  She has far more of a chance to win South Carolina and a host of other states.  She has loads of money, endorsements and the Establishment with her.  Plus, Sanders has to overcome the "small" difficulty of convincing people to vote for him despite his being a Democratic socialist.

So, why has Hillary and her campaign chosen to suddenly distort Sanders' positions and get sleazy?  Why not just rely on Hillary's considerable strengths in debating and describing the differences between her positions and Bernie's?

I don't know.  She doesn't have to do it.  But, consider just a few different ways she's gone after Sanders:  First, she keeps attacking him on his position on gun control.  Now, Clinton, without question, has a stronger anti-gun position than Sanders.  She has been far more outspoken about her concerns about gun violence....but, in recent days, in a number of television interviews, she has tried to paint Sanders as being terrible on gun safety.  One would think - from listening to Hillary - that Sanders was like a Republican opposing any and all gun safety proposals.  That is not at all true.
As Bernie has pointed out, the NRA once gave him a D- for his record.  Yet, Hillary keeps harping on a vote Bernie took in 2005 that concerned the liability of gun manufacturers in the event of hypothetical gun violence.  Sanders voted against it and I have no problem with Hillary criticizing him for it......but, in the midst of her "panic," recently, Hillary has taken all this further.  In an interview, she claimed that Sanders had been "a pretty reliable vote" for the NRA (or in words very close to that)  That remark was simply false and unnecessary. (Sanders called it "mean-spirited.")  And, while Hillary can and should try to distinguish herself from Sanders on gun safety, she should keep their differences in context.  Bernie Sanders is not an NRA "supporter."  He has supported some measures aimed at improving gun safety, including President Obama's recent executive actions. 
Second, Hillary's daughter, Chelsea, was incredibly misleading about Sanders' overall position toward health care.  In remarks to a New Hampshire audience, Chelsea said one false thing after another:
"Sen. Sanders wants to dismantle Obamacare, the CHIP program, dismantle Medicare, and dismantle private insurance," Chelsea said.  "I don't want to empower Republican governors to take away Medicaid, to take away health insurance for low-income and middle-income working Americans.  And I think very much that's what Sen. Sanders' plan would do."
Sanders advocates what he calls a "Medicare for all" plan and wants the country to evolve to using a single-payer system.  That would involve much work and many stages and steps.  Chelsea - and later, Hillary - made it seem that those steps would involve stripping away programs when that is clearly NOT Sanders' intent.

Memo to Chris Matthews: Hillary Was More Than an "Enabler" of Bill Clinton's Infidelities;

Has the truth ever played a smaller role in a presidential campaign than in the current one?

The news media coverage, particularly on television and the Internet, has been overwhelmingly driven by entertainment.  That's why Republican Donald Trump has thrived. Trump "gets" how superficial television coverage has become and he aims to attract attention accordingly.  That's why he's been able to say the most reckless, bigoted, mean, crazy things and keep leading in most polls.
Distortions, half-truths, out-of-context statements and lies have always been a big part of presidential campaigns, but, in 2016, larger falsehoods go uncovered by the press than ever before.  While the Republicans have made, by far, the most misleading statements, I noticed a recent example of distortion - this time on a popular political TV talk show - regarding Democratic frontrunner, Hillary Clinton. 
Chris Matthews on his show, "Hardball," last week, was discussing Trump's recent criticisms of Clinton and her role as her husband, Bill Clinton, engaged in various sexual indiscretions in the past.  Trump had claimed that Hillary had been "an enabler" of Clinton's infidelities.
Matthews said emphatically that he didn't think Hillary had ever been "an enabler," and, he went on to praise how well Hillary had emerged from the Monica Lewinsky episode in the 1990s from the White House.

I know Matthews likes the Clintons, but, I thought, this was ridiculous.  What about in 1992?  Didn't Matthews recall how Hillary had assisted Bill when his entire quest for the presidency was on the line?

I remembered, very clearly, the events of early 1992, when Bill Clinton was campaigning before the New Hampshire Primary.  Suddenly, out of nowhere, came Gennifer Flowers and her allegations that she'd been involved in a 12-year affair with Bill.  Clinton and his campaign staff immediately began aggressively denying Flowers' allegations, which had first appeared in an article in a tabloid newspaper.  "It's cash for trash," said Clinton's top aides, who went on an all-out offensive to
try to destroy Flowers' credibility.

In the instance or two when members of the media spontaneously asked Clinton himself directly about Flowers, he gave the briefest of denials, but, I remember thinking:  "He's not acting like a guy with nothing to worry about."

Then, in a desparate move, the Clintons lined up an appearance on "60 Minutes," immediately following the Super Bowl.

Steve Kroft of "60 Minutes" interviewed both Clintons, and Bill denied Flowers' allegation of a 12-year affair or any affair with Flowers.  He did acknowledge he had "caused pain in my marriage," but avoided volunteering  specifics about his relationship with Flowers or any alleged extramarital affairs.  (Flowers had a press conference the next day and brought excerpts of tape recordings of phone conversations she had had with Bill, including a few vague references to their relationship).  

Hillary, who sat by Bill's side during the "60 Minutes" interview, contributed comments occasionally that backed up, or, supplemented, Bill's account.  At one point, she said she had spoken to two different women (to show her empathy or support) who had been linked to Bill somehow.  At another moment, Hillary said, by what she and Bill had been willing to discuss, they had "gone further than anybody we know of and that's all we're going to say..... and we're going to just leave the ultimate decision up to the American people, " Hillary told Kroft.

Clearly, Hillary's role in this 1992 instance amounted to far more than "enabling." She helped Bill defend himself against explosive allegations at the most important press appearance to do so.  And, by doing so, she helped Bill Clinton lie about Gennifer Flowers.  I say lie because six years later, in a deposition related to the Paula Jones sexual harassment lawsuit vs. Bill Clinton, President Clinton admitted he had had a sexual relationship with Gennifer Flowers. (In the deposition, he stated that he'd had a one-time encounter with Flowers rather than the 12-year-affair she claimed)

His lie in 1992 had helped him become President.  Shortly after the "60 Minutes" appearance, Bill Clinton, though he lost the New Hampshire Primary, called himself "The Comeback Kid" because of his better-than-expected second-place finish, and, a few  months later, Clinton was nominated for President.

I have no idea what Hillary's role has been every time Bill Clinton has faced allegations of infidelities.  There have been many times.  And, I know that Chris Matthews, in his comment last week, seemed to be focusing primarily on Hillary's role during and after the Monica Lewinsky affair.   However, because Trump's labeling Hillary "an enabler" seemed to apply to more than one affair, it seemed to me that Matthews's comments amounted to quite a broad defense of Hillary also.

It's a defense that - when you consider her key role in her husband's 1992 campaign - is badly flawed because it is simply not true.