SATURDAY, JULY 23, 2016
Today’s Good News And Bad News
From Our Local Political Junkie We’ll Call “Cincy Dave”

SOME GOOD NEWS AND BAD NEWS WITH 108 DAYS UNTIL ELECTION DAY
Hillary has chosen Virginia Senator and former Governor Tim Kaine for VP. He is a good choice because he is almost as boring as Mike Pence and hence is not seen as a divisive figure. He has plenty of experience in foreign policy, serving on the Armed Services committee and the senate Foreign Affairs committee. Additionally, he is personally a pro-life Catholic and speaks fluent Spanish. His selection will help Hillary secure Virginia, an Old South State that is trending Blue in recent elections. If they win, the party will not lose a senate seat because his replacement will be named by Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe, a Democrat, who would probably select himself. This was probably a big factor in why she didn’t select our own Senator, Sherrod Brown.

GOOD NEWS FOR TRUMP
As you may have heard, Roger “Jowls” Ailes, chairman and CEO of Fox News, was forced to resign after a sexual harassment lawsuit was filed by former Miss America and Fox personality, Gretchen Carlson. The lovely Megyn and several others also told investigators that they were harassed by Jowls, so that was it for him. No one has a clue as to why he never tried to proposition Judge Jeanine Pirro or Greta Van Susteren. The good news for Trump is that Roger will stay on as an advisor, so that will probably mean the daily memos from him on how to spin the day’s news will continue, as well as the fawning coverage of the Trump Campaign from everyone on Fox.

Good News/Bad News
After Four Days of intense Hillary Bashing in Cleveland, it will soon be time for some Trump Bashing. Hillary bashing will continue but the Democrat Convention opens Monday and they will respond. This is where the fun really begins, with dueling mudslinging. Will Fox News carry the convention in its entirety? We don’t know but it will be interesting to see how “fair and balanced” they are. Don’t expect much of that.

Bad News for Trump
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell yesterday took issue with Donald Trump’s statement that the United States might not help NATO allies if they were attacked. This is not the first time that Trump has made such statements, earlier suggesting that the U.S. might withdraw from NATO. McConnell said: “NATO is the most important military alliance in world history. I want to reassure NATO allies that if any of them get attacked, we’ll be there to defend them.” McConnell and other Senate Republicans are trying to distance themselves from Trump in the expectation that he may go down in flames.

Bad News for Trump
By now, everyone has heard about Ted Cruz’s attempt to undermine Trump’s campaign by making a speech at the convention in which he flat-out refused to endorse Trump. At first glance, that act would appear to hurt Cruz more than Trump. But digging a little deeper, two things are apparent.

First, the Trump campaign had an advance copy of the speech and still let Cruz go on with it. That speaks to the incompetence in the campaign. They could easily have made some excuse to change the schedule and write Cruz out of a speaking role. Perhaps more important was Cruz’s stated reason for not endorsing Trump – He pointed to the smears and insults from Trump to both he and his wife. Trump famously claimed that Cruz’s wife was unattractive and repeatedly called Cruz “lying Ted”. Could it be that some of Trump’s insults have come back to bite him? Maybe that is also the reason Jeb Bush, John Kasich, John McCain, Mitt Romney and others have refused to support Trump. Perhaps Jeb was right when he told Trump in one of the debates that you can’t insult your way into the White House. We will see on Nov. 8th.

Never one to let a feud go, Trump struck back yesterday, reviving the falsehood that Cruz’s father was involved in the JFK assassination. Now that will really help him get support from Cruz fans. Settling scores is something Trump really likes to do.

Good News for Hillary
Three voting rights cases were decided last week in the Courts. In Wisconsin and Texas, Voter ID laws were struck down. In Michigan, a law to prohibit straight ticket voting was overturned. It is well known that the purpose of voter I.D. laws is to suppress voting by the poor, who often don’t have drivers licenses, and such laws have been passed by Republican legislatures in 37 states so far. The Texas ruling won’t make any difference but the Wisconsin and Michigan ones may have some impact.

2012 Campaign Promises Fulfilled?
A number of promises were made to voters during the 2012 campaign. Among them:
Unemployment, which was then over 8% will be brought below 6%
Millions of new jobs will be created
The price of gas will be brought down, to less than $2.50 a gallon
The stock market will boom
All of these things have happened, of course. Unemployment is now below 5%, 9 million jobs have been created, the nationwide average price of a gallon of gas is $2.20, and the Dow has risen more than 40%, to about 18,500. So, Democrats believe Obama delivered on his promises, and then some? Not at all, because these weren’t his promises, they were those of Mitt Romney. Good Job, Mitt!

More Good News And Bad News Tomorrow