WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 24, 2016
Today’s Good News And Bad News
From Our Local Political Junkie We’ll Call “Cincy Dave”

GOOD NEWS FOR TRUMP
Republican Party Chairman Reince Preibus says that Trump will take the lead by Labor Day, which is less than 2 weeks away.  He claims that Trump has had a good couple of weeks and the trend will continue. Needless to say, this view differs slightly from what we and just about anyone else thinks about what the Trump campaign has done in the last couple of weeks.  Maybe he knows something that everyone else doesn’t know.   It is his job to be optimistic but putting such a short time frame on catching up does seem to be a pretty big stretch.  We will check back in 13 days to see just how good his crystal ball is.

BAD NEWS FOR TRUMP
People who keep track of Electoral Votes have noted that the Democrat candidate has won the same 18 states plus D.C. in the last 6 presidential elections.   Right now, it looks like this will happen again.  Also, of the swing states, Virginia, Colorado and New Mexico are looking strong for Hillary.   So much so that Hillary has pulled assets out of Virginia and Colorado to concentrate on the other swing states.  Together, all of these add up to 269 of the 270 needed to win.   That means that for Trump to win, he would have to run the table on every other swing state.   That’s a very tall order and leaves no room for error.  He had better hope that there is some really good dirt in those emails.  Maybe Vladimir could help out on this.

BAD NEWS FOR HILLARY
Muckrakers, digging through the latest email dump have discovered to no one’s surprise that donors to the Clinton foundation often wanted to meet with someone important.  If they wanted only a meeting, they usually got it but if they wanted more, they didn’t.  The example given is a person who wanted to bypass the normal visa rules to get an athlete, who had been convicted of a crime, a visa to visit the U.S.   He didn’t get it.

Many people might be shocked that people who donate money often get access to politicians and sometimes much more. The Supreme Court doesn’t think buying only access is such a big deal, and earlier this year overturned the conviction of former Virginia Republican governor Bob McDonnell, who granted access and arranged meetings for donors with state officials. It remains to seen whether Clinton did any more than meet with donors. If that’s all she did, she’s probably safe. If it went beyond that and she took official actions that she wouldn’t have taken otherwise, it will be big trouble.  Of course, her opponents are trying to make the most of everything.

BAD NEWS FOR FOX NEWS
Andrea Tantaros, the former Fox News host who accused Roger Ailes of sexually harassing her has filed a formal lawsuit that implicates other high-level Fox executives and Bill O’Reilly.  Tantaros has been fighting with Fox since she was suspended from the network in April. According to Fox, the suspension was over a contract issue regarding her book. According to Tantaros’ attorney, Judd Burstein, that was an excuse to retaliate against her for filing sexual harassment and hostile-workforce complaints. Now, Tantaros has filed a lawsuit.  The New York Times reports:  “Fox News masquerades as a defender of traditional family values, but behind the scenes, it operates like a sex-fueled, Playboy Mansion-like cult, steeped in intimidation, indecency and misogyny,” Ms. Tantaros’s suit says.  This comes on top of the similar suit filed by former Miss America, Gretchen Carlson, against Fox. Could this be the end of O’Really?  He once paid millions to settle a sexual harassment suit from one of his assistants.  Interestingly, Tantaros and almost every female talking head on Fox has essentially claimed that campus rape doesn’t happen and that workplace harassment is non-existent.  Looks like the shoe is on the other foot now, in more ways than one.

“I AM NOT A RACIST”
One way for Trump to turn around his campaign is to convince a lot of people that, in spite of all his hateful talk in the past year, he is not a racist.  To win, he has to get at least a small chunk of the black vote and the Hispanic vote.   Moreover, there’s a lot of white voters who don’t like racism either that might otherwise vote for him.   It’s a good plan but it  may be a little too late – his reputation may not be fixable, at least in the short time left to him.   

“I AM NOT A HOOKER”
Melania Trump is threatening to sue everyone that even mentions the fact that people in Europe are saying that she was a high priced call girl in her younger days, before meeting Daddy Warbucks.  Her lawyer, Charles Harder (we aren’t making this up) is sending threatening letters to media everywhere.   We were wondering if she will also sue us if we point out some other obvious things, such as that, during her last cosmetic surgery, the surgeon yanked the corners of her eyes over the tops of her ears?   Well, either that or he sewed them shut and then opened the lids with a box cutter, sorta like Rocky Balboa.  Well, that’s being too mean.   She may just be an ambitious lady who came from a poor background and lied a lot on her resume’, visa application, citizenship papers, about her education, speech writing and the reason she married the Donald.  Other than that, she could be an honest woman.  Ironically, First Ladies and potential First Ladies were off-limits to opposition and media criticism before Hillary became First Lady.  It’s funny how some things come back to bite you.

TRUMP QUADRUPLES THE RENT

In his Federal Election filings, the Huffing and Puffington Post has discovered that Trump has jacked up his campaign’s Trump Tower rent now that someone else is paying for it.  He seemingly never misses a chance to make money, even from his own campaign.  

OBAMA PLAYS GOLF WHILE CALIFORNIA BURNS
Obama sure likes his golf –  he has played more golf than any president since Eisenhower.  Best estimates are that he has played about 260 rounds since taking office, or about 34 rounds per year.    Compared with Ike though, he has hardly played at all –  Ike got in 800 rounds during his 8 years, an average of three times as much as Obama, and he had a lot of time off with a heart attack, bowel surgery and a stroke while in office.  But the all-time biggest golfing president was Woodrow Wilson, who reportedly played 1200 rounds of golf.  This is even more remarkable because he was severely disabled from a stroke for the last couple of years.  With less than 5 months to go, Obama is on track to finish with a mere 275 rounds, which won’t even come close to Ike’s record and certainly won’t make the Hall of Fame for presidential golfers   We expect both Ike’s and Wilson’s records will stand forever.  By the way, Ike averaged scores in the low 80s.  We have no info on Obama’s scores.

TODAY’S MEANINGLESS POLLS
One reason that we call these polls meaningless is that they are often way off.  Today’s Florida poll is an example of that.  Hillary may be ahead in Florida but it is much, much closer than 14 points.  You can bet on that.

— More Good News And Bad News Tomorrow —