THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 2016
Today’s Good News And Bad News
From Our Local Political Junkie We’ll Call “Cincy Dave”

GOOD NEWS FOR HILLARY
After taking three days off to recover from pneumonia, Hillary is supposed to be back on the campaign trail today.  In her absence, the Big Dog did scheduled events on her behalf.  He remains a popular figure, but isn’t quite what he used to be as he is now 70 and almost as old as The Donald.   He apparently still gets around pretty good though because Colin Powell’s hacked emails showed that he thinks old Bill is still [boinking] bimbos.  At his age, the Big Dog probably hopes people think that.

CANDIDATES RELEASE HEALTH DATA
Well, yes and no.   Hillary released a letter from her doctor that said she was in great shape while The Donald made a production out of it, taping a TV show starring himself, of course, and a letter from the doctor who wrote a previous letter saying that he will be the healthiest person ever to be president.   The former letter brought a lot of derision because that would mean that the 70 year-old trump (who would be the oldest president ever) was more healthy than all the presidents who were in their 40s or 50s at the time of election.  If either one has any serious problems, you can bet that they would go to great lengths to conceal them.    Anyway, we know little more about either candidate’s health now than we did before except that they both take medication to control the kinds of problems that old people often have, such as cholesterol, hypothyroidism and such.   Together, these two are the oldest pair ever to run against each other for president.   The only real indication that they are in pretty good health is their ability to keep up a rigorous campaign schedule.

BAD NEWS FOR TRUMP
A Newsweek article claims that Trump’s foreign business ties would upend U.S. National Security.   The article details many of Trumps dealing around the world, including his associations with some pretty unsavory characters.

MELANIA IMMIGRATION
In response to many questions about how and when Melania Trump first came to the U.S.,  she released a letter from her lawyer that said she complied with all immigration laws.  However, no supporting documents were released.  The letter’s timeline of her travels here conflicts with the accounts and recollections of others, so actually, we still have only the Trump organization’s word for any of this.   She claims that she first entered the U.S. in 1996 but her former roommate disputes this.   The Donald had promised that she would hold a news conference to settle the matter but that has never happened.  The State Department handles immigration and her files no doubt still exist, so we wonder if there is anyone in the Hillary campaign that knows anyone in that Department that could verify any of Melania’s story.   Here’s more:

NOT IN MY HOUSE, PASTOR TELLS TRUMP
Trump’s last-minute attempt to win over African-American voters veered off course Wednesday afternoon when the pastor of a historically black church cut him off mid-stump speech, reminding him that he had not been invited there to deliver a political speech. “Hillary Clinton failed on the economy, just like she has failed on foreign policy. Everything she touched didn’t work out, nothing,” Trump told 50 or so people inside Bethel United Methodist Church. The Rev. Faith Green-Timmons, an African-American pastor in this predominantly Democrat city, didn’t want to hear it and stepped in to stop him. “Mr. Trump, I invited you here to thank us for what we’ve done in Flint,” Green-Timmons said as she approached Trump. “Not to give a political speech.” A chastened Trump quickly looked to smooth things over. “OK, that’s good. I’m going to go back onto Flint,” he said, pivoting back to a discussion of the city’s troubles with a lead-contaminated infrastructure that has left its water supply undrinkable. “Flint’s pain is a result of so many different failures.”

Later, Trump reinterpreted the events for Fox News viewers, implying that the pastor was trying to ambush him  “Donald Trump is lashing out against an African-American pastor who interrupted him Wednesday to chide him for campaigning in her Flint, Mich., church” said Fox. “Something was up,” Trump told Fox and Friends on Thurday morning. “I noticed she was so nervous when she introduced me.”   “When

Hillary Clinton had a terrible weekend starting with her criticism of half of Trump’s supporters as “baskets of deplorables” and ended with her fainting spell at the 9-11 memorial.

she got up to introduce me she was so nervous, she was shaking. I said, wow, this is kind of strange. Then she came up. So she had that in mind, there’s no question,” Trump said.   A reporter who covered the event had a completely different recollection of events.  More here:

TRUMP DIVORCE RECORDS
The NYT and others are trying to get Ivana and Donald’s divorce records unsealed to dig for more dirt.  Of course they are both fighting this.  We do know that Ivana once accused The Donald of raping her, but  later softened that, at least in published reports.   We think it is unlikely that a judge will agree to unsealing the records, and even if one did, Trump has enough money to tie it up for years with appeals and stays.  But you never know.

WAS RNC HACKED?
Representative and Homeland Security Chairman Mike McCaul (R, TX) claimed on CNN that the Republican National Committee’s emails were hacked by the Russians, not just the DNC.   Later, after hearing from RNC officials, he took it all back, saying that he misspoke.   There is a very good chance that he was correct the first time, given his position on the Homeland Security Committee and found out from the RNC that they didn’t want the news to come out just yet.   Time will probably tell if he was lying the second time or not. 

TODAY’S MEANINGLESS POLLS
If there is any meaning to today’s Ohio polls, it is bad news for Hillary.   That, along with Florida means that the debates will be all-important for both sides.  The first one is only a week and a half from now.  Only a few days ago we had a poll showing that Hillary was substantially ahead in Ohio.

 — More Good News And Bad News Tomorrow —