SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2016

Today’s Good News And Bad News

From Our Local Political Junkie We’ll Call “Cincy Dave”

WILL TRUMP PAY HIS OFFER OF $5 MILLION?
In 2012, The Donald offered to pay 5 million dollars to charity if anyone could prove that Obama was born in the U.S.   Later, he upped the offer to 50 million.  At the time of the original offer, Obama had already released his long-form birth certificate so no one knew what it would take to convince him that Obama was actually born here.  Apparently he has become convinced and said so on Friday.  So the question comes up, “will he pay the 50 million, or even the 5 million to charity?”  Naturally, everyone is holding their breath, because The Donald would never, ever renege on a promise.   Ivana, Marla, or many of the hundreds of contractors, workers, clients, investors or students that he has dealt with in the last 50 years might have other opinions.

BAD NEWS FOR TRUMP – GATES RATES CANDIDATES
Robert Gates, the former Secy. of Defense under both president George W. Bush and Barack Obama said Trump  is “beyond repair.”    While criticizing Hillary for many past missteps, he reserved his harshest words for Trump.  “When it comes to credibility problems, though, Donald Trump is in a league of his own,” said Gates, a Republican who led the Defense Department under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed Friday, adding that electing Trump is “too great a risk for America.”  “The world we confront is too perilous and too complex to have as president a man who believes he, and he alone, has all the answers and has no need to listen to anyone,” Gates wrote. “A thin-skinned, temperamental, shoot-from-the-hip and lip, uninformed commander in chief is too great a risk for America.”  Gates called Trump too “willfully ignorant about the rest of the world” to be commander in chief. He specifically criticized Trump’s plan to build a wall on the US border with Mexico, his call to torture terrorists and kill their family members, and his praise of Russian President Vladmir Putin.  “At least on national security, I believe Mr. Trump is beyond repair. He is stubbornly uninformed about the world and how to lead our country and government, and temperamentally unsuited to lead our men and women in uniform,” Gates wrote. “He is unqualified and unfit to be commander in chief.”   Robert Gates worked for 8 presidents over a 50+ year span. Besides being the Secretary of Defense, he also was Director of the CIA.    Later, Trump sent out a Twitter message:“Never met but never liked dopey Robert Gates. Look at the mess the U.S. is in. Always speaks badly of his many bosses, including Obama.”  Seems that Trump’s first reaction to anyone saying anything that he doesn’t like is to call them names.   Robert Gates is “dopey”?  We can think of a few dopey people but Gates would be last on almost anyone’s list.

GOOD NEWS OR BAD NEWS?
The Donald intentionally started another controversy yesterday and Friday by stating that Hillary’s Secret Service detail should be disarmed.   This ridiculous statement was included with assertions that Hillary wants to abolish the second amendment, which she has said repeatedly that she does not.   However, it has its intended effect, drawing headlines and inciting the gun nuts other associated deplorables.   It is also a good possibility that the whole thing was intended to take attention away from the birth certificate controversy where he came out so badly. 

TRUMP RECEIVED 885 MILLION IN TAX BREAKS
Over the years,  Trump has managed to get NYC officials to give him tax breaks, unavailable to ordinary folks, totaling at least 885 million dollars.   His biggest single jackpot was the Grand Hyatt Hotel, where he has collected 360 million in tax savings for a building that cost only 120 million to build.   Now there’s a guy who knows how to buy off politicians.  Taxes are for little people.  No amount of public money was too small for Trump to  go after either.   After 9/11 he successfully sought and received a grant of $150,000 for a building that he owned near ground zero that he admitted was undamaged in any way.  (More HERE)

PENCE WANTS TO BE CHENEY
Asked in an interview aired on NBC today about which former Vice President he would like to model himself after, VP nominee Mike Pence surprisingly said, “Dick Cheney.”  Although Cheney was a very active VP and believed by a lot of people to be telling George Jr. what to do, at least in the first Bush/Cheney administration, he was not particularly popular.   Cheney left office with a 9% approval rating, which is something that very few politicians aspire to.  Perhaps Pence didn’t know this.   In fact, Cheney was so disliked that he earned the nickname “Darth Cheney” and his late endorsement of John McCain in 2008 was called “The Kiss of Death”.  If Pence really wants to be like Cheney he’d better start chain smoking right away because he’s way behind Cheney on smoking-related heart attacks.

TODAY’S MEANINGLESS POLLS
We have only one new poll today – it’s God’s half-day off.   Trump should hope this one is meaningless because Pa. is critical to him having any chance to win.

— More Good News And Bad News Tomorrow —