THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016
Today’s Good News And Bad News
From Our Local Political Junkie We’ll Call “Cincy Dave”

LAST NIGHT’S DEBATE
The third and final presidential debate is in the history books and it was memorable for several reasons. First off, the candidates actually discussed issues more than in the previous debates, although they traded plenty of insults as well. Once again, Hillary demonstrated her knowledge of issues with detailed answers while The Donald spoke in broad generalities. When he did try to give specifics they were often inaccurate, false or unsubstantiated. The biggest headlines from the night were Trump’s refusal to say that he would accept the results of the election, and his refusal to denounce Russia’s interference in the election, claiming instead that no one really knows who is behind the Wikileaks hacking, in spite of 17 U.S. intelligence agencies saying it was indeed the Russians.

Another memorable moment was when Trump cut in on Hillary, stating “such a nasty woman.” That should really help him with the women’s vote. At times, The Donald looked exactly like his character on Saturday Night Live, frequently interrupting Hillary to interject “false” or “wrong” into her statements. The funniest point of the evening was when Hillary was detailing how Trump mistreats women, taking away their dignity and self-worth and Trump responded, “Nobody has more respect for women than I do – nobody.” That brought a big round of laughs from the audience, who were supposed to remain quiet. SNL’s writers couldn’t have done it any better. Trump is actually doing their work for them.

Of course, both campaigns claimed their candidate won the debate, with Trump making his usual 3 AM Tweet that he won. A CNN/ORC poll after the debate gave the win to Hillary by the score of 52 to 39, so the over-all result was about the same as the first two debates, with Hillary a fairly clear winner. The bottom line is that Trump didn’t help himself and may have even cemented public perception that he is a cartoonish character and not prepared for the top job. Trump’s refusal to say that he would accept the results of the election is bound to dominate conversation for days, and make him look even more like a sore loser. Some people thought it was more important than the entire rest of the debate. Here’s the way one pundit put it: The only thing that really mattered – Talking about anything else except Trump’s refusal to accept the results is very much like the old joke: “Apart from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?” The Washington Post published a complete fact-check article which detailed all the claims made by both candidates and Trump was way ahead in false claims. More here: 

GOOD NEWS FOR HILLARY
America now has over 200 million voters, according to an article in Politico. This is an amazing surge of 33 percent during the last 8 years, with 42 percent of new voters favoring the Democrat Party and 29 percent leaning Republican. This disparity between the parties is even more in favor of Democrats in the swing states, where there has been a big effort to register new voters. One small caveat here – the research was conducted by TargetSmart, a Democrat political data firm, so Republicans can take some comfort from that. 

Rubio Warns GOP
Yesterday, Marco Rubio warned Republicans to stay silent on Wikileaks hacks. He stated, “Further, I want to warn my fellow Republicans who may want to capitalize politically on these leaks: Today it is the Democrats. Tomorrow it could be us,” he said. It sounds like “Little Marco” as Trump called him, has at least half a brain. Ya think he might have his eye on 2020? 

TODAY’S STATE POLLS

We don’t really believe that Hillary is up 5 points in Arizona, but it is possible. If this is true, the election will be a landslide for Hillary.

HEADLINES FOR THE NEXT 18 DAYS
Some cartoonist with a pretty good crystal ball issued the following headlines for the next 18 days, saving newspapers a lot of trouble. It looks pretty accurate to us.

— More Good News And Bad News Tomorrow —