The Ledes

Thursday, September 19, 2024

New York Times: “A body believed to be of the suspect in a Kentucky highway shooting that left five people seriously injured this month was found on Wednesday, the authorities said, ending a manhunt that stretched into a second week and set the local community on edge. The Kentucky State Police commissioner, Phillip Burnett Jr., said in a Wednesday night news conference that at approximately 3:30 p.m., two troopers and two civilians found an unidentified body in the brush behind the highway exit where the shooting occurred.... The police have identified the suspect of the shooting as Joseph A. Couch, 32. They said that on Sept. 7, Mr. Couch perched on a cliff overlooking Interstate 75 about eight miles north of London, Ky., and opened fire. One of the wounded was shot in the face, and another was shot in the chest. A dozen vehicles were riddled with gunfire.”

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The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

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Publisher & Editor: Marie Burns


Wednesday
Oct122016

The Commentariat -- October 13, 2016

Afternoon Update:

Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "Donald J. Trump pushed back aggressively on Thursday against what he called 'false smears' from women who claimed unwanted advances, seeking to stabilize his campaign as Michelle Obama declared 'it doesn't matter what party you belong to, no woman deserves to be treated this way.'... In a series of messages posted on Twitter on Thursday morning, Mr. Trump said that the article in The Times was a 'total fabrication' and denied the incident described by Natasha Stoynoff, a former writer for People, who said that Mr. Trump had forced his tongue down her throat while she was working on an assignment for the magazine about his first anniversary with his wife, Melania." -- CW ...

... Greg Sargent: "Michelle Obama is a tremendously popular public figure, who is probably better positioned than anyone else in the country to make this particular case. And that's what makes this a seminal, defining moment.... If Trump has a capacity for basic and sustained public decency, it has yet to make its appearance. And now we really seem to have crossed a point of no return. Michelle Obama marked it down. No going back":

"Ladies..., Grow Up." Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "Trump's top supporters, many of them middle-aged or older men, have tried to explain away Trump's behavior in terms that range from puzzling to offensive -- angering people in both parties and complicating the Republican nominee's attempts to move past the controversies.... Some, including former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, have described Trump's comments on the video as typical male behavior in general. Others are also attempting to discredit the women accusing Trump of assault. And some of Trump's male supporters seem more than willing to lecture women on how they should put up with sexist talk. 'Ladies out there, this is what guys talk about when you're not around. So if you're offended by it, grow up. Okay?' actor Scott Baio said on Fox News." -- CW

** Ian Millhiser of Think Progress: NYT lawyer to DJT lawyer: Trump has no reputation to protect. -- CW

"Last week Megyn Kelly of Fox "News" complained, "Donald Trump ... will go on Hannity and pretty much only Hannity and will not venture out to the unsafe spaces these days." Not Any More. Brian Stelter of CNN: "On Thursday morning, [Trump] canceled on his friend Sean Hannity.... He had been scheduled to appear on Hannity's Fox News show Thursday night. He backed out around 11:30 a.m. ET. Hannity is still set to interview the four Clinton critics who appeared with Trump at a pre-debate photo op on Sunday: Kathy Shelton, Paula Jones, Kathleen Willey, and Juanita Broaddrick." -- CW

Hallie Jackson & Alex Johnson of NBC News have new details on Donald Trump's (alleged) sexually aggressive behavior against Temple Taggart McDowell in 1997, when (then Taggert) was a 21-year-old beauty pageant contestant representing Utah. -- CW

David Wright of CNN: "Barbara Res worked for Donald Trump for 18 years as a construction executive, and asked Thursday if she believed the allegations of sexual misconduct and assault against him, she was frank. 'I do believe it. Yes, absolutely,' Res told CNN's Alisyn Camerota in an interview on 'New Day.' 'He's a blatant sexist.' 'I saw him be aggressive in business, and throw his weight around and use the fact that he had power. And I think sexual assault and sexual harassment are really about the abuse of power -- "I can do this to you because I am who I am" -- I do think it went to his head. So much else went to his head that it does make sense to me that he would do something like that,' Res, who is supporting Hillary Clinton for president." -- CW

Michael Grynbaum & Rachel Abrams of the New York Times: "Mark Burnett, the reality-show auteur whose 'Apprentice' series catapulted Donald J. Trump to national stardom, issued a forceful denunciation of Mr. Trump's presidential bid on Wednesday evening, saying he rejected 'the hatred, division and misogyny that has been a very unfortunate part of his campaign.' The statement capped an unusually challenging few days for Mr. Burnett..., who has faced growing demands that he release footage from the 'Apprentice' set that some former crew members say could reveal Mr. Trump acting in vulgar and offensive ways." -- CW

AND I suppose I should post this, the contrast with reality being so stark. Thanks to Whyte O. for the link:

Myles Ma of NJ.com. "Enough probable cause exists for a citizen's official misconduct complaint against Gov. Chris Christie to move forward in connection with the governor's alleged failure to stop politically-motivated lane closures at the George Washington Bridge in 2013, a judge in Bergen County ruled Thursday. The complaint by Bill Brennan, a retired Teaneck firefighter and citizen activist, alleges that Christie knew of the closures while they were happening and should have halted them. He alleges that inaction constitutes second-degree official misconduct, a charge punishable by five to 10 years in prison. 'I'm satisfied that there's probable cause to believe that an event of official misconduct was caused by Gov. Christie,' Municipal Presiding Judge Roy McGeady said. 'I'm going to issue the summons.'" ...Akhilleus

Trump Apologizes! Molly O'Toole of Foreign Policy. "The list of women accusing the Republican presidential nominee of sexual assault is growing, along with Republican leaders and voters who have abandoned his presidential campaign. [Donald] Trump's answer: Apologize --  but to Serbians, for the U.S.-led air campaign in the Balkans in the 1990s that helped stave off potential civilian slaughter in Kosovo...'The bombing of Serbs, who were our allies in both world wars, was a big mistake,' Trump told the Serbian weekly magazine Nedeljnik in an article published on its website Thursday. He promised 'a new policy with the Balkans,' though he didn't specify what it would look like. 'Serbians are very good people,' he said. 'Unfortunately, the [Bill] Clinton administration caused them a lot of harm, but also throughout the Balkans, which they made a mess out of.'" ... ... Akhilleus: The interview, which Trump now claims never took place (funny because it's a cover story on the magazine and appears on their website), bears all the hallmarks of Russian propaganda. Trump's main point in apologizing, apparently, is that the US led bombing stopped those nice Serbian ethnic cleansers, the war criminals Slobodan Milosevic and Radovan Karadzic, from murdering even more Muslims. The idea! But apologize for sexual assault? Never!

Presidential Race

Washington Post Editors: "IN THE gloom and ugliness of this political season, one encouraging truth is often overlooked: There is a well-qualified, well-prepared candidate on the ballot. Hillary Clinton has the potential to be an excellent president of the United States, and we endorse her without hesitation." -- CW ...

Anne Gearan of the Washington Post: "Hillary Clinton denounced 'scorched earth' tactics by Republicans on Wednesday, saying Democrats must not allow themselves to turn away from the election in disgust. Those tactics have recently included protesters accusing former president Bill Clinton of rape. Clinton's campaign appearances were interrupted two days in a row this week by people shouting while holding or wearing T-shirts that brand her husband a rapist." -- CW ...

... CW: They weren't really protesters. They were entrepreneurs. Or something. ...

... Alastair Jamieson & Frank Thorp of NBC News: "Multiple hecklers shouting 'Bill Clinton is a rapist' interrupted President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton at separate rallies after a pro-Donald Trump radio host offered a cash reward to anyone carrying out such a stunt. Three separate protesters disrupted Hillary Clinton's election campaign rally with Al Gore in Miami, while three others -- including two wearing 'Bill Clinton rapist' T-shirts -- cut into Obama as he addressed a crowd in North Carolina.... Alex Jones, the conspiracy theorist and right-wing radio host who founded the Infowars website..., on Friday offered $1,000 to supporters pictured on television for at least five seconds wearing a 'Bill Clinton rape' T-shirt and $5,000 to anyone who can be heard shouting 'Bill Clinton is a rapist' while wearing such a garment. Jones, who believes the Sandy Hook shootings were a hoax, also says Obama and Hillary Clinton are demons who smell like sulfur." See also Sam Reisman's post, linked below, on Eric Trump's fake news tweet. -- CW

Politico: "Hillary Clinton's campaign escalated its response Wednesday to WikiLeaks' ongoing publication of hacked emails from John Podesta.... 'It is also now clear that the illegal hack of John Podesta's email is the work of the Russian government, according to the FBI,' campaign spokesman Glen Caplin said in a statement issued after Roger Stone, a longtime Trump confidant, told NBC News that he was in touch with WikiLeaks through a 'mutual friend' of founder Julian Assange.... 'I have a back-channel communications with WikiLeaks,' Stone said. 'But they certainly don't clear or tell me in advance what they're going to do.'... On Tuesday, Podesta directed reporters to an Aug. 21 tweet by Stone that he said showed 'advance warning' of the hack. 'Trust me, it will soon the Podesta's time in the barrel,' Stone tweeted.... 'We did not deny this,' Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said of the hacking allegations in an interview with CNN on Wednesday. But, he ad[d]ed, 'They did not prove it.'" -- CW ...

... WYSIWYG. Russell Berman of the Atlantic: "... the leak of thousands of hacked email exchanges among [Hillary] Clinton's top advisers ... capture a candidate, and a campaign, that seems in private exactly as cautious, calculating, and politically flexible as they appeared to be in public.... The emails made public by WikiLeaks reveal little about her as a person. These were hacked from the accounts of John Podesta, her campaign chairman, and very few of them are from Clinton herself." -- CW ...

... Josh Gerstein of Politico: "The FBI is reacting to the hacking of Hillary Clinton campaign chair John Podesta's emails by re-issuing a broadly-worded statement about cyber threats to those active in American politics.... The statement ... is identical to one the law enforcement agency issued on July 29 in response to reports of hacking into systems run by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.... However, as the reports of hacking spread across the Democratic establishment, FBI officials decided not to publicly confirm or deny each new hacking victim." -- CW ...

... See also "The WikiLinks Strategy" report by the New York Times, linked below.

... Washington Post Editors: "... Donald Trump, is, as we have written, 'uniquely unqualified to serve as president, in experience and temperament.' Below is just a sampling of his many erroneous, malicious and ignorant comments since he launched his campaign in June 2015, along with commentary from Post Opinions writers and The Post editorial board." -- CW

CW: To those of you who doubted predictions here that Donald Trump would go nuts before the election (or as Charles Blow puts it in today's NYT, "a maladroit savage spiraling out of control"), read on:

Sean Sullivan of the Washington Post: "Four women accused Donald Trump of groping or kissing them without their consent in news reports published Wednesday, just days after the Republican presidential nominee insisted in a debate that he had never engaged in such behavior.... Separately, CBS News on Wednesday reported 1992 footage filmed for 'Entertainment Tonight' in which Trump is heard commenting about a young girl, 'I'm going to be dating her in ten years.' Also Wednesday, Rolling Stone published a story that included the allegations of Cassandra Searles, Miss Washington 2013.... Searles wrote, 'He probably doesn't want me telling the story about that time he continually grabbed my ass and invited me to his hotel room.'... Early Thursday morning, Trump's campaign released a letter from attorney Marc E. Kasowitz demanding a retraction from the Times." -- CW

Meghan Twohey & Michael Barbaro of the New York Times: "More than three decades ago, when she was a traveling businesswoman..., [Jessica] Leeds said, she sat beside Mr. Trump in the first-class cabin of a flight to New York. They had never met before. About 45 minutes after takeoff, she recalled, Mr. Trump lifted the armrest and began to touch her. According to Ms. Leeds, Mr. Trump grabbed her breasts and tried to put his hand up her skirt. 'He was like an octopus,' she said. 'His hands were everywhere.' She fled to the back of the plane. 'It was an assault,' she said....

     ... [Rachel] Crooks was a 22-year-old receptionist at Bayrock Group, a real estate investment and development company in Trump Tower in Manhattan, when she encountered Mr. Trump outside an elevator in the building one morning in 2005.... They shook hands, but Mr. Trump would not let go, she said. Instead, he began kissing her cheeks. Then, she said, he 'kissed me directly on the mouth.'... Their accounts echo those of other women who have previously come forward....

     ... In a phone interview on Tuesday night, a highly agitated Mr. Trump denied every one of the women's claims.... He said that The Times was making up the allegations to hurt him and that he would sue the news organization if it reported them. 'You are a disgusting human being,' he told the reporter as she questioned him about the women's claims." -- CW

When you're a star they let you do it. You can do anything. -- Donald Trump to Billy Bush, 2005

Joe Capozzi of the Palm Beach Post: Mindy "McGillivray, 36, said she was groped by Trump at Mar-a-Lago 13 years ago. She said she never reported it to authorities. But her companion that day, photographer Ken Davidoff, vividly remembers when McGillivray pulled him aside moments after the alleged incident and told him, 'Donald just grabbed my ass!'... According to Davidoff, it was Jan. 24, 2003, when he and his father, the late Palm Beach society photographer Bob Davidoff, took photos at Mar-a-Lago during a concert by Ray Charles.... Ken Davidoff said he brought his friend McGillivray to help him during the concert.... After the show, Davidoff and McGillivray were standing in a pavilion behind the main house in the middle of a group of people.... To McGillivray's immediate right was Trump and his fiancée, Melania.... 'All of a sudden I felt a grab, a little nudge.... I turn around and there's Donald. He sort of looked away quickly. I quickly turned back, facing Ray Charles, and I'm stunned.... It was pretty close to the center of my butt. I was startled. I jumped.' Later, near a restroom, Trump began flirting with McGillivray, but Melania interrupted them. -- CW

Natasha Stoynoff of People: "'Just for the record,' Anderson Cooper asked Donald Trump, during the presidential debate last Sunday, 'are you saying ... that you did not actually kiss women without (their) consent?' 'I have not,' Trump insisted. I remember it differently.... In December 2005, around the time Trump had his now infamous conversation with Billy Bush, I traveled to Mar-a-Lago to interview the couple for a first-wedding-anniversary feature story.... When we took a break for the then-very-pregnant Melania to go upstairs and change wardrobe for more photos, Donald wanted to show me around the mansion. There was one 'tremendous' room in particular, he said, that I just had to see. We walked into that room alone, and Trump shut the door behind us. I turned around, and within seconds he was pushing me against the wall and forcing his tongue down my throat." Please read on. -- CW

Molly Redden of the Guardian: "Donald Trump deliberately walked in on two young Miss USA 2001 contestants while they were naked and getting dressed for a rehearsal, one of the former beauty contestants has claimed in an interview with the Guardian.... Just before he entered, the former contestant said, she heard the security detail outside the dressing room tell someone approaching the door that the women inside were naked. 'Mr Trump just barged right in, didn't say anything, stood there and stared at us,' she recalled. Trump's attitude, she said, seemed to be: 'I can do this because I can.'... The woman -- who did not wish to be identified -- is the second competitor from the 2001 Miss USA pageant to claim that Trump took advantage of owning the pageant, which he broadcast on NBC, in order to view the contestants naked.... The other 2001 beauty contestant to accuse Trump of misconduct was Tasha Dixon." -- CW

Tessa Stuart of Rolling Stone provides some "'highlights' from Trump's storied history as a [beauty] pageant creep." -- CW

CW: There must be hundreds of women who have similar true stories to tell. Any politician who endorses Donald Trump, anyone who votes for him, is condoning, supporting & encouraging unchecked violence against women. An extra-special shoutout to those "Towers of Jello" -- story linked below -- who endorsed Trump, then unendorsed him because they were so "shocked" by the Trump-Bush tape, then re-endorsed him because they thought it would help their sorry political careers. How many of these geniuses figured no women would out Trump in the coming days? And let's hear from Gov. mike christian-family-man pence.

CW P.S.: We all owe thanks to these brave women for coming forward to describe how Donald Trump abused & humiliated them. I'm sure they know Trump & his supporters will do their best to further demean them. We all know it takes guts to stand up to bullies. It takes a lot of guts to do it on a national stage.

Greg Sargent: Donald Trump "is threatening to sue the New York Times for its story quoting two of the women, and his lawyers are charging the paper with recklessly providing those out to smear Trump with 'a platform.' It's almost as if Donald Trump thinks you are too stupid to remember that only a few days ago, he literally tried to provide a platform for Bill Clinton's accusers, when he attempted to parade them into his family box at Sunday's debate, in hopes of creating a great confrontation before an audience of tens of millions, only to see his plot thwarted by the debate organizers." CW: And of course Trump did provide a platform for the women shortly before the debate in a feint he described as "debate preparation." Now, of course, he's complaining that the debates are "rigged" (story linked below). Did we mention Bill isn't running for president?

By Driftglass. Multiple applications today.Ben Kamisar of the Hill: "One day after warning the GOP that his 'shackles' are off..., Donald Trump floated the prospect of a 'sinister deal' preventing Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) from coming to his defense. Trump at a Florida rally on Wednesday questioned why Ryan, who effectively conceded Trump's White House chances during a call with lawmakers this week, wouldn't come out and congratulate him after Sunday's presidential debate....'"You'd think they'd say, "Great going, Don. Let's go, let's beat this crook...." No, he doesn't do that. There's a whole deal going on. We're going to figure it out. I always figure things out. There's a whole sinister deal.'" -- CW

Adam Raymond of New York: "Donald Trump blasted the Commission for Presidential Debates on Wednesday, claiming the bipartisan group is 'rigged' and declaring himself 'done' with it. 'The head guy worked for Bill Clinton. Ay yai yai. What a rigged deal this is,' Trump said at a rally in Florida. He was referring to CPD co-chair Mike McCurry, who served as Clinton's press secretary.... What Trump did not mention is that McCurry's co-chair is Frank Fahrenkopf, chairman of the Republican National Committee while Ronald Reagan was president. Trump went on to suggest that he might skip the third debate, scheduled for October 19 in Las Vegas.... Trump spokesperson Jason Miller told the Daily Beast's Olivia Nuzzi that Trump does, in fact, plan to participate in the third debate." -- CW

Hillary Clinton 'lost as much as $6 billion in taxpayer money while she was running the State Department. Now, some people say it was misplaced. Oh, billions of dollars misplaced.' -- Donald Trump, remarks in Panama City, Fla., Oct. 11

The $6 billion was not lost or misplaced; it's that $6 billion in contracts had missing paperwork. On top of that, the majority of contracts with missing or incomplete paperwork stemmed from the Bush administration, before Clinton became secretary of state. So it's ridiculous to claim Clinton was in anyway responsible for the problems with the contracts. The only thing 'lost' in Trump's statement is reality. -- Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post

The WikiLeaks Strategy. Patrick Healy, et al., of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump is suddenly embracing an unlikely ally: The document-spilling group WikiLeaks, which Republicans denounced when it published classified State Department cables and Pentagon secrets about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.... Mr. Trump, his advisers, and many of his supporters are increasingly seizing on a trove of embarrassing emails from Hillary Clinton's campaign that WikiLeaks has been publishing -- and that American intelligence agencies said on Friday came largely from Russian intelligence agencies, with the authorization of 'Russia's senior-most officials.' The Trump campaign's willingness to use WikiLeaks is an extraordinary turnabout after years of bipartisan criticism of the organization and its leader, Julian Assange, for past disclosures of American national security intelligence and other confidential information. The accusation that Russian agents are now playing an almost-daily role in helping fuel Mr. Trump's latest political attacks on Mrs. Clinton raises far greater concerns, though, about foreign interference in a presidential election." -- CW

The Sore Loser Strategy. Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker: "Trump is either victorious or victimized, but never a loser. This week marked the end of Trump trying to actually win, and the beginning of him plotting to explain why the election was stolen." -- CW ...

... The Denial Strategy. Brian Stelter of CNN: "With Hillary Clinton extending her lead nationwide and in key battleground states, Trump is toying with what might be called 'poll denialism.'... ;Even the polls are crooked,' he said at a Monday night rally, expressing disbelief that he is losing to Clinton in Pennsylvania. 'Look, we're in a rigged system.'... On Tuesday when Bill O'Reilly told him that 'you're behind with women,' Trump responded, 'I'm not sure I believe it. I'm not sure I believe it.' Nearly every national poll finds Clinton well ahead among women.... Some of Trump's bullish talk is run-of-the-mill campaign rhetoric ... but there are times when Trump and his aides are clearly misleading voters. Trump told O'Reilly that 'Virtually everybody, other than, you know, some crooked polls, said that we won the debate easily.' In fact, every scientific poll of debate watchers found that Clinton was the victor. O'Reilly did not interject to correct Trump." -- CW

The Chattel Strategy. Joshua Green of Bloomberg: "Donald Trump believes his ploy at the Oct. 9th presidential debate to invite three women who claim they were assaulted by former president Bill Clinton ... has left Hillary Clinton 'shaken' and helped unify Republican voters behind his embattled campaign. So he's doubling down on the strategy, which his advisers believe will make his opponent toxic and depress turnout among a key demographic group -- young women -- Clinton is counting on to win. A senior Trump adviser says the campaign will soon bring forward new accusers: 'Women are coming to us who have been groped or sexually abused by Bill Clinton.'... On Thursday night, the Trump campaign will begin a new media blitz, his advisers say, with [Juanita] Broaddrick, [Kathleen] Willey, and [Paula] Jones appearing together on a one-hour Fox News special hosted by Sean Hannity. Additional interviews will follow." ...

     ... CW: This brilliant strategy makes a lot of sense to those who believe wives are nothing more than extensions of their husbands. Hey, maybe this explains why Hillary's campaign isn't doing an anti-Melania blitz. That, or the Clinton campaign has some decency, sense & integrity.

Michael Kranish & Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post: "The populist candidacy that upended the GOP order and has torn through many of the norms of American politics is now raising a concern among critics in both parties: that Trump is, in effect, running to be a strongman with dictatorial powers.... His latest campaign ad ends with the words: 'Donald Trump will protect you. He is the only one who can.'... It would seem few aspects of daily life would be beyond the reach of the power he envisions.... Trump has repeatedly praised authoritarian leaders.... Trump has also expressed admiration for some dictators.... Constitutional scholars say they are alarmed that Trump does not seem to understand the separation of powers." This is a straight news report. -- CW

Towers of Jello. James Hohmann of the Washington Post: "Republican elected officials are personally outraged and ashamed by something their party's nominee says or does. So they distance themselves. But as soon as they face a whiff of blowback from some in the party, they cave and fall back in line. Then they offer up excuses and rationalizations, twisting themselves into pretzels to justify voting for a guy who some will tell you privately is a danger to the Republic. It's happened over and over again now, and it validates what Trump himself said during the primaries: Many politicians are indeed craven and interested mainly in maintaining power for themselves, principles be damned." Akhilleus: I think I'm being unkind to weasels. Even calling these pusillanimous frauds cowardly would be unfair to most cowards. They are a special brand of spineless poltroon. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Gaslight. Rudy 9/11 Attacks Clinton for Saying What She Never Said. Aaron Rupar of Think Progress: "During a Donald Trump rally Wednesday afternoon in Ocala, Florida, Rudy Giuliani ... [said of Hillary Clinton,] 'Yes, yes you helped to get benefits for the people who were injured [September 11]. But I heard her say she was there that day. I was there that day, I don't remember seeing Hillary Clinton there.... As far as ThinkProgress could discern, there's no record of Hillary Clinton ever saying she was at Ground Zero on September 11, 2001." [She was in Washington, D.C., when the Pentagon was hit.] "But as Clinton detailed during a recent interview with CNN, she traveled to Ground Zero the very next day. In fact, numerous photos of her at the site with Giuliani exist." -- CW ...

... Sam Reisman of Mediaite: "Eric Trump was delighted to discover an article that proved -- proved -- that protesters at Trump rallies were paid by the Clinton campaign. 'Finally the truth comes out!' he wrote [in a tweet], appending the hashtag CrookedHillary and a link that, at first glance, pointed to a damning ABC News article.... The only problem is the article is completely fake, as is the 'ABC News' site on which it appears, a fact that Trump may have picked up on if he had noticed the curious '.com.co' domain.... Or the fact that Trump supporter Ann Coulter and former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski tweeted out the exact same fake story in March." CW: Funny how Little Dracula is horrified by fake paid Clinton "protesters" but apparently not troubled at all by real paid Alex Jones protesters. Also funny how the Trump campaign has no message control. ...

... Mary Ann Georgantopoulos of BuzzFeed: "Eric Trump sent a fundraising email out to supporters Wednesday morning" that included a U.S. map which apparently showed that Daddy-o was winning in a number of states that have been leaning Clinton. Eric claimed in the e-mail that "right now all the momentum is on our side." "Here's the problem," Georgantopoulos writes: "That map GIF is from FiveThirtyEight's Nate Silver, showing what the election would look like if only men voted." CW: Who knows? Maybe "The Trump Master Plan for Improving the U.S. Constitution," as yet only partially disclosed, is to rescind the 19th Amendment, too. Great! One less responsibility for the weaker sex. ...

... CW: BTW, Little Dracula:

... CW: The two maps, Eric's "Manmentum" map & the one posted above, appear in one post by Silver, so it's not as if the Boy Trump, dumb as he is, didn't know he was lying to Trump supporters for the purpose of getting them to transfer their cash to Dad's campaign. ...

... Trump Family Values, Ctd.:

Buyer's Remorse. Leigh Ann Caldwell of NBCnews. "Two big-money donors who have given or raised tens of thousands of dollars for Donald Trump are livid at the Republican presidential nominee and are asking for their money back, according to a bundler who raised money for Trump. 'I cannot express my disappointment enough regarding the recent events surrounding Mr. Trump,' one donor wrote to a Trump fundraiser in an email with the subject line 'Trump support withdrawal.'... The donor, who had given to and raised money for Trump, said. 'I respectfully request that my money be refunded.' Senior Trump spokesman Jason Miller said the campaign is 'unaware of any donors making such a request.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Akhilleus: Anyone think Trump will actually return the money? Soitanly not! I mean the guy doesn't pay anyone. Why would he give money back to schmoes he's already conned? Besides, Trump has already spent that money on a rack full of those pussy bow blouses Melania wore to the debate. The ones Maureen Dowd wasted an entire column considering.

Jessie Hellmann of the Hill: "Liberty University students on Wednesday issued a reprimand against their school's president, calling his defense of Donald Trump disappointing.... 'In the months since Jerry Falwell Jr. endorsed him, Donald Trump has been inexorably associated with Liberty University. We are Liberty students who are disappointed with President Falwell's endorsement and are tired of being associated with one of the worst presidential candidates in American history,' the student organization Liberty United Against Trump wrote in a statement Wednesday. 'A majority of Liberty students, faculty and staff feel as we do. Nevertheless, President Falwell eagerly uses his national platform to advocate for Donald Trump,' the statement read." -- CW

Meet Your Trump Supporters. Message from Russia: Elect Trump or Else. Andrew Osborn of Reuters: "Americans should vote for Donald Trump as president next month or risk being dragged into a nuclear war, according to a Russian ultra-nationalist ally of President Vladimir Putin who likes to compare himself to the U.S. Republican candidate. Vladimir Zhirinovsky, a flamboyant veteran lawmaker known for his fiery rhetoric, told Reuters in an interview that Trump was the only person able to de-escalate dangerous tensions between Moscow and Washington." Akhilleus: Yes, and I am Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Zhirinovsky goes so far as to award Trumpy a pre-wrapped Nobel Peace Prize, which he can gaze at while Putin goes on a rampage across Eastern Europe. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Congressional Races

Alex Isenstadt & John Bresnahan of Politico: "Speaker Paul Ryan told top donors on Wednesday evening that he's growing concerned about whether House Republicans will be able to weather the political storm this November -- and suggested the outcome for his party could be dire. During a conference call, Ryan said he believed that House Republicans had taken a serious hit amid Donald Trump's freefall following release of the now-infamous 'Access Hollywood' video...." -- CW

Other News & Views

Martin Longman of the Washington Monthly: "... I can't see Paul Ryan actually being the Speaker of the House next year. And if he is, I can't see him lasting for very long." -- CW

Stacy Cowley & Michael Corkery of the New York Times: "The scandal engulfing Wells Fargo toppled its chief executive on Wednesday, as John G. Stumpf announced his departure from the company, effective immediately. The move was a swift and stunning fall for an executive whose bank made it through the 2008 financial crisis relatively unscathed only to be undone by a product sales scandal that pervaded its community banking division and has percolated under the surface for years.... The timing and swiftness of his departure came as a surprise to the bank's board." -- CW

Gary Gately of the Washington Post: "Many white people fought alongside African Americans in the civil rights movement. But few made as vital and enduring an impact as Jack Greenberg, a protege of and successor to Thurgood Marshall at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Mr. Greenberg, who died Oct. 12 at 91, joined the New York-based legal organization in 1949, fresh out of Columbia Law School. At the time, civil rights law was a small field frequently overlooked by ambitious white lawyers, but Mr. Greenberg said he was invigorated by the principles at stake and the intellectual challenge on hand." -- CW

Linda Greenhouse: Litigious conservatives now seek out judges who will "legislate from the bench," as long as the judge is likely to "legislate" their way. "The notion of legislating from the bench was never more than a political slogan. Now it's simply fatuous. That doesn't mean that it won't be heard at the next Senate confirmation hearing. It's easier for some senators to accuse judges of legislating from the bench than to do any actual legislating themselves." -- CW

Beyond the Beltway

Scott Suppression Scheme Scotched. Gary Rohrer of the LA Times: "Floridians will get one more week, through Tuesday, Oct. 18, to register to vote, a federal judge ruled Wednesday. The move could tip the balance of a pivotal swing state as Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump make their pitch to voters in the final month of the campaign. After a one hour hearing, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Walker ruled the right to vote was fundamental and shouldn't be jeopardized because of a natural disaster like Hurricane Matthew.... The suit was filed Sunday by the Florida Democratic Party after Gov. Rick Scott refused to extend the deadline due to disruptions caused by Hurricane Matthew." -- Akhilleus (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Dave Altimari, et al., of the Hartford Courant: "Traffic is once again flowing on Main Street [in Hartford, Ct.], where a twin-engine plane crashed yards from Pratt & Whitney property Tuesday, but questions linger about the cause of the crash. A high-ranking local law enforcement official said Wednesday that the student pilot [Feras M. Freitekh] and instructor were arguing shortly before the crash, which killed the student. Another source said the student pilot started flying the plane erratically and the instructor fought to gain control before the crash. The source said the student was distraught and feeling stressed over his poor performance at the flight academy. A federal official told The Courant that the crash appears to have been a case of suicide, and that nothing had been found by Wednesday evening to suggest terrorism." -- CW

Matt Zapotosky of the Washington Post: "The San Francisco Police Department stops and searches African Americans at a disproportionately high rate and does not adequately investigate officers using force, a Justice Department review found. The review -- released Wednesday by the Justice Department's Office of Community Oriented Policing Services -- uncovered 'numerous indicators of implicit and institutionalized bias against minority groups,' along with insufficient training and data collection. It found the vast majority of those killed by police were people of color." -- CW

Wesley Lowery & Cheryl Thompson of the Washington Post: "Keith Lamont Scott was struck at least three times by bullets fired by a Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officer, with at least one of the fatal shots striking him in the back, according to a private autopsy conducted for his family and obtained by The Washington Post." -- CW

News Ledes

Washington Post: "Bob Dylan was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature on Thursday for work that the Swedish Academy described as 'having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.' He is the first American to win the prize since Toni Morrison in 1993, and a groundbreaking choice by the Nobel committee to select the first literature laureate whose career has primarily been as a musician." -- CW

New York Times: "King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand, who took the throne of the kingdom once known as Siam shortly after World War II and held it for more than 70 years, establishing himself as a revered personification of Thai nationhood, died on Thursday in Bangkok. He was 88 and one of the longest-reigning monarchs in history.... The military junta, which seized power in a coup two years ago, derives its authority from the king. The king's heir apparent, Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn, is seen by many as a jet-setting playboy and not held in the same regard as his father. And the king’s death raises questions about the future of the monarchy itself." -- CW

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Tuesday
Oct112016

The Commentariat -- October 12, 2016

Afternoon Update:

Towers of Jello. James Hohmann of the Washington Post. "Republican elected officials are personally outraged and ashamed by something their party's nominee says or does. So they distance themselves. But as soon as they face a whiff of blowback from some in the party, they cave and fall back in line. Then they offer up excuses and rationalizations, twisting themselves into pretzels to justify voting for a guy who some will tell you privately is a danger to the Republic. It's happened over and over again now, and it validates what Trump himself said during the primaries: Many politicians are indeed craven and interested mainly in maintaining power for themselves, principles be damned." Akhilleus: I think I'm being unkind to weasels. Even calling these pusillanimous frauds cowardly would be unfair to most cowards. They are a special brand of spineless poltroon.

Buyer's Remorse. Trump donors want their money back, dammit! Leigh Ann Caldwell of NBC News. "Two big-money donors who have given or raised tens of thousands of dollars for Donald Trump are livid at the Republican presidential nominee and are asking for their money back, according to a bundler who raised money for Trump.... 'I regret coming to the Trump support event, and in particular allowing my son to be a part of it,' [a] donor, who had given to and raised money for Trump, said. 'I respectfully request that my money be refunded.' Senior Trump spokesman Jason Miller said the campaign is 'unaware of any donors making such a request.'"Akhilleus: Anyone think Trump will actually return the money? Soitanly not! I mean the guy doesn't pay anyone. Why would he give money back to schmoes he's already conned? Besides, Trump has already spent that money on a rack full of those pussy bow blouses Melania wore to the debate. The ones Maureen Dowd wasted an entire column considering.

Scott Suppression Scheme Scotched. Gary Rohrer of the LA Times. "Floridians will get one more week, through Tuesday, Oct. 18, to register to vote, a federal judge ruled Wednesday. The move could tip the balance of a pivotal swing state as Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump make their pitch to voters in the final month of the campaign. After a one hour hearing, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Walker ruled the right to vote was fundamental and shouldn't be jeopardized because of a natural disaster like Hurricane Matthew.... The suit was filed Sunday by the Florida Democratic Party after Gov. Rick Scott refused to extend the deadline due to disruptions caused by Hurricane Matthew...Akhilleus

Message from Russia: Elect Trump or else. Andrew Osborn of Reuters. "Americans should vote for Donald Trump as president next month or risk being dragged into a nuclear war, according to a Russian ultra-nationalist ally of President Vladimir Putin who likes to compare himself to the U.S. Republican candidate. Vladimir Zhirinovsky, a flamboyant veteran lawmaker known for his fiery rhetoric, told Reuters in an interview that Trump was the only person able to de-escalate dangerous tensions between Moscow and Washington." Akhilleus: Yes, and I am Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Zhirinovsky goes so far as to award Trumpy a pre-wrapped Nobel Peace Prize, which he can gaze at while Putin goes on a rampage across Eastern Europe.

*****

Presidential Race

Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: "The stark choice that Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump pose for voters goes as well for their revised tax plans: Mr. Trump would simplify the tax code but cut taxes mainly for the rich and add trillions of dollars to the federal debt, while Mrs. Clinton would do the opposite, an independent analysis released Tuesday concluded." Clinton's plan would not add to the national debt. "Her plan would increase federal revenue $1.4 trillion over the first decade. Rather than lower the federal debt, however, Mrs. Clinton would use the money to pay for education and other initiatives." -- CW

Matt Flegenheimer of the New York Times: "In a rare return to presidential politics, [Al] Gore, who was Bill Clinton's vice president, joined Hillary Clinton [at Miami Dade College] for a 45-minute Democratic call to arms.... 'Your vote really, really, really counts,' he said, in the state synonymous with his excruciating 2000 election loss. 'You can consider me as an Exhibit A.'... Introducing Mr. Gore, Mrs. Clinton spoke of clean energy, curbside gardens, the Paris climate agreement and Donald J. Trump's suggestion that climate change is a hoax. She commended Mr. Gore's Nobel Peace Prize and his documentary, 'An Inconvenient Truth,'...." -- CW ...

     ... Russell Berman of the Atlantic has more.

Nolan McCaskill & Sarah Wheaton of Politico: "President Barack Obama ... openly mocking Republicans who are refusing to rescind their endorsements even as they condemn the nominee for talking cavalierly about sexual assault. 'The fact that now you've got people saying: "Well, we strongly disapprove. We really disagree. We find those comments disgusting, but we're still endorsing him. We still think he should be president." That doesn't make sense to me,' Obama said Tuesday during a Hillary Clinton rally in Greensboro, North Carolina.... The president slammed Trump on myriad issues, including taxes, his threat to jail Clinton ('no trial, no indictment, no lawyers') and the rhetoric from his supporters -- specifically conservative radio host Alex Jones, who suggested that Obama and Clinton are demons." CW: The full speech is here.

Kathleen Hennessey & Julie Pace of the AP: "Hillary Clinton's top adviser said the FBI is investigating Russia's possible role in hacking thousands of his personal emails, an intrusion he said Donald Trump's campaign may have been aware of in advance. If true, the assertion from Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta would amount to an extraordinary link between Russia and an American presidential campaign. Podesta said the alleged ties could be driven either by Trump's policy positions, which at times echo the Kremlin, or the Republican's 'deep engagement and ties with Russian interests in his business affairs.'" -- CW

Mark Leibovich, in the New York Times Magazine, has a long piece -- likely the cover -- on Hillary Clinton & the dynamics of this year's election. Leibovich interviewed Clinton in Ohio in early October. -- CW

Hold On, America, He's Been Holding Back Until Now! Stephen Collinson, et al., of CNN: "Donald Trump is launching a kamikaze mission -- fracturing his own party four weeks before Election Day. The GOP nominee is lashing out in a stream of tweets boiling with rage and resentment, slamming House Speaker Paul Ryan for effectively cutting him loose and accusing the party leadership of dooming his campaign. It's a meltdown unprecedented by a presidential nominee this late in the year. 'It is so nice that the shackles have been taken off me and I can now fight for America the way I want to,' Trump said in a tweet that raised the prospect of a full on civil war in the Republican Party. Akhilleus: Poor Donaldo, he's been laboring in slavery so far, but now he'll eally show everyone a thing or two. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)...

Nikita Vladimirov of the Hill: "Donald Trump on Tuesday blasted Speaker Paul Ryan in an interview with 'The O'Reilly Factor,' stating that he no longer wants the Wisconsin Republican's support. When asked if he thinks establishment Republicans, including Ryan, will support him as president if he's elected, Trump said yes while speculating about the speaker's future. 'They'll be there. I would think that Ryan maybe wouldn't be there, maybe he'll be in a different position. The fact is, I think we should get support and we don't get the support from guys like Paul Ryan,' [Trump] ... said...." -- CW ...

... Jonathan Swan of the Hill: "Steve Bannon, the chairman of the right-wing news outlet Breitbart who became CEO of Donald Trump's presidential campaign, gave explicit orders to his staff to destroy Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.). On editorial conference calls, the Breitbart chairman would often say 'Paul Ryan is the enemy,' according to a source who worked with Bannon at the news organization. In December 2015, weeks after Ryan became Speaker, Bannon wrote in an internal Breitbart email obtained by The Hill that the 'long game' for his news site was for Ryan to be 'gone' by the spring." -- CW

Despite winning the second debate in a landslide (every poll), it is hard to do well when Paul Ryan and others give zero support! -- -- Donald Trump, Oct. 11 tweet

In reality, not a single quality poll shows he won the debate, though one indicated a near-tie. -- Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post

...Josh Marshall of TPM: "Remember, Trump is a bully. Bullies seek out people they can hurt. Trump has done everything he possibly can to hurt Hillary Clinton. But he doesn't seem to be able to do so.... But there is someone else he can hurt profoundly, even as he falls behind in the general election: the Republican party. All the better since they are his best argument to justify his defeat as a betrayal rather than a personal failure.... Like an abuser who takes out his personal failures and frustrations and rages on his wife and his children, Paul Ryan and the GOP are now alone in the house with Donald Trump. He is angry and the prospect of defeat will no doubt make him angrier. In Trump's world of displacement, abuse and vengeance turning against the GOP is the most logical thing in the world." --safari

Trump's Debate Real Estate

Nikita Vladimirov of the Hill: "Donald Trump on Tuesday blasted the claim that he was lurking behind Hillary Clinton during the presidential debate on Sunday. 'One thing I will say, you know, right after the debate they left and said, "Oh, Donald was right in her space." I never walked near her. I was at my lectern and all of a sudden she walks over to me, stands right in front of me and the next day I read that I was in her space,' he said in an interview with Bill O'Reilly. 'I was standing at my lectern and all of a sudden from nowhere she walks right in front of me. I never walked near her. She stands right in front of me. The next day it was I was in her space. I was standing at my chair, my lectern,' Trump reiterated on 'The O'Reilly Factor' Tuesday." -- CW

Jose DelReal of the Washington Post: "Don't call Donald Trump a 'lurker.'... On Tuesday night [he] lashed out at critics who said he had invaded Hillary Clinton's personal space during Sunday's second presidential debate in St. Louis. Instead, he insisted during a campaign event ... in Florida that it was in fact Clinton who had gotten too close." Read on and/or watch the video of Trump's remarks.

The HuffPost has a more extensive video of Trump's dominance moves at the debate. It's a slow loader, which will eventually appear near the top of the page.

New York Times Editors: "Andrei Kozyrev, a former Russian foreign minister, told The Times: 'I'm sure Putin is trying -- and more successfully than many think -- to manipulate both the process and one of the candidates. He realizes that Trump will trample American democracy and damage if not destroy America as a pillar of stability and major force able to contain him.' In the end, it may not matter whether Mr. Trump is being manipulated by Mr. Putin or naïvely accepting Mr. Putin's twisted views. What does matter is that with each new bizarre utterance he provides further proof of his inability to evaluate credible information and, more broadly, his lack of fitness to further his country's best interests." -- CW

Steve M. embeds Trump's new ad where Trump focuses on Hillary Clinton's illnesses to demonstrate that she doesn't have the stamina to run the country. "... this ad suggests to me that Trump genuinely connects physical imperfection and imperfection of character.... He's repulsed by blacks on the floors of his casinos, and a Mexican-American judge, and Mexicans and Muslims in general; he's spent years in a blind rage at a beauty queen (Hispanic, of course) who gained a few pounds; he regularly touts the physical superiority of his daughter Ivanka (her breast size, her height).... Trump believes in a white, fit master race. Those who stumble and cough are not among the fittest, in his worldview." ...

... CW: ... which is kinda odd because Trump himself is a flabby old guy, near-clinically obese, with a paunch, a fat butt, a disappeared chin, a mystery hairline, & a suspicious snort-sniffle-wheeze. Not to mention a recovering bone-spur victim! Seen here at the GOP convention, grabbing his ultra-fit daughter Ivanka:

I'm telling you Donald Trump owned the pageant for the reasons to utilize his power to get around beautiful women. Who do you complain to? He owns the pageant. There's no one to complain to. Everyone there works for him. -- Tasha Dixon, a former Miss Universe contestant

I would never let my daughter run for a pageant that he owns. -- Mariah Billado, a former Miss Teen USA ...

... Fred Barbash of the Washington Post: "On an April, 11, 2005, Howard Stern show, Donald Trump bragged about some of the special perks he enjoyed while owner of the Miss USA pageant. They came not in a locker room but a dressing room.... CBS 2 Los Angeles did a little fact checking and, guess what, this time, no Pinocchios. Tasha Dixon, Miss Arizona of 2001, told the station that Trump just came 'waltzing in' while contestants were nude or half-nude as they changed into bikinis. Separately, BuzzFeed reported early Wednesday that four women in the 1997 Miss Teen USA beauty pageant said he walked into their dressing room while they were changing. Some were as young as 15, BuzzFeed said." -- CW

James Keaten of the AP: "U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump would be 'dangerous from an international point of view' if he is elected, the U.N. human rights chief said Wednesday, defiantly doubling down on his recent expression of concerns about 'populist demagogues' that prompted a rebuke from Russia's ambassador to the United Nations. In a broad-ranging news conference touching on issues like violence in Yemen, Syria and sub-Saharan Africa, Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein said some remarks by Trump are 'deeply unsettling and disturbing to me,' particularly on torture and about 'vulnerable communities.'" -- CW

The Great Embarrassment. Jill Lepore of the New Yorker: "[American writer] Joe McGinniss once observed that the American voter 'defends passionately the illusion that the men he chooses to lead him are of a finer nature than he' and that 'it has been traditional that the successful politician honor this illusion.' That tradition has ended. No one in the Republican Party can possibly believe that [Donald] Trump is a better person, a man of finer nature, than the ordinary American voter. The problem for the Party is that no one, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, can even pretend to believe that anymore. No one can believe that in daylight, or in the darkest hour of night, while Trump, restless, tweets about the conspiracies that he believes are being hatched by his enemies men and, especially, women -- to fell him."...Akhilleus (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Garrison Keillor goes to London where it occurs to him that "Mr. Trump would have enjoyed the 17th century, the tumult, the divine right of kings, the suppression of Parliament. Vituperation was normal discourse, the idea of privileged sexual aggression was common in high places, money flowed freely, rich men commissioned great monuments to themselves.... If you put him on Grub Street in 1650, he'd be magnificent in his great swirling robes, surrounded by courtiers and sycophants, ranting against the Puritans, supporting the monarchy, smiting his enemies." -- CW

"Trump's Strategy for Minority Americans? Don't Let Them Vote. Washington Post Editors: "WITH DONALD Trump's polling numbers in a tailspin, he has doubled down in calling on Republican vigilantes to take matters into their own hands to thwart what many of them are primed to regard, without proof, as a rigged election. The Republican nominee's rhetoric, inciting white rural and suburban voters who fear the voting clout of black urban Democrats, is a recipe for voter intimidation and even violence on Election Day. It also lays the groundwork for his followers to believe, if he loses,that his defeat was a historic swindle.... Mr. Trump's odious gambit is ... in keeping with long-standing voter-suppression schemes in state legislatures...." -- CW ...

... Darren Samuelsohn of Politico: "Republicans have started warning their increasingly ostracized nominee to stop stoking his supporters with claims that the 2016 election will be stolen, daring him to show proof or put a lid on it.... 'I don't think leading candidates for the presidency should undercut the process unless you have a really good reason,' Sen. Lindsey Graham ... told Politico." Thanks to Gloria for the link. -- CW ...

Now That Those Shackles Are Off, Trump Can Really Show Those Namby-Pambies How Real Authoritarians Do It: Arthur Delaney of Huffington Post. "Maine Gov. Paul LePage (R) would apparently like for ... Donald Trump to rule with absolute power and squelch personal freedom. At least that's what he seemed to be saying in a radio interview Tuesday when he called for Trump to embrace authoritarianism. 'Sometimes I wondered that our Constitution is not only broken, but we need a Donald Trump to show some authoritarian power in our country and bring back the rule of law,' LePage said on a conservative radio station in Maine. 'Because we've had eight years of a president, he's an autocrat, he just does it on his own, he ignores Congress and every single day, we're slipping into anarchy.'" Akhilleus: Hmmm...so we've had eight years of authoritarian rule and what we need now is more of that, only better, because white, of course. Well, thanks for clearing that up, Guv! (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Meet Your Trump Supporters. Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-Texas), one of the dimmest bulbs in a House full of them, said he would consider still backing Donald Trump if Trump said he liked raping women. Apparently someone told Pajama Boy that rape didn't poll well, as he later apologized. -- CW ...

     ... Update: See also comments by Akhilleus & Gloria in today's thread.

... ** Anita Hill in a Boston Globe op-ed: "Twenty-five years ago Tuesday..., I testified before Senate Judiciary Committee about the sexually harassing behavior of the nominee, Clarence Thomas. As being a target of harassment wasn't bad enough, I was then victimized a second time by a smear campaign meant to protect the nomination. Stunningly, people wondered aloud why his behavior mattered in a hearing about his character and fitness.... We must understand the harm that sexual harassment and sexual violence causes. Missing from the conversation this weekend, which focused almost exclusively on the character of the offender, was concern about the victims of sexual violence.... Trump's language, which he and others have tried to minimize as 'locker room banter,' is predatory and hostile. To excuse it as that or as youthful indiscretion or overzealous romantic interest normalizes male sexual violence." -- CW ...

... CW: In case it escaped your notice, one of the main things Trump means when he inveighs against "political correctness" is the crimp sexual harassment laws have put in his style. (And, yeah, that's what Bill Maher means, too.) ...

... ** Rebecca Traister of New York: "Republicans are not shocked; they're scared. Donald Trump is losing and they are beginning to understand that his loss is going to expose them, not simply to partisan defeat, but as a party that has been covert in its cohesion around the very biases that he makes coarse and plain. Trump's attitudes about women are not different from the attitudes that have been supported by the contemporary Republican Party via their legislative agenda.... The view of women as yours to control via political power, star power, or simply patriarchal power, is what Republicans -- not just Trump, but lots of Republicans -- have been doing for years as they work to reduce reproductive-rights access and reinstall women in early marriage and traditional hetero homes where their competitive, independent, threatening power might be better contained." ...

... CW: Traister is giving Republicans too much credit: they still think their repression of women is chivalric; they[re too misogynistic to feel "exposed," as Traister herself demonstrates by their responses to the Trump-Bush tape. Nonetheless, her column is a must-read.

John Koblin of the New York Times: "Four days after the explosive Donald J. Trump 'Access Hollywood' tape was made public, Billy Bushis negotiating his exit from NBC. Mr. Bush and NBC are working out the terms of his departure from 'Today,' which may come in the next few days, according to two people briefed on the plans. It would be a swift fall for Mr. Bush after a brief tenure as a host in the 9 a.m. hour of the show. He joined 'Today' this summer." CW: Still, thanks again, Billy. Maybe there will be an opening for you at Trump TV. You'd be a great host for "Miss Politics USA" or "Hot Babes in Politics," both in the planning stages.

AND Maureen Dowd -- the Pulitzer Prize winner & esteemed owner of the most influential piece of newspaper real estate in the USA -- in her usual manner, jabs right at the heart of the presidential race: what about that pussy bow? And the shoes! If Donald Trump is the paradigm of American exceptionalism, nonpareil in reality or fiction, then Dowd is aspiring to take that prize for U.S. journalism.

Other News & Views

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court agreed on Tuesday to decide whether high-ranking George W. Bush administration officials -- including John Ashcroft, the former attorney general, and Robert S. Mueller III, the former F.B.I. director -- may be held liable for policies adopted after the Sept. 11 attacks. The case began as a class action in 2002 filed by immigrants, most of them Muslim, over policies and practices that swept hundreds of people into the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn on immigration violations in the weeks after the attacks. The plaintiffs said they had been subjected to beatings, humiliating searches and other abuses." -- CW

Adam Liptak: "In an argument marked by testy exchanges, the Supreme Court on Tuesday struggled to decide whether it should make an exception to the usual rule that jury deliberations are secret when evidence emerges that those discussions were marred by racial or ethnic bias." CW: Chief Justice John Roberts was skeptical, because, as you know, "The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race." Putz.

Jonelle Marte of the Washington Post: "The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia found that the setup of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which is led by a single director, is not in line with other independent agencies, which are typically run by a group of commissioners.... But the court decided against shutting down the CFPB, instead ordering that the agency be restructured so that the director could be removed by the president at will. Currently, the director can only be removed with cause -- a system that Judge Brett Kavanaugh said lacked checks and balances.... The ruling comes as Republican lawmakers and financial groups are upping their efforts to weaken or dismantle the agency.... The CFPB said Tuesday that it is reviewing its options for challenging the ruling." CW: Kavanaugh is -- surprise! -- a Bush II appointee. Also, too, he's a protege' of Ken Starr & an all-around ass.

Brian Fung of the Washington Post: "Comcast is paying one of the biggest fines ever levied on a cable company after regulators said it illegally billed customers for unwanted equipment and services. In a settlement with the Federal Communications Commission, Comcast is agreeing to pay $2.3 million. It's also agreeing to give consumers a chance to block the addition of new services and equipment if they don't want it. Some subscribers who complained to the FCC said they'd been charged for premium channels, set-top boxes or video recording devices despite telling the company they weren't looking for upgrades, the agency said Tuesday." CW: Note to FCC: DirectTV does it, too. There is no way in hell I wanted that NFL package they foisted on me. And they made me pay for it for a full season, even after I complained. Capitalism is awesome, all right.

Beyond the Beltway

Ted Sherman & Matt Arco of NJ.com: "The defense attorney for a former Gov. Chris Christie aide charged in the George Washington Bridge lane closure scandal suggested on Tuesday his client told the governor about the lane shutdowns before they occurred and while they were happening." [Emphasis added.] -- CW

More from the Trump-Loving Authoritarian Right. This time, hopefully, from prison. Jacques Billeaud of the AP: "Prosecutors said Tuesday they will charge Sheriff Joe Arpaio with criminal contempt-of-court for defying a judge's orders to end his signature immigration patrols in Arizona, exposing the 84-year-old lawman to the possibility of jail time. The announcement in federal court sets in motion criminal proceedings against the sheriff less than a month before Election Day as he seeks a seventh term as Maricopa County sheriff. The 2016 election cycle has also seen Arpaio ... appearing alongside Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on several occasions. A judge previously recommended criminal contempt charges against Arpaio but left it up to federal prosecutors to actually bring the case. Prosecutor John Keller said in court that the government will bring charges. Arpaio could face up to six months in jail if convicted of misdemeanor contempt." Akhilleus: Poor Joe, persecuted for his belief in rule by billy club and racial hatred.

Way Beyond

Weston Phippen of the Atlantic: "For two days over the weekend, German police searched for suspected Syrian terrorist Jaber al-Bakr, a refugee who had come to Germany last year, and whom they believed was plotting to bomb a train station or airport.... Police asked the public for help.... The refugees [Chancellor Angela] Merkel's opponents are set on keeping out were the ones who led the police to al-Bakr: On Monday, three Syrian refugees turned the suspect terrorist into police when they realized he was on the run." -- CW

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Monday
Oct102016

The Commentariat -- October 11, 2016

Afternoon Update:

He's Been Holding Back Until Now! Stephen Collinson, Eugene Scott and Eric Bradner of CNN: "Donald Trump is launching a kamikaze mission -- fracturing his own party four weeks before Election Day. The GOP nominee is lashing out in a stream of tweets boiling with rage and resentment, slamming House Speaker Paul Ryan for effectively cutting him loose and accusing the party leadership of dooming his campaign. It's a meltdown unprecedented by a presidential nominee this late in the year. 'It is so nice that the shackles have been taken off me and I can now fight for America the way I want to,' Trump said in a tweet that raised the prospect of a full on civil war in the Republican Party. Akhilleus: Poor Donaldo, he's been laboring in slavery so far, but now he'll really show everyone a thing or two.

Now that those shackles are off, Trump can really show those namby-pambies how real authoritarians do it: Arthur Delaney of Huffington Post. "Maine Gov. Paul LePage (R) would apparently like for ... Donald Trump to rule with absolute power and squelch personal freedom. At least that's what he seemed to be saying in a radio interview Tuesday when he called for Trump to embrace authoritarianism. 'Sometimes I wondered that our Constitution is not only broken, but we need a Donald Trump to show some authoritarian power in our country and bring back the rule of law,' LePage said on a conservative radio station in Maine. 'Because we've had eight years of a president, he's an autocrat, he just does it on his own, he ignores Congress and every single day, we're slipping into anarchy.'" Akhilleus: Hmmm...so we've had eight years of authoritarian rule and what we need now is more of that, only better, because white, of course. Well, thanks for clearing that up, Guv!

More from the Trump-loving authoritarian right. This time, hopefully, from prison. Jacques Billeaud of the AP. "Prosecutors said Tuesday they will charge Sheriff Joe Arpaio with criminal contempt-of-court for defying a judge's orders to end his signature immigration patrols in Arizona, exposing the 84-year-old lawman to the possibility of jail time. The announcement in federal court sets in motion criminal proceedings against the sheriff less than a month before Election Day as he seeks a seventh term as Maricopa County sheriff. The 2016 election cycle has also seen Arpaio take a prominent role ... alongside ... Donald Trump on several occasions. A judge previously recommended criminal contempt charges against Arpaio but left it up to federal prosecutors to actually bring the case. Prosecutor John Keller said in court that the government will bring charges.... Arpaio could face up to six months in jail if convicted of misdemeanor contempt." Akhilleus: Poor Joe, persecuted for his belief in rule by billy club and racial hatred.

The Great Embarrassment. Jill Lepore of the New Yorker. "[American writer] Joe McGinniss once observed that the American voter 'defends passionately the illusion that the men he chooses to lead him are of a finer nature than he' and that 'it has been traditional that the successful politician honor this illusion.' That tradition has ended. No one in the Republican Party can possibly believe that [Donald] Trump is a better person, a man of finer nature, than the ordinary American voter. The problem for the Party is that no one, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, can even pretend to believe that anymore. No one can believe that in daylight, or in the darkest hour of night, while Trump, restless, tweets about the conspiracies that he believes are being hatched by his enemies -- men and, especially, women -- to fell him."...Akhilleus

*****

Presidential Race

Carrie Dann of NBC News: "As Donald Trump's campaign reels over tapes of the presidential candidate's sexually aggressive comments about women in 2005, the Republican nominee now trails Hillary Clinton by double digits among likely voters, according to a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. The poll, conducted on Saturday and Sunday but before the second presidential debate, shows Clinton with 46 percent support among likely voters in a four-way matchup, compared to 35 percent for Trump." CW: Don't get cocky, people; voters have the memories of gnats.

Darrel Rowland of the Columbus Dispatch: "Before a crowd [at Ohio State U.] the [Clinton] campaign said the Secret Service estimated 18,500 when those watching from outside the secured area were counted, [Hillary] Clinton said, 'It wasn't just this one video that was so disturbing and shocking. We have seen this behavior throughout this entire campaign.... He's targeted others as well.'... Today, Ohio was moved to 'leans Democrat' from 'leans Republican' by the much-watched Crystal Ball, run by the University of Virginia's Center for Politics."

Chris Megerian of the Los Angeles Times: Hillary Clinton's "campaign is releasing a series of videos that highlight Republicans who plan to vote for Clinton." -- CW

Jose DelReal of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump continued to attack Hillary Clinton over her husband's marital indiscretions during a campaign event [in Ambridge, Pa.,] Monday, citing allegations of sexual improprieties against former president Bill Clinton while dismissing intense criticism over his own treatment of women.'As I outlined last night, Bill Clinton was the worst abuser of women ever to sit in the Oval Office. He was a sexual predator,' Trump said. 'For decades, Hillary Clinton has been familiar with her husband's predatory behavior and, instead of trying to stop him, she made it possible for him to take advantage of even more women.'" -- CW ...

... Nolan McCaskill of Politico: "Trump, speaking before a rally in Pennsylvania on Monday afternoon, said he's been ganged up on ever since Friday's release of a 2005 tape that captured the billionaire speaking in incredibly crude terms about women.... Trump warned against the release of more damaging tapes of his past comments, threatening to continue attacking the Clintons over former President Bill Clinton's alleged infidelities and Hillary Clinton's response to those women's accusations if more such tapes emerge." -- CW ...

... Trump: Don't vote for Hillary because ... Chappaquiddick. Trump was reading from a teleprompter when, in an anti-media rant, he made remarks about Ted Kennedy. Who is dead. Who supported Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton. CW: Funny how Trump hates womanizers, isn't it? ...

... ** CW: If you think that's incredible, Kurt Eichenwald of Newsweek does us one better. Yesterday at his Wilkes-Barre, Pa., rally, Trump read from what was supposedly a leaked memo from Wikileaks' docudump of John Podesta's hacked e-mail account. According to Trump, the e-mail he read was from Hillary Clinton's long-time consigliere Sidney Blumenthal, & it implicated Clinton as responsible for the Benghaaazi affair. BUT, what Trump read to the crowd was actually a short portion of a longer article by Eichenwald condemning one of the many GOP Benghazi committees for politicizing the tragedy in Libya. And the only way that Trump could have obtained this false information was from Sputnik, the Kremlin propaganda outlet (what Eichenwald calls "Putin's mouthpiece"), which misattributed the Eichenwald citation to Blumenthal. ...

     ... "This is not funny," Eichenwald writes. "It is terrifying. The Russians engage in a sloppy disinformation effort and, before the day is out, the Republican nominee for president is standing on a stage reciting the manufactured story as truth. How did this happen? Who in the Trump campaign was feeding him falsehoods straight from the Kremlin?" -- CW ...

By Driftglass. Multiple applications.... Ed Pilkington & Lauren Gambino of the Guardian: During the Wilkes-Barre rally, Trump "praised the open-information group that acted as conduit for one of the biggest leaks of US government secrets in history: 'WikiLeaks, I love WikiLeaks,' he said." CW: Yup, the GOP presidential nominee is praising an arm of Putin's anti-American propaganda operation. ...

     ... ** Robert Windrem & William Arkin of NBC News: "During Sunday's debate, Donald Trump once again said he doesn't know whether Russia is trying to hack the U.S. election, despite Friday's statement by the U.S. intelligence community pointing the finger at Putin -- and despite the fact that Trump was personally briefed on Russia's role in the hacks by U.S. officials. A senior U.S. intelligence official assured NBC News that cybersecurity and the Russian government's attempts to interfere in the 2016 election have been briefed to, and discussed extensively with, both parties' candidates, surrogates and leadership, since mid-August. 'To profess not to know at this point is willful misrepresentation,' said the official. 'The intelligence community has walked a very thin line in not taking sides, but both candidates have all the information they need to be crystal clear.' On Sunday, Trump disputed the idea there was any hack at all." ...

... Alt-Reality. Margaret Hartmann of New York has more on the Sputnik-Breitbart-Trump connections. ...

... CW: It is not even speculative any more, much less wacky, to claim that Trump is an agent of the Russian government, & is himself a party to the Russians' efforts to undermine American democracy. As Eichenwald writes, "It's terrifying." This is a lot worse than his history of sexually assaulting women. It is abundantly clear now that a demagogue with less baggage could easily have been elected POTUS -- this year or at any time in the future. ...

... Washington Post Editors: "Once again, [Donald Trump] played the part of Vladimir Putin's lawyer. 'She doesn't know if it's the Russians doing the hacking,' he said of Ms. Clinton. 'Maybe there is no hacking.' Mr. Trump is receiving classified intelligence briefings, so he is certainly aware of the evidence that hackers backed by Moscow have stolen email and other records from the DNC and tried to penetrate state electoral systems. So why does he deny it?... In Sunday's debate, Mr. Trump reeled off a series of false statements about Russia's intervention in Syria, saying it was aimed at the Islamic State even though almost all of Russia's bombs have fallen on rebel groups fighting the regime of Bashar al-Assad, or on civilians.... Mr. Trump's advocacy on behalf of an aggressive U.S. rival, and the opaqueness of his motivation, is one of the most troubling aspects of his thoroughly toxic campaign." The headline on the editorial: "Donald Trump, Putin's Puppet."

... Eli Stokols & Glenn Thrush of Politico: "... people close to [Donald Trump] ... say he's viewed the staggering setbacks over the last four days as license to loosen up, be himself, and wage a personal war against the unified forces of the liberal media and dying GOP establishment. Venture onto the pro-Trump right-wing Breitbart website and a Trump-Pence ad pops up: 'It's Us Against the World,' it proclaims, but there's no Pence, just two Trumps -- the glowering candidate and his image in a mirror. 'He hates all these guys, anyway, never liked kissing their butts, so he's inclined just to say good riddance,' says a top Republican who has known Trump for years." -- CW

Alexander Burns & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: The Republican fissure Trump has engendered is growing worse. ...

Philip Rucker & Robert Costa of the Washington Post: "The Republican Party tumbled toward anarchy Monday over its presidential nominee, as House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (Wis.) cut Donald Trump loose in an emergency maneuver to preserve the party's endangered congressional majorities. Ryan's announcement that he would no longer defend or campaign with Trump prompted biting condemnations from within his caucus and from Trump himself, who publicly lashed out at the speaker.... Unlike Ryan, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) was rendered mute.... He told a business group in Kentucky that if they wanted to hear his thoughts on Trump, they 'might as well go ahead and leave,' according to the Associated Press.... Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus pledged complete fidelity to Trump in a conference call with RNC members...." -- CW

Paul Ryan should spend more time on balancing the budget, jobs and illegal immigration and not waste his time on fighting Republican nominee. -- Donald Trump, in a tweet Monday

... Kelsey Snell of the Washington Post: "House Speaker Paul Ryan will not campaign with or defend Donald Trump through the November election, according to a knowledgeable source who participated in a phone call with House GOP lawmakers on Monday morning. 'The speaker is going to spend the next month focused entirely on protecting our congressional majorities,' said Ryan spokeswoman AshLee Strong. 'There is no update in his position at this time,' Strong said regarding an endorsement." CW: Strong also confirmed that Ryan, a Wisconsin Republican, would call upon his state legislature to change the Badger State's official state animal to a weasel. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

** Max Fisher & Amanda Taub of the New York Times: "When Donald J. Trump told Hillary Clinton at Sunday's presidential debate that if he were president, 'you'd be in jail,' he was threatening more than just his opponent. He was suggesting that he would strip power from the institutions that normally enforce the law, investing it instead in himself. Political scientists who study troubled democracies abroad say this is a tactic typical of elected leaders who pull down their systems from within: former President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, the fascist leaders of 1930s Europe." -- CW ...

... Josh Gerstein of Politico: "Donald Trump's debate-night vow to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Hillary Clinton's email setup and put her 'in jail' provoked a sharp blowback from former U.S. prosecutors, who said Trump's view of the Justice Department serving the whims of the president is antithetical to the American system. While presidents appoint the attorney general, they do not make decisions on whom to prosecute for crimes -- and were Trump to do so, prosecutors warned, he would spark a constitutional crisis similar to that of the 'Saturday Night Massacre' in the Nixon administration.... Former Republican appointees to senior Justice Department posts used words like 'abhorrent,' 'absurd' and 'terrifying' to describe Trump's threat to use the legal system to imprison Clinton." -- CW

Neetzan Zimmerman of the Hill: "Newly resurfaced footage from an episode of 'Celebrity Apprentice' reveals that Donald Trump once fired a contestant for engaging in 'locker room' talk. In a 2010 episode of his reality TV show, Trump had little patience for what he deemed a 'locker room' remark made in the boardroom by professional wrestler Maria Kanellis -- and terminated her on the spot. 'Isn't it sort of gross bringing that up? It's, like, disgusting,' Trump said, in reference to a comment Kanellis made about another contestant's bodily functions. 'This is my board room. It's not a locker room. Maria, you're fired.'... [Trump]'s no-nonsense attitude toward Kanellis six years ago is a change from the way he's brushed off the current-day controversy raging over his past remarks." ...

     ... The video is here. CW: Trump's reaction is not surprising. We've learned before that Trump does not like to hear about bodily functions, which he describes in the tape as "gross" and "disgusting," before "firing" Kanellis. I'm sure a professional can explain why Trump is both obsessed with beautiful bodies & disgusted with their "mechanics." A male media bigshot (who was not Trump) once said to me about a woman with both knew, "She's so beautiful, she doesn't shit. Little fairies come & take it away." ...

... Lisa Hagen of the Hill: "The producer of ... 'The Apprentice' confirmed on Monday that he cannot release footage from its archives.... Mark Burnett and MGM, which owns his production company and the NBC show hosted by the GOP nominee from 2004 to 2015, released a joint statement clarifying recent reports about potential leaks of outtakes. 'Despite reports to the contrary, Mark Burnett does not have the ability nor the right to release footage of other material from The Apprentice, the statement read.... 'Various contractual and legal requirements also restrict MGM's ability to release such material.... 'The recent claims that Mark Burnett has threatened anyone with litigation if they were to leak such material are completely and unequivocally false. To be clear, as previously reported in the press, which Mark Burnett has confirmed, he has consistently supported Democratic campaigns.'" -- CW

Mr. Buffett Is Not Amused. Allegra Kirkland of TPM: "Billionaire investor Warren Buffett on Monday offered up some numbers to contradict Donald Trump's debate-night claim that the two ultra-wealthy moguls took similar approaches towards tax payments. 'He has not seen my income tax returns. But I am happy to give him the facts,' Buffett said in a statement to CNBC, after Trump accused the Berkshire Hathaway chairman of taking a 'massive deduction' ... [during] the second presidential debate.... 'I have paid federal income tax every year since 1944, when I was 13. (Though, being a slow starter, I owed only $7 in tax that year.) I have copies of all 72 of my returns and none uses a carryforward,' Buffet[t] said." -- CW ...

     ... Patricia Cohen of the New York Times: "Warren E. Buffett is not running for president. But on Monday, Mr. Buffett ... volunteered more detailed information about his income taxes than Donald J. Trump ... ever has. Mr. Buffett released the information after essentially being called out by Mr. Trump during Sunday night's presidential debate. Acknowledging for the first time that he had avoided paying federal income taxes for years by claiming nearly a billion dollars in losses in 1995, Mr. Trump then tried to shift attention to ... Hillary Clinton.... 'Many of her friends took bigger deductions,' Mr. Trump said. 'Warren Buffett took a massive deduction.'... 'My 2015 return shows adjusted gross income of $11,563,931,' [Buffett] revealed. 'My deductions totaled $5,477,694.' About two-thirds of those represented charitable contributions, he said [in the statement released above]. Most of the rest were related to Mr. Buffett's state income tax payments. Mr. Buffett, the chairman of Berkshire Hathaway and one of the richest men in the world, went on to say: 'My federal income tax for the year was $1,845,557. Returns for previous years are of a similar nature in respect to contributions, deductions and tax rates. Last year, Mr. Buffett paid about 16 percent of his reported income in federal income taxes." -- CW

Hunter Walker of Yahoo! News: "After largely staying silent for the first few days of the firestorm that erupted after a leaked video showed his running mate making lewd comments about women, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence expressed strong support for Donald Trump on Monday." Includes video clip. -- CW

Margaret Sullivan of the Washington Post reports on Steve Bannon's role in Trump's campaign: when Trump goes low, Bannon goes lower. "When Trump brought Bannon on board, he knew exactly what he was doing. The campaign would, with no qualms, pull out every last stop." -- CW

CW: Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway says you'll have to find video of Trump actually grabbing pussy, instead of just boasting about it, if you want to "bandy about" terms like "sexual assault." Okay, that's not exactly how she put it, but that's the implication of her position. ...

... Somebody Draw Beauregard a Picture. Allegra Kirkland: In the spin room after Sunday's debate, "Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) claimed Sunday that Donald Trump was not describing sexual assault in a leaked video recording in which the Republican nominee brags about grabbing women 'by the pussy' without their consent.... 'But beyond the language, would you characterize the behavior described in that [video] as sexual assault if that behavior actually took place?' the Weekly Standard asked. 'I don't characterize that as sexual assault,' Sessions replied. 'I think that's a stretch. I don't know what he meant --' 'So if you grab a woman by the genitals, that's not sexual assault?' the Weekly Standard pressed. 'I don't know. It's not clear that he -- how that would occur.'" -- CW ...

... Emily Crockett of Vox: "Trump surrogates have started normalizing sexual assault in a terrifying way."-- CW

CW: I would never say anything derogatory about anyone's body, but just as a point of information, did anybody watching Sunday night's debate notice whether or not Trump has a fat ass?

MJ Lee of CNN: "Donald Trump issued an unmistakable threat to Hillary Clinton Sunday night: I am willing to cross any line to make the next 30 days of your life hell." -- CW (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Rosie Gray of BuzzFeed: "Trump's revanchist positioning is a sign he's retreated to pleasing the hard core of his base, despite the fact that they cannot deliver him the White House; a performance like this won't bring on board the voters Trump must persuade in order to win.... On Sunday night, Trump's Facebook page posted an image emblematic of where his campaign is now. It's a meme of him standing at a lectern, with the words 'She would be in jail' right next to his face." -- CW (Also linked yesterday.)

Steve M.: "I'm told that yesterday's events are unprecedented in American politics.... But the only thing new that happened yesterday was that Trump brought the attitudes, suspicions, and resentments of conservative America to the debate stage undiluted.... Donald Trump is the real Republican Party stripped of phony civility and fake high-mindedness. He represents his party better than John McCain and Mitt Romney ever did. He's the genuine article. If you're shocked by his campaign, you've had your head in the sand for a long time." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... CW: Yup, what's really upset Republicans this election season is that Donald Trump is the crude public embodiment of who they really are, and the deplorables they rely on to support them.

Greg Sargent: "There is a lot of chatter to the effect that Trump has 'stopped the bleeding.'... If it means, 'Trump fired up demoralized hard-core GOP base voters with an exciting show of fight, which will make it harder for GOP lawmakers to continue abandoning him, requiring them to instead say he took steps towards righting his campaign,' then, yes, Trump probably 'stopped the bleeding.' But..., if anything, Trump doubled down on his core boorishness, mostly to deepen his bond with his supporters, because in the end, those are the only voters he knows how to connect with." -- CW (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Brian Stelter of CNN: Two sources say Billy Bush is unlikely to ever be back on air at NBC. CW: Nevertheless, that Bush bro may have saved the nation from itself.

Way Beyond the Beltway

Neil MacFarquhar of the New York Times: "Amid increasingly tense relations with the United States over Syria, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia took advantage of a routine meeting in Istanbul on Monday to advance the Kremlin's reconciliation with Turkey, including an agreement to revive a suspended natural-gas pipeline project.... The pipeline would make it much easier for Russia to cut off gas supplies to neighboring countries like Ukrainewithout disrupting sales to countries farther west like Italy or Austria. Russia has been trying for years to establish such an export route." -- CW

News Lede

New York Times: "Samsung Electronics is terminating production of its troubled Galaxy Note 7 smartphone, according to a person familiar with the decision, in a major and embarrassing about-face for the South Korean electronics giant. In a statement filed with the country's stock exchange late Tuesday, Samsung said it had made a 'final decision' to stop production. That means the company will no longer produce or market the smartphone.... Samsung has struggled with reports that the Note 7 could overheat and catch fire because of a manufacturing flaw. Last month, the company said it would recall 2.5 million of the phones, but in recent days, reports that the fixed version could also catch fire began to surface as well." -- CW

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