Breaking Down the 2016 POTUS Race Contenders & Issues

[SW VandeCarr]

I hope this post passes muster. The recent call from a Russian lawmaker that failure to elect Trump could lead to nuclear war seems to indicate that Trump is indeed the "Kremlin" candidate, whether he knows it or not. His own statements, including his rebuck of Pense's hawkish statements regarding Russia, only lend credence to this claim. This should be unacceptable most Republicans and most Americans. Putin has clearly declared his overt hostility to the US and to the West in general and no statements by a Russian lawmaker (member of the State Duma and Putin's party) would go public without Putin's approval.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/433613/trump-kremlins-candidate
This is a is a respected conservative journal.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-russian-trump-idUSKCN12C28Q?il=0

 

[BillTre]

In a normal election year this would be the kiss of death for the candidate being supported by the Kremlin.
At this point however, it probably doesn't mean much (from a political horse race point of view).
It would not surprise me if a lot of those associating themselves with Trump end up in worse political circumstances, particularly certain Republicans, but possibly also Putin.

How about that Republican party?
Looks like it has three major components: religious right, corporate right, and the outrageous (alt) right which seems to contain a lot of violent xenophobic, misogynistic, racists (which Trump is trying to provoke).
The last group is making things difficult for the others. After they lose, what happens to the GOP? The party base will continue to be filled with the third group and will be pissed off at the others.
I would not be surprised if the first two groups split from the GOP, leaving it to the third group and form a new party more acceptable to them.
This would be better for everyone, including the Democrats.

 

[mheslep]

I hope this post passes muster. The recent call from a Russian lawmaker that failure to elect Trump could lead to nuclear war seems to indicate that Trump is indeed the "Kremlin" candidate, whether he knows it or not. His own statements, including his rebuck of Pense's hawkish statements regarding Russia, only lend credence to this claim. This should be unacceptable most Republicans and most Americans. Putin has clearly declared his overt hostility to the US and to the West in general and no statements by a Russian lawmaker (member of the State Duma and Putin's party) would go public without Putin's approval.
...

My highlight.

Lost you in exactly what "this" refers to. Is it that most Republicans and Americans should not find a Russian lawmaker shooting off his mouth about a US election acceptable? Reuters states most Russians view said lawmaker, Zhirinovsky, "as a clownish figure". I gather you don't mean Americans should take action to silence a Russian clown.

Zurbrin's piece in NR was set off by Carter Page finding a place on Trumps foreign policy staff. Page was let go last month. Take Page away and the abandonment of Ukraine is the unacceptable part of that article:

...In February 2014, thousands of Ukrainians braved police gunfire to rise up and overthrow the corrupt Putin stooge Viktor Yanukovych, who had been president of Ukraine for four years. Yanukovych, breaking his pledge to take Ukraine on the path to freedom offered by the European Union, had decided to surrender the country to the Moscow-run “Eurasian Union” instead. Within weeks, the Kremlin responded by sending troops to invade the Ukrainian province of Crimea, and then, in April, it seized Donetsk, Lugansk, and other parts of eastern Ukraine as well. Under the terms of the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, in return for Ukraine’s giving up its nuclear arsenal, the United States, Russia, and the United Kingdom were all bound to defend Ukraine’s territorial integrity. As the invasion unfolded, however, the Obama administration chose to ignore this pledge,...

 

[mheslep]

corporate right

Corporate vote goes to Hillary.

2013-2015 Speeches:

• 4/18/2013, Morgan Stanley, Washington, DC: $225,000
• 4/24/2013, Deutsche Bank, Washington, DC: $225,000
• 4/24/2013, National Multi Housing Council, Dallas, Texas: $225,000
• 4/30/2013, Fidelity Investments, Naples, Fla.: $225,000
• 5/8/2013, Gap Inc., San Francisco, Calif.: $225,000
• 5/14/2013, Apollo Management Holdings LP, New York, NY: $225,000
• 5/16/2013, Itau BBA USA Securities, New York, NY: $225,000
• 5/21/2013, Vexizon Communications Inc., Washington, DC: $225,000
• 5/29/2013, Sanford C. Bernstein and Co. LLC, New York, NY: $225,000
• 6/4/2013, The Goldman Sachs Group, Palmetto Bluffs, SC: $225,000
• 6/6/2013, Spencer Stuart, New York, NY: $225,000

...

 

[SW VandeCarr]

My highlight.

Lost you in exactly what "this" refers to. Is it that most Republicans and Americans should not find a Russian lawmaker shooting off his mouth about a US election acceptable? Reuters states most Russians view said lawmaker, Zhirinovsky, "as a clownish figure". I gather you don't mean Americans should take action to silence a Russian clown.

Clown or not, there's no way his statement would become public without Putin's permission, something I already said. And where did I or anything in the linked article say anything about "taking action" against Zhirinovsky? He's just serving his master.

Zurbrin's piece in NR was set off by Carter Page finding a place on Trumps foreign policy staff. Page was let go last month. Take Page away and the abandonment of Ukraine is the unacceptable part of that article:

Carter Page was approved by Trump. He's obviously become a political liability, but I would guess Trump had to be persuaded to dump him. Trump hasn't changed his attitude toward Russia as indicated by his rebuck of Pence in the second debate. How did Page get on Trump's staff in the first place? Another person close to Trump must have recommended him.

 

[BillTre]

Corporate Right = Corporations looking to avoid factual implications for political thought.

 

[BillTre]

The greatest challenge to civilization today is climate change and it long term impacts.
Intelligent responses to this is my Primary Consideration in Politics currently (or my Prime Directive).
It starts with being open to facts instead of denying them.
That's what significant portions of the Corporate right are into.
Some of the others just want more money. They are less dangerous.

 

[Evo]

We do not allow political Discusuions of Climate Change. All Climate Change must be purely scientific and in the Earth forums. Thank you.

 

[BillTre]

We do not allow political Discusuions of Climate Change. All Climate Change must be purely scientific and in the Earth forums. Thank you.

OK, my mistake.

Guess its an exception to the current news thing?

 

[Evo]

Yes, we only allow climate science if it actually is about the science. No harm, no foul, lots of rules you can only learn by running into them.

 

[BillTre]

OK, what if one were to talk about: "That Which Must Not Be Mentioned" (or the wonderful acronym: TWMNBM)?

I suppose a symbol for the same thing would not work, but I feel driven to ask.

 

[OmCheeto]

...
Not sure if I'll get a response back, in this lifetime.

Well, call me Lazarus.
My sister called me back, and gave me another stream of consciousness.
About the same amount of information, but different stuff. I'll not list it, as I'm sure most of it has been gone over already.

One interesting, and astonishingly true story though, related to a reference which Evo mentioned on July 6th, 2016, in regards Hillary's missing emails.
The story I read was from a year earlier, and delved more deeply into one specific thing mentioned in the above article:

Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation Amid Russian Uranium Deal [New York Times]
APRIL 23, 2015

I've been researching this story since she called, so about 6 hours.

All I have to say is; "Wow." I had to read it three times. And it's really long too. I usually can't make it through a paragraph of most articles. But this one is like an international spy novel.

Oh, and some other things:
Frank Giustra figures prominently in the story. Pay attention to that name. His name also shows up twice in the top donors to the Clinton Foundation list.
This was actually one of my sister's new topics for today; "Do you know who gave the Clinton's money? The Russians! And Qatar!". She did not mention Mr. Giustra. But going over the list of people who have donated money to their foundation, it looks like half the people, and every corporation on the planet, have.

Anyways, I'll probably still vote for Hillary, even though my eyebrows got a real workout today.

 

[Astronuc]

It's not directly about Trump or Clinton, but it is part of the current election cycle.

Democrats quickly raise $13,000 to help reopen firebombed North Carolina GOP office
https://www.yahoo.com/news/m/67b23174-f086-378a-8cc3-d9557d2dd83b/democrats-quickly-raise.html

. . . , just hours after the North Carolina Republican Party reported that its campaign office in heavily Democratic Orange County had been gutted with a Molotov cocktail, a collection of Democrats raised more than $13,000 in 40 minutes through crowdfunding site GoFundMe "to enable the Orange County, North Carolina Republican office to re-open as soon as possible."

People on opposite sides of the political divide should work together to ensure a fair (and safe) process. People should not be destroying the property of others or harming others.

 

[Orodruin]

Trump's views on minorities and women might make me scared of the dark, but this scares me in broad daylight: http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/201...ection-claims-raise-historical-alarms-n667831

Democracy builds upon trust and accepting that a majority of voters might not agree with your own opinion (as almost half the people in Great Britain experienced this summer). This behaviour

Last week, two armed Virginia men supporting Trump stood for hours outside a Democratic campaign office to "protest" Clinton. The action was legal, but it appeared designed to intimidate.

seems to me as it belongs in a state on the verge of becoming totalitarian, not a country that styles itself as the greatest democracy on Earth.

If you fear a rigged election, help making sure that it is fair instead of complaining about it.

 

[Bystander]

If you fear a rigged election,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_turnout_in_the_United_States_presidential_elections
--- get off the couch and vote.

 

[Vanadium 50]

This behaviour seems to me as it belongs in a state on the verge of becoming totalitarian

Sadly, it is not new: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Black_Panther_Party_voter_intimidation_case

 

[BillTre]

I live in Oregon and I vote from my couch!

This is because our state is all mail-in ballots (just like an absentee ballot).
This is the best voting method I have ever used. You can take a lot of time and read about each candidate or issue as you go along and mark the ballot without any pressure to be fast. No lines either.

 

[russ_watters]

Trump's views on minorities and women might make me scared of the dark, but this scares me in broad daylight: http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/201...ection-claims-raise-historical-alarms-n667831

Democracy builds upon trust and accepting that a majority of voters might not agree with your own opinion*...

Why? That reporter/those historians seem to have a selective memories. I remember Democrats screaming to high heaven - also with no evidence - that Diebold was stealing elections for Bush (we had a number of discussions of it here). And Gore went so far as to challenge the election in court to ensure that all of the votes in categories that might help him get counted by methods that might help him. The article lists Gore's challenges, but with absurdly charitable and oft repeated in liberal circles verbiage such as "Gore...won the popular vote" (that isn't a thing) and "Supreme Court decided the election" (no it didn't - the votors and electoral college did).

If the fear is strictly over Trump's rhetoric, so what? Why do we care about Trump's rhetoric? There is no power behind it. Barring an unlikely extremely close election and Bush/Gore/Florida situation, there really isn't anything Trump can do to make real trouble if he loses. The only thing he can do - sue - would go nowhere. The Supreme Court would fast-track his lawsuit to the trash can.

Can he stir-up trouble with his supporters? Sure. And that would get them exactly as far as the conspiracy theories went about Diebold stealing elections for Bush.

*I know what you mean, but in this election it is likely based on current polling that both Hillary's and Trump's votors will have to accept that a majority of votors don't agree with their opinion.

[edit] Here's a more balanced article on the issue:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/10/18/politics/donald-trump-rigged-election/index.html

Despite quoting Trump directly though, it does ignore his primary complaint: that the media is acting against him and even conspiring with the Clinton camp. These claims are, of course, universally understood to be true, right...?

 

[mheslep]

where did I or anything in the linked article say anything about "taking action" against Zhirinovsky?

Your first post on the subject stated an ambiguous "this" should be "unacceptable" to "Americans", with a link to a statement this Russian made last week. Okay, assume for a moment the guy speaks for Putin. One more time, what exactly is 'this', and what are you suggesting Americans do about it?

 

[Orodruin]

Why? That reporter/those historians seem to have a selective memories. I remember Democrats screaming to high heaven - also with no evidence - that Diebold was stealing elections for Bush (we had a number of discussions of it here). And Gore went so far as to challenge the election in court to ensure that all of the votes in categories that might help him get counted by methods that might help him. The article lists Gore's challenges, but with absurdly charitable and oft repeated in liberal circles verbiage such as "Gore...won the popular vote" (that isn't a thing) and "Supreme Court decided the election" (no it didn't - the votors and electoral college did).

To me there is a clear difference between using legal methods in order to try to benefit yourself and issuing a call to arms because you do not agree with an election result. In fact I would welcome a Trump legal process because it would put additional weight behind a statement of the election having been conducted according to the electoral laws.

If the fear is strictly over Trump's rhetoric, so what? Why do we care about Trump's rhetoric? There is no power behind it. Barring an unlikely extremely close election and Bush/Gore/Florida situation, there really isn't anything Trump can do to make real trouble if he loses. The only thing he can do - sue - would go nowhere. The Supreme Court would fast-track his lawsuit to the trash can.

I am not worried about Trump taking legal action. I am worried about Trump calling upon more militant factions to take up arms, such as his thinly veiled hints at "second amendment people" to "do something about it". As a non-American, this strikes me only as an additional argument for abolishing the second amendment.

 

[russ_watters]

To me there is a clear difference between using legal methods in order to try to benefit yourself and issuing a call to arms because you do not agree with an election result.

Oh, yeah, I'd agree with that. I'm not seeing anything about a "call to arms" in that article though. Can you provide a quote of Trump's call to arms?

I am not worried about Trump taking legal action. I am worried about Trump calling upon more militant factions to take up arms, such as his thinly veiled hints at "second amendment people" to "do something about it".

Just in case I'm misunderstandung: are you claiming Trump has made a "call to arms" or just worried that he might? What you posted previously about fearing what was in the article doesn't seem to me to fit together with what you are saying here, unless there is some reading between the lines needed to find the thing to fear.

The only "militant" things I can recall from him are the 2nd amendment comments, which didn't have anything to do with recourse against a rigged election.

 

[BillTre]

Another, more interesting election issue:

In Florida, the mosquito (Aedes aegypti), which is the main vector (biological instrument of spread and infection) for the Zika and Dengue diseases, is going to the ballot!
The residents on a small island, will be voting on whether to have a test release of recombinant Aedes aegypti as a control method on part of their island.
The mosquitoes already exist in the island and Zika is a looming threat.
Many different potential control methods for this species exist, each with different costs, benefits, and possible problems.
Different people (of course) have a variety of opinions on these different control methods.
Whether to have the vote itself has also been an issue.
This article gives an overview of this complex and yet to be resolved situation.

As an aside, I like to point out that the Aedes aegypti is an invasive species (from Africa) and does not really belong in the western hemisphere.
I would like to see it eliminated.

 

[Orodruin]

Oh, yeah, I'd agree with that. I'm not seeing anything about a "call to arms" in that article though. Can you provide a quote of Trump's call to arms?

The appeal to "second amendment people" along with Trump's current rhetoric is what worries me. Regardless of whether he intends it as a call to arms or not, I do not consider it beyond some of his more radical right extrimist followers to interpret it as such. I even saw a video on CNN where a woman in the audience at a Pence rally called for armed revolution should Trump lose the election. Granted, Pence tried to put a lid on that, but there are people in Trump's ranks that consider this as a viable (or necessary) measure in case of a (now rather likely) Trump loss. I do not think Trump thinks or cares about the consequences of appealing to this crowd.

 

[mheslep]

Trump's views on minorities and women might make me scared of the dark,

Plenty of crude remarks were circulated months ago. See https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/6777 , "taco bowl engagement", along with an attempt at Jew baiting. All of this odious. I don't know that scare is suddenly in order, unless it is to ignore some comments and emphasize others.

but this scares me in broad daylight: http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/201...ection-claims-raise-historical-alarms-n667831

Democracy builds upon trust and accepting that a majority of voters might not agree with your own opinion (as almost half the people in Great Britain experienced this summer).

Without pointing to something he can correct, those are useless and inflammatory comments from Trump. But election dirty tricks and accepting the will of the majority are two different things. Also, bias and dirty dealing by those charged with neutrality in this election cycle are not without basis, namely the collusion between the DNC and Clinton Campaign to beat Sanders.

This behaviour

seems to me as it belongs in a state on the verge of becoming totalitarian, not a country that styles itself as the greatest democracy on Earth.

Yes, poor behavior (if those guys were who they say they were). Actual violence is worse.

 

[jim hardy]

his thinly veiled hints at "second amendment people" to "do something about it".

? Ignoramus reporters spun that one into the dark side. It was a clear reference to NRA's "Institute for Legislative Action" who basically lobby legislatures for common sense .

Source- my vivid recollection of the quote itself . I said "They'll make hay with that one. "

,

 

[Orodruin]

Yes, poor behavior (if those guys were who they say they were). Actual violence is worse.

The "if those guys were who they say they were" is a baseless accusation in this case unless you have actual evidence they were not. That such things happen does not mean that any case will be of this form. You may just as well accuse the people in your second video of being paid by Trump. To think that this sort of behaviour is limited to one side of the fence is naive.

Of course, violence or reprecussions based on voting preference in all forms must be shunned in a democracy. You are free to think your political opponents are idiots, but they have a democratic right to be and it is your task to peacefully convince a majority that you are right.

 

[Orodruin]

It was a clear reference to NRA'a "Institute for Legal Action" who basically lobby legislatures for common sense .

I strongly disagree with this. That it can be interpreted this way does not mean it is a far stretch to reach the other interpretation. The problem here is that Trump makes statements that are often not coherent or precise and vividly open to interpretation. He often let's people fill in the blanks themselves, creating an illusion that he is saying exactly what you want to hear.

Did he mention the "Institute for Legal Action" in the statement? If not it is not a clear reference.

Igmoramus reporters spun that one into the dark side.

This sounds rather paranoid to me, but typical of what Trump tends to do - blaming the system rather than finding a coherent argument.

As a non-American, I understand that you may find Clinton unsuitable, but I find the alternative several orders of magnitude worse. If the US was not such a major power worldwide, I might not have cared as much and considered it entertainment (in Sweden a political ad with your opponent barking like a dog would be strictly counter productive and probably lose you the election), but this fact makes it difficult to ignore.

 

[jim hardy]

Yes, poor behavior (if those guys were who they say they were). Actual violence is worse.

i can't say who's who, no mainstream source i can find is touching it yet

From mhselep's link

Two of Creamer’s underlings in the video, Zulema Rodriguez and Aaron Black take credit for organizing the March Chicago protest which made Trump cancel his rally and left police officers injured.

Federal Election Commission confirms Zulema Rodriguez was paid around $20K.
https://beta.fec.gov/data/disbursem...ent_name=zulema+rodriguez&max_date=10/18/2016

see what if anything falls out of it.

old jim

 

[jim hardy]

I strongly disagree with this. That it can be interpreted this way does not mean it is a far stretch to reach the other interpretation. The problem here is that Trump makes statements that are often not coherent or precise and vividly open to interpretation. He often let's people fill in the blanks themselves, creating an illusion that he is saying exactly what you want to hear.

Did he mention the "Institute for Legal Action" in the statement? If not it is not a clear reference.

Did you see the statement delivered? It was clearly an afterthought,

Duhhh, Senate confirms justices and there is plenty of support in Senate (as well as general public ) for 2nd amendment issues.I grant you Trump is not the smoothest of public speakers.

 

[mheslep]

The "if those guys were who they say they were" is a baseless accusation in this case unless you have actual evidence they were not. That such things happen does not mean that any case will be of this form.

True, and my guess is those guys are what they say they are. But I don't know and neither do you. Your quote has no more basis than what those two random guys say. The local media outlet gave no independently checked background, no address, nothing.

You may just as well accuse the people in your second video of being paid by Trump.

Both are long time Democratic operatives with a public record. https://www.linkedin.com/in/sbfoval , Bob Creamer.

To think that this sort of behaviour is limited to one side of the fence is naive.

Who's one sided? Somebody firebombed a GOP office in North Carolina a couple days ago, a few months ago some Brit tried to assassinate Trump at one his rallies, and apparently two armed Trump supporters stood outside a Democratic office in Virginia for hours. You pick the latter to support an end-of-Democracy narrative.

 

[russ_watters]

The appeal to "second amendment people" along with Trump's current rhetoric is what worries me. Regardless of whether he intends it as a call to arms or not, I do not consider it beyond some of his more radical right extrimist followers to interpret it as such. I even saw a video on CNN where a woman in the audience at a Pence rally called for armed revolution should Trump lose the election. Granted, Pence tried to put a lid on that, but there are people in Trump's ranks that consider this as a viable (or necessary) measure in case of a (now rather likely) Trump loss. I do not think Trump thinks or cares about the consequences of appealing to this crowd.

As I pointed out (and will expand), his Second Amendment appeal was months ago, before his implosion and was if anything a threat on candidate Hillary, not President Elect Hillary or the election/transition system. It can't be construed as a suggested recourse against a rigged election. And that's even assuming we consider it coherent/specific enough to be a real threat/suggestion. And setting aside that no one took him up on it. So I'm reading that as confirmation that the link that scares you doesn't actually contain content on the thing you fear - you've generated the thing you fear from vague implications of other things.

Look, everyone is entitled to their fears - you can fear whatever you want for any reason you want. But when Trump hasn't said the things you fear he might someday say, that means the fear is mostly a product of your imagination. Again, you are entitled to it, but personally, I'm going to choose not to fear something that for the time being isn't real/hasn't happened. Maybe that makes me naive and maybe I won't see it until it's too late whereas you/others are seeing it before it happens. But to me this just looks like an extension of the early "Trump is a fascist/Nazi" rhetoric that opened the door for wild speculation that he could do anything a an actual 1930s fascist/Nazi might have done. Which to me sounds far fetched, to put it mildly.

The problem here is that Trump makes statements that are often not coherent or precise and vividly open to interpretation.

Agreed. But a "call to action" is not something that can be incoherent or open to interpretation if he wants it to be successful. Again, you are free to harness your imagination to generate focused meanings to fear from Trump's incoherent statements if you want, but I choose not to and I believe that objectively the risk that incoherent statements could lead to coherent action is very small.

The "if those guys were who they say they were" is a baseless accusation in this case unless you have actual evidence they were not. That such things happen does not mean that any case will be of this form. You may just as well accuse the people in your second video of being paid by Trump. To think that this sort of behaviour is limited to one side of the fence is naive.

I think you completely misread that: mheslep was being deferential toward your position by offering that the evidence he presented to counter you was unsubstatiated. But he was otherwise just holding up a mirror to you. Everything you said in that quote, you could read back to yourself in my voice because it is pretty close to exactly the point I'm trying to make to you. You're taking vague scraps and crafting a narrative out of them. When it is pointed out to you that vague scraps exist on the other side that if someone wanted to they could craft their own mirror image narrative, you say...that. So I guess in an odd way -- I agree with everything you just said.

 

[BillTre]

A lot of this discussion has concerned itself with parsing the exact meanings of words and phrases of the Donald.
This is not going to be very fruitful and in many cases, I feel, misses an important point.

There is a long tradition in American politics using "dog-whistle" words and phrases or saying things in a way that can have an intended meaning for your rabid followers and a convenient more innocuous meaning for the more general public. This is not done unintentionally. Trump does it a lot and he is good at it.

Dog-whistles are something heard by the rabid followers (an example: skittles now seems to be a clear symbol to represent non-whites to racists, but is largely known as candy to normal people).

 

[Orodruin]

Look, everyone is entitled to their fears - you can fear whatever you want for any reason you want. But when Trump hasn't said the things you fear he might someday say, that means the fear is mostly a product of your imagination. Again, you are entitled to it, but personally, I'm going to choose not to fear something that for the time being isn't real/hasn't happened. Maybe that makes me naive and maybe I won't see it until it's too late whereas you/others are seeing it before it happens. But to me this just looks like an extension of the early "Trump is a fascist/Nazi" rhetoric that opened the door for wild speculation that he could do anything a an actual 1930s fascist/Nazi might have done. Which to me sounds far fetched, to put it mildly.

I do not see how you read any of this into my comments. The main point from the beginning was the degradation of the faith in democracy. To have a candidate question the legitimacy of the election before it has even taken place is unprecedented. You say you are holding up a mirror, but to me as an external observer it is really Trump who is in need of one. You are also failing to acknowledge the fact that what I was doing to mhsleep was just that.

Again, I am sure there are idiots on both sides. What scares me are not those idiots. It is how the front person they are following respects democracy that is the issue. If the leader does not respect democracy, we find ourselves in adangerous situation.

It may very well be that this is unfounded and that Trump will go quietly when he loses (as seems likely from current polls). In that case this line of rhetoric is just misplaced as it might rally his base but is likely to drive away undecided voters. I feel this is Trump's main problem in getting elected - he appeals and attracts a certain base, but his rhetoric is off putting to undecideds that he would need to attract in order to actually win. As someone put it, he is attractive to a majority of republican voters but not to a majority of voters. Clinton has the same but opposite problem, but seemingly to a lesser extent.

 

[BillTre]

In that case this line of rhetoric is just misplaced as it might rally his base but is likely to drive away undecided voters. I feel this is Trump's main problem in getting elected - he appeals and attracts a certain base, but his rhetoric is off putting to undecideds that he would need to attract in order to actually win. As someone put it, he is attractive to a majority of republican voters but not to a majority of voters. Clinton has the same but opposite problem, but seemingly to a lesser extent.

Not only is Trump's rhetoric repelling Women (both parties), Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, Republicans who disagree with his recent blathering, and White men with a college education, but his claims that the elections is rigged will likely reduce turnout of the people who might otherwise vote for him (since if the big guys says its rigged, why bother to vote?).
He also has virtually no ground game (to coordinate getting people to the polls on election day) and relatively little money for advertisements.
His main innovation seems to be encouraging people to go to neighboring areas (with minorities) in an attempt at veiled intimation.

His rigging claims are all about protecting his ego and image since it is clear to everybody, including him, he is going to lose, possibly in a landslide.
He is a small person.

 

[mheslep]

i can't say who's who, no mainstream source is...

Took them two days, popped up 4 hrs ago.
http://www.cnn.com/videos/tv/2016/1...rative-fired-another-resigns-griffin-lead.cnn