Category: Politics

This is it. Tonight’s the night.

Yes, it is the final presidential debate. One might hope for this to be an uplifting talk about issues the new president will face in January. But hope in the one hand and …

So far, it sounds as if another miserable, dirty, discouraging contest will take place on a stage in “Sin City,” Las Vegas, Nev.

CNN reports that Donald Trump will have a “never-before-seen” accuser of Bill Clinton, some local TV news reporter who worked in Arkansas who reportedly said Clinton sexually assaulted her when he was governor.

If this smacks of desperation from Trump it is. The Donald is in the tank and so he has spent the last week or so creating an alibi in the, seemingly likely outcome of his defeat next month. That is, of course, “this election is rigged,” excuse.

I really don’t look forward to this nastiness. I imagine many prospective voters feel the same way. But this whole damned campaign has been in this manner.

One facet of this election that truly makes me sad is the propaganda machine that has helped create the illusion among Trump voters in which a Hillary Clinton presidency would mean the end of our lives as we know it.

There definitely will be some changes in our lives, especially if a purging of Republicans in Congress happens. My guess is that the House will remain controlled by Republicans, but perhaps by a much slimmer majority. The Senate looks to be different. If the presidency and Senate is controlled by Democrats then some change will potentially take place, including the possibility of a more liberal Supreme Court majority.

I also hear these fears, which are frankly unfounded, that the Second Amendment will be abolished. That will not happen, that is, unless the NRA and irresponsible gun owners force the government’s hand.

Hillary Clinton is first and foremost a moderate Democrat who will not significantly upset the apple cart. You Trump true believers out there may not believe me, but that is your problem, not mine.

The sooner this debate is over and the votes are counted after next month’s election, the better our democracy will be. That is provided Donald Trump isn’t elected and he accepts that outcome.

For more than six years I have posited on this site that the Republican Party was teetering on the edge of a divorce. Luckily, I wasn’t — at least I hope I wasn’t — stupid enough to say when this split would happen. I would say at this moment we are likely as close as anytime in the history of the Grand Old Party that an implosion of Republicanism could happen as a result of this election.

The Republicans have been openly feuding for years — that is not something exclusive of that party — only since the establishment of the Tea Party as a legitimate wing of the GOP has the infighting escalated to an intra-party civil war.

Donald Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, has deeply divided the party since before he announced his intention to seek the White House. There are a number of reasons but mostly because Trump is perhaps the most lying, gas-lighting son of a bitch that has been seen or heard from in any presidential race in history. The tape — need I say more — has caused an open wound that has festered off the television set into our living rooms.

Now the Republican elected class are wringing their hands more than when those people were in school, waiting to make their first speech.

How the tape release will weigh on the presidential race is for us, the voting public, will be partially known in the next 48 or so hours. That will involve waiting to see what happens until the second debate between Hillary Clinton and Trump tomorrow evening. Then one final debate, the vote and the Electoral College, will hopefully nail all of this malarkey down. Certainly, anything can happen which will make voters wholly reject Clinton and whomever runs whether Trump or, whatever dog and pony show the GOP puts together.

This has been a miserable week for Donald Trump, the worst. It would seem as if Hillary would be a lock. As my ex-pat friend in Tokyo, Paul, said today in a rich What’s Up chat:

 “The only way Clinton can fuck this up is if her head spins around and she hurls green vomit at the audience on Sunday.”

Hopefully, Father Damian will not be needed for an exorcism.

 

 

This has been a very unusual presidential election period, to say the very least.

We have the two most disliked major party candidates in recent history and one of those candidates is kind of nuts. The kind who is nuts. There are two so-called “third-party” candidates.

Gary Johnson, the Libertarian Party candidate, was a two-time governor of New Mexico. Green Party candidate Jill Stein is a habitual also-ran candidate who failed in bids for Congress, Massachusetts governor, Massachusetts House and for the commonwealth’s Secretary. Stein won only half of one percent of the votes in the 2012 election for president.

Since the presidential campaigns largely developed into two-party ones, many of the third party candidates largely ran to advance certain political beliefs and points of view. Some candidates actually thought they could win. Those campaigns are filed in history under “D” for delusional.

Today’s deep-down political narrative is not the the early morning Tweet-orgy from Donald Trump, who took to cyberspace to whine about the former Miss Universe whom he supposedly called her Miss Piggy, as well an ethnic slur. No, that narrative is the growing number of newspaper editorial boards that are making history by endorsing Hillary Clinton, or just making a stand against Trump.

Today, the nationwide USA Today released its first voting recommendation in its more than three-decades history. The Gannett publication noted its editorial board unanimous consensus that Trump was not fit for the presidency.

 “From the day he declared his candidacy 15 months ago through this week’s first presidential debate, Trump has demonstrated repeatedly that he lacks the temperament, knowledge, steadiness and honesty that America needs from its presidents,” the editorial stated.

The publication stopped short of recommending a presidential candidate, a move that many journalists, former journalists and semi-former journalists such as myself see as a lily-livered exercise.

More politicians and publications favoring Hillary Clinton for president have been out today on the stump telling the electorate that a vote for a third party candidate is essentially a vote for Trump.

Libertarian candidate Johnson and his Green Party counterpart have some decent attributes that I find agreeable.

Johnson’s “Allepo Moments” have become a running joke except to those of us getting up there in age whose every little forgetfulness is a concern.

Likewise, Stein has some positive ideas with which I agree. But she has others I cannot get behind.

And the major problems I have with the third-party candidates — Oh, I also think Libertarian VP candidate Bill Weld was a good choice — is they have an  ice cube’s chance in hell in making any substantial showing.

I have previously mentioned here that I fear a 1998-like election rerun in which the outcome will have an extension such as Gore v. Bush. I hope not. I hope with all I can hope with and hope a little more. Because I am ready to get this election in our rear-view mirror. Unfortunately for me, the driver’s side-door mirror is my favored mirror and it got shattered yesterday when my little truck sideswiped a big truck. I’m just saying.