BloggeRhythms

Today’s opener’s a blockbuster because of its source: The Wall Street Journal, which has been decidedly anti-Trump for quite some time now.

Kimberley A. Strassel @wsj.com, headlined her column: “Grifters-in-Chief,” subtitled: “The Clintons don’t draw lines between their ‘charity’ and personal enrichment.”

The opening text speaks vividly for itself: “In an election season that has been full of surprises, let’s hope the electorate understands that there is at least one thing of which it can be certain: A Hillary Clinton presidency will be built, from the ground up, on self-dealing, crony favors, and an utter disregard for the law. 

“This isn’t a guess. It is spelled out, in black and white, in the latest bombshell revelation from WikiLeaks. It comes in the form of a memo written in 2011 by longtime Clinton errand boy Doug Band, who for years worked simultaneously at the Clinton Foundation and at the head of his lucrative consulting business, Teneo. 

“It is astonishingly detailed proof that the Clintons do not draw any lines between their “charitable” work, their political activity, their government jobs or (and most important) their personal enrichment. Every other American is expected to keep these pursuits separate, as required by tax law, anticorruption law and campaign-finance law. For the Clintons, it is all one and the same—the rules be damned.” 

Then, after providing details on how the Clinton/Teneo relationship worked, the money raised and personal benefits to all involved, Ms Strassel closes her column, as follows:    

“Here’s the lasting takeaway: The Clintons spent their White House years explaining endless sleazy financial deals, and even capping their exit with a scandal over whether Bill was paid to pardon financier Marc Rich. They know the risks. And yet they geared up the foundation and these seedy practices even as Mrs. Clinton was making her first bid for the presidency. They continued them as she sat as secretary of state. They continue them still, as she nears the White House. 

“This is how the Clintons operate. They don’t change. Any one who pulls the lever for Mrs. Clinton takes responsibility for setting up the nation for all the blatant corruption that will follow.” 

And then, in a completely different context Arjun Kharpal @cnbc.com, provides quite strong evidence suggesting that: “Trump will win the election and is more popular than Obama in 2008, AI system finds.” 

According to the article: “An artificial intelligence (AI) system that correctly predicted the last three U.S. presidential elections puts Republican nominee Donald Trump ahead of Democrat rival Hillary Clinton in the race to the White House. 

“MogIA was developed by Sanjiv Rai, the founder of Indian start-up Genic.ai. It takes in 20 million data points from public platforms including Google, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube in the U.S. and then analyzes the information to create predictions. 

“The AI system was created in 2004, so it has been getting smarter all the time. It had already correctly predicted the results of the Democrat and Republican Primaries. 

“Data such as engagement with tweets or Facebook Live videos have been taken into account. The result is that Trump has overtaken the engagement numbers of Barack Obama's peak in 2008 – the year he came into power – by 25 percent.” 

Most encouraging for Trump and his supporters is: “Rai said that his AI system shows that candidate in each election who had leading engagement data ended up winning the elections. 

"If Trump loses, it will defy the data trend for the first time in the last 12 years since Internet engagement began in full earnest," Rai wrote in a report sent to CNBC.” 

In a far subtler indication of Trump’s favorability, an article by Dustin Stockton @breitbart.com, was mentioned here yesterday in which it was written: “With increasing regularity, these journalist snowflakes are “reporting” their victimization at the hands Trump supporters who chant mean things like, “CNN sucks” and call them names like “presstitutes.” 

As of this morning, 11,250 reader comments had been posted, almost every single one of them anti-press, with the readers fully aware of MSM bias and refusing to be mislead by its “propaganda.”

Reader, Frankly_Scarlett wrote: “If they were actual journalists, rather than propaganda puppets, I would have some sympathy. But there aren't, so I don't. 

Another, Alti, opined: “I have exactly zero sympathy. I'm a millennial. The damage MSM lies have done to my generation is infuriating. The damage they've done in this election is the last straw. I hope these special snowflakes spend every last dollar they have hiring personal security.” 

Additional disparaging news for Democrats came from David J Lynch and Courtney Weaver in Washington @ft.com, the Financial Times website whose headline read: “Bill Clinton’s business comes back to haunt Hillary in campaign.

“Candidate is battered by daily WikiLeaks revelations about the Clinton Foundation.” 

An example from the text reads: “In February 2014, Mr [Doug] Band pressed [Mr John] Podesta, [the chairman of the Clinton campaign and a former White House chief of staff] to meet Andrew McKenzie, the chief executive of BHP Billiton, during a Washington visit the following month, according to new emails released by WikiLeaks on Thursday. The Anglo-Australian mining company had contributed $175,000 to the Clinton Foundation two years earlier.  

“Would really appreciate if you could see andrew, important to me,” Mr Band wrote Mr Podesta on February 27, 2014.  

“Thirteen hours later, Mr Podesta replied: “For you, I’ll try.”  

Doug Band is president of the consultancy Teneo Holdings, who filled multiple roles as an aide to the former president. "Republicans have accused Mr Band of acting as the ringleader of a “pay-for-play” operation that solicited foundation donations from companies that were also pressed to hire the ex-president for paid speeches.”

At the same time, aside from campaign related mega-problems, the Clinton platform received another major blow yesterday. This one regards the healthcare tax, legislation that a Democrat administration would continue to fully support.   

Roberta Rampton writes @ca.news.yahoo.com, that: “Obama rallies Obamacare troops at 'critical time' for program”

“President Barack Obama on Thursday urged more than 25,000 volunteers and advocates who dialed in to a White House conference call to pull out the stops to boost the number of people signing up for Obamacare health insurance plans. 

“Obama warned it will be challenging to overcome the skepticism about the plans given an onslaught of headlines about surging premium prices, but he said the stakes are high. 

"I think we're at a critical time where we have to show that this program works for people, if they just see what their options are," he told the volunteers, who work in their communities to encourage and assist enrollment.” 

Then, in one short sentence Obama glossed over the unfixable, major flaw which is the reason that socialism in general -and this plan in particular- are always doomed to undeniable failure.  

Obama said: “more young and healthy people need to sign up for plans. That would offset insurers' costs of covering members with serious illnesses.”

And that’s absolutely true. Except for the fact that those very same young and healthy people don’t need nor want this kind of insurance, and certainly have no interest whatsoever in subsidizing older, sicker needy folks whom can’t afford to care for themselves.  

Something else for Democrats to think about came from a friend who sent this: “The owner of the Phoenix Suns basketball team, Robert Sarver, came out strongly opposing AZ's new immigration laws. Arizona's Governor, Jan Brewer, released the following statement in response to Sarver's criticism of the new law:

"What if the owners of the Suns discovered that hordes of people were sneaking into games without paying? 

“What if they had a good idea who the gate-crashers are but the ushers and security personnel were not allowed to ask these folks to produce their ticket stubs, thus non-paying attendees couldn't be ejected. 

“Furthermore, what if Suns' ownership was expected to provide those who sneaked in with complimentary eats and drink? 

“And what if, on those days when a gate-crasher became ill or injured, the Suns had to provide free medical care and shelter?" 

“Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer” 

And then a friend sent this one:

Bringing us to today’s update on Bill Clinton’s wife which came from an article by Pat Buchanan @wnd.com yesterday.

Titling the piece: “A presidency from hell?,” Pat suggests that “Clinton would take office with 2/3 of nation believing she is untruthful.”

He then proposes that “with the election over, the investigative reporters of the adversary press, Pulitzers beckoning, would be cut loose to go after her.

“The Republican House is already gearing up for investigations that could last deep into Clinton’s first term. 

“There is a vast trove of public and sworn testimony from Hillary, about the server, the emails, the erasures, the Clinton Foundation. Now, thanks to WikiLeaks, there are tens of thousands of emails to sift through, and perhaps tens of thousands more to come. 

“What are the odds that not one contains information that contradicts her sworn testimony? Rep. Jim Jordan contends that Clinton may already have perjured herself. 

“And as the full-court press would begin with her inauguration, Clinton would have to deal with the Syrians, Russians, Taliban, North Koreans and Xi Jinping in the South China Sea – and with Bill Clinton wandering around the White House with nothing to do. 

“This election is not over. But if Hillary Clinton wins, a truly hellish presidency could await her, and us.” 

The truly critical factor here is that Pat is almost certainly correct as to what backlash would be like if Trump should lose. Because, if nothing else, he’s given voice, strength and visibility to a huge number of disappointed citizens extremely upset with the nation’s current condition and direction. Thus, it’s highly unlikely that they’ll just quietly walk away from a loss and simply lick their wounds.   

What's more, as Pat also mentions, Congress now knows quite clearly what roughly half the nation’s voters want. Which means that members will have to produce acceptable results if they wish to remain in office themselves. 

As a result, since Bill’s wife can actually deliver none of what half of the nation certainly desires, the ongoing question needs asking once more: Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, Jerry Brown, and Starbucks chairman and CEO, Howard Schultz, are you guys are reading this?

   

That's it for today folks.  

Adios