Ted Cruz Suspends Presidential Campaign, Washington Free Beacon via YouTube, May 3, 2016
Archive for the ‘2016 elections’ category
Ted Cruz Suspends Presidential Campaign
May 4, 2016Full Donald Trump Indiana Primary Victory Speech
May 4, 2016Full-Donald Trump Indiana Primary Victory Speech, Washington Free Beacon via YouTube, May 3, 2016
(Gracious, particularly to Ted Cruz who has “suspended” his campaign. As Trump said, now it’s time unite the party and to go after Hillary Clinton. — DM)
Humor | To Know Ted Cruz Is To Wish You Didn’t
May 4, 2016Leftist Violence and Double Standards
May 3, 2016Leftist Violence & Double Standards, Front Page Magazine, Ari Lieberman, May 3, 2016
The so-called “mainstream” national media has developed a penchant for focusing on violence originating from certain quarters while all but ignoring hooliganism emanating from others. The disparity in treatment is due primarily to an agenda being pushed by leftist elements within the media establishment including but not limited to, MSNBC and the New York Times.
Violence emanating from Trump supporters buttresses a false narrative that many within the establishment media wish to propagate; namely that Trump’s immigration and border policies are laced with racist undertones. The issue is not framed within the context of securing borders, protecting U.S. citizens from crime and terrorism and curtailing an already overburdened entitlement system for illegals. Rather, Trump’s opponents and their allies in the media have succeeded in framing the issue as one involving racial divisiveness and incitement.
That narrative, displayed over and over again in print as well as social media has succeeded in fueling extreme left-wing violence at Trump rallies far outweighing the violence exhibited by a very limited number of Trump supporters. Yet violence by Trump supporters is still given prominence despite its limited scope and scale. Isolated incidents involving violence at Trump gatherings are given disproportionate coverage far beyond their importance.
Consider the side-by-side contrast of media coverage in two separate instances of violence at Trump rallies. On March 10, a 78-year old senior citizen punched an anti-Trump demonstrator in the face at a Trump rally in Fayetteville, North Carolina. The action was inexcusable and the perpetrator was arrested and rightfully charged with misdemeanor assault while his victim required no medical attention.
On Thursday and Friday, a large unruly mob of anti-Trump hooligans, some of whom displayed Mexican flags, assembled at the Orange County Fairgrounds in California where a pro-Trump rally was held. The mob quickly resorted to violence, blocking traffic, throwing bricks, ransacking police cars and attacking policemen. One bystander, who had the misfortune of wearing a Trump T-shirt was slugged in the face, knocked to the ground and required several unsightly stitches to close his wound. Several police cars were damaged and a police horse was injured. The resulting damage will reportedly cost the fairgrounds tens of thousands of dollars.
The former case involving the pro-Trump senior citizen made headlines nationally. Video of the incident was shown in an endless loop. Elements within the establishment media made certain to frame the issue as one with racial overtones, since the perpetrator was white and the victim, black. Coverage of the incident – which involved a single punch and no real injury – lasted for weeks with MSNBC and other media commentators noting (falsely) how Trump rallies draw racist crowds. Trump’s supporters were unfairly painted with a broad brush.
In the latter case, while the incident received prominent local media coverage, it lacked the national staying power of the Fayetteville incident even though the resultant violence was far more extreme and damaging. CNN tried to “balance” its reporting of the incident by citing claims by the louts that they were merely there to demonstrate their angst against Trump’s “message of hate.” Vandalism and property damage was justified as a “mere symptom of hate speech.” CNN bent over backward to provide justification or at least understanding of the demonstrators’ baleful actions. No such slack is ever afforded to Trump supporters.
Of course, there was no justification for the violence in Orange County just as there was no justification for the violence in Fayetteville. But for some inexplicable reason, in the eyes of agenda-driven leftist media outlets, not all acts of violence are created equal.
Bullying and hooliganism of the sort that had been characteristic of the radical right has now become part and parcel of tactics employed by the radical left. Whether it’s a professor calling for “some muscle” to eject a student reporter at the University of Missouri or pro-Palestinian activists disrupting a peaceful gathering at San Francisco State University, the methods are becoming more violent and their use, more frequent.
These incidents of radical leftist hooliganism are given mere scant coverage by the leftist media. Often, they are entirely ignored by left-wing media and only belatedly covered after non-mainstream bloggers bring it to the community’s attention by creating a social media storm.
In the case of Trump, it is readily apparent that certain elements within the mainstream media have sacrificed journalistic integrity to advance a particular ideology. It is indeed a sad reflection of the present state of journalism.
Humor | Democrats Debate 2016 – Capitol Steps
May 2, 2016Democrats Debate 2016 – Capitol Steps via YouTube, May 1, 2016
State official tries to block Trump from speaking in Calif.
April 30, 2016What do YOU belong to?
April 30, 2016What do YOU belong to? Dan Miller’s Blog, April 30, 2016
(The views expressed in this article are mine and do not necessarily reflect those of Warsclerotic or its other editors. –DM
The Demorat and Publican parties appear to believe that since we belong to them they own us and can control us. Until recently, they were right. Now, at least for the Publican Party, not so much.
The Federal Government also believes that we belong to it, that it owns us and that hordes of unelected bureaucrats can and should control us; it’s all for our own good, of course, they would say (but it’s mainly for theirs). Perhaps, if we continue to change the Publican Party, we will have opportunities to change the Federal Government as well. The Demorat Party is hopeless.
Doesn’t thinking about the loving, benign dictators who believe they own us send warm, pleasant tingles down your leg? Or was that just a painful muscle spasm? They don’t mind, so it doesn’t matter.
The Political Parties
Many if not most now belong, or have belonged, to either the Democrat or Publican party. They tend to reward us by selecting the candidates, particularly the presidential candidates, whom they believe can keep or put them in power. They work very hard to save us from having to make such difficult choices. Since we “belong” to them, it must be only fair to accede gratefully to their wishes and vote as directed. At least that seems to be their view.
Until the current presidential election cycle, it worked quite well for the establishments of both parties. This time, it has not worked at all well for the Publican establishment. Despite its efforts to have a congenial establishment member nominated, it has not succeeded. Trump now has about 1,002 of the 1,273 delegates needed to get the nomination on the first ballot; the only other candidate with a significant number of delegates, Cruz, has only 571 and appears to be crumbling in his “must win” state of Indiana, where Trump has a substantial lead in the polls.
Trump is the top choice among the solely self-reported Republicans surveyed, taking 42 percent compared to 34 percent for Cruz and 17 percent for Kasich.
The businessman is also the top choice among the self-reported independents and Democrats deemed likely to vote in the primary, leading Cruz by 10 points among that group.
While Trump holds a 13-point lead over Cruz among men, 45 to 32 percent, his lead among women is narrower — 36 to 32 percent.
According to an article by The Washington Examiner, a generally anti-Trump publication,
Ted Cruz has a problem that a win in Indiana Tuesday may or may not be able to fix.
Not only might he be unable to stop Donald Trump from winning the 1,237 delegates needed to win the Republican presidential nomination on the first ballot, but Cruz is now so far behind Trump that it will detract from the credibility of a contested convention choosing anyone else even if he is still able to force one. [Emphasis added.]
The Tea Party senator from Texas is well ahead of John Kasich, but is now in Kasich territory. He will likely need hundreds of delegates to switch in order to push him over the top.
That’s not really what Republicans had in mind.
Most reasonable contested convention scenarios assumed a certain degree of closeness in the race. “Donald is going to come out with a whole bunch of delegates,” Cruz explained in February. “We will come out with a whole bunch of delegates.”
Cruz is now 431 delegates behind Trump and 672 short of a majority. He has won 3.2 million fewer votes while Trump’s tally is now higher than Mitt Romney’s at the end of the 2012 primaries. [Emphasis added.]
Are Republicans really still contemplating handing Ted Cruz the nomination in Cleveland? Or worse, Kasich who has won only Ohio? Or some white knight who has received zero votes?
“Those are the rules!” anti-Trump Republicans exclaim. In widely misinterpreted comments, Marco Rubio argued that as a private organization it’s up to GOP delegates to decide the nomination.
“That’s the meaning of being a delegate,” he said, “is choosing a nominee who can win.”
But the delegates’ role in the nomination process has largely been a formality for forty years. The American public has come to understand their primary votes as deciding the major party nominees. And in practice, that is how it has now worked for decades. [Emphasis added.]
For the nominee selection to be made by ignoring the primary votes at a contested convention,
The delegates would regain their power at the precise time faith in the Republican establishment is at an all-time low and its preferred candidates were all rejected by the voters. Some GOP voters don’t even like the alleged Cruz-Kasich alliance. [Emphasis added.]
And it would all clearly be happening because influential Republicans didn’t like the outcome of the election. [Emphasis added.]
Yes, Trump is at risk of a contested convention because he is a weak front-runner. He is facing higher than normal intraparty opposition at this phase of the campaign.
The alternative is to nominate candidates from other factions of the party that have demonstrated that they are even weaker, people who have been rejected by an even higher percentage of Republicans.
For all the talk of Trump’s inability to win in November, national polling shows Trump with comparable support to Clinton on the Democratic side, with Cruz and Kasich not doing as well as Bernie Sanders.
Even if Cruz wins in Indiana, Trump should have easy wins in most of the remaining primary states and should, therefore, win substantially more than a majority on the first convention vote. If he does not, Cruz and Jeb Bush will be happy; or at least Cruz will be happy until the nomination goes to someone else.
I do not “belong” to any party; I am merely a registered Publican. Being either a member or a registered Publican allows one to vote in Publican primaries when they are generous enough to have them. Party caucuses? In some cases, members considered sufficiently subservient to the party establishment have at least a modest say in selecting the delegates to the national Publican convention. Those merely registered get to gripe if delegates pledged to someone they don’t want are chosen, but that’s about it.
The public has, to a greater extent than I can recall, been focused on this year’s selection of delegates. That may well be due in large part to Trump and his supporters. The public will very likely be no less focused on what those delegates do at the nominating conventions. Assuming that the Publican establishment is aware of that focus and takes it seriously, it may well affect the outcome.
The Feral Federal Government
Our selected, and elected, Congresscriters and Presidents get to shape “our” enormous unelected bureaucracies which usurp the role of Congress in legislating. Then, “our” unelected civil “servants” selflessly undertake the difficult task of interpreting the rules they created as well as those the Congress bothered to enact and the President didn’t veto. As noted at The Federalist,
Administrative agencies are creatures of legislation but directed by the executive branch, which has no constitutional authority to pass laws. Their powers derive from statutes that delegate the quasi-legislative authority to issue binding commands in specified contexts. Administrative agencies generally operate independently from Congress and the courts and possess discretionary rulemaking authority.
. . . .
It will take a new kind of president to roll back the administrative state altogether. State resistance alone is no longer enough. Without any pressure from the executive branch, Congress will remain content to pass off touchy political decisions to administrative agencies, which, unlike politicians, cannot be voted out of power. Congress, in turn, can blame the agencies for any negative political consequences of those choices. [Emphasis added.]
We may never recover the framework of ordered liberty that the Founding generation celebrated and enjoyed. But for the sake of our future, and to secure the hope of freedom for our sons and daughters, our grandchildren and their children, we must expose and undo the regulatory regime of administrative agencies. It’s our duty to do so. [Emphasis added.]
In far too many ways, “our” Feral Federal Government resembles that of the European Union. The de facto seat of the EU is in Brussels, Belgium, where hordes of unelected bureaucrats dictate to the member states and their citizens. The seat of “our” Federal Government is in Washington, D.C., where hordes of unelected bureaucrats dictate to the States and to the “folks” who live there. According to Pat Condell, the EU is on the verge of collapse. Will that also be the fate of “our” own little EU? And of the political parties which empower it?
Conclusions
A more efficient and less costly Federal Government would be nice. A smaller, more efficient and less costly Federal Government, much of the power of which has been returned to the States, will be much better. Perhaps the return of significant powers to the States will even awaken some of the more somnolent States and their citizens. For the most part, people in States far removed from Washinton pay little attention to Federal actions until they have significant direct impact on them. Decisions made locally are more likely to have direct local impacts and to attract higher levels of local interest. “Mere” local citizens seem likely to demand voices in what is to be done and how.
Which of the still viable candidates for President is likely to give us the type of Federal Government I envision? Hillary Clinton and her supporters? They like their party and the Federal Government as they are. Trump and his supporters have done much to diminish the power of the Publican Party establishment. They have broken some stuff that needed to be broken and are rebuilding the system on a more populist foundation. As I wrote last September, To bring America back we need to break some stuff. Perhaps they can begin to break “our” bloated Nanny State and recast it in ways comparable to what they have done to the Publican establishment. Doing so could and should put power back where it belongs, in the hands of the States and of the people.
Horowitz: The Biggest Election Deception
April 28, 2016Horowitz: The Biggest Election Deception, Truth Revolt, David Horowitzz, April 28, 2016
One thing we do know, however, because Republican primary voters have already spoken: The political landscape is changing before our eyes, and the Republican Party will never be the same. This is true whether the GOP falls apart at the convention in August and cedes the election to Hillary Clinton, or whether its standard-bearer is an anti-establishment Republican like Trump or Cruz.
******************************
We hear a lot of talk about the November election especially from John Kasich who has lost 45 of 46 primary contests but stays in the race because he’s the only Republican who beats Hillary head on in the polls. “Remember this,” Kasich told Fox, “I’m beating Hillary Clinton in every single poll… I’m the only one with the positive ratings so we ought to be focusing on what happens in the fall not just who wins the nomination.”
But as Kasich knows – and everyone else should – polls are merely snapshots of the way people think when they are taken. Polls taken before the actual campaigns, whose purpose is to influence people’s opinions, are meaningless. They are also meaningless because events like the Iranian hostage crisis in the Reagan-Carter election of 1980 can change everything.
There have already been campaigns in the primaries. On the Republican side this is a good part of the reason why the negatives for Trump and Cruz are so high. Republicans have spent more than 100 million dollars to convince voters to never vote for Trump, and Trump has fought back by flooding the TV airwaves with character attacks on “Lyin’ Ted” that have driven his negatives almost as high. Perhaps in the next election cycle Republicans will have learned to design their primary advertising and debates so that they don’t destroy their potential candidates before the Democrats even get a crack at them. But don’t bet on it.
Fortunately for Republicans, Hillary has raised her own negatives high enough by her own efforts that the two may cancel each other out. No one knows what the effects of such negatives on both sides will be, because no one knows what the electorate’s opinion in November will be.
In any case a simple glance at the facts is enough to show why all polls about the November elections taken in April are virtually meaningless, especially when the spread is 10 or 11 points as most of those polls are now.
In April 1980 Carter led Reagan 40% to 34%. In November, Reagan beat Carter by 50.7% to 41%
In May 1988 Dukakis led Bush 54% to 38%. In November Bush beat Dukakis by 53.4% to 45.6%
In April 1992, Bush led Clinton 44% to 25%. Clinton won in November 43% to 37.4%.
That’s three important elections. But one need look no further than this year’s Republican primaries to see how campaigns can change the numbers. At first it was said that Trump would be toast in September, then that he couldn’t break a 20% ceiling in winning Republican support. Then the ceiling became 30%, then 40%, then 50%. In the latest primaries, Trump won 60% of the Republican vote. Obviously he has overcome a lot of negatives and a lot of hostile political ads to reach those figures. Could he do the same in a general campaign? At this point nobody knows.
One thing we do know, however, because Republican primary voters have already spoken: The political landscape is changing before our eyes, and the Republican Party will never be the same. This is true whether the GOP falls apart at the convention in August and cedes the election to Hillary Clinton, or whether its standard-bearer is an anti-establishment Republican like Trump or Cruz.
Humor | Crisis at the Canadian Border
April 28, 2016(But they don’t go. Via e-mail, author unknown. — DM)
H/t Socialism is not the answer
Image via artfulpuck.wordpress.com
The flood of American liberals sneaking across the border into Canada has intensified in the past week, sparking calls for increased patrols to stop the illegal immigration. The Republican Presidential primary campaign is prompting an exodus among left leaning citizens who fear they’ll soon be required to hunt, pray, and live according to conservative ideas about the Constitution.
Canadian border farmers say it’s not uncommon to see dozens of sociology professors, global warming activists, and “green” energy proponents crossing their fields at night.
“I went out to milk the cows the other day, and there was a Hollywood producer huddled in the barn,” said Southern Manitoba farmer Red Greenfield, whose acreage borders North Dakota . “The producer was cold, exhausted and hungry. He asked me if I could spare a latte and some free-range chicken. When I said I didn’t have any, he left before I even got a chance to show him my screenplay, eh?”
In an effort to stop the illegal aliens, Greenfield erected higher fences, but the liberals scaled them. He then installed loudspeakers that blared Rush Limbaugh across the fields, but they just keep coming.
Officials are particularly concerned about smugglers who meet liberals near the Canadian border, pack them into electric cars and drive them across the border where they are simply left to fend for themselves after the battery dies.
“A lot of these people are not prepared for our rugged conditions,” an Ontario border patrolman said. “I found one carload without a single bottle of Perrier drinking water. They did have a nice little Napa Valley cabernet, though, and some kale chips.”
When liberals are caught, they’re sent back across the border, often wailing loudly that they fear retribution from conservatives. Rumors have been circulating about plans being made to build re-education camps where liberals will be forced to drink domestic beer and study the Constitution.
In recent days, liberals have turned to ingenious ways of crossing the border. Some have been disguised as senior citizens taking a bus trip to buy cheap Canadian prescription drugs. After catching a half- dozen young vegans in blue-hair wig disguises, Canadian immigration authorities began stopping buses and quizzing the supposed senior-citizens about Perry Como and Rosemary Clooney to prove that they were alive in the ’50s. “If they can’t identify the accordion player on The Lawrence Welk Show, we become very suspicious about their age,” an official said.
Canadian citizens have complained that the illegal immigrants are creating an organic-broccoli shortage, buying up all the Barbara Streisand c.d.’s, and renting all the Michael Moore movies. “I really feel sorry for American liberals, but the Canadian economy just can’t support them,” an Ottawa resident said. “How many art-history majors does one country need?”
Gingrich – Trump is “One of the Most Amazing Experiences in Political History”
April 28, 2016Gingrich – Trump is “One of the Most Amazing Experiences in Political History” via YouTube, April 27, 2016
(I am not aware of any discussion about it, but how about a Trump – Gingrich ticket? — DM)
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