The Republican Candidate Silently Approving of Racism

On CBS; Face the Nation on Sunday, Chris Christie reiterated his view that Nikki Haley is not a serious candidate for the presidency because she has said that Donald J. Trump is fit to return to the office. The former New Jersey governor stated

... in the end, look, Governor Haley got an endorsement this week that got her a lot of free media publicity, but it doesn't change one simple fact. She won't answer questions about Donald Trump. In fact, you know, she said just this week that he's fit to be president. This is a guy who last night in New Hampshire, used Vladimir Putin as a character witness for the decaying Democracy in America. A Vladimir Putin is an expert in democracy and someone who says that is fit to be President United State? It's- it's ridiculous.

However, Christie went a little further, both in questioning Haley's motives and in making a further case against the leading GOP contender. He charged

Once she hasn't ruled out being his vice president, I don't think you could take her as a serious contender against him. Rod DeSantis and I have both ruled out accepting the vice presidency from Donald Trump. Nikki Haley has not. That's why she's not saying strong things against Donald Trump. Why she's saying he's fit to be president of the United States. I mean, the fact that if you watch that speech last night, where he says that immigrants from Asia, Africa and South America are poisoning the blood of America, I don't know how you could take someone like that and say that they're fit to be president of the United States.

Christie was referring to the remark in a campaign speech in New Hampshire Saturday when Trump charged 

They're poisoning the blood of our country. Not just in South America, not just the three or four countries that we think about, but all over the world they are coming into our country, from Africa, from Asia, all over the world. They're pouring into our country, nobody's even looking at them.

Afterward on social media, Trump wrote (caps his) "ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION IS POISONING THE BLOOD OF OUR NATION... WITHOUT BORDERS & FAIR ELECTIONS, YOU DON'T HAVE A COUNTRY." 

In a video from October, the candidate who longs to be an authoritarian referred to immigration as "poisoning the blood of our country." He repeated the remark last week because the earlier one received little attention. In so doing, he has ratcheted up his rhetoric- and not only because it borrows from Adolph Hitler.

                         

A week after being inaugurated as President, Trump signed an executive order temporarily banning immigration from seven predominately Muslim countries. That was blocked in court and was replaced by another executive order, which also was blocked. A third added North Korea, which has relatively few Muslims, and visa restrictions later were extended to six other countries, at least two of which are not majority-Muslim.

This was insufficiently comprehensive to fit the definition of a "Muslim ban"- as it was derided by the left and centrists- but it emphasized blocking from immigration individuals of that religion. The President's critics assailed the policy for being anti-Muslim and even "racist."

We didn't know it at the time but those were the good-old days, when Trump singled out persons because of their beliefs and not their genome or other immutable characteristics- their "blood."

As of this moment, Nikki Haley has not responded to Donald Trump's blood remark. At the fourth Republican debate, she gave the leading candidate the thumbs up, stating "I think he was the right President at the right time." She added "it's just I don't think he's the right person to be President," presumably because she believes she is the right person. Having not ruled out being his running mate, Haley appears ready to assist Trump in his plans for America and in return, Trump has not criticized the former South Carolina governor.

Christie may eventually drop out of the race and endorse Haley to prevent the GOP from nominating Trump. But at this point, he has the two of them dead to rights, and one seems eager to be an accessory to autocracy and racism.

 

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"Just Another Republican Billionaire..."

The answer to "how do I love thee" is "let me count the ways."   The answer to "what is wrong with  Donald Trump" is the same: "let me count the ways."

Trump has a remarkable love for authority and authoritarians, going so far as recently praising Vladimir Putin because he projects strength. He is a singularly sexist politician, claiming a Fox News anchorperson had "blood coming out of her wherever."  When a few years ago he stated "I've said if Ivanka weren't my daughter, perhaps I'd be dating her," it was probably far less sexist than really, really creepy (even assuming he was thinking of "dating").

He is taken to saying such things as "I have fantastic relationships with the Hispanics" (the Hispanics?) and "I am going to protect women," and bragging that he forced Ford Motor Co. to move a manufacturing plant from Mexico to Ohio. Politifact has labeled Trump's statements- plural- its "lie of the year."

Views differ on Trump's perspective on immigration and guilt by association is unfair. However, it is probably not a good sign when David Duke praises the candidate's remarks as “I’ve said from the beginning I think his campaign is good in the sense that it’s bringing these issues to a discussion which we have to have in America."(In Trump's favor, Duke disagrees with him about Israel.)

And on and on and on- but enough of that, because Bernie Sanders on CBS' Face the Nation (video below) encapsulated the biggest problem with Donald Trump, albeit one which the mainstream media and most of the Washington establishment has little problem with. Sanders noted the GOP frontrunner had maintained wages are excessive,which Trump promptly on Twitter falsely denied. The Vermont senator and most authentically Democratic candidate then explained

Donald Trump says that I’m a liar because I said he believes wages in America are too high. Really?…It appears that Mr. Trump is getting nervous that working families are catching on that his policies represent the interests of the billionaire class against almost everyone else. He refuses to support raising the minimum wage. He believes wages are too high, and he wants to provide hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks to the very richest families in America. That’s not an agenda that ‘makes America great.’ It’s just another Republican billionaire wanting to make the very rich richer at the expense of working families.

As Sean Illing summarizes, Donald Trump is  "a fraud and a shill for the billionaire class, which the GOP dutifully represents." And like Illing, Bernie Sanders seems to recognize that Trump is a confederate in the GOP's goal of reinforcing corporate control of the economy and the culture. Take away Donald Trump's bravado and crudeness, and he's a perfect match for the Republican Party.

















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Excuses, Excuses



"There's only three things he mentions in a sentence -- a noun, a verb, and 9/11," Senator and presidential candidate Joe Biden once famously said of Rudy Giuliani.  Five years later, Joe Biden is vice-president and Rudy Giuliani hasn't changed much.

On Face The Nation (transcript here) Sunday, Giuliani remarked

Unfortunately, I think the way this was presented gave people who wanted to vote against it an out. It never dealt with the mental health aspect of this. So if you say, if this law had been passed would it have prevented Adam Lanza? The sad answer to it is no, it would not have prevented Adam Lanza because Adam Lanza was not in any database indicating that he had mental illness because all that information is kept very private. It's kept very confidential. If we're really going to improve here, if we're really going to be honest with these people you had on the show, and prevent, or attempt to prevent another Sandy Hook, you've got to do something about how secretive all of these mental health records are.

The mental health dodge will not die.  Late last month, court records which were released revealed

To carry out the second deadliest school shooting in U.S. history, Lanza used 30-round magazines at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, said Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy after the previously sealed searches of Lanza's car and home were made public.

"We now know that he left the lower capacity magazines at home," Malloy said in a statement. "This is exactly why we need to ban high capacity magazines and why we need to tighten our assault weapons ban."

Fairness dictates that Rudy Giuliani, now excusing the inexcusable opposition of 42 Republicans and 4 Democrats to extending background checks, be credited with supporting an assault weapons ban when he was U.S. Attorney, a position held prior to his election as mayor of New York City.  Those Senators who cited mental health issues in their opposition to background checks would have voted against the Manchin-Toomey amendment anyway, and would have found another excuse to cite.  Expanded background checks are designed, obviously, to prevent firearms from being sold to mentally ill individuals, as well as to criminals.

Passage would have been a step in the right direction, though further progress would have been unlikely.  A few days earlier, an amendment to re-establish the federal assault weapons ban and one to limit the size of magazines to ten rounds also failed in the U.S. Senate.

As Mark Follman and Gavin Aronsen  noted in Mother Jones

Gun rights advocates argue that larger magazines, which can add convenience for gun owners who enjoy sport shooting, are simply "standard" for semiautomatic handguns and rifles. The debate turns semantic quickly, in the same contentious vein as the one over the definition of "assault weapon." Law enforcement officials, meanwhile, tend to agree that no law-abiding citizen needs high-capacity magazines for self-defense.

Gun rights advocates also commonly argue that mass shooters could kill just as easily by rapidly reloading smaller magazines, and that a ban would make no difference. But such capability requires extensive training under intense conditions, according to Chipman. "Anyone who's been a cop or in the military knows that that's not something you can do unpracticed," he says.

The Tucson mass shooting is telling here in another regard: It was only after Loughner had emptied his 33-round magazine and paused to reload that bystanders were able to tackle him and end the carnage.

Before Giuliani spoke, Erica Lafferty gave what would have been a splendid retort to the former mayor:  "I mean, I've said it a plethora of times before, my mom was not scared in the halls of Sandy Hook, they should not be scared to cast a vote to protect millions of innocent people."




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The Republican Media- No. 19

Faithfully repeating Republican talking points, Bob Schieffer on yesterday's Face The Nation (transcript via PDF) on CBS introduced a question of John McCain by saying

Let's start right in with what you were talking about the other night. You did something really extraordinary at that convention. I've never been at a political convention where I heard a candidate get up and not only go after the other party, but go after your own party. You even said at one point your party had lost its way. You said that Washington has to change, and you're the one that can change it.

Can an endorsement be far behind?

Confronting John McCain

Speaking at the Republican National Convention last week at a breakfast meeting for his state party's delegation, global warming- denying, right-wing Senator Jim Inhofe (R-OK) said of Barack Obama

Do you really want to have a guy as commander in chief of this country when you can question whether or not he really loves his country? That's the big question.

When it came time to "apologize" in writing later in the week (9/6), Infhofe merely clarified his inflammatory, obnoxious statement:

Let me be clear. I am not questioning Sen. Obama's patriotism, but you have to question why at times he seems so obviously opposed to public displays of patriotism and national pride, like wearing an American flag lapel pin.'

A spokesman for the Democratic nominee issued a cookie-cutter response, maintaining

Sen. Obama won't let anyone question his love of this country. Challenging your opponent's patriotism to win an election is the type of cynical partisan politics Americans are tired of — and won't bring the change we need in Washington.

Senator Inhofe's comment would be less outrageous if it weren't so calculated. The Repub presidential nominee finds it advantageous to take the high road. Asked by Bob Schieffer yesterday on CBS' Face The Nation (transcript as pdf) whether he will have "Democrats in your cabinet," John McCain characteristically claimed "yeah, of course" and a moment later added "well, I don't know how many, but I can tell you, in all due respect to previous administrations, it's not going to be a single, you know, "well, we have a Democrat."

Meanwhile, inspired by Governor Earmark of Alaska, he has his surrogates taking the low road. No one outside of Oklahoma cares about Jim Inhofe, yet the Obama camp criticized him for "challenging (Obama's) patriotism to win an election." McCain himself has to be challenged, with Democratic surrogates everywhere demanding to know whether the Arizona senator agrees with Inhofe or anyone else who questions the patriotism of the Democratic nominee for President of the United States.

Well Put

A little credit is due Bob Schieffer, host of CBS' Face The Nation. Typically, the talking heads ask a potential vice presidential selection whether he/she is going to be selected or has spoken to the presumptive presidential nominee about joining him on the ticket. And the answer, predictably and inevitably, is noncommittal.

Schieffer, however, took a different tack when on Sunday's (8/17/08) Face The Nation he interviewed Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, reportedly on John McCain's very short list, and Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, reportedly on Barack Obama's very short list. He asked the two, appearing jointly,

Gentlemen, what we've sort of been doing here as a matter of routine with potential running mates is if either of you has been told that you're going to be the nominee, we would certainly like to hear that from you this morning. Or if either of you have said that you've asked that your name be taken out of consideration, I'd like to hear from either of you on that. If not, I won't put you through this dance of how pleased you are to be talked about and all of that, but you can't say. Does anybody have announcement here?

The answer(s)?

Governor TIM PAWLENTY (Republican, Minnesota): I think the senator does.
Senator EVAN BAYH (Democrat, Indiana): Well, we may make news this morning, Bob, but it's not going to be that. So I hate to disappoint you, but nothing to report today.

This is a different and mature inquiry and one to which the response was at least a little bit revealing. There is no way to confirm that Bayh wasn't lying, but his response probably accurately suggested that neither has been told either that he will be selected or that he is out of the running. It seems to have confirmed the common wisdom that as of that (Sunday) morning, both were being seriously considered for the second spot. And the "we may make news this morning.... but not that nothing to report today" was actually a fairly clever and succinct way of making the point.