Monthly Archives: March 2016

Who Stands By You?

BY RICH GALEN
MAR 31 | Reprinted from Mullings.com

I Tweeted this Tuesday night:
Gotta give @realDonaldTrump this: He is much better at defending his employee than Breitbart was at defending theirs

Of the 11.5 thousand times I’ve hit the “Tweet” button (I don’t have any other hobbies) this one struck the loudest chord. 394 people either re-Tweeted or Liked it.

Once again the DC-NYC axis doesn’t get it. Continue reading

35 Years Ago Today

BY B. JAY COOPER
MAR 30 | Reprinted from The Screaming Moderate (bjaycooper.com)

Thirty-five years ago today, Ronald Reagan was the victim of an assassination attempt, fewer than three months into his first term in office. Thirty-five years ago today I was working my first day as a political appointee in the Reagan Administration, as a public affairs staffer over at the Commerce Department, led by Secretary Malcolm Baldrige.

I can’t say I recall every minute of that first day for me, as Imy memory is overtaken by the attempt on the President and the effects of that on the country and the world. I imagine I spent most of the morning filling out paperwork as a new employee of the government. Which would mean that, after lunch, I was in my first hours of actual work, or learning what it was I was supposed to be doing, when we got the news that President Reagan had been shot. It was a memorable day on many levels. Continue reading

Donald Trump’s Giant Convention Con

BY MICKEY EDWARDS  |  MAR 26

Originally published in Politico.com

Donald Trump is likely on the verge of losing the Republican primary, falling short of the number of delegates required to win the presidential nomination. But, as bullies are wont to do, Trump is now trying desperately to change the rules—to argue that the nomination should go not to the candidate who wins 1,237 delegates but to whoever comes closest.

What’s wrong with that argument? Electing a U.S. president is not a schoolyard game, where goalposts change when bullies whine. There’s a reason a candidate has to make it to 1,237 votes to win the nomination. Each party’s goal is to put forth a nominee whom the party’s members, represented by their elected delegates, believe will best reflect the party’s collective judgment—a determination possible only when the level of support is clear and convincing. That’s why both parties set a benchmark, the political equivalent of the tape at the finishing line of a race, sufficient to establish the party’s preference. In a hundred-yard dash, a runner who beats the others but who can only manage 95 yards doesn’t go home with a medal. Continue reading

Mr. Trump Goes to Washington

BY B. JAY COOPER
MAR 22 | Reprinted from The Screaming Moderate (bjaycooper.com)

Donald Trump’s tour of Washington, D.C., yesterday – ed board at the Washington Post, speech at a major Jewish organization, press conference at a hotel he’s building – showed different facets of Donald Trump, Marketing Genius.

I watched his speech, I read about his press conference and I read the transcript of his interview at the Post. What those events demonstrated to me is that Donald Trump is the exact opposite of what he claims to be. He says he’s not a politician but he certainly is, in the worst, cynical sense. Continue reading

It’s Getting Harder Everyday

BY RICH GALEN
MAR 14 | Reprinted from Mullings.com

Elite Washington is totally consumed by the political events over the past week. From Donald Trump cancelling a large rally in Chicago on security grounds, to video of a White (assumedly) Trump supporter cold-cocking a Black protester being led out of another rally, to Trump’s campaign manager Cory Lewandowski allegedly grabbing and shoving to the ground a female reporter for Breitbart.com, Michelle Fields.

In all of that there was no mention of anyone else. Especially not anyone else named Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, or John Kasich. Continue reading

How Did We Get Here? How Do We Get Out?

BY MICHAEL S. JOHNSON  |  MAR 8

Almost every day you can view in HD the emaciated bodies of frightened, starving children crying for help, trapped inside the bombed out rubble of entire neighborhoods and cities all across Syria.

You can look into the angry and horrified faces of refugees along the closing border of Greece and Macedonia, tugging their children along, looking for human salvation, many of them the relatives of those whose bodies have floated up on the Mediterranean beach having not survived the desperate trip across the sea.

You are left aghast at the grotesque, genocidal inhumanity of man all across the Middle East and North Africa where terrorist extremists massacre innocent women and children, without a hint of remorse. Continue reading

‘Is It ‘Evening’ In America’? Or ‘Morning?’

BY FRANK HILL
MAR 5 | Reprinted from TelemachusLeaps.com

‘It’s morning again in America. Today more men and women will go to work than ever before in our country’s history. With interest rates at about half the record highs of 1980, nearly 2,000 families today will buy new homes, more than at any time in the past four years. This afternoon 6,500 young men and women will be married, and with inflation at less than half of what it was just four years ago, they can look forward with confidence to the future. It’s morning again in America, and under the leadership of President Reagan, our country is prouder and stronger and better. Why would we ever want to return to where we were less than four short years ago?’

So goes the text of one of the most successful political ads in American history, ‘Morning in America,’ which was the theme of the 1984 presidential campaign of incumbent President Ronald Reagan asking the American people for a second term. Continue reading

Trump’s Not Killing the GOP

BY JOHN FEEHERY
MAR
|  Reprinted from TheFeeheryTheory.com

“One clear loser in Thursday’s debate: the Grand Old Party,” blared The Washington Post.

“Welcome to the GOP civil war,” Politico chimed in.

“A Heated Debate Along a Growing Republican Divide,” agreed the New York Times.

Does Donald Trump really represent an existential threat to the future of the GOP?

I don’t think so. Continue reading

An Extraordinary Day in Politics

BY RICH GALEN
MAR 4 | Reprinted from Mullings.com

I’ve been involved with politics since I was in college which is a long, long time ago. I have never been through a day like today.

I am including in that election day (and night) 2000 when Bush won Florida, then Florida was too close to call, then we descended into the nightmare of the recount – a process that didn’t end until December 12, 2000.

I covered local politics as the news director of WMOA Radio (1490 on your AM dial in Marietta, Ohio 45750). I ran for City Council twice. Lost by two votes the first time, but won in a walk the second time when the Mullings Director of Standards and Practices ran my campaign. Continue reading

Earnings Per Share

BY RICH GALEN
MAR 2 | Reprinted from Mullings.com

A lot that happens in American politics is like Earnings Week on Wall Street: It’s not how you do, it’s how you do in relation to what you were expected to do.

Example: If you have a company that reports earnings per share of $1.15 and the Street predicted you would do $1.13 you’re a big winner. But, if the Street’s prediction was $1.17 per share, that same $1.15 is seen as a failure.

Last night Clinton and Trump did very well. They each won seven of the 11 states. By any measure that is a huge night.

Except it wasn’t because – at least on the GOP side – Donald Trump was expected to win 10 of the 11 races. Ted Cruz was expected to win his home state of Texas, and he did. Continue reading