The Real News: The Dark Abyss of Politics

RUINING A PIZZA

HILLARY STICKY SITUATION

Hillary's campaign has turned into putting pineapple on a pizza. A few people may like pineapple on a pizza, but for Real Americans pineapple on a pizza is abhorrent.

With each new email scandal revelation, and her unbelievably bad stone wall responses, have put even loyal Democratic media covers running for the exits. Bob Woodward has compared her attempt to wipe her email servers clean to the Nixon tapes. No one ever wants to be compared with Nixon in a presidential campaign.

Her party is so desperate to find an alternative to a coronation that supporters have started to gravitate toward socialist Bernie Sanders.

It is Hillary's own fault. She and her ilk of career politicians believe that they know better than the average citizen. They think they are smarter than us. They think they are privileged ruling class because they have been elected to an exclusive club. They think they are an oliarchy where the rules do not apply to them. The breed has turned from arrogance towards the common man to contempt.

Several op-ed pieces by former government officials indicate that if it was anyone else but Hillary, that person with classified documents on a personal server would have been indicted and waiting trial. The excuse that there were private emails amongst the government emails is as lame as my dog ate my homework. A government official is supposed to keep government business on secure government servers. She could have set up a second private account for her private emails. But the reality of the situation is that politicians and officials believe there is no distinction between government service and potential private gain.

The New York Times was villified by its peers when its initial story contained the phrase criminal investigation in the Hillary email situation. The White House and Justice said there was no criminal investigation. But no one challenges that assertion because it is just too dumb. The FBI does not conduct academic exercises for fun. The FBI's purpose is to conduct criminal investigations. So, if the FBI is involved, it is an investigation that could lead to criminal charges (that the Justice Department would have green light.) But it looks bad for the Democrats if their party front runner is under a cloud of criminal suspicion.

It is speculated that if the FBI gets all the emails from Hillary, it may show a pattern of practice of crony legislation that would make federal prisoner Blaggo blush. If she was seeking to share classified data and foreign policy discussions with her political operatives to forge not official responses but future electoral spin, then that is an abuse of the system. She is putting her political future ahead of current foreign policy. In addition. a few pundits have speculated that these private emails may contain donate-to-play type decision making with foreign nationals or multinational corporations and the Clinton Foundation, the billion dollar charity that no one seems to know what it actually does with all the money.

At the very least, it gives the average person a window into the sausage factory of The Jungle of D.C. politics. People may only care about getting their monthly entitlements, so they may be indifferent to the actual cost, waste, and incompetence in the decision making process of elected officials.

Missing emails. Found emails. Denials about cover-ups. It seems that is the standard story line in Washington for the past eight years. The IRS scandal involving conservative not-for-profits tracks along the same line: those in charge don't have the correspondence so those in a position of oversight can investigate alleged wrongs.

But some may think who cares? It is just politics. And politics is a dirty sink hole that most people care less about than the price of a pineapple at the supermarket. That is too bad because soaring food prices is a factor from the macromanaging style of big government regulatory bureaucracies. As Ike warned in th 1950s of the miliary-industrial complex, we have warned people of the academic-government complex where social engineering becomes a core domestic policy overriding basic individual constitutional freedoms.

PART TWO * JANUARY 31, 2016

I, OH, WHY?

VOTER ANGER

INDEPENDENT ANGST

The official 2016 campaign begins with the Iowa caucus, the living room neighbor get together pot roast candidancy straw poll. The bumper sticker for this election has to be God Better Save America but it is clear that the average, informed American voter is disgusted with the current crop of candidates.

Donald Trump is a boisterous, pompous, crude C-level celebrity who is trying to put the bully back in the bully pulpit. He has attacked women journalists, fellow politicians and business leaders not with facts but school yard insults and accusations. He is not a typical politician - - - he is a reality television personality who has turned the election into a really bad reality show pilot. He has captured the angry taxpayer populus segment. When he answers questions, he is very Clintonian - - - he does not answer it with facts but spews random trains of thought on how tough, great, rich, successful he is - - - - that is enough for him to lead the free world like a stubborn secured creditor in a bankruptcy hearing.

The entire basis for Hillary's campaign is that she is entitled to the presidency because she has put up with all the crap from her husband, Bill Clinton. This sense of entitlement from a person who sees herself above the common man voter is the biggest turn off. She has always been about acquiring wealth and power so she latched on to a charismatic student body president through the slop of Arkansas politics to the White House. Everything she says and does contradicts her own selfish motives. She has enough super delegates and powerful fundraising partners to buy the nomination. The street politics is beneath her sense of dignity. That is why she is a horrible campaigner - - - besides her own record of contradictions, denials and misdirections - - - she has gone from arrogance towards the people to contempt.

Bernie Sanders is the crazy uncle who gets put in the basement during family barbeques so as to limit the amount of public embarassment. He actually believes that Big Government is not big enough. His progressive policies are pure Marxism. He chides Hillary that she is not a progressive Democratic to the point where both of them are pandering to the whacko left wing of the party. Sanders continues to see a national health care program run by the federal agencies as the Holy Grail - - - even though experts conservatively believe it would cost at least $1.25 trillion in new public spending. The government is already bankrupt but progressive dismiss basic math for grand central planning for everyone's life because the people are not smart enough to figure it out on their own. No one challenges him on why Obamacare is failing so bad in the states because even that program is too expensive to be sustainable. Sanders greatest strength is that he is the Anti-Hillary candidate. But all pundits believe that he is unelectable, another McGovern in the wings.

The one Republican candidate the Democratic Party feared the most was Carly Fiorina. Carly was a successful business woman, a clear and present contrast to Hillary, the prohibitive nominee. Hillary could not take her public service record against her because it is pot marked with scandal and controversy from Bengazhi to top secret emails on her home computer server. But Fiorina was muted by the old GOP handlers who questioned her corporate leadership, the failings at HP (which started with her successor) and her stumbles on the campaign trail (even though she does well in the debate format). As a woman who has dealt with international issues such as direct trade with China, she gives a large group of voters comfort in having a business oriented, balanced budget person to reign in unchecked government spending. But Carly will never get through the old GOP boys back room door to be a serious contender.

Poor Jeb Bush. He was supposed to walk his way to the third generation Bush White House dynasty. He was the natural foil to Hillary - - - the name recognition battle royale. But something has happened from being a competent Florida governor-candidate to a national figure. He is not very polished at stump speeches. He is very wooden. He seems to have no passion for the campaign or his audiences. Whether he expected an easy road to the convention floor nomination is something history books will seize upon. Early old, big money donors backed Jeb, but now think they backed the wrong horse. Trump's loud and brash surreal off-the-cuff speeches have taken all focus away from the Republican favored son. He really needs to finish at least third in Iowa and New Hampshire in order to stay in the race as a viable alternative to Crazy Donald.

In recent polls, approximately 65 percent of registered voters now classify themselves as independents. They do not align themselves with either Democratic or Republican parties. The reason is simple: people no longer see any difference between the two major parties. They are career politicians who are using a free wheel spending bureaucracy for their own private gain. Apathy and low voter turnout keeps incumbents rolling through special legislation, crony capitalism and large fundraising campaigns. But the Independents have more power than they have ever had; social media is beginning to start an undercurrent that real change can only happen if you vote against ever incumbent at the local, state and federal levels. This backlash is from the fact that the most states, counties and major metro cities are bankrupt, financially and morally. High taxation, high unemployment, low real wages, higher than reported inflation are killing the middle class who cannot support a massively growing government debt burden.

Of the candidates, the two political outsiders, Trump and Fiorina, may get the most headlines but for different reasons. Trump will take a victory lap around the planet with an Iowa win. But that is still a big if because as a non-traditional candidate, he has not put enough resources to actually build a network of ground troops to get people to the caucus sites or the polls. He thinks that his popularity alone will carry the day. Hubris can be a cruel mistress. Fiorina may get some column fodder for being pushed out of a crowded field of Republican men even though most Republicans would probably like what her policy positions are in this election.

The national media continues to focus on personalities instead of the facts or the real issues critical for the nation. Wehther Ted Cruz is qualified to be President when he was born a U.S. citizen because his American mother gave birth in Canada is the birther issue of this election. The concept of having the 9 members of the Supreme Court to decide what seems to be a common sense question is another scary thought because most Americans don't trust any branch of government anymore.

The other candidates are like the credits of the Seven Dwarfs, minor characters on a bigger stage.

PART THREE * FEBRUARY 13, 2016

NEW CHUMP SHARES

CULLING THE HERD

HILLARY FEELS THE BERN

The GOP establishment was hoping that Donald Trump would get the message from Iowa that the party regulars won't support him. That he should not waste his money prolonging the agony of defeat. But what the establishment and national press fail to realize is that Trump is in the race for the long haul. Why? Because what do egomaniacs crave: attention. He has the national and international spotlight on him. He can be a foul mouth loon but he only cares about his popularity in the poll numbers. Trump has turned the American electoral system into a weird version of a Reality TV series which combines elements of broken promises of Survivor, the unrealistic fantasies of the Bachelor and the outlaw anti-government sentiment of the Moonshiners. Trump is making chumps out of the old establishment players.

Trump collected a hand full more delegates than the field in New Hampshire. But so far the delegate totals are irrelevant. The early contests are to cull the herd from future campaign donations and sitting alone in hotel campaign rooms like Jim Gilmore. (Ten points for anyone who realized that he was actually a candidate until he suspended his campaign.) This first primary gives losers a second chance to become less of a loser. But it was Trump who stumbled in Iowa with an unexpected victory - - - because the word was that he did not have enough boots on the ground; that he was bad at retail politics, the meet and greet with the public; and voters wake up their senses inside the polling booth to abandon Trump for a presidential candidate.

From the rubble of a very crowded GOP field, a dark horse candidate, Kasich, came out of no where to finish second. The Ohio governor, whose swing state is critical in any electoral college total, got the jumpstart he needed to at least survive to Super Tuesday in March. Jeb Bush, the walking zombie campaigner that was once considered a shoe-in in 2014, crawled into a distant top four finish which kept his big donors from hanging themselves with expensive Jeb! banners. Cruz and Rubio continue to tussle over who would be the best vanilla gingerbread compromise candidate. But the also-rans have not connected with the public, yet. It is because the anti-establishment bashing of the loud mouth Trump has carried the airwaves of discontent in these early contests. No one is running on issues, platforms or their record; it is still name recognition. The establishment is trying to gel to find a respectable Anyone-But-Trump candidate.

The Democrats have started to scramble as well, trying to find an alternative to Bernie as their Anyone-But-Hillary candidate. Sanders is an unelectable socialist mad man who wants to nationalize health care and education by taxing the working class into poverty. At least he understands that free program promises are not actually free. Someone has to pay the price, and his target is Wall St. bankers, the wealthy and by default - - - anyone who owns a business including the sandwich shop owner who is barely making it. The Dem establishment looks at Sanders as the McGovern-Dukakis nightmare with more baggage.

Hillary still does not get it. She got whipsawed so bad in New Hampshire, her handlers could not lie, spin or distort the results into some kind of victory or beating expectations. She was beaten bad in the raw vote, but in traditional back room system rigging, she may only lose 1 or 2 delegates to Sanders. With 92 percent of the vote in, both candidates had earned 15 state delegates. Hillary still leads by a wide margin because she corraled Superdelegates, Democratic convention delegates i.e. professional politicians like state party chairmen, governors, senators, etc. to back her before the election cycle. She did so by funneling PAC money into state party coffers, which allows them to get around individual donor limits. Hillary was buying her delegate loyalty early which made her an unvisible candidate before the campaign turned into high gear. That is why no one wanted to run against her - - - including Joe Biden - - - because Hillary should have gotten 20 percent of the delegates before one voter cast a ballot.

But those who stood on the sidelines and failed to organize a campaign committee and state campaigns are kicking themselves nightly. They forgot the simple truth that Hillary is a terrible campaigner. She is not a winner. Obama crushed her when most of her supporters blindly followed her down the drain. But she still has the money and the manpower to push her way into the convention hall. But her base may be abandoning her.

The most telling statistic from New Hampshire was a single exit poll question. When Democratic voters were asked “who do you trust more, Hillary or Bernie?” Sanders won 92 percent to 8 percent. But Hillary got 38 percent of the vote - - - which means 79 percent of the people who voted for her don't trust her more than Sanders!

That shows how weak Hillary's support is in real world terms. Even by throwing out a weak stump routine of Bill Clinton, no energy was made to close the Bernie gap in NH. Hillary is losing the suburban, working soccer moms and youth vote to Sanders.

This year will be the year of the Independents. Only 19 percent of eligible voters identify themselves as Republicans and only 26 percent as Democrats. The rest firmly believe that they are Independents. And most Independents are fed up with the traditional crisis do nothing parties in power. That is why people like Michael Bloomberg are considering running as a third party candidate to tap into that huge bloc of voter anger.

PART FOUR * MARCH 13, 2016

CHICAGO

ATTACK ON TRUMP

POPULIST AUTHORITARIANS

The Secret Service detail assigned to Donald Trump canceled his Chicago speech due to security details. Protesters were in the UIC Pavillion on last Friday night. Before Trump arrived, the shouting between protesters and supporters increased as has been the pattern for the last week of the campaign. When a protester rushed the stage, he was subdued by two security men, but that was the national news channels image of the evening. Trump never made it to the event. The protesters claimed victory by stopping Trump's event.

But the protesters (and this entire presidential election) are misguided. By exercising their own free speech rights, they trampled the free speech and assembly rights of the Trump group. The protesters were lashing out at the violence of the Trump people at prior speeches, but their presence in the venue was the actual cause of the violence. Trump may have incited action by his harsh, police state rhetoric, but he still has a right to speak. (Which is also ironic, since he wants to destroy the First Amendment to punish people, including news outlets, who give him unfavorable coverage.

That night, Trump blamed Bernie Sanders supporters. The news media dismissed the charge, even though the pictures showed many protesters with Bernie signs. Two days later, there was an acknowledgement that Democrats may have filtered into Trump events to disrupt Trump's momentum. Chicago is the Capitol of Dirty Tricks and Electioneering. It has an organized band of professional protesters who hit the streets on quick notice to shut down the Michigan Avenue shopping district to outside the Mayor's residence. It is important for the Democrats to try to de-reail Trump just as Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio have tried to do. Trump has captured many disillusioned Democrats left behind by the politics of Wall Street and Washington, D.C. Trump is still way ahead in raw vote totals through the primary season, more than both Democratic candidates. Even though he does not have half of the Republican pledged delegate count, he continues to gather more votes as each GOP candidate drops out of the race. Conservative Ben Carson endorsed Trump, which means his people may not follow Cruz or Rubio. But that makes some sense because Carson was running on the same platform: a businessman outsider not beholden to the political class. Cruz and Rubio are establishment insiders, Senators, who have only one thing in common: stop Trump.

Rubio was so bold to tell his Ohio supporters to not vote for him but instead vote for John Kasich, who could win all the state delegates from Trump. Analysts believe that Trump can accelerate ahead of his 70 delegate lead over Cruz (who has double the delegate count than third place Rubio) if he takes the winner-take-all states of Ohio and Florida. Kasich, the former Governor of Ohio, knows this is his last stand. Likewise, Rubio needs to win his home state of Florida to remain relevant.

But the establishment candidates fail to realize that Trump can temper such victories by winning Illinois on March 15th. Illinois is a heavily Democratic controlled state. But with massive deficits, a budget stalemate and angry voter discontent, the voters elected a Republican Governor, Rauner, who has taken on the state Democratic establishment. The Dems blame Rauner for putting higher education institutions on life support. The governor blames house speaker Madigan of obstructing real solutions for the bankrupt state. The dissatisfaction over the collapse of civil statesmanship in politics is a driving force in the outsider campaigns. Trump can undercut any establishment win in Ohio or Florida by winning Illinois.

There have also been reports that in open primary states like Illinois that Democrats have been taking Republican ballots to vote for Trump in a plan to destroy the Republican party because Trump is toxic to its core conservative values. However, history is lost in those theorists who fail to realize that those crossover voters may be voting for Trump because they like him or his message, just as blue collar Democrats flocked to Ronald Reagan. Some times straight talk resonates more than the party line.

For the DNC, Sanders is just as toxic as Trump. They will acknowledge that Sanders is not electable in a general election because his proposals are even extreme in his own party. His call for free higher education and free national health care would cost in excess of $15 trillion dollars. He claims that he would fund it with punitive taxes on the wealthy and corporations. But wealthy often falls most heavily on the middle class, any mom or pop sub shop is a small business corporation that would get the brunt of new taxation. Sanders' plan would suck up an entire year of Gross Domestic Product from the U.S. economy. It would be the largest transfer of wealth to a government since the coup and creation of the Soviet Union or China.

But the Democrats have a problem with putting lipstick on the piggish other candidate, Hillary Clinton. She has accepted millions from Wall St. firms for speaking fees. Then she spouts off that she is against Wall St. No one believes her. Her initial claim that she was not under any criminal investigation due to her private, insecure email server was fantasy because the FBI does not conduct academic exercises. With her IT person granted full immunity, party insiders are worried that even if Clinton is not indicted the FBI offer of proof will be leaked and be used as gatling gun in the general election because at worst, it shows her total lack of common sense on international security issues and ignorance of the law. But she comes off as a political elitist - - - the law does not apply to her because she is the smartest person in the room. She can try to squeeze out of the corner by word games but it is possible that this investigation could lead to bigger problems, like an audit of the Clinton Foundation which accepted millions in foreign dollars during Hillary's term as Secretary of State. Clinton has always been about accumulating wealth through powerful positions. The general public can see through her bold face lies. That is why the anti-Hillary, Sanders, won't die or give up.

Sanders wants to hold on to the populist outcry. The people who don't trust the government are clearly in the majority in this country according to recent polls. These same people are upset with how they are being treated by their government officials. Officials do not address the issues that are important to them. Many are living pay check to paycheck under the false headlines that the economy is improving under Obama. In the last Labor Department stats, more jobs were created but at the same time, actual wages went down. That means better paying jobs are being replaced by entry level minimum wage jobs. But Sanders is not a true change populist. He wants to socialize everything - - - create a bigger government telling people what to do with their lives. This is the exact opposite of what populists truly want this year.

And Trump may have populist support, but he also has a segment of authoritarians - - - people who want someone to smash the status quo and give the average person the opportunities that have been lost in the current regulatory bureaucracy. Trump has the tough talk and empty promise that he'll get things done. But Trump is a Macy's parade hot air balloon: he has no substance behind his words. He has no functional programs. He has no objective policies. He is a showman, a snake oil salesman who is selling the only thing he cares about: himself.

So in all the yelling and screaming, pushing and shoving, the American people are left with a morass slate of candidates who stand for nothing but themselves and their desire for power.

PART FIVE * MARCH 27, 2016

ESTABLISHMENT

HILLARY WEAKNESS

TRUMP LOSING HIS BASE

Just when the national pundits were about to bury Bernie, Sanders wins by a huge margin the caucuses in Washington, Alaska and Hawaii. If one looks at the populist votes (non-superdelegates), Sanders is almost even with Hillary on elected delegates. It is Hillary's huge advantage with party regulars and officials that she coralled before the campaign started is her lead.

In a year that members of both the Democrats and Republicans are in civil war against their establishment leaders, Hillary's success is directly tied to the power brokers that her own voters abhor. She wishes and washes through her self-serving speeches to special interest audiences as being a Socialist Democrat, to Populist, to Progressive, to being the most experienced to the most transparent candidate (which explodes the brains of the fact checkers). She is a political insider. She is the DNC establishment candidate. She got her claws in the party machinery so far ahead of the pack that no real challenger wanted to get run over by her pre-primary bandwagon.

Donald Trump's entire campaign platform was being the Anti-Establishment candidate. Non-Beltway Republicans have been seething at the GOP Congress and the era of the Obama Executive orders whittling away at their personal freedoms. The GOP voters wanted their elected representatives to pull back Big Government, simplify the tax code, and get out of the people's lives. Instead, John Boehner handed off the fumble to Paul Ryan who voided his own pledges to pass another pork ladened budget to help incumbents get around a stalemate issue on this year's campaign trail. It has backfired as Trump continues to draw more independent and mad Democrats to his side.

Trump continues to run his mouth like a speeding motorboat still tied to a dock. He has now taken to personally attack Ted Cruz's wife after Cruz's campaign put out Trump's wife in an alluring meme to get conservative Utah voters to polls for Cruz. While the world is crippled with multiple terrorist attacks, the global economy faltering, central banks on the verge of currency wars, the Republican candidates are playing juvenile name-calling games.

Candidates for both parties are trending with huge negatives. Nearly three-quarters of Hillary's own voters do not trust her. An equal number don't think Sanders could win a general election against a Republican. Of the three remaining GOP contenders, only Kasich beats Hillary on a one-on-one race. Trump has been unable to reach 50 percent in any primary. His negatives continue to rise in exit polls which leads some early supporters to have second thoughts. While Trump screams about the establishment trying to steal his victory if he comes to the convention short of fifty percent of the delegates, it shows how politically naive and dumb Trump is: if you do not have enough delegates prior to the convention it is not stolen from you - - - you have to convince other delegates to switch to your side. With a potential Trump temper tantrum in Cleveland, more and more independents are hlding their ears like being trapped in a room with a screaming baby.

Long time observers stress that both political parties are being torn a part at the roots. The establishment of both parties are fighting to control their own membership from revolting toward non-traditional candidates like Trump or Sanders. People have heard the false promises from party officials. They see taxes increases and personal opportunities decrease. No one talks the economy. No one talks about the massive government deficits. No one talks about foreign policy solutions to U.S. security concerns. All the public hears is hollow stump speeches by candidates they would not trust washing their cars.

The election is turning into a melting muddy snow pile. You really don't know what gunk was buried under the ice and snow. The garbage is now coming to the surface and the public does not like its smell.

PART SIX * APRIL 10, 2016

SAY, CHEESE!

CRUZ MILKS A VICTORY

HILLARY SPEWS CURDS & WHY?

IT has been a rough week for the frontrunners. The other candidates keep oiling the paths to nominaion so Trump and Hillary cannot get enough traction to the delegate rich end game states of New York and California.

Wisconsin is an odd political state. It is known as a progressive state, but it also elected convervatives like Speaker Paul Ryan and controversial Gov. Scott Walker. Wisconsin has pockets of urban liberalism in Madison and Milwaukee. But it also has vast areas of rural farmland filled with hard working people who are tired of the political churning for their votes.

The conservatives and the progressives won the Dairy State. Ted Cruz got the popular vote victory over Trump while Bernie Sanders continued his unlikely streak of primary and caucus victories. With his win in Wyoming (even though he tied in final delegate count), Sanders has won the last 8 of 9 contests against Hillary. It has become so infuriating to Hillary, that she began to lose her cool against the Bern. She called him unqualified after he inferred that she was unqualified to a point where they both back tracked to say they are both more qualified than any Republican. But apparently in this election cycle, the only qualification for president is a pulse.

Hillary lost it during a meet and greet as she yelled a citizen that she was tired of Bernie's lies. She did not elaborate on what wasp's nest was under her Easter Bonnet, but it was more of the strain of going out in public day after day. Hillary is a terrible campaigner. She tries to come off enthusiastic, but all she does is yell. When she gets one on one time with friendly members of the press, she dribbles her answers through a clearly fake smile. She thought her victories in the South would have buried her competition. But Sanders continues to raise millions after each populist victory so she is stuck doing what she hates: mingling with the common folk.

Hillary cannot understand why her opponents just fall on their own swords and give her the nomination. She is a Clinton, by the way. Except the era of Bill Clinton is over. Bill's campaign stops for Hillary are only drawing crickets. The only news he makes is when he goes off script and stumbles out an attack against the Black Lives supporters. Bill can't even energize a bunny, whether it be a battery or a Hefner model.

Bernie gets his crowds going by just by showing up and proclaiming free stuff for everyone. The least common denominator for Trump crowds is the alleged lack of intelligence or perception, but Sanders is asking Americans to pony up another $12 trillion in government spending with no feasible plan to pay for it. But no major candidate is telling us solutions for their tired stump promises.

Cruz takes his Badget state victory as a sign from God that he is the establishment's chosen one. There was plenty of spilled milk in The Donald's camp. Trump spent the week after huddled with his advisors, the voices in his head, to plan the final assault on the Republican party. He continues to proclaim that he is being mistreated by the GOP. That Cruz and his followers are straw men for the Republican establishment. That they are trying to steal the nomination from him if he goes to Cleveland shy of the first ballot delegate total. No one has told Trump that if he does not lock up the nomination BEFORE the convention, then no body has stolen anything from him; he has not earned it.

It is this lack of common sense and math skills that is running rampant in this election cycle. Trump's campaign is waning because the independent voters are tired of his self-bloated banter. Hillary's quest has stalled because even her own Democratic loyalists continue to distrust her both as a politician and as a person. No one is buying the candidates position that they deserve the office of president.

In a race desperate for the lesser of those two evils, no national media outlet covered the FoxBusiness channel's Libertarian candidate forum hosted by John Stossel. A recent Monmouth poll had Libertarian Gary Johnson polling 11 percent nationally in a race with Trump and Hillary. That is almost Ross Perot type support from the public with absolutely no media coverage. It shows how badly the two main parties have been conducting themselves.

PART SEVEN * JUNE 12, 2016

VICTORY!

SPOILED BRATS

BAD CANDIDATES

In the Great Race to the Conventions, both winners are stumbling to the finish line. Donald Trump still cannot figure out that insulting Republican leaders will not gather their support of his November bid. Hillary Clinton still cannot figure out that an FBI investigation is a criminal matter and not some academic exercise of no consequence to her, her aides or her candidacy.

Bernie Sanders still will not give up. He probably regrets taking the high road and not attacking Hillary on her lies, bad judgment, poor public service record and the sleaze that continues to ooze out of the Clinton Foundation. He is now trying to undermine her Superdelegates, party insiders who will give Hillary the nomination. Superdelegates are not chosen by the party members so their votes are not tied to any one candidate. They can change their minds. When the AP declared Hillary the winner, its method was questionable. It only asked Superdelegates who was their preference, not for whom they would vote for at the convention. It is not surprising that the national media is pro-Hillary in order to try to make history as the first major party female candidate for president. But Sanders and Trump have struck a chord in the public who deserves an outsider, an anti-establishment candidate who will break up the political elitist class of corruption, burdensome regulation and economic stagnation.

When Obama endorsed Hillary and met with Sanders in the White House, everyone assumed that the President was trying to get Sanders to back off on his rhetoric about taking his campaign to the convention floor. He was asked to unify the Democrats to defeat Trump at all costs. Except, Sanders got the first national attention in his lfe time. He liked it. He believes himself as a reformer, a populist and a political revolutionary. Rebels do not bow down to conventional wisdom or concede defeat before the gallows. Sanders is hoping that Hillary's compounding scandals will cause the Democrats to abandon her before Philadelphia. But that is a long shot since Obama's endorsement is a signal to his Attorney General NOT to indict Hillary for her email breaches of national security.

California will continue to count its million early and absentee ballots but Sanders cannot truly believe he will overcome a 55-45 deficit. Besides, California is no longer a winner take all state. Even in the liberal dominance of California, Sanders ultra progressive platform with a potential of a several trillion dollar increase in the national debt has its limits. But Sanders is an idealist who believes that his message should have a prime time place at the convention. Someone will have to appease his glory and give a politician his shining moment on national TV.

The same cannot be said for Trump's victory stage in Cleveland. More and more elected officials and GOP leaders have decided not to attention the convention. They do not want to be associated with the toxic blabbering of Trump. Trump accused Milt Romney as being a loser since Romney would not support a man who is spewing “trickle down racism.” Even Speaker Paul Ryan is caught in the middle of the Trump madness. He cannot quite endorse him, and he cannot abandon him since Ryan is the de facto head of the party. And if the party is to survive, Ryan has to keep it together.

If party regulars thought Hillary or Trump would change their personal, destructive behavior traits, then they were sadly mistaken. Niether has the common sense to even think of being presidential, informed or humble. Trump continues to blast away with insults with no grasp of the issues or the facts. Hillary continues to weasel words in order prop up her entitlement claim of being the first woman president in the face of growing criticism of her character, her judgment and her temperment.

In the forthcoming Summer of Nonsense, we should prepare our selves for the worst in Trump and Hillary. Trump is only about winning. And he will say or do anything to win. Except he has no national infrastructure to get out the vote in November. He does not have a billion dollars to self-finance the media blitz that Clinton will have in the fall. And Hillary, despite having a party regular base in place, had a difficult time defeating an obscure, grass roots activist from the small state of Vermont. People really do not like or trust either Trump or Hillary.

And as Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson said, the major party candidates will merely trade insults this summer. He asks whether there needs to be an adult on the stage who is able to talk facts about the issues and propose real solutions to America's problems. If Johnson gets to the magic 15 percent in the polls (some show him at nearly 10 percent with little national media coverage), then he will be that adult figure and true third party candidate that most Independents would vote for in 2016.

PART EIGHT * OCTOBER 9, 2016

VICTORY!

FIRST DEBATE SCRATCHES

SECOND DEBATE PREVIEW

I had to bail on the First Debate at the half hour

mark because the moderator lost control of the candidates.

If I wanted to hear snippy insults, I would hang

out on the divorce floor of the local courthouse.

Here are my debate sketches from the first part of the debate.

Ink and pencil drawings.

The second debate looms like a boil on an NFL kicker's toe. Trump has continued to offend women with his latest locker room rant about his sexual aggressive prowness. Republicans who believe in conservative, Chrisian family values were stunned and outraged by Trump's off-camera locker room remarks prior to a 2005 entertainment TV interview. It appears Trump has never been to a sexual harassment seminar. He is clueless on his crude behavior. He makes raving idiots blush. It is worse than a South Park mockumentary on him. He is doing everything in his power to lose this election. But despite his own zeppelin inflated ego, he is still within the margin of error in most of the lastest national polls.

Just as feminists and soccer moms are gnashing their teeth on Trump's disrespect for women, these same groups historically have given the Clintons' a free pass on Bill's actual sexual harassment charges. Bill was caught in a sexual relationship with an intern. In any business in America, that would have caused the man to be fired and company liable for damages. But a president who believes in a woman's right to abortion got a free pass. And Hillary got credit for sticking by her man (even though many White House objects were broken in a rage.)

The truth continues to be that both Clinton and Trump are horrible people. They are bloated con artists. In the lastest WikiLeaks disclosures, it shows emails that Hillary was telling her banker/large donors one story in private while acknowledging that a candidate needs to tell a different story to the people to get elected. She is a chameleon only interested in winning. There is no principle except self grandeur.

People are so turned off by these two candidates that Sunday Night Football should rule the evening.

PART NINE * NOVEMBER 13, 2016

SUDDEN VICTORY!

MEDIA AND POLLSTERS BAFFLED

THE AMERICAN BREXIT

THE UNKNOWN CHOSEN ONE

Hillary Clinton had a double digit lead in many national polls with only two weeks to go in the Campaign. Trump had been staggered by sexist and offenses against women, who began to crawl from the woodwork like a Bill Clinton reunion. It was supposed to be a continuation of liberal rule in America, a vindication of Obama's wavering legacy and confirmation of globalism controlled by an elite ruling class.

Trump's path to victory was narrow since Clinton's DNC believed it had the formable firewall of Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania to stop the Republican nominee from running the table of toss up states like North Carolina, Florida, Colorado, Nevada and surprisingly Georgia. But Trump went to the Rust Belt in the waning days of the campaign. Pundits believed that he was wasting his final resources on blue states. Again, the media was godsmacked because Trump was correct in his map strategy.

By taking Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania Trump crushed the bicoastal Democratic strongholds. The forgotten man became the post-election theme that everyone missed except a few people who warned that there was a growing anti-establishment mood which shocked Britain with Brexit.

Voters had a stinky diaper choice of candidates: Hillary's untrustworthy number was at 67 percent; Trump at 60. Both candidates were old and non-issue oriented during the campaigns. It was a street fight of insults, accusations and taunts. Most voters got fed up and stayed home. Voting was down from 2012, with Black turnout lower for Clinton (and slightly improved for Trump over Romney's previous returns.)

But it was the Middle USA that came out stronger for the outsider, Trump, than Clinton and the establishment. His promises to re-work unfair trade deals hit home to the displaced former factory workers in Michigan. There is a sense that the country's rebound from the 2008 financial crisis only benefited insider bankers and political-government power axis while the shrinking Middle Class was left to drift into the collective depressing abyss. Federal and state government debt is at record levels. Politicians are padding their protected pensions with huge tax increases while public services get cut. People realized that this was an unsustainable Banana Republic model of doom. This election was more about a rejection of the governing status quo than a vote for Trump or his policies.

What was the last straw? It is hard to say. One example could be that the average person is getting taxed into the poor house without anyone representing their viewpoints in the capitols across the land. Being disenfranchised is something that is shown in the national media daily with minorities and special interest groups. But now, a silent majority awoke to regain some sovereign power over their leaders.

The rude, cruel and uncontrollable mouth pistol Trump suddenly has to become presidential. He started well with his victory speech in the early morning hour of November 9. It helped when his handlers took away his Tweeter account for the last week of the election cycle. But that was not enough to bridge the anger backlash of protesters. Women were very hurt by the election results as the chance for the first female president fell by the wayside.

As an outsider, with a Republican Congress, Trump has the opportunity to pass his agenda. However, as an outsider with few establishment GOP friends, he may wind up like Jimmy Carter and his Democratic Congress - - - in another kind of stalemate. Trump will bring on board loyalists to the executive branch. Since most of the Republicans did not support him in the primaries or the general election, the GOP party regulars will be out of luck finding new Washington D.C. political jobs.

In fact, Obama's 4000 partisan work force will be unemployed on January 20. So in essence, both the regulars of both parties are out of luck with a Trump administration. There is a cull in the swampy bottom herd.

No one really knows what Trump is going to do. Most believe that he will push some real enforcement of existing immigration laws against illegal aliens. He will clear out the politics of the Justice Department with career prosecutors. He will dismantle failing Obamacare but keep provisions like coverage for pre-existing conditions (which were already in place under many state laws). Rumor has it that he may be agreeable to increase the federal minimum wage to $10 an hour to help the underemployed Middle Class households.

But the most shocking thing from Trump's victory is that trade partners voluntarily asked to re-negotiate NAFTA. This was one of Trump's battle cries to get manufacturing jobs back in the USA because of unfavorable wage and tariff terms with Mexico. America is still the number one consumer market for foreign goods. Trump will have to figure out how to leverage this market to get foreign investment (and new jobs) in the US.

But for many single issue voters, the idea of Hillary appointing ultra liberal Supreme Court justices (or the Senate refusing to confirm any) swayed their vote to Trump and his promised conservatively constitutional short list of judges.

Because Trump is such a wild card, no one knows how successful he can be. Anyone can be president; now we have an actual Anyone.

The hurt and bitter Clinton supporters will continue to protest and mock the new president. He represents to them a massive rollback of civil rights and return to white power politics. They forget that Trump was once a registered Democrat who supported many different candidates, including Bill Clinton, during his terms. Trump may be the centrist moderate that would grind the gears of both liberals and conservatives.

THE DARK ABYSS OF POLITICS

Commentary on the 2016 Election

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