I've had people say it's a hardening, actually ~ US presidential election 2016 part 9/11 never forget

Again, never said anything about immunity from prosecution. And for having called me myopic I think you may have lost sight of the fact that we have one of these things every four years and the incumbent isn't always on the same side as you.

I'm struck with the parallels between Berlusconi and Trump (down to allegations of sexual misconduct with minors). Small solace that our legal system is somewhat less corrupt, Berlusconi was able to weather charges for 9 years as Prime Minister.

On the Carson rerun tonight on Antenna TV, they just had this Op-Ed bit with Floyd R. Turbo protesting the idea of Puerto Rico getting statehood. If you added multiple pauses and constant restatements of the statements made, it would work as a Trump speech.

"The AG needs to press a case now because Trump might win" is saying precisely that the case should be politicized to keep Trump from being elected. It's not like a federal case is going to be past a few meetings in the office to decide staffing in eight weeks.

So tonight I was talking about Trump with a friend at a bar and "Ignition (remix)" started and I realized Trump is like R. Kelly for undecided voters: either he works on you in a way that lets you dissociate, or the disgust keeps you from considering him. But it's not a rational decision.

because it's 2:46am and this is the best possible thing i could be doing, i want to point out a small lol to be had at this little doodledoo on digby:

The NY Times endorsed Clinton but actually they're heavily promoting Trump for president. How heavily? Literally by a 2:1 margin.

Put another way, the Times believes that what Trump says and does is twice as important as what his closest rival says and does.

Think I'm kidding? If you go now (now being September 24, 2016 at 2:18 EST) to the NY Times Web site and do a word search, you will come up with

Trump: 16 mentions
Clinton: 8 mentions

2 Pictures of Trump
1 picture of Clinton

It's no wonder he's pulled even.

then you do a quick ctrl+F on digby's front page and find:

119 mentions of trump
65 mentions of clinton

grifters are good for business

identify with the aggressor

this election season, people will cast votes by jiggling in the direction of mirrors while gnawing at their elbows and swallowing salt water. election observers hump the machines and every vote requires you to pull down a lever, hard, five to eight times

meanwhile this guy gets paid to be on tv and occasionally asks questions to presidential nominees

http://i.imgur.com/LrYZnSu.jpg

"I think he's unqualified, has poor judgement, can't manage things very well, isn't particularly likeable, and doesn't care about me, but I am going to vote for him."

I can see a lefty in a swing state saying the exact same thing about HRC. (Let's not start w/ the "qualified" generality, DT's kindergarten qualities notwithstanding)

Tomboto and Lion's arguement has me thinking that its actually a great idea to have the president Inaugurated nearly two months after the election. The AG could start an investigation right after election night and the new prez might be getting subpoenas while (s)he's unpacking boxes, while issues of partisan pressure had been avoided.

http://time.com/4506963/donald-trump-gennifer-flowers-debate/

No Flowers, apparently

bummer

You don't bring me Flowers
You don't swing Wisconsin

Once again, Trump fails to bring home the D-List celebrity bacon...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOV6bf6DzVs

\m/

David Fahrenthold is promising something big coming tomorrow about the Trump Foundation. Cautiously excited.

Don't those related tweets indicate perhaps criminal tax evasion, albeit mitigated by his "ignorance *is* a defense" note? That is, perhaps Trump Inc. was truly up to illegal stuff, but he was following the advice of council, which perhaps led him astray?

I saw someone on twitter say that if the moderator of the debate aren't supposed to have fact checking authority, then... why should it be a journalist? If they're just there to keep the thing going, get Ryan Seacrest to do it.

Stay safe, America. The world is fucked up.

No, get Oprah!

Someone on twitter

It was Ryan Seacrest

No, it was Oprah!

I don't know whether moderators should intervene or not. Partly I think no, that's the whole point of the debate, for the two people up there to go at each other. But as What's A. Mook said on one of the shows this morning, if Clinton has to spend the whole debate fact-checking Trump, she won't have time for anything else.

obviously there can't be an expectation that the moderator is Arbiter of Right and Wrong but there's a huge gulf between asking for that and asking the moderator, you know, to at least *question* the obviously wrong thing that was just said (ie "well now, actually Obama wasn't President in the 60s so he couldn't have been at fault for Bay of Pigs", not "I think you'll find trickle down economics don't work!").

https://twitter.com/victomato/status/780119655423676416

Maybe instead of a moderator trying to fact check, the network should just do the CNN chryon thing and state facts on the screen so that the viewers get some helpful details but the debate itself doesn't get bogged down.

"Trump says he will take the oil (this doesn't make sense)"

Lawn Sign Update: I was walking through my neighborhood this morning, seeing a number Trump signs. I know a few specific homes with Hillary bumperstickers, but Trump yard signs are much moore common. Expected this, as it's a pretty Republican neighborhood within a majority Dem zipcode, but depressing regardless. Finally came across a home with a Clinton/Kaine sign and it brightened up my day. Then I noticed their lawn jockey.

same shit in 2012

Lots of Clinton signs in my neighborhood plus a few Johnson signs, no Trump. I'm in suburban Austin, so my neighborhood is probably more republican than the city overall.

Anderson Cooper back to his old glasses. He had these weird ones on the other night with a wire nose bridge.

during the eagles game today again during halftime they ran two political commercials - a pro hillary ad (the one where she's championing children throughout her life) followed by an anti-mcginty ad (and also in like the first quarter there was an anti pat toomey ad). no trump advertisements.

The view from 96:

http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/my-nineteenth-presidential-election-and-the-most-important

Happy to report that Clinton/Kaine yard signs are EVERYWHERE in my town as of this week

A stray Trump/Pence sign here or there

I stick at a different moment—the lighthearted comment he made when, in early August, an admiring veteran presented him with a replica of his Purple Heart and Mr. Trump said, “I always wanted to get the Purple Heart. This was much easier.” What? Mr. Trump is saying he wishes that he had joined the armed forces somehow (he had a chance but skimmed out, like so many others of his time) and then had died or been scarred or maimed in combat? This is the dream of a nine-year-old boy, and it impugns the five hundred thousand young Americans who have died in combat in my lifetime, and the many hundreds of thousands more whose lives were altered or shattered by their wounds of war. I take this personally, representing as I do the last sliver of the sixteen million Americans who served in the military in my war.

My lunch walk route leads me past what I've always taken to be a fairly conservative household; a weathered minivan sits out front, wearing bumper stickers that make clear where the owner stood in 2004, 2008, and 2012.
It'll be interesting and instructive to see if a Trump/Pence sticker surfaces there. I'll keep you posted.

y'all don't have to rub it in, ok?

http://i.imgur.com/sXUleQH.jpg

Someone I work with posted this on Facebook over the summer, something he photographed about 30 miles outside of Toronto.

http://i1059.photobucket.com/albums/t427/sayhey1/sign_zpszg3xckx6.jpg

"How far did I cycle today? And I thought I was riding north."

probably placed by the folks in charge of trump's push to win ontario; you know it's never been done by a republican candidate yet.

Ontario's in play!

Newfoundland is a long shot tho

I see tons of Clinton signs and and a couple of Johnson things, like the t shirt on a guy sitting near me at the playground. I wanted to ask how he enjoyed the taxpayer funded public facilities but didn't want to voluntarily start a conversation about libertarianism with an Idahoan.

I also finally saw a shitload of trump signs last week on the way to Seattle, all in the cascades where the rugged individualist ranchers don't have to worry about pissing off all of their Mexican neighbors like the farmers a couple miles east.

only two trump houses in town that i've found but one is rly going above and beyond: at least a dozen signs, many homemade/handlettered, one giant MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN banner

Last night I saw a 6'3ish drunk young blonde man yelling make america great again repeatedly right in the face of a late 40's diminutive Hispanic woman. I hate this election so much.

Can we give prohibition another shot

I'm sure we've discussed this already but I watched A Face In The Crowd at the weekend and its a great movie but there's no way the ending would pan out that way for Trump - his fans are too invested in his grift, he could spit in their faces and call it champagne and they'd lap it up. I just don't know how you get past that level of blind idiot devotion, beyond retroactive education. I mean, this election proves that the Dems/the Left's best hope for the future is to invest heavily in education, esp civic education, so people know better than to vote so hopelessly against their best wishes (full disclosure, I am a British and yes still scarred from Brexit)