Sleepless in Midland

The odor of mendacity -- Judge McAfee's line -- where it came from

Did you know where that line came from? It's from Tennessee Williams' novel "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" which was made into a movie by the same name starring Elizabeth Taylor, Paul Newman, Burl Ives, and others. IMDB link.

Big Daddy (Burl Ives) was a wealthy southern land owner whose days were numbered, and his nuclear family was hovering around, trying to curry favor in hopes of a sizable chunk of the fortune that might soon be thrust into probate. Big Daddy could see through it all, and in one subtle declaration noted that there was an "odor of mendacity" present.

So when Judge McAfee, in his ruling regarding Fani Willis and Nathan Wade and their prosecution of Donald Trump, declared there was an "odor of mendacity," one has to wonder it the Judge is an old movie fan or a Tennessee Williams fan.

Perhaps the analogy is that the smell of money and power inspired Willis and Wade to go after Donald Trump. Whereas, the judge sniffed out the mendacity.

I agree with Trump -- Border Adjustment Tax is complicated

Some are saying that a border adjustment tax is just the thing we need, even going so far as saying it will pay for The Wall. See Yes, Trump can make Mexico pay for the border wall. Here’s how. There Marc A. Thiessen makes it sound simple enough. To wit:

The House Republicans’ plan would lower the corporate tax from 35 percent to 20 percent and apply the tax based on the location of consumption rather than the location of production. It would do this through a “border adjustment” that exempts exports while taxing imports. Under the plan, all imports coming into the United States would be subject to the 20 percent tax, but exports would have the tax refunded — making them tax-free.

Easy money, right? Here's a more thorough explanation at the Tax Foundation Blog:

Standard economic theory states that a border adjustment ends up in a wash for both exporters and importers because prices adjust to leave the trade balance unchanged. Specifically, the value of the domestic currency adjusts upward. Standard supply and demand shows why both the import tax and the export exemption work together to push the value of the domestic currency up.

The first piece is the import tax. An import tax would raise the cost of imports and reduce domestic demand for them. When Americans demand fewer imports they also provide foreigners with fewer U.S. dollars. This reduces their supply, makes them more difficult to get, and pushes up the value of the U.S. dollar relative to other currencies.

The second piece is the export subsidy. By itself, an export subsidy would allow U.S. producers to drop their prices in foreign markets. This would increase the demand for our exports. In order to purchase those exports, foreigners will need more U.S. dollars. This drives up demand for U.S. dollars in order to purchase those exports. This increases the value of the U.S. dollar relative to other currencies.

Separately, an import tax and an export subsidy only result in partial adjustments to the value of the U.S. dollar and would impact either exporters or importers. However, the impact of both of these policies together is a full offset of each.

It sounds like a very delicate balancing act. And if it doesn't work as predicted, proponents can simply say it needs more time.

I agree with Trump -- it's complicated. I miss the good old days when they were talking about tax simplification.

Welcome back, Churchill sculpture

Barack Obama has done a lot of things to antagonize friends of the U.S., and getting rid of the sculpture of Winston Churchill certainly didn't do much to enhance our friendship with Britain.

So it's nice to hear Donald Trump will bring it back to the White House. Source: Winston Churchill bust set for Oval Office return by Donald Trump.

For what it's worth, that article is dated 1/7/17, however, it reads as if it was written last November. In any event, trying to undo some of the things Obama did is a worthwhile goal. Although, undoing the damage done to Israel may not be as effortless.

Got a problem? It's Trump's fault

"George Bush stole my puppy." I heard that was the caption on a sad little boy's sign in a political cartoon back in the day when GWB was the president. Trump is getting the same treatment.

The best one so far is the woman whose dating life was ruined. See Howard Kurtz' Fine Whine: Now Trump is being attacked for ruining a woman's dating life.

“‘I can’t,’ I told him. ‘I just can’t.’ I’ve lost the desire to attempt the courtship phase.”

And that’s it. Poor Stephanie is depressed, so she doesn’t feel like dating, and it’s all Trump’s fault for messing things up. Sad!

Dang! Can people just get a life?

So Tillerson got along with Putin -- yawn

The typical viewer of the news shows might come away thinking Trump's potential Secretary of State pick, Rex Tillerson, is the worst choice ever because he got along so well with Vladimir Putin. Tillerson even received some sort of Russian friendship award.

The opposition seems to be based on the theory that if Tillerson becomes Secretary of State he will put this personal relationship with Putin ahead of the USA.

But shouldn't Russians be just as worried that Putin would put his friendship with Tillerson over his love for Mother Russia? Somehow they don't seem worried about that.

As for Tillerson, Exxon shareholders weren't disturbed by the relationship because obviously it had to be good for Exxon. The idea that he would put his relationship with Putin over his loyalty to the company seems absurd. The same principle applies to the Secretary of State post. To think that Tillerson would put his love for Putin over his loyalty to the USA requires the kind of conspiracy theory only partisan politics can bring out.

Maybe all this vote recounting will lead to voter registration reform

The Clinton/Stein vote count project will likely focus on finding only two things -- uncounted Clinton votes and unqualified Trump votes. That's unfortunate, because just about every rational person suspects that there were a lot of people voting for Clinton who shouldn't have been voting. If the numbers are small, they may not affect the ultimate outcome. But we really don't know.

Americans would like to think the system is solid and reliable. But local registrars in Blue states are loyal Democrats. And let's face it. Most of us have become suspicious of government whether run by Democrats or Republicans.

Hopefully, all this focus on recounting votes might reinvigorate the movement to reform voter registration in spite of all the claims that purging the dead from voter rolls and requiring proof of citizenship are discriminatory.

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Of interest here is an article from dailysignal.com. See More Than 800,000 Noncitizens May Have Voted in 2016 Election, Expert Says. That "expert" is merely extrapolating from information voluntarily given in previous years. And it wouldn't take an expert to expect the motivation this year would be stronger. But the point is there. Many non-citizens vote when there is no one to stop them.

Would Trump have the courage to bust government employee unions?

That's hard to answer. Die hard Trump supporters will say, "Yes, he does!" But we don't really know.

However, he could have leverage against the federal bureaucracy by threatening to do it. Michael Bargo, Jr., tells us in How Trump Can Defeat the Establishment Bureaucracy that federal employee unions were created by President Kennedy in 1962 with an executive order. And President Trump could revoke it if he wanted to.

Here are some interesting numbers pulled from Mr. Bargo's article:

The SEIU is headquartered in Washington and has 1.9 million members. Since 1989 the SEIU has given $238 million to political candidates, making them the number one political contributor with 100% going to Democrats. The number three biggest contributor is the National Education Association, their 3 million members having given $114 million, 97% going to Democrats. The number four contributor is the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Their 1.6 million members gave $100 million with 99% going to Democrats. The number nine biggest contributor is the American Federation of Teachers who gave $81 million, 100% going to Democrats. They have 1.6 million members in 3,000 localities nationwide.

These four unions, active throughout the U.S., have a total of 8.1 million active members and since 1989 have given $533 million to political candidates, 98% of which went to Democrats. And this number does not include the other municipal public sector unions, etc. which amount to about 12 million members, giving a total number of public union members of 20.2 million. This is the size of the bureaucratic opposition Trump has in the states and Federal government.  On the Federal level, there are 45,000 Federal employees in Chicago alone. About 28% of all Federal workers are union members.

I suppose the silver lining is that only 28% of federal workers belong to a union. But even then we can be sure that Democrats in Congress will fight tooth and nail to keep the unions as loyal contributors to their own coffers.

Violent protesters rioting against hate -- huh?

So who's deplorable now?

Those of us who participated in the Tea Party rallies recall how peaceful they were. Contrast those rallies with the riots taking place against our next president, Donald Trump.

What's stunning is that they seem focused on hate seemingly oblivious that their own display of hatred exceeds anything we've seen from Trump and his supporters.

The photo came from a CNN post titled What do anti-Trump protesters want? Here are 5 key demands.

It's hatred on display. Whose? The anti-Trump demonstrators. That's what they want: to vent their spleens.

Let's hope Trump's transition goes better than when Bush took over after Clinton

We are hearing how Obama promises a smooth transition of the White House to Trump. Let's hope he means it and expects the same from his staff.

Let's just focus on the actual house for now. The things Bill Clinton, et. ux., Hillary Clinton, did when they left the White House have a way of haunting the memory. It was bad enough to steal government furniture. But the staff went out of their way to make things hard when they pried all the "W"s off each keyboard in the White House. Just childish fun, but someone had to pay for it, and it was us, the taxpayers. But that's the disdain they had for us.

Should we expect antics like that this time? Obama promised a smooth transition. And he wouldn't lie, would he? OK, you can stop laughing now.

Actually, they probably fear that Donald Trump could make them look like the small creatures if they did try some shenanigans.

Expect calls to do away with the Electoral College -- don't listen to them

It's too soon to get the 2016 vote totals, however some reporters contend that Clinton got more votes than Trump even though he achieved the Electoral College win.

There will be people (Democrats) who will revive the call to do away with the Electoral College and adopt a system whereby the winner of a plurality wins the election.

If the total vote count was all that mattered, presidential candidates would concentrate all their get-out-the-vote efforts on the major metropolitan areas. Voters in the big cities tend toward Democrats for reasons that we won't go into here. But the fact that they do would be bad news for those of us in flyover country without some way of spreading the vote count over a larger area.

The founding fathers knew what they were doing when they put the Electoral College in the Constitution. Let's leave it there.

Where were you when you learned that Donald Trump won?

I was in bed. Woke up around 1:45am cst and turned on the radio to hear a man speaking to a crowd. After a moment it was clear this was a winning Vice Presidential candidate, but which one?

Then a bunch of male voices in the audience chanted "U S A, U S A, U S A." That's not exactly a signature line. But I just couldn't imagine a crowd of Clinton supporters chanting that. Can you?

So Trump won. Make America great again!

BTW, thehill.com has a list of celebrities who claimed they would leave the country if Trump won. Why do they say that? Is it to demonstrate that they have so much emotion invested in the election? BFD. Go ahead. Move. Show us you really mean it. Here's the list at Celebs who said they’d leave country if Trump won.

Did anyone really wait until election day to decide for whom to vote?

This post is being written on the morning of the election after seeing an interview on one of the TV shows. A reporter interviewed patrons of a breakfast diner somewhere in flyover country. At one table of three, only one claimed to have decided for whom to vote. The two others claimed to be undecided.

How can that happen? There really isn't much left to reveal about either of the candidates or, more importantly, what they plan to do if elected. Those guys demonstrated a level of indecisiveness that was truly baffling.

If they need an issue, the Supreme Court is up for grabs. And we all know which candidate will present the most danger to the Constitution as we know it.

Maybe they weren't very comfortable making decisions -- they don't trust their own judgment. They probably need a strong leader at their workplace. And so far neither of the candidates have demonstrated much leadership.

But in reality, they probably have made up their minds, they just don't want to tell anyone. If a fellow says he's voting for Clinton, his conservative friends will think he's stupid. If he says he's voting for Trump, his Democrat friends might try to get him fired or ruin his business. He has a right to remain silent. Anything he says can and might be used as an excuse to do him harm.

Candidates spend millions on psychological data on voters so they know all about us

Barack Obama put the Big Data idea in the news after his win in 2012. The prospect of data banks full of information about the voters which could be used to get the right voters to the polls was stunning at the time. It's old news now.

And any politician who can afford it has invested in it. Donald Trump can and does. See Trump’s plan for a comeback includes building a ‘psychographic’ profile of every voter. Excerpt:

The firm says it can predict how most people will vote by using up to 5,000 pieces of data about every American adult, combined with the result of hundreds of thousands of personality and behavioral surveys, to identify millions of voters who are most open to being persuaded to support Trump.

Very impressive, if it works. See also Behind the scenes at Donald Trump's UK digital war room. To wit:

"The traditional model where 50 million people receive the same blanket advert is being replaced by extremely individualistic targeting.

"So we're able to identify clusters of people who care about a particular issue, pro-life or gun rights, and to then create an advert on that issue, and we can nuance the messaging of that advert according to how people see the world, according to their personalities."

Cambridge Analytica's method relies on machine learning. It starts with a detailed survey, often presented as a psychological test.

The tech company creates these and seeds them on Facebook, where they are filled in by hundreds of thousands of people.

Those answers are combined with data, bought or licensed from brokers and sourced from social media, to create models of their personality. Those models are then applied at a population-level scale.

Mr Nix said: "Each one of these data points on its own is not that revealing, but the sum of them begins to paint a fairly comprehensive picture.

"So we model the personality of every adult across the United States, some 230 million people."

The technology then identifies key voter types, who receive tailored messages - including Facebook and banner adverts.

Unlike traditional media, hypertargeted online and social messaging is not well regulated. Some researchers are concerned about privacy issues, as well as the effect of highly individualised messages on political discourse.

The company pulling all this together is Cambridge Analytica, and if Americans weren't eager enough about sharing their personal psychology online already, the company helpfully offers their psychological survey at its website. Go ahead. Take their Personality Quiz and get in their data base, if you aren't already in it. A sneaky voter might throw in some false information so he might be able to detect why a particular message happens to come his way.

A bombastic, blowhard, billionaire versus a greedy, corrupt, multimillionaire -- Guess which one the Occupy Wall Street crowd supports

Remember Occupy Wall Street? All those idealistic Democrats were out there demonstrating their disgust with Wall Street. Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton was pulling in big bucks from speaking engagements to the biggest Wall Street investment bankers, brokers, and financiers.

Now those happy campers from Occupy Wall Street are proudly displaying their "I'm for Hillary" badges.

Are they forgiving, or are they forgetful? In either case it's all partisan politics.

 

Trump's refusal to release tax returns is very important, at least to the NPR audience

I was listening to liberal talk radio (NPR) Friday morning, and the host and a guest were appalled at the fact that Donald Trump is the only presidential candidate in modern history who didn't release his tax returns. Is that really an issue?

I would have liked to ask them, "If Trump released his tax returns, would you then vote for him?" HA HA! We know they wouldn't. It would be merely the first of many steps he would have to take for them to accept him as a human being.

But with all that has and is coming out about Hillary Clinton, it's interesting to hear just what arguments they use these days to try to drag down Trump. To get him down to her level is going to take some doing.

Furthermore, it's hard to imagine anything in his tax returns that would embarrass him. If so, it would have leaked already.

Anyway, let them have their fun. We'll know soon enough who will be our next president.

If Ted Cruz or Ben Carson had gotten the Republican nomination, would the MSM be hauling out old embarrassing videos about them?

We recently learned from the released emails that Team Hillary, aided and abetted by the msm, targeted Donald Trump as their preferred winner of the Republican nomination for president, because they thought he would be the easiest to defeat in the national election.

With the msm releases of video of Trump's offensive language and new sexual assault complaints, independents and wavering Dems are supposed to be ready to abandon Trump in favor of Clinton. If it happens, then Team Hillary bet on a winning strategy, however underhanded it might seem to those of us at whom it was aimed.

But there were two others on Hillary's wish list: Ted Cruz and Ben Carson. What if one of those other two had won the primary? Democrats probably have already dug up the dirt on them, but we may not learn their worst secrets unless/until either of them runs for president again, and then not until Democrats and the msm decide disclosing them will do the most damage.

As for Trump, conservatives who fear Clinton don't have much choice but to vote for him now that Ms. Clinton herself has facilitated his primary election. But it's hard to forgive Trump for self sabotage like this: Trump Said to Block Campaign’s Requests to Do Self-Opposition Research. Presumably, he had an inkling of what might come out, but he was so confident in his own power of persuasion that he didn't want any help. After all, he's going to make America great again, right?

Obama finally draws a red line that holds -- but it's with Donald Trump!

Obama shows some back bone on occasion. But it's consistent with what we've all seen already -- the only enemies Obama recognizes are his domestic political enemies. Sad but true.

Now we read that Obama has drawn another red line. This one is a warning to Donald Trump not to go after Michelle Obama.*

What chivalry! And so far it's holding.

*Ted Cruz probably had a palm to forehead moment -- "Why didn't I think of that!" Actually, it must be disheartening to Cruz to realize that Trump has more respect for Obama than he does for Cruz.

Careful what you wish for Hillary -- turns out she wanted Trump on the ticket

Team Hillary was yearning for Donald Trump to win the Republican nomination as part of her grand strategy, although Ted Cruz or Ben Carson would do. The goal was to try to help build up these conservative Republicans to help them get the nomination so that Hillary Clinton could more easily roll over them. What? Another Mitt Romney would be too hard to beat?

This information comes from a Wikileaks leak which Redstate.com tells us about in Leaked Emails Show That Trump Was a Tool Used by the Hillary Campaign From Day One.

Democrats are remarkably wily politicians, and this is a good example of the type things they do. Saul Alinsky would smile. Make the opposition take an extreme position, then brand them with it.

Donald Trump was the ideal candidate for "Operationalizing the Strategy" to draw in primary voters for a candidate that could be painted as too extreme for the populace.

One of the goals was quite functional: muddy the waters against any attacks against HRC.

Do Republicans do this? If so, with the msm as Democrat operatives, Republicans are working with one hand tied behind their backs.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump has been counted out before, and if his boasts about sexual conquests don't score a knock out for Hillary, he's still got a chance. So Hillary, be careful what you wish for. If you lose, you could end up Operationalizing a new theme: "I fought the law, and the law won."

Trump is like the rodeo bull hell bent on ripping the rider to shreds but distracted by a clown

Someone once made the observation that rodeo bulls must be easily distracted. A rider tries to ride out the time on the back of one of those bad boys. The bull is mad as hell, and once the rider is off, the bull is ready to rip the guy apart, then trample the guy into the ground.

Hey wait. Where did that rodeo clown come from? In an instant the bull forgets about the rider and goes after that clown.

Donald Trump is that bull. Strong and focused, until he gets distracted by that clown in the colorful suit. The Clinton campaign has figured it out and applied it to their advantage. Remember that first debate between Trump and Clinton? All it took was a reference to alleged remarks he made about Alicia Machedo. And there went Trump like a bull after a rodeo clown. The rider calmly walked away and watched from behind the fence.

There are probably more clowns hidden away, waiting for the bull to throw the rider.

P.S. Maybe all those strange clown sightings we hear about are actually Clinton supporters simply rubbing our noses in bull manure.

Town Hall? Clown Hall.

We recently learned that team Hillary had a young actress prepped to ask her a question at a recent event. The kid performed perfectly, Hillary answered perfectly, the audience was moved, and the msm dutifully reported this example of Hillary Clinton's skill on the hoof.

Now we are getting ready to watch the second debate, called a town hall meeting. We know that Hillary is working harder than a KGB spy to stack the deck in advance. But those of us out here in flyover country aren't going to be as easily impressed as the reporters are.

If I were in charge I would publish the questions in advance. Not 13,000 random questions, but the actual questions to be used that night. Let the candidates prepare their best answer, and we'll hear what they've got. After all, we want to see them at their best. Sure, they would have had help, but impromptu speeches are fine as far as they go. However, we expect the best from the president. And we want to know what that is, not how good they are at improv.

Editor's note: Send in the clowns. Scary clowns, HA HA!. -- Robo-ed.

Michelle Obama -- I need an honest man

That's not a direct quote, but it works better to highlight the absurdity.

The real headline was Michelle Obama: ‘We Need Someone Who’s Honest and Plays by the Rules’ as President. Duh, as the kids say.

It's safe to say that George W. Bush was honest and played by the rules, and that factors in the fiction invented by Democrats about lies about Iraqi weapons. The problem is that we haven't had an honest president in almost eight years. I'll leave it to readers to do their own searches for the long list of Obama lies which, of course, would be incomplete if it didn't include that whopper about being able to keep your doctor or insurance plan.

Could Ms. Obama have been making a pitch for Hillary Clinton? HA HA! That's too absurd to even contemplate. Leftists have to lie to get their agenda passed. No one in their right mind would vote for it if they understood what it involved. So they lie about lying.

The choice in November is between a loud mouth show boat or a bald faced liar.

If looking for a presidential role model and you think sexism is worse than dishonesty then Hillary is your person

I was listening to progressive talk radio (NPR) and heard a woman proclaim that she hated to think that her sons might be influenced by a president like Donald Trump who seemed to have such disdain for women. That's not what she wanted for her sons. She wanted her sons to grow up respecting women.

Listen to conservative talk radio and one is likely to hear about how Hillary Clinton lied, raked in millions in pay-for-play schemes, and attacked women who claimed to have been assaulted by her husband. No one would want their daughters growing up with her as their role model.

But you know what? If the parties were reversed: Hillary was a Republican and Donald was a Democrat, it would be a mirror image. We would be hearing the same complaints but with the parties reversed. Democrats would be shocked at what Hillary had done and defensive of what Donald had done. Republicans the opposite.

It's all partisan politics. It's hard to take any of them seriously any more.

But of course, my one vote is committed to Trump. He's the only one who might possibly appoint a supreme court justice who won't bend the bill of rights to fit a progressive agenda.

If Republicans were serious about Clinton's skirting the law, they would try to pass laws outlawing that behavior -- same with Dem's outrage at Trump's tax loss carry forward

Hillary Clinton did some things that normal people wouldn't do but could have done great harm to the nation. But they weren't deemed illegal enough by FBI Director Comey to recommend prosecution. Thus the Clinton Defense was born. It would be easy to toughen the law. So here we have Texas Rep. John Ratcliffe proposing the "Classified Information Protection Act." Source: GOP bill kills the 'Clinton defense' for violating classification laws. Seems simple enough.

Two can play the game. Democrats are trying to hurt Donald Trump with assertions that he hasn't paid taxes in a while, and for evidence the publish what they say is a portion of one of his previous returns which claims a large loss which he carried forward to cut his future taxes. See Donald Trump's Billion-Dollar Tax Loss Is a Diversion From More-Serious Matters. From all accounts, Trump got good tax counsel and did nothing illegal.

But if Democrats are that upset about it, they would pass laws abolishing the tax loss carry-forward. Well? What are they waiting on?

Tim Carney tries to scare one issue voters away from Trump, but what's the alternative?

This will sound like a broken record to anyone who has read my previous posts about why I'll vote for Trump. I'm a one issue voter -- future Supreme Court nominees.

There's a lot at stake here: It's the U.S. Constitution. The First and Second Amendments are acknowledged targets of Hillary Clinton. And the conventional wisdom is that her nominees will be far left of center.

Even the adherents to the "Living Constitution" theory would have to acknowledge that many Americans own guns and would keep them even after a law ruling them unlawful. And the "Living Constitution" should protect that right since the so called living constitution is supposed to fit existing attitudes.

But a far left justice would be worse as the existing attitude he/she would want to enshrine in the law of the land would mirror leftist ideology.

Anyway, Tim Carney casts a vote against Trump in The 'but judges!' argument for Trump, and why it fails. He makes a valid point that Trump can't really be trusted to do anything he says whether about judges or anything else. But after calling Trump a con man and us his latest mark if we believe his promise about conservative judges, he does say this:

After examination, the "judges" argument is eroded down to this thin reed: It's possible Trump will nominate conservative judges, while it's certain Clinton will not.

Yeah, it's "possible." Thanks for that, Tim. Yet a possibility beats a certainty, especially if that's all we've got.

The Emperor's thick skin -- libs fired blanks with naked Trump sculptures

Democrats thought they knew how to get under Donald Trump's skin -- 1st, remove his clothes.

The unflattering sculpture of a naked Trump is about as insulting as anyone can be to another person. Their scheme had to be to make him mad, get him in the headlines, and bring down his poll numbers. Didn't work. They fired a blank.

So far, nothing but silence from the new Donald Trump. Good for him. Maybe there's still hope for him. Play it cool, boy, real cool.

Germany tries to close door to immigrants and advises locals to stock up on food just in case

Two interesting articles that need to be read together. First, Germany tightens Swiss border controls: Swiss minister which reports that "Germany has tightened border controls with southern neighbor Switzerland to choke off a flow of illegal immigrants."

That's probably a smart thing to do, although the barn door was left open too long. That brings up the second article: Germany to tell people to stockpile food and water in case of attacks: FAS. If effect, the German government might not be able to secure your community if all those immigrants we let in go on a rampage. So hunker down and eat your sauerkraut.

Better advice might be to stockpile ammo. Unfortunately, the populace is largely unarmed. Unorganized and unarmed civilians beset by hostile mobs -- sounds absolutely medieval. But see Indiana Jones vs. the swordsman for an example of how that could play out with a satisfactory conclusion.

Here at home, Hillary Clinton wants to resettle thousands of Syrians. Donald Trump, on the other hand, wants to subject potential immigrants to some serious scrutiny. Smart.

Did Joe Biden just cost the nuclear code carrier his job?

Apparently, there's a fellow whose job it is to carry the football -- the briefcase containing the code for declaring nuclear war -- wherever the vice president goes. And Joe Biden helpfully pointed him out to the audience while he was busy Trump bashing. See Biden Says Trump Can't Be Trusted With Nuclear Codes, Then Tells Crowd He Has the Codes 'Right Back Here'.

Now that the guy has been outed, is he safe? Will he have to be replaced? Does he get secret service protection, too? He needs it now.

BTW, it's probably a safe bet that Biden either never knew or can't now remember the password should it be necessary to access said football. Not quite as likely, but still in the realm of possibility in light of recent news is that foreign sources have hacked into the nuclear launch system, if it still works.

Did the Clintons neglect to spend ANY of their foundation money on actually helping anyone but themselves?

The mainstream media have been falling all over themselves trying to highlight Donald Trump's unwillingness to divulge his tax returns. Everywhere you look there's someone pointing that out. The dirty little secret is that his supporters couldn't care less.

But here's something that the Clintons could use to earn some points with the msm. They were too secretive about the Clinton Family Foundation and the Clinton Global Initiative, but the information came out in spite of their attempts to keep it under wraps. And if they really did try to carry out the pretense that the Foundation and the Initiative were in fact eleemosynary institutions, then surely someone other than the Clintons benefited from the largess of those two institutions.

But it's the dog that didn't bark. The msm are silent. There aren't any other beneficiaries. The dirty little secret is that her supporters couldn't care less.

Democrats have Trump's number

It should be easy for Hillary Clinton to beat Donald Trump. If I can figure it out, they figured it out long ago.

Everyone knows he's got thin skin, and it doesn't look like it's very hard to bait him into attacking some seemingly innocent person. The gold star dad, Khizr Khan, got a good jab in at the Democratic National Convention. And Trump's reaction put him in the news for days, and not in a good light.

Mr. Khan had some serious flaws which came to the forefront later, but it was too late. The low information voter got to see a preview of what President Trump would look like on their TV screens for the next four years. And they didn't like what they saw.

A few more of those before the election, and Trump's loyal supporters won't be enough to swing the swing states. And we'll be watching President Clinton prevaricate on our TV screens for the next four years.

Trump's mop up crew will be busy, busy, busy

Opposition research for the Trump camp involves digging up trash on those bystanders hit by a Trump insult.

Rudy Giuliani had the best suggestion -- Trump should aim his caustic remarks at Clinton and leave the little skirmishes to surrogates.

The latest headline about a Trump battle is with the Sharia lawyer whose son was killed in Iraq. We all have sympathies with the gold star moms and pops. But the ones who showed up at the Democratic National Convention were awarded a sacred honor by the left leaning msm.

It's up to a clean-up crew to try to mop up the carnage Trump left on the floor. Think of Mr. Wolf in the movie "Pulp Fiction."

For example, here's Thomas Lifson with Khizr Khan’s writings discovered subordinating US Constitution to Sharia law in which he shows that Mr. Khan isn't exactly the full throated American he pretended to be.

In any event, between now and the election the mop-up crew will be busy. Will they be successful? If they are, then they will likely have a busy next four years as recent history shows us that Trump leaves a pretty big wake of hurt feelings and appalled journalists.

Donald Trump 2016 reminiscent of Clayton Williams 1990

For anyone who doesn't know, Clayton Williams was a candidate for Texas governor in 1990. He was a successful businessman and wildly popular as a candidate. He was the politically incorrect candidate of the time. He would shoot off his mouth, the press would pounce, and supporters would cringe.

Texas Monthly magazine, no friend of Williams, provided a refresher in 1999 in What ever happened to Clayton Williams.

He may have made a good governor, but we'll never know. At one point he had a 20 point lead over that darling of the left, Ann Richards. But he couldn't keep his mouth shut. On election day he got trounced, and we ended up with Richards as governor.

Does Williams remind you of anyone? Oh, but that couldn't happen again.