Friday, February 26, 2016

Trump defends Libya’s Gaddafi













For a man who claims he has the world’s greatest memory presidential candidate, Donald Trump apparently has forgotten that Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi killed 189 American passengers of a Pan Am jet. Passengers from other countries and people on the ground in Scotland also died.
Trump defended Gaddafi in Thursday night’s Republican debate. He didn’t mention Gaddafi’s terrorist acts against many countries.
Gaddafi’s agents also blew up a DC-10 operated by the former French airliner UTA over the Sahara Desert. The 170 killed included seven Americans.
His agents also killed three people, including two American soldiers, and injured many more people, in a West Berlin discotheque.
President Ronald Reagan tried unsuccessfully to kill Gaddafi.
Trump also apparently forgot during the debate that Gaddafi had pitched a tent on land owned by Trump in New York, though public pressure prevented him from ever staying in it.
Trump and other defenders of Gaddafi say he kept order in the region, and had stopped terrorist acts, and paid money to some victims.
Trump denied during the debate that he had supported the overthrow of Gaddafi, though fact checkers confirmed he had publicly claimed a role in the regime change.
BuzzFeed reported:
“I can’t believe what our country is doing,” said Trump on his video blog. “Qaddafi in Libya is killing thousands of people, nobody knows how bad it is, and we’re sitting around we have soldiers all have the Middle East, and we’re not bringing them in to stop this horrible carnage and that’s what it is: It’s a carnage.
“Trump said Libya could end up one of the worst massacres in history, and it would be very easy to topple Qaddafi.
“You talk about things that have happened in history; this could be one of the worst,” he said. “Now we should go in, we should stop this guy, which would be very easy and very quick. We could do it surgically, stop him from doing it, and save these lives. This is absolutely nuts.”
BuzzFeed
One implication of Trump’s remarks was that because Gaddafi had used his oil revenue to pay more than $2 billion to some of his victims he could be forgiven.
This is consistent with Trump’s attitude that deals can always be cut.
It should come as no surprise. Last November Comedy Central’s Trevor Noah had predicted Trump could become America’s Gaddafi, the nation’s “first African president…”
The writer of this blog covered the Sahara Desert crash of the UTA plane blow up by agents of Gaddafi. He was then a reporter for Associated Press based in West Africa.
IN THE TENERE REGION OF THE SAHARA (AP) First it appeared like confetti in the endless sand. Then big chunks of fuselate shattered in the crash that killed all 171 aboard, came into view.







Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Networks blow off alleged Trump scandals


Growing claims of Donald Trump scandals are being blown off by many in the mainstream media. MSNBC on Wednesday made fun of claims by former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney.

Romney, who some say is leading the fighting against Trump for the GOP establishment, said the Republican leader may be hiding some bombshells in taxes he has so refused to release.

MSNBC’s panel said Romney had no proof and was just blowing smoke.

"Mitt Romney, who totally blew an election that should have been won and whose tax returns made him look like a fool, is now playing tough guy,” Trump tweeted. It seemed as though the Donald and MSNBC were on the same page.

At the same time, news of allegations that Trump created a phony university to make himself richer are only finally getting some mention. That is because a tentative court date has been set and Trump may have to take time off from the campaign pundits say he has already won to testify about alleged fraud multiple lawsuits.

Certainly his supporters do not care about the many rude and racist remarks Trump has made. According to Trump he could shoot someone on 5th Ave. and no one would care.

Some in his party care because they believe Trump is not a conservative and will not support those who are if elected.

The university story just won’t go away, years later.

The Washington Post reported:  "Never
licensed as a school, Trump University was in reality a series of real estate workshops in hotel ballrooms around the country, not unlike many other for-profit self-help or motivational seminars. Though short-lived, it remains a thorn in Trump’s side nearly five years after its operations ceased: In three pending lawsuits, including one in which the New York attorney general is seeking $40 million in restitution, former students allege that the enterprise bilked them out of their money with misleading advertisements.

“Instead of a fast route to easy money, these Trump University students say they found generic seminars led by salesmen who pressured them to invest more cash in additional courses. The students say they didn’t learn Trump’s secrets and never received the one-on-one guidance they expected.”

The strangest thing about Romney’s allegations is that he ruled in the possibility that the question is not whether Trump paid his fair share of taxes. Romney said we may find Trump is not as rich as he says he is, which might explain why he uses every trick in the book to get free TV pay rather than pay for time.



Even with billions Trump not rich enough


As he appeared to be heading towards nomination as the Republican presidential nominee, is it possible Donald Trump will be the one in jail?

With all the talk about Hillary’s secret emails it is Trump who may be going to court.

He may be answering questions in as many as three lawsuits about a university critics say he created to make more money.

This isn’t something he can shout down with the backing of crowds and network television.

New York Times Trump Fraud

Here is what Wikipedia, ever mindful of Trump’s threats of law suits, said: “On August 24, 2013, the State of New York filed a $40 million civil suit against the institution (which had largely ceased operations in May 2011), alleging illegal business practices and claiming numerous "false promises" made by The Trump Entrepreneur Initiative and its representatives.[8] Donald Trump denied the allegations, claiming the school has a 98% approval rating and said New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is "a political hack looking to get publicity."[9] The New York Times editorial board stated that "Mr. Schneiderman’s suit offers compelling evidence of a bait-and-switch scheme."[10]

“Schneiderman accused Trump of misleading more than 5,000 people to pay up to $35,000 to learn his real estate investment techniques.[11]

“Trump has given conflicting stories. In his infomercial he said: “And honestly, if you don’t learn from them, if you don’t learn from me, if you don’t learn from the people that we’re going to be putting forward, and these are all people handpicked by me, then you’re just not going to make it in terms of world-class success.” He testified in a 2012 deposition that, contrary to the Trump University sales materials and statements he made in the infomercial to the media, he neither selected the instructors nor oversaw the curriculum.[12]

“In October 2014 a New York judge found Trump personally liable for the institution's violation of state education laws.[11]

Media reports this week said Trump would be compelled to testify in the case. Politico said no trial date has been set but Trump could be forced to appear on a primary day.

He already has had to defend himself against charges that he profited from bankruptcy.

Politico said even without a trial ”… After winning three of the first four nominating contests, Donald Trump hasn’t just hijacked the Republican Party but fractured it newly into three.”

Might there be a brokered convention. Would Trump break his pledge not to run as an independent. Would Michael Bloomberg throw his hat in the ring?


Salon Trump Fraud
·

Sunday, February 21, 2016

How a college kid sneaks into a presidential campaign

By ROBERT WELLER
LITTLETON COLORADO

   CHAPTER 1

Looking back, it was almost like I was on a miniature Hunter S. Thompson campaign voyage, though without the ability of a writer who later became a friend.
Before I began driving fancy convertibles, handing out wads of cash to pay campaign workers, drinking beer at topless joints and meeting famous people In my pre-journalism life I was seen as a nerd.
Though in those days four-eyes was a more likely insult, and history was my first love even before girls.
I especially liked books about World War 2, presidents, and the Wild West.
My father was in the Air Force, fighting the Cold War, and had been a 17-year-old machine gunner after D-Day.
I didn’t read about journalism at first, at least not that I can remember.  I did take Journalism 101.
When I went to college my love of history followed me. Vietnam was on the horizon, and that made the history of Indochina and colonies my favorite reading choice.
Being a military brat, initially I disdained Wayne Morse and other early critics of the war.
At the same time, my mother and father were both strong supporters of John Kennedy.
My first major experience with journalism was when I was pulled from high school in Aurora, Colo., because President Kennedy had been assassinated in Dallas.
Though journalism was not yet in my future plans, watching the war on TV, as well as the growing opposition of my college student peers, began convincing me a war I might have to soon go fight was wrong.
Photos from AP and others showing burning civilians, an army officer shooting a prisoner in the head, was shocking.
The My Lai Massacre left up to 509 Vietnamese dead. It was immediately reported by a U.S. helicopter nearby. The ground commander spent less than four years in house arrest and was pardoned.
For children of the Greatest Generation, who defeated Hitler and Japan, it shook us to the core.
Other than take part in anti-war demonstrations there seemed little a history student at a small Baptist college north of Kansas City could do. The area was not immune to the anti-war demonstrations sweeping the nation but classes continued pretty much as they had.
I also claimed close to being drafted, a student deferment just saving me.
President Lyndon Johnson had a powerful grip on Washington after replacing assassinated and beloved President John F. Kennedy. Republicans supported the war as much or more than Kennedy did.
U.S. commanders told the nation in in 1967 they could “see the light at the end of the tunnel” in the war against the Chinese- and Russian-backed rebels.
A surprise offensive on Jan. 30, 1968, named “tet” for the Vietnamese new year, took major towns and cities across the country. Though the U.S. forces were able to recapture most lost ground it was now clear this was not going to end soon.
The only way to have enough troops to meet this threat an army that had been reduced after World War 2 had to use its power to draft hundreds of thousands of young men.
College was a sanctuary for many of the middle class and well-to-do. Critics said blacks and other minorities would provide the bodies needed to stop the Viet Cong.

CHAPTER 2

A little known, maverick U.S. Senator from Minnesota, Eugene McCarthy, dared to take on President Lyndon Johnson.
Polls had been around for decades but did not rule the roost as today. Spin was always present. McCarthy got 42 percent and Johnson an edge under 50 percent on March 12, 1968.
The nation was stunned. Polls didn’t warn them that it could be this close. New Hampshire, in those days was a right-wing haven, and pro-war. It  had been one of only six states to vote against Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 following the Great Depression blamed on his opponent.
Sen. Kennedy was also stunned by the New Hampshire. He had avoided getting into the nomination race because many felt it looked like he was trying to take advantage of his brother’s assassination.
Johnson withdrew as a candidate for what would have been his second elected term.
Resentment against Kennedy was so fierce he was crushed in the first primaries that followed New Hampshire, even in his home state Massachusetts..
Then he turned the tables winning the Indiana primary in the heartland.
Then, in an even more the unlikely state, Republican-dominated, rural Nebraska, a primary was being held within easy driving distance from Liberty, Mo., 200 miles, in my Corvair.
I knew no one in the, including any one one to call. And I was just turning 21.
There campus was flooded with McCarthy organizers. Never saw a Kennedy representative.
My parents, as I said Kennedy lovers, had little money being in the military. They were split on the war. Dad supported it. Mom opposed.

CHAPTER 3

I remember a couple of high school friends who had enrolled at Creighton in Omaha. I crashed with them in their form, though it meant listening to trash talk about RFK all night.
I found my way to the Kennedy headquarters and met the late John Treanor, a long-time Kennedy campaigner. He had been a volunteer with John F. Kennedy’s first race..
When I showed up I was I pretty much was at the head of line of volunteers. Perhaps the only one. Just like young people today seem to favor Bernie Sanders, McCarthy was the choice in 1968.
He didn’t even check my driver’s license before  putting me in a rental car (mine was an embarrassment). I began delivering things usually I had no idea what they were.
They paid my gas and snacks.
Often I went into what was considered Omaha’s ghetto. While McCarthy had the student vote, blacks and farm workers were lined up with Kennedy.
After a few days Treanor put me in a room in the Sheraton Fontenelle, a landmark in downtown Omaha.
The lobby was full of campaigners, journalists, and those hoping to catch the eye of one of the candidates.
One evening a couple of TV crews were happying to be the toast of Kennedy. My parents didn’t drink much, and neither did I.
I got tipsy pretty fast. Someone ran to our table, the Kennedy table, and said we had to get a new speech to Bobby.
Frank Mankiewicz was forced to remove a joke about Muriel Humphrey, Hubert’s wife, who had fallen ill.
This was even before faxes let alone mobile phones.
The next thing I knew I was headed out the door.

A waiter yelled demanding who would    pay for these drinks: someone shouted bill them to Mr. Mezzanini.

I was a put in shiny new a white convertible cougar, a model that had only been out for a year.
The Secret Service knew I was coming so they got there quickly.
I’ll never forget the ruddy face and smile that greated me when his door opened.
He quickly took charge. “What are you going to do now,” he asked.
I said I would drive back to Omaha.
“No, you’re not. You are spending the night here after we get you fed.”
He handed me a copy of his book, “To Seek A Newer World,” and wrote kind words to me.
CHAPTER 4

This speech delivery, one of the highlights of my life, also got me on the staff, though I was not getting paid. The next day I delivered wads of cash to blacks in the Lincoln ghetto who had gotten out the vote and helped Kennedy win with 52 percent support.
Kennedy was on a roll now, and I was with him.
I went back to William Jewell College to catch up on classes and get more clothes.
The campaign had sent me an airline ticket to join the campaign in San Jose, where I worked in several areas, including San Francisco.
Driving a convertible _ they seemed to have a preference for them _ to Santa Cruz gave me a chance to see some beautiful sights and swim.
At one point I was sent to deliver supplies to farm icon Cesar Chavez.
We knew we had to work hard because after a string of primary victories McCarthy upset Kennedy in neighboring Oregon.
Still, we celebrated from time to time. One night we went to a topless bar in San Francisco, in those days it was called the “Ore House.”
The Kennedy crew was made of men, most veterans of one war or another.
Treanor, who later became an assistant U.S. attorney, a judge and held other government jobs, loved to fiddle.

CHAPTER 5

Election night we went to the bar, I think it was in the San Jose Marriott. We had heard predictions we won, and it seemed our area, might have provided the margin.
Then the screaming began. We could see chaos on one of the hanging televisions.
The next morning I was given an airline ticket to return home a long with a ticket to fly on to Washington, D.C. We had been in the air for an hour or two when the pilot came on the intercom and announced Bobby was dead.
I stayed with Treanor at the apartment he shared with his brother and attended the funeral. We rode down the Potomac and sipped beer and shared our tears.
That may have been what led me to become a journalist, more than 35 years with Associated Press in jobs around the world: editor in New York City the day Saigon fell, the Alaska Pipeline, apartheid in South Africa, Indira Gandhi’s assassination, the famine in Ethiopia, the Columbine Massacre and much more.






2016 Presidential Race Calms Down


Even with networks and reporters trying to keep the U.S. presidential vote alive as long as possible it is starting to calm down.
First, Hillary Clinton has regained gained her edge. This was no surprise. The pundits had sought to portray Bernie Sanders as capable of beating Clinton.
They knew the chronological would make it an easy sell because the first two states for Democrats were Iowa and New Hampshire, more than 95 percent wife.
Plus Sen. Sanders is from Vermont, a neighbor of New Hampshire.
But these early races meant nothing. According to Wikipedia, Hillary had led polls in 46 of 50 states in the past 18 months.
In Nevada, networks trying to get people to watch media sought to make it appear Sanders might upset Clinton. This despite a total lack of reliable polls because the major companies said it was too risky in such a caucus situation.
Within minutes of declaring Hillary the winner some pundits had been saying they believed Sanders could pull an upset.
Guess what. Hillary did carry the Latino vote.
The New York Times said Sanders is falling farther behind in delegates. The Times reported: “After Mrs. Clinton’s defeat in the New Hampshire primary, she sharpened her political message to focus on breaking “barriers” that keep black and Hispanic Americans from rising in society and earning a high-quality education, good jobs and fair treatment from police officers and the criminal justice system.
“Mrs. Clinton, her campaign surrogates and her television commercials repeated these themes throughout Nevada, and her campaign aides portrayed Mr. Sanders as preoccupied with attacking the political system and Wall Street rather than helping real people.
“According to entrance polls, Mrs. Clinton won among women and low-income voters — two groups she lost to Mr. Sanders in New Hampshire. Moreover, she seemed to hit on a message that showcased her caring side, a quality that some voters have wanted to see.”

The mainstream is still treating Donald Trump like Alexander the Great. But did Alexander ever settle for a third of the vote?
That seems to be Trump’s ceiling.  In South Carolina, two Republican U.S. senators, Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio, about 22 percent of the vote each. They got 100,00 votes more than Trump. Three other candidates still another 100,000. So Trump, together, got 200,000 fewer than the other candidates out of a total.
One of those candidates, Jeb Bush, withdrew from the campaign last night.
Trump is going to find things much tougher when more candidates withdraw. How would he do against just or two opponents?
No one knows where the votes would do. It seems unliklely that would attack more votes. He has probably already threw just about every insult in the sink against the Pope, John McCain, Apple, female journalists and editors and others. Those who support him are probably on board.


Sunday, February 14, 2016

Columbine mother's interview angers victims and families and leads no where

                                                                        Wikipedia

The television interview given by the mother of Columbine killer Dylan Klebold leaves out important information, actually reducing the amount known about WHAT led to the 13 killings.
No one is suggesting Sue Klebold knew the young men were preparing a massacre.
But the carefully choreographed televised interview leaves out important things that were known.
Some parents are angry that she waited so long to say virtually nothing.
Several so-called experts appeared but did not talk about bullying. Many believe that bullying of the killers by athletes was a major factor.
Columbine had very successful athletic teams.
“It was clear in the first hours after the shootings that vengeance against athletes was a preoccupation of the two killers. Harris and Klebold began firing with the words  "anybody with a white hat" stand up,  the Washington Post reported.
The Post, in a review of the Klebold’s book, mentions that bullying was endured by the killers.
It was reported by the Denver Post that Wayne Harris, father of Eric Harris, had found at least one pipe bomb in his son’s belongings before the shootings.
The idea that Klebold would make no money from a book being promoted by the ABC interview with former Nixon speech writer Diane Sawyer is disingenuous. The settlement of lawsuit filed by victims and their families prohibits making any money from any media accounts of what happened at Columbine or the events that preceded the killings.
It is unlikely that anyone will be able to tell whether Klebold got any money from book through back channels.
That settlement included depositions in which both families answered questions with the condition that what was said would not be released for 20 years years. This information will only be available in 2027.
The interview also made no apparent attempt to look at why Jefferson County sheriff’s deputies did not pay attention to warnings that the teens were threatening to kill people.
Colorado’s state government dropped its own investigation.

Wednesday, February 10, 2016

Whack a Repubican mole


Donald Trump is running out of one-liners.
At one time there were 20 or so Republican presidential candidates. That meant Trump could get away with one-liners instead of talking policy.
Assuming he does have some ideas, he soon will have to talk about them.
What was once 20 Republican candidates is now down to four or five.
Nobody has heard from Ben Carson.
Chris Christie and Carley Fiorina are the latest to withdraw.
On Saturday, in Houston, there will only be four five on the stage, depending on whether Carson shows up and is admitted.
There won’t be such great pressure to make sure Trump, Sens. Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, and present and former Govs. John Kasich and Jeb Bush get their chance to speak.
Kasich has tried to show he is the only moderate. This week he is expected to sign a bill taking money away from Planned Parenthood.
There still may be too many on the stage to deal with serious issues, and Trump has shown no sign of being interested in them.
If billionaire Trump does become the GOP candidate that could bring the even richer former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg out as an independent.
Despite Bernie Sanders so far in two very small, nearly all white states, roadblocks lay ahead. Starting with Nevada and South Carolina, both with large minority populations.
Clinton may be so embedded in the Democratic party’s structure that she cannot be stopped



Tuesday, February 9, 2016

White racists win in all-white state. Who cares?

Two candidates whose candidacies are based on winning the declining white vote have captured the first primary in the 2016 presidential race.
Sen. Bernie Sanders and real estate tycoon Donald Trump had lost a week before.
Now the media “narrative,” this year’s term, will declare them victims and the likely presidential nominees of the Democrat and Republican parties.
How can this be given that the share of whites, meanwhile Caucasians of Anglo-Saxon descent, is declining each year?
Imagine, a jeweler using an arthroscopic surgeons’ tools, removed two tiny areas from the nation and added up the votes.
Iowa and New Hampshire, combined population less than 5 million of the total of 319 million in the country.
That is not quite 2 percent.
As late night TV hosts repeatedly said, there were more blacks on the university basketball teams in the two states than in their black populations.
The two states both allow people to cross lines and vote for a candidate in either party. Most states require primary voters to be registered members of the party whose race they are voting in.
Next up are Nevada and South Carolina, both with big minority populations, and polls show Clinton with big leads. She lost to Sanders by 18 points, less than the 30 the polls predicted.
Trump may do better since there are so few blacks and so many evangelical, Confederate flag lovers.
As for New England,
It used to be joked that the New England states were in their own world. “As Maine goes, so goes Vermont.”
This evening’s Huffington Post banner headline said: “NH Goes Racist Sexist Xenophobic.”
Sanders and Trump appeared to share one thing. But they were opposite sides of the coin.
Sanders wants to be a socialist. Trump want build walls around the country.
Sanders approves of same sex marriage and legal abortion and even legal weed.
Trump wants to put anyone who marries someone of the same sex in jail along with any woman who had an abortion, even if raped.
Here is where the polls seem at odds with each other.
Majorities approve of the gay marriage, legal abortion and legalizing marijuana.
With the two major parties apparently under the control of leftists and rightwing nut cases, former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, also a billionaire, may enter the race as an independent.
He has been a Democrat, a Republican and now an independent.
The biggest problem with Trump and Sanders is that they are both boring. The media has supported Trump and opposed Clinton.
Bloomberg might give the nation the solid third-party choice most countries already have.
Lastly, the good news. Fatso Christie is out.

Sunday, February 7, 2016

Old man wins Super Bowl


Even here in Denver most people didn’t think a lame 39-year-old quarterback, Peyton Manning, could win a Super Bowl.
He did, 24-10 over the Carolina Panthers and their 25-year-old stud quarterback.
Having lost three of five previous Super Bowls, Mile High City residents were accustomed to losing.
John Elway, who won two before retiring, was the oldest to have ever won in the past.
Elway was different. Most years he was the entire team. Elway, now the manager, took a bet, and signed Manning despite neck surgery that left him questionable.
Manning was annihilated by Seattle in his first trip for Denver two years ago. But this year Elway and defensive coach Wade Phillips, had created the best defense in the National Football Leage.
Time after time, despite a tendency for penalties due to rough play, the Broncos won the game when its offense failed to show up.
Backup quarterback Brock Osweiler won some of those games. And it would not have been a huge surprise if had replaced Manning when the going got tough.
Manning was sacked and forced to fumble but Panthers’ quarterback Cam Newton missed on many throws and a few of his runs out of the pocket made no difference.
Fireworks were going off all over the Denver Metro area.
On Monday there probably be just as many people wearing orange jerseys. They used to the Orange Crush, because of their defense in the 1970s. Now they are the Orange Rush, again for their defense.
It might have been more of a surprise if the Broncos hadn’t destroyed New Englands Patriot Tom Brady.

Both Newton and Brady frequently had to throw balls away to avoid being sacked.