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Politics

Hillary Clinton addresses the 2016 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

Hillary Clinton addresses the 2016 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

And the elitist hits just keep coming out of the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, who released another batch of emails from Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta. An email to Podesta dated March 13, 2016, from Bill Ivy, an academic and head of Global Cultural Strategies, reveals a concern that the Left’s goal of making Americans an “unaware and compliant citizenry” backfired with the rise of Donald Trump.

“Secretary Clinton is not an entertainer, and not a celebrity in the Trump, Kardashian mold; what can she do to offset this? I’m certain the poll-directed insiders are sure things will default to policy as soon as the conventions are over, but I think not,” Ivy writes to Podesta with concern. “And as I’ve mentioned, we’ve all been quite content to demean government, drop civics and in general conspire to produce an unaware and compliant citizenry. The unawareness remains strong but compliance is obviously fading rapidly. This problem demands some serious, serious thinking – and not just poll driven, demographically-inspired messaging.”

Essentially, Mr. Trump is a celebrity and they suspect he probably cannot be taken down by the same political strategies Democrats have relied upon in past election cycles. Particularly, Ivy is concerned that Mrs. Clinton is so bland that she doesn’t drive the same interest and loyalty (“demographically-inspired”) from minorities. He wrote to Podesta because he doesn’t have the money for pay to play.

“I will attend the Clinton fundraiser here next week but as I can only afford the low level of participation may just get to wave without a ‘hello’,” he wrote.

GCS is “encouraging worldwide communication and understanding across boundaries of nationality, ethnicity, race, gender, and age.” In other words, its mission is textbook globalism, or elites pushing multiculturalism with no respect or regard for the modern nation-state. The Right has long believed that to be the ultimate goal of the Left, but the WikiLeaks dump pretty much proves it. They hold disdain for religion and hope the shiny lights distract the “unaware and compliant citizenry” away from corruption and two-faced agendas.

Unaware and compliant: The elitist hits just

Opinion

Hillary Clinton speaks at the first presidential debate at Hofstra University on September 26, 2016.

Democrat
Hillary Clinton speaks at the first presidential debate at Hofstra University on September 26, 2016.

Will Hillary Clinton clean out the nest of anti-Catholic bigots in her inner circle? Or is anti-Catholicism acceptable in her crowd?

In a 2011 email on which Clinton campaign chief John Podesta was copied, John Halpin, a fellow at the Center for American Progress that Podesta founded, trashed Rupert Murdoch for raising his kids in a misogynist religion.

The most “powerful elements” in the conservative movement are Catholic, railed Halpin: “It’s an amazing bastardization of the faith. They must be attracted to the systematic thought and severely backward gender relations…”

Clinton spokesperson Jennifer Palmieri agreed: “I imagine they think it is the most socially acceptable politically conservative religion. Their rich friends wouldn’t understand if they become evangelical.”

“Excellent point,” replied Halpin. “They can throw around ‘Thomistic’ thought and ‘subsidiarity’ and sound sophisticated because no one knows what the hell they are talking about.”

What the pair is mocking here are both the faith decisions of the Murdoch family and traditional Catholic beliefs and social teaching.

This is a pristine example of the anti-Catholicism that historian Arthur Schlesinger Sr., called “the deepest-held bias in the history of the American people.”

In another email in this latest document dump from WikiLeaks, writes Ben Wolfgang of The Washington Times, Podesta and Neera Tanden, the president of the Center for American Progress, mocked the Miss America pageant, because so many finalists are Southern girls and young women.

Said Podesta, “Do you think it’s weird that of the 15 finalists in the Miss America, 10 came from the 11 states of the CSA?”

The CSA would be the Confederate States of America.

“Not at all,” says Tanden, “I would imagine the only people who watch it are from the confederacy and by now they know that so they’ve rigged the thing in their honor.”

In another email, Podesta himself uses the sort of language liberals once said disqualified Nixon from staying on as president — regarding former Governor Bill Richardson. Podesta refers to him and other Hispanics whom he is trying to court for Clinton as “needy Latinos.”

What these emails reveal is the sneering contempt of liberal elites for Catholics, Evangelical Christians, Southerners, and even Hispanics loyal to them. And the contents of these emails correlate with the revealed bigotries of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

In September, Clinton told a gathering of rich contributors at a gay rights fundraiser in New York City:

“[Y]ou could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the ‘basket of deplorables.’ Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic — you name it.”

Responding to the cheers and laughter, Clinton went on, “Now, some of those folks — they are irredeemable, but thankfully they are not America.”

What Clinton said to the LGBT partisans echoed what Obama told rich contributors in San Francisco in 2008, who wondered why he was not doing better in Pennsylvania.

“You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and … the jobs have been gone now for 25 years. … And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

Obama was saying that when small-town Pennsylvanians fall behind, they blame others and revert to their bibles, bigotries and guns.

Yet Obama has never explained what caused him to sit content for 20 years — and be married and have his daughters baptized — in the church of a ranting racist like Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who, at the time of 9/11, roared from his pulpit “God Damn America!”

What so attracted Barack Obama to Rev. Wright’s bigotry?

These latest emails confirm what we already knew.

Our elites, who are forever charging others with “racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia,” are steeped in their own bigotries — toward Southerners, conservatives, Middle Americans, Evangelical Christians, and traditionalist Catholics — the “irredeemables.”

Though the election is still a month off, the campaign of 2016 has already done irreparable damage to the American establishment.

Its roots in the nation it purports to lead have been attenuated if not severed. It has shown the world a portrait of American democracy at its apex that approaches the repellent.

Through the savagery of its attacks on those who have risen up against it, the establishment has stripped itself of all claim to be the moral leader of American society. Its moral authority is gone.

Even if Clinton wins, it can no longer credibly speak for America.

As for the national press corps — the Fourth Estate — it has been compromised, its credibility crippled, as some of the greatest of the press institutions have nakedly shilled for the regime candidate, while others have been exposed as propagandists or corrupt collaborators posturing as objective reporters.

What institution in America today, besides the military, enjoys national respect? And if people do not respect the regime, if they believe it acts in its own cold interest rather than the nation’s, why should they respect or follow its leadership?

We have entered uncharted waters.

Will Hillary Clinton clean out the nest

Opinion

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gives a thumbs up as he speaks during a campaign rally, Friday, July 29, 2016, in Colorado Springs, Colo. (Photo: AP/Evan Vucci)

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gives a thumbs up as he speaks during a campaign rally, Friday, July 29, 2016, in Colorado Springs, Colo. (Photo: AP/Evan Vucci)

Each passing day, this presidential election becomes more distasteful, but that doesn’t relieve me of my duty to do what I believe is right.

During the primaries, there were 17 GOP candidates, and I chose the one I believed would be the best for America. Now my realistic choices have been narrowed to two candidates — Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton — one of whom will be the next president.

What does this mean for me? Well, some people on the right faced with this binary choice have concluded they can’t in good conscience vote for Trump, no matter how bad Clinton is. Some acknowledge that Clinton is terrible but believe that Trump could do more damage to conservatism and thus the nation in the long run — even more than a Clinton presidency at this precarious moment in our nation’s history.

I confess that I momentarily weighed all the possible scenarios, but I could never remotely convince myself that a Trump presidency would be worse for the nation than a Clinton one. I have not changed my mind despite the recent charges against Trump.

We are used to seeing Republicans beating one another up during the primaries, and the most recent three cycles — 2008, 2012 and 2016 — involved extremely vicious infighting in some cases. As a frequenter of Twitter, I have witnessed this firsthand. This year’s primary was hands down the worst, but that’s not the only way this year is different. In the previous two cycles, there was some residual discontentment, but most eventually united around the GOP nominee, notwithstanding lingering rumors that millions of evangelicals sat out the 2012 election.

The fighting among the never-Trumpers, the Trumpers and the never-Hillarys is approaching a fever pitch, with mutual accusations of abject immorality.

As the election gets closer, I see the horrors of a Clinton presidency in increasingly clearer relief. I acknowledge that this may cause me to rationalize some of my earlier distaste for some things about Trump, but I have to remember that my vote for Trump isn’t an endorsement of everything he’s done. I’m not saying I no longer have reservations about him or his policies. I do.

My decision to vote for Trump isn’t a contradiction of my position during the Clinton impeachment that character matters or that private conduct is relevant in the election of public officials. Nor am I betraying my Christian values to vote for a candidate who, in almost any scenario I can imagine, would be better for America than Clinton. People suggesting that Christians voting for Trump have sold their souls are ignoring the moral implications of not voting for Trump and thereby enabling Clinton’s destruction of our nation. Now that, my conscience wouldn’t tolerate, though I don’t judge those who disagree with me on this.

If I were voting for Trump in a vacuum, this would be different. But Clinton isn’t a vacuum. She’s more like a vulture lying in wait to end the republic as we know it. Accuse me of hyperbole or alarmism if you must, but I genuinely fear Clinton could do irreversible damage to the country. And millions agree with me.

Some say, “Look at what you are condoning if you vote for Trump.” And I say, “I’m condoning nothing, but if you want to use that metric, look at what you’re condoning if you don’t try to do everything you can to prevent another Obama-Clinton term.” Evangelicals withdrawing their support for Trump need to consider what they’re abetting by not doing everything in their power to prevent Clinton’s election. In my view, we can’t pretend we have other choices and wash our hands of responsibility by sitting this out. Nor does acknowledging that God is in control absolve us, as Christians, from doing our part.

If you want to know what we’d be in for with Clinton, consider what she’s done and how she’s wholly escaped accountability for all of it. In every respect, she is worse than the worst allegations against Trump, including the treatment of women.

Look at what happens when Democrats are in control. The Justice Department and IRS have been politicized. If recent reports about the outrage of FBI agents over Director James Comey’s refusal to indict Clinton for her email felonies are even 25 percent true, this is incredible. Clinton won’t even get a wrist slap. Consider also the Clinton Foundation corruption, as well as the WikiLeaks bombshells and the media collusion in ignoring them.

Fear a Trump presidency if you choose, but in electing Clinton, America would be ratifying her egregious misconduct, her self-serving corruption and President Obama’s agenda on steroids. It would be giving her a mandate from hell.

It’s not just about Supreme Court appointments, though more liberal activists would enable an unprecedented assault on our liberties and the Constitution. A Clinton presidency would result in more babies destroyed in the womb; more encroachments on the Second Amendment; further degradation of the military; open borders and all that entails; the continued disaster of Obamacare and possibly worse with single-payer, which has always been Clinton’s dream; higher taxes and dramatically increased regulations; ongoing economic malaise; more government dependency; continuing escalation of racial tensions; a further breakdown in law and order, with more violence in the streets and an ongoing war on cops; the acceleration of the dangerous national debt and of the insolvency of our entitlement programs; an escalation of the war on business; more demonization of the so-called wealthy; further deterioration of our vital relationship with Israel; more domestic and foreign terrorism; further proliferation of the Islamic State group; the sucking of more revenue and human resources into environmental and globalist projects; a possible IRS vendetta against Clinton’s Republican and conservative opponents; nightmares from Iran; and more hostility to the energy industry, making us less energy-independent.

We’ve already seen the one-sidedness that allows Clinton to escape scrutiny and accountability, and she’s not in power. Imagine if she were. Could a Clinton presidency finally succeed in suppressing the dissent of political opponents — including through the so-called Fairness Doctrine, designed to emasculate conservative talk radio?

In short, if Clinton were to win, in all likelihood, she would consummate Obama’s crusade to fundamentally transform America into something the Framers and most of us never envisioned and couldn’t tolerate. Suffice it to say that I am not going to be shamed on moral grounds for fighting to prevent this calamity.

Each day, this presidential election becomes more

Economy

The Labor Department said Thursday weekly jobless claims was 246,000, unchanged from the previous week’s revised level. The previous week’s level was revised down by 3,000 from 249,000 to 246,000.

The 4-week moving average was 249,250, a decrease of 3,500 from the previous week’s revised average. This is the lowest level for this average since November 3, 1973 when it was 244,000. The previous week’s average was revised down by 750 from 253,500 to 252,750.

There were no special factors impacting this week’s initial claims and no state was triggered “on” the Extended Benefits program during the week ending September 24.

While this marks 84 consecutive weeks of initial claims below 300,000, the longest streak since 1970, longterm unemployment has simply shrunk the eligible pool of applicants.

The highest insured unemployment rates in the week ending September 24 were in Alaska (2.7), Puerto Rico (2.6), the Virgin Islands (2.5), New Jersey (2.1), California (2.0), Connecticut (2.0), Pennsylvania (1.9), Massachusetts (1.7), West Virginia (1.7), and Illinois (1.6).

The largest increases in initial claims for the week ending October 1 were in Missouri (+1,717), Pennsylvania (+1,322), Ohio (+526), Illinois (+492), and Nevada (+404), while the largest decreases were in Michigan (-2,800), Georgia (-923), Texas (-371), Arkansas (-247), and Kentucky (-194).

The Labor Department said Thursday weekly jobless

Politics

Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks at the North America's Building Trades Unions 2016 Legislative Conference in Washington, U.S., April 19, 201616. (Photo: Yuri Gripas/Reuters)

Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks at the North America’s Building Trades Unions 2016 Legislative Conference in Washington, U.S., April 19, 201616. (Photo: Yuri Gripas/Reuters)

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., on several occasions called on Hillary Clinton to release the transcripts of paid speeches given to investment banks like Goldman Sachs. In response, during the Democratic primary, Mrs. Clinton said on the campaign trail and in debates she would “look into” releasing the transcripts.

She never did and, now that we have Mrs. Clinton’s remarks to Wall Street bankers and other big donors, we know why. The documents, which were released by the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, confirm whats Sen. Sanders, Democratic primary voters in Michigan and Republican rival Donald Trump have been arguing the entire time: Hillary Clinton is lying about her opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which she called “the gold standard” of trade deals.

As People’s Pundit Daily previously reported, Mrs. Clinton’s “dream is a hemispheric common market, with open trade and open markets.” But a further review of the transcript reveals trade policy under a President Hillary Clinton is likely to be far worse than Sen. Sanders ever imagined.

The former secretary of state first flip flopped on TPP in October, 2015, when she was worried about Sen. Sanders on her left flank. She was hoping to mend frail relationships with labor unions, who are largely opposed to the trade deal. In a leaked email, the Clinton campaign was furious over AFL-CIO chief Richard Trumpka praising Vice President Joe Biden and insinuating Mrs. Clinton couldn’t be trusted on trade, stating he “has been fighting for working people his whole life.”

“It implies that HRC has not,” the email from Clinton staffer Ann O’Leary to Adrienne Elrod and communications director Jennifer Palmieri reads. “Is there anything we can do to get him to add something nice about HRC?”

“I agree. He is annoying,” Elrod responded.

In August, during an economic policy speech in Warren, Michigan, Mrs. Clinton tried to reenforce the claim she now opposes TPP and will as president.

“It is true that too often past trade deals have been sold to the American people with rosy scenarios that did not pan out,” she said about Trump’s charges that trade deals have wrecked American industry. “Enforcement –particularly during the Bush administration– has been too lax.”

Mrs. Clinton also said she would appoint a special trade prosecutor to handle complaints and compliance against countries that cheat on trade. However, the transcripts from her speeches confirm suspicions and the donor money trail–she will be doing no such thing.

“There is so much more we can do, there is a lot of low hanging fruit but businesses on both sides have to make it a priority and it’s not for governments to do but governments can either make it easy or make it hard and we have to resist, protectionism, other kinds of barriers,” she said during a speech to Banco Itaú on May 15, 2013. Banco Itaú is a Brazilian bank that merged with Unibanco on November 4, 2008, to form Itaú Unibanco.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a longtime Clinton ally under federal investigation for public corruption, told Politico Mrs. Clinton will support TPP if elected.

“Listen, she was in support of it,” Gov. McAuliffe said before quickly trying to walk it back. “There were specific things in it she wants fixed.”

Except, that’s not how trade negotiations work. The deal that was negotiated will be the only version of the deal that moves forward unless it is scrapped and negotiations completely restart.

McAuliffe’s admission came less than 24 hours after Mr. Trump warned voters she would “betray” them and a day Mrs. Clinton told the head of the United Automobile Workers (UAW) that she would rewrite North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), a trade deal her husband and former President Bill Clinton signed into law in 1993. It cost Americans millions of jobs in the Rust Belt and around the country. But her public promises don’t match her private rhetoric to big donors behind closed doors, where she promises to expand NAFTA.

“Just think of what doubling the trade between the United States and Latin America would mean for everybody in this room,” she told Banco Itaú a few months before her promise to the UAW. In remarks to Sanford Bernstein, now the global asset management firm AllianceBernstein L.P., she even discussed how annoying auto workers can be for other foreign leaders who donors wanted to get in on TPP.

“At what level, I can’t predict, but it was a good sign when Prime Minister Abe said that Japan would negotiate on the Transpacific partnership, that is something that we tried to get prior prime ministers to commit to, and they were under pressure from the car industry and from the rice farmers and others, but he did say Japan wants to be part of the TPP,” she said on May 29, 2013. “If they follow through on that, that will be a good sign.”

Critics on both sides of the aisle say it will dictate the operations and give control to corporations of 40% of the global economy, as well as infringe on American sovereignty. The deal would completely eliminate tariffs that are considered barriers to free trade, which Mr. Trump and Sen. Sanders both argue will hurt American companies and workers.

“Greater connections in our own hemisphere hold such promise,” Mrs. Clinton said, praising TPP in a paid speech to Canada 2020. “The United States and Canada are working together with a group of open market democracies along the Pacific Rim, Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Chile, to expand responsible trade and economic cooperation.”

The deal is still deeply unpopular among base voters on both sides of the aisle and cost her the Michigan Democratic primary, despite leading by double-digits. It was the worst polling debacle since the 1984 New Hampshire Democratic primary. Apparently Michigan voters were on to her. Sen. Sanders and Mr. Trump aren’t the only ones who ever questioned Mrs. Clinton’s truthfulness regarding trade.

“The fact is, she was saying great things about Nafta until she was running for president,” then-Sen. Barack Obama said during the 2008 Democratic nomination.

Mr. Obama was right about her not telling the truth. In a speech to the Canadian Bank of Imperial Commerce (CIBC) on January 22, 2015, she reassured big donors that they could count on her like they did her husband.

“He passed NAFTA,” she said, despite knowing he would be “alienating a lot of the Democratic base.” Only a few months later, Mrs. Clinton announced she was against TPP.

Meanwhile, Sen. Sanders naively endorsed Mrs. Clinton at the Democratic National Convention and nothing has changed. Clinton’s delegates voted down amendments proposed by Sanders supporters to reject TPP in the Democratic platform. Further, the Clinton campaign was actively whipping delegates to oppose the “fair trade” language proposed by Sanders loyalists.

The proposed amendments would have put the Democratic Party on record for opposing a vote on the TPP during the lame duck session of Congress, when lawmakers gather after Election Day but before the new Congress’ and President’s terms begin in January.

The review comes after PPD reported Mrs. Clinton also told the National Multi-Housing Council that she has two different positions on policy, a public and private position.

“I mean, politics is like sausage being made. It is unsavory, and it always has been that way, but we usually end up where we need to be,” she said. “But if everybody’s watching, you know, all of the back room discussions and the deals, you know, then people get a little nervous, to say the least. So, you need both a public and a private position.”

The leaked transcripts from her paid speeches

Opinion

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton pounds her fist as she testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2013, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on the deadly September attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. (Photo: AP/Associated Press)

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton pounds her fist as she testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2013, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on the deadly September attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. (Photo: AP/Associated Press)

It seems that at every turn during this crazy presidential election campaign — with its deeply flawed principal candidates (whom do you hate less?) — someone’s personal or professional computer records are being hacked. First it was Hillary Clinton’s emails that she had failed to surrender to the State Department. Then it was a portion of Donald Trump’s 1995 tax returns, showing a $916 million loss he claimed during boom times. Then it was those Clinton emails again, this time showing her unacted-upon doubts about two of our Middle Eastern allies’ involvement in 9/11 and her revelation of some secrets about the killing of Osama bin Laden.

The reason we know about these leaks is the common thread among them — the willingness of the media to publish what was apparently stolen. Hence the question: Can the government hold the press liable — criminally or civilly — for the publication of known stolen materials that the public wants to know about? In a word: No.

Here is the back story.

When Daniel Ellsberg, an outside contractor working in the Pentagon, stole a secret study of U.S. military involvement in Vietnam in 1971, which revealed that President Lyndon Johnson had lied repeatedly to the public about what his military advisers had told him, the Department of Justice secured an injunction from U.S. District Judge Murray Gurfein, sitting in Manhattan, barring The New York Times from publishing what Ellsberg had turned over to Times reporters. Such an injunction, known as a “prior restraint,” is exceedingly rare in American legal history.

This is so largely because of the sweeping language of the First Amendment — “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press” — as well as the values that underlie this language. Those values are the government’s legal obligation to be accountable to the public and the benefits to freedom of open, wide, robust debate about the government — debate that is informed by truthful knowledge of what the government has been doing.

Those underlying values spring from the Framers’ recognition of the natural right to speak freely. The freedom of speech and of the press had been assaulted by the king during the Colonial era, and the Framers wrote a clear, direct prohibition of such assaults in the initial amendment of the new Constitution.

Notwithstanding the First Amendment, Judge Gurfein accepted the government’s argument and found that palpable, grave and immediate danger would come to national security if the Times were permitted to publish what Ellsberg had delivered.

The Times appealed Judge Gurfein’s injunction, and that appeal made its way to the Supreme Court. In a case that has come to be known as the Pentagon Papers case, the high court ruled that when the media obtains truthful documents that are of material interest to the public, the media is free to publish those documents, as well as commentary about them, without fear of criminal or civil liability.

The government had argued to the Supreme Court — seriously — that “‘no law’ does not mean ‘no law'” when national security is at stake. Fortunately for human freedom and for the concept that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land and means what it says, the court rejected that argument. It also rejected the government’s suggested methodology.

The government argued that because Congress and the president had agreed to void a constitutional mandate — the First Amendment’s “no law” language — in deference to national security, the judiciary should follow. That methodology would have rejected 180 years of constitutional jurisprudence that taught that the whole purpose of an independent judiciary is to say what the Constitution and the laws mean, notwithstanding what Congress and the president want. Were that not so, the courts would be rubber stamps.

Moreover, the high court ruled, it matters not how the documents came into the possession of the media. The thief can always be prosecuted, as Ellsberg was, but not the media to which the thief delivers what he has stolen. In Ellsberg’s case, the charges against him were eventually dismissed because of FBI misconduct in pursuit of him — misconduct that infamously involved breaking in to his psychiatrist’s office looking for dirt on him.

Since that case, the federal courts have uniformly followed the Pentagon Papers rule. Hence, much to the chagrin of the Obama administration, the media was free to publish Edward Snowden’s revelations about the ubiquitous and unconstitutional nature of government spying on Americans by the National Security Agency. The same is true for Trump’s tax returns and Clinton’s emails.

Are these matters material to the public interest?

Of course they are. In a free society — one in which we do not need a government permission slip to exercise our natural rights — all people enjoy a right to know if the government is spying on us in violation of the constitutionally protected and natural right to privacy. We also have a right to know about the financial shenanigans or uprightness and the honesty or dishonesty of those who seek the highest office in the land. That is particularly so in the 2016 campaign, in which Trump has argued that his business acumen makes him uniquely qualified to be president and Clinton has offered that her experiences as secretary of state would bring a unique asset to the Oval Office.

Efforts to silence the press or to punish it when it publishes inconvenient truths about the government or those who seek to lead it are not new, and the vigilance of the courts has been unabated. Thomas Jefferson — himself the victim of painful press publications — argued that in a free society, he’d prefer newspapers without a government to a government without newspapers. Would Clinton or Trump say that today?

The same is true for Donald Trump's

Opinion

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump looks on as Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton answers a question during the second presidential debate at Washington University in St. Louis, Sunday, Oct. 9, 2016. (Photo: Reuters)

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump looks on as Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton answers a question during the second presidential debate at Washington University in St. Louis, Sunday, Oct. 9, 2016. (Photo: Reuters)

It seems ages ago, but recall when the second presidential debate was deemed the sink-or-swim moment for the candidacy of Donald J. Trump. The slobbering sex tape had just come out, causing many fearful Republicans to dis-endorse him. One more astounding meltdown on the debate stage and Trump would be out (though how that could happen was never made clear).

The post-debate consensus held that Donald stopped the heavy bleeding and Hillary Clinton was cautious. She didn’t bait him with anything new and left the heavier fire for the second half, thus helping the Trump candidacy live to self-destruct another day.

That’s exactly what happened. And whether by design or not, that’s exactly what Clinton and other Democrats should have wanted. The importance of keeping Trump at the top of the Republican ticket could not be overstated.

Democratic wish come true, Trump again bubbled up from the black lagoon and turned his malevolence on the Republican Party. Unleashing new chaos in the electoral ranks, he blasted Republicans who had broken with him over the tape. He poured hot new insults down on House Speaker Paul Ryan and Sen. John McCain. Cowed by the display, some Republicans who had disgraced themselves by not dropping Trump long ago disgraced themselves again by pedaling back.

In sum, Republican candidates are faced with an unenviable choice. They can back a candidate whom most independents and many fellow Republicans regard as repellant. Or they can drop him and risk the wrath of Trump supporters vowing revenge on any Republican disloyal to The Donald. Some Trumpsters are threatening to not vote for down-ballot Republicans.

With national polls shifting decidedly in Clinton’s favor, Democrats feel free to put resources in red states once considered fairly out of reach. Georgia and Arizona are now very much in play.

The Democrats’ strong hope of restoring a Senate majority has grown stronger thanks to The Donald. As a result, Republicans Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Richard Burr of North Carolina face titanic battles — titanic as in the RMS Titanic. And the previously impossible Democratic dream of taking the House now seems possible.

GOP leaders should draw no comfort in a poll suggesting that voters are making little distinction between Republicans for Trump and those who renounced him when times got tough. As for the second group, Trump promises to make their political lives as painful as possible. One thing The Donald knows how to do is deliver pain.

Borrowing from the 12 days of Christmas, Democrats may be planning the 12 days of October Surprises. The month began with the revelation that Trump may not have paid federal income taxes for close to two decades. Then came the gift-wrapped tape in which Donald spoke freely of his animal magnetism with women and willingness to grab that which is not offered. The month is still young.

This cannot be a happy time for those who value a vigorous political culture, regardless of where they hang their partisan hats. We need two functioning political parties, each offering a reasonable alternative to the other.

The bright spot here is that an electoral rout might force Republicans to do something they should have done long ago — cast off the delirious mobs of their so-called base and replace them with independents open to sane conservative arguments. Many principled conservatives are now talking along these lines. Some have gone so far as to herald a Trump-driven electoral collapse as the shock therapy their party needs.

Dr. Bornstein, please keep Donald healthy. He can’t lose it if he’s not in it. America needs Trump to plunge headfirst into the black lagoon — and stay there.

It seems ages ago, but recall when

World

USS Mason, a U.S. Navy destroyer. (Photo: DoD/U.S. Navy Handout)

USS Mason, a U.S. Navy destroyer. (Photo: DoD/U.S. Navy Handout)

U.S. military official confirmed for the second time this week that Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen targeted the USS Mason in the Red Sea. The Pentagon is now vowing payback, or some form of retribution, though did not specify or give further details.

“We are going to find out who did it and take action accordingly,” said Capt. Jeff Davis, a Defense Department spokesman said Tuesday. “Anybody who puts U.S. Navy ships at risk does so at their own peril.”

The USS San Antonio and the USS Ponce was operating in the area with the USS Mason, a U.S. Navy destroyer at the time. The vessels were conducting routine operations in international waters near the strait of Bab el-Mandeb.

A coastal defense cruise missile was fired from Houthi-controlled area located south of Al Hudaydah at roughly 6:00 PM local time. Officials said the USS Mason, which is equipped with anti-cruise missile technology, used countermeasures. However, they were not yet certain whether the measures stopped the missile or if it fizzled.

This is the second time this week the USS Mason was targeted by at least one incoming missile fired from Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. The first act of aggression took place on Sunday as the American ship was conducting routine operations in international waters.

Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said Wednesday that the military will respond.

“Those who threaten our forces should know that U.S. commanders retain the right to defend their ships, and we will respond to this threat at the appropriate time and in the appropriate manner,” Secretary Cook said.

As People’s Pundit Daily exclusively and correctly reported in 2015, President Barack Obama and top State Department officials never believed they would have to evacuate the U.S. Embassy in Yemen. In fact, sources at the State Department told PPD that Obama administration officials believed they had successfully negotiated a deal with the Houthi rebels through Iran to keep the U.S. Embassy open in Sanaa.

It was a stunningly embarrassing development the White House struggled to explain, which came less than one year after President Obama cited the Arab world’s poorest country as the model for how he and his administration plan “to degrade and ultimately destroy” the Islamic State (ISIS). They’ve largely failed to deal with or repel Iranian aggression in the region ever since, despite agreeing to the one-sided nuclear deal.

Last week, U.S. warships were sent to Yemen’s coast after a United Arab Emirates ship was recently targeted by the Houthis. That ship used to be owned by a U.S. company, but was contracted to UAE at the time.

U.S. military official confirmed for the second

Elections

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has been warning his supporters at rallies to be on the lookout for voter fraud, something the Democrats have called ridiculous and an excuse for losing the election. But in truth, as People’s Pundit Daily has shown and will continue to expose in the days to come, voter fraud, or election fraud as it is defined, is very real and a very real problem in the United States.

New York City Board of Elections Commissioner Alan Schulkin was caught on tape explaining voter fraud, or at least one of the many ways Democrats commit mass election fraud.

New York City Board of Elections Commissioner Alan Schulkin, a Democrat, on tape explaining voter fraud, or at least one of the many ways Democrats commit mass election fraud. (Photo: Project Veritas Video SS)

New York City Board of Elections Commissioner Alan Schulkin caught on tape explaining voter fraud, or at least one of the many ways Democrats commit mass election fraud. (Photo: Project Veritas Video SS)

The video, which was captured by Project Veritas, which is led by James O’Keefe, sparked outrage among New York City lawmakers. But, unbelievably, the outrage by Democratic officials is over him linking the voter fraud efforts to them and minority communities.

“His comments about alleged voter fraud coming from Black, Latino Asian and Muslim communities reeks of racism and is factually incorrect,” Bronx Assemblyman Luis Sepulveda said. “There is minimal evidence of voter fraud. Commissioner Schulkin’s comments were disgraceful and demonstrate that he is incompetent to serve as a Commissioner. Resign immediately!”

In fact, the evidence is overwhelming and it doesn’t come from suburbia or rural precincts. To his credit, Schulkin admits his hands are tied because of voter ID laws, which Democrats say are racist and nothing more than voter discrimination. This instance, as explained by the commissioner, is textbook tactics in what are known as “Spigot Cities,” and what People’s Pundit Daily reported in states like Ohio and Minnesota in 2012, where Democrats bused around Somali Muslim immigrants, many of which were illegally in the United States, to vote multiple times in multiple precincts.

Interestingly, in addition to Commissioner Schulkin saying people in minority neighborhoods are taken from “poll site to poll site,” he acknowledged that Muslims can hide their identify in burkas.

Democrats rely upon Spigot Cities to overcome Republican margins in suburban and rural precincts, which is why big counties such as Loudoun County in Virginia, hold their ballots back as others in the suburbs and rural precincts report the results. As PPD has witnessed and explained, they are calculating how much of a margin they need and fill in unclaimed absentee ballots or bus around certain voters from “poll site to poll site” last-minute.

But according to a spokesman for Mayor Bill de Blasio, it’s no longer racist to suggest voter fraud exists, it’s racist to expose it on video. The mayor’s office slammed Commissioner Schulkin, who was appointed in 2014 with the support of Council Speaker Melissa Mark Viverito, as well as Manhattan Council members Corey Johnson, Margaret Chin, Mark Levine and Ydanis Rodriguez.

“These allegations are not only false, they’re racist. Voter fraud fear-mongering is a right-wing smokescreen designed to not only disenfranchise the poor and people of color, but thwart efforts to deliver sorely needed electoral reforms in New York and across country. New Yorkers deserve public officials who are committed to defending democracy, not undermining it,” said spokesman Austin Finan.

New York City Board of Elections Commissioner

Opinion

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump answers Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton during the second presidential debate at Washington University in St. Louis, Sunday, Oct. 9, 2016. (Photo: AP/John Locher)

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump answers Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton during the second presidential debate at Washington University in St. Louis, Sunday, Oct. 9, 2016. (Photo: AP/John Locher)

Donald Trump turned in perhaps the most effective performance in the history of presidential debates on Sunday night.

As the day began, he had been denounced by his wife, Mike Pence, and his own staff for a tape of crude and lewd remarks in a decade-old “locker room” conversation on a bus with Billy Bush of “Access Hollywood.”

Tasting blood, the media were in a feeding frenzy. Trump is dropping out! Pence is bolting the ticket! Republican elites are about to disown and abandon the Republican nominee!

Sometime this weekend, Trump made a decision: If he is going down to defeat, he will go out as Trump, not some sniveling penitent begging forgiveness from hypocrites who fear and loathe him.

His first move was to host a press availability, before the debate, where a small sampling of Bill Clinton’s alleged victims — Kathleen Willey, Paula Jones, Juanita Broaddrick — made brief statements endorsing Trump and denouncing the misogyny of the Clintons.

“Mr. Trump may have said some bad words, but Bill Clinton raped me,” said Broaddrick, “and Hillary Clinton threatened me.”

The press had to cover it. Then the women marched into the auditorium at Washington University to watch Hillary Clinton defend her behavior toward them after their encounters with Bill.

As the moderators and Hillary Clinton scrambled to refocus on Trump’s comments of a decade ago, Trump brought it back to Bill’s criminal misconduct against women, his lying about it, and Hillary’s aiding and abetting of the First Predator.

It was like a tawdry courtroom drama in an X-rated movie, a new low in presidential debates. But what it revealed is that if Trump is going down, his enemies will carry away their own permanent scars.

As Caesar said of Cassius, “Such men are dangerous.”

Hillary Clinton has never been hammered as she was Sunday night, and it showed. Knocked off her game, she was no longer the prim and poised debater of Hofstra University.

There were other signs that, win or lose, Trump intends to finish the campaign as he began, as a populist-nationalist and unapologetic adversary of open borders, globalization and neo-imperialism.

When moderators Martha Raddatz and Anderson Cooper revealed their bias by asking Trump tougher questions and more follow-ups, and interrupting him more rudely and often, he called them out.

“It’s one on three!” said Trump. And it sure looked like it.

How could the moderators have ignored that other leak of last week, of Clintons’s speech to Brazilian bankers where she confessed she “dreams” of a “hemispheric common market with open trade and open borders.”

If the quote is accurate, and Clinton has not denied it, she was saying she dreams of a future when the United States ceases to exist as a separate, sovereign and independent nation.

She envisions not just a North American Union evolving out of NAFTA but a merger of all the nations of North, South and Central America, with all borders erased and people moving freely from one place to another within a hemispheric super-state.

If this quote is accurate, Clinton is working toward an end to the independence for which our Founding Fathers fought the American Revolution.

After all, Thomas Jefferson did not write some declaration of diversity in 1776, but a Declaration of Independence for a new, unique and separate people.

Clinton dreams of doing away with what American patriots cherish most.

When the issue of Syria arose, Clinton said she favors a “no-fly zone.” Unanswered, indeed unasked by the moderators, was whether she would order the shooting down of Syrian or Russian planes that violate the zone.

Yet, what she is suggesting are acts of war against Syria, and Russia if necessary, though Congress has never authorized a war on Syria, and Syria has not attacked us.

Trump did not hesitate to overrule the suggestion of Mike Pence that we follow Clinton’s formula. He believes ISIS is our enemy, and if Syria, Russia and Iran are attacking ISIS, we ought not to be fighting them.

As of sunrise Sunday, the media were writing Trump off as dead.

By Sunday night, they were as shocked and stunned as Hillary and Bill.

What did Trump accomplish in 18 hours?

He rattled Hillary Clinton, firmed up and rallied his base, halted the stampede of the cut-and-run Republicans, and exposed the hypocrisy of liberal and secular celebrants of the ’60s “sexual revolution,” who have suddenly gotten religion where Trump is involved.

Trump exposed the fraudulence of the Clintons’ clucking concern for sexually abused women, brought Pence back into camp, turned the tables and changed the subject from the Trump tapes to the Trump triumph at Washington University.

Upshot: The Donald is alive.

While his path to 270 electoral votes still looks more than problematic, there is a month to go before the election, and anything can happen.

Indeed, it already has — many times.

Despite it all, Donald Trump turned in

People's Pundit Daily
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