kpete

kpete's Journal

May 7, 2016

First on CNN: Cheney says he will support Trump

Cheney told CNN Special Correspondent Jamie Gangel that he has always supported the GOP nominee and will do so this year as well.

The announcement makes Cheney one of the few Republican Party elders to announce their support of Trump and comes a day after House Speaker Paul Ryan told CNN he is "just not ready" to back Trump.

Former President George W. Bush, who Cheney served, said this week he would skip this summer's Republican convention where Trump will be formally nominated. Former President George H.W. Bush and John McCain and Mitt Romney, the GOP's 2008 and 2012 nominees, also don't plan to attend the convention.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, meanwhile, said Friday he would sit this election out because he can't bring himself to vote for either Trump or Hillary Clinton.

Graham said he was a "little bit" surprised when informed by CNN's Dana Bash that Cheney was supporting Trump.

http://addictinginfo.org/2016/05/06/dick-cheney-just-did-the-most-disgusting-thing-since-lying-about-wmds-in-iraq/

May 7, 2016

Trump picks running mate:

http://liberaleffects.tumblr.com/post/143965466231

May 7, 2016

Exclusive: New Photos Show Bush’s Response To 9/11 Attacks

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, the presidency of George W. Bush changed instantly. In a new collection of never-before-seen photographs from that day, the president can be seen responding to the worst terrorist attack in United States history — an event that would redefine his time in office and propel the nation into two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The images, which were given to FRONTLINE through a Freedom of Information Act request, provide a new window into President Bush’s actions on 9/11 — from the initial scramble for information upon learning of the attack at an elementary school in Florida, to his meetings with senior staff throughout the day, and his return to the White House that evening, where in an address to the nation he vowed to “find those responsible and bring them to justice.”

“I have spoken to the vice president, to the governor of New York, to the director of the FBI, and have ordered that the full resources of the federal government go to help the victims and their families — and to conduct a full-scale investigation to hunt down and to find those folks who committed this act,” he said. “Terrorism against our nation will not stand.”

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/exclusive-new-photos-show-bushs-response-to-911-attacks/

May 7, 2016

President Obama: "This is not a reality show. This is a contest for the presidency of the USA."

https://twitter.com/charliespiering/status/728631570236637185?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2016/05/06/urging-scrutiny-trump-obama-says-presidency-not-reality-show/84023532/

May 6, 2016

Erick Erickson to GOP: If You’re Going to Embrace Philanderer Trump, Apologize to Bill Clinton

He smeared his opponents, their wives, and their families. He embraced 9/11 trutherisms that George Bush was to blame for the attacks, he peddled malignant, false stories about Ted Cruz’s father, and few Republicans ever called on him to account. Many gave him passes on the lies they would never give to Bill Clinton.

Republicans owe Bill Clinton an apology for impeaching him over lies and affairs while now embracing a pathological liar and womanizer. That apology will not be forthcoming. In fact, for years Republicans have accused the Democrats of gutter politics and shamelessness. Now the Republicans themselves have lost their sense of shame.

http://www.mediaite.com/online/erick-erickson-to-gop-if-youre-going-to-embrace-philanderer-trump-apologize-to-bill-clinton/

May 6, 2016

Exact same things.

?w=600&h

May 6, 2016

The man who delivered Florida to George W. Bush in 2000 says that Donald Trump must be stopped.

Mac Stipanovich: An open letter to my fellow Republicans

Each of us wants to believe that if we were tested in some fundamental way when the chips were down — morally, spiritually, or physically — that we would pass the test.

But we do not really expect to be tested. That sort of thing only happens to people we see on television and read about in books, heroes and such. And if we were tested, surely we would know it. How could a literal moment of truth in our lives go unnoticed?

The answer is Normalcy Bias. That’s the sense that this day, this problem, or, in the instant case, this election is pretty much like any other, different only in degree, not in kind, that everything will be alright, notwithstanding overwhelming evidence to the contrary, because everything has always been alright before.

We analyze, rationalize, and temporize until we fail the test by not taking it.

Make no mistake, we Republicans stand on the threshold of a fundamental moral test in the 2016 presidential election, a challenge so serious as to be existential. As Ronald Reagan said in 1964, it is a time for choosing, and the choice, while clear, is one Reagan could never have imagined.

Hillary Clinton on the one hand; Donald Trump on the other. Scylla and Charybdis. The Devil and the deep blue sea. Or so it would appear.

But appearances deceive. Hillary Clinton is in the minds of many conservatives an ethically challenged liberal, hatred of whom has become a reflexive part of Republican liturgy. But as flawed as she may be, she is different only in degree from past presidential candidates. She is business as usual concealed by a little progressive smoke here and a few populist mirrors there.

Donald Tump, on the other hand, is different in kind, and dangerously so.

On a personal level, Trump is a boor, a bully, a carnival barker, and an embarrassment. Politically, by intent or instinct, he is a neo-fascist — a nativist, an ultranationalist, a racist, a misogynist, an anti-intellectual, a demagogue, and a palingenetic (sorry) authoritarian to whom clings the odor of the political violence he encourages.

He appeals to our fears, preys on our anxieties, and exploits our ignorance. A worse candidate to sit in the Oval Office for the next four years cannot be imagined.

And he is our responsibility. We spawned Donald Trump; now we must stop him. We must deny him the presidency by not voting in the presidential election at all or voting for Hillary Clinton if conscience permits.

A drop of a few percentage points in the Republican vote for Trump will be enough, which is why the pressure to conform, to toe the Party line, will be enormous. We cannot depend on our elected leaders to lead us. They, for the most part, will fold like cheap lawn chairs, cowed by fear and fueled by ambition.

It’s up to us. Each one of us is being tested, and the choice each of us makes matters, for ourselves, for our grandchildren. As bad as the cure for Trump’s Caesarism will be for the Party and for the country, it will not be bad as the disease, and both will survive.

So if anyone asks you, “Et tu Brute?” answer proudly, “Damned right.”

***

John “Mac” Stipanovich is a Republican lawyer and lobbyist who served as Gov. Bob Martinez’s chief of staff. Column courtesy of Context Florida.

http://saintpetersblog.com/mac-stipanovich-open-letter-fellow-republicans/