The company that owns the National Enquirer, a backer of Donald Trump, agreed to pay $150,000 to a former Playboy centerfold model for her story of an affair a decade ago with the Republican presidential nominee, but then didn’t publish it, according to documents...

http://www.wsj.com/articles/national-enquirer-shielded-donald-trump-from-playboy-models-affair-allegation-1478309380

In what might be the most “Donald Trump” story of the 2016 election, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that the National Enquirer went to extensive (and expensive) means to squash the story of the Playboy Playmate in question, who had intended to tell the world about the affair Trump allegedly had with her while he was married to Melania.

Instead the Enquirer, which is closely tied to Donald Trump, bought the story exclusively with the misleading motivation of never publishing it and making sure she could never publish it anywhere else either. ABC News, a much more respectable news outlet, had been planning to report her story before the Enquirer stepped in and offered her too much money to say no to. However, she’s now taking legal action over the fact that she had been tricked into her legally required silence.

Karen McDougal was the 1998 Playmate of the Year, and she asserts that her affair with Donald Trump took place in 2006. That would place it seven years into Donald’s relationship with Melania, and just one year into their marriage; the same year that their child Barron was born. That fits with the claims of several of Trump’s sexual assault accusers, many of whom say he assaulted them in 2005 or 2006, roughly the period of time in which Melania was pregnant. Trump is on tape as having referred to Melania as being physically unattractive during her pregnancy – and now it appears that his solution was to simply cheat on her.


http://www.dailynewsbin.com/news/melania-pregnant-donald-trump-affair/26517/

For the first time in decades, Americans will likely hit the voting booths on Election Day without being able to review the tax returns of one of the major presidential nominees. Though Donald Trump previously vowed to release his taxes—as all top nominees since Richard Nixon have done—he reneged on that promise and for months fiercely refused to make this basic information public, offering shifting excuses. Trump did submit the public financial disclosure form that all federal candidates must fill out, but that does not cover all the fundamentals of his finances. By withholding his tax information, Trump has ensured that the American public cannot see how much income (if any) he pocketed, how much money (if any) he paid in taxes, and how much money (if any) he donated to charities. Without his tax returns, voters are in the dark about important details regarding his sources of income and his debts.

There are many more questions about Trump's finances and business operations that remain as the 2016 presidential campaign slouches toward its end. Trump is the owner of a private business empire with elements that have been structured in Byzantine fashion. He is a proliferate user of shell companies, as many developers are. He has tried to broker deals around the world with assorted financial players with their own agendas. He has taken on hundreds of millions of dollars in debt. There is a great deal publicly unknown about many of his ventures. Much of his deal-making—probably most—is not transparent. He is asking Americans to vote for a man who has not revealed basic information about his wide-ranging endeavors and associations.

Here is a list of Trump mysteries that will not be solved before Election Day.

* His partners: Trump lists about 500 business entities on his financial disclosure form. Many are shell companies, and if any of them have partners, there is no telling with whom Trump is in business. There is also no way to know if this is an accurate list reflecting all his dealings domestically and overseas. (These disclosures are not vetted by forensic accountants.) These entities would allow anyone seeking to gain favor with Trump to funnel investments and money to him and his family without public disclosure. As Newsweek put it, "Any government wanting to seek future influence with President Trump could do so by arranging for a partnership with the Trump Organization, feeding money directly to the family or simply stashing it away inside the company for their use once Trump is out of the White House...The partnerships are struck with some of the more than 500 entities disclosed in Trump's financial disclosure forms; each of those entities has its own records that would have to be revealed for a full accounting of all of Trump's foreign entanglements to be made public." The magazine added, "The dealings of the Trump Organization reach into so many countries that it is impossible to detail all the conflicts they present in a single issue of this magazine."

Trump's personal financial disclosure form hints that he has international business deals in the works that are still under wraps. There are corporations listed that indicate he may be planning hotels (with or without partners) in China and Saudi Arabia—projects which he has not publicly discussed.

* Huge loans from foreign banks: After Trump's near-crash-and-burn bankruptcies of the 1990s, major US banks stopped doing business with him. But foreign banks picked up the slack, most notably the private banking arm of Deutsche Bank, which Trump owes more than $300 million. His cozy relationship with Deutsche Bank has never been explained. A bank spokeswoman would not talk about how it came to be.

Continues...

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/11/what-we-dont-know-about-trump

In both my professional and personal life, I am forever frustrated by the fact that I cannot read a room. Every day, I know I am going to be blind to dozens of social cues others expect me to see, and be subtly punished for it. And sometimes not so subtly: I was once fired from a job after two days because the project manager thought I was being disruptive on purpose.

Relatively speaking, I am lucky. I had parents who could afford to put me though the counseling and accommodations necessary to live independently. Not everyone does.

Hillary Clinton is the first presidential candidate in history to propose a government initiative specifically to help people with autism. Her plan includes a nationwide childhood screening and awareness campaign; requiring the Affordable Care Act, Medicaid, and TRICARE to cover occupational therapy and accommodation; and launching a national public-private partnership called Autism Works, which will help young adults on the spectrum transition from school into the professional world.

Every time I read her policy document, the one thing that leaps out at me is her empathy. She never once, as many people do, refers to my struggle as an “illness” to be “cured.” Nor does she simply seek to make it easier for society to deal with me. She seeks to ensure that I can deal with society. That I can live my life with independence, pride, and fulfillment.

If we are fortunate enough to have Hillary Clinton as the next President of the United States, I know she will fight for me. She will put what I have faced daily into the national conversation. It is something I — and many others like me — are eagerly awaiting.

http://shareblue.com/what-hillary-clintons-support-of-autism-rights-means-to-me/

Officials from two European countries told Newsweek that Trump’s comments about Russia’s hacking have alarmed several NATO partners because it suggests he either does not believe the information he receives in intelligence briefings, does not pay attention to it, does not understand it or is misleading the American public for unknown reasons. One British official said members of that government who are aware of the scope of Russia’s cyberattacks both in Western Europe and America found Trump’s comments “quite disturbing” because they fear that, if elected, the Republican presidential nominee would continue to ignore information gathered by intelligence services in the formulation of U.S. foreign policy.

Trump’s behavior, however, has at times concerned the Russians, leading them to revise their hacking and disinformation strategy. For example, when Trump launched into an inexplicable attack on the parents of a Muslim-American soldier who died in combat, the Kremlin assumed the Republican nominee was showing himself psychologically unfit to be president and would be forced by his party to withdraw from the race. As a result, Moscow put its hacking campaign temporarily on hold, ending the distribution of documents until Trump stabilized, both personally and in the polls, according to reports provided to Western intelligence.

America’s European partners are also troubled by the actions of several people close to Trump’s campaign and company. Trump has been surrounded by advisors and associates with economic and familial links to Russia. The publicized connections and contacts between former campaign manager Paul Manafort with Ukraine have raised concerns. Former Trump advisor Carter Page is being probed by American and European intelligence on allegations that he engaged in back-channel discussions with Russian government officials over the summer. Page did travel to Moscow, but he denies any inappropriate contact with Russian officials. The allies are also uneasy about retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, a Trump advisor who was reportedly considered a possible running mate for the GOP nominee. Last December, Flynn attended a dinner at the Metropol Hotel in honor of the 10th anniversary of RT, a Russian news agency that has been publicly identified by American intelligence as a primary outlet for Moscow’s disinformation campaigns. Flynn, who was two seats away from Russian President Vladimir Putin at the dinner, has frequently appeared on RT, despite public warnings by American intelligence that the news agency is used for Russian propaganda.

MORE: http://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-vladimir-putin-russia-hillary-clinton-united-states-europe-516895

Officials from two European countries told Newsweek that Trump’s comments about Russia’s hacking have alarmed several NATO partners because it suggests he either does not believe the information he receives in intelligence briefings, does not pay attention to it, does not understand it or is misleading the American public for unknown reasons. One British official said members of that government who are aware of the scope of Russia’s cyberattacks both in Western Europe and America found Trump’s comments “quite disturbing” because they fear that, if elected, the Republican presidential nominee would continue to ignore information gathered by intelligence services in the formulation of U.S. foreign policy.

Trump’s behavior, however, has at times concerned the Russians, leading them to revise their hacking and disinformation strategy. For example, when Trump launched into an inexplicable attack on the parents of a Muslim-American soldier who died in combat, the Kremlin assumed the Republican nominee was showing himself psychologically unfit to be president and would be forced by his party to withdraw from the race. As a result, Moscow put its hacking campaign temporarily on hold, ending the distribution of documents until Trump stabilized, both personally and in the polls, according to reports provided to Western intelligence.

America’s European partners are also troubled by the actions of several people close to Trump’s campaign and company. Trump has been surrounded by advisors and associates with economic and familial links to Russia. The publicized connections and contacts between former campaign manager Paul Manafort with Ukraine have raised concerns. Former Trump advisor Carter Page is being probed by American and European intelligence on allegations that he engaged in back-channel discussions with Russian government officials over the summer. Page did travel to Moscow, but he denies any inappropriate contact with Russian officials. The allies are also uneasy about retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, a Trump advisor who was reportedly considered a possible running mate for the GOP nominee. Last December, Flynn attended a dinner at the Metropol Hotel in honor of the 10th anniversary of RT, a Russian news agency that has been publicly identified by American intelligence as a primary outlet for Moscow’s disinformation campaigns. Flynn, who was two seats away from Russian President Vladimir Putin at the dinner, has frequently appeared on RT, despite public warnings by American intelligence that the news agency is used for Russian propaganda.

MORE: http://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-vladimir-putin-russia-hillary-clinton-united-states-europe-516895