And his bonkers comments arguing that man-made climate change is real but that there’s no point in trying to stop it because “in billions of years, the sun is going to actually grow and encompass the Earth.” Or the time he high-fived George W. Bush about the fact that neither of them knew anything about anything. “Not one thing,” Johnson recounted proudly, when introducing his fellow anti-egghead at a rally. Johnson’s campaign tries to spin such ignorance and anti-intellectualism as proof that he’s “a real person.” And it’s true, he is a real person — just one who happens to be unprepared for the presidency.

So what about Stein? In brief: Despite being a medical doctor who knows better, she’s pandered to anti-vaxxers; expressed strong stances on high-profile issues, such as Brexit, only to abruptly reverse herself without explanation; and (along with running mate Ajamu Baraka) trafficked in conspiracy theories, among other disqualifying behaviors.

And independent latecomer Evan McMullin? (Who?) The most memorable thing he’s done thus far in the election is to accidentally pick the wrong running mate. These candidates have received relatively little media scrutiny, let alone attacks from competitors. This allows many Americans to think of them as the purer choices for the presidency. If all the mudslinging misses them, their feet of clay go unnoticed.

Which is precisely why they probably haven’t felt the need to do their homework. If you give them your precious vote, you haven’t done yours, either.

The response of Donald Trump and his staff on September 29 to the revelation that one of his companies illegally violated the Cuban trade embargo during Fidel Castro’s presidency has exposed a growing problem for the Republican nominee: His campaign operation is disorganized and shares Trump’s disdain for facts.

Both the Trump campaign staff and the Trump Organization had been told for days by Newsweek that it was about to publish an article disclosing that a Trump company had paid at least $68,000 to explore business opportunities in Communist Cuba. Federal law at the time imposed tough restrictions against spending even a penny in Cuba, with the intent of financially starving the country, which for decades been categorized as an American enemy. While there were some exemptions, such as engaging in humanitarian work approved by the government, the Trump venture did not qualify for any of them, and once the Cuba business trip was over, consultants and Trump executives discussed ways to make the trip appear to be a charitable effort.

Newsweek’s requests for comments, documents and even an interview with Trump were ignored, which was unusual. Traditionally, when campaigns, companies and other professional groups are told that a piece about them is in the works, they will contact a reporter to find out the scope of the story, even if there is no plan to give a comment. That way, they can have a planned response ready when the story breaks.


On September 28, the night before Newsweek’s story on the Trump-Cuba connection was posted, The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC revealed the findings of the article, and Maddow read several of the opening paragraphs on the air. About 15 minutes after that segment ended, a Trump lawyer emailed Newsweek, stating that someone in Trump’s camp had searched the company’s records and found no documents proving the Cuba trip had occurred. The Trump lawyer suggested the magazine rethink posting the story.

Still, the 2016 version of that gap is a doozy, wider than it’s ever been and growing. Add in another factor: Huge numbers of women with “negative” opinions of Donald Trump don’t simply dislike him but loathe him in visceral ways. In other words, something unusual is going on here beyond party or policy or even politics—something so obvious that most pundits, busy fielding Trump’s calls and reporting his bluster on a daily basis, haven’t stepped back and taken it in.

Even Hillary Clinton, when she comes out swinging, politely refrains from spelling it out. In her recent speech on foreign policy, she declared Trump temperamentally unfit to be president: too thin-skinned, too angry, too quick to employ such “tools” as “bragging, mocking, and sending nasty tweets.” Admittedly, she did conjure up a scary, futuristic image of an erratic bully with a thumb on the nuclear button, describing as well his apparent fascination with and attraction to autocrats like Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un. But she stopped short of connecting the Trumpian dots when she concluded, “I will leave it to the psychiatrists to explain his affection for tyrants.”

In truth, most women don’t need psychiatrists to explain the peculiar admiration of an aspiring autocrat for his role models. Every woman who has ever had to deal with a Trump-style tyrant in her own home or at her job already has Trump’s number. We recognize him as a bloated specimen of the common garden variety Controlling Man, a familiar type of Household Hitler.

In fact, Donald J. Trump perfectly fits the profile of an ordinary wife abuser—with one additional twist. Expansive fellow that he is, Trump has not confined his controlling tactics to his own home(s). For seven years, he practiced them openly for all the world to see on The Apprentice, his very own reality-TV show, and now applies them on a national stage, commanding constant attention while alternately insulting, cajoling, demeaning, embracing, patronizing, and verbally beating up anyone (including a “Mexican” judge) who stands in the way of his coronation.

Donald Trump’s admiration of Russian President Vladimir Putin isn’t a good look generally, but it may play particularly badly with Americans of Eastern European descent … and it turns out there are a lot of them in some key battleground states.

In Pennsylvania, according to the most recent Census data available, there are more than 100,000 people of Ukrainian descent; 820,000 of Polish descent (a demographic that tends to lean more Democratic but that cares about strong support for NATO); 46,000 Croatians; and thousands of Lithuanians, Latvians, Albanians, Estonians and people of other Eastern European ethnicities. In Ohio, there are around 40,000 Ukrainians, more than 400,000 Poles, and thousands of Americans of other Eastern European heritage.

Although these groups tend to vote Republican, there may be an opening for Hillary Clinton this year:

“The Latvians are primarily Republicans, as are Lithuanians, Estonians, and many Ukrainians, but Trump has put them in a real bind,” said Maris Mantenieks, a Latvian leader in Ohio’s Eastern European ethnic community. “Because in all honesty they don’t want to vote for [Clinton], and yet again they can’t express their Republicanism due to Trump’s positions.”

These voters, many of whom live in swing states like Ohio and Pennsylvania, are deeply worried by an emboldened Moscow, and anxious over the possibility that the Baltic nations might be the next target of Russian adventurism. Trump’s lavish praise of Putin has exacerbated those concerns — leaving an opening that Clinton’s campaign is leveraging by emphasizing her willingness to get tough with Putin, and her unwavering support for NATO. Earlier this month, Clinton met with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in New York — and her allies made sure to publicize the message that Trump snubbed him.

And in states like Ohio, relatively small numbers of defections from traditionally Republican voters could make a big difference.

A video of Donald Trump testifying under oath about his provocative rhetoric about Mexicans and other Latinos is set to go public as soon as Friday, drawing new attention to those comments just weeks before voters cast their ballots in the presidential race.

Trump gave the testimony in June at a law office in Washington in connection with one of two lawsuits he filed last year after prominent chefs reacted to the controversy over his remarks by pulling out of plans to open restaurants at his new D.C. hotel.

D.C. Superior Court Judge Brian Holeman said in an order issued Thursday evening that fears the testimony might show up in campaign commercials were no basis to keep the public from seeing the video.

"This Court finds that Plaintiff has not demonstrated that any subject video deposition contains scandalous, libelous, or other unduly prejudicial material warranting denial of media access," Holeman wrote. "The public shall not be held captive by the suggested eventuality of partisan editing in a manner unfavorable to Plaintiff or the deponents."


More here: http://www.politico.com/blogs/under-the-radar/2016/09/trump-deposition-video-release-schedule-228953

Donald Trump’s charitable foundation — which has been sustained for years by donors outside the Trump family — has never obtained the certification that New York requires before charities can solicit money from the public, according to the state attorney general’s office.

Under the laws in New York, where the Donald J. Trump Foundation is based, any charity that solicits more than $25,000 per year from the public must obtain a special kind of registration beforehand. Charities as large as Trump’s must also submit to a rigorous annual audit that asks — among other things — whether the charity spent any money for the personal benefit of its officers.

If New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman (D) finds that Trump’s foundation raised money in violation of the law, he could order the charity to stop raising money immediately. With a court’s permission, Schneiderman could also force Trump to return money his foundation has already raised.

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment Thursday.