Trump

[gravy]

Lewandowski is out

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/21/us/po ... p=cur&_r=2

This is pretty big and a sign of a campaign in a bit of turmoil.

[pogo]

Elizabeth Warren doing her usual excellent demolition job, from about 10 minutes in.

[pogo]

Lewandowski is out

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/21/us/po ... p=cur&_r=2

This is pretty big and a sign of a campaign in a bit of turmoil.

Hopefully. Or it could be he is finally listening to sensible people and getting rid of some of the liabilities on his staff. Not that it will make much difference, once he is on his own no amount of advice can stop him spouting damaging nonsense.

[PumaG]

Lewandowski is out

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/21/us/po ... p=cur&_r=2

This is pretty big and a sign of a campaign in a bit of turmoil.

Hopefully. Or it could be he is finally listening to sensible people and getting rid of some of the liabilities on his staff. Not that it will make much difference, once he is on his own no amount of advice can stop him spouting damaging nonsense.

You don't think Lewandowski will be replaced then?
Maybe he'll be made a scapegoat for Trump's decline, since the reaction to the Pulse murders?

[gravy]

That's why he was pushed, it's pretty obvious. I wonder where he got that idea from!

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/sta ... wsrc%5Etfw

Trump's camp now idiotically publicly briefing against Lewandowski too. I can't see any up side to that at all.

[pogo]

Everything I’ve read suggested Lewandowski was a bit of a liability. Not just the assault charge but more generally being one of the people too willing encourage Trump to, well, be Trump.

He really needs people around him that are more professional, able to take charge of his communications, his messaging, to responding to media and events. Except I doubt whether, even if he has the people, Trump will be willing to cede control. Let other people run his Twitter feed, write his speeches. He has such a high opinion of himself that he probably still thinks he is doing a good job, despite the evidence from the polls and the Republicans failing to support him wholeheartedly.

Latest slip was his support of profiling, for Muslims. On its own that does not sound too bad, certainly no worse than other things he has said he will do to Muslims. Problem is racial profiling is incredibly negative for Hispanics and especially Blacks who suffer from it today in America. Trump has just reminded them, if they needed it, to not vote for him and to turn out in force for Clinton in November.

[gravy]

I completely agree but he move towards professionallity isn't helped by a trump advisor tweeting DING DONG THE WITCH IS DEAD or inside sources saying "corey did well but the rolling stones tour manager doesn't get inducted into the hall of fame"

Apparently he's been ousted by Ivanka

EDIT

Ooof, escorted out of Trump Tower by security. Wonder if he'll sell his undoubtedly fascinating story

[pogo]

US election: Arrested man 'wanted to shoot Donald Trump'

The Republicans have their candidate right there. Except he is ‘believed to be British’, and only natural born Americans can become president.

[carolen]

US election: Arrested man 'wanted to shoot Donald Trump'

The Republicans have their candidate right there. Except he is ‘believed to be British’, and only natural born Americans can become president.

See, this is what get me. I have no torch for Trump, I can't vote for him and wouldn't even if I could. But between the Orlando massacre and Jo Cox we've have nearly 2 weeks now of GUN CONTROL, TERRORISM THREAT ad nauseam but when it comes to (a) an alleged attempt on the life of He Who Must Not Be Named and (b) in the middle of a packed crowd with the high likelihood of bystander casualties it's all perfectly OK, go for it.

Rank hypocrisy, much?

[pogo]

Me? It was not exactly a serious suggestion. The serious point is it only happened as their police carry guns. Republicans probably see no problem with this, but police here don’t, normally.

In related news the Senate failed to pass some gun control measures, voted on after Democrats staged a filibuster to force it. The final votes were largely on party political lines and this is a problem for Republicans as the measures were popular ones, including the one almost everyone agrees on that suspected terrorists, i.e. the people banned from flying should also be banned from buying guns.

[gravy]

Hahaha, what a hustler 20% of the small amounts the Trump campaign have raised through donations go to Trump companies

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/20-of- ... 2016-06-21

He's looking seriously under funded right now compared to Hilary

[pogo]

Yes, he has been short of money for a while. Right now he is losing badly in the polls, which may be why Lewandowski was finally shown the door. But that’s not the worst of his problems.

The US presidential election is not won by popular vote but by state delegates. It’s quite possible to win the popular vote and lose the election. Al Gore managed this in 2000 (after the Supreme Court intervened to settle a dispute over the Florida count). To win states you need two things: organisation at the local level and money for targeted advertising. Clinton has both; she’s inherited Obama’s excellent organisation, after Obama and the Democrats rewrote the book on how to do it in 2008. And she has much more money.

Trump meanwhile has made a virtue of not taking money from donors, and still seems reluctant to do so. Instead he is doing small scale fundraisers which are taking him away from the states he has to win. He is of course exceptionally poor at organisation.

And now he is diverting some of that money to his businesses? To me that says he knows he is going to lose this, so wants to extract maximum value from it before it all implodes. Once donors (what few he has) get wind of it then he might see even the small donations he gets now dry up.

[gravy]

Not sure why he hasn't pulled the lever on serious fundraising.

The RNC have given him a big list of wealthy donors but he's not bothered calling them.

[Governmentyard]

US election: Arrested man 'wanted to shoot Donald Trump'

The Republicans have their candidate right there. Except he is ‘believed to be British’, and only natural born Americans can become president.

See, this is what get me. I have no torch for Trump, I can't vote for him and wouldn't even if I could. But between the Orlando massacre and Jo Cox we've have nearly 2 weeks now of GUN CONTROL, TERRORISM THREAT ad nauseam but when it comes to (a) an alleged attempt on the life of He Who Must Not Be Named and (b) in the middle of a packed crowd with the high likelihood of bystander casualties it's all perfectly OK, go for it.

Rank hypocrisy, much?

Not at all. Neither the clubbers nor the MP were actively trying to turn a nation into a festering cesspool of hatred and intolerance. Trump is. You can't dominate world headlines with your enormous movement to do exactly that and then not expect to meet with hatred and intolerance yourself.

[pogo]

More on the spending issue, 2012 vs. 2016, June each time. Trump is simply not competing in the states he needs to win (and he needs to win them). He is letting Clinton and her supporters tell voters all about him instead. I’m sure they are taking full advantage of this.