Does Trump Really Want to Win?

Power Line Blog  "From the very beginning I’ve wondered whether Trump was really running for president thinking he’d be a real contender, or whether this was just a yuuuge business branding exercise. Because once again the Trump presidential campaign is looking more like a college frat prank that got out of hand.

"I thought that Trump’s Twitter feed had been brought under control, but in the middle of the night last night Trump couldn’t resist continuing what John called yesterday “Trump’s off-message detour” with a series of tweets about the expanding Miss Universe Alicia Machado. Every moment spent prolonging this sideshow is a moment lost with a decent attack message on Hillary Clinton."

We Are the Third World

Perhaps what is most disturbing about this whole affair is the affirmative response Obama has received in some corners. Many Americans are unabashed in their support for what he said. Of course, they are not a majority, but they are nevertheless a sizable portion of the public. That in itself is sufficient evidence of how Obama has managed to Third-Worldize the minds of many Americans.*

Timothy Birdnow    "In the presidential debate last Monday Donald Trump warned America that she's "become a third-world country" to the guffaws and disdain of the liberals, the media (but I repeat myself) and Hillary Rodham Clinton, who later accused Trump of talking smack about the country she wants to loot, er, lead.

"One must ask, is Trump correct or do we continue to occupy the apex of the first world? Is there evidence to support Mr. Trump's claim?

"Let me offer exhibit A.  

"According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Two years after the University of Missouri closed the state’s lone hospital for treating tuberculosis and other infectious diseases, state health officials are looking at opening a new facility.

The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services is seeking bids for a study that could provide officials with a roadmap for opening a new treatment center to replace the current process of sending patients to other states.

It comes amid a nationwide increase in the number of people contracting the airborne bacterial disease that attacks the lungs.

According to the request, Missouri has averaged 90 active tuberculosis cases in each of the past three years

. . .  "According to the CDC 88% of all antibiotic-resistant TB in the U.S. comes from immigrants.

"And that is just one infectious disease. Consider that last year we had 15 cases of bubonic plague in the U.S. Bubonic plague is clearly a third-world disease, one long absent in America." . . .

. . . "As I have noted, East St. Louis has levels of violence comparable to Honduras and other hellholes. 

. . . 

"No Third World country is complete without vote fraud to keep the ruling junta in power. Consider the fact that fraud may well be the reason Obama won re-election last time. 

"A nation without the rule of law is a banana republic. Banana republics are inherently third world."

"So Hillary and the Left may dismiss Mr. Trump's argument that America is becoming third world, but the facts belie their claims. "

*A bit of corroboration:

Why Obama is a third world president  . . . "As a naturalized American who grew up in the Third World, I saw firsthand the shenanigans that Third World leaders (who should at best be called misleaders) used on their people.

"Consequently, I am much more concerned about preserving America’s greatness than about conforming to the mindless mantra among many minorities that this president is a great leader. He is not. I came to America when Ronald Reagan was president. He was a great leader. And he was a president who was unmistakably proud to be American—not a man who went around the world apologizing for America." . . .

Here Are The Mainstream Reporters Who Are Open About Their Anti-Trump Bias

Daily Caller  "Reporters covering the presidential election from a myriad publications including The New York Times and NBC have expressed negative opinions about Republican nominee Donald Trump in writing, a Daily Caller investigation reveals.

"The journalists all expressed their thoughts about Trump over the past year on Twitter. New York Times political reporter Ashley Parker referred to “Peak Trump” in a retweet of someone saying the GOP nominee had gone “apes--t.” A fellow New York Times reporter Jeremy Peters dismissed Trump’s run as a publicity stunt and connected the GOP nominee to racism and xenophobia a month after his announcement speech. “What Trump sought to bolster by running for president — his brand – is now tarnished by associations with xenophobia and racism,” Peters tweeted in July.

"Fellow New York Times reporters Alex Burns and Jonathan Martin have mocked the GOP nominee relentlessly on Twitter. Politico’s political reporters are a little more openly biased towards Trump than those at The New York Times. Politico’s chief political correspondent Glenn Thrush wrote “exactly” in a retweet that referenced Trump that said, “so black people are to blame because they oppose a racist? It’s the voters fault and not the candidate’s? Ok.”

"Politico political reporter Eli Stokols said in September, “Trump’s constantly contradictory rhetoric requires a lot of cognitive dissonance-but only if you presume he means anything he says.”

"In another tweet, Stokols referred to Trump’s “racist birtherism.” NBC News and MSNBC political reporter Benjy Sarlin has also been open about his disdain towards Trump." . . .

Insightful: Hillary Names Merkel As Her "Favorite World Leader"

Infidel Bloggers Alliance 

"Nothing could more disqualify Hillary for President than this revealing statement.

"From Politico:

Hillary Clinton trolled two White House opponents with a single response, dinging Gary Johnson and Donald Trump by naming Angela Merkel as her favorite world leader. The Democratic presidential nominee on Thursday joined the discussion about politicians’ favorite world leaders, a topic that went viral when Johnson, the Libertarian nominee, drew a blank when asked Wednesday to name a world leader he looks up to and respects.

What Obama refers to as "my military": Military budget for gender reassignment treatments

This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

. . . There are between 1,320 and 6,630 transgender troops in the active-duty force of 1.3 million, according the RAND Corp. which conducted a study for the Pentagon. Of those troops, RAND estimates that between 30 and 140 would like hormone treatment, and 25 to 130 would seek surgery.The Defense Department policy states if a service member’s ability to serve is hindered by a “medical condition or medical treatment related to their gender identity,” they will be treated. When an active duty service member receives approval from a military medical provider to undergo gender transition, the commander must approve the timing of medical treatment.

"Funny how there’s always a discussion and a report involved when these things come out of Congress, but not this time – it goes straight to the field." . . .

Dead Democrats Vote in Rigged Election

americanthinker.cartoons

Infowars "The FBI is investigating allegations of voter registration fraud after officials say almost 20 voter applications were turned in under the names of dead people."

Then there is the rush to process immigrants in time for the election:

Why Immigrants Vote for Democrats  . . . "I would venture that a large majority of immigrants, whether they are from Greece, Iraq, India, or anywhere else, have similar presuppositions regarding government. Although some of these countries are quasi-democratic in their government structure, they all have one thing in common: They are all socialistic to one extent or another. There is government-run healthcare, pension systems, and a host of other benefits." . . .

UC President: It’s Freedom of Speech, not Freedom from Speech

" . . .Napolitano’s acknowledgment that American universities are facing a crisis of free speech, and her sharp criticism of illiberal activism, is an important step forward for the movement to save universities from the forces of censorship and intolerance. Let’s hope that a critical mass of students and faculty will back her up."

The American Interest  "Janet Napolitano, President Obama’s former Head of the Department of Homeland Security and now leader of the largest university system in the United States, is the latest high-profile college administrator to come out and forcefully criticize the campus crusade against liberal norms of speech and expression. A passage from her op-ed in the Boston Globe:

As president of the University of California system, I write to show how far we have moved from freedom of speech on campuses to freedom from speech. If it hurts, if it’s controversial, if it articulates an extreme point of view, then speech has become the new bête noire of the academy. Speakers are disinvited, faculty are vilified, and administrators like me are constantly asked to intervene.

The goal of our university education today should be to prepare students who are thoughtful, well-informed, and resilient. " . . .

St. Louis U. Requires Prof to Give Trigger Warning Remarks Before Allen West Speech   . . . "First, an administrator banned members of the campus conservative club from including the words “radical Islam” on advertisements for the event, claiming Lt. Col. West, a veteran of Operation Desert Storm and Operation Iraqi Freedom, did not have enough “experience” to speak on that topic." . . .

UNC Chapel Hill Marked First Amendment Day With Panel on Safe Spaces  "Paging George Orwell…"

"Only on a college campus, could the First Amendment be celebrated by talking about the importance of safe spaces.

"Campus Reform reported:" . . .

The Media Freak-Out

Rich Lowry at NR

"Now that they realize Clinton is hardly a shoo-in, the liberal media is panicking at the prospect of President Trump."

. . . “This is not normal,” you’ll hear it said over and over about Trump (often correctly). But did anyone think it was normal when Trump said Ted Cruz was ineligible to run for president? Or questioned Ben Carson’s faith? Nonetheless, according to an analysis by the Shorenstein Center, most coverage of Trump in the first half of 2016 was “positive or neutral in tone.” 

"There have been two seminal events in the freak-out. The first was the absurdly over-the-top criticism of Matt Lauer for not being tough enough on Trump at an NBC national-security forum. Lauer couldn’t have satisfied his critics short of slapping Trump in the face and demanding, “Have you no sense of decency, sir?”" . . .

Obama administration backed lifting sanctions on Iranian banks as part of hostage ransom

Another Day, Another Secret Obama Side Deal with Iran  "According to a September 30 Wall Street Journal article, the Obama administration signed a secret agreement with Iran to lift U.N. sanctions from two Iranian banks — Bank Sepah and Bank Sepah International — that helped finance Iran’s ballistic-missile program. U.S. and Iranian officials signed this deal on January 17, 2016, the same day Iran released four U.S. prisoners." . . .

"  . . .former hostage Saeed Abedeni’s recent statement concerning the actions of Iranians at the airfield is enough to question whether or not that is still our stance.

“I just remember the night at the airport sitting for hours and hours there, and I asked police, ‘Why are you not letting us go?’ ” Abedini said. “He said, ‘We are waiting for another plane so if that plane doesn’t come, we never let [you] go.’ ”  

Rick Moran  "The Wall Street Journal has a shocking report that adds fuel to the fire over the $1.7 billion in cash paid to the Iranians to get the hostages released.

On the same day the cash payment arrived in Tehran, the U.S. secretly agreed to back a U.N. effort to lift sanctions on two Iranian banks accused of assisting Iran's ballistic missile program. 

The Obama administration agreed to back the lifting of United Nations sanctions on two Iranian state banks blacklisted for financing Iran’s ballistic-missile program on the same day in January that Tehran released four American citizens from prison, according to U.S. officials and congressional staff briefed on the deliberations.

The U.N. sanctions on the two banks weren’t initially to be lifted until 2023, under a landmark nuclear agreement between Iran and world powers that went into effect on Jan. 16.

"Just how much of this nuclear agreement with Iran was real?  We learned after the deal went into effect that restrictions on Iran's centrifuge technology were a sham and that despite assurances from the White House, the deal did not prevent Iran from testing its ballistic missiles (separate U.N. resolutions were supposed to restrict the missile program)." . . . 

Military Drills Obama at Fort Lee

BarbWire

. . . "For the military, the townhall was a unique opportunity to get some things off their chests. The real shame, however, is that the president didn’t start listening to his troops sooner. If there’s one thing we can all agree on: the next president is inheriting a huge mess on military readiness and national defense. FRC’s Lt. General Jerry Boykin (U.S. Army-Ret.) spent 36 years in the military and says, “Morale is lower than I have ever seen it due to the social experiments and the assault on religious liberty. Good people are leaving and quality young men and women are discouraged from entering the services as they see what our armed forces have become and how they would be treated.” For these reasons, he writes, “I have very grave concerns about Hillary Clinton as the next commander-in-chief.”

Tony Perkins is president of the Washington, D.C.-based Family Research Council. He is a former member of the Louisiana legislature where he served for eight years, and he is recognized as a legislative pioneer for authoring measures like the nation’s first Covenant Marriage law. 

Emphasis added, TD

Hillary Clinton and Alicia Machado: Sisterhood of the travelling getaway car

"But I think I know why Hillary may feel a common bond with this gangster bimbo.  Alicia, you see, was accused of driving a getaway car for her gangster boyfriend in a killing in Venezuela but escaped prosecution for lack of witnesses.  Don’t you think Hillary must admire Alicia for that?  After all, in a symbolic sense, isn’t that what Hillary Clinton has always done for Bill in all his extensive history of sexual predation: drive his getaway car?" 

Russ Vaughn  "Democrats have been high-fiving and deliriously jiving since their candidate introduced the voluptuous Venezuelan vigilante upon Donald Trump during Monday night’s debate.  The Dems would have you believe that this luscious Latina was used and abused by that cruel capitalist in a manner that should totally disqualify him from ever serving as president.  Apparently as her boss, a business owner who hired her and signed her to a contract that required her to maintain her lovely person in a physical state so as to be able to gracefully and gorgeously represent the public persona of Miss Universe, her mean old plantation master castigated the poor, pretty thing for ignoring those specific terms of her contract and becoming a very non-contractual fatty." . . .

Obama's Peres eulogy: It's all about him

Rick Moran  "President Obama spoke at the funeral of Shimon Peres, calling him a "dear friend" and, as usual, made the great occassion all about himself.

"You have to wonder what the assembled guests thought of a speech that placed Obama on the same historical plane as Ghandi, Lincoln, and Nelson Mandela.

“I could somehow see myself in his story and he could see himself in mine,” Obama said, delivering the final eulogy for Peres Friday morning in Jerusalem, calling the former Israeli prime minister and president in Hebrew “dear friend,” and lingering for a moment with his hand on the coffin as he left the stage. Peres died Wednesday at the age of 93.

"As Carrie Hart notes in her report on the funeral, President Obama said some nice things about Peres and Israel.  But then there was his effort to portray himself as a Peres intimate:

"It was so surprising to see the two of us, where we had started, talking together in the White House, meeting here in Israel," he said. "I think both of us understood that we were here only because in some way we reflected the magnificent story of our nations."

"I sincerely doubt that Peres thought of himself in any way as Obama's "equal" or that the president occupied the same historical space as Peres.  But Obama sees himself as a world-historical figure like Mandela, Peres, and even Queen Elizabeth despite the leaders that really matter in the world – Netanyahu, Putin, Merkel, Xi – holding him in contempt.

"Once a narcissist, always a narcissist."

It is a pattern, you know:

"Egomaniac President Thinks Americans Are “Not Inspired” To Vote This Year Because “Barack and Michelle Are Not On The Ballot This Time”…"

"Barack Obama Marks Death Of Golfing Legend Arnold Palmer With A Picture Of . . . Barack Obama…"