Week 39: "Laughingstock Rag" (September 18, 2016)

Dear Readers,

The great chaos that is the 2016 election season keeps hurtling at us, and I’ll help you make sense of it all. Remember, all newsletters (and more) are available at www.electreport.blogspot.com

Days until General Election: 51

Days until 1st Debate: 8

Trump Contradicts 5 Years of Rhetoric, Concedes that Obama Was Born In America

After saying - nay, screaming - the opposite for five years, and pledging $5,000,000 to anyone who could convince him, Trump has finally admitted Obama was born in America. Birtherism, insane as it may be, was what first made Trump a hero of the right and, especially, the alt-right. It’s nothing new for Trump to double back on a position he’s held for a long time, but the way he did this was particularly awful. He started the event an hour late, had thirty minutes of military endorsements, and then said three sentences. All in all, he got almost two hours of coverage for one statement, which contradicted a basic tenet of his campaign..

A Week In Trump Tweets

“Never met but never liked dopey Robert Gates. Look at the mess the U.S. is in. Always speaks badly of his many bosses, including Obama.”

“The failing @nytimes has gone nuts that Crooked Hillary is doing so badly. They are willing to say anything, has become a laughingstock rag! My lawyers want to sue the failing @nytimes so badly for irresponsible intent. I said no (for now), but they are watching. Really disgusting”

“Wacky @NYTimesDowd, who hardly knows me, makes up things that I never said for her boring interviews and column. A neurotic dope!”

“I was never a fan of Colin Powell after his weak understanding of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq = disaster. We can do much better!”

Reince Priebus Attempts to Circumvent Rules...

In order to heal his party, he threatened all 2016 contenders not supporting Trump by saying that if they ran again, they’d have trouble making it on the ballot in South Carolina. Priebus said on Face the Nation: “People in our party are talking about what we’re going to do about this. I mean there’s a ballot access issue in South Carolina. In order to be on the ballot in South Carolina, you actually have to pledge your support to the nominee, no matter who that person is. So what’s the penalty for that? It’s not a threat, but that’s just the question that we have a process in place.”

Senate Preview #9

PENNSYLVANIA:

Pat Toomey’s days in the Senate seem numbered. The incumbent is in one of the closest races in the country, against Katie McGinty, former Secretary of the EPA in Pennsylvania, McGinty defeated 2010 nominee Joe Sestak in the primary, and while polls generally show her leading Toomey, the race is volatile,

Rating: Tilt D

SOUTH CAROLINA:

This is one of the most boring races. Tim Scott, a popular incumbent, should easily secure re-election against pastor Thomas Dixon, who has no Wikipedia page, and is not competitive. Scott should win this seat by at least 25 points,

Rating: Safe R

SOUTH DAKOTA:

Long-time Senator John Thune could fall asleep for 6 months and still win this election. Thune faces important Yankton County Democrat Jay Williams, who ran unopposed for the nomination. Nobody else will even be on the ballot,

Rating: Safe R

This Week In World Elections

Croatia: Andrej Plenkovic’s HDZ won a plurality of seats, and should be able to form a coalition. Zoran Milosevic withdrew from politics following the loss. The HDZ won by 2.5%, and won 6 of the 10 regions.

Belarus: 93 pro-government “Independents” were elected, followed by 8 Communists, and 8 from other parties. The second-highest vote-getter was none of the above. More proof that the elections are fairly corrupt.

Russia: The State Duma, the lower house of the Russian Assembly, hold an election today. The ruling United Russia party should win easily, which makes sense, since the elections are very not democratic and there have been calls for a boycott.

Thanks for reading! As usual, comments are welcome!