The UnReported Story of Hillary's Strength

Hillary Clinton knows better than anyone else that four months is an eternity in politics. She also probably knows that she's ahead. Polling shows her crushing Donald Trump in Iowa of all places, a state that has never really warmed to her like some others. But that's not all:

According to Ballotpedia's battleground poll, Clinton leads Trump:

• 51% to 37% in Florida
• 45% to 41% in Iowa
• 50% to 33% in Michigan
• 48% to 38% in North Carolina
• 46% to 37% in Ohio
• 49% to 35% in Pennsylvania
• 45% to 38% in Virginia

Her leads held at nearly the same margins when Libertarian Party nominee Gary Johnson was included in the poll. And Clinton led Trump 48% to 37% when all states were factored together. With Johnson included, Clinton led Trump 44% to 34%, with Johnson at 13%.

Yes, Quinnipiac did show the race closer, but the ABC/Washington Post and the NBC/Wall Street Journal Polls both found her comfortably ahead.

Hillary Clinton's common ground in all the polls is that she leads. She hasn't trailed in a national poll in well past a month now. She doesn't trail in any swing-state polls either. Some show the race closer, some show it further apart, none of them show Trump ahead. Maybe this is about Trump's relative weakness. Maybe it's all about Clinton's campaign. Either way- she's strong right now. The argument that Democrats couldn't nominate her because she'd be sure to lose is basically dead. While she's not a lock to win at this time, FiveThirtyEight sets her odds at 79.2%. What should be more telling is that they are setting current state margins for South Carolina, Mississippi, and Kansas inside of 5% for Trump. That is really not good for him.

Obviously you won't read about how Hillary might win a blowout victory. If it's over now, why would anyone care about future coverage, which hurts the media outlets. They won't spite themselves to report the facts, so you'll just have to wait until November 8th to hear about it.

The Over-Hyped, Faux Story of Pennsylvania's Competitiveness

In 2000, Tom Ridge refused to believe Al Gore had won Pennsylvania. In 2004, George W. Bush ran the same campaign model that won him Ohio and Florida, but John Kerry carried Pennsylvania. In 2008, John McCain tried to resurrect himself as the floor fell in by doing so in Western Pennsylvania. Mitt Romney seemed to have the good sense in 2012 to get the point, but Republicans are saying it again- Donald Trump can win Pennsylvania. They even cite the registration changes above. This will end up like the others.

Pennsylvania is won in Philadelphia's suburbs. Yes, the Western part of the state has trended Republican in recent years, but the population there has dropped. Running a "guns and God" appeal to those voters out there does not win the state for a Republican, in fact it hurts them worse in the Philadelphia region, where people are still moving. While the map above should not make a Democrat feel "good" about things, it's worth noting that most of the registration change is just "Reagan Democrats" actually registering as Republicans, like they vote. It's not new registrants switching. Those people were already in many cases voting Republican. There's no beef in this argument.

In short, Pennsylvania will be competitive, maybe even close, as it always is. One of these days, maybe the Republicans will win it, but if that happens, they probably already won the election. It's worth noting though that elections have actually become more lopsidedly Democratic at the state level. In 2002, Governor Rendell won a large victory. In 2004, Democrats won two out of three state row offices and the Presidential race, only losing for Senate and Attorney General. In 2006, Governor Rendell and Casey won blowouts for Governor and Senator. In 2008, President Obama won a blowout and the Democrats won two out of three row offices. In 2012, President Obama and Senator Casey won fairly comfortable wins, and the Democrats swept the row offices. In 2014, Governor Wolf won easily. In 2015, in a relatively new outcome for off-years, Democrats swept all the state judicial races handily. The only exception in which Republicans did well in Pennsylvania statewides recently was 2010, which was a year they did well everywhere. In other words, the PA GOP hasn't done so well in recent years. Donald Trump is not a particularly strong candidate according to polls, and he doesn't have a really strong campaign. In other words, I don't see him flipping Pennsylvania right now. I don't see why people are giving this story legs.

Check back in November.

Is Global Trade for the 1%, or the Global Poor?

Provocative stuff from Jonathan Chait:

The argument for restricting this trade rests on protecting the interests of the working class in rich countries at the expense of the global poor who are taking their jobs. In an interview last summer, Ezra Klein pushed Sanders into more or less conceding that his trade plans would look out for American workers at the expense of poor workers overseas. “I think what we need to be doing as a global economy is making sure that people in poor countries have decent-paying jobs, have education, have health care, have nutrition for their people,” Sanders replied, when asked how he would balance the two. “That is a moral responsibility, but you don't do that, as some would suggest, by lowering the standard of American workers, which has already gone down very significantly.”

This is the meat of the debate between free-trade Democrats and protectionist ones. On the one side, free traders arguing that trade lifts up the global poor and reduces barriers to exports. On the other, an argument that we need to lift foreign workers up to our standard of living for their labor. It's a rather straight-forward debate.

Chait goes further in though:

Sanders argues that the correct response to the system that is allegedly failing rich and poor countries alike is “real change,” stripped of nativist sentiments: “we do not need change based on the demagogy, bigotry and anti-immigrant sentiment that punctuated so much of the Leave campaign’s rhetoric — and is central to Donald J. Trump’s message.” But Trump’s message, for all its demagoguery and racism, is at least connected to a factually coherent analysis of how trade works, as Annie Lowrey points out. Trump is arguing that trade deals have helped foreign countries and screwed American workers. He’s straightforward about his intention to screw over foreign countries.

Sanders, on the other hand, wants to pretend that a policy that screws over the global poor can be undertaken not only without overt bigotry, but that it will also benefit the global poor themselves. Between the two, Trump’s case is the more realistic one.

And here in lies the provocative part of this- Trump at least gets global trade, while Bernie and his supporters don't. I don't know that I buy it- a certain amount of rhetorical ignorance has to be allowed to any policy point. With that said, Trump's appeal does get the zero-sum nature of this issue- he casts it as "American workers vs. the global working poor." Sanders is trying to cast this as a "workers of the world vs. the rich" debate. Trump's case is the factually accurate one. It is also the factually dangerous one. It promotes xenophobia, hyper-nationalism, and frankly, racism. Bernie's perhaps does over-simplify who should be aligned with who, but nails the fact that really, no worker should be exploited just because of where they live. I think Chait hits on some important points here. I just also think he's boiling the issue down further than we really should.

Donald Trump Cannot Win the Election, Hillary Can Only Lose It

What one calls arrogance, can simply be stated truth. In American national elections, at this point in our history, the country leans to the left. Democrats have won the popular vote in five of the last six elections. They haven't finished below 48% in any of them since 1992. Republicans increasingly rely on an electorate that is male, older, and whiter than the country on the whole, which leaves them with less wiggle room to win. Republicans can win the election, but it is less likely than not. In other words, as of 2016, Presidential elections lean towards the Democrats, in generic terms.

So, let me state my point- Donald Trump cannot "win" the election. I'm not saying he won't be the victor on November 8th, I'm saying he will only be so if Hillary "loses" the election for herself. I completely discount the theory that Trump will pull out such a massive bigot vote as to win, unless you convince me that Hillary wildly underperforms President Obama. Is that possible? Sure is. Probable? Your guess is as good as mine.

A few points here:

1. Hillary hasn't basically been ahead since the end of the primaries. She has certainly been ahead since her blistering speech attacking Trump on foreign policy. The size of her lead varies from a point or two to double-digits. The point is that the most common outcome right now in the polls is she is ahead.
2. There are even more state-level polls than national ones, because there are 50 states. She does not lead every single swing-state poll- but she leads the solid majority of them. Right now, Trump does not hold a consistent lead in a single state that President Obama won. Not one. There is time obviously for that to change, but as is, expect her to win over 300 electoral votes.
3. Donald Trump really should not do any better amongst any non-white group than Mitt Romney did. Not African-Americans, not Hispanics, not Jewish-Americans, not Asian-Americans, not LGBT people. His "Make America Great Again" line has no real appeal to people who have traditionally been marginalized. Given that Trump has gone out of his way to insult Hispanics, Muslims, women, and lots of other groups in this campaign, I don't think he has a way to really improve on Romney's numbers here.
4. The idea that Trump will win because he will turn out droves of non-traditional white voters, or that Democrats are suddenly switching sides to vote for him, is basically all bunk. The white "lazy voter" theory has been run before, and did win- most recently in 2004- but President Obama has shown that strategy to be inadequate in winning a national election. Don't forget, Mitt Romney's margin amongst white voters in 2012 was virtually identical or better to President George H.W. Bush's 1988 margin- which resulted in a blowout win- but Romney lost. It's also worth noting that Romney saw huge white-Democrat crossover in the "Rust Belt" states- but he lost them. 
5. The idea that a catastrophic world event, such as a terrorist attack, could help Trump, doesn't seem to be in the cards. The Orlando shooting seemed to help Clinton, not Trump, in the polls. She consistently wins on national security questions. I think this issue is inverted on what we're used to.

So, with that in mind, Donald Trump cannot win the 2016 election. He may be the victor though. What do I mean? Hillary Clinton can lose the election. How?

1. Hillary can make a mistake. What is that mistake? If I knew, I'd stop her from doing it. She could say something damning though, a gaffe that ends the race. Is it likely? No. Possible? It always is, for any candidate.
2. The Bernie wing of the party could become enraged and not back her. By my math, we're only really talking about two or three million voters who are up for grabs, after accounting for those on board and those who will never be, but that's a point or two in the polls. How the next three weeks heading into Philly go is critical, but they should certainly be seen as working for his support in the lead up to the convention.
3. Turnout, turnout, turnout. A lame Vice-Presidential nominee, too hard of a rush to the center, or an insufficient outreach campaign to the varying groups in the Democratic coalition could end up leading to Hillary underperforming President Obama sufficiently. That could cost her.
4. The economy. I'm less worried about terrorism than a market crash in the closing months of this race. Events like Brexit are beyond an American President's control, and can lead to a global slowdown. Something like this could dampen enthusiasm for the sitting President, and flip even the small sliver of the electorate that is up for grabs.

One other thing you should note- I do believe Republicans will show up for Trump at levels rivaling or even slightly exceeding Mitt Romney. I do believe his hardcore base will vote. I do not believe the "Trump coalition" would be enough to win though, unless Hillary Clinton proves to be considerably weaker than President Obama was. Remember, his cushion was 63 electoral votes, while Romney fell 65 electoral votes short. Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan all going to Trump would not win him the election alone, and he will have to hang onto Arizona, North Carolina, and Georgia, all of which aren't easy.

What I am saying is that Hillary Clinton should win the 2016 election and be the 45th President. What I am saying is that her built-in advantages, and Trump's weaknesses as a candidate make that clear. What I am saying is that I don't fear Trump's strengths as a candidate. What I am saying is that her substantial financial advantage is important. Even a three or four point win, which the polls basically suggest she should get to right now, equates to a Democratic win with over 300 electoral votes. Clinton should win a relative electoral landslide, at least under the terms of political landslides in America after the Cold War.

I'm not saying Clinton will absolutely win though. I am afraid of the left eating itself alive in disputes about ideology and purity. I am afraid of complacency amongst an electorate that has been "fat and happy" with our incumbent President. I am worried about external market pressures souring Americans on the Obama era. More so than anything though, i'm nervous about Democrats beating themselves. Donald Trump does not scare me at all. Progressives, liberals, Democrats, or whatever else you want to call us, killing ourselves is what worries me. Our inability to ever be happy with our success and strength is what worries me. To me, this election is an "in-house" fight.

This Ignoramus Might be the Next British Prime Minister, Sooo.....

There is a belief amongst some on the left that there is no way for Donald Trump to be elected President. In truth, under even 2012 turnout (leaving out 2008), there's not. That doesn't mean that Trump can't win though. Just knock down Democratic turnout and if Trump continues to push out Republicans, he may win.

This may seem implausible, and hopefully come October, it will be. Don't discount it though. The man above, Boris Johnson, the outgoing Mayor of London, was not only elected Mayor of London, but is in line to be the next Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He wants to stop immigration, disassociate with Europe, and "take back" his country, not unlike Donald Trump. He stood against Prime Minister David Cameron (of the same party), and won the Brexit fight.

Don't sleep on this.

Donald's Implosion, Why He's Still Dangerous, and Why He's Still Here

Donald Trump is not doing very well right now. He's losing by double-digits in some national polls, but losing outside of the margin of error in just about all of them. To be clear, that is odd in recent political memory. At this point in 2008, for instance, John McCain was still very much alive, and even leading in the polls some times- and he lost by a lot.

That he's losing isn't the end of the world though. Donald Trump may be behind by an alarming amount in the polls, but it is June, and he has months to move the public. The problem he has is that he's stone-cold broke. He doesn't have the money to advertise and change minds. He doesn't have a ground game out there in the battleground states either. Top all of that off with the fact that he just canned his manager, and you see why Trump's White House hopes are dimming.

Let me touch on something being missed though, particularly about his manager- that may be the most dangerous piece to him of all. Corey Lewandowski was not "qualified" to run this race. That's precisely why Trump succeeded in the primaries. A more established manager would never have allowed Trump to go out and gin up white supremacists, the angry, and hillbillies. Lewandowski did. This is why Trump won. Let's be clear, no policy won him this race on it's own, the general idea that Trump stood with those people brought them out. The idea that he would say exactly what those folks felt was what made him attractive. Lewandowski was the perfect manager for Donald Trump, the manager who allowed him to function at "peak Trump."

So, in the midst of all of this talk about Trump's current implosion, it's important to not get caught up in it. The same people that nominated Trump, and many more like them, still exist. Donald Trump will probably continue to try and reach them. As long as those two things are true, Donald Trump remains dangerous. Should he be able to win with the message he has? Of course not. MOST of these people voted for past Republican nominees, and obviously they've won the popular vote one out of the last six times. Even so, the fact that Donald Trump understood what the Republican electorate really wanted to hear (note here: it's not "limited government"), shows just how dangerous he can be. The man is actually not a great businessman (he bankrupted many companies), he's a great marketer. He showed us his marketing prowess in the primaries. He still has that in him. Sure, every metric shows him to be in big danger, and he is, but I wouldn't get over confident yet.

The only question that I can still not answer about Donald though is his motivation. Why is he doing this? I suspect that a few years from now, we'll find out that he felt slighted by another candidate (probably Jeb), or the party didn't treat him with respect when seeking his donation, or some other personal motivation drug him into this, which is also why he doesn't seem to have the same fire right now, when he's the presumptive nominee, like he did during the primaries. He certainly didn't plan this out like a campaign, and he clearly didn't take the advice of major political consultants. Getting into his head on all of this would be fascinating.

Regardless, Donald Trump has some major issues right now, but he's not "dead" politically. People would be foolish to read too deep into his issues in June, and assume that we will defeat him easily.

Even 37% is Too Much

Hillary Clinton leads in a Bloomberg Poll 49-37% over Donald Trump. But consider:

Meanwhile, Trump has shown no sign that he plans on moderating his tone or policy proposals now that he will top the Republican ticket. He drew the condemnation of top members of his party over his claims that a federal judge presiding over Trump University lawsuits is biased because the judge is of Mexican descent. More recently, since the mass shooting at an Orlando LGBT night club, Trump has doubled down on his proposal to ban Muslims, while insinuating that President Obama was somehow connected to the attack.

A man who is spewing outright racism is getting 37% of our voters. That's over one out of every three voters you see. How? How can that many people think that this know-nothing racist is capable of being President. This bothers me:

It also said that it was "troubling" for Trump that 63 percent of women polled said they could never vote for him. For decades, female voters have made up a majority of the electorate.

Trump is leading Clinton among white men -- 50 to 33 percent -- according to the poll, but he still has work to do to catch up to the 62 percent of white men who supported Mitt Romney in 2012 exit polls.

A majority of likely voters -- 64 percent -- said they expect that Trump will keep saying things that upset Republicans, while only 30 percent said they believe the presumptive GOP nom would tone it down.

Trump did lead Clinton, 50 percent to 45 percent, when likely voters were asked who would better combat terrorist threats here and abroad.

As a white man, I'm disgusted with those like me. As someone with a brain, i'm disgusted that 50% of the public thinks he could fight terrorism. I'm kind of just disgusted that anyone supports this. This man is a clown, and not a funny one. He's an ignoramus on an unmatched level, and fits the stereotype of that ignorant relative who just spews Rush Limbaugh's one-liners at you during Thanksgiving Dinner.

I really hope Gary Johnson somehow beats this clown.

Terminology Won't Beat ISIS

Hillary Clinton did call it "Radical Islamic Terrorism." President Obama did not. Donald Trump insists failure to call it that should be a disqualifier. To listen to this arguing about a term, you would think the term was actually a substitute for a strategy to handle ISIS. Of course, that's laughable- ISIS won't disband just because the President does or does not call them "radical Islamic terrorists." It doesn't work that way.

To be clear here, Donald Trump would not know the first thing about how to handle ISIS if he were President. He has zero experience in dealing with terrorism, and his talk of being tough with them would simply create more ISIS. Calling them "radical Islamic terrorists" won't do anything either, at least if your goal is to actually defeat them. In fact, it will feed into their narrative- that this is a war between Islam and America.

About the only net effect of the term that I can think of is to divide us here at home. To make non-Muslims view Muslim-Americans as an "other," as someone different, as an enemy within. It will serve Trump's purpose of dividing Americans and bringing the most ignorant ones to his side of the argument. It won't help us defeat ISIS though, no matter how hard he says it. If that worked, we would have been saying "radical Christian terrorists" for a long time in America.

No, President Obama Is Not Weak

"Make America Great Again." It's nothing more than a slogan. It has nothing behind it. It isn't grounded in any facts. In fact, it's pure fiction- America is great now. President Obama has kept us strong. President Obama is the epitome of a strong President.

Of course, persistence is the lifeblood of a lie, and those on the right who hate President Obama won't stop just because facts don't support them. Their latest attack is that he "apologized" for the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima while in Japan. That is patently false. That's right, he didn't apologize. That is false.

What President Obama has done is reach a climate change deal with China, a nuclear arms deal with Iran, kill Osama Bin Laden, normalize relations with Cuba, pull our economy back from the brink of extinction, end the Iraq War, and cut ISIS territory in half. I'm not saying his foreign policy is perfectly ideal, but I am saying he's kept America great.

#ImWithHer: Hillary Tells it How it is on Donald Trump

Was it her best speech yet? It felt like Hillary Clinton was finally freed up to be herself. She didn't seem like she was splitting hairs, or like she was uncomfortable, or that she had any apprehension. Hillary simply crushed Donald Trump with point after point, using his many blunders, and doing it in a nationalistic manner. It was as good of a performance as I have ever seen her give as a political candidate. She was great.

She was also honest. Donald Trump has no idea how to lead American foreign policy. He would fight with allies and embrace enemies, he would say one thing, then try to say he said the opposite. He offers no stability, no capability, no intellectual capacity at all. She crushed him for supporting nuclear proliferation, she smacked him for praising dictators like Kim Jong-Un. She scolded him for proposing giving ISIS a safe-haven in Syria. She chided him for saying he would not support Israel. She mocked him for picking fights with the Prime Minister of Great Britain, the Mayors of London and Paris, the Pope, and others. She called him out for saying NATO has no current application. She even pointed out his inconsistencies on Iraq, Libya, and all sorts of other foreign policy issues. On every point, she literally used his words.

This is the candidate we are all hoping for. This is the leader America needs. I'm very, very happy she went out and gave this speech. This is how she will be our next President.

Unfit for Command

Donald Trump has spent much of the past week saying that reporters are sleazy for reporting on his campaign's "issues" and slamming a Federal Judge for releasing records pertaining to his fraudulent Trump University.  He is petty and tends to go after people for disagreeing with him.

Recently, Trump was unable to say what the "Brexit" is. That would be the proposed British exit from the European Union. He said that NATO is no longer necessary, as Russia takes territory in Eastern Europe. Donald Trump does not have any real knowledge of foreign affairs.

Donald Trump says he was against the Iraq War. He was not. Donald Trump also says he was against going into Libya. He was not.

Donald Trump says Saudi Arabia, Japan, and others should have nuclear weapons. He said he wouldn't rule out using nuclear weapons in Europe.

Donald Trump has proposed building a wall along our borders. He's also called for banning Muslim immigration to America.

Donald Trump does not have the temperament, knowledge, or plans to lead this nation. He should not be our commander-in-chief, his temper is too dangerous. He should not have his finger on the nuclear button, he doesn't understand the power of those weapons. He should not speak for our nation. He will leave us isolated.

Being mad is one thing. Being stupid is another. We must not elect Donald Trump.

Trump Surging? Not So Much

Republicans fall in line, not in love. I want you to remember that as you watch the polls in the coming weeks and months, and act surprised that Donald Trump isn't losing by 15-20% in them against Hillary Clinton. Every time you hear how she's surprisingly weak against him, or how Bernie would do better remember what I said. Of course she's not doing better than Bernie, she's actually a candidate for the general election. Of course Trump is close or even leading some polls, he's the Republican nominee.

Look, eight years ago at this time, Hillary was doing better than President Obama in general election polls. When you're not going to win, you're being attacked less, and you do better. It's really not hard to figure out. Much as the Republicans would have attacked Hillary with every vicious lie that they are now in 2008, Republicans would turn on a dime and utterly decimate Bernie Sanders if he were the nominee. There's lots to attack, and i'm not even talking about calling him a socialist, though i'm sure they'd turn him into some combination of Mao, Castro, and Stalin by November. To be polite, Bernie is benefitting from less than full coverage. I think his Senate Chairmanship of the committee that oversees the Department of Veteran Affairs from 2013-2015 alone would disqualify him in the general election. Of course he polls well right now- because he isn't going to win. That is the main point. The person who is going to lose, always looks better at the end of the process.

So with that out of the way, let's talk about Trump's "surge." When he initially became the presumptive Republican nominee, Hillary Clinton had a double digit lead on him. Now he's tied or leading in many polls, causing a lot of people to grow concerned about her in the general election. We're a far cry from when most of the articles were talking about his bad map. Clearly this is bad for Democrats, right?

No. After winning the GOP nomination in 2008, John McCain enjoyed a good Spring in the polls. Mitt Romney did very well about now in 2012, after clinching the GOP nomination. What did I say in the first line of this article? All of this is just the GOP base-consolidating behind Trump. To be clear, i'm not saying Hillary Clinton is a stone-cold lock, or that she'll have a ten point lead in a month. Not at all. I'm saying the current polling is a product of formerly skeptical Republicans decided that Donald Trump is superior to Hillary Clinton amongst their choices. This is to be expected- they are Republicans. Coming in around 46% is also quite consistent with where ultimately McCain and Romney came in as well. The only recent Republican to do better than that in a general election was George W. Bush. Trump continues to suffer from all of the problems that Romney and McCain did in the last two elections against President Obama- bad polling numbers amongst African-Americans, Asians, Latinos, Women, Youth, and all other non-old, white, and male groups. You cannot win a national election just winning white people. Not in 2016. That day in American politics has come and gone.

I guess this is as good of a time as any to address the "Bernie or Bust" worries though. While no one is as annoyed as me at these people, it is worth noting that I don't think they are the end of the world that we treat them as. For one, about 66% of Sanders national support says they will back Clinton in the general election, a number that is in line with where Clinton supporters were with President Obama at this point in 2008. In the end, the overwhelming majority of the holdouts came around to the President, and there is no compelling reason right now to believe that won't happen. Some will not, but I'd also wager a guess that most of those voters have not been past Democrats. Do I like that this process goes on and continues to be nasty and divisive? No. However, in the end I believe she will get 85% or more of the Sanders support in the general. If i'm right, it will be enough. The real hardcore "Bernie or Bust" people will make their point, and that's fine. They can embrace their privilege of choice any way they'd like.

Now, none of this means i'm saying Hillary is in the clear. She has high negatives, and that's not being helped by this primary fight. Unlike President Obama in 2008, she is underwater with independents. She will have a tough time winning this race, and it probably will look more like 2012 than 2008. Could she end up as our generation's George H.W. Bush, winning a third term for her party in a landslide? Sure. She could lose too though, even though I doubt it. My point is that she's in for a fight.

Back to the main point at the beginning though- Republicans fall in line, not in love. Donald Trump is their nominee now. They hate Hillary. This isn't hard for them. Trump isn't really "surging" by picking up Romney and McCain voters. He needs a lot more than that to win. He's simply consolidating his base, something Clinton has not done yet.

Trump and the Economy

Donald Trump is woefully inadequate to serve as President on matters of the economy. As ridiculous and immoral as his positions on Muslims, foreign policy, and social issues are, all of that pales in contrast to his inadequacy on the economy, the one thing his supporters probably believe he is capable of managing as President. Donald Trump at least marginally knows how to run a business, and he is a master at branding. The man is a dysfunctional, illiterate mess on macroeconomics.

The government cannot be run like a business. Businesses exist to create profit in exchange for a good or service. Government exists to regulate business and provide services to a public that needs them. Businesses can go through bankruptcies when that makes economic sense. The government is constitutionally barred from defaulting on it's debt, and would cause a global meltdown if they did. Businesses have to turn a profit for their shareholders. The government has no mandate to create profit. The two entities have different objectives. They aren't the same. Trump, in his statements, has shown a basic illiteracy on macroeconomics that is scary.

Trump's recent declaration that the U.S. will never go into default on it's debt because it "prints money," in response to his early statements that he would negotiate with creditors to get them to take less in payments, is insane. It shows a complete lack of any idea of how government debt and monetary policy work. It also shows that while this guy may know how to run a casino, he basically knows nothing about macroeconomics. He doesn't understand that U.S. Treasury bonds, which finance our debt, require the "full faith and credit" of our nation to be worth squat. He also doesn't seem to understand the massive number of problems with just printing money to fulfill your debts. In short, the man is an ignoramus.

Donald Trump's macroeconomic skills are not on par with the average government employee in Washington, DC. That this man is saying such grotesquely stupid things should scare you as a citizen. In his first week as the Republican nominee, he has proposed a self-imposed default on the national debt and massive inflation, the likes of which we have never seen. That this man is one step from the White House is utterly horrifying.

The Donald is an Economic Imbecile

One of the biggest fallacies about this election that you will hear far too often is that Donald Trump is a skilled businessman. When you start off as the heir to hundreds of millions of dollars in several decades ago money, owning a business empire at seventy years old is not impressive. Donald Trump has outsourced and bankrupt his way through a business career that is really only distinguished by branding of himself as a product. Trump is certainly no Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, or Steve Jobs.

The other part of this fallacy is the idea that even a good businessman is fit to run the country. Running a business is not the same as running a government. The two things aren't compatible. In business, your job is to turn a profit. In public-sector endeavors, the job is to provide good services to the public that meet their needs. The other over-riding factor is that sometimes a private business can go bankrupt or default on it's bonds, because it's in the best interest of the shareholders. In the public-sector, the government cannot do that. The "full faith and credit" of our nation, really the backbone of so much of the world economy, depends on the United States paying it's debts.

Enter here the failed businessman and economic illiterate, Donald Trump:

On CNBC this morning Trump suggested that one strategy he'll use for reducing the national debt is having bond holders accept "haircuts". To be clear what that means, he'll try to get people who own US Treasury bonds and are owned X to accept X/2, or some reduced amount of what they are owed.

That's called defaulting on a debt obligation.

In other words, he wants to put the US through something like bankruptcy. Now, to be clear, in the world of business this is not at all uncommon. In a bankruptcy proceeding almost everyone takes a haircut. Many lose everything. You were owed $7 million and you have to accept $2 million. It often happens in simple business negotiations too. Things aren't going great. Debt has to be restructured to help the company survive. A creditor thinks they might lose everything so they'll accept 50 cents on the dollar.

So all good, except the United States is not a struggling casino. It's a sovereign nation with sovereign debt.

It is not too much to say that centuries of American prosperity have been undergirded by the "full faith and credit of the United States." In other words, the US always pays its debts in full and on time. Indeed, it's black letter text in the US constitution that the country's debt can never even be questioned. Defaulting on the national debt would clearly be unconstitutional.

That's the constitution part, which is a weighty matter. But the entire architecture of the global economy and the United States place in it rests on the certainty and basic risklessness of US government debt obligations. It's as simple as that. (This has actually allowed the US to in effect have people pay the Treasury to hold on to their money since 2008.) Introducing the idea that the US might pay back only a portion of the returns on Treasury bonds would basically disrupt the entire global economy, have massive and traumatic knock-on effects on the US economy and its ability to service its own debt. It would be catastrophic, an entirely self-inflicted wound.

A private company may, from time to time, be in a position where bankruptcy is a superior option to paying. The impact is that it will cost much more for that company to service it's debt, and borrowing money will be harder. Think about that from a national standpoint- The United States of America has had an unprecedented run of low-interest bond sales to finance it's debt, because the United States is one of the safest investments in the world. Quite obviously, the U.S. would have to pay astronomical interest rates and make gigantic, painful cuts to everything it does if it didn't pay it's full debt. The secondary impact is that the entire global economy may collapse under Trump's plan, because so many investors do hold U.S. Treasury bonds, or debt, and we would wreck one of the safest investments in the economy. What Trump just said is dangerous.

Oh, and unconstitutional. For all of my conservative friends who like to cite an imaginary constitution of their's, here's something actually unconstitutional for you to chew on- from the presumptive Republican nominee for President.

It Ain't Anti-Establishment Politics Tying Donald and Bernie...

I think this mostly gets what i've begun to suspect about 2016:

But first, allow me to rebut their ongoing theory of the case which is that this is all just a rebellion against “establishment politics” and “anger at Washington.” That argument held some water against dynastic sleepwalkerJeb Bush or Gang of Eight-er Marco Rubio, but most of the other candidates were not part of the establishment. But the greatest proof against this theory was demonstrated Tuesday night:

 

Ted Cruz, whatever else you think of him, is the most anti-establishment figure there is, and he was standing onstage with a high-powered, wealthy CEO who has never held public office, yet Trump managed to beat them all.

The reason is crystal clear, and always has been: it’s the racism, stupid. More broadly, though, it’s the racism’s kissin’ cousin, white male resentment, which isn’t just for white males. Trump has been forgiven every possible deviation from conservative orthodoxy and simple human decency because he has remained rock-steady about fighting the dirty Mexicans, the evil Muslims, and the uppity criminal blacks and their liberal allies. In his desperation, Ted Cruz actually managed to pick the only kind of hate that doesn’t sell so well anymore.

Van is onto something about Bernie Sanders, though it isn’t some general anger at Washington, either. Sanders’ largely white liberal support comes from a different strain of white resentment, a more patronizing one. While they all pay lip service to having the “right” positions on black issues, their overarching theory is that what’s good for everyone is especially good for black people, and if they’d only listen, they would get that. This is essentially what Bernie said at the beginning of his campaign, and what his campaignis still saying now. Yes, he was pressured into rolling out a racial justice platform, but even in that document, pivoted to his broader economic policies. Ask him today what needs to be done first, and his answer will be to overturn Citizens United and end economic inequality. "[Read more]

This author nails my sentiments about the current political season. 

Pundits and those in the chattering class like to dance around the real reason for the rise of Donald, but no matter how they try they can't escape the reality. Just look at the majority of his supporters and listen to what they are saying. 

And look, I get it. Angry working class whites who feel that they are entitled to god jobs and a Ozzie &  Harriet existence in America, cannot understand why they are losing everything, and Donald trump, with his Make America White Great Again brand, could not have come at a better time.

Whether we're talking about white nationalism or white liberalism, it's about a "White America" that is gone, and some don't want to accept that. I'm not a fan of identity politics, in general, but it's kind of hard to deny that which is staring you in the face.

Donald Trump is a Throwback Candidate to the Ugliest in American Politics

Many words have been used to describe Donald Trump this year. Often times though, we fail to really define Trump's campaign. This failure has lead to lazy analysis that treats Trump as though he is somehow an outlier in the GOP. In truth, he's not. He's a throwback candidate to some of the ugliest past political ideologies of both the GOP and the country.

Trump is the modern GOP. Mix old-Southern Democratism with 1910's isolationism, mix in some 1952 Taft with some 1920's Laissez-Faire economics, and then finally mix in some Neo-con garbage- because no matter how much he claims to be against war, he swears he's going to wipe ISIS off the map with our military. Red-baiting, women hating, blame the Mexicans for the job losses, and say you'll fight with China in a trade war. This may not all be the GOP of 2014, but he has re-awakened all the worst demons of the conservative mind, and put them all together to define the GOP of 2016.

Donald Trump is not some outlier in the Republican Party, he's just the most honest amongst them. This is who they are. This is what they are. We can argue all day about what the "intellectual conservatives" should do, but the reality is that Trump really does represent the base of the GOP. He's a throwback to what they've been since the day Ronald Reagan announced his 1980 general election campaign. This campaign is about racism. That's pretty sad in 2016. Let's not let it be made into an outlier though.

The Stones to Trump: Stop, Loser!

I love the Rolling Stones, but this just made me love them more:

Despite being the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump is having a difficult time finding a song to soundtrack his campaign. Over the past few months, Mr. Drumpf has used songs by Adele, R.E.M., and Neil Young, only to receive cease and desist notices from each artist. With Woody Guthrie’s music also out of the equation, Trump chose to soundtrack Tuesday night’s victory speech with Rolling Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” and “Start Me Up”.

Given that Keith Richards once pulled a knife on Trump, it’s hardly a surprise to learn the Stones have already issued their own cease and desist against the presidential candidate. According to a statement obtained by CBS, the band has not given permission to the Trump campaign to use their songs and “have requested that they cease all use immediately.”

Keith Richards remains the coolest dude in the world. Donald Trump? Still a loser.

Demographics Are Still Destiny

In 1988, George H.W. Bush won a landslide victory for President on the back of a 60% share of the white vote. In 2012, Mitt Romney got 59% of the white vote, and he lost comfortably. While it's true that Donald Trump may do better than Romney amongst white voters, Romney would have needed something in the neighborhood of 63% to win the electoral college in 2012. Trump would have to run extremely well to get there.

The problem that Donald Trump has is that even if he meets the benchmarks needed from Romney amongst whites to win, that might not do it. You see, the non-white share of the electorate in 2012 was 28%. There is a very good chance that the 2016 electorate will be close to 30% non-white. President Obama won 80% of this vote against Mitt Romney in 2012. Mitt didn't spend his primary insulting Latinos, calling for a ban on Muslims, saying President Obama was born in Kenya, putting down female reporters, or generally insulting every group but white men. Given Trump's divisive nature with minorities, it is fair to assume that the non-white vote will grow (as it has been, almost uninterrupted since 1980), and that Trump may very well do worse than Mitt Romney did losing 80%.

My guess is that Donald Trump will not get absolutely crushed in November the way that polls currently show. I hope and believe it's possible that he will do worse among white voters than Mitt Romney did, but I think it's more likely he's back around 60% of the white vote in the end. I also don't think that's good enough. In the end, I don't see how nominating someone who doubles down on a "whites first" political strategy will change any of the demographic problems the Republicans had in 2008 and 2012. That seems to be more of a "head in the sand" strategy than a bow to reality. There are some Democrats who don't agree with me, and think Hillary has to stop the bleeding amongst white voters, but frankly I think staying right on her current path means 300 plus electoral votes.

Pushing Back on the "Evil Hillary" BS

Whatever hopes were still left of "liking" both candidates at the end of the Democratic primary were basically put on some level of ice a few days ago, when Jane Sanders said "it would be nice if the FBI moved it along" in regards to the Hillary Clinton e-mail probe. While I strongly believe the FBI will eventually come out and say there is no crime in regards to Clinton's e-mail server, and I suspect Jane Sanders knows that too, she clearly wanted to put the impression that the outcome of this investigation is in question, which is basically what Donald Trump would like you to think too. I don't have any use for people who would run in the Democratic primary and scorch the Earth if they are not likely to be the winner in the end. We're rapidly arriving at that point in this process.

I always really liked Bernie Sanders, but that's rapidly not the case anymore. Hillary Clinton does not deserve the dishonest personal attacks and innuendo being shot her way by her soon-to-be vanquished primary opponent. I guess if you arrived to this process five minutes ago and think that there may be merit to Republican accusations against her on her e-mails or Benghazi, you might want to believe Bernie and Jane, but for the rest of us, the record speaks for itself. Republicans have accused her of everything up to murdering an aid over the past four decades that she has spent in the public eye, and not once has she ended up in trouble for illegal or unethical behavior. Despite the best efforts of the Republican Party to make people believe Hillary is a crook, there is not, and has never been, any kernel of truth to that.

The loose and misleading attacks against Hillary Clinton probably won't stop, because it's good politics with the bases of both Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. Bernie can loosely make it sound like Hillary gave paid speeches to Goldman Sachs while she was a Senator, even though that never happened, and his base likes to hear that. Unfortunately, that is the way these decisions are being made right now, and Jane Sanders is just nakedly laying that out there for everyone. There's not even a pretense of hiding this talk behind responsible language.

I'm not going to give any credence though to the idea that Hillary should be lumped in with Donald Trump as "unlikable" heading into November. Donald Trump has said bigoted, sexist, and false things in his campaign, and if he is really that unliked, has well earned it. Hillary Clinton, as the clear front-runner in this Presidential race from day one, has been the subject of attacks in a way that "more popular" candidates like Sanders and John Kasich never have. The good news though is that Clinton's unpopularity has not yet translated into any ballot-box weakness- despite the best attempts to tear apart the person, she leads the general election polls and has the most votes so far of any candidate in this primary election. Maybe most people are pretty smart, in the end.

Police Raids, Torture- Maybe the GOP Can Just Call for a Concentration Camp Next

Everyone who watched the terror in Brussels yesterday was horrified. The senseless death and pain inflicted on the public by the monsters of ISIS deserves a tough response. While that may not mean another ground war in the Middle East (in fact, it shouldn't, at least if we're fighting it), all decent people should join together to destroy ISIS.

We also should not abandon our values. We have a free and open society. The minute America abandons that for the sake of safety, we're just not the same people. We become not much better, frankly, when we start targeting innocents in any group of people, for the purpose of making others feel safe. Here's the truth- America is a very safe place, but there will always be exceptions to the rule. I ride in subways in New York, in Philadelphia, in Washington, and I know the risks associated with that. I do not want us to infringe on the civil liberties and human rights of others to make me .01% safer from the frankly impossible to totally prevent events like we saw in Paris and in Brussels. There will always be crazies. They will always commit harm. We will always be disappointed to see this. I think our government does a very good job preventing as much of this as possible. I'm fine with their current efforts.

Ted Cruz apparently is not though. He's a Presidential candidate, but he called for police to patrol and secure "Muslim neighborhoods." This disgusting suggestion of engaging in strong-man, "big brother" tactics across the nation are beneath a Presidential candidate. The good Muslim-Americans in Orange County, Dearborn, Brooklyn, and other places are not criminals, and do not deserve to have their civil rights infringed on by a megalomaniac like Cruz. This suggestion is beneath our nation.

But.... Donald Trump had to one up that. He accused British Muslims of not reporting suspicious activity, agreed with Cruz, and then said we need to go back to waterboarding suspected terrorists. Basically, Donald Trump called for us to use torture. This is obviously illegal, stupid, and doesn't work. He wants to do it anyway. Because of course he does, he's Donald Trump.

Since the GOP candidates are trying to one-up each other with crazy xenophobic statements about Muslims, I guess we can expect someone to call for "internment camps" like we used during World War II for Muslims, or maybe full-blown concentration camps after that. This kind of red-meat feeding to the masses of ignorant voters these two are attracting to the primary polls is well beneath the standard of such past Republican Presidents as Lincoln, Roosevelt, Eisenhower, and even Reagan and the Bush duo. The Republican Party should be embarrassed to have these men running for their nomination.