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Month: February 2016

The worst thing you will read today

Published by digby on February 17, 2016

The worst thing you will read today

by digby

The Washington Post reports:

The emails arrive at an accelerating pace. Once sporadic, they now come in an incessant stream of 40, 45 or 50 per day.

Most are in Spanish or Portuguese. Others are in broken English.

All of them express the same sentiment, the same fear, the same desperate plea.

“Help!” one email begins. “Zika in Venezuela. I need abortion!”

The emails are from mothers in Latin America who are scared of giving birth to children with microcephaly, the mysterious condition marked by an undersized head and brain damage that doctors have linked to the mosquito-born Zika virus.

Some of the women say they have already tested positive for the virus. Others say they only fear they have contracted the disease and that their child will be born disabled.

All of them are asking for something that is simple yet elusive — and generally illegal — in this part of the world: abortion pills.

In more than a thousand emails to Women on Web, a Canada-based group that provides advice and medication for women wanting an abortion in countries where it is banned, the women beg for the pills that are banned by law in their respective countries of Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru or El Salvador.

Leticia de Araujo (L) holding her daughter, one-month-old Manuelly Araujo da Cruz, who was born with microcephaly after being exposed to the zika virus during her mother’s pregnancy, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 11 February 2016.  (EPA/ANTONIO LACERDA)

I’m sure you’re wondering about the response of the “right to life” zealots to the prospect of millions of people born with a sever birth defect in poor countries. Yeah, they don’t care:

Babies with the brain disorder microcephaly deserve the same right to life as everyone else, Catholic authorities told South American countries this week as they work to curb the spread of the Zika virus.

The mosquito-borne virus, a growing concern in South America, is potentially causing brain disorders such as microcephaly in unborn babies whose mothers are infected. Microcephaly is a neurological disorder where a baby’s head is significantly smaller and the brain is abnormally developed, according to the Mayo Clinic. The condition is not typically fatal, but it can cause health problems throughout the baby’s life.

Several South American countries report that the number of babies born with the disorder has been increasing astronomically with the spread of the virus, though the link has not been confirmed. “Between October 2015 and January this year medics in [Brazil] have registered almost 4,000 cases of microcephaly in newborns, compared to 163 in a normal year,” according to The Pool.

Abortion activists are using the health crisis to push for legalized abortion in pro-life South American countries; but Catholic leaders responded to the push this week, contending that babies with microcephaly also deserve a right to life.

“Nothing justifies an abortion,” said the Rev. Luciano Brito, spokesman for the Catholic Archdiocese of Olinda and Recife in Brazil. “Just because a fetus has microcephaly won’t make us favorable [to abortion].”

It hasn’t changed their position on birth control either, in case you were wondering. And yes, the American “pro-life” movement is right there with them, spewing their usual noxious lies for cheap political purposes:

The abortion group’s actions are extremely troubling for multiple reasons. One of the problems with Zika is that it is difficult to diagnose. Health authorities say people who are infected do not necessarily show symptoms of the virus; and when they do, their symptoms can look like other illnesses. Similarly, conditions like microcephaly often are not diagnosed until women are 20 weeks pregnant or later. By offering abortions up to nine weeks, the Women on Waves group fails to mention that there is very little way of knowing at that point if the unborn baby or mother really are infected. Women could very likely be aborting healthy unborn babies and putting their own lives at risk. It also should be noted that no matter whether an unborn baby is healthy or sick, the baby deserves a right to life.

Another problem is with the drug itself. Chemical abortions can be deadly to the woman as well as her unborn child. Without a doctor’s visit or medical supervision (neither of which Women on Waves appears to be providing with the free, mail-order abortion drugs), more lives could be in jeopardy. Although Women on Waves says the abortion pill is safe, evidence from the United States indicates that’s not the case. In America, where emergency medical care often is readily available, the Food and Drug Administration documented at least 14 women’s deaths and 2,207 injuries from abortion drugs in the past 12 years, LifeNews previously reported.

It is possible that some of the courts in Latin America will eventually find an exception in the law that will make it possible for some of these women to terminate rather than force them to give birth to severely disabled children. Who knows how long that will take or if these people will do the right thing? In the meantime, there will be a whole lot of misery among women and their families. But then I guess that’s the point. Eve screwed up — women must pay.

I’m sickened by the total lack of compassion these people have for anything but a blastocyst and their own preeening egos. I sure hope all these people will tithe at least 20% of their income for life and volunteer to go down to Latin American to help take care of all these disabled kids born to people already living in grinding, hellish poverty, right? Because if they don’t and what they believe about God is true they’re all going straight to hell.

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Big Boss becomes Big Brother

Published by digby on February 17, 2016

Big Boss becomes Big Brother

by digby

This is really creepy stuff:

This passage from an article on the mining of employees’ healthcare-related (and shopping-related and credit-related and voting-related) data by big corporations released by The Wall Street Journal last night is really something:

Trying to stem rising health-care costs, some companies, including retailer Wal-Mart Stores Inc., are paying firms like Castlight Healthcare Inc. to collect and crunch employee data to identify, for example, which workers are at risk for diabetes, and target them with personalized messages nudging them toward a doctor or services such as weight-loss programs.

Yeah, the retail chain that has come under fire for its practice of hosting food drives for its own employees is among a group of companies looking to delve into those same people’s health records so they can be told to hit the gym.

The tech is so advanced that it even attempts to predict, based on data from company-affiliated insurers, whether an employee is considering a costly procedure like spinal surgery. Then, it sends that employee options for a second opinion. (“After finding that 30% of employees who got second opinions from top-rated medical centers ended up forgoing spinal surgery, Wal-Mart tapped Castlight to identify and communicate with workers suffering from back pain.”)

Even shopping history can be taken into account. Harry Greenspun, director of Deloitte LLP’s Center for Health Solutions, explained that big data companies can look at whether an individual is spending their money at a bike shop or a Gamestop and make reasonable conclusions about that person’s risks for certain diseases. He then went on to explain the merits of monitoring an employee’s credit scores, which could determine how likely they are to fill their prescriptions and stay healthy. There is also an apparent health-related benefit to keeping tabs on if someone votes in midterm elections.

Who thinks that employers would only use this information to “help” their employees? Exactly. More importantly, it’s none of their damned business.

From mandatory drug testing to the fact that employees can be fired for their political speech outside of work to the notion that your bosses religious beliefs should dictate what health benefits they are obliged to provide, employers already have way too much power over workers’ private lives.

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About those conspiracy theories

Published by digby on February 17, 2016

About those conspiracy theories

by digby

Yes, they are stupid:

Generally, when a 79 year old man who was known to be in poor health is found dead in his bed with no signs of a struggle, reasonable people do not immediately include “assassination” even if the deceased happened to be one of the most venerated figures in conservative politics. But the Internet is the Internet, and certain less-than-scrupulous websites have long realized that feeding the paranoia of the paranoid is always good for clicks, and so here we are.

I’m not going to link to any of these charlatans here, but suffice it to say that the fact that Scalia was found with his head under a pillow is now being used to strongly suggest that Scalia was murdered rather than died of natural causes. And the fact that Scalia’s wishes apparently included the cremation of his remains means that in some corners the freakout is reaching an absolute fever pitch.

I guess the story is supposed to go that the pillow is evidence that Scalia might have been suffocated, as opposed to the fact that he just sleeps with his head under a pillow, as tons of people do. How, pray tell, is that supposed to have worked? Scalia’s body was not found until Scalia the person had been missing for quite some time, so his would-be assassin was clearly not in a hurry.

One would think that a would-be assassin of an aged and ailing Supreme Court Justice who wanted to make his death look like an accident by smothering him with a pillow might have, you know, bothered to remove the pillow from Scalia’s head so as not to arouse suspicion after he was done with the act, but apparently reasonable thinking is not the currency anyone is trading in today. The fact that Scalia was found inside a closed room with no signs of forced entry and that he was in an apparent state of repose with unwrinkled clothes also does not matter.

Personally, I hope an autopsy is performed for the benefit of the public interest but in the absence of more evidence than what we have right now, I can’t say I’m compelled to disagree that it’s up to Scalia’s family as to whether one will be performed. And if one isn’t, I have no idea what indulging in these conspiracy theories will do for the country, but I have no doubt that people who have a financial incentive to stoke those flames will be telling us about the infamous pillow for years to come.

Uhm, that’s not from Daily Kos. It’s from Red State.

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Trump’s race baiting

Published by digby on February 17, 2016

Trump’s race baiting


by digby

I wrote about Trump’s latest race-baiting for Salon today:

In his press conference on Monday, a reporter asked Donald Trump what he would do with the DREAM kids, those undocumented young people who were brought to the U.S. as children. You’ll recall that in the wake of the failure of the DREAM act in the congress, President Obama issued a policy in 2012 allowing them to apply for a deferral of deportation, assuming they met certain criteria. In the past, Trump has insisted they would “have to go” along with their parents. In fact, he’s said that the American children of undocumented workers would be deported as well.
When asked about it in the press conference, he oddly said DREAMers were “great” and then launched into a speech which clearly gave the opposite impression:
You know what I want? I want dreamers to come from this country, ok? You mention dreamers, excuse me, you mention dreamers. I want dreamers to come from the United States. The people in the United States that have children I want them to have dreams also. We’re always talking about dreams for other people, I want the children who are growing up in the United States to dream also and they’re not dreaming right now.
Fair enough. But then he switched gears:
You look at African American youth, I mean 58% unemployment. You look at African Americans and they’re 30 years old an 40 years old and you have an African American president and he has not done anything for African Americans in this country, ok? And he got a free pass. Because if that were me or someone else, we would be taken over the coals.
Trump is known for exaggerating the unemployment rate, so the figure of 58 percent unemployment is wrong. Obviously. African American youth unemployment is too high, absolutely. But as Jonathan Capehart reported in the Washington Post last month, it’s actually lower right now than it’s been in years. In December 2015, black people aged 16-24 had a 17.6 percent rate of unemployment, down from the all time high of 34 percent during the worst of the Great Recession in 2011.
But the point he seemed to be making was something else: that the president had put the well-being of Latino immigrant youth before that of African Americans and that if it were anyone but Barack Obama, African Americans would be angry about it. That’s a typical right-wing whine, unsurprising coming a man who claims he will be better for African Americans than the first black president —  and he’ll do it by punishing all those Latinos that president allegedly prefers.
For the most part, there has not been a history of antagonism between Latinos and blacks as regards immigration. There have been some prominent African American politicians of the past, like the late Congresswoman Barbara Jordan, who believed that immigration brought down wages which helped keep African Americans in poverty. This is currently being exploited by anti-immigrant groups using her words in advertisements to make the case for closing the borders.
But most economists do not believe that wages are suppressed by undocumented workers, and institutions which used to be hostile to immigration, like unions, have changed their position on the issue. In fact, the immigration debate is much more focused these days on culture, citizenship, “welfare” and the abstract notion of sovereignty than on wages. African American leaders are squarely with the Democratic mainstream position in favor of comprehensive immigration reform.
Pitting Latinos against African Americans remains a tactic on the anti-immigrant far right, however, where nativist groups like VDARE fatuously declare their deep concern for the well-being of African Americans while running articles like this onefrom John Derbyshire, in which he complains about Beyoncé’s “anti-white thunder thighs.” Their insincerity toward the problems of the African American community couldn’t be any clearer.
No one can say that Donald Trump is not very tuned in to the anti-immigration right. And these comments juxtaposing the DREAMers and African Americans did not happen in a vacuum. As a matter of fact, Trump has released a new ad that comes at this theme from another angle:
Breitbart News wrote about the ad when it was first released explaining that Trump is trying to attract African American votes in South Carolina. And according to Buzzfeed, Trump and some of his racist friends actually think they have a chance to woo African American voters with this appeal:
As the possibility of Trump winning the nomination sinks in, some Republicans have been floating this theory: that Trump could put black voters like Jackson and Cook in play for Republicans in the general election.
This theory — which is mostly being pushed by a few pollsters, fringe black operatives, Trump sympathizers, and Trump himself — is rooted in the idea that black voters aren’t as excited about either of the leading Democratic contenders, and that Trump’s high name ID and life story could win over a higher percentage of black voters than GOP nominees have been able to secure in recent presidential elections.
One problem: Public polling does not currently back this theory up, when it comes to Trump himself or the policies he’s proposed.
Still, the theory hasn’t died — even among establishment Republicans in Washington. They won’t publicly talk about it, but the idea has come up in private discussions on Capitol Hill, half a dozen sources say.
It’s far fetched to believe that African Americans are going to vote for Trump just because he’s famous. They are loyal Democrats who are not going to be swayed by the obvious manipulation in that ad. They surely feel sorry for Mr Shaw’s loss but to people who are often subject to collective punishment for the acts of a few, this argument isn’t likely to be persuasive.
Trump is deluded enough to think African Americans will vote for him, but he is more likely doing what conservative always do — seeking to prove they aren’t racist even as they propose racist policies.
Which is especially rich, considering that Trump has a long history of racism, of a very ugly sort. Here’s just one example:
After the brutal rape of a white jogger in Central Park in May 1989 received widespread media attention, and amid a rise in crime rates nationwide, Trump took out a full-age ad in four New York City newspapers with the title “BRING BACK THE DEATH PENALTY! BRING BACK THE POLICE!” He did not specifically reference the Central Park jogger attack in the ad, but its timing made the connection inescapable.
“Mayor [Ed] Koch has stated that hate and rancor should be removed from our hearts. I do not think so. I want to hate these muggers and murderers. They should be forced to suffer and, when they kill, should be executed for their crimes. They must serve as examples so that others will think long and hard before committing a crime or an act of violence. Yes, Mayor Koch, I want to hate these murderers and I always will. I am not looking to psychoanalyze them or understand them, I am looking to punish them. If the punishment is strong, the attacks on innocent people will stop. I recently watched a newscast trying to explain “the anger in these young men.” I no longer want to understand their anger. I want them to understand our anger. I want them to be afraid.
“How can our great society tolerate the continued brutalization of its citizens by crazed misfits? Criminals must be told that their CIVIL LIBERTIES END WHEN AN ATTACK ON OUR SAFETY BEGINS!”
Trump was referring to five young black and Hispanic males who were in custody at the time. They were all tried, convicted and sentenced to multiple years in prison — and they were all innocent of the crime. Years later, they were exonerated. They sued the city and were awarded $40 million dollars.
Forty million dollars is a lot of money for the taxpayers of New York to pay when we are already the highest taxed city and state in the country. The recipients must be laughing out loud at the stupidity of the city.
Speak to the detectives on the case and try listening to the facts. These young men do not exactly have the pasts of angels.
All these years later and he has not changed one bit. Indeed, “your civil liberties end where our safety begins,” could be his campaign slogan. He has no moral compass and cares nothing American constitutional principles. Latinos and African Americans will have no problem recognizing him for what he is and rejecting his attempt to use them for his own ends. They know his type very, very well.

Cruzing to second place? by @BloggersRUs

Published by Tom Sullivan on February 17, 2016

Cruzing to second place?
by Tom Sullivan

A large sedan with magnetic Ted Cruz signs on the doors was out front when I returned to my South Carolina hotel last night. (I spend a lot of time in SC.) Two men in Cruz tee-shirts were in the lobby this morning discussing their volunteer list over breakfast. (Someone backing Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida seems to have beaten them to reserving the conference room off the lobby; the double doors are plastered with Rubio’s name.) None may have been with the actual campaigns.

Over the weekend, a large “Choose Cruz” sign appeared at a major intersection in an upscale part of Greenville, SC near the Michelin North America headquarters. One of the largest employers in the state, Michelin is known by some vendors as the “blue Mafia,” although Greenville County, where last Saturday’s GOP debate took place, is perhaps the reddest part of South Carolina. Republican Congressman Trey Gowdy of the Benghazi hearings fame represents the area.

A sandwich place near the intersection is a hub for business people to have lunch meetings and for pastors, youth ministers, and churchy people to meet to talk about churchy things. Maybe a third of the people in there pray over their meals.

Two guys eating beside me last week were talking about a friend who was making some pocket money canvassing for Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. They spoke about how this country needs a Christian in the White House, and Christians teaching in our schools, etc., etc. The one guy was new to the area and shopping for a church. One he mentioned favorably had a pastor who was “politically engaged.” That was a selling point. There are no lines between church and state for this sort. The Bible tells them so.

It seems Ted Cruz is receiving a lot of paid help in South Carolina from PACs (one in particular) encroaching on traditional campaign turf:

Said super PAC, called Keep the Promise—which is actually sub-divided into several different PACs, each funded by a different billionaire family—has blithely tossed the traditional super PAC playbook to the winds. In fact, they’ve taken on typical campaign operations: gathering voter data, targeting likely Cruz supporters, and knocking on thousands of doors to get out the vote.

The super PAC has had upwards of 250 people canvassing the state, targeting the homes of persuadable Republican voters. Thus far, they estimate they’ve knocked on more than 93,000 doors. And by Election Day, they’re shooting to have knocked on 100,000. In any given week, they say, 100 to 150 individual people spend eight-hour days doing the door-knocking. And most of them get paid.

[…]

Keep the Promise staff explained that the group has been door-knocking across the state, in a few targeted regions and counties, since last November. In early January, those door-knockers started focusing on persuasion: identifying likely Republican primary voters who favor an Evangelical Christian candidate, knocking on their doors, and having conversations aimed at persuading them to back Cruz

Meanwhile, the Cruz campaign proper is calling on local TV stations to stop airing an attack ad on Cruz sponsored by a different super PAC, American Future Fund:

“The ad falsely claims ‘Cruz proposed mass legalization of illegal immigrants.’ Ted Cruz has never introduced, outlined, or supported any policy that would give legal status to illegal immigrants,” wrote Eric Brown, general counsel to the campaign, in the letter shared with the media. “Indeed, quite the opposite, Ted Cruz led the fight in Congress against legislation written by Senator Rubio, among others, that created legal permanent status for millions of people in the country unlawfully. At least two fact-checks have evaluated this claim and determined it to be false, and others found no evidence to support it.”

American Future Fund has spent heavily against Cruz in Iowa and in South Carolina, painting the senator in the latest spot as soft on immigration enforcement and “weak” on national security, including by tying him to Bernie Sanders and President Barack Obama. POLITICO reported last week that the group, which is overseen by veteran GOP operative Nick Ryan, is spending $1.5 million on broadcast and cable stations through Saturday, the day of the Republican primary.

For all the PAC money and Cruz’s “punching up” at Donald Trump, given Trump’s dominance in the race (it is about dominance, isn’t it?), Cruz is liable to finish second at best, PACs or no PACs.

(h/t reader JH for photo)

Michael Moore steals ideas from other countries in Where to Invade Next @spockosbrain

Published by Spocko on February 17, 2016

Michael Moore steals ideas from other countries in Where to Invade Next


by spocko


Last week I watched Michael Moore’s new film Where to Invade Next, the GOP and Democratic debates.

The GOP debate was funny and confrontational. The Democratic was optimistic and educational.

The movie was the funny, optimistic, educational and provocative. It was also made me a bit sad, but that shouldn’t stop people from watching it, because it has a lot to offer about what Americans say we value vs. how we act.

In the movie and the debates people talked about ideas that could help Americans succeed.

Moore showed specific ideas and programs already implemented in foreign countries that helped a majority of the citizens there. During the debate Sanders talked about ideas and programs that he believes could create a better future for most Americans here. Trump gave ideas and slogans that looked to the past that he believes would help “many many” Americans win–again.

They all said they want to help America and Americans. The distinction is which America and which Americans they want to help win.

One of the movie themes that struck me is how often the idea of putting “me” first vs. “us” first is pushed in America.  Moore asks why a CEO would walk away from more money that came at the expense of workers. A CEO who doesn’t put money over employees seems puzzling to someone familiar with American management. How is less money for the CEO a win?  Isn’t a bigger win for the CEO, usually defined monetarily in America, what they should naturally want?

The idea of winning at the expense of others seemed a bit…foreign to the people interviewed. If you have to compete with foreign slave labor savvy American companies find a way–by using America’s new prison slave labor force.

Another big movie theme was the dignity of humans and their lives. Moore raised the question to various citizens around the world, why are you, your government and your business leaders doing these nice things for the people in your country?  They also raise the issue of who are your countrymen and why should they be helped.

It reminded me of an old story about a guy who knew that taking care of your neighbor, as well as yourself, was a good thing. But he didn’t really want to, so he asked a teacher to define neighbor. Was his neighbor the one who was from the same religion? From the same elite family? Interestingly, the teacher’s definition of neighbor involved a person from another country–with a different faith–who did the right thing.  

In the movie they talked about how American values have been eaten away here in the US, and how in current American establishment culture money really trumps everything.  (Yes, yes, pun intended)

Perhaps this explain why Trump feels he is qualified to lead,. “I’m qualified because I’m super rich.”

Why isn’t the right hating Where to Invade Next more?

Where to Invade Next, is one of Moore’s most optimistic films–and least confrontational. He pokes fun at his own persona from past films like Roger and Me when he meets with business CEOs and political leaders.

He interviews other officials and working people in other countries who explain their ideas and programs in education, workers’ rights, health care and abortion, women in politics, crime, prosecution of crimes, remembering of past crimes and prison systems. Connecting these is a theme of human dignity, community and the ability to make change that benefits a lot of people vs. only a few.  He contrasts these with programs and attitudes in United States.

The people in other countries are often flabbergasted by how mean-spirited, short-sited and sad our programs are here in the United States. I was nodding along in agreement listening to Moore describe what happens in America in schools and work and it made me sad. I thought, “What is WRONG with us?”

At some point in the movie I felt a tribal protective attitude, “Hey, don’t pick on my country/state/city, neighborhood/school!” and “We aren’t all bad! He’s cherry picking! Italy and France have problems too!” Moore addresses that right up front by saying he knows he is picking the flowers, not the weeds.

When someone on the left criticizes America and suggests there is another way to act we hear the usual defensive denial and anger. “If you don’t like it here, LEAVE” Of course these are the people who “send a message” to other countries by renaming their deep-fat fried potatoes. Message received, it was delicious. So the idea of bringing the ideas here, vs going there, confuses them.

Why are programs that would clearly help a majority of Americans attacked?

A friend who is widely traveled said he had been waiting 20 years for people to see how other countries did things. He wondered, how can these good things not be clear to Americans? I explained that there are people whose full-time job it is to push division and hate of others–and that doesn’t count the unpaid volunteers. Moore points out that fear is a money maker in the US. Since other countries don’t spend almost 60 percent of their taxes on the military, they can have those nice things. But it’s not just about moving money around from one program to another. It is also about attitudes about people, the role of government and what constitutes a good life.

We have seen that a message of hating others can unite people. Keeping people angry and afraid can make a lot of money for some people. In America we are using the majority of our tax money to kick the crap out of people in other countries and to pay for real and imaginary programs to protect us from old terrorists and the new ones we have made.

Michael Moore reveals the shocking truth behind the French lunch program! 



We say we value education but cling to programs that don’t work, we say we want a happy and a healthy working life, but encourage and reward programs and incentives that destroy jobs, crush dreams and sicken people.  He shows us examples of how other countries make good programs work. This part was hopeful, but made me sad too.

As I said, this is one of the least confrontational of Moore’s films. It is fun to watch him be welcomed into factories and government offices. This gives him the opportunity to show solutions rather than just problems. It’s a nice switch from trying to meet CEOs in America.

Near the end of the film Moore goes to the Berlin Wall to point out that attitudes can change. Good ideas do take root and succeed. Positive changes have happened, and in our lifetimes. The fight for good things is worth it, but it won’t be easy.

Spocko sez, check it out. Two Vulcan salutes up

QOTD: The Good Doctor

Published by digby on February 16, 2016

QOTD: The Good Doctor

by digby

Sometimes I wonder what’s in the cocktails they’re serving in the wingnut bubble these days:

Dr. Ben Carson says Republican presidential candidates wouldn’t be calling on deceased Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s replacement to be nominated by the next president if a member of their party currently held the White House.

Asked on WRNN 99.5 FM in South Carolina if his fellow candidates would say the same thing about waiting to nominate a new justice if there was a Republican president, Carson replied, “No, they wouldn’t.”

“But then again, recognize that the two picks that the president has selected are ideologues, so there’s really no reason to believe that his next pick wouldn’t be an ideologue also,” Carson said.

Republicans don’t appoint ideologues in case you were wondering.

Hey, whatever works, amirite?

Rush’s take

Published by digby on February 16, 2016

Rush’s take

by digby

In case you were wondering:

If you look at South Carolina, it is an open primary, meaning Democrats can vote. We took advantage of this, Operation Chaos, Democrat side back in 2008. Democrats can vote, independents can vote. And the things that Trump said and did Saturday night came out of nowhere. They didn’t make any sense. Here we are in a Republican primary, and Donald Trump, out of the blue, starts blaming the Bush family for 9/11, for knowing that the intelligence was made up, that there never were any weapons of mass destruction, and they knew it, Trump said.

Michael Moore doesn’t even say that. The World Trade Center came down when George W. Bush was president so don’t anybody tell me, Trump said, he kept us safe. He jumped all over the Bush family and the Iraq war and claimed that he was on record way, way back as always being opposed to the Iraq war, that it was going to muddy up the Middle East and cause a quagmire. Nobody can find any record of Trump having opposed the Iraq war in 2001, 2002. They asked him about that, and he said (paraphrasing), “I wasn’t a politician back then, so the things I was saying weren’t getting noted like they would be had I been a politician, but I said it.”

On the stage at a Republican debate, Donald Trump defended Planned Parenthood. Not the abortion stuff, he said, but the fact that they do great things for women’s health. Folks, there were a number of occasions where Donald Trump sounded like the Daily Kos blog, where Donald Trump sounded like the Democrat Underground, sounded like any average host on MSNBC. And I said to myself, “Now, wait a minute. What’s going on?” Trump is not — I don’t care what any of you think, he’s not stupid. He has political advisors. He has a lot of people who are conservatives who are there to tell him where the boundaries are, and he crossed those boundaries on Saturday.

I don’t know how many people in his circle knew where he was going Saturday night, if he was gonna go there and how far. But on a Republican debate stage, defending Planned Parenthood in language used by the left, going after George W. Bush and Jeb Bush and the entire Bush family, for the most part, using the terminology of Democrats, people think that Trump was out of control, that he had emotional incontinence that night. You like that term? Emotional incontinence. Lost control. Was out of control. Well, maybe, but I still think there was a strategy going into this.

Short version, I think Trump strategically was making a move on independents and Democrats in South Carolina since it’s open. And I think that he wants to wrap this up ASAP. I think he wants a blow ’em out, going-away win in South Carolina. I think he just wants to wrap this up. I think he thinks he can. I think the audience booing him ticked him off. It’s been happening the last couple, three debates. The donors have gotten a majority of the tickets. I don’t recall any Republican debate with the amount of booing that I heard on Saturday night.

I remember debates with very little applause, but not outright booing. And it wasn’t just Trump. It was Cruz as well. The establishment’s trying to rig these debates as they are seen on TV. The establishment was trying to humiliate and embarrass Ted Cruz and Trump. And I think it really ticked Trump off and may have been — I’m wild guessing here — may have been one of the reasons why he was a victim of emotional incontinence.

I don’t think Trump “strategizes” that specifically. But he’s probably aware that the South Carolina primary is open and that he can drag in some yahoos that aren’t normally Republican voters. Maybe even some Democrats who don’t like the woman or the socialist.

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Cruz’s Trump Card

Published by digby on February 16, 2016

Cruz’s Trump Card

by digby

It’s hard to know why this wouldn’t show up in polling this close to the election but it’s quite interesting. Betsy Woodruff is an excellent journalist who has great insight into the right wing so she may be privy things the rest of the pack is overlooking:

South Carolina, as you may know, is kind of a big deal. It has a large population—4.8 million people—and a bad reputation because it’s a place where candidates love to break out their dirtiest tricks.

Or, in the case of Ted Cruz’s super PACs, their most experimental. The cluster of well-funded super PACs boosting Cruz’s candidacy is trying out a new tactic in the Palmetto State, indicating the extent to which super PACs are encroaching on traditional campaign turf.

And it has Cruz’s rivals scared.

Said super PAC, called Keep the Promise—which is actually sub-divided into several different PACs, each funded by a different billionaire family—has blithely tossed the traditional super PAC playbook to the winds. In fact, they’ve taken on typical campaign operations: gathering voter data, targeting likely Cruz supporters, and knocking on thousands of doors to get out the vote.

The super PAC has had upwards of 250 people canvassing the state, targeting the homes of persuadable Republican voters. Thus far, they estimate they’ve knocked on more than 93,000 doors. And by Election Day, they’re shooting to have knocked on 100,000. In any given week, they say, 100 to 150 individual people spend eight-hour days doing the door-knocking. And most of them get paid.

Traditionally—to the extent that we have age-old super PAC traditions—super PACs pay for expensive TV and radio ads. Federal election law forbids them from coordinating with the campaigns they try to boost, so shelling out big bucks to produce and air TV ads has been their natural role. And that’s what most of them have done in this cycle—from a pro-Rubio super PAC running birther-esque ads ominously intimating that Cruz is darkly influenced by his Canadian roots, to the pro-Bush Right to Rise PAC, which got President George W. Bush to star in a spot boosting Jeb.

That’s the norm. Campaigns run events, corral volunteers, and staff regional offices; super PACs slap up ads.

South Carolina politicos describe it as an effective, relentless operation. And it has some of Cruz’s opponents feeling a little jittery.

“I’ll be very shocked, honestly, if Ted Cruz doesn’t win the primary,” said an operative for a rival campaign, citing Keep the Promise’s blanketing of the Upstate.
Trump has led by double digits in all the recent Palmetto State polls. But some are skeptical that his lead is really that commanding. And they point to the different ground games—particularly, to that of Keep the Promise—as evidence for their doubt.
Keep the Promise staff explained that the group has been door-knocking across the state, in a few targeted regions and counties, since last November. In early January, those door-knockers started focusing on persuasion: identifying likely Republican primary voters who favor an Evangelical Christian candidate, knocking on their doors, and having conversations aimed at persuading them to back Cruz.

“What we are doing right now is what I dreamed about doing as Scott Walker’s state director,” said Dan Tripp, who formerly helmed Walker’s South Carolina operation and now runs the show there for Keep the Promise.

South Carolina has strange gothic political practices that aren’t easily discerned by the normal methods. I don’t know how this plays out — or if Trump’s body slams on Cruz will have the desired effect. But it’s interesting that they’re doing this in any case. I don’t know that anyone anticipated that Super PACS would be used for evangelical ground game.

It’s another little data point that shows how the old political practices are changing in the face of Super PACS, technology, celebrity and the shrinking of power within the political parties. It’s a whole new game.

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