Trump on Bringing Guns to GOP Convention: I Have not Seen the Petition

Score on for Tom Brown here, he's been on about the next step for the GOP as allowing firearms at the RNC convention.

Now there is indeed a petition for exactly that.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2016/03/26/20000-sign-petition-allow-guns-republican-national-convention/82289342/

Again, this shows a law of US politics in 2016 as firm as any law of thermodynamics: you can never come up with a scenario too farfetched for the 2016 GOP. What is meant as satire will be reality soon enough.

I guess you have to give the GOP 'credit for consistency' here. For ages liberals have excoriated them for not being consistent and allowing guns at the convention.

"Republicans Want Guns In Schools But Not At Their National Convention"

"So it might come as some surprise that this year’s Republican National Convention in Cleveland will completely bans guns. The event will be held at the Quicken Loans Arena where “firearms and other weapons of any kind are strictly forbidden.” (Guns were banned at the 2012 Republican National Convention as well.)"

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2016/03/27/3763744/republican-convention-guns/

I wonder what Judd Legum, the TKP writer, has to say now. The GOP is being consistent now!

And this goes to something I have long believed: those obsessed with consistency are wrong. So often consistency is a stupid consistency.

Anyway, here's the cherry on top: Trump was on This Week with Stephanopolous this week and said he hasn't seen the petition. You know, he has to see the fine print. 

In other news: did Ted Cruz actually pay Carly Fiorina hush money over #CruzSexScandals? I don't know but  enquiring minds want to know. 

"Did 2016 Republican Presidential contender Ted Cruz pay Carly Fiorina’s campaign to keep her quiet about an affair? It’s unlikely, but Twitter speculation abounds."

"Chatter about the “scandal” stems entirely from a National Enquirer story that hit newsstands March 25, alleging Cruz had affairs with five women. The Enquirer ran pixelated headshots of five women that the tabloid claims had affairs with Cruz. One of the headshots appears to be of Carpenter, but there’s no evidence to back up the Enquirer’s report."

"A Ted Cruz-affiliated Super PAC, Keep the Promise I, donated $500,000 to rival Carly Fiorina’s presidential campaign in July 2015. The Washington Post noted that the donation was “unusual” at the time, but Twitter and the National Enquirer claim to have a key piece of context: Cruz was having an affair with Fiorina staffer Sarah Isgur Flores."

"The Enquirer claims that Cruz cheated on his wife with five different women over the course of his campaign. While the Enquirer pixelated the photos it ran with the story, Twitter sleuths posting at #CruzSexScandal have claimed to unravel a few of the mysteries."

http://heavy.com/news/2016/03/ted-cruz-hush-money-carly-fiorina-sex-scandal-affair-sarah-isgur-flores/

This GOP primary is just Christmas every day and twice on Sundays.

Who Died and Made Ruth Marcus the Resident Expert on the Politics of Sex Scandals?

Never Say the GOP Primary hit Bottom

It can always get lower. More, it always will lower. It's basically a natural law that the GOP primary will always get lower.

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/03/how-do-you-know-its-lie.html

For some reason:

1. Ruth Marcus has put herself forward as some sort of authority regarding when a sexual scandal is 'fair game' in a political campaign and when it's not.

2. In her supreme expertise on sex scandals and the political weight to give them, she says that it's fair game for Donald Trump to bring up Bill Clinton's 90s affairs and for Hillary to be held accountable for infidelities for which she was a victim because she called Trump a sexist.

3. Evidently, Ms. Marcus believes that there is a rule that says if you as a woman call a man a sexist but your husband has cheated on you, you are a hypocrite.

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/03/why-is-bill-clintons-past-fair-game-but.html

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2016/03/25/with_tweets_on_heidi_cruz_trump_sinks_to_new_depths__130105.html

4. On the other hand. for some reason, Ted Cruz's alleged sexual affairs are off limits. Trump doesn't have the right to bring them up-if he did, after all it was the National Enquirer who put these stories out-after Ted Cruz's super PAC put out a picture of Trump's wife in a GQ spread.

That is not fair game because it wasn't Ted Cruz who did that just a super PAC that was trying to help him win. Because candidates never have anything to do with their super PACs. They abide by a Chinese wall. And if you believe that I have a bridge to sell you.

So much for Rush Marcus. Meanwhile just when you think it can't get worse, it does. It turns out that some of Cruz's alleged infidelity partners are very well known.

"It hasn’t taken much detective work to determine the identities of two of the five women whose slightly obscured photographs appear in the National Enquirer as supposed Ted Cruz mistresses. One of them is Donald Trump spokeswoman Katrina Pierson (who isdenying any involvement), and the other is Carly Fiorina deputy campaign manager Sarah Isgur Flores (source). If the claims are false, these women can – and probably should – file lawsuits against the Enquirer. However if the claims are true, it paints Cruz as a man with so little sense of boundary that he seduced the very last women in the world he should have been eying."

"On the other hand, if someone like Donald Trump did fabricate and plant this entire Enquirer story, as Cruz is claiming, it would be politically convenient to falsely tie Cruz to these women in particular. It would also be incredibly cutthroat of Trump to make up a fake accusation about his own spokeswoman having an affair with his rival. Who would put their own employee through such tribulation? Though, considering Trump’s track record toward women, it wouldn’t be shocking. But the Fiorina campaign angle adds another, more bizarre twist."

"Last summer, this publication and others reported that the financially strapped Carly Fiorina campaign was being kept afloatby a half million dollar gift from a Super PAC which was supposed to be helping Ted Cruz. It was a strange enough development that even the Federal Election Commission was prompted to ask for clarification. At the time it was thought that Cruz and the republican party might have been keeping Fiorina in the race so they would have a female candidate who could bash democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton. It was also speculated that Cruz might have been planning to pick Fiorina as his running mate if he won the nomination."

"Fiorina’s campaign fell apart as she dropped to zero in the polls, ending any such scenarios. But now, at the least, the incident begs for reexamination. If the Cruz sex scandal story is true, did the half million dollars have something to do with the affair? And if the sex scandal story is false, is whoever made it up trying to falsely tie Cruz and Flores together due to the fact that the half million dollars gives plausibility to the idea that something was going on?"

"In other words, there appear to be only two possibilities here. One is that Ted Cruz is the victim of a brilliantly evil fake scandal which falsely paints him as a man who is so out of control he can’t help but get involved with the top female employees of his direct political rivals. The other is that Ted Cruz is in fact a man who is so out of control he can’t help but get involved with the top female employees of his direct political rivals. And now the fate of the republican race hangs on which of those two completely opposite scenarios is in fact the truth."

http://www.dailynewsbin.com/opinion/ted-cruz-accused-of-affairs-with-trumps-spokeswoman-and-fiorinas-campaign-manager/24264/

Not to add any more gist to the mill-I would never do that as Ruth Marcus says this is off limits-but it's further interesting that Carly Fiorina has actually endorsed Ted Cruz and been out campaigning for him.

"Sex scandals tend to unfold rather quickly, as evidenced by the fact that we already know the identities of two of the five women supposedly involved (again, they’re both victims here if the scandal is proven to be a fake one). So I expect the truth to be fully revealed long before the republican convention. If the story is true, Cruz is finished. If the story is false and it’s determined that Trump planted it, Trump may be finished. If the story is false and Trump didn’t plant it, the prognosis is unclear. Regardless of whether anyone including me thinks elections should hinge on something like this, it now appears the republican nomination largely does."

Actually, the idea that the story is false and Trump didn't plant it is possible. The etymology of this story seems to have originated with the Marco Rubio campaign's opposition research on Ted Cruz. 

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/03/25/ted-cruz-affair-rumors-peddled-by-marco-rubio-s-allies.html

It's not implausible that Trump planted this story with the NE-this is a story that even Breitbart thought beneath its standards. 

Trump is buddies with the NE owner and it has endorsed him. But if Trump planted the story it's probably only second hand as it originated with the Rubio campaign. 

I Wish Maureen Dowd Good Health and a Long Life

At least until January 2017 when she has to see the day her nemesis, Hillary Clinton is sworn in as POTUS.

That was my first reaction to Maureen Dowd's piece on President Obama this morning. Nothing to do with the piece, just my first thought whenever I think of Maureen Dowd-which I mostly avoid doing overly much.

She has some observations on Obama.

"BARACK OBAMA is tangoing into history, and there’s something perfect about that."

"The tango has been described as vertical solitude. And this president is all about vertical solitude."

"Republicans are frothing and comics are tweaking about the baseball diplomacy in Cuba and the tango diplomacy in Argentina, juxtaposed with the terrorist attack and manhunt in Brussels."

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/27/opinion/sunday/obamas-last-tango.html?ref=opinion&_r=0

It is amazing, though, how popular President Obama is again. A new Gallup poll has him now a plus 9 in his approval rating. 

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_obama_job_approval-1044.html

A 53 percent approval rating in this day and age of partisan warfare is like a 73 percent approval rating 20 years ago. Why is this? Even some conservatives like Scott Sumner, Dave Henderson, and David Brooks are praising him now.

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/03/why-president-obama-is-so-popular-now.html

It's simple, you don't appreciate what you've got until it's gone. With the Trumpian primary, it's now clear how much worse the country could do. 

Back to Maureen Dowd:

"Barack Obama started off as a man self-consciously alone on stage and that’s how he is exiting. He is, for better and worse, too cool for school. His identity is defined by his desire to rise above the fray. Unfortunately, he is in politics, which is the fray."

This is why I am going to be interested to see the effect of Hillary's Administration following his own. The one thing she understands is the fray.

Hey Maureen: can I sit with you at the Inauguration? I'm paying.

"Obama shot to prominence at the 2004 Democratic National Convention with a rousing speech about boldly moving past our barriers — red and blue, black and white. But those divisions are more pronounced than ever. So now he brings people together and gets things done when he can, like importing modernity to Cuba and inveigling China on climate change."

"The president has a bristling resistance to what he sees as cheap emotion. (See: flag pin, 2008.) That has led him, time after time, to respond belatedly or bloodlessly in moments when Americans are alarmed, wanting solace and solutions."

"The Christmas bomber; the BP oil spill; James Foley beheaded by ISIS, the Paris attacks, the San Bernardino attacks, and now Brussels, which he discussed rationally and briefly with ESPN at the baseball game, wearing cool $485 Oliver Peoples sunglasses beside a cool Derek Jeter."

"He feels that fanatics who are not an existential threat to us want to disrupt our lives and we should not let them; that more people die slipping in their bathtubs than in terrorist attacks."

That anthropological detachment — the failure to viscerally connect and vigorously persuade, the lip-curling at needy lawmakers, jittery Americans or anyone else who does not see things as he does — may keep him from being a Mount Rushmore president."

I'm not so sure he won't be on Mt. Rushmore. Certainly he will if I have anything to do with it. 

He is right of course about the slipping in the bath tub and that the terrorists do want to disrupt our way of life. I find Obama welcome after the endless saber rattling of the Bush years. 

But it's true that the theatrical side of politics has never been Obama''s thing. Again, this may be the side  of him that Hillary will be able to round out when she takes the baton from him in 2017. She is able to talk about terrorism more in the way that many seem to want to hear. 

I get why Obama is frustrated about the need for theatrics-after all, he again proved he knows what he's doing by taking out the number two ISIS leader in Syria days after Brussels. But the theatrical side has always dogged him. 

In 2012, the reason he lost that first debate to Romney was his impatience with the need to perform. 

I mean what was interesting about that debate is that while everyone said he got smoked by Romney there was not a single substantive point you can really point at and say Obama messed up. He wasn't beaten substantively, but he gave a poor performance in the opinions of most who watched it. 

"Obama went to a baseball game with Raúl Castro just 15 months into their working relationship. It took him six years, with his trade bill — one of his top foreign policy initiatives — on the line, to go to the congressional baseball game, toting some White House home brew."

"If he were up for re-election, the president probably would have forced himself to appear more emotionally responsive to the terrorist attacks, urged on by his staff."

"But he clearly feels liberated in the homestretch, relishing what he can do alone, venting privately about world leaders, lawmakers and pundits who have not risen to his lofty standards. Once he read about F.D.R.’s legislative prowess. Lately, he has been buffing up on Teddy Roosevelt blowing a raspberry at Congress and expanding executive power."

What if Obama could run for a third term? Matt Yglesias recently wrote a post that claimed that Obama would win in a landslide if he ran today while Hillary is a 'weak candidate.'

I do think Obama could win again, and I agree with Yglesias there is no good reason for the two term limit other than the GOP was afraid of another FDR in 1948. 

Still, remember that American politics are a strange thing. You are always a lot more popular when you aren't running for anything anymore. In part Obama is more popular again as he's what he always wants to be: a nonpartisan figure. 

We hear now that Hillary is a 'flawed candidate.' This is very shortsighted. It's true her personal approval ratings are upside down with her stuck around 40 percent give or take a few points. Not where you want to be. 

But in 2011 and 2012, during Obama's reelection she was at the zenith of her own personal approval at 63 percent. Then even most Republicans approved of her. Then she again put her hat in the partisan ring. 

Back then many argued that Obama should drop Joe Biden for her. Last year we heard the opposite: Hillary is a flawed candidate who should get out for Joe Biden. No one was calling him a gaffe machine anymore. 

Last Maureen Dowd quote:

"He was a long way from 2008, when a Fox TV channel in Houston blew up a story about an Obama volunteer who had the unpatriotic temerity to have a Cuban flag with a picture of Che at her desk."

"Conservatives then were trying to smear Obama as a socialist. Now many Democratic voters, especially young ones, are disappointed that Obama wasn’t liberal enough and are gravitating toward a real socialist rather than the president’s preferred successor."

There is some irony here that while Obama was smeared by the Right as a socialist for years with the emoprogs mad he never was a socialist. But don't gloat Ms. Dowd. There aren't enough to stop Hillary from being the next POTUS. I wonder what Dowd thinks her chances are for making Mt. Rushmore?

Again, I'm buying, Maureen.

Huffington Post Writes Most Embarrassing Post of the Entire Primary

If you want to see an alleged news outlet that is totally in the tank for a candidate it's Huff Po and it's love for the Bern. Last week they wrote an article that 'proved' Bernie was really winning the nomination where it counted.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-abramson/sanders-currently-winning-democratic-primary-race-ill-prove-to-you_b_9528076.html

I'm sure when she is being sworn in next year Huffington Post will still be saying that.

Last night Bernie did what he needed to do but he's still very well short and that will be his nadir. Whether or not he wins Wisconsin in 10 days, it won't be by 40 points.

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/03/a-good-night-for-bernie-but-this-is-as.html

Whether he wins by 2 points or she wins by 2 points, it''s still a win for her. Right now Bernie is predicting a stampede of super delegates to him because he has won a bunch of white caucuses with very low turnout. I think a debate for the future is in order whether we want to keep the caucus system at all.

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/03/a-good-night-for-bernie-but-this-is-as.html

It's ironic that Bernie is running as the champion of the working class when he does best in a format that is really biased against workers.

Iowa, will no doubt jealously guard it's caucus. Beyond that, we may see many states move off this in the coming years.

As embarrassing as the Huff Po piece is, this new theory of the race by Bernie is pretty embarrassing too.

"I think the momentum is with us," Sanders said on CNN's "State of the Union" with Jake Tapper on Sunday. "A lot of these superdelegates may rethink their positions with Secretary Clinton."

The Vermont senator swept Saturday's Democratic contests in Washington, Alaska and Hawaii, easily winning the majority of the 142 pledged delegates in those states. The biggest prize of the day was in Washington, which offered 101 delegates to be split up on a proportional basis.

The latest delegate counts still put Sanders behind Clinton, however, with 1,004 pledged delegates to her 1,712.

Of those, 469 are superdelegates who have pledged to Clinton and only 29 have pledged to Sanders."

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/274402-sanders-superdelegates-may-jump-from-clinton

It's amazing what silly things Bernie has said about SDs in the last two months considering that his campaign manager, Tad Devine, basically invented the SD system.

1. When she still has a pledged delegate lead of 268 why would they switch over?

2. There has been voting in 31 states so far and she is winning 58 percent of the popular vote.

3. He has won 9 of 11 caucuses but she has won 16 of 20 states and there are few remaining caucuses.

4. The SDs from the states that he won big are a small number of the outstanding SDs.

5. SDs are not bound delegates. If they were they would't be SDs. Bernie saying they have to vote for whoever won their state falsely tries to take out the super nature of superdelegates. In 2008, for instance, the reason many of the superdelegates moved from Obama to Hillary wasn't because that's what democratic principles demand so much as they wanted to be on the side of the winner.

I'm currently reading a good book about Hillary-her rebirth at the Obama State Department.

http://www.amazon.com/HRC-Secrets-Rebirth-Hillary-Clinton/dp/0804136777/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1459028730&sr=8-3&keywords=hillary+clinton+secretary+of+state

It starts with the end part of the 2008 primary. Interestingly it talks a little about the race for superdelegates back in 2008. What you have to remember about Bernie today is that he's in Hillary's position in 2008 only two or threefold.

Bernie hopes to win NY-as if my state would ever feel the Bern-CA, NJ, Pennsylvania, etc. Here's the thing: she won all these states in 2008. She also won Michigan and Ohio. She had some much more solid wins than he will get. No way does he win NY by 14 points as she did in 2008.

Ironically he's trying to run the 2008 Hillary playbook that failed and he's trailing her 2008 pace anyway. She actually won Arizona and Texas while he lost them by landslides.

In 2008 she won Pennsylvania by 10 points. Yet the above linked to book shows that Hillary and Bil tried to get a superdelegate in PA by pointing out she had won the state and won his district by 31 points. He still went with Obama: to back the winner.

This is what Bernie doesn't admit. The SDs are going to want to back the likely primary winner whether or not she won their state or not.

6. I get why Bernie is talking about the SDs again. If you factor in the SDs last night, then according to Politico this morning, he gained just 5 delegates on her in Hawaii with two remaning outstanding. In other words, that could take his margin down to 3 points. In Washington state while 118 delegates are up for grabs, only 48 have been allocated so far:

23 for Bernie

18 for Hillary

7 remain undeclared.

These are probably undeclared as they'r'e waiting for a safe time to get behind Hillary. So of the 48 allocated so far it may well be the case that she actually is leading 25-23. Or maybe losing only 25--23, depending on the preferences of the 7 undeclared. My guess is that most are for her or they'd already get behind Bernie, the winner of the caucus.

The question is what about the remaining 70 Washington delegates? Good question:

"Saturday's caucuses will elect 27,170 delegates, proportionally allocated to each candidate. Those delegates will then move on to county conventions and legislative district caucuses, where a smaller group will advance to the congressional district caucuses at the end of May, when 67 delegates will be elected to the Democratic National Convention. The following month, the remaining 34 delegates will be chosen and bound based on the ratio of support determined at the May 21 congressional district caucuses."

http://www.kiro7.com/news/kiro-news-app/washington-democratic-caucuses-saturday-coverage-and-where-to-find-results/180566529

So the real caucus isn't until May 21. This vouchsafes with a very interesting piece Rachel Maddow did the other day on the 2012 GOP primary where Ron Paul was able to finagle the rules and win some states where he got very few popular votes. 

The key thing to realize is this: the party decides in truth and it chooses Hillary. That may seem unfair-but remember technically that's us as well. We as loyal, engaged Democrats are part of this process. The party has chosen Hillary. 

The caucus system is hardly a democratic ideal in any case. Such a small percentage are able to vote in those that Bernie's campaign that has been so dependent on white caucus states is in no position to lecture anyone on the democratic process. 

A Good Night for Bernie but This is as Good as it's Going to Get

He did what he needed to do tonight. He won the states he was supposed to win by big margins-over 80 percent in Alaska, and 72 percent in Washington-where 101 pledged delegates hang in the balance.

Having said that she still has a very large pledged delegate lead.

"Noting the “huge” voter turnout — in Washington, Democratic Party officials estimated more than 200,000 people participated on Saturday, close to the record set in 2008 — he told the crowd, “We are making significant inroads into Secretary Clinton’s lead.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/27/us/politics/election-results.html?_r=0

The Bern is taking some license with the words 'significant inroads.' She still holds a very large lead, over double the largest lead Obama had over her in 2008-and his lead proved to be insurmountable. One reason Bernie says he continues to fight on is that, after all, she did it in 2008.

Her deficit wasn't as big, but in any case she packed it in early June. Surely he doesn't plan to go beyond that.

"The victories in Washington and Alaska, which awarded 16 delegates on Saturday, slightly narrow the gulf with Mrs. Clinton in the quest for the 2,382 delegates needed to clinch the Democratic nomination. As of Saturday evening, Mrs. Clinton had roughly 280 more so-called pledged delegates, who are awarded based on voting, and 440 more superdelegates — party leaders and elected officials — than Mr. Sanders."

When the dust settles she still leads him by over 700 delegates and is over 71 percent of the way there to 2383. And this is going to be his highwater mark of the campaign.

DailyNewsBin plausibly argues that Hillary will likely get her 2383 by May depending on how timid the undecided superdelegates declare for her-most of them will. First of all they are Democrats and don't want to vote for a democratic socialist whose renting out the party.

Besides that, most delegates would rather support the winner.

http://www.dailynewsbin.com/opinion/when-will-hillary-clinton-mathematically-clinch-the-democratic-nomination-i-think-i-know/24240/

Here's the way to look at it:

"After a rough day, Hillary Clinton takes her massive lead into much more favorable April states."

http://www.dailynewsbin.com/opinion/hillary-clinton-takes-massive-delegate-lead-and-popular-vote-lead-into-favorable-april-states/24256/

Wisconsin is next and is worth 86 delegates-there are 10 superdelegates, most of which will go to her. Whether he beats her by a few points or loses to her by a few points the result will be the same: she wins and he loses. 

Because they will come out roughly with the same number of delegates which is a loss for him. As she's over 71 percent to the Promised Land, a tie is a win for her as she still gets about 45 delegates or so out of the state. 

 Bernie and Tad Devine make a lot of noise about winning NY. I don't know what their basis for thinking they can win my home state is. Judging by the conversations I'm hearing, there aren't too many Bernie supporters in the state of NY. If I know my fellow New Yorkers they don't want any part of Bernie. 

But again, the state is worth almost 300 delegates and even if he were to win by a couple of points she'd still end up with close to 150 when you factor in the 47 superdelegates. 

By the way, supderdelegates aren't going to feel intimidated with arguments that say 'Well we won your state by 1.5 percent so you better support us to make sure your being democratic.'

As it's' a proportional system many SDs will come from areas Bernie lost anyway. And a lot of SDs will care much less about who won their state by 2 points and rather who is going to win the nomination. 

If HRC gets 150 delegates that by itself would get her 22 percent closer to the nomination. And that's assuming he wins by a few points. The polling and what I know about my state says that she will win this comfortably-the word Jim Clyburn uses to predict her margin of victory in his South Carolina. 

Comfortably in SC meant almost 50 points. 

Why President Obama is so Popular Now

In this age of partisanship, understand: a 51 percent approval rating is like a 71 percent approval rating in the old days. He is in truth about as popular as Bill Clinton was in the late 90s.

The difference is that Hillary unlike Gore is running on Obama's record rather than Gore in 2000 who wanted to be a populist outsider.  The irony is that while Obama had at one time in 2008 considered her for VP-his team had to talk him out of it-she is effectively running as his VP; Secretary of State is close enough.

It's funny, Obama has been getting some love even among some conservative voices like David Brooks, Scott Sumner and David Henderson lately.

http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=31576

http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2016/03/kudos_to_obama.html

Yes, sometimes you don't appreciate what you have until it's gone. David Brooks kind of says it all:

"As this primary season has gone along, a strange sensation has come over me: I miss Barack Obama. Now, obviously I disagree with a lot of Obama’s policy decisions. I’ve been disappointed by aspects of his presidency. I hope the next presidency is a philosophic departure."

"But over the course of this campaign it feels as if there’s been a decline in behavioral standards across the board. Many of the traits of character and leadership that Obama possesses, and that maybe we have taken too much for granted, have suddenly gone missing or are in short supply."

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/09/opinion/i-miss-barack-obama.html?_r=0

As for this 'philosophic departure' I think that ship has sailed with the fall of Marco Rubio. 

But Brooks is right: he and many conservatives have taken Obama's virtues for granted. I think that party of why his numbers are up is the contrast to this surreal primary campaign. 

It also should further enhance Hillary's chances. 

Why is Bill Clinton's Past 'Fair Game' but Ted Cruz's Isn't?

I notice a lot of sympathy for Ted Cruz from Beltway pundits in his latest fights with Donald Trump and funny enough, I feel no sympathy for Cruz whatsoever. Just review his own body of work and whatever he gets now is pure Karma.

Cruz did start it off in the gutter with that picture of Trump's wife. Now, ok, it was a super PAC but we know that's often a distinction with little difference. It's not as if Ted Cruz has disavowed the super PAC in question.

Now we have the National Enquirer story about Cruz's alleged affairs and there are all these pundits trying to defend him. I'm certainly not interested in defending Ted Cruz. How do I know whether he has or has not been faithful to his wife?

The media defense of Cruz also irritates me as they all took Trump's side when he went after Bill's past infidelities. Why is that relevant to Hillary's campaign in 2016 what Bill did in 1996?

It seems that the 'penchant for sexism' is not just Donald Trump's the Beltway press which was delighted to have the issue of Monica Lewinsky reopened.

"How Much Should We Care About Ted Cruz’s Alleged Affairs?

Read more: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/ted-cruz-sex-scandal-press-coverage-213769#ixzz440tZjTtF


With Hillary the infidelities that she was a victim of 20 years ago, the media has decided remain 'fair game.' With Ted Cruz they have a different standard. Now are these stories true? Again, I have no idea.

"To be sure, with the Evangelical voters, it may not matter whether it's true or not. The accusation could be enough:

"How much damage will the National Enquirer allegations do to the Cruz campaign? According to Gawker, which has read the story, none of the alleged paramours are named, and their photos reproduced in the piece are pixilated, presumably to deter speedy identification. How can we convict on such sketchy evidence, even if that sketchy evidence appears to be more substantial than Lessard’s case against Kennedy? On the other hand, the publication has a pretty good track record catching cheating notables (Hart, Edwards, Tiger Woods, Jesse Jackson). Maybe it has temporarily vagued-out the specifics of Cruz’s alleged affairs because it plans to drip-drip-drip the details into the public over the course of several issues to sell more copies."

"If true, the story will be damaging. But even if false, which is entirely possible, the charges will be almost as damaging to Cruz, because he can’t afford to spend scarce time and political capital on the controversy to refute and erase the stain. He’s too busy fighting Trump for the nomination!"

Read more: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/ted-cruz-sex-scandal-press-coverage-213769#ixzz440uhJ3nu