Countdown to Extinction: The 2016 Presidential Election

[Marc]

Man, the entire system is rigged.

Where's my 6.5 Mannlicher–Carcano?

[Karl Henning]

Independent candidate Evan McMullin, who might win Utah, says that his mother is married to another woman.

This is like the real-life, non-comedic parallel to Isaac in Manhattan, one of whose earlier wives "left me for another woman."

[San Antone]

Only if she wins, but ...

Get ready for four more years of Clinton scandals

And not limited to just her emails, which of course will drag on -

the Wall Street Journal reported this weekend that, according to sources, the Obama Justice Department limited efforts by FBI agents to investigate whether the Clinton State Department gave special access and favors to Clinton Foundation donors. Congress will certainly investigate whether there was improper interference in those FBI efforts. And there will almost certainly be investigations into ABC News' recent revelations that State Department officials gave special treatment to Clinton Foundation donors after the Haiti quake, asking for them to be identified as "FOBs" (friends of Bill Clinton) or "WJC VIPs" (William Jefferson Clinton VIPs) while sending others to a government website.

There will also be investigations into the Wall Street Journal's revelations that the political organization of Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (a Democrat who is a longtime "FOB"), and the state Democratic Party he controls, steered some $675,000 into the campaign of Virginia Senate candidate Jill McCabe, whose husband, Andrew, later helped oversee the Clinton email investigation as deputy director of the FBI. The Post reports that the FBI is also investigating whether McAuliffe, who was an unpaid director of the Clinton Foundation, violated a statute regarding U.S. citizens' lobbying on behalf of foreign governments.

It is a mighty big swamp to drain ...

[Karl Henning]

Donald Trump is refusing to pay his campaign pollster three-quarters of a million dollars

Donald Trump's hiring of pollster Tony Fabrizio in May was viewed as a sign that the real estate mogul was finally bringing seasoned operatives into his insurgent operation.

But the Republican presidential nominee appears to have taken issue with some of the services provided by the veteran GOP strategist, who has advised candidates from 1996 GOP nominee Bob Dole to Florida Gov. Rick Scott. The Trump campaign's latest Federal Election Commission report shows that it is disputing nearly $767,000 that Fabrizio's firm says it is still owed for polling.

Trump campaign officials declined to provide details about the reason the campaign has declined to pay the sum to Fabrizio Lee, the pollster's Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based firm. "This is an administrative issue that we're resolving internally," said senior communications adviser Jason Miller. Fabrizio did not immediately respond to requests for comment....

[Karl Henning]

Only if she wins, but ...

Don't be glum:  even if El Tupé wins, we can have criminal investigation of a president!

Two experts say Donald Trump should be investigated for criminal tax evasion

[Karl Henning]

Hacked emails suggest Trump was right after all: Clinton got previews of some debate questions

[Karl Henning]

While we may get another scandal later this week (and why not), it would be fitting if this was how the 2016 presidential election ended: with the media in an utter frenzy and Republicans carried aloft on a wave of joyous outrage over a story about Hillary Clinton that has literally zero substance to it, but consists only of speculation about hypothetical crimes that someone might have committed.

This is what happens when a party nominates Donald Trump to represent it. The Republican reaction to the James Comey mess highlights the moral and psychological compromises the GOP has made in order to justify its choice, and this will poison our politics for years to come.

Right now there are basically two kinds of Republicans, if we set aside that small number who have decided that they simply cannot support Trump. There are the enthusiastic Trump supporters, and then there are the reluctant ones, who find him repellent but nonetheless prefer him to the alternative. Both these groups have convinced themselves that Hillary Clinton is not merely wrong on the issues or even unethical, but positively evil, a figure of such transcendent malevolence that American politics has never seen anything like her before.

Consider this poll out today from Politico and Morning Consult, which asked whether respondents agreed with Donald Trump's assertion that, as the poll read, "the issues around Clinton's emails are worse than Watergate." Eighty-two percent of Republicans said they agreed. Eighty-two percent.

So that's become an almost universal belief among Republicans: Clinton's use of a private server for her emails is worse than the worst political scandal in American history, in which an entire panoply of crimes was committed by dozens of people, including break-ins and money-laundering and document-forging and obstruction of justice, in which those who went to prison included the attorney general, the White House chief of staff, and the president's chief domestic policy adviser, in which the president of the United States resigned after his own party informed him he was about to be impeached and would surely be convicted. The email story is worse than that.

This is not merely wrong or ahistorical. It's lunacy. It's like saying, "This paper cut I got on my finger? Worse than pancreatic cancer."

[drogulus]

     I'm ready for Clinton scandals. What impact will they have on government is something else. I haven't a clue. It could be bad, but I don't see how Repubs will behave much differently impeachment-wise. They need to have something to fill the void from not governing and they have plenty to choose from even if nothing else pops up.

     Good Sense Dept: Hillary can count on Congressional Repubs to make a hideous mess out of any opportunity they are handed. Any legitimate complaints against Hillary will continue to be buried in a mountain of Breitbartian sludge. The voters Repubs court and fear will demand no less.

[Parsifal]

The idiocy that the campaigns have been sent into Chaos because that reptile Weiner's computer had some emails from a Clinton aide that might contain some emails from Clinton that might not have already been collected. They couldn't actually look at the emails before making announcements? Lord, this feels like the end of days.

[Turner]

Leading senator claims the FBI has hidden proof of the Trump campaign coordinating with the Russian government:

http://www.unian.info/world/1599667-senator-claims-coordination-between-donald-trump-russia.html

[Marc]

ARE YOU SAYING 'E-MAIL' TO THAT OLD WOMAN?

Um.... yes.

OH, WHAT SAD TIMES ARE THESE WHEN PASSING AGENTS CAN SAY 'E-MAIL' AT WILL TO OLD LADIES.
THERE IS A PESTILENCE UPON THIS LAND... NOTHING IS SACRED.

[San Antone]

'What Trump represents isn't crazy and it's not going away.' Peter Thiel defends support for Donald Trump.

Billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel reiterated his support for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump Monday morning, telling a room of journalists that a Washington outsider in the White House would recalibrate lawmakers who have lost touch with the struggles of most Americans.

Thiel said it was "both insane and somehow inevitable" that political leaders would expect this presidential election to be a contest between "political dynasties" that have shepherded the country into two major financial crises: the tech bubble burst in the early 2000s, and the housing crisis and economic recession later that decade.

The support Trump has enjoyed is directly tied to the frustration many across the country feel toward Washington and its entrenched leaders, and they shouldn't expect that sentiment to dissipate regardless of whether Trump or Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton wins at the ballot box on Nov. 8, he said.

[Herman]

Absolutely. A narcissistic pseudo-billionaire, obsessed with the young ladies, would definitely restore DC feeling 'for the struggles of most Americans'.

As frigging if

[Madiel]

You are assuming a lot.  There is a good chance that Clinton did know of these emails since the laptop was used by both Weiner and Abeidin. 

That is also assuming a lot.

[Karl Henning]

They're only allegations against El Tupé (presumption of innocence!), but Lock Her Up!

(* munches popcorn *)

[amw]

I've been following 538's election coverage as per usual, and man, it increasingly seems like they're almost as sick of this election year as I am.

Kind of hard to blame them. Pretty sure the Republican Party could have literally chosen Adolf Hitler as their nominee and the race would still be within a few percentage points. All the year's revealed is the extent to which American society is still driven by misogyny, classism, racism and xenophobia, and how those things are probably never going to change no matter how many likely outsiders challenge party elites for leadership.

I guess I'm glad Clinton's probably going to win because at least she'll keep the status quo instead of actively making things worse, but as 2016 has shown, the status quo is already pretty shit, honestly.

[drogulus]

     

All the year's revealed is the extent to which American society is still driven by misogyny, classism, racism and xenophobia, and how those things are probably never going to change no matter how many likely outsiders challenge party elites for leadership.

     The economic situation has made the divide between Red and Blue America worse. While the Blues may face the headwinds of slow growth with optimism about future improvements, the Reds see more pain. When policy makers set growth this low it's going to be uneven, not as bad as Greece/Germany because we have a fiscal union, but bad enough to enable populist extremism in the hardest hit areas.

[Karl Henning]

. . . Pretty sure the Republican Party could have literally chosen Adolf Hitler as their nominee and the race would still be within a few percentage points.

Yes, although my preferred counterexample has been Gaddafi.

[San Antone]

Tracking Polls: ABC/WP: Trump +1 | LA Times: Trump +4 | IBD/TIPP: Clinton +1

[Brian]

Tracking Polls: ABC/WP: Trump +1 | LA Times: Trump +4 | IBD/TIPP: Clinton +1

Did that LA Times poll include the teen black Trump voter?