04/17/16

Oops: Donald Trump mistakenly touts poll showing that Cruz is gaining on him

By: Renee Nal | New Zeal

Image via Breitbart

On Saturday, Donald Trump re-tweeted Twitter user @AshleyEdam claiming that a CBS Poll showed Trump was starting to gain Cruz supporters. Of course, like our friend @umpire43 (see here, here, here), Ashley turns out to be spreading completely false information as the poll showed the exact opposite: Trump is LOSING support to Cruz.

As reported at CBS News on Thursday, Trump’s “margin over Cruz has decreased.” In one short month, “Trump’s lead over Cruz was 20 points, but now it’s dropped to 13 points…”

Here is the original Tweet:

New CBS Poll shows defections from Cruz’s core supporters & increased support for @realDonaldTrump …Not surprising.

— Ashley Edam (@AshleyEdam) April 16, 2016

Read more here…

02/7/16

PREDICTION VALIDATED: Trump Poll Numbers May Be Vastly Inflated Due to Reality Show Name Recognition

By: Malcolm X. Cromwell | Doug Ross @ Journal

Two-and-one-half months before last week’s Iowa Caucus, columnist S.A. Miller of The Washington Times noted what could be called “The Trump Effect” on poll numbers with an article entitled “Donald Trump seen unlikely to win in Iowa despite poll numbers“:

Laura Kamienski, a Republican Party caucus precinct representative for Hiawatha District in Cedar Rapids … said she expects a surprise in the caucus this cycle similar to former Sen. Rick Santorum’s unexpected win in 2012. Mr. Santorum is back in the 2016 Republican race but is polling near the bottom of the crowded field in Iowa and nationally.

…Pollsters defended their survey methods and stood by their numbers. But some credited Mr. Trump’s dominance in polls to his near-universal name recognition as star of the hit TV shows “The Apprentice” and “Celebrity Apprentice.”

Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski dismissed any doubt about the poll numbers. He said it was coming from the same “political pundits who have been wrong every step of the way” about Mr. Trump’s candidacy, including predicting he would fade after the summer… He also noted that they had hired the Iowa organizer from Mr. Santrorum’s 2012 campaign, Chuck Laudner, who is considered one of the most formidable grass-roots organizers and get-out-the-vote strategists in the state.

At the time, Trump and Carson were dominating the polls in Iowa. As it turned out, Kamienski — who pointed out that she had seen no real evidence of large-scale Trump support — astutely predicted a surprise in February. That turned out to be case as Ted Cruz walked away the victor by a significant margin.

The critical question that Miller and others have raised is the possibility that some poll respondents choose Trump based not upon policy positions but because they recognize his name.

In my non-scientific discussions with various registered voters, I have discovered a rather significant percentage who are unfamiliar with the name of any GOP candidate, except for that of Donald Trump.

Mention Trump’s name, however, and you see faces light up. The recognition and the reality show association is immediate. Quite a few are able to parrot Trump’s (in)famous quote from The Apprentice — “You’re fired!” — but know little else of the candidate’s background or political preferences.

Of course, many Trump advocates are quite familiar with the candidate and are certainly energized to vote. A Trump advocate observed after a November speech by the GOP frontrunner that many of the attendees “are not simply gawkers or fans of his TV shows.”

I suspect that many of these people are frustrated with the additional burdens and strife that Obama and the federal government have inflicted upon them; they are turning out as a result of Trump’s fame and the role he portrayed on his reality television show.

The term “low-information voter” may be too harsh, but I suspect that many Trump supporters feel the increased problems weighing them down but they can’t exactly identify the cause nor the origin of their problems.

They are not aware of imminent crises here and abroad, but they have then taken Trump’s reality show role and are applying it to the real world. They then conclude in their own minds that whatever the reason for the problems, Donald has always been successful dealing with it on TV and they extend that notion to Donald being the answer in present world circumstances.

These folks have stayed glued to the television for so long that they are convinced that the Donald is the solution to their problems. They have, however, come to the realization that they cannot change the channel.

With that said, it is also likely that many poll respondents who offer Trump as their preferred candidate do so only because they recognize his name.

This could provide insight into Trump’s inability to meet the pollsters’ predictions in Iowa and it could portend further disappointment for the billionaire real estate investor.

It may also explain Trump’s lowering of expectations in New Hampshire over the past several days.

Hat tip: BadBlue Real-Time News.

07/27/15

The Senate Circus and Donald Trump Advances

By: Denise Simon
FoundersCode.com

It was tantamount that Republicans took control of the Senate to get rid of Harry Reid

..check…we made that happen.

It was imperative that we get rid of the Export-Import Bank

…check we did that too.

Given the recent investigative videos on Planned Parenthood, we were well on the way to do that too….until….Mitch McConnell and several other republican senators voted for their own elitist’s agenda and dismissed ours.

Trump is advancing because he is saying what we need to have said without using measured words. So, is anyone in the Senate or any other republican candidates scratching their heads yet on this ‘in-your-face- Trump-phenomenon? Simply put, Americans cannot tolerate cheating and lying much less obstruction. Below, Daniel Horowitz spells it out.

Yesterday’s Circus in the Senate is Exactly Why Trump is Surging

By: Daniel Horowitz | July 27th, 2015

When Donald Trump uttered the words “I like people who weren’t captured” in response to a question about Sen. John McCain’s service in Vietnam, there was a universal sentiment among both admirers and detractors that he would sink like a rock in the polls. His meteoric rise was destined for a swift collapse. Except – that collapse never occurred. Why not?

Trump Maintains his Lead in the Polls

According to a new CNN-ORC International poll, which was conducted a week after Trump’s major gaffe, Trump is leading the field nationally with 18% of the vote, followed by Jeb Bush and Scott Walker. As Breitbart observes, Cruz is now beginning to surpass Rubio for 4^th place. In addition, a new NBC News/Marist poll shows Trump with a commanding lead in New Hampshire, leading his closest rival 21%-14%.

When was the last time a Republican survived such a widely circulated career-ending gaffe?

In order to understand this unprecedented stubbornness of the GOP base in coalescing around a protest vote like Trump, look no further than the circus on display in the GOP-led Senate this past Sunday.

The Sunday Massacre in the Senate

What was the emergency impetus for this rare Sunday session in middle of the summer? Were the senators meeting to overturn Obama’s Iran alliance? Were they preparing a package of bills to “comprehensively” address the imminent problem of criminal illegal aliens? Were they holding a crisis session over the Supreme Court’s coup against our Constitution and the impending disaster of anti-religious bigotry unfolding in a number of states? Were they concocting a response to the growing homegrown Islamic terror attacks on our soil? Did they finally decide that our military bases, which have become prime targets for terror attacks, should be populated by armed soldiers instead of unarmed soldiers?

Nope – none of the above. They met on Sunday to renew the corporate welfare Export-Import Bank, the one government agency conservatives have successfully closed down for the first time in years. They met to rush through a massive $300 billion highway bill, in which McConnell blocked all amendments addressing some of the aforementioned issues so that the amendment process can be reserved for the crony Export-Import Bank.

The Senate voted 67-26 to reauthorize the Ex-Im Bank and attach it to the “must-pass” highway bill. This amendment was supported by 24 Republicans. Accordingly, McConnell has now followed through with his private commitment to attach Ex-Im to the highway bill, in contravention to what he told GOP members privately. Yet, instead of exhibiting outrage over McConnell’s lie, Sens. Hatch, Alexander, and Cornyn – three allies of McConnell – took to the Senate floor to condemn Cruz for calling him a liar. If only they cared as much about our Constitution and the existential national security and sovereignty threats as they did “Senate decorum.”

Yes to Corporate Welfare, No to Conservative Priorities

Next, Cruz attempted to force a vote on an amendment prohibiting the lifting of sanctions on Iran until they recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state and release the four U.S. hostages. Although his amendment was ruled out of order, any senator can force a vote overruling the decision of the chair if 10 other senators (for a total of one-fifth of the 51 quorum) join to “second” the request for a vote. Yet, for the first time in recent memory, GOP senators refused to second the motion, thereby saving Democrats, once again, from having to vote on Iran and Israel. McConnell and Corker had already blocked such amendments in May when they originally passed the unconstitutional Corker-Cardin Iran bill.

John Cornyn had the nerve to argue Sunday that the Corker-Cardin process has already granted the Senate sufficient oversight over the Iran deal and that there was no need for Cruz’s amendment. Evidently, he’s not up on the news that Obama has already abrogated that process.

Finally, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) attempted to offer an amendment to defund Planned Parenthood. Once again, he was rebuffed by the chair and he could not muster even 10 colleagues to force a vote on defunding Planned Parenthood.

Hence, corporate welfare is in; fighting Iran and Planned Parenthood is out. Is this what the American people thought they were getting when they voted for a GOP Senate last November?

The American people, and the GOP base in particular, are tired of liars. They are tired of Obama fundamentally transforming every value, principle, and tradition of this country before their very eyes while the Republican majority they elected stands by idly and focuses on liberal, petty, or trivial priorities – or downright helps Obama implement his policies.

This is exactly why the polls are continuing to show strong support for Trump. He is a protest vote through which voters are declaring their independence from the failed and corrupt Republican Party.

Over the weekend, Ted Cruz has shown a willingness to fight this corrupt political cartel like nobody else in recent history. Obviously, Trump’s persona as a pop culture figure has overshadowed Cruz’s work in the Senate, especially given the “inside baseball” nature of this fight. But if he continues to bring this sort of fighting spirit to the campaign trail, he will be well positioned to reap the windfall from the wave Trump has created if and when The Donald implodes. Unfortunately, that cannot be said of most of the other contenders running in the field.

07/25/15

The Religious Origins of the Sanctuary Movement

By: Cliff Kincaid
Accuracy in Media

Thanks to Donald Trump, the major media are being forced to cover the illegal immigration movement, such as the proliferation of “sanctuary cities” across the U.S. that attract criminal aliens, give them legal protection, and let them back out on the streets to commit more crimes. But the really taboo topic is how these sanctuary cities grew out of a movement started by the Catholic Church and other churches.

Over 200 cities, counties and states provide safe-haven to illegal aliens as sanctuary cities, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) reports. What has not yet been reported is that the Catholic Church, which gave President Obama his start in “community organizing” in Chicago, has been promoting the sanctuary movement for more than two decades.

What’s more, in April, a delegation of U.S. Catholic bishops staged a church service along the U.S.-Mexico border and distributed Communion through the border fence. At the same time, Pope Francis said a “racist and xenophobic” attitude was keeping immigrants out of the United States.

No wonder the pope’s approval ratings have been falling in the United States. Overall, Gallup reports that it’s now at 59 percent, down from 76 percent in early 2014. Among conservatives, it’s fallen from 72 percent approval to 45 percent (a drop of 27 points).

“Few people are aware that this extreme left branch of the Catholic Church played a large part in birthing the sanctuary movement,” says James Simpson, author of the new book, The Red-Green Axis: Refugees, Immigration and the Agenda to Erase America.

Simpson says Catholic Charities, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and its grant-making arm, the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, are prominent elements of the open borders movement.

The sanctuary movement has its roots in the attempted communist takeover of Latin America.

With the support of elements of the Roman Catholic Church, the Communist Sandinistas had taken power in Nicaragua in 1979. At the time, communist terrorists known as the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) were threatening a violent takeover of neighboring El Salvador. President Ronald Reagan’s policies of overt and covert aid for the Nicaraguan freedom fighters, known as the Contras, forced the defeat of the Sandinistas, leaving the FMLN in disarray. In 1983, Reagan ordered the liberation of Grenada, an island in the Caribbean, from communist thugs.

Groups like the Marxist-oriented Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) were promoting the sanctuary movement for the purpose of facilitating the entry into the U.S. of illegal aliens who were supposedly being repressed by pro-American governments and movements in the region. The U.S. Catholic Bishops openly supported the sanctuary movement, even issuing a statement in 1985 denouncing the criminal indictments of those caught smuggling illegal aliens and violating the law. Section 274 of the Immigration and Nationality Act prohibits the transportation or harboring of illegal aliens.

Two Roman Catholic priests and three nuns were among those under indictment in one case on 71 counts of conspiracy to smuggle illegal aliens into the United States. One of the Catholic priests indicted in the scheme was Father Ramon Dagoberto Quinones, a Mexican citizen. He was among those convicted of conspiracy in the case.

Through the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, an arm of the Bishops, the church has funded Casa de Maryland, an illegal alien support group which was behind the May 1, 2010, “May Day” rally in Washington, D.C. in favor of “immigrant rights.” Photographs taken by this writer showed Mexican immigrants wearing Che Guevara T-shirts, and Spanish-language communist books and literature being provided to rally participants.

An academic paper, “The Acme of the Catholic Left: Catholic Activists in the US Sanctuary Movement, 1982-1992,” states that lay Catholics and Catholic religious figures were “active participants” in the network protecting illegals. The paper said, “Near the peak of national participation in August 1988, of an estimated 464 sanctuaries around the country, 78 were Catholic communities—the largest number provided by any single denomination.”

A “New Sanctuary Movement” emerged in 2007, with goals similar to the old group. In May, the far-left Nation magazine ran a glowing profile of this new movement, saying it was “revived” by many of the same “communities of faith” and churches behind it in the 1980s.

One group that worked to find churches that would provide sanctuary to immigrants in fear of deportation is called Interfaith Worker Justice, led by Kim Bobo, who was quoted by PBS in 2007 as saying, “We believe what we are doing is really calling forth a higher law, which is really God’s law, of caring for the immigrant.”

But conservative Catholic Michael Hichborn of the Lepanto Institute says Interfaith Worker Justice is run by “committed Marxist socialists,” and that Bobo is “highly active and involved with the Democratic Socialists of America,” a group which backed Obama’s political career.

02/2/15

Why Does Obama Get Job Performance Approval?

By: Alan Caruba
Warning Signs

It is one of the great mysteries. How does Barack Obama continue to generate job approval ratings that say he’s doing a good one?

On a recent weekend Rasmussen Reports rated him at 51% while Gallup gave him a 49% rating. At the Pew Research Center, his rating was at 47%, but they noted that at this time in his presidency, George W. Bush had a job approval rating of 33% while Bill Clinton was rated at 63% approval.

Of course, Bush and Clinton were President at different times dealing with different factors but metaphorically Obama’s ratings suggest that close to half of the voters polled still thought he was doing a good job or, at the very least, not a bad one.

Are the voters that are being polled simply not paying that much attention to the White House and its occupant?

Consider some aspects of his record in office to date:

As 2014 came to a close, Tyler Durden, writing on Zero Hedge, addressed the U.S. debt, noting that it had “just hit a new historic level…which also means that total U.S. debt had increased by 70% under Obama, from $10.625 trillion on January 21, 2009 to $18.005 trillion most recently.”

The level of debt led to the first downgrade of the U.S. credit rating in the nation’s history. At the same time federal spending (25% of Gross Domestic Product) was the highest since World War II.

Obama has presided over a terrible economy for the past six years and, while other Presidents came into office facing a comparable recession, Obama’s failed policies turned it into the Great Recession. Employment sank to the lowest since 1983 at 58.1% of the working population and long-term unemployment (45.9%) was the highest since the 1930s.

One might think that so many people either out of work or who had given up seeking it would be unhappy enough to credit Obama with the economy’s sluggish state. He is currently taking credit for any improvement, but much of it is attributable to the energy sector and he has taken steps to harm it since 2009 with “a war on coal”, restricting any exploration or drilling for oil and natural gas on federal lands, and most recently, attempting to put one of the most energy-rich regions of Alaska off-limits to any access.

As we begin to work on our tax returns, it’s worth noting that only 49% of taxpayers will be paying an income tax, the lowest level in the modern era and, predictably, government dependency (47%), defined as the percentage of people receiving one or more federal benefit payments, is now the highest in American history.

There was a time when being on welfare was something people tried to avoid. That suggests that something has changed in the American character, but we know that all too well as we watch our society accept a range of conduct that includes demands for same-sex marriages, legalization of marijuana, a growing population of single-parent families, attacks on the saying of prayers at public ceremonies, hostility to the police who protect us, and a host of other behaviors that undermine the moral values that previous generations of Americans passed on to their descendants.

Another mystery is the way facts about Obama seem to stir so little interest. He allegedly has a Social Security number from a state in which he has never lived. Many of the records of his life that other Presidents have made public have been kept sealed from examination. A birth certificate has been deemed a forgery by document experts. Whole books have been devoted to the disparities between his two memoirs and facts that have raised many questions.

At the least, one might assume that Americans know that he lies all the time. The typical television news program includes video of something he said previously that clashes with whatever his recent version is. Why would voters grant a 50% approval rating to someone who so consistently lies to them?

The fact is that his namesake legislation—ObamaCare—has been a disaster from the day it was passed. It was sold to the public with a series of outrageous lies told by the President. Passage was based solely on the votes of a Democratic Party that controlled Congress but the recent election did shift control of Congress to the GOP, so the voter’s actions do speak louder than words.

The then-Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, summed it up saying they had to pass the 2,000-plus page monster “in order to find out what’s in it.” That is not how government is supposed to function, but worst of all, ObamaCare requires Americans to purchase a product, health insurance, they may not want or may not need. That is a lot closer to a dictatorship than a democracy.

How many scandals have occurred during the President’s six years in office? The short answer is “too many”; the most recent being the exchange of five Taliban generals for one American soldier deemed by those with whom he served to have deserted his unit. In the same fashion it has taken months to pry information from the White House about the Benghazi attack that took the life of a U.S. ambassador and three others. As is frequently the case, it is the cover-up that rivals the event.

In the end, one must conclude that Obama’s job performance approval ratings say as much about the mood and outlook of the voters who were polled as the facts cited above would suggest. A lot of Americans continue to express their anger and frustration with Obama, myself included, but that is not showing up in the ratings that suggest that a least half the voters think he’s doing, if not a great job, at least a good one.