Trump’s money may serve one positive purpose – chasing out fringe opponents

I haven’t made it a secret that I don’t think much of the presidential candidacy of New York real estate developer Donald Trump, and wonder seriously about the mental stability of those people who think there’s anything presidential about him.

FIORINA: Could she really be the GOP nominee?

Yet I’m now thinking there’s one very positive aspect to the Trump candidacy – one that ultimately will benefit the electoral process in this presidential campaign cycle.

HE’S A WELL-funded (he can afford to pay the campaign bills out of his own pocket) candidate who will chase away the weaklings who probably had no right to have dreams of someday working at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, N.W.

In a candidate field that has reached as large as 17, two potentially-serious candidates have already dropped out because they couldn’t even fake being competitive against the Trump juggernaut.

Those are former Texas Gov. Rick Perry and current Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker – the latter of whom announced this week he’s dropping out.

Both of those governors had the paper “credentials” to be taken seriously. Yet neither could get their act together enough to beat a guy who’s never held elective office and has such a blowhard ego that he’s likely to be an embarrassment if he were actually at the White House.

WALKER: Fell by the wayside

AND A GUY who’s got such a girl-chasing reputation that he makes Bill Clinton look like a prude. Perhaps it wasn’t that the ideologues of our society weren’t really offended by Clinton’s behavior with women – they were just upset he had that “D” connected to his name.

Walker thought he could take his union-bashing tactics in Wisconsin and apply them to the federal government. Yet it isn’t going to happen.

PERRY: Will his ego make him run again in '20?

Perhaps someone like Gov. Bruce Rauner ought to keep that in mind. He acts as though he wants to bring Wisconsin-style politicking to Illinois. But it would seem it’s not a universal trait.

Walker’s failure could become Rauner’s failure on a different scale. He could wind up an equal failure if he doesn’t back off.

BUT BACK TO the presidential campaign, which is now down to 15 candidates all scratching and scraping for a lead while the actual leaders wind up having something like 20 percent or so support.

Will we get this type of gaffe in '16?

There are bound to be more political dreamers dropping out, following the lead of Walker and Perry – who ought to learn that his serious presidential bid was in 2012 when there was a brief time period when HE was the GOP front-runner.

Of course, I remember back to all the times that Ronald Reagan ran for president before he finally caught on in 1980 – remember that Chicago Sun-Times headline saying that Reagan would take former President Gerald Ford as his V-P pick?!

So I’m sure his ego is determined to try again, and again and again yet again.

ALTHOUGH PERRY MAY be the polar opposite of Vice President Joe Biden, who now says he may hold off his own presidential aspirations to 2020. His time, if it is ever to come, IS now. Waiting could turn him into a “never was” with ease.

So what should we think of the presidential field on the Republican side? It could wind up that Trump, retired cardiologist Ben Carson and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina become the serious candidates – they’re the ones who show something beyond 1 or 2 percent support in the polls.

TRUMP: When will his $$ wither away

I can’t say I’d support any of them (if you ever meet my step-mother’s brother, he’s a California resident who still thinks Fiorina is a loon on account of her 2010 campaign for U.S. Senate from the Golden State). But the sooner the Republican field gets whittled down to a manageable number, the sooner people can figure out who to seriously vote for.

And then, people can start thinking for real in terms of whom the Grand Old Party can nominate for president – at which point, the Trump bluster withers away into the nothingness it deserves.

  -30-

Still way too early to learn much of substance about presidential dreamers

I didn’t bother to watch the Republican presidential debate that was televised Wednesday night – I just wasn’t in the mood to sit through political psycho-babble, particularly anything from the mouth of Donald Trump.

FIORINA: The winner?

Although after reading and watching the news accounts from those entities who felt the need to see the supposedly-top presidential dreamers stand in front of “Air Force One” (the closest most of them will ever get to that aircraft), I don’t think I missed much by waiting until Thursday morning to know what was said.

AND I ALSO don’t think anyone who bothered to watch it live is any better informed about its significance – unless they really needed to pretend that they were there to see it all happen.

My own quirk is that after having covered many political debates (including some that involved presidential prospects), they all seem alike.

So what’s the real point here? I still think this field is overly-broad, and that most of the people who blathered on and on will not be a factor next year when people are actually asked to cast ballots for who will get the right to be the next president come January 2017.

The overview I have heard from many is that former CEO Carly Fiorina somehow showed herself to be the most credible persona of the Republican presidential batch.

THAT MAY WELL be true, although I’d say the reason she stands out is that the rest of the batch is so mediocre – past political failures who are trying again, or people whose only qualification to be the nation’s chief executive is their own over-bloated ego.

BUSH: He's sorry

And as for the fact that the so-called most-tweeted moment was former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s apology to his mother for having smoked marijuana when he was young?

It was probably a more honest moment than Bill Clinton back in 1992 when he said he smoked, but “didn’t inhale.” Which all these decades later, I still don’t know what he thinks the difference is.

All in all, not the most enlightening of shows.

THE KEY, OF course, is Donald Trump, whose money and bluster enabled him to take large early leads – with some of the candidates coming in so low they barely register.

TRUMP: Will he still be relevant tomorrow?

Although it is interesting that the neurologist, Ben Carson, has had recent polls showing he is running neck-and-neck with Trump. It could be that about half of those who have an opinion back either of those two.

Evidence that the Republican hard-core wants a new name – no matter how much that person may not have a clue about what is actually involved in being president. It’s not all about having a personal jet plane to fly around on, and you don’t get to “bark” orders to Congress.

Just think how much happier Barack Obama would be if he could have told Congress what he wanted, and they would have been obligated to obey.

BUT THE MOST truthful thing I may have read in recent days was a poll in the Washington Post – 27 percent of people actually have an opinion about who should be president. It’s still early. We’re more than a year away from the general election.

The serious people will probably start giving all this a thought come January. Everything we’re reading or hearing these days is going to be so irrelevant by the time it matters. Don’t forget that Rick Perry, the former Texas governor, has already dropped out (his second presidential failure). More and more will fall to the wayside in coming weeks and months.

Would you mess with the U.S. if this man was present?

Which is why I didn’t feel compelled to watch on Wednesday.  The re-run of “Hill Street Blues” that I watched was more entertaining than learning that Trump tried to back away from his past sexist trash-talk about Fiorina.

I say “Capt. Furillo” for president ("Joyce Davenport" for first lady), with “Mick Belker” ("Grrrrrrr!!!!!") as his personal enforcer. It makes as much sense as any of the people who are really in the running.

  -30-

We’re looking for leadership. Will anyone rise to presidential challenge?

This past weekend, I stumbled across a question posted by a Facebook “friend” asking people who they would choose for president – IF the choice is a matter of Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., or Ted Cruz, R-Texas.

Personally, I said I would sooner lead a write-in campaign for the “friend,” who is a former competitor from my days as a Springfield reporter-type person.

BECAUSE THE IDEA of an Indianapolis-based radio personality as president makes about as much sense as any of the other scenarios being pitched out to the public.

For I don’t have a clue as to who will wind up actually running for president in the 2016 election cycle to replace Barack Obama. There isn’t anybody coming forth who is going to capture the spirit and emotions of the public (at least the portion that isn’t ideologically-inclined to still view Obama as some sort of “socialist”).

Former first lady, senator from New York and secretary of state Hillary R. Clinton has been lingering for so long as the presumptive presidential candidate for the Democratic Party that I can’t help but think most people are sick and tired of hearing about her possible campaign.

Did she do herself in by waiting so long to state her intentions that nobody cares anymore what she does?

WHAT MAKES THIS particular election cycle for president intriguing is not just that Chicago will lose its personal tie to the White House, it is that Vice President Joe Biden isn’t the automatic choice of Democrats to succeed Obama.

I expect Biden will run for the post. But can he win? Would anybody get excited at the thought of a President Biden? Or would he create the kind of electoral excitement amongst would-be Democratic voters that led to the overwhelming Republican victories in this year’s election cycle. A Monmouth University poll shows Biden with only 2 percent support (compared to 48 percent for Hillary).

On the Republican side, I have heard the names of “Jeb Bush,” “Haley Barbour,” “Newt Gingrich,” “Bobby Jindal,” “Rick Perry” and “Marco Rubio,” along with former Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels – who might well attract the attention of what’s left of the Illinois Republican establishment, which often acts as though it wishes they could be Hoosiers.

The Republican National Committee is doing a straw poll trying to gauge support for presidential dreamers, and has 34 different names on its ballot, according to the Washington Times newspaper.

MY POINT BEING that in such a large sea, the ideological rants of Cruz could easily catch on with just enough Republican people that he winds up becoming the front-runner.

Cruz vs. Warren isn’t the biggest fantasy in the world, except for the fact that Warren herself said Monday during an interview with NPR that, “I’m not running for president.”

That is, unless the lack of a clear candidate arouses her ego to the point where she decides to change her mind. It wouldn't be a political first!

Because you also know that the moment Hillary does make it public what her intentions are, all the goodwill her name brings up now will dissipate, and the ideologues’ rants and memories of the Clinton presidential administration (“Hide the girls, Bill Clinton’s back in the White House,” is the image they will repeat over and over) will predominate the public debate.

PERSONALLY, IT’S ALL going to make me reminisce more fondly for the days of Obama. That’s how stupid the rhetoric is going to get between the presidential dreamers.

Which is why I can joke about the notion of “Abdul-Hakim Shabazz” as president. Anybody who knew him when he was a broadcaster in Springfield, or who now listens to him in Indianapolis, knows he has the over-bloated ego to be a public official.

Along with a sense of decency as a human being that many in our society – including those who actually will run for president – are totally lacking.

  -30-

Political chaos! That’s GOP these days

What a mess the Republican primaries for president seem to have become.

ROMNEY: Blowing 'front runner' status

I woke up Thursday to news reports that former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney didn’t really win the Iowa caucuses (although the confusion and technicalities that are involved may really be evidence that the caucus concept itself is flawed).

BUT I CAN’T say that former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania should think that highly of his new win. Because Romney got the benefits of being the “winner” for a couple of weeks and the momentum that goes with it.

I couldn’t help but note the tone of condescension in the statement Romney issued that congratulated Santorum on his “victory.”

This confusion from Iowa came at the same point that Texas Gov. Rick Perry accepted reality and dropped out. He didn’t even wait to get his clock cleaned in the South Carolina primary coming up Saturday before deciding it was time to return home.

That has many of the political observers convinced that former Sen. Newt Gingrich of Georgia (who now lives in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C.) is going to become the recipient of the ABM vote.

ALL THOSE PEOPLE who want Anybody But Mitt as the Republican presidential nominee (because they think he’s not enough of an ideologue for their taste) could whomp on Romney if they do solidify themselves behind one lone candidate.

PERRY: Accepting reality?



Yet before Gingrich gets all excited about his chances, he’s having to defend himself from what he anticipated would be an attack by one of his ex-wives – who gave an interview to ABC News.

Supposedly, the man who would like to think he stands for Christian morals told wife number two that he wanted either a divorce – or permission to cheat (a.k.a., an “open marriage”).

Honestly, I can’t figure who is suffering the most. It’s like these candidates are determined to see who can batter themselves up more than anyone else. It’s like the Republican electorate is determined to put forth the most bloodied-and-battered nominee to take on Barack Obama – who gets to spend the next few months raising the millions of dollars that could enable him to bury the GOP nominee come the Nov. 6 elections.

IF I DIDN’T know better, I’d think it was some sort of conspiracy by the Obama camp to ensure that he gets “four more years!” of residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W.

Or maybe this is Ron Paul at work. Because as much as I personally don’t think he has the temperament to be president, I have to confess that he is starting to look like the most rational excuse of a human being in the running for the Republican nomination for U.S. president.

In fact, it has me wondering if he will be the “big” winner of all this chaos taking place. Just the fact that his name isn’t being associated with something bizarre could make him the person that people who pick a Republican ballot cast their vote for.

“Vote for Paul. The boring guy!”

THAT IS WHAT this election cycle has devolved down to, and we’re not even past voters in two of the 50 states (along with the District of Columbia and various territories) having their say.

PAUL: The 'sane' candidate



This certainly won’t be an election cycle remembered for “hope” and “change” (which are noble goals, even though nitwits like Chris Christie and Sarah Palin try mocking them) and people inspired to vote for “A Better America.”

The Nov. 6 general election was always destined to become the election cycle in which people cast their vote for the candidate they despise the least.

Now, it seems that the primaries (including our own on March 20) will take on the same tone. Which doesn’t do a thing for making me want to vote.

  -30-

GOP partisans truly seem determined to give us “four more years” of Obama

Why am I convinced that President Barack Obama is capable of overcoming the economic struggles of our society that are strong enough to take down the toughest of politicians and get himself re-elected to another term in office?

Is Mitt Romney's sense of humor ...



Perhaps it has something to do with $10,000 – the figure that presidential dreamer Mitt Romney offered up as a “bet” during a weekend presidential debate that is now being used as “evidence” of how out-of-touch the former Massachusetts governor is – compared to so-called “real” people.

I’D ARGUE THE people who think this is anything resembling a legitimate issue  are the ones who are out-of-touch, and that those of us “real” people ought to be grossly offended that these ideologues think they are among “us” in society.

Now for those of you who had real lives and didn’t watch the debate (personally, I watched my alma mater play college basketball that day), it seems that Romney opponent (and Texas governor) Rick Perry tried once again to claim that the health care reform plan that Romney pushed for in Massachusetts was identical to the plan that Obama pushed for on behalf of the American people.

You know, the one that the ideologues are now demonizing and desperately hoping that the Supreme Court of the United States strikes down as unconstitutional?

Romney’s response on Saturday to the latest repetition of this charge was to challenge Perry to a $10,000 bet that the statement he had just made was inaccurate.

OF COURSE, IT was ridiculous debate rhetoric, and Perry quickly backed down. But since then, he has been playing up the fact that Romney is some sort of rich guy who could afford to make a $10,000 bet.

It would be mere pocket change for him, Perry would like us to believe. Even though I personally find Romney’s explanation that the bet was “an outrageous number to answer an outrageous charge” to be completely believable.

... more lame than Barack Obama's?



Perhaps it is because I have covered so many campaign debates as a reporter-type person throughout the years that I realize nothing said by anybody during these staged events should be taken literally.

But this just reeks of being a non-issue.

IN FACT, IT didn’t surprise me at all to learn of a claim by FactCheck.org at the Annenberg Public Policy Center that said Romney was factually correct. Perry, in his attempt to simplify a charge to make a tight, pithy sound bite, did make a charge against Romney that was not accurate.

If there had been a real bet, Romney would have won.

If the people who are following the Republican primary blow-by-blow were interested in serious fact and learning more about the candidates, the “issue” now would be how Perry can’t get his facts straight.

Perhaps that he’s the one who’s willing to spread mistruths (although the gist that Romney’s former views on healthcare are remarkable similar to Obama’s current views is truthful).

INSTEAD, BECAUSE THIS is the primary cycle where Romney has perhaps one-quarter of the Republican Party in his favor and the remainder desperately convinced that they want anybody EXCEPT for Romney to be the GOP nominee running against Obama in the 2012 general election, they’re willing to go along with this kind of nonsense charge by Perry.

Which convinces me that the GOP is on the verge of nominating somebody whom the majority of the American people will despise more than their apathy causes them to distrust Obama.

It is moments like this that make it impossible for anyone of any sense to take any of these candidates seriously. It is turning this upcoming election cycle into the candidate we hate, versus the candidate we don’t care about.

Not the least bit inspirational, to be honest about things.

ALTHOUGH I WILL say one thing about Romney and his sense of “humor.”

It kind of reminds me of a moment from the 2008 election cycle when Obama was at an event of extremely-religious white people, and one person put a question to him that was meant to make him squirm in admitting to this heavily anti-abortion crowd that he was not on their side when it came to this issue.

Obama tried using humor to get out of answering the question; coming up with a lame line about how an appropriate answer was, “above my pay grade.”

It was a lame quip from Obama then. But one that may have been topped by Romney’s lame $10,000 wisecrack on Saturday.

SO WHAT DOES this mean? Romney’s not a comedian! Neither is Obama.

Then again, don’t we want to have a person who can get serious while sitting in the Oval Office?

Because if it turns out that we want a comedian in the White House, then I’m voting for Dick Gregory. It would only be 44 years after his real campaign – the one that got him some 47,097 votes. Too bad the late Pat Paulsen couldn’t be his running mate!

  -30-

One year, and counting

I already have a headache from the 2012 election cycle and all the rancid rhetoric it has produced. The idea that we’re going to have to endure one more year of this nonsense-talk is something I don’t know if I can endure.

OBAMA: One year from victory?



It’s true. The general election for 2012 will be held one year from Sunday. In exactly one year, we’re going to learn whether the economic downtown that doesn’t want to leave is going to take down the presidency of Barack Obama – or if the Republicans will manage to blow their chance to put “one of their own” in the White House.

I WRITE IT that way because the struggles many people are facing are going to make them inclined to take down whoever they can come Election Day.

Unless there is some turnaround in the economy that is historic in nature, there won’t be much of anything that Obama can take credit for on that front. And that front could be the only one that many people will care about.

Take the last presidency that suffered from this issue – that of George Bush the elder when he ran for re-election in 1992. All the trash that afflicted Bill Clinton’s candidacy should have been enough to take him down.

Yet there were a significant-enough number of people who wanted to vote for Anybody But Bush. Some of those ABB’s went for Texas billionaire H. Ross Perot. But Clinton got more than his share, which led to his victory.

IN THEORY, THE same thing is going to happen to Obama one year from now.

And while one can argue that the economic downturn was caused by the ideological policies of past presidents (such as the former Bush’s son), the fact seems to be that Obama hasn’t been able to break through the ideological hostility to be able to accomplish much of anything to fix the problem.

Yet, a part of me seriously believes that Obama could wind up prevailing a year from now. We could be watching his second victory party, which will not seem as impressive as the first.

Then again, that 2008 election cycle truly was historic in nature. There’s no way he should be expected to match the old enthusiasm – some of which was so naïve in nature that he should not have been expected to live up to their desires.

IT’S JUST THAT I see the harsh ideological nature that the 2012 opposition to Obama has taken. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney turns up as the front-runner in some polls, but usually with overall support that indicates the bulk of Republican partisans want Anybody But Mitt to get the nomination.

The fact that someone as fringe-ish as Herman Cain can continue to linger as a challenger to Romney or Texas Gov. Rick Perry (and in some polls turn up as the leader) makes me seriously think that the GOP is on the verge of picking as its presidential hopeful someone whom the bulk of people in this country will hate even more than they might distrust Obama.

I can’t help but notice that the same polls that show Obama with weak approval ratings usually show members of Congress with approval ratings that are historically awful.

Which means that many of those political people who rant and rage about Barack and want to believe that “real Americans” think just the way they do will find out that real people can’t stand the ideologues either.

WHICH IS WHY I honestly expect to have several migraine headaches throughout the upcoming year. Because an election cycle between people who are hoping to be the least-detested candidate seeking office is NOT going to be the most high-brow of campaigns.

The trash talk we’re going to hear in the upcoming year is going to rise to levels we haven’t heard in the political past. It’ll be uglier than a typical Chicago Cubs season.

You can’t get uglier than that!

  -30-

It’s too early to think of Election Day!

Remember nearly a month ago there was a straw poll in Iowa that briefly made people think that Michele Bachmann was the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination?

CAIN: Flavor of the month

Now, we have a new straw poll – this one out of Florida. This poll has Herman Cain as the leader to be the GOP nominee.

I WOULD THINK these two polls, in and of themselves, ought to convince us that the value of “straw polls” is nil, and that it’s way too early for us to be thinking about who is going to run for president against incumbent Barack Obama come the 2012 election cycle.

We already have many Republicans working the electorate; trying to get support for themselves and create the image that they really could be president of the United States.

That is why we’re hearing a lot of “stupid talk” and ridiculous rhetoric from various candidates. What amazes me is not so much that the political people are doing this (they’re a unique breed who often don’t know any better), it is that people are taking this seriously.

That latter straw poll out of Florida literally inspired the Chicago Tribune website headline Rick Perry’s campaign struggles to explain straw poll loss.

IF THE TEXAS governor is really squirming in his shorts at the thought that he didn’t come out on top of a straw poll, then perhaps he is showing us up front that he can’t keep things in proper perspective and that we probably shouldn’t be thinking of him as someone worthy of presidential caliber.

To me, it’s just fluff being touted by the kind of people who are so intensely interested in the electoral process and usually have their own ideological hang-ups that may be bigger than their interest in elections in general.

BACHMANN: Flavor of last month?



The kind of people who bothered to show up and participate in a Florida straw poll are nowhere near the average voter, let alone the average resident of this nation.

So the fact that Herman Cain could get the highlight of his presidential campaign (it will probably be the only time something happens that puts him on top) is not a shock at all.

WHEN REAL PEOPLE start paying attention to the election cycle, the kind of people who take seriously people such as Cain or Bachmann will be so vastly outnumbered.

The same actually applies to the opposite end of the ideological extreme. Put together an event of Democratic partisans who have nothing else going in their life but to obsess about the Nov. 6, 2012 presidential elections, and you’ll find a group of people so in love with Barack Obama that you could be deluded into thinking that the president is a shoo-in for re-election.

He’s not!

Although a part of me wonders if the types of people who get all worked up over a Cain or a Bachmann at this stage of the game will assert so much influence come Election Day that they will wind up “doing in” the chances of victory for whomever actually gets the Republican nomination?

THAT COULD BE the one legitimate lesson of the straw polls – the fact that there is a segment of the GOP so off-the-mark with the bulk of the nation. Then again, I think most of us already knew that.

More likely, this is just such an early part of the political process and anybody who’s seriously trying to pick winners now is the equivalent of the baseball fan who is convinced his team has the pennant clinched, just because they managed to win the first exhibition game of Cactus League play.

So reading about these straw polls amused me about as much as reading a Washington Post account about Obama’s re-election strategy.

OBAMA: Next year's flavor of the month?

Surprise, Surprise!!!

HE’S GOING TO be focusing on voter turnout of voters with strong ethnic ties, along with the most liberal elements of our society. In short, the people who are the base of the party these days.

Get enough of them to the polling places on Election Day, and it really doesn’t matter what the other side does.

Then again, the strategy is the same for the eventual GOP nominee. Get the conservative ideologues with their pet causes (gay marriage, abortion, too many foreigners, etc.) to the polls, and it doesn’t matter what Obama and crew do.

In short, it’s way too early for us to be thinking about who’s running for president. I think the people who are focusing on who will make it to the World Series this year are probably more logical.

THEN AGAIN, THESE two straw polls do combine to give one hilarious story line.

For the Michele Bachmann who was the favorite of the Iowa political geeks in their straw poll actually wound up coming in dead-last in the Florida version!

How the mighty can fall oh so quickly.

  -30-