Current Trends by Natasha Sapp

And who wouldn’t be when the primary talking points are Donald Trump’s use of words that have to be bleeped on the nightly news critiquing the democratic debate, yet too squeamish to be clear about Hillary Clinton’s bathroom break causing her to return late to the debate podium calling it too disgusting, something he didn’t want to discuss while making her out to be some sort of flaky, derelict, quitter for not showing up on national TV with the female equivalent of her fly open. When voters have to fact check politicians in general, but these relentlessly, not for their own piece of mind, their own understanding rather for the actual truth hidden somewhere in all that false flag, hyped up nonsense they choose to try and get people to care about. The stolen data by the Sanders campaign was initially blamed on a software glitch allowing access; did the staffer even realize what they had gotten their hands on? Nevertheless that staffer was fired, 2 more suspended, there was an on stage, very public apology at their debate, what more do you want; instead it’s DNC freak out, suspension from vital campaign information, dust up about unethical campaign operations, come on. Meanwhile Jeb Bush warrants mention because he showed he was more than just barely alive, holding onto a pulse and Ted Cruz rather than the predicted attack on Donald Trump, went after Marco Rubio chiefly on immigration helping his hitherto momentum again in the polls. Yet his biggest moment was, surprise, surprise when he blasted the media via a prominent newspaper cartoonist for a political drawing featuring him and his daughters, them as trained monkeys saying it ticked him off; irony, he demonstrates his outrage after placing his daughters in a campaign ad reading parody Christmas stories including ‘How Obamacare Stole Christmas’ and ‘The Grinch Who Lost Her E-mails.’ Chris Christie on the other hand spent his debate time days before blaming Obama for allowing the Russians into Syria, apparently not knowing Russia has had bases there since 1971, by the way when the president was 10 years old, operated their facilities in the region for 20 years until 1991 at the fall of the Soviet Union indicating all Russia has done is go back to old holdings, not gain new ones. But his comment to the American people, viewers at home remarking, if your eyes are glazing over right now, calling discussion on 2 bills meant to aid in national security an angels on the head of a pin argument instead of proven action by a former prosecutor caused his numbers to climb in New Hampshire, if nowhere else. Carly Fiorina raised watchful eyebrows in the undercard debate with a whopper about bringing back the warrior class generals supposedly all retired early by president Obama for telling him things he didn’t want to hear including one who served the previous administration not this one, one who was disgraced and retired early after facing charges for giving national security secrets to his mistress and one who left his job as general after an unflattering magazine article calling out him and his staff on their failings, leaving voluntarily unlike the guy who gave secrets to his mistress and was found guilty of a crime. Trump gets to propose a ban on Muslims coming into the country after San Bernardino, far too many people agree with, only ratcheting up his poll numbers before the latest squaring off; however, when Hillary Clinton says something mildly intelligent calling him ISIS’ biggest recruiter putting his words on video to gain members he demands an apology saying there is no such video calling her a liar enfolding in e-mails and the long dead horse of Whitewater. Which is the safer, surer bet, Donald Trump’s words being used to evoke terror or people splitting hairs enough to call Hillary Clinton a liar on something terror experts educatedly conclude is merely a matter of time? Interesting we the people knew exactly where she was going with her claim; plus, prior to getting your nose out of joint Mr. Trump, Trump supporters, that fact checkers like PolitiFact rated what she said a lie, widen your perspective enough to understand they rated yours, your candidates entire campaign their biggest lie of 2015 citing not one but an endless multitude of things they determined to be false, constituted lies. So exactly who has the bigger problem here, the person whose statement is inevitable or the person whose statements repeatedly can be verified, were obviously distorted or made up?

We, smart, non-xenophobic, arguably under 50 members of the public only mildly following politics, who have disturbingly time consuming things like jobs and families to manage, support and spend time with, were so busy being justifiably upset by Trump’s proposed plan to ban Muslim’s, some of whom were U.S. citizens returning from vacations, religious pilgrimages. We missed the second half of his desired plans to defeat ISIS, keep the claws of terror from sinking themselves into our impressionable youth via cyberspace by, “shutting down that internet thing.” Rand Paul got this one right at the debate, you mean like they do in China, North Korea? This following his amendments to said plan indicating yes, Muslim Americans serving in the military, dignitaries and the like would be allowed back in the country post tour of duty, job related travel; that it had to be clarified tells you how not well thought out it truly was, forget solid things like the constitution over America’s long immigrant history fortifying our stance on immigrant citizen travel. The debate being near Christmas time, holiday season in full swing just imagine if Christians visiting Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus, were detained upon returning, labeled Jewish terrorists or religious fanatics, exemplifying how absurd his plan is; that he wants to incorporate the internet into said ban proves exactly how much he doesn’t know. Certainly it’s laudable to want to keep ISIS, of all things, off social networking, communication means like twitter, Facebook, yet senator Paul is right people, voters, those wishing to be our next commander in chief must understand what that entails, what is the cost to our freedom? Still if he had said what he elaborated on later, that what he ultimately wanted was smart computer persons, like Bill Gates, to put their heads together and devise a way to keep terror groups from using social media to radicalize followers, right here in America too, recruit members globally, he probably would have gotten more support and avoided opening himself up to an obvious shot, giving the impression that, in the name of safety, we are going to make ourselves in the image of the most oppressive developed nations on the globe. Important considering he is continually positioning himself, is poised to be the republican nominee presumably facing off against the democratic presumptive nominee Hillary Clinton in the general election, where if not before then he will have to face his recent, proven false rhetoric; namely the idea there were large groups of Muslims on rooftops in New Jersey and elsewhere cheering the fall of the towers on 911, by the thousands according to what he saw with his own eyes, on television, depending on which rally he’s speaking at. The completely sidestepped part of this is the impact his repeated theme is having out in mainstream America, Muslim Americans, many of whom were born and raised, naturalized citizens possessing the right to vote living in fear thanks to Donald Trump’s words. A story relayed by a Muslim teen to CBS news doing a segment on misconceptions surrounding those of the Muslim faith who told the reporter and the assembled group about her neighbor, who had known her since she was 6 years old, was friends with her daughter, attended a family wedding the previous year suddenly treated differently, suddenly shunned, suddenly the subject of a hate filled Facebook letter, not just because of San Bernardino, Paris and the horror that happened there, the fact that radicals claiming to be Islamic were responsible, but because of Trump’s words. Speaking of San Bernardino sparking the latest round of Muslim backlash, mosque fires, harassment, vandalism, both Trump and the mainstream media have been at this one for a while alleging those shooters posted messages on social media, Facebook and so on talking about jihad going as far back as prior to their dating, supposedly exposing visa screeners who aren’t allowed, by Obama administration guideline, to scrutinize social media postings as part of the approval process. Except, as Salon.com pointed out chastising  the  New York Times, along with clarification statements from the FBI, neither Syed Farook, nor Tashfeen Malik posted any public message espousing terror, terror plots, a desire to commit terror acts apart from the lone Facebook post pledging herself to ISIS Malik left just before the attack that same day.  What they did find, private messages pointing to radicalization only accessible via a warrant, which you must demonstrate probable cause for; regardless of the apparent bumbling Obama administration policy missing a major communication tool used, frequented by terrorist, radicalized jihadists— applying for a fiancé visa hardly qualifies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UKsg0sfEUM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNn9ffaDSV0

http://www.salon.com/2015/12/18/the_new_york_times_blew_this_big_time_an_epic_reporting_fail_with_dire_national_consequences/

Even before the latest republican debate Ted Cruz was talking about carpet bombing ISIS, “not knowing if sand could glow in the dark but he was willing to find out,” doubling down at the debate couching his wild idea in the cloak of ‘keeping America safe.’ Educated, sensible news persons asking does he not realize how vastly inappropriate his statements are forget as a strategy or that such a strategy would also be disastrous to the global climate, global climate talks currently meant to curb carbon emissions, other toxins, halt global warming and generally preserve the planet on which we live?  Of course for him climate change is a liberal myth meant to strangle business and further the left agenda comprising complete government dependence; despite smog canceling recess, in some cases closing schools in China, their poor air quality a known fact for decades. As for the “total dependence” it’s usually made up of people republicans leave out in the cold, many children whose only crime is being born to poor, hardworking, still struggling parents. Never mind if we carpet bomb that region in an effort to take out ISIS the thousands upon thousands who will be caught in the middle, essentially killed; many also children whose only crime is being born in a war torn part of the world. Moving to those left after such an arcane offensive, if he thinks we have a refugee crisis now invading the western world, refugees Cruz has repeatedly said shouldn’t be let into the United States or only if their Christian, it varies so much who could keep track, what does he think will happen when troops, drones, chosen military ordinance X renders swaths of the globe uninhabitable when they used to be habitable? Where are people going to try and go; continuing, how does this action he sees as being tough on terror not create more terrorism as displaced civilians look at America justifiably saying, the only thing you could do to stop the terrorists is destroy the place we called home, then refuse to accept us into your virtual paradise? Playing devil’s advocate for a moment assuming public commenters on these news stories are correct and the definition of carpet bombing has been misrepresented, wasn’t attached historical references made, senator Cruz wants something more precise exclusively targeting ISIS, he remains left with several problems; A- are we capable of  successfully rendering said strikes sans heavy civilian casualties similar to the international funded/run hospital bombed by mistake determined to be human error killing several. B-worse, minding the platform he’s running on to become the next commander in chief, targeted strikes, precision offensives meant to hit only terrorists, terrorist occupied land holdings, resources bears no difference to what is already being done under the Obama administration, blowing big holes in his anti-establishment candidate reputation.  Singular reason he is surging in poll data is due to the implosion of Ben Carson, voters coming around to the reality he knows nothing on a presidential level least of all foreign policy, and has benefited from the evangelical, ultra-conservative, not to mention angry, republican voting populous while, his lone rival Marco Rubio is forced to overcome, place in a different light the albatross he is an establishment candidate, playing to that much smaller base to attempt winning the nomination. Cruz scoring cheap shot points calling out the media for going after his kids, ordinarily off limits in campaigns for political office out of decency and deference to fact their parents, not them, are the ones running for  whichever vacant, soon to be vacant political appointment. Essential question though, does Cruz have the right to be crying foul when he was the one to first use his kids to political ends, and we’re not just talking about endless family footage on their campaign website, similar to the car ads with the latest generation carrying the last name of a franchised dealership, ads depicting politician X as a family man. We are talking about an ad featuring the Cruz family him, mother and daughters, one of the girls reading from the parody Christmas story ‘The Grinch Who Lost Her E-mails’ talking about using her own server and no one being the wiser; that tender 7-year-old probably too young to know what a server is. Leading to the deeper question needing to be asked addressing the clearly fake scandal, would the Washington Post cartoonist have ever drawn the cartoon they did if he hadn’t made the ad first? Arguable answer no; you made them fair game when you did the former shamelessly using your children to such ends. Shame on you and if multitudes were Mrs. Cruz, they wouldn’t have agreed to participate in the ad, let alone place their daughters in it and would be furious at him for suggesting it, not mad at the media for capitalizing on something a politician got wrong to begin with.

On the democratic side, funny after the first republican debate people don’t remember either Megyn Kelly or, for that matter, Rosie O’Donnell demanding an apology for being thrown under the buss in the latter’s case as the sole source/excuse of Trump’s sexist vitriol, and defacto being called a liar in the formers case, even after the blood coming out of her wherever remark. People do perhaps remember women coming out in droves to describe their negative experiences with Trump, including a top magazine writer who told news outlets after criticizing Trump she received a cover of that magazine with a dog pasted over her face complete with derogatory comment, the supposedly disgusting, incompetent lawyer and the breast pump accusation. Yeah woman planning to use her lunch break to pump breast milk forced to admit why she needed the prearranged break, given women all a glimpse into a Trump workplace. I saw with my own eyes and provided a news clip from a standard national news program proving he did indeed say/do the aforementioned things listed by Kelly for my debate breakdown analysis. So why is it he gets to demand an apology from Clinton, the Clinton campaign for an educated, logical guess projection just because there is no actual, singular video to prove unequivocally ISIS is using his words as a recruitment tool? Reality check his words are all over Arabic TV, if you think they don’t get American, western TV over there you’re dreaming, haven’t paid one iota of attention to the al-Qaeda  released videos; meaning they don’t have to, he opens his mouth and does the work for them, exactly her point. And if you think hearing his inflammatory rhetoric won’t radicalize Muslims across the world, never mind here at home, who might not otherwise have been, you’re delusional. Maybe that’s why 50% of polled voters said they would be embarrassed if Trump became president as opposed to a third who said the same of Hillary Clinton. Potentially bolstering her favorability, credibility rating, Edward Snowden the data morality zealot exposing the American government’s ‘massive collection of personal data from both citizens and U.S. allies,’ that turns out wasn’t nearly as massive as his initial supporters thought it might be looking at his over reactive behavior, now holed up in the Russian embassy unable to go home sans facing charges for his actions on information that was so vastly accumulated you’d never find anything in the mantua anyway, is the only one actively criticizing her “hawkish” foreign policy. Apart from candidate rival Bernie Sanders who said of her defense relating to the 2011 Libya coalition she was too interested in regime change, too aggressive without knowing what the unintended consequences might be. Notable would be if we could get Mr. Sanders to tell us if his distaste for regime change extends to denying the will of the people living under those regimes, refusing aid to the desperate, destitute and oppressed people suffocated by those regimes and willing to fight for change.  Because, as she pointed out in another debate, Europe was jamming our phones begging for help with what they felt was impending genocide and the Libyan people removed their despotic leader not us. Of greater significance, Europe would have done it if we hadn’t leaving the quagmire currently representing Libya exactly as it is now- a mess. Sander’s apparent stance on democracy desired by the developing world, the Arab world defies common sense. It’s like decrying Egypt’s bid for democracy, saying it was wrong to throw our political weight behind them when they did all the heavy lifting because not doing so would have made the region less complicated for political leaders to handle inside their own heads, excising their staggeringly limited brain power. Latest strategy by the presidential race’s most unpredictable candidate warring Clinton to be careful announcing if she’s going to play the woman card he’s going to bring up her husband’s past as the ‘sexist woman abuser’ we know Bill Clinton to be. Grossly underestimated by Trump it seems is one, how much younger voters have no idea what he’s talking about and don’t care; two, how many already know Mr. Clinton’s faults and therefore his “bombshell” loses any sting, how many, even republicans, would take Bill Clinton, known problems and all over the existing GOP field, have been pining for the Clinton years of surplus, thriving economy and getting things done. Worth mentioning he obviously confused women abuser and womanizer; one is a guy who is prolific with the ladies, can’t keep it in his pants, the other is more dangerous to women and women’s issues i.e. Trump’s long known provocative behavior toward those with 2 X chromosomes.  Further for increased perspective on the 90’s sex scandal read the end of the Salon article 2 paragraphs up reporting on what the San Bernardino shooters didn’t do remarking it was the same paper and their reporters who had investigators scrambling and what they found when all the dust settled. “Jeff Gerth’s sloppy reporting during Bill Clinton’s presidency of the Whitewater controversy that led federal investigators to spend several years and millions of dollars chasing Clinton misdeeds all over Washington and Arkansas. That all those investigations ever turned up was the president lying about a blowjob is one of the more absurd spectacles in the long history of absurd spectacles in American politics.”

http://www.salon.com/2015/12/20/hillary_just_terrified_everyone_edward_snowden_slams_clintons_hawkish_foreign_policy_in_third_debate/

It’s similar to the deplorable defense of Donald Trump written by a self-described Sanders supporter ‘who values honesty’ parsing words and contextual meanings announcing the media, everyone needed to stop telling this lie about him: he called all Mexicans rapists, Mexican immigrants rapists. Technically no, he didn’t, but what he did do was just as bad, if not worse, starting with floating the conspiracy theory that Mexico was actively sending groups of people here, and when they did it was people with problems, bringing their problems with them; listed among the negative groups rapists. Most would be surprised Mexico, the place they warn tourists not to drink the water, is/was ever that organized. Compounding the destructive impact of his statements on the Latino, Hispanic, Mexican America, illegal immigrant populations, he totally misrepresented researched data on women and girls victimized by rape, sexual assault trying to cross the border, that it was done by opportunists, criminals on the Mexican side, coyotes charging so much per head to get into the country not immigrants actually seeking a better life, work in America. His, the authors, crime statistics related to Mexican immigrants regarding rapes and sexual assaults along with the number of deportations are meaningless, how many were criminals before entering the U.S. because, as he points out, they were deported and crime statistics on Mexican immigrants lumped in legal and illegal persons skewing what little data there is. I know his assertions about drugs from Mexico are at minimum slightly off particularly on methamphetamines coming from there as I live in the state known as the meth capital, which happens to be in Middle America sadly. Commenters equally not buying the spin trying to let him off the hook, admonishing the author to reread his own quotes to asserting the nuance that only some Mexicans are rapists is not what’s getting him, Trump, votes rather the “misinterpretation” that all Mexicans are rapists. Going one step beyond, the commenter delved deeper saying the nuance this author is so mesmerized by, hangs all his hopes of Trump being other than what his is painted as a racist bigot, on top of power hungry megalomaniac, sometimes business mogul, on is only there for plausible deniability. Others rightfully accuse Trump supporters of the same willful misinterpretation using it to beat up on homeless Latinos while Trump’s only response is how passionate his people are. I am an unabashed Hillary Clinton supporter and will vote for her should she achieve the nomination and I have been abundantly clear about why; I too value honesty and Mr. Trump, Mr. Alberto A. Martinez aren’t it either. Not missing the next elephant in the room, the only e-mails anyone ever cared about were Hillary’s not the people in equally high governmental positions before or after her supposedly unethical move to use a private server, so what was the laser focus on  Hillary if not the already proven partisan witch hunt?  Nothing ever found in those e-mails showing misconduct, ethics violations, criminal activity, yet that didn’t stop another paper from claiming a federal indictment was coming down the pike; all that was uncovered were snippets of personality in TV shows and foods she liked adding some humanity to her “cold” demeanor.  Real media ‘snow jobs’ could be better articulated in what they and the DNC potentially did to Bernie Sanders, his possibly doomed candidacy for present. From the beginning it seemed odd the news coverage alleging a Sanders campaign staffer stole Clinton campaign data; chief question why. Off too was the DNC response to what news outlets were calling a software glitch; why are you suspending someone for accessing something a technical failure allowed them to see dubiously identified when they did see it? This follows what Sanders himself said about at least one prior incident in which Sanders’ staff found they had access to Clinton data and followed procedures informing the DNC, wanting, requesting a full investigation, desiring these data breaches to stop. Better question, who are these venders, who has control over DNC data as a whole and should you seriously consider switching monitors, security firms?  Locking out Sanders under those circumstances smacks of extreme, fuels the idea the DNC is throwing undue support behind Clinton, favoring her for the nomination and solidifying the concept the whole system is rigged. It was either a software glitch or it wasn’t; if it was, it’s the 21st century argument you hear repeatedly from music and movie pirates putting same all over the internet, watching, listening to it, downloading it from the internet, if it’s illegal why do you make it so easy? Channeling the likely mindset of the fired and suspended campaign staffers, if you keep putting it in my face, hell yeah I’m guuna use it, and they were fired and suspended respectively for it.

http://www.salon.com/2015/12/21/the_media_needs_to_stop_telling_this_lie_about_donald_trump_im_a_sanders_supporter_and_value_honesty/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GiA20iAYaM

http://www.salon.com/2015/12/24/karl_rove_obama_wishing_americans_merry_christmas_in_hawaiian_proves_hes_un_american_and_soft_on_isis/

At the end of the day we have people vying to be president, trying to be president who have no idea how to be president.  When you have to remind or inform Chris Christie that the Russians have had bases in Syria for years; their returned presence might be new but nothing else. Contrary to the Russia is there to prop up Assad at the behest of Iran so Iran can exert more power in the region theory; the singular thing Vladimir Putin cares about is increasing Russia’s prominence on the world stage, enhancing their view as a better superpower than the rest, i.e. beating the United States. Why would he then let Iran have a piece of the global pie he could control and controlling would make him look better; here’s a hint, he wouldn’t. When Governor Christie has said on other occasions recently that we’re already in WWIII and if the president doesn’t realize that it’s just more proof he’s unfit for leadership; almost identical to the Salon article titled ‘Karl Rove: Obama wishing Americans “Merry Christmas” in Hawaiian proves he’s un-American and soft on ISIS.’  You don’t get past the name Karl Rove without comprehending the problem; never mind Hawaii and thus Hawaiian are part of the United States, one of the many languages representing our melting pot fabric of many nations, tongues and cultures. Adding to the absurdity that comes with that name, wishing people a Merry Christmas in Hawaiian is only natural as he’s from there; Hawaiian being a native island language on par with mainland native American languages across the remaining 48 states. It has absolutely nothing to do with the Middle East, terrorists, ISIS or president Obama’s reassurances on the damage the Islamic state can’t do to us industrially, institutionally; said statements in no way diminishing ways they do present a threat or the loss of life they are responsible for as was Rove’s defacto implication. You know it’s bad when Donald Trump also thinks you’re an idiot stemming from Mr. Rove’s dogged assertion Romney won the election in 2012. Christie then did it again mentioning standing across from king Husain of Jordan saying “you have a friend again sir;” unfortunately king Husain of Jordan has been dead for over 15 years and his son king Abdullah isn’t some obscure nobody in the region. Maybe that’s why Chris Christie’s foreign policy reads like a bad parody of Marvin the Martian, because all his facts are out of date.  Carly Fiorina has an adjacent problem; she can’t tell propaganda from legitimate video a-la the Planned Parenthood baby parts non-scandal, she isn’t familiar with enough recent U.S. military history to keep straight the top generals working throughout the 7 years of the Obama administration, let alone the authentic why they left their positions. What can she do, forget effectively? Good news is, none of these two have the poll numbers to achieve the presidency; the bad news, it leaves the door open for one of the two republican contenders Trump, who when asked about the triad of nuclear military vehicles planes, submarines exc. and which one he thought was of propriety importance, he went on about the power held in nuclear arsenals; prompting MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, after posing the question what would a republican president, republican national security plan look like post the devastating failures of Iraq, to say please god don’t let that, Trump’s just detailed  response, be their final answer. Or Cruz whose solution to terrorism is carpet bombing ISIS and whatever else gets in the way, violating the laws of war while he’s at it and whining about a political cartoon featuring his kids based on a situation he orchestrated. And we wonder why American voters don’t seem to know anything substantive on issues, those who do don’t care, don’t follow politics, can’t be convinced to go through the process of voting. Can you blame them looking at the debate highlights, debate highlights the media didn’t edit for anything other than time and boredom?  We can’t even have intelligent debates on one whole side of the political field because everyone debating from there doesn’t have the acumen on key points to debate intelligently causing me to start to agree with the following article title: ‘Just let the Republicans win: Maybe things need to get really bad before America wakes up.’

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