Monday Reads: One More Day Until Hillary Clinton Makes History!

Posted: June 6, 2016 | Author: | Filed under: morning reads, U.S. Politics | Tags: , , , , , | 121 Comments
Hillary Clinton takes a selfie with supporters at a rally at Sacramento City College, Sunday, June 5, 2016,AP Photo/John Locher)

Hillary Clinton takes a selfie with supporters at a rally at Sacramento City College, Sunday, June 5, 2016,AP Photo/John Locher)

Good Morning!!

Hillary had a great weekend, winning the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico primaries by comfortable margins. She now needs only about 30 pledged delegates to reach a majority and clinch the Democratic nomination. That will happen after the votes come in from the New Jersey primary tomorrow night.

As you know, she will give her victory speech tomorrow night from her Brooklyn headquarters. Hillary Clinton will become the first woman ever to win a major party presidential nomination; and when she goes on to beat Donald Trump in November, she will crash through the highest glass ceiling of all–the presidency of the United States of America!

After our dreams were dashed in June 2008, I wondered if there would be another chance for a woman president in my lifetime. Well, here we are, with a very good chance of seeing that happen! I know you are all as excited as I am. I just cannot wait until tomorrow night! I feel like a kid on Christmas Eve wondering if Christmas morning will ever come.

Hillary Clinton concedes Democratic nomination to Barack Obama in June 2008

Hillary Clinton concedes Democratic nomination to Barack Obama in June 2008

NBC News: Hillary Clinton Edges Closer to Clinching Nomination After Puerto Rico Win.

Hillary Clinton won the Puerto Rico primary Sunday, edging even closer to the delegate majority she needs to become the presumptive nominee of the Democratic Party.

A total of 60 pledged delegates were at stake in the island primary contest, which comes ahead of Tuesday’s crucial race in California.

Puerto Rico voters faced long lines and confusion over polling stations, many of which had closed since the Democratic primary in 2008. The island is also in the throes of an economic crisis after having accumulated more than $70 billion of outstanding debt.

Gov. Alejandro Padilla endorsed Clinton on Wednesday, calling her the best candidate to help the government out of the fiscal crisis.

Clinton also notched a victory in Saturday’s caucuses in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

She is widely expected to secure the Democratic nomination on Tuesday when Democratic voters in six states, including California, will head to the polls in the last multi-state primary day of the nomination race.

At a rally in Sacramento late Sunday, Clinton underscored the importance of that primary, telling the crowd: “I want to finish strong here in California. It means … it means the world to me.”

https://twitter.com/politicalmiller/status/739820833456132096

The Clinton Campaign’s main job today is to keep superdelegates from putting her over the top until after her speech tomorrow night.

Of course we still have to deal with Old Mr. Nasty, Bernie Sanders; but nothing he does after tomorrow will make any difference. He is going to find himself shunned and ignored if he continues his path of attacking the Democratic nominee. The man is on his last legs. Here’s what he looked like in California yesterday. Not very presidential.

https://twitter.com/word_34/status/739644631789408256

Sanders may also face a serious challenge to his Senate in 2018. Joy Reid at The Daily Beast: Meet Al Giordano, the Man Who Wants to Take Bernie Down.

If Al Giordano challenges Bernie Sanders for his U.S. Senate seat in 2018, he will tick nearly all of the boxes Sanders checked during his surprisingly robust presidential run.

Nearly zero odds of defeating an entrenched Washington politician? Check.

Little chance of Democratic Party support? Double check! A decades-old history of lefty activism that casts him as a hippie-turned-politico? Check, check, and check again.

So why would he do it? Because in Giordano’s view, and that of his social media supporters, Bernie is losing ugly and hurting Democrats’ chances of prevailing against Donald Trump in November.

“I mean, what haven’t they touched?” Giordano asks, peering at me via a 6-by-4 inch Skype window from his home in Mexico City. “What part of the Obama coalition have they not alienated? It’s like they want to erase the coalition.”

Al Giordano

A little about Giordano:

Giordano, a bearded, graying, former reporter with the Boston Phoenix alternative weekly, cut his teeth as an anti-nuclear protester in the early 1980s while living in Rowe, a small Massachusetts town bordering Vernon, Vermont. When he wasn’t filing for the Phoenix, he spent his time protesting the twin nuclear power plants on either side of the state border: Yankee Rowe and Vermont Yankee. And he became close friends with the late leftie activist and anarchist Abbie Hoffman. He has spent the last 19 years in Mexico, where he runs an online newsletter, Narco News, and a school that trains journalists to cover social movements. His claim to fame is winning a First Amendment case against the Banco Nacional de México, which sued him, a Mexican reporter and Narco News for libel over a series of stories claiming a bank official was in league with Central American drug cartels.

Giordano recalls being an early Bernie Sanders supporter.

“I did support him when he first ran for [Burlington] mayor,” he says of Sanders. “I did support him when he first ran for Congress, and then the year he won. I supported him as a journalist and got my newspaper to endorse him.” But he says he cooled to Sanders after the Newt Gingrich-led “Republican revolution” takeover of the House in the 1994 midterm elections. Back then, Sanders was still distancing himself from Democrats, including liberal stalwarts like Barney Frank and Steny Hoyer, who were, in Giordano’s words, “giving Gingrich hell.”

Read the rest at the link.

Democrats in Puerto Rico are blaming the Sanders campaign for the long lines at a vastly reduced number of polling places during their primary yesterday.

Puerto Rico Democrats managed to give Hillary a big win anyway. Here’s what one Clinton voter had to say:

Trump News

Republicans are getting very nervous about their presumptive nominee, according to CNN:

Top Republican officials and donors are increasingly worried about the threat Donald Trump’s attack on a judge’s Mexican heritage could pose to their party’s chances in November — and about the GOP’s ability to win Latino votes for many elections to come.

Trump is under fire for repeatedly accusing U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, who is overseeing a lawsuit involving Trump University, of bias because of his Mexican heritage. Those concerns intensified Sunday after Trump said he would have the same concerns about the impartiality of a Muslim judge.
House and Senate GOP leaders have condemned Trump’s remarks about Curiel, while donors have openly worried that losing Latino voters could doom them in key down-ballot races. Other important party figures, including former Speaker Newt Gingrich, are urging Trump to change his combative, confrontational style before it’s too late.
Veteran Republican strategist Rick Wilson warned this weekend that GOP leaders who have endorsed Trump “own his politics.”
“You own his politics,” Wilson wrote in a column for Heatstreet, adding later, “You own the racial animus that started out as a bug, became a feature and is now the defining characteristic of his campaign. You own every crazy, vile chunk of word vomit that spews from his mouth.”

The GOP’s deepest fear: A Barry Goldwater effect that could last far longer than Trump’s political aspirations.

Goldwater, the Arizona senator who was the 1964 GOP nominee and a leader of the conservative movement, alienated a generation of African-American voters by opposing the Civil Rights Act — opening the door for Democrats to lock in their support for decades. Republicans fret that Trump could similarly leave a stain with Latino voters.

Of course, Trump is just saying in plain language what Republicans have been dog-whistling for decades. Here’s conservative writer Kathleen Parker: The GOP surrenders to the dark side.

With the surrender of House Speaker Paul Ryan to the Trump crusade, it is fair to wonder what the Republican Party stands for.

Mr. Ryan’s endorsement of Trump, which appeared in an op-ed the speaker wrote for his hometown paper — rather than before a gaggle of reporters and newscasters with his arm draped around Mr. Trump’s shoulders — was a white flag from the establishment opposition.

In his op-ed, Mr. Ryan explained that though he doesn’t support all of Mr. Trump’s ideas (brave!), he’s confident that a President Trump would support the House agenda. Moreover, Mr. Ryan felt that his endorsement was needed to maintain a Republican majority in the House.

In other words, he caved, as most everyone knew he would after a respectable period of resistance.

The party has to stand united, after all. Because, as the Geico guy would remind us, that’s what they do.

Next likely to fall will be evangelical Christian leaders, who are scheduled to meet with Mr. Trump on June 21. The expectation is that Mr. Trump will promise to pick conservative Supreme Court justices who would restore the nation’s social order to a pre-Roe v. Wade, pre-gay-rights version.

If the purportedly devout can accept the ungodly Trump as the nation’s leader, then there really is nothing sacred. But, by God, he’s better than Hillary Clinton, clamors the crowd.

Newt Gingrich objected to Trump’s attacks on a federal judge overseeing a fraud case against Trump “university” and became the latest Trump enemy.

Donald Trump jabbed Newt Gingrich on Monday after the former House Speaker criticized the presumptive GOP nominee for attacking the federal judge overseeing the Trump University lawsuit, saying his critique was “inappropriate.”

Appearing on “Fox and Friends,” Trump said he’d heard Gingrich’s comments about him and “was surprised at Newt. I thought it was inappropriate what he said.”
Gingrich, who has drawn scrutiny as a potential vice president pick, joined a chorus of top Republicans rebuking Trump for repeatedly accusing U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, overseeing a lawsuit involving Trump University, of bias because of his Mexican heritage. Those concerns intensified Sunday after Trump said he would have the same concerns about the impartiality of a Muslim judge.
In an interview with the Washington Post, Gingrich said “I don’t know what Trump’s reasoning was, and I don’t care. His description of the judge in terms of his parentage is completely unacceptable.” And on “Fox News Sunday,” he said that it was “one of the worst mistakes Trump has made,” adding: “I think it’s inexcusable.”

The Republicans are not going to be able to control Trump. He’s turning their party into a train wreck, and they deserve it.

So . . . what else is happening? What stories are you following today? Let us know in the comment thread and have a great day!