Vicious Lies and Outright Thuggery in Nevada as Trump Rolls

Now we're down to it on the republican side. Vicious lies and outright thuggery are permeating a campaign that, thanks to Donald Trump, never traveled the high road to begin with.

Yesterday the Nevada caucuses were, by several reports, a nightmare of mismanagement and vile chicanery. The Trumpster won it overwhelmingly when he took in an estimated 45.9% of the ballots. Of course running up a number like that is easy to do when your unabashed supporters, many wearing Trump paraphernalia, are the ones counting the votes.

The Nevada republican hierarchy was quick to point out it wasn't against caucus rules, set by the party, not the state, for volunteers at the polling places to wear gear supporting one candidate, or another. Yes, yes, but one has to admit that those voting for, say, John Kasich might have a bit of  distrust in a system which forces them hand over their filled out voter forms to some proud Trump junkie for tabulation. There was also at least one report of 40 to 50 cast paper ballots being hidden and not counted, in addition to others of double voting. In a moment of supreme irony there appeared to be numerous locations--despite all the GOP caterwauling about voter ID laws--where absolutely no one was checking the identification of people participating in the process, or keeping records of who had actually voted. In other instances precincts ran out of ballots and voters were either turned away, or told to go to other polling places. It was so bad, a precinct in the Sierra Vista section of Reno didn't even have a site set up to receive people wanting to participate in the caucus.

While there isn't any hard evidence Brother Trump's campaign specifically sponsored this evil nonsense, there can be no doubting the amoral zeal of his followers, a few of whom have gleefully punched out opponents at Trump rallies. No matter the reality, his supporters wouldn't the be first ones during this race to play fast and loose with either party rules, or the truth.

Ted Cruz, the smarmy little Canadian, who has been constantly witnessing to his Christian faith in order to gain support from fundamentalists, has proven to be a campaigner so low Dick Nixon would have been proud. First was the, "Ben Carson is dropping out of the race before New Hampshire," rumor spread among pre caucus Iowa voters. The abject lie so enraged Dr. Carson he has stuck around, simply out of spite, long after everyone in the world, including himself, has recognized his run for the oval office is doomed. Then there was the photo shopped head of Marco Rubio, placed on the body of some unknown person shaking hands with the dreaded, Barack H. Obama. Finally a video emerged which seemingly showed Rubio disparaging the bible to Cruz's evangelical father. It was such a crude attempt at misinformation that it was exposed almost immediately and the backlash caused Cruz to fire his chief spokesperson, Rick Tyler.

Unfortunately, Cruz's evil trickery seems positively juvenile compared to what came earlier in the week. Prior to yesterday's caucus in Nevada, Trump, proving once again his concept of a president is something akin to a mafia don, took to Twitter and darkly warned republicans Marlene and Joe Ricketts--major contributors to an anti-Trump Super Pac--"The family is secretly spending $'s against me. They better be careful, they have a lot to hide."

Katie Packer, who heads up the PAC, claims she has received death threats and said, among other things, Trump, "...bullies and harasses."

Yeah, well, tell us something we don't know, Katie.

In the midst of all this madness is Marco Rubio, who now seems like the only person who can possibly stop Trump's roll to the nomination. He came in second in Nevada with 23.9% of the vote. The establishment republicans, the few who are left, seem to be finally coalescing around him. Unfortunately when he speaks he comes across as either an overly nervous high school sophomore participating in his first debate, or some guy who has eaten a little too much speed. Let's face it, the guy rattles on at 95 miles an hour while repeating the same phrases over and over again.

What we are seeing is an extraordinary shift in American politics. Trump says he, "heard," national unemployment is 42%  while it is actually 4.9%. He claims he knows of a poll where 25% of African Americans will support him against Hillary Rodham Clinton. Every reputable poll puts the figure at between 9 to 12%. He still insists he personally saw thousands of Muslims in New Jersey celebrating the terrorist attack on New York City in 2001 when there is verifiable proof it didn't happen--yet the howling fools following him believe every word he says. And it's all because they are utterly convinced the mainstream media--the very fuckers who got Trump to this point in the first place--are congenital liars.

The conspiracy theorists and racists--those loons on YouTube who claim the Newtown murders never took place and feral packs of white supremacists--are currently winning the republican nomination for president of the United States of America. They are willingly aided and abetted by an aging white electorate who is terrified of the changing demographics of the country and have a twisted fantasy of what this republic once was and should be.

Next stop is Super Tuesday and polls say Donald Trump leads in every republican primary up for grabs.

At first we wrote the gruesome bastard off as a joke, now we need to recognize him for the real danger he is.


sic vita est


2-24-16