Donald Trump said during an interview with MSNBC’s Morning Joe that he believed a low minimum wage was a good thing for America, because it helped the country compete with foreigners.
“Your slogan is ‘Make America Great Again,'” host Mika Brzezinski noted. “I’m curious on the issue of wages ,which have been flat for years now… do you think the minimum wage should be raised across the board?”
“Mika, it’s such a nasty question because the answer has to be nasty,” Trump said. “We’re in a global economy now. It used to be companies would leave New York State or leave another state and go to Florida, go to Texas, go to wherever they go because or lower wages…”
But now, Trump noted, the United States is competing with much lower wages in other countries. “We can’t have a situation where our labor is so much more expensive than other countries that we can no longer compete. One of the things I’ll do if I win, I’ll make us competitive as a country.”
“I want to create jobs so you don’t have to worry about the minimum wage, they’re making much more than the minimum wage,” he said. “But I think having a low minimum wage is not a bad thing for this country, Mika.”
For months political prognosticators have predicted Donald Trump’s political demise — but is it possible that polls are actually understating the Republican frontrunner’s support?
The theory was first propounded by John Phillips, a California-based conservative columnist and radio host.
“This means that nontraditional news consumers and nontraditional voters made a point to tune in and see what Trump had to say, yet many of these Trump supporters won’t be considered in the polls,” Phillips recently wrote in a column, pointing to the fact a jaw dropping 24-million people turned into the first Republican debate on Fox News, most likely because of Trump’s presence.
“Take the PPP poll, for example,” he went on, speaking of a recent Public Policy Polling survey which showed Trump with a sevem percentage point lead over his nearest Republican rival in Iowa. “It reflects only the opinion of ‘likely’ Republican primary voters. They define ‘likely’ voters as those who are self-described ‘regular’ primary voters. Therefore, any new person brought into the process by Trump wouldn’t be counted, underestimating his actual support.”
Phillips suggested that the Trump phenomenon might be similar to the elections of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jesse Ventura, both non-conventional celebrity gubernatorial candidates in California and Minnesota, respectively.
“In the 1998 election for Minnesota governor, an Oct. 20 poll conducted by the Star Tribune had Democrat Hubert Humphrey III in the lead with 35 percent, Republican Norm Coleman just behind him with 34 percent and wrestler Jesse Ventura in third,” Phillips pointed out. “On Election Day, Ventura won with 37 percent of the vote.”
There are obviously differences between Trump, Ventura and Schwarzenegger. Ventura, for instance, got elected as an independent in 1998 and though Schwarzenegger was elected as a Republican in 2003, he ran in a recall election that boasted 135 candidates.
Still, could Phillips’ theory have legs — could Trump really have a more commanding lead than surveys currently show? Some pollsters and political analysts tell The Daily Caller it’s not unthinkable.
“I don’t know if polls are underestimating or overestimating Trump’s support. Either is possible,” Princeton professor Sam Wang, who runs the Princeton Election Consortium, told TheDC in an email. “It
There’s something happening here. What it isain’t exactly clear.
The words of Buffalo Springfield in the ‘60s anthem “For What It’s Worth” evoked social unrest in a turbulent time, even if they were penned more in response to Los Angeles street riots than Vietnam.
But the lyrics have resonated for decades in part because they can apply to so many social trends difficult to comprehend as they evolve. The 2016 presidential campaign to date may be revealing one of those trends, spiced with a genuine touch of revolutionary spirit.
We all keep laughing at Donald Trump’s chutzpah, the apparent silliness of his entire pseudo-campaign. Yet he keeps growing stronger in the polls. His supporters say Trump gives loud voice to the concerns of many Americans tired of half-hearted, diplomatic solutions.
On the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders’ unabashedly ultra-liberal style has his poll numbers surging against the long-presumed nominee, Hillary Clinton. People laugh at Sanders’ absent-minded professor mien in dismissing his candidacy as little more than a chance to raise the public profile of a few pet issues. But his supporters see in him someone who truly understands the dangers of the nation’s escalating wealth gap.
There’s a long way to go. The “anyone-but-Clinton” movement has picked up serious steam and may draw other Democrats like Vice President Joe Biden into the race, dampening the Sanders’ spark. The Republican field will inevitably be winnowed down even before we reach 2016, and the coalescing of voters around some of the survivors figures to reel in Trump.
So this may not last. But why is it happening even now?
We like what Sanders brings to the campaign table, beating the drums on issues that need to be voiced. We can’t be as enthusiastic about Trump, but a lot of people like what he’s selling. Still, a nation ruled by their extremes and eccentricities on either side of the aisle would serve the interests of precious few. The two-party system is designed to encompass large cross-sections of values and philosophies and to avoid control by extreme ideologies. Sanders and Trump in their own ways represent those dangerous extremes. If we’re headed toward that kind of choice, we’re in trouble, regardless of the winner.
But Sanders and Trump also reflect a nation sick to death of the bitter partisanship, the relentless deceptions and obsequious deference to money and power that poisons modern politics. It all feels like one enveloping lie, a game we’re forced to play over and over again. From that mud pile Sanders and Trump come across as candidates who are simply saying what they think and believe, and letting the chips fall where they may. There’s something refreshing about that, and voters who don’t have to make areal choice for president this early in the process are embracing that.
If somehow this could herald a more forthright era in politics, America would be a better place. But where this is headed just ain’t clear.
Last month the debate about illegal immigration shifted sharply against those who believed indifference or even resistance to attempts to enforce the rule of law. The murder of a San Francisco woman by an illegal immigrant who had been released by authorities acting on the authority of a sanctuary city law highlighted a serious problem. Liberals, including Hillary Clinton, found themselves on the defensive with no way to explain why Democrats had backed such clearly dangerous proposals. But today Americans woke up to a new immigration debate and the 14th Amendment that has given the left back the moral high ground and put Republicans in the soup. Donald Trump has wrongly claimed credit for putting illegal immigration back on the nation’s front burner. But it must be acknowledged that he deserves all the blame for this one. By proposing an end to birthright citizenship and wrongly claiming that the courts have never ruled on whether it applies even to the children of foreigners born in the United States, he has led the GOP down a rabbit hole from which there may be no escape. Thanks to the Donald, Americans have stopped worrying about sanctuary cities or even how best to secure the border and instead are the astonished onlookers to a sterile debate about stripping native-born Americans of their citizenship and fantasies about deporting 11 million illegals.
The element of Trump’s plan to deal with illegal immigration that has gotten the most attention is his proposal to strip the children of illegal immigrants born in the United States of their citizenship. Doing so involves overturning an interpretation of the law that goes back virtually to the beginning of the republic. Moreover, contrary to the assertions of Trump and his backers, the Supreme Court has ruled on the issue when it decided in 1898 that the 14th Amendment gave citizenship to all those born in this country even if their parents were foreigners.
Nevertheless, Trump’s idea has now spawned a growing debate principally on the right about whether that concept is firmly rooted in constitutional law. Some saw it can be ended by presidential fiat in the manner of President Obama’s extralegal executive orders. Others believe the Supreme Court can, if given a case on which a ruling might be based, overturn the precedent. Still others, more sensibly, point out that the best way to end birthright citizenship would be to pass a new constitutional amendment.
For those who like arcane legal arguments, this is great entertainment. But what those conservatives who have eagerly tumbled down the rabbit hole with Trump on the issue are forgetting is that we are in the middle of a presidential election, not a law school bull session.
It must be acknowledged that although Trump’s proposal about citizenship has as little chance of being put into effect as the deportation of all 11 million illegals, it is nevertheless quite popular in some precincts. Trump’s popularity rests in his willingness to articulate the anger that many Americans feel about injustices or the failure of government to deal with problems. If there are 11 million illegals in the country, they want them all to be chucked out. If they have children here, who are, by law, U.S. citizens, they say, so what? Chuck them out too.
The question of what to do with illegals already here is a problem that vexes anyone that isn’t inclined, as President Obama and the Democrats are, to grant them amnesty and forget about it. Reasonable people can differ about possible solutions to the problem but there’s nothing reasonable or practical about a proposal that assumes the U.S. government is capable of capturing and deporting 11 million people plus the untold number of U.S. citizens to which they have given birth.
The notion that the American people will stomach such an exercise or pay what Politicoestimates (probably conservatively) the $166 billion it would cost to pull off such a horrifying spectacle is a pure fantasy.
What needs to be emphasized here is that wherever you stand on birthright citizenship or mass deportations, so long as it is these ideas that Republicans are discussing (as Trump did last night with Bill O’Reilly on Fox News), then they are losing the debate about immigration and very likely the next presidential election. No one is going to be elected president on a platform of depriving people born in this country of citizenship no matter who their parents might be. Nor, despite the cheers Trump gets from his fans, will the American people ever countenance the kinds of intrusive measures and the huge expansion of the federal immigration bureaucracy and police powers that would be needed to pull off a mass deportation.
Let’s be clear. This isn’t a matter of appeasing a Hispanic vote that is probably locked up for the Democrats even if the GOP nominates a pro-amnesty Hispanic. It’s about derailing a productive discussion about real-world solutions to problems into an ideological trap that will only convince moderates and independents, and probably some conservatives as well, that the Republicans are not ready for prime time.
These are the same voters who are likely to agree with Republicans when they say any immigration reform must only come after the border is secured by reasonable measures rather than by reconstructing the Great Wall of China or perhaps the epic ice wall from “Game of Thrones” on the Rio Grande that will be paid for by Mexico in Trump’s dreams. These voters were horrified by the murder of Kate Steinle and support efforts by the Republicans to pass a “Kate’s Law” that would penalize Democrat-run cities that flout federal authority to the detriment of the rule of law and the safety of citizens. They want the border to be secured and are disturbed by Obama’s efforts to circumvent the constitution to grant amnesty. But they aren’t likely to applaud Trump’s effort to ignore settled law or throw out American-born kids.
The point is, contrary to the conventional wisdom of the liberal mainstream media, a conservative stance on illegal immigration is a political winner for Republicans so long as they stick to points on which they have a clear advantage. But when they follow Trump into circular debates about birthright citizenship or fantasize about throwing all illegals out, including citizens or children raised here, they are losing the voters they need to win back the presidency.
Donald Trump and all GOP candidates should pledge to authorize education savings accounts.
The mainstream press and political pundits are bombarding us with a stream of warnings that Donald Trump and the other Republican candidates are driving minority voters away from the Republican Party by their “extreme” proposals and rhetoric. Whether or not one believes there’s any truth to this, Trump and every other Republican candidate can prove the dire predictions wrong with one simple act — sign a pledge that they support education savings accounts (“ESAs”) for all families and will work to pass legislation authorizing ESAs. No single policy proposal will do more to attract low-income black and Hispanic voters than treating the dreams and aspirations that those voters have for their children to be as important as those of families who can afford to move to the right zip code or pay private school tuition.
Mr. Trump and the other Republican presidential candidates should agree to sign the ESA pledge at the beginning of the CNN debate scheduled for September 16 at the Reagan Library. Nothing would be more fitting than for the leaders of the current Republican Party to honor the legacy of Ronald Reagan by signing this pledge in his library and before his wife, 32 years after the publication of A Nation at Risk. This Reagan initiative issued the alarm that “The educational foundations of our society are presently being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity that threatens our very future as a Nation and a people.” In its words, “If an unfriendly foreign power had attempted to impose on America the mediocre educational performance that exists today, we might well have viewed it as an act of war….” The authors of the report began with a restatement of a fundamental premise of the American Dream:
All, regardless of race or class or economic status, are entitled to a fair chance and the tools for developing their individual powers of mind and spirit to the utmost. This promise means that all children by virtue of their own efforts, competently guided, can hope to attain the mature and informed judgment needed to secure gainful employment, and to manage their own lives, thereby serving their own interests but also the progress of society itself.
Unfortunately, in 2015, we still do not give all children a fair chance since we only allow it to those with the economic means to segregate themselves in public schools in the right zip code, or in private schools. Mr. Trump and his fellow candidates would, by taking the ESA pledge, honor President Reagan’s beliefs, expressed at a White House briefing in January 1989, when he said:
Choice represents a return to some of our most basic notions about education. In particular, programs emphasizing choice reflect the simple truth that the keys to educational success are schools and teachers that teach, and parents who insist that their children learn.… And choice in education is the wave of the future because it represents a return to some of the most basic American values. Choice in education is no mere abstraction. Like its economic cousin, free enterprise, and its political cousin, democracy, it affords hope and opportunity.
Americans today still fundamentally support Reagan’s belief in the inherent right of parents to make the best choices for their children with as little interference from the government as possible.
For a more recent example of the power of parental choice, the Republican candidates should look to Nevada, where in January 2015 Republicans took joint control of the Nevada legislature and governor’s mansion for the first time since 1929. Less than six months later, Nevada Republicans passed a ground-breaking law allowing universal school choice for the first time in the history of the United States. The power of ESAs can be seen by the fact that those families whose children aren’t currently eligible for the program because their children attend private schools are clamoring for an amendment to include them. Nearly every poll shows that, regardless of political persuasion, economic class, or race, two of every three Americans support school choice. As Deborah Beck, a Democratic pollster put it, in announcing the results of her January 2015 poll showing 70% support for the concept:
“The poll clearly shows widespread support, among both political parties, for school choice. Any public official — or potential candidate for President — who ignores these numbers does so at their own peril.”
Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval and his fellow Republicans, by following the beliefs of President Reagan and authorizing ESAs, made it possible for families all over America to legitimately ask Mr. Trump and every political leader: If Nevada trusts its parents to make the right choice, why can’t my children have the same freedom and opportunity? As Assemblyman Ira Hansen said, when one of the bill’s opponents questioned whether parents are skilled in making the right choices for curriculum and instruction: “I think we need to have more confidence in our parents…”
In his first magazine cover interview and photo shoot as the leading Republican, the reality TV presidential candidate lets loose on Hillary's email scandal ("Watergate on steroids"), Bill Cosby ("Was he drunk?"), whether he'll go on Megyn Kelly's show, why he won't accept vice president, Melania as first lady, and if he even needs Fox News and the haters.
A version of story first appeared in the Aug. 28 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.
I'm sitting in the reception area of Donald Trump's offices on the 26th floor of Trump Tower in New York when an assistant comes to fetch me: "Mr. Trump would like to see you," she says, as if I were a contestant on The Apprentice, the NBC reality series that brought the real estate mogul's bravado and business savvy to 20 million Americans each week at its peak. She leads me to a vast conference room where cameras click as Trump, 69, signs papers with another man. Standing at attention are two of his children, Ivanka, 33, andErik, 31, and about a dozen others. The scene has the pomp of historical significance one might associate with the Yalta Conference. Except this agreement being signed is for new Trump hotels in Asia in partnership with a gentleman who, Trump enthuses, is "the richest man" in his country (at press time, the deal was yet to be announced). Pens write with flourish, there is applause. Trump then calls me over: "Janice! You got to see this woman!" he says, motioning to a female dressed in a suit sitting next to the "richest man." It's never explained to me whether she is his wife or colleague. I don't know if she understands what is being said. "Isn't she beautiful? Beautiful!" he continues as she stands expressionless. "This is your business to know these things," he says to me, as an editor. "Just look at her!"
Donald Trump has a new ad out today attacking Hillary, telling her IT DOES MATTER:
I have to admit I chuckled when I saw the ad the first time because the messaging is so simple and to the point. It’s not dolled up with all of this pomp and circumstance. It’s focus is the message and nothing else.
I did like how they threw in the Whitewater controversy between the emails and Benghazi as a reminder back to the 90s
In his August 17 monologue, Rush Limbaugh discussed Trump's spot-on immigration plan extensively, a plan that incorporates all three of the main points I summarized in my August 5 article, “Hard Truth for the GOP from its Base.” I can’t and don’t claim Trump got his plan from me -- any marginally thoughtful political observer not paralyzed by total dependence on corporate money can see America’s desperate need to halt illegal immigration and cauterize the risk of its recurrence. Not only did Rush praise the Trump plan, but -- at least as important -- pointed out, citing serious polling evidence, that Trump’s immigration proposal resonates loud and clear with the overwhelming majority of the US electorate (not just with Republicans and conservatives), and that any major Republican candidate who had timely addressed immigration as Trump has would be leading the field now by a wide margin.
Check out Rush’s monologue. It should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in the future well being of America. And forgive my pointing out that the same message can be found in my now two week old article.
The next major issue/opportunity that the mainstream Republican field is preparing to fumble through pusillanimous silence and lack of vision is the "black lives matter" fraud.
Expect the Democrat perpetrators of the Left’s latest despicable falsehood -- that America and its police are racist -- to soon start interrupting Republican candidates, as they already have Bernie Sanders. And to demand that the Republicans grovel and apologize too, as Sanders has. Recalling the debate, Scott Walker, ill-advised and politically tone deaf, has already shown how not to handle this issue: Asked what he would say to those who claim blacks are victims of racist police, Walker mumbled something PC about the need for thorough training and imposing consequences on bad cops. Thus, giving credence to the lie. I doubt that the cops of America and their families thank Walker for those remarks.
What Walker should have said, and what any Republican interested in winning the presidency should say to the thugs themselves, or to anyone who brings up their libels, is something like this:
"I've got news for you buddy/Ma’am: This is the least racist nation in history and so are its police. America is the best place on the planet to be a black person or to be any minority. The overwhelming majority of Americans, and their police, have been struggling for decades to treat everyone fairly and justly. To call this nation, its people or its police racists is a damned lie."
These sentences, if any Republican had the vision and courage to utter them, would be remembered to great good consequence. The vast majority of Americans feel in their gut they are not only true, but the heart of the matter. About 80% of the electorate would breathe a collective sigh of relief to hear someone at last stand up for the truth.
Once that core message had been delivered, the candidate could add whatever he/she wants about how the problem facing American blacks is not racism, which is a politically motivated lie, but that the problem includes the destruction of the black family, children growing up without fathers, and low wages and no jobs for black youth, at least in part because of out-of-control illegal immigration, all deliberately engineered by the Democratic Party to create dependency and buy black votes.
Donald Trump has a new target for his criticism of the nation's immigration policies - Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Trump said he wants to require employers to pay H-1B workers much more money, which he said would discourage companies from hiring them and boost job prospects for Americans. He also wants to have tech jobs offered to unemployed Americans before they can be filled by workers with H-1B visas.
"This will improve the number of black, Hispanic and female workers in Silicon Valley who have been passed over in favor of the H-1B program. Mark Zuckerberg's personal Senator, Marco Rubio, has a bill to triple H-1Bs that would decimate women and minorities," Trump wrote in his immigration plan. Rubio is also seeking the Republican nomination for president.
Zuckerberg started a public interest group called Fwd.us to push for immigration and lobbying reform along with Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer. Neither Facebook(FB, Tech30) nor Fwd.us had an immediate comment on Trump's criticism of Zuckerberg.
Trump says that there are plenty of graduates with degrees in science, technology, engineering and math, known as STEM, to fill tech jobs. That means that employers don't need H-1B visas to fill jobs, and are using them instead to keep wages low.
Employers are supposed to pay a typical wage to anyone hired under a H-1B visa. But in reality, employees on these visas are typically paid 20 to 45% less than U.S. workers who they are are often replacing, said Ron Hira, a Howard University public policy professor who has studied the visa's pay scale.
"I don't think you should eliminate the H1-B program. The problem is it's being abused and it's a source of very cheap labor," said Hira.
argued that GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump’s position paper on immigration is “bold,” “strong,” and “positive,” although he added, “I’d like to plug a couple more things in there” on Monday’s broadcast of CNN’s “New Day.”
King said, “Well, when I read through that document, in the end, I thought it’s a very, very positive document. It’s bold. It’s strong. It’s broad. It covers most of the things that you’d want to cover. I’d like to plug a couple more things in there.”
He continued, “But with regard to birthright citizenship, for example, it is — has constitutional underpinnings, yes, but the way you start that is, as you pass the legislation that puts an end to birthright citizenship, I happen to be the author of that legislation. And then it will be litigated, there isn’t any doubt about it, but there’s a clause in there thatsays, ‘and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,’ ‘All persons born [or naturalized] in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof’ are American citizens, and — or are United States citizens, to be more technically correct. So, we have to start the legislation, I think it’s constitutionally sound to pass the legislation, and end birthright citizenship. There aren’t very many countries in the world that have that policy. But I was curious, for some time, about how Donald Trump would get Mexico to pay for the wall. As you know, I’ve advocated for a long time for a fence — a wall and a fence on the southern border. I’m optimistic about this. I think the tactics that he uses are legitimate, and he’ll use more leverage in that. … I think that he can get to that place, but whether they do or whether they don’t pay for the wall, as he says in his document, the cost of that wall pales in comparison to the cost of not building it.”
King was then asked why he isn’t pushing for criminal sanctions for employers who hire illegal immigrants. He answered, “I’m supportive of doing those things. The reason we haven’t pushed this harder in the last six and a half years is because, there’s no way that one can imagine that this administration is going to enforce any of that. I mean, they’ve gone to court to block local jurisdictions from even mirroring federal immigration law, let alone…how they’re accepting sanctuary cities, which I’m grateful that Donald Trump has in his document, he’s going to end that.” And “if you’re going to punish and fine employers, you have to have a Justice Department and an Obama [administration] — a presidential administration that’ll follow through. I would do that. But I think I have a better idea, and I was hopeful that it would be in this document. There’s room for it within the language that’s there, it’s not specified, it’s called the New IDEA Act. And that’s a piece of legislation that I offered, several cycles ago, that does this. It brings the IRS into play, and it tell — and it says this, ‘If you’re an employer, and you use E-Verify, you get safe harbor for those that you hire. But, you cannot be left the wages and benefits paid to illegals under this legislation.’ And so, the IRS would go through, under a normal audit of a business, and they would run the Social Security numbers of the employees through. If E-Verify kicks them out, and says, ‘Sorry, they can’t work in the United States,’ then the employer would lose his business deduction. So, your $10 an hour illegal, after there’s interest, penalty, and taxes charged on that, becomes a $16 an hour illegal. And we would — and there’s a six year statute of limitations on it. So, we would clean up this workforce, and we’d do so with the IRS. And we require the IRS to cooperate with the Social Security Administration, and the Department of Homeland Security. I know that’s within the — I’ll say within the list of things that Donald Trump would be looking at to support, but I don’t — but it’s not in the document. So, that’s what I would do. I think it’s actually — it enhances our revenue stream. It’s a — it would score out a plus by billions of dollars, and clean up our workforce.”
King concluded, “There’s something he’s tapped into here, and we — nobody knows how long this’ll last. We’ve never seen anything like this before, but he has tapped into the discontent in America, the malaise within America, the people who are fed up. They’re fed up with political correctness, they’re fed up with the disrespect for the rule of law, they’re fed up with the dilution of Americanism, and they want cultural continuity, they want English as the official language, they want free enterprise to be something we can proud of again, and they want to be done with an administration that’s been punishing big business. It’s important for all business to be profitable. That’s the engine that drives the freedom that we have. And there’s a robust America there, that needs to be tapped into. And that’s why I think he’s got the support he has, and why that helicopter landed a little ways away from me the other day.”
BALTIMORE (WJZ)—Ravens Head Coach John Harbaugh may have been hinting at a 2016 presidential run after remarks made during a Saturday afternoon press conference.
The conversation started about refs and quickly took a turn toward governmental issues.
In a discussion about Thursday night’s game against the Saints, Harbaugh called the officials “rusty” after they apparently missed an intentional grounding call in the preseason opener. He feels they need more time during training camp to be better prepared for the regular season.
“But they only get three days of practice in training camp, so they’re going to be rusty,” he says. “If they got a little bit more practice in training camp, I think they would do a little bit better.”
Harbaugh jokes, saying he’s made that proposal to the NFL.
“It’s interesting because when you ask the league, they’ll say the union won’t let them do it. When you ask the refs, they all say they want to do it. My proposal is that they get together and get on the same page.”
And that’s where the discussion takes a political turn.
“To me both sides want it, maybe they should start talking to one another. Maybe like our government too,” Harbaugh says.
“Maybe talk to one another, solve a problem once in a while, instead of creating a problem. Be more concerned about the country than you are your party. How about we do that? Let’s try to fix things around here, you know, in this country. That’s what made us great.”
After the brief ramble, Harbaugh jokes “I’m going Trump here.”
“Build the wall. It’s not that hard. If you don’t have a border, you don’t have a country. At the same time, we’ve got 12-15 million hard-working people here. Give them a shot! Give them a chance to become a citizen!”
Reporters ask if he’s hinting at a president run and Harbaugh laughs and says,” I might be coming out, I might be running.”
So now we have to ask the question…would you be a Harbaugh 2016 supporter?
President Jimmy Carter — 60%. Former California Governor Ronald Reagan — 36%. So confident was Carter White House Chief of Staff Hamilton Jordan of the coming year’s presidential election that he boasted: “The American people are not going to elect a seventy-year-old, right-wing, ex-movie actor to be president.” Hamilton Jordan was a smart guy — and he was also wildly wrong. A little less than a year later the American people — ignoring that Gallup poll — elected Ronald Reagan to the presidency in a landslide — in a three-way race. Reagan won 50.8% of the vote to Carter’s 41%. Third party candidate John Anderson, a liberal Republican who had been defeated by Reagan in the GOP primaries, won a mere 6.6% of the vote. Reagan carried 44 states to Carter’s six plus the District of Columbia.
What happened? How could Reagan go from losing a Gallup poll to Carter by 24 points — then winning the actual election by almost 10 points? Answer? The emergence of what would become known to political history as “the Reagan Democrats.” Who were they? Blue collar, working class, largely Catholic and ethnic, they originally emerged in Richard Nixon’s 1968 and 1972 elections. In which Nixon referred to them as the “Silent Majority.” In 1980, angered by Carter’s handling of the economy, the feckless handling of the Iran hostage crisis, and the left-wing tilt of the Democrats, these voters — many of whom had voted for John F. Kennedy twenty years earlier — returned with a vengeance. Famously, Macomb County, Michigan, which cast 63% of its vote for JFK in 1960, turned around in 1980 and voted 66% for Reagan.
On Tuesday night of this week, Donald Trump appeared in Birch Run, Michigan in Saginaw County. Here’s the headline from the Detroit Free Press:
A lovefest for Donald Trump in Birch Run
The story begins:
BIRCH RUN, Mich. — Addressing about 2,000 very enthusiastic people at the Birch Run Expo Center, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump touched on everything from immigration, China, the military, Obamacare and his Republican opponents.
The crowd, some coming from outside of Michigan, ate it up, giving him frequent standing ovations and breaking into chants of “Trump, Trump, Trump!” and “U.S.A, U.S.A.”
The obvious question. Are Reagan Democrats returning to the center of the American political scene — this time known as Trump Democrats?
A new CNN poll in Iowa has some very revealing stats. The poll notes:
Donald Trump has a significant lead in the race to win over likely Iowa caucus-goers, according to the first CNN/ORC poll in the state this cycle. Overall, Trump tops the field with 22% and is the candidate seen as best able to handle top issues including the economy, illegal immigration and terrorism. He’s most cited as the one with the best chance of winning the general election, and, by a wide margin, as the candidate most likely to change the way things work in Washington.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump Sunday released his campaign’s immigration plan, which includes ending birthright citizenship for the children of illegal immigrants.
“We are the only country in the world whose immigration system puts the needs of other nations ahead of our own,” Trump also said. “That must change.”
Here is how Trump describes the three principles of his plan:
A nation without borders is not a nation. There must be a wall across the southern border.
A nation without laws is not a nation. Laws passed in accordance with our Constitutional system of government must be enforced.
A nation that does not serve its own citizens is not a nation. Any immigration plan must improve jobs, wages and security for all Americans.
Trump’s plan includes his frequent call to make Mexico pay for a wall across the southern border. “For many years, Mexico’s leaders have been taking advantage of the United States by using illegal immigration to export the crime and poverty in their own country (as well is in other Latin American countries),” Trump says.
Says Trump: “We will not be taken advantage of anymore.”
Trump is also calling for the government to triple the number of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, mandate nationwide e-verify systems for employers, deport criminal illegal immigrants, end catch-and-release of people caught trying to enter the country illegaly, defund sanctuary cities and implement harsher penalties for immigrants overstaying visas.
Conservative author Ann Coulter tweeted Sunday that Donald Trump’s immigration policy is so awesome, she doesn’t care if he performs abortions in the White House.
Ann Coulter
