Amen!!!

"This election has nothing to do with Vichy, whatever number you give to it." One of Le Pen's campaign points was deporting immigrants; I'm thinking she didn't mean Germans, Dutch, Polish immigrants, but the survivors of France's colonial policies in Africa, Asia, and possibly the ME. Who did the French deport in 1942? Jewish immigrants. The French police not the Germans carried out rounding them up and getting them to German death camps. Maybe she didn't really mean it. Maybe she wouldn't do it. In the meantime, the example of Vichy stands as a warning. Let's call it Vichy 1.25.

Exactly so.

Annihilation in NYC is a daily possibility. I hadn't particularly thought of the Russians doing it. Of course, there are the Russian cabbies, but they can only pick off one or two people at a time.

This informal Saturday poll responding to, "What Does this Mean..." seems to be: Doesn't mean a damn thing, except that the Democrats are sore losers.

Yes, I do remember very well. And you probably remember that I was taken to be an ardent Clinton supporter. I was certainly opposed to Trump and voted for Clinton. However, I was, and among those, who during the election lamented that we had to spend so much time criticizing the Republicans and Trump in particular. We were looking forward to the day when we would having Clinton "to kick around again"; meaning that in the face of two bad choices, she was the least bad. I don't recall that you were specifically a Trump fan, but you won't mind my saying, I hope, that you should be careful what you wish for.

The comments questioning her analysis are also worth a read.

And the Washington Post has this: "The CIA has concluded in a secret assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election to help Donald Trump win the presidency, rather than just to undermine confidence in the U.S. electoral system, according to officials briefed on the matter." http://wapo.st/2h9HyW3

Touche! It is especially unfair to hound dogs.

Excellent rendition of Alice in Wonderland, 2016 edition.

Intimidate you? Impossible. Would never think of it. Would never want to. The kewpie doll comparison took me aback. Peace.

Only here where there is a strong streak of misogyny. It's one thing to read it on a Tyler post, I was sorry to read it on one of yours.

If I may....Can we agree on this: Women shouldn't be given a pass on ideas, statements, performance, execution, etc. Stuff that counts. But...it seems to be a cultural factoid of U.S. media and politics that women have to show up in public with make-up perfect, hair done, clothes clean and pressed. And so Clinton did. She looked fine for a 68-year old. Let me contrast her mode and demeanor with her opponent who looked like an old hound dog with his puffy eye bags, pouty lips (though no drool), and baggy suit. I would never mention this except in contrast. She was obliged to look as good as she could. He was not. The day a woman candidate can walk up to the podium looking like Mr. Trump did last night will be aesthetically sad, but then we can judge candidates on their political smarts, or lack thereof. With pardon to our German friends, let me point out that Chancellor Angela Merkle is a fine representative of a culture where politics and media do not dictate what she wears and how she looks. Bravo!

"NYC real estate is highly regulated." You bet it is--by the real estate industry itself and its lobbyists and representatives in Albany and at City Hall. You're electing a president who learned everything he knows in NYC real estate.

"I will vote for her because there's no choice," I should have added because, as I may have mentioned I was born and baptized in Chicago, and therefore I must vote for someone...

Not because I am her supporter. I will vote for her because there's no choice, but I am not her supporter. A koan! Impartial--not the issue. He had two strikingly different characters before him. He hectored her and let him off free. He didn't know what he was doing, imho!

Apropos of the observation in the addenedum above: "I thought Lauer was quite even handed and is now paying the price levied by the band of leftist harpies gathered around HC. You know their names." Even-handed in what way? Lauer several time told Clinton to cut it short, until she finally had to say at one point "Let me finish." Had the air of a marital "dialogue." With Trump it was more like shooting the bull with the guy next to you at the bar. Since Trump says the minimum, perhaps there was no need to say, "cut it short"; couldn't have been any shorter. On the other hand, if Lauer really knew much about the issues he questioned the two on, he would have had better follow-up queries and points to Trump; he might even have done the same for Clinton. We can all look forward to the debates with fear and loathing. See you there. Whatever Lauer's politics, the problem is he was vastly underinformed and undercoached on running such a forum. A bit like Judy Woodruff on the Newshour.

Yes, hmmm, perhaps. However, I have long thought that Israel is playing a double-game with Syria. However much medical support they may be giving to IS fighters (haven't actually seen that reported), they have been reported as giving medical assistance to the opposition and "other" Syrian fighters. No doubt humanitarian. And no doubt with an eye to the ultimate settlement, which very likely could be without Assad but with the Alawites a major contingent, perhaps dominant, in a new government. Syria's new government concedes the Golan and peripheral border territory to Israel. As a lead-up to that how about this: Turkey kow tows to Putin and ends support of all factions fighting in Syria; Assad finally gets his dacha (perhaps in Crimea); Turkey and Israel have, if not kissed at least made up; Netanyahu is looking to flirt with Putin as a lever to move along the U.S. subvention to the occupation (and Liberman, foreign minister, and former citizen of the Soviet Union is there to translate.) Iran? will follow Assad's lead...not sure about this? Perhaps I am naive (she says), but the idea that Clinton is going to nuke the world seems more far-fetched than the scenario I have just sketched. Of course, I could be wrong...only a history major.

Her inauguration is 5.5 months away. Maybe Russia, Turkey, Israel, and Assad will have settled matters per the comments on "30 Syria-2016 just to thwart her nuclear ambitions!

Colonel Lang: Insofar as I was born in Chicago and baptized a Catholic and a Democrat, you could say I am a Dem partisan. For some years now, and for various policy reasons, I have been a homeless Democrat. So I know how many Republican partisans must be feeling now. As to the Rodham family drama, I know very little. What you write about mother and father Rodham sounds right. The Rodham brothers, as I recall, were something of a nuisance during Bill Clinton's presidency, but they seem to have gone off-screen. The Rodhams lived in one of Chicago's commuter suburbs not far from O'Hare airport. Like most Chicago suburbs it was staunchly Republican, and if I remember correctly this one may have had a serious John Birch contingent. The politics were anti-Chicago. My family would never have gone there! Hillary Clinton has written about her break from this politics. She credits the youth minister of the local Methodist church with having introduced her and her cohort to inner-city Chicago and contact with African-Americans (tutoring was big then, but I can't recall the project). Off she went to Wellesely and the rest is history. Perhaps her father did not see eye-to-eye with her sympathies and new political views. It may also be that he was a somewhat traditional pater familias against whom she had to rebel and they were never reconciled. Maybe he was just a drinker--so many possibilities. Perhaps her foreign policy tendencies are simply the leftovers from 1950s Cold War America (we did have to hide under our desks during air raid drills). If so, they may be confounded with the R2P impulses of some of her Democratic colleagues, e.g., Samantha Power. Since she is likely to be our next president, whatever any of us think of her policies, we should hope (and pray) that she will avoid the very obvious missteps that lie in wait. That's all I know!

Thanks for the clarification and correction. Question: How will the "new" Glass-Steagall Act resolve the problem?

To: Sam Peralta @ 7:52 Whatever Trump's challenges in Florida, North Carolina, and Ohio, I puzzle over Pennsylvania. Coal-mining and Scranton are not the only issues, but one of the reasons coal-mining is on the downward spiral can be seen in the level of fracking that goes on in Pennsylvania. I don't have statistical comparisons, but while coal-mining PA has tanked, fracking PA (natural gas) has surged. Once the wells are dug, the jobs look to be pretty minimal, but lots of farmers and land owners are raking in the royalties....

To Walrus @6:53 Glass-Steagall: What did I carelessly suggest? Bear-Stearn, Lehmann Brothers, and AIG, major factors in the crisis, would not have been Glass-Steagall regulated. The subprime mortgage crisis was not primarily a bank crisis but a crisis of mortgage orginators, such as Countrywide Financial. I say "may or may not," because as far as I can tell had it been in place, there would still have been a crisis because these were not banks. Therefore, reinstating it unless recalibrated to today's conditions "may or may not" prevent the next crisis....

I read the New Yorker article by Jane Mayer. What I found both fascinating and frightening was Trump's inability or refusal to sit down and talk. He hired the guy, he agreed to the terms, and then he wouldn't/couldn't sit down to be interviewed for the project. If I got Mayer's report right, Schwartz already had half of the very large advance. Schwartz had to follow Trump around and create the narrative. So was/is Trump ADD, a spoiled rich guy, a sociopath? Something's not normal. But maybe that's what many supporters are looking for in their next president.