Trump Visit to Louisiana Disaster Area Panned by Dems

GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump's visit to flood ravaged areas of Louisiana was panned by Presidential Press Secretary Josh Earnest as "a virtual usurpation of President Obama's prerogative. Everyone knows that it is the President's right to visit and comfort the afflicted. That a non-office holder like Trump would ignore this right demonstrates a dangerous overreach."

Earnest contrasted Trump's unauthorized visit with President Obama's 2012 visit to hurricane damaged New Jersey, which he characterized as "in line with the accepted protocols of such events. As we saw then, Republican Governor Christie welcomed the President's attention. In Louisiana, though, Governor Edwards has denounced Trump's invasion of his state as a 'photo op.'" Edwards is a Democrat.

The Clinton campaign expressed similarly derogatory comments. "Showing up when the President has declined to interrupt his well-deserved vacation is disrespectful," complained Clinton campaign manager Robbie Mook. "It's this kind of stunt that has Trump trailing in the polls and will lead to his defeat in November."

Mook boasted that "Hillary is devoting her full attention to saving the country from this unfit poseur. While Trump is wasting his time helping unload relief supplies—work that could easily be done by anyone with brute strength—our candidate is resting up before two major fund-raising events this coming week, one hosted by mega-star Cher in Miami Beach. The ability to extract money from big donors is a skill far more critical to winning elections and governing this nation than Trump's simulated sympathy for the victims of a natural disaster caused by global warming."

Hillary for America Communications Adviser and Senior Spokesperson Karen Finney called Trump's Louisiana toting escapade "implicitly sexist. Lifting boxes of food and medical supplies unfairly exploits a male's superior physical strength and subtly conveys the message that a female is too weak to govern. Can America afford to elect a president who would stoop so low in a desperate grab for votes?"

New Email Scandal Excuses Tested

Faced with the difficulty of persuading a skeptical public that the "extraordinarily careless" characterization of her email practices by FBI Director James Comey is significantly different from the legally culpable "gross negligence" standard, the Clinton campaign is field testing a couple of new excuses.

First out of the block was the disclosure that neither Secretary Clinton nor any of her many aides (including Cheryl Mills, Huma Abedin, Jake Sullivan, Dennis Cheng, Anne Marie Slaughter, Phillippe Reines, Caitlin Klevorick, and Kris Bladerston) embroiled in the scandal completed the mandatory ethics training required for federal employees.

Clinton Campaign Manager Robbie Mook pointed out that "any confusion, missteps, or technical violations of the law can't be held against Secretary Clinton or her staff if they were never given the proper training. You can hardly blame the Secretary's loyal staffers for following her wishes regarding her off-site email server. Neither can we blame Hillary who previously had very limited exposure to classified communications."

The real culprit according to Mook was "former Secretary of State Colin Powell. It was this Bush appointee who advised incoming Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to use her own private email for all her important communications. It was Powell who told her that the only way she could ensure control over access to her email was to take it off-site. Otherwise it would be out of her hands. And as we have seen from the fuss made over the emails Hillary did turn over to the State Department, we can only wonder how much worse it could've been if she hadn't had the opportunity to delete 30,000 personal emails."

CAIR Criticizes Trump's "Extreme Vetting" Proposal

The Council on American–Islamic Relations (CAIR) sharply criticized GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump's promise to exercise "extreme vetting" of immigrants from terror-plagued regions of the world, calling it "unconstitutional."

CAIR spokesman Iman Aswad declared that "Trump's vetting would interfere with the free exercise of our religion. Islam is not like Christianity or Judaism. Our faithful are bound to fight against unbelievers. Trump's idea that the government can screen out those who are committed to this fight discriminates against one, and only one religion: Islam. As such it is unconstitutional under American law."

"It is also impermissible under sharia law," Aswad added. "As stated in the Quran, all the world is for Allah. Any country's secular laws that refuse to acknowledge this higher law are not binding. People like Trump only prolong the conflict and postpone the day when all can live in peace as members of one united umma. American voters who want this peace must not accept Trump as their president."

Aswad rejected Trump's plan to consult with moderate Muslims, calling it "an ignorant outsider's view of Islam. There is no 'moderate Islam.' There is no 'radical Islam.' There is only Islam. The inclusion of heretics and infidels on his vetting commission does not correct the deficiencies of his proposed intrusion into our religious beliefs. Only true Muslims can be the judges of Islam. The best that non-Muslims can do short of converting is to submit and obey the laws laid down by the Caliphate."

In related news, Democratic vice-presidential candidate Sen. Tim Kaine suggested that women's rights in Muslim countries are better protected than they are in the United States. "In America it took more than a century for women to get the right to vote," Kaine observed. "Even today fewer than 20% of the members of Congress are women." According to Kaine this compares unfavorably with countries like Afghanistan and Iraq. "Those who claim that women would be worse off under a Muslim regime are distorting the facts," he said.

Rapist Not Necessarily a Bad Guy

Writing for Wonkette, Rebecca Schoenkopf expressed her opinion that Bill Clinton probably did rape Juanita Broaddrick back in 1978, but that this doesn't necessarily make him an "evil person."

"Let's look at the facts of that particular case," Schoenkopf argued. "First, Bill showed he cared by advising Juanita to put some ice on her lip that he bit. Second, he called her later to apologize. This is a level of concern that most rapists don't show. Third, while there has been a string of alleged improprieties involving indecent exposure, molestation, and sexual indiscretions since then there haven't been anymore rapes."

"Against this inappropriate abuse of women we need to weigh the good he has done for America," Schoenkopf insisted. "He served two successful terms as president. He introduced his wonderful wife Hillary to a nation starved for genuine female heroes. He raised his family out of bankruptcy after leaving the White House via a series of fabulous speeches and crafty business deals that built the Clinton Foundation into a multimillion dollar charity juggernaut. So, I think the pluses outweigh the minuses."

Schoenkopf said she trusts Bill Clinton's promise "to cease his pay-for-play efforts if Hillary is elected by stepping down from his job as head of the Clinton Foundation. The media spotlight on the first female president will be too bright for any of that type of skulduggery to go unnoticed. And I think Bill is too decrepit to woo any interns inside the White House. Any shenanigans would, I'm sure, involve professional women and take place in more discreet locations."

In related news, a new NBC News|SurveyMonkey Weekly Election Tracking poll found that only 12% of Democrats see their Party's presidential candidate as honest and trustworthy. Clinton supporter Gov. Maggie Hassan (D) brushed this finding aside saying that "choosing a dishonest person over an unfit person should be an easy one for voters to make. Isn't a liar who can get the job done preferable to a politically inexperienced naif?"

Trump's Pitch to Black Americans Called Flawed

GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump's bid for Black votes was labeled "flawed" by his critics. In a speech in Wisconsin this week Trump maintained that Democratic policies have worsened the plight of minorities. This view was assailed by Democrats and their media supporters.

"Trump's contention that minorities are the foremost victims of the breakdown in law and order doesn't excuse his failure to reach out to the Black Lives Matter group," contended CNN talking head Carol Costello. "By refusing to bring BLM inside the tent he leaves them no option but to burn down neighborhoods, beat white folks, and agitate against police repression. This man's election would undo all that President Obama has done to empower the minority community. Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, has made BLM's interests a guiding light for her future policies toward the minority community."

"Trump's notion that he can win a significant share of the minority vote is absurd," Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton declared. "Democrats are the champions of all the government programs that have sustained the minority segment of our population for generations. Democrats have built public housing. Democrats have ensured that their access to abortion will be unconstrained. Democrats have put food on their tables. Democrats are the ones who take their grievances against the police seriously."

Steve Bannon, Chief Executive of Trump's presidential campaign, defended his man by assailing "the 'plantation mentality' of the Democrat's claim that they own the minority vote. The welfare programs they boast of creating have destroyed the minority community in our inner cities. By subsidizing unwed motherhood the Democrats have undermined minority families. Democrats' unstinting support for abortion has ensured that more Blacks die from this than die from America's leading killer—heart disease. Democrats' job-destroying economic policies have left fewer opportunities for minorities to earn an honest living. Democrat-created public housing ghettos have become high-crime neighborhoods that terrorize and claim the lives of too many in the minority community."

"Donald Trump wants to get past the Democrats' propaganda and bring real solutions to the suffering that has gone on too long," Bannon continued. "This means bypassing the Democrats' pandering to radical hate groups like Black Lives Matter. He doesn't deny that wrongful police shootings have occurred, but riots targeting innocent bystanders solve nothing. He offers policies that make a self-sustaining life a more realistic possibility for all Americans. He offers support for the law enforcement that defends the rights of all to peacefully pursue happiness. He thinks that a government that respects all persons is the 'hand-up' that will improve lives more effectively than the 'hand-outs' that have been the core Democrat policy."

In related news, Democratic vice-presidential candidate Sen. Tim Kaine told a group of Black Baptists in New Orleans that "the 400 years of repression of Blacks in this country must be balanced by a period of repression of whites if we are to achieve true equity between the races."