The Secret to Cracking Trump’s Base. (Timothy Egan, The New York Times)

TRUMP hates dogs, Southerners, hillbillies, rural people.

We, the People, reject DONALD JOHN TRUMP and all his works and pomps.

Herr TRUMP is a dupe, one whose dalliance with Russia, pollutersand other organized criminals is a stench in the nostrils of our Nation, and the entire planet. It's time for TRUMP to go.

The Secret to Cracking Trump’s Base

New polls show that some of the most hard-core Trumpsters are starting to get a clue. It might be because he finally crossed a line: He’s now insulting them.

By Timothy Egan

Contributing Opinion Writer 

• Sept. 14, 2018

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President Trump speaking to supporters in Sioux Falls, S.D., last week.CreditCreditDoug Mills/The New York Times

We know that Donald Trump, the first president without a pet since James K. Polk, appears to hate dogs. And the feeling is mutual, according to one of his ex-wives. He also uses pooches as pejoratives when insulting women.

Dogs, though known for their loyalty, can take only so much from one abusive human. Alas, the same cannot be said for the aging, white, rural and southern people who make up Trump’s base. He can lie to them, hurt them with tariffs, make a mockery of their values, suck up to freedom-hating dictators they once distrusted, and they’ll stick with him. Cult 45 is thought to be impermeable.

But surprise — a raft of new polls show that some of the most hard-core Trumpsters are starting to get a clue. I know, hold your applause. It’s like discovering that climate change is not a hoax when your town is under water, and all your commander in chief can do is throw you a roll of paper towels. And the woke among the true believers is small.

The decline could be because Trump’s increasingly moonstruck tweets have lost their power. Or maybe it’s because all of the people around him believe he’s an idiot and they’re going public with the consensus inside the White House (another reason to get a dog). But I think Trump’s base is showing some erosion because his followers feel he finally crossed a line: He’s now insulting them.

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It didn’t go over well in Alabama that Trump reportedly called his ’Bama-bred attorney general, Jeff Sessions, “a dumb Southerner” and ridiculed his accent. Trump has denied the account from Bob Woodward’s new book, “Fear.”

Abraham Lincoln said, “No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar,” and Trump clearly doesn’t have the bandwidth for the magnitude of his mendacity. I’ll take the word of Woodward, White House stenographer for at least six presidents, over Trump — who just passed the 5,000 mark for false or misleading statements during his presidency.

Trump has used the regional dis before, calling the family of another ex-wife, Marla Maples, “dumb Southerners” and “hillbillies,” as one reporter recalled. Last week, the longtime Trump confidant Roger Stone trashed Sessions as an “insubordinate hillbilly” — expressing a double dose of hick hatred.

It’s in Trump’s character to deride those without gold-plated bathroom fixtures as inferior. His people, as he said in a North Dakota non sequitur, have the best apartments and the nicest boats. But you don’t need what comes out of his mouth as proof of his class disdain. Look at the two biggest policy initiatives of his presidency.

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He has tried mightily to destroy Obamacare and all the lives dependent on it. He’s still pushing a repeal plan that would leave upward of 18 million people without health care. And who are those people? His supporters, mostly.

Working-class whites, particularly in the old Rust Belt, were the main beneficiaries of the expansion of health care under President Barack Obama. In Midwestern states that flipped from Obama to Trump, far more non-college-educated whites gained health coverage than did whites with degrees or members of ethnic minorities, according to an Urban Institute study. And if the president’s party succeeds in choking the last life out of Obamacare, these Trump voters stand to lose the most.

As noted, some of them are catching on. A Quinnipiac poll out this week showed that even among non-college-educated whites — the strongest demographic holdout for Trump — a plurality now say they’d like to see Congress be more of a check on the president. Since his election, he’s down 14 points among the “poorly educated” that Trump once professed to love, a CNN poll found.

In West Virginia, where Trump could shoot the Mountaineer mascot and still walk at the head of a parade, attacks on Obamacare are killing Republican chances of taking down Senator Joe Manchin.

The other signature issue is the tax cut. Remember how Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, another plutocrat who has trouble hiding his contempt for flyover country, described it last year? “Not only will this tax cut pay for itself,” he said, “but it will pay down the debt.”

We’ll soon be running a trillion-dollar deficit, up 32 percent this fiscal year, thanks to the tax cut. Wasn’t this the sort of thing that roused Tea Party opposition to President Obama — crippling our children with a legacy of debt?

The collapse in revenue will hurt Trump supporters in other ways. One is the paucity of federal dollars for investment — in community colleges, roads, opioid treatment, Pell grants for students, ultimately even Social Security or Medicare. Another is that, by forcing borrowing costs up, the Trump deficit contributes to rising interest rates. That makes it much harder for working families to buy homes.

In truth, economics will probably not move Trump supporters. Their vote for him was more about status anxiety in a changing nation than about financial uncertainty. They’ll stay with him only so long as they allow themselves to be easy marks for the insulting con of this presidency.

CALLING LT. COLUMBO: Kavanaugh is pressed on the key July 1 entry in his calendar. But only to a point. (WaPo)

Did a 1982 calendar kept by a Georgetown preppy just help keep him off the Supreme Court?

Like a hog caught under a gate, Judge Brett Kavanaugh won't support an FBI investigation but claims he did not attempt to commit rape in 1982.

I believe the testimony of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, Ph.D.

I don't believe Judge Brett Kavanaugh, the lying, crying, yelling, Supreme Court nominee, who is an out-of-control termagant wingnut

It looks like The Washington Post's  brilliant reporter Philip Bump has figured it out.

On July 1, 1982, in his calendar, Brett Kavanaugh wrote down the attendees at a small party -- the attendees names match the victim of the alleged attempted rape.

He wrote it down.

Reminds me of St. Augustine's founder, Pedro Menendez de Aviles, who in 1566 ordered the murder of a Gay French translator of the Guale Indian language -- his brother-in-law wrote it down.  This proved helpful in 2005, when United States District Court Judge Henry Lee Adams, Jr. ordered Rainbow flags to fly on our historic Bridge of Lions in St. Augustine in honor of Gay Pride from June 8-13, 2005, relying in part on that fact.

Reminds me of the Columbo episode where the murderer, a detective novelist, wrote down a murderous novel plot on a matchbook, only to be caught using the idea in a murdr of his writing partner.

He wrote it down.

I reckon that Judge Kavanaugh is NOT going to the Supreme Court.

From The Washington Post:




Kavanaugh is pressed on the key July 1 entry in his calendar. But only to a point.

(Provided by Brett Kavanaugh to the Senate Judiciary Committee)

By Philip Bump

September 27 at 5:31 PM

During Thursday’s dramatic questioning of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, he was quizzed repeatedly about the calendars he provided to bolster his case that he didn’t assault Christine Blasey Ford while a high school student in 1982.

Ford alleges that she attended a party at someone’s home that summer, where, she alleges, Kavanaugh and his friend Mark Judge pushed her into a bedroom and locked the door and where Kavanaugh then began to try to remove her clothes. Among the others at the party, Ford alleged, was another friend of Kavanaugh’s named P.J. Smyth. Kavanaugh denies the allegation and told Fox News' Marth MacCallum that while he might have met Ford, he didn’t know her. Judge said in a statement that he doesn’t remember any such party. Smyth made a similar statement.

It was Kavanaugh’s hope that providing those calendars would show that he attended no such gathering. He insisted, in his testimony Thursday, that any party of the sort must have been on a weekend (since he and his friends had jobs) and that the calendars showed that essentially all of the weekends were booked with other activities. (His friend Mark Judge, in a memoir about his past drinking problem, wrote that this wasn’t a concern of his: He’d regularly show up at work hung over or drunk.)

Watch Brett M. Kavanaugh's full opening statement

Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh delivered an opening statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Sept. 27, after being accused of sexual assault. (Reuters)

Rachel Mitchell, hired by the Republican majority of the Senate Judiciary Committee to navigate the questioning of Kavanaugh and Ford, pointed to one particular calendar entry that got some attention after the calendars came out. It read:

Tobin’s House — Workout / Go to Timmy’s for Skis w/ Judge, Tom, PJ, Bernie, Squi

The reference to “skis” is apparently to “brewskis,” or beers. The entry was July 1, a Thursday. Mitchell asked him about it.

MITCHELL: The entry says, and I quote, go to ‘Timmy’s for skis with Judge, Tom, P.J. Bernie and ... Squi?’

KAVANAUGH: Squi. It’s a nickname.

MITCHELL: To what does this refer, and to whom?

KAVANAUGH: [after explaining the “Tobin’s House” part] It looks like we went over to Timmy’s. You want to know their last names, too? I’m happy to do it.

MITCHELL: If you could just identify: Is ‘Judge’ Mark Judge?

KAVANAUGH: It is. It’s Tim Gaudette, Mark Judge, Tom Kaine, P.J. Smyth, Bernie McCarthy, Chris Garrett.

Notice two things here. First, that “Squi” was in attendance at the party — someone who, we learned thanks to Mitchell’s questioning of Ford, was going out with Ford over the course of that summer. Second, notice those two other attendees, one of whom Mitchell highlighted: Mark Judge and P.J. Smyth.

Mitchell’s questioning continued.

MITCHELL: Did you in your calendar routinely document social gatherings like house parties or gatherings of friends in your calendar?

KAVANAUGH: Yes, it certainly appears that way, that’s what I was doing in the summer of 1982. You can see that reflected on several of the-- several of the entries.

MITCHELL: If a gathering like Dr. Ford has described had occurred, would you have documented that?

KAVANAUGH: Yes, because I documented everything, those kinds of events, even small get-togethers. August 7 is another good example where I documented a small get-together that summer. So yes.

During her testimony, Ford made clear that the event at which she says she was assaulted was a casual get-together before the others (who were older than her and had a later curfew) went to other, bigger parties. Kavanaugh says that the gathering at Timmy’s on July 1 was essentially that.

We noted Thursday, too, that the time frame of this July 1 party fits with Ford’s testimony. She says that six to eight weeks after the alleged assault, she saw Judge working at a store in the area. Judge’s book indicates that he was working at that store for several weeks in early to mid-August.

This is a central point to Ford’s allegation. Kavanaugh denies knowing her, denies being at a party with her. Here is an event in July where he was with several long-standing friends, two of whom were named by Ford and one of whom she’d been going out with.

But Mitchell’s next question completely fumbles the point.

MITCHELL: Have you reviewed every entry that is in these calendars of May, June, July and August of 1982. 

KAVANAUGH: I have.

MITCHELL: Is there anything that could even remotely fit what we’re talking about in terms of Dr. Ford’s allegations?

KAVANAUGH: No.

That was it. Mitchell changed the subject.

There were all sorts of ways that Mitchell could have pressed the issue. How, for example, might Ford have been able to identify by name two of Kavanaugh’s close friends if she didn’t know him or had barely met him? Why isn’t it possible that this July 1 get-together was precisely the sort of event at which Ford alleges she was assaulted? That more than remotely fits the allegation? But she didn’t ask.

Mitchell had been stepping in for Republican senators during the day’s questioning, a tactic that helped the majority avoid the spectacle of men grilling a woman about an attack she says she experienced. There was no break in that pattern — until the July 1 question. The next two Republican senators who had the chance to ask questions took that opportunity to make comments of their own.

PLANNING AND BUILDING DIRECTOR DAVID BIRCHIM AND HOTELIER KANTI PATEL TREE CONSULTANT'S CONFLICT OF INTEREST: September 6, 2018 Letter Proves It

DAVID DOUGLAS BIRCHIM, City Planning and Zoning Director of The City of St. Augustine, Florida created a conflict of interest when he contracted with MARQUIS LATIMER + HALBACK VP and partner FREMONT LATIMER for arborist advice on rewriting the City's tree code and on individual trees, at the same time that he knows that the ML+H  is working for applicants for tree-killing applications. 

BIRCHIM previously violated F.S. 112.313(7) when he failed to recuse himself from the application of his own building contractor for fourteen (14) homes on Riberia Street.

LATIMER himself signed the paperwork for PATEL wanting to destroy trees at a future hotel site..  

Here's the text of the September 6, 2018 letter from the City's conflicted consultant, on behalf of hotelier KANTI PATEL, only two days after BIRCHIM informed Planning and Zoning Board member of the hiring of FREMONT LATIMER.

Marquis Latimer+ Halback

~ LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE · PLANNING

September 6, 2018

Kanti Patel

32 Avenida Menendez St. Augustine, FL 32084

Re: Tree Removal and Consultation at proposed Hilton Garden Inn

Dear Mr. Patel

At your request, I have visited the site of your proposed hotel site at 185 Matanzas Avenue to examine the existing trees and develop a site plan that preserves existing tree where possible. I performed a detailed visual inspection from the ground of both the trees and the site. This report does not constitute a hazard assessment.

Site Characteristics

The site is an urbanized area composed of multiple uses including a parking lot, construction yard/storage, single family residence, and undeveloped lot that appears to have been previously cleared. The soil cover is variable due to the urban nature of the site and vehicular areas are severely compacted.

Tree Characteristics

There are several small live oaks and sabal palms on the site that have been recently planted. The recently installed oak trees are showing signs of stunted growth and poor canopy development, likely caused by poor root condition and installation/establishment. There are a number of mature oaks on site that qualify as "preserved" by the City of St. Augustine that are individually documented on the following pages.

Recommendations for development

The development program calls for the erection of a new hotel on the western parcels of the project site. This portion of the site will require a significant amount of fill as the elevation of the new structure is required to have a final floor elevation (FFE) of 10.0' and the existing grades on site are between 5.5' and 6.9'. The eastern parcel will be used for parking and can more closely follow the existing grade.

On the western parcels, the location of the trees and the amount of fill required make the preservation ofthe existing trees unfeasible. However, sabal palms have a high survivability when transplanted an recommend having some of the relocated to the eastern parcel where the construction activity will be less intensive. On the eatern parcel there are several large live oaks that are located on the periphery of the parcel. These should be preserved in place and any paving or resurfacing should be built on top the existing grade while avoiding compaction of the native soil.

If there are any other questions regarding the trees or site plan, please feel free to contact me. Sincerely,

Fremont Latimer, RLA, PrincipalISA Certified Arborist #FL5480AMarquis Latimer+ Halback, Inc.34 Cordova, Suite A

St. Augustine, FL 32084

904.588.5389

Oil industry targets Florida in new offshore drilling advocacy push (The Hill)

There's reason for hope, particularly with U.S. Senator Bill Nelson leading Gov. Rick Scott in the Senate race, and Andrew Gillum leading Ronald Dion DeSantis in the Governor's race.

Oil industry targets Florida in new offshore drilling advocacy push

BY TIMOTHY CAMA - 08/15/18 03:04 PM EDT 45

1,386

© Getty Images

The oil industry is undertaking a new public relations campaign to push for offshore drilling along Florida’s coast.

The American Petroleum Institute’s Explore Offshore program, launched in June to promote offshore drilling, held its first Florida event Wednesday.

The Trump administration’s January proposal to allow offshore oil and natural gas drilling all along the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf coasts met strong opposition in many places, but it was especially widespread in Florida.

That quickly prompted Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to promise that no drilling would be allowed in the water near either side of Florida.

But the oil industry has nonetheless pushed for some compromise, including allowing some new drilling with a large margin around the state.

“Our American way of life and the freedoms we enjoy are undoubtedly linked to access to affordable, reliable energy. At the same time, 94 percent of America’s offshore energy resources are completely off-limits to natural gas and oil development, disallowing hundreds of thousands of American jobs and abundant domestic energy supply, and keeping us reliant on foreign sources,” Jim Nicholson, co-chairman of Explore Offshore, said in a statement.

“Affordable energy is critical to the quality of life in the Sunshine State,” said Jeff Kottkamp, the Florida co-chairman for the campaign and a former Republican lieutenant governor of the state.

“We are speaking with our local leaders throughout Florida to discuss ways to maintain our state’s natural beauty and meet the energy needs of our growing population of over 20 million residents and 110 million annual visitors.”

At the event, Nicholson said that with the drilling the industry wants, there would be no rigs visible from the shore.

“Most of these offshore reserves are the same distance from land as that of Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. There’s little or no chance of this exploration being visible from coastal lands,” he said at the Tallahassee event, according to radio station WJCT.