NEW YORK, NY - APRIL 16: Donald Trump attends the "All-Star Celebrity Apprentice" Red Carpet Event at Trump Tower on April 16, 2013 in New York City. (Photo by Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images)
Photo by Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images
How exactly can you “Make America Great Again” when you build your products in other countries?
“Trump has a unique way of showing his love for America,” the ad says.
The ad shows a recent campaign speech during which Trump calls for Americans to “have more pride buying made in the USA,” and then pivots to news clips of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee defending his decision to manufacture products overseas.
The DNC railed against Trump’s “made-anywhere-BUT-the-USA business practices.”
“A lie from Donald Trump? Shocking,” the ad says.
“Trump’s dangerous and divisive campaign is as un-American as the products he manufactures anywhere but the USA,” added DNC spokesperson Luis Miranda. “His deceptive campaign against the very business practices he uses is exactly why the American people should reject him in November, and a reminder he lacks the temperament to serve in our nation’s highest office.”
A Loras College poll released Thursday had the Iowa lawmaker in a statistical dead heat against Patty Judge, his Democratic challenger. Grassley led by only one point, 46-45, against the former lieutenant governor. That nominal advantage was well within the poll’s four-point margin or error.
Public Policy Polling, a left-leaning firm, released a survey earlier last week showing Grassley with a 7-point lead. But even that margin hardly suggests safety for the incumbent.
“When I see a poll like the Loras poll or the [Public Polling Policy] poll, if I’m Grassley that makes me nervous. …That’s trouble,” said David Peterson, a political science professor at Iowa State University and editor of the academic journal Political Behavior. “I think he’s clearly more vulnerable than he’s been in past elections.”
Democrats and outside groups pounced on the polling.
Judge’s campaign blasted out the Loras College poll, noting Grassley “is consistently polling in the 40s for the first time since his election to the Senate in the 1980s.”
“We’re obviously excited about that poll,” Sam Roecker, Judge’s campaign manager, told The Hill. “This is unprecedented for Chuck Grassley.”
I sort of forgot that Chris Christie was still the Governor of New Jersey and an active politician until this week, so quiet was he on policy and bombast.
But now he’s back.
His first foray was to emerge with a set of checks made out to suburban school district students for $6,599 each. This was his way of solving the school funding problem that has vexed governors for the better part of 40 years. Christie’s solution was, in essence, to tell the students who live in New Jersey’s cities to either go to a Charter School, move, get different parents, or suck it up and try to learn in a class with 34 other students because Christie’s plan would mean a bunch of school closures.
To the suburban districts, the message was much less harsh: Your property taxes will go down and you can continue to have fine schools. What I really like is that the amount of aid isn’t a round number. In fact, I think if Christie had consulted Donald Trump, the price would have been $6,599.99. The pennies add so much class.
And speaking of Christie and Trump, the other information that emerged this week is that the Governor is being vetted for the Vice-Presidency. Yes, I’m still scared of ISIS, but this potential pairing comes in a close second (and tied, by the way, with the thought of Newt Gingrich being VP). Christie has evidently been giving Trump political advice ahead of the GOP’s Cleveland Convention, weighing in on the recent firing of Trump’s campaign manager and moderating Trump’s speeches so they include more substance and less invective. OK, that last one isn’t working out too well, but Christie is taking his job as manager of Trump’s transition very seriously.
Which brings us to this weekend’s crisis in New Jersey over the Transportation Trust Fund which, I am told, is out of money because the Legislature hasn’t raised the gas tax to fund it. Of course, it’s really Christie’s problem because instead of agreeing to the gas tax increase in return for an end to the inheritance tax, which Christie has been running on forever, he tried to make a different deal to agree to the gas tax, but lower the sales tax by 1%. That would create a huge hole in the state budget. When the state Senate balked at the deal (both Republicans and Democrats opposed it), Christie threatened to shut down road projects over the weekend. Which would throw a bunch of people out of work. And seriously compromise driver safety. And make him less popular than he already is.
In years past, even though I didn’t agree with much of what the Republican politicians wanted to do, I could at least see their arguments and follow their thinking. Not this year. The party’s done blowed itself up. And Chris Christie has his hand on the dynamite plunger.
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