The Rod Martin Report: May 23, 2016

You can read about the world anywhere. You read The Rod Martin Report to understand it.

by Rod D. Martin
May 23, 2016

Dear Friend,

I’m grateful for all of you who faithfully read RodMartin.org and who send so much positive feedback. It means a lot.

It has been a fascinating week from an electoral perspective. First, Donald Trump finally released his long-awaited list of prospective Supreme Court Justices. In the words of the Trump-loathing National Review, a publication which has made it its mission to defeat The Donald, “these names are a Federalist Society all-star list of conservative jurisprudence.”

Now of course, NR proceeds to point out that Trump can’t be trusted. And they may be right. But it’s just not so simple as that. There are some very strong reasons to believe Trump will follow through. In the interests of space, I won’t list them right here, but I strongly encourage you to read my essay “Trump’s Judges: Why They Matter“.

As I’ve said from the very beginning, this is the very most important issue we face: everything else hangs upon it, as it has in no other year. And I’m quite certain I’ve addressed some things you haven’t thought of.

And note well: I am still not a Trump supporter. I am still not sure I can endorse him. But a superficial “Trump’s terrible and he’s lying” is simply not an adequate response. One thing you can always count on: I’ll tell you what I objectively think, even when I’m entirely happy about it.

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But second, continuing a trend that almost no one (except me) predicted, Trump continues to rise and now surpass Hillary Clinton in the polls.

A month ago, the conventional wisdom was that Trump would get slaughtered by Hillary. As I predicted (not entirely happily), that “wisdom” was ludicrously wrong. Rasmussen now has the race 42-37 – yes, that’s Trump beating Hillary by 5, well outside the margin of error – yesterday morning. That’s up from a 2 point lead last week in the same poll.

Last week Rasmussen was more-or-less alone. But Wednesday, Fox News found Trump with a 3 point lead, 45-42. For perspective, in the same poll last month, it was Hillary 48, Trump 41; and in March Hillary 49, Trump 38. And in Sunday’s Washington Post poll, Trump is leading — for the first time ever — by 2, 46-44.

Trump is still behind in the NBC poll, but just barely: 48-45, within the margin of error. NBC also found similar gender-gaps for each candidate: men by 11 for Trump, but shockingly enough, women by only 15 for Clinton. But Rasmussen has Trump with a 22 point lead among men, and just an 11 point deficit with women. Either way, given that the male Barack Obama beat John McCain with women by that same 14%, Hillary’s “girl power” campaign appears to be tanking. And Fox actually has Trump winning white women 47-38.

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Other polling highlights: NBC finds that self-identified “very conservative” Republicans trust Trump over Paul Ryan by 63-34, underlining my point from last week about who needs whom. NBC also finds that Trump leads among independents by 44-36, but Fox has it 46-30. And as I’ve consistently predicted, party unity is identical: Pubs 82, Dems 83. But as the Sanders-Clinton fight drags on, and as #NeverTrump’s appeal fades, these numbers look worse and worse for Hillary.

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Oh, and don’t think this means people like them. Just 31% say Clinton is honest; 40% say so about Trump. Over half say “has strong moral values” does not apply to either: Clinton 57, Trump 58. Similar majorities believe neither candidate “cares about people like me.” By 71 Clinton and 65 Trump, voters say both candidates “will say anything to get elected.”

But at the end of the day, 59% say Trump is a “strong leader” to Clinton’s 49%. And 49% believe Hillary is “corrupt” vs. just 37% who say this about The Donald.

With or without an indictment, that may prove to be the ballgame.

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Just to illustrate the point, the Wall Street Journal – which has literally lampooned The Donald (and for that matter, Ted Cruz as well) from the beginning – did an abrupt about-face this week. James Tarranto entitled his Tuesday “Best of the Web”: “Can Hillary Win? It’s Hard to See How”.

It actually gets worse. The rest of the subtitle reads “Unless She Can’t Lose”, which is not a suggestion of her invulnerability but rather a mocking of the Washington Post’s vague hope in “demographic realities” and other such hooey.

To which I can only say, she’s been inevitable before.

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Juan Williams’ argument Tuesday night was even more pathetic. Arguing Hillary’s chances on Fox, Williams stated without obvious irony that Trump would soon run up hard against Hillary’s steadiness, statesmanship, experience and policy knowledge.

In other words, Juan believes Trump will lose to Jeb Bush.

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But of course Jeb! did not easily slay the Trumpster, despite all the confident punditry (other than mine) to the contrary. Hillary is starting to learn why.

This week, in a move that probably caused fainting in Miami and Houston, Donald Trump accused Bill Clinton of rape. Why? Well at least in part because he’s a rapist: if you haven’t read Juanita Broaddrick’s account of her ordeal, it’s past time you did (you should also pick up a copy of my friend Candice Jackson’s Their Lives: The Women Targeted by the Clinton Machine: it’s clear Trump has).

But of course the main reason is that the one-man wrecking ball that is Donald Trump intends to drive Hillary’s sky-high negatives as far as they can go. And part of that is to make the case that, far from being the women’s candidate, Hillary is a dirty enabler of the worst sort of misogyny.

Juanita’s story paints that picture in bold colors. Bill’s part almost pales in comparison.

But Juanita’s is far from the only one (full disclosure: Juanita Broaddrick is a very close friend of a very close friend of mine). And it’s a real problem for the Hildebeast. To those of us old enough to have lived through the 1990s, all of this may seem old news. But there’s a reason Millennials – who have no such memories – are so vehemently opposed to her, supporting Sanders by over 80%, including a pretty consistent 83% of Millennial women.

To them, Clinton is no feminist icon. She’s just old, and an enabler, and a sell-out.

This is why the Monica Lewinsky story – a classic case of sexual harassment if there ever were one – is about to have real power again, perhaps more than before. And with Hillary now promising that she will let Bill run the economy, he’s not just the future First Lady: she has made him inseparable from herself.

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Just an aside: did the feminist candidate really just say she’s going to let Hubby handle the money? LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

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You know this is starting to be all too real when the leftist McClatchy papers run a headline like “War on Women Has a Democratic Front Too”, featuring – in addition to the prospective First Rapist – Ed Rendell’s statement this week that there are “more ugly women in America than attractive women,” plus “a vulgar, jarring stream of sexist attacks chairwoman of the Nevada Democratic Party” by Bernie Sanders supporters.

Somehow they seem to have missed that other Democratic assault on women, the one inviting men into women’s bathrooms to assault them.

Don’t think I’m suggesting we mistreat poor little transgendered waifs (if any such people exist): we ought to be kind to everyone.

But Obama’s bathroom edict requires that schools stand by while the football team temporarily identifies “female” and harasses 7th grade girls. This, apparently, is social progress, and in no way violates “a woman’s right to privacy.”

Guess what women: you’re pretty much a subsidiary of the Democrat Party now, just like black people. Your rights no longer matter.

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Perhaps this meme will help understand the draconian insanity Obama and Hillary’s party today advocates:

If you ever wondered whether liberals actually care about the causes they claim to espouse, you no longer have to. A “woman’s privacy” is violated beyond all measure if we can’t force Hobby Lobby to pay for her abortion, or if we can’t give 12 year olds birth control (and even abortions) without their parents’ knowledge. But if a man puts on a dress and trolls her restroom, and she complains, she’s just an ignorant transphobic bigot.

Power is the left’s only value. Destroying the legitimacy of conservatives (and Christians) is their only obstacle.

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By the way, the cowardice on our own side is maddening. You will recall this February when, unprompted and in a GOP debate of all places, Jeb!, Marco and Chris Christie volunteered their support for drafting women. Ted Cruz stood against them, more or less alone.

The issue is back. Draft-dodger Mitch McConnell wants women drafted. Joining the Democrats, he opines that, because Barack Obama has allowed women into combat roles, it is a “woman’s right” to…be forced into combat. John McCain and Lindsey Grahamnesty agree.

This is as stupid as saying a man in a dress is a woman (which, by the way, would have outraged feminists just a couple years ago).

It is not that surprising that Mitch would sell out our daughters. It is a bit more so that McCain and Graham would. But in fact, only three Republicans on the Armed Services Committee voted against this travesty: Cruz, Lee and Rounds.

The more conservative House has blocked the measure…for now. But not before the House Armed Services Committee voted 32-30 for the exact same “right”. Expect more.

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On a lighter note, as you know, the Social Justice Warriors have been after the Washington Redskins for quite some time now: their name is apparently a hate crime, or something. (And be sure to see the brilliant, although definitely R-rated, South Park episode about this.)

This week put a hole in their tire. It turns out just 9% of Native Americans consider the name “Redskins” offensive.

That’s gotta hurt.

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Finally, one very encouraging note: despite the best efforts of Democrats to keep school choice from blacks, whom they prefer to keep in the union-dominated indoctrination camp, choice is working. A study released this week by the University of Arkansas shows just how dramatically.

And for the Dems, that’s a problem.

As I’ve written previously, 94% of New Orleans high schoolers are now in a charter school: they just exceeded the statewide average for standardized test scores for the first time in Louisiana history. 46% of Washington, D.C. high schoolers are in a charter, thanks to a courageous black Dem mayor ten years ago: they’re poorer on average than their public school counterparts, and their schools are more, ahem, financially efficient. Yet their test scores are better, their graduation rate is higher, and lots of them are getting accepted to college.

The liberal plantation just doesn’t work. And those consigned to it are figuring that out.

I don’t want to sound overly optimistic. We face a lot of problems, I know. But from the denial of reality inherent in transgenderism to the stupidity of letting public sector unions control education (and finance leftist politics with your tax dollars), the left’s unending overreach provides opportunity to re-teach fundamental principles: conservatism. And in the end, truth cannot help but win, as books must be balanced and lives must be lived successfully and things just have to work.

Don’t believe me? Ask the average Venezuelan today how happy she is with socialism.

Americans spend more now on taxes than on food, clothing and housing combined. That sort of thing catches up, just like failing schools caught up with the NEA in two predominately Democrat cities. Success breeds success too: it took a generation after Reagan repudiated Carterism before people unlearned the lesson.

Add a few of the right judges, to undo some of the worst of the left’s abuses (such as the compulsory union dues Scalia would have nuked this term had he lived) and the country could be in very sound shape very fast.

I keep saying there’s an opportunity for a realignment. I don’t know if Donald Trump will help that along or kill it in its crib. But watching those Hillary supporters tells you what’s possible.

It’s not time to give up. It’s time to dig in.

You can read about the world anywhere. You read The Rod Martin Report to understand it. Do your friends a favor and pass it along; and remember, there’s a lot more we publish each week that doesn’t make the newsletter.

For Freedom,

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