Occupy Messaging: Who Are The Real Job Creators?

Posted by on December 13, 2011 at 10:53 am. 8 Comments :

For too long now, right-wing propagandists like Frank Luntz have been manipulating language to distort the real issues that impact so many lives of American citizens. They engage in dishonest wordcraft that disguises their true meaning in order to shape public opinion and deceive voters. It’s time to counter that rhetorical offensive by restoring definitions that actually reflect reality.

One of the most recent and insidious examples of this practice is the conservative effort to replace references to “the rich” with the phrase “job creators.” It is of no interest to these hacks that no evidence exists to validate the claim. In fact, NPR’s congressional reporter, Tamara Keith, asked members of congress and representatives of conservative business groups to refer her to business people who could substantiate the assertion that tax cuts for the wealthy would induce them to increase hiring. They were unable to come up with a single name or example to affirm their half-baked theory. However, Keith found several examples of her own that utterly refuted it. This caused Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to note that “Millionaire job creators are like unicorns. They are impossible to find and don’t exist.”

The agenda that Republicans have adopted has literally no popular constituency. Every poll taken on the subject reveals that majorities of Americans (including majorities of Republicans) favor increasing taxes on the rich. Even polls of the rich show that they believe that they are not presently sharing the sacrifice required to restore the nation’s economic health. An independent group of Patriotic Millionaires released a video beseeching Congress to raise their taxes.

So the next time you hear some GOP flunky whining about the plight of the rich whose only desire is to be unburdened from the shackles of what are the lowest taxes in decades, remember that they have not, and cannot, certify any claim that lower taxes will spur hiring. In fact, the evidence is all to the contrary. And whenever possible, we need to recapture the phrase “job creators” and use it in a manner that is more in line with reality. Here is a handy, shareable chart that illustrates who the real job creators are:

(click to view larger)
Job Creators

[Addendum] President Obama asked these questions in his economic address last month:

Are you going to cut taxes for the middle class and those who are trying to get into the middle class? Or are you going to protect massive tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires, many of whom don’t even want those tax breaks?

Are you going to ask a few hundred thousand people who have done very, very well to do their fair share? Or are you going to raise taxes for hundreds of millions of people across the country – 160 million Americans?

Are you willing to fight as hard for middle-class families as you do for those who are most fortunate?

What’s it going to be?

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Fox Nation vs. Reality: Obama’s Marxist College Mate

Posted by on December 12, 2011 at 12:18 pm. 28 Comments :

Once again Fox Nation has ventured into the realm of make-believe in order to slander President Obama. In this episode the Fox Nationalists posted as their featured headline story an article with the title: College Mate: Obama Was an ‘Ardent’ ‘Marxist-Leninist’

Fox Nation

In order to fabricate this wholly dishonest smear, Fox sunk to re-posting a column written by conservative bomb-thrower Selwyn Duke. Duke’s article was originally published by The New American, the periodical of the extremist and notoriously fascistic John Birch Society.

In the article, Duke relied entirely on the testimony of John Drew, a man who has been pushing his dubious and uncorroborated account of a college relationship with Obama for years. He claims that Obama was a close friend and confidant. The truth is he only met Obama casually a handful of times at gatherings with many others present. He never attended college with Obama because the future President didn’t enter Occidental College until after Drew had graduated.

It’s painfully clear to anyone paying attention that Drew is attempting to exploit his brief encounters with Obama to exalt himself, disseminate his rightist propaganda, and earn a few bucks in the process. The only person Drew references in his tales who has spoken publicly about them is a former Obama associate named Hasan Chandoo. Two years ago, when asked about Drew’s assertions that Obama was an ardent Marxist, Chandoo, who is now a financial consultant, told the conservative magazine NewsMax that…

“I can’t remember Obama ever talking like that. It sounds a bit absurd to me, but that’s my opinion. I can’t remember him ever expressing an interest in being a Marxist.”

Nevertheless, Drew and his Bircher enablers continue to press this ancient story with no factual basis. And now, after years of plodding through radical right-wing rags and Internet backwater rabble, Drew and Duke have succeeded in getting Fox News to sling their stale mud.

When Fox has to resort to acquiring material from the John Birch Society that is several years old, you might conclude that they are getting desperate. They have apparently recognized that the comically weak field of Republican presidential aspirants is doomed to defeat next year and they are ramping up any random disparagement they can find.


More Proof Fox News Is Not News: The Russia/Greece Mashup

Posted by on December 10, 2011 at 2:43 pm. 8 Comments :

Earlier this week Fox News broadcast a report on protests taking place in Russia. They made a point of noting the violent nature of the demonstrations and included dramatic footage of raging fires and rampaging protesters. The only problem with that is that the video Fox aired was not of the Russian protests. It was from protests that took place in Greece and even included shots of businesses with Greek signs.

This is not an uncommon occurrence on Fox News. There have been some notorious incidents when Fox fouled up, including one where Sean Hannity aired video of a well attended rally that he said was a Tea Party event. However, it was from a different rally entirely, and the real Tea Party gathering actually drew a rather meager crowd. On another occasion Fox News published an ad that accused CNN of failing to report on a Tea Party event, but the photo of the event that Fox used in their ad was taken off the air from CNN’s broadcast.

Also notable is this headline story and image that was featured at the top of the Fox News web site today:

Fox News

What’s wrong with this picture? Once again it is not what Fox says it is. These are not protesters in Russia. They are protesters demonstrating at the Houses of Parliament in London. You would think that all of the English language signs would be a dead giveaway. But apparently Fox is unconcerned that their audience is smart enough to pick up on that.

These amateurish flubs are typical of Fox’s sloppy brand of pseudo-journalism. It demonstrates their lack of seriousness with regard to reporting and informing the public. What’s more, they are aware of the problem. A couple of years ago they distributed a memo to their newsroom warning of the consequences of continued blunders:

“Mistakes by any member of the show team that end up on air may result in immediate disciplinary action against those who played significant roles in the ‘mistake chain,’ and those who supervise them. That may include warning letters to personnel files, suspensions, and other possible actions up to and including termination.”

So will heads be rolling at Fox News? Don’t count on it. Fox doesn’t regard these incidents as mistakes. In fact, they are an integral part of their mandate. A mistake would be if they inadvertently allowed something truthful to get on the air. That would be cause for termination at Fox.


The Donald Trump/NewsMax Debate: What No One Is Talking About

Posted by on December 9, 2011 at 9:30 am. 2 Comments :

Donald Trump

Ever since it was announced that Donald Trump would be moderating a debate between the Republican presidential primary candidates, the focus of the press and pundits was centered on the absurdity of a clown like Trump being taken seriously in that role. After all, he is charlatan who pretends to be a successful businessman, but in reality he is fraud who has presided over four bankrupt enterprises and rescued his floundering career by becoming a TV game show host.

GOP luminaries from George Will to Karl Rove to RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, have all dismissed Trump a distraction, a joke, or worse. And consistent with his pugilistic personality, Trump fired back with a barrage of petulant insults. More importantly, the candidates themselves have shunned Trump and his Narcissistic endeavor. Huntsman, Paul, Romney, Perry, and Bachmann are all officially out. When Bachmann gave notice on Fox News she complained to Gretchen Carlson that…

“…[Trump] was also on television saying that he was leaning toward one candidate. Even if he was leaning towards me it suggests the idea of bias and I just don’t know if that’s necessarily the right format.”

And just to illustrate how clueless the characters on Fox News are, Carlson responded to Bachmann saying…

“That’s interesting, because I had not thought about the latter part of what you just said as being possibly a conflict of interest if he actually is leaning towards one candidate.”

Yes, Gretchen, that is interesting (I mean the part about you having thoughts). And while Huntsman and Paul spoke candidly about their reasons for sitting out the debate, Romney, Bachmann, and Perry all polished their snub by lavishing the Donald with flagrant flattery and shameless adulation. Nevertheless, it has become glaringly apparent that Trump holds no sway with either the public or the political players. The roster for the much ballyhooed debate (mostly ballyhooed by Trump himself) is now set with only Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum participating. That should make for some compelling TV drama. However, it is unlikely to result in the fulfillment of his prediction that “We will get, probably, the highest ratings of any debate.” Such grandiose hyperbole can only come from the ego of Trump.

But lost in the sublime comic relief of all of this Trumpling is any substantive review of his partner in this debasement of debate. NewsMax is a popular conservative magazine and web site. Popular among the curmudgeon crowd of over-65 conspiracy nuts, that is. Its editor, Chris Ruddy, is the author of a book that advanced the scurrilous lie that Bill Clinton’s aide, Vince Foster, did not commit suicide as all available evidence proved, but was – murdered! When Ruddy could not get his employer, Rupert Murdoch of the New York Post, to go along with this fable, Ruddy struck out on his own with the help of another right-wing media baron: Richard Mellon Scaife. It ought to be a warning sign if Murdoch is uncomfortable with your lunatic ravings.

Scaife is a stalwart anti-communist who seems to believe that anyone to the left of Barry Goldwater is a Trotskyite. His largesse extends to a who’s who of rightist foundations like the American Enterprise Institute, David Horowitz’s Freedom Center, and the Heritage Foundation. He is similarly generous to organizations that oppose public education, unions, and global warming science. But he is best known for bankrolling the investigations of sex scandals and drug-running plots that he was convinced Clinton was engaged in back in Arkansas.

So in addition to the embarrassment of being associated with Donald Trump, the two remaining participants in his debate must also account for their connection to NewsMax and Scaife. This is about more than just Trump’s ego and Birtherism. It also extends to extremist delusions about murdered White House staffers and drug traffickers. Even worse, NewsMax once published an article that was a thinly veiled call for a military coup against the Obama administration. Or as it is referred to legal circles – treason.

Santorum doesn’t have much to worry about because he isn’t going anywhere anyway. But Gingrich is the current GOP frontrunner (and the likely beneficiary/victim of a Trump endorsement), and he should be asked to comment on the appropriateness of aligning himself with these controversial figures. Sadly, it may be too much to expect the media to hold Gingrich’s feet to the fire when they haven’t even bothered to report that there is a fire. While it may be tempting to fill the airwaves with the Tales of Trump, that is only half the story. NewsMax and Scaife are as much a part of this ludicrous debate as Trump and deserve a little attention as well.

[Update] Trump spoke with Don Imus on the Fox Business Network this morning and delivered some deeply depressing news. Imus asked Trump if the debate would be going forward with only Gingrich and Santorum participating. Trump said, “I don’t know. I have to look into it.” Aside from being an enormous insult to Gingrich and Santorum, canceling the debate would eliminate one of the most eagerly anticipated comedy events of the holiday season. Come on, Donald…stick with it.


Bill O’Reilly Gets Occupied – Brandishes A Lethal Umbrella

Posted by on December 8, 2011 at 7:58 pm. 7 Comments :

The senior eminence of Fox News, Bill O’Reilly, demonstrated yesterday just how tender his thin skin is. O’Reilly was surprised by a chance encounter with a “fan” who wondered whether he was attending a fundraiser for Newt Gingrich (he wasn’t). But the encounter got a little out of hand when O’Reilly’s inner bully emerged.

The funny thing about this episode wherein O’Reilly physically assaults someone who did nothing more than ask him a question, is that this is a tactic that O’Reilly has championed for years. It was O’Reilly’s own producer, Stuttering Jesse Watters, who was so often dispatched by O’Reilly to ambush unsuspecting folks in an attempt to embarrass or harass them. When criticized for this cheesy debasement of journalism, O’Reilly steadfastly defends it as rooted in the proud historic tradition of Mike Wallace and 60 Minutes (it’s not).

However, subjected to the same sort of reporting that he favors, O’Reilly proves that he can dish it out but he can’t take it without lashing out and whining to a nearby law enforcement officer. And as the video shows, the only person who engaged in potentially unlawful violence was O’Reilly himself. He deployed his umbrella with such force that he broke it.

On his Fox “Spin Zone” program tonight, O’Reilly sought to portray the curious citizen as a threat who was “armed” with a cell phone camera. O’Reilly said that the man was “running at [him] in the dark, screaming.” Of course the video tells an entirely different story. And for some reason O’Reilly didn’t bother to play the video. I wonder why.

O’Reilly followed his self-serving defense with a discussion of the event with a former police detective. The two of them brazenly misrepresented the video that they refused to play. Clearly they didn’t want the audience to know what they were talking about. And, of course, his guest absolved O’Reilly of any wrongdoing.

At one point O’Reilly conceded that he and his minions have used the same tactic to get interviews, but he lied by asserting that if a subject asked them to leave they would do so. Here’s some pretty conclusive evidence that that was not the case:

So what we’ve learned from this is that O’Reilly is a liar, a bully and, like most bullies, a coward. It’s too bad the fellow who suffered the wrath of O’Reilly’s umbrella doesn’t have his own TV show to set the record straight. However, if any of O’Reilly’s friends watched the video, they now know what to get him for Christmas.


Time Magazine: #Occupy Wall Street #1 Story Of 2011

Posted by on December 8, 2011 at 12:49 pm. 14 Comments :

The editors of Time Magazine have selected the Occupy Wall Street movement as the top news story of 2011. This was a year that featured a contentious primary race for the Republican nomination for president, a bitter congressional battle over the debt ceiling, and a trial of staggering importance to the nation that found Michael Jackson’s doctor guilty of manslaughter.

Nevertheless, Time managed to make the right choice. The Occupy movement is an unprecedented expression of the First Amendment rights of free speech and the redressing of grievances. This country has never before seen a protest that planted itself in a public square and remained there long after most other rallies would have dissipated and gone home. And this phenomenon replicated itself in hundreds of cities across the nation.

As a result, the public debate over policy and governance flipped 180 degrees from the phony discourse over debt and the size of government, to the far more relevant subject of economic fairness and the abuse of power by the wealthy, the well-connected, and the giant multinational corporations who have no allegiance to America or its citizenry. It shoved the AstroTurf Tea Party out of the headlines and caused the Republican establishment to admit that they are “frightened to death” of Occupy and the 99%.

While Time got the top spot right, there were a couple of glaring omissions in the remainder of their top 10. Somehow they left out the killing of Osama Bin Laden which, after a decade of consuming a major portion of the national consciousness, ought to have earned a spot on this list. It is likewise curious that the News Corp phone hacking scandal was overlooked. That affair resulted in the closure of Britain’s largest circulation newsweekly, 17 arrests (and counting), numerous resignations of top management, Parliamentary hearings that compelled the appearance of Rupert Murdoch and his son James. This was not only a huge news story, it was the biggest news story about the news in decades.

These omissions might have been excusable if the crush of major events simply pushed the stories further down the list. But Time saw fit to include the “Penn State Sex Abuse Scandal,” and “Freak Weather” in the list. Do they really believe that those stories rank higher than the downfalls of the world’s top terrorist and top media propagandist?

[I’ll leave it you to decide which is which]
Rupert MurdochOsama Bin Laden

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Fox News Shrink Keith Ablow Offers His Psycho Analysis Of President Obama

Posted by on December 8, 2011 at 3:23 am. 6 Comments :

There is a lot of nonsense on Fox News. After all, this is the network that employs Dick Morris and Sarah Palin. It’s the network that brings in people like Jon Voight, Victoria Jackson, and Ted Nugent, to discuss serious matters of government and finance. But there may be no other Fox contributor that comes even close to the delusional lunacy of Dr. Keith Ablow.

Lou Dobbs hosted a segment of his Fox Business Network program that sought to explore President Obama’s identity crisis, wherein Ablow offered his typically twisted analysis of Obama’s psychological defects. The excrement that spews from his lips is so utterly perverse that I think I’ll just let it speak for itself:

“When you don’t have a core you’re able to slip the binding of your own existence and play other presidents.”

“Where’s the fire? Where’s the leadership? Why can’t we get anything done? Well, what if there’s nobody inside there other than the guy on GQ magazine on the cover?”

“If you go through enough abandonment, which this president has, if you are disenfranchised, you can cut yourself off from those feeling of rage and fire. That is all you can do to not disintegrate.”

“That’s why we’re adrift, Lou. Because there’s nobody in the White House, not really.”

“This is a president who captured the White House but considers himself different than us. OK? Quite different. And not sure at all that he liked us.”

“The whole reason the Birther movement came up is because people were flummoxed. They couldn’t figure out how can you be President of the United States and seem not to like the citizenry of the United States?”

“The answer is he doesn’t hate us. He simply isn’t there to hate or love. Because, guess what? Long ago he severed himself from all core emotions.”

There you have it. Obama is a phantom president whose own lack of emotion caused right-wing extremists and Tea Partiers to doubt his citizenship. And Ablow put forth these baseless theories in an embarrassingly childish performance that was peppered with repeated interruptions and pleas for attention.

Ablow is fond of pretending that he can psychoanalyze people who he has never examined or even met. That is a sign of certain quackery reminiscent of “doctor” Bill Frist’s pathetic attempt to diagnose the terminally ill and vegetative Terri Schiavo. What’s more, Ablow is in violation of the American Psychiatric Association’s Principles of Medical Ethics (Section 7.3), which state:

“On occasion psychiatrists are asked for an opinion about an individual who is in the light of public attention or who has disclosed information about himself/herself through public media. In such circumstances, a psychiatrist may share with the public his or her expertise about psychiatric issues in general. However, it is unethical for a psychiatrist to offer a professional opinion unless he or she has conducted an examination and has been granted proper authorization for such a statement.“

Ablow’s unethical hackery fits well on the Fox airwaves, and his credentials suit the requirements of the so-called “news” network that has proudly cast off any semblance ethics. He is the co-author of a book with conspiracy schizoid Glenn Beck, who has tried his own hand at psychoanalyzing the President as well – with hilarious results.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that characters like this fill the schedule on Fox. Notwithstanding how easy Fox makes it look, it really is difficult to come up with consistently demented lies and insults of the “quality” that Fox has maintained. So perhaps we should cut them some slack if they have to resort to lowlifes like Ablow on occasion just to avoid having dead air.


The Phony Fox News Course Correction

Posted by on December 7, 2011 at 1:32 pm. 1 Comments :

A couple of months ago Fox News CEO Roger Ailes told the Daily Beast that his network was undergoing an editorial realignment that he called a “course correction.” The implication was that Fox would cease to be the fiercely partisan propaganda outlet for which it has become so well known.

Well, that didn’t last long.

This morning Fox Business Network anchor Stuart Varney appeared on Sean Hannity’s radio program and candidly announced his political biases while discussing the upcoming presidential election:

“We must win. I say ‘We’ – I’m a conservative, I’m a Republican. I say we must win”

Varney went on to declare that if Obama is reelected the country will be bankrupt in four years. Of course, Hannity agreed with everything Varney said. This is a pretty good example of the actual course that Fox intends to pursue. And the political beneficiaries of Fox’s agenda know full well what they can expect from their favorite network. Mitt Romney was interviewed by Neil Cavuto yesterday and testified on behalf of the network saying…

“I’ll be on Fox a lot, because you guys matter when it comes to Republican primary voters.”

Indeed they do. In just the past two months since the alleged course correction, Fox News has hosted Liz Cheney to accuse Obama of wanting the economy to fail. They invited Victoria Jackson to present her shrill theory that Obama is a communist. They have relentlessly broadcast numerous phony stories in an effort to tarnish the administration (i.e. fast and furious, climate researcher’s emails, a Christmas tree tax, etc.) And they have gone out of their way to misrepresent Obama’s public remarks, such as the fuss they made out of his using the word “lazy.” This week Fox didn’t even bother to broadcast all of Obama’s major economic speech in Kansas. They cut away from the speech about half way through in order to air an interview with GOP loser Michele Bachmann.

So if anyone has fallen for the fairy tale that Fox is moderating their extremist right-wing activism, they clearly are not paying attention to the barrage of hostility that continues to emanate from Murdoch’s media. The Fox empire has never been more offensive and unethical, even when they still had Glenn Beck’s ravings blasting the airwaves. If they have made any course correction at all, it is further to the right and in support of the GOP primary candidates. And given the sorry nature of that bunch, you would think that they’ve suffered enough embarrassment for the remainder of this year and next.


Obama’s Kansas Speech Owes A Debt To #Occupy Wall Street

Posted by on December 6, 2011 at 3:26 pm. 3 Comments :

President Obama traveled to the site of Teddy Roosevelt’s “New Nationalism” speech in order to deliver an address on the economy. The most striking thing about the President’s remarks was the extent to which they appear to have been influenced by the Occupy movement. Obama segued from one assertion of economic inequality to another as he insisted that “in America, we are greater together – when everyone engages in fair play, everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share.”

That is the call of the Occupiers in a nutshell. It is a campaign to restore fairness and justice and to take back control of the government from the wealthy special interests it has come to serve. If you missed the speech, I’ll save you twenty minutes by posting the one paragraph that summarizes the core of the message:

“Now, in the midst of this debate, there are some who seem to be suffering from a kind of collective amnesia. After all that’s happened, after the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, they want to return to the same practices that got us into this mess. In fact, they want to go back to the same policies that have stacked the deck against middle-class Americans for too many years. Their philosophy is simple: we are better off when everyone is left to fend for themselves and play by their own rules.”

Indeed, the Collective Amnesia Ward is overflowing with patients who not only are suffering from the malady, they want to infect every American with the disease. In fact, the only way that they can prevail next November is to spread the amnesiac virus beyond the community of conservative Republicans who are most susceptible to it. And if that one message is effectively communicated by the Obama reelection committee, the President will serve a second term.

On the other hand, the paragraph following the one above reiterated one of Obama’s most severe flaws. He still believes that there is a commonality of interest between his principles of inclusion and the Republican obsession with power. He believes that that by embracing a universal American togetherness the GOP will cease to demonize him and join the effort to rebuild the nation. It starts off well enough, but crashes and burns at the end.

“I’m here to reaffirm my deep conviction that we are greater together than we are on our own. I believe that this country succeeds when everyone gets a fair shot, when everyone does their fair share, and when everyone plays by the same rules. Those aren’t Democratic or Republican values; 1% values or 99% values. They’re American values, and we have to reclaim them.”

To argue that the 1% and the 99% share common American values is evidence of a dangerous blind spot. What Obama is missing here, and what he has missed for the past three years, is that there is a massive chasm between Democratic and Republican values. Whereas Democrats aspire (at least rhetorically) to empower the middle-class, the Republicans freely admit that their top objective is destroy Obama. That simple truth ought to be enough to convince the President that he is not going to recruit any allies in the fight for fairness and economic renewal from the ranks of the establishment GOP.

To illustrate the determination of the right-wing to throw every available obstacle into Obama’s path, Fox News cut away from the speech about half way through. Apparently they wanted to protect their fragile viewers from this subversive philosophy. By tonight Fox will be castigating the speech as a paean to socialism owing to its praise for working together. And the pressing news that demanded the interruption of the President was that Megyn Kelly had an interview with Michele Bachmann, who has about as much chance of becoming the Republican nominee as Miss Piggy.

On the whole the speech was another validation of the Occupy movement. This speech would not have been written a year ago. The public debate has been utterly transformed in the two and a half months since an unruly rabble encamped in a park in Lower Manhattan. Today the Republicans are “frightened to death” of the prospect of average Americans ascending to the top of the political food chain. And the President of the United States of America gave a speech honoring the notion that “We still have a stake in each other’s success.”


Donald Trump’s Presidential Apprentice Primer

Posted by on December 5, 2011 at 2:09 pm. 2 Comments :

Donald Trump

Pretend billionaire and megalomaniac, Donald Trump is making the media rounds to prop up his Apprentice spin-off program: The Republican Presidential Primary Debate, or Presidential Apprentice. The announcement last week of this momentous event has been met with near universal yawns. Already two candidates (Jon Huntsman and Ron Paul) have declined the invitation. The only candidate who has accepted to date is Newt Gingrich.

True to his character, Trump attacked Huntsman (who is in third place in New Hampshire polling) and Paul (who is in third place in Iowa polling) as joke candidates. If they were truly joke candidates, however, they would be headlining Trump’s circus. As it stands, only Gingrich is set to appear. That is most likely because the new front-runner is broke, has no staff, and desperately needs the free media that any public appearance provides.

Republican elders are dismissing Trump’s affair. George Will said that the candidates should be presidential and say that “we’re not going to be hijacked and participate in this.” Karl Rove said that it’s absurd for any candidate to participate in a debate moderated by someone who is planning to make an endorsement and has hinted at running as an Independent. He further noted that “It’s gonna be a giant ego trip.”

Should anyone else decide to join Trump and Gingrich, they should be prepared for what they might encounter in a Trump-moderated debate. So I have compiled some of the subjects that Trump has championed in order that the candidates can familiarize themselves with his platform. Studying these areas of interest will give the debaters a leg up on their campaign for Trump’s affection:

1) Obama’s Citizenship: This is without a doubt the cornerstone of Trump’s political agenda. He talks about it at every appearance – including this morning on MSNBC, where he told Chuck Todd that he is still interested in this even if others are not. He has yet to reveal the findings of the security team he sent to Hawaii to investigate the matter.

2) Obama’s Religion: Despite the fact that the President has repeatedly affirmed his devout Christianity, Trump suspects that he is secretly a Muslim and the proof may be on his birth certificate. Never mind that any religious designation on a birth certificate would be irrelevant. Obviously the baby Barack did not select his faith, but the adult has been clear and consistent.

3) Obama’s Authorship: Trump has embraced the WorldNetDaily crackpots who believe that Bill Ayers was the ghostwriter of Obama’s autobiography “Dreams From My Father.” The evidence of this fraud is the observation that both used certain phrases like going “against the current.” Well, that settles that. Trump also believes that Obama was born Barry Soetoro and later changed his name, despite the fact that his step-father Lolo Soetoro didn’t marry Obama’s mother until he was four years old.

4) Obama’s Academics: Trump is fond of questioning Obama’s academic credentials, insisting that he was too stupid to get into Harvard. He says he is investigating this (are they the same investigators he sent to Hawaii?). Of course it is documented that Obama had graduated from Columbia before getting a scholarship to Harvard where he became the first black editor of the Harvard Law Review and graduated magna cum laude.

5) Foreign Policy: Trump has advocated declaring a trade war with China. He also proposed addressing the deficit by stealing the oil from Libya and Iraq. This is the sort of bravado that Trump likes to display with his own business enterprises, which have resulted in four bankruptcies. In addition he has expressed support for an actual shooting war with both Iran and North Korea. However, with international relations between sovereign nations with standing armies, he may produce even worse outcomes than he has with his failing hotels and casinos.

6) Economic Policy: While he doesn’t have a 999 plan, Trump has proposed a tax increase that might inflame the sensitivities of Grover Norquist and the Tea Party:

“I would impose a one-time, 14.25% tax on individuals and trusts with a net worth over $10 million. For individuals, net worth would be calculated minus the value of their principal residence. That would raise $5.7 trillion in new revenue, which we would use to pay off the entire national debt. […] Some will say that my plan is unfair to the extremely wealthy. I say it is only reasonable to shift the burden to those most able to pay. The wealthy actually would not suffer severe repercussions.”

That actually sounds pretty good. Too bad he has disavowed that plan that appeared in his book, and now thinks he can appropriate billions of dollars from other countries to pay down our debt (he doesn’t say how).

This primer for the Trump debate should prepare the candidates to deal with the peculiar lunacy of the Trump vision for America. It would certainly be enlightening for voters to get a clearer perspective on these important matters.

However, there is a significant obstacle that might prevent this illuminating discourse from proceeding. It is highly probable that no one will show up but Gingrich. There really doesn’t seem to be much incentive to participate in a debate between Christmas and New Year’s Day that is hosted by charlatan whom polls show would harm the candidacies of anyone that he endorsed. With only three weeks to confirm, we’ll know pretty soon if there are others in the race who are as desperate as Newt. In a pinch Trump could always call Meatloaf or LaToya Jackson and see if they would be willing to sign on again.