On today’s BradCast, WikiLeaks releases transcripts from Hillary Clinton’s paid speeches to Wall Street bankers (and more) as America’s long national nightmare known as Election 2016 grinds towards the finish line. [Audio link to show posted below.]
But first, some encouraging breaking news at the top of the show: A federal judge today has ordered swing-state Florida’s voter registration deadline to be extended by one week (until Oct 18th), after Republican Gov. Rick Scott refused to issue any extension, even as he ordered the evacuation of 1.5 million residents last week, over what had been planned as the big final weekend for voter registration drives, as Hurricane Matthew bore down on the Sunshine State. (We discussed why that was a huge problem on yesterday’s BradCast with FL election expert Daniel Smith.) Also, as we went to air today, embattled Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf finally announced he was stepping down.
Then…WikiLeaks has been releasing thousands of hacked, private emails to and from Hillary Clinton campaign chief John Podesta. Included among them are partial transcripts of Clinton’s paid speeches given to groups like Goldman Sachs and other bankers and Wall Streeters before she became a candidate. One of those transcripts was cited by Donald Trump during the 2nd Presidential debate. But did he tell the truth about it? Did she? She has refused to release the speeches during both the primary with Bernie Sanders and the general campaign with Trump. So, would they have helped or hurt her had she done so? They do reveal her, after all, lauding single payer health care and opposing both the TPP and KeystoneXL long before she did so publicly. But what else do tell us that we hadn’t known previously?
Does anything in the transcripts released to date live up to the ‘outrage’ that corporate media and Clinton opponents have suggested? David Atkins of the generally-Clinton-supporting Washington Monthly described the hacked and leaked partial transcripts over the weekend as “problematic” and joins me today to explain why he thinks so.
Also today: Trump misinforms his own supporters about the date of the election (it’s November 8th, not 28th) and GOP Veep nominee Mike Pence does something not horrible for a brief moment and we laud him for it, even though he can’t help but lie to his supporters about “voter fraud” at the same time.
Finally, has Election 2016 hit ‘rock bottom’ yet? Evidence suggests we may not yet even be close…
Ah yes the republican party say they are for the middle class and yet they keep trying to suppress the middle class from voting. Jobs Jobs Jobs the republicans were crying in 2010, pray tell me what jobs program they have voted for. Look at how many Chevrolets and Chryslers are on the road plus all the industries that build parts plus all dealers that employ people. Remember republicans voted to let them go bankrupt. Ah yes those republicans that quote the constitution and then try to circumvent it at every turn.
Since their agenda is unsalable and their ideology is untenable they must lie, cheat and steal to remain in power. As long as good people do nothing that’s where we’re at.
well I will bet most of you haven’t been reading the leaks very much. I can tell by the way you still talk. An observation, your welcome.
bet most of you haven’t been reading the leaks very much. One can tell by the way you still talk, an observation, your welcome.