Good morning all. Here’s what’s happening out in the world today, delivered straight to the comfort of your computer or iPhone screen so you don’t have to actually venture out into that scary, confusing place known as reality. We’re going to focus on the presidential election for this roundup, since both candidates have spoken here in the past couple days.
GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump just wrapped up his address to the 98th annual American Legion national convention in Cincinnati. He gave an uncharacteristically short speech — under 20 minutes — in which he hit all his usual talking points around the nefariousness of his opponent, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, immigration, terrorism, strengthening America’s military, trade protectionism and the danger of Syrian refugees. He sprinkled in some specific nods to veterans, pledged to reform the Department of Veterans Affairs, and even tried to reach out to female voters with a single sentence about giving female vets “the best care in the world.” The speech’s truncated nature made it feel a bit fractured at times. During a two-minute stopover on the subject of Clinton’s emails during her time with the State Department, Trump made a slightly cryptic, somewhat evocative comment that those messages had been “bleached. Bleached. An expensive process. Why? Why?” The crowd, made up mostly of American Legion delegates, was slightly larger than Clinton’s yesterday, but applause seemed light and polite, a big contrast from the raucous gatherings Trump’s rallies generally represent.
If you’re looking for that kind of party, you might trek up to Wilmington, Ohio, where Trump is holding a campaign rally at noon today. Supporters are reportedly already lined up en mass for that appearance.
• Clinton gave her speech yesterday, and, as expected, it dealt a great deal with America’s military might and international clout. Clinton also pledged not to privatize the Department of Veterans Affairs while improving the quality of care there. Clinton’s speech skewed remarkably hawkish and conservative, a function of playing to an audience that generally likes strong words on defense and foreign policy. She did stress coalition building and diplomacy as vital facets of America’s leadership role in the world, skills she said Trump does not possess. She blasted his last-minute trip to Mexico, which he took yesterday, as a political publicity ploy that betrayed his lack of understanding for the importance and difficulty involved in foreign affairs.
• So, about Trump’s Mexico visit. How did that go? He appeared with President Enrique Pena Nieto and read brief, moderate and serious prepared comments at a news conference there. Trump seemed in a conciliatory mode at that event and others like it on his trip, which included a private meeting with Nieto in which the two discussed the problems facing Mexico.
• But later in the evening at a speech across the border in Phoenix, he lashed out again at the country, spending his hour-long address on immigration reciting crimes committed by immigrants and pledging once again to build a 2,000-mile-long wall across the U.S. border with Mexico. The speech had some factual smudges, as you might expect, but drew big applause from Trump supporters on the right. So, that happened. Trump insisted at the event that Mexico will pay to build the wall, despite Nieto insisting that he told Trump during their meeting that such a thing would never happen. The whole 24-hour period represented a striking shift toward a more reasonable tone from Trump followed by a lightening quick shift back to his strict stances painting immigrants as one of the main threats to America. The move caused at least a couple of Trump’s allies from the Hispanic community who had been acting as campaign trail surrogates to distance themselves from the candidate.
• Finally, have you signed up to be a Trump volunteer dialing up your neighbors to tell them the good news about The Donald? If so, you might have had to sign an unusual 2,200-word contract that prohibits you from criticizing Trump, his wife and his children into perpetuity. That’s… unusual, campaign experts say. Check out more about that weirdness here.
This article appears in Aug 31 – Sep 7, 2016.
