Seriously out of touch
The chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee said last week, in all seriousness, that “the left is the center of America right now.”
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., quickly qualified her remarks that the center was “not the far left,” where President Barack Obama, the 2016 presidential candidates and she live. “I think the messages that come from left of center, that focus on reaching the cornerstone of a middle-class life, are really where Americans are today.”
She went on to describe the Republican Party as “xenophobic” and “jingoistic” and said it is strangled by its tea party base. Never mind that references to the tea party have been seldom heard on the campaign trail in 2015.
Despite Wasserman Schultz’s rhetoric to Christian Science Monitor breakfast attendees, polls show the country remains largely center right in its thinking and politics. And, unthinkable at this juncture in most recent presidential elections, Republicans lead the polling in the early primary states of Iowa and New Hampshire.
On the other hand, it is the DNC chairwoman’s job to spin, not necessarily to tell the truth.
Moore loses moorings
Speaking of people out of touch with the mainstream, filmmaker Michael Moore, preparing for the opening of a new documentary at the Toronto Film Festival, suggested Hillary Clinton could one day be compared to Pope Francis.
“Don’t sell Hillary short about what she may do as president,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “I believe it’s very possible with her as president that we are going to have a Pope Francis moment. That once in, remarkable, incredible things are going to be done.”
Moore opined that he’s not endorsing the former secretary of state and said that he and Socialist Bernie Sanders “share ideas, not on most things, but on many things.” Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., “is a much more attractive candidate for me,” he said.
He also praised President Obama, who shares similar far left-wing ideals.
“I believe at his core,” Moore said, “we have a very intelligent person in the Oval Office, which is kind of rare. I just want him to go for it. And I want him to know he has the support of the majority of the American people.”
Apparently, the filmmaker has been so busy making films, he hasn’t checked opinion polls in the last several years.
Bond-ing with Bernie
The action was not very James Bond-like in several ways, but actor Daniel Craig, who plays the British sleuth in movies, recently contributed $47,300 to a super PAC that supports Sen. Bernie Sanders in his 2016 Democratic presidential bid.
It’s nothing new that vapid Hollywood actors contribute to Democratic candidates, but Sanders’ socialist politics are closer to those of the Russian-type of enemies the Bond character used to face in films of the genre in the 1960s and 1970s.
Plus, apparently Craig didn’t choose his super PAC, Americans Socially United, well. Its founder, Cary Lee Peterson, has faced numerous legal and financial problems and, according to court documents reviewed by the Center for Public Integrity, has been ordered to pay creditors hundreds of thousands of dollars for breaching contracts.
Peterson’s history has raised questions about what he is doing with the money he raises for Sanders, whose campaign, which shuns political action committees and corporate money, has asked Peterson to stop soliciting donations on the senator’s behalf.
Craig said he made the donation in good faith and would ask for his money back if he learned that it was not being used as intended.
Video giveth; video taketh away
Video footage has been credited in recent years for exposing the brutality of some police personnel in the stopping, detaining and arresting of various personnel across the country, but what can expose also can exhonerate.
Such was the case recently in a late-night traffic stop for speeding by the Pearland (Texas) Police Department of former Houston Oilers football player Lamar Lathon. Lathon said he reached down to get his license, and the officer immediately drew his weapon and pointed it at his face.
“I was like, ‘Guys, what’s going on, what’s the problem,'” the former University of Houston player said. “‘Have you lost your mind? Why are you pulling a gun on me?'”
The incident, Lathon said, left him “completely terrified.”
Dash cam video, however, shows the officer told Lathon three times not to reach under under his seat, and when he did it a fourth time the officer drew his weapon. But he did not point it at the former player’s face, and the officer holstered it when he brought up his wallet. He subsequently made a vague threat to the officer, who gave him a ticket for speeding (65 mph in a 50 mph zone).
The police department, upon review of the footage, said the officer was “professional and within both the law and policies of this agency.” The Pearland Police Offers Association, in turn, called on the former player to apologize for his “attempt to divide the community and law enforcement.”
“This is not a perception issue about what transpired during the traffic stop,” association President John DeSpain said. “It is an outright lie.”