Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Donald Trump takes lead in Wisconsin, Marquette Poll, 9/24-9/28/15. Trump gets largest share of departed Walker voters

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Dates, 9/24-9/28/15 (Th-Mon). 321 Republicans and independents who lean R .Margin of error 6.5%.

Trump 20
Carson 16
Rubio 14
Fiorina 11
Bush 7
Cruz 5
Christie 3
Huckabee 3
Kasich 3


Chart below: Where Walker supporters went:

Chart from Fox6now, Milw.











9/30/15, "MU Poll: Trump takes over lead in Wisconsin," wisn.com, Milwaukee
 

"With Gov. Scott Walker out of the race, the Marquette University Law School poll released Wednesday showed 20 percent of Republicans favor Donald Trump
for president, followed by Ben Carson at 16 percent and Marco Rubio at 14 percent. Related Carly Fiorina has 11 percent of the support followed by Jeb Bush with 7 percent, Ted Cruz with 5 percent, and Mike Huckabee, Chris Christie, and John Kasich each at 3 percent.

On the Democratic side, Hillary Rodham Clinton was ahead with 42 percent followed by Bernie Sanders at 30 percent and Joe Biden, who hasn't announced a run, with 17 percent.

The questions about partisan preferences for president had smaller sample sizes and larger margins of error - 6.5 percentage points for Republicans, 5.9 percentage points for Democrats....

Walker abruptly dropped out on Sept. 21. He said he was not interested in taking a Cabinet position and is undecided about seeking a third term....

The poll of 803 registered voters was done between Sept. 24 and Monday. The margin of error is plus or minus 4.1 percentage points [for all voters combined]."

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9/30/15, "Marquette Law School poll: Gov. Walker job approval rating at 37%, a new low," fox6now.com, Milwaukee

"In another blow to the governor, many supporters of his failed presidential campaign said they had shifted their support to Donald Trump. Walker on Sept. 21 said he was quitting the race -- and calling on other candidates to do the same -- in the hopes of another Republican defeating Trump.



Instead, 22 percent of Walker's supporters moved to Trump's camp, enough to vault Trump into first place among Wisconsin Republican primary voters.

"Ironically, he`s provided a reservoir of additional support for Trump," said Charles Franklin, director of the MU Law poll....

Independent voters have abandoned Walker as the governor shifted to the right during the presidential campaign. The contentious state budget may have also played a role, Franklin said.

"The question I think is more one of whether he can reassemble the public support he had," Franklin said, noting that independent voters carried Walker to each of his gubernatorial victories.

In the GOP presidential race, Trump leads in Wisconsin with 20 percent. Ben Carson is second with 16 percent, then Marco Rubio at 14 percent and Carly Fiorina at 11 percent.

The remainder of the field includes Jeb Bush at 7 percent, Ted Cruz and Rand Paul each at 5 percent, and Mike Huckabee, Chris Christie and John Kasich each at 3 percent. No other candidate received more than 1 percent support.

Trump shows a significant gain from August when he was supported by just 9 percent of Wisconsin Republicans. On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton has opened a slightly wider leader over Bernie Sanders. Clinton got 42 percent, while Sanders had 30 percent and Joe Biden had 17 percent. No other candidate received more than 1 percent support....

About the Marquette Law School Poll

The Marquette Law School Poll is the most extensive statewide polling project in Wisconsin history. This poll interviewed 803 registered Wisconsin voters, by both landline and cell phone, from September 24-28, 2015. The margin of error is +/- 4.1 percentage points for the full sample. For Republicans and independents who lean toward the Republican Party, the sample size is 321, with a margin of error of +/- 6.5 percentage points. For Democrats and independents who lean toward the Democratic Party, the sample size is 394, with a margin of error of +/-5.9 percentage points. Republican and Democratic presidential primary items were asked of the corresponding party samples.

The partisan makeup of this sample, including those who lean to a party, is 40 percent Republican, 49 percent Democratic and 9 percent independent. The long-term estimate over the previous 29 statewide Marquette polls, with 25,121 respondents, is 43 percent Republican and 47 percent Democratic, with 9 percent independent. The partisan makeup excluding those who lean to a party is 25 percent Republican, 30 percent Democratic and 41 percent independent, compared to the long-term estimate of 27 percent Republican, 31 percent Democratic and 38 percent independent.

The entire questionnaire, full results, and breakdowns by demographic groups are available at http://law.marquette.edu/poll."

Image above from fox6now.com

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Donald Trump up 6 points in USA Today national poll, 9/24-9/28/15, likely Republican voters. Jeb Bush falls to 5th place from July poll-USA Today

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9/24-9/28/15, 380 Likely R voters, margin of error +-5

Trump 23
Carson 13
Fiorina 13
Rubio 9
Bush 8
Cruz 6
Huckabee 2
Kasich 2
Paul 2
Christie 1
Graham 1
Jindal 1
 
9/30/15, "Poll: Donald Trump still on top as outsiders Fiorina, Carson rise," USA Today, Susan Page and Paulina Firozi

"Billionaire businessman Donald Trump has strengthened his lead at the top of the USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll while two other outsider candidates, Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina, have gained ground over rivals with electoral experience.

Jeb Bush, who two months ago was second to Trump in the USA TODAY survey, has tumbled to single digits and fifth place. The third-place finisher last time, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, suspended his campaign entirely this month.

"Unfortunately, I'm leaning toward Trump, only because he's a non-political figure," says Ginger Mangam, 58, a customer-service representative from Little Rock, Ark., who was among those surveyed. Asked about his lack of electoral experience, she replies: "I don't think it's a problem; I think it's a message."

Anthony Edelen, 37, a small-business owner from Vermillion, S.D., likes what he hears from Trump and Fiorina. "I just want somebody who is going to move our country in a direction different from where it is currently," he said in a follow-up interview.

The shifting landscape underscores an electorate that is fed up with politics-as-usual and willing to embrace contenders who promise to shake things up. Some presidential hopefuls with significant political experience — New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham among them — have failed to gain traction and now score at 1% or below, a standing that may make it harder for them to raise money and command a spot on stage in future televised debates.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio has risen to fourth place, backed by 9% of those surveyed.

The poll of 380 likely Republican primary voters, taken Thursday through Monday, has a margin of error of +/- 5 percentage points. The full sample of 1,000 likely voters has an error margin of 3 points....

He (Trump) continues to lead the field at 23%, up 6 points from the July survey. Carson, a retired neurosurgeon, and Fiorina, an ex-CEO, tie for second at 13%, both big jumps the last poll. That means about half of the GOP electorate now backs candidates who have never served in elective office.

No other candidate breaks into double digits. Rubio is at 9%, Bush at 8%, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz at 6% and Ohio Gov. John Kasich at 2%. Not a single respondent backs former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum or former New York governor George Pataki.

"I support Donald Trump because...he's the only one that has what it takes to stand up to people," declares Nina Neece, 56, of Turlock, Calif. "He's not afraid of offending anybody."

Jordan Penegor, 21, a barista from Reno, Nev., is following Carson on Facebook and likes what she reads. "He's not a politician so he doesn't look at the political views," Penegor says. "He just looks at helping the American people as a whole."...

Six in 10 say the country is on the wrong track, and just 30% say the Democratic and Republican parties do a good job of representing Americans' political views. A 53% majority say a third party or multiple parties are necessary.

Meanwhile, most Americans say it's not possible for a Muslim to be elected president, an issue that arose when Carson expressed skepticism on NBC's Meet the Press about whether an observant Muslim could meet the job's constitutional requirements. By 53%-39%, those surveyed say a Muslim couldn't be elected. However, by 49%-40%, they also say they would vote for a qualified Muslim themselves."...

"Statement of Methodology: This survey of 1,000 likely voters was conducted between September 24 and September 28, 2015, and is based on live telephone interviews of adults 18 years of age or older, residing in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, and who intend to vote in 2016. Quota and demographic information -- including region, race, and age -- were determined from 2010 Census data. Samples of both standard landlines (65 percent) and cell phones (35 percent) were called using a probability-proportionate-to-size method, which means that the phone numbers assigned to each state were proportional to the number of adult residents in each state. States were grouped into four general regions. Respondents in the households were selected by initially asking for the youngest adult. Surveys were administered in English and Spanish. The margin of sampling error for results based on the total sample is plus or minus 3 percentage points. Error margins increase for smaller subgroups in the cross-tabulation document that follows. All surveys may be subject to other sources of error, including but not limited to coverage error and measurement error. The margin of error for the Republican primary subset of 380 voters is +/- 5.03 percentage points."
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Links to USA Today poll: Marginals, Tables

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Added: The Republican Establishment nomination racket:

9/23/15, "Band (of consultants) paid on: Explaining Scott Walker," Washington Times, Ed Martin

"Mr. Walker failed because in every Republican cycle, the establishment needs some guys to run and to fail. The Establishment needs the money and employment, and they need candidates to play along with the rigged Republican nomination process. Mr. Walker bought the Establishment plan and he ran the same playbook that the Republican establishment has been using for nearly two decades. That is, raise a boatload of money and spend it on consultants and staff (especially in early states) and then raise more money and run ads in Iowa and New Hampshire. (Media buyers get 10 percent for the ad buys, and the media in Iowa and New Hampshire love the cash too!) Pollsters must be paid big money to parse positions and “sharpen” the candidate.

Mr. Walker went along with it all. He imported a campaign manager (Rick Wiley) directly from RNC Chairman Reince Priebus' staff. And the hiring began. Here in St. Louis, a prominent consultant was hired to do grassroots/conservative coalitions…paid thousands of dollars but that needle never moved (except down). Great quote from Mr. Reince’s guy who ran the Walker campaign: “We didn’t have a spending problem - we had a revenue problem.” Everyone wins except Scott Walker.

Next, Mr. Walker started dancing on his positions as pollsters demand and it made him look weak and confused - immigration is the best example. And the band (of consultants) paid on as the ship slipped sideways.

This a racket that has worked well for the consultants with campaigns. (By the way, don’t worry about the consultants and staffers - they are being snapped up by other campaigns running the Establishment plan like Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush! And Reince can put them back on the payroll, too.)

However, voters are sick of ​the D.C. racket.​ Voters care less if candidates have served in office (Donald Trump, Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson) or if they understand the nuances of foreign policy (again, Mr. Carson, Mr. Trump). No, the voters - in fact, most Americans - want someone who is authentic and who will fight for them not for a political office but for their future. If Mr. Walker understood this, he could have kept his staff to a minumum and his spending light. He could have announced, “I plan to run until the end and make a big argument for Americans.” He easily could have become the consensus choice in late March or April when the others stumble.

Instead, his staff gathered Wednesday night at a microbrewery near their Wisconsin headquarters. I suspect toasted their good fortunes: “Here’s to us and to our next stop on another campaign.”"

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Gov. Scott Walker knew he was part of a sham:

Gov. Scott Walker said he knew before Wed., 9/16 CNN debate even took place, the narrative was in place saying Fiorina won the night:

"We knew the narrative no matter what" was going to be that Fiorina won the night:

9/17/15, "Scott Walker: Media Would’ve Said Fiorina Won Debate ‘No Matter What’," MediaIte, by Andrew Desiderio

"Wisconsin Gov. and Republican presidential candidate Scott Walker went after the media following CNN’s GOP debate, telling radio host Glenn Beck on Thursday that members of the political press were going to spin the debate as a win for Carly Fiorina “no matter what.”

I think going in, we knew the narrative no matter what was going to happen was that they were going to say Carly had a big night, no matter what, and obviously they said that,” Walker said."...






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Kareem Abdul-Jabbar says Sharia law is for Muslims, and if there's a Muslim majority state then it has to be run by Sharia law-Fox Business News interview

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9/23/15, "Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: Judge People on their Character," Fox Business News, Julia Limitone

"During an interview with the FOX Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo, NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar discussed Republican presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson’s anti-Muslim comments. “I am not an infidel or a heretic. To be characterized like that is just an expression of bigotry. Americans are judged on their character,” he said.

He argued Dr. Ben Carson doesn’t support the Constitution.

“When they run for office there is no religious component in qualifying for public office in America. That’s clearly in the constitution… Mr. Carson says we have to support the Constitution, but he doesn’t support the Constitution by denying Muslims the same access to public office as any other person from any other religion. He is clearly distorted and I think a little deranged,” he said.

Abdul-Jabbar discussed the process of converting to Islam and expressed his feelings towards Sharia law.

Sharia law is for Muslims. So if there is a Muslim majority state then it has to be run by Sharia law. But I live in a very diverse country and I have to respect everyone else’s beliefs -- the Koran says that…and unless they are criminals you can’t persecute them on the basis of religion. So people who support their government-- I totally support my government. The United States Constitution protects my rights to practice Islam. That’s the only criteria that Muslims have in being a minority in the country. We have to respect the laws and traditions of America.”"...via Pamela Geller



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New York City judge absolves Saudis of 911 involvement. No mention by AP that 28 pages of 911 Commission Report remain redacted

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9/29/15, "Judge drops Saudi Arabia from Sept. 11 lawsuit,"AP, Larry Neumeister, New York

"Sean Carter, a plaintiffs' lawyer, said: "Obviously, we respectfully disagree with the court's ruling." He promised an appeal.

"Evidence central to these claims continues to be treated as classified. The government's decision to continue to classify that material certainly factored into this outcome," he said....[last sentence of AP article]

Saudi Arabia was dismissed Tuesday as a defendant in lawsuits brought by the families of victims of the Sept. 11 attacks by a judge who said lawyers had failed to show sufficient evidence linking the country to the attacks.

U.S. District Judge George Daniels said in a written ruling that lawyers for the plaintiffs had failed to show facts sufficient to overcome Saudi Arabia's sovereign immunity. He also dismissed as a defendant the Saudi High Commission for Relief of Bosnia and Herzegovina on the grounds that the charity is an instrument of Saudi Arabia and thus covered as well by sovereign immunity....

Lawyers in the Sept. 11 cases have frequently cited the report by the Sept. 11 Commission. Lawyers for the plaintiffs have said the commission supported their argument that Saudi Arabia had long been considered the primary source of al-Qaida funding, while lawyers for Saudi Arabia have argued that the commission found no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually funded al-Qaida."...

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Added: Two 2013 articles about the 28 pages of 911 Commission report that remain redacted:

12/9/13, "9/11 Link To Saudi Arabia Is Topic Of 28 Redacted Pages In Government Report; Congressmen Push For Release," IB Times, Jamie Reno

"Since terrorists attacked the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, victims’ loved ones, injured survivors, and members of the media have all tried without much success to discover the true nature of the relationship between the 19 hijackers – 15 of them Saudi nationals – and the Saudi Arabian government. Many news organizations reported that some of the terrorists were linked to the Saudi royals and that they even may have received financial support from them as well as from several mysterious, moneyed Saudi men living in San Diego.

Saudi Arabia has repeatedly denied any connection, and neither President George W. Bush nor President Obama has been forthcoming on this issue.

But earlier this year, Reps. Walter B. Jones, R-N.C., and Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., were given access to the 28 redacted pages of the Joint Intelligence Committee Inquiry (JICI) of 9/11 issued in late 2002, which have been thought to hold some answers about the Saudi connection to the attack.
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"I was absolutely shocked by what I read," Jones told International Business Times. "What was so surprising was that those whom we thought we could trust really disappointed me. I cannot go into it any more than that. I had to sign an oath that what I read had to remain confidential. But the information I read disappointed me greatly."

The public may soon also get to see these secret documents. Last week, Jones and Lynch introduced a resolution that urges President Obama to declassify the 28 pages, which were originally classified by President George W. Bush. It has never been fully explained why the pages were blacked out, but President Bush stated in 2003 that releasing the pages would violate national security.

While neither Jones nor Lynch would say just what is in the document, some of the information has leaked out over the years. A multitude of sources tell IBTimes, and numerous press reports over the years in Newsweek, the New York Times, CBS News and other media confirm, that the 28 pages in fact clearly portray that the Saudi government had at the very least an indirect role in supporting the terrorists responsible for the 9/11 attack. In addition, these classified pages clarify somewhat the links between the hijackers and at least one Saudi government worker living in San Diego.  

Former Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., who chaired the Joint Inquiry in 2002 and has been beating the drum for more disclosure about 9/11 since then, has never understood why the 28 pages were redacted. Graham told IBTimes that based on his involvement in the investigation and on the now-classified information in the document that his committee produced, he is convinced that “the Saudi government without question was supporting the hijackers who lived in San Diego…. You can't have 19 people living in the United States for, in some cases, almost two years, taking flight lessons and other preparations, without someone paying for it. But I think it goes much broader than that. The agencies from CIA and FBI have suppressed that information so American people don't have the facts." 

Jones insists that releasing the 28 secret pages would not violate national security.

“It does not deal with national security per se; it is more about relationships,” he said. “The information is critical to our foreign policy moving forward and should thus be available to the American people. If the 9/11 hijackers had outside help – particularly from one or more foreign governments – the press and the public have a right to know what our government has or has not done to bring justice to the perpetrators."

It took Jones six weeks and several letters to the [John Boehner controlled] House Intelligence Committee before the classified pages from the 9/11 report were made available to him. Jones was so stunned by what he saw that he approached Rep. Lynch, asking him to look at the 28 pages as well. He knew that Lynch would be astonished by the contents of the documents and perhaps would join in a bipartisan effort to declassify the papers.

"He came back to me about a week ago and told me that he, too, was very shocked by what he read,” Jones said. “I told him we need to join together and put in a resolution and get more members on both sides of the aisle involved and demand that the White House release this information to the public. The American people have a right to know this information."

A decade ago, 46 senators, led by Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., demanded in a letter to President Bush that he declassify the 28 pages.

The letter read, in part, "It has been widely reported in the press that the foreign sources referred to in this portion of the Joint Inquiry analysis reside primarily in Saudi Arabia. As a result, the decision to classify this information sends the wrong message to the American people about our nation's antiterror effort and makes it seem as if there will be no penalty for foreign abettors of the hijackers. Protecting the Saudi regime by eliminating any public penalty for the support given to terrorists from within its borders would be a mistake.... We respectfully urge you to declassify the 28-page section that deals with foreign sources of support for the 9/11 hijackers."

All of the senators who signed that letter but one, Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas), were Democrats.

Lynch, who won the Democratic primary for his congressional seat on that fateful day of Sept. 11, 2001, told IBTimes that he and Jones are in the process of writing a “Dear Colleague” letter calling on all House members to read the 28 pages and join their effort.

"Once a member reads the 28 pages, I think whether they are Democrat or Republican they will reach the same conclusion that Walter and I reached, which is that Americans have the right to know this information," Lynch said. “These documents speak for themselves. We have a situation where an extensive investigation was conducted, but then the Bush [administration] decided for whatever purposes to excise 28 pages from the report. I'm not passing judgment. That was a different time. Maybe there were legitimate reasons to keep this classified. But that time has long passed.”

Most of the allegations of links between the Saudi government and the 9/11 hijackers revolve around two enigmatic Saudi men who lived in San Diego: Omar al-Bayoumi and Osama Basnan, both of whom have long since left the United States.

In early 2000, al-Bayoumi, who had previously worked for the Saudi government in civil aviation (a part of the Saudi defense department), invited two of the hijackers, Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi, to San Diego from Los Angeles. He told authorities he met the two men by chance when he sat next to them at a restaurant.

Newsweek reported in 2002 that al-Bayoumi’s invitation was extended on the same day that he visited the Saudi Consulate in Los Angeles for a private meeting.

Al-Bayoumi arranged for the two future hijackers to live in an apartment and paid $1,500 to cover their first two months of rent. Al-Bayoumi was briefly interviewed in Britain but was never brought back to the United States for questioning.

As for Basnan, Newsweek reported that he received monthly checks for several years totaling as much as $73,000 from the Saudi ambassador to the United States, Prince Bandar, and his wife, Princess Haifa Faisal. Although the checks were sent to pay for thyroid surgery for Basnan’s wife, Majeda Dweikat, Dweikat signed many of the checks over to al-Bayoumi’s wife, Manal Bajadr. This money allegedly made its way into the hands of hijackers, according to the 9/11 report.

Despite all this, Basnan was ultimately allowed to return to Saudi Arabia, and Dweikat was deported to Jordan.

Sources and numerous press reports also suggest that the 28 pages include more information about Abdussattar Shaikh, an FBI asset in San Diego who Newsweek reported was friends with al-Bayoumi and invited two of the San Diego-based hijackers to live in his house.

Shaikh was not allowed by the FBI or the Bush administration to testify before the 9/11 Commission or the JICI.

Graham notes that there was a significant 9/11 investigation in Sarasota, Fla., which also suggests a connection between the hijackers and the Saudi government that most Americans don’t know about. The investigation, which occurred in 2002, focused on Saudi millionaire Abdulaziz al-Hijji and his wife, Anoud, whose upscale home was owned by Anoud al-Hijji’s father, Esam Ghazzawi, an adviser to Prince Fahd bin Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, the nephew of Saudi King Fahd.

The al-Hijji family reportedly moved out of their Sarasota house and left the country abruptly in the weeks before 9/11, leaving behind three luxury cars and personal belongings including clothing, furniture and fresh food. They also left the swimming-pool water circulating.

Numerous news reports in Florida have said that the gated community’s visitor logs and photos of license tags showed that vehicles driven by several of the future 9/11 hijackers had visited the al-Hijji home. 

Graham said that like the 28 pages in the 9/11 inquiry, the Sarasota case is being “covered up” by U.S. intelligence. Graham has been fighting to get the FBI to release the details of this investigation with Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests and litigation. But so far the bureau has stalled and stonewalled, he said.

Lynch said he didn’t know how the Obama administration would respond to the congressional resolution urging declassification, if it passes the House and Senate.

“But if we raise the issue, and get enough members to read it, we think we can get the current administration to revisit this issue. I am very optimistic,” he said. “I’ve talked to some of my Democratic members already, and there has been receptivity there. They have agreed to look at it.”

Obama administration officials declined to comment
on the congressional resolution or on the classification of these documents."...

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The entire US political class runs interference for its Saudi pals:

12/15/13, "Inside the Saudi 9/11 coverup," NY Post, Paul Sperry

"After the 9/11 attacks, the public was told al Qaeda acted alone, with no state sponsors.

But the White House never let it see an entire section of Congress’ investigative report on 9/11 dealing with “specific sources of foreign support” for the 19 hijackers, 15 of whom were Saudi nationals.

It was kept secret and remains so today.

President Bush inexplicably censored 28 full pages of the 800-page report. Text isn’t just blacked-out here and there in this critical-yet-missing middle section. The pages are completely blank, except for dotted lines where an estimated 7,200 words once stood (this story by comparison is about 1,000 words).

A pair of lawmakers who recently read the redacted portion say they are “absolutely shocked” at the level of foreign state involvement in the attacks.

Reps. Walter Jones (R-NC) and Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.) can’t reveal the nation identified by it without violating federal law. So they’ve proposed Congress pass a resolution asking President Obama to declassify the entire 2002 report, “Joint Inquiry Into Intelligence Community Activities Before and After the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001.”

Some information already has leaked from the classified section, which is based on both CIA and FBI documents, and it points back to Saudi Arabia, a presumed ally.

The Saudis deny any role in 9/11, but the CIA in one memo reportedly found “incontrovertible evidence” that Saudi government officials — not just wealthy Saudi hardliners, but high-level diplomats and intelligence officers employed by the kingdom — helped the hijackers both financially and logistically. The intelligence files cited in the report directly implicate the Saudi embassy in Washington and consulate in Los Angeles in the attacks, making 9/11 not just an act of terrorism, but an act of war.
 
The findings, if confirmed, would back up open-source reporting showing the hijackers had, at a minimum, ties to several Saudi officials and agents while they were preparing for their attacks inside the United States. In fact, they got help from Saudi VIPs from coast to coast:

LOS ANGELES: Saudi consulate official Fahad al-Thumairy allegedly arranged for an advance team to receive two of the Saudi hijackers — Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi — as they arrived at LAX in 2000. One of the advance men, Omar al-Bayoumi, a suspected Saudi intelligence agent, left the LA consulate and met the hijackers at a local restaurant. (Bayoumi left the United States two months before the attacks, while Thumairy was deported back to Saudi Arabia after 9/11.)

SAN DIEGO: Bayoumi and another suspected Saudi agent, Osama Bassnan, set up essentially a forward operating base in San Diego for the hijackers after leaving LA. They were provided rooms, rent and phones, as well as private meetings with an American al Qaeda cleric who would later become notorious, Anwar al-Awlaki, at a Saudi-funded mosque he ran in a nearby suburb. They were also feted at a welcoming party. (Bassnan also fled the United States just before the attacks.)

WASHINGTON: Then-Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar and his wife sent checks totaling some $130,000 to Bassnan while he was handling the hijackers. Though the Bandars claim the checks were “welfare” for Bassnan’s supposedly ill wife, the money nonetheless made its way into the hijackers’ hands.

Other al Qaeda funding was traced back to Bandar and his embassy— so much so that by 2004 Riggs Bank of Washington had dropped the Saudis as a client. The next year, as a number of embassy employees popped up in terror probes, Riyadh recalled Bandar.

Our investigations contributed to the ambassador’s departure,” an investigator who worked with the Joint Terrorism Task Force in Washington told me, though Bandar says he left for “personal reasons.”

FALLS CHURCH, VA.: In 2001, Awlaki and the San Diego hijackers turned up together again — this time at the Dar al-Hijrah Islamic Center, a Pentagon-area mosque built with funds from the Saudi Embassy. Awlaki was recruited 3,000 miles away to head the mosque. As its imam, Awlaki helped the hijackers, who showed up at his doorstep as if on cue. He tasked a handler to help them acquire apartments and IDs before they attacked the Pentagon.

Awlaki worked closely with the Saudi Embassy. He lectured at a Saudi Islamic think tank in Merrifield, Va., chaired by Bandar. Saudi travel itinerary documents I’ve obtained show he also served as the ­official imam on Saudi Embassy-sponsored trips to Mecca and tours of Saudi holy sites.

Most suspiciously, though, Awlaki fled the United States on a Saudi jet about a year after 9/11.

As I first reported in my book, “Infiltration,” quoting from classified US documents, the Saudi-sponsored cleric was briefly detained at JFK before being released into the custody of a “Saudi representative.” A federal warrant for Awlaki’s arrest had mysteriously been withdrawn the previous day. A US drone killed Awlaki in Yemen in 2011.

HERNDON, VA.: On the eve of the attacks, top Saudi government official Saleh Hussayen checked into the same Marriott Residence Inn near Dulles Airport as three of the Saudi hijackers who targeted the Pentagon. Hussayen had left a nearby hotel to move into the hijackers’ hotel. Did he meet with them? The FBI never found out. They let him go after he “feigned a seizure,” one agent recalled. (Hussayen’s name doesn’t appear in the separate 9/11 Commission Report, which clears the Saudis.)

SARASOTA, FLA.: 9/11 ringleader Mohamed Atta and other hijackers visited a home owned by Esam Ghazzawi, a Saudi adviser to the nephew of King Fahd. FBI agents investigating the connection in 2002 found that visitor logs for the gated community and photos of license tags matched vehicles driven by the hijackers. Just two weeks before the 9/11 attacks, the Saudi luxury home was abandoned. Three cars, including a new Chrysler PT Cruiser, were left in the driveway. Inside, opulent furniture was untouched.

Democrat Bob Graham, the former Florida senator who chaired the Joint Inquiry, has asked the FBI for the Sarasota case files, but can’t get a single, even heavily redacted, page released. He says it’s a “coverup.”

Is the federal government protecting the Saudis? Case agents tell me they were repeatedly called off pursuing 9/11 leads back to the Saudi Embassy, which had curious sway over White House and FBI responses to the attacks.

Just days after Bush met with the Saudi ambassador in the White House, the FBI evacuated from the United States dozens of Saudi officials, as well as Osama bin Laden family members. Bandar made the request for escorts directly to FBI headquarters on Sept. 13, 2001 — just hours after he met with the president. The two old family friends shared cigars on the Truman Balcony while discussing the attacks.

Bill Doyle, who lost his son in the World Trade Center attacks and heads the Coalition of 9/11 Families, calls the suppression of Saudi evidence a “coverup beyond belief.” Last week, he sent out an e-mail to relatives urging them to phone their representatives in Congress to support the resolution and read for themselves the censored 28 pages.

Astonishing as that sounds, few lawmakers in fact have bothered to read the classified section of arguably the most important investigation in US history.

Granted, it’s not easy to do. It took a monthlong letter-writing campaign by Jones and Lynch to convince the House intelligence panel to give them access to the material.

But it’s critical they take the time to read it and pressure the White House to let all Americans read it. This isn’t water under the bridge. The information is still relevant ­today. Pursuing leads further, getting to the bottom of the foreign support, could help head off another 9/11.

As the frustrated Joint Inquiry authors warned, in an overlooked addendum to their heavily redacted 2002 report, “State-sponsored terrorism substantially increases the likelihood of successful and more ­lethal attacks within the United States.”

Their findings must be released, even if they forever change US-Saudi relations. If an oil-rich foreign power was capable of orchestrating simultaneous bulls-eye hits on our centers of commerce and defense a dozen years ago, it may be able to pull off similarly devastating attacks today.

Members of Congress reluctant to read the full report ought to remember that the 9/11 assault missed its fourth target: them."

"Paul Sperry is a Hoover Institution media fellow and author of “Infiltration” and “Muslim Mafia.”"

====================

================== 
...............

The US political class has long enabled Islamic terrorism:

10/20/11, "The Lost Decade," [2001-2011] Angelo M. Codevilla, Claremont Institute

............ 
"Our ruling class justified its ever-larger role in America’s domestic life by redefining war as a never-ending struggle against unspecified enemies for abstract objectives, and by asserting expertise far above that of ordinary Americans. (parag. 9)...It failed to ask the classic headwaters question: 

what is the problem?...

That would have pointed to Middle East’s regimes, and to our ruling class’ relationship with them, as the problem’s ultimate source. The rulers of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the Palestinian Authority had run (and continue to run) educational and media systems that
demonize America.

Under all of them, the Muslim Brotherhood or the Wahhabi sect
spread that message
in religious terms to Muslims in the West as well as at home.

That message indicts America, among other things, 

for being weak.
........
And indeed, ever since the 1970s U.S. policy had responded to acts of war and terrorism from the Muslim world 

by absolving the regimes for their subjects’ actions.
................

For example, when Yasser Arafat's PLO murdered U.S. ambassador Cleo Noel, our government continued building friendly relations with Arafat, and romancing the Saudi regime that was financing him. Since then the U.S. government has given $2.5 billion to the PLO. Part of the reason was unwarranted hope, part was fear, and part was the fact that 
..............
many influential Americans were making money in the Arab world."... (subhead, 'Whatever it takes')
.  







UK PM David Cameron at UN says 'the biggest problem we have today is Islamist extremist violence'-Washington Times

.
9/29/15, "Cameron slams Obama: ‘Barack, biggest problem we have is Islamist extremism’," Washington Times, David Boyer

"British Prime Minister David Cameron challenged President Obama with some blunt talk on Islamist extremism Tuesday during a gathering of world leaders at the United Nations to develop an international strategy for defeating the Islamic State and other terrorist groups.

Well aware that Mr. Obama shuns the term “Islamist extremists, the Conservative British prime minister reacted strongly at the meeting when the president, who chaired the session, advised the assembled foreign leaders to avoid profiling Muslims because “violent extremism is not unique to any one faith.”

“Barack, you said it and you’re right — every religion has its extremists,” Mr. Cameron said. But we have to be frank that the biggest problem we have today is the Islamist extremist violence that has given birth to ISIL, to al-Shabab, to al-Nusra, al Qaeda and so many other groups.”...

Mr. Cameron on Tuesday said Western governments must “root out the extremist preachers that are poisoning the minds of young Muslims in our countries.”

“We need to make sure we don’t allow the incubation of an extremist worldview even before it gets to justifying violence,” Mr. Cameron said. We’ve got to get it out of our schools, get it out of our prisons, get it out of our universities. I believe in freedom of speech, but freedom to hate is not the same thing.”

Having recently embarked his government on a five-year plan to defeat home-grown extremism, Mr. Cameron went on as Mr. Obama listened: “The boy who straps a bomb to his chest and blows up an Iraqi town, the guy that stands in the desert with a knife, having just beheaded a British hostage or whoever, they don’t get there from a standing start. They have extremist views and an extremist mindset before they make that final decision to be an extremist terrorist.

“We have to stop this process at the start, not at the end,” Mr. Cameron said....

Before he left the meeting, Mr. Obama conceded that the British prime minister had made some good points.

“I thought David Cameron’s point [on radicalization] was excellent, that we are focused on violent extremism, but violent extremism is emerging out of an extremist worldview that has to be counteracted,” Mr. Obama said.

Without getting specific, the president said such an effort should result in “good governance and political settlements…so that we don’t have incubators for expressions of violent extremism.”

Seeking a ‘global movement’

A day after his tangle with Mr. Putin, Mr. Obama said he is leading a global movement to defeat the Islamic State and repeated that his strategy includes the removal of Mr. Assad, a Russian ally.

Defeating the Islamic State in Syria “requires, I believe, a new leader,” Mr. Obama said. “We are prepared to work with all countries, including Russia and Iran, to find a political mechanism.…It is not going to be enough to defeat [the Islamic State] on the battlefield.”

During their closed-door meeting Monday, Mr. Obama and Mr. Putin disagreed sharply on the best way to take on the Islamic State in Syria.

Russia is arming the Syrian military and sending troops, and Mr. Putin said the Assad government is the only effective force fighting the extremist group on the ground.

Mr. Obama told the U.N. that military efforts alone won’t defeat the Islamic State and said the international coalition must offer citizens in the region “a more attractive and compelling vision.”

“This is not going to be turned around overnight because it is not just a military campaign that we are involved in,” Mr. Obama said. 

“There are problems that have been built up over decades that are expressing themselves.…Even if we were to wipe out the entire cadre of [Islamic State] leadership, we would still have some of these forces at work.”

As Mr. Obama was speaking, his administration was announcing sanctions Tuesday against 25 people and five groups connected to the Islamic State, effectively acknowledging that the deadly jihadi movement had established more links across Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

The State Department designated as foreign terrorist organizations Islamic State regional spinoffs in Russia’s Caucasus region, Algeria, Indonesia and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, The Associated Press reported. Among the individuals designated as terrorists was Sally Jones, a British native and the widow of an operative killed recently in an American drone strike.

Most world leaders at the summit agreed that the solution to countering terrorist groups must include military, political, economic and media campaigns. But as Mr. Obama continued to call for Mr. Assad to give up power, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius warned against “fake magic solutions” to the crisis in Syria.

“We will have to find a political solution which will allow us to find the exit strategy and which will further allow a government which has some elements of the present government but other elements of the moderate opposition,” Mr. Fabius said. “There isn’t a magic formula here that’s going to allow us to avoid the long efforts necessary to fight Daesh."...King Abdullah II of Jordan said Muslim nations must lead the fight “to protect and show the true nature of our religion.”...

He also said world powers must work more effectively toward a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Tensions such as the clashes over the historic Al Aqsa mosque in East Jerusalem only contribute to the aims of extremist groups, he said.

“We cannot tackle this threat in a vacuum,” the king said. “A world that allows the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to move further away from a two-state solution is a world that fuels extremists’ recruitment. The world should not be silent to violations of the sanctity of Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, as this will only empower those who seek to wage a religious war.”"
.................
This article is based in part on wire service reports.
................................. 

Comment: David Cameron has proved over many years that he doesn't have the slightest intention of getting incipient violent extremismout of our schools...out of our prisons...out of our universities."


......... 

Trump at 30% among Republican voters in Reuters 9/29/15 five day rolling average national poll

.
9/29/15, "GOP Nomination: Possible Republican presidential candidates in 2016," Reuters, 5 day rolling averages

554 responses, Republican voters

Trump 30%
Carson 12.9%
Fiorina 10.8%
Bush 9.8%
Paul 5.6%
Rubio 5.3%
Huckabee 5.2%
Cruz 5.1%
Christie 3.2%
Jindal 1.5%
Kasich 1.4%
Santorum 1.4%
Pataki .3%
Graham .1%














Above, screen shot of Reuters 9/29/15, five day rolling average, Republican voters
......................... 

..................

Teamsters endorsed Ronald Reagan for President in 1980 and 1984. Teamster Union rank and file of 1.7 million voted for Reagan re-election, 53.7% to 43.6 for Mondale-NY Times, 8/31/1984

.
1984 NY Times article

8/31/1984, "Teamsters Vote to Endorse Reagan," NY Times, Gerald R. Boyd, Columbus, Ohio

"The International Brotherhood of Teamsters became the first major labor union to endorse President Reagan for re-election. 

The endorsement came after the results of a mail survey in which 25,841 of the union's 1.7 million members responded, the union said in a statement. Results of the survey showed 53.6 percent favored Mr. Reagan and 43.6 percent backed his Democratic opponent, Walter F. Mondale, said the teamsters' general president, Jackie Presser. 

Mr. Presser said the teamsters' 21- member board had voted unanimously to endorse Mr. Reagan. 

''It is with great, great, great pride that this international acknowledges the fact that our membership had an opportunity to vote and cast their ballots for whom they felt would be best to serve this nation,'' he said. 

Later, Mr. Presser praised Mr. Reagan by saying that he had found the President to be tough, firm and fair. The endorsement by the union, which supported Mr. Reagan in 1980, appeared to be anticipated by Reagan campaign officials....

Mr. Bush and others in the Reagan re-election campaign had been banking on the endorsement to counter organized labor's overwhelming support of Mr. Mondale. Both Mr. Bush and Mr. Presser sought to portray the endorsement as reflecting the desire of rank- and-file labor members as opposed to union bosses. 

''It means a lot to us that we are getting the endorsement of the only large union in the country that really has polled its entire membership,' Mr. Bush said, ''getting back a good percentage response.... 
........... 

Mr. Bush reflected the hope that the Reagan campaign would garner blue- collar support in this election. ''I think we are doing well among blue-collar voters because they understand the values we strive for,'' he said at an airport news conference. 

Later, he sounded a familiar campaign theme that the economy had improved under Mr. Reagan's leadership....

Mr. Bush dismissed any suggestion that the endorsement from the union, which has had public disagreements with the Reagan Administration over enforcment of Federal labor laws, had resulted from a deal. Mr. Presser has complained to the White House about the union's difficulties in getting favorable rulings from Mr. Reagan's appointees on the National Labor Relations Board and demanded the ousting of its chairman, Donald L. Dotson....

''If you are trying to imply that there is some deal, there is no deal,'' he said. ''There is no suggestion of a deal and no deal."... 
........... 
Mr. Bush was greeted by Mr. Presser as he arrived at a hotel here where he spoke and inspected a blue rig with gold lettering that included ''Teamsters: A Part of American Life.'' He then met briefly with board members before the address."

.......................
==================

Comment: The Bush crowd despised Reagan and fought viciously to prevent him from getting the Republican nomination in 1976 and 1980. Incredibly, Reagan turned around and named Bush his VP and cursed the country with the Bush crowd for decades.

...............................
.........................

Added: In 2015, Teamsters are waiting on Biden, may consider Trump:

9/29/15, "Whoa – Reports That Teamsters Union Considering Donald Trump Endorsement….," The Conservative Treehouse, sundance
 
"Candidate Donald Trump supports U.S. first pro-growth polices including: Keystone Pipeline, renegotiating NAFTA, withdrawal from the current Trans-Pacific Trade Deal, border security, immigration reform and renewed financial efforts targeted to boost the middle-class worker. These are very favorable policy positions for the Teamsters Union."...





............................

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Trump has double digit lead in Florida in latest Florida Chamber of Commerce poll, 9/16-9/20/15

.
9/29/15, "Florida Chamber poll of FL: Donald Trump 25%, Marco Rubio 14%, Jeb Bush 13%," StPetersblog.com, Mitch Perry

Trump 25
Rubio 14
Bush 13
Fiorina 11
Carson 9
Cruz 6


"Donald Trump continues to enjoy a double-digit lead over any other Republican in a new GOP presidential poll released on Tuesday by the Florida Chamber of Commerce....

Trump is at 25 percent, 11 points more than the second place candidate, Senator Marco Rubio, who has 14 percent. Jeb Bush is at 13 percent, Carly Fiorina at 11 percent, Ben Carson at 9 percent, and Ted Cruz at 6 percent....

The Florida Chamber political poll was conducted September 16-20, 2015, and the margin of error is +/-4 with a 95 percent confidence level."

......................

Comment: No link to actual poll, no mention how many Republicans polled, no mention of methodology, no mention of poll numbers for candidates below 6%.


..................


Trump expands lead to 26 in North Carolina Public Policy Poll, 9/24-9/27/15. Jeb Bush falls to 7th place: 'Not only are voters not supporting him (Bush), but they don't even like him.' PPP, 9/29/15

.
9/29/15, "Trump Steady in North Carolina; Biden Polls Well," Public Policy Polling, Tom Jensen

Trump 26
Carson 21
Fiorina 12
Rubio 10
Cruz 9
Huckabee 6
Bush 5
Kasich 4
Christie 2

Jindal 1
Santorum 1
Graham O
Pataki O
Paul O

Poll dates 9/24-9/27/15, 576 Republican primary voters, 4.1 margin of error. "PPP's newest North Carolina poll finds that Donald Trump is holding his ground- at least compared to where he was in the state six weeks ago....Trump's 26% is almost identical to his 24% standing from mid-August....

2 candidates have noticeably headed in the wrong direction in North Carolina over the last month. Jeb Bush has gone from being in third place at 13% to being in seventh place at 5%....Most concerning for Bush might be that not only are voters not supporting him,  but they don't even like him....In June Rand Paul was polling at 12% in North Carolina. By July, that was down to 7%. In August that was down to 3%. And now he has so little support that it rounds down to O....

Public Policy Polling surveyed 1,268 voters from September 24th to 27th, including 605 Democratic primary voters and 576 Republican primary voters. The margin of error for the overall survey is +/-2.8%, for the Democratic primary voters it’s +/-4.0%, and for the Republican primary voters it’s +/-4.1%. 80% of participants responded via the phone, while 20% of respondents who did not have landlines conducted the survey over the internet."...

"North Carolina was a Super Tuesday state, but recently moved their contest back by two weeks due to a GOP rule that prevented them from being a winner-take-all delegates state before March 15th. [In return for making rule changes to help Jeb Bush, NC Republican delegates have been increased from 12 to 72].

Now North Carolinians will vote on the mini-Super Tuesday alongside Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, and Florida."...
.......... 
...........
9/28/15, "[NC] State GOP switches to proportional representation; selects new executive director," greensboro.com, Danielle Battaglia  

...........................

9/29/15, "Trump Widens Lead In North Carolina – RNC Changes Rules To Benefit Jeb Bush – Battles Continue… The Conservative Treehouse, sundance 




.....................
 

GOP E busy making delegate rule changes to ensure only a lobbyist approved candidate can win: New rules in Colorado 'may hurt GOP contenders such as Donald Trump.' (Denver Post). Colorado and its 37 delegates are 'completely off the map in primary season'. No. Carolina rockets to 72 delegates from 12 as RNC thanks for changing rules to favor unpopular Establishment candidates

.
North Carolina and Colorado:

1. North Carolina-has 72 delegates instead of 12 thanks to adopting new rules:

9/28/15, "[NC] State GOP switches to proportional representation; selects new executive director," greensboro.com, Danielle Battaglia 

=================

9/28/15, "Latest North Carolina Poll Shows Rand Paul at ZERO – Donald Trump Expanding Lead With 26%…," The Conservative Treehouse, sundance 
................

"The actual poll will not be released until tomorrow.  However, Public Policy Polling (PPP) has released some twitter previews of what the poll contains. Now people will understand why the North Carolina Republican Establishment has changed the rules.


The GOPe have rewarded North Carolina for making the decision to use “proportional assignment” for their primary delegates.

The proportional distribution helps Team Jeb, because they are counting on winning delegates with low support numbers.  This was always the plan within the GOPe road map.

As you can see Donald Trump has now up-ended this GOPe scheme, and if party bosses don’t immediately change the rules, Trump will dominate the delegate support.

GREENSBOROThe state’s GOP leadership believes it has positioned North Carolina to be a focal point for Republican candidates seeking the 2016 presidential election.

The state Republican Party’s executive committee met at the GOP Headquarters in Greensboro Saturday and decided to divide its delegates for the Republican National Convention by the number of votes presidential candidates receive instead of using a winner-take-all system, often used in states that have primaries shortly before the convention.


A.J. Dauod, the Sixth District Republican chairman, said Sunday the Republican National Committee also gave the state party 72 delegates, instead of 12, because of the move. That makes North Carolina the state with the sixth highest number of delegates at the convention.  (read more)

Another Article HERE

[…] While the executive committee debated which method to use, the party’s central committee was meeting elsewhere in the building to select a new executive director for the state’s party. The committee selected Dallas Woodhouse, the former state director for Americans for Prosperity and current president and founder of Carolina Rising. Woodhouse, a native of Raleigh, succeeds Todd Poole, who resigned from the position Aug. 31. (more)

Here’s more about Dallas Woodhouse who is an establishment GOPe tool: [10/22/14 FEC letter to Carolina Rising Inc., attn Dallas Woodhouse]

North Carolina – Dallas Woodhouse, former head of AFP’s North Carolina chapter and the Pat McCrory / Thom Tillis-aligned Carolina Rising PAC, was officially hired as executive director of the North Carolina Republican Party. (Sources tell me it was made known to the state party leaders that GOP leaders in DC strongly favored the hiring of Woodhouse.) Carolina Rising took some heat earlier this year for allegedly being involved in push-polling and primary candidate recruitment against key GOP state senate leaders. (more)"

Added: "What’s important about that is we’ll get a lot of the presidential candidates visiting the state. And having the sixth highest (number of delegates), (candidates will) pump money into the state for advertisements, events and things of that nature,” Daoud said. “It’ll be a big boost to the state’s economy.”"...
...................

============================
================================
...................

2. Colorado-has 37 delegates. "It takes Colorado completely off the map" in the primary season, said Ryan Call, a former state GOP chairman." Under new rules, each delegate can remain uncommitted until GOP convention in July 2016. As of 8/25/15, Colorado was the first state to forfeit a role in the early nominating process, making it less likely Republican candidates will campaign in the state:

Colorado commenter re: recent changes in Colorado delegates to help GOP Establishment candidates:

Comment posted at The Conservative Treehouse:

"Prothonotary Warbler says:
My state, Colorado, officially forfeited its delegates recently. The official reason given for this move is that it was in protest of the RNC’s last minute rules changes, but I suspect the move was actually made in support of the GOPe.

Coloradans are pretty independent-minded, and so I think Trump was in good position to win here.

It saddened me, not just because it means my primary vote means nothing, but also because it exposed Steve House, who successfully ousted GOPe tool Ryan Call for chairmanship of the state GOP, as a GOPe tool himself."...

............................ 


""It takes Colorado completely off the map" in the primary season, said Ryan Call, a former state GOP chairman."

8/25/15, "Colorado Republicans cancel presidential vote at 2016 caucus. Move makes Colorado only state to opt out of early nominating process," Denver Post, by John Frank

"Colorado will not vote for a Republican candidate for president at its 2016 caucus after party leaders approved a little-noticed shift that may diminish the state's clout in the most open nomination contest in the modern era.
The GOP executive committee has voted to cancel the traditional presidential preference poll after the national party changed its rules to require a state's delegates to support the candidate that wins the caucus vote.

The move makes Colorado the only state so far to forfeit a role in the early nomination process, according to political experts, but other caucus states are still considering how to adapt to the new rule.


"It takes Colorado completely off the map" in the primary season, said Ryan Call, a former state GOP chairman.

Republicans still will hold precinct caucus meetings in early 2016 to begin the process of selecting delegates for the national convention--but the 37 delegates are not pledged to any specific candidate. 

The Democratic Party still will hold a presidential straw poll March 1--a Super Tuesday vote in a key swing state that is attracting attention from top-tier candidates.

For Republicans, no declared winner means the caucus will lack much of its hype. The presidential campaigns still may try to win delegate slots for their supporters, but experts say the move makes it less likely that candidates will visit Colorado to court voters.

The Colorado system often favors anti-establishment candidates who draw a dedicated following among activists--as evidenced by Rick Santorum's victory in 2012 caucus. So the party's move may hurt GOP contenders such as Donald Trump
, Ben Carson and Rand Paul, who would have received a boost if they won the state. State Republican Party Chairman Steve House said the party's 24-member executive committee made the unanimous decision Friday--six members were absent--to skip the preference poll. The move, he said, would give Colorado delegates the freedom to support any candidate eligible at the Cleveland convention in July. Republican National Committee officials confirmed that the change complies with party rules....

"It's an odd scenario," said Josh Putnam, a political science lecturer at the University of Georgia who runs a popular blog on the presidential nominating process. "It's not to say the campaigns won't be there....But you won't have a good reflection of support at the caucuses, much less Colorado Republicans as a whole."...

With the change, the only way Colorado Republican delegates would remain relevant is the remote chance that no candidate emerges as a clear winner in the primary contest. In this case, the state's unbound delegates would receive significant attention and may hold the key to victory in a floor fight.

"If there's the potential for a brokered convention in any way, the unaffiliated delegates become extremely important," said Joy Hoffman, the Arapahoe County GOP chairwoman who attended the party meeting. "If there is someone who becomes a front-runner, ... then nobody's important. So I think the view became that if we were not bound, it's not the worse thing that could happen."

..........................................

8/22/15, "Could Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders win Colorado caucuses? History says yes," Denver Post, by Thomas E. Cronin and Robert D. Loevy

Fixed. Colorado GOP caucuses were eliminated.




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