From Digby:

"If he becomes the presidential nominee at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland in July, he’ll also obtain something most real-estate developers will never receive: his very own top-secret briefings, delivered by the US intelligence community. And there appears to be little stopping him from repeating to his roaring crowds what he hears there.
[...]
That means, if Trump were the nominee, a man famously without filter will be privy to national secrets – and compartmentalizing his thoughts from his public utterances has never been one of his strengths. He has tweeted random, and sometimes untrue, items he read on the internet; he’s trumpeted false crime statistics; he’s even been fine with quoting Benito Mussolini. So far, he’s been able to get away with much of it by disavowing responsibility afterward."


http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/

http://www.vox.com/2015/12/14/10122890/donald-trump-health-records

The link is to his personal physician's letter attesting to his health.

The dr. sounds exactly like Trump - all hyperbole and no facts. . .

somehow I don't believe it.

Trump (and all other repub candidates) is promising exploding economic growth and millions of new jobs based on the republican economic fantasy. When that doesn't happen, what will the "Winner" be forced to do?

What all demagogues do: declare war. Nothing raises an economy as much as putting the nation on war standing.

This will be the only option that he will have, and he has been preparing the country for it, because unconsciously he knows that he will have to do it.

There has been a lot of articles about Scalia's "originalism" but not much about his religious basis for political "originalism".

However, in an article about his views on capital punishment “God’s Justice and Ours” http://www.firstthings.com/article/2002/05/gods-justice-and-ours, Scalia explains his basis for this belief.

Divine right never died.

Scalia explains that in past times the majority of people were told that rulers gained their authority directly from god. And this was backed by a pageant of ceremonies that connected the god and the ruler. However, with democracy, it is not so self-evident to people that the state recieves its authority from god (because politicians, elections and other malarkey.)
But the state’s authority in a democracy is derived from god just as it is in a monarchy.

Divine right means that the Constitution was divinely ordained at its inception to further the aims of god through civil authority.

He believed the Constitution is not a living document, just as the bible is not a living document, and therefore society’s views of judgments and punishments should not change, but must adhere to the god’s word as given in the bible.

God has given the government the authority to judge and punish in accordance with god’s laws.

Thus because God punished with death, the state can also punish with death.

Civil rights not mentioned in the bible are not legitimate.

For example, since there is no mention of a right of abortion in the bible it can not be a legitimate civil right.

In other words, Scalia did not believe in the separation of church and state . . . He should never have been a lawyer, much less a judge.

See
http://www.firstthings.com/article/2002/05/gods-justice-and-ours

This is an article Scalia wrote explaining why he had no problem with the death penalty, but the fun part is where he explains where democracy went wrong . . .

spoiler alert: it has to do with divine right of kings . . .

The Congress will be deadlocked, the SCOTUS will be deadlocked . . .

The election is upon them and they have NO winning candidate . . .

I think that POTUS will have some leverage to appoint a justice . . .

Question: why have such unprepared screw-ups like Paul, Walker and Cruz decided that they are capable of being President of the United States?

They have no idea of the character, maturity and sense of humor that lie behind Obama's ability to respond spontaneously to any situation and come out on top.

Paul and Cruz both have been groomed by their fathers to believe that they are "ordained" to win. How's that bubble working for them now?

they are thinking of running. What's up with that?

They issued a statement that was a further insult. Here is how it works:


Method: Did I just call you a derp?

Apologize for lies by repeating them as in:

"This applies especially to discussions of so-called 'no-go zones,' areas where non-Muslims allegedly aren't allowed in, and police supposedly won't go."

Good use of "so-called", "allegedly" and "supposedly". This implies that there is somewhere, somehow, there is some actual basis for the lies and the apology is just a minor correction that does not invalidate the basic lie.

"Some of the neighborhoods were highlighted incorrectly," she said. "We apologize for the error."

Good use of "some" to imply that there are correctly highlighted neighborhoods.


Method: Why do I have to waste my time apologizing?

Avoid any mention of the people directly targeted by lies:

"We deeply regret the errors, and apologize to any and all who may have taken offense, including the people of France and England."

Use of "may" to imply that only a few crackpots would take offense.


Method: This is just a one time slip-up.

No mention that this is just an ongoing policy of targeting Muslims and that world-wide outcry was the only reason that there was a non-apology issued.