We begin today’s roundup with The New York Times editorial board which calls out Donald Trump for his government bailout:
If Mr. Trump wanted to defend his tax practices, he could simply release his returns. But it seems that even for Mr. Trump, paying no taxes would be a political embarrassment. It would show that the government bailed him out of his catastrophically bad business decisions. Legal or not, this is the kind of handout no ordinary citizen could hope to get no matter how dire the circumstance. [...]
Every new revelation about Mr. Trump’s business career shows that he’s built his millionaire’s lifestyle on debt, tax avoidance and other people’s money. From bankrupt casinos to a so-called university, he milked them for all he could and left workers, students and taxpayers holding the bag.
Eugene Robinson:
Pollsters try to account for any enthusiasm gap when they screen for “likely” voters. But really, there should be no gap at all.
The coalition of women, young people, African Americans, Hispanics and Asian Americans that twice elected President Obama has even more reason to come out in force to elect Clinton. Anyone who believes that Trump is essentially harmless, or that he is so ridiculous a figure that inevitably he will lose, is whistling past the graveyard.
The Clinton campaign is setting in motion a get-out-the-vote campaign that represents the state of the art. Ultimately, however, this is on you. There is one sure way to avoid the nastiest of surprises on Nov. 8: Vote, or you’ll have no right to complain.
S.V. Date at The Huffington Post dismantles Trump’s claims that he was a successful businessmen who built a business out of nothing:
Trump took over running that company in 1974, at age 28, when it was worth approximately $200 million, according to a contemporaneous New York Times article. The vast majority of Trump’s wealth today flows from that initial nest egg, which he and his four siblings eventually inherited when their father died in 1999.
What’s more, given the size of that original fortune, Trump has actually underperformed both the stock market as well as the real estate market.
Had Trump taken his share of what would become his father’s inheritance and put it into an index fund matching the S&P 500 back in 1974, it would have been worth $3 billion today. Had he put the $200 million that Fortune magazine determined he was worth in 1982 into that same index fund, he would be worth more than $8 billion today.
Peter Gelzinis at The Boston Herald:
Donald Trump’s only asset is his malignant ego. The rest is just a sham, propped up by tax lawyers and reality television. He stands naked before us.
For some strange reason I feel a certain sadness (or is it pity?) for the legions of Trump ditto-heads who can no longer cling to the idea that their candidate for president is this “amazing, successful businessman” who will make America great again because “I know how to make great deals.”
The one and only “great deal” The Donald can claim is how he’s managed to lose a ton of money in Atlantic City casinos, along with a number of other stupid, ego-driven ventures, and still work those “rigged tax laws” to keep himself afloat.
Catherine Rampell explains how the flaws in Trump’s tax defense:
Of course, even if you buy the argument that Trump had a “fiduciary duty” to investors to minimize the tax obligations of his corporations, partnerships and LLCs, the leaked documents in question were portions of Trump’s personal income tax returns, not any corporate or partnership income tax returns. So there were no investors to let down.
Whose wrathful litigiousness, then, compelled Trump to stiff the tax man? Who could have possibly sued Trump for wantonly dispensing too much of his own money to the feds?
Why, it must’ve been Trump himself, the only entity whom Trump has ever felt any “fiduciary duty” to enrich.
Kyle Cheney and Katie Glueck on Trump’s risky early voting strategy:
Trump’s haphazard campaign, ignoring standard practice, relies largely on mining his boisterous, battleground state rallies to amass his early-vote totals. Clinton’s effort is more methodical and traditional, hinging on an extensive field organization to drive its advance voting strategy. As Trump allies see it, it’s a test of the real estate mogul’s magnetism versus Clinton’s technical mastery. [...]
In Iowa, where absentee votes began trickling in late last month and in-person voting began last week, Republicans are crowing about a sharp drop in the number of absentee ballot requests by Democrats — from 155,000 on Oct. 3, 2012 to about 89,000 this year.
Burgess Everett at POLITICO previews tonight’s VP debate:
The Virginia senator’s job is to make the Indiana governor uncomfortable defending Trump, whether it’s the business mogul’s $900 million reported loss in 1995, his feud with a former beauty queen or his proposal to build a wall on the United States’ southern border. Trump is wounded, Democrats say, and the lone vice-presidential debate, to be held in this rural town, is an opportunity for Kaine to go for the jugular.
Here’s Alexander Burns on tonight’s debate:
Mr. Pence can expect to be challenged on Mr. Trump’s denigrating comments about Alicia Machado, a former Miss Universe; on Mr. Trump’s attacks on Mrs. Clinton’s marriage; and on the prospect that Mr. Trump may have gone nearly two decades without paying federal income taxes. And those are just the hits from last week.
Up to this point, Mr. Pence has proved adept at deflecting questions about Mr. Trump’s incendiary comments, redirecting interviews to rote talking points about shaking up Washington. But a debate is an entirely different format; and as Senator Marco Rubio of Florida found, using the same dodge over and over again can have catastrophic consequences.
And, on a final note, here’s Margaret Hartmann’s preview:
While social issues have not played a large issue in the campaign, Kaine will likely be asked about one significant difference with his running mate. While Clinton is very pro-choice, Kaine, who is Catholic, is personally against abortion. He opposes creating new restrictions on abortion access, but unlike Clinton, he is in favor of keeping the Hyde Amendment, which prevents federal money from funding abortions. [...]
The vice presidential debate comes after one of Trump’s worst weeks on the campaign trail, and Pence will likely try to downplay the recent controversies and play up the distrust voters have for Clinton. Trump tends to derail Pence’s efforts to help, so the real test may be whether the candidate can get through even a debate he’s not participating in without generating a new controversy.