So the Republican Party Finally Gets Trump?

So all of a sudden his party gets it? When Trump was rushing to personally insult Hillary Clinton — whether it was her “look” or her stamina or what goes on in her marriage and why she is to blame — that was fine. Republicans were lining up for an “Attaboy.”

It took the mental image of their own child and/or spouse looking up to, or perhaps being in a room alone with, a man who casually chats about groping women against their will — labeled sexual assault in criminal codes — before GOP leaders could see the light and decide that harsh criticism, not lukewarm justification, was warranted?

Faith Journeys Led Kaine and Pence in Different Directions –

When one reviews the charges and countercharges that have characterized the 2016 presidential election campaign, one topic that’s been left on the fringes is faith. That changed on Tuesday night as two candidates whose faith is central to their political philosophies took to the debate stage.

It’s an argument, at its simplest, on the meaning of justice and mercy, Old Testament and New Testament, and how to live one’s personal faith.

 

Can Trump Repair His Disconnect With Minorities and Women?

Donald Trump went into his first one-on-one presidential debate with his base solidly behind him. But one would assume he also wanted to continue his outreach to minority and female voters. He does, after all, need to win the approval of half of the population, one that is rapidly becoming more diverse. He must have had some plan to persuade those looking askance at the full-throated endorsement from folks such as David Duke or his informal confidante Roger Ailes, chased out of Fox News because of sexual harassment charges.

With Hillary Clinton across the stage from him, any plan he might have had did not work out.

 

Trump’s ‘Charm Offensive’ Continues, as Daughter-In-Law Opens North Carolina Offices

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Lara Trump, the candidate’s daughter-in-law, is just a “Carolina girl,” from Wilmington, she wants you to know, with “good Southern values.” And Donald Trump, “the man I know him to be,” is “a very humble, soft-spoken, funny guy,” with a weakness for McDonald’s.

That was the message of the wife of Eric Trump at a Wednesday appearance opening the first North Carolina offices for the GOP presidential candidate in the important swing state.

 

Did Hillary Clinton Ace Her ‘Job Interview’ in North Carolina?

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — It’s obvious why North Carolina is tantalizing for both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton and why the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates each made an appearance in the battleground state this week. Trump was in Greenville on Tuesday (and will be in Asheville on Monday), and on Thursday afternoon, Clinton attended a rally at Johnson C. Smith University, a historically black university in Charlotte, for what its president Dr. Ronald L. Carter called a “high level job interview.”

African-Americans Hear Trump Loud and Clear

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — It’s so refreshing to know that Donald Trump cares about me. I was in that Charlotte crowd when he made one of his first outreach efforts to African-Americans. Because the supportive Trump fans gathered in the portioned-off section of the convention center included few actual African-Americans, he could very well have been talking just to me when he said Democrats and Hillary Clinton have totally taken African-American votes for granted. “What do you have to lose by trying something new?” he asked.

That appearance set the tone and backdrop for the Republican presidential nominee’s practice of talking about African-Americans to predominantly white audiences. Though I was joined by members of a local black church that has endorsed Trump, and we were all carefully watched by a diverse group of unsmiling security personnel whose glances I tried to avoid so I would not meet the same fate as an Indian-American Trump supporter tossed out of a rally when he was profiled as a potential troublemaker.

 

Michelle Obama: Star of the RNC and, Perhaps, the DNC

PHILADELPHIA — When you want to put on a memorable show, you cast a superstar to get it started. Is anyone surprised to see a Michelle Obama speech scheduled for Monday, Day One of the Democratic National Convention?

Without even attending the convention the Republicans just wrapped up in Cleveland, the first lady found a way to dominate in the most visible way possible; her words anchored the prime time speech of Melania Trump. Like many women of all political persuasions I’ve interviewed through two terms of President Barack Obama and his family in the White House, the wife of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump found inspiration and something relatable in Michelle Obam

 

Hillary Clinton’s ‘Law and Order’ Problem

PHILADELPHIA – In politics, nuance is often a negative, particularly in the middle of a cutthroat presidential campaign. So while Hillary Clinton’s position — supporting and sympathizing with both police officers and the mothers of African Americans killed in encounters with police — is a reasonable one, it doesn’t quite fit on a bumper sticker. It’s about criminal justice and race and trust and perceptions it would take a pile of history books to start to untangle.

On the other hand, “law and order,” the mantra often repeated by GOP nominee Donald Trump in Cleveland at the Republican convention, fits just fine.

 

Melania and Michelle: Sisters in the American Dream

It is embarrassing that portions of Melania Trump’s opening night speech repeated not only the themes but the very words spoken by Michelle Obama in 2008 at the Democratic National Convention — not, however, for the reason most would think. (Though you should expect at least one sloppy speechwriter’s head to roll.) No, the real reason the campaign’s public gaffe stings is that it contradicts the presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump’s message that America is a “divided crime scene .”

If the African-American first lady whose journey took her from the South Side of Chicago to Princeton to Harvard Law and the White House and the Slovenian-American immigrant , model/designer and perhaps future first lady have so much in common, that means the Trump candidacy has little reason to exist. We don’t need a “law and order” candidate to get us in shape. Maybe we aren’t at each other’s throats after all.

 

Why Obama’s Vision of ‘One American Family’ Matters

President Obama rose to the occasion. In a Dallas speech that started with a joke about the first lady’s love of Stevie Wonder and quickly grew solemn, the president included everyone, and asked something of everyone, as well. He acknowledged his own humanity and imperfections and asked those on all sides to do the same.

And he reminded those listening, at least those with the “new heart” and “new spirit” the Lord promised Ezekiel, that he is a leader who cherishes the promise of America. For someone whose faith has been questioned, the president always reaches deep into Scripture for comforting messages.