TRUMP is seriously dangerous

[8bitagent]

Watching replay of tonight's RNC, where the whole audience is chanting "lock her up!" during Christie's speech against Hillary. He just called her the butcher of the middle east. Ben Carson later alludes to her
being Satanic and that God will turn his back on America if we don't elect Trump. Saw a montage of all the times Trump impassioned his audience to beat up protestors, and his shout out to "my African American" for savagely beating a young anti Trump protestor. Did even the 1968 election contain that sort of extreme anger? It's fascinating, yet jarring to see how smashed the overton window is on some semblance of structure.
If the crowd inside the RNC starts chanting in unisom death threats, I woudn't be surprised.

Trump's polls seem to be rising, at this point I'd be a bit surprised if Clinton wins in November, and as others mentioned above in this thread, I too can't see some secret conspiracy behind Trump at the moment. Which may be pretty scary

[backtoiam]

He is not alone. He is safely in the read and blue train.

[82_28]

This is in Denver. I do not think it is related to Trump, the one related to our time but it does serve as a "time machine" akin to Back to the Future 2 and a total motherfucking DUMP.



The story it comes from is here:

http://www.westword.com/news/denver-did ... za-8111405

[brekin]

I think CNN has primed from day one, and is priming, for a Trump victory.
Even his recent nomination win was something like, "Trump Wins!" in big bold letters.
When Hilary is mentioned it is usually in relation to something court related, as if she's a permanent defendant and not candidate. Sure, she's a crook (which high level viable candidate isn't?) but Trump's record of malfeasance, vileness and corruption is pretty bad as a businessman and husband, he just hasn't had governmental powers.

I think Trump has basically pulled a Berlusconi, taking over the airwaves, but without having to buy out the media channels because he simply makes them a shit ton of money. He's basically the shock radio presidential candidate that the media is willing to promote to line their pockets at the expense of destroying the country. And after over promoting him and freely guaranteeing his nomination and possible election they will sit back and shake their head at the stupidity and gullibility of the American people. It's like they have been saturating the airwaves and internet with "twinkies in bowls of pancake syrup" as the most viable breakfast food and then looking down on all those slobs who choose poor food choices each morning.

The Media's Not Being Honest About Its Trump Obsession

What's Popular Replaces What's Newsworthy
Blog ››› March 7, 2016 8:05 AM EST ››› ERIC BOEHLERT
http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/03/07 ... obs/209038

Right after the Feb. 25 Republican debate, front-runner Donald Trump was interviewed at length on the debate stage by CNN's Chris Cuomo. The move seemed a bit odd, since during the debate Trump dominated the speaking time compared to the other candidates. And now he was given even more time, immediately after the showdown, to address the CNN audience. (Sen. Ted Cruz was later interviewed, but Trump's immediate interview seemed like an attachment to the actual debate.)

But it didn't end there. Less than an hour later, Trump reappeared for another lengthy CNN one-on-one interview, this time with Anderson Cooper. Some viewers started to wonder if this was a debate broadcast or a paid commercial for the Republican. "Its [sic] official. CNN is your 24-hour Trump channel," tweeted Washington Post writer Joe Heim.

That Trump receives an unprecedented amount of media attention, and especially free television time, has been well documented in recent months. (Even Fox News is marveling at the "clear imbalance.") But to date, the press hasn't been especially honest about the wild disparity.

Still clinging to the traditional campaign model that suggests candidates receive the amount of coverage that mirrors their importance and their standing in the race, the press insists the never-ending gusher of Trump media attention simply reflects his political significance.

Or, that Trump just really likes to give interviews.

Here's how CNN president Jeff Zucker explained the channel's tidal wave of Trump attention:

"You can say what you want, but Donald Trump has been willing to subject himself to interviews," Mr. Zucker said. "And just because he's willing to do it and others weren't necessarily willing to do it, doesn't mean that he should be penalized because the others won't do it. And we shouldn't be penalized for not doing it because the others won't do it."

Trump is drowning in CNN attention because he says yes to interview requests? That doesn't add up. It doesn't explain, for instance, why CNN and the other cable news channels often cover Trump rallies live and interrupted. There's nothing especially newsworthy about most of the rah-rah events. So why block off hour after hour and allow the GOP frontrunner to speak uninterrupted while being showered in adulation from his fans?

Where's the "news" in that?

"I find the coverage of Trump, the over-coverage, the fawning coverage of Trump on TV, allowing him to call in, to be one of the most shocking things of the last 30 or 40 years," Walter Shapiro recently told Media Matters. A campaign veteran, Shapiro covered White House runs over several decades for outlets like The Washington Post and Newsweek.

We seem to have entered unchartered territory where campaign coverage, at least Trump's campaign coverage, is based on what's popular (or what makes money for news outlets), and not based on what's newsworthy. Casting aside decades of precedent, campaign journalism seems to have almost consciously shifted to a for-profit model.

"The news channels have always seen their revenue driven by major news events, many of which are unplanned, but elections are an exception because they are predictable," Derek Baine, a research director at SNL Kagan market analysis company, recently explained to U.S. News.

Writing at The Observer, Ryan Holiday suggested a new paradigm is in play this campaign season:

Politicians have always sought to manipulate the public. What's changed is that media is now not only a willing co-conspirator, they are often the driving force behind the manipulation. No longer seeing itself as responsible for reporting the truth, for getting the facts to the people, it has instead incentivized a scrum, a wild fight for attention in which anything that attracts an audience is fair game. And as long as theirs is the ring where the fight goes down, they'll happily sell tickets to as many as will come.

Is Trump's backstory of being a political novice, a bigot, and former reality TV star unusual for a presidential campaign? Yes it is. Is Hillary Clinton's backstory of trying to become the first female president in American history unusual? Yes it is.

So why does Trump land double and even triple the TV airtime that the historic Democratic front-runner gets? The press celebrates Trump as a political phenomenon even though Clinton has quietly accumulated a larger share of votes than him this primary season.

Last year, Trump received 327 minutes of network evening news coverage, compared to Clinton's 121 minutes, according to television news analyst Andrew Tyndall. Bloomberg News calculated that Trump's network TV tally was worth approximately $23 million in free television time. And that was just counting the evening newscasts.

In February, Trump tallied 69 minutes of evening network news time, compared to Clinton's 31, according to numbers Tyndall provided to Media Matters.

More data: In the last 60 days, Clinton has been mentioned approximately 45,000 on cable news, according to the GDELT Project using data from the Internet Archive's Television News Archive. Trump? 95,000 mentions.

Today's revolutionary campaign coverage has been sparked by the fact that Trump can create big bucks for news outlets via clicks and ratings. For instance, primary season debates in the past were never considered big moneymakers. They drew modest television audiences and were carried by news divisions as a way to forge their brand and build goodwill. But when the first Republican primary debate of the season last year drew an astounding 24 million viewers, everything changed.

CNN's "five highest-rated moments since January 2015 are all from presidential debates," The New York Times reported.

That kind of windfall has created the unsettling suspicion that Trump is awarded unending, and not-very-pointed, coverage in order to generate a news profit. It's created the lingering distrust that the campaign press no longer works as a check on abuses and excesses, but has become part of the formula that celebrates abuse and excess.

"Donald Trump may be good for ratings, but in its determination to court him, TV news has sacrificed its duty to interrogate the Republican candidate and his policies," wrote Lloyd Grove at the Daily Beast. "Wall-to-wall coverage doesn't necessarily mean sharp critical scrutiny."

And that's this campaign season's big question: Are journalists going easy on Trump because he represents the goose now laying the golden eggs?

Note that the cable news town hall forums "have also become a moneymaker for CNN," according to the Times. And yes, these were some of the questions put to Trump at CNN's last town hall:

"What do you eat when you roll up at a McDonald's, what does - what does Donald Trump order?"
"What's your favorite kind of music?"
"How many hours a night do you sleep?"
"What kind of a parent are you?"
"What is one thing you wish you didn't do?"

Watching a different, albeit equally soft, Trump town hall on MSNBC, Slate's Isaac Chotiner bemoaned how "It remains shocking that after months of bigoted comments and almost pathological dishonesty, Trump still lands these types of interviews."

Indeed, why would a candidate who spouts so many ugly, bigoted and juvenile comments often be subjected to such soft coverage? ("It's pathetic," says former CBS reporter Eric Engberg.) And is there a quid pro quo for access?

Remember that CBS executive chairman, president, and CEO Les Moonves recently insisted the Trump campaign "may not be good for America, but it's damn good for CBS," adding, "Donald's place in this election is a good thing."

[brekin]

This is in Denver. I do not think it is related to Trump, the one related to our time but it does serve as a "time machine" akin to Back to the Future 2 and a total motherfucking DUMP.



The story it comes from is here:

http://www.westword.com/news/denver-did ... za-8111405

I didn't want to broach the fringe conspiracy of Biff World and Trump that is a percolating out there, but you gave me the assist:

[brekin]

Donald Trump’s nomination in Cleveland will put a thriving country at risk of a great, self-inflicted wound
Jul 16th 2016 | From the print edition

FROM “Morning in America” to “Yes, we can”, presidential elections have long seemed like contests in optimism: the candidate with the most upbeat message usually wins. In 2016 that seems to have been turned on its head: America is shrouded in a most unAmerican pessimism. The gloom touches race relations, which—after the shooting of white police officers by a black sniper in Dallas, and Black Lives Matter protests against police violence, followed by arrests, in several cities—seem to get ever worse. It also hangs over the economy. Politicians of the left and right argue that American capitalism fails ordinary people because it has been rigged by a cabal of self-serving elitists. The mood is one of anger and frustration.

America has problems, but this picture is a caricature of a country that, on most measures, is more prosperous, more peaceful and less racist than ever before. The real threat is from the man who has done most to stoke national rage, and who will, in Cleveland, accept the Republican Party’s nomination to run for president. Win or lose in November, Donald Trump has the power to reshape America so that it becomes more like the dysfunctional and declining place he claims it to be.

The dissonance between gloomy rhetoric and recent performance is greatest on the economy. America’s recovery is now the fourth-longest on record, the stockmarket is at an all-time high, unemployment is below 5% and real median wages are at last starting to rise. There are genuine problems, particularly high inequality and the plight of low-skilled workers left behind by globalisation. But these have festered for years. They cannot explain the sudden fury in American politics.

On race relations there has, in fact, been huge progress. As recently as 1995, only half of Americans told pollsters that they approved of mixed-race marriages. Now the figure is nearly 90%. More than one in ten of all marriages are between people who belong to different ethnic groups. The movement of non-whites to the suburbs has thrown white, black, Hispanic and Asian-Americans together, and they get along just fine. Yet despite all this, many Americans are increasingly pessimistic about race. Since 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, the share of Americans who say relations between blacks and whites are good has fallen from 68% to 47%. The election of a black president, which seemed the ultimate proof of racial progress, was followed by a rising belief that race relations are actually getting worse.

What explains the divergence between America’s healthy vital signs and the perception, put with characteristic pithiness by Mr Trump, that the country is “going down fast”? Future historians will note that from about 2011 white and non-white babies were born in roughly equal numbers, with the ageing white population on course to become a minority around 2045. This was always going to be a jarring change for a country in which whites of European descent made up 80-90% of the population for about 200 years: from the presidency of George Washington to that of Ronald Reagan.

Demographic insecurity is reinforced by divisive partisan forces. The two parties have concluded that there is little overlap between the groups likely to vote for them, and that success therefore lies in making those on their own side as furious as possible, so that they turn out in higher numbers than the opposition. Add a candidate, Mr Trump, whose narcissistic bullying has prodded every sore point and amplified every angry sentiment, and you have a country that, despite its strengths, is at risk of a severe self-inflicted wound.

Reshaping politics
The damage would be greatest were he to win the presidency. His threats to tear up trade agreements and force American firms to bring jobs back home might prove empty. He might not be able to build his wall on the border with Mexico or deport the 11m foreigners currently in the United States who have no legal right to be there. But even if he failed to keep these campaign promises, he has, by making them, already damaged America’s reputation in the world. And breaking them would make his supporters angrier still.

The most worrying aspect of a Trump presidency, though, is that a person with his poor self-control and flawed temperament would have to make snap decisions on national security—with the world’s most powerful army, navy and air force at his command and nuclear-launch codes at his disposal.

Betting markets put the chance of a Trump victory at around three in ten—similar to the odds they gave for Britain voting to leave the European Union. Less obvious, but more likely, is the damage Mr Trump will do even if he loses. He has already broken the bounds of permissible political discourse with his remarks about Mexicans, Muslims, women, dictators and his political rivals. It may be impossible to put them back in place once he is gone. And history suggests that candidates who seize control of a party on a prospectus at odds with that party’s traditional values tend eventually to reshape it (see article). Barry Goldwater achieved this feat for the Republicans: though he lost 44 states in 1964, just a few elections later the party was running on his platform. George McGovern, who fared even worse than Goldwater, losing 49 states in 1972, remoulded the Democratic Party in a similar fashion.

One lesson of Mr Trump’s success to date is that the Republicans’ old combination of shrink-the-state flintiness and social conservatism is less popular with primary voters than Trumpism, a blend of populism and nativism delivered with a sure, 21st-century touch for reality television and social media. His nomination could prove a dead end for the Republican Party. Or it could point towards the party’s future.

When contemplating a protest vote in favour of tearing up the system, which is what Mr Trump’s candidacy has come to represent, some voters may ask themselves what they have to lose. (That, after all, is the logic that drove many Britons to vote for Brexit on June 23rd.) But America in 2016 is peaceful, prosperous and, despite recent news, more racially harmonious than at any point in its history. So the answer is: an awful lot.

http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/2 ... risk-great

[82_28]

Betting markets put the chance of a Trump victory at around three in ten—similar to the odds they gave for Britain voting to leave the European Union. Less obvious, but more likely, is the damage Mr Trump will do even if he loses. He has already broken the bounds of permissible political discourse with his remarks about Mexicans, Muslims, women, dictators and his political rivals. It may be impossible to put them back in place once he is gone. And history suggests that candidates who seize control of a party on a prospectus at odds with that party’s traditional values tend eventually to reshape it (see article). Barry Goldwater achieved this feat for the Republicans: though he lost 44 states in 1964, just a few elections later the party was running on his platform. George McGovern, who fared even worse than Goldwater, losing 49 states in 1972, remoulded the Democratic Party in a similar fashion.

Even the idiot who started this OP finally got something right. This will never go away.

[stoneonstone]

8bitagent

Trump's polls seem to be rising, at this point I'd be a bit surprised if Clinton wins in November, and as others mentioned above in this thread, I too can't see some secret conspiracy behind Trump at the moment. Which may be pretty scary

If our overlords don't believe they can steal the election for Clinton without straining credulity TOO much (can you say 'hanging chad'), expect a flurry of bullets in Trump from the Bush-y Knoll crowd before or very close upon the inauguration.

Hell, maybe even Thursday night, which may be why the clan is absent from Cleveland...

[Luther Blissett]

Is Trump Speechwriter Meredith McIver A Real Person?
by Tod Perry



2016 has provided Americans with a long, strange presidential campaign where, at this point, nothing is shocking. The most recent fiasco was the revelation that the speech made by then-presumptive nominee Donald Trump’s wife, Melania, at the Republican National Convention, was partially plagiarized from one made by Michelle Obama in 2008. Today, the Trump campaign sent out a statement saying that a long-time Trump employee, Meredith McIver, was responsible for the debacle. But many on the Internet have doubts whether McIver actually exists.

It seems wildly speculative that Trump would make up a fake person to take the fall, if he hadn’t invented fake people in the past. Back in the ‘80s and ‘90s, Trump would call news outlets acting as his own fake PR agent using the pseudonyms John Miller and John Barron. So who’s to say the campaign wouldn’t create a fall guy to protect Trump’s wife, Melania? The Internet thinks there’s a conspiracy happening right before our eyes.

The host of MSNBC’s AM Joy has her doubts.

Joy Reid ✔ @JoyAnnReid
Serious question: has any news outlet seen or interviewed Meredith McIver? Asking because of the GOP candidate's history of using aliases.
1:15 PM - 20 Jul 2016

McIver’s not on the payroll.

Matt @mattemeterio
Gonna need to see Meredith McIver's long form birth certificate.
Follow
Matt @mattemeterio
There's no #MeredithMcIver in Trump's June payroll reported to the FEC. pic.twitter.com/v3dgLCdoZl

Twitter user @SheWhoVotes notes that McIver’s Everipedia entry is only a day old.

Laura @SheWhoVotes
Almost everything in this Meredith McIver profile, including pics, were added 15 hours ago: https://www.everipedia.com/meredith-mciver/ …

McIver’s Facebook page is only a day old as well and she has no friends. One would hope that as a “long-time employee” she would have made at least a few friends in the Trump organization.

Cheryl G @steakhousegirl
Does Meredith McIver (Melania speechwriter) exist? She has a FB page with no friends that was created today.
2:23 PM - 20 Jul 2016

Molly Knight ✔ @molly_knight
News outlets are citing Meredith McIver's Speakerpedia page as proof she exists. I'm going to need to see her long form birth certificate.
3:35 PM - 20 Jul 2016

McIver has a page at Speakerpedia, but strangely there are only two reviews, both of which came over the past two days. And the page has yet to be claimed by Ms. McIver. McIver does have an author page on Amazon.com, but there’s no photo, or any writing credits outside of work done for Trump.

Her Twitter identity is a little shaky as well.

Jon Danziger @jondanziger
The photo on Meredith McIver's Twitter page is of a Pilates instructor in Florida. http://www.corecontour.com/featured-coa ... a-bellora/ … #McIver pic.twitter.com/3apSvLbAeV
Follow
Jon Danziger @jondanziger
Oh, look, it's Manhattanhenge now, everything's fine, this is going GREAT. #MeredithMcIver pic.twitter.com/h4mQ3mgDO4

And some people on Twitter are just having fun with the conspiracy.

Steve Kazee ✔ @SteveKazee
Dear universe...I don't ask for much. Please, please, please let #MeredithMcIver be made up. Please. I beg you. That is all. Thank you.
5:59 PM - 20 Jul 2016

Marisa Williams @marisa
.@realDonaldTrump show us the #MeredithMcIver birth certificate. Just want to confirm she's not Melania's IMAGINARY friend, ya know.
3:54 PM - 20 Jul 2016

Martinique_Castal @mahr_tn_eek
I found a photo of Meredith McIver at her home!!!! #MeredithMcIver https://www.instagram.com/p/BIF9tobjHwy/
2:22 PM - 20 Jul 2016

Here’s the note that McIver allegedly wrote taking responsibility for the plagiarism fiasco.



The truth is out there…

[RocketMan]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/07/2 ... l=facebook

During a 45-minute conversation, he explicitly raised new questions about his commitment to automatically defend NATO allies if they are attacked, saying he would first look at their contributions to the alliance. Mr. Trump re-emphasized the hard-line nationalist approach that has marked his improbable candidacy, describing how he would force allies to shoulder defense costs that the United States has borne for decades, cancel longstanding treaties he views as unfavorable, and redefine what it means to be a partner of the United States.

Giving a preview of his address to the convention on Thursday night, he said that he would press the theme of “America First,” his rallying cry for the past four months, and that he was prepared to scrap the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada if he could not negotiate radically better terms.

He even called into question whether, as president, he would automatically extend the security guarantees that give the 28 members of NATO the assurance that the full force of the United States military has their back.

For example, asked about Russia’s threatening activities that have unnerved the small Baltic States that are the most recent entrants into NATO, Mr. Trump said that if Russia attacked them, he would decide whether to come to their aid only after reviewing whether those nations “have fulfilled their obligations to us.”

[seemslikeadream]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDMxCgQFl1s

[seemslikeadream]

Jill Harth, woman who sued Trump over alleged sexual assault, breaks silence
Harth stands by claims of incident described in 1997 lawsuit as ‘attempted rape’ and wants apology from Donald Trump: ‘Don’t call me a liar’

Woman who sued Trump over alleged sexual assault speaks out
Lucia Graves in New York
@lucia_graves
Wednesday 20 July 2016 14.19 EDT Last modified on Thursday 21 July 2016 10.53 EDT

A woman at the centre of sexual assault allegations against Donald Trump has spoken for the first time in detail about her personal experience with the billionaire tycoon who this week became the Republican nominee for president.

Jill Harth, a makeup artist, has stayed quiet for almost 20 years about the way Trump pursued her, and – according to a lawsuit she instigated – cornered her and groped her in his daughter’s bedroom.

After Trump mounted his campaign for the White House, details emerged of the 1997 complaint, in which Harth accused him of “attempted ‘rape’”.

She said she was quickly inundated with interview requests from major US television networks, but resolved not to speak about the events – until Trump publicly said in May that her claims were “meritless” and his daughter Ivanka gave an interview in which she said her father was “not a groper”.

Harth, who feels she has been publicly branded a liar and believes her business has suffered because of her association with the allegations, decided to speak out about her experience with Trump because she wants an apology.

Jill Harth's allegations against Trump paint a picture of an entitled narcissist
Jessica Valenti
Jessica Valenti Read more
In an hour-long interview at the Guardian’s New York office on Tuesday, Harth said she stands by her charges against Trump, which run from low-grade sexual harassment to an episode her lawyers described in the lawsuit as “attempted ‘rape’”.

She first met Trump in December 1992 at his offices in Trump Tower, where she and her then romantic partner, George Houraney, were making a business presentation. The couple wanted to recruit Trump to back their American Dream festival, in which Harth oversaw a pin-up competition known as American Dream Calendar Girls. Harth described that meeting as “the highlight of our career”.

But in other ways, it was something of a lowlight: Trump took an interest in Harth immediately and began subjecting her to a steady string of unwanted sexual advances, detailed by Harth in her complaint.

There was the initial leering in that first December meeting in Trump Tower, and the inappropriate questions after her relationship status. It continued the next night over dinner at the Plaza Hotel’s Oak Room, where at a dinner with beauty pageant contestants she alleges he groped her under the table.

It culminated in January 1993, when Harth and Houraney were visiting his Florida mansion, Mar-a-Lago, to finalize and then celebrate the beauty pageant deal with a party.

After business concluded, Harth and Houraney were on tour of Mar-a-Lago along with a group of young pageant contestants – Trump wanted to “see the quality of the girls he was sponsoring”, Harth recalled – when he pulled her aside into one of the children’s bedrooms.

“He pushed me up against the wall, and had his hands all over me and tried to get up my dress again,” Harth said, “and I had to physically say: ‘What are you doing? Stop it.’ It was a shocking thing to have him do this because he knew I was with George, he knew they were in the next room. And how could he be doing this when I’m there for business?”

Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago in 1992
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Donald Trump in 1992 at his Mar-a-Lago estate, where Harth says ‘he pushed me up against the wall, and had his hands all over me and tried to get up my dress’. Photograph: Alamy
Speaking as Republicans gathered in Cleveland to formally declare Trump as the party’s candidate in the November general election, Harth said she had been very reluctant to talk after the sexual assault allegations resurfaced, “because honestly, it was painful for me to have to do it again. It was stressful, it gave me anxiety, it definitely wounded my marriage – it wasn’t the death knell, but it wounded it, it was stressful having to handle this.”


Who supports Donald Trump? The new Republican center of gravity
Read more
She recalled how Trump – who had just gone through a divorce from his first wife, Ivana, and was in a relationship with Marla Maples, who would become his second wife – pursued her and urged her to leave Houraney.

“Trump did everything in his power to get me to leave him. He constantly called me and said: ‘I love you, baby, I’m going to be the best lover you ever had. What are you doing with that loser, you need to be with me, you need to step it up to the big leagues.’

“He was constantly working on me during that time and that took a toll on me. But I moved on. I’m a forgiving type person, OK? I’m a Christian, I moved on.”

‘They tried to get me to say it never happened’
Trump’s decision to run for president brought the question to the fore for her once more. And initially, she said she was inclined to let bygones be bygones.

She concedes she even found herself getting excited at the thought that someone she knew so well was running for president.

A recent Trump rally she attended seemed to confirm her decision to lie low. “‘Don’t worry about it,’ I said, ‘I’m not going to say anything bad, we’ve moved on, we’re friendly,’” Harth recalled in her interview with the Guardian.

When Trump thanked her and gave her a hug, she thought he wouldn’t say anything either.

The interaction, Harth said, reaffirmed her decision to stay quiet. That is, until she saw Trump dismiss media reports referencing her case as “meritless”, or worse.

After the New York Times ran a story in May this year about Trump’s history with women, including an account of Harth’s story, Trump’s campaign even reached out to her to pressure her to take back her account, she told the Guardian on Tuesday.

“His office – and I have it on my voicemails that he called, that they called – they asked me to recant everything when the New York Times article came out. They were trying to get me to say it never happened and I made it up. And I said I’m not doing that,” she recalled. Trump’s office denied this.

She was further upset by an interview Trump’s daughter Ivanka gave in the wake of the New York Times article saying her dad is “not a groper”.

Nobody was defending me, that's why I'm talking … I went through hell and I still have to relive this again
Jill Harth
“I understand that the girl wanted to defend her dad, being it’s her dad,” she said, “but what did she know? She was 10 years old! She was 10 years old at the time. She didn’t know what her father was about, what he was doing, how he was acting.”

Such statements felt defamatory to Harth, adding insult to injury. That’s when she hired attorney Lisa Bloom to demand that Trump retract his statements that are, as Bloom put it, “effectively calling her a liar”.

“Jill is very clear that she is not a liar,” Bloom said. “And her reputation is important to her. And her living a life free of this kind of stress is important to her. So we’re calling on not only Mr Trump, Ivanka Trump, too.”

The renewed controversy comes as Trump prepares to give his keynote speech in Cleveland on Thursday. It also comes as Roger Ailes, the chairman and CEO of Trump-friendly Fox News, is in the process of being ousted following a sexual harassment suit filed by a former anchor.


Emails written to the Trump campaign by Jill Harth, provided by his office in response to her allegations.
When Trump’s office was asked to respond to Harth’s allegations, they highlighted her inconsistency about her views on Trump, forwarding emails from 2015 and as recently as January 2016 in which she expressed friendly feelings about Trump and even asked about a job helping to do his campaign trail makeup.

As Harth wrote in an August 2015 email forwarded by Trump’s campaign: “I also would like to show my support for Donald and his campaign. I am offering my services to do his grooming and getting him perfectly camera ready for photos and Hi-Definition TV. He knows better than anybody how important image is.”

In another email from October 2015, she praised Trump for “doing a tremendous job of shaking things up in the United States” and added: “I am definitely Team Trump!”

Harth said those emails were written months before Trump called her integrity into question. She also defended her action, as a businesswoman who has never been too proud to look for help where she needs it, even if it smacks of opportunism.

Meanwhile the fact that Trump has an army of staffers and family defending him is part of what inspired her to speak out, she said.

“Nobody was defending me, that’s why I’m talking,” Harth said. “You can believe it or not, but I went through hell and I still have to relive this again. And I just, I’m horrified that I have to think about this again.”

Michael Cohen, executive vice-president and special counsel to Donald Trump, responded by email to a Guardian request for comment, saying: “It is disheartening that one has to dignify a response to the below absurd query. Mr Trump denies each and every statement made by Ms Harth as these 24-year-old allegations lack any merit or veracity.

“Hope [Mr Trump’s spokeswoman Hope Hicks] will forward to you under separate e-mail, a series of e-mails documenting Ms Harth’s support of Mr Trump, the race for the White House as well as seeking a job opportunity with the campaign.”

In an earlier phone call, Cohen said Harth had “massive credibility issues”.

Harth said of her wish for an apology from Trump: ‘I don’t fully expect one.’

Harth said of her wish for an apology from Trump: ‘I don’t fully expect one.’ Photograph: Guardian
Speaking in Cleveland at the Republican national convention on Wednesday, Roger Stone, a veteran strategist and longtime Trump adviser, dismissed the allegations, saying: “I have an excellent bullshit detector.”

Stone added: “A verbal agreement is entirely unprovable … So it’s more he said, she said. Sure sounds like bullshit to me.”

Such responses from the Trump camp aren’t new and neither is the lawsuit, which Harth brought forward in 1997. She dropped it weeks later after Trump settled an outstanding business lawsuit from her partner Houraney claiming he broke contract by backing out of the American Dream festival. (Houraney sued for $5m but settled with Trump for a smaller, undisclosed amount.)

Houraney met Harth when she was still in high school and though he didn’t witness any of the alleged incidents with Trump, aside from that first meeting in Trump Tower, Houraney has never doubted her. “I know they’re all true,” he said of the allegations. “I knew her way too long to think she could make up stuff like that, It wasn’t in her. She wasn’t capable of making up the things she said in that thing.”

Harth told the Guardian she expected very little from Trump. “I’m not going to get an apology from him. That would be nice, but he – I don’t fully expect one. But he really should have been taught, if you don’t have anything nice to say don’t say anything, OK? Don’t call me a liar.

“He didn’t have to say anything. For once, he should have closed his mouth. He didn’t have to comment. We were on great – not great, I’ll take that back – we were on good terms, friendly terms. He didn’t – he started this. What is happening now is of his own making, OK? I was quiet.”

[82_28]

Last night, billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks et al, Mark Cuban, was asked on the Colbert show if he thought Trump was worth 10 billion. He responded something like "yeah if I loaned him 9.5 billion".

[Pele'sDaughter]

Last night, billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks et al, Mark Cuban, was asked on the Colbert show if he thought Trump was worth 10 billion. He responded something like "yeah if I loaned him 9.5 billion".

[Elihu]

Less obvious, but more likely, is the damage Mr Trump will do even if he loses. He has already broken the bounds of permissible political discourse with his remarks about Mexicans, Muslims, women, dictators and his political rivals. It may be impossible to put them back in place once he is gone.

bound freedom i like that