More Thoughts on the Trump Tape

Yesterday's news about the Trump tape with Billy Bush from 11 years ago hit me like a body blow because I immediately sensed that this was the end of any hopes of stopping Hillary Clinton. I still pretty much feel that way, but I would like to try and put this in a little perspective as we await Sunday's debate.

I cannot defend Trump in any way for what he said. I am no choir boy myself, but I never conducted myself with women in the manner Trump described nor did I talk out of school about them like that. This is not what we want in the White House especially in such serious times. Yet, that is exactly what we have had in the White House. We had it with John F Kennedy, we had it with Lyndon Johnson, and more to the point, we had it with Hillary Clinton's own husband, Bill, who by most accounts is still playing around as we speak. Even more to the point, when Bill was president, Hillary was dismissing all the talk as a "vast right-wing conspiracy". She sent out her minions to trash the myriad of women who had gone public and claimed to have had affairs with her husband or been groped or even raped by her husband. Thus, Hillary's tweet of yesterday, "This is horrific. We cannot allow this man in the White House," rings very hollow. What we can say about Donald Trump is that he is very much like Bill Clinton when it comes to women.

In addition, while Paul Ryan cancels a campaign appearance with Trump and Republicans like Mike Lee and Jason Chaffetz withdraw their support, how many Democrats can you name who have called for Hillary Clinton to withdraw given the constant drumbeat of released emails and revelations about her violations of the law? None.

Indeed, lost among the mainstream media feeding frenzy yesterday over Trump are the Wikileaks release of Clinton hatchet man John Podesta's hacked emails in which he is going over passages from Hillary's Wall Street speeches (the ones she won't release) that talk about her support for open trade and open borders as well as her statements to her audiences that it is Wall Street itself that is able to solve our economic problems-all quite in variance with her anti-Wall Street campaign speeches to her supporters. None of that matters. And how about the passage where she tells them that Bernie Sanders' supporters are a "bucket of losers"?

Indeed, none of it matters to Hillary supporters who are too young to remember the Clinton excesses and sex scandals during Bill's time in the White House-or they just don't care. It is old news. How many Sanders supporters will jump off the Hillary bandwagon over that "loser" statement remains to be seen, but I don't expect it to be significant.

What a charmed life Mrs Clinton leads. About 80% of the people know she is a scoundrel, but this year she is matched against Donald Trump.

I am inclined, perhaps, naively, to think that Trump should either withdraw from the race or the RNC should invoke the articles that allow them to replace the nominee-in favor of Mike Pence, who would give the country a real choice of decency and competency over Trump and Clinton. Of course, the hard core Trump supporters will bolt, and that will insure a Clinton victory anyway. At least the Republican party could demonstrate to the country that it stands for something-quite opposite the Democrats.

I do not see any good outcome.