5 Thoughts for August 10, 2015

1. Yesterday, football fans finally got their fix with the NFL preseason Hall of Fame Game (Minnesota looked sharp while Pittsburgh looked flat). And thus began the hand-wringing countdown to the personnel cuts to meet the eventual 53-person roster. I still believe that George Farmer is the best player that wasn't drafted, and if he doesn't keep a spot with the Cowboys, I continue to hold out hope that Seattle will pick him up. Speaking of Seattle, it was never right for Kam to hold out.
2. You know that algae bloom that was near Ross Island? I'm seeing algae growing along the edges of the Willamette, north of the Steel Bridge. It reminds me of oil, but green.
3. I'm not too impressed with Bernie Sanders' showing in Portland, and here's why: Portland already leans Socialist but is also heavily white -- the two demographics that are core to Sanders' support. If he garners large crowds in the South, then that would pique my interest. While he stands for a lot of things I stand for, when I look at him I see an old white guy who was baffled and befuddled by Black Lives Matter folks -- when heckled, he cuts short his speech; following the latest heckling in Seattle, he had a young black woman serve as his spokesperson in Portland. If you watch how Obama deals with interruptions from all sorts of groups, there's a stark difference.
4. How naive is a wide swath of the press is? A good number of them re-posted Scott Walker's supposed zinger -- "It’s sad to think right now, but probably the Russian and Chinese government know more about Hillary Clinton’s e-mail server than do the members of the United States Congress" -- not cognizant of the fact that Wikileaks has published just about everything the State Department has emailed -- except the personal emails from Hillary of course. Where did he get this stuff from? Probably from this retired DNI official who said it was likely that these countries hacked into her email. But this guy is full of shit -- if you listen carefully, he mentioned Hillary's Blackberry. What he didn't tell you is that up until 2013, BES / Blackberry devices were the only secure devices the DoD approved for use by gov't officials.
5. Speaking of shit, it's hitting the fan now. We've now got confirmation on Trump's post-debate numbers. Reuters-Ipsos reports that his post-debate numbers are the same as before: 24%, but Bush's numbers have dropped 5 points, down to 12% -- his closest rival. But wait, it gets worse. According to Morning Consult poll (via Huff Po Pollster tracking) Trump's up to 32% while Bush, again his closest rival, is down to 11%. What these two polls tell us, is that the gap is growing. And hey, don't forget who told you that TRUMP WON THE DEBATE. On substance, he offered nothing, but blame Fox News for this, as they chose to make this a reality-TV show in the first place, and Trump's got the reality-TV show thing down pat. Okay, nuff about politics...no more (unless something huge occurs) for the rest of the month.