MORNING MESSAGE
Claiming
to have taken New York City “from the crime capital of America to the safest
large city in America,” Giuliani declared, “What I did for New York, Donald
Trump will do for America.” What Giuliani did was appoint William Bratton as
chief of police, who then joined Giuliani in putting the “broken windows” theory
of policing into practice. “Broken windows” became the basis for the NYPD’s
“stop and frisk” policy, which disproportionately targeted blacks and Latinos,
with minimal effect on crime.
GOP CONVENTION OPENS WITH a SCANDAL
Politico
deems first day of Republican convention “disastrous”: “[Melania Trump’s]
speech bore a striking resemblance to a Michelle Obama speech from 2008 … NBC
wrapped up its hour … with a shot of a shockingly empty arena … there were even
fewer signs of outreach across the aisle or to independents. For most of the
night, the convention lineup felt and sounded more like a tea party rally on the
statehouse steps…”
Gov.
Chris Christie defends plagiarized speech on NBC’s Today: “…93 percent of
the speech is completely different … they expressed some common thoughts … the
worst day of the convention is the first day …”
“Republicans’
Convention Advertises Their Weakness” notes Bloomberg’s Jonathan Bernstein:
“…most speakers on Day 1 of the convention were speaking fully within the
conservative closed information loop. It’s a (fictional) world in which Obama
spent the last eight years apologizing for the U.S. rather than opposing
terrorism, a world in which Obama and Clinton support open borders, and so
on.”
“The
GOP Is the Party of Death” argues TNR’s Jeet Heer: “[Rudy] Giuliani earned
the most enthusiastic response from the Republican crowd of the evening because
he made the message of impending death the most explicit of anyone speaking. But
he was only the loudest ranter of the evening; otherwise his message wasn’t
unique … This fear of death played into the other major theme of the evening,
the need to punish Clinton … criminalizing political differences is a grave
threat to the very legitimacy of the democratic process.”
I’m
worried that I will be the last Republican president,” George W. Bush tells
former aides according to Politico.
GOP EMBRACES GLASS-STEAGALL
GOP
approves platform including reinstatement of Glass-Steagall. WSJ: “Delegates
approved the GOP platform on the opening day of the Republican National
Convention in Cleveland. In addition to reinstating the Depression-era law, the
party blueprint also supported repealing the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial overhaul
bill … The plank hadn’t been included in earlier drafts of the platform, but a
single sentence was inserted in the 66-page final document. ‘We support
reinstating the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 which prohibits commercial banks from
engaging in high-risk investment,’ the platform states.”
Platform
stops short of opposing TPP. Bloomberg: “[The platform says] trade
agreements — such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiated by the Obama
administration, though an explicit reference to that deal was removed — should
not be rushed.”
CLINTON TARGETS PENCE
Clinton
slams Pence for education record at American Federation of Teachers convention.
Politico: “….Clinton said Pence cut millions from higher education while he
was ‘giving huge cuts to corporations.’ Clinton also said Pence ‘turned away
millions of federal dollars that could’ve expanded access to preschool for
low-income children’ — an apparent reference to his decision, in 2014, to not
apply for federal preschool grant dollars, and instead create a small pilot
pre-K program.”
American
Prospect’s Justin Miller dissects Pence’s record on labor: “…back in 2007,
when Pence was a U.S. congressman, he argued that increasing the federal minimum
wage from $5.15 to $7.25 an hour was much too drastic … while he was governor of
Indiana, Pence’s party blocked an effort to increase the state minimum wage to
$8.25. Instead, Pence signed into law legislation that preempts localities from
passing ordinances that require minimum wages higher than the state’s, or any
other benefit, such as paid sick or family leave, that isn’t
state-mandated.”
NEW DATA on RACISM IN MORTGAGES
Mortgage
lending abets housing segregation in St. Louis area. NYT: “Federal data has
long shown that the black neighborhoods of St. Louis have been almost devoid of
mortgage lending in recent years … But the new report, released on Tuesday by
the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, a consumer advocacy group, found
that race was also an important factor in deciding where banks lend.
Specifically, the report indicated that banks made fewer loans to middle- and
lower-income borrowers in minority neighborhoods than to borrowers with similar
incomes in white neighborhoods.”
“A
GOP Congressman Just Made An Argument For White Supremacy On Live TV” reports
HuffPost: “[Rep. Steve] King [said] he was tired of efforts to blame “white
people.” And then he took it a step further … He suggested that white people are
actually responsible for most of the good in the world … ‘I’d ask you to go back
through history and figure out where are these contributions that have been made
by these other categories of people that you’re talking about. Where did any
other subgroup of people contribute more to civilization?'”
Progressive
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