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At a rally on Friday in Miami, GOP Presidential Candidate Donald Trump called out Hillary Clinton’s hypocrisy on the right to keep and bear arms by calling on Hillary’s bodyguards to voluntarily disarm. Several former journalists crossed the line between reporting and editorializing in response.

“I think that her bodyguards should drop all weapons,” Mr. Trump said. “I think they should disarm. Immediately. Let’s see what happens to her. Take their guns away, okay? It’ll be very dangerous.”

Trump was referring to Hillary Clinton’s well-known hypocrisy on firearms: the wife of the former President is on record as in favor of banning possession of various firearms by American citizens while ensuring that they would remain available for use by police, military and other security services, including the men and women who provide round-the-clock protection for the Democratic Presidential nominee.

Mrs. Clinton is also on record as favoring numerous steps to provide obstacles to the purchase of firearms by Americans, such as a wholesale federal ban on private sales of firearms. The openly pro-Clinton New York Times reported in May in an article written by journalist Amy Chozick that Mrs. Clinton had made this opposition to the right to keep and bear arms a centerpiece of her primary campaign, attacking socialist Bernie Sanders from the left on the issue.

If all that wasn’t enough, Mrs. Clinton herself declared that she considered advocates for gun owners to be one of the “enemies” she was most proud of having.

Despite these facts, the ‘hot take’ from some in the news/entertainment business to Mr. Trump’s speech bordered on hysteria. More than that – the ‘journalists’ simply abandoned their job and started engaging in open political advocacy in favor of Mrs. Clinton and spinning outright falsehoods.

On CNN.com, an article editorial by reporter Jeremy Diamond stated:”Clinton has called for tightening access to guns, including instating universal background checks, but has never suggested she would seek to do away with the Second Amendment.”

Similarly, the Associated Press engaged in some electioneering on behalf of Clinton. The piece stated, in part: “Trump has long incorrectly suggested his Democratic opponent wants to overturn the Second Amendment and take away Americans’ right to own guns.” (The link to the piece defending Hillary quoted above goes to the Chicago Tribune for filler content, as usual, to make it look as though that paper has a much larger news staff with a much wider reach than it actually does.)

In the New York Times, journalists opinion writers Nick Corisanti, Nicholas Confessore, and Michael Barbaro ignored the May article written by Ms. Choznick and Hillary Clinton’s own website and instead started making things up:

Mr. Trump suggested that the Secret Service should stop protecting Mrs. Clinton because, he falsely claimed, she wants to “destroy your Second Amendment,” apparently a reference to her gun control policies.

In addition to that, all of them falsely claimed that Mr. Trump was making a veiled call for violence against Clinton. You may judge for yourself; the link to Trump’s entire speech is here (the bodyguard comments come at around the 12:00 mark). I have quoted the relevant portion below:

We have decent American citizens who want to uphold our tolerant values and keep our country safe. People who support the police, who want crime reduced and ended and who are not prejudiced, they are concerned and loving citizens whose hearts break every time an innocent child is killed violently on the streets. Which is happening all over our country.

Yet while Hillary Clinton lives behind gates and walls and guards and raises millions from hedge funds — you know, look what she’s doing with these hedge funds – raising millions nad millions. I know so many of these people. give me a break. The hedge funds and the Wall Street donors, she slanders and smears with her statements last week working people who just want a fraction of the security enjoyed by our politicians and certainly enjoyed by her.

Now you know, she’s very much against the Second Amendment. She wants to destroy your Second Amendment. Guns, guns, guns, right? I think that what we should do is–she goes around with armed bodyguards like you have never seen before. I think that her bodyguards should drop all weapons. They should disarm. Right? Right? I think that they should disarm — immediately. What do you think, yes? Yeah. ‘Take their guns away!’ She doesn’t want guns, take their — let’s see what happens to her. Take their guns away, okay? It’d be very dangerous.

Her comments displayed the same sense of arrogance and entitlement that led her to violate federal law as Secretary of State….

I gather there was some sort of kerfuffle between the GOP Presidential Candidate and the media earlier on Friday — in fact, I kept seeing stories about him ‘punking‘ or ‘rickrolling‘ a bunch of hapless journalists who are apparently paid to follow him around and report on his doings. It appears that this sent a few of them absolutely out of their minds. It appears they’ve decided that they’re now all-in to write stories in the hopes that it will help him lose the election. Which is, of course, their right protected under the First Amendment.

That means, however, that whatever vanishing amount of value these folks and their employers had as reliable news sources have gone out the window; in this case the truth about guns, and the truth about the constitution appear to be little more than collateral damage in this campaign. Nevertheless, for a Friday that contained more lies and half-truths in the news and entertainment media than any Friday in recent memory, these statements stand out as particularly egregious.

No matter how hard they want to pretend, the words in our constitution are quite empty if people don’t fight for them. Would the First Amendment, for example, mean anything if the government allowed private bands of arsonists to burn down any newspapers that printed stories criticizing the President? What sort of craven liar would dare say that such a government actually protected freedom of speech. One would hope that journalists, whose livelihoods and careers depend most vitally on the explicit protections of freedom of speech and freedom of the press in the Bill of Rights, would understand that. But that seems to be the place these people are willing to go if it means beating the man who embarrassed them.

Real journalists might, I think, understand that. Advocates for corrupt politicians like Hillary Clinton might not even care.

(DISCLOSURE: I have discussed my own concerns about a possible Trump presidency here. I have also written that despite his flaws, I considered Trump to be a more acceptable alternative than Hillary. I have given rather small contributions to several different presidential candidates this year for various reasons; none of them have been named “Donald J. Trump”.)

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106 COMMENTS

  1. Trump has been knocking it out of the park recently.

    This was the perfect statement to expose her hypocrisy. If she thinks WE should be disarmed, they her bodyguards should be as well.

    It’s an extension of the ‘law doesn’t apply to her’ as exemplified by Comey and Lynch.

    (Take note, “Never Trumpers,” he’s WINNING.)

    • Exactly. The last year has shown me without a shadow of a doubt that there are two classes in this country. You are politically connected and in the favor of the current regime or you are just “we the people”. This country might as well be called the ussr because it’s closer to that than the republic that the founders created. A republic, if you can keep it…

      • I actually heard Geraldo Rivera tell the Fox News anchor people don’t need to protect themselves like Hilary does because she’s a target for ISIS because she was secretary or state. I didn’t know the second amendment said anything about terrorism. There absolutely is a difference between the politically connected and everyone else the liberals know it and they agree with it which is utterly frightening.

    • Well, he’s tying, for now. He’s got a credible chance. But my respect for him has skyrocketed since the “birther” press conference. That. Was. Epic.

      Things started turning around for him when he hired Kellyanne Conway. He hasn’t said wild and crazy things, he’s started to build on the ground organization. Because he’s actually running a competent campaign now, he’s actually been able to take advantage of Clinton self-destructing. If he keeps this up, a President Trump is very possible.

      • 1) Things gave been going gangbusters since *exactly* after Hillary collapsed
        2) Trump is backpedaling or reversing himself on core issues almost weekly
        3) No one with influence is rebuking him for #2

        Do you want a Republican president who gives his fellow (R) congressmen cover to pursue federal gun control? Because this is how you get it, just like with Reagan & Bush I. Hillary is mortally wounded, politically and literally; this unconditional support of Trump out of Hillary-terror has got to stop. He needs to understand that if he wants to win, he will pursue *our* issues –the ones he won the primary on. And not those of Bernie Sanders voters.

        • I’m not a Trump supporter. He’s not strong on any issues I care about. I’m just saying he’s actually running a competent campaign now, and that’s better than Clinton strolling essentially unopposed to the Presidency.

        • I believe he is backpedaling to gain the election and I do not believe he is changing his views.
          Bill Clinton did the same thing to get elected; in fact he went so far out of the Left, the Left started criticizing him vehemently.
          Trump has to win to have any impact and Clinton must be stopped. I am okay with a little deception to win given nearly all of Clinton’s campaign is corruption and lies. Sometimes only fire can stop fire. And it is working.

    • Oh come on. But they don’t want to disarm you. They just want to take the black rifles away. Short rifles. Short shotguns. Guns with exchangeable magazines.

      They always said that muskets are OK. Because muskets is what the founding fathers had in mind.

      Right?

      • The America envisioned by the Founding Father’s was violently maimed by the tyrant Lincoln and what remained was brutally executed by the vehement socialist FDR.

        • True and well said.

          It remains to be seen if it can be ‘rebuilt.’

          Even if it is, within a generation or two, the decline will begin again. I fear this is just human nature…to many r Selected whiners want to sh1t where they eat cuz they are too lazy to do otherwise.

          It requires constant diligence – the opposite of complacency – to keep freedoms that are fought for.

        • All true. I would only add that Teddy & Woodrow helped out a lot too. They bridged the gap between Lincoln and FDR.

        • At least Lincoln paid the proper price for “doing what seemed right,” so I suppose I can forgive the man, if not the events he set into motion.

  2. Yeah, the first amendment does not protect slander. When Trump wins, we need to clean house at the various liberal propaganda pieces. See how much those clowns enjoy being brought up on treason charges. Hillary is an enemy of the United States, giving her aid and comfort is treason.

      • Just talking like Liberal Democrats for a change. They won’t really do that.
        The difference is that Democrats really do it: look at BLM demonstrators.
        How many Republicans have looted and burned their neighborhoods again?
        Where is all the gun crime: Republican middle class neighborhoods or Democrat-controlled inner cities?

      • The problem is not with the gulags it’s who’s in them. The way I see it, giving leftists a taste of their own medicine is poetic justice.

      • Got a problem with purging the Fed Gov;t of ALL progtards appointed or hire under Clinton or Obumer?

        The BIGGEST Bush failure was not purge the Clintonestas. NOW some have been there for TWENTYFOUR years.

    • Yes D-rats notice their ship is sinking, the bilge pumps of lies are furiously working to save it, meanwhile the monster vote wave rises to send them to the abyss.

    • Trump’s no spring chicken, himself. The one thing the elites can’t buy is youth (thank God), so remember that the Donald could realistically have a heart attack or stroke tomorrow. The Republicans would be freaking out just as badly (though many have been freaking out since March)

  3. The Trump Rolling was epic. No one takes them seriously, anymore. The fact they are so mad they were tricked into giving him one minute of positive coverage proves for all to see how corrupt they are. It’s that fire we’ve been talking about, fellas; he’s doing it, he’s burning it all down.

    • ” It’s that fire we’ve been talking about, fellas; he’s doing it, he’s burning it all down.”

      +1000

      And he’s been getting a little help from a cartoon frog…

  4. The big plus of this election has been the media and political classes putting their stupidity on full proud display over and over either by blatantly misconstruing statements, not being able to read context and or subtext and so far the best of the best is the full frontal assault on a cartoon frog illustrating how out of touch they are with the now. I can forgive dinosaurs like Clinton and Stephanopolous but even hipster du jour Mr. Maddow is so far removed from reality she subjected all 6 of her viewers to a tirade against the green face last night.

    The big minus of all this is that even with such grand idiocy on full display for the world nothing will change regardless of which, Douche or Turd Sandwich, wins the office.

  5. It’s bits like these that show Trump really has changed on the RtKaBA, unlike Romney and (especially) McCain (who is this very congress introduced pro-disarmament bills).

    • Indeed it does seem promising, I just wish his respect for civil rights made the leap beyond the RKBA. The watchlist stuff in light of his anti-ish gun stances killed it for me. I’m where I’ll need definitive proof of action and/or loyalty to vote for his reelection if the time comes (shame, because a single meaningful donation to pro gun groups in NYC or the NRA before he decided to run is all I’d have needed)

  6. I find it entertaining to know that no matter who wins the election, half of the US is going to completely lose it. I mean right around the bend kind of mental breakdown. Quivering, drooling, foaming at the mouth kinda stuff.

    • The next collapse is already starting, and it’ll likely be worse than the last one. When it happens, I’d much rather we’d have had Dems at the helm and maybe, just maybe, we’d be able to get it through peoples’ thick skulls that trusting the .gov is not the way to go.

      Unfortunately, with the Supremes in play, gotta take a Trump.

      • There’s always a next collapse looming on the horizon. Living without debt is a good way to go. We weathered the last popping bubble quite well cause we owe nothing to nobody.

      • “Unfortunately, with the Supremes in play, gotta take a Trump.”

        ^ This!

        We could probably muddle our way forward with Hillary in the White House if the Supreme Court had a solid 6 to 3 conservative majority. On the other hand, even with a solid 6 to 3 conservative majority in the Supreme Court, another 8 years of Progressive lower court judicial appointments could start to take a serious toll on the health of our nation because the Supreme Court cannot hear and overturn every lower-court case.

        No matter how you look at it, we cannot have Progressives in the White House for 16 years straight: that will cause irreversible damage to the Judicial branch.

      • Don’t worry, people will get plenty of “government trust” to chew on with Donald at the helm. It’s best that *all* Americans learn the lessons of socialism, and not just half. Maybe when enough morons are too jaded to bother voting in the primaries, we can have a grown up discussion about how we actually want to run things here. Bernie’s downfall coupled with collapse under a big talker’s “leadership” could be a good thing in the long run.

    • I had a brother-in-law get Baker acted when GW Bush won the first time. Seriously. If Trump wins it’ll put him and others like him over the edge and it’s going to be fun to watch.

      • I’m still meh. But at least I won’t vomit in terror when I vote “donnie”. And I would write-in Cruz if I thought it mattered. Really I hate this election…

    • Americans have shown time after time that they despise the far-left “social justice” idiocy, yet the media keeps pushing it harder and harder, thus driving more people to support Trump. Personally, as someone with multiple degrees in Economics, I truly despise Trump’s godawful economic policies (especially in regard to trade). However, he’s still better than Hillary and with the next President getting to replace about half of the Supreme Court, the Constitution can’t survive another Democrat in the White House.

      • “Americans have shown time after time that they despise the far-left “social justice” idiocy, yet the media keeps pushing it harder and harder,”

        Law #2: SJW’s Always Double Down

        They can’t help it. It’s their programming. And the MSM is nothing if not programmed.

  7. Hillary can not walk back her, on record, comment “maybe we need the Australian Solution” This election is not about voting your conscience, it’s about voting for your Rights

  8. Well folks this might end up being the historical 5th time a candidate wins the popular vote and loses due to losing the EC vote. BTW the EC vote is what puts them in office not the “Dog and Pony” media show that is your “vote” A short 16 years ago Bush defeated Gore this way.(look it up) The sheep keep on keeping on. This whole thing is driven by $$$ nothing else.

  9. I am voting for Trump, I mean what choice do I have, but man, this guy is mentally ill.

    Not that Clinton is not also. But how in the world did we get stuck with this freaking guy. I thought we were supposed to get Rubio and an easy victory rallying around The Good Guy.

    Trump = mentally ill. He’s like a white , businessman Kanye West.

    • Yep, seen this?:

      NYT: ‘Tsunami of unease’ overwhelms Hillary supporters…

      “Hillary Clinton’s Backers Thought She Couldn’t Lose. Now, ‘I Can’t Go There.’”

      http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/17/us/politics/hillary-clinton-voters.html

      Warms my cold, black heart, yes it does… (My Precious!)

      *snicker*

      They’re finally waking up to the fact that she’s seriously ill.

      What’s good for us is the only way for her to up her ‘presence’ is to do the grueling work of campaigning IN PERSON, and she’s simply not physically capable of doing that without dissolving into another coughing fit or collapsing again.

      You know, standing for more than an hour under hot studio lights during the debates may just trigger another incident.

      Even if that happens, she is so blinded by ambition she would never step aside.

      The worst thing that can happen to us at this point is if she steps aside and Bernie steps up.

      That would sink us…

      • You know what’s funny? I’ve actually looked at the requirements for moving to other countries. Turns out you can’t just go. You have to offer something they actually want or need, like skills or money to invest. Just showing up and wanting to stay because you’re unhappy with your place of birth? Sorry, not good enough.

        • About 15 years back, blinded by love, (even tho it was actually lust, but I digress…) I looked into emigrating to Canada and discovered my net worth was roughly $150,000 short of what I would need for them to welcome me with open arms.

          (Apparently, the Canadian girlfriend welcoming me with her open legs wasn’t enough. *cough*)

          So yeah, you are right, nations can particular to who they want as citizens…

        • We couldn’t be so lucky as to have the NY-DC-LA elites give up their citizenship and move to Canada.

  10. Why the “Disclosure?” The article properly exposed left wing lies and hypocrisy. Was there some compulsion to announce contempt for a candidate in order to take some assumed moral high ground?

    It reminds me of the politicians who claim, “I support the Second Amendment, but. . . .”

    The qualifier is a disqualifier.

    • Actually, I think this kind of thing is preferable. Wouldn’t you like to see reporters have to wear their political biases on their sleeves? The media in the US operates under the pretense of objectivity, but there’s a huge amount of editorializing in news articles. Wouldn’t it be great, for example, to see a note under an article stating the author is a Democrat?

    • Well, Ralph, I put the disclosure in there because if I’m going to be attacked for what I write, I want there to be no confusion over where I stand. Since I was calling out former reporters for their own howling biases, I wanted to be up front with what I’ve said and done concerning this election. With that in mind, the reader can decide whether the points I made above hold water.

      I didn’t intend to express contempt for Trump – at least, nothing beyond the normal level of contempt I feel for anyone who seeks political power.

  11. When Tramp, sorry Trump, gives up his tax paid for and armed body guards, then he can run his big, fat, ego, blow hard mouth. I do not care what his opinion is on weapons

  12. There’s no doubt, this is SPOT ON. THIS is the LITMUS TEST. Whatever Anti-Gun Laws/Confiscation you propose Hillary, MUST be applied to YOU and your Personal Bodyguards as well. No “Assault Weapons”? – NONE for them either. It’s ONE for ONE.

    Or what, is it just the ‘Political Elite’ that should be afforded a greater ability to defend themselves and their families, and us PROLES are all potential criminals and should be treated as such? And WHO is REALLY the CRIMINAL between us? If you were ME, you’d be sitting in the clink right now!

    It’s BY THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE.

    NOT, By the ELITE FOR THE ELITE!

  13. If Mr. Trump was allegedly making a veiled call for violence against Clinton by asking her to disarm, then have Democrats been making veiled threats of violence against all American citizens by calling for us to disarm? The answer is no. Democrats are not issuing veiled threats. The threats are open and clear coming from the leftists, the group which murdered over 100 million people last century.

  14. Cool! So the next time Hillary reflects on the possibility of Australian-style gun control, the press will flip out and accuse her of wanting the American people to be defenseless and murdered. Sweet! Can’t wait!

    /sarc

  15. Trump could have stated simply, “Her security detail should turn in their guns so that she can enjoy the same safety the rest of the American people are forced to survive in”. But he didn’t say that because he is Trump. If he did anything else he would be another person.

    I am rooting for him as much as I can physically allow myself to, but this statement made me really laugh out loud because I understood the sentiment above to be the meaning. Whether that is true or not, is really immaterial anyway cause Hillary is a non person, she is a blackhole of power hungry, psycho, BS that MUST obey the power of the Dark Side. heheheh.

    • I applaud Trump for making his statement in exactly the way he did. If he made some drawn out, oh-so-rational totally nuanced RINO statement, would the press have picked it up and made a campaign issue out of it? I don’t think so.

      He’s running against the MSM now. Since trust in the media is at an historic low according to Gallup, I think he’s running the right race. Every time the press goes spastic, his poll numbers climb.

      • Right after he clinched the nomination, I recall reading one person lamenting the fact that if they hadn’t given Trump the hundreds of millions in free coverage every time he opened his mouth, they wouldn’t be having the problem they have now, that Trump has a solid shot of really defeating HRC.

        As much as I’m loving how this is currently playing out, I’m getting a bit concerned that if it looks like he may actually pull it off, with the raw, visceral hatred the Left are expressing I wouldn’t be surprised if one or more of them actually goes over the edge and does something outrageous…

  16. Well done, DJT. I’m enthusiastically voting for him. A lot of folks on TTAG had the political naïveté to vote for Obama, because he “wouldn’t go after guns.” Trump is the clear anti-establishment choice. I knew Bernie didn’t have a backbone, something his supporters finally discovered just months ago.

    And to the supposed “gun advocates” who aren’t supporting Trump, know that he should be easy to replace if he winds up stinking as a president. Hillary, on the other hand, will mint so many New Democratic voters in refugees, pardoned felons, dead voters (no voter ID), right-voting vets dying on government healthcare and corrupt leftie judges that peacefully steering our country back to freedom and respect for rights may no longer be an option.

  17. There are a few things I would agree with the Donald. But this is a very good point out on the witch and the bs that the main stream like to put out.

  18. After Trump becomes president I hope he asks Diane “only guns for me” Feinstein and rest of the US Congress to give up their armed security as well.

    The never Trump crowd are globalists and or socialist who are just dishonest with themselves and the public.
    They would do away with any or all of the US Constitution to make foreign powers happy.
    There is no such thing as a perfect candidate.

    • If Trump wins, I fear it will fracture America permanently.

      If he wins and stacks SCOTUS 6 to 3, and they rule voter ID, and strengthening the 2A as constitutional they will have only 1 goal, and that will be that they stack SCOTUS with their justices and neuter the 2A.

      It will just be a never-ending battle for both sides to stack SCOTUS.

      If it looks like Trump will win, I won’t be surprised if some of the enraged Left starts doing things like fire-bombing houses with Trump signs.

      I’m serious about that…

      • The last time SCOTUS ruled citizens had no right to firearms it lead to a civil war and 700,000 dead Americans.
        The progressives should be very careful, they have no guns.

  19. Most of the people on this message board only care about one issue. I care about that issue as well, but I also want to see the survival of the Republic, so I’m voting Hillary.

    Let the flaming begin in 3, 2, 1…

    • As someone who is firmly #nevertrump, please excuse me when I say that you are out of your fucking mind if you think a vote for Clinton is a vote for the overall health and ultimate survival of our republic.

        • We’ve been over this before.

          Johnson is certainly not the poster child for Libertarianism but my hope (and that of many) is that enough votes in this election for a third party will knock enough sense into the electorate that it starts considering something other than the false binary choice we’ve all been hoodwinked into believing is the only choice.

        • Matt. Here’s hoping your lost cause siphons more votes from hillary than Trump. The siphoning of votes is really the only effect it will have. There won’t be enough votes in play to effect a 3rd party. A 100 years from now some idealist will be playing this same rationale out on whatever passes for the web then. With the same results.

        • Jwm, you’re totally right. The Republican Party was never a third party.

          You’re in California, aren’t you? Why siphon votes from a potential third party by voting for Trump in a state that’s going to go to Hillary in a landslide?

    • “I care about that issue as well, … so I’m voting Hillary. “

      Oxymoron of the year right there.

      If you vote for Hillary, you neither care about ‘that issue’ NOR the survival of the Republic.

      Just. Wow.

    • Trump is way too unstable to be president, and has shown blatant disregard for constitutional separation of powers. When people like Trump get elected, dictatorship follows.

      Besides, I live in Idaho, so my vote will not affect the Electoral College outcome. I’m voting more as a protest to shore up the popular vote than anything else.

  20. Advocating repeal of the second amendment is the only honest thing that HRC can do. Anything else violates every oath of office that anyone in the country would take.

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