NO. WAY. Clinton Foundation’s Fundraisers Pressed Donors to Steer Business to Former President.

Two chief fundraisers for the Clinton Foundation pressed corporate donors to steer business opportunities to former President Bill Clinton as well, according to a hacked memo published Wednesday by WikiLeaks.

The November 2011 memo from Douglas Band, at the time a top aide to Mr. Clinton, outlines extensive fundraising efforts that Mr. Band and a partner deployed on behalf of the Clinton Foundation and how that work sometimes translated into large speaking fees and other paid work for Mr. Clinton.

The memo, part of a cache of emails stolen from Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager, resurfaces an issue that she has had a hard time shaking: questions over the relationship between the Clintons’ charity work and their personal business.

The Clintons don’t produce any desirable consumer products, or perform any traditionally useful services like accounting or dry cleaning. They have built no factories, dug no mines, nor worked any farms. They hold no patents and have developed no real estate. They are not medical doctors of rare skill. They haven’t starred in any hit movies or sung any popular songs. They have (allegedly) written and sold some books, but not the kind of bestsellers that get turned into TV shows and make real money.

And yet they have grown rich “beyond the dreams of avarice” since Bill left office nearly 16 years ago, and even richer since Hillary entered international politics just eight years ago.

How?

By peddling influence — an activity which generates great wealth only in a corrupt and overly bureaucratic society.

That’s the swamp that needs to be drained, and it runs much deeper and wider than most anyone realizes.

BUT DEATH PANELS ARE A MYTH: Terminally ill mom denied treatment coverage — but gets suicide drug approved.

GOOD LORD:

#Arizona Obamacare premiums in 2017: pic.twitter.com/XIp2OdtSSE

— FOX Business (@FoxBusiness) October 26, 2016

That means it’s working? Of course! Now Is Time To Be Bold & Expand Obamacare.

The cure for a failed big government program is always a bigger government program.

DEMOCRAT ED RENDELL: “I Think There’s A Hidden Donald Trump Vote”

“I think there’s a hidden Donald Trump vote,” Rendell told Philadelphia radio host Rich Zeoli Tuesday. “All this talk about it being over and now the real contest is the Senate is going to persuade a couple of Hillary Clinton voters and Democratic voters to say ‘Well, what do I have to stand on line for an hour [to vote] for?’”

Rendell added that “there a lot of things that are in motion that are favorable to Donald Trump. I wouldn’t say that it’s over then. The odds are that he’s going to lose, but I wouldn’t bet my life on it.”

It’s 2016; anything can happen.

JOLLY GOOD: U.K. Growth Shows an Economy Resilient to Brexit.

A LITTLE PIECE OF POLAND, A LITTLE PIECE OF FRANCE: President Erdogan talks of dominating parts of Iraq and Greece.

In one recent speech, the 62-year-old said Turkey “did not accept the borders of our country voluntarily” and mentioned the National Pact – a plan made at the end of the Ottoman Empire to conquer the Iraqi city of Mosul.

So far the global community has resisted President Erdogan’s desires to be involved in the current military campaign against Islamic State in Mosul, at the request of the Iraqi government.

The Istanbul-born politician lamented: “In 1914 our land covered 2.5 million square kilometres, nine years later it fell to 780,000 square kilometres.”

Mr Erdogan’s fiery comments come as his country stands on the brink of potentially having a major referendum that could see its parliamentary democracy system replaced by an executive presidency, handing the ruling AK Parti boss significantly greater powers than he already has.

Even if Erdogan is speaking only for domestic consumption, that’s worrisome enough.

RESET: Britain, U.S. sending planes, troops to deter Russia in the east.

Germany, Canada and other NATO allies also pledged forces at a defense ministers meeting in Brussels on the same day two Russian warships armed with cruise missiles entered the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Denmark, underscoring East-West tensions.

In Madrid, the foreign ministry said Russia had withdrawn a request to refuel three warships in Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta after NATO allies said they could be used to target civilians in Syria.

The ships were part of an eight-ship carrier battle group – including Russia’s sole aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov – that is expected to join around 10 other Russian vessels already off the Syrian coast, diplomats said.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the troop contributions to a new 4,000-strong force in the Baltics and eastern Europe were a measured response to what the alliance believes are some 330,000 Russian troops stationed on Russia’s western flank near Moscow.

Expanding NATO was a mistake. Expanding the alliance’s geographical responsibilities while reducing the alliance’s military capabilities was an even bigger mistake — it fed Russian paranoia about NATO’s intentions and fed Russian contempt for NATO’s strength.

DID THE EARTH MOVE FOR YOU, TOO?: The entire continent of Australia sways (a little) with the weather.

HEH: New York City Tap Water Contains 11% Molly and 6% Oxycontin.

GOOD SPORTSMANSHIP: Hidden Mic Catches Chicago Cubs Star Anthony Rizzo Apologizing to MLB Umpire.

WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: Army Lasers Will Soon Destroy Enemy Mortars, Artillery and Drones From Strykers.

I WOULD CERTAINLY HOPE SO: ObamaCare premium hikes fuel Trump, GOP case in key swing states.

DOWN THE MEMORY HOLE:

.@mattyglesias Obamacare marker – which was solid as of 15 minutes ago – appears to no longer be markering pic.twitter.com/a0EyXImI8g

— Omri Ceren (@cerenomri) October 26, 2016

ANALYSIS: ALL-TOO-TRUE. Obamacare woes to linger long after Obama is gone.

Big price hikes to Affordable Care Act premiums announced this week mean that Obama’s proudest legislative achievement will fail to resolve the decades-old controversy surrounding the government’s role in managing the cost of and access to health care.

It will fall to the next administration whether to fix Obamacare’s shortcomings — including rising premiums and deductibles, slowing enrollment growth and the increasing number of insurers pulling out of the ACA marketplaces — or to trash the system and start again.

Heckuva job, Barry.

JOHN SCHINDLER: Syria’s Civil War Is Over — Russia Won.

For Putin, his Syrian intervention has been an unambiguous win on the world stage. Its benefits exist on many levels, not least Russia’s reinforcing the potent message that Moscow, unlike Washington, stands by its friends. When his regime was collapsing in 2011, Hosni Mubarak, who had led Egypt for three decades as a loyal ally of America, was coldly abandoned by the White House. President Obama, against the advice of his own national security experts, cut Mubarak loose to the mob, refusing to take his panicked phone calls pleading for help.

That same year, when his regime was facing the abyss as civil war enveloped Syria, Bashar al-Assad got all the help he wanted from Moscow. Russia saved Assad and has not cared one whit about cries from the international community and NGOs about the brutal methods employed by the Syrian regime against rebels. This message has not been missed in the Middle East. It’s no wonder that even Israel has sought parley with Moscow, which has replaced Washington as the new regional kingmaker-cum-sheriff, while Egypt has renewed security ties with the Kremlin that Cairo abandoned more than four decades ago, in favor of the Americans. No more.

Putin and his ministers have acted cynically and cunningly in Syria, to good effect for Russia. However, it would be wrong to portray Moscow as strategic geniuses here. It’s much more about the staggering, unprecedented foreign policy incompetence of President Obama and his White House than anything else. Time and again, Obama and his coterie of self-proclaimed foreign policy masterminds on his National Security Council have been bested by the Russians, who view them with undisguised contempt.

As Mark Steyn noted about the jihadis after 9/11 — the question isn’t “Why do they hate us?” but “Why do they despise us?“

MODERN STATESMEN:

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

A fun reminder from Free Enterprise Alliance.

ANALYSIS: TRUE. Jeffrey Toobin Doesn’t Know The First Thing About Clarence Thomas’s Legal Legacy.

As someone who had the privilege of clerking for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, I am more familiar with his opinions than most people are. I read them one after another as I nervously prepared to interview for the position.

With each opinion, I became less confident that I could even carry on a conversation with the man who had written so thoughtfully and prolifically about the original meaning of the Constitution, let alone help him with his work. But one does not have to have read the Thomas canon to know that Jeffrey Toobin’s recent article in The New Yorker, “Clarence Thomas’s Twenty-Five Years Without Footprints,” is nonsense.

Read the whole thing.

CHUTZPAH: Liberal CNN Commentator Blames Republicans for Obamacare’s Rising Premiums.

BECAUSE AFTER EIGHT YEARS, TURNABOUT IS FAIR PLAY? Philippines’ Duterte Leaves U.S. Policymakers “Baffled”

THE 1980s CALLED… YOU KNOW THE REST: Russia Unveils RS-28 Sarmat ‘Satan 2’ Nuclear Missile.

HUMA ABEDIN EMAIL: Hillary ‘still not perfect in her head’

Top aide Huma Abedin warned the Clinton campaign team in a 2015 e-mail that Hillary was “still not perfect in her head” and would have to “stick to notes” during an event.

The e-mail is among thousands hacked from Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta’s account that have been released by WikiLeaks.

The exchange came at the end of a discussion among staffers about how Clinton would address then-GOP candidate Jeb Bush’s use of Super PAC money to fund his campaign.

Unfit to stand up to Jeb Bush, but ready, willing, and able to re-reset with Vladimir Putin.

21ST CENTURY CRIME: National Intelligence Director Says Data Suggests ‘Nonstate Actor’ Was Behind Cyberattack.

Network experts studying the attack are also starting to rule out usual suspects, such as national governments and online blackmailers. That suggests, they said, the attack was another cry for attention by online attack-for-hire services and their customers looking to make a statement.

“All the arrows point away from any sort of political motivation,” which hurts “the nation-state argument,” said Allison Nixon, a researcher at online-security firm Flashpoint. “Of course, you never know until someone’s got handcuffs on them.”

Evidence instead points to the “loosely knit social circle of kids and young adults” who tend to launch similar attacks, Ms. Nixon said. Flashpoint called comments from online groups like WikiLeaks and the New World Hackers that claimed a connection to the attack “dubious.”

It isn’t at all comforting that a loose group of “script kiddies” might be responsible for such a large attack.

SUNSHINE: Trump Has 2-Point Edge in Bloomberg Politics Poll of Florida.

Marco Rubio is up by ten in his Senate race.

ANALYSIS: TRUE. Richard Nixon could only wish he got Hillary’s FBI treatment.

Michael Goodwin:

One result is that, while “Nixonian” is a synonym for illegal abuse of authority, his resignation and the smooth transfer of power marked a ringing triumph of justice. The fundamental principle that nobody in America is above the law was upheld in practice.

Now imagine another scenario. America wakes up on Nov. 9 to President-elect Hillary Clinton, and to the cold reality that the same principle of equal justice is null and void.

Her election would mean that some people are above the law. It would mean that one of them will assume the commanding heights of our country despite abundant evidence that she committed crimes and got away scot-free.

Oh, for the good old days of Watergate and of public servants like Elliot Richardson and William Ruckelshaus. We should be so lucky now.

I’m still having trouble believing we actually get the government we deserve.

HMM: Trump cuts off fundraising events for Republican Party.

Donald Trump’s campaign has ended fundraising events meant to support the Republican Party’s get-out-the-vote efforts in next month’s elections.

Aides to the Republican nominee told Fox News on Tuesday that Trump Victory, the joint fundraising committee for the GOP and the campaign, held its most recent fundraiser on Oct. 19 and no more such events were scheduled.

The move, which was first reported by The Washington Post, cuts off a key money source for Republicans hoping to keep hold of both houses of Congress.