Clinton.com in Coal Country

Normally, when someone changes their opinion to one I agree with, I give them the benefit of the doubt, but when it's Hillary, I just assume it's pandering for votes: Clinton Flip-Flops on Coal, Now Wants Coal to Prosper. She caveats it with wanting to capture the carbon for sequestration, another one of the rainbows and unicorns often suggested by the left, and people who don't understand the laws of thermodynamics, but I repeat myself. By way of Wombat-sochos "In The Mailbox: 05.02.16", Don Surber shows us that coal country is not being fooled: Mayor to the Clintons: Stay out of Logan, West Virginia

I write that to put in perspective the email Logan Mayor Serafino Nolletti sent to Mike Browning of Democratic Senator Joe Manchin's office about President Clinton's planned visit to Logan on Sunday.

Via WOWK:

Mike,
While we appreciate all that you and Senator Manchin's office have done for the City Of Logan over the years we must make the following statement:
Bill and Hillary Clinton are simply not welcome in our town. Mrs. Clinton's anti-coal messages are the last thing our suffering town needs at this point. The policies that have been championed by people like Mrs. Clinton have all but devastated our fair town, and honestly, enough is enough. We wish them the best in their campaign, however we again state they are not welcome on our city properties. We hope that you will respectfully consider NOT visiting our community. Please don't hesitate to contact me if you have any questions, 304-687-4002. I am writing this on behalf of the City Of Logan.

Democrats have lost every single presidential election in West Virginia since Al Gore chose to run his anti-coal campaign in 2000.

Ann Althouse, who reads Andrew Sullivan so you don't have to, spots an interesting passage:

Anyway, here, I'll excerpt a paragraph — one that's not about Plato or Trump-as-Hitler dramatics. This is some well-stated political analysis about Hillary:

Okay, this is something I've been wanting to talk about — reliance on "unfavorables." It seems to me, we're going to end up with 2 major-party candidates that most people don't like. The election is going to be decided by the people who are going to be stuck voting for one of 2 people neither of whom they like. The question isn't who has higher unfavorability, but which one is more capable of getting a vote from a person who is disgusted by both of them. As Sullivan's paragraph suggests, one is exciting, risky, and entertaining. The other is dreary, predictable, and medicinal.

Remember James Carville’s core question in the 1992 election: Change versus more of the same? That sentiment once elected Clinton’s husband; it could also elect her opponent this fall. If you like America as it is, vote Clinton. After all, she has been a member of the American political elite for a quarter-century. Clinton, moreover, has shown no ability to inspire or rally anyone but her longtime loyalists. She is lost in the new media and has struggled to put away a 74-year-old socialist who is barely a member of her party. Her own unfavorables are only 11 points lower than Trump’s (far higher than Obama’s, John Kerry’s, or Al Gore’s were at this point in the race), and the more she campaigns, the higher her unfavorables go (including in her own party). She has a Gore problem. The idea of welcoming her into your living room for the next four years can seem, at times, positively masochistic.

And while it's hardly a majority of the polling, Rasmussen shows Trump 41%, Clinton 39%. I guess Hillary's just not that likable. On College Campuses, Now Even Hillary is a Dirty Word, which doesn't bode well for her turn out. Politico, where they wince every time anyone in the country disses Hillary: How Hillary Could Win the Election—and Lose the Country

 The reason is that Clinton lacks a big, new animating idea in a year when voters in both parties are so discontented they have embraced some pretty bad ones. Like them or loathe them, Donald Trump's and Bernie Sanders’ messages are crystal clear and call for dramatic change, while Clinton’s remains spread softly all over the map. And her agenda promises less change than continuation—of the centrist Democratic Party policies that her husband pursued and which Barack Obama has largely followed. It’s no surprise that one of Clinton’s biggest campaign themes is to praise both her predecessor Democratic presidents—the one she married and the one she went to work for—effusively.

Even the Preznit joined the fun:  President Obama hinted at his post-presidential plans at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on Saturday, joking that he would consider giving paid speeches for the investment bank Goldman Sachs.. Joking? It's a near certainty. Instapundit doesn't call him President Goldman Sachs for nothing.

Over at The American Thinker, Joe Herring thinks that Hillary is going to be replaced by Joe Biden at the last possible minute. Clinton Was Never Intended to Be the Democrat Nominee

. . . Here is my reasoning: realizing that the evidence against her could rise to the level of treason, Secretary Clinton has struck a bargain with the Obama White House that in return for bowing out at or near the convention, she will receive a full pardon in order to ensure that she will never see the inside of a prison cell.

She takes the slings and arrows, exhausting the opposition research budgets of Republican campaigns, leaving V.P. Biden and Sen. Warren largely immune from scrutiny during these long months of primaries and caucuses.

By the time she begs off the nomination, citing medical issues, the Republicans will have barely three months to investigate and counter the actual nominees, Biden and Warren. . .

Aluminum foil hat material, for sure, but stranger things have happened in American politics.

And meanwhile, the corruption of the electoral process continues: Clinton campaign taps aide tied to 2008 fundraising scheme

The New York Times reported Monday that Minyon Moore, a longtime Clinton adviser, will become a senior adviser on Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign focusing on political outreach and strategy.

But the paper did not mention her ties to the fund-raising scandals related to the 2010 Washington mayoral race, describing her as a “Longtime Clinton Insider” with extensive ties to both Bill and Hillary.

Ms. Moore was allegedly at the center of a 2008 fundraising scheme tied to Thompson, who was convicted of funding a “shadow campaign” for former D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray in 2010.

Thompson also pleaded guilty in 2014 to funneling more than $600,000 in illicit donations to Mrs. Clinton’s 2008 White House bid.

Court documents said a top Clinton campaign official — Ms. Moore — asked Thompson to pay for canvassers and “street teams” to reach minority voters in several key early-primary states during the 2008 Democratic presidential nominating contest.

A representative for Ms. Moore said in 2014 that she didn’t know Thompson was donating money illegally, and that she complied with campaign finance laws.