Not just a pimply-faced kid this time

Donald J. Trump, once and future President, is safe tonight after law enforcement responded to an apparent second assassination attempt, on his golf course in West Palm Beach FL.

Breitbart News reports that Mr Trump, who survived an attempt on his life at a rally in Butler PA in mid-July, was golfing on his course this afternoon, when security officers apparently encountered a man running out of some bushes, in which were found an AK-47, a GoPro camera and some other non-golf club equipment. 

Secret Service agents fired at the manafter seeing the muzzle of the gun pointing through a chain-link fence one hole ahead of where Mr Trump was playing. The person hiding in the bushes fled the scene in a car, but an alert bystander had the presence of mind to take a picture, including a clear image of the car's licence plate. The police were then able to spot the car on the Interstate, and arrest the lone occupant.

Accused of pointing an AK-47 at President Trump is 58-year-old man accused of pointing an AK-47 at former President Donald Trump is 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh, of no fixed address. According to Fox News, Mr Routh has a prolific arrest record spanning several decades. A background check revealed that he currently lives in Hawaii and has faced dozens of run-ins with police, stretching back to at least the 1990s. 

Mr Routh is a native of North Carolina, where his list of arrests includes simple drug possession, driving without a licence, expired inspection and operating a vehicle with no insurance. In addition, the Greensboro News & Record reported in 2002 that he was arrested after barricading himself in his roofing company's office during a three-hour standoff that followed a traffic stop in which he put his hand on a gun before fleeing.

As a sometime Floridian (during my misspent youth, long ago), I can tell you that all the flotsam and jetsam of American society washes up in the Sunshine State, sooner or later. So it may be that Mr Routh is just another burnout, one step ahead of the men with nets, acting on his own, for reasons (?) of his own. 

That's what the lickspittle media will want you to believe. But is it true? I'm opening a book on the possibility of a misfortunate accident happening to Mr Routh before he has a chance to tell his story. Couldn't happen, you say? Remember Lee Harvey Oswald.

Florida, the new Zimbabwe

Regular readers of WWW [as oppoed to "irregular" border-crossers. Ed.] will know that Walt has an abiding interest in Zimbabwe, the failing African state whose name has become a metaphor for incompetence and corruption -- two nouns which have been much in use since November 8th as journalists and pundits struggle to describe the gubernatorial and senate elections in the Not-so-great State of Florida.

The ZANU-PF party has ruled the Land of Bambazonke since independence, thanks to its expertise in the rigging ["running", shurely! Ed.] of elections. For instance, when their candidate is trailing in the vote count, they simply stop counting! That's what happened in 2013 when weeks after polling day it was announced that President Mugabe had received the most votes, but not enough to prevent a run-off. The opposition candidate then withdrew from the race, leaving Comrade Bob to win in a landslide. See "'Incidences' from the Zimbabwean election", WWW 2/8/13.

They didn't risk having to compete in a run-off this year. All the results of July's polls were announced within 48 hours, except for that of the contest for the presidensity. After a couple of days of "They're coming just now," the government-appointed Zimbabwe Electoral Commision announced that Bob's successor, Comrade ED [No relation! Ed.] had won 50.8% of the vote, just enough to avoid a runoff. See "ED wins Zimbabwe presidential election - quelle surprise!" WWW 2/8/18.

Does this remind you of any election in any place you've been hearing about lately? How about Florida? In particular, how about Broward and Palm Beach Counties? I have no bias against those counties -- used to live there myself -- but can't help but notice that the stench of electoral corruption is worse than usual this year.

"Preliminary results" announced in the wee hours of Wednesday showed Republican Governor Rick Scott leading incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson in the contest for a US Senate seat, and Republican Ron DeSantis ahead of Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum in the race for the state house.

To nobody's surprise, the lamestream media refused to "project" a winner, saying it was too close to call, absentee ballots hadn't been counted, a recount was possible, and so on. Why? Because the election machinery was in the control of "non-partisan" officials such as Broward County's Supervisor of Elections, Brenda Snipes, who President Trump said "has had a horrible history..."

Here, from the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, is what POTUS was talking about.

• In 2004, approximately 58,000 mail-in ballots were not delivered to voters.
• In 2012, nearly 1,000 uncounted ballots were discovered a week after the election.
• Election results in the 2016 primary were posted on the election office's website before the polls closed.
• A court ruled Snipes had broken election law when she destroyed ballots from the 2016 election 12 months after it, instead of the 22 months required by federal law.

Republicans blamed problems in Broward County on the design of the ballot there. “The ballot was laid out in an incompetent fashion by the incompetent supervisor of elections,” said Mr Scott's attorney, Bill Scherer, apparently referring to Mrs Snipes.

The analysts at FiveThirtyEight questioned whether the position of the Senate race on the Broward County ballot (at the bottom left-hand corner of Page 1) meant some voters skipped over the race. In Broward, some 26,060 fewer people casts voted in the Senate race compared with the governor’s race, a difference of 3.7%.

Mr Nelson's attorney, however, said he believes the problem was with the machine counters -- nothing to do with Mrs Snipes. "I am pretty confident what you are going to see are markings that were not picked up by the machines or a calibration issue that was not registering that part of the ballot," he said.

Reports that Brenda Snipes received her training in public administration in Zimbabwe are untrue. She comes from that hotbed of democracy, Talladega County AL. It's just a coincidence that the start of a statewide recount, which began Sunday morning, has been delayed by a series of technical glitches with the counting machines... in Broward County.

Stay tuned for the revised and improved results, due at 1500 EST on Thursday. Or call Mrs Snipes' office for the official figures. If you can't wait, call anytime!

Further reading: "What can we expect from Florida recount — 2018 edition?" by Brendan Swisher, South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 10/11/18.

Christian convicted of aiding Muslim jihadis

Interesting report a couple of days ago in the Washington Times under the headline "Three Florida men sentenced for providing material to support to ISIS".

Way back in July of 2016, government agents at Miami International Airport stopped ex-Marine Gregory Hubbard, 54, who was attempting to get on a plane bound for Syria, where he intended to join ISIS. Apparently Mr Hubbard was impressed by the example of Cassius Clay (aka Muhammad Ali) and converted to the Religion of Peace some years ago, without, however, changing his name to something more Islamic. By 2016 he had become convinced that the sure way to Paradise (and the services of 72 virgins) was to join the jihad against infidels.

The Justice Department announced this week that Mr Hubbard would be spending the next 12 years as the guest of the state, i.e. in prison. But he won't be alone. Two co-defendants, also converts to Islam and, like Mr Hubbard, sometime residents of Palm Beach County FL, were convicted of plotting to provide guns and other help to the Islamic State, and received lesser sentences. One of them was Darren Arness Jackson, 52, who got four years. The other, who received a sentence of eight years, was 33-year-old Dayne Christian.