On top of Trump Deranged Syndrome (TDS), for First Lady, New York Senator and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is showing signs of Terminal Russian Universal Meddling Paranoia (TRUMP).

Do not misunderstand.  I do believe that the Russians meddled in the 2016 General Election.  In fact, I am quite sure that Russian President Vladimir Putin has been meddling in our domestic and foreign affairs before and since.  I think that is also true of the Chinese, the North Koreans, the Iranians, the Cubans – and even the Brits, the French the Germans and that guy in all-white in teeny-tiny Vatican City.

In fact, we meddle in other country’s elections.  One need only recall how a bunch of President Obama’s political advisors traveled to Israel to try to defeat President Benjamin Netanyahu.  We meddled in any number of South and Central American national elections.  We meddled big time when we used the Army to remove and arrest Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega.  He is still serving time in an American prison.

Though there is some equivalency, that is not to minimize the extensive and elaborate efforts undertaken by Putin to disrupt our political and social harmony.  It is just that Hillary seems to have gone over the edge.

Granted, losing the presidency to Donald Trump had to be a YUGE blow to her ambitions and ego.  I mean … on the morning of Election Day 2016, this lady was prepared to be giving a victory speech later in the day.  Was to become the first female President in American History and the first First Lady to become President – the most powerful woman in the world.  The emotional and mental shock of losing was commensurate with the perceived certainty of her victory.  And she loses everything to … Donald Trump.

No doubt, every day of the Trump presidency must be an agonizing mental comparison of the “only if …”  The bitterness and rage within her soul must be a consuming conflagration that intensifies rather than subsides.

As a result, the lady has gone bonkers.  As a defense … an explanation … of her failure, she appears to have created her own internal reality.  And when it rises to the surface like the hot magma of a volcano, it reveals her emotional state.

Since losing the election, Clinton has expressed several theories to explain her loss – and they all have to do with ignoring the facts and advancing her narrative-of-choice.  Most have to do with the Russians.  Though everyone concluded that the election was not stolen.  There were no examples of wholesale flipping of votes by Russians hacking into the various voting systems.

It was also reported – and conveniently forgotten – that some of the Russian disinformation campaigns on social media was directed against Trump – and that much of it was designed to trigger social unrest along racial lines.  But everyone from President Obama on down assured America that while there was Russian meddling it did not … repeat NOT … alter the outcome of the election.  It was much later when Democrats and their media cronies spun the narrative in a much different direction.

In the spirit that she did not lose the election, but it was stolen, Clinton now believes that had it not been for Russian meddling, she would have won the election in the Electoral College – although there is no evidence to support that claim.

Suffering from “the phone doesn’t ring much anymore,” – not to mention all those big-dollar speaking engagements – Clinton is using her limited exposure to the national spotlight to advance increasingly bizarre and irrational theories and accusations.

It is difficult to image that Clinton could conceivably top her latest.  In a recent podcast, the former First Lady alleged that Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard is a “Russian asset.”  Not just soft on Russia as a matter of policy, but as a witting operative of Vladimir Putin.

Clinton goes on to suggest that Gabbard will abandon her run for President in the Democratic primaries to become a third-party candidate for the sole purpose of siphoning off enough Democrat votes to get Trump re-elected.  That is unless the 2016 Green Party candidate, Jill Stein, serves in that role AGAIN.   Yes, again.

It seems Clinton believes Stein was part of the Russian meddling – a Putin asset – designed to take away votes from Democrats.  Under that theory, you might also believe that Ralph Nader was Russia’s guy to take votes from Vice President Al Gore.  And what international conspiracy empowered Ross Perot to damage the re-election effort of President George H. W. Bush?

Whatever her state of mind, Clinton’s public statements are increasingly sounding like a plot from a Russian novel.  Her only chance of preserving a reputation of dignity may be to take a vow of silence.

So, there ‘tis.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi recapped Wednesday’s tumultuous White House showdown with President Trump over Syria, saying she told him his troop pullout was a gift to Vladimir Putin, and questioned him about helping Saudi Arabia, before Trump had what she called “a meltdown.”

However, according to President Trump and others in the meeting, it was “Nervous Nancy” who had the “meltdown.” After Pelosi walked out on the meeting, the president took to Twitter, responding to the latest Democrat attacks questioning his mental health and saying that it was he who had the “meltdown.” Trump tweeted that either Pelosi has mental problems or she and other Democrats deliberately put their partisan interests above the interests of those of the country.

Pelosi reportedly stormed out of the meeting with top White House officials, citing disrespectful treatment by President Trump. Republican lawmakers who were at the meeting, however, have said Pelosi’s claims make no sense.

“Inside the meeting, what I listen to, the speaker referred to the President I thought was unbecoming. The only thing that happened in this meeting was the Democrat leadership got up and walked away. When there was a time of crisis, leaders should stay whether they like what is said or not and actually work to solve a problem.”

— Representative Kevin McCarthy ( R-Calif.)

Meanwhile, Democrats are increasingly focusing on the 2020 elections, while also continuing their push for presidential impeachment. Pelosi defended her party’s impeachment effort, saying it was about the rule of law, not electoral politics.

“I keep saying to people impeachment is about the truth and the Constitution of the United States. Any other issues that you have disapproving of the way the president has dealt with Syria, whatever the subject is, the reluctance and cowardice to do something about gun violence, the cruelty of not wanting to help our Dreamers and transgender people, the denial about the climate crisis we face, the list goes on,” she said. “That’s about the election. That has nothing to do with what is happening in terms of our oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution.”

Trump has slammed the impeachment process as a witch hunt and scam by the Democrats, because they know they can’t beat him at the ballot box.

As reported by the Associated Press and other news outlets, Maryland Rep. Elijah E. Cummings, died Thursday of complications from longstanding health problems. He was 68 years old. Cummings was a sharecropper’s son who rose to become a civil rights champion and the powerful chairman of one of the U.S. House committees leading an impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump.

As chairman of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, Cummings often found himself at odds with President Trump. Cummings led investigations of the president’s governmental dealings, including probes in 2019 relating to Trump’s family members serving in the White House.

Cummings died at Gilchrist Hospice Care, a Johns Hopkins affiliate. As chairman of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, he was one of the most powerful Democrats in Washington, and he has played a key role in the House Democrats’ ongoing efforts to impeach Trump.

Tributes poured in Thursday from lawmakers and others in politics on both sides of the aisle.

“I was shocked and saddened to learn the news this morning of my dear friend’s passing,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, a fellow Maryland Democrat, said in a statement. “Elijah Cummings was a man of principle, patriotism, and conviction, whose loss will be deeply felt throughout the State of Maryland and our country.”

At the White House, the flag was lowered to half-staff. Despite Cummings and Trump often tossing unkind words at one another, the president had nothing but praise for the deceased congressman.

“My warmest condolences to the family and many friends of Congressman Elijah Cummings,” Trump tweeted. “I got to see first-hand the strength, passion and wisdom of this highly respected political leader. His work and voice on so many fronts will be very hard, if not impossible, to replace!”

Cummings Had “Longstanding” Health Issues

Cummings’ office said in a brief statement that he died “due to complications concerning longstanding health challenges.” Cummings had been in ill health the past few years, navigating the Capitol in a motorized cart and using a walker.

“He worked until his last breath because he believed our democracy was the highest and best expression of our collective humanity,” his wife, Maya Rockeymoore Cummings, said Thursday.

Cummings did not return to work after an undisclosed medical procedure that he said would only keep him away for about a week. The New York Times reported that Cummings had heart surgery in 2017 and had a bacterial infection in his knee.

However, Cummings had not been seen the past few weeks at closed-door interviews, alongside House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff and Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel. Yet, every subpoena, document request or statement which was issued on impeachment of late was done in the name of all three committee chairs. New York Rep. Carolyn Maloney is next in seniority to take over the gavel of the committee.

The committee postponed a planned hearing Thursday.

Rudy Giuliani said that he was “disappointed” in former National Security Adviser John Bolton, after reports emerged that he had called Giuliani a “hand grenade” over his Ukraine investigations and that Bolton had told a top aide to alert a lawyer in the National Security Council over Giuliani’s apparent meddling in State affairs.

“I am disappointed in John,” Giuliani said in a statement to Fox News. “I’m not sure he realizes I received all this evidence as part of my representation of the president. It was all part of the evidence, and suppression of evidence, involving Ukrainian collusion and the origin of some of the false information against the president.”

The comments from the president’s personal attorney came after it emerged that Fiona Hill, a former senior director to Russian and Eurasian affairs, told lawmakers Monday that a meeting between Ukrainian and U.S. officials left her and Bolton so concerned that he told her to alert John Eisenberg, a lawyer at the NSC. According to the New York Times, Hill said Bolton told her to notify Eisenberg about the efforts by Giuliani, and acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and E.U. Ambassador Gordon Sondland to press Ukraine to investigate Democrats.

“I am not part of whatever drug deal Sondland and Mulvaney are cooking up,” Bolton allegedly told Hill, according to the Times. Hill said Bolton had previously called Giuliani a “hand grenade who’s going to blow everyone up.”

The dramatic testimony demonstrated how Giuliani and others’ efforts to investigate activity in Ukraine — particularly that of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter– has split the White House.

House Democrats launched an impeachment inquiry last month, alleging that Trump withheld crucial US military aid to Ukraine in an attempt to force the Ukrainians into investigating his political opponent — specifically Biden’s role in the firing of a top prosecutor who had been investigating a Ukrainian gas company, where Hunter Biden sat on the board.

Trump has denied any quid pro quo, and claims instead that he was only looking to crackdown on corruption. He has instead attempted to direct attention to Hunter Biden’s activities in both Ukraine and China.

As the impeachment inquiry has heated up, it has also brought more scrutiny to Giuliani’s role in spearheading a separate investigation into Ukraine. The New York Times reported Friday that prosecutors in Manhattan are investigating whether the former New York City mayor broke lobbying laws in his own dealings with Ukraine. On Monday, Reuters first reported that Giuliani’s firm had been paid $500,000 in 2018 by one of the two Ukrainian-American businessmen arrested last week on campaign finance charges.

Trump gave his backing to Giuliani on Saturday, tweeting that he was a “great guy and wonderful lawyer.”

“So now they are after the legendary “crime buster” and greatest Mayor in the history of NYC, Rudy Giuliani. He may seem a little rough around the edges sometimes, but he is also a great guy and wonderful lawyer,” he tweeted. “Such a one-sided Witch Hunt going on in USA. Deep State. Shameful!”

As the White House reels, and the press swarms like angry bees around the Impeachment Inquiry of President Donald Trump, many have forgotten that the draft report on potential abuse by FISA by IG Horowitz remains in review, and now set to be released by “the end of this week.”

Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo says the report by Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz is expected to be published on Friday, October 18th, and she says her sources expect it to cover “more than just FISA abuse.”

Bartiromo tweeted this thing is “as thick as a phone book.”

As the Washington Examiner reports, “it has been exactly one month since Horowitz announced the completion of the investigation by his team, who pored over more than 1 million records and conducted 100-plus interviews. The inspector general gave a draft to the Justice Department and FBI for a classification review. Upon the completion of that process, the report will first be delivered to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, who has pledged to do a “deep dive” of his own into FISA that will run concurrently with U.S. Attorney John Durham’s review of the early stages of the Russia investigation. The South Carolina Republican said his “No. 1 goal” is to have as much of the report declassified as possible.”

Last week, U.S. District Judge John Bates praised IG Horowitz for what he said was a thorough job, and what he expects to be a “fair and accurate” report.

“I expect a very thorough report — a very fair report from Michael Horowitz. He’s a good inspector general. He’s careful,” Bates said. Bates added later that he expects the report to be “pretty lengthy.”

Bates’ assessment of Horowitz bolsters the watchdog’s credibility at a time when he will find himself yet again at the center of a political firestorm when the FISA report is released to the public next week, if Bartiromo’s sources are accurate.

Horowitz Has Already Taken Fire

Bates’ compliments of Horowitz ahead of the report’s release come as the IG’s integrity has already been called into question, most notably by someone mentioned in his probe — disgraced former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe. McCabe was fired last year after a report from Horowitz found that he made unauthorized disclosures to the media and misled investigators. In a legal fight against the Justice Department over his ouster, McCabe’s lawyers slammed Horowitz’s report as being “deeply flawed.”

Horowitz has been talking with U.S. Attorney John Durham, who is handling any criminal referrals from the investigation. As to what exactly the report says, Bates could not guess. Despite the rumors of a coming bombshell that could hit Democrats hard, “I don’t have a prediction for whether he is going to find fault and mistakes or worse and at what levels. Because remember that the sign-offs on these applications in the Department of Justice and the FBI were pretty high levels,” he said.

Satunch Trump supporter, Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., literally got the boot on Monday when he tried to sit in on the testimony of a Fiona Hill, former top National Security Council expert on Russia who was appearing on Capitol Hill as part of the House impeachment inquiry into the president.

Gaetz, who sits on the House Judiciary Committee, attempted to attend the testimony of Hill, but was told that because he was not a member of the House Intelligence Committee that he had to leave. The House Intelligence, Oversight and Foreign Affairs committees are conducting the impeachment inquiry into Trump.

A frustrated Gaetz aired his disappointment to reporters after being told he was not welcome to sit in on the hearing, venting his anger over what he says are “selective leaks” by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and questioning why he was not allowed to be present during Hill’s testimony. Gaetz added that the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., was involved in the impeachment inquiry.

“It’s not like I’m on agriculture,” Gaetz said. “What are the Democrats so afraid of?”

A visibly annoyed Gaetz followed his comments with a tweet calling the impeachment inquiry a kangaroo court and using one of Trump’s favorite nicknames for the intelligence committee chairman, “Shifty Schiff.”

“Judiciary Chairman [Jerry Nadler] claimed to have begun the impeachment inquiry weeks ago,” Gaetz tweeted. “Now, his own Judiciary members aren’t even allowed to participate in it. And yes – my constituents want me actively involved in stopping the #KangarooCourtCoup run by Shifty Schiff.”

Republicans Rally Around Trump

Other Republicans closely aligned with Trump continued on Monday to complain about Schiff and his handling of the impeachment inquiry – with Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, also lambasting the California Democrat for excluding some congressional Republicans from the testimonies and for leaking “cherry-picked” information from the closed-door hearings to the press.

“She was going to come voluntarily but he’s going to subpoena her I believe so he can ask certain questions and again keep those secret except for the certain things that he wants to leak, the cherry-picked information to the American people,” Jordan said of Schiff before Hill appeared on Capitol Hill to testify. “The tragedy here and the crime here is that the American people don’t get to see what’s going on in these sessions,” Jordan said.

Hill’s testimony comes ahead of a planned Thursday appearance by Gordon Sondland, Trump’s hand-picked Ambassador to the European Union, and follows the revelation of a cache of text messages from top envoys, which have provided a vivid account of their work acting as intermediaries around the time Trump urged Ukraine’s new president, Volodymr Zelenskiy, to start investigations into a company linked to the family of a chief Democratic presidential rival, Joe Biden.

One witness who may not be called before Congress is the still anonymous government whistleblower who touched off the impeachment inquiry. Top Democrats say testimony and evidence coming in from other witnesses, and even the president himself, are backing up the whistleblower’s account of what transpired during Trump’s July 25 phone call with Zelenskiy.

Schiff said Sunday, “We don’t need the whistleblower, who wasn’t on the call, to tell us what took place during the call. We have the best evidence of that.” He added it “may not be necessary” to reveal the whistleblower’s identity as the House gathers evidence.

“Our primary interest right now is making sure that that person is protected,” Schiff said.

Despite the shocking news of a recent Fox News poll that found that now 51% of Americans are in favor of President Trump’s impeachment and removal from office, the majority of Republicans, still staunchly support the embattled president.

In reality, the Fox survey is not that different from other recent polls on the subject. But some media types like to say “even Fox” has found such-and-such, as if it’s a survey of the network’s viewers rather than its widely respected professional polling operation.

However, not surprisingly one of those who are displeased with the Fox poll, and their reporting of it, is Trump.

“From the day I announced I was running for President, I have NEVER had a good @FoxNews Poll,” he tweeted. “Whoever their Pollster is, they suck. But @FoxNews is also much different than it used to be in the good old days.” He went on to name some of his least favorite network figures–Andrew Napolitano, Shep Smith, Donna Brazile–but added, “Oh well, I’m President!”

But there’s the thing when you drill down on the poll, it reflects the same old partisan chasm that has defined Trump’s presidency since Inauguration Day.

According to the poll, 85% of Democrats support impeachment and removal; independents are split, with 39% in favor, and 36% not in favor. Most importantly, only 13% of Republicans back impeaching and expelling Trump from office.

Now, it may be noteworthy that more than one in 10 Republicans want Trump gone. But if you’re a Republican senator, and the country is almost evenly split on impeachment, and the vast majority of your party opposes it, you’re not exactly under withering pressure to abandon your president.

Another point to note, overall in the Fox poll, the president’s approval drifted down only a couple of points, to 43 percent. And perhaps, most telling, upon closer examination the Fox poll contains a silver lining for the president after all. While 69 percent of those surveyed find Trump’s dealings with Ukraine’s leader extremely, very or somewhat troubling, 62 percent say the same about his allegations against Biden and his son’s business dealings in Ukraine and China.

The elitist liberal press predicates days of repetitious reporting on two assumptions – which they claim are facts.  Assumptions are NOT facts.

First is the claim that President Trump wanted Ukrainian President to “make up dirt” on former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter “for political purposes.” At best, that is one person’s theory – spin.  It is not an established fact by the transcript of the conversation or any of the secondary commentary.

It is equally reasonable – and there is hard evident to support it – that President Trump was continuing the United States interest in ferreting out corruption in Ukraine and that the Biden issue was just one example.  It is just as arguable that Biden was mentioned because it was the most prominent example in which there was legitimate suspicion.

Biden, the Democrats and their media allies say that the Bidens have been investigated and totally exonerated.  There is no there there.  That is simply untrue – nothing more than a partisan narrative.  Several publications usually friendly to Democrats raised questions and suspicions of Hunter’s seemingly lucrative business deals based on nothing more than his father’s power and influence.

The case-in-point was the fact that young Biden was provided a $60,000 PER MONTH part-time long-distance position on the board of Bursima, a major oil company in Ukraine, despite that fact that Hunter is without any obvious experience in the energy business, was not associated with Ukraine previously and had a personal work history that would question his ability to attain any high-level job anywhere in the world on his own.

To make matters worse, the company that “hires” Hunter is deeply involved in the corruptive environment of Ukraine and headed by an oligarch often cited as one of the corruptors.  This was before the reform candidate, Volodymyr Zelensky, was elected President.

As Vice President of the United States, daddy Biden travels to Ukraine to say that the United States will withhold American funds much needed by Ukraine in their fight against Russia unless the lead prosecutor is replaced.  He wanted a favor – a quid pro quo – from the widely recognized corrupt leadership in Kyiv.   (Hmmm.  Does that sound like what they accuse Trump of doing?)

Some say the dismissed prosecutor was investigating Bursima and some say he was one of the corrupt officials.  That is irrelevant because his successor did not investigate Bursima and the Biden connection.  That was simply a declaration from Biden’s new hand-picked prosecutor.  Well, duh!

When Biden & Company say that Hunter did nothing wrong, that is because there was no real investigation.  If the FBI had not looked into Al Capone’s tax evasion, old Scarface could also have claimed to have “done nothing wrong.”

Of course, “doing nothing wrong” and “doing nothing illegal” are also two different things – as we see in so many of the accusations against Trump.  Most of the accusations against Trump deal with alleged improprieties that would unlikely hold up in a court-of-law – even though Democrats and the media claim they would.

The concern over Hunter’s Ukraine dealings gains a degree of legitimacy when he traveled on Air Force Two to China with his dad and comes home with a billion-dollar deal for his consulting business – in which the son of former Secretary of State John Kerry is Hunter’s partner.  Small world.

It is clear that as Vice President, Joe Biden did help his son get access to extraordinarily lucrative deals with nations that had – at the time – a troubling relationship with the United States.  The extraordinary amounts of money involved seem to far exceed the professional capabilities of the recipients – and even of far more knowledgeable and capable professionals.

There is enough there there to warrant a serious investigation of Hunter Biden.  What service did he provide  to the corrupt oligarch and his company?  What does he know about the alleged corrupt activities of the aforementioned?  What would legitimately cause any business to hire Hunter at such an extraordinary pay grade? No matter how you wish to interpret Trump’s motivation in pursing an investigation of the Biden boys, it is still very worthy of a full and thorough investigation.

So, there ‘tis.

Fox News has recently reported that an alleged “Chinese spy” who was arrested for trespassing at President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was tasked by her handler to target not only the President, but the Clintons.

According to court documents, Yujing Zhang, 33, had been urged by “her handler” to target the Clintons and billionaire businessman Warren Buffett. Zhang, who is scheduled to be sentenced on Nov. 22, was caught by Secret Service agents with troves of technology embedded with malware and thousands of dollars in cash after she claimed that she was at Trump’s prestigious club to attend a “United Nations friendship event” that had apparently been canceled. Her bizarre behavior and backstory led to suspicions that she was actually an operative for the Chinese government, but she was not charged with espionage or related crimes.

Zhang apparently purchased a $20,000 travel package from Li Weitian, also known as Charles Lee, who advertised tickets on the Chinese social media site WeChat promising access to events across the U.S. to meet prominent political and business figures.

Lee ran the United Nations Chinese Friendship Association, which is not affiliated with the U.N., and was photographed at least twice with Cindy Yang, a Republican donor and former Florida massage parlor owner who organized events at Mar-a-Lago.

Upon learning that the event at Mar-a-Lago had been canceled, Lee tried to convince Zhang to attend another event on Wall Street in New York City. Text messages between the pair released by the South Florida court that Bill and HIllary Clinton were scheduled to be at that event.

“Regarding the event at the Trump’s estate, it’s been put on hold for now. We can forget about it. We have two other activities now. I sent them to you already,” Lee texted Zhang on March 26, four days before she was arrested on the Trump property.

At the time of her arrest, Zhang told federal agents that she did not know that the event had been canceled, a claim contradicted by her messages.

According to court records, Lee had urged Zhang to go to “Clinton’s event, Clinton and his wife Hillary,” he said, offering her a ticket for $60,000. “There are politicians and the finance people that you talked about wanting to meet in this event. You can meet with these two famous people in one setting. Hillary was the former Secretary of State, equivalent to the Prime Minister. That is very extraordinary. Er… you can stand in between them and have a photo taken.” In the same message, Lee also says, “You can also go to Buffett’s event which is particularly for investment and finance,” referring to business mogul Warren Buffett.

In subsequent messages, Zhang asked Lee for her money back after hearing of the cancellation but ended up traveling from Shanghai to Florida anyway. Her motives for going to the property and lying to Secret Service agents at Mar-a-Lago remain unclear.

I sincerely extend my best wishes to Bernie Sanders for a speedy recover from his heart attack and stent operation.  The operation is not all that serious – although underlying causes can be.  The only delay in getting back to full activity is waiting for the incision into the artery near the groin to heal.  These days it does not qualify as major surgery.  It can often be done as an outpatient procedure.

How do I know that?  I have more than a half dozen of those little devices in my body.  Anymore and they will send me to the metal scrapyard when I die.

The fact that Sanders suffered a “mild heart attack” makes a difference.  Such heart attacks are not a grim foreboding of a limited future.  Many people – me included – had had them. So, from what we know, Sanders should be okay.  But this medical emergency is have an effect.

The outlook for his political future is not so optimistic.  For months, he and Elizabeth Warren had been running neck-and-neck for the leadership of the progressive Democrats – which currently make up a majority in the party.  Once that happened, I have long predicted that the Biden lead would vanish. And so, it has.

Sanders has been slipping for several weeks (not referring to his fall in the shower that required a few stitches).  For the far left, the choice will be which of these two candidates – Warren or Sanders – has the best chance to beat Trump. The momentum is moving in Warren’s direction.

She appears to have three advantages over Sanders.  She is a woman.  That appeals to the progressives.   As much as they love the old curmudgeon, he is still an old white male – a political breed as unpopular with those on the left as the billionaires Sanders attacks so much.

The second advantage Warren has is that, despite the fact that she and Sanders are identical twins in terms of the issues, her I-have-a-plan-for-everything has been far more effective as a campaign pitch than Sanders’ I-hate-billionaires drone.

The third advantage is age and energy.  For sure, Warren – at the age of 70 —  is not a spring chicken.  But she performs on stage – and off – like the Energizer Bunny.  It seems to be a presidential campaign affectation since she has been more sedate in her senate campaigns.  It is her way of drawing a comparison to the two old men she hopes to defeat – Sanders and Biden.

Both Sanders and Biden would hit their 80s in the first term.  Warren would never hit 80 during a two-term tenure.  In fact, Warren would be about the same age as Sanders is today AFTER serving two terms in office.

Though not life threatening, Sanders stent operation shows that he has Coronary Heart Disease.  Most old folks do.  He is a reminder that the odds against being alive, healthy and – most importantly –functional for the next nine years is not very good.  Very few people survive their 80s – and even fewer retain physical and mental facility sufficient to maintain an active lifestyle.

Most people understand that – and that is why Sanders’ stent operation is likely to cost him votes and continue his downward slide.  Warren is likely to pick up those votes and use them to overcome Biden’s current lead.

It is not a matter of how they perform today, but how they are likely to perform in the future.  Former President Jimmy Carter put it bluntly – declaring that 80 is too damn old to be President.  Sanders’ operation is a warning flag – and it points the issue in Biden’s direction as well.  With more than a year to go until the 2020 General Election, I would not be surprised to see another one or two “health scares” for Sanders or Biden.

So, there ‘tis.