No Press Intimidation by Trump - hence: BREAKING REPORT: Melania Trump Was A Sex Worker After Moving To United States - repeating story the Trump Attorneys are now making bigger story than it was

There is a story in a major British newspaper The Daily Mail, which reports that there are now stories that Melania Trump, who was a nude model in her past - that is not under question, had also been an Escort model ie a hooker ie a prostitute and has been working as a hooker, ie Escort in New York before she married Donald Trump. I do take it upon myself to ridicule and laugh at Donald Trump's absurd political run this year. I did laugh at Melania when she was caught plagiarizing Michelle Obama's speech at the Republican Convention in July and as it since emerged, she has lied about having a college degree from Ljubljana University in Slovenia, which she does not (they have removed references to the fake degree from her website since this news broke out). But this blog is not at war with Trump's third wife, bought by Trump sixteen years ago, to rear some kids for Trump that Trump himself won't bother to get to know until they've grown up to be adults. Wives, that Trump buys from East Europe and replaces roughly every 16 years. I was mainly focused on mocking Trump himself.

So there is an American website, Liberal America, where a brave writer Andrew Bradford, wrote about the Melania Trump Escort modelling background, referencing the British stories via The Daily Mail. A perfectly valid commentary of a public person - Melania Trump volunteered herself into the public domain when she joined the campaign with her husband. She is now open to public stories as a public person. And Andrew Bradford's writing was fairly reporting what others had published. Andrew Bradford did not start the insinuations of Melania Trump having been a hooker ie prostitute ie Escort model; he repeated what was published by a British newspaper and which still today stands on their website.

The Trump attorneys attacked Liberal America and Andrew Bradford insisting he must apologize or be sued .Andrew is not rich enough to defend himself against a Billionaire's attorney attack-dogs so he relented and wrote an apology. Its quite an epic apology which does its best to keep all of the accusations still in view, and he also published in full the attorney's letter. A letter which uses such phrases as "Melania Trump was a sex worker after moving to the United States" haha. So it is that letter in verbatim, which is now on the blogsite and further hopefully adding to smear Melania Trump's name. But still, I feel very strongly about freedom of speech and feel a strong personal sense of support to Mr Bradfort that I have never met. I have never even heard of their publication, the Liberal America. But I now of course add my blog to the support of that issue. I link from this blog to Liberal America and I urge my readers to go read Andrew's very smart article where he deals with the attorneys' demand for apology.

I will also now for the record repeat all the issues that were raised by Melania Trump's ATTORNEYS

Melania Trump was a sex worker after moving to the United States

Melania Trump, the current wife of the GOP nominee for the White House, worked as an escort shortly after she first moved to the United States and was a favorite of rich men such as her current husband.

On the one hand, they [the girls] pretended to be models, but they principally earned money as elite escorts. They even had two composite cards (presentation cards held by each model) — with two photos and basic information such as measurements, eye and hair color, and agency details.

The second card…listed whether or not the woman liked older men and what her sexual skills in the bedroom were.

The modeling agency Melania signed with after arriving in New York was owned by Paolo Zampolli, who allegedly used the agency as a front for an escort service.

I am quoting VERBATIM from the letter as sent by Melania Trump's attorneys. You can compared the exact words to what is in the original pdf attorney's letter on the Liberal America website. 

This blog will stand for freedom of the press. This blog also will not stand for intimidation. Those words will stand on this blog forever. Donald Trump and his attorneys will not be able to get me to retract those words and I will add more.

Melania Trump was a nude model. That is beyond question. Donald Trump was unfaitful to his earlier wife. That is beyond dispute. Donald Trump was accused of raping his wife and went to court about it. That is beyond dispute. Melania Trump gave a plagiarized speech using Michelle Obama's words and has yet to apologize for it. That is beyond dispute and tells us all we need to know about the lack of any morally redeeming character in Melania Trump. Melania Trump claimed under oath in a court case to have a university degree from Ljbuljanka University in Slovenia which she does not have. That is not beyond dispute. Melania Trump is exactly the type of slimy slut personality who would sell herself to a sleazebag like Donald Trump - a man who posed as an imaginary publicist, using the alias 'John Miller' who bragged about the women Trump was supposedly having sex with. Those stories are as fake as his alleged status of being a Billionaire.

There are LOTS of matters that ARE in dispute. When did the Trumps get married. Donald Trump himself seems confused about the year. Was Melania in the USA married to someone else before Trump. What visa did she come into the USA under, was Slovenia part of the visa regime she now claims, when she arrived, and has she worked illegally with a visa not allowing work. All this could be easily resolved if Melania Trump gave the press conference she promised about her immigration status. Those promises are as worthless as a degree from Trump University and as likely to be seen as Trump's tax returns.

What is not in dispute is that Melania Trump sold her naked body at least in pictures. She was a nude model. This is not in dispute. She has been claimed in multiple press stories from the USA to UK to her home country of Slovenia, to having been an Escort Model, which means hooker, which means prostitute, which is of course illegal in New York. She'd have been not only working illegally with visa but doing work which itself is illegal. I understand Melania Trump is freaking out that the truth is coming out, but its her past. She should not have married a guy who wants to run for President, because this shit will come out. And Trump, he should have done some 'extreme vetting' of his wife before marrying an Escort model.

Now on the reason why I write this. I hate to see Andrew Bradford at the Liberal America website bullied into a bogus apology. Trump himself should apologize to the Khan family and the US prisoners of war, and to Megyn Kelly and to Mexicans and to the Pope and to blacks and to Hillary Clinton and to Ted Cruz and his dad, and to President Obama and so forth. Andrew Bradford and Liberal America reported on a fair story that was published by reputable media. He has nothing to apologize for. I ask any bloggers and journalists and writers to join Andrew Bradfort in supporting him and the website Liberal America, that this kind of intimidation will not succeed. It is truly Vladimir Putin-esque of Trump to go after the free media like this. Shame on you Donald Trump. This will not stand!

Comments

[paul]

Also Daily Mail has gotten sued by Melania Trump! What is strange with this is that actually Daily Mail has published the article that throws doubts over Melania Trump was an escort.

Melania Trump pursues Daily Mail over '100% false' rumors about her past

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/22/melania-trump-lawsuit-daily-mail

[paul]

Trump, the wife of the Republican presidential nominee, has placed The Daily Mail and other news organizations "on notice... for making false and defamatory statements about her supposedly having been an 'escort' in the 1990s," Charles Harder, a lawyer for Trump, said in a statement. [from: Melania Trump threatens to sue news outlets http://money.cnn.com/2016/08/22/media/melania-trump-threatens-to-sue-news-outlets/ ]

Melania's Fury: Trump's Wife Threatens to Sue Websites That She Says Falsely Suggested She Was Once an Escort
http://www.insideedition.com/headlines/18245-melanias-fury-trumps-wife-threatens-to-sue-websites-that-she-says-falsely-suggested-she-was

[Winter]

Tomi
"Melania Trump is exactly the type of slimy slut personality who would sell herself to a sleazebag like Donald Trump"

Personally, I really do not care whether Mrs Trump was a sex worker in the past (I would actually vote for a sex-worker who represents my views and interests). From her public appearances, I think I would not like Mrs Trump's personality and she might be a match to Donald himself in morality.

However, I do not think she is more of a "slut" than Donald himself. It seems to me she is now judged on behavior she was paid to perform by rich American men.

In this case, I even think it is a good deed to marry a foreign sex worker and give her a home. That is one positive thing I would grant Donald. Albeit that his treatment of her most likely negates all the good karma of this deed.

[Isceald Glede]

The possibility that Melania Trump was once a sex worker means nothing to me. What consenting adults do together and why they do it is their own business. Making laws against the oldest profession just puts women in more danger. Her marriage to Donald suggests remarkable levels of tolerance for which she deserves respect. Working without a visa is a bit more questionable. The idea of having laws against working for a living seems strange to me, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nannygate suggests this is a socially acceptable way to make the minimum wage apply only to US citizens.
The plagiarism has two possibilities: If she wrote the speech then she owes Michelle Obama an apology. If she didn't, then she owes an apology to the speech writer for when she tried to pass that work off as her own.
Possible typo: degree from Ljbuljanka ... That is not beyond dispute.
Tomi, is the 'not' an accident? Claiming a qualification she has not earned is really bad, but not quite as bad as unleashing a horde of lawyers against people accurately reporting a past she would rather keep secret, and for that I wish Melania a happy Streisand effect.

[sgtrock]

So far as I'm concerned, Melania's possible or even probable past as a sex worker should have no bearing whatsoever on Trump's suitability as a candidate. Any issues that should arise rightfully are personal ones The Donald and her. For heaven's sake, sexual issues certainly didn't seem to have much effect on Kennedy's or Clinton's ability to govern (to name just two on the opposite side of the aisle).

Nope, what I'm far more interested in is this whole new release of 15,000 emails that's been all over the news.

From everything that I've read to date, Hillary did the right thing from a procedural standpoint. She let a team of lawyers set up a search engine that, based upon subject line, generated a raw dump of emails that was forwarded on to the Departments of Justice (FBI) and State for review. That's _exactly_ how she should have handled it from an evidentiary perspective. Stay hands off so no possibility of evidence tampering could be alleged in court. If that's what she really did, then she did everything correctly and the "new" release very likely has no bombshells in it.

On the other hand, if she personally or her staff did personally vet the emails that were released, then she may have cherry picked emails to hide that will now come out. Personally, I'd say the odds of that were vanishingly low but it's certainly possible. Questions that I have not seen answers for at this point:

1) Where did the new dump come from?
2) How was it generated?
3) Is there any overlap with the original 30,000?

Anyone know?

[cornelius]

Some of the previous commenters here have said that Melania's sexual life is not relevant to the political debate. Fair enough. But let's remember that Trump has actively spread rumors about Cruz's father killing Kennedy, Bill Clinton being a rapist, Hillary Clinton being not healthy, Obama not being born in the US. Is it OK for Trump to smear his political opponents but not OK to smear him and his slutty wife? Karma is a bitch. Thank you, Tomi, for helping spread the word about Melania. Trump deserves every bit of dirt and then some.

[sgtrock]

As my sainted mother used to say, "Two wrongs don't make a right." ;-)

[Winter]

@sgtrock
"Two wrongs don't make a right."

My thoughts.

The Donald is a hypocrite, and that is one of his lesser vices. Melania is his wife and most likely had only little influence on the whole circus surrounding her. It is not morally right to use her as a stick to beat Donald. Unless you want to show the world you are just as despicable as he is.

[sgtrock]

@Winter;

Thank you! That is a great articulation of my thoughts as well.

[cornelius]

OK, let's leave Melania alone. How about Trump using 55,000 from campaign funds to buy his own book? I mean clearly the book is invaluable. what's a few tens of thousands of dollars for such a great book? The best book.

http://www.cnbc.com/2016/08/24/donald-trump-used-campaign-funds-to-buy-his-own-book-report.html

[sgtrock]

Oh, I don't think we have to leave Melania /completely/ alone. As Tomi pointed out, she never did apologize for plagiarizing Michelle. She doesn't get a pass from me on that one. Nor, for that matter, does The Donald or the rest of the campaign team. ;-)

As to the book buying? I could see the campaign buying a bunch for giveaways as long as Trump doesn't profit from it. That would mean foregoing any royalties. Knowing what a slimeball he is, I'm not expecting to hear that he has.

Frankly, what I find truly breathtaking is just how blatant all of his ripoffs are. If there were any other context except a Presidential election, he wouldn't be on the campaign trail. He would be sitting in a jail cell somewhere sweating at the thought of a whole slew of charges instead.

[grouch]

If accepting royalties for those books amounts to conversion of campaign funds, how can the Donald legally be renting rooms and services to the campaign (even before the recent quadrupling of fees)?

[cornelius]

@grouch It's quintupling, not quadrupling.

In other news: Donald Trump delivers his biggest insult yet, demeaning celebrities for their not-hotness

Because the hotness is the only thing that matters. His wife is hot, that's what's important. The fact that she is a whore is of no importance.
PS: Please note the Twitter reaction at the end about Scott Baio not being hot :-)

http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/trailguide/la-na-trailguide-updates-not-hot-donald-trump-lodges-his-1472067484-htmlstory.html

[Tomi T Ahonen]

Hi everybody

Thank you for the comments. I also agree with those holding a more should we say 'libertarian' view about sex workers, I think its a legitimate job and should be legal and be protected by laws and not be hidden in crime etc. So say like they have in the state of Nevada or in many European countries. I also don't think its a reason to vote against Trump who has far far greater reasons to disqualify him from becoming President. What this blog was about, is primarily the press intimidation tactics of the Trump Campaign and that I object to vehemently, also it attacks Melania Trump personally for her lies and especially the fact she still has not apologized to Michelle Obama for delivering a speech that clearly plagiarized from her speech - something we later learned, was based on the fact that Melania loved that speech by Michelle. All the more telling about her personality (Melania's) that she still won't apologize for having stolen from Michelle (and ironically, she stole specifically a passage claiming to have learned honesty and integrity).

So yes karma is a bitch. I had a long hashtag game episode attacking Melania around her plagiarism and had a great time with that, back in July, ran all night with great laughter. But at some point I felt sorry for her, that this race is not Hillary vs Melania, it is Hillary vs Trump and Melania didn't write that speech even though she at one point claimed she did, and I felt it was enough. She had put herself up to taking the heat, she got burned, but that was enough. I shifted my attention back on Donald Trump.

This is different. Now a minor story of a British typical newspaper - of what seems to be very clearly also Melania's real past - and painfully consistent with the parts that have already come out - could have been a minor forgotten story. Instead, the Trump attorneys are unleashed on some media outlets. And then of course that is by CHOICE what the Trump team wants to draw attention to. So be it. Then I will continue to make a lot of fun ridiculing Melania in whatever chances I get, and keep reminding all that she is reportedly a hooker, a prostitute, an Escort.

Incidentally, while this is a forgotten trivial tech blog in the murky hidden nether regions of the interwebs, when I did a Google search yesterday on Melania Trump Prostitute, this blog shows up on page 6 of the search results. Thats bad enough that Melania's life reputation will forever have more damage simply because of this one blog. Trump doesn't understand how the internet works. On 'hooker' and 'escort' the search was lower but for 'sex worker' this blog story came up on the second page of Google search hits. Thats real damage to her reputation forever. I had never heard of this writer or even of that Liberal America news site. But this blog has had 4 million visits lifetime, so when this blog links to someone else, we do get heavier attention by Google than a random smaller blog. And that while a tiny step, is one more that will damage her reputation, courtesy of her attorneys.

This is the 'Communities Dominate' ethos of this blog that I use when I feel it justified, like in the past with some tech leaders (Elop) but also at times when some other entity needs to be mocked and need a stain onto their online reputation.

If Melania Trump was a normal person with normal values, and gave a speech plagiarizing someone she admires - due no fault of her own, because someone on her staff was lazy or incompetent - any normal person would have had an apology to Michelle Obama immediately (and of course any normal Campaign would have fired the speechwriter). She has a warped sick sense of values not to do that. The TEAM has admitted there was plagiarism. She KNOWS what that means. Yet she hasn't apologized. So she 'deserves' this. She has no 'benefit of the doubt' and no 'good will' for earning some latitude.

Separately is the lying about her university degree. That now shows more of this deceitful character flaw and this attempt to invent a different past for herself. Yeah, you may get away with lies but not if you run for President you don't. Not as the wife of someone running for President. Did Trump KNOW that her university degree was not real? He probably did, and that makes Trump a fool for attempting to run with this deception. Its possible Trump didn't know and now this revellation is adding more strain to their relationship. If you notice, Melania is not much seen on the trail, and it may be part of the reason Trump is so Grumpy.

Anyway, because the attorneys attacked the media, especially very weak ones who can't afford a proper legal defense, then the least we can do on this blog, is to come to that defense and help spread that story, try to prevent this from becoming more 'normal'. But I appreciate the comments and I'll now move onto the current issues of the race (I wonder if we should keep that debate on the other thread or here?)

Anyway, a thorough analysis of TV ads of the cycle, accumulating all TV ads both in money spent and actual TV ads aired, by both sides - in the context of all pro and against ads by SuperPACs and also, very interestingly, the context of OTHER political ads by local races for Senator, Governor, etc - is at the Wesleyan University site. FASCINATING results. Check them out

http://mediaproject.wesleyan.edu/releases/aug-2016/

The study measures the total visibility 'this cycle' including primaries so from January to now, August. It includes a separate mention of now the first week of when Trump has aired ads in 4 states. But overall - the total TV ad spending is roughly on par with the last Presidential year, 2012. About half of all ads spent have been on the Presidential race, the other half local races. Whats totally wrong, is that Trump's Campaign has spent nearly nothing, so the rough parity to year 2012 reflects a growth of about 25% vs 2012, by the other parties, combined, if we ignore the main Republican Candidate's campaign (Romney of 2012 or Trump of 2016).

So most ads seen have not been only Hillary. Her ads (and those of her SuperPAC) have had roughly the same level of ad exposure as other local TV ads run for Congress or Mayor or Senator or Governor etc. And missing in action has been Trump.

I'll dig into those numbers later, you may want to do so too and please post comments. Its really fascinating and very deep. I only wish we had a breakdown of the last month, separate from the 7 month total, so we could see the 'current' race more clearly. But nonetheless, that one week of real Trump vs Hillary is also telling. In the top markets there are a few places where Trump is AHEAD of Hillary's TV ads but others of the 4 states where they fight, where she is ahead. This is as to be expected, now the Campaigns react to each others' moves and see how the race is forming.

BUT I think its fair to say, the damage by the TV ad superiority by Hillary is one of the main forces driving her dramatically better performance in the battleground states, than her overall essentially stagnant lead of about 5 points in the national race. This is further helped/hurt by the past Trump nonsense campaign of rallies, which he now is trying to remedy.

Anyway, enjoy the analysis and lets discuss

Tomi Ahonen :-)

[cornelius]

NY Times has a fresh forecast about the Senate race

"The Democrats have a 60% chance of winning the Senate"

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/upshot/senate-election-forecast.html

[Isceald Glede]

@GF:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines

[Eduardo M]

Rural versus urban for Trump versus Clinton

http://www.npr.org/2016/08/18/490240652/is-rural-resentment-driving-voters-to-donald-trump

[Wayne Borean]

Nigel Farage thinks Trump is a wonderful Presidential candidate!

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-08-25/ukip-s-farage-champions-trump-at-rally-in-mississippi

[Wayne Borean]

Obama will only impose martial law if it looks like Trump will win.

http://canadafreepress.com/article/obama-will-only-impose-martial-law-if-it-looks-like-trump-will-win?utm_source=fark&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=im

[Winter]

@Wayne Borean
Nigel Farage has no one else to go to. Even his own party, Ukip is tearing itself apart.

http://heatst.com/world/suzanne-evans-ukip-should-be-celebrating-not-tearing-itself-apart/