The Friday Night Dump

Reporters are making much of the “Friday-night dump” of the Clintons’ tax returns. And by the way the reporters speak of it, the “dump” must be a recurring event. Politicians hope therby to slip something by the press. It is believed that the weekend papers have too much extra content, and real newsy stories stand a good chance of being overlooked and then forgotten by weekenders escaping the city.
Does anyone remember that one favorite tactic of Adolf Hitler’s was his Friday night decrees which contained infamous policies destructive of the “democracy” of the Weimar Republic. Such was one political use of the “Friday night dump” by one of the world’s most hated totalitarians.

Are our politicians taking a page out of the history of totalitarianism? Or is it a smart political means of slipping bad news past the press and the public? Oh, well, newspaper reading seems to be going out of style, according to what I hear, and the entertainment function of media is overtaking the news-reporting and editorial functions. Called, “amusing ourselves to death.”

The tax returns reveal that the Clinton’s have substantial wealth. How does it affect their policy-making for the not well-to-do? It certainly made a contribution to keeping Hillary’s campaign afloat. In a vote of dollars, Obama is winning the election. I do not believe that the tax returns should have been treated by the Clintons as a “Friday night Dump”, or was the release just coincidentally on Friday?