Here are my observations and opinions of my selected news of the day.

THE OFTEN-CRITICIZED Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell deserves an attaboy for his leadership in persuading his colleagues that 15 judge positions needed to be approved before he would order a recess allowing them to go home to campaign.

I was reminded of the accompanying 1957 photo of then Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson “persuading” Sen. Theodore Green, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. While I’m sure Mitch didn’t use the in-your-face tactics of LBJ, he got results.

And that’s not the whole story. In addition to shepherding two Supreme Court nominees through the gauntlet of self-serving senators, he was able to gain confirmation for 84 conservative judges approved for the important district and appeals courts in the past 20 months. Don’t underestimate the importance of that achievement.

Jonathan Turley, professor at the George Washington University school of law, called Senator McConnell “the master of the legislative process.”

Now if we can just get Mitch interested in the rest of the president’s agenda.

A GOOD QUESTION – Red State asks, “Does CNN turning on Kyrsten Sinema mean the Democrats are calling it quits in Arizona?” It reports that in a new poll the “looney left Democrat” is down by six points to Martha McSally.

The question surfaced when a piece by Andrew Kaczynski, a highly partisan CNN reporter ran an article detailing Sinema’s far-left statements over the years.

“The obvious conclusion is that one thinks Sinema is going to win this race and they are trying to reestablish a veneer of impartiality,” says Red State.

I understand that 80 percent of Arizona voters vote early.  It’s no time to be complacent. We need Martha McSally in that “Flake” seat.

CHARGES OF ‘RACISM’ AND ‘WHITE SUPREMACY’ by the media are getting tiresome. The comments by both white and black television anchors following President Trump’s invitation of Kanye West and Jim Brown to the White House were unbelievable. CNN and MSNBC referred to West as “dumb,” “a house negro,” “a token black,” “a minstrel,’ and even “a white supremacist.”

Remember Donna Brazille, the political hack who passed along CNN questions to Hillary Clinton in advance of a debate? She proclaimed “Ye (sic) set blacks back 155 years.”

“My curiosity wasn’t about what came out of Kanye’s mouth,” said CNN’s Chris Cuomo, “my wonder went to what was going on in Trump’s head.” Cuomo went on to imagine racist scenarios he thinks Trump would think up.

So, now the media is reading minds and visualizing racist thoughts dancing over the heads of Republicans. Perhaps they should get a clue that blacks “are waking up to the years of Democrat exploitation,” writes Roger L. Simon at PJMedia. They are witnessing white liberals acting out in unprecedented manners.

Clearly, the Democrat Party is no longer the Democrat Party of my father.

THERE’S MORE – “The racism in the GOP runs deep,” tweeted NBC’s Soledad O’Brien after President Trump praised Robert E. Lee as “a great general” during a rally in Lebanon, Ohio Friday night.

It didn’t take long for twitterers to take on O’Brien.

Taylor Griffin wrote @tgriffinnc: “Soledad, really. I’m not usually one to defend Trump, but he was talking about Lee’s undisputed brilliance as a general as a set up for the scale of Grant’s accomplishment in defeating him.

“She’s (O’Brien) just a political hack (as well as historically uniformed),” wrote Theologineer @theologineer.“

Alexandria Brown, writing @alexthechick commented that O’Brien’s “lack of basic knowledge … was in keeping with her prior statements.”

ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ, the darling of the socialist-leaning Democrat Party, unleashed another pledge Thursday: “I think we take back the House, we take back the Senate, we take back the presidency, and we pack the Supreme Court of the United States of America.”

REPUBLICANS: You need to pledge that you will vote on November 6, 2018

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER? – Not really. It was welcome news to learn that Hillary Clinton requested that her security clearance be lifted on August 30, 2018, but it doesn’t cover-up the fact that she was guilty of gross negligence in the handling of classified material and, escaped criminal charges because of who she was.

As a result of the FBI’s decision not to prosecute her and members of her staff, others accused of flouting national security rules are handed a perfect defense, pointing to the dual standard in how senior government officials are treated.

“I intend to use the Hillary defense,” Sean M. Bigly, a lawyer whose firm handles dozens of cases a year involving national security clearances, once said.

DONALD TRUMP JR. and girlfriend Kimberly Guilfoyle have raised more than a million dollars for Republican candidates, including Ted Cruz in Texas, Mike DeWine in Ohio, Dan Tarkanian in Nevada and Mark Harris in North Carolina. Guilfoyle will be headlining a fundraiser for Pete Sessions in Texas.

THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER’S Pete Bedard writes of President Trump’s accomplishments as he nears the two-year mark. “The administration has counted 289 accomplishments in 18 categories,” reports Bedard, all listed in his column.

REMEMBER OBAMA’S ATTEMPT TO MOOCH credit for the current economy? A survey by Hill TV and the HarrisX polling company reveals that 49 percent of respondent attributed today’s economy to Trump, while 24 percent unbelievably credited Obama.