High Plains Blogger

What Is Hunter Biden Being Investigated For? Details of Federal Probe (msn.com)

business news

Is this Biden’s ‘Benghazi’?

July 22, 2022 kanelis2012

Hunter Biden’s business activity and the controversy that’s being hyped up about it is beginning to remind me more than just a little bit of … Benghazi!

You remember Benghazi. Terrorists stormed the U.S. consulate in the Libyan city in late 2012. Four people — including the U.S. ambassador to Libya — died in the attack. Republicans blamed Hillary Clinton, who was secretary of state during the attack.

Clinton sat before a congressional committee for 11 hours. Republicans on the panel sought to find something — anything — with which to accuse her. They grilled her incessantly.

They found nothing.

So now we have the son of President Biden on the griddle. The GOP insists that Hunter Biden’s laptop contains material that could send the president’s son to prison. They keep yapping about an investigation “when we take back the House.” What, I want to know, do they plan to investigate?

What did he do? Biden accepted high-paying jobs that he got because he is the son of a former U.S. senator, former vice president and current president. He is making a lot of dough working for these companies, even though he has no practical experience in the energy business, which is relevant to at least one of the companies that hired him.

Is it a crime for the child of a famous person to accept a cushy, well-paying job? Hah! It’s been done many times before and will be done far into the future.

The GOP is trying to hang tax charges on Hunter Biden, contending he didn’t pay his share of taxes.

This business about Hunter Biden has been kicking around for a while. During the 2020 campaign, GOP operatives sought to make Biden’s business dealings a campaign issue to use against his dad. Hunter Biden had taken a job with a Ukrainian energy company, for example, prompting Republicans to wonder aloud about the propriety of the hire. However, a Ukrainian prosecutor declared out loud that neither Biden — not Joe nor Hunter — did anything illegal.

End of story? Hardly!

My sense is that this matter will produce as much credible criminal wrongdoing as the Benghazi tragedy did against Hillary Clinton.

We will have, to borrow a term, a nothing burger.

local news

Contraception is alive, but struggling

GOP Texans in Congress vote against bill to protect right to contraception | The Texas Tribune

The U.S. House of Representatives has approved a bill that allows Americans to take measures to avoid pregnancy when they engage in intimate activity.

Sounds, well, rather normal, right? Not if you’re a Texas Republican member of Congress. You see, all GOP House members from Texas voted against this modern, common-sense, rational bill. That means my congressman, Van Taylor of Plano, has something against allowing his constituents to use contraceptives during sex.

What the hell?

Someone has to explain to me the reasons behind the partisan resistance to this measure.

It appears to be some additional blowback to the Supreme Court decision to overturn the law that made abortion legal. Justice Clarence Thomas — the right-wing king of the high court — let it be known that the SCOTUS might next take aim at same-sex marriage and, yes, allowing contraception.

Good grief!

The 50-50 U.S. Senate isn’t likely to follow the House’s lead, given that the GOP side of the divide is wedded to this idiocy that contraception is some sort of Satanic mischief.

Well, it’s as clear as deep blue sky that the Texas Republican congressional delegation has swallowed the swill that now governs GOP policy these days.

They sicken me.

crime news

School boards now must boost security

The rampage of violence in schools and many other public places has changed the game plan for those who must prepare for new seasons.

Consider the issues facing educators in, say, Uvalde, Texas, which is still grieving over the massacre of 19 fourth-graders and two teachers.

Not only must they prepare for curriculum requirements and ensuring that teachers have plenty of stationery, books and online equipment to teach, they now must ensure their classrooms are secure against any possible burst of rage.

This is life in contemporary America, ladies and gentlemen. It saddens me to my core and sickens me terribly.

But .. we must stand guard these days against domestic terror just as we were shaken and angered by the events of 9/11. The international war on terror is still raging, even though it has been pushed off the front pages of newspapers and off the evening newscasts in cities and towns across the land.

9/11 taught us a terrible lesson, which is that the mightiest country on Earth is vulnerable to acts of insane violence.

We have stopped countless attempts since that terrible day. We need to commit to stopping future attempts similar to what we have seen occur in Uvalde, Buffalo, El Paso, Sutherland Springs, Newtown, Las Vegas, Parkland, Littleton, Aurora … and on it goes.

I speak to local educators in North Texas and they tell me the same thing, that they are getting ready for the next school year with both eyes and ears dialed in to the need for greater classroom security.

I do hate saying this, but they must never let their vigilance down. Not for one second.

environmental news

Biden to use his power

President Biden has made a vow that many of us will seek to ensure he keeps it.

He pledges to use all the executive authority contained in his high office to wage war against climate change, which he labels — quite correctly — as an “existential threat” to the nation’s security.

Biden cannot depend on Congress to enact legislation. Sen. Joe Manchin, the West Virginia Democrat who seems to take pleasure in torpedoing Biden’s agenda, signaled yet again he won’t back any legislative answers to climate change.

That means, according to Biden, that he will use the power of his office to take whatever measures he can legally take.

Let’s understand that only one person is elected on a national scale: the president of the United States. The Constitution does distribute power to the legislative and judicial branches of government. Individual senators, House members or judges, though, do not have the authority bestowed on the individual who is elected by the entire nation.

Thus, President Biden is spot on in his effort to deploy the power of his office to do what Congress is unable — and unwilling — to do.

That is to declare war on climate change. Many of us are keeping our eyes open to ensure he follows through.

environmental news

Fix the damn grid!

Hey, didn’t Texas Gov. Greg Abbott promise to fix the electrical grid after it nearly failed during the February 2021 deep freeze that killed all those Texans?

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas wasn’t very “reliable” then. Abbott made the grand promise to ensure the grid wouldn’t fail.

Well, that was then.

Now we keep getting these advisories from ERCOT asking us to turn the air conditioners up to 78 or80 degrees … even though the summer heat is cooking us crispy. The temp hit 107 degrees today in our North Texas home in Princeton. There is no long-term relief in sight!

Now comes the question: When will we get the grid fixed to avoid the potential for electrical failure … Gov. Abbott?

We do not yet have a totally “reliable” electrical grid in Texas. It came close to collapsing nearly two years ago during the Texas deep freeze. Now we are getting warnings of potential failure as temperatures set records for summer heat.

We all should stand up and take a bow, though, by saving ERCOT from dealing with demand eclipsing the supply of electricity. ERCOT’s initial hot-weather conservation request helped the grid managers from having to implement rolling blackouts to conserve energy; the success came because Texans responded by shutting down non-essential use of electricity. Good job, y’all!

Back to the point …

Greg Abbott told us when we came out of that February 2021 deep freeze that he would ensure the grid is fixed, that ERCOT would live up to its “reliability” promise.

I am not yet convinced that the governor has kept that promise.

legal news

Back to the beginning on marriage?

Wow. I didn’t ever think we would reach this point after the Supreme Court ruled in 2015 that men could marry men and women would marry women.

We’re now watching the U.S. House of Representatives enacting legislation that makes same-sex marriage — and same-sex intimacy — legal all over again. A bipartisan bill seeks to head off a possible future Supreme Court ruling that could make gay marriage illegal in this country.

What in the world are we doing to ourselves?

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, recently said the SCOTUS ruling legalizing gay marriage was wrong. Cruz is wrong. Not the court, which ruled that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution guarantees all Americans the right to due process and equal protection under the law.

But wait a second! The nation’s highest court struck down the law legalizing abortion and is sending signals it could do the same thing to gay marriage and perhaps even interracial marriage.

Yikes, man!

The House vote doesn’t codify what shouldn’t even be on the table. The Senate has to approve it but needs 60 votes to make it law. A 50-50 split between Democrats and Republicans, though, signals that the Senate might not have the votes to do the right thing.

That would be to enact a federal law that strengthens the high court’s decision legalizing gay marriage.

I am shaking my noggin utter disgust.

crime news

Buckle up and wait for these results

There likely will be no clearer referendum on the health and status of today’s Republican Party than a primary vote set to take place next month in Wyoming.

U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, the state’s lone representative in the House, is running for re-election. She has been as staunch a conservative lawmaker as any in the House. She is fervently pro-life and pro-gun; she is anti-tax and has voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

But she’s being called a “dead woman walking” in the upcoming GOP primary because she is being challenged by a Trump cultist who has earned the endorsement of the twice-impeached former president.

Why worry about this election? Because Cheney has committed an unpardonable sin in the eyes of the cult cabal that follows Donald Trump. She has joined a select House committee seeking to know the truth behind the 1/6 insurrection and attack on the Capitol. She has said Trump is criminally liable for what occurred that day. She has been faithful to her oath, which she took to defend the Constitution.

That has earned her a spot on the Donald Trump sh** list of politicians who would dare to challenge him for, oh, breaking the law and doing something no other president in history has ever done … which is launch a coordinated attack on the peaceful transition of power after an election that he lost.

If the Wyoming primary voters oust Cheney, then I am certain it will signal the death of the Republican Party as we have known it. If Cheney fends off the challenger, which appears unlikely, then there might be hope that the GOP can cleanse itself of the soiling that Trump has brought to it.

I am pulling for Rep. Cheney. Not because I like her politics, but because the Republican Party needs someone in its ranks who will stand for the rule of law. It is fundamental to the success of this democratic experiment the nation’s founders left us.

crime news

Fire the chief!

Let’s get straight to the brass tacks of this discussion: Pete Arredondo’s name is mud within the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District.

He needs to be fired from his job as the ISD’s police chief. The Uvalde CISD board is meeting Saturday to decide whether to fire him.

Yes. By all means imaginable, the chief needs to go. Immediately. There must not be any separation agreement. Just can the chief. The man has no support within the grieving district.

He failed in responding appropriately to the shooter who walked into Robb Elementary School and slaughtered19 children and two heroic teachers. Arredondo said he didn’t know he was in charge. Well, he should have known. He should have taken command. He should have ordered his officers into the room where the shooter was murdering his victims.

He didn’t do any of it. He dawdled and waited around as the shooter kept on killing his victims.

I am not going to suggest any criminal prosecution for Arredondo. He will, however, likely be served with plenty of wrong death lawsuits from the families of those he betrayed by his failure to protect those children and their valiant educators.

This is a no-brainer, school trustees.

However, bear in mind that a legislative report labeled the incident a “systemic failure” at all levels. Firing the Uvalde CISD chief of police is just one step needed to repair what went so tragically wrong.

national news

Garland intrigue is building

Hey, what’s going on with U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, who’s signed a memo declaring that any indictment of a president or former president running for the same office must be signed off by the AG himself?

Garland has revived a Donald Trump administration policy, which brings me to why this is significant now.

Donald Trump — the twice-impeached and defeated former POTUS — is dropping hints of running again in 2024. Think of the campaign slogan he could use.

Vote for me, ’cause it’ll keep me out of prison.

Trump well might be indicted for various felonies against the government connected to the 1/6 insurrection and attack on the Capitol as officials were counting 2020 election Electoral College ballots certifying Joe Biden the winner over … yep, Donald Trump.

Garland’s memo seems to suggest to some observers to signal a reluctance to indict Trump for anything prior to the midterm election this fall.

Trump might decide to run for POTUS prior to the midterm election.

Yeah, it’s going to muddy up a lot of things.

Personally, I do not believe he’ll be nominated. Also, I do believe that Garland will have enough to prosecute Trump for something, although I dare not predict what that would be.

This disgraceful excuse for a politician — Trump — is trying to work every angle he can to keep his sorry backside out of the slammer.