national news

More of the same trash from Trump

I won’t pattycake this issue with you … but so help me when I heard that Donald Trump had a big announcement to make during his prime-time TV talk I was hoping for something really spectacular.

That would be an announcement that he was quitting the presidency, that he’d had enough of the negativity surrounding him and his administration. Truth be told, I was hoping for a sort of an “LBJ moment,” that might remind us of the time in March 1968 when President Johnson announced on TV that he was suspending the bombing of North Vietnam and then dropped the biggest bombshell of all by declaring he “would not accept” the Democratic nomination “for another term as your president.”

I musta been living in a dream world. I get it. What we got from Trump instead was a warmed-over speech about unconfirmed and unprovable claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him. What a crock of sh**!

Trump has no more ideas left in that vacuous, pointed skull of his. He is relying now on the raw emotion of the MAGA morons who have bought into his election theft rubbish.

He said he would release documents that never have been seen. That was his “major announcement.” Big fu***** deal, Donald!

If anyone on Earth is guilty of attempting an election theft, it’s Donald John Trump. And, brother, we had better wake up to the fact that the incumbent president is the thief in chief.

medical news

Candidates’ health is of major concern

I can’t claim this as an original thought, because I am stealing it from a friend of mine, but candidates’ health must become a major issue in determining their fitness for a job.

We’ve had too many presidents of the United States taking office while hiding serious illness. My friend notes that President Wilson suffered a debilitating stroke during his second term, President Cleveland suffered from cancer, President Franklin Roosevelt sought to conceal his wheelchair, President Kennedy suffered from Addison’s disease.

All those ailments were serious enough to consider even now, so many years after these men served in the highest office in the land. Indeed, FDR won election to a fourth term in 1944 while suffering from an ailment that would kill him a month after taking office in 1945. He was virtually a dead man when he planned the final assault on the Axis Powers near the end of World War II.

We had those phony questions about President Biden’s mental acuity during his term in office. Leading that charade was former White House physician and current Texas Panhandle congressman and loudmouth Ronny Jackson.

But my point is that a candidate’s health must be front and center on the issue to be discussed and examined. The candidates ought to be required to present physicians statements as to their physical well-being … as well as their mental alertness. And they should be prepared to refute any claims of ill health if they arise during the campaign.

national security, political news

Game of election denial … breathtaking!

Never in my life — not ever! — have I witnessed a rhetorical game being played out to the extent that it has been regarding the result of the 2020 U.S. presidential election.

I’ve been around a bit, as I am now 76 years of age and have been following politics pretty closely for, oh, about the past 60 years.

Donald Trump’s choice to become the next director of national intelligence was merely the latest Trumpkin to play the word game with Democratic lawmakers. Jay Clayton, in testimony this week to a Senate committee, refused to say that President Biden won the 2020 election.

Here’s how Al Jazeera reported the exchange between Clayton and senators:

“Senators pressed Clayton about his views on the 2020 race between Biden and Trump, and he acknowledged that Biden had been ‘certified’ as the victor. But he avoided directly saying Biden ‘won’ the race.

“In one exchange, Democrat Jon Ossoff asked Clayton point-blank, “’Who won the 2020 election?’

“’I’m not going to do this with you,’ Clayton responded.

“’This is a job interview. We’ve established that you have an obligation to be honest and forthright with the committee,’ Ossoff replied. He then repeated, ‘Who won the 2020 election?’ Clayton responded that he had ‘already answered the question.'”

Clayton danced the same two-step with Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona. He refused to say Biden “won” the 2020, but that he was “certified” the winner by virtue of the electoral votes he received.

It baffles me to end in sight why these individuals would choose to damage the integrity of the electoral system based on the Big Lie being fomented by the liar in chief. This game has been going on since that election, which President Biden won a slim but undeniable Electoral College majority and a 7 million popular vote majority. Trump, though, still has none of it and, of course, he instigated the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol that injured hundreds of people and killed several others.

Trump’s team has repeatedly refused to answer the simplest of questions regarding the 2020 election. They have demonstrated their disgusting fealty to a convicted felon over the U.S. Constitution. They make me sick.

national news

ICE goons are back at it

The individuals who comprise the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency do not deserve to be called “law enforcement officers,” as they routinely break the law with actions that result in the deaths of innocent U.S. residents.

I’ll stick with terms I believe more closely describe the character of these masked, heavily armed and unidentifiable individuals.

You know, terms like goons, thugs, creeps, crooks … and toss in a**holes.

These ICE goons keep killing people they should never have stopped in the first place. At last count, I’ve heard 11 people have died at the hands of ICE thugs. This also shouldn’t surprise a single American patriot, which is that Donald Trump — the POTUS who elevated ICE to the front of our discussion on immigration — never says a word that is remotely critical of what we can know about the deaths of these victims.

ICE agents continue to run amok among us. They continue to pounce on residents hiding behind those masks while adorned with body armor and carrying weapons designed to inflict maximum pain on those who dare to resist. Many of them don’t bother to inform the arrested the reason they are being detained. Their task, seemingly as defined by the Homeland Security department, is to intimidate the public.

Nothing I say on this blog will change anything. Trump will continue to deploy the thugs to seek migrants from sh**hole countries. Just know that ICE only disgraces itself in the eyes of Americans who are repulsed by the behavior of individuals who break the law while pretending to enforce it.

local news, national news, political news

Lowering flags for this clown?

Someone will have to explain why flags all over Collin County, Texas, have lowered to half-staff … and I damn sure hope it isn’t to honor the memory of a piss-ant partisan who died over the weekend.

I have concluded that the flags are flying at half-staff because Sen. Lindsey Graham — a Republican from South Carolina — has passed away.

Now, I must ask: What in the name of politics has Graham done to benefit Texas, other than to fall in line with his Big Daddy, Donald J. Trump? Graham once had the balls to tell the truth about Trump … when he was running against him for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination. He called Trump a “race-baiting” nitwit; he called the future POTUS an individual who is unfit for public office, let alone the presidency.

He fell in line about the time Trump secured the party’s nomination that year and has been licking the liar in chief’s boots ever since.

And for that — and virtually nothing else — he’s being honored with businesses, government offices and individual property owners flying flags at half-staff.

Give me a … break.

national news

Sen. Graham is gone, but damage is done

I wish I could speak well of Sen. Lindsey Graham now that he’s dead … but the hard truth is that I cannot in good conscience speak of him without tossing out a qualifier or two.

Graham was a South Carolina Republican who became one of Donald Trump’s fiercest allies in the Senate. And this was after he portrayed himself as one of Trump’s most ferocious critics. It makes me wonder: Which Lindsey Graham is the real thing and which one is the phony baloney fraud.

I will say this about Graham: He bucked Trump by becoming a close friend of Ukraine President Volodymr Zellensky, who had drawn Trump’s wrath because he had the temerity to stand up to Russian strongman/goon/thug Vladimir Putin’s illegal and immoral invasion of Ukraine. OK, that’s one positive thing.

Graham, though, became a shill for Trump, even after declaring “I’m out” when it came to the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the capital.

Graham also maintained close friendships with politicians on the other side. He was dear friends with former President Joe Biden and the late Sen. Joseph Lieberman. Graham once declared that Biden was the finest man ever knew in politics. Then he would remain silent as Trump trashed Biden repeatedly. What gives with that?

So, Lindsey Graham is gone. History will record that he was a complicated man driven by complex motives.

Still, I will wish him a peaceful rest in eternity.

military news

Redefining ‘winning’ and ‘losing’

It seems safe to say that Donald J. Trump has reinforced something I have believed for the past 50 years or so, which is that we have redefined winning and losing wars.

I took part briefly in the Vietnam War, which is generally considered to be a conflict that the United States lost to a determined enemy. We won virtually every major engagement on the battlefield. We inflicted far more casualties on the enemy than they inflicted on us.

But we ended the war because we ran out of patience. We ran out of time. Vietnam was fighting to preserve its existence against a foreign power. I now accept the idea that we actually lost the Vietnam War. I am no less proud that I spent some time there doing my duty as ordered by my government.

Trump launched a war with Iran a few months ago. He decided to bomb the crap out of the place. Our aviators along with those from Israel sent bombs crashing into military facilities. Trump declared the war essentially to be over a few weeks after he started it. He kinda/sorta declared victory as well.

Then we entered talks to end the war. The sides emerged with a “memorandum of understanding” that they would stop the fighting. Iran wouldn’t obtain nuclear weapons, according to the MOU. Iran also would be able to sell its oil on the open market. The United States would lift the sanctions it imposed on Iran during the Barack Obama administration.

I have to ask: Is that winning?

Trump’s strategy looks more like that of a loser than a winner.

Now we’re back to bombing Iran. The Iranians have shut down the Strait of Hormuz — again! The price of oil is inching back up. We might lose more American lives; to date, 14 Americans service personnel have died.

To make matters even more maddening to American patriots … such as me: We don’t yet have a detailed explanation from the commander in chief as to our strategy for going to war, nor do we know of an exit strategy that Trump has cooked up in his feeble brain.

national news

Come clean, old timer

Mitch McConnell has a few million “bosses” in Kentucky who have every right to know whether he’s able to represent their interests in the U.S. Senate.

McConnell, who is more than 80 years of age, is hospitalized with an undisclosed illness. He’s been out of action for several weeks. His family isn’t talking about his condition. There actually has been some discussion that he might have died. I don’t think that’s the case.

But this matter brings to mind the issue of elderly men and women in public office and whether they are able to serve the public they were elected to represent. McConnell, the former Republican leader of the Senate, once was a formidable political figure who controlled legislative flow.

This matter spreads across party lines. You’ll recall how the late Diane Feinstein, a California Democrat, missed many months of votes in the Senate. She died from her ailments. Then we have the case of President Biden, who was running for re-election in 2024 when he stumbled badly during a debate with Donald Trump. Questions arose about the president’s mental acuity. Biden said he had all the snap he needed to govern, but he pulled out of his re-election effort.

McConnell’s condition needs to be dealt with openly by the senator. If he is incapable of speaking for himself, his bosses in Kentucky need to know. He is drawing a healthy six-figure salary to make decisions on behalf of the people of his state.

This matter won’t go away … until Mitch McConnell comes clean.

local news

Waiting for my ‘home town’ to mature

You know already that I love living in North Texas, particularly this city that is under construction.

I refer, of course, to Princeton. The construction to which I refer is the highway work along the length of the city’s main drag … U.S. Highway 380. My family is nearby. I enjoy living so close to them that I don’t have to make a day out of traveling to visit.

When my wife and I moved into our home, we had no real idea that we would be on the front end of a building boom that continues to this day. Therein lies the crux of this blog.

Princeton’s population has exploded since we closed on our home. It stands at 40,000-plus. I don’t have an exact figure because I don’t think anyone really knows how many folks live here from week to week. The number keeps growing. As a result, the number of residences in Princeton have turned this into a classic “bedroom community.” Lots of new residents have a place to call “home,” where they sleep at night and from which they go to work.

However, the city’s path to full maturity has yet to be traveled. I refer to development of commercial businesses that serve this growing city’s needs. We lack any sort of fine-dining establishments. Virtually nowhere to purchase major appliances. Almost all the home-repair outfits in this area operate out of neighboring communities.

I keep hearing about plans to build something called the Princeton Town Center. I see signs identifying where they want to turn the dirt over. The Town Center will solve a lot of the issues that face residents daily. It will contain a plethora of commercial developments and give the 40,000-plus residents plenty of places to shop locally.

When will this occur? Beats the bejabbers out of me, man. Texas transportation crews have to finish their highway and street work. They haven’t broken ground on the Princeton Town Center. Yes, some small businesses are cropping up along U.S. 380.

I am a patient man. I am waiting for my new home town to grow into the city I know it can become.

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