national news

Perverts misconstrue patriotism

So much of Donald J. Trump’s return to the White House offends me at almost every level imaginable, but one offense stands out among all the others.

It’s the notion that Trump appeals to Americans’ sense of “patriotism,” that those who adhere to this clown’s world view — such as it is — are more “patriotic” than the rest of us.

Wow!

I have some news for them, but it’s not an original thought from this patriot. It has come from many others. However, since I have this forum from which I can vent, I will do so with glee and gusto.

The perverts who slander the real patriots of this great nation contend that the Jan. 6, 2021 was an act of “peaceful protest.” Their president calls it a demonstration of “love.” My world view suggests that anyone who attacks a sworn police officer, who defecates on the Capitol grounds, who threatens to hang the sitting vice president is guilty of treason.

Donald Trump pardoned those individuals without regard to the nature of the crimes they committed. He has populated the executive branch of government with a collection of unfit and unqualified individuals.

Trump vows to sic the Justice Department on members of the media for their coverage of the events leading to and including the insurrection. He wants to prosecute career prosecutors for doing their jobs under the law.

And he is cheered every step of the way by the perverts who claim to be patriots.

Allow me to stand before you and declare with the fullest voice I can summon that I am a patriot. I pay my taxes willingly. I have worn the uniform of the U.S. Army and have gone into a war zone to serve my country. I cherish the sound of our National Anthem. I am the grandson of immigrants who chose to live in this great and glorious land and I am the son of a man who enlisted in the Navy on the very day this country fought back against the sneak attack on our forces in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

I also know this country has its faults. Our journey from our declaration of independence has hit a few bumps along the way. I also know that the founders sought to build a “more perfect Union,” but they knew they never could create “the perfect” nation.

I will not tolerate the idea that those who follow the idiocy preached by Donald John Trump are patriots. They do not know the meaning of the word.

local news

This news hurts … seriously

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I am at the age of my life where I spend time looking at obituaries … just to see which of my friends and acquaintances have gone on to reap their great reward.

I did so again today — and got the shock of my life!

Inside the obituary page of the Amarillo Globe-News was news that a former marketing director for the newspaper had died at age 65. Her name was Jo Tyler Bagwell.

Jo was not famous outside of Amarillo — or Claude, where she grew up and attended high school. However, this woman was a force of nature. I first made her acquaintance when she worked in the marketing department of a local bank; I met her a day or two after I moved to Amarillo in January 1995 to start my job at the Globe-News. We hit it off immediately.

I want to pay a brief tribute to this woman because she was, to borrow a phrase, the “complete package.” She was physically attractive, but she also was a kind, generous, gregarious, charming, smart individual. She was a devoted Aggie.

Above and beyond all of that, she was a proud and devoted mother to her son, Blake, who many of us watched grow into a wonderful man.

I once told Jo that she was an angel put on Earth by God to care for Blake, who was born with myriad challenges, but who overcame them to blossom into the fine man he has become. He owes everything to his mother.

Many years have passed since I last spoke with Jo Bagwell. She struggled through the last stages of her life on Earth. I am saddened beyond every emotion I can summon at the news I saw today. At my age of 75 I am going to keep looking at obituaries to keep up with the rite of passage we all must face eventually.

Damn, I do not want to be surprised soon in the manner this news hit me like a punch in the gut.

national news

Stop the Musk train wreck!

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Elon Musk must be stopped cold, ending the charade he is leading as some sort of federal budgetary guru advising Donald J. Trump on what to cut from the government.

The man is out of fu**ing control! Period!

Musk is a zillionaire who is spawning movements across the country to remind our gutless wonders in Congress that Americans did not elect this foreign-born high-tech mogul to the nation’s highest office. Americans elected Trump to a second term. Trump has willfully handed the reins of budgetary power to Musk, who once shared that duty with Vivek Ramaswamy, who has mysteriously disappeared.

Musk now is on his own, pitching budget slashes that would leave millions of Americans helpless against forces they cannot fight without the federal government.

I never thought I would say this, but here goes: I am beginning to wish Trump would jerk this clown into place, reminding him that he hasn’t been elected to anything. Trump needs to remind Elon Musk that he — Trump! — is the elected politician who’s in charge and that Musk needs to play second fiddle to the man who holds the title of president of the United States of America.

Pundits already have projected a tenuous relationship between Trump and Musk. Some of them have predicted that Musk won’t last a year as head of that thing called the Department of Government Efficiency. Now it’s called DOGE.

DOGE doesn’t have any constitutional authority to act as its daddy, Elon Musk, is trying to do. Budgetary responsibility rests with Congress, which disposes of ideas that the president proposes.

Elon Musk is a pretender who needs to be stopped!

national news

Cast of clowns nearly finished

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It looks as though Donald J. Trump’s cast of clowns and kooks assembled for the executive branch of the federal government is about complete.

All that’s left, apparently, is for the FBI director-designate, Kash Patel, to squeak through his committee hearing and then he’ll be confirmed likely by a party-line vote in the Senate.

Oh … my. Spare me the anguish.

Trump has picked an array of goofballs, kooks, outright numbskulls to lead agencies that are supposed to carry out the bidding of Congress.

Except that Congress has been compromised beyond immediate repair by the gutless wonders who comprise the Republican majority in both legislative chambers. I keep waiting for someone, anyone, among the GOP majority to stand up to Trump, to tell him the unvarnished truth … which is that he doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing!

He imposes tariffs on major international trading partners, then backs off. He issues orders to furloughs to tens of thousands of federal employees, then backs off of that order, too. He fires inspectors general and orders probes into anyone who worked on the probe into the Jan. 6 insurrection that he incited.

The confirmation hearings related to Patel, DNI-designate Tulsi Gabbard, health secretary RFK Jr. were too painful to watch.

Courage is MIA in the Senate and in the House. The slim majorities in both chambers just cannot summon a modicum of courage to stand up to Trump, to tell him the truth. Former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said that speaking truth to Trump is the only way to prevent him (hopefully) from bullying you.

The cast of clowns with whom he has surrounded himself is now set to take over the executive branch … more or less. Trump still has his unelected sidekick, Elon Musk, issuing directives about how the government should spend our money.

Good ever-lovin’ grief, man.

national news

Trump 2.0 worse than before

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The second version of Donald Trump’s foray into national governance is turning out to be the nightmare so many of us feared it would become.

He has enlisted the aid of a zillionaire who’s moved into an office in White House, a guy who is making decisions without any authorization from Congress or the courts.

Now we have Trump himself declaring his intention to “take over” the Gaza region that’s been torn apart by the war between Israel and the terrorists known as Hamas. He well might send U.S. troops to oversee the takeover of a sovereign land … and to think this moron was elected while promising to end warfare as we have known it.

Trump’s hatchet man wants to dismantle the Department of Education. There’s no plan for what we can do to shore up public education. Nor is there a plan for how to govern effectively by slashing bazillions of dollars from the federal government.

Confusion anyone? Chaos?

Dude imposed tariffs on Mexico and Canada, only to pull them back after those countries bitched their way out from them. China, the third tariff target, is imposing tariffs of its own against U.S. products.

Give me some relief from this madness. Make no mistake, it’s sheer and unalterated madness coming from the West Wing.

I hope the 77 million Americans who cast their ballots for this dipsh** are happy with what they’re getting. The other half of the country and I are not.

national news

Cowards’ caucus remains silent

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The Republican Party caucus of congressional cowards continues to advance unqualified, unfit and undeserving nominees to the Cabinet headed by Donald J. Trump.

The party-line votes for the likes of Tulsi Gabbard, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.; Pete Hegseth suggest that these individuals aren’t likely to enjoy any sort of support from Democrats. But, by cracky, their Republican support among senators unswayed by the serious questions into their qualifications will be enough, more than likely, to lead them across the finish line.

Gabbard and Kennedy have just been approved by their respective nominating committees. Defense Secretary Hegseth was approved as well and, in fact, has taken office and has been dealing — rather smartly, I suggest — with the crash in D.C. of the Army helicopter and the American Airlines commercial jet.

Trump continues to hand power to an unelected zillionaire who continues to make command decisions on matters over which he has zero authority. What are Republicans doing to protect their constitutional authority?

This all pains me to ask: What the hell is happening to this government we all say we cherish, honor and vow to protect?

Trump is nominating certifiable wack jobs to key executive posts and is getting away with it because the Republican majority that controls both houses of Congress won’t stand up to him. Some of them tease with tough questions, only to vote to confirm the likes of Gabbard to be the next Director of National Intelligence and Kennedy to lead the Health and Human Services Department.

Next up is likely to be the worst of them all, FBI Director-designate Kash Patel, the moron who once declared his intention to shutter the FBI building and turn it into a museum of the deep state.

I am left to lament the absence of the governing majority that could stop this march toward madness. They are cowering in the corners of Congress while Donald Trump and his unelected sidekick, Elon Musk, run roughshod over the rule of law.

local news

Worst day spawns new life

The worst day of my life befell my family and me two years ago today.

My beloved bride, Kathy Anne, lost her battle with glioblastoma. Fifty-one years with this wonderful woman could not have been more glorious, adventuresome and thrilling as we watched our sons grow into the two finest men you’ll ever know. We also watched our granddaughter come into this world and she, too, is growing into a delightful young lady.

I am not going to dwell, though, on the sorrow. I am going to deal briefly with the journey I have taken on my way out of the darkness.

I took that journey largely on instruction from my bride, who told me that if she were to go first that she wanted me — she insisted on it — to find happiness. Do not wallow in grief, she said. Kathy Anne was a woman of conviction, which told me she meant what she said.

My life is still under reconstruction. I don’t know when I’ll be able to declare that my task is complete. Maybe it’ll never be done completely. Whatever. I am ready for whatever comes my way.

She prepared me well for this kind of journey. For that preparation I will be in her debt forever.

Every single person I have met, or will meet along the rest of this trek will know that I miss her. I just intend to tell the whole world, though, that despite her absence I will live every day as if it’s my final day on this good Earth.

That is my bride’s legacy.

local news

P.S.: Here’s how I knew I had licked it

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A brief post script is in order after I posted a blog item detailing how I quit smokint cigarettes cold turkey on Feb. 2, 1980. Here goes.

My father died in a boating accident in September 1980. We were shocked beyond all we could measure. The accident occurred in Gibsons, British Columbia, Canada. Two passengers of the boat died that evening: Dad and the owner of the boat; two others, friends of Dad, survived.

They recovered the remains of the driver of the boat that evening. Dad remained MIA. So, the owner of the company for which Dad worked arranged to fly me to Gibsons to stand by while the Royal Canadian Mounted Police searched for Dad’s remains.

I arrived at the camp where Dad had been staying and we were joined by some loggers who worked on other side of the inlet. We were served some stew that night for dinner.

Then the loggers began pouring the booze. We talked about Dad. One of the loggers paid me a nice compliment by telling me I had “guts” to come there. He also regaled me with his distate for French-Canadians; hey, I knew all about the regional distate between easteern and western Canadians.

They got me sh**-stinking drunk that night. I was wasted beyond belief. I could’ve lit up a smoke that night.,

But I didn’t!

I got through the bender beyond belief. I turned in for the night. I woke the next morning and then returned home to Portland.

I thanked my new friends for taking good care of me.

One more point: The Mounties didn’t find Dad’s remains while I was there. They recovered Dad a few days later.

This much I knew, which was that if I could endure the body-numbing pain of the loss we had suffered without lighting up … I was home free.

business news

Trade war set to begin

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Let’s be crystal clear about what is going to commence among three North American neighbors now that Donald Trump has declared his intention to impose tariffs on imported goods.

Canada and Mexico, two of our strongest allies and most dependable trading partners, have been targeted — along with China — as candidates for massive tariffs on all goods delivered to the United States.

Who will pay the tariff? You and I will. Our neighbors, too, So will our loved ones. We will shoulder an immense burden as importers seek to pass the cost of the tariffs on to those of us who use the products imported from the three tariff-strapped nations.

I do not understand what Trump is trying to prove with these tariffs. He isn’t punishing those nations. They will respond by imposing tariffs on goods they import from U.S. exporters.

Hey, didn’t Trump negotiate a new free-trade agreement with Canada and Mexico during his term in office? It was supposed to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement. Trump called it a superior pact.

Well, it’s no longer superior to anything.

Buckle up, my fellow patriots. We’re going to pay through the nose for a lot of goods.

medical news

45 years of tobacco freedom!

It was 45 years ago today that I lit the last cigarette I ever would attempt to smoke … only to snuff it, toss it and turn my back on a nasty habit I had acquired at the tender age of 15.

I was 30 years of age when I quit the habit cold turkey. My bride had been badgering me to do so, in that I had developed a “smoker’s cough.” I was smoking two packs a day, man! I wasn’t feeling well that day, so when I lit the cigarette, I damn near choked on it. My immediate thought in the monent was: What the hell am I doing to myaelf?

I knew the answer. I was killing myself. I was not prepared to die, given that I had a beautiful wife and two young sons who told me they wanted me to part of their lives.

I knew nothing about the cost that the habit would bring to those who still light ’em up today. Cigarettes sell now for about $7 a pack. Multiply that by two and that’s $14  each day going up in flames in my house. Ninety-eight bucks each  week, and $5,096 annually.

Wow! I can think of many more productive and enjoyable ways to spend that kind of dough.

And healthier, too!

As I look back, I believe today that decision — made immediately and acted on with dispatch — was among the smartest acts I have commited in the long life I have been granted.

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