local news

Get rid of work sessions

Believe it or not, I am going to agree with an editorial published in the newspaper where I worked for more than 17 years.

The editorial published in the Amarillo Globe-News says the City Council needs to, in effect, get rid of its work sessions as they’re currently constituted and do all its business in the City Council Chambers meeting room.

That’s a good idea.

Here’s why. The work sessions, where city council members discuss much of the business on which they will vote in their open session, take place in a cramped meeting room. Most of the space in that room is taken up by a large conference table around which sit council members, senior city administrators and department heads.

The public is invited to attend, as the items under discussion are open to the public — until the mayor calls for an “executive session,” which is closed to the public to enable the council to discuss certain things exempted from public view under the Texas Open Meetings Law.

I’d share the editorial with you here, except that I don’t subscribe to the newspaper and, thus, I am unable to access the online edition because of its “pay wall” restricting access only to those who have paid subscriptions to the printed edition.

I left the paper unhappily in late August 2012, if you’ll recall … but enough about that.

The editorial suggests that the city shouldn’t scrap its work sessions, but merely take them into a room where more people can attend if they desire. If no one attends the work session, well, no harm-no foul. The council can convene its executive session, then open its regular session and pass the ordinances and other measures it has discussed.

I do not believe the city has kept secrets from the public regarding matters of public concern. I believe the mayor and the city administrator are honorable men who do not hide behind the Open Meetings Law to discuss things that must be kept in the open.

However, the work sessions have produced a perception among some in the community that these meetings somehow are meant to keep the public in the dark.

Let me stipulate once again: The City Council cannot keep the public away from its meetings except when it discusses certain items specified by state law Those items include pending litigation, sale or purchase of real estate and personnel matters. One major flaw in the state meeting law is that there’s little way to monitor what’s actually said behind closed doors; but that’s for the Legislature to change when it ever gets around to it.

The City Council work sessions are valuable in allowing council members an opportunity to discuss the pros and cons of issues before them. So, do it in the big room — the Council Chambers — to enable everyone who is interested a chance to hear it all with their own ears.

 

military news

‘Every politician … needs to come here’

Vietnam%20Memorial-500

Not too many years after moving to the Texas Panhandle, my wife and I ventured west into New Mexico and discovered something in the resort community of Angel Fire that moved us both profoundly.

It’s the Vietnam Veterans National Memorial.

It was conceived and developed by a man whose son, David, was among the 58,000 Americans who died during the Vietnam War.

Mere words cannot begin to describe the power and pathos contained inside this memorial. It features the words of those who died. It tells the story — through letters written to loved ones back home and in diaries — of their fear, their apprehension, of their pride in the service to their country and of their love for each other as brothers in arms.

The late Victor Westphall’s memorial to his son comes to my mind today as the nation celebrates Memorial Day. President Obama laid a wreath today at the Tomb of the Unknown. Other memorials today will be visited by those who cherish the memories of those who have died in defense of the nation. We’ll pay appropriate tribute to those who gave their “last full measure of devotion.”

My wife and I took our time walking through this memorial. We tried to read every word that was written by the young warriors — and about them.

We emerged from the chapel. My wife’s eyes were moist. So were mine.

“Every politician who ever sends young men to war,” she said, “needs to come here and see this place.”

media news

Fox News’s power is overrated

I want to share this link with readers of this blog.

It comes from Jack Schafer, senior media writer for Politico. com and it offers an interesting analysis of the power that Fox News has — or doesn’t have — on the rest of the media and the voting public.

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/05/fox-news-liberals-118235.html?hp=t1_r#.VWNDQFLbKt8

Schafer’s analysis is most interesting in that he relies heavily on the thoughts of a known political conservative — Bruce Bartlett — to make the case that Fox’s actual power overrated.

Bartlett has served as a key policy guy for Republican presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush and remains devoted to his political principles. He believes Fox is hindering his party’s effort to advance and to return to the White House. Fox News, he contends, is appealing to the narrowest wing of the GOP.

Schafer notes an element of Fox’s strategy that I found quite interesting: “One thing Bartlett gets absolutely right in his critique is how Fox seized on the repeal of government censorship of the airwaves (also known as the Fairness Doctrine and the equal-time rule) to create a news outlet that would cater to the country’s underserved conservative audience. You don’t have to be a Fox fan to credit the network with reintroducing ideological competition to the news business, which began to fade at the midpoint of the 20th century.”

I don’t watch Fox News routinely. Maybe I should. It leans away from where I lean; I suppose the older I get the more vulnerable I feel when my blood pressure elevates as the veins in my neck start throbbing. For that matter, I am having trouble watching MSNBC these days, but for a vastly different reason: MSNBC’s predictable liberal slant has become boring.

Schafer takes note of “reliably liberal” New York Times columnist Frank Rich’s assessment of Fox News: “The median age of a Fox viewer is 68, eight years older than the MSBNC and CNN median age, and its median age is rising. ‘Fox is in essence a retirement community,’ Rich writes, and a small one at that! ‘The million or so viewers who remain fiercely loyal to the network are not, for the most part, and as some liberals still imagine, naĂŻve swing voters who stumble onto Fox News under the delusion it’s a bona fide news channel and then are brainwashed by Ailes’s talking points into becoming climate-change deniers,’ he writes.”

The bottom line is that Fox News isn’t the political juggernaut its viewers think it is.

This is a most interesting analysis. Take a look.

 

local news, State news

Now … about all that rain

Ama street flooding

In my 20-plus years living on the High Plains of Texas, weather-related conversations usually have fallen into several discussion topics.

They go something like this:

* Boy, how about that wind? You’d better hold on to your hat today.

* Hey, is it hot enough for ya? When’s it going to cool off around here?

* I had to dig my car out of the snow this morning on the way to work. When will it ever stop snowing? When will it warm up around here?

Rarely have I had to talk about rain. Copious amounts of it, to boot. Then again, my wife and I are still fairly new to the area. Long-timers around here have talked about the flooding of the late 1970s. Or they’ll mention the storm-drain lakes built to catch all the water.

The talk all over town — indeed, all across Texas — has been about the rain.

We’ve gone a long time around here without rain being atop our minds’ awareness.

As I scan my assorted news sources this morning, I see that as wet as we’ve been in Amarillo and the Panhandle the past few days, we’re still relatively desert-like compared to places like San Marcos and Wimberley in Central Texas. The Riverwalk in San Antonio has spilled over. Our old haunts in the Golden Triangle, as well as in Houston, well … they’ve been wetter than usual — and that’s really saying something for that part of the state. Dallas-Fort Worth also is soggy beyond belief

My wife and I are hoping to take our fifth wheel out over Father’s Day weekend. Our plan is — or at least was — to go to Eisenhower State Park in Denison, on the Oklahoma border. We called to make our reservation. “Sorry sir,” the young lady said. “We aren’t taking reservations right now. Too much water. The lake is overflowing. Roads are closed. Try again closer to the date when you want to come here … and we’ll see.”

Hey, I know you can’t control the Almighty — which is why we call him “Almighty.”

I’m going to hope for the best. The rain is surely welcome. The playas are full. The rivers are rushing. Lake Meredith, just north of us in Hutchinson County, is going to get a lot of in-flow from its watershed for the next several days as the water continues to drain from Amarillo and other locales.

Perhaps, though, I’ll just ask that it more or less evens out. In fact, I think I might say a little prayer to that effect.

Why not? Someone — such as the Almighty himself — already has answered our prayers for rain.

local news

Words to live by … and to ponder

I know this couple here in Amarillo. They’ve been active in civic and community affairs for a very long time.

They’re both natives of the city and I am totally convinced they love it with all their heart.

They sent me a short blog, which I have attached to this post:

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2015/05/a-fool-in-front-of-the-crowd-is-an-inevitable-side-effect-of-work-that-matters.html

It seems to speak directly to the skeptics who harbor thoughts of some conspiracy lurking in the minds of those who have cobbled together a grand vision for the future of Amarillo.

Here’s what it says. I attached the link so you might want to look at more items on the blog to try to size up the fellow who wrote these words.

“When you do work that matters, the crowd will call you a fool.

“If you do something remarkable, something new and something important, not everyone will understand it (at first). Your work is for someone, not everyone.

“Unless you’re surrounded only by someones, you will almost certainly encounter everyone. And when you do, they will jeer.

“That’s how you’ll know you might be onto something.”

I think the author of this post is suggesting — while obviously not speaking to our local circumstance directly — that the vision being considered for Amarillo’s downtown goes perhaps a step or two too far for some of us to grasp immediately.

Do I grasp it? Hardly. I’m just anxious to see what develops.

We’ve heard some “jeering” lately from those who think the city is hiding something. They seem to think there’s more “there there,” to borrow a portion of a phrase from Gertrude Stein.

I will continue to hope for the best as the city moves forward with development plans they hope will transform the city’s central business district into something we don’t yet recognize.

However, I strongly suspect we’ll know we’ve found it the moment we see it.

legal news, State news

So long to ‘pick-a-pal’ grand jury system?

Texas might be on the verge of doing something it should have done years ago.

It might dramatically reform the way many of the state’s 254 counties select members to sit on a grand jury.

Let’s hold to the cheers until it clears the Texas Legislature and lands on Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk.

http://www.texastribune.org/2015/05/24/texas-moves-closer-to-overhauling-grand-jury-syste/

The Texas House of Representatives has approved Senate Bill 135. It would require grand juries to be chosen the way trial juries are picked: randomly.

The current system allows state district judges to impanel grand juries using a jury commissioner system. The judge picks a jury commissioner, who then looks for friends, acquaintances or just plain folks he or she knows to serve on a grand jury.

Here’s where I make my full disclosure. I once served on a Randall County grand jury. A neighbor who happens to be a friend asked me to serve. I said “yes.” I then was seated by 181st District Judge John Board, along with other grand jurors. We met for the next three months and heard criminal complaints presented by the Criminal District Attorney’s Office.

Did that grand jury work well? Yes.

However, there remains the potential problem of friends picking friends to serve on grand juries. Heck, even judges pick friends to serve as jury commissioners. Cronyism can — and does, on occasion — run amok.

As the Texas Tribune reports: “Critics of the ‘pick-a-pal’ system, an uncommon practice nationwide, say it could lead to conflicts of interest. The debate over the legislation has unfolded amid outrage nationwide that grand juries have failed to indict police officers in shootings of unarmed men.”

A random selection method does not diminish the quality of the grand jury that hears criminal complaints and decides whether to indict someone for an alleged crime.

Look at it this way: If a randomly selected trial jury can decide whether someone lives or dies if he or she is convicted of a capital crime, then a similarly chosen grand jury can decide whether that person should stand trial in the first place.

 

media news

More ‘lies’ from O’Reilly

2 Comments

Bill O’Reilly is a serial liar, according to one of his former colleagues at Fox News Channel.

OK, that doesn’t surprise a lot of folks. What’s a bit surprising to me is that the allegation of lying comes from Eric Burns, who was a host of “Fox News Watch” for a decade until 2008, when the network let him go.

I’m not sure if Burns is spitting out some sour grapes here, but he did tell CNN’s Brian Stelter that O’Reilly long has been known to embellish his credentials, if not lie outright about what he reported on.

The clip attached to this link is about 8 minutes long. It’s a highly interesting critique on O’Reilly’s time at Fox and whether his bosses and colleagues at the network expect much from him. Burns said no, they don’t.

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/03/ex-fox-host-tells-cnn-olbermann-was-right-all-along-fox-is-a-cult-and-oreilly-is-a-liar/#.VPy5tRDsw1s.twitter

Why is this such a big deal? Well, maybe it’s not huge. But in the media world, O’Reilly has become cable the biggest star on cable “news,” although I use the term “news” guardedly where it involves O’Reilly or, for that matter, Fox News in general.

About the time Brian Williams got suspended by NBC for fibbing, er, lying, about being shot down in Iraq, O’Reilly came under criticism for his reporting from the Falklands War “front” in 1982 when, in reality, he never set foot on the island territory when British forces landed to take it back from Argentine forces.

Williams got suspended — and likely won’t get his news anchor job back — while O’Reilly’s ratings have soared, as Burns told Stelter on CNN’s “Reliable Sources.”

That seems to be the aim at Fox: ratings. Burns said the network is giving O’Reilly a pass because the more he comes under fire, the more his rating soar. Burns suggested to Stelter that’s a likely consequence of the audience that tunes in to Fox. He calls Fox News watchers “cultish.” Watch the clip and listen for yourself to what he says.

It’s interesting that in all the discussion, I didn’t hear a mention of what now-Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., has called O’Reilly over the years. Back when he was a mere political humorist, Franken would refer the Fox News host as “O’Lie-ly,” which enraged O’Reilly so much that to this day he refers to Franken by his former “Saturday Night Live” character, Stuart Smalley.

Whatever the case, the interview with Eric Burns is worth your time.

Well, at least was worth my time.

political news

Only the ‘rich’ can serve in Congress?

Alcee Hastings must not be a wealthy man.

The Florida Democratic U.S. representatives wants a pay raise from the 174 grand he makes annually. He says “only rich people” are able to serve in Congress, given the paltry sum House members and senators earn each year.

Please. Stop.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/19/congressional-pay_n_7337282.html?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000013

Have members of Congress earned a pay raise? Consider a little bit of information here.

The latest average of polls compiled by RealClearPolitics.com puts congressional approval rating at about 15 percent. Fifteen percent of Americans think Congress is doing a good job. The polls don’t ask voters, more than likely, whether they think Congress deserves a raise.

As for Hastings’s assertion that only rich people can serve now, I want to add two quick points.

One, did he not know how much the office paid when he chose to run for Congress when he was impeached by Congress and tossed off the federal bench after being convicted of bribery and perjury by the Senate?

Two, there exist plenty of examples of members of Congress enriching themselves while serving on Capitol Hill. One example that comes to mind immediately is my former congressman, the late Jack Brooks, a Democrat from Beaumont, who used to cite how poor he was when he was elected to Congress in 1952, but who acquired tremendous wealth by virtue of his serving on a number of bank and other corporate boards.

The only possible positive I can see in Hastings’s demand for more money lies in the U.S. Constitution’s 27th Amendment, which says: “No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.”

 

 

military news, national news

R.I.P., young soldier

I posted this blog essay two years ago to commemorate Memorial Day. I want to share it again today as the nation prepares to honor the memories of those who have fallen in battle.

I don’t dwell too much on these kinds of things, but I’m thinking today of a young man I knew briefly many years ago.

His name was Jose DeLaTorre. We served in the same U.S. Army aviation battalion at Marble Mountain, a heavily fortified outpost just south of Da Nang in what used to be called South Vietnam. He served in a different company than I did; he worked on a UH-1 Huey helicopter crew while I was assigned to a fixed-wing outfit, the 245th Aviation Company, which flew OV-1 Mohawk reconnaissance aircraft.

One day in June 1969, Jose came bursting into our work area full of enthusiasm. He was going home in just a few days. I recall he’d extended his tour in ‘Nam several times. I think he had served something like 32 months in-country. I recall he usually was full of it – even on his quiet days. But on this day, Jose was pretty much out of control with excitement.

Later that day, his Huey company scrambled on a troop-lift mission. DeLaTorre did what he usually did when his company got the call to lift off: He strapped himself into an M-60 machine gun and flew as a door gunner on the mission.

It was supposed to be a “routine” drop at a landing zone. It wasn’t. The LZ was “hot,” meaning the ships were greeted by heavy enemy fire when they arrived.

You know how this tale turns out.

DeLaTorre was killed in action that day.

I didn’t know him well. Indeed, it took me 21 years – when I visited the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in D.C. in 1990 with my wife and sons – to learn he hailed from Fullerton, Calif. I saw his name carved into The Wall. I paid my respects and, yes, choked back the lump in my throat.

Today I’m thinking of that effervescent young man and the 58,000-plus other names on that monument, as well all those who have fallen in battle since the beginning of this great republic.

May they all rest in peace.

Thank you for your sacrifice.

national news, political news

Media turn 'bloodthirsty' over Duggar coverage?

Hey, let’s cool the hyperbole, former Mike Huckabee.

The ex-Arkansas governor and current Republican presidential candidate, says the media are “blood-thirsty in their coverage of the Josh Duggar scandal. Duggar, one of the “19 Kids and Counting” featured in the former TLC reality series, has admitted to molesting young girls, including some of his sisters, when he was a teenager.

Huckabee is a family friend, who’s received the Duggars’ endorsement in his run for the presidency.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/huckabee-slams-media-for-blood-thirsty-coverage-of-duggar-molestation-report/ar-BBk7Vps

Bloodthirsty?

Hmmm. Were the media bloodthirsty in its coverage of former U.S. Rep. Anthony “Carlos Danger” Weiner’s “selfies” of his private parts? I don’t recall the governor saying such a thing then. Do you?

How about the media’s treatment of former President Bill Clinton — Huckabee’s home boy from Hope, Ark. — and the president’s affair with the White House intern? Were the media piling on about that? I believe the governor was silent about that, too.

Did the media pile on then-U.S. Rep. Barney Frank when they reported his dealings with a male hooker? Come on.

Granted, Josh Duggar was just a dumb teenager when he did those things. But he’s grown up now. He’s become politically active, right along with Mom and Dad Duggar. He became involved with the Family Research Council, a highly political organization that promotes “traditional family values” and high morals. What’s more, Mom and Dad kept it all secret for several years before being outed by a magazine.

This outrage needs to be covered by the media. There’s no political blood lust involved.

Commentary on politics, current events and life experience