national news

May the flag fly proudly … always!

It’s time to wish us all a happy Flag Day.

We love Old Glory, the Star Spangled Banner, the Stars and Stripes.  By whatever name we call it, we cherish our national symbol.

That is the more important point I want to make with this brief blog post. It is a symbol of the nation our founders created.

Those wise men wrote our Constitution and ratified it in 1787 after winning our independence from the English crown. The flag has come to mean many things to millions upon millions of Americans then and in the two-plus centuries since that time.

What it means to me is simple, but a bit nuanced. The flag flies as a symbol of the liberties we enjoy as citizens of a great nation. Among those liberties is the right — as expressed in the very First Amendment to that Constitution — to register peaceful protest. If we don’t like what our government does for us or to us, we are able to assemble “peaceably” without recrimination.

Yep, that means no tear gas, no clubbing by cops, no handcuffs and, dare I say it, no knees pressed into the back of our necks while the police are detaining us.

We are able to speak our minds.

So, the flag is far more than a piece of cloth stitched together in red, white and blue. It is an ideal by which we live and for which we fight. The ideal is being challenged these days as the nation grapples with injustice, which it always has done.

However, the flag will continue to fly and it will continue to represent the ideals we hold dear as proud citizens of this most exceptional nation.

State news

No need to ‘erase history’

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, a Texas Republican and the senior senator from this state, is now “open” to the possibility of changing the names of U.S. military posts that contain the names of Confederate traitors against the nation.

He formerly opposed it. Now he’s willing to study it along with members of both parties in the Senate.

“I realize these are contentious issues,” he continued. “What I don’t want us to do is to try to erase our history because, frankly, if you forget your history, you’re condemned to relive it.”

Look, there is no need to “erase our history” by removing the names. Just put those names in the proper museums, allowing our children to study them and to understand what they did to have their names eliminated from those military installations.

For the record, what they did was declare war against the United States, fight for the Confederate States of America, inflict hundreds of thousands of casualties on American warriors. And for what purpose? To allow states to keep human beings in bondage as slaves.

Lesson over. Take the names down.

I hope Sen. Cornyn’s views on the subject continue to evolve in the right direction.

military news

Noble power and righteous glory?

“No force on earth can match the noble power and righteous glory of the American warrior.” 

I just cannot let stand the remarks by Donald J. “Draft Evader in Chief” Trump without a brief comment on their sheer and blatant hypocrisy.

Trump spoke today to graduating cadets from the U.S. Military Academy. They had scattered far and wide, but Trump summoned them back to listen to his remarks at a socially distant commencement ceremony in Upstate New York.

Yes, we have had draft dodgers serve as president. Bill Clinton bobbed and weaved his way out of serving during the Vietnam War just as Donald Trump did. Trump got a doctor to tell the future president’s draft board that the rich kid couldn’t serve because of “bone spurs.” Trump said he “never was a fan” of that war. No sh**, dude? Neither were others of us … but we served!

Now, after dismissing and denigrating the generals and admirals who run our military, after co-opting their mission by threatening to use them to put down domestic protests and to serve as border cops to stop a phony “caravan” of refugees, he salutes these newly commissioned officers as possessing “noble power” and “righteous glory.” 

This commander in chief sickens me.

national news

Wanting to banish 2020 … be gone!

I am not one to wish away entire years.

Usually I take them as they come, slogging through the events as they transpire. I then wait for the ball to drop in Times Square and welcome the new year.

This year is vastly different. 2020 has been a serious downer, as in uber serious, man.

Right around the first month of the year we began getting word that some folks in China had been stricken by something called a “coronavirus.” Then … just like that it became a pandemic.

Donald John Trump, the “very stable genius” who runs the executive branch of our government, blew it off. It’ll disappear like a miracle, he said. Fifteen cases and — poof! — it’ll be gone. Well, it hasn’t just vanished. It has killed more than 115,000 Americans. Many more will die. The economy shut down, sending us into a recession. Trump resisted the seriousness of it. Then it dawned on him: Hey, we’d better do something; I mean, I’ve got a re-election campaign to run and those jobless numbers won’t look good as I campaign for another term.

And then came George Floyd’s death. The Minneapolis cops killed him after arresting him for trying to pass a counterfeit bill — allegedly. His death has ignited a firestorm of protest and recrimination. It’s still blazing out of control.

I want the year to end. First things first, though. We have this election coming up. I want Trump to be defeated by Joe Biden. I want POTUS gone from the White House. My preference would be that he escorted by the cops, maybe even the Marines who guard the White House.

I do have a serious concern about that election. It is that the coronavirus pandemic is going to frighten folks, keep them from voting. That plays in Trump’s wheelhouse. He proclaims a phony belief in “rampant voter fraud” if we vote by mail, which is his way of covering his a** against a big turnout that would boot his sorry backside out of office.

States should enact policies that enable voters to cast their ballots in a safe and secure manner. Texas isn’t likely to be one of them, as we are governed by Trumpkin Republicans who are faithful more to the man than to the Constitution they all swore to protect.

We’ll get through it. I just want the election to turn out the way I prefer. The rest of the year? I want it gone.

crime news

Cops under even more scrutiny

I never thought it possible that law enforcement officers would be put under the glare of national scrutiny in the manner that is now occurring all across the nation.

It has happened. It is happening right now.

During nearly four decades in journalism, I have covered law enforcement officers in two states. Those I have known professionally have been stand-up men and women. They have been devoted to the oaths they took to protect and serve the communities where they work and live.

Some of those officers became personal friends and I have sought to keep those relationships separate from the work I did as a reporter and later as an editor. I’ve always have told them: Don’t mess up.

We have entered a whole new era. Police have been seen via social media conducting themselves badly with regard to certain citizens who they swore to protect. These incidents have revealed an ugly and terrible racial divide.

Accordingly, the men and women who risk their lives each day simply by reporting for work are now being scrutinized in a way none of them possibly ever expected.

I live near a law enforcement officer. He works unusual hours and I often go several days without ever seeing him. I now intend, once I get the chance, to visit with him and to elicit — I hope — a candid response to what he is feeling as he interacts with the public he serves.

I long have believed the cops I have known back in Oregon, in the Golden Triangle region of Texas, in the Texas Panhandle and even now in North Texas (where my wife and I plan to spend the rest of our lives) to be men and women of high integrity. None of what we have witnessed in these terrible and troubling times will shake my belief in the honor of those I have known.

The intense scrutiny that has come upon these individuals — and the agencies that employ them — is likely deserved, based on what we have witnessed. I do not intend to impugn anyone’s integrity. I do intend to endorse the call for even greater accountability and transparency of those who work in arguably the most dangerous profession imaginable.

They have my gratitude for honoring the oath they take. I just want to ensure that they continue to earn it.

State news

Is there a landslide in the making?

I am not predicting anything, but I do want to share an idle thought that crossed my mind on this sweltering North Texas day.

I have seen a number of reputable public opinion polls that say the same thing: Joe Biden is well within striking distance of Donald Trump among Texans in the 2020 presidential election. A couple of these surveys have the former VP at a percentage point or perhaps two behind Trump. That is a statistical dead heat, a tie, it’s anyone’s race to win.

So … here’s the deal. If Joe Biden picks off Texas, which hasn’t voted for a Democrat since 1976 when Jimmy Carter defeated President  Gerald Ford, then we’re looking at a serious landslide victory for Joseph Biden Jr.

Biden’s strategy? Campaign hard in Texas and he must remind Texans that Donald Trump is a pathological liar who doesn’t give a rat’s a** about them.

Just thinking — and hoping — out loud. Be cool, man.

military news

Glad to re-engage this Confederate debate

I am so very happy that Americans are re-engaging each other in this debate over the Confederacy, the Confederate States of America and whether we should be naming public institutions — namely military establishments — in honor of enemies of the state.

The debate has been joined yet again because many Americans are awakening to the realization that the CSA was formed in 1861 for one purpose: to destroy the United States of America. Why? To enable states to continue to enslave human beings, to allow them to be kept as property of other human beings.

So the Confederacy fired on a Union garrison in Charleston Harbor, S.C., and ignited the Civil War.

The men who fought for the CSA were traitors to the nation. There is no other way to consider them. So now we have resumed the debate over whether their names belong on places such as Army posts, which trains, houses and equips men and women to defend this country against its enemies. The irony is astounding.

You may spare me the tired notion that the Confederate statues and the names of these individuals on buildings and other public establishments is a recognition of the nation’s “heritage.” The heritage that some of us want to protect does not deserve the honor it has been given. That it took so long to understand that perhaps is the most astonishing aspect of this debate.

The argument that the CSA was steeped in protecting “states’ rights” also has been revealed as a tired euphemism for what it really intended to protect. Slavery is this nation’s original sin and we must deal with it forthrightly.

Now is as good a time as any, given that so much time has passed since those Americans were set free and granted the rights of citizenship they deserved to possess all along.

This debate, of course, is lacking one key voice … that of the commander in chief, who says he won’t accept the idea of changing the names of military posts. Donald Trump cannot offer a single reason to keeping these names, other than to placate those among his political base who demand that they remain.

Someone said today that the names of these enemies of the Union — and the flag under which they fought — deserve to be displayed in museums … alongside other enemies of the United States: the Nazis, fascists, ISIS, al-Qaeda, the Soviet Union, the North Vietnamese communists, the People’s Republic of China.

Should they remain attached to places of high honor and respect? Absolutely not!

national news

Protester suffers brain injury

You no doubt have seen the video.

Martin Gugino, a 75-year-old protester, approached a phalanx of Buffalo, N.Y., police officers armed with shields and assorted riot gear. The cops pushed him to the ground. Gugino hit his head hard on the pavement and blood began pouring out of his ear.

The police walked on by. Someone finally summoned medical help. Gugino was taken to the hospital, where he was listed in serious but stable condition.

It turns out Gugino suffered a brain injury. He needs physical therapy.

What, though, did the president say about this fellow? The Conspiracy Theorist in Chief suggested that Gugino faked his fall, that his tumble onto the pavement was exaggerated. Donald Trump called him an Antifa “provocateur.”

Let’s just say that the only provocateur in this instance is Donald Trump, who is provoking more anger, more distrust of those who are protesting police brutality … which was the cause of the Buffalo march in the first place.

Get well, Mr. Gugino. As for Donald John Trump, well … I am just hoping he is in the final throes of his disgraceful tenure in the nation’s highest office.

medical news, national news

Texas ought to follow Oregon’s lead

1 Comment

I have intimate knowledge and familiarity with two of our nation’s 50 states. I was born, came of age and grew up in Oregon; I have lived in Texas for most of my life, 36 out of 70 years on Earth.

Oregon is experiencing a spike in COVID-19 infections and is slamming a halt to its plan to reopen the state’s business community. Texas also is experiencing a spike, setting infection and death records daily, but it is moving ahead with its phased reopening.

Hmm. I believe Oregon has it correct and that Texas is reacting badly. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott says he sees no real need to scale back, let alone shut down, the state’s reopening. Why? Because the state has no shortage of intensive care unit beds in hospitals, according to Abbott.

Oregon has adopted a go-slow approach to this pandemic. Accordingly, Oregon has experienced a much lower per capita infection and death rate than many states. Texas cannot make that claim.

According to the Texas Tribune: The number of available beds is seen as a key gauge for the state’s ability to handle a potential surge in coronavirus cases, and Abbott has said the hospitalization rate — the proportion of infected Texans who are requiring hospitalization — is a benchmark he’s closely monitoring. That number has trended slowly downward since April and was just over 8% on Friday.

I continue to believe the state is moving too quickly to return to what some Texans hope is “normal” business and recreational activity.

Hey, I want this to end as much as the next guy. I want to return to regular activity. I am tired of wearing a mask when I mingle with others at the grocery store. I am sick of slathering sanitizer on my hands whenever I touch door handles, fuel pumps and shopping carts.

I also do not want my family members exposed to a virus that could do them serious harm. I want the state to take greater care than it is already doing to help ensure that they remain safe.

national news

Are we really ready to repeat this fluke?

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I have written of Donald Trump’s election as president as being the greatest political fluke in U.S. history.

Hardly no one saw it coming in 2016. The pundit class, all the political “experts” believed to their core that Hillary Clinton would be elected. She wasn’t. Instead we got a guy who had never sought public office, let alone ever held one. Many of us predicted he would be a disaster as president of the United States.

I hate saying this — yes, I really do hate it — but he’s proven to be far worse than we thought. The Nitwit in Chief has shredded the presidency. He has destroyed relations between the legislative and executive branches of government. Trump has decimated our international alliances. POTUS has turned us into a worldwide laughingstock.

We have a chance in November to rescue what Trump has damaged. The destruction he has brought to intergovernmental relations can be restored by electing someone who understands how the executive and legislative branches can cooperate and seek common ground. Yes, that would be Joe Biden, the former longtime senator and two-term vice president.

However, the wreckage that Trump has brought will be difficult to clear from the landscape.

Time and time and time again, this president refuses to speak to issues that compel his attention. The issue of race relations has returned to the top of our minds. The death of a black man by a white police officer who choked the life out of him for nearly nine minutes has galvanized a movement. Trump doesn’t speak to that tragedy specifically. Instead he quotes racist cops from more than 50 years ago and drives wedges between Americans, relishing the division he is creating and widening.

Yes, we also have the pandemic. Trump’s initial response was pathetic and rotten to the core. Tens of thousands of Americans have died from COVID-19; there will be tens of thousands more who will die. Trump claims success. For what?

Are we really ready to commit the Greatest Political Fluke 2.0 come November? The polling tells us “no!” Then again, it said the same thing four years ago … and look at what we got.

Commentary on politics, current events and life experience