Mitt Romney’s famous about faces on key issues has many tongues wagging as the presidential campaign heads for the home stretch.

* He once believed that humans caused climate change; now he says it’s bunk.

* Mitt once thought we could institute “reasonable” controls on guns; he now opposes that, too.

* Romney rammed through a comprehensive health care reform for his state, which served as the model for President Obama’s own national program; now he wants to repeal “Obamacare.”

* Romney once espoused a woman’s right to choose to have an abortion; he now vows to select judges who would repeal Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion in this country.

But he’s not the first Republican politician to switch so dramatically, particularly on abortion.

My favorite GOP flip-flopper is the 41st president of the U.S., George H.W. Bush.

Let’s flash back to 1980. Ronald Reagan was about to be nominated for president by the Republican Party. The Gipper was shopping around for a running mate. He actually negotiated with former President Gerald Ford about taking the job; Ford declined, not wanting to play second fiddle to the guy who almost defeated him for the GOP nomination in 1976.

So, Reagan turned to Bush. One little problem emerged, though. Bush was strongly pro-choice. Were he to take the job as Reagan’s VP, he’d have to change his mind on abortion – immediately. Bush did. He became adamantly pro-life the instant he said “yes” to The Gipper.

No one seemed to mind at the time. And that makes me wonder if the flip-flop charge against Romney is going to matter so much.

In my mind, it should. A politician should stand by his/her beliefs.

And just how strongly did Bush believe in a woman’s right to choose? When he served in the U.S. House in the late 1960s representing the Houston area, he acquired a nickname owing to his strong support of women’s reproductive rights.

His congressional colleagues called him “Rubbers.”

You know what’s been one of my favorite elements of the series of presidential/vice presidential debates so far? The absence of audience involvement.

Barack Obama/Mitt Romney One was notable for the lack of cheers, jeers, hoots and hollers from the audience; same for Joe Biden/Paul Ryan in their VP debate this past week. I’m hoping Obama/Romney Two – and Three, next week – will feature this much decorum.

Too many times in past debates, the candidates have played to the audience in the hall, not to the broader audience out there, in TV Land. Yes, some of these encounters have produced memorable sound bites and applause lines. We laugh about them now and recall how much punch they carried when the politician uttered them.

But they do nothing to enhance the quality of the discussion.

President Obama and Mitt Romney will have some important things to say, as will Vice President Joe Biden and Paul Ryan. We’ll get two more chances to hear the presidential candidates make their case in front of tens of millions of us. I’ve noted already that my mind is made up on this race, but all of us can learn something new about the men who seek to lead this nation.

I intend to focus my undivided attention on what they are saying. Crowd noise is just that – noise.

I hear they’ve started voting early in some states back east. Ohio, for one, has opened up balloting for president and the word is that the early ballots are tilting significantly in President Obama’s favor.

Good for them Buckeyes.

As for me, I long have hated the idea of voting early and I will, as is my custom, wait until Nov. 6 to cast my ballot for president and a bunch of down-ballot races.

Why the loathing of early voting? Simple: I don’t like casting my lot with a candidate without knowing all there is to know about him/her prior to election day. Were I to vote early for a candidate and then learn something hideous about that person before election day, I’d regret that vote for the rest of my life. I recall once way down yonder in Orange County, Texas, when a county commissioner candidate was revealed to have committed an act of extreme sexual harassment. Early voting had begun and the paper where I worked had endorsed this guy. We withdrew the endorsement and backed his opponent. That’s the risk you run when you vote early.

It’s supposed to have boosted voter turnout. It hasn’t worked out that way in Texas, where turnout of registered voters remains among the lowest in the nation. All it’s done here is boost the number of Texans who vote early. The total turnout is still hovering around 50 percent of registered voters.

Early voting in Texas commences Oct. 22. I’m quite sure many voters will flock to the polls to cast their ballots early. Good for them, too.

I’ll just wait until Nov. 6 and then stand in line along with the rest of the late-comers.

Then I’ll vote … and hope nothing happens to embarrass any of my candidates between election day and the moment they take office.

My name is John and I’m a poll-aholic.

I’ve been addicted to this affliction for some time now, going back maybe to 1980, when Ronald Reagan defeated Jimmy Carter in a landslide.

I recall then that the polls had the race basically tied heading into the final week. But a danger sign loomed for President Carter: that big bloc of undecided voters. In the end, most of the undecided voters swung to Reagan and the Gipper won in a landslide.

No need to watch the polls in 1984, when President Reagan won in a 49-state landslide over Walter Mondale. The ‘88 polls were interesting, as Michael Dukakis squandered a 17-point lead over George H.W. Bush and lost big to the then-vice president. 1992? Go figure that one. Ross Perot at one point was actually leading in a three-way race with Bush and Bill Clinton; Clinton won with a 43-percent plurality and Bush never has forgiven Perot for stealing the election from him. Clinton’s re-election was in the bag four years later. Then came 2000 and that wild ride to the finish, with Vice President Al Gore and Texas Gov. George W. Bush battling it out to the wire in a photo finish. 2004 ended up right about where it began, with President Bush being re-elected by a slim margin over John Kerry. And 2008 was a bit of a roller-coaster as well, with John McCain leading right up until the time he decided to suspend his campaign during the financial meltdown – to what end no one knows to this day.

Here we are now. President Obama and Mitt Romney are see-sawing. One is up one week, then down. I’m getting dizzy watching these polls. The average of all those surveys, as of this morning, had the two men in a dead heat.

Why not fixate more on the issues? Well, my mind is made up. I know where these guys stand on the big issues. I’ve been in the “decided” category of voter for a long while. With my mind made up, I’m ready to cast my vote. But until then, I’m addicted to these polls.

I think I need help.

http://amarillo.com/news/local-news/2012-10-13/beilue-survivors-were-heroes-dust-bowl

Let’s thrust ourselves back in time, say, to around 1935.

Some residents of the Panhandle are old enough to remember those days. That was an era of incessant dust storms that blackened the sky. Farms literally were blown away. Along with the dirt went people’s livelihoods. Dreams were shattered. Many people surrendered to their darkest instincts.

But many of those folks endured. They powered through the crisis. They came out all right on the other side. And when the world plunged into war in the late ‘30s – with the United States joining that conflict in late ‘41 – the nation rallied to defeat a hideous enemy and the greatest industrial and military power in the history of the planet emerged from the carnage.

Timothy Egan wrote a book in 2006, “The Worst Hard Time,” and has been the subject of some talk around these parts on the eve of the showing of a PBS documentary on the Dust Bowl that will air next month. Egan came to Amarillo recently to talk about his experiences talking with survivors of that terrible time. I know a few of them myself and they possess the stoutest of souls.

I want to mention this bit of history as many of us ponder an economic crisis that has become a major focal point of a presidential election campaign. One side says the worst is behind us and that we’re on the way back; the other side, though, says we aren’t emerging quickly enough from that crisis and we need to do more.

Whoever is right depends on one’s political persuasion. Me? I side with those who hold out hope that a brighter future is on the way.

And when I consider how difficult times really got on the High Plains during the first half of the previous century – and then look at where we’ve come since – I really don’t feel so bad.

I am keeping the faith.

We’re hearing some grumbles around Amarillo that the City Commission should put a cellphone ban ordinance to a popular vote, as was done twice some years ago with an indoor smoking ban.

The commission voted 4-1 recently to ban the use of handheld cellphones while driving motor vehicles. It’s been a tough road for the city, but I have concluded finally that commissioners made the right call.

The yammering for a referendum, though, is getting tiresome.

We elect these five individuals to make some difficult decisions on occasion. And they do it for virtually nothing; getting 10 bucks per meeting doesn’t exactly constitute a living wage for these folks. The cellphone ban is one of those tough calls. Let them make the decision.

Municipal governing bodies make these decisions all the time in communities across the state and nation. But yet we keep hearing from the vocal minority in Amarillo that the city “shoves laws down our throats.” What utter nonsense.

It’s not as though voters are powerless in the face of these City Hall mandates. Amarillo does have municipal elections every other year. All five commission members – including, of course, the mayor – have to stand for re-election if they decide to seek another two-year term. If you don’t like the decisions they make, vote them out and elect someone who’ll do your bidding. Isn’t that the essence of a representative democracy?

And if you or your candidate happens to lose fail to get enough votes to win, well, understand the time-honored political truism: Elections have consequences. I’ll just add “for good or ill.” The cellphone ban is a constructive step that commissioners needed to take.

I have to agree with Jim Messina, campaign manager for President Obama re-election team: If the other side’s major gripe is about your guy’s facial expressions and manners, then you know you won a debate on the issues.

In my view – and you can take it for whatever it’s worth – Vice President Joe Biden cleaned Republican VP nominee Paul Ryan’s clock the other night in their only debate. Did I like Biden’s constant snickering and occasional guffaws? Not really. But that’s not how you should measure these events. Yes, the administration has some explaining to do regarding the tragic security lapse at the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, where four diplomats died recently in an attack on the compound. But on issue after issue, the vice president was in command and on the attack.

Which brings us to the next debate, set for Tuesday in Long Island, N.Y., between President Obama and GOP challenger Mitt Romney.

Yes, Biden teed it up for the president. Now it’s up to Obama – if you’ll pardon the mixed metaphor – to hit it out of the park. The pressure is going to be immense on the president to follow up on the vice president’s fire-and-brimstone performance.

And for Romney? He’s read all the media accounts along with the rest of us. He’ll have to be ready to counter whatever the president throws at him. I’m guessing he’ll be prepared too.

Quick historical note …

The 1960 televised debates between Sen. John Kennedy and Vice President Richard Nixon started out with a relative whimper, with Kennedy “winning” on style points – not to mention superior makeup. The subsequent encounters got testier. Few of us talk these days about the follow-up contests between these guys. They both were aggressive and in each other’s faces.

I think history is going to repeat itself as we head down the stretch.

After watching the vice-presidential debate Thursday night, I came away with this thought: I would love to have been a fly on the proverbial wall when President Obama called Vice President Biden to congratulate him for some pretty stellar work on behalf of the Democratic ticket.

Imagine that the phone rang in Biden’s limo as he left the debate venue.

Biden: Hello, Mr. President?

Obama: After watching you tonight, Mr. Vice President, I only can say that you took me to school. And by the way, I’m going to call you “Mr. Vice President” from now on. No more just plain “Joe” from me, sir.

Biden: What do you mean, I took you to school?

Obama: You instructed me with cold precision on just how a politician brings his A-game to a debate. I messed up the other night in that first debate with Mitt Romney. It won’t happen again. I guarantee it. After watching your full frontal assault on Paul Ryan, I now know what I have to do the next time Romney and I get together for Round Two.

Biden: Well, thank you, Mr. President. I’m a loyal soldier and, let’s face it – to borrow a phrase they say down in Texas – this wasn’t my first rodeo. But as you probably will find out, the Republicans thought their guy won and Democrats will think I won. But here’s the thing: We got our base fired up once again. I’m pretty sure we’ve at least stopped the momentum Romney gained after the Round One of your debate. And don’t forget that their base is fired up too.

Obama: OK then. Thanks for teeing it up for me. But if you don’t mind, I probably won’t laugh next week as much as you did.

Biden: Suit yourself, Mr. President. But you’d better bring it or else we both may be out of a job in January.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/11/tech/social-media/facebook-politics-friends/index.html?hpt=hp_bn5

I’ll have to admit that Facebook is testing my friendships.

As the CNN link here tells, politics is getting in the way of friendships. Apparently millions of folks have “unfriended” people over their political views. I hope it doesn’t come to that for me.

I’ve been on a political rampage lately with this blog. These posts go directly to Facebook, where they are shared with my Facebook friends, many of whom don’t share my own center-left leanings; indeed, some of those very friends might accuse me of being a commie. In return, I’ve endured some of their own rants.

I don’t intend to disavow my association with them over politics. The way I look at it, we all love our country equally. We just disagree on some of the finer points of how we should govern this great nation.

Is that worth losing a friendship? Hardly, except of course if you take yourself too seriously.

And yes, I do know some of those folks too.

Chill out, friends. It’s only politics.

Tonight’s vice-presidential debate between the incumbent, Democrat Joe Biden, the challenger, Republican Paul Ryan, is likely to produce some embellishment, a bit of braggadocio and maybe even some prevarication.

The run-up to this encounter has included some interesting sound bites from previous VP debates. My all-time favorite, of course, has been the 1988 face-off between Democratic VP nominee Lloyd Bentsen of Texas and Republican nominee Dan Quayle of Indiana. Both men were serving in the U.S. Senate at the time.

During the debate, which occurred in Danville, Ky. – where Biden and Ryan will square off tonight – Quayle sought to make a comparison between his congressional experience and that of a previous president, John F. Kennedy. He said that his experience matches up favorably with JFK’s experience in the House and Senate before Kennedy’s election in 1960.

Bentsen pounced. He was waiting for Quayle’s ill-advised comparison.

“I knew Jack Kennedy,” Bentsen said. “I served with Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you’re no Jack Kennedy.” Bentsen brought the house down. It was a devastating blow to Quayle, who retorted that the remark was “uncalled for, senator.” Bentsen responded, “But you brought it up … senator.”

OK, but was Bentsen really as close to JFK as his snappy response suggested? No.

Bentsen and Kennedy served together in the House for about five years; Kennedy left the House when he was elected senator from Massachusetts in 1952. Bentsen stayed in the House until 1955, and didn’t return to Washington until 1971 after his election to the Senate, more than seven years after Kennedy’s death.

Bentsen and Kennedy were little more than casual acquaintances during their time together. They represented vastly different regions of the country: Kennedy hailed from New England, Bentsen represented South Texas. They both served during World War II, they both came from wealthy backgrounds.

They weren’t exactly pals.

But hey, why let context get in the way of a good sound bite?