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Farewell sis … what a ride!

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PORTLAND — I came back to the city of my birth — and my sisters’ birth — to bid farewell to the older of my two sisters.

Georgianne surrendered to the physical demons that had plagued her for years, succumbing Feb. 24 to complications brought on by COPD.  She was 14 months younger than me.

We had two services. One was to celebrate sis’s amazing life. She lived just short of 74 years. Her trip in this life was a wild one, to be sure. She had her issues growing up. Sis got through them and went on to lead a productive life. The other service was at the crypt where her ashes are interred next to Mom and Dad.

Sis never really shook herself completely free of the difficulties that followed her into teenhood and early young adulthood.

However, she was full of love and that love came back to blanket her during the celebrations we had of the life she led. I am grateful for that and I know she is, too.

I will return home late tomorrow to North Texas, where I have established my own life. Perhaps I should say where I am rebuilding my life. Many of you who have read this blog know about the circumstances there. It’s coming along.

This trip to where I came into this world, though, is about Georgianne Duback. She would tell me while seeking a favor from me that “I’ll love you forever.”

Well, sis, know that I truly will love you forever.

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World has gone mad!

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Let us be sure we don’t pussyfoot around the obvious … which is that our political world has gone stark-raving mad.

How can I make such a claim? I have a friend in Germany, a journalist and a student of American politics. He usually is spot on with his understanding of U.S. political trends, as he said they occasionally mirror developing trends in Germany.

My friend wrote me a note that led with this: “I don’t understrand what is happening to your country.”

The major concern for my friend is the U.S.’s new found friendship with an assassin, a killer, a dictator and a highly aggressive head of state, Vladimir Putin.

Putin invaded Ukraine three years ago in a bold-faced territory grab from a sovereign nation. Ukraine also is an ally of the United States. President Biden immediately went to NATO officials to enlist their support for our financial and materiel aid to Ukraine. He got it.

Now, Biden is retired. He’s gone back to Delaware and is playing with his grandkids. Meanwhile, the nimrod who succeeded him has cozied up to Putin, seeking to broker a cease fire. Donald Trump hasn’t made a single demand of Russia other than for the troops to stop firing at Ukrainians.

Therefore, my friend in the beautifiul Bavaria region of Germany is as confused as many of us are about what has become of this nation.

For the first time in U.S. history, we have turned our backs on a dependable ally — Ukraine — in favor of an aggressor state while the two countries are in the middle of a bloody ground war!

Therein lies my friend’s confusion. He doesn’t understand this country. Nor do I.

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Trump is POTUS? Hardly!

High Plains Blogger readers might recall that in 2016 I pledged never to post the word “President” directly in front of Donald Trump’s name.

My belief then was that he wasn’t my president. Not only did I vote against him, I considered him fundamentally unfit to hold the nation’s highest elected office. I still cling to that belief.

Six weeks into his second go-round as POTUS, the wisdom of that pledge is being brought into sharper focus. Only for a different reason.

He has taken office in the shadow of the world’s richest human being, Elon Musk. How in the world can this be? I can’t figure out how a publicity-seeking former reality TV mogul, real estate developer and huckster without equal can cede the spotlight to a tycoon who isn’t even eligible to run for president, as he was born in South Africa.

Americans didn’t elect Musk to anything. They elected Trump. However, Trump has turned budgeting authority over to Musk and his made-up Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE as it’s now known colloquially.

What’s more, he sits quietly while Musk takes Secretary of State Marco Rubio to task for not cutting enough from his State Department budget. Good grief! That isn’t Musk’s place! The authority to make such demands in public belongs exclusively to the president of the United States!

You see, Trump isn’t acting like the individual elected to the presidency. He has become the sidekick, the second banana, the guy riding shotgun in the clown car.

It is ridiculous and outrageous at the same time.

It also gives my pledge look all the more prescient.

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Finally a good word for Trump?

Can it be that your friendly blogger — aka me! — will be able to send a good word of encouragement for something the Donald Trump administration did?

Negotiations in Saudi Arabia between U.S. and Ukrainian diplomats have produced a ceasefire agreement that seemingly strengthens Ukraine’s hand. It might lead to a peace treaty that ends the three years of bloodshed caused when Russia invaded Ukraine.

If it holds up and if the Russians agree to it, then I will be delighted to extend a good word to Trump for directing this big step toward ending a war that began because Vladimir Putin had empire-building on what passes for his cagey mind.

“The Ukrainian delegation today made something very clear, that they share President Trump’s vision for peace, they share his determination to end the fighting, to end the killing, to end the tragic meat grinder of people,” White House national security adviser Michael Waltz said after the meetings.

I have said all along that I don’t believe anything Trump says. If he says the sun sets in the west, I well might be forced to look it up.

But in this case, if there’s a glimmer of hope for an end to the killing in Ukraine, I am anxious to give Trump the credit for a potential breakthrough.

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What does an ultra-rich guy know?

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Placing federal budget-slashing authority in the hands of the richest man on Earth is a prescription for disaster.

The billions of dollars that Elon Musk is slashing from, say, the Education Department, or USAID, or Medicaid is no sweat off the nose of Musk, who cannot relate in any fashion to the troubles faced by Mom and Pop, or the young family seeking to survive.

But here is, making decisions that determine whether kids have enough food to eat, or whether parents can send their children to college or whether to send money to help impoverished nations.

Musk doesn’t get any of that. For that matter, neither does the POTUS, who grew up in a privileged household and was given millions by his father to chart his own business course. Donald Trump’s business record has been, shall we say, a mixed bag.

Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency is designed to make government less bloated. I actually endorse what sounds like a noble idea. However, slashing and burning federal departments while depriving “normal” Americans of services they have grown to expect carries the strong hint of arrogance … and ignorance into how much regular folks depend on that service.

Elon Musk doesn’t get it … not at all!

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Good call to move inaugural indoors, however …

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The decision to move the Monday presidential inaugural indoors is a good call for one obvious reason: it protects spectators and participants from the bitter cold expected to slam into the nation’s capital this weekend.

They’re going to open the Rotunda to the event that will feature Donald John Trump taking the oath of office for president. The Rotunda has a capacity of a couple hundred people. Which brings me to another, less obvious, issue related to the inaugural.

Moving the event indoors removes a discussion topic from the table: the size of the crowd gathered to witness it.

Or does it … ?

In 2017, Trump offered yet another obvious lie by saying his inaugural crowd set a record. Photographic evidence of the Mall crowd told a different story. The first Barack Obama presidential inaugural crowd in 2009 was far larger; for that matter, the second Obama inaugural in 2013 drew a larger crowd than Trump’s. Yet, Trump was having none of it.

Why is this important for today? I am waiting for ways that Trump will spin the interest in his inaugural crowd into something that won’t exist. I am all but certain he and his PR team will find a way to suggest that the “waiting list” for tickets to related inaugural events will soar into the millions of Americans.

Of course, none of this matters in the grand scheme of events. It will matter only if Trump and his team make a big deal out of it. I expect them fully to fixate on the trivial … which is what the narcissist in chief would require them to do.

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Will new POTUS follow this custom?

Presidents take their oath of office and, dating back for a good while, often open their inaugural speech with a tribute to the man who preceded them immediately in the high and exalted office.

Americans have seen a lot in recent days of President Carter turning to his predecessor, President Ford, and thanking him in 1977 “for all he did to heal our land.”

Every president since then — except for one — has issued a word of thanks for their predecessor’s service to this land. The exception, of course, was President Biden, who in 2021 took office while his predecessor, Donald Trump, was flying to Florida after refusing to concede that he lost the 2020 election.

We have another presidential inaugural on tap. Monday at noon, Trump will take an oath and then will stand in front of the world to deliver a speech that normally sets the tone for the presidency. Will the new president thank his predecessor who, after all, has stayed the course and helped transition from one administration to the next one?

I won’t predict what Trump will do or say. My hope is that he will turn to his predecessor and finally — finally! — put the Big Lie to rest once and forever by declaring that Joe Biden won the 2020 election.

I know. My expectations at times are unrealistic.

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Getting old is OK, however …

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Forgive me for reneging a little on a promise I made regarding this new nutrition and weight-management program I have just begun.

I said I wouldn’t bore you with nitty-gritty details I take at every step along the way. I want to share one item with you. So … bear with me.

The Veterans Administration has a program that teaches us how to control our meal intake and change our lifestyle. I have gotten far too heavy for my own liking. My dear bride’s passing from cancer nearly two years ago sent me into an eating frenzy I didn’t realize was occurring in the moment. But it was.

I am working my way out of that former life. I have just started that long journey. I have decided that my older age — I just turned 75 a little while ago — has robbed me of the discipline I was able to employ many years ago.

Once, in my mid-20s, I had gained a lot of weight. I decided to join my wife, who had just given birth to our first son, in a weight-loss program. It worked famously. I peeled off 52 pounds. If I may sound a bit conceited, I was proud of myself.

Those days are long gone. I have put even more weight on this aging body. I need professional help. I sought it out at the VA and the agency has responded by putting me on this program.

I am entering the program with an abundance of confidence, although I cannot yet declare whether it will bear the fruit I seek.

I can declare — therefore I will do so — that I need the help from the VA nutritionist with whom I am working. Just maybe she will keep me focused sufficiently to reach the finish line after completing my stated goal.

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Give it a rest, wackos!

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Right-wing wackos have been pissing me off for decades, but by golly they have stretched my tolerance past the breaking point this past week.

President Biden rewarded 19 deserving individuals the Presidential Medal of Freedom. They range from Bono, the U2 front man, to the late Sen./Attorney General/and probable president Robert F. Kennedy.

Among those honored were two people who have drawn the ire of the right-wing cabal, former U.S. Sen./Secretary of State/first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and progressive political activist George Soros. Why, the right-wingers just can’t tolerate the idea of these individual being honored with the nation’s highest civilian award.

What did they do to disqualify them? Clinton ran for president twice, in 2008 and in 2016. She was nominated by Democrats to run against Donald J. Trump; she lost the 2016 election. However, during her many decades in public life, Clinton became a champion for the underserved, for women’s rights, for children and for democratic principles.

And Soros? He came to this country from Hungary to build a better life for himself and his family. He has been a progressive political activist, giving tons of money to fellow progressives running for office and for causes they support.

The right-wingers don’t like either of them. That is just too … damn … bad!

Sure, they have made some mistakes. Who in the hell hasn’t?

They have earned the recognition that the president has bestowed on them. The right-wing kooks need to shut the hell up.

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Dems keep government open … thank goodness!

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What in the name of good governance is happening here, with Congress once again dodging a government shutdown bullet.

The House, facing a Friday deadline to provide money to keep the government open, approved a three-month funding extension. It sent the measure to the Senate, which then piddled around for a few hours before approving the measure, sending it to President Biden’s desk for his signature.

Call me a fuddy-duddy, but I am one American patriot who is sick and tired of this brinkmanship orchestrated in large part by the MAGA wing of a once-great Republican Party.

Donald Trump and his first buddy, Elon Musk, torpedoed a measure worked out by both parties, contending they need to suspend the debt ceiling requirement. Then Republicans cobbled together a new version, only to watch it go down in flames.

Both sides got together a second time and approved a measure that ignores the Trump-Musk demand on the debt ceiling; it passed overwhelmingly. Then it went to the Senate, where Democrats maintain nominal control of the upper chamber. Senators approved it early today.

It will get Biden’s signature likely before the sun comes up over North Texas.

These are called “continuing resolutions.” They are a patchwork of measures. They solve no problems. They deal with no long-term solutions. They give us zero confidence they can ever solve the governance issues that need a resolution.

I’ve been yapping and yammering about good government lately. I’ll keep bringing it up until Republicans, dominated by the MAGA goons in Congress — and very soon by the guy in the White House — learn how to actually govern.