Category Archives: Uncategorized

Uncategorized

Talarico: the real Democratic deal!

James Talarico has emerged as the latest political star in Texas and he hopes to parlay his standing into a successful career in Congress.

The man has my support and I am about to explain why.

Talarico is a man of deep Christian faith. He wears his faith plainly and professes it from the campaign stump. He’s a Presbyterian seminary student and he has a graduate degree in economics. He’s a smart guy.

Talarico’s faith, though, carries an important caveat that he’s also proud to display. Talarico understands what the founders intended when they drafted the nation’s governing document. They intended to create a secular state free of religious influence. James Talarico gets it … and endorses the founders’ intention.

He has emerged as a fierce foe of Christian nationalists, those who seek to turn the U.S.A. into a Christian nation.

I guess I favor Talarico because he and I share the same view of the religion to which we both profess our faith. I practice my faith with enthusiasm, but am reluctant to shove it down the throats of others.

I want Talarico to succeed in his quest to win a U.S. Senate seat. If he defeats Sen. John Cornyn in the fall, I suspect it will occur because voters have grown weary of D.C.-centered politicians like Cornyn passing laws we all must follow. If he manages to beat Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, it well might be because Texans are disgusted with the way Paxton has conducted himself in the decade he has served in statewide elected office.

Talarico is a new breed of Texas Democrat, which in its way mirrors the way Democrats here used to present themselves.

The Democratic Senate nominee has time to refine his message, to fine-tune the manner in which he intends to deliver it. I also want him to ensure to keep the many promises he no doubt will make as he travels the length and breadth of this great state.

Many of us are waiting, James Talarico.

Uncategorized

Asians: a new major minority

I picked up my copy of the Dallas Morning News the other morning and was stunned by the top story on the front page: It dealt with tensions rising in Frisco over the emergence of South Asians who now call the community home.

I am not going to pass judgment on the rightness or wrongness of the concerns. I know that it’s real, that some North Texans are concerned that their culture is being changed by an emergence of immigrants from a region far from this hemisphere.

Frisco has grown tremendously since 2000, with a population these days of something just a bit south of 300,000 residents. Indian Americans once accounted for about 2% of the population; today they number about 33%, according to the Morning News.

It’s a changing world out there, ladies and gents. We had better get used to it.

I found a similar tension arising in another North Texas city not long after I began reporting on the city council there. Sachse, which straddles the Collin-Dallas County line, remains a smallish city of about 30,000. But my first exposure to the city brought forth complaints from a couple of residents who are afraid that Sharia law — the ultraconservatve tenet is Islam — will be taught in schools in Sachse.

Uhh, no. That won’t happen. The First Amendment to the Constitution prohibits religion from being taught in public schools. It doesn’t prohibit citizens from forming private schools to teach religion. We are free to practice our faith or not practice it. It’s our call.

I am going to hope that my new friends in Sachse keep their wits about them. I want them to settle down and allow their new neighbors to establish themselves as devoted Texans. I am going to wish the same for the folks in Frisco, a city that is undergoing an enormous evolution from a sleepy burg into a city bursting with commerce.

Uncategorized

Is a Jan. 6 replay possible?

You have no need to answer the question posed in the headline, because I know the answer. Damn right it’s possible … and Donald Trump has signaled it himself. Imagine that, eh?

Trump said the other day he might not accept the results of the midterm election if they don’t go his way. Meaning that if voters react the way every pundit from Pensacola to Portland is suggesting. That is, voters are likely to show the Republican-led Congress the door and hand the House — and maybe the Senate — gavel to the Democrats.

What does non-acceptance mean? We saw it play out in horrifying and graphic terms on Jan. 6, 2021 when Trump provoked the insurrection and sent the mob to Capitol Hill to storm the seat of our federal government while Congress was certifying the Electoral College victory of Joe Biden over Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

Spare me the crap that he called for a “peaceful demonstration.” The moron did nothing for hours while the mob gathered and then stormed into the Capitol building, smashing windows and assaulting police officers assigned to protect the place.

Some folks died in that assault. Many others were hurt. Capitol cops were beaten by the mob. The traitors threatened the life of Vice President Mike Pence. Some mobsters even defecated on the floor of the Capitol building.

But … what did the felon in chief do when he took office in January 2025? He pardoned all of them! Including the most violent among them!

So, when this imbecile says he might not accept the results of another free, fair and legal election, no one on this side of the grass should doubt what could transpire.

local news, media news, Uncategorized

If I had a dollar …

You’ve heard others say it, or perhaps you have said it yourself, that “if I had a dollar for every time … blah, blah, blah.“

I am an old-school media guy. I grew up reading the newspaper that was delivered to our home from front to back. I did so each day. Every day!

My love of newspapers didn’t end when I left home when I was in my quite early 20s. I got married at 21 to a young woman who was 19. We built a nice life together and it involved newspapers. I worked for four of them over the course of nearly 40 years. Two in Oregon. Two in Texas.

My full time career ended in August 2012. The media world was in the midst of a huge change. It’s still underway.

Americans aren’t ready newspapers the way we all once did. So, when someone tells me they still “prefer to read an actual newspaper” that blackens their fingers with printer’s ink, all I can do is chuckle.

Why? Because if I had a dollar for every person who said such a thing to me I’d be a gazillionaire.

I hang out, I reckon, with too many old timers like me, folks who grew up as I did reading newspapers. That includes the advice columns and the horoscopes, man.

I’m all but absolutely certain that were I to hang with younger folks that I would see a much different world than the one I have left behind. Which I suppose brings me to my point. The media are looking for ways to appeal to the younger among us. They are the future. People like me are part of the fading past.

I get it. Totally and completely.

I want to wish the media companies well in their quest for new readership audiences. I also want to wish the younger Americans out there looking for sources to inform them of the events of the day. They’re out there. You just have to look carefully and decide who among those sources are giving it you straight and which of them are foisting their own world view on a gullible ocean of empty skulls.

Uncategorized

Ohhh … the lack of humanity!

Donald Trump’s lack of humanity, grace and forgiveness are on full display with every eruption of politically inspired violence that erupts in communities across this land of ours.

An Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot a woman to death as she was fleeing a scene in her car. The jury is still out on whether the ICE officer committed a murderous act or whether he acted in self-defense. The video evidence suggests strongly the former.

The woman was the mother of three small children. She was present to protest ICE’s rounding up of residents for possible deportation. Minneapolis has been shaken to its muncipal core.

So, where is Trump? Has he weighed in with a comment expressing any sort of concern for the children of the woman whose death has left them as orphans? He hasn’t even offered a tepid platitude expressing regret over the incident.

One of the unwritten rules that falls on every president is to lend some level of comfort in times of tragedy, or duress, or tumult. Someone who gets shot to death by an agent of the government, it seems to me, is one of those tragic events that requires a president to step up and say something — anything! — that could lend a modicum of comfort to the nation.

He is silent while chief White House aides and at least two Cabinet officials have determined that the ICE officer was defending himself … against a woman who was driving away from him.

The current POTUS didn’t deliver. No, I am not surprised. I am still angered.

Uncategorized

Why run up the score?

Oh, man … it hurts to make this comment criticizing a college football team I want to win the NCAA championship, but I have to speak out at what I saw at the end of the Orange Bowl game on Thursday.

I watched the University of Oregon score touchdown when none was needed to ensure their victory over the Texas Tech Red Raiders.

The Ducks were leading 16-0 with about 30 seconds left in the game. They had stuffed the Tech offense thoroughly during the game. Head coach Dan Lanning called a time out and the Ducks returned to score a touchdown to make the final score 23-0.

Oregon could have simply snapped the ball to run out the clock. There was no time for the Red Raiders to score twice and snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

Sometimes I just don’t quite understand what goes through coaches’ minds in the heat of the moment. I just believe Coach Lanning could have let the clock secure the win all by itself. Don’t misunderstand me. I am glad the Ducks won … but still.

local news, Uncategorized

Following custom this holiday season

Custom reigns supreme in my humble North Texas home, which really doesn’t amount to much, except that it means something to little ol’ me.

It is custom in my home that I stay put the day after Christmas, just as I do the day after Thanksgiving. Black Friday is a non-starter in my home. I leave that madness to others to pursue to varying degrees of success.

Same is true for Christmas. The Eve night will be quiet. I might go to to church around midnight. I will make that call later. I will spend the holiday with my sons, daughter-in-law and granddaughter.

I made a pact long ago to not let Christmas stress me out. I was faithful to that pact once again this year. I finished my shopping five whole days early, which is pretty good for me. I have been seen frequenting stores on Christmas Eve looking for that “perfect gift” for my special loved one. I got it done early this year.

The new year awaits. 2026 looks like it’s going to be a good one for me and for those close to me. I’ll just gear up for the festivities.

I’ll follow the customary path into the coming year.

With that … Merry Christmas and let’s prepare for a year full of surprises and dreams come true.

Uncategorized

One holiday at a time … thank you!

The street where I live in Princeton, Texas, is part of a nice subdivision just south of U.S. 380. It’s next to an elementary school and the neighborhood is crawling with kids who run or skateboard to school each morning.

The homes are modest, but nice. It’s probably my forever place to live.

But as I look up and down the street this evening just after saying good night to my family who were here to celebrate Thanksgiving with dear ol’ Dad and Grandpa, I am struck by the sight of lights adorning rooflines celebrating Christmas. Some of the houses have those blow-up decorations on the lawn depicting Santa Claus, Rudy the Reindeer and assorted other symbols of Christmas.

I have to tell you that it boggles my mind how folks can celebrate two famed holidays at once. I mean, c’mon! Thanksgiving is quite enough to stand all by itself in Americans’ homes, as it commemorates the settling of this great land along the 13 Colonies in the 17th and early 18th centuries. We went to war with the Crown to win independence from the Brits. I watched “The Patriot” the other evening just to remind myself of the brutality associated with the American Revolution.

Now I turn my attention to Christmas. Not while I’m carving a turkey in the kitchen and serving it to my sons, my daughter-in-law and my granddaughter.

One holiday at a time is sufficient for this old-timer.

Uncategorized

Vets get overdue respect

High Plains Blogger has called attention over the years to my favorite veteran … that would be my Dad, a World War II Navy vet who saw his share of hell on Earth during his years fighting fascists.

I occasionally speak a bit about my own military experience, which pales in comparison to what Dad endured.

Today, I want to discuss the growing up of the nation, which this week celebrates the millions of men and women who have served in the military. It took a war that we didn’t win on the battlefield for Americans to stoop to new lows in the way it treated its veterans. Many of my colleagues came home to actual scorn from Americans because they followed lawful orders and committed — in the uneducated eyes of their fellow citizens — crimes against humanity.

Baby killers? My ass …

This year veterans are bound to feel love and respect they were denied when we came home from the Vietnam War. I won’t dwell on what happened in the bad old days. Instead, I will call attention to the respect coming from TV commentators who, two generations ago, likely would be leading the jeers intended for the returning veterans.

Whatever. We’ve all grown up. We are more mature these days. I will accept whatever thanks that could come my way as we celebrate those who suit up to defend this nation and protect the rights we all enjoy.