I thought my ears were plugged up the other day when I heard about Sen. Rand Paul’s comments regarding the use of drones in the hunt for the Boston Marathon bombing suspects.

The Kentucky Republicans said he would have favored deploying the drones to find the Tsarnaev brothers. My first reaction was, “What the … ? Did this guy just filibuster the nomination for CIA director John Brennan because he wanted the administration to promise never to use drones in the United States – against U.S. citizens?”

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/04/23/rand-paul-faces-blowback-after-new-drone-comments/?hpt=hp_bn3

That’s what he said, over and over and over again … for 13 hours during his filibuster on the floor of the Senate.

He finally got a pledge from Attorney General Eric Holder that the U.S. wouldn’t use the unmanned aircraft. It was then that he ended his filibuster.

Now Paul says the government should have used the drones to hunt down the brothers who are believed to killed those people along the marathon route.

Granted, he didn’t say anything specific about firing missiles from the drones to kill the men? He just wanted to use them as surveillance tools, I reckon.

Paul has denied he has changed his views on drones. I’m not so sure this isn’t a serious policy reversal. Isn’t this guy supposed to be a straight-shooter who ran for the Senate vowing to be true to his tea party/libertarian convictions?

Max Baucus stunned the political world the other day by announcing he’s going to retire from the U.S. Senate after the 2014 election.

The Montana Democrat’s seat is now among the many others that Republicans think they have a chance of snatching away from the majority party.

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/max-baucus-bitter-feuds-with-democrats-90533.html?hp=t2_3

Why the retirement? Why now? It appears his vote in the Senate the other day against a bill that would expand background checks for those who want to buy firearms has made him – so to speak – a target for those on his party’s left.

Thus, we’re now seeing the Democratic ideologues finding common ground with the ideologues in the Republican Party. Neither ideological extreme can much handle those who wish to work with those on the other side.

This isn’t good for representative democracy, ladies and gents.

I’ve been watching with some amusement as Republicans started singling out GOP officeholders in party primaries. The most famous result occurred this past year when GOP Sen. Dick Lugar of Indiana lost his party primary to tea party nut case Richard Mourdock, who went on to lose the 2012 general election to a Democrat after he remarked stupidly that a pregnancy that results from a rape is “God’s will.”

I’m now watching the Democrats threatening to do the same thing to one of their own. Baucus is the third-most senior member of the Senate. He’s long been a key player in budget matters. Then he cast a vote against background checks, which an estimated 90 percent of all Americans favor. His vote seems to have enraged the base of his party.

Now he’s soon to be gone.

The Senate is about to lose another voice of reason.

I remain hopeful that the 2013 Texas Legislature will enact a statewide ban on texting while driving and that Gov. Rick Perry will sign the bill into law.

He’s threatening another veto, contending that a statewide texting ban intrudes too deeply on individuals’ behavior. He vetoed a bill that came out of the 2011 Legislature and says he hasn’t changed his mind since that time.

But here’s the question that some folks are asking: Given that the state requires everyone in a car to wear a seatbelt and given that failure to do so puts the people in that vehicle at risk of serious injury or death in case of an accident, why doesn’t the same standard apply to people who text while driving their motor vehicle? What’s more, given also that the seat belt law is intended to protect only those individuals in a particular vehicle, doesn’t a texting ban protect other motorists as well as the offending motorist from serious bodily harm?

Amarillo already bans texting and operating handheld cellphones while driving. I’m glad the city has acted on its own. The city ordinance will stand even if Perry vetoes a texting ban law should it arrive at his desk.

But it’s high time the state acts on the inherent dangers associated with this incredibly stupid behavior.

I’m still hoping.

Presidents of the United States wear many hats: commander in chief, chief executive of the government, head of state, head of government and, yes, mourner in chief.

President and Mrs. Obama are traveling Thursday to Baylor University in Waco to attend a memorial service honoring the victims of the fertilizer plant blast this past week in nearby West, Texas, that killed 14 people and injured many more.

http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/04/21/4791152/memorial-service-set-for-first.html

President Obama is “good” at these kinds of events, just as President Bush had to do the same after 9/11 and after the Columbia shuttle tragedy, and as President Clinton had to do after the Oklahoma City bombing and as President Reagan did after the shuttle Challenger explosion.

This is what presidents must do. They don’t wish it on themselves or on any of those who will succeed them. They ought to look at the way their predecessors handled such crises, learn from them and take a bit of that advice with them as they perform this essential task of leadership.

Barack Obama noted the other day that “This has been a tough week,” in describing the events that occurred during the Boston Marathon and its immediate aftermath, as well as the tragedy that tore apart the tiny town of West.

A nation looks often to its elected leaders for comfort in times of pain. The president has been forced by events to offer a healthy dose of it. That’s why we pay him the big bucks.

I’m waiting anxiously to hear if any members of Congress, those who comprise the tea party wing of the Republican Party, gnash their teeth over whether to send federal assistance – in the form of money – to West, Texas, the town ravaged by that horrific fertilizer plant explosion this past week.

It was the other great tragedy that fell on a nation that was riveted mostly on Boston and the manhunt for the two men suspected of that hideous act of terror. As President Obama said, “This has been a tough week.”

But out here in West, 14 people were killed, many more were injured and even more were made homeless by that ghastly explosion. The mushroom cloud rising over the town near Waco could be seen in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, nearly 100 miles away.

Take a look at these pictures.

http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/04/21/4791152/memorial-service-set-for-first.html

But we’ve witnessed some odd resistance to rushing federal aid to communities hit by disaster. Joplin, Mo., was all but leveled by a tornado in 2011 and some congressional hotshots – such as House Republican Leader Eric Cantor of Virginia – balked at sending aid to Joplin until Congress could cut spending in other programs to pay for it. Then came the ridiculous resistance to sending aid to victims of Hurricane/Super Storm Sandy that pummeled New Jersey and New York in 2012; again, the resistance came mostly from the tea party faithful.

Texas has just elected another tea party favorite to the Senate, Republican Ted Cruz, who joins fellow Republican John Cornyn in Congress’s upper chamber. This is just a hunch, but I’m betting they won’t resist federal help if and when it is offered.

President Obama took note of the West disaster while thanking law enforcement for the fine job it did in apprehending the surviving suspect in the Boston bombing. “I’ve spoken to Gov. (Rick) Perry,” Obama said in assuring Texans that the federal government won’t forget the suffering being felt at this moment in that tiny community.

My advice to Sens. Cruz and Cornyn would be for them tell their tea party allies on Capitol Hill to keep their traps shut when the time comes to send federal aid to Texas.

Rudy Guiliani knows a thing or three about the impact of terrorist attacks on a city – and a country.

The former New York mayor was on duty when the planes crashed into the World Trade Center on 9/11, launching the United States into a ground war in Afghanistan and, later, Iraq.

Appearing on MSNBC the other day in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing, Guiliani told commentator Chris Matthews that it’s important to keep this single attack in some perspective. He agreed with Boston officials’ decision to lock the city down for several hours while the bombing suspects were still at large. He then said that the nation needs to understand something about the relative safety it has enjoyed since the 9/11 attacks.

His point essentially was that two presidential administrations, the Bush administration and now the Obama administration, “have done a very good job” of heading off further terror attacks since that horrible September day in 2001.

The former mayor noted also that law enforcement agencies have been quite successful in catching terror suspects before they have done their evil deeds, with most of that detection occurring under the public radar. We’ll never know precisely how many plots have been foiled, Guiliani suggested.

As horrifying as the Boston bombing was and the horror it provoked in a great American city, this isn’t the time to panic and fear that the nation is under attack once again. The authorities in Boston did their job. Order is being restored daily.

Let’s always be alert, but let’s also get on with our lives.

I normally support the American Civil Liberties Union’s view of protecting people’s, um, civil liberties.

But the ACLU’s objection to the federal government’s waiving of Miranda rights to the surviving suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing is off base.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/20/17840955-aclu-denying-miranda-rights-to-marathon-bombing-suspect-is-un-american?lite

The ACLU says every citizen deserves to be read his or her Miranda rights before being questioned by law enforcement authorities. The federal government, though, is invoking a long-standing exception to that rule by suggesting the existence of a potential future threat to public safety.

The Miranda rights stem from a 1966 Supreme Court ruling that gives criminal suspects “the right to remain silent,” as well as the right to legal counsel before being questioned by authorities. The bombing suspect has not yet been given that warning while he recovers from injuries he suffered while trying to elude capture after the Monday bombing along the Boston Marathon route.

I am confident that Dzokhar Tsarnaev – who only recently became a U.S. citizen – will get a fair trial if it goes that far; he still has the option of pleading guilty to the crime for which he will be charged.

My own view of this is that the government is reacting to what it perceives as a dangerous terrorist act. It has not yet determined whether there were accomplices to the plot the young man and his late older brother executed; Tsarneav’s brother, Tamarin, was killed by police in a fire fight.

So, until the government can determine beyond any doubt that these two young men acted on their own, it is within its right to do all it can to protect Americans from potential threats … such as the one perpetrated in Boston.

Allow me this moment to boast about a member of my family.

Our great-nephew Noah Pearson is a 10-year-old with a huge heart. He lives in Albany, Ore., and is an accomplished bowler. He also is orchestrating a fundraiser scheduled for April 28 to raise money for the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing.

http://democratherald.com/news/local/bowling-to-help-boston/article_11c14538-a97c-11e2-a0ff-0019bb2963f4.html

His hometown paper, the Albany Democrat-Herald, published a story about Noah’s effort. So far, according to the paper, Noah is getting a lot of attention – which is translating to a lot of tangible interest in his bowling tournament.

Others around the country no doubt are putting together programs to raise money to help the victims of the bombing. Noah’s intrepid spirit and his outward expression of compassion, though, simply blows me away. OK, I know what you’re thinking: Yeah, he’s family; of course he would blow you away. Well, I’m not the only one who is taken by Noah’s selflessness.

Bowling alley owner Roger Nyquist is, too.

According to the Democrat-Herald story, “He (Noah) sat down, looked me right in the eye and expressed his feelings about what had happened, and he had a plan, and he pitched it to me,” Nyquist recalled. “It’s neat to see somebody that young acknowledge what they’re feeling and in short order come up with a constructive activity.”

“Neat” isn’t quite the word I’d use. “Astonishing” is more to my liking.

Well done, Noah.

I occasionally get turned off by the shouts of flag-wavers who sometimes launch into overheated reactions to certain outcomes. Let me be clear: I’m an unapologetic flag-waver myself; we fly the flag at our house proudly to commemorate many patriotic holidays throughout the year. But occasionally the chants seem a bit out of place during some events.

The end of the Boston bombing manhunt, though, is a case where the cheers were more than warranted. They were directed at federal, state and local law enforcement authorities who somehow – miraculously, in my view – managed to take the second Boston Marathon bombing suspect into custody alive. Crowds cheered the police as they drove away from the scene of the climactic siege.

The 19-year-old suspect had been shot apparently in an earlier fire fight that killed his older brother. He was holed up in a boat parked in front of a home in Watertown, Mass. SWAT teams fired many rounds at the young man as he cowered in the boat.

Negotiators reportedly talked him into surrendering. Now the greater Boston area can start to return to some sense of normal living. The rest of us, far from the scene of the tragic events, can peel ourselves away from our TV sets and computer screens as well.

The police and FBI deserve the highest praise possible for capturing a live suspect accused of committing a heinous act this past Monday. The speed with which the FBI caught up with the two suspects after releasing their photos to the public on Thursday simply is breathtaking.

The FBI, along with Massachusetts and Boston-area police authorities now will be able to do the jobs for which they all are highly trained. They’ll let the young man regain his strength from the wounds he suffered and then they’ll pry some answers from him.

All Americans will await his response to a fundamental question, which no doubt will lead to other answers: Why?

The vote cast in the U.S. Senate that failed to approve increased background checks on gun buyers illustrates the power of money.

The National Rifle Association opposes the background check expansion. A huge majority of Americans, however, support it; most Democrats support it; most Republicans support it; some polls suggest that even a majority of families with NRA members support it.

But the Senate voted 54-46 in favor of expanding the background checks. However, because of Senate rules, the body needed 60 votes to send the measure to the House of Representatives. Texas’ two Republican senators, John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, were among the 46 “no” votes.

Thus, the bill has been put on ice for the time being.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/18/opinion/a-senate-in-the-gun-lobbys-grip.html?smid=fb-share&_r=1&

Senators are afraid of NRA, but as Gabrielle Giffords – the former Arizona congresswoman who was shot in the head at a political event in Tucson two years ago – has written, senators’ fear is nothing compared to the terror felt by the children caught in the gunfire in Newtown, Conn.

But the senators’ fear of the NRA apparently has far greater power than their constituents’ desire for them to act on a law that many Americans believe could prevent criminals and the mentally disturbed from purchasing a firearm.

And that is to the senators’ shame.