Category Archives: national news

national news, political news

Trump scrapes bottom of barrel

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We all know that elections have consequences, but I am going to presume that few of us saw the consequence that is emerging from the 2024 presidential election.

Donald Trump won a second term as POTUS and vowed to populate the executive branch of government with the brightest minds in all of humanity. Oh, man … he’s falling far short.

It’s beginning to look to me as if Trump is going to be left with an assortment of clowns, frauds, bozos and bimbos for the rest of his time in office. White House press flack lasted one week on her job. Trump gave her the boot. Seems that the flack lied about her academic credentials.

He’s got utterly incompetent nincompoops running the Defense and Justice departments, the FBI, the Treasury Department, the Commerce Department, the Agriculture Department … and on it could go. You get the point.

The self-described genius at hiring “the best people” is now hiring a hysterical assortment of flakes. No one’s laughing.

I’ll just ask: Does anyone believe that a President Kamala Harris would stoop to plucking people off of TV talk shows or hired them from the ranks of personal legal counsel to fill these spots?

And so … we shall soldier on.

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Paxton ‘debut’ awaits election result

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No matter the outcome of the Nov. 3 midterm election for the U.S. Senate seat from Texas, we’re going to get a good look at the type of man Democratic candidate James Talarico calls “the most corrupt politician in Texas.”

I refer, of course, to Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

I want to stipulate two key points. One is that I want Paxton to lose the contest to Talarico. I want there to be no doubt who wins this race. My hope is that Talarico wins by a healthy enough margin to forgo any sort of mandatory recount. The second point is that even though Paxton has been AG for more than a decade, I cannot ever recall hearing him make a speech in public.

It has been a brutal campaign for the seat now occupied by John Cornyn, whom Paxton defeated in the Republican Party primary. Paxton has been troubled by ethical and legal difficulty almost since the day he took office in January 2015.

I am wondering what kind of man emerges when the dust settles on Election Day. If lightning strikes and Paxton actually wins, will he give his opponent his due as a worthy foe? Or will he aim his rhetorical guns at the “liberal media” and the “communists and socialists” who despise him? I suppose I can wonder the same thing if Paxton comes up short on Election Day.

For his part, Talarico — a state legislator from Austin — has campaigned on his record as a Democratic man of faith. He refers frequently to New Testament scripture that instructs us to love our neighbor and, yes, our adversaries. Paxton, though, has been poisoned by the hate spewed by Donald Trump and other MAGA morons.

It’s not clear to me what kind of speechmaker Paxton is or can be. He’s been in the public eye for a long time, yet he remains a bit of a mystery.

We well could learn a whole lot about him … quite soon.

legal news, media news, national news

Back to the beginning with Trump

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One of my initial arguments against Donald Trump ever seeking, let alone winning, an election to the White House has proven to be true beyond measure.

I said prior to his ride down the escalator in Trump Tower in the summer of 2015 that the candidate-to-be lacked any exposure to public service. His entire professional life had been staked to his personal enrichment. His glorification. His desire to be recognized for every good deed that occurs on this planet.

As I look back on his nearly a decade in politics, I find that my assessment of the individual was correct. I don’t say this to brag about it. I wish I was wrong. I also wish Trump would prove me wrong and that he would have brought a level of success to the only public office he has ever sought.

I scan the immediate past of this guy’s record and I see his desire to put his name on the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts; he wants to build a triumphant arch; he has torn down the East Wing to build a gold-encrusted ballroom; he keeps insisting he deserves a Nobel Peace Prize; he contends he was elected in 2024 in a landslide; he hired the world’s richest human to cut the daylights out of Medicare, Medicaid, USAID, CDC with no understanding of how it affects everyday humans’ lives.

The man has called military vets “suckers and losers” because they want to don the uniform of their country. Thanks a lot … Donald, you loser!

These examples only prove what many of us have said all along. Donald Trump has no business in the office he occupies.

media news, national news, political news, State news

What? No mention of policy?

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As many of you are experiencing the same thing that’s occurring at my home in North Texas, I want to share an observation I made after reading — from front to back — a campaign brochure sent by Donald J. Trump on behalf of GOP U.S. Senate nominee Ken Paxton.

In the piece, Trump offers his “complete and total endorsement” of Paxton, who is in the fight of his political life against Democratic candidate James Talarico.

The text covers four full pages. I want to share an observation of what I have determined to be an error of omission.

Not once does Trump mention a policy decision from the White House that Paxton allegedly endorses. Nothing on the tariffs that are a regressive tax on all Americans who purchase items that come to us from offshore sources. No mention of the Iran war that Trump launched; so far 20 Americans have died in this “forever war” that Trump vowed he never would start were he sent to the White House in 2024. Not a peep from POTUS on the Ukraine war that Russia launched three years ago.

Trump has experienced difficulty defending these policies all by himself. Every president since Republican Herbert Hoover has called tariffs a tax. This guy says foreign governments are paying them. That is utter crap. The wars both have gone badly for our side, although Ukraine might be on the verge of declaring victory against the marauding Russians.

The brochure is vintage Trump. It is short on substantive debate and long on invective. He and Paxton spend most of the space in the letter to voters like me denigrating Talarico, his background, even making fun of his name.

If the POTUS is going to proclaim his endorsement for a damaged candidate such as Ken Paxton, it would seem to make more sense to explain why the candidate’s apparent endorsement of Trump’s policies is a reason to vote for him.

Oh, wait! Never mind! Trump won’t go there because he knows what we all know … that his policies have stunk up the campaign trail.

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Now comes the wait … for the midterm blowout

Elections, they say, have consequences and on Nov. 3 Americans are going to find out whether the 2026 midterm election produces the kind of consequence that many of us desire.

Accordingly, I am going to keep my powder dry with regard to the expected outcome.

Damn near every political pundit this side of Sam Rayburn thinks Democrats are going to regain control of the U.S. House. Getting control of the Senate today looks more hopeful than ever.

Texas has an upstart who has been making a good bit of noise as he campaigns for the seat held by GOP Sen. John Cornyn … who, by the way, lost his GOP primary race to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. State Rep. James Talarico could defeat Paxton in 30-something days. If Paxton pulls this one out and becomes the senator from Texas, well … we’re in deeper trouble than any of us are thinking at this moment.

Donald Trump has made a hash out of our representative democracy. His “handiwork” has trickled down many states’ ballots. For reasons that boggle my noggin, Trump continues to draw support from the MAGA cabal who keep endorsing his cockamamie notion that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. I have heard more than one MAGA nitwit blame President Obama for the 9/11 terrorist attack. Hmm. You and I know that Obama was still eight years away from being elected president when 9/11 occurred. So … how do you reason with idiots such as that?

I am likely to lapse into relative solitude prior to the midterm election. I remain hopeful we can get the electoral result our nation deserves. This MAGA madness has flat worn me out!

national news, political news

Hoping my wish list comes true

My wish list for the end of Donald Trump’s time in office is short, not terribly pretentious and I hope it is achievable.

I am wishing for a few things to occur once the Trumps vacate he White House on Jan. 20, 2029.

My first wish is that we get a president who understands the Constitution he or she will take the oath to “defend and protect.” Trump refuses to read the damn thing. And by the way, even though my preference would be for a Democrat to succeed Trump, a doctrinaire Republican would be acceptable over a MAGA moron.

I want whoever takes over to order the immediate removal of the gold doo-dads that Trump has plastered over the Oval Office, as well as the rest of the West Wing. That can be done quietly, without much fanfare.

A return to regular legislative order would be most appropriate. The late GOP Sen. John McCain used to call regularly for regular order. He hated all the partisan sniping that froze any legislative accomplishment.

I want the restoration of collegiality. Of comity among the congressional and executive branch ranks. This might not seem like much of a request. There are many of us who are old enough to remember the legendary friendships that formed between leaders of both major parties. Ronald Reagan and Tip O’Neill come immediately to mind. In an odd way, so do Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich. These four political titans worked together on key legislation.

The clock continues to tick off time during Trump’s administration. The sooner it all expires the better. My patience is getting a bit of a second wind, however. I’ll wait for the end of this madness and hope for all I’m worth that a new day will restore our nation’s greatness.

national news

DJT hates JFK … but why?

Donald John Trump seems to hate John Fitzgerald Kennedy for reasons that defy logic.

Trump didn’t know the 35th president of the United States. An assassin ended Kennedy’s presidency nearly 63 years ago, when Trump was a teenager likely plotting ways to avoid serving in the U.S. military.

Trump hates the impact JFK had on America’s life. The nation cried incessantly when we buried the president. The arts community decided to honor the slain president by building the JFK Center for the Performing Arts in D.C. Now we have Trump wanting to desecrate the building by slapping his name on it, despite contributing next to nothing to the performing arts.

Now comes word that he might knock the building down if he fails to get his name inscribed on it.

All of this is the action of a small man. An insecure man. A man seeking to be perceived as great where greatness doesn’t not exist.

I am not one of those Americans who holds President Kennedy to a status he doesn’t deserve merely because his life ended far too soon. The greatness of his presidency still is being examined and written. I do know, however, when an inferior politician seeks to muscle his way to a place he doesn’t deserve.

That he would do so at John Kennedy’s expense tells me that Donald Trump hates JFK only because President Kennedy enjoyed the nation’s reverence that it denies Donald.

Donald Trump, national news

A new day is coming … honest!

One day, and this is an immutable fact, Donald J. Trump no longer will dominate the headlines, he no longer will be a presence on our TV screens and he longer will be filling cyberspace with his social media idiocy.

I’ve been thinking about when that day arrives and to be honest, I am stuck in a sort of limbo over how I might react when there’s no Trump around to get my blood boiling. It might come sooner than we think. Don’t misunderstand me on this point: I do not want Trump to perish. He does have a family and I am going to presume they love him, so I don’t really want them to suffer the agony of his passing.

He might resign the presidency, which is getting some legs in recent weeks as pundits, politicos and prognosticators calculate how much more of this constant battering even Donald can withstand.

This much is as ironclad as I can possibly get. On Jan. 20, 2029, Trump will hand the keys to the Oval Office to someone else. I have no clear favorite lined up who will get my vote. We have a number of fine individuals who should run for the office. I just want someone — anyone! — who knows how government works. Who knows his or her limitations. Who won’t seek to usurp power he or she doesn’t have per the Constitution.

I mean, the very idea that we could elect and then re-elect someone as ignorant as Trump to the nation’s highest office simply blows my noggin to smithereens.

The man is going to play out the string … eventually.

It is that knowledge that enables me to wake up every single morning with a smile on my puss. We’re getting a day closer with each sunrise to a day of liberation.

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Donald, think of us out here … eh?

Donald … and no, I won’t refer to as Mr. Anything, but I have a message for you.

Stop messing with my income, my retirement savings, the nest egg I want to leave my family. I am sickened by your ridiculous war that you pledged never to start. I am tired of watching my investment account shrink because of you, your idiotic advisers and that dimwit you have serving as defense secretary.

The price of oil keeps skyrocketing. Same with the price of everyday grocery items. You’ve imposed an illegal tariff on everything this country imports. And stop with the lies about all that money you say is pouring into the Treasury from those tariffs. Those tariffs are, Donald, a regressive tax that everyone in this country pays.

I have been sick of this crap that has flowed from your pie hole from the very first day you launched your 2016 campaign. My sickness only has worsened the longer you have been in office.

You are a lying piece of mule dookey, and the sound of your voice only worsens my condition.

The Iran war must end. We have to assist Ukraine in their effort to defeat the Russian invaders. And you must end this tariff BS.

There. Now that I’ve got that off my chest, I think I’ll try to figure out how to pay my bills.

military news, national news

Combat ineffective? My ass … !

Next time our idiot Defense Secretary declares that Iran’s military has been reduced to “ineffective in combat,” or has been rendered “defenseless,” remind Pete Hegseth that his lies have been exposed with every report on Iran’s attack on U.S. and other regional targets.

Iranian drones today struck a Saudia Arabian oil pipeline, rendering it useless “for the time being.”

U.S. and Israeli airstrikes have rendered Iran’s military to being ineffective?

My … ass!