Category Archives: national news

legal news, national news

A lesson on Public Service 101, Mr. Councilor

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Kirby Delauter needs to be taught a lesson.

I will try to teach him one right here.

Delauter serves on the Frederick County, Md. County Council. He’s an elected public official, whose statements made in a public forum become grist for the media at any time. He makes statements on the record, for the record. They become part of the public domain.

And yet …

This individual is threatening to sue the Frederick News-Post if it uses his name in any fashion “without permission.”

Without permission? That means, if I’ve read the news story correctly about this tidbit, that the News-Post must get his permission to quote him by name even if he says something in the course of performing his duties as an elected public official. You know, such as saying something during a public meeting.

According to a News-Post account: “In a Facebook status posted Saturday, Delauter said he was upset with reporter Bethany Rodgers for ‘an unauthorized use of my name and my reference in her article’ published Jan. 3 about his and Councilman Billy Shreve’s concerns over County Council parking spaces.”

Therefore, the councilor says, he’s going to sue if a reporter uses his name without his authorization.

Um, Kirby, that’s how it works.

http://m.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/delauter-to-the-news-post-don-t-use-my-name/article_e965025f-6c48-5a02-b162-600dfd2b5495.html?mode=jqm

I’m pretty sure no one in Frederick County elected this guy King of the World, or Commissar of Information, or Guru of Gab.

He’s elected to represent his constituents. The News-Post’s role is to report on what he says in public. The newspaper doesn’t need his permission to use his name.

I don’t know Maryland open meetings law, but it probably looks something similar to what Texas has on its books, or what other states allow to be kept from public scrutiny. The issues usually involving pending litigation, real estate transactions or personnel discussions. That’s it. The rest of it is fair game.

Here’s a bit of advice to the young man: Ask yourĀ county’s legal counselĀ if you have anyĀ standing to sue anyone who uses your name without “authorization.” My hunch is that your counsel will laugh in your face.

The paper’s managing editor, Terry Headlee,Ā said it best: “Kirby Delauter can certainly decline to comment on any story.Ā But to threaten to sue a reporter for publishing his name is so ridiculously stupid that I’m speechless. It’s just a pointless, misguided attempt to intimidate and bully the press and shows an astonishing lack of understanding of the role of a public servant.ā€

local news, national news

Higher gas price = safer highways

Here’s a thought that perhaps didn’t cross your mind; I didn’t think of it.

It’s the idea that skyrocketing gasoline prices slow drivers down, make them think about quick starts and stops and keep them more alert on our streets and highways. Yes, they conserve fuel by driving more slowly while starting and stopping with more care — but they also make the streets and highways safer for everyone else.

A discussion on this topic occurred this morning on National Public Radio.

The interview discussed the plummeting gasoline prices and what it might do to drivers’ awareness of the need to conserve fuel. Accordingly, if drivers no longer are as concerned about fuel economy, they likely might drive more quickly and revert to relatively hazardous driving habits — which, therefore, make our public thoroughfares more dangerous.

Wow! None of this ever occurred to me.

Gasoline in Amarillo as of this morning is down to $1.87 per gallon of unleaded regular; diesel is down to around $2.85 per gallon. None of this really means I’m about to go speeding around the city with nary a care in the world. I trust it won’t do the same to others, although still others might throw caution to the wind and push the pedal to the metal.

Energy analysts tell us the price of oil is continuing to fall and will keep falling for the foreseeable future. It’s below 50 bucks a barrel as of this morning.

I’m not one to want to pay more for a product I consider essential to my existence.

Therefore, I’ll settle for paying less for gas — and hope that my fellow motorists will continue to observe safer driving habits.

 

national news, political news, State news

Gay marriage on its way … to Texas?

Do you ever feel as though you’re swimming against a tide that keeps getting stronger while it sucks the energy out of your efforts to fight it?

That’s how I’m feeling with this gay marriage issue.

I’m still grappling with the notion that it’s all right for people of the same sex to marry each other. I’m a traditionalist and my own values make it hard for me to embrace the idea of same-sex marriage as beingĀ the same as the marriage I have enjoyed for the past 43-plus years.

OK, I’ve laid down that marker.

I also understand what the law says, what’s in the U.S. Constitution and how all Americans are guaranteed equal protection under the law. Thus, it appears that states’ bans on gay marriage appear doomed.

That notion I will accept.

Florida has just begun allowing same-sex couples to marry. Federal judges — those damn “unelected judges,” in the eyes of conservatives — keep overturning state bans on same-sex marriage. A federal judge in Texas has ruled that our state’s ban — written into the Texas Constitution — violates the federal Constitution’s equal protection clause stated in the 14th Amendment. It grants full rights of citizenship to anyone born in the United States with zero regard to that people’s sexual orientation.

All of this makes perfect sense to me. If the states are governed by a federal framework — the Constitution — then the states are obligated to obey the rules set down within that framework.

Does any of this mean that all Americans must embrace the idea of same-sex partners getting married? Honestly, no.

All it means to me is that the law is the law and that states cannot impose their own laws that supersede the Constitution of the United States of America.

That includes bans on same-sex marriage.

I can feel that tide of political and cultural change getting stronger all the time.

 

national news, political news

Boehner will keep speaker's gavel, however …

John Boehner is going to be re-elected speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.

The Ohio Republican, though, is going to pay a price. Or, more to the point, rank-and-file Americans are going to pay the price.

It will be because the challenge to Boehner’s speakership is coming from the far right wing of the speaker’s Republican Party caucus in the House. And those clowns are going to pressure Boehner to keep tacking to the rightist fringe of the GOP.

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/01/john-boehner-speaker-vote-2015-113984.html?hp=l2_3

Bank on it.

The question for some of us — including me — is whether Boehner will rediscover the backbone he has shown in resisting TEA party pressure to do foolish and destructive things, such as shut down the government over disputes with President Obama.

Reps. Louie Gohmert of Texas and Ted Yoho of Florida have decided to run for speaker. The vote will occur Tuesday. Gohmert is a goofball. I can’t speak to Yoho, other than I know he’s a TEA party guy, just like Gohmert.

Boehner has said categorically that impeachment of the president is off the table as long as he’s speaker. Gohmert says quite the opposite. Is Yoho on board with the Gohmert view? Yeah, probably.

This dynamic reminds me of what might happen here in Texas, with a new governor about to take office. He’ll have a lieutenant governor who’ll push him to the right with the threat of a challenge from within the GOP when the governor’s office is up for election in 2018. I hope Gov. Greg Abbott can fend off the pressure that Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick is going to apply.

I wish the same for Boehner once he is re-elected speaker in a House that will be even more Republican than the previous one.

And as the GOP takes command of the Senate, we’ll all get to see if the new brand of Republican lawmakers can actually govern, as in can they present legislation to the president that he actually can sign into law.

I am not feeling good about the prospects.

 

national news

Let the trial begin for Tsarnaev

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s trial has begun.

In Boston.

Where it needs to occur.

The man accused of setting off the bomb at the end of the 2013 Boston Marathon had sought a change of venue. His lawyers contended he couldn’t get a fair trail in Boston, where everyone it seems knows something or someone associated with the horrific attack that killed three people and injured dozens more.

Look at the Timothy McVeigh bombing case, they said, noting that McVeigh — who blew up the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995 —Ā was tried in Denver, Colo. The Justice Department moved the case out of OKC because everyone there had an opinion on the tragedy.

Well, the Denver jury convicted McVeigh and then the federal government executed him.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/06/us/boston-marathon-bombing-trial-dzhokhar-tsarnaev-jury-selection.html?

There would be zero point in moving the trial out of Boston to some other location. The entire world knew of the bombing. Indeed, the Boston Marathon is an international event that draws competitors — and their entourages — from throughout the world.

The other point has been the plea-bargain deal. There had been negotiations for Tsarnaev to plead guilty to the crime and avoiding the death penalty. Although I oppose capital punishment on principle, I want this trial to proceed. I want to hear the evidence. I want to hear testimony.

Most of all I want Tsarnaev to explain precisely who was pictured in those security videos leaving a bag carrying a bomb near the finish line of the big race. If it wasn’t him and his brother — who died trying to escape — then who in the hell was it?

Tsarnaev innocence is presumed. His guilt will need to be determined. I feel comfortable in knowing that the federal judicial system will convict this individual.

Let it be in Boston, where he can look his victims — allegedly — in the eye.

 

national news

A 'remarkable' little girl, indeed

They might write books, perhaps make a film, about Sailor Gutzler.

One day they might. Not now. Not for a long time yet.

She’s just 7 years old and is going through an ordeal no one should ever endure at any age, at any time of their life.

Sailor survived a plane crash in rural Kentucky. The crash killed her parents, her older sister and a cousin. Her entire immediately family was gone. Just like that.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/divine-intervention-how-a-young-plane-crash-survivor-found-safety/ar-BBhwy8U

The remarkable aspect of the story deals with (a) how Sailor survived the deadly crash of a small, twin-engine plane and (b) how she found safe haven in cold, dark, damp woods.

Sailor reportedly was sitting in the rear of theĀ Piper piloted by her dad, 48-year-old Marty Gutzler. He was an experienced pilot who apparently earned his pilot’s license before being licensed to drive a motor vehicle. It’s said often that the rear of these aircraft are safer than anyplace nearer to the front.

She crawled out of the aircraft that had landed upside-down. Sailor apparently knew her family had perished. Off she went, clothed in Florida summer vacation clothing, from where she and her family were returning to their home in Illinois.

It was cold that night. She trudged some distance through thickets, through a deep ditch. She spotted a light and walked toward it.

The light turned out to be the home of Larry Wilkins. She knocked on the man’s door. He opened it and she told him her parents had died in the crash. She was bleeding, in pain, confused and terribly frightened. Wilkins called 9-1-1.

This story is as heartbreaking as it gets.

How this little girl will cope with the memory of what happened on that dark Kentucky night well could become grist for literature and film.

Not for a long time. She must heal. Thoroughly heal.

“She is one remarkable young lady,”Ā National Transportation Safety BoardĀ investigator Heidi Moats said at a Sunday news conference.

Boy, howdy!

 

national news

Once more, NYPD disgraces itself

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio spoke once again at the funeral of a fallen police officer.

And once again the officer’s comrades turned their back on the mayor.

Disgraceful, indeed.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/at-police-funeral-for-officer-liu-many-officers-turn-backs-to-de-blasio/ar-BBhvwNr

Officer Wenjian Liu was laid to rest. His family flew here from China to honor their loved one. His new bride now must carry on without her man.

Liu was shot to death the other day, along with Officer Rafael Ramos, by a gunman seeking revenge for a grand jury declining to indict another officer in the choking death of a black man in Staten Island.

De Blasio has said about all he can say to honor the two slain officers. He’s offered sympathy, support, words of encouragement and high praise. And yet again — as they did at Officer Ramos’s funeral — the officers turned their back on the mayor.

They have dishonored themselves and spit in the face of their comrade’s loved ones.

 

national news, political news

Go, Louie, go for the speaker's job!

This might be the best news yet of the new year — which, I know, is just four days old.

U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-TEA Party Fringe, has just announced he’s going to challenge John Boehner as speaker of the House of Representatives.

How does it get any better than that?

Gohmert, you see, is in the running as well for being the goofiest member of Congress. He’s got some competition for that honor. The previous frontrunner was fellow Texan Steve Stockman, who had the bad form to challenge Sen. John Cornyn in the GOP primary this past spring; he lost badly. He’s now out of the House. Right up there, too, is Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa,Ā who said illegal immigrants are packing illegal drug across the border while running on “calves the size of cantaloupes.”

Gohmert hails from East Texas and he’s challenging fellow Republican Donald Trump for the unofficial title of “birther in chief.” He and The Donald just do not believe that President Obama was born in the United States of America, in Hawaii, and that — by golly — he’s constitutionally qualified to serve in the office to which he was elected twice.

Now he’s running for speaker. He told his pal Tucker Carlson on Fox News that someone needs to challenge Boehner. Gohmert says he’s gotten “a lot” of support to mount that challenge.

I’d love to ask him how he defines the measure of so-called support. Maybe it is a lot. It surely must be vocal because that’s how the TEA party wing of the GOP operates. It outshouts the other side within the Republican Party and then it outshouts the Democrats.

Hey, the truth is he’s just firing a shot across Boehner’s bow. He’s telling the speaker to watch his right flank. The TEA party will be watching, waiting and looking for any opportunity to undermine the speaker’s instincts to work with the other side.

I’m still glad to see Rep. Gohmert step up — even if it does embarrass some Texas residents back home who really would prefer that he shut his trap.

national news, political news

Rev. Huckabee joins growing GOP field

It’s official, or practically so.

Mike Huckabee is going to run for president of the United States in 2016. He quit his Fox News Channel talk show amid signs he is getting set to make his decision.

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/01/mike-huckabee-ends-talk-show-weighs-presidential-run-113948.html?hp=t3_r

He’s a former Arkansas governor. He’s glib and funny. He’s also a staunch conservative.

Let me re-introduce an element that is likely to play a role in a Huckabee presidential campaign. He’s an ordained Southern Baptist preacher.

Why is that important? Many Americans are going to look to someone such as Huckabee strictly because of his well-known, firmly established and say-it-loud Christian faith. They’ll rally to his side for that reason chiefly — if not exclusively.

It certainly isn’t a disqualifier. Heck, I’m a practicing Christian myself. All of our presidents have shared the basic tenets of my faith. I’ve never voted for a president on that basis.

Indeed, the Democratic Party has had its share of clergy running for president. Rev. Jesse Jackson ran twice in the 1980s, as did Rev. Al Sharpton in 2008.

However, the Constitution states clearly that there should be no religious test for anyone seeking any public office. I have taken that to mean that I, as a voter, need not consider a candidate’s religious faith as a reason to vote for him or her. I choose not to go there.

Huckabee’s fellow Republicans are getting ready for him. Rand Paul is attacking Huckabee’s tax policy while he was Arkansas governor, just as he has targeted Jeb Bush’s “moderation” while he served as governor of Florida.

The GOP field is expanding. Huckabee could be one of the more interesting candidates running. Look for him to play to his party’s evangelical base. Hey, with a Baptist ordination in his hip pocket, he’s got something none of the other GOP hopefuls can claim.

 

national news, political news

David Duke's name is pure poison

Steve Scalise must not have gotten out much before he was elected to Congress in 2008.

There can be no explanation for his not understanding that any organization associated with someone named David Duke would be pure poison, toxic and a group to avoid at all costs.

He didn’t hear the news about Duke, apparently. He must not have known that Duke is a (former)Ā Ku Klux Klansman, a hater of blacks and Jews and someone whose ideas about anything under the sun are anathema to the principles of inclusion.

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/12/steve-scalise-white-supremacy-group-reaction-113872.html?hp=b1_l2

Scalese spoke to a EURO Organization ostensibly about taxes when he served in the Louisiana state legislature in 2002. He now says he “regrets” speaking to the group. He says is now that the country has learned of the House majority whip’s speaking to the group.

Did he disavow the white supremacist group’s world view the moment he learned of David Duke’s association with it? Gosh, I haven’t heard that he has done that. Has anyone elseĀ heard such a thing?

Scalise is now in damage-control mode, trying to fend off the critics who condemn his speech.

The single question I have is this: Did he know that David Duke was the group’s founder when he agreed to speak to its membership?