Category Archives: political news

national news, political news

It’s only been a year since the ’16 election?

We’re about to commemorate the longest political year in many of our lives.

We’ll mark the event this coming Wednesday. One year ago, American voters — in my oh-so-humble view — made a monumental mistake. They elected Donald John Trump Sr. as president of the United States of America.

I might be inclined to wait until Jan. 20 — Inauguration Day — to call attention to this one-year-later moment. Except that the “fun” started almost immediately after the votes were counted.

Hillary Rodham Clinton ended up with nearly 3 million more votes cast for her than for Trump. However, Trump won where it counted, in the Electoral College.

My wife and I remember watching it unfold with some friends in Amarillo. We went to our friends’ home expecting to cheer Clinton’s election as the nation’s first female president. Then came words none of us wanted to hear. They came from longtime Democratic operative James Carville, who said on CNN that, “I don’t like what’s happening” with the vote count.

Trump was picking off states that Barack Obama won twice: Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin.

It was game over fairly early.

It’s been a rocky year since the election, don’t you think? Trump got inaugurated and managed to make a mess out of that event, quibbling with reporting that challenged the size of the crowd gathered in front of the Capitol Building.

The new president’s inaugural speech was dark, forbidding and grim. The one comment that sticks in our craw, ‘er, mind is when he said “The American carnage stops right here.” Uplifting, right?

It’s been one hissy fit after another ever since.

One would hope to mark the moment by calling it an “anniversary” of sorts. I won’t use that term to describe this upcoming event. Anniversaries are meant to celebrate things: weddings, moon landings, heroic events. You know. Positive occurrences.

I get that many readers of this blog will disagree with me on this. But  don’t consider Donald Trump’s election as president to be a happy event. It saddens, sickens and frightens me.

And to think it was just a year ago. It seems like an eternity.

national news, political news

With a ‘friend’ like this, Hillary’s in trouble

You know already that I supported Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in 2016. So it is with more than a bit of chagrin that I am hearing some bad news about her failed bid for the White House.

The weirdest part of it is that it is coming from a fellow Democrat who I always presumed was on her side. Silly me. That’ll teach me for presuming too much.

Donna Brazile, a long time Democratic operative who served for a time as interim chairman of the Democratic Party, has come out with some stunning news about Clinton’s campaign.

One is that Clinton’s campaign “rigged” the party nominating process in her favor. It used underhanded tactics to torpedo the campaign of Vermont U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders. Brazile alleges that Clinton didn’t consider Sanders to be a real Democrat; he represents Vermont as an independent in the U.S. Senate.

This rigging allegation, of course, adds fuel to the fire that continues to burn that Clinton is “crooked,” “ruthless” and will do whatever it takes to win, no matter who it harms.

I will concede that I do think less of Clinton than I did a year ago, or even a week ago.

What’s worse, though, is what the revelations from Brazile reveal about her, not Clinton.

We also have learned that Brazile has written that she contemplated replacing the Hillary Clinton-Tim Kaine ticket with one led by then-Vice President Joe Biden.

Think of the ham-handed nature of such a decision were it to come to pass. The Democratic Party had nominated a candidate nearly every political analyst in America believed was a lock for the presidency. Then she stumbles along the way. Her campaign went into a form of intellectual vapor lock. Brazile was so upset she was going to engineer an ouster of the party’s nominee?

I surely get that Clinton’s foes are going to seize on this as proof — as they see it — that she is Satan’s daughter. I won’t go there.

Yes, these are disturbing things to hear from an ostensible ally of the woman thought to be the next president of the United States.

Are they deal breakers? Do they make me rethink my support for her in 2016? Given the choice we faced nearly one year ago … not for a single second!

national news, political news

POTUSes 41 and 43 ‘tell it like it is’

Presidents George H.W. and George W. Bush are pulling no punches as it regards one of their successors, Donald John Trump.

Bush 41 calls Trump a “blowhard”; Bush 43 says Trump doesn’t understand the impact of occupying the world’s most powerful public office.

They are actual Republicans. Trump, as I understand their interpretation, is a quintessential Republican In Name Only, a RINO. The former presidents believe the GOP is in trouble with Trump as its titular party leader.

A new book, “The Last Republicans” by Mark Updegrove, details the views of the former presidents regarding the current Oval Office occupant. It’s rare, indeed, to hear ex-presidents comment at all on their successors, but this is no ordinary time in American politics.

I mean, the country elected someone to the presidency in 2016 with no prior public service. None! He came from the world of big business, beauty pageants and reality TV. His entire professional career was aimed at self-enrichment and self-promotion.

And that gets to the heart of Bush 43’s critique of Trump as someone who doesn’t understand what it means to be president. Trump spoke during the campaign of being his own best adviser, as he touted his intelligence and steel-trap memory. President Bush 43 sees that as a serious indicator of Trump’s lack of understanding of the office he occupies.

The interviews were conducted before Trump even became the Republican nominee for president. Bush 41 was leery of Trump from the beginning and has said in blunt terms that “I don’t like him.”

The White House, of course, has returned the volley, saying that the Bushes’ concern about the future of the GOP is more of an indictment on their leadership than it is about Donald Trump.

Sure thing. Except that the guy in the White House ran as a Republican only because he saw it as providing the path of least resistance to his form of populism/nativism/isolationism.

The guy who was elected because he “tells it like it is” is now getting a serious dose of his own rhetorical medicine by two seasoned Republicans who know the ropes, know about the office they held between them for 12 years and who understand the consequences of electing someone with no knowledge of how to govern.

political news, State news

Evangelical infatuation with Trump still confuses

Someone has to explain something to me in simple language.

My question goes like this: How does Donald J. Trump continue to hold tightly onto support from the evangelical Christian community?

I ask because of a blog posted by R.G. Ratcliffe in Texas Monthly. Ratcliffe writes about a potential Republican challenger for U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz next year from an evangelical TV network executive who is angry that Cruz didn’t endorse Trump at the 2016 Republican presidential nominating convention.

The challenge might come from Bruce K. Jacobson Jr., vice president for LIFE Outreach International and an aide to James Robison, a noted televangelist.

I do not get this! Honest! It confuses me in the extreme!

Christians line up behind Trump

The president of the United States would seem to be totally anathema to the evangelical movement, given the president’s past. He has bragged about his marital infidelity; he has admitted to groping women; he never has been associated with faith-based causes or associated openly with religious organizations.

Sen. Cruz has been much friendlier to evangelical causes than Trump ever had been prior to his becoming president. Jacobson, though, holds Cruz’s non-endorsement at the RNC in 2016 against him.

As Ratcliffe writes: Cruz had signed a pledge to support the party’s nominee, Jacobson said, but then didn’t follow through at the convention. “I’m concerned about anybody who doesn’t keep their word. I’ve very concerned about that. In Texas, when we give our word, it’s our word,” Jacobson said.

If memory serves, Cruz made that pledge early in the GOP presidential primary campaign, only to be humiliated personally by Trump’s insults and lies. Trump disparaged Cruz’s wife with a cruel tweet and then suggested the senator’s father was linked somehow to the assassination of President Kennedy. Cruz called Trump an “amoral” liar, which I also happen to believe he is.

Did the eventual Republican nominee conduct himself as a “good Christian” with that kind of behavior?

I don’t know about you, but I am not at all surprised — nor displeased — that Ted Cruz chose not to “endorse” Trump at the 2016 Republican convention.

So here we are. Cruz stood on a principle of fair treatment and for that he might get a Republican Party primary challenge from an evangelical Christian leader?

Explain it to me. Please.

national news, political news

Earth to POTUS: You won!

Dear Mr. President …

There you go again, trying to re-litigate the 2016 presidential election.

Hillary Rodham Clinton has been blasted yet again by her fellow Democrats for supposedly “rigging” her party’s nomination fight. She’s been exposed by so-called “ally” Donna Brazile, a longtime Democratic Party operative and former interim Democratic National Committee chairwoman.

It’s a party matter, Mr. President. You’re a Republican (supposedly). So, why are you tweeting your brains about calling on the Justice Department to investigate the woman you keep disparaging with that nasty nickname?

The most ridiculous assertion you make is this:  “Everybody is asking why the Justice Department (and FBI) isn’t looking into all of the dishonesty going on with Crooked Hillary & the Dems. New Donna B book says she paid for and stole the Dem Primary,”

Everybody is asking, Mr. President? I hate to break the news to you, but “everybody” isn’t asking. I’m not. My wife isn’t, either. I’m pretty sure that most of the 65 million Americans who voted for Hillary aren’t asking, either. It might be, too, that many of the 62 million who voted for you aren’t all that concerned, either.

But, hey, you won the election. You’ve got a pretty full plate of things to consider. Why don’t you just get past the 2016 election and get on with the business of governing the nation?

As long as we’re talking politics, Mr. President, this isn’t your fight. It should be settled by Democrats.

So, with all due respect, sir … butt out!

national news, political news

Impeachment talk heats up prematurely

I’ve made no secret of my loathing of Donald John Trump Sr.

I still believe he is unfit for the office of president of the United States. Furthermore, I believe he has disgraced his high office and has embarrassed the nation he was elected to govern.

Do I believe he should be removed from that office? Yes, either by election or by some other extraordinary means, such as impeachment.

However, the talk of impeachment that reportedly is getting hotter by the week — if not by the day — is a good bit premature.

Some congressional Democrats aren’t waiting for the special counsel, Robert Mueller, to finish his job. They want Trump’s scalp now. One Democrat, Rep. Steve Cohen of Tennessee, believes that Trump’s reaction to the Charlottesville, Va., riot in which the president equated white supremacists with those who protested against them is enough of a reason to impeach the president.

Hey, folks. Impeaching the president is the most politically dangerous thing the House of Representatives can do. I get that the House doesn’t need any official findings to launch an impeachment. President Clinton was impeached because he messed around with a young female White House intern; House Republicans said the real reason was that he lied under oath to a grand jury about it.

I maintain — as I have all along — that House members need to wait for Mueller’s investigation into the “Russia thing” runs its course, even if it lasts well into the 2018 congressional election season. Mueller already has indicted three members of Trump’s campaign team, including its former chairman Paul Manafort. There appears to be much more to follow.

So, with that, let’s cool the impeachment talk while the special counsel goes about his arduous task of cobbling together a highly complicated finding of fact.

As The Hill reported: It is not, obviously, off the table at some time in the future, but is premature at this point in time,” Rep. Steny Hoyer, the House minority whip, told reporters last month.

If something emerges that rises to the level of an “impeachable offense,” I happen to believe Robert Mueller and his crack legal team will hand it to Congress.

local news, political news, State news

Early vote turnout ‘just dismal’ … oh, really?

Randall and Potter County election officials say the early voter turnout for next Tuesday’s statewide election is miserable in the extreme.

Only about 3 percent of the registered voters in both counties have bothered to cast ballots for the Texas constitutional amendments that will be decided.

Wow! Who knew? Actually, many of us could have seen this coming.

System breeds extreme apathy

The state’s system of amending its Constitution requires statewide voter approval of the amendments. It’s a highly obsolete and archaic system of government. It has caused me in the past to wonder: What is the point if so few Texans take part in this electoral process?

I have wondered before about whether we should have a Texas constitutional convention to re-craft a governing document that looks more like the federal Constitution. The nation’s founders established a governing framework avoids the cumbersome nature of calling elections whenever Congress and the president want to amend the Constitution.

Texas chose long ago to put all that power in the hands of rank-and-file Texans. Which is fine if they would actually exercise that power by going to the polls. The dismal turnout suggests to me that the vast majority of Texas residents don’t care about what their State Constitution says.

If only the state would think about the effectiveness of a system that places so much authority for governance in voters who refuse to take part in what is supposed to be a participatory process.

The Legislature won’t change it. The governor won’t go there, either.

So, we’re stuck with “dismal” turnouts that places a whole lot of power into the hands of too few of us.

national news, political news

Trump can’t help himself … or so it seems

The president of the United States is either (a) genetically incapable of saying the right things in the moment of national grief or (b) willfully ignores the impulse to offer comfort and surrenders to the urge to politicize these events.

I truly am baffled. I cannot make the call.

A lunatic drove a truck into a crowd in New York City, killing eight people; he injured many others. An NYC police officer shot and wounded him. It turns out the suspect is a Muslim immigrant from Uzbekistan who reportedly shouted “Allah Akbar!” before driving the truck into the crowd.

What does Donald Trump do? He starts leveling blame on Democrats. He calls our nation’s justice system a “laughingstock” and a “joke.” He announces plans to immediately revoke the immigration policy that enabled the suspect to enter the national legally in 2010.

Oh sure. He called the suspect an “animal.” Indeed, if the young man is convicted of the crime for which he’s being accused, he will deserve the maximum punishment allowed under the law.

It’s the politicization that is most bothersome. The president simply appears ill-equipped to offer anything approaching words of comfort and support. He needs to reach out to the loved ones of those who died. He needs to speak of the heroism of the first responders, such as the officer who stopped the man accused of the shooting.

Trump needs to provide some semblance of actual leadership, rather than blasting out those damn tweets. The president’s one-time good buddy, Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., has it right when he blasts the president for failing to lead the nation that is troubled once again by an act of terror.

I’m not smart enough to do a lot of things. One of them is to reach any conclusion about whether the president just isn’t wired to offer high-minded words of comfort or whether he just chooses willingly to take the low road.

Whatever it is, the president of the United States keeps falling far short of performing the tasks he inherited when he took the oath of office.

national news, political news

‘W’ takes off the muzzle

I don’t know Amarillo resident James Whitaker, the author of a brief letter to the editor of the Amarillo Globe-News.

The letter included this passage:

What disturbs me is that during eight years of President Barack Obama’s administration, and the reversal of many of President Bush’s actions, Bush said nothing. But now he comes out and attacks this current president?

I think I might have an answer for this gentleman.

President Bush was quiet because President Obama conducted himself with grace and dignity during his two terms in office. Yes, he was critical of Bush administration policies and, yes, he sought to reverse some of his immediate predecessor’s policies.

Obama also was quite gracious toward Bush as the men conducted a relatively seamless transition from one administration to another. He thanked Bush publicly on multiple occasions for the cooperation he delivered during that transition after the 2008 election.

President Obama also made a point of telling the world that the first phone call he made after U.S. special ops forces were out of harm’s way after the mission that killed Osama bin Laden was to President Bush.

George W. Bush’s recent criticism of Donald J. Trump was aimed at the sheer coarseness of the political debate that has been generated ever since Trump entered the political arena back in June 2015.

President Bush was the first leading politician to declare after 9/11 that “we are not at war against Islam.” Donald Trump has all but turned aside that notion with his continual attacks on Islam and those who practice it.

What’s more, Trump’s insults against the former president’s brother, one-time GOP primary campaign opponent Jeb Bush, surely has weighed on W’s mind.

I am one who found the former president’s remarks recently about the current president to be on the mark. They were cogent and they accurately portrayed the divisive nature of Donald Trump’s effort to govern the United States.

Here’s the former president’s recent remarks that provide a barely veiled reference to the current president.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wz6SaVTquuY

I believe President Bush makes his case with precision.

national news, political news

Waiting for a ‘Me Too’-themed political campaign

In the bad old days, when President Clinton was being impeached over his relationship with the White House intern, we saw a rash of political campaign themes aimed at extolling candidates’ marital fidelity.

As if someone should actually boast about honoring a sacred oath he took to love his wife “for as long as we both shall live.”

But it happened. I found it disgusting at the time to see these individuals making their devotion to their families a political talking point.

That was then.

This latest incarnation of moral misbehavior has produced a plethora of allegations against politicians and various celebrities from all walks of life. It’s called the “Me Too” campaign, with women coming forward to accuse men in high places of sexual harassment and, in some cases, of sexual assault.

I’m not predicting it will happen, but I won’t be at all surprised to see a new spate of political ads from men running for public office who will say that they know how to behave in the company of women. They well might couch their slogans in ways that seek to ensure that voters understand that they’ve never done anything they would regret as it regards women.

My reaction is likely to mirror how I felt when politicians in the late 1990s sought to capitalize on the president’s misbehavior. It sickened me then.

I don’t look forward to seeing what I fear might occur in this age of “Me Too” politics.