Monthly Archives: May 2014

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Romney switches course on minimum wage

Do you recall the 2004 presidential campaign political ad that lampooned Democratic nominee U.S. Sen John Kerry for saying he was “in favor of the Iraq War before I opposed it”?

Well, 2012 Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney once opposed increasing the minimum wage but now he favors it.

http://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/romney-on-minimum-wage-raise-it-251118147687

Romney spoke correctly on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” broadcast this morning by saying Republicans should be the party of more and better-paying jobs. He reminded his hosts that he parted company with the conservative wing of his party by favoring an increase in the minimum wage.

Indeed, Romney now is aboard the same wagon with a majority of Americans who favor increasing the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour.

His Republican colleagues in Congress need to listen to the party’s most recent presidential nominee who, let’s not forget, received nearly 61 million votes in the 2012 election.

To their discredit, though, congressional Republicans are listening instead to tea party conservatives who don’t want to lift minimum-wage earners who have to support their families out of poverty.

And hasn’t President Obama been saying that no family relying on the minimum wage should live in poverty? Strangely, Mitt Romney’s stance put him squarely in the same corner with the man who defeated him in the 2012 election.

Don’t wait for Romney to extol the president’s correctness on the minimum wage issue. That would go beyond the pale.

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Ready for tougher water-saving measures

It’s been reported that Amarillo residents haven’t yet subscribed to the water-conservation memo that’s been circulated.

We’re using water as if there’s no tomorrow. Oh yes, we’re in the middle of a drought that’s about four years old now and there’s no apparent relief in our immediate future.

What to do? Keep those “voluntary” restrictions in place? I’m beginning to think we need to get some orders from City Hall: Use less water or else.

I know that utility experts at City Hall are acutely aware of what’s happening around here. City Manager Jarret Atkinson happens to be a water expert in his own right. Still, the city keeps sending mixed messages. It says we should conserve water and then it says the city is in good shape, that it has enough water to last for, oh, about another 200 years. I sense that many of us are hearing the second part of that message more clearly than the first part.

The city has set monthly maximum water-use goals. Residents are exceeding those goals every month. Let’s remember, too, that summer isn’t even here yet.

The city has drafted a Stage 1 water emergency plan that calls for voluntary measures, such as watering lawns on certain days depending on whether you live at an odd- or even-number address; what’s more, you shouldn’t water your lawn more than three days a week.

That’s all fine. What happens, though, when you don’t comply? Nothing.

What should happen? Some fines might be get folks to stop using water. A more enforceable method might be to boost water rates, which is another way of hitting folks in the wallet.

It absolutely goes without saying that water is — hands down — the most precious resource we have. We cannot live without it. Nor can we continue to keep using it at the current pace.

If we cannot — or will not — comply with voluntary measures, it’s time for our local government to take the next step by ordering us to use less water.

The rain likely will return. No one on Earth can predict when that will happen. It might happen soon, maybe later, maybe sometime in our lifetime. Then again, maybe not until a lot longer after that.

What in the world are going to do until — or if — that day arrives?

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Israel journey was a life-changer

Most of us have life experiences that stick with us, well, forever.

I’ve had the usual experiences: marriage to a wonderful girl, producing two wonderful sons who’ve grown into fine men, wearing my country’s uniform during a time of war, embarking on a rewarding career that has taken me to places I never imagined seeing.

Another one stands out. It’s a rare event that occurred five years ago this week. It was when four young people and I boarded an airplane for Israel. We were part of an extraordinary adventure. We spent four weeks in the Holy Land, touring one of the world’s most interesting countries from top to bottom. We lived with families and became, at one level, part of their families — if only briefly. We weren’t tourists. Thus, we saw more of a fascinating place than most people ever get to see.

***

I am a member of the Rotary Club of Amarillo. Our Rotary district had set up an exchange with another Rotary district in Israel. Our district needed a Rotary member to lead a team of four non-Rotarians on this exchange. I was one of several Rotarians who interviewed for the team leader spot. The interview took place in the fall of 2008 and the committee assigned to consider the applicants chose yours truly to lead the team.

I was stunned.

Then we got to work picking a team. They would comprise four individuals ages 25 to 40. We found four outstanding young professionals who had their employers’ blessing to take four weeks off to learn from their peers in Israel.

The program is called Group Study Exchange and its aim is manyfold: It’s meant to build relationships among nations in a people-to-people way; it exposes professionals to like-minded folks in other countries; and it helps build interest in Rotary, encouraging team members to join Rotary and become active in their own communities.

Three young women and a young man formed the team and together we began to prepare for this journey. They are Katt Krause of Amarillo, who was office manager for her family landscape contractor business; Aida Almaraz Nino of Hereford, who was a social worker at Boys Ranch; Fernando Valle of Lubbock teaches post-graduate courses for school administrators at Texas Tech University; and Shirley Davis of Levelland, teaches math at South Plains College.

We prepped for several weeks, meeting mostly in Lubbock. We learned about Israelis culture. We talked about the do’s and don’ts of embarking on a journey such as this. We prepared our presentation that we would deliver to host Rotary clubs.

At one point during our preparation, violence broke out in Gaza; Israel responded with a heavy counterattack against terrorists who were throwing missiles and mortars at cities in southern Israel. There was a serious thought that the trip might be canceled because of security concerns. The Israelis, as they usually do, put down the violence. The trip was on.

Then the day came to depart. It was May 9, 2009. Our flight was long and grueling, but we landed at David Ben-Gurion International Airport and were greeted by our Rotary hosts and by another GSE team, from The Netherlands, with whom we would travel for the next four weeks.

Our adventure exposed us to so many treasures. We were shown Christian, Jewish and Muslim holy sites. We went deep into the Judean Desert. We walked among the ruins of Masada. We swam in the Dead Sea. We went to Nazareth. We swam in the Mediterranean Sea. We looked out over the Red Sea at Eilat. We saw antiquities all along the way.

Our journey ended with a Rotary district meeting in Jerusalem, the holiest of the holy cities in Israel. We received a spontaneous prayer from an American monk on the Mount of Olives. We walked through the Old City. We saw the Holocaust museum at Yad Vashem.

Our hearts were broken and filled with joy all at the same time.

The families that greeted us, housed us, entertained us and showed us their country became our friends.

***

The most rewarding part of the trip arguably is the friendships I forged with the young people with whom I was given the honor to accompany on this magnificent experience.

I pretty much think about different parts of our trip daily. Random parts that have to do with my day. Dead Sea, Masada, advice and conversations with hosts I had, inside jokes, beautiful sites. I gained so much from our adventure. It helped me grow and learn a lot about who I am. I love Rotary and what it gave to me. It’s an amazing organization, and on our trip we truly witnessed the 4-Way Test.
I will be forever grateful to Rotary International for what it gave to me. — Katt Krause.

We laughed at each other’s jokes and found ways to lighten the mood whenever we could.

The Dead Sea trip, basking in the sun and salt water while feeling the burn sensation of the exfoliation, peeling layers of skin and any scabs I may have had. Also, the total body mud masks that everyone participated in that temporarily changed our identities to that of an aboriginal warrior. — Shirley Davis.

It moved us beyond measure in ways that occasionally sneaked up on us.

Living and seeing life through the Israelis’ eyes was an experience that will, for sure, never be forgotten. One of the best moments, for me, was during our last days in Jerusalem. Walking where Jesus walked. We had traveled Israel for almost a month without seeing a drop of rain, and the moment when the monk prayed with us and for that short moment … it sprinkled! Rain over us! That was absolutely amazing! Loving the people and being loved by them, also, was an experience that’s sometimes hard to explain. I will always feel a special bond with the family I traveled with and the family I made while in Israel. — Aida Nino.

We built relationships that we all believe will last a lifetime.

Even though five years have passed, the emotional connections made with Rotarians and their families in Israel are as vivid as the country. We experienced more than hospitality, as a GSE team we were afforded rich cultural experiences and real daily life of the country. I will never forget walking through Jerusalem, shedding tears next to a family at Yad Vashem, eating with a host family or spending the day with the GSE team in the Red Sea off the coast of Eilat. Be’er Sheva welcomed us with open arms and Haifa and Tel Aviv showed us where Israel has been and where it is headed. GSE and Rotary afforded me an opportunity to understand and appreciate people across the world, especially the warmth of humanity. I am forever grateful for the experience. I went on a trip to Israel with a newly formed GSE team and came back with more than friends. I came back with a family. — Fernando Valle.

I have maintained contact with a couple of the Dutch GSE team members in the years since that amazing journey. Although we don’t see each other as much as I would like — and I assume the others as well — I consider all four of my fellow West Texans among my very best friends in this world.

We shared an experience few folks can understand fully. Perhaps other GSE teams that ventured to other far-off lands understand how it is.

This one was for the books. I am grateful beyond measure for the experience it provided to me and for the friendships it has built.

What a journey it was.

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'R-word' surfaces yet again

There goes that pesky “R-word” being bandied about as politicians debate the presidency of Barack Obama.

The latest uttering of it came from former Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who used to be a Republican but now is running for his old office — as a Democrat.

Why did he leave the Grand Old Party?

Crist says it is because too many Republicans just can’t stomach the idea of an African-American serving as president of the United States. He calls those critics racist.

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/05/charlie-crist-racism-drove-me-from-gop-106442.html?hp=l10_b1

Is it true? Is Crist correct to assert that GOP criticism of Obama is based mostly — if not solely — on the fact that his father was a black African and his mother was a white Kansan?

Crist leveled a pretty heavy barrage against his former party in a TV interview. “They’re perceived now as being anti-women, anti-immigrant, anti-minority, anti-gay, anti-education, anti-environment,” he said of Republicans.

Crist told interviewer Jorge Ramos he couldn’t tolerate that kind of view. So he switched parties.

Republicans, not surprisingly, say Crist left the party to become an independent initially because he couldn’t beat GOP Sen. Marco Rubio in the 2010 election. Again, I cannot know someone’s motives.

Crist, though, is speaking aloud about a chronic, nagging problem that is dogging the Republican Party. Are Obama critics fueled by racism? At the very least, is the president’s racial background factoring at some level into the intensity of the criticism being leveled at him?

I haven’t a clue. The issue, though, is worth a thorough national discussion.

Bring it on.

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'Benghazi' a fundraising tool? Shocking!

Stop the presses!

Congressional Republicans have been raising the issue of the impending Benghazi hearings to raise money for their political campaigns. What a revoltin’ development! Who knew?

And yet the GOP majority in the U.S. House of Representatives just keeps insisting that the probe isn’t about politics. It’s about the truth, they tell us. They want the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Let’s back up a moment.

House Speaker John Boehner announced the creation of a House select committee to be chaired by Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., to examine the Sept. 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. What did the State Department know and when did it know it? Did State know it was a premeditated terror attack or did it assume wrongly it was a spontaneous response to an anti-Islam video? Did the U.S. do enough to protect the four Americans who died, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya?

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/05/07/gowdy_gop_should_not_fundraise_off_the_backs_of_four_murdered_americans.html

To his credit, Chairman Gowdy has said Republicans shouldn’t raise money “on the backs of four murdered Americans.” Good going, Mr. Chairman.

This investigation can be wrapped up in fairly short order, just as the congressional probe of the 1983 attack on the Marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon was able to do. You’ll recall that attack killed 241 Marines, but other attacks followed and many questioned whether the Reagan administration was doing enough to protect our interests, and our people, against terrorists. The Democratic-led Congress concluded its probe, made constructive recommendations and finished the job with a bipartisan report.

Can this investigation proceed like that one? Let’s hope so.

It needs to start down that path, however, by ensuring that Republican lawmakers stop using the upcoming probe to raise political campaign money.

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Patrick, Dewhurst get personal

Well … there goes civility.

State Sen. Dan Patrick and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst engaged in a televised debate this past week in their runoff campaign for Texas lieutenant governor.

It got ugly right off the top and it stayed that way throughout much of the 45-minute joint appearance.

http://www.texastribune.org/2014/05/07/video-lieutenant-governor-runoff-debate/

The Republicans are seeking their party’s nomination for lieutenant governor. The runoff occurs on May 27. The winner will face Democratic nominee state Sen. Leticia Van de Putte this November. The winner of that race will preside over the 2015 Texas Senate and will help shape legislation important to Texans.

I guess Dewhurst’s biggest mistake might have been trying to out-shout a long-time talk radio host. My experience with those individuals is that they don’t get out-shouted by anyone.

Patrick is glib, quick-tongued, articulate and is quite ferocious in his zeal to defeat Dewhurst. For his part, the lieutenant governor is trying to remake himself into someone he hasn’t been for the 15 or so years he’s been in state government, first as land commissioner and now as lieutenant governor. He’s trying to get mean and dirty with his opponent.

The debate this past Friday was supposed to shed more light on the two men’s approaches to state government. Instead, we got more heat that revealed a serious mutual dislike.

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Durant exhibits true class

Basketball experts — real and/or imagined — are debating today whether Kevin Durant or LeBron James should be the National Basketball Association’s Most Valuable Player for the 2013-14 season.

I’m not one of them. I’ll just go with Durant, who has been named MVP for the season that has yet to be completed.

The former University of Texas star who’s been lighting it up for the Oklahoma City Thunder has demonstrated a quality not always visible among today’s professional athletes.

He is truly humble and grateful for those who helped him along the way.

Take a look at the video of Durant accepting the MVP award. He thanked his family, his boyhood friends. But he saved his greatest accolade for his mother, who watched her celebrated son with tears streaming down her face.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/05/07/nba_mvp_kevin_durant_my_mom_is_the_real_mvp.html

Kevin Durant won the scoring title this year for the NBA. He’s led his team into the playoffs once again. He’s become the star every expert said he’d become.

He also has shown that celebrity status and adulation need not diminish one’s strength of character.

Well done, Kevin Durant. You’ve made your mom proud. That’s the most important achievement of all.

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City needs careful animal monitoring

Human beings are suckers when it comes to certain forms four-legged creatures.

I’m talking about domestic cats and dogs. Many of them end up at the city-run and publicly financed animal shelter where, sadly, they are euthanized. They need to leave this world as painlessly as possible. When they suffer needlessly, humans get their dander up.

Two key administrators have been put on leave because of allegations of mistreatment of animals at the city’s animal shelter. The Randall County Criminal District Attorney’s Office is deciding whether to recommend indicting them for breaking the law. Meanwhile, the city has taken steps to end what it acknowledges has been shabby — and potentially cruel — treatment of animals.

I don’t know where this case will end up, but the city has been caught in another large dose of bad publicity over the way it handles the public’s business.

What gives at City Hall?

The City Council has approved measures designed to euthanize unclaimed animals humanely. The city had been doing the deed without weighing the animals to determine the right dosage of drugs to put animals down. The result reportedly has been some animals have died in agonizing fashion. A veterinarian will be present during all euthanasia procedures.

What will happen to Animal Control Director Mike McGee and his chief assistant, Shannon Barlow, who’ve been placed on administrative leave? Well, if it were up to me, I don’t believe they should return to their jobs. The Animal Control Shelter has been exposed for incompetence under their watch and it would appear that it’s time for the city to clean out the top of the shelter’s chain of command.

The city has been the subject of some snickering in recent times. It went through that silly logo kerfuffle in which the city adopted a logo that was a virtual copy of a logo in use by another entity; it had hired a traffic engineer, only to learn he had been in trouble at a previous post.

Now comes news of difficulty at the Animal Control Shelter. Amarillo Humane Society acting president Carry Baker expressed “outrage” at the treatment of the animals and said the organization might seek an injunction to prevent euthanizing animals. Tom Riney, a lawyer representing the local Humane Society, called for top-level management changes to ensure the cruelty ends at the shelter.

This mess needs cleaning up in a major hurry.

I’m beginning to sense a major public-relations campaign aimed at educating Amarillo’s human population on how to care for its pets is in order.

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Condi Rice is Tech's gain

Rutgers University faculty and student body have made a mockery of academic tolerance and inclusiveness.

How? They shunned former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as a commencement speaker. Not to worry, though. Texas Tech University has just asked her to deliver such a speech to its student body. There might be some grumbling, but Tech won’t be dissuaded from persuading Rice to accept.

Good for Tech. Bad for Rutgers.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2014/05/05/condoleeza-rice-rutgers-free-speech-editorials-and-debates/8721095/

Rutgers protesters have done their school a serious disservice. Rice had accepted the invitation, but then backed out in the face of the protests. She must have figured there was little to be gained by igniting a potential disturbance at the New Jersey school.

What in the world ever happened to the notion that universities are magnets for wide-ranging views, ideologies and philosophies? Don’t they imbue such things any longer in our institutions of higher education?

One can hope that Texas Tech — which sits in the middle of strongly conservative West Texas — would welcome speakers from, say, the far left. The reason in that instance would be for precisely the same reason Rutgers should have welcomed Rice, to expose students to a full spectrum of ideas and world views.

You’ll recall that West Texas A&M University faced a similar protest some years ago when it invited former Bush administration political adviser Karl Rove to speak prior to WT’s commencement. The school held firm. Rove spoke and the students got an interesting take on the state of politics in America.

Condi Rice is a brilliant academician. She served her country as national security adviser and as secretary of state. Her background is stellar and she is full of important perspectives.

Let’s hope she accepts Texas Tech’s invitation, and let’s hope Rutgers thinks deeply about the opportunity it has lost by shooing Rice away.

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Happy V-E Day, America

This day cannot pass without some comment.

It is V-E Day, the day the Nazis surrendered to the good guys who were closing in on them to end World War II. Victory in Europe Day marks one of the great military victories of all time.

Of course, the term “good guys” carries a bit of a mixed message in today’s context. The Soviet Union’s Red Army got to Berlin ahead of the American- and British-led Allies who were advancing from the west. The Soviet Union is now gone and Russia has re-emerged as a thorn in the U.S. side. But that’s another story for another day.

The aim today is to salute the brave warriors who advanced on Berlin and ended the Third Reich’s reign of terror. The Reich was supposed to last 1,000 years — or longer. It fell far short, only existing for a dozen years.

V-E Day was celebrated in cities around the world. The Greatest Generation saw to it that tyranny wouldn’t be allowed to stand in Europe.

The Nazis had marched across most of Europe, starting in 1938 when they seized control of the Sudetenland and then Czechoslovakia. Then all hell broke loose on Sept. 1, 1939 when Germany invaded Poland; Britain and France declared war on Adolf Hitler’s regime.

Europe would go up in flames.

In June 1941, Hitler decided to turn on the Soviet Union, with which he had signed a “non-aggression pact.” Germany and the Soviets had split control of Poland, but then Hitler decided he wanted the USSR, too.

He advanced far into Russia, only to be stopped by a combination of ferocious winter weather and a determined Soviet military machine.

The world emerged a different place after V-E Day. The United States was the greatest power on Earth. It led the effort to rebuild a continent destroyed by war. The Greatest Generation, which has been heralded ever since that great conflict, built a nation — America — into the world’s pre-eminent industrial power.

That generation is now receding into history. Of the 16 million or so Americans who answered the call during World War II, only about 2 million are left. They’re old and largely feeble now. We occasionally forget they were young, strong and brave.

We owe them everything.