Monthly Archives: July 2014

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Plagiarism is a firing offense

Journalists know this to be true: Plagiarism arguably is Rule No. 1 that never should be broken.

To do so is to commit a firing offense.

Is it the same for political figures seeking the trust of the voters? I think so.

U.S. Sen. John Walsh, D-Mont., is running for election to the seat to which he was appointed when Max Baucus left the Senate to become U.S. ambassador to China.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/213161-report-montana-senator-plagiarized-masters-thesis

Now comes a report from the New York Times that Walsh plagiarized his master’s thesis.

Oops. Can’t do that, senator.

The Times reports that Walsh, who was an Army officer attending the War College, lifted material without attributing it for his thesis, which he wrote in order to graduate from the War College.

Walsh has denied any “intentional” plagiarism.

Whatever. As the Hill reported about a portion of the thesis Walsh submitted for review, “The 800-word section is copied nearly verbatim from a paper from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.”

The question now is this: Should voters in Montana “fire” Walsh for this kind of transgression? He has, after all, trumpeted his War College credentials and his experience as an Army officer to the voters. If he failed to complete the requirements needed to obtain that degree by copying large segments from other writings, isn’t that tantamount to falsifying his background?

Yes it is.

Walsh has an uphill fight as it is. Montana is leaning Republican this year. His opponent, GOP U.S. Rep. Steve Daines, at one time commanded a big lead. Walsh reportedly had cut into that lead.

This report is likely to hurt his standing with voters. As it should.

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Putin is bathed in blood

Vladimir Putin did not order the missile launch that struck down a commercial jetliner and killed nearly 300 passengers and crew.

However, the Russian president must be held accountable for this unspeakable act of terror done by rebels fighting in his name.

http://seattletimes.com/html/editorials/2024128738_ukraineedit22xml.html

The Seattle Times editorial lays it out in stark terms.

Putin has been emboldened by a lack of worldwide resolve in Ukraine’s fight with Russia. Now this fight has been expanded far beyond the region that has been at war with itself. The downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 has made this a truly international conflict.

I will include President Obama in this litany of lameness. The president has been curiously reticent in his remarks about the shootdown of the airliner. He needs to lay the responsibility squarely at the feet of the macho man, Putin.

As word is trickling out, it appears that the rebels fighting the Ukrainian government thought they were firing at a Ukrainian transport plane. Only when they got to the wreckage and discovered it belonged to a commercial Boeing 777 did they realize their mistake.

That excuses nothing.

The Russians have been arming the rebels who are fighting to separate from Ukraine and attach part of that country to Russia. As the Seattle Times noted: “Russia inspired and armed the rebel soldiers in Eastern Ukraine who have sustained a separatist movement that has only grown more desperate. Suddenly, this presumably ragtag collection had the military might to bring down a civilian airliner from 33,000 feet.”

As the Times noted, Europe has to step up: “Europe can do better than be intimidated by the possible loss of Russia’s gas supplies. Look what the revenues are paying for, and look at the leader they sustain.”

It’s also time for the United States to step up as well.

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Troops to the border

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The more I think about Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s decision to mobilize approximately 1,000 National Guard troops to patrol the Texas-Mexico border, the more ridiculous it sounds.

Texas Monthly’s Paul Burka had a brief post on it Monday. Here is most of what he posted: “What is the purpose of sending the Guard to the border? The National Guard is a military force. Is its mission military or humanitarian? Who is the giving the orders? What are the rules of engagement? Who is the enemy? Are the troops going to cross the border and invade a foreign country, as Pancho Villa did in Columbus, New Mexico, during the Mexican Revolution? Meanwhile, what happens to the refugees? And, by the way, what is this going to cost? These are good questions in search of answers.”

If there ever was a political stunt meant to appeal to an audience outside of Texas, the governor has just performed it — clumsily, I should add.

Perry’s decision is pure showboating.

As for the cost, it became known earlier today. The troops will cost the Texas treasury an estimated $12 million per month.

To do what? The National Guard has no jurisdiction in the effort to stem the tide of children fleeing their Central American nations. Fox News’s Brit Hume asked Perry about that very thing. The governor’s response? He said the troops were there for show. He knows they cannot arrest anyone, or that their “adversaries” are unarmed children who are surrendering in droves quite willingly to local police and federal Border Patrol agents.

The governor wants to run for president in 2016. This National Guard stunt is aimed at the Republican Party primary base in places like Iowa and New Hampshire that is going to eat this stuff up.

It’s another embarrassing display of grandstanding.

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No moral equivalency in this struggle

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A Democratic senator from New York tonight laid out with stunning clarity who are the bad guys in the latest eruption of violence in Israel.

Chuck Schumer said the bad guys are the Hamas terrorists. The Israelis who are defending their country against rocket attacks aimed at civilians are doing what they must to survive, Schumer said on MSNBC’s “Hardball” talk show.

I couldn’t possibly agree more with the senior senator from New York.

Yet we keep hearing from those who try to blame “both sides” of this conflict.

How can they say such things with a straight face?

Hamas is the terrorist organization dedicated to Israel’s destruction. The Palestinian Authority governs the Gaza Strip; Hamas is part of that governing authority. Hamas has been shelling Israel for several weeks now. They place their missile batteries among civilians. The Israelis must respond with its military might against the attacks. How, then, do the Israelis avoid inflicting some civilian casualties?

Schumer also noted that Israel has accepted two cease-fire deals brokered by Egypt. Hamas has rejected both of them.

The senator also spelled out that it’s Hamas that started this conflict and that Hamas has never backed away from its desire to see Israel eradicated.

The Israelis are doing what they must.

I believe Sen. Schumer has spelled out where our national allegiance must rest in this conflict. It belongs squarely with Israel.

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DREAM Act not related to current crisis

Let’s try to end this nonsensical discussion about whether the DREAM Act has played a role in the crisis on our southern border.

It hasn’t a thing to do with it.

The DREAM Act — which stands for Development, Relief, Education for Alien Minors — is intended to give a break those who were brought here illegally by their parents when they were children. It’s meant to clear a path toward citizenship if these individuals meet certain requirements.

The principle — supported by none other than Texas Gov. Rick Perry, among others — is to give those who have known only life in the United States to become citizens. It’s akin to Perry’s support of providing in-state public university tuition to these young Texans.

Some critics of President Obama have sought to suggest that the DREAM Act is a code for “amnesty” for the children who are flocking to this country from Central America. The actual attraction comes from a 2008 law signed by President Bush after it was approved unanimously by Congress. The law is intended to strike back against child pornographers and other human traffickers by making it more difficult to deport those who are here illegally.

With the border being choked with young refugees from Latin America, some now want to tweak that 2008 law to speed up the deportation process.

The hysterical criticism that gets tossed around, however, needs to be reeled in.

The border crisis really isn’t a function of a “porous border.” It’s a lengthy border along our southern flank, to be sure. However, to suggest that the U.S. Border Patrol isn’t doing its job requires one to examine all the children who have been taken into custody.

They are being held in detention centers. The system has been choked by the sheer volume of refugees who have fled here. It needs serious repair.

How about we deal with the real problem and stop casting blame in search of scapegoats?

The DREAM Act isn’t the problem.

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Medicare info overflows from my mailbox

This is another in an occasional series of blog posts commenting on impending retirement.

My 65th birthday looms just a few months down the road.

Someone must have ratted me out to every health insurance company on the planet. Nearly every single day our mail box contains something from someone telling me about my Medicare options when I hit that magic number.

Maybe I should send them all return slips telling them “Stop sending me these mailers.”

Would they heed my command? I doubt it. Strongly.

They’ll keep coming.

Here’s the latest on my Medicare sign-up planning: I have given it hardly a thought.

Medicare was that genius legislation cooked up during the Lyndon Johnson administration. President Johnson signed the Medicare bill into law in 1965. Unlike the hassling and haggling over the Affordable Care Act, there was little overt opposition to the then-new law when the president signed it.

Yes, they tweaked the provisions within the Medicare program once they figured out how to solve the problems. They didn’t toss it all out and start over, which is what many ACA critics keep insisting must be done now. To borrow a phrase from Col. Sherman T. Potter: buffalo bagels!

Medicare is still a seemingly complicated matter. My mother-in-law is on it and my intrepid wife is forced on occasion to sort out some kind of issue with it as it relates to her mother’s health care.

You’ve got parts A, B and D. I think that’s it. Whatever happened to Part C? Maybe it’s part of the pile of mailings I’ve gotten, but have just missed it.

Someone advised me once that my Veterans Administration health care coverage — which, of course, is prepaid — would be sufficient, that I wouldn’t need to mess with Medicare.

I’ll get to poring through the Medicare mailings eventually. Maybe I’ll decide on a plan to cover me in case I get sick.

It can wait. All these mailers make my head hurt.

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Why Warren … and not Clinton?

Conservatives seem to have hitched themselves to a possible candidacy by a leading U.S. Senate liberal.

Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., has been wowing crowds at political events lately. She’s been firing up the political base of her Democratic Party. Warren also has gotten the attention of conservative commentators and pundits, such as Byron York, who contends that Warren offers a plan while Hillary Rodham Clinton is running essentially on her resume.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/will-elizabeth-warrens-fight-for-causes-put-hillary-clinton-in-the-shade/article/2551098

I’ll hereby offer my own explanation of why York, a columnist for the Washington Examiner and a Fox News Channel contributor, is so taken by Warren: He wants the Democratic Party to marginalize itself the way Republicans might be willing to do when they nominate their candidate for the 2016 presidential campaign.

You see, Hillary Clinton is a centrist Democrat in the mold of her husband, the 42nd president of the United States. Bill Clinton was the master of “triangulation,” and he parlayed his skill at working the extremes against each other so well that he won two smashing election victories in 1992 and 1996.

Republicans don’t want any more of that.

So some of them have glommed onto Warren’s candidacy, talking her up.

Don’t get me wrong. Elizabeth Warren is a powerhouse. She’s smart and courageous. She’s taking on big-money interests and is talking a darn good populist message about income equality, marriage equality, and financial and tax reform.

York and other conservatives likely don’t give a damn about the content of Warren’s message. They’re just thrilled to have someone out there willing to possibly challenge Hillary Clinton’s perceived inevitability as the Democratic presidential nominee in two years.

She reminds me vaguely of the late Sen. Eugene McCarthy, who in 1968 took on President Lyndon Johnson when it was perceived widely that LBJ would run for re-election. McCarthy stunned the president by nearly beating him in the New Hampshire Democratic primary. On March 31, 1968, LBJ declared he wouldn’t seek “another term as your president.”

The news thrilled Republicans in ’68. I suspect similar news from Hillary Clinton this time around would have the same effect on the GOP if Warren jumps in and then mounts a serious challenge to Clinton’s perceived invincibility.

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Militarize the Texas border?

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is deploying 1,000 or so National Guard troops to the state’s southern border.

I am moved to ask: For what purpose? To round up those children? Arrest them? Detain them? Send them back to their home country?

U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro said Perry is “militarizing” the border in the absence of a legitimate national security threat. The kids aren’t going to undermine our defense … are they?

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/07/rick-perry-texas-border-national-guard-109165.html?hp=r6

“We should be sending the Red Cross to the border not the National Guard to deal with this humanitarian crisis,” the congressman said in an email. “The children fleeing violence in Central America are seeking out Border Patrol agents. They are not trying to evade them. Why send soldiers to confront these kids?”

Hey, this is Rick Perry we’re talking about, Mr. Castro.

I have to agree with Castro’s assessment. Sending troops to do the job that the Border Patrol already is doing is little more than political symbolism, which is how the White House has described it.

Let us remind the governor of something. The Texas border with Mexico is being tightened already. Those children are being captured, detained and are being housed by U.S. authorities as they seek a way to humanely repatriate them to their home countries. As Castro noted, the kids are “fleeing violence in Central America.”

Do we just send them back to the misery they seek to escape? I think not.

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End of a life puts it all in perspective

We’ve all done it.

We awake from a fitful sleep. We’re out of sorts. We’re a bit crabby over this little thing or that. We struggle through our morning. Get ready for work. We arrive at our place of employment still a bit under the emotional weather.

We start working at our job. Then a jolt of reality strikes you right in the gut, as it happened to me this afternoon. A colleague asked me, “Did you hear the news?” I responded, “About what, or whom?”

Then it came. A young service technician at the Amarillo auto dealership where I work was on his lunch break. He had been riding his motorcycle en route back to work — or so I understand. He was hit by a motorist, apparently very hard.

This young man died today. He was 18 years of age. Eighteen.

I was shaken in a way I wouldn’t have expected.

I didn’t know the young man all that well. We spoke often as our paths crossed at work. He once had intended to enlist in the Marine Corps. In fact, my very first conversation was an ice-breaker as I introduced myself to him. He told me of his plans to become a Marine.

This young man was quite fit. He told me when we met he enjoyed “working out and being a bad ass.” I chuckled and told the young man, “Let me give you just this bit of advice: Lose the ‘bad ass’ attitude. The Marines have a way of dealing with that and you won’t like the way they disabuse you of that notion.”

We both laughed and went about the rest of our work that day.

His sudden death today served to remind me — it should remind everyone — about how precious life is and how quickly it can be snatched away.

My young colleague had his whole life ahead of him — or so he thought when he fired up his motorcycle today.

Tonight the young’s man life on Earth has ended.

And that niggling stuff that had me so out of sorts this morning? It doesn’t mean a damn thing.

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It's been 45 years since that 'giant leap'

Allow me this admission: I didn’t do much thinking Sunday about the 45th anniversary of man’s first steps on the moon.

I was too busy traveling home from a glorious weekend with my family.

And to be frank, thinking of that day saddens me a little. It’s not because of the event itself. The late Neil Armstrong’s first step off the Apollo 11 lunar lander was captivating at a level I’d never experienced. “One giant step for (a) man, one giant leap for mankind” became a mantra to be repeated by proud Americans everywhere.

No, the sadness comes in realizing where we’ve gone — or not gone — in the decades since then.

We landed a few more times on the moon, had a near-tragedy when Apollo 13 exploded en route — only to be brought home in a miraculous seat-of-the-pants rescue effort. Alan Shepard, America’s first man in space, got to land on the moon and hit that golf shot that went miles.

Those were heady times.

Then the missions became “routine.” How sad. NASA pulled the plug after Apollo 17. It embarked on the Skylab mission to test humans’ long-term endurance in space. Then came the space shuttle experiment, with its huge highs and devastating tragedy.

Then it ended. The shuttle fleet is retired. We’re piggybacking into space aboard Russian rockets.

I admit to longing for the days when we could get re-inspired the way we were when President Kennedy made it the national goal to “put a man on the moon before the decade (of the 1960s) is out and return him safely to the Earth.” We had that big, bad Soviet Union to race to the moon. We won that contest.

Now there’s some vague talk about going to Mars — eventually. Why “vague” talk? Because one hardly ever hears anything publicly about what’s going on. NASA engineers are toiling in obscurity — apparently — designing a vehicle to take humans to the next planet out there in our solar system.

My late mother and I spent many mornings awaiting the launches of the early space missions. Mercury and Gemini preceded the Apollo program. We agonized over the delays. Cheered at the launch. Wept with joy when the men landed safely in the ocean.

I’ve never grown tired of watching these vehicles lift off from the pad and roar into space. It pains me that the nation became bored with it.

I am grateful to have watched humanity’s first steps on the moon. I surely now want to live long enough to hear someone say, “Houston, we have landed on Mars.”