Monthly Archives: December 2014

International news

North Korea to attack U.S.? With what?

North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un has issued a direct threat to President Barack Obama.

His country will attack the United States if the president retaliates with a cyber counterattack as payback for the hacking of Internet systems at Sony Pictures.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/21/north-korea-threatens-us_n_6362608.html?ir=Politics&ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000013

So he’s going to attack us, yes? With what, precisely?

Well, if there ever was an empty threat, I’m guessing this is one.

Kim isn’t going to see this bit of advice, but I’ll offer it anyway.

Do not talk like that, young man. You are playing a very dangerous game when you threaten the greatest military power in the history of Planet Earth. If by “attack” you mean another cyber raid on our computers, I shall remind you as well that our resources are far greater than yours and that you would rue the day you tried that tactic as well.

I don’t mean to dismiss Kim Jong-Un as a toothless tiger on the world stage. He does have nukes … allegedly. South Korea sits just on the other side of the 38th Parallel and that nation is a critical ally of this nation; indeed, we’ve got about 40,000 troops stationed there.

However, this tough-guy talk isn’t likely to stop President Obama from considering — and perhaps ordering — a “proportional” response to the havoc Kim reportedly brought to Sony computers over the company’s production of that movie depicting Kim’s attempted assassination.

 

 

medical news

Is the 'pop doc' a quack?

Dr. Mehmet Oz professes to have miracle cures for all kinds of maladies.

He’s got his followers. His syndicated TV talk show is a huge hit. He’s become something of a pop culture icon, depending on whose opinion you’re seeking.

Oz is just the latest in a long — and growing — line of popular culture experts. Remember the late Joyce Brothers? How about Phil McGraw? They’re two psychologists who’ve become part of the pop culture scene.

Now it’s Dr. Oz.

Of the names I’ve just mentioned, Oz’s credibility has been taken into serious account by the British Medical Journal.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/12/19/half-of-dr-ozs-medical-advice-is-baseless-or-wrong-study-says/

The journal contends that at least half of Oz’s diagnoses and cures are baseless and lack any foundation. According to the Washington Post: “Recommendations made on medical talk shows often lack adequate information on specific benefits or the magnitude of the effects of these benefits,” the (British Medical Journal) article said “… The public should be skeptical about recommendations made on medical talk shows.”

OK, let’s not call Dr. Oz a quack. But his naturopathic approach to curing ailments has been questioned seriously by a leading medical journal.

The journal “selected 40 episodes from last year, identifying 479 separate medical recommendations. After paging through the relevant medical research, they found evidence only supported 46 percent of his recommendations, contradicted 15 percent and wasn’t available for 39 percent.” the Post reported.

Is it fair to ask whether TV talk-show doctors, such as Oz, prey on people’s gullibility? Is it fair also to wonder, as the British Medical Journal has done, whether “marketability” is the driver in promoting these cures, that an ability to sell these notions to the public takes precedence over actual scientific and medical fact?

This isn’t the first time Oz’s claims have been questioned. A Senate panel grilled him thoroughly earlier this year over some of the “miracle” cures he has pushed on his TV show.

I guess it’s the term “miracle” that has some folks — including yours truly — scratching their heads over just what this popular TV star is promoting.

In all my years on this Earth, I’ve never heard a physician who uses that term to describe the effectiveness of a treatment.

 

International news

Ebola fighters get too much credit

I’m not prone to critiquing Time magazine’s annual Person of the Year selection.

The choices don’t usually get me too worked up — either positively or negatively. This year’s choice is a bit different.

Time chose to honor the Ebola fighters, the medical professionals who went to West Africa to battle the killer disease.

Of all the choices Time could have made, the editors could have chosen someone with more, um, immediate and palpable impact.

As my pal Tom Taschinger wrote in the Beaumont Enterprise, “Granted, these men and women are doing noble deeds. But Ebola has faded from the epidemic that will end Life As We Know It to an overhyped cable-TV story.”

Indeed, this story was overplayed from the beginning, particularly the “outbreak” in the United States that never occurred.

Here’s one of the posts I published on my blog about the coverage:

https://highplainsblogger.com/2014/10/16/shep-gets-it-exactly-right-on-ebola/

One man flew to Dallas from Liberia; he was carrying the virus with him. He got sick, checked into a first-rate hospital in the Dallas area, but then died. Another man died in Nebraska. A nurse got infected in Dallas, went to Atlanta, and was declared Ebola free.

That’s it.

The disease has receded from the headlines and from CNN, MSNBC and Fox news coverage.

As Taschinger noted in his excellent column, occasionally Time picks a notorious figure as its Person of the Year — such as Ayatollah Khomeini or Timothy McVeigh. It has leaned more in recent years to feel-good selections. I agree that they’re important, too. But let’s get real here. Is Ebola really a worldwide threat?

http://www.beaumontenterprise.com/opinions/columns/article/THOMAS-TASCHINGER-The-Person-of-the-Year-is-a-5969800.php

The magazine can do better next year.

 

local news, State news, Uncategorized

Oil price plunge: Good for U.S., bad for Texas

It’s become almost a truism that Texas marches to a different cadence than much of the rest of the country.

Take the plunging price of oil and gasoline. Millions upon million of Americans are cheering the good news, that they’re paying less for gas than they were yesterday, let alone a year ago. Meanwhile, Texas oil producers are crying the blues.

And then we have Texas government, which is likely now to face a serious shortfall in revenue derived from oil that’s pulled out of the ground in, say, the Permian Basin and along the Caprock here in the Panhandle.

http://www.texastribune.org/2014/12/19/oil-prices-could-dampen-legislative-session/

What’s good for the rest of the county isn’t necessarily so for Texas. What to do?

Given that I don’t have a particular dog in this hunt — in the form of oil holdings that pay handsome royalties — I’m more than happy to see the price of gas continue to slide downward. It’s at $1.98 per gallon in Amarillo as of right now; it’s subject to change any moment.

The Texas Tribune link attached to this post notes that the state’s new comptroller, Glenn Hager, is facing a tough baptism in state government. He’ll have to produce some revenue forecasts for the next Legislature. At the rate the price of oil is falling, it’s becoming a bit problematic for the comptroller-elect to project anything for the next week, let alone for the next two years.

Gov.-elect Greg Abbott has proposed an ambitious start for his administration that will depend on money. Highway improvements? The amount of that money will depend on oil prices. Public education? Again, the state derives royalty money from oil and natural gas to help pay for public school.

So, while the rest of the country hails the falling price of oil and gasoline, lawmakers and statewide elected officials in Texas, which produces so much of it, are wringing their hands.

Yep, as the promotional slogan goes: Texas is like a whole other country.

 

local news, medical news, State news

Statewide smoking ban: Round 5

Let’s hope that the fifth time is the charm.

For what? The state ought to impose a statewide ban on indoor smoking. No exceptions, please. Everywhere should fall under the rule.

The Texas Tribune reports that the Texas Legislature is likely to take up the issue for the fifth consecutive session when it convenes in January.

http://www.texastribune.org/2014/12/19/smoking-ban-stalls-capitol-cities-go-it-alone/

The odds aren’t great that it’ll pass either legislative house. Both chambers will be full of pro-business Republicans who think the government has no say in determining whether Texans should be exposed to second-hand smoke. That’s a business call, they’ll contend.

Never mind that the Texas Restaurant Association — a key business group affected directly by such a law — supports a statewide ban.

We’ve danced to this tune already in Amarillo. Voters here have rejected narrowly two city referenda calling for a citywide ban.

The state, though, can weigh in this coming year.

It’s not that Texas is plowing new ground. Two dozen states already have enacted statewide smoking bans. More than 30 Texas cities have enacted such a ban, many with exceptions made for restaurants and businesses that serve alcohol.

Yes, there will be those who contend that business owners should be allowed to make these decisions for themselves.

But if second-hand smoke presents a health hazard and if some businesses refuse to ban smoking inside their establishments, isn’t the state obligated to step in protect people’s health?

Yes, we have choices. We can choose to do business in a place where we cough at the smell of smoke, or we can choose to go somewhere else.

Still, a statewide ban isn’t an unreasonable rule to impose on business owners. Who knows? Maybe we’ll all get used to living in a totally smoke-free indoor environment.

I’m not going to hold my breath — pun intended — waiting for the Legislature to do the right thing.

 

Uncategorized

This crime needs national attention

Two New York City police officers were assassinated over the weekend.

They were “profiled,” and that’s what it was, because they were wearing their uniforms. They were on duty, protecting the neighborhood from thugs, such as the one who killed them in cold blood.

Now we find out the killer was retaliating for the Eric Garner case, in which a man — Garner — died after being choked to death by a Staten Island police officer. A grand jury declined to indict the officer — and all hell broke loose.

Then this happened.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/2-cops-ambushed-fatally-shot-in-car-gunman-kills-himself/ar-BBh3g1E

The dead officers are Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu, who were sitting in their patrol car when Ismaayil Brinsley walked up to their car and shot them point-blank. Brinsley then fled to a subway station and killed himself. No great loss there.

The loss of the police officers, though, is tragic beyond description.

The men and women who take an oath to uphold the law and protect citizens from criminals — as Liu and Ramos were doing — put their lives on the line every day they report for work. They take that oath in good faith — virtually all of them do, anyway — and then do their duty.

That some moronic goon would respond to a tragedy by creating yet another tragedy simply defies one’s senses at almost any level.

This story deserves a lot of media attention, too.

 

International news, political news

Lame-duck status has its advantages

Sometimes it can be good for politicians to use their lame-duck status to move important debates forward.

Take the lame-duck president of the United States, Barack Obama. All he has done in the past few days is call for a profound change in our nation’s relationship with Cuba, with which we’ve had zero relationship for, oh, the past 50 years.

With no more campaigns to run, or elections to win (or lose), the president has done what he could have done years ago. Indeed, earlier lame-duck presidents dating back to the Johnson administration could have done it.

They chose sit on their hands.

Contrast that context with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., a possible — if not probable — candidate for president in 2016. He’s a TEA party Republican who’s backing the Democratic president on this deal.

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/12/rand-paul-supports-opening-cuba-113677.html?hp=b2_l3

Paul will have some answering to do if he faces the deeply split Cuban-American community in south Florida in a couple of years.

Obama has staked out an important change in U.S. foreign policy with this push for “normalization” of relations with Cuba, which came with the release of Alan Gross, an aid worker who’d been held prisoner for five years on a bogus spying charge by the Fidel/Raul Castro regime in Havana.

He had to have figured he could act now that he’s a lame duck. Of course, no politician ever admits to such a thing. They offer up high-minded rhetoric about “doing the right thing” or “acting in the best interests” of the city, state or nation.

That explains, perhaps, the president’s change of heart on Cuba. It doesn’t explain Sen. Paul’s courage on the issue, given that he’s bucking many fellow Republicans on this matter.

About the only thing that makes sense about Paul’s support of Obama on the Cuba policy issue is that he’s not going to run for president after all. I hope that’s not the case.

As for the president, well, lame duck status does have its advantage.

 

Uncategorized

Staying ready for Christmas

The question comes to me — and everyone else — every … single … year.

“Are you ready for Christmas?”

Upon making a pact with myself some years ago to avoid the “hassles” associated with Christmas, I initially found the question a bit awkward. I’d come up with some kind of semi-catchy response, although I no longer can remember what I’d say.

These days, my answer is simple.

Yep. I’m ready. I’m always ready. I stay ready. I was born ready.

In fact, my current response is taken from something a friend of mine down Beaumont way, the late Gene Dumatrait, used to say. He was always “ready” for anything. You name it, Gino was ready for it.

Back to my point, which is that Christmas is something for which I always am ready. I spend very little time worrying about anything this time of year. Indeed, the holiday shouldn’t be about getting prepared for things. I choose to take time to reflect on simple pleasures, on the many blessings I have … such as my family. I want to consider the real “reason for the season,” which Scripture tells us is the birth of Jesus.

I no longer concern myself with getting “ready” for Christmas.

I’m not denigrating others who get caught up in the hustle, bustle and sometimes tussle of this holiday time. That’s their call to make and more power to them.

Me? I’ll just go with the flow.

Isn’t Christmas a time for joy? I intend to have a joyful time of it.

 

political news, State news, Uncategorized

Perry to Aggies: I'm thinking about running

Here’s a news flash: Texas Gov. Rick Perry said some other things to college graduates besides declining an offer to have a building named after him at Texas A&M University.

Such as — he’s thinking about running for president of the United States of America.

That’s kind of a big deal, yes?

Perry spoke at the Texas A&M convocation. He told graduates the school from which he graduated shouldn’t name the Academic Building after him. Then he went on to say that he’s pondering another run for the White House.

http://blog.mysanantonio.com/texas-politics/2014/12/perry-teases-presidential-run-in-speech-to-aggies/#13219101=0

He ticked off his credentials as someone who governed a state with the world’s 13th-largest economy and oversaw a group of individuals who “bicker a lot,” referring to the Legislature.

He told the A&M grads he’ll be looking for a job in about 30 days, just as they will.

Is this a precursor to a presidential run? Yes, it sounds like it to me.

I hope he jumps in. I’ve already spoken out in favor of Mitt Romney getting back into the game. I’m inclined also to welcome Jeb Bush into the Republican presidential field.

Why not — to coin the late Molly Ivins’s term — Gov. Goodhair?

He’s got the look, the charisma, some governing experience and he’s developing a pretty good gift of gab.

Perry’s ideas about the role of government, though, don’t quite set well with some of us out here. He’s inclined to be anti-federal government, which is sort of an dubious stance for someone who wants to oversee it.

But what the heck. He gave us a few laughs the last time he ran for the White House in 2012. Maybe he’s got a few more gag lines up his sleeve the next time around.

Bring it, governor!

 

entertainment news, national news

Rethinking this Sony film matter

Mea culpa time, kind of.

I’ve been getting beaten up over a blog I posted about whether Sony erred in making a comedy about an attempted assassination of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un. I said Sony Pictures’ biggest mistake was in making the film at all.

The chastening I’ve taken has forced me to reconsider what I wrote. Here it is:

https://highplainsblogger.com/2014/12/19/sonys-bigger-mistake-was-in-making-film/

President Obama said this week that Sony “made a mistake” in pulling the film from its scheduled release. He said the filmmaker should not be intimidated by a two-bit dictator. Others have noted that the United States, the strongest nation on Earth, shouldn’t be cowed by a tinhorn despot.

My friends on the left and the right have slung barbs at me for suggesting that Kim Jong-Un had a legitimate beef with the filmmakers and the film, “The Interview,” which stars Seth Rogen and James Franco.

No one likes admitting they were mistaken, but I think I’m about to go there.

Maybe I got caught up in the heat of the moment and didn’t think through the implications — all of them — in suggesting Sony had messed up.

Perhaps if I were running Sony, I would have been reluctant to depict the killing of an actual sovereign leader. Here’s the thing, though: I am not running Sony. That was someone else’s call. They had the right to make that decision.

Kim Jong-Un, therefore, didn’t have the right to bully Sony into pulling back the release of its film.

There. I actually feel better now.