Monthly Archives: August 2015

national news, political news

Clinton needs to steel herself over server

Hillary Rodham Clinton is getting the third, fourth and maybe the fifth degrees over this server business.

The Democrats’ presidential frontrunner is under fire over the way she handled e-mail communications while she was serving as secretary of state and her use of a personal e-mail server to conduct State Department business.

She cut off a press conference when the question kept coming about the server issue and whether she destroyed information that belongs to the public.

At one level, this continuing investigation has partisan politics written all over it. Republicans do not want her to become the 45th president of the United States; thus, it’s understandable that they would do whatever they can to deny her the office.

The e-mail controversy — and I refuse to call it a “scandal” — has given them a quiver full of ammo to fire at former secretary of state.

She said today she did everything that is prescribed by law and insisted she broke no laws.

On a human level, I understand her continuing frustration over the continuing coverage of this matter.

On another level, though, I want this matter settled. She has turned her server over to the Department of Justice. My hope is that Clinton will answer all the questions posed to her.

At some point it will have to become as obvious to the rest of the country — as it is to Clinton — that the investigations into the e-mail matter will produce zero criminal culpability.

Therefore, all the politicians involved in seeking to undermine her candidacy will realize they are doing more damage to themselves than they are to her.

First things first, though. Hillary Clinton needs to deliver all the goods about this e-mail business for thorough public inspection.

political news

TV shows provide Trump all he needs to know about ISIL

I almost forgot this one.

Here goes …

“Meet the Press” moderator Chuck Todd asked Donald Trump this past weekend how he planned to fight the Islamic State. He said he’d wipe out the bad guys. Would he deploy American troops? He said “yes,” more or less.

Then came the question: Who gives you military advice?

Trump’s answer: He watches the news talk shows and that’s where he gets the information and expertise he needs to do battle with ISIL.

Interesting, yes?

I think so. Here’s why.

Because the military experts who show up on these news talk shows cannot possibly tell the TV audience all the details involved in launching military campaigns. They might or might not have access to privileged information. You know, the classified stuff that only they can know and must be kept out of the public domain.

But that doesn’t matter to Trump.

He watches TV news talk shows.

They tell him all he needs to know.

It’s reassuring, isn’t it?

 

national news, political news

Trump continues to confound

So help me, I was certain that Donald Trump sank his presidential campaign when he made light of John McCain’s heroic service during the Vietnam War.

It didn’t happen.

I was certain that he would implode during that first Republican joint appearance with nine other “leading” GOP candidates.

That didn’t happen, either.

Then he got into that public feud with Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly over that ghastly remark he made about the source of “the blood.”

Hey, no problem.

Trump said “I’ll build a wall” to keep illegal immigrants from entering the U.S. through its southern border. Yep, he’s going to do all this all by his ownself.

I don’t pretend to be an expert on this stuff.

The latest poll numbers show that Trump is putting some distance between himself and the rest of the GOP field — which comprises some serious, intelligent and accomplished individuals.

What in the world is happening here? Have we become so celebrity conscious that we (meaning the Republican Party’s most faithful voters) place celebrity above actual knowledge of things, such as, say, the limits of the office at stake?

Trump is sounding like someone who wants to take singular control of the federal government. All those first-person singular references to all the action he intends to take suggest he doesn’t understand that the U.S. Constitution inhibits the power of the presidency.

Checks and balances, Donald?

The current president, Barack Obama, has used his own executive authority rationally and in accordance with the law … and yet we keep hearing from GOP leaders about the “lawlessness” they insist pervades the Obama administration.

Just wait’ll they see what a President Trump might try … not that it’ll matter to them.

And yet the man continues to set the pace in a field of highly qualified GOP contenders.

What in the world gives?

 

legal news, national news, political news

Woodward knows a ‘scandal’ when he sees one

Bob Woodward knows his way around a political scandal.

He once was a young police reporter working for the Metro desk at the Washington Post. Then some goofballs broke into the Democratic Party National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex. Woodward and Carl Bernstein, another young reporter, began smelling a scandal in the works.

It turned out to be a big one. President Richard Nixon ended up resigning when it was learned he ordered the cover-up of the burglary.

Woodward sees a similarity between then and what’s happening now with Hillary Rodham Clinton’s e-mail controversy. The e-mail matter deals with messages Clinton sent on her personal server that might have contained highly classified information while she was serving as secretary of state.

According to The Hill: “’Follow the trail here,’ Woodward said on MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe,’ noting that emails erased from Clinton’s private server when she led the State Department were either sent or received by someone else, too.”

Clinton erased the e-mails, just like those audiotapes were erased back in the 1970s as the Watergate scandal began to creep up on President Nixon. That’s according to Woodward.

The man knows what a scandal looks like. The Clinton e-mail controversy isn’t a scandal. At least not yet.

State news

Nuke the Muslims? Stick to ag policy, Mr. Miller

sid miller

Sid Miller wouldn’t like this comparison; then again, neither would the man with whom I am making the comparison.

But the current Texas agriculture commissioner is making as many waves with his occasionally goofy behavior as former Ag Commissioner Jim Hightower.

Miller’s Facebook page recently featured a social media statement that said the United States has been at peace with Japan since Aug. 9, 1945 — when we dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki; then the post said “It’s time we made peace with the Muslim world.”

Hmmm. Does that mean he supports the idea of dropping nuclear bombs on Muslim nations? To be fair, Miller or his staff did not post the item, nor did Miller personally share it. But they aren’t going to apologize for its appearance on his department’s Facebook page. As the Texas Tribune reported: “The commissioner has no plans to figure out which of his staffers shared the posting, or to apologize, (Miller spokesman Todd) Smith said.”

The social media post has drawn the expected criticism. Indeed, this kind of message borders on the unbelievable.

Nuke the Muslim world? Does this guy really mean to obliterate all of it?

Good grief! We’re engaged in a death struggle with Muslim extremists, religious perverts — who do not represent the majority of those who worship one of the world’s great religions.

Miller is on a trade mission in China. I’ve got an idea: Why don’t you stick to promoting Texas agricultural products overseas, commissioner?

Outrageous social media posts have this way of diverting the commissioner from the message he was elected to deliver.

 

 

political news

Birthers now targeting Sen. Cruz

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) speaks during the Family Leadership Summit in Ames, Iowa, on Aug. 10.

Ted Cruz wants to be president of the United States.

Is he constitutionally qualified to run for the office, let alone occupy it?

That is the question of the moment.

The birther movement has returned. This ought to be fun.

The freshman Republican senator from Texas was born in Canada. His mother is an American citizen; Daddy Cruz is from Cuba. My understanding of the U.S. Constitution tells me that Momma Cruz’s U.S. citizenship makes him eligible, regardless of the fact that he was born in another country.

But what the heck. That apparently isn’t quite as clear as it seems.

Mom and Dad Cruz might have become Canadian citizens prior to young Ted’s birth. The question that needs to be answered is this: Did Ted’s mother surrender her U.S. citizenship if she became a Canadian citizen?

If she didn’t, then there’s no problem. If he did, well, then Sen. Cruz has a problem.

This problem has dogged Barack Obama ever since he emerged as a possible presidential candidate prior to the 2008 election. Those on the right insisted he needed to prove he was born in Hawaii and not in Kenya, where his father was born. If we apply the same logic to Cruz’s citizenship — that he earned U.S. citizenship merely because his mother is an American — then such a question never should have mattered as it regarded Barack Obama; his mother was an American, too.

The birthers are back.

They’ll pursue Ted Cruz with the same passion they pursued Barack Obama … I’m quite sure.

business news, national news

Blue Hole: an opportunity missed?

blue hole

SANTA ROSA, N.M. — The attraction pictured here is one of the cooler places I’ve ever seen.

It’s an 80-foot hole in the ground. It is surrounded by rock. The water is about 80 to 90 feet deep. A spring feeds it and the water temperature is at a constant 64 degrees.

The Blue Hole is just off of Historic Route 66 in this tiny community about 150 or so miles from Albuquerque and about 55 miles west of Tucumcari.

My wife and I took a dip in the Blue Hole. The water is, shall we say, bracing.

The Blue Hole is known as a mecca for scuba divers. On the day we visited, we saw several classes of divers being instructed by experts. They dove deep into the hole, practicing rescue techniques. There were others, such as my wife and me, who were there just to get wet and jump into the crystal clear water from the ledges above its surface.

I came away from visiting the place wondering how a community such as Santa Rosa doesn’t capitalize on the obvious attraction that this place is to many people. We drove all along Route 66 through town and couldn’t find a single dive shop, or other specialty outlet that caters to divers who come here — presumably — from great distances away just to partake in a thrilling activity.

The marvelous natural attraction gives visitors bureau officials loads of incentive to build marketing campaigns around efforts to lure tourists here.

From my vantage point, I didn’t see any advantage being taken to cash in.

Rather odd, actually.

But it’s still quite a sight to see.

 

International news, national news, political news

Get Mexico to pay for a wall? How do we do that?

GRA030 MELILLA, 22/10/2014.- Agentes de PolicĂ­a junto a algunos de los ochenta inmigrantes que estĂĄn encaramados desde primera hora a la valla de Melilla, fronteriza con Marruecos, tras el Ășltimo intento de entrar en la ciudad autonĂłma protagonizado por varios centenares de subsaharianos, algunos de los cuales, al menos una docena, ha conseguido superar el vallado perimetral. EFE/Francisco G. Guerrero

Donald Trump has revealed his position paper on illegal immigration.

It appeals to a lot of Americans — apparently.

He wants to build an impenetrable wall; he wants to get rid of birthright citizenship; he demands that we deport all 11 million immigrants who are here illegally.

The question remains of the leading Republican Party presidential candidate: How do we do this?

I think the nuttiest notion deals with how we persuade Mexico to pay for building the wall. I’m trying to understand how a foreign government could demand something like that of, oh, the United States of America!

Would an American president stand still for such a demand? Would our Congress be willing to spend the money? Of course not!

I am wondering how a President Trump (those two words make my fingers tremble as I type them) could possibly expect Mexico to foot the bill for an enormous wall stretching from the mouth of the Rio Grande River to the Pacific Ocean.

And what, I must ask, would such a demand do to the long-standing friendship between the nations?

As the Washington Post reported: “… Trump says that undocumented immigrants ‘have to go,’ and he has vowed to undo President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.”

The president issued an executive order that seek in part to protect temporarily those who were brought here when they were children from deportation. Trump would undo that order, round up those protected from deportation and send them back to the country their parents fled … even though they have grown up as Americans?

Someone has to explain to me how that is a humane policy.

local news

Why not play ball at MPEV?

2 Comments

Amarillo MPEV

Jon Mark Beilue might have laid out what could be a pivotal argument for approving construction of a multipurpose event venue — as it’s currently configured — in downtown Amarillo.

The stellar Amarillo Globe-News columnist — and a friend of yours truly — noted in an essay: “I would bet all the change in my pocket that no less than two years after construction, independent baseball would be replaced with AA Texas League affiliated baseball. From there, the MPEV could be designed in such a way as to draw other events that are the other half in making the venue succeed and attracting downtown crowds to added retail.”

The MPEV is coming up for a vote on Nov. 3. It headed to the ballot on a narrow 3-2 Amarillo City Council vote, with the three newest council members voting to place the issue on the ballot.

The crux of Beilue’s column was that the new guys “whiffed” on common sense, and that they had their mind made up long before taking the vote.

But I’m intrigued by the notion of what might happen if the MPEV design gets voter approval this fall.

As has been noted before — in this blog and in many other forum — Potter County Memorial Stadium, aka the Dilla Villa and now the Thunderhead Park, is a dump. It’s hardly more than a piece of fecal matter as far as athletic complexes go.

Is it unreasonable to believe that a brand new, shiny, state-of-the-art venue could become a magnet for the kind of minor-league baseball organization that Beilue and others visualize for the city?

My answer is “no,” not in the least.

Beilue writes: “Neither I nor most others are married to a baseball stadium as the signature piece of an MPEV, but it’s the most logical. The MPEV needs an anchor tenant, and baseball fits that.

“A Hollywood Bowl design has appeal, but its events would be in direct competition with the Globe-News Center for Performing Arts and Amarillo Civic Center Complex. Baseball is a unique alternative that would draw thousands.”

I refuse to heed the naysayers who insist that Amarillo “isn’t a baseball town.” It hasn’t been a baseball town for years largely, in my view, because that rat hole at the Tri-State Fairgrounds is a lousy place to play — or watch — a baseball game.

The ballot measure states: “Should the Multi-Purpose Event Venue (MPEV) to be constructed in downtown Amarillo include a Baseball Stadium at the approximate cost of $32 million?”

It works for me.

business news, media news

Thanks, Internet, for changing travel habits

SANTA ROSA, N.M. — We ventured west along Interstate 40 to this community.

Our intention was to relax in our fifth wheel, do a little swimming at the Blue Hole and just get away from the hustle/bustle of our regular lives — although it’s a lot less hustle-and-bustly than it used to be.

However, one of my travel indulgences includes purchasing a newspaper.

So, we awoke and, given that this was a Sunday morning, I only assumed I’d be able to drive to the nearest convenience store, truck stop, grocery market and purchase a paper from a large metropolitan area that’s not too far away from here.

Silly me.

I went to three retail outlets. At the last one, I asked the clerk: “We’re from out of town. Is there anywhere here where we can purchase a Sunday newspaper?” The lady said, “Oh no. They stopped delivering the Albuquerque Journal some time ago.”

That did it!

Then it occurred to me. I can blame the Internet for this catastrophe. Newspapers everywhere are cutting back — or eliminating — regional distribution of their editions (I refuse to refer to newspapers as “products,” which is what my former employers in Amarillo have taken to calling the newspaper that’s being published there in diminishing numbers).

Thus, one of the staples of my traveling habits has been eliminated whenever my wife and I travel to markets that don’t have a daily paper of their own.

Thanks for nothing — whoever it was who invented the Internet.