Monthly Archives: April 2017

national news, political news

Trump keeps teeing it up

I am not going to join the critics’ chorus that is yapping about Donald J. Trump’s penchant for golf.

I defended Barack Obama’s golf outings even as Trump was criticizing him. Why? The president is never off the clock. He should be allowed to play golf on occasion, which Obama did.

Now … fast-forward to the present day.

The current president spent a lot of time campaigning for the office that he wouldn’t have time for golf. He’d be “too busy working for you.” He wouldn’t take a lot of time to hit the links. He would stay on the job, in the White House, in the Oval Office, in the Situation Room. He would spend his time “making great deals.”

That’s what the president said while campaigning for the office he now occupies.

Has he delivered on that key campaign promise? Umm. No. He hasn’t.

He has spent 17 of his 81 days as president at Mar-a-Lago, the ritzy resort Trump owns. He’s been playing golf. A lot of golf.

My beef isn’t that he’s playing golf, per se, mind you. My concern is that Donald Trump is breaking his word. He promised Americans he’d keep his shoulder to the wheel of running the government. He’d be diligent in luring all those jobs that have been pilfered to overseas markets.

I know this is a surprise, but I believe the president lied to us. He made a campaign promise he had no intention of honoring.

national news, political news

Congressman gets a taste of retribution

What in the world do you make of this?

U.S. Rep. Joe “You Lie!” Wilson went home to his South Carolina congressional district, sought to conduct a town hall meeting with constituents, and was given a healthy dose of the treatment he tossed at then-President Barack Obama.

Wilson, a Republican, infamously shouted “You lie!” at the president during a televised speech to a joint session of Congress. He received a stern look from then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Vice President Joe Biden at that heated moment.

Wilson received bipartisan scolding

As Mother Jones reported: “In 2009, Wilson was the subject of bipartisan condemnation after he interrupted Obama’s address to Congress by calling him a liar when the president said his proposed health care plan wouldn’t cover undocumented immigrants. The congressman was forced to apologize for violating congressional decorum with the heckling, but he benefited in the end: Shortly after the incident, an aide confirmed Wilson had raised more than $1 million in campaign contributions thanks to the outburst.”

Well, he was telling constituents this week about how hard he has worked to deter violence against women. The response from the crowd? A chorus of “You lie!”

Wilson stepped away from the microphone as the chants continued, which was something the president couldn’t do when the congressman shouted the epithet while sitting among his congressional colleagues.

Payback can be a bitch. Can’t it, congressman?

media news

Small-town paper makes it … big time!

I love hearing stories like the one that brought a lot of attention to a small Iowa town and the newspaper that serves its residents.

The Storm Lake Times was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing. Big deal, you say? Damn right it is!

The winner of the prize is a fellow I don’t know, although I feel a certain kinship with him. Art Cullen is his name. I have had a long personal friendship with his brother, Jim, with whom I worked at the Beaumont (Texas) Enterprise. Jim moved eventually to Austin, where he covered state government for the newspaper. He now is editor of the Austin-based Progressive Populist.

His brother Art’s big prize speaks to the value of community journalism, the kind practiced by small newspapers all across the nation.

Taking on the big interests

The Pulitzer committee recognized Cullen “For editorials fueled by tenacious reporting, impressive expertise and engaging writing that successfully challenged powerful corporate agricultural interests in Iowa.”

Those “powerful” interests are important at many levels to the readers of the Storm Lake Times, given Iowa’s heavy reliance on farming and ranching.

It’s also fascinating to me that the Pulitzer committee gave Cullen the award over finalists from the Houston Chronicle and the Washington Post. It simply shows that size — meaning the amount of corporate funds and resources — matters less than the quality of one’s work.

We hear all the time about reports from vaunted big-city media organizations. You know, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times … and on and on.

It gladdens my heart to know that a 3,000-circulation newspaper — which is published twice each week — has received such high praise from a panel of peers who recognized the courage it takes to challenge such important players in the community it serves.

I offer my own congratulations to Art Cullen and his colleagues at the Storm Lake Times.

International news

Trump-Putin ‘bromance’ on the rocks

It took a good while — too long, in fact — but it appears the Donald Trump-Vladimir Putin bromance might be on the verge of ending.

The White House has issued a stern statement accusing Russia of covering up the Syrian chemical weapons attack that killed several dozen civilians, including children. The gassing of Syrian civilians prompted the U.S. air strike that wiped out several Russian-made Syrian jet fighters at the base from where the gas attack was launched.

White House talks tough to Russia — finally

The strongly worded statement demands international condemnation of Syria for using the chemical weapons and accuses Russia of “shielding” its Syrian allies.

As the New York Times reported: “It marks a striking shift by President Trump, who entered office praising President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and seeking common ground with him — and now appears to be moving swiftly to isolate him. The charges came as Rex W. Tillerson, the secretary of state, was preparing for meetings in Moscow on Wednesday, and as Congress and the F.B.I. are investigating potential ties between Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign and Russia.”

Has the president finally gotten the message that Vladimir Putin is no friend of the United States and shouldn’t be a friend of the man who now governs this country?

As for the investigation that’s under way regarding the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia, let it continue full throttle.

The here and now, though, presents a whole new and different set of challenges that must require an end to the strange buddy relationship between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.

local news, political news, religious news, State news

Texas Senate deciding whether to defy U.S. Supreme Court

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I cannot believe the Texas Senate is considering a bill such as the one it is considering.

Senators are debating whether to allow county clerks to deny gay couples a marriage license.

Let’s see. How is this supposed to work?

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled two years ago in a landmark decision that gay marriage is protected under the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution. It ruled that every state in the country should allow same-sex couples to marry, which requires them to obtain the legal documentation necessary to become married — just as straight couples are required to do.

The highest court in the nation — to which Texas belongs — ruled that gay marriage is legal.

County clerks, thus, are required to obey the oath they take to honor the laws of the land. Isn’t that right? A handful of county clerks quit their posts rather than perform the duties required of them as a result of the court ruling. Those who remain, though, must fulfill the oath they take — regardless, it seems to me, of their own religious conviction.

Amarillo straddles a border separating Randall and Potter counties. Renee Calhoun and Julie Smith, who serve as county clerks in Randall and Potter counties, respectively, both declared they would issue licenses to gay couples who requested them.

Given the political nature of this discussion, I feel compelled to note that both Calhoun and Smith are Republicans. A healthy majority of Republicans are inclined to oppose gay marriage as a matter of principle, relying on their belief in biblical assertions that marriage should be performed only between one man and one woman.

To my way of thinking, there shouldn’t even be a bill considered in the Texas Legislature that would give county clerks an “out” if they chose to deny gay couples a license to marry.

The Supreme Court of the United States, acting as the final arbiter on these constitutional matters, has decided the issue once and for all. Gay marriage is legal and county clerks ought to be required to do the job to which they swore an oath to perform faithfully.

I must stipulate that they swear their allegiance to the Constitution, as secular a governing document as any ever enacted.

International news, national news, political news

Building ‘The Wall’ faces mountain of obstacles

Donald J. Trump’s mouth provides an endless supply of nonsense.

The wall he intends to build to keep an imagined horde of criminals and terrorists from entering the United States of America provides a stark example of his “ready, fire, aim” approach to public policy.

The New York Times, in an editorial published Sunday, took note of the enormously complicated task associated with building a wall across our nation’s southern border.

Did the Republican candidate for president consider any of them before riding down the escalator to announce his candidacy in the summer of 2015? Umm. Nope. No way, man.

The Times asks:

“How do you build a wall along the 1,200 miles of the Rio Grande, the Texas stretch of border? Do you put it on our side and abandon the river to Mexico, or seize Mexican territory for it, or put it in the middle of the river, or do some zigzag compromise? What do you do then about a treaty requiring that both countries have open access to the river?

“How do you make a concrete wall see-through, so smugglers aren’t invisible to the Border Patrol?

“How do you get private landowners to go along? What about the Tohono O’odham Indians, whose reservation straddles the border in Arizona and who want no part of any wall on their sacred land?

How do you wall out deep tunnels, drones and catapults? What about the tons of drugs that pass through existing ports? Did you know that drug cartels have ships and submarines? What happens when drug bales start coming ashore in San Diego, or over from Saskatchewan?

media news

CNN vs. Fox over this O’Reilly matter

There’s little doubt I will tire of this story quickly, but for now I’m kind of chuckling at a media war that’s flaring up over the controversy surrounding a cable news star.

You’ve heard of Bill O’Reilly, the Fox News Channel’s main man who’s been accused by several women of behaving a boorishly, of committing acts of sexual harassment.

Meanwhile, CNN talking heads and commentators have been blazing away rhetorically over the troubles at Fox.

Fox is firing back, accusing CNN of ignoring a story regarding whether former national security adviser Susan Rice outed some Trump campaign officials who might have been monitored by, oh, someone. CNN denies ignoring the story. Fox, meanwhile, is sticking with O’Reilly.

The two main-event combatants appear to be O’Reilly and CNN’s Don Lemon.

I plan to watch this tempest play itself out from the peanut gallery.

Fox is ignoring the O’Reilly matter

CNN has been covering the Rice story. It’s pretty clear, though, that Fox is giving short shrift to the O’Reilly story. I get that the stories aren’t parallel; Rice is a former government official while O’Reilly is employed by one of the feuding cable news networks.

Fight on, cable news guys.

national news, political news

Another ‘family values’ official takes a fall

Robert Bentley got elected governor of Alabama partly on the basis of his belief in what he defined as traditional family values.

But wait! The Republican got involved romantically with a senior staffer. He got re-elected and then tried to cover the affair up. His wife of 50 years then divorced him after learning of text messages revealing the affair hubby was having.

Now he’s out of office.

This isn’t a huge deal in terms of what it means for the entire nation. Kay Ivey, another Republican, took the oath of office as governor today. State government will go on. Bentley will serve two years of probation and then he’ll disappear from the public stage.

What gives this story its legs, I suppose, is the sight of another moralist/politician going down for the count. We see this kind of thing on occasion.

Two pols stand out in my memory.

Do you remember John Edwards, the former Democratic senator from North Carolina? He used to talk publicly about the love he had for his late wife, Elizabeth, all while he was taking a tumble with a woman who was assigned to put his life story on film.

Then we had the former Republican speaker of the U.S. House, Newt Gingrich, ranting and railing about President Clinton’s sexual misdeeds as he, too, was cheating on his wife with a staffer.

During the nadir of Clinton’s presidency there were candidates for public office who would proclaim their sexual fidelity as a reason to vote for them. Imagine that, will ya? As if that’s something about which you should boast.

Bentley quit just as Alabama legislators began filing impeachment procedures on the basis of evidence that Bentley violated state campaign rules in covering up this episode.

The late President Nixon taught the nation graphically a particular lesson about political scandals. It’s rarely the deed itself that brings the politician down; it usually is the cover-up.

Governor pleads guilty, then quits

There might be a lesson, too, for future politicians to heed. Don’t try to sell yourself as a “family values” champion if you have any predilection to violate a sacred pledge.

International news, military news

What about the ‘barrel bombs’?

Donald J. Trump unleashed 59 Tomahawk missiles against Syrian jet fighters and support facilities because of chemical weapons were used against Syrian civilians.

That is a horrific act, to be sure, and the president was right to take action against Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad.

Here, though, is the question: What about the barrel bombs that Syrian military forces are dropping on civilian victims?

It is agreed around the world that chemical weapons use must be stopped. The images we see of children writhing in agony are heartbreaking in the extreme.

However, the Syrian government has killed many thousands more innocent victims using barrel bombs, which are devices filled with shrapnel. The bombs explode and the shrapnel flies out, shredding whatever — and whoever — is in its path.

Death by barrel bomb might not be as agonizing — and horrifying to watch — as death by chemical weapon, but Assad’s use of the hideous ordnance needs a stern world response as well.

What is the strategy to deal with this hideous monster? Finally, what are we going to do about the Russian role — the Russians’ complicity — in the use of barrel bombs and chemical weapons?

business news

This isn’t ‘customer service,’ United Airlines

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You’ve just taken your seat on a commercial jetliner. The plane is full. The crew gets on the public-address system and asks passengers to give up their seats in exchange for an $800 travel voucher.

No one takes the offer. The plane is overbooked. The airline, United Airlines, needs to find four seats for UAL employees to occupy to fly to their destination.

No one takes volunteers to leave. So what does UAL do? It selects four passengers randomly. The airline demands they leave. Most of them do, begrudgingly. Then they approach a gentleman, a physician whose name was drawn. He says he won’t get off; he has patients to see at the other end of the flight.

The airline then calls the cops, who struggled with the guy and dragged him off the plane.

Customer service, anyone? is this how you treat folks who shell out good money to use your product, which happens to be an overbooked jetliner?

This incident erupted at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport. The plane was bound for Louisville, Ky.

How does the airline justify what occurred?

Someone has some explaining to do

I believe I have a solution: How about United — and all other commercial air carriers, for that matter — stop the practice of “overbooking” their flights? I understand the need to ensure a full airplane, but this is the kind of story that surprises me in one way: I’m surprised we haven’t more of these kinds of incidents already.

The doc had to get to his destination because he had patients waiting for him. Couldn’t the airline have picked another name? Couldn’t it have found another way to get their employees to Louisville?

Some passengers recorded the incident on their cell phones. Some of them were heard yelling their anger at the airline for the rough manner in which they treated the doctor. They were outraged, I’m telling ya.

Interesting, yes? Any one of them perhaps could have given up their seat to avoid the disgraceful behavior and the humiliation suffered by the physician on board. But they didn’t.

Meanwhile, United Airlines had better offer some justification for treating a paying customer in such a brutish manner.