Monthly Archives: January 2018

local news

RV travel presents weather-related headache

You are aware by now that my wife and I have moved into our recreational vehicle.

Our house is empty. It’s been dolled up. It’s about to go on the market. We’re now living full-time in our home on wheels.

We returned from a lovely week downstate, settling for a few days in an RV park in Sherman, Texas. We got to visit with our granddaughter, her big brother, our son and daughter-in-law and our daughter-in-law’s parents.

As great a time as we had, we did experience our first significant weather related conundrum. It got cold in North Texas. As in bitter cold, man!

How cold was it? It was so cold we lost our water for two days.

We did what we were supposed to do. We unhooked our fifth wheel from the water source. We had water in our tanks. Then the temperatures plunged, into the low teens, with wind chills taking the temp into single digits.

The water in our RV froze. We got it to trickle some. Then as the temps inched above freezing we tried to turn the spigot outside. No luck. The water source was frozen, too!

Thanks goodness we stayed at an RV park with working restrooms/showers. We were parked only about 50 feet from the park’s facilities.

Here’s some more weirdness for you. We left Sherman on Tuesday. We arrived in Amarillo later that afternoon. I figured we were jumping from the fridge into the deep freeze. It’s generally much colder in Amarillo than it is downstate.

We arrived at our RV park back home. Then we got some good news. The outside temperature hovered around freezing at 4 p.m., then we were told that we had running water at the site reserved for us.

Ahh, yes. There is good karma, right?

We’ve now prepared for the next serious cold snap. No damage done by the loss of water — and for that we are grateful.

Today was a good day, indeed. The Arctic blast that took temperatures on the High Plains to single digits has dissipated. The sun is shining. The ice has melted. The water is flowing.

Life is good … once again. It’ll get cold again. We are ready for it.

national news, political news

Voter fraud commission is a goner … good!

Donald J. Trump said this today in a statement released by the White House:

“Despite substantial evidence of voter fraud, many states have refused to provide the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity with basic information relevant to its inquiry.

“Rather than engage in endless legal battles at taxpayer expense, today I signed an executive order to dissolve the Commission, and have asked the Department of Homeland Security to review these issues and determine next courses of action.”

Where do I begin? I’ll start with this: Mr. President, the only “evidence” produced came from your mouth or, more accurately, your Twitter account.

The president said after the 2016 election that “millions of illegal immigrants” voted for Hillary Clinton, giving her the nearly 3 million popular vote margin she rolled up while losing the Electoral College tally. Trump never produced a scintilla of evidence. No one ever proved a thing about alleged widespread voter fraud.

So he convened this voter fraud panel to prove he was right. It didn’t find a thing. The president is right about one thing: States refused to cooperate because elections officials — including those in Texas — couldn’t determine any rational cause for releasing the information.

This looked for all the world like an effort to find a solution in search of a problem. The problem didn’t exist in the manner that the president alleged.

I’ll make a friendly wager. No money involved: The Department of Homeland Security won’t find anything, either.

national news

Trump torches Bannon

I guess Donald Trump and Stephen Bannon won’t be exchanging Christmas cards any longer.

Bannon, the former chief strategist in the Trump White House, has decided to turn on his former boss-friend by writing in a new book that Don Trump Jr.’s meeting with a Russian lawyer during the 2016 presidential campaign was “unpatriotic” and “treasonous.” Oh, and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and former campaign chief Paul Manafort were there, too.

The president’s response may go down in political annals as a classic. He fired off a statement that declared that Bannon has “lost his mind,” that he had little to do with the victory that Trump scored in the 2016 election and that Bannon was the primary reason Republican U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore lost an Alabama election he was supposed to win.

As one CNN analyst said, Trump in effect turned a flamethrower on his former top White House aide.

According to CNN: “Steve Bannon has nothing to do with me or my Presidency. When he was fired, he not only lost his job, he lost his mind. Steve was a staffer who worked for me after I had already won the nomination by defeating 17 candidates, often described as the most talented field ever assembled in the Republican party,” Trump said in the statement. 

Well … I guess this means Trump no longer has any relationship with Bannon. To think that Bannon declared after he was let go from his White House job that he would be the president’s best friend and most loyal political ally. Bannon pledged to carry Trump’s message forward.

What does Bannon’s published statement mean to the investigation that special counsel Robert Mueller is conducting? Hmm. I suppose it might mean that it piques the curiosity of Mueller’s legal team enough to question Bannon extensively on what he means by “unpatriotic” and “treasonous.”

Oh, the hits just keep coming.

media news, national news

Donald Trump: master of the obvious

I probably shouldn’t concern myself with yet another presidential Twitter tirade from Donald John Trump Sr.

But … here goes anyway.

The president of the United States just had to tell North Korean dictator/goofball Kim Jong Un that the United States has a bigger bomb than the North Koreans have and that his “button works.”

Why in the world does the commander in chief of the world’s greatest military machine have to goad, chide, needle someone who just might do something terribly and tragically foolish? That would be to start a nuclear exchange with the U.S. of A.

The world has known for a long time that Kim was battling to become the world’s nuttiest head of state. I am having trouble grasping that the Donald Trump is now rivaling the North Korean nut job for that dubious distinction.

However, he is doing the seemingly impossible.

Social media, of course, went crazy overnight regarding the president’s goofy tweet. Imagine my non-surprise at that!

I suppose it’s fair to remind everyone who reads this blog that Donald Trump said he’d likely set his Twitter habit aside once he became president.

To think that many of us actually had hope he would deliver on that pledge. Silly us.

So “unpresidented.”

local news

City Hall seeks to get an earful about trash pickup

I want to give Amarillo City Hall a handclap.

The city is pondering possible changes in the way it picks up trash. Officials are considering whether to go to a curbside pickup instead of driving trucks down alleys to toss the contents of Dumpsters. The move is designed to save money and to improve the appearance of alleys.

But first …

The city wants to hear from the “bosses,” the folks who pay for trash pickup. That’s us. Our property taxes are dedicated to certain municipal government functions; trash collection is one of them.

Officials are going to convene two public hearings — Thursday at the Downtown Library and next Monday at the Southwest Branch Library; both meetings begin at 5:30 p.m.

Here’s the deal. The city has been criticized — often unfairly — because of policy decisions it makes. Critics have alleged some sort of star-chamber process that produces changes allegedly in secret. We heard that nonsense during the discussion about the multipurpose event venue that’s going to be built downtown. The MPEV came to be after many public hearings and public discussion among City Council members and citizens committees appointed by the council.

So the city is asking residents if they prefer a new garbage-collection system or do they like the way the city is doing it now.

City Hall has put the word out. It wants to hear from you. It’s now residents’ turn to answer the call.

And let’s not question whether the city is being “transparent” while pondering this important new policy.

national news, political news

Utah’s loss is nation’s gain

Bye, bye, Sen. Orrin Hatch.

The Utah Republican has announced his plans to retire from the U.S. Senate at the end of this year. He won’t seek re-election to his umpteenth term.

It doesn’t sadden me to see Hatch retire. He’s had his time … and then some, in the Senate. When he was first elected in 1976 he campaigned partly on the notion that senators need not stay too long in the World’s Greatest Deliberative Body. I believe 42 years could be construed as “too long.”

I don’t favor term limits, mind you. It’s just that Sen. Hatch has grown old and stale.

Hatch resisted intense pressure from Donald Trump to stay on. He has become one of the president’s staunchest Senate allies.

Now comes the fun part.

Mitt Romney, the guy who called Trump a “phony” and a “fraud” is likely to run for the seat Hatch will vacate. I look forward to how Sen. Romney — presuming his election this year — will deal with the “phony and fraudulent” president’s agenda.

Romney — the GOP’s 2012 presidential nominee — made sort of nice with Trump when the president-elect was looking for a secretary of state. Romney didn’t get that gig, and has been critical of the president from time to time. Trump’s closest aides don’t trust Romney. Too bad … not!

Romney figures to be the prohibitive favorite to succeed Hatch. I welcome Mitt’s return to public life, notably because he’ll be a bur under Trump’s saddle.

national news

Dear Mr. (Former) President …

We’ve entered the month that will mark the first year of the start of Donald John Trump’s term as president.

That day will occur on the 20th of January.

I thought I would mark that event a bit early with an open letter to the man he succeeded as president of the United States.

It goes like this:

***

Dear Barack:

I hope it’s OK if I call you by your first name, now that you’re no longer president.

As you know, it’s been a rough and rowdy year since you, your wife and daughters lifted off the White House lawn and took up status as private citizens.

I just wanted you to know a few things.

First, I wish you were still on the job. Yes, I know that you were anxious to leave. I also know you and your lovely wife chafed at times at being under the world’s microscope 24/7. But that’s what you signed on for when you took the oath twice. Still, I don’t begrudge you for being glad to be sleeping in, going where you want when you want and not being held to airtight scheduling.

I was proud to vote twice for you. You inspired me, even though I’m a good bit older than you are. You made me almost as proud of those two votes as I was the first time I voted for president in 1972. I cast that vote for George McGovern. It didn’t work out well that year for my guy. In 2008 and again in 2012, I was proud to count my votes among the 135 million ballots you collected in your two winning campaigns.

I know you get lots of these kinds of notes. I hope you see this one.

It’s been tough to watch your successor struggle just learning how to act presidential. To your immense credit, you had none of that kind of on-the-job  training. Then again, you at least brought some knowledge of government when you took the oath the first time.

I can’t let this opportunity pass without acknowledging that you weren’t the perfect president. You made some mistakes. I am particularly chagrined that you drew the “red line” in Syria, but then didn’t act on it when the Syrian military crossed the line and used chemical weapons on their citizens.

The Affordable Care Act isn’t perfect. It needs fixing. At least you had the guts to say as much and offered to work with congressional Republicans to improve it. They weren’t having any of that. Shame on them.

That’s all water over the dam. You’re now in private life. I am glad for you. But damn, I sure wish there was a way we could get you back.

With that, young man, I’ll offer this final thought.

Yes, we did! Well done, Mr. President.

local news

Happy Trails, Part 67

Rarely have I looked forward to new years with quite the level of anxiousness that I am looking toward 2018.

My wife and I are retired. You know that already.

We are preparing to relocate. You know that, too.

We have spent the week between Christmas and New Year in North Texas. We’ve played with our granddaughter, visited with our sons, our daughter-in-law, her parents and one of our grandsons. It’s been a glorious holiday.

We’ll return in our now-permanent home, which we are hauling behind our 3/4-ton pickup, back to Amarillo to prepare for the next big challenge in our life together.

Our house is going on the market. We keep hearing from those who say they’re “in the know” that the house will sell quickly. Truth be told, I don’t want to hear that. My interest only lies in the actual sale.

Most of our worldly possessions are stashed away in a storage bin. The rest of it we’ve jammed into our fifth wheel RV. We’ll live in it for as long as it takes to sell the house and then find a suitable dwelling to call “home” nearer to our precious granddaughter.

I’ve already said I’m “anxious” as the new year commences. By that, though, I don’t mean to infer that I am impatient. This RV lifestyle has been quite fun. We do intend to take our time looking for just the right place once we sell the house we’ve owned for 21 years.

The beauty of RV living is that we can take it all with us. We tire of one place? Fine. No sweat. We’ll pack it all up and go … somewhere else.

So it might proceed as we get farther into 2018.

It’s a bit of a leap of faith. However, my faith is strong that we are ready to take it.

national news, political news

This is ‘winning,’ Mr. President?

Happy New Year, White House staff. They’re seemingly filled with anxiety about their future and the future, possibly, of the Man in Charge — the president of the United States.

Donald Trump has returned to the White House from his “working vacation” at Mar-a-Lago in Florida. He is sunny, upbeat and ready for the challenges that 2018 will bring him.

I hope he’s really ready for what could be a rough year, as if 2017 wasn’t rough enough.

Sure, he got that tax cut through Congress and signed it into law before Christmas. But … that was it, legislatively. Of course, the president had a different take on it, calling his first year the most successful in the history of Planet Earth.

A new year is now upon us all. The White House reportedly is getting ready for more senior staff shakeups. I guess they’re getting used to it by now. Trump has let one White House chief of staff go; he canned the White House communications director, who replaced the guy who resigned; he fired his first national security adviser; the first White House press secretary quit in a huff.

Deputy Cabinet officials have yet to be named in many departments. The secretary of state might be on the bubble; but then again, maybe not.

And, yes, we have the special counsel’s investigation into that “Russia thing.”

Against all that backdrop, there is a concern among White House staffers about a potential Democratic onslaught in the upcoming midterm election. “They absolutely should worry about 2018,” said Ari Fleischer, a former press secretary to President George W. Bush. “I do fear a wave election. Democrats are highly motivated to vote against Trump and all Republicans. Trump has got to grow beyond the base, and he has got to make himself less hated among a group in the middle.”

Anxiety abounds

Yet the president keeps talking about “winning” and saying all is good, all is bright, all is just plain peachy within the White House.

I, um, don’t think that’s the case.

medical news

Quitting smoking? No sweat! Really!

We’ve entered the Season of Resolutions.

Many of us resolve to do certain things, or not do certain things, depending on the nature of the resolutions we make.

I want to tell you about something I did 38 years ago and how it might play in today’s climate of medical disclaimers and equivocations.

I keep hearing commercials for quit-smoking aids. One of them, Chantix, is particularly interesting to me. The voice-over tells the viewer that the prescription drug carries many potential side effects. Those who use this drug to quit smoking may suffer from withdrawal symptoms that include “change of mood” or “thoughts of suicide” or “actions” relating to suicide.

I hear these disclaimers and think: Do I want to take a drug that might make me want to kill myself?

Thirty-eight years ago — it was on Feb. 2, 1980, to be precise — I quit smoking.

Cold turkey! Just like that! I took a drag on a cigarette, damn near choked on it and then tossed it and the pack from where it came into the garbage. I was done. Over. Finished.

The truth is I was a heavy smoker: about two packs daily. Remember, that was an era when cigarettes cost a whole less than they do today. I recently saw a guy spend more than $70 on a carton of smokes. Sheesh, dude! I’m trying to figure the logic in spending something you light with a match and burn to ashes.

I had developed a nagging cough. My wife was imploring me to quit. So … I did what I normally do: I followed my wife’s instructions.

I got through the withdrawal pangs immediately after tossing the weeds into the trash. I don’t recall any suicidal thoughts, let alone taking any action in that regard.

Over the years I have told others who say they “intend” to quit smoking after they finish the pack they’ve just opened that such intent won’t get the job done. I, too, intended many times to quit before I finally did.

I realized that one’s intention to quit smoking means as much as the sign that at the bar that declares “Drinks are on the house … tomorrow.”

For several years after quitting the nasty habit I was inclined to describe myself as a “former smoker.” No longer. For many years I have been a dedicated non-smoker.

I did it without quit-smoking aids that might lead to suicide. I guess I realized the habit I was quitting would kill me just as dead.