Monthly Archives: April 2018

State news

Harvey’s impact will be felt for a long time

BEAUMONT, Texas — Here’s the buzz my wife and I are getting while visiting friends in the Golden Triangle: Hurricane Harvey left a lasting — but not indelible — impact on this region.

We’re hearing that many neighborhoods remain under repair. The Northwest Forest neighborhood west of the city is “like a Third World country.” Streets are under repair. We noticed huge slash piles of brush stacked up under tall timber along Interstate 10 as we entered the city.

But the city will fight its way back.

Hurricane Harvey stormed ashore for a second blast in the late summer of 2017, dumping a record-setting 50 inches of rain in a 24-hour span of time. It deluged the city water system. Two of our friends told us of being without water for more than a week, while the electricity was restored in short order.

“Riverfront Park is destroyed,” we were told. The park used to be a site of outdoor activities next to the Civic Center along the Neches River. It’s now gone.

We all have read about huge fundraising efforts ongoing to assist the folks in Houston, about 80 miles west of the Golden Triangle on Interstate 10. Houston Texas all-pro defensive end J.J. Watt has become an iconic figure in the Bayou City for his work raising more than a quarter-billion dollars to assist in the repair of Texas’s largest city.

Yes, Houston needs help. The state and the federal government have stepped up to lend disaster assistance.

The pain stretches a good bit beyond the big city. Beaumont is feeling the pain brought by the storm’s rage.

I have no doubt that our friends in the Golden Triangle will recover. They will triumph. They will get on with their lives.

I’m betting, though, they’ll never listen again to the sound of rain with the same serenity it used to bring.

national news

‘An attack on our country’?

Let me try to sort this out for a moment. That’s all it will take.

Donald J. Trump calls an FBI “raid” on a lawyer’s office, which it executed legally through court-ordered search warrants, an “attack on our country.” He calls it a “disgrace.” He condemns the FBI in the strongest terms possible.

Meanwhile, what does he say about Russian efforts to manipulate the 2016 election? What condemnation does he level at Russians who hacked into our electoral process and disseminated information intended to influence that election in Trump’s favor? Nothing, man!

OK. So, which is the greater “attack on our country”? The FBI sought records from Trump lawyer Michael Cohen to tie up some loose ends in connection with a relationship the future president of the United States had with a porn actress. The FBI is trying to determine the source of a $130,000 payment that Cohen made to Stormy Daniels to buy her silence related to the alleged relationship.

That is the “attack on our country” but the actual attack, by the Russians during our 2016 presidential election, is not?

What in the name of election collusion am I missing here?

national news

Speaker Ryan gives it up

I had a glimmer of hope that Paul Ryan could retain some semblance of sanity in the U.S. House of Representatives when he became speaker of the people’s House.

Damn, anyway! It wasn’t meant to be.

I never envisioned that Donald J. Trump would be elected president of the United States in 2016. Nor did I envision that Trump would reshape the Republican Party into an unrecognizable political unit.

So, what does the speaker of the House do? He announced today he won’t seek re-election in his Wisconsin U.S. House district. He’ll walk away from public life at the end of the year to “spend more time” with his family.

I don’t know what is in Ryan’s head and heart. I guess we should accept his public statements about seeking more face time with his children and his wife.

However, there well might be a political element to Ryan’s decision to call it a career.

Trump has managed to mangle the GOP. He has “governed” — and I use that term with great caution — with a recipe that resembles something my grandmothers used to follow. They never measured anything; they just tossed ingredients into a mixing bowl and somehow what came out tasted good!

I always considered Ryan to be a product of a more deliberate governing process. He is a product of Washington, D.C. He ran for vice president in 2012 to help bring some D.C. wisdom to the GOP ticket led by a former governor, Mitt Romney.

He’s going to leave it to the next speaker — whoever the heck that turns out to be. I guess the task will fall on House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy — but that presumes that Republicans will retain control of the House after this year’s midterm election.

That prospect is quite suddenly looking a good bit less likely. I suppose, then, that Ryan just couldn’t stand the notion of toiling in a legislative body led by someone such as Democrat Nancy Pelosi.

So, do you suppose that Donald Trump had anything to do with Ryan’s decision to walk away? I believe that’s looking more and more like the case, no matter the outcome of the midterm election.

International news

Why not just send him detailed plans? Hmm?

What happened to Donald J. Trump’s alleged penchant for unpredictability?

The president is now telling Russia to “get ready” for air strikes against Syrian targets in response to dictator Bashar al Assad’s latest gassing of civilians, including children.

How does this work? Do the Russians now harden their targets to lessen their losses in the event of an attack? Then there’s the warning that Russian strongman Vladimir Putin plans to “target” U.S. military targets in response to a retaliatory strike.

Trump keeps telling us he likes being unpredictable. He wants to keep our foes and friends alike guessing what we’ll do next. Isn’t that what he has said? Over and over?

This man is playing a dangerous game of chicken.

He is out of control!

As for Assad, he needs to be arrested and ordered to stand trial on charges that he has committed crimes against humanity.

local news

Did the City Council overreact to applause?

Amarillo’s City Council has decided to make an issue out of something that shouldn’t really matter.

It is going to prohibit applause during City Council meetings.

Holy cow! Stop the presses!

A constituent decided to break out in applause. Mayor Ginger Nelson ordered him out of the council chambers. I understand he was arrested. The “altercation” has produced something of a mini-tempest at City Hall.

Some folks argue that the mayor has inhibited someone’s First Amendment right of free political speech. I wouldn’t go so far.

Then again, I wonder why the mayor decided to make this an issue in the first place. Does the applause distract anyone? Does it delay the conduct of city business? Are there epithets being hurled?

I get that the council has the authority to set rules of decorum and behavior. It can allow public comment, for instance, or it can disallow it. The council allows constituents to speak on issues of the day.

I remember a time when Randall County Commissioners Court — presided over by County Judge Ted Wood — would allow constituents to speak for as long as they wanted. If they want on for hours, hey, that was OK with Wood. The county belongs to them, not the commissioners, he said. Woods’s generosity with public time drew some criticism, too, just as Mayor Nelson’s relative stinginess has brought some barbs.

I don’t see this issue as any big shakes one way or the other.

If I were King of the World, I would allow constituents to applaud. Within reason, of course.

national news

GOP appointees turn on their benefactor

The president of the United States is steamed that the FBI raided his private attorney’s office in a hunt for evidence related to the president’s fling with porn queen Stormy Daniels.

He calls it a “disgrace” and an assault on “everything we stand for.”

Interesting, isn’t it?

But let’s remember something: The three men who signed off on this raid all are Donald J. Trump appointees. That would be Deputy U.S. Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, Southern District U.S. Attorney Gregory Berman and FBI Director Christopher Wray.

What is the president going to do? Is he going to fire them? All of them? Will he terminate them as a precursor to firing special counsel Robert Mueller?

The raid is intended to bring to light what transpired when Trump lawyer Michael Cohen paid Daniels $130,000 to keep her quiet about the alleged 2006 liaison with the man who would become president a decade later. Oh, but Trump keeps saying he didn’t have a fling with the porn start. He said he didn’t know about the payment of 130 grand in hush money.

I’m left to wonder: If Trump and Daniels didn’t take a tumble, what in the world is the hush money is all about? And are we supposed to believe that Trump’s lawyer would do something so foolish and stupid as pay someone off without telling his client?

Bizarre. Yes?

national news

Go ahead, make our day, Mr. President

Donald Trump reportedly “believes” he has the legal authority to fire special counsel Robert Mueller.

A part of me wants to caution the president against doing something so patently stupid and political suicidal. Another part of me wants him to cut his own throat politically by firing the man hired by the Department of Justice to probe “the Russia thing.”

Indeed, several key Republican lawmakers are arguing against doing it. Sen. John Cornyn of Texas says it would be “a mistake”; Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa called it “suicide”; Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said Mueller “should be allowed to finish his job.”

Will the president heed those words of wisdom? Does he ever listen to anyone with a semblance of common sense?

He might have the “legal authority” to act with profound stupidity. That doesn’t make it the right thing — or the smart thing — to do.

Mueller was appointed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein because AG Jeff Sessions had recused himself over his connection to Trump’s campaign and his transition into the presidency. Mueller is supposed to determine whether the Trump campaign “colluded” with Russians who meddled in our 2016 election.

Trump calls the Mueller probe a “witch hunt.” He calls allegations “phony” and a product of “fake news.”

Good grief, Mr. President! If it’s phony, if there’s no “there” there, then let Mueller finish his job and issue a report that declares there’s nothing more to do.

Trump, though, insists on acting as if he’s got something to hide. A summary dismissal of Mueller — a former FBI director and a first-rate, meticulous lawyer — would send a signal all around the world that, yep, we’ve got a smoking gun out there … somewhere!

Wouldn’t it just stink of, oh, obstruction of justice?

As President Ronald Reagan once said — quoting another well-known Republican, Clint Eastwood — “Go ahead. Make my day.”

State news

Harvey’s footprint remains huge

VILLAGE CREEK STATE PARK, Texas –– I knew it before we got here. But to see it up close still reminds me of just how powerful nature’s wrath can be.

Hurricane Harvey stormed ashore for a second time along the upper Gulf Coast in the summer of 2017. It had blown in earlier over the Coastal Bend, wiping out neighborhoods with high wind and storm surge.

The storm backed away over the Gulf of Mexico and then returned over Houston and the Golden Triangle with — shall we say — a record-setting deluge. It totaled 50 inches in a 24-hour span of time, which is the greatest single-day downpour in continental U.S. history.

Harvey’s footprint remains all over the Golden Triangle. We arrived at Village Creek State Park — just north of Beaumont — hoping to hike the trails and enjoy the sights and smells of the Big Thicket. No can do, we were told by the park staff. All the trails remained closed.

The storm inundated the park. It damaged the trails. It made them impossible to trek.

The Big Thicket National Preserve just a few miles north of us are OK, the state park staff told us.

It’s good to be back where we once lived for nearly 11 years before moving to the Texas Panhandle in early 1995.

My heart broke during Harvey’s assault on the Golden Triangle. Many of our friends suffered from the storm’s wrath, if not from actual flooding and the damage it brought to their property, but from the terror they clearly must have felt during that terrible time.

We’ll get to catch up with some of them. We might even hear their tales of struggle and triumph.

International news

Yes, Mr. POTUS, you need to act

You aren’t likely to believe this, but I’ll say it anyway.

I truly want Donald Trump to do the right thing regarding a possible U.S. response to Syria’s latest use of chemical weapons on innocent Syrian civilians — including women and children.

I also want the president to keep shining the light of accountability on the Russian government, which has sponsored Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad’s brutality. Trump said the Russians could pay a heavy price if the United States decides to use military force against the Syrians.

Does that mean Vladimir Putin — who has escaped much of the fiery rhetoric that comes from Trump — will pay a price, too?

I do hope so.

I do not want U.S. troops to remain in Syria. I do not want us to get swept up in the civil war that has killed more than 400,000 Syrians.

If the president is going to strike a tough-guy posture with regard to crimes against humanity, he needs also to single out Russia, which is wallowing in the filth of those crimes in Syria.

I am among millions of Americans who cannot understand why Trump has gone so soft on Putin and the government he leads. I also am among those Americans who is waiting for some sign that Trump’s infatuation with Putin has ended.

Finally!

State news

Ex-congressman faces a possible prison term

I would feel a hint of compassion for a former congressman.

Except that I cannot.

Steve Stockman once was a Republican member of the House of Representatives. He served two non-consecutive terms. He now faces a possible decades-long prison sentence if a jury convicts him of mail and wire fraud, money laundering and election law violations.

He allegedly treated himself to lots of campaign cash, not to mention using it to pay for non-political related expenses for staffers and family members.

I don’t know whether he’s guilty of the charges brought against him. That will determined by a Houston-area jury. I do know of Stockman as one of the strangest politicians I’ve ever encountered.

He first won election to the House in 1994 as part of the GOP Contract With America tidal wave. He managed to sweep from Congress a powerful Democratic committee chairman, Jack Brooks of Beaumont, who at the time was the senior member of the Texas congressional delegation. Brooks chaired the House Judiciary Committee when he lost to Stockman — who knew next to nothing about the congressional district he represented for two years.

He most recently invited the angry man of rock ‘n roll music, Ted Nugent, to attend President Obama’s State of the Union speech in 2013; that occurred during Stockman’s second term in the House.

He didn’t distinguish himself at all during his time in the House. He ran for the U.S. Senate in 2014, but lost to incumbent John Cornyn in the GOP primary.

Stockman was a goofball while he served in the House. As the Texas Tribune reported, Stockman once had a bumper sticker printed that read: “If babies had guns they wouldn’t be aborted.”

Doesn’t this jokester just crack you up? Naw, me neither.

Well,  I’ll await his verdict and I might offer a comment when the jury delivers it.

I would wish him well, if only he had learned how to behave himself while he served in the People’s House.