Monthly Archives: July 2018

national news

‘Witch hunt’ keeps reeling ’em in

The U.S. Department of Justice announced the indictments of 12 Russian military intelligence officials, accusing them of conspiring to meddle in our electoral system.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said he briefed the president “fully” on the grand jury indictment.

So, what does Donald John Trump do? He tells the world yet again today that Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling is a “rigged witch hunt.”

Mr. President, this is the farthest thing possible from a “witch hunt.”

It has produced indictments and confessions of wrongdoing; key Trump administration aides are now cooperating with the Mueller legal team. There has been tangible, demonstrable evidence that Russians have attacked the heart of our democratic system of government.

And the president keeps calling it a “witch hunt.”

Outrageous.

national news

Puerto Ricans are Americans, too

I honestly don’t know if there’s been an uptick in the Age of Trump in episodes such as the one shown on the video below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ4CnowxMMg

But it surely gives me pause. Yes, there seems to be more of these kinds of episodes being reported these days.

The video that has gone viral demonstrates the absolute hateful ignorance of some Americans. The guy in this video is berating a young woman for wearing a shirt that depicts the flag of Puerto Rico.

He said she needed to wear an “American” shirt. The woman reminded the man of what is obvious to most of us: that Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens.

An interesting back story developed as well. The police officer shown in the video didn’t respond to help the woman; he didn’t get the man to back off. He was put on leave by his department and then he resigned.

This whole Puerto Rico issue came to a head this past summer in the wake of Hurricane Maria, which savaged the island territory. The federal government was accused of dragging its feet to help the island’s 3.5 million residents. Why the delay? Critics said the government didn’t feel the need to rush to Puerto Ricans’ aid the way it did in, say, Texas and Louisiana after Hurricane Harvey.

But the idiot shown in this video personifies hateful ignorance that cannot be tolerated.

This is a contentious time in our nation’s history. We must not allow frightening bullies to intimidate their fellow Americans.

national news, political news

It’s the timing, man!

What are we to make of the timing of two key events in the 2016 presidential campaign?

Donald J. Trump in July of that year invited the Russian government to find the missing 30,000 e-mails that Hillary Rodham Clinton deleted from her file at the U.S. State Department.

Here is the GOP nominee making that invitation:

Then … according to an indictment handed down against 12 Russian military intelligence officers, on that very day they began hacking into the Democratic nominee’s files.

Coincidence? I think not. Neither does the legal team headed by special counsel Robert Mueller or the deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein, who appointed Mueller to the special counsel post.

I have believed since the beginning of this probe that Mueller’s so-called “witch hunt” is nothing of the sort.

Uncategorized

So … what about cyber security?

Those nagging, knotty questions about cyber security keep recurring.

Robert Mueller’s legal team has indicted 12 Russian goons for conspiring to meddle in our 2016 election. Vladimir Putin, the Russian strongman, likely ordered it. Our intelligence brass has concurred, as has the intelligence arms of our major allies.

Donald Trump hasn’t yet acknowledged the existential threat to our electoral system. What’s more, the Russians likely are seeking to screw up our 2018 midterm elections, too.

Back to a question I have posed before: Where is our cyber security reform?

About a decade ago, the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, John Boehner, gave my former congressman, Mac Thornberry, a Clarendon Republican, the task of developing a way to protect our nation’s cyber network.

Thornberry’s all-GOP task force issued a detailed report. Then they were done. They all went back to doing whatever it is they do.

As the nation wrings its hands over cyber security and wonders how it is going to protect its secrets from foreign foes — such as Russia — I haven’t heard a sound from Rep. Thornberry!

Speaker Boehner spoke quite highly of Thornberry’s skill in leading this reform effort, if my memory serves me. Yes, Thornberry is a smart fellow.

But what in the world are we doing to deter the kind of manipulation and possibly decisive meddling that occurred in 2016? Have there been improvements to our cyber network to prevent future interference?

The fellow who used to represent me in the U.S. House of Representatives presumably led the effort to make us safer against such meddling. Didn’t he?

International news

Cancel the Putin meeting, Mr. President

I’ll weigh in with millions of other Americans who believe Donald Trump needs to call off his meeting next week in Helsinki with Vladimir Putin.

Don’t go there, Mr. President.

Here’s the deal. The special counsel has just indicted a dozen Russian military and intelligence officers for conspiring to meddle in our 2016 presidential election. Every high-level spook worth a damn says the same thing: The Russians sought to influence the election outcome; they hacked into Democrats’ computer systems and they attacked our electoral process.

So now the president wants to meet with Putin with no obvious agenda on the table. What is the purpose of this meeting? We don’t know. We do know that there is a gigantic elephant in the room: the meddling and now the indictment from special counsel Robert Mueller.

Trump said he intends to bring the meddling up with Putin. Then he said “don’t expect anything” to come from it. The president doesn’t anticipate a “Perry Mason” moment where Putin admits to the meddling and pleads for mercy.

Trump’s campaign pledge to talk tough with other world leaders has wilted like a flower in the heat when it comes to Putin. He hasn’t challenged Putin any meaningful, tangible, demonstrable way for the manner in which he attacked our electoral system.

The longer he plays nice with Putin and the more he resists taking him to task directly and forcefully, the more culpable Trump looks to the rest of the world.

The meeting with Putin lacks the earmarks of an established agenda with goals clearly lined out. From all appearances, this meeting — on the heels of the NATO meeting — looks like another opportunity for Trump to grovel at Putin’s feet.

The indictments handed down by Mueller in his ongoing search for the truth about potential Russian collusion and obstruction of justice have made such a meeting a non-starter.

Call it off, Mr. President! Return home and start developing a strategy — for once — on how you intend to defend our system against future attacks from hostile powers … such as Russia!

International news

Europe is ‘losing its culture’? Which ‘culture’ is it, Mr. POTUS?

Donald J. Trump needs to read more. He needs to understand the world. He needs to get a grip on the world as it is, as it has been and what it will become.

The president has declared that immigration is destroying Europe’s “culture.” Now, think about that for a moment.

Europe comprises disparate nations. I’ve had the pleasure of visiting a handful of them. Greece is nothing like The Netherlands; Germany and Denmark are separate nations with unique identities; Sweden and Great Britain are worlds apart.

My point is that there is no such thing as a monolithic European “culture.”

However, the president took time this week to disparage immigrants who are going to Europe, many of them fleeing persecution in their home countries, some of which I’ll presume Trump thinks of as “sh**holes.”

Donald Trump once again is revealing a sinister element of his world view. It suggests to me a deep-seated racist and xenophobic view of how the world should be.

As The Hill reported: The president’s comments during his interview with The Sun, however, highlighted Trump’s deeply held skepticism of immigration and resurfaced a line of attack that he had used often on the campaign trail — that Europe was being overrun by non-Europeans and was quickly becoming a shell of what it once was.

“I think you are losing your culture,” he told the tabloid. “Look around. You go through certain areas that didn’t exist ten or 15 years ago.”

Donald Trump doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

For the president of the United States — which used to welcome people from throughout the entire rest of the world — to seek to slam the door shut on immigrants is to ignore our own country’s history.

Indeed, the United States of America’s culture is a conglomeration of many cultures. Each of them is unique and each of them has contributed mightily to the greatness that defines America.

Now he’s spreading his anti-immigrant poison to Europe?

Disgraceful.

local news, Sports news

Sod Poodles sounding more like the top name

I’m hearing from a number of longtime Texas Panhandle residents — many of them lifelong residents — who say the same thing.

Sod Poodles is not another name for prairie dogs.

Yet the owners of the minor-league baseball team that will play ball in Amarillo, Texas, beginning next April might be leaning toward naming their team the Sod Poodles.

And it’s over the apparent objections of those who contend that the finalist name — despite contentions from team owners — really has no historical reference to the critters that still populate the Caprock.

I’ve done a 180 on the name. The first time I heard the list of finalist names … I hated all of them. I might even have hated Sod Poodles the most. The name I hate the most at the moment, though, is Jerky.

Now? I understand the marketing ploy that the Elmore Group — owners of the team that is moving to Amarillo — is trying to use. They want a cute name. They want a name that will have fans talking about the label, the team. They want to gin up interest among baseball fans.

I think they have accomplished their mission.

For the record, I want the Amarillo Sod Poodles to play hardball next year.

International news, national news, political news

How will we know what comes from this meeting?

Donald J. Trump and Vladimir Putin are set to meet in Helsinki, Finland.

Trump says he’ll bring up the Russian meddling in our 2016 election. Now the question: What will Putin say in response?

How about the bigger question: How in the name of bilateral diplomacy are we ever going to know what Putin says?

The two men are going to meet one on one. No senior aides will be present. Only the presidents’ interpreters will be in the room.

Trump is a liar. Putin is a liar; Putin also is a killer, which gives me pause about the future of the interpreter Putin is bringing into the room with him. The Russian interpreter had better do his job correctly … if you get my drift.

Putin will deny meddling in the election. Trump will have the combined assessment of every intelligence agency at his command that has determined the Russians did attack our electoral system. Is the president going to throw that assessment back at his Kremlin colleague?

Oh, and now we have the indictments of 12 Russian intelligence officials. Robert Mueller has indicted them for their role in interfering in our election. This is a big one, folks. But do you know what? It could get even bigger!

How? Mueller well might be preparing to indict the Americans who were complicit in what the Russians allegedly did.

But … the U.S. president will meet with the Russian president. The proverbial elephant in the room will be the meddling matter. If only we could trust our president to tell us the truth about what he discusses with his Russian counterpart. Vladimir Putin most certainly isn’t to be trusted.

I fear about the certain lack of trust in our president, as well.

national news

East Texan gives lunacy a bad name

1 Comment

U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert outdid himself today.

The East Texas member of Congress decided to do something few members of Congress have done. He accused a witness before a committee who had taken an oath to tell the truth of being a liar. The witness was Peter Strzok, the FBI agent who the House Operations Committee grilled for hours over his role in the Robert Mueller investigation into the Donald Trump presidential campaign.

Gohmert, a Republican, violated a rule of the House. Members are not allowed to question the veracity of witnesses who swear an oath to tell the truth. He did so anyway. To his great shame.

Oh, but he wasn’t done.

Gohmert then decided to wonder whether Strzok was truthful when he looked his wife in the eye while denying an affair he was having with another FBI agent. That line of questioning brought out howls of protest from Democrats on the committee.

Gohmert’s behavior today stood out in a hearing that was full of disgraceful utterances.

That is really saying something. And none of it is good.

Louie Gohmert is a disgrace to his office.

business news, local news, State news

Trump’s trade war inflicts casualties on friendly forces

Donald J. Trump keeps insisting that the United States hasn’t declared a trade war against China.

Except that we have.

Here’s the bad news for those who supported Trump’s “America First” political mantra in 2016. The trade war is going to hurt them. It will hurt them bigly.

The Texas Tribune reports that Texas agriculture is being cost in the trade war crossfire between Washington and Beijing.

I lived in the heart of Texas Cotton Country until just a few weeks ago. I am saddened to read what might happen to cotton growers in the Panhandle.

As the Tribune reports: President Donald Trump — and by extension many of the nation’s farmers — is seeing that lesson in action after he launched a bevy of tariffs against China on Friday, prompting the People’s Republic to retaliate with its own tariffs on imports from the United States. Among those American goods are some key Texas exports, including cotton, corn and sorghum. Some of the Chinese goods targeted in Trump’s tariffs are vital parts for Texas’ agriculture industry, such as livestock equipment.

“No question, it’s going to hurt,” said Gene Hall, a spokesperson for the Texas Farm Bureau.

They harvest a lot of cotton and corn in the Panhandle, much of which goes to China. More from the Texas Tribune: Cotton is the state’s 10th largest export. Nearly half of the U.S. cotton exported to China comes from Texas. Soy is a smaller market for Texas, but China is the state’s largest international soy customer. Texas exports about $157 million worth of corn a year, making it the 13th largest exporter of the crop in the country, though U.S. corn exports to China have dropped precipitously over the past few years due to increased regulations on the Chinese side.

Read the entire Texas Tribune story here.

And, yes, I hasten to add that many of the farmers who now are going to suffer from the trade war collateral damage supported Trump’s election in 2016. They rallied to his “America first” rhetoric, apparently not anticipating that a trade war would ensue that would have a direct impact on their ability to make a living.

The 26 counties that comprise the Texas Panhandle voted roughly 80 percent for Trump in 2016. I am wondering at this moment how many of those who live off the land are going to regret their vote for the guy who vowed to “make America great again.”