Monthly Archives: July 2018

medical news

There will always be abortions

Let’s be crystal clear about something few of us want to discuss.

If the U.S. judicial system decides to overturn a ruling that legalized abortion, does anyone really believe that abortion will come to an end? Will women across the country decide to give birth even though they have been raped by an attacker, or impregnated in an incestuous relationship?

Abortion is about to return front and center to the public debate stage as the U.S. Senate ponders the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In 1973 the high court ruled in the epic Roe v. Wade decision that abortion can be done legally throughout the United States. It declared that the Constitution guaranteed a woman’s right to choose to end a pregnancy.

The discussion today centers on whether the court would reverse that decision if it receives a case involving abortion.

I want to be clear. Abortion won’t end if the court hands the issue back to the states. Many states are likely to make abortion illegal. I live in one of those states: Texas. Legislators here already have enacted anti-choice legislation and Gov. Greg Abbott has signed it into law. They have decided to make obtaining an abortion quite difficult.

Does it end abortion? Not in the least. Women will continue to seek them — for whatever reason they believe compels to do so.

I get the argument from those who are fervently anti-choice. They are sincere in their belief about when life begins. Their argument, though, won’t ever stop women from making profoundly difficult choices that only they can make.

International news

Let us honor the rescuer who died

The world is rightfully rejoicing today over the news that a dozen boys and their soccer coach are free from their underground imprisonment.

The rescue was daring and well-coordinated by the Thailand government. It was performed with precision and extraordinary care.

However, the operation wasn’t flawless. Saman Gunan died trying to save the youngsters and their coach.

Gunan was a retired Thai Navy SEAL who perished while swimming through a flooded cavern. Reports indicated that he ran out of oxygen in his SCUBA equipment.

We ought to keep this hero in our thoughts today as we ponder the remarkable event that unfolded on the world stage in real time.

May this man’s sacrifice remind the rest of us of the extreme danger into which all the rescuers thrust themselves while producing the joyous result we celebrate today.

legal news, national news, political news

Time to praise SCOTUS selection

I am feeling so good over the rescue of the Thai boys and their soccer coach from that flooded cave in northern Thailand that I want to offer a good word for Donald John Trump’s selection to the U.S. Supreme Court.

I’ll stipulate up front that you’ll deem this to be faint praise, but it’s praise nonetheless.

Appeals Court Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court has angered the crackpot Trump “base.” They’re none too happy with Kavanaugh, fearing that he doesn’t appear to be as firmly opposed to Roe v. Wade as the base continues to be. Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania chided the president for surrendering to what he called the “Washington elite” by selecting Kavanaugh.

To be sure, the justice nominee is a conservative. He appears to be what one could call a “mainstream conservative,” not a goofball/wack-job conservative.

He has pledged to be independent and to study the law as it is written, not as one wishes it were written.

Is this the kind of judge I would have selected? Of course not! However, Trump is the president of the United States.

By anyone’s measure, Kavanaugh is supremely qualified to serve on the high court. He’s a Yale Law School grad, meaning that the entire Supreme Court would comprise Ivy League legal eagles if Kavanaugh is confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

The Senate will nitpick the daylights out of Kavanaugh’s lengthy written record. Senators will need to examine Kavanaugh’s views on health care, as well as on whether sitting presidents can be indicted for criminal offenses. His record suggests he might tilt the “wrong way” on both of those issues.

I continue to believe that while Kavanaugh’s conservative credentials might solidify the court’s right-leaning bias, it doesn’t guarantee it necessarily on every single key ruling that would come before the Supreme Court.

That seeming uncertainty, I submit, is what might be driving the Trump bloc of “base” voters nuts.

International news

Rescue of Thai boys and coach: a joyful event

Oh, man, it was good to wake up this morning to some good news.

I mean, some really good news. I only can imagine how the parents of 12 boys and the loved ones of their soccer coach are feeling this morning.

Rescue teams pulled the last of the boys and their coach out of that purgatory where floodwaters had trapped them. They were stranded in that cave for more than two weeks.

Indeed, when I first heard about the “missing” boys and coach, my heart sank. There’s no way they’ll be found alive, I thought. Well, silly me. Indeed, silly the rest of the world, too.

They not only were alive when they were detected deep underground, they were in relatively good condition, in relatively good spirits.

So, they’re in a hospital in northern Thailand, being treated for whatever ills they might have developed while awaiting their rescue. I heard someone report that the boys were “quite hungry.” Do ya think?

This is the kind of story that lifts all our spirits.

How does one offer appropriate congratulations and expressions of gratitude to the Thai navy SEALs and the international community that worked so damn hard to free those young men from their captivity?

I guess a mere “thank you” will have to suffice.

Meanwhile, I might be smiling all day.

legal news, national news, political news

Lifetime job has this way of shaping opinions

I tend to interpret the U.S. Constitution the way I interpret the Bible.

That is, I take a more liberal view of what both documents say. That’s just my view. I am not a “strict constructionist” as it regards the Constitution; nor am I a “fundamentalist” as it regards the Bible.

But let’s consider what the future might hold for the body that interprets the former document, the Constitution.

Donald J. Trump has nominated Judge Brett Kavanaugh to join the U.S. Supreme Court. He comes to this nomination after being recommended highly by the Heritage Foundation and the Federalist Society, two staunchly conservative think tanks.

Now, what does this mean for Kavanaugh’s tenure on the high court?

I’ll give you my hope for what happens. I hope Kavanaugh proves to be as unpredictable as previous “conservative” justices who were nominated by “conservative” presidents.

The record going back more than six decades is full of how this has occurred.

  • President Eisenhower appointed two “conservatives” to the high court: Earl Warren as chief justice and William Brennan as an associate justice. They both proved to be progressive in the extreme.
  • President Nixon tapped Harry Blackmun to the high court, only to watch as Blackmun wrote the majority opinion in the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion.
  • President Ford’s pick to the court, John Paul Stevens, turned out to be a reliably liberal vote.
  • President George H.W. Bush nominated David Souter, who then turned out to be a liberal justice as well.

President Reagan nominated two justices — Sandra Day O’Connor and Anthony Kennedy — who became quite a bit less reliably conservative than the president would have wanted.

No one really saw these justices’ service turning out as they did in advance.

Thus, it well might be that Judge Brett Kavanaugh could join the list of conservatives who take a more, um, expansive view of the Constitution.

That is my hope. But, hey, I’m just one guy — a blogger out here in Flyover Country — who wants history to repeat itself.

national news

SCOTUS nominee needs to get set for big battle

Brett Kavanaugh is now headed for the fight of his life.

He stands nominated to a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court. He is 53 years of age. We know a good bit more about his personal history: only child of two two lawyers; father of two daughters, one of whom he said “likes to talk a lot”; married to a West Texan.

He also pledges to be faithful to the U.S. Constitution. But that’s what all Supreme Court justice nominees pledge to do.

What happens next? He’s going to make the rounds of senators who will vote up or down on his nomination.  He won’t answer questions about how he would vote on specific issues that come before the high court.

Kavanaugh won’t have to answer those questions for senators to get a good read on this man’s judicial philosophy. He has a lengthy paper trail of opinions he has written, of essays, a history of serving as a clerk for the justice he seeks to succeed on the court, Anthony Kennedy.

If I could ask him one question it would be this: Do you consider Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling that legalized abortion in this country to be “settled law”? I would prefer him to answer “yes.”

If he says “no” or refuses to answer because he might have to decide an abortion case, well, that’s troubling.

This nomination will proceed, despite protests from those — such as me — who think the Senate should await the results of the midterm election this fall before considering this nomination.

I won’t predict how it will turn out. I feel comfortable suggesting that this confirmation process is going to be a donnybrook.

national news

Longing for a return of bipartisan ceremony

I cannot remember the last time I saw a president posing for pictures with politicians of both major political parties.

You remember those days, right? President Lyndon Johnson signed landmark civil rights legislation into law, and handed pens out to Republicans and Democrats gathered around him.

President Richard Nixon did the same thing with, say, creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. Same with President Ronald Reagan as he signed significant tax legislation.

President Bill Clinton worked hand in glove with Republican congressional leaders to balance the federal budget and both sides sought to take credit for that noble achievement. Fine. Let ’em!

I remember the time not long after 9/11 when GOP President George W. Bush embraced Democratic Senate Leader Tom Daschle on the floor of the House after delivering a speech that called the nation to arms after the terror attacks.

These days, presidents are photographed only with pols of their own parties. President Barack Obama would be photographed at bill signings only with Democrats. The current president of the United States, Donald J. Trump, meets almost exclusively with Republicans and wouldn’t be caught dead sharing space with Democrats.

Legislating is a team sport. Teamwork often requires pols of both parties to work together.

We see so little of it these days, and indeed over the course of at least two presidential administrations. Republicans and Democrats have declared the other guys to be the enemy. They aren’t just mere opponents.

It’s a toxic time in Washington, D.C. It is threatening to poison the system for far longer than can possibly benefit the cause of good government.

International news, national news

Public thirsting for ‘good news’?

Once in a while — maybe more often than we realize — the public seems to grow weary of the constant barrage of negativity it gets on TV, newspapers and other forms of media.

Thus, when we get a good-news story to hang on to, we grab it with gusto, unable to let it go. Do you recall the time Chesley “Sulley” Sullenberger flew that jetliner onto the Hudson River, saving the lives of the more than 100 passengers and crew? We loved that story. We cherished the cool, calm, collected nature of the flight crew that Sulley commanded.

We were being battered by bad news at the time. We wanted to keep cheering Sulley and his crew.

I am waiting to cheer some rescuers in Thailand for very much the same reason, not to mention that 13 lives are at stake.

Eight boys have been evacuated from that flooded cave in northern Thailand. Four more boys remain trapped, along with their soccer coach. I join the rest of the world in hoping — and, indeed, believing — the rest of the boys and their coach will be taken out safely. They will all be reunited with their families. Their lives will go on, albeit after some serious emotional and perhaps psychological rehabilitation.

One aspect of this story that I find particularly heartwarming has been the reaction of the boys’ parents regarding the coach to led them into the cave in the first place. They are refusing to blame the coach for the predicament that trapped the team for more than two weeks.

The team walked into the cave. They got deep into the bowels of the cavern. Then the rain came. It poured! The deluge that no one predicted trapped the boys and their coach.

The parents’ generous spirits have lifted my own spirits as I join the rest of the world in watching this drama  unfold in real time.

We want this story to end well. I am now officially quite hopeful that it will. We need a reason to smile and to wish Godspeed to these youngsters, their coach … and the responders who have risked their own lives to save the lives of others.

national news

Self-awareness, Mr. Majority Leader?

I could barely contain myself. I wanted to toss a shoe at the TV set as I listened to U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell condemn what he called “far left” resistance to whomever Donald J. Trump would appoint to the Supreme Court.

Why, he just cannot fathom how these groups could make such judgments without even knowing who the president plans to select.

Wow! Does the majority leader — who made his remarks in a Senate floor speech — not remember what he said immediately after Antonin Scalia died in early 2016, creating a vacancy on the high court?

Let me remind him. About an hour after Justice Scalia died, McConnell declared that no one whom President Obama would appoint would get a hearing and a confirmation vote. He declared the president’s pick dead and buried. Obama had nearly a year left in office when McConnell mounted his successful obstruction campaign.

So now he is accusing lefties of pre-judging any appointment that would come from Donald Trump.

Does anyone else see the irony of this idiocy? He is leveling an accusation against a political opponent that he could have leveled against himself when the previous president sought to fulfill his constitutional responsibility.

This is rich.

International news

Settle down, Mr. POTUS

Why in the world is Donald John Trump Sr. so darn angry?

He is lashing out yet again at our North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies in advance of a NATO summit.

I mean, c’mon, man! You’ve been elected to the highest office in the land; you live in damn good public housing (even though you once called the White House a “dump”); you have access to state-of-the-art public transportation; you eat well; you’ve got that big nuclear button at your fingertips.

Still, he rails and rants at our allies. NATO comprises nations that signed on after World War II to an agreement to protect each other in case of an attack from the Soviet Union. The USSR faded into oblivion in 1991, but the need remains strong, with Russia making noises about European conquest.

So, why is the president continuing his anger campaign … against our friends?

As I watch these machinations, I am compelled yet again to wonder: Why doesn’t he channel at least a bit of his outrage against the Russians? They meddled in our election. They sought to influence the election outcome. They have sown the seeds of discord and discontent in our electoral system. They have launched another meddling campaign in the 2018 midterm election here.

Trump’s lingering anger — and this is the least I can say about it — is entirely misdirected.