Monthly Archives: July 2018

national news

Comey ratchets up partisan battle cry … weird

James Comey these days is a private citizen — more or less — and, thus, is entitled to speak his mind about any issue under the sun.

Except that he’s not just an ordinary private citizen, such as, say, I am. He’s a former FBI director who is near the center of a raging firestorm relating to the man who fired him, Donald Trump, and a special counsel who is looking at whether Trump’s presidential campaign colluded with Russians who attacked our electoral system.

So, when he puts out a tweet that calls for Democrats to win the midterm election, let’s just say it gives me some pause. Comey writes: Democrats, please, please don’t lose your minds and rush to the socialist left. This president and his Republican Party are counting on you to do exactly that. America’s great middle wants sensible, balanced, ethical leadership.

Comey’s entry onto the partisan battlefield seems oddly out of place and it borders on unseemliness.

His obituary will include the words “FBI director,” and that means he will be identified forever as the head of the nation’s top law enforcement agency. He’s not a politician and shouldn’t be considered as such.

Comey is a legal and law enforcement pro who ought to leave the partisan rhetoric to the politicians who have practiced it far longer than the former FBI director.

Bizarre.

International news

Verbal threats prompt this kind of response? Wow!

The Iranian government makes a verbal threat to launch “the mother of all wars” against the United States.

The response from the president? He fires off a tweet — written in all capital letters — that Iran should “NEVER, EVER” threaten the United States or else face the consequence of a full military strike.

This is where we’ve come? A rogue nation’s head of state makes a foolish statement and the commander in chief responds with threats of total annihilation, again via Twitter.

Sheesh.

media news

Social media etiquette gives way to threat of war

Get a load of a tweet that came from the fingers — reportedly — of the president of the United States.

To Iranian President Rouhani: NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE. WE ARE NO LONGER A COUNTRY THAT WILL STAND FOR YOUR DEMENTED WORDS OF VIOLENCE & DEATH. BE CAUTIOUS!

Isn’t that amazing?

Rouhani made some kind of threat to launch the “mother of all wars” against the United States.

Donald J. Trump answered with this message via Twitter.

I’m a frequent Twitter user myself. Trust me on this: I am not an expert on social media etiquette, not that having good manners is necessarily a requirement at all times. I do know, though, that typing something in all caps denotes an anger that some could construe borders on instability. Is that the message that Donald Trump seeks to convey to the Iranian president?

Yes, he did the same thing with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. He threatened him with total destruction. He spoke of the threat of “fire and fury.” Kim and Trump did meet in Singapore. The jury is out on what was accomplished. This much appears to be certain: The world remains under threat of a nuclear North Korea, no matter what the president has said.

So, what’s the deal with this all-cap Twitter message? If the president intends to convey the message that he is so angry that he’s out of control, well, millions of Americans have harbored those thoughts already.

media news

Listen up: Your grandparents were right all along

Your grandparents — and, yes, mine too — were visionaries. They were way ahead of their time.

They warned us, “If you can’t say something nice to someone, then keep it to yourself” … or words to that effect.

They didn’t anticipate the advent of cell phones or the myriad other recording devices that have proliferated our society. But, man, they nailed it!

Just look at the Uber driver who has been caught recording passengers without their knowledge. Then you had the idiot at the Chicago Cubs baseball game who took a ball from a youngster after one of the Cubs players had tossed the ball to the little boy; yes, the ballpark incident was captured by TV, but you get the point.

This all happened over the weekend.

There have been instances of people cussing others out. Road rage incidents are recorded for posterity by motorists who watch them unfold in real time.

I’ve lamented before that the ubiquitous nature of these devices should make us all a lot more reticent when confronted with potential problems.

Everyone, or so it seems, has a camera these days. You say something unkind or crude, it gets recorded. You erupt in a spasm of anger, or possibly, violence — that, too, becomes part of the “public domain.” You mistreat someone, get ready for the “viral” distribution of that action all across the planet.

When will we ever learn? When will we heed the advice given to us years ago by men and women — Grandpa and Grandma — who were way ahead of their time?

International news

Wishing DNI Coats had kept quiet about his reaction

Man, I wish Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats hadn’t issued an apology to Donald J. Trump.

The president reportedly was upset with Coats because of the DNI’s reaction to news that Trump had asked Russian strongman Vladimir Putin to visit Washington in the fall.

Coats, the nation’s top spook — and a valuable member of Trump’s national security team — learned about the invitation while being interviewed on national television.

His reaction was classic. It also was not a reason for him to apologize.

As Politico reported: Trump, according to two outside allies, has grown exasperated with Coats, whom he blindsided Thursday when White House press secretary Sarah Sanders announced on Twitter that the administration was working to bring Putin to Washington this fall. The news landed while Coats was in the middle of a live interview with NBC in Aspen, Colorado.

Coats said he meant no “disrespect” to the president, who reportedly was angry. Good grief, he could have said as much privately in a phone call to the president.

Truth be told, it as Coats who was “disrespected” by the president who failed to consult with one of his chief national security advisers before issuing the invitation to the very man who attacked our nation’s electoral process in 2016.

The shoe, I’m tellin’ ya, was on the other foot.

Coats, though, felt compelled to set the record straight.

I just wish he hadn’t done it. There was no need.

national news

Obama, Hillary … it’s all their fault?

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Donald John “Stable Genius” Trump Sr. fired off yet another in an infinite string of idiotic tweets.

This came out earlier today: So President Obama knew about Russia before the Election. Why didn’t he do something about it? Why didn’t he tell our campaign? Because it is all a big hoax, that’s why, and he thought Crooked Hillary was going to win!!!

A big hoax. There you have it.

Why, then, is the president making such a big deal out of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into alleged collusion between Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and the Russian goons who attacked our democratic process?

Because … it’s not a hoax.

It’s real. Trump knows it. His team knows it. He is diverting attention from it.

Let’s stay tuned and hang on with both hands.

local news

Toll roads: They’re everywhere, I tell ya!

One of the adjustments to moving from the Texas Panhandle to the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex involves my motor vehicles.

And I don’t mean the traffic.

I’m talkin’ about toll roads. They’re all over the place.

We live just a stone’s throw from the Sam Rayburn Tollway. We’ve got the North Dallas Tollway. There’s the President George Bush Turnpike about eight miles or so south of us. I know I’m missing a bunch of them. But you get the drift.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t object to the toll roads. They’re necessary for paying for the wear and tear we motorists inflict on our highways.

What’s especially non-objectionable is the way the North Texas Tollway Authority assesses these tolls. The NTTA deploys cameras along the highways. You pass under them, the cameras snap a picture of your license plate and then the NTTA sends you a bill. I just paid a bill for $8.08, which was the fee we paid for driving along the Rayburn toll road en route to a furniture store in The Colony, and then back to our new digs in Fairview. Not bad.

Moreover, it beats the dickens out of the way some states assess tolls. Take Oklahoma, for instance. Not many years ago, about four years or so, my wife and I found ourselves on a toll road north of Oklahoma City. We had to fumble around for the correct change as we motored along the highway and approached a toll booth.

Ridiculous, I’m tellin’ ya!

The NTTA does it right. I appreciate the absence of the need to be carrying cash with me as I try to get from place to place. I’ve still got to learn my way around without the hassle of fumbling for cash.

Come to think of it, the technology the NTTA uses to assess toll fees reminds me of the red-light cameras that cities such as, say, Amarillo use to nab traffic violators who just cannot obey traffic signals’ instructions to stop when the light turns red.

business news

Oh, those doggone tax returns

Pardon me for gloating for just a moment.

I have kept yapping about those income tax returns that Donald J. Trump has refused to release for public viewing. He has broken with a 40-year tradition laid out by presidential candidates of both major parties.

Now he has had that hideous press conference this past week with Vladimir Putin, calling into question yet again whether the Russians — and their president — have something, anything on Trump’s business dealings that the U.S. president might not want known to the public.

Thus, the tax return issue has returned. It’s back. Hey, it won’t go away.

The Hill reported this: The issue of Trump’s tax returns had become less prominent in recent months. But that changed following last week’s joint press conference with Putin in Helsinki when Trump questioned the findings of the U.S. intelligence community that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election.

Trump continues to hide behind the lie that an Internal Revenue Service audit prevents the tax returns release. The IRS — which hasn’t commented on whether it is auditing Trump’s taxes — says no such audit would prevent the release of tax returns to the public.

For that matter, Trump hasn’t even produced a letter saying that the IRS is auditing him.

The questions and suspicion about Trump’s refusal to condemn the Russian attack on our election are valid. Does it have anything to do with Trump’s business dealings in Russia? Do the Russians have the “goods” on the president? If they do, what do those “goods” constitute?

I am happy to realize that others have suggested what some of us have been saying all along: Release those tax returns. The public needs to know what they contain. Do it! Now!

national news

Now it’s a hoax, Mr. President?

Which is it today, Mr. President?

You said just the other day that the Russian attack on our electoral system in 2016 occurred. You accepted finally the U.S. intelligence agencies’ view that the Russians did it.

Then you send a message out today that calls it a “hoax”?

Let’s look back for a moment.

All of our nation’s intelligence bosses — FBI, CIA, director of national intelligence, National Security Agency, the Joint Chiefs of Staff — have been singing off the same hymnal page. The Russians did it! They acted alone!

You have denigrated their work. You have stood next to the Russian president and accepted his lying, prevaricating denial.

Then you backed off of that and said you now believe the U.S. spooks.

Now you call it a hoax.

Man, oh man. I am getting confused, Mr. President. You’re making my ears bleed. My head is spinning. I need smelling salts. I’m getting a case of rhetorical vertigo.

You won’t listen to me. I mean, you don’t listen to DNI Director Dan Coats, or CIA Director Gina Haspel, or anyone for that matter on anything!

I’ll offer this bit of unsolicited advice: Why don’t you just keep your unpresidential trap shut, let the special counsel, Robert Mueller, finish his job and then let the chips fall where they will fall?

national news, political news

Happy birthday, Sen. Dole; thank you for saving the world

Robert Dole’s 95th birthday shines a vivid light on what we all have known for a long time.

It is that the world’s Greatest Generation is getting very old. Many of them are in failing health. They remind us daily — even without saying a word — of the sacrifice they made to protect us from tyranny and the tyrants who practiced it.

I saw a gentleman today, in fact, with a “World War II Veteran” ballcap. I thanked for him saving the world from the monsters who sought to enslave the world. He smiled and said, simply, “You’re welcome.”

That’s how it is with the Greatest Generation. They went to war, did their duty, answered the call and returned home to start their lives, rear their families, and live normal existences.

Sen. Dole is getting his share of good wishes today. He earned them all. He served for decades in the U.S. Senate, representing Kansas. He ran for president a couple of times, winning the Republican nomination in 1996 and then losing to President Clinton who won re-election in near-landslide proportions.

His service, though, preceded his political years by a good bit. It began when he enlisted in the U.S. Army and deployed to Italy, where he fought the Germans in the waning weeks of World War II.

Dole was wounded grievously in the Italian mountains. His right arm was shattered. He would keep his arm, but it became virtually useless.

He didn’t let the wound stop him from fulfilling many years of dedicated service to the country.

That’s how the Greatest Generation rolls. Indeed, subsequent and preceding generations of fighting men and women have exhibited these traits of selflessness.

However, I want to single out the Greatest Generation as a way to recognize one of its members, his service to the nation and take note of time’s inexorable march onward.

Happy birthday, Sen. Dole. And thank you.