Monthly Archives: September 2018

national news

Listen to this grieving father

Rob Tibbetts’s broken heart has not rendered him silent.

His daughter’s death at the hands of a man suspected of being in this country illegally has been cause for politicians to use Mollie Tibbetts’s memory as a political football.

Her dad is having none of it.

Rob Tibbetts wrote in an emotional op-ed in the Des Moines Register: The person who is accused of taking Mollie’s life is no more a reflection of the Hispanic community as white supremacists are of all white people. To suggest otherwise is a lie. Justice in my America is blind. This person will receive a fair trial, as it should be. If convicted, he will face the consequences society has set. Beyond that, he deserves no more attention.

Mollie Tibbetts disappeared several weeks ago while jogging along a rural Iowa road. Her body was discovered just recently and a man stands accused of her murder. The suspect reportedly is here as an undocumented immigrant. Yet politicians, including the president of the United States, have jumped all over this tragic case as a reason to round up every illegal immigrant in this country and deport them to the country of their birth.

It’s a maximum overreaction to a human tragedy.

Rob Tibbetts does not want his daughter’s death to be used in this manner, as he stated in his essay. You can read it here.

I want to offer one more sample of Rob Tibbetts’s poignant message:

My stepdaughter, whom Mollie loved so dearly, is Latina. Her sons — Mollie’s cherished nephews and my grandchildren — are Latino. That means I am Hispanic. I am African. I am Asian. I am European. My blood runs from every corner of the Earth because I am American. As an American, I have one tenet: to respect every citizen of the world and actively engage in the ongoing pursuit to form a more perfect union.

Given that, to knowingly foment discord among races is a disgrace to our flag. It incites fear in innocent communities and lends legitimacy to the darkest, most hate-filled corners of the American soul. It is the opposite of leadership. It is the opposite of humanity. It is heartless. It is despicable. It is shameful.

Donald Trump, national news, political news

Meghan McCain had every right to say what she said

I want to declare one more time — and I hope it’s the final time — that Megan McCain didn’t say a single inappropriate thing while paying tribute to her father, the late Sen. John McCain.

I was proud of the courage and steely fortitude she demonstrated while standing in the National Cathedral pulpit to honor the life and heroic public service that her beloved father exhibited for more than six decades.

Listen to her remarks.

And yet to hear some of the gripes from Donald J. Trump’s loyal followers who say she was too cruel, too mean and too vengeful in her remarks simply galls me beyond measure.

She compared her father’s “suffering” while serving the nation to those who lived — at that time — existences of “privilege and comfort.” Yes, she was referring to the president of the United States, who was pointedly not invited to the private funeral in Washington, D.C. Sen. McCain and Trump had serious differences that went far beyond mere policy disagreements. It was personal and visceral.

Think, too, for a moment about the source of the criticism toward Megan McCain. It comes from supporters of a man who (a) has said some hateful and insulting things about his foes and (b) has never apologized for anything he ever says. Trump had the utter gall to say that McCain — a Vietnam War prisoner — was a “war hero because he was captured. I like people who aren’t captured, OK?”

Well, I happen to like presidents who don’t utter crass and cruel statements about a legitimate American war hero.

The 62 million Americans who voted for Trump in 2016 knew what they were getting when they cast their votes for the one-time reality TV celebrity/serial philanderer/real estate mogul/pathological liar.

Perhaps their criticism of Meghan McCain’s remarks is meant to disguise their own regret for casting their ballots for Donald Trump in the first place … not that many of them will ever acknowledge it publicly. Think of it: That, too, mirrors the attitude demonstrated by their champion, the president of the United States.

Meghan McCain spoke from her broken heart. She also spoke the truth in her father’s honor.

As former Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Connecticut Democrat, and one of the late senator’s dearest friends, said of Meghan McCain: She clearly “is her father’s daughter.”

local news, political news, State news

Memo to Beto: Money doesn’t win elections

All these news stories I read about the Beto O’Rourke-Ted Cruz fight for Cruz’s U.S. Senate seat keep harping on the same theme: O’Rourke is raising more money than Cruz.

To borrow a phrase: Big … fu***** … deal.

O’Rourke is the Democrat challenging the Republican incumbent, Cruz. Texas hasn’t elected a Democrat to statewide office since 1994. Texas Democrats are feeling it this year, man. Maybe it’s for real. Then again, we are talking about Texas, where Republicans generally have both legs up merely by being Republican.

Make no mistake: I want O’Rourke to shoot down the Cruz Missile. The Washington Post story accompanying this post tells of O’Rourke’s meet-the-people strategy and how well he is performing in places one might not expect a progressive Democrat to do so well.

Such as the Texas Panhandle, where we used to live.

See the Post story here.

But money alone won’t win this election. Andrew Gillum got outspent by a factor of about 20 in Florida, but he still managed to win that state’s Democratic primary for governor this past week. The same can be said of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who won a New York congressional Democratic primary a few weeks ago against a powerful incumbent despite being outspent by 40 or 50 times.

It is with that I offer Beto O’Rourke and his avid followers a word of caution.

I want him to win. I will use this blog to advance his candidacy for the U.S. Senate. His opponent, Cruz, isn’t concerned with the state nearly as much as he with his own image, reputation and political ambition.

Do not try to tell me that O’Rourke is some flaming “socialist” or extremist who is going to vote to disarm our armed forces, open our borders to criminals and confiscate everyone’s firearms.

He is a reasonable young man who deserves a chance to represent Texas in the U.S. Senate.

Sure, he’s raising a lot of money. However, the pile of campaign cash doesn’t always equate to more votes than the other guy.

Keep working and hustling, Beto.

Many of us in Texas will have your back.

Donald Trump

Remember the Archibald Cox firing, Mr. President

The buzz around Washington, D.C., is that Donald Trump well might dismiss Attorney General Jeff Sessions and then nominate someone to replace him who will ensure that special counsel Robert Mueller is sent packing.

What can go wrong with that notion? Try this: Let’s remember what happened when an earlier president fired a special prosecutor who was examining the details behind the Watergate break-in.

All hell broke loose, that’s what happened.

President Nixon ordered two attorneys general to fire Archibald Cox. Elliot Richardson and William Ruckelshaus quit rather than do the president’s bidding. The solicitor general, Robert Bork, stepped up and fired Cox.

It got a whole lot worse for Nixon. Allegations of obstruction of justice boiled to the surface. Then came the articles of impeachment approved by the House Judiciary Committee.

Donald Trump is miffed at Mueller’s investigation into the Russia collusion allegation. The AG, Session, recused himself from the probe. Why? Because he served as a key campaign adviser. He couldn’t investigate himself, so he backed away.

Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein appointed Mueller, who has proceeded with all due meticulousness in his search for what happened. Trump calls it a “rigged witch hunt,” which it isn’t.

If he fires Sessions and then gets a new AG confirmed — which is no sure thing if the midterm election turns out badly for Republicans — there well could be a serious elevation of impeachment talk against Trump.

Such talk began to boil seriously after Nixon got Cox canned.

History, therefore, well might be ready to repeat itself.

national news

Sen. McCain got the sendoff he deserves

It’s been said over the past few days that the pomp, circumstance and pageantry associated with U.S. Sen. John McCain’s funeral is reserved usually for presidents of the United States.

Well, to my mind, the senator deserved all the tributes — and the accompanying ritual — that he received.

The great man’s six decades of public service all alone was worthy of the salute bestowed to him.

The eulogies delivered in Phoenix by former Vice President Joe Biden and in Washington by former Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush spoke volumes about the nature of the ceremony that the late U.S. senator planned for his farewell.

It was Vice President Biden who introduced himself to the crowd assembled by saying, “I’m Joe Biden; I am a Democrat: and I loved John McCain.”

And so it went as the nation poured out its heart to memorialize the iconic Republican lawmaker.

I was glad that the ceremonies didn’t dwell too heavily on the single aspect of McCain’s service to the country — his five-plus years as a Vietnam War prisoner. But it was there. It was impossible to set that part of his sacrifice aside.

The last public figure to get this kind of sendoff was President Ford, who died in 2006. Then it fell to others to deliver such a heartfelt salute to a man who fought a valiant battle against disease.

He already had battled his wartime captors. And he won that fight.

Sen. John McCain was the rare public figure who emerged even bigger after he lost the toughest political battles of his life: his unsuccessful campaign for the GOP presidential nomination in 2000 and his losing bid for the office in the 2008 election against Barack Obama.

With that, the nation has bid farewell to a gallant warrior and a true-blue American hero.

May this sometimes irascible man rest in peace.

As he said of himself, Sen. McCain “lived and died a proud American.”

The country he loved and served with honor and distinction is better because he came along.

national news

Such flipping and flopping on AG Sessions

“We need an attorney general that can work with the president, that can lead the Department of Justice. This relationship is beyond repair, I think.”

So said U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican who in an earlier incarnation said something quite different about the president of the United States.

Graham said in the not-too-distant pass that there would be “hell to pay” in Congress if Donald Trump fired Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

I actually agree with both things that Graham said. Yes, there will be “hell to pay.”

Also, the president must be able to work with the AG, but working with someone doesn’t necessarily require total, blind and unabiding fealty to whatever the top man wants.

Sessions has taken an oath to follow the law, just as the president has taken a similar oath. To my mind, Sessions followed the law when he recused himself from the Russia probe, given the obvious conflict of interest that would have existed had Sessions led an investigation into alleged collusion between Russians and the Trump presidential campaign. Sessions was a key player in the Trump campaign, so there was no way on Earth that Sessions could investigate himself.

Graham, himself a lawyer and an officer in the U.S. Air Force Reserve, knows that as well.

I don’t believe Sessions will be on the job by the end of the year. I also believe Donald Trump is foolish enough to fire him and open himself up to accusations of obstruction of justice.

Yes, there will be “hell to pay.”

Donald Trump, national news

Trump team hits back … at a grieving daughter

It appears that Meghan McCain, the grieving daughter of the late U.S. Sen. John McCain, hit a nerve with the tribute she gave in memory of her beloved father.

She spoke of how the senator believed in America’s greatness. She talked of her father’s adherence to public service and the suffering he endured in that service to his nation. She hailed him as a great man whose demonstrated commitment to the nation far exceeds others who never served their country and who were born into a life of comfort and privilege.

The Donald Trump cadre of supporters took it personally. They are hitting back at Megan McCain for speaking from her shattered heart.

Imagine that. Are you surprised? Neither am I.

They also have taken aim at former President Barack Obama, who essentially echoed much of what the senator’s daughter articulated. President Obama said McCain didn’t suffer petty arguments and the politics of fear.

The Trump gang took that personally, too.

The Trumpsters, interestingly, have been relatively quiet about the thinly veiled references to the president’s divisiveness and anger uttered by former President George W. Bush. Whatever. President Bush is a Republican politician, just as Donald Trump belongs to the GOP.

Hey, this is a toxic, divisive time. The president who vowed to unify the country only has succeeded in dividing it more. And that is among the reasons that Sen. McCain made it abundantly clear that the president would be unwelcome at his funeral.

Donald J. Trump and his base of supporters are getting precisely what they deserve.

State news

How will POTUS fill the ‘biggest stadium we can find’?

Donald John Trump is blowing it out of his backside when he proclaims his effort to stage a campaign rally in “the biggest stadium we can find.”

He intends to come to Texas to campaign for Sen. Ted Cruz’s re-election. The president said in a Twitter post that he is going to look for the largest venue in the state to stage the rally.

One quick query: How does the president expect to fill such a venue?

He has staged rallies for a couple of years since announcing his presidential campaign in June 2015. He hasn’t drawn crowds that would even begin to fill such a monumental venue.

AT&T Stadium in Arlington? Kyle Field in College Station? Memorial Stadium in Austin? Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth?

They’re all big venues. As in really big, man.

Does the president really believe his presence at a rally will attract 100,000 or more spectators?

C’mon!

Cruz is running against Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke, an El Paso member of the House. O’Rourke has closed Cruz’s lead to virtually zero. The men are tied. It’s a dead heat. Yes, we have several more weeks to go before midterm Election Day.

I plan to support O’Rourke, who by my lights puts Texas’s interests ahead of his own ambition — unlike the Cruz Missile.

Cruz and Trump have exchanged some mighty angry rhetoric in the past. That’s all behind them — or so they hope.

The rally that Trump will stage? He ought to set his sights a whole lot lower than the “biggest stadium” notion. Of course, we all know that won’t happen.

If Trump has this rally in the huge venue and attracts enough supporters to fill half the seats, or fewer, he’ll still proclaim it to be the “biggest rally crowd” in the history of the world.

The Trumpkins will believe their hero, which is all that matters to the president.

national news

The message was clear, as was its intended target

I am quite certain that Donald John Trump is going to be pretty steamed when he catches up with the events of today.

The president was pointedly not invited to the late Sen. John McCain’s funeral. He and McCain had differences that went far beyond policy matters. Trump disparaged McCain’s heroism during the Vietnam War, when he was held captive as a POW for more than five years. When the senator became stricken with the brain cancer that took his life the other day, Trump continued to harangue against the senator’s “no” vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

McCain took it personally.

The senator did invite Trump’s two immediate predecessors: Presidents Obama and George W. Bush. Both men delivered touching eulogies honoring the life and public service career of the senator.

Both men also delivered messages in tribute to Sen. McCain that could not be mistaken for what they were intended to do: to remind us of the pettiness, petulance and small-mindedness that has infected the White House since Donald Trump became president.

President Bush said McCain didn’t tolerate “swaggering despots.” President Obama praised McCain for calling on Americans to be “bigger” than the politics that are based on “fear.”

“So much of our politics, public life, public discourse can seem small and mean and petty, trafficking in bombast, and insult, and phony controversies, and manufactured outrage,” Obama said at the National Cathedral.

You know who the 44th president had in mind. So does the current president of the United States.

But, hey … if the shoe fits.

local news

Puppy Tales, Part 56: Memory never fails him

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Toby the Puppy’s memory is like a steel trap. A vise. He never forgets. Anything.

We returned home to Fairview today after spending more than two weeks on the road. We hauled our fifth wheel north and west: through Denver, through Wyoming, to West Yellowstone, Mont., then to Grand Coulee, Wash.

Then we came back home.

More than two weeks on the road, man!

What does Toby do the instant we walked into our digs in Fairview? He ran straight for where he stashed one of his toys and dropped at his Mommy’s feet. He wanted her to throw it. Now! It was time to play fetch/catch.

Holy cow! I was stunned. Our puppy was home. He knew immediately where to find the item he knew was to be tossed, so he can fetch it and bring it back.

All the activity we saw on our marvelous sojourn out west was ancient history in Toby’s mind.

He was ready to resume the fun of being home.

Man, I am worn out. It will have to wait until the morning.