Monthly Archives: November 2018

national news

Lander gives us InSight into Mars

I am such a space junkie, even when human beings aren’t at the center of daring missions into deep space.

The InSight lander has touched down on Mars. It’s beginning to send back startling, stunning and astonishing pictures of the Martian surface. The picture above shows a portion of the lander with the barren Martian landscape in the background.

The journey took 205 days to complete. The InSight’s mission is to probe into the Martian dirt to give us some clues to the origin of the planet and whether there is any sign of life, past or present, on the planet.

I loved watching the NASA ground technicians cheering, hugging, high-fiving each other when they realized the space ship had made its landing safely.

My excitement over the success, so far, of this unmanned vehicle makes me hope my heart will be able to withstand the excitement if and when we send human beings to the fourth planet from the sun in our solar system.

I also hope I am still around to watch it happen. If so, I plan to do what I did when I was a kid and the Mercury astronauts took off on their Earth-orbiting missions: I would get up early and wait with great anxiousness for the rockets to take off from Cape Canaveral, Fla.

In the meantime, I am going to cheer NASA’s success in landing the InSight vehicle on Mars.

Given all the political furor and grief we’re experiencing here on Earth, this flight gives us a good reason to smile.

Sports news, State news

Excellent outcome, flawed tactic to get there

A San Antonio state representative has pitched a marvelous idea, but I do not believe his tactic to get there is the right way to go.

State Rep. Lyle Larson, a Republican, has filed a bill to require the University of Texas and Texas A&M University to play a non-conference football game each year. Larson, an A&M graduate, has put his name on House Bill 412, which would require the teams to play that game some time in November.

Oh . . . my!

First of all, I applaud his intent. I, too, would love to see the teams play each other again. The Longhorns and Aggies last played a tackle football game in 2011, before Texas A&M bolted the Big 12 Conference for the Southeastern Conference.

The Longhorns and Aggies used to play on Thanksgiving Day. It used to be part of Texas’s holiday tradition. It was a home-and-home series, alternating between Austin and College Station.

It’s huge, man!

But now it’s history.

Should there be a legislative remedy? Umm. It’s unnecessary. The Legislature must spend more time dealing with issues that are infinitely more critical to Texans than requiring an annual UT-A&M football game. OK, I get that such a football game is about as important as it gets for some Texans. But, c’mon!

I would like to implore the athletic directors at both schools to consider scheduling such a game earlier in the season. Most of the nation’s top-drawer football programs schedule a series of non-conference games at the beginning of each season. Many of their non-conference opponents are of the “cupcake” variety; they bring teams representing smaller colleges and universities into their mammoth stadiums full of fans, giving those smaller schools a slice of a large revenue pie to take back home.

That, of course, is not the issue with either UT or A&M. Both schools are loaded with money. Their endowments are among the richest in the world. Their respective athletic budgets are among the priciest of any in the country.

The issue here is to have student-athletes from these universities play football. It is to give loyalists, alumni and just plain fan(atics) a chance to cheer for their favorite team. It enables one of them to achieve bragging rights for the rest of the year when they defeat the other guys.

I appreciate Rep. Larson’s desire to see the teams return to the field of competition.

However, we should take this battle straight to the schools’ ADs.

Uncategorized

A new Courts Building on the horizon? Maybe?

Potter County (Texas) Judge Nancy Tanner is a woman of her word.

She told me a couple of years ago that she intended eventually to move toward the possible construction of a new Criminal Courts Building to replace the monstrosity across the street from the old courthouse in downtown Amarillo.

It appears that the initiative is taking a baby step toward that direction.

The Commissioners Court has approved a $45,000 measure to come up with a conceptual design for a new court building.

Tanner wants to take the county’s move forward one step at a time. It recently completed the relocation of the sheriff’s office, vacating a long-standing structure downtown.

Next up? It might be the Courts Building.

I don’t want to be too harsh, but that structure is a piece of crap. I haven’t seen it in quite some time, but the last time I walked inside, I was struck by the damage to the front of the building. It is terribly crafted. The workmanship on it is abominable.

Whenever I see that building I think of how Tanner’s predecessor as county judge, Arthur Ware, has described it.

Ware calls it “The Grain Elevator.” He hates the Courts Building, which was erected about a decade before Ware took office as county judge.

I concur with the old Marine.

The county needs to vacate the Grain Elevator.

national news

How will history judge Robert Mueller, Donald Trump?

Donald J. Trump is continuing his full-on frontal assault on Robert Mueller. This strategy by the president is causing me to wonder: How will history judge these two men’s roles in the drama in which they both are starring?

I am believing Mueller will emerge as the shining light; Trump will be relegated to the role of villain . . . no matter how this all ends.

Mueller’s investigation into alleged collusion between the Trump 2016 presidential campaign and Russian operatives is entering a mine field full of ordnance about to explode. Trump knows the stakes and is engaging in some of the most ferocious innuendo imaginable to discredit the investigation the special counsel is conducting.

Meanwhile, Mueller is remaining quiet. He is saying nothing. I don’t even remember what his voice sounds like. He is proceeding with diligence, doggedness and dedication to the mission: finding the truth.

Trump’s response has been to act like a frothing animal. His Twitter tirade is non-stop and non-sensical. He is accusing Mueller of undefined “conflicts of interest” and wonders why Mueller is not questioning principals who want to be questioned.

One of Mueller’s star witnesses, former Trump campaign boss Paul Manafort, now is accused of lying to Mueller’s legal team after accepting a plea agreement to cooperate with the special counsel. Is he seeking a presidential pardon? Will the president be stupid enough to grant him one?

Trump and Mueller represent two extremes emanating from similar beginnings. Both men came from families of privilege. Both of them attended Ivy League schools. Both earned high-powered degrees. They came of age during the Vietnam War. One of them sought deferments to keep him from going to battle. The other man enlisted in the Marine Corps and served with valor in combat during that terrible conflict in Southeast Asia. The first man is Donald Trump; the second man is Robert Mueller.

Trump entered the private sector and parlayed his father’s healthy stake in his business into even greater wealth. Mueller returned from the battlefield and has devoted much of his life to public service, including a tour as director of the FBI.

How will history judge these men? It’s still early, but the picture is beginning to take shape.

environmental news

Oh, how I hate trophy hunting

I am not a hunter. Yes, I’ve gone hunting a time or two in my life. It’s not my bag, man.

Having declared that, I want to add that I detest trophy hunting, the idea of going into the wild and killing animals for the purpose of displaying their stuffed carcasses as trophies.

A social media acquaintance of mine has been posting pictures of trophy hunters that show up on my Facebook timeline. I won’t reproduce them here, because they disgust me in the extreme.

I just feel the need to vent for a moment about the ridiculousness of shooting big game, depriving Mother Nature of a prized creature and then displaying the remains in one’s “game room,” or “trophy room” or even in one’s living room.

Although I do not hunt wild animals, I do understand the idea of hunting them for, say, food. Deer provide venison. Elk can be consumed as well. I once had a stew prepared with black bear meat; it was quite tasty, if you want to know the truth.

However, I cannot pull the trigger on those creatures.

I especially cannot do so when it involves an animal I won’t eat at the dinner table.

Thus, trophy hunting disgusts me. So do the pictures I keep seeing of those hunters and their sh**-eatin’ grins sitting behind one of God’s magnificent creatures.

If you are a trophy hunter and you take offense at my remarks . . . that’s just too damn bad.

national news

Is POTUS going to spoil the holiday spirit again?

I’m sure you remember when Donald John Trump was campaigning for president and he said he would require business employees to wish their customers a “Merry Christmas.”

As if he had the authority to do such a thing.

If he’s elected president, the Republican nominee said, he would bring Christmas back into play. No more “Happy Holidays” for that guy. Swell. 

It’s as if Christmas ever disappeared. Which it didn’t. It never has. It never will in a society such as ours where we place so much emphasis on Christmas, whether in the secular, gift-buying, retail frenzy sense or in the spiritual, Christian-based celebration.

What is likely to annoy me in the extreme would be to hear the president make this Merry Christmas brouhaha — a figment of POTUS’s imagination — part of the myriad holiday events in which he will take part.

That would ruin the event. Tree lighting ceremonies well could become platforms for the president to make idiotic declarations about how he is bringing “Merry Christmas” back from the dead.

I am a baptized Christian, a believer in the reason we celebrate Christmas in the first place. However, I never — ever! — have taken offense when someone wishes me a “Happy Holidays.” That individual is likely a stranger. He or she doesn’t know a thing about me. He or she might not want to offend me by wishing me a greeting aimed at those who worship a certain way. For that matter, that person might be a flaming atheist who cannot bring herself or himself to mentioning Christmas in any fashion. I would have no idea.

I am OK with that. Honest. It doesn’t matter one bit to me.

Therefore, I find all this Merry Christmas vs. Happy Holidays kerfuffle to be a made-up, phony, bogus, dubious controversy.

We likely will be able to rest assured that the president of the United States is intent on ensuring that it stays at the top of people’s minds.

national news

A pardon for Manafort? Consider the consequence

There’s a good bit of speculation afoot about why Paul Manafort, Donald Trump’s campaign chairman who pleaded guilty to felony charges and then agreed cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller, would lie repeatedly to Mueller’s team.

Mueller is looking into whether Trump’s campaign “colluded” with Russians who attacked our election system in 2016. Manafort was thought to have a lot of answers to Mueller’s many questions. Then he lied, according to Mueller. Manafort blew the plea deal apart.

But . . . why? Some analysts suggest Manafort might be angling for a presidential pardon.

I have two words for them: Gerald Ford.

A presidential pardon is likely to explode like a volcano over the political landscape. Hey, come to think of it, if such an event results in Trump’s ouster, then I am all for it!

Back to President Ford. The president took office in August 1974 after President Richard Nixon resigned in the wake of the Watergate scandal. Barely a month in office, the new president issued a blanket pardon for any offenses his predecessor might have committed. He freed President Nixon from any prosecution.

Ford was vilified at the time for the pardon. He ran for election in 1976 and lost that year narrowly to Jimmy Carter. The pardon was seen at the time as a major contributor to the president’s defeat.

I was among those who criticized Ford at the time. Since then my views have changed about President Ford and the pardon. But the damage was done in real time.

If the current president thinks he is going to cover his backside from any incriminating circumstance by pardoning Paul Manafort, he is likely instead to purchase a whole basket full of political crises.

I am now wondering whether the president has any idea of what might transpire if he is foolish enough to take such an action.

national security, political news

Espy vs. Hyde-Smith: Race still matters . . . sadly

I do wish this weren’t the case, but race still matters in determining our elected leadership in many of our states.

I fear we’re going to see an example of it at the end of today when they count the ballots in Mississippi, a state long held up as an example where bigotry and racism run rampant.

U.S. Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith is running for election to a seat to which she was appointed. The Republican is facing Democrat Mike Espy, a former agriculture secretary in the Clinton administration and a former member of the U.S. House of Representatives. It’s a runoff election, with Hyde-Smith and Espy competing as the top two finishers in an open contest featuring candidates from both major parties.

It doesn’t look good for Espy at this moment. Why? Well, Espy is an African-American candidate. He also is known as a moderate Democrat, a thoughtful fellow with extensive government experience.

Hyde-Smith has been caught in a number of troubling incidents. She said just a few weeks ago that she would be on the front row if she were invited to a “public hanging.” Many substituted the term “hanging” with “lynching,” which of course sounds the siren to African-Americans who know what that entails.

She then offered one of those idiotic non-apologies, saying she is sorry to “anyone who was offended” by her remarks. She also had her picture taken in 2014 wearing a Confederate cap, packing a rifle under a caption that extolled the Confederacy’s glowing role in state history.

Sheesh, man!

Mississippi is a deeply Republican state. Espy is hoping to capture lightning with a record African-American turnout today, while winning roughly a quarter of the white vote. Will it happen? I hope it does.

Here, though, is one more kick in the gut: The third-place finisher in that earlier election was a Donald Trump sycophant, Chris McDaniel; most of the votes that McDaniel got are damn near a cinch to end up in Hyde-Smith’s column at day’s end.

Yes, we should all should be interested in this race, even though it’s down yonder in Mississippi. The winner will help write national laws that affect all of us.

Thus, I am pulling for Mike Espy.

national news

Trump campaign chairman violates plea deal . . . wow!

“After signing the plea agreement, Manafort committed federal crimes by lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Special Counsel’s Office on a variety of subject matters, which constitute breaches of the agreement.”

So it goes in a statement issued today jointly by special counsel Robert Mueller and the defense team working for Paul Manafort, the former chairman of Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.

Manafort has been convicted of felony crimes related money laundering and tax evasion. He then pleaded guilty to more charges and agreed with work with Mueller, who is investigating allegations that the Trump campaign “colluded” with Russian operatives who attacked our electoral system in 2016.

Now come a series of highly critical questions. What is Manafort hiding? Who is he seeking to protect? And the big one: Will the president issue a blanket pardon to clear Manafort from spending any time in prison?

It is astonishing in the absolute extreme to hear these accusations coming from Mueller, that Manafort agreed to a plea deal, agreed to cooperate with the special counsel . . .  only to lie and violate the terms of the agreement.

This isn’t a case of incompetence or of Manafort making a dumbass mistake. This looks like some sort of plot by Manafort to block the special counsel’s efforts at determining the unvarnished truth behind some serious allegations leveled against the president, his campaign team and his closest presidential advisers.

This case is getting even more serious and more troublesome for the president, as if it wasn’t reaching critical mass even without this stunning revelation about Manafort.

Something tells me that the excrement is about to hit the fan.

International news, media news, national news

State-run TV station? Sure thing, Mr. POTUS

Donald J. “Authoritarian Wanna-be in Chief” Trump wants the government to establish a TV network.

Yep, the protector of the U.S. Constitution has suggested the government establish a network to report news that is favorable to the president, his policies, his pronouncements and the direction of the government he was elected to lead.

Hmm. I believe the Constitution — the one that Trump swore when he took office to uphold — forbids such a thing. It’s that First Amendment clause that refers to a “free press” not being abridged.

This suggestion well might rank among the more idiotic ever to come from the 45th president of the United States. That’s really saying something, when you consider the mountain of idiocy that has poured out of his pie hole.

I’ll also remind everyone that the president once expressed a level of envy that North Korea’s TV anchors speak so glowingly about dictator/murderer Kim Jong Un. He wishes he could get that kind of love from the networks in this country, or so he said during his visit with Kim in Singapore earlier this year.

Here’s a reminder, Mr. President. Those TV anchors work for the same government that is run by Kim Jong Un. If they were to report the news accurately, you know, chronicling such things as the starvation and the abject poverty that afflicts the population, they likely would be yanked off the air, executed and their corpses would be fed to starving dogs.

I hope the president gets the picture.

However, I doubt that he does.