Monthly Archives: April 2019

media news

Media merger in the works?

I cannot avoid a comment on what I perceive to be the slow, agonizing death of a newspaper that employed me for nearly 18 years before I was “reorganized” out of a job in the summer of 2012.

I noticed this week that the Amarillo Globe-News and the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal – two newspapers owned formerly by the same corporate owners – published identical editorials on the same day. Morris Communications sold its entire newspaper group in October 2017 to Gatehouse Media.

So, what’s going on here?

The Globe-News and the Avalanche-Journal are being run by a single publisher, one executive editor, one opinion page editor, one circulation director, one production director.

The opinion editor – aka the director of commentary – ran identical editorials in both papers that (a) congratulates the Texas Tech Red Raiders for their runner-up finish in the NCAA men’s basketball tournament and (b) salutes the Wayland Baptist University women’s basketball team for its induction into the college basketball hall of fame.

I shall point out that the Texas Tech is based in Lubbock; Wayland Baptist is in Plainview. The Globe-News no longer circulates in Plainview; I do not believe the A-J does either.

I am left to wonder: What’s the story here?

I have lamented the lack of local emphasis on the editorial page of the paper that employed me and gave me the opportunity to serve as editorial page editor. The G-N used to cover the Texas Panhandle like a blanket. From Dalhart to Childress, from Perryton to Plainview. We even had an eastern New Mexico bureau in Clovis and our reach stretched into the Oklahoma Panhandle and even a bit into southwestern Kansas.

That was then. The here and now is quite different.

Morris Communications retrenched, reduced and redirected its diminishing resources inward before giving up the fight in the changing media climate. The Globe-News reporting and editing staff was decimated.

Gatehouse is now finishing what I believe began under the former corporate ownership.

Identical editorial commentaries on the same publication day tell me that Gatehouse – despite what it tells its readers – has no intention of serving these respective communities fully.

Gatehouse has vacated the Globe-News’s historic buildings and relocated into the FirstBank Southwest Tower. The old G-N site is up for sale. Its physical presence in the community has diminished right along with its news and editorial commentary influence.

It saddens me greatly to detect what I believe is happening.

local news

Silicon Gulch not exactly fully connected

DRIPPING SPRINGS, Texas — Yours truly’s string of consecutive blogging days came dangerously close to ending this week.

How could that happen? Here’s how: We hauled our fifth wheel recreational vehicle to Pedernales Falls State Park, set up our campsite and then discovered that our site had zero Internet accessibility and damn near no cell phone service.

Is that a bad thing? Not at all. Except that I want to keep the streak alive. It has survived. Here, though, is the quandary.

Pedernales Falls is near Austin, which I’ve always been led to believe is one of the most “connected” communities on Earth. Hey, it’s the hub of what they call the Silicon Gulch, that stretch of real estate between Austin and San Antonio. High-tech firms continue to sprout all over the region.

I didn’t anticipate being disconnected from rest of the planet, being that we are vacationing in this highly connected, 21st-century community.

There might come a day when I no longer want to keep this blogging streak alive. I have occasionally enjoyed being disconnected from the Cell Phone Universe.

The good news, though — if you want to call it that — is that we are to travel to my brother-in-law’s house in this suburban Austin community. It is from here that I am able to post these musings.

And so, the streak goes on.

Our travels will take us very soon to Sea Rim State Park in the Golden Triangle region of Southeast Texas. Let us hope — or let me hope — that we have Internet available there to keep this blogging streak on course.

national news

Not surprised, but still disappointed in AG Barr

Attorney General William Barr’s apparent decision to release a significantly redacted version of the Robert Mueller report to the nation is not surprising. However, the attorney general is about to disappoint me greatly.

Mueller’s findings on the issue of whether Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign colluded with Russians who attacked our electoral system reportedly contain mountains of evidence showing how the special counsel reached his conclusion. He said Trump didn’t conspire to collude with the Russians.

He also said, according to Barr, that he didn’t “exonerate” the president on obstruction of justice questions.

Barr reportedly is set to release Mueller’s report, but it is likely to contained large portions that will be blocked from public view.

The disappointment is well-known to readers of this blog. I want to see as much of the Mueller report as possible. Barr, though, appears intent on keeping secret matters that go beyond issues of national security and grand jury testimony. He wants to protect individuals who were “peripheral” to the investigation. How does he make that call?

My disappointment rests in my belief that Barr would be more transparent in releasing his findings. I have expressed my belief that he is an upstanding individual. It has been shaken by what he’s reportedly about to do.

I guess I placed too much faith in the attorney general initially. When we learned of his memo criticizing Mueller’s investigation — which many have said was an “audition” for his appointment as AG — I should have snapped to the reality of what he stated.

As I have pondered what he said those many weeks ago, I can say today that it doesn’t surprise me that he might hide much of the evidence that shows how Mueller reached his conclusions about the president and his campaign.

I wanted the attorney general to prove me wrong.

Silly me.

national news

Pence vs. Mayor Pete: It’s getting personal

Here we go . . .

The presidential candidacy of an openly gay Midwest medium-sized city mayor is starting to get ugly.

Pete Buttigieg is among the seemingly dozens of Democrats running for president. He has drawn the attention of a fellow Hoosier, Vice President Mike Pence.

Buttigieg has responded to statements that Pence allegedly has made about the mayor’s sexual “preference” by suggesting that the VP’s quarrel shouldn’t be with Buttigieg, but with his “creator.”

I am undecided about who among the Democrats I want to succeed Donald Trump. Buttigieg, though, has gotten my attention of late. He is an interesting young man with a wealth of life experience that needs to be examined.

Feud escalates

I want to point out that he is a Navy veteran. He served honorably while deployed to war zones in the Middle East.

He came out as gay only in 2015. Pence, who was Indiana governor at the time, said that Buttigieg — the mayor of South Bend, Ind. — is a “dedicated public servant and a patriot.”

Now, though, he has taken another view of Buttigieg, I guess.

Buttigieg is emerging from the field of Democrats as a potential contender for the party’s nomination. My hunch is that the vice president won’t be quite so magnanimous when discussing Mayor Pete in the future.

For his part, Buttigieg is pushing back hard on evangelicals’ support of Trump, someone who Buttigieg believes is the very antithesis of the kind of individual who should appeal to strong Christian believers. He says the “hypocrisy is unbelievable,” and adds that Trump’s behavior “is not consistent with anything I hear in scripture in church.”

I once commented on this blog that my preference would be for Democrats to look hard at someone who came out of nowhere, perhaps in the mold of Jimmy Carter. It might be that Pete Buttigieg is that individual.

Time will tell.

State news

LBJ truly loved being ‘of’ Texas

PEDERNALES FALLS STATE PARK, Texas — Lyndon Baines Johnson wasn’t just from Texas, he was of Texas.

The nation’s 36th president knew from where he came and where he would go after he left public life.

LBJ’s public life ended on Jan. 20, 1969 when Richard Nixon succeeded him as president. Johnson boarded the jet from Washington, which took him and his wife Lady Bird “home” to Texas.

My wife and I are spending a few days in the heart of what can be called “LBJ Country.” I surely do understand – indeed, I have understood it for the 35 years we have lived in this state – why he loved coming back to his beloved Hill Country.

We’re parked in an RV campground at Pedernales Falls State Park. It is a magnificent piece of real estate near Johnson City, Dripping Springs and a bit west of Austin. The bluebonnets and Indian paint brush are in their full spring blossom glory.

President Johnson ascended to the nation’s highest office under the worst circumstance imaginable, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The men’s styles could not have been more different; Kennedy was all Cape Cod, Ivy League and combat heroism, while LBJ was pure Texan, a bit unpolished and a supreme politician with decades of experience legislating in both chambers of Congress.

While he served as president for nearly six years, one often heard Johnson refer to his beloved Pedernales River, the Hill Country. He was known to speed around his sprawling ranch in Stonewall at the wheel of his Cadillac convertible.

He loved this place. He loved coming home. I often got the impression – perhaps burnished a bit in the decades since he left office – that he detested going to work in Washington. He lived in a nice house at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. But it wasn’t his ranch house in the Hill Country.

The ravages of the office he inherited took their toll on Lyndon Johnson. They aged him far beyond his years. War does that to any man, especially a commander in chief whose duty included sending young Americans into battle against an intense and resourceful enemy. It’s not a stretch to say that the Vietnam War killed Lyndon Johnson.

However, he died where he always intended to die. At his ranch. He suffered a heart attack, notified the Secret Service detail that protected him that “something bad is happening.” That “something bad” killed him on Jan. 22, 1973. He wasn’t yet 65 years of age.

They buried LBJ and later his wife under a grove of trees on his ranch. It is the perfect place to lay this man of Texas to rest.

Sports news

Tech took it to the limit; stand tall, Red Raiders

Well, those of us with West Texas connections, if not roots, had wanted this game to end differently.

It didn’t end the way we wanted. Texas Tech’s Red Raiders came up just this much short against the Virginia Cavaliers. The teams went into overtime in the NCAA men’s basketball championship game.

I’ve noted already that I did not attend Texas Tech. I worked and lived in West Texas long enough — 23 years — to know how devoted Red Raiders’ fans are. They love their football. They love their basketball, men’s and women’s alike.

So, the season is over. They’re cheering in Charlottesville. I hope they don’t riot, tear the place up, light fires and act stupidly. Hey, it’s the place that Thomas Jefferson called home and founded the University of Virginia.

They aren’t cheering in Lubbock tonight.

Here’s the deal. The sun will rise in the morning. The wind might even blow.

Texas Tech took it all the way to the end, and then some, into overtime.

Great season, Red Raiders. If this non-Tech dude is allowed to say it, I’ll offer only this: Guns up!

national news

Trump rattling his fellow Republicans with DHS purge

Donald Trump is on a tear through the agency formed to protect Americans against enemies of our nation.

He has fired (essentially) the secretary of homeland security, gotten rid of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, canned the Secret Service director. There are threats of more dismissals/resignations to come.

Republican senators are shaking their heads, according to Politico. Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa said she thought DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was doing a “fantastic” job.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said “It’s a mess,” referring to the border situation and the confusion and chaos at DHS.

Yep, it’s a mess, all right.

I believe that is exactly how Donald Trump prefers it.

Cohesion and smooth operation? Forget about it! Yet he calls his administration a “fine-tuned machine.” The president is not hearing the clanks and misfires from the political “engine” he has built.

I guess I’m allowed to wonder how all this tumult at Homeland Security is going to affect the agency’s ability to, um, secure the homeland.

Donald Trump

It’s so believable that Trump would say such a thing

If only Donald Trump hadn’t built such a huge public record of personal insults.

Peter Baker, chief White House correspondent for The New York Times, says he had heard from sources inside the White House that the president had mocked the appearance of Secret Service Director Randolph “Tex” Alles.

What makes it so believable? The things Trump has said out loud. Such as . . .

The time he mocked Sen. Rand Paul’s appearance during a Republican primary presidential debate in 2016; or he hung the nickname of “Little Marco” on Sen. Rubio of Florida, another GOP primary opponent; or when he mocked the appearance of yet another GOP opponent, Carly Fiorina; or the “best” one of all, when he mocked the physical disability of a NY Times reporter, Serge Kovaleski.

Three areas always should be off limits when political foes argue public policy: their respective families, their given names and their appearance.

Trump has violated two of those three axioms. Do you recall how he posted that hideous picture of Heidi Cruz, the wife of Sen. Ted Cruz, still another GOP presidential opponent?

The man lacks class. He lacks dignity. He lacks empathy. He lacks humanity.

I also should add that he lacks self-awareness.

See what I mean?

national news

Trump mocks his appearance, then fires him . . . coincidence?

The president had soured on Alles a while ago, even making fun of his looks, calling him Dumbo because of his ears, two officials said.

That would be Randolph Alles, the soon-to-be former head of the U.S. Secret Service. The observation of Donald Trump’s view of Alles comes via Twitter from Peter Baker, chief White House correspondent for the New York Times.

OK, I happen to believe what Baker is reporting. I completely believe that the president of the United States is fully capable of exhibiting untold cruelty toward individuals. Example? Recall the time he mocked NY Times reporter Serge Kovaleski’s severe physical disability.

So now we hear that Trump (allegedly) mocked Randolph Alles, the man in charge of the agency whose most high-profile job is to protect the president and his family.

Must I remind readers of this blog who think the sun rises and sets on Donald Trump’s vacuous head that he ain’t exactly GQ material.

Would it surprise anyone that this man, the president, is systematically alienating himself from the public service professionals who put everything on the line in service to their country? To think the denigration and the disgrace comes from someone who has no clue about what it means to serve the public.

It wouldn’t surprise me.

Not in the least.

national news

Great job, fella . . . but hit the road

This kind of thing drives me nuts when I hear about matters such as this. A public servant is fired from his or her job and the guy to whom the person reports tells us all what a “great” job he or she did.

If the person getting canned is doing a great job, wouldn’t that person keep his or her job?

They’re cleaning house

U.S. Secret Service Director Randolph “Tex” Alles is heading for the exits. Donald Trump instructed White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney to fire Alles. So, he did.

Then press secretary Sarah Hucakabee Sanders said on behalf of the president that Alles had done a great job running the agency that used to be part of the Treasury Department, but has moved to the Department of Homeland Security.

DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen “resigned” effective immediately over differences with Trump on immigration policy. The president thanked her for her service. That’s it. Message received: Nielsen wasn’t cutting it at DHS, in Trump’s view.

But the Secret Service ouster appears to be part a wholesale housecleaning at DHS.

I’ve read the reports that the man/child behind the shakeup is that 30-something whiz kid/maniac Stephen Miller, who seems to believe that the president needs to get even more harsh on immigrants, legal and illegal alike.

This isn’t fun to watch, no matter the president, the party or the policy involved.