Monthly Archives: May 2019

national news

Fourth of July celebration to ‘star’ Donald Trump? Really?

This can’t be happening, but I guess it is. When I first saw reports of this upcoming event celebrating the nation’s independence, I thought it might be a phony, made-up gossip item concocted by some Internet troll.

Turns out it’s real. Donald Trump appears intent on making the annual national Fourth of July celebration — which historically has been a non-partisan/non-political event — into something akin to a political rally.

The Washington Post reports that the president is moving ahead with plans to move the fireworks display from the National Mall to West Potomac Park. Then there’s this: He wants to address the nation from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

According to Mother Jones: The traditional event has been staged for more than 50 years, and has long included fireworks on the mall organized by the National Park Service, as well as a concert near the Capitol featuring the National Symphony Orchestra and a lineup of major musical stars.

The national event has been televised for many of those years by PBS.

That isn’t apparently going to happen this year. Trump appears intent on inserting himself into the celebration. Only the Good Lord Almighty knows what the president is going to say when he takes the stage in front of President Lincoln’s statue.

I get that Trump is a proud American. However, to use the high profile of his office to promote himself — which appears to be a high probability — at an event choreographed to honor the nation is a reprehensible act of partisan politics.

Trump reportedly got the idea at a Bastille Day celebration in Paris. He wanted to stage a huge military parade in Washington, D.C., to commemorate Veterans Day, but that idea has been put off for at least a year; its cost is, um, prohibitive.

The Interior Department calls the Fourth of July event a “Salute to America.” Does anyone really believe, though, that this president is going to allow such a salute to occur without taking credit for his effort to “make America great again”?

Neither do I.

As the Post reports: The president’s starring role has the potential to turn what has long been a nonpartisan celebration of the nation’s founding into another version of a Trump campaign rally. Officials said it is unclear how much the changes may cost, but the plans have already raised alarms among city officials and some lawmakers about the potential impact of such major alterations to a time-honored and well-organized summer tradition.

Good grief!

national news

‘The Executioner’ wrote the book on impeachment

There are times when you think you know someone and you find out things about that individual that you might have suspected, but didn’t ever confirm.

The late U.S. Rep. Jack Brooks of Beaumont was my congressman for nearly 11 years. I commented on his public service while working as editorial page editor of the Beaumont Enterprise. I spent many hours visiting with him when he would return to the Golden Triangle to do whatever members of Congress do when they meet with their constituents.

I knew a few aspects of the man who dubbed himself Sweet Old Brooks: He was a ferocious Democratic partisan who detested Republicans; his mentor was the famed House Speaker Sam Rayburn; Brooks was in the motorcade the day Lee Harvey Oswald murdered President Kennedy in Dallas and stood behind Lyndon Johnson as LBJ took the oath of office as the 36th president of the United States.

Here’s what I did not know about Sweet Old Brooks: He authored the articles of impeachment against President Richard Nixon in 1974. Brooks served on the House Judiciary Committee and took it upon himself to ensure that the panel dotted every “i” and crossed every “t” perfectly.

Politico Magazine has published a fascinating article about my former congressman that lays out the reason why President Nixon labeled Jack Brooks “The Executioner.”

Read the article here.

Brooks represented Southeast Texas for 42 years in the House before losing a re-election battle in 1994 during the Republican sweep of Congress. He returned to Beaumont and continued to serve on various bank boards until his death in December 2012.

I lost track of Jack Brooks after he lost his House race. I moved from Beaumont to the Texas Panhandle the next month and became involved in my new duties at the Amarillo Globe-News.

Politico’s article about Brooks discusses how the cantankerous old Marine essentially wrote the book on how the “opposition party” should respond to political crises involving a president of the other party.

As Politico reports:

A list of 37 potential charges against Nixon, introduced in various resolutions and including crimes ranging from domestic surveillance to illegal campaign practices, were now the subject of intense debate in Congress. The House Judiciary Committee chairman, Peter Rodino, and special counsel, John Doar, equivocated on how to decide the official charges against Nixon. Neither one felt confident, and the committee’s proceedings seemed to languish month after month, capturing headlines but moving nowhere. Observers wondered whether the chairman was unwilling or just inept.

Brooks, on the other hand, felt assured. In early July 1974, he seized the initiative by drafting the articles himself, along with the help of staff. As far as Brooks, the tough-talking former Marine who relished legislative fights, was concerned, Chairman Rodino “wasn’t worth a shit” in the impeachment process, as Brooks later told an interviewer. He was certainly fair and experienced as a legislator, but Brooks thought Rodino “didn’t have the guts a chairman needs to have.”

While other lawmakers were concerned about looking too overzealous or partisan, Brooks’ concerns were larger. Nixon was clearly guilty of impeachable offenses, had violated his oath and needed to be removed, regardless of any future political fallout the Dems might suffer for it. Brooks made it no secret that he was enthusiastically pursuing impeachment and conviction. At a Democratic caucus amid the Judiciary Committee hearings for his impeachment articles, for instance, someone asked about the theme of the second article concerning Nixon’s alleged misuse of the FBI, CIA and IRS. Brooks, as one staffer remembered it, was leaning way back in his chair and smoking a cigar. He came down on the chair hard, took the cigar out of his mouth, and said, “The theme of this article is we’re gonna get that son of a bitch out of there!”

To Brooks, the Judiciary had been chosen to be the tip of the spear. Brooks was determined that it be a sharp one.

Well, there you have it. Is there a lesson to be learned as today’s congressional Democrats ponder how to respond to another Republican president?

Man, oh man. You think you know someone . . .

As many of his supporters used to say about Rep. Brooks, “He might be an SOB, but he’s our SOB.”

national news

Trump ‘goading’ Democrats to impeach him?

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has initiated a most fascinating talking point, which is that Donald Trump is “goading” Democrats into impeaching him, that he wants it because of the divisive impact it would have on the nation.

You know what? I happen to agree with her.

Pelosi stands against the idea of impeaching Trump. She can’t count votes. There likely are enough House votes to impeach Trump, but Pelosi doesn’t believe — and neither do I — that the Republican-controlled Senate would convict Trump in a Senate trial.

Trump knows it, too.

So he’s denying House and Senate committees any access to anything or anyone to answer questions about the Robert Mueller report. He is usurping congressional prerogatives granted the legislative branch in the U.S. Constitution. Congress wants to exercise its authority to conduct oversight of the executive branch.

Trump is now wanting the House to impeach him, or is daring House members to attempt such a move?

Pelosi has signed on to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler’s assessment that we have entered into a constitutional crisis. I believe them both. We have. It is going to get even uglier.

So here we go. The chaos president — as some have described him — is taking headlong into a maelstrom that suits this carnival barker just fine.

This is how you “make America great again”?

Hah!

economic news

Here’s a thought: Share the economic glory

Democrats running for president say that Donald Trump doesn’t deserve credit for the current boom in the nation’s economy.

They drape the credit over the shoulders of Trump’s immediate presidential predecessor, Barack H. Obama. They say President Obama’s policies are responsible for the continuing job growth, the diminishing unemployment rolls, the increase in the Gross Domestic Product, the increase in wages and salaries.

So, there you go.

Oops. Not so fast!

Hey, don’t misunderstand me on this matter. Donald Trump doesn’t deserve nearly all the credit he keeps taking. However, he does deserve credit at least for not botching the progress that was well under way when he took office in January 2017.

I resist granting him all that credit mainly because I want him out of office. I want him defeated in the 2020 election and I do not want him to ride behind the wave created by the good economic news that keeps coming his way.

However, the ongoing good news is occurring on the current president’s watch.

However, I cannot yet fathom why this president cannot give any credit to anyone else for the success he enjoys in the moment. That refusal to offer a positive nod to President Obama’s economic policies perhaps is fueling Democratic politicians’ current anger with the current president.

Hey, we’re heading into an election year. Thus, one man’s economic miracle is another man’s economic disaster. Donald Trump plays that game better than most.

local news, media news

Time of My Life, Part 32: In the company of media greatness

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The name of a one-time Texas media giant came up today during a discussion I had with a dear friend of mine and it prompts me to look back on an extraordinary meeting I had with this individual back when I wrote editorials and edited the opinion page of the Beaumont Enterprise in Southeast Texas.

You remember the great Molly Ivins, I’m sure. She died of cancer in 2007. She was just 62 years of age.

Ivins was an unreconstructed liberal. And she was damn proud of it! She is the originator of at least two quintessential quips regarding politicians she railed against regularly: She was fond of referring to Texas Gov. George W. Bush as “Shrub”; then she hung the label of “Gov. Goodhair” on Bush’s successor as governor, Rick Perry.

Those legendary nicknames came after I had left Beaumont for the Texas Panhandle. But one afternoon in the Beaumont Enterprise newsroom brought me up close and personal with Molly Ivins.

She had come to Beaumont from Austin to cover the state of politics in the Gulf Coast community. She wanted to watch the Beaumont City Council in action. Ivins was not impressed, as I recall, with the quality of Beaumont’s municipal leadership, let alone its governing body.

I recall one column she wrote at the time in which she ridiculed the late Councilman Andrew P. Cokinos, the youngest of four brothers, all of whom had been players on the Beaumont political stage. She wondered about the middle initial “P.” that all the brothers used. She knew the “P” stood for “Pete,” and poked fun at them in general, and at Andrew in particular.

She wandered into our newsroom one afternoon. My memory is shaky at times, so I cannot recall the precise date of that meeting. I believe it was in the late 1980s or early 1990s.

She held court in the newsroom for well more than an hour. She regaled the journalists gathered around her with story after story of the characters she encountered during her years as a Texas journalist.

She got away somehow with crafting copy that no one else could. She wrote with biting humor, but lurking just below her trademark sarcasm one could find a serious theme to her commentary, as she was a serious journalist, although political conservatives (chiefly Republicans) usually found a way to belittle her.

However, in those days when newspapers actually mattered greatly, when they were relevant to telling communities’ stories, Molly Ivins was a giant among Texas journalists.

To be candid, I always envied her writing skill and more than once I lamented under my breath, “Damn, I wish I could write like that.” I was glad I was able to tell Molly Ivins that very thing to her face that day in Beaumont, Texas.

education news

Will new trustees shake AISD out of its silence?

The Amarillo Independent School District board of trustees will have three new members soon. Two of them will succeed incumbents who lost their re-election bids; a third succeeds an incumbent who didn’t seek re-election earlier this month.

What now? The AISD board has become ensnared in a controversy over the resignation of the Amarillo High School girls volleyball coach. The board hasn’t addressed the controversy in any form. It has remained silent while community whispers, chatters and expresses anger at the way the allegedly was treated by the board and school administrators.

Kori Clements quit after a single season at the helm of one of Texas’s most vaunted high school athletic programs. She complained about a parent who allegedly harassed her over playing time given to her daughters. The board didn’t back the coach; neither did the administration.

I’m unaware of the political rhetoric that preceded the May 4 election. I am quite aware, though, of the hard feelings among many of the school system’s constituents over Kori Clements’ treatment.

Is there a connection between the election result and how the newly constituted AISD board will handle the current matter, let alone future matters of this type?

Three new board trustees do not comprise a majority on this board. It might take another election cycle to weed out more of the silent types who have presided over this situation.

I just hope there isn’t more damage to be done.

local news, State news

Texas GOP wages new ‘civil war’ against cities

A progressive publication has called attention to what it sees as a fascinating new reaction to “liberal” cities’ attempts to rid themselves of monuments to arguably the darkest period in American history.

Texas cities are taking action to remove monuments to the Confederate States of America, which formed in 1861, declared war on the United States of America for the purpose of preserving states’ rights to enslave human beings, to allow them to be kept as property.

Dallas is the latest and perhaps most notable city to take action, according to the Texas Observer. The Texas Legislature led by a Republican super-majority in both legislative chambers, is fighting cities’ efforts to eradicate those symbols of treason against the United States.

The Observer notes that more than 30 Confederate monuments have been removed from Texas municipal property between 2015 and 2018. As the Observer noted: This has sparked an intense backlash from Anglo conservatives who see the removal of these monuments as an erasure of their Antebellum heritage. Activist groups pumped out robocalls and radio ads calling on Texas Republicans to keep the monuments in place.

The Dallas City Council approved a measure in 2018 to take down a century-old statue in downtown Dallas. It’s still standing. It has become a rallying cry, according to the Observer, of those who want such symbols to stand as a testament to Texas’s “heritage.”

Two bills, one in each legislative chamber, were introduced this legislative session that would strip local governments’ authority to take down these monuments or to rename public streets, parks or other property. As the Observer noted: Brandon Creighton, a Republican senator from suburban Houston who authored the upper-chamber version, brought the bill to the Senate floor Tuesday, prompting a heated and emotional debate. Houston Senator Borris Miles, one of the Senate’s two black members, called the legislation “disgraceful.”

Is this really going on here? Is this some sort of legislative hanky-panky aimed at circumventing cities’ ability to self-govern? What’s more, is it a form of “municipal aggression,” as the Observer calls it, launched by conservative legislators to get back at more, um, progressive/liberal politicians who wield power in city halls or county courthouses?

Again, from the Observer: Texas isn’t alone. For years, red states have enacted laws prohibiting cities from establishing local minimum wages and other labor protections. In the face of renewed public opposition to Confederate monuments, several Southern states have passed laws making it extremely difficult to remove historical monuments.

I continue to stand with those who believe the Confederacy is nothing to be saluted, or honored. The Confederate States of America committed treason against the United States of America. It was by the grace of President Lincoln who said in his second inaugural speech that he would  seek “with malice toward none and charity for all” to bind the wounds that the Civil War inflicted on the nation.

None of that, though, should stand as a reason to honor the cause of that bloodshed.

local news

Happy Trails, Part 158: Finding a new way to live

Now that I no longer have to worry about daily deadlines, or filling space on a blank newspaper page, or deciding which issues to comment on, I find myself pondering more personal matters.

One of them involves the way I live.

Oh, my wife and I have carved out a good life in retirement. We love our new home in Princeton, Texas; we laugh daily at Toby the Puppy; we enjoy spending more time with our granddaughter; we enjoy hauling our fifth wheel around the country.

The way I live, though, requires some tweaking. I got a lesson on it this morning. I visited the gym where I work out most morning and received a serious wakeup call from a personal trainer who conducted a full body scan on me and told me how I can shed the weight that has piled onto this old man’s body.

Yes, I’ve heard it all before. I have known for decades what I need to do. I need to exercise more, eat less and concentrate on maintaining that regimen for the rest of my life on Earth.

There. He told me — yet again! — what I know already.

This time it was a bit different. I saw the outline of my body as drawn by the scan. I saw the “tale of the tape,” so to speak. My gut is too big. My body fat ratio is out of whack. I saw the minimum calorie count I need to consume daily and, oh yes, I saw the maximum count I should not exceed.

So, with that I have decided to try a new way of living.

I have been blessed with relatively good health over many years. I don’t take a bucket load of pills each day. As I told the trainer this morning, however, I have discovered that it is “much easier to fall into bad habits than it is to acquire good ones.”

It’s not an old-age thing. It’s been part of my existence since, well, the beginning.

I’m going to turn the page beginning today. Time is no one’s friend, especially those of us who have much less of it ahead of us than behind us.

It’s time, therefore, to make the most of what’s left.

national news

Rep. Scalise is searching for forgiveness; he might find it

U.S. House Minority Whip Steve Scalise is on the hunt for forgiveness.

I hope he finds it. If he does and then accepts what happened to him as the act of a deranged individual, then he’ll likely be an even better man for it.

Scalise was gravely injured when a gunman opened fire on him and other Republican members of Congress who were practicing for a baseball game planned against Democrats.

The gunman was killed in a fire fight with capital police. Scalise, meanwhile, fought for his life. Happily, he is still recovering.

Scalise said he found additional strength while talking to the pastor of one of the predominantly African-American churches that were burned in Louisiana. He said the pastor imparted wisdom, saying that he — the pastor — had forgiven the individual who has been charged with torching  the churches out of hate.

The gunman who opened fire in Arlington, Va., in June 2017 at GOP House members also was filled with hate. According to The Hill: “I’ve never internally fully forgiven the shooter from the baseball shooting and it’s something I struggle with as a Catholic. I mean, part of my faith is forgiveness and I’m, I’m working to get there, and it was actually helpful to talk to him afterward about,” he continued. “And if we agreed to talk some more — I asked him if we could talk some more and he wants to so we’re going to do that.”

I wish Rep. Scalise well in his search for forgiveness. If he adopts it, I would consider him to be a better man than many of us.

national news

Lying has become ‘tolerable’ among politicians?

Jimmy Carter once promised that he would never lie to Americans if they elected him president of the United States.

To the best of my knowledge and memory, the 39th president kept that promise. Perhaps he didn’t tell us everything in real time about sensitive negotiations with Egyptian President and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin as they crafted a comprehensive peace treaty. He might have held back on what he told Iranian leaders who held our citizens hostage for 444 days in 1979-80.

I don’t believe he lied.

We fast-forward now to the present day. The current president has demonstrated that he cannot tell the truth.

Donald Trump lies at every level. He lies when he doesn’t need to lie. He lies when it is easier to tell the truth. He lies about matters large and small.

I cannot single out the major lies he has told. They usually involve a political foe. He will say something that puts someone in a negative light. If it’s a lie, well, so be it.

The petty lies are equally remarkable. He lied about his late father being born in Germany; Fred Trump was born in New York City. He lied about losing friends on 9/11; he lost zero friends, he attended zero funerals of those who died on that terrible day.

Trump is lying at an astonishing pace. The Washington Post is keeping a running tabulation the falsehoods; it has passed the 10,000 mark so far and the pace is quickening.

I mention all of this because Donald Trump keeps insisting that he has been “totally exonerated” regarding the Russia matter. No, he hasn’t.

Thus, Trump lies even when the public record demonstrates precisely the opposite to be true. Robert Mueller’s report on his investigation into alleged collusion is clear: The special counsel could not clear Trump of obstruction of justice; nor could he prosecute him. Still, Trump lies when he says he has been “totally exonerated.”

How in the world can we accept a single thing this individual says as truth? My view: We cannot.Â