Monthly Archives: May 2020

national news

Trump is ‘filling the swamp’

Donald John “Stable Genius in Chief” Trump has just fired the fourth inspector general since he was cleared of charges brought during his impeachment by the House of Representatives.

The victim this time is Steve Linick, the IG in charge of keeping tabs on the State Department’s conduct.

Trump vowed to “drain the swamp” of corruption in Washington, D.C. His latest ad hominem attack on government accountability suggests to me that he instead is filling the swamp with even more corruption.

Donald Trump is out of fu**ing control. He is unhinged.

When reporters asked Trump why he canned Linick, he deferred to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who he said asked the president to let the IG go. Then said, “Yeah, I don’t know him at all. I never even heard of him.” 

What the … hell? 

Trump fired a guy he said he didn’t know. For what reason? He said Pompeo had “lost confidence” in Linick. Then he said he has the authority to fire anyone he wants. Sure he does. I get that. But … why? Isn’t there some accountability due? Of course there is!

Linick, I should add, was appointed inspector general at State by the Obama administration. So this firing looks like yet another vestige of Trump’s immediate predecessor he wants excised by his administration.

I also should add that Linick reportedly was examining reports that Pompeo was allegedly using his office for personal use, that he reportedly was having government employees running errands for Mrs. Pompeo and taking the couple’s pooch out for walks in the park.

Republican U.S. senators are seeking an explanation from Trump on why he is gutting so many department inspectors general operations. I haven’t heard — at least not yet — any expressions of outrage from the GOP side of the senatorial aisle. There certainly should be demands that Trump come clean.

Donald Trump is exhibiting dangerous symptoms of megalomania.

medical news, national news

Medics alarmed at Trump taking ‘unpoven drug’

I would be alarmed along with many doctors about Donald Trump taking a drug that hasn’t been proven to perform the miracles he keeps touting.

Except for this little thing: I don’t believe that the Liar in Chief is actually taking hydroxychloroquine, the drug he’s been touting as a potential cure for the COVID-19 virus that has killed more than 90,000 Americans.

He dropped that bomb today during a press availability. The first reaction was shock and amazement that the White House medical staff would give its tacit permission for Trump take the drug.

Then came the skepticism that Trump is actually taking the drug. You can count me as one of them.

It wouldn’t surprise me in the least to learn that this is just one more gratuitous lie that came from Trump, a publicity stunt, the act of a carnival barker.

The word, though, from many of the docs is that hydroxychloroquine might cause heart problems. Given that Trump is officially “morbidly obese,” well … we might have a serious problem.

But only if he’s telling the truth.

legal news, local news, medical news, State news

She’s no hero; she is a lawbreaker

Shelley Luther is being hailed as a heroic figure, someone who is standing up to what many contend is a form of governmental tyranny.

I consider her to be a lawbreaker, someone who flouted a legally mandated directive to keep her business closed to save lives against a killer virus that has swept across the world in the coronavirus pandemic.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott ordered salons closed. Luther’s business, Salon La Mode in Dallas, remained opened. She was doing customers’ nails and performing other cosmetic procedures even though she was putting herself and, more importantly, her customers at risk of catching COVID-19.

As the Texas Tribune reported: Luther knew she was operating in blatant defiance of emergency orders from the state and county. She had already torn up a cease-and-desist letter from local authorities, winning loud cheers onstage at an Open Texas rally in Frisco.

Ridiculous.

Here’s my favorite part. U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Houston decided to get his hair cut at Luther’s salon … in Dallas. The Cruz Missile, who backs Donald Trump’s rush to return reopen the economy that has collapsed in the wake of the pandemic, thought he’d score some cheap political points by standing with Shelley Luther.

Cruz should be ashamed of himself, except that he isn’t.

As for Luther, she had been sent to jail for violating the stay-closed order. Top Texas Republicans sought to work for her release. So she got sprung from the hoosegow. She came out to a hero’s welcome.

Now this business owner is being hailed as a sort of cultural icon because she’s standing her ground against what she believes is government overreach.

She is standing instead for the fruitcakes who have stormed the Michigan state capitol building brandishing assault rifles and waving swastikas and Confederate battle flags; she is standing for other protesters around the nation who flock to beaches and ignore social distancing recommendations.

It’s people like Shelley Luther who make enforcing mandates aimed at protecting our health — and even our lives — more difficult than they need be.

medical news

Trump ups the ante to potentially dangerous level … or has he?

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You know already that I trust Donald John “Liar in Chief” Trump about as far as I can throw his overfed body.

But there he goes, offering what well might be yet another in the nearly 20,000 documented lies he has told since becoming president.

He said he is taking a drug that doctors are warning us about the potentially deadly side effects. Hydroxycloroquine is its name. Trump has been touting its supposed effect in fighting the coronavirus, even though doctors are quite reluctant to avoid prescribing it as a cure for the killer virus.

Trump blurted it out today. He said he has been taking hydroxycloroquine for about two weeks. He said the White House physician effectively told him “Sure, why not?” when Trump asked whether it was OK to take the drug.

I do not believe Donald Trump is taking the drug.

I do believe he lied to us once again.

Why would he lie about this? I haven’t a clue.

It merely is that physicians worth a damn wouldn’t prescribe this drug as an antidote against COVID-19. I do not believe, therefore, that the White House doc gave the green light for the president of the United States to take a drug that is far from a proven remedy for this viral infection.

“What do you have to lose?” Trump keeps asking about hydroxychloroquine. The answer from many doctors has been clear and concise: Your life.

And yet we now have the president making a potentially reckless declaration that well could encourage Americans to follow this nimrod’s lead down a dangerous path. Let us remember that this is moron who said we could ponder whether to ingest “disinfectants” to fight the virus. Now this.

Reprehensible.

national news

‘Humans have to explore’

Binge-watching TV while we’re holed up during a worldwide health pandemic has delivered a curious dividend. A Netflix series, “A Year in Space,” has given me some grist for a blog I intend to share.

I now am filled with a newly heightened desire to see Americans restart its manned space program. We rely on Russian technicians to haul American astronauts into space, which I am sure would send Presidents Kennedy and Johnson — pardon the intentional pun — into orbit.

“A Year in Space” tells the story of astronaut Scott Kelly’s year-long mission aboard the International Space Station. It talks of his preparation, the launch, the trials and travails of living in the most controlled environment imaginable, of the return to Earth and his reacquainting himself with the sights, sounds and smells of the Earthly environment.

He spoke occasionally throughout the 12-part series about “when” we send human beings to Mars. I want to be among the living and breathing when that event occurs.

I grew up worshiping the seven men selected to be the first Americans to fly into space. I still know their names. I can tell you the sequence of when six of them flew aboard the Mercury space capsules; the seventh, Deke Slayton, was grounded initially because of a heart murmur, but he would fly in 1975 aboard an Apollo-Soyuz mission with his American astronaut comrades and the Soviet team they would meet in Earth orbit.

My heart seemed to stop when Apollo 13 suffered the near catastrophe in 1970 and cheered when the crew landed safely.

My heart broke when the shuttle Challenger blew up after its launch in 1986 and when the shuttle Columbia disintegrated on re-entry in 2003.

Then the U.S. manned program ended when the remaining shuttle fleet was grounded.

Jeffrey Kluger, a senior writer at Time magazine and author of a book on the Apollo 13 mission, said it well at the end of the “A Year in Space” series. “Humans have to explore,” he said. “Only the target changes.” He said we had the oceans, the highest peaks, unsettled wilderness.

What’s left for us? It sits way past the moon.

With that, I want to offer a heartfelt thank you to Netflix for filling my heart with hope that we’ll embark on the next great exploratory mission.

Mars is waiting.

environmental news

‘Vancouver, Vancouver … this is it!’

When you grow up in a part of the world full of natural beauty highlighted by snowcapped peaks all along your eastern horizon, you take for granted that they’ll always be there … as in always.

Forty years ago today, that notion changed for those of us who lived west of the Cascade Range, a long string of volcanic peaks stretching from British Columbia to Northern California.

Mount St. Helens blew apart on May 18, 1980. I was at home in Portland, Ore., about 50 miles south-southwest of the peak. We couldn’t watch the event occur in real time, as the sky was overcast that Sunday morning (yes, imagine that, if you can). But oh brother, we knew about it.

There are things in life you really don’t expect to witness or experience up close. An erupting volcano, to be honest, was not on my list of life experiences. However, that day it damn sure did etch itself into my memory.

The peak began rumbling to life in March. The ground beneath the then-9,677-foot summit in southwest Washington was quaking regularly. The peak began collapsing as craters formed atop the pristine summit of Mount St. Helens. I was editor of a small daily newspaper in Oregon City. We felt compelled to cover the story as it was developing. One of our reporters, David Peters, drove to near the peak with his fiancée to visit with a young man assigned by the U.S. Geological Survey to study Mount St. Helens’ evolution from dormant to active volcano.

The young man was David Johnston. He gave Dave Peters a statement that proved hauntingly prophetic, which was that if the mountain were to blow up then and there, they all would be killed. Happily for my friends, it didn’t. They returned home and Dave wrote a wonderful story for the newspaper.

I had another thrill, flying in a single-engine airplane over the summit that day as the mountain was quaking and shuddering. Only after we returned to my acquaintance’s hangar in Mulino, Ore., did I learn that federal aviation officials clamped a no-fly restriction for miles around the summit. They didn’t bust us, for which I will be grateful.

Then came the blast that changed the history of the Pacific Northwest. The mountain’s north face slid away from a huge earthquake, releasing an torrent of ash, fiery gas and rock. Thousands of acres of virgin timber were destroyed. Spirit Lake filled with logs and all manner of volcanic debris.

David Johnston radioed immediately to his USGS headquarters, “Vancouver, Vancouver … this is it!” 

Then he was gone. The pyroclastic flow from the beastly mountain incinerated the young volcanologist in an instant.

Oh, man. The memory of it all.

medical news

‘We’re back’ … umm, no we aren’t

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Donald John Trump’s state of denial is breathtaking in its scope.

He said this past week that “vaccine or no vaccine … we’re back.” 

Actually, Mr. POTUS, we aren’t back. We are far from “back.” Thousands of Americans are still dying daily. Thousands more of us are getting sick. Take away the decline in death and infection in New York, and the rest of the country is still spiking.

Take a look at Texas — where my family and I live — and we see a surge in infection.

So while the president can bellow, bluster, bloviate all he wants about us being “back,” the reality tells us something quite different.

The death toll has surpassed 90,000 on its way to 100,000 Americans dying. Who knows when it will end? Trump doesn’t know. Neither do the medical experts he has brought aboard to coordinate the pandemic response.

So, Donald Trump needs to do us all a favor … and keep his trap shut!

national news

Trump vs. Obama … ‘er Biden?

Donald Trump has been asking for it. He’s been needling, ridiculing and criticizing his immediate presidential predecessor since the moment he won the 2016 election.

Now he’s getting a portion of what he has dished out. He doesn’t like it. He called former President Barack Obama a “grossly incompetent president.” Indeed, Trump’s response to Obama’s chiding tells me plenty about the fundamental differences between these two individuals.

One of them is urbane, erudite, sophisticated. He speaks with high-minded nobility, such as what we heard Saturday night during his “virtual” commencement remarks to the nation’s high school class of 2020.

The other one is, well, crude, petulant, petty. He resorts to name-calling. He deals in innuendo, defamation of character. We have heard that, too, and we’re going to hear a lot more of it from this fellow.

Barack Obama and Donald Trump just might go at each other’s throats before this election season winds down.

But wait! Only one of these guys is running for public office in 2020. It’s Trump! He’s got an opponent out there and it’s not Barack Obama! It’s the guy who served nobly for two terms as vice president of the United States during the Obama administration.

Joe Biden has been holed up in his Wilmington, Del., basement during the coronavirus pandemic. Meanwhile, the former president has endorsed Biden’s presidential candidacy and has made it abundantly clear he intends to work hard to ensure his election this November.

Biden and Obama, though, have a difficult dance to perform. Biden will emerge in due course — and I hope it’s soon — as the Democratic Party’s titular leader. He slogged and slugged his way through a grueling primary process against a record number of primary opponents. Biden stands alone as Donald Trump’s most pressing immediate political threat.

However, Barack Obama’s standing as the nation’s most engaging political figure threatens to eclipse the former vice president. None of this, of course, doesn’t matter one damn bit to Donald Trump, who’ll continue his insufferable tirades against the former president.

Through it all, we just might be able to take a full measure of the smallness of the individual who wants a second term as president of the United States. If Barack Obama can reveal more of that to us through his measured, dignified commentary on the quality of our current leadership, then so much the better … for Joe Biden.

national news, State news

Here’s a thought: Call ’em, ask how mail-in voting works

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, mimicking his fellow Republican Donald J. Trump, thinks mail-in voting invites fraudulent balloting.

That is the crux of his resistance to implementing it in Texas … or so he says.

I have an idea for Paxton to ponder. We have five states that conduct their elections by mail — Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Utah and Hawaii. Granted, four of the five of them are governed by Democrats; Utah is the exception. Pick up the phone, Mr. Attorney General, and talk at length with any or all of the elections officials in those states and ask them: How do you protect your electoral system from voter fraud?

It might be that Paxton, the loyal Republican, doesn’t want to hear how this works in a state run by Democrats. Big deal. He can call Utah’s election bosses.

Whatever it takes.

The concern over mail-in voting centers more on partisan concerns, in my view, than actual fear of widespread voter fraud. All the states that run their elections by mail report that they have not experienced anything resembling the rampant fraud that Paxton and other Republicans say will occur.

We are in the midst of a national medical emergency. The coronavirus pandemic makes traditional Election Day balloting a potentially life-threatening endeavor. Would I prefer to vote on Nov. 3? Yes, I would. However, I harbor concerns about my health and that of my family, so I want to see a full-blown presidential election occur by mail if that’s the best way to ensure full participation in this most important rite of citizenship.

Donald Trump spilled the beans not long ago by declaring that all-mail voting would doom Republicans’ electoral chances. Which tells me he is far less concerned about vote fraud than he is at his re-election chances. That is just too … damn … bad!

Now we hear from his GOP allies, such as Ken Paxton, parroting the Trump lie about voter fraud concern. That is BS!

The election officials who conduct this kind of balloting in their states proclaim great success. They say their systems are secure.

Again … Mr. Attorney General, if you are truly concerned about voter fraud, listen to your colleagues who just might be able to educate you about how to get more voters involved in this process. They also would be able to tell you how they do so without the so-called “fraud” you insist will occur.

national security, political news

What happens if Trump loses?

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REUTERS/Sarah Silbiger

This notion, as preposterous as it sounds, is worth pondering nevertheless, given Donald Trump’s extreme penchant for unpredictability.

What happens if Donald Trump loses the presidential election and (a) rejects the results and (b) refuses to vacate the White House?

You are entitled to snicker and maybe even guffaw at the notion. However, some learned political pros are talking about it out loud. That tells me that even though they dismiss the reject and refuse-to-leave notion as implausible, they are still talking about it … which means it’s, well, possible.

I have posed this notion already not long after Trump took office. Some of my Trumpster friends and acquaintances scolded me for suggesting such a thing. However, with this guy nothing on this good Earth is beyond the realm of possibility.

He has ranted already about “rigged” elections. He accused “millions of illegal immigrants” of voting for Hillary Clinton in 2016 but hasn’t yet produced a shred of evidence to back up the spurious claim. When every pundit on Earth was predicting Hillary would defeat Trump, the Huckster in Chief said he would lose only because the election would be rigged in Hillary’s favor.

Does anyone with a half a noodle in their noggin actually believe that Donald Trump would orchestrate a smooth and orderly transition to Joseph Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee?

The campaign already is shaping up to be the most hideous, the nastiest, the most innuendo-filled, defamatory campaign in anyone’s memory. It makes me shudder to ponder what could happen in case Donald Trump loses this election.

Trump will say anything, will resort to any tactic he can consider to win a second term. If he loses, well, we ought to prepare for the worst.