Monthly Archives: May 2020

local news

Feds send force to ‘attack’ virus outbreak in our former city of residence

I want to feel comforted by this news, but given the dismal performance so far by our federal government in response to the coronavirus pandemic, well … let’s just say it doesn’t settle my nerves.

Federal health officials are being dispatched to Amarillo to “attack” a huge spike in COVID-19 infection at a Moore County meatpacking plant. Potter County, which comprises roughly half of Amarillo’s land area, is registering an infection rate that is significantly greater than the rates in Dallas or Harris County.

My wife and I lived in Amarillo for the 23 years. We have plenty of friends there. More importantly, though, our older son still lives there. He remains healthy. He has a public service job, but his employer is restricting heavily his contact with the clientele he serves and for that we are grateful beyond all measure.

At issue is the huge spike in infection at the JBS Beef meatpacking plant in Moore County, which has an viral infection that dwarfs the rate in Potter County.

According to the Texas Tribune: Meat and poultry plants nationwide have emerged as incubators for coronavirus spread. More than a dozen have been forced to shutdown temporarily as the number of cases and deaths tied to those facilities rose; others have scrambled to ramp up health and safety precautions in facilities where meatpackers often must work shoulder to shoulder.

The report I have seen doesn’t specify how officials will “attack” the outbreak. I just remain skeptical that anything associated — at this moment — with the federal government is guaranteed to produce success.

I want desperately to be proven wrong.

national news

‘They are good people’

These four men are among the “good people” to whom Donald Trump referred the other day.

They were among those who protested the government restrictions imposed in the wake of the killer virus that has claimed nearly 70,000 American lives. The COVID-19 virus has forced state governments to order businesses to close, imposed shelter in place and stay at home orders, mandated gatherings should not exceed 10 people, and ordered “social distancing.”

The aim of the government restrictions is as noble as it gets: to save lives and prevent illness.

However, some Americans have stormed into state capitol buildings in several states. Donald Trump calls them “good people,” yes, even the fellows pictured with this blog, the guys who are packing assault rifles and wearing masks … that are intended to hide their identity as opposed to protecting them from the killer virus.

We have come to this, ladies and gentlemen. Americans who want to reopen the economy are willing to risk their lives and worse, to risk others’ lives by rushing toward a premature return to what they used to think of as a “normal” life.

I can think of few images that are more frightening than what we have seen coming from these protests. They include individuals waving Confederate flags, even swastikas! — and yet the president of the United States declares them to be “good people.”

This is all a disgraceful display of protest running amok.

We have witnessed political protest mixed with coercion and intimidation. No sane individual wants the economy to collapse; no one wants Americans to suffer from economic deprivation; no one wants economic tragedy. Neither should a sane person want to expose other Americans to the threat of a deadly virus.

We keep hearing from the Trump administration that we need to witness two weeks of decline in the rate of infection to start moving toward normalization. We aren’t there yet.

In the meantime, protesters brandishing assault weapons are demanding that government lift the restrictions it has designed to protect our health … enabling us to continue our “Pursuit of Happiness.”  

Go figure.

International news

Trump is ‘glad’ that the killer Kim Jong Un is OK? How sweet!

Donald John Trump is just happy as the dickens that the world’s most infamous dictatorial recluse isn’t dead after all.

How nice. How sweet.

North Korea’s killer/despot Kim Jong Un has made a public appearance, putting aside rumors that he might have died from a botched medical procedure. Trump’s reaction was predictable, I suppose, given that the two of them reportedly are “in love” with each other.

Trump put out a Twitter message: “I, for one, am glad to see he is back and well!” OK. I’ll just add that I happen to have wished he had left this Earth … not that Kim’s death would make anything any better for North Korea.

It’s just that Kim Jong Un is a ruthless tyrant who allows mass starvation among his people while he lives in relative opulence and spends tons of money developing a nuclear arsenal, which he uses to threaten South Korea, Japan and, oh, yeah, the United States of America.

Trump wishes Kim well? They deserve each other.

national news

Bush calls for end to ‘partisanship’; Trump blasts Bush … wow!

Leave it to Donald John “Partisan Hack in Chief” Trump to find some way to trash a fellow Republican for saying what needed to be said about the political climate in light of the coronavirus pandemic.

Former President George W. Bush issued a video statement this weekend that called for an end to partisanship. “In the end we are not partisan combatants,” President Bush noted in his message about the fight against a shared “invisible enemy.” He said the pandemic only illustrates “how small” our political differences have become.

Trump, of course, fired back. He tweeted some idiocy about how Bush didn’t call for an end to partisanship while Trump was being impeached by the House of Representatives and put on trial by the Senate.

Here’s my guess on that: I am guessing that Bush believes that Trump should have been convicted of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress and removed from office. He just didn’t have the guts to say so out loud. Indeed, the former president’s silence during that entire ordeal spoke volumes to me.

However, the ex-president is correct to assert that the pandemic should overshadow partisan concerns. If only Donald Trump would understand the need to focus exclusively on a dire matter and ignore the partisanship that keeps getting in the way.

That won’t happen. Not with this president. Not … ever!

local news, Sports news

Looking toward a possible grim reality: no baseball in Amarillo

I am trying to equivocate as much as I can, using the word “possible” in front of “grim reality.”

I am fearing the worst for my former neighbors up yonder in Amarillo, where they are waiting for the start of the minor league season featuring the defending Texas League champion Amarillo Sod Poodles.

The worst is that there might not be a season to celebrate.

I watch the “Sod Squad” fan club on my Facebook page. It is full of hopeful statements from fans. I want their hope to be well-founded. I want them to be able to cheer the Sod Poodles into their second season in existence. Their first one was epic, winning the Texas League title against the defending champion Tulsa Drillers.

It’s just that the coronavirus pandemic has spooked athletic leagues and associations everywhere. Major League Baseball is trying to figure out how to play a 100-game schedule, how to split the two leagues into three divisions and how to play all their games in Florida, Arizona and Texas … with few if any fans watching in person.

Minor league ball isn’t that far along.

I want there to be baseball this spring and summer. I am leery of it returning this year given the loss of life that is occurring at this very moment.

The Sod Poodles have what must be one of the more devoted fan bases in all of minor league baseball. I love reading their Facebook posts. I draw from their enthusiasm.

Now that I live a good bit distant from Amarillo, I am hopeful to see the Sod Poodles play when they venture to nearby Frisco to play the Roughriders. Trust me when I say I would cheer loudly for them even as I am surrounded by Roughrider fans.

My gut is telling me it might not happen this year. Let’s start preparing for the worst.

media news, national news

‘I will never lie to you’

Kayleigh McEnany made news this week by answering a direct question with a remarkably direct response.

She is the fourth White House press secretary to work in the Donald Trump administration. The first three were doozies. Sean Spicer opened his tenure by arguing with reporters over their coverage of the inaugural crowd that greeted Trump’s presidency; Sarah Huckabee Sanders admitted to lying at times to the media; Stephanie Grisham never held a White House press briefing.

Now we have McEnany, who comes to the administration after serving as a Trump apologist on the Fox News Channel.

A reporter at McEnany’s initial press briefing got right to the point: Will you pledge to always tell the truth?

“I will never lie to you,” she answered.

Well now. Given that she works for the Liar in Chief, and given that lying often is essential to protecting his political standing — which is most important of all to Donald Trump — the press secretary has issued a mighty tall promise.

We all must hold her accountable for it.

medical news, national news

Can’t stop thinking about heroes among us

It’s not that I want to stop thinking about them, but my thoughts keep returning to the heroes among us, the folks we too often take for granted.

Once we get past the pandemic that has effectively shut down the Texas and national economies, I would hope that we never take for granted the individuals and groups of individuals we continually salute in this time of extreme peril.

You know who they are: doctors, nurses, paramedics, firefighters and police officers; they are grocery store clerks, lawn care crews, mechanics of all stripes; truck drivers, ambulance drivers, taxi drivers, armored vehicle drivers; they are teachers, school administrators, custodial staff members, librarians, cafeteria cooks, office personnel.

I want to mention, too, the media representatives who report the news to us, who deliver the images, write the words, provide context and who offer snippets of critical thinking that make us analyze how well or poorly our government at all levels is responding to our needs.

They might be your next-door neighbor or the family across the street or the folks around the corner.

We’ll get past this crisis eventually. I hope it is sooner rather than later. I fear that it might stick around for a whole lot longer than we would prefer.

I long have lamented the overuse of the term “hero.” We attach that form of high praise to individuals who don’t deserve it. The individuals and groups we see each day performing above and beyond what we normally expect of them qualify as heroes.

The reporting of the myriad heroic acts we see daily will stay with me for a long time. I hope they stay with me forever. I do not want to lose sight of the good that is arising from the tragedy that has claimed so many lives, sickened so many more of us and delivered misery to so many loved ones around the world.

We all need to do better at thanking them for the work they do … for all of us!

Donald Trump

Hoping to be able to look with respect again at president

We are enmeshed in a global health crisis the likes of which very few of us ever have witnessed.

The last global pandemic to sweep the planet occurred while the nation was fighting World War I and, yes, there are a small number of centenarians who have a fleeting memory of the measles pandemic that killed millions of Americans.

Still, we also are facing a presidential election near the end of this year. I am trying the best I can to look ahead without taking my eye off the current crisis that has killed nearly 70,000 Americans.

I am longing for a return to a time when I can look with respect at the president of the United States. The current president never has won my trust, so it is difficult to say he “lost” my trust during this crisis, given that there was no trust for Donald Trump to lose in the first place.

I want to be crystal clear. When I refer to “respect for the president,” I refer only to the individual who holds the office. I continue to revere the presidency. The office commands all our respect. However, when I look at the individual sitting in the office — now that he has demonstrated beyond all manner of doubt his unfitness for that office — I am filled with horror and dread.

The juxtaposition of the coronavirus pandemic and the upcoming election only pulls the two events into sharp relief.

Trump had the opportunity to rise to the level of a leader. He could have executed his duties as comforter, consoler, unifier. He has failed miserably on all three and then some! He casts the health crisis almost solely in economic terms, hoping for all he’s worth that the economy will rebound in time for Trump to reap some political reward.

This con man/carnival barker/charlatan/fraud offers next to zero words of comfort to those who suffer. Listen to his comments about how “no one is more concerned about the death” than he is; listen to him follow that with the very next sentence that says “by the same token, we have to worry” about the economy.

This guy sickens me.

I want the next election to give us a leader who can behave with dignity and grace. It looks as though Joe Biden will be Trump’s foe this fall. Fine. I’m all in … now! I wasn’t in the beginning of this campaign, but given what we are witnessing from the Liar in Chief, I most certainly have become what you might call a Bidenista.

Those critics of this blog will laugh with scorn at what I will say next, but … whatever. I am truly weary of speaking so ill of the president. I want to be able to speak with high praise of the individual who serves as our head of state.

The current individual just can’t cut it. Nor will he ever cut it.

national news

Governors offer different approaches to reopening their states

As I watch different coastal-state governors issue their orders on the best way to reopen their states in this age of the coronavirus pandemic, I sit back and wonder: Which is the best way to go?

Do we follow the Florida model set by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and go virtually all the way right now, including allowing folks back onto the beach? Or do we follow the West Coast model set by Govs. Gavin Newsom of California, Kate Brown of Oregon and Jay Inslee of Washington, all Democrats, and keep the states shut down for, oh, another month … or maybe longer?

My vision mirrors the Left Coasters. Thus, I am weary of another coastal-state governor, Greg Abbott, right here in Texas, and whether he is moving too quickly despite his assertion that he is taking a go-slow approach to re-start the state economy.

My wife and I have concluded that we are going to continue living as we have for the past six weeks: While we’re at home, we won’t go anywhere unless it’s to purchase groceries or fuel for our truck; when we see our granddaughter, it will be while observing social distancing. We want to be careful, hoping that the longer we hold out the better the chances that they’ll come up with (a) a drug that treats the disease quickly or (b) a vaccine that makes us all immune to the killer virus. Just so you know, we are hauling our fifth wheel out and will take it to a state park in Oklahoma; while we’re there, we will live like the hermits we’ve been while sitting in our house.

I do not want to rush into anything. Period!

I never imagined that the discussion over the battle against this viral infection would devolve into yet another partisan battle. But it has.

Democrats and progressives favor a stricter approach to relaxing the restrictions. Republicans and conservatives seem to favor a quicker return to what they think is “normal,” hoping the economy bounces back and, oh yeah, helps Donald Trump win re-election.

Is there a closeted desire among Democrats to see Trump suffer politically because of the way he has mishandled the response and the economic disaster that mishandling has exacerbated? Oh, yes. For sure. However, I am not going to adopt the cynical view that progressive want to see more people suffer economically just because it reflects badly on the Liar in Chief.

Even if the economy recovers, there remains plenty of ammo to toss at Trump and his bungling, stumbling and incoherent response to the crisis as it developed.

He saw it coming and did nothing … until it was too late.

And so, here we are. Some states are moving rapidly to return to normal. Others are taking it slow. I will follow the go-slow approach, even if my state speeds up its reopening plan.

medical news, national news

‘Counterproductive’ to hear from expert on COVID-19? How so?

I believe I know how the White House defines as “counterproductive” any testimony before a congressional committee by a leading infectious disease expert on the fight to curb infection brought by the coronavirus.

Dr. Anthony Fauci won’t talk to the House Appropriations Committee next week. The White House has blocked him, calling his testimony “counterproductive.” The meaning there is that Fauci might testify with language that doesn’t heap flattery all over Donald J. Trump, therefore, it is counterproductive … in the White House view of things.

Oh, but Fauci will talk the next week to the Senate, which is controlled by Trump’s fellow Republicans. Yes, the House is in the hands of Democrats.

Counterproductive? Yep. That’s it. Right there.

The White House insists it isn’t muzzling Fauci. They aren’t seeking to silence the physician/scientist/researcher who’s been known since the outbreak of the viral infection to contradict statements delivered by the Stable Genius in Chief.

You can’t have that. You can’t have an actual expert telling us the truth to countermand the fiction and the lies being put forth by the liar masquerading as the president of the United States.