Tag Archives: US Constitution

military news

We are witnessing an unprecedented rebellion

Don’t accuse me of overstatement, because I believe in what I am about to pronounce.

It is that we are witnessing an unprecedented rebellion among former general-grade military officers who once worked at the highest levels of the chain of command. They are rebelling against the astonishing ignorance of the current commander in chief.

The first of them to speak out is the former defense secretary and retired Marine Corps general, James Mattis. He has accused Donald John Trump of being a threat to the U.S. Constitution. He said he is witnessing for the first time in his storied military career a president who is making no effort to unite the country, but is working diligently to divide it.

Then came the endorsement of Mattis’s comment from another retired Marine general, former White House chief of staff John Kelly.

Then we heard from retired Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff along with another Joint Chiefs chairman, retired Admiral Michael Mullen. They, too, are appalled at Trump.

Joining them was the former Admiral William McRaven, the special operations command boss who coordinated the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden. He blasted Trump over his clearing the streets of peaceful protesters so he could stage that hideous photo op in front of St. John Episcopal Church … when he held the Bible in front of the boarded-up house of worship that had been damaged by rioters.

Current Joint Chiefs Chairman Army Gen. Mark Milley and current Defense Secretary Mark Esper have bolted from Trump’s decision to send active-duty military personnel into our cities to put down protesters rallying to decry police brutality in the wake of George Floyd’s hideous death at the hands of rogue cops.

The custom has been for retired general-grade officers to keep their political views to themselves. Since custom has been tossed aside by Trump, then I left to presume the former officers feel unrestrained these days from speaking their minds.

All of this, these men say, is antithetical to the very notion of our Constitution, of the principles on which the founders created this nation. The president seeks to dispatch members of the world’s most destructive, most lethal military force to work against citizens who are guaranteed constitutionally the right to seek redress of government policy.

Yep, we have a dangerous man at the helm.

national news

Gen. Mattis unloads on Trump … yes!

What do you suppose will be Donald John “Stable Genius” Trump’s response to criticism leveled at him by a man generally viewed as one of the few bright lights of the president’s administration?

This comes from former Defense Secretary James Mattis, who said in a statement to reporters: “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people — does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership.”

Is this the ranting of a “loser”? Of a “low-IQ” rat? Or of someone who is disloyal to the president and the country he served with honor and distinction while wearing a Marine uniform?

Mattis, a retired Marine Corps general who is revered by the men and women who served under his command, has spoken out eloquently and forcefully at what he has witnessed — along with the rest of us — in the conduct of the commander in chief.

Mattis has said that Trump is violating Americans’ constitutional rights by using military troops to curtail peaceful protests in the wake of the George Floyd killing by four cops in Minneapolis. The nation has erupted in indignation over the perception of widespread police brutality. Trump’s emphasis has been on ending the protests, which have become violent in many cities.

Mattis is concerned that Trump is trampling over citizens’ civil liberties.

Trump’s ham-handed response to the protests drew Mattis’s specific condemnation. As Politico reported: Mattis called the decision to clear protesters in Lafayette Square an “abuse of executive authority” and said that Americans should “reject and hold accountable those in office who would make a mockery of our Constitution.”

Donald Trump’s response to this criticism no doubt is going to reveal the shallowness and emptiness of the president. I’ll stand with Gen. Mattis, who I consider to be a patriot and a statesman.

national news

Get the kid off the stage

Jared Kushner clearly married “up,” if you presume becoming a member of the Donald John Trump family constitutes a sort of promotion.

The young man’s father-in-law is now the president of the United States. Trump had the bad taste to place Kushner in the role of “senior adviser,” even though the kid has no experience advising anyone of anything, especially when it concerns high-level federal policy.

Kushner needs to fade away, far from the klieg lights. Off the stage. Gone, man!

He isn’t qualified to do anything of importance. For example …

He hinted just this week that there might be a reason — if the coronavirus pandemic isn’t arrested — to delay the date of the presidential election. To be fair, he backed away from what he implied. Still, Kushner seemed to suggest in the first instance that he was offering a belief on something about which he has zero authority, let alone any knowledge.

This boy wonder has been put in charge of cobbling together a comprehensive Middle East peace deal. He hasn’t made the grade. He also has been tasked with reforming government operations. No good there, either. Then he declared the other day that Daddy-in-Law Trump’s pandemic response has been a “great success story.” Seriously, Jared? Sheesh!

The Constitution declares that the presidential election must occur on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. This year it’s Nov. 3. The question will be the manner in which we cast our ballots. Moving the date is a non-starter.

Someone should inform Jared Kushner of that fact, which has been as lost on him as it has on his know-nothing father-in-law.

International news

Canadian PM acts decisively on guns; no 2nd Amendment to block him

What has just occurred in Canada cannot happen in the United States of America, but I have to tell you that I wish somehow that we could follow the Canadian model on how to stem gun violence.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced an immediate ban on the sale and use of assault-style weapons in the wake of a Nova Scotia shooting that killed 22 victims in April.

That means you can’t own an AR-15, or an M-16 or an AK-47. Period.

As The Associated Press reported: “Canadians need more than thoughts and prayers,” he said, rejecting the reaction of many politicians after mass shootings.

Trudeau cited numerous mass shootings in the country, including the rampage that killed 22 in Nova Scotia April 18 and 19. He announced the ban of over 1,500 models and variants of assault-style firearms, including two guns used by the gunman as well as the AR-15 and other weapons that have been used in a number of mass shootings in the United States.

I am left to say, merely, “Wow!”

The Canadians don’t have a constitution that contains an amendment that guarantees that the “right to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.” That gives the prime minister a clear path to take unilateral action.

Spare me the dogma associated with gun-owner rights. I do not want to move to Canada. I am a proud American patriot who believes in the U.S. Constitution, including the Second Amendment that guarantees gun ownership.

However, I remain baffled, bamboozled and blown away (no pun intended) by our inability to legislate any kind of modest gun reform that could prevent the sort of carnage through which we suffer with alarming frequency.

The AP reports: Trudeau said the weapons were designed for one purpose and one purpose only: to kill the largest number of people in the shortest amount of time.

“Today we are closing the market for military-grade assault weapons in Canada,” he said.

Owners of these weapons use them for that purpose here, as well, yet our political structure is hamstrung by fealty to the Second Amendment and the inability or unwillingness of politicians to buck the gun lobby.

But here we are with two nations of comparable physical size, but with huge differences in population. They also are governed by vastly different documents and precepts.

We need not be held hostage in this country by gun lobbyists. I continue to believe there exists a legislative solution to gun violence that keeps faith with what the founders wrote when they drafted the Second Amendment to our beloved Constitution.

national news

Pandemic turns traditional political dogma upside down

Do you want another goofy example of how political norms can be twisted beyond all recognition?

Consider this: Conservatives for decades have been fond of relying on the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as an argument against ham-handed federal intervention. The amendment reads: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Got that? Good!

These days, though, we hear progressives/liberals holding up the 10th Amendment against what they determine to be Donald Trump’s ham-handedness in dealing with the coronavirus pandemic.

You see, Trump declared that as president he has “sole authority” to order state governors to relax restrictions they have placed on residents of their states. I should point out that Trump has reneged a bit on that bodacious assertion. Still, it’s out there.

The reality, though, is quite different as explained in the10th Amendment. The president has no authority over health issues per se. That authority rests in state capitols. Trump, though, believes he can just tell the governors what to do and that they are obligated to do what he says.

Oh, no.

Governors, mostly Democrats among them, are quick to remind Trump that he was elected “president” and not anointed “king” in 2016. Therefore, he is restricted by the Constitution’s clearly written limits on executive power.

Yes, the Donald Trump Era has changed many once-staid political norms. It’s how he fashioned the presidency once he took office. He’s fine with ruffling it all up, or so he implies.

Except that the U.S. Constitution is a document that shouldn’t be trifled with. The founders got it mostly right when they drafted it in the late 18th century. Yes, they’ve done some tinkering with it over the many years since the nation’s founding.

The 10th Amendment, though, is written with as much clarity as any of those amendments that spell out our Bill of Rights. The only difference these days is the change in those who support and those who oppose its message.

State news

Gov. Abbott needs to defend Texas

I know what I am about to ask will be tantamount to waiting for hell to freeze over, but it’s worth asking anyway.

When are you going to challenge Donald Trump’s profound ignorance of the U.S. Constitution, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, and defend for your own executive authority as governor of one of our 50 United States?

There the president was on Monday, proclaiming that he has “absolute authority” to order states to relax their own governor’s executive orders issued in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Trump declared that he makes the call as president of the United States, that he can dictate when the country can get back to business as usual.

Meanwhile, some governors — almost all of them Democrats — have begun to push back on that. Chief among them is New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who has emerged as the real political superstar in this drama while he deals with the death and illness brought to his state by the pandemic. Cuomo reminded Trump that he is an “elected president” and is not a king.

Oh, and where is Abbott? The Republican governor is silent … so far. Good grief. He knows better than to accept Donald Trump’s ridiculous assertion of “absolute authority.” Abbott took an oath to defend the Constitution when he became governor in 2015. Indeed, he is lawyer, a former trial judge in Houston, a former Texas Supreme Court justice and a former Texas attorney general. He knows the law.

Federal law — along with the 10th Amendment to the Constitution — do not allow the president to intercede in such a ham-handed fashion.

Abbott is planning to release his own directive later this week on how he intends to proceed with possible relaxation of stay at home guidelines for Texans. Trump in effect has declared that Abbott’s pending announcement is irrelevant, that the president can exert whatever authority he deems fit to force states to follow his bidding.

He does not have that authority.

Gov. Abbott needs to make that fact abundantly clear to the ignoramus who is posing as president of the United States.

national news

No one expects perfection, but … c’mon!

A family member of mine — someone with whom I joust occasionally about the president of the United States — says that no one could have responded to the coronavirus pandemic perfectly.

I guess that is his way of suggesting that Donald Trump has done the best he could do and that we should appreciate all he’s done in the wake of the crisis that has killed thousands of Americans.

I need to respond briefly to my dear family member.

He is correct in suggesting that perfection is too high a hurdle to clear in times like this. Indeed, I haven’t heard a single Trump critic say that the president should have or could have responded perfectly. What I do hear are concerns about the utter incompetence of his response and that he failed to respond immediately to the very beginning of the crisis as it developed.

Trump’s downplaying of the crisis severity initially is what slowed the national response. Of that there can be little doubt, and yet he told us he responded “perfectly.” He used that word, as if to compare it to that infamous phone call he made in June 2019 to the Ukraine president. It was Trump, no one else, who ascribed perfection to a national response that was far from it.

I am never going to say that a fallible human being — even the president of the United States — is going to do anything with utter and absolute perfection. The very nature of our humanity accepts that all of us make mistakes.

I should add, too, that the framers of our nation’s government stated in the preamble to our U.S. Constitution that they intended to “form a more perfect Union.” You see, even those great men knew that absolute perfection was unattainable even in creating this marvelous governing document.

I have not expected perfection from our president in his handling of this monumental crisis … but I damn sure expected a lot better than what we’ve gotten so far.

legal news

Judges seek permission to violate their oaths of office

Two Texas judges, Brian K. Umphress in Jack County and Diane Hensley in McLennan County, are suing the state because their religious faith compels them to refuse to perform same-sex marriages.

Hmm. OK. Let me pose this question: What part of the oath of office you took that says you shall obey all the laws of the state and be faithful to the U.S. Constitution don’t you understand? 

These individuals both swore to uphold the secular laws of the counties they were elected to govern. The oath demands that they are faithful to those laws. It makes no mention of their religious beliefs or gives them any room to say, “Well, I’ll obey only those laws that do not conflict with my faith.”

This is nonsense.

Both of these judges are empowered by the Texas Constitution to perform marriage ceremonies. The Constitution, though, does not require them to perform every single service that shows up on their agenda.

These individuals have sued the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct, which has sanctioned them for refusing to perform the duties to which they swore their oath. The Dallas Morning News reports, by the way, that even though Umphress presides over the Jack County Commissioners Court, he is not a “law judge.”

Justice of the Peace Hensley also is empowered to perform marriages. She has refused for the same reason that Umphress cites. I should tell her the same thing: Such empowerment is not a requirement.

Both of these folks can hand those duties off to other duly empowered county officials if they cannot in good faith perform that duty.

I also need to remind them both — although they know it already — that the U.S. Supreme Court, citing its belief in the equal protection clause in the U.S. Constitution, has declared gay marriage to be legal in all 50 states. 

If the laws of the land do not comport with these judges’ religious beliefs, then they shouldn’t be serving in their respective public offices.

media news

Media earn a shout out on pandemic coverage

I imagine you’ve heard the gripes, mostly from conservatives, who bitch about the media coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.

They complain that the media are covering this matter so intensely for the so political harm to Donald John Trump

Their complaints are without basis. They are dubious in the extreme.

The media have done a spectacular job covering this crisis. And it is a crisis, no matter how many times some of our political leaders — such as The Donald — might seek to understate its impact on the world.

The media coverage arc has tracked like many of these events often do: They report on an incident, give it the attention it deserves; they follow its progression, then report on increases of incidents; then the story explodes when governments start reacting to the increasing instances of illness … and death.

The World Health Organization has weighed in with a declaration that the coronavirus outbreak has reached pandemic status, which quite obviously is a major development. The media have covered the WHO involvement carefully and thoroughly.

What’s more, the media have explored the nuts and bolts, the ins and outs, the zigs and zags of this issue from damn near every angle imaginable. There are quite likely to be even more angles to cover.

As for the political impact, well, let me just declare that the media only have reported the stumbles, bumbles, bungles that have come from the U.S. government’s highest levels. There can be no way for the media to paper it over. Has it harmed Donald Trump? Yes, more than likely. Is it the media’s fault? Hell no! The media are simply the messengers delivering the news.

So it has gone. The media are charged with the responsibility of chronicling what government does for us … and to us. The Constitution protects the rights of a “free press” and the media seek to be true to the document that informs government that it cannot interfere with or manipulate them.

The media will continue to do their job as the pandemic likely worsens. They will report to the world what they see without regard to the political consequences, which are of no concern to journalists who simply are doing their job.

political news

Time to ‘re-defeat’ Donald Trump?

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A late friend of mine in Amarillo, William H. “Buddy” Seewald, once told me during the 2004 presidential election season that he was working to “re-defeat” President George W. Bush.

Seewald was appalled at the manner in which Bush was elected in 2000, losing the actual vote by roughly 500,000 ballots but winning the presidency in the Electoral College by a vote of 271-266; and that vote came after the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to stop recounting the ballots cast in Florida, giving Bush a 537-vote margin out of more than 5 million ballots cast in that state.

Well, Bush won the 2004 election by a relatively comfortable margin.

Now comes the 2020 election and there well might be a revival of the “re-defeat” mantra, this time against Donald John Trump, the current president.

You see, Trump actually lost the vote to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who collected just short of 3 million more ballots than did the guy who “won” the election. Trump won the Electoral College by a 306-232 count; when the electors cast their ballots in December 2016, the final tally ended up at 304-227, with some electors voting for other candidates rather than the two major-party contestants.

What has gotten lost in all the hubbub surrounding that election is that Clinton actually finished where almost all the public opinion polls said she would. She finished with 48.02 percent of the vote, compared to Trump, who collected 45.93 percent.

All the pre-election polling pegged Clinton ahead by about the margin where she finished ahead of Trump. The difference came when Trump narrowly picked off those three states — Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — that Barack Obama had won in 2008 and2012; those stated provide Trump with the Electoral College majority he needed to win the election.

I don’t dispute that Trump was elected according to the U.S. Constitution. Nor do I dispute the notion to which I subscribe that he needs to be “re-defeated” in 2020.

Wherever he is, I am certain my friend Buddy Seewald would agree.