Bergdahl may prove to be biggest mistake

Bowe Bergdahl is accused of deserting his post and his comrades when he was captured by the Taliban.

The Army sergeant then was released in a five-for-one swap: five Taliban senior officials for one American soldier.

Bergdahl came home, went to the White House and was hailed as a “hero” by President Obama.

No matter how this matter plays out — if Bergdahl is acquitted or convicted — the episode might stand as one of the president’s most embarrassing moments.

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/jason-amerine-army-whistleblower-testimony-bowe-bergdahl-118588.html?hp=l2_4

It is my fervent hope that one day the president — even if it’s after he leaves office in less than two years — will explain to Americans whether he harbors any regret regarding the now-overblown reaction to Bergdah’s release.

This matter is troubling on at least two levels.

One is that we gave up five known terrorists — and I will refer to the Taliban as “terrorists,” even though the White House won’t go there — for one soldier.

The other is that we negotiated with the terrorists, despite our stated policy of “never negotiating” with terrorist organizations.

Bergdah’s future remains undecided. I hope we learn that he didn’t actually commit an act of desertion. I hope we can learn that it was some sort of terrible error on his part, and that he left his post and that he blundered his way into Taliban captivity.

No matter how it turns out, the young man appears to be far less heroic than when he was set free.

And the president of the United States should feel embarrassed.

 

Hastert scandal drips with irony

If you think for a moment about the scandal involving former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, you come away scratching your head at the incredible irony.

A grand jury has indicted Hastert on charges that he spent money illegally to keep someone quiet about an alleged sexual encounter between Hastert and the then-student at the high school where Hastert was a teacher and a coach.

That part of it is weird enough.

But consider the context of the time he was selected to become speaker of the House of Representatives.

* The House had impeached President Clinton for lying to a federal grand jury about an extramarital dalliance he was having with a White House intern.

* The then-speaker, Newt Gingrich, who railed incessantly against the president for his moral failings, resigned from public office after it was revealed that he, too, was fooling around with a woman who wasn’t his wife.

* Up stepped Rep. Bob Livingston, who was set to become speaker. But oops! He dropped the effort because he also was involved in an extramarital affair.

Man, sex was in the air.

Then came the Boy Scout, Denny Hastert. He was chosen to become speaker — and the first person, after the vice president, in line of succession to the presidency of the United States of America.

I guess they didn’t vet him at all, let alone thoroughly.

Thus, the irony.

Feeling badly about scolding Obama

Let’s assume for a moment that my prediction that Donald Trump won’t run for president next year turns out to be wrong.

If he does declare his candidacy, I might be forced to eat some crow regarding my recent scolding of President Obama for using the first-person singular pronoun too liberally while accepting credit for the good things he’s done as president.

Barack Obama is a piker compared to The Donald.

Trump told the Des Moines Register that he’s the “most successful candidate ever to run” for president. He declared “the American dream is dead,” and then said he’d bring it back all my himself. He said he’d wipe out the Islamic State quickly and its elimination would be a “beautiful thing.”

Sheesh!

Can this guy really and truly be serious? Is he really, honestly going to run for president and use his immense personal wealth as a reason to elect him?

Mr. President, I don’t want to take back what I said, but I will if Donald Trump declares his intention to succeed you in the White House.

My head is about to explode.

 

A more relevant question regarding Hastert

A blog that I follow, Bell Book Candle, has offered an interesting question regarding the growing scandal involving former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert.

Hastert has been indicted on felony accusations involving sexual abuse of a student back when Hastert was a wrestling coach at an Illinois high school.

The media need to focus not on the sex, but on the money. According to the blog:

“The media will focus on Dennis Hastert’s past indiscretions if they are of a sexual nature. However, the real question that they should be asking is how a relatively obscure public servant can afford to pay $3,500,000 to buy the silence of one person. Our politics and our politicians are being corrupted by the huge amounts of cash available to them. We must rid our democracy of the ability of some to buy favoritism for themselves, be they corporations or be they the 1%.”

The media won’t trouble themselves quite so much with the money part of this matter.

As the saying goes: Sex sells.

However, money does have a corrupting influence at many levels involving those who make public policy.

This is one of the stranger stories I’ve heard in many years.

A big part of me hopes that it doesn’t pan out. A bigger part, though, fears that it will.

 

Take this vow from Patrick with much salt

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick says he’ll never run for governor against Greg Abbott.

Not only that, he says he’s not going to run for governor ever.

http://www.texastribune.org/2015/06/01/patrick-im-not-running-against-abbott-2018/

Do I believe him? Is this the final word on the subject?

I remain a bit dubious about this disavowal of any further political ambition. As for the finality, do not bet anything, not a nickel, that we’ve heard the last of it.

As lieutenant governor, Patrick presides over the Texas Senate. As governor, Abbott is the state’s chief executive. Patrick’s conservative agenda is well-known. So is his rather meteoric temperament. Abbott’s conservative credentials also are beyond question. However, there are times when he doesn’t seem as fervently conservative as Patrick.

I hear what Patrick says today about his political ambition. However, these things can and do change.

There’s just something about Patrick that makes me wonder whether he’s telling us the whole truth.

The late U.S. Sen. Lloyd Bentsen once told me he wouldn’t accept a vice-presidential spot on the Democratic Party ticket in 1988. Then he did.

The late U.S. Sen. Robert Kennedy said he wouldn’t seek the presidency in 1968. Then he did.

I believe Dan Patrick is capable of changing his mind.

 

Welcome back, High Noon on Square

Downtown Amarillo’s future is getting a bit cloudier as we start looking a little farther out.

Back to the present day, though. High Noon on the Square begins Wednesday in front of the Potter County Courthouse. It’s a fine event, bringing folks out of their offices during lunch time to get something to eat and listen to some entertainment for an hour before heading back to whatever grind awaits them.

My friend Beth Duke, who runs the Center City program, is proud of it and I am proud of her for the work she’s done to make this a bustling event over the course of several weeks.

It’s fair to ask, however: Is this the best we can do?

I do intend to disparage High Noon. I do, though, intend to express the hope out loud that downtown Amarillo’s future includes far more than just a brief weekly interlude on the courthouse lawn.

I’m referring to that proposed multipurpose event venue that’s becoming part of the city dialogue relating to downtown’s revival. There might be an election in our future to determine whether to proceed with its construction. Money to pay for it will come from individuals who visit here from far away: I refer to hotel-motel tax revenue. The plan is to welcome them downtown as they attend conventions and other events.

The MPEV well might be a venue that could play host to a number of outdoor events.

Planners envision a minor-league baseball playing games at the MPEV. They also envision other events occurring at the place. A baseball club could have a modern park in which to play ball, rather than at that rat hole that serves as a ballpark at the Tri-State Fairgrounds east of the downtown district.

I try to envision more for downtown. The proposed MPEV, plus a convention hotel can be serve as twin catalysts for whatever future awaits the central business district.

That is, of course, unless the newly constituted City Council — and its three new members — decide to torpedo the whole thing. The election result suggests that’s a definite possibility — but I believe it would be a tragic mistake.

Meantime, we’ve got High Noon on the Square.

That’s it.

Hey, go out there and enjoy yourself. Then ask yourself: Is this the best it’s ever going to get in Amarillo?

 

JFK would be a Republican … and Ike would be a Democrat

Ted Cruz says John F. Kennedy would be a Republican.

The U.S. senator from Texas, and a GOP candidate for president, said there’s “no room” in today’s Democratic Party for a tax-cutter like JFK.

Really? And in my view Dwight Eisenhower would be laughed out of the Republican Party today. It was Ike, you’ll recall, who warned us during his farewell message as president in 1960 of the “military-industrial complex” and the danger of making it too powerful.

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/ted-cruz-believes-jfk-would-be-republican-today?cid=sm_tw_msnbc

How would that fly today in the world of the neocons who relish the idea of going to war rather than solving problem through diplomacy?

Cruz, though, I believe offers an incorrect attribution to a famous political quote from the 1960s — which was before Cruz was born.

According to Cruz: “I would point out that in the 1960s, one of the most powerful, eloquent defenders of tax cuts was John F. Kennedy. As JFK said, ‘Some men see things as they are and ask why; I see things that never were and ask why not.’”

Actually, senator, that observation came from another famous Democrat, U.S. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, who recited that mantra as he campaigned for the presidency in 1968.

Yes, the parties have changed since those days.

Let’s not single out one politician and one political party. If you look at the bigger picture, you’ll also find that today’s Republican Party isn’t very welcoming either to those who saw the world differently than many see it today.

 

Downtown momentum facing serious trouble

Amarillo’s downtown revival might be heading for the cliff.

Here’s what I’ve heard just in recent days.

The city is going to fill the final spot on the City Council when it conducts a runoff election for Place 4 between Mark Nair and Steve Rogers. Nair, who finished first in the May 9 election, is considered the favorite. He’s a bright young man, who happens to believe voters should decide whether to build the multipurpose event venue planned for construction on a now-vacant lot just south of City Hall.

Two other brand new council members, Elisha Demerson and Randy Burkett, have taken office. They are sounding as if they, too, want to put the issue to a vote.

If Nair defeats Steve Rogers in the runoff, that means the council will have three members who want voters to decide this issue; the council comprises five members, so … there’s your majority.

The city says the MPEV will be paid with hotel-motel tax revenue. Why that revenue stream? Because the city also is planning to construct a convention hotel, which also will be paid with private investment money — and which will generate more tax revenue, and a parking garage, also financed with private investors.

The so-called “catalyst” project is the MPEV, according to City Hall officials. If the MPEV isn’t built, then nothing else happens. The developer who wants to build the Embassy Suites hotel complex will back out; the parking garage doesn’t get built.

The city is then left with, well, nothing!

Years of planning, cajoling, discussion, debate and negotiation will be flushed down the proverbial drain.

Amarillo, then, as a leading City Hall official told me this morning, will become as the cantankerous oilman T. Boone Pickens once described it: A glorified truck stop.

I happen to remain committed to the concept that’s been developed by planners, city leaders and local businessmen and women. The MPEV, or “ballpark,” will tie itself to the hotel, which will be linked with the parking garage.

But some folks somehow think the MPEV is a lemon. They believe the city needs to invest first in improvements to the Civic Center.

Do they actually understand that Civic Center improvements — which would cost more than the three-pronged construction project already on the table — is going to require more public money, meaning more tax revenue, meaning more money out of their pocket?

City officials have told me they plan to improve the Civic Center eventually. They remain confident in the results that will come from the rest of the projects that already have been set in motion.

Let’s also understand one final point.

A citywide referendum would be a non-binding vote. The city isn’t required by law to abide by the results of such an election, any more than it was bound by the 1996 vote to sell Northwest Texas Hospital to a private health care provider. The city did the right thing, though, in ratifying the results of that hospital sale vote. To do otherwise would been to commit political suicide.

Such would be the case if an MPEV referendum went badly for the city and the council ignored the voters’ wishes.

There had better be some serious soul-searching as the city prepares to take the next big steps.

Either it revives downtown, or it doesn’t.

If it’s the latter, well, let us just kiss the future goodbye.

 

Speaking in the first person … singular

President Obama can take credit for a lot of good things that have happened while he’s been living and working in the White House.

But as the short video attached to this blog post indicates, he seems all too willing to take all the credit.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2015/06/01/obama_under_my_leadership_the_united_states_is_the_most_respected_country_on_earth.html

Readers of this blog know that I’ve been a strong supporter of Barack Obama’s work to fix what was ailing the country when he took office. I hope those who’ve read it over the years also will understand that I bristle when he keeps using the first person singular pronoun when he speaks of the good things that have occurred.

The president took some questions at the White House and, by gosh, he did it again. He kept using the words “I” and “me” and “my” when referencing the positive accomplishments of the presidency.

“On my watch” the United States is the most respected nation on Earth, he said. “I” fixed the auto industry, he said. “I” got the country working again, he added.

Mr. President, you are part of a team that, yes, you assembled. But you all have worked together to do these things. Isn’t that correct?

President Nixon had an equally annoying habit of referring to himself in the third person. “The president” has the power to do certain things that others don’t have, he would say. Nixon’s use of the third person became prevalent during the Watergate scandal and it chapped my hide royally every time I heard him say it.

I recall something President Reagan once said. I am paraphrasing it here, but he said something about not caring “who took the credit” for positive outcomes. On the flip side, I recall him saying that “mistakes were made” during the Iran-Contra scandal that embarrassed him and his team — as he lapsed into that maddening passive-voice verbiage so common among politicians who refuse to take full responsibility for the policies that go wrong.

It’s fine for the current president to take credit as well for the plus side of his time in office. I just wish he’d be willing to acknowledge publicly, out loud, so everyone can hear it, that it’s a team effort.

How about a little more “we,” “us,” and “our,” Mr. President?

 

‘Protecting the homeland’?

Forgive me, please, for expressing this, but Jeb Bush might be suffering from brotherly-love blindness.

He was questioned by Bob Schieffer on CBS’s “Face the Nation” news talk show.

Schieffer asked the former Florida governor and likely 2016 Republican presidential candidate what he learned from his brother, former President George W. Bush.

“Well, the successes clearly are protecting the homeland,” the former Florida governor opined. “We were under attack, and he unified the country, and he showed dogged determination, and he kept us safe.”

And he kept us safe. He said that.

OK, let’s reel this back a bit. The 9/11 attacks occurred on President Bush’s watch, which Jeb has acknowledged. It’s been reported from various sources that the president likely ignored warnings from his national security team that a major attack was imminent. He was briefed by his predecessor, Bill Clinton, about the threat that al-Qaeda posed.

And yet …

The attack occurred on that bright Tuesday morning in New York and Washington.

President Bush “kept us safe”?

Yes, but only after all hell broke loose.