Tag Archives: MAGA

national news, political news

This is it, Nikki Haley!

If I were a betting man — and I am not — I would suggest that Nikki Haley is facing the breaking point in her attempt to win the Republican presidential nomination.

She once served as governor of South Carolina. She was popular, too. It’s different these days. She is running for POTUS against a fellow Republican who once held the office. He’s favored to win the upcoming GOP primary contest.

Therefore, Haley is facing her Waterloo, her Little Big Horn, her Alamo. She’s got to win on Feb. 24 … or else.

The “or else” means she’s in a futile fight. The GOP frontrunner can all but cinch the nomination if his poll numbers hold up in the Palmetto State.

It galls me to say such a thing, given how much I detest the moron who’s on track for a third straight presidential run.

However, Nikki Haley must be realistic. It’s now or never!

national news

Not understanding this … at all!

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I will go to my grave likely never coming to grips with the political phenomenon that continues to play out as the 2024 presidential campaign starts to ramp up.

We have an incumbent president, Joe Biden, sitting on one of the healthiest economies in nearly a generation. Yet he stands in danger of losing his re-election bid.

To whom? Possibly his immediate predecessor who was impeached twice by the House, who has been indicted four times by state and federal grand juries, who continues to defame his foes and who is preparing to stand trial for felony counts brought against him.

The confusion? I cannot fathom in my wildest dreams how this ex-POTUS continues to hold sway with Americans.

In an earlier era, Republican voters and political leaders never would have tolerated the behavior of an individual who they are poised to nominate for a second run as POTUS. He admits to cheating on his wives; he said he could date his daughter, who he described as being “hot.” He called John McCain a hero “only because he was captured (during the Vietnam War); I like people who aren’t captured.” He denigrated a physically challenged reporter and said he could grab women by their private parts because he’s a “celebrity.”

Nope. I’ll never understand what bounces around in the noggins of those who suggest that their guy can fix this nation.

Somewhere there must be a political sanity god who can guide this nation away from the madness that this guy represents.

legal news, national news

Founders weren’t ‘perfect’

Our nation’s Constitution has become the subject of considerable discussion in recent years as politicians seek ways to sidle up to what they believe the nation’s founders intended when they wrote it.

I never have considered myself to be a constitutional expert. However, I long ago appreciated the brilliant rhetoric the founders used to frame the document that has become the model for much of the rest of the world.

The Constitution’s very first sentence lays down the predicate for what has followed. The founders wrote: “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union … “

We’ll stop there. You do realize, I hope, what I believe to be the three most critical words in our governing document: “more perfect Union.”

Our founders knew from the get-go that forming a “perfect Union” was way beyond their reach. They knew that perfection was unattainable.

I mean, we have amended the Constitution 27 times since its ratification in 1789. One of the amendments was enacted to overturn a previous amendment that turned out to be a monumental failure.

The 18th Amendment — ratified on Jan. 16, 1919 — sought to make the production, sale and consumption of liquor illegal. It didn’t take long for politicians to realize the mistake they made. On Dec. 5, 1933, Americans ratified the 21st Amendment, which repealed the 18th Amendment.

Where am I going with this? I am trying to understand what the founders intended  when –having won our nation’s independence after the Revolution — they crafted what I believe to be a “living document” that is subject to change, reform and improvement.

Indeed, the founders likely expected the Constitution to need improvement when they inserted the word “more” just ahead of “perfect” when they signed off on the greatest governing framework in world history.

Those who insist on following “original intent” so many years later, or proclaim themselves to be “constitutional conservatives,” should take heed of what I believe the founders intended.

national news, political news

Haley gets her wish … hold on!

Nikki Haley has been saying lately that she wants to go head-to-head with the Republican Party’s leading presidential candidate.

Well, as of today she got her wish when Florida Gov. DeSantis — once hailed as the lone alternative to the former Liar in Chief — folded up his campaign tent and then endorsed the guy he refused to take on with stern rhetoric.

Haley’s first big effort lines up in just a couple of days when New Hampshire Republicans go to the polls and cast real votes for the candidate of their choice. Haley, the former South Carolina governor and one-time U.N. ambassador, or the guy who appointed her as our envoy to the U.N.

I have no particular preference, other than to somehow ensure that the former POTUS never darkens the door in the West Wing ever again.

My personal desire when all the votes are counted in November is to see President Biden on the job for the next four years. As if you didn’t already know that.

Haley has been regurgitating some rhetoric repeatedly, saying that “rightly or wrongly, he brings chaos.” Well, duh! Someone will have to explain what she means by “rightly or wrongly.” How is it “right” for a leading politician to foment “chaos” wherever he goes?

I guess Haley doesn’t want to piss off the cult followers of her foe too much.

Whatever. It is now Haley vs. the pol who confuses her with Nancy Pelosi, who says he ran against Barack Obama, and who says Joe Biden is going to lead us into World War II. Spoiler alert: He didn’t run against the 44th president and we already fought — and won! — World War II.

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One more thing. Perhaps you are noticing I refuse to mention the GOP frontrunner by name. I won’t, at least for a while. I am sick of seeing his name in print and hearing it on the air.

media news

Cynicism takes over

Far too many of my former journalism colleagues have conflated two terms in describing their reasons for becoming reporters.

They have told me they are “cynical” by nature and their “cynicism” makes them fit for the craft they pursued. I prefer another term in describing why we pursue that line of work.

That term is “skeptic,” or “skeptical,” or “skepticism.”

It’s easy to become cynical, particularly these days, when covering politics or reporting on policy decisions. I want to point y’all to the words and actions of the immediate past POTUS.

Skeptical reporters no doubt have grown cynical over the way the e-POTUS lies and is able to get away with it. Their task when covering this guy is to prevent their cynicism from infecting the tone of their coverage of his coming and going.

I offer the notion that it’s OK to look at what he says and the actions he takes with a huge dose of skepticism. It’s what good journalists always should do. Take it from me also that the world of journalism contains a many solid reporters who take seriously their pledge to cover their subjects fairly.

Even as they look with intense — but healthy — skepticism at what these pols are saying.

crime news

DOJ report: Police failed miserably in Uvalde

Words fail me at this moment as I ponder the release of a nearly 600-page report chronicling the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde.

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland told the world Thursday of a systematic failure — from top to bottom — of the police response to the massacre of 19 children and two educators.

For 77 interminable minutes the cops did nothing while an 18-year-old lunatic was holed up in the school … and murdering children and the teachers who sought to protect them.

State troopers were present, along with Uvalde municipal cops, officers of the Uvalde school district, sheriff’s deputies. They were leaderless. They received no instruction to storm the school and take the shooter out.

The officers sat on their hands and allowed the carnage to continue.

I have no words of wisdom to offer. I cannot think of a way to prevent this sort of tragedy from recurring.

All I know is that the men and women who suit up as “leaders” failed to perform the essential tenet of leadership. They failed to issue orders to storm the school and do whatever it took to “neutralize” the moron who had purchased legally an AR-15 rifle and then used it to take the lives of innocent and precious children.

AG Garland took specific note that the AR-15 is intended for “the battlefield.” Its purpose is to kill people as quickly as people. It does not belong in the possession of individuals — such as the Uvalde madman — who then can rein havoc and mayhem on defenseless children.

How do we stop this madness? I have no clue on how one can do so while navigating the rough political water that so far has prevented any meaningful laws to curb such senseless violence.

Were I the King of the World, I might ponder whether there’s a way to amend the Second Amendment, the one that gun-rights advocates use as their political shield against solutions to the gun violence plague.

But I’m not. I am left only to gasp in horror at the findings of the Department of Justice and share the attorney general’s grief over the senselessness of the slaughter that no doubt will continue.

 

national news, political news

Polls aren’t predictors

I have to remind myself of an important fact as I ponder these public opinion polls showing President Biden possibly losing his re-election bid to the leading Republican challenger.

It is that the polls are not predictors of what will happen many months from now, but merely are snapshots of the public’s mood in the moment. What does that mean? It means that circumstances can change the public mood in dramatic fashion.

And, oh Lord, there are factors a-plenty out there that could change the minds of millions of Americans preparing to cast their votes for president.

We have several trials awaiting the GOP frontrunner. They are a dizzying array of felony charges. The former POTUS could be convicted of any of the felonies, from one accusing him of seeking to overturn the results of the 2020 election, to hiding classified documents in his posh digs in south Florida, to pressuring election officials in Georgia to “find” enough votes to award him that state’s electoral votes.

If a jury convicts him of any of them, he no longer can run for public office, let alone serve in the one he seeks. It’s on the books, man.

That means voters who currently favor the former POTUS in his bid to return to the office from which he was drummed out in 2020 will have to make decide whether they really want to vote for a convicted felon to become commander in chief of the world’s most powerful military and head of state of the world’s most indispensable nation.

The ex-POTUS can yelp and yammer all he wants about whatever decisions come down. The facts, though, will stand on the record forever if he is convicted of any of the serious charges that have been leveled against him.

President Biden has been a national politician for more than five decades. He knows his way around the political pea patch and no doubt will be able to exploit the obvious flaws in his opponent’s record … presuming, of course, that Republicans are foolish and stupid enough to nominate him.

Am I worried, therefore, about what these polls are telling us today? Nope. The worry will kick in on election eve if they are delivering the same message.

God help us if that occurs.

national news

Patriot? Hardly!

Vivek Ramaswamy ended his 2024 Republican presidential campaign this week and then endorsed the idiot who finished ahead of the shrinking GOP field in Iowa.

What, though, did the businessman call the former Liar in Chief? He called him a “patriot.” OK, I am going to dispute that label with every fiber of my being.

The GOP frontrunner is not a patriot. Pure and simple, he chastises who he says “hates America” … but he is the hater who is leading a cult cabal of haters. 

What else would you use to describe a mob that storms the Capitol Building on Jan. 6 and traipses under the Dome brandishing a Confederate flag? They did that heinous deed at the behest of the former POTUS who vowed to “take our country back,” from whom never has been clear to me. The Stars and Bars was never seen in the Capitol during the Civil War, as it symbolizes a group of states that went to war with the United States of America.

That isn’t the act of a patriot. Nor the act of someone who reveres our government or respects the work that our nation’s founders did to write a Constitution that serves as the framework for the greatest form of government ever created.

He ain’t a patriot. Not by my sense of the word, or the sense of anyone who believes we are a great nation and those who honor any oath we take to be loyal to the nation’s government document.

The man whom Ramaswamy is backing is — in my humble view — a traitor to the nation.

environmental news

Yes, climate is changing

You hear it almost unfailingly whenever we get hit with a cold snap, such as what has gripped North Texas — and much of the rest of the country of late.

It comes from climate change deniers who scoff at the notion that our climate is changing, and the globe is getting warmer. I heard it the other morning while having breakfast with some gentlemen with whom I am acquainted. They dissed the notion of global warming.

I didn’t say a word, as I don’t know them well enough to challenge such nonsense.

One of our local TV meteorologists put it well recently in a public service announcement. The weather, he said, defines what is happening in the moment, while “climate” defines longer-term trends.

That was his way of telling us to disregard current weather conditions when discussing whether the climate is changing.

I believe he is correct.

I remember the time during an earlier D.C. cold snap when climate change denier U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma took a snowball to the floor of the Senate to make some kind of idiotic argument that climate change is a hoax, a product of liberals seeking to damage to the fossil fuel industry which, I should add, was a big contributor to Inhofe during his years in public life.

The term “global warming” has for all intent been replaced by “climate change,” which I believe is a more inclusive description of what is happening to our good Earth. We indeed are suffering through more climate extremes from year to year.

The data we receive from worldwide meteorological organizations is beyond dispute. It is that despite these cold snaps, Earth’s mean temperature is rising year over year, the global ice caps are melting, mountain glaciers are receding and that thousands of species of wildlife are endangered by the changing climate.

When I hear the climate change deniers dismiss the evidence because they’re bundling up to protect against frigid air temps, I am left only to shake my head in dismay at their ignorance.

political news

The race begins in earnest

I am going to revisit briefly an observation I made about the presumed frontrunner for the 2024 Republican Party presidential nomination.

I said a good while ago that I wasn’t sure the 45th POTUS would be the nominee. I want to reiterate that view.

The Iowa caucus begins Monday. The weather statewide is hideous. Temps will be minus 15 degrees; wind chill is expected to drive it to 35 degrees below zero. Chris Christie has dropped out of the race. The GOP campaign is now down to just four challengers to the former Liar in Chief: They are Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy, Asa Hutchinson and Ron DeSantis.

Haley appears poised to pick up a good bit of late support now that Christie is on the sidelines.

What does any of this mean? Beats the bejeebers out of me.

The one-time POTUS is miles ahead in the latest polling. Big f***ing deal, as the current president once said to Barack Obama as the then-POTUS was set to sign the Affordable Care Act into law.

I keep hearing grumbling that even some of the ex-POTUS’s cultists are growing weary of his incoherent rants. Does it mean an upset is in the making? What about New Hampshire, which is having its primary. Remember what happened there in 1968.

President Johnson was seeking re-election. The Democratic primary took place and lo and behold, Eugene McCarthy, the anti-Vietnam War candidate, finished a close second to LBJ. On March 31, Johnson announced in a televised speech to the nation a suspension of the bombing of North Vietnam and then, in a stunner, announced: “I will not seek, and will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your president.”

Thus, there is ample room for more surprises this time out.

I would be amazed if the 45th POTUS suffers a proverbial near-mortal wound as he seeks to shed the weight of upcoming criminal trials … but not terribly surprised.

If only …