Tag Archives: George Floyd

national news

Time has come for federal police reform

The nation is facing a watershed moment in its struggle to correct a problem that has grown into a full-blown crisis.

We must debate honestly, completely and comprehensively the issue of police reform at the federal level. What does that take? It requires our Congress — House members and senators — to determine that racist policies in local police departments have contributed to the needless deaths of too many African-Americans.

George Floyd’s tragic demise two weeks ago in Minneapolis, Minn., ad the hands of a rogue white cop appears to be the tipping point.

Democrats are calling for a national response. Republicans so far have been quiet about that. Democrats see racism as a national crisis; Republicans appear to view it as a local matter to be solved at the local level.

I believe today that we are entangled in a national crisis that needs a solution enacted by Congress and signed into law by the president of the United States.

We can talk all we want about police departments enacting policies that ban chokeholds or other restraint techniques that inhibit people’s ability to breathe … for crying out loud! Do we trust all PDs to do the right thing? No. We cannot.

I believe the time has come for Congress to enter this fight. There ought to be a solution that that makes use of these techniques a violation of federal law. I am not not altogether certain that we can endure the kind of response we have seen in the wake of George Floyd’s death.

Will a federal prohibition end this mistreatment of U.S. citizens? Probably not. However, there must be ways to apply deterrent pressure on beat cops and the brass sitting in police headquarters to ensure that they follow federal law or else face serious consequences.

Call it the George Floyd Law if you wish, or name it after any of the individuals who have died as a result of police brutality.

Let’s get it done!

national news

Way to go, Mitt

I am developing a sort of vicarious relationship with a man I opposed when he ran for president of the United States, but whose conduct as a U.S. senator is making me quite proud of his courage.

That’s you, Mitt Romney, a Republican senator from Utah.

I voted proudly for President Obama in 2012 when he ran for re-election against Mitt Romney. I would do so again were the two men to seek that office against each other.

However, Sen. Romney is exhibiting the sort of spine that has been undiscovered among almost all of his Republican Senate colleagues. He is challenging Donald Trump openly and with vigor.

I will not forget that memorable speech Sen. Romney delivered on the Senate floor when he declared his intention to vote to convict Donald Trump on abuse of power during the president’s impeachment trial. He was the lone GOP senator to break ranks from the cult that has developed on Capitol Hill that seeks to protect Trump against those who seek political justice to be delivered to a man who is unfit to serve as president.

He has been excoriated for his vote. Trump has threatened him via Twitter. Mitt has stood his ground.

And now he is marching with “Black Lives Matter” protesters who are demonstrating against the kind of police brutality that killed George Floyd in Minneapolis. He is standing with those who are shocked and dismayed at Floyd’s death. He is one of distressingly few GOP public officials willing to stand on the right side of history.

Trump’s reaction to Mitt Romney has been to skewer him for acting on his own conscience and for doing what he believes is right.

I will stand proudly with Mitt Romney. If only others within his party would exhibit the level of courage that Sen. Romney continues to put on display.

national news

Tempting to put faith in polls, however …

It is so tempting for those of us who want Donald Trump to get his head handed to him at the ballot box this November to place faith in all those polls showing him trailing Joe Biden by double digits.

Then again, these polls only serve to remind us of a painful truth about Trump, which is that he might be the luckiest — even with his utter incompetence and unfitness — politician in U.S. history.

I am forced to remind myself that Hillary Rodham Clinton also held big leads against Trump in the early summer of 2016. She enjoyed the backing of every major newspaper in the country. Pundits across the board predicted not just a Clinton win, but a possible landslide win at that!

Then it happened. Trump committed an act of proverbial political thievery by capturing three swing states that had voted twice for Barack Obama: Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. He won all three by a combined vote of 77,000 ballots and with them earned enough Electoral College votes to be elected president of the United States.

So, as tempting as it is to believe that Trump is in trouble politically in 2020 as he seeks re-election, I must reel in my enthusiasm.

I want Joe Biden to win this election. He wasn’t my first choice among Democrats. My initial hope was that the party would find a “sleeper,” a new voice among the huge field to back for the nomination. It didn’t pan out.

The former VP is now the presumptive nominee. He is beginning to clear his throat and is speaking with clarity and conviction about why we need to evict Trump and his cabal from the People’s House.

Circumstances have handed Biden some tailor-made issues on which to run: the pandemic, and George Floyd’s tragic death have produced hideous responses from Donald Trump. The economy has flat-lined as a result of the COVID-19 crisis. Trump has failed miserably to rise to the level of leader. He is unable or unwilling to assume the role of Consoler in Chief. He has become instead the Numbskull in Chief with his idiotic posturing on the pandemic and then on how he favors unleashing “thousands of heavily armed” active-duty military personnel to put down peaceful protests against police brutality.

None of that guarantees a Joe Biden victory. Indeed, the former vice president has to pay attention to the political landscape and avoid giving away an election as Hillary Clinton did in 2016.

The polling data looks promising. However, it is far too early in this game to get excited about what it is telling us.

crime news

Don’t do this, Minneapolis City Council

Talk about the Mother of Overreactions.

The Minneapolis City Council, which governs a city reeling from the death of George Floyd, the black man killed by an white police officer in an incident that has spawned an international protest movement, is considering disbanding the city police department.

Yep. Nine of 12 council members have signed on to a plan that would eliminate the police department and apparently start over. They want to build a new department from scratch, from the ground up.

Hold on here! I believe that would a monumental mistake.

Yes, George Floyd died because he was brutalized by four officers of the Minneapolis Police Department. One of them is charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter; three others face charges of complicity in the actions of the one rogue cop. I hope they are convicted and are sent to prison.

I also believe the Minneapolis Police Department needs a top-to-bottom review of its policing strategies and tactics. But … disband the department? Remove it? Wipe it out? Is this what’s on the horizon?

PDs across the nation are undergoing intense public scrutiny. There is this “defund the police” movement developing in some communities, again as an extreme overreaction to what is without a doubt a hideous example of police brutality against an African-American citizen.

I want there to be reviews done within police departments. We need to end this terrible trend of cops treating racial and ethnic minority suspects differently — and more harshly — than they treat white folks. That has to stop! Now!

Disband departments while potentially leaving communities without police protection? This crisis can be resolved without such drastic overreaction.

national news

Should he speak to us from the Oval Office?

There is word out of the West Wing that Donald John Trump might speak soon to the nation about race relations, police conduct and unity among Americans.

He’ll go on national TV, or so the reports suggest, to quell the unrest that has roiled in cities from coast to coast to coast since Minneapolis cops killed George Floyd while arresting him for allegedly passing a counterfeit $20 bill.

The question one must ask is this: What good would a Donald Trump speech do?

Many of us out here do not believe Trump is sincerely concerned about the incidents of police conduct that have brought people into the street in protest. He seems much more concerned about the damage done by the rioters who have erupted. I understand that concern; that conduct troubles me, too … so on that score, POTUS and I are on the same page.

However, the issue goes way beyond that aspect and Trump hasn’t talked openly and sincerely about the concerns that have prompted the protests.

If we hear from Teleprompter Trump during an Oval Office speech, I doubt seriously whether he would move anyone to believe he finally gets it. That version of Donald Trump simply is not believable. He reads prepared text as if he’s being held hostage.

The other Trump, the one in which he is merely himself, well … that version of this con man is incapable of speaking to us about matters of the heart.

I have next to zero hope that Donald Trump is wired in a way that can deliver a heartfelt speech about race relations in this country. I mean, this clown is the Godfather of the Birther Movement, who sought to disparage the candidacy of the man who became the first African-American ever elected president of the United States.

national news

Kneeling is a legitimate form of peaceful, civil protest

OK, here it comes again: the discussion over whether “taking a knee” while they play the National Anthem dishonors Old Glory.

I didn’t want to re-enter this discussion, but I am going to do so anyway. I’ll just need to prepare for some blowback.

Americans are protesting today against the treatment of African-Americans by some police departments and officers. It’s been a longstanding problem that the nation has so far failed to face on a national level. The George Floyd tragedy brought it to our attention in graphic, tragic and reprehensible fashion.

You saw the former cop kneeling on Floyd’s neck, snuffing the life out of him. Now we have re-ignited the discussion of whether professional athletes have dishonored Old Glory when they take a bended knee while they play the National Anthem.

No. The flag is not dishonored.

What does the kneeling represent? It represents a form of civil protest against certain practices and policies enacted by law enforcement agencies. The demonstration against those policies is, at its very essence, the basis for the founding of this great nation and the flag that flies over government buildings.

The nation was built by men who protested religious oppression. They created a governing document that laid out certain civil liberties in the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The first of those amendments addresses several key provisions: Congress shall make no law that establishes a state religion or interferes with a free press or prohibits the right of citizens to speak freely and to seek “redress” of grievances against the government.

Is that clear enough? It is to me.

Kneeling during the playing of the Anthem speaks against policies that many of us find objectionable. It is in no way a statement of disrespect to the flag, to the nation, to the men and women who fight to preserve our freedoms, or to those who serve the public.

Yet this form of civil protest has been perverted into something unrecognizable to the men who sought to make a hallmark of the government they created.

It all started when a pro football player took a knee to protest. Donald Trump called him and other pro athletes “sons of bitches.” He said they should be tossed aside, ignored, punished for their alleged disrespect of the flag. That is as shallow and idiotic a response as I can imagine.

Here’s my request: If we disagree with the method some folks use to protest a public policy, then focus the disagreement on the act itself … and stay far away from suggesting it disrespects or dishonors the principles on which the founders created this country.

Good heavens! Taking a knee in peaceful protest is the embodiment of what the founders intended!

national news, religious news

Good Book becomes part of POTUS’s political playbook

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Shawn Thew/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images

I will remain offended likely for a long time at the sight of Donald Trump prancing in front of the church near the White House, holding up a Holy Bible as if it was a political prop.

I’ve heard some chatter out there about how Trump was holding the Bible backward and upside-down.

What is perhaps most profoundly upsetting was the tactic he used to clear the path from the White House to St. John Episcopal Church. He used tear gas and dispatched heavily armed police tactical units to beat back peaceful protesters. You’ve seen the video, yes? It shows cops walloping protesters with their “defensive” shields while tear gas is billowing up around everyone.

This came after Donald Trump proclaimed his honoring of “peaceful protesters.” That ain’t how you “honor” them, Mr. President. They were out there to protest police brutality and to call for reform in the wake of George Floyd’s death at the hands of rogue cops in Minneapolis, Minn.

Then he stands before the boarded-up church. He holds up the Bible. A reporter asked him if it was his Bible. He responded, “It’s a Bible.”

He doesn’t have a clue as to what it contains, which of course is the holy word by which faithful Christians seek to live. Donald Trump isn’t one of them.

No. He’s carnival barker and a con man. For him to use the Good Book in that fashion is anathema to the message delivered by Jesus Christ himself.

Donald Trump, as has been chronicled widely, doesn’t read anything. He reportedly has no need, being the self-proclaimed smartest human being in all of recorded history.

Instead, he uses Christendom’s holiest text as a political prop.

Disgusting.

local news

Unity found in small towns; bigger cities suffer strife

I went to a “unification rally” this week in Princeton, Texas, the city where my wife and I reside.

It’s a small town, but is growing rapidly. I believe the population here is about 15,000 residents. The unification rally was called in the wake of the George Floyd tragedy, where an African-American man died at the hands of cops who treated him with extreme malice and brutality. It proceeded with calm and good manners.

The response to the Floyd tragedy is far different just down the road from Princeton. Dallas is caught up in turmoil and tempest. The police there fired rubber bullets on protesters marching across a bridge that connects downtown Dallas with the western reaches of the city.

Some folks want Dallas Police Chief U. Renee Hall to resign. If she won’t quit, they want her fired. Hall is standing her ground. I don’t know who’s right in this matter; I wasn’t there. I was busy soaking up the unity being expressed in my Collin County community.

My point, though, is that while there appear to be calls for unification coming from rural communities just like the one where we live, there also appears to be plenty of strife developing in larger cities. Austin had a similar beef that has erupted in Dallas. Other major cities across the nation are enduring emotional conflict and tension as people march for justice and seek reform in the way police departments do their job.

The tension causes me plenty of concern about where we are headed. I do not subscribe to the “defund the police” argument that is getting a voice in some communities. That view suggests rampant corruption and cruelty in all big-city PDs; I do not believe that is the case. Policing is a tough job under the best of circumstances. It becomes exponentially more dangerous when police do not have the support of the community they swear to “protect and serve.”

The nation’s law enforcement community is facing a serious crisis as it seeks to answer the questions that critics are raising about it in the wake of George Floyd’s killing.

The law enforcement crisis isn’t presenting itself in places like Princeton, Texas. It is, though, showing itself in Dallas … and other big cities across the land.

Donald Trump

Worst week of hideous saga coming to an end

I believe it’s fair to suggest that Donald John Trump is coming off the worst week of the presidency he inherited.

It has revealed to the world just how low this individual can go to debase the principles he took an oath to protect.

Let’s ponder a few things that occurred.

George Floyd was killed by police in Minneapolis; the cops who killed him were fired immediately; one of them was charged with murder and manslaughter, while three others have been charged as well. Trump’s response was to lash out at the protesters; to be fair, many “protests” turned to riots … which drew Trump’s public attention. He has been silent on the issue of how African-Americans are mistreated too often by police agencies.

Trump then vowed to unleash “thousands and thousands of heavily armed” active-duty military personnel to “dominate” the streets of American cities. He said he would use the most potent and lethal military machine in world history on American citizens exercising their rights to protest government policy.

He also used cops and some sort of “secret security force” to clear the streets between the White House and an Episcopal church of peaceful protesters. The cops used tear gas on the protesters. Trum then traipsed to the church, carrying a Bible. He stood before the holy place, held up the Bible … for a photo opportunity! Yes, this individual demonstrated for all the world to see how he is able to use a Holy Bible as a political prop.

The blowback from these repeated demonstrations has been scathing condemnation general-grade officers, including a former defense secretary, two former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a former White House chief of staff, the former special operations commander and an assortment of three- and four-star officers, all of whom have served their country with honor and heroism. 

Oh, and thousands more Americans died from COVID-19, the disease Trump dismissed as no worse than the flu.

I have said it many times and I will say it again and again. Donald Trump is morally, temperamentally and psychologically unfit for the office he holds.

I would suggest that we have witnessed the worst possible week of a presidency in mortal peril of disintegration … except that we have many more weeks ahead of us before we can usher this individual out of the Oval Office for the final time.

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.