Tag Archives: Mitt Romney

national news

Trump is still a ‘phony’ and a ‘fraud’

I didn’t vote for Mitt Romney in 2012 when he ran for president against Barack H. Obama. I felt at the time — and I do at this moment — that the incumbent president was better for this country than his Republican opponent.

But then Mitt had to make a speech in 2016 that spoke for many millions of his fellow Americans. Here it is …

He called the then-prospective GOP nominee a “phony” and a “fraud.” He was right then. He would be right today — were he to muster the nerve to say it about the fraudulent politician who went on to be elected president of the United States.

I just want to share this video once again to offer a glimmer of hope that now Sen. Romney, of Utah, will muster up some guts to break ranks with his Republican Senate colleagues.

Sen. Romney says he wants former national security adviser John Bolton to testify in the ongoing Senate trial of Donald John Trump. Bolton heard Trump’s infamous phone call to Ukraine’s president in which he asked the foreign government for a political favor. Bolton reportedly was alarmed at what he heard.

The House has impeached Trump on abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. Trump’s legal team has begun its defense of the president. No one in the Senate or the House who purports to support Trump has stood up for the man’s character.

Sen. Romney damn sure isn’t.

The speech attached to this blog post speaks volumes — and it speaks them loudly — to the essence of the man who sought the presidency in 2016 and who has abused the power of his office ever since he swore an oath to defend the Constitution.

national news

Need to do better at keeping emotions in check

Oh, I need to do a much better job of restraining myself in the Age of Trump.

There can be no doubt that something has triggered an emotional response in me that I didn’t think would do so prior to Donald Trump sashaying onto the political scene.

“There’s more to life than politics,” Mitt Romney once said while saluting the adversarial relationship he had at the time with President Barack Obama. The men were running for the presidency in 2012 and Romney took a moment to say that he and the president didn’t harbor “ill will” toward each other.

That ain’t the case these days. It’s rubbing off on me. Dang it! I’ve got to control myself.

A member of my vast network of Facebook “friends” and actual friends posted something the other day that sought to poke a bit of fun at the rash of sexual harassers/abusers who’ve been in the news lately. Two of the examples showed photoshopped images of Obama hanging Presidential Medals of Freedom around the necks of Anthony “Carlos Danger” Weiner and Harvey Weinstein. The other two images were legit, with Bill Cosby and former President Clinton getting the medals.

“Why do you post this sh**?” I asked an actual Facebook friend who shared it. He fired back a tart response, telling me it was a joke and that I should “lighten up.” Touche. 

I blame Donald Trump for dragging me into this pit of emotional instability and nervousness. I still can take a joke as well as the next guy. My problem these days is that I am getting numbed by the constant barrage of hideous reports pertaining to the president, not to mention to the amazing barrage of insult-inspired Twitter messages that the president is prone to unleash.

I am nowhere close to needing therapy. At least not at the moment. If this glaring lack of joke awareness persists, however, I might need some counseling.

In the meantime, I am going to pray that the pending impeachment of Donald Trump gets traction and that, should he (likely) survive the Senate trial that will result, he gets thumped at the November 2020 election.

economic news

Hey, wasn’t the ‘national debt’ considered a deal breaker?

Check it out! Twenty-three trillion! As in dollars, man!

What does it represent? The national debt.

It crossed yet another milestone. The national debt keeps growing, despite bold — and arguably reckless — predictions that the president of the United States all by himself was going to eliminate the annual budget deficit by the end of his second term.

It, too, keeps growing, adding to the debt that those in Donald Trump’s Republican Party used to warn would bankrupt the country.

Has it bankrupted the United States of America? I don’t think it has, although the debt does pose a serious potential threat.

I guess my concern is that Donald Trump’s penchant for braggadocio persuade enough Americans to vote for him in 2016. He made that bold promise. He called himself “the king of debt,” whatever that was supposed to mean. Trump also pledged to balance the budget.

The current fiscal year deficit is growing at a breakneck pace, owing to the tax cuts enacted for the richest Americans along with still-uncontrolled federal spending.

I recall vividly the mantra repeated throughout the 2012 presidential campaign that the national debt, which totaled about $16 trillion, was the deal-breaker among Republicans. GOP nominee Mitt Romney said President Obama must not be re-elected because the national debt was just unsustainable. The message didn’t sell, as Obama was re-elected with a handsome margin — although it was diminished from the margin that Obama rolled up in 2008.

The debt has piled on another $7 trillion since 2012. It is still growing. What is Donald Trump going to promise to do about it to ensure his re-election in 2020?

I’m all ears.

entertainment news

Stand firm, Ellen, in your friendship with ‘W’

I hereby endorse Ellen DeGeneres in her declaration that she is friends with former President George W. Bush and former first lady Laura Bush.

The comedian is taking flak because she happened to attend a Dallas Cowboys football game at AT&T Stadium, where she sat next to the former first couple, had a few laughs and enjoyed each other’s company.

DeGeneres noted out loud the other day that it does strange for a “gay liberal” such as herself to be friends with a “conservative” such as President Bush. Which makes me respond: So what? 

Ellen is taking heat from some in the entertainment industry. Actor Mark Ruffalo commented via Twitter that Bush’s policies are anathema to the “kindness” that DeGeneres mentioned in her comments about her friendship with “W.”

Look, I get it. I am not “friends” with the former president, although I have had the pleasure of meeting him three times over the years. The first time was on an elevator at the 1988 GOP convention in New Orleans; the second time was in 1995, when I interviewed the then-new Texas governor at his office at the State Capitol; the third time was in Amarillo in 1998 when he was running for re-election as governor.

My impression of President Bush is clear: He is the kind of guy I would love to have a beer with … except that he no longer drinks alcohol. He is affable, jovial, personable, humble and all-round good guy. His politics stink, but as Mitt Romney once said during the Al Smith Memorial Dinner in 2012 when he appeared on the same dais as President Barack Obama against whom he was running, “There is more to life than politics.”

So it is with Ellen DeGeneres and President Bush.

Stand firm, Ellen.

national news

What the hell is going on with POTUS?

Donald J. Trump

✔ @realDonaldTrump

Somebody please wake up Mitt Romney and tell him that my conversation with the Ukrainian President was a congenial and very appropriate one, and my statement on China pertained to corruption, not politics. If Mitt worked this hard on Obama, he could have won. Sadly, he choked!

What you see here is a tweet that Donald Trump fired off after Sen. Mitt Romney criticized him for admitting to asking for China to “investigate” Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.

I am virtually speechless over this.

Think for just a moment about this.

The president is likely to be impeached by the House of Representatives over his soliciting foreign government assistance in his re-election, an act forbidden by the U.S. Constitution.

A House impeachment means the president stands trial in the Senate. Mitt Romney is a Republican member of that body and will serve as one of 100 jurors in a trial to determine whether the president is guilty of “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

Is this how you talk to one of those jurors? Is this a prescription for conviction, particularly if Romney is able to persuade other GOP senators that the president of the United States has lost his ever-lovin’ mind and must be removed from office?

Not smart, Mr. POTUS. Oh wait! I almost forgot. Trump says he’s the smartest man in human history.

national news

Mitt has it right: Trump’s action ‘appalling’

Mitt Romney has it precisely right.

The junior U.S. senator from Utah has described Donald Trump’s call for China and Ukraine to “investigate” a potential political foe “appalling” and “wrong.”

Is the GOP dam about to break as it regards the president’s troubles in the face of probable impeachment by the U.S. House of Representatives?

Romney, the GOP presidential nominee in 2012, wrote this on Twitter: When the only American citizen President Trump singles out for China’s investigation is his political opponent in the midst of the Democratic nomination process, it strains credulity to suggest that it is anything other than politically motivated.

Do ya think?

Trump keeps insisting he is trying to root out “corruption.” He declares that it’s normal for presidents to seek foreign government assistance in that noble endeavor. Actually, it isn’t normal. There’s nothing normal about what is unfolding before our eyes.

Sen. Romney, who once warned us about Trump being a “phony” and a “fraud,” is justifiably “appalled” at what he is witnessing from the president of the United States.

Oh, how I hope there will be other Republicans who will awaken to the rampant corruption on display in the White House.

national news

‘Troubling in the extreme’? Boy, howdy!

U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, put a tweet out today that said the following …

If the President asked or pressured Ukraine’s president to investigate his political rival, either directly or through his personal attorney, it would be troubling in the extreme. Critical for the facts to come out.

Gosh. Do ya think?

Donald Trump, quite naturally, is pushing back on reports that he and his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, asked the Ukrainians to look for dirt involving former Vice President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, who reportedly has business dealings with a Ukrainian oligarch.

Yes, it is critical to get all the facts, as Sen. Romney has stated. Romney is trying to be fair by waiting for the facts. I accept that. I, too, want to know all the facts. Where I differ from the freshman senator — and former Republican presidential nominee — is that I get to state what I believe … which is that I believe Trump did what has been alleged.

Trump’s propensity for lying makes it difficult for me to assume he’s being truthful when he says a whistleblower is conducting “another witch hunt.” What’s more, it was Mitt Romney himself who said in 2016 that Trump is a “phony … a fraud.” Yep, Mitt was right then.

Look, let’s get to the facts at hand. Let’s find out what Trump did, what he said and to whom he said it.

Let us also not be bullied by Trump’s assertion that it’s just another witch hunt. There hasn’t been a witch hunt to this point. There have been serious investigations.

The next one ought to reveal whether Trump is telling the truth, that he didn’t do what has been alleged.

I am not willing to wager that he can tell the truth about this or anything!

national news

Where are the GOP challengers with ‘heft’?

Joe Walsh has joined William Weld and Mark Sanford as actual and potential challengers to Donald Trump in the president’s quest for nomination by the Republican Party for another term in office.

A friend of mine wonders where the GOP challengers with “heft” are hiding. He believes Trump will “swat” any of the three challengers being discussed “like flies.” I fear he is right.

Who, then, are the hefty GOP heavyweights who might stand a chance of giving the president the primary campaign scare he so richly deserves?

I am having difficulty coming with names.

Former Secretary of State/Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Colin Powell more or less comes to mind. He won’t walk onto the field. He had his chance leading up to the 1996 election when Bill Clinton was running for re-election. Gen. Powell begged off, citing the lack of support from his wife, Alma. I doubt Mrs. Powell has changed her mind. Besides, Powell’s time has passed.

I think also — are you reading for this? — of Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah. Naww. He won’t do it, either.

I fear the GOP is left with three men who don’t stand a serious chance of inflicting any meaningful damage on Trump, who is raising many millions of dollars toward his re-election effort.

Mark Sanford is grievously damaged already. He once was South Carolina’s governor who messed around with a woman other than his wife; he skulked off to South America for a fling, while telling his staff to lie to the media about his whereabouts, instructing them to say he was “hiking the Appalachian Trail.” No good, Mark.

William Weld ran for vice president in 2016 on the Libertarian ticket headed by former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson. Weld does have political experience, having served two terms as Massachusetts governor. But he ain’t gonna make the grade, either.

Joe Walsh served for a term as a congressman from Illinois. He’s a firebrand, a TEA Party advocate. He is ultraconservative. He also cannot stand the idea of Trump serving as president. He says things about Trump that many of us have said to each other at dinner tables and living rooms around the country.

I fear the GOP pool of challengers is thin, given the state of politics in the country at this moment. History shows that intraparty challenges against presidential incumbents have proven politically fatal to the incumbent. Sure, Trump is likely to have someone run against him, but he has rewritten the playbook and installed strategies that few “traditional” politicians can recognize, let alone emulate.

The GOP primary campaign will contain plenty of fiery rhetoric. Of that I am sure. Will it matter? I am thinking it won’t.

We’ll have to await the main event to commence sometime in the late summer of 2020 when Democrats nominate their candidate and Republicans swallow hard and send Donald Trump back into battle.

Oh … boy!

national news

Mr. Ryan is moving to Washington

I don’t know exactly why this is such a big deal, why the media are making hay about it, but it kinda/sorta is a big deal.

Former U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan is moving from his beloved hometown of Janesville, Wis., to Washington, D.C. Yep, he’s moving his family — all of ’em — to the nation’s capital city.

Why is it a big deal?

Here’s my take. Ryan made quite a big splash about how he loved getting out of Washington, how he cherished his time away from The Beltway, how he wanted to commune with the home folks to get a feel of what the rest of Middle America was thinking.

He’s now out of office. He left the speakership and the House of Representatives at the end of 2018. Maybe he’s had all the Middle America perspective he can stand.

Let’s remember, too, that Ryan ran for vice president in 2012 on the Republican ticket led by now U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah. Indeed, I recall vividly during that campaign how Ryan espoused the virtues of going home, of how he wanted to spend as much time as possible away from the halls of power.

To be fair, Ryan is not selling his Janesville home. He and his wife will rent a house in the D.C. ‘burbs in Maryland. He plans to return home to Janesville. His foundation will be based back “home.”

It’s just that when a national politician makes a lot of noise about spending time away from the Center of the Political Universe, only to return to it, well … it does make me scratch my noggin.

national news

Sen. Romney stands on principle in voting ‘no’ on judge

I know that a single U.S. Senate vote does not signal a trend, but I have to be heartened by a principled “no” vote cast by Utah’s freshman Republican senator, Mitt Romney.

The former GOP presidential nominee was the lone Republican to vote against the nomination of Beaumont lawyer Michael Truncale to be a U.S. district judge. Truncale won confirmation by a narrow 49-46 vote to take a seat on the bench representing East Texas.

Why the “no” vote from Romney? Because Truncale describe President Obama in 2011 as an “un-American imposter,” which quite naturally was seen by many as a play into the “birther” lie that plagued Obama during much of his presidency; you know, what he was born in Kenya and, thus, was ineligible to run for, let alone serve as, president of the United States.

“He said some things disparaging of President (Barack) Obama and having been the Republican nominee in 2012, I couldn’t sign onto that for a district judge,” Romney told CNN.

Romney has demonstrated that he won’t be Donald Trump’s “yes man” on all matters that come before the Senate.

Truncale received a grilling from Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats about the remark and he answered that “it is possible” he was expressing frustration over what he called Obama’s lack of “overt patriotism.”

Yeah, sure thing, bub. Suppose he was merely popping off at that false assumption. Doesn’t that, therefore, speak to the man’s judicial temperament, or the lack thereof?

Romney famously said during the 2012 Al Smith Memorial Dinner in New York that he and President Obama — who were locked in a fierce battle for the White House at the time — did not harbor personal “ill will” toward each other despite their widely divergent world views.

Sen. Romney’s “no” vote against Michael Truncale keeps faith with that declaration.