International news, military news

Just think of the irony

Irony can be a real bitch … you know?

Let us consider two issues dealing with “respect for our troops” and whether we can make any sense of them.

Donald Trump has been foaming at the mouth over the sight of pro athletes “taking a knee” to protest police brutality while they play the National Anthem. “Throw the SOBs out!” Trump bellows, contending that such a form of protest disrespects the flag … as well as disrespecting the men and women who fight on behalf of that flag.

Are you with me?

Now we have the distressing news about Russians paying bounties to the Taliban for killing American service personnel. Reports have seemingly confirmed what has been divulged, that the Russians have paid the money. The question now is when Trump knew about it.

His reaction to the initial reports has been, shall we say, much less visceral than he has been in reacting to athletes kneeling during the National Anthem.

This brings to mind a puzzle I am trying to solve. If the president is going to demand that we respect our troops by standing proudly, with hands over their hearts, while we sing the National Anthem, then where is the outrage over reports that Russian goons are paying bounties for the lives of our priceless treasure?

My goodness, Donald Trump’s relative passivity over these reports is more than disconcerting. It is reprehensible, disgusting, disgraceful. It speaks volumes to me — as well as to others — about the seeming lack of sincerity from Trump about the respect he demands for our fighting men and women.

The irony of these two examples — taking a knee and silence in the face of evidence of threats to our fighting warriors — is hideous in the extreme. I only can conclude that Trump’s alleged love and respect for our troops in battle is as much of a sham as his version of the presidency.

U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney — a Utah Republican — was right in 2016 when he called Trump a “phony and a fraud.” I implore the rest of the country to wake up to what has been patently obvious about this con man all along.

medical news

Masks do not hinder our rights! Got it? Good!

I am sick and tired of hearing the gripes of those who think mandates to wear surgical masks hinders their civil liberties.

We are in the midst of a global pandemic. It has killed 127,000 Americans. More of us are going to die. Medical experts say wearing masks — along with social distancing — helps alleviate the death and hospitalization tolls.

So what the hell is the problem here?

We keep seeing demonstrators griping about the masks. We see the occasional viral YouTube video of idiots raising hell with cops about whether they are observing proper distance or wearing masks as required by local government officials.

I am tired of repeating myself, but I feel the need to restate the obvious.

It is that mask wearing is no more a civil liberties violation than wearing seat belts while riding in a motor vehicle, or helmets while riding on a motorcycle, or behaving like a civilized human being when we are in public places.

If the city council in the community where I live requires mask wearing, we are going to adhere to the rules. If a ruling comes down from Collin County’s courthouse, fine … I’m all in. If Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issues a statewide requirement for masks, great.

We keep hearing that mantra that “We’re in this together.” That notion should apply to all of us obeying the rules that come forth from officials who are charged to “provide for the general welfare” of the public they serve.

medical news, State news

Lt. Gov. Patrick needs to shut … up

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I can state with a high degree of confidence that Dr. Anthony Fauci doesn’t need a chump like me to defend him against the idiotic rant of a partisan hack like Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.

But I am going to defend him anyway.

Pay attention, Dan Patrick. I will say this slowly: You need to shut … your … know-nothing … fly trap yapper. 

Patrick went on Fox News this week to tell us that Dr. Fauci, the nation’s pre-eminent infectious disease expert, “doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

What drew Patrick’s moronic ire happens to be the dire assessment by Fauci over Texas’s big spike in COVID-19 infection and hospitalization. Fauci serves on the White House coronavirus pandemic response team and told U.S. senators that the nation could see 100,000 daily infections if we don’t corral this virus immediately.

Fauci singled out some problem states, Texas among them. Patrick objected. According to The Hill newspaper:

“Fauci said that he’s concerned about states like Texas that skipped over certain things. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” Patrick said on Fox News after Fauci testified before a Senate committee about the U.S. response to the coronavirus outbreak. “We haven’t skipped over anything.”

“The only thing I’m skipping over is listening to him,” Patrick added. “He has been wrong every time, on every issue. I don’t need his advice anymore. We’ll listen to a lot of science, we’ll listen to a lot of doctors, and [Gov. Greg Abbott (R)], myself and other state leaders will make the decision. No thank you, Dr. Fauci.”

I think I’ll stand with Dr. Fauci’s advice, relying on a learned medical heavyweight instead of a political hatchet man.

Dan Patrick needs to stick with what he knows best, which involves blathering right-wing dogma.

International news

Why hasn’t Trump responded with outrage?

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I now will clear the air:  I believe that Russia paid bounties to Taliban fighters who killed American troops on the battlefield in Afghanistan.

Moreover, I also believe the essence of those reports has been established by thorough media investigations. The question remains, though, about what Donald Trump knew and when he knew it.

If the worst case is true, that Trump knew of the bounties being paid and did nothing, then we have a series crisis on our hands. We have a president who has fundamentally violated his oath as commander in chief by refusing to protect the men and women he sends into harm’s way. To be fair, the worst case hasn’t been established.

There really is no “best case,” given what I believe we know … that the Russians placed bounties on the heads of our service personnel.

What if Trump didn’t get the briefing? What if it landed on his desk but he didn’t open up the folder to read its contents?

That all is on the table now for discussion and further inquiry.

Here’s my question of the day: Given that the president now knows what the world knows, that the Russian intelligence network paid money for our service personnel’s lives, why in the name of all that is sacred has he not raised holy hell with Vladimir Putin?

Why does our president remain stone-cold silent on the deed that many of us believe occurred?

Instead, he talks with Putin on the phone. He yaps about getting Russia installed as a member of the G7 coalition of leading industrialized nations — over the objections of the other members. He doesn’t seem to accept the notion that Russia is a third- or maybe fourth-rate economic power and doesn’t qualify as a player among the leading industrialized nations.

This story isn’t going anywhere any time soon. If I were to venture a guess I am willing to suggest that it likely won’t end well for Donald Trump.

We need answers. Right now!

medical news

Happy talk isn’t stemming the COVID tide

Donald Trump’s monstrously deceptive happy talk about the coronavirus pandemic has filled too many Americans with some idiotic notion that our national “strategy” is working.

It isn’t.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the infectious disease expert who signed on to the president’s coronavirus task force, laid bare what he thinks might be in store, which is that the national daily infection rate might hit 100,000 soon. The number is exploding.

And yet, there was Trump’s top-tier suck-up, Mike Pence, coming to Texas to declare that we have reason to cheer the national response to the killer virus.

Good grief, man!

At the very moment Pence was telling the world that “all 50 states” had turned the corner on the virus, more than half of our United States reported record numbers of infections. Texas — where Pence delivered his ignorant blather — is leading that pack of states.

Look, I don’t have any answers here. I’m just a chump blogger who is taking this threat very seriously. I fear for my family and want them to remain holed up to the extent they can.

What’s more I am sick and tired of listening to Trump and Pence lie to us about the “fantastic” job they say they are doing. They are failing us in this effort.

The United States contains less than 5 percent of the world’s population, but we are registering 20 percent of the world’s infection from COVID-19 and 20 percent of the deaths from the virus.

That’s success? No! It is failure! I want the president to give this crisis the seriousness it deserves.

International news, military news

Where is the next Howard Baker?

U.S. Sen. Howard Baker asked what has become the centerpiece  question of the Senate Watergate hearings of 1973: What did the president know and when did he know it? 

The late great Tennessee Republican sought to get to the root of what President Nixon knew of the Watergate break-in at the Democratic National Committee office and whether he sought to cover it up.

Sen. Baker’s legacy comes to mind as the nation ponders whether Donald J. Trump received a briefing about a hostile power offering to pay bounties on the deaths of American service personnel.

In other words, what did the president know and when did he know it?

The New York Times initially reported that intelligence officers had the information. Trump, as is his style, denigrated the Times reporting, calling it “fake news.” Then came more reporting from the Wall Street Journal, from The Associated Press that Trump received briefings in written form.

Trump says he never was briefed. Oh, but the AP reports that John Bolton, the former national security adviser, told Trump — to his face — about the intelligence he had received as early as March 2019.

Trump says he didn’t know about it. Others offer much different pictures of what he knew and when he knew it.

As has been mentioned before on this blog, Trump’s credibility on every issue on Earth is suspect. He cannot tell the truth. He is unwilling or unable to speak truthfully … about anything. Thus, I am one American who doesn’t believe a single thing we hear from this presidential imposter.

We are faced with at least two terrible prospects.

  • One is that the president knew about the intelligence reports and did nothing to stop a hostile foreign power from paying terrorists when they kill our service personnel.
  • The other is that he received the briefings on his desk, but didn’t look at them. He didn’t bother to read the important material that had been brought to him by the intelligence experts who spend their careers working to protect U.S. interests from hostile acts.

If he knew about it and did nothing to stop this hideous activity, then we have a president who — in my mind — has committed a treasonous act.

What did Donald Trump know and when did he know it? We need a full accounting of the wreckage this imbecile has done to the nation’s highest office.

Oh, how we need a dose of the courage that Howard Baker exhibited during that earlier intense crisis.

military news

How would I react to this news?

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A social media friend posed a fascinating question to me regarding the latest scandal involving Donald Trump, the one involving reports that he failed to respond to intelligence that Russia was paying bounties to Taliban terrorists who killed U.S. servicemen and women.

He noted that I had served in the military and wondered how I would react to such reports that the commander in chief was looking the other way at news that an enemy state had put a bounty on my head.

You know what? I cannot answer that question definitively. It’s hypothetical and when I am faced with such a question, I tend to fall back on how “I would hope to respond.” I hope I would be filled with rage at the individual who sent me into harm’s way.

I was a 19-year-old kid when I arrived in a war zone more than 50 years ago. I don’t have the foggiest recollection of where my head was in that moment. I cannot recall if I ever gave any thought to anything other than wishing my tour of duty would be over quickly so that I could return to “The World.”

What’s more, I was that we used to refer to as a REMF. The first three letters of that acronym were “rear echelon mother …” I let you figure out what the fourth letter meant. I served in the rear, at first on a flight line, then I went to work at a tactical operations center in  Da Nang, South Vietnam.

My concern at this moment deals with what the men and women who put their lives on the line while fighting for our country are thinking about the commander in chief and the latest astonishing scandal that is boiling up around him. I acknowledge a lack of “consensus” from intelligence officials on whether the Russians are paying bounties to Taliban fighters. But to my ears the reports seem credible.

Donald Trump might have known and did nothing. Maybe he never bothered to read the briefing papers that contained the intelligence. Perhaps the intelligence officers who provide Trump with this information never bothered to tell him what they knew. Are any of these possibilities acceptable? Absolutely not!

I cannot get past the notion that the men and women in harm’s way are mad as hell at the commander in chief.

medical news

Face masks … everyone’s wearing ’em!

Given that my wife and I don’t get out much these days — that worldwide coronavirus pandemic is keeping us close to the house — I am left to comment on fascinating sights I see running routine errands, such as to the grocery store.

Here’s what I saw today at the supermarket where my wife and I do the bulk of our food shopping: face masks! All the store employees are wearing them. Although I didn’t count them all, my best guess is that of the customers who were there, fully 75 percent of them were covering their faces behind masks.

Why is that a big deal worthy of a comment? We live in Princeton, Texas, which is in Collin County, which borders Dallas County, which is undergoing a surge in COVID-19 infections. Gov. Greg Abbott has shut down bars and ordered restaurants to seat no more than 50 percent of capacity.

This mask-wearing matter has become a political talking point, if you can believe it. So help me I don’t understand why it has become such, but it has. Those who identify themselves as Republicans are dismissing the masks; those who ID as Democrats are buying into the notion of wearing masks.

Collin County is at the epicenter of Donald Trump Country. Trump is the nation’s leading Republican and his Trumpkin Corps has bought into the hare-brained notion that face masks aren’t as critical to preventing the spread of COVID-19 as others — such as medical doctors — say they are.

I know this is purely anecdotal, but based on what I witnessed at the supermarket today, even those who live in Trump Country are adhering more to the advice of medical experts than to the yammering of GOP politicians.

That is my idea of good news.

military news

How do our service personnel react to this?

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I should ask him directly, but instead I will do so on this forum.

I have a member of my family who’s on active duty in the Army. He has served in combat in Afghanistan. He also is an avid supporter of Donald Trump. He is fond of saying “Trump 2020” when we chat via social media.

How in the world can my family member possibly continue to support a president who reportedly (a) didn’t know about reports that Russians were paying Taliban fighters to kill American military personnel or (b) knew about it but did nothing to stop it?

To me the reports of intelligence that Russians were paying a bounty  on our troops seem credible. We need answers. Now!

International news, military news

Trump commits grievous act

(Photo by Chris McGrath/Getty Images)

There is no limit, no depth to the measures that Donald Trump would use to betray the sacred oath he took when he became president of the United States.

I think we are witnessing the worst case imaginable. My outrage is challenging my ability to control myself.

Media reports indicated that Russian spies paid bounties to Taliban fighters for Americans they kill in Afghanistan. Donald Trump denied the reporting. Now it appears that intelligence officials have confirmed to the media that they placed reports of those bounties on Trump’s desk. They were contained in his briefing papers … at least three months ago.

And yet the president did nothing! He didn’t intercede on behalf of the troops he swore to protect.

I don’t know how others would define that, but my sense is that we have a commander in chief who is aiding and abetting a terrorist organization. He has the legal and political authority — if not the moral standing — to raise holy hell with Russian strongman Vladimir Putin. He didn’t do it. Donald Trump sat by silently while Putin was authorizing payments to Taliban terrorists who killed our men and women in battle.

Let that sink in. Have you ever in your life heard of anything so outrageous, so disgraceful, so reprehensible? We appear to have a president of the United States, when given reportedly actionable intelligence that the leader of a hostile power is paying bounties on the deaths of our service personnel, has done not a damn thing to halt it!

I’ll pose this question: Is this the act of a traitor?

We need to get straight to the root of what has been reported.

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