Tag Archives: Barack Obama

national news, political news

‘The bottom’ of Trump’s wiretap will be bare

U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham promises to “get to the bottom” of the president’s allegation that his predecessor wiretapped Trump Tower.

OK, then. The South Carolina Republican has expressed his deep worry about what Donald J. Trump has alleged.

Did President Obama order an illegal wiretap? Is there a “there” there? Or, did Trump make it up? Did the president decide to fire off a storm of tweets alleging something that is patently ridiculous on its face?

Trump said Obama wiretapped the Trump Tower offices to prove that the president-elect had conversations with Russian officials. This controversy is boiling to a scandal status.

Here is what I think Sen. Graham is going to find.

Nothing! I believe the “bottom” of this specious claim is going to reveal yet another bald-faced lie from the president of the United States.

national news

Proof, Donald, we need proof … yet again!

It’s helpful to keep everything that flies out of Donald J. Trump’s mouth — or shows up on his Twitter feed — in their proper perspective.

It is that the president of the United States is likely to say or tweet whatever the hell pops into his noggin at any time of the day or night.

He now accuses President Obama of wiretapping his Trump Tower offices, allegedly to determine if he had held unauthorized talks with Russian officials before he became president.

Proof? Pffft! Who needs it? Trump seems to ask.

Let us review for a moment a couple of other specious claims that Trump has made.

* He said “thousands and thousands of Muslims cheered” the collapse of the World Trade Center during the 9/11 attacks. They didn’t.

* The president said that “millions of illegal immigrants voted for Hillary Clinton” in the 2016 presidential election, giving her the comfortable popular vote margin she scored over Trump while losing the Electoral College. He has yet to prove that, either.

Now this.

Obama had his staff wiretap his office, according to Trump.

No proof has come forward.

How on God’s Earth can we believe anything that this clown keeps saying?

I cannot.

media news, national news, political news

It’s official: Trump has blown himself apart

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After the latest and “greatest” Donald J. Trump tweet-storm — this time regarding his immediate predecessor as president of the United States — I am compelled to ask a simple question.

Can someone explain to me as if I’m a 5-year-old why in the name of all that is holy did 62 million Americans vote for Trump as president?

Trump now says Barack Obama wiretapped the new president’s offices at Trump Tower in New York. He once again offered no evidence. No proof. Nothing to substantiate a single idiotic word he sent out via Twitter.

What’s more, then we get U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican — and former GOP presidential opponent of Trump, saying he is “worried” about the president’s moronic accusation.

What the hell does that mean, senator? Worried? About what?

I can’t tell if he’s worried that the president would resort to such idiocy or he’s worried that there might be something to what he has alleged.

“Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!” Trump said in one of his tweets.

President Obama, of course, has denied any such thing ever occurred.

At issue, in case you’ve forgotten, is whether the Trump campaign had any improper or illegal contact with Russian government officials during the campaign or immediately afterward — and before Trump took office. Did they talk about the sanctions that the Obama administration had leveled against the Russians because 17 U.S. intelligence agencies believe they sought to influence the outcome of the election?

Trump now has flipped his beanie. His butter has slipped off his noodles.

Some of us out here warned about Trump’s temperament, his judgment, his fitness for the job he won. The very idea that the president of the United States would launch this Twitter tirade and accuse his predecessor of breaking the law is — all by itself — enough to disqualify this individual from holding any public office.

Then again, I thought so way back when he said Sen. John McCain was a “war hero only because he was captured” by the North Vietnamese and beaten to within an inch of his life while being held captive during the Vietnam War.

My question still stands: How did this clown win a presidential election?

International news

‘W’ trying, perhaps, to be too cute with his critiques

George W. Bush is saying he doesn’t want to “criticize” his successors as president of the United States.

Then he says things that sound oh, so critical of them.

Which is it, Mr. President? Are you going to weigh in fully or are you going to keep one foot off the scales?

Speaking at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, the ex-president warned against “isolationist tendencies,” an apparent reference to some of the statements made by Donald J. Trump and his administration.

It would behoove Bush to steer clear of references to the Iraq War, which in my view, didn’t turn out quite the way he and his team envisioned it and sold it to the United Nations and to the American public. We weren’t greeted as “liberators”; the fight to secure Baghdad was far tougher than advertised; and, oh yes, we never did find those weapons of mass destruction that the Bush team said were in the late Saddam Hussein’s possession.

As USA Today reported, “Bush said that there is a lesson ‘when the United States decides not to take the lead and withdraw,’ an apparent critique of former President Barack Obama.

“’Vacuums can be created when U.S. presence recedes and that vacuum is generally filed with people who don’t share the ideology, the same sense of human rights and human dignity and freedom that we do,’ he added.”

The former president should lose the pretense of “not wanting to be critical” of his successors. That would be too bad if he did decide to weigh in fully. I kind of admired his declaration that he didn’t want to undermine his immediate successor, President Obama, as he sought to craft his own foreign and domestic agenda. Neither did his father, George H.W. Bush, when he turned the presidency over to the man who defeated his re-election effort, Bill Clinton.

If Bush 43 is going to speak critically of current policy, then he just ought to say so and cease trying to sugarcoat it with “I don’t intend to criticize anyone” statements.

Actually, Mr. President, I get what you are trying to say.

business news, national news

‘Mess’? Mr. President, you inherited a ‘mess’?

Barack Hussein Obama doesn’t need me to defend him.

Aww, what the heck. I’ll do so anyway.

His successor as president of the United States told us Tuesday night once again that he inherited a “mess” when he took office a little more than a month ago.

Donald J. Trump’s assertion came during his speech to a joint session of Congress. He talked about 94 million Americans no longer looking for work and about how the economic recovery is the slowest in 60-plus years.

He blamed President Obama’s economic policies.

Ayyye!

I’ll stipulate up front that the economic recovery isn’t as robust as most of us would like.

But …

The economy isn’t a “mess,” as Trump said it is. You want a “mess”? Consider what Obama inherited when he took office in 2009: Employers were shucking jobs at 700,000 per month; the stock market plummeted, costing trillions of dollars in wealth; the auto industry was failing; banks were failing; the economy was heading straight into the crapper, man!

Eight years later, where do we stand? The Dow Jones Industrial Average virtually tripled in wealth; the jobless rate has been cut in half; we’ve had 80 consecutive months of job growth; the auto industry has been revived; bank closures have all but stopped.

Oh, the 94 million figure Trump cited about those who are no longer seeking employment? That number includes retirees and students. It’s a phony statistic.

The debt? Sure, it’s high. I wish it were less than it is, too. Why did we accrue such debt? Because the economic stimulus package Congress approved shortly after Obama took office required the infusion of public money to shore up an economy on the verge of total collapse.

I’ll add — for the umpteenth time — this point as well: The annual federal budget deficit has been cut by nearly two-thirds during the past eight years.

A mess, Mr. President? No, sir. You did not “inherit a mess.” Stop repeating that outright lie!

military news

In Trump World: Buck stops … somewhere else

Commanders in chief are supposed to know a fundamental truth about sitting atop a large and complex military chain of command.

They are allowed to take some of the credit for success, but they also must take responsibility when missions don’t go according to plan.

Donald J. Trump signed off on a mission to kill or capture some top al-Qaeda leaders, to collect some intelligence on the terror network and, presumably, to return all the men assigned to carry out the mission back home.

The mission that occurred in Yemen in late January. A Navy SEAL, Chief Petty Officer William “Ryan” Owens died in the fire fight. A state-of-the-art Osprey V-22 tiltrotor aircraft was lost. Some al-Qaeda leaders died in the battle. So did some civilians, including at least one child.

Military and national security officials are still trying to assess the value of the intelligence collected. We keep hearing conflicting assessments. The president, of course, says it is of high value.

But the current commander in chief has done something that is quite extraordinary — and inexcusable. He is laying the blame for Petty Officer Owens’ death on the military planners. “They” lost the SEAL, Trump has said.

Wait a flippin’ minute, Mr. President! The buck is supposed to stop at your desk. One of your predecessors, President Truman, famously posted the sign on his Oval Office desk that said “The Buck Stops Here.” President Kennedy once declared that “victory has a thousand fathers, while defeat is an orphan” after the failed Bay of Pigs operation shortly after he became president.

Trump’s response? He has declared that the planning for the Yemen raid was done by President Obama’s national security team. They crafted the plan that failed, Trump has implied. It’s their fault, too!

This is not what commanders in chief do. Under any other circumstance, presidents stand up and take the heat when things go badly. They do not blame others — namely the military brass or their predecessors. JFK’s failed mission in Cuba was actually conceived by his predecessor, President Eisenhower, but the new guy took the hickey, accepted full responsibility for the mission’s failure.

A military man who just a few years later would become commander in chief himself, devised a strategy to liberate Europe from Nazi Germany. Army Gen. Dwight Eisenhower — supreme commander of Allied Forces — launched the D-Day invasion of Normandy, France in June 1944. The mission succeeded, Europe would be liberated.

But Ike had written an alternative announcement he would have read over the radio had the mission failed. In the message that was never broadcast, he took full responsibility for its failure.

That is what leaders do.

I am not going to wander into the muck over whether the Yemen raid was a success or failure. The president’s assertion that the generals were to blame for the death of a brave young SEAL suggests to me that he has doubts about the mission’s overall success.

Whatever the case, the event occurred on the commander in chief’s watch and it is that person — no one else — who should be held fully accountable.

national news, political news

Yep, Trump speech was worth watching

It was an open question in my own mind for most of the day whether I would watch Donald J. Trump’s speech to a joint session of Congress.

When the time arrived, and the House of Representatives sergeant at arms introduced the president of the United States, there I was … waiting to hear what Trump had to say.

I got scolded, though, from a friend of mine, an Amarillo businessman and apparently an avowed Trumpkin. He was putting some comments out on social media about how Democrats weren’t willing to stand and applaud the president. He and I got into a brief snit this evening over it, but I think we’re still friends.

He did imply, though, that I don’t respect the office of president. I sought to assure him that I most certainly do respect the office; I don’t think my friend believes me.

I’ll say so here: I respect the office, even if I dislike the occupant. This isn’t the first time I’ve had this dual feeling of respect for the office but disrespect for the individual. Hey, it happens.

My friend also implored me to “get over it!” I should get over it, but then so should have Republicans “gotten over it” when Barack Obama was elected president in 2008. Many of them didn’t, even to the point of questioning whether he was constitutionally qualified to hold the office to which he was elected twice; one of them was — oh yeah! — Donald J. Trump.

I watched all but about four minutes of Trump’s speech tonight. I had to take Toby the Puppy for a brief walk in the middle of it. But I watched most of the speech precisely because I do respect — even revere — the office.

I powered through it. I’m proud of myself.

national news, political news

‘I don’t like the racism and name-calling’

Mr. President, many millions of other Americans don’t like any of it either.

George W. Bush is speaking out more forcefully about one of the men who has succeeded him as president of the United States.

Will the object of President Bush’s critique, Donald John Trump, listen to what No. 43 has to say? I rather doubt it.

Still, the message needs to be delivered. And the former president is doing so in a measured, but unambiguous manner.

Bush spoke with People magazine about his post-presidential hobby, painting, and also about Trump and the new president’s rocky first month in office.

Despite his critique of Trump, Bush remains an optimist. According to People: Bush called the political climate in Trump’s Washington “pretty ugly” (“I’m not going back nowhere!” he added for emphasis), but said he isn’t feeling anxious about the direction of the country. “Not really. I’m optimistic about where we’ll end up. … We’ve been through these periods before and we’ve always had a way to come out of it. I’m more optimistic than some.”

The ex-president was adamant about refraining from criticizing his immediate successor, Barack Obama. Not so, apparently, with Obama’s immediate successor.

I want to share in President Bush’s optimism. Sadly, I cannot.

However, I do share Bush’s view of what he’s heard coming from the nation’s capital in this still-new Trump era: “I don’t like the racism and I don’t like the name-calling and I don’t like the people feeling alienated,”

If only Donald Trump would listen. If only …

national news, political news

Get ready for Trump’s ‘coming-out’ speech

No, I don’t mean that kind of “coming out.”

However, I do mean that the president of the United States will step onto a significantly larger stage than ever before. The podium will be of, oh, standard size, I guess. He’ll be standing tonight in front of a joint congressional session. The vice president and the speaker of the House of Representatives will sit behind him.

The speaker will declare that “it is my high honor and privilege to introduce the president of the United States.”

Applause will fill the room. Donald J. Trump will begin his speech.

That’s when the pomp and pageantry ends and when we get a look at just how much he’s been able to “unify” the body to which he is speaking, let alone the country.

I don’t know about you but I’m going to look at a few external factors as Trump speaks … assuming, of course, that I can power through the entire event.

The Supreme Court justices will be there. Who among them will sit this one out? When Trump’s immediate predecessor spoke to these joint sessions, a couple of the court’s conservative justices — the late Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas — famously were no-shows. One or both of them said they disliked having to sit there while everyone around them were clapping and cheering.

President Obama famously scolded the court for its 2010 ruling enabling corporations to give unlimited amounts of money to political candidates. The justices had to take it. Personally, I thought the president was wrong to do so in that venue and it surely rankled the court majority that decided the infamous Citizens United case.

Who’s going to stay away from Trump’s speech? Will it be, say, one or two of the court’s liberal justices?

Who stands and claps and who sits? This is a fairly normal occurrence. Lawmakers of the president’s party usually clap and cheer at everything that comes out of the president’s mouth; those on the other side don’t.

Republicans didn’t much cheering for Barack Obama during the eight years he spoke to joint sessions. I rather doubt Democrats will, either, when Trump stands before them.

His defense-spending boost will be a big topic. He wants to spend $54 billion more on defense, ostensibly to “rebuild our military.” At what cost? Which domestic programs get the axe? Which Americans will feel the pain? Maintaining military strength usually is a non-partisan/bipartisan issue. Something tells me when the president gets around to that one, we won’t see much cheering from Democrats.

Will the president veer off topic? He’ll have a Teleprompter in front of him. He’ll be reading a prepared text. I have to wonder if Trump is going to be tempted to take off on one of his vaunted campaign-style riffs and rants about, oh, the size of his Electoral College victory, or about the “fake news” he says is being peddled by the “mainstream media.”

I don’t expect to hear the names “Michael Flynn” or “Vladimir Putin” come from the president’s mouth. I don’t expect either to hear him say the word “Russia.” Nor do I expect him to talk about things such as the difficulty he is having assembling his government; key appointees keep dropping out for one reason or another.

But let’s get ready — ladies and gents, boys and girls — for an interesting show this evening, shall we?

Pass the popcorn … and the Pepto.

media news, national news, political news

‘W’: Free press is ‘indispensable to democracy’

Maybe you remember the bumper stickers with President George W. Bush’s face on them, with the caption: Do you miss him?

The message was meant as a dig at President Barack H. Obama.

Well, I didn’t miss him then. I do miss him now that a new president is in charge … and who’s decided to wage open war against the media.

President Bush said on “Today” that a free and strong media are “indispensable to democracy.”

Trump doesn’t grasp the notion that the media play a critical role in assuring that public officials — even the president of the United States — always stay on the straight and narrow.

“I consider the media to be indispensable to democracy. … Power can be very addictive,” he told NBC’s “Today.” Do you think?

George W. Bush is among a handful of men who have held those reins of power. He did so for two terms. While his record is a mixed one, he always seemed to comprehend the limits inherent in the power of the presidency.

Two presidents later, we have a guy in the White House who is trying to manipulate the media in ways most of never have seen. He seeks to shut out major media organizations from press briefings; he seeks to curry favor with “friendly reporters”; he blasts reporters and organizations openly for being “dishonest” and purveyors of what he calls “fake news.”

The First Amendment guarantees a “free press.” It prohibits the government from interfering in the media’s effort to do their duty.

Trump doesn’t get it. President Bush does get it. “We need an independent media to hold people like me to account,” “W” said.

Do I miss the 43rd president?

Yes. I do.