Tag Archives: Allen West

State news

West seeks to drag Abbott into the right-wing ditch

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

This is just dandy.

A right-wing former one-term Florida congressman is now seeking to become Texas’s next governor by suggesting that the current right-wing governor isn’t right-wing enough.

Spare me the alt-right demagoguery.

Allen West, the former head of the Texas Republican Party, has declared his intention to challenge Gov. Greg Abbott in the GOP primary next spring. What has Abbott done to incur West’s political challenge? I guess he hasn’t yet rounded up and thrown illegal immigrants into jail and tossed the keys into the Gulf of Mexico.

The former president of the U.S.A. has endorsed Abbott already, so West isn’t likely to curry much favor with the bloc of fanatics who hang on POTUS 45’s every idiotic pronouncement.

Allen West announces he’s running against Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in primary | The Texas Tribune

Abbott wants to build a wall along our southern border. He has stuck his thumb in President Biden’s eye practically every chance he gets. Abbott has anticipated this challenge from West, so he’s moving his re-election rhetoric farther to the right-wing fringe all the time. It’s not as if he isn’t adhering to the conservative mantra preached by the likes of Allen West and so many other Texas Republicans.

Allen West is a far-right ideologue. Indeed, the entire Texas GOP playing field is cluttered with others just like him.

West now wants to take his game to the next level. He wants that governor’s office. Ugh!

Don’t get me wrong. I am no fan of Abbott. I am even less of a fan of Allen West, the guy who got drummed out of the Army because he mistreated prisoners of war in Iraq … allegedly.

West is now a Texas GOP fire-breather. This upcoming campaign season will be fun to watch, if I have the stomach for it.

State news

Ex-GOP chair West to seek another office? Oh, boy!

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

One of my least favorite Republicans — ever! — has declared he is thinking seriously of running for statewide office in Texas.

That means governor. Allen West resigned as chair of the Texas Republican Party to declare that he well might run for governor. He said he wants to avoid any potential conflict of interest by holding a partisan job while seeking a public office. Well, good for you on that score, Allen West.

But this guy really pi**es me off! Seriously, man.

He moved to Texas just a couple of years ago to run for party chair. He got elected and then started picking fights with other Republican pols. He got into snits with Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and House Speaker Dade Phelan. West’s beef with Phelan was the funniest of them all, as he called Phelan a “traitor” because he works relatively well with legislative Democrats.

You can’t have any sort of bipartisanship, right Mr. GOP Chairman?

What ought to become an issue in any sort of political campaign that West launches is his military record. He resigned from the Army as a colonel, but got caught up in a scandalous incident in which he was party to the brutal mistreatment of an Iraqi prisoner during the Iraq War. He left the Army to run for Congress in Florida. He served a single term. West moved to Texas.

I chuckle how he compares himself to some of Texas’s heroes. According to the Texas Tribune: “Many men from Georgia, many men from Tennessee, came here to serve the great state of Texas, and so we’re gonna consider it,” said West, who grew up in Georgia. He added that he was announcing his resignation, effective next month, so that there is no conflict of interest as he weighs his next political move.

Texas Republican Party Chair Allen West resigns | The Texas Tribune

Allen West seems to embody the carpetbagging trend we happen to see these days. U.S. Rep. Ronny Jackson had never lived in the 13th Congressional District before moving to the Texas Panhandle to run for the office that Mac Thornberry vacated when he retired. Indeed, former Democratic state Sen. Wendy Davis moved from Fort Worth to the Austin area to run for a congressional seat, but lost that bid. Others have followed suit.

Now we have Allen West, who knows next to nothing about the specific issues related to Texas. Will this guy study up on West Texas water needs, or on North Texas’s transportation issues, or on Gulf Coast shoreline erosion problems?

Hey, if he doesn’t want to run for governor, West — who resides in the Metroplex — said he might look at seeking the 32nd Congressional District now held by Rep. Collin Allred, a Democrat.

Good grief!

State news

Gov. Allen West? Eek!

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

So help me, I do not know what I am likely to do if Allen West decides to challenge Greg Abbott in the 2022 Texas Republican gubernatorial primary.

I do not intend to leave Texas. However, this state remains a ruby-red Republican state, which suggests to me that whoever the GOP nominates for governor next year stands a good chance of being elected.

West is a bomb-throwing, fire-breathing, reckless and feckless Texas Republican Party chairman. He has lived in Texas for just a few years. He once served in Congress, representing a Florida district for a single term before he got beat for re-election. Then he moved Texas in search of a political job. He found one at the state GOP headquarters.

The guy is a kook. He’s nuttier than a fruitcake. He has said Texans should have the right to vote on whether to secede from the Union. Good, ever-lovin’ grief!

Allen West floats secession after Supreme Court rejects Texas election challenge – Washington Times

He now is being talked about as a possible primary challenger to Gov. Abbott, who is thinking openly about running for president in 2024.

I long have harbored suspicions about the Texas GOP. They were more or less confirmed when it elected a wacko as its chairman. Now he aspires to higher office? Ugh! I have hoped for a return to sanity in this once-great political party. I sense that it will remain certifiably nutty as we enter the next political season.

As for Abbott, well, he’s disappointed me, too. He recently began lying about President Biden’s immigration policy, suggesting it was luring more migrants into Texas who were bringing COVID infection with them. An Abbott-West primary fight would present a miserable choice for Texas Republican voters. But … that ain’t my decision to make.

I am going to try to keep an open mind about how the GOP primary plays out. I also can hope that Allen West will decide against running for governor. We already have too many Republican fire breathers occupying statewide office.

State news

Secession? Are they serious?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

It’s close being declared official, that the Texas Republican Party has lost what passes for its mind. Hey, maybe it already is an official declaration!

Get a load of this: the Texas GOP has signed on to a proposal to allow Texans to vote on whether the state should secede from the Union and form an independent nation.

The Guardian reports: In a talk show interview, the party chair, Allen West, argued that: “Texans have a right to voice their opinions on [this] critical issue.

“I don’t understand why anyone would feel that they need to prevent people from having a voice in something that is part of the Texas constitution,” the former Florida congressman said of the Texas Referendum Independence Act. “You cannot prevent the people from having a voice.”

Texas Republicans endorse legislation to allow vote on secession from US | Texas | The Guardian

Allen West is out of his mind. He has gone around the bend. His butter has slipped off his noodle.

What are we to expect from a one-term Florida congressman who moved to Texas specifically to hijack the state GOP. Oh, I should also mention that he resigned from the Army after being accused of mistreating Iraqi prisoners of war during the Iraq War.

Now he is lending his voice to the craziest notion since, oh, the last time Texas seceded from the U.S. of A., in 1861, when it joined the Confederate States of America, which then lost the Civil War, the bloodiest armed conflict in our nation’s history!

This secession issue has been around ever since. It keeps cropping up during Texas legislative sessions. Kinda like the way fire ant mounds pop up after a spring thunderstorm.

The Texas Tribune reported in January that secession is illegal.

Texas can’t secede from the U.S. Here’s why. | The Texas Tribune

You don’t have to take my word for it; a lot of brainiacs have said that any notion that Texas can secede is the stuff of lunatics.

When in the name of political sanity is the Texas Republican Party going to pull its head out of its a**? Ever?

State news

Texas GOP has gone ’round the bend

I can declare it loudly that the Texas Republican Party has gone bonkers, around the bend, it’s out to lunch … and dinner.

The party has just elected a former one-term congressman from Florida as its new chairman. He is Allen West, who “distinguished” himself in Congress by picking fights with President Obama and riling even his own colleagues with his fiery rhetoric.

West succeeds James Dickey as Texas GOP chair. The two of them have locked arms in solidarity, pledging to keep Texas solidly Republican in the upcoming presidential election.

Let’s look back at former Rep. West’s still-brief political history. The African-American former Army lieutenant colonel once said blacks were better off under segregation. He said that Islam is not a religion but is a “totalitarian, theocratic political ideology.” I think my favorite utterance came when he said that congressional Democrats were being controlled by communists and Marxists dedicated to the overthrow of the American political and economic system.

As the Texas Tribune reports: “We’re disgusted but not surprised that Texas Republicans chose a certified racist conservative hardliner like Allen West as their new chairman,” state Democratic Party spokesman Abhi Rahman said in a statement. “West is everything that is wrong with the Republican Party and brings to light their failures on building an inclusive, welcoming party that is deliberate and thoughtful in handling crisis situations.”

This is the guy who now is going to lead the Texas Republican Party?

Oh, brother.

political news, State news

Texas government is a monstrous entity

Sunset-in-Texas-Banner_1

I posted a blog recently that was critical of an appointment to the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick selected a former Florida congressman, fellow Republican Allen West, to the panel. Its job is critical to assuring that Texans are being well-served by their state government agencies.

I feel a need to flesh out just a bit why I object to West’s appointment.

I’ll get right to the point: Allen West likely knows next to nothing about how our state’s government functions and how its myriad agencies work.

The Texas Sunset Commission recommends which agencies should continue and which should bit the dust. It conducts serious business. It reviews agencies’ efficiency and whether they’re giving Texans the biggest and best bang for the big bucks Texans spend on their state government.

West’s credentials? His expertise?

Well, he’s a fiery conservative, just like the man who picked him for the post. Dan Patrick earned his own political stripes first as a radio talk show host and then as a state senator from Houston. West’s record contains a couple of significant chapters: He was an Army officer who lost his battalion command during the Iraq War in 2003 after he admitted to assaulting an Iraqi detainee; he then was elected to Congress in 2010, but lost his re-election bid two years later.

Then the former congressman moved to Texas a year ago to begin a new job.

This job shouldn’t go to someone who’s a political celebrity. It ought to go to individuals who have a sufficient knowledge of how to make Texas massive government machinery work well for the folks who pay the bills.

I believe it is fair to ask Lt. Gov. Patrick: Weren’t there a sufficient number of individuals who (a) share your political philosophy and (b) understand the complexities of our state’s enormous bureaucracy?

 

political news, State news

Lt. Gov. Patrick makes celebrity pick for Sunset panel

Allen_West_jpg_312x1000_q100

Allen West is a brand-new resident of Texas.

But by golly, he’s gotten himself a high-powered political job, thanks to an appointment by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.

West is a retired Army lieutenant colonel, a former one-term Florida congressman, and a contributor to the Fox News Channel. He’s now a member of the Texas Sunset Commission, the panel that decides which state agencies live and which ones should die.

West’s statement upon the appointment is quite fascinating, too. According to the Texas Tribune: “There is no mission more important than working towards a more efficient and effective state government,” West said in a statement. “As a graduate of the University of Tennessee and a former member of Congress, it is a blessing to follow in the footsteps of Davy Crockett who came to Texas to fight for liberty and freedom.”

He’s a Republican, as is Patrick.

I believe West is a smart man, although I happen to disagree with just every utterance that has come out of his mouth since I first heard of him. He’s a fiery conservative who has said some rather remarkable things over the years, such as, oh, that most Democrats in Congress are communist sympathizers.

West’s combat duty during the Iraq War suffered a serious blemish. He was serving as a battalion commander, but then was stripped of his command after he admitted that he assaulted an Iraqi detainee during an interrogation. That’s not how officers behave, you know?

So, does this brand new Texan — he moved to Dallas about a year ago — know enough about Texas government agencies to be a serious contributor to the Sunset Commission?

I’m just wondering … out loud.

He’s a smart guy and perhaps he’ll get up to speed. I hope he does.

It’s just that from my perch, it seems that Lt. Gov. Patrick has picked someone as much for his notoriety as for his expertise.

Good luck, Col. West.

 

national news, political news

Love brings diversity to Black Caucus

Well, how about this? The Congressional Black Caucus — normally an echo chamber comprising progressive Democrats — is going to have a Republican join its ranks.

U.S. Rep. Mia Love of Utah will become a member of the CBC, a group she once vowed to “dismantle.” She now hopes to change it from within.

Good for her. Good for the CBC.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/01/06/mia-love-joins-the-cbc-the-group-she-vowed-to-dismantle/

It’s not that the CBC has been devoid of Republican members. The most recent member had been Rep. Allen West of Florida, the TEA party blowhard who — in my view — disgraced himself by suggesting that most Democrats were closet communists. Voters tossed him out after a single term.

Black Republicans in the past have been reluctant to join the CBC. The late former Sen. Edward Brooke of Massachusetts, the first African-American elected since Reconstruction, didn’t join; neither did former U.S. Rep. J.C. Watt of Oklahoma; current Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina hasn’t joined.

It’s good for the caucus to hear from Rep. Love. She clearly is going to sing from a different hymnal than her CBC colleagues.

That’s OK. A group that preaches “diversity” is now going to have some within its own ranks.

 

national news

Idiocy runs rampant

The idiocy that some cable “news” networks try to pass off as punditry continues to amaze me.

Allen West is a retired Army officer, a former member of Congress and a current “contributor” to the Fox News Channel.

He said the best way to combat the activities such as the shooter who invaded the Canadian Parliament building this week in Ottawa is to close down certain mosques and “Islamic Centers” and deport imams who are “feeding Islamic terrorists.”

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/10/24/allen-west-on-ottawa-attack-shut-down-mosques-o/201303

Here’s part of what West said on a radio interview:

“We’re not saying, you know, we start shutting down mosques and Islamic Centers. But the ones who are feeding us these violent jihadists, they need to be the ones that are shut down. Like I said, the imams, the mullahs that are there running these mosques and centers, they need to be deported. Because we have to say, this is, you know, a zero-sum game. We’re not tolerating it.”

Let’s bring this issue home, to Amarillo.

A prominent Amarillo physician, who happens to be Muslim, erected such a center on the far western edge of the city some years back in honor of his mother.

I actually heard someone express fear that the center would become a “school” for terrorists, that the center would breed bad guys who then would spread their hatred in the form of violence perpetrated against “infidels.” I told this individual with whom I am acquainted that terror cells do not operate in the open like that; they operate under cover of darkness that no terrorist organization — no matter their so-called religious affiliation. They’re not going to advertise their association with a clearly marked and identified structure, such as an Islamic center.

This individual didn’t get my point.

How about we just maintain keen vigilance, stay alert at all times and hunt down the terrorists we can identify?

Civilized nations all around the globe — and that surely includes the United States of America — are doing that already.

Uncategorized

West questions Duckworth's 'loyalty'

Allen West served a single term in the U.S. House of Representatives before losing his bid for re-election in 2012.

Yet, the Republican keeps making waves. I wish he’d keep his trap shut.

West has implied that a decorated — and seriously wounded — Iraq War veteran might be more loyal to the “Democrat Party” than she is to her country by agreeing to serve on a House select committee charged with examining the Benghazi controversy.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/22/allen-west-tammy-duckworth_n_5375138.html?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000013

He’s talking about Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., who lost both of her legs while flying a helicopter for the Army during the Iraq War. Her ship was hit in 2004 by a rocket-propelled grenade. Duckworth received the Purple Heart as a result of her injuries.

“I just don’t know where her loyalties lie,” West said in a radio interview. “You know, for her to be a veteran, a wounded warrior for the United States Army, she should know this is not the right thing,” he said. “And hopefully … she’ll remember the oath of office she took as an Army officer and not the allegiance I guess she believes she has to the liberal progressives of the Democrat Party.”

Good grief.

Congressional Democrats have said the select committee hearings on Benghazi are a sham. Duckworth is one of five Democrats named to the panel. Her office pledges that she’ll take her responsibilities on the committee seriously, which all 12 committee members from both parties have vowed to do.

Allen West’s comments about Duckworth’s “loyalties” should be scorned and condemned.