Tag Archives: US Constitution

national news

How in the world did we elect this guy?

Never, not ever, in the history of the U.S. of A. have Americans had to witness an elected president who is so ignorant, so damn filled with hatred of his political enemies, who is such a pathological liar continue to function as the ostensible leader of what we used to call the free world.

Donald Trump has declared what amounts to war on Democrats in the Congress, threatening with death for speaking the truth about why service personnel should resist following illegal orders. One of them, Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona, has been singled out as a particularly egregious target of Trump’s retribution campaign.

Kelly is a retired Navy captain, a former combat aviator, husband of a congresswoman who was nearly killed by a gunman in an assassination attempt, a former astronaut who has flowin space on four missions. He is a patriot. Kelly serves with honor and humility. He has spoken the truth. He dissents from Trump’s public policy … which the Constitution guarantees in its First Amendment.

Trump is ignorant of all of that. He doesn’t give a crap about the Constitution. He blindly accuses Sen. Kelly of commiting sedition, which carries a death penalty if convicted.

And yet … this nation somehow managed to elect this idiot to a second term as POTUS.

Kelly is not the only Democrat in power who has drawn Trump’s petulant anger.

Kids, we are living in a dangerous era in this nation’s long history.

The only recourse we seem to have at this moment happens to the federal court system, which appears to be stiffening its spine at just the right moment. Congress is rolling over for Trump’s idiocy. Trump has populated the executive branch with yes men and men. That leaves the court system to stand tall against this individual’s moronic overreach.

I have heartened by the actions of a Trump-nominated federal judge who tossed aside the indictments of former FBI director James Comey and New York AG Letitia James, calling those indictments pure political revenge brought by a U.S. attorney who is unqualified to hold her job.

Right there you have an example of the Constitution doing its job. I am clinging to the hope that it remains strong and that the courts stand firm against the Trump’s frontal assault on the rule of law.

crime news

MAGA festers in ignorance

The ignorance of the morons who comprise many of Donald Trump’s MAGA base continues to astonish me in ways I never thought possible.

New York City voters elected a Muslim, a democratic socialist as its next mayor. What was the reaction among some of the MAGA cultists who heard this news?

One of them, a member of Congress, said out loud that he wants Zohair Mamdani deported. Yep. He wants to banish him to the country of his birth. I believe it’s Sudan.

One little problem with that idiotic notion. Mamdani has been a naturalized U.S. citizen since he was boy. You can’t deport a U.S. citizen. Good grief, the man wants to live in the United States. He wants to pay his taxes here. He wants to educate his children here. He wants to govern the nation’s largest, most sophisticated, most cosmopolitan city.

This MAGA idiocy reminds of when Nikki Haley, the Republican governor South Carolina, agreed to take down the Confederate flags in her state, drawing calls for her deportation. Wait! She was born in South Carolina to parents of Indian descent. I guess her parentage made the all-American governor a deportation target.

You cannot negotiate with a political movement that comprises so many of these morons!

political news, State news

Amend the amendment process

Texans well might awaken Wednesday morning living in a state governed by a constitution that was amended 17 times at the ballot box the previous day.

Yep, the Texas Constitution could have 17 more amendments tacked onto it, making it a governing document that has been changed, well, countless times. The Legislature calls this “the will of the people at work.” I call it something different. It is government by ignorance and apathy … meaning that most Texans don’t care about the amendments they’re voting on and have no intention of learning about them.

This is a lousy way to run a state government.

I have written about this before, back when I was working for a living writing opinion pieces for the Beaumont Enterprise and the Amarillo Globe-News. I have called for a constitutional convention in Austin to change the manner in which we amend our state constitution.

We’ve tried this before. The Legislature convened a convention in the 1970s to change our system of constitutional government. The effort fell short.

The constitutional amendment process of governing occurs every legislative year, meaning every odd-numbered year when the Legislature meets ostensibly for 140 days in Austin. Issues they cannot resolve are sent to the ballot in the fall. This year we got 17 proposed amendments.

It sorta reminds me of the number of counties Texas has on the books. Not a chance of reducing the number of counties, as it would reduce the number of elected officials who set policy. I have to remind myself that the smallest of counties enjoys a seat at the power table in Texas. Those who created the state in 1845 wanted to diffuse as much power as possible from Austin. Which also explains the enormous number of counties scattered throughout the state. We’ve got 254 of them, some with tiny populations, such as Loving and Roberts counties, both of which are home to more livestock than human beings.

The federal way of governing is preferable to me. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. Except for right now when we have nimrods shutting down the government because compromise isn’t in their legislative DNA.

I don’t expect the state to convene a constitutional convention anytime soon … if ever. I just felt like venting because the founders who created the national constitution gave me the right to seek “a redress of grievances.”

national news

Hold congressional pay, too!

My rage against Congress is building, and we’re only in the second day of the government shutdown.

Congress inability to find a funding solution that keeps government operating fully has forced thousands of public servants to work out without. I’m talking about air traffic controllers and and airport security personnel. Here’s the punchline: Congress is continuing to receive its six-figure salary in full.

That is outrateous! I hereby call on Congress to do the impossible, which is to withhold the pay it gives to its members, make them suffer the same indignity they are forcing on public service employees.

The 27the Amendment to the U.S. Constitution does withhold congressional pay raises from taking effect until the next congressional election. That’s a start toward holding members of Congress accountable for the decisions they make. Or fail to make.

The idea that our congressional representatives are drawing their full salary while forcing others to go without theirs makes my blood boil … and therefore, I wish a plague on both sides of the political chasm.

media news

On same track as the Cruz Missile? Who knew?

Hell has frozen over, which is the only explanation I can find to explain how Sen. Ted Cruz and I are on the same page regarding the First Amendment.

Trifling with the very first civil liberty written into the U.S. Constitution is a “dangerous” exercise, Cruz said this week. He was speaking of the efforts to silence people who are critical of Donald Trump. People such as late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel.

Allow me this loud and full-throated cheer for Cruz, a dedicated Trumpkin to be sure, but also someone who understands what the First Amendment means, what it says and how it must be honored. Cruz served as Texas solicitor general before being elected to the Senate in 2012. He holds a law degree from Harvard University. I’ve never doubted his smarts. I just disagree with his policy views and detest the self-serving nature in which he carries himself.

On this matter, Cruz is right. He lamented the Trump administration’s thin skin regarding something Kimmel said that got ABC to suspend him “indefinitely.” Kimmel didn’t even criticize the Trump administration, which always seems to stand front and center in anything involving Trump’s criticism of the media and fellow politicians. Kimmel made some un-funny crack about provocateur Charlie Kirk’s killer possibly being a MAGA moron. That crossed some blurry line, ABC said.

Kimmel’s indefinite suspension lasted about three days. He’s back on the air tonight. I’ll be watching. I might even stand and applaud in my North Texas living room when he opens his show.

I just want to welcome the Cruz Missile into my world of protecting the nation’s governing document … even the part that gives us the freedom to criticize our government.

media news

Kimmel is back to stick it deeper

As a rule I don’t plan my day around what’s appearing on TV … but Tuesday night I am making an exception.

I am going to be sure to watch Jimmy Kimmel’s return to his 10:35 pm (Central Time) slot on ABC’s “Late Night” show. This is a big … deal, man!

Why? Because the network that suspended Kimmel indefinitely from his talk show made an egregious error in judgment. Its decision to fire Kimmel flew directly into the teeth of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the amendment that guarantees free speech.

Kimmel had made a crack on the air that Charlie Kirk’s murder the other day well could have been a MAGA-inspired event and not a deed done by a lunatic who disagreed with the right-wing influencer’s point of view. ABC determined Kimmel was out of bounds.

Wait a second! Kimmel didn’t offer an original thought. Almost at the moment Kirk was mortally wounded, some lefties sought to argue that the MAGA crowd was looking for way to tear our attention away from those Jeffrey Epstein files that allegedly contain Donald Trump’s name and suggest that the president and the convicted sex trafficker and pedophile were friends.

Look, ABC overreacted. Kimmel did not need to be punished in this manner. I am glad Kimmel is coming back.

To be clear, on the rare occasion that I stay up late enough to watch one of the after-hours comedians, i prefer Stephen Colbert on CBS-TV. He’s funnier — and more biting — than Kimmel. But that’s just me.

On Tuesday night, I will dial in to watch Jimmy Kimmel march triumpantly on stage and listen to what he has to say about what the network did to shame him. Without a shred of doubt, I will not be the only American who does so.

legal news

It’s not written, but still …

Critics of federal court rulings mandating that burning Old Glory is a form of protected political speech occasionally lapse into a tired argument to make their case.

It is that the Constitution doesn’t spell out that burning the Stars and Stripes falls into that category of protected civil liberty. They’re right. The Constitution doesn’t say any particular form of protest is protected by the First Amendment.

The argument reminds me of a constant argument I had with a colleague in Amarillo, who argued that the Constitution doesn’t say a word about the “separation of church and state,” so therefore, there is no separation. I told my colleague that the separation clearly is implied in the first clause of the First Amendment when it declares that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion … “

The Constitution doesn’t single out flag burning. Or draft-card burning. Or marching in the streets carrying signs that refer to police officers as ugly farm animals.

The founders, all those wise men, knew enough to grant interpretive power in our court system. They decided the courts should be the final arbiter on what’s constitutional and what isn’t.

The Supreme Court has ruled already that flag burning is protected speech. It has issued rulings repeatedly since the founding of our republic. Donald Trump says flag burning should result in a year in jail for the numbskull who does it. No, Donald. You can’t go there.

The nation’s founders had this one right. The current president of the United States has it wrong.

legal news

Flaws run deep in Trump doctrine

Donald Trump and his gullible gang of MAGA goofballs are operating on a faulty assumption that the nation’s Constitution protects them against protests over the extreme overreach in which they are engaged.

They purport to be true-blue conservatives who are led by a president who is claiming that the office he occupies grants him authority essentially to break the law … as long as he is performing an official act.

Let’s see about that.

The reality, as I interpret it, is that the nation’s founders created a relatively weak executive branch of government. They invested equal amounts of power in Congress and the courts and charged them with the responsibility of exercising appropriate “checks and balances” against executive overreach. One of those branches, the legislative branch comprising Congress, essentially has rolled over for Trump. The Republicans who control both congressional chambers act as if it’s OK for the president to usurp their constitutional authority. Their acquiesence has emboldened Trump to keep reaching beyond his governmental grasp. So far so good, or so it seems.

That leaves the courts as the last man standing in Trump’s way. And we are beginning to see some signs of backbone among federal judges. Trump’s legal challenges are being swatted away by judges … some of whom appointed by Trump himself. That kind of independence is precisely what the founders intended when they created a system that grants judges lifetime appointments to the federal bench.

Yeah, that kind of judicial independence just pisses Trump and his MAGA minions off. Too damn bad!

The founders did not intend to build a government that invested limitless power in one individual. If Trump had any understanding at all of our democratic process, he would know that.

But he doesn’t. Nor do the 30% to 35% of the nation’s voters who adhere to the idiocy that flows from their leader’s mouth.

education news

Trump at war with First Amendment

Let there be zero misunderstanding about this truth, which is that Donald J. Trump has declared all-out war on the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Yes, the ignoramus in chief has taken every provision in that amendment and subjected it to the whims of his desire to create an autocracy in the land founded on the principle that it never should become what Trump desires.

Let’s look at it, one clause at a time …

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof …” Trump has ordered the placement of the Ten Commandments in federal buildings and argued for the placement of them in public schools. Clearly a violation of the church-state separation clause.

“or abridging the freedom of speech …” Trump is jailing people who are speaking out against government policies initiated by the Trump administration. He signed an executive order declaring that anyone who burns Old Glory is subject to a year in jail, despite the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that declares that flag-burning is protected political speech.

“or the press …” Trump has banned certain newsgathering organizations from the White House press briefing room. Why? Because they decline to use certain terminology favored by Trump — such as the continuing to call the Gulf of Mexico by its long-standing name, rather than referring to the Gulf of America.

“or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances … “ Trump has deployed Homeland Security personnel to arrest people for assembling to complain about government policy. He has declared that they are traitors to the government if they disagree with the lame-brained policies put forth by the administration. Any third-grade student in the United States has been taught that this country was founded on the principle of dissent, that our founders were a collection of dissenters intent on creating a government that cherished political dissent as part of the our national fabric.

The first 10 Amendments to our nation’s Constitution were intended to protect our civil liberties. They are the basis for this nation’s very existence. Donald J. Trump is out of what passes for his mind!

crime news

Gun debate renews

The rumbling under our feet is the sound of those who want to raise awareness of gun violence in the wake of the Minneapolis school shooting that killed two children and injured several other kids and adults.

Good … luck!

It is so sad to say that this event won’t produce any tangible legislative remedy than all the scores of earlier shootings that have resulted in hundreds of deaths of innocent Americans including scores of children. I mean, if Sandy Hook in Newtown or Rowe Elementary in Uvalde — where dozens of children died at the hands of madmen — can’t move the debate forward, then I doubt this one will make a damn bit of difference.

I wish I had an answer to this tragic circumstance. I have sought to say categorically that legislation can be crafted that does nothing to impede the Second Amendment to our Constitution, which protects the rights of Americans to own firearms. Yet, we hear from anti-gun-reform advocates that any measure taken does restrict our constitutional right to gun ownership. That, of course, is pure horsehit.

Critics of this blog keep reminding me that nothing could have prevented the massacres we have witnessed in schools, churches, shopping malls, theaters or music events. I cannot respond to those claims because they are made without any sense of empathy or compassion.

I have always presumed that the nation’s founders intended for firearm ownership to pertain to responsible American citizens who could pass a background check to ensure they have nothing in their past that trigger any alarms. I am not an originalist, because I don’t know what went through the brilliant minds of the men who created this government. I’m just making an assumption … which I know is dangerous.

The debate will swirl once again as we assess the tragedy of Minneapolis. Maybe the solution lies in the ballot box, where voters can replace politicians who they know resist legislative efforts to bring sanity to our lives. A congressional election is just a little more than a year away. It is time to get busy.