International news

Israel is right to defend itself

Some of my right-wing friends already are looking for U.S. politicians to blame for Hamas’s sudden and vicious attack on Israel over the weekend, forcing the Israelis to declare war against the terrorists.

Who are our right-wing friends blaming? President Biden, of course. They say that Iranians helped Hamas plot the attack that caught the Israelis off-guard. These right-wingers also contend that Iran was able to assist Hamas because of a $6 billion payment made to secure the release of Americans helped captive in Iran.

Hold on! The Iranians haven’t yet received a nickel of that money, meaning that the deal played no role — none! — in the Iranians’ ability to assist in planning the Hamas attack on Israel.

For the record, I believe Israel has every right to defend itself against terrorists such as Hamas, which targets civilians deliberately when it launches these attacks against Israel. I fear for my many friends in Israel, as some of them live near Gaza City, which is controlled by Hamas.

One horrific consequence of Israel’s response to Hamas’s attack will be that it, too, will inflict civilian casualties. Why? Because hides its high command in the middle of civilian neighborhoods, and make no mistake that Israel is looking to take out the commanders who are coordinating these attacks.

My five weeks in Israel in the spring of 2009 almost give me a stake in seeing how this drama plays out. I intend to stand with the Israelis as they seek to root out the monsters who have started this war.

local news

Texas GOP sounds battle cry

These are difficult times if you are a Republican speaker of a House of Representatives, whether on a state level — such as Texas s — or on the national level in D.C.

Kevin McCarthy was tossed out of his speaker’s chair in Washington by an angry MAGA moron — Rep. Matt Gaetz — who filed a motion to declare the speaker’s chair “vacant.” McCarthy made the deal with the MAGA cult … and it cost him!

Next up will be Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan, a Beaumont Republican, who is set to open the House proceedings in the third special session called this year by Gov. Greg Abbott.

Except that Phelan is in trouble with his own caucus, too. He led a House of Reps that impeached Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton with an overwhelming bipartisan vote. It turned out that the “will of the House” had its say. Then the Texas Senate acquitted Paxton on all the complaints filed against him.

There’s a move afoot in Austin to boot Phelan out of the speaker’s chair. Conservative lawmakers don’t like the way the speaker handled the impeachment of Paxton. They want his head on a platter.

It looks as though, to my eyes, that the Republican Party simply is too damn dysfunctional just to govern. Why is that? Because too many of the mainstream GOPers are afraid of retaliation by the MAGA cult.

Shameful, man.

local news

Fall/winter ‘flora’ returns!

My memory at times fails me, particularly when I try to recall events in my life … such as when I began growing a fall/winter beard.

I started it again this year a few days before the start of autumn. The autumnal equinox came and went a few days ago and my beard already was in full — or nearly full — swing.

It will remain on my puss until the first day of spring, sometime in March.

I’ve been known to cheat on growing the thing and then shaving it off. My dear wife disliked it when I was late starting in the fall, and  she damn sure really didn’t like it when I shaved it off before the vernal equinox.

But she got over it and liked me just the same — with or without the facial flora. At least that’s what she told me.

It gets saltier each year I grow it, meaning it contains far more “salt’ than “pepper” these days.

The mustache? I started that thing when I was still in the Army. I believe it began sprouting in July 1970. I kept it for 10 years before I shaved it off in a fit of stupidity. I recall coming out of the bathroom sans ‘stashe. My sons took a look at me and started laughing. They never had seen Dad without facial hair. They kept laughing until two or three days later I decided “it’s coming back.”

Fifty-three years later, it’s still there, now accompanied by the beard that makes me proud.

As a former colleague and friend of mine, the late Claude Duncan, once told me: “You may have your share of shortcomings, but growing hair isn’t one of them.”

education news

Support public education … not deplete it!

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has called the Legislature back to work for its third special session this year, aiming to enact a law that allows Texans to divert their property taxes into private school systems.

Gov. Abbott can count me out!

I happen to want the Legislature to put more money into public education, not deplete its revenue stream by allowing Texans to purchase vouchers to spend on their kids’ education.

I am willing to concede that public education in Texas isn’t doing all it can do to provide our children with the best education possible. I see the test results and I am acutely aware that Texas students’ perform below the national averages on almost all educational disciplines. Much of that is cultural, some of it is economic.

It’s also because Texas public educators likely do not believe they have the support of the men and women in power who have it within their power to give teachers and administrators all the support they deserve.

Dammit to hell, anyway! Texas public education deserves better than it is getting from the state and, in some instances, from local school boards whose members have been bitten by the “anti-woke” bug. Public educators have found themselves distracted by pressure to ban books or to teach students only a “certain way” that adheres to some right-wing ideology.

I hate the notion of public education being kicked around like the proverbial political football. That is what is happening with the governor and legislators getting set to fast-track Texans away from public education.

As a believer in spending public money on public education, my sincere hope is that we can do more within government to improve the education we provide our children.

International news

Hamas attacks shake me personally

Reports this morning out of Israel shook me to my core as I learned of the Hamas terrorist group’s assault on Israelis.

The terrorists fired rockets out of Gaza, thousands of them, reportedly, striking neighborhoods and killing several civilians. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said “we are at war” with Hamas.

Has it been anything but a war footing with the monsters who live on the outskirts of the Israeli border.

In May-June 2009 I spent five weeks in Israel. I learned first-hand and saw up close the damage that the terrorists can bring to that country.

I saw damaged houses in Ashkelon and learned how Israeli building codes require the installation of fortified rooms to give residents protection from the barrage. Our group looked into Gaza City from a bluff overlooking the area and were told how it teems with groups intent on destroying Israel. We learned how little time it takes for jet fighters to cross Israeli air space.

My emotional support is with the Israelis. I want them to put down this latest uprising, no matter what it takes. I have too many friends from that earlier visit in 2009 who remain near to my heart.

local news

Journey nearing its end

My journey through the darkness has found sufficient light for me to declare that I believe it is nearing its end.

Does that mean the destination is near, that I have no more distance to travel before I can declare my life has been (more or less) restored since the passing of the only woman I’ve ever loved with all my heart?

It means only that I can see much more clearly these days, that I can profess openly that I am ready for a relationship if the right one were to present itself. I don’t mean to sound coy or cagey. I only mean to tell you the obvious, which is that my heart is likely to remain permanently damaged and that I am learning the complexities of dealing with the pain.

Kathy Anne’s brief but savage fight with glioblastoma at the beginning of this horrible year will remain with me for the rest of my life on Earth. She had six weeks from her diagnosis to the end. The oncologist who was scheduled to treat her called her form of cancer “the most aggressive” he ever has seen.

That was then. The here and now puts me in a position to start to move on, to commence with the rest of my life. My beautiful bride, Kathy Anne, was 71 when she passed. I am almost 74. She was in good health until, well, she wasn’t. I am in reasonably good health … at this moment. The events of this year have taught me the bitterest of lessons. One of them is that at my age, health can turn from blessing to curse in rapid fashion.

I am not going to sit around, awaiting the outcome I know awaits all of us. I intend to live, just as Kathy Anne insisted I do back when we both were young and had a long life ahead of us.

There will be more tales to tell about my journey as it progresses into the blinding light of the living. I’m not there yet.

But, damn … I believe it’s getting closer!

education news, local news

Institute shouldn’t ignore diversity

Alex and Cheryl Fairly are paying it forward in a big way at the university from which they both graduated.

The Fairlys are contributing $20 million to West Texas A&M University, creating an institute they say will promote West Texas values.

“The mission of The Hill Institute is to encourage reflection upon the importance of ten West Texas, Texas, and American values and, through study and scholarship, promulgate the values among students within the diverse disciplines of the University and the extended community,” according to a flier distributed by WT.  The institute is named after Joseph Hill, the second president of WT.

I hope they’ll allow this word of caution about the way of life the institute hopes to promote. Do not neglect or give short shrift to the immense diversity that is occurring throughout West Texas. I refer to ethnic, religious and racial diversity among the population that is growing throughout Amarillo and, indeed, in many of the surrounding communities.

The gift is the largest ever given to WT and for their generosity, the Fairlys deserve high praise.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick attended the announcement ceremony of the Fairlys’ gift. He said, according to the Texas Tribune, “This is the America that all America used to be, it should be again,” Patrick said of the sprawling, pastoral region whose rural counties and smaller outposts have long been a Republican stronghold. “These are American values here.”

West Texas A&M gets $20 million gift for new institute | The Texas Tribune

Let’s understand, though, that the Panhandle is now home to an increasing number of non-Anglo, non-Christian families. Let’s not deny them their place in the shaping of the Panhandle’s future. Nor let us not forget that even the Texas Panhandle is drifting toward a more “urban” society than it has known.

These changes are inevitable and likely cannot be reversed.

national news

MAGA mugs McCarthy

Kevin McCarthy’s tenure as speaker of the U.S. House came crashing down this week, a brief but still eventful stint as the Man of the House.

It appears that the California Republican will be remembered for brokering a deal that had the twin effect of ensuring his election as speaker and guaranteeing his demise the first time he broke faith with the folks with whom he brokered the deal.

It also appears that McCarthy will go down in the annals of U.S. political history as the worst negotiator ever to ascend to the post that put him third in line to the U.S. presidency. Wow! Stunning, man.

In one sense, McCarthy’s post-expulsion statement makes sense, that a tiny clique of right-wing extremists changed the course of legislative history. These extremists, the MAGA cult, have little support outside the halls of the House, he said. Yet they won the day.

Am I crying over that? No! He brought it all on himself by chipping away at his authority in order to get elected. It took him 15 ballots to win the speakership at the beginning of the year. He got his wish, then lived to regret forging a deal with the legislative devil.

One of the conditions of his being elected speaker was to enable a single House member to call for the “vacating of the chair” if the speaker didn’t do the bidding of the MAGA cult. McCarthy didn’t do the MAGA bidding. His sin was that he teamed with House Democrats to avoid a shutdown of the government.

Big …. deal! The plan he negotiated keeps the lights on for 45 days. Then we’ll face the same crisis all over again. Happy Thanksgiving, y’all. We can thank the former speaker for a return to the madness.

Yeah, this guy got precisely what he deserved to get. A boot in the ass from the MAGA cult that is even less trustworthy than those within the Republican Party who hates them and the Democrats on other side of the House chamber.

This is no way to govern.

Donald Trump

Mind-boggling revisiting of issues

It simply boggles my noggin that the media have begun revisiting the issues that turned so many Americans off about Donald Trump when he ran for POTUS the first time.

Take his utter disdain for those who served this nation in uniform, who went to war to defend Americans, who were captured by the enemy or those who died in service to the country.

The issue has returned to the front burner in the wake of revelations that Trump said that retired Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley should be “executed” for committing an act of “treason.”

Can this clown, Trump, be any more despicable than that? Oh, probably.

Milley told an interviewer that he served this country while wearing an Army uniform for more than 44 years. He said Trump’s attack on him was in reality an attack on all the men and women who serve. He is too much of a gentleman to respond specifically to the idiocy that poured out of Trump’s mouth.

This latest example simply adds to the litany of insults he has heaped on those of us who served our nation in uniform. He called the late Sen. John McCain a “loser” because he was captured by the enemy after being shot down during the Vietnam War. He denigrated a Gold Star family whose son died in combat in Iraq.

Trump has never served “the public” in any capacity — even while sitting in the Oval Office for four years. So, for this guy to denigrate a decorated Army general by suggesting he should be executed for treason simply goes beyond all that is sane.

Donald Trump has lost his mind.

national news

Why didn’t Dems help?

One might be inclined to ask: If Kevin McCarthy’s loss of the U.S. House speakership was a result of his working with House Democrats to forestall a government shutdown, why didn’t Democrats vote to keep him in office?

I think I know. It is because Democrats don’t trust him any more than the MAGA cult followers who led the charge to oust him.

You see, Kevin McCarthy is a sort of closet MAGA minion. He condemned Donald Trump for his conduct on 1/6, then went immediately to Mar-a-Lago to have his picture taken with the former POTUS, grinning and embracing the leader of the MAGA cult.

How do you work with someone like that?

Moreover, then McCarthy had the MAGA crowd to whom he had to make plenty of promises in order to be elected speaker. It took House members 15 ballots to hand the gavel to McCarthy. One of the stipulations, apparently, was that he shouldn’t work Democrats and that under a new rule, a single House member could call for a motion to vacate the speakership if McCarthy broke any of the rules … to which he agreed!

He broke the rule about working with Democrats and that prompted Rep. Matt Gaetz to file the motion to vacate the speakership.

Democrats sat still and listened to Republicans argue among themselves on the House floor today.

This entire discussion and the resulting vote demonstrated clearly that Kevin McCarthy was no more the Man of the House than the guy who sweeps the floor at the end of the day.

Thus, I won’t feel one little bit of sympathy for this individual.

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