Jeez, do ya think? The White House press secretary today declared that Donald John Trump is unfit for office — I’ll presume any public office, not just the presidency — after he declared he might pardon the traitors who stormed the Capitol Building on 1/6 if by some hideous fluke he returns to the presidency.
So it was that press flack Jen Psaki today called out the ex-POTUS for his outrageous comment delivered at a rally in Texas.
“It’s just a reminder of how unfit he is for office,” Psaki said of Trump’s comments. “It’s telling that even some of his closest allies have rejected those remarks as inappropriate in the days since.”
How in the name of all that is sacred and holy can anyone condone the actions of those who committed that hideous attack on our democratic process? Yet that is what Trump is doing by suggesting that the defendants are being treated “unfairly.” Unfairly? What the hell?
This man continues to ratchet up the danger he poses to our democratic system of government with every lunatic utterance that spews from his foul mouth.
Ken Paxton must be feeling the heat from the Looney Tunes wing of the Texas Republican Party, aka Paxton’s “base” of support. Why? Because he reportedly is taking out ads attacking Rep. Louie Gohmert, one of three GOP challengers to the AG in this year’s primary.
The attorney general and the East Texas congressman figure to carve up the radical right-wing voters of the GOP while they battle for Paxton’s office. Paxton reportedly has taken out some ads that are going after Gohmert.
To be brutally candid, I don’t give a damn about either of these guys, other than I want Paxton removed from the AG’s office. He is an embarrassment to the state I call home and I want him gone from public life. He has been under indictment for felony security fraud almost since the time he took office in 2015; he has yet to go to trial. He’s also angered some of his top legal assistants, who have quit and blown the whistle on what they allege is illegal activity within the AG’s office; the FBI is investigating the allegations.
He has two other serious challengers: former Texas Supreme Court Justice Eva Guzman and Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush.
Polling shows Paxton continuing to run fairly strong among the four candidates, a thought that makes my blood boil. Gohmert, though, figures to peel away enough of the goofball vote to possibly force a runoff between the top two finishers in the primary.
My idea of a political perfection includes a scenario in which the top two do not include Paxton. That ain’t likely to happen. If only …
Anger is an emotion that fills me with — yep, that’s right — anger, lots of anger.
I get angry with myself for feeling as angry as I do at times, particularly over matters or individuals I cannot control. The current political climate swirling around us provides me with the latest example of how angry I have become.
I am angry at the politicians and their sycophants who continue to keep The Big Lie alive and kicking. The Big Lie, as you know, purports to suggest that Donald Trump actually won the 2020 presidential election. He didn’t. He lost it bigly.
He came to Texas this past weekend and proclaimed, among many falsehoods, that the “election system is corrupt.” Dammit to hell, anyway! It isn’t! When he says such a thing, he defames the good men and women associated with both major political parties who take an oath to do their jobs with integrity and honesty and then follow that oath to the letter.
That makes me angry as hell. However, I also get angry with myself because the only weapon I have is this blog in which I can express my anger. I want to make a difference. I want this anger to sink into the thick skulls of the individuals who ignite these hard feelings. It doesn’t. I feel as though I am talking to the chair on which I am sitting at this moment.
My anger is visceral these days in a way I have never experienced. I find myself using harsh language when referencing the ex-POTUS. So help me, I never have used this kind of language when referring to POTUSes who never got my vote.
I want the anger to pass. I fear that the only way that’ll happen will be for the man who lights the fuse to disappear. I just will have to deal with my anger and seek to avoid getting so damn angry at myself.
I have this need to disclose my professional football bias. I am a diehard fan of the American Football Conference, which once was known as the American Football League.
Of all the 55 Super Bowls that have been played, I have cheered precisely one time for the National Football Conference team to win the big game. In 2010, that honor fell to the New Orleans Saints, who gave their city the lift it needed after it had endured the tragedy of Hurricane Katrina five years earlier.
The Saints beat the Indianapolis Colts 31-17 in the game played in Miami.
I tend to favor the underdog. When the AFL came into being in the early 1960s, I gravitated to the young league. I enjoyed its razzle-dazzle, high-scoring brand of football. Then the leagues — the AFL and the NFL — announced plans to merge. The pro football championship would be decided in a title game between the leagues. I cheered mightily for the Kansas City Chiefs in that first game against the Green Bay Packers and for the Oakland Raiders in the second game against the Packers; both AFL teams got clobbered.
Then the New York Jets scored the big upset in Super Bowl III against the Baltimore Colts and the Chiefs came back in Super Bowl IV to manhandle the Minnesota Vikings.
My bias remains intact this year, with the Cincinnati Bengals waiting for the winner of the 49ers-Rams game this evening.
And so … may the better team win and I do hope it’s the representative of the AFC.
What? Do you mean to tell me that a Republican U.S. senator who has been licking Donald Trump’s boots for the past five years is speaking with reason and sanity about President Biden’s pending selection for the U.S. Supreme Court?
That would be Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who today actually said that Biden’s decision to appoint a black woman to the court is no sign of “affirmative action.”
Wow! I’m impressed. At least as impressed as I can be with a guy who once called Joe Biden one of “the finest men God ever created,” but who since has turned on his former friend.
Graham is pitching his preference for one of the women on the alleged short list of Biden’s choices. Judge J. Michelle Childs is Graham’s favorite for the spot. She is a federal judge in South Carolina. Graham said Judge Childs is the perfect candidate for the nation’s highest court.
There. He has laid his cards on the ol’ table. As for the affirmative action epithet that came from Republican Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, Graham is right to say that the president is on the right track. Wicker is swimming against the strong tide of history.
Paranoia is no fun when you are dealing with a deadly disease and the potential — no matter how remote it might seem — of being sickened by it.
I now shall explain.
I came down three days ago with a head cold. Classic symptoms: a little scratchy throat, a bit of a cough, runny nose, sneezing. You know, the usual. But wait! Was it COVID-19, the virus that is still making people sick, sending them to the hospital, forcing medical personnel to roll out the ventilators, putting people into medically induced comas?
No. It wasn’t that. I sought to get a test. I couldn’t find a place to obtain one immediately. So, I waited it out. I’m well now. I am back to my usual effervescent self.
This is one of the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic that is annoying me to no end. I know what a head cold feels like. I’ve been getting ’em for, oh, more than seven decades.
It kinda reminds me of when someone cuts me off on the street. My initial instinct used to be to lay on my horn, possibly shout a bad word or two and maybe offer an obscene gesture. No more, man! This is Texas! You never know who’s got a firearm with him. Too many damn road-rage episodes are being reported and too many of them are ending tragically.
Am I paranoid when I drive my truck? Not really … but I could get that way.
No, I am not paranoid because I caught a three-day head cold. It’s just that the killer virus has given me pause.
President Biden is on the cusp of making history with his first nomination of someone to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court. He pledges to nominate a black woman. Yes, it’s historic.
It is not, however, without precedent for a president to narrow the search field in the manner that Joe Biden has done.
Ronald Reagan was running for president in 1980 when he declared that he intended to nominate a woman for the high court if given the chance. Voters gave him that chance in the election and in 1981, President Reagan nominated Sandra Day O’Connor as the first woman ever chosen to sit on the court.
In 2020, Donald Trump made the same pledge upon the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Trump said he would find a woman to succeed Ginsburg. He delivered the goods by nominating Amy Coney Barrett as a justice. Barrett joins Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan as the only women serving on the nine-member panel.
Now comes Biden, who says he will select the most compelling nominee he can find. I have no doubt he, too, will deliver on his pledge. Why, though, are Republicans grumbling? Two POTUSes of their party did virtually the same thing, but they didn’t gnash their teeth then.
GOP U.S. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine this morning called Biden’s handling of this matter as “clumsy.” I heard he say it and my first reaction was, “What is she talking about?” I didn’t spot a hint of clumsiness in the way the president has handled this matter.
Let’s all just settle down and wait for the president’s selection. I’d be willing to bet real American money that her credentials will be sparkling beyond belief.
Donald Trump operates with a bottomless trove of outrageous pronouncements from which he uncovers ways to make declarations that are profoundly offensive and reprehensible.
This weekend, the 45th POTUS did it again. He ventured to Texas to declare that he might — if hell freezes over and he is elected president in 2024 — offer unconditional pardons to the traitors who stormed the Capitol Building on 1/6 and sought to block the certification of the 2020 presidential election.
That’s right. He would pardon the men and women who threatened to kill Vice President Mike Pence and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, injured scores of police officers, defecated on the floor of the Capitol and vandalized the hall of government by smashing through windows.
There is a reason this blog never has refused to print the words “President” and “Trump” consecutively. It is because your friendly blogger cannot recognize this lawless, corrupt, amoral, profane individual as my head of state, head of government and commander in chief.
For this moronic dipsh** to suggest he might offer pardons to those who — at his incitement — stormed the Capitol Building and sought to dismember our democratic process is so utterly beyond the pale that it boggles my understanding how any sensible human being can cling to the crap that flows from this guy’s mouth.
President Biden’s pledge to nominate a black woman to become the next Supreme Court associate justice has produced a highly predictable, and thoroughly reprehensible, round of criticism from those who suggest that Biden is implementing an “affirmative action” policy to fill this key judicial slot.
It’s all pure crap.
Justice Stephen Breyer is retiring soon from the court. President Biden has pledged to find a candidate with impeccable credentials, high ethical standards, legal brilliance and a record of sterling, stellar achievement.
That the individual he selects is an African American woman should be of little consequence with regard to the qualifications required of the next Supreme Court justice.
You can count me as one American patriot who believes the president will have no difficulty finding a supremely qualified candidate among the pool of individuals from whom he will choose.
As for the critics who will question whether the next SCOTUS nominee is smart enough or has the required experience, I also am certain they will be revealed as possessing a racial bias that has no place in determining the fitness of the person to be considered.
Most of us who follow football — even a little bit — understand that it is a game of numbers. You know, yards gained, yards lost, interceptions, tackles, penalty yards, sacks, punting yardage. Whatever …
Tom Brady reportedly is retiring after 22 seasons of professional football becoming arguably the greatest quarterback of all time.
I want to focus on a particular number as we ponder the effect this guy had on the game he played with excellence and precision.
The number is 198. What does that number signify?
It is the number players selected ahead of Brady in the NFL draft of 2000. Now think for a moment if you’re a general manager who had the chance to select this young man what you might have thought after he won all those Super Bowls and led the New England Patriots and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to all that glory.
One hundred ninety-eight players got into the NFL ahead of the GOAT. Six rounds! Granted, not every team drafting in that sequence needed a quarterback. Still, Tom Brady quite unexpectedly became the gold standard for winning in the National Football League.
The Patriots drafted him out of the University of Michigan even though they had a decent QB calling signals for them. Drew Bledsoe then got hurt; Brady replaced him on the field. And the rest, as they, is history.
I know, we had that “Deflategate” matter involving the footballs that were allegedly tampered with by the Patriots, giving Brady some sort of advantage over his foes. Phooey.
Now, let’s look at some other numbers.
Seven Super Bowls; five Super Bowl MVP awards; more than 84,000 yards passing; 624 touchdown passes; three league MVP awards. I won’t go on. You get the picture.
The guy was a stellar athlete. He possesses an incomparable work and dietetic regimen that has allowed him to play the game at a high level until the very end of his playing days. He led the NFL in passing yards at the age of 44, for crying out loud.
Perhaps, in my mind, the greatest measure of this guy’s greatness can be found in this episode. He left the Patriots after the 2019 season and joined the Buccaneers. The Patriots, who had won six Super Bowls with Brady at QB, missed the playoffs that year; the Bucs went on to win the Big Game, beating the defending champs, the Kansas City Chiefs.
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