BY JOHN SHAFFER The nation is mourning the death of George H W Bush, 41st president of the United States. He passed away at age 94, and surely was one of the last of his kind, and he was unique. He took flight training with Ted Williams (the future Baseball Hall of Famer) and as a member of the 1948 Yale College World Series baseball team, shook the hand of Babe Ruth (another Hall of Famer), shortly before Ruth’s passing later that year. The “Walker” in his name comes from the same man as “The Walker Cup,” awarded in international golf. Mr. Bush is the last World War II veteran to serve as President (along with Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, and Ford. President Carter entered the Naval Academy in 1943 but the war ended before his class graduated in 1947); and except for his son, who served in the Air National Guard, Mr. Bush was the most recent US President with military service. George H W Bush was a successful businessman, Chairman of the Republican National Committee; US Congressman; Ambassador to the United Nations; Director of the Central Intelligence Agency; Vice President of the United States; and in 1988 was elected President. No vice-president since has succeeded to the office. He received over 48 million votes in that election; when he lost the presidency four years later he received about ten million fewer votes, losing to Bill Clinton, who received nearly 45 million both times he won the office. His 1988 victory was the last “landslide” presidential election (claims of the current President notwithstanding). In other words, Bush went from very popular to very unpopular in a brief period of time. Why was this, and, of equal consequence, why is he “popular” once again, now that he has passed?
BY JOHN SHAFFER Our television screens have been filled with images of hundreds of illegal immigrants being dispersed and repelled with tear gas as they were rushing the border fence at San Ysidro, California. By the way, they came from the caravan that the mainstream media and the progressive left assured us was a “myth” concocted by President Trump to gin up support prior to the election. Interesting that a “caravan” of people whose progress has been visible from its origins in Central America, monitored as it forcibly crossed Mexico’s southern border, traced the length of Mexico, all the way to the California border, was dismissed by the left as an election stunt or a myth, right up to the moment the caravan was tear-gassed, and then it somehow became real. And oh, the shrieking and wailing and gnashing of teeth by the left – as they decry the use of gas. “Unprecedented,” they assert. “America’s shame,” they accuse. “Contrary to international law and the US Constitution,” they claim. Elijah Cummings, who will be a Committee Chairman when the newly-elected Democrat majority in the US House of Representatives is sworn in in January, says we should welcome the members of the caravan and let them cross.
That illustrates the only real political game being played here, for prior to the election the Democrats assiduously avoided mentioning the caravan; they did not want to have to defend it – for that could harm them with moderate voters; and they did not want to criticize it – for that would harm them with the left; so they ignored it or pretended it did not exist. Now that the election is safely won, they can once again unmask their “open borders” agenda. BY JOHN SHAFFER While most of the time we all tend to concentrate on the “major” news – recently of course, the election, the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, the wildfires in California, various antics of various politicians or elected officials, etc., but quite often the “little” stories deserve attention as well. Here’s a couple from recent days that may have been missed but provide insights into our modern value system.
A substitute teacher in Parkway South School District in St. Louis Co. Missouri was either fired, suspended, or reassigned because he thanked the 22 students in his class who stood for the Pledge of Allegiance. He told the students, “Thanks to all of you that participated in that. I’m sure that all of those families who lost loved ones so that we could enjoy the freedoms we have today would appreciate the effort.” However, two students in the class did not stand, and at least one of them told a school official that he was “hurt” by the teacher’s comments. We do not know whether the student considered the possibility that the other 22 students or the teacher might have been “hurt” by his refusal to stand, but we suspect he would be indignant at the thought they might. After all, that would impinge on his rights, would it not? The school says that the teacher was “bullying” the students, and that this was only one in a series of incidents that prompted his punishment. Perhaps there were others and whether the teacher should have been reprimanded we cannot say, but it seems to us that if a high school student has enough awareness of current events and knows even a modicum of American history, and chooses not to stand, he should be capable of understanding why someone might disagree with his decision; after all, the non-standing student, we assume, has a good reason for refusing to stand – and if so, should be capable of explaining why and willing to provide that explanation when confronted. by John Shaffer ~ editor@myweeklysentinel.com The Democrats had a very good Election Day, gaining control of the US House of Representatives with a pickup of about 32 seats; the party also made a gain of 7 governors. The Republicans did win four Senate seats previously held by Democrats, but apparently have lost two they had held, giving the GOP a net gain of two. However, there were plenty of missed opportunities for the Republicans, who nominated some weak challengers or ran poor campaigns in seats that they might have been able to win.
These results are typical of elections held in a president's first midterm, but actually President Trump fared better than his immediate two Democrat predecessors. In 1994, President Clinton's first midterm, the Democrats lost 54 House seats and 8 senate seats, losing control of both houses; and in President Obama's first midterm in 2010, the Democrats lost 69 House seats and six senators. by John Shaffer - editor@myweeklysentinel.com Everyone loves a parade, we are told, but it's safe to say that not everyone loves all parades, because the current parade of refugees from Central America is beloved by the political progressives and abhorred by the conservatives.
For some reason, hundreds of people, mainly residents of Honduras and other nations in the Central American isthmus, believe that they have the unchallengeable right to enter the United States on demand and have banded together in a caravan and are walking across Mexico toward the US border with the hopes of gaining entrance, and eventually permanent residency, legal or otherwise. None of us will disagree that the US is a desirable place to live, and at the risk of being termed a "nationality bigot" we will make the observation that it must be a far more attractive place than the nations the caravaners originated from (or else why would they be abandoning it to come here?), but there are rules that should be followed and the caravaners and the thousands like them who cross the border on a weekly basis do not follow the rules that the US historically expected immigrants to follow and which every other nation in the world requires be followed. Let's face it: being in Fenway Park or Dodger Stadium for the World Series is desirable for many of us, but see what happens if one were to collect a couple hundred of his best friends and storm the gates at one of those ballparks. We doubt if management would open the turnstiles and grant admission; and if they did, the folks who had paid for the tickets to that game and to those seats would not take kindly to their displacement by folks who had no tickets. The identical principle applies to entry into the US by those who have not followed the rules, and if a couple thousand of people without tickets are admitted to a baseball game, that ends right there; but granting free and unrestricted entrance into the USA grants many other privileges, rights, and opportunities far more permanent than one ball game. BY JOHN SHAFFER editor@myweeklysentinel.com Here's a topic near to our heart but one we haven't visited for some time: potential election fraud - or more specifically voter fraud. Conservatives and Republicans contend there could be millions of illegal votes cast in the typical US election; Democrats contend that fraud either does not exist or is so rare and infrequent that it is not significant. Surely the truth lies somewhere between.
Of course, voter fraud has been with us for many years, but generally only in specific races, but with the upsurge in illegal immigration, the potential and the opportunity for fraud has ballooned, and the biggest influence on the phenomenon is the "Motor Voter law" passed by the Democrat majority Congress in 1995 and signed by President Clinton. Voter registration and eligibility historically (and Constitutionally) was something left to the individual states, until Motor Voter effectively federalized the system, requiring registration at motor vehicle bureaux and given that citizenship is required for voter eligibility but is not required for holders of driver's licenses, the likelihood of non citizens voting certainly is augmented by the law. By John Shaffer Today’s title is borrowed from the title of the classic song by Etta James, and we think that most of America feels a sense of relief that “At Last” the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation fiasco is over. We say “most of America” because the hard progressive Antifa left refuses to “let it go” (if we may borrow another song title). They are convinced that everyone who supported the confirmation of Judge (now Justice) Kavanaugh is a racist, sexist, fascist, white-supremacist bigot. Well, there are plenty of Republicans who are none of those things, just as there are plenty of Democrats who are not hard-left Antifa loving anti-American socialists.
We guess it hasn’t occurred to the left that they over-reached both in their comments and sentiments and in their ardor for any tale told against Mr. Kavanaugh, believable or otherwise. We have been over this ground for several weeks and the furrows have been plowed pretty deep but, sad to say, there still seem to be plenty of clods to turn up. We continue to hear the anti-Kavanaugh forces railing about how he is “tainted” because of the “credible” accusations against him. We beg to differ. Why would one be tainted by false accusations? Why should anyone have believed any of the half a dozen so-called “credible” stories that materialized in the last few weeks before the vote was taken on Mr. Kavanaugh’s confirmation? Think about it – a half dozen stories, each wilder than the last – that (and here is the key) NEVER were hinted at in any of Mr. Kavanaugh’s previous clearances and confirmations. Think about it again – did it not give the left pause – even a little pause – that absolutely nothing about any of those tales had ever been told before? Did they not suspect that someone was bluffing or making it up? And did it not give pause that in none of the cases was there any confirmation or contemporary account – no mention at all, in fact, other than claims the accusers made – not at the time of their supposed occurrence – but over thirty years after the fact? And did it not give pause that every single witness that those accusers named denied any knowledge of the incidents? But still they believed, and still they believe. BY JOHN SHAFFER How does one tell when someone is lying? Here is as good a way as any: Someone probably is lying when he tells a story and provides the names of several people who (our someone claims) will confirm that story – and – (here comes the main point) not one of them confirms the story; we will go one step further, when every one of them denies that the story took place at all. That situation is precisely what we have in the story of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford. Now, everyone in America, it seems, who favors abortion, or wants to preserve Roe v. Wade, or despises Donald Trump, or who says “Conservatives need not apply” to a Supreme Court vacancy, also believes Christine Blasey Ford. Why (besides the four reasons given in the previous sentence?) Probably because they know in their hearts that there are hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of victims of sexual abuse, and Dr. Ford has become a stand-in for everyone of them. Sure, those folks don’t care that her story may be uncorroborated; or it may be politically motivated; it, full of internal contradictions, may be inconsistent with itself to say nothing of inconsistent with the behavior of the accused; or may be untrue, but they don’t care, because Dr. Ford is the poster person for the victim, and thus Judge Kavanaugh represents the brutal abuser, and being able to prove it is no concern, because, according to at least two US Senators, Judge Kavanaugh does not possess the presumption of innocence. Well, we are pretty sure that Senator Schumer and Senator Coons haven’t learned that the law books or the Constitution actually say the opposite; and we know they have been pretty quick to forgive and excuse criminals who have committed crimes far more violent, far more often, and far more recent that those Judge Kavanaugh is accused of.
BY JOHN SHAFFER The Democrats on the US Senate Judiciary committee would like Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh to answer questions about an incident that a woman claims took place back in 1982, she thinks, but maybe another year; it took place in Montgomery County, Maryland, she is sure, but she doesn’t know the date, the place, the occasion, or – apparently, the number of people in the room at the time, for her lawyer has already told a different story than the accuser related in her letter that, through the office of Rep. Anna Eshoo ended up in the hands of Sen. Diane Feinstein. And “DiFi” has plenty of questions she wants answered. Of course, when the Senator had Mr. Kavanaugh under her questioning earlier this month, she did not ask those questions, and in fact spoke nary a word about the letter, which she has possessed since July. Then, it seems, would have been the proper time to ask questions, but never let it be said that the modern Democrat party wastes a lot of time doing the proper thing anymore.
No, the end justifies the means, and because they strongly fear that as Justice, Mr. Kavanaugh might overturn the Roe v. Wade decision, they will stop at nothing to keep him from the court. And their ethics are so variable that they believe that an accusation from 36 years ago when (if it took place at all – more on that later) both the principals were minors, is disqualifying for Mr. Kavanaugh – and yet the while-they-are-adults-and holding-public-office sexual exploits of Bill Clinton, Chris Dodd, Ted Kennedy, Robert Menendez and Keith Ellison, for example, raise barely a ripple of concern. After all, “it’s just sex,” unless you’re a Republican, and then nothing can save you – even if the incident didn’t take place at all. BY JOHN SHAFFER It’s been a busy couple of weeks. Two American icons, Aretha Franklin and Sen. John McCain, passed away. Sadly, the memories of two great people were pushed a bit to the backseat at their funerals, because some of the living rather put greater emphasis on attacking President Trump than they did memorializing the departed. Senator McCain’s family issued its own public rejection for his funeral, pointedly letting the world know that President Trump was not welcome. Now the President and the Senator did not have much good to say about each other, and each made some flip remarks about the other that used never to be said (at least in public). It being a free country, the Senator’s family was well within its rights, and we can sympathize with their reaction, because there is no doubt that as a candidate and as President, Mr. Trump said some nasty things about the Senator; things that never should have been said. That being the case, it is a bit incongruous for someone such as Senator McCain being so upset at President Trump for his crude, coarse, intolerant manner that his funeral exhibited the same kind of intolerance, but that’s what makes the world go around. As the epigram has it, if you don’t go to someone’s funeral, don’t expect them to go to yours.
At least Senator McCain had a valid reason for disliking, and excluding, President Trump – the other funeral of a prominent person, that of Aretha Franklin, was pretty much as firmly anti-Trump, even though Mr. Trump never attacked or criticized or ridiculed Ms. Franklin. She, or the people who staged her funeral, like so many others, did not care for his attitude or his policies or his style, and, like so many others, they weren’t shy about letting the whole world know. Some years from now, folks may look at the videos of the two funerals and cringe at their political aspects, and wonder why folks had so little respect for the departed that they wanted to show their little respect for the President rather than celebrating the lives of the great people who had passed on. It is worthy of note that the final memory people will have of Senator McCain and of Aretha Franklin will be their intense dislike of the President of the United States instead of a positive celebration of respectively, their lives as a Navy veteran, an heroic prisoner of war and a dediciated US Senator; or as a widely-admired singer. Let us not let the worldly interfere with the eternal. BY JOHN SHAFFER California is experiencing perhaps its worst fire season ever, and according to numbers released by the USDA Forest Service, the possibility exists that it could get much worse. The Forest Service reports that as of December 2017 there were 129 million dead trees in the state. That’s a lot of firewood – perhaps literally in this case – because dead trees, particularly conifers, tend to go up as torches during a fire, and two major fires are raging not yet contained.
The drought of five years, which ended in the winter of 2016-17, is chiefly responsible for the tree die-off, as lack of water weakens and kills most living things, including trees. Bark beetles have infested millions of trees, and the beetles prefer dying and dead trees. One way to control the beetle population is to control its hosts – in this case, dead trees, because while some beetles like live trees, most prefer dying or dead ones. Therefore the more dead trees that are removed, the less likelihood that the beetles will find a suitable host, thus reducing the number of beetles, thus making the tree population healthier. BY JOHN SHAFFER There are more incongruous things going on than usual, and we haven’t played “Why?" in a while so let’s get started:
It obviously is unethical to seek out “dirt” on a political opponent, and only a special class of lowlife would ever express interest in obtaining “dirt.” It is obvious that the Trump campaign, in the person of Donald Jr., responded to a Russian’s offer of “dirt” on Hillary Clinton. This is universally considered to be wrong, immoral, unethical, nasty and perhaps illegal. "Why?" is the Clinton campaign’s purchase of “dirt” on Donald Trump in the form of a dossier not considered to be equally as bad? After all, the Trump campaign received no “dirt.” The Clinton campaign not only received “dirt,” it received it from Russian sources, AND it paid for it – AND it was fictionalized to boot. Funny how the same people who are talking impeachment over what the Trump campaign tried to do aren’t at all interested in what the Clinton campaign actually did. How about this? The major news media outlets in America were strongly opposed to Donald Trump’s election, and supported Hillary Clinton with equal fervor. Of course, that is their right, but the “Why?” part is, given the overwhelming and incessant pounding that the President has been subjected to (and we are not taking a position on whether or not it is just, or justified), why is the media outraged that the President treats them with contempt? Why is it OK for them to treat him poorly and not OK for him to respond in kind? City officials in West Hollywood want to remove Donald Trump's star from the Walk of Fame. It has frequently been vandalized and is a focus of protests. They aver that Mr. Trump's lack of morals precludes the honor. How many other Hollywood celebrities will have stars pulled for the same reason? BY JOHN SHAFFER One thing we can count on is the “outrage” expressed over some word or action by President Trump, or some event that they can blame him for, even if said thing has been happening for years. One example is the “family separation” issue, which causes screams of displeasure today but which generated little comment when it was employed as a tool by the previous administration. Another is the national anthem controversy, which began, you will recall, while Barack Obama was president. He was wise enough not to make negative remarks about the protestors, but President Trump has been a loud objector to “taking a knee.” And, even though the practice began several years ago, it became a significant part of the progressive agenda only when it could be used against President Trump.
President Trump makes a pretty good target, and it is not hard to gin up artificial controversies about him. Here’s one of the latest: There has been quite a bit of outrage over the technology for 3-D printed plastic firearms. The top echelon of the Democrats in the US Senate are hoping that this is the issue that will topple the President, so they are yammering and hammering away as if Mr. Trump himself developed the technology and did so for the purpose of allowing terrorists to manufacture “undetectable” firearms. They, desperate to score some political points, call for bans on publication of instructions on the process used, prohibition from the internet, etc., and some federal judges have complied. BY JOHN SHAFFER On Saturday, The FBI released a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) application. It was 412 pages long, and perhaps because it was so verily heavily redacted, opponents of and proponents of President Trump each claim it supports their positions. The application had been filed so the FBI could receive a warrant to conduct surveillance on Carter Page. Mr. Page was, briefly, an advisor to the Trump Campaign. The warrant was granted in October 2016, about a month before the election. Republicans have always had suspicions about the entire process, and we think Democrats would have as well, were the shoe on the other foot. The mere fact that a warrant was sought at that point should have raised plenty of red flags, because America does not have a mechanism to investigate “political crimes,” nor do we have a police force to investigate them. At least we didn’t, until the Obama Administration began this investigation. Any law enforcement official who believed in his oath of office should have been very wary of sniffing around a political campaign, especially so close to the election. Also, the same FBI that was profoundly concerned about Carter Page and a few other Trump operatives and their “connections” to Russia was shockingly uninterested in many other things, such as Hillary Clinton’s 30,000 missing emails, or in actually inspecting the Democratic National Committee’s server that reportedly was “hacked.” Come to think of it, the FBI didn’t care very much about the several hundred thousand dollars that Mrs. Clinton’s husband received from Russians for making a not very lengthy speech. In our opinion, the FBI should not have been concerned about any of those things – from the Clinton Campaign or the Clinton Family, nor from the Trump Campaign nor the Trump family, because American law enforcement agencies should not be fishing for intelligence that might lead to theories from which they could derive information that might be interpreted as perhaps being potentially illegal behavior.
BY JOHN SHAFFER What to make of President Trump? Some voters hoped he would be different; others feared he would be different. His comments at his Helsinki joint-press conference with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin have been excoriated by the folks who disliked the President; they have been harshly criticized by most of the folks who support him; and they definitely play into the point that has been made on many occasions: President Trump is his own worst enemy – that he, by careless and casual, unclear and incomplete, eruptive and evidently thoughtless ways he says things - upsets the people who want to be his supporters, outrages the people who already disagree with him; and worries the people who just want to get along with him or with America.
Let us be clear: Russia is not our friend. They, and China, are the two largest threats to peace, and generally speaking in one way or another they have been suborning or bankrolling or giving material support to most of the “bad guys” in the world: North Korea, Iran, Cuba, and many of the international terrorism groups that have inflicted so much misery on the rest of us. They have been doing those things for decades, and American presidents of both parties have often gone out of their way not to "offend" Russia or China, and on those occasions when our Presidents have challenged them, it’s a safe bet that the Democratic Party, the mainstream media, academia, and “intelligent opinion” have taken the side of – Russia. They did so against Ronald Reagan; considering him a bigger danger than Communism. It really is laughable to hear many of the voices accusing President Trump of “treason” or “being in Putin’s pocket” or worse, because we remember that just a few months or a few years ago they were dismissing the threats from Russia and were more worried that American Presidents were “provocative” or “had a Cold War mentality” than that they were too friendly to Russia or failed to take such threats seriously. It was nearly eight weeks after the 2016 election that President Obama made any serious sanctions on Russia for its behavior in that election. John Brennan, the former CIA Director who has accused President Trump of treason for his press conference performance, himself voted for a Communist candidate for US President in 1976 and did not seem very concerned about Russian aggression or territorial ambitions or geopolitical threats when he was in office. Many of the Democrat members of Congress who have assailed President Trump for being too weak against Russia blasted Ronald Reagan for being too harsh. The Obama administration pulled, at the last minute, defensive missiles from Poland and others of our allies, and did so abruptly, unraveling years of patient diplomacy that had prepared the way for their installation. Was this because the Obama administration saw Russia as a threat? It also stood by as Russia annexed the Crimea and part of Georgia, and as it threatened other American allies – successor states of the former Soviet Union who truly understood the danger posed by Russia. This after the “reset” of our relations from the dark days of the Bush administration, which was seen as failing to appreciate Russia’s geopolitical needs. |
Local ColumnistsFind articles by date or topic through quick links below. Categories
All
Archives
March 2020
|