out of the blue Archives - Where Is The Outrage?

Monday Morning News Roundup

Why am I up at 2:30 in the morning? Craziness. It would be so much different if I were actually on call. I’m not. I’m supposed to be asleep. For some reason, I’m wide awake.

The NFL has become just as goofy as crazy as politics. After three weeks, it is clear that the replacement referees are not up to snuff. Yet, the NFL Commissioner and NFL owners are in a complete state of denial. Professional football is a highly emotional game. It is critically important to keep emotions in check. Yet,the replacement refs continually let the game get out of control. There’ve been more fights in the NFL and there have been in WWF cage match.

The problem with Mitt Romney and his campaign is Mitt Romney. For weeks I’ve been listening to conservatives whine about how the media is so much tougher on Mitt Romney than it is on Barack Obama. I have continually said the problem isn’t the media (the media is a separate problem) but the problem is Mitt Romney. Take for example his stance on his tax returns. He has decided that he is not going to release any more of his tax returns. Okay. Yet, he continually talks about the problem. Last week, out of the blue, he decided to mention that he was gonna release his 2011 tax returns. But, wait. He was not going to release all of the tax returns for 2011, just a selected portion of them. What? All this is going to do is, once again, stir up speculation.

Now releasing a portion of his 2011 tax returns wasn’t bad enough. He also contradicts himself. In an interview with ABC News Mitt Romney said, “I don’t pay more than are legally due and frankly if I had paid more than are legally due I don’t think I’d be qualified to become president.” Well, in the portion of his 2011 taxes he released, he paid a higher tax rate by not deducting $1.75 million in charitable contributions. Why did he write off those contributions? Because he would’ve contradicted something he said earlier when he said that his tax rate never dipped below 13%. So, Mitt Romney tied himself in knots. There was no trickery by the media. This was simply Mitt Romney putting his foot in his own mouth and chewing vigorously. (more…)

By ecthompsonmd|2013-11-03T18:14:55-04:00September 24th, 2012|Elections, Party Politics, Sports|1 Comment

US Attorney's – We need to investigate

I found this article on my computer. I wrote this article back in May of 2007. Hope that you enjoy it.

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Just because something is complex does not mean it’s not understandable. The US Attorney scandal is confusing. The question is, what’s going on? Well, in order to figure out everything that’s going on there must be investigations. Some folks on Capitol Hill are calling the current investigations a witch hunt and “political theater.”

Question B if a policeman sees someone walking down the street with a large plasma TV should he be curious? So he asks the guy, “What are you doing with that TV?” He replies, “I’m fixing it for Ms. Smith.” “Ms. Smith? There’s no Ms. Smith that lives on this street.” “Did I say fixing it? I meant delivering it to Mr. Jones.” I think that everyone would assume that this situation deserves further investigation.

The same type of thing has happened with the Justice Department. Eight US attorneys were fired out of the blue. All of these attorneys were Republicans. The initial explanation was that they were fired for performance reasons. Several reporters were able to obtain performance evaluations on several of these attorneys and they were excellent. The next explanation was that some of the attorneys did not prosecute enough immigration cases. This explanation did not hold up to investigation either. Finally, Alberto Gonzales, the US Attorney General, stated that these US attorneys serve at the pleasure of the president. Therefore, the president can fire them at any time for any reason. Well, this is sort of true. It is true that the president has the power to hire and fire US attorneys. But, and this is important, the President cannot fire at a US attorney to influence a particular case or to halt a particular investigation or for political reasons. (more…)

By ecthompsonmd|2008-06-14T23:53:34-04:00June 14th, 2008|Newsletter, US Attorneys|Comments Off