Pope Francis leaves behind a legacy of caring for the poor and forgotten as well as the climate much like his namesake St Francis of Assisi. But I suspect it will be his humble and plain-spoken ways and deft pastoral touch that will be the defining legacy of his papacy.
Secretary of Defence Loose Lips is at it again posting military operational plans on Signal. But at least he didn't have a journalist seeing those details...this time, it was his wife who I'm pretty sure has less of a security clearance than the Pentagon janitors. It's man overboard and he clearly needs to go but it seems clear his boss has other ideas... :(
The Secretary of Defence tries to defend the indefensible and fails miserably! There's no way a SecDef that no defence minister in the world can ever trust again can stay in the job after a scandal in which not only actionable intelligence of a sensitive nature was compromised, it was done in the most silly and stupid way which just beggars belief. Any junior officer or official would have already been cashiered out of the service...it's time for the "warfighter's SecDef" to actually do the honourable thing for once and resign for the good of the service.
Get ready for another rendition of that dance we all know as "The Potomac Two-Step". Cabinet officials discussed classified military operations details on a commercial and insecure platform called Signal and willfully violated OPSEC (operational security) if not the Espionage Act in the process...and that was before the National Security Advisor added a journalist to the chat. This is *WHY* we need people who know what they're doing minding our national security... :(
The Uhmerican House of Representin's "budget blueprint" tells you all you need know about how stupid they think the American people are. The truly sad thing is that their view of the electorate's stupidity is probably more optimistic than it ought to be which will allow them to get away with complete dereliction of their duty to protect America's most vulnerable citizens... :(
Last Friday, the American people and the world were witnesses to the most unabashedly savage political hit job ever seen in the Oval Office when President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine was ambushed by VP Vance and President Trump. In so doing, they proved themselves to be disgraceful and weak cowards who have sold every shred of honour of this country and are perfectly content to do Vladimir Putin's dirty work in destroying the most successful alliance this world has ever seen.
President Trump's hiring criteria for senior positions seems to boil down to one essential skill: how well can they stick their nose up the bum of the boss? You'd think the Senate who is supposed to use the "advise and consent" prerogatives in the Constitution would weed out the worst and most unqualified of them but you'd be utterly wrong. "Abdicate and cower", more like... :(
President Musk through the Office of Personnel Management pulled one of his old HR tricks out of the bag of stupid management practices when he sent a "justify your existence in five bullet points" EMAIL to the entire Federal civil service. Stupidity this blatant and contemptible really deserves only one possible answer...
So I guess the good news is that I don't have to deal with the awkwardness of telling somewhere where I was born which was Fort Bragg NC. But did the taxpayers really need to take it in the shorts to the tune of at least $50M to rename Fort Bragg to Fort Meh and back again?!?
Can we *FINALLY* put to rest the tired notion that the NFL is rigging games in favour of the Chiefs? *THAT* had to be the most incompetent job of rigging the game in their favour I'd ever seen! Fair dinkum and congratulations to the Eagles for executing their game plan to perfection!
Senator Tillis seemed to be taking the Senate's duty under Article II Section 2 of the Constitution very seriously when it came to the nomination of Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defence until...he didn't. This shouldn't be a surprise when there is a clear record of flip-flopping on defending the prerogatives of Congress versus the Executive Branch. Advice and consent doesn't mean blindly accepting every fool and sycophant offered in nomination. You can actually show a measure of courage and say *NO*...and you really need to start doing it much more often when dealing with nominees who are being put up for office by toddlers!
The First Amendment says I've no choice in whether random people turn up on my doorstep to sell me things. But it does not mean I have to accept you parking your truck in my driveway without leave and then being disrespected on my own doorstep... :(
Somehow I think my gentle jokes comparing winter life in more temperate southern climes might have provoked some karmic backlash from my northern cousins!
Finally getting a chance to see Alex working hard with dignity and the right sort of pride at his Chick Fil-A in Garner today was quite a blessing. Meeting Miss Gena was even more of one! :)
Ever have a person at the checkout till grab your phone and start swiping through your apps? Neither had I...until tonight! :(
After a week of pouring my soul into some very harrowing posts, what's been said about 2024 is all that needs being said. I can only hope that we can hang together as a nation in 2025...
Just in time for Christmas...yet another stealth payment processing price increase by Intuit that was discovered after the fact and smells of a certain villain's deal tactics. :(
President Carter showed that even though he was only allowed one term in the nation's highest office, it's what he did with the next 44 years that truly made him the Obi-Wan amongst modern chief executives!
He was bound and determined to move heaven and earth to live up to S Truett Cathy's dictum of "my pleasure". He succeeded better than one could have ever imagined... :)
Some Christmas messages are really easy to write and just flow from the keyboard. Others haunt your dreams for days. Three guesses and the first two don't count as to how the composition of this year's message went... :)
We'd never get away with it now but back in 1978, a beloved grandmother and eight year-old me teamed up on a poor unsuspecting Chrysler dealership in the Kansas City metro area with a Hungarian haggling thrashing they wouldn't soon forget! :)
Sometimes inspiration can come from seemingly mundane coincidences. The 9th anniversary of my father's passing and my 9th year on Earth will do nicely... :)
Why am I getting a bill for using the toll road when I have a transponder and an account with NC Quick Pass? It turns out that the letter "O" I thought was in my personalised number plate I've had for decades is actually a zero "0". Interesting!
There's nothing like a wonderful turkey feast to share on Thanksgiving Day. For my first two years living in Florida, Thanksgiving involved the "Drive of Shame" to Publix to save the day...
Thanksgiving comes a day early thanks to Mom and Meghann being at a bit of loose ends and a turkey that's just begging to be the guest of honour at dinner... :)
