Old & Opinionated

October 30, 2023- Monday   The Dallas Cowboys took down the Los Angeles Rams yesterday and they did it in whopping fashion, 43 to 20. The game was not that close. The 33 to 3 score at halftime was more indicative of how the game went for the Cowboys. A blocked punt for a safety, and intercepted pass for a touchdown, and key plays for several Cowboys lead to a total domination of the Rams. For the average Dallas Cowboys’ fan, it was great to watch. For other fans, they still remember the beating the Cowboys received at the hands of the San Francisco 49’ers so what kind of team are we really watching? The Cowboys are basically beating the mediocre to bad teams of the NFL. They have lost to San Francisco, a team many believe will be in the Super Bowl. The exception to the beating of the bad teams, is the Cowboys loss to an Arizona Cardinals team that will not be seeing the Super Bowl this year by a long shot. Now it’s time for the rubber to meet the road. Dallas travels to ...

October 26, 2023- Thursday We don't know what causes people to lose their minds and start destroying people.  Last night, Lewiston, Maine became the latest community ripped apart by the pathology of person who decided shooting and killing people was a good thing to do.  At this point, eighteen people have lost their lives and thirty other people are severely wounded by a man who is criminally mentally ill.   Our society is split by who can have guns and who cannot.  Many people want to see all guns removed from society.  That isn't going to happen.  If the person who is being hunted right now truly did the shooting, he is a military firearms trainer. What do you do with this?   Psychologists, psychiatrists and many others continue to study and work to find ways to predict who might be a person who loses their mind for some reason and resort to killing people.  No progress has been made.  The killings continue.  It's more than h...

  October 24, 2023- Tuesday The highly unlikely actually happened last night.  The Texas Rangers beat the Houston Astros to win the American League Championship in professional baseball.  This seventh game win came about after Texas won four games, all in Houston.  The Rangers have spent the entire Major League Baseball playoffs winning on the road.  There were several other teams many of the experts expected to see in the 2023 World Series, but Texas was down the list of possibilities.  They now own home field advantage for the World Series. For the Rangers, the home field advantage may not be all it's cracked up to be.  They have played so well on the road in the playoffs, they may just as soon be on the road.  This may also be a knee-jerk reaction because the Houston Astros played so well in Texas.  The tremendous offensive team the Astros were quite evident in Arlington, Texas where the Rangers play but they were contained on their home f...

October 22, 2023- Sunday We are twenty days into not having a Speaker of the House of Representatives in the United States government and absolutely no progress has been made.  We have a huge military conflict escalating in the Middle East with Israel getting prepared to launch a huge ground invasion into Gaza. Ukraine is still fighting for its life against the eight-hundred-pound gorilla, Russia.  The Republicans in the House of Representatives still can't find a single person they can all agree would be a good Speaker of the House.  We still have the eight to twelve renegade Republicans who are instigating the chaos and now that group is working to stay out of the media.  They seem to be relishing this government shutdown which is exactly what it is.  Kevin McCarthy is out because of these small group.  Steve Scalise would be able to do the job, but he had twenty or so people who refused to vote for him.  Jim Jordan couldn't engender enough support t...

October 13, 2023 -  A University of Virginia professor has offered extra credit to students who will attend a pro-Palestinian demonstration today. The news media is investigating to see if the intent of the extra credit is to support pro-Palestinian positions or if the extra credit is being given so the student will see what a politically motivated demonstration is all about.   This situation comes on the heels of several student groups at Harvard University coming out in support of Hamas and Palestinians instead of Israel.  The President of Harvard has publicly stated the student groups do not speak for Harvard, but students are allowed free speech. To be fair, there are also many pro-Israel rallies or demonstrations being held also but the pro-Hamas groups are the ones getting the lion share of coverage.  Why?  The media loves video that inflames and causes emotional responses because that looks better on television.  The people organizing these demo...

Update- Black Lives Matter has retracted some of its inflammatory statements supporting Palestine from yesterday. They continue to be out of line in their support of Palestine but at least they have backed off of their support of Hamas.   Sports- The bout is set.  The Texas Rangers will be facing the dreaded Houston Astros starting Sunday for the 2023 American League Championship. In a lot of ways, Texas matches up well against Houston. In one area Houston has a definite advantage: relief pitching.   Texas will need to rely on starting pitchers to be their bullpen for the playoff series and that could possibly work for the Rangers.  It will require pitchers who are not accustomed to pitching in relief to change their preparation to pitch but this is the time of year when you do what you have to do. Houston has been there and done that.  They know what they’re doing, and they have a complete team.  The series will begin in Houst...

  October 11, 2023 A very interesting thing happened today in the United States. Several chapters of the Black Lives Matter organization publicly came out in support of Hamas in the war between Hamas and Israel. The Black Lives Matter organization states they are supporting Hamas because of the Israeli oppression of Hamas , and Hamas has the right to attack Israel.   For me, this is the highest level of hypocrisy that may have ever happened. Black Lives Matter came into existence following the mistreatment and subsequent death of a black man in Minnesota and it became a national movement. We have since seen how much money the organization has been given and how thousands of those dollars were mismanaged. The organization is now condoning the actions of Hamas .   Black Lives Matter condones the annihilation of hundreds of Israelis and a few other nationalities while at a music festival. Black Lives Matter condones the attack with automatic weapons of people qui...

 Every National Football League team goes to their preseason training camps with a positive view of the upcoming season.  Every team has a good idea of where their weaknesses and strengths are and how the season will probably line up for them.  Some teams have nothing but the Super Bowl in sight.  Some teams realistically look at their schedules and look to get into the NFL playoffs.  Once in the playoffs, many things can happen that can help them win playoff games.  That usually means some key injuries have occurred to very good teams and that levels the NFL field somewhat.  The Dallas Cowboys better hope San Francisco and Philadelphia have 10 or 12 season ending injuries to their starters. The Cowboys started their season the same way as the usually do.  Owner and impotent General Manager, Jerry Jones sees multiple ways the Cowboys can get to the Super Bowl.  When donkeys fly.  The San Francisco 49'ers showed the entire NFL they are th...

  October 9, 2023- Monday-   Two days ago, Hamas launched a tremendous attack against Israel. Israel did not know this was about to happen. The Israeli intelligence organization did not know it was coming. The attack was intense with more than one thousand rockets being fired from Gaza into southern and western Israel. The Hamas terrorists breached the fortified border into Israel and attached hundreds of people and killed hundreds. They also kidnapped over one hundred people which included women and children. The initial attacks were very bloody and there are reports of Hamas terrorists stripping women and beating and raping them in the streets.   Most decent people in the western world are denouncing the attacks and are publishing hard statements against the Hamas terrorism. The President of the United States, Joe Biden, has given a statement denouncing the terrorist attacks and “rock solid support” for Israel. This is as it should be. There are a ...

October 7, 2023- Saturday   Money. For most people, there is never enough money. There is usually even less money when kids are added to the equation. Now families are faced with the decision of whether to go to college or not. The reason it is a question is because of the astronomical cost of a college education. Some young people are choosing trade schools or other paid apprentice programs and not going to college. The thousands upon thousands of dollars colleges and universities are charging have resulted in years and years of debt payments for those wanting to go that route. Yes, each person has a choice and decides whether they want to fight the debt for most of the rest of their lives.   Once that decision is made, we don’t need the government coming in and forgiving debt. That tells the students they are not fully responsible for their decision. Government forgiveness sends the message loud and clear to the universities they can charge even more because t...

Illegal immigrants are welcome here!  If you are here illegally, come to our city and we will take care of you!  Illegal immigrants can come to our city and not feel afraid of being sent back to your home country!  We love illegal immigrants!   These are the declarations of the leaders of Sanctuary Cities in the United States.  New York City, Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles are the key Sanctuary Cities proudly proclaiming how illegal immigrants are very welcome to come to their cities and live.  Those cities will provide a protected environment for those illegals and let them take part in the American Dream.  This was before the rubber met the road.   What the Democratic leaders of these cities were really saying is this, "If there are ten or fifteen illegal immigrants wandering around the country with no place to go, they could come to their city and not be afraid of being sent back to their home country."  That's what they...

 Alejandro Mayorkas, Director of Homeland Security for the United States has stated publicly for the last three years that the border between Mexico and the United States is secure. Vice President Kamala Harris, the "border czar" has told the people of Central and South America to not come to the United States.  The Biden Administration has sued the State of Texas and Governor Greg Abbott because Abbott ordered a floating fence placed in the Rio Grande River to stop people from coming across the Rio Grande River into Texas.  Why did Abbott feel the need to do this when we have been told repeatedly by the Biden Administration there is no border problem?  That's because there is a problem.  A massive problem.  Over two million people came across our southern border illegally in 2022.  Now more than that have crossed over our "secure" border in 2023.  That's four million people who have entered the United States illegally in two years.  Where ar...

  October 4, 2023- Wednesday   Just about the time you think you’ve seen all of the political stupidity that could possibly happen in one lifetime, a new level of stupidity is reached. Eight Republicans and the Democrats voted to remove Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House of the United States House of Representatives. These Stupid Eight decided they didn’t have enough control over McCarthy and McCarthy was working to avoid a government shutdown with Democratic help. They wanted a more conservative budget, so they voted to eliminate the Speaker of the House .   The Stupid Eight have sent a broad message to voters in the United States. These pro-Trump, Make America Great Again Republicans, have shown the voting public the Republicans are a group who not only can’t work with Democrats, they can’t work with themselves. They are a divided organization.  They have shown by their actions, the Democrats are a united force. That’s a big deal.   This ...

 Donald Trump is in a New York courtroom today.  He is being tried for civil property fraud and tax evasion.  The judge in the case has declared Trump had overvalued his property and holdings in New York.  The one example given was Mar-A-Largo in Palm Beach, Florida.  The judge valued the proper at $18 million.  The land alone is worth that much money not considering anything built on it.  Trump evaluated the property tremendously higher than the $18 million so it really looks like both Trump and the judge are wrong.  If this is any indication of how Trump's holding was valued, he is getting ripped royally.  The judge should know that discredits him when he is supposed to be unbiased.   I'm not a Trump supporter.  I don't like the guy at all.   There are many, many people who do like the guy.  Trump has an insurmountable lead for the Republican nomination for President over all of the other Republican candidates....

  October 2, 2023- Monday   In the Bible, the book of Jeremiah talks of life. In Jeremiah 1:5 says, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, before you were born, I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.” There is also another short passage in Psalm 139:14, “I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” This is the basis for the pro-life commitment of people. If a person believes the Bible is the inspired word of God, then the protection of babies, growing to be independent and viable, must be protected.   In 1983, I was taking trash from our house to our trash receptable behind our house so the sanitation company could pick it up. Our next-door neighbor had already taken her trash out. I casually glanced at the neighbor’s container and saw something very strange lying on the ground beside the trash cannister. I could not see what it was, so I bent down to get a closer look. ...