Commentary
I have previously quoted opinion columnist Phil Boas, who provides the only conservative viewpoints allowed by the editor of the left-leaning Arizona Republic, so when I read the headline, “Mark Kelly is no traitor,” over his Sunday edition column, I stopped to read it.
Boas’ column addressed Elon Musk’s calling Kelly a traitor for going to Ukraine, sending a mixed message of Trump’s policy. While Kelly violated the tradition that “Politics stops at the water’s edge” – the words of former Republican Sen. Arthur Vandenberg – that doesn’t make Kelly a traitor. And it doesn’t make him a patriot either, as Boas claimed.
I have often noted that Kelly rarely provides his constituents with his position on issues of significance. In this instance, in a social media note, he offered his opinion of Trump’s policy as “screw you go it alone foreign policy,” but at the same time he felt the need to add that “America is the strongest, richest country in the world.”
While I was not surprised with Kelly, I was taken aback by Boas’s obvious position against Trump’s America First agenda, suggesting that Republicans are winging it on American foreign policy. Just as in his first term, Trump is calling for other NATO countries to step up in funding.
During his recent visit with Trump, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte lauded the president’s efforts to push NATO allies to increase defense spending, amid efforts to end the war in Ukraine.
While Boas chose to quote British Prime Minister Keir Starmer telling The Times, “Americans have become a psychic burden,” Rutte remarked that “You’re starting to hear the British Prime Minister and others all committing to much higher defense spending.”
Further, Rutte told Trump,” I really want to work together with you to make sure that we have a NATO which is really reinvigorated under your leadership.”
I wonder, where was Boas’ reference to Kelly, the Navy combat pilot and astronaut, “who proved his patriotism by putting his life on the line,” when Kelly insulted Musk.
While Musk invented the Tesla electric vehicle, successfully launched his Space X organization, and brought in two experienced journalists to audit Twitter protocols after his acquisition, Kelly failed to recognize his entrepreneurial talents and his dedication to weeding out waste, fraud and abuse without pay.
Feebly, Kelly stated that he “didn’t want to drive a car designed by a man dismantling our government and hurting people,” as he decided to sell his Tesla.
Doing so, with media cameras trained on him, Kelly could be cited as someone encouraging further domestic terrorism against Tesla dealerships.
Democrats Don’t Get It
Democrats know that Trump’s omnipresence on television and the social media paved the way for this 2024 return to office, so they’re thinking they’re going to turn things around for their party with the 2020 midterms and 2026, by similarly getting face time for their candidates.
Trump made historic appearances on wildly popular podcasts; those of Joe Rogan and Charlamagne tha God, and many others, three hours at a crack.
But the left doesn’t get it. Trump answered question after question on a wide variety of subject, most of which on topics the voting public wanted to hear. The Democrats not only doesn’t have a leader, but they also don’t have a message.
Who do they have who can make an appearance at a Super Bowl or the Daytona 500. Who do they have with the savvy to see the value of serving Big Macs and fries at a McDonalds or climb up in a garbage truck?
California Gov. Gavin Newsom inaugurated his new podcast last week and invited three Republicans as guests. Former first lady Michelle Obama and her brother kicked off their podcast with chit chat about Barack. One serious guy on the political scene is sports journalist Stephen A. Smith.
Dismantling the Education Department
Since my March 14, piece in which I asked if President Trump would be successful in abolishing the Education Department this time around, I have noted a few other comments worth passing along to you.
You may recall my remarks about AFT Union President Randi Weingarten. The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board inserted criticism of her in its opinion piece of March 15-16, “Don’t Cry for the Education Department,” attacking her insinuation that Mr. Musk is out to “steal the money, which Congress appropriated for children, to pay for tax breaks for the rich.”
“Ms Weingarten’s crocodile tears for ‘our kids’ ignore that no one has betrayed children more than her union,” stated the board.
While the board also commented on the Education Department’s “student loan boondoggle with a $1.6 trillion portfolio,” it failed to remind its readers of how it was former President Obama who created the student loan crisis in 2010 when he eliminated the federal guaranteed loan program, which let private lenders offer student loans at low interest rates.
Selling the government takeover as a way to save money – why bear the costs of guaranteeing private loans, he said, when the government can cut out the middleman and lend the money itself? The cost saving didn’t happen.
In a letter to the editor of the Arizona Republic in response to a piece they published on college entry tests, Karen Stout of Phoenix wrote, “Funny. The thing I didn’t see in this op-ed was the study of reading, math and science,” which I covered in my blog edition of March 14.
While the uninformed continue to accuse the president of ignoring the Constitution with his call for the dismantling of the Education Department, they fail to recognize that the Constitution doesn’t explicitly guarantee a right to public education.
Those in opposition are citing the 14th Amendment, which protects public education through its Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses.
The Tenth Amendment reserves powers not delegated to the federal government to the states of the people. This provision shapes the decentralized nature of the U.S. educational system, granting states substantial authority over educational policies.
Stay tuned.
May God continue to bless the United States of America.
