Republican Summit Today, Friday Night Lights

The Circus: Donald Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan are scheduled to meet today with other Republican leaders to see if they can agree and cooperate on what the party and its presidential candidate stand for. Ryan said yesterday, “We need a real unification of our party, which, you know, after a tough primary, that’s going to take some efforts.”

Trump said, “I have a lot respect for Paul Ryan. If we make a deal that’ll be great. And if we don’t we will trudge forward like I’ve been doing and winning, you now, all the time.”

Trump, Ryan and the party have major policy differences.

-Ryan would cut so-called “entitlement” payments; Social Security, Medicare, federal retirement plans. Trump would not.

-Ryan supports immigration reform. Trump says he would send all illegal immigrants back where they came from.

-The Speaker opposes raising the minimum wage and Trump says it might be necessary.

-Ryan condemns banning Muslim immigrants and visitors from the US, contrary to one of Trump’s central campaign promises.

-Free-trade agreements are good with Ryan and Trump hates them.

Good for the Gander: Hillary Clinton is calling out Donald Trump for failing to release his tax returns. “So you’ve got to ask yourself, why doesn’t he want to release them?” Mrs. Clinton said, indicating suspicion. “Yeah, well, we’re going to find out.”

Trump says he’s being audited and will not release his returns until the audits are complete. The tradition of releasing tax returns dates back to President Richard Nixon, whose tax returns were released, revealing that he paid virtually no taxes.

Of course, Clinton refuses to release the transcripts of speeches she gave to Wall Street financial institutions. She says she will do it as soon as everyone else does, but “everyone else” is Bernie Sanders who didn’t give speeches to Wall Street for big paychecks.

Nation: The fire that caused an enormous explosion in a fertilizer plant in West, Texas in 2013, nearly leveling the town, has been ruled an act of arson. No suspect has been identified. The explosion created a crater 93 feet wide and 10 feet deep, killing 15 people, 10 of whom were volunteer firefighters.

Brazilian Blowout: Brazil’s Senate debated all night long before voting this morning to impeach President Dilma Rousseff and put her on trial on accusations that she illegally covered up a budget deficit by borrowing from state banks. They say she did it to get re-elected two years ago. Rousseff has refused to resign so she will be suspended and replaced, at least temporarily, while she’s on trial.

Signoff: Morley Safer, 84, the longest-serving correspondent for 60 Minutes on CBS News, announced that he’s retiring after 46 years with the broadcast. Safer has been a fixture with CBS since the Vietnam War when he filed a story showing US Marines burning a Vietnamese Village. It was a turning point in the US government’s ability to justify and sell the war to the voting public.

With 60 Minutes, the Canadian-born Safer has been one of the most felicitous, ironically funny, and astute correspondents in the history of television news. Safer has said, “I really don’t like being on television… It makes me uneasy. It is not natural to be talking to a piece of machinery. But the money is very good.”

Friday Night Lights: Voters in a Texas city have approved the building of a $63 million, 12,000-seat football stadium — for high school football. The stadium in McKinney, Texas, would be used by three local high school football teams.

Texas is experiencing a kind of arms race in the construction of high school stadiums. Allen, Texas, has a $60 million football stadium that seats 18,000 people.

In January, Texas was ranked 43d out of 50 states for the quality of education in its schools.

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Thursday, April 25, 2024

Page Two

The Most Corrupt Justice

Monday, October 2, 2023

Democracy and Video in the Dark

Sunday, February 26, 2023

Page Two: Do the Right Thing

Tuesday, February 1, 2022

Page Two: Sound Recall

Monday, September 13, 2021

Page Two: Cuomo Must Go

Friday, August 13, 2021

Trump and the Truth

Tuesday, November 3, 2020

The “Great” President

Monday, March 30, 2020

The Wright Stuff

Saturday, February 29, 2020

It's Been Said

"In my mind, I’ve never crossed the line with anyone, but I didn’t realize the extent to which the line has been redrawn. There are generational and cultural shifts that I just didn’t fully appreciate, and I should have, no excuses."

-Andrew Cuomo, resigning as governor of New York after accusations of sexual harassment

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