Views from Point Breeze

I am happy that the Republican National Convention came and went with minimal disruptions last week.  I guess the protesters were allowed to exercise their rights to exhibit their opposition to whatever issue they were concerned with.  I was worried about the open carry laws in Ohio and whether those carrying guns would be involved in any violence.  I had to watch because it was interesting to see how those politicos on the other side of the aisle view the future of our elected government.  It was a dark, dreary picture painted by Donald Trump.  Republicans must be empowered by the statement that we will be safer on day one in 2017 if he is elected. In spite of the sweltering heat that we will face in Philadelphia this week, Mother Nature let loose this morning with a storm that included steady rain and thunder and lightning.  I called myself taking a little bike ride to get some exercise.  By the time I got to Sansom Street, the rain was on and pop...

The Republican National Convention has been a must watch even for Democrats like myself.  The Convention opened on Monday night with a speech by Melania Trump.  Donald Trump could not avoid the spotlight and entered onto the stage to a song by Queen, We Are the Champions, to introduce his wife.  The London based group did not authorize the use of the song and it set the stage for the controversy surrounding the speech by the possible first lady.  How is it that excerpts of her speech sounded exactly like the speech that Michelle Obama gave when introducing her husband?  She quoted the current First Lady word for word in parts of her speech. The response for two days was not forthcoming and honest.  Ms. Trump said she wrote the speech with as little help as possible.  Two famed speechwriters, Matthew Scully and John McConnell, sent Mrs. Trump a draft of a speech and expected to work with her on this attempt to humanize the bombastic Trump.  It i...

I love summer for the beautiful moments that it has caused in my life.  I am a summer baby.  On July 23rd, God willing, I will celebrate another birthday.  I have learned repeatedly to appreciate every year and everyday that I have been afforded to live and breathe on this earth.  The tragedies that have been a part of the news cycle have been so steady as to make a person wonder as to the certainty of life.  An individual can become a statistic in the blink of an eye.  Hug your Family and tell them you love them today.  Seriously. Last night in Turkey, hundreds of people died in a suspected coup attempt by the military.  Turkey is a country of 74 million people though.  The hurt and pain are real and sustained for the relatives of those killed.  There was a bombing at the Ataturk Airport recently that killed 41 people and injured almost 240 people.  In Pakistan, at least 74 people were killed by a suicide bomber on Easter Sunday...

I was glued to CNN last night while watching a rambling speech by the presumptive Republican nominee for President, Donald Trump.  His speech was anything but political.  I would call it more of a blame game than anything.  As I mentioned in a previous post, I have never seen a billionaire who was more angry about a supposedly rigged system than he is.  He is constantly pointing the finger at someone for his successes.  He is filthy rich according to his own admission but he won't release his own tax returns.  He recoiled at the criticism of his Tweet which featured the Star o f David on a disparagement of Hillary Clinton then pushed back by saying that he shouldn't have deleted the Tweet. There are political fact checkers for most speeches that are given by candidates for President.  I still wonder what researchers would check based on last night.  Mr. Trump talked about his hotel that he is building in DC and the fact that it is on time and u...

Hillary Clinton is the presumptive nominee for the Democratic party.  Preparations have been underway for Philadelphia to host the Nominating Convention in twenty days.  It is a shame that the scandal over her e-mails will not go away.  Donald Trump falsely stated that they were hacked by a foreign entity.  There are some classified e-mails that were part of trove of private server communications.  As the Secretary of State I think that this use of a private server for anything other than private e-mails was a major lapse in judgement. Bill Clinton was on a layover in Phoenix.  Somehow he was informed that Loretta Lynch's plane would be landing in the same city.  He conveniently waited for her and they had a private conversation in his plane.  I love the conveniences that those in positions of authority and influence have.  They probably didn't have to pass through any lines at all.  Ms. Lynch indicated that they spoke about family, g...