media news

Dobbs cancellation signals a dramatic new turn

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Fox News’ decision to cancel Lou Dobbs’ evening gab show didn’t raise much of a stink in our house.

We don’t watch him. I haven’t watched or listened to Dobbs since he turned sinister with his Barack Obama birther conspiracy nonsense and then became a Donald Trump suck-up while working for Rupert Murdoch’s unfair and unbalanced news organization.

But … Fox’s decision to yank Dobbs off the air might signal a dramatic new turn in the ongoing struggle to present truth and avoid lies.

Dobbs has been hit with a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit over his repeating lies about so-called “rigged” voting machines.

As the New York Times reported: Smartmatic, a voter technology firm swept up in conspiracies spread by former President Donald J. Trump and his allies, filed its defamation suit against Rupert Murdoch’s Fox empire on Thursday, citing Mr. Dobbs and two other Fox anchors, Maria Bartiromo and Jeanine Pirro, for harming its business and reputation.

Lawsuits Take the Lead in Fight Against Disinformation (msn.com)

I am not yet sure what this means for Pirro and Bartiromo, and whether they will follow Dobbs out the back door of Fox News.

What this portends apparently is a realization from the network that truth must remain the first and last line of defense in any kind of lawsuit challenging media credibility.

Perhaps the biggest surprise might be that it took this long for someone to say “enough, already!” to the lies that keep drawing breath because of phony commentators such as Lou Dobbs, who fomented the lies about vote fraud, just as he kept yammering about former President Obama’s place of birth and his constitutional eligibility to seek and hold the office of president.

At a certain level, Lou Dobbs symbolizes the degradation of honest journalism. I used to watch him when he reported on business news while working for CNN. Then he switched networks, which by itself is fine.

Then he flew head-first off the rails, into the ditch and became a leading spokesman for the Liar in Chief during his tenure as president.

I cannot predict how this lawsuit will end up. I’ll just suggest that I foresee some kind of major settlement in the making. Smartmatic stands to make a bundle of cash.

And it should.

Joe Biden, national news

Collegiality still MIA

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I must admit to a certain level of naivete.

My hope had been that with the election of Joe Biden as president of the United States that the nation would see a fairly rapid restoration of good manners among members of Congress and congressional interaction with the White House.

President Biden built a lengthy Senate career marked by the former senator’s long-standing and nearly legendary ability to work with Republicans. He calls himself a “proud Democrat” but he managed to forge friendships with colleagues from the other side of the room.

He served 36 years in the Senate before becoming vice president in the Obama administration. He worked hand-in-glove with GOP senators.

Then he ran for president against Donald Trump, whose term as president was marked by constant battles with Democrats. He took a lot of Republican members of Congress along with him in those fights.

What I never quite banked on was that the animosity would outlive Donald Trump’s departure from the White House. I am saddened to realize that the residue of that anger and animosity has infected many GOP House members and senators, even as the nation has sought to recover from the tempest, tumult and turmoil of the Trump years.

The nation’s divisions run deep. I am not going to concede that the divisions are deepening at this moment. I will cling to the belief that they have reached rock bottom. Until we are able to bind up those wounds, I fear that President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are in for a long slog through the morass.

I heard today that Merrick Garland, the president’s nominee to be attorney general, can’t get a hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee to consider his confirmation. The current chair, Republican Lindsey Graham, won’t schedule a hearing.

There’s good news, though, on the horizon. Graham will hand the chairman’s gavel over to Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy soon and Leahy then will get the hearing scheduled.

What is remarkable about Graham’s intransigence is  that he once described Joe Biden as one of “the finest men God ever created.” The men’s friendship was long thought to be a model of bipartisan chumminess. Then Graham slipped into Donald Trump’s hip pocket and that all changed.

I use that example to illustrate the anger that continues to infect the governance of this country.

The lingering anger likely will be one of the many distasteful legacies that Donald Trump leaves behind.

national news

Trump hates ‘former president’? Too bad!

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Donald J. Trump reportedly hates to be referred to as a “former president.”

He bases his loathing of the term because, it seems, that he cannot accept that Joe Biden is the current president. We only have one of ’em at a time, correct?

That’s fine with me. I never referred to him directly with the term “President” preceding his name. It doesn’t bother me in the least that he hates the term “former president.”

I’ll go one better on Trump. From now on I won’t use the term “former president” when referencing him. Ever again. He’ll just be “Trump” or “Donald Trump” or “The Donald.” I might even throw in a more, um, descriptive term on occasion.

There. Problem solved.

national news

‘Normal’ makes news?

(AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

This is strange in my humble view.

What passes for “normal” in the White House has become the stuff of feature articles in magazines and newspapers. The Hill, which covers Capitol Hill, published an article this week that talks about how “normal” life has become in the White House since President Biden took over from, oh … you know.

It’s kinda bizarre.

Normal now includes daily presidential briefings, which Donald Trump couldn’t stand. Trump called them a waste of his time, which if you think about it, he probably was right; he needed that time to send out Twitter pronouncements and hurl insults at his foes.

As The Hill reported: “It’s so funny – I hear from friends on both sides of the aisle how cleansing it is to wake up in the morning without feeling that the day will be inflamed by a crazy tweet,” said former Rep. Steve Israel, who served as the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in the Obama era. “Even people who disagree with President Biden say that at least we’re back to normal.”

Biden doubles down on normal at White House | TheHill

President and Mrs. Biden attended church on their first Sunday living in the White House. That, too, is going to become part of the first couple’s routine. So, um, very normal.

What we are witnessing is the re-creation of an executive branch of government built on long-standing practices, procedures and principles that President Biden knows well, given his immense U.S. Senate and vice-presidential pedigree. Donald Trump entered the only public office he ever sought with no such experience or understanding and, oh brother, it showed.

I welcome the return of normal. I also look forward to the day when it no longer is newsworthy.

media news

How will they remember us?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

As I communicate occasionally with former colleagues of mine around the country I am left with a stunning realization.

It is that the communities where I worked for 37 years in daily journalism are not alone as the newspapers that once served them with pride — and occasionally with tenacity — are dying before the communities’ eyes.

There was a time when I was feeling a bit of a complex about the communities where I worked. I started my career in Oregon City, Ore.; the newspaper that served that town is now gone, closed up, the building wiped off the slab on which it sat. I gravitated to Beaumont, Texas, where I worked for nearly 11 years; the company that owns that paper is now trying to sell the building and the news staff has been reduced to virtually zero. Then I moved to Amarillo and worked there for nearly 18 years; same song, different verse than what is playing out in Beaumont, except that Amarillo’s newspaper staff has vacated the building and is now housed in a downtown bank tower suite of offices.

Did I contribute to their death or terminal illness?

Then comes the other question: How will our descendants remember us?

I have a granddaughter who’s almost 8 years old. I actually wonder what she will say if someone were to ask her, “What did your grandpa do for a living?” Could she answer the question in a way that makes sense to her and to the person who asks it? I hope her mommy and daddy will help explain it to her. I will do my best to put it in perspective when the moment presents itself.

I am proud of the career I pursued. I did enjoy some modest success over the decades. My peers honored my work on occasion with awards. It’s not about that, of course. We did our jobs with a commitment to tell the truth and, in my case as an opinion writer and editor, to offer our perspectives fairly and honestly.

This transition is playing out everywhere in the land.

I spoke this week with a friend in Roanoke, Va., a fellow opinion journalist, who told me that paper also has suffered grievously in this new age of social media, live-streaming and cable TV news/commentary. I hear the same from others in the upper Midwest. I see circulation figures from major newspapers and cringe at the calamitous decline in paid readership.

For example, my hometown newspaper, the (Portland) Oregonian, once circulated more than 400,000 copies daily; the World Almanac and Book of Facts says the paper now sells 143,000 newspapers each day.

I feel like a dinosaur … and I take small comfort in knowing that there are many of us out there who lament the pending demise of a proud craft. I hope for all it’s worth that whatever emerges to take our place will continue to tell the truth and do so with fairness.

local news, medical news, military news

VA comes through once again

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I consider it a “pre-paid benefit,” and I use it whenever and wherever possible.

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs stands ready to assist 18 million American veterans for whatever needs arise. So with that, I will tell you that I got a phone call the other day from the VA. The automated voice informed me that I could call a number and make an appointment to receive a COVID-19 vaccine at the VA North Texas Medical Center in Dallas. I jumped all over it.

I ended the call, then phoned the number the “voice” gave me. After a lengthy wait, a human being picked up on the other end and she set up an appointment. I could come in the very next day!

And so … the demystifying of this process kicked in.

I received the Pfizer vaccine the next day. My wife and I drove from Princeton all the way through McKinney, Allen, Plano, Richardson and then through Dallas. We navigated our way through the Interstate 30/35E/45 interchange next to downtown Dallas and then arrived at the VA medical center.

We parked in a garage close to the building where I needed to wait for my shot.

I walked in, got my temperature taken and then trekked down the hall to check in with the clerks who were running the inoculation entry station. Here is where my heart began to sink. Why?

Well, when I talked to the lady on the phone the previous day, she told me that a mid-afternoon appointment was likely to mean sparse attendance at the clinic where we reported for our vaccination. What I saw upon arrival, though, was, um, vastly different from what the lady on the phone led me to believe would occur.

I walked down the hall past a long, seemingly interminable line of masked-up veterans. I turned down three more halls and found the end of the line.

My first thought when I got there – which I believe I muttered out loud under my own mask – was “holy crap! I am going to be here forever!” I phoned my wife, who was waiting outside and informed her that I was at the end of a line with at least 300 people in front of me. “I’m going to be here a while,” I told her.

Then a bloody miracle happened! At least it seemed like a miracle. It seemed as though I had been waiting for less than 30 minutes when I found myself suddenly at the desk where I had checked in. I was about to enter the room where 24 inoculation stations were set up.

Jeff Clapper, public affairs officer for the North Texas VA Health Care System, suggests it’s all according to plan. The system, he said in a statement, “has been remarkably effective at immunizing VA North Texas staff and patients, successfully delivering 11,600 doses of the Pfizer vaccine to date, with wait times consistently below 45 minutes.”

Clapper added, “The Dallas (point of distribution) is currently vaccinating both eligible veterans and VA North Texas employees by appointment only; no walk-ins allowed.” He said the North Texas VA office “contacted over 25,000 priority eligible enrolled outpatients via phone call.” He said the Dallas POD is now booking new vaccination appointments for not earlier than the first week of March.”

I have been enrolled in the Department of Veterans Affairs medical program for just a few years. I signed up when I was living in Amarillo and have found the VA level of service to be exemplary. I had nothing but smooth sailing at the Thomas Creek VA Medical Center in Amarillo. The level of service remains high at the Sam Rayburn Medical Center in Bonham, where I go these days for my regular wellness visits. That brings me to another point: I have suffered no medical emergencies, but at my age I am aware that my luck is likely to run out … eventually.

The Dallas visit to obtain my first Pfizer vaccine shot to prevent me from catching the COVID virus only enhances my good feelings toward the Department of Veterans Affairs.

I am sure I can speak for many veterans who appreciate the care they get. I understand that no massive government system is perfect. For me, though, it’s been pretty close to perfection.

For now, at least.

NOTE: This blog post was published initially on KETR-FM’s website.

Uncategorized

She’s off the committees, but not gone!

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

It is good to cheer the House of Representatives for removing Marjorie Taylor Greene from congressional committees.

The QAnon queen of the House has no business helping craft education policy, having called hideous school massacres made-up stories.

Greene, a Republican from Georgia, has been silenced, more or less, within the halls of Congress. She has not been silenced, though, as a political influencer. The House voted this week to kick her off the Education and Budget committees.

You see, this conspiracy theorist still has social media available to her to spew the filth that pours out of her pie hole. Which she will continue to do.

If only one could find a way to stuff a proverbial sock into her mouth. But … we cannot do that. The US Constitution gives all citizens the right of free speech. So, Marjorie Taylor Greene will continue to rant her nonsense.

And, by golly, there will be nimrods out among us who will buy into the sh** she will peddle.

Yes, this is a great country. However, sometimes …

national security

No briefings for Trump

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

“I’d rather not speculate out loud. I just think that there is no need for him to have the intelligence briefings. What value is giving him an intelligence briefing? What impact does he have at all, other than the fact he might slip and say something?”

That about sums it up. President Biden has declared that Donald J. Trump, his immediate predecessor, won’t get intelligence briefings.

Biden says Trump shouldn’t get intel briefings (msn.com)

Indeed, what is the point of giving this information to someone who placed so little value on the daily presidential briefings to which he was entitled when he held the office? None, as far as anyone can tell.

It’s usually customary to give immediate past presidents these briefings. It is meant as a courtesy to the individual who had immediate access to the most sensitive information in the country until the moment he left the presidency.

Trump, though, has engaged in some of the most hideous behavior imaginable since losing his re-election bid in 2020. He has not — and may never — accepted the results of the election. He has not yet congratulated President Biden specifically.

And, of course, he egged on the terrorist mob to storm Capitol Hill on Jan. 6. We know what happened on that terrible day.

Give him presidential intelligence briefings? No way, man.

national news

Trump won’t testify … imagine that

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

This likely is the biggest non-surprise of the lead-up to next week’s impeachment trial of Donald John Trump.

It is that Trump won’t testify in his own defense on the floor of the U.S. Senate. Democratic House trial managers had summoned the former president to testify in the trial that will determine whether he committed “incitement of insurrection,” as spelled out by the U.S. House of Representatives impeachment.

Why won’t Trump testify? My strong guess is that he would have to swear to tell the “whole truth” to the Senate that will act as jurors. The trial managers would have put Trump under oath to tell the truth. Failure to do so would result in perjury, which is a criminal offense.

Do you get where I am going with this? If not, here it is: This individual cannot tell the truth! He is incapable or unwilling to tell the truth, even under threat of criminal punishment.

The evidence of what Trump did on Jan. 6 has been recorded for posterity. He stood before a mob of terrorist rioters and told them to march on Capitol Hill to “take back our country.” They must not act out of weakness, the president said. The terrorists took him at his word and stormed into the Capitol Building to stop the certification of the 2020 election, which Congress was in the process of doing.

The mob killed five people, including a Capitol Police officer. They shouted “Hang Mike Pence!” while looking for the vice president. They shouted for Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

They acted on the instigation of Donald Trump.

My lingering thought is: How does Trump defend his conduct? 

Defending the indefensible is too steep a hill to climb, especially for a pathological liar who would have to swear to tell the truth.

local news, medical news

Plano … you had a problem

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

We were alarmed Thursday night when we heard the news about a COVID vaccine site that had run into some, um, difficulty.

My wife was scheduled to report at that very site at John Clark Stadium in Plano, Texas, the next day to receive the first of two COVID vaccine doses. We held our breath this morning as we set out for her rendezvous with immunity from the killer pandemic virus.

We arrived 25 minutes after leaving our house in Princeton.

Then something quite cool happened. We drove Big Jake, our 3/4-ton pickup, into line. We inched forward. We met with a young attendant who took down some information from my bride.

We then drove to another line. We waited a few more minutes. Then we met a second COVID vaccine staffer, who took some more info from her.

Then came the final stop. My wife chatted for a moment with the third attendant, answered a few medical questions.

Then she got the shot. Ba-da-boom … she was done.

I checked the clock. Finished in less than an hour.

News reports the previous evening told us about overbooking at that site because of no-shows and cancellations. We heard about agonizing waits in line, with residents told there were no vaccine doses left; they were turned away.

We didn’t have any particular expectation of similar problems today, only a nagging fear that they might present themselves to my wife.

They did not. What’s more, and this is a rather amazing thing to report, the staff working on the parking lot at Clark Stadium could not have been more courteous, friendly and professional. The personal demeanor actually made the experience almost enjoyable.

She got the Pfizer vaccine, which means she returns in three weeks for the second dose. Now that we know what to expect, there will be far less dread waiting for the end of this vaccine protocol.

I just want to offer a word of thanks and appreciation to some folks who are under a lot of pressure to serve an anxious community.

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