local news

Giving thanks once again

I have lived a blessed life … of that I am more certain than anything that has ever crossed my mind.

Therefore, I am going to offer a word of thanks and gratitude for the blessings I have enjoyed in my nearly 73 years on this Good Earth.

I learned at a young age to avoid “looking for the girl of my dreams.” What I also learned was that the individual would just show up. I was 21 years of age when she appeared. We found ourselves sitting at the same table with a mutual acquaintance; we exchanged winks and smirks as this fellow made a fool of himself.

We ended up soon after that going on a date. The rest is history. Fifty-one years later I am proud to say that I hit the first pitch out of the park. I give thanks every day for the girl who became my bride.

Our two sons have grown into the finest men you’ll ever know. They have remained close to my bride and me and to each other. One of them found the girl of his dreams and they have produced our lovely granddaughter.

I give thanks to the career I pursued with great joy. It provided some modest success for me. It also gave me a good living. Together, with my wife, we were able to provide for those two boys of ours. My craft enabled us to travel around the world, allowing us to see things we never thought we could see when we started our life together.

I long have enjoyed the blessings of living in the greatest nation on Earth. I gripe a bit about our government, The blessing comes, though, in that I am free to gripe without recrimination. There’s nothing like liberty … you know?

My family means everything to me. So do the friends I have acquired over the years. My blessings are countless. I give thanks for all that I have every single day, not just on Thanksgiving.

Today, though, I am paying a form of tribute to all that I have.

Happy Thanksgiving.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

medical news

Thank you, Dr. Fauci

While we’re giving thanks to this or that person, I want to offer a word or two of gratitude for the public service delivered by someone who served seven U.S. presidents.

Anthony Fauci has retired from his post as chief medical adviser to President Biden. He is calling it a career after serving as the nation’s chief infectious disease expert.

I want to offer him thanks for taking on a job that earned him as many foes as friends over the years. Why is that? Because he was unable to predict the course that infectious diseases would take, but he still managed to save literally millions of lives over his many years of service.

Republicans who are about to take control of the House of Representatives have promised to bring Dr. Fauci back to Capitol Hill to answer stern questions about his service during the COVID pandemic. The good doc likely will stand strong against the GOP onslaught.

I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Fauci while attending the International Conference on HIV/AIDS in Bangkok back in the summer of 2004. He was there to provide wise counsel to those seeking answers to that disease. I was in Bangkok as part of a journalist contingent traveling through Southeast Asia to learn about the impact of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in that part of the world.

Fauci served with distinction in presidential administrations dating back to Ronald Reagan. He served under the administrations of George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump and finally, Joe Biden.

Yes, there were some rocky times, particularly during the Trump years as the administration sought to get its arms around the COVID virus. The vitriol hurled against Dr. Fauci from those on the far right has been unfair and just plain wrong.

I just want to take this brief moment to express one American patriot’s deep thanks for the service Anthony Fauci delivered. Those who survived illness from the killer virus well might owe this good man their lives.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

media news

No ‘non-politics’ pledge this year

Years past have seen your friendly blogger — that’s me! — pledge to move away from politics during this holiday season.

I won’t make that pledge this year. I had only mixed success in keeping previous promises. This year I will forgo doing what appears to be the impossible … which is set politics aside in this period between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

However, I am making this pledge, which I am comfortable with, as I believe I can keep faith with it. Blog posts during this period will not contain the occasionally personal rhetoric I spew when referencing Donald J. Trump, the man I still consider to be an existential threat to our nation’s political fabric.

Accordingly, I don’t expect to be so visceral and angry even when referencing those who follow what passes for the former POTUS’s ideology. It is terribly tempting to speak the ugly truth about those who I believe hold treasonous views about our democratic process.

I’ll refrain from snorting fire.

That all said, I will continue to speak what I consider to be the truth about them, their cult leader, the misguided notions that come forth. I just won’t use angry rhetoric.

I also realize that having laid down that stipulation, readers of this blog will interpret my comments as being, well, unkind. That is their problem. Not mine.

If I sound unkind or mean, it’s all unintended. Therefore, I will offer a pre-emptive apology of a type I detest hearing from those in the news. If I offend you, I am sorry.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

Trump allies dropping off

Now it’s William Barr who has incurred the wrath of the man who selected him to be — ostensibly, at least — the nation’s attorney general.

The reality, though, was that Barr turned out to be a Donald Trump loyalist who misinterpreted the Robert Mueller special counsel findings on whether Trump colluded with Russians in 2016. There were many other times when Barr acted more like Trump’s lawyer than the nation’s chief law enforcer.

Now we hear from Barr that Trump is likely to be indicted for allegedly violating the Presidential Records Act and the Espionage Act by pilfering classified documents, taking them from the White House and storing them at his home in Florida.

Trump is angry, man. He is outraged. How can Barr say those things? He can say them because he is pretty good lawyer who likely has a good sense of what prosecutors know.

There have been a long and growing list of former Trump loyalists who now are speaking out — belatedly — about the hideous conduct of the 45th POTUS.

The list will grow. Bet on it.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Deniers make no sense

The election deniers who continue to yammer about “theft” of elections and the rigging of outcomes that deliver losses to Republican candidates simply baffle me.

I do not understand how this alleged “rigging” is supposed to work. In Arizona, the election denying GOP candidate for governor, Kari Lake, refuses to concede that she lost to Democrat Katie Hobbs. Republican county officials in Cochise and Mojave counties refuse to certify the results because, they allege, of irregularities in the balloting.

This is nonsense. It is foolishness. It is dangerous.

These believers in The Big Lie have declared war on our democratic process. They cannot be allowed to spread their lies and do potentially irreparable harm to our cherished republic.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

business news

SCOTUS clears way for Trump tax return

How does the saying go? Oh, I know: Inquiring minds want to know … actually those inquiring minds need to know and have a right to know.

Know what? They have a right to know how much a former president of the United States paid in taxes. They have the right to know how much he gave to charity. They are entitled to know the nature of his business dealings. They also have a right to know whether Donald J. Trump is as wealthy as he claimed to be while running for POTUS in 2016.

The U.S. Supreme Court has cleared the way for the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee to get its hands on Trump’s tax returns. The court didn’t disclose any details of its decision or reveal how the justices voted on it. Now, that begs the question: Does that mean you and I will see them? Not right away.

However, given the sieve quality of Congress, my guess is that we’ll get a peek at them in due course. Maybe soon.

Why is this a big deal? It’s a big deal because Donald Trump made it a big deal in 2015 when he announced his intention to seek the presidency. He rode down the Trump Tower escalator and said, among many things, that he would release the returns as other candidates have done.

Then he backed off. Then he said he would release them when the Internal Revenue Service completed its audit of the returns. We never learned whether the IRS was actually auditing them; Trump never produced any evidence of an audit. The IRS said it couldn’t confirm an audit but said that an audit didn’t preclude someone from releasing the returns.

Then he balked again. He’s been fighting release of the returns ever since.

Many of us want to see the returns. We are entitled to see them. The man worked for us. Trump was our “employee” for four years.

He wants to run for POTUS again. He likely will bellow, blather and boast more about his wealth. I long have known that the truly wealthy among us don’t brag about it. Thus, I am suspicious of Trump’s dubious claims of fabulous wealth.

Let us see for ourselves.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, legal news

Why target FBI?

Republicans are preparing to wage war on several fronts against the government they proclaim they want to protect

They have several targets in their sights but for the moment I want to focus on just one of them: the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The FBI used to be considered a sacred cow in GOP political circles. They dared not criticize the elite federal law enforcement agency for fear of being labeled “soft on crime,” or being a squishy liberal.

No more, man.

The FBI is now Public Enemy No. 1 among many Republicans for doing its job legally and by the book. What did the FBI do to incur the GOP wrath?

It acted on orders from the Department of Justice, the attorney general and entered the home of a former president to look for evidence of a possible (or probable) crime. The ex-POTUS took several boxes full of classified documents with him from the White House to his glitzy estate in Florida. AG Merrick Garland sought a federal judge’s permission — also by the book — to search the ex-POTUS’s estate for evidence. The judge granted it and so he sent the agents to the house to conduct the search.

That’s a no-no, according to the GOP stalwarts who defend the ex-POTUS to the hilt. How dare the feds do their job?

They are gunning for the attorney general and — get a load of this! — for the FBI director, Christopher Wray, who was appointed to his post by Donald Trump, the aforementioned ex-POTUS.

Let’s understand a couple of key points.

One is that the attorney general did nothing out of the ordinary. He ran all the necessary traps before authorizing the search at Trump’s estate. He acted within the law. Accordingly, AG Garland has declared that “no one is above the law,” and by “no one,” he means not a single American citizen … and that includes former presidents of the United States.

The FBI has not been “weaponized.” The AG has utilized the law enforcement agency totally within its scope of authority and for Republicans to declare their intention to “defund the FBI” makes a mockery of their criticism of progressives who said the same thing about local police agencies.

The world has been turned upside-down. We need to regain our balance.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, legal news

Special counsel looking better

Merrick Garland’s decision to appoint a special counsel to lead the investigation into the 1/6 insurrection and the pilfering of classified documents by the former POTUS is looking better all the time.

The counsel is John L. “Jack” Smith, a career prosecutor, a registered independent and a no-nonsense public servant. The attorney general saw a potential conflict of interest in prosecuting Donald J. Trump while the former president campaigns for the office. The conflict would arrive if Trump gets nominated by Republicans and runs against Joe Biden, the president who selected Garland to run the Justice Department.

So he’s backing away from active participation. Why is that such a bad thing?

I see few downsides to it. Smith will get to work immediately and will guide the prosecutorial team already assembled to its conclusion in both of these cases.

My hunch follows the lead already expressed, which is that Smith will get to the end of it all in fairly short order. Then we’ll get a decision on whether Donald Trump is indicted for the crimes I believe he committed.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Boehner was right about the GOP loons

John Boehner once sat in the chair reserved for the speaker of the House. Then he walked away, because he said he was tired of dealing with the TEA party lunatics who populated the Republican caucus in the House.

Well, the TEA party loons have been replaced, more or less, by the QAnon cabal and MAGA right wingers who are seeking to control the agenda set by a new speaker.

That would be Kevin McCarthy, who appears set to take the gavel from Speaker Nancy Pelosi. McCarthy is going to remove three Democrats from key committees, accusing them of lying and of spreading anti-Semitic rhetoric.

We are heading to a new era of chaos in the House. It will be chaotic in a way that Speaker Boehner never imagined when he bailed out.

The new — and razor thin — Republican majority is going to unleash the blowhards to investigate, of all people, Dr. Anthony Fauci. They want to impeach President Biden and others of the Cabinet.

The lunatic fringe is running the lower legislative chamber … just as John Boehner spoke about in an earlier time.

What goes around is coming around once again. God help us!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Giving thanks for founders

Thanksgiving aims to fill us with gratitude for the bounty we enjoy, and I do enjoy plenty of it, as I have been blessed beyond measure with a loving family and friendships.

But I want to offer a brief expression of thanks for men who have long departed this good Earth. They are the founders of this great nation.

They created a government that would serve the nation they founded in the 18th century. It has worked well, despite its imperfections.

It is being tested today as Americans struggle over whose arguments will win the day. Do we heed those who believe in good government and in the tenets of fairness, equity and liberty or do we follow the precepts of those who purport to be patriots, but who in reality want to overturn elections and deny all Americans the same level of liberty?

I’m going to stick with the former, because that is what our founders laid out for us.

To be sure, the founders didn’t create a perfect governing document. The U.S. Constitution contained serious flaws. It failed to grant full citizenship rights to women, who didn’t even acquire the right to vote until 1920, for crying out loud! The Constitution also was silent on slavery, as it allowed human beings to possess other human beings as property, the way they owned farm implements. The nation got around to abolishing slavery in the19th century, but we had to go to war with ourselves to win freedom for everyone who lives here.

The founders did create a document that has proved pretty damn durable. It has withstood many crises over the two-plus centuries of our republic’s existence. I will continue to cling to the belief that it will weather this storm, too, just as it saw us through presidential scandals, the Civil War, presidential assassinations and assorted assaults on the beliefs that our founders held dear to their hearts.

I am going to keep the nation’s founders in my own thoughts this week as I join my family in celebrating this uniquely American holiday. Their effort at creating this great nation is so very worthy of our thanks.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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