economic news

POTUS: Someone has to pay for what we need

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden’s many decades in government taught him a hard lesson, which is that everything the government does comes with a cost.

Taxpayers have to foot the bill.

He pushed a COVID relief package through Congress. He now wants to enact an infrastructure overhaul through the legislative body. Both of them together are projected at around $4 trillion.

Ouch … yes? Yes, but here’s the deal: In order to pay for all this, the president seeks to levy taxes on the wealthiest Americans. Now he is talking about an increase in capital gains taxes.

Donald Trump talked about infrastructure deals, too. Nothing happened. Congress didn’t move anything through. The president never articulated a way to pay for whatever it was he wanted done. He seemed to suggest that the tax cuts he rammed through Congress would jumpstart the economy sufficiently so that any major government project would pay for itself.

It didn’t happen. Then the pandemic brought the economy to its knees.

Trump lost his re-election bid and now a new president is trying to craft a workable plan to pay for a massive effort to rebuild our economy.

The tax plan already pushed out there will not increase taxes to a level prior to the cut enacted during the Trump years. It still gives congressional Republicans fits, so they’ll fit it along with everything else that the Democratic president proposes.

Reasonableness be damned!

national news

POTUS calls it a ‘crisis’

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden calls the immigrant situation on our nation’s southern border a “crisis.”

Which it is. It has been one for several weeks. The Biden administration has been reluctant to call it such.

But … it is a crisis. Too many children have migrated to our border unaccompanied by their parents. They are filling up temporary shelters all along the border.

Look, I am not going to beat the hell out of President Biden because of his prior reluctance to label this matter a “crisis.” He’s done so. That’s good enough for me.

Now he needs to get busy with finding a solution.

If nothing else the president might be able to get his right-wing critics to muzzle their bloviating about it and start offering some suggestions for how to fix the problem.

International news

Yes, it was genocide

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Joe Biden never has struck me as a politician willing to blaze many new trails. Still, as president of the United States, Biden has made a declaration that seemed to scare off every one of his predecessors for the past century.

No U.S. president, Democrat or Republican, has been willing to categorize the Ottoman Empire’s massacre of Armenians as an act of “genocide” … until now.

Biden made the declaration today after talking with Turkish President Tayycip Erdogan, apparently warning the strongman of his intention to do what he did today.

So, you might wonder: Why the presidential reticence?

Turkey is a key member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which was founded after World War II to deter possible aggression from what was called the Soviet Union. Thus, previous U.S. presidents were concerned about offending Turkey, upon which NATO depends as an important military ally.

President Biden has tossed those concerns aside.

The reality is that in 1915, Turkey set about to execute more than 1.5 million Armenians in what only can be described as a form of “ethnic cleansing.” Put another way, they engaged in genocide against an ethnic minority.

According to Yahoo News:

“Beginning on April 24, 1915, with the arrest of Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople by Ottoman authorities, one and a half million Armenians were deported, massacred, or marched to their deaths in a campaign of extermination,” Biden said in a statement on Saturday, marking Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day. He emphasized the need to recognize and remember such atrocities “so that the horrors of what happened are never lost to history.”

“The American people honor all those Armenians who perished in the genocide that began 106 years ago today,” Biden said. “We honor their story. We see that pain. We affirm the history. We do this not to cast blame but to ensure that what happened is never repeated.

Biden recognizes as ‘genocide’ the killing of 1.5M Armenians by Ottoman Turks (yahoo.com)

Yes, President Biden is trying to walk along a nuanced line. I get that. It also signals a presidential intention to ensure that human rights remains at the top of our foreign-policy consciousness.

local news

Mourning a painful loss while honoring a glorious legacy

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

My heart is shattered.

An anticipated phone call came this morning, but hearing the news that our family had expected didn’t make it any easier. My cousin died this morning of cancer that she had battled ferociously for a quarter century.

Her name was Becky Phillips Olson; she was the second child of the younger of my mother’s two brothers.

I want to share with you what made Becky so very special to all of us who loved her.

Simply put, Becky taught us how to live. She fought through five recurrences of cancer that started in her breast. Along the way, she committed her life’s work to giving comfort to others who endure the agony, the emotional and physical pain, as well as the fear that accompanies this killer disease.

She co-founded an organization she named Breast Friends. She and her foundation partner became motivational speakers. Becky would tour the nation sharing her story with others. She did so with humor and with blunt talk.

Becky wrote a book that she titled “The Hat That Saved My Life.” It tells of her struggle through cancer, of the hat she wore when she lost her hair from the chemotherapy treatments. The hat gave her some measure of strength to go through her days while engaging in this brutal struggle. The truth is that she didn’t actually need the hat to see her through. Her immense strength came from within her marvelous soul.

The cancer that began in one part of her body had spread dramatically. Becky was the quintessential force of nature who was blessed with a spirit and inner strength that were as formidable as any I ever have witnessed in any human being I have encountered along the way.

Our world today is significantly dimmer because Becky Olson has left it. However, Becky Olson’s legacy lives on in those who sought assurance from someone who turned her suffering and pain into tools she used to provide strength and comfort.

One cannot possibly have done more than that.

national news

Did he say that? Really?

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Complete candor requires us to realize that we didn’t think a U.S. senator was a certifiable nut job when he took office.

Still, Republican Ron Johnson of Wisconsin has provided ample evidence that he might need to be committed.

Johnson has been a COVID denier since the pandemic broke out. Now he says that there is “no reason” for Americans to get vaccinated if their neighbors have the vaccine. He is actually seeking to dissuade us from getting vaccinated against a virus has has killed just a bit south of 600,000 Americans.

Yes, the death rate is declining. The infection rate in many states, though, is spiking. Vaccines are rolling out. Three drug companies have produced enough vaccine to inoculate tens of millions of Americans.

Ron Johnson wonders, “Why the push for vaccine?”

Republican Ron Johnson tries to explain why there is “no reason to be pushing vaccines on people” (msn.com)

I think I can explain. We want the vaccine injected into as many Americans as possible so we can protect ourselves –and them — from the virus. Holy cow, man! It ain’t complicated!

As the Business Insider reports: Last month, the congressman claimed that he doesn’t plan on getting vaccinated because he already contracted the disease, which he argued “probably provides me the best immunity possible.” According to the Centers for Disease Control, with regards to natural immunity, “experts don’t know for sure how long this protection lasts, and the risk of severe illness and death from COVID-19 far outweighs any benefits of natural immunity. COVID-19 vaccination will help protect you by creating an antibody (immune system) response without having to experience sickness.”

This is the same guy who said the Jan. 6 insurrection on Capitol Hill took place even though most of the rioters are law-abiding citizens who have a deep respect for law enforcement. Uh, senator? I saw the video of that riot. There wasn’t a lot of abiding by the law taking place. He also believes the Big Lie about phony voter fraud.

Now he is popping off about vaccines.

Hmm. Shut up, Sen. Johnson.

local news

Bad move in Greenville

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Allow me this bit of unsolicited advice to educators everywhere: Do not engage in “jokes” that seem to mirror hideous news events.

So it is, then, that a Greenville Independent School District teacher has resigned after being suspended over a picture of her placing her foot on the back of a Lamar Elementary School student’s neck. Sound familiar? Yep, the teacher took part in this supposedly good-natured stunt on the day that a Minneapolis jury convicted former cop Derek Chauvin of murdering George Floyd by pressing his knee on the back of Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes in 2020.

The ”joke” went over like the proverbial lead balloon. Could the timing of this incident have been any worse?

When the picture went viral, the school district suspended the teacher. The youngster on whom the supposed joke was perpetrated said he didn’t take offense. The boy’s mother said her family has a good relationship with the teacher and she, too, spoke in support of the educator.

Then the teacher quit. I should point out that the teacher is white and the student is African-American.

Good grief.

KETR’s Mark Haslett reported: “We take this situation very seriously. It will be thoroughly investigated, and appropriate action will be taken,” Superintendent Demetrus Liggins said in an email that went out to parents of Greenville ISD students. “We have heard from many community members, and we understand their concern and anger.”

The anger apparently prompted the teacher to resign rather than face possible recrimination for her action.

The entire world’s sensitivity to this kind of conduct has been heightened tremendously by the Chauvin trial and the incident that resulted in his conviction of murdering George Floyd. Chauvin is a white former police officer who applied unreasonable force to restrain Floyd, a black man who was arrested for – get this – passing some counterfeit currency in a Minneapolis convenience store.

So, for a Northeast Texas educator to take part in a so-called prank and have the image of her foot on the back of a youngster’s neck released on the very day of Chauvin’s conviction smacks of the height – or the depth – of poor judgment.

So, there’s a lesson to be learned from all of this. I believe the world’s eyes have opened wide to people’s perception of actions intended ostensibly to be done as a good-natured joke.

NOTE: This blog post was published initially on KETR.org.

national news

Waiting on a probe

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The nation endured an insurrection on Jan. 6.

The Department of Justice has charged more than 400 people involved in the riot that sought to overturn the results from the 2020 presidential election. DOJ expects the count to reach 500.

The riot resulted in the second impeachment of a president, the death of a police officer and four others, injuries to hundreds of individuals.

It was a concerted, planned attack on our federal government.

The question: Why hasn’t there been a non-partisan, blue-ribbon commission named to root out the cause of the riot and to make recommendations on how we can possibly avoid future attacks on our democracy?

Congress is dawdling. The Justice Department needs to get more involved as well. Attorney General Merrick Garland knows how this process should work, as he has experience gained from his own probe of the 1995 domestic terrorist bombing of the federal courthouse in Oklahoma City.

You may count me as one American patriot who demands answers to what we witnessed that day as crowds stormed into the Capitol Building, yelling for VP Mike Pence and threatening to hang him; they defecated on the floor of our government; they were looking for Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Do not tell me that the word “insurrection” is incorrect or too, um, strident a term to describe what happened. That is precisely what we witnessed.

We need there to be a commission patterned after the panel formed in the wake of 9/11 to give us answers.

political news

Show us fraud, GOP pols!

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Tom Cruise yelled famously in the film “Jerry Maguire” to “Show me the money!”

In that spirit, I am inclined to yell out to Republican politicians intent on perpetuating the Big Lie about the 2020 election: Show me the vote fraud!

GOP pols in states all across the nation keep pitching for “voter reforms” they contend will protect the electoral process from fraud that they imply is rampant. The keep feeding that fantasy that the 2020 presidential election was somehow, some way rife with corruption.

Holy cow, man! It was clean, free and fair. It also was the most secure election in U.S. history, according to a Trump administration official, Christopher Krebs, who was hired to ensure the election’s security.

I watched Texas state Rep. Briscoe Cain today rail on and on about protecting the state’s electoral system against fraud. He didn’t cite a single shred of evidence that fraud even exists. Yet this GOP lawmaker is being charged with crafting vote-restriction legislation aimed at making it more difficult for Texans to vote.

He is far from alone. Republican members of the U.S. Senate and U.S. House bellow and bluster continually about alleged voter fraud. It doesn’t exist in anywhere even close to the level that these pols keep implying.

It is maddening and infuriating in the extreme to hear allegedly responsible public figures make assertions that are patently untrue and then to foist legislation on us that they base solely on the lie they keep fomenting.

Our elections are the product of hard work at the local, county and state level. States such as Texas have worked diligently to protect our electoral system. Have they enacted a totally fool-proof process? No. Instances of fraud, though, are rare. They amount to an infinitesimal fraction of the millions of ballots that we cast.

When I hear politicians cite threats and fears of “widespread vote corruption,” I am left only to exclaim in the loudest voice I can summon to “Show me the vote fraud!”

national news

Sen. Kennedy gets an earful

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Sen. John Kennedy, a Louisiana Republican, might have thought he could get away with hurling a rhetorical fastball at a noted voting rights activist.

He asked Stacey Abrams of Georgia to explain to him what in that state’s new voting restriction law is “racist.” Abrams, a Democratic activist who happens to be African-American, fired back.

DAMN! GOP Sen. John Kennedy Tries To Grill Stacey Abrams On Georgia voting law And Gets Served – YouTube

Abrams launched into a point-by-point recital of all the provisions in the Georgia law she deems to be discriminatory.

Kennedy sought a couple of times to shut her down. Abrams persisted. She continued. Abrams ended up giving Kennedy far more than he thought he would get when he posed the question.

I attached a link to this brief blog post that explains what I am talking about. It’s worth taking a look.

International news

Human rights returns!

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden has laid the law down on a dictator with whom this nation is bonded through a military alliance.

Biden and Turkish president Tayyip Erdogan have talked. The president told Erdogan that he considers the Ottoman Empire’s extermination of millions of Armenians to be an act of genocide. He intends as well to bring it up when the men meet in a bilateral encounter later this year during the annual meeting of nations that belong to NATO, of which Turkey is a member.

This is a big deal. Why? Because the American presidency has lacked any open discussion of human rights violations for the past four years. Donald Trump chose to ignore these and other international abuses of human dignity during his tenure in the White House. President Biden is returning human rights to the table.

To which I say … yes!

The Hill reports: The White House readout of the call noted the two men would meet this summer but made no mention of discussion about the potential genocide declaration, which Turkey has long lobbied against strenuously. Bloomberg News later reported that Biden informed Erdogan that he plans to recognize the massacre of Armenians as genocide.

Biden, ErdoÄźan speak amid tensions over Armenian genocide (msn.com)

The world is full of human rights abuses — and abusers. You can spare me the rejoinder about such abuses occurring here at home. I am fully aware of them. As is President Biden. Still, he intends to exert his moral authority as the leader of this great nation to remind others around the world that all humans have inalienable rights that deserve honor and respect.

I welcome the president of the United States engaging in  that critical discussion.

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