Category Archives: media news

An abuse of presidential power?

March 5, 2019 kanelis2012

I want to share a brief item posted on Facebook by Robert Reich, a fiery critic of Donald J. Trump. Reich writes:

Another impeachable offense. Trump personally tried to block AT&T’s merger with Time Warner as retribution for CNN’s coverage of him, according to a new report. In meetings with his advisors, he demanded that the Department of Justice’s antitrust division to stop the merger. The move would have also been a huge victory for Rupert Murdoch, who owns Fox News and viewed the AT&T-Time Warner as a threat to his business.

If these reports turn out to be true, this would be a clear violation of the First Amendment’s protection of freedom of the press — conspiring to block a merger for the sole purpose of limiting press coverage. We must not become inured to this unconstitutional behavior.

What do we make of that? Reich, a former labor secretary during the Clinton administration, believes the president of the United States has interceded in direct violation of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

We’ve been hearing a lot in recent days and weeks about “conspiracy to obstruct justice,” about “alleged collusion with Russian operatives” who attacked our electoral system.

We now might start hearing more chatter about “abuse of presidential power.”

The U.S. House Judiciary Committee has launched an expansive investigation into an array of questions regarding Donald Trump’s conduct as president of the United States.

The committee’s agenda is overflowing.

media news

Off to the races with public radio station KETR-FM

March 4, 2019 kanelis2012

Well, we have a launch of a new project involving, um . . . me.

KETR-FM has posted my first essay for its website. You can read it here.

I chose to comment on the Texas teacher pay increase that’s now under consideration in the Texas Legislature. The Senate is poised to approve a $5,000 annual raise for public school teachers; senators will send it to the House. If the House approves it, the issue goes to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk for his expected signature.

I am thrilled to be part of this new endeavor. My association now is with Texas A&M University/Commerce and its radio station, which is affiliated with National Public Radio.

It’s a whole new gig for me. I want to give thanks to KETR news director Mark Haslett for giving me a chance to offer some perspective through the radio station.

I feel as though I’ve been given a fresh chance to pursue an aspect of a craft that gave me many years of enjoyment.

media news

Media are ‘all Democrats, all liberals’? Eh?

February 24, 2019 kanelis2012

Joseph DiGenova is sounding like a crackpot.

The former U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia is a frequent contributor to the Fox News Channel, the conservative-leaning cable network that gives Donald Trump all the support it can muster.

DiGenova is right at home with the network.

Yet he goes on the air and declares there’s a “civil war” commencing in the United States. Then, in a fit of hilarious irony, he declares that the media are “all Democrat” and “all liberal.” He claims the media are hell bent on destroying Donald Trump and his presidency.

Do you see the irony?

DiGenova is a contributor to a key player in what conservatives like to call “the mainstream media.” Yep, I consider Fox to be part of the media “mainstream,” given the network’s popularity among a large segment of Americans.

So, why is DiGenova blathering about the media being “all Democrat”?

No, sir. They are not!

media news

You never can take it ‘all back’

February 24, 2019 kanelis2012

Social media have their good points . . . I suppose.

However, I consider it to be a mostly negative influence on our national mood, not to mention the quality of our political discourse.

Whatever the medium — Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google . . . whatever — social media has become the wave of the present, never mind the future.

I want to look briefly at Twitter.

Entertainment and sports celebrities, and politicians fire these messages out via Twitter. Occasionally they regret them immediately. Given the nature of Twitter, though, an “immediate” retraction isn’t quick enough. Whatever it is these folks say via Twitter goes out in a serious nano-second jiffy. Boom! Gone! Just like that!

I laugh out loud when I read how those celebrities and pols take down their comments immediately. I want to yell:

Too late, sucker! It’s out there! You lose!

Do you remember when Donald Trump fired off that tweet that concluded with that non-word, “covfefe”? The White House took it back, except that it’s still the subject of comedians’ punchlines.

The late Claude Duncan was a dear friend and colleague, as well as a brilliant writer and thinker. He once told me that you “cannot unhonk the horn.” He didn’t envision social media when he offered me that bit of wisdom.

However, that statement never has been truer than it has become since the arrival of social media.

Perhaps that explains why the president of the United States — the unofficial Twitter Maven in Chief — never takes anything back. The most outrageous statements that flew into cyberspace from his Twitter account remain out there. They are uncorrected. He doesn’t pull ’em back. He says these things and, well . . . that’s it! Take it or leave it!

That doesn’t excuse the president’s bizarre use of that social medium to get his message out there. However, I suppose his reluctance to take anything back is a harsh realization that what flies out there is, um, out there for keeps.

local news, media news

Sorehead critics are few, still just annoying

February 22, 2019 kanelis2012 2 Comments

My life as a full-time blogger has been on a mostly uphill trajectory. Indeed, I am enjoying this gig almost as much as I enjoyed writing for newspapers — and got paid for it!

There is one aspect of blogging, though, that continues to stick in my craw. Don’t misunderstand me: I am not choking on it; it’s just a tad annoying.

You know the type of individual who cannot give you credit for anything? These are the folks you know who are quick to criticize but who just cannot find it within them to say a good word when you say or do something with which they agree.

Among the folks who read this blog I am blessed with a few of those types of critics. I’ll call ’em “soreheads,” because I cannot think of a more apt term to describe them.

Yeah, this is a mostly political blog. I wear my bias on my sleeves, on my chest, pasted to my forehead . . . you name the place, it’s there. I won’t apologize for it. My bias is who I am. It’s what I believe. It is where I’ll stand.

But the blog also deals with what I like to call “life experience,” which by definition is about as broad a topic as you can find. I like writing about family, my pet(s), places I’ve seen, people I’ve met, things I’ve done.

Those posts draw occasional comment from readers. They aren’t always fawning praise. Readers might see something in these posts that trigger a unique thought, which they’ll share.

Do any of the soreheads respond to those posts? Not on your life! They prefer to wait for the next tart comment I’ll put out there that looks critically at — oh, let’s see — the president of the United States.

That’s when they pounce. Sometimes they pounce hard.

Am I tempted to block them? No. I’m not. I want their comments out there. Sometimes they provoke debate among other readers of that post. They occasionally get entangled with other High Plains Blogger readers. I usually resist weighing in on those exchanges. Instead, I have what only can be described as an out-of-body experience. It’s kinda fun, if you want to know the truth.

None of this is intended to cry on anyone’s shoulder. I’m an old man these days. I’ve had my share of beefs and arguments with those who disagree with me. I once had a Texas judge threaten to sue me over some commentary I wrote about what I perceived to be a conflict of interest that involved the judge.

I just want to re-state for the umpteenth time that blogging is a gas. I am having the time of my life . . . even with the soreheads looking over my shoulder.

media news

Trump escalates shameful war against media

February 21, 2019 kanelis2012 2 Comments

Donald J. Trump’s shameful war against the media is proceeding unabated.

He calls The New York Times the “true enemy of the people.”

Why? Because the Times is doing its job. It is reporting the news regarding the Trump administration. It is seeking to chronicle what the president knew about possible “collusion” with Russian government agents in 2016.

Throughout all the Twitter tirades that Trump has launched against the media, he never seeks to refute specific elements of the reporting that’s been published. He simply denigrates the work of professional journalists with epithets like “loser,” “fake news,” and of course, “enemy of the people.”

He told us he would be an “unconventional president.” That is one campaign pledge he has kept. He is unconventional in the extreme.

Trump has declared war against the media. No president in modern history — with the exception, perhaps, of Richard Nixon — has been so wrong about the media’s role as watchdog and their responsibility to hold government officials accountable.

Donald Trump keeps shaming himself and his high office.

Disgraceful.

media news

Time of My Life, Part 23: Welcome to the ‘catbird seat’

February 21, 2019 kanelis2012

I grew up in Oregon. A career opportunity beat on my door in late 1983. The knock on the other side of that door came from a former boss of mine, Ben Hansen, who had gone on to become executive editor of the Beaumont Enterprise in the Golden Triangle region of Texas.

I had been a full-time journalist for about seven years when Hansen called with an offer for me to come to Texas to interview for a job as an editorial writer for the Enterprise.

He told me over the phone that Beaumont was a fabulous “news town,” that there was much happening there and that as editorial writer, I would be perched in the “catbird seat” from which I could comment on the issues of the day.

Hansen hired me and I started working there in April 1984.

Ben Hansen was so very correct about Beaumont, about the liveliness of the news there.

My culture shock was fairly profound as I packed up from the community I knew well, Portland, and headed for a whole new environment. Beaumont was a world away from what I knew. Adding to the stress of that change was the absence of my wife and my still-young sons; they stayed behind while my wife sought to sell our house. They joined me later that summer, just in time for the start of the school year.

However, a couple of things happened to relieve me of the stress of being without my family.

One was the amazing pace of news that unfolded that spring. Beaumont is a racially diverse community, roughly 50 percent white and 50 percent black. The first month of my employment at the Enterprise featured an election that resulted in the election of an African-American majority on a newly reconstituted Beaumont Independent School District board of trustees. Also on the ballot was a referendum to rename a major Beaumont thoroughfare after the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

The street renaming effort failed narrowly. The new BISD school board took office amid a palpable sense of tension in the community. Beaumont was late in the school integration game. A federal judge ordered the merger of the Beaumont and South Park school districts; the “old” BISD was mostly black, while the South Park district was mostly white.

Tension anyone? They had it!

Ben Hansen’s description of Beaumont was spot on. I was thrilled to be part of it, to watch it up close and to be able to offer some commentary that sought to lead the community through its travails.

The second aspect that lessened the impact of missing my wife and sons was the amazing embrace I received from my colleagues at the Enterprise. They knew of my circumstance. They went out of their way to include me in their after-hours fellowship.

The friendships I developed among many of those individuals are among the most solid I have forged with anyone I’ve ever met over my many years on this Earth.

My love for them is deep and is indelible.

We all shared a love of our craft and we would laugh and occasionally argue over what that day had brought.

Man, it was more fun sitting in the catbird seat than I ever deserved.

media news

No ‘retribution,’ Mr. President; it’s not possible

February 18, 2019 kanelis2012 1 Comment

How many times does one have to tell you, Mr. President, that you are not a monarch, or a dictator? You cannot bring “retribution” against a comedy show made famous by its parodies of powerful people.

But there you go again, threatening “Saturday Night Live” because it decided to spoof you yet again.

“SNL” trotted Alec Baldwin out to do that hilarious send-up of you and you just cannot stand being ridiculed. C’mon, Mr. President! Get a grip.

The comedy show has been doing this to presidents since 1975, when Chevy Chase poked fun at President Ford. It hasn’t stopped. They’ve all gotten the treatment. Not a single predecessor of yours has threatened “SNL” with any kind of political or legal payback.

And do I need to remind you once more, Mr. President, about that First Amendment matter? You truly need to read it, try to understand what it protects. It guarantees the right to worship as we please; it protects the press from government intervention; it says we can protest the government. It also says we can criticize the government without facing “retribution” from the government we are criticizing.

Your tweet about “SNL” was typically idiotic. As a reminder, you wrote:

Nothing funny about tired Saturday Night Live on Fake News NBC! Question is, how do the Networks get away with these total Republican hit jobs without retribution? Likewise for many other shows? Very unfair and should be looked into. This is the real Collusion!

Total Republican hit jobs? They “get away” with it the way “SNL” poked fun at Presidents Carter, Clinton and Obama. Those Democrats didn’t bitch constantly about “SNL.” For that matter, neither did the Republican presidents who had to take the heat, too.

I am tiring of repeating myself, Mr. President. Still, it bears repeating that you need to understand that positions of power invite this kind of treatment from the entertainment industry and the media. You are the most powerful man in the country, Mr. President.

You can act like it simply by stopping these mindless, brainless and feckless threats against a TV comedy show.

media news

Time of My Life, Part 22: Career ruined penmanship

February 15, 2019 kanelis2012

These were the tools of my craft. They allowed me to chronicle the events and examine the people who made our communities tick.

They also contributed to the destruction of something that once gave me a source of pride: my penmanship.

My wife and I signed a whole lot of documents today while closing on the purchase of our new home in Princeton, Texas. Our daughter-in-law was there, too, and the title officer complimented her on her penmanship.

That was when I piped up and told her how my career ruined my own handwriting. “What did you do?” the title officer asked. I told her I was a journalist for nearly four decades.

You see, one of the challenges of doing what I did was to write fast and furious to make sure I got everything that was said or that I was able to record all the events I witnessed. Those events at times come and go quickly and you need to be alert to capture all the salient points that you might want to record as you report on them.

I interviewed plenty of men and women who were equipped with machine-gun mouths. They fired facts, figures, assorted data, cracked quips, made critical points in rapid-fire fashion. I had to capture them all.

So when you have to write quickly, well, you get my drift. One has no time to make sure you write capital letters as you were taught how to write them in the third and fourth grade. Yep, they used to teach that stuff in the old days. No longer.

I usually fared pretty well at report-card time. The teachers graded me highly on my penmanship.

Then I enrolled in college, studied journalism, embarked on my career and, as they say, the rest is history. My once-neat penmanship became history in the process.

I got into my share of beefs over the course of 37 years with the subjects of some of the reporting I did, and the commentary I offered. We’ve all heard about reporters’ notes being subpoenaed by courts when someone wanted to challenge the accuracy of what was reported. I never had my notes summoned.

Damn, I wish I could have had the pleasure of giving up my notes and then daring the lawyers and the judge to try to discern what I wrote.

Only I knew.

All that said, it certainly was a hoot trying to keep up with those events as they unfolded.

Commentary on politics, current events and life experience