Category Archives: national news

national news

GOP gap set to widen

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I have this burning need to inform the Republican Party that booting out a conservative leader of the GOP House caucus only widens the divide between two factions within the party.

The Trump faction has its suck-up in the chair, Rep. Elise Stefanik. The establishment wing’s darling, Rep. Liz Cheney, has been cast aside.

The Trumpsters vs. The Establishment.

Let the battle commence. I am going to pull for The Establishment wing. It’s not that I am one of them. It is that the Trumpsters now are seeking to become poised to ruin the country, not to mention their political party.

The Trumpsters in the House, now led by Stefanik, are going to promote the Big Lie, that Trump lost the election via theft and vote fraud. They are lying their a**es off. They are continuing The Big Lie that Trump himself keeps alive.

They disgust me to no end.

As for Liz Cheney, she is far from my favorite House member. However, she voted to impeach Trump after the then-POTUS incited the insurrection on Jan. 6. What’s more, she has continued to stand strongly behind her vote and has drawn the wrath of the Trumpsters with whom she serves.

The fight for control of the congressional Republican caucus ain’t ending. You go, Rep. Cheney.

national news

Cheney for POTUS? Wow!

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The Liz Cheney soap opera is getting downright weird, man.

The congresswoman from Wyoming, who has just lost her job as House Republican caucus chair, has been asked whether she would run for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024. Her answer: She said she will do anything to stop Donald Trump from getting the nomination.

“I’m very focused on making sure that our party becomes again a party that stands for truth and stands for fundamental principles that are conservative,” she said. “And I won’t let a former president or anybody else unravel the democracy.”

Well …

What do you think of that one?

Cheney won’t rule out running for president to stop Trump (msn.com)

Cheney lost her GOP congressional post because she voted to impeach Donald Trump after he incited the Jan. 6 insurrection. She hasn’t let up on the ex-POTUS. She calls him a threat to our democratic process.

She is correct about the danger Trump poses. The House GOP, though, is looking to populate its leadership roster with Donald Trump suck-ups. That ain’t Cheney.

Now she’s talking openly about running for POTUS?

Why, we’ll just have to stay tuned.

national news

Liberal: no epithet

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Yes, the term “liberal” has become a four-letter word.

For that we all should share in the shame of the demonization of a proud political philosophy. The quote attached to this brief blog post is attributed to the woman pictured with it, Eleanor Roosevelt … arguably the prototype of the modern first lady.

What troubles me about the degeneration of the term “liberal” is how liberals don’t even call themselves that these days. They call themselves “progressive.” I hear congressional liberals, virtually all of them Democrats, refer to their “progressive” agenda. They are afraid of what and who they are.

When did it become an epithet? I’ll go back to the days of the Contract With (on) America election of 1994. The conservative fire-breather who led the Republican takeover of Congress that year was Newt Gingrich, a House member from Georgia, who said the following:

“We intend to make liberals the enemy of normal Americans.”

I did not make that up. He actually said that and exhorted the conservatives who comprised the Republican ticket in all 50 states to do as Newtie suggested; they made liberals the “enemy of normal Americans.”

Here’s the weird part of that story: They succeeded. They whipped conservative Americans into a frenzy to establish the evil credentials of liberal politicians.

The conservative movement has continued to demonize liberal politicians. They have called them un-American. They speak to many Americans’ darker instincts.

The term “liberal,” though, is meant to connote an open mind, to look beyond the strict boundaries, the limitations of government. My goodness, there’s nothing evil in that.

So, I will examine the remarks attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt with thought and will make a solemn vow: I will not shy away from the term that defines my political world view.

DC riot, national news

Now comes the fight … maybe

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

This just in: U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Austin might decide he wants to lead the House Republican caucus because the presumed heiress apparent, Elise Stefanik of New York, is too liberal.

Ah, yes. Let’s have a fight, shall we?

The House GOP caucus ousted Liz Cheney of Wyoming because Cheney is appalled at the conduct of Donald Trump. She happened to have the bad form to criticize the former president for inciting the Jan 6 terrorist attack on the Capitol Building while Congress was in the midst of certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election.

Why, those Republicans just cannot stand the notion of one of their leaders criticizing such abhorrent conduct. So they booted Cheney out of her leadership post.

OK, that’s done. Now comes the fight to find a successor.

Roy said Stefanik’s voting record is too, um, moderate to suit his taste. He wants a fire-breather in that leadership job. Hey, kinda like Liz Cheney, whose own conservative credentials are beyond dispute.

Is Roy going to sing from the same page as Stefanik, giving Trump a pass on his insurrection-incitement? That appears for all the world to be the only credential any card-carrying GOP member of Congress needs these days to assume a leadership role.

This’ll be fun to watch.

Go ahead, Rep. Roy. Let’s see what you have.

national news

Hey, Rep. Cheney: Keep messaging!

(Photo by Marc Piscotty/Getty Images)

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The U.S. House of Representatives Republican caucus has thrown in with the former Liar in Chief and decided that a truth-teller among its ranks has no place in its leadership.

Rep. Liz Cheney this morning was stripped of her title as chair of the House GOP caucus, the No. 3-ranking post among congressional Republicans.

Prediction: Liz Cheney isn’t going to skulk away quietly.

Indeed, she said today that she intends to do all she can to ensure that Donald Trump never sets foot in the Oval Office ever again.

Good for you, Rep. Cheney.

Be not confused here. I detest Cheney’s politics. I do admire her courage in standing firm against Donald Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 insurrection and her vote to impeach Trump a second time when he exhorted the terrorists to storm Capitol Hill.

Cheney told the truth about Trump. Her colleagues in the House are having none of it. They have shamed themselves and their governing institution.

national news

It’s all topsy turvy

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

My ever-lovin’ goodness.

I am cheering for Liz Cheney, a right-wing Republican member of Congress.

She is about to be stripped of her chairmanship of the Republican House caucus because … she is telling the truth about Donald Trump, the ex-POTUS and insurrectionist in chief.

It’s a dark day if you’re a Republican. I am not. I call myself a “good government progressive.” In Texas, in fact, we don’t register as Democrats or Republicans. We vote in open primaries. We get to vote in whatever primary we choose. The election judge might stamp our voter registration card with a “D” or an “R.” Or he or she might not.

Still, I dislike Liz Cheney’s politics. Too right wing for my taste.

However, she ain’t buckling under the pressure of the Trumpkin Corps. She is continuing to speak the cold, hard truth about Donald Trump, that he’s a threat to our government and that he needs to be stopped.

And so, the Republican poo-bas are going to relieve her of her chairmanship because she won’t swill the poison that makes believers of Trump’s Big Lie about the 2020 election being “stolen.”

Indeed, a dark day is going to dawn very soon on the national Republican Party.

national news

Trump: a national peril

REUTERS/Sarah Silbiger

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I take no pleasure in asserting what I believe in my heart … that Donald J. Trump presents a dire and existential threat to the nation he once governed.

Of all the men who preceded him as president — and there have been some serious losers/wack jobs/crooks/criminals, none of them come as close to presenting the threat to our very governmental fabric that Donald Trump presents.

He continues to spew the Big Lie about the 2020 presidential election. His minions in the House of Representatives are about to boot the GOP caucus chair from her post because she stood on principle. He threatens anyone who crosses him. Trump has not a shred of decency to stop the assault on our electoral process that is underway in Arizona, where conspiracy theorists are concocting scenarios they hope will deny President Biden the votes he won legitimately.

Donald Trump is a threat to our national security. To our very governmental fabric. To the balance of political power.

Do I like saying these things about him? No. Of course not!

When the votes were counted in the 2020 election, Donald Trump could have picked up a phone and congratulated the winner, Joe Biden. He could have wished him well. He could have pledged his support. Trump could have declared his intention to oversee a smooth transition of power. He could have welcomed the president-elect and his wife to the White House, shown them around the place and then sat there at the inaugural and clapped politely when the new president took his hand off the Bible as he was sworn in.

No. Donald Trump didn’t do any of that. Indeed, he incited a riot by a terrorist mob on Jan. 6. He turned his back on Vice President Mike Pence, who was presiding over the certification of the Electoral College victory that Biden rang up. Trump has turned his back on Pence, who did his constitutional duty and had to be holed up in a secure location while the terrorists were yelling “Hang Mike Pence!” as they stormed into the Capitol Building.

To think, therefore, that most Republican voters have swallowed that poison that Trump has dished out — believing that the election was “stolen” — is utterly beyond anything I ever could have imagined.

Donald Trump continues to threaten the nation. Anyone with a sense of shame would be, well, ashamed. This individual simply defies any norm of decency, dignity and decorum.

national news

House GOP to define itself

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The U.S. House of Representatives Republican caucus is facing a defining moment this week.

It will have a chance to define itself as being willing to push forward a serious agenda or whether it will serve as a cabal of toadies for a disgraced, defeated for president of the United States, the former Liar in Chief who continues to foment the Big Lie about the 2020 presidential election, that it was stolen from Donald Trump by “rampant vote fraud.” There was no rampant fraud. It’s a lie. It’s the Big Lie.

The moment will come in a vote over whether to replace Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming as the Republican caucus chair and seat Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York in her place.

Cheney is a right-wing conservative lawmaker with serious GOP chops, being the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney. She also is a principled conservative who was as appalled and aghast as others were at the insurrection that Donald Trump — the aforementioned Liar in Chief — incited on Jan. 6. She voted to impeach Trump.

That doesn’t sit well with most of the GOP caucus. They fawn over Trump and are fearful of what he could do them if they were to cross him, the way Cheney did.

So up steps Stefanik, a Trumpster to the core. She has bought into the Big Lie. She is loyal to the Liar in Chief. And so … the House GOP caucus will get to choose her over Cheney, which they appear set to do on Wednesday.

It surely will mark a dismal moment in the history of a once-Grand Old Party.

There’s a glimmer of good news in this key vote. It well good pi** off enough serious Republicans to turn their back on the Big Lie … and on Donald J. Trump.

national news

Big Lie: alive and festering

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The Big Lie, the one fomented by Donald Trump, is alive and festering in Maricopa County, Ariz.

What gives? Well, a group of conspiracy theorists is ramrodding a supposed “recount” of votes cast during the 2020 presidential election. The Arizona vote ended up narrowly in President Biden’s total, giving him the state’s electoral votes.

The conspiracy nuts are looking for justification to turn the results over in the state’s most populated county. My prediction? They won’t find anything, at least not legitimately.

However, there is not a damn thing legitimate about what is happening in Arizona and in Maricopa County.

The Big Lie purveyors, who hang on the lie promoted by Donald Trump that the election was “stolen” through vote fraud, are on the hunt for anything they can use to give validation to the phony assertion about fraud that did not exist.

The so-called “audit” of the ballots is being done by individuals and organizations with zero election experience. They are Trumpkins in disguise. They have stooped to looking for evidence — and this is fantastic! — of “bamboo” in the paper used in ballots to confirm specious assertions of manipulation by nefarious forces in Southeast Asia.

We are witnessing a ridiculous attempt spurred on by a ridiculous former POTUS to overturn the results of a fair, legal and free election.

Sheriff Goes Ballistic After Arizona Recounters Demand Access To County Passwords | HuffPost

There will be nothing constructive gained from this form of idiocy, other than to confirm that those who are seeking to overturn the results are, indeed, certifiable idiots.

They are being fed The Big Lie. They consume it willingly and seemingly with glee. They stand behind a man elected to the presidency and then defeated in his re-election bid only because they adhere to the nonsense and the lies he throws out there.

Now they are messing around with an electoral process that has been deemed “the most secure in U.S. history.” Who made that assertion? Donald Trump’s choice to protect the electoral system, Christopher Krebs, who then got “rewarded” for doing his job by getting fired by the Liar in Chief. Someone has to explain to me how that makes a lick of sense.

So it is that the Big Lie is alive.

It is festering.

national news

GOP has gone to hell

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

There’s no nice way to say it, so I’ll just fire away.

The Republican Party has gone head first into the shi**er. It’s gone to hell. It no longer represents anything other than fealty to a hate- and fear-monger, an ignorant buffoon who had no business being elected POTUS.

Donald Trump’s vise grip on the once-great political party is shameful in the extreme.

The party has devolved into an organization that now stands and cheers for an alleged sex trafficker in Rep. Matt Gaetz, embraces the lunacy of QAnon queen and conspiracy theorist Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene … and then boos and jeers actual Republicans such as Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah and Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming.

The House Republican leadership is set to boot Cheney out of her GOP caucus chairmanship. The party rank-and-file has turned its back on the 2012 GOP presidential nominee, Romney. What do these two politicians have in common? They voted to impeach and convict Donald Trump of inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection on Capitol Hill.

And so the party now slobbers all over Donald Trump’s shoes and demands that other politicians do the same.

What in the name of governance happened to this group of individuals? They have been taken hostage by an imbecile.

Wow! I … am … stunned.