Category Archives: national news

national news

Matt Gaetz needs a dog

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Someone once said if you want to have a “friend in Washington, get a dog.” My sense today is  that U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, a Florida Republican, needs a pooch if he desires to find a friend.

Friends are in short supply for Gaetz as he faces allegations of improper sexual  relations with an underage girl and — this is the worst part by far — whether he engaged in sex trafficking. Then there are reports from his colleagues that Gaetz has been showing ’em nude pics of the women with whom he has taken a tumble.

It really and truly stinks to be Matt Gaetz at this time.

Don’t get me wrong. Gaetz, who has been described as a political troll who is more interested in furthering weird causes than actually legislating, is one of the more detestable individuals serving on Capitol Hill. Media are reporting a decided lack of surprise among his congressional colleagues over what has been alleged.

Yeah, he’s got a few pals. They are fellow Donald Trump acolytes who, like Gaetz, continue to suck up to the ex-president. Gaetz is hoping, it appears likely, that Trump can parlay what little political stroke he has remaining to save this clown.

It’s instructive to me that Gaetz’s congressional communications director has quit, citing “principle” as his reason for resigning. Well, who else is going to abandon this nut job?

Yep, Gaetz needs a pooch.

national news

Forecast of economic doom? Hah!

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Hey, wait a second!

I could swear I heard Donald John Trump make a bold prediction that if Joe Biden were elected president of the United States that the U.S. economy would collapse.

That the stock market would crater. That jobs would flee the nation. That unemployment rates would balloon beyond anything we could recognize. That the economic health of the nation required the re-election of Trump as president.

Didn’t he say that? Or words to that effect?

Well, let’s see. The March jobs report came in today. Private non-farm job growth registered a 916,000 surge. Joblessness fell to 6 percent. The U.S. Labor Department report suggested, according to economists, that our economy is showing signs of post-pandemic vitality.

Now, let me be clear. President Biden does not deserve all the credit for this performance. Vaccines are being injected into more Americans every day. I know about the increase in COVID cases and an uptick in deaths from the virus. Health officials are urging us to stay the course, to keep wearing masks, practice social distancing.

However, I want to highlight one more lie that Donald Trump just  had to throw out there before he exited the White House for the final time. This formerly legendary business mogul made a prediction that has turned out — like practically everything he has said — to be patently false.

national news

Bipartisanship withering away

REUTERS/Mike Blake

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

It’s becoming clearer by the day, if not the hour, that President Biden’s stated wish to conduct a bipartisan government policy is being tossed aside.

Congressional Republicans accuse Biden of talking a good game about working with the GOP, but acting in a highly partisan, far-left manner.

The $2.25 trillion infrastructure bill that Biden wants enacted by the Fourth of July is drawing plenty of hits from the GOP. Why? They don’t want to raise taxes on the rich folks who got that big tax cut during the Trump administration … or so they say.

Republicans don’t think Biden really wants to work with them | TheHill

Let’s flash back for a brief moment to 2009. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said his No. 1 priority then was to make Barack Obama a “one-term president.” That meant he sought to make Joe Biden a one-term vice president. Do you think the current president of the United States has forgotten that solemn pledge? Hah! Hardly.

Still, President Biden’s inaugural speech included lots of talk about unity. He would seek it. He would work with Republicans. He wanted to bridge the political chasm.

It hasn’t happened. Nor, I am fearful, does it appear to be gaining traction as the debate ensues over the infrastructure plan. Biden didn’t get a lick of GOP support for his COVID-19 relief bill, despite overwhelming public support for it.

Indeed, he has the proverbial wind at his back on rebuilding roads, bridges, rail lines, airports, water systems and Internet access. The public backs his notion on that, too.

So, who among our political leaders is out of step with those of us out here who want to see government doing things for us? Is it President Biden and congressional Democrats? Or is it the Republican caucus that continues to obstruct because they still might be angry at losing their majority in Congress along with the White House?

national news

Is this clown going down?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I am not proud to admit this, but here it comes.

Matt Gaetz is in serious trouble and I actually hope the federal authorities have the goods on this seriously bad political actor.

Gaetz is a Florida Republican member of Congress who is being investigated over an allegation that he has had a sexual relationship with an underage girl. He has been tied to alleged sex trafficking activities.

Why is he bad actor? He is a dedicated Trump suck-up, a guy who is more committed to the former president, the guy named Donald Trump, than to the rule of law, or to regular order, or to genuine GOP policy.

Gaetz ventured to Wyoming, for crying out loud, to protest Rep. Liz Cheney’s vote to impeach Donald Trump. Oh, there’s also this: Liz Cheney is a real Republican member of Congress, someone who stood up for the rule of law and the Constitution after Trump incited the Jan. 6 insurrection against the federal government.

Gaetz tried to cover Donald Trump’s ample backside.

So now this guy who seems to have damn few friends in Congress because of his fealty to Donald Trump is now being examined into charges that he has been taking tumbles with a girl.

I know he is entitled to the presumption of innocence. That is a legal presumption. I am under no obligation to provide such a presumption as an American who detests everything this guy symbolizes.

national news

POTUS looks for patriots

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden is striving mightily to appeal to our love of country while pitching hard for a massive new program aimed at repairing, restoring and reviving our nation’s infrastructure.

He is running — so far, at least — into a partisan wall erected by Republicans who comprise the so-called “loyal opposition.”

Biden wants to spend at least $2 trillion on repairing our nation’s roads, highways, bridges, rail lines, airports, water delivery systems, all while improving Internet service.

It’s the patriotic thing to do, he said this week in a speech in Pittsburgh. The president is right, but … hold on! Republicans say it’s too costly. They don’t want to pay for it by increasing taxes on millionaires and others who got a huge tax cut from Donald J. Trump and the GOP-led majorities in both congressional chambers.

Joe Biden proposes to increase the corporate tax rate from 21 to 28 percent. Here’s the deal, though: The 28-percent tax rate proposed by the president is still less than what it was before Trump and his Trumpkins slashed the rate to 21 percent.

Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell calls President Biden’s proposal a “Trojan horse” that is actually full of too many perks for the “far left wing” of the Democratic Party. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the unofficial leader of the House progressive movement, doesn’t think the president goes far enough. She wants to spend at least — I hope you’re sitting down for this — $10 trillion. To which I say: Holy crap, AOC! Are you out of your mind?

So, the president’s search for patriots among us is running into resistance from the far left and the far right. Meanwhile, the vast moderate middle, which polls suggest supports what the president wants to do, is being kicked around while the extremists fight it out on the edges.

Go figure.

national news

Go big or go home

REUTERS/Mike Blake

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden appears to have adopted the theory that it is best to just “go big … or go home.” 

Thus, we have just witnessed the latest rollout of a massive economic recovery effort launched by the nation’s newest president. It is, as Joe Biden once whispered to President Obama after enactment of the Affordable Care Act, a “big fu**ing deal.” 

It is going to cost a lot of money, around $2 trillion. Yep, that’s trillion with a “t.” It exceeds the cost of the COVID-19 relief package that Biden managed to push through Congress.

NBC News reports that Biden has pitched “a sweeping proposal that would rebuild 20,000 miles of roads, expand access to clean water and broadband and invest in care for the elderly.

Speaking at a carpenters training facility in Pittsburgh, Biden urged Congress to act on his proposal, called the American Jobs Plan, arguing that failing to make the investments would contribute to a weakening middle class and leave the U.S. at a competitive disadvantage abroad.

“I am proposing a plan for the nation that rewards work, not just rewards wealth,” Biden said. “It’s a once-in-a-generation investment in America, unlike anything we’ve seen or done since we built the interstate highway system and the space race decades ago.”

The plan would create millions of jobs, Biden said, and jump-start the fight against climate change. The proposal, which would be spent out over eight years, would be paid for over 15 years by raising the corporate tax rate from 21 percent to 28 percent, ending the Trump-era tax cuts.

Biden unveils sweeping $2 trillion infrastructure plan (nbcnews.com)

Is the Democratic president going to get any support from his Republican friends in both congressional chambers? Do not hold y our breath on that one. Already they are carping. So, too, are Democratic progressives, such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who said the Biden infrastructure bill doesn’t go far enough.

AOC needs to pipe down. It’s a huge deal. President Biden is planting his hope on the jobs that this major reconstruction effort will bring. In a way it reminds many longtime observers of the bold approach that a Republican president, Dwight D. Eisenhower, had when he proposed building the nation’s massive interstate highway system. Ike sold the highway plan as a national security imperative. Joe Biden wants the nation to battle climate change with the same level of ferocity.

I am acutely aware of the up-front cost of this massive project. I also am willing to invest in that effort if it allows us to put millions of Americans to work, allowing them to achieve their dreams and allow the nation to deal head-to-head with our worldwide competitors.

You go, Joe! I’m all in!

local news, media news, national news, political news

Rep./Dr. Jackson tweets his thoughts … who knew?

(AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

My friends and former neighbors in the Texas Panhandle are getting a totally expected treat from their new congressman: a Twitter storm of statements, proclamations and, dare I say it, demagogic grenades.

Check out a tweet that came from Rep. Ronny Jackson, the newly elected congressman from the 13th Congressional District:

We must say NO to any mandated “vaccine passport.” This isn’t about “stopping the spread,” it’s about CONTROL and restricting our RIGHTS. Vaccine passports = TYRANNY!

You know, I just love the all-caps approach to driving home a point to the faithful. Actually … I don’t. Why not? It’s so, um, Trumpian!

I am thinking at this moment of Mac Thornberry, the actual lifetime resident of the congressional district whom Jackson succeeded when he got elected in 2020. My thought is that Twitter tirades are so not like Thornberry. He was not inclined to fire off Twitter bombs. Thornberry would do that Washington thing, you know … dictate a policy statement and then issue it through his press office. The Thornberry method was more professional and for me more likely to be taken seriously than a wild-eyed, mouth-frothing tweet!

It’s not that Rep. Jackson is a stupid man. He is, after all, a medical doctor who once served as physician to three presidents: George W. Bush, Barack H. Obama and Donald J. Trump and along the way rose to the rank of rear admiral in the Navy.

Now he’s a politician and has taken so very readily to the medium of choice for many blowhards on the left and the right.

I hope my former Texas Panhandle neighbors have a stronger stomach for the upcoming barrage of Twitter messages than I believe I would have were I still living there.

local news, national news, political news

Why the disinterest?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

An earlier post on this blog saluted the “courtesy” that Princeton City Hall gave to its residents with a significant credit in their monthly water bill.

I intended to call attention to local governments’ ability to respond to taxpayers’ needs in time of suffering. Princeton answered the call.

Now, for my point: It is that government at the local level often is the most responsive and its actions have the most direct impact on citizens’ lives. Thus, it baffles me that local government elections usually draw such little attention among voters.

Local government responds | High Plains Blogger

You know what I’m talking about. Voter turnout for municipal elections often languishes in the single digits. That is, fewer than 10 percent of those who are registered to vote bother to actually vote. I have witnessed this astonishing apathy play out over and over again during by 37 years as a daily print journalist. I watched it happen in Oregon City, Ore., in Beaumont, Texas, and in Amarillo, Texas, where I worked before retiring and moving to Princeton. It’s happened here, too.

Texas is going to the polls again on May 1. We will choose our city government and school district elected leaders. Will many of us even bother to vote? Hah! I am not holding my breath.

And that is the ongoing shame of our democratic process.

The 2020 presidential election produced an astonishing turnout among registered voters, something on the order of 65 percent. The raw numbers of voters, more than 158 million, also was staggering. Don’t misunderstand me. Presidential elections are important as well. However, presidents and those we send to Congress make decisions that occasionally have little to do with our daily lives.

City council members decide how much property taxes we pay; they make decisions on the quality of police and fire protection, on our parks, whether we have streets lights in our neighborhoods and, yes, whether we have potable running water. School board trustees decide how much to pay public school teachers, which has a direct impact on our property taxes, the books our children and grandchildren read, the curriculum they study.

I am not suggesting we should treat national elections with the apathy we demonstrate at the local level. I am suggesting that local races deserve at least as much of our attention as those elections farther up the electoral pecking order.

national news

It’s now Biden the Legislator

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I am going to stand firmly and stand tall (to the extent that I can do that) behind my belief that President Biden’s lengthy history as a legislator will serve him well as he seeks to advance his policy agenda.

Joe Biden spent 36 years in the U.S. Senate before being selected to run as vice president with Barack Obama in 2008. The Obama-Biden ticket, of course, won that election and served two successful terms leading the executive branch of government.

Joe Biden, though, was a man of the Senate. He built friendships and alliances across the aisle. He worked well with Republicans as well as with his fellow Democrats.

Now that he is president, he brings that extensive knowledge of (a) the leaders of the legislative branch of government, (b) of how the legislative system works and (c) the language that members of both congressional chambers speak to each other.

That’s not important? Of course it is!

President Biden is the most legislatively accomplished president since, oh, Lyndon Baines Johnson.

This is worth mentioning once again as Joe Biden begins crafting a strategy to enact a massive — and I mean gigantic — infrastructure bill.

To be sure, he will deal with a Republican minority in the House and Senate that is still chapped at having lost their majority and at Biden whipping Donald Trump’s keister in the 2020 election. I am going to retain my faith that President Biden’s legislative experience will hold him in good stead as he moves his agenda forward.

I do like Joe Biden’s style of leadership. He seeks to remind us of the good work that government can do for us. We need help fighting the pandemic. Our economy needs a big push. The federal government is a monstrous, often cumbersome machine. It needs a president who knows which levers to pull, which buttons to push.

We have one on the watch now.

national news

So much to hate about this law

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(Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The new Georgia voter suppression law signed by Gov. Brian Kemp is so detestable at so many levels.

One element, though, rises above the rest of it in terms of its offensiveness. It’s the prohibition that makes it a crime to provide food and refreshments to voters who are standing in line — sometimes for many hours — to cast their votes.

I want you to ponder that for a moment. What in the world can be possibly gained from this prohibition? It appears designed to dissuade people from voting if they believe a long wait is in the offing. Indeed, Georgia electoral history suggests that long voting wait times occurs most frequently in precincts with large African-American majorities, who — surprise! — tend to vote for Democratic candidates for public office.

So, this is the Republican response? This is how that state’s GOP intends to fight?

The law limits the number of polling places. It places restrictions on early voting. Across the board the law seeks to make voting a good bit more difficult, which to my way of thinking is about as un-American as any legislation I have seen in a good while.

The notion, though, that Americans cannot deliver refreshments to their fellow citizens to give them sustenance while they wait to cast their ballot is just plain offensive in the extreme.

It sickens me.