Category Archives: national news

national news

Anxious to vote!

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I cannot even begin to believe how my attitude about early voting has changed, given the context of the time.

That said, I am waiting anxiously to cast my vote on Tuesday. My wife and I will trek to a local church to cast our ballots. We want to get them recorded into the electronic system. We will insist that our votes count … as if we don’t always insist on it.

Donald Trump has sought to cast doubt on the integrity of our electoral system. I don’t believe a word he says about “rampant voter fraud” as a result of mail-in balloting. Still, I want to ensure my vote gets logged into the massive system in Collin County, then counted among the millions of Texas ballots that will be cast.

Yes, Joe Biden has our support. We want to ensure he gets it. We need him to win this election. We need former Vice President Biden to restore the presidency to a level of respect, dignity and decorum that Donald Trump has plowed asunder.

We also need him to exhibit actual leadership in this fight against the pandemic that has killed more than 215,000 Americans.

I once would have held out until Election Day to cast my ballot. The tenor of our times prompts me to rethink that dedication to Election Day voting.

We’ll be standing in line if there is a line forming at the church where we intend to vote. We’ll be masked up, standing a “social distance” from our fellow Americans and we’ll observe all the instructions the poll workers will provide to keep us safe and healthy.

Bring it!

national news

Trump ‘cured’? Uh, huh

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Donald J. Trump says he is “cured” of the coronavirus that felled him and the first lady.

Do you believe him? Do you take anything that comes from Trump’s mouth at face value? Nope. Neither do I.

The doctors, though, do say he is no longer contagious, which I suppose Trump has interpreted as meaning he is “cured.”

Donald Trump has called his positive test for the virus that has killed more than 215,000 Americans as  “blessing.” Yet he continues to downplay it. He declares the disease will disappear. I have this flash for The Donald: More than 50,000 Americans are still getting sick daily from the virus, which is a trend that has spanned several days in a row. From my perch out here in Flyover Country, it doesn’t look like the disease is anywhere near disappearing.

This brings me to another key point. If Trump was “blessed” to have been stricken by the virus, one might hope he would have learned to keep his mouth shut and let the scientists, the medical doctors and the assortment of experts who comprise his White House COVID response team explain to us in detail what is going on with the disease.

I only can surmise that Trump’s blessing doesn’t extend to acquiring any wisdom about speaking out of turn and spewing lies that put Americans at risk.

He went so far as to declare himself “immune” from future positivity because he has caught the disease once. Not so fast, say the experts. COVID doesn’t respect previous afflictions, they tell us.

So now we’re back to where we were when Donald Trump tested positive for a serious disease. I am glad he appears to be on the mend. I only wish he would have learned something from it. He didn’t learn a damn thing.

national news

Leave the country?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

This item showed up on my Facebook feed today. It makes me chuckle.

It reminded me of previous zealots who “threatened to leave” the country if a certain candidate was elected to high political office. Alec Baldwin said as much in advance of Donald Trump’s election in 2016; I believe Whoopi Goldberg did, too. Other celebrities pop off prior to election, threatening to do things they have no intention of doing.

To be honest, I have not heard any Trumpkins make such a pledge. It doesn’t bother me in the least were they to stay. I welcome them, actually.

In fact, I consider these statements about bailing on the country to be just so much nonsense from those who like to make idle threats.

Understand this: There likely was no one in America who was more adamantly anti-Donald Trump than I was during the 2016 presidential campaign. It never occurred to me — at least in any serious way — to pack up everything I own and move to some faraway land were he to actually be elected president.

I say that while acknowledging that my wife and I have friends in Germany who have offered to help us find a place to live there. If only the European Union would lift the travel ban on Americans because we have done such a sh**ty job handling the coronavirus pandemic. But that’s another story.

Yeah, these threats to leave the country make me laugh, and I do mean laugh. They aren’t to be taken seriously, even when high-profile celebrities make them.

So, let’s just chill out. Let us also allow the political system to run its course. If it turns out the right way, we can all rejoice in the return to sanity in our federal government. If it turns out badly, well, we can keep raising all the hell we want. Our beloved Constitution grants us that right.

national news

Is the end of an era at hand?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

My ticker continues to flutter at the prospect of Joe Biden possibly bringing our latest “long national nightmare” to its merciful end.

That would be the presidency of Donald J. Trump.

Now, though, comes a sort of an admission.

I have been lapsing into speaking out loud the word “president” directly in front of Trump’s name. I do not intend to memorialize those words by typing them on this blog. Not for as long as this man remains in office.

I have been referencing Trump’s political title as I gripe and moan to my wife and anyone else who will listen to me. Do I dare type it on this blog? Not on your life. Or on Trump’s life.

I look forward to referring to the next president in a way that restores respect to the man who occupies the office. Yes, the words “President Biden” do have a nice ring to them as I type those terms consecutively.

The man who holds the office now? No … way.

Let us hope we awaken from this nightmare in about, oh, 25 days.

national news

Trump endangers his followers

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Certainly long after this election has gone by — perhaps even forever and ever — I will remain baffled by how Donald Trump continues to hold onto his support when he puts his ardent followers at extreme risk of catching a virus that could have killed him.

Trump once again today called a rally at the White House. Supporters were arrayed in front of the balcony from which he spoke. Trump himself might still be contaminated with the COVID-19 virus that hospitalized him for a few days this week; at least he had sense enough to stay away from the fans.

There they were, though. Clustered together. Many of them wore masks. Some of them didn’t. They cheered the Old Man’s lies and invective just like they always do.

And there he was, in all his campaign-rally glory, exhorting the troops to march on as if nothing has happened to change everyone’s life for well past the foreseeable future.

Joe Biden continues to enjoy a comfortable poll lead. Do I believe the former vice president will win this election going away? Hah! No. I don’t! My hope remains strong that he will be able to win by a comfortable enough margin to dispel any doubt that Trump vows to concoct that the election is somehow “rigged.”

How in the world does Trump manage to hold tightly to that 40 to 42 percent bloc of voters, some of whom get to stand in front of him in crowds that defy medical experts’ recommendations — and admonitions?

It’s a mystery. Perhaps I should just let that mystery stand and cease trying to attach a semblance of reason to the irrational.

national news

Terrorism comes home

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Thirteen men have been charged with assorted crimes associated with a plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and possibly do some serious harm to her.

These individuals are terrorists. They fit the description. They aren’t religious zealots. They do not march under some foreign flag.

They are home-grown, corn-fed terrorists and for the life of me I do not understand why Donald Trump won’t condemn them for what they are accused of doing.

The FBI busted them this week as Whitmer sought to manage the coronavirus pandemic that continues to ravage the state she governs. You’ll remember that other armed “militia” members stormed the Michigan capitol in Lansing, taking over the public’s grounds in a hideous display of armed defiance of the government.

These lunatics are members of something called the Boogaloo Boys.

The FBI has uncovered a plot described as an attempt to kidnap Whitmer, put her on “trial,” and punish her for whatever conviction they concoct.

Donald Trump’s response to all of this has been to criticize Whitmer’s handling of the pandemic. Whitmer told an interviewer on Friday that a “decent man” would have asked how she’s doing and inquired about the health and well-being of her family. Donald Trump is, shall we say, not a decent man.

Here we are. The FBI is now pursuing an investigation into a serious terrorist threat that resides in the nation’s heartland. Of course, this isn’t a new phenomenon. Recall what Timothy McVeigh did in April 1995 when he detonated a bomb in front of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 Americans … including several children. Back then, though, we had a president — Bill Clinton — who had the heart to call it then what we knew it to be: an act of terror.

These terrorists well could portend a wave that should frighten us all we move past this most consequential election.

national news

Hoping for this outcome

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I have been roaming this good Earth long enough to know that there ain’t no such thing as perfection in politics.

However, I also know when to search for preferred outcomes and to judge whether they reach a satisfactory level that could pass for virtual perfection.

The race for the U.S. presidency is heading into its stretch run. Here is what I hope happens when they count all the ballots.

Joe Biden should accrue far more than enough Electoral College votes to win election as the 46th president of the United States. He also should roll up a substantial actual vote margin of victory over Donald J. Trump.

What would constitute a suitable finish? Hmm. How about, say, 350 electoral votes for Biden, with the remaining 188 of the them going to Trump; it takes 270 electoral votes to win an election.

Trump managed to win the presidency by eking out a narrow Electoral College victory on the basis of 77,000 votes cast in three states that Barack Obama won twice before Hillary Clinton lost them in 2016. He has sought laughably to translate the 2016 squeaker into a “landslide” victory. It was nothing of the sort.

He now is threatening legal action if Biden collects more votes at the end of the ballot-counting process. I want the former vice president to have so many more ballots in his pile that there can be no doubt as to who won. Would that forestall a Trump legal challenge? Hoo boy! Hard to know.

I am not going to give up, though, on this notion: that Trump well could realize he cannot win a court challenge and that — despite his threats to the contrary — he accepts the results, makes the concession call to Joe Biden, stands before the nation and bids us adieu as he prepares to make his final exit from the Oval Office.

As I noted, there is no such thing as political perfection, but that outcome will seem like nirvana were it to occur.

national news

It surely still adds up

1 Comment

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I keep adding 2 plus 2 and I still come up with 4.

So, I therefore cannot stop thinking that the arrest of individuals in Michigan on charges of attempted kidnapping of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer had something to do with the ultra-angry rhetoric of Donald J. Trump.

These 13 individuals reportedly are associated with far-right-wing groups. They were arrested and charged with plotting a bizarre kidnapping of Whitmer, a Democrat who has been the target of nasty tweets and other remarks from Trump over the state response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Do you remember the right-wing protesters who marched on the state capitol in Lansing earlier this year? Some of them were packing firearms openly; I mean we’re talking assault rifles, the kind used on battlefields to kill enemy soldiers.

Indeed, the suspects arrested today reportedly were among those who stormed the capitol.

The FBI reports that the suspects were allegedly planning to storm the capitol again, using Molotov cocktails on the police and grabbing the governor while intending to whisk her away.

Has it come down to this? Individuals have been accused of plotting terrorist acts against American politicians. Where is the president on all of this? He has said nothing to support Gov. Whitmer.

It makes me believe that 2 plus 2 really does equal 4.

national news

Oh, the irony is rich

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I am trying to understand the irony of Donald Trump’s assertion that a Joe Biden victory will come only if the election in November is “rigged.” The ironic richness is beyond belief.

The Russian government interfered in our 2016 presidential election. Its aim was to help Trump defeat Hillary Clinton. Moreover, the Russians intended to sow confusion and suspicion in our sacred electoral system.

Think of it! The guy the Russians wanted to win four years ago is now doing the Russians’ work for them! The president of the United States is asserting that Joe Biden can win only if the election is rigged.

Trump doesn’t provide a scintilla of proof of what he suggests would occur. Yet he is now mounting a prejudicial campaign against an electoral system he took an oath to protect and defend. Yes, think also of that … if you dare.

The presidential oath contains a clause that compels the nation’s head of state to protect the very system that puts him in office. The U.S. Constitution undergirds the entire process. Yet the president is now threatening some unspecified action to challenge the results of a free and fair election if it doesn’t produce the result he prefers.

I keep circling back to what happened in 2016. You heard him encourage the Russians to search for Hillary Clinton’s missing e-mails, right? The Russian government led by Vladimir Putin commenced its attack on our system that very day. At Trump’s invitation! Was the 2016 election rigged? Did it produce an electoral result that was, shall we say, illegitimate? 

So now we have arrived in the here and now. Donald Trump, having benefited in some fashion from foreign interference in the previous election, is threatening to undermine the results of the next presidential election. He bases his threat on allegations he cannot prove. He is sowing the same seeds of doubt that his Russian benefactors did four years ago.

The irony is rich. It’s also dangerous.

national news

Let’s hold off on the victory dance

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I feel the need to douse the victory dances I am seeing around the country as we head toward the home stretch in this highly bizarre presidential election season.

Joe Biden is leading in every serious polling survey. His lead over Donald Trump varies from around 12 percent (from GOP-friendly Rasmussen) to 16 percent. The Bidenistas smell blood in the water. They watch Donald Trump continue to raise the coronavirus pandemic as a talking point, all as Trump continues to downplay the seriousness of the infection that has felled him, his wife and two dozen or so of his top White House aides.

Yes, Trump appears to be self-destructing before our eyes.

However … and it pains me to say this, Donald Trump should not be left for politically dead. This guy is quite capable of doing anything he needs to stay in power. Were it not for the relentless attacks he leveled against his 2016 opponent — with a big assist from FBI director James Comey’s decision to reopen the “email scandal” — we would be talking today about President Hillary Clinton’s effort to win a second term.

I share the view that Donald Trump is crazy as a loon. He is infected with a virus that could kill him. I don’t want that to happen, I merely am acknowledging the obvious.

Trump is not without some weapons of his own. One of them sits in the Kremlin, where Russian goons are working as we sit here to ensure his re-election.

We “only” have 27 days to go, but that is a lifetime in politics, as the saying goes. Joe Biden needs to campaign as if he is behind by double digits. I will be able to breathe freely and easily once we get all the ballots counted and Joe Biden piles up significantly more votes than Donald Trump.