Category Archives: national news

national news

GOP voters = numbskulls

All right, gang, here’s a confession coming your way: I have been far too willing to overstate the intelligence of the average Republican presidential primary voter.

Therefore, I am going to presume the worst among my GOP friends, that they aren’t as discerning a group of voters as I have presumed for far too long.

Evidence of my misguided attitude? It is that Donald J. Trump stands out among the Republican pretenders for the presidency as the hands-down favorite for the party’s nomination next summer.

So help me, God in heaven. I never thought that Republican voters would be so gullible to believe that a twice-impeached, once (for now) indicted politician could emerge from a field of supposedly competent pols as the frontrunner.

What in the world is happening to our body politic?

A party that once stood for fiscal responsibility, for democratic rule over autocracy, for maintaining our standing as the world’s indispensable nation, for equality for all Americans has become an organization that is steeped in the politics of fear.

They tell us that Democrats intend to “take our guns away,” that they are “socialists” and that they condone pedophilia. They look the other way as Russia attacks a sovereign neighbor and seeks to bring Ukraine under the Russian jackboot.

Republicans are following the lead of the former POTUS, the guy who was impeached for seeking political favor from a foreign head of state and for inciting an assault on the Capitol Building as Congress was seeking to ratify the results of the 2020 presidential election.

Here he is again, never once conceding that he lost the 2020 election, seeking yet another turn in the Oval Office. And Republicans are lining up behind his overfed backside to support him.

Who knew — or thought — this could happen?

Well, not me.

I’ve been sitting out here in Flyover Country suggesting that Trump’s candidacy is going to flame out, that Republicans would come to their senses and look for someone else to lead their party. How silly and naive of me to think such a thing.

I’m not going to surrender my thoughts on the future of Trump’s candidacy. I will cling to the belief that the upcoming indictments — which constitute the main event in this titanic brawl — will doom his candidacy ultimately.

The legal system might be the only thing left to rid us of this hideous monster. We certainly cannot rely on Republicans’ (non-existent) good judgment.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Biden: ‘Watch me’

OK, Mr. President. I’m going to keep an eye on you … in fact, I’ll keep both eyes on you as you navigate your way to what I hope is a second term as president of the United States.

I am glad you announced your intention to seek re-election. I am profoundly disappointed and astonished that I have overstated the intelligence of rank-and-file Republicans, who reportedly still want to nominate a twice-impeached and indicted former POTUS.

Go … figure.

In some perverse way, I would welcome a rematch between you and the moron you defeated in 2020. I am not going to spend much time worrying about him. I am going to spend the bulk of my political attention on you, sir, and hope that you continue to maintain good health as you continue to lead the nation while campaigning for another term in the White House.

And, yes, I am glad as well that your re-election announcement ad featured Vice President Kamala Harris, who I believe has served you — and the country — well in her history-making role as second-in-command of the executive branch of government.

Your age isn’t a plus. That’s a given. What also should be a given is the record of accomplishment you have piled up in your first term as president.

With that, I will wish you Godspeed, Mr. President, as you launch the final political campaign of your career.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Biden set to go again?

Joe Biden doesn’t need any advice from little ol’ me out here in Flyover Country … but he’s going to get some anyway.

Mr. President, let me be among the millions of Americans who voted for you in 2020 to wish you well as you launch your re-election effort. We hear it’s this week and that you’ll do it via an online platform of some sort.

Go for it!

The president has plenty to sell a public that seems embittered by the politics of the past half-dozen years. It appears that Joe Biden cannot do anything totally right in the eyes of a public that seems unwilling or unable to recognize success when it slaps ’em in the puss.

President Biden has gotten damn little help from his Republican “friends” in Congress. Democrats have held together on Capitol Hill to approve a number of key laws: gun safety rules, the Inflation Reduction Act, infrastructure repair and rebuilding.

Biden has spoken glowingly of his history of working well with Republicans. I guess it goes only so far as his record in the Senate and his eight-year stint at vice president. As POTUS? The GOP has dug in, many of ’em still angry that he defeated their hero in the 2020 presidential election.

I don’t want the president to re-litigate the previous election, which is what his defeated foe in 2020 keeps doing. Joe Biden should look to the future and tell us what he intends to do in a second term.

President Biden might need some help in ensuring he carries through on his agenda. Voters appear to be getting lathered up over the GOP’s insistence on banning abortion nationally, its resistance to gun safety measures and its haggling over the debt limit increase … and the failure to pay our debts sending the world’s economy into the crapper.

I said prior to the 2020 primary campaign that Joe Biden wasn’t my first pick. He ended up winning the Democratic nomination and, therefore, became my guy along with 81 million other Americans.

He’s my guy going into the 2024 election.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

GOP pursues backward strategy

It is with decidedly mixed feelings that I offer a commentary on the pursuit of Republican presidential candidates — some of whom are announced, others are presumed to be running — to win back the White House in 2024.

Their strategies are backfiring. Rather than reaching out to the middle class, to independents, to women appalled at the GOP’s assault on their reproductive rights, the party is shoring up its support with his shrinking — but still fanatic — political base.

Why the mixed feeling? Because as a good-government progressive, I want Democratic President Joe Biden to be re-elected next year. GOP candidates are playing right into Democrats’ wheelhouse with their rigid ideology.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, one of the presumed Republican candidates for POTUS, is going after the Disney Corporation, which makes me go … huh?

DeSantis is faithful to the “don’t say ‘gay'” doctrine that seeks to denigrate gay Americans. He wants to ban books from public schools that teach students about racism. DeSantis and other hard-core Republicans also resist any effort to seek solutions to the gun violence that continues to kill innocent Americans seemingly every day. And, of course, he wants to invoke a nationwide ban on abortion.

DeSantis and the 45th president of the United States are the presumed frontrunners for the GOP presidential nomination. The ex-POTUS still cannot stop harping about The Big Lie and the long-since-debunked notion that the 2020 election was pilfered from him. No! The dude lost the election!

He also has been indicted and faces the probability of more indictments to come.

There likely will be others who will seek the GOP nomination. Former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson are in. Ex-VP Mike Pence might run, too.

Who among them will break away from the MAGA base’s infatuation with the ex-POTUS? Whoever does will proceed at his or her risk, as the MAGA wing controls the flow of events within the party.

How does that make this voter feel? Let ’em fight among themselves.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Santos to run again?

Why in the name of political sanity does anyone outside of a New York congressional district care about this moron’s decision to seek re-election to a second term in the House of Representatives?

I guess it’s because of the circumstances of his election in the first place and the fact that he actually votes on legislation that affects you and me far away.

George Santos announced he is running for re-election to the House in 2024. Santos is the dipsh** who lied his way to election in 2022. He lied about damn near every aspect of his life: his parentage, his faith, his work background, his education, his marital status.

The Republican has become a laughingstock. He embarrasses all Americans who are concerned about electoral integrity. I am one of those Americans.

This clown needs to lose his re-election bid next year. Indeed, many within his own GOP are saying the same thing.

But … here’s the thing: Santos has zero shame. Were he to actually win re-election, I fear it could open the door to even more frauds traipsing through the halls of Congress, a place that already suffers from abysmal public opinion ratings.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Praising intel-leaker?

The MAGA wing of the Republican Party is making me sicker by the day. Consider what some of them said about the Air Force National Guardsman who leaked the sensitive intelligence info to the world.

They offered praise for Jack Texiera. The right-wing firebreather Marjorie Taylor Greene said the young man has “told the truth” about the war in Ukraine.

Good grief. U.S. Rep. Greene needs to be stripped of her Homeland Security Committee spot, censured and sent to the back bench where she belongs.

As for Texiera, he should face severe punishment. I won’t call for his execution, as some have done. The young man does need to spend time in prison if he is convicted.

Rep. Michael Turner, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said Texiera is no one to be admired. At least some reasonable Republicans are treating this matter with the seriousness it deserves.

How does the Biden administration deal with this? Again, it cannot blow it off as a simple mistake. It needs to crank up its investigative tools to get to the bottom of how this reservist got his hands on intelligence that only the top members of the chain of command should be able to see.

I am going to place my faith in the administration’s efforts to stop this kind of travesty from repeating itself.

The MAGA cult, meanwhile, needs to shut its collective mouth.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Clown show plays poorly

The Jim Jordan Clown Show opened and closed after the U.S. House Judiciary Committee chairman sought ostensibly to examine crime in New York City.

Except that the clown show wasn’t at all about NYC crime. It was an attempt to embarrass Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg, who had the temerity to ramrod a grand jury indictment of Donald Trump. Jordan, the Ohio Republican, would have none of that.

What did the GOP fire-breather do? He convened a “field hearing” in NYC that he said would seek to examine the crime in the nation’s largest city. Oh, wait! He didn’t mention that New York’s crime rate is among the lowest per capita of any large city in the country.

NYC’s violent crime rate is lower than, say, Columbus or Cleveland, in Ohio — where Jordan lives.

What the nation witnessed in New York was a blatant effort to politicize a legitimate criminal investigation, which the Manhattan DA concluded with the grand jury indictment of the former POTUS. And to listen to Jordan and his fellow GOP Trumpkins accuse Democrats of playing politics is enough to make me hurl.

What’s more, Jordan decided to conduct this so-called field hearing after he sought to summon Bragg to testify before his committee at the Capitol Building. One problem: Jordan has no legal or constitutional authority to require an elected official from one of our states to make such an appearance.

Alvin Bragg did his job according to the oath he took when he became district attorney. The grand jurors also did their jobs in accordance with the oath they took when they surrendered their time as working citizens to examine the evidence presented to them.

I am not going to take anything that comes from Jim Jordan or his Trumpkin cabal seriously until he — and they — take their public offices seriously. I doubt it will happen.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Sen. Feinstein should quit

I am hereby joining others in suggesting that Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, needs to resign her Senate seat.

She’s missed far too many votes in recent weeks because of illness. Feinstein already has declared that this is her final term in the Senate. Fine. Except that she’s unable to do the job for which she is drawing a handsome, six-figure salary.

A resignation would clear the way for Gov. Gavin Newsom to appoint a new senator, someone who can show up for the work and do the fundamental task we demand of our elected representatives. Which is to vote on important policy matters.

Feinstein has enjoyed a distinguished career in the Senate after serving as San Francisco mayor. However, her time is up.

A more vibrant senator would enable the Senate to enact legislation that could stall if one of the Democrats in the majority is unable to do her job. Let us remember, too, that the Democrats’ hold on the Senate majority is mighty tenuous.

Resign, Sen. Feinstein … and thank you for your service to the country.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

No, RFK Jr., don’t do it!

Never in a zillion years would I have believed I would declare my intention to oppose the political aspirations of one of the late Robert Kennedy’s children.

But … Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s intention to run for president of the U.S.A. in 2024 as a Democrat has me mighty steamed.

RFK Jr. is an anti-COVID vaccine advocate, which means policies such as his would have resulted in many more deaths than we already have suffered since the pandemic swept into the country in late 2019.

I hate saying this about one of the heirs to my first political hero, but RFK Jr. is a kook, a nut, a goofball. He has filed paperwork declaring his intention to run for president.

According to BBC: In March, Mr Kennedy shared on Twitter that he was considering a run for president.

At the time, he said: “If I run, my top priority will be to end the corrupt merger between state and corporate power that has ruined our economy, shattered the middle class, polluted our landscapes and waters, poisoned our children, and robbed us of our values and freedoms.”

Kennedy heir to challenge Biden for White House (msn.com)

Memo to Bobby Jr.:  The economy ain’t “ruined.” The middle class isn’t “shattered.” And I have not been robbed of a single “value” or “freedom.”

I’m going to stick with President Biden, thank you very much. Stay out of the race, RFK Jr. Anti-vaccine policies such as his are the true danger to us all.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Recalling stirring oration

A lot of Americans — too many of them, perhaps — are fixated on the upcoming charges awaiting the 45th POTUS, the moron who brought us the memorable boast that “I, alone can fix” what ails the country.

A dear friend reminded us today on a social media post about another speech delivered shortly before a gunman assassinated the man who delivered it.

He said, in part, in Memphis, Tenn. on April 4, 1968:

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. stirred a nation with such rhetoric. I prefer to honor this great man’s memory as I venture through my day.