Category Archives: national news

national news

Witness proves she’s credible

Cassidy Hutchinson arguably was the most credible witness to deal a potentially mortal wound to the Donald J. Trump administration.

It wasn’t what she said today that well might sink the Trump effort to hold onto power in the waning days of the presidency he lost in the 2020 election.

It was her continued devotion to Trump’s agenda. Yes, the 25-year-old former aide to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, remains a Trumpkin, no matter what she witnessed in the West Wing while the traitorous mob was attacking the Capitol Building on 1/6.

I don’t begrudge Hutchinson her continuing devotion to Trump. Indeed, as I listened to her testimony, I heard her express disgust and disappointment at the then-POTUS’s behavior. She was aghast and appalled that Trump would physically accost a Secret Service agent who told him he couldn’t venture to the Capitol to egg on the attackers.

Through all this surprise, last-minute testimony I found myself believing every assertion she made in describing Trump’s orchestration of the effort to undermine the Electoral College vote count and his effort to cling to power by using any means he deemed necessary.

Cassidy Hutchinson is no disgruntled ally of Trump who sought to exact revenge for being wronged. She instead appears to be someone who remains devoted to his agenda but who has separated his policy views from his personal conduct.

She endorses the policy. Hutchinson condemns the conduct.

U.S. House Select Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson convened today’s surprise hearing while keeping the contents of what would come forth a secret. To be candid, I wasn’t expecting to hear from someone such as Cassidy Hutchinson. She isn’t flashy or gregarious. She doesn’t have a single connection to Donald J. Trump … other than devotion to his agenda.

All of that made her an extremely credible deliverer of grim news for the disgraced — and thoroughly disgraceful — former president.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

A new ‘John Dean’ emerges

Cassidy Hutchinson has emerged as the “John Dean” of the 1/6 insurrection scandal, given what she told the House select committee today in televised testimony.

Let me start by declaring that young Hutchinson — to put it bluntly — blew the doors off the building where she offered testimony in a surprise hearing called at the last minute by Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss.

Hutchinson served on White House chief of staff Mark Meadows staff. She was, to borrow a phrase, “in the room” when all hell was breaking loose on 1/6.

She told the committee that Meadows asked for a presidential pardon; so did Trump’s lawyer Rudolph Giuliani. Don Trump Jr. begged his father to call off the treasonous attackers on 1/6, along with Ivanka Trump. Hutchinson said the POTUS heard all those concerns and worries … and didn’t do anything to end the violence. Hutchinson told the panel that Vice President Mike Pence knew of the “Hang Mike Pence!” chants, as did Trump; still, the president didn’t halt the assault.

She told committee members that Trump wanted to go to the Capitol to incite the attackers even more, but when the Secret Service told him “no!” he became so enraged that he attacked an agent assigned to his security detail.

Those of us who are old enough to remember Watergate today received a first-hand account from a ringside seat inside the West Wing of the pre-meditated chaos that erupted after Trump incited the insurrection.

John Dean gave us a similar look during the Watergate scandal when he came forward to tell the Senate Watergate Committee about the “cancer” that was growing in the presidency of Richard Nixon.

Mick Mulvaney, who served as chief of staff in the White House prior to Mark Meadows, said via Twitter after Hutchinson’s testimony that “I know Cassidy … and I don’t believe she is lying.”

I believe her, too.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Abortion: always toxic

A long time ago, a young Texas congressman served the Houston area. He was famously friendly to organizations that favored women’s reproductive rights.

George H.W. Bush served in Congress for two terms, from 1967 to 1969. He voted routinely in favor of spending bills to pay for those programs now demonized by the right wing of his Republican Party.

Rep. Bush developed — as I understand it — a nickname in the House. His colleagues referred to him as “Rubbers.”

He left Congress and served as CIA director, head of the Republican National Committee, special envoy to China and as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Then along came Ronald Reagan in 1980. “Rubbers” Bush ran against Reagan for the GOP presidential party. Reagan won the nomination and looked for a VP running mate.

He chose George Bush … who then underwent a remarkable political transformation. The instant he accepted Reagan’s invitation to join him on the GOP ticket, “Rubbers” became a fervently pro-life candidate.

The Reagan-Bush ticket won that year. The rest is history.  I hasten to add that as a presidential candidate in 1988, Bush did not wave the pro-life banner with undue vigor; nor did he do so when he ran for re-election in 1992.

I point all this out to remind us all that abortion and women’s reproductive rights long has been among the most toxic issues imaginable. The Supreme Court ruling that strikes down a woman’s right to obtain a legal abortion only fans those embers into a full-blown fire.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Eternal optimism gets test

Yes, it is time to acknowledge the obvious about today’s political climate: These times test even the most optimistic among us … and you count me as one of those folks.

My eternal optimism over the strength of democracy is suffering from serious stress.

The U.S. Supreme Court has punched the hot buttons that create my anxiety. The ruling on concealed carry permits for handguns in New York got me started. Then came the decision that tossed aside Roe v. Wade, the landmark ruling that legalized abortion.

Political figures are being hectored, harangued and harassed because they insist on following the rule of law. They and their families are being threatened with bodily injury … and worse!

A president who lost re-election in Novembe 2020 threatens to overturn the results of that election in an unprecedented attack on our governmental process. His cult followers insist he is right, and the rest of the country is wrong.

I am not alone in wanting our U.S. Constitution to hold together. I believe it will. I also believe it will hold the nation together.

My family and friends are likely to tell you — if you ask them directly — that I tend to see the good in people. The recent former POTUS, though, makes me think only the worst in him. Thus, my eternal optimism is being put to a test I did not foresee occurring … even when the former POTUS was elected to the presidency in 2016.

It’s a struggle. The news I watch for much of most days depresses me, pushing my emotions to a level with which I am mostly unfamiliar. Look, I dislike feeling this way. It’s against my nature. I am not an ebullient fellow normally, but I long have maintained an innate faith that our system of government — cobbled together by our nation’s founders — is built to absorb punishment.

My inherent faith in our system of government — as imperfect and occasionally rickety as it is — will keep me going even as I fight off the depression that threatens to put me asunder.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Political perversion at its worst

The political perversion that is underway within what passes for the Republican Party cannot be illustrated more plainly than what well might happen to one of the party’s stalwarts in an upcoming GOP primary election.

Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming stands front and center among Republicans in her opposition to the lawlessness demonstrated by Donald J. Trump — particularly during the final weeks of his administration as POTUS.

Because of her fealty to the Constitution and the oath she took to protect and defend it, Cheney is facing the wrath of the Trumpkins who populate her party in Wyoming. She is running for re-election this year and has drawn stiff opposition within her party; Trump has endorsed one of Cheney’s rivals. Why? Because she believes in the rule of law and believes that Trump has violated that tenet by his re-telling of The Big Lie about why he lost the 2020 presidential election.

Cheney is as stalwart a conservative Republican as anyone in the House of Representatives. None of that matters to the Trumpkins who have censured her and effectively declared her to be persona non grata within the Wyoming GOP.

That’s because she refuses to profess her loyalty to Donald Trump.

This is a shameful perversion of principle and of the oath all members of Congress take when they enter the People’s House.

I am not going to predict that Cheney will lose her primary fight when the balloting occurs in Wyoming. I’ve seen the various polls and will admit that it doesn’t look good for her future.

I also must stipulate once more that she is not my favorite Republican serving in Congress. She is too conservative for my taste, which illustrates why these attacks on her anger me so much.

I guess, therefore, the political perversion is complete when a member of Congress with whom I have fundamental philosophical disagreements can win my support on the basis of her rage at a president who embodies all that is wrong with today’s Republican Party.

Go figure.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

No ‘real conservatives’?

Wow, man. Nimrods exist in every nook and cranny, even among avid readers of blogs — such as mine. One of them showed himself by making the dumbest assertion I can imagine about the House select committee examining the 1/6 insurrection.

This particular nimrod, a fellow with whom I used to work in Amarillo, said that the panel contains “no real conservatives.”

Holy partisanship!

I will respond with this brief post. What in the world would you call Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, the two Republicans chosen to serve on the panel?

Both of them are as true-blue — or ruby-red — conservative as you can get. They both have opposed traditionally, for instance, efforts to control firearm ownership, massive spending on domestic programs, abortion rights, increasing the minimum wage … shall I go on?

I won’t. Suffice to say that Reps. Cheney and Kinzinger are conservative lawmakers, a point I and others have sought to make since their appointment by Speaker Nancy Pelosi to serve on the insurrection committee.

They also happen to believe — contrary to some faux conservatives — in the rule of law and in their fealty to the Constitution.

Does that make them Republicans In Name Only? No. It does not. It makes them true to their principles.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Body language reveals much

I watched virtually every minute of Day Five of the House select committee’s televised hearing on the 1/6 insurrection, but one image from my day in front of the TV stands out.

U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., was questioning the Justice Department officials summoned to testify. The discussion turned to a Defense Department request made in early January 2021 to examine whether an Italian firm was able to change ballots cast for Donald Trump into votes for Joe Biden.

The look on Kinzinger’s face as he was grilling the witnesses was, to say the least, most edifying. It was as if he couldn’t believe (a) that he was asking such a question and (b) that the Defense Department was actually exerting any effort to uncover such nonsense.

The request reportedly came from Donald J. Trump. Yep, the POTUS himself wanted to know whether DOD could determine whether there were any Internet spooks monkeying around with the returns.

I mention this for an important reason.

It is that at no time during the frontal attack on the Capitol on 1/6 did Donald Trump bother to call the Defense Department to deploy troops to quell the violence that killed several police officers and injured dozens of others.

Oh, no! He was fixated on an election he lost to Joe Biden … which lends some authenticity to Rep. Kinzinger’s apparent disbelief in the testimony he received from the DOJ officials sitting before the committee.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

What if these folks had remained?

The U.S. House select committee that Speaker Nancy Pelosi impaneled to examine the 1/6 insurrection is performing a stellar public service in delivering evidence to Americans who want to know the truth behind what happened on that horrifying day.

But … you know what? It could’ve gone sideways in a major hurry had the House GOP leader’s selections to the committee been allowed to stay on the panel.

Kevin McCarthy selected several Republican House members to serve on the panel, but Pelosi — acting within her authority as the House’s presiding officer — nixed those picks.

One of them, I hasten to add, was none other than Jim Jordan, the Ohio GOP lawmaker who has made quite a (nasty) name for himself with his bloviating bluster while seeking to deflect any blame for the insurrection from his guy, the 45th POTUS.

I was thinking of Jordan today as I watched Day Five of the televised hearings and wondering: How would these hearings go if wild men such as Jordan been kept on the panel?

I have been trying to wrap my noggin around that thought. I say that, though, wondering if there isn’t a way for the panel to summon more Trump-friendly witnesses to justify the events of 1/6 and how the insurrection wasn’t what it damn sure looked like to me and millions of others who saw it unfold in real time. It looked like a frontal assault on our democratic process with one aim: to overturn the free, fair and legal results of the 2020 presidential election.

You can bet your first-born child that a dedicated Trumpkin serving on the committee would spin the insurrection into something that none of us would recognize.

The committee that emerged from the mess left at its creation, though, is a bipartisan panel, comprising two Republicans along with seven Democrats. It has performed beautifully in collecting and presenting evidence to the public.

I also want to offer a high-five to Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., who has conducted the hearings with decorum, grace and class as it has slogged through the mountain of evidence that keeps getting higher after every session.

There’s more to come? Yes. I am waiting with bated breath.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

How do they stand behind The Big Lie?

How in the name of all that is holy and sacred, all that is just and truthful, all that is rational and reasonable does anyone continue to subscribe to The Big Lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen?

That is my takeaway after watching Day Five of the 1/6 House select committee’s hearing on the insurrection instigated by the 45th POTUS.

Indeed, Donald Trump keeps insisting the election is being victimized to this day by electoral thieves. You know what? He’s telling the truth! Because it is Donald Trump who is committing the attempted theft!

Just as he blasted the media for putting forth “fake news” while at the same instant questioning whether Barack Obama was qualified to run for and serve as president, Trump is doing the same verbal shuffle with The Big Lie.

The televised hearing today highlighted the testimony of three former Department of Justice officials — including Jeffrey Rosen, the former acting AG at the end of the Trump administration — who told House committee members of Trump’s efforts to subvert the Constitution. These men worked for Trump!

I will admit readily that these hearings have riveted me. They have me transfixed by the testimony. They have demonstrated beyond a shadow of doubt in my own mind of the existential threat Donald Trump poses to our democratic process.

But as committee vice chair Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., pointed out succinctly in her closing remarks, there remain those who will refuse to accept what the rest of the world knows is the truth about Donald Trump.

That he is a dangerous, evil man.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Compromise = good legislation

For as long as I have been studying politics and government — which predates my college years in the 1970s — I have accepted a fundamental truth about effective governance.

No one should expect to get everything they want or require, that compromise is an essential part of what I call “good government.”

Thus, the legislation on gun reform that has won U.S. Senate endorsements from both sides of the great divide, while not perfect, is as good as we can expect to get from the current, sharply divided legislative body.

I am particularly intrigued by Republican opposition to the bill from the likes of Ted Cruz of Texas, from those who contend that it does too much, that it is too restrictive of Second Amendment rights to keep and bear arms. On the other side we hear yammering from progressives that the legislation doesn’t go far enough, that it should contain provisions banning assault weapons and should increase the minimum age of those who want to purchase a firearm.

There once was a time when I was a young ideologue who wanted legislators to see everything my way. Then I got older and, presumably, a bit wiser about how the real world functions.

I have a wish list of items I want to see enacted in legislation that seeks to reduce gun violence. The “red flag law” contained in the current bill is a good start; so are background checks for younger purchasers of firearms. I can live with it and I want it all to become law.

It has been many decades since Congress has gotten off its a** and done something, anything, to deal with this gun violence crisis.

Thus, I will endorse what Senate negotiators have pieced together. I pray it’s just a start. That they hammered this deal out gives me hope.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com