Monthly Archives: January 2023

national news

How will Trump be remembered?

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Events in my personal life have taken my mind mostly away from current news events … but I do want to offer a brief comment on something that has me wondering.

How will the nation eventually recall the single term as president of one Donald John Trump?

Presidents who seek a second term but lose that effort have faded away. Some of them have forged fine careers and lives after their defeat.

I am thinking of Presidents Herbert Hoover, George H.W.  Bush, Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford. They all lost campaigns, conceded to the winners, accepted their defeat and then entered private life. Some of them did good work that benefited others. Presidents Hoover and Carter come to mind as men who found new life after serving in public office.

Donald Trump? Wow! How in the world is this guy going to be remembered? He likely won’t build a presidential library. I cannot imagine him being honored with a presidential portrait that would hang in the White House. Will he do anything at all to help the underprivileged or underserved? Hah!

He hasn’t yet conceded that he lost his re-election effort. He likely is going to be indicted for some crime he allegedly committed.

I would call it a tragedy that his single-term legacy has been damaged. Except that he has done the damage himself.

Not a damn thing is “normal” about this guy. His political career began seemingly as a prank. Then he won the 2016 election in what I consider to be the greatest political fluke in U.S. history!

Donald Trump has squandered every single opportunity he ever could have had to be remembered with any sort of fondness.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

media news

Once-great newspaper signs off … forever

Friday the 13th turned out to be a bad day for those of us who still love newspapers and wish for an improvement in the medium’s constant decline.

The Medford (Ore.) Mail-Tribune signed off for the final time this past Friday, ending an era of great journalism in the southern Oregon community.

The news came earlier in the week from the newspaper’s owners, who delivered a terse announcement that the paper would cease publishing.

The Mail-Tribune used to be one of the state’s great mid-sized newspapers. I remember competing against that paper when I worked for a small suburban daily paper in Oregon City. The Mail-Tribune consistently scored well in statewide contests measuring papers’ journalistic quality.

No longer.

This one hurts in a way I cannot quite grasp. I never lived in Medford. I passed through there many times over the years I lived in Oregon, where I was born and reared. I once crashed my dad’s car there while carrying my wife and two small sons, but … well, that’s another story.

Medford now has no newspaper to chronicle its story, to keep residents informed about the Boy and Girl Scouts, the 4-H clubs and, yes, about the hard news that occasionally rocks communities such as Medford.

The media landscape continues to evolve in ways none of us imagined when we pursued our print journalism craft oh, those many years ago. The change has claimed many victims over the years. More victims will fall, of that I am absolutely certain.

Still, I know I don’t speak just for myself when I express sadness when a once-formidable newspaper simply calls it quits.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Mayors want ‘local control’

A cadre of big-city Texas mayors has delivered a critical message to state legislators who have gathered in Austin for the 88th Texas Legislative Assembly.

The mayors want to retain control of their cities’ destiny.

Man, what a concept!

San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg, president of the Texas Big City Mayors Coalition said the group’s battle to keep control at city hall will be central to their observance of the Legislature.

Too often, it seems that legislators purport to know how cities should govern themselves. From my standpoint in little ol’ Princeton, the most egregious example of that stemmed from the debate over whether cities should have the authority to install cameras at signaled intersections to combat those who disobey stop lights.

The Legislature grudgingly allowed the cities to enact such ordinances, then took that authority away. said at a conference Friday along with eight other members of the Texas’ Big City Mayors coalition.

“As mayors with the responsibility of managing services and operations that largely impact the daily lives of our residents, we believe we are best positioned to determine local policies,” Nirenberg said. Well, there you go. End of argument, right? Not even close!

As the Texas Tribune reports:

Mayor George Fuller of McKinney, a city of just over 200,000 people north of Dallas, said there has been a “degradation” of the relationship between the state and cities in recent legislative sessions.

“We’ve seen nothing short of an assault on local control,” Fuller said. “We need to right that ship. We at the local level are your partners in the state. We are boots on the ground.”

Texas mayors want to keep control of local issues | The Texas Tribune

“Boots on the ground.” There you go. Mayors don’t want — or certainly don’t need — politicians from faraway places telling them how to run their cities.

The message I gleaned from the Big City Mayors outfit?

Butt the hell out!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

medical news

They’re like family … almost

I didn’t think it was possible to grow attached to a team of medical professionals who would answer the call to care for my bride.

But I have … become quite fond of the men and women who have worked tirelessly at Medical City/McKinney to assist her as she begins her recovery from brain surgery.

I will declare that I likely will shed a tear or three in a couple of days when my wife leaves their care and comes home to Princeton, Texas — to Toby the Puppy and me.

My wife told me something today as well that softens me up for the emotional goodbye that awaits. She said the nurses told her they often cry when patients leave. They shed tears when their favorite patients depart their care and venture out to begin their own journeys back to recovery.

I suppose I need to share with you this bit of intel: My dear bride has become a favorite among the nurses, techs, physician assistants and nurse practitioners who have cared for her. She doesn’t ask for much from them, as she knows how hard they work, given her long-ago experience working at an acute care hospital in our hometown of Portland, Ore.

That was then. The here and now is about to bring us a flood of emotion as we depart their care and venture into the next challenging chapter of our long life together.

I have to get ready for this.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Vengeance could be costly

Congressional Republicans’ vengeance agenda as the new Congress gets underway well could prove seriously damaging to any hope of the GOP maintaining control of the legislative branch of the U.S. government.

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy — who will be remembered forever as the man who needed 15 ballots to eke out a victory for the speakership — takes office as the weakest and most feckless speaker in recent House history.

So … what does he do? He vows to kick Democrats off of key committees merely because of their vocal opposition to Donald J. Trump during his two impeachments and subsequent Senate trials.

Then he says he might consider “expunging” the record of Trump’s impeachment.

Then the House has announced a plan to form a committee that will investigate Congress’s earlier investigations of conservatives who ran afoul of the rules and possibly broke the law.

Oh, and now GOP members want to investigate whether the classified documents found at a D.C. think tank and at President Biden’s home violated the same rules that Donald Trump has all but admitted breaking when he spirited highly classified documents from the White House to his Florida mansion.

Then the House will consider whether to impeach President Biden, the homeland security secretary, the attorney general … along with finding dirt to fling at Dr. Anthony Fauci.

If there was a compelling message that voters delivered in the 2022 midterm election, it is that they want Congress to govern. They want positive results coming from Capitol Hill.

If Congress doesn’t deliver what voters want and instead gets hung up on ways to stick it to Democrats and to Joe Biden, well … the 2024 election could mean the GOP kisses its newfound power goodbye.

That damn karma is a real bitch … you know?

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

‘Expunge’ impeachment? What the … ?

What in the world is going through what passes for U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s mind?

The nimrod Man of the House says he is considering whether to “expunge” the House record of its two impeachments of Donald J. Trump.

So, I am sitting out here in the middle of Flyover Country wondering: How in the world does that make a lick of sense? It doesn’t!

Expunging the record will not suddenly cleanse our memories of what happened. Trump had a “perfect phone call” with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in which he asked him for a “favor,” which was to find dirt on Joe Biden. No can do, said the House, which impeached him for seeking political help from a foreign government.

Then came the1/6 insurrection. The House impeached him again for inciting the assault on our nation’s Capitol with the aim of stopping the certification of the 2020 presidential election result and for his refusal to stop the assault as it was unfolding.

Historians will continue to record the events that led to the two impeachments. Americans — such as you and I — will remember them, too.

Ain’t no way to remove that stain from the presidency that Trump occupied.

Good, ever-lovin’ grief, man!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Love it or leave it? Hardly!

Something has been stuck in my craw ever since I became politically active … which occurred a long time ago. So, I am taking a moment to spit it out.

I came of age politically during the Vietnam War. Those of us who opposed conduct of the war were shouted down by those who hollered at us to “love it or leave it!”

You know what they meant, right? They meant that we should accept the United States for all its flaws and room for improvement or just plain leave the country.

Well … I want to explain myself on that one.

First of all, I donned an Army uniform for my country in August 1968. The Army then trained me to be a soldier and then sent me to Vietnam to take part in that aforementioned war. I did. I came home. But you know what? I was just as confused about why we were there as I was when I got my orders.

I wanted to improve the country of my birth. I wanted it to be a better place.

Do not misunderstand me on this. I love my country, flaws and all. I served my country honorably for two years when I went to war. However, I never have begrudged those who resisted service in the military for reasons that only they could feel. We all have principles. War resisters acted on their own set of values and I honor that belief.

The nation today seemingly is even more divided now than it was a half-century ago. The divisions are not so much along the line separating war and peace. They are marked by whether we are loyal to a politician or to the country and its Constitution.

I do not hear as much of the “love it or leave it” mantra that was all the vogue in the previous century. However, I know it’s still out there.

Accordingly, my craw is now clear of what had been stuck in there since my fellow Americans sought to get America’s critics to leave the country we all love as much as the faux patriots who sought to evict us.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

Let’s see who is ‘weaponizing’ justice

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Republicans in Congress have adopted a goofy notion that Democrats — starting with President Biden — are “weaponizing” the Justice Department in an effort to bring down Donald J. Trump.

Well, let’s see how that plays out.

Attorney General Merrick Garland has named Robert Hur as special counsel in a probe into whether Biden broke the law when he held classified documents in a think tank and in his Wilmington, Del., garage. The documents come from his time as vice president.

Hur is a U.S. attorney endorsed by Trump. Hmm. Will the prosecutor follow the law, or will he back the Trump allies’ campaign to subvert and destroy Biden? If it’s the latter, then just who is “weaponizing” the Justice Department?

I believe Garland did the right thing by appointing a special counsel. He had no choice, given that he did the same thing when he appointed a special counsel to examine whether Trump broke the law when he took documents out of the White House and hid them in his Florida home.

One of many key differences in these cases lies in the principals’ response. Biden vows to “cooperate fully” with authorities; Trump has sought to block any effort to return the documents to the National Archives, where they belong, on the specious grounds that they are his property. That is pure crap!

Who is guilty of weaponization? It’s not AG Merrick Garland and President Joe Biden. If Robert Hur does his job dispassionately and without bias, then the whole weaponization mantra will be rendered moot.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

medical news

Needing to keep emotions in check

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A big day awaits my bride and me. It’s coming on Monday, which is when she checks out of the Medical City/McKinney (Texas) rehab unit and returns home.

Many of you know the story by now. She had a cancerous tumor removed from her brain two days after Christmas. She has been in rehab for several days regaining her strength, her balance, her dexterity in her left hand.

Now I must prepare to say so long to some folks who have become almost like family to us. I refer to the rehab medical staff at Medical City.

I have told many of them already to their smiling faces how much we appreciate the care she has received. I am ratcheting it up a bit farther with this blog post.

To be brutally candid, at this moment I am not sure how I am going to hold my emotions in check when she leaves the rehab center.

Now, spare me the lecture about how they’re just doing their jobs; that they are trained to do the things we have asked of them; that they hear high praise all the time and they likely might not even remember us once we walk out the door.

I don’t care about any of that. I feel the overwhelming need to praise them for their kindness, their caring, their compassion, their senses of humor and their patience with doting family members who ask them zillions of questions each day.

So, I am offering them praise here. Hey, it’s my blog and I intend to use it as a source of encouragement for them as they prepare to do the very same thing for future patients who will entrust themselves to their care.

These medical professionals all have brought a measure of joy to us on this latest lap on our life journey. More challenges lie ahead but we are keeping the faith that a positive outcome awaits.

I am just want to keep the blubbering to a minimum when we leave the hospital and head for the house.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

Not the same, folks

Joe Biden’s critics have begun their “aha!” bellowing over the discovery of classified documents stashed away in a Washington, D.C., think tank.

Why, shoot! This is no different than what Donald Trump did when he spirited classified documents away from the White House and hid them at Mar-a-Lago, the Biden critics are yammering.

Hold on. Yeah, it’s different. It’s not right and Biden’s document kerfuffle needs to be probed thoroughly. Attorney General Merrick Garland has handed the matter to a U.S. attorney — a Trump appointee, by the way — to investigate. Garland may yet decide whether to launch a full Justice Department investigation into the matter.

Why is this different than what Trump did? Because Biden reportedly didn’t know the documents were stored away from the National Archives. He returned them immediately upon learning of their existence. Trump, though, has lied — imagine that! — about what he turned over to the feds after the FBI seized the documents at his Florida mansion.

Biden is cooperating fully with the feds; Trump is stonewalling.

And … Trump has all but acknowledged publicly that he did something illegal.

None of this will stop President Biden’s critics from falling into full “gotcha!” mode.

Ridiculous.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com