Monthly Archives: April 2023

legal news

Come clean, Mr. Justice … or else!

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas should be in a world of hurt right now, but he isn’t. Not by a long shot.

Why? Because the court on which he has served since 1991 has no rules governing its members’ conduct.

Oh, my … that needs to change!

It has been revealed that Thomas accepted ritzy travel gifts from a rich Republican donor, Harlan Crow of Texas, without reporting them to authorities. Thomas  now says he was advised by others that he didn’t need to do such a thing and, of course, accepting such extravagant gifts did nothing to influence his rulings on political matters.

Democrats are outraged over these findings. They have good reason to be angry. They also are a bit dispirited because they have few legislative options in Congress available to them.

Thomas is a walking case of judicial hypocrisy. The high court demands that lower courts set strict ethical standards and requires them to enforce them strictly. The SCOTUS, though, is immune from such protection. Justices are free to flout the rules whenever they please. Clarence Thomas is the worst of the bunch.

He needs to be impeached by Congress and put on trial for his ethical transgressions. Will it happen? Hah! Hardly.

The man is a disgrace to the court and to the nation.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Now for the return

MONITOR, Wash. — I am getting ready to make the turn and head for the house.

My return to North Texas will commence in a couple of days, after I visit with a couple of family members and we get caught up on what’s happening in our lives.

They know my story, as I have been chronicling it on this blog.

To be candid, I am ready to start the return to familiar haunts … not that those I have seen already aren’t plenty familiar to these 73-year-old eyes.

The constant rain that has fallen during my entire stay in the Pacific Northwest is maddeningly familiar to be sure. I grew up in Portland, where it seemingly drizzles forever and then some. Yes, I also saw old friends, five high school classmates, plenty of family, my godmother (who also is family, according to Orthodox Church tradition) and some old haunts.

But it’s time to make the trek back to Collin County. I’ll take a different route than the one that brought me to this place on the eastern slope of the Cascade Range.

What’s more, I am going to travel along some highways that I’ve never seen before. I trust that my late bride, Kathy Anne, will smile in approval as Toby the Puppy and I wind our way back to the house.

More family will greet us in the Texas Hill Country and some friends await us in West Texas.

This journey was intended for me to simply get away from the nearness of the event that broke my heart in early February. I will miss Kathy Anne forever and then some.

But I am ready to start assembling my life for the still-unknown journey that awaits.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

This ain’t Wal-Mart, Mr. Justice

Clarence Thomas once declared he is favors RVs and Wal-Mart parking lots over luxury vacation retreats.

He said he comes from “simple stock.”

Oh, really, Mr. Supreme Court Justice? How does he explain the luxurious vacations he and his wife, Ginni, took on the dime of a wealthy Republican donor? Well, he isn’t talking because the Supreme Court doesn’t have any ethics rules for justices to follow.

Justice Thomas is a hypocrite of the lowest order. He needs to be resign from the court. The House ought to impeach him. The Senate ought to try him and he ought to be removed from the court.

Recall, too, how Justice Thomas voted against rules sanctioning the 45th POTUS after it was revealed that Ginni Thomas is a vocal supporter of The Big Lie about the 2020 election, which she contends was “strolen” from the ex-POTUS.

Good grief! This baloney has got to stop.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

How am I doing? Umm … OK

PORTLAND — The question is inevitable as I make my way across the western United States and begin thinking about the return trip to my home in North Texas.

“How are you doing?” my friends and family members ask with the look of those who know the pain I am feeling.

My answer is truthful. “Oh … I’m OK.” They know I’m not really OK, but they understand the reason the shrug I give them and the look in my eyes.

But in truth, I actually am doing a bit better than just OK. It’s not a lot better, but it’s a little bit so.

I embarked on this venture to clear my head after my wife passed away suddenly in early February after getting a cancer diagnosis that knocked me for a loop … but which seemed in the moment to have been something Kathy Anne might have expected.

She was stoic and steadfast in her response to the doctor: “Let’s just get it out of there.”

I had to leave the house. So, I did. I am very close to the halfway point. Soon I’ll be turning my pickup around and heading toward the house.

My sense is that I’ll be able to walk into my Princeton home feeling a bit of emotional relief as a result of the time I have taken away.

To be sure, there are likely to be more of these ventures in my near and medium-term future. This one, though, has been fairly successful in that I have been able to accomplish much of what I intended when Toby the Puppy and I hit the road nearly two weeks ago.

I’ll get more of the “How are you doing?” questions along the way. Those who ask it will get the same answer I’ve been giving. I trust they’ll understand.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Blog = journal

LA CENTER, Wash. — I have made a command decision on whether I am going to write a “journal” chronicling my progress out of the darkness after my bride’s tragic passing two months ago.

It is that I am writing it already. I have been doing so on this blog. I am doing so at this very moment.

My heart is still broken. It might be irreparably damaged. However, if the docs who treated Kathy Anne for the cancer that claimed her were unable to “control” the tumor, perhaps I can control the pain that tears at my ticker. I will seek to do that with this blog, although I assure you, I won’t write forever about this tragic event in my life.

For as long as I have something to offer, though, I will do so and High Plains Blogger will serve as a journal of sorts for me.

It’s helping me along the way as Toby the Puppy and I continue our lengthy journey.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Uncategorized

Friendships are forever

LAKE OSWEGO, Ore. — Jack and I chowed down a couple of burgers in a diner in this community’s downtown district.

It hit me as we chatted about the old days, mutual friends of ours and the good time we had as kids: these friendships last forever. Maybe in longer … if that’s possible.

I have known Jack since our days together in junior high school at the other end of the Portland metro area. Our lives took different paths after we graduated from Parkrose High School in 1967. Jack enlisted in the Marine Corps and went to Vietnam. The Army drafted me and sent me there, too.

We discovered today that we served in close proximity in ‘Nam for a time.

We returned home, met the girls of our dreams, married them and embarked on radically different careers, unbeknownst to each other. He sold real estate; I ventured into journalism.

Many years would pass before our paths would cross again. They did some time ago. I am delighted they did.

Today, we picked up as if that time gap didn’t exist. It was a wonderful, albeit brief, encounter today at the burger joint.

It just reminds me that friendships — those we create and then nurture — are worth the test of time. Ours has endured through that test.

It has helped validate my decision to venture back to where I came into the world. Yes, it has contributed to a bit of healing.

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

education news

Princeton ISD crosses its t’s and dots its i’s

Make no mistake about this: The Princeton Independent School District is making a thorough effort to avoid “campaigning” on behalf of a bond issue it will ask its voters to approve in May.

The bond issue is a big’n: $797 million to build eight campuses over the next 10 years. Princeton ISD has compiled a thorough explanation of its request on its website:

Bond / Bond Information (princetonisd.net)

I was fortunate to be able to cover many of the meetings held by the citizens committee appointed to craft the proposal. They took deep dives into the cost of the project; the district’s growth projections; the impact on property owners; and even the names the district plans to attach to the new campuses.

Throughout the process, the committee was made aware of the restrictions the state places on local governments. They are empowered only to inform district residents of what they want to do; they are banned from campaigning for it using public money.

That doesn’t restrict board trustees or senior administrators from offering personal opinions on what voters should do when they go to the polls on May 6. It’s a sure-fire bet they will speak on behalf of the issue … which is OK with me.

The proposal laid out on the website is a thorough examination of the needs of a school system in the midst of a growth explosion.

It’s well done and I applaud Princeton ISD for the work it has done.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Uncategorized

Mayor’s legacy lives on

PORTLAND, Ore. — At the risk of being hooted out of the blogging world, I feel the need to extol the legacy that a once-promising politician left behind in the city he led as its mayor.

Neil Goldschmidt took office at City Hall as a young whipper-snapper in 1972. I think he was 32 years of age, a young man elected to lead a city that at the time had about 375,000 residents.

He then proceeded to map out an agenda aimed at creating a vibrant downtown district and enhancing the city’s mass transit system.

Goldschmidt vetoed what was called the Mount Hood Freeway project, which was planned as a highway system from southeast Portland east to Mount Hood, about 50 miles away. The mayor said he didn’t want an endless series of strip malls developed along that corridor.

Instead, he persuaded the city council to focus its interests on downtown and on mass transit. He succeeded.

What has occurred in the 50 years since then is the city’s downtown district became a showpiece. The city’s bus and light-rail systems are the envy of other cities.

Oh, but wait. Goldschmidt then became transportation secretary in the Carter administration before being elected governor of Oregon. Then it hit the fan, as he was exposed as a pedophile after a newspaper investigation revealed he seduced a teenager while he was serving as mayor; reporting revealed he had sex multiple times with an underage girl.

His public service career ended on the spot. He resigned from every board on which he served. The State Capitol staff took down his governor’s portrait from the gallery of former governors and stashed it out of sight.

Goldschmidt went from municipal pioneer to pariah overnight.

He’s gone from public view, but the legacy he built remains. His reputation never will be restored. I don’t necessarily want, though, for the city treasure he discovered to be buried.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Mountains aren’t ‘out’

PORTLAND, Ore. — Those who live in this part of the world have a saying that seems to be unique to them.

When the sun is out and the clouds are gone, they will say, “The Mountain is out.” Meaning, of course, Mount Hood, the 11,245-foot sentinel that towers about 50 miles to the east of Portland along the Cascade Range.

I’ve been here for a couple of days and the Mountain isn’t out. It is hiding under a thick shroud of clouds that continues to douse the region with rainfall. Furthermore, there is no apparent window for when Mount Hood will present itself in all its snowy splendor.

Mount Hood isn’t the only such landmark to grace the horizon. Portlanders also get to gander at Mount St. Helens, the active volcano that, on May 18, 1980, blew about 1,300 feet off its summit in a spectacular explosion that killed 60 or so people, some of whom refused to heed warnings to vacate their property.

Mount St. Helens is shrouded, too.

These are the kinds of sights that those who visit this gorgeous part of the country come here to see. These days? They’re all, shall we say, “sh** outta luck.”

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com