By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I will just speak from my gut.

Josh Hawley is a dangerous young man. The Republican U.S. senator from Missouri already had crafted his infamy by being among those senators to challenge the results of the 2020 presidential election, which chose Joe Biden as the next president of the United States.

Then he said this just today about the mob of terrorists who were gathering at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6: “They had every right to be there.” 

If their intent was to storm the Capitol, to interfere with Congress doing its constitutional duty to certify the results of the election, to injure police officers and kill one of them, to threaten bodily harm to the vice president and speaker of the House, to defecate on the floor of Congress … then they had no right to be there.

And yet the junior senator from Missouri continues to stand by that hideous raised-fist photo of him saluting the mob waiting to storm the place where our Congress writes laws to which we all must obey.

Why did the rioters do what they did? Because the man who was soon to leave the presidency, Donald J. Trump, exhorted them to “take back” the government from forces he alleged had “stolen” the election and given it to President Biden. He continues to foment The Big Lie and members of Congress — such as Sen. Hawley — cheer on the disgraced ex-president.

Josh Hawley now is widely believed to aspire to a presidential run in 2024. How does that make you feel? Warm and fuzzy? Do you want to place the nuclear codes in the hands of an insurrectionist? Do you trust this guy to “defend and protect” the very Constitution he sought to destroy by challenging the result of a free, fair and duly certified presidential election?

What’s more, he now is defending the terrorists who committed the single greatest assault on our government since, oh let’s see, the Civil War.

The danger that Sen. Josh Hawley presents to this country cannot be overstated.