Tag Archives: insurrection

crime news, legal news

Tamping expectations

Try as I have done to tamp down expectations on what will occur Monday when the House select committee makes its criminal referrals on the insurrection and assorted crimes relating to the 1/6 insurrection, I admit to difficulty doing so.

However, I am prepared to acknowledge that the House panel charged finding truth behind that violent chapter in our nation’s history only is going to recommend criminal charges be brought against those who were responsible for the onslaught.

The heavy lifting will occur in the offices of the Department of Justice and the special counsel who is examining the evidence.

I believe the referrals will include Donald Trump. He incited the assault on 1/6. He refused to stop the assault, even as the treasonous assailants were shouting “Hang Mike Pence!”

Let us remember that the House committee has no power to issue indictments. That power rests solely within the executive branch of government, which means the DOJ and the man who is serving as special counsel in this probe.

Still, I am certain that Americans who decide to tune in Monday will be treated to some riveting TV watching. I look forward to watching this drama unfold.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Cheney’s credentials: They are impeccable

You aren’t about to read the final blog item I’ll ever post about Liz Cheney, but I feel moved to say this as she prepares to cast the most significant votes of her congressional career.

She is going to vote Monday — I am quite certain — in favor of referring criminal charges against Donald J. Trump for his role in the insurrection and assorted other crimes he committed.

Cheney, a congresswoman from Wyoming who lost her primary battle earlier this year to a Trump sycophant, has been accused of being a “traitor” to the party.

Hmm. I want to make this point one more time, with emphasis.

Cheney’s voting record during her years in Congress has been as staunchly Republican and conservative as anyone ever elected under the GOP banner.

She is staunchly pro-life on abortion; she has opposed legislation aimed at curbing gun violence, standing with the gun lobby every single time; she has been a small-government conservative, favoring tax cuts for businesses, even those that make billions of dollars for their owners; she has been tough on illegal immigration; she supported our war efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Liz Cheney voted in favor of Trump’s legislative agenda more than 90% of the time!

She isn’t my type of legislator. However, she won the hearts of liberals and even a few moderate Republicans for the courage she has shown in standing firm for the Constitution and for opposing Trump’s blatant, illegal and immoral power grab.

The allegation of being a “traitor” comes from those who pledge their loyalty to a man and who — like their cult hero — ignored the oath of office they took to protect and defend the nation’s governing document.

I declare once more my admiration for Rep. Cheney for standing up for the rule of law. Would I vote for her for any public office? Uhh, probably not, but … I would if the only other opponent on any ballot was the man she wants to ensure “never gets close to the Oval Office ever again.”

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Uncategorized

Now … comes the 1/6 report

Americans with an interest in how the government came under attack on Jan. 6, 2021, and how we might prevent a recurrence of such a travesty have some riveting TV viewing ahead of them.

The House 1/6 select committee is going to meet one final time Monday in front of you and me. It will discuss what it has discovered after interviewing more than 1,000 witnesses and reviewed more than a million documents.

The committee then will take arguably the most monumental congressional votes in U.S. history. It will vote on whether to refer criminal charges against the former president of the United States who, in 1/6, incited the insurrection that tore through the Capitol Building with the aim of overturning a free and fair presidential election.

To be abundantly clear, Congress only can refer criminal charges to the Department of Justice. DOJ must decide whether to indict whoever the congressional committee refers in its report.

And … yes. Donald J. Trump’s name needs to be among those referred for criminal prosecution.

To suggest that the1/6 committee has been anything but meticulous, patient, diligent and courageous in its pursuit of the truth about 1/6 is to be guilty of the most partisan cynicism imaginable.

On the receiving end of those referrals, of course, is Attorney General Merrick Garland, who has insisted repeatedly that “no one is above the law.” By “no one,” he means precisely what we must infer, which is that Donald Trump is vulnerable to a criminal indictment … or two … or three.

Having watched many hours of previous testimony and commentary from committee members, I have no doubt — none, zero! — that Donald Trump committed multiple crimes before, during and after the assault on the Capitol Building.

What remains to be determined if whether the AG is going — after poring through the committee’s findings — to make history by doing something to previous attorney general has done. Will he indict Donald J. Trump?

I believe that moment is coming.

Meanwhile, I am going to listen with the most intense interest possible at committee members’ message as this drama draws to its long-awaited conclusion.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Cheney goes out with a roar

1 Comment

Say what you might about lame-duck U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, I’ll just add this: She is going out of office with a mighty roar and not a whimper.

She reportedly said this recently about her arch enemy, fellow Republican Donald J. Trump: “No honest person can now deny that Trump is an enemy of the Constitution.”

Ouch, man!

Cheney earned a primary challenge this year for standing up for the Constitution and standing against Trump’s aim to undermine it, to gut it, to reverse a free, fair and legal election for president in 2020. Cheney got thumped hard by Wyoming Republican voters. She has been a lame duck in name only ever since.

Cheney has served with courage, determination and distinction on the U.S. House select committee examining the insurrection that Trump incited. I already have expressed my admiration for this true-blue, rock-solid Republican conservative lawmaker.

She has been punished only for defying a former president whose sole aim is to cling to power.

I am one American patriot who will hold her forever in the highest esteem possible.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

SCOTUS needs ethics rules

What in the name of judicial ethics will it take for the U.S. Supreme Court to adopt a code of ethical behavior that it insists that lower court judges must follow?

Good grief. We now are witnessing two justices on the nation’s highest court violating what would appear to be clear ethical rules governing their conduct as jurists. They both are conservatives, Justices Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh.

Justice Thomas — the court’s longest-serving member — has been ruling routinely on matters related to the 1/6 insurrection even though his wife, Ginni, took part briefly in the rally that day preceding the frontal assault that Donald J. Trump incited. Thomas has been a lonely voice in standing up for Trump while his colleagues — liberal and conservative — have ruled against the ex-POTUS.

I have said many times that Justice Thomas should quit the court, not just recuse himself. His behavior has been nothing short of disgraceful.

Now we hear that Justice Kavanaugh has been keeping company with far-right-wing activists who belong to organizations that have brought matters before the Supreme Court. Huh? What? Are you kidding me?

How in the world does Kavanaugh rule impartially and without bias when he pals around with MAGA types? He cannot do it.

Back to my original point. The Supreme Court has punished jurists for unethical conduct over many decades. And yet the justices are not held to any sort of code of conduct that requires them to follow ethical rules of behavior.

How in the world does the nation’s top judicial bench justify that? How does Chief Justice John Roberts explain that lack of ethical standard? He doesn’t because he can’t.

This lack of ethical code is beyond absurd. It is reprehensible.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, national news

Ah, yes, the ‘sarcasm’ defense

Congress’s reigning QAnon queen, Marjorie Taylor Greene, has tossed out the old “it was sarcasm” canard in response to criticism she has received for making what sounds for all the world like a statement of a traitor.

Greene told a roomful of MAGA sycophants that had she been running the show on 1/6, the assault on the Capitol that day would have succeeded and that Donald Trump would have been able to overturn the 2020 presidential election result and returned to the White House.

They cheered her for those treasonous remarks. Did she say in the moment that it was all for fun? Did she walk any of it back? Ohhh, no. She responded only when others began reporting on the remarks and calling them what they are: the moronic muttering of an individual who has no business making laws that affect you and me.

The Georgia Republican, feeling emboldened I am sure by her re-election this past month, is getting ready to return for just her second term in the House of Representatives. To think that this certifiable idiot has been able to win election in the first place, win re-election to a new term and then possibly take the reins of congressional leadership is utterly astounding.

God help us!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

Stay tuned, my friend; it’s gonna get hairy!

This post is dedicated to my friend and former colleague, a fellow I have known for 22 years who has contended ever since Donald Trump’s first impeachment that the former POTUS needs to be hauled away in cuffs and leg irons.

It looks as though the good guys are gunning for Trump and will issue indictments for criminal conduct. That is my message to my friend, Peter, who lives far away in Australia but who is following the machinations of the American political and judicial systems as closely as any American I know.

The House select committee appears ready to issue referrals for indictments based on Trump’s incitement of the 1/6 assault on our Capitol Building. The attorney general’s office has handed over investigations into the insurrection and the pilfering of classified documents from the White House as Trump was leaving the place for his refuge in Florida to a special counsel who is moving at breakneck speed to finish what the DOJ has begun.

The Fulton County (Ga.) district attorney is working on her own probe into whether Trump violated state law by pressuring Georgia elections officials to “find” enough votes to give the state’s Electoral College votes to Trump rather than to Joe Biden, who them in the 2020 presidential election.

This is all getting quite dicey for the ex-president.

They won’t slap the cuffs on him when the indictments arrive. Thus, my friend might be disappointed that Trump isn’t hauled away in a paddy wagon. I wasn’t prepared to say that indictments are a sure thing. They’re looking more certain all the time.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

What would happen if …

I have been rolling around a notion that came to my attention the other day and which I shared on this blog.

It came from former federal prosecutor Barbara McQuade, who said the 1/6 House select committee has enough evidence to refer to Justice Department officials an allegation that Donald J. Trump committed involuntary manslaughter by refusing to call off the 1/6 insurrection.

Thus, I cannot get rid of the thought that if DOJ actually indicts Trump on such a criminal act, the MAGA crowd would launch into orbit. It would explode. It would go utterly, completely and irrationally ballistic.

I don’t think it will happen, but a part of me wonders if DOJ has the stones to do, well … the seemingly impossible.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

DC riot, Donald Trump

Manslaughter charge for Trump? What the … ?

1 Comment

Five people died in the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol, an event that Donald J. Trump could have stopped with a single verbal order to his maniacal followers that day.

He didn’t say a word. He let the attack on our government continue. The event turned bloody. Now comes this tidbit from a former U.S. attorney, Barbara McQuade, who says Trump could face manslaughter charges for his role in provoking the assault and for his abject failure to stop it.

Wow, man!

Is that for real? McQuade believes the 1/6 House select committee has compiled enough evidence to refer to Justice Department legal eagles a criminal referral seeking a manslaughter indictment.

McQuade wrote this in making the case: Under federal law, involuntary manslaughter occurs when a person commits an act on federal property without due care that it might produce death. To establish a criminal case of manslaughter against Trump, prosecutors would need to prove each of the elements of that offense beyond a reasonable doubt: an act, committed without due care, that caused death.

First, did Trump commit an act that could constitute the actus reus for manslaughter? His statements at the Ellipse in which he urged the crowd to march to the Capitol could be an act that constitutes this element. Recent evidence that this was not a “metaphorical” statement, but rather a coordinated plan, would make the statement even more egregious because it would mean that Trump had time to reflect on the potential deadly consequences of his actions.

Oh, boy. I don’t know that the committee needs to go that far. It seems to me it has enough evidence to seek plenty of criminal indictments that stop short of accusing Trump of manslaughter.

Still, the idea does make one ponder what might be coming down the road.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, national news

Here comes the report!

I already have marked down — in a manner of speaking — the date in which the House 1/6 select committee is set to reveal its findings into the insurrection, the attack on our government and whether the Donald J. Trump did what many millions of us know he did.

Which is that he incited the assault intending to stop the transition of power to the Joe Biden presidential administration.

Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., has spilled a few of the beans, meaning he has told us the committee plans to issue “criminal referrals” to the Department of Justice. In other words, the panel is going to recommend that someone gets indicted for the hideous events of 1/6.

The big date is Dec. 21. Think of the irony for just a moment. That is the date of the winter solstice, meaning it’s the day with the shortest span of daylight during the calendar year. The day of prolonged darkness, therefore, could be the darkest day in Donald J. Trump’s life. Why? Because the panel well might recommend indictments for the 45th POTUS for his role in inciting the attack and for purposely doing nothing to stop it as the mob stormed Capitol Hill.

There had been reports of disagreements among committee about the focus of the report. Rep. Liz Cheney reportedly argued for the committee to focus intensely on Trump’s role; others said the focus should turn elsewhere, such as recommending steps to prevent future such assaults.

There can be both.

I also want to caution us all about what the referrals might involve. They could recommend indictments related to the assault. There could be referrals to cases involving witness tampering. The field happens to be wide open.

My own belief is that Trump committed at least one demonstrable offense in calling for the insurrection and for refusing to stop it.

I am going to await the date of the panel’s report with keen interest.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com