Cruz is correct on gay sex? Wow!

It surely doesn’t occur often, when U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz and your friendly blogger — that would be me — are on the same side of an issue.

Get a load of this: The Texas Republican junior senator told the Dallas Morning News that the state needs to repeal its decades-old law that bans gay sex. How come? Because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2003 ruling that declared the state gay sex ban is unconstitutional.

“Consenting adults should be able to do what they wish in their private sexual activity, and government has no business in their bedrooms,” Cruz’s spokesperson told the newspaper.

I need to shake my marbles loose. I am shocked to hear such wisdom coming from Cruz or from any of his spokespeople.

Ted Cruz says Texas should repeal its now-defunct anti-sodomy law | The Texas Tribune

The state also had a law on the books that banned same-sex couples from engaging in intimate activity. They called it the “anti-sodomy law.”

I am not going to gush freely over what appears to be a sort of epiphany from the Republican lawmaker. As the Texas Tribune reports: But questions over the future of that precedent have surfaced after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June. Both the 1973 abortion case and the gay sex case, known as Lawrence v. Texas, were decided based on the idea of a constitutional right to privacy.

I have this nagging concern that should the Supreme Court rule in the future that “rights of privacy” also no longer apply to sexual relationships, that it might decide that states, indeed, can make laws such as the Texas ban on same-sex marriage.

What would Cruz say about that ruling? I guess I have come down on my belief that I don’t trust Ted Cruz to stand by what looks like a reasonable statement.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

It was no mere ‘riot’

The more I see and hear from — and about — the 1/6 House committee examining the insurrection, the more secure I feel about some of the command decisions I made regarding how I would communicate on the matter through this blog.

What do I mean?

What occurred on 1/6 now looks for all the world like a premeditated attack on our nation’s governmental process.

Thus, I do not refer to it as a “riot,” which by definition is a spontaneous event that erupts during a protest, which brings me to Point No. 2.

I do not refer to that event as protest, nor do I refer to the mob who attacked the Capitol as protesters. The U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment refers to “the right of the people peaceably to assemble … ” The mobsters were traitors to the nation.

There was nothing “peaceable” about what we witnessed that day.

I long ago adopted the word “insurrection” to define on High Plains Blogger what occurred that day. A couple of critics have told me that no formal charge of insurrection has been filed against anyone. Testimony and eyewitness accounts of what transpired that day have confirmed — to my eyes, at least — that we did witness an insurrection.

I say all this with a heavy heart. Spare me the criticism that I am crying “crocodile tears” over what transpired on 1/6. It truly does pain me, as a red-blooded American patriot, to see this chapter being re-told in this fashion.

It is an abject lesson we all must watch and heed, no matter how much it hurts.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Way to go, Mitch

Let’s just call him Mitch the Obstructor, the guy who never — not ever! — seems to back a Democratically inspired notion that well could produce astonishing results for the nation.

But there’s Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell saying that a Democratic deal hammered out by maverick Democrat Joe Manchin and Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer is a job killer. It’s a “socialist” program. It’s just going to sink the nation faster than that iceberg did to the Titanic.

He cannot back it under any circumstance.

It’s a $430 billion bill that would produce cleaner air, would reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, would be paid for with modest tax increases on the richest Americans. Yet to hear McConnell bellow about his opposition, it’s the worst thing to come down the pike since President Nixon’s wage and price controls of the 1970s. Oh, wait, Nixon was a Republican, so I guess that made it OK.

Manchin has performed a fairly stunning reversal on this matter. He recently declared his opposition to President Biden’s Build Back Better idea, which everyone at the time thought doomed the notion for good.

Now he comes around. Again! I cannot keep up with the West Virginian who seems to enjoy the role of senator with outsized influence.

He and Schumer and the POTUS, though, now must deal with Mitch the Obstructor. I am hoping they can put Mitch in his place … presumably under something from he cannot re-emerge.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Storm clouds brewing over Biden

“I’m working on my own election. And that’s all I’m focused on right now.
 
We have got a little under four months here in Ohio, and we’re running a great campaign. We’re up in the polls and working really hard. So, I’m just going to focus on that, and then we can chat about that after I win and get in the United States Senate. I will be happy to comment.”

The above comment came from a candidate for the U.S. Senate, a Democrat and a longtime friend and political ally of President Biden.

And yet … Rep. Tim Ryan just couldn’t bring himself to say he supports the president’s re-election effort, which Biden has insisted is going to ramp up and that he is going ahead full throttle at seeking a second term.

Hmm. I don’t know about you, but the question from a Fox News anchor seemed straightforward enough. “Do you intend to support the president’s bid for a second term?”

There was nothing in the question, as I understood it, that required Ryan to go into detail about the level of support he would give to the president. Nor did it require him to offer specific strategies and tactics he intends to employ on the president’s behalf.

Will he support Joe Biden? Yes or no, congressman.

This tells me something I hate acknowledging, which is that Joe Biden’s support even among his closest allies may be evaporating. I won’t suggest for a moment that the president needs to surrender or declare he won’t seek a second term.

I am willing to acknowledge, though, that the road to another four years in the Oval Office is fraught with peril.

It is time to get busy, Mr. President.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

’20 election: most secure … ever!

One of the more annoying aspects of The Big Lie and those who believe it to their everlasting shame is that the 2020 presidential election was so “fishy” that the system has been put on notice to ensure that future elections are not fraught with the kind of tomfoolery the Big Lie believers insist occurred in 2020.

That is so wrong that I cannot let it stand.

I hear such rubbish from my network of social media acquaintances. Several of them believe that the next election will be clean, secure and fraud-free only because of all the attention being paid to the shenanigans that allegedly occurred during the 2020 election.

Bear in mind that these nitwits suggest that the only electoral “theft” occurred in the presidential contest. They say that only Donald J. Trump was the victim of “widespread voter fraud.” No other races have been contested in quite the manner than the one that Trump lost to President Biden.

I feel the overwhelming need to remind everyone of this fact. Trump hired a first-rate electoral security expert, Christopher Krebs, to repair what he said was wrong with the electoral system.

Krebs then delivered on what the then-president instructed. He declared after the 2020 election that it was “the most secure election in U.S. history.” His reward for telling the truth? Trump fired him … and then proceeded to call him everything short of the Son of Satan.

The Big Lie is the biggest lie ever told to vilify our democratic process. It is a disgraceful display of petulance and arrogance from an individual who simply cannot stand the thought of losing.

The 2020 election set a standard for electoral cleanliness. The 2024 election for president, I am quite certain, will follow suit.

It will have nothing to do with a “fishy” result.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Keeping emotion in check

It is difficult to stop clapping, smiling and wishing that the big news announced this week will produce justice for those of us worried about the impact of the 1/6 insurrection.

But, dang! Here comes news that the Department of Justice has been conducting an active investigation into possible criminal activity by the immediate past president of the United States, the purveyor of The Big Lie, the guy who wanted to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election … which he lost!

Attorney General Merrick Garland has spelled out in terms that even I can understand that “no one is above the law,” and that DOJ is going to pursue anyone who was criminally culpable in the peaceful transition of power of one presidential administration to another.

Wow! Do you think, therefore, that the AG has his sights set on Donald J. Trump?

Looks like it to me.

However, my inclination tells me to hold off on the celebration that there might be a way after all to keep that charlatan away from the Oval Office.

The former Idiot in Chief was impeached twice. He got away both times because not enough Senate Republicans had the courage to convict him of either soliciting a political favor from a foreign power or inciting the 1/6 attack on the Capitol.

And all that yammering about the House select committee marching far ahead of DOJ in the hunt for the truth behind the insurrection? It now appears that Justice Department sleuths were doing their job all along, only in private.

From my vantage point it appears that the walls are continuing to close in on Trump. May they close to the point of making history with an indictment of the most crooked and venal individual ever to win election to the nation’s highest office.

Stay on the hunt, Mr. Attorney General.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

TDCJ inmates need not broil

The summer’s incessant and relentless heat wave has returned an issue to the front of the shelf that needs some examination.

It is whether to install air conditioning systems into Texas’s massive prison system. Think for just a moment about something. Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts Glenn Hegar projects that the Legislature will convene in January with an estimated budget surplus of about $13 billion.

Well, how might we spend some of that surplus? Oh, here’s a thought. Perhaps we could install A/C units into at least some of our state’s prisons.

I sort of understand why Texas hasn’t chosen to give the state’s enormous state prison population some of the comforts others of us receive and take for granted. However, reports indicate that indoor temperatures at some of our prison units have reached 140 degrees during this summer’s intense heat wave.

That is unacceptable.

I became acquainted with the lack of A/C units during a tour I took in 1995 of the Clements Unit outside of Amarillo. Frankly, I hadn’t studied the issue much since my arrival in Texas in early 1984. However, I was acutely aware of how hot and hostile summer gets in all regions of Texas.

My first thought upon learning of the lack of A/C was: Hey, didn’t an inmate sue the state for housing inmates in “inhumane” conditions … and didn’t he win that lawsuit, forcing the feds to take run the state prison system for many years?

Putting A/C units in our state prisons surely doesn’t turn our lockups into “country clubs.” It simply provides a livable environment for inmates who, frankly, deserve to be treated like human beings.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Go for it, Mr. AG

Given that I consider Attorney General Merrick Garland to be a man of high honor, integrity, honesty and candor, I will take him at his word when he declares …

That he would be willing to prosecute a former president of the United States for crimes against the government if the evidence he gathers leads him to that decision.

Even if it “tore the country apart”? asked NBC News anchor Lester Holt.

Yes, Garland said. Even that will not dissuade him from holding “everyone” accountable who has committed a crime involving the 1/6 insurrection.

“So, if Donald Trump were to become a candidate for president again, that would not change your schedule or how you move forward or don’t move forward?” Holt asked.

“I’ll say again that we will hold accountable anyone who is criminally responsible for attempting to interfere with the transfer — legitimate, lawful transfer of power from one administration to the next,” Garland answered.

Merrick Garland does not rule out prosecuting Trump over Jan. 6 (msn.com)

OK. Are we clear? Must we continue to hector, pester and harangue the AG over his intentions? That is unwise.

President Biden chose a man of impeccable integrity to become the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. I remain committed to the belief that AG Garland will do his duty thoroughly and completely.

I also happen to believe that Donald J. Trump should be prosecuted. But …  that ain’t my call.

I am going to hold out hope that if the facts lead us to Donald Trump’s feet that the attorney general will do what he must do to hold “everyone accountable” for the dastardly deed of seeking to overturn a free, fair and legal presidential election.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

How does Pence remain silent?

Many things have been known to escape my occasionally meager skills at understanding certain matters, such as …

How in the world does former Vice President Mike Pence remain so silent when the whole world now knows that Donald J. Trump didn’t give a damn whether he got hanged by the mob of traitors who stormed the Capitol on 1/6?

Testimony has been revealed that on the day of the insurrection, with mobsters carrying signs that said “Hang Mike Pence!” the then-POTUS didn’t lift a finger to quell the violence. Nor did he call the VP to determine whether he was safe. Nor did he salute the VP for doing his constitutional duty.

Oh, no! All that Trump said that day about the vice president was that “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage” to overturn the 2020 presidential election and that “Pence let me down.”

What a piece of sh**!

But the ex-VPOTUS won’t condemn in unambiguous language what many of the rest of us find repugnant beyond belief. That the president was derelict in his duty that day. That he violated his sacred oath of office. That he has never expressed a single public word of remorse over what happened on 1/6.

Pence has been at the center of this investigation. Yet he remains curiously silent about the behavior on that horrifying day of the man who incited the whole thing with The Big Lie.

Go figure.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Hey, libs: Pipe down and let AG do his job

To be sure, I have spent a lot of emotional capital chastising conservatives over a whole array of issues. Today, though, I want to take aim at the progressives among us who are growing impatient with the pace of Attorney General Merrick Garland’s potential probe into Donald Trump’s role in the 1/6 insurrection.

Summing it up, I want to say that progressives need to settle down and quit acting as if the world is going to explode if Garland doesn’t meet their deadline for a decision.

The AG is examining whether to prosecute a former president of the United States of America — for God’s sake — on charges that might include conspiracy to commit sedition. Think of the seriousness, here.

It’s never been done before.

Now, do I believe Trump committed crimes while refusing to stem the attack on the Capitol on 1/6? Yes! I do! However, I am just a chump layman out here in the peanut gallery. I use www.highplainsblogger.com to say what I believe, which is my right as a red-blooded American citizen.

I will not have to pay the price, though, were I to seek a flawed indictment of a former POTUS.

Therefore, I am willing to give the attorney general all the room he needs to roam in search of evidence he believes will result in a conviction of unnamed, unspecified charges against Donald J. Trump.

Earth will not spin off its axis if Garland doesn’t meet the progressives’ deadline … whatever it is! He is a studious, careful, meticulous, learned lawyer. Let him do his job!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com