Monthly Archives: January 2021

local news

Some communities respond beautifully to vaccine effort

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Good news needs sharing, so I’ll do it here.

I keep seeing social media posts from friends in the Texas Panhandle who proclaim they have received both of their COVID-19 vaccine shots. They all live in Amarillo, where we lived for more than two decades before moving to the Metroplex in 2018.

It strikes me that Amarillo has earned the applause it is getting over the way it has handled the vaccine response protocol with which it has been forced to operate.

Amarillo reportedly is No. 1 in the nation in the rate of vaccines. Collin County, where we now live? Not so good, although I understand it is kicking into a higher gear with a new “mega” vaccine center opening up in Plano. My wife and I are on a waiting list. We hope to get called soon by Collin County’s health department.

This brief post is intended to toss some praise at Amarillo for doing a bang-up job in getting its residents inoculated against a virus that has infected a large number of my friends, former colleagues and former news sources. It has taken the lives of many fine individuals who made Amarillo and the Panhandle a special and vibrant place.

Have we turned the corner as a nation? Probably not just yet. I keep hearing that we might be starting the long ride out of the deep, dark woods with this killer virus. More misery lies ahead.

However, I am heartened beyond measure by the good news I am hearing from my old haunts. I enjoy learning about the hurdles my friends are clearing as they continue their own struggle against the virus that continues to haunt us all.

Uncategorized

This isn’t our ‘best’

1 Comment

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Make no mistake, I am not a Pollyanna. I know good bit about our political system, about how we can elect zeroes as well as heroes to our governing bodies.

But, oh brother, we have an astonishing number of numbskulls in Congress, taking power and being handed the opportunity to make laws that govern all of us, not just those who send them to Congress from their various states and congressional districts.

Marjorie Taylor-Greene, I am talking about you.

Rep. Taylor-Greene is the walking, talking embodiment of a domestic demon in our midst. She represents a Georgia congressional district and she is a believer in that QAnon cult that has gripped millions of Americans by the genitals.

She believes Muslims cannot serve legitimately in Congress; she has stated that the Sandy Hook and Parkland, Fla., school massacres were hoaxes; she says President Biden stole the election from Donald Trump; she has called for the summary execution of Democrats.

Yes, she is now among the 535 men and women who serve in the legislative branch of government.

She is a traitor. A potential terrorist. She is certifiably unfit to serve in a public office.

And yet … the folks in her congressional district sent her to Capitol Hill. Astonishing, yes? You know the answer. It is frightening in the extreme.

The news gets even worse. Congress contains others who hold the same view as this idiot. Oh, and the Republican leadership to which she ostensibly answers isn’t calling her, slapping her down, telling her to keep her mouth shut. They stand behind the First Amendment’s free speech clause.

I am a big believer in free speech and in the First Amendment. I also believe free speech should be responsible and shouldn’t be perceived as a threat to our very government.

This member of Congress doesn’t represent our best. She represents the worst of us.

International news

Putin isn’t your pal, Mr. POTUS

1 Comment

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden and Russian dictator Vladimir Putin chatted the other day.

They reportedly covered — according to a read-out supplied to the media by the White House — a number of topics. They included at least two topics that Donald Trump refused repeatedly to mention to his pal Vlad: the bounty paid to Taliban terrorists who kill American service personnel on t he battlefield and the Russian interference in our elections.

What a change in tone. What a welcome change.

President Biden has made it clear, or so it appears, that he doesn’t plan to be Vladimir Putin’s friend. He wants to assert U.S. moral authority. He wants to engage Russia on nuclear arms reduction. Biden intends to face Russia down on its efforts to subvert Ukraine.

Trump boasted of his deal-making prowess but he never came close to negotiating a nuclear arms reduction deal with his good pal Putin.

Biden enters this relationship with a long history of involvement in foreign policy discussions. Let’s remember that he formerly chaired or was ranking member of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee before he became vice president for two terms serving under President Obama.

Indeed, the White House read-out of the meeting is something the public didn’t get for the past four years during Donald Trump’s term. No one ever knew what the two men talked about, except what Trump would say out loud; and we all know how believable Donald Trump could be, right?

To be sure, the read-out only reveals what the White House wants us to know. However, my own sense is that the Biden administration will deal much more forthrightly and candidly with Vladimir Putin than the Trump administration ever did.

President Biden has laid down an important marker at least by challenging Putin on the hideous report of the bounties he paid for the lives of American service personnel.

Don’t let up, Mr. President.

environmental news

Climate change: existential threat

1 Comment

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden has blasted his way out of the chute determined to make good on proclamations he made along the campaign trail.

He has a pandemic with which to deal. He vows to restore our worldwide alliances. Biden vows to boost our economy with a titanic stimulus package. Oh, and he wants to tackle climate change head-on, full throttle.

I want to explore briefly the climate change matter.

In one of his first acts as president, Biden signed an executive order returning the United States to the worldwide Paris Climate Accord, from which Donald Trump pulled this nation.

Then he named John Kerry the head of a newly created position, special envoy on climate change. Kerry comes to this task with an impressive personal and professional record: combat veteran of the Vietnam War, senator from Massachusetts, secretary of state during the second term of the Barack Obama administration.

He now takes on the role of climate change envoy to communicate with the world on policies enacted by the Biden administrationĀ  dealing with climate change.

President Biden isĀ  taking precisely the opposite approach to climate change than the one articulated by Donald Trump. Biden calls climate change an “existential threat” to the nation; Trump calls it a “hoax.” It isn’t a hoax. It’s the real thing. It is harming us tangibly. It poses a threat to Earth and to our ability over the long term to continue to thrive, let alone survive, on the only planet we can call home.

Biden wants to suspend oil and natural gas leases. He intends to re-energize — no pun intended — efforts to develop renewable energy sources. The president plans to restore the tougher air quality rules andĀ  regulations that Donald Trump rescinded.

John Kerry doesn’t take on this task peering through sparkly glasses. He is realistic about the threat. Kerry said recently that even if we reduce carbon emissions today to “zero,” we still might be unable to reverse the effects of climate change on Earth’s environment.

* * *

I must add an important caveat to what I hope is a concerted effort to stem to effect of climate change. Someone will have to explain to me how our military establishment will operate the equipment it uses in a climate-friendly manner. Our jets, naval vessels, and our vast array of land vehicles — tanks, trucks, fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers — require fossil fuels to operate. If we can find our way to balance those needs with strategies that attack the existential threat many of us believe is out there … then we might be able to save the world.

I want to give President Biden a push in the direction he needs to go to attack climate change.

Uncategorized

Trump likely to escape … again!

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Virtually all of me wants the Senate to convict Donald Trump of “incitement of insurrection.”

No matter how much I want to will the Senate to do the right thing, political reality is staring all of us in the puss. Conviction requires 17 Senate Republicans to join their Democratic colleagues in convicting Trump.

A conviction won’t remove him from the presidency. A clear majority of voters did that on Nov. 3 when we elected Joe Biden to be our next president. Oh, I am so happy to among the 81.2 million Americans who spoke loudly and clearly.

LetĀ  us face reality, though.

Donald Trump still commands the attention of too many Senate Republicans, who fear the Trumpster Corps scattered across the land. The Trump cultists are rattling their proverbial sabers, threatening senators with dire political consequences if they vote to convict their guy, The Donald, the former Liar in Chief, the huckster, the con man, the phony, the fraud … stop me before I run out of breath.

Only five GOP senators voted this week that the trial is constitutional. They are right. The 45 Rs who stuck together are wrong. The Constitution doesn’t require a president to be in office for the HouseĀ  to impeach him. Indeed,Ā  the House did impeach Trump — for the second time! — just a week before he left office.

Now he is gone. The aim of the Senate is to secure a conviction and then to cast a simple-majority vote to deny Trump from ever seeking public office.

Here,Ā  though, is another reality. Donald Trump will not be elected president ever again! His sounding the bugle for the terrorists who stormed Capitol Hill on the Sixth of January sealed his political fate.

If only the Senate could find enough Republicans with sufficient courage to convict him. I fear the worst outcome, that Donald Trump will skate through this latest Senate trial.

State news

Make ’em wear helmets!

2 Comments

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I know this wonā€™t happen, but it wonā€™t deter me from saying it anyway.

It is that I would hope the 2021 Texas Legislature would rethink a decision that an earlier Legislature made. It rescinded a law that required motorcycle riders ā€“ such as those who drive them ā€“ to wear helmets.

The 1995 Legislature approved the rescission, which then was signed by the stateā€™s newly elected governor, George W. Bush.

It is a decision that I am certain that many Texans regret. Why? Because they have suffered grievous, traumatic head injury that would have been prevented had they been wearing protective headgear.

Now, of course the Legislature built in some safeguards against madness aboard motorcycles. It required children to wear helmets. It also requires licensed motorcyclists to carry insurance policies that cover a part of their hospitalization. Oh, but hereā€™s the thing: The amount totals $10,000. Do you have any idea how quickly an injured motorcyclist can burn through 10 grand?

Just like ā€“ snap! ā€“ that. That makes me wonder how much value can be had in such a pittance of a policy.

The 1995 Legislature was feeling its Wheaties, as I recall, when it decided to pull back its mandatory helmet law. I argued vociferously at the time that the Legislature shouldnā€™t touch the law. I had that argument with many proud, independent Texans who actually disagreed with my view that helmets saved lives and saved Texans millions of dollars in insurance payment increases.

My favorite argument against helmet laws came from a guy in Orange County, Texas, who told me in the early 1990s that he had to feel the ā€œwind in my hairā€ as he drove his motorcycle. I pray the fellow all these years later still has a head of hair and is still alive to feel it blowing in the breeze.

My wife and I spend time in our pickup driving around Texas; we haul our RV to state parks across our state. We do not exceed 60 mph while pulling our RV, so we get passed continually by motor vehicles along our highways. So help me, as God is my witness, I cringe when a helmet-less motorcyclist whizzes by at some untold speed. I pray he or she stays safe.

We both have a friend, a former colleague of mine, who some years ago got a phone call that every parent dreads. Her son had been involved in a motorcycle wreck in Amarillo. He suffered grievous wounds ā€¦ to his head. He suffered irreparable brain damage. He lost cognitive skill, the ability to speak clearly and to the best of my knowledge is still living, albeit with state-funded assistance.

On the flip side, I once served with a guy in the Army who told me in 1970 about a terrible motorcycle wreck he suffered in his home state of Indiana. He was alive at that moment to recall what happened. Why? Because he was wearing a helmet at the time of the crash.

ā€œThe helmet,ā€ he told me, ā€œsaved my life.ā€ I would presume as well that it saved his fellow Indiana taxpayers a ton of money.

BLOGGER’S NOTE: This blog was posted originally on KETR-FM’s website.

national news

GOP continues to cower

6 Comments

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Listen up, America.

Have we just witnessed a precursor to the verdict we can expect from the U.S. Senate that is putting Donald Trump on trial after his second impeachment by the House of Representatives?

I am afraid so. The Senate voted today to narrowly defeat a GOP measure to dismiss the trial on grounds that it isn’t constitutional. Five Senate Republicans joined Democrats in moving ahead. The vote was 55-45. The GOP senators with guts are: Mitt Romney, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Pat Toomey and Ben Sasse.

The rest of ’em? All cowards. They are cowering under threat of reprisal by the Trump cultists in their home state who will go after them at the next election.

They contend that the Constitution calls for impeachment to remove a president. Donald Trump already is gone, they say, so the trial is irrelevant and is unconstitutional.

Oh, my. Forty-five out of 50 Senate Republicans want to give a pass to a president who fomented a riotous mob into violence on the Sixth of January. What in the world is wrong with these idiots, er … individuals?

The terrorists captured the very floor of the Senate, where our lawmakers do their jobs. They threatened to kill then-Vice President Mike Pence and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, only God knows who else might have been killed or wounded in action had the rioters had gotten their hands on them.

None of that is sufficient to persuade most GOP senators to proceed with a trial that should occur, if only at this point to keep Donald Trump out of the political scene … for the rest of his miserable life.

Stay tuned, folks. It looks to me as though a Senate trial conviction is slipping away.

medical news

Biden moves quickly on pandemic fight

2 Comments

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden is wasting no time proving he means what he says about pulling out all the stops in fighting the killer pandemic.

The president today ordered 200 million more doses of the vaccine that is expected to help eradicate the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States.

This, dear friends, is music to my pointy ears.

Now, a bit of full disclosure.

A very close and dear member of my family has just been released from the hospital, where she spent four weeks, most of the time hooked up to a respirator. She now is resting at home with her husband and her golden Labrador retriever.

This is my way of telling you that this disease cuts me close to the quick and I am not going to relent one iota in following the recommended measures to maintain my own health, along with the health of our beloved family members.

President Biden said during his inaugural speech that we should wear masks and do all the things we need to do out of love for our country. I love my country, Mr. President! I hear you, sir!

I also want you to ensure the nation that you do not let up — not at all, not one bit! — in maintaining our national resolve to rid us all of this killer virus.

The death count passed the “horrific” status long ago. It is climbing as I write these words. It came too damn close to claiming someone who is very special to me.

Two hundred million more doses on the way? Yes! Bring more … many more!

Uncategorized

Get rid of this nut job!

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

By all means, a first-term congresswoman from Georgia needs to go. She needs either to resign or the House can kick her sorry backside out of the place.

Then, too, there’s always impeachment.

Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene comes from the school of idiots who believe in the conspiracy theories that everyone with half a brain dismiss.

Pressure Mounts for Congresswoman to Resign for Endorsing False Claims School Shootings Were Staged (msn.com)

Calls are mounting for her to resign because she has put out the phony notion that the Sandy Hook grade school massacre in 2012 and the high school shooting in Florida were hoaxes. Yes, she’s a believer in that moronic QAnon conspiracy club.

She needs to get her a** out of the People’s House and she has no business signing her name onto laws that affect those of us who live far away from her Georgia congressional district.

Georgia voters, you had the good sense to elect two solid Democrats to the Senate this year. Show that the sensibility carries over to how you can dispose of the idiot Greene’s political career.

 

national news

Follow the evidence, senators

1 Comment

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Donald Trumpā€™s defense in his second impeachment trial is beginning to take shape.

It will not center on the high crime for which the House of Representatives impeached him. What he did was visible on TV screens around the world: He incited the terrorists to storm Capitol Hill on the Sixth of January and seek to prevent Congress from certifying the 2020 presidential election that determine Joe Biden the winner.

Instead, the former presidentā€™s defense will hinge on some constitutional language that suggests that the House acted beyond the scope of its power by impeaching a man who no longer would be serving in the office of president.

Except for this little item: Trump was president when the House impeached him on Jan. 13. He left the office a week after that. The Senate is trying him now to prevent him from seeking public office ever again.

As I ponder this event, which begins on Feb. 9, I am left to wonder whether a second acquittal for Donald Trump will be on a technicality. You know, the kind of verdict that hardline prosecutors detest when they lose cases in which they present incontrovertible evidence, only to see it swept aside because of some technical matter.

You can bet your final dollar that the House managers who present their case will rely solely on the evidence that everyone saw with their own eyes and heard with their own ears. Think as well about the fact that senators will be hearing this evidence in the very scene of the crime that the rioters committed ā€¦ at Donald Trumpā€™s behest.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi delivered the single count leveled against Trump to the Senate. The House managers have a steep hill to climb if they hope to persuade 17 GOP senators to do the right thing and vote to convict Trump.

However, as we have seen with all too much maddening regularity, congressional Republicans too often exhibit cowardice when faced with political repercussions. Donald Trump is now a cult leader in exile ā€¦ but the cultists who follow him remain committed to him far more than to the country they profess to love.