Tag Archives: Fox News

crime news

Libs have blowhards, too

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I recently called Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson a right-wing “blowhard,” which drew rebukes from my friends who believe he is right and others of us are mistaken about the state of affairs.

It all got me to ponder something. Do I aim my “blowhard” epithet only at right wingers and if so, am I being fair to them? I want to lay down a predicate, which is that we all are fueled by our own bias. So, when I toss out an epithet such as “blowhard,” or “gasbag” I usually am talking about righties with whom I disagree.

As I scan the political commentary landscape, I find far fewer such left-leaning targets. However, the field isn’t devoid of left wing blowhards.

In the interest of fairness, I want to offer you this example: The Rev. Al Sharpton. 

I am no fan of Sharpton. He runs the National Action Network. He has become a “civil rights leader” of some repute and renown. Sharpton shows up at protest marches to extol the virtues of Black Lives Matter. He delivers eulogies to victims of police brutality. He speaks on behalf of what I consider to be noble causes.

However, every time I see the Rev. Sharpton, I cannot erase one incident from my memory: Tawana Brawley. Do you remember her?

In the late 1980s Brawley accused white New York City police officers of brutalizing her, of raping her, of dehumanizing her. She is an African-American. At that time, up stepped Al Sharpton to raise holy hell on her behalf. He and others accused the cops of behaving in a disgraceful, despicable manner.

It turns out that Tawana Brawley made it all up. The cops sued Brawley and others, including Sharpton, for slander and defamation. They won their case!

Has the reverend ever apologized for taking part in that monumental charade? Nope. Not a word. Instead, he parlayed his 15 minutes of fame into a role he has embraced as a “civil rights leader.”

This has not a thing to do with the causes for which he speaks. I happen to endorse most of Sharpton’s platform. If only, though, he hadn’t emerged from such a scandalous event — in which he was on the wrong side of a contentious dispute — to bask in the celebrity status he enjoys today.

So, there you have it. I have just declared that lefties have blowhards, too.

national news

He did ‘the opposite’?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I didn’t hear it in real time when Donald Trump said it, but I have just heard it and I am still utterly astonished.

Trump told Fox News the other day that he deliberately “did the opposite” of what Dr. Anthony Fauci recommended he do to reduce the infection rate and death rate from the coronavirus.

The president of the United States, from what I have just heard, has admitted to ignoring the advice of the nation’s preeminent epidemiologist. It can be argued that Fauci is the top infectious disease expert on the entire planet.

So there we have it. Donald Trump ignored his advice. He did the opposite of what Fauci advised him.

Hmm. What’s been the cost of such ignorance? Oh, only the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans who might still be alive today had the president/commander in chief/head of state had followed the advice of the men and women he enlisted to help him ostensibly with the nation’s pandemic response.

Can there be anything more astonishing than to realize that millions of Americans actually want this imbecile to run for president again?

Donald John Trump should be prosecuted for homicidal negligence.

DC riot, national news

Mulvaney calls it correctly

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Donald John Trump’s delusion continues even as he tees it up at his posh South Florida resort.

The ex-president told Fox News that the Jan. 6 insurrection from the riotous mob of terrorists posed “zero threat.”

That brought a sharp rebuke from one of Trump’s chief defenders/enablers, former White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, who told CNN that Trump’s remarks are “manifestly false.”

“I was surprised to hear the president say that … Clearly, there were people who were behaving themselves and then there were people who absolutely were not,” Mulvaney told CNN.

Mulvaney calls Trump’s comments on Capitol riot ‘manifestly false’ | TheHill

No. They were not behaving themselves.

And yet Donald Trump continues to lie incessantly.

The riot’s aim was to stop Congress from doing its constitutional duty on Jan. 6, which was to certify the results of the presidential election. It was a violent attempted insurrection. It was an act of sedition. It was profoundly violent and dangerous!

I am no fan of Mick Mulvaney. However, I am glad to hear him speak the truth about the delusion that rumbles around in the head of his former boss.

military news

Blowhard treads where he shouldn’t go

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Tucker Carlson is a right-wing gasbag who quite often bloviates on matters of which he knows nothing.

I’m a bit late entering this kerfuffle, but Carlson has waded into a thicket that has drawn deserved scorn from military veterans.

The Fox News blowhard had the stones to say the other day that women who serve in the military downgrade the quality of the nation’s fighting force. He had the very bad taste to suggest that pregnant women in particular are a detriment to this nation’s readiness.

Whoa! Dude, you stepped in it.

You see, Carlson never has served a single nanosecond in the nation’s military. Thus, he has no actual knowledge of the military culture, let alone the value that all our men and women bring to the defense of the nation.

Career military officers and non-commissioned officers alike have slammed Carlson for his remarks. I want to join them in that rebuke.

I need to stipulate that I served at a time — from 1968 to 1970 — before women became integrated fully into all the military occupational specialties that the Army offers. However, I do retain some familiarity with the culture that drives the military. I have no doubt as to the readiness of our nation’s armed forces, which are the most formidable on Planet Earth; and, yes, the women who serve contribute to our nation’s readiness.

And I speak with personal knowledge that a dear member of my family, a woman who served with valor and honor in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, is every bit as capable as any man with whom she served in the United States Army.

Tucker Carlson would do well to examine his own qualifications before he pontificates on matters with which he has no experience.

media news

Dobbs cancellation signals a dramatic new turn

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Fox News’ decision to cancel Lou Dobbs’ evening gab show didn’t raise much of a stink in our house.

We don’t watch him. I haven’t watched or listened to Dobbs since he turned sinister with his Barack Obama birther conspiracy nonsense and then became a Donald Trump suck-up while working for Rupert Murdoch’s unfair and unbalanced news organization.

But … Fox’s decision to yank Dobbs off the air might signal a dramatic new turn in the ongoing struggle to present truth and avoid lies.

Dobbs has been hit with a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit over his repeating lies about so-called “rigged” voting machines.

As the New York Times reported: Smartmatic, a voter technology firm swept up in conspiracies spread by former President Donald J. Trump and his allies, filed its defamation suit against Rupert Murdoch’s Fox empire on Thursday, citing Mr. Dobbs and two other Fox anchors, Maria Bartiromo and Jeanine Pirro, for harming its business and reputation.

Lawsuits Take the Lead in Fight Against Disinformation (msn.com)

I am not yet sure what this means for Pirro and Bartiromo, and whether they will follow Dobbs out the back door of Fox News.

What this portends apparently is a realization from the network that truth must remain the first and last line of defense in any kind of lawsuit challenging media credibility.

Perhaps the biggest surprise might be that it took this long for someone to say “enough, already!” to the lies that keep drawing breath because of phony commentators such as Lou Dobbs, who fomented the lies about vote fraud, just as he kept yammering about former President Obama’s place of birth and his constitutional eligibility to seek and hold the office of president.

At a certain level, Lou Dobbs symbolizes the degradation of honest journalism. I used to watch him when he reported on business news while working for CNN. Then he switched networks, which by itself is fine.

Then he flew head-first off the rails, into the ditch and became a leading spokesman for the Liar in Chief during his tenure as president.

I cannot predict how this lawsuit will end up. I’ll just suggest that I foresee some kind of major settlement in the making. Smartmatic stands to make a bundle of cash.

And it should.

medical news, national news

Hey, Don Jr.: Shut … up!

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Donald J. Trump Jr. said what?

Let me see if I have this straight …

On a day when 1,000 Americans died from the coronavirus pandemic, Don Jr. told Laura Ingraham, a Fox News talking head, that pandemic deaths were “almost nothing.” Don’s dad, The Donald, has said pretty much the same thing, that we are “turning the corner” and that the pandemic “is under control.”

I’ve already implored Donald Sr. to keep his yapper closed, to leave the medical analysis to the scientists and assorted experts with whom he has surrounded himself. Dad ain’t listening to little ol’ me.

I don’t expect Junior to listen, either. However, I must pass along this bit of advice to the elder Know Nothing Son of the Know Nothing President:

Don Jr. … shut the f**k up!

media news

‘Fake news’ from its originator

I continue to be astonished that Donald J. “Fake News Purveyor in Chief” Trump continues to hurl epithets at the media in that petulant fashion he has adopted.

He calls the media “fake news.” My ever-lovin’ goodness, the man has no shame, no self-awareness.

He did so again today during that campaign riff disguised as a “news conference” in Bedminster, N.J. He said the media don’t report the progress he supposedly is making against the pandemic, calling them “fake news.”

I feel the need to call Trump out because he, alone, is responsible for more than 20,000 reported instances of misleading statements and outright lies since becoming president, according to the Washington Post. He lies and lies some more. His “base” gives him a pass because, in their twisted view, he is “telling it like it is.”

The most egregious act of fake news, of course, came when Trump kept alive the lie that Barack Obama was born in Africa and wasn’t qualified to run for president. It was a blatantly racist attack on the first African-American ever elected president. He followed that up by questioning President Obama’s academic credentials at Harvard University.

Trump’s familiarity with fake news is well-known to everyone on Earth … except him. A certifiably pathological liar is prone to say things without any realization that he’s lying. That’s what Trump does. He blurts statements out. He gets fact-checked and he is told that what he says is untrue. He doesn’t care.

He recently told Fox News’ Chris Wallace that Democratic nominee-in-waiting Joe Biden wants to “defund the police,” which Wallace challenged on the spot. Trump ignored what Wallace said.

Fake news, anyone? Anyone?

The upshot of all this, maddeningly, is that those who continue to endorse Trump also continue to buy into his claptrap nonsense about “fake news.” They applaud the president for his declaration that the media are the “enemy of the people.” They, too, see the media as peddlers of “fake news.”

I never thought such idiocy would be contagious. Silly me. I was wrong.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump keeps peddling his own version of fake news. The difference between what he seeks to pawn off on us and what he accuses the media of peddling is that Trump is dealing in the real thing.

Donald Trump is a liar.

media news

Trump sure to ramp up his war against ‘fake news media’

Donald Trump sought Monday to turn a White House “briefing” on the coronavirus pandemic into a campaign pitch for his re-election.

To their credit, two major cable news networks — CNN and MSNBC — decided that viewers did not need to see a propaganda video in place of what was supposed to be an analysis of the federal government’s response to the worldwide health crisis.

Fox News, of course, stayed with it, no doubt to Trump’s pleasure. That’s their call.

I want to applaud CNN and MSBNC for exhibiting sound news judgment in deciding that Trump’s self-aggrandization should not be part of a sober assessment of a health crisis that has killed more than 20,000 Americans and sickened more than a half-million of us; and be sure, those numbers might be far fewer than the reality, given the shocking shortage of testing equipment to determine the actual infection rate.

You can take this to the bank as well: Donald Trump is going to ramp up his war against what he labels falsely the “fake news media” outlets that refuse to pander to his every wish.

He doesn’t grasp — or refuses to grasp — the principle behind a “free press.” The principle that he ignores is that the media do not work for him; they work for the public.

That likely won’t stop the Imbecile in Chief from going ballistic against the media who, I hasten to add one more time, are just doing their job.

national news

Trump’s ignorance puts Americans in jeopardy

Donald Trump has emerged as a threat not only to our national security but now to the health and well being of rank-and-file Americans.

Consider what he told Fox News’ Sean Hannity, as reported by Yahoo! News:

“A lot of people will have this and it’s very mild. They’ll get better very rapidly. They don’t even see a doctor, they don’t even call a doctor. You never hear about those people,” Trump told Fox News host Sean Hannity. “So you can’t put them down in the category of the overall population in terms of this corona flu and or virus. So you just can’t do that. So, if you know, we have thousands or hundreds of thousands of people that get better just by, you know, sitting around and even going to work. Some of them go to work, but they get better.”

A word to the wise and the unsuspecting: Do not go to work if you have the coronavirus!

What troubles many of us is that a lot of Americans who continue to hang onto the Medical Expert in Chief’s words will take him seriously when he blathers such nonsense.

Thus, in my view, the president of the United States — the fellow who swore on a Bible to protect us — instead is putting many of us in danger of getting potentially deathly ill.

Why and how? I can’t explain the why. The how is simple: Donald Trump is an ignorant buffoon who says whatever he thinks will benefit him politically.

national news

Standing with a courageous GOP senator

I want to stand with an embattled Republican U.S. senator who chose to honor his sacred oath rather than following a path toward blind partisan fealty.

Mitt Romney, the GOP’s 2012 presidential nominee, voted to convict Donald John Trump on an allegation of abuse of power when the Senate cast its vote to acquit the current president.

That has brought a barrage of scorn and recrimination from Trump’s loyalists. One of them is Fox News talker Jeanine Pirro, a former judge from New York who said this, according to The Guardian: “get the hell out of the United States Senate,” while claiming that “your dream of endearing yourself to the Trump-hating left is a joke.”

Sigh …

Pirro doesn’t know what she’s talking about.

Sen. Romney, a freshman from Utah, is more of a Republican than Pirro or her Fox pals ever have been or ever hope to be. He is a man of deep religious faith. He takes the oath he took to deliver “impartial justice” as seriously as he could take any oath he’s ever taken.

So he voted to convict Trump on a single charge brought to the Senate from the House of Representatives impeachment. Trump was still acquitted. Romney’s vote didn’t matter, a point he made while declaring his intention to cast a “guilty” vote in a speech on the Senate floor.

I am reminded a bit by a former Republican House member I got to know well while I worked as editorial page editor of the Amarillo Globe-News.

Larry Combest represented the 19th Congressional District, which for a time included the southern portion of Amarillo. In the mid-1990s, Combest resisted a GOP-led farm policy overhaul. It was called “Freedom to Farm.” Combest stuck it in then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s eye when he opposed the Freedom to Farm legislation.

Gingrich demanded loyalty to the party platform. Combest was unwilling to grant it. Why? Because the farmers and ranchers in West Texas — for whom Combest worked — opposed the legislation. Combest was more loyal to them than to the House party leadership.

Accordingly, Mitt Romney was more loyal to the oath he took than to the president of the United States. Mitt Romney didn’t get my vote for POTUS in 2012. He gets my undying respect now.