Tag Archives: Joe Biden

legal news

Will they be ‘respectful’?

US. Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz will have plenty of explaining to do if they follow their partisan instincts and vote against the historic nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to join the U.S. Supreme Court.

These two are Texas’s senators on Capitol Hill. They both opposed Judge Jackson’s previous appointment to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. They both pledge to give President Biden’s pick for the high court respect, while ensuring a vigorous vetting of her credentials to become the sixth woman and the first Black woman ever to join to the nation’s highest court.

President Biden promised to find a jurist with unassailable legal credentials. By most accounts, he hit a home run with Judge Jackson’s nomination. He also promised to select a Black woman if he got the chance to nominate someone to the court; he got that chance when Justice Stephen Breyer announced he would retire this summer at the end of the court’s term.

If senators are going to judge a nominee on her credentials, on her legal scholarship, on her temperament then Judge Jackson should sail through. That won’t be senators’ measuring stick. They’re going to look for reasons to oppose someone — if we’re truthful — simply because she was selected by a president of the opposing party.

“Ultimately, I will be looking to see whether Judge Jackson will uphold the rule of law and call balls and strikes, or if she will legislate from the bench in pursuit of a specific agenda,” Cornyn said. Well … isn’t that special? The senior U.S. senator from Texas, I presume, would have us believe that judges selected by Republican presidents have no “specific agenda.”

https://www.texastribune.org/2022/02/25/ted-cruz-john-cornyn-ketanji-brown-jackson/

I guess I need to remind the senator of what Donald Trump promised when he selected Justice Amy Coney Barrett to join the court after Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in 2020. Trump promised to select someone who would overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark ruling that legalized abortion. Isn’t that finding a jurist with a specific agenda? Yes! It most certainly is such a thing!

I also should add that Donald Trump insisted on justices who would “legislate from the bench.” Are you paying attention, Sen. Cruz?

Judge Jackson is a first-rate nominee to join the Supreme Court. Sens. Cornyn and Cruz must be held to their pledges to give her a respectful confirmation hearing.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

International news, national news

Time to come together

The world is reeling as Russian armed forces storm their way toward the capital city of Ukraine. They are meeting ferocious resistance from Ukrainians defending their sovereign nation against the invaders. They have earned the world’s support against the aggressors.

So, what has been the response in the United States? At one level, we see ordinary American citizens marching in unison in support of Ukraine. They fly the Ukrainian flag, wear the blue and yellow colors of that banner.

However, some politicians — namely Republicans in Washington — have chosen to politicize it all. They blame President Biden for Russia’s singular act of aggression. According to the Dallas Morning News editorial published today:

Just as President Joe Biden announced sanctions against Russia, the official Twitter account for U.S. House Republicans posted a tweet. It said: “This is what weakness on the world stage looks like.” And it included a photo of Biden walking away from a podium.

Later in the week, two Texas Republicans — U.S. Rep. Van Taylor and Sen. Ted Cruz — seized the moment to continue that narrative. Both rightly voiced support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and global efforts to save it, but then quickly pivoted to blame Biden for the invasion.

Taylor cites Biden’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan and scuttling of the Keystone XL Pipeline project as examples of the president emboldening Putin. Likewise, Cruz tweeted: “Biden’s weakness, both in general and his surrender on Nord Stream 2, undeniably facilitated Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.” And in another tweet, Cruz said, “America’s adversaries took note of Biden’s weakness and incompetence around the withdrawal from Afghanistan. That disaster alone increased the threats of our rivals attacking our allies ten-fold.”

https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/editorials/2022/02/26/can-we-not-agree-that-putin-is-the-aggressor/

It is disappointing in the extreme for me to read about the conduct of my congressman, Van Taylor, who supposedly prides himself on working with Democrats. He claims credit for being non-partisan when the need arises.

Well, what in the hell does Rep. Taylor need to persuade him that such a need has arisen as the nation seeks a cogent response to Vladimir Putin’s act of aggression?

Ted Cruz? He’s a lost cause!

The time arrived the moment the tanks started rolling across the border into Ukraine for this nation to rally behind the commander in chief’s efforts to respond appropriately to an aggressive act.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

What is the State of our Union?

President Biden is getting ready to deliver a speech that many of us have waited to hear. He will stand before a joint session of Congress and after a few opening remarks and perhaps a quip or two he will tell us about the State of our Union.

He is likely to make a declaration that starts out, “My fellow Americans, the State of our Union is … “

Is it “strong”? Is it “weak”? Is it “troubled”? Is it a mixed bag of all of the above and perhaps even something none of us can quantify?

Were I advising the president, I would urge him to offer a “strong” description of our Union’s current condition. Not because all is well and good. But because I cling to the hope that despite our trouble and anxiety that Americans’ collective strength will see us through it all.

Our political structure is roiling under The Big Lie that too many politicians continue to foster about the 2020 presidential election. Congress is examining whether a former POTUS incited an insurrection against our democratic process; I believe he did, but I am not in a position to make an official declaration.

We’re facing down in real time a serious threat by Russia against Ukraine. Our NATO allies stand ready to defend Ukraine if they deem it necessary.

Our economy, while it is exhibiting tangible strength, continues to struggle with raging inflation.

And yes, the pandemic is waning … at least for now.

President Biden will stand before a Congress divided by suspicion among its members toward each other and by those on one side of the great divide who continue to resist any effort on the president’s part to actually govern responsibly.

We’ll wait for the applause lines and we’ll watch the Democratic half of Congress cheer while Republicans sit on their hands. It will disgust many of us.

The Union’s strength lies in the people who are the real bosses. It isn’t the congressional leaders who seek to guide federal policy while ignoring the will of those they govern.

I don’t know what President Biden will declare about the strength of our nation at the State of the Union speech he will deliver in a few days. I just hope he tells us we are stronger than the forces that seek to divide us and tear at the fabric of our nation’s greatness.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

International news

Is invasion going awry?

Can it be that the world is witnessing an international bully getting his comeuppance not only from the nation he seeks to bring under his control but also from the people over whom he rules with an iron fist?

Russia launched an invasion of Ukraine. One sovereign nation has attacked another one for reasons that remain something of a mystery to me and to others around the world.

Russian goon/strongman Vladimir Putin’s invasion was thought to be a cakewalk. It isn’t. The Ukrainians are putting up a stout fight against the Russian invaders. The Russian army isn’t racing headlong across the Ukrainian landscape without resistance.

President Biden has levied a series of punishing economic sanctions. Today the president announced sanctions against Putin himself and against his top aides. Moreover, commercial air carriers are severing ties with Aeroflot, the Russian national airline. The Russians are being banned from international sporting activities. Top-flight Russian athletes — tennis stars, hockey stars for instance — are declaring their public opposition to the war that Putin has launched.

Then there’s this: Russians in Moscow are demonstrating against the war. Russian police are arresting protesters. Putin is hearing from city streets that the people he governs are rising up against his seemingly pointless invasion of Ukraine.

Vladimir Putin has been cast as a pariah. It is good to wonder how he likes the role he is playing on the world stage.

Still, we are witnessing a dangerous event in world history.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

Waiting for phony SCOTUS objections

Let the debate begin now that President Biden has presented us with a historic selection for the U.S. Supreme Court. What will intrigue me for certain are the phony objections that U.S. senators are going to present as they argue against the nomination of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to become the latest justice on the nation’s highest court.

The trumped-up objections will come from Republicans in the Senate. They will cling to ridiculous notions that Joe Biden engaged in an “affirmative action” hire in selecting Judge Jackson. Why? Because as a presidential candidate in 2020, Joe Biden promised to nominate a Black woman to the court if he got the chance. Justice Stephen Breyer delivered that chance to President Biden when he declared his intention to retire from the court at the end of its current term.

The president vowed to find a stellar jurist. He found her in the person of Ketanji Brown Jackson. There should be no debate over her qualifications.

I want to make the point that I have sought to make for many years when these nominations come forward. Elections have consequences. I have said so when Republican presidents have made these nominations, as well as when Democrats do so. President Biden’s election in 2020 means that he gets the chance to deliver on his constitutional duty, which he has done.

Judge Jackson by all accounts is a first-rate, top-drawer, stellar jurist. She has a well-rounded background in the law, serving as a public defender as well as a prosecutor.

I am not going to listen to those who gripe about President Biden’s decision to look exclusively for a Black woman to fill this important lifetime post. Ronald Reagan made a similar pledge in in 1980, as did Donald Trump in 2020. They both delivered on their pledges and Republicans said not a single thing to object to their commitments.

Whatever phony excuse they come up with now should be greeted with all the derision they deserve.

Ketanji Brown Jackson deserves to take her seat on the nation’s highest court … period.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

Judge Jackson must become Justice Jackson

Prediction time, if you’ll indulge me for a moment or two. Ketanji Brown Jackson is going to get a superior rating from the American Bar Association; her record as a lawyer and a jurist will be pored over by the Senate; and some Republican soreheads in the Senate are going to concoct some phony reasons for opposing confirming her for a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court.

President Biden made history today by nominating Judge Jackson to fill the seat held by Justice Stephen Breyer, who is retiring at the end of the court’s current term. Biden promised during the 2020 presidential campaign to look for an African American woman to nominate for the high court and today he delivered.

He found a first-rate jurist in Judge Jackson, who currently serves on the D.C. Court of Appeals. She once clerked for Justice Breyer. She had a stellar career in private practice. Moreover, she once served as a public defender, coming to the defense of those who couldn’t afford to pay for legal counsel.

President Biden took specific note of Jackson’s temperament, her outlook on the law and her life experience as the daughter of two educators — one of whom (her father) eventually earning a law degree. Her brothers have served in law enforcement, and she is married to a prominent physician.

She got a law degree from Harvard and possesses a sparkling legal mind.

Look for the pretexts to oppose to come forth. They will come from Senate Republicans who will contend that speciously that they dislike the way Joe Biden narrowed his search to find a competent, front-rank lawyer among the many African American women who fit that bill.

One prominent Senate Republican, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina — who lobbied hard for a woman from his home state, Judge Michelle Childs — has stated that the “far left won” with the president’s choice of Judge Jackson. I do hope Sen. Graham will put his hurt feelings aside and look objectively and fairly at Judge Jackson’s background and legal temperament before deciding how he intends to vote.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin promises a swift confirmation process. He wants the committee to make its recommendation no later than Easter. Good!

It is time for the Senate to get busy … and confirm this stellar jurist to the U.S. Supreme Court.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

Oh … now for the SCOTUS pick

2 Comments

What? You mean there’s another story brewing far from the battlefield in Ukraine? Oh, yeah! We’ve got this U.S. Supreme Court matter to resolve, which is what President Biden is about to do by naming the first black woman to the nation’s highest court.

Judge Ketanji Brown-Jackson is about to be nominated by Biden to fill the vacancy created by the retirement of Justice Stephen Breyer. This goes to show that President Biden is able to, shall we say, “compartmentalize” his thought processes. He can levy punishing economic sanctions on Russia for invading Ukraine and in his next move interview qualified candidates for the Supreme Court and then select one of them for the lifetime appointment.

Biden reportedly looked at three finalists for the job. They all are first-rate jurists. Judge Ketanji Brown-Jackson once clerked for Justice Breyer and she sits on the D.C. Circuit Court in the seat once held by Attorney General Merrick Garland.

She has a varied legal background, serving as a public defender and a prosecutor. I like the public defender aspect of her career; it gives her a unique perspective that other justices lack when they ponder criminal appeals that come to the highest court in America.

President Biden hopes his nominee wins some Republican support in the Senate. I believe the judge will be confirmed with a bipartisan vote. She has been confirmed already twice for lower-court appointments.

The president vowed to select an African American woman to the court. He kept his pledge. What’s more, he said the nominee would be highly qualified. He kept that pledge, too.

Judge Jackson-Brown’s confirmation won’t change the ideological balance on the court; it will remain a 6-to-3 conservative majority panel. However, the next Supreme Court official photo will look different, with four women sitting with their five male colleagues on a court that didn’t welcome its first female member until 1981.

Let’s not forget as well that Ronald Reagan made a similar pledge while running for the presidency in 1980 to select a woman to the court.

Let the confirmation process move forward with all deliberate speed.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

International news, local news, national news, political news

Rookie pol makes ass of himself

Ronny Jackson is new to this game of politics, but barely a year into his gig as a member of Congress he has established himself as a darling of the far-right wing of the Republican Party, which makes his comments about the Russia-Ukraine war worthy of a brief retort from your friendly blogger.

Jackson, who represents the 13th Congressional District of the Texas Panhandle, said this via Twitter about the invasion that began just a few hours ago:

WHERE IS JOE BIDEN!? Is he even AWAKE right now!? The absence of leadership from this White House is SICKENING! This war should’ve NEVER happened!

Hmm. Wow! There you have the ramblings of a former Navy flag officer, a former physician and a carpetbagger who moved to Amarillo specifically to run for political office. He detests President Biden, who I actually wonder if he gives a crap about what this neophyte politician says about him. Joe Biden has many bigger and more important issues to concern himself.

However, Jackson does have a following — I presume. He did get elected to Congress after trumpeting his close ties to The Donald. Furthermore, the ex-doc keeps offering peanut-gallery diagnoses challenging Joe Biden’s mental acuity. Now, when the president of the United States is trying to rally the nation to his resistance to the unprovoked invasion of Ukraine by the tyrant who runs Russia, Ronny Jackson provides this kind of brainless rebuke of the commander in chief.

I hope my friends in the Texas Panhandle are proud of themselves for sending this nitwit to Congress.

If I could ask Jackson any question at this moment, it would be: How would you have prevented Putin from invading Ukraine?

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

International news

No surprise that Trump would praise Putin

Does anyone really profess to be surprised or amazed that Donald Trump would heap praise on Vladimir Putin over his attempted takeover of a sovereign nation?

Donald, let us remember, once referred to North Korean Marxist dictator Kim Jong Un as a “smart cookie,” and professed to have “fallen in love” with the guy who starves his people to death while living in luxury and spending lots of money developing nuclear weapons.

He also has lamented how strongmen in other countries get tons of praise from local media, apparently ignoring the obvious fact that the government in those countries control the media; that ain’t the case in the United States of America, where the nation’s founders took great care to ensure that the media are free of government interference.

Now he calls his pal Vlad’s declaring the independence of two breakaway Ukraine provinces “savvy” for making that statement. All Putin did was provoke President Biden into invoking economic sanctions against Russia.

Yeah, Donald loves dictators. He wishes he could become one of them. Indeed, he made an effort at it on 1/6 in his effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

The dipsh** should be heading for prison.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news, State news

Keep blathering about vote fraud … Donald

You know what? I think I am going to offer Donald J. Trump some campaign advice going into the upcoming election season — and I don’t mean the 2022 midterm election, but rather the 2024 presidential election.

It is this: Go ahead, Donald, and keep yapping about the “stolen” election in which you lost to President Biden. Please, keep reminding Americans of all political stripes what a complete ass you have made of yourself by (a) not conceding defeat in a free, fair and legal election and (b) questioning the integrity of an electoral system run at the local level by dedicated public servants.

Trump keeps repeating The Big Lie. Great! Go for it, Donald! Your resistance to forgetting the past kinda reminds me of how Ann Richards lost her re-election bid for Texas governor back in 1994. A novice pol named George W. Bush defeated Richards by staying focused on his campaign talking points, as well as by the incumbent governor’s own refusal to offer a vision on how she would govern the state for the next four years.

I recall well how it was watching that campaign unfold. Richards sought to live on the laurels of her election in 1990 in a race she was supposed to lose to Midland oil mogul Clayton Williams, who then destroyed his own campaign through a major gaffe about comparing rape to the bad weather, suggesting women should just “relax and enjoy it.”

So, we fast-forward to today and we hear Trump continuing to yap, yowl and yammer about “massive voter fraud” that did not exist in 2020. It didn’t. Honest! It was fair and legal. Just like the folks assigned to protect its security promised it would be.

Trump, though, keeps living in the past. He keeps reciting The Big Lie. He keeps losing court battles over myriad issues and legal challenges.

Stay with it, Donald. If it makes you feel like you’re going to win the hearts and minds of voters whose support you would need in your futile and feckless attempt to get back into office, then … what the hell?

Go for it! Few things would make me happier than to watch your political career go down in flames.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Commentary on politics, current events and life experience