Tag Archives: Joe Biden

national news

Another big date looms

We have just marked the first year since the 1/6 assault on our democratic system of government and now we’re about to take a look back at another landmark date that — to my mind — is actually worth celebrating as an “anniversary.”

This coming Thursday will be one year since Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. became the 46th president of the United States. His predecessor wasn’t there for the ceremony. He had jetted off to south Florida to stir up the brew known as The Big Lie about President Biden’s election in November 2020.

The very idea that we’re still talking about POTUS 45 is remarkable in the extreme. I don’t know if that’s by the ex-Liar in Chief’s design or if it is the result of the media’s lust for sensational headlines.

But … here we are, talking about the seditious moron who masqueraded for four years as our head of state and our commander in chief.

Good grief. So help me I want him to disappear. As long as he continues to make news — and I am afraid it’s legitimate news, given the stakes involved — I will feel the need to comment on what he’s doing, saying and plotting against the government he once swore an oath to protect.

My fondest hope is that the feds come up with enough evidence to warrant his arrest. I am actually fantasizing over the sight of him being hauled off in cuffs and leg irons.

Hey, do you remember how he ridiculed police for protecting bad guys’ heads when they loaded them into police cruisers? Another fantasy would be to see the cops rough him up the way he wanted them to treat street thugs.

Well, I want to wish the current president well as he embarks on his second year in office. Yeah, the first year has had its ups and downs. I remain strongly in his corner as he moves us farther away from the dark era of his immediate predecessor.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

How does POTUS reach the other side?

President Biden today — and I shall borrow a phrase — was “preaching to the choir” when my wife and I tuned in to listen to his speech commemorating the year since 1/6.

We believe what he said about the cause of the riot on Capitol Hill; we endorse the notion that his presidential predecessor is more interested in “power than in principle”; we shudder at the belief that we witnessed a year ago the first direct assault on our democracy by those loyal to the individual who lost a free and fair election.

My question as I watched the president and Vice President Harris speak to us this morning was this: How in name of all that is sacred in our democracy do these officials reach those who need to understand the truth of what they are saying?

Those would be the cultists who continue to believe The Big Lie that the former POTUS keeps alive, that the 2020 election was stolen.

I simply want to highlight briefly something to which Biden alluded during his remarks given in Statuary Hall … that Republicans actually performed well down the ballot in November 2020 and that no one has challenged the results of those returns. Oh, no. Biden reminded us that the only challenge has come from the former president and his cultists regarding the race at the very top of the ballot. How come?

Oh, it’s because the former president lost that one and that his “bruised ego” won’t let him accept that he lost the most secure, most examined election in our nation’s history.

President Biden need not convince those of us who live in this North Texas home. He needs somehow to reach those who continue to believe The Big Lie.

I wish the president all the very best as he embarks on that effort.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news, State news

Cruz misfires with impeachment threat

(Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

Ted Cruz has lost his marbles. His butter has slipped off his noodles. He has gone ’round the bend. He is nuttier than a Snickers bar.

The junior U.S. senator from Texas — the guy who once described Donald Trump as a “sniveling coward” but then became Trump’s primo suck-up senator — believes President Biden can be impeached if Republicans take command of the House after the midterm election.

According to the Texas Tribune: “​​Democrats weaponized impeachment,” he said, referring to House Democrats twice voting to impeach former President Donald Trump. “They used it for partisan purposes to go after Trump because they disagreed with him. And one of the real disadvantages of doing that … is the more you weaponize it and turn it into a partisan cudgel, you know, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.”

https://www.texastribune.org/2022/01/04/ted-cruz-joe-biden-impeachment/

Wow! I am trying to catch my breath.

The Cruz Missile has misfired — again! Democrats didn’t impeach Trump for “partisan purposes.” They impeached him for trying to persuade a foreign leader to do him a political favor; then the House impeached Trump for inciting the riot on 1/6. The weaponization of the impeachment process occurred on the Republican side of the great congressional divide when all but a dignified handful of GOP House members and senators decided to give Trump a pass when he clearly committed “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

For Cruz to suggest that President Joe Biden faces potential impeachment if the GOP takes command of the House is tantamount to inviting a constitutional crisis where none should exist.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Uncategorized

Prepare for shellacking

1 Comment
(AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

Dear Mr. President … it’s been a while since I’ve addressed you in a blog post, but here comes a warning for you.

Prepare for an electoral “shellacking,” to borrow a phrase, in the midterm election later this year. President Obama called a similar event in the 2010 midterm that cost y’all control of Congress; Republicans seized control of the legislative chamber. But I don’t need to remind you of that.

Nor do I need to remind you what happened in 2012, when you and the president got re-elected.

The shellacking you can expect to take this year doesn’t portend political doom for the administration you lead. Yes, I am aware your polling doesn’t reflect lots of good cheer for you.

Bear in mind, though, that the liars on the other side of the great divide continue to keep outshouting the truth-tellers.

The economy is recovering at a brisk pace; I feel it and sense it. We have been hit once again by another variant spawned by the coronavirus pandemic, but my gut tells me we’re going to end 2022 in much better health than we are entering it. We have some challenges around the world with which you must deal, but I will continue to have faith in your own legislative leadership experience that I believe will guide you as you confront them.

Much depends, surely, on whom Republicans nominate for the presidential run in 2024. I am sure you heard what Sen. Lindsey Graham — the guy who once described you as one of the “most decent men God ever created” — said about Donald Trump. He said the next election is “Trump’s to lose.” I am maintaining my faith in Americans’ good sense that we won’t go down that path again.

Then again, I also am going to cling to my skepticism that Trump actually runs again.

So, I wish you well in this new year, Mr. President. I stand with you.

I just want you to prepare early for the remarks you will have to give when they count the votes for the midterm election. A “shellacking” appears to be coming your way. Don’t feel you’re the only POTUS to suffer such an indignity. Others have been dealt serious defeats during their first term in office.

Don’t surrender. There well could be a revival at hand, too.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Dear Gov. Abbott: Get real, will ya?

You had me then you lost me, Gov. Greg Abbott.

Perhaps you might not remember when we had a nice professional relationship. You served on the Texas Supreme Court and then later as state attorney general. You would come see us in Amarillo when I worked at the newspaper as its editorial page editor.

I considered you to be a decent fellow. Thoughtful, not terribly partisan, reasonable.

Then you got elected governor in 2014. I was gone from the business when that happened, but I have been watching you closely ever since. Frankly, Gov. Abbott, you have disappointed me.

You keep hammering the federal government over Affordable Care Mandates, or border security issues, over COVID-19 protection measures. You just cannot stop blasting the feds over this and that.

I get that you might want to seek the presidency in 2024. You’re entitled to harbor your ambition. But what the hell? Now you want the feds to send more testing kits to Texas and more antibody material. You keep yammering that President Biden isn’t sending enough of them here. Hey, does it occur to you that Texas is one of 50 states and several territories that also require federal assistance during this pandemic?

I was hoping you might take your even-handed approach to government into the governor’s office when you got elected. Silly me. I was a fool for thinking that would happen.

What is so remarkable about your insistence on federal help now is how you have stiffed the feds — and the president — previously.  You didn’t even have the decency to show up for a photo op with Biden when he came to Texas. He’s the president of everyone and good manners would dictate that you could at least grace him with a handshake for the cameras. But you’re all over the former Liar in Chief when he visited the Texas. What a joke!

Well, enough of this note to you, Gov. Abbott. I just had to get this off my chest. I feel better now.

Happy new year … and stop trying to make political points by your constant bitching about Joe Biden.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

medical news

Dr. Fauci: national hero

People who weaponize lies are killing people.”

That wise phrase came from Dr. Anthony Fauci, who has been the target of “weaponized lies” for about, oh, the past couple of years. The lies are coming from right-wing critics who refuse to accept the truth he is telling about the disease that continues to kill Americans every day.

Some of the more strident critics have talked openly about fitting Fauci with an “orange jump suit.” They want to lock him up. They want to charge him with criminal acts.

This is absurd, ridiculous. It is utter trash.

I am fed up to here with the gutter talk that comes from the right-wingers who are fabricating reasons to oppose the doctor, who happens to be the nation’s foremost infectious disease expert. Donald Trump brought him on board ostensibly to assist the administration in developing an anti-COVID strategy; Fauci sought to do what the president asked, only to have Trump undercut him.

Trump lost the 2020 election and the new POTUS, Joe Biden, came on board. He retained Fauci and has since allowed the learned physician to talk openly to us about what we need to do to escape the clutches of the virus. President Biden has stayed the hell out of the way!

None of that has silenced the critics.

The Fox News blowhards — led by Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity — have led the phony amen chorus calling for Fauci to be charged with some dubious criminal act.

They have allies in Congress who say the same thing. One of them, a Republican who represents the Texas Panhandle, is a former physician and Navy flag officer. Ronny Jackson has picked up the falsehood weaponry and is firing it at Dr. Fauci.

Jackson is a disgrace to the office he occupies.

As for Fauci, I consider him to be a national hero.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

medical news

Rapprochement? Really?

Say it’s so. Then again, it’s an impossibility, given what these two men have said to and about each other for, oh, the past two or three years.

There was President Biden offering a word of praise for his immediate predecessor, Donald J. Trump, for declaring he had taken the COVID booster shot and for the speed of the development of the vaccine.

Then came word from Trump that he was “surprised” and “pleased” that his successor would give him a shout out. Trump then said Biden’s kindness makes it difficult for Trump to speak critically of the president.

Hmm. Now, we all know that the two men aren’t likely to call a halt to the name-calling, the insults, the epithets, the nastiness that has brewed between them. I mean, Trump still preaches The Big Lie about the 2020 election being stolen by non-existent widespread voter fraud. All of that surely must sting Joe Biden, given the historic nature of his victory and the immense voter turnout that elected him the 46th president of the United States.

There is no rapprochement likely. Then again, stranger events have occurred.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

medical news

POTUS praises ex-POTUS

President Biden today did something worthy of a word of praise, as it shows a largeness of spirit that too often was missing from his immediate predecessor.

Biden today offered a word of praise to Donald J. Trump for getting a booster shot — and admitting to it — and for the development of the vaccines that are protecting 200 million or so Americans from the killer COVID-19 virus and its assorted variants.

Imagine the former POTUS doing such a thing. I know. It wouldn’t happen. It won’t happen.

Biden’s magnanimous spirit comes in the heat of a contentious political climate. His immediate predecessor keeps spewing The Big Lie about “rampant voter fraud” in the 2020 election and yet the man who defeated him in that election found a moment today to toss a bouquet at the former POTUS.

It might that President Biden has an ulterior motive. He well could be appealing to that base of Trump cultists who refuse to get vaccinated. It might be that he is seeking to soften their foolish resistance to the vaccine. Whatever it takes … you know?

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Manchin serves to obstruct

Joe Manchin must think he is the smartest man in politics this side of Donald J. Trump. He knows more than the West Virginia residents he represents in the U.S. Senate.

Why else does he oppose President Biden’s Build Back Better package, the one supported by most West Virginians? Does he know something no one else on Earth knows? Does he really represent the individuals who elect him every six years to the Senate?

Manchin told a TV interviewer today he’s a “no” vote on the $1.7 trillion social spending bill that Biden wants the Senate to approve. Manchin, a Democrat, said he wants to concentrate on COVID-19 relief. Plus, he told “Fox News Sunday,” the national debt is too big, that the BBB bill would add too much to the debt.

Does this signal the death of Build Back Better? No, it doesn’t. Joe Biden is likely to tinker with it — some more. The president doesn’t exhibit any inclination I can detect that he will dig in on every single nickel and dime.

He wants a legislative triumph to go along with the infrastructure bill that Manchin managed to support.

As for the senator from West Virginia, my sense is that he is relishing his fame as a deal-breaker. Never mind all those doggone public opinion polls that tell him his constituents would benefit from the legislation he opposes. He is digging in. A 50-50 Senate split means curtains for the package if Manchin’s resistance holds up.

Yes, I get that West Virginia voted overwhelmingly for Trump in 2020. The former POTUS, though, is on the sidelines. The here and now tells me that Sen. Manchin would do well to listen to what his constituents want. I sense that it isn’t to crush this deal.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Joe Biden

Standing with Joe Biden

(AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

I keep reading about polling that suggests that independent voters and even some who call themselves Democrats are abandoning President Biden’s efforts to “restore our national soul” while enacting legislation aimed at putting people back to work and rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure.

I am not one of either category of American citizen.

Therefore, I want to declare that I continue to stand with the president.

The mean tweets from those on the right annoy me to the max. The refusal by congressional Republicans to set aside their partisan anger when they can do something for the common good is beyond reprehensible.

Yes, there is plenty to frustrate us. Joe Biden predicted at the beginning of the year that we would declare our “independence” from the COVID pandemic by the Fourth of July. I guess he got a bit ahead of himself on that one. Right? Is it the president’s fault? No. It isn’t. Nor is it the fault of the medical team advising him on how to battle this disease. The virus is as unpredictable as any we could imagine. Yet it persists on President Biden’s watch.

I am not going to lay the blame on the recurrence of these virus variants on human beings who are trying their best to rid us of the killer.

Nor will I second-guess the president on myriad economic issues. I continue to endorse the agenda he has laid out. I support the infrastructure bill that Biden signed into law. I want the social spending package to get through Congress and I want him to sign that legislation into law as well. Our roads and bridges are crumbling; we pride ourselves on our transportation infrastructure in Texas but it, too, needs work and the feds are going to provide help to repair it.

Joe Biden continues to conduct himself the way a U.S. president is supposed to do. I admire that about him.

The man has been knocked down, endured tragedy that few others have suffered. Yet he persisted as he served in the Senate, later as vice president and now that he has reached the pinnacle of power and prestige, he continues to have my support.

So, spare me the knock that I am wearing blinders. I can see clearly where Joe Biden wants to take this nation. He can continue to count me — a red-blooded American patriot — to have his back.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com