Tag Archives: Joe Biden

national news

Government no longer ‘the problem’?

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Ronald W. Reagan stood on the Capitol steps on Jan. 20, 1981 and declared that “government is the problem.”

President Joseph R. Biden stood inside the House chamber on Wednesday night and said, well, something quite different, that government can repair what ails many Americans.

So it is that the “era of big government” is returning to the forefront of American life. I have slightly mixed feelings about that, although I do endorse much of what President Biden wants to bring to the lives of Americans ravaged by a global pandemic and the economic hardship that accompanied it.

I endorse Biden’s call for comprehensive immigration reform. I believe the government needs to make permanent the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals program — which lends a hand to those who were brought here illegally as children by their parents.

The nation’s infrastructure as Biden has defined it needs government help. I endorse the president’s plan to tax the wealthiest Americans more to pay for much of his big agenda.

Free community college for every student? Hmm. Not sure about that one.

Climate change poses an existential threat to our national security and, yes, government has a role to play in stemming the impact of the change on our fragile planet.

Joe Biden’s speech Wednesday night wasn’t a stemwinder. It didn’t move Americans to jump into the fight fully. It was, however, far from the dark, forbidding speech that Donald J. Trump gave at his inaugural in 2017.

Although, I do want to say that Biden’s speech did contain at least one reference that might stand the test of time, which is that the Jan. 6 insurrection was the worst such act “since the Civil War.”

President Biden has laid out an aggressive government agenda. He said that inaction is not an option, that Congress must seize the moment and act on behalf of an entire generation.

Oh, I am certain that the Republicans who occupy a hefty minority in both congressional chambers will dig in on their opposition to anything that comes from the Democratic administration. It is their modus operandi.

I stand, though, as one American patriot who welcomes the return of our federal government as a last resort to helping Americans who continue to suffer from a killer virus.

Joe Biden

Not a SOTU, but it sounded like one

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden never once tonight uttered the words “The state of our Union is … “ whatever, but he might as well have said as much.

His speech that went more than an hour long before a sparse gathering of members of Congress had the sound and feel of a State of the Union speech.

It was his first such speech and it took place in an extraordinary environment. The COVID pandemic is still raging and it kept most of those who normally attend presidential speeches before a joint congressional session away.

Biden spoke to us in varying vocal tones. He whispered at times. Biden didn’t bellow exactly the way his immediate predecessor would do.

Yeah, I noticed that he got few hand claps from Republicans gathered before him, although he did get them to stand and applaud when he declared his intention to rid the world of cancer “once and for all.”

So here we go. President Biden is now 100 days into a new administration. The second 100 days well could be even more consequential than the first 100.

I will wait patiently for when we can see the president deliver a speech to us before a packed House chamber.

national news

‘Old man in a hurry’?

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Leave it to the Brits to put American politics in some form of perspective that we might not always recognize on this side of The Pond.

A BBC broadcast on NPR this morning was talking about President Biden’s aggressive agenda. He sought, and received, a $1.9 trillion COVID relief package. Now he is going after a $2.2 trillion infrastructure reform package that he wants enacted by the Fourth of July. Biden also is pressing hard for gun control legislation that doesn’t plow under the Second Amendment to our Constitution.

The British analyst — whose name escapes me at the moment — then offered a tart description of the president, calling him an “old man in a hurry.”

Well, there you go.

Joe Biden is by far the oldest man ever elected president. He is 78 years of age. He turns 79 in November. Were he to run for re-election in 2024, he would do so at the tender age of 82.

Why does this matter? Let’s see. It matters because President Biden knows — as someone who has buried two of his children — how fragile this Earthly existence can be. His infant daughter died in a horrific car crash in 1972 along with the first Mrs. Biden; his two sons were grievously injured in that tragic event.

The older of his sons then contracted glioblastoma — an aggressive form of brain cancer — and died in 2015 at the age of 46.

Joe Biden campaigned for the presidency partly by reminding us of his humanity and how he appreciates the fragility of our life on this good Earth.

In that context I presume you can say that time is no human being’s friend. Father Time becomes even more menacing to those of us who have logged the amount of time that Joe Biden has racked up already.

Just as Bill Clinton told us in the 1990s that the “era of big government is over,” Joe Biden has taken an entirely different approach. Big government must serve the people who pay for it, or so it appears to be when President Biden discusses the big things he wants done.

The backdrop, though, is indisputable. Joseph Biden Jr. is an old man who I hope with all my heart remains in good health. However, old men such as Joe Biden cannot depend fully on anything in life.

Yes, the president appears to be in a hurry. I cannot blame him for wanting to get things done … as in right now!

national news

GOP needs to retool itself

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

After every presidential election cycle, the party that loses the contest — particularly if they lose it in a landslide — announces plans to engage in self-examination.

The Republican Party made that declaration after Mitt Romney lost to President Barack Obama in 2012, seeking ways to expand its appeal to include more racial minorities. What happened then? Donald Trump became the party nominee in 2016 and he went on to win the White House.

Eek! Then he lost his re-election effort to President Joe Biden. Admittedly, it wasn’t by a landslide. Now, though, the party is having to face its own mortality, given the stranglehold that the Trump cult has placed around the GOP neck.

If ever a political party needed a retooling, it’s the Republican Party of 2021, which now contains two disparate elements: the establishment wing and the Trump wing.

I’ll be brutally honest on this point. I don’t really give a crap-ola which way the GOP tilts. I don’t find either wing of the party to be all that enticing. Of the two wings, I much prefer to deal directly with the establishmentarians among Republicans. The Trumpkins? No way in hell, man!

The GOP, though, faces a struggle the likes of which it hasn’t seen. It reminds me a bit of the internal struggle the Democratic Party went through after its 1972 crushing under President Nixon’s landslide victory. The party sought to remake its image. It produced a maverick nominee four years later, Jimmy Carter, who managed to win the White House. He served for a term then got his headed handed to him by another maverick, GOP nominee Ronald Reagan, who then remade the Republican Party into what it became before Trump hijacked it in 2016.

This much is clear to me: The Republican Party needs to cleanse itself of the toxic formula brewed by Trump and his acolytes if it is going to be taken seriously as a legitimate forced with which Democrats must reckon.

national news

No ‘designated survivor’?

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden is going to stand before a sparse gathering of officials Wednesday night for his first speech to a joint congressional session.

Here, though, is a strange wrinkle: There will be no “designated survivor” among the Cabinet members who can step into the office in the event of a catastrophe.

The COVID pandemic is going to limit the audience to 200 people. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will be present, along with Vice President Kamala Harris, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate President pro-tem Patrick Leahy. Harris, Pelosi, Leahy and Blinken all, in that order, would succeed to the presidency if something happened to those ahead of them in the line of succession.

So, were something to happen, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen would be the next to step into the office.

No designated survivor for Biden’s first joint address to Congress (msn.com)

Nothing is going to happen. Let’s stipulate that much.

It does kind of give me the creeps nonetheless to comprehend how much this pandemic has upset everything.

medical news

COVID: still worrisome

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden’s latest amendment to the COVID mandates he has sought has produced a cause for worry.

Biden now echoes a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommendation that says it’s OK to go without masks when we’re outdoors. The CDC also cautions against mingling with large crowds of people.

The worry? It comes because I fear too many of us will ignore the caveat laid out there by CDC and the president.

Biden and his medical team are trumpeting the vaccines — all three of them — that are being injected into human bodies. About 30 percent of the U.S. population has received at least one dose. West Virginia is now offering cold cash money to residents who are resisting the inoculation. I get that we are turning the proverbial corner against the killer pandemic.

Dang it, though! We need to continue to exercise what’s been called “an abundance of caution.”

My wife and I are fully vaccinated. So are our son and daughter-in-law. Their two older sons are as well. Our granddaughter is not yet … but she’s a young’n. We feel comfortable going without masks when we’re in their presence, as we do with our older son who lives elsewhere but who is about to receive his second vaccine.

I just don’t want there to be some mad rush toward “normal living” by those who have grown tired of the masks, of the social distancing, of the incessant hand-washing.

We all can see that so-called light at the end of it all, but we still have some distance to go.

national news

GOP testing POTUS’s patience

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(AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Every human being who’s ever lived has limits to his or her patience.

My strong sense is that the today’s Republican Party leadership is testing the wellspring of patience that rests within President Biden.

If only the GOP honchos would wean themselves of the Big Lie being fed to them by Donald J. Trump and his minions about the 2020 election. If only the Republican hierarchy would divest its interest in seeking to overturn a free and fair election. If only they would act as American patriots instead of lunatic wackos.

Trump sits on the sidelines these days. He isn’t silent. He keeps yammering about the phony vote fraud that has prompted the “audit” of Arizona’s election returns. He continues to suggest the election was stolen. He never provides a scintilla of proof for any of the outrageous lies he keeps repeating.

Yet the GOP congressional leadership keeps gobbling it up. It presents itself as being responsible stewards of our federal government. They aren’t. They are responsible only to the former Imbecile in Chief. Damn few of them can say a single critical word about the Big Lie.

Meanwhile, we have a president who wants to enact some big programs. We are fighting a pandemic. We are trying to recover economically from the havoc it has brought. President Biden cannot get the GOP to sign on to what should be a bipartisan effort. Why is that? Because too many of the loyal opposition’s leadership is too wedded to the Big Lie.

The president’s patience surely has its limits.

national news

POTUS to speak to sparse ‘crowd’

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Joe Biden campaigned for the presidency in the midst of a pandemic, meaning that he avoided staging big campaign rallies.

As president, he is getting set to speak to a joint session of Congress this week. Hmm. Guess what … the House of Representatives chamber will contain a fraction of the number of people who usually listen to these speeches.

The Cabinet won’t be there. Only the Supreme Court chief justice, John Roberts, will be present, with the rest of the court staying away. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Army Gen. Mark Milley will represent the military brass. Members of the House and Senate will be there. First lady Jill Biden and second gentleman Doug Emhoff will be in the VIP section, but they will be virtually unaccompanied.

But … the event will show off a bit of history-making. Sitting behind President Biden will be two women: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Vice President Kamala Harris.

I understand they’ll be masked up, as will the audience in the chamber.

An earlier blog post wondered how the partisans will react. Will they cheer the president’s arrival? Will they stand and applaud when Speaker Pelosi introduces him?

I am not going to obsess over things we cannot control. I am, however, going to applaud the precautions that the powers that be are taking to avoid creating one of those “super spreader” events.

After all, the pandemic is still raging.

national news

Time and money wasted

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

You need to pay careful attention to what I intend to say here, which is that an invaluable amount of time and money is being spent in Arizona to determine whether a free and fair election was conducted, well … freely and fairly.

Spoiler alert: It was conducted fairly and was relatively corruption-free.

That, however, is not dissuading Arizona Republican Party officials from conducting an “audit” of more than 2 million ballots cast in the state’s largest county, Maricopa, which — I hasten to add — voted for Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee for president in 2020.

Now, to be fair, the Biden margin of victory over Donald J. Trump wasn’t huge. It was only a little more than 45,000 votes out of the total cast in the sprawling county. Will the election audit produce the kind of swing that GOP loons want to occur? Hah! I wouldn’t bet your sturdiest pair of jeans on that happening.

And what do you suppose it would do to the overall Electoral College outcome if by some miracle that hell freezes over and they overturn the election result in Arizona? Not a damn thing. Joe Biden still would be elected president and Donald Trump still would be banished to his posh south Florida resort.

The Arizona Republic reported:

Former President Donald Trump on Friday praised GOP senators in Arizona for their “tireless efforts” to recount millions of Maricopa County ballots, predicting the massive review would produce startling findings.

Despite prior audits — and a host of election lawsuits — failing to turn up evidence of Joe Biden “stealing” the presidency, Trump thanked the lawmakers for “the incredible job they are doing in exposing the large scale voter fraud” in the 2020 election.

Startling findings? Hah! There he goes again, fomenting the Big Lie about phony vote fraud.

Arizona election audit updates: Pause in recount appears off as Democrats won’t post bond (msn.com)

I am going to say this for as long as I can string a cogent thought or two together: There was no rampant vote fraud in the 2020 election.

Think for just a moment about this fact: If you are an election official anywhere in the United States and you know about the Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, you are going to work double- and triple-overtime to ensure that the process is squeaky clean.

Does anyone with a half a noodle in their skull believe there was anything approaching the hanky-panky that Trump and his cabal of goons suggest occurred?

Donald Trump talked about the media being the “enemy of the people.” He has it all wrong. The 45th president of the United States is the enemy we all should fear.

economic news

POTUS: Someone has to pay for what we need

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden’s many decades in government taught him a hard lesson, which is that everything the government does comes with a cost.

Taxpayers have to foot the bill.

He pushed a COVID relief package through Congress. He now wants to enact an infrastructure overhaul through the legislative body. Both of them together are projected at around $4 trillion.

Ouch … yes? Yes, but here’s the deal: In order to pay for all this, the president seeks to levy taxes on the wealthiest Americans. Now he is talking about an increase in capital gains taxes.

Donald Trump talked about infrastructure deals, too. Nothing happened. Congress didn’t move anything through. The president never articulated a way to pay for whatever it was he wanted done. He seemed to suggest that the tax cuts he rammed through Congress would jumpstart the economy sufficiently so that any major government project would pay for itself.

It didn’t happen. Then the pandemic brought the economy to its knees.

Trump lost his re-election bid and now a new president is trying to craft a workable plan to pay for a massive effort to rebuild our economy.

The tax plan already pushed out there will not increase taxes to a level prior to the cut enacted during the Trump years. It still gives congressional Republicans fits, so they’ll fit it along with everything else that the Democratic president proposes.

Reasonableness be damned!