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GOP has gone bonkers

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Just how wacky has the Republican Party become in the Age of Trump?

Well, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, one of Trump’s strongest allies, got booed when he stood to speak before the George Republican convention. Why were the goober Republicans angry with Kemp? Because the governor wouldn’t force the secretary of state to break the law and “find” enough votes to turn the state from a Joe Biden win to a Donald Trump win.

So, for that the nut jobs have taken their vengeance out on a governor who happens be a Trump ally … but who just couldn’t bring himself to break the law or violate the U.S. Constitution.

This is the kind of goofiness that Republicans are facing as they do battle among themselves, not to mention when they face Democrats in the upcoming midterm election.

Trump loyalists boo Kemp at Georgia’s GOP convention (msn.com)

Of course, Trump is playing the GOP loyalists like the fools they are for following the dictates of the former Dipsh** in Chief. I mean, the ex-POTUS is even a real Republican, but he has fooled ’em into thinking he is one of them.

They are left now to boo and jeer actual Republican politicians — such as Gov. Kemp — only because they won’t follow Trump’s demands out the window.

Weird, man.

Joe Biden

‘Normal’ looks so special

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

A brief conversation with a member of my family brought to mind something I have thought since the Donald Trump Era came to a halt and we welcomed in a new era of “presidential normality.”

My family member couldn’t speak angrily enough about the way Trump conducted himself in office. I responded that my own view is that a “non-traditional presidency” wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing if the president exhibited any form of competence. That is one of the many shortcomings that Trump brought to the office; he didn’t know anything about government and his actions reflected a knee-jerk, chaos-driven philosophy. The man is incompetent. Not to mention crooked, amoral/immoral and narcissistic. Oops, I just did.

Which brings me to this point.

President Biden’s normal approach to governing now looks special in its own right. It’s not that Joe Biden has scored dozens of key legislative victories. He has just one so far: the COVID 19 relief package that passed with zero Republican help. He well could roll up some more wins with only aid from fellow Democrats. That’s fine.

The Trump method just didn’t work. The Biden method — which features attempts at compromise and jaw-boning with the loyal opposition — holds considerable promise … if only the GOP members of Congress would cut the POTUS just a bit of slack. The problem, though, is that the GOP caucus is being dominated by the Loony Bin Wing, the Trump adherents who keep fomenting the Big Lie about 2020 presidential election vote fraud that did not exist.

I am going to stick with the guy who ran for office vowing to “restore our nation’s soul.” He’s got a ways to go before he can declare full restoration. The normal approach to governing, though, looks pretty good to me.

DC riot, national news

Rep. Cheney rules?

(Photo by Marc Piscotty/Getty Images)

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

GREEN RIVER, Wyo. — As we approached the Utah border with Wyoming, I was hoping to receive a unique form of greeting from the state we were entering.

I wanted to see a sign that said something like: Welcome to Wyoming, home of Rep. Liz Cheney, one of the few Republicans in Congress with a backbone.

We didn’t see it. However, as we trekked through this state I am left to wonder a thing or two about the embattled congresswoman.

Allow to me clear the air a bit.

I did not much care for Cheney’s decision to run for the lone U.S. House seat in this marvelous, sprawling and so very scenic state. She is an arch-conservative thinker, the daughter of an equally conservative former Wyoming congressman, defense secretary and vice president. What’s more, I considered her a carpetbagger, given that she did not grow up in this state; she is a child of Washington, D.C., where her dad served for so many years prior to becoming VP during the Bush 43 administration.

She was elected to the House. Then she did something so remarkable that it has given me a reason to rethink some of my original dislike of her as a politician.

Rep. Cheney voted to impeach Donald J. Trump in his second House impeachment. She was one of a handful of GOP lawmakers who agreed with most of the country: Donald Trump incited an insurrection against the government, which at the time of the Jan. 6 riot was certifying President Biden’s election. Trump is still having none of that and Cheney is having none of Trump’s insistence in the Big Lie that he was the victim of some massive electoral theft conspiracy.

She has said so with vigor and passion, so much so that nitwits like Florida U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz — the alleged child molester and sex trafficker — has come to Wyoming to criticize his fellow conservative colleague.

So it is with some measure of gratitude that I wandered through this state knowing that it is represented in the House of Reps by an individual who is willing to stand up the Trump cult of personality.

If only she could take the next step and endorse some of the progressive notions being kicked around by President Biden and his Democratic friends in Congress.

Well, we can’t have all that we want … right?

DC riot

We need a probe into Jan. 6!

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

If only the congressional obstructionist caucus — comprising Republicans, of course — would appreciate the gravity of the attack that occurred on Jan. 6.

They can’t or won’t accede to demands from Democrats that there needs to be a thorough accounting of the insurrection that occurred on that horrible day.

As many in Congress have noted: The nation’s Capitol has been attacked twice in its history and this attack, unlike the first one during the War of 1812, was done by Americans. It was an attack on our governmental process and it sought to overturn the results of a certifiably free, fair and legal presidential election.

Democrats are now left to weigh how they could proceed without Republican cooperation, which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer have insisted on.

As The Hill reported: In a call this week with House Democrats, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) floated four different routes Congress could take: have the Senate vote again on the House-passed bill to create an outside commission; form a select House committee, consisting of lawmakers hand-picked by leaders in both parties; allow several sitting committees to continue their probes into Jan. 6; or empower a single House committee, like Homeland Security or Oversight, to take the lead on the investigation.

Democrats debate shape of new Jan. 6 probe (msn.com)

Yes, we know the outlines of the event. Donald Trump held a rally on the Ellipse that morning. He revved up the riotous mob. The terrorists then marched on the Capitol Building. They stormed into the place. They injured many of the cops trying to protect members of Congress and the vice president from the mob. One of the DC cops died in the melee. Donald Trump did nothing to stop it.

A thorough investigation into the event can determine ways to prevent it from happening again. That solution lies at the heart of the need for this probe.

If only congressional Republicans would buy into the need to prevent a repeat of the attack that threatened them, too.

DC riot

Pence and Trump ‘may never agree’?

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Mike Pence continues to demonstrate the suck-up qualities he put to dubious use while serving as vice president during the Donald J. Trump administration.

Consider what he told an audience in New Hampshire this week:

“You know, President Trump and I have spoken many times since we left office. And I don’t know if we’ll ever see eye to eye on that day. But I will always be proud of what we accomplished for the American people over the last four years,” Pence said to applause.

“And I will not allow Democrats or their allies in the media to use one tragic day to discredit the aspirations of millions of Americans, or allow Democrats or their allies in the media to distract our attention from a new administration intent on dividing our country to advance their radical agenda,” Pence continued.

Just to remind the former VP: The riotous mob that Trump incited stormed the Capitol Building with signs that screamed “Hand Mike Pence!” What’s more, Trump did not a damn thing to stop the onslaught after it spiraled out of control. Oh, and he didn’t call Pence for several days after he got out of the Capitol Building while hiding in a secure location to protect himself from the terrorist mob.

Do I really believe he and Trump have spoken “many times” since that hideous event?

Not for one second.

Yeah, Mr. VP,  we’ll all “move on” once we get a full accounting of what happened that day. In case Pence has forgotten, the mob launched a full frontal assault on the very democracy he and Trump vowed to “defend and protect.”

Donald Trump

Donald won’t run … ever again

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelils_92@hotmail.com

Against my better judgment, I am going to offer something that to some will resemble a political prediction, except that I have given up on predicting things political.

So, here goes. It is my considered opinion that Donald Trump will decide that he cannot win the presidency back from President Biden. Nor does he even have confidence in winning the Republican Party presidential nomination in 2024.

You see, The Donald is now in command of the nut job wing of the GOP. So help me I am beginning to hear the faint stirring of establishment Republicans who finally are finding the voices that left them during Trump’s two impeachment trials.

Former House Speaker Paul Ryan — one of the chief GOP weenies — has said the party is doomed if it gloms onto following an individual rather than adhering to a philosophy. Rep. Liz Cheney continues to pound Trump for inciting the riot on Jan. 6. Sen. Mitt Romney and five other Republican senators voted to create a bipartisan commission to examine the cause of the Trump-inspired insurrection.

Is there a pattern developing? Oh, I certainly hope so.

Trump might find it more to his advantage to pull some strings behind the scenes rather than expose himself to the possibility of losing the GOP nomination, let alone the probability of losing another general election in just a little more than three years.

I have no way of knowing any of this will play out as I hope it does. So I am going to avoid predicting such an outcome.

Oh, and we also have the prospect of criminal indictments in New York City and in Fulton County, Ga., involving Trump, his company and perhaps even members of The Donald’s family. Are there truly enough whack jobs among Republicans to nominate and elect the former chief imbecile to the nation’s highest office?

If so, then we’re in a whole lot more trouble than any of us imagined.

national news

‘Reinstated’ in August? Huh?

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

If this report is true — and I believe it has legs — then it needs to be said loudly and with maximum clarity.

Donald John Trump is certifiably and clinically insane.

New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman, who knows Trump as well as anyone in the media, is reporting that Trump is telling allies he believes he will be “reinstated” as president in August.

Yep. The election will be overturned. President Biden will be stripped of his office. It will be handed to Trump.

Hmm. Someone needs to call the paddy wagon. Fit the old ex-POTUS with a straitjacket. Send him to the loony bin. Let him talk to the walls about how the 2020 election was “stolen” from him and handed to the guy who beat him bigly by virtue of “rampant and widespread vote fraud.”

Trump is telling people he thinks he’ll be ‘reinstated’ as president in August, according to a report (msn.com)

Oh, my.

How in the name of political nuttiness does one escape the realization that Trump is out of his ever-lovin’ noggin?

I cannot. You can’t, either. No one can.

Let me be as clear as I can possibly be: There is no way on God’s good Earth that Donald Trump will be reinstated. Period. End of story.

Now, shut the hell up … Donald.

local news

Rep./Dr. Jackson needs to shut the hell up

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

It’s official.

The individual who now represents the congressional district where I lived for 23 years has established himself as a first-rate a**hole.

Republican Ronny Jackson said this via Twitter: Fauci and Democrats have been covering for China for over a year about the origins of this virus. They’ll badmouth America any chance they get, but with China, they’re SILENT. Wonder why that is??

This guy is a menace. To think that he gets to vote on laws that affect all Americans, not just those in the Texas Panhandle — where he moved to run for Congress in 2020 after spending his entire adult life far away — is reprehensible on its face.

He succeeded Republican Mac Thornberry, who served the district with dignity for 25 years, even though I rarely agreed with his politics. Jackson has taken to Twitter to taunt Democrats, just like his hero, Donald J. Trump.

He sickens me.

International news, media news

Sanctions against Belarus? Uhh, yes!

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Think for just a moment how the immediate past president of the United States might respond to the act of state-sponsored thuggery that unfolded in Belarus the other day.

Donald Trump well might applaud the action that took a journalist into custody for — get this — criticizing the autocrat who runs his country.

President Biden is planning to invoke sanctions against Belarus and also has hinted that the audacious display of ham-handedness will be on the table when he and Russian strongman Vladimir Putin for their first summit.

Biden administration to reimpose sanctions on Belarus over diverted flight | TheHill

You know the story, yes? A jetliner took off from Athens en route to Lithuania the other day. When it crossed Belarus air space, air traffic controllers ordered the plane to land, contending it might have a bomb on board. The plane landed. Authorities found no bomb. Instead, they arrested Raman Pratasevich, a Belarusian journalist who also is active in the opposition movement against Alexander Lukashenko, the dictator who runs the country.

This act of repression borders on terrorism, in my humble view. This kind of aggression cannot be allowed to stand.

It is my fervent hope that President Biden follows through with his threat to deal strongly with the dictator who has demonstrated a callous disregard for basic human rights. Indeed, the entire issue of “human rights” has returned — thankfully — to the West Wing of the White House, where for the previous four years it was ignored by the Strongman Lover in Chief.

Donald Trump

Trump is the GOP ‘curse’

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Listening and reading Donald Trump’s response to real Republicans’ criticism of him makes me laugh out loud … even though nothing about the ex-president is hah-hah funny.

Former U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan is the latest target of Trump’s vitriol. Ryan said in a speech at the Ronald Reagan library that the GOP is in deep trouble if it continues to adhere to the ruminations of Trump.

The former Insurrectionist in Chief calls Ryan “weak” a “Republican In Name Only,” and a pretender to what Trump says is actual GOP policy. Good fu**ing grief!

If anyone politician in memory has done more than Donald Trump to damage a major party’s brand, someone will have to present that individual to me. I ain’t seeing it! Trump has been a disaster not just to a party he purports to represent, but has posed an existential threat to the very government he took an oath to defend and protect.

Trump fires back at Paul Ryan: ‘Curse to the Republican Party’ | TheHill

Trump is the “curse.”

But don’t mistake this rant as an endorsement of Republican Party leadership. It has enabled this fraud to continue to foment the Big Lie about alleged “theft” of the 2020 presidential election. It has kowtowed to this idiot’s bluster and bellowing. And, yes, Paul Ryan is among the cowards who failed to call this imbecile down when they shared power with him while he was president of the U.S.A.

Man, oh man. Donald Trump is as infuriating as ever!