AG race: most troublesome

Of all the contests on the Texas ballot in this midterm election cycle, one of them presents the greatest opportunity for joy … and also for profound disappointment.

It’s not the governor’s race. It’s the next one down on the ballot, the contest for Texas attorney general.

I keep hearing chatter that it might be the closest statewide race on the ballot, the one contest that gives Democrats their greatest chance of breaking the death grip Republicans have had on the state elective offices for nearly three decades.

The GOP incumbent, Ken Paxton, is seriously damaged goods. Yet here he is, seeking a third term after winning re-election in 2018 while under felony indictment for securities fraud. In 2022, he’s still under indictment. 

Oh, but there’s more. Seven of his top legal assistants quit the AG’s office complaining about what they allege is criminal conduct. They blew the whistle on what they contend is corruption. The FBI has launched an investigation into Paxton’s conduct.

The man has embarrassed the state. His Democratic foe is Rochelle Garza, a civil-rights lawyer from the Valley. She reports that the race is narrowing. Indeed, polling from around the state suggests a tightening contest.

What gives me hope is that Garza is as clean as they come. She can hold her own background up to Paxton’s shady behavior, which became evident when the Collin County grand jury indicted him in 2015 on an allegation that he failed to disclose his relationship with an investment firm to potential customers.

But there’s even more to pore through. Just this past week, Paxton ran like a frightened puppy when a federal process server showed up at his McKinney home to serve him papers to testify in a court proceeding. Paxton said he didn’t know who was standing outside his house; but then we learned that he knew several days earlier that he would be served the summons.

The guy is a worm. A weasel. A coward.

For the life of me I do not understand how this guy continues to have any standing among Texas voters.

A grand jury in his home county indicts him on a felony charge; his top legal team bails; the FBI launches a probe into alleged misconduct; he hides from a process server.

And on top of all that, the AG has been front and center in promoting The Big Lie, that Donald Trump was the victim of an electoral heist in the 2020 presidential election.

Can’t we do better than having someone so damaged as our state’s top law enforcement official? Well, we can! The question: Will voters show the good sense to reject this clown?

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Chill out, congressman

Ronny the Carpetbagger continues his Twitter rants with more nonsensical demagoguery.

This guy, aka Ronny Jackson, the Republican who purports to represent the Texas Panhandle in Congress, is now suggesting Democrats are out to “destroy” the U.S. of A.

Well, how’s that going to happen?

By enacting crucial climate change legislation? By seeking to legislate an end to gun violence? By working with Republicans to enact critical infrastructure legislation? By restoring employment to pre-pandemic levels? By unifying NATO in resisting rampant and illegal Russian aggression in Ukraine? By seeking to curb the effects of climate change on the world?

Good grief. Ronny the Carpetbagger needs to look inward. If anyone is seeking to “destroy the country,” it’s the former Big Liar in Chief who continues to insist that non-existent widespread vote fraud cost him re-election in 2020.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Rep. What’s Her Name says what?

“I am not going to mince words with you all. Democrats want Republicans dead and they have already started the killings.”

This comment has been attributed to U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Loony Bin, aka Rep. What’s Her Name.

I am not going to parse this bit of idiocy, but idiots need not get any more attention than they deserve. In her case, that means none.

Well, OK. The fact that I have mentioned her briefly means she’s getting a little bit of attention. Just know that were I to spend time commenting on all the stupidity that flows from What’s Her Name’s mouth, I would have time for nothing else.

I’m out.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Change of weather brings cheer

I want to take a moment or two away from politics and policy to extol the virtues of seasonal change.

It took a few days after the official arrival of the autumnal equinox, aka the arrival of fall, but I am feeling a bit more cheerful tonight.

The weather topped out here in North Texas at something a bit north of 80 degrees. It began to cool dramatically as the sun approached the western horizon.

I do look forward to the seasonal changes. From summer to autumn is particularly welcome this year. It was as if spring never really arrived. We froze for weeks on end during the winter of 2021-22. Then summer arrived … with a vengeance!

I joked this morning that I was “ready for summer” when I saw that the temperature was 47 degrees. I was just kidding, of course.

I am not kidding, though, in welcoming autumn’s arrival. Soon enough, autumn will give way to winter. There’s chatter out there about whether our electrical grid can withstand another killer freeze which paralyzed us in February 2021.

I won’t worry about that just yet. I just want to welcome the seasonal change. It’s always a good day when we can go from dawn to dusk without turning on the air conditioner.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

This election is a big … deal!

Pssst. I am going to reveal to you a matter that so far appears to be a secret: Princeton, Texas, voters are going to get a chance in just a few weeks to decide whether to approve a home-rule charter that allows the city to govern itself.

Why is it a secret? Because … state law prohibits the city from spending public money to campaign for a political cause. Unfortunately, the task is supposed to belong to a citizens’ political action committee that hasn’t yet been organized.

I have it from the highest local government authority possible that the PAC hasn’t formed despite the city council’s decision to put the home rule charter on the November ballot. Mayor Brianna Chacon said she has tried to find someone to take on the task of chairing the PAC. No takers.

This is the fifth election Princeton will have conducted to form a home-rule charter. The city’s population has exploded in recent years. The city now contains more than 20,000 inhabitants, according to City Hall estimates.

Here is what I found on the city’s website:

Home Rule Charter | Princeton, TX (princetontx.gov)

Princeton simply needs to take this step toward municipal adulthood. Since the city’s founding, Princeton has been governed as a “general law” city, meaning that it must follow the law with restrictions imposed by the Texas Legislature. Yes, lawmakers from the Valley, the Panhandle, from the Hill Country, the Golden Triangle and the Trans-Pecos region make decisions affecting how Princeton can govern itself.

That has to change. The election set for Nov. 8 will enable the city’s voters to approve a home-rule charter that allows City Hall to make its own rules. That makes sense, right? Well … it does!

I have looked around Princeton for outward signs of political activity regarding the home-rule charter. I haven’t seen a lawn sign, or a bumper sticker, or received a push card or seen any pamphlets extolling the virtues of home-rule governance.

As I understand it, state law bans governments from spending public money to campaign for issues such as home-rule charter. It doesn’t appear to disallow city officials from acting on their own time, spending their own dime and devoting their off-duty efforts to pitching this important measure.

It should never have come to that, but it might.

I am going to hope for the best that enough voters will realize the importance of a growing community such as ours to take charge of its own affairs. It’s a big … deal, man!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

This is how POTUS should respond

At the risk of riling some of the Trumpkin Trolls who read this blog, I want to offer a brief word describing what I believe is an essential difference between the way Joe Biden handles his presidential duties and the way his immediate predecessor handled them.

Hurricane Ian hammered Florida with Category 4-level wind and storm surge. It marched across that state, headed out over water to regain its strength and then pummeled the South Carolina coast with more devastating wind and water.

President Biden’s response? He declared a federal disaster for Florida and well might do the same for South Carolina. He vowed to be there for all of those who suffered from nature’s wrath. Biden made a specific point that Republicans and Democrats alike will be treated with compassion from the government.

OK. How does that compare with how Donald J. Trump handled national tragedies? The wildfires that destroyed thousands of acres in California in 2019 became grist for Trump to lecture the state on how it should manage its forests. He would routinely castigate Democratic officials — who didn’t support him in 2016 — for their failures.

Biden, who didn’t carry either Florida or South Carolina in 2020, did not go there. He is president of all the United States, he reminded us … and he intends to carry out his response to the tragic hurricane accordingly.

There you have it. We elected a president who understands the unwritten job description he must follow.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Did Beto come clean on cops?

Beto O’Rourke got the question I was hoping someone would ask him tonight in his debate with Greg Abbott down yonder in Edinburg.

Does he want to “defund the police”? I asked O’Rourke, the Democratic nominee for governor, to answer that one cleanly and crisply.

He, um, didn’t. Is that a deal breaker? Does that mean I am pulling my support for O’Rourke? No.

A reporter asked him straight up. His answer was that he “always” has supported law enforcement. Hold on. I heard him praise the Black Lives Matter movement for calling on communities to defund the police.

Now he says he always has supported police fully? Not exactly.

I am a strong supporter of the cops, too. I have said so many times on this blog and have expressed it verbally to police officers over many years. If O’Rourke is going to continue supporting the cops from this moment forward, I’m all in.

I just wanted him to clear up any misunderstanding on the issue. He didn’t do it.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Let her believe that crap, however …

Ginni Thomas is entitled to believe whatever conspiratorial crap fills her seemingly vacuous noggin, such as the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Donald J. Trump.

We have no evidence of any such theft. Still, that’s reportedly what she told the House select committee examining the 1/6 insurrection.

Fine, lady. You believe whatever you wish.

However, she occupies an unusual place in the world of public figures. She’s not elected or appointed to any high-profile office. She is, though, married to someone who fits that bill: U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Here is where Ginni Thomas’s denials of wrongdoing get a little sticky, not to mention stinky. She insisted to the committee that she and her husband don’t ever discuss politics at home. And yet, she would have anyone with half a noodle in their skull believe that she would ignore what she has told others that the 2020 election was the “greatest political heist” in U.S. history.

Is she going to have us believe she never has said anything to her best friend, the man to whom she’s been married for 35 years about what she believes is the greatest act of theft in the history of our nation?

I am not going to accept that Justice and Mrs. Thomas never have talked between themselves about her political life outside the walls of their home.

The issue came to the fore when Justice Thomas cast the lone dissenting vote as the court ruled that he had to turn over his presidential papers to the National Archives. Every other justice ruled that Trump had to cut them loose; not so, Clarence Thomas ruled.

I will stand by my earlier demands that Clarence Thomas resign from the court. He has no business ruling on matters related to the insurrection when he is married to someone who believes The Big Lie about alleged electoral thievery.

And I do not believe for a nanosecond that Ginni Thomas has never said a word about to the justice.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com