Tag Archives: High Plains Blogger

national news

Blogging is just so much fun

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I once thought that the terror attacks on 9/11 broke open a dam for opinion writers. I went through a lengthy spell while writing opinions for a daily newspaper that I had to confront more topics that I could comment on each day.

My task after 9/11 became difficult: I had to decide what I could set aside for another day.

I left daily journalism more than eight years ago. I now am a full-time blogger. I am relearning now that the Donald Trump Era of American politics has given me a new surge in subjects on which I can comment.

Soon, though, the Trump Era will come to a merciful end. I am hopeful for a new day in American politics. President Joe Biden promises to restore our national soul. I hope he does. Our soul is in dire need of restoration.

If he does, then I hope that the trove of topics on which to comment will remain full. I am going to use this blog to offer all manner of opinion on issues of the day.

It gives me reason to keep on blogging.

national news

Focusing now on Joe Biden

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I want to make two quick points, then I’ll step aside.

First, I have declared that Donald Trump is sliding rapidly into irrelevancy as a defeated candidate for re-election as president of the United States.

Therefore, I am going to spend equally rapidly declining effort commenting on his still-incessant lying.

Second, this blog is going to concentrate instead on President-elect Joe Biden’s transition into the nation’s highest office. I want to offer him advice when I feel I can provide it. I might even scold him if he says or does something that displeases me. Hey, no one is perfect … you know?

It’s time for High Plains Blogger to turn the proverbial page.

Thus, I have just done so.

Good night.

national news

Consumed by returns

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I am trying to find something about which to write on this blog.

I can’t get there. My mind is consumed by the presidential election returns that are trickling in.

Yes, the world is full of topics that deserve comment on this blog. They’ll just have to wait for another day.

As for the election, there is next to nothing to say at this moment, or perhaps even the next moment, until we have some clearer notion on who wins this contest.

You know already that I want Joe Biden to win. I am going to wring my hands now, grit my teeth and wait along with the rest of the world for the returns to tell us something we need to know.

My anxiety had been replaced by serenity. Anxiety has returned.

In full force.

local news

Duty overtakes blogging

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

For those of you who might be waiting for a full-scale, full-throated, front-on return of this blog, I am making an announcement.

It will return in full and frequent force just as soon as I clean up our house.

You see, household duty has pulled High Plains Blogger away from the usual frequent fare of commentary on this and that. I have climbing up and down ladders, step ladders and step stools for the past few days as we paint the interior of our home.

We just completed the first phase. We’re going to take break, collect our thoughts and decide what color we want to plaster on the remainder of our walls.

Now I get to return to something I love doing, which is offering commentary on issues of the day.

Hmm. Let’s see. I think we have a few topics to discuss.

media news

Minds are made up

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I get this question on occasion. It’s fairly rare that someone asks, but given that I get the query, I’ll speak to it briefly here.

The question: Why don’t you engage people who disagree with statements you make on your blog?

I generally dislike engaging in a give-and-take because people’s minds are made up. As is my own mind. I am not going to change anyone else’s view of a public policy issue and, I dare say, neither will anyone likely change my own mind.

That’s the short answer. A more expansive response seems appropriate.

I write this blog as my final statement on an issue. For instance, I have published an endless stream of posts that assert that Donald J. Trump is fundamentally unfit for the office he occupies. I have sought to say why I believe that throughout this man’s foray into political life. My mind is made up. I will not be persuaded to change my mind that Trump is somehow actually fit for the presidency. What would be the point of going back and forth with someone who believes Trump is the next “great president”?

It’s pretty much true on most issues. I tend to make up my mind before I post something on High Plains Blogger.

This does not mean I do not welcome critical comments. I most certainly do welcome them. Whether you respond directly to the blog’s site on Word Press, or on Facebook, or any other social medium that distributes these posts, I say, simply: Bring it!

I am highly unlikely, though, to argue with those critics. I am too old to waste my time trying to persuade someone that their views are all wrong and that mine are all right.

I just know it all to be true. That’s good enough for me. It’s also good enough for my critics.

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What’s next, post-Trump?

By JOHN KANELIS

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Yes, I do think at times of matters that take my brain into outer space.

One of them has popped into my noggin and it has to do, not surprisingly, with Donald John Trump.

I have spent a lot of emotional energy on High Plains Blogger commenting on the foibles of Trump and the presidency he inherited. What will happen to this blog once Donald Trump exits the White House? You probably haven’t thought about it, as you have many other things to occupy your mind. Truth be told, so do I, but I still have time to ponder things such as this.

I am supremely confident that this blog will continue. For all I know it might even flourish.

The world is huge. We have this pandemic that is likely to stay with us well past Trump’s time as president, which I hope ends in January 2021. We have many existential threats facing us: climate change, race relations/civil unrest, war and peace, terror threats.

There also will be plenty of wreckage left behind by Donald Trump that the next president — and I want it badly to be Joe Biden — will have to clean off the deck.

You see, all of this will require my attention. I intend to attend to all of it in due course as we move past the Donald Trump Era of Political Malfeasance.

I also have other matters to ponder, the “life experience” stuff that occasionally gets my attention. I want to continue chronicling the joy of being parents to Toby the Puppy; we have this eternal retirement journey on which we have embarked and I will discuss that as well with you.

Donald Trump may think he’s bigger than the presidency. He isn’t. The office will recover once he is gone. Trump damn sure isn’t bigger than High Plains Blogger. It, too, will go on.

national news

When Trump departs …

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I cannot believe I am thinking about this, but I am.

My thoughts are wandering toward that blessed day when Donald Trump is no longer president of the United States. My thoughts deal specifically with this blog.

What will be its future? Well, it looks bright no matter when Trump departs the White House for the final time. It could be this coming January. Or — and I have to swallow hard right about now — it could come four years from January.

High Plains Blogger has been my vehicle for venting about Trump. I used this platform relentlessly during the 2016 campaign. I had high hopes almost until the very end that Hillary Clinton would defeat Trump. I went to an election night “watch party” with friends in Amarillo. We were prepared to uncork the bubbly in celebration.

Then came some words I didn’t want to hear. When Pennsylvania swung to Trump, I heard the great Democratic political operative James Carville say, “I don’t like what I’m seeing.”

The night didn’t end well for our friends or for wife and me.

My blog has been my release ever since.

Now we’re on the cusp of another election. Joe Biden is positioned at this moment to unseat Donald Trump. If the former VP wins and sends Trump packing, then I this blog likely will need to fill cyberspace with commentary on a whole array of non-Trump issues.

I am prepared to deliver that to readers of High Plains Blogger.

There might be a caveat to add: Some of that will depend on what the former president (I hope) does as he slinks off into a non-political life. I fear he’ll keep blathering, blabbing and bloviating about public matters, mostly I am certain dealing with his election loss. The good news for you and for me is that he becomes entirely irrelevant once he returns to private citizenship.

We’ll just have to await the returns. I’m prepared to stand watch until they come in.

I do look forward to commenting on policy matters emanating from a shiny new administration that has a lot of cleaning up to perform. I hope that day comes sooner rather than later.

media news

Allow this boast

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I shouldn’t boast, given that I criticize Donald J. Trump for doing so.

Just bear with me for a moment.

I have just logged the 402nd consecutive day posting a blog on High Plains Blogger. I happen to believe that’s boast-worthy.

You might ask: Why?

It’s because I like to think I have a lot to say. It’s importance, of course, is open to interpretation. Much of my blog involves political and policy matters; less of it involves life experience, but I do consider that important, too. I also have series of posts on the blog: I talk about retirement and I also discuss adventures my wife and I have with Toby the Puppy; and I also look back from time to time on the full-time journalism career that concluded nearly eight years ago.

On that last point, my journalism endeavor hasn’t ended completely. I wrote for a public TV station in Amarillo for a time after leaving print journalism; I also wrote for a CBS-TV affiliate, also in Amarillo. Since moving to the Metroplex, I have become a freelance blogger for KETR-FM public radio at Texas A&M University-Commerce. And … I am a freelance reporter for a group of weekly newspapers, writing chiefly for the Farmersville Times.

Through it all, I have kept firing away on my blog. It’s what I do.

Some folks tell me I am a “prolific” blogger. I take that as a supreme compliment. I have help in that regard. The world is bursting with news on which to comment. It’s been that way since, oh, roughly about the time 9/11 occurred. That event changed the world and brought bloggers and other commentators like me along with it.

So, this blog continues apace. I am thrilled to be able to contribute some small perspective to the huge world of opinion.

Hey, it beats working!

national news

Less on Trump, more on Biden

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I have made a command decision regarding this blog.

As I have stated already, I intend to use this forum to do what I can to defeat Donald John Trump this coming November. To be candid, I am approaching the end of the line concerning my rage at this individual. I am running out of ways to express my anger and fear at the prospect of this moron getting another term in office.

So I want to start focusing more on Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democrats’ presumptive nominee.

If we’re going to defeat Trump, we’ll replace him with someone with different ideas, a different approach to the presidency, someone with a vast knowledge of the U.S. Constitution, someone with many years of experience serving the public.

I won’t turn totally away from trashing Donald Trump when opportunities present themselves; heaven knows Trump will provide them. I just intend to speak well of Joseph Biden rather than speaking only ill of Donald Trump.

There will be times when this blog will need to refer to Trump while saluting a policy pronouncement from the former vice president. If we’re going to make a choice — and I hope it is Joe Biden over Donald Trump — then it would serve me well to expose the reasons why Biden has earned my support at a time when the nation’s future is being imperiled by the Moron in Chief.