Tag Archives: Donald Trump

national news

Transition makes the head spin

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

This presidential transition, which began in earnest just two days ago — more than two weeks after an election! — has my noggin spinning.

I mean, we have a president in office who I am ignoring. Why? Because I believe nothing that comes out of Donald J. Trump’s mouth. That’s why! He is irrelevant to me … unless, of course, he decides to start a war or do something else that’s really stupid and foolish. He is the commander in chief until Jan. 20.

We also have a president-elect who won the election clearly and decisively in a free and fair contest. Joe Biden is the one who is sounding, acting and behaving in a presidential manner. And he’s not in even in office yet!

Do you get my point? Maybe I shouldn’t suffer from this head-spinning dilemma. OK, I won’t.

I am just going to focus solely on the rhetoric I hear from President-elect Biden and ignore the hogwash that spews from Donald J. Trump.

There. Problem solved. My head just stopped spinning.

national news

Trump refuses to accept loss? Big … deal!

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The media need to stop harping on an issue that, to my way of thinking, has zero relevance to anything important.

It is that Donald Trump continues to refuse to accept President-elect Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election.

Trump went to Pennsylvania today to pitch the bogus assertion that Biden’s win was the result of a “rigged” election. It won’t matter. The courts there will do what other courts have done, which is toss the complaints out summarily.

As The Associated Press reported: “This was an election that we won easily. We won it by a lot,” Trump declared to the group gathered at a hotel in Gettysburg. Trump, in fact, lost to President-elect Joe Biden by about 80,000 votes in the state, and Pennsylvania certified Biden as the winner on Tuesday.

The important aspect of this post-election drama is that the General Services Administration has commenced the transition process with the new president’s team. That is what matters. It doesn’t matte a damn bit to me that Donald Trump won’t accept the obvious.

You see, we all know what the numbers tell us: Joe Biden collected 80 million votes; he won 306 Electoral College votes; he beat Trump by roughly 4 percentage points; Biden flipped five states that voted for Trump in 2016.

What’s more, he did all this while winning what Donald Trump’s own national security election guru has called the “most secure election” in U.S. history.

Whether the current president accepts this is irrelevant. Donald Trump is under no legal or constitutional obligation to do so. It’s merely a custom. Trump has boasted of smashing presidential customs. So, let him smash this one, too.

I merely want the GSA to certify the obvious and for the transition to continue as it should, giving President-elect Biden’s team access to relevant pandemic response issues, daily presidential intelligence briefs, the whole host of issues that the new guy needs to familiarize himself with as he prepares to take office.

Trump’s petulance is the reaction of a narcissist.

national news

Flynn gets pardson; so … ?

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Here’s a flash for you: A presidential pardon does no expunge the record of a man who has admitted to lying twice to the FBI and the vice president of the United States.

He won’t do time. That’s the effect of the pardon that Donald Trump today issued for retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, a one-time (and short-time) national security adviser to the Trump administration.

Flynn’s acceptance of the pardon, of course, also implies guilt for the crime he admitted to committing.

Flynn disgraced his uniform by lying to the FBI about what he knew about the Russian efforts to attack our electoral system in 2016. He did it again by lying to VP Mike Pence.

No presidential pardon doesn’t restore Michael Flynn’s reputation, which he plowed asunder all by himself. Still, it’s a disgrace that Donald Trump would issue it.

national news

Transition has begun; that’s what matters now

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I am delighted that the Donald Trump administration has begun the official transition to the Joe Biden administration.

There. It has begun. The General Services Administration has instructed the Trump team to begin working with the Biden team. That means a lot of things are going to happen in rapid succession.

Now, does it matter that Donald Trump continues to refuse to talk about losing the presidential election to President-elect Biden? Not … one … bit. Not even a little bit. It doesn’t matter to me in the least that Trump won’t concede, that he won’t admit to losing his re-election bid.

The GSA directive, which no doubt came with Trump’s blessing, means that the Trump administration is picking up the pace on its way out the door.

To which I say, “Wonderful! Hooray!”

There is not a word in the U.S. Constitution that says an outgoing president must concede. There’s no law on the books. It’s just been a tried-and-true presidential custom. Elections come and go. The loser concedes and calls the winner, who then makes a speech and tells us that he has just spoken with his opponent and offered his congratulations for waging a tough campaign. Then the winner makes his speech. He offers similar congratulations to the losing candidate.

That isn’t going to happen, more than likely, in this campaign. President-elect Biden already has declared victory. He didn’t need a concession to state the obvious: that he got more votes than Trump.

The big news rests with the GSA and its decision to let the transition begin officially, in earnest, for real.

That is all we need to hear. I will now watch with intense interest as President-elect Biden prepares to be become President Biden.

national news

Trump admits defeat … finally?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

If any reader of this blog believes I am about to offer a good word to Donald Trump for authorizing the beginning of the transition to a new administration, well … it ain’t gonna happen.

Trump has told the General Services Administration to begin the formal transition to an administration led by President-elect Joe Biden, who defeated Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

Sigh …

This should have happened, oh, about two weeks ago when the networks determined that Joe Biden had defeated Donald Trump and denied Trump a second term as president. It should have begun right then. Right there. At that moment.

Instead, we have been force-fed a series of lawsuits, complaints, tweets and blustering about a “rigged election,” replete with attempts to disenfranchise millions of Americans who cast their ballots freely, fairly and without a hint of corruption.

Now he has ordered the GSA to begin a process that has been delayed for far too long? Give me a break!

Donald Trump has inflicted terrible damage on the image of this country around the world. He has conducted himself with absolute disrespect for the nation’s electoral process. Trump has sown discontent throughout the system and has brought scorn and embarrassment to our government.

Am I now going to offer any praise for him now just because his administration is doing what it should have done weeks ago? Not on your life!

national news

Walls close in on Trump era

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Michigan has certified the results of the 2020 presidential election in that state, granting President-elect Biden 16 electoral votes.

Is that the end of Donald Trump’s foolish, feckless and futile attempt to overturn the results of the election? Not … yet.

Oops. Wait! This just in: The Trump administration has ordered the General Services Administration to begin the transition to the new administration. Finally! More on that later.

It appears that Trump is running out of any sort of legal wiggle room. State and federal judges keep tossing his lawsuits out. A federal judge in Pennsylvania did so with extreme malice; what’s more that judge, a George W. Bush appointee — meaning he is of a Republican ilk — did so with remarkable harsh language. He asserted that Trump has failed to provide evidence of voter fraud, which rendered his complaint not worth the court’s time.

That’s how it is going for Trump as he continues his campaign against the sanctity of our electoral process.

Donald Trump is disgracing himself daily, if not hourly. He  tweets lie upon lie. Trump continues to cling to power as if he would shrivel up and die without it.

Oh, and meanwhile …

President-elect Biden is forming a government. He has selected someone to serve as secretary of state, as secretary of homeland security, as United Nations ambassador, as Treasury secretary, as director of national intelligence, as climate change envoy. What do they have in common? They are experienced hands. They know government. They have worked at the highest levels already. They are ready to serve the public under the Biden administration.

Many of these folks will need to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

This is how it is supposed to go. Presidents get elected and they begin the search for competent, reliable and dedicated public servants to serve the nation they all love.

And the outgoing president instructs his staff to cooperate with the new team … and then steps aside.

national news

Why Trump should avoid Biden inaugural

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The more thought I give to this subject, the more rational it seems for Donald Trump to stay far away from the Jan. 20 inaugural of President Biden.

It makes sense at many levels.

First, Trump has made it clear he detests losing to Biden. He has refused to concede his election loss. He might never concede.

Second, the Biden inaugural is going to be full of almost all pro-Joe Biden partisans, fans, faithful followers. Were the public address announcer to declare Donald Trump’s arrival at the inaugural podium, my sense is that he would be booed, hooted and jeered off the stage. Does the egomaniacal president really want to hear that?

Third, given all the bad blood that has flowed between Trump and the president-elect, does anyone on Earth really think the new president is going to offer any sort of a political olive branch to his immediate predecessor after he takes the oath? Hah! I damn sure don’t expect it.

Fourth, Trump has embarrassed himself, the nation and the democratic process by this futile, feckless effort to overturn the results of a free and fair election. He is rewriting his presidential legacy every single day.

Yep. It makes plenty of sense to me that Donald Trump simply should avoid any public appearances involving the changing of the presidential guard. It would produce an array of ugly and regrettable scenes.

Donald Trump’s ego seemingly wouldn’t allow it.

Just stay away, Mr. POTUS.

medical news

Why do GOP pols keep getting sick from COVID?

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

OK, don’t hate me because I am going to ask this question, given that I recently called for an end to the politicization of the COVID pandemic.

I gotta ask: Why are Republican politicians and political operatives — not to mention members of Donald Trump’s family — keep getting infected by the virus? Why aren’t more, um, Democratic pols and key aides to President-elect Biden getting the disease?

Oh, I think I know. It’s because GOP pols and key aides keep dismissing the measures the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention keep urging us to take to avoid getting sick; Democrats, meanwhile, are taking these measures seriously.

Could that be it? Oh, sure it is!

Is there a lesson to learn here? You bet there is.

national news

GOP wising up to the obvious: Biden is the president-elect

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Psst. Don’t tell anyone, but I’ve got a secret I want to share.

Congressional Republicans are finally — finally! — wising up to what we’ve known since, oh, Nov. 3 … which is that Joe Biden beat Donald Trump in the race for president.

The GOP caucus is beginning to sound off, albeit a bit mutedly, that Trump needs to back off his reprehensible attempt to overturn the election results.

President-elect Biden has been proceeding as best he can toward forming a government that will take over on Jan. 20. He has gotten zero help from Trump’s team. Still, the Biden team — led by newly named chief of staff Ronald Klain — is lining up Cabinet and senior staff appointees, some of whom the POTUS-elect plans to announce on Tuesday.

Now comes word that some Republican senators and House members are telling their staffs to start working with the president-elect’s team.

Newsweek, for instance, reports: Sen. Kevin Kramer, a North Dakota Republican, said that he has instructed his staff to cooperate with any outreach from President-elect Biden’s transition team while asserting that it was “past time” for President Donald Trump to do the same.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a longtime Trump supporter, said this morning that Trump’s refusal to help Biden’s effort to form a government is “undemocratic” and is a “national embarrassment.” Sen. Pat Toomey, a Pennsylvania Republican and another senatorial Trumpkin, has said the same thing.  Same for Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, the GOP presidential nominee in 2012.

It might be said that it’s a bit “too little and too late” for the GOP to start coming around. I won’t go there. I welcome the Republican pressure. Will it persuade Donald Trump to give up his fight to undermine our democratic process? Will it stem the embarrassment he is bringing to us from around the world? Will it cause Trump to stop endangering the safety and well-being of Americans?

Time will have to reveal all of that. For the time being, I am going to cling to a glimmer of hope that the GOP uprising will pay off.

national news

The impossible is happening

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I didn’t think it was humanly possible, but something strange is happening in real time, right here and now.

Donald John Trump is making me even more anxious than ever for him to leave the White House, hitting the road for Mar-a-Lago, or Bedminster or wherever. Yes, I was anxious for him to leave the moment President-elect Joe Biden was declared the winner of the 2020 presidential election.

But my goodness! Trump’s behavior, his betrayal of the oath he took to defend the Constitution, his denigrating of the democratic process has forced me into a realm of anxiousness I didn’t know I possessed.

But I do. I possess it to the extent that I am wishing he simply would vacate my house far sooner than he needs to vacate it. By that I refer to Jan. 20, the date Joe Biden becomes the next president.

Just go, Mr. POTUS. Get the hell out of there! You can keep your presidential powers until the date of the new president’s swearing-in. Just don’t use them foolishly or dangerously.

I wouldn’t object one little bit to Twitter disconnecting Trump’s account. The social medium already has flagged damn near everything that Trump launches into cyberspace as being untruthful. Why not, then, just pull the plug on this clown?

Donald Trump just keeps making matters worse for him. What’s more — and this infinitely more damaging — he is making it worse for the country.

Just go away. Vanish. I want you out of my sight.