Tag Archives: Joe Biden

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.

environmental news

Welcome back, John Kerry

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Good show, Mr. President-elect.

Joe Biden has delivered on a key campaign promise, which was to re-elevate the worldwide climate crisis to the top of the presidential administration’s priority list.

Biden has named former Secretary of State John Kerry as head of a climate change post within the National Security Council. This is a clear signal that President-elect Biden intends to put Kerry to work full time on searching for solutions to the worldwide crisis that, indeed, poses a national security threat of the first order.

I am delighted (a) to see John Kerry brought back into public service and (b) to know that Joe Biden intends to follow through on a key campaign promise to devote sufficient energy and emotional capital to the world’s most glaring international threat.

Kerry made climate change a key focus of his time as secretary of state, seeking to persuade his peers around the world of the need to curb the impact of carbon emissions and other human-caused effects on the world’s climate.

There can be no doubt that the climate is changing. There also should be no doubt that human activity has led to an acceleration of that change. I won’t buy into the notion that the change is part of some natural epochal cycle over which we have no control. We must seek ways to do whatever is humanly possible to stem the effects of the changing climate.

The new president is making it clear he intends to do what he can.

I applaud his decision to bring John Kerry back onto the field of battle against climate change.

economic news

Socialism = scare tactic

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I never have thought of Harry Truman as being a squishy socialist, a guy who wanted to wrest control of our lives from private interests and hand it all over to the government.

What he says in these remarks attributed to him near the end of his presidency do resonate today as conservatives seeks to paint so many efforts to help Americans as a ploy to enact socialistic policy.

I hear it from friends of mine. One of them, an Amarillo business owner, believes that President-elect Biden is a tool of socialist interests who are intent on enacting a full government takeover of virtually every aspect of our lives. That’s how the dictionary defines socialism, by the way.

Well, I will stand by my own belief that it is not going to unfold as the president-elect’s critics suggest. They are intent on injecting fear among us.

President Truman’s wisdom is in short supply among many contemporary politicians.

Socialism = red herring | High Plains Blogger

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.

national news

Giving thanks for voters’ wisdom

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Allow me a brief moment to mix a bit of politics with the holiday week we’re going to celebrate.

I am giving thanks for the wisdom voters exhibited on Nov. 3 by tossing Donald John Trump out of the White House.

I remained cautiously optimistic that the outcome would turn out as it did, with Joe Biden assuming the title of president-elect. Yes, I had concern that Trump might pull a Houdini-like escape performance by repeating the stunning upset he scored in 2016 to become president.

When the votes came in and were tabulated, my concern was replaced by the satisfaction in realizing that most American voters were able to rectify the mistake that occurred four years ago.

They’re still counting ballots around the country. I look at the running totals almost daily and am heartened by the realization that more than 51 percent of Americans endorsed Joe Biden’s pledge to “restore our nation’s soul.” It needs restoration, to be sure.

I am going to place my faith in the deeds of the new president, that he will be able to bridge the chasm that divides us.

We’re going to give thanks for a lot of things this week. We shall give thanks for living in this great nation, for the liberty granted to us as Americans. We will give thanks for our families and the love that surrounds us and that we give in return.

I also am going to give thanks for the spirit of political redemption that arose on Election Day.

If this post offends you because it mixes partisan politics with the joy of a happy holiday, well … too bad. It’s what I am feeling in my heart this glorious morning.

Have a wonderful day.

national news

Anxious for a new president

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

You know by now I have refrained from typing the word “President” directly in front of Donald Trump’s name.

Trump is too fundamentally unfit for the office for me to acknowledge that he has earned the title. So I have declined to refer to him directly with the title he acquired upon election four years ago as president of the United States.

Accordingly, I am looking forward to referring to the new president in that fashion. I am going to take a certain measure of delight in typing the words “President Biden” as he assumes the office to which he was elected.

This sounds petty, I am sure, to many of those of you who voted for Trump. You’re entitled to feel that way. As I am entitled to feel the way I do about the outgoing president.

This blog consists mainly discussion about politics and policy. I am keenly aware that many policy decisions come from the politicians who haven’t earned my support at the ballot box. They serve in state and local offices in Texas. However, none of them is as unfit for the offices they occupy as Donald Trump. Therefore, I am not at all reluctant to refer, say, to Gov. Greg Abbott, or Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, or U.S. Rep. Van Taylor … or even Vice President Mike Pence.

Donald J. Trump? He occupies a special place of derision for me. I won’t go there. Not ever.

With that I await the inauguration of our next commander in chief, President Joe Biden. 

I just am going to ask him one thing: Do not do something so egregious that I will be forced to reconsider my intent to extend you the courtesy of referring to you by the exalted title you have earned.

national news

Biden does his due diligence

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By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President-elect Biden’s transition — such as it is to date — to the nation’s highest office is going to include a steady, learned search for individuals who will comprise the executive branch of the federal government.

I think it’s fair to suggest that Biden’s many years of government and public policy experience is going to serve him well as he seeks to fill the top Cabinet and staff positions. It’s also fair to compare his search with what confronted his predecessor as he began his own quest to fill those posts.

Donald Trump didn’t have any of the experience that Biden brings to the presidency. He was steeped in a checkered business career. It showed.

He selected a secretary of state who came from the fossil fuel industry. Rex Tillerson fell out of favor when he referred to Trump as a “fu**ing moron.” Trump has gone through four national security advisers. Three chiefs of staff. Trump installed his daughter as a senior adviser and his son-in-law as chief Middle East negotiator. Many of his campaign advisers and aides have been indicted for criminal activity and served time for it.

To be sure, he did hire some top-flight folks. James Mattis as defense secretary comes to mind. Mattis, though, got canned because he, um, disagreed with Trump’s ignorance about his role as commander in chief.

Trump has failed to fill many posts vacated by resignation or dismissal.

I do not expect any of this to occur in a Biden administration. The new president served eight years as vice president and 36 years as a U.S. senator. He chaired the Judiciary and Foreign Relations committees. The man knows government. My goodness, he has lived and breathed government for nearly a half-century.

The United States conducted something of an experiment when it elected Donald Trump to its highest political office. The experiment, in my view, failed. Trump didn’t know how to govern. He never thought to learn anything about the complexities of running the nation’s executive government branch.

We have turned now to someone with a wealth of knowledge about that government. He is in the process of looking high low, far and wide for competent individuals who I am going to presume will put the nation’s needs ahead of their own or those of the president.

I am going to maintain my confidence in President-elect Biden’s knowledge and understanding of our complex federal government.

Moreover, I am delighted to say goodbye to the chaos and confusion we have witnessed for the past four years.