Tag Archives: COVID

national news

So much to ponder this election cycle

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This big world is full of issues, talking points and factors that zoom right past my pointy little head.

Here’s another one I want to examine briefly. How does a president as successful as Joseph R. Biden Jr. struggle with polling data that suggest he is going to get his clocked cleaned on Election Day?

I do not get it!

Biden inherited an economy in free fall from the COVID pandemic. Joblessness was through the roof. Hundreds of Americans were dying daily from the killer virus. Our national budget deficit was skyrocketing. His presidential predecessor had sought to undermine the “peaceful transition of power.”

President Biden took office and managed to work with Congress to enact an infrastructure rebuilding bill, approve the Inflation Reduction Act, approve climate change legislation. He issued executive orders that took aim at reducing prescription drug costs.

Joe Biden is in the midst of a successful presidency. Now he’s in deep trouble of being forced out of the re-election campaign because Democratic Party honchos are worried he cannot beat Donald Trump, the GOP nominee.

How in the world does the president wrap his arms around the juxtaposition of those facts. Unemployment is down, the budget deficit is shrinking, our alliances are strong … but he’s trailing in the polls and experts are telling him his chances of winning are shrinking daily.

The MAGA cultists who comprise Trump’s base are energized. Biden’s base is demoralized. Trump has a deeply flawed moral character that he seems to wear like a badge of honor. Biden enjoys deep affection among those who are close to him.

Up is down and down is up. The man who lost the previous election now might be poised to beat the man who defeated him four years ago. What the hell is wrong with this country?

national news

What should his legacy become?

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Suppose for a moment that President Biden’s parsing of the tea leaves tells him he should no longer seek re-election … what shall be the opening paragraph say about his term as leader of the world’s pre-eminent nation?

I hope it doesn’t mention that he ended his re-election effort over questions about whether he was competent to run the nation for a second term. I want it to focus on what he did accomplish.

He took the reins of power as the nation fought like hell to recover from the COVID pandemic. That battle included rescuing an economy that had tanked. Biden wanted to restore our national “soul,” which had been wounded grievously by the chaos that enveloped the presidency of his immediate predecessor.

By almost any measure one can apply, Joe Biden’s presidency has been a success. He signed legislation that aims to improve our infrastructure, seeks to reduce inflation, and seeks to arm Ukraine in its fight for survival against invading forces from Russia.

Biden has taken executive action to eliminate crushing student debt obligations and has acted with dignity and decorum on the world stage.

All of that might get short shrift in the event President Biden decides to pull the plug on his re-election campaign. Instead, the media will focus on whether he has lost too many steps in his losing fight against Father Time.

Joe Biden’s presidency has been a success and no matter when we start writing the history of this man’s time at the pinnacle of power, I want us to remember that fact first.

economic news, national news

Yes, I am better off

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Allow me to make this declaration … as if you can stop me from making it.

Here goes: I am better off by a long shot than I was four years ago.

The question, “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”, is getting some traction of late. Republicans are saying “no!” They want to tar President Biden with a phony economic crisis, suggesting that the recovery from the COVID pandemic is a figment of our imagination.

It isn’t. Our economy is robust. It is — to borrow the phrase — “rocking along” by producing a record number of new jobs, historically low unemployment, a shrinking national budget deficit, an inflation rate that is stabilizing and shrinking, too.

Yes, the nation is better off than it was when Joe Biden took office as president. I won’t listen to the lies put forth by his immediate presidential predecessor.

Are in perfect condition? Of course not! Perfection is an impossibility.

But we’re damn sure better than we were.

medical news, political news

Why now, RFK Jr.?

Many things get past this old codger, one of them being the Democratic Party presidential candidacy of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

I’ll stipulate once more that RFK Jr. was given the name of my first political hero, his father. His campaign for the White House, though, is based on conspiracies that, to my mind, do not exist.

Moreover, he expresses deep personal affection for President Biden, who enjoys the overwhelming support of RFK Jr.’s family.

He says the mandated COVID-19 vaccines were an overreach by the government, which he said should never have required us to be vaccinated against a virus that killed about 1 million Americans.

Hmm. Wow! What do you suppose the death toll would have been had the Biden administration not ordered the vaccines? My hunch: a whole lot more than those who perished.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will not be elected president. Not this year. Not any year. Never. He sounds like a goofball nut case seeking to make a name for himself. Imagine that if you will … a man with arguably one of the most revered political names of the past century seeking even more attention.

I’m still trying to wrap my arms around this guy’s candidacy.

For now, I am left merely to shake my noggin in astonishment.

national news

RFK Jr. lost me right away

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. carries the name of the man I most admired in American politics … that is as far as it goes.

RFK Jr. is a conspiracist, a nut case, a man with an agenda that bears no resemblance to reality and he says he wants to run for president of the United States.

I am stunned beyond belief at the way this political scion has conducted himself while seeking the Democratic nomination for POTUS. He says he is anti-vaccine, then denies saying it. He says the COVID virus was targeted to strike people of certain races and religions, then denies saying that, too.

If you speak nicely to him, he’s all yours. If you criticize his comments or take his policy pronouncements to task, you become a “censor.” RFK Jr. does not know the meaning of the word.

Hey, it gets worse!

If he fails to win the Democratic Party presidential nomination next summer, he might embark on a third-party campaign. To what end is anyone’s guess.

RFK Jr. also has contended that Sirhan Sirhan, who shot Sen. Robert Kennedy to death on June 5, 1968 and was caught with the gun in his hand in the LA hotel kitchen that horrible night, didn’t do the heinous deed. What the hell?

Remember, too, that this is the fellow who said he voted for President Biden in 2020. He says his family has deep personal affection for Joe Biden and supports the president’s policies, and that he shares their views of the president. Why, then, is he embarking on this fool’s errand?

Oh, I know. It’s because he is a fool!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

medical news

Where is Fauci Squad?

The congressional Republican hit squad made a grim prediction on the eve of the 2022 midterm election.

They would, if they regained control of the House of Representatives, launch an immediate investigation into all the wrongs committed by Dr. Anthony Fauci, the one-time coronavirus guru hired first by Donald Trump and then kept by Joe Biden to lead the nation out of the pandemic crisis.

They accused Fauci of lying, of covering up the cause of the pandemic, of spreading confusion. They were going to get to the bottom of it all right then and there … they said with passion.

What the hell?

Fauci has retired. He’s spending more time with his wife, his children and grandchildren. He is out of the limelight. For my money, the man deserves a medal. Hell, he ought to get several medals for putting up with the ration of horseh** he got for four years during the Trump years and during the time he served the Biden administration.

Oh, wait. I almost forgot. The Republican congressional caucus has been sniffing around Hunter Biden’s laptop, looking for crimes that they say he committed. Then we find out that an informant who reportedly was friendly with the GOP caucus is an arms dealer who worked for China … and who now is on the lam.

As for Fauci, the GOP continues to be distracted by other phony probes to spend any time looking into so-called wrongdoing by a dedicated infectious disease physician.

From my perch in the cheap seats, Anthony Fauci is a hero who saved millions of American lives. The GOP chumps looking for dirt to throw at him continually disgrace the government they have pledged to serve.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

No, RFK Jr., don’t do it!

Never in a zillion years would I have believed I would declare my intention to oppose the political aspirations of one of the late Robert Kennedy’s children.

But … Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s intention to run for president of the U.S.A. in 2024 as a Democrat has me mighty steamed.

RFK Jr. is an anti-COVID vaccine advocate, which means policies such as his would have resulted in many more deaths than we already have suffered since the pandemic swept into the country in late 2019.

I hate saying this about one of the heirs to my first political hero, but RFK Jr. is a kook, a nut, a goofball. He has filed paperwork declaring his intention to run for president.

According to BBC: In March, Mr Kennedy shared on Twitter that he was considering a run for president.

At the time, he said: “If I run, my top priority will be to end the corrupt merger between state and corporate power that has ruined our economy, shattered the middle class, polluted our landscapes and waters, poisoned our children, and robbed us of our values and freedoms.”

Kennedy heir to challenge Biden for White House (msn.com)

Memo to Bobby Jr.:  The economy ain’t “ruined.” The middle class isn’t “shattered.” And I have not been robbed of a single “value” or “freedom.”

I’m going to stick with President Biden, thank you very much. Stay out of the race, RFK Jr. Anti-vaccine policies such as his are the true danger to us all.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Sports news

COVID vaccine: political weapon

Damar Hamlin’s collapse on the football field during the Buffalo Bills-Cincinnati Bengals contest the other evening has prompted a disgusting and disgraceful display of politicization I didn’t believe was possible.

Hamlin is now released from the hospital and is home in Buffalo continuing his recovery from the frightening moment when he suffered a heart attack after tackling a Bengals player in the first quarter of a game that was suspended and eventually canceled by the National Football League.

Now comes word from some right-wing commentators and a Republican U.S. senator from Texas that Hamlin’s collapse might have been spurred by the COVID-19 virus vaccine.

What an utterly disgraceful turn!

The senator was Ted Cruz, who retweeted a message that came from actor Kevin Sorbo questioning the circumstance surrounding Hamlin’s collapse. Cruz took the tweet down. U.S. Rep. Collin Allred, a Dallas Democrat — and a former pro football player — called Cruz’s politicization of the Hamlin incident a “new low, even for Ted Cruz.”

This kind of second-guessing, grandstanding and hideous conjecture from the cheap seats simply illustrates the coarsening of our society.

It has no place … except in the gutter.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

medical news

Thank you, Dr. Fauci

While we’re giving thanks to this or that person, I want to offer a word or two of gratitude for the public service delivered by someone who served seven U.S. presidents.

Anthony Fauci has retired from his post as chief medical adviser to President Biden. He is calling it a career after serving as the nation’s chief infectious disease expert.

I want to offer him thanks for taking on a job that earned him as many foes as friends over the years. Why is that? Because he was unable to predict the course that infectious diseases would take, but he still managed to save literally millions of lives over his many years of service.

Republicans who are about to take control of the House of Representatives have promised to bring Dr. Fauci back to Capitol Hill to answer stern questions about his service during the COVID pandemic. The good doc likely will stand strong against the GOP onslaught.

I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Fauci while attending the International Conference on HIV/AIDS in Bangkok back in the summer of 2004. He was there to provide wise counsel to those seeking answers to that disease. I was in Bangkok as part of a journalist contingent traveling through Southeast Asia to learn about the impact of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in that part of the world.

Fauci served with distinction in presidential administrations dating back to Ronald Reagan. He served under the administrations of George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump and finally, Joe Biden.

Yes, there were some rocky times, particularly during the Trump years as the administration sought to get its arms around the COVID virus. The vitriol hurled against Dr. Fauci from those on the far right has been unfair and just plain wrong.

I just want to take this brief moment to express one American patriot’s deep thanks for the service Anthony Fauci delivered. Those who survived illness from the killer virus well might owe this good man their lives.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

education news, State news

Teachers want to bail

Finding and keeping high-quality educators is a difficult enough job even when conditions are ideal. Throw in a killer pandemic and then politics on top of that, then the public school system faces a seriously daunting task.

The Texas Tribune reports a disturbing trend: Results from a new online survey of K-12 teachers in Texas, released on Thursday, shows most “seriously considered” leaving the profession this year, a 19% increase from two years ago.

Not good, man. Not good at all.

Earlier this year we saw Dallas-Fort Worth area school districts pummeled by resignations of superintendents, some of whom were leaving districts that as recently a year ago were honored for superlative work in educating children.

What drove them away? In too many cases, it was the constant hectoring from parents over mask mandates and other restrictions made necessary by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Tribune reports:

For its third annual survey on teacher satisfaction, the Charles Butt Foundation last spring sent an online questionnaire to 1,291 Texas public school teachers who were randomly selected from the Texas Education Agency’s 2020 roster of teachers in the state. All of them responded.

The Charles Butt Foundation is a nonprofit organization named after the chair and CEO of H-E-B, the largest privately held employer in Texas. The foundation’s goal is to make public education more equitable across the state through community partnerships.

I tried my hand at substitute teaching in 2012 and learned right away I am not wired to work with other people’s children. My brief exposure to classroom work filled me with admiration for those who see it as a calling.

Therefore, I am unsettled to learn that politics is getting in the way of those who are dedicated to guiding young minds and to teaching them skills they will need to succeed.

New survey indicates more Texas teachers want to quit | The Texas Tribune

It shouldn’t need to be said, but Texas can ill-afford to let good teachers go because of political pressure. Our public school system, for which we all pay, suffers as a result.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com