Tag Archives: The Hill

legal news

No need to pack SCOTUS

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Hell hasn’t exactly frozen over, but the rare moment of my agreeing with a conservative legal scholar has arrived.

Jeremy Dys writes in The Hill that there exists no clear reason to expand the ranks of the U.S. Supreme Court, or to “pack” it to make it more palatable to us liberals.

I happen to agree with him.

Furthermore, I wish the lefties among us would just pipe down and let the judicial branch of our federal government do the job granted to it by the U.S. Constitution.

Dys and I come at this from different perspectives. He believes the court’s “center-left demise” has been exaggerated. I happen to believe that elections have consequences, as we learned to our dismay — I hasten to add — with the election in 2016 of the moron who got impeached twice by the U.S. House of Representatives.

He exited the White House in disgrace. However, he was able to nominate three individuals to the high court and much to the surprise of many of us, the judicial troika he selected hasn’t fallen in lockstep with whatever judicial philosophy POTUS 45 wanted them to follow.

No reason to pack the court | TheHill

Justice Stephen Breyer is not sending any strong signals that he is about to retire from the court. The liberal justice’s successor would not change the ideological balance on the SCOTUS. I do have a fear that if the GOP gets control of the Senate after the 2022 election that its leadership will stall any nomination process the way it did in 2016 when Justice Antonin Scalia died and the Senate denied President Obama the chance to select a successor to the conservative judicial icon.

But that’s how it goes.

I just dislike the notion of monkeying around the size of the Supreme Court because the politics of the moment do not suit one side of the political divide.

national news

‘Audit’ won’t change a thing

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Earth to the cabal of Republican Party fruitcakes who just cannot free themselves from the death grip of the cult of personality surrounding the recent past POTUS …

The phony audits that are wrapping up in places like Arizona will not “change the outcome” of the 2020 presidential election. Joe Biden won the election. It has been certified, verified, signed into law. The former Dipsh** in Chief’s assertion of widespread vote fraud will never bear fruit.

According to The Hill: A majority of Republicans in the poll, 51 percent, indicated they think reviews of the 2020 election will change its outcome, including 29 percent who “definitely” think it will change the outcome and 22 percent who think it “probably” will change the results.

Majority of Republicans think state reviews will change 2020 outcome: poll (msn.com)

Umm. How can I say this? No. Nothing will change. The fruitcakes need to have their numb skulls examined.

national news, political news, State news

‘Jim Crow in the 21st century’

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President Biden has shucked the gloves and donned the brass knuckles to use against Republican Party efforts to suppress voter turnout.

Biden is taking particular umbrage at laws enacted in Georgia and signed by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp that seeks to restrict voter access to the ballot. Imagine that, if you dare.

One of the more odious aspects of the law is something that utterly boggles my noggin. It makes it a crime — a crime! — to give a voter food or refreshment while he or she is waiting in line to cast a ballot.

President Biden has described the law as “Jim Crow in the 21st century.” I happen to agree with him.

Gov. Kemp is pushing back, not surprisingly.

Kemp in a statement shared with The Hill said the legislation he signed into law Thursday “expands voting access, streamlines vote-counting procedures, and ensures election integrity.”

“There is nothing ‘Jim Crow’ about requiring a photo or state-issued ID to vote by absentee ballot – every Georgia voter must already do so when voting in-person,” he continued.

Kemp fires back at Biden: Nothing ‘Jim Crow’ about Georgia law | TheHill

I don’t have a particular problem with requiring a photo ID to vote. I do have a serious problem with restrictions on early voting, or reducing the number of polling places.

Is it a revision of “Jim Crow,” which is how President Biden describes it? So help me, it looks that way!

It is striking that the Georgia legislature would enact such restrictions immediately after Democrats captured two U.S. Senate seats; one of those Democrats, I hasten to add, happens to be an African-American, Raphael Warnock. Coincidence? As they say: In politics, there is no such thing as coincidence.

Georgia, sadly, isn’t alone. Texas legislators are in the midst of enacting equally restrictive voting laws, not to mention getting ready to redraw congressional boundaries in ways that favor electing Republicans.

President Biden happens in my view to call it correctly with regard to what Georgia is trying to enact.

Let the battle rage on!

national news

But … why, RNC?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

The Republican National Committee is striking back at Donald Trump, who has demanded that Republican politicians cease using his name to promote their candidacies.

The Hill newspaper has reported on the RNC’s response: The letter from RNC chief counsel Justin Riemer says the GOP “has every right to refer to public figures as it engages in core, First Amendment-protected political speech, and it will continue to do so in pursuit of these common goals.”

RNC fires back at Trump, says it ‘has every right’ to use his name in fundraising appeals | TheHill

Hmm. I guess my question simply is this: Why would the RNC want to affiliate itself with a twice-impeached and thoroughly disgraced former president?

Just wondering.

medical news

Fauci threatened for telling us the truth … amazing!

(AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Anthony Fauci might possess the strongest resolve of anyone in the United States of America.

Time magazine has declared Dr. Fauci to be one of its People of the Year for 2020. Do ya think?

The Hill newspaper reported: “I mean I’ve been doing this for 36 years as director of the (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases).” I’ve seen disagreements. I’ve seen political issues get in the way over the 36 years, but I’ve never seen the extent of the divisiveness which leads to hostility against public health measures,” he continued.

Fauci revealed earlier this year that he and his family, including his daughters, have received harassment over complaints about his public health recommendations during the pandemic, including wearing face masks or coverings. 

Let’s just ponder this for a brief moment.

Donald Trump brings an esteemed infectious disease expert aboard to help run a coronavirus response effort. Then he dismisses the expert’s advice, his wisdom and his call for caution. The dismissal brings out the lunatics among us who do things such as what Fauci has described. His daughters are harassed? Their lives are threatened? Is this for real?

And yet the good doctor continues to deliver the news we need to hear, eschewing the tendency to tell us what we — and Donald Trump — want to hear.

Does he deserve the recognition that Time is bestowing? Absolutely!

We do not yet know who will receive the coveted Person of the Year honor from Time. My own sense is that it should go to those on the front line of this fight against COVID-19: nurses, doctors, police officers, firefighters and educators.

Somewhere in all of that we can find a spot to insert Dr. Anthony Fauci’s name for him to receive the high honor and respect he has earned, not just for this fight but for all he has done to educate us about the danger of infectious disease.

national news

Poll shows NYT tax story makes little impact

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

A New York Times bombshell report about Donald Trump’s taxes and the huge debt he owes to, um, someone apparently has made little impact on voters’ perception of Trump.

You know, I get it.

A poll by Hill-HarrisX says that the report makes no difference in how people intend to vote for president. It didn’t move the needle much at all, The Hill newspaper reports.

Duh!

I was adamantly opposed to Trump from the get-go, so the story didn’t influence me in the slightest. I sense that the Trumpkin Corps, which believes the New York Times conveys “fake news,” isn’t going to be moved, either. They believe the Liar in Chief no matter who contradicts him or no matter the mountain of evidence that Trump is a flat-out liar.

The reports, then, of the public opinion remaining static about the president really doesn’t surprise me. I only am baffled by the stubbornness with which the Trumpkins exhibit in expressing their undying love for this guy.

My wife pointed out a lawn sign near our house in Princeton, Texas, that proclaims support for Donald Trump, adding that he doesn’t “bullsh**” us. Really?

This individual is the King of BS, man!

economic news

Tariffs harm U.S. economy, experts say

It turns out that Donald Trump’s alleged expertise on international trade policy is, shall we say, a bit overstated.

Put another way, the president’s decision to impose tariffs on imported goods has harmed U.S. taxpayers and cost American jobs he vowed would return in droves.

Whose analysis is this? The Federal Reserve has released a study laying out what it says has been the impact of the tariffs across the land. It hasn’t been good, according to the Fed analysis.

This likely will bring some recrimination from Trump, who will say the numbers are wrong, they’re cooked up in some star chamber kitchen and that they’re intended to throw the upcoming election into his opponents’ corner.

As The Hill reports: “We find that tariff increases enacted in 2018 are associated with relative reductions in manufacturing employment and relative increases in producer prices,” the report by Fed economists Aaron Flaaen and Justin Pierce reads.

This is pretty in line with what many economists have said all along about tariffs, which is that they don’t harm the producers of the goods being imported into this country, but that they inflate the prices we pay here.

Trump is having none of it. He keeps insisting that tariffs are part of a successful strategy to “put America first.” He wants to punish countries that don’t play fair in the game of international trade. I certainly understand the president’s stated reason for wanting a fairer playing field.

Why, though, must he invoke tariffs that do two things immediately? They boost prices on imported goods, which is a de facto tax and they rattle the daylights out of financial markets, affecting the retirement portfolios of millions of Americans … such as, well — my wife and me!

This so-called trade policy damn sure isn’t making America great again.

national news

‘No one cares’? Yes, we do care

Ed Rendell is a fierce Democratic Party partisan and an acknowledged supporter of former Vice President Joe Biden’s campaign for the presidency of the United States.

He also is mistaken when he says “no one cares” about the gaffes that keep flying out of the former VP’s mouth on occasion.

Rendell, the former Democratic national chairman/Pennsylvania governor/Philadelphia mayor, has written that the only folks who give a hoot about Biden’s misstatements are the media and politicians. Hmm. I believe he needs to rethink that.

Rendell has written a column about it for The Hill. See it here.

I will agree with this assertion, however: Biden’s gaffes are not nearly in the same league as Donald John Trump’s continuing full frontal assault on the truth.

Biden does have this annoying tendency of mangling his facts, as he did when he sought to tell the story of a warrior who he said was awarded a Silver Star for valor. Military officials and witnesses to what Biden said occurred contend he got some of the details wrong, that he conflated events into something no one recognized. Biden stands by what he said.

Is this the same as Trump making preposterous declarations that he uses to glorify himself and inflate his role any event imaginable? Not even close, man!

Ed Rendell’s allegiance to VP Biden is understandable in this regard: They both have Pennsylvania roots, as Biden was born in Scranton, but moved to nearby Delaware as a young man and served the neighboring state in the U.S. Senate for 36 years before being elected as vice president in 2008.

However, Americans do care about Biden’s misstatements. The ex-veep needs to sharpen up his message and avoid these kinds of mistakes, which I believe he is capable of doing.

As for Trump, well … he’s a lost cause.

environmental news

There’s fate . . . and then you have this!

I believe I have just read what could be the most dramatic demonstration karma imaginable.

The Hill newspaper reports the following:

South African wildlife authorities say they have recovered the remains of a man suspected of poaching rhinoceroses, one of Africa’s most endangered great beasts.

But get a load of this . . . they believe the guy was killed by an elephant and his corpse was devoured by a pride of lions.

Check out the story here.

To be brutally candid, I don’t know how I’m supposed to react to this kind of story. I have heard about how some African governments have issued shoot-on-sight orders to park personnel who witness individuals killing wildlife illegally. Given that I am a devoted wild animal lover, I have cheered those reports.

Should I feel badly for this guy’s family? I suppose so. Park officials have offered their condolences, which is appropriate.

This development, if it turns out to be true, would buttress the old commercial jingle that over the years has turned into something of a cliché: It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.

business news, economic news, national news, political news

How do you say it in, oh, Mandarin?

Donald J. Trump has been facing this scrutiny ever since he rode down that escalator at Trump Tower and declared his intention to “Put America First” while campaigning for the presidency of the United States.

Reuters News Agency reports that the Trump re-election campaign has getting its “Keep America Great” banners from a factory in the People’s Republic of China. The Trump team denies it. Reuters stands by the story.

I am going to go with Reuters’s version of events.

You see, Trump and his team have demonstrated repeatedly their ability to lie to our faces. They’ve done so on almost any and every issue under the sun. They get away with it in the eyes of the “base” that continues to support the president.

The Hill reports: Manager Yao Yuanyuan told Reuters that she was worried Trump’s own tariffs would hurt production numbers, but said she did not know if the banners’ buyers were officially affiliated with the Trump campaign or the GOP.

Yao said her factory has been making Trump banners since the president was a candidate. 

There have numerous reports ever since Trump entered the rough-and-tumble world of politics about Trump-brand clothing being made offshore. Trump hasn’t denied it categorically. So, there’s a history of his using foreign labor to manufacture items with his name on them.

Should it surprise a single person that he would do so with the re-election campaign banners? Hah! Not even …