Tag Archives: Wall Street Journal

legal news, media news, national news, political news

Is that all there is? Yep, that’s it!

The Wall Street Journal, a longtime champion of conservative causes and those who promote them, wants to know why all the fuss over the FBI search of Donald Trump’s home in search of incriminating evidence.

The Journal, owned by Trump sycophant Rupert Murdoch, questions the release of the heavily redacted affidavit that gave FBI permission to go through Trump’s posh estate.

The newspaper editorializes: It’s possible the redactions in the 38-page document release contain some undisclosed bombshell. But given the contours of what the affidavit and attachments reveal, this really does seem to boil down to a fight over the handling of classified documents. The affidavit’s long introduction and other unredacted paragraphs all point to concern by the FBI and the National Archives with the documents Mr. Trump retained at Mar-a-Lago and his lack of cooperation in not returning all that the feds wanted.

I have to ask: Why question the motive behind the search … and no, I will not call it a “raid”?

There remains a lot behind those redacted passages we don’t understand. There might be the ol’ smoking gun in there. But from what I have been able to glean so far, the FBI said it had enough evidence of “probable cause” that a crime has been committed on Trump’s property. Hell, there might even have been crimes committed within the White House.

The release of the redacted affidavit is enough to persuade me that the federal government appears set to prepare an indictment or maybe two or three against — oh, you know — someone very high up in the government.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Donald Trump

Give it a rest, Donald … oh, wait!

Part of me wishes Donald J. Trump would stop yammering about an electoral theft that didn’t occur. Then it dawns on me: Why not keep up the charade, given that more Americans are tuning that nonsense out of their minds?

Gerald Baker, former editor in chief of the Wall Street Journal, is the latest conservative to say that The Donald needs to stop yapping about the “voter fraud” that didn’t occur during the 2020 presidential election.

Wall Street Journal Editor Has Had It With Republicans Who Back Donald Trump’s Big Lie (msn.com)

In an opinion piece published Monday, Baker wrote that many prominent Republicans and major donors don’t actually believe Trump’s election lies and would love for him to “go quietly away.”

“It is a desire expressed as fervently in private as it is assiduously and dexterously avoided in public,” said Baker, who served as the WSJ’s editor-in-chief until 2018.

Well, geez. Keep talking about it, Donald. Yeah, it’s old “fake news.” Yeah, it never happened. Sure, Trump has yet to produce a shred of evidence to back up his specious claims of electoral theft.

It’s getting real old, Donald.

So, keep fomenting The Big Lie … loser!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

education news

Still stewing over the ‘Dr. Biden’ dust-up

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I admit to being a bit miffed over an essay that appeared in the Wall Street Journal that takes Jill Biden to task for her generous use of the honorific term “Dr.” in front of her name.

The author of the piece refers to her as “Jill” and “Kiddo,” the latter term I cannot imagine him ever using while referring to a man. But the future first lady was fair game, I suppose, for the writer and for the editors of what I consider to be one of America’s great newspapers.

I watched Biden and her husband, the president-elect, last night on “The Late Show” with Stephen Colbert. Colbert asked her about the controversy and she brought up the “Kiddo” comment with something of a pained expression on her face. She didn’t belabor the content of the op-ed column, other than to take offense at the sexist nature of the criticism.

She kept her day job as an educator while serving as second lady during Joe Biden’s vice presidency and hinted that she will do so again once she becomes the nation’s first lady. Jill Biden once said that teaching young people isn’t just what she does, it is “who I am.”

She is well-educated, having earned a doctorate in education from the University of Delaware. Suffice to say, moreover, that she is far from the first doctorate-level academician to use the “Dr.” term in front of his or her name.

If she wants to call herself “Dr. Biden,” well … that’s OK with me.

media news

Criticism is sexist to the core

1 Comment

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Sexism stinks as badly as racism, ageism or any form of prejudice that poisons the human spirit.

Sexism revealed itself in a pointless essay published in the Wall Street Journal that questions why Jill Biden, wife of the president-elect, keeps referring to herself as “Dr. Jill Biden.” The author of the screed, Joseph Epstein, said she should stop doing so, calling it “fraudulent.”

Umm. No. It isn’t. Good grief, dude.

Jill Biden earned a doctorate in education long ago. She has every right to call herself “Dr. Biden,” as does anyone who chooses to use the honorific title to her.

Just as a point of personal privilege, I don’t necessarily like tossing the term around for anyone and I routinely decline to use the term to describe “academic doctors”; I reserve the title to describe in initial references to medical doctors.

That said, any suggestion that a great newspaper such as the WSJ would publish such a hideous screed smacks of sexism.

Does anyone really believe the newspaper would have allowed such a thing to see print if it referred to a man who calls himself “Dr. So and So”?

Read the screed here.

Stupidity still festers.

national news

More armchair diagnosis is coming

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John Harwood is an educated man. He’s smart. He is well-spoken. He can string sentences together.

He lacks, however, a certain credential that is important in his assessing the president’s state of mind and, I’ll presume, his medical competence: Harwood lacks a medical degree.

He writes for the New York Times, he once wrote for the Wall Street Journal and he is a contributor to CNBC, the cable news network that specializes in business news. He graduated from Duke University with a degree in history and economics.

But here he goes, popping off about Donald Trump’s mental state. He said the president’s press conference before departing the G-7 summit was a stumbling, bumbling performance.

Then he said this on MSNBC: I got to say that the upshot about this press conference was about tariffs. I’ll be honest as a citizen: I’m concerned about the president’s state of mind. He did not look well to me in that press conference. He was not speaking logically or rationally. It sounded as if he was making stuff up, saying China told me nobody’s ever talked to us, saying, ‘Oh, I talked to Justin Trudeau and can’t believe he was getting away with so much trade stuff.’

I don’t think those things are true. And he — there was something about his affect which was oddly kind of languid for him. I don’t know what it means but he did not look well to me.

C’mon, Mr. Harwood. Leave the diagnoses to the pros, the individuals who have training in observing people’s behavior.

This kind of cheap-seat evaluation is getting tiresome. A journalist’s national forum does not give him license to discuss issues of which he knows nothing.

environmental news

More chaos from Trump; this time it’s those Paris Accords

This is what I mean when I mention the chaos that emanates from Donald J. Trump’s White House.

He said he would pull out of the Paris Climate Accord, citing the worldwide agreement to cut carbon emissions as endangering U.S. jobs. Then comes word that the president is having second thoughts.

Major media outlets — such as the Wall Street Journal — report that Trump is having second thoughts about his decision to pull out of the agreement. The White House says “no!” that’s not the case at all. The president intends to pull out; he’s going to keep one of his major campaign promises, White House flacks insist.

Then there’s confusion over whether he wants to renegotiate the accords to make them more acceptable to whatever concerns he has over them. Is he willing to renegotiate or not? A European Union officials said the United States won’t renegotiate the deal, but will review the terms to decide if there’s some wiggle room to allow continued U.S. participation.

Sheesh! I keep wishing for a No Drama Obama type of White House operation. Former President Barack Obama used to operate under a premise that the less drama, confusion and, yes, chaos, the better for the White House.

Donald Trump’s modus operandi is to pursue precisely the opposite result. The more chaos and confusion, the better.

Can we get our stories straight? Ever?

national news, political news

GOP comes down with ‘buyer’s remorse’

donald

Buyer’s remorse must be spreading.

British voters agree to pull Great Britain out of the European Union and now might be regretting that decision.

Now we hear that most Republicans in this country want someone other than Donald J. Trump to be their party’s presidential nominee.

In both cases, I fear that voters will have to live with the consequences of their decision.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/donald-trump-republicans-polls-224853

A poll published by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal say that 45 percent of Republicans want Trump to be their nominee. They want someone else to carry the banner into the fight this fall against Hillary Rodham Clinton and the Democrats.

Sorry, folks. Here’s the thing: Trump has won more primary contests by far than anyone else. He’s collected enough convention delegates to win the nomination on the first ballot. He’s going to be the GOP nominee this summer when delegates gather in Cleveland.

We have a saying in Texas that goes something like this:

“You dance with them that brung ya.”

Sure, Trump has a seemingly endless list of failings as a national political leader. No need to detail them here. You know what they are.

But he’s won a fair-and-square primary fight against a large field of opponents, most of whom were much more qualified than he is to become commander in chief.

He’s your guy, GOP.

Good luck at the dance.

national news, political news

Hillary might not win the nomination … really?

hillary

Is it entirely possible that Hillary Rodham Clinton — the one-time candidate of destiny for the Democratic Party — could lose here party’s presidential nomination after all?

Douglas Schoen — a former pollster for President Bill Clinton — thinks it’s possible.

His thesis is simple.

If U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders wins the California primary next Tuesday, the Democratic brass is going to come down with a case of terminal heebie-jeebies at the prospect of nominating a badly damaged candidate for the presidency.

Where would they turn? Who would redeem the party’s political fortunes?

That would be the vice president of the United States of America, Joseph Biden.

The vice president has said repeatedly two seemingly contradictory things about his decision to opt out of running for the presidency.

One is that he believes he made the right call. Two is that he regrets making that decision.

You might ask: Huh?

If you are, I get it. I’ve asked the same thing.

http://www.newsmax.com/Politics/Doug-Schoen-Pollster-Democrat-Hillary/2016/06/01/id/731649/

Honestly, I don’t know what will happen after Tuesday. Everyone’s expectation is that Clinton will secure enough delegates to win the nomination on the first ballot when Democrats gather this summer in Philadelphia. In addition to California, voters in the Dakotas and New Jersey are going to the polls.

Clinton cancelled campaign events in Jersey to concentrate on California.

What does all this mean for Biden?

“Mr. Biden would be cast as the white knight rescuing the party, and the nation, from a possible (Donald J.) Trump presidency,” the Democratic pollster said in an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal.

I’ve stated already my admiration for the vice president. I wish he would have run. I understand why he stayed out. His son, Beau, had just died. The man is still mourning his son’s death.

In every other political year, though, it would appear that Biden’s decision to stay out of the race would be cast in stone.

As we’ve seen at almost every step along the way in this election season, this ain’t like anything we’ve ever seen.

 

media news, national news, political news

What’s with this ‘national poll’?

polls

More often than not I’m going to look carefully at public opinion poll results.

In this election season, we’re being inundated with them. Republican-leaning polls say one thing; Democratic-leaning polls say another. I prefer to look most closely at polls unaffiliated with either party, or certain ideological think tanks, or media outlets I know to have bias in either direction.

But one recent poll has me wondering: Is this one even relevant to anything?

Hillary Clinton leads Bernie Sanders by 25 percentage points nationally, according to a poll released by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal.

The relevancy issue?

Well, consider a couple of things.

They’re both running for the Democratic Party presidential nomination, which means that they’re not going to face each other in a national election. Therefore, they are battling state by state: Iowa, then New Hampshire, then South Carolina . . . and on it goes.

They’ll get to Texas in early March.

Therefore, whether Clinton beats Sanders by a single percent or a million percent in a national poll doesn’t matter one bit.

How are they faring in each state?

The poll does compare the candidates’ chances against a potential Republican nominee and it shows Clinton faring better against the GOP foe than Sanders.

That’s relevant, I guess.

However, these polls pitting one candidate against the other running in the same party primary simply doesn’t register with me.

 

International news, national news, political news

Some self-awareness, Mr. Vice President

cheney

Dick Cheney’s utter lack of self-awareness is an astounding thing to behold.

The former vice president and his daughter, Liz, have co-written a book, “Exceptional: Why the World Needs a Powerful America.” In an extended excerpt published in the Wall Street Journal, Cheney writes that President Obama has made “false” statements about the Iran nuclear deal.

False statements? Yes, the man who orchestrated — along with the rest of the George W. Bush national security team — this nation’s invasion of Iraq on a whole array of falsehoods has now laid the charge on the man who succeeded President Bush in the White House.

He has joined the GOP amen chorus in blaming Obama for the rise of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, contending that the United States has “abandoned” Iraq and is “on course” to do the same thing in Afghanistan.

I don’t disagree with the title of the Cheneys’ book. The world does need a “powerful America.” I will simply add my own view that the world still has a powerful America in its midst.

We remain the world’s pre-eminent military power — by a long shot. Our economy is still the envy of the world. People are aching to gain entry into the United States. Yes, many of them come here illegally, but many more come here legally and in accordance with federal immigration law.

Let us stop denigrating our current role in the world — as many of the GOP presidential candidates have done — by suggesting we’ve lost our place at the top of the geopolitical food chain.

As for the former vice president, he needs to take time for some serious introspection before he accuses others of stating foreign-policy falsehoods.

Read more on this link.