History – Page 216 – immigrationcourtside.com

RELIGION/POLITICS/REFUGEES: Pope Francis Puts Migrants’ Lives First — World’s Top Catholic Stands Tall Against Those Who Would Shun Most Vulnerable — Pence’s Values Might Bar Meeting With Women, But Haven’t Stopped Him From Supporting Policies That Hurt Refugees, Migrants, Transgender Children, Gays, The Sick, The Poor, The Starving, Many Women & Almost All Other Vulnerable People! Big Time Disconnect!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/how-pope-francis-is-leading-the-catholic-church-against-anti-migrant-populism/2017/04/10/d3ca5832-1966-11e7-8598-9a99da559f9e_story.html?hpid=hp_rhp-more-top-stories_no-name%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.1dbd72f3d9a0

Anthony Faiola and Sarah Pulliam Bailey report in the Washington Post:

“VATICAN CITY — As politicians around the world including President Trump take an increasingly hard line on immigration, a powerful force is rallying to the side of migrants: the Roman Catholic Church led by Pope Francis.

Catholic cardinals, bishops and priests are emerging as some of the most influential opponents of immigration crackdowns backed by right-wing populists in the United States and Europe. The moves come as Francis, who has put migrants at the top of his agenda, appears to be leading by example, emphasizing his support for their rights in sermons, speeches and deeds.

The pro-migrant drive risks dividing Catholics — many of whom in the United States voted for Trump. Some observers say it is also inserting the church into politics in a manner recalling the heady days of Pope John Paul II, who stared down communism and declared his opposition to the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The Vatican is standing in open opposition to politicians like Trump not just on immigration but also on other issues, including climate-change policy.

But the focal point is clearly migrant rights.
In the United States, individual bishops, especially those appointed by Francis, have sharply criticized Trump’s migrant policies since his election. They include Newark Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin, who last month co-led a rally in support of a Mexican man fighting deportation. Tobin has decried Trump’s executive orders on immigration, calling them the “opposite of what it means to be an American.”

In Los Angeles, Archbishop José H. Gomez, the first Mexican American vice president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, which leads the U.S. church, described migrant rights as the bishops’ most important issue. He has delivered blistering critiques of Trump’s policies, and instructed his clerics to distribute cards in English, Spanish, Korean and Vietnamese informing migrants of their rights in 300 parishes .
Chicago Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, one of Francis’s closest allies in the U.S. church, has issued orders that if federal immigration authorities should attempt to enter churches without a warrant in search of migrants, priests should turn them away and call the archdiocese’s lawyers. Catholic school principals were given the same instructions by the archdiocese, which Cupich said was an attempt to respond in a way that was firm “but not extreme.”

He said Francis has helped bishops shape their response.

“The pope makes it a lot easier for me to be a bishop because he’s very clear in his teaching, and [on] this one in particular, he’s trying to awaken the conscience of the citizens of the world,” Cupich said.

Francis has long been an advocate of migrants — kicking off his papacy in 2013 with a trip to an Italian island used as a waypoint for migrants desperate to enter Europe. In a highly public spat early last year, Francis and Trump exchanged barbs — with Francis declaring that anyone who wants to build walls “is not Christian.”

. . . .

Those who have the pope’s ear say Francis is seeking to counter anti-migrant policies by appealing directly to voters.

“I don’t think the pope is challenging [the politicians]. I think he is challenging their supporters, both those who actively support them and those who passively allow their policies to happen,” said the Rev. Michael Czerny, undersecretary of the Vatican’s new Section for Refugees and Migrants, which opened in January, just before Trump took office. Czerny reports directly to the pope — a sign of the importance of the new office.

“Mr. Trump or Ms. Le Pen are not the root of the problem,” Czerny continued. “The root of the problem is the fear, selfishness and shortsightedness that motivate people to support them.”

. . . .

He [William E. Lori, Archbishop of Baltimore] added that previous popes have taken similar positions as Francis on immigration. But, Lori added, Francis is “perhaps more dramatic.” His trips, such as his 2016 visit to the U.S.-Mexico border, also connected his stance on migrants to politics.
“The poor is the hallmark of his papacy,” Lori said. “It will affect our priorities and it should.”

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Meanwhile, Carla Gardina Pestana writes about “Arrogant Christians in the White House” in HuffPost:

“Mike Pence, the fundamentalist Christian whose views are so extreme that he cannot be alone with a woman other than his wife, and Donald Trump, who brags about sexually assaulting women and famously stumbled over an attempt to quote a biblical passage while on the campaign trail, seem to hold wildly divergent religious views. Yet both adhere to variations of Christianity inflected with arrogance. Together they represent two troubling trends in American Christianity, trends which appear to prove all the complaints secular liberals ever leveled against Christians.

Pence adheres to biblical literalism. Put simply, this view asserts that the Bible is a transparent document, one that prescribes specific behavioral guidelines. Glossing over the fact that the Bible is a complex text built of ancient fragments brought together by human hands, that it does not speak directly to many modern issues, and that even on its own terms it encompasses numerous contradictions, these Christians confidently declare that the Bible provides clear guidance for every Christian. Literalists arrived at this position only relatively late in Christian history, in response to various challenges from many quarters, including biblical scholarship, advances in science, and a rise in unbelief. Cutting through the complexities and the need to make choices, literalists declared all choice to be false and all discussion to be error. It was a comforting if simplistic and authoritarian solution to the problem of uncertainty.

Its arrogance lies in the hubris of those who believe that only their chosen answers are correct. Its potential to harm others comes when adherents gain political power and force their mandates on nonbelievers. One of the many dangers emanating out of the Trump White House is the power of Pence to impose not his religion but the behaviors his religion dictates onto the rest of us. Women’s rights and gender equality are on Pence’s hit list.

Trump’s religion, although very different, is similarly alarming. Unsurprisingly Trump accepts a religious viewpoint that tells him he is uniquely awesome. Whatever he has—however he acquired it—God wants him to enjoy to the fullest. Although traditional Christian social practice mandates that believers exercise humility, charity and other virtues that put others before self, Trump’s faith rejects all curbs on self-indulgence and self-aggrandizement. This religious position, known as Prosperity Theology, is newer than Pence’s literalism. It preaches that God wants the rich to be not only rich but selfish. Its attraction to a man like Trump—born to wealth, selfishly guided by his own desires, endlessly demanding that others adore him but never judge him—is transparent.

. . . .

Pence’s arrogance leads him to believe that he knows exactly what God wants us all to do and that he ought to force that on us if he has the power to do so. Trump’s faith simply endorses his own self-regard, elevating his personal whims to God’s desires. The political marriage of the two men is obviously one of expedience, given the great disparities in their beliefs and goals. Yet between them, they can do a great deal of damage. Arrogant self-righteousness and egotistical self-regard together wield power over the rest of us.

Little wonder that the pope has been modeling Christian humility and singing the praises of Christian charity, or that the supporters of these two find his lessons in what it means to be a Christian so infuriating.”

Read the complete article here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/arrogant-christians-in-the-white-house_us_58e94a6fe4b06f8c18beec89?

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Also, Allen Clifton writing in Forward Progressives quotes the views of Pastor John Pavlovitz taking Trump and the GOP to task for hypocricy on Syrian refugees, a point that has been noted several times previously in this blog:

“There are many things concerning Donald Trump that completely baffle me, but the fact that he’s strongly and enthusiastically supported by a party that comically portrays itself as representatives for “the Christian moral majority” is right near the top of my list. Of all the major candidates who ran for president from either party, Trump was, without a doubt, the least Christian of any of them. I haven’t viewed Republicans as actual Christians for years, but Trump’s rise to the top of the GOP cemented the fact that there’s nothing Christian about the Republican Party.
A great example of what I’m talking about is Trump and the GOP’s take on refusing to accept Syrian refugees. Innocent, desperate people, many of whom are women and children, fleeing a war-torn country hoping to escape a brutal dictator who, once again, just used chemical weapons against his own people. Not only have Trump and his fellow Republicans blatantly vilified these poor people as a means of pandering to the bigotry that fuels their party, but they continually lied about the process refugees must endure before ever stepping foot on U.S. soil.
If you listen to Trump talk about the vetting process, he essentially said we never had one — which is an outright lie. Every refugee allowed into the United States endures a rigorous process that usually takes between 18-24 months to complete and these refugees never know where they’re actually going to end up. So it’s not as if some “undercover terrorist” can pose as a refugee, say they want to go to America, and they’re here in two weeks.
Nevertheless, it’s undeniable that Trump and the GOP have gone out of their way to demonize these poor people for political purposes.

That made it rather nauseating to watch Trump claim that the images of the victims of the most recent chemical weapons attack launched by Assad are what “moved” him to take action by ordering last week’s airstrike. Nothing like selling yourself as the party of “Christian values,” while vilifying and rejecting refugees, then claiming that the images of victims of a horrific chemical attack “moved you” — not to do everything you can to help people who need it — but to fire 59 Tomahawk missiles at an airbase that was up-and-running within a few hours of the attack.

I’m sorry, but you can’t claim you’re “moved” by the sickening images of what’s going on in Syria when your administration’s policy is to reject helping thousands of refugees desperately trying to flee the carnage that’s plagued that nation for over six years now.

That’s also along the lines of what North Carolina Pastor John Pavlovitz said in a recent blog post:
‘This is the human collateral damage of what Donald Trump’s been selling for 16 months now. It is the cost in actual vibrant, beautiful lives, of the kind of incendiary rhetoric and alternative facts and Fox News truths that you’ve been fine with up until now. This is what you bought and paid for. Maybe not something this sadistic or explicitly grotesque, but the heart is the same: contempt for life that looks different and a desire to rid yourself of it.
I want to believe that you’re truly outraged, but honestly your resume is less than convincing.
Honestly, you didn’t seem all that broken up when Muslim families were handcuffed in airports a couple of months ago, or when mosques were being defaced, or when many of us were pleading the case for families fleeing exactlythe kind of monstrous atrocities you were apparently so moved by this week—and getting told to eat our bleeding hearts out by MAGA hat-wearing trolls. You weren’t all that concerned when your President told terrified, exhausted refugees to leave and go home—twice.'”

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Matthew 25:

44And they too will reply, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?’ 45Then the King will answer, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.’ 46And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”…

PWS

04-11-17

HISTORY: GEORGE WILL: War Is Hell On The Home Front Too — World War I Unleashed Deadly Nationalism, Xenophobia, & Racism In America, All In The Guise Of False “Patriotism” — Set The Stage For Even Worse Things To Follow!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/what-world-war-i-unleashed-in-america/2017/04/07/4a8412b4-1b07-11e7-855e-4824bbb5d748_story.html?utm_term=.e64d2fbd91cf

“Woodrow Wilson imposed and incited extraordinary repressions: “There are citizens of the United States . . . born under other flags . . . who have poured the poison of disloyalty into the very arteries of our national life. . . . Such creatures of passion, disloyalty and anarchy must be crushed out. . . . They are infinitely malignant, and the hand of our power should close over them.”

His Committee on Public Information churned out domestic propaganda instructing the public how to detect pro-German sympathies. A 22-year-old Justice Department official named J. Edgar Hoover administered a program that photographed, fingerprinted and interrogated 500,000 suspects. Local newspapers published the names of people who were not buying war bonds or otherwise supporting the war. People were fired or ostracized for insufficient enthusiasm. The Espionage Act of 1917 made it a crime to “collect, record, publish or communicate” information useful to the enemy.
In Illinois, Robert Prager, a German American coal miner suspected of spying, was stripped, marched through the streets and hanged. The Post deplored such “excesses” but applauded the “healthful and wholesome awakening in the interior part of the country.”

Josef Hofer and his two brothers were South Dakota Hutterites whose faith forbade any involvement in war, including wearing a military uniform. They were arrested in March 1918, and a week after the armistice they were sent to Fort Leavenworth, Kan. Arriving at the military prison around midnight, they stood naked for hours in a 17-degree November night. Then they were suspended naked from the bars of their cells, their feet barely touching the ground, refusing to wear the uniforms left in their cells. Fed only bread and water, after two weeks David Hofer was allowed to telegraph Josef’s wife, telling her that her husband was dying. He died the morning after she arrived. Prison guards mocked his corpse by dressing it in a uniform.”

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I have to admit that the experience of the Trump Administration is making me look at George Will, whom I had previously related to on few topics than baseball, in a new, more appreciative, light.

I continue to be amazed at how many folks seem to delight in the idea of their country going to war. Of course, the overwhelming number of celebrants are those who don’t actually fight the wars.

But, it’s still going on! Donald Trump has been bumbling through the first hundred days of his Presidency. But, finally, in contradiction to his recent statements, his campaign promises, and his cutting America’s already inadequate humanitarian response to vulnerable Syrian refugees, he lobs some missiles at a Syrian airbase.

The result, of course, was militarily insignificant, particularly since we warned the Russians (who presumably warned their Syrian clients) in advance. Syrian (or Russian) bombers took off from the same airbase the next day to hit the same Syrian cities, only this time being careful to kill civilians with “conventional” weapons rather than gas. Are civilians hit with conventional bombs really less dead than those killed in gas attacks?

Trump couldn’t begin to tell you what his strategy is or what he sees as the “endgame” in Syria. Yet, the next morning, many (not all) of his critics were congratulating him for finally doing something “Presidential.” I guess it doesn’t get much more “Presidential” than ordering a missile attack.

Back to World War I. It started for no apparent reason, and there were no discernible principles or values at stake. It was a product of weak leaders, irrational nationalism, a gullible public, and imbecilic generals on all sides. In the end, it not only killed and maimed millions, but set the stage for Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, large scale genocide, and the absolute horror of World War II.

Although the U.S. has fought some smaller wars since World War II, we haven’t really “won” any of them (except for fairly insignificant skirmishes like Grenada and Kuwait). But, that hasn’t stopped folks from thinking that the next one will be the “best war ever,” and Presidents from believing that dropping bombs and sending missiles will make them look like brave, courageous, and wise leaders — in other words, “Presidential.”

PWS

04-09-17

HuffPost: Larry Strauss — Trump, Sessions, & Co. Are On The Wrong Side Of History — “If you are knowingly hurting children, there is something wrong with you, whether or not you have the law on your side.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/deportations-immigration-trump-children_us_58e66103e4b0773c0d3ebbb5?0tr

Larry Strauss, veteran high school teacher and basketball coach; author, “Students First and Other Lies” writes in HuffPost:

“Trump and his supporters have their own moral arguments. They say we must put America and Americans first. Of course these phrases express geographic ignorance, since many of the people they wish to expel are, in fact, Americans (the U.S. being but one country in America). But we know what they mean. Why should citizens of the United States be sympathetic to people from other places when so many of our own people are struggling so mightily? One can argue that undocumented individuals are not actually taking away jobs or other resources from those born here, but it’s a tough sell to someone whose financial fortunes have collapsed in the last five or ten or twenty years. The students in my classroom who were brought here or born to parents who came here will almost uniformly go further than those parents and enjoy prosperity far beyond that of those parents. It is not surprising that they are resented by those Americans (of the U.S. variety) whose prospects are far less than those of their parents and grandparents.

But politics and policies born of resentment cannot be good for the soul of our country. Nor can any law — ANY LAW ANYWHERE — that, for any reason, hurts children. If you are knowingly hurting children, there is something wrong with you, whether or not you have the law on your side.

Every year the school at which I teach enrolls students in my classes and whoever those children are I teach the hell out of their class for them — and so do most of my colleagues.

When you work with kids you don’t decide who deserves to be taught and encouraged. Where they come from and how they got here just doesn’t matter. I once taught the grand-daughter of a Nazi who’d escaped to El Salvador after World War II. The girl owed me no apology or explanation. Just her best effort and her homework on time — most of the time.

So I am not sympathetic to those who wish to punish the children of those who snuck into our country — or those who came on false pretenses.

I wish that Jeff Sessions and his ICE men and women would restrict their deportations to serious criminals — those no country wants. Why are federal agents wasting time and resources on people who’ve committed minor crimes? Are such actions any better than a municipality shutting down a lemonade stand because of a city ordinance?

Here’s an idea: if the crime of an undocumented immigrant does not exceed the crime of Jeff Sessions himself (perjury, that is) then let them stay. And if the harm of the deportation exceeds the harm of the deportee’s crime then let’s have a little collective heart.

We are a nation of laws but if those laws are being used to harm people for political expedience by indulging bigotry and ethnic paranoia, then those laws do not deserve out respect and the politicians exploiting them do not deserve our support.

Those who deported Mexicans and Mexican-Americans in the 1930s were within the law — but on the wrong side of history.

Those who interned Japanese Americans in the 1940s were within the law — but on the wrong side of history.

Those who forced Native American children into border schools to assimilate them were within the law — but on the wrong side of history.

Trump and Sessions are within the law — at least they are on immigration enforcement — but their cruelty is dragging us all onto the wrong side of history.”

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I couldn’t agree more with Strauss’s sentiments, although I’m not willing to say that everything Trump, Sessions, Kelly, and company are proposing is within the law. In fact, they seem to be heading toward some massive violations of the due process guaranteed by law.

However, “nations that turn their backs on children will be dealt with harshly by history” is the gist of an earlier op-ed that I wrote criticizing the Obama Administration’s inhumane and wrong-headed prioritization of recently arrived women and children for removal. http://wp.me/P8eeJm-1A.

While the “Obama priorities” were rescinded upon the change of Administration, the Trump Administration appears to have an even crueler and more inhumane fate in store for women and children seeking refuge from the Northern Triangle: detention, expedited removal, attempts to deny the fair opportunity to apply for asylum, intentional restriction of access to counsel, criminal prosecution of parents seeking to save their children, and an overall atmosphere of coercion and mistreatment meant to encourage those who have recently arrived to abandon their claims for refuge and to discourage others from coming to seek refuge under our laws. Only time will tell whether the Article III Courts will allow the Administration to get away with it.

I particularly like Strauss’s use of the “Sessions standard” — anybody who has done no more than perjure themselves under oath should be allowed to stay. And, talk about someone who has lived on the “wrong side of history” for his entire life, yet stubbornly refuses to change: well, that’s the very definition of Jeff Sessions’s depressingly uninspiring career. Given a chance for some redemption late in life, he’s instead choosing to “double down” on his biases and narrow outlook. Jeff had better hope that there’s forgiveness for his sins out there somewhere in the next world.

PWS

04-07-17

SYRIAN REFUGEE HYPOCRISY: I’m Not The Only One To Notice The Moral Disconnect In Shooting Missiles While Ignoring The Plight Of Millions Of Vulnerable Syrian Civilian Refugees, Many Children!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-syria-humanitarian-refugees_us_58e6fd6ee4b051b9a9da3d6e

Akbar Shahid Ahmed writes in HuffPost:

“WASHINGTON ― As President Donald Trump on Thursday night announced a military strike on Syria because of his deep concern for “beautiful babies” and other civilians killed in a chemical weapons attack this week, two legal battles continued over his efforts to keep Syrian children and their families out of the United States.

The president’s first ban on refugees and travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries is being litigated in a federal court in Seattle. His second attempted Muslim ban remains blocked by a federal judge in Hawaii, with an appeals court scheduled to hear the case in May.

Both executive orders halted the entry of refugees, and targeted Syrians in particular. The language of the orders echoed Trump’s campaign talk about the humanitarian crisis facing more than 20 million people from that country. In September, the then-candidate said denying U.S. entry to Syrian refugees is “a matter of terrorism” and “a matter of quality of life.”

Since his inauguration, Trump has repeatedly spread lies about refugee-related problems in Sweden. And his administration has tried to mislead the public on the number of refugees being investigated on terror charges. The Washington Post rated Trump’s talking point on the issue “highly misleading” last month.

After a U.S. intelligence analysis suggested that Syrian President Bashar Assad used the banned chemical weapon sarin in an attack on an opposition-held village on Tuesday, Trump spoke multiple times about children and other civilians who were affected.

“Assad choked out the lives of helpless men, women and children. It was a slow and brutal death for so many. Even beautiful babies were cruelly murdered at this very barbaric attack,” Trump said after launching the strike Thursday night. “No child of God should ever suffer such horror.”

The White House confirmed after the attack that Trump has not altered his position on refugees. National Security Adviser James McMaster said the refugee issue “wasn’t discussed as any part of the deliberations” for the strikes, according to a White House pool report.

The hypocrisy did not go unnoticed.

. . . .

“More than 11 million Syrians have been displaced from their homes since Syria’s civil war began in 2011, when Assad attacked peaceful protests against his family’s decades-long rule.

“In many cases, children caught up in this crisis have fared the worst, losing family members or friends to the violence, suffering physical and psychological trauma, or falling behind in school,” the nonprofit World Vision wrote in a post on March 15, the sixth anniversary of the civil war. “Children affected by the Syrian refugee crisis are at risk of becoming ill, malnourished, abused, or exploited.”

Trump’s strike in itself is unlikely to have any serious impact on civilian suffering. A one-off U.S. show of force may help the president and his team feel they’re taken action. But the Assad regime’s assault on Syria’s people will likely continue, perhaps after some small break.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson suggested this would be the case Thursday night, telling reporters not to expect a change in U.S. policy toward directly trying to force Assad out.

“If Trump just wants Assad to stop using [chemical weapons] but does nothing about sieges, torture & mass executions, then Assad will likely say ‘deal,’” Kristyan Benedict, campaigns manager for Amnesty International UK, tweeted. “Stopping Assad’s chemical attacks has value for sure but [chemical weapons] are just one tool the regime use to terrorize civilians & maintain their power.”

The hypocrisy also was noted in a NY Times Op-Ed by Anthony J. Blinken on the need for an effective diplomatic follow-up to the military response:

“Here at home, Mr. Trump must speak directly to the American people about the country’s mission and its objectives, thoroughly brief Congress and seek its support, and make clear the legal basis for United States actions. And while he’s at it, he should reopen the door he has tried to slam shut on Syrian refugees. The president’s human reaction to the suffering of those gassed by the Assad regime should extend to all the victims of Syria’s civil war, including those fleeing its violence.”

Read Blinken’s entire op-ed here: https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/04/07/opinion/after-the-missiles-we-need-smart-diplomacy.html?em_pos=small&emc=edit_ty_20170407&nl=opinion-today&nl_art=0&nlid=79213886&ref=headline&te=1&_r=0&referer=

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Sorry, but I wouldn’t expect any real humanitarian or moral leadership out of this Administration. It’s really all about muscle, authority, acting tough, showing up the Obama Administration, throwing bones to the military, and shoring up shaky support among GOP hawks in Congress who have been itching to start another un-winnable war in the Middle East for years. Oh yeah, and it changed the subject from the Russia investigation, internal war in the West Wing, failed health care, and more attacks by this Administration on America’s environment, health, safety, privacy, and civil rights.

I also wouldn’t let new NSC head Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster off the hook here. Yes, he did America and the world a huge service by getting alt-right nationalist Steve Bannon off the NSC and perhaps shaking his standing in the West Wing. And, he undoubtedly brings a much needed voice of military and national security expertise to the table. The idea of Gen. Mike Flynn, a proven liar and flake, and Bannon being given any part in America’s national security apparatus is scary beyond belief.

But, McMaster’s failure to “connect the dots” between military policy and the intertwined ongoing civilian humanitarian refugee crisis in Syria is simply inexcusable. And, by publicly turning our back on Syrian refugees we actually signal that our talk of humanitarian concerns in Syria is merely a “smokescreen.”

We have, and will continue to, show little concern for the real human victims of the Syrian war. This signals to both Assad and Russia that our only real interest is maintaining politically visible “red lines.” As long as Assad sticks to “conventional means” of murdering, maiming, terrorizing and displacing Syrian civilians we will continue to turn our back on the suffering of refugees.

Both knowledge of and actual hands on field work in the area of refugees and humanitarian relief should be a job requirement for any military officer promoted to the rank of General or its equivalent in other branches of service. War, at the end of the day, is about only one thing: people. And, there is no such thing as a war that doesn’t produce both civilian deaths and refugees.

PWS

04-07-17

SYRIA/HUMAN RIGHTS: Firing Missiles To Solve A Humanitarian Crisis, While Ignoring The Plight Of Syrian Refugees Makes Little Sense — But It Does Serve To Undermine U.S. Moral Leadership — By Turning His Back On Syrians Who Could Be Saved, Trump Made The Situation Worse!

President Trump’s suddenly discovered moral outrage over the gassing of Syrian civilians and his hasty resort to military force seems odd in light of his studied indifference, and even demonization, of millions of desperate Syrian refugees in need of resettlement in America and the West. Pelting Syria with missiles is likely to kill some innocent civilians as well as Assad supporters and Russians. But, helping Syrians in need who actually managed to flee the country would be a sure-fire way of saving the lives of civilians, many of them women and children, enriching United States, taking pressure off our allies in the region with overflowing refugee camps, and showing some moral leadership to other Western nations who are wavering in their humanitarian commitments.

Here’s a clip from HuffPost showing how UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, notwithstanding her pictures of gassed Syrian kids, had no answer for why the U.S. is failing to fulfill its humanitarian responsibility to take a fair share of Syrian refugees.

HuffPost reports:

“Earlier on Wednesday, Haley gave a fierce speech at the United Nations condemning the Syrian regime and its Russian ally.

“How many more children have to die before Russia cares?” Hayley asked at the meeting of the United Nations Security Council.

Despite Hayley’s comments, it’s unclear what response the U.S. is considering in the wake of the attack. Trump said during a joint press conference with Jordan’s King Abdullah on Wednesday that Tuesday’s attack had changed his attitude toward the Assad regime and the country’s ongoing civil war. Just last week, the Trump administration had signaled it would no longer push for Syrian President Bashar Assad’s removal.

But neither Hayley nor Trump addressed whether Tuesday’s atrocity changed anything toward the president’s stance on Syrian refugees. Though there are already stringent requirements for refugees to enter the U.S., Trump repeatedly said during the presidential campaign that he considered Syrian refugees a terrorist threat.

After taking office in January, Trump signed an executive order on immigration that blocked admission to the U.S. for all refugees for 120 days and for Syrian refugees indefinitely, while also cutting the goal for refugee admissions this fiscal year from 110,000 to 50,000. The ban was later struck down in court. The implementation of a revised version of the executive order, which didn’t single out Syrian refugees but still blocked admission of all refugees for 120 days and decreased the total number of refugees to be admitted, was also halted in court.

At one point during Haley’s exchange with Van Susteren, a woman sitting in the mezzanine yelled out: “What about refugees?”

Haley went silent. Van Susteren paused, and then said, “Moving on.” The subject of refugees did not come up again.

. . . .

Haley’s talk came directly after a panel on the weaponization of medical care in Syria, in which two doctors asked those in the audience to start caring about Syrian doctors, civilians and refugees.”

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The sad fact is that the dead children in Syria are dead. Neither missiles nor recriminations about failed Obama Administration policies will bring them back to life. But, there are hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of still alive Syrian kids in refugee camps whose lives can be saved and who need our help. Sooner, rather than later.

PWS

04-06-17

LA TIMES EDITORIAL #4: “Trump’s War On Journalism”

http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-ed-trumps-war-on-journalism/

“In Donald Trump’s America, the mere act of reporting news unflattering to the president is held up as evidence of bias. Journalists are slandered as “enemies of the people.”

Facts that contradict Trump’s version of reality are dismissed as “fake news.” Reporters and their news organizations are “pathetic,” “very dishonest,” “failing,” and even, in one memorable turn of phrase, “a pile of garbage.”

Trump is, of course, not the first American president to whine about the news media or try to influence coverage. President George W. Bush saw the press as elitist and “slick.” President Obama’s press operation tried to exclude Fox News reporters from interviews, blocked many officials from talking to journalists and, most troubling, prosecuted more national security whistle-blowers and leakers than all previous presidents combined.

But Trump being Trump, he has escalated the traditionally adversarial relationship in demagogic and potentially dangerous ways.

Most presidents, irritated as they may have been, have continued to acknowledge — at least publicly — that an independent press plays an essential role in American democracy. They’ve recognized that while no news organization is perfect, honest reporting holds leaders and institutions accountable; that’s why a free press was singled out for protection in the 1st Amendment and why outspoken, unfettered journalism is considered a hallmark of a free country.

Trump doesn’t seem to buy it. On his very first day in office, he called journalists “among the most dishonest human beings on earth.”

Since then he has regularly condemned legitimate reporting as “fake news.” His administration has blocked mainstream news organizations, including The Times, from briefings and his secretary of State chose to travel to Asia without taking the press corps, breaking a longtime tradition.
This may seem like bizarre behavior from a man who consumes the news in print and on television so voraciously and who is in many ways a product of the media. He comes from reality TV, from talk radio with Howard Stern, from the gossip pages of the New York City tabloids, for whose columnists he was both a regular subject and a regular source.

But Trump’s strategy is pretty clear: By branding reporters as liars, he apparently hopes to discredit, disrupt or bully into silence anyone who challenges his version of reality. By undermining trust in news organizations and delegitimizing journalism and muddling the facts so that Americans no longer know who to believe, he can deny and distract and help push his administration’s far-fetched storyline.

It’s a cynical strategy, with some creepy overtones. For instance, when he calls journalists “enemies of the people,” Trump (whether he knows it or not) echoes Josef Stalin and other despots.

But it’s an effective strategy. Such attacks are politically expedient at a moment when trust in the news media is as low as it’s ever been, according to Gallup. And they’re especially resonant with Trump’s supporters, many of whom see journalists as part of the swamp that needs to be drained.”

************************************

Read the full editorial at the above link.

PWS

04/05/17

LA TIMES EDITORIAL #3: “Trump’s Authoritarian Vision”

“Trump’s Authoritarian Vision”

“In a way, Trump represents a culmination of trends that have been years in the making.

Conservative talk radio hosts have long blasted federal judges as “activists” and regulators as meddlers in the economy, while advancing the myth of rampant election fraud. And gridlock in Washington has led previous presidents to try new ways to circumvent the checks on their power — witness President George W. Bush’s use of signing statements to invalidate parts of bills Congress passed, and President Obama’s aggressive use of executive orders when lawmakers balked at his proposals.

What’s uniquely threatening about Trump’s approach, though, is how many fronts he’s opened in this struggle for power and the vehemence with which he seeks to undermine the institutions that don’t go along.

It’s one thing to complain about a judicial decision or to argue for less regulation, but to the extent that Trump weakens public trust in essential institutions like the courts and the media, he undermines faith in democracy and in the system and processes that make it work.
Trump betrays no sense for the president’s place among the myriad of institutions in the continuum of governance. He seems willing to violate long-established political norms without a second thought, and he cavalierly rejects the civility and deference that allow the system to run smoothly. He sees himself as not merely a force for change, but as a wrecking ball.

Will Congress act as a check on Trump’s worst impulses as he moves forward? One test is the House and Senate intelligence committees’ investigation into Russia’s meddling in the presidential election; lawmakers need to muster the courage to follow the trail wherever it leads. Can the courts stand up to Trump? Already, several federal judges have issued rulings against the president’s travel ban. And although Trump has railed against the decisions, he has obeyed them.

None of these institutions are eager to cede authority to the White House and they won’t do so without a fight. It would be unrealistic to suggest that America’s most basic democratic institutions are in imminent jeopardy.

But we should not view them as invulnerable either. Remember that Trump’s verbal assaults are directed at the public, and are designed to chip away at people’s confidence in these institutions and deprive them of their validity. When a dispute arises, whose actions are you going to consider legitimate? Whom are you going to trust? That’s why the public has to be wary of Trump’s attacks on the courts, the “deep state,” the “swamp.” We can’t afford to be talked into losing our faith in the forces that protect us from an imperial presidency.

This is the third in a series.”

Read the complete editorial here: http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-ed-trumps-authoritarian-vision/

**********************************

PWS

04/04/17

WashPost OP-ED: Send In The Clowns! — Catherine Rampell Says Trump Needs A Genuine Court Jester!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumps-court-needs-a-fool/2017/04/03/45d07658-18ab-11e7-bcc2-7d1a0973e7b2_story.html?utm_term=.4256b1f510ab

Rampell writes:

“Think King Lear’s “all-licensed fool,” except in a Cabinet post.

I realize it’s a bit gauche to suggest the administration start talent-scouting clowns when 488 of 533 Senate-confirmed jobs still don’t even have a nominee. But most of those jobs can be filled by Jared Kushner.

Normally, there’s no need for a formal fool position in the White House. That’s because most executives are capable of tolerating some degree of dissent, devil’s advocacy and gentle ribbing. In fact, some presidents have cultivated these things.”

********************************

Rampell’s complete op-ed is worth a read at the above link. There are some funny lines, but the message is dead serious and points to the difficulties ahead for our country.

I must say, that one of the first things that bothered me about Trump was his lack of a sense of humor, particularly about himself. In 44 years, I’ve not only been a senior executive, but I have known, represented, or served dozens and dozens of them, in Government and the public sector. Never met a good one without a sense of humor, the ability to take a joke, and some perspective. Even those who were pretty reserved or appeared self-contained had a wry sense of humor hiding in there that occasionally came to light.

There is a name for those who can dish it out, but not take it. Not an executive — a bully!

PWS

04-04-17

HISTORY: Matthew Yglesias In VOX Shows How Immigration Made America Great, Right From Our Beginning — It Wasn’t Always About Generosity To Others; It Was Mostly About What Made Us More Successful & Prosperous!

http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/4/3/14624918/the-case-for-immigration

“George Washington set in motion a strategy so radical that it made this country the wealthiest and strongest on Earth — it made America great.

Immigration.

He embraced a vision for an open America that could almost be read today as a form of deep idealism or altruism. “America is open to receive not only the opulent and respectable stranger, but the oppressed and persecuted of all nations and religions,” he told newly arrived Irishmen in 1783. He assured them they’d be “welcome to a participation of all our rights and privileges, if by decency and propriety of conduct they appear to merit the enjoyment.”

But Washington’s vision wasn’t primarily about charity or helping others. It was about building the kind of country that he wanted the United States to become. Greatness would require great people. America would need more than it had.

The contemporary debate around immigration is often framed around an axis of selfishness versus generosity, with Donald Trump talking about the need to put “America first” while opponents tell heartbreaking stories of deportations and communities torn apart. A debate about how to enforce the existing law tends to supersede discussion of what the law ought to say.

All of this misses the core point. Immigration to the United States has not, historically, been an act of kindness toward strangers. It’s been a strategy for national growth and national greatness.

. . . .

Last but by no means least, while it’s certainly true that Americans care about the average well-being of American citizens, we also care about something else — greatness, for lack of a better word.

In per capita income terms, the United States has, by most measures, been overtaken by Switzerland. The Netherlands is relatively close behind, and when you consider inequality and quality of public services, the typical Dutch person may well enjoy a higher standard of living than the typical American. This kind of thing matters. But at the same time, there is a reason that when Americans feel anxiety about national decline, they tend to think of China and not Switzerland. The Netherlands is a great place to live, but it hasn’t been a great nation since the early 17th century.

Aggregates matter, in other words.

If Americans had listened to the counsel of the Know-Nothing movement in the 1850s and drastically curtailed immigration from outside of Protestant Europe, it would probably still be a rich country today. But it would be a very different kind of rich country from the one we know — one with fewer, smaller cities mainly focused on exporting agricultural goods and other natural resources to the wider world. A place more like Canada or a supersize version of New Zealand, rather than an industrial and technological powerhouse that intervened decisively in two world wars and anchored a coalition of liberal states to defeat communism.

Going forward, demographers forecast that immigration — both the people it provides directly and the children that immigrants bear and raise — is the only reason America’s working-age population isn’t declining. This is doubly true when you consider that immigrants’ work in the household and child care sectors likely serves to increase native-born Americans’ childbearing as well.
A declining working-age population, seen already in Japan and some southern European countries, poses some serious challenges to a national economy. It tends to push interest rates down to an incredibly low level, making it difficult for central banks to respond to a recession. It also makes it more difficult to sustain public sector retirement programs and elder care more generally.

There are some offsetting upsides (less strain on transportation infrastructure, for example), and, like anything else, the problems are solvable. Fundamentally, however, an America that is shrinking is a country that is going to be a lesser force in the world than an America that is growing. It’s true, of course, that an America that continues to be open to immigrants will be a progressively less white and less Christian country over time. That’s a threatening prospect to many white Christian Americans, who implicitly identify the country in ethnic and sectarian terms. But America’s formal self-definition has never been in those terms.

And for those who believe in the principles of the Declaration of Independence and the value of America’s ideals, accepting a future of decline and retreat in the name of ethnic purity should be unacceptable. That the more homogeneous America will be not just smaller and weaker but also poorer on a per capita basis only underscores what folly it would be to embrace the narrow vision. That hundreds of millions of people around the world would like to move to our shores — and that America has a long tradition of assimilating foreigners and a political mythos and civil culture that is conducive to doing so — is an enormous source of national strength.

It’s time we started to see it that way.”

*********************************

I had these same feelings about many of the “happy cases” that came through my courtroom in Arlington over the years. I was constantly impressed with the courage, dedication, determination, and under-appreciated skills of the folks who came before me. And, I felt inspired and optimistic that they had chosen, notwithstanding hardship and obstacles, to join our national community and help make America even greater. Building America, one case at a time.

PWS

04//03/17

POLITICS: Dear DT, You’re Not On Reality TV Any More — You Can’t “Fire” The Freedom Caucus — Only Their Constituents Can Do That — And GOP Gerrymandering Insures That’s Not Going To Happen!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2017/03/31/daily-202-how-trump-s-threats-against-the-freedom-caucus-may-backfire/58de0ed5e9b69b72b2551089/

James Hohmann writes in the Washington Post:

“– Trump tried carrots, offering pizza parties and invitations to the White House bowling alley. Since that hasn’t worked, he’s using the stick. Niccolo Machiavelli wrote that one should try to be loved and feared. “But, because it is difficult to unite them in one person, it is much safer to be feared than loved,” the Italian diplomat explained in “The Prince.”

This approach makes much less sense in America circa 2017 than it did in the Italy of 1532.

In practice, throughout the history of our republic, this has almost never been an effective way to govern. Franklin Roosevelt, vastly more popular than the current occupant of the Oval Office, went all-in during the 1938 midterms against Southern Democrats who weren’t consistently voting for New Deal programs. The ensuing debacle, in which all but one primary challenger FDR supported lost, is a cautionary tale that Trump may want to consider before he follows through on his threats to knock off members of the House Freedom Caucus if they don’t quickly fall in line.
The defiance we saw from several members of the Freedom Caucus yesterday, including Sanford, strongly suggests that Trump’s gambit will fail. Rather than cower, principled movement conservatives wore the attacks as badges of honor. They saw the threats as testaments to their courage. And they pledged to never back down. The fact that Sanford went to the Charleston paper to say Trump had threatened him reflects the degree to which these guys are not scared.

“I have zero worries about it,” Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) told the Heritage Foundation-backed Daily Signal. “Trump’s tweets reaffirm that the Freedom Caucus is having a major impact on public policy in Congress — that the Freedom Caucus is not a force to be ignored. … If you want me to vote for a piece of legislation, either persuade me it is good for America or change it so that it is good for America.”

Rep. Scott DesJarlais (R-Tenn.), one of Trump’s earliest endorsers, said the Freedom Caucus won’t change no matter what the president does. “We’re elected as Republicans to put forth good conservative policy, and I’m on board as soon as we start doing that,” he told Roll Call. “In my district, we’re very conservative, so if he gets me out office, he’s going to get someone more conservative than me.”

“If somebody can get to the right of me in the primary, God bless him,” added Freedom Caucus member Trent Franks (R-Ariz.).”

*************************************

Vladimir Lenin (an earlier generation Russian strongman) could have told President Trump that while Bakuninists (like the Freedom Caucus) can be useful in taking power, when you go to consolidate and exercise the power of government, well, not so much.

Lenin had a straightforward solution. He simply had Trotsky and the Red Army exterminate the Bakuninists, along with others who opposed his one-man rule. (Yes, long before he became the grandfatherly figure of the Frida Kahlo movies and stories, LT was a cold-blooded mass-murderer who had the misfortune to lose a power struggle to an even greater and more ruthless mass murderer, Joe Stalin) The survivors scattered and went into exile. Presto, problem solved.

But, our system doesn’t work like that, at least not at present. Most members of the Freedom Caucus were in office before Trump came along, and they fully expect to be there after he’s gone. And, giving in to the demands of the Freedom Caucus eventually would force some of the small number of less conservative Republicans (true moderates no longer exist in the GOP) to pal up with the Dems to block the most disastrous parts of the Freedom Caucus agenda.

Running for the Presidency is harder than being on reality TV. And, governing is much more difficult than running. So far, the message doesn’t seem to have gotten to DT. Will it?

PWS

04-02-17

FLYNN COLEMAN IN GLOBAL CITIZEN: “We Are All Immigrants”

https://community.globalcitizen.org/post/we-are-all-immigrants?utm_source=Iterable&utm_campaign=iterable_campaign_US_Mar_21_2017_citizenship_newsletter_2_actives&utm_medium=email

Coleman writes:

“The immigrants and refugees you see in this country today are the next generations of every single American who is not a Native American. It’s only a temporal difference. Irish, Roman-Catholics, Russians, Poles, Jews, all of the ethnicities of my heritage, have all been discriminated against, turned away, and have made this country a better place. We were all immigrants, refugees, strangers of this land once, until this country said, you are welcome here.

If we truly care about keeping our country safe while protecting the ideals it was founded on, we need to look at what works. Canada has opened its doors to immigrants, and not just on a governmental level. And Canada is seeing more and more people pouring into its borders, including those who have lived in the U.S. for years and are afraid of the new policies. Homeland Security has been told to round up people without papers, and people are panicked and bracing for potential assaults on DACA and Sanctuary Cities as well. Is this our country? People have come together from all walks of life in Canada to sponsor immigrants and refugees. Take a look at how successful that has been, how they speak about people coming to find a safe home in their country, and follow their example. And then read about how we can focus on truly fighting and defeating terrorism in all of its insidious and evil forms.

Then read a story about a Jewish and a Muslim family, who met by happenstance at an airport protest in support of immigrants and refugees. Read about what happened after their children looked at each other as they held signs in support of their neighbors, and then what happened when they shared a meal together.

Once I arrived back home, I walked along the Brooklyn eights Promenade, where the sun was setting behind the Statue of Liberty. I looked out across the water and thought about the millions who passed through Ellis Island to get here, including the very first three, who were children. I thought about those who were accepted, and those who were turned away, and the fact that each one of them has a story and a voice that deserves to be heard.”

********************************

Coleman “is an international human rights attorney, an author, a public speaker, a social entrepreneur and innovator, an educator, and a founder and CEO.” Read her full op-ed at the above link.

PWS

03/21/17

NYT OPINION: DAVID BROOKS: The “American Exodus” Is A Unifying Theme!

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/21/opinion/the-unifying-american-story.html?em_pos=small&emc=edit_ty_20170321&nl=opinion-today&nl_art=3&nlid=79213886&ref=headline&te=1&_r=0&referer=

“One of the things we’ve lost in this country is our story. It is the narrative that unites us around a common multigenerational project, that gives an overarching sense of meaning and purpose to our history.

For most of the past 400 years, Americans did have an overarching story. It was the Exodus story. The Puritans came to this continent and felt they were escaping the bondage of their Egypt and building a new Jerusalem.

The Exodus story has six acts: first, a life of slavery and oppression, then the revolt against tyranny, then the difficult flight through the howling wilderness, then the infighting and misbehavior amid the stresses of that ordeal, then the handing down of a new covenant, a new law, and then finally the arrival into a new promised land and the project of building a new Jerusalem.

The Puritans could survive hardship because they knew what kind of cosmic drama they were involved in. Being a chosen people with a sacred mission didn’t make them arrogant, it gave their task dignity and consequence. It made them self-critical. When John Winthrop used the phrase “shining city on a hill” he didn’t mean it as self-congratulation. He meant that the whole world was watching and by their selfishness and failings the colonists were screwing it up.

As Philip Gorski writes in his new book, “American Covenant,” which is essential reading for this moment, the Puritans understood they were part of one covenant and had ferocious debates about what that covenant meant.”

************************************

Read the full Brooks op-ed at the link above.

PWS

03/21/17

HAIL, HAIL ROCK & ROLL: IN MEMORIUM: Chuck Berry, “Godfather Of Rock & Roll” — Today’s Rock Stars Owe Him Big Time For His Pioneering Work!

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/19/arts/music/chuck-berry-rock-innovator.html?emc=edit_nn_20170320&nl=morning-briefing&nlid=79213886&te=1&_r=0&referer=

John Caramanica writes in the NY Times:

“Chuck Berry’s “Roll Over Beethoven” wasn’t the first rock ’n’ roll song, but it was the best and brashest of the genre’s early advertisements. Released in 1956, it opens with a nimble, bendy guitar riff — a prelude to the one that would be perfected a year later, on “Johnny B. Goode” — that serves as an intrusion and an enticement. Then Mr. Berry describes the fever, “the rockin’ pneumonia,” that was soon to grip the country.

“My heart beatin’ rhythm/And my soul keep-a singin’ the blues,” he sang. “Roll over Beethoven/And tell Tchaikovsky the news.”

Plenty of artists would go on to cover “Roll Over Beethoven” — the Beatles streamlined and sweetened it; Electric Light Orchestra distended it into an overlong, pompous shuffle with a snatch of the Fifth Symphony; Paul Shaffer and his band made a sleek version as the theme to the 1992 film “Beethoven,” about a St. Bernard with the composer’s name.

But those covers lacked the panache, the transgressive potential, the unexpected twists and turns of the Chuck Berry originals.

Mr. Berry, who died on Saturday at his home near St. Louis, was the first true rock ’n’ roll superstar. When in his late 20s he emerged from St. Louis onto the national scene, the genre wasn’t yet codified. In its infancy, rock was hybrid music, and Mr. Berry was its most vivid and imaginative alchemist.

From the mid-1950s through the end of that decade, he concocted a yowling blend of hopped-up blues, country and then-emergent rhythm & blues that ended up as the template for what became widely accepted as rock ’n’ roll (though the term predated his rise).”

**************************************

Great musician, entertainer, and stage performer whose influence will continue as long as rock and roll is played!

I find it interesting how the “mainstream culture” eventually adopts and idolizes folks like Chuck Berry and Mohammad Ali. In their “heydays,” both were considered dangerous renegades, not cultural idols.

The largely white-driven mainstream America often tried to suppress and deny their achievements and even subjected them to prosecutions that looked more like persecutions. (Regardless of its morality, how many white Rock and Rollers have transported underage girls, and lots of other “illegal stuff,” across state lines for “immoral purposes,” do you think? How many were prosecuted — twice for the same crime in Berry’s case — and sent to prison?) In both Ali’s and Berry’s cases, their careers never completely recovered from their well-publicized legal problems.

Contrast this with the great “outlaw” country singer Johnny Cash (another of my personal favorites) who was “busted” seven times for misdemeanors (if he were an immigrant, he undoubtedly would have been characterized as a “dangerous repeat offender” not fit to live in America) but never spent more than one night in jail.

I have absolutely no difficulty with “mainstream America” recognizing folks like Berry and Ali for their amazing contributions to our world and adopting them as “folk heroes.” To me, it shows why the “cultural wars” being waged today by Trump and the GOP are ultimately doomed to failure.

But, it would be better if in posthumously recognizing great African Americans like Berry and Ali, all of us also acknowledged that contemporary society had it wrong about their contributions and probably treated them unfairly during their “prime of greatness.”

PWS

03/20/17

MATT CAMERON IN THE BAFFLER: Trump’s Immigration Policies Promise To Make A Bad System Even Worse

https://thebaffler.com/outbursts/strangers-in-a-cruel-land?utm_campaign=Newsletter&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=45427323&_hsenc=p2ANqtz–SrQwaCmT1prkolHBKrPKHSN4djFsqLNoveeB1BWE10ZO3rscc5BcXMhmwFedKjGnCbzzw56UKYKQ-sIulUP96Hwj8rw&_hsmi=45427323

“Donald Trump’s presidential campaign capitalized on a familiar brand of nativist anti-immigrant slander usually reserved for our nation’s most desperate times. It was an ugly old vein to mine, but now that he’s managed to strike electoral gold there, he is not wrong to view his election as a mandate to carry out his promise to enforce federal immigration law to its fullest extent. This would be alarming to friends of the Constitution under any circumstances, but especially so given Trump’s open embrace of white supremacy—as a concept, if not a movement—in the primaries. We haven’t encountered such an openly bigoted presidential campaign on the right since Pat Buchanan’s last failed insurgent run at the GOP nomination in 1996, and we have never seen an avowedly white-nationalist leader accede to the Oval Office.
Nor should any of us expect the chastening experience of actual governing to temper his outlook. Trump has proven at every opportunity that he is all but ineducable about even the simplest details of how immigration to the United States actually works. And this, it turns out, is probably one of the few things he has in common with a considerable majority of Americans.”

. . . .

The immigration system I keep hearing about from pundits and politicians (all of whom should know better) is almost entirely unmoored from actual fact. It seems to be a chimerical pastiche of the one we had before Ellis Island closed, the one we had just before the moon landing, and some sort of rosy Tomorrowland fantasy in which visas would be awarded to the undocumented if only they would do it the right way. This is not the system I work with every day.
When a white, native-born American says, “my family came here the right way,” what the speaker almost invariably means is that one or more of his ancestors came to the United States without a visa during a time of virtually unrestricted European migration. They boarded a trans-Atlantic ocean liner, stood in line at an immigration inspection station for the better part of a day, answered a standard series of twenty-nine questions, were subjected to a medical exam, and were admitted indefinitely to the United States. That’s how my Scottish great-grandparents did it in 1916. If you were born in the United States with European ancestors, it’s probably how you came to be here too. That system ended in 1924. Its successor, the “national origins” quota system (a more restricted but still relatively open “line”), was abolished in 1965. But I still regularly meet well-meaning fellow citizens who believe that anyone who deserves a chance can simply “fill out the forms,” “get in line,” and “come the right way, like my family did.” At which point, I have to patiently explain that they can’t.

For most of my undocumented neighbors, in East Boston and beyond, there are no forms. There is no line. There never was. Telling an undocumented Mexican dishwasher that he should “wait in line, like my family did” is no more realistic than advising him to switch to the same model of iPhone your great-grandfather used. Yet the lie persists, with nearly every presidential candidate since George H. W. Bush invoking the imaginary “line.”

. . . .

[Bill] O’Reilly was too charitable. There is no reason to believe that Trump has ever understood the basic precepts of due-process protection. Commitment to due process would have been fundamentally incompatible with Trump’s record as a casino magnate, a New York City landlord, or an authoritarian game show host given unlimited license to “fire” contestants at whim.

Trump has signaled the likely place of due process in his immigration system by promising to immediately deport 2 to 3 million “criminal aliens.” This staggering number, nearly the entire urban population of Chicago, would represent more deportations than Obama (the current record-holder) completed in eight years, and more than twice as many as were carried out during Operation Wetback.

. . . .

In fifty-eight immigration courts nationwide, immigration judges are operating (per a recent study) at a degree of mental stress equivalent to that of an emergency-room doctor. “This case,” sneered federal judge Richard Posner in a recent dissent, “involves a typical botch by an immigration judge.” Posner, punching down from the lofty heights of a federal appeals court, went on to concede graciously that the immigration court’s status as “the least competent federal agency,” might have something to do with congressional underfunding and the resultant “crushing workloads.”
Our nation’s roughly 250 immigration judges [now approximately 305] are now responsible for managing a record backlog of more than five hundred thousand pending deportation cases, with thousands more pouring into the system each day. The judges I appear before in the Boston immigration court are humane and learned experts who work long hours, in circumstances that couldn’t be less familiar to Judge Posner, but they are as susceptible to human error as any judge anywhere.

In an executive order signed within days of his inauguration, Trump authorized Congress to triple the number of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on the ground. He has made no mention of any plans to extend the courts the same courtesy, but this new flow of cases simply cannot be sustained within today’s judicial plumbing.”

*********************************

Cameron’s full, hard-hitting article is definitely worth a read. And, as he points out, quite sadly, it’s likely to get much worse from a due process standpoint before it gets better.

I also think he is right that few U.S. Court of Appeals Judges would be able to survive working as U.S. Immigration Judges under today’s incredibly difficult circumstances and conditions.

PWS

03/15/17

WashPost OPINION: EUGENE ROBINSON — Rep. Steve King (R-IA) Is A Self-Proclaimed Racist/White Supremacist — White House Doesn’t Appear To Have A Problem With That

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/white-supremacism-is-ready-to-roar/2017/03/13/883e7570-082b-11e7-b77c-0047d15a24e0_story.html?utm_term=.52288350b631

Robinson writes:

“White supremacism was never banished from American political thought, just shoved to the fringe and hushed to a whisper. Now, in the Age of Trump, it’s back in the mainstream and ready to roar.

Witness the words of Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) on the subject of immigration: “Culture and demographics are our destiny. We can’t restore our civilization with somebody else’s babies.” King offered these sentiments Sunday in a tweet expressing solidarity with Geert Wilders, an openly racist and Islamophobic Dutch politician who has a chance of becoming prime minister in elections this week. Wilders is someone who “understands,” King wrote.

And we understand just what King meant. Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke certainly got the message, using his vile Twitter account to proclaim, “GOD BLESS STEVE KING!!!”

. . . .

“Immigrants — both voluntary and involuntary — have shaped this nation since long before its founding. The first Africans were brought here in bondage in 1619, one year before the Mayflower. Americans have never been a single ethnicity, speaking a single language, bound by the centuries to a single patch of land. We have always been diverse, polyglot and restless, and our greatness has come from our openness to new people and new ideas.

King’s distress about birthrates can be read only as modern-day eugenics. If he is worried about the coming day when there is no white majority in the United States, he has remarkably little faith in our remarkable society — or in the Constitution that he, as a member of Congress, is sworn to support and defend.

President Trump played footsie with the white supremacist movement during his campaign. His chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, waged civilizational war when he ran the Breitbart News site. Trump could definitively denounce King’s racism with a statement or a tweet, but so far his silence is deafening.”

********************************

I’m glad that Robinson makes the point that America literally was developed, founded, and built on the backs, free labor, and talents of African American “involuntary” immigrants. (In my Refugee Law and Policy course at Georgetown Law we referred to them as “forced migrants.”)

In fact, of our first five Presidents, only John Adams was self-supporting. The others owed their livelihood to the free labor provided by enslaved African Americans. Sad, but true.

PWS

03/15/17

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