Category Archives: Immigration

Oct 24 2018
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Adrastos, Bigotry, Campaign Notes, Congress, Elections, Immigration, Political Crack, Race, The Darnold

Fear Itself

It’s getting ugly out there. We already knew that the only way the Insult Comedian knows how to run for office is by scaring his supporters shitless. We’re used to the GOP running a disgusting base election: they’ve been doing it since at least 1988, but it’s reached new heights (depths?) 30 years later.

Donald Trump is a real estate developer. The phrase “soft sell” is not in his limited lexicon. Watching him on the stump is like lumping together the worst used car salescreeps you’ve ever dealt with and multiplying it by a factor of 10.

The Insult Comedian goes past the hard sell to the racist sell. He’s finally come out of the closet of horrors as a an unabashed nationalist. That’s white nationalist to people like us, even though the salesman has the orange glow of the tanning bed or spray tan.

We’re hearing a lot about the “illegal immigrant” caravan; the timing of which is suspicious to me but unlike the president* and his ilk, I prefer not to level unsubstantiated charges. On second thought, if the caravan is being financed by an American fat cat, it’s more likely to be a Robert Mercer-type than a George Soros-type even if the latter is so omnipotent that some fucker tried to bomb his house.

Whipping up anti-Hispanic xenophobia is not enough, now they’re claiming that there are “unknown Middle Easterners” marching north. Another day, another lie.

The Trumper base is so terrified that one of them said this to the Failing New York Times:

But Mr. Trump’s dystopian imagery has clearly left an impression with some. Carol Shields, 75, a Republican in northern Minnesota, said she was afraid that migrant gangs could take over people’s summer lake homes in the state.

“What’s to stop them?” said Ms. Shields, a retired accountant. “We have a lot of people who live on lakes in the summer and winter someplace else. When they come back in the spring, their house would be occupied.”

I guess the Latins will become squatters at some lake houses and the “unknown Middle Easterners” will bomb the rest. They’re clearly taking a bead on Minnesota: they’re into middleness, will their next stop after the Midwest be Middle Earth? The “unknown Middle Easterners” may even be armed with bone saws for all we know.

Nobody should be surprised that Donald Trump’s midterm strategy involves throwing lies against the wall and seeing how many stick. It reminds me of the spaghetti scene in The Odd Couple:

“Now it’s garbage” aptly describes Donald Trump’s entire political career and this campaign in particular. The next president is going to have a helluva mess to clean up. I’m sure Felix will be glad to help.

There’s a whiff of panic in the air among Democrats. That’s what the MSM and the GOP expect from us. It’s time for everyone to redouble their efforts to retake the House and defend vulnerable Democratic Senate seats in Florida, Indiana, Montana, and Missouri. We’re going to need fighters like Claire McCaskill and Jon Tester next year whether we’re in the majority or not.

I remain convinced that the key issues in 2018 are health care and the need to reign in a rogue regime. The Republicans are whipping their shrinking base into a frenzy. Let them do the panicking for a change. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: To Hell With The Trump Base.

In 13 days we will learn how many bigoted assholes there are in the country. Here’s hoping that enough voters will ignore the fear mongering of 45 and heed the words of the 32nd president and founder of the modern Democratic party, Franklin Delano Roosevelt:

CZwQ8nYWcAAOHHB

INSTANT UPDATE: Some Trump inspired motherfucker sent explosive devices to the Clinton’s house and Barack Obama’s office. The devices have been defused, the plot has been foiled. It’s to get both mad *and even.

UPDATE TOO: If you’re jittery about the election, Josh Marshall has a post up called: Everything Shows a GOP Resurgence Except for the Evidence. Shorter Adrastos: What Josh Said.

Aug 13 2018
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Adrastos, Big Damn Heroes, Bigotry, Immigration, Political Crack, Twitter

Family Smackdown Day

We all have relatives whose politics we dislike. These family ties have become increasingly strained with the advent of the crude dictator wannabe, Trumpberius aka the Kaiser of Chaos. There seems to be something in the air today that led two men I’d never heard of go after two relatives that we know and loathe.

First, Stephen Miller’s uncle Dr. David Glosser wrote a scathing article about his nephew for Politico. It may be the best thing I’ve ever read in that deservedly ridiculed online publication. After detailing their family history, Uncle David let his hypocritical nephew have it:

I have watched with dismay and increasing horror as my nephew, who is an educated man and well aware of his heritage, has become the architect of immigration policies that repudiate the very foundation of our family’s life in this country.

I shudder at the thought of what would have become of the Glossers had the same policies Stephen so coolly espouses— the travel ban, the radical decrease in refugees, the separation of children from their parents, and even talk of limiting citizenship for legal immigrants— been in effect when Wolf-Leib made his desperate bid for freedom. The Glossers came to the U.S. just a few years before the fear and prejudice of the “America First” nativists of the day closed U.S. borders to Jewish refugees. Had Wolf-Leib waited, his family would likely have been murdered by the Nazis along with all but seven of the 2,000 Jews who remained in Antopol. I would encourage Stephen to ask himself if the chanting, torch-bearing Nazis of Charlottesville, whose support his boss seems to court so cavalierly, do not envision a similar fate for him.

Dr. Glosser has a future as a polemicist. It took a lot of guts to go after his sister’s son like this. It seems as if he’d finally had enough of his nephew’s wicked wicked ways. Thanks, Doc.

Then there’s Bobby Goodlatte who is the son of retiring Virginia Congressman Bob Goodlatte who we last met when he ran the Strzok hearing with all the style and finesse of a Kangaroo Court judge. The Good Goodlatte took to twitter to announce his support for the Democratic woman who is running for dear old dad’s seat:

Then he confessed his shame over his father’s handling of the Strzok hearing:

I’m blown away by the intestinal fortitude shown by the Good Goodlatte *and* Dr. Glosser. I hope we see more of it amid the infamy of the Trump administration and the 115th Congress. It’s time for people to speak out and save the Republic from the likes of Stephen Miller.

The holidays should be very interesting for the Miller-Glosser and Goodlatte families.  Just thinking about it tops this great scene in Barry Levinson’s ode to “chain immigration” Avalon:

Jul 01 2018
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Athenae, Immigration, Immoral Values, Terrorism, Urban Hellhole

Families Belong Together: Chicago

Fifty thousand strong in the streets yesterday, including Mr. A and Kick and I, in the 100-degree heat. I took this photo from my friend Amy’s office window just before the march itself.

For longtime immigrant and labor rights organizer Jorge Mujica, the call to end family separation from non-immigrant sectors of the population is an opportunity to create change at the policy level.

“Today’s march is a reflection of the general disgust at separating families, but this is just the tip of the iceberg,” he said. “We need to retake discussion of immigration reform and take advantage that public opinion is on our side.”

This was my favorite sign:

#FuckJeff needs to be trending every day

Our children — including those in detention — need to know that people fought back for them. They need to know that people stood up. Tens of thousands of us everywhere. And yeah, it’s not enough to just “get in the streets,” and it’s not enough to yell on Twitter and call our reps and nothing is enough, right now. I think that’s why this week was awful, it just seemed like nothing was enough.

I heard this over and over as we marched, as we sang, as we cheered the firefighters spraying us with cold water around the second turn of the march route: “It just feels like nothing’s getting through.” Of course it feels like that. Nothing is.

November, though. November. All fifty thousand strong and millions more besides, for Parkland and the families who’ve lost their children and for the Supreme Court theft and the grifting and the puss-grabbing and the Muslim ban, for all of it and all of us.

We open the doors of the cages we built and we let ourselves out, however we can, as many times as we have to until everybody’s free. It was blindingly hot on Saturday as we walked through the streets. A pair of Native American artists in full regalia danced next to a sign that read, “No one is illegal on stolen land.” Of course it feels like nothing’s getting through.

It should feel like that. So we keep marching. So we keep moving forward, no matter how hot it gets, no matter how many people try to push us back.

A.

Jun 27 2018
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Adrastos, Bigotry, Diary, Fog Of History, Immigration, Language, Political Crack, So Called Liberal Media, Twitter

Civility Is Overrated

Anyone with a pulse should recognize that we’re going through another IOKIYAR moment. Republicans and their allies in the MSM as well as some spineless liberal pundits are lecturing us about manners and civility. It’s particularly rich when the party in power is led by the crudest and rudest president* since Andrew Johnson. We’re being told that manners are for Democrats and that it’s RUDER for Sarah Huckabee Sanders to be refused service in an eatery than for the Trump regime to imprison children. Once again: IOKIYAR.

I, for one, refuse to be lectured by the followers of a president* who sucks up to dictators while attacking our friends and allies. The rationale for tariffs against the best neighbor in the world, Canada, is national security. Justin Trudeau is a threat to our national security? Imagine if Barack Obama had insulted Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper in this manner when they were both in office. The outrage on the right would have exceeded Tan Suitgate. Once again: IOKIYAR.

The Insult Comedian’s persistent racism has inspired his supporters to go after religious, ethnic, and racial minorities. It’s become commonplace to hear of insults being thrown at people of color but when Maxine Waters attacks Donald Trump that’s out-of-bounds incivility. Once again: IOKIYAR.

Some intrepid soul on twitter dug up an article detailing how Paul Ryan celebrated a baker who refused to serve Joe Biden during the 2012 election.  The same Paul Ryan is lecturing us about civility. All hail the Miss Manners of Wisconsin. Once again: IOKIYAR.

Then there’s former Nixon and Reagan aide David Gergen who I thought had been put out to pasture long ago,

Since rampant both-siderism has broken out, I have an example from each side back then. On the right, Bull Connor sicced dogs on children protesting for civil rights in Birmingham, Alabama. On the left, a favorite chant of anti-war protesters was: “Hey, hey, LBJ. How many kids did you kill today?”

Sounds like incivility to me, but what do I know? I didn’t write dog-whistle laden speeches for Tricky Dick, which somehow makes Gergen an expert on civility.

I am in favor of civility in the abstract. I used to be able to discuss politics with conservative friends and relations without drawing blood. That started eroding when Bush the younger was president and ground to a full-stop when those folks wouldn’t admit racism was a factor in Obama derangement syndrome on the right.

There’s been plenty of incivility from the right in my lifetime. Those of us who opposed the Iraq War were accused of siding with terrorists and opposing the troops. The same bunch wants us to be civil in the face of children being torn apart from their parents; a policy that even Laura Bush finds rude. As they say across the pond, BOLLOCKS.

The MSM, Republicans, and their fellow travelers among the liberal punditocracy are using the word civility as a wet blanket to smother dissent. Genuine civility is based on mutual respect as opposed to unilateral verbal disarmament.

I think Amanda Marcotte summed it up nicely on the tweeter tube:

Civility is overrated. I’ll take honesty over hypocritical “niceness” any day.

Repeat after me: IOKIYAR.

Jun 24 2018
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Athenae, Immigration, Immoral Values, Stupid Republican Tricks

On Hypocrisy and Where You Are

Where were you when OTHER kids were being separated, huh? HUH?

They get three meals a day, plus snacks. Allowed to play outside. Have TV. Game rooms. They are very well taken care of. Oh yes, they get medical care and schooling. A whole lot more then our vets, homeless, and our own children get.

–

Libtards did not care about the illegals separated and put in detention centers in 2014 and they don’t care now. Its nothing but faux outrage and opportunistic propaganda.

A variation on this line was posted to a group sponsoring a march Kick and I and Mr. A attended on Saturday and there’s a short response, which is go to hell, because these aren’t arguments against putting kids in cages, these what-abouts, these where-were-yous. They’re the speaker/writer’s sad, desperate attempt to excuse themselves from caring and stomp on the tiny little feeling that maybe they should do something. That’s all they are, and engaging with them is pointless.

The longer response is, of course, WE WERE PAYING DUES TO THE ACLU. We were voting for people who promised to reform immigration and provide citizenship to undocumented children. We were donating to food banks and raising money for homeless shelters. We were striking for better schools and community clinics and investment in minority neighborhoods. Where were we? How dare you. We were here the whole time.

You saw us, in fact. You saw us pushing for a higher minimum wage so fewer kids would go hungry and you mocked the “burger-flippers and janitors” who were demonstrating on the streets. You saw us fighting for health care for all and you told us to take chickens to the doctor. You saw us trying to do right by the poor — yes, YOUR HARDWORKING AMERICANS WHO ARE ALREADY HERE — and all you did was scream about welfare queens.

(And not for nothing, but if we were all useless libtard hypocrites? FINE, then. We’re useless libtard hypocrites. You’ve proved your point, so you’ll let the kids out of their cages now, right? RIGHT?!)

Don’t come to us now, those of us in the streets every night and every weekend trying to change just this one little outrage at a moment when the world is overwhelmed by them, and ask us why we didn’t protest the other things you ignored or mocked us for protesting. We were in the streets against the Iraq War. We were on the phones against warrantless wiretapping. We were on the picket line for Wisconsin workers and Ohio laborers and we were at the polls in 2016 trying to stop this.

Where were we?

We were right here.

Where were YOU?

A.

Jun 20 2018
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Adrastos, Bigotry, Fog Of History, Fog Of Scandal, Hurricane Katrina & Federal Flood, Immigration, Immoral Values, Political Crack, Race, The Darnold

Kirstjen’s Katrina Connection

It had to happen. Some pundits are calling the caged children scandal “Trump’s Katrina.” First, former Failing NYT editor Jill Abramson in the former Manchester Guardian followed by New Yorker editor David Remnick. To be fair, Remnick acknowledges a crucial difference:

Some pundits have suggested that what is happening now in Texas will be “Trump’s Katrina.” But, without excusing the racism and the indifference shown by the authorities in that horrific episode, it ought to be pointed out that at least the federal government did not order the flooding of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. What is happening now is purely gratuitous, a deliberate act of cruelty intended as leverage to build a “beautiful wall.” And it is a wall intended not only to block Mexicans and Central Americans from making their way into the United States but to divide the United States itself, in order to retain power.

Bush’s Katrina moment was based on incompetence and casual racism whereas the separated family scandal (I’m trying out different rubrics) is deliberate and based on incompetence as well as malicious racism. Shorter Adrastos: the shitheads want to keep out people from shithole countries. Team Trump *wanted* the outrage thinking it would gin up the baser elements of their base. This is what happens when Jeff Sessions, Stephen Miller and the Insult Comedian are driving the train. Hopefully, it will cause a wreck in November.

There’s a more interesting direct link to Katrina involving the very white lady at DHS:

Nielsen moved over to the White House as special assistant to the president and senior director for prevention, preparedness and response. She had that job in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast. Nielsen’s job didn’t involve coordinating storm response—she served more as an information conduit to the White House—but the George W. Bush administration’s botched response to Katrina reflected poorly on all involved.

A bipartisan report (pdf) prepared by the House of Representatives after Katrina specifically cites Nielsen for not recognizing the storm’s potential for destruction, although her office had received warnings. The Washington Post reported that “Nielsen was one of a handful of White House officials warned of the so-called ‘New Orleans scenario’: a hurricane rated Category 3 or higher hitting the city and bursting its aging levees.” Even after in the storm’s aftermath, with hundreds of people awaiting rescue, Nielsen’s office had trouble getting the attention of Bush, who went to California to give a speech. “It does not appear the president received adequate advice and counsel from a senior disaster professional,” according to the House report.

Nielsen is yet another example of upward mobility based on failure. She helped screw the Katrina pooch and ended up Homeland Security secretary.

I rarely watch Trump administration press briefings but I saw Nielsen the other day. It’s bad enough when the Press Secretary pleads ignorance, it’s infinitely worse when the person in charge of things does so. Nielsen made like Huck’s horrible spawn and said she hadn’t seen the images from South Texas or heard the heartbreaking recording of the weeping six-year-old Salvadoran girl. She told the assembled press corps that she’d look into it and get back to them. She’s done neither. Sarah Huckabee Sanders is a shitty role model, y’all.

Harry Truman famously had a sign on his desk saying “the buck stops here.” Team Trump is intent on passing the buck. Bigly. So much so that Dahlia Lithwick compiled a list of Trumper excuses, evasions, and downright lies in defense of this disgusting policy. Their spin doctors are so dizzy that *they* need a doctor. It’s a pity Ronnie Jackson is no longer there to minister to their needs.

Speaking of pointing the finger of blame, I recently read Bob Mann’s fabulous biography of Gret Stet Senator Russell Long. The events involving the very white lady at DHS put me in mind of Long’s legendary aphorism:

To say these are trying times is a grotesque understatement. We have a president* who tweets out shit like this:

Applying the word “infest” to human beings is straight out of the Goebbels playbook. The fucking moron president* may not know the history behind this but Stephen Miller does. Making matters even more grotesque is the fact that Miller is Jewish. Oy, just oy.

Back to the very white lady at DHS. I’d like to praise the folks who heckled her out of a Mexican restaurant in Washington City. And they say that irony is dead. Nielsen puts the tacky in taco.

I was tempted to call this post Kirstjen’s Katrina Konnection but decided that was a bit heavy-handed. I’m as fond of alliteration as anyone but it’s what the Ku Kluxers do, so include me out.

Finally, it may be a struggle in 2018 but I *still* try to be a glass half full person. That’s why Todd Rundgren gets the last word:

Jun 18 2018
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Adrastos, Bigotry, Diary, Fog Of History, Immigration, Law/Justice, Political Crack, Race, The Darnold

Hostages To Misfortune

Every time we think Trumpism cannot get worse, they exceed our already low expectations. The family separation policy makes sucking up to dictators and fighting with allies look positively tame. Angela Merkel is a tough woman who can take care of herself. Children torn from their parents cannot. Let the children go, Mr. Trump.

Team Trump’s chaotic messaging has made matters even worse. The very white lady at Homeland Security cannot keep her story straight, Jeff Bo is quoting the Bible, and the president* started blaming Democrats the minute the story blew up in the administration’s face. Democrats are supposed to repeal a non-existent law so the kids can go free and/or be deported. It’s the clusterfuck of clusterfucks. That’s why I call him the Kaiser of Chaos.

What’s really going on is a hostage crisis. Team Trump are the kidnappers. They’re making unreasonable demands: FUND THE WALL or else. The hostages are children torn from their parents and placed in cages, cells whatever you want to call them. What’s important is that this outrage stop. Pronto.

Trump has no problem using immigrant children as hostages. There’s a long history in this country of demonizing non-white children as Rebecca Onion pointed out at Slate:

Like so many cruelties that have intensified under Trumpism, the idea that only white American children are truly “innocent” and worthy of protection isn’t his invention—it’s just subtext, made text. As historian Tera Hunter wrote in the New York Times, “child-snatching” has a long history in the United States. Black parents in slavery and Native American parents facing white colonialism had children sold, killed, or put into boarding schools and re-educated out of their culture. “Nits make lice,” Col. John Chivington is supposed to have said before the Sand Creek Massacre in Colorado in 1864, when his soldiers killed a group of Cheyenne and Arapaho, women, children, and all. Part of the rationale for these atrocities was that these children are not really children, in the way white people understand it—those families were not really families, and those people were not really people.

It’s horrifying that Trump *is* capable of saying something as deplorable (there’s that word again) as “nits make lice.” In this instance, it’s probably good that his ignorance of history is as profound as his malice for everyone who does not look like him. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen such raw, naked, overt racism in the White House. It should curdle the blood of all decent Americans. It was too much for Laura Bush. Let the children go, Mr. Trump.

Adding to the horror of the situation is that the New Yorker is reporting that the government does not have a plan or protocol to reunite the families they’ve torn apart.  They think of them as pawns in this president’s* game of low brow chess with Congress. It’s because the families consist of “nits and lice” as far as the Trump regime is concerned. They do not give a damn.

I thought of Francis Bacon’s words when I sat down to write this post:

He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief.

There’s no fortune to be made in this situation. Donald Trump’s goal is to wreak as much havoc and destruction as possible while he’s in office. They say that misery loves company and the Insult Comedian is one miserable, angry son-of-a-bitch. His election made us all hostages to misfortune.

We should resist in whatever way available and, more importantly, get out and vote this November. Only a Democratic Congress can reign in this cruel, racist, and evil government. I’m tired of being a hostage to misfortune.

The last word goes to the good people at the New York Daily News. A tabloid headline speaks louder than a thousand words;

Jun 03 2018
3 Comments
Athenae, Diary, Immigration, Immoral Values, Stupid Everything Tricks, Terrorism

Separations

Kick has had the same caregiver since she was eight weeks old.

We are unendingly blessed to have, in our life-with-newborn state of dazed terror, stumbled upon a woman who has spent the past four years filling our daughter’s life with joy and adventure. I fully believe this person puts my child’s happiness above her own on a daily basis and would stop at nothing to keep Kick from harm. She has keys to my house and we’ve borrowed each other’s cars and I trust her completely.

Yet at least once a day I freak out at my desk because Kick is beyond both earshot and arm’s reach of me at that exact moment and I want nothing more than to call up and be like, “So whatcha doin’?” like a fucking psychopath. I was once stranded an extra day on a work trip due to weather and Kick was so happy WITH MY OWN ACTUAL PARENTS she didn’t even want to talk on the phone, and I still nearly tore LaGuardia apart with my bare hands trying to get a flight back in a blizzard because I needed to see my baby.

Growing a human being inside you makes you insane. You all know me, I don’t think women have magical powers and “mommy instinct” isn’t really a thing, but what is a thing? Is having carried a person curled up under your rib cage next to your heart, inside your pulse, feeling them twist and roll and settle into your bones. You never get to be that close to them again and that loss? Is incomprehensible.

In my case it flipped an anxiety switch that obliterated pretty much MY ENTIRE PERSONALITY. Kick was 8 miles away from me as I wrote this, digging in the sandbox a block from our house, with a caregiver who I think sometimes is better for her than I am, and I know objectively that’s where she should be.

But I also know people shoot heroin at that park and every few weeks the city has to comb all the used condoms out of that sandbox and humans are filth pigs and if some creepy old asshole told Kick he had a kitten in his panel van she would totally go with him to see it and she eats anything an adult will put in front of her and is insanely confident about finding her own way places and it only takes ten seconds for a normal day to turn into an episode of SVU.

(Of course none of this will happen. My therapist calls this “catastrophizing.” I was astonished to learn we had a name for what, previously, I had thought of as “being alive.”)

My point is that I can’t be away from my kid, even when she is driving me crazy, for more than 5 minutes without my whole body screaming at me that SOMETHING IS WRONG NOW. Right now at this moment I know exactly where Kick is, and who she is with, and that she is well, and the urge to flip my desk and cab it home and hold her is so powerful it gives me the shakes.

Which is all to say that if you did this to me I would lose my fucking mind:

When we woke up the next morning, immigration officers brought us outside where there were two government cars waiting. They said that I would be going to one place, and my son would go to another. I asked why repeatedly, but they didn’t give me a reason.

The officers forced me to strap my son into a car seat. As I looked for the buckles, my hands shook, and my son started to cry. Without giving me even a moment to comfort him, the officer shut the door. I could see my son through the window, looking back at me — waiting for me to get in the car with him — but I wasn’t allowed to. He was screaming as the car drove away.

A few things about this story that have arisen in the past week: No, MAGA-troids, this is not necessary to deter anyone who is being threatened politically from seeking asylum in the U.S. because nobody thinks about packing up their toddlers and crawling across half a damn continent unless shit is really, really real. So stop with the “maybe they just shouldn’t come here then” crap. The mother in the story above was being teargassed in her home. Most of you red-hatted barcalounging segregationists would shit yourselves if you heard a bottle rocket in the alley.

You are the demographic that calls the cops on black people golfing. If the 82nd Airborne threw down in your cul-de-sac you’d flee to Canada faster than a flock of geese.

Additionally, yes, we can let these people in and give them asylum, them and their families. We can house them, feed them, give them health care and papers and jobs, for roughly what Jeff Bezos blows on lunch. That we have decided not to, and have given it to Jeff B. instead, is a decision we have made and not a reflection on what is physically possible. So just save your “this is what happens in the Great Battle for the Soul of White America” or whatever you are on about in the U.S. comments sections.

Last but not least, STOP THROWING OBAMA AROUND TO JUSTIFY THIS. If this happened under Obama it was bullshit and should stop. It is happening under Trump, and it is bullshit, and it should stop. Both those things can be true. I have zero interest here in being morally superior so if I congratulate you on your superior OWNZING of the neolibs with your “this is an Obama policy” crack, can we give these mothers their babies back please? Can we do the job in front of us, right now today?

Because it’s monstrous. It’s incomprehensible. There is no reason for it and there’s no possible justification that fits within the bounds of human decency. The ONLY justification for doing it to other parents is that our society sincerely considers that perhaps parents of color do not love their children as much as we virtuous honkies do. That they wouldn’t tear the world open with their teeth to get their children back.

I don’t believe that of anyone.

A.

May 11 2018
1 Comment
Adrastos, Bigotry, Fog Of History, Immigration, Malakatude, Political Crack, Stupid Republican Tricks

Malaka Of The Week: John Kelly

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: John Kelly is a more polished version of Donald Trump. Like his master, he has a tendency to shoot off his mouth and say horrible, xenophobic things. And that is why General/White House Chief of Staff John Kelly is malaka of the week.

Kelly firmly believes in pulling up the drawbridge and excluding immigrants. He also believes in demeaning and degrading those who want to emigrate to our country. Kelly expressed these views in the crudest possible terms yesterday:

“Let me step back and tell you that the vast majority of the people that move illegally into the United States are not bad people. They’re not criminals. They’re not MS-13. … But they’re also not people that would easily assimilate into the United States, into our modern society. They’re overwhelmingly rural people. In the countries they come from, fourth-, fifth-, sixth-grade educations are kind of the norm. They don’t speak English; obviously that’s a big thing. … They don’t integrate well; they don’t have skills. They’re not bad people. They’re coming here for a reason. And I sympathize with the reason. But the laws are the laws. … The big point is they elected to come illegally into the United States, and this is a technique that no one hopes will be used extensively or for very long.”

Here’s a reminder to Kelly of how his own people, the Irish, were viewed in their early days in America.

That was a cartoon by Thomas Nast depicting an Irishman as a sub-human, drunken papist who got his orders from the Catholic Church. Nast was a legendary 19th century satirist who worked for high-toned publications such as Harper’s Weekly and the New York Herald-Tribune. But Nast also trafficked in the bigoted stereotypes of his day.

I assume that Kelly would find Nast’s anti-Irish cartoons to be offensive.  I wish that he’d understand the analogy, but I have my doubts. Like the president* he serves, he is incapable of empathy or understanding the other person’s point of view. And that is why John Kelly is malaka of the week.

Jan 31 2018
1 Comment
Adrastos, Diary, Immigration, Krewe du Vieux, Mardi Gras, New Orleans, Political Crack, The Darnold

Spanktuary City

Photograph by David Aguiar.

The forecast was dire for last Saturday’s Krewe du Vieux parade. I am the Krewe of Spank’s voice of weather doom but I was wrong. It poured off and on until 3:30 PM, then the front moved on leaving us with slightly slippery streets and a dry parade.

The sub-krewe of Spank’s theme this year was Spanktuary City. I’ll let a neutral observer, my boy Kevin Allman of the Gambit Tabloid, describe it for you:

Krewe of SPANK, which always mounts ambitious floats and even more ambitious themes, paid tribute to the pushme-pullyu over New Orleans’ status as a sanctuary city with the theme “SPANK-tuary City” and a float with an elaborate, moving whack-a-mole game.

Time to edit the editor. There’s no hyphen in Spanktuary, dude. It’s our pun and we’ll decide how to punctuate the sucker. Besides, we’ve used that moniker for our annual parade route party since its inception. Additionally, it’s Spank-a-Mole as you can see in these pictures taken by Dr. A:

Spank-a-Mole is a game of endurance wherein you beat the mole into submission. That’s what the anti-Trump resistance has to do: keep spanking the ugly orange mole. I understand the SOTU was an endurance test as well. I skipped it. 80 minutes of an Insult Comedian with a dead nutria atop his head? No thanks.

It’s time for some non-Spanky pictures involving members of Drips and Discharges. They mocked pervy NOLA celebrity chef John Besh. This headpiece won the parade:

My buddy Brother Bob Bolin is also in Drips. Here he is slumming it with me:

Here’s a close up of Bob’s sign:

A reminder: Krewe du Vieux is a homemade parade. All the work was done by the talented members of the various sub-krewes. That’s what makes it so distinctive and great. The satire is pretty darn good as well

A quick shout-out to my fellow Spankster and Deadhead David Martin for turning me on to the marvelous parade route photo by David Aguiar. Thanks, man. To read more about the parade take a closer look at Kevin’s instant analysis.

Finally, this year members of the Krewe of Spank costumed as Lady Liberty with blue togas. We looked like an inebriated gang as we marched. I’m not sure if we were the Jets or the Sharks. We *were* the first Blue Wave of 2018:

Jan 15 2018
1 Comment
Free Republic, Immigration, The Darnold, Tommy T

Today on Tommy T’s Obsession with the Freeperati – “He sold us out” edition

I gotta tell you guys – after last week’s ceremonial under-the-bus-throwing of Steverino Bannon, I figured that the Freeperati were now completely out of people to disown.

I was wrong.

Trump says he’ll ‘take the heat’ for bipartisan immigration reform
NY Post ^ | January 9, 2018 | Bob Fredericks

Posted on 1/9/2018, 2:29:58 PM by EinNYC

President Trump on Tuesday said he’d be willing to “take the heat” if Democrats and Republicans can push through comprehensive immigration reform — calling for “a bill of love.”

Trump reiterated his demand that any deal to protect the so-called “Dreamers” — undocumented immigrants protected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program — would have to include funding for his border wall.

So, OP – what do you think?

What the HELL? Since when is Trump taking instruction from the RINO Lindsey Graham, who really should in all honesty hang out his dummcrap placard? Why, with a majority in the House and the Senate, must immigration reform be a “bipartisan” issue? That is politi-speak for SELLOUT. Why should we allow illegal invaders to stay in our country? Does his “compromise” include the continuation of chain migration, immigration lottery, and anchor babies? Just to get a wall, allowing those things to continue is hardly worth it, and then the dummocraps get ALL THEIR AGENDA FULFILLED. Dummocrap voters forever. So if having “Republicans” as a majority in the House and the Senate is not enough to get rid of these filthy stinking illiterate disease-ridden cheating invaders, what will it take? Why does Trump think he has to take any “suggestions” from the likes of sellouts to the American people like Pelosi and Schumer, professional criminals? I am so disgusted, I could spit.
1 posted on 1/9/2018, 2:29:58 PM by EinNYC
Otherwise, OK?
To: EinNYC

 

Wow, it is getting depressing.

2 posted on 1/9/2018, 2:31:22 PM by central_va (I won’t be reconstructed and I do not give a damn)

You misspelled “hilarious”.
To: EinNYC

 

Then Trump will be a one term president.

3 posted on 1/9/2018, 2:31:23 PM by ealgeone

To: ealgeone

 

.7 term

4 posted on 1/9/2018, 2:31:46 PM by central_va (I won’t be reconstructed and I do not give a damn)

But enough about Mueller….
To: EinNYC

We don’t need no stinkin’ bill of love!

How precious!

Bannon screwed up BIGLY. He might have provided a conscience and kept them honest if he had only kept the cork in the bottle.

I don’t think that Bannon’s been able to keep any cork in its bottle for some time now. Just sayin’…

As soon as Bannon is dumped, the Grahamnisty and “Bill Of Love” poison bubbles to the surface.

9 posted on 1/9/2018, 2:36:35 PM by Governor Dinwiddie (CNN is fake news.)

Hey  – you and your Freeper fucktoys were the ones who wanted him dumped.
.
Or was that last week?
To: EinNYC

 

He is sounding more and more like Yeb. Makes me sick

12 posted on 1/9/2018, 2:37:28 PM by nbenyo

Yeb?
Yumpin Yimminy!
To: Governor Dinwiddie

 

For God sake Bannon better clean up his act and get back in the game. The wheels are starting to wobble and may fall off.

14 posted on 1/9/2018, 2:37:59 PM by central_va (I won’t be reconstructed and I do not give a damn)

ThatShipHasSailed
To: EinNYC

 

“Bill of Love” = Democratic landslide in 2018. Does Trump have anyone advising him?

22 posted on 1/9/2018, 2:45:06 PM by LydiaLong

Bwahahaha
(snif)
Oh deary deary dear…..
(wipes eyes)
To: Truthoverpower

 

Here comes where we get screwed.

41 posted on 1/9/2018, 3:08:34 PM by Mouton (The MSM is a clear and present danger to the republic.)

You voted for The Darnold, and you’re surprised that he’s screwing you?
.
Are we talking about the same Trump?
.
More fears from the vale of tears after the Love Bill…

Continue reading →

Tagged , , , , , , , ,
Jan 12 2018
4 Comments
Big Damn Heroes, Current Affairs, Diary, Do Something, Doc, Immigration, Stupid Republican Tricks, Uncategorized, Your President Speaks

A nation of shitholes

GreatGrandpa

This is my great-grandfather. A farmer by birth, a carpenter by trade, a factory worker by necessity.

He came to this country in his early 20s, leaving behind his family and everything he ever knew to start a better life in America. Shortly after he left Bohemia, it no longer existed, as it was swallowed up through the consolidation of what became Czechoslovakia. He lived to be 100 and died when I was 12. His wife, my great-grandmother, lived to be 96 and they were married for more than 70 years. They had four children who lived and never moved from the house he built for them shortly before my grandfather was born.

WeddingGreatGrandparents

These are my mother’s grandparents, immigrants from Poland. I never knew them, other than through the tales my grandfather and mother would tell me. They would tell stories about family members back in the old country and have half the family rolling on the floor with side-splitting laughter. The other half? They didn’t speak Polish.

Factory workers, farmers, carpenters, barbers, artists and homemakers. These are my roots. Poland, Bohemia, maybe pre-1900s Germany. These are my lands.

These people were not the countries’ “best people” sent as emissaries, but rather as hard-working, hardscrabble people who wanted to make better lives for themselves. This country gave them hope. It gave them help. It gave them a new home.

Today? It never would have given them a chance.

A lot has been made of our president’s question about why we’re getting people from all these “shithole countries.” His indignation, venom and disgust flow freely in that two-word phrase and it represents how many people feel about these “Johnny Come Lately” immigrants who are just stealing from the “real Americans.” A lot of people believe this because they can’t see back far enough (or they just don’t want to) to understand that every, single person out there came from somewhere else (except for the Native Americans, who we shuffled around like the queen in a game of three-card monte). And every, single person who came here from elsewhere came from a shithole somewhere.

And the people who were here already had no problem letting them know that.

You had the “thieving wops and dagos.”

You had the “drunk, lazy Micks.”

You had the “stupid Poles.”

You name a group, you can guarantee the group that got here six minutes earlier already had a disparaging name for it and a “there goes the country” attitude about it.

People in this country essentially live this paradox:

I know where I came from and I know that it took a lot for us to get here and become who we are. My father, who in his later years has become more introspective, has noted to me a few times recent, “We were poor. I never thought about it at the time, but we were really poor.” My mother’s grandparents survived through the Depression because my great-grandmother rented rooms in her upstairs to workers from the slaughter house and the foundry. Her husband was a barber, and there wasn’t a lot of hair being cut at 25 cents a head back then.

They came at a time when I’m sure many in this country wanted to turn on the “No Vacancy” sign or at least they didn’t want “those people” here. To say now to the next group, “Sorry. We’re not taking any of you shithole immigrants” is unconscionable.

Those of us who came here from shithole countries need to stand up to this shit-talk from this asshole and speak to him in his native tongue.

“Pardon me, Mr. President, but fuck you.”

Jan 11 2018
4 Comments
Adrastos, Bigotry, Food and Drink, Immigration, Language, Political Crack, Race, The Darnold

Shithead Says Shithole

Today on President’s* say the darndest things:

President Donald Trump on Thursday asked lawmakers why the United States allows people to immigrate “from shithole countries” like Haiti and African countries, the Washington Post reported.

The Washington Post reported, citing two unnamed sources briefed on Trump’s meeting with lawmakers, that Trump asked, “Why are we having all these people from shithole countries come here?”

According to the report, Trump made the remark in reference to Haiti and African countries, and then suggested the United States should allow more immigrants from countries like Norway instead. Trump met with Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg on Wednesday.

The MSM is having the vapors right now over having to say shithole. That’s half the fun of this latest flow of rascist diarrhea from the Insult Comedian. We already knew that he hates people of color and thinks African is full of cannibals like in cheesy old B-movies. All in all it’s just another brick in the wall.

Past potty-mouthed presidents had the good sense not to curse in big meetings, and their staffs were loyal and did not leak stories wherein presidents used what the failing NYT would call “off-color language.” We didn’t know what a foul mouth Tricky Dick had until the White House Tapes were full of expletives deleted to my unexpurgated delight. Truman and LBJ were known to swear like sailors too. It’s not the language, it’s the unvarnished bigotry.

As to the Norwegian  comments.  (ICYMI, I’m half-Norwegian: my darling mother was one of them very white white people.) Has Trump ever had Norwegian food? Lutefisk and Pickled Herring should be banned from the country. Ack. Barf.

I think it’s time to have a cuisine test: only immigrants from countries with good food can be admitted. It’s one way to keep Nigel Farage from immigrating.

It’s just another day in Trumpworld where Shitheads say shit like shithole everyday.

Sep 18 2017
1 Comment
Free Republic, Immigration, The Darnold, Tommy T

Today on Tommy T’s Obsession with the Freeperati – “The Art Of The Squeal” edition

Good morning, all! After three flips and a flop, thus quoth The Darnold :

Donald Trump: Let DACA Recipients Stay; Not Amnesty
Breitbart.com ^ | 14 Sep 2017 | Charlie Spiering

Posted on 9/14/2017, 3:32:48 PM by Rockitz

President Donald Trump argued that allowing DACA recipients to stay in the United States would not be amnesty. “We’re looking at allowing people to stay here,” Trump said to reporters in Florida on Thursday.

He insisted that his deal with Democrats on DACA recipients would not be amnesty.

“We’re not looking at citizenship, we’re not looking at amnesty,” Trump said.

On Air Force One however, a White House spokesperson confirmed that “legal citizenship over a period of time” for DACA recipients would likely be part of a deal. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi insisted that the plan would offer them a “path to citizenship.”

***********

Legal status with a pathway to citizenship is NOT amnesty. So I guess that’s scratch number 7 here?

 

How has Trump screwed me?  Let me count the ways :

1. Secure the border in a transparently verifiable way;

2. End the anchor-baby interpretation of the 14th Amendment

3. Enforce e-verify without exception and with severe penalties;

4. End chain migration. Entry per individual qualifications; not family ties.

5. Deportation upon contact with any law enforcement agency- federal, state or local;

6. No government benefits beyond critical emergency care(and that ought to be billed back to the home government);

7. NO “Path to citizenship” EVER for anyone who has entered the us illegally.

1 posted on 9/14/2017, 3:32:48 PM by Rockitz

“Otherwise OK?”
“Spock! Analysis?”
To: Rockitz

 

The bastard has morphed into John McCain

2 posted on 9/14/2017, 3:36:46 PM by pissant ((Deport ’em all))

Not true!
McCain’s brain actually still works.
To: Rockitz

 

What happened to Trump?

One day swinging like Tyson, tweeting, defending America. The next acting like Jeff Sessions.

6 posted on 9/14/2017, 3:41:04 PM by FreedomStar3028 (Somebody has to step forward and do what is right because it is right, otherwise no one will follow.)

To: xzins

 

Call it what you want, worker permit, student grievance, non citizen status it’s illegal illegal illegal. Let’s not parse words…are they still here? Yes…are they here illegally? Yes….are they illegal aliens? Yes….

Why are they not gone?

8 posted on 9/14/2017, 3:41:27 PM by Jarhead9297

Because Baron Poostain Harkonnen can’t snap his fingers and make it happen?
To: Rockitz

 

Art of the deal
Wow, so much for his campaign promises..hope I’m wrong

10 posted on 9/14/2017, 3:42:46 PM by rainee (Her)

A Freeper even uses the T word, but fortunately, used a strikethrough.
To: Rockitz
” a White House spokesperson confirmed that ‘legal citizenship over a period of time’ “ 

None dare call it treasonamnesty.

14 posted on 9/14/2017, 3:44:00 PM by Governor Dinwiddie
That was a close one.
Click the lovely “read more” for more stunned realizations that they’ve been had…

Continue reading →

Tagged , , , , , , , ,
Sep 11 2017
2 Comments
Free Republic, Immigration, The Darnold, Tommy T

Today on Tommy T’s obsession with the Freeperati – back in the saddle edition

And very gingerly back in the saddle – as in sitting for 45 minutes or so at a stretch.

So – a short one today, featuring The Darnold.

He’s a DACA DACA DACA DACA DACA chameleon!

TrumpBoyGeorge

Donald Trump on DACA: ‘Chuck and Nancy Want to See Something Happen — and so Do I’
Breitbart ^ | 7 Sep 2017 | Charlie Spiering

Posted on 9/7/2017, 9:47:50 AM by sickoflibs

President Donald Trump signaled support for signing a permanent deal to assist DACA recipients, giving amnesty to illegal immigrants brought to the United States as children.

“Chuck and Nancy would like to see something happen, and so do I,” Trump said, referring to Democratic leaders Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer.

(excerpt required clip).

The president suggested that ideal legislation would include border security funds and a permanent fix for DACA .

“I’d like to see a permanent deal, and I think it’s going to happen,” he said. “I think we’re going to have great support from both sides of Congress.”

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

Breitbart is having a field day with Trump’s quotes.

Are they, now?  You know, it’s almost as if someone who works there was mad at The Marmalade Shartcannon.

Look at the deal that Trump made with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer on the three month budget.

1 posted on 9/7/2017, 9:47:50 AM by sickoflibs

To: sickoflibs

 

Pardon me while my breakfast turns into emesis.

2 posted on 9/7/2017, 9:48:57 AM by alstewartfan (We have no money but we stay afloat. The Jellyfishes don’t scare us. Al Stewart from Red Toupee)

Feel free to re-ingest it as many times as you need to. We’ve got the time.
To: sickoflibs

 

He wants to see what will happen? You’ll lose your base pal and be a one term failed POTUS. You’re dealing with two traitors to the United States

6 posted on 9/7/2017, 9:53:08 AM by GrandJediMasterYoda (Trump: Greatest POTUS of all time solely for preventing Satan taking office.)

To: sickoflibs

 

I have to admit it’s been a bit of a letdown watching Trump deal/capitulate with the DEMs. My wife, who is usually much more of a “glass is full” person than I am when it comes to politics has been starting to question why she even voted for Trump.

10 posted on 9/7/2017, 9:57:25 AM by CatOwner
Pretty soon now, she’s also going to start to question why she even married you.

Shades of Bush Sr, and his bipartisan agreement that killed his read my lips pledge.

20 posted on 9/7/2017, 10:02:11 AM by proust (Since a politician never believes what he says, he is quite surprised to be taken at his word.)

To: sickoflibs 

I want to see boxcars stuffed full headed south.

NaziBoxcars

And I want my wall.

28 posted on 9/7/2017, 10:08:24 AM by gaijin

Berlin_Wall
They seem upset.
Follow below for the impassioned defenders of Shart Garfunkel, and their attempt to imagine this as 13th-dimensional chess…

Continue reading →

Tagged , , , , , , , ,
Sep 06 2017
2 Comments
Adrastos, Bigotry, Congress, Diary, Immigration, Immoral Values, Political Crack, The Darnold

The Buck Passer In Chief’s DACA Debacle

We all knew it was coming. We all knew that Donald Trump would rescind DACA. I actually believe that he has qualms about ending the program, not because he “loves the dreamers,” but because even he understands the optics of rounding up some 800K young people and deporting them. The title of Josh Marshall’s blog post after the announcement says it all:

Trump Wishes Dreamers Luck as He Tosses Them Out of the Plane

As does this passage in Josh’s post:

What the President is doing is the executive action equivalent of flying the plane up to 10,000 feet, tossing the Dreamers out the door and yelling after them, “I hope you have a parachute or if you don’t that Paul Ryan can get you one really fast!’ Actually, one small difference. He had Jeff Sessions toss them out of the plane.

Yowza.

Trump the phony tough guy  once again proved his cowardice by having true believer white supremacist Jeff Beau make the announcement.  As always, Jeff Beau prevaricated and demonized his way through the statement. I’m surprised he didn’t gleefully rub his hands together in celebration like a cartoon villain. Bigots like Jeff Beau have much to celebrate: mass deportations of service people, first responders, teachers, and on and on and on. DACA has a rigorous vetting process so its beneficiaries are the best of the best. I doubt many people at the Trump White House could pass muster. Slumlord Jared would have to amend his form because he’s such a forgetful boy.

What Trump has done is to punt this clusterfuck to the Congress. The six month deadline is an arbitrary one and major legislation rarely passes both houses in six months or less. The president’s* sole aim is to accept as little responsibility as possible for this heinous and callous action. Feral Trumpers will howl in approval but this is yet another incredibly unpopular move done solely to placate the MAGA Maggots.

There *may* be majorities in both Houses of Congress to pass a new Dream Act. I’m uncertain if there’s a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate and dubious that it can get past the so-called Hastert Rule in the House. The rule named for Coach Pervert applies to the Republican caucus: only legislation with majority support in the caucus reaches the floor. There are enough nutbars and white nationalists to keep it off the floor UNLESS the GOP leadership gets around a rule named for a convicted felon. It’s a caucus rule, not a law, after all. Stay tuned but I am not optimistic. Speaker Ryan is as cowardly as the Insult Comedian.

The administration* is sending mixed messages about its DACA debacle. Trump is holding out hope of a change in plans but nobody believes anything he says about anything. If LBJ had a so-called “credibility gap” on Vietnam, Trump has a credibility canyon on everything. I put more stock in a White House memo telling dreamers to prepare for deportation.

A detestation of buck passing was instilled in me as a child. I always got in more trouble with my parents if I deflected responsibility for my words and deeds. They went easier on me if I fessed up and took the blame. Donald Trump is incapable of taking responsibility for his actions. It’s never his fault, the finger of blame always points elsewhere.

Trump’s perennial buck passing made me think of Harry Truman who famously had “the buck stops here” sign on his White House desk. This is Trump’s second pairing with a man whose ass he is not fit to wipe. Trump’s stunning 2016 electoral college victory surpassed Truman’s 1948 shocker as the biggest upset in American political history. Thanks to the DACA debacle, Trump is now fated to be the anti-Truman. Just call him the Buck Passer in Chief.

A new nickname has been born. And a new benign earworm has hatched. Let’s hope it doesn’t come true.

I’ll give the last-ish word to the late Ted Kennedy. It’s the closing passage of his 1980 speech to the Democratic convention. It is *not* about the dreamers but it could be:

For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.

It’s time for people to both hit the streets and call their GOP Congresscritters. Make the fuckers squirm like the worms they are.

Sep 05 2017
1 Comment
Athenae, Immigration, Immoral Values

Just To Be Mean

There’s no reason for any of this.

DACA recipients aren’t taking jobs, they aren’t criminals, they aren’t hurting anyone. They’re working or going to school, they’re paying taxes, serving in the military, doing what we tell everybody a Good American and a Good Immigrant should do, and we’re gonna deport them just ’cause.

This is the fuck-you administration. TTo kick the weaker kid, to laugh along with the bully so the bully won’t bully you. Undo everything Obama did because it’s fun to pick on the black president these people hate, smack immigrant kids around because they can’t fight back.

Part of the frustration in dealing with this administration’s supporters comes from the attraction they have to this kind of bullying. I made the drug addict comparison a few months ago, with regard to the steady diet of meanness and hate people consume through their TVs and radios, and how that hate means more to them than their children and their friends.

It’s hard to argue with someone’s weakness, because their weakness is their fear, and you can’t argue someone out of a fear. They have to decide to take the leap to not be afraid of the bullies anymore, to not go along with whatever the meanest, loudest guy in the room is saying. Until they do, we’re going to keep looking for reasons they’re doing what they’re doing, when there isn’t a reason.

It’s just to be mean.

A.

Aug 03 2017
Leave a comment
Adrastos, Bigotry, Fog Of History, Immigration, Malakatude, Political Crack, Race, So Called Liberal Media

The Fog Of Cosmopolitan History

I wish I were writing about the drink they were obsessed with on Sex and the City or the magazine of that name. Not that I’d drink a cosmopolitan since they contain the demon vodka. I’m referring to comments by made by alt-right nutbar Stephen Miller in response to a question posed by CNN’s Jim Acosta. Acosta is on the verge of becoming the Dan Rather of the current White House press corps. You may recall that Dan the Man was the teevee reporter who really got under Tricky’s skin when the Watergate shit was hitting the fan. Splat. Tom Brokaw was a mere fly to be swatted away. I’m surprised Nixon didn’t make Ron Ziegler his designated fly killer. He was vaguely Priebusian, after all.

Back to the “pride” of Duke University who makes up for his lack of people skills with his use of buzz words:

The conversation went off the rails. At one point, Acosta implied the policy would favor immigrants from English-speaking countries — a logical assumption, if English speaking skills are prioritized in green card applicants.

“Are we just going to bring in people from Great Britain and Australia?” he asked.

“No! This is an amazing moment,” Miller said triumphantly. “This is an amazing moment. That you think only people from Great Britain or Australia would speak English is so insulting to millions of hardworking immigrants who do speak English from all over the world.”

“Of course the are people who come — ” Acosta began.

“But that’s not what you said, and it shows your cosmopolitan bias,” Miller said.

“It sounds like you’re trying to engineer the racial and ethnic flow of people into this country as policy,” Acosta said.

“Jim, that is one of the most outrageous, insulting, ignorant and foolish things you’ve ever said,” Miller said. “The notion that you think that this is a racist bill is so wrong and so insulting”

That part of the exchange was too juicy to cut. I’ve bold-faced the buzz words: cosmopolitan bias. There has been much back and forth as to whether this makes a white dude with a boring name a Nazi neo or otherwise. It think it shows his inclination toward Putinesque neo-Fascism since Putinism is derived from Soviet Communism when it metastasized into kleptocracy.

“Rootless cosmopolitanism” was a Stalinist buzz word deployed during a post-war anti-Semitic campaign waged by the Soviet dictator and his lackeys. Many of the enemies purged by Stalin during the Thirties were Jewish but the post-war campaign had more to do with the Red Tsar’s paranoia and dipsomania. Stalin was a vodka drinker. What more evidence do you need that vodka is Satan’s beverage?

It really doesn’t matter what one calls the likes of Miller be it Nazi or Facisct. He’s a white nationalist aka white supremacist aka racist aka bigot. He’s also known as a malaka, which ends in aka. We have a theme here, which has nothing to do with the Mardi Gras Indian song Aka Aka. Yeah, I know, it’s Iko Iko. Cut a brother some slack, y’all. I have a pun community to tend to.

Miller is also historically illiterate and an obnoxious know-it-all. That makes him the perfect Trumper. I am filled with glee whenever the White House trots him out to alienate everyone who isn’t a fan of Jeff Bo and Bannon. Thanks, Donald.

This is as good a time as any to point y’all at the Vanity Fair profile of Miller that discussed in a Saturday post in a segment called Annals of a Duke Puke. The segment title is as true now as it was two months ago.

I don’t feel like writing a treastise on my views about immigration. I’ve already done that so I’ll point you in the direction of a 2014 post, Pulling Up The Drawbridge. It says it all.

Finally, I feel bad for rock and roll hall of famer Steve Miller for having the same name as the Duke Puke. The Real Steve Miller gets the last word with a song that, despite the title, has nothing to do with MAGA maggots.

“Somebody get me a cheeseburger.”

What’s more American than that?

Jul 23 2017
4 Comments
Athenae, Bigotry, Immigration, Immoral Values, Stupid Republican Tricks

This is What You Voted For, Assholes

Great job. Really great, all of you: 

Mr. Jeanty, 29, came to the United States from Port-au-Prince in September 2006 with his eldest brother and stayed after his tourist visa expired. He has what is known as temporary protected status, or T.P.S., which was granted to Haitians who were visiting the United States or living here illegally when a devastating earthquake struck their homeland in 2010. T.P.S. allows him and other Haitians to live and work legally in this country, until conditions in Haiti have improved enough to return home safely.

Now, the Trump administration is monitoring earthquake recovery efforts to determine whether temporary protected status for Haitians should be terminated in January when its recent six-month extension ends.

Great job, all you comfortable suburban assholes who voted for Trump because he was gonna “get rid of all the illegals.” This is what that looks like. You think after this guy gets deported, you’ll get a better job, your kids will get a better school, your potholes will finally get fixed? You think that’s how this works?

You do, don’t you. You think your healthcare is too expensive because too many Mexicans are crossing the border to come to your emergency rooms. You think if you send all the immigrants home, your bill will automatically come down. You think it’s really like that, a tradeoff, a tit for tat, that you pay more because someone else doesn’t pay.

Jesus H. Christ, I don’t know who raised you but whoever they are, they owe you an apology because this is not how America works. It’s not how anything works.

Your kid’s school sucks because your local municipality gave away the farm to every passing corporation, promising them their taxes would stay low when your kid’s school needed those taxes. Right-wing politicians then promised your taxes would stay low, too, and instituted tax caps so schools couldn’t get money from you, either. Then they told you to blame the teachers and the unions. That’s how this works.

Your potholes don’t get filled for the same reason. Your job sucks because your company doesn’t care about adequate staffing, reasonable hours or regular wages because your company doesn’t answer to anyone anymore. Republicans told everyone regulation and minimum wages were mean, and any meaningful worker protections were too expensive, and you voted them into every statewide and national office you have.

Your healthcare is too expensive because your GOP governor rejected Obamacare and refused to expand Medicaid to cover the likes of you and yours. Your healthcare is too much of a giant pain in the ass because every time some liberal politician wanted to regulate the insurance industry the Republican moneymen paid people to scream about freedom and entrepreneurship on Fox. Plus you hated it was named after the black president, there was that, but it’s not as big a factor as the Fox money and the lack of rules.

In short, your life sucks because of Republican governance, full goddamn stop. It sucks because they did everything they told you they were gonna do. Including getting rid of all the illegals.

This guy gets deported, you look around the next day and you see. Is your life any better? Are you rich? Are you happy? Forget the morality of your position that somebody who’s here working and contributing doesn’t deserve to be here. You’re taking a hateful position and trying to justify it with practicalities and those practicalities aren’t even true.

You’re selling your soul for nothing. You’re hating people for nothing. There’s no reason good enough and your bad one isn’t real.

A.

Jul 23 2017
1 Comment
Athenae, Bigotry, Guns, Immigration, Immoral Values, Law/Justice, Race

Your Fondest Wish Comes True. THEN WHAT?

So let’s say that tomorrow Trump is indicted, impeached, frog-marched out of the White House, and his entire team including Pence and Ryan are in prison and Orrin Hatch is president.

Let’s say this happens (not a quarter of it is going to happen) and we all watch it on TV.

Then what? I mean it, then what? Like the next day what happens? We pop the champagne and assume it’s all over?

I think a lot of my fellow pale-faced liberal types are underthinking the amount of violence people of color, young people, and women are already facing because of Trump, and that’s after a VICTORY. Their whole angry worldview was validated in a national election and it’s just made them MORE angry. I didn’t think they could get more angry but they are.

These are the people arming and prepping themselves for the apocalypse, who bought an extra AR-15 just to piss those libtards off and have been stockpiling ammo since the days of that draft-dodger Bill Clinton. We all had a good time clowning on Meal Team Six back when they seized a frickin’ bird sanctuary, but put one of those assholes in a crowded room and he could mow down a movement.

Ninety percent of Trump supporters? If he’s thrown out of office they’ll be fine as long as whatever comes after him immediately gives them jobs. They’ll go to work and they’ll have less time to be pissed off. I don’t have an answer for that other 10 percent but I think we’re downplaying the threat they represent to people already feeling marginalized and targeted.

So if I seem less openly enthusiastic about the idea of impeachment or criminal proceedings against the Trump Syndicate, it isn’t because I think they’re innocent of anything. It’s because even if they’re found guilty, they won’t suffer a fraction as much as those with so much more to lose already.

A.

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