Former President Donald J. Trump

[Sneelock]

http://time.com/5316389/trump-united-na ... s-council/

The Trump administration is set to announce Tuesday its departure from the United Nations’ main human rights body in its latest withdrawal from an international institution.

[Jimbo]

The White House is scrambling to present a coherent message on its policy of separating unlawful entrants' children from their parents in light of scathing criticism.

ProPublica published audio of young children separated from their parents screaming and crying inside of a U.S. Customs and Border Protection facility. In the recording, an agent can be heard joking at their expense. “We have an orchestra here,” he says.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/20 ... efing.html

The practice certainly does seem barbaric.

Not defending Trump but the immigration service has never been known as a benevolent service. Maybe it is somehow even worse under Trump but if mics were there under Obama and before I'm sure there was as much wailing and many tears shed. It's a really tough dilemma in any time, whom to let into the country and whom to kick out. If separating kids from parents is going on it's bad, but horror stories about the INS (ICE) are many and this latest news is just another Trump cudgel.

Then again, if for once the press is doing its job and exposing the horror, better late than never. Hopefully it'll get better thanks to the exposure. Under Trump, that is unlikely but maybe.

[bobzilla77]

You ARE defending Trump.

[Jimbo]

You ARE defending Trump.

Kinda maybe. But it's the immigrants who are being used in a political game to unseat him. You wouldn't know about ICE doing what they're doing if it weren't Trump. Under Obama's tough and cruel (maybe necessary) immigration reign the Republicans were happy and the Democrats were silent.

[Count Machuki]

If separating kids from parents is going on..

It is.

[toomanyhatz]

You have no clue what you're talking about, do you?

THE SEPARATION OF CHILDREN FROM THEIR PARENTS WAS NOT AN OFFICIAL POLICY UNDER OBAMA.

It was no picnic I'm sure - and there will always be abuses. But there is a HUGE difference.

[bobzilla77]

Yeah in this case the abuse and cruelty are the defining feature of the policy, and some of the people in his base are excited to see it happening. It's not quite time for the return to executions and floggings in the public square, but this is whetting their appetite.

Others are making uncomfortable noises but in the end, they'll surely accept it as "the unfortunate price of fixing Obama's open border policy."

But Jimbo's a fan of authoritarian rule, he's a paid spokesman for it. He can't even be honest with us about whether he is defending Donald Trump's immigration policy.

[Brickyard Jack]

Can you imagine being a six year old, or a four year old, or a two year, and you are taken away from your mum or dad? It brings tears to my eyes. Torturing little kids? How tough is that? Evil, like I said.

[Jimbo]

You have no clue what you're talking about, do you?

But there is a HUGE difference.

You know what you're talking about. How HUGE?

There was a an On The Media story about deportation of innocent Muslims during Obama that was shocking and surely extralegal. US immigration is a cruel and heartless service, but important nonetheless. I'll bet some of our UKers coming to the states have some kind of story to tell. Maybe because it's Mexicans and Latinos who are the victims and not Muslims it's a bigger story. Shit, Muslims are the last admin's bogie men. Now it Russians and Mexicans. But that it's Trump doing it just adds to his legacy of stupid moves. And separating children sounds cruel but might it deter undocumented families from coming in? I hear that asylum seekers who should be getting hearings are instead being turned away while their kids ... the kids, are they forced to stay? Can they go back with their families? If we were there in the immigration lines we'd see a different more focused perspective with each hopeful entrant with a different circumstance and each handled a little differently. But a tougher stance at the border is probably is what is needed. That employers under every administration were illegally hiring immigrants but allowed to do so is telling. The rigamarole I had to go though with Japanese immigration was not cruel but a hassle - and I was married to a Japanese. If maybe their home countries were better places they wouldn't need to come to America but they're not. But is that the US's problem? Sometimes, yes, our policies under Obama and before fucked up those countries and people had to get out. If I sound heartless what I'll say next is more so. Man, will those kids have a story to tell their grandchildren.

[Sneelock]

Ugh. Show us your tattoo?

[Sneelock]

I mean, shit, right now who knows what’s going on in those detention centers?

[Snarfyguy]

And separating children sounds cruel but might it deter undocumented families from coming in?

Nope. https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/18/politics ... index.html

Citing the Bible and pointing out how different his policy is from the Nazis' policy toward Jews, Jeff Sessions has been quietly dismantling immigration law. One of the policies he's introduced is the changing the treatment of unlawful immigration as a civil matter to criminalizing the conduct and implementing a "zero-tolerance" attitude toward what are basically refugees, while disingenuously suggesting they constitute a criminal element (which, technically, they now do, via the most self-serving, circular reasoning imaginable), with some going so far as to suggest that minors are posing as the children of criminals in order to gain entry to the U.S. I can't even follow the reasoning there.

This, and much more, is a break with hundreds of years of tradition and it's just so Trump can stir up racial anxiety.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/pos ... 92c470dca4

[Jimbo]

Over on Snopes they're debunking that Obama had a "law" to separate children when in fact there was a "policy" to do so.

There is no federal law that stipulates that children and parents be separated at the border, no matter how families entered the United States. An increase in child detainees separated from parents stemmed directly from a change in enforcement policy repeatedly announced by Sessions in April and May 2018, under which adults (with or without children) are criminally prosecuted for attempting to enter the United States... The rumors correctly suggested that “family detention” as a whole came before the Trump administration, but as of August 2015 intact families at the border were rarely separated.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/was-l ... ssed-1997/

It was happening but there was just an increase under Trump. I am arguing it is a matter of Hatz' "hugeness" vs border business as usual - - plus.

[Sneelock]

okay, so if I just get me a t-shirt that says "I'm a Big Fat Hypocrite" can I get that out of the way? can I express an opinion about any goddam thing TRUMP does without getting caught in the rhetorical flypaper of what others did or didn't do?

Holy SHIT, I hope so because I have NO problem with people who never gave a DAMN about these things who see crying kids and change their fucking minds. good for them. welcome aboard. no strings attached.

ever since the goddam internet showed up you cant have a political discussion without people telling you what they think you are entitled to say given what they presume you did or thought before.

well, I've HAD it with that shit. I think we should just have a show of hands, see who thinks this is wrong and put the screws to the bastards who don't.

[toomanyhatz]

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/was-l ... ssed-1997/

It was happening but there was just an increase under Trump. I am arguing it is a matter of Hatz' "hugeness" vs border business as usual - - plus.

Reading comprehension fail.

Here, tattoo this on your brain:

It has long been a misdemeanor federal offense to be caught illegally entering the US, punishable by up to six months in prison, but the administration has not always referred everyone caught for prosecution. Those apprehended were swiftly put into immigration proceedings and, unless they met the threshold to pursue a valid asylum claim, can be quickly deported from the country.

The current DHS plan makes no special arrangements for those who claim asylum when apprehended. While they will be allowed to pursue their claims and could eventually be found to have a legitimate right to live in the US, they could still already have a conviction for illegal entry.

The Trump administration has decided to refer every person caught crossing the border illegally for federal prosecution, a policy that could result in the separation of far more parents from their children at the border.

The move would also mean that even if immigrants caught at the border illegally have valid asylum claims, they could still end up with federal criminal convictions on their record regardless of whether a judge eventually finds they have a right to live and stay in the US.

It is not a matter of degree. It is a new policy.

[Sneelock]

I see more people in my Facebook feed right now splitting hairs over what Obama and Hillary supporters are allowed to be pissed about than shooting flames out of their asses because the TRUMP administration is doing this right now, can't keep their stories straight and keep blaming people who aren't to blame.

wtf? meanwhile this is happening. let's stop this from happening and play BLAME YAHTZEE later!!!

[Jimbo]

I liked Obama, a lot! His speeches were fantastic. But I also don't hate Trump and his speeches stink but he's good for a goof. I think the visceral hatred of Trump is more harmful than a fuck it attitude, especially when you know many of his policies are not that much different from Obama's. Immigration policy must be the hardest to craft. Obama's wasn't a "let 'em all in" policy like the MAGAs are yelling. His was supposedly the strictest policy ever. Trump campaigned and was elected to get tough on immigration and that is what he is trying to do, to get tough but I'll bet that somehow, like under Obama and presidents before, the California farmers will still have plenty of illegals picking fruit this year. It's all about style over substance.

[Sneelock]

depends on what you mean by "plenty"
https://www.npr.org/2018/05/03/60799681 ... e-industry
you're a big boy Jimbo. If you see no difference between regressive policies and this "America First" horseshit then that's your business.

I think WAY different. I've seen people on TV cheering this guy saying "they're rapists", calling them animals. I think there's a big difference between bad policies that smell of racist politicizing and policies that STINK of it.

[Jimbo]

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/was-l ... ssed-1997/

It was happening but there was just an increase under Trump. I am arguing it is a matter of Hatz' "hugeness" vs border business as usual - - plus.

Reading comprehension fail.

Point taken but I just wanted to you to know that family separation happened under Obama - to a lesser extent - as it does with Trump.

But the INS has always been a horror. Had a camera caught some of the shit under Clinton or Bush, a kerfuffle of guilt and blame could be stoked. Look how Roosevelt treated Jews.

MS St. Louis was a German ocean liner. In 1939, she set off on a voyage in which her captain, Gustav Schröder, tried to find homes for over 900 Jewish refugees from Germany. Due to countries' immigration policies based on domestic political realities, rather than humanitarian grounds, they were denied entry to Cuba, the United States, and Canada. The refugees were finally accepted in various European countries, including Belgium, the Netherlands, the UK, and France. Historians have estimated that approximately a quarter of them died in death camps during World War II.

My larger point is that America has been and is racist and mean no matter who's president. I'm not arguing to keep Amerca American! I can only hope for a better and kinder future but if you don't know the past, like with Obama, (sorry Snarf) then it's doomed to be the same old fucked up racist shit hole it's been since Columbus.

[Sneelock]

so, next time TRUMP says taking down statues of Jefferson Davis is just the same as taking down statues of George Washington remember - other people said dumb things so you are a big hypocrite if you want to smack him with a Nerf bat.