Sadly I know the immigration game. Discriminate, denigrate, threaten deportation. If you dont count the political pawns section of things all this is to make sure that undocumented have no rights in this country so they can be paid less and cant use social services. When Trump.doesnt pay.some of his workers those without papers havs zero recourse. And thats exactly how business likes things. Cheap with no health benefits and no recourse. We keep millions of people held back in this country who pay into the system just....just to keep some wealthy shit head snd his drugee kids high on the hog while immigrants slave underneath them. (Sorry Daniel I know I am talking to the choir).
THE ENEMY INSURRECTIONIST ARE AT THE GATE, DEFEAT TREASONOUS , TERRORIST, AND CON REPUBLICONS EVERYWHERE AND JAIL CORRUPT AND TRAITOR RTRUMP AND CRONIES.THE ENEMY INSURRECTIONIST ARE AT THE GATE, DEFEAT TREASONOUS , TERRORIST, AND CON REPUBLICONS EVERYWHERE AND JAIL CORRUPT AND TRAITOR RTRUMP AND CRONIES. VOTE PROGRESSIVE DEMOCRATS , AND RESTORE DEMOCRACY.
I second the sentiment, makes a great bumper sticker or T shirt, Keep the Immigrants, deport the racists.
My two cents, FWIW. There are to kinds of people who show up at the border.
Job seekers (picking tomatoes is a job)
Asylum Seekers.
Asylum seekers come from places like Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua
Dangerous places to live, government hit squads, death squads, MS-13
The rest are job seekers. Save for the Venezuelans
Those that show up from Venezuela are clean, wearing designer sports clothes, boys carrying soccer balls, girls carrying dolls.
They haven't traveled the dangerous trek from Venezuela, through the Jungles of Columbia, through the very deadly Darien Gap, and the 1,000 mile trip from Panama to the border. I lived three years in Panama, and know very well the Daqrien Gap, even native Panamians won't go there, the deadly Fer de Lance viper, peccaries (a deadly wild hog, criminal gangs, hostile natives, and dirty as hell. No this people fly in from Caracas and a one way trip costs $1,500
These are well heeled middle class, who lived well if not high on the hog, until Hugo Chavez made the fatal error of actually believing that Venezuelan oil belong to Venezuela, not Exxon (A majority share holder in Exxon is Saudi Arabia, BTW). They are neither asylum seekers or job seekers, certainly not forced to migrate because of global warming.
This country needs people who are willing to work at jobs and wages, that haughty Americans won't work at or for. I mean how will we have tomatoes, lettuce, avocados for salads and taco's if we don't have low wage workers, picking the crops, or how will we have our Kentucky fried chicken if it weren't for imported wage slaves. Susan Huckabee Sanders has the answer toss aside child labor laws and have kids process chickens. The machine used to pluck feathers is dangerous and has already killed kids, not to mention the knives.
I know what to do with these immigrants send them to North Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, all of the red states, that have a low minority rate.
As regards terminology, don't get hung up on semantics. There are legal and illegal immigrants. Legal immigrants go through a process to get green cards, illegal immigrants don't, they sneak in.
Then there are those, mostly from the Middle East, who have money, usually students, obtain student visas, and then over stay their visas.
You've seen a lot of them on the streets with signs "Free Palestine from the River to the Sea:.
I was with you, Lee, until the last couple of paragraphs on overstays with signs. This is something I never heard of, though I have read statistics that visa overstays are a very big part of illegal immigration. If I were young I would hold a sign saying Free Israelis and Palestinians from Benjamin Netanyahu! (And the ultra-right-wingers behind him.)
I agree with your sentiments totally. The problem is, as always, the right-wing, be they American, Jewish, Muslim, European, African, Iran, Afghanistan, India, Azerbaijan, and yes visa over stays are a major,undiscussed problem, because they are from wealthy families and countries like the Saudi's, and not something that an ambitious reporter can get a hold of for their career, like Sec Defense Austins hospitalization., for prostate cancer, another mountain out of a mole hill.
Next time you see Daniel Solomon's post, ask him all about the visa overstay problem, he was a federal prosecutor and knows all about the problem.
Be careful what you say, Carol, Biden is behind Netanyahu and REFUSES to tell him to stop the bombing and attacks on Gaza. AND continues to supply Israel with gobs of money and tons of weapons. AND is right now trying to get Congress to give him even more billions for Israel. It's not just the rightwingers! If I had my way, South Africa would be charging the U.S. with genocide and dragging Biden off to The Hague for war crimes, right alongside Netanyahu!
The Venezuelan family our Quaker Meeting is sponsoring and housing doesn't speak any English yet, but the only answer we got when we asked how they got here was "selva" (jungle).
Of course, What would you expect them to say "avion" I know Panama, lived there three years, I once want to go to the Darien Gap, and was told no way, it was full of vipers, hostile natives, dangerous animals. Even Panamanians stayed awa No one travels the jungle in the rainy season.
Panama has a hot and humid, tropical climate, with a long rainy season from May to January and a short dry season from January to May. The rainy season is between May and December and brings an estimated 250-700 millimeters (mm) of rainfall across the country.
In Maine, the state, (my tax money), is paying for lodging, food, cell phones, cultural accommodation, education, utilities, clothing, all needs for minimum 6 months, usually one year and more for migrants, asylum, economic mostly. As Robert Reich has stated, US Common Good is gone for citizens. Cheap & child labor for richy Rich & the Corporations. They each have more money than in our US Treasury. The migrants must be halted, caught up and quality services for US citizens restored. Volunteers in Vermont support migrants. They want cheap, grateful workers, as the US middle class can no longer afford to live there. Housing ghettos will emerge & be tolerated. Wake up.
I held 22 types of visa cases. At one time I was on BALCA, Board of Alien Labor Certification Appeals. Big business loves immigration -- legal and otherwise. We've been talking about this stuff elsewhere -- like Thom Hartmann.
Lots of immigrants come here legally, as tourists, students, thorough work visas and stay, becoming illegals. IMHO a large segment of our economy -- like construction -- is funded by program that most people do not know exist, like the treaty trader programs. https://www.uscis.gov/working-in-the-united-states/temporary-workers/e-1-treaty-traders There are two investment options which can make a foreigner eligible for an EB-5 Visa: Investing at least $800,000 in a Targeted Employment Area (TEA). Investing in a rural area or an area which has a high rate of unemployment, in a government-approved program. Direct investment of at least $1.05 million outside a TEA.
Thom Hartmann's reports are another good place to get factual information that we can confidently share.
I read yesterday that more immigrants dressed in sandals and tee shirts were deposited in Chicago, some from Venezuela. One of the immigrants said it was quite a shock to find himself there after the 30 plus hour bus trip. The city of Dekalb of N.I.U. refuses to accept anymore busloads of immigrants without notice. These are human beings used as political pawns. This isn't Biden's fault. Congress needs to own this tragedy.
The Republicans in Congress refusing to even debate proposals to fund border security are using the LACK of funding for border security as a cudgel to hit Biden over the head, and poorly informed people are lapping up the misinformation. The longer they can hold off doing anything, the longer they can blame it on Biden.
It’s frustrating beyond measure to see people so easily misinformed, being someone who tends to over-obsess on reading the news ….
The 3 w's that confront the people of this country are, "Who are we, Where are we, and What are we. To confront the idea of "Who" we are, is simple, all that is necessary is a good recollection of who we were. Subtract the current influence pressed upon us by Trump and the past becomes the present, and the people of this country still have a future. In his youth, Trump was an "anal" child. Regrettably, this resulted in the destruction of everything his parents gave him, no matter what it was, he systematically "Rectum." We stand as Americans despite Trump's interference. As to "where" we are, that's a different story. I figure somewhere between the perviable rabbit hole and Trump's descendants on that stupid escalator. The man has lost every election he has ever attempted to take part in. The people as a whole see Trump as a clear and present danger, yes I browed that from a Harrison Ford Movie. The vote will spell his end, but it might take a history book from 2030 for him to believe it. Finally, "What" are we becomes a poignant question. This is the same country it's been for hundreds of years, it's our people that have changed. We've become fat, lazy, and basically illiterate. Who do we have to thank for our new found identity? Ourselves!! Trump is a danger to our Democracy, that is easy to visualize but what do we do about it? The general election of 2024 is just around the corner, if we don't find a way to "Wake Up" the people of this country we won't have a country to speak of. The "Who" the "Where" and the "What" have been answered, cast your vote and seal the deal. The chapter assigned to Trump in that history book, he may not like. It tells a "True" tale of an American "Whore" story, starring "Donnie Boy" himself.
I think “we” are responsible for becoming fat and “illiterate” because we were so intent on becoming fat that we did not pay attention to the people who were making sure we’re illiterate. Part of the game plan for the Right’s take-over of the reins of the country — even though they are a pretty serious minority on the political scene — has been the undoing of our educational system {they don’t even LIKE public education}. They put people on School Boards. We were warned they were doing it, and it seemed so innocuous, we didn’t seem to care — right? School Boards? D’uh. And then they wentt into local office, and then into state legislatures, and then into Congress. It took ‘em forty years, but here’s where we are {This is history — look it up.}
During the time they were on school boards, they had influence on what was taught in schools. I’m all for STEM, really, I LOVE science and math, but persuading us to ditch the humanities for the STEM curriculum creates people who don’t have the breadth of social knowledge to think about our SOCIETY critically and analytically. [Our education system, I have been harping on for decades, is meant to create a CITIZEN, not an employee … Job training was supposed to come with apprenticeships and internships and post-public-education options. Public school was meant to turn out a citizen. Not any more, though….]
Getting people to ditch public schools, or rewriting their history and geography and language books, helped to avoid having to teach the truth about colonialism {in the US and around the world} and slavery, and the Robber Barons, and the runnup to the Civil War or The Great Depression, or how we got out of those … or expose students to the writings of thinkers from around the world about their CULTURES.
Take a look at WHO is falling for the Great Body of Lies headed up by Donnie, but not in any way confined to him. The entire Right Wing of our country is in thrall to the likes of these braying media types like Tucker and Bannon and Newt {and Manafort behind the scenes}.
And it’s the Evangelicals, the ones who thought public education was indoctrinating their kids with anti-Biblical lessons, who are the most energized behind these guys now. And the middle of the country, where education was hollowed out.
Maybe I’m just seeing what I expect to see, but this is what I see.
Thank you! the kind of information we all need has to be UNBIASED! and all of us know that the media is not ANYMORE providing UNBIASED JOURNALISM! shame on all the media! By the way - I am boycotting UNIVISION for having interview the lier-tRump and refusing to give time to President Biden.
The media is corporate. Meaning it is owned by corporations. I just did a search on MSNBC to see who owned it. First though, a corporation is run by a Board of Directors, and these directors are basically professionals, that sit on other corporate boards, and even interlocking BoD's.
MSNBC is owned by NBCUniversal, who is owned by ComCast, who is owned by about five private equity funds, which are in turned owned by other private equity funds, wealth management funds, mutual funds and drilling down you come to stuff like the Saudies and family trusts.
The board of directors of a corporation have one mandate, one responsibility and their own jobs depend on it, not to mention their incomes, and that is to ensure the corporation receives a positive return on investment, profit, and not just a PRI, but a steadily increasing PRI, as reflected in the quarterly profit and earning statement.
To achieve that goal, they hire executives, especially CEO's, that are, of necessity, sociopathic psychopaths, who see people as nothing more than widgets, a human resource, and a resource is something that is consumed in production..
Thus the CEO hires staff, editors and producers who will follow instructions or alike a member of the mafia, know what the party line is, and enforces it, and he or she in turn hire reporters and hosts who also know where the boundaries are, if not they get fired like Keith Olbermann, Tiffany Cross, even Bill O'Reilly and Tucker Carlson. Each corporation has different boundaries, and the only commonality between the four is that they crossed corporate boundaries.
What drives profits in corporate media? Advertisers. You can tell a lot about the audience of a particular media, by the ads they carry.
For MSNBC it is old farts like myself, PhRMA ads, health and life insurance ads, mostly.
The fossil fuel industry has no need for ads, except to promote a false public image, because the demand for oil and gas is inelastic,
The same with the Military Industrial Congressional complex, the viewer is not the consumer, and their ads are tax deductible and meant to influence public opinion. Get set for ads for Boeing in the wake of the door failure on the 737 Max, as well as positive spin from the news about the problem has been identified, was the result of a passenger.
The first report it was a window that blew out a the clothing from a child was ripped off, now we are being shown signs of an exit door in the rearm and there are no seats next to exit doors
As mentioned above, Venezuelan immigrants are simply middle middle and upper middle class people, who have found themselves at the bottom of the social ladder, as they are no longer privileged. Thanks to Exxon (Saudis) have undue influence with our government.
Did you see that one of Mexico's requirements for cooperating with Biden concerning the border is to end sanctions on Venezuela and, I believe, Nicaragua.
Re reading your comment, I see it through a different light.
That the President of Mexico, is telling Biden to lift sanctions on Nicaragua and Venezuela because it is those sanctions that are flooding Mexico with financial refugees, not political asylum seekers.
I am letting my comment below stand.
Nope. And I can't understand that either. Nicaragua is ruled by a tyrannical leftist regime, the Sandinistas, with Daniel Ortega, a student of Chez Guevara. Orega and his Sandinista's overthrew the CIA installed Dictator Anastasio Somoza Debayle so beloved of the John Birch Society, and the CIA founded and financed the Contra's, which proved essential as Nicaragua served as an important way station in Iran Contra.. Cocaine was flown by from Colombia to Nicaraguan Contra dirt runways, then flown to drop point in the US, by contract pilots, after they dropped off small arms and ammo for cocaine. And the cocaine was used to create an addiction by the CIA, to fund the purchase of weapons, that were bought by Israel and delivered to the Ayatollah Khomeini in his war with Saddam.
According to Mike Felerstein writing in Oct 2023 in
Hopes that an election in Venezuela next year might resolve the country’s political divisions and revive a moribund economy have reemerged as the Biden administration and Nicolás Maduro’s regime are reportedly near an agreement to lift some U.S. sanctions in return for steps to hold a fair contest in 2024.
Anyway if what you say is true. I want to know the story behind the story, I never ever take news at face value, there is always a subtext, a story behind the story if it is politics.
It is like accidents, they are the culmination of bad choices and/or mechanical failures.
You misunderstood. My concern is that they need warm clothes. I was trying to figure out how I can get my warm clothes that I don't wear to homeless people. The Goodwill is a for profit enterprise. The Salvation Army is across town and we are in a snowstorm today.
A search of "organizations taking donations for warm clothing for immigrants" could answer your concern. We have hundred of desperate Haitians near me, who were scammed into paying for bogus rides to the north from the Mexican Border after they were processed for entry. They are kept warm by local donations.
Venezuelans are common in the north, welcomed by all the warehouses looking for skilled employees. They tend to have basic English, are educated, electronically savvy, and are reliable workers. They get their bearings quickly upon entry, then move to cities where their skills are needed. The Somalis tend to have fewer skills, are transported north and settled by organizations. Younger people work in warehouses, older ones who speak little English are capable cashiers at supermarkets.
There exists in this country a fractional percentage of the whole, who are insecure, poorly educated and like Trump are just plain ignorant. They try to find a snitch where they can feel comfortable in a country that views them as lost. Their agenda is based on a healthy pack of lies slewed by the Don. Their foot hold has shocked the good people of this country, to the point where we feel what we have held as sacred is now in danger. If Trump caused a high-grade fever, oozing pustules and obvious delusions, the systematic signatures of what they actually had would be easy to diagnose. It traveled on the back of Trump's favorite animal, the "Rat."
You want to know how we have progressed as a society, let me give you a glimpse of the past so you can compare. Our family had a cottage built by my grandfather with the assistance of a kind neighbor. This structure was erected in a time when indoor toilets were at a premium. Hense the old "Out House." Within this vestige from our past, which stood proudly in the rear of the cottage that overlooked the beautiful Lake Margarethe, there was a bucket filled with items I hesitate to identity. Back then money was difficult to come by so the mother of invention came into being. The brave people back then used dried corn cobs that had the cornels removed as toilet paper. They were a tougher breed. Oh-By the way, our outhouse was a 2-seater. I can just imagine the conversations that ensued as friends and family went about their daily duties, and we bitch about how difficult life has become, Try "wiping" that image from your mind.
Wow my child hood in Ashley Co., AR including corncobs, sans kernels.
Sears and Roebuck catalog for guests, white corn cob for #1 women.
Smoke house uphill and to the right of the outhouse (right as you exit)
a hog pen, pappy would rope one hog, hang it upside down from a tree, slit it's throat and catch ghe blood, the other went nuts so he had to shoot in the head, which didn't make mammy happy because she loved brains and eggs (yuck, I still cant eat pork, I was 4 and watched the slaughter, hens peck scraps around the house, mammy would wring their neck, vegetable garden, pappy rode to town on a mule drawn sled, to buy salt, sugar,flour, snuff and maybe gingham for mammy to guilt. Quilting loom suspended from ceiling, quilting parties, pot belly stove in the middle of the living room around which we huddled at night wrapped in quilts, water pumped behind the house near the steps. Wood fired cook stove to warm the water for Sunday go to meeting bath. with platter and pitcher.
Good times. Still love black eyed peas, okra, sour dough warm bisquits in in the morning. Yeast stock had to be as old as the colonies, mammy would take a pinch wrap it in cloth, set it aside for the next day.
Pappy hunted deer, mammy squirrel, Squirrel taste great, like the nuts it eats, she also did the fishing.
Lee--How different, that time from now. Things were so simple back then, but the people of today would look upon our past as a trip back in time to what they would consider hell. My dad would wake up in the morning with snow on his bed because of the holes in the roof. The only meat they ate was either raised or shot. The North side of the house was where they hung small animals they had killed so nature could tenderize them. Then my grandfather would tell me, "If you get really hungry remember a mouse is simply a very small cow, which is tough to milk, but they work great in a stew.
Don, thank you for this vivid entry. Now you can appreciate what you have, and you feel fortunate. Now imagine Trump and other individual born into great wealth: they have nothing to appreciate! They are afflicted with mental poverty. Paradoxically, great wealth, not poverty, may drive pathological acquisitiveness.
My granny’s house had an outhouse before 1967. They had the first flush toilet in the town, but alas the infrastructure to make it all work wasn’t there, so it was back to tradition. There were enameled lidded buckets to use at night, emptied outside in the morning and rinsed with bleach. As to corncobs, my mother told jokes about brown vs white corncobs in her childhood.
Carol--Hooray for corn! My mother was a debutante from the city of Detroit. Her parents sent her to a private college to protect her from social harm. My father was raised in a dirt floor cabin in Northern Michigan and got a basketball scholarship the same school. Yes, they hooked up and that's why I'm here. But aside from that, after graduation pop took his new wife, who was jealous of her best friend because she could make Jello, to his parents fishing camp to work for the Summer. Her first responsibility was to remove the chamber pots from each cabin, after the people had left for the mornings fishing trip and do to them as you suggested in your post. For her it was where the rubber met the road. The ones in our outhouse were all of the dark brown variety. Can you imagine the preparatory struggle in getting ready for a standard colonoscopy.--------"Oy-Vey"
More info to share from the conservative Cato Institute.
“ According to new data published last month, the Biden Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has removed a higher percentage of arrested border crossers in its first two years than the Trump DHS did over its last two years. Moreover, migrants were more likely to be released after a border arrest under President Trump than under President Biden.”
Well, I know a few people who need to know more about that. Nobody can say the CATO Institute is a Left-wing patsy group.
BUT OF COURSE, even though it says Biden taking steps to reduce the “hordes of people streaming across at the border,” it will antagonize people who want to be more fair about granting asylum, and they will be angry with the current administration, too — which, to some extent, <I> am. Not for policing our border, but for not having a humane system to dealing with people so desperate to escape conditions in their own country that they’d take the awful and dangeorus trek to come here … The anti-foreigner bunch thinks everyone on the planet wants to leave their home country and come to America to get rich off the fat of the land … Egad. How do we open people’s eyes!!!!!
Get rich off the US, I wish the immigrant dream was true. $650 a month has to go back to the home country to pay the Coyote or they lose the home they used for collatoral. If they are working with another persons SSI (its minimum wage) they're tax money represents someone else. If they have a bank account they are forced to get a TIN and pay taxes on the income they put in there (Ie double taxed). And they have to pay for housing, food, clothing, etc. Dont get sick. It's indentured servitude by any other name.
Yesss. American’s don’t know that the majority of undocumented people are working into our economy, but not to their own benefit — Yes, if they use a false SS, they pay into it and NEVER get anything out. They pay into Medicare, too, but can’t use it. They pay sales tax and gas tax. They pay SOMEBODY for shelter, and that person is in the economy —
And, as was said already, they are trapped into low-wage jobs because they have no recourse to complain {people are ANGRY WITH THEM for working at crap wages, instead of angry with employers who hire them under the table and take massively unfair advantage — we have a skewed sense of who is at fault over these things ….}, and their work contributes to the productivity of the country, but not to their own well-being.
I’m not saying we should be thrilled to have millions of undocumented people “contributing” to our society, because especially now, we have been putting huge amounts of money into corralling, detaining, and deporting them — instead of figuring out how to handle the migration that Al Gore warned us was coming … !
As said above, so much of what the undocumented earn goes back “home” — how many still think of where they came from as “home”? Most? — to pay crooks, or to keep a roof over the heads of people they left behind.
It’s a serious cluster-f**k of human beings NOT coping with our world ….
@Daniel Solomon, the US has used migrant workers as soccer balls since Robert E. Lee rode to the gates of Chapultepec Castle in Ciudad Mexico in 1848. In the 1930's, under the phrase "voluntary repatriations" the Immigration and Naturalization Service sent thousands of Mexicans out of the country, many of whom had been born in the US and were US citizens. In Los Angeles County, for example, INS sent federal immigration agents to conduct raids and hold removal hearings. In a number of high profile raids in 1931, the agency arrested 389 deportable aliens, 269 of whom were Mexican. Up to 1.8 million people of Mexican descent—most of them American-born—were rounded up in informal raids and deported in an effort to reserve jobs for white people.
1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo gives Mejican nationals in essence superior status -- granted federal citizenship to thousands of Mexicans who gradually gained full citizenship through the admission of the various states.
Lots of migrant Mejicans a/k/a Chicanos do not even know whether they are US citizens, where they were born, or for that matter where their parents or grandparents were born.
When I was at SSA, I had to address the fact that Mejicans had some laws that not all states recognize, but because it is a treaty - at the same level as the Constitution - we give it in effect "full faith" deference. SSA was not happy, but that's the law.
That same treaty gave citizenship to all residents of the territory ceded to the US by Mexico. However, this did not stop the United States from sending armies to kill Native Americans in the ceded territory, and take their lands.
Martha, this is very important! Is this by chance the same territory from which our Republican oil magnates draw the oil from? By the way, some of these oil magnates also pose as Evangelicals.
I HATE the terms "illegals" and "illegal immigration!" To become "legal," all one needs to do is ask for asylum. BOOM.
They are all "legal asylum seekers" in my eyes . . . or at least the ones not involved in severe crimes like the human trafficking Mike Papantonio has been prosecuting for decades.
He's not a "prosecutor." Lawyers can make a living pursuing employers who violate these laws and representing Americans who are screwed out of jobs given to illegals.
@DanielSolomon those TEA programs have to be approved in many instances by county commissioners, as I recall. I also recall lobbyists seeking their creation through Ohio General Assembly action. Since that’s in my rear view mirror, I would love to see the results. EB-5 visas were used for family members of those investors, not just “highly skilled” staff.
With the working under another persons social security trick the minor can show up as whatever age the SSI donor is. Employers are absolutely culpable of letting this happen and these kids should have actual ID papered or not. The fact that we dont let immigrants get ID in many states further fuels discrimination and abuse. Giving undocumented a small modicum of rights would easily solve these problems if we just let them work under their own info.
You must have seen that God gave us the Donald video? Wow that is pathetic. That seemed made as much for him as his White Christian National followers.
CEO'S want the cheapest labor they can find. They don't want this fixed. Undocumented workers are their chattel for dollars. I live in farm community. The good church goers bash immigrants and then cry in their socks when they can't get help on their farms. The GQP are about chaos. It's pivoting with purpose. Look over there don't look here. They are a lost cause without it. They don't give a fuck who suffers. They will step over dead bodies on their way to the top. Like they do with gun violence, a Pandemic and women's health. They don't give two shits unless they can profit it.
Horrible! But it’s how people behave, closing their eyes to avoid seeing — Closing their minds.
As Bill Reitz says below, that ol’ crook Newt Gingrich is still helping to craft conservative policies and shape conservative mindsets — He’s the “Zero Sum” KING — we don’t win unless they lose. How to undo the New Deal and the Great Society.
It’s outrageous that a guy can be reviled for pilfering from a store but hailed as a hero for being a grifter and crook in Congress … Fame and Power apparently confer immunity on these guys.
WWJD? Evangelicals apparently think he’d go on a cruise with Fat Cats.
I agree with that. I just saw Newt Gingrich giving lip service to more of Trumps BS. Newt doesnt actually support dictatorship, but hey if it means supporting the Republican stonewall agenda then he's all in. It doesnt matter what depths it may bring us as long as he and they can keep their party on top. "Anything Goes". It makes me as angry as it makes you.
Newt, oh my. I was actually reading an article last night about what his ex-wives thought of him. The man must spend a fortune on Viagra. What a creeper, gross. He's a true narcissist.
I would agree, serial filandery. Its always the next younger model. Typical narcisissm. The only joy that brings me is he looks like shit yet his narcissism will make him think he is still young and spry. People like that are sad and pathetic. Most likely puts his first year congressman picture on ourtime.
I want to put an acknowledgement on here, but just cannot do “like”—
Back a ways, we had some sociological data that suggested many people misjudge the level of crime in this this country based on watching TV shows! They ingest an impression based on so many cop shows and so many “inner cities” overrun [EDITED TO REFLECT THE RACISM] with exaggerated crime, racist depictions of POC, and illegal immigrants trying to avoid being found out.
Trying not to be too simplistic here, but I think this is still a problem, grafted onto nightly news programs that flog the border problems without making clear WHO is holding up action on proposed legislation,
I sometimes get shouted down for this but I will repeat it. In a disfunctional relationship narcissists will yell and scream about problems to distract from the relationship issues. These problems are very frequently of there own causing to begin with. You can rest assured they will blame you to put you on the defensive and distract you. This is the Republican narcissist party. Its head is a narcissist MAGA are communal narcisissts and congressional Republicans tow the line quitely or openly emulate the malignant narcisisst in chief. The situation our country is in is where we cant get a divorce from these guys. The only solution is to have really good boundaries and be firm (ie jail the ones who break the law).
You’re talking “interpersonal boundaries” right? Not lines in the sand.
Yeah, I hear it — the narcissistic bent has been strong, not only in Donnie, but in his followers beliefs, too. “We are only total losers because we are being picked on …”
[Narcissists THINK they are total losers, which is why they have to get people to reflect back to them an image better than their own self-image. It’s all mixed up, but they don’t look inward, they almost totally look outward for their sense of self, and they demonize anything that “reflects” badly on them. It’s almost impossible to correct the ACTUAL narcissistic personality that cannot be truly introspective for fear of seeng a revolting pile of sh*t inside themselves.
But those who join a narcissistic cult can sometimes be reached.
As Prof. R says, gather ye thy info and speak it to the people who need to hear it!
The dumbass Mike Johnson says many illegal immigrants crossing the border have been terrorists??? If these lying fanatical Fascist GQP would look in a mirror, they would see who the real bona fide terrorists are that are serving in our House of Representatives. They are the ones that need to be deported. Those hypocritical SOB's make me sick.
I didn't get into the details, like the history of Trump Model Management, later shortened to T Management, when he brought in hundreds using visas, some that might have been questionable and involved under age girls. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_Model_Management
At least one former model alleged that he violated the H1B violations but DOL dismissed the case due to the statute of limitations.
Funny how it seems like "big strong Bunkerboy" EXCLUSIVELY hires/dates foreign women. Almost like . . . HE HATES AMERICAN WOMEN?!? Thanks for the links!
We have the equivalent - https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/agriculture/h2a The H-2A temporary agricultural workers program - often called the H-2A Visa Program - helps American farmers fill employment gaps by hiring workers from other countries.
Right To Work laws were made based on Jim Crow policies. The man who wrote them in 1949 was a big Christian. Those laws are about oppression and profits.
You know the attack on immigrants the methods and the tactics are very similar to union busting. The less laws protecting immigrants equates to the less laws protecting all of us.
..back in 1980 150 undocumented Poles were brought in to assist with clearing the block where T**** Tower now stands. These workers were required to do their jobs often in violation of safety regulations and afterwards the Trump Organisation refused to pay them. It is also been reported that the organisation hired undocumented immigrants to work at his hotels and golf resorts (including Mar a Loser).
Of course the narcissistic real estate shyster denies he had any knowledge of it and it was all the contractor's fault. Apparently vetting isn't his or his organisation's strong point but going with a slipshod company to save a few zloty's (the old Polish currency) is.
Thanks for reminding us of that fact Daniel. It is quite ignored by corporate media, and the Democrats have not made it an issue either.
I do have my own issues with immigration. Those piled up at the Texas border are culturally very Christian, hence very Conservative and once settled and feeling at home with ciizenship they are natural allies for the culture war of the right, provided our fragile democratic Republic survives that long.
I also saw a photo of a group of men around a fire at "the fence" one of them was wearing a Sikh turban. Now Sikhs aren't Muslims or terrorist, except those Sikhs sent here to murder Indian Sikh dissenters.
But that also tells me, if Sikhs are traveling to Mexico by airplane, who else is crossing the border from China, Africa, Muslim countries that aren't coming here with a paycheck or political asylum in mind.
I also know, as thinking liberals should know, that the rise of the fascistic right in Europe is attributable to the flood of migrants from Africa , the Mideast. west and central Asia. In fact that is what got Orban elected he promised to build a fence and he did.
And it isn't racism, per se, racism is mostly an American thing, though Europeans aren't immune, but it isn't a hyper political thing,
The problem is the European culture war, but not against gays (except in Poland) but because of the threat of the Islamic culture that is threatening to displace and over power, Western culture.
Islam is exceptionalist and triumphalist and resistant to modernization as is many right wing theocratic Christian sects like the Southern Baptists and Dominionists, but are not schismed and are united.
The Islamic world reacts in solidarity with HAMAS and in defense of Islam., but you don't see the same reaction of peoples on the street, reacting and parading for Ukraine or when a Christian culture or western nation is under attack, and certainly not one for the Jews.
Bush attacked Iraq for his own personal reasons, political, Cheney had Iraq's oil in his covetous mind, but the Islamic world perceived it an attack on Islam, except the Saudi's who perceived
Saddam as a threat to their suzerainty over the Islamic mind. Saddam screwed up when he posed as a reincarnated Nebuchadnedzzar, but that was nothing when he had images of him made next to Salah al Din, (Saladin) the name is a title, it means The Righteousness of the Faith.
it was not his birth name, neither was Ali binAbi Talib (theShia saint, it means Exalted son of the father of the Student, which is what he was the son of the cousin of Muhammad, whom they claim to be the rightful heir of Muhammad not the Sunni (Sunnah means follower) Ansar means Helper.
Wester support of Israel is deemed by Muslims as an attack on Islam, and their response is a holy war a Jihad, meanwhile Biden and Blinken, with the help of Qatar , the King of Jordan and MBS is keeping that tamped down.
Arrogant westerners are fools, they are totally ignorant of Islam, and Islam likes it that way, as they can use our ignorance to twist us around their fingers.
Which they are doing in the Israel Hamas war.
Above all else Westerners worship money, even the most radical of Christians,,and especially the most radical.
Muslims do enjoy luxury and opulence and the things that money can buy, but in the end money is simply a tool, by which to spread the faith and conquer the west, for that is what their godhead, their prophet (PBUH) demanded. The leaders of the faithful live in luxury, while the faithful are merely disposable tools offered the glory of Paradise for their sacrifice, which is acatually no different what Popes, Cardinals, Bishops, Popes, Priests and their Protestant counterparts do.
Anyway Islam is on the verge of overwhelming western culture in Europe, and that has the Europeans full of anger and angst, and that has led to the rise of the right.
There is a similar anxiety in America, but instead of culture being the threat, after all they are Christians and everyone loves Mexican food (tongue in cheek, Central and South Americans don't make or eat "Mexican food", neither do Mexicans for that matter. I ate Mexican food, cheese enchilada's tasteless. Hevos Rancheros made with rancid oil. Most used spice in Panama is oregano.Puerto Rican and Cuban food in no way resembles Tex Mex., but the culture is conservative Christian and fits perfectly with the MAGAt culture,
Evangelastic Christians like the Pentecostals have made great inroads with Central Americans and even are a source of impetus for migration northward,.
In the World Happiness Report, the United States is definitely not near the top of the list. The countries who rank the highest also have the highest ratings of happiness of the immigrant population and the native population is happy to have immigrants. the United States on the other hand rates high on the three emerging health problems that threaten happiness: obesity, the opioid crisis, and depression. So, if we have such an unhappy population, those who are the most unhappy are looking for someone who will offer a solution that is simplistic and puts the blame on others. Currently in the United States blame of immigrants has been a popular issue for the MAGA Republicans. Historically minority groups were blamed, but now they have strong advocacy organizations. Undocumented immigrants have few to stand for them so they are an easy target. They are not the cause of obesity, the opioid crisis or depression but they bear the brunt of being held out as scapegoats by Trump, and the Republican (Fascist) party. Thank you Professor Reich for the facts. I might use this information to write a Letter to the Editor. In a small town paper, those that have survived, the editors often look for letters that can stir up some debate.
With a paralyzed congress due to Republican constipation of just about everything having to do with solutions to an outdated immigration policy., it keeps this issue alive for the upcoming elections.
What is the short term solution? Elect Biden, keep the Senate blue and flip the house but the long term solution has to do with radically diminishing or even eliminating the influence of the wealthy corporations and individuals. This would take a willingness to "think outside the box" for progressives.
The Senate should investigate Congress members who have fake resumes and those who had voted against certifying Biden's win on Jan 6. It is a matter of public record.
I just wrote my Senator Amy Klobuchar, about that same thing this morning. My district is represented by Michelle Fischbach. I think she's Ginni Thomas's twin sister. She is so far up Trump's ass she can scratch his throat.
Hello fellow Minnesotan! Governor Walz is my hero these days. I was traveling through to Nebraska last summer and big guy walked up to me and my husband and pointed to my Minnesota license plates. Then proceeded to call her and Tina Smith bitches. And a few other things. Course, I had to reply. My husband is giving me the get in the damn truck look. I did. Very slowly. I hate bullies.
I’d like to travel across the country to visit my nephew in Tucson, and I wonder if it’s safe to drive through Trump Country with a Vermont license plate …
Lee Markland ; Senators, Congress members, any one who opposed the certification of Joe Biden's presidency win or engaged in the attack on the Capitol and betrayed their oath of office should be disqualified.to be in or run for office.
I totally agree laurie, preaching to the choir here. Now to get state legislatures and Judges, but question is how many of these are from Republican states.?
Lee Markland ; I guess there would have to be legal challenges brought by those who have 'standing'. That is not anything I would know about. It is crazy that insurrectionists hold seats in our Democracy. That our Congress can interfere with the promise made by President Biden to help Ukraine defend itself from Russia, by withholding aid/support.
Republicans encourage Cubans, Venezuelans and others to protest, even rebel against the governments in their home countries, but when they flee oppression and try to come to this country, they are scapegoated, harassed by the same Republicans.
The Constitution delegates to the United States Congress the power “[t]o establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, … throughout the United States.” Thus, the Constitution gives Congress the power to determine which foreigners can become citizens, and under what conditions.
Refugees are persons who are outside their country of origin for reasons of feared persecution, conflict, generalized violence, or other circumstances that have seriously disturbed public order and, as a result, require international protection.
The right to seek asylum was incorporated into international law following the atrocities of World War II. Congress adopted key provisions of the Geneva Refugee Convention (including the international definition of a refugee) into U.S. immigration law when it passed the Refugee Act of 1980. Non-U.S. citizens, including lawful permanent residents, refugees and asylees, generally have the same rights as citizens. The Refugee Act of 1980 created The Federal Refugee Resettlement Program to provide for the effective resettlement of refugees and to assist them to achieve economic self-sufficiency as quickly as possible after arrival in the United States.
There are 3 ways of obtaining asylum in the United States:
The affirmative process;
An Asylum Merits Interview after a positive credible fear determination; or.
As immigration surges so does the backlog of asylum hearings. It rose from 2 million to 3 million over the last year, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse. Depending on the path, the length of the asylum process can range from a few months to a few years; current wait times for cases in the asylum backlog average 1,525 days. Asylum seekers are authorized to remain in the country while their application is pending.
IMHO it wouldn't take much to eliminate the backload.
Daniel, thanks for the concise summation of what is a very complex issue around asylum. At the very top of the link you reference is the following: "Under the rule, certain individuals who enter the United States through its southwest land border or adjacent coastal borders are presumed to be ineligible for asylum, unless they can demonstrate an exception to the rule or rebut the presumption."
So in effect, if a person requesting asylum enters the United States through the "southwest land borders or adjacent coastal borders," they have less rights than those who enter from the north, east or western borders. If you enter from the south, you are presumed guilty until proven innocent. So in theory, all an asylum seeker needs to do is to take a boat ride further up the coast to avoid this onerous provision. Weird!
There is a diff between asylum seekers and job seekers, or people migrating for economic reasons like the Venezuelan middle class.
The Maduro government is not persecuting anyone, however the middle class Venezuelans are discovering what it is like to live like a peon, the class whom they lorded over since its inception, and they don't like it all. So they hop on an airplane and fly to Mexico, then a bus to the border.
Daniel Solomon : These are mean 'people' without decency or empathy. Who weaponize innocents. They are beneath the pit! The same people who are guilty of wage theft. They stiffed roofers who worked in the hot sun after Katrina to fix properties, and then left them flat with no pay! Their karma will catch up to them!
Daniel Solomon: I'm reminded by your post how there were people encouraging asylum seekers to get on those planes in Texas, to go to Martha's Vineyard. It would not surprise me if there were operatives in Venezuela and other South American countries who tell lies and encourage them to come to our Southern border . The 'right' are often wrong, and Nasty about it. They use people as political footballs.
I don't know it for a fact but I suspect that impoverished Africans and Cubans were funded by right wing groups. How much does it cost to fly to Mejico?
"We are engaged in the fight of our lifetimes to uphold the fundamental ideals upon which this nation is based." Professor Reich has summed up our predicament in one concise statement. I would add that out of crisis comes opportunity. With Trump's brand of Fascism knocking at our door, progressive Americans are faced with an existential crisis. Are those of us who look to uphold the original ideals stated in the Declaration of Independence willing to fight for what we believe in?
The citizens of the United States as a voting population have been asleep at the wheel. Trump is not the problem, he is the ultimate expression of the problem of wealthy multinational corporations gaining greater and greater power over lawmakers at all levels and now even the Supreme Court. Unbridled greed is causing the ruin of our governance and therefore our country. If Trump and the Fascist Party of America wins in the next election, we will be forced to grapple with creating a new form of democracy that empowers its citizens, and equitably distributes purchasing power. I believe Economic Democracy and the Progressive Utilization Theory offer the best solutions so far.
Just to respectfully clarify @MarcNevas, “fight” should exclude political violence. As President Biden said yesterday, “Americans must reject all forms of political violence...all”. He called upon everyone to do so. As a grandmother, I wish to see us figuratively “fight” by registering voters, engaging in legal means of voter protection, and then lawfully getting out the vote. We can and must do this. In my 20 years as an elected Democrat, never did I see “ political violence “.
However...bring on the truth through comedic relief! If more of us watched Stephen Colbert (see last night 1/8/24) winning would get much easier. Seeing the orange fool as the silly old man he actually is, needs this touch, and, brought me guffaws and a pleasant night’s sleep.
When I use the word fight, I mean to use it in the way that Robert Reich fights. We must fight to overcome adversity if we want dynamic change. Violence only begets more violence.
I would like to see organized marches in every state as a show of solidarity against corporate greed (and tyranny). Most people would agree that corporate greed exists, but they have no idea how true it is, how it has affected them (socially, culturally, politically, and so on and so on), and what to do about it.
PaulaOH, biggest reason I survived The Former Guy's administration was Stephen Colbert. I would watch his monologues on Youtube and somehow the sky would clear. He is a must in my survival kit.
How we shop and how we eat is a vote. To thwart obesity, we need to eat whole food, not processed food and decrease toxic substances in our daily products and homes. ewg.org is a good site to find healthier products for laundry, cleaning, soap, shampoo, toothpaste, makeup, etc. Dr. Michael Greger’s books can help with healthier diets. google organic clothes. and shop from companies that use sustainable practices for producing clothes. We can move the happiness quotient in this country. We can learn from our Hawaiian fellow countrymen. I had thought aloha meant hello and good by. Watching W. Kamau Bell interviewing native Hawaiians I learned it has a much deeper meaning that is part of their culture, but more deeply it is part of their souls. Aloha is an essence of being: love, peace, compassion, and a mutual understanding of respect. Aloha means living in harmony with the people and land around you with mercy, sympathy, grace, and kindness. When greeting another person with aloha, there is mutual regard and affection. There is acknowledgment of the exchange of breath, the very essence of life, What if we were all taught this from birth? What would our national identity be then?
Linda - Your thoughts resonate so strongly for me! When we cherish the gift of life in all it's forms, we support the Common Good that Prof. Reich has compellingly written about. The thread of this awareness (and way of life) is woven into our national identity but it very much needs to be dusted off and reaffirmed.
once you start looking for things to clean up you environment you’ll be amazed at how much information is out there, You might also like to watch the Netflix show You are What You Eat as a starting sample.
Last I checked, before the midpoint of Bunkerboy's failed presidency I believe, 'Murica stood at a "life satisfaction index" of around his stolen president number: 45%. Oh to live in a Nordic countryty like Norway, Denmark, or Sweden. Their percentage is in the NINETIES!!!
Finland tops the ranking. I have been there several times and it is a happy place. They have full health care and excellent schooling. Teachers are venerated and have a respectable pay scale. It is bitter cold and dark in winter, but they enjoy their saunas.
Not so sure about your happiness report.Ialy, Greece France, Germany, Poland, Slovakia are very unhappy with the migration from Africa and he Mid east, which accounts for he rise of fascism. in Europe. Orban heard the distress of Hungarians and promised to take them back to the past and build a wall to keep out the immigrants and he did.
Please keep posting to articles like this fact filled one. I save them and use them as talking points when debating the right-wing lies. You're not "preaching to the choir" you're giving us the resource's we need to get the truth out there.
Yes, you are giving your readers (and followers ) a stronger foundation and clarity of what is actually happening. Thoughtful communities need trustworthy leaders and resources. I’m very grateful for this opportunity to stay informed.
Thank you Prof Reich! Yes, the rethuglicans' prime motive is FEAR. And of course that *fear* is turbocharged by misinformation. Thanks for helping arm us with the facts to counter that misinformation.
I am the granddaughter of immigrants and I am the grandmother of an adopted immigrant and the grandmother-in-law of a student immigrant and the biological grandmother of an American citizen with dual US and Brazilian citizenship. How about you? Complicated and beautiful. Thanks to Dr. R and all the commenters about this issue. I have learned a lot.
I can’t help but be reminded of Melanie’s coat that she wore when visiting the southern border detention camps. The message “ I really don’t care, do you?” is about as honest as I could imagine. Believe them when they tell you.
I saw Bidens South Carolina speech and I can say that was a zinger. It was better than his Jan 6 speech. He spoke about negotiating drug prices for everyone. Even if that was a Biden gaff bravo! The gloves are off baby, this is gonna be a good fight. I am attaching a link to his speech on PBS here.
I received a "donate now" request from Biden two days ago. One of the "accomplishments" listed was "more people can afford decent healthcare." Are you kidding me? Everybody has a right to decent healthcare! We need SINGLE-PAYER UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE! Negotiating drug prices? I'm underwhelmed. Our manufacturing can't even compete with countries that don't have healthcare added to the price of their products like we do. Our national "product" is increasingly finance, insurance, and real estate. Hospital systems are being purchased and what should be a service industry is becoming swallowed up in the finance/insurance and now real estate industrial complex. Life and death decisions are in the hands of big business.
In countries with single-payer universal healthcare, negotiating drug prices has been part of the system for decades. It isn't celebrated as a bonus or great accomplishment. Now, how do we disentangle healthcare which should be a service without collapsing the economy. It gets worse every year.
I’ve alway found it humorous that not just the extreme right but “ordinary “ citizens think that drug smugglers are crossing the border by swimming the rio grande or hiking the desert. Aside from the tunnels or private planes, they cross at check points and various legal points of entry. The people escaping cartel violence and food insecurity are not sitting in trailers synthesizing narcotics. Every Republican should be forced to watch the film “The Counselor”.
Trump's BS is coming from a second generation IMMIGRANT who is married to an IMMIGRANT who may have come into the country illegally. As far as I've been able to tell, the U.S. (yep even Trump has discovered that spells "us") is TOTALLY a nation of IMMIGRANTS. Even the "Native Americans" are descendants of IMMIGRANTS who migrated to North America from Asia via what was then the "land bridge" between today's Alaska and Russia. Trump's "demagoguery" is simply more RACIST BS coming out of his mouth - which should be "washed out with soap" - although even that wouldn't stop the incessant LYING coming from our TWICE IMPEACHED so-called two time popular vote LOSING four times INDICTED (ex) president. Sadly those in his CULT thrive off every word he says - with absolutely no willingness to "fact check" anything. To me, that means his CULT followers are "willfully STUPID." As a retired Middle School teacher I hate that word, but can't think of any other explanation for their being part of Trump's base/CULT. This is truly a fascist movement which will only stop if "we the peop;le" commit to voting republicans into the history books along with their fuhrer - right next to Benedict Arnold!
Thank you again for an important and well-written post, Robert. I appreciate having your kind, sensible, and intelligently laid-out information at my fingertips day after day. Substacks like yours and that of Heather Cox Richardson are the daily armor I put on for our deeply troubling times, times in the face of which Vice President Kamala Harris has implored us to, "... not throw up our hands when it’s time to roll up our sleeves." Indeed.
Thanks Robert. As an outsider it appears that Trump' coup attempt has regained energy over the last 12 months and now seems to be actively supported and even driven by the whole of the GOP with the backing of oligarchs, big Industry and legal strategists. The threat to Democracy now is much bigger than in Jan21 and take over plans and strategies are being discusses spread openly........... but the average American does not seem to care and that is very worrying as it was always believed that a fair election would stop this threat. If the American people cannot be mobilised to vote in a large majority to defend democracy, it will loose. After the 22 elections I mentioned that the fight for Democracy was still a uphill battle. It looks like the hill has become much steeper. I am worried for the American people but also for the consequences it has for the rest of the world. The signs are there but we seem to refuse to see them,
These types of letters that you write Robert are how these kinds of topics should be told to others in such simplistic manner as you have beautifully written. You explain the lies with the truth and you do it very well. Trumps own wife was an immigrant - but I guess if you were a model who could put up with him then that doesn’t count. Republicans do not want to “solve” the problems with the boarder (or else they would not be trying to take money away from CBP) because they would have nothing to campaign on. That should be in the headlines about them instead of the false statements and repugnant comments that they blast on repeat. I don’t understand why some people who have come from countries south of our boarder are actually going to vote for trump. The republicans are not for law and order (obviously - unless it benefits them) nor are they for any of the other topics/people they campaign on.
About 6 months ago, I had a person point toward me (motioning to my and her lily-whiteness) and say, our families immigrated, right? Yes, I said. Then she proceeded to say that, our families were successful and made it because of hard work. I saw where she was going. So I said yes we did work hard but we would still be poor and have very little, if it weren't for government policies and programs of FDR in the 1930's who gave us Social Security, worker's rights, work programs, and other New Deals for our ancestors and LBJ policies of Medicare, Medicaid, Civil Rights, and union support. And minimum wage helped our families rise up too.. Without these government programs, our families would still be poor. She didn't know what to say. What could she say? To the whole truth she had never been told. She had her whole life been operating on only a part truth.
We can also use the fact that all four of Trump’s grandparents were immigrants and his mother and two of his wives. His blood must be poisoned too. What about the Trump kids?
Cass Murphy, oh oh you might just expose the truth. That it's really about the hue of the skin and whether they are wealthy enough to buy their entry/citizenship. Do unto others be damned. Human beings are a transaction, nothing more.
But they can't say that, so they justify and rationalize their cruelty.
This ugly scapegoating can be seen in Europe too. It is terrible.
What it is leading to, might be even more terrible. When I see the Trump supporters being interviewed, I feel that rationality is totally gone. That is not promising good for the campaign: politics should be about something, about goals and means to reach them.
Trump was the poster boy for receipt of employer sanctions for hiring illegals. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/27/nyregion/trump-tower-illegal-immigrant-workers-union-settlement.html
He uses temporary work visas to displace American workers on his properties.
Sadly I know the immigration game. Discriminate, denigrate, threaten deportation. If you dont count the political pawns section of things all this is to make sure that undocumented have no rights in this country so they can be paid less and cant use social services. When Trump.doesnt pay.some of his workers those without papers havs zero recourse. And thats exactly how business likes things. Cheap with no health benefits and no recourse. We keep millions of people held back in this country who pay into the system just....just to keep some wealthy shit head snd his drugee kids high on the hog while immigrants slave underneath them. (Sorry Daniel I know I am talking to the choir).
Bill - agree - and give Dreamers a pathway to citizenship.
THE ENEMY INSURRECTIONIST ARE AT THE GATE, DEFEAT TREASONOUS , TERRORIST, AND CON REPUBLICONS EVERYWHERE AND JAIL CORRUPT AND TRAITOR RTRUMP AND CRONIES.THE ENEMY INSURRECTIONIST ARE AT THE GATE, DEFEAT TREASONOUS , TERRORIST, AND CON REPUBLICONS EVERYWHERE AND JAIL CORRUPT AND TRAITOR RTRUMP AND CRONIES. VOTE PROGRESSIVE DEMOCRATS , AND RESTORE DEMOCRACY.
What? I can’t read you, you’re YELLING.
I second the sentiment, makes a great bumper sticker or T shirt, Keep the Immigrants, deport the racists.
My two cents, FWIW. There are to kinds of people who show up at the border.
Job seekers (picking tomatoes is a job)
Asylum Seekers.
Asylum seekers come from places like Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua
Dangerous places to live, government hit squads, death squads, MS-13
The rest are job seekers. Save for the Venezuelans
Those that show up from Venezuela are clean, wearing designer sports clothes, boys carrying soccer balls, girls carrying dolls.
They haven't traveled the dangerous trek from Venezuela, through the Jungles of Columbia, through the very deadly Darien Gap, and the 1,000 mile trip from Panama to the border. I lived three years in Panama, and know very well the Daqrien Gap, even native Panamians won't go there, the deadly Fer de Lance viper, peccaries (a deadly wild hog, criminal gangs, hostile natives, and dirty as hell. No this people fly in from Caracas and a one way trip costs $1,500
These are well heeled middle class, who lived well if not high on the hog, until Hugo Chavez made the fatal error of actually believing that Venezuelan oil belong to Venezuela, not Exxon (A majority share holder in Exxon is Saudi Arabia, BTW). They are neither asylum seekers or job seekers, certainly not forced to migrate because of global warming.
This country needs people who are willing to work at jobs and wages, that haughty Americans won't work at or for. I mean how will we have tomatoes, lettuce, avocados for salads and taco's if we don't have low wage workers, picking the crops, or how will we have our Kentucky fried chicken if it weren't for imported wage slaves. Susan Huckabee Sanders has the answer toss aside child labor laws and have kids process chickens. The machine used to pluck feathers is dangerous and has already killed kids, not to mention the knives.
I know what to do with these immigrants send them to North Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, all of the red states, that have a low minority rate.
As regards terminology, don't get hung up on semantics. There are legal and illegal immigrants. Legal immigrants go through a process to get green cards, illegal immigrants don't, they sneak in.
Then there are those, mostly from the Middle East, who have money, usually students, obtain student visas, and then over stay their visas.
You've seen a lot of them on the streets with signs "Free Palestine from the River to the Sea:.
I was with you, Lee, until the last couple of paragraphs on overstays with signs. This is something I never heard of, though I have read statistics that visa overstays are a very big part of illegal immigration. If I were young I would hold a sign saying Free Israelis and Palestinians from Benjamin Netanyahu! (And the ultra-right-wingers behind him.)
I agree with your sentiments totally. The problem is, as always, the right-wing, be they American, Jewish, Muslim, European, African, Iran, Afghanistan, India, Azerbaijan, and yes visa over stays are a major,undiscussed problem, because they are from wealthy families and countries like the Saudi's, and not something that an ambitious reporter can get a hold of for their career, like Sec Defense Austins hospitalization., for prostate cancer, another mountain out of a mole hill.
Next time you see Daniel Solomon's post, ask him all about the visa overstay problem, he was a federal prosecutor and knows all about the problem.
I’d be right there with another sign saying the same thing, Carol.
Be careful what you say, Carol, Biden is behind Netanyahu and REFUSES to tell him to stop the bombing and attacks on Gaza. AND continues to supply Israel with gobs of money and tons of weapons. AND is right now trying to get Congress to give him even more billions for Israel. It's not just the rightwingers! If I had my way, South Africa would be charging the U.S. with genocide and dragging Biden off to The Hague for war crimes, right alongside Netanyahu!
The Venezuelan family our Quaker Meeting is sponsoring and housing doesn't speak any English yet, but the only answer we got when we asked how they got here was "selva" (jungle).
Of course, What would you expect them to say "avion" I know Panama, lived there three years, I once want to go to the Darien Gap, and was told no way, it was full of vipers, hostile natives, dangerous animals. Even Panamanians stayed awa No one travels the jungle in the rainy season.
Panama has a hot and humid, tropical climate, with a long rainy season from May to January and a short dry season from January to May. The rainy season is between May and December and brings an estimated 250-700 millimeters (mm) of rainfall across the country.
SirK - Wear that shirt with pride.
In Maine, the state, (my tax money), is paying for lodging, food, cell phones, cultural accommodation, education, utilities, clothing, all needs for minimum 6 months, usually one year and more for migrants, asylum, economic mostly. As Robert Reich has stated, US Common Good is gone for citizens. Cheap & child labor for richy Rich & the Corporations. They each have more money than in our US Treasury. The migrants must be halted, caught up and quality services for US citizens restored. Volunteers in Vermont support migrants. They want cheap, grateful workers, as the US middle class can no longer afford to live there. Housing ghettos will emerge & be tolerated. Wake up.
I held 22 types of visa cases. At one time I was on BALCA, Board of Alien Labor Certification Appeals. Big business loves immigration -- legal and otherwise. We've been talking about this stuff elsewhere -- like Thom Hartmann.
Lots of immigrants come here legally, as tourists, students, thorough work visas and stay, becoming illegals. IMHO a large segment of our economy -- like construction -- is funded by program that most people do not know exist, like the treaty trader programs. https://www.uscis.gov/working-in-the-united-states/temporary-workers/e-1-treaty-traders There are two investment options which can make a foreigner eligible for an EB-5 Visa: Investing at least $800,000 in a Targeted Employment Area (TEA). Investing in a rural area or an area which has a high rate of unemployment, in a government-approved program. Direct investment of at least $1.05 million outside a TEA.
Thom Hartmann's reports are another good place to get factual information that we can confidently share.
I read yesterday that more immigrants dressed in sandals and tee shirts were deposited in Chicago, some from Venezuela. One of the immigrants said it was quite a shock to find himself there after the 30 plus hour bus trip. The city of Dekalb of N.I.U. refuses to accept anymore busloads of immigrants without notice. These are human beings used as political pawns. This isn't Biden's fault. Congress needs to own this tragedy.
The Republicans in Congress refusing to even debate proposals to fund border security are using the LACK of funding for border security as a cudgel to hit Biden over the head, and poorly informed people are lapping up the misinformation. The longer they can hold off doing anything, the longer they can blame it on Biden.
It’s frustrating beyond measure to see people so easily misinformed, being someone who tends to over-obsess on reading the news ….
The 3 w's that confront the people of this country are, "Who are we, Where are we, and What are we. To confront the idea of "Who" we are, is simple, all that is necessary is a good recollection of who we were. Subtract the current influence pressed upon us by Trump and the past becomes the present, and the people of this country still have a future. In his youth, Trump was an "anal" child. Regrettably, this resulted in the destruction of everything his parents gave him, no matter what it was, he systematically "Rectum." We stand as Americans despite Trump's interference. As to "where" we are, that's a different story. I figure somewhere between the perviable rabbit hole and Trump's descendants on that stupid escalator. The man has lost every election he has ever attempted to take part in. The people as a whole see Trump as a clear and present danger, yes I browed that from a Harrison Ford Movie. The vote will spell his end, but it might take a history book from 2030 for him to believe it. Finally, "What" are we becomes a poignant question. This is the same country it's been for hundreds of years, it's our people that have changed. We've become fat, lazy, and basically illiterate. Who do we have to thank for our new found identity? Ourselves!! Trump is a danger to our Democracy, that is easy to visualize but what do we do about it? The general election of 2024 is just around the corner, if we don't find a way to "Wake Up" the people of this country we won't have a country to speak of. The "Who" the "Where" and the "What" have been answered, cast your vote and seal the deal. The chapter assigned to Trump in that history book, he may not like. It tells a "True" tale of an American "Whore" story, starring "Donnie Boy" himself.
I think “we” are responsible for becoming fat and “illiterate” because we were so intent on becoming fat that we did not pay attention to the people who were making sure we’re illiterate. Part of the game plan for the Right’s take-over of the reins of the country — even though they are a pretty serious minority on the political scene — has been the undoing of our educational system {they don’t even LIKE public education}. They put people on School Boards. We were warned they were doing it, and it seemed so innocuous, we didn’t seem to care — right? School Boards? D’uh. And then they wentt into local office, and then into state legislatures, and then into Congress. It took ‘em forty years, but here’s where we are {This is history — look it up.}
During the time they were on school boards, they had influence on what was taught in schools. I’m all for STEM, really, I LOVE science and math, but persuading us to ditch the humanities for the STEM curriculum creates people who don’t have the breadth of social knowledge to think about our SOCIETY critically and analytically. [Our education system, I have been harping on for decades, is meant to create a CITIZEN, not an employee … Job training was supposed to come with apprenticeships and internships and post-public-education options. Public school was meant to turn out a citizen. Not any more, though….]
Getting people to ditch public schools, or rewriting their history and geography and language books, helped to avoid having to teach the truth about colonialism {in the US and around the world} and slavery, and the Robber Barons, and the runnup to the Civil War or The Great Depression, or how we got out of those … or expose students to the writings of thinkers from around the world about their CULTURES.
Take a look at WHO is falling for the Great Body of Lies headed up by Donnie, but not in any way confined to him. The entire Right Wing of our country is in thrall to the likes of these braying media types like Tucker and Bannon and Newt {and Manafort behind the scenes}.
And it’s the Evangelicals, the ones who thought public education was indoctrinating their kids with anti-Biblical lessons, who are the most energized behind these guys now. And the middle of the country, where education was hollowed out.
Maybe I’m just seeing what I expect to see, but this is what I see.
This is what we are UP AGAINST.
Getting truth to people will be hard.
Thank you! the kind of information we all need has to be UNBIASED! and all of us know that the media is not ANYMORE providing UNBIASED JOURNALISM! shame on all the media! By the way - I am boycotting UNIVISION for having interview the lier-tRump and refusing to give time to President Biden.
The media is corporate. Meaning it is owned by corporations. I just did a search on MSNBC to see who owned it. First though, a corporation is run by a Board of Directors, and these directors are basically professionals, that sit on other corporate boards, and even interlocking BoD's.
MSNBC is owned by NBCUniversal, who is owned by ComCast, who is owned by about five private equity funds, which are in turned owned by other private equity funds, wealth management funds, mutual funds and drilling down you come to stuff like the Saudies and family trusts.
The board of directors of a corporation have one mandate, one responsibility and their own jobs depend on it, not to mention their incomes, and that is to ensure the corporation receives a positive return on investment, profit, and not just a PRI, but a steadily increasing PRI, as reflected in the quarterly profit and earning statement.
To achieve that goal, they hire executives, especially CEO's, that are, of necessity, sociopathic psychopaths, who see people as nothing more than widgets, a human resource, and a resource is something that is consumed in production..
Thus the CEO hires staff, editors and producers who will follow instructions or alike a member of the mafia, know what the party line is, and enforces it, and he or she in turn hire reporters and hosts who also know where the boundaries are, if not they get fired like Keith Olbermann, Tiffany Cross, even Bill O'Reilly and Tucker Carlson. Each corporation has different boundaries, and the only commonality between the four is that they crossed corporate boundaries.
What drives profits in corporate media? Advertisers. You can tell a lot about the audience of a particular media, by the ads they carry.
For MSNBC it is old farts like myself, PhRMA ads, health and life insurance ads, mostly.
The fossil fuel industry has no need for ads, except to promote a false public image, because the demand for oil and gas is inelastic,
The same with the Military Industrial Congressional complex, the viewer is not the consumer, and their ads are tax deductible and meant to influence public opinion. Get set for ads for Boeing in the wake of the door failure on the 737 Max, as well as positive spin from the news about the problem has been identified, was the result of a passenger.
The first report it was a window that blew out a the clothing from a child was ripped off, now we are being shown signs of an exit door in the rearm and there are no seats next to exit doors
For the past 8 years, I don't think it's possible to read too much news.
NIMBY
Exactly!!
As mentioned above, Venezuelan immigrants are simply middle middle and upper middle class people, who have found themselves at the bottom of the social ladder, as they are no longer privileged. Thanks to Exxon (Saudis) have undue influence with our government.
Did you see that one of Mexico's requirements for cooperating with Biden concerning the border is to end sanctions on Venezuela and, I believe, Nicaragua.
Re reading your comment, I see it through a different light.
That the President of Mexico, is telling Biden to lift sanctions on Nicaragua and Venezuela because it is those sanctions that are flooding Mexico with financial refugees, not political asylum seekers.
I am letting my comment below stand.
Nope. And I can't understand that either. Nicaragua is ruled by a tyrannical leftist regime, the Sandinistas, with Daniel Ortega, a student of Chez Guevara. Orega and his Sandinista's overthrew the CIA installed Dictator Anastasio Somoza Debayle so beloved of the John Birch Society, and the CIA founded and financed the Contra's, which proved essential as Nicaragua served as an important way station in Iran Contra.. Cocaine was flown by from Colombia to Nicaraguan Contra dirt runways, then flown to drop point in the US, by contract pilots, after they dropped off small arms and ammo for cocaine. And the cocaine was used to create an addiction by the CIA, to fund the purchase of weapons, that were bought by Israel and delivered to the Ayatollah Khomeini in his war with Saddam.
According to Mike Felerstein writing in Oct 2023 in
https://www.usip.org/publications/2023/10/cautious-hopes-breakthrough-venezuela
Hopes that an election in Venezuela next year might resolve the country’s political divisions and revive a moribund economy have reemerged as the Biden administration and Nicolás Maduro’s regime are reportedly near an agreement to lift some U.S. sanctions in return for steps to hold a fair contest in 2024.
Anyway if what you say is true. I want to know the story behind the story, I never ever take news at face value, there is always a subtext, a story behind the story if it is politics.
It is like accidents, they are the culmination of bad choices and/or mechanical failures.
Sign up at thomhartmannreport.com
You are just another NIMBY. Keep 'em in Texas and Arizona. Not your problem.
You misunderstood. My concern is that they need warm clothes. I was trying to figure out how I can get my warm clothes that I don't wear to homeless people. The Goodwill is a for profit enterprise. The Salvation Army is across town and we are in a snowstorm today.
A search of "organizations taking donations for warm clothing for immigrants" could answer your concern. We have hundred of desperate Haitians near me, who were scammed into paying for bogus rides to the north from the Mexican Border after they were processed for entry. They are kept warm by local donations.
Venezuelans are common in the north, welcomed by all the warehouses looking for skilled employees. They tend to have basic English, are educated, electronically savvy, and are reliable workers. They get their bearings quickly upon entry, then move to cities where their skills are needed. The Somalis tend to have fewer skills, are transported north and settled by organizations. Younger people work in warehouses, older ones who speak little English are capable cashiers at supermarkets.
There exists in this country a fractional percentage of the whole, who are insecure, poorly educated and like Trump are just plain ignorant. They try to find a snitch where they can feel comfortable in a country that views them as lost. Their agenda is based on a healthy pack of lies slewed by the Don. Their foot hold has shocked the good people of this country, to the point where we feel what we have held as sacred is now in danger. If Trump caused a high-grade fever, oozing pustules and obvious delusions, the systematic signatures of what they actually had would be easy to diagnose. It traveled on the back of Trump's favorite animal, the "Rat."
You want to know how we have progressed as a society, let me give you a glimpse of the past so you can compare. Our family had a cottage built by my grandfather with the assistance of a kind neighbor. This structure was erected in a time when indoor toilets were at a premium. Hense the old "Out House." Within this vestige from our past, which stood proudly in the rear of the cottage that overlooked the beautiful Lake Margarethe, there was a bucket filled with items I hesitate to identity. Back then money was difficult to come by so the mother of invention came into being. The brave people back then used dried corn cobs that had the cornels removed as toilet paper. They were a tougher breed. Oh-By the way, our outhouse was a 2-seater. I can just imagine the conversations that ensued as friends and family went about their daily duties, and we bitch about how difficult life has become, Try "wiping" that image from your mind.
Wow my child hood in Ashley Co., AR including corncobs, sans kernels.
Sears and Roebuck catalog for guests, white corn cob for #1 women.
Smoke house uphill and to the right of the outhouse (right as you exit)
a hog pen, pappy would rope one hog, hang it upside down from a tree, slit it's throat and catch ghe blood, the other went nuts so he had to shoot in the head, which didn't make mammy happy because she loved brains and eggs (yuck, I still cant eat pork, I was 4 and watched the slaughter, hens peck scraps around the house, mammy would wring their neck, vegetable garden, pappy rode to town on a mule drawn sled, to buy salt, sugar,flour, snuff and maybe gingham for mammy to guilt. Quilting loom suspended from ceiling, quilting parties, pot belly stove in the middle of the living room around which we huddled at night wrapped in quilts, water pumped behind the house near the steps. Wood fired cook stove to warm the water for Sunday go to meeting bath. with platter and pitcher.
Good times. Still love black eyed peas, okra, sour dough warm bisquits in in the morning. Yeast stock had to be as old as the colonies, mammy would take a pinch wrap it in cloth, set it aside for the next day.
Pappy hunted deer, mammy squirrel, Squirrel taste great, like the nuts it eats, she also did the fishing.
It was a great life when I was a child.
Lee--How different, that time from now. Things were so simple back then, but the people of today would look upon our past as a trip back in time to what they would consider hell. My dad would wake up in the morning with snow on his bed because of the holes in the roof. The only meat they ate was either raised or shot. The North side of the house was where they hung small animals they had killed so nature could tenderize them. Then my grandfather would tell me, "If you get really hungry remember a mouse is simply a very small cow, which is tough to milk, but they work great in a stew.
Don, thank you for this vivid entry. Now you can appreciate what you have, and you feel fortunate. Now imagine Trump and other individual born into great wealth: they have nothing to appreciate! They are afflicted with mental poverty. Paradoxically, great wealth, not poverty, may drive pathological acquisitiveness.
Victor--And it can lead to basic stupidity.
My granny’s house had an outhouse before 1967. They had the first flush toilet in the town, but alas the infrastructure to make it all work wasn’t there, so it was back to tradition. There were enameled lidded buckets to use at night, emptied outside in the morning and rinsed with bleach. As to corncobs, my mother told jokes about brown vs white corncobs in her childhood.
Carol--Hooray for corn! My mother was a debutante from the city of Detroit. Her parents sent her to a private college to protect her from social harm. My father was raised in a dirt floor cabin in Northern Michigan and got a basketball scholarship the same school. Yes, they hooked up and that's why I'm here. But aside from that, after graduation pop took his new wife, who was jealous of her best friend because she could make Jello, to his parents fishing camp to work for the Summer. Her first responsibility was to remove the chamber pots from each cabin, after the people had left for the mornings fishing trip and do to them as you suggested in your post. For her it was where the rubber met the road. The ones in our outhouse were all of the dark brown variety. Can you imagine the preparatory struggle in getting ready for a standard colonoscopy.--------"Oy-Vey"
More info to share from the conservative Cato Institute.
“ According to new data published last month, the Biden Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has removed a higher percentage of arrested border crossers in its first two years than the Trump DHS did over its last two years. Moreover, migrants were more likely to be released after a border arrest under President Trump than under President Biden.”
https://www.cato.org/blog/new-data-show-migrants-were-more-likely-be-released-trump-biden
Well, I know a few people who need to know more about that. Nobody can say the CATO Institute is a Left-wing patsy group.
BUT OF COURSE, even though it says Biden taking steps to reduce the “hordes of people streaming across at the border,” it will antagonize people who want to be more fair about granting asylum, and they will be angry with the current administration, too — which, to some extent, <I> am. Not for policing our border, but for not having a humane system to dealing with people so desperate to escape conditions in their own country that they’d take the awful and dangeorus trek to come here … The anti-foreigner bunch thinks everyone on the planet wants to leave their home country and come to America to get rich off the fat of the land … Egad. How do we open people’s eyes!!!!!
Get rich off the US, I wish the immigrant dream was true. $650 a month has to go back to the home country to pay the Coyote or they lose the home they used for collatoral. If they are working with another persons SSI (its minimum wage) they're tax money represents someone else. If they have a bank account they are forced to get a TIN and pay taxes on the income they put in there (Ie double taxed). And they have to pay for housing, food, clothing, etc. Dont get sick. It's indentured servitude by any other name.
Yesss. American’s don’t know that the majority of undocumented people are working into our economy, but not to their own benefit — Yes, if they use a false SS, they pay into it and NEVER get anything out. They pay into Medicare, too, but can’t use it. They pay sales tax and gas tax. They pay SOMEBODY for shelter, and that person is in the economy —
And, as was said already, they are trapped into low-wage jobs because they have no recourse to complain {people are ANGRY WITH THEM for working at crap wages, instead of angry with employers who hire them under the table and take massively unfair advantage — we have a skewed sense of who is at fault over these things ….}, and their work contributes to the productivity of the country, but not to their own well-being.
I’m not saying we should be thrilled to have millions of undocumented people “contributing” to our society, because especially now, we have been putting huge amounts of money into corralling, detaining, and deporting them — instead of figuring out how to handle the migration that Al Gore warned us was coming … !
As said above, so much of what the undocumented earn goes back “home” — how many still think of where they came from as “home”? Most? — to pay crooks, or to keep a roof over the heads of people they left behind.
It’s a serious cluster-f**k of human beings NOT coping with our world ….
I understand the basic idea of your comment, even though most of the acronyms are unknown to me.
Kathy, thank you for this information, but, clearly, this is not a solution to the problem.
@Daniel Solomon, the US has used migrant workers as soccer balls since Robert E. Lee rode to the gates of Chapultepec Castle in Ciudad Mexico in 1848. In the 1930's, under the phrase "voluntary repatriations" the Immigration and Naturalization Service sent thousands of Mexicans out of the country, many of whom had been born in the US and were US citizens. In Los Angeles County, for example, INS sent federal immigration agents to conduct raids and hold removal hearings. In a number of high profile raids in 1931, the agency arrested 389 deportable aliens, 269 of whom were Mexican. Up to 1.8 million people of Mexican descent—most of them American-born—were rounded up in informal raids and deported in an effort to reserve jobs for white people.
https://www.history.com/news/great-depression-repatriation-drives-mexico-deportation
1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo gives Mejican nationals in essence superior status -- granted federal citizenship to thousands of Mexicans who gradually gained full citizenship through the admission of the various states.
Lots of migrant Mejicans a/k/a Chicanos do not even know whether they are US citizens, where they were born, or for that matter where their parents or grandparents were born.
When I was at SSA, I had to address the fact that Mejicans had some laws that not all states recognize, but because it is a treaty - at the same level as the Constitution - we give it in effect "full faith" deference. SSA was not happy, but that's the law.
That same treaty gave citizenship to all residents of the territory ceded to the US by Mexico. However, this did not stop the United States from sending armies to kill Native Americans in the ceded territory, and take their lands.
And some, like Tejas, legally segregated Mejicans, discriminated against then via Jim Crow laws.
Martha, this is very important! Is this by chance the same territory from which our Republican oil magnates draw the oil from? By the way, some of these oil magnates also pose as Evangelicals.
I HATE the terms "illegals" and "illegal immigration!" To become "legal," all one needs to do is ask for asylum. BOOM.
They are all "legal asylum seekers" in my eyes . . . or at least the ones not involved in severe crimes like the human trafficking Mike Papantonio has been prosecuting for decades.
He's not a "prosecutor." Lawyers can make a living pursuing employers who violate these laws and representing Americans who are screwed out of jobs given to illegals.
@DanielSolomon those TEA programs have to be approved in many instances by county commissioners, as I recall. I also recall lobbyists seeking their creation through Ohio General Assembly action. Since that’s in my rear view mirror, I would love to see the results. EB-5 visas were used for family members of those investors, not just “highly skilled” staff.
You got it. Some cities, like Dayton, pride themselves that they are foreign funded and that foreigners are moving there.
We all need to understand these complex immigration policies, Daniel.
Also, they are hiring minor children to do dangerous work.
With the working under another persons social security trick the minor can show up as whatever age the SSI donor is. Employers are absolutely culpable of letting this happen and these kids should have actual ID papered or not. The fact that we dont let immigrants get ID in many states further fuels discrimination and abuse. Giving undocumented a small modicum of rights would easily solve these problems if we just let them work under their own info.
But, but, but … unfair! … they are “illlegal” … translate, “BAD!”
What are the consequences?!! There must be consequences!!!
Except for Donnie. He doesn’t have to suffer any consequences. He is exempt. God loves Donnie.
It’s all pretty nuts.
You must have seen that God gave us the Donald video? Wow that is pathetic. That seemed made as much for him as his White Christian National followers.
I DID see it! Big mistake. It broke my brain for two days. I’m only just now recovering… Ooooooooooooo…..
A national disgrace!!!!
Bill, this choir needs to sing that out loud and clear!!
CEO'S want the cheapest labor they can find. They don't want this fixed. Undocumented workers are their chattel for dollars. I live in farm community. The good church goers bash immigrants and then cry in their socks when they can't get help on their farms. The GQP are about chaos. It's pivoting with purpose. Look over there don't look here. They are a lost cause without it. They don't give a fuck who suffers. They will step over dead bodies on their way to the top. Like they do with gun violence, a Pandemic and women's health. They don't give two shits unless they can profit it.
Horrible! But it’s how people behave, closing their eyes to avoid seeing — Closing their minds.
As Bill Reitz says below, that ol’ crook Newt Gingrich is still helping to craft conservative policies and shape conservative mindsets — He’s the “Zero Sum” KING — we don’t win unless they lose. How to undo the New Deal and the Great Society.
It’s outrageous that a guy can be reviled for pilfering from a store but hailed as a hero for being a grifter and crook in Congress … Fame and Power apparently confer immunity on these guys.
WWJD? Evangelicals apparently think he’d go on a cruise with Fat Cats.
I agree with that. I just saw Newt Gingrich giving lip service to more of Trumps BS. Newt doesnt actually support dictatorship, but hey if it means supporting the Republican stonewall agenda then he's all in. It doesnt matter what depths it may bring us as long as he and they can keep their party on top. "Anything Goes". It makes me as angry as it makes you.
Arrrgh!
Newt, oh my. I was actually reading an article last night about what his ex-wives thought of him. The man must spend a fortune on Viagra. What a creeper, gross. He's a true narcissist.
Double arrrrgh!
Lisa, Newt has an overactive tongue. He does not need Viagra.
I could live without that visual.
I would agree, serial filandery. Its always the next younger model. Typical narcisissm. The only joy that brings me is he looks like shit yet his narcissism will make him think he is still young and spry. People like that are sad and pathetic. Most likely puts his first year congressman picture on ourtime.
Right on Bill. Sad, but so ridiculous. I just laugh.
I want to put an acknowledgement on here, but just cannot do “like”—
Back a ways, we had some sociological data that suggested many people misjudge the level of crime in this this country based on watching TV shows! They ingest an impression based on so many cop shows and so many “inner cities” overrun [EDITED TO REFLECT THE RACISM] with exaggerated crime, racist depictions of POC, and illegal immigrants trying to avoid being found out.
Trying not to be too simplistic here, but I think this is still a problem, grafted onto nightly news programs that flog the border problems without making clear WHO is holding up action on proposed legislation,
I sometimes get shouted down for this but I will repeat it. In a disfunctional relationship narcissists will yell and scream about problems to distract from the relationship issues. These problems are very frequently of there own causing to begin with. You can rest assured they will blame you to put you on the defensive and distract you. This is the Republican narcissist party. Its head is a narcissist MAGA are communal narcisissts and congressional Republicans tow the line quitely or openly emulate the malignant narcisisst in chief. The situation our country is in is where we cant get a divorce from these guys. The only solution is to have really good boundaries and be firm (ie jail the ones who break the law).
You’re talking “interpersonal boundaries” right? Not lines in the sand.
Yeah, I hear it — the narcissistic bent has been strong, not only in Donnie, but in his followers beliefs, too. “We are only total losers because we are being picked on …”
[Narcissists THINK they are total losers, which is why they have to get people to reflect back to them an image better than their own self-image. It’s all mixed up, but they don’t look inward, they almost totally look outward for their sense of self, and they demonize anything that “reflects” badly on them. It’s almost impossible to correct the ACTUAL narcissistic personality that cannot be truly introspective for fear of seeng a revolting pile of sh*t inside themselves.
But those who join a narcissistic cult can sometimes be reached.
As Prof. R says, gather ye thy info and speak it to the people who need to hear it!
The dumbass Mike Johnson says many illegal immigrants crossing the border have been terrorists??? If these lying fanatical Fascist GQP would look in a mirror, they would see who the real bona fide terrorists are that are serving in our House of Representatives. They are the ones that need to be deported. Those hypocritical SOB's make me sick.
I loved your comment . the only problem was you were to nice to them
Not to mention his THIRD immigrant-bride, Melanie! [sic] She wasn't deported because Barron was her ANCHOR-BABY!
"Rules for thee and none for me."
I didn't get into the details, like the history of Trump Model Management, later shortened to T Management, when he brought in hundreds using visas, some that might have been questionable and involved under age girls. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_Model_Management
At least one former model alleged that he violated the H1B violations but DOL dismissed the case due to the statute of limitations.
Melania may or may not have been kosher. https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/08/donald-trump-model-management-illegal-immigration/
Both Ivana and Melania were "anchors" for their parents, some former communist officials.
Funny how it seems like "big strong Bunkerboy" EXCLUSIVELY hires/dates foreign women. Almost like . . . HE HATES AMERICAN WOMEN?!? Thanks for the links!
Argh, again. Gad. This stuff is disheartening …
We need to bring back the Bracero Program.
With proper oversight it can work to the benefit of employers and workers.
We have the equivalent - https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/agriculture/h2a The H-2A temporary agricultural workers program - often called the H-2A Visa Program - helps American farmers fill employment gaps by hiring workers from other countries.
I heard appeals. https://www.dol.gov/agencies/oalj/topics/libraries/LIBINA
tRump married an illegal woman brought by a Repub bad man, they both got her to be legal / did it illegality
to displace non-union American workers...
Right To Work laws were made based on Jim Crow policies. The man who wrote them in 1949 was a big Christian. Those laws are about oppression and profits.
You know the attack on immigrants the methods and the tactics are very similar to union busting. The less laws protecting immigrants equates to the less laws protecting all of us.
TOTALLY OFF TOPIC, but
- THE JACKSON MISSISSIPPI STORY THAT SHOULD OUTRAGE ALL OF US:
https://youtu.be/g2aDTGMKmr8?si=OczmfnMVNPDWUlzi
8 months I dont think soft tissue would be of much use in an autopsy then. 215 people. Thats systematic neglect and or murder.
My question concerns what the devil business a police station has in having its own graveyard.
This story is not going to end well.
Agreed.
..back in 1980 150 undocumented Poles were brought in to assist with clearing the block where T**** Tower now stands. These workers were required to do their jobs often in violation of safety regulations and afterwards the Trump Organisation refused to pay them. It is also been reported that the organisation hired undocumented immigrants to work at his hotels and golf resorts (including Mar a Loser).
Of course the narcissistic real estate shyster denies he had any knowledge of it and it was all the contractor's fault. Apparently vetting isn't his or his organisation's strong point but going with a slipshod company to save a few zloty's (the old Polish currency) is.
He paid the fine. Didn't appeal.
Thanks for reminding us of that fact Daniel. It is quite ignored by corporate media, and the Democrats have not made it an issue either.
I do have my own issues with immigration. Those piled up at the Texas border are culturally very Christian, hence very Conservative and once settled and feeling at home with ciizenship they are natural allies for the culture war of the right, provided our fragile democratic Republic survives that long.
I also saw a photo of a group of men around a fire at "the fence" one of them was wearing a Sikh turban. Now Sikhs aren't Muslims or terrorist, except those Sikhs sent here to murder Indian Sikh dissenters.
But that also tells me, if Sikhs are traveling to Mexico by airplane, who else is crossing the border from China, Africa, Muslim countries that aren't coming here with a paycheck or political asylum in mind.
I also know, as thinking liberals should know, that the rise of the fascistic right in Europe is attributable to the flood of migrants from Africa , the Mideast. west and central Asia. In fact that is what got Orban elected he promised to build a fence and he did.
And it isn't racism, per se, racism is mostly an American thing, though Europeans aren't immune, but it isn't a hyper political thing,
The problem is the European culture war, but not against gays (except in Poland) but because of the threat of the Islamic culture that is threatening to displace and over power, Western culture.
Islam is exceptionalist and triumphalist and resistant to modernization as is many right wing theocratic Christian sects like the Southern Baptists and Dominionists, but are not schismed and are united.
The Islamic world reacts in solidarity with HAMAS and in defense of Islam., but you don't see the same reaction of peoples on the street, reacting and parading for Ukraine or when a Christian culture or western nation is under attack, and certainly not one for the Jews.
Bush attacked Iraq for his own personal reasons, political, Cheney had Iraq's oil in his covetous mind, but the Islamic world perceived it an attack on Islam, except the Saudi's who perceived
Saddam as a threat to their suzerainty over the Islamic mind. Saddam screwed up when he posed as a reincarnated Nebuchadnedzzar, but that was nothing when he had images of him made next to Salah al Din, (Saladin) the name is a title, it means The Righteousness of the Faith.
it was not his birth name, neither was Ali binAbi Talib (theShia saint, it means Exalted son of the father of the Student, which is what he was the son of the cousin of Muhammad, whom they claim to be the rightful heir of Muhammad not the Sunni (Sunnah means follower) Ansar means Helper.
Wester support of Israel is deemed by Muslims as an attack on Islam, and their response is a holy war a Jihad, meanwhile Biden and Blinken, with the help of Qatar , the King of Jordan and MBS is keeping that tamped down.
Arrogant westerners are fools, they are totally ignorant of Islam, and Islam likes it that way, as they can use our ignorance to twist us around their fingers.
Which they are doing in the Israel Hamas war.
Above all else Westerners worship money, even the most radical of Christians,,and especially the most radical.
Muslims do enjoy luxury and opulence and the things that money can buy, but in the end money is simply a tool, by which to spread the faith and conquer the west, for that is what their godhead, their prophet (PBUH) demanded. The leaders of the faithful live in luxury, while the faithful are merely disposable tools offered the glory of Paradise for their sacrifice, which is acatually no different what Popes, Cardinals, Bishops, Popes, Priests and their Protestant counterparts do.
Anyway Islam is on the verge of overwhelming western culture in Europe, and that has the Europeans full of anger and angst, and that has led to the rise of the right.
There is a similar anxiety in America, but instead of culture being the threat, after all they are Christians and everyone loves Mexican food (tongue in cheek, Central and South Americans don't make or eat "Mexican food", neither do Mexicans for that matter. I ate Mexican food, cheese enchilada's tasteless. Hevos Rancheros made with rancid oil. Most used spice in Panama is oregano.Puerto Rican and Cuban food in no way resembles Tex Mex., but the culture is conservative Christian and fits perfectly with the MAGAt culture,
Evangelastic Christians like the Pentecostals have made great inroads with Central Americans and even are a source of impetus for migration northward,.
That’s right: immigrants can’t take your job, but your boss can give your job to an undocumented worker.
In the World Happiness Report, the United States is definitely not near the top of the list. The countries who rank the highest also have the highest ratings of happiness of the immigrant population and the native population is happy to have immigrants. the United States on the other hand rates high on the three emerging health problems that threaten happiness: obesity, the opioid crisis, and depression. So, if we have such an unhappy population, those who are the most unhappy are looking for someone who will offer a solution that is simplistic and puts the blame on others. Currently in the United States blame of immigrants has been a popular issue for the MAGA Republicans. Historically minority groups were blamed, but now they have strong advocacy organizations. Undocumented immigrants have few to stand for them so they are an easy target. They are not the cause of obesity, the opioid crisis or depression but they bear the brunt of being held out as scapegoats by Trump, and the Republican (Fascist) party. Thank you Professor Reich for the facts. I might use this information to write a Letter to the Editor. In a small town paper, those that have survived, the editors often look for letters that can stir up some debate.
With a paralyzed congress due to Republican constipation of just about everything having to do with solutions to an outdated immigration policy., it keeps this issue alive for the upcoming elections.
What is the short term solution? Elect Biden, keep the Senate blue and flip the house but the long term solution has to do with radically diminishing or even eliminating the influence of the wealthy corporations and individuals. This would take a willingness to "think outside the box" for progressives.
The Senate should investigate Congress members who have fake resumes and those who had voted against certifying Biden's win on Jan 6. It is a matter of public record.
I just wrote my Senator Amy Klobuchar, about that same thing this morning. My district is represented by Michelle Fischbach. I think she's Ginni Thomas's twin sister. She is so far up Trump's ass she can scratch his throat.
I love our Senator Amy Klobuchar!
Hello fellow Minnesotan! Governor Walz is my hero these days. I was traveling through to Nebraska last summer and big guy walked up to me and my husband and pointed to my Minnesota license plates. Then proceeded to call her and Tina Smith bitches. And a few other things. Course, I had to reply. My husband is giving me the get in the damn truck look. I did. Very slowly. I hate bullies.
Be careful, though.
I’d like to travel across the country to visit my nephew in Tucson, and I wonder if it’s safe to drive through Trump Country with a Vermont license plate …
Eeeek
She is an alert Senator ! Sen Klobuchar
Lisa59 ; It's all in the family! With MAGAs
Marianne L : Hey, Sis! Hafta laugh, or I would puke!
Except there were senators voting against certification and at least one in the planning and execution of J6, Josh Hawley. McConnell knew, he had to.
Lee Markland ; Senators, Congress members, any one who opposed the certification of Joe Biden's presidency win or engaged in the attack on the Capitol and betrayed their oath of office should be disqualified.to be in or run for office.
I totally agree laurie, preaching to the choir here. Now to get state legislatures and Judges, but question is how many of these are from Republican states.?
Lee Markland ; I guess there would have to be legal challenges brought by those who have 'standing'. That is not anything I would know about. It is crazy that insurrectionists hold seats in our Democracy. That our Congress can interfere with the promise made by President Biden to help Ukraine defend itself from Russia, by withholding aid/support.
Republicans encourage Cubans, Venezuelans and others to protest, even rebel against the governments in their home countries, but when they flee oppression and try to come to this country, they are scapegoated, harassed by the same Republicans.
The Constitution delegates to the United States Congress the power “[t]o establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, … throughout the United States.” Thus, the Constitution gives Congress the power to determine which foreigners can become citizens, and under what conditions.
Refugees are persons who are outside their country of origin for reasons of feared persecution, conflict, generalized violence, or other circumstances that have seriously disturbed public order and, as a result, require international protection.
The right to seek asylum was incorporated into international law following the atrocities of World War II. Congress adopted key provisions of the Geneva Refugee Convention (including the international definition of a refugee) into U.S. immigration law when it passed the Refugee Act of 1980. Non-U.S. citizens, including lawful permanent residents, refugees and asylees, generally have the same rights as citizens. The Refugee Act of 1980 created The Federal Refugee Resettlement Program to provide for the effective resettlement of refugees and to assist them to achieve economic self-sufficiency as quickly as possible after arrival in the United States.
There are 3 ways of obtaining asylum in the United States:
The affirmative process;
An Asylum Merits Interview after a positive credible fear determination; or.
The defensive process.
https://www.uscis.gov/humanitarian/refugees-and-asylum/asylum/obtaining-asylum-in-the-united-states
As immigration surges so does the backlog of asylum hearings. It rose from 2 million to 3 million over the last year, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse. Depending on the path, the length of the asylum process can range from a few months to a few years; current wait times for cases in the asylum backlog average 1,525 days. Asylum seekers are authorized to remain in the country while their application is pending.
IMHO it wouldn't take much to eliminate the backload.
Daniel, thanks for the concise summation of what is a very complex issue around asylum. At the very top of the link you reference is the following: "Under the rule, certain individuals who enter the United States through its southwest land border or adjacent coastal borders are presumed to be ineligible for asylum, unless they can demonstrate an exception to the rule or rebut the presumption."
So in effect, if a person requesting asylum enters the United States through the "southwest land borders or adjacent coastal borders," they have less rights than those who enter from the north, east or western borders. If you enter from the south, you are presumed guilty until proven innocent. So in theory, all an asylum seeker needs to do is to take a boat ride further up the coast to avoid this onerous provision. Weird!
We used to have a "dry foot/wet foot" policy for Cubans. "The wet feet, dry feet policy or wet foot, dry foot policy was the name given to a former interpretation of the 1995 revision of the application of the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966 that essentially says that anyone who emigrated from Cuba and entered the United States would be allowed to pursue residency a year later" .https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wet_feet,_dry_feet_policy#:~:text=The%20wet%20feet%2C%20dry%20feet,pursue%20residency%20a%20year%20later.
Some wealthier immigrants move to Canada, which is more liberal, stay 5 years, establish Canadian citizenship and emigrate here.
There are lots of other ways to avoid it, like the treaty trader exemption. In Miami, "tourists" arrive by plane, cruise ship, never leave.
There is a diff between asylum seekers and job seekers, or people migrating for economic reasons like the Venezuelan middle class.
The Maduro government is not persecuting anyone, however the middle class Venezuelans are discovering what it is like to live like a peon, the class whom they lorded over since its inception, and they don't like it all. So they hop on an airplane and fly to Mexico, then a bus to the border.
Daniel Solomon : These are mean 'people' without decency or empathy. Who weaponize innocents. They are beneath the pit! The same people who are guilty of wage theft. They stiffed roofers who worked in the hot sun after Katrina to fix properties, and then left them flat with no pay! Their karma will catch up to them!
Daniel Solomon: I'm reminded by your post how there were people encouraging asylum seekers to get on those planes in Texas, to go to Martha's Vineyard. It would not surprise me if there were operatives in Venezuela and other South American countries who tell lies and encourage them to come to our Southern border . The 'right' are often wrong, and Nasty about it. They use people as political footballs.
I don't know it for a fact but I suspect that impoverished Africans and Cubans were funded by right wing groups. How much does it cost to fly to Mejico?
"We are engaged in the fight of our lifetimes to uphold the fundamental ideals upon which this nation is based." Professor Reich has summed up our predicament in one concise statement. I would add that out of crisis comes opportunity. With Trump's brand of Fascism knocking at our door, progressive Americans are faced with an existential crisis. Are those of us who look to uphold the original ideals stated in the Declaration of Independence willing to fight for what we believe in?
The citizens of the United States as a voting population have been asleep at the wheel. Trump is not the problem, he is the ultimate expression of the problem of wealthy multinational corporations gaining greater and greater power over lawmakers at all levels and now even the Supreme Court. Unbridled greed is causing the ruin of our governance and therefore our country. If Trump and the Fascist Party of America wins in the next election, we will be forced to grapple with creating a new form of democracy that empowers its citizens, and equitably distributes purchasing power. I believe Economic Democracy and the Progressive Utilization Theory offer the best solutions so far.
Just to respectfully clarify @MarcNevas, “fight” should exclude political violence. As President Biden said yesterday, “Americans must reject all forms of political violence...all”. He called upon everyone to do so. As a grandmother, I wish to see us figuratively “fight” by registering voters, engaging in legal means of voter protection, and then lawfully getting out the vote. We can and must do this. In my 20 years as an elected Democrat, never did I see “ political violence “.
However...bring on the truth through comedic relief! If more of us watched Stephen Colbert (see last night 1/8/24) winning would get much easier. Seeing the orange fool as the silly old man he actually is, needs this touch, and, brought me guffaws and a pleasant night’s sleep.
When I use the word fight, I mean to use it in the way that Robert Reich fights. We must fight to overcome adversity if we want dynamic change. Violence only begets more violence.
I would like to see organized marches in every state as a show of solidarity against corporate greed (and tyranny). Most people would agree that corporate greed exists, but they have no idea how true it is, how it has affected them (socially, culturally, politically, and so on and so on), and what to do about it.
PaulaOH, biggest reason I survived The Former Guy's administration was Stephen Colbert. I would watch his monologues on Youtube and somehow the sky would clear. He is a must in my survival kit.
How we shop and how we eat is a vote. To thwart obesity, we need to eat whole food, not processed food and decrease toxic substances in our daily products and homes. ewg.org is a good site to find healthier products for laundry, cleaning, soap, shampoo, toothpaste, makeup, etc. Dr. Michael Greger’s books can help with healthier diets. google organic clothes. and shop from companies that use sustainable practices for producing clothes. We can move the happiness quotient in this country. We can learn from our Hawaiian fellow countrymen. I had thought aloha meant hello and good by. Watching W. Kamau Bell interviewing native Hawaiians I learned it has a much deeper meaning that is part of their culture, but more deeply it is part of their souls. Aloha is an essence of being: love, peace, compassion, and a mutual understanding of respect. Aloha means living in harmony with the people and land around you with mercy, sympathy, grace, and kindness. When greeting another person with aloha, there is mutual regard and affection. There is acknowledgment of the exchange of breath, the very essence of life, What if we were all taught this from birth? What would our national identity be then?
Linda - Your thoughts resonate so strongly for me! When we cherish the gift of life in all it's forms, we support the Common Good that Prof. Reich has compellingly written about. The thread of this awareness (and way of life) is woven into our national identity but it very much needs to be dusted off and reaffirmed.
yes
Linda, thanks for broadening the conversation. I looked at ewg.org and it seems to be a good source of information.
once you start looking for things to clean up you environment you’ll be amazed at how much information is out there, You might also like to watch the Netflix show You are What You Eat as a starting sample.
Last I checked, before the midpoint of Bunkerboy's failed presidency I believe, 'Murica stood at a "life satisfaction index" of around his stolen president number: 45%. Oh to live in a Nordic countryty like Norway, Denmark, or Sweden. Their percentage is in the NINETIES!!!
Finland tops the ranking. I have been there several times and it is a happy place. They have full health care and excellent schooling. Teachers are venerated and have a respectable pay scale. It is bitter cold and dark in winter, but they enjoy their saunas.
Yep, with aquavit!
Not so sure about your happiness report.Ialy, Greece France, Germany, Poland, Slovakia are very unhappy with the migration from Africa and he Mid east, which accounts for he rise of fascism. in Europe. Orban heard the distress of Hungarians and promised to take them back to the past and build a wall to keep out the immigrants and he did.
CONGRESS: Biden must do something about the US Border Crisis!
BIDEN: You can help by providing funding for Border Reform.
CONGRESS: Nice try.
Please keep posting to articles like this fact filled one. I save them and use them as talking points when debating the right-wing lies. You're not "preaching to the choir" you're giving us the resource's we need to get the truth out there.
Yes, you are giving your readers (and followers ) a stronger foundation and clarity of what is actually happening. Thoughtful communities need trustworthy leaders and resources. I’m very grateful for this opportunity to stay informed.
Thank you Prof Reich! Yes, the rethuglicans' prime motive is FEAR. And of course that *fear* is turbocharged by misinformation. Thanks for helping arm us with the facts to counter that misinformation.
Let’s start saying: “I’m the grandson of immigrants; how about you “.
I am the granddaughter of immigrants and I am the grandmother of an adopted immigrant and the grandmother-in-law of a student immigrant and the biological grandmother of an American citizen with dual US and Brazilian citizenship. How about you? Complicated and beautiful. Thanks to Dr. R and all the commenters about this issue. I have learned a lot.
I can’t help but be reminded of Melanie’s coat that she wore when visiting the southern border detention camps. The message “ I really don’t care, do you?” is about as honest as I could imagine. Believe them when they tell you.
I saw Bidens South Carolina speech and I can say that was a zinger. It was better than his Jan 6 speech. He spoke about negotiating drug prices for everyone. Even if that was a Biden gaff bravo! The gloves are off baby, this is gonna be a good fight. I am attaching a link to his speech on PBS here.
https://www.youtube.com/live/O2D_jrbqT14?si=q3WF5MEteOuoD1Xq
I received a "donate now" request from Biden two days ago. One of the "accomplishments" listed was "more people can afford decent healthcare." Are you kidding me? Everybody has a right to decent healthcare! We need SINGLE-PAYER UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE! Negotiating drug prices? I'm underwhelmed. Our manufacturing can't even compete with countries that don't have healthcare added to the price of their products like we do. Our national "product" is increasingly finance, insurance, and real estate. Hospital systems are being purchased and what should be a service industry is becoming swallowed up in the finance/insurance and now real estate industrial complex. Life and death decisions are in the hands of big business.
In countries with single-payer universal healthcare, negotiating drug prices has been part of the system for decades. It isn't celebrated as a bonus or great accomplishment. Now, how do we disentangle healthcare which should be a service without collapsing the economy. It gets worse every year.
I’ve alway found it humorous that not just the extreme right but “ordinary “ citizens think that drug smugglers are crossing the border by swimming the rio grande or hiking the desert. Aside from the tunnels or private planes, they cross at check points and various legal points of entry. The people escaping cartel violence and food insecurity are not sitting in trailers synthesizing narcotics. Every Republican should be forced to watch the film “The Counselor”.
Trump's BS is coming from a second generation IMMIGRANT who is married to an IMMIGRANT who may have come into the country illegally. As far as I've been able to tell, the U.S. (yep even Trump has discovered that spells "us") is TOTALLY a nation of IMMIGRANTS. Even the "Native Americans" are descendants of IMMIGRANTS who migrated to North America from Asia via what was then the "land bridge" between today's Alaska and Russia. Trump's "demagoguery" is simply more RACIST BS coming out of his mouth - which should be "washed out with soap" - although even that wouldn't stop the incessant LYING coming from our TWICE IMPEACHED so-called two time popular vote LOSING four times INDICTED (ex) president. Sadly those in his CULT thrive off every word he says - with absolutely no willingness to "fact check" anything. To me, that means his CULT followers are "willfully STUPID." As a retired Middle School teacher I hate that word, but can't think of any other explanation for their being part of Trump's base/CULT. This is truly a fascist movement which will only stop if "we the peop;le" commit to voting republicans into the history books along with their fuhrer - right next to Benedict Arnold!
Thank you again for an important and well-written post, Robert. I appreciate having your kind, sensible, and intelligently laid-out information at my fingertips day after day. Substacks like yours and that of Heather Cox Richardson are the daily armor I put on for our deeply troubling times, times in the face of which Vice President Kamala Harris has implored us to, "... not throw up our hands when it’s time to roll up our sleeves." Indeed.
Thanks Robert. As an outsider it appears that Trump' coup attempt has regained energy over the last 12 months and now seems to be actively supported and even driven by the whole of the GOP with the backing of oligarchs, big Industry and legal strategists. The threat to Democracy now is much bigger than in Jan21 and take over plans and strategies are being discusses spread openly........... but the average American does not seem to care and that is very worrying as it was always believed that a fair election would stop this threat. If the American people cannot be mobilised to vote in a large majority to defend democracy, it will loose. After the 22 elections I mentioned that the fight for Democracy was still a uphill battle. It looks like the hill has become much steeper. I am worried for the American people but also for the consequences it has for the rest of the world. The signs are there but we seem to refuse to see them,
These types of letters that you write Robert are how these kinds of topics should be told to others in such simplistic manner as you have beautifully written. You explain the lies with the truth and you do it very well. Trumps own wife was an immigrant - but I guess if you were a model who could put up with him then that doesn’t count. Republicans do not want to “solve” the problems with the boarder (or else they would not be trying to take money away from CBP) because they would have nothing to campaign on. That should be in the headlines about them instead of the false statements and repugnant comments that they blast on repeat. I don’t understand why some people who have come from countries south of our boarder are actually going to vote for trump. The republicans are not for law and order (obviously - unless it benefits them) nor are they for any of the other topics/people they campaign on.
About 6 months ago, I had a person point toward me (motioning to my and her lily-whiteness) and say, our families immigrated, right? Yes, I said. Then she proceeded to say that, our families were successful and made it because of hard work. I saw where she was going. So I said yes we did work hard but we would still be poor and have very little, if it weren't for government policies and programs of FDR in the 1930's who gave us Social Security, worker's rights, work programs, and other New Deals for our ancestors and LBJ policies of Medicare, Medicaid, Civil Rights, and union support. And minimum wage helped our families rise up too.. Without these government programs, our families would still be poor. She didn't know what to say. What could she say? To the whole truth she had never been told. She had her whole life been operating on only a part truth.
Let’s start saying: “I’m the grandson of immigrants; how about you?”
Jeffrey Shapiro, see my post a little further down. They have a comeback for that. But so do we.
We can also use the fact that all four of Trump’s grandparents were immigrants and his mother and two of his wives. His blood must be poisoned too. What about the Trump kids?
Cass Murphy, oh oh you might just expose the truth. That it's really about the hue of the skin and whether they are wealthy enough to buy their entry/citizenship. Do unto others be damned. Human beings are a transaction, nothing more.
But they can't say that, so they justify and rationalize their cruelty.
This ugly scapegoating can be seen in Europe too. It is terrible.
What it is leading to, might be even more terrible. When I see the Trump supporters being interviewed, I feel that rationality is totally gone. That is not promising good for the campaign: politics should be about something, about goals and means to reach them.