Immigration

Trump Plagiarizes a Dubious Fox News ‘DREAMer’ in an Inflammatory Anti-DACA Tweet

Posted by on February 10, 2018 at 3:36 pm. NO Comments :

With the March 5 deadline rapidly approaching, Donald Trump continues to politicize immigration and blame Democrats for the lack of progress in Congress. Never mind that the problem only exists because Trump rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program that was implemented by President Obama in 2012. And Trump’s insistence on tying the restoration of DACA to other punitive measures and his idiotic border wall further set back any reasonable resolution.

Fox News Dreamer

In this scenario Fox News predictably has come to the aid of the White House they are in collusion with on virtually everything. The “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends magically managed to find a conservative DACA recitpient to join them for a Trump-fluffing session on Saturday morning (video below). Hilario Yanez was introduced as a “DREAMer” and was immediately asked what he likes about Trump’s plan. He responded with praise for Trump’s alleged leadership, compassion, and courage. Presumably these are traits demonstrated by first rescinding DACA and then throwing up numerous obstacles to its restoration.

Yanez expanded on the reasons for his admiration of the President by noting his support for the border wall, his opposition to the diversity lottery, and his view that DACA advocates Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi were using DREAMers as pawns. What Yanez was actually revealing was his ultra-conservative political bias which he seasoned with heavy doses of religiosity. He was hardly a representative DACA recipient, nor was he particularly knowledgeable on the subject. As an example, he offered this criticism of Democrats:

“Democrats owned all three branches of the government back in 2008 to 2011, and they still chose [not] to do anything.”

It’s true that Democrats did absolutely nothing about DACA between 2008 and 2011. They might have done more except for the fact that it didn’t exist. The policy was established by Obama in June of 2012 by executive action after the Congress was stymied by persistent GOP opposition. As noted above, it was later rescinded by Trump in September of 2017.

However, it’s absolutely untrue that Democrats “owned all three branches of the government” from 2008 to 2011. George W. Bush was president until January of 2009. And Democrats were short of filibuster-proof majorities during much of that time due to the months-long delayed election results in Minnesota (Al Franken’s race), and the death of Sen. Ted Kennedy. Also, Republicans assumed the majority in Congress in January of 2011. That’s a lot to get wrong and Fox didn’t bother (or know) to correct these easily identified falsehoods.

There’s a good reason for that. These distortions of reality play well on Fox News. And that’s especially true for its number one fan in the White House. Trump spends untold hours watching and recording Fox News and frequently regurgitates what he sees on Twitter as it happens. That appears to be the case here. Shortly after Yanez’s appearance on Fox and Friends, Trump tweeted out an almost verbatim replay of what he said:

There is so much wrong with that tweet it’s hard to know where to begin. First of all, Trump didn’t bother to attribute this comment to its source. That’s the definition of plagiarism. His language was nearly identical, complete with the factual inaccuracies. And the timing of the tweet further proves where he stole this from. Secondly, it’s ludicrous to assign any interest in DACA to Republicans who have been working tirelessly to quash it. And finally, Trump’s political cheerleading at the end does nothing to further a legislative solution. But it does imply that he isn’t interested in any solution until next year when a new congress is seated.

Ironically, Trump’s total abandonment of the DREAMers is going to frustrate his hopes for a more republican Congress. The American people overwhelming favor DACA with a pathway to citizenship. And Latinos are presently the fastest growing segment of the electorate. All of this combines to bolster what many election analysts are predicting will be a “blue wave” in November. Let’s hope that comes to pass. But more importantly, let’s work our butts off to insure that it comes to pass. We may have the political winds at our backs, but Trump has a massive propaganda platform and, of course, Russia.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

So Stupid: Fox News Guest Says CNN ‘Needs Illegal Immigrants to Get Their Ratings Up’

Posted by on February 7, 2018 at 3:00 pm. NO Comments :

The right’s relentless campaign to demonize immigrants is an openly racist attempt to “make America white again.” There is no ethical justification for deporting productive, law-abiding people, who have lived here since childhood, to countries they never knew as home. But Republicans are determined to conflate these good neighbors with criminals and force them to leave their families and businesses for no reason other than their hatred of what they consider dark-skinned invaders.

Fox News

Consistent with their support for conservative bigotry, Fox News invited right-wing radio talker Wayne Dupree to discuss immigration with the knuckleheads of Fox and Friends (video below). The discussion was triggered by a clip from CNN wherein host Brooke Baldwin stated the obvious truth that it’s wrong to imply that all immigrants are criminals. Well, that indisputable fact was too much for the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends to comprehend.

The Fox segment featured a banner that read: “CNN Analyst: Trump Labels Illegals as Killers.” Setting aside the racist and insulting “Illegals” rhetoric, it was otherwise accurate. Trump has been tying immigrants to criminals since the day he announced his candidacy. But co-host Steve Doocy still had to admit that he couldn’t understand what Baldwin was talking about:

Doocy: You’ve got her saying that people are here for all kinds of valid and patriotic reasons. I don’t get that part.
Dupree: Oh, I do. It’s easy. CNN is trying to raise their ratings. They need illegal immigrants to watch their ratings, to get their ratings back up so that’s why they’re calling them patriotic. Listen, I don’t know what’s going on over there, whether it’s wacky tobacky or Latin lettuce in the break rooms or what not, but the American people right now, we want our polticians to enforce the laws.

Are you friggin’ kidding me? This deep-fried dope is in the media business and has no idea how ratings work. Does he think that immigrants dash across the border and are picked up by representatives from Nielsen Media who immediately start to register their TV viewing habits? This is too stupid, even for Fox News. Yet Dupree portrayed it as the “easy” answer to Doocy’s asinine question.

And if that weren’t enough, Dupree then implies that CNN’s reporters are drug users, and that results in them opposing law enforcement. Does anything coming out of his mouth make the slightest bit of sense? And before you answer that, consider this unadulterated nonsense:

Dupree: Illegal immigrants…don’t have any allegiance to this country. They don’t care about this country. And that’s why they can go out drinking and run over a rising NFL star.

What the F…? If anyone is high here, it’s Dupree. There is simply no discernible logic in that statement. Does he really think that anyone would get drunk, then take the car out for spin because they don’t like America? That would be stupid enough by itself, but it’s even worse when accusing people who take great risks to come to this country of not caring about it. What’s more, if Dupree thinks that drunk driving fatalities are caused by people who don’t like America, then let him explain the 10,000 annual deaths caused by drunk driving American citizens.

This idiotic argument is nothing new for Fox News. They exploited the same sort of thing with the tragic death of Kate Steinle. In that case an immigrant accidentally fired a gun he had found. He was acquitted of any criminal homicide charges. And every time there is any crime committed by an undocumented resident, Fox News goes bonkers trying to associate the crime with the person’s residency status. Which has nothing to do with the crime. Something else that Fox News will never accept is the fact that undocumented immigrants commit far fewer crimes than native-born citizens. But why let facts get in the way of a good racist narrative?

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Confederacy of Morons: Trump Thanks Fox and Friends for Funneling Him Another Blatant Lie

Posted by on February 5, 2018 at 12:11 pm. 4 Comments :

It’s Monday morning and Donald Trump is deeply embedded in his ritual of “Executive Time,” stretched out with last night’s cheeseburger and his (not very) smart phone. As usual, he is glued to his daily so-called “intelligence” briefing from the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends, who are his most trusted advisers on pretty much every issue. What could possibly go wrong?

Fox News

The crew at Fox News prepared a lengthy report on alleged problems with Britain’s National Health Service (NHS). They invited ultra-rightist British politician, and Fox News contributor, Nigel Farage, in for a well-scripted segment bashing universal healthcare (video below). The apparent inspiration for these eight minutes of unadulterated hogwash was a report that thousands of protesters took to the streets of London to express their dissatisfaction with the U.K.’s health care system. And our TV-addicted president was paying close attention. He tweeted that:

And giving credit where credit is due, Trump shortly after acknowledged his pals at Fox and Friends for enlightening him:

You have to wonder why Trump sounds “soooo much” like a thirteen year old girl when he tweets. But more to the point, you should wonder why he is soooo oblivious to the truth. The President, following his marching orders from Fox News, completely misunderstood the British rallies. The people were, in fact, protesting the Conservative government that has been cutting funding to the NHS and curtailing services. The marchers were in favor of their universal healthcare and were demanding that the NHS be properly funded. British leaders, including the Conservative Party Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, lashed out at Trump’s ignorance:

The Farage interview on Fox News brazenly lied about the purpose of the demonstrations and the state of British health care. And to make matters worse, Farage went to great lengths to blame what he alleged were problems on immigrants:

“The National Health Service has turned into the International Health Service and we’re providing a lot of healthcare for people coming into Britain from all over the world.”

True to form, Fox News is seeking to make immigrants the cause of every problem that rich, pseudo-patriotic, white, Christianists suffer through. Whether it be the supposed hoards invading the U.K., or the imaginary masses streaming into the U.S. across the Rio Grande. Foreigners always seem to be the cause of whatever these bigots happen to be upset about at any given time. And America’s first TV game show president buys into it and spreads his diseased ignorance to the glassy-eyed disciples who worship him. it’s a closed loop of hate and stupidity that feeds off of itself.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Fox News Fear Mongers Over Fake News Claim That Illegal Immigrants Are Voting

Posted by on January 24, 2018 at 1:45 pm. 1 Comments :

Attorney General Jeff Sessions just announced that he will begin to issue subpoenas to sanctuary cities. It’s an effort to force Donald Trump’s racist federal immigration policies down the throats of local jurisdictions. This obsession by Republicans to dehumanize immigrants has overtaken almost every other item on their agenda. It’s what derailed the budget negotiations last week and led to the shutdown of the government.

Fox News Ann Coulter

Last year Trump’s phony voter fraud commission was disbanded because state election officials refused to participate with the blatantly biased operation that couldn’t find a scintilla of evidence that any voter fraud had occurred. The whole charade was launched because Trump wanted to invalidate the fact that he lost the popular vote by three million votes.

Undaunted, the right’s determination to sow distrust in democracy continues. And Fox News leads the way. They are orchestrating a well coordinated campaign to blame undocumented immigrants for imaginary voting irregularities. The latest salvo in this contrived war was fired on Tuesday night’s episode of the Laura Ingraham Angle (video below). The segment was introduce by Ingraham asserting that:

“Under new California law people will be allowed to vote, and it will happen actually automatically when they obtain old or new drivers licenses regardless of whether they are U.S. citizens. As leftist politicians import voters they still don’t seem to understand that there are actually dangers when this happens.”

Oh No! People will be allowed to vote? What’s next, a representative democracy? Surely that is against the long-held principles of Fox News, Ingraham, and her guest Ann Coulter. But make no mistake, Ingraham’s dismay over improper voting is entirely a figment of her deliberate deception. Democrats are not, and cannot, “import voters.” The law is clear that only U.S. citizens are permitted to vote. The law referencing voter registration through driver’s licenses accounts for that and does not send registration data to the Secretary of State unless the applicant is eligible.

This fact is even stated in an article on the Fox News website. Although the article also falsely states that a “New California Policy Opens the Door to Illegal Immigrant Voting,” buried near the end is this errant factoid:

“Undocumented immigrants obtain a special driver’s license that notes on it ‘Federal limits apply.’ […] “They’re asked if they’re 18, if they’re U.S. citizens. They don’t move on to the voter registration if they’re not eligible.”

That ought to have settled the debate and eliminated the need to even bring this up. Undocumented immigrants get a different license than U.S. citizens, and they do not get automatically registered to vote. The same is true for legal, non-citizen immigrants. And the same is true for sixteen and seventeen year olds, who are old enough to drive but not to vote.

So Fox News knows that the system is set up to only send registration information for applicants who are eligible. But they are nevertheless hyperventilating over massive illegal voting that isn’t occurring now and never has. Their only objective is to incite fear among their bigoted viewers and exacerbate the hatred and division that has become the primary political strategy of the Trump Republican Party.

But this tactic will surely backfire. That’s because there really are millions of Latino citizens who see this overt prejudice and will be motivated to show up at their polling places and throw the bigots out of office. And although it may be several years away, the legal immigrants who eventually become citizens aren’t going to be any more likely to vote for racist Republicans. So good work, Fox News. And good luck when those Southwest red states like Arizona and Texas turn bright blue.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

This Racist Trump Ad Calls Democrats ‘Complicit’ in Murders Committed By Illegal Immigrants

Posted by on January 21, 2018 at 8:06 am. 5 Comments :

After only one uneventful year in office (if you don’t count disastrous and embarrassing events) Donald Trump is already focusing on 2020. It’s the earliest launch of a reelection campaign that anyone can recall. For the most part he’s using the guise of campaign as a slush fund to hold rallies that feed his insatiable ego. He craves the adoration of his glassy-eyed disciples, particularly considering his historically low approval ratings. And there is a fair chance he won’t finish his first term if special counsel Robert Mueller comes through.

Donald Trump

Trump just released a campaign ad (posted below) that mirrors his repulsive and bigoted personality perfectly. It begins with video of an alleged murderer spewing vulgarities. That may also be a first for an American political advertisement. But it gets worse. The ominous tone of an anxious narrator asserts that “President Trump is right” in his fetish to build a wall along the southern border that will solve nothing and won’t be paid for by Mexico. The ad is rife with thinly veiled insinuations that all immigrants are scary brown foreigners with a lust for American blood. Trump offers himself up as the sole savior of our vulnerable families. And then he drops this reprehensible rhetorical bullshit:

“Democrats who stand in our way will be complicit in every murder committed by illegal immigrants.”

Oh really? Trump is actually trying to lay the blame for random and heinous criminal activity on his political opponents. He’s associating differences of opinion with complicity to murder. It’s an absurd and unethical political attack that should be repudiated by his Republican peers. The logic of it is so weak that it, if anything, it blows up in his face. It’s more consistent with his own support for white nationalists and neo-Nazis who commit far more crimes of violence than any immigrants. In fact, even undocumented immigrants commit fewer crimes than native born citizens.

The racism is not the least bit disguised. The entire premise of the ad is that monsters from south of the border are plotting to invade our country, break into our homes, and commit unspeakable atrocities. The words “Stop Illegal Immigration” appear on screen over video of two Latino men whose faces have been eerily blurred. Never mind that the men in the picture are not engaging in any crime or acting in any way threatening. Just their ethnicity is enough to signal danger in the minds of Trump and his Deplorables.

There is also a hint of totalitarianism in the ad’s language that demands obedience on the part of Democrats, warning them not to “stand in our way.” It’s reminiscent of the threats leveled at German citizens who opposed Hitler’s enforcers as he rose to power. And the consequences of standing in Trump’s way are charges of murder, which have a penalty of death. The next step for the StormTrumpers would be to raid the homes of his perceived enemies, load them into freight cars, and deliver them to concentration camps. Don’t think it can’t happen here. That’s what many Germans thought.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

UPDATE: In a Sunday morning appearance on Meet the Press Trump’s legislative affairs director, Marc Short, first tries to distance the administration from the racist ad by saying it’s from an outside group. But that’s a blatant lie. The ad is from Trump’s own campaign committee, which Chuck Todd pointed out and Short ignored. Moments later Short refuses to to even criticize the “tone” of the ad and insists that it’s actually helpful to Trump. So after failing to disown it, he embraces it. How Trumpian.

Trump Echoes Fox News to Politicize Terrorist Attack in New York and Falsely Blame Democrats

Posted by on November 1, 2017 at 4:34 pm. 2 Comments :

Sadly, another terrorist attack has taken place in New York City. This tragedy has taken the lives of eight innocent victims and injured a dozen more. At times like these Americans are called upon to unite against such senseless brutality and to come together in support of those affected. It’s a manifestation of the strength and resolve that we have to endure and prevail.

Donald Trump Fox News

However, it is also sad that Donald Trump doesn’t share these principles. The President’s first reactions to the carnage were blathering assertions that what had just happened in America can’t happen in America. But what he later sought to convey, after having slept on it, was even more repulsive. In a series of brazenly political tweets, he declined to criticize the terrorist or the extremist views that inspired him. Instead, Trump lashed out at fellow Americans in Congress. Specifically, Senate Minority Leader (and the representative of the state that was attacked) Chuck Schumer and Democrats in general:

It’s nauseating that Trump appears to be more upset with Sen. Schumer than with the terrorist. What’s more, he is predictably misrepresenting the truth. The Diversity Visa Lottery program was supported by Schumer as an amendment to the Immigration Act of 1990. That bill passed in the Senate by a whopping 89 to 8 vote and was signed into law by George H.W. Bush. It was also supported by some notable Republicans including Chuck Grassley, Orrin Hatch, and current Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell. Funny, Trump didn’t attack any of them.

Something else Trump left out was that in 2013 a bipartisan group of senators, including Schumer, proposed to eliminate the Diversity Visa program. Known as the “Gang of Eight,” they offered a compromise immigration reform bill that would have ended the lottery. The bill was killed by conservative Republicans in the House.

Trump’s comments fly in the face of his response to last month’s terrorist attack in Las Vegas. After that horrific mass murder Trump and the GOP were aghast that anyone would talk about solutions to gun violence. And after the murder in Charlottesville, Virginia, by neo Nazis, Trump declared that he couldn’t talk about it until he had the facts. But just a few hours after the attack in New York, while the investigation was still in progress, Trump was already pushing his partisan agenda and lying about his political foes.

Not surprisingly, it’s easy to figure out where Trump got these talking points. He was obviously watching Fox News. In the hours following the attack, Fox News hosts and pundits were pushing their biases out onto the airwaves. And their stridently anti-Muslim bigotry was on full display. Here are some examples:

  • Tucker Carlson: It seems obviously tied to immigration, why is the country unwilling to have that conversation, to face that?
  • Pamela Geller on Hannity: The fact is Muslim immigration means more Islamic terrorism. It’s just that simple.
  • Laura Ingraham: Why must we take the risk, knowing that we can’t tell if an Islamic individual is going to be radicalized?
  • Zuhdi Jasser on Tucker Carlson Tonight: [Americans] are in denial if we don’t believe that nonviolent Islamism is a precursor to militant Islamism.

Trump’s TV was typically tuned in to Fox and Friends. That’s where he got the Schumer connection, which was not even confirmed at the time. Co-host Steve Doocy said so when he stated that:

“According to Mark Levin, and I looked online, and there are a bunch of websites that say that Chuck Schumer was one of the sponsors. We have not independently confirmed that through our brain room yet.”

Let’s just set aside the dubious assertion that Fox News has a “Brain Room.” The network was admittedly disseminating rumors in order to blame political adversaries for a terrorist attack. And that was enough for Trump to regurgitate it and give Fox News credit. Doocy’s colleague, Brian Kilmeade, contributed to this deliberate disinformation. Undoubtedly, this is the first time Trump had connected the visa lottery to the attack:

“All right, let’s talk about how he got here. He applied to a lottery system, the diversity visa program […] And congratulations, you win the lottery and then eight people are run over in this case eventually down the line because of this.”

For the record, the Diversity Visa Lottery program was not a free pass to American citizenship. Recipients had to be vetted by all of the same criteria as any other immigrant applying for entry. They are also subject to the same requirements and waiting periods. Kilmeade’s description was patently dishonest and purposefully misleading.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

The fact that Trump relies on the disinformation and lies of Fox News is appalling and dangerous. They clearly don’t have the credibility to be the foundation for government policy. But Trump puts more faith in them than he does in the intelligence agencies he oversees. This morning he called his own Justice Department “a joke and a laughingstock.” The result is ignorant policies that are infused with noxious racism and bigotry. Not to mention the corrosive division that is sown by a President who regards his political opponents, and the media, as worse than our nation’s real enemies.

TRUMP: ‘Does Anybody Really Want to Throw Out’ DREAMers? YES, You Do! (VIDEO)

Posted by on September 14, 2017 at 12:29 pm. 2 Comments :

Within the past twenty-four hours Donald Trump has surpassed his ordinary level of chaotic confusion. And that’s saying something. It began with the news that he had met with Democratic leaders Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi. They reportedly discussed the status of the DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), after he rescinded the executive order issued by President Obama.

Donald Trump

According to Pelosi, they agreed to codify DACA into law. But it didn’t take long for Trump’s team to flip and shoot that down, insisting that there was no agreement. And then, in another flop, Trump tweeted this:

So Trump wants to know if anyone really wants to throw out the DREAMers. And the answer to that is a resounding “YES!” Trump himself wants to throw them out. He said exactly that to Chuck Todd on Meet the Press in August of 2015:

CHUCK TODD: You’ll rescind the DREAM Act executive order–
DONALD TRUMP: You’re going to have to.
TODD: DACA?
TRUMP: We have to make a whole new set of standards. And when people come in, they have to come in legally–
TODD: So you’re going to split up families?
TRUMP: Chuck.
TODD: You’re going to deport children–
TRUMP: Chuck. No, no. We’re going to keep the families together. We have to keep the families together.
TODD: But you’re going to keep them together out–
TRUMP: But they have to go. But they have to go.
TODD: What if they have no place to go?
TRUMP: We will work with them. They have to go. Chuck, we either have a country or we don’t have a country.

The gall of this lying cretin to pretend that he’s concerned about these young people who have demonstrated their patriotism, is gravity-defying. He could have simply said that he was convinced by Schumer and Pelosi that this was the right thing to do. Instead he chose a flagrantly dishonest path in order to exalt himself. So even when he tries to do the right thing, he wraps it in lies and conceit.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

DACA: The ‘Cruel Hand’ of Donald Trump Steals Hope Away From America’s DREAMers

Posted by on September 4, 2017 at 8:43 am. 2 Comments :

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA) was implemented by the Obama administration in 2012. Its purpose was to provide undocumented immigrants, who entered the country as minors, protection from deportation. Applicants must have completed school or military service and cannot have a criminal record. The program is a humanitarian solution to the unfair punishment of young people who weren’t responsible for their immigration status. The beneficiaries are known as DREAMers because through DACA they were allowed to pursue the American Dream.

DACA DREAMers

For several days Donald Trump has been teasing a final decision on the future of DACA. And on Sunday, the day that Trump declared a National Day of Prayer, he also dashed the prayers of the DREAMers. White House sources reported that Trump has decided to end DACA with a six month delay before enforcement. It’s a typically Trumpian demonstration of callous insensitivity and overt bigotry. Criticism of his decision has already begun to emerge. And the reaction by Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-MA) is especially relevant and moving:

“It’s a cruel hand that extends the American dream and then steals it away. With a fierce faith in our country’s word, DREAMers walked out of the shadows and bravely embraced the only home they’ve ever known. In contrast, tonight President Trump gave in to his own dark fear of diversity and punished hundreds of thousands of young people for simply trusting the United States.”

Cruelty barely describes what Trump is proposing. The DREAMers registered for the program and paid $500.00 in fees. They completed school, got jobs, or enlisted in the military. Now they are identifiable and vulnerable. They believed in America and believed that this nation, the only home they ever knew, was honorable and trustworthy. What they didn’t anticipate was the hateful reign of a born liar. A con man who couldn’t care less about the dignity of keeping one’s word or honoring a promise. And now they have to live in fear of being banished to a foreign land where they may not even speak the language.

That’s what Donald Trump is putting these innocents through. Remember, they broke no laws. They were children under the care of their parents. And their parents only wanted what all parents want: a better life for their kids. It’s the promise chiseled into the base of the Statue of Liberty. It’s the pledge made by a prior administration that the current one has turned into a trap. That’s even after Trump was asked if the Dreamers should be worried, and he replied disingenuously “We love the Dreamers. We love everybody.”

Now, if Trump goes through with this, there will be 800,000 people whose lives are hanging by a legal thread. This is more than a humanitarian travesty. Economists at the Center for American Progress have studied the impact of ending DACA. They concluded that it “would result in a loss of $460.3 billion from the national GDP over the next decade.” The loss of the productivity of these workers and the taxes they paid would severely hamper the economy. And the decline of spending in their communities would cost business profits and jobs.

A peculiar wrinkle to the proposal being reported is the six month delay. The presumption is that Trump is giving Congress that time to draft and pass legislation to replace DACA. But what would Trump have to gain by handing this off to Congress? If they fail to act, then he still gets the blame for ending the program. If they pass legislation to preserve it, then Trump is tagged with being the racially divisive swine who tried to kill it. And he would be in the awkward position of signing legislation that reversed his own executive order.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

The only possible upside would be the bolstering of Trump’s support within the alt-right, white supremacist movement. Just as with his pandering to the bigots after Charlottesville, and his pardoning of Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Trump may be playing to his deplorable base. His approval ratings are so low that he needs to cling to every potential vote, no matter how repulsive. But that’s only a plus in the perverse world of Trump and his racist followers. And it surely won’t help him with the majority of Americans who have the same dreams for the nation as DACA’s DREAMers.

Donald Trump Just Made the Best Friggin’ Argument for NOT Building the Border Wall

Posted by on August 31, 2017 at 1:54 pm. 2 Comments :

Donald Trump’s agenda so far has been a complete bust. The so-called master negotiator has failed to kill ObamaCare. He’s made no progress on tax reform. His budget has never advanced beyond the imaginary. He hasn’t even proposed a jobs bill or any infrastructure legislation. Hillary Clinton hasn’t been locked up. After seven months, everything he campaigned on is still in limbo, if that.

Donald Trump

That goes for his most recognizable campaign chant as well. Trump’s promise to “build the wall” along the border, that Mexico would pay for, is still an unrealized, unrealistic fantasy. Especially the part about Mexico paying for it. Even Trump is now conceding that American taxpayers would have to front for his vanity wall. And on top of the billions that we now have to devote to the victims of Hurricane Harvey, that becomes even more unlikely.

However, the best argument against building the wall may have come from Trump himself. During a recent press conference, Trump drifted off into campaign mode to brag about his achievements with immigration and border issues. Naturally he focused on the evils of our neighbor to the south as a crime-ridden haven for drug trafficking. All of which he used to justify going forward with the wall. But then he said this (video below):

“The wall is needed from the standpoint of security. The wall is needed from the standpoint of drugs. Tremendous, the drug scourge, what’s coming through the areas that we’re talking about. As you know, I have General Kelly here. We stopped traffic coming through, 78 percent. It’s going to be, I think, 81 percent this quarter, which is a record.

“In other administrations if they stopped it just a little bit, like 1 or 2 or 3 percent, they considered that a great thing. Well, we’re up to almost 80%, we’ll soon be over 80%.”

So Trump is asserting that without any new funds or personnel or legislation, he has already nearly eliminated illegal border crossings. That’s quite an success story. In fact, it makes the very notion of an expensive, questionably effective wall obsolete. Why spend billions of dollars on a problem that is already pretty much solved? The remaining percentage of the problem (in the teens) should be manageable with the same methods that produced these results.

If Trump’s boasting about these numbers is true, the wall would provide little benefit. Particularly since it was never a very good idea. Most undocumented residents did not scurry across the desert into the U.S. They came through border checkpoints with valid visas. And the major drug cartels ship their inventories primarily by sea and air. Neither of which would be impeded by a wall. So Trump has provided the best possible justification for ditching the wall project entirely.

By declaring victory and moving on, Trump could actually see a rise in his dismal approval ratings. The American people are staunchly opposed to the wall. And that opposition has only grown in recent years. According to a new poll by Fox News, the wall was supported by fifty percent in November of 2015. That went down to forty-one percent in September of 2016. And it now sits at only thirty-nine percent approval. The trend is crystal clear.

So the only conceivable reason to proceed with the wall would be to satisfy Trump’s gargantuan ego. Unfortunately, that’s generally the only reason he does anything. But in this case, the reasoning laid out above has a small problem. Trump’s contention that his inept and unproductive administration reduced border crossings by eighty percent is verifiably false. PolitiFact researched the claim and tried to run it through a variety of scenarios to get it to work. They all failed.

Trump has tried to peddle this falsehood on prior occasions, and it wasn’t true than either. So what we are left with is Trump’s lie about cutting illegal immigration. Which, ironically, serves to to make a lie of his insistence on the need for a border wall. It’s an usual three dimensional lie that only an accomplished liar like Trump could pull off.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Jeff Sessions Floats a Racist Plan to Make Americans – Not Mexico – Pay for the Border Wall

Posted by on April 24, 2017 at 5:03 pm. 5 Comments :

The 100 day mark is rapidly approaching in Donald Trump’s already failed presidency. And as it nears he is becoming more desperate to produce an achievement he can brag about. Ironically, he now pretends that the 100 day milestone is a “ridiculous standard.” Never mind that he cited it himself repeatedly.

Jeff Sessions

At the top of his list is his promise to build a wall along the southern U.S. border and make Mexico pay for it. It’s clear that Mexico has no intention of shelling out for such a ludicrous project. Consequently, Trump and his team have been flailing wildly to come up with an alternative payment scheme they can spin as dinging Mexico. The latest was proposed by Attorney General Jeff Sessions Sunday on ABC’s This Week:

“We’re going to get paid for it one way or the other. I know there’s $4 billion a year in excess payments, according to the Department of the Treasury’s own inspector general several years ago, that are going to payments to people – tax credits that they shouldn’t get. Now, these are mostly Mexicans. And those kind of things add up – $4 billion a year for 10 years is $40 billion. There are a lot of ways we can find money to help pay for this.”

As pointed out in Politico, Sessions was likely referring to a Treasury Department report published in 2011. It found that there were people who are not authorized to work in the U.S. but had received $4.2 billion in refundable tax credits. However, the report didn’t mention Mexicans or any other nationalities. That was an assumption spurred by bigotry. Trump tried to pass off this same lie during the campaign, but was slapped down by PolitiFact:

“Trump conflates ‘illegal immigrants’ with ‘unauthorized workers,’ a group composed largely of undocumented immigrants but also legal immigrants and others. The $4.2 billion refers to the amount given in tax credit refunds for children, the large majority of whom are U.S. citizens.”

That’s right. While some of the recipients of these tax credits may have been unauthorized workers, the beneficiaries were their children. These kids are citizens who were born in the United States. In effect, Sessions is proposing that funds intended to help American children should be diverted to Trump’s border wall instead.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
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Perhaps the biggest deception in this mean-spirited scheme is even if the beneficiaries were Mexican, the money wouldn’t be coming from Mexico. These are funds from the U.S. Treasury collected from U.S. taxpayers. So it’s Americans who would be paying for the wall with money originally intended to help American kids. But Sessions is trying to spin it as a way to get Mexico to pay. The dishonesty and cruelty of this contrivance is nauseating – and typical of Team Trump.