Today, May 1, another segment of the so-called “resistance” to the legal, democratically established Presidency of Donald J. Trump will be holding rallies to proclaim the “right” of foreign citizens to break US law by entering the country illegally, and to stay here unmolested as long as they don’t commit another serious crime, and maybe even if they have. Despite its enthusiastic support from the Democratic Party and the mainstream media, this concept is so self-evidently bats that most American and even most Hispanic-Americans reject it, but never mind: we will hear and see passionate speakers all day long advocating the non-enforcement of essential laws and the adoption of some kind of bizarre system allowing illegal residents to be treated like legal residents as long as they limit their law-breaking to, say, just endangering the public by driving drunk.
I wonder if Mothers Against Drunk Driving agrees that illegal immigrants should not be treated too harshly for DUI convictions. Actually, I wonder if the anti-Trump, pro-illegal immigrant forces have enough self awareness to realize that their argument is worthy of the Bizarro World.
Incompetent, foolish sounding and acting political opposition to the party in power is in nobody’s interest, especially the U.S. democratic system. However, addressing this requires enough self-awareness to realize when your advocacy has crossed the line into absurdity. Currently a critical mass of Democrats and progressives lack self-awareness, and that’s an understatement.
This applies to the news media as well, which is, though it refuses to admit it, a full and indispensable member of “the resistance.” At the pathetic and bitter White House Correspondents Association Dinner, relegated to irrelevancy after President Trump properly refused to attend, journalists whose organizations have warped political news with their bias, carelessness, malice and incompetence sniffed about not being “fake news” (start acting like real journalists as defined in your own ethics codes, and we can talk) while assigning the MC duties to Hasan Minhaj, a “senior correspondent” for The Daily Show, the fake news show from which a large proportion of the anti-Trump “resistance” tells pollsters that they get their “real” news. Completely predictably, assuming that whoever hired him was familiar with his work, Minhaj sought partisan laughs with pure Trump/Republican hate, like this quip: Mike Pence wasn’t there because some of the women in attendance were ovulating, Pence’s wife found out, see, and he couldn’t attend! “Good job ladies, because of you, we couldn’t hang out with Mike Pence,” Minhaj said. Classy. Later, Minja told the crowd that Jeff Sessions also wasn’t there, and that his RSVP just said, “‘no,’ which is his second-favorite ‘n’ word.” Nice, Another example of the evening’s host’s wit: “We’ve got to address the elephant that’s not in the room. The leader of our country is not here. And that’s because he lives in Moscow”
Nah, no bias in that audience.
This crippling mindset—to fair and objective journalism, at least—leads to news stories with headlines like this one, from the Washington Post, substituting the pejorative, emotional trigger word “fear” for the correct word, law enforcement, a basic governing concept which the Obama Administration rejected in the area of immigration.. A headline from a non-partisan news source would be “Amid immigration setbacks, one Trump strategy seems to be working: law enforcement”…not “fear.”
We already know that unapprehended lawbreakers fear arrest.There is nothing newsworthy about that.
Consistent with the Post’s illegal immigrant-pitying spin–Poor illegal immigrants! The mean President is scaring them! And now those poor foreigner are scared to come here too!!-–is the astounding new policy of the Democratic Baltimore city government:
The Baltimore State’s Attorney’s Office has instructed prosecutors to think twice before charging illegal immigrants with minor, non-violent crimes in response to stepped up immigration enforcement by the Trump administration.
Chief Deputy State’s Attorney Michael Schatzow, in a memo sent to all staff Thursday and obtained by The Baltimore Sun, wrote that the Justice Department’s deportation efforts “have increased the potential collateral consequences to certain immigrants of minor, non-violent criminal conduct.”
“In considering the appropriate disposition of a minor, non-violent criminal case, please be certain to consider those potential consequences to the victim, witnesses, and the defendant,” Schatzow wrote.
Got that? Prosecutors are being urged to favor illegal immigrants who break laws, while continuing to charge those poor schmucks we call “citizens.” Again, Bizarro Wold ethics—but this is what happens when bias, partisan extremism and ideology without ethics eat your brain. If the anti-Trump resistance keeps behaving like fools, then only fools will take it seriously.
…which segues nicely back to May 1.
At the end of last week, the President proclaimed today as “Loyalty Day.” “The resistance” went nuts on social media: this was terrifying! It’s proof that Trump is a Nazi! ARRRGH!
As much as social media hurts the President when he is unable to stop himself from tweeting falsehoods, insults, and just plain dumb stuff that undermines his dignity and authority, it hurts his opposition more by illustrating the intense and irrational hatred of his opponents, the bias of anti-Trump journalists, and the ignorance and anti-American bile of so many progressives. This episode was a classic in the “It’s okay when WE do it” double standard category. You see, President Obama also declared May 1 as Loyalty Day, and oddly, this wasn’t taken as proof the he was Black Hitler. Every President since Eisenhower made the first such proclamation [above] has done so.
Bias makes the resistance stupid, hate makes it repulsive, and ignorance makes it incompetent.
What will it take to make these people embarrassed?
Ethics Alarms 
Whaddya know, the inaugural Loyalty Day fell on the day I was born.
And who better to register my rare good fortune than Caddyshack’s indefatigable Carl Spackler:
“Wang, it’s a parking lot!”
Big hitter, the Lama. I feel like a hundred dollars, thank you very little.
Happy Loyalty Day. Here I thought it was May Day, celebrated all over the world by workers, and their Commie overlords.
Isn’t May Day popular because that’s when all the April 15th checks clear?
Of course, Ike’s proclamation was a direct Cold War slap at the May 1 celebrations of Communism and socialism.
Right. Or I guess “Left” would be more appropriate.
Jack asked, “What will it take to make these people embarrassed?”
The simple answer is they will never be embarrassed because their bias has made them stupid and you can’t fix stupid; these idiots actually think they are right. Their stupidity will take us to the brink of social collapse if we as a nation do not put a stop to this idiocy. The only question remaining is, do we confront these idiots head-on and beat them into submission using facts, logic, ethics, and hard-core common sense or do we wait until they take their idiocy to the next level of stupidity and hate and allow them freewill to start a civil war; believe it or not, there are advantages and disadvantages to both options.
You have it backwards, “… their bias has made them stupid and you can’t fix stupid;” Those people are already stupid, and “RightThink” makes them feel smart. The people they listen are in power, therefore they are smart. If those people lose power, well, the parasites will find a new host.
“RightThink” = Robotic Hive Minds
Doubleplus goodthink.
“Right” think would be doubleplus ungood
“do we confront these idiots head-on and beat them into submission using facts, logic, ethics, and hard-core common sense ”
I am getting cynical as I age, because my gut reaction to that was they have abandoned all of your tools already, so why would they work?
“to start a civil war…” This is what I fear the most. These boneheads think someone else will fight for them (they cannot even stand the sight of guns, after all) when those they would depend on (military, police, etc.) don’t share their ideology. This would be a blood bath, and I don’t think the snowflakes would get the better of it.
It seems that the resistance is trying to make Trump to be the LBJ of these moronic protests. In the 60s, I went to some of the anti-war protests against LBJ and enjoyed the theater and hysterics of these events. Pretty soon we’re going to be hearing “Hey, hey Donald Trump, how many immigrants did you kill today!”
“the pathetic and bitter White Correspondents Association Dinner”
Given the name of the host and the unfunny humor, it sounds more like the “Anything BUT White Correspondent’s Association Dinner.”
Ugh. Sorry.
Understood, and semi-sorry for the racially-tinged slap at the emcee, which is to say sorry to you for going low, but not sorry to him, because he deserved the slap for engaging in naked and ugly political attacks.
Let me try to defend Schatzow, because while his statement may be motivated by ideology, it’s good policy to tell prosecutors to be aware of changes to collateral consequences.
We’ve recently seen two major appellate opinions vacating convictions for ineffective assistance of counsel following confusion over what crimes lead to mandatory deportation. In each case, a proper soliloquy before taking a guilty plea would have remedied the error.
Appeals are expensive; moreso if they lead to new trials. While it’s easiest to point at defense counsel, that doesn’t put money back into the budget. What does keep the purse strings closed is preventing the problem. As officers of the court, prosecutors are in a fine position to ensure that all parties are aware of matters of law. And they work for Schatzow, so he can tell them they must be aware and do so.
If this leads to favorable plea deals for aliens that are unavailable to citizens, then the 14th Amendment is implicated and it’s alarums and excursions time. Until then, I’m willing to offer the benefit of the doubt.
The threat of deportation is a collateral consequence for any illegal alien taken into custody by state authorities, just like the threat of a general court-martial is a collateral consequence for a desrter taken into custody by state authorities.
Michael, you’re wrong as a matter of law, but that’s not even relevant. The issue I’m describing pertains to legal alien residents, for whom some crimes result in effectively mandatory deportation.
The ethics of plea bargaining are beyond the scope of my comment, but as a practical matter this is a thing that happens in the world. In a plea bargain, it’s important that the defendant is fully-informed of the consequences. This is true both as part of the government’s obligation to offer due process in criminal proceedings and as our society’s obligation to not be evil.
But I’d like to reiterate that your comment is wrong as a matter of law. Advocating for change is fine, but making up reality is not.
Drew, could you please elaborate? Your due process point is important, but are you saying that some illegal immigrants who have not been officially promised conditions under which they could remain here cannot legally be deported? How? Aren’t all illegal immigrants subject to legal deportation, depending on policy, absent other factors?
In terms of illegal aliens there are a couple problems with what you say.
One is terminology: Illegal aliens rarely face deportation as a collateral punishment because they are normally removed administratively. Collateral punishment is what happens when a criminal conviction triggers another law which can result in further punishment. For example, loss of 2nd Amendment rights is a common collateral punishment for some crimes. Administrative removal is, legally, not a criminal punishment so it has a lesser due process standard.
The second problem is one of jurisdiction. States don’t deport or remove–the feds do. States may work with the feds to notify them of such illegal aliens they encounter, and may assist them in detention (but they aren’t required to under the Anti-commandeering Clause). Any actual process and decision belongs to the feds.
So while getting deported due to a traffic ticket is quite possible for an illegal alien, nobody involved with the ticket is involved in the removal process, and the removal is not (usually) handled as a criminal punishment.
Significantly, front-line city prosecutors will rarely be involved in any way with removing an illegal alien (their boss may, however, be involved in the decision to cooperate or not with the feds). Those prosecutors will likely have the opportunity to make sure the ‘i’s are dotted in legal resident’s plea bargain, though.
You are talking process and semantics, then, not law. Under the law, any illegal immigrant is here at the risk of deportation. As I thought. Whether an illegal is “removed administratively” or deported is a distinction without a difference to the ejected illegal alien.
It is similar as to how deserters are subject to apprehension and delivery into custody of military authorities.
http://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-updates/incidents/australian-man-held-in-us-detention-centre-after-overstaying-visa-by-a-single-hour/news-story/ff2aa65faef5d4c393c8e524cdde161a
” Ms Kancso said in order to keep his visa valid, Mr Reid had to exit and re-enter the US every six months.
So on April 23 the couple drove to the Canadian border in upstate New York before his visa was due to expire at midnight on April 24.
But as they approached the border, Ms Kancso said Canadian border officials began to give the couple “a bit of a hard time”.
“They spent hours asking us remedial questions and giving us the run-around, with hours of dead time in between,” she said.
“After wasting over four hours there, they [Canadian authorities] sent us to the US border patrol because they refused to let Baxter through.
“The US border patrol ended up taking Baxter away, because after waiting for hours with the Canadians, he technically violated his visa requirements and was illegally in the US for a single hour.”
Ms Kancso said border police then arrested Mr Reid and took him to the prison.
“This is a man who has no prior incidents with the law, not in the US or his native Australia,” she said.”
—
On average, he should be out of prison in 6 months before being permitted to leave the US. A hearing to schedule the date for a hearing is set for 3 weeks time. Legal fees of $8000 so far.
That’s awful.
Taken at face value and reading the account provided in the link; there is something wrong with the timeline account of this story that makes me question its validity.
“So on April 23 the couple drove to the Canadian border in upstate New York before his visa was due to expire at midnight on April 24.
But as they approached the border, Ms Kancso said Canadian border officials began to give the couple “a bit of a hard time”.
“After wasting over four hours there, they [Canadian authorities] sent us to the US border patrol because they refused to let Baxter through.
“he stayed less than two hours too long in the US, prompting his arrest.”
Based on the account of the story timeline they arrived at the border sometime on the 23rd and spent 4 hours with the Canadian border officials and then suddenly it was after mid-night on the 24th thus it was early morning hours of the 25th. That’s at a minimum of 28 hours difference in time.
Lastly; why would anyone in this situation wait until somewhere between 10:30pm and 11:00pm at night (or the last or second to last day) of their visa to get this taken care of; cutting this that close is freaking nuts!
So is this bad logic and a bad accounting of dates, times, and expiration date/time or is the story a complete fabrication? Inquiring minds want to know.
I caught that too, Z. Just a bit suspicious in the time line, and screaming ‘blazing idiot’ in waiting so long. It is almost as if he wanted to be caught…
It might be another GoFundMe ruse.
I blows my mind how many people have their tears jerked out of their heads, flush their common sense, say something similar to “Awww, that’s terrible.” and then turn around and start donating dollars via GoFundMe without critically thinking about the validity of the stories that they have no way of verifying.
Something interesting; I just did a Google search of GoRundMe Ruse and it really surprised me how many people with the last name “Ruse” have GoFundMe fundraising pages; I’ve never heard that last name. Coincidence? Maybe? 😉
I suppose I’m an asshole for not instantly believing everything I read on the internet.
French Model Commercial
… just because you do not believe everything you read on the Internet, does not make you an asshole. Many can become one by believing a select viewpoint!
I appreciate your skepticism, Zoltar.
A fool & their money are lucky to get together in the first place.
The ONLY reason I’ll let go of a dollar?
To get a better grip…!
No, that distinction matters. Because, you recall, the topic is prosecutors’ legal strategy. Ensuring knowledge of collateral consequences is useful when deportation is at issue, but not when removal is. This stuff matters when the topic is lawyers practicing law in a court of law. You seem to want to make a larger, but irrelevant, point, but I’m focused on the reasoning behind a memo and why it makes strategic sense.
(And it absolutely matters to the alien, who can negotiate a plea or go to trial to avoid deportation but can do relatively little to challenge administrative removal.)
An update.
https://mobile.nytimes.com/comments/2017/04/24/opinion/what-liberal-snowflakes-get-right-about-free-speech.html
“If the election were on October 27, I’d be your president.”, “I’m now back to being an activist citizen, and part of the resistance,”
Hillary Clinton 2017 Women for Women International Conference
I saw that too, she has absolutely no shame whatsoever.
Like my Dear 92 year-old Father always says: “If the dog hadn’t stopped to take a shit, he’d a caught that rabbit!”
Poetic justice?
Her being forced to slobber very publicly the exact opposite of Sally Field’s 1985 Academy Award Best Actress (“Places In The Heart”) acceptance speech: “You like me. Right now! You like me!”