The Flog of War

 

Tom Cotton on Fox News Sunday: "As far as I'm concerned, Israel can bounce the rubble in Gaza. Anything that happens in Gaza is the responsibility of Hamas. Hamas killed women and children in Israel last weekend." pic.twitter.com/j1BiV7yjab

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 15, 2023

Sure. Make the rubble bounce.  As far as Tom Cotton is concerned. But I'm not Tom Cotton (thanks be) and I have a conscience and understand that just because Hamas sucks, doesn't mean responsible people get to be comfortable that innocent humans become collateral damage. This is why someone like Tom Cotton shouldn't really be a senator. One of my absolutes in a very small basket of them is sociopaths shouldn't be in office. If you have no empathy for other people, go be elsewhere. Sell patent drugs to gym rats. Produce reality television. Design hideous clothes for plus size people. You'd still be a horror-show, but you wouldn't this fucking dead-eyed horror-show, talking about how Palestinian kids are bearing responsibility for shit they never did to the extent that bricks should fall around their ears. 

He thinks he's talking about "rubble". He doesn't see that people, real humans, live in and around that. Kids are in, around, and under the rubble. They are starved and thirsty when supplies are denied them. He's a father. He isn't thinking about the rubble bouncing on his own kid. It never would. 

I'm a little sorry for my delinquent posting--but I took a couple days to think about why anyone needed to demand pictures of beheaded babies on Twitter to believe the Hamas massacre against Israelis existed, and why I saw so many pictures of Syrian dead babies I remembered from 10 years ago being called Palestinian dead babies. I'm having a hard, hard time understanding who is satisfied by pictures of dead babies at all. (This sort of thing isn't new at all and is for shock value.) 

My Eyes Don't Deceive Me

 

The opponents of critical race theory, not more than a handful of months ago, were telling us it was a damn shame that Dr. Seuss was being cancelled for racial caricatures in a handful of nearly-forgotten children's books (yes, I do believe the Venn Diagram there is exactly a circle) but I wonder what they would say about the banning of books by Black authors in a school district in Pennsylvania. To me, it looks an awful lot like my impression that the criticism of CRT is actually a way to demonize a very specific kind of Black history (the kind that comes from Black voices and is heard from even when it isn't February) is pretty much the mood being catered to. 

The reason certain people want CRT to be minimized, want to discredit the 1619 Project, want to talk about All Lives Matter instead of why Black lives need to be discussed, why Latino/a/ex lives need to be discussed, why Asian lives need to be discussed, all within their contexts, is because the context doesn't show white culture in a positive light. Because it shouldn't. 

In discussing policing in the US, it's hard to divorce law enforcement from the slave patrols charged with keeping the peace (for a very racially-biased version thereof) in our early history, and about as hard to separate our Border Patrol from the same. 

So when right wing people talk about caravans and the gathering of Haitian refugees (just like the "threat" of Syrian refugees) and think of course violence will turn them away because who even are they? I don't think my eyes deceive me. I see human beings who deserve life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. But I know those other folks don't and I see what they are, too. And it's not so much that I want to emulate our nation's founders--I think we could do better. 

We are not free if we don't believe in these principles for all. All. One runny pimple on Montana's ass just got upset at the notion of a mere 75 Afghan refugees resettling there, some very small quantity of a huddled mass of people yearning to breathe free.  Sure, 75 human beings, with hardly nothing to their names, women and children included, are going to overrun your whole dumb gun-toting red white and blue-blooded state.

I'm not a Christian, but I believe what you are willing to do for the people with the least is your whole job as a human, because you need to know that could be you, too.  Politics and weather and poverty and all the shit fate throws at you permitting. But there's a very good label for what my eyes see when I see CBP deploying whips (or whatever your sensibility prefers to call the lash or the strap) on Haitian asylum-seekers. 

And it's the very word the anti-CRT folks want to pretend very much the US isn't about anymore, but you know what? Maybe we still live with that history and need to recognize and confront it. And we shouldn't fear people fleeing from danger so much as to hate, revile, and punish them on top of their own tragedy. 

Am I My Brother's Keeper?

 

Ingraham: Is it really our responsibility to welcome thousands of refugees from Afghanistan? pic.twitter.com/Sopvx4RJ0H

— Acyn (@Acyn) August 17, 2021

Well, Laura Ingraham's Fatherland figure, Donald Trump, certainly didn't think so, but there is a certain idea of reciprocity many civilized people would observe in regards to people who have risked their lives alongside of your people for a purpose--especially when the purpose (whatever kind of nation-building we were lying to ourselves and others about) never did come to fruition and these quite decent and extensively vetted people are in some deep shit.

I don't know what she thinks it would cost us. The dilution of our cultural purity, perhaps, for whatever value that's supposed to have. I have looked at the cultural value of Laura Ingraham, and found it disturbingly lacking. I would go so far as to say that Ingraham is lacking in the Judeo-Christian values she alleges to believe in, when the traditions that would have humanity's first murderer ask "Am I my brother's keeper?" are answered again and again with, "Love one another", "Treat the stranger among you like a citizen", "Love your enemies and bless them that curse you." 

All I know is, these people tangibly have done more to try and fix a deadly situation with their whole asses on the line, that Ingraham has done within her safe and well-paid sinecure--in fact, she's advocated for things that would worsen a slow-rolling pandemic negligent genocide. 

So what I'm saying is, for what it's worth, I would be less concerned about refugees from Afghanistan living in my neighborhood than a bigot who probably would consider my mixed urban neighborhood a slum in comparison to her experience. I know I place my faith in humankind as a humanist. I think her flavor of bigotry makes things worse, denies the common thread among people, hardens our hearts, makes it more difficult to connect and communicate. 

Of course you are your brother's keeper. And you are blessed to have him. Just as we're all cursed with one another on this heating rock, this triumph of the bacterial, this monument to entropy. You don't have to like doing someone else a fucking solid. But you'd want one yourself if things were on the other foot, right? So you do. You mask up, or greet a stranger with kindness, or just try for a whole minute not to be a hatemonger, which Ingraham has made her stock in trade. 

Is there a reason I should be this sister's keeper? All I have is my words, but she'd deny them. She could dine at my table, but never feel nourished. I could offer her water, but it would be salty to her. But it's only human to offer.  I can't be her keeper. I can only say she is wrong. And maybe some day she'd fix herself were she so inclined. 

But I doubt it. 

Trump Did Not Have a Great Day 2

Any given day in the Trump Presidency might be indicative of some absolute unprepared amateur-hour crack-pottery, but some days just stand out--and this is another one of those days.

It started out with Trump Tweeting about a news story that was in progress regarding his contact with China--he flagged an earlier story that indicated when he last called the Chinese government, which was updated at some point after his most recent call, which left him linking to a story in a Tweet about his having just now called China that made it look like he actually was not able to read.

He also was quick like a bunny in Tweeting about Lawfareblog.com regarding a quote he heard on the very-low rated failing Morning Joe show he supposedly never watches, which is not actually favorable to his immigration executive order. This also sort of made it look like he either doesn't read (or can't), or just responded via Twitter to a thing he saw on tv, without any critical thought.

This is pretty non-terrific. But he did have what could have been a saving grace--a visit from Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who is an ally of the US, and how could Trump screw that up--

Except by giving one of his weird dominance-display handshakes to someone whose culture isn't even about handshakes, and getting his name wrong because foreign policy-fail.

But let's talk about something a little closer to home--like Trump's National Security Advisor who apparently spoke to Russia to reassure them, before Trump was even sworn in, that the sanctions regarding the apparent election-hacking were only temporary.

This scenario makes a liar out of VP Mike Pence, who either was misled by Flynn or is covering up a little. But what is amazing is that this little bit of who said what to who when and who knew it and when is going on while law enforcement is finding more credibility in the Russian dossier. This once again reminds us that there was a lot of fishiness about the circumstances of what kind of stories were being pushed in various media during the election--to Trump's favor.

But let's not suppose that Trump is any more aware of that than he is of the Flynn story (he says). After all, he has his mind firmly fixed on the real electoral threat of busloads of Massholes invading New Hampshire to vote illegally.  (I love you, Massachusetts, and wouldn't call you "Massholes" myself, but that's what alleged Pats fan Trump is saying, which is wicked two-faced, right?)

Anyhow, this is another very not-good day in Trumplandia.

Trump Ban Blocked

In case you missed it, Donald Trump's EO to restrict entry into the US from seven majority Muslim nations was blocked by US District Judge James Robart, who pointed out the obvious--the ban served to discriminate against Muslim people, but had nothing to do with any pressing threat from the seven countries indicated, because there was never any indication there had ever been a threat from those countries based on prior activity.

Trump, naturally, appealed this. The appeal was declined. Trump's response towards these decisions was basically, if anything happens for whatever reason post this decision--it falls on the judge who allowed "people pouring in". Meh.

It seems to me like appointing competent people to positions relating to national security, and maintaining a good relationship with and accurate information from the intelligence community, would be of more use than imposing a blanket ban on people from any specific region. It would be more easily defensible to collect information and rely on trained counter-terrorism professionals to use the information received, than to justify the restriction of travel by people who have already been cleared by various agencies.

Trump seems to believe that the job of the judiciary is to rubber stamp his whims. They rely on the Constitution, not his preferences, for their guidance--which is as it should be.

He does not seem to have a clear, historical understanding of this basic civic dynamic.

Trump Did Not Have A Great Day

Just for the record, April Fool's Day is still April 1st and has not been moved up to February 1st, no matter what kind of fooling went on this Wednesday. For one thing, it was the first day of Black History Month, so our President, Donald Trump, sat between Omarosa and Dr. Ben Carson to say some very important and historical things.  Here's a sample:

“Last month we celebrated the life of Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., whose incredible example is unique in American history. You read all about Dr. Martin Luther King a week ago when somebody said I took the statue out of my office. And it turned out that that was fake news from these people,” Trump said during his introductory remarks, gesturing at the pool reporters who had been allowed in to view the start of the meeting. “Fake news. The statue is cherished ... but they said the statue, the bust of Dr. Martin Luther King, was taken out of the office. And it was never even touched. So I think it was a disgrace. But that's the way the press is, very unfortunate.”

This is how you know he's genuine--he thinks the bust of Martin Luther King, Jr belongs in the Oval Office. And the lying media tried to own him over it--so who is really very discriminated against, anyway? Also, too:

I am very proud now that we have a museum on the National Mall where people can learn about Reverend King, so many other things. Frederick Douglass is an example of somebody who’s done an amazing job and is being recognized more and more, I noticed. Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, and millions more black Americans who made America what it is today. Big impact.

I wonder if he knows Frederick Douglass from Morgan Freeman. Nota bene: One of them is alive, and has played a president more believably than Donald Trump. I'm just saying.

But Trump went on from there to do a little statesmanship. Before his graham crackers and nap, apparently. He seems to have possibly suggested marching federales into Mexico (possibly the same or different from the ones he's marching into Chicago) to address "bad hombres".  Which is kind of condescending and threatening of their sovereignty and gross-- and then he called Australia and boasted about his electoral win (which isn't that boastable TBH) to Malcolm Turnbull, and ragged him over a refugee deal Trump pretty obviously only just found out about. 

This being the same day we all realize just how screwed up his first ordered attack in Yemen was, and have a picture of how personally liable he is as POTUS, reminds me of how much respect I have for this office because of the stakes--and how serious it is that the holder of that office be competent to serve.

The Role of the Press

I guess it's been pretty well documented that the package of KellyAnne Conway and Steve Bannon added to the Trump campaign at it's quasi-ebb was probably a gift from the Mercers. This is why it isn't any real surprise to find them on the same page about something like what the media ought to do--like shut their word holes! KellyAnne Conway put this a little bit more diplomatically, by just suggesting that the journos who were "wrong" about Trump (by probably just reporting things that actually happened that were negative, because OMG, yeah) should be fired. As in, said things that were negative but pretty accurate about Trump. Right. Steve Bannon has referenced the media as the "opposition party". So does Trump--it seems a little paranoid, maybe?

This kind of denial that Trump does anything wrong ever and that people can't actually see what he's doing because of the smokescreen is quaint, but I need to direct your attention to this funny bit of WH propo:

One senior administration official explained the ground rules to reporters gathered at the White House and listening on a conference call, then said: “With that, I'll turn it over to a senior administration official.”

“Thank you,” the other senior administration official said before beginning a 45-minute defense.

Their overarching message: Everything is going exactly according to plan, nothing has changed since the order was signed, and the news media need to calm down their “false, misleading, inaccurate, hyperventilating” coverage of the “fractional, marginal, minuscule percentage” of international travelers who have been simply “set aside for further questioning” for a couple hours on their way into the greatest country in the world.

Hi, I'm a grown adult with a history of reading newspapers and voting--are the massive protests and ACLU suits and all that really that dismissible if we were to presuppose a USA that still had Constitutional rights? Because in my world, it looks to me like Donald Trump took an oath of office to the Constitution with no faith in it at all. Are WH staffers really supposed to just take an open crap on the First Amendment like that?

Press Secretary Sean Spicer was heard not that long ago vowing that the press would be "held accountable" for what they do.  It's the other way about--the job of the press is to hold elected officials accountable to the public they supposedly are here to serve. So they can't just pretend all is well. The many protests at airports all over are not normal and are not just some kind of liberal flash mob.  This is about who we are as a nation, and the so-called SJW's, the lawyers and civil liberties types, the bleeding heart pink hats and multiculturalists and immigrant-lovers--

Are America, too. Yeah, this is the crowd that didn't vote for Trump. But hey, he lost the popular vote, didn't he? Maybe listen to the immigrants, and the vets , and the descendants of immigrants, and the people who have done contract or missionary work in those arbitrary seven countries. Try to listen to the narratives that bubble up from the media, who are just trying to tell the story of the day.

Silence is violence, Conway, Spicer, and Bannon. People need to know what is being done in their name. When Iraqi interpreters and their families are detained and submitted to questions they should not be asked about their allegiance, when little kids and disabled elderly Muslims are held for hours at a time, when they could be of no threat to anyone--how is this going well?

This is not well, or normal at all, and if no president ever was faced with so many well-attended protests so early in his term of office, let it be admitted into the record that Trump earned his disapprobation via the hard work of the bigoted villains he let run his shop.

This Escalated Quickly

Immigration ban not sitting well with America. pic.twitter.com/PV6NQZml10

— ian bremmer (@ianbremmer) January 29, 2017

When Americans started to hear about people getting detained at the airport, heard the stories of people who had visas pulled, whose families were being separated, whose lives were being disrupted, whose careers were getting held up, by President's Trump's foolish, arbitrary and cruel Muslim ban, they turned out in force. If Trump was feeling a little something about crowd envy, well, he draws crowds now--to protest his bullshit. Lawyers and protesters came to assist people whose very lives were being played with for no justifiable reason.  And some degree of victory was even obtained on the behalf of people whose future had been disrupted while in transit.

It's a start. But this is the level the US has to stay at, and while it is very good that we saw Rep. John Lewis (who certainly, contrary to what Mr. Trump says, is not "all talk") come where this injustice was happening, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren came to Logan airport, and many other figures came on down, while the support of religious groups is welcome, it's not just about showing up this time--it's about legal challenges, and throwing the Constitution back into the face of this Administration over and over again. It's about sustained outrage that never settles for the short term victory--but keeps protesting until it's Trump and Co. that feel overwhelmed. Calling your representatives to voice concerns or give support to the resistance they give to the White House. The WH is in denial that the slimmest of electoral margins and a serious popular vote deficiency does not give them a mandate for every poorly-thought out promise Trump made in his gonzo campaign bid.

So we'll just have to let them know.

Because this is what it's all about, not the scare-tactics of equating people from other countries and other religions with terror.

If We Have Forgotten

If there was a thing I thought growing up, it was that the US was great. The great melting pot. The leader of the free world.  A nation of laws, not men. A free country. One nation, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all. And I continued to believe it as an adult, for old time's sake, even when the sins of a nation were uncovered through greater study--mostly good. Aspiring to be great. Freer than most.

Our unique position, historically, has been called "American Exceptionalism". The American cradle story we ought to know is that our country exists on paper--it is not any particular religion or ethnicity that informs our uniqueness,  but the documents that inform our law and our values. We have made sacred texts of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution because they represent the formation of the American viewpoint. The expansion of the US meant that over time, our borders changed, and the influx of immigrants over the years meant our ethnic and religious composition also changed, but what was not called into doubt was that we made Americans of our immigrants and they became ours. This happened imperfectly. But it's been going on for years.

Later on, American Exceptionalism meant something about our strength as a nation and our military power--post-WW2 and through the Cold War and beyond. This in part can be viewed as a product of the denouement of WW2--the fall of the Nazis and the liberation of the camps, and the shock and awe of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Divorced from the aspirational view of an arc of history bending towards justice, there was always the more pessimistic view of our collective trajectory--voiced by H.L. Mencken and Sinclair Lewis, that fascism could happen here--and I, steeped in liberal altruism, concurred.  It could happen here, wrapped in a flag, carrying a cross. Popular sentiment, that accepted slavery, segregation, know-nothings, bigotry against Catholics and Jews, Jim Crow, lynching, and so on, would betray our American ideals, because we aren't just aspirational about our exceptionalism, but are also always fucking it up.

That Debate Could Have Been Worse

After the weekend Trump Campaign set-back due to the airing of Trump's immature and pervy attitudes towards women, I was in cringe-mode over what fresh horror the actual debate would bring us. Trump seems to respond to challenges by slugging, and made an interesting mind game move of having a public sit down with former President Bill Clinton's accusers re: sexual misconduct, as well as a victim of an assault whose perpetrator was defended by then-attorney Hillary Clinton. (I won't go so far as some commenters regarding Bill Clinton's accusers, except to say that in light of what Trump has revealed himself to be, to move to support him politically with their stories leaves a certain impression in my mind.) Was he trying to set up shop in Hillary Clinton's head? Was this payback for the Alicia Machado lousy week he had? (Which was his own damn dumb fault for not being able to leave anything alone.) Who knows?

And yet, this debate was barely a hair more cringe-inciting than the first debate. Trump might have seemed more prepared--to an extent, but the stakes were considerably higher for him this time. There was a definite needs of fact-checking--which Clinton helpfully directed people to her website to in order to get what skeptics would probably not consider unbiased Trump debunkage.

But there were definitely some awkward moments--take the picture above. The freewheeling standing and walking about the stage to face the audience townhall-atmosphere gave both debaters the opportunity to move around and seem looser--unchained from their podia, so to speak. But Trump sometimes gave the impression of shadowing Ms. Clinton, like he was skulking up behind her. That was a little weird. Trump repeated his lie, already called out in the first debate, that he opposed the Iraq invasion originally, and made the also long-debunked accusation that the 2008 Clinton campaign started birtherism. He really disappointed in any answer that had to do with Syria. I noted regarding the VP debate that Pence is more of a Russian realist and doesn't quite share Trump's foreign policy outlook--Trump basically was like "I don't talk to that guy." His running mate. Whose debate success he wanted to take credit for. Ok. That's not really awkward. (Yes it is!) And he made a point of trying to intimidate Clinton over the mostly moribund email scandal, by saying if he became president, he would get her locked up. Which sounds like just prosecuting one's political enemies in a banana republic kind of way. Ew.

Also, for some reason he insisted Assad and Russia were targeting ISIS (not really, when this is a thing the US is totally doing. Not those guys. Us.) And when he was asked about the humanitarian efforts in Aleppo, for some reason he shifted gears to Mosul? (Well, when asked about how he'd reassure a Muslim-American about Islamophobia, he basically gave an Islamophobic answer, and still, despite push-back, doesn't seem to realize that not all Black people are living in some kind of inner city hell--so maybe we can only expect so much. With one month left to go before the election.)

He's not really fit to be president. But he avoided some kind of lurid psychotic break on the stage, and that was awfully basic and functional of him. Let's see how many pundits call this a draw.

EDIT: By the way--Trump was still snorting like a mad bull. What is that?

These Candies Leave a Bad Taste

This image says it all. Let's end the politically correct agenda that doesn't put America first. #trump2016 pic.twitter.com/9fHwog7ssN

— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) September 19, 2016

So, Donald Trump, Jr. posted the above message on Twitter, and I don't think he'll delete it because it was exactly the message the Trump Campaign was putting out today regarding the acts of alleged terrorist Ahmed Rahami--who was not Syrian, nor a refugee, and who was found asleep in a doorway by police. (My priceless Tweet: "I woke up in a Linden doorway, the policeman knew my name," has been absurdly ignored, and I am miffed.) What can one even say? The alt-right version, no less simplistic, usually uses M&M's. So it's not original, in just the way it isn't insightful or clever. But it does have the Trump/Pence logo going for it. Which inspires me, because of course it does.

UPDATE: People trying to flee are dying before our actual eyes. And this privileged peckerwood wants to compare them to poisoned candy? Fuck him, his Daddy, their party and the alt-right.

UPDATE 9/28: He seems to have deleted the picture so here:

The internet doesn't actually forget, even if it loses some graphic integrity.

Brexit, Pursued by a Bear?

I'm a little bit at a loss as to how to write about the vote of the UK to leave the European Union, because the details of what it meant to the UK economical seemed to be a bit complex and regional and I'm over here on this side of the pond anyway, so it wasn't a thing I followed especially. What I do know is that the UK did not, as a resut of this vote, leave the UN--which some chyron entry person at FOX Mushroom Farm seems to have thought.

What is a bit concerning, though, is the possibility that people who voted for the UK to leave the EU did so without entirely understanding what they were voting for, and that some seem to, the very morning after, regret their vote.  The market freak-out investors faced on the dawn of this new trade reality probably was a bit of bracer that the economic ramifications might actually be extensive (although maybe non-UK traders should cool their jets, alright?)

And the timing is, in world news terms, pretty stunningly offset by the US Presidential election's own bete noire, Donald Trump, landing in Scotland (which voted to Remain) whilst praising the Brexit vote. As you might know, Scotland already thought Donald Trump was a wee daft tangerine bawbag of indiscriminate geography, but post-Trumpian Brexit commentary, they waxed Rabbie Burnsian, and some.  Because, and gather 'round, children, the fact is, Trump does not actually know shit about trade or foreign policy, and what he's saying about US trade policy and what he means to do to it is get "exity". Dissolve current trade deals and singularly negotiate new ones with each place on the strength of the kind of excellent interpersonal skills that made him so beloved in Scotland. Awesome-sauce! See what happened to the British pound on the morning after the vote when there's still the possibility that the MPs (who actually decide) can back out? What happened to markets all over?

Yeah, that bearish to-do will be much larger on the face of the coming of Trump to an economy personal to my actual readers (mostly US-Aians). Which is why I want to reinforce the necessary idea that elections do have consequences, yeah?  The UK might be able to adhere to the schoolyard tradition of "takesies-backsies"--but while I really think Trump's economic plan would be a first 100 days'  constitutional crisis,  he has nonetheless the potential to do real harm because he is, basically, a Thicky McThickerson. You can't even drill down to the bits of brain active enough to take on new info.

So that why I had night-terrors late Thursday--the implications of this kind of vote and what it signifies is not unique to the UK. And that doesn't even get me started on the semi-Fascist and racist parts. But they are there.  And I can't unsee them.

I recommend all US voters get very intimate with successful political-content Googling during this election year--it means a lot.  Don't wait until after the vote, or assume that some responsible pool of voters will just do the right thing so you don't have to. Doing right matters. It always does.

Don't Make This Great

So, I was pretty terse regarding the news in my last post, because I didn't even have words. (An earlier post in the way-past my bedtime zone was deleted as I mistakenly thought the BLM protest that was shot up was one of the many memorializing the death of Tamir Rice. I deleted it. The error is embarrassing and I'm totally admitting it.) The shocking thing is that the shooting of five demonstrators regarding another police shooting, of Jamar Clark, occurred on the eve of the charging of a police officer with the first degree murder of Laquan McDonald.

It took over four hundred days to charge an officer with the slaying of a 17-year old kid who had a three-inch knife who showed up and in 30 seconds put 16 bullets in a human being, and who was only stopped when he paused to reload, when that boy was as dead as dead can be.

This is not the America I cherish. This is something I am watching wondering how many terrible and shocking things occurred before we were even paying proper attention.

So when I see the kind of news that makes protesters in Irving, TX pace around armed outside a mosque, because of something that was in the news, or some damn idiot leaves a fake bomb outside a mosque in VA--I understand that words mean things, and there are stupidly ambitious people out there using words (and fake statistics)  in stupidly dangerous ways. Racism is our original sin, and xenophobia and religious bigotry are not terribly more creative.

This isn't "greatness". And this country can't be made great through these kinds of thuggish actions. And people who spread the kind of manure that let these violence-flowers blossom? Are just shit.

So, Let's Look at Donald Trump, Meta-Candidate

For a candidate who is supposedly "shoot-from-the-hip", I would submit that celebrity reality-show personality Donald Trump has a pretty good idea of what the "optics" of his candidacy means to the people watching. I'm pretty sure that when he talks about the obese heckler who showed up at one rally, a lot of fat white folks chuckled because sure: they're glandularly-challenged. But that protester was a got-dambed lazy welfare queen.

(I'm quibbling here--I'm what in Yiddish is called "zaftig" myself. I should talk.)

The way an elected official talks matters. Trump wants to have things both ways: he can racially foghorn (because that shit is not a dogwhistle) but also pretend he is simply clean and honest and truth-slinging--but check this shit out:

“It could be the great Trojan Horse of all time,” he continued. “When I look at the [immigration] line, I see all strong powerful men. And I see very few women, and I see very few children. There’s something strange going on. And if you look at what’s happening in Europe, a lot of bad things are happening in Europe.”

After pointing out that a majority of the Syrian refugees were, in fact, women and children, Stephanopoulos wondered if Trump would bring back waterboarding, which was banned by President Barack Obama.

“We have to be strong,” the candidate insisted. “You know, they don’t use waterboarding over there, they use chopping off people’s heads, they use drowning people.”

First off--when someone points out he's lying, he blows it off. Lets point these things out more aggressively, hm, journos? But look at how he refers to waterboarding.

Even Dick Cheney pretended we were waterboarding to interrogate people for intelligence purposes. I think he's kind of indicating a Trump Administration would just use waterboarding as a tactic to threaten people with the idea that we could. We just could and would.

(I bolded the bit about women and children because this thing is sort of "truthy" . There are a lot of children. There might be slightly more males--but that isn't necessarily a threatening thing, for one thing, that's marginal, for another, they are all kinds of vetted.)

I don't think journalists should be handicapping what Trump says because of his popularity and relative newness to national politics. Reporters should be facing up to what he's actually saying, and how it would work as policy. That his supporters are radicalized towards minorities should be concerning. And that the resonance his message has with so many people is pulling the other 2016 GOP candidates dangerously toward facism  should be seen as horrifying.

To me, leadership would be pulling the wet blanket down on this incendiary hate-speech. But for the sake of ambition, no one apparently wants to go there.

What won't he lie about?

David Vitter Loses in LA Gov. Contest

Sen. David Vitter lost by a good margin to Democrat John Bel Edwards in yesterday's election for Louisiana Governor, and has also announced that he will not be seeking re-election for the US Senate. I wouldn't necessarily say that this makes the LA Sen. match a nice possible pick-up for Dems, because Vitter's losing last night has an awful lot to do with David Vitter.

A lot of people might point back to the infamous D.C. Madam scandal, that left many with an uncomfortable mental image after rumors  (not exactly corroborated, and not exactly not corroborated, you know) suggested that Vitter was fond of adult baby/diaper fetish play. But that didn't sink him in the 2010 election for Senate. If personal scandal was what scuttled Vitter's chances, the somewhat dodgy claim that he had a mistress whom he impregnated and then advised to get an abortion (not a very sympathetic story in heavily pro-life Louisiana) could be a bigger factor as a sort of October Surprise. (Although a similar story regarding U.S. Rep. Scott Desjarlais never bit him in the ass in equally pro-life Tennessee.)

So what really hammered in the last nail in Vitter's political coffin? I'm going to go with a persistent attitude of shadiness. Campaign finance shadiness. Endorsement-seeking shadiness. Just plain all-around shadiness.  Even his last-minute Hail Mary leap onto the anti-Syrian refugee bandwagon was done in a particularly shady way, claiming a refugee settled in Louisiana had "gone missing" when he in fact just moved and made whatever notifications had to be made through normal channels.

So, he practically "swatted" a guy to try to finagle slightly better polling just ahead of an election. Yeah. Shady.

But then there's LA Gov. Bobby Jindal. You could say that Jindal's performance as Governor already wasn't doing a prospective Republican candidate any favors (only KS Gov. Brownback is more generally hated by folks in his own state). But WP's David Weigel suggests that Jindal timed his exit from the GOP presidential primary to "bigfoot" all over any last minute publicity Vitter meant to generate. (If so, I can honestly say something good came out of the Jindal presidential campaign.)

Governor-elect Edwards seems like a good guy, and I hope he turns things around in Louisiana. But were it not for Vitter's awfulness, I have no reason to think a generic Republican without Vitter's negatives would have lost.

Carrying a Cross and Wrapped in the Flag

I don't like the flavor of the current political atmosphere much these days, as I keep returning to how the attacks in Paris turned into a hotbed of concern about accepting Syrian refugees in the US. Tengrain, at the risk of Godwinning, took a look at the kind of things that were being batted around, and heard that as the "dog whistle heard round the world." I think that's exactly right. Politicians right here tend to not realize there is a whole entire world outside of the US with the ability to see what we're doing. And what we're doing is very Christian-signifying.

Take the idea that being Christian should specifically be privileged in accepting refugee applications. I really hate this idea. The Assad government isn't specifically bad to Christians at all, but they definitely have a problem with Daesh and other militant Islamist groups--I just don't see how this makes life worse for them than Muslims who apply, or why we should view them as better because "there's no meaningful risk" of Christians committing acts of terror. And sure, in context, Syrian Christians won't, and for the same reason Muslims wouldn't--pretty fucking grateful to be here and not where the bombs and bullets are!  But if the slinger of that bullshit, son of a Cuban refugee and a supporter of refugees until like, a minute ago, Ted Cruz, wants to talk about whether Christians ever do terror--yeah. Right here in the US, they sometimes do.

The Often-Backwards Santorum

I'd been lamenting that I was seldom getting the opportunity to rake Rick Santorum over like a gently-aged pile of mulched garbage, but Hark! He's actually been caught by media people saying things:

“This president has been following, this president makes excuses for not acting, and if you look at what this president has done with ISIS, it is the worst foreign policy in the history of America,” the former senator told Brian Kilmeade during an episode of his program Kilmeade and Friends. “The president’s policy toward ISIS is to contain ISIS. ISIS’s policy in order to gain credibility as a caliphate, in the Middle East, and around the world, is to maintain their territorial integrity.”

“Let me repeat that: The president’s policy is to keep ISIS within their bounds; ISIS’s objective is to keep their territorial integrity,” continued Santorum. “Now, what does that sounds like? It sounds like president Obama is in cahoots with the strategy of ISIS to maintain their territorial integrity.”

“And he doesn’t realize, by having this strategy he provides the greatest recruitment tool for ISIS, which is: America is fighting us, and we are maintaining our territorial integrity, and we are winning this battle,” he added. “The president is helping ISIS every single day by the policies we have, and he doesn’t even know it because he refuses to accept the reality that ISIS is a caliphate.”

Every part of that is completely backwards. All of it. The US is engaging in airstrikes in the region and is leading a coalition to combat Daesh.  Daesh's "territorial integrity" is being contained, and even shrunk. The strategy isn't mere containment, although that's a start--it's beating them back. Because they are not, as Santorum wants to insist, a caliphate, although they would like very much for people to acknowledge that they are. They're an occupying force.

The airstrikes are intended to weaken Daesh's hold on occupied areas so they eventually can't hold them. They aren't building a bloody wall around the area and calling it a day. It just takes time.

Profiles in Chickenshit

Today was like watching an amazing case of "follow the leader", where state governor after state governor decided to Make! A! Political! Statement! that they would no-way, no-how, be accepting any Syrian refugees in their state. AL Gov. Bentley managed to combine his statement refusing to accept any Syrian refugees (which his state as of to date hasn't done) with a prayer for "those who have suffered loss." Nice. Syrian refugees have lost family, neighbors, their homes. He'll pray for them--but by the way, they can fuck off. A slew of other governors followed on this small-hearted and shallow-souled wake. (One even signifying on a Louie "Terror Babies" Gohmert level of ridiculousness.)

It's obscene that the Paris attacks, mostly carried out by people already French or Belgian citizens, are causing a problem for Syrian refugees, who did not do this. The one case where a Syrian passport was found near a suicide bomber (which was cited by TX Gov. Abbott, because of course a person can blow themselves up and their passport survives, and who doesn't take their passport to a suicide bombing?) it was very probably a fake.

And why would anyone do that? Because Daesh wants Westerners to reject Syrian refugees. They want to drive a wedge between people, polarizing them, eliminating the middle. Imagine, for example, what happens when Syrian people are turned away from a place to shelter. They are facing the possibility of returning home to die, because there are a lot of ways to die in Syria right now. They knew, depending upon the length and path of their route that they might be facing death anyway--and that this would be especially hard on children.

So in this great and generous, and some would even claim, Christian nation--what are these elected officials doing? Pretending to send people who are most likely no threat at all, and who are themselves under terrible threat, away from people in their states who they would like to convince they just did a wonderful brave thing for--because they are chickenshits. And they would rather fake leadership by making this basically annoying stand,  because the alternative is learning stuff and being decent and showing actual courage and compassion--and who even has time for that?

Because the people who make these mouth noises about how we can't really know who's who? Apparently have no clue that refugee application involves multi-agency inspections and can take 18-24 months to process. The US has only taken about 2000 people to date since 2012, and here's the scorecard on who is actually dangerous to our fellow Americans. Counting 9/11 as basically sui generis, you've got a lot of homegrown horrorshows. And here's my point--toddlers have, in any given year but 2001, killed more Americans than terrorists have. Take, like, any four American school-shooters, and you'd have an event that rivals the Paris attacks. The actual risk of a Syrian refugee actually turning out to be a Daesh operative is seriously low. It's ridiculous to angst over--

And in the meanwhile--think about the generation of Syrian youth who just got the message that we considered them disposable. Is that not radicalizing?

It's chickenshit. It's leading by following uninformed opinion. It's pants-pissing xenophobia and nationalistic signifying.

And Mike Huckabee wants Paul Ryan to step down if he doesn't stop the refugees from slowly dribbling in as they've been doing. And Ted Cruz wants to ensure that Syrian Muslims, specifically, are barred from entry. I can't imagine responses that would make Daesh happier, honestly. They couldn't be playing into what Daesh wants more if they tried. Are they that stupid? That pandering?

And what about the Authorization of Force against ISIL/Daesh Obama requested?

Right. Chickenshit.

When Babies Wash up on Western Shores

I will not link to stories about Aylan Kurdi or to the picture where this toddler lay, face down, on the Turkish coast. The story of the refugee family that was torn apart by the indecent difficulty of their struggle to escape a hell that was once called "home", is more than I can actually do. I think one would have to be made of stone not to be moved by the image of a baby washed up on the sand like so much flotsam, and one would have to be made of something far more foul to wonder what about that child or that family "made" that baby's lying there acceptable, or at least, inevitable.

There had to be a better life for this child. There had to be. There had to be, or else we are doing it wrong as a species. There had to be, or what can any of us expect? There should have been a home, stability, peace, and a future. And yet there was war, and want, and escape, and this west where no one wanted this baby.

This child.

Are we here to welcome them? Because for all we could not do to end the war in Syria, and all we may have inadvertently done, we can not help but see these legions as ours, when actions or inactions of ours have borne them across sea and sand. Do we fear those downturned faces, on our shores?

This is World Refugee Day

You should want to know about Muzoon, who is introduced to us by Khaled Hosseini, who is one of my favorite novelists--just brilliant, go and read The Kite Runner and  A Thousand Splendid Suns if you don't already know how good a novel can be.

It's easy for us westerners to talk about how sexist Muslim culture can be, but that a displaced girl like Muzoon can become an eloquent speaker for education and civil rights is outstanding (and that we also have Malala to compare her to.)

I want to read what she will have to say, and what the girls who are educated because of the efforts of young Muslim feminists like herself and Malala Yousufzai have to say regarding the society in which they live, and the ideas they have about molding it to their hearts' desire.

I support the access of refugees to expedited paths to citizenship and to access to means to practice their activism in this or any other recipient culture.