Is Southern Border Truly Top Security Threat?

Over the past months, and especially over the period of the government shutdown, Donald Trump has tried to spin a narrative that the immigrants coming over the southern border is the most pressing security matter facing the nation.  It does not require this blog to splash cold water on such a ridiculous notion.   Of course, the southern border is not the Number one issue confronting the leaders of this nation as they consider where to place assets and spend critical time thinking about policy ideas.

Today on Face The Nation there was a short, and perfect summation about this matter.   David Sanger, reporter for The New York Times, nailed the ineffectiveness of Trump, when it comes to one who sits in the Oval Office, and is supposedly thinking about the national security needs of the nation.   The following also underscores the lies told by Trump, which have been allowed to take hold among the Trump base, but are proven not to be factual in the light of day.

I think– perhaps the most important, was the strategic cost. It really revealed, apart from the President’s sort of huge– uselessness of the exercise, it revealed an inability by this administration to prioritize about what our true security threats. Think of what Mick Mulvaney said to you. He said, “The President takes seriously– takes security at the nation– of the nation as his highest priority.” Well, on Tuesday, his intelligence chiefs are going to go out and do that annual exercise of laying out the security threats to– to the country, right, in an unclassified briefing. If it’s like the past five years, you know, cyber is number one, terrorism is number two, nuclear proliferation, rise of China, aggressiveness by Vladimir Putin, you get to border issues around page fourteen of last year’s, and, yet, he has spoken very little about the others.

The Southern Boarder is NOT a top national security concern. 

The reason, however, Trump uses the border and immigration as his rallying point for his base is due to the bias and bigotry which is baked into the DNA with that part of the Republican Party.  Racial chords have always played to a segment of the electorate, and sadly, we have seen at times it does work.   When it comes to the wall, and the disdain many in the GOP have for brown people, the only thing that can be said, which most can agree, is that it is truly a sad thing to witness.

But at the same time it can also be said the racial bigotry from the GOP has not been able to win the day.

The closing weeks of the 2018 mid-terms were an effort by Trump to scare the voters concerning all sorts of ‘dreadful things about to occur at the border’.  I am so proud the voters turned away from the hate, elected Democrats as the majority party in the House, and have placed a brake on the dangerous ideas peculating in Trump’s head.  The only wall that matters is the one that separates Trump’s desires from the taxpayer funds which are needed to make them happen.

Political Cartoons About The Wall And Government Shutdown

Nothing says it better about the political news than a well crafted political cartoon.

White Man (NOT Hispanic) Kills 5 With Gun In Louisiana

If it is Saturday it must be time for another wild act of gun madness in America.  What makes the news today even more top of the fold is that it comes less than 24 hours after Donald Trump made outrageous and racist remarks following his caving to national pressure and political reality over the government shutdown.

Listening to Trump made it seem all violence and mayhem, started and ended, with brown people who come to our borders and ‘sneak in’.  One could almost hear the dramatic music build in the background yesterday as Trump rallied his racist supporters, even though he had failed miserably to attain what had been boasted about in campaign appearances.

Today the nation is reminded that too much violence in the nation is committed by white angry men.  Not as the fear-mongers would have us believe, Hispanics.

Reports today from authorities in two parishes in Louisiana state five people have been shot, with the suspect, as of this posting, still at large.  The shootings happened in Ascension and Livingston parishes, about 70 miles west of New Orleans.

The suspect has been identified as Dakota Theriot, 21.  The gun man is, of course, white.  NOT Hispanic.

We will perhaps hear reports of how he was troubled and perhaps needing medical care for a mental illness.  And we will doubtless hear he had every right to own a gun and ammunition.  Lord knows the crazed NRA would not want to infringe on anyone’s right to grab a weapon.

And if the NRA can play this just right they can shamefully use the blood of the victims as a scare tactic as to why others should buy even more weapons so to ‘prevent other such crimes’.  The NRA is never far removed from making more money for their brethren in the gun manufacturing industry, ‘the merchants of death’.

Roger Stone Makes Me Want To Take Scalding Shower

Last night James and I watched the Netflix documentary, “Get Me Roger Stone” and it left me wanting to take a scalding shower.

Regardless of your party affiliation the under-mining of the political process and our institutions is cause for concern.  But with ruthlessness and glee Stone–in his own words–shows how he has lived a life that places him squarely on the dark side.

Older folks reading my blog likely recall during the Robert Dole’s presidential campaign the sex orgy story that came to light about Stone—eww. That story–with Stone’s confirmation of it–is part of the program.  Also is the story about the tattoo of Richard Nixon he wears proudly on his back.  There is no way to make this stuff up.

Stone is tacky and terrible–and a close friend to Donald Trump.

When Richard Nixon Foundation Wants To Distance Themselves From You….

From the Richard Nixon Foundation this evening.

This morning’s widely-circulated characterization of Roger Stone as a Nixon campaign aide or adviser is a gross misstatement. Mr. Stone was 16 years old during the Nixon presidential campaign of 1968 and 20 years old during the reelection campaign of 1972. 

Mr. Stone, during his time as a student at George Washington University, was a junior scheduler on the Nixon reelection committee. Mr. Stone was not a campaign aide or adviser. Nowhere in the Presidential Daily Diaries from 1972 to 1974 does the name “Roger Stone” appear.

Richard Nixon Did Not Show Skin With Victory Sign

Recently arrested Roger Stone told reporters today outside the courthouse in South Florida that he plans to plead not guilty and that he looked forward to “being fully and completely vindicated.”  His role in nefarious activities during the presidential election of 2016 will be his undoing.

While making a media spectacle was Stone’s goal, and he was most successful without a doubt, there was a moment today when some people gasped, others laughed, and still others cringed.  Stone threw up his arms in a V for victory salute reminiscent of his old idol, Richard Nixon.

The problem is that Nixon was able to carry off the gesture. Stone looked like a kid who was trying to wear his dad’s too-large sized clothes.  It was very foolish looking.

And then there was the fact that Nixon never showed skin with the move.  Stone—well–he did.

 

Good News About Morning Joe

Morning Joe is a weekday staple for many Americans.  We never miss the team in our home, and from the ratings, neither do you.

Joe, Mika, Willie, Mike, and the countless other faces which provide insight and institutional memory start off our days with conversation that matters.  Without pandering to any political party the dialogue is smart, peppered with facts and logic thus making it the perfect place for reasonable viewers to gain information.

It was announced today that Morning Joe just received the highest ratings in MSNBC’s 21-year history from 6-9 A.M.   Morning Joe’s audience was the only among their competitors to grow in 2018.

Awesome!  We will see them back on the air Monday.

 

DEAL! Shutdown To End With No Wall Funding

Public disapproval of Donald Trump has moved the White House to open government without wall funding. The public mood has swelled to outrage over shutdown as majority of Americans hold Trump, and Republicans responsible for the needless (and racially motivated) shutdown.

Public disapproval of Trump has grown five points to 58 percent over three months as a majority of Americans continue to hold him and congressional Republicans most responsible for the partial federal government shutdown, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

More than 1 in 5 Americans say they have been personally inconvenienced by the record-long shutdown, which reached the five-week mark Friday amid reports of turmoil at airports, slowdowns at the Internal Revenue Service and growing public pain as 800,000 federal workers, and many government contractors, go without pay.

That is why in minutes of this posting news will be made that Congressional leaders and Trump have reached a tentative deal to temporarily reopen government without wall funds.

As this blog has stated, the opening without wall funding, is the only way the matter could be handled.  Trump was not able to score points for holding nation hostage.  In the end this deplorable action has cost Trump and the GOP dearly.