Today's administration: the Whites and the Blacks of it.

Tim Wise
6 hrs ·
Pandering to white workng folks post-election is fascinating. When white people are hurting economically we're supposed to feel their pain and "bring the jobs back" to their dying rural towns. But when people of color lack jobs in the cities (in large part because of the decline of manufacturing over 40 plus years, as well as discrimination) we tell them to "move," to go to school and gain new skills, and we lecture them on pulling themselves up by their bootstraps because the government doesn't owe them anything. But apparently we DO owe white coal miners and assembly line workers their jobs back because remember, out of work white men are "salt of the earth" while out of work people of color are lazy.

Yeah, to hell with that. Why aren't we asking white people to aspire to more? Maybe white West Virginians should demand something better than shitty mine jobs that give them black lung and kill them by 55. Maybe they should aim for higher than doing the same thing their great-grandaddy did...notice, people of color strive to better their situation from generation to generation, but we're supposed to praise white rural folks when they don't? And we condemn BLACK culture for being pathological and dysfunctional? Hell, no black parent back in the day ever said "I really hope that my grandchildren are doing the same thing I'm doing, because 'tradition'!" But it appears that's how some white folks think, and the rest of us are supposed to applaud that as heartwarming Americana, or evidence of strong families, or some such thing.

Make no mistake, we should make sure that everyone has access to remunerative employment or a guaranteed wage or guaranteed food/shelter and medicine. So I'm not saying we turn our backs on these white folks. We DO owe them for a lifetime of service in dangerous professions. But we have no obligation to pander to their desire to do anachronistic jobs just because they want them. Some jobs just aren't coming back, and some jobs shouldn't come back even if they could, given the ecological and health-related costs. These folks are no more entitled to "the way things were" than horse and buggy operators, or the folks who once worked in a typewriter ribbon plant, or the Liquid Paper factory. White male entitlement and expectationalism are what drive this white rage and Trumpist bullshit, and we need not indulge it for one more minute...

it is long past the time when white men are going to have to learn something that folks of color have always known: nothing is certain and nothing can be taken for granted; life is about change and disruption. And the minute you get comfortable and sleep on the way the world works, is the minute you go under. The privilege of not having to KNOW that -- and a long damned time ago -- is what has so many white folks shook right now.

The Ban

Most of this is from an old fellow Kitty Hawk sailor, Michael D. Lawrence.
He has nailed it well. I just wanted to keep it for good reference.
Scroll down to the five points, if nothing else.

This is from Michael.
As far as caring for others, I would suggest that it is not an "either or" situation. We can care for our own AND care for others simultaneously. When another nation suffers a disaster of some sort, we don't say "We'll help you as soon as we finish taking care of our own problems". No, we do both. And sometimes that means we sacrifice. I can care for my own family AND help out a stranger in need. As far as the risk posed by immigrants, there is always some risk in helping others to escape the threat to life that exists in their current situation.

We can accept refugees AND still not have to fear that some immigrant that looks, dresses, speaks, or worships differently than us is going to kill us and try to destroy America. There has always been a fear of immigrants and we have tried to stop them coming to America. The Chinese, the Catholics, the Jews, the Irish, the Mexicans, etc., etc., It's true there are extremists that see America as their enemy, and we should indeed take measures to ensure we don't allow them to come to America (although no process will be perfect and there will always be a chance of someone wanting to do harm to slip through). As it stands, the process for someone to come to America from the nations that the recent executive order intended to stop takes from 1 1/2 to 2 years to clear them for entry. If we feel it's necessary to make that process even more stringent, then we can do that. But clearly the way that EO tried to do so did not work and another process will need to be tried

There are at least five enormous differences between Trump’s executive order and what the Obama administration did.

1. Much narrower focus. The Obama administration conducted a review in 2011 of the vetting procedures applied to citizens of a single country (Iraq) and then only to refugees and applicants for Special Immigrant Visas (SIVs), created by Congress to help Iraqis (and later Afghans) who supported the United States in those conflicts. The Trump executive order, on the other hand, applies to seven countries with total population more than 130 million and to virtually every category of immigrant other than diplomats, including tourists and business travelers.

2. Not a ban. Contrary to Trump’s statement and the repeated claims of his defenders, the Obama administration did not “ban visas for refugees from Iraq for six months.” For one thing, refugees don’t travel on visas. More importantly, while the flow of Iraqi refugees slowed significantly during the Obama administration’s review, refugees continued to be admitted to the United States during that time, and there was not a single month in which no Iraqis arrived here. In other words, while there were delays in processing, there was no outright ban.

3. Grounded in specific threat. The Obama administration’s 2011 review came in response to specific threat information, including the arrest in Kentucky of two Iraqi refugees, still the only terrorism-related arrests out of about 130,000 Iraqi refugees and SIV holders admitted to the United States. Thus far, the Trump administration has provided no evidence, nor even asserted, that any specific information or intelligence led to its draconian order.

4. Orderly, organized process. The Obama administration’s review was conducted over roughly a dozen deputies and principals committee meetings, involving cabinet and deputy cabinet-level officials from all of the relevant departments and agencies — including the State, Homeland Security, and Justice departments — and the intelligence community. The Trump executive order was reportedly drafted by White House political officials and then presented to the implementing agencies after the fact. This is not just bad policymaking practice; it led directly to the confusion, bordering on chaos, that has attended implementation of the order by agencies that could only start asking questions (such as: “Does this apply to green card holders?”) once the train had left the station.

5. Far stronger vetting today. Much has been made of Trump’s call for “extreme vetting” for citizens of certain countries. The entire purpose of the Obama administration’s 2011 review was to enhance the already stringent vetting to which refugees and SIV applicants were subjected. While many of the details are classified, those rigorous procedures, which lead to waiting times of 18-24 months for many Iraqi and Syrian refugees, remain in place today and are continually reviewed by interagency officials. The Trump administration is, therefore, taking on a problem that has already been (and is continually being) addressed.

The Bottom line is: No immigration vetting system is perfect, no matter how “extreme.” President Obama often said his highest priority was keeping Americans safe. In keeping with America’s tradition and ideals, he also worked to establish a vetting system that worked more fairly and efficiently, particularly for refugees who are, by definition, in harm’s way. President Trump should defend his approach on its merits, if he can. We should not compare it to his predecessor’s.

The Trump administration wants us to be fearful. This is precisely how all authoritarian regimes of the past have controlled the people and forced their agenda through. That fear divides us and leads to distrust and hatred for each other. I would suggest that we not fall prey to these fear tactics that we have seen so many, many times in history.

This is from me:
As to the Ban? my thought is that it was conducted so utterly sloppily, by people who are not detail oriented but just wanted to make a big bang. Working on fear.

It screwed up a lot of good people who had already been thoroughly, effectively, vetted, and or had been contributing to our nation's welfare, it just affected a lot of people it shouldn't have. You would be hollering if you were walking in the moccasins of some of them.

There was already a thorough vetting process, rigorous and taking a long time, being used.

As to those from south of the border: Rubio's plan was ions more humane. But the current administration cares not who they hurt. You will see. I have never seen the like.


Steve Heller - captured for reference

Just glanced at the CNN news notifications on my iPad and they were as follows:

1:46pm: President Trump has "full confidence" in national security advisor Michael Flynn, according to top adviser Kellyanne Conway.

2:51pm: In new statement Sean Spicer says President Trump is "evaluating the situation" around security adviser Michael Flynn.

7:04pm: Source: DOJ warned Trump administration that Michael Flynn was potentially vulnerable to blackmail from Russia.

8:56pm: Michael Flynn has resigned as President Trump's national security adviser, two sources tell CNN.

Interesting and turbulent times, indeed.