What a got damn shitshow. [warning politics]

[SUP Leave]

SUP leave, do you carry a US passport or certified birth certificate with you at all times. Next time you're stopped for a broken taillight, would you be able to produce documents on the spot that proves you are in the US legally? Think it won't happen? Ask the passengers that were deplaning in NY from a domestic flight.

Great point. I think most will not consider unintended consequences before it hits them in the face. The poor vetting of executive orders is unnerving to me.

I still wonder where Stone's boundaries are. How many people in the government can have secret meetings with Russia before it seems like a pattern worth investigating?

I agree with what you are both saying here. There will be annoyance, tragedy and heartbreak as a result of the EO.

My argument is that it is bad politics to govern from the point of empathy for an individual or small group (sounds terrible right?). The point being that while empathy towards a certain group or person makes a lot of sense, it may be unfair to the remainder of the governed.

Trump has no empathy for anyone except himself, and so we will see how it plays out.

I actually have personal tragedy semi-related to the EO. Long story short, a young man I am friends with/mentored is in ICE jail and going to be deported. He made a bad decision and because he was an alien there is no recourse it seems, even though very expensive lawyers have been involved. The thing is, he was destined for deportation 3 or 4 months before the election. The immigration laws haven't changed one iota since Obama was president.

[yugi]

Years ago I read that countries that do well on livability/health/education/etc. indexes share the trait of being homogenous societies, and it seems true when you think of which countries those are--especially the low-population Scandinavian ones.  The idea was that it's easier to run a country successfully when you don't have large cultural, religious or other differences among the population.  In contrast, it's a lot harder in a place like the U.S., with a large, diverse population.   Somewhere like Norway or Denmark in respect to size or diversity is more comparable to Minnesota than it is to the entire U.S., and Minnesota is certainly easier to run than the U.S.


But over the last several years, as those idyllic-in-comparison-to-here countries take on immigrants, it looks like things like racism weren't absent from them because people weren't racist, but because there just weren't many people of other races for racism to show itself.  As those countries become more diverse, they may become more comparable to the U.S., and may start having problems more similar to what the U.S. has been known for for decades.

Ahhh… but you fail to understand that Scandinavian countries have always had each other to hate and be racist about. It’s practically a sport.

And then you have Switzerland where it’s way beyond sport. They really do hate each other. Hell, they don’t even speak the same language.

Yet Scandinavia and Switzerland rank high in happiest countries.  Maybe it’s because they always have had someone to wail on and have all their frustrations let out. I think that’s a better theory.

Or maybe massive consumption of beer could explain things.

Hey, how about Casper crossing from Denmark to Norway in mid winter? You seen this? Crazy vikings. You can brush up on your Danish while watching this...

http://www.redbull.com/dk/da/surfing/stories/1331847229001/viking-crossing-en-kamp-mod-moder-jord 

[lucabrasi]

Or maybe massive consumption of beer could explain things

if nothing else it might explain late night postings of old rock videos as a commercial break in a political thread.
Fosters. Now that's a beer.

[yugi]

Danish workers have rights and they stand up and fight for them!

   http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/foodanddrinknews/7569596/Carlsberg-workers-on-strike-because-of-beer-ban.html

[Tom]

SUP leave, do you carry a US passport or certified birth certificate with you at all times. Next time you're stopped for a broken taillight, would you be able to produce documents on the spot that proves you are in the US legally? Think it won't happen? Ask the passengers that were deplaning in NY from a domestic flight.

Great point. I think most will not consider unintended consequences before it hits them in the face. The poor vetting of executive orders is unnerving to me.

I still wonder where Stone's boundaries are. How many people in the government can have secret meetings with Russia before it seems like a pattern worth investigating?

I agree with what you are both saying here. There will be annoyance, tragedy and heartbreak as a result of the EO.

My argument is that it is bad politics to govern from the point of empathy for an individual or small group (sounds terrible right?). The point being that while empathy towards a certain group or person makes a lot of sense, it may be unfair to the remainder of the governed.

Trump has no empathy for anyone except himself, and so we will see how it plays out.

I actually have personal tragedy semi-related to the EO. Long story short, a young man I am friends with/mentored is in ICE jail and going to be deported. He made a bad decision and because he was an alien there is no recourse it seems, even though very expensive lawyers have been involved. The thing is, he was destined for deportation 3 or 4 months before the election. The immigration laws haven't changed one iota since Obama was president.

Here's how the law is now being enforced.
http://abc7news.com/news/undocumented-dad-taken-by-ice-while-dropping-kids-off-at-school/1783553/

UNDOCUMENTED DAD TAKEN BY ICE WHILE DROPPING KIDS OFF AT SCHOOL

Friday, March 03, 2017 01:30PM
HIGHLAND PARK, LOS ANGELES -- While being dropped off at school with her sisters, 13-year-old Fatima Avelica recorded her undocumented father being picked up by agents with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Romulo Avelica-Gonzalez had been in the country for 20 years with four children, two of whom are grown.
The ICE officials, who wore police jackets, took the 48-year-old father into custody as he dropped his girls off at school in Highland Park on Tuesday.
"It's really hard what we're going through," Avelica-Gonzalez's daughter Brenda Avelica said. "I never thought we'd actually go through something like this. It's terrible to feel and see your family being broken apart."
Executive director of the Highland Park charter school Academia Avance, Ricardo Mireles, brought together about two dozen people to support the family.
"I think the impacts are going to come in terms of, 'Hey, how do we pay the rent? And how do we move forward?'" Mireles said. "We want to be able to find resources to help this family go through this process."
Mireles said the girls' father had a nearly decade-old DUI conviction and an incident 20 years ago where the father said he bought a car with an incorrect registration sticker, unbeknownst to him. Both were reasons given for the deportation.

An attorney for the family was attempting to file paperwork for a U-visa, which would allow Avelica-Gonzalez to remain in the country.

ICE released this statement about the incident:

Officers with one of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Los Angeles-based Fugitive Operations teams took Mr. Avelica into custody Tuesday morning. Mr. Avelica was targeted for arrest because relevant databases indicate he has multiple prior criminal convictions, including a DUI in 2009, as well an outstanding order of removal dating back to 2014. After conducting surveillance to confirm his identity, the officers arrested Mr. Avelica during a vehicle stop in the 3200 block of Pasadena Avenue, approximately a half mile from the charter school described in the related social media post. No one else was detained during the vehicle stop. Mr. Avelica remains in ICE custody at this time.

Also, concerning 'empathy for the individual'  The bill of rights have one thing in common, all 10 are concerning rights of the individual, not the well being or rights of remainder.

[pdxmike]

You can also look at it in a pragmatic way, separate from empathy.  If you take cases like Tom's example, what are the consequences?  Could be deportation in this case, which I'd assume was the goal of picking him up.  But along with it may come more likelihood of others here illegally going off the radar.  Do you show up for required check-ins?  Keep your kids in school?  Call the police if you witness a crime?  Stay at the scene of an accident?  What happens to family members left here without their breadwinner, or kids left without their dad?  Do they become a new cost to society?

It seems you have to balance the intended consequences with the unintended.  Surely the chance to deport a murderer or rapist outweighs the unintended, negative consequences.  Picking up someone whose only illegality was having parents who brought them here illegally when they were seven doesn't outweigh them.  Other cases are somewhere in between.

It's like adding tariffs or taxes.  You have to factor in changes in behavior that will reduce tax revenue, countermeasures by other countries that may offset any good the tariffs do, etc.

[supthecreek]

RE Toms tear jerker "story"
Ok…. cuz you are so horrified by this bit of raw meat, bullshit story... I am compelled to jump in.

As always, the oh so empathetic left, focus ONLY on the plight of the poor family of the “undocumented DAD”

This story has been written with only ONE goal…. to drum up more hate for President Trump and conservatives.

Leave out enough information and cleverly word it to make the casual reader horrified and angry.
THAT is the stories ONLY purpose… and you fall for it. Every time.

Occasionally, try reading these stories with some honest intellectual curiosity.

So…
at the bottom of the story is the cause for arrest:

"Mr. Avelica was targeted for arrest because relevant databases indicate he has multiple prior criminal convictions, including a DUI in 2009, as well an outstanding order of removal dating back to 2014."


Hard to google what the prior (unnamed) criminal convictions were, but they are conveniently left out.
Ok… so, we got OUI… not so bad right?

Why break up the poor hardworking  family over that minor OUI offense, right?
Bullshit!

My curiosity turned up some lengthy research done by an angry American DAD, of a KID killed by an Illegal Immigrant  while OUI:

“As many as 7,500 Americans -- 20 per day -- are killed annually by unlicensed drivers, and Rosenberg calculates that more than half, are the victims of illegal immigrants. Now, by testifying before lawmakers, speaking to parents who have been through the same ordeal and posting his research on his nonprofit’s website, unlicensedtodrive.org, Rosenberg is shedding light on a frightening number not readily available from government sources.”


That’s over 3000 people killed in the US each year, by illegal immigrants….. many of them OUI…. most of them unlicensed and uninsured.

The government has purposefully and willfully, refused to track the criminal offenses by illegal immigrants.
Apparently, immigration status is only pertinent, when trying to drum up sympathy.

“Our archives are filled with stories of drunk-driving illegals killing U.S. citizens,” William Gheen, of the Americans for Legal Immigration Political Action Committee, told FoxNews.com. “It is our official estimate that more than 3,000 U.S citizens lose their lives each year due to the insufficient enforcement of our existing border and immigration law.”




BOTTOM LINE:
I don’t break any laws, because I have kids.

If I broke the law…. I would expect to get arrested. No one, no newspaper story, no political party.. would come to MY defense.
My kids don’t want me arrested… it would suck.

SO…. ever since my kids were born…. I have NEVER had more than ONE drink in a day….EVER ….. because I didn’t want to get arrested. (and I owned a bar for 30 years)

IT”S FRICKING SIMPLE… if you don’t want to be arrested…. don’t break the law.

Being a DAD is NOT a free pass for ME…. why should it be for an illegal immigrant?

Your blind, manipulated empathy toward stories like this, is disturbing.

[lucabrasi]

Guilt and shame in the media? Really?
You think there are any stories just as sad over the last 5 years that were not covered?
Nah......

Oh my.........the decisions we are faced with now.

" Consumer behavior experts say under a Trump presidency these reactions make sense."
http://time.com/money/4687575/why-ivanka-trump-clothing-is-presenting-a-major-closet-conflict-for-women/?xid=homepage

we mustn't forget the therapists whose schedules are more full than ever. Just overwhelmed.
I wonder if anyone has brought up to their therapist that they have just discovered they had Ivanka stuff?

as pdx alludes to or says.......the thing about laws or rules......they need to be wrote in black and white but when you put those together it's gray.

[Area 10]

STC - 10% of all US road fatalities caused by illegal immigrants? If records aren't kept, as you claim, then how is this figure known?

And anyway, if 90% of road fatalities do NOT involve "illegal immigrants" then you'll probably find that twice as many are killed by soccer moms. Is deporting soccer moms going to help the situation?

It sounds to me like these numbers are just being plucked from the air, and you are probably being every bit as manipulated as those you criticise. It's the easiest vote in the world to win right now: angry old white guys.

[freetobeme]

Lead Birther

And

Now

Paranoid Golfer, err I mean World Leader. 

How does anyone take this dude seriously? I don't get it.


http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/03/04/518478158/president-trump-accuses-obama-of-wire-tapping-provides-no-evidence

[freetobeme]

Assuming those stats are spot on.

3,000 deaths for a population of 319,000,000. Im sure America will carry on. Besides I need my avocado for my morning toast. 

Id be willing to bet a mortgage payment that texting and not obeying stop signs and speed limits by white American males cause far more fatalities. Add alcohol and my stats would skyrocket. 


Personally, I much prefer the folly of the human condition to the blatant and abrupt divisive policies of our oligarchy.

[surf4food]

And anyway, if 90% of road fatalities do NOT involve "illegal immigrants" then you'll probably find that twice as many are killed by soccer moms. Is deporting soccer moms going to help the situation?

What if we convert them to SUP moms?

[PonoBill]

On the one hand, I find Creek's concern about 3000 deaths (potentially invented) to be startlingly inconsistent, but still, this story is horseshit. An illegal alien with a DUI and a removal order? Why wasn't he gone long ago?

[surf4food]

It sounds to me like these numbers are just being plucked from the air, and you are probably being every bit as manipulated as those you criticise. It's the easiest vote in the world to win right now: angry old white guys.

Even though my own politics lean left for the most part, STC does bring up a valid point that there are always two sides to every story.  I also question where those statistics came from and also think it's a stretch that he's never broken the law since having kids or had more than on drink in a day EVER since having kids (not even at home?), but Mr. Avelica did sort of bring this on himself.  I would think that someone who's is here illegally would be walking on eggshells just to keep a low profile. 

[surf4food]

On the one hand, I find Creek's concern about 3000 deaths (potentially invented) to be startlingly inconsistent, but still, this story is horseshit. An illegal alien with a DUI and a removal order? Why wasn't he gone long ago?

That's what I was thinking.  If he was actually convicted of a DUI, not to mention if he was here illegally and therefore would not be able to even get a license, how was he not departed back then? 
So much does not add up.