Tag Archives: immigration

International news

Sh**hole story just keeps roiling

The sh**hole story is the gift that just keeps on giving.

Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen sat before a Senate committee today and couldn’t recall hearing Donald J. Trump use the term “sh**hole” to describe African nations, as well as Haiti and El Salvador.

Intelligence Committee members grilled her on what she heard. They queried about what Sen. Dick Durbin said he heard, as he attended the White House meeting on immigration.

Then came a curious response to a question from Sen. Patrick Leahy.

The president had said during the White House meeting that the United States needed to encourage more immigration from Norway, which Nielsen acknowledged during her testimony today.

“Norway is predominantly white, yes?” Leahy asked. Nielsen actually said — and I am not making this up — that she didn’t know about Norway’s predominant ethnic composition.

I am left to wonder … huh, are you kidding me?

The Homeland Security boss doesn’t know that a significant Scandinavian country comprises citizens who are, um, quite white? Many of them are blonde; they have blue eyes; they’re, um, nothing like the folks who come here from those “sh**hole countries.”

This story won’t go away.

Especially when the Trump administration keeps trotting Cabinet officers out who cannot respond to direct questions with equally direct answers.

national news

POTUS is at it again with Twitter ‘bullying’

Welcome to the president’s world of Twitter targets, U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin.

The Illinois Democrat has now been tagged “Dicky” by Donald John Trump Sr.

You see, Durbin stands by his assertion that Trump used the term “sh**hole” to describe Haiti, El Salvador and nations of Africa; he coined the label during a White House meeting on immigration. Durbin was present in the meeting. He said he heard it. He said Trump made that remark “repeatedly.”

Why do we get all these immigrants from “sh**hole countries,” the president reportedly said, adding that he preferred more immigration from “countries like Norway.”

The remark has drawn international scorn. Trump denies he said it. Sure thing, Mr. President. I believe you, just like I believed your claim that Barack Obama was born in Africa and couldn’t serve as president of the United States.

So, the guy who pledged to be the “most presidential” occupant of the White House in history after he took office has dredged up yet another Twitter nickname.

I think one might call this a form of Internet “bullying.”

Oh, that brings up a couple of questions: How about the first lady’s stated desire to make Internet bullying a hallmark during her time in the White House?

Have you had The Talk with your husband, Melania Trump?

national news

POTUS keeps telling us how smart, rich, non-racist he is

Heroes don’t brag about their heroic acts.

Geniuses don’t tell us how smart they are.

Great athletes — the late, great Muhammad Ali notwithstanding — don’t crow about their athletic prowess.

Wealthy folks don’t boast about their riches.

And non-racists don’t need to tell us they aren’t racist.

So … why does Donald John “Stable, Rich, Non-Racist Genius” Trump Sr. insist on reminding us of his myriad admirable qualities?

The president stood alongside a fellow Republican this past weekend, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, and told us that he is “not a racist. I am the least racist person you have ever interviewed.” The response was directed, I presume, at a reporter who had asked Trump “Are you a racist?”

I am baffled by this president’s insistence on reminding us of the things that need no reminder.

The racist label has been given new prominence in the wake of Trump’s statement about immigrants coming here from “s**thole countries” that, by the way, happen to be populated by citizens with dark skin. This statement attributed to the president, of course, follows a distinct pattern of disparagement and disrespect of certain individuals and institutions.

So, he tells us he is “not a racist.” Big … deal! His actions and his myriad utterances over many years suggest something quite different.

He bellows about how rich he is. Then he refuses to release his tax returns, ignoring a custom followed by presidential nominees for the past 40 years. Those returns would tell us whether he is as rich as he claims to be.

And his intelligence? Well, he keeps yapping about how he knows “the best words,” and how he attended the “best college,” where he was an academic star. Just wondering: Has anyone seen this guy’s college transcript?

As CNN’s Chis Cillizza has noted, the president clearly is “overcompensating” for what appear to be some serious shortcomings.

My own view is that someone who tells you he is the “best” at anything, he usually isn’t. If he has to remind us that he is “not a racist,” well, you know …

International news, national news

An ’embarrassment’? Yeah, do ya think?

Chuck Hagel isn’t your run-of-the-mill Donald John Trump critic.

He once served as defense secretary for President Obama. Oh, but wait! The man isn’t a squishy liberal. He also is a former Republican senator from Nebraska, one of the many states known to be rock-ribbed, red-state Republican bastions. Hagel also is a Vietnam War veteran, serving there in the U.S. Army. He’s been in battle and knows its consequences.

So, when Chuck Hagel calls the president an “embarrassment” to the nation, well, I tend to listen to him.

Hagel sat down with the Lincoln (Neb.) Star-Journal in which he unloaded on the president. He tore into him for his reported “sh**hole countries” comment describing Haiti, El Salvador and nations in Africa that account for many immigrants coming into the United States.

“Donald Trump is doing great damage to our country internationally,” Hagel told the newspaper.

He said lawmakers take an oath to defend the Constitution and not stand blindly behind any individual or their political party. “I was philosophically a Republican with a conservative voting record,” Hagel said, “but that did not mean I would always go along with the party.”

So, he’s not going along. He is speaking from his heart and telling us what’s on his mind. Moreover, he is speaking for a lot of his fellow Americans — such as yours truly — when he tells us that the president is embarrassing us.

I happen to be embarrassed — and ashamed — by the conduct of the man who is our head of state.

Thus, I share Secretary/Sen. Hagel’s pain.

national news

‘I am not a racist’ Oh, really?

Donald J. Trump says it clearly and with seeming conviction.

“I am not a racist. I am the least racist person you’ve ever interviewed,” said the president of the United States.

OK, then. That settles it, right? Trump isn’t a racist. He didn’t actually question Barack Obama’s place of birth and his legitimacy as president; he didn’t actually call those countries in Africa, as well as Haiti and El Salvador “sh**holes”; he didn’t actually say an Indiana-born federal judge couldn’t decide a case involving Trump University because “he’s a Mexican.”

Well, I believe the president’s denial of racist leanings reminds many of us the time President Nixon told us “I am not a crook.” We know how that turned out in the 1970s, yes?

Trump has taken a tremendous amount of criticism for his sh**hole comment, which he reportedly made during a White House meeting on immigration.

This blog has used the “racist” term, too, to describe the president’s leanings. Indeed, the record that includes a large body of demonstrable evidence of racial bias can be used as a counterweight to the president’s assertion that he doesn’t harbor bias against people who don’t look like him.

The sh**hole comment about nations that produce immigrants to the United States — coupled with an assertion that the United States needs to encourage more immigration from “countries like Norway” — only fuels the fire that’s burning close the White House.

Donald Trump can tell us all he wants that he is not a racist. The lengthy record of previous pronouncements, though, tells us something quite different.

national news

Who can we believe regarding POTUS’s gutter mouth?

It’s come down to this: No longer can I take a single thing that Donald John Trump Sr. says at face value.

I do not believe unequivocally a single statement he can make.

Take his recent use of the term “sh**hole” to describe Africa, Haiti and El Salvador. He denies saying it. This morning, Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., who was in the room when the president said it actually stood with Trump in his denial.

Others in the room — Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Dick Durbin, D-Ill. — said Trump used the term. Durbin said he uttered the term “repeatedly” while talking about immigration.

Trump’s lying is so pervasive, so inclusive, so very disturbing that I’ve crossed a key threshold that now casts into doubt every single utterance that flies out of his mouth.

My state of disbelief rivals how I used to feel about a one-time Amarillo, Texas, figure. I refer to the late Stanley Marsh 3, the eccentric millionaire artisan/lawyer/goofball who in his day did some mighty strange things.

The Weather Channel came here in the early 2000s to cover a weather-related event and while the TV weatherman was on the air, Marsh — while wearing a feathered head dress — started prancing around in the background doing some sort of Native American dance.

Marsh was the strangest of strange dudes. It got so weird that there came a time when there wasn’t a single thing one could say about Marsh that I could dismiss out of hand.

“Hey, did you hear that Stanley flew to Mars and brought a Martian back to Earth with him.” I always felt in the deepest part of my gut, “You know … I wouldn’t put it past him.”

And so it is with Donald Trump. The man has been heard in public using filthy language. He referred to pro football players protesting police conduct against African-Americans as “sons of bi*****. ” He has used what my father used to call “the functional four-letter word” on more than one occasion since becoming a politician. He has done the same with the scatological term as well.

So, when he denies calling certain nations of the world “sh**hole” countries, well … I don’t believe his denial.

The man is a liar.

media news, national news

No such thing as ‘off the record’

Michael Smerconish is a smart commentator and CNN TV host.

He offered a prime piece of political wisdom this morning when he said, “There’s no such thing as ‘off the record.'”

There it is. A lesson that no doubt has not been lost on the “stable genius” who sits in the Oval Office of the White House. Donald Trump clearly knew that when he described African nations and Haiti as “sh**hole countries” would be picked up and flashed around the world.

As Smerconish noted today, seemingly everyone has a smart phone equipped with a camera and a recording device.

When the president blurts out a racist comment, or when he makes declarations that are sure to offend millions of Americans — let alone billions of other world inhabitants — he is speaking only to a narrow audience: his political base, the 30-some percent of Americans who stand with him no matter what.

As Smerconish noted today, Barack Obama was caught telling a fundraising crowd that many Americans “cling to their guns” and their religious faith; four years later, Mitt Romney was overheard telling a crowd that “47 percent of Americans” who live on government programs will vote for President Obama “no matter what.”

The world is listening to these politicians.

I get that Trump’s sh**hole comments aren’t a precise parallel to the examples cited already. Still, Donald Trump called an entire continent a place full of “sh**hole” countries populated by dark-skinned people. Lawmakers heard him say it and have declared they heard it. Such a statement sounds pretty damn racist to me.

He has offended millions of Americans.

Trump doesn’t care. His base hangs with him.

national news

Does the president ever surprise us?

The more I think about it, the less surprised I get over the epithet that flew out of Donald John Trump’s mouth earlier this week.

I refer to his questioning why the United States accepts immigrants from “sh**hole countries” such as Haiti and those in Africa.

African Union member states have called on a retraction and an apology from the president of the United States. Democratic politicians in this country are howling about the racist-sounding rant the president leveled during a White House meeting to discuss immigration issues.

But this comment merely is the latest in a disturbing pattern of behavior that Trump has demonstrated for many years.

He questioned Barack Obama’s legitimacy as president; he called white supremacists, Klansmen and neo-Nazis “very fine people”; he said an Indiana-born federal judge couldn’t adjudicate a case because of his Mexican heritage; he has attacked a Muslim Gold Star family; he called Mexican immigrants criminals; he called for a ban on all Muslims entering this country.

And on and on it goes. Seemingly forever.

He cannot control his impulse to denigrate groups of people. He seems always inclined to target darker-skinned people or non-Christians. He plays solely to his political base.

Why is it a surprise, then, that he would blurt out an epithet about “sh**hole countries comprising dark-skinned citizens?

It’s not. The surprise would come if Trump ever could find a way to offer a word of kindness and compassion for those who want to come here in search of a better life.

I do not expect that from Donald Trump.

national news

Once more … about immigrants

I cannot resist offering another comment on that unpresidential epithet about immigrants from Haiti and Africa.

It might be my final comment. Then again, maybe not.

Donald John “Stable Genius” Trump’s fit of pique earlier this week about immigrants who come here from s***hole countries hits me personally.

I am a direct descendant of Americans who chose to come to this country from a part of the world that once was considered a s***hole. All four of my grandparents were ethnic Greeks. They risked all they had to come to this country in the early 20th century.

What I haven’t discussed in this blog is how Greeks were treated by other immigrant groups with whom they lived in the Land of Opportunity. Perhaps you are aware that groups such as the Ku Klux Klan sought to intimidate Greeks who had settled in the United States. The Klan considered Greeks to be, um, subpar.

I will not equate what happened to those early Greek-Americans with what the Klan did to African-Americans at the time, or even to Vietnamese immigrants who came to this country in the 1970s after the end of the Vietnam War. Please know, though, that some Americans thought little of immigrants who came here from southern Europe.

They were thought to be from a s***hole place.

Discussion about immigration always catches my attention. It is because I grew up with a keen awareness of my ethnic background. My grandmothers particularly were keen to instruct my sisters and me about our heritage.

They were proud Greeks and they imbued that pride in all of their grandchildren.

So, when the president of the United States disparages immigrants who come here willingly from s***hole nations, he raises my hackles. Donald Trump’s racist ignorance might not raise the hackles of other Americans. Whatever. We all have our own consciences and I wouldn’t dare interject my own values into another American’s heart or mind.

I simply will express my utter outrage that the leader of the world’s greatest nation has chosen to play favorites with those who want to craft a better life for themselves and their descendants.

My grandparents would be appalled.

***

Here is part of the inscription inside the base of the Statue of Liberty:

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

The president has dishonored those time-honored words.

International news

Memo to Carlson: POTUS mustn’t talk like that

1 Comment

I certainly expected right-wing TV host Tucker Carlson to give Donald Trump a pass on his “s***hole” comment about Haiti and nations in Africa.

The Fox News host/commentator said the president “something almost every person in America agrees with.” Trump, as you know by now, griped out loud during a White House meeting on immigration about the nation accepting so many immigrants from “s***hole” countries; he mentioned Haiti and those in the continent of Africa. He then lamented whether the United States should encourage more immigration from “countries like Norway.”

I will not argue the point about the quality of life in the nations Trump disparaged in such a reprehensible manner, except to say that the people who live there deserve a level of respect that Donald Trump is incapable of giving them.

However, I want to make a point about what Carlson said in response to the president’s hideous remarks.

Whether “almost every person in American agrees” with what Trump said totally misses a critical point.

I am one American who believes that presidents of the United States shouldn’t make such statements in public. I cannot prevent presidents from thinking such things. However, for crying out loud, the current president needs to exercise some semblance of discretion when discussing issues of keen importance to the United States of America.

That he would make such a ghastly statement reveals what many of us have believed all along about the president: Donald Trump is an ignorant racist.

So, to Tucker Carlson, I will say: Read my lips, young man. I don’t give a damn what you might think of some portions of the rest of the world … but I certainly do care when the leader of my beloved country pops off like a tinhorn thug.