Category Archives: Immigration
Elephant In Debate Room
CNN says Hillary Clinton won the debate. Donald Trump disagrees but most other polls aren’t backing him up, so far.
Trump seemed to get the best of Hillary in the first 30 minutes when they tangled over trade rules. He caught her on the wrong side of President Obama’s Trans-Pacific Trade Deal, pointing out that she had called it the “gold standard.” Hillary denied this and then replied it wasn’t her responsibility and that she had changed her mind. So Trump insisted that she say it was Obama’s fault:
TRUMP: You called it the gold standard of trade deals. You said it’s the finest deal you’ve ever seen.
CLINTON: No.
TRUMP: And then you heard what I said about it, and all of a sudden you were against it.
CLINTON: Well, Donald, I know you live in your own reality, but that is not the facts. The facts are — I did say I hoped it would be a good deal, but when it was negotiated…
TRUMP: Not.
CLINTON: … which I was not responsible for, I concluded it wasn’t. I wrote about that in my book…
TRUMP: So is it President Obama’s fault?
CLINTON: … before you even announced.
TRUMP: Is it President Obama’s fault?
CLINTON: Look, there are differences…
TRUMP: Secretary, is it President Obama’s fault?
CLINTON: There are…
TRUMP: Because he’s pushing it.
CLINTON: There are different views about what’s good for our country, our economy, and our leadership in the world. And I think it’s important to look at what we need to do to get the economy going again. That’s why I said new jobs with rising incomes, investments, not in more tax cuts that would add $5 trillion to the debt.
At that point Trump seemed to be mopping the floor with her. But Hillary quickly got under his skin by trashing his business acumen and ethics.
She took a page from the Harry Reid playbook to claim Trump doesn’t pay income taxes. Incredibly, The Donald seemed to agree by saying, “it makes me smart.” For the record, PolitiFact doesn’t agree. It rates her claim mostly false.
But after that Trump seemed Low Eenergy.
Elephant In Debate Room
The elephant in debate room was the fact that Immigration, Benghazi, and the Clinton Foundation didn’t make the cut. Those issues were never brought up by moderator Lester Holt or Trump.
Unburdened of that baggage, Hillary dragged her prey off into the tall grass. There she dismembered the small handed one with accusations of racism and sexism.
She claimed the Stop and Frisk law was ruled unconstitutional and moderator Holt backed her up. She also insisted the murder rate continues to decline. In truth, Stop and Frisk was never ruled unconstitutional. And the FBI released a report the next morning showing the murder rate had surged 10.8% in 2015.
Hillary went on to back up her racism charge using Tulsa and Charlotte as “tragic examples.” Trump lacked the energy to point out that Black people rioted in Charlotte where a black man was killed by a black police officer who worked for a black police chief.
Hillary’s Alt-Right Conspiracy Theory
In a speech on Thursday, Hillary updated her Vast Right-Wing conspiracy theory to an Alt-Right conspiracy theory. As a result The NYT reports the actual Alt-Right is thrilled.
Race Card
The speech was an attempt to trump Trump with the race card. She also accused The Donald of subscribing to dark conspiracy theories.
Putin Card
Then she played the Putin card by theorizing that Vladimir Putin is the “Godfather of this global brand of extreme nationalism.”
By Friday afternoon the news was focused back on the Clinton Foundation. Paul Joseph Watson has a great YouTube sendup of Hillary’s speech, tinfoil hat and all, here.
Words Matter
For a guy who’s all about narratives President Obama doesn’t seem to think words matter anymore.
He still refuses to use the term “radical Islam“. He says it wouldn’t make any difference. On Tuesday he angrily asked, “What exactly would it accomplish? What exactly would it change?”
The WSJ editorial board thanked him for asking and answered his question:
If the U.S. is under attack, Americans deserve to hear their President say exactly who is attacking us and why. You cannot effectively wage war, much less gauge an enemy’s strengths, without a clear idea of who you are fighting.
Mr. Obama’s refusal to speak of “radical Islam” also betrays his failure to understand the sources of Islamic State’s legitimacy and thus its allure to young Muslim men. The threat is religious and ideological.
Islamic State sees itself as the vanguard of a religious movement rooted in a literalist interpretation of Islamic scriptures that it considers binding on all Muslims everywhere. A small but significant fraction of Muslims agree with that interpretation, which is why Western law enforcement agencies must pay more attention to what goes on inside mosques than in Christian Science reading rooms.
Words Matter
During the 2008 campaign Hillary Clinton dismissed Obama’s gift for gab as “just words.” Obama responded with this speech:
“Don’t tell me words don’t matter: ‘I have a dream,’ just words? ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal,’ just words? ‘There is nothing to fear, except fear itself,’ just words?’”
Obama Bashes Brexit
President Obama threatened Britons who favor a Brexit. A Brexit would be a British exit from the European Union in a referendum coming up June 23. Obama said if the UK leaves the EU it would have to move the back of the queue if it wants to do a trade deal with the US.
Obama prefers to deal with undemocratic bureaucrats in Brussels rather than Britons who prefer to retain their sovereignty in London. He claims it could take 10 years to reach a trade deal with an independent UK.
Obama’s intervention enraged London Mayor Boris Johnson who claimed Obama’s Kenyan background makes him hostile to the British Empire. That remark hi-lighted the special relationship between American and British students. Johnson was disinvited from a debate on the Brexit. British students also favor “safe spaces” to protect them from unpleasant ideas.
The Wall Street Journal points out that what Obama thinks may not matter since he’s a short termer.
Ford Plant in Mexico
There’s a new Ford plant in Mexico. Presumably Mexicans will stay in Mexico to work there instead of sneaking into this country to steal jobs here.
Donald Trump calls that an “absolute disgrace”.
