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 Peregrine wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Sanctuary Citys are breaking the law by Aiding and Abetting a fugitive from federal justice.

No. Remember, sanctuary cities aren't providing any active assistance to immigrants in evading federal justice, they are merely refusing to provide assistance to the federal government. Or are you now going to make the argument that state and local police departments are under the authority of the federal government and must provide work (without financial compensation for their labor) as directed by the federal government? Shall we extend this principle to individuals too, and charge anyone who does not provide full cooperation and answer every question the police ask with aiding and abetting a fugitive? Are the police allowed to declare that you are now an unpaid slave of the police department and order you to perform whatever labor they require? I'm sure this won't produce any issues with a police state...

You'll maybe recall Garcia Zarate. The guy that was arrested in San Francisco on a lesser charge, and then when San Francisco authorities heard that ICE was coming to pick him up released him. He then later "accidentally" killed that women with a handgun.

That was pretty blatant obstruction of federal immigration enforcement by releasing him before they could get there. And it cost a women her life. How he got acquitted of that murder charge I don't understand.

IMO, that is blatant assistance given to an illegal alien.

 BaronIveagh wrote:

 Jadenim wrote:
So I guess this will turn into the USA offering to remove tariffs if the rest of the G7 stop subsidising key industries.

I predict Hell levying a tariff on Snow Blowers before that happens.

Speaking of proof and evidence, a court has ruled that the EPA must present the science which shows that humans are NOT causing climate change.


https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/judge-orders-epa-to-produce-science-behind-pruitts-warming-claims/

Bravo.

 LordofHats wrote:


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
Yeah, when I read that bit about "no subsidies", I pictured quite a lot of American farmers suddenly turning very pale and worried.

In my own experience, farmers are habitually in denial how dependent what they do is on government money. Something about bootstraps and such and those damn city folk always giving out money to minorities or something. SO I wouldn't be remotely shocked if they maintained that line right into the financial grave.

[/size]
Look no further than the Ethanol Mandate™ or the Sugar Subsidy.

Trumps behaviour at the G7 is fething unacceptable. I hope we treat the US with the same contempt it has shown us, in future.

It Trump, not the USA, which deserves to be treated with contempt.

I simply hope the USA and the modern system of international organisation can survive Trump.

The USA is fond of telling the rest of the world that it is a democracy with government for the people, of the people and by the people. The people of the USA are culpable in the behaviour of their democratically elected leader, certainly more so than the people of Afghanistan or Iraq were in their autocratic leaders. The people of Iraq and Afghanistan were collectively punished by the US for their leaders actions and I do not recall much in the way of upset about that, only upset about how it might impact "the troops". So I do not have sympathy anymore for the argument that the people of the US should not be held responsible for the actions of their government.

As to the system of international organisation, I dunno. I want us all to stop kowtowing to the US, it is humiliating and inappropriate.

The people of the USA didn't elect Trump. He lost the popular vote.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The people of the USA didn't elect Trump. He lost the popular vote.

We elected him. Popular vote or not, he won the election by the methods we have set. I am absolutely on board with the US suffering the downsides because we as a people need to have it drilled through our heads that like it or not we are one country. The whole 'not my president' is the sort of us vs them mentality that got us the craphole of politics we have.

I go back to my classic example of the guy jumping into the cactus. Maybe one arm and leg tried to stop him, but the other arm and leg still dragged him into a thorney doom while the torso sat there and said 'they're both bad'.

We elected what we deserved.

I don't believe it is necessary to bring the western world crashing down to convince Trumpists that they are wrong, and actually I"m not sure they wouldn't find a way to blame someone else when it happened.

For now, concentrate on the mid-term elections. Then concentrate on stopping Trump from a second term.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The people of the USA didn't elect Trump. He lost the popular vote.

Incorrect.

We have 50 popular votes... not 1 popular vote.

The fact that we don't directly elect the POTUS doesn't mean "the people" didn't elect Trump. "The people" in those 50 states certainly did.

Also, speaking of the G7, I find this picture illuminating:

David Mack
✔
@davidmackau
15h
Angela Merkel's office has released this photo taken today at the G7, which tells you a lot about how things went. pic.twitter.com/IXX6K3ayys

BOTH sides can claim what they want when they see here....

When people say "He lost the popular vote" they mean when votes are counted on an individual basis, he got fewer votes than his opponent, and you know that.

Also, I would dispute that there are only 2 sides present in that photo.

 Da Boss wrote:
When people say "He lost the popular vote" they mean when votes are counted on an individual basis, he got fewer votes than his opponent, and you know that.

...and I mean it's meaningless to belabor that point. This is not unique in our country.

Also, I would dispute that there are only 2 sides present in that photo.

Dunno... on the left it looks like Merkel is admonishing Trump and Trump is smirking like a teenager ready to talk smack...

You've got to admire Trump's poker face, though. He's going to nail Kim Jong-Un with his utter absence of "tells".

On a slight tangent, isn't Trudeau quite the dandy, wearing brown shoes to a serious meeting? (I hope they at least are oxfords.)

I felt like a dangerous rebel when I started wearing brown shoes to work.

So to compound his general obnoxiousness, Trump has decided, on behalf of all Americans, to give the United States' closest and most trusted allies the finger and flounce off to try and cosy up with a dictator who would happily seek our destruction.

Just whose side is the US on any more?

Trump isn't the USA, but while he's in charge there isn't any point in being on the same side, because you probably won't be for more than a couple of hours.

Trump has shown he will agree a statement and then rip it up by tweet on his way to the airport.

 Grey Templar wrote:
You'll maybe recall Garcia Zarate. The guy that was arrested in San Francisco on a lesser charge, and then when San Francisco authorities heard that ICE was coming to pick him up released him. He then later "accidentally" killed that women with a handgun.

That was pretty blatant obstruction of federal immigration enforcement by releasing him before they could get there. And it cost a women her life. How he got acquitted of that murder charge I don't understand.

IMO, that is blatant assistance given to an illegal alien.

Your opinion is wrong. San Francisco is not obligated to provide free labor to the federal government or free storage space for people the federal government wants to arrest. ICE may request cooperation, but the state/local government is not required to provide it. The DA declined to prosecute him on the charges he was being held for, so he was released just like any other person would be. There is no evidence that the San Francisco government, say, helped to sneak him over the border or provided him with fake documentation to prove himself a legitimate immigrant. The only thing they did is decline to provide a requested service to the federal government, and I don't think you want to live in a police state where refusing to answer to every whim of every federal employee is a crime.

Also, using this single case as a policy argument is a terrible position to hold. Zarate's immigration status had nothing to do with the shooting and there was no information, at the time of his release, that he was about to commit a crime (other than continuing to stay in the US). Arguing that we should jail people indefinitely just in case they commit a crime would never work if they're US citizens, so why should it work for illegal immigrants? The responsibility for the victim's death that you're trying to assign to San Francisco would never be applied in any other situation, so it shouldn't be applied here.

How he got acquitted of that murder charge I don't understand.

Because the case was weak. The prosecution's only motive was "he decided to shoot into a crowd just for fun", which seems like a pretty poor explanation when he only fired a single shot instead of aiming for more kills like a typical mass shooter. And in US criminal cases the standard of proof is "reasonable doubt", not "someone is dead and the killer must pay".

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The people of the USA didn't elect Trump. He lost the popular vote.

We elected him. Popular vote or not, he won the election by the methods we have set. I am absolutely on board with the US suffering the downsides because we as a people need to have it drilled through our heads that like it or not we are one country. The whole 'not my president' is the sort of us vs them mentality that got us the craphole of politics we have.

I go back to my classic example of the guy jumping into the cactus. Maybe one arm and leg tried to stop him, but the other arm and leg still dragged him into a thorney doom while the torso sat there and said 'they're both bad'.

We elected what we deserved.

I've got to agree. Even if Trump hadn't been elected, there mere fact that a clown like him was in contention would have been chilling in itself.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The people of the USA didn't elect Trump. He lost the popular vote.

We elected him. Popular vote or not, he won the election by the methods we have set. I am absolutely on board with the US suffering the downsides because we as a people need to have it drilled through our heads that like it or not we are one country. The whole 'not my president' is the sort of us vs them mentality that got us the craphole of politics we have.

I go back to my classic example of the guy jumping into the cactus. Maybe one arm and leg tried to stop him, but the other arm and leg still dragged him into a thorney doom while the torso sat there and said 'they're both bad'.

We elected what we deserved.

The more I think about it, the more I disagree with the underlined part. The "not my president" mentality of the people is the inevitable result of the "you're not my voter" mentality of the politicians. For too long, politicians have only represented their party first, but they're supposed to represent the people of their district/state, including the ones who didn't vote for them.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
including the ones who didn't vote for them.

Unfortunately I think this is an unavoidable consequence of a political system where the only electoral position that matters is first place. There is no mechanism or means in US politics for the losers of elections to exert any meaningful influence beyond social pressure (something inherently limited when you lose). We'd have to completely restructure the state and electoral systems to avoid this problem, and the common solutions (mandates, coalitions, etc) have their own problems.

 r_squared wrote:

Just whose side is the US on any more?

Not even it's own at this point. On the up side, they've finally remembered that elections have consequences, and, choosing a known con man for be President was probably a bad move. I'm sure there are die hard Trump fans out there, I had one telling me Friday that we had to allow Israel to butcher all the people they wanted to, even if they killed all of Europe, so that Christ would return and bring salvation to the Jews, and annihilate the Muslims.

This was at work. I work for the US government. Do you understand how scary the level of crazy has gotten? When *I* am the voice of reason and moderation?

 Peregrine wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
You'll maybe recall Garcia Zarate. The guy that was arrested in San Francisco on a lesser charge, and then when San Francisco authorities heard that ICE was coming to pick him up released him. He then later "accidentally" killed that women with a handgun.

That was pretty blatant obstruction of federal immigration enforcement by releasing him before they could get there. And it cost a women her life. How he got acquitted of that murder charge I don't understand.

IMO, that is blatant assistance given to an illegal alien.

Your opinion is wrong. San Francisco is not obligated to provide free labor to the federal government or free storage space for people the federal government wants to arrest. ICE may request cooperation, but the state/local government is not required to provide it. The DA declined to prosecute him on the charges he was being held for, so he was released just like any other person would be. There is no evidence that the San Francisco government, say, helped to sneak him over the border or provided him with fake documentation to prove himself a legitimate immigrant. The only thing they did is decline to provide a requested service to the federal government, and I don't think you want to live in a police state where refusing to answer to every whim of every federal employee is a crime.

Also, using this single case as a policy argument is a terrible position to hold. Zarate's immigration status had nothing to do with the shooting and there was no information, at the time of his release, that he was about to commit a crime (other than continuing to stay in the US). Arguing that we should jail people indefinitely just in case they commit a crime would never work if they're US citizens, so why should it work for illegal immigrants? The responsibility for the victim's death that you're trying to assign to San Francisco would never be applied in any other situation, so it shouldn't be applied here.

How he got acquitted of that murder charge I don't understand.

Because the case was weak. The prosecution's only motive was "he decided to shoot into a crowd just for fun", which seems like a pretty poor explanation when he only fired a single shot instead of aiming for more kills like a typical mass shooter. And in US criminal cases the standard of proof is "reasonable doubt", not "someone is dead and the killer must pay".

I guarantee you that if he had been wanted on some other charge, like capital murder or something, San Francisco would have held him. They let him go only because they want to stick it to ICE.

 Grey Templar wrote:
I guarantee you that if he had been wanted on some other charge, like capital murder or something, San Francisco would have held him. They let him go only because they want to stick it to ICE.

Yes and, and "kinda"?

Yes if he was wanted on capital murder, they would have held him, because their policy was to hold anyone wanted to a violent felony present or past.

I can only go "kinda" on the "the only reason they left him go is to stick it to ICE, because they let him go because of the above guidelines. But the whole point of the sanctuary cities is sort of to stick it to ICE, so you're not 100% wrong, either.

The whole thing is a little dumb honestly and I have a super hard time defending sanctuary cities in any but the most high-level reasons, i.e. you shouldn't be able to compel the state to do the federal government's legwork.

It seems like pretty poor governance though. If you're in the country illegally generally speaking I feel like if you get picked up by the cops, you should be sent home, but I really would like to see immigration liberalized in general because legal immigration in the US is absolutely bonkers.

I also don't buy that illegal immigrants are this huge threat to jobs as they are painted to be. As Louis CK once said, if someone can come here not knowing anyone and not knowing the language and take your job, maybe you were just really gak at your job.

Sorry that was a kind of grab bag of random thoughts, re-reading that.

I agree we should expand legal immigration because we need their labor, but that shouldn’t be an excuse to let illegals off the hook.

The real threat from illegals is the unknown. They haven’t been screened by immigration to ensure they aren’t a security threat. Illegals provide cover for the smuggling of drugs and other illicit items into the country. And frankly it’s surprising we haven’t had any terrorists and other terrorist related stuff get smuggled across down there.

The other thing that grinds my gears is people claiming that illegal immigrants somehow have a right to be in this country.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The people of the USA didn't elect Trump. He lost the popular vote.

We elected him. Popular vote or not, he won the election by the methods we have set. I am absolutely on board with the US suffering the downsides because we as a people need to have it drilled through our heads that like it or not we are one country. The whole 'not my president' is the sort of us vs them mentality that got us the craphole of politics we have.

I go back to my classic example of the guy jumping into the cactus. Maybe one arm and leg tried to stop him, but the other arm and leg still dragged him into a thorney doom while the torso sat there and said 'they're both bad'.

We elected what we deserved.

The more I think about it, the more I disagree with the underlined part. The "not my president" mentality of the people is the inevitable result of the "you're not my voter" mentality of the politicians. For too long, politicians have only represented their party first, but they're supposed to represent the people of their district/state, including the ones who didn't vote for them.

Which is a valid point; citizens did not simply generate that attitude on their own. However at the same time we did decide to vote for politicians who supported that mindset. I don't mean to suggest that politicians aren't at fault, far from it, but I'm sick of US citizens playing the victim and ignoring that these are elected politicians.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I don't believe it is necessary to bring the western world crashing down to convince Trumpists that they are wrong, and actually I"m not sure they wouldn't find a way to blame someone else when it happened.

For now, concentrate on the mid-term elections. Then concentrate on stopping Trump from a second term.

I'm optimistic about the long term impact, which certainly factors into my opinion. At any rate it's not so much about teaching the depusional but rather teaching the massive number of people who stayed home because this just wasn't important enough for them to spend a day of their time on.

 Grey Templar wrote:

The real threat from illegals is the unknown. They haven’t been screened by immigration to ensure they aren’t a security threat. Illegals provide cover for the smuggling of drugs and other illicit items into the country. And frankly it’s surprising we haven’t had any terrorists and other terrorist related stuff get smuggled across down there.

And some, I assume, are good people.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
including the ones who didn't vote for them.

Unfortunately I think this is an unavoidable consequence of a political system where the only electoral position that matters is first place. There is no mechanism or means in US politics for the losers of elections to exert any meaningful influence beyond social pressure (something inherently limited when you lose). We'd have to completely restructure the state and electoral systems to avoid this problem, and the common solutions (mandates, coalitions, etc) have their own problems.

What about ranked voting?

 Grey Templar wrote:
I agree we should expand legal immigration because we need their labor, but that shouldn’t be an excuse to let illegals off the hook.

The real threat from illegals is the unknown. They haven’t been screened by immigration to ensure they aren’t a security threat. Illegals provide cover for the smuggling of drugs and other illicit items into the country. And frankly it’s surprising we haven’t had any terrorists and other terrorist related stuff get smuggled across down there.

You know who else provides cover for the smuggling of drugs and other illicit items into the country? Officials(law enforcement and customs) that have been paid off. Legitimate businesses that look the other way in exchange for payments.

Let's stop pretending that cartels run strictly off of illegal immigration and smuggling associated with it, shall we? You'd do well to educate yourself.

The other thing that grinds my gears is people claiming that illegal immigrants somehow have a right to be in this country.

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight, because that's an argument that gets made honestly.

GT must hate eating at restaurants because those places survive on illegal immigration

So, in the end, what will happen with the g7 ? Did the USA actually sign or not at the G7 ? It's really confusing.

Wonder what will happen with the NK submit now. I'm kinda expecting another tweet rant from Trump after the meeting, once he's not there anymore and saying the opposite that was established then. * sighs *

And yeah, USA will be blamed for that, not just Trump. Americans are involved, even if they don't agree. That's how politics work - actions and consequences. That's the only bright side - reality has to be faced no matter how hard you try to avoid it.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
... ... ...

... ...

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I don't believe it is necessary to bring the western world crashing down to convince Trumpists that they are wrong, and actually I"m not sure they wouldn't find a way to blame someone else when it happened.

For now, concentrate on the mid-term elections. Then concentrate on stopping Trump from a second term.

I'm optimistic about the long term impact, which certainly factors into my opinion. At any rate it's not so much about teaching the depusional but rather teaching the massive number of people who stayed home because this just wasn't important enough for them to spend a day of their time on.

I think you do have to think about the so-called "delusionals".

To ignore their concerns and win by mobilising the opposition will only entrench the divisive attitudes that seem to have gripped the USA in recent decades.

I'm not saying you should give in to them, but I think you do have to engage with them and try to persuade them that their ideas are not working.

You have to reach out and persuade people who think climate change is a swizz, or that the Laffer Curve works, or that trickle-down economics make the poor better off.

It shouldn't be too hard to get these points over because reality increasingly obviously is on your side. But it's a potentially humiliating climb-down for a lot of people who need to un-nail their colours from those various masts. You can help get them through that by not trying to humiliate them.

I mean these people are often accused of being stupid, but they aren't stupid. They've got something else pushing their views, and part of it probably is resentment at the way the the other side talks about them.

 Grey Templar wrote:

I guarantee you that if he had been wanted on some other charge, like capital murder or something, San Francisco would have held him. They let him go only because they want to stick it to ICE.

ICE is the US Gestapo so any city or state sticking it to ICE is to be applauded.

 Grey Templar wrote:

The other thing that grinds my gears is people claiming that illegal immigrants somehow have a right to be in this country.

They are on balance no better or worse than you, and you get to live in the US, so there's no reason to deny them the inherent right to live in the same enormous country that you do. People should have the freedom of movement.