Filed under: Democrat Corruption, Middle East, Politics, Progressivism, Terrorism | Tags: Benghazi Libya, Pay No Attention, Terrorist Attack On America
Filed under: Democrat Corruption, Middle East, National Security, Politics, Terrorism | Tags: Incompetence and Malfeasance, Political Advocacy, The Decline and Fall of Journalism
The suck-up leftist media has gone into full-fledged spin control. How these people can live with themselves or even face themselves in the mirror is beyond me. As Dan Gainor wrote at Fox News:
In the real world, when you cover up four murders after the fact, you likely go to jail. In government, you retire with dignity and run for president with full media support.
Up until yesterday, that was the Benghazi scenario following the death of four Americans including our ambassador to Libya.
The Obama administration has lied, stonewalled, bullied, and intimidated – the true marks of an open and transparent administration. And, with a few notable exceptions, the American media haven’t just let them get away it. Heck, they’ve helped.
Let’s be clear here. Yes, the administration has tried at all levels to cover-up the murder of four Americans; but that is not all. The administration is deeply complicit in those deaths. The disgusting media is not interested in murders, but in attempting to attack Republicans for noticing the whole thing which was “a long time ago” (Jay Carney).
Republicans are now “engaged in a witch hunt” (Eugene Robinson), who said “the hearing convened by Rep.Darrell Issa (R-CA) produced a riveting narrative of the chaotic events in Libya last September. But what was the supposedly unforgivable crime?”…The three diplomats who testified at the hearing gave no evidence that this failure sprang from anything other than the need to use limited resources as efficiently as possible.” Gosh, maybe they could have taken a few bucks out of State’s $4.1 million fund for embassy art.
Frank Rich in New York Magazine emphasized that nobody was paying attention and nobody cared, or will care, and if you dare to care, you will be attacked, and made fun of by late night “comedians.” He even dragged up the original 9/11, the Bush lied, the Iraq War that “drained resources from the battle against al Qaeda and the search for bin Laden” — the one truly noble effort of the past century.
The New York Times headlined their editorial “The Republicans Benghazi Obsession.”
Before Wednesday’s hearing on the attack in Benghazi, Libya, Republicans in Congress promised explosive new details about the administration’s mishandling of the episode. Instead, the hearing showed, yet again, that sober fact-finding is not their mission. Common sense and good judgment have long given way to conspiracy-mongering and a relentless effort to discredit President Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The whole thing was dismissed as “thoroughly covered” by the independent inquiry by Thomas Pickering and Adm. Mike Mullen. Their “unsparing report” concluded that:
“systemic failures and leadership and management deficiencies at senior levels” in the State Department’s bureaus of diplomatic security and near eastern affairs resulted in a “security posture that was inadequate for Benghazi and grossly inadequate to deal with the attack that took place.” Mrs. Clinton took responsibility for the security failures when she testified at a Congressional hearing in January.
Splendid example of bureaucratese. Bet the State Department really got a scolding for that. The Washington Post tweeted “Who’s tweeting about Benghazi? Rich, middle-aged men and Chick-fil-A lovers.” NBC said there was an “obvious political undercurrent” to the hearings and accused the GOP of going after the “most popular Democrat”, Hillary Clinton. (She is? Who knew?) The CBS network held back Emmy award-winning reporter Sharyl Attkinsson from writing about Benghazi “CBS News executives see Attkisson wading dangerously close to advocacy on the issue.” Attkisson is now in talks to leave CBS ahead of contract.
The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank treated the testimony as if the witnesses were lying. His column called the sworn testimony a “yarn” and referred to our No. 2 diplomat in Libya as a “virtuoso storyteller.” He added “Hicks didn’t lay a glove on the former secretary of state on Wednesday.”
It is not bias. It is complete abandonment of the basic principles of journalism, which is supposed to be about curiosity, the search for truth and understanding, and an impartial observation of government activities and actions to inform the people in a free society. They have traded that in for the opportunity to write political advocacy and puff pieces. More fun. You don’t have to investigate, dig, consider, or even do any hard thinking — you can just feel — and wallow in your emotions.
Filed under: Politics, Foreign Policy, Media Bias, Terrorism, Law, National Security, Middle East | Tags: A Politicized IRS, "Off the Record", At This Point What Difference Does It Make?
Fridays are famous in the news cycle as the day to release foul and disreputable tidbits since everyone is occupied with weekend plans and finishing up at the office. Apparently if it’s a particularly nice weekend that is promised, they can even release bigger news. If people happen to hear, hopefully they will forget.
So in the course of events, the Internal Revenue Service has apologized for “inappropriate targeting of conservative political groups during the 2012 election to see if they were violating their tax-exempt status. IRS agents singled out dozens of organizations for special review because they included those dangerous words “tea party” or “patriot” in their exemption applications. In some cases these groups were asked for lists of their donors, which “violates IRS policy.”
Terribly sorry if that kept you from raising money, caused you problems, low-level employees, no high-level officials involved. Apologies. White House flack Jay Carney said it was indeed “inappropriate” (there’s that word again), but the Treasury Department’s inspector general for tax administration has been investigating ever since last summer and his report is due next week. (Also “insensitive”) Nobody’s fault really, low-level employees, just move along. Jay Carney, White House flack, added that one of the directors of the IRS was appointed by George W. Bush.
And of course there is Benghazi. The press has noticed that there is something funny about the talking points and ABC’s Jonathan Karl has obtained 12 different versions of the CIA talking points as they evolved from the first draft written entirely by the CIA to the final versions distributed to Congress and UN Ambassador Susan Rice. Is this an indication that the story of Benghazi is to be all about talking points? Wasn’t there something about people dying, perhaps unnecessarily, because of administration malfeasance?
The news that the Secretary of State in the most transparent administration in history had her chief of staff warn a Benghazi whistle-blower not to spill the beans on Benghazi. Hillary had long experience with “handlers” delegated to deal with the “bimbo eruptions.” People who dare to speak out need to be intimidated. Gregory Hicks, the deputy chief of mission in Libya, a career foreign service officer for 22 years, said that after he talked to investigators about Benghazi, he received a searing phone reprimand from a very angry Cheryl Mills, chief of Staff to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Hicks was told not to talk to Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) when a congressional delegation visited Libya after the attack. When he did anyway, a long string of glowing performance reviews morphed into criticisms of his management style and leadership and he was demoted to desk officer. Hicks said he had never before been told not to meet with a congressional delegation. Far from trying to find out what happened, Hillary Clinton and the State Department sought to suppress the truth and punish anyone who would speak the truth.
So, an efficient administration, being on top of the news cycle and aware that accusations of an attempted cover-up of events leading to the murder of our Ambassador, his aide, and two SEALS are floating around, what do you do? Why you have an off-the-record briefing for the White House press corps, so the reporters can’t repeat anything even if they want to. Why would the press agree to that?
Simple. They changed the language describing the meeting from “off-the-record” to: Though the existence of the meeting was off the record, it was conducted on “deep background.” “Deep Background” apparently means that the information presented by the briefers can be used in reporting, but the briefers can’t be quoted.”
Ari Fleischer tweeted : “Time Magazine reporter Jay Carney would have been the 1st person to object to how the WH is handling the press today.”
Filed under: Domestic Policy, Intelligence, Middle East, National Security, Politics, Terrorism | Tags: Blinded by Ideology, Competence and Honesty, The Attack on Benghazi
This interview with former Attorney General Michael Mukasey by Fox News’ Megyn Kelly on the situation in Benghazi, Libya was posted on October 31, 2012, after the attack in Benghazi on September 11, and before the upcoming election. Mr. Mukasey, George W. Bush’s Attorney General was highly respected, and a serious man.
Helps sometimes to look back towards what was said at the time, well not very far back, only six months, but events in the meantime, reporting and misreporting change our impressions.
Ideology and cynicism. Tunisian man that we cannot interrogate? We treat it as a law enforcement issue, our enemies treat it as a war.
I do hope they establish a select committee to delve much deeper into the administration response to an attack on America.
Filed under: Foreign Policy, Intelligence, Middle East, Terrorism, The United States | Tags: Administration Lies, Benghazi Hearings, Political Cover-Up
Like many political junkies, I have been fascinated with the Benghazi hearings today, and with what is being written about the hearings. Investors said “Testimony by the Benghazi whistle-blowers presents clear evidence of shameful political manipulation of the truth seven weeks before an election and a willingness to let four Americans die to maintain a campaign narrative.” Read the whole thing.
That pretty well sums it up. We had three witnesses testify today. 1). Eric Nordstrom was a regional security officer of the U.S. Mission to Libya from September 2011 to July 2012. 2). Mark Thompson, a former Marine and official with the State Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau, who said he was not interviewed by the State Departments Accountability Review Board, testified that he was rebuffed by the Whit House when he asked for a Foreign Emergency Support Team (FEST) that’s been activated in past threats to diplomats. This is a unit made of special operations personnel, diplomatic security, intelligence and other officers. 3). Greg Hicks, US. Deputy Chief of Mission in Libya that night, who was near tears at times, recounted how a Special Forces team, including one member hobbling with a cast on his leg and a heavy machine gun on his shoulder, was ready to deploy on a Libyan C-130 to Benghazi, only to be forbidden from doing so by U.S. Special Operations Command South Africa.
What we know for sure is that UN Ambassador Susan Rice lied to the UN and to the public, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lied to Congress, Vice President Joe Biden lied to reporters, and President Barack Obama lied to the American people. There was no “demonstration” about the video that no one watched. There was only an organized attack by Ansar al Sharia, an Iranian supported terrorist group allied with al Qaeda.
The Obama administration has done its best to confuse and conceal what actually happened. There are lots of officially unknowns: Why was Ambassador Stevens in Benghazi in the first place? And on September 11? The ‘consulate’ there was just a residence, not up to State Department standards, and Stevens needed special authorization from Sec. Clinton to go there. Why was the security for the ‘consulate’ removed? Who refused help at every opportunity?
If you recall your history, Watergate concerned some Republican “plumbers” who broke into a Democratic campaign office. No one ever claimed that President Nixon either knew about it, nor was responsible, but it was embarrassing that his people had done it and they tried to cover it up. Yet Watergate was supposed to be the most dreadful scandal ever to touch the American presidency.
We had an American Ambassador, his tech guy, and two former SEALs — employed by the CIA — who were first denied security, denied help, and denied rescue at the highest level of the American government.
The Big Media is in full defensive mode. They are rallying around the administration in the very way that was so desperately needed by our people in Benghazi. The New York Times is oddly unaware that there is a place in Libya called Benghazi.
Time magazine’s Joe Klein demonstrates the obtuseness of the American media’s complete failure to perform the most basic task of a supposedly free press.
The Republicans, apparently with nothing better to do, are still chasing their tails over the tragic events in Benghazi on September 11.
Actually, no. That’s not true. They’re chasing their tails over what happened after the tragic events of September 11. They’re mostly concerned that the Obama Administration tried to cover up the fact that this was a terrorist attack by a local militia (translation: local street gang) which aspired toward bad-butt Al Qaeda status. This is a pretty hard sell since, the day after the attack, the President called it an “act of terror.”
It does seem that the Administration’s talking points were massaged a bit after the President’s candor. This may have been attributable to the presidential campaign and the Administration’s desire to low-ball the Al Qaeda threat. If so, this was a venial, not a mortal, sin. It affected not one life.
No, Joe Klein, it not only affected four lives, it ended them. Security was denied, Safety was denied. Help was denied, because an election was coming up and no one wanted any bad publicity, particularly when an Iranian-supported group of terrorists called Ansar al Sharia who were closely affiliated with al Qaeda (who was supposedly ‘on the run’ because Obama had called in the SEALs.) The same people as those two valiant men who went to rescue the remaining personnel at the ‘consulate’ and who begged for help while they stood off that “local street gang”. There was help available and the order to stand down reportedly had to come from the president.
The Big Media in our nation — the Free Press — a term they revel in, are not now, and have not been, performing their most basic task, being a watchdog on government. They quit that a while back. The Democrats give better parties I guess. The public is coming to the realization that they are useless, and the media is slowly going broke. I can even remember when Time was a thick magazine, bulging with lots of advertising and important articles that made news and created a stir. Long ago and far away.
Filed under: Freedom, Islam, Terrorism | Tags: A Moment of Silence, All By Himself., The Boston Bombing
Tuesday morning, the White House press office issued a peculiar announcement. President Barack Obama would hold a moment of silence for the victims of the Boston bombings. All by himself. At the White House. Heroically. No press. No one else present. Alone, for a private moment.
Just the White House photographer to record the sacred, private moment.
Filed under: Media Bias, Terrorism, National Security | Tags: President Bush, Incompetence, Barack Obama, Boston Bombing
[click to enlarge]
Terrorists attacked the United States at home on September 11, 2001, 8 months into President Bush’s first year in office. We now know, from the 9/11 Commission, that one of the major reasons is because the Clinton administration had erected a “wall” that prevented the CIA and FBI from communicating with one another. After that horrific day, President Bush kept Americans safe at home for the rest of his two terms in office.
Five years into his presidency, Barack Obama cannot say the same thing.
America has been attacked again, by people we not only allowed to immigrate, but for whom we provided welfare as well. If the news media were remotely fair or balanced, or if a Republican were president, this failure is all they would be talking about. But it is not, so they are trying their hardest to ignore the administration’s failure altogether.
Our government was warned multiple times and did nothing. Americans deserve answers.
Filed under: Capitalism, Economy, Immigration, Intelligence, Islam, Law, Terrorism | Tags: State Supported Terrorism, The Boston Marathon, The Brothers Tsarnaev
As we gradually learn about the two Tsarnaev brothers, one of the big questions has been where did they get the money and training to amass their arsenal of bombs and guns? Apparently, from the taxpayers of Boston.
According to the Boston Herald Tammerlan Tsarnaev, a 26-year-old with a green card entitling him to permanent residence in the United States, was living on taxpayer-funded welfare checks from the State of Massachusetts Office of Health and Human Services, along with his wife and their 3-year-old daughter. The welfare benefits ended in 2012 when the family stopped meeting income eligibility requirements.
His wife was working 80 hour weeks as a home health aide, while Tammerlan stayed home and delved into the world of radical anti-American Islamism. Both of the Tsarnaev parents received benefits, and the brothers received benefits through their parents when they were of age. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, a 19-year-old now in federal custody, was attending college on scholarship, but recent grades showed hm failing. He apparently earned money by selling pot, and in 2011, when FBI agents interviewed the brothers on suspicion of terrorism, the City of Cambridge awarded him a $2,500 scholarship, according to the Boston Globe.
Tammerlan had been a Golden Gloves boxer who delivered pizza while attending community college, and hoped to compete in the Olympics. Supposedly at the urging of his mother, he began taking his religion more seriously, started intensely studying Islam and attending a radical local mosque funded with Saudi money and controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood. Relatives say his descent into extremist Islam began around 2008 or 2009.
The Russian FSB intelligence service reportedly contacted the FBI repeatedly to warn that Tammerlan was suspected of being a dangerous radical. In mid-2011 he was being monitored by the FSB, as he prepared to leave the United States to join unspecified underground groups. The FBI reported finding no “terrorism activity,” and according to Secretary Janet Napolitano dropped him off their watch list. Lots of questions.
The bigger the bureaucracy, the more fraud and abuse can be found. You get way too many layers of management, and the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing, and nobody wants to stir up trouble, large or small. The ideal becomes going along to get along. Is that inevitable? I thought there was something in the immigration laws that required those seeking to immigrate to prove that they would be self-supporting. That’s another problem with big bureaucracies, The people no longer know what the rules are, and we only find out when something terrible happens to expose the carelessness of government. Mistakes happen, of course, but when they become big ones, people lose faith in their officials.
Filed under: Foreign Policy, Intelligence, Iran, Islam, Israel, Middle East, National Security, Politics, Terrorism | Tags: Dictators and Democracy, We Are Not At War With Terror, Weakness And Indecision
This video is from August 6, 2009. Not new, but it certainly demonstrates the problem. As long as we are unable to think clearly about terrorism, we will not solve the problem. I guess you could call political correctness a kind of worm in the brain, burrowing into every thought process and leaving a slimy trail of weakness, indecision, and misdirection.
This kind of sloppy thinking led to a failure to negotiate a status of forces agreement with Iraq, with the consequences that have followed our abrupt pullout. It has led to the mistake of setting a date for our withdrawal from Afghanistan, allowing the Taliban to wait until then to take over. It has led to attempting to impress the Afghans with our trust by depriving our own troops of weapons to defend themselves and costing more lives. We have lost far more of our troops under Obama than ever happened under George W. Bush.
And it’s the kind of thinking that deluded the administration to assume the Arab Spring was a democratic movement that would lead to peace in the Middle East and an end to terrorism. But the Arab world had no experience of democracy ever, and no idea how it was to work. What they have known forever is dictatorship, so a new set of dictators moved in.
Mr. Brennan is now the Director of the CIA.
Filed under: Art, Fun n Games, Global Warming, Middle East, News the Media Doesn't Want You to Hear, Politics, Terrorism
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police have charged two men living in Canada with conspiracy to carry out a terrorist attack against a VIA Rail passenger train inside Canada. The RCMP said the two men planned to carry out an “al Qaeda-supported” terror attack to derail a train, which was also aimed at harming the economy.
The Police said, at a news conference, that the two men were receiving guidance and direction from al Qaeda related elements in Iran. The men are not Canadian citizens. There was no imminent threat to the public, but had the terror project come to fruiting, innocent people would have been killed or injured.
The Obama administration has gone out of their way to make light of the threat from terrorism, but the evidence merely points out the presidents state of denial about the rising threat. CNN’s homeland security analyst, Juliette Kayyem asserted “We have not had (even) a small-scale terrorist attack on American soil since 9/11.”
We have suffered a number of major attacks, and most of them have taken place on Obama’s watch. Since 2009, terrorists have attacked our military bases, assassinated our diplomats, burned our embassies and murdered innocent spectators at a sporting event and ambushed and shot police officers.
— June 1, 2009: Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad shot and killed a military recruiter and wounded another at a Little Rock Arkansas recruiting station. A convert to Islam, Muhammad identified with al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
— September 2008: Afghan native Najibullah Zazi was arrested before he could blow up the New York City Subway.
— September 2009: Police nabbed Jordanian Hosam Maher Husein Smadi before he could plant a bomb in a Dallas skyscraper.
— November 5, 2009: Nidal Malik Hasan, a U.S. Army major psychiatrist opened fire at Fort Hood Texas, shouting “Allahu Akbar!” as he killed 13 fellow soldiers and wounded 29. He was advised by al Qaeda operative Anwar Awlaki. Homeland Security has defined this as a workplace incident.
— December 2009: Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was tackled by passengers before he could detonate explosives sewn into his underwear. He was trained in Yemen by al Qaeda.
— March 4, 2010: John Patrick Bedell, a Muslim convert, shot and wounded two Pentagon police officers at a checkpoint in the Pentagon station of Washington Metro in Arlington, VA.
— May 2010: A massive bomb was planted by Faisal Shahzad, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Pakistan failed to explode in an SUV parked in Times Square. He was trained and funded by the Taliban.
— October 2010: Chicago synagogues discovered explosives packed inside two printer cartridges shipped by cargo planes from al Qaeda in Yemen. The attack failed.
— Sept. 11, 2012: On the anniversary of 9/11, al Qaeda operatives attacked the American diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya. The armed assault targeted the consulate compound, and a nearby CIA annex. The U.S. Ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens was killed along with three others and ten others were wounded in a 7 hour gunfight.
— April 15, 2013: Two Muslim jihadists set off bombs at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing three people and injuring 183. The terrorists shot two police officers, killed one, and injured several others. One of the brothers is dead, the other in custody.
The administration continues to downplay Islamist terrorism, and proposes talks with the Taliban and with Iran.
The “Arab Spring” was mistakenly assumed to be a movement for democracy in Arab North Africa. The movement was perhaps inspired by televised shots of Iraqis, male and female, proudly voting in free elections. That was considered the equivalent of an earthquake in the Arab Middle East, where oppressive dictatorship was the norm. But Arabs had no experience of Democracy, and the Muslim Brotherhood was ready to step in.
No terrorism here, nothing to see. Just move along.
Filed under: Capitalism, Democrat Corruption, Economy, History, Law, Middle East, National Security, Politics, Terrorism | Tags: Euphemism and Denial, The Absence of Sraight Talk, The War on Terror
The Long War on Terror continues. We practice all kinds of denial and misdirection, disguise it with euphemism, and strangely — attempt to scare people with claims of radical right-wing extremism.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has tied herself in knots attempting to re-define Islamist terrorism out of existence. Her Department has listed Right-Wing Extremist groups as threats to national security, but no one seems to know who they are, or where they are, or what kind of threat they represent. The old ladies and little children who are searched and patted down to avoid “profiling” are beyond absurd.
The Left has long objected to the idea of a “War on Terror.” They don’t like the phrase. They object to calling it Islamist terrorism. NPR counterterrorism reporter Dina Temple-Ralston spoke for the left in the immediate wake of the bombing;
Well, officials told us that they have some promising leads, though no actual smoking gun. They expect this case will take weeks, not months, to solve. The thinking, as we’ve been reporting, is that this is a domestic extremist attack. And officials are leaning that way largely because of the timing of the attack.
April is a big month for anti-government, and right wing, individuals. There’s the Columbine anniversary. There’s Hitler’s birthday. There’s the Oklahoma City bombing. There’s the assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco. And the FBI right now is comparing this to the Eric Rudolph case. That’s the 1996 bombing at the Olympics in Atlanta. That involved a relatively simple bomb that was hard to trace.
The Left was determined that the bomber must be domestic, white, racist, and apparently Republican. The denial of the existence of Islamist terrorism is becoming pathological. If there is such a thing as Islamist terrorism, then we might have to admit that the Arab Spring was not a hope for democracy, that overthrowing dictators in Egypt and Libya did not result in peaceful democracies, and that our questions about Benghazi had never been answered.
Once the connection to Islamist terrorism is established, Muslims call in to radio talk shows anxious to deny that — this is not Islam. Islam is a peaceful religion. These people are not Muslims, they are radicals, and so on. And that is undoubtedly true. But Islamist radicalism is a problem within the Islamic religion, and it must be corrected by Muslims. The rest of us can’t fix it. And I don’t see any determined movement within the Muslim religion to disavow the radicals.
We are the object of their jihad, the “Great Satan.” We can make war on the jihadists, we can use our military, we can use drones, we can try to help Moslem countries to modernize, we can send them aid, we can help with modern techniques of agriculture, medicine and education. But that does not solve the problem. Can Muslims address the portion of their faith that seeks jihad against the West? Or are we doomed to carry on until it all blows up?
Filed under: Domestic Policy, Economy, Latin America, Law, National Security, Terrorism, The United States | Tags: "Amnesty" Brings a Flood, Lies About Immigration, Promises Ignored
The Senate Judiciary Committee has just completed a hearing on the “Gang of Eight” immigration reform legislation. The hearing, according to Paul Mirengoff, “lasted for about two hours and was limited to one round of questions for two witnesses — economist Douglas Holtz-Eakin (who supports the bill) and Peter Kirsanow of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission (who opposes it).”
Kirsanow testified they had received the nearly 900-page bill only about two days ago, and lacked enough time to review and analyze it sufficiently. In other words, Mirengoff adds —”the hearing was a farce.”
I am getting more than fed up with Congress churning out bills in a great hurry that no one has had a chance to read. That, of course, is the idea. You do it slowly, time to get public input, discuss the provisions, why it might end up being something the people don’t want at all. It might turn out to be something poorly thought out and damaging to the country and the economy. Here is the situation as I understand it:
We have ten million working age Americans who cannot find work. So there is a big rush to ‘regularize some guesstimated eleven million illegals” because “we can’t deport eleven million people.” Besides, some of them have been living here for years, have homes, and have children who were born here, or children who were brought here as little children who know no other home. The call for compassion.
We are a nation of laws. Crossing the border illegally is against the law. The Department of Homeland Security is in charge of the Border Patrol and Customs and Border Enforcement. Secretary Napolitano insists that the Border is well controlled, and illegals crossing the border are not a problem. People on the border and states on the border say illegal immigration has increased substantially since “amnesty” was first mentioned. The illegals even say “Obama will let me out.” And they are illegal, not “undocumented.”
The situation along the border with the drug cartels and coyotes transporting people is so bad that the Border Patrol doesn’t even patrol the border, but has had to pull back about 25 miles from the border.
Congress passed some kind of law and some kind of appropriations for a fence along the border, but everyone has apparently lost interest after about two miles were built, and while Gang of Eight Members were down on the border to look at the existing fence, some illegals were climbing over the fence right in front of them— which they found amusing.
The President of the United States who is tasked with seeing the laws are enforced, has told the Homeland Security people not to pay any attention to illegals, we presume because he thinks they will be Democrat voters.
There was an enormous scandal about “Fast and Furious.” a gunrunning ploy that was supposed to identify the cartel leaders, but ended up killing Border Patrol agent Brian Terry and a few hundred Mexicans, but it wasn’t anyone’s fault and we are supposed to ignore it. Border Patrol people are armed with bean bags and cannot protect themselves.
We have an E-Verify system in place to prevent illegals from gaining employment with false or forged documents, but it is not enforced, nor required.
It seems to me that before we start rushing through a big bill that is supported by a “bi-partisan” Gang of Eight that attempts to settle the entire immigration problem, a 900 page bill that nobody has read nor considered the consequences of each change. we might separate it into smaller parts. Part One might be enforcing the laws that are presently on the books. If enforcing them is impossible because of Executive Orders issued by the President, then Congress needs to step up and see that the laws are enforced. That is his Constitutionally mandated task. Once the Border Patrol can go back to the border with something besides bean bags, the fence is built, and E-Verify is up and running and being enforced — then we can begin to talk about Part Two: how many people we want to let in, and from where, and how we decide.
I am thoroughly sick of false promises of mandates and fixes and regulations and appropriations that somehow never happen; and a border that is never enforced because Democrats want more welfare dependent Hispanic illegals who will be reliable Democrat voters. Marco Rubio is sure that — this time, they mean the promises. They will write them down in the bill. But somehow it will never get enforced. First you fulfill the promises about enforcement. Then, when that is done, we can talk.
