LIES, LIES, LIES. AND WORSE.

Stephen Miller appears on CNN's State of the Union (screen grab).

Stephen Miller appears on CNN’s State of the Union (screen grab).

Although White House adviser Stephen Miller has quickly emerged as a fall guy for this past weekend’s chaos at major American airports, he nonetheless appeared on CBS’s This Morning to paint the Trump administration’s travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries as a massive success.

Oh sure. Absolute chaos, people trapped in airports, crying, wondering if they will ever be able to see their families again, people trying to commit suicide out of despair, yeah, that’s success alright! Godsdamned evil fucking nazis, who call this orgy of hate a “success”. :spits: As noted in a previous thread:

So many people in this country are just fine with this evil. They can’t even manage to think for 5 fucking seconds – who in the hell wants to be a refugee? No one, that’s who. Leaving your home, uprooting your whole life, struggling, facing bias and hatred, having to start all over again? Yeah, sure, people do that sort of thing just for fucking fun.

If you’re one of the people okay with this demonstration of stupidity and cruelty, congratulations, you’re officially a fuckwit.

Miller also said that the Trump administration will, over the next month, develop screening procedures to ensure that only foreigners who “love” America are allowed into the country.

“We’re going to take the next 30 days to develop a new set of screening protocols to try and ensure that people entering our country, particularly on a permanent basis, truly love and support the United States of America,” he said. “There’ll be a 60-day period where countries will be asked to comply with the new directives. Countries that are in compliance will have regular, ordinary and routine migration with the United States.”

Oh, well that’s not Orwellian at all, no. “I do declare I love America in the most bigly, yugely way possible! I love America more than anything!” Talk about sickening. If you’re not up on your history, I suggest you do some reading, stat. Fascists and Nazis just adore this sort of disgusting bullshit. Note that little “comply” up above, too. When dictators and tyrants start tossing “comply” around…Yeah.

Miller then went on to say that the administration’s overall goal is to make sure people who are intolerant of others’ differences shouldn’t be granted entry to the United States.

“It only makes sense that we engage in some kind of selections process that prioritizes the entry of people who, as the order stated, don’t hold bigotry, hatred or violence against any sexual orientation, against any race, or against any particular class of people,” he said.

:chokes; sputter: Oh please! Christ, I can’t take this sort of shit first thing. uStates, a country founded on intolerance, hatred, greed, genocide and theft, and hasn’t gotten any better. Now we’re the country of love and tolerance? We have now surpassed Orwell, and that is no mean feat. FFS, I can’t even, I oh fuck. This godsdamned country, where hate and bigotry reign supreme, where cops murder people of colour at will, where the government is still trying to finish the genocide of Indians, where a host of stupid white people spew toxic bigotry every moment of the day, where half the states still defend fucking slavery, and the flag symbolizing it’s glories, a country where LGBTQ peoples are assaulted and murdered, and where the government tries at every turn to legislate their bigotry and hate, *deep breath* a country that is so damn stupid they still try to teach creationism, a country where half of the people are attempting to legislate all women into the untrustworthy, subhuman slut category, shoving their damn noses into our pants at every turn, vile, evil, immoral, fanatical christians who think they have the right to oppress and glory in hate, and that barely covers it.

Aaaaaaauuuuuuugh. I will be screaming in fury all damn day. Unfuckingbelievable.

Via Raw Story.

Iran Ban.

President Hassan Rouhani.

President Hassan Rouhani.

Iran said on Saturday it would stop U.S. citizens entering the country in retaliation to Washington’s visa ban against Tehran and six other majority-Muslim countries announced by new U.S. President Donald Trump.

“While respecting the American people and distinguishing between them and the hostile policies of the U.S. government, Iran will implement the principle of reciprocity until the offensive U.S. limitations against Iranian nationals are lifted,” a Foreign Ministry statement said.

“The restrictions against travel by Muslims to America… are an open affront against the Muslim world and the Iranian nation in particular and will be known as a great gift to extremists,” said the statement, carried by state media.

Look, a president with brains! It’s nice that Iran has a president who can easily recognize that the current xenophobic excess of uStates will indeed be a gift to extremists of all stripes. It would be really nice if uStates had a president who could think. Alas.

Earlier on Saturday, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said it was no time to build walls between nations and criticised steps towards cancelling world trade agreements, without naming Trump. … “Today is not the time to erect walls between nations. They have forgotten that the Berlin wall fell years ago,” Rouhani said in a speech carried live on Iranian state television.

I think it’s past time for world leaders to start naming Trump, loudly and clearly. The fucking asshole is a clear and present danger to the whole world, and yes, I know people choose their words with care because Trump is also a maniac who might just decide to let missiles fly in a fit a pique, and sensible people don’t want that, but eternal tip-toeing isn’t going to work, either. The Berlin wall has been on my mind ever since Trump started hollering about walls. FFS, that wasn’t all that long ago, what in the hell is wrong with people?

“Today is not the time to erect walls between nations. They have forgotten that the Berlin wall fell years ago,” Rouhani said in a speech carried live on Iranian state television.

“To annul world trade accords does not help their economy and does not serve the development and blooming of the world economy,” Rouhani told a tourism conference in Tehran. “This is the day for the world to get closer through trade.”

I agree. Unfortunately, we’re stuck with the wannabe god emperor idiot.

Rouhani, a pragmatist elected in 2013, thawed Iran’s relations with world powers after years of confrontation and engineered its 2015 deal with them under which it curbed its nuclear programme in exchange for relief from sanctions.

Oh, how nice it would be to have a sane and sensible person in office.

Full story here.

Up in Flames, So We Go…

Used with permission from the Islamic Center of Victoria.

Used with permission from the Islamic Center of Victoria.

A Texas mosque was set on fire just hours after Trump signed an executive order restricting migration from Muslim-majority countries.

The Islamic Center of Victoria was set on fire around 2 a.m. on Saturday, according to localreports.

Victoria Fire Marshal Tom Legler told the Victoria Advocate he had no theories about the cause of the fire, but he is seeking assistance from state and federal fire investigators.

[…]

On Sunday, the center plans to hold a public prayer service in the lawn to “pray for peace & safety for all.” The center said it will be rebuilt with love, and it has already started a GoFundMe fundraiser for financial support to do so.

[…]

Since the election in November, there has been an increase in hate crimes across the country. In the one month following the election, the Southern Poverty Law Center found over 1,000 reports of hate incidents. ThinkProgress is keeping a stricter record of targeted incidents, and we have still found almost 250 incidents of hate. A significant number of these are anti-Islam in nature.

The fire in Victoria comes just three weeks after an Islamic Center under construction in Austin was set on fire and destroyed.

The full story at Think Progress. I read this right after checking a conversation at Pharyngula, where people are still fiercely arguing against punching Nazis, and fully defending their right to speech, because talking about killing all black people, having a dreamy white state, or ethnic cleansing, well, it’s just talk, and that’s okay. Some people in that thread are still behaving as though ‘merica was still this great democracy, so it will be okay. No, it won’t be okay. There is no democracy, it’s gone. Oh, there’s still a partial skeleton of tattered and deliquescent bones, but they are falling fast. Nazism is being defended and normalised not just by all the Joe Q. Publics’, but liberals and lefties all over the place. We must be nice! We must be better! We must do this the right way! I have one thing to say to all that: Fuck No.

I am sick to death of this “we must be better” crap. I’m not better for refusing to stand up to nazis speechifying about the horrors of non-white, non-hetero people. I’m not better for turning my head away when I see someone targeted by nazis. I’m not better for defending the rights of nazis to talk about how wonderful nazism is, we just have to get rid of all those people. I will say this straight out: I am one hell of a fucktonne better than anyone who is being a handwringing milquetoast over the rights of fucking nazis. I will fight, openly, every inch of the way. I will not stand by along a road which will end up littered with bodies. I will not be complicit. I will not condone. I will shout down nazis at every opportunity. Fuck them. They do not have any right to speech as far as I’m concerned, because it’s all hate, and it’s incitement. A person in that thread stated that speech was not action. That’s not true. Of course speech is an action, it’s an attempt to communicate. Only an idiot would consider all speech benign. Speech, as wielded by nazis, is an incitement, an incitement to horrific actions.

We are past trouble here in the States. Everything you thought you knew, forget it. We are in a dark, lost age, and while this terrifies me personally, I refuse to shut my eyes to what is happening right in front of my face. I will stand, no matter how much I may tremble, and I will try to help and protect all those who are nothing more than fuel for the fire in the eyes of nazis and racists everywhere.

You’re Mad Because a Nazi Got Punched in the Face?

Sunday Facepalm.

632914834-4630

Trump’s little nazi, Bannon, is everywhere. I’m surprised Trump isn’t trying to clone him. Now it’s Nazi NSA.

Meanwhile, Trump signed a presidential memo directing the Pentagon to submit a plan within 30 days to defeat the Islamic State, an effort to make good on his campaign promise to more aggressively confront Islamist terrorism than his predecessor did. … As he signed his directive at his desk in the Oval Office, Trump said, “I think it’s going to be very successful. That’s big stuff.”

Jesus Fuck. I still can’t believe we have a president who talks like a toddler.

Counseling Trump in the effort will be Stephen K. Bannon, the White House chief strategist whose influence inside the administration is expanding far beyond politics. In a separate presidential memo, Trump reorganized the National Security Council to, along with other changes, give Bannon a regular seat on the principals committee — the meetings of the most senior national security officials, including the secretaries of defense and state.

That memo also states that the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff will sit on the principals committee only when the issues to be discussed pertain to their “responsibilities and expertise.” In the previous two administrations, both were included as regular attendees.

The White House thinks the changes will make the NSC more adaptive to modern threats. Trump said the changes would bring “a lot of efficiency and, I think, a lot of additional safety.”

The changes affirm the ascent of Bannon, the former executive chairman of Breitbart, a conservative website that is popular with white nationalists, who has emerged as Trump’s political consigliere and the keeper of the president’s populist flame.

I think it’s fairly clear who the new president actually is, and it’s not Trump. Trump is an easily manipulable puppet. The Nazis are here and in charge.

Full story at Washington Post.

Think Progress is also covering this unprecedented  move, noting that even that asshole Bush jr never went so far, and in fact, went to considerable trouble to keep Rove away from any and all NSA meetings. Let that one sink in a little.

And don’t forget about Bannon:

Bannon has a history of anti-Semitic, misogynistic, and bigoted comments, and has openly disparaged Jews and minorities and has called women “dykes.” Both the Klu Klux Klan and the American Nazi Party cheered his appointment to the White House. Bannon also reportedly had a major role in crafting key parts of Trump’s Muslim ban, including the fact that the ban also applies to people with lawful permanent residence.

Fuck Nones.

So. There’s an article up about the so-called rise of the irreligious, and how they might change the political landscape. My initial reaction on seeing the headline was a rather cynical hmmm. Ever since people got all excited about the wave of ‘nones’, it’s been my experience in interacting with them that they are remarkably wishy-washy. The thing they seem to be most intensely reluctant to discuss or be involved in, activism wise, is anything to do with religion or secularism. Oh, they don’t believe, but it’s not a big deal, right, live and let live, all that jazz or “I think most religious people are okay, it’s just not my thing” or or or or or. Yeah, great, catch ya later. They don’t want to be rude. They don’t want to be pushy. They don’t care enough, in any direction. For the most part, I’ve found them to be one big shrug. Disclaimer: This is not every single person who identifies as ‘none’. Most, but not all.

I’m reading the article. Nothing I don’t already know, keep reading. Then I get to a bit I didn’t know – most nones can’t be arsed to vote. They don’t care, and even worse, most of them are uninformed about the recent election, out of choice. Fucking idiots. Thanks for fascism, thanks ever so fucking much.

chart

The 2016 Presidential Election

Interest in the Election

Consistent with their lower rates of voter registration, religiously unaffiliated Americans express less interest in the 2016 election, compared to white Christian groups. Fewer than four in ten (37%) religiously unaffiliated Americans say they are following news about the 2016 election very closely. Three in ten (30%) say they are following it fairly closely, while more than one-third (34%) say they are following the election not too closely or not at all closely. In contrast, a majority (56%) of white evangelical Protestants say they are following the election very closely.

PRRI. Oh well, maybe when nuclear winter hits, they’ll organize a nice bonfire or something. Fuck’s sake.

NO DAPL Roundup.

Malia Obama (Pinterest)

Malia Obama (Pinterest)

Malia Obama has chosen to stand with Standing Rock.

A group of 100 people gathered in Park City to protest the revival of the project by new U.S. President Donald Trump. Despite freezing temperatures and heavy snowfall, Malia Obama joined the protester who were holding up signs that read: “Exist. Resist. Rise.” and “Impeach corporate control,” according to the Daily Mail.

Along with protesting the construction of the pipeline, which will disturb sacred grounds and introduce contaminants into the local water supply, the group was protesting the festival sponsorship by Chase Bank, which is invested in the pipeline. The rally was held in front of the Chase Sapphire on Main lounge.

Courtesy MSNBC via YouTube.

Courtesy MSNBC via YouTube.

Chairman Archambault on MSNBC: ‘President Is Circumventing Federal Law’.

Standing Rock Sioux Chairman David Archambault II was more surprised at the rapidity with which Donald Trump signed presidential memoranda purporting to speed up the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) and reinstate the Keystone XL pipeline than he was by the act itself.

“We were prepared for President Trump take a run at everything we have accomplished in the last two years,” Archambault told Tamron Hall on MSNBC on Wednesday January 25, the day after Trump signed a Presidential Memorandum attempting to move DAPL along. “This nation better start bracing itself for what’s to come if in the first four days we’re witnessing him using an executive order to circumvent federal laws. It’s not right, and it’s something we better get ready for. I was disappointed that it came this soon, because we had worked so hard for the last two years.”

The tribe wants closer study of the pipeline’s potential effects on water supply, sacred sites and treaty rights, he said, and Trump is trying to do an end run around such statutes as the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).

“The troubling thing is that this president is circumventing federal law,” Archambault said. “We have Treaty rights, we have water rights with our Winter’s Doctrine, we have NEPA.”

The Keystone XL Pipeline Will Create Just 35 Permanent Jobs. Don’t Believe the Lies.

For those who still insist fossil fuels are the future, the Trump administration represents a new day for some old ideas. In an early sign of things to come, the president showed his faith in big oil when he signed documents Tuesday pressuring federal agencies to support construction of the Dakota Access and Keystone XL oil pipelines. Each of these projects faced enormous protests and was put on hold by the Obama administration because of legitimate environmental and due process concerns.

Congressional Republicans frequently howled at far less heavy-handed exercises of executive power under the previous administration. Today, they applaud Trump’s move on the mistaken premise that these pipelines are good investments. Not only will these projects not create long-lasting jobs – as CNBC, not exactly an anti-corporate mouthpiece, has noted: “Pipelines do not require much labor to operate in the long term” – they will further delay the inevitable transition to clean, renewable energy our economy needs and the American people demand.

Standing Rock Chairman Archambault Sends Strong Letter to Trump.

Editor’s note: Reaction was swift and strong when President Donald Trump signed a series of Presidential Memoranda and Executive Orders designed to move the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) forward and revive the Keystone XL pipeline. The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe responded immediately, and on January 25 Standing Rock Chairman Archambault wrote a letter to Trump explaining the legal constraints, the support that the Environmental Impact Statement and the tribe have, and the need for a leader-to-leader meeting. The full text is below.

DAPL Profiteers Steal Marty Two Bulls Designs.

You’ve probably seen and shared at least one of the many brilliant political cartoons by Marty Two Bulls at some point in time. Marty Two Bulls—an artist from the Oglala Lakota Nation—has been drawing political cartoons with great success for many years. His work has long been a staple on the pages of ICTMN. He’s known for bringing clever humor and hilarious imagery to hot, controversial issues: most recently the anti-DAPL movement in Standing Rock.

But now, you might see his work in places it shouldn’t be: dozens of t-shirt sellers who are hoping to make a buck from the #NoDAPL campaigns have ripped off Marty Two Bulls designs and been using them to sell t-shirts of their own with no credit, profit, or acknowledgement offered to the artist. Now, Two Bulls has taken the matter into his own hands. In addition to filing dozens of reports to stop production of the rip-offs, he has decided to sell t-shirts of his own.

The design thieves are mostly from overseas with no connection to Native country.
“So far I caught over 20,” Two Bulls said, “I go online, I search terms like #NoDAPL and Water is Life on Facebook, and there they are.”

Marty is an amazingly talented artist, and one of the best political cartoonists in the world, he’s brilliant. Please, if you want to show support for Standing Rock, take the time to make sure your item is coming from the actual artist. Most artists aren’t rolling in money, and this theft hurts, one more than one level. Marty is trying to do something for his people, and if you want to help, and like his artwork, please buy from Marty Two Bulls.

Google Goes Conservative.

Eric Schmidt, the chairman of Alphabet, Google’s parent company, arriving at Trump Tower in January to meet with Donald J. Trump. Mr. Trump’s team is wary of Mr. Schmidt, who has been allied with Democrats and advised the Obama White House. Credit Kevin Hagen for The New York Times.

Eric Schmidt, the chairman of Alphabet, Google’s parent company, arriving at Trump Tower in January to meet with Donald J. Trump. Mr. Trump’s team is wary of Mr. Schmidt, who has been allied with Democrats and advised the Obama White House. Credit Kevin Hagen for The New York Times.

WASHINGTON — Few companies have been as intimately tied to the Democratic Party in recent years as Google. So now that Donald J. Trump is president, the giant company, in Silicon Valley parlance, is having to pivot.

The shift was evident a day after Congress began its new session this month. That evening, about 70 lawmakers, a majority of them Republicans, were feted at the stately Smithsonian Arts and Industries Building, where they clinked champagne and bourbon glasses and posed for selfies with the 600 guests assembled in their honor.

The event’s main host was not from the Republican establishment. Instead, the party was primarily financed and anchored by Google.

“We’ve partnered with Google on events before, but nothing like this party,” said Alex Skatell, a founder of The Independent Journal Review, a news start-up with a right-leaning millennial audience, which also helped host the event. “I’ve never heard of an event as big.”

The event was emblematic of an about-face by Google. Over the last eight years, the company was closely associated with former President Barack Obama. Google employees overwhelmingly supported Mr. Obama’s presidential campaigns and some later took roles in his administration. Eric Schmidt, the chairman of Alphabet, Google’s parent company, advised the Obama White House. And last year, Google employees gave $1.3 million to Hillary Clinton’s campaign to succeed Mr. Obama, compared with $26,000 to the Trump campaign, according to federal filings.

Now, the tech giant is scrambling to forge ties with Mr. Trump’s new administration and to strengthen its relationship with a Republican-dominated Congress. Most important, Google is trying to change the perception that it is a Democratic stronghold.

So terribly reassuring to see everyone rush to suck up. CNN has the full story.

“I sat under the glory spout and it just was coming out all day long on me.”

Rick Wiles.

Rick Wiles.

Rick Wiles has been orgasmic over Trump, and that psychopathic god of his, ecstatically going on about ooze and glory spouts. It’s kinda disturbing. I don’t care what Wiles does in private, but I don’t need to hear about it, either. In this latest outing, Wiles is comparing Trump to Samson, which I find quite amusing, because El Shaddai didn’t do well by Samson.

“Friends, listen to me,” he said. “God’s favor is on us. Please, please, please comprehend what is happening. It’s more than a political revolution. This is a spiritual revolution. God’s favor is shining on us. I can’t get out of my mind what Mario Murillo said Monday, ‘Grace is oozing out of Heaven.’ It’s just oozing towards us right now. I’m basking in it. I’m rolling around in it. I’m enjoying it.”

That’s nice. I’ll stay ooze free if you don’t mind.

I keep getting this picture that Donald Trump is like this Samson, who has been raised up by God to fight the Philistines and all the Philistines have now turned their attention away from the church, turned their attention away from attacking Christianity, and all of the Philistines are running to Washington to attack Samson. But Samson is strong enough for them. He’s been called. He’s been equipped for this battle. That is his job. That is his assignment. He’s going to beat them down. They will not be able to overtake him. He’s Samson. He was designed by God. He was created for this hour to fight these Philistines.

The story of Samson is an interesting one. Warped, seriously fucked up, but interesting. Once again, I highly recommend Drunk With Blood: God’s Killings in the Bible, by Steve Wells. If you don’t have the book, but would like the insightful commentary, head over to SAB, and note the commentary on the right side. Samson wasn’t a terribly smart guy, and you couldn’t give him any points at all for astuteness, even though his mum was knocked up by an angel while her husband was gone. Tsk. Samson is wandering about one day, sees a Philistine woman he likes the look of, and demands his parents procure her. They do, he’s pleased. Apparently at some point, they marry, there’s a week long party, an inexplicable riddle, Samson gets pissed, kills 30 people and steals their clothes so he doesn’t have to pay his buddies, then gives his wife to a companion and leaves. Some hero.

Then there’s a raft of super-nonsense. Samson decides he wants to go back and have sex with his wife (the one he gave away). Now the story is that her father gave her to someone else (women rarely have names in the bible), and offers her younger sister to Samson. He doesn’t want the sister, so he has a cunning plan to get sex with his wife: he’s gonna set the Philistines grain fields on fire. This wouldn’t be a problem for most people. Samson figures the best way to do this is to catch 300 foxes, tie their tails together, light them on fire, and set them loose in the grain fields. Genius! How in the fuck can people not be embarrassed by this shit? Anyway, the cunning plan didn’t work, Samson’s wife and father were burned to death by the pissed off Philistines. Golly, there’s just so much love and light in this How To Be A Psychopath book. Samson then slaughtered a bunch of Philistines. Then that glory spout thing happened, y’know, the spirit of the lord came upon him, and he grabbed that conveniently placed jawbone of an ass and killed 1,000 men. Yeah. As Steve Wells notes, it’s easier to believe stories like this if you don’t know they exist.

Then Samson goes to Gaza, has sex with a prostitute, ripped out the doors and gate posts of the city, carried them up a hill, and fell in love with Delilah. Delilah was paid to find out the magical source of Samson’s strength, y’know, find his wand or whatever. There’s a long, idiotic story about these attempts. Delilah finally gets it right, and cuts his hair. The Philistines nab Samson and gouge out his eyes. They also chained him up, and put him in a prison house. Then someone gets the bright idea to bring Samson out to entertain them. Naturally, Samson prayed to El Shaddai:

Now the house was full of…about three thousand men and women…And Samson called unto the LORD, and said, O Lord God…strengthen me…that I may be at once avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes…and he house fell upon the lords, and upon all the people that were therein. So the dead which he slew at this death were more than they which he slew in his life. Judges 16.27-30.

As Steve Wells notes, this was the first suicide terrorist act. It resulted in the deaths of 3,000 civilian men and women. God approved it, and gave Samson the strength to do it. Why in the hell christians still parade this idiotic story around, I don’t know. Samson was something of a dumbfuck, mostly interested in sex and getting out of paying his bets. He was a murderer and a thief. He wasn’t too kind to animals, either. Point being, there was no reason at all to hold him above the Philistines, who couldn’t really be any worse; at best they were pretty much the same. El Shaddai didn’t love Samson enough to enhance his thinking ability, or to magically give him his eyes back, or find a way for Samson to avenge himself without having to commit suicide. Somehow this awful story never manages to make the point that the situation Samson found himself in was his own doing. It has always baffled me that christians are so damn impressed with this story. It’s awful, and just one more story highlighting the fact that Jehovah is a bloodthirsty, stupid, psychopath.

If Trump is Samson of a latter day…yeah. Maybe the folks in charge of the Doomsday Clock should shave off that 30 seconds.

Wiles added that God is also blessing his radio ministry and that God’s glory has been flowing: “I didn’t get home until after 8 last night and I had some visitors in the house, they were waiting and everybody had already finished dinner and I came in and I was floating, I just said, ‘I’ve been sitting under the glory spout all day.’ That’s what I felt like. I sat under the glory spout and it just was coming out all day long on me.”

Eeuuw. If you happen to be one of those people blessing Wiles’s ministry, I beg of you, please, think. Give me five fucking minutes: think.

Via RRW.

ITMFA!

Dan Savage (MSNBC).

Dan Savage (MSNBC).

Savage announced that he’s launching Impeachthemotherfuckeralready.com, where like-minded people can buy merchandise to display their campaign shorthand.

“I didn’t think I’d see a worse president than George W. Bush in my lifetime,” Savage wrote. “But here we are. So I’m bringing back ITMFA buttons and adding T-shirts and, yes, red hats to the ITMFA collection.”

He also added that the money raised will be donated to the American Civil Liberties Union, Planned Parenthood, and the International Refugee Assistance Project.

“We’re in for a long and ugly four years, readers,” he continued. “Let’s raise some money for groups fighting Trump, let’s bring ITMFA back into our everyday vocabulary, and let’s remember that we—people who voted against Trump, people who want to see him out of office as quickly as possible, people who are appalled by this and this and this and this—are the majority.”

Costly, Wasteful, Harmful. Yeah, Trump.

Suspected undocumented immigrants are transferred out of the holding area after being processed at the Tucson Sector of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection headquarters CREDIT: AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, File.

Suspected undocumented immigrants are transferred out of the holding area after being processed at the Tucson Sector of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection headquarters CREDIT: AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, File.

Trump’s scarily close to insane fixation on immigration is going to be incredibly costly, and it should go without saying, highly harmful to all manner of peoples.

As part of a series of executive orders aimed at attacking immigrants and immigrant communities, President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday that going forward, his administration will order the mandatory detention of all those apprehended or arrested by immigration enforcement officials.

The U.S. already spends more on all immigration enforcement — nearly $20 billion a year — than on all other federal law enforcement combined, and currently detains more immigrants each day — more than 42,000 — than ever before. Summary removals and mandatory detention are at an all-time high. And the focus on removals has come at the cost of due process, placing vulnerable populations like asylum seekers at risk. The number of asylum seekers held in detention increased threefold from 2010 to 2014.

Making detention mandatory will only exacerbate these issues.

It will also be expensive. The mandatory detention of all immigrants apprehended or arrested will cost the U.S. an additional $902 million each year, for a total of $9 billion in new federal spending over the next decade.

[…]

And these estimates are by their nature conservative. They don’t take into account potentially lengthened stays in detention under this executive order, nor any costs to DHS for rapidly building or acquiring more detention facilities and bed space to meet new needs.

Let’s put that in perspective. For $9 billion, the U.S. could instead:

Ah, those would be good things though, and the rethuglicans are in charge of the asylum, so we definitely rule that out. No point at all in helping all people, and building a safe and stable society, with some thought to a social safety net. No, in our new fascist order, that sort of thing is bad. Spending all that money to simply no point outside of causing harm, that must be more of those really good business moves we keep hearing about. *eyeroll*

Full story here.

New CIA Director: ‘Jesus Christ Our Savior Is Truly the Only Solution For Our World.’

170112111433-02-pompeo-testifies-0112-exlarge-169

Speaking at a church event in Wichita [in 2014], then-Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kansas), the newly confirmed Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, said radical Muslims want “to wipe Christians from the face of the Earth,” and that Christians need to pray, fight, and understand that “Jesus Christ our Savior is truly the only solution for our world.”

[…]

“But I can tell you that this threat to America is from people who deeply believe that Islam is the way and the light and the only answer,” said Pompeo.

“So, as we think about what U.S. policy needs to be, how we will begin to combat this, we need to recognize that these folks believe it is religiously driven for them to wipe Christians from the face of the Earth,” he said.

Right. You think your god [placeholder] is the way and the light and the only answer. You believe, as a christian, you are religiously driven to wipe muslims from the face of the earth, and you want to force your religious beliefs on everyone. As usual, such fanatics completely ignore the fact that you aren’t fighting over two gods [placeholder], it’s the same fucking one. Abrahamaic religions: Judaism, Islam, Christianity. Same fucking god. (If you’re confused, ‘god’ is a generic word, a placeholder for a specific god; ‘allah’ is the same thing, means ‘god’. Unless you specify, ‘god’ in any language could be applicable to thousands of imaginary beings.)

You bloodthirsty christian assholes want a jihad, you want to kill, slaughter, and most likely torture first. No room to talk here, a fanatic is a fanatic, and all you idiotic fanatics want to do this over different interpretations. It’s fair enough to say most christians just want to live their lives, like everyone else, and be left in peace. It’s fair enough to say the very same thing about most muslims. I dearly wish we could just lock up all you fucking religious fanatics in a room, lock it, and walk away.

“But these folks are serious and they abhor Christians,” said the future CIA director. “And [they] will continue to press against us until we make sure that we pray and stand and fight and make sure that we know that Jesus Christ our Savior is truly the only solution for our world.”

Yes, some fanatical assholes do abhor christians. Just like some fanatical assholes abhor muslims. Can’t say I’m altogether fond of fanatics of any stripe, but here in the States, where I live, it’s christians who constantly prove to be a threat to all people who don’t measure up to their fucked up immoral standards. Turn that laser focus on yourself, sir, and let that ‘god’ of yours fight its own fucking battles.

Unsurprisingly, Pompeo is willing to go along with Trump and bring torture back, because torture good.

Via CNS.

Defiant Tweeting.

The U.S. Department of Defense had an interesting tweet yesterday:

“From refugee to Marine,” the tweet reads. “USMC Cpl Ali J. Mohammed takes the fight to the doorstep of those who cast his family out.”

The tweet then links to an article on the Marines’ official homepage that explains how Mohammed and his family came to the United States after being targeted by Iraqi insurgents for their role in helping the U.S. government during the Iraq War.

Mohammed subsequently enlisted in the Marines in 2014, and is now serving in Iraq as “a translator with an SPMAGTF Advise and Assist team that supports Iraqi forces as they fight to oust ISIL from their country.”

It’s not known whether the DoD’s social media manager sent out this particular story on Wednesday to tweak the president, although the timing is interesting given Trump’s expected new policy on Muslim refugees that would have barred Mohammed from ever entering the United States in the first place.

This is activism. Small, subversive activism, and I hope to all hells that we see much more of it, and people gather their spines and stand up against the fascist regime. This is one tiny facet of the most important thing – refusing to other, seeing human beings as human beings. I don’t know who tweeted this story, but I’m thankful, and this small act put a smile on my face, and kindled a tiny flame in my heart.

Via Raw Story.

South Dakota: New Attack on Transgender Kids.

South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard (R). CREDIT: AP Photo/James Nord.

South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard (R). CREDIT: AP Photo/James Nord.

Last year, Gov. Daugaard vetoed an anti-transgender bill, after meeting with a number of transgender persons. Unsurprisingly, the bigoted bill is back on the table, with a new twist.

The 2017 bill, SB 115, has the same purpose as last year’s: blocking schools from letting transgender students from accessing bathrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity. But there’s a new word included in the bill — one not seen in other anti-transgender bills — that could set a dangerous new precedent for legislation designed to discriminate against transgender people.

“The term, biological sex, as used in this Act, means a person’s immutable biological sex as objectively determined by anatomy and genetics existing at the time of birth,” the bill reads. “A person’s original birth certificate may be relied upon as definitive evidence of the person’s biological sex.”

That word “original” means there would be no way for any transgender person to ever obtain legal recognition.

Currently, in South Dakota, transgender people can obtain court orders to amend their birth certificates to reflect their gender identity without any specific medical requirements.

[…]

But if anti-trans legislation starts referring to “original birth certificates” like South Dakota’s new bill does, that would further limit the already-few ways trans people have to protect their gender identities under the law. Indeed, it would eliminate the relevance of any legal documentation they obtain that confirms their gender identity.

[…]

Given South Dakota’s otherwise-identical bill made it all the way to the governor’s desk last year, this year’s version could similarly have legs. And there’s nothing to stop the many other states considering various anti-trans bills from incorporating the same change or propose new bills with this extra rejection of transgender identities.

This is absolutely evil, and so unnecessary. I’m tired of saying it should not be alright to legislate hate and bigotry. I would hope that Daugaard find the spine to do the right thing again, but I’m doubtful. Even if he does, this will be picked up by spiteful, bigoted, hateful, christian asses in many other states.

Full story at Think Progress.