Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[iam416]

The Supreme Court sort of punted on gerrymandering. Thank fucking god. The opinion was based on lack of standing. Kagan wrote a concurrence basically spelling out exactly what she thinks a claim will look like and that, in her opinion, it should succeed. Of course, she only had 3 others, so it was a mere concurrence.

I like Kagan well enough, but reading her concurrence I can't help but think of what a train-wreck that decision would be if she can get a 5th.

[Ghengis Jon]

Can you clarify the Wisconsin punt? If the question is the effect of gerrymandering, how can a significantly large block of voters (in this case Wisc Dem voters) not have standing in the case?

[iam416]

The Plaintiff has to suffer a particularized injury. As is always the case. The Court said that in order to show this you need to show that you suffered vote dilution in your district. It's not enough to show that someone else did in some other district. The named Plaintiff CONCEDED that you couldn't redraw his particular district in a way that would be different (vote-wise), so he suffered no injury.

Four others merely asserted the generalized theory but didn't attempt to show individual injury. The Court remanded the case back to the District Court to give those four plaintiffs a chance to offer evidence of particularlized injury. Kagan's Concurrence is a roadmap to what she thinks they should offer as evidence.

[Kapture1]

First, heh. Second, are you new to politics? This is how it works.

I knew it was coming before it hit too, back when several leftist activists, including Shawn King and a former 0bama official and Pod Save America douche tweeted the same photo, from 2014. The former official deleted his tweet and commented that he would have never posted the picture had he known it was from 0bama's term lol

[Kapture1]

If you read your own shit, you would know that in 2014 the was a huge unflux of unaccompanied children. Unaccompanied. They had to be housed until they were reunited with their parents. (80% were)

This is not the same thing.

God, I'm sick of the #trumpbutlickers taking a completely different situation, trying to show it as being the same and crying... But Obaaaaaaaaama

it is different, now parents are trying to use their kids as a fucking passport and cross the border illegally rather than sending them off on their own to make the trip through Mexico. In BOTH cases, it's the parent's fault for being separated from their children.

[Ghengis Jon]

Thanks Talent.

[Dr. Strangelove]

The current wave of family separation has nothing to do with Obama. Trump was furious when he saw the number of illegal crossings was quickly rising in latter 2017 and early 2018. So the admin changed strategy in March/April to prosecute literally every single illegal, no more simple deportations, even for first time offenders. This moved jurisdiction out of DHS' hands and is what made family separation required as part of DOJ procedure.

Trump wants to do this, because he want illegals punished as severely as possible, but he also knows it's visually a losing issue for him which is why he keeps trying to pin the blame on Dems and use the kids to extort concessions on The Wall, steep reductions on LEGAL immigration, etc.

We can debate the merits but claiming it's merely a continuation of Obama policy (Trump) or that it's even not happening (Nielson) is disingenuous at best, deliberate lying at worst. At least Sessions/Kelly are upfront about what they're doing and how much a good thing they think it is.

[CGVT]

The current wave of family separation has nothing to do with Obama. Trump was furious when he saw the number of illegal crossings was quickly rising in latter 2017 and early 2018. So the admin changed strategy in March/April to prosecute literally every single illegal, no more simple deportations, even for first time offenders. This moved jurisdiction out of DHS' hands and is what made family separation required as part of DOJ procedure.

Trump wants to do this, because he want illegals punished as severely as possible, but he also knows it's visually a losing issue for him which is why he keeps trying to pin the blame on Dems and use the kids to extort concessions on The Wall, steep reductions on LEGAL immigration, etc.

We can debate the merits but claiming it's merely a continuation of Obama policy (Trump) or that it's even not happening (Nielson) is disingenuous at best, deliberate lying at worst. At least Sessions/Kelly are upfront about what they're doing and how much a good thing they think it is.

Exactly

[Dr. Strangelove]

India is the latest to pass retaliatory tariffs on US products. Will match dollar-for-dollar

http://www.keyt.com/news/national-world/india-moves-ahead-with-tariffs-on-us-goods/754408232

[CGVT]

I wonder if that includes the cost of tech support? ;)

[Kapture1]

The current wave of family separation has nothing to do with Obama. Trump was furious when he saw the number of illegal crossings was quickly rising in latter 2017 and early 2018. So the admin changed strategy in March/April to prosecute literally every single illegal, no more simple deportations, even for first time offenders. This moved jurisdiction out of DHS' hands and is what made family separation required as part of DOJ procedure.

Trump wants to do this, because he want illegals punished as severely as possible, but he also knows it's visually a losing issue for him which is why he keeps trying to pin the blame on Dems and use the kids to extort concessions on The Wall, steep reductions on LEGAL immigration, etc.

We can debate the merits but claiming it's merely a continuation of Obama policy (Trump) or that it's even not happening (Nielson) is disingenuous at best, deliberate lying at worst. At least Sessions/Kelly are upfront about what they're doing and how much a good thing they think it is.

you are missing the point, which is you are a hypocrite if those pictures bother you, but the ones from 2014 don't.

[Jeff Buchanan]

I listened to a reporter this morning babble on about how separating children of parents who have crossed into the US illegally from their mother/father is Trump administration policy and has nothing to do with "Democrats" or previous administrations. She did not address the central question which is what laws and court rulings apply to the separations. It would help if reporters did the research and reported the facts rather than babbling on about the horror of the separations.

In my read, neither the Trump administration or the opposition to it on this matter are accurately depicting the circumstances that apply to the separations.

"Catch and Release" ...... the practice by U.S. authorities of releasing children and asylum seekers into the community while they await immigration hearings. Catch and release is not a single law so much as a collection of policies and court rulings spanning the last four Democratic and Republican administrations. Many caught and then released under this policy fail to show up for their hearings and remain in the country without legal authorization. The Trump administration claims that enforcement of immigration law under this policy has created loop holes in immigration law that allow too many immigrants from Central and South America to remain illegally in the US. That is an accurate claim though I can't find what kind of numbers we are talking about. As closely as I can tell it is upwards of 5000 annually and the number has been increasing over the last 24 months.

Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008, is a law signed by President George W. Bush. The TVPRA is meant to give safe harbor to victims of human trafficking and says unaccompanied children ?are exempt from prompt return to their home country,? unless they come from Canada or Mexico, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Children fleeing violence in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras are covered by this law. This law applies to immigrants who present at a boarder crossing and file a claim for safe haven in the US under the TVPRA. It does not apply to illegal boarder crossers.

?Flores settlement? from 1997. This legal agreement struck by President Bill Clinton?s administration requires the federal government to release rather than detain undocumented immigrant children, first to their parents if possible, to other adult relatives if not, and to licensed programs willing to accept custody if no relatives are available. As a last resort, U.S. officials may place children in the ?least restrictive? setting available.

A federal judge in California ruled in 2015 that the Flores settlement covered all children in immigration officials? custody, regardless of whether they were apprehended at the border alone or with family members. The judge?s ruling also covered any accompanying parents. But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit reversed the latter part of the ruling and said the Flores settlement required only that children, not parents, be released. Therefore, the government is required to keep immigrant children and their parents together only for a limited time. After that what happens to the children is not clear under court ruling or law.

So, on one hand, the Flores settlement and the TVPRA require that children be released. On the other, Sessions?s zero-tolerance policy subjects any accompanying parents to criminal prosecution and eventual deportation.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/attorney-general-announces-zero-tolerance-policy-criminal-illegal-entry

The bluster about Democrats creating the current separation circumstances from Trump boils down to an assertion that is not altogether correct but also not completely wrong. It's not the Dems though, its, four administrations and their sitting Congresses and Federal Court interpretations that have created the present circumstances regarding these separations.It is also Session's implementation of the Zero Tolerance OPA that has changed the landscape. Visually, its a bad move. In practice and to stop the increasing flow of immigrants from Central and South America, it is entirely reasonable. IMO, Congress could act and should act to clarify under what circumstances children can be detained/separated from their parents and I[ve repeatedly posted that here ..... change/clarify the process,

[Dr. Strangelove]

Just in the past 24 hours I've seen Laura Bush, Franklin Graham, Cardinal Dolan, Ben Sasse, Da Mooch, and even Bill O'Reilly come out against the "zero tolerance/mandatory separation" policy. Bush and Sasse are not fans of Trump. The other 4 have been overwhelmingly supportive of him. A Quinnipiac poll released today showed 35% of Republicans being against the policy and 66% of voters overall.

[AlabamAlum]

The 5 best midrange bourbons:

1. Maker's Mark
2. Jim Beam Black
3. Four Roses (any)
4. Eagle Rare
5. Elijah Craig

[CGVT]

I don't drink much bourbon, but I keep a bottle of Maker's Mark on hand for when I want a little touch