Tag Archives: morality

A Party’s Failure on Immigration

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The Party in question isn’t the Republican Party.  Those folks always have had a very stringent position on immigration, and they’ve not hidden their view from the public’s eye.  No, the failing party is the Progressive-Democratic Party.  Those folks have long claimed—a claim we now know to be a cynical pretense, a pretense consistent with the underlying philosophy of the party of Jim Crow and of racist and sexist affirmative action—to be champions of immigrants and of DACA children.  But last week, they voted against every bill, Republican-offered and “bipartisan,” that was brought up.  The Progressive-Democrats wouldn’t even vote for cloture so the bills could be openly debated on the Senate floor.

Many Republicans voted against the bills, too, it’s true enough.  But as I said, they’ve had a sterner view of immigration all along.  It’s the Progressive-Democrats who voted against their avowals, who welched on their public commitments to DACA children and to immigrants and immigrant wannabes.

The Progressive-Democratic Party has shown with last week’s display that they don’t give a damn about DACA children or about immigration reform generally.  They only want the issue for campaigning for their political gain.

DACA children aren’t human children.  Prospective immigrants—including the illegal aliens already present—aren’t adult humans.  They’re just shovels for digging up votes.

This is how the Progressive-Democratic Party so shamefully has said they view these people.  This is what all of us need to remember in the fall.

Immigration, Progressive-Democrats, and Votes

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President Donald Trump has an immigration bill on offer before the Congress, the Republicans have one, and a bipartisan group of two Senators have one.  Trump’s bill includes legalization and an eventual possibility of citizenship for 1.8 million Dreamers (1.2 million, or so, beyond ex-President Barack Obama’s (D) illegal DACA program Dreamers), funding for a border wall, and changes to our visa programs.  The Republicans’ offer centers on DACA protections and a border wall.  The “bipartisan” bill has only DACA protections, not even border security.

The Progressive-Democrats in Congress oppose both of the first two, and all three bills don’t look promising for passage, with that third a non-starter for its lack of protections for our nation.

This is what we see from the Progressive-Democrats.  They’ll vote against a bill that provides protections for the Dreamers protected under DACA.  They’ll vote against a bill that provides protections and legal status for three times the number of Dreamers than were protected under Obama’s DACA.

This is the conclusion that follows.  The Progressive-Democratic Party and its Congressional members don’t see DACA Dreamers—and especially the added Dreamers under Trump’s offer—as human beings.  Not at all.  These people are just a mechanical commodity, a tool to be used politically as a campaign issue on which to raise money and get votes.

The Progressive-Democrats claim that Trump’s offer would reduce overall immigration through the visa changes, and it likely would.  That, though, is just a broader, immigrants-as-commodity for Party political gain, argument.  Immigrants generally aren’t human beings in the eyes of Progressive-Democrats; the mass of immigrants is just a tool.

Of course, the Progressive-Democrats could prove me wrong.  They could stop playing politics with human lives and support Trump’s bill.  Or they could stop playing politics with human lives and support the Republicans’ DACA plus border security bill.

If they don’t, remember their attitude toward men and women and children this fall.

A Thought on American Women’s Gymnastics

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Unless you’ve been vacationing unplugged under a rock for the last several months, you’re aware of the atrocities committed by Larry Nassar, the ex-pseudo-doctor for the US’ women’s gymnastics team.  Now we find out that

The US Olympic Committee didn’t intervene in USA Gymnastics’ handling of sexual-abuse allegations against longtime national-team doctor Larry Nassar in 2015, even after USA Gymnastics’ then-president told two top USOC executives that an internal investigation had uncovered possible criminal behavior by the doctor against Olympic athletes.

And pursuant to a lawsuit,

the organization [USOC] said it was “first made aware of the possibility that a USA Gymnastics physician had sexually abused USA Gymnastics athletes in the summer of 2015, when we were informed by USA Gymnastics.”

Gymnastics is a physically dangerous and mentally stressful sport, as are most competitive sports.  Our women, and our girls, who participate in this game don’t need the added stress, much less the added damage, of sexual misbehaviors, sexual harassment, sexual assault inflicted on them by those placed in positions of power or authority over them—trainers, coaches, doctors, anyone.

I think it has become necessary to shut down women’s gymnastics as a formal sport in the US for a significant period of time, perhaps 2-5 years.  The time is necessary to completely revamp the sport and purge the criminals and the merely misbehaving personnel, folks like the imitation doctor Nassar, just convicted of harassments and of assaults against our girls; folks like the Karolyis, whose “training” techniques at best don’t align with American values; others who mistreat our girl and woman athletes while pretending merely to “toughen up the buttercups” or who get their jollies from molestations.

USA Gymnastics and the women’s side of the United States Olympic Committee must cease to exist.  When the time comes, replacements for USAG and that portion of USOC must be created from the ground up.  Anyone associated with USAG and USOC and anyone associated with those personnel out to and including the second degree of association must be banned from participation also.

Full stop.

One more item: the boys and men’s side of this needs a full, deep, and independent investigation, too, on general principles.  What deeply nefarious affairs are going on there that we don’t know about?  Hopefully none, but it’s time to look closely.

Another Reason

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Now it’s just getting petty.  For the period surrounding this year’s Super Bowl, P Boston is banning anything to do with Philadelphia from the city.

Boston is banning cheesesteaks, Philadelphia cream cheese, beers associated with Philadelphia.  One Boston-based bakery chain even has cut ties—permanently—with its Philadelphia cream cheese distributor.

Boston is getting hysterical, too.  In addition to banning foodstuffs, that city is banning people: Will Smith and Sylvester Stallone, one because he was raised in Philadelphia, the other because he set the Rocky series of films in that city.  Even bald eagles—can you believe it?—are banned from the Esplanade.

This is another reason not to bother with the Super Bowl, at least for this year.

Hypocrisy

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…is alive and well in the National Football League.  The NFL invited American Veterans, a major veterans support organization, to submit an ad for the Super Bowl advertising suite.  So AMVET did.

It turns out the NFL just wanted to look good in the public shower; it wasn’t at all serious.  Having received AMVET’s submission, they chose to reject it.  The ad committed the heinous crime of asking folks to stand for the national anthem.  The NFL’s excuse?  The Super Bowl is

designed for fans to commemorate and celebrate the game, players, teams, and the Super Bowl…

it’s not a place for political statements.  But NFL allows football players to insult our veterans and attack our national anthem, including planned kneelings at the upcoming Super Bowl.  That’s not a political statement, though.

Consider this carefully as you decide whether you want to watch what used to be a great game.  Consider, also, whether you want to drop a dime, next year, on the NFL, given its support for its players’ attacks on our national anthem and their insults to generations of our veterans.