Trump and Miller’s raiding “party” targets hard-working, law-abiding, on-time rent-paying families—i.e. “violent criminals”

How often have we heard Donald Trump and certain far-right commentators who claim that his “base” supports inhumane and economically brain-dead attacks on undocumented Hispanic immigrants who are simply here to earn their keep for themselves and their families? Oh, I’m sorry, wasn’t that “rapists,” drug runners and assorted “violent criminals” who “kill 100,000 Americans” every year? Or is it that, like Stephen Miller, they are motivated solely by their racism against Hispanics, who “ironically” enough seem to be the “go-to” group for opportunities of various other demographics to vent their “issues”: “stealing” jobs for blacks, “sex fiends” for white women, and for whites generally in whatever paranoid fantasy comes to mind, and even illegal immigrants from Asia (India in particular) who are upset that Hispanic immigrants are drawing unwanted attention to them (the Pew Foundation finally admitted to the almost unchecked rise in illegal immigration from Asia, although the media continues to ignore it). It’s all the same everywhere people don’t want Hispanics around—whatever their reason for being, it isn’t anything good.  

I always find it hilarious that even supposedly “educated” and “progressive” white people think Hispanics are too stupid to know how to use a computer, yet you always see someone who vaguely appears Hispanic on those Life Lock commercials apparently smart enough to use one to hack into your personal files (it does no good to point out that Russian hackers store billions of items of personal data, then sell them in “packets”). Hispanics in your neighborhood? Apple’s anti-theft video system portrays a Hispanic couple roaming around picking off packages in front of doors. It seems like every time somebody needs a “criminal” type in their television ads, it is almost always someone “ethnic” who can “easily” be “confused” as being Hispanic. It is "racist" to point out that Hispanics commit fewer crimes in total that either whites or blacks, apparentluy because when someone who is not defined as a "real" American commits a crime--even if a native-born American citizen--it is somehow 10 ten time worse in magnitude.

The truth is somewhat different. Landlords of apartment buildings say that the ICE is targeting their most dependable on-time rent payers, many of them with children who are U.S. citizens. Temp agencies usually send Hispanic males looking for work to do the “dirty” jobs nobody else wants to do or lasts very long in. For example, there is a warehouse in Seattle where one side takes in unsold Goodwill items, which arrive in chaotically-loaded  fashion in trucks, which must be  sorted, bailed or boxed and sent off to places like Africa—and on the other side people are stacking and boxing t-shirts all day. On one side, all the workers are Hispanic; on the other side white and black. Guess who does the difficult, physically-challenging work, and who does the easy work? If you pretend not to know the answer to that then you are certainly a bigger hypocrite than you are ever willing to admit. 

And these are the working people that Trump and Miller are sending their ICE brown shirts to vacuum-up like so much “useless” crumbs. Just like Trump and Miller’s tariff idiocy, this campaign “strategy” to shore-up the racist “base” and satisfy racist far-right media fanatics can only cause harm to the U.S. economic stability if in fact “millions” are deported in a relatively short time frame; not only that, but most undocumented workers pay into the Social Security fund that they will likely never be able to collect on themselves.  Even the so-called “liberal” media is into the game: Hispanics are not “real” people, they are just objects to comment on occasionally, usually either in negative terms or in negative contexts. Hispanics are rarely if ever allowed to speak for themselves; apparently even those who were born and raised in this country have no rights a “real” American is bound to respect. The funny thing is, of course, is that most Hispanics in this country have something that “real” Americans don’t have: the “blood” of indigenous peoples of this land.

CAFTA has brought profits to U.S. corporations--and misery to Central America

Donald Trump’s threat to impose an escalating amount of tariffs on goods imported from Mexico was so stupid on so many levels—the biggest one being the likely reversal of the economic stability that free trade has brought to Mexico, which has over time to the steep decline of illegal immigration from that country. Not that free trade has been entirely beneficial to Mexico; while U.S. consumers have benefited from year-round fresh fruits and vegetables from Mexico, many small farmers in Mexico have nevertheless been burned by competition from U.S. imports and forced to go to the cities to find work. Trump’s threats on Mexican manufacturing would throw them out of that  work as well, and where would they go from there? This just shows you how stupid Trump’s chief advisor in such matters—Stephen Miller—really is. Trump’s complaints about the trade deficit with Mexico ignore the fact that the U.S. has a much larger consumer base than Mexico does; the one truly out-of-whack trade problem the U.S. has is with China, and Trump “war” with that country apparently will only end when Trump is out of office, with the loser being American consumers.

Despite Trump’s claims of an “invasion” and the media following along with its own hysterical headlines, illegal immigration from south of the border is still down from what it was 20 years ago. Most migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. today are from Central America, a region which also has the “benefit” of a free trade agreement with the U.S., called “DR-CAFTA,” the former acronym referring to latecomer the Dominican Republic. But CAFTA clearly has been far more beneficial to the U.S.; in 2018 it exported $32.7 billion in product to those countries, while importing $25.2 billion for a trade surplus of $7.5 billion. Considering the fact that the even combined the CAFTA countries have only a fraction of the consumer and consumer spending base as the U.S., this tends to demonstrate that free trade has not led to increased investment and living wage job creation in Central America, in fact quite the opposite. 

Back in the “Banana Republic” days U.S. companies robbed Central American countries blind, backed by hand-picked regimes that enforced repression of the population and labor based on the peonage model practiced in the U.S., and when finished pillaging  destroyed all infrastructure so that it could not used by the natives. It is not all that certain that the economics have changed all that much under CAFTA. Back in 2014, a report by Foreign Policy in Focus pointedly asserted that “the pact has had a devastating effect on poverty, dislocation, and environmental contamination in the region. And perhaps even worse, it’s diminished the ability of Central American countries to protect their citizens from corporate abuse.”

The report notes that U.S. companies have particularly abused their power in Central American countries through the pernicious Investor-State Dispute Settlement program, which allows such companies to overturn any local law that affects their profits, in effect “Such lawsuits can be financially devastating to poor countries that already struggle to provide basic services to their people, much less engage in costly court battles with multinational firms. They can also prevent governments from making democratically accountable decisions in the first place, pushing them to prioritize the interests of transnational corporations over the needs of their citizens.”

This includes U.S. interests in mining production. One-third of the entire territory of Guatemala and Honduras is devoted to unregulated mining, with toxic effects to the environment and the population. Countries like El Salvador and Costa Rica, which have put up a brave face before the U.S. foe, have been sued by U.S. companies through various international “dispute” mechanisms to overturn environmental and labor rules in those countries. While most of these suits have not been successful, they have cost El Salvador and Costa Rica millions in ill-afforded dollars. When such suits are successful, the arbitrary unfairness of them is palpable, as the Focus report notes:

TECO Guatemala Holdings, a U.S. corporation, alleged in 2009 that Guatemala had wrongfully interfered with its indirect subsidiary’s investment in an electricity distribution company. Specifically, TECO charged that the government had not protected its right to a “minimum standard of treatment”— an exceptionally vague standard that is open to wide interpretation by the international tribunals that rule on such cases — concerning the setting of rates by government regulators. In other words, TECO wanted to charge higher electricity rates to Guatemalan users than those the state deemed fair. Guatemala had to pay $21.1 million in compensatory damages and $7.5 million in legal fees, above and beyond what it spent on its own defense.

It goes on and on. Last year, the journal Foreign Policy noted that the U.S.—which is principally at fault for the violent street gang problem in Central America, as it is the “incubator” of those gangs before “deporting” the problem elsewhere—has done little to reign in its rogue corporations or help the economies of those countries in stable job creation, which “free trade” was supposed to do. A 2015 AFL-CIO report noted the devastation of small subsistence farming wrought by CAFTA, not just by U.S. imports but by the shift to “corporate plantations” to compete in the global market. Small farmers thrown out of work have not—like they have in Mexico—been able to find anything but the lowest paying work without any rights whatever, save to breath and work under intolerable conditions. The government of Honduras has been remarkably complicit in this; in 2013 its so-called Supreme Court allowed a law that gave foreign corporations sovereign control over all territory their businesses were situated on. 

Thus it is no “coincidence” that the large migrations from Central America began in earnest since the CAFTA agreement promulgated during the Bush administration. The U.S.’ failure to reign-in abusive U.S. corporations and insure that native workers are provided living wages, and the continuing U.S. policy of deporting U.S.-nurtured gangs to ravage communities and drive out small businesses, is the principle reason for the so-called “invasion.” The U.S. needs to come to its senses and realizes that it is not its own interests to continue to overlook its culpability in a border “crisis” largely of its own making. This “crisis”—which began in 1965 with an immigration law which for the first time put a cap on legal immigration from Latin America, and the 1986 law which “criminalized” undocumented labor—will not only continue but become worse if the U.S. criminally turns its back on what it has wrought.

Trump’s “condolences” over yet another mass shooting is as worthless as sprinkling water over the raging fire of hate he has repeatedly set

Multiple death shootings by mainly right-wing nut-jobs were fairly commonplace during the Clinton and Obama administrations, but they seemed to be driven by the notion that these supposedly “socialist” presidents represented a “threat” to the white world order. But multiple death shootings in the Trump era are on a record pace, and the “explanation” for it cannot be for the same “justifications.” Trump has not “threatened” white hegemony but has been an ardent supporter of white nationalism, nativism and xenophobia; regardless if he admits it or not, he “learned” to be a bigot from his German father, who was so racist that Woody Guthrie—who once lived in a Trump tenement—wrote a song about it (“Old Man Trump”). Having fed those beliefs and allowed them to crawl out of the sewers of racists’ minds and fester, Trump has been not a “threat” but an enabler of the worst of human nature. Not only that, but the “better angels” of the America psyche have been for the most part submerged, in large part because many people who do not necessarily support Trump still agree with some of his “ideas” about who “merits” being in this country; they will do nothing until the hatred that Trump has inspired spins so far out of control that people will finally be forced to confront the true meaning of Trump. 

The latest mass shooting, at a Virginia Beach government building where 12 died, is nevertheless seemingly as confoundingly without apparent motive as many of the Trump-era shootings; even the “motive” for the Las Vegas mass killing of 58 people remains a mystery. Yet we can see in them the insane thoughtlessness and lack of conscience  that we often see in Trump and his most fanatical stooges, like Stephen Miller. They hate for hate’s sake, demonizing and dehumanizing people they don’t even know or wish to know. The people they choose to hate are just an “infestation” of so much vermin, not human beings who have their own hopes and dreams like other human beings. So while mass killers who do not have an apparent political or social “cleansing” motivation still share the total lack of regard for humanity as the people who do. We also  see in Trump someone who has complete disregard for the opinion of anyone who does not have hate in their heart, calling them “losers,” belittling their intelligence or mocking their physical stature. He traffics in the worst racist stereotypes and the people most likely to be “moved” to action by those stereotypes are his most ardent hate-filled supporters; we nevertheless should also fear those who are not moved at all one way or the other, for in their own way they are Trump’s enablers as well.

While unabashedly partisan Republicans like Newt Gingrich set the table for the sick brew to be served raw, Trump’s hate-filled rhetoric and stated policy desires has served up a banquet for his most ardent supporters to feast on. There are those of course who will sneer at the very suggestion that the endless, incomprehensible violence that has attended Trumps’ presidency has anything to do with him personally. But we only have to listen to his words, read his tweets and view adoring, fanatical MAGA hat-wearing crowds to know that this so-called human being has created such a toxic atmosphere in this country where just breathing it in is all that is necessary to set some people off to “cleanse” the world that the Trumps, Millers, Coulters, Ingrahams, Carlsons, Dobbs and Buchanans of the world have told us time and again are “infestations” that must be “eradicated” by whatever means necessary. But the bar is set so low that such hate also consumes those in the upper rungs as well. Hate is like a raging fire that consumes first the “target” and then all before it, making no distinction as long as it is combustible. A fire doesn’t think, it just does until it is stopped.

Maybe Trump is right: He can shoot someone on 5th Avenue and that still isn’t low enough for his supporters

Robert Mueller, rather than answer questions before a House committee, decided to just have a press conference, make a statement, and call it day at the Justice Department. But at least he was clear enough in what he had to say; while he could not prove a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia, it was not because it didn’t happen, but because witnesses who could have shed light on the subject either gave false testimony or took the Fifth—which suggests that something amiss did occur, and his report did show that some Trump campaign officials did have contact with Russians. The “failure” was that it just could not be proved that this was “coordinated” from a central source—say, Trump himself. On the subject of obstruction, once more Mueller reiterated that there were numerous incidents that could be construed as obstruction on the part of Trump, but that it was up to Congress to make the determination if this constituted an impeachable offense. In fact it almost seemed as if he was pushing that Congress do just that.

Yet Trump immediately took to twitter and “interpreted” Mueller’s comments as “cased closed.” We know that Trump is not a very good reader or speller, but obviously he can’t hear very well either; perhaps he is just parroting the “interpretation” from Fox News’ usual motley crew of hysterical fanatics (shouldn’t Jeanine Piro have been locked-up in an institution years ago?), although the (few) more literate analysts like Bret Baier are more careful in accessing  Mueller’s statement—although one suspects that Trump privately considers Baier and Chris Wallace to be “losers.” 

While most people do in fact realize that Trump is living in a world of make-believe, playing by rules only he has the “genius” to fathom, and utterly unmindful of the damage he is causing to civilized norms, there is a sizable percentage of  whites (with a few minorities who pathetically attempt to outdo the bigots in their bigotry) who are like weeds with deep roots of hatred that thrive because Trump not only refuses to mow the grass every once in a while, but allows the weeds to grow and prosper and blight the lawn. Now, suddenly we see this epidemic of racist white women coming out of the woodwork menacing blacks and Hispanics with Trump-inspired harangues and even threats with weaponry—the latest incident involving a female manager of a campground in Mississippi pulling out a gun on a black couple who merely wanted to have a picnic. 

The question of how low is too low for Trump supporters and even Republican lawmakers was answered by Trump himself even before the election:  "You know what else they say about my people? The polls, they say I have the most loyal people. Did you ever see that? Where I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose any voters, okay? It’s like incredible.” We are reaching the point where that is becoming less and less a fantasy only Trump shares.

Trump’s latest blow-up proves that his infrastructure “plan” was never a serious one

When Donald Trump was campaigning for president, he promised a $2 trillion infrastructure plan to create jobs and shore-up decaying roads and bridges, the conditions of which the American Society of Civil Engineers has given a grade of D+ and would cost (surprise) $2 trillion to fix; Trump would never come up with anything on his own if it actually made any sense. As one might recall, when he became president, Barack Obama and the Democrat-controlled congress—to the intense opposition of Republicans who were more interested in preventing an Obama policy “victory” than with the welfare of the American people—passed a $700 billion economic stimulus  bill that included “just” $111 billion for infrastructure. Only three moderate Republicans in the Senate voted for the bill during the height of the “Great Recession.” But as we have seen repeatedly, Trump’s own infrastructure “plan” has never gotten off the ground, largely because the Republicans in control of Congress his first two years were simply not interested. They passed their tax cut bill that largely benefited corporations and the already well-off, and then  called it a day. 

The lack of seriousness about an infrastructure bill, and merely using it as a political prop, was made plain when Trump held a press conference ostensibly about infrastructure, but almost immediately pivoted into his controversial Charlottesville comments about “fine people,” completely overshadowing what little he had to say about the original topic, soon to be forgotten. Trump has on occasion brought up the topic at his early campaign rallies, but unlike those of Obama which were largely spent to pitch policy initiatives in a rational manner, Trump’s only seems to be interested in throwing red meat—mostly in the form of misinformation and lies—to his faithful fanatics who just want their voices to be “heard.” Mention of “infrastructure” is just more talk and no action, and his supporters couldn’t care less. 

Democrats, of course, support an infrastructure plan because it fits into their own political program, and at least the leadership wants to make a show of “working” with Trump on something that benefits voters. But Trump is not interested in “benefitting” anyone but himself and his “brand”; if anyone benefits who actually needs “benefitting,” that is entirely accidental. His repeated misrepresentations and outright lies about all things that he has “accomplished” as president and his refusal to be “transparent” in his internal policy and financial dealings demonstrates his extreme paranoia, something he shares with Richard Nixon. Such paranoia has created problems of Trump’s own making; no one in their right mind should trust Trump or his principle aiders and abettors with making policy decisions that are based on reasoned examination of the facts, but only those based on  paranoid instincts. 

Thus it should have come as no surprise to any party that the infrastructure meeting the other day between the Democratic leadership and Trump was a trap to force House Democrats to end their investigations of Trump. Infrastructure has been from the start more smoke and mirrors than a serious policy proposal, given the fact that Republican lawmakers themselves when they controlled Congress never discussed or put forward even the barest of bones of a proposal. The Trump administration itself has never provided anything more than a few “ideas” of what an infrastructure plan would like that, only some regulation changes. If there was any “seriousness” to an infrastructure proposal, Trump wouldn’t be using it as a bargaining chip to conceal his crimes; thus Trump’s infrastructure rhetoric should be taken as it is: as rotten in its foundation as many of the nation’s bridges and dams.