Before I get to the huge failing of this president which seemed to has passed by unnoticed by most I want to follow-up on Trump’s attitude toward immigrants by noting.that he wrote on the 14th that he wants “people coming through a system based on MERIT”; on the 12th he wrote a typical nativist statement: “Wall was not properly funded, Chain and Lottery were made worse and USA would be forced to take numbers of people from high crime countries which are doing badly. I want a merit based system of immigration and people who will help take our country to the next level.”
The twenty-five countries with the highest homicide rates are
Central America: Belize (3), El Salvador (4), Guatemala (5), Mexico (20), Panama (25);
Africa: Lesotho (7), Swaziland (8), South Africa (10), Democratic Republic of the Congo (14), Rwanda (17), Nigeria (22), Equatorial Guinea (23), Botswana (24);
Caribbean: Jamaica (6), Saint Kitts and Nevis (9), The Bahamas (12) , Trinidad and Tobago (13), St. Vincent and the Grenadines (15), Dominican Republic (18), St. Lucia (19), Dominica (21);
South America: Honduras(1), Venezuela (2), Colombia (11), Brazil (16).
Three things stand out to me. These nations have majority populations of people of color; it is quite understandable that people would want to flee from such places with so high a homicide rate, and most likely the individuals who want to get away are not the criminals. Isn’t it possible to reach out to those rather than others who don’t live in fear of being murdered and offer them sanctuary? If not that, why, as Trump indicated the other day are about the 200,000 Salvadorans who have lived in the United States for years in a peaceful and productive manner going to be sent people back to their country that presents such danger.
But that’s aside from the reason I write.
The incompetence and dangerousness of this administration was shown last Saturday. Since we are within a couple of days of remembering Martin Luther King I’ll put the matter in context with a quote from him: “The ultimate measure of man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at time of challenge and controversy.”
You remember that at 8:07 a.m. Hawaii time an emergency alert went out stating in capital letters: “BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT INBOUND TO HAWAII. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL.” The time in Florida at the Mar-a-Largo golf course where Trump was out on the links was 1:07 pm. I have no knowledge who was with him but I am sure it was not all of the generals who are on his staff. I also assume he was in immediate contact about this (although who knows what the SOP is when he golfs. Maybe he can’t be disturbed.).
We do know that Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard tweeted 12 minutes later to her followers: “HAWAII – THIS IS A FALSE ALARM. THERE IS NO INCOMING MISSILE TO HAWAII. I HAVE CONFIRMED WITH OFFICIALS THERE IS NO INCOMING MISSILE.”
If Rep Gabbard could determine the threat was false that must have been known to the people in the military or other officials within seconds of the false alert. Shouldn’t they have figured out that many people in Hawaii were being wrongly traumatized? Why then didn’t the Trump Administration do something to relieve their anxiety? Isn’t there one person in the chain of command who thought it would be a good idea to quickly take action to notify the people on those islands they were not in danger?
Representative Gabbard has 176,000 followers on Twitter; there are 1.4 million people who live in Hawaii and an average of 50,000 tourists. At best 1.3 million people did not receive Rep. Gabbard’s tweet but had to worry about the end coming sooner than expected. The Trump White House much later did issue a statement. It said the alert was “purely a state exercise.” Are we to take that to mean that since Trump and his team were not responsible for the snafu they cared less about what happened?
Trump was golfing. He did and said nothing about the incident. He finished his golf game and then went back to his club. He’s not mentioned it since. We clearly see where he stands at a time of challenge and controversy.
His generals and other high officials also did and said nothing. Why? Are they afraid to take the initiative? Are they afraid of being chastised by Trump if they make the right call? Or were they frozen into inaction?
The first thought of Trump and his staff should have been to assuage the fear of the people of Hawaii. He allegedly has 46.6 million followers according to Twitter. Yet, despite his penchant for tweeting he did not stop his golf game to tweet. Nor apparently did anyone dare interrupt it. Just think, if things were not so abominably incompetent in his administration, a simple tweet could have meant so much to over a million people. This is a total callous indifference to American citizens.
It is worse. Trump and his staff failed in their first emergency. They did not react to it as normal people would to accept the responsiblity of correcting it which they should have done.
True, the mistake is on the state. More true, the government learning of it should have assumed the obligation to our fellow Americans to act promptly to alleviate their fears of imminent death.
Thankfully it was a false emergency. We better hope no real one comes along.
Wa-llahi! MAGA (Mueller ain’t going away).
Trump is a man with a low moral compass. He is not a righteous man. Nor is he particularly intelligent. Anyone who defends or supports him will have to answer to the supreme creator of the Universe. And I , for one, wouldn’t want to be in that person’s shoes.
Somehow, we will take that risk.
As tadzio said, get over it.
So God is going to be sitting there on his throne and drumming his fingers on a bible and stare you down.
“I understand you supported Donald Trump. Go to Hell.”
Why would he care?
It’s even worse than that, Honest Abe.
Guess who God is? It’s whoever the lefties are deifying at the moment.
For a while, it was The Anointed One, Barry Hussein Osama (Osama is what Ted Kennedy called him). Then it was “her” – you know, Billary Pandersuit. Now, its Harpo – oops, I mean Oprah, because she gives good speech.
And giving good speech is what it’s all about for lefties.
It doesn’t matter if reality is far different, and it doesn’t matter if it changes from moment to moment.
Soaring, pining, groaning, creeking, sky-is-falling speech.
There is no such thing as a happy leftie, and the earth is always about to implode, explode, crumble, dissolve, disappear, evaporate, vaporize, or melt, or all of the foregoing, unless we all do what lefties say in their soaring speeches.
It’s all about giving good speech.
Two thirds of Americans in 2016 thought the nation was heading in the wrong direction which accounts for the incumbent party being thrown out of office. If those are the numbers in 2020 the same will happen. Reagan asked the correct question in 1980. Are you better off? Is the country better off after four years of Carter? America is far better off after 15 months of Trump than before. If all the positive tends continue he will be unbeatable in 2020. His doctor said he is fit now and will be for the next seven years. 2. There is an interesting comparison between John Connolly and Mike Flynn. Both were framed by a corrupt DOJ and FBI. Flynn during the transition had a completely legal conversation with the Russian envoy. His talk was illegally unmasked by someone in the Obama Administration. A felony was committed by that person when they leaked signal intelligence to the Post which published a story. Flynn fell for the dirty trick claiming he broke the law and lied about it. FBI agent Strozk asked Flynn about the incident and Flynn lied. Flynn was stupid. But Flynn was the victim of the crime not the perpetrator. The FBI. committed the crime by combining with the Post to entrap an unsuspecting Flynn using signal intelligence. Why would the FBI ask Flynn about a legal and proper conversation unless a deep state conspiracy was afoot? Why would Mueller indict a person acting legally? Did Mueller know that the person who leaked the classified intel to the Post was the criminal not Flynn? Yet no charge against him. A special counsel is needed. A grand jury should hear from everyone at the Post who published that story. The source of the leak must be indicted. Strozk and the others who framed Flynn should be in the Dock. This is the exact same technique they used to get Connolly. Manufacture a crime and set a trap for the innocent. The Rogue Agent theory is a total fantasy. But it looks like the Rogue Agency, DOJ and FBI, exists. Trump has to drain the swamp.
Flynn pled guilty because he was guilty. John Connolly did not plead guilty. Flynn made a deal to plead to lesser crime to save his son and himself from greater charges. John Connolly made no deals. How can you possibly compare their situations? Connolly has stood up, Flynn stood down making deals with Russia to enrich himself by providing Russian nuclear plants to Saudi Arabia. Connolly made no deals to enrich himself.
Well said Matt. Imagine if it had been Obama acting like Trump.
Matt, we know you don’t like President Trump . . .perhaps you despise him, that’s your right to follow your conscience and your free speech right as an American to write as you will
But, when you write something like “did you notice those countries are predominantly people of color” I stop reading.
Here’s why. Planet Earth’s human population is about 10% white or of European descent so in Leftist Orwellian Speak-Jargon, 90% of the world is “people of color” and the left continues “who are oppressed by the White Man.”
Oh how I pine for the time when men like Martin Luther King advised us to judge people on the content of their character, not on the color of their skin.
SO WHAT THAT THE HIGHEST POVERTY RATES AND CRIME RATES ARE IN COUNTRIES PREDOMINANTLY NON-WHITE (EASTERN EUROPE TOO HAS ITS HIGH CRIME AND LOW GDP RATES) BUT SO WHAT? TRUMP DID NOT CAUSE THOSE COUNTRIES TO HAVE HIGH CRIME RATES AND DEEP POVERTY.
YOU NOTICE THE DARK SIDE: LEFT UNSAID ARE THE MANY AFRICAN, ARAB, ASIAN, LATINO, CARIBBEAN NATIONS WHERE CRIME RATES ARE NOT SKY HIGH AND WHERE POVERTY IS NOT CRIPPLING DUE TO CORRUPT RAPACIOUS USUALLY COMMUNISTIC-SOCIALISTIC GOVERNMENTS/RULERS.
BE THAT AS IT MAY: HAVE A HAPPY DAY!
Check the Carribean statistics to see your error.
Actually we are the cause of a lot of issues in Central/South America. MS-13 was a gang formed of El Salvadoran immigrants in U.S. prisons. We deported back them to ES. These guys walked off of the planes and back into ES communities.
We also helped to perpetuate a bloody civil war there during the 80s.
We did more than help that war. Absolute disgrace. I know many people from that country that lived through that mess. ISIS ain’t got nothing on the monsters in charge.
If the President responded to every idiotic mistake made by a government employee he would be a very busy, overworked man. As the error was made in the state system what information is there that it reached the federal or military level before it was defused.
The Congress Critteress from Hawaii has a staff that is in constant contact with constituents in a way that it makes perfect sense that the matter would be immediately brought to her attention outside of official channels. She was right to check it out and to reassure her constituents. There is no reason that it had to go higher up or that it would make sense for it to.
It is not part of the President’s remit to stick his snout into each and every matter. If he did the fake news media would raise a hue and cry that he was exploiting for personal advantage an insignificant event. The crybabies are going to scream and bang their rattles no matter what. They grow more irrelevant daily.
Donald Trump was elected President. He is the President of all Americans. Get over it.
I don’t think Matt is asking for the POTUS to address every mistake by state workers. I think he is asking for the Commander in Chief of our armed forces to get off the golf course and reassure the American people that the announcement of an ICBM strike on U.S. soil is a false alarm.
The President is the President for all Americans. He seems to only care about Americans in the states in which he won the electoral college.
His defenders will literally say anything to defend his actions. Case in point are your comments.
Dave,.
Thanks for clarifying my view. It seems it is becoming more and more dangerous to say things bad about the self proclaimed genius. It’s amazing the frivolous defenses his supporters come up with.