75th Critique "Little Guatemalan hazelnut Eminems." In this critique, I focus on the Washington Examiner’s political editor W. James Antle III’s views on sanctuary cities. These critiques are for you all and for myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the portion of the article from the webpage and the photo within it, and lastly, I added my commentary throughout. The article is in black text and my commentary is in red text. Link to the original source, https://www.amren.com/news/2017/07/sanctuary-cities-defiance/ Posted on July 17, 2017 At least it’s not July 2015. That would mean another fucking Kate Steinle article.. W. James Antle III, The American Conservative, July 14, 2017 May 29, 2017 – Nearly one thousand protestors from different areas of the United States rally at Texas’ Capitol in Austin, United States, 29 May 2017, to reject the SB4 Law that bans sanctuary cities and includes an amendment which allows authorities to question the migratory status of any arrested person. On the surface, that seems pretty retarded. I mean that there’s actually a protest against questioning legal status of someone who’s arrested. Someone who’s FUCKING arrested. Ha.(Credit Image: © Alex Segura/EFE via ZUMA Press) For a few weeks this winter, the biggest immigration news came not from Washington, D.C., but one of its affluent suburbs—Rockville, Maryland. Two Hispanic teenagers, one 18 and the other 17, were accused of raping a 14-year-old girl in a high school bathroom. The “Rockville rape case” became a staple of cable news and talk radio. How do two people come to the conclusion of raping someone? I can see 1 sick fuck coming to that conclusion, but 2 people deciding together just blows my mind. Especially a child in a school. {snip} I assume the “snip” is there because it’s taking pieces from the original article. The older of the two alleged assailants was Henry E. Sanchez-Milian, a Guatemalan who U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said was caught illegally crossing the border from Mexico just a few months earlier. He had been issued a notice to appear before an immigration judge for a deportation hearing, according to the agency. Then in May the rape charges against the two were dropped. Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy announced that after a “painstaking investigation” it was concluded that “the original charges cannot be sustained” and prosecution is “untenable” due to lack of corroboration and “substantial inconsistencies” in the girl’s story. Maybe, just maybe, she’s lying. Supporters of lenient immigration enforcement hailed the dropped charges as vindication and decried the controversy as an example of the kind of anti-immigration hysteria fostered by President Trump, along with his deputies and voters. The question we’ve got to ask ourselves is this. Would the case come out ANY differently if the two boys were of legal status? If so, this case shouldn’t even be discussed in this context. {snip} Not surprisingly, immigration control advocates found the morality tale more complicated. Yes, the rape charges were dropped. Such allegations are hard to prove. But you have one already potentially deportable illegal immigrant who is being charged with possession of child pornography, and the two clearly were engaged in behavior that was inappropriate if not verifiably criminal. Yeah, of course there’s going to be those types of people wherever you go. Still, the first crime committed was not entering the country legally. We don’t need to paint them this way. It’s not fair to paint them this way. It’s just plain and simple that we have to enforce the law that people need to enter this country legally.Two men in their late teens were enrolled in the ninth grade at the school. Little Guatemalan hazelnut Eminems. Beyond the emotions generated by the case and the intractable nature of the underlying issue, the episode reflects the legal and political complexities unleashed by the emergence of so-called sanctuary cities. Except Detroit. Who told me that? Jorge Ramos. He isn’t a reliable source you say? Well point me to the one who is 100% honest and I’ll point out their lies. Until then, I’m going to take away the little truths I gather on the way from the left and the right.This is a designation given to local governments that refuse to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement, largely by declining to identify illegal immigrants with whom they come into contact. This part is still really fuzzy to me.Rockville considers itself to be such a sanctuary jurisdiction, and officials there were deliberating about whether to formalize this policy when the case involving the teens became national news. Even if they were convicted, that alone shouldn’t even be a factor in this decision. Now if illegal alien 17/18 year old 9th grade rapists were a consistent issue, that’s a different story, but it’s not. And the boys weren’t even convicted. And it isn’t even mentioned that their illegal status had any effect on the outcome of the case. What’s really bad about my argument here, is that I’m for deporting them! But I’m not for exploiting a couple of teenagers as rapists when the judge concluded they were innocent based on inconsistencies in the story and lack of evidence written in this same fucking article. Trump set himself foursquare Fun game to play at recess.against such policies throughout his campaign. “We will end the sanctuary cities that have resulted in so many needless deaths,” Trump vowed at one point. “Cities that refuse to cooperate with federal authorities will not receive taxpayer dollars, and we will work with Congress to pass legislation to protect those jurisdictions that do assist federal authorities.” I don’t think I’ve acknowledged the fact that Trump is totally guilty of painting undocumented immigrants as criminals. It’s the same tactic liberals use when they paint republicans as Nazis. It’s obvious, but I’m acknowledging that fact…..now. {snip} As many as 300 municipalities are considered sanctuary cities, Did it jump up 100 cities?though they vary in the degree to which they embrace the label. Contrary to the phrase’s implications, they cannot stop the federal authorities from enforcing the law. But they can make it more difficult and thus effectively thwart deportations. The most commonly accepted definition of a sanctuary city is the refusal of local jurisdictions to enforce detainer orders issued by federal immigration authorities. I am looking forward to an article or video that can explain this detaining situation well.These are requests for local governments to hold suspected illegals so federal officials can arrest and ultimately remove them. The main issues, from what I understand, is the length of the detainment process is undisclosed and there are legal issues with just detaining an individual for an undisclosed period of time. Or at all really. Over the 19-month period from January 1, 2014, to September 30, 2015, reports an immigration-restriction think tank called the Center for Immigration Studies, Good source.more than 17,000 detainers were rejected by these jurisdictions. “Of these,” says the organization, “about 11,800 detainers, or 68 percent, were issued for individuals with a prior criminal history.” That’s because the subjects of these detainers are frequently criminal aliens in local custody for non-immigration-related offenses. Yeah, more often than not, probably, a person who is arrested has had some sort of criminal record. I’d say around 68 percent. I’m including everyone and I’m not using any statistics. Wouldn’t you say it would be around that number?Cooperation between federal and local law enforcement greatly expedites the removal of illegal immigrants, and people in city and county jails constitute the subset of the undocumented population that draws the least political sympathy. What? I read this sentence like 10 times and I’m still confused. I understand the cooperation between federal and local law enforcement expedites the removal of illegal immigrants, but I am totally confused about the second half of that sentence. I read it again, and I kind of understand, but fuck it. Moving on.Politicians of both parties often say they favor their deportation. Bill Clinton and Obama. Sanctuary cities have emerged as a major political flashpoint in the incendiary immigration issue. The Trump administration wants to attack them in its fight to step up immigration enforcement and sharply curtail the number of unauthorized immigrants living in the United States. Liberal jurisdictions, meanwhile, celebrate their status as sanctuary cities in order to align themselves with the anti-Trump “resistance.” Taking away the truths and criticizing the bullshit. And that right there, is a truth. {snip} But the proliferation of sanctuary cities has more than just political consequences. The Pew Research Center found that 61 percent of the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States live in 20 major metropolitan areas. Seventeen of them are considered sanctuary cities. I see where he’s coming from with this statistic, but it just seems irrelevant. I thought it would actually be a higher percentage than that. The Trump administration has plenty of room to increase deportations even with all the sanctuaries. It has expanded the category of criminal aliens who get enforcement priority. Like a DUI. Not criticising, just being more clear.Its rhetoric and reputation alone have decreased border crossings and encouraged some illegal immigrants to “self-deport.” At least the theme isn’t, “Everything is going to hell!” like a lot of articles. {snip} After Trump’s election he sought to make good on his immigration-related campaign promises. He was a lot more straightforward than other president elects in my lifetime, so he had to.His administration rescinded the Obama-era enforcement directives and replaced them with much stricter standards. Doesn’t acknowledge the fact that the Obama administration deported over 2 million illegal immigrants between 2010 and 2014 according to Politifact.The new president awarded the Justice Department to Jeff Sessions, a Republican senator from Alabama who was the leading immigration restrictionist on Capitol Hill and a major influence on Trump’s own position on the issue. {snip} “[T]he Department of Homeland Security recently issued a report showing that in a single week, there were more than 200 instances of jurisdictions refusing to honor Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainer requests with respect to individuals charged or convicted of a serious crime,” Sessions said in a speech earlier this year. So I know there are more than 200 sanctuary cities, but he’s saying 200 instances of jurisdictions refusing to honor the law. Out of how many? 200 or something else?“The charges and convictions against these aliens include drug trafficking, hit and run, rape, sex offenses against a child, and even murder.” “I mean they’ve done some bad shit, you know like rape, child molestation, all that bad shit. But what I am about to tell you may shock you. Are you ready? MURDER!" In continuing to prioritize criminal aliens for removal, Trump has expanded the number of people who would be so considered. Illegal immigrants convicted of any criminal offense, charged with a criminal offense, guilty of defrauding any public benefits program or government agency, or who pose a national-security threat, can all be removed. So he does more clearly address the fact that if an undocumented immigrant commits any crime, they will be deported. Cool. I proof read this before, but must have spaced out during this part.And, unlike the Obama policy, there is no hierarchy of priorities; all are in theory equally deportable. It is true that his policy is more strict than Obama’s? He’s honest, but just leaving out what Obama did regarding deportation. {snip} “This is the Trump era,” Sessions said in a statement focused on sanctuary cities. “Progress is being made daily, and it will continue. This will be the Administration that fully enforces our nation’s immigration laws.” The administration had issued an executive order stripping some federal funding from designated sanctuary jurisdictions. But getting rid of sanctuary cities won’t be easy. The liberal and pro-immigration sentiments driving the move toward sanctuary policies are very powerful throughout much of the country. {snip} And some jurisdictions become sanctuary jurisdictions not by choice but by threat of lawsuit. Some officials in these localities believe that they are on legally shaky ground if they hold suspected illegal immigrants at federal authorities’ request without a valid court order. In 2014, a federal judge ruled that a local jail in Oregon violated a woman’s civil rights by complying with a detainer request without court approval. So always get court approval. It’s not that simple? A Stateline report late last year highlighted rural Sioux County, Iowa, where 82 percent of the vote went to Trump, who also won statewide. The sheriff publicly states that he does not wish to make his jurisdiction a sanctuary county. But judicial rulings like the one in Oregon keep him, as a matter of policy, from detaining suspected illegals without a court order. Good info. The Trump administration also has limited options when it comes to forcing cities and counties to comply with its immigration measures. Technically, while sanctuary cities may be violating the spirit of the law, the local cops aren’t immigration agents. Most federal legislation aimed at stopping these practices would employ the tactic of denying federal funding to local authorities who refuse to cooperate with immigration enforcement. But the withholding of federal funds must be tied to the activity involved, and the monetary leverage here is less potent than in other areas. If a state adopts a drinking age below 21, for example, Washington can deny federal highway funds, a powerful incentive. Good analogy. Bad commentary. {snip} The Trump administration in May appeared to concede that its options were limited when the Justice Department under Sessions adopted a narrow definition of sanctuary cities for the purpose of withholding federal funding. Only cities, counties, and towns that violate a federal law requiring sharing information on immigrants’ legal status would be in jeopardy of losing funding, the Justice memo said. That means the Trump executive order would not apply to communities that refuse to comply with detainers, so most places considered sanctuary cities would still be eligible for the Justice Department grants. {snip} Also, Trump isn’t alone in moving against sanctuary cities. He has allies on Capitol Hill. Sens. Luther Strange, R-Ala., and David Perdue, R-Ga., have brought forth legislation that would cut federal transportation and infrastructure spending for local areas whose governments refuse to cooperate on immigration enforcement. That gets closer to the state drinking age example. Seems pretty impactful.Strange succeeded Sessions in the Senate, while Perdue and Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., Is he a pirate?seem to be in competition to become Sessions’s main replacement as Congress’s foremost immigration restrictionist. They would withhold from sanctuary cities money from one transportation program that has given out $5 billion since it was started in 2009 and a second one expected to dole out $4.5 billion over the next three years. That’s $950,000 million right there. Crazy when you look at it that way. {snip} While much of the onus for action against sanctuary cities remains on the Trump administration, which is embattled on multiple fronts, *Cough cough* Ann Coulter *Cough cough*immigration restrictionists expect the executive branch to rise to the occasion. {snip} It likely wasn’t the last move for the rest of the administration either. When the president’s first federal budget proposal was unveiled, burrowed deep within the dense document were proposals to expand the definition of sanctuary cities from the narrow one recognized by the Justice Department and expose more jurisdictions to the risk of losing funds. God, I can’t imagine how fucking complex all of that shit is.The budget calls for defunding local entities that don’t comply with detainers. The Justice Department has already threatened nine jurisdictions with cuts. Under these rules, the numbers would likely exceed 100. The budget also would make it easier to withhold the money in other ways. “The Secretary of Homeland Security or the Attorney General may condition a grant or cooperative agreement awarded by the Department of Homeland Security or the Department of Justice to a State or political subdivision of a state, for a purpose related to immigration, national security, law enforcement, or preventing, preparing for, protecting against or responding to acts of terrorism,” the document reads. So withhold money from many sources of funding. Nice. Though presidential budget proposals don’t necessarily become law, this Trump language reflects the president’s determination to bring states and localities to heel on the issue of sanctuary policies designed to thwart the federal enforcement of immigration laws. His determination is matched, however, by the strong pro-immigration sentiments that generated these sanctuary policies in the first place. Trump’s election is both a symptom and cause of great national polarization. Thus it shouldn’t be any surprise that his election has exposed yet another division: between, on the one hand, states and localities that want to cooperate with his proposed immigration crackdown and, on the other, growing numbers of liberal enclaves that will use whatever powers they have at hand to defy it. And they have NO boundaries. My Response: 1st Impression - Agreeing with James. This article is divided into different viewpoints, mostly from a conservative angle. I’m not used to that. The exploitation of the 2 teenage boys admittedly triggered me, but the article really grew on me the more I read. I understand the local authorities are upset about doing federal authorities job. It’s still fuzzy to me how that works, but this article does help. I know both parties are to blame for the trouble in that area. Comment and share your thoughts unless you're an illegal alien literally from outer space, because that shit scary. Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold on January 7, 2018.
76th Critique "if the unbiased truth was revealed by a monotone robot, conservatives would become liberals and liberals would become conservatives. Think about it." In this critique, I focus on the Washington Examiner’s political editor W. James Antle III’s views on sanctuary cities. These critiques are for you all and for myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the excerpt and I added my commentary throughout. The excerpt is in black text and my commentary is in red text. Link to original excerpt, "Run for the Border" by Antle, W. James, III - The American Conservative, Vol. 6, Issue 18, September 24, 2007 | Online Research Library: Questia It’s been a few weeks, so I might be a little rusty and forgot everything I’ve ever learned. jk MAGAZINE ARTICLE The American Conservative Run for the Border By Antle, W. James, III Article excerpt Republican candidates reinvent themselves as immigration restrictionists. WHILE THE LOWER-TIER candidates have occasionally lobbed spitballs at the frontrunners, Americans do have the tendency to hate our leaders these days, which is partially justified.the contest for the Republican presidential nomination has mostly been a gentlemanly affair. Hmmm, “written in September 2007.” Okay, just making sure.The immigration issue threatens to disrupt that comity. Yes, because we were sooo very adhesive 10 years ago until that damn immigration issue came in. It’s frustrating sometimes to be clear when I’m being sarcastic. If it was a video, it would be easier. In August, Mitt Romney launched an uncharacteristically sharp attack on Rudy Giuliani's leniency toward illegal immigrants as mayor of New York City. "If you look at lists compiled on websites of sanctuary cities, New York is at the top of the list when Mayor Giuliani was mayor," Romney said. "He instructed city workers not to provide information to the federal government that would allow them to enforce the law. New York City was the poster child for sanctuary cities in the country." I don’t remember hearing much about NYC being a sanctuary city in 2017. Romney's campaign followed up with a radio advertisement that doesn't mention his rival by name, Come on Romney, don’t be a pussy. You’ve got that Mormon blood in you. Make Joseph Smith proud.but pointedly includes New York in a list of havens for illegal immigration. "Immigration laws don't work if they're ignored," the announcer intones. "That's the problem with cities like Newark, San Francisco, and New York City that adopt sanctuary policies." The subliminal message: don't trust San Francisco Democrats or New York Republicans to guard the border. Well played Romney. Joseph Smith would be or is proud whether or not you believe he’s dead or not, because I don’t know much about Mormonism and I’m being an asshole just to make this more entertaining yet informative. Ugh. Giuliani supporters disputed the "amnesty capital" designation and fired back with some tough words about Romney's own record. They quickly uncovered resolutions by three cities in Massachusetts-Cambridge, Somerville, and Orleans-proudly declaring themselves sanctuary cities. Peter King, a pro-Giuliani congressman with some credibility on the immigration issue, charged that, as governor, Romney "simply ignored" these cities' determination to flout the law and looked the other way when illegal aliens demonstrated at the state capítol. That’s like the Zodiac killer saying, “Those chutzpah motherfuckers. I heard on the radio the cops are looking for me. That’s fine because I am a killer, but they simply ignored Ted Bundy, the BTK killer, Jeffrey Dahmer, and John Wayne Gacy!” In the fucked up reality that they’re all in the same time period. This idea that you have to include a list of other names when you call someone out for his or her wrongdoings is absolutely absurd. It’s not like Romney called out a city with 1,000 people to avoid backlash from bigger cities. He called out the big apple for Christ’s sake.Randy Mastro, one of Giuliani's deputy mayors, told the New York Observer, "We have a word here in New York for what Mitt Romney is trying to do here-it is called chutzpah." Is that a compliment or an insult?.....Or both? Probably an insult. Chutzpah it may be, but both candidates are reinventing themselves as immigration enforcers. Neither Giuliani nor Romney was especially vehement about border security before the presidential campaign beckoned. While Giuliani inherited New York sanctuary-city policy from his Democratic predecessors, he defended it from critics and Congress alike. "There are times when undocumented immigrants must have a substantial degree of protection," Statements like this is what fuels me to keep going with these despite having any audience at the moment. That statement right there is something anybody can agree with. Yeah, I’m sure there are times when undocumented immigrants need a substantial degree of protection. You could totally oppose the idea that undocumented immigrants should be allowed in without filling out the proper forms. You could say that you want more immigrants to come over! But why the fuck would you encourage people to cross over illegally? The mayor of NYC’s not stupid. There’s obviously more to his agenda than just saying, “They work hard. They good people who want good things. They love ‘Merica and you don’t care about people and your heart’s filled with hate if don’t want people to not go through the proper procedures to enter this country you xenophobic neo-Nazi. You blame my city for being a sanctuary city, but what about San Fran? You’re criticism has been stamped as irrelevant. Trying to bully the big apple acting like a big worm of a politician.” But yeah, I can agree that undocumented immigrants need a certain degree of assistance, but I don’t think we should help them. There, I said it. I must hate Mexicans right? People aren’t that stupid. I know they’re not. I’m fucking stupid. I just don’t understand.he once told an audience in Minneapolis. In 1996, America's Mayor unsuccessfully sued to block two federal laws that cracked down on lax local enforcement practices. He also established himself as a harsh critic of efforts to curb illegal immigration during the 1990s. He probably wasn’t a big fan of Pat Buchanan."Some of the hardest-working and most productive people in this city are undocumented aliens," Giuliani said at a press conference in 1994. Yep, he’s probably totally fucking right and I’m not being sarcastic. "If you come here and you work hard and you happen to be in an undocumented status, you're one of the people who we want in this city. Just take the “un” out of undocumented and I couldn’t agree more. You see how these statements are coming together?You're somebody that we want to protect, and we want you to get out from under what is often a life of being like a fugitive, which is really unfair." Oh, what a sweet man. “Protect,” “fugitive,” “unfair,” “victim, victim, victim, victim.” Illegals are welcome, and enforcement is unfair. Hell yeah James. I’m just adding fuel to your fire.Giuliani stopped short of engraved invitations, but the message was clear-and obviously at odds with his current pledge to "end illegal immigration." He stopped short of flying over to Acapulco, Mexico and saying, “Attention residences of Acapulco. I stand before you now as a friend, not an American. I have been led by not my mind or by any comprehension of the greater good, but by an agend….I mean by my heart. I am sick and tired of being sick and tired of my fellow amigos being mercilessly shot in the street and not being provided opportunities for growth. Mi hermanos y hermanas, my residential inhabitants of the USA have become spoiled and lazy victims and brats, therefore we need a new wave of immigrants, tough immigrants, so we can encourage current documented Americans to do things such as, get off their lazy culos and get to work on time, get off their lazy culos and get to work if they don’t feel like it, have Americans realize that there’s more motivated and hardworking people in your country who would triple the production of the ungrateful Americans current hourly minimum wage production without complaining about minimum wage pay BECAUSE of your lack of opportunity, and lastly, more burritos and salsa. Salsa dancing obviously.” Maybe I should work on my sentence structure. Particularly run-on sentences. In fact, Giuliani once said that such a goal was impossible. In a 1996 speech to Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, he declined to "defend" illegal immigration, but contended that "the federal government may never be able to stop illegal immigration completely." Could we ever stop aids completely? No, but is it still a COMMON problem? I’m sure at the time he made this statement, the ventriloquist who had his or her hand stuck up his ass had him straddling the fence or should I dare to say…...the wall and wasn’t quite sure what stance on immigration would be the most profitable for them politically. Not sure if profiting politically makes sense, but it seems like it would. Romney was less permissive. He might not have gone after liberty….al city councils Nice GTA reference. that passed feel-good resolutions laying out the welcome mat, but he generally took the pro-enforcement side when immigration bills reached his desk. Romney opposed giving illegal aliens drivers licenses and vetoed in-state tuition for them-even if the uproar created by Boston talk-radio hosts like Howie Carr played a bigger role in getting the legislature to reconsider its position. … My Response, 1st Impression: Agreeing with James - Only thing that has noticeably changed from 2007 to 2018 within the context of this article excerpt - - same shit, different city. Sometimes I wish we could just remove the curtain and be exposed the truth to everything. Truly why there is such a divide in America on nearly every issue, why sanctuary cities ENCOURAGE ILLEGAL immigration, and why Mexico is apparently a shit-hole compared to America. (good thing I’m not the president) If that did happen; if the unbiased truth was revealed by a monotone robot, conservatives would become liberals and liberals would become conservatives. Think about it. I know I was incredibly random, vocal, and savage in this one, but to be straight with you, I agree with James on this one. He put Romney in a good light and the former NYC Mayor in a bad one for justified reasons. It’s funny how if you take away the specific people and cities within the article and kept the issues the same, it could easily be applicable in 2018, despite the fact that Donald Trump himself has been president for over a year. Share stuff in your brain. Thanks! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold on January 18, 2018.
Thank you for sharing that. I listen to Joe Rogan's podcast sometimes, but I haven't seen that clip. And I do find it very relevant to this forum since it's a very bipartisan outlook, so I do appreciate it.
77th Critique I do not like the idea for trigger warnings and this isn't technically one, but I just want to inform any reader to read the whole thing before taking anything out of context. Thank you. In this critique, I focus on the the journalist at the Washington Post Dan Balz’s views on sanctuary cities. These critiques are for you all and for myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the article and I added my commentary throughout. The article is in black text and my commentary is in red text. Link to original article, Romney, Giuliani Escalate Their Immigration Fight By Michael D. Shear and Dan Balz Would be a great porn star name.Washington Post Staff Writers Friday, August 17, 2007 Last critique was also on this same thing. What a coincidence. The two leading Republican presidential candidates have turned the GOP primary campaign into a nasty, week-long debate about illegal immigration, accusing each other of supporting efforts to give undocumented residents sanctuary from federal immigration laws. I feel like Dan Balz and his partner covered this story better than W. James Antle III, because Balz seems less biased. At campaign stops, in radio ads and with increasingly hostile statements by supporters, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani are talking about little else as they position themselves on an issue critical to conservatives in their party. "They are trying to rattle their sabers louder than the other and thump on their chests," said Angela Kelley, Typical men.the deputy director of the pro-immigrant National Immigration Forum. "Both of these guys are trying to remake themselves." Born again politically haha. Romney started the fight, and his criticism reflects his campaign's emerging strategy after the former governor's victory in the Iowa straw poll last Saturday. Romney's advisers would like to narrow the GOP race as much as possible to a two-person contest with Giuliani, and they are seeking to brand Romney as the true conservative in the race, in contrast to Giuliani. And they did. And he would have won if it wasn’t for that meddling nigger! They also hope to seize the initiative with conservatives before former senator Fred D. Thompson (Tenn.), expected to enter the race next month, can establish his own bona fides with the party's base. At the heart of the Romney-Giuliani argument is the role of cities in the immigration crisis. Romney has said that New York, under Giuliani's leadership, became a magnet for illegal immigrants when city officials refused to strictly enforce federal deportation laws. Giuliani in return has accused Romney of looking the other way as cities and towns in Massachusetts declared themselves "sanctuaries" for lawbreakers. Both camps continued to escalate the issue yesterday. Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.), writing on behalf of Giuliani, attacked Romney in an opinion piece in the Washington Times. King accused Romney of failing to act as governor against sanctuary cities in his state. I must have totally missed the fact that Romney was governor of Massachusetts at one point. It would have changed and shortened some of the rants I gave in my last critique. They’re both guilty really. It’s a pissing match as Angela Kelley basically said in the quote earlier. "Mr. Romney did not cut their funding. “And neither did I.”He recommended millions of dollars in state funding for them, and made no attempt to force these cities to change their policies," King wrote. "When the immigration issue came before him, he simply ignored it." Typical men. Giuliani's former deputy mayor, Randy Mastro, went further in an interview. "We have a word here in New York for what Mitt Romney is doing," Mastro said. "It's called chutzpah." Sounds like a really expensive dog breed. Romney aides responded with an online column by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Tex.), who called the immigration policies in New York "troubling" and blamed them for the growth of the nation's population of illegal immigrants. It’s like if a couple both cheated on each other and argued for days about how bad the other was for cheating. "Sanctuary policies create virtual amnesty zones for illegal immigrants. While amnesty was just defeated in the Congress, places like New York City offer a promise of amnesty to those who ignore our immigration laws," Smith wrote. "Furthermore, sanctuary city policies encourage illegal immigration and weaken our nation's ability to secure our borders." Like beating a dead horse with a big logic stick. Romney has focused on a New York executive order that Giuliani inherited Romney - “I’m gonna show them that I’m the lesser of the 2 evils. They’ll see.”-- and later supported -- that protects illegal immigrants from deportation. Romney aides point out that Giuliani once sued the federal government to keep the executive order in place. Okay, that’s pretty bad. Giuliani responds that his actions in New York -- which allowed children of illegal immigrants to go to school, and let such immigrants receive medical care and report crimes without facing deportation -- reduced crime and improved public health. That’s a tough one. The childyeen. I’m just a cold-hearted motherfucker and I say teach those families who refuse to fill out those papers a lesson. In a radio ad running in South Carolina, Giuliani says he was attempting to focus efforts on the true problem: criminals. B B Bullshit."As the mayor of New York, I wanted to see if I could get the immigration service to help me. Let's see if you could get rid of the drug dealers who are coming out of jail," he says. Romney opened his attacks Monday during a campaign stop at the U.S.-Mexico border in San Ysidro, Calif., criticizing "cities that call themselves a zone for protection," using the phrase that Giuliani once used to describe New York. Well played.He said that as president, he would cut off federal funds to cities that offer sanctuary to illegal immigrants. Trump is Romney’s alter ego. The Mormon incest crackercuck couldn’t beat the nigger, but he beat the cunt. As governor, Romney vetoed a bill that would have allowed illegal immigrants to receive in-state tuition at Massachusetts colleges and reached an agreement with federal officials to allow state troopers to enforce federal immigration laws. Okay, so there’s a difference between allowing undocumented immigrants to report a crime without being deported and allowing adult illegal immigrants to receive in-state tuition. But Romney's tough rhetoric about sanctuary cities is new, said Shuya Ohno, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition. Ohno said Romney was "kind of a non-factor" in most debates about illegal immigration in the state. Better than Giuliani’s past *ba-dum tshh* am I right haha? *Crickets* "It's only after he started spending a lot of time in Iowa getting ready for the presidential run did he really step into the public on the issue," Ohno said. "It's certainly much stronger than anything we heard when he was running for office here, and certainly much more polarizing." Yeah, no shit. Have you thought to maybe why that is? © 2007 The Washington Post Company My Response, First impression: Agreeing with Balz - This wasn’t much of an opinion piece, but he’s a conservative and Balz seemed to be leaning more to being anti-sanctuary cities. I’m glad I ran into a second article about this same story back to back, because I made some errors in the last one I now realize. Can’t change it, because displaying growth is a big part of this. I shitted on Romney a little, therefore I shatted, but I think he was in the right. (no pun intended) I think Giuliani and his crew were just trying to grab the last branch before they hit the ground. Comment and share your thoughts! Thank you! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold.
The next phase of critiques will be going over Muslim immigration and will feature 8 diverse political journalists/pundits
78th Critique In this critique, I focus on journalist and national-affairs analyst for NBC News and MSNBC John Heilemann’s views on Muslim immigrants. These critiques are for you all and for myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I typed out the transcript and added my commentary throughout. I was unable to embed the video within the forum, but I did provide the link. The transcript is in black text and my commentary is in red text. Link to video, Trump & the consequences of anti-Muslim propagandaShiiiiittttt…..Sunni or Shiite? DEADLINE: WHITE HOUSE 11/30/17 Video starts, Nicole Wallace: This is Brendan Cox, husband of murdered British MP, Jo Cox I like how they just put these clips out without providing hardly any contex…...oh wait. Brendan Cox: It matters not just because I don’t like the content, I don’t like what he was saying, but it matters because it drives hate. Like a good chunk the Quran? Haha am I right?(Cox cont.) And when you drive hate, there are consequences. Carrie Underwood tells Jesus to take the wheel. Donald Trump tells hate to.(Cox cont.) My family is a living consequence of what happens when people are fed hatred, and this president, it pains me to say it, but this president has become a proverbial of hate. At least he’s consistent. I understand that’s irrelevant to this. Sorry about your fam dawg. Nicole Wallace: So, we’re not being wet rags when we say that the president’s actions have consequences. We’re not being scolds when we suggest that by forwarding fake videos that incite violence against Muslims might get people killed, I mean, there’s a real life example of it. From what I understand, the videos Trump posted of Muslim violence weren’t even Muslims. That is shitty. He can call Africa a shithole all he wants, but don’t post fake news. Ironic right?(Wallace cont.) Can you speak to the fact that he isn’t just an embarrassment at home to 67% of the country, but now he’s sort of a scourge on the world stage? I could’ve sworn I’ve seen liberal media say something like this before. John Heilemann: Well yeah, yes, I don’t think, I don’t think that’s new. Seems a bit nervous. I tried to make the transcript as accurate as possible.(Heilemann cont.) He’s behaved in ways that’s made him disdained throughout the world. We’ve seen your former boss had a lot of disdain aimed at him when he was prosecuted in the Iraq war. Seems irrelevant, but okay.(Heilemann cont.) Around the world it’s much more intense with Donald Trump because he’s seen in a lot of places and a lot of industrialized democracies as being ignorant and ill-suited to the job and as that sound just illustrated as someone who purveys hate, I think that I….. Better watch what you say bud. They’re watching and so am I, but more importantly they.(Heilemann cont.) the part that I want to just get to though is more at home, because I think that yesterday there was a lot of discussion on what happened with these videos yesterday, and on reflection, the more you think about it, the more kind of grotesque the entire thing is, because the reality is the president of the United States is fundamentally responsible for nothing more so than the safety of every American citizen. It’s fucked up because the videos weren’t accurate in whom they were supposed to be representing. That’s what I find sickening. Otherwise, it would be a totally different discussion from my side.(Heilemann cont.) That’s what his job is, is to keep people safe at core. Nobody really wants “safe,” but you’re hitting it in the sweet spot. Keep goin’.(Heilemann cont.) And by putting these tweets up, he essentially made every Muslim American more vulnerable around the country. Now maybe today there hasn’t been an act of hate crime against a Muslim. Maybe there won’t be tomorrow. But you bet your ass when there is, MSNBC will have an hour special over it.(Heilemann cont.) Maybe there won’t be a direct correlation, but the president seems not to care about that. My Response: 1st Impression: Agreeing with John - This was short and there’s not too much to go over in this context. It can’t be that fucking hard for the Trump Administration to find clips of actual Muslims inciting violence. I can make a quick case against atheists having no moral compass and make a case against them using clips of some shitty people inciting violence who happen to be atheists. OR I can try to find my notes from 7th grade religious studies and go over every religious war that has ever occured and make a case against religion itself. My point is, it’s a very slippery slope when we start making a case against a belief that is deeply engraved into the souls of 1.8 BBBillion people. I know the Quran and the Bible have many differences, but they’ve also got their similarities. Share thoughts. thanks.....! Lol Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold on January 25, 2018.
79th Critique "This is implying that France and America are built on the same values and ethics. It’s like using 2 completely different religions to argue one broad point to a moral issue." In this critique, I focus on journalist and national-affairs analyst for NBC News and MSNBC John Heilemann’s views on Muslim immigrants. These critiques are for you all and for myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the written article and transcript for the video, and lastly, I added my commentary throughout. The transcript is in black text and my commentary is in red text. Link to original article, Heilemann: Governors Refusing Syrian Refugees 'Shameless, Un-American' By Mark Finkelstein | November 16, 2015 6:05 PM EST Fallout from the ashes of Kate Steinle. Oh wait, wrong aliens. Written article starts, Would John Heilemann have called Francois Hollande "shameless" and "un-French" if a few months back he had halted the immigration of Syrian immigrants into France, thus stopping two of the Paris terrorists—who reportedly posed as refugees—from entering the country? I get where he’s coming from, but this comment is beyond retarded if you think about it. This is implying that France and America are built on the same values and ethics. It’s like using 2 completely different religions to argue one broad point to a moral issue. The question arises because on today's With All Due Respect, Heilemann condemned as "shameless" and "un-American" the dozen or so governors, mainly Republicans, who have declared that their states won't accept Syrian refugees. JOHN HEILEMANN: If we were doing our newly-minted segment "With No Due Respect," Mark, I would be calling out the governors of all these states [refusing Syrian refugees.] It would probably get better ratings with all due respect to this segment. I was about to say “no pun intended” but luckily I’m not completely brain dead. I was trying to come up with some clever pun to put at the end of this, but fuck me disrespectfully.It's not clear if they have the legal authority to do this at all. What do you mean it’s not clear? At least get into why you said that a little more. Or are you just planting a seed without any evidence?This is the worst kind of shameless posturing and grandstanding you can imagine on this issue. I'm with President Obama entirely on the fact it's un-American, but apart from that as I say it's also widely impractical and potentially not legal, but it is something we have seen play out, in a dramatic way, in a slightly different way in the isse over Gitmo. Governor: “But John, it is legal. Here it is in writing. You can’t just go around planting doubt into peoples heads on that.”John: “Who knows though, it might not be. Could my wife really be my wife? She could just be a figment of my imagination and everyone else is just playing along because they feel bad for me. Could my kids really be my kids? Maybe my wife fucked another guy and has manipulated me into thinking she would never do anything like that and now I’m stuck with being a cuck while the other guy lives free fucking as many women as he wants, because you know, who knows. It might be.” Or possibly he’s saying that for a good reason and the article has taken this segment out of context, because who knows, it might be. The president knows how difficult it is when you have recalcitrant states. Like….sanctuary cities?It could be a problem for him, but again I think the main thing we want to focus on right now is just how shameless these politicians are who are doing this for, I think, purely political reasons. “Purely political” is a much different than just saying “political,” because if you’re doing something primarily for one specific gain and nothing else, there’s usually some shady shit going on. Written article resumes, What would Heilemann say if and when, God forbid, one of the "Syrian refugees" he is so adamant about admitting commits an atrocity on American soil? Here we go again with this fear-mongering bullshit. Goddammit I’m tired of that shit from both sides of the political spectrum. Don’t fall for that. You, right there, don’t fall for that shit. You can think I am the most ridiculous person in the world, but do not fall for that fear-mongering bullshit that both sides pull. Don’t do it. My Response: 1st Impression: Disagreeing with Heilemann - It’s not a black and white disagreement on this for me. I obviously have just started looking into this and he could be totally right, but the clip was short and the 3 paragraphs of the article was obviously biased against him. He also said little things that ticked me off a bit, especially the “might not be legal” part, but for all I know he went more in-depth into why that is in another interview, or maybe even this one and it was cut out. It was 0:46 fucking seconds long though, or was it????? Feel free to give your honest opinion. Thanks! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold on January 26, 2018.
80th Critique "I want to be perfectly clear that the writer for the 3 paragraphs giving his opinion on the matter, Mark Finkelstein, is much more repulsive to me even though I disagreed with Heilemann." In this critique, I focus on journalist and national-affairs analyst for NBC News and MSNBC John Heilemann’s views on Muslim immigrants. These critiques are for you all and for myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the written article and the transcript for the video, and lastly; I added my commentary throughout. The written article and transcript is in black text and my commentary is in red text. Link to original article, Heilemann: Some Say Trump Muslim Plan 'Fascist,' I Say 'Reactionary'That’s like saying when Obama was president, “O’Reilly: Some Say Obama’s Healthcare Plan ‘Communist,’ I Say ‘Progressive.’” Written article starts, By Mark Finkelstein This guy sucks. He’s said like 5 dumbass things in the past 2 articles about Heilemann. And he’s written like 5 paragraphs!| December 7, 2015 6:57 PM EST For a moment there, it looked like John Heilemann might go Absolut Olbermann and call Donald Trump a "fascist" for his proposal which would for the time being bar the entry of all Muslims into the United States. You definitely would’ve gotten an extra paragraph out of it. That’s like 30% more. But Heilemann backed off that f-word. While noting "some will say fascist" about Trump or his policy, Heilemann declared "I'm not saying that." Instead, he settled for asserting that there are "many voters in the country who are in fact reactionary" and that there is no way to describe Trump's policy "other than reactionary." Better than fascist, but it’s mostly about the message he gives. JOHN HEILEMANN: We apply a political lens to everything on this show, and I'm as inclined to do that is anybody, and certainly as inclined to do it as you are, Can we have YouTube channel Charisma on Command analyze this guy? Nice intro Heilemann. but in this case I really do feel like you have to stop and take a breath and say wait a second, this is a presidential candidate and by almost every measurement the front runner for the Republican party who's saying that the American immigration policy should be determined by a strictly religious test. I don’t believe a religious test is a bad idea. I don’t believe in banning all Muslims, but if they were required to take a test and they fell under more of an extremist ideology, they shouldn’t be allowed to enter America.Not Syrian refugees, not suspected terrorists. All Muslims, French Muslims, Belgian Muslims, Muslim tourists, all Muslims should be barred from entering the United States because they all pose some kind of a threat to the United States. I think it is genuinely a dangerous, irresponsible, horrible thing to say that will have bad ramifications around the world. This will make headlines all over the world and it's a huge win for Islamic State to have a presidential candidate of Donald Trump's stature, and I say that because of his standing in the polls, saying something that is I think genuinely un-American. Yeah, extremists would see that as a win. They’re being recognized, but their job will be harder. MARK HALPERIN: For all the reasons you said, I think this could be a turning point. And what's interesting in history here, of the Trump candidacy is, this is not in a gaggle. He was not goaded by a reporter. He chose to put out a statement, and in any other campaign of any Republican or Democrat who has ever run for president, if a candidate said I want to take a position that immigration policy should be based on a religious test, they would be stopped by their staff. If a short religious test keeps a few extremists out, but still welcomes Sunni Muslims, I’m all for it. But if the test keeps people out based only on if they’re Muslim or not, I’m against it. I have a feeling the test wouldn’t only be judged based on if they are or aren’t Muslim. Reminder: This was written in 2015, but the debate is close to the same.And this shows that Mr. Trump has no one around him who will stop him from doing things. But I will say again, I think a lot of voters will think this is a perfectly sensible idea. God I wish I could find the actual test so I could conclude to which side I am on with this. So according to a Washington Post article titled, “Will we be forced into a religious test? The dangerous questions Muslims are facing,” the test doesn’t automatically ban Muslims. If they do believe in Sharia Law, however, it does imply they will be banned. I couldn’t find too many details online that show what specific answers will ban a Muslim. It comes to the specifics with me on this one. According to Pew Research Center website’s section on Sharia Law, most Muslims believe in it. There are 1.8 billion Muslims, so we’re talking a ban on an enormous scale here. HEILEMANN: Well, the fact there are many voters in the country who are in fact reactionary and will embrace a reactionary policy, we know that as true. But there's no other way to describe this than reactionary. Some will say, and they already are saying, some will say "fascist." I thought the transcript fucked up, but no, that’s exactly how he put his words together.I'm not saying that, but I am saying there is no way to describe this other than reactionary. And as I say, against I think the best ideals, the best traditions of what the country has always tried to be about. Religious freedom. Look at some of the dark points of Christianity. I know Christians haven’t been violent on the scale of Muslims in the current times, but it’s good to remember religion itself can be pretty fucked up. So can atheism. People can be pretty fucked up. Back to written segment, Note that, without smearing them as reactionaries or otherwise, Mark Halperin made the incontestable observation that "a lot of voters will think this is a perfectly sensible idea." Question: If the loved ones of those killed by Islamic terrorists in America expressed the wish that such a ban had been in place, would Heilemann call them "reactionaries" to their face? Shut your fucking face. My Response: 1st Impression: Disagreeing with Heilemann - I was close to agreeing, but Heilemann didn’t play his cards right. He answered my test wrong. He believed in Sharia Law. I want to be perfectly clear that the writer for the 3 paragraphs giving his opinion on the matter, Mark Finkelstein, is much more repulsive to me even though I disagreed with Heilemann. “You wouldn’t say that to the face of a family member who was impacted by Muslim violence you heartless bastard blabamamama.” “Tell Kate Steinle’s father you want illegals here blabmamama.” “Tell the parents of the victims of Sandy Hook that you don’t want a ban on assault weapons. You must like dead kids you.. Sick.. Fuck.. Mabalalblama.” “Tell the mother of the kid who set himself on fire that the episode of Beavis and Butthead shouldn’t be pulled blabmamalmbalabla.” “How about you tell that car crash victim’s daughter, mother, son, father, and dog that we shouldn’t stick to horse and buggy to save human lives. Blamablablablablmama. blamamamabla.” I’m sure that has been said 100 years ago. “Reporting suggests the killer of 22 innocent people and 36 kittens put in 324 days of playing all 16 Grand Theft Auto titles over the years. That’s over 7,500 hours.” “That’s not GTA’s fault.” “How about you tell that to the victim’s son, Little Billy. If it weren’t for GTA, Little Billy would’ve had a father who loved him and had taken care of him, but the game forced him to play it instead of being a father, and the game basically told him to kill 22 people. And 36 kittens. A matter a fact, I have him right here. Hey Little Billy, this man has something he wants to tell you.” “No, it’s okay…..” “That’s what I fucking thought. So you’re in on banning the game now right?” Just shut the fuck up with that shit. I don’t care what you’re arguing. On a serious note, I disagreed with Heilemann because he seemed to disagree with any kind of testing for Muslims altogether. I believe it should be difficult to fail the test, but there should be something. If we do this Muslim testing thing, I believe that we should look into the Bible a bit as well. How about we start out with some of the less controversial commands from the Bible. “If your genitals have been damaged, stay out of church: 'He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord. (Deuteronomy 23:1)'” Let’s run with that one first. Or how about people that believe in nothing? That’s pretty scary to right? No moral beliefs in place at all? Basically they’re saying you can do anything you want, including anything in Sharia Law. Anything, no moral compass at all. I’m kidding. It’s all very complicated. Feel free to comment if you feel led. Thanks! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold on January 27, 2018.
81st Critique In this critique, I focus on liberal commentator and writer for New York Magazine Jonathan Chait’s views on Muslim immigrants. These critiques are for you all and myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive. I copied and pasted the written article and pictures within the article, and lastly, I gave my opinion throughout. My commentary is in red text and the article is in black text. Link to original article On Muslim Rights, the Republican Party Is Now the Trump Party By Jonathan Chait March 22, 2016 2:33 pm “Quiet Jeb! I mean Ted!”Donald Trump and Ted Cruz agree to agree. Huh, never actually heard the phrase “agree to agree.”Photo: Chip Somodevilla/2016 Getty Images Donald Trump’s candidacy has carved a gulf down the middle of the Republican Party. Yep, barely won the election. Down the middle of the Republican Party you say? Well that doesn’t make any sense. I’ve got a little tape to show you. It’s called “Schoolhouse Rock.”But the divide is not formed by the elemental us-versus-them appeal that lies at the heart of Trump’s unbreakable connection with the Republican base. I think you meant to say “lies at the soulless black abyss of Trump’s relentless latch he has on the alt right.”Look at the way traditional conservatives have framed their attacks on him. Anti-Trump conservatives relentlessly describe Trump as “center left” or “liberal.” I’ve heard that, but I wouldn’t say it’s something often said.They run ads attacking him for his past rhetorical support for universal health insurance, ignoring his current rock-solid Republican positioning. If only people over time actually changed, so we would have an excuse for people giving different views than they did in previous years. That sarcastic remark isn’t in relation to Trump. He’s totally just playing the game.Conservatives attack Trump as a liberal because they have given up on fighting his ultranationalist appeal, or else never cared to oppose it in the first place. I honestly don’t know what to make of that sentence. Give in?This new reality can be seen in the wake of the Brussels bombings, in which the divided Republican Party speaks with one voice. Following the attacks, Trump renewed his calls for expanded torture and excluding Muslim immigrants. Ted Cruz, not to be outflanked on the right, began with his customary denunciation of President Obama for refusing to use sufficiently inflammatory terms to identify the enemy (“we can never hope to defeat this evil so long as we refuse to even name it”). I’m not even researching the difference in the words used, because 1) It’s pretty irrelevant and 2) Why the hell did this prolific NY magazine writer not put it into context for the reader, unless it’s suggesting Obama didn’t say evil and Ted did. Sensing this might not be enough, he unveiled a new commitment, to “empower law enforcement to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods before they become radicalized.” This is a breathtaking idea that merits deeper examination as evidence of what is now the policy stance of the putatively ===aka considered=== non-crazy candidate of one of our two major parties. I believe it just boils down to delving into the ideals and beliefs of supposedly non violent Muslims and using crime statistics to prove that enforced law enforcement is actually needed. The great benefit enjoyed by the United States over Europe is its multicultural character, in which citizenship is not identified with a racial group. Conservative: “Including…..” Liberal: “No, it’s not like that.” Conservative: “Come on say it with me. Including…” Liberal: “Innnc…..No….” Conservative: “Inc...Including white people there you go, great job.” Liberal: “I hate you!” That multiculturalism has allowed American Muslims to assimilate much more easily than in Europe, which makes Americans safer — though not, of course, perfectly safe — from terrorism. Looking at this state of affairs, with a dangerous, ghettoized European Muslim population and a much less threatening, well-assimilated American Muslim population, Cruz proposes to treat American Muslims like European ones. He endorses racial profiling of “Muslim neighborhoods.” That’s like using the phrase, “racial profile” to Vatican City if they were in suspect of….you know. Basically, the Muslim religion isn’t a race. Neither is being Catholic. Cruz does not even justify this policy as a response to radicalization. He proposes to do so, in his words, “before they become radicalized.” Cruz’s belief is that subjecting a non-radicalized population to discriminatory policing will prevent rather than cause its radicalization. This is bad journalism. I’m not a critic…..come on it’s bad journalism. Pauly Shore has the right to say Kathy Griffin is a shitty comedian. I also have the right to say Jonathan Chait is a shitty NY mag writer. Anyways, I would like to point out that it would be good if we could make the distinction to why exactly the two groups are different and how they grew further apart in ideals over time. I’m guessing it is the places they grew up in. This is the kind of madness that now prevails for foreign-policy logic in this party. Cruz, of course, has appointed raging paranoic Frank Gaffney as a foreign-policy adviser. Gaffney has called Barack Obama “America’s first Muslim president.” “Oh so you don’t like Muslim eh? Well how about the first EVIL president?” Perhaps Cruz envisions the special law patrols to include the neighborhood of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, to prevent the (further) radicalization of its Muslim occupant. Meanwhile, the party’s most cosmopolitan Wait, are we talking about ice cream or racial equality? Because if you’re referring to what I think you’re referring to, get the hell out of my country. Are you aware of how unhealthy it is to America and because of the risk, the co-founder of Baskin Robbins 31 flavors died from a heart attack because of it? Jesus, you’re intolerance just gave me a brain-freeze.and respected figure, House Speaker Paul Ryan, delivered a speech today that he billed as a “stand in defense of religious liberty.” One might think Ryan would have in mind the liberty of law-abiding Muslim-Americans not to be singled out for their religious faith. But, no, Ryan did not say anything about that. “Religious liberty” is a Republican term of art that describes the prerogatives of the majority religion, the persecution of which ranges from Obamacare to the war on Christmas. We’ll need all the Obamacare we can get when we combine suicide bombers with the devastating war on Christmas. In Europe, ethnically homogenous Christian populations have been unable to assimilate immigrant populations, with disastrous results. The Republican Party now appears doctrinally bound to replicate that failure. And he doesn’t even reveal if the 2 are going the same way about things. Fantastic. My Response: 1st Impression: Disagreeing with Jonathan - Did this guy say anything? I read through this twice, as I do every critique, and it’s very well written. It’s like everything he had to backup what he was saying was omitted from the article. He’s not clear about the facts with anything. I do not like this guy’s style at all. This guy goes on and on about terrorists and equality blablabla, fuckin’ meanwhile, there’s 31 frozen creamy killers on the loose in the midst of the bleak, terror-filled reality that is the war on Christmas. Up to this point I end up making stupid dumbass jokes when I realize the person’s full of shit. Comment if you feel led to. Thank you! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold.
82nd Critique "The fact that Trump had to relabel his policy 'extreme vetting' is worrisome as well due to the fact that vetting is supposed to be extreme in and of itself." In this critique, I focus on liberal, commentator, and writer for New York Magazine Jonathan Chait’s views on Muslim immigrants. These critiques are for you all and myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the written article and the pictures within the article and gave my opinion throughout. My commentary is in red text and the original article is in black text. Link to original article, Trump Has Made Up At Least 4 Lies About His Refugee BanFinally, an article that will reveal to me why Trump is truly “Little Hitler.” There you go liberals, don’t forget to give me some kind of credit for coining the nickname. By Jonathan Chait Oh.January 30, 2017 10:59 am Not-at-all short-fingered President Donald Trump. Photo: Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty ImagesThe irony to this photo is hilarious, but what would be even more hilarious and ironic is if it was photoshopped. A light bulb just turned on over my head: Photo below not in original article. (Photo by Jan Kruger/Getty Images) Photo below not in original article. (Photo in article, The Only Thing You Need to Read to Understand Donald Trump - Washington Free Beacon ) Photo below not in original article. Marco Rubio has reason to be proud of his hands. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio) Photo below not in original article. (Found on link, Donald Trump, Business Magnate and... President of the United States ) LTSold: I think I might have just formed a verdict on Trump’s claw-like hands. Yes, I do focus on every single detail in every article. Devil’s advocate: What about this segment in your last critique? “Following the attacks, Trump renewed his calls for expanded torture and excluding Muslim immigrants. Ted Cruz, not to be outflanked on the right, began with his customary denunciation of President Obama for refusing to use sufficiently inflammatory terms to identify the enemy (“we can never hope to defeat this evil so long as we refuse to even name it”). I’m not even researching the difference in the words used, because 1) It’s pretty irrelevant and 2) Why the hell did this prolific NY magazine writer not put it into context for the reader, unless it’s suggesting Obama didn’t say evil and Ted did.” LTSold: Maybe I just stepped up my fuckin’ game so shut the fuck up. Devil’s advocate: Great character defining moment for yourself Mr. Sold. And how about you put a fucking question mark at the end of a fucking question? LTSold: Fuck you. Devil’s advocate: Are you asking if you want to fuck me? It’s hard to tell with your 3rd grade level grammar. LTSold: Let’s get back to the article. Devil’s advocate: I don’t know, should we? Back to original article, Donald Trump insists that his Muslim ban, or extreme vetting that is definitely not a ban, or his ban of something but not Muslims, is going extremely smoothly. Come on, it’s confusing enough when I’m sarcastic in my critiques. And can I add that every president will say SHIT is RUNNING SMOOTHLY.“It really is a massive success story in terms of implementation on every single level,” explained a senior administration official. Did he have a black eye with door knob cum on his cheeks? (South Park reference)And yet news has depicted scenes of chaos, confusion, and inhumane treatment of innocent people. Oh so now I understand why Mr. Chait is so unfairly biased against Trump.The administration has thus been forced to supply a series of defenses: 1. President Obama did the same thing. “My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months,” insists Trump. Multiple Fact Checkers have examined this claim and found it wanting. In response to intelligence linking two refugees from Iraq to a bomb attack on American forces there, the Obama administration slowed, but did not stop, its refugee-admission process in order to tighten its screening. A tightening of vetting procedures in response to specific intelligence about a single country is not the same thing as a sweeping halt in the absence of a reported breach. Okay, Trump probably exaggerated on it being similar. 2. Only 109 people were detained. It’s not clear where Trump got this figure, but the Department of Homeland Security announced that in the first 23 hours alone, 375 people were detained. Awesome, an actual direct reference. Mr. Chait must’ve had more time to research this one. 3. There were some big problems, but it was caused by Delta’s computer system. Why the fuck? Would Trump even tweet this lmao. A side thought: watch Trump on tv for 5 minutes. Something like C Span. Remove all politics and emotion you have of him and just watch him. It’s freakin’ ridiculous and disturbing at the same time to come back to the realization that he is our president based solely on that 5 minute viewing. What a time to be alive. In fact, problems began Friday night, and Delta’s system went down Sunday night, and was fixed after a few hours. Had nothing to do with it being Delta. Nothing at all. I write that with pure sarcasm, but I write this with pure seriousness when I say it’s good Jonathan Chait added this to support his argument. It doesn’t hurt to show the little things in your agenda against something. 4. The premier (premier is crossed out in article) president loves surprises. Possibly the most interesting defense is that the administration was unable to use the normal interagency review process because it would have tipped off the terrorists. “What we couldn’t do was telegraph our position ahead of time to ensure that people flooded in before that happened, before it went into place,” said White House spokesman Sean Spicer. “If we had telegraphed that ahead of time, then that would have been a massive security problem.” President Trump, as usual, put the argument in pithier terms: He won the motherfucking presidency using “pithier terms,” and I’m not pointing that out as a good thing. Haha Jesus Christ. This defense suffers from two enormous flaws. First, it assumes that allowing agencies tasked with security to have input on a policy would be tantamount to publicizing the policy. Oh shit. Chait, where the hell have you been? Niccce.The president is supposed to be able to discuss plans in confidence without assuming they will be leaked immediately. That is how the federal government works. Calm down a little Chait, you’re on fire.If the only way to announce a foreign-policy move was to keep new policies a closely guarded secret within the administration, then this kind of amateurism would be standard. There is a long record of American presidents announcing surprise foreign policy decisions that were planned in advance by officials other than a speechwriter in his early 30s and a Breitbart lunatic. Chait must be angry and motivated from my last critique. I’m kidding, nobody gives a fuck about my critiques and the timeline wouldn’t make sense. The second problem with this defense is that it assumes terrorists were sitting around the world, planning to enter the United States to launch an attack, and able to enter at any time, but lacking any special urgency. (Perhaps they were waiting for the fares to drop.) An announcement of one week’s notice would have given them just the motivation they needed to hop on a plane. This isn’t right, Ben Shapiro says liberals aren’t logical. This must be some kind of alternate reality. This bears no relation to reality. I knew it!People from the countries banned by Trump already face an extensive, 20-step vetting process that can take up to two years. None of them could have legally made it through within a week, or anything close. And once you realize this, it becomes clear that Trump’s policy was not only bungled in its implementation but conceptually flawed. Trump originally proposed a “Muslim ban.” But he had to back away from this policy given that it is both unconstitutional and transparently unenforceable (how do you prevent a terrorist from lying about his religion?). Because it’s a sin for them to lie! I’m kidding, that’s a great point and I feel like an idiot for not thinking it.This forced Trump to relabel his policy “extreme vetting.” waterboarding?But the reality is that vetting is already extreme. When “extreme vetting” doesn’t work, he’ll say, “total maximum xtreme vetting.” Trump has not identified any weak points in the vetting procedure. Indeed, there is no connection whatsoever between his policy and any terror incidents in the United States. Radicalized domestic American terrorists have all come from countries not on Trump’s list. His policy grows out of a need to take some kind of action. But weren’t the countries on the list supposed to statistically have the most radical terrorists? In a way, it makes perfect sense that he would skip the normal interagency review — input from security experts would only reveal that Trump’s plan has no relationship to any security objective. The purpose of this policy is to retroactively justify Trump’s campaign fearmongering. Liberals who accuse Trump of fear mongering are only hurting themselves. My Response: 1st Impression: Agreeing with Chait - This is my second critique of Jonathan Chait, and I have to say the difference between this one and the last one is like night and day considering how better this one was. This article was written about 10 months later, so maybe he just improved that much. The fact that we knew so much about Trump’s plan in such a short amount of time is worrisome. The fact that Trump had to relabel his policy “extreme vetting” is worrisome as well due to the fact that vetting is supposed to be extreme in and of itself. The fact that this will ultimately be counterproductive in preventing acts of terror is also worrisome, because each act of terror is meticulously planned due to the stakes presented to the extremists goals, beliefs, and provided assistance. Does the Trump administration really believe that the specific Muslims who will be sent out to commit acts of terrorism entering the U.S. in 2018 will Arabic men wearing taqiyahs who barely speak English? No! The community is large enough where they have access to use the least suspecting profile. Does that mean we shouldn’t do anything about the situation? No, but this one didn’t seem very well thought out. Feel free to comment. Thank you! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold on February 1, 2018.
Quick Announcement: I want to make it clear that any kind of criticisms/disagreements which are and will be made on this thread are very closely examined and never does offend me. This announcement is for people who wants/wanted to say anything critical in this thread, but didn’t because it may seem rude, hateful, or uninformed. (since this thread is a very convoluted) When I say critical; I mean anything critical. (structure, comments, facts, etc.) Even if I completely disagree with a critical comment regarding the critiques, (unlikely) I’ll still appreciate the person highly for taking the time to be honest. The way I present myself in my critiques isn’t how I’ll present myself to any kind of criticism. The fact is, I’m not going to stop posting these. The format and commentary now won’t be the same level of quality people will see years from now. My passion & persistence comes from the idea of what I can make with years of practice, so the last 82 critiques are just stepping stones for something more on down the road. I know a lot of what I write can be wacky/cringy and some offensive, but I’ll learn to incorporate the satirical comments better over time. And that will take time. My point is, don’t be afraid or feel sorry to hurt my feelings lmao. With that being said, I would like to thank the users who have given any criticisms and/or advice: (so far) Lenny.: Recommended nobody click on the first link I posted to the critiques. This helped me realize the quality or presentation was lacking, so thank you for the criticism. Jman42028: Advised me to present my stance on politics more clearly. So far, the critiques have been a mess, but the format and my stance will clean up over time. I appreciate you pointing that out. NorseMythology: Recommend against me reviewing mainstream media pundits. Looking back now; it’s much better to take what they say as a grain of salt, so I appreciate this. Also gave me a list of pundits to go over, which I appreciated. I do pick them randomly to keep it unbiased, but you didn’t know that at the time, so thank you. NorseMythology, JohnnyWeedSeed, Made me aware the links I used to provide for my critiques wouldn’t work for the Grasscity app. I highly appreciated that, because I would’ve never known. CBD Burner: Commented that news on tv is like reading a paperback to see what’s on tv lmao. I appreciated this, because it did give me more insight of what some people probably thought, but wouldn’t say. I respect that. Twostrokenut: Commented “tl;dr” which stands for “too long; didn’t read.” This made me realize I needed to change the structure and shorten my points better, so thank you. We went back and forth with little insults, so it was all in good fun. VikingToker: Recommended that I comment on each paragraph and summarize my statements into shorter points. This was probably the most valuable advice, which will take effect on the 87th critique. My intention with this isn’t to get attention. My intention for this is to make people aware that I really do appreciate any form of criticism and will take into consideration all of it and put into effect most of it when I catch up to the point I am at now, which is the 87th critique. Thank you for reading and have a good day.
83rd Critique "There’s so many perceptions and arguments to be made." In this critique, I focus the correspondent for National Review Kevin Williamson’s views on Muslim immigrants. These critiques are for you all and myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the written article and the photo within the article, and lastly, I gave my opinion throughout. My commentary is in red text and the article is in black text. Link to original article, Muslim Immigration -- After Paris, It’s Time for U.S. to Get Serious | [site:name] | National Review I’m not a big “art” fanatic, but this article is art. (Read this paragraph in an old English accent) I feel as if I have been swept up by a tornado of Peruvian Lilies and gently cast away as an infant into a sea of Tempur-Pedic unaware of the horrors which haunt my fellow dimensions. ‘Not Welcome’ By KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON / November 15, 2015 5:00 AM A window of the Cafe Bonne Biere in Paris, France, November 14, 2015 (David Ramos/Getty) Unsentimental after Paris The Sunday after the shootings at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, I attended Mass at a Catholic church in a very conservative suburb in a Western state where gun rights are in the main unquestioned. As he spoke about the massacre in Charleston, the priest, who showed no sign of indulging himself in ecclesiastical theatrics, grew genuinely angry — that such a thing had been done at all, and that it had been done in a sanctuary among Christians at prayer. Later I asked him what he would have done if it had been his church. “This congregation?” he asked with a little smile that was meaner than you want a priest’s to be. “Probably administer his last rites.” “Throw a steak off the yacht To a pool full of sharks, he'll take it. Leave him in the wilderness With a sworn nemesis, he'll make it. Take the gratitude from him I bet he'll show you something.” - K Dot I thought about that good pastor as reports of the horrors in Paris came in. There was the usual sentimental outpouring on social media, the tricolors and the invocations of the Marquis de Lafayette and the Empire State Building lit in honorary blue, white, and red. Professor Ebony Elizabeth Thomas of the University of Pennsylvania chidingly reminded no one in particular to report anybody who was engaging in anti-Muslim rhetoric on Twitter. All of that is useless, of course, but one feels the need to do something. But the only thing one can really do is the one thing that Parisians cannot do: shoot back. It is better to be at war with al-Qaeda than with the Islamic State and its confederates. Al-Qaeda’s specialty is terrorist spectaculars such as the atrocities it committed on September 11, 2001. Though we failed to do so, attacks of that kind can be stopped: They require the acquisition of particular kinds of skills, transportation, logistics, and financial support, and a fair amount of communication to make all that happen, and these can be detected so that the plot may be disrupted. The attack in Paris on Friday — and the attacks in other European capitals preceding it — has more the character of an intifada: All you need is a crowd and the will to do evil. Guns, knives, gasoline, improvised explosives, motor vehicles — the weapons are commonplace, and they are incidental. What an intifada needs is either easy passage across borders or a suitable domestic environment in which to hide. Paris offered both in the form of Europe’s open borders and the large population of immigrant Muslims in French cities. The United States should see to it that we offer neither. The United States should apply an extraordinary level of scrutiny to visitors from countries whose main exports are jihad. Fas Securing the borders — there’s an “s” on the end of that word, remember — isn’t just about getting control of territory contiguous with Mexico to make sure that Mr. Santiago from Ixmiquilpan picks no lettuce. Or brings any in.Workplace enforcement (i.e., marching a couple dozen food-processing executives off to prison) would take care of economically oriented illegal immigration, and most of our illegals now arrive here the same way the 9/11 hijackers did: at the airport with U.S. visas on their passports. Not fake ones, but real ones. That is something that we can, in fact, do something about. The United States should apply an extraordinary level of scrutiny to visitors from countries whose main exports are jihad — before, during, and possibly even after their stays. And we should place severe limits on immigration to the United States from those countries. Europe’s ambulatory Syrian invasion has a number of Europe’s peoples, such as the Poles, asking themselves why a country that doesn’t already have a large unassimilated Muslim minority in its midst would want one, and there aren’t any convincing answers coming out of Paris or Stockholm or London or Frankfurt or . . . Yes, that would constitute an act of terrible callousness to millions of people seeking a better life away from base primitivism in Dar al-Islam, but the responsibility of the United States government is to United States citizens, not to the poor suffering people of Yemen and Syria. The good and the guilty will suffer together, in no small part because the good unwittingly provide the fertile soil in which the guilty cultivate jihad. That suffering will be inflicted in the interest of the citizens of the United States, including its Muslim citizens, many of whom came here precisely to escape the backwardness that thrives in Muslim immigrant communities in France and the United Kingdom. As Turkey’s President Erdogan put it, there is no such thing as moderate Islam; Islam is Islam and that’s that. Where there is Islam, there will be Islamic extremism, Islamic supremacism, and murder. Song is not in article. I placed this here with the intention to turn on and softly play in the background from here until the end. Replay it if it finishes before you do. The United States should not disengage from the Islamic world, by any means — the lack of American leadership only encourages the graybeards in Tehran and elsewhere and contributes to the very instability that enables the emergence of forces such as the Islamic State. But the United States need not make the same decisions Europe has made in the belief that there will be different results once Khalid al-Mihdhar feels the San Diego sunshine on his face. We cannot solve all the problems of the Islamic world, but we can do a great deal to ensure that they are not the immediate problems of Milwaukee. That’s Plan A, and, before you write it off, give a little thought to what Plan B is going to be. That priest knew, and so do the rest of us, if we’re being honest about it. — Kevin D. Williamson is roving correspondent for National Review. My Response: 1st Impression: Disagreeing with Kevin - What a beautifully written article. I didn’t want to interrupt it more than I had to. I usually don’t feel unresponsive to these, but I can’t see through the same lense Kevin does at the moment. There’s so many perceptions and arguments to be made. I guess I’m just tired and this article admittingly went over my head a bit. From what I understand, this is a rough translation of the lyrics from the song from Soundcloud I posted in the article earlier. They’re interesting to ponder on. “For the conviction I told you .. Tough to complete Sawa .. Shail any idea in your mind .. My heart is strong .. Before you do not bother me .. You know the injustice. Speak in time .. And God, O Omri .. What we wrote to each other .. وش نسوى الشكوة لله ,, This is our luck again. Many of us took a few .. God compensates you. And you deserve what you deserve .. And if I were to be my hand .. What made us no difference … Feel free to comment. Thank you! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold.
84th Critique "The US should be like the Harvard of countries." In this critique, I focus the correspondent for National Review Kevin D. Williamson’s views on Muslim immigrants. These critiques are for you all and myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the written article and the photo within the article; and lastly, I gave my opinion throughout. My commentary is in red text and the article is in black text. Link to the original article, Terrorism & Muslim Immigration Connected — Let’s Admit It | National Review Terrorism Is Not Random Nothing is random. By KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON / May 28, 2017 8:00 AM Kevin D. Williamson, because there’s another Kevin Williamson who is an actor and a screenwriter. CCTV image of Manchester bomber Salman Abedi on the night of the attack (Manchester Police/handout via Reuters) We must look at Muslim immigration with clear eyes. Despite the scattered dust from the acts of terrorism. Okay, I’ll stop trying to be anything close to this guy’s level of writing. Actually, no I won’t. Tim McVeigh was God’s gift to the Left, and the Left will forever keep his memory alive, tending it like a kind of sacred flame. His style of sarcasm is more confusing than mine, and I’m not being sarcastic. Al-Qaeda attacks the United States on September 11, 2001? Yes, but don’t forget about McVeigh. Omar Mateen lets loose an “Allahu akbar!” Or as Futuristic would say, “Allahu al'umu sakhif akbar!” before massacring 49 people at a gay bar in Orlando? All mistreated children in foster care whose parents were Muslim should have the first set of potential parents as successful gay couples. Preferably Keith and David from the show Six Feet Under. Well the idea of them not cheating on each other all the time. I’m on season 4.Yes, but remember McVeigh. Salman Abedi and his pack of “lone” wolves get a jump on Ramadan by nail-bombing a bunch of little girls and their grandmothers at a concert in Manchester? Come on, give them a break. They’re probably just really hungry. This scenario would go great in a Snickers commercial.Terrible, of course, but let us not forget about the real threat: right-wing terrorism on the McVeigh model. The more you know about McVeigh, the less he fits the mold of right-ring extremist. He was an agnostic who declared “science is my religion,” who held views on U.S. foreign policy that fell somewhere between those of Noam Chomsky and those of Oliver Stone, and who had a weakness for adolescent Nietzschean posturing, whose final statement was William Ernest Henley’s poem “Sol Invictus,” with its romantic conclusion: “I am the captain of my soul.” But there was also the militia stuff and the Waco obsession and other aspects of his worldview that had more than a whiff of right-wingery about them. The Waco siege disturbs me at a personal level more than the terrorist nail bombing disaster in the last paragraph. I guess it’s because we assume any act of violence or hostility committed by a religious organization within the last few decades is or was of the Muslim religion, but the situation with Waco was not. Situations like these are one reason why I’m so torn on the Muslim ban. I know there’s a divide in the Muslim culture and banning the Muslims who promote bringing peace really brings into question the acceptance of every other belief in the ether. For the sake of argument, let’s say the Quran clearly commands believers to kill all infidels. There’s still a problem here. The Bible and the Quran are a plethora of content filling its pages with metaphors, significant contextual layers, similes, and parables. Combining this all together will spark many divides and beliefs under the umbrella that is the name of the religion. The main problem with my argument here is, how do you punish someone who’s passion results in killing other people along with themselves? These aren’t violent acts where the perpetrator snaps due to the societal norms or is absent of any moral values. No, these are acts carried out by people who believe what they’re doing is beneficial to society AND rewards them in the afterlife, which results in children being raised with that mentality. When you’re taught to believe something as a child, regardless of who you are or if you end up deciding to act on those beliefs as an adult, it will always be ingrained in who you are. When a terrorist group under a certain religion grows to the point where it’s a worldwide problem, at what point does a country say, “We’re going to reject this belief until it’s clear the problem has died down.” And that’s a big counter argument to my perspective in my last paragraph. This appears to be a “my response,” but this is how I wanted to express the view in the moment, so no copy and pasting. Jared Lee Loughner was obsessed with monetary policy, as was John Salvi, who feared that the Vatican was planning to issue its own currency. Lots of loons are sui generis. There a lot of names and phrases being thrown out. This is no Bill O’Reilly monologue and I like that. So from what I understand, Williamson doesn’t like ideological Rambos. But lots of them aren’t. Maybe I was just talking out of my ass with the “ideological Rambos.” The Venn-diagram overlap I’m stealing this between the world’s Muslims and the world’s terrorists may be small, but it is not trivial, and the confrontation between the Islamic world and the West puts a cold light on areas of concern beyond political violence. In the Islamic world itself, we see a heritage of high culture and great civilizational achievements, Yes, history is another good thing to note.but a great deal of it looks like Karachi at the high end and rural Yemen at the low end: violent, backward, cruel, and uninterested in progress to the extent that “progress” is synonymous with Westernization — which, multiculturalist pieties notwithstanding, it is. The argument with this situation is very backward compared to other political issues and really does require looking at it in more than one way.Even if you set aside the propensity of certain Muslim fanatics to bomb pizza shops and to name public plazas in celebration of fanatics who bomb pizza shops, Good name for a pizza chain.there’s still a lot of real life as lived in Afghanistan or Egypt that just isn’t going to fly in Chicago. He should’ve said, “isn’t going to fly in New York. (no pun intended)” It had to have crossed his mind lmao. It would’ve been much more IMPACTFUL. (no pun intended) In places such as Minneapolis, we have done a fairly poor job integrating the relatively small number of Muslim immigrants we already have. And that is of some intense concern in light of the experiences of the many Western European metropolises that are today home to large and poorly assimilated Muslim minority populations, immigrants and the children and grandchildren of immigrants, a non-trivial number of whom are not especially interested in becoming German, Dutch, Swedish, French, or British. It is from among this population that international terrorist networks are able to recruit their local boots on the ground, maladjusted misfits and losers (for once, the president’s penchant for insults is appropriate) Hahasuch as Omar Mateen and Salman Abedi and the Tsarnaev brothers. It may very well be the case that 99 out of 100 members of Muslim immigrant communities reject jihadism and Islamic supremacism, but the 100th man is Salman Abedi. Here we go afuckingain with this, “There’s 99 of that not being the case, but what about that 1” bullshit.If you happened to live in a city that does not have a significant, poorly assimilated Muslim minority population on the Malmö model, would you want one? No.Why? Because that’s not the question we should be asking ourselves. I don’t want to be in a room full of anarchists, but that’s just my preference.Maybe there is invidious prejudice in that, but that is not all there is to it. Yeah, no shit. A note on the side of the article reads, If you happened to live in a city that does not have a significant, poorly assimilated Muslim minority population on the Malmö model, would you want one? It’s like he knew. Back to article, In the case of many terrorist incidents in the West, immigration and travel to and from Islamist hot spots abroad is a part of the equation: San Bernardino, Manchester, 9/11, Orlando, 7/7. The Trump administration is trying, in its habitually incompetent way, to take that fact into consideration, twice failing to impose travel restrictions that fall well within the president’s statutory powers under U.S. immigration law. If anything, the administration does not go far enough. Anti-terrorism considerations should be a substantial part of our public policy not only where visitors’ visas and the like are concerned, but especially in the matter of immigration. Is this guy proposing some kind of police state?The responsibility of the American government is to the American people, as sympathetic as many of those Syrian refugees might be. We do not seem to have much of a well-developed policy on them at the moment, but the most intelligent and decent one would be seeing to it that they are reasonably well looked after — in Syria, or in one of the bordering countries. Or is he proposing to change the foundation of something? Foundation of what? Oh, I don’t know….. “Amendment I. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.” We were, impossible as it sounds to say it, in one sense lucky to have al-Qaeda as our main terrorist threat in the years immediately following September 11, 2001. “People should learn from their mistakes.” I don’t know who said it. It’s something people just say. I think my dad has said it before, “People should learn from their mistakes.”- my dad.Al-Qaeda was, as an ideological matter, focused on spectacular attacks when it came to the West, desiring each to be more dramatic than the last. Osama bin Laden et al. found 9/11 difficult to follow up on, especially with U.S. forces hunting them down in their safe havens. Team America, “Fuck yeah!”The Islamic State has no such ideological limitation, and it is happy to bomb a concert here and behead a hostage there. Yeah hehe, like those right wing Nazi’s who hate black people. All right-wingers. Oh no, we’re going into political inception… The left accuses the right of racism towards black people, but the right accuses the left of being hypocritical due to the fact they encourage Islamic culture, which teaches women are unequal to men. Women are more unequal and sexually reserved in Islamic countries, but are more equal and sexually exploited in the US. The left accuses American men of sexual assault in a series of cases where powerful American men are brought down, therefore the left promotes Islam with the plan to bring Islam to America to accuse powerful Muslim men of treating Muslim women unequal. Consequently, the right accuses the left of sexism towards men over the course of my centuries, therefore brings about more political pressure over time. This results to there being a divide in the Muslim religion and the rest of the US, so the rest of the US moves to Asia. Eventually, the right accuse the left of racism towards white people, but the left accuses the right of being hypocritical due to the fact they encourage US culture, which teaches men are unequal to women. Men are more unequal and sexually reserved in the US country, but are more equal and sexually exploited in the country of Islam. The right accuses Islamic women of sexual assault in a series of cases where powerful Islamic women are brought down, therefore the right promotes US morals with the plan to bring the US to Islam to accuse powerful US women of treating US men unequal. Consequently, the same shit continues over the centuries because the left and right views on this are all backwards to their basic political views. Events and outcomes may vary. The mullahs in Iran may dream of a nuclear Armageddon, but the Islamic State would be perfectly satisfied with a permanent intifada being fought in every Western city of any consequence. The only thing that would make Muslim extremists perfectly satisfied is if every infidel was exterminated. No one wants to see the United States turned into a police state — which almost certainly would mean, among other things, subjecting our own Muslim communities and the U.S. citizens in them to an extraordinary degree of surveillance and other invasive counterterrorism measures. I was wrong to say Kevin’s proposing a police state.The most humane and effective policy consistent with our traditions of constitutional government and civil liberty is to limit the pool of potential Islamist allies in the United States, where Muslims make up only about 1 percent of the population. Just make it harder to come in. The US should be like the Harvard of countries.The pretense that Islamist terrorism in the West can be understood as a phenomenon separate from the Muslim immigration and the character of Muslim immigrant communities serves no one very well — least of all those Muslim immigrants in Minneapolis or the Bronx who thought they were leaving this sort of trouble behind in Sana’a or Kismayo. — Kevin D. Williamson is National Review’s roving correspondent. My Response: 1st Impression: Agreeing with Kevin - This might seem hollow and basic, but when I thought of “US should be the Harvard of countries,” it clicked to what my view on the Muslim ban is. I believe people from certain countries should at least be examined and my opinion doesn’t come from the “It may very well be the case that 99 out of 100 members of Muslim immigrant communities reject jihadism and Islamic supremacism, but the 100th man is Salman Abedi.” bullshit. It’s my overall conclusion. If that was the concluding question to sway any controversial stance I’m undecided on, I’d be against automotive transportation. I know there’s the question, “Well what if they lie about being Muslim?” Well I guess we should look under the surface a little more shouldn’t we. To illustrate my stance on the issue another way: currently living in the US vs coming in = 2 different things. The US won’t kick you out based on what you believe in unless you commit a crime, but the US should be able to control who comes in based on what they believe in. I think the 1st Amendment should be viewed in context to that. “Read more at: Terrorism & Muslim Immigration Connected — Let’s Admit It | National Review “ That kept coming up when I was copying and pasting the article, so I took the hint. Comment and share your thoughts. Thank you! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold.
85th Critique"The language of the Immigration and Nationality Act is plain enough:" "Which has had 78 years to be polished. Wait, that’s only the 'Nationality Act,' not the 'Immigration and Nationality Act.'…. So 66 years….hold up, there’s 2 different versions of it; one in 1952 and one in 1965."In this critique, I focus the correspondent for National Review Kevin Williamson’s views on Muslim immigrants. These critiques are for you all and for myself to learn from and to better understand multiple perspectives over time, but be warned, some of my comments can be offensive and satirical. I copied and pasted the written article and the photo within the article; and lastly, I gave my opinion throughout. My commentary is in red text and the original article is in black text. Link to original article, Donald Trump – Muslim Ban Struck Down | National Review Trump’s Immigration Pre-Crime By KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON / Kevin is a vampire. His last one I commented on was posted at 4 AM.May 26, 2017 8:00 AM (Reuters photo: Joshua Roberts)It appears the photo of Trump is trying to convey disappointment. Claire Fisher, from the show Six Feet Under, and I could have a whole article dedicated to the meaning of this photo. Maybe I should make references that most people can relate to, but wouldn’t that just be a watered down version of what I want to express and not holding truth to what these critiques mean? Should I call someone a “bitch” instead of a “cunt” to avoid offending more people? I am feeling the amphetamines. The courts are wrong on the ‘Muslim ban.’ President Donald Trump’s second attempt at restricting travel from certain predominantly Muslim countries has been struck down for a second time, and for a second time, the courts are in the wrong. I’m still straddling the border wall on this one. I know, it’s like my last critique didn’t even happen, but I’m not saying I have no idea where I stand; I’m just saying I’m not completely there yet. Here’s a website which provides some interesting Muslim/Islam statistics, Muslims and Islam: Key findings in the U.S. and around the world I literally googled “Muslim statistics,” clicked the top page in the search engine, skimmed it over, and briefly looked up the legitimacy. All websites claim pewresearch.org is non-parison and no article I noticed questioned the facts it presents. The biggest thing I noted from skimming over the statistics is the consistent growth in Muslim Americans in the past 10 years. The language of the Immigration and Nationality Act is plain enough: Which has had 78 years to be polished. Wait, that’s only the “Nationality Act,” not the “Immigration and Nationality Act.”…. So 66 years….hold up, there’s 2 different versions of it; one in 1952 and one in 1965. Quickly Googling something isn’t the best way to gather information. I spend a lot of time and effort on these, but there’s a reason they’re called an “experiment.” “Whenever the president finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.” Seems pretty clear to me. Of course I wouldn’t totally throw away the possibility of this being taken out of context. BTW, it’s the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, not the one of 1965. Chief Judge Roger Gregory of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals makes a two-part argument that one must admire for its creativity: “One must admire for its creativity.” Usually the compliment after any insult of work I’ve created lmao. The “bless your heart” version for artists.In the first part, he argues that, because of Trump’s dopey anti-Muslim comments during the campaign, it is reasonable to conclude that the travel restrictions constitute “invidious discrimination,” a constitutional no-no. But the Constitution, as Judge Gregory readily admits, does not protect the rights of foreign nationals not under the authority of the U.S. government or otherwise classifiable as U.S. persons: “Aliens who are denied entry by virtue of the President’s exercise of his authority under Section 1182(f) can claim few, if any, rights under the Constitution.” (My post) 8 U.S. Code § 1182 - Inadmissible aliens Hell no I didn’t read it. Yet, he argues in the second part, failing to apply the standards of U.S. civil-rights law to . . . the entire population of the rest of the world, presumably, makes it likely that the U.S. government will violate the civil rights of U.S. citizens who share certain demographic features: “When the President exercises that authority based solely on animus against a particular race, nationality, or religion, there is a grave risk — indeed, likelihood — that the constitutional harm will redound to citizens.” Sounds like something Frosty the Snowman would say. Totally separate from my last comment - there’s a clear distinction between being xenophobic and racism versus being Islamophobic. 1) There’s no rules for race. 2) The citizen of any country isn’t bound by faith to the country’s laws. 3) Islam is a belief that is deeply engraved in a person’s values. According to many sources on Google, there are roughly 1.8 Billion Muslims in the world with a moderately wide dynamic of statistics giving the number of Muslim extremists. Loonwatch.com has the lowest number of Muslim extremist stating 99.6% are not, which means there are 7.2 million Muslim extremists. Other sites claim the number to be between 1%-3%, so you do the math. Banning only a few select countries with the most radical Muslims should be considered, but I believe demonizing the Muslim religion isn’t necessary at the moment. So, on the one hand the judge is attempting to read the state of the president’s soul rather than the language of the executive order, and, on the other hand, he is arguing that the executive order violates the Constitution not because it violates the Constitution but because something else might violate the Constitution — someday. Trump is in effect being accused of presidential pre-crime. Kinda like a white person being called racist using the word “nigger” in a non-racist form. Well, not really, but hopefully you see where I’m coming from. This represents what is known as outcome-oriented judicial reasoning: Pick your conclusion first, and then construct a case around it in whatever way is most convenient. This makes the context of my last statement more clear.It is also preposterous. It is plain judicial politicking of the sort that undermines the standing of the judiciary and the faith of the people in that judiciary. This in turn damages the perceived legitimacy of our legal institutions, undermining the rule of law itself. It’s funny I hear the bashing of corrupt lawyers, politicians, and big corporations all the time, but not so much judges. It’s weird they’re the odd man or woman out due to their position. Maybe because Judge Judy and Judge Joe Brown made judges look so badass. Deepfake material. The “inadmissible aliens” section of the law (8 U.S. Code § 1182) is indeed extraordinary. It might even be unconstitutional in the breadth of Congress’s delegation of power to the president. It might not. The courts have not found it to be unconstitutional. They have found only that the condition of Donald Trump’s soul is unconstitutional. It is the Nixon standard inverted: “When this president does it, that means it’s illegal.” Like him or not, I think the world is losing touch with reality each day when we ponder on the fact that Donald J. Trump aka the “Rosie O’Donnell is disgusting inside & out” guy, the “You’re fired Apprentice and Celebrity Apprentice” guy, the “difference between a wet racoon and my hair, is that a wet raccoon doesn’t have 7 f%ckin’ billion dollars in the bank” guy is the leader of the free world. The policy in question might be good, bad, or ultimately inconsequential. My own view is that significant restrictions on travel and immigration to the United States from such countries as Yemen and Somalia is an eminently reasonable prophylactic against Islamic terrorism, and I’d put a few more countries — Pakistan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia — on that list. But the question here is not whether this is a good policy — it is a question of whether it is a policy that the president is entitled to enact. It might be a mistake, but it is far from obvious that it is an unconstitutional mistake. That could potentially cause a domino effect of this nature. Note at the side of the article reads, The rational basis of the law is fairly Straightforward. Which makes reality even more sad. Article resumes, Judge Gregory insists that the policy amounts to “invidious discrimination,” which means discrimination that has no rational basis. That plainly is not the case: The rational basis for the policy is preventing jihadists from entering the United States. Maybe he meant statistically.Maybe that is not a rational basis of which you approve — and maybe it is not even a particularly strong rational basis — but it is a rational basis nonetheless. Couldn’t you sum up about any law, political statement, or belief anybody proposes as having some sort of rational basis, unless they’re a schizo? Maybe the judge thinks Trump’s a schizo. Maybe that’s Kevin’s fuckin’ point anyways. And do the 2 phrases “invidious discrimination” and “having no rational basis” truly translate to meaning the same?Even if we were to assume that the standards of protection from discrimination that apply to U.S. citizens apply to foreigners abroad with no connection to the United States — and they do not — the rational basis of the law is fairly straightforward. The last sentence’s placement confuses me, but I guess I deserve it. If the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 itself is partly unconstitutional, then the courts should say so. If Congress does not like the content of 8 U.S. Code § 1182, then Congress can change it. But to set aside a presidential act that accords perfectly well with the letter of the law as the law stands because a judge believes that he detects malice on the president’s part is not jurisprudence. — Kevin D. Williamson is NR’s roving correspondent. “For the 50th time I don’t write screenplays; I am a roving correspondent. Editor, be sure my middle initial is added. And insert my name at the top and bottom of the article.” My Response: 1st Impression: Agreeing with Kevin - I know I was all over the place with this one. There’s a lot more on my mind than usual that doesn’t pertain to this. Trans - I agree with Kevin on certain countries to be restricted, but not to the extent that he does. I believe there should be a ban only on a select few countries that suffer the most when it comes to Jihadism. This is not counting the Muslim inhabitants, but counting specifically the Muslim extremists the most accurate way possible. About ¼ of the world’s population are Muslim. It’s not like the moral fabric isn’t being pulled beneath our feet here in America at the moment or anything. Comment and share your thoughts. Thank you! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold.
86th Critique Warning: Contains Offensive & Satirical Content Primary political issue: Muslim immigrants Primary pundit being critiqued: Kevin D. Williamson - Correspondent for National Review Link to the original article, Immigration & Assimilation -- Somali Refugees in Texas, Outside the Melting Pot | National Review Below is the replicated format and text of the original article in the link above. My commentary is in red text throughout. by KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON June 15, 2016 1:12 PM Twitter - @KEVINNR (Boguslaw Mazur/Dreamstime) Consider the thousand-plus Somali refugees in Amarillo, Texas. Not quite the first city I would pick for the poster child in the fight against Somali refugees if I confidently thought it was a problem. The jokes came pretty quick, and I was quick to join in: A gunman at a Walmart in Amarillo? He’ll be lucky if he lives long enough for the police to show up. This is what was going through my head after reading this paragraph; “haha yeah, I can relate to the humor being from east Tennessee. We’re polite, but man we’re armed and ready for trouble if trouble presents itself.” As it turns out, he lived that long, but not much longer: A SWAT officer killed him before he could injure anybody. This is what was going through my head after reading this paragraph; “That was quite the blunt transition and tonal shift. Jesus.” People on Twitter joked: At least we can be pretty sure it’s not a jihadist. How many angry Muslims could there be in Amarillo? Haha, yeah I know. There’s no way this article will point out that indeed it was a jihadist. What would be even crazier is if this was actually home to one of the largest populations of refugees relative to its population of any city in the country, but there’s no way. What really puts the nail in this coffin is the fact that Kevin joked about Amarillo being an unlikely victim of Muslim terrorism in the paragraph before last. Pssssh, the terrorist was probably some screwed up white kid who finally snapped after playing GTA in his grandmother’s basement and immersing himself in toxic forums 24/7. These people don’t know Amarillo, which has one of the largest populations of refugees relative to its population of any city in the country, the largest by some estimates. They are mainly Somali, Burmese, and Iraqi, and many are employed in nearby slaughterhouses and meat-packing facilities. The feedlots there are something to see: cattle all the way to the horizon. If you’ve heard of “factory farming,” this is the Pontiac of beef. You’ve got to make them feel like they’re murdering something living for Allah. I’m kidding. “Pontiac of [insert consumer product]” I like that. The Walmart gunman was indeed a Somali [EDITOR'S NOTE: See correction at end], by the name of Mohammad Moghaddam. A note in what was presumed to be Arabic (the Amarillo police department is not jam-packed with Semitic linguists) was, according to overheard police-scanner traffic, left in the shooter’s car. It is Ramadan, and jihad is in the air after Orlando. But he had worked at the Walmart, and his target seems to have been his former boss. The police are saying it is just another episode of workplace violence. I try not to use top shelf, aggressive words in instances where they shouldn’t be used to emphasize any point I make; like for example, the left overusing the word “rape” and the right overusing words, such as “anarchy, chaos, etc,” so the assumption still being made regarding this man’s motivations having anything to do with his background seems discriminatory just looking at the facts presented so far. Here’s the correction for the EDITOR’s NOTE he mentioned at the top of the paragraph, so readers do not have to skip to the end: “UPDATE: News reports originally identified Mohammad Moghaddam as a Somali immigrant; subsequent reports identify him as an immigrant from Iran.” But that’s the thing about having a diverse society: A simple episode of workplace violence isn’t necessarily just that. Amarillo’s churches and institutions have done a great deal for the refugees, but many locals believe that the city already has done more than its fair share, that enough is enough. Not everyone in this Panhandle city has been entirely happy to host those thousand-plus Somali refugees, who have not undergone what you would call rapid assimilation. The Somalis may not be entirely happy to have been shipped to a cow town on the far side of the world, either, though one supposes that what greeted them in Amarillo is a bit nicer than what the local warlords might have had in mind for them back home. “A simple episode of workplace violence isn’t necessarily just that.” No of course it’s not. I agree with that statement alone stripping it from the manipulative purpose it’s used for. What his statement is doing is addressing a broad and universally accepted fact while simultaneously implying the violent acts were influenced by the culture of the perpetrator. This is pretty disgusting due to the fact that the police investigated it and concluded the action stemmed from issues contained in the Walmart. You have to keep in mind that the dude worked at Walmart. That is enough evidence to understand why he snapped right there. Would Muhammad Moghaddam have been treated differently by his boss if he’d been an Anglo or a Mexican American? (Potter County is about 38 percent Hispanic; as is true of much of West Texas and the Texas Panhandle, the Anglo and Latino communities, having had more than a century to get used to one another and very little to fight over in the way of status or economic resources, are much better integrated than they are in, say, Southern California.) Would he have perceived his treatment differently? Would he have cracked up in the way he apparently did if he were not a refugee in an alien land? It is impossible to say. I can say that the local reception to a gunman named Muhammad has been rather different from what it would have been to one named Ray. He would’ve reacted the same if he was still a shitty person. The scholarly literature in economics and the other social sciences suggest that a certain level of diversity is healthy for a society (if you have lots of different ideas and approaches to community problems, you’re more likely to have a good one) but that diversity beyond certain levels imposes real social costs. People are less trusting and less cooperative when dealing with people who are unlike them, and it may very well be the case that this isn’t a learned attitude but an evolved response to real threats in the ancestral environment. This is me using the same tactic Cathy Newman used while debating Jordan Peterson: “So what you’re saying is white people hate other races.” If you don’t understand the reference, look it up. This isn’t the area’s first time around with refugee questions. In the 1970s, a great many Vietnamese families settled there, many of them attached to Texas Tech University or to local businesses such as the now-defunct Texas Instruments factory. One of my best friends growing up was one of these immigrants. He didn’t speak a word of English when he showed up in the second grade; by sixth grade, you’d have thought he was a refugee from San Diego. They assimilated quickly in West Texas, in part because there wasn’t much choice. Where their numbers were larger, such as on the Gulf coast near Houston, they formed more-enduring unassimilated enclaves. Given the fact that he could’ve been mistaken as being from San Diego after 4 years of American citizenship, did he also start smelling his own farts? Oh shit wait, that’s San Francisco. I was in a tenth-grade American-history class the first time I heard one of my teachers, a well-meaning left-winger of the Ann Richards variety for whom the entirety of American history was slavery, Jim Crow, and the Triangle Shirtwaist fire, talk about the “salad.” You know the salad: America shouldn’t aspire to be a melting pot, this line of thinking goes, but a kind of tossed salad, in which everything is mixed up but each bit retains its distinctiveness. A great deal of our public policy, from so-called multicultural education (which is in fact the opposite of an education in culture) to refugee protocols that concentrate foreign populations instead of dispersing them, assumes the salad. We’ve seen how well that’s worked for the Swedes, the Germans, the French, etc., but we’re sure that our salad will be a gourmet masterpiece compared to the French frisée or the German . . . whatever passes for a salad in Germany. “(which is in fact the opposite of an education in culture)” Finally someone said it. To put it simply, I believe we should welcome other cultures, but pick families individually who can bring needed or beneficial work to America. I don’t know if Kevin, the author, would agree with me on that. It’s not projecting hate; it’s common sense that if people flee here with nothing valuable to offer, it slowly pulls our country down. It isn’t. I think of my Vietnamese friend, lost and no doubt feeling very, very alone in the second grade. It must have been hard on him, and still harder on his parents, who were terrific people but who never really were quite at home in their adopted country. But their son is as assimilated as he can be, and if their grandchildren grow up to be presidents or CEOs, no one will be surprised. That exercise in assimilation was hard, fast, unsympathetic — and effective. I assume what he means by immigrants assimilating, is by following the ethics and values of America’s founding fathers. The melting pot isn’t comfortable — it is, metaphorically, a kind of trial by fire — but it works. At least we’re passed the point when it literally was. There’s a lot standing between those Somali refugees in Amarillo and assimilation, and Islam is not the least of it. We did a pretty good job of assimilating those Vietnamese, and we aren’t doing such a bang-up job so far with the Somalis — not in Texas, and not in places such as Minneapolis. They’re assimilating better than American citizens as a whole. There’s a lesson in that for immigration reformers, if they have eyes to see. I see through your facade. — Kevin D. Williamson is the roving correspondent for National Review. UPDATE: News reports originally identified Mohammad Moghaddam as a Somali immigrant; subsequent reports identify him as an immigrant from Iran. I don’t understand why he didn’t just edit it and address his mistake in the same spot haha. My Response: 1st Impression: Disagreeing with Kevin - I was really impressed with how this article flowed and was structured. He addressed the Amarillo shooting, told the unseemingly related, for this specific context, story about his young Vietnamese friend migrating here, and lastly, he addressed the theme of assimilation. If I’m not mistaken, the only difference between Kevin’s point of view regarding the assimilation between the Vietnamese migrating over in the ‘70s and the Somali refugees in the present is the prevalence of the Muslim religion in Somalia. I see where he’s coming from and I think what he believes is just a more extreme version of what I believe with Muslim immigration. I just came up with this while reviewing this article, but there probably should only be an intake of skilled Somali refugees. Not refugees, as I stated earlier, who will live off of our government. America should be the Harvard of countries. Leave a like, comment, and subscribe. Lol. Thanks! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold on February 20, 2018.
87th Critique Warning: Contains Offensive & Satirical Content Primary political issue: Muslim immigrants Primary pundit being critiqued: Kevin D. Williamson - Correspondent for National Review Below is the replicated format and text of the original article. My commentary is in red text below. Fake Hate Crimes By KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON / March 5, 2017 9:00 AM “No Trump!” - Maybe “No KKK!” - Agreed “No Racist USA” - Ironic, but I agree. Anti-Trump protest in Seattle, Wash., on inauguration day, January 20, 2017. (Reuters photo: Jason Redmond) And fake hate, too Democrats find themselves in the odd position of simultaneously suggesting 1. that Donald Trump is a closet anti-Semite and 2. that his son-in-law and close adviser, Jared Kushner, is a nefarious Jewish agent of Israel hoping to turn Washington into the Jewish state’s “Santa Claus.” If Ben Shapiro hasn’t accused Trump of anti-Semitism, he probably isn’t one. OMG the article in the hyperlink uses SOOO many Christmas metaphors describing what the Trump administration could be to Israel. I think there’s even a pun or 2. It tapers off throughout, but it really brought me back to the conclusion of the 2016 election. But first, a detour. Juan Thompson, a left-wing journalist fired from his position at The Intercept for falsifying stories, is once again accused of falsifying a story: He has been arrested for making a string of threats to Jewish community centers in what police say was a plot to frame his ex-girlfriend. Thompson, who is black, said on Twitter he was himself being framed by a “racist white girl.” Yeah, but how many people are really behind Juan with this hate crime? He just sounds like a piece of shit to me. Fake hate crimes committed by progressives are by this point so familiar that they are practically a cliché. When a Muslim woman at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette was attacked and had her hijab ripped off, two things happened: One, the Left insisted that this announced the coming wave of pogroms against Muslims in the Age of Trump; two, people who follow this sort of thing began betting how quickly she’d be exposed as a fraud. It did not take long. Incidentally, her name has been kept out of media reports, even though she faces potential charges herself for filing a false report. These hoaxers should be publicly named, as there is no legitimate reason to protect their identities. I think the hyperlink Kevin linked timed out or something. Anyways, yes; it appears the 2 individuals mentioned so far have indeed falsely accused people of hate crimes. I’m a little conflicted on this. In 2018, I think in rare instances, a hate crime could be applicable. If it hasn’t yet, hate crimes will probably be more applicable to white victims from other races, but one should never make the assumption someone is racist unless there’s proof. So if I went out today and randomly picked a person to beat up out of a crowd, which happened to be a black guy, I better get charged with assault and not with a hate crime. Haha. There were other fake hate crimes attributed to Trump enthusiasts: Zeeshan-ul-hassan Usmani of Cary, N.C., says that he planned to leave the United States after an Islamophobic assault on his son following harassment by neighbors who named-checked Trump. School officials say there is no evidence that attack ever happened. A gay man in Santa Monica claimed to have been assaulted by Trump partisans, but the attack seems not to have happened. The San Francisco homeowner who raised a swastika flag was not a Trump supporter but a Trump opponent. A catalogue of similarly false, exaggerated, or distorted hate crimes has been assembled by Reason. You can make a list of people being shitty all day to support your side of any issue. (i.e. political, racial, etc.) It is perfectly fine to give examples of specific instances to support your cause, but don’t make it your main argument point. There is a link to some hard hitting statistics Kevin lists in the next paragraph, which….lmao I’ll get to that in the next paragraph, but it’s not the focus of this article. (And it makes sense why) And the hyperlink Kevin placed in the paragraph above lists a lot of the same falsely accused hate crimes he did. Fucking fuckity fuck. It’s not like most of these people he’s listing are being convicted. Kevin’s message would be much more impactful if the people listed were actually being convicted of hate crimes by the court with insufficient evidence, but that’s not the case. Falsely accused and dismissed, basically. But the fake hate crimes and other politically charged fictitious horrors did not begin with Trump’s election. In her memoir, Lena Dunham made up a story about being raped by an Oberlin College Republican named Barry; after reporting here at National Review and elsewhere (and a lawsuit threat from an Oberlin graduate), Random House was obliged to emend the book. Two black students were charged with pro-KKK vandalism at the University of Miami. Terroristic threats made against Muslim students at Concordia University turned out to come not from right-wing Muslim haters but from a Lebanese-Canadian man named Hisham Saadi. Anti-Arab graffiti on the home of an Arab family in Ohio was put there by a fellow named Osama (!) Nazzal. A large Internet archive of such fake hate crimes, with links to local media reporting, is available here. As it turns out Osama Nazzal was raised by a bunch of inbred rednecks in the deep south. I have no proof of that, but it’s possible. For all I know, Kevin only listed the name, not the background of the perpetrator. But I digress. Okay, so on to the falsified fucking hate crime statistics. If you click on the hyperlink embedded in the word “here” above, it will take you to a list of individual cases of hate crime hoaxes, which at first glance, seem like a lot. At the top of the page, click on the “Graphs” link. According to the graph, in 2016 there were 54 falsified hate crimes, which is the most falsified hate crimes in a single year. Literally 54. That number drops 20% in 2017. Attendance of some individual college classes are more than 54. I’ve had sex with more women than that! Okay fine, I haven’t, but still that’s close to 1 falsified hate crime a week in 2016. It’s pretty deceitful to write an article and act like 54 falsified hate crimes in a year are a problem when there are 320,000 million people in the U.S. You have a 65,000x better chance of DYING in a vehicle related accident than being falsely convicted of a hate crime, since Google states that 1 in 93 people die in car crashes and I would rather be falsely convicted of a hate crime. Don’t believe me? The numbers are displayed above. In Kevin’s defense, LOL sort of, this article was written in March of 2017, which is relevant to address due to the fact that 2016 falsified hate crimes more than doubled from 2015. Lastly, it’s good to keep in mind that the individual cases Kevin listed is the cases most in line with his agenda as a right-winger. The Left desperately wants Americans to be indecent people who go around attacking Muslims and foreigners with funny names, but, by and large, we aren’t. Campus feminists desperately want “rape culture” to be a reality, and so they invent phony rape stories from Duke to the University of Virginia, making sure to target fraternities and sports teams, which are to them symbols of patriarchy. These stories are given currency and credence by incompetent journalists such as Sabrina Erdely and her editors at Rolling Stone, none of whom had the intelligence or grit to question the transparently false claims made in “A Rape on Campus.” Gathered from the hyperlink above, I’m going to list the news websites and outlets that did a good job and the ones that did a shitty job pointing out the specific discrepancies of Sabrina Erdely’s story. The Good: The Washington Times, The Washington Post, The Philadelphia Inquirer The Bad: ABC News Lmao ABC WTF. It’s quite ironic that the news sources that initially called BS on Sabrina Erdely’s story, based on the Wikipedia hyperlink, were those of the left-winged media. Here is the thing: It is not only the hate crimes that are fake. For the most part, the hate they are intended to highlight is fake, too. No matter how many times Jamelle Bouie of Slate insists that American conservatism is an ideology founded in white supremacy, no matter how many times the halfwits at Salon claim that the neo-Confederate impulse is the motive behind Republican policy ideas, no matter how passionately every third-rate intellectual from Bennington College believes that “all heterosexual sex is rape,” it is not so. These claims are as fictitious as the made-up rape at the University of Virginia — they are simply more general. Dude, the bitch in the hyperlink died 12 years before this article. Give me a break. I mean, not that time makes it irrelevant, but that just seems shoehorned in with the other current stories listed. Regarding the literal text Kevin writes for the hyperlink above, I found this statement from Catharine MacKinnon, Dworkin's longtime friend and collaborator, “lies about her views on sexuality (that she believed intercourse was rape) were published and republished without attempts at verification, corrective letters almost always refused.” It’s hard to say what the truth is here. The Left desperately wants Americans to be indecent people who go around attacking Muslims and foreigners with funny names, but, by and large, we aren’t. And you want more people like the radical feminist Andrea Dworkin to go around spouting their batshit crazy views. There are many strands of conservatism and many kinds of conservatives. There are those such as myself whose views are shaped by the epistemic critique of central planning associated with Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek, who believe that all attempts to replace the spontaneous order of free exchange with purportedly rational central planning will fail for reasons having to do with the way knowledge is distributed and used in a complex society. There are moral traditionalists and Christian traditionalists and nationalists, and there are those whose main concern is that the wider world is a dangerous and unpredictable place that would be more dangerous and unpredictable without American diplomatic leadership and military power. There are green-eyeshades conservatives and anti-abortion conservatives. Most conservatives are a compound of two or more of those tendencies. It is significant that the broadly defined Right’s racists and Jew-haters — of course they exist — felt the need to identify themselves as a separate movement and a distinct political school. Oh yeah, I’m with him 100% in this paragraph, but he spends 95% of the time calling out the left. I understand that a conservative pundit would criticize the left disproportionately to the right, but not to the level Kevin is at. He’s a little bit on the radical side. The Republican party within living memory was led by a Jewish man. The Democratic party just came within a hair of elevating to its highest institutional position a man who has long associated with the worst kind of anti-Semites, conspiracy theorists, racists, and lunatics, who has worked with them and apologized for them: As it turns out, Keith Ellison will only be elevated to the rank of No. 2 rather than given the top leadership position in the party. There have been pogroms in modern American history: A notable one happened after the Reverend Al Sharpton gave a number of speeches denouncing Jewish “bloodsuckers” and delivered a stirring denunciation of Jewish merchants in which he insisted “You got to pay!” at a venue in which was hanging a banner reading “Hitler Did Not Do the Job.” The left: “You did this!” The right: “What about the time you did this?” The left: “Ha, didn’t think I would find out about this did ya?” The right: “You did that too!” The right and the left simultaneously: “Racist!” Whatever happened to Al Sharpton? Do you know why there has not been a string of fake hate crimes and acts of violence conducted by right-wing hoaxers? Because the Right does not have to make this stuff up: Left-wing rioters really did set fire to Berkeley when an unpopular right-wing speaker was invited to campus. They really did burn Baltimore. Jeremiah Wright really is part of a loony race cult. Van Jones really is a 9/11 truther and an apologist for Mumia Abu-Jamal. No need for fiction. He definitely has a point about the consistent string of chaos perpetrated by the left compared to the right in 2017/2018. The Left, particularly in the English-speaking world, has been in intellectual crisis since the fall of the Berlin Wall. The Left’s last really big idea was Communism. (Bernie Sanders would say “socialism,” and the difference is not entirely trivial: Communism begins with a gun in your face, socialism ends with a gun in your face.) When Communism was discredited — not only by the failures of central planning alluded to earlier but also by its horrifying body count of some 100 million victims in the 20th century — the Left was left intellectually unmoored. It has come up with strategies — environmentalism, feminism, identity politics, “1 percent” resentment politics — but no big ideas. This is a problem, because conservatism’s big idea — the marriage of free enterprise to liberal political institutions — is doing pretty well almost everywhere it has been tried. The United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and countries around the world from Western Europe to Scandinavia to Singapore that have adopted, however partially and imperfectly, the universal truths embedded in Anglo-American liberalism are doing pretty well. Venezuela isn’t. “The universal truths embedded in Anglo-American liberalism are doing pretty well.” I am so confused what he means by this, but with everything else I am with him on. I’m stretching pretty far from Muslim immigrants at the moment, but I have to address everything else in the article as well. “Communism begins with a gun in your face, socialism ends with a gun in your face.” I like that. The Left, for the moment, cannot seriously compete in the theater of ideas. So rather than play the ball, it’s play the man. Socialism failed, but there is some juice to be had from convincing people who are not especially intellectually engaged and who are led by their emotions more than by their intellect — which is to say, most people — that the people pushing ideas contrary to yours are racists and anti-Semites, that they hate women and homosexuals and Muslims and foreigners, that they could not possibly be correct on the policy questions, because they are moral monsters. This is the ad hominem fallacy elevated, if not quite to a creed, then to a general conception of politics. Hence the hoaxes and lies and nonsense. Phony hate crimes. Phony hate. I’m at a consensus with what he’s saying, but I really hate some of the ways he goes about reporting to support his agenda. And it’s pretty evident that he purposely tries to consistently avoid giving any criticism to the right, which is a shame, because he is a great writer. He’s in fact an excellent writer and extremely well educated, but I’m not going to sit here and suck his dick instead of being vocal on the blatantly one-sided anti-left propaganda of his. Yes, I used propaganda for someone I’m about to agree with. KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON — Kevin D. Williamson is the roving correspondent of National Review. @kevinnr My previous ideal vision of what he might look like lmao. My Response: 1st Impression: Agreeing with Kevin - This article took up a good amount of space listing individual false hate crime after false hate crime. As I said earlier, it’s apparent why he didn’t touch much on the statistics of actual falsely accused hate crimes. I guess I agree with him based on the shit you see on the leftist media outlets. I believe it’s good to avoid seeming unempathetic about the reality of some of the painful history in the US while also calling out the bullshit of people who’s just playing victim. It’s all in the way you go about presenting your argument. It’s a tough balance to achieve. Link to the original article, https://www.nationalreview.com/2017/03/bogus-hate-crimes-trump-conservatives/Comment and share y’alls thoughts. Thanks! Critique by Jacob Taylor aka LTSold.