The All Things Political Topic - Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence

[Malcador]

"When the media and the far left obsess over an MS-13 gang member and demand that he be returned to the United States for a *third* deportation hearing, what they're really saying is they want the vast majority of illegal aliens to stay here permanently. "

From his replies it seems he thinks they need to skip process out of laziness more than anything else.

Edited Saturday at 07:25 PM by Malcador

[Bartimaeus]

The Supreme Court apparently seized the deportation case from Alito after he inexplicably didn't refer it to the Court and then summarily ruled on it without even giving him or Thomas any time to write their dissents at 1 in the morning. If that's not the Supreme Court in a late night panic trying to conserve the little power they have remaining (and in the face of two of their members willingly try to give that away, too), I don't know what is. Waiting for that Gromnir Easter scoop on this...

Edited Sunday at 01:55 PM by Bartimaeus

[BruceVC]

https://www.wsj.com/world/americas/mexico-border-crossing-numbers-6b2ddf34

We dont have any Trump good news stories on this thread around his presidency

But here is one, illegal migrations are down to record lows. Trump ran on this as one of his main objectives, Im not sure if its enough to counter all the bad policies or negative  sentiment   but its something that US voters care about so it matters

"Border Crossings Grind to Halt as Trump’s Tough Policies Take Hold

Illegal crossings at southern border are at lowest levels in decades, as a trend that began before the election has continued under new administration

CIUDAD JUÁREZ, Mexico— In this border city, large groups of migrants marching toward the U.S. have all but halted. Migrant encampments are disappearing, and few people are trying to sneak across remote desert areas to start new lives in the U.S.

“The door is closed,” said Yorman Briceño, a Venezuelan migrant staying at a church-run shelter in Ciudad Juárez, just across from the border from El Paso, Texas.

He had been waiting about six months for his Jan. 23 appointment to request asylum in the U.S. under a Biden-era program, until it was scrapped by President Trump on Jan. 20. Now, after watching how others have been rounded up in immigration sweeps and extradited by the U.S. to a notorious prison in El Salvador, he said he wasn’t even sure he wanted to go anymore.
“There’s no more hope for entering legally as long as Donald Trump is there, and anyone telling you otherwise is lying,” said Briceño.
During the presidential campaign, Trump promised to shut the U.S. border to illegal immigration after surreptitious crossings reached record levels under the Biden administration.
As the issue featured prominently in the campaign, migrant encounters tallied by U.S. authorities fell precipitously in the months leading to the election. Since taking office, Trump has delivered on his pledge as encounters have since fallen further to their lowest levels since the 1960s.

For the moment, tighter controls by the U.S. and Mexico, along with Trump’s moves to shut down legal immigration pathways has brought migrant crossings to all but a standstill. The administration’s targeted and dramatic expulsion of migrants to the prison in El Salvador has also created a powerful deterrent.

Though Trump is struggling to deliver on another campaign promise—mass deportations—the border is an early political victory. According to a Wall Street Journal poll in March, 53% of voters approve of Trump’s handling of border security, while 43% disapprove.

At an annual Border Security Expo this month in Phoenix, administration officials celebrated the low border crossing numbers to a crowd of hundreds.

Border czar Tom Homan said “gotaways”—an agency guess of how many people might have crossed the border without getting caught, based on clues such as footprints and camera sightings—had dropped to 41 the day before.

“Forty-one is pretty good,” he said. “But we’ll get to zero. And when we get to zero, we’ll have operational control of the U.S. border for the first time in this nation’s history.”

 

Edited Monday at 06:44 AM by BruceVC

[Gorgon]

On 4/19/2025 at 9:25 PM, Malcador said:

"When the media and the far left obsess over an MS-13 gang member and demand that he be returned to the United States for a *third* deportation hearing, what they're really saying is they want the vast majority of illegal aliens to stay here permanently. "

From his replies it seems he thinks they need to skip process out of laziness more than anything else.

the 20 million number is false, it's round about 10 times less.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/fact-check-have-21-million-people-been-let-into-the-us-under-the-biden-harris-administration/ar-AA1qMiXH

But of course one can scream 'fake news' at anything and call it done. 

[Malcador]

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/20/us/politics/hegseth-yemen-attack-second-signal-chat.html

Surprised Hegseth hasn't been sacked.

[rjshae]

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/20/us/politics/hegseth-yemen-attack-second-signal-chat.html

Surprised Hegseth hasn't been sacked.

I suspect he'll only be thrown under the bus when he makes DJT look bad.

[majestic]

2 hours ago, rjshae said:

I suspect he'll only be thrown under the bus when he makes DJT look bad.

DJT makes DJT look so bad none of his goons can keep up. Guess that means this time, their jobs are pretty safe. Unless they suggest to stop the tariffs, like Musk did.

[Lexx]

But Hillary's e-mails!

[ShadySands]

41 minutes ago, Lexx said:

But Hillary's e-mails!

That was back in the beforeforetimes when stupid decisions, and doubling down on them, were supposed to have consequences. 

[Zoraptor]

Hegseth could at least have given the traditional bastion of top secret military leaks, the WarThunder forums, a heads up instead of keeping it to select officials/ family/ friends/ the mailman and a journalist.

[majestic]

The US government just making up numbers reminds me of our former right-wing star populist Jörg Haider, who did exactly that - just 30 years ago. Went to interviews with little cards having numbers on them, holding them into the camera. "This is the amount of crimes committed by Chechnian refugees in Carinthia", then the next one "this is the amount of money we spend on Chechnian refugees per year" and so on and so forth.

The numbers were all just made up. At the time there were grand total of zero Chechnian refuguess in Carinthia. The meteoric rise of his party was only halted for a bit when internal problems caused a schism and split into two parties, and ultimately when he was involved in a deadly car accident - driving way too fast and drunk out of his mind (alternatively he was killed by the Mossad). Just last year they got the majority of votes, but failed to find partners for a coalition government.

Edited Monday at 08:14 PM by majestic

[Malcador]

https://www.npr.org/2025/04/21/nx-s1-5371312/trump-white-house-pete-hegseth-defense-department

NPR being radical leftist fake news aside and all.   Although, considering this administration, his replacement could be worse.  Maybe Eddie Gallagher

[Pidesco]

15 hours ago, BruceVC said:

https://www.wsj.com/world/americas/mexico-border-crossing-numbers-6b2ddf34

We dont have any Trump good news stories on this thread around his presidency

But here is one, illegal migrations are down to record lows. Trump ran on this as one of his main objectives, Im not sure if its enough to counter all the bad policies or negative  sentiment   but its something that US voters care about so it matters

"Border Crossings Grind to Halt as Trump’s Tough Policies Take Hold

Illegal crossings at southern border are at lowest levels in decades, as a trend that began before the election has continued under new administration

CIUDAD JUÁREZ, Mexico— In this border city, large groups of migrants marching toward the U.S. have all but halted. Migrant encampments are disappearing, and few people are trying to sneak across remote desert areas to start new lives in the U.S.

“The door is closed,” said Yorman Briceño, a Venezuelan migrant staying at a church-run shelter in Ciudad Juárez, just across from the border from El Paso, Texas.

He had been waiting about six months for his Jan. 23 appointment to request asylum in the U.S. under a Biden-era program, until it was scrapped by President Trump on Jan. 20. Now, after watching how others have been rounded up in immigration sweeps and extradited by the U.S. to a notorious prison in El Salvador, he said he wasn’t even sure he wanted to go anymore.
“There’s no more hope for entering legally as long as Donald Trump is there, and anyone telling you otherwise is lying,” said Briceño.
During the presidential campaign, Trump promised to shut the U.S. border to illegal immigration after surreptitious crossings reached record levels under the Biden administration.
As the issue featured prominently in the campaign, migrant encounters tallied by U.S. authorities fell precipitously in the months leading to the election. Since taking office, Trump has delivered on his pledge as encounters have since fallen further to their lowest levels since the 1960s.

For the moment, tighter controls by the U.S. and Mexico, along with Trump’s moves to shut down legal immigration pathways has brought migrant crossings to all but a standstill. The administration’s targeted and dramatic expulsion of migrants to the prison in El Salvador has also created a powerful deterrent.

Though Trump is struggling to deliver on another campaign promise—mass deportations—the border is an early political victory. According to a Wall Street Journal poll in March, 53% of voters approve of Trump’s handling of border security, while 43% disapprove.

At an annual Border Security Expo this month in Phoenix, administration officials celebrated the low border crossing numbers to a crowd of hundreds.

Border czar Tom Homan said “gotaways”—an agency guess of how many people might have crossed the border without getting caught, based on clues such as footprints and camera sightings—had dropped to 41 the day before.

“Forty-one is pretty good,” he said. “But we’ll get to zero. And when we get to zero, we’ll have operational control of the U.S. border for the first time in this nation’s history.”

 

In other news, USA now such a terrible destination that Mexicans prefer life under the cartels.

[BruceVC]

9 hours ago, Pidesco said:

In other news, USA now such a terrible destination that Mexicans prefer life under the cartels.

But Pidesco dont you think its important we give Trump recognition when he is able to deliver on campaign promises and commitments? 

We dont only want to hear about all the negative things 

 

 

[Lexx]

Does the end justify the means? Sure, he managed to make mexicans not go into america anymore. Awesome! How did he do that? He deports the ones that still do into death camps, lol.

[Elerond]

2 hours ago, BruceVC said:

But Pidesco dont you think its important we give Trump recognition when he is able to deliver on campaign promises and commitments? 

We dont only want to hear about all the negative things 

 

 

Considering that Congress prevented Biden's admin to get through their policies to prevent illegal border crossings, because Trump asked them to do so that he can use those illegal border crossing in his campaign  and now those polices have been enabled and border crossing are decreasing. So how much credit we should give Trump and republicans for solving issue they themselves created in order to win election?

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/23/senate-democrats-immigration-border-bill

https://apnews.com/article/congress-ukraine-aid-border-security-386dcc54b29a5491f8bd87b727a284f8

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/senate-republicans-block-bipartisan-border-package-scrapping-deal-they-had-demanded-from-democrats

https://eu.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/ej-montini/2024/08/22/trump-border-bill-arizona-visit/74898253007/

Edited Tuesday at 10:08 AM by Elerond

[ShadySands]

I brought that up before too but I got some handwavey response about perceptions or something.

[BruceVC]

1 hour ago, Elerond said:

Considering that Congress prevented Biden's admin to get through their policies to prevent illegal border crossings, because Trump asked them to do so that he can use those illegal border crossing in his campaign  and now those polices have been enabled and border crossing are decreasing. So how much credit we should give Trump and republicans for solving issue they themselves created in order to win election?

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/23/senate-democrats-immigration-border-bill

https://apnews.com/article/congress-ukraine-aid-border-security-386dcc54b29a5491f8bd87b727a284f8

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/senate-republicans-block-bipartisan-border-package-scrapping-deal-they-had-demanded-from-democrats

https://eu.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/ej-montini/2024/08/22/trump-border-bill-arizona-visit/74898253007/

Yes  the GOP blocked  the implementation of Bidens bipartisan border  policies at the end of Bidens presidency

But the Dems only did this at the end of Bidens presidency and this was the problem, they failed to anything meaningful about the border and its one of the reasons that the Dems lost so badly in the election 

Its important to try not to  be obsessed with all the SM drama and outrage around Trumps presidency. Focus on what delivers on, like this, and what he fails on around actual outcomes 

For example the global tariffs are very inconsistent and confusing and not a good idea

But no reasonable person would suggest the Dems took the border seriously or did anything significant  about illegal migration numbers into the US

These new numbers reveal a much more positive story and shows border policy success. We just have to wait and see if it is maintained 

[BruceVC]

2 hours ago, Lexx said:

Does the end justify the means? 

Its a great question and only American voters can answer that because they will vote on the successes or failures of Trumps presidency

So we  will see in the Midterms, personally I think Trump has created too much chaos, inconsistency and criticism for this positive development to balance out 
 

But  we will have to see, the strength of the economy and  overall inflation will be the deciding factor in support for Trump in the midterms. That can negate or worsen everything else 

[Malcador]

6 hours ago, BruceVC said:

But Pidesco dont you think its important we give Trump recognition when he is able to deliver on campaign promises and commitments? 

We dont only want to hear about all the negative things 

 

 

Why? The thread must be fair and balanced?

[Pidesco]

7 hours ago, BruceVC said:

But Pidesco dont you think its important we give Trump recognition when he is able to deliver on campaign promises and commitments? 

We dont only want to hear about all the negative things 

 

 

He delivered, specifically, on negative things. So that's what we talk about. Promises and commitments with wildly negative consequences.

[rjshae]

2 hours ago, BruceVC said:

Its a great question and only American voters can answer that because they will vote on the successes or failures of Trumps presidency

So we  will see in the Midterms, personally I think Trump has created too much chaos, inconsistency and criticism for this positive development to balance out 

But  we will have to see, the strength of the economy and  overall inflation will be the deciding factor in support for Trump in the midterms. That can negate or worsen everything else 

From a certain perspective, it can be viewed as a race against time: will DJT ruin the economy before he can impose his vision of an authoritarian regime. In that case it can make tactical sense to delay his imposed measures for as long as possible. Hence, we get a massive number of lawsuits while the judicial branch still retains power. I don't think DJT's measures to limit immigration will be disfavored by a majority voters. Likewise, the focus on transgender is a side issue. It's all about the economy.

[Bartimaeus]

Honestly, I kind of thought crisis might be the whole point: crisis, after all, generally leads to the seizing of more power, not the loss of it. Even if you're the one who's deliberately causing it.

[Gorth]

At the risk of sitting inside an echo chamber and listening to like minded individuals, I thought this guy had some interesting points. Obviously biased, but not in the stupid category (imho).

 

[BruceVC]

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

Why? The thread must be fair and balanced?

I was under the  impression that Trumps doublespeak and selective interpretation of facts was a reason for criticism?

But that should apply to both sides

Shouldn't it be normal to believe in fair and balanced opinions?