Kids as Pawns

Zero Tolerance:  Zero tolerance is the policy du jour with regard to “unlawful” immigrants and “lawful” refugees crossing the Mexico border but it’s not Trump’s fault that he’s acting in a hateful and despicable manner, the fault belongs to those Democrats.  So to be clear, every time a child is separated from his or her parents and placed into a prison like facility where even hugs are banned, the blame sits with Obama, Schumer and Pelosi, at least that’s Trump’s position. Trump is lying, but that’s not news, after all he lied continuously for 50 minutes in an impromptu press conference on Friday, and he continues to believe that if he blames the Democrats loudly and frequently this lie will morph into a truth, an approach that does seem to work with a large share of his base.  Still it’s absurdly bizarre that Trump, who is so confident of his power that he’s sure he could pardon himself if he was so inclined, wants us all to believe that his hands are tied, that he has to “follow a law” that he insists requires him to separate the children from their parents despite earlier administrations’ conclusion that such a policy was inhumane and ineffective as a long term deterrent to people fleeing poverty and/or violent situations at home.  Despite the best efforts of a few of his spokespeople, including Kellyanne Conway who actually showed up on the Sunday talk show circuit to insist that as a Catholic she doesn’t want to see children mistreated, but that Trump has no choice, many don’t buy Trump’s excuse. In an op-ed published in the Washington Post, the usually quiet former first Lady Laura Bush called the policy “immoral” and “cruel” and compared it to World War II era Japanese internment camps.  Bush era CIA chief and retired General Michael Hayden, went with a Nazi analogy, he tweeted out a stark black and white picture of the entrance to Auschwitz with the words “other governments have separated mothers and children” in the text line.  Senator Lindsay Graham tweeted what we all know, that Trump could stop the separation policy with a phone call. While calling the separation traumatizing for children, Senator Susan Collins proved once again that at the end of the day she mostly tows the party line, she said that she couldn’t support legislation proposed by Senator Diane Feinstein which would ban family separation within one hundred miles of the border because unlike separating children that’s a step too far. Current First Lady, Melania, tweeted something too, but it was sufficiently bland to be essentially meaningless and did not mention her own questionable immigration pathway.  Not surprisingly, the two Steves, Bannon and Miller, are all in on zero tolerance.  Bannon who seems to be worming his way back into Trump’s graces said that zero tolerance doesn’t have to be justified, because it’s the right thing to do.  Miller, who may be the architect of the program said “It was a simple decision by the administration to have a zero tolerance policy for illegal entry, period. The message is that no one is exempt from immigration law.”  Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Neilsen, who once upon a time threatened to resign because Trump yelled at her in front of the rest of the Cabinet, seems to have recovered from that slight, she slammed the irresponsible press for reporting on the policy, and then went on to say, despite proof to the contrary, that family separation isn’t happening. The bottom line is that a large number of children are being separated from their families, facilities are being created to house the children and some of the newer facilities seem to be following the Joe Arpaio “hot tent” design plan, staffing is stretched, and for some bizarre reason, even siblings aren’t permitted to hug each other.  Even the odd Duggar family permits side hugs!  Though Conway denies it, the Trump strategy appears to be holding the kids hostage in an attempt to force the passage of immigration legislation, legislation that at the very least funds his wall with scads of cash. Congressional Republicans appear close to bringing two forms of immigration legislation to the floor, a right wing bill and a “compromise” plan,  that is supposed to be more reasonable though no Democrats have been involved in its creation so it’s only a compromise to the extent that anyone thinks that Paul Ryan talking with his echo chamber of likeminded Republicans knows how to create legislation that could obtain critical Democratic votes.  Late last week Trump, who of course is weak on details, said that he wouldn’t support a compromise plan, then someone whispered in his ear that he would, so he changed his mind.  He is scheduled to meet with House Republicans tomorrow to discuss the strategy.  That said, neither plan is likely to pass, the kids will continue to suffer.

Another Russia Meeting:  Yesterday, the Washington Post reported about another Trump campaign meeting with Russians.  This one involved Trump friend and sometimes mentor the Nixon tattoo sporting, nefarious oddball Roger Stone and one time campaign advisor Michael Caputo and an odd Russian guy wearing a MAGA hat who went by the name of Henry Greenberg, though his real surname, Oknyansky, sounds far more Russian.  Reportedly Greenberg offered “dirt” on Hillary Clinton in exchange for $2 million.  Stone and Caputo report that Stone told Greenberg that “you don’t understand Trump, he doesn’t pay for anything,” the meeting ended and that was the end of it.  The version of the story that is now being revealed by Stone and Caputo is questionable, at best, in part because they are already on record telling Congress that they never had any Russia meetings and because, at least with regard to Stone, he never really tells the truth about anything.  Their sudden recollection of this meeting appears to have been triggered by evidence provided by and intense questioning from Special Counsel Mueller. Suddenly Stone and Caputo not only remember the details of their meeting, but remember it in excruciating and identical detail.  Complicating matters, it appears that the Greenberg character is another one of those sketchy Russians with a curious past that may have involved some time serving as an FBI informant.  That said, he claims that his work with the FBI was over by the time that he sat down with Stone and Caputo.  Still Stone and the Trump crowd are now claiming that the meeting wasn’t an enthusiastically received dangle from the Russians, but an attempt by the FBI to implicate the Trump campaign in meddling, an accusation that holds little water because the meeting took place well before the FBI actually opened an investigation into the Trump campaigns Russian canoodling.  Trump spokesman/lawyer Giuliani of course denies that Trump ever knew about this meeting.  For his part Trump had nothing to say about the meeting but did attack the Washington Post yesterday in a strange tweet where he said that “Washington Post employees want to go on strike because Bezos isn’t paying them enough. I think a really long strike would be a great idea, Employees would get more money and we would get rid of Fake News for an extended period of time!”  

Inspector General Fallout:  Last week’s Inspector General Report on how the FBI handled, or mishandled, the investigation into Clinton’s email server provided harsh criticism of former Director Comey’s failure to follow established policy about the disclosure of ongoing investigations and noted that his concern about the FBI’s reputation combined with an inadequate communication between him and then Attorney General Lynch led to poor decision making.  However, nowhere in the 500 page report is there any suggestion that the ultimate conclusion that Clinton didn’t commit any crimes is incorrect.  That said the Trump echo chamber has latched onto Peter Strzok’s “will stop it” text, to justify claims that the FBI was biased against Trump and that the whole Mueller investigation should be shut down now.  To be clear, the IG report did not and was not intended to address Russian meddling or anything related to the FBI or Mueller investigation.  The report does cite a culture of leaks among current and former FBI agents out of New York and suggests that the leaking subject in and of itself requires additional evaluation.  So unfortunately at this time, we still don’t know how Giuliani knew about the so called “bad stuff” that was going to come out, i.e., the Anthony Weiner laptop situation, in advance of Comey’s reveal.  For his part, Steve Bannon remains outraged, having somehow or other missed that Trump won and that, if anything,  Comey’s actions benefitted his man.  He is now calling for Attorney General Sessions to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate how the FBI was “weaponized” against Trump during the 2016 campaign.