Now this is scary! According to the Washington Post, the mastermind behind the Muslim travel ban and other signature Trump policies is Alabama Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions, soon to be confirmed as Attorney General.
“The early days of the Trump presidency have rushed a nationalist agenda long on the fringes of American life into action — and Sessions, the quiet Alabaman who long cultivated those ideas as a Senate backbencher, has become a singular power in this new Washington.
“Sessions’s nomination as Trump’s attorney general is scheduled to be considered Tuesday by the Senate Judiciary Committee, yet his influence in the administration extends far beyond the Justice Department. From immigration and health care to national security and trade, Sessions is the intellectual godfather of the president’s policies. Sessions’s reach extends throughout the White House, with his aides and allies accelerating the president’s most dramatic moves, including the ban on refugees and migrants from seven mostly Muslim nations that has triggered fear around the globe.
“The author of many of Trump’s executive orders is senior policy adviser Stephen Miller, a Sessions confidant who was mentored by him and who spent the weekend overseeing the government’s implementation of the refugee ban. The tactician turning Trump’s agenda into law is deputy chief of staff Rick Dearborn, Sessions’s longtime chief of staff in the Senate. The mastermind behind Trump’s incendiary brand of populism is chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon, who promoted Sessions for years as chairman of the Breitbart website.”
Masterminds botched the rollout.
The backtracking has begun, but I wonder if any heads will roll.
Evidently Giuliani wanted to claim credit for getting the ban together.
In a brief public statement today he may have given the ACLU and other originators of lawsuits a boost.
They are claiming the ban has been a great success.
We must become accustomed to the lies.
Evidently Obama is speaking out right now to organize against Trump who just also signed another Exec Order to demolish all the Obama legislation re gay marriage and protections for the community.
It is overwhelming to see how fast our nation is looking like Nazi Germany. He will be sending all misfits like Jews, Muslims, gays, and deformed people to the gas chambers when he constructs this new money making venture. It will help the coal industry in which he is heavily invested. Pruitt will oversee it.
This obnoxious kid, Steve Miller, was trained by Sessions, and Bannon kept lauding Sessions at Breitbart. Miller went to public high school in Santa Monica, Ca. (Santa Monica HS) and was considered a whacko there for his early Right Wing agendas.
Miller and Kushner are acting as Trump’s ‘capos’…but he will whack them in time after they do his dirty work. Where is Ionesco when we need him to tell this horror story?
AERA has issued a statement, finally.
Ellen,
Do you have a link as to the Exec Order that you say Trump signed to abolish gay marriage legislation? I’ve been looking but can’t find it. Thank you!
Mamie,
I haven’t heard of that one.
Mamie…it was on AOL Breaking News a couple of hours ago.
The beloved “since 9/11…” canard, such as the oft-repeated although false claim that since 9/11 right-wing terrorists have killed more Americans than Islamic terrorists.
The recent executive order by the Trump administration on immigration led to an urgent desire to proclaim that there is no terrorism threat from immigrants. The most egregious example: A tweet from The New York Times’ White House correspondent Maggie Haberman, who is also a CNN analyst. She posed the question, “Other than San Bernardino shootings, has there been a terrorist attack involving a non-US-born attacker since 9/11?”
Of course, there is no sensible reason for excluding San Bernardino shooter Tasheen Malik, who was born in Pakistan, from a list of terror attacks. The attack killed 14 and took place only last year.
But even within the confines of such a ludicrously constructed sample, the question surprised more up-to-speed denizens of Twitter, who quickly bombarded Haberman with lists of successful and unsuccessful attacks carried out by non-U.S.-born individuals, including some of the most notorious recent terror attacks.
Yes, Foreign-Born Immigrants Have Committed Terrorism
Among such individuals: the Tsarnaev brothers of the Boston Marathon bombing, who were both born abroad. Tamerlan was born in Kyrgyzstan in 1986, and Dzhokhar was reportedly born in Dagestan.
The 2015 Chattanooga Recruiting Center shooter, Mohammad Youssuf Abdulazeez, was born in Kuwait and lived in Jordan before migrating to the United States at the age of six. He killed five people.
Ohio State University attacker Abdul Razak Artan, who ran over several fellow students with a car before attacking them with a butcher knife, was a refugee born in Somalia who had only been in the United States for two years.
Ahmad Khan Rahimi, born in Afghanistan, detonated a bomb near a 5K run event, then another in downtown Manhattan in October of last year.
Dahir Adan, a Somali born in Kenya who immigrated to the United States as a child, launched a mass stabbing attack at a St. Cloud Minnesota mall in 2016. And these are only a few recent examples.
Let’s Just Define Away Counterexamples
While it might be amusing to imagine that a mainstream media figure of some note is totally oblivious to any of the details of recent terror attacks, it’s almost beside the point. Had Haberman known better, perhaps she’d have simply constructed a question that did meet what appears to be her preformed opinion that foreign-born individuals are nearly incapable of representing a threat.
That was the position CNN took in its piece on the Trump administration’s executive order. The piece moved the goal posts yet again, insisting that no refugee had carried out a fatal terror attack in the United States. That’s surely cold comfort to the families of those killed by Waad Ramadan Alwan and Mohanad Shareef Hammadi, two Iraqi refugees settled in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
After their fingerprints were discovered on Iraqi IEDs, the two Iraqi refugees were caught in an FBI counterterrorism investigation, where Alwan bragged about using a sniper rifle to kill American troops abroad. The two plotted to kill returning U.S. troops as well. An IED constructed by Alwan is believed to have killed four Pennsylvania National Guardsmen in 2005.
That case resulted in a six-month freeze on Iraqi refugee resettlement in 2011 as U.S. authorities attempted to clamp down on serious screening problems. But, according to CNN’s twisted logic, these Iraqi refugees were never a threat. Ironically, the more attacks American law enforcement successfully prevent or mitigate, the less of a threat there is, according to the CNN model.
If one were truly interested in whether there is a terror threat from individuals born abroad, one would examine the totality of activity, not a narrowly constructed definition aimed to minimize it. That’s what senators Ted Cruz and Jeff Sessions did last June when they examined 580 individuals successfully prosecuted on terrorism offenses from September 2001 until 2014. According to the senators, 380 were foreign-born and at least 40 were refugees. While not all of those cases involved successful or attempted terror attacks, all involved cases that were terrorism-related.
Thanks to Yes, Foreign-Born Immigrants Have Committed Terrorism
Among such individuals: the Tsarnaev brothers of the Boston Marathon bombing, who were both born abroad. Tamerlan was born in Kyrgyzstan in 1986, and Dzhokhar was reportedly born in Dagestan.
The 2015 Chattanooga Recruiting Center shooter, Mohammad Youssuf Abdulazeez, was born in Kuwait and lived in Jordan before migrating to the United States at the age of six. He killed five people.
Ohio State University attacker Abdul Razak Artan, who ran over several fellow students with a car before attacking them with a butcher knife, was a refugee born in Somalia who had only been in the United States for two years.
Ahmad Khan Rahimi, born in Afghanistan, detonated a bomb near a 5K run event, then another in downtown Manhattan in October of last year.
Dahir Adan, a Somali born in Kenya who immigrated to the United States as a child, launched a mass stabbing attack at a St. Cloud Minnesota mall in 2016. And these are only a few recent examples.
Let’s Just Define Away Counterexamples
While it might be amusing to imagine that a mainstream media figure of some note is totally oblivious to any of the details of recent terror attacks, it’s almost beside the point. Had Haberman known better, perhaps she’d have simply constructed a question that did meet what appears to be her preformed opinion that foreign-born individuals are nearly incapable of representing a threat.
That was the position CNN took in its piece on the Trump administration’s executive order. The piece moved the goal posts yet again, insisting that no refugee had carried out a fatal terror attack in the United States. That’s surely cold comfort to the families of those killed by Waad Ramadan Alwan and Mohanad Shareef Hammadi, two Iraqi refugees settled in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
After their fingerprints were discovered on Iraqi IEDs, the two Iraqi refugees were caught in an FBI counterterrorism investigation, where Alwan bragged about using a sniper rifle to kill American troops abroad. The two plotted to kill returning U.S. troops as well. An IED constructed by Alwan is believed to have killed four Pennsylvania National Guardsmen in 2005.
That case resulted in a six-month freeze on Iraqi refugee resettlement in 2011 as U.S. authorities attempted to clamp down on serious screening problems. But, according to CNN’s twisted logic, these Iraqi refugees were never a threat. Ironically, the more attacks American law enforcement successfully prevent or mitigate, the less of a threat there is, according to the CNN model.
If one were truly interested in whether there is a terror threat from individuals born abroad, one would examine the totality of activity, not a narrowly constructed definition aimed to minimize it. That’s what senators Ted Cruz and Jeff Sessions did last June when they examined 580 individuals successfully prosecuted on terrorism offenses from September 2001 until 2014. According to the senators, 380 were foreign-born and at least 40 were refugees. While not all of those cases involved successful or attempted terror attacks, all involved cases that were terrorism-related.
Haberman’s offhand tweet is a snapshot of the willingness of the mainstream media to engage in reflective self-censoring, a kind of doublethink, where reporters seem to remain proudly unaware of key evidence that would contradict their pre-established conclusions. Unfortunately for The New York Times correspondent, not everyone on social media was inclined to play along.
Thanks to : Kyle Shideler is the director of the Threat Information Office at the Center for Security Policy. Kyle has worked for several organizations involved with Middle East and terrorism policy since 2006. He is a contributing author to “Saudi Arabia and the Global Islamic Terrorist Network: America and the West’s Fatal Embrace,” and has written for numerous publications and briefed legislative aides, intelligence, and law enforcement officials and the general public on national security issues.
“But after sifting through databases, media reports, court documents, and other sources, Alex Nowrasteh, an immigration expert at the libertarian Cato Institute, has arrived at a striking finding: Nationals of the seven countries singled out by Trump have killed zero people in terrorist attacks on U.S. soil between 1975 and 2015.”
“ZERO” …
“Between 1975 and 2015, the “annual chance of being murdered by somebody other than a foreign-born terrorist was 252.9 times greater than the chance of dying in a terrorist attack committed by a foreign-born terrorist,” according to Nowrasteh.” …
“Every jihadist who conducted a lethal attack inside the United States since 9/11 was a citizen or legal resident,” New America reports.
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/01/trump-immigration-ban-terrorism/514361/
If only immigration policy were as simple as rebutting a Maggie Haberman tweet.
JDHollowell,
Let’s lock the doors and keep everyone out! But who will save us from Timothy McVeigh and other homegrown killers?
Laura would you please link for the AERA information? Is AERA the American Education Research Association?
Trump is out of his depth now.
Too bad he’s not under the depth now.
Brains? Your comment is a delicious oxymoron.
ouch
An old Alabama breakfast dish is scrambled brains and eggs. I think that applyies to Sessions.
Around St. Louis it’s the having a fried brain sandwich for lunch! (Hard to find these days)
Don’t underestimate any of these guys. It’s a mistake to deal with them like they are reasonable people. They are not. They are dangerous misfits from the fringe where lunatics hang out. Just as we think they have been slowed up or stopped, they will declare martial law or something else unexpected and start to arrest people by the hundreds of thousands just like what is happening in Turkey and the Phillipeans.
The only way to stop them is to act boldly and act fast. That means normal methods as spelled out in the U.S. Constitution won’t work. They are counting on that because democracy and justice are slow.
Lloyd,
Sigh. This is a dangerous and frightening time.
For those of you on Twitter, follow #StopPresidentBannon
GregB
What is twitter (although I use it to sign on to Diane’s sight) tweeting is for bird brains. .
My favorite chant at the Woman’s march was ” We need a leader not a F—ing tweeter”. Actually we need neither.
So if this is the way they roll out the first week Their management of the economy will leave it in flames, Leaving us ready for real change . Will the opposition party be there or will “the new boss be same as the old boss”
site
Joel, to be honest, I have a Twitter account but very rarely use it. (I’m one of your followers!) As you’ve figured out, I can’t contain my thoughts into 140 characters.
It’s a communications, information-sharing service for a short attention span generation. There are a couple of people I occasionally check out who have interesting links. I really should use it more, but in the professional circle I’m in, it’s usually the same few folks sharing thoughts that don’t get far beyond them.
It’s easy to get around the 140 character limit on Twitter. Just attach a photo/image and add more words to that, a blurb, a quote, etc. I do it all the time when promoting my books.
GregB
A little sarcasm on my part . I have an account never have used it .
Like you say, 140 characters is beyond my editing ability .
That last message would have fit into a tweet! 🙂 As would this one.
Diane,
If Lloyd feels normal methods spelled out in the Constitution, and didn’t delineate what “Bold” moves he calls for – hopefully none of them require illegal and lawless actions – then I would agree it is a dangerous time…and just look at U of Berkley – they call for free speech but destroy property over speakers invited there – hmmm the left displays their tolerance again.
Lloyd – the “unhinged” is beginning to be emblematic of your chicken little’s the sky if falling refernce of Turkey and the Philipeans…I did visit your site reference d on the crimes of Obama – thanks, but there are a number of actions not referenced at the site I find questionable but not impeachable – for instance –
1) Illegally armed Mexican drug cartels and ISIS militants
In Operation Fast and Furious, the Obama administration facilitated the sale of thousands of guns to Mexican drug cartels and stopped tracking those weapons once they crossed the border so the administration could later blame the Second Amendment.
2. Carried out military interventionism in Libya without Congressional approval
Obama violated the Constitution when he launched military operations in Libya without Congressional approval.
3. Had four U.S. citizens killed without judicial process
Obama had four U.S. citizens killed without judicial process, to which then-U.S. Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX) said was an impeachable offense.
4. Ordered private company to fire 1,000 employees
After Boeing hired 1,000 new employees to work at its new factory in South Carolina in 2011, the Obama administration ordered the company to close it down because the factory was non-union.
5. Had armed SWAT agents raid a law-abiding guitar factory because it was owned by a Republican
President Obama had an armed SWAT team raid the Gibson guitar factory and seized guitars and other property from the factory – without any charges being filed.
Obama’s so-called justification for the raid was that Gibson had broken environmental laws from India regarding the imported wood that Gibson had been using, but C.F. Martin & Company, Gibsons’s competitor, had used the exact same imported wood.
The difference? Henry E. Juszkiewicz, the CEO of Gibson, was a Republican donor, whereas Chris Martin IV, the CEO of Martin, was a Democratic donor.
I could go on and on for Holder but lets move on from there
jscheidell,
It is obvious where you get your information – from some of the same alternative fact (meaning: lies, gossip, rumors, and misinformation) sites that malignant narcissist President Littlefingers Donald Trump also visits for information that fuels his alternative reality to the real world. I wonder how many of your alternative fact news sites are out of Russia with Putin’s stamp of approval on them.
#1 Fast and Furious
“we see no indication Obama had an influential role in the border operation. That is, there is no sign that Obama either initiated or approved the deliberate flow of guns to cartels”
http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2012/jun/18/rick-perry/rick-perry-says-obama/
http://www.factcheck.org/2009/04/counting-mexicos-guns/
Investigation finds no evidence AG Eric Holder knew of ‘Fast and Furious’ run-running sting
http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/19/13966068-investigation-finds-no-evidence-ag-eric-holder-knew-of-fast-and-furious-gun-running-sting
#2 Obama violated the Constitution when he launched military operations in Libya without Congressional approval.
From FOX News no less
Like it or Not, Constitution allows Obama to strike Syria without Congressional approval
“Despite his mistakes in reading his domestic powers too broadly, this time President Obama has the Constitution about right. His exercise of war powers rests firmly in the tradition of American foreign policy.”
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/08/30/constitution-allows-obama-to-strike-syria-without-congressional-approval.html
#3 Obama had four U.S. citizens killed without judicial process
Obama had four U.S. citizens killed without judicial process
“Four U.S. citizens killed in Obama drone strikes, but 3 were not intended targets”
“U.S. drone strikes reportedly carried out on Obama’s authority killed the citizens listed by Rogers. But three deaths were evidently not intended, while it’s debated — and unsettled at best — whether the killing of al-Awlaki, targeted for his al-Qaeda role, was an assassination.
“We rate this claim, which presents these deaths out of context, as Half True.”
http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2014/mar/19/kesha-rogers/four-us-citizens-killed-obama-drone-strikes-3-were/
#4 After Boeing hired 1,000 new employees to work at its new factory in South Carolina in 2011, the Obama administration ordered the company to close it down because the factory was non-union
Mitt Romney attack Barack Obama over Boeing plant question
We rate his statement FALSE.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2011/oct/14/mitt-romney/mitt-romney-attack-barack-obama-over-boeing-plant-/
#5 Obama had armed SWAT agents raid a law-abiding guitar factory because it was owned by a Republican
“We rate it Pants on Fire”
http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2014/may/06/wayne-rogers/former-mash-star-obama-lied-200-times/
The majority of the people don’t know how ruthless these people are!they believe they voted for christiansl leaders but will soon find out it was only words !religion and politics are entertwined!
Cynical use of religion to acquire power
These guys are pseudo
So the law of the land doesn’t make you happy – as Obama once called it a charter of negative liberties – and I guess thats why he violated the law at least ten times, but you didn’t delineate what actions should be taken boldly
and quickly…..
Are “reasonable people” only those who believe the way you do? The “fringe” say the same about your side – I wonder what is the middle for you?
If Obama had broken the law (actually violated the U.S. Constitution like the malignant narcissist Littlefingers Donald Trump is doing), the GOP would have been all over him. The laws you are alleging were broken were spread like gossip by the far right hate media misinformation machine and have little or no foundation in fact.
For Obama to be guilty of any allegation, he has to be found guilty in a court of law. I condemn Obama for what he has contributed to the end of community-based, democratic, transparent, non-profit, arguably highly successful traditional public schools, but even in that could he have been found guilty in a court of law for violating the U.S. Constitution?
Politifact.com (a fact check site, even reported on such allegations), and rated the statement FALSE.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2014/jun/29/bob-goodlatte/gop-leader-supreme-court-has-ruled-13-times-obama-/
Mastermind is a funny word when the product is horse manure. More like guy pushing the fetid wheelbarrow.
Trump has about 36% support according to the polls, but how many of that 36% are true productive members of society? A small fraction, I think. And many of those who elected him, voted against things, not for him.
We are not against a big dumb half, but a highly activated, moneyed and disenfranchised (dangerously volatile mix) idiot fringe, in power. They can be defeated, they are idiots, bigots and truly the most deplorable dregs this side of semi-civilized humanity.
You just described half the women at my wife fitness club, In a solidly middle to upper middle class neighborhood on Long Island. There are no factory workers within 30 miles.
But we have a problem those favor-ability numbers are not based on voters and as Sanders said poor people don’t vote.
From Daily Beast…
“Obama: ‘American Values Are at Stake’
Former President Barack Obama’s office released a statement on Monday that essentially condemned the new administration for President Donald Trump’s recent executive order banning foreign nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries. Spokesman Kevin Lewis also praised those protesting the ban. “Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake,” Lewis said. “With regard to President Obama’s foreign policy decisions, as we’ve heard before, the president fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion.” Over the weekend, former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton also spoke out against the executive order. “
That 36% are the ones with weapons like AK 47s and other repeater rapid kill guns. They are starting to beat up resisters. Online right now is a story of two young men who tried to speak out and were almost killed yesterday when they got beaten to pulps by these thugs.
And the airport police sided with Trump and refused to follow the law and honor the judicial order.
We are in a civil war, but the Dems seem be the last to recognize it.
“That 36% are the ones with weapons like AK 47s and other repeater rapid kill guns.”
Any source for your statement? Please provide.
And what is a “repeater rapid kill gun”?
If everyone who reads Ravitch’s website were to call their senators today to urge the Senate not to approve the unqualified people Trump has nominated for Cabinet positions, (e.g., Sessions, DeVos, Pruitt), we might have a chance at slowing down the devastation that is happening. When it comes to the Supreme Court nominee, we must ALL speak up, quickly, and with a powerful voice (assuming the nominee would uphold Trump’s disastrous efforts).
I’m off topic, sorry, because I am upset about 15 years of education deform about to manifest in a confirmation tomorrow. I’m upset. Betsy DeVos says government sucks.
Betsy DeVos sucks.
Circus! Trump fires AG!
https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/us/politics/trump-immigration-ban-memo.html
And a very messy raid!
https://www.google.com/amp/www.nbcnews.com/news/world/amp/seal-american-girl-die-first-trump-era-u-s-military-n714346?client=safari
From amateur hour to nuthouse.
For a while this left wing populist (me) has been torn by what he wants to believe and what he has observed . I just posted an observation about the deplorable’s at my wife’s gym. They are not working class . The union construction workers I have dealt with are not working class by income level, by a long shot. So much to lose and so stupid. .
This analysis pretty much is spot on .
“They Are Not Predominantly White Working Class but Rather Anxiety-Ridden Middle Class ”
Which explains their lack of empathy for all those things that would be supportive of that white working class.
http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/democrats-cant-abandon-white-working-class
I hear you. I would really like demographics on who is actually supporting his policies. How wide is this lunatic fringe?
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/where-trump-got-his-edge/
Part of the answer. But II think we can say that Trump drew out more of the vote in areas that normally vote Republican from voters who normally don’t vote. Where as for many reasons Clinton had fewer voters turn out who normally do .
So it you went into a retirement community he out preformed Romney . White suburbs out preformed Romney , Rural ares out preformed Romney.
“its the racism and xenophobia stupid” more so than” its the economy stupid”
Does that willingness to look for scapegoats translate to economic insecurity perhaps .
DRUMPH is a pathological LIAR!
With a change of pronouns (for which I apologize to the artist), Bob Dylan said it best in “Maggie’s Farm:”
“He talks to all his servants about man and God and law, everybody says he’s the brains behind pa….”
Today’s New York Times editorial addresses Trumpty’s shadow government “President Bannon?”
“As a candidate, Mr. Trump was immensely gratified by the applause at his rallies for Mr. Bannon’s jingoism. Yet now casually weaponized in executive orders, those same ideas are alienating American allies and damaging the presidency”
They are testing the waters, moving us toward a full-on coup. Most Americans will remain clueless until it is too late. Troops to quell protests will soon be at a city near you, and the internet will be shut down to allow only approved information to get out. But we as dissenters are marched to rehabilitation camps, and society devolves into chaos, we can all chant, “Trump made America great again!”
I can’t imagine Jesus going along with this scenario.
Headline: Trump’s Right-Hand Man Steve Bannon Called for Christian Holy War: Now He’s on the National Security Council
By Ben Norton / AlterNet
January 29, 2017
In remarks to a 2014 conference at the Vatican, Bannon warned his Christian audience, “We’re at the very beginning stages of a very brutal and bloody conflict.”
“We are in an outright war against jihadists, Islam, Islamic fascism,” Bannon continued. He likewise condemned “the immense secularization of the West” and the increasing secularism among millennials.
Bannon stressed that “the people in this room, and the people in the Church” must “bind together and really form what I feel is an aspect of the Church militant, to really be able to not just stand with our beliefs but to fight for our beliefs against this new barbarity that’s starting that will literally eradicate everything that we’ve been bequeathed over the last 2,000 and 2,500 years.”
In his speech, Bannon articulated a view of the world as a constant conflict between the capitalist “Judeo-Christian West,” which is a benevolent force of “enlightenment,” and the malevolent forces of socialism, atheism, and Islam.
Trump’s chief strategist, who will now play a crucial role in crafting U.S. foreign policy and sit in on meetings of the National Security Council Principals Committee, has been described even by hard-line conservatives as an extremist.
Ultra-right-wing pundit Glenn Beck compared Bannon to the Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels, a close ally of Adolf Hitler, and said the Trump campaign was “grooming Brownshirts,” in reference to Nazi paramilitaries. According to Beck, Bannon is “quite possibly the most dangerous guy in all of American politics.”
http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/steve-bannon-christian-holy-war-islam-donald-trump-capitalism-secularism-atheism#.WJCXieQGt_M.email