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F250

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Posts posted by F250

  1. 2 hours ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

    Imagine if the United States went really imperialist a 100 years ago and we owned all of Latin and South America.   This cruelty at the border is absurd when you really think about it, especially when you do a cost/benefit analysis.  

    It never happened due to the same reason we are having a humanitarian crisis at the border now.

     

    John C. Calhoun on why the U.S. shouldn't annex Mexico. Cliff notes version, it had nothing to do with respecting Mexican sovereignty but a simple desire to keep out brown skin people.

    The next reason which my resolutions assign, is, that it is without example or precedent, wither to hold Mexico as a province, or to incorporate her into our Union. No example of such a line of policy can be found. We have conquered many of the neighboring tribes of Indians, but we have never thought of holding them in subjection—never of incorporating them into our Union. They have either been left as an independent people amongst us, or been driven into the forests.

    I know further, sir, that we have never dreamt of incorporating into our Union any but the Caucasian race—the free white race. To incorporate Mexico, would be the very first instance of the kind of incorporating an Indian race; for more than half of the Mexicans are Indians, and the other is composed chiefly of mixed tribes. I protest against such a union as that! Ours, sir, is the Government of a white race. The greatest misfortunes of Spanish America are to be traced to the fatal error of placing these colored races on an equality with the white race. That error destroyed the social arrangement which formed the basis of society. The Portuguese and ourselves have escaped—the Portuguese at least to some extent—and we are the only people on this continent which have made revolutions without being followed by anarchy. And yet it is professed and talked about to erect these Mexicans into a Territorial Government, and place them on an equality with the people of the United States. I protest utterly against such a project.

    Sir, it is a remarkable fact, that in the whole history of man, as far as my knowledge extends, there is no instance whatever of any civilized colored races being found equal to the establishment of free popular government, although by far the largest portion of the human family is composed of these races. And even in the savage state we scarcely find them anywhere with such government, except it be our noble savages—for noble I will call them. They, for the most part, had free institutions, but they are easily sustained among a savage people. Are we to overlook this fact? Are we to associate with ourselves as equals, companions, and fellow-citizens, the Indians and mixed race of Mexico? Sir, I should consider such a thing as fatal to our institutions.

    The next two reasons which I assigned, were, that it would be in conflict with the genius and character of our institutions, and subversive of our free government. I take these two together, as intimately connected; and now of the first—to hold Mexico in subjection.

    • Like 2
  2. 43 minutes ago, Zavala said:

    you have to click a little for the punchline

    lkwgjew.jpg

    It just goes to a FB login page and I don't have a FB account. So no, I didn't understand your cryptic reply.

    Although I understand your point now but would add that it's been established that victims of sexual assault display behaviors that appear counterintuitive.

     

  3. 17 minutes ago, elfenix said:


     

     


    This is why ICE needs to be abolished. The institution knowledge it posseses is bad.

    The institutional knowledge comment is an excellent point. If you look at the abuses from the Bush and Obama administration's, they are not all that different than the one's happening now under Trump.

    It's not like Stephen Miller whispers in the agent's ear. These bastards have been doing this for a long time. Trump just removed the restraints from these dogs.

    This reminds me of the time I was visiting a friend in Del Rio who was a BP agent at the time. We were having drinks with his BP friends and one them mentioned getting 60 "thonks" earlier in the day. Not getting the reference I asked for an explanation. The explanation was simple, a "thonk" is a headcount of captured illegals because that's the sound a Maglite makes when it hits someone's head. Shit got uncomfortable after they opened up about other practices.

     

     

    • Like 1
  4. 1 minute ago, Mojo Hand said:

    That doesn't follow.  First, fixing the system requires electing people who will fix the system, and that cannot happen without electing someone other than Trump.   Second, electing someone other than Trump will at minimum roll back all of the extra shit he's added on to the previous problematic system.   Third, Obama was particularly bad on this issue and out of step with Dems like Warren, who were calling him out at the time. 

    Yes, we should be clear that the problem is broader than Trump and that ousting him alone won't end the problems overnight.  But Trump is nonetheless a major part of the problem, and electing a good Dem candidate will go a long way towards taking us on the right path. 

    I am saying, simply replacing Trump as POTUS will not resolve the problem. Sure a kinder POTUS will likely remove Trump's policies but if that is all that's done then the actual problem will not be resolved, it will only temporarily go away.

    The only way to fix this is through legislation and a POTUS that is willing to expend their political capital on pushing massive immigration reform. On top of that the POTUS will need the will of the voters. People need to demand massive reform not just a return to normalcy. Right now, its largely been a call for a return to normalcy.

    I personally don't like Castro but he was spot on with his criticism of Beto on the issue of removing border crossings as a crime. Beto who is being touted as a immigration reformist doesn't go far enough. We need a candidate that will push a policy that goes back past the Bush DHS monster and even the Clinton reform.

    Stopping now because I can go off the rails on this topic.

     

     

    • Like 2
  5. 25 minutes ago, Mojo Hand said:

    I agree with this entirely, other than the suggestion that there was a policy of intentional mistreatment of children by the Obama administration itself.   The case you cite was decided because of deviations from official policy by individuals at CBP.   The Obama administration is fully responsible for those results, as it is an entirely foreseeable consequence of family detention within the limitations they had.  And that is what hundreds of Dems at the time argued in seeking to halt family detention.   I don't know what Obama was thinking, but I haven't seen any evidence that he intentionally sought to harm children to achieve some policy end.   By contrast, there is clear evidence that Trump and his people are doing precisely that, starting with the family separation policy.

    And I think your follow-up post that I now see reflects that distinction, so I'm not sure we disagree at all.   Our country should have learned lessons from Obama's misguided and harmful family detention initiative.   At best, there are systematic problems that need to be fixed by law.  But we now have a lunatic in charge who is actually leaning into those systematic problems, and making them far worse by flooding the system, removing a number of improvements made at the end of the Obama administration, and adding new, cruel policies expressly for the purpose of hurting immigrants and their children.  Anyone who criticizes Obama — which is fine and deserved — should be among the loudest of critics of Trump's far worse policies.   But too often they say almost nothing about what Trump is doing, using a false equivalency with Obama to normalize and excuse what is going on right now.  Plus they use "But Obama" to delegitimize the Dem opposition to what Trump is doing, even though this specific issue is one of the rare instances when Dems actually rose up against Obama in 2015.    It's not right. 

    Eh, it doesn't take a genius to spot those that justify Trump's actions by citing Obama's actions. Why even bother engaging in that kind of discussion? Those people will not change their mind.

    I'd rather engage those that are horrified and are open to humanitarian solutions.

     

  6. 20 minutes ago, Captainant said:

    As I posted above, I agree that Obama fucked up in his initial response. He also made concrete efforts and created new programs to lessen the negative repercussions of his decision, rather than doubling down. Trump has cancelled those programs and made concrete efforts to worsen an already critical situation. 

    But sure, go for the full anastasia and #bothsides this shit show

    I understand you have a moral imperative to become defensive of a particular politician, it's the nature of a partisan. But set aside your partisanship for a moment.

    There is a reason immigration rights advocates and attorneys are pointing out that the current problem existed before Trump. Trump didn't build the machine that he is using in a grotesque manner. This issue goes back past Obama and even Dubya and yeah Bush had his own camp setup in Hutto.

    The problem is greater than the Trump administration, it requires legislation and if people see this as a partisan issue only there will be no real change. We as a nation must look at our recent past to identify the cause of the problem and address it.

    If people think electing someone other than Trump will resolve the problem they are wrong.

     

  7. Obama was a decent person and yet children were treated cruelly by his administration. Trump is so fucking sick in the head, I have no idea how to describe his nature. Anyways, we've seen what happened when a decent person was in charge and what it's like with a lunatic in charge.

    Obviously, we cannot rely on the POTUS to treat immigrants ethically. Too many forces involved at that level.

    We need immigration reform that is codified into law by Congress. We need fucking rules to tell our leaders how to treat people because we can't trust them to do it on their own.

    • Like 2
  8. 2 hours ago, Captainant said:

    Those detention centers weren't being utilized as concentration camps. Children weren't being denied medical care. They weren't sleeping on concrete floors with foil blankets in rooms intentionally made uncomfortably cold. People weren't being packed into rooms like sardines for multiple days. Obama wasn't threatening ICE raids to sweep through cities looking for undocumented people so he could also put them into these facilities.

    It's the deliberate creation of misery by the trump administration that makes what's happening now be concentration camps, and distinct from what's happened in the past. 

    I recommend that you read Mojo Hand's post again. 

    Let's not downplay the cruelty of the past to highlight the cruelty of the present. Immigrant children were intentionally mistreated under the Obama administration. The Obama administration didn't make mistakes, that shit was intentional. Hell, immigration rights advocates had to sue the Obama administration.

    One example from the Obama administration.

    "Judge Gee found that the government continues to detain children in “deplorable and unsanitary conditions” at Customs and Border Protection stations in the Rio Grande Valley Sector—essentially a violation of the agreement. The mistreatment of children in immigration detention proven by the Plaintiffs includes lack of adequate food (some of the food made the children ill), lack of clean drinking water, unsanitary conditions (testimony was presented that up to 50 people were forced to use an open toilet in one room), extremely cold temperatures of detention cells (hieleras)/some CBP officers who purposely made the cells colder to retaliate against crying children, and impossible sleeping conditions, all in flagrant violation of CBP policies and standards."

    "Last, but not least, the Plaintiffs presented evidence that children were being detained for periods in excess of the permitted maximum of 20 days, and cited children who were detained five weeks, eight months and 13 months, respectively."

     

    https://www.latinorebels.com/2017/06/29/another-blow-to-the-obama-administrations-family-detention-policy-just-happened/

    • Like 1
  9. 2 hours ago, elfenix said:

    well there was that whole thing where he was trying to catfish the washington post.  or the lying edits to acorn videos.  or tampering with a senator's phone lines. or embarass a cnn correspondent.  cutting up audio of gasland's director.  trying to entrap campaign staffers.  etc, etc.  fair to be vastly skeptical of anything o'keefe does at this point.

    This. A basic application of skepticism for the sake of intellectual honesty would require someone to listen to O'keefe's narrative with a critical eye. Regardless of one's political views just ask yourself, "Is this information feeding my confirmation bias and is the source a reliable narrator?"

     

     

  10. 1 hour ago, closetojumping said:

    Playing 70+ games of baseball every spring and summer from 13 years old through 18 was brutal before select ball ratcheted things up a notch. 

    The number of games in teenage baseball are about the same as they were back in the day. It's in the 12 and under levels where the game counts are insane. Why are 10 year olds playing more baseball games than 17 year olds? That makes no sense.

     

  11. On 6/24/2019 at 1:26 PM, Nueces River Rat said:

    Some of these high school coaches want to be liked and they will name drop a kid or a group of kids about how they can't wait to get them in their program and that pretty much tells those late bloomers or hard workers to pound sand and don't even bother to show up to tryouts when they are Freshmen.  I can almost be certain in many high school programs with your younger coaches, they are going to give a kid the time of day who played with a certain select team vs one who decided to go the old school route and play league ball and never play on a select team.   

    I've never seen this before and my experience has been the opposite, at least in 6A. High School coaches want to win and select players based on athleticism and talent. Many select baseball players get cut their freshman year. Playing select doesn't earn anyone extra cred. Yeah some players are identified before they show up on campus but those are the 14 year olds pitchers that are cruising in the 80's. This is no different than the head football coach at Steele HS anticipating a 14 year old Malcolm Brown to start H.S.

    The only bias that I have seen when it comes down to the last few cuts is for the athletic football players that lack a strong tool set but are given the benefit of the doubt. Things were the same when I was in High School, this is Texas football rules the school.

     

     

  12. Regarding Google Gate.

    I'm looking forward to Dr. Sebastian Gorka's views on bayesian optimization with gaussian processes for regression.

    Make America Great Again through Bayesian Analytics.

     

  13. 17 minutes ago, Incredulity said:

    Wtf is a corporate entitlement?

    Corporate welfare, bro. That should piss off anyone more than the EBT recipients. Speaking of EBT, I used to work for a company that handled all of the EBT transactions and everything was built around Walmart. The amount of federal dollars that flows into Walmart's coffers is unreal.

     

  14. Is this the thread where I complain about millennial cultural appropriation?

    Avocado toast = what Mexicans make when there are no more tortillas.

    Chickens in the backyard = Mexicans have had chickens in their backyard on the west side of San Antonio since the beginning of time. At least the millenials didn't bother with putting goats in the backyard.

    Fusion Taco Trucks = WTF is this fusion stuff? Ok its delicious but I used to be able to buy two chorizo and egg tacos from an abuela carting around a ice chest full of tacos for $2.

     

  15. 23 hours ago, wild_turkey said:

     


    True, but kids are living in a different world these days. The internet, social media, and smart phones have changed adolescence in a way that most of us cannot relate to.

    Meh, maybe I knew some messed up people in my youth but nothing is really different than it was in the past.

  16. On 6/20/2019 at 12:28 PM, Dennis Taylor said:

     

    That's hilarious. One of my kids pulled a similar stunt and slowly turned his head back to the ump. The blue just shook his head at him. The kid in this video played it smooth, my kid turned around like he was busted.

     

     

     

  17. Our immigration law is a festering pustule that finally caused a systemic infection.

     

    ACLU Sues Obama Administration For Detaining Migrant Women and Children

     

    Anyone remember Hutto during the Bush administration?

    Half the detainees at the T. Don Hutto Residential Center, a privately run prison in Texas, are children.

     

    "The simple fact is that we must not — and we will not — surrender our borders to those who wish to exploit our history of compassion and justice."
    - President Bill Clinton, New York Times, July 28, 1993

    Shit went down hill after Bill Clinton signed the IIRIRA.

    https://cmsny.org/publications/jmhs-iirira-to-trump/

     

     

  18. 3 minutes ago, David Dennison said:

    Except there are a whole lot more suffering right now.

    Another Blow to the Obama Administration’s Family Detention Policy Just Happened

    On Tuesday, U.S. District Court Judge M. Dolly Gee issued a long-awaited ruling that gave former President Obama’s “family detention” practices the smackdown they deserve. “Family detention” was the Obama administration’s euphemism for its practice of detaining Central American mothers with their children in inhumane conditions for lengthy periods of time in violation of the Flores Settlement Agreement: a Clinton-era settlement of a Reagan-era lawsuit regarding the mistreatment of children in federal immigration detention.

    After Judge Gee’s July 24, 2015 decision finding that the Obama Administration had violated the Flores Settlement Agreement by mistreating immigrant children, the government appealed. The Ninth Circuit affirmed Judge Gee’s original decision as to the treatment of immigrant children under the age of 18 on July 16, 2016. However, numerous allegations of mistreatment of children in federal immigration detention continued, and the Center for Constitutional Law filed a motion to enforce the settlement agreement.

    Judge Gee found that the government continues to detain children in “deplorable and unsanitary conditions” at Customs and Border Protection stations in the Rio Grande Valley Sector—essentially a violation of the agreement. The mistreatment of children in immigration detention proven by the Plaintiffs includes lack of adequate food (some of the food made the children ill), lack of clean drinking water, unsanitary conditions (testimony was presented that up to 50 people were forced to use an open toilet in one room), extremely cold temperatures of detention cells (hieleras)/some CBP officers who purposely made the cells colder to retaliate against crying children, and impossible sleeping conditions, all in flagrant violation of CBP policies and standards.

    Judge Gee also held that the federal government has not properly made continuous efforts to release minor children, and is required to make individual determinations as to whether each child should continue to be detained. The government had argued that it lacked the institutional resources to evaluate placements of children; however, since the federal government agreed to do those evaluations in 1997, Judge Gee was unpersuaded. The government also argued that it should be allowed to continue to place immigrant children in secure, unlicensed facilities despite Judge Gee’s prior 2015 order because the states do not license immigration facilities; in response, Judge Gee ruled that children simply may not be held in those facilities.

    Last, but not least, the Plaintiffs presented evidence that children were being detained for periods in excess of the permitted maximum of 20 days, and cited children who were detained five weeks, eight months and 13 months, respectively. Philip Miller, Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Executive Associate Director of Enforcement and Removal Operations testified in a deposition that the government measures the length of stay for detainees who have been released (and therefore does not include information on detainees that are still currently detained, no matter how long they may have been in detention).

    Judge Gee ordered the government to identify and propose a “Juvenile Coordinator” to report directly to the Court regarding the government’s compliance with its obligations toward immigrant children in detention. If, in a year, the government is still not in substantial compliance, the Court will consider the appointment of an independent monitor.

    https://www.latinorebels.com/2017/06/29/another-blow-to-the-obama-administrations-family-detention-policy-just-happened/

  19. 32 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

    A 12-year-old talks about being locked up in a freezing room with her younger sister. No soap, no bed, no toothpaste.

    In 2014

    All part of Obama's plan to deter people fleeing economic devastation and gang/political violence.

    AMERICA!

     

    But Obama wasn't so brazen about violating the rights of children. He kept it on the down low so people wouldn't get upset.

    Seriously, this problem goes back further than Trump and simply electing a regular human being as POTUS isn't going to change things.

     

    • Like 1
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