Kathleen Parker: Good Morning, Democrats. Goodbye, GOP of Trump.

Tent city for child prisoners.

I left the Republican Party going on two decades ago when I could no longer abide the party's conflation of right wing Christianity with the civil laws. Hand in hand with that phenomenon was the seeping hatred of others that the Christofascists and evangelicals brought with them as the infiltrated and then ultimately hijacked local city and county committees. Slowly but surely, the GOP became a moral cesspool even as the professional Christian crowd intertwined with the Party proclaimed their religiosity - a religiosity that focused on denigrating and harming gays and opposing abortion.  The rest of Christ message had been flushed down the toilet.  Enter Donald Trump on the political scene and the hate that has simmered under the surface of the GOP agenda has now burst into flame.  Many are belatedly taking the step that I did years ago and deciding they simply can not longer be a Republican - at least not if they want to retain a shred of morality and decency.  In a column in the Washington Post, [former?] conservative columnist Kathleen Parker looks at the need to decide between morality and decency or remaining a Republican.  Here are column excerpts:

Cracking down on illegal immigration was never going to be pleasant, but this?

It’s worse than you think. The travesty of separating children from their undocumented, migrant parents was less about cracking down as a policy than about President Trump’s bet-winning. If Niccolo Machiavelli hadn’t been born, Trump would have hired someone to write “The Prince” — or his more likely title, “The King” — explaining why his merciless means justify the ends of his majestic self-ardor.

Reports from hell, which we’ve finally located at the U.S.-Mexico border, have confirmed that [Trump] this president will do anything to get his way. We’ve seen the image of the 2-year-old crying while her mother is frisked by a Border Patrol agent. We’ve read of the father who, separated from his wife and 3-year-old last month, apparently killed himself while in custody.

What, one wonders, would it take to convince Trump that he’s wrong? That this policy of separation must stop yesterday? The trauma suffered by many of the nearly 2,000 children being held in government detention centers — especially by the very young ones — is excruciating to consider. Indeed, ­two-thirds of Americans oppose Trump’s tactic of trying to force Democrats to essentially “pay for the wall.” Who knew there were so many Mexicans in the U.S. Congress?

Now, just a few months from the midterm elections, Trump wants that wall more than he once wanted Stormy Daniels’s phone number. He wants it so much, babies can cry and little boys can curl into fetal balls for all he cares. He wants it so badly that traumatizing children is acceptable to him.

This isn’t supposition, it’s data. To the rich boy from Queens, you gotta be tough to make it in this world. To the King of the Swamp, you can’t let those people run over you: Give them back their 3-year-old son, and next they’ll want a free Harvard education.

Trump’s political calculation wasn’t just way over the top, it was sick. And, yes, these tactics qualify as mental torture similar to forcing a POW to listen to the screams of a comrade as a means of extracting information or inducing submission.

The irony is also sick, but in a good way, as karma goes. Republicans have been in such a dither over illegal immigrants — lest they become Democrats — they’ve created a scenario in which virtually no one of Latino descent would now consider supporting a GOP candidate.

Good morning, Democrats. Good night, GOP of Trump.

Notwithstanding the objections of a few Republicans — and lately more, given the political omens — it’s over. What’s obvious and belated is that most congressional Republicans were silent until their political futures seemed at risk. You have to wonder what it’s like to look in the mirror and see the face of someone who was essentially willing to condone the psychological torture of little children for political gain. Nauseating, I should think. But Republican dissenters have learned that to confront their dear leader is to face expungement by the one-third of Americans who support Trumpand who, coincidentally, also support separating children from their parents. 

Election Day will tell, and the outcome will reveal who we really are.

Children Murdered After Deportation by United States

As sadly seems to always be the case with today's GOP and even more so its Christofascists/white supremacist base, objective facts, the truth and often basic decency do not matter.  Their entire agenda lies based on greed, a desire to force their sick religious beliefs on all, and a hatred of anyone who doesn't have lily white skin.  Thus, the GOP base and its elected whores deny that children flocking to America's southern borders are doing so often literally fear for their lives.  To these Republicans and the "godly Christians" the lives of these children simply do not matter why?  Because they aren't white.  Think Progress looks at the fate of some of the children deported by the United States.  Here are highlights:

Between five and ten migrant children have been killed since February after the United States deported them back to Honduras, a morgue director told the Los Angeles Times. Lawmakers have yet to come up with best practices to deal with the waves of unaccompanied children apprehended by Border Patrol agents, but some politicians refute claims that children are fleeing violence and are opting instead to fund legislation that would fast-track their deportations. 

San Pedro Sula morgue director Hector Hernandez told the Los Angeles Times that his morgue has taken in 42 dead children since February. According to an interview with relatives by the LA Times, one teenager was shot dead hours after getting deported. Last year, San Pedro Sula saw 187 killings for every 100,000 residents, a statistic that has given the city the gruesome distinction as the murder capital of the world. That distinction has also been backed up by an U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency infographic, which found that many Honduran children are on the run from extremely violent regions “where they probably perceive the risk of traveling alone to the U.S. preferable to remaining at home.” Hugo Ramon Maldonado of the Committee for the Protection of Human Rights in Honduras believes that about 80 percent of Hondurans making the exodus are fleeing crime or violence. 

Politicians like Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) and Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) have been keen on expediting the legal process by demanding that immigration judges make a court decision within seven days. But that move could undermine children’s rights by denying due process to children who already don’t understand the courtroom procedures. As Vox found out, one teenage girl told a border agent that she was afraid of being forced into prostitution only after her paperwork had been filed.

According to a United Nations report, at least 58 percent of the children cited “international protection needs” as in they were seeking protection from the international community because their home governments could no longer protect them.

What is fueling the violence in Central America?  Mostly the drug trade which is fueled by America's failed "war on drugs" that makes drug trafficking so lucrative and in the process encourages lawless gangs and drug lords. Add to that corrupt and incompetent governments and the poisonous mix is complete. 

Ann Coulter: Deal With Border the Way Israel Deals with Hamas

If one wants a good glimpse at the ugly racism that is now a pillar of Republican Party policy look no farther than the remarks of drag queen look-a-like Ann Coulter who would have America deal with the supposed "border crisis" by treating the undocumented children the way that "Netanyahu deals with Hamas."  With hundreds of Palestinian children being murdered by Israeli forces, the demand is horrifying.  But then again, to Coulter and much of the GOP base, if one isn't a white, heterosexual conservative Christian, one isn't really human and, therefore, murder or misery are one's due.  Perhaps the only good news is that people like Coulter are driving the younger generations not only from the GOP but from Christianity as well.  The Raw Story looks at Coulter's heinous statements:

Ann Coulter told host Sean Hannity that she wished Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was “our president,” so he could deal with our border problems the way he deals with border issues in his own country.

Comparing tunnels found at the U.S./Mexican border with tunnels used by Hamas, Coulter asserted the U.S. is being invaded.

“We need a Netanyahu here. Can you imagine all these — yes, sometimes Palestinian kids get killed, ” she said as she began to laugh. “That’s because they are, they’re associated with a terrorist organization that is harming Israel, and Netanyahu doesn’t care what the religious leaders say, weeping about Palestinian children. He doesn’t care what the UN says. He doesn’t care what the media says.”

She concludes, “We are a country, we have borders, and Netanyahu enforces them. Why can’t we do that in America?”

 Laughing about the death of children - yep, that's today's GOP.  It is down right evil.  Just like the "godly Christians" in the GOP base.

The Congressional GOP: The Face of Unreason and Hypocrisy

As a former Republican I continue to be dismayed by how low the GOP has sunk and how a party that once valued reason and logic has become a sectarian insane asylum.  Even once rational people within the party act as if they had undergone either a lobotomy or a "Stepford Wife" transformation - yes, Karen,I do mean you - that has them parroting the most idiotic catch phrases of the Tea Party.  Moreover, the party acts as if it suffers from a massive case of bi-polar disorder.  How else to explain the House GOP which wants to sue Barack Obama for use of executive orders yet now wants to throw the "border crisis" into Obama's lap to deal with via executive order.  A column in the Washington Post looks at this batshitery and hypocrisy.  Here are excerpts:

After conservatives on Thursday brought down House Speaker John Boehner’s bill to address the border crisis, the new House Republican leadership team issued a joint statement declaring that President Obama should fix the problem himself.

“There are numerous steps the president can and should be taking right now, without the need for congressional action,” the leadership quartet proclaimed, “to secure our borders and ensure these children are returned swiftly and safely to their countries.”

Just the day before, House Republicans had voted to sue Obama for using his executive authority. They called him lawless, a usurper, a monarch, a tyrant — all for postponing deadlines in the implementation of Obamacare. Now they were begging him to take executive action to compensate for their own inability to act — even though, in this case, accelerating the deportation of thousands of unaccompanied children coming from Central America would likely require Obama to ignore a 2008 law. 

This was not a momentary lapse but a wholesale upending of reason.

Apparently, if Obama is using his executive authority to advance a policy House Republicans support, it’s a meritorious exercise of presidential authority; if he uses that same authority to aid a policy they oppose, it’s time to write up articles of impeachment.

In another action this week, Republicans acknowledged, at least tacitly, that Obama has the executive authority to postpone deportations. The House majority drafted, and scheduled a vote on, legislation that would forbid the executive branch from anything that would “expand the number of aliens eligible for deferred action.”

But in proposing such legislation (which was pulled from the floor along with the border bill), Republicans implicitly acknowledged that Obama has such power now. Therefore, until both chambers of Congress can pass such a law by veto-proof margins, Obama retains the power. This is probably why House Republicans, just two weeks earlier, scoffed at the suggestion that they pass this sort of legislation when the idea came up before the Rules Committee.

If the GOP position sounds contradictory, that’s because it’s less about the Constitution than cleavages within the party.   . . . . . The planned lawsuit was a bone thrown to conservatives to quiet their impeachment talk. The legislation restricting Obama’s executive authority on immigration was a similar effort to buy off conservatives who had been encouraged to rebel by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.).

But the efforts to placate conservatives aren’t working. 

Until the Christofascists and Tea Party are driven from the GOP we can only expect more insanity and lots of hypocrisy.

New Poll: 70% of Americans Support Allowing Undocumented Children to Remain in USA

Proving once again that they care more about prostituting themselves to foul Christofascists/Tea Party lunatics than about the views of the majority of Americans, Congressional Republicans continue their attacks on those who want to give succor to the thousands of undocumented children from Central America.  Indeed, on may far right sites, these children are depicted as disease ridden vermin to be exterminated deported, proving yet again that no one has more disdain for the true gospel message than the self-congratulatory "godly Christian" crowd.  As Politico reports, a new poll found that 70% of Americans believe that these children should be allowed to remain in America - heartening news that the less godly folk have a sense of compassion  absent from those who wrap themselves in the American flag as they clutch their bibles.  Here are excerpts from Politico:

Nearly 70 percent of Americans believe the undocumented Central American children entering along the U.S.-Mexico border should be treated as refugees, a new poll shows.

According to a poll released Tuesday by the Public Religion Research Institute, 69 percent of those surveyed believe U.S. authorities should treat the children as refugees and allow them to stay in the country if it is determined it is not safe for them to return to their home country. Twenty-seven percent of Americans say the children should be treated as illegal immigrants and should be deported.

Seventy-one percent also say they mostly or completely agree that the U.S. should provide refuge and protection for all people who come to the U.S. if they are fleeing serious danger in their home country, the poll found. But 59 percent of Americans say they mostly or completely agree with the statement that the allowing the children to stay will increase illegal immigration.

The findings come as the Obama administration and Congress debate how to respond to the influx of more than 50,000 undocumented children that have arrived at the border since October. Congressional Republicans are largely pushing for a change to a 2008 law that would expedite the deportation process for the children, while Democrats have resisted a change in the law.

Mark Zuckerberg’s Pro-Immigration Group Threatens Republicans

Young undocumented immigrants being housed in dog pen like conditions no doubt favored by the GOP base

Today's Republican Party is caught between a rock and a hard place somewhat of its own making.  By welcoming racist Christofascists and white supremacists into its base with open arms , the GOP has made it very hard to maintain support among angry whites while embracing any form of immigration reform.  Meanwhile, all the demographic trends indicate that the aging white population to which the GOP has prostituted itself is headed towards a minority status in the near term with the Hispanic population exploding in relative terms.  The situation has set the stage for a form of slow political suicide.  Now, Facebook billionaire Mark Zuckerberg is funding a pro-immigration group that seeks to increase the pressure on the GOP and to target anti-immigrant Republicans.  Here are highlights from The Daily Beast:

A pro-immigration reform group founded by Mark Zuckerberg is issuing an unsubtle warning to vulnerable Republicans about the possible electoral consequences if no further progress is made on overhauling the immigration system before November.


The Council for American Job Growth, a progressive affiliate of Zuckerberg's nonpartisan FWD.us, released the results of a poll Tuesday they conducted in ten swing districts currently represented by incumbent Republicans that have significant Hispanic and Asian-American voting populations.

The survey simulated the way this fall’s campaign might unfold if a group like Fwd.us launched pro-immigration advertisements in these districts, linking the Republican incumbents to inaction on immigration reform.


After being read a sample negative advertisement linking the Republican incumbent to GOP leadership to, for example, “punishing… young immigrants and taking away their opportunity to make a positive contribution to society” by blocking a bill that aided DREAMers, vote shares for the incumbent dropped from 51 percent to 45 percent.
Among independents, the vote shares of Republican incumbents dropped seven percentage points after these messages were read.


“The data makes clear that there are real electoral consequences for Republicans in these districts, because voters tie them to their party's own failure to take action on passing reform legislation,” FWD.us spokeswoman Kate Hansen said.
Overall, respondents in the 10 GOP swing districts broadly supported immigration reform – 76 percent supported a proposal including a pathway to citizenship and border security, while 19 percent opposed it. And among these same voters, a majority – 58 percent – said that it was personally important to them that Congress fix America’s immigration’s system.

Young Conservatives of Texas: "Catch an Illegal Immigrant"

If some in the Republican Party remain baffled as to why the GOP cannot capture the Hispanic vote even though Hispanics are described - at least in GOP circles - as conservative on social issues, they might want to focus on the batshitery that came down at the University of Texas where the Young Conservatives of Texas ("YCT") created a Facebook event detailing a game titled “Catch an Illegal Immigrant.”  One has to wonder if some future "games" will involve (i) disenfranchising black voters and (ii) advanced gay bashing.  Thankfully, the unvarnished racism embodied in the "game" wasn't missed by Hispanics and their allies and protests were unleashed even as YCT decided to cancel the "game."   The Daily Beast looks at this PR disaster for YCT and their Republican allies.  Here are article excerpts:

The game was canceled, but the protest went on anyway.  By early afternoon on Wednesday, some 500 students had gathered on the steps of the main building of The University of Texas at Austin—chanting, holding signs, and wearing t-shirts with a single word stamped across them: undocumented. As Ugly Betty actress America Ferrera took the stage at 12:30, even the Frisbee-playing students on a nearby lawn joined in. “I am the daughter of immigrants,” Ferrera shouted into a megaphone, and the crowd, some holding fluorescent signs reading “Aliens Live in Space,” erupted into applause.

The rally—the culmination of days of heated campus-wide debate—came in response to a controversial event planned by the college chapter of The Young Conservatives of Texas, or YCT, which describes itself as a non-partisan, conservative youth organization.

On Monday, YCT created a Facebook event detailing a game titled “Catch an Illegal Immigrant.” The premise of the game—set to take place Wednesday—was that some members of the organization would walk around campus labeled as illegal immigrants. “Any UT student who catches one of these ‘illegal immigrants’ and brings them back to our table will receive a $25 gift card,” the event listing read. “The purpose of this event is to spark a campus-wide discussion about the issue of illegal immigration and how it affects our everyday lives.”

The proposed game followed an earlier incident in September where the same group held a bake sale by charging students different prices for baked goods as an exemplification of affirmative action. Latino students were charged $1 for brownies while white students were charged $2.

Administration officials were to quick to join the outcry. First was Gregory J. Vincent, the Vice President for Diversity and Community Engagement, who said YCT was “contributing to an environment of exclusion and disrespect among our students, faculty and staff by sending a message that certain students do not belong on our campus.” Bill Powers, president of the college, released a statement saying, “The proposed Young Conservatives of Texas event is completely out of line with the values we espouse at The University of Texas at Austin.”

[T]he proposed event had already grabbed national headlines, even drawing a response from the state’s gubernatorial candidates. So the ULI forged ahead with its counter-protest, and students from across the state of Texas came to join them from Rice University, Texas A&M, and Southern Methodist University.

As I said in a prior post, far too many of today's conservatives and Republicans are not nice or decent people.