Since When Does NBC Have a Problem With 'Controversial' Personalities?
Donald Trump in his announcement speech, June 16: The U.S. has become a dumping ground for everybody else's problems. When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best. They're not sending you. They're not sending you. They're sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems with us. They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people. But I speak to border guards and they tell us what we're getting. And it only makes common sense. It only makes common sense. They're sending us not the right people. It's coming from more than Mexico. It's coming from all over South and Latin America, and it's coming probably -- probably -- from the Middle East. Nearly two weeks later, NBC decided the remarks are too offensive to continue their relationship with Trump. Now, it's entirely possible -- probable, even -- that NBC was looking for a way to formally separate itself from Trump during his presidential bid anyway. (See if they refuse to work with him again in say, 2017, or so.) Ratings dropped for The Celebrity Apprentice's last season, and the show had spent two years off the air. But are we really at the point where Trump's uncouth assessment of illegal immigrants is enough to get someone persona non grata in network television? Is it a jerky thing to initially describe the 5.9 million or so Mexicans who entered the United States illegally as "people that have lots of problems" and "rapists"? Sure. But a lot of people on television say jerky things all the time. And before anyone says "Trump said all Mexicans are rapists!", note his very next sentence is, "some, I assume, are good people." Some may find that condescending, but he at least acknowledges his preceding statements paint with too broad a brush. Trump is speaking hyperbolically, but he's doing so about a real problem some would prefer to ignore. From the FBI's 2013 report on gangs: Immigration violations also present a significant challenge to law enforcement in the region. In many cases, gang members who commit criminal activity in the region are not US citizens nor lawful permanent residents. Once deported, gang members attempt to reenter the United States illegally in order to rejoin the gang and engage in criminal activity. [Customs and Border Protection] survey respondents indicate in some southwest border sectors, the percentage of non-US citizen gang members was as high as 80 percent. In 2013, ICE freed 36,007 convicted criminal aliens from detention who were awaiting the outcome of deportation proceedings; 426 had sexual assault convictions, 303 kidnapping convictions, 1,075 aggravated assault convictions, 9,187 dangerous drug convictions, and 193 had homicide convictions. A wise mind recently observed to me that there are two separate conversations going on in America right now. One is the increasingly restricted conversation of the progressive aristocracy -- sometimes turning on its own members for comments deemed insufficiently sensitive, as in the cases of Trevor Noah, Amy Schumer, Stephen Colbert and Alec Baldwin. And then there's the conversation going on in the rest of the country, which probably includes tons of comments other people would find offensive -- from hypersensitive social-justice warrior types to folks who bristle at the F-bomb to people who tire quickly of other people's inane ramblings. When somebody sufficiently high-profile speaks in the "rest-of-America" language long enough, it's just a matter of time before they say something the progressive aristocracy deems "beyond the pale" and requiring economic censure in the form of firing, not just social censure in the form of "what a jerky thing to say." The pale is getting awfully small these days. In progressive aristocracy America, it's ipso facto xenophobic to point out that quite a few violent criminals enter the United States across our insufficiently guarded borders. Trump speaks the "rest of the country" language. For those of us who don't think terribly highly of him -- I'd like to see the deep thinker really lay out how he's going to make Mexico pay for a border wall -- Trump's bluntness and directness is one of the most likeable traits.
Before You See Trump as a Consistent Immigration Restrictionist…
By the way, here's Donald Trump in 2011: O'REILLY: OK. Now, the 15 million illegal aliens already in the United States. What do you do with them? TRUMP: I think right now you're going to have to do something and, you know, it's hard to generalize. But you're going to have to look at the individual people. See how they've done. See how productive they have been. See what their references are and then make a decision. O'REILLY: And then make a decision. All right, on case by case. It's going to take a long time and a lot of people. TRUMP: A long time, but, you know, you have some great productive people that came in. O'REILLY: No doubt. TRUMP: And then you have some total disasters that probably should be in prison. That's not quite endorsing a path to citizenship for some illegal immigrants, but that's not really ruling it out, either.
Hillary Lied, Again; Her Spokesman Deny the Obvious, Again. Oh, she lies so shamelessly… Hillary Rodham Clinton told reporters last month that the memos about Libya she received while secretary of state from Sidney Blumenthal, a longtime adviser whom the Obama administration had barred her from hiring, had been "unsolicited." But email records that Mrs. Clinton, according to officials briefed on the matter, apparently failed to turn over to the State Department last fall show that she repeatedly encouraged Mr. Blumenthal to "keep 'em coming," as she said in an August 2012 reply to a memo from him, which she called "another keeper." The missing email records -- nine complete messages and parts of six others -- were discovered after Mr. Blumenthal turned over to the House committee investigating the Benghazi attacks his own batch of Libya-related email correspondence with Mrs. Clinton. Angered that the State Department had not already provided it with some of those emails, the committee asked the department whether it had received them from Mrs. Clinton. The department determined that it had not received all or part of 15 emails. In response to an intelligence memo Mr. Blumenthal sent Mrs. Clinton in July 2012, she said: "Greetings from Kabul! And thanks for keeping this stuff coming!" And, responding to a March 2012 memo, she wrote: "This strains credulity based on what I know. Any more info about it?" Mr. Blumenthal replied, "Will seek more intel." A spokesman for Mrs. Clinton, Nick Merrill, said, "The idea that this runs counter to the assertion that the emails were unsolicited is a leap." Somebody get him a dictionary.
Jeb Bush: Here Are My Tax Forms, Going Back Nearly Forever Looks like Jeb Bush isn't going to get stuck in one of those "when is he going to release his tax returns" controversies. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush plans to release 33 years of personal tax returns on his campaign website Tuesday afternoon, Fox News has learned. Campaign insiders say the release on Jeb2016.com will illustrate the Republican presidential candidate's commitment to transparency and the high level of disclosure they say was Bush's standard as Florida's first two-term GOP governor. Until now, former U.S. Senator Majority Leader Bob Dole held the record for such disclosures, having released 30 years of tax returns, but that was 20 years ago. Since then, Mitt Romney and Sen. John McCain each released two years of tax returns, while now-President Obama released seven years of returns. Hillary will say she's released her tax returns, but the real issue is the books of the Clinton Foundation and its many, many ties to lots of powerful interests. ADDENDA: If Scott Walker were a web site, he would be NRO? Boy, does a higher compliment even exist? Care to see our friend Charlie Cooke and some bright minds debate "Conservatarianism" and whether it represents the future? CENTER |
The Cato Institute's Center for Constitutional Studies and the
National Review Institute invites you to a Book Forum
Tuesday, July 14, 2015 at noon
| | | | | The Conservatarian Manifesto (Crown Forum, 2015)
featuring the author
Charles C. W. Cooke
Staff Writer, National Review
with comments by
Ilya Shapiro
Senior Fellow, Cato Institute
Katherine Mangu-Ward
Managing Editor, Reason
and
Ben Domenech
Publisher, The Federalist
moderated by
Trevor Burrus
Research Fellow, Cato Institute | | | | Book Forum Tuesday, July 14, 2015 at noon Luncheon to follow Cato Institute, 1000 Massachusetts Ave., N.W., Washington, D.C. 20001. To register to attend this event, email events@cato.org, fax (202) 371-0841, or call (202) 789-5229 by noon on Monday, July 13, 2015. | 
