Time To Take A Stand

The news media and my Facebook feed are full of stories about the horrific mistreatment of families and small children at the border.

Children are dying of disease and neglect. One seven-year-old girl died of dehydration--she wasn’t given enough  water to drink! A four-month old was separated from his family. Hundreds of people are packed into shelters built to hold a fraction of the number crammed in…the horror stories go on and on.

From Lawyers for Good Government, we learn that

The Trump administration argued in court this week that detained migrant children do not require basic hygiene products (like soap and toothbrushes) to be held in “safe and sanitary” conditions. Lawyers who recently interviewed detained children report that kids are living in “traumatic and dangerous” conditions – insufficient food and water, going weeks without bathing, kids as young as 7 years old being told to care for the babies and toddlers.

Our delusional and mentally-ill President has no intention of doing anything to ameliorate the humanitarian crisis he has created. In interviews, he insists Obama began the family separation policy (he didn’t–the only time his administration removed children from their families was when they were believed to be in danger) and simply denies what numerous reports have documented.

Meanwhile, rather than calling on Congress or all those self-proclaimed “Christians” to intervene, conservative apologists attack those who–like AOC–call these facilities what they clearly are: concentration camps.

There is no ambiguity about what is happening. The heartless people who are defending the documented abuse and inhumanity are telling the rest of us who–and what– they are. 

“Fox & Friends”co-host Brian Kilmeade showed his support for President Donald Trump’s “zero tolerance” approach to border policy, adding that the migrant children who have been separated from their families“aren’t our kids.”

“Like it or not, these aren’t our kids,” said Kilmeade on Friday’s episode of the Fox News morning show. “Show them compassion, but it’s not like he’s doing this to the people of Idaho or Texas. These are people from another country and now people are saying that they’re more important than people in our country who are paying taxes and who have needs as well.”

Is this really what America has come to?

Are we really prepared to defend unforgivable and inhumane treatment so long as the objects of that treatment aren’t “our” kids?  Are we content to be like the “good Germans” who wouldn’t personally have taken their Jewish neighbors to the camps, but who were quite willing to close their eyes and pretend not to see the atrocities around them?

This isn’t about immigration policy. Good people can disagree about border security, about the criteria for allowing migrants to cross the border, about the number of refugees America should resettle. Good people do not and cannot excuse callous, barbaric, inhumane treatment of children and families trying to escape desperate conditions–conditions that our country has some measure of responsibility for creating and that our ignoramus President has made worse by cutting off aid that would to some extent ameliorate the conditions they are fleeing.

This humanitarian travesty is being done in our name. And to add insult to injury, private prison companies are profiting from it. Big time.

For me, there is nothing worse than the feeling of powerlessness–the recognition of a great wrong that I feel helpless to address. Surely other people feel the same.

What would it take to organize a national strike? A day when only critically important workers (policing, hospitals, etc.) show up? Those of us for whom morality means caring for our fellow humans rather than fixating on other people’s genital activity need a way to tell our broken, pathetic excuse for a government–in Howard Beale’s famous words– that we’re mad as hell and we aren’t going to take it anymore. That we aren’t going to sit by while an American government perpetuates unforgivable behaviors in our name.

I’m open to other ideas, but we need some vehicle to express our collective outrage, and send a message. We can’t just avert our eyes.

67 Comments

  1. Len,

    Thanks for the Jewish history lesson. However, I don’t need one. I said that I knew Rabbi Abe Cooper personally and that he was full of shit. As a matter of fact, in 1990,
    he asked me to be the Weisenthal Center’s Director of National Fund Raising, which I rejected. My statement had nothing to do with the Holocaust.

    The fact that he is, personally, a liar is a problem, especially with his POLITICAL attachment to the State of Israel and the Likud government. He has absolutely no credibility with me. As far as I am concerned, he is no better than Benjamin Netanyahu, who I have also know personally.

    If you want more specifics, I’ll be glad to pass them on to you.

    P.S. I’m sure my statement also bothered Irvin. I’m sorry if it did. There’s just no time left for any more BULLSHIT.

  2. 1. Make ‘5 calls’. Visit [https://5calls.org/] to get numbers for your representatives and suggested scripts about what to say about various issues (like the detention (i.e. CONCENTRATION) camps.

    2. Participate in the July 12th ‘Lights for Liberty’ vigil to bring awareness to the concentration camps. Register here: [https://www.lightsforliberty.org/]

    3. Donate to RAICES. RAICES is a nonprofit that provides free and low-cost legal services to immigrant children, families, and refugees. RAICES is working actively to help people (esp. children) detained at the U.S. border. Donate here: [https://www.raicestexas.org/]

    4. Donate to or volunteer with Cara Pro Bono. Cara Pro Bono is an organization fighting to end the incarceration of immigrant children and families. Get involved here: (http://caraprobono.org/)

    5. Educate yourself and others around you about what is going on. Call people out. Use your privilege. This site breaks down the border situation pretty well. You can also volunteer with them or make donations, and they have a ‘How to Help’ sections with suggestions. [https://www.rescue.org/topic/seeking-safety-border]
    (https://tinyurl.com/yxk3m3ej)

    6. Know how to be properly prepared for an ICE raid (i.e. how to help others and/or yourself). This site (written in both English and Spanish), details what to do in the event of an ICE raid, and also offers a ‘Community Raid Preparedness Checklist’ for advocates responding to raids.
    [ https://www.informedimmigrant.com/how-to-prepare-yourself-…/ ]
    (https://tinyurl.com/y2rn5j3a)

    7. Donate to and/or volunteer with Lawyers for Good Government. They send lawyers (esp. Spanish-speaking lawyers) to the concentration camps and refugee centers. They also have a program where you can donate your frequent flyer miles to help get lawyers to the border to help children and their families. They have volunteer opportunities available. Many of them are specifically for lawyers, but not all. Big bonus if you can speak Spanish. Check out their options and suggestions here: [https://www.lawyersforgoodgovernment.org/]

    8. Donate to a program like Southwest Key that houses unaccompanied children: [https://www.swkey.org/about/overview/]

  3. Don’t forget that the privateers are pocketing $750 per day per detainee. That’s your tax dollars.

  4. Marv,

    Since you say you know Rabbi Cooper personally, I will take your word for his veracity, or lack thereof. I got the impression that he is a Likudnik, so I am in agreement with you on his politics.

    As for the history lesson, I really didn’t think you needed one, but I like to repeat that on public forums where appropriate because I feel that the magnitude is lost on many people. I feel the same way about the US genocide for American Indians.

  5. Len,

    I agree with you. I’m aware that I’m overly sensitive when it comes to Rabbi Cooper. His “knife in my back” still hurts.

  6. Len,

    I strongly suggest that Rabbi Cooper’s visit on Fox was a message that the organized Jewish Community was still behind the Trump/Netanyahu political “love affair.” Only a few days later, we now have the Kushner Middle East Peace Plan having Netanyahu’s backing.

    How could any Jew, despite Donald Trump’s obvious anti-Semitism, be against him, “the new savior of the Jews.”

    Let’s don’t forget the Transfer Agreement negotiated with Adolph Hitler which allowed for the German Jews to have safe passage to Israel. All of this has the same “smell.”

    Nothing but BULLSHIT.

  7. Sheila, I appreciate your post but I’m ashamed to be an American because somehow there seems to be a need for it. Why in the hell haven’t we done anything? This continues to unfold. We just complain. Lyn, I thank you for your input especially since you gave us solid options. Marv, I truly understand how you feel and why. And we all know that Fox News is the bane of this country’s existence along with being the true power that currently runs this country. We Have To Do Something!!!!!!!. I am 73 and disabled but if I could mail letters, make phone calls, Please let me know. I want to help even in my limited capacity Lyn, I am going to use your list to try and find something i can jump into for this mess. Thanks all

  8. Anyone concerned with America’s future MUST READ: “The Transfer Agreement: The Dramatic Story of the Pact Between the Third Reich and Jewish Palestine” by Edwin Black (Dialog Press, Washington, DC, 1983):

    “During the first months of the Hitler regime, leaders of the Zionist movement concluded a controversial pact with the Third Reich [Donald Trump?] which, in its various forms transferred some 60,000 Jews and $100 million—almost $1.7 billion in 2009 dollars to Jewish Palestine.

    In return, Zionists would halt the worldwide Jewish-led anti-Nazi boycott that threatened to topple the Hitler regime in its first year.”

    Sound familiar?

  9. If it was up to me, and it isn’t, I would stage an IMMEDIATE MARCH directed against the Weisenthal Center in L.A. They’re using the HOLOCAUST as a cover for their UN-AMERICAN activities.

    A successful march against Rabbi Cooper and the rest of his “gang” at the Weisenthal Center could start a “chain reaction” that would, eventually, topple the TRUMPENSTEIN MONSTER much like in the ’30s movie “KING KONG.”

  10. This all reminds me of the march I suggested, about thirty years ago, to be directed at the home of the then Dallas mayor, Annette Strauss. It, “sparked” the toppling of the whole sordid regime, including President George Bush. See http://www.The Alarm Report.info.

  11. When you strike the right NODE, in a complex, non-linear, system the chances of a DOMINO EFFECT are very real, like what happened from the A.L.A.R.M. REPORT presented to the City Council of Dallas in 1991.

  12. Bravo, Lyn, for your eight suggestions to be in action regarding separation of migrant families. I, too, have been feeling helpless and somewhat hopeless.

  13. Trump is a “nut” case. Gangsters don’t try to stand out in public. They have others do their dirty work like Trump has, through their collection of “sheister” attorneys.

    Trump wanted to have his “cake and eat it too.” He’s a Godsend if there ever was one other than Jesus Christ.

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