As Americans head to the polls this week the question on immigrants’ minds, like mine, and for those interested in the immigration debate is what is going to happen with immigration. Will the hardline anti-immigration policies remain, or will America get back to a more normal immigration stance where immigrants are blamed but not demonized… Read More Will The Election Change The Plight of Immigrants
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 208!
According to a report in The Washington Post yesterday, there are 545 orphaned migrant children because the federal government cannot find their parents. The Trump Administration launched a “zero tolerance” program designed to discourage migrants from coming to the country. As part of the deterrence program, the federal government began summarily separating migrant children from… Read More The El Paso Nexus To The Missing Children
Every ten years the United States counts the number of people living in America. The count is used to designate who represents the country in the House of Representatives. The count is also used for distributing federal funds, among other things. This is the Census. It is enshrined in the Constitution. The Supreme Court will… Read More Originalism And The Census And Undocumented Immigrants
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 207!
On October 13, 2020, the Committee on Foreign Relations of the United States Senate released a Democratic Staff Report titled, DHS Run Amok? The report states that “in January 2020, Senate Foreign Relations Committee (SFRC) Democratic Staff uncovered a disturbing incident in which DHS misused State Department funding to carry out an unauthorized operation.” The… Read More Department of Homeland Security Accused of Illegal Activities in Guatemala
On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Times reported that Los Angeles County “agreed to pay out $14 million to settle a class-action lawsuit alleging that the Sheriff’s Department routinely held people in jail beyond their release dates solely because of pending immigration investigations.” [1] As of 2014, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department has stopped honoring ICE… Read More Los Angeles Pays $14 Million To Settle Lawsuit For Detaining Immigrants
This year, several Border Patrol agents have been arrested for crimes ranging from QAnon conspiracies, to deprivation of civil rights, drug running and the sexual assault of minors. Their arrests show a pattern of a deteriorating federal agency manned by individuals with questionable characters. QAnon Deranged Border Patrol Agent Threatens to Kill His Supervisor This… Read More Border Patrol Agent Arrests Show Troubling Pattern
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 206!
El Paso Politics recently reported, that El Paso immigration judges are among the worst in the nation for asylum seekers. Various news outlets are reporting that justice department officials drove the immigration policy of separating children from their parents as part of the Trump Administration surge to control the border. The New York Times states… Read More El Paso Was Pilot Program For Child Separations
You may have noticed some changes on the blog over the last day or two. Like for many of you, 2020 has been a year of changes. I am now writing on three online publications in addition to my upcoming book. All of this in between my real job. And, you all likely know there… Read More Time To Make Another Change
As some readers may remember, I covered the El Paso Children’s Hospital bankruptcy extensively. The children’s hospital is back in the news. Over the last few weeks I have reviewed documents and interviewed several individuals. What I found is troubling. It shows a hospital more intent in the profits it can generate than in patient… Read More El Paso Children’s Hospital Exposé
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 205!
If the debacle of Tuesday’s presidential debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump isn’t enough to convince you that America is severely politically divided, then there is nothing that will get you to go vote. But if you are now convinced that you need to cast a vote on November 3, then next week has… Read More Register To Vote
Disney employees in California and Florida got the bad news yesterday that they are losing their jobs. Disney has blamed the Covid-19 pandemic and the resulting closures and limits on their operations as the reason for the layoffs. According to various news sources, the company is terminating 28,000 employees. Almost 7,000 in Florida are on… Read More Disney Layoffs Signal Economic Recovery Still Not Here
Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, lifted all Covid-19 restrictions on Friday. All businesses, including bars and restaurants no longer have state mandated restrictions. DeSantis allowed local governments to impose some restrictions, if the restaurant isn’t faced with a restriction limiting their seating capacity to more than 50%. Yesterday, while talking to the manager of an Orlando… Read More Florida Covid-19 Reopening Order Exposes Another Economic Hurdle
I am an immigrant from México. Since I immigrated, I have paid my taxes. I am not even a U.S. citizen, but I pay my taxes. Donald Trump apparently hasn’t paid federal income taxes in years. The two times he made a payment in the last fifteen years he paid $750 a year, for two… Read More I Am An Immigrant. I Pay My Taxes.
There are growing protests across America demanding that police departments be defunded. Other protestors are demanding that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) be abolished. Protestors in Portland protested outside the ICE building recently. ICE has drawn attention in recent years as the Trump Administration has intensified efforts to close the borders to immigrants. U.S.… Read More The Culture of Racism At El Paso Based Border Patrol & BORTAC
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 204!
It showed up on my Apple news feed innocently enough and I almost skipped the article. I almost skipped it because it was from The Kansas City Star, a newspaper I wasn’t familiar with and I was afraid it was just clickbait. But the headline, As a Black US diplomat in Mexico, I was constantly… Read More U.S. Diplomat Describes What I Felt Crossing The U.S.-Mexico Border In El Paso For Years
The post for today is very simple. It is a reminder to all those who are thinking about voting for Donald Trump on November 3rd that they are voting for the destruction of America. Trump, and many of his supporters, believe that Donald Trump is for America First. But the reality is nothing more than… Read More The Trump Legacy – 250 Thousand Plus Dead
There is this idea pushed forth by political observers that Latinos are a growing voter base and that they are on the verge of substantially changing the face of the American electorate. Each election cycle it is the Latino vote that will make the difference and each time it fizzles into nothing. The 2020 elections… Read More The Illusive Latino Vote Even More Illusive in 2020
Readers are likely aware that Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died this weekend. RGB, as she is colloquially referred to has been a factor for the upcoming November elections. However, on her passing, RBG will likely play a larger role in the election. Political pundits and legal scholars are discussing the how and the… Read More The RBG Voter Factor
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 123.
One of the most hypocritical things I see is the hypocrisy by both police officers and their supporters who have no problem violating the Flag Code while arguing that individuals should follow the law to avoid problems. Some even argue that those that the police violate likely had it coming because they broke the law… Read More Support Police And Violate The Flag Code
The Thin Blue Line was a 1952 television show about the Los Angeles Police Department. It was conceived and produced by William H. Parker, the then Los Angeles police chief. The show, which lasted for a short time, was a question and answer show about policing. From the show, The Thin Blue Line emerged as… Read More The Racist History Of The Thin Blue Line
Donald Trump ordered a payroll tax holiday for all workers through the end of the year. But like all Trump directives not all is what it seems. On September 1, workers were supposed to start seeing a 7.65% bump in their paychecks. Trump had ordered that the Social Security (6.2%) and Medicare (1.45%) payroll taxes… Read More Trump Payroll Tax Is Not Trickling Down To Workers
Does Donald Trump have a chance to win on Election Day? The economy is in shambles, notwithstanding the booming markets. Most voters do not benefit directly from a stock market rally. For most voters, the stock market is just numbers scrolled across screens. The real metric for voters is their jobs. Do they have jobs… Read More Will There Be a Vaccine for Election?
The 2020 presidential election will come down to one poignant thing – the facemask. The country is divided by different social and economic problems. The two sides are hoping their candidate, either Joe Biden or Donald Trump comes out victorious in November. The ideology driving both sides is a complex mismatch of several political issues… Read More The Mask Election
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 202!
Some 9/11 cartoons courtesy of Cagle Cartoons.
Campaign disinformation troll houses have become synonymous with Russia. There is no doubt that Russia is interfering in the 2020 elections. But there are other players playing in the social media arena who are also trying to manipulate elections in other countries. Some of them are American. Social media platforms have become voter outreach centers… Read More Russia Is Not The Only Campaign Disinformation Purveyor
The Russians interfered in the 2016 elections. They are also interfering in the 2020 elections. Their preferred platforms are Facebook and Twitter. For their part, Facebook and Twitter are addressing foreign interference in the political process through ever more complex and evolving schemes that have not stopped the political interference via their platforms. What Facebook… Read More How Facebook and Twitter Can End Political Interference Easily
The United States is a divided country. On one side you have Donald Trump supporters and on the other you have those who opposed him. Politics always divide people. But in this case, the division is so great that it has evolved into violence. There are many reasons why people support Donald Trump. Among them… Read More The Great Replacement Explains America Today
I wish you and your families a wonderful Labor Day 2020! I hope you enjoy these cartoons courtesy of Cagle Cartoons.
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 201
Downtown Orlando has been dead for about six months now. It used to be a vibrant and active community with office workers in the daytime and party goers at night. Restaurants abounded everywhere. Now, restaurants are few and people are scarce. Downtown Orlando has become a ghost town. The Houston Chronicle reports the same for… Read More Covid-19 Killed Smart Growth
Most of us that watched the Terminator movies have likely wondered when will the killer robots come after us. A recent Pentagon test pitting a fighter pilot against an artificial intelligence shows us that combat robots are on the horizon. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) held a competition between eight artificial intelligence systems… Read More The Robot Warriors Are Here
In response to the Covid-19 emergency and because Congress has been unable to pass new legislation to help the economy, Donald Trump issued several executive orders on August 8. One of them was the Payroll Tax Deferral Memorandum. The so-called payroll tax holiday reduces that taxes withheld on employee paychecks from September 1 through the… Read More Payroll Tax Holiday – What It Means To You And Your Company
I hope you enjoy RumpToons No: 200.
