Making Trump’s case

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3&v=eGuSdXiFtLk

CNN reporter ends up making Trump’s case for separation of families, but doesn’t realize it.  She acknowledges that children are used for sex trafficking and as drug mules.

Wellness seminar in Lakeside on nutrition

 

Actually, I wrote that yesterday.  This morning we’re going to the Idlewyld Bed and Breakfast www.idlewyldbb.com  owned by Dan and Joan Barris at 350 Walnut.  Best breakfast in town.  First I walked 2 miles along the Lakefront in the glorious sunshine.  Life is tough.

Today’s programing is on sustainability.  I’ve been hearing that, or a version of it, for 40 years, but I might stop in to hear the one on Lake Erie.  Tomorrow there is a seminar on Listening and the art of paying attention by a “geriatric life enhancement consultant.”  I could do that—I’m old and I don’t pay attention!

Also tomorrow afternoon is a book review by my friend Nancy Long on “Dreamland: the true tale of America’s Opioid Epidemic (Sam Quinones) at the Lakeside Women’s Club. Her birthday was this week and we went out for lunch at the Bluebird restaurant. www.bluebirdatlakeside.com I had the “Italian Lover” panini, which is fresh pesto, tender chicken, tomato, and provolone cheese with a side of fresh veggies.  Nancy had the “Rockin’ Robin” salad which was strawberries, crimbld goat cheese, roasted sweet potatoes, toasted nut-medley on baby spinach with maple-balsamic reduction.

Sometimes on Friday afternoon I attend the World Affairs program (it’s call dialogue, but you know how Lakesiders are).

That’ll work

Congress needs to solve this; could start with current law

This morning I listened to Paul Ryan talking about making special facilities for "families." Assuming there's a magic wand to get this past Democrats who need it as an issue going through the mid-terms, the first kid who is found out to NOT be a family member, but trafficked, will all be blamed on Trump.

Senator Schumer is challenging Trump to use his pen, make it go away,  the way Obama did. Since Democrats in Congress will never allow a "comprehensive immigration law" change and have blocked Trump on DACA, which has increased the problem,  and the border, here's an idea for the gridlock. Let's work with the laws now on the books!

Leaving children with parents in detention for weeks or months. Is that what Democrats want? Do you suppose the Democrats could find a judge somewhere, Hawaii maybe, to challenge that and let them go into the general population like the Obama years? Betcha.

Three percent returned for court date under Obama's "catch and release" program for illegal immigrant families. And we wonder why the government doesn't know where the children are? What if only 3% of the children have been trafficked? Is that OK? What if only 3% have joined MS-13. OK with Democrats?

Democrats are ridiculing “family values” of Republicans

They’re certainly right that sanctity of marriage is a Republican value, since Democrats have been in the business of destroying marriage and family since 1964, and Republicans do eventually absorb the cultural values imposed by liberals.

And they’re right that sanctity of life is a Republican value (for some Republicans); abortion doesn't appear in the RNC mission statement as it has in the DNC for 3 decades.

And they’re right that the federal government more often disregards the rights of the states when Democrats are in charge.

But they’re  wrong that the current dust up is about children from Mexico; the unaccompanied minors who are being trafficked for sex or labor come mostly from Central America 'with parents" and have passed through Mexico who doesn't want them, or won't take them as refugees.

And they’re right the protests against abortion are about liberty--the right of a child to live, the most basic form of all liberty.

I'm a little puzzled about the FBI probe, though--they confused me on that one. The left is OK with the bias shown at the highest levels? Is that OK in the Ferguson or Baltimore investigations?

Once again, Democrats get Republicans to take the “get Trump” bait

The Inspector General’s Report Reveals the biggest crime of the Obama administration, but by focusing on children separated from parents who have committed a crime, it can be wiped off the front burner. Democrats have done it again, and I can’t believe the Republicans are falling for it.  It's the "look over there" technique that politicians have perfected.

https://thefederalist.com/2018/06/15/11-quick-things-know-inspector-generals-report/

Maggie Thurber of Toledo observes: "I find it interesting and disturbing that the issue of separating children from family units when the family unit enters the country illegally arose at the same time as the IG report on bias in the FBI came out. Especially because it's a practice that the government has been following for years. Did anyone else notice the report is no longer top news.

Four years ago Mother Jones wrote about the deplorable conditions and 70,000 minor children, yet didn’t mention Obama once. Today the children in custody of HHS is a story all and only about Trump, not the failures of Clinton, Bush and Obama years. https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/06/child-migrants-surge-unaccompanied-central-america/

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Mike Huckabee gives out the Sick Hypocrisy Award: Planned Parenthood jumps on the illegal immigration virtue signaling wagon by tweeting its principled stance that precious children deserve not to separated from their parents. Unless you’re separating them with surgical tools and a vacuum hose, I suppose?

*                    *                       *

FBI bias training? "Career attorney Christopher Wray is only the latest man to reach the top of the FBI without ever serving as an agent. And now he says agents need to be instructed to remain impartial as they conduct investigations. Pentagon officials who never served in uniform typically don’t announce plans to teach their troops about patriotism, but perhaps the FBI is a very different institution. " Wall St. Journal Best of the Web, June 19

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/06/inspector-general-report-reveals-fbi-bias-in-clinton-email-investigation/

Fact checking the media’s version of the child immigration policy

As reported in the Daily Signal.

“In 1997, the Clinton administration entered into something called the Flores Settlement Agreement, which ended a class action lawsuit first brought in the 1980s.

The settlement established a policy that the federal government would release unaccompanied minors from custody to their parents, relatives, or other caretakers after no more than 20 days, or, alternatively, determine the “least restrictive” setting for the child.

In a separate development, in 2008 the Democrat-controlled Congress approved bipartisan legislation to combat human trafficking and President George W. Bush, a Republican, signed it into law.

Section 235 (g) in that law, the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, states that unaccompanied minors entering the United States must be transferred to the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement rather than to the Department of Homeland Security.

Section 235 (g) in that law, the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, states that unaccompanied minors entering the United States must be transferred to the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement rather than to the Department of Homeland Security.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit expanded the Flores settlement in 2016 to include children brought to the country illegally by their parents.

For consistency between the provision of the anti-trafficking law and the 9th Circuit’s interpretation of the Flores agreement, children who came into the country illegally with parents had to be taken into HHS custody, said Art Arthur, former general counsel for Immigration and Naturalization Services (now known as Immigration and Customs Enforcement) as well as a former federal immigration judge.

“As soon as their parents are detained, the children are classified as unaccompanied,” Arthur, now a resident fellow for law and policy at the Center for Immigration Studies, told The Daily Signal.” “

First week of the season at Lakeside

The Preacher of the week at Lakeside this week is Rev. Dr. John A. Nunes, President of Concordia College, New York. He said yesterday at church his talks would be on the infantilization of adults and the adultification of children--I think it's based on a book, but I've forgotten the author, as there have been more than one with that theme. I plan to attend (9:15), at least today, but it's awfully hot.
At 10:30 is children's author Jill Hardie and at 1:30 is Richard Cowdrey who illustrates children's books. At 3:30 the curator from Mazza Museum (Findlay, OH, children's books) will give a presentation and there's a display of children's book illustrations at Hoover, which I haven't seen yet. I see no space in here for a nap, one of my favorite things to do.

There was a great program yesterday to celebrate Hoover Auditorium’s 90 years.  The construction began during the fall of 1928 and it opened for business in 1929.  What an amazing building with unusual wiring, bathrooms, sound control, seating, doors and stage curtains all having their own stories including roof collapses and fires. Very interesting display of some of the famous speakers and performers from Eleanor Roosevelt to Marian Anderson to Norman Vincent Peale. The Women's Club will have a presentation by David Blank on Peale tomorrow. In order to go to that, I’ll have to skip one of the program’s on children’s books.

Why is Peter Strzok still employed with FBI?

In remarks on Sunday Maria Bartiromo show, Alan Dershowitz said,

“FBI agents are allowed to be biased,” Dershowitz said. “They're allowed to support political candidates. That's part of the law. Where I draw the line is when an FBI agent says ‘we'll stop him.’
“That's not an expression of bias. That's not saying who we're going to vote for. That sends a message to the American people that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is going to interfere in an election, in an effort to try to stop the election of one candidate rather than the other. . .you're entitled to support a candidate if you're an FBI agent. But you're not allowed to try to use your office to stop somebody from being elected president of the United States.”

Pregnancy Decision Health Centers

http://pdhc.org/

Pregnancy Decision Health Center is where I’ve been a volunteer for the last 5 or 6 years (don’t remember when I started but there was a big ice storm and I had to cancel my first day).  It provides women with pregnancy tests and ultrasounds (all free, no government money). It also provides counseling, material aid, educational materials, parenting classes, maternity clothes, layettes of beautiful new clothes and hand made things by church ladies.  It educates the community and has teams that go into the high schools to talk about being sexually responsible.  PDHC also has a fatherhood project to promote two parent families and the benefits of monogamy. There is also an emergency hot line.  All this was started about 40 years ago by one woman who began with a hotline in her home after the Roe v. Wade court case. 

There are four locations in central Ohio, all with a nurse-director, para-professionals, interns, volunteer counselors most with degrees, and greeters, which was my position. We do the clerical stuff, entering records on the computer (when I began the files were paper and in a file cabinet) and greet the people with a clip board and instructions, like you would see at a doctor’s office. I also search the internet for any recalls on baby equipment that is donated like strollers, bouncers, bathtubs, write thank you notes for donations, insert educational material into packages which are given to each woman. I unpack and sort baby clothing donations, some of which has to be washed, and some of which comes from Catholic ladies who buy or make them, and pack.  I think that organization is about 100 years old.

Our clinic on West Broad Street has a pleasant lobby with comfortable chairs,  two counseling rooms nicely furnished, an education room with tables, chairs, video, etc.  A “store” with maternity clothes, free children’s clothes for older children in the family, diapers, books, etc., and an ultrasound room, plus 2 restrooms. A certain amount in the store is free, others can be earned by attending classes. Some of the locations, like on the OSU campus, offer STD testing, but we don’t. All the ultra-sounds are read by doctors who volunteer their time. 

I’m a greeter, but have been on the prayer team for 18 years. Each week or so we get an e-mail list (without names because God knows) of about 10 requests for prayer as these women make the decision to either parent or abort.  I think I’ve only seen adoption a few times in all those years, although that may be because the decision has been made.  Not every woman is seeking an abortion; some need the documentation to qualify for government benefits. But our staff provides follow up anyway, and at the end of their pregnancy they can still have a layette.  Also if there is a miscarriage, grief counseling.  Some don’t have a doctor and need a referral.

Private contributions are 65% of PDHC’s support, grants 18%, churches direct contributions 12% and investments 4%. There is no government funding.  The current budgeted income is about $1.4 million. In 1981 309 clients were served; in 2017 the number served was 4411. 71% of those who seek help have incomes of less than $15,000.

One surprise for me was the list of local resources we compile and hand out—local, state, federal, non-profit, church, etc. It’s extensive and very specialized, like beds, or scholarships, or free clinics, or low cost housing, or food pantries. The bed ministry is from churches—ours has one.  It’s surprising (to me) how many families don’t have beds, or the women have fled abuse with no furniture, or the house was treated for bed bugs, and all the mattresses were thrown out. For a child to have his own bed is something really special. 

Bias against Trump within FBI

  

There is much more of this hostility evidence in the IG report, but apparently hostility is not against the law, even with vast amounts of evidence beginning at the top.  Mueller chose only those who hated Trump to be part of his investigation.

Father’s Day June 16

I saw this today. "The greatest gift my father has ever given me was his time." That's not the kind of dad I had. He worked 12 hours a day. I treasure the few memories I have like that because they were so few. Like riding in his truck listening to him sing. Or the Sunday afternoons he drove my girl friends and me to the skating rink. Or his carrying my 11 year old sister in his arms to take her to the hospital when the doctor said she had polio. Or when all six of us would drive to Rockford to see a movie--I even remember the names of the movies! King Solomon’s Mines.  African Queen. What do I remember? How he treated my mother. Like she was the most important person in the world. How he treated his own mother, stopping by to visit her almost every day. That's how to make a little girl feel special and safe.

The Inspector General Report

Manafort is in prison and Ms. Clinton, Comey, McCabe, Clapper, Strzok and Page all of whom tried to bring down the 2016 election are running free. Feeling safe yet?

The Korean dead will be returned

I teared up when I read that the remains of soldiers would be returned from North Korea. Their parents are gone now, but there are siblings and children and grandchildren. I remember when my uncle came home in 1947 after being killed in China in 1944 during WWII. He was an aerial engineer for the 24th Mapping Squadron of the 8th Photo Group, Reconnaissance (10th Air Force) which served in the China, Burma, India theater. Clare and a pilot in his unit were killed in an explosion when their plane hit a gasoline supply, through the stupidity of his commanding officer who insisted the men go up in a blinding storm. No one else in that unit lost his life and we only found out how Clare died when a great nephew, Steve, attended one of their reunions in the 1990s. Clare came home on the Honda Knot through San Francisco with 233,181 American dead mostly from action in the Pacific. Another large number came to New York from Europe. Hundreds of thousands of grateful Americans lined up to greet them. I hope we can welcome home those who died in Korea, the war that never ended. Thank you, President Trump

https://www.militarytimes.com/flashpoints/2018/06/12/trump-kim-agree-to-repatriating-us-military-remains-from-korean-war/

http://collectingmythoughts.blogspot.com/2010/05/remembering-uncle-clare-on-memorial-day.html