The Border & Illegal Aliens, And What We Are Doing About It.

[Bullheaded Texan]

Attorney General Jeff Sessions said.

“We are not going to let this country be invaded!

We will not be stampeded!

We will not capitulate to lawlessness!

This is NOT business as usual.

This is the Trump era!," the Attorney General said.
 

[Bullheaded Texan]

Germany Just Agreed To Essentially Close Its Borders. How Did They Get There?
Rigid work restrictions forced hundreds of thousands of people to sit in camps, in limbo, living on taxpayer money. Nothing good can come from that.
7/15/18 Jenipher Camino Gonzalez
German Chancellor Angela Merkel stunned the world in 2015 by announcing that she would allow nearly a million asylum seekers into her country, a humanitarian gesture offering hope to those suffering from the ravages of wars worldwide.
The move transformed her into the poster child for opening up international borders. High-profile German politicians, mainstream media outlets, and the public rallied behind the idea. Images of Germans welcoming refugees at train stations matched public opinion polls showing majority support for the new arrivals.
To those who were feeling a bit nervous, the chancellor reassured them that the country and her government could "handle it."
But by 2018, the public mood had soured significantly.
A new YouGov poll finds 72% of Germans saying their country's immigration policy is negligent, with only 12% saying it's about right.
Last week, the reversal in public sentiment became official when the German chancellor ended a standoff with hardline immigration restrictionists in the government by 'dealing a mortal blow to the concept of open borders'.
She agreed to speed up deportations, to turn back refugees already registered in another European Union nation, and to let anti-immigration leader Horst Seehofer remain as head of the ministry charged with implementing these policies. She even acceded to opening "transit centers" along the border in Bavaria where refugees could be detained, though this provision was later dropped.
The deal is a dramatic repudiation of everything Merkel asked Germans to believe in just three years ago, which leaves many wondering: What on Earth went wrong?
The German Bureaucracy Did Not Deliver:
Channeling a million migrants into productive lives in their new home is no small job, and in this case, government itself became a stumbling block. Germany's bureaucratic institutions were asked to review each application and grant or deny asylum, allow residence, or deport—as quickly as possible. They were also tasked with providing shelter, health insurance, food, and "integration" assistance in the form of language courses and job placement.
But even as officials worked to help the newcomers, restrictions designed to zealously protect native workers' jobs made the effort nearly impossible. Aside from needing legal status, in Germany, refugees face regulatory hurdles—from additional training and certification requirements to demands that they already know the language—before they can qualify for jobs at any level.
Germany's bureaucratic monolith, not exactly known for its efficiency, and resistant to rapid change, was expected absorb the sudden influx. And refugees' new lives hung in the balance. Without approved legal residency and permission to enter the job market, they could not hope to support themselves and contribute to society. Instead, hundreds of thousands of people would sit in camps, in limbo, living on taxpayer money, indefinitely. A report from the Institute for Employment Research found that just 10% of the working-age refugees who arrived in 2015 were employed by 2017.
Nothing good could come from such a situation. A series of high-profile refugee-related scandals followed, taking a toll on the nation's patience. Studies revealed that the new arrivals were not finding employment.
The year 2016 began with reports of mass groping by foreigners in Cologne's central train station. There were a couple of murders committed by refugees, 'one of whose application had been denied but who was not deported'.
And a scandal erupted in Bremen after migration office employees allegedly took bribes in exchange for approving asylum applications.
Reports of ill-equipped public employees surfaced in the media. Local leaders openly denounced the German federal government's failure to provide needed resources. Merkel's own Interior Ministry began saying the refugee inflows were not sustainable.
Evidence was mounting that the bureaucracy was simply unable to "handle it," as the chancellor had promised.
Loosening Regulations Could Have Prevented This Crisis:
There was never any room for error in Merkel's open-border policy. While empathy and solidarity led Germans to back her push initially, a deep appreciation for order and stability are also etched into the country's psyche.
The uncertainty that resulted from three years of bureaucratic failures led to increased anxiety and eroded the public's support for immigration.
And the far right was lurking. Every error by the state, it claimed, proved that Merkel's efforts were a grave mistake!
The strategy worked. After the 2017 elections, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), a euroskeptic-turned-anti-immigration organization, entered Parliament with the third most votes of any party.
The result shocked and frightened the German mainstream, exposing the scope of the blowback to Merkel's failed refugee policy.
The deal is a dramatic repudiation of everything Merkel asked Germans to believe in just three years ago, which leaves many wondering: What on Earth went wrong?
The German Bureaucracy Did Not Deliver:
Channeling a million migrants into productive lives in their new home is no small job, and in this case, government itself became a stumbling block.
Germany's bureaucratic institutions were asked to review each application and grant or deny asylum, allow residence, or deport—as quickly as possible. They were also tasked with providing shelter, health insurance, food, and "integration" assistance in the form of language courses and job placement.
But even as officials worked to help the newcomers, restrictions designed to zealously protect native workers' jobs made the effort nearly impossible!
Aside from needing legal status, in Germany, refugees face regulatory hurdles—from additional training and certification requirements to demands that they already know the language—before they can qualify for jobs at any level.
Germany's bureaucratic monolith, not exactly known for its efficiency, and resistant to rapid change, was expected absorb the sudden influx. And refugees' new lives hung in the balance. Without approved legal residency and permission to enter the job market, they could not hope to support themselves and contribute to society.
Instead, hundreds of thousands of people would sit in camps, in limbo, 'living on taxpayer money', indefinitely.
A report from the Institute for Employment Research found that just 10% of the working-age refugees who arrived in 2015 were employed by 2017.
Nothing good could come from such a situation. A series of high-profile refugee-related scandals followed, taking a toll on the nation's patience.
Studies revealed that the new arrivals were not finding employment. The year 2016 began with reports of mass groping by foreigners in Cologne's central train station. There were a couple of murders committed by refugees, one of whose application had been denied but who was not deported. And a scandal erupted in Bremen after migration office employees allegedly took bribes in exchange for approving asylum applications.
Reports of ill-equipped public employees surfaced in the media. Local leaders openly denounced the German federal government's failure to provide needed resources. Merkel's own Interior Ministry began saying the refugee inflows were not sustainable.
Evidence was mounting that the bureaucracy was simply unable to "handle it," as the chancellor had promised.
To save her party and her tenure, the weakened chancellor gave in to her more hawkish allies, inking this month's agreement to formally end the experiment in open borders and joining a long list of flip-flopping politicians willing to betray their convictions for political expediency.
Migration is still a must for Germany's future, thanks to worrying demographic patterns. Without a lot of new workers, the aging population and its shrinking taxpayer base will lay ruin to the country's generous welfare system.
But the country is stuck wondering how to successfully integrate such a huge mass of outsiders. This riddle is one shared by a number of countries worldwide.
Merkel could have enacted new immigration laws focused on easing barriers to employment. Admittedly, this would have required major policy changes for a risk-averse country, such as opening low-wage jobs to newcomers—but it would have helped avoid the idleness (and resulting boredom and frustration) that can push people to commit crimes, which in turn increases resentment among the native-born population. Instead, she threw the problem at a bureaucracy unaccustomed to dealing with high levels of immigration and hoped it would figure something out. The consequence has been plummeting support for refugees and a German people more bitterly divided than at any time since World War II.

[Bullheaded Texan]

Germany Just Agreed To Essentially Close Its Borders. How Did They Get There?
Rigid work restrictions forced hundreds of thousands of people to sit in camps, in limbo, living on taxpayer money. Nothing good can come from that.
7/15/18 Jenipher Camino Gonzalez
German Chancellor Angela Merkel stunned the world in 2015 by announcing that she would allow nearly a million asylum seekers into her country, a humanitarian gesture offering hope to those suffering from the ravages of wars worldwide.
The move transformed her into the poster child for opening up international borders. High-profile German politicians, mainstream media outlets, and the public rallied behind the idea. Images of Germans welcoming refugees at train stations matched public opinion polls showing majority support for the new arrivals.
To those who were feeling a bit nervous, the chancellor reassured them that the country and her government could "handle it."
But by 2018, the public mood had soured significantly.
A new YouGov poll finds 72% of Germans saying their country's immigration policy is negligent, with only 12% saying it's about right.
Last week, the reversal in public sentiment became official when the German chancellor ended a standoff with hardline immigration restrictionists in the government by 'dealing a mortal blow to the concept of open borders'.
She agreed to speed up deportations, to turn back refugees already registered in another European Union nation, and to let anti-immigration leader Horst Seehofer remain as head of the ministry charged with implementing these policies. She even acceded to opening "transit centers" along the border in Bavaria where refugees could be detained, though this provision was later dropped.
The deal is a dramatic repudiation of everything Merkel asked Germans to believe in just three years ago, which leaves many wondering: What on Earth went wrong?
The German Bureaucracy Did Not Deliver:
Channeling a million migrants into productive lives in their new home is no small job, and in this case, government itself became a stumbling block. Germany's bureaucratic institutions were asked to review each application and grant or deny asylum, allow residence, or deport—as quickly as possible. They were also tasked with providing shelter, health insurance, food, and "integration" assistance in the form of language courses and job placement.
But even as officials worked to help the newcomers, restrictions designed to zealously protect native workers' jobs made the effort nearly impossible. Aside from needing legal status, in Germany, refugees face regulatory hurdles—from additional training and certification requirements to demands that they already know the language—before they can qualify for jobs at any level.
Germany's bureaucratic monolith, not exactly known for its efficiency, and resistant to rapid change, was expected absorb the sudden influx. And refugees' new lives hung in the balance. Without approved legal residency and permission to enter the job market, they could not hope to support themselves and contribute to society. Instead, hundreds of thousands of people would sit in camps, in limbo, living on taxpayer money, indefinitely. A report from the Institute for Employment Research found that just 10% of the working-age refugees who arrived in 2015 were employed by 2017.
Nothing good could come from such a situation. A series of high-profile refugee-related scandals followed, taking a toll on the nation's patience. Studies revealed that the new arrivals were not finding employment.
The year 2016 began with reports of mass groping by foreigners in Cologne's central train station. There were a couple of murders committed by refugees, 'one of whose application had been denied but who was not deported'.
And a scandal erupted in Bremen after migration office employees allegedly took bribes in exchange for approving asylum applications.
Reports of ill-equipped public employees surfaced in the media. Local leaders openly denounced the German federal government's failure to provide needed resources. Merkel's own Interior Ministry began saying the refugee inflows were not sustainable.
Evidence was mounting that the bureaucracy was simply unable to "handle it," as the chancellor had promised.
Loosening Regulations Could Have Prevented This Crisis:
There was never any room for error in Merkel's open-border policy. While empathy and solidarity led Germans to back her push initially, a deep appreciation for order and stability are also etched into the country's psyche.
The uncertainty that resulted from three years of bureaucratic failures led to increased anxiety and eroded the public's support for immigration.
And the far right was lurking. Every error by the state, it claimed, proved that Merkel's efforts were a grave mistake!
The strategy worked. After the 2017 elections, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), a euroskeptic-turned-anti-immigration organization, entered Parliament with the third most votes of any party.
The result shocked and frightened the German mainstream, exposing the scope of the blowback to Merkel's failed refugee policy.
The deal is a dramatic repudiation of everything Merkel asked Germans to believe in just three years ago, which leaves many wondering: What on Earth went wrong?
The German Bureaucracy Did Not Deliver:
Channeling a million migrants into productive lives in their new home is no small job, and in this case, government itself became a stumbling block.
Germany's bureaucratic institutions were asked to review each application and grant or deny asylum, allow residence, or deport—as quickly as possible. They were also tasked with providing shelter, health insurance, food, and "integration" assistance in the form of language courses and job placement.
But even as officials worked to help the newcomers, restrictions designed to zealously protect native workers' jobs made the effort nearly impossible!
Aside from needing legal status, in Germany, refugees face regulatory hurdles—from additional training and certification requirements to demands that they already know the language—before they can qualify for jobs at any level.
Germany's bureaucratic monolith, not exactly known for its efficiency, and resistant to rapid change, was expected absorb the sudden influx. And refugees' new lives hung in the balance. Without approved legal residency and permission to enter the job market, they could not hope to support themselves and contribute to society.
Instead, hundreds of thousands of people would sit in camps, in limbo, 'living on taxpayer money', indefinitely.
A report from the Institute for Employment Research found that just 10% of the working-age refugees who arrived in 2015 were employed by 2017.
Nothing good could come from such a situation. A series of high-profile refugee-related scandals followed, taking a toll on the nation's patience.
Studies revealed that the new arrivals were not finding employment. The year 2016 began with reports of mass groping by foreigners in Cologne's central train station. There were a couple of murders committed by refugees, one of whose application had been denied but who was not deported. And a scandal erupted in Bremen after migration office employees allegedly took bribes in exchange for approving asylum applications.
Reports of ill-equipped public employees surfaced in the media. Local leaders openly denounced the German federal government's failure to provide needed resources. Merkel's own Interior Ministry began saying the refugee inflows were not sustainable.
Evidence was mounting that the bureaucracy was simply unable to "handle it," as the chancellor had promised.
To save her party and her tenure, the weakened chancellor gave in to her more hawkish allies, inking this month's agreement to formally end the experiment in open borders and joining a long list of flip-flopping politicians willing to betray their convictions for political expediency.
Migration is still a must for Germany's future, thanks to worrying demographic patterns. Without a lot of new workers, the aging population and its shrinking taxpayer base will lay ruin to the country's generous welfare system.
But the country is stuck wondering how to successfully integrate such a huge mass of outsiders. This riddle is one shared by a number of countries worldwide.
Merkel could have enacted new immigration laws focused on easing barriers to employment. Admittedly, this would have required major policy changes for a risk-averse country, such as opening low-wage jobs to newcomers—but it would have helped avoid the idleness (and resulting boredom and frustration) that can push people to commit crimes, which in turn increases resentment among the native-born population. Instead, she threw the problem at a bureaucracy unaccustomed to dealing with high levels of immigration and hoped it would figure something out. The consequence has been plummeting support for refugees and a German people more bitterly divided than at any time since World War II.

[Bullheaded Texan]

New Report Shows Government Gave DACA Protection to Thousands of Criminals!
8/2/18 by: Hans von Spakovsky/Christopher Baldacci
Historian Jacob Burckhardt once warned against being deceived by “terrible simplifiers.” If he hadn’t died in 1897, you might be tempted to think he was writing about defenders of President Barack Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.
The left consistently characterizes all DACA recipients as though they were innocent, law-abiding Phi Beta Kappa college graduates. They also treat anyone questioning DACA as a child-hater. That is just one of the myths surrounding the program.
When President Donald Trump last tried to rescind DACA, a program that obuma implemented 'without legal authority' or the approval of Congress, liberals decried the move as an attack on peace-loving immigrants. However, new research challenges that simplistic narrative.
Recently, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services did a comprehensive review of aliens who applied for benefits under DACA.
Getting approved under DACA provided a period of deferred action (a promise that the alien would not be deported) as well as access to certain government benefits such as Social Security and Medicaid.
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services found that approximately [8% of DACA beneficiaries had previously been arrested], including for crimes such assault, rape, and murder,
'yet were still approved'.
Judicial Watch warned back in 2013 that DACA’s very limited vetting procedures were woefully inadequate, and the data has proven it right.
For those who think that, during the obuma administration, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services 'was actually checking the backgrounds of all DACA applicants', "nothing could be further from the truth".
It implemented a “lean and light” system in which only a few randomly selected DACA applications were ever actually investigated, and only rarely was any of the information on the applications themselves even verified.
This new data from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services contradict claims that DACA has not been a shield for criminal aliens.
Director L. Francis Cissna lamented: “The truth is that we let those with criminal arrests for sexually assaulting a minor, kidnapping, human trafficking, child pornography, and even murder be provided protection from removal.”
Not only were some of the DACA beneficiaries—the so-called “Dreamers”—criminals before they received deferred action, but a number of them committed crimes after they were given a free pass. Of the group of DACA beneficiaries with prior arrests, 13 percent of them—nearly 8,000 aliens—were arrested for another crime after they were in the United States.
The Center for Immigration Studies reported that, as of January, more than 2,000 individuals had their protection under DACA revoked for criminal or gang activity, including with MS-13, considered by many to be the most dangerous and brutal criminal gang in the country!
Yet only 30% were actually deported or put in custody as a result.
Of course, those who want to treat illegal aliens as if they are legal immigrants want to ignore criminal activity both before and after individuals became DACA beneficiaries.
One recent study from Arizona found that DACA-eligible immigrants made up 2% of the state population but 8% of the prison population.
*The 8,000 crimes committed by DACA beneficiaries who were given the privilege of remaining in the U.S. would never have occurred if DACA didn’t exist—or at the very least if its prohibitions were actually enforced.*
obuma’s unilateral executive action setting up the DACA program was beyond his constitutional and statutory authority—and dangerous.
The president was never meant to implement immigration policy with the stroke of a pen.
The Constitution entrusts Congress, not the president, with the power to regulate immigration so that it can debate, deliberate, and work out the most effective solution to the country’s immigration issues.
The evidence from DACA’s actual implementation helps make sense of Congress’ refusal to pass the DREAM Act, which is DACA’s legislative equivalent.
Like DACA, this legislation would be unfair to 'legal immigrants'—those who abide by the rule of law when they come to America—and it would reward illegal behavior, acting like a magnet to draw in even more illegal aliens.
Congress, not the president, has the final word on this issue.
And the No. 1 concern of Congress should be ensuring the safety of the American people!

[Bullheaded Texan]

Pg. 2
Trump’s Border Wall Is Destroying Land, Livelihoods, and Butterflies in the Rio Grande?
"You may learn about eminent domain, but until you are in the crosshairs of the government, you don't understand how it really works."
7/26/18 Mark McDaniel
https://youtu.be/Sjy53S7iofU
"And I just got word the government has moved to 'dismiss our lawsuit," Trevino-Wright says.
These issues will be sorted out in court. Regardless of the outcome, for the property owners of the Rio Grande Valley, the long-term outlook is bleak.

Video produced, shot, and edited by Mark McDaniel.

[Bullheaded Texan]

Trump’s Border Wall Is Destroying Land, Livelihoods, and Butterflies in the Rio Grande?
7/26/18 by: Mark McDaniel
"You may learn about eminent domain, but until you are in the crosshairs of the government, you don't understand how it really works."
"You may learn about eminent domain, but until you are in the crosshairs of the government, you don't understand how it really works," says Marianna Trevino-Wright, the director of the National Butterfly Center, a 100-acre private wildlife refuge located in Texas near the U.S. border with Mexico. "They invoke it, they take your land, and they do what they want."
The National Butterfly Center, or NABA, is directly in the path of President Donald Trump's planned border wall. Part of the Rio Grande Valley Conservation Corridor, it's home to the largest concentration of butterflies in North America. ***UH, CAN'T BUTTERFLIES FLY? ****
https://youtu.be/Sjy53S7iofU
The border wall project is moving ahead in the Rio Grande Valley. In the 2018 omnibus spending bill, Congress authorized one component of the project, a 33-mile section of fencing running through the Valley. And the Department of Homeland Security is threatening to use eminent domain to seize the land.
The National Butterfly Center's land will be cut in two by the border wall—70% of the preserve will become contiguous with Mexico and difficult to access.
The government is also planning to establish a "control zone" for monitoring illegal alien entrants, which will mean clearing up to 200 yards of vegetation, specifically planted to host butterflies, on the river side of the wall. That land could be taken through eminent domain.
"The border wall is doing what General Santa Anna couldn't do 150 years ago," says Trevino-Wright. "He couldn't push the border of Mexico north of the Rio Grande River, and that is what the border wall is doing."
Fred Cavazos and his cousin Rey Anzaldua are descended from Spanish settlers who, in the 1700s, were awarded land grants in the Valley. The house where the Cavazos lives will end up on the U.S. side of the wall, but much of his land and rental properties fall on the Mexican side, making them difficult to access. He says they'll likely become worthless.
"Every time we turn around, they are trying to take land from us," says Anzaldua. "They say it's for the good of the community. But what about our own good? Who's compensating us for all this land we're losing? Nobody. They give us peanuts for it." Anzaldua says the family has had enough, and plans to fight any government efforts to take the land.
That could backfire on the Cavazos family and the Valley landowners. In 2008, when the Bush administration was building an immigration barrier in the neighboring town of Brownsville, the Department of Homeland Security exploited loopholes in the law meant to protect property owners.
Today landowners are still fighting for what they consider 'just compensation' for the land they lost a decade ago. "There are still 90 lawsuits open now," says Trevino-Wright, "because their land was taken with no compensation."
Trevino-Wright says NABA's property rights are being trampled in other ways as well.
Federal immigration law gives the agency the authority to search and patrol private property within 25 miles of the border without obtaining a warrant. "They drag tires, they have drones and helicopters, they have agents on foot, on bicycles, on dirt bikes, on horses, on four-wheelers, in SUVs, on boats on our shores," she says. "Every kind of presence you can imagine."
The government doesn't have the authority to enter and alter private property in preparation for the border wall, but Trevino-Wright says that she encountered a group of government contractors on the Butterfly Center's property clearing foliage that had been planted to host butterflies. When she asked them what they were doing there, she was told a representative from U.S. Border Patrol would contact her.
A few days later Manuel Padilla, who's the chief border patrol agent for the Rio Grande Valley, paid the Butterfly Center a visit.
"He showed up unannounced, in plain clothes, and his attache, and a uniformed border agent," says Trevino-Wright. Padilla presented plans for the border wall to Trevino-Wright, and according to her account, said the contractors would be back. This time he was accompanied by a "green uniformed presence."
"So I asked him about that later," Trevino-Wright says. "Do I understand you correctly, that you are sending armed federal agents onto private property to protect your contractors?"
NABA decided to take legal action, suing the Department of Homeland Security and Customs and Border Protection on the grounds they have exceeded their authority.
"You know, private property is supposed to be for the owner and their enjoyment and use and purpose," Trevino-Wright says. "Well, we don't enjoy that here. Our land, according to Border Patrol, is theirs to do with as they please."
The lawsuit also alleges that the government violated the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act. Although Wright doesn't believe the lawsuit will delay construction of the border wall, she hopes it will force the government to adhere to the measures meant to keep it accountable.
After the lawsuit was filed, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol sent a form letter to every property owner in the area, asking for 18 months of irrevocable access so the agency can survey the land to prepare for construction.
Many owners, including NABA and the Cavazos family, refused to sign.

[Bullheaded Texan]

Attempt to reign in 'milk madness' fails.
Can consumers tell the difference between dairy milk and its vegan alternatives, such as almond milk, cashew milk, and hemp milk?
Consumers haven't been complaining:
Sales of soy, seed, and nut milks have grown tremendously this decade.
But this trend has the dairy industry worried, and it has gone crying to the government for help.
Now senators and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are backing a ban on calling non-dairy beverages milk. They even want to stop businesses from using the term to describe animal milk that doesn't come from cows.
Democrats from Wisconsin first introduced the idea last year, with the so-called DAIRY PRIDE Act. This summer, FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb took up the cause.
Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Cory Booker (D–N.J.) tried to stop the nut-milk madness this week. They introduced an amendment to an appropriations bill that would have prohibited "the use of funds to enforce standards of identity with respect to certain food."
"No one buys almond milk under the false illusion that it came from a cow," Lee said on the Senate floor Wednesday. "They buy almond milk because it didn't come from a cow."
Lee mentioned Hampton Creek, the company behind vegan mayonnaise Just Mayo. It "was one of hundreds of increasingly popular alternative foods developed in recent decades, marketed to vegetarians, vegans, and people with food allergies or other health concerns," he said Lee. But then, as soon as Just Mayo started to win confidence, it started to attract the attention of top executives in the egg industry.
Unfortunately, their intent was not to improve quality or reduce prices. It was, instead, to enlist the government in a pattern that would chill competition.
That pressure from the American Egg Board did indeed lead the FDA to go after Hampton Creek, but the product was eventually able to keep its name with some labeling concessions. "Under a 1938 Federal law," Lee explained, the FDA has set "rules defining what does and does not qualify as a particular food product" and "anything calling its 'mayonnaise' has to have eggs in it."
The new FDA rule "would ban the use of the term 'milk' for nondairy products" because "the FDA says milk is 'lacteal secretion...obtained by the complete milking of one or more healthy cows,' and nothing else," said Lee.
Whatever their original value, these labeling requirements are outdated and they are unnecessary. The amendment I am offering would protect consumers from these 'standards of identity' requirements, and they would protect them from this kind of abuse....The role of government in the market is to protect competition, not any one competitor.
The Lee-Booker amendment would have stopped federal funds from being used to enforce "rules against products simply because of their use of a common compound name—such as where a word or phrase identifies an alternative plant or animal source," said Lee "In other words, it would protect products like 'almond milk,' 'goat cheese,' and 'gluten-free bread' from accusations of being illegally labeled."
The amendment was voted down 84–14. The 14 dissidents included three Democrats and nine Republicans, including 2016 presidential hopefuls Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Marco Rubio.
"Must all language be literal?" asks Jibran Khan at National Review:
The FDA's new stance would seem to suggest so.
The pulpy juice of coconut has been called "coconut milk" for generations, because of its appearance.
Peanut "butter" does not come from miniature cows.
Gold and silver "leaf"—used for decoration in some teas, liquors, and desserts across the world—is not made of leaves at all, but from thinly hammered foils of those metals.
People buy and use these items, and have for centuries, while fully understanding what it is they're dealing with.
Likewise, I don't know of any case in which a customer has purchased soy or almond milk and then been outraged to discover it is not cow's milk!
Wisconsin Democrat Tammy Baldwin does not agree. Speaking Wednesday, the senator called Lee's amendment "an attack on dairy farmers across the country and in my home state of Wisconsin." Taking federal action against non-dairy milk, she insisted, "ensures that when a consumer buys a dairy product, it will perform in recipes as expected."

[Bullheaded Texan]

The ACLU Won't Rest Until Every Illegal Alien Gets In.

  8/1/18 by: Ann Coulter

After all the wailing about the children streaming across our wide-open, wall-less border, there was very little media interest in the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday on this very subject. Knowing facts could interfere with their showboating displays of compassion.
 Among the facts journalists might have learned is that, although the Constitution technically gives Congress the power to write laws, it turns out our immigration laws are written by the ACLU.
 The children clamoring across our border can't be held for more than 20 days. This isn't because Congress, after hearings, debate and negotiation, passed a law. The 20-day rule was the ACLU's innovation.
 The Alien Civil Liberties Union brought endless lawsuits, resulting in a 1997 "settlement agreement" between two parties who appeared to be opposed, but were actually on the same side: the pro-open borders Janet Reno Justice Department versus the pro-open borders ACLU. No, no -- not the briar patch, ACLU! Anything but that! 
 The 20-day limit is unfortunate because, from capture to final order, an immigration proceeding takes 30 to 40 days. Illegals who are detained at the border cost the taxpayers $1,600 to remove.

 By contrast, releasing illegals, even under the much-celebrated "alternatives to detention" (ankle monitors and "community supervision"), costs U.S. taxpayers $75,000 per removal -- and most of them don't ever get removed. By some estimates, 90% don’t even show up for their hearings.
 The biggest spike in illegal border crossings came after Judge Dolly Gee, an obuma-appointed federal district court judge in Mexifornia, announced in 2015 that not only "children," but also any adults traveling with them, had to be released into our country after 20 days.

 I wonder if Judge Gee's order created any sort of incentive. Drag some unfortunate child across thousands of miles of desert and ... YOU WIN! You're in and will most likely never be caught and deported. Arrive alone and you will be detained and probably removed after 30 days.

 How insane was that ruling? It was too much even for the Ninth Circuit, which ruled that the free pass applies only to "the children." (Ch...

 If the kids can't be held for longer than 20 days and the parents can't be separated from their (alleged) children, then the only option is to release both adults and children into the U.S. As Matthew Albence, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) official, said, Judge Gee effectively imposed "catch and release" on the entire country.

Members of Congress pass laws to stop child trafficking -- and then the ACLU comes in and creates a gigantic incentive to engage in child trafficking.

 The parents are so broken up about being separated from "their" children that hundreds of them have gone home without them. Reams of articles hysterically claimed that the evil Trump administration tricked these super-involved parents into signing forms they couldn't understand!

  "Migrant parents were misled into waiving rights to family reunification, ACLU tells court" -- The Washington Post, July 26 2018

[Bullheaded Texan]

Biased Media Don't Want to Understand President Trump Voters, all 63 Million of Them!

  8/2/18 John Kass

As the tax evasion trial of former presidential campaign manager Paul Manafort began, the President Trump-hating Democratic Media Complex renewed its howls, hoping Manafort flips and gives up President Trump's head.

 Mollie Hemingway, the conservative senior editor from The Federalist, asked a question on Twitter.

"At this point, I genuinely believe reporters/pundits truly don't understand President Donald Trump, his rhetoric, his administration, etc., and aren't just pretending to be idiots," Hemingway wrote. "But my question is why they continue to be paid to cover a man they clearly don't understand in any way."

 Mollie, they're not idiots. They're journalists, highly educated, adept at social media, Washington networking and social gatherings, a class that has deferred to the establishment for generations.

 The jokes they tell at the White House correspondent's dinner and the show tunes they sing in costume at the Gridiron Dinner for the amusement of the ruling class are testament to their deference.

 They understand the game, as it was played at Versailles, as it is played in Washington. They also understand that peeling the skin off Donald Trump and trolling the almost 63 million Americans who voted for him, drives viewership and internet clicks.

 Trump calls the Washington press corps "the enemy of the people" and "fake news," and they hate him right back, calling him dangerous and stupid, and by doing so, they call his voters stupid, and worse.

All 63 million of them.

 President Trump and journalism are now locked in a battle of excess and outrage with neither acquitting themselves particularly well.

 President Trump, with his constant tweeting and needy ego, has never even tried to be "presidential."

And many if not most in the media have given up trying to be fair. Like liberal arts faculties at American colleges, much of American media begins on the left and proceeds ever leftward.

 Early in the Trump administration, independent studies showed the coverage of the president was overwhelmingly negative. It was as negative as coverage of former resident barry obuma was fawning. 

 Journalism still hasn't reckoned with its obsequious coverage of obuma. Journalism has ignored it. And that's understood, too.

 So, what is bothersome isn't that reporters and many pundits don't understand President Trump.

But what concerns me are his voters, our countrymen and women. That's half of our nation.

 And what bothers me is that I really don't think many in journalism want to understand them.

Shame on them.

 But President Trump's voters know what put him in the White House. It wasn't merely that killary clinton was a lousy candidate.

 It was that President Trump voters detested the crowd that backed her, loathed them; and those voters in turn were viewed as something to be stepped on, to be ridiculed for heresy.

 By not wanting to understand them, I worry that journalism blinds itself to something very real, critical and, in the long term, dangerous in our nation:

  A simmering resentment against the establishment in much of red state America.

And it's not going away even if President Trump goes away.

 What's clear from the anti-Trump punditry is that President Trump supporters are still detested; the working class, the suburbanites in high-tax blue states; the families in rural America, all painted with a broad brush and dismissed regularly by the pundit class as hateful, xenophobic and worse.

 Because they think their country needs borders and that illegal immigration should have been stopped years ago? Because they like tax cuts? Because they like working after being without work for years?

 Or, is it that for eight years, as they were hurting, they watched a love affair between obuma and the media?

They read the papers. They watch TV. They hear the late-night talk show comedians mocking them. They read pundits who ridicule them. They understand shame all too well.

  Cultural elites have given up on old-fashioned concepts like honor. But shame? Shame is a useful lash.

Think back on the ridicule that killary clinton, the establishment Democrat of 2016, heaped on President Trump voters when she called them "deplorables."

 It was what clinton said, that bothered those 63 million voters.

Many were shocked by President Trump's manner, by his bragging, his rude behavior, reference to his hand size, his boorishness, the way he treated women. - And still they voted for him. Why?

 Because they loathed the other side more. They loathed the establishment. They loathed the media. And their reservations about Trump were washed away by the laughter following clinton's "deplorables" line.

 Think back on that laughter, on that giggling when she talked of "deplorables." What followed were the snickers of the clique who get the joke at the expense of those who don't.

 That laughter stuck. And Trump voters took the memory of it to the polls on Election Day.

clinton won the popular vote, but Trump voters overwhelmingly gave him the Electoral College victory.

 Now, Democrats are lathered up with the trial of this B-movie villain, this Manafort, whose alleged crimes took place long before he worked a few months for President Trump.

 Let's say their Manafort fantasies come true, and he cuts a deal, and he serves President Trump to special prosecutor Robert Mueller and the orange presidential head is placed upon a platter.

Then what?

 What do you do with the millions who voted for Trump? Mock them into submission? Have them grovel and beg forgiveness before they're re-educated?

 You don't have to understand President Trump, but it's dangerous not to understand the 63 million who voted for him. They're not going into exile. They're here.

[Bullheaded Texan]

Democratic Governor Absconds to Italy.

  8/1/18 by: AAN Staff

Despite his staff's refusals to say where Gov. Phil Murphy (D-NJ) went, the secret is out. (Fox News)
 His constituents are complaining about the state's crumbling transit system.

His own party wants to strip him of gubernatorial powers. The soccer team he owns is living in dire conditions, and one of his sons has been in trouble with the law.

 What's a newly elected governor with no experience in elected office to do? He takes a vacation far, far away.

 New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy raised eyebrows last week as he embarked on a swanky 11-day trip to Italy, where he owns a $7 million home he bought during his 23-year stint at Goldman Sachs.

 The governor’s office initially declined the reveal where Murphy was going for his holiday, but NJ.com solved the mystery and reported that Italy was the destination.

 Of course, the state’s taxpayers will pick up the tab for protecting the governor while he’s on vacation, with the tab reaching as much as $100,000. **** WHY? ****

 Could’ve probably avoided all this if the Murphy administration just said he went to Italy.

Unfortunately – for Murphy – New Jersey's problems will be there when he returns.

[Bullheaded Texan]

Nation's Most Powerful Union 'Could' Back Trump? Maybe not!

 8/2/18  by: TTN Staff

The leader of the nation's most powerful union will not rule out supporting Trump in 2020. Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO clarified that the union will take a look at all candidates before endorsing.
 According to The Daily Wire:

The most powerful union leader in the United States says he hasn’t ruled out supporting Donald Trump for president in 2020.
 On Wednesday, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka spoke to Newsmax regarding support for Trump in 2020, asserting, “Well, he will be looked at. Every one will be looked at.”
 The AFL-CIO has endorsed every Democratic presidential candidate since 1956 with the exception of George McGovern in 1972.

  But Trumka allowed, “We will consider every candidate who’s running in 2020.”
Speaking of the 2016 presidential race, Trumka said, “President Trump got 3% more of our members than Romney did in 2012,  killary clinton, got 10% less of our members than obuma did in 2012.

 And some didn’t vote for President or some voted third party.”It is likely, judging from history, that this won't happen. But it looks like President Trump and his roaring economy could have a chance at receiving the union's endorsement.