"PELOSI AND SCHUMER SHOW THEIR COLORS" - David Limbaugh: Dec 14, 2018; https://townhall.com/columnists/davidlimbaugh/2018/12/14/pelosi-and-schumer-show-their-colors-n2537458 [AS I SEE IT: If you simply watched what the media chose to show of this meeting in the Oval Office earlier this week, you would have only seen what the Democrats wanted to highlight from the confrontation. Unfortunately, very few of us has the time to actually watch the entire meeting as this article and so only saw what the media highlighted. President Trump took a chance that this would happen but the alternative would have been to merely have reporters summarize what they heard, which would of course have been similar as the Democrats' talking points. As is too often the case these days, we again were given an example of why the mainstream press can no longer be trusted to report things without editorializing it in some way. P.S. - Be sure to check out the article referenced at the end of this article that explains why the wall needs to be built. P.S.S. - It's astounding that the disagreement is over about $4 billion dollars! Much more is wasted on pork-barrel projects to appease special interest groups in our multi-trillion dollar federal budtet. It only points out how the issue for the Democrats is not funding the wall. Incredible!- Stan]
---------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Contrary to liberal media reporting, the Oval Office meeting with President Trump, Democratic House leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was a win for Trump, both in substance and in tone. The meeting gave people an opportunity to see who fears transparency, who's misrepresenting his/her position and who is being the aggressor in the border debate, and it's not Donald Trump.
Instead of listening to the media's version, watch the video. President Trump set the tone of the meeting, and it was decidedly cordial, saying it was a great honor to have Pelosi and Schumer there and acknowledging that they've worked very hard on various bipartisan initiatives, such as criminal justice reform and the farm bill. Trump then turned to "the wall," saying Republicans support it and he would like to avoid a government shutdown over the issue while acknowledging that it is a very difficult issue because Republicans and Democrats are "on very opposite sides."
When Trump surrendered the floor to Pelosi, she immediately invoked the subject of a government shutdown, saying the American people recognize that we must keep the government open -- as if that, and not border security, were the overriding issue -- and warning, "You should not have a Trump shutdown." Notice the blatantly calculating way she spun this as a "Trump shutdown" rather than a possible impasse that could lead to a government shutdown. Also note: Pelosi drew first blood, and it was deliberate.
After a minor skirmish over whether Trump should initiate a bill in the House that would be sure to fail in the Senate, Pelosi, playing to the camera, said, "We're here to have a conversation in a prayerful way, so I don't think we should have a debate in front of the press." Pelosi knows that a House bill could not survive a Democratic filibuster in the Senate, yet she continued to press Trump to offer a bill.
Schumer began his remarks by insulting Trump, saying The Washington Post gave him "a whole lot of Pinocchios" on the wall and stressing that Democrats have "a disagreement ... not on border security but on the wall." He chided Trump for calling for a shutdown 20 times, ignoring that Trump had specifically said in this meeting that he does not want that.
Then a frustrated Pelosi said they needed to call a halt to the discussion because they had come in to the meeting in good faith to discuss with Trump how they could keep the government open. Again, Trump was not the one talking about a shutdown; he was talking about the wall and border security, the former being indispensable to the latter. Like Pelosi, Schumer said they should "debate in private," while Pelosi was insultingly mumbling, "We have taken this conversation to a place that is devoid, frankly, of fact." In other words, "You're lying, President Trump, because you won't agree to our partisan version of reality."
Schumer insisted that border security is possible without a wall and that experts say a wall would be wasteful -- implying, with a straight face, that the Democratic leadership can get exercised over the expenditure of government money. Pelosi lamented again that they were having the debate in public after having come in to the meeting in good faith, and Trump rightly noted, "It's not bad, Nancy. It's called transparency." So it was Nancy's "good-faith" expectation that Trump would just sit back and take their insults and not discuss the issue that could lead to the dreaded shutdown?
Pelosi responded, "It's not transparency when we're not stipulating to a set of facts." Are you kidding me? Unless you agree with Democrats on the facts, the discussion can't be transparent? This is the same logic by which leftists ban expression of opinions that don't agree with theirs. I hope people are paying attention.
Just as the mood was beginning to soften, Schumer again turned to Trump and accused him of wanting to shut the government down, and again Trump denied it. It was only after repeated haranguing that Trump indicated he was tired of playing semantic games and said that if they want to put the shutdown on him, fine, he would be willing to shut down the government if he could not get the wall.
How can anyone believe that the Democrats support border security -- wall or no wall -- when they have repeatedly broken their promises to work with Republicans on it, when they demonize all opponents of illegal immigration and amnesty as racists, when they oppose all reasonable measures to guard the border, and when many of them actually advocate the elimination of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement?
After the meeting, Pelosi and Schumer continued vilifying Trump, with Schumer describing Trump's behavior in the meeting as a "temper tantrum" and Pelosi telling colleagues, "It goes to show you: You get into a tinkle contest with a skunk, you get tinkle all over you. ... It's like a manhood thing for him -- as if manhood could ever be associated with him."
It's undeniable that Pelosi and Schumer initiated the aggressive exchanges, that they personally insulted Trump and were rude and condescending to him, that they openly objected to transparency, and that they misrepresented their own position on border security.
Say what you want about Trump, but he very honestly said that he was determined to get a border wall, that he preferred to have this discussion in front of the entire world and that he would be willing for the government to shut down over it. Pelosi and Schumer are just as willing to shut down the government over it but unwilling to be honest about it.
I applaud President Trump for bringing this issue front and center and exposing the fraudulent and reckless position of the Democratic leadership on border security.
[italics and colored emphasis mine]
"Why Our Country Needs the Wall, and Now" - Ted Budd / @RepTedBudd / December 13, 2018 / https://www.dailysignal.com/2018/12/13/why-our-country-needs-the-wall-and-now
"... That’s why it is critical that we stop the inflow. Doing so will allow us to focus on reforms that prioritize legal immigration and reward law-abiding people for doing the right thing. And we know how to do this: a border wall, and ending catch and release.
Catch and release is the natural result of a series of loopholes in current U.S. asylum laws that encourage lawbreaking. Because of various legal settlements and the unintended consequences of a 2008 law, when families come to the U.S. to claim asylum, they are released out of legal custody into the country to await a hearing. Many never show for their hearings, and simply disappear into America.
Armed with this knowledge, illegal immigrants game the system to get into the U.S. and plant roots, undermining our laws. Fixing this and making it easier for border agents to send illegal immigrants home will discourage illegal immigration and encourage people to immigrate the right way.
We need to pair this with a border wall, so that illegal immigrants cannot physically cross our border in the first place. And we know border walls work. When Israel constructed a barrier along its southern border, it cut down on illegal immigration by 99 percent. Along the U.S.-Mexico border, in the places where we currently have strong barriers, illegal crossings have also been drastically reduced..."
| -------------------------------------------- | |
|