Category: US Politics

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December 12, 2018 2:30 pm

Members of the “Honduran Migrant Caravan” marched to the U.S. Consulate in Tijuana on Tuesday and delivered a letter directed to President Donald Trump, demanding entry into the United States or $50,000 each to return home. They also requested the removal of military installations in Honduras.

Approximately 200 members of the caravan departed El Barretal camp in southeast Tijuana to the offices of the National Institute of Migration (INM) and later the U.S. Consulate General to hand deliver a letter outlining demands. The demonstration aimed to accelerate the process for migrants to request asylum and work in the United States. Security for the effort was provided by federal, state and municipal police, according to local reporting.

At the consulate, the migrant caravan was stopped by a team of riot police and were told to select a group of spokesperson to deliver the letter. The marchers were later directed toward two buses to transport them back to El Barretal.

Local news outlets later received and printed a copy of the letter.

In sum, the letter requested passage into the U.S., noting they were fleeing poverty, insecurity, and oppression caused by the administration of Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez. They also decried economic, political, and military interference from the U.S. throughout Central America over the past century.

The letter states that if the U.S. wants migration to stop, it should remove its security and economic interests from the region, which includes 13 military installations. If entry is not granted, the migrants seek $50,000 USD each to return home. They also asked for the removal of the sitting Honduran president.

The letter is signed, “The Honduran Caravan Migrants,” and set a 72-hour time limit for a response.

Several demonstrators carried signs in English. Some read:

You got it wrong Trump, we asked for jobs you responded with weapons. If asking for work is troublesome than I’m totally confused.

Don’t close your door employers. One day you will need me then I will remember the rejection. Entrepreneurs don’t turn your back on us. You know we both are the backbone of society.

One march organizer, Alfonso Guerreo Ulloa, offered comment on the $50,000 figure.

“It may seem like a lot of money to you … But it is a small sum compared to everything the United States has stolen from Honduras,” according to a Fox News report.

The Fox report also notes that a second letter was marched to the consulate, specifically asking for an uptick in daily asylum claims processed from 50 to 300.

This article was updated to include additional content.

Robert Arce is a retired Phoenix Police detective with extensive experience working Mexican organized crime and street gangs. Arce has worked in the Balkans, Iraq, Haiti, and recently completed a three-year assignment in Monterrey, Mexico, working out of the Consulate for the United States Department of State, International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Program, where he was the Regional Program Manager for Northeast Mexico (Coahuila, Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon, Durango, San Luis Potosi, Zacatecas.) You can follow him on Twitter. He can be reached at robertrarce@gmail.com

When yet another Christian celebrity fails to give a straight answer on a hot-button moral issue, it reveals a deeper problem.

Back in September, an article in Rolling Stone announced, “A Christian Singer is Bigger than Drake and Arianna Grande this Week.” That singer is Lauren Daigle, the Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter whose brilliant voice, soulful style, and hope-filled lyrics has won fans well beyond the Contemporary Christian genre. She’s becoming a regular on talk shows and in national publications, and has officially earned the coveted status of “crossover artist” at just 27 years old.

But with broader appeal comes a challenge: maintaining one’s identity, not as a “Christian singer,” but as a Christian. Sadly, it’s a challenge many Christian celebrities have struggled to handle.

Last week during an interview with iHeart radio, Daigle was asked, given her recent appearance on the Ellen DeGeneres show, whether she believes homosexuality is a sin.

“I can’t honestly answer that,” Daigle replied. “I have too many people that I love, and they are homosexuals.”

She went on to explain that since she’s not God, she can’t say one way or another. Instead, people should just “read the Bible and find out” for themselves.

Now let me say from the beginning here I understand how hard this high-pressure situation can be.  For a young woman like Daigle with a skyrocketing career, calling homosexuality a sin in a public forum could mean closing a lot of doors and alienating a lot of fans. There’s a real cost that comes with taking a stand for the Christian view of sex and marriage. Deciding to pay that price in a split second with a microphone shoved in your face is something better-trained theologians and pastors have failed to do.

But this whole story reveals something else—the deep crisis of authority plaguing evangelicalism right now. First, we should be past the point of answering this question, because the Christian view of sex and marriage should be so clear and our commitment to it should be so well-known by now that there should be no longer any point in asking the question!

The reason it still comes up is that too many evangelicals, like mainline Protestant liberals before them, have sounded an uncertain note on this topic. I’m not just talking about those very few pastors and writers who’ve reinvented their faith to accommodate LGBT theology. I’m talking about the epidemic fear to even broach the topic in so many evangelical churches and ministries, and how we’ve avoided the topic especially with our young people, instead wrongly catechizing them to look to their emotions for truth instead.

Neither the Bible nor nearly two millennia of Christian teaching are at any level ambiguous about homosexual behavior. Numerous passages in the Old and New Testaments condemn it, along with any sexual behavior outside of God’s good design for marriage between a man and a woman. No one in Christian history ever doubted this until about five minutes ago. There is no room for disagreement on the point.

For Daigle or any other Christian for that matter to publicly say, “I don’t know whether homosexuality is a sin” is like saying “I don’t know whether stealing or worshipping false gods are sins.”

And that brings up a second angle on the church-wide authority problem we face. When theological training is de-prioritized and even avoided, then our celebrities become our experts. Yes, Daigle should know better. But we should know better than to hold celebrities up as theological authorities.

And finally, we need to ask ourselves: How would we respond in Lauren Daigle’s situation? You might think, well, I’m not a celebrity. But it’s not just celebrities that will be faced with this question in awkward situations.

What will you say when someone with the power to seriously damage your career asks you what you think about a culturally popular sin? For that matter, what will you say at Christmas dinner when that one relative—maybe a relative who identifies as gay—asks you the same question?

There are no easy answers in that moment. But that doesn’t mean there are no right answers.

John Stonestreet is President of The Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview and BreakPoint co-host.

Editor’s Note: This piece was originally published by BreakPoint.

(CNSNews.com) – Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) said Tuesday that U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents used tear gas 126 times against illegal aliens since 2012, including 79 times between 2012 and 2016 under President Obama.

“On November 25, 1,000 migrants in the caravan ignored and overwhelmed Mexican law enforcement in an attempt to breach our border at port of entry San Diego. Agitators in the group rushed the port, hurtling rocks, bottles, debris, and other projectiles at your officers guarding a fence,” Grassley said while questioning CBP Commissioner Kevin McAleenan during a CBP oversight hearing.

“In response, the agents deployed non-lethal tear gas to control the agitators and closed the port of entry. As you know, Commissioner, this incident has been criticized and mischaracterized by the media and others, but the use of tear gas isn’t unprecedented,” Grassley said.

He noted that while the number of times CBP agents used firearms decreased since 2012 to a record law in 2018, the number of attacks on CBP agents has increased.

“CBP deployed tear gas a total of 126 times since 2012. That includes 79 times between 2012 and 2016 under President Obama. Nobody wants to see children and women hurt. Nobody wants to see migrants, travelers, or even our agents hurt,” the senator said.

“That’s why I’m happy to hear that your agency’s use of firearm decreased 69 percent since 2012 to a record low this year. Unfortunately, assaults against your personnel has increased 45 percent to 847 times in fiscal year 2017, so I want you to give me—give you an opportunity to explain to the committee and the American people what happened on November 25. So four parts, and I’m going to read all at once so you don’t have to answer short questions,” he said.

“Who initiated the conflict? Did your agency intentionally target women and children? What were the agents’ options, and did this incident deviate from standard protocol, and is there an investigation?” Grassley asked.

 

McAleenan explained what happened when Border Patrol agents confronted migrants who pushed past Mexican federal police on Nov. 25 and tried to breach the U.S. border.

“November 25th, we faced a dynamic and challenging situation in Tijuana – no question. We had over 1,000 migrants who were marching toward the Mexican side of the port of entry, El Chaparral, and pushed through the federal police, Mexican federal police lines there and then started really a chaotic attempt to enter the U.S. through both the port of entry on the Mexican side and then ultimately through different areas and weak points along the fence line in San Diego sector,” McAleenan said.

“This was a 2 ½-mile stretch of border that large groups attempted to penetrate at multiple points over the course of about a four or five-hour stretch. Importantly, due to the help of the Department of Defense, who put barriers in place in the southbound lanes very quickly after we saw this group forming and push past Mexican federal police, were able to shut down access through the southbound lanes in the United States, so they were deterred and turned around,” he said.

“Unfortunately, they then sought weak points along the fence line, and throughout the next five hours, we saw large groups entering the United States through weak points in the legacy fence that’s actually being replaced right now. Thanks to the investments in fiscal year 17. We’ve already built 33 out of those 40 miles. We’re putting the rest in place now. They were assaultive in their behavior. They threw rocks at agents.”

McAleenan said one Border Patrol agent has to have surgery for a dislocated kneecap as a result of rock attacks by migrants.

“We had an agent who now has to have surgery for a dislocated patella. He was hit by a rock during this event, and the agents were in challenging spaces. First the Tijuana River channel, where you’ve seen a lot of photography and video of over 500 migrants who were seeking to enter en masse through that area, and in the border zone, where we have a primary fence and a border fence where there’s very little room to maneuver or back up,” he said.

“So our agents were in a difficult situation. To answer your specific questions, who initiated this contact, it was initiated by some of the agitators and lead organizers of this group. Whether women and children were intentionally targeted with less lethal gas and pepper spray, absolutely not. The agitators who were throwing rocks were the ones targeted,” the commissioner said.

“Whether this was within protocols – yes, in fact in our use of force continuum, pepper spray and CS gas are authorized to address assaultive behavior or even act of resistance, which was certainly occurring in this case. And is there an investigative review? Yes,” he said.

McAleenan said CBP has a use of force review board and a review of the Border Patrol agents’ use of force “is being pursued under the auspices of San Diego sector, requested by Chief Rodney Scott, who oversees the agents involved with support of our National Office of Professional Responsibility and our Law Enforcement Safety and Compliance Division.”

The commissioner said “it’s remarkable” that Border Patrol agents “were able to resolve the situation without a serious injury to any of the migrants, without a serious breach of the border by a large group,” and it was “done very professionally.” He said CBP will “take any lessons learned from this review and apply them in the future.”

 

The first test of wills between leaders of split government arrives three weeks early, and it might produce nothing other than a government shutdown. Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer will meet with Donald Trump this morning to discuss the remainder of the 2019 budget, which still has not formally funded the departments of Homeland Security, State, and Justice. Trump has adamantly demanded $5 billion in funding for his border wall, and Pelosi and Schumer are just as determined not to give it to him:

Trump is scheduled to meet in the Oval Office on Tuesday morning with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer less than two weeks before a deadline to pass legislation to keep the Department of Homeland Security and several other agencies funded and open beyond 11:59 p.m. on Dec. 21. …

The high-stakes meeting was delayed one week as Washington paused for the funeral of former President George H.W. Bush. But those somber events only delayed the inevitable: a partisan clash and public relations fight that will pit Trump’s demand for $5 billion for a southern border barrier against the Democrats’ staunch opposition to one penny above a $1.6 billion border security proposal in a Senate-passed spending bill.

Schumer and Pelosi ramped up the rhetoric in a Monday statement, saying Trump “knows full well that his wall proposal does not have the votes to pass the House and Senate, and should not be an obstacle to a bipartisan agreement.”

Roll Call argues that Trump’s legal woes undermine his position, “complicating his talks” with the Democratic leaders. Why that should matter is not entirely clear. If anything, Trump’s more likely to stick to his guns on immigration policy and the wall to keep his base engaged; moderates aren’t going to flock to him under these circumstances if he backs down. Besides, Trump’s leverage in this case remains the same — the Senate and his own ability to veto a budget that doesn’t fund his priorities.

Trump raised the curtain on this morning’s meeting by declaring on Twitter that he’d get the wall built, with or without Pelosi. If Congress won’t provide specific funding for the bill, then Trump said he’d have the Pentagon do it:

…..I look forward to my meeting with Chuck Schumer & Nancy Pelosi. In 2006, Democrats voted for a Wall, and they were right to do so. Today, they no longer want Border Security. They will fight it at all cost, and Nancy must get votes for Speaker. But the Wall will get built…

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 11, 2018

….People do not yet realize how much of the Wall, including really effective renovation, has already been built. If the Democrats do not give us the votes to secure our Country, the Military will build the remaining sections of the Wall. They know how important it is!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 11, 2018

That might be one reason that Trump reversed himself on the military budget this week. Trump had complained before about spending at the Pentagon, but now the president has agreed to back Defense Secretary James Mattis on getting a budget boost:

President Donald Trump has told Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to submit a $750 billion budget proposal for fiscal 2020, in a reversal from his pledge to trim defense spending, two people familiar with the budget negotiations have told POLITICO.

The $750 billion figure emerged from a meeting Tuesday at the White House among Trump, Mattis and the Republican chairmen of the House and Senate Armed Services committees, both people said.

“It’s 750. Secretary Mattis secured that over lunch with the president,” an administration official said of the meeting, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a figure that has not yet been announced. Mattis was joined by Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-Texas). “That’s the top line.”

That would dwarf the $733 billion budget proposal Mattis and other top military leaders have been fighting to preserve and would represent a stunning about-face for a president who recently called the fiscal 2019 top line of $716 billion for defense spending “crazy.” In October, Trump said the defense figure for 2020 would be $700 billion, a roughly 5 percent cut in line with decreases planned for other agencies.

Hmm. That’s a $34 billion increase from FY2019, an increase of 4.3% in a single year. It’s also easy to fit a $25 billion wall in that increase and still have some left over for other military priorities. Could Trump try to shift funds from military spending on the basis of national security? If Congress doesn’t earmark all the funds for specific purposes — a practice that has gone out of style, thanks to congressional corruption around pork-barrel politics — then it’s arguably possible, although that would touch off a huge fight with the House.

Expect that topic to come up when Donald meets Nancy and Chuck this morning. The two Democrats can’t afford to give Trump a win today, and Trump can’t afford any more delays on his border wall. An end-around through the Pentagon might be the only resolution for the standoff … for Trump, anyway.

These people are nuts.

Via Twitchy:

Because climate change caused by excess carbon emissions is killing the planet and all, billionaire businessman, philanthropist and possible 2020 presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg helped finance this public art project that flew in giant hunks of ice from Greenland to London so people can watch them melt:

They want you to come and touch the ice and feel the global warming in action:

Keep reading…

There’s currently a holy jihad against the song “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” Written in 1944, the holiday classic is currently verboten because it includes the line, “Say, what’s in this drink?” — apparently, to some, a sign that the male figure in the holiday tune was going to drug and rape the female figure.

I wasn’t alive 74 years ago, but then as now drugging women and then raping them was beyond frowned upon. Many things in gender relations changed in the intervening three-quarters of a century but I’m fairly confident that isn’t one of them.

Nor is it a predatory anthem where a man is constantly importuning a woman desperately, another argument used against the standard. Holiday favorites generally aren’t built on such a foundation, and you would hope people would realize this. Alas, no.

Radio stations across the country have taken it off their playlists. An indoor lacrosse team in Saskatchewan has made news for the indignation they’ve caused by showing support for the song, which is a sign of just how contentious the issue is because nobody cares about indoor lacrosse anywhere it’s played, much less Saskatchewan.

But, hey, if you need to hear “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” this Christmas but the Dean Martin version has been taken off of your local radio station’s playlist, here’s the Holderness Family with a 2018 version of the song:

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“Baby it’s cold outside” 2.0

😆😂🤣🤣🤣🤣

But, seriously😏#MondayMotivation pic.twitter.com/45uQSmSzGF

— 🇺🇸🇨🇺🇺🇸MamaReg🇺🇸🇨🇺🇺🇸 (@MamaReg2) December 10, 2018

That about sums it up.

Most of the sturm und drink has to do with these four lines:

“So really I’d better scurry (Beautiful please don’t hurry).

“Well maybe just a half a drink more (I’ll put some records on while I pour).

“The neighbors might think (Baby it’s bad out there).

“Say what’s in this drink? (No cabs to be had out there)”

Again, let me reiterate that date rape drugs weren’t culturally acceptable in 1944. There weren’t misogynist, cisgendered white husbands laughing along with that and going, “Oh, that Dean Martin. He’s joking around about putting a barbiturate into her drink. Oh, ho ho. That cad.”

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Nor is the male figure a predator, which is another reason being given for banning the song.

“People might say, ‘Oh, enough with that #MeToo,’ but if you really put that aside and read the lyrics, it’s not something that I would want my daughter to be in that kind of a situation,” said a host at WDOK-FM in Cleveland, the first major station to ban the song.

“The tune might be catchy, but let’s maybe not promote that sort of an idea,” the host said.

I didn’t think that “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” needed to be contextualized for the modern era, but apparently I’m wrong. So, here’s an abridged version.

I don’t think there’s any possible explanation of the song that doesn’t involve two grown adults. Both — I reiterate, both — want to be with one another, as can be understood by the context of the song; even the female parts are sung by someone who wants to be involved (“I wish I knew how … to break this spell,” the female protagonist sings).

So, what’s going on here? The female protagonist simply wants the male protagonist to do a little bit of pursuing. She’s not trying to get away. If that were the case, trust me, she’d find a cab. And that’s where the joke is in the parody version. It’s a guy who can’t take the hint. He doesn’t know how to pursue. There shouldn’t be anything inappropriate with pursuit as long as the individual being pursued is interested.

But that’s not what political correctness is saying in this day and age. Instead, they want the art of romance to look something like this:

All I’m saying is that if a Saskatchewan-based indoor lacrosse team wants me to go to the effort of protesting against them, this is what it ought to embrace. Then, I’d gladly stand in the glacial conditions outside some godforsaken Saskatoon arena with an angry placard, no matter how cold it was outside.

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He won’t get his weapons back.

Via Ammo Land:

On the 2nd of December, 2018, a 25-year-old man was at home with his girlfriend and a pit bull dog they were fostering. All of them were lying on a bed at about 6 p.m. The dog attacked the man. The man attempted to move the pit bull off of the bed. Instead, the dog bit the man on the left arm, and would not let go. From bostonglobe.com:

In a desperate attempt to end the attack, the man reached for a 9mm handgun he had in his nightstand and shot the dog, police said.

“The single shot stopped the attack and the dog died shortly afterwards,” police said in the statement. “The man is fully licensed to have firearms in Massachusetts.”

The man was rushed to Cape Cod Hospital to be treated for his injuries, police said.

Police took the man’s handgun, a 12-gauge shotgun, and ammunition found in the home “for safekeeping.” The dead pit bull was taken away by Yarmouth animal control officers, police said.

It is unknown if the legal gun owner will be charged in the case.

Massachusetts is the only state in the nation that still requires all firearms in a home to be locked up when not in use.[…]

The U.S. Supreme Court has not heard a gun storage case since Heller, in 2008. No other state has a gun storage law as restrictive as Massachusetts. But San Francisco and other California cities have stricter gun storage laws dating from 2007 and later.

The Ninth Circuit upheld the San Francisco law. In the Ninth Circuit ruling a judge said that modern safes and gun locks can be opened so quickly as to not interfere with the right to self defense in the home. From sfgate.com:

Because trigger locks and modern gun safes can be opened quickly, a stored or locked handgun “may be readily accessed in case of an emergency,” Judge Sandra Ikuta said in the appeals court’s ruling.

The Ninth Circuit judge said the law serves a government function of reducing gun related injuries and deaths resulting from an unlocked handgun in the home.

Keep reading…