Postal bureaucratic mess in Chicago gives immigration excuse to deny man

Let’s hear it for the U.S. Postal Service, which at least is willing to admit it screwed up in its efforts to deliver to a Chicago-based immigration office in a timely manner a New York man’s application to remain in the United States.

Admitting their error

The result, as reported by the New York Times, is that the man who had been in this country under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, has been denied the legal permission to remain in this country and is now expected to leave on his own – or else face deportation.

A RESULT THAT may well please the ideologue nitwits who think serious reform of our immigration policies is anything that results in more deportations.

But this particular situation, even when one takes into account the fact that in this Age of Trump officials are looking for any way they can to encourage people to leave, is little more than an embarrassment to those who believe in the “American Way” of life.

It definitely is evidence that Trump-ites don’t have a clue how to “Make America Great Again,” and most likely have no real interest in doing so.

This particular incident involved a New York area resident who back in mid-September sent through certified mail his paperwork to gain an extension on the status by which he has been able to live openly in this country in recent years.

Not their problem. Or so they say!

ALL THROUGH THE DACA program that was the creation of now-former President Barack Obama and meant to let people who had lived the bulk of their lives in this country remain here – even if their immigration status and circumstances of their arrivals here were less than pristine.

But current President Donald Trump has made it clear that DACA is one of the many initiatives of Obama that have to go – as though Trump is determined to have the legacy of the man who erased Obama from the national conscience.

Maybe the ideologues think they can pretend that Obama never really existed, and that the electorate of this country never was deluded enough to pick someone so unlike themselves to be our nation’s chief executive?

Trump types might be pleased, but that's all

In this particular case, the application was mailed from New York on Sept. 14. It needed to be received by a regional processing warehouse of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office by Oct. 5.

RECORDS SHOW THAT the piece of mail made it to the Chicago-area by Sept. 16, then from Sept. 17-19 was “in transit to destination.” At which point, it sort of disappeared until Oct. 4 when it was “on its way” and ultimately delivered on Oct. 6.

But if you note the dates and consult a calendar, you’ll see his application that was sent nearly a month in advance was received one day too late.

Which is the reason immigration officials officially gave for rejecting the application. Not because of the merits of the case, but because of the postal delay – which Postal Service officials admitted to the New York Times was a problem on their end.

It should not have taken anywhere near so long for that piece of mail to get from New York to Chicago. But immigration officials are claiming that’s not their problem, and they’re not about to do anything to resolve this case in a responsible manner.

Some determined to erase Obama from memory

IT MAKES ME think of whenever conservative ideologues complain about government bureaucracy and try channeling Ronald Reagan by saying “government IS the problem.”

They actually don’t care. They like it if bureaucratic bungles wind up advancing their ideological desires. In this case, they’d probably think it just that a mail delay were to cause someone who has lived the bulk of his life here and is more than capable of making contributions to our society were to be given the boot.

All of which is such an embarrassment to those of us in the majority who’d like to see the so-called “American ideals” implemented in ways that actually benefit our society.

Otherwise, we wind up looking buffoonish and mean-spirited – if we’re willing to let a Postal Service glitch determine the outcome of someone’s life. That’s most definitely not something that “Makes America Great Again.”

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Do we have a DACA agreement? Only time will tell if our pols can work

I stumbled across an item Thursday on the Internet saying that President Donald J. Trump DID come to an agreement on the fate of those young people brought into this country without valid visas when they were children.

Will the fight prevail?

Trump, it seems, is willing to let them stay in the United States, provided that THEY do the actual labor of erecting the border wall along the U.S./Mexico boundary that the president has long pledged to his ideological nitwit backers.

OBVIOUSLY, THAT IS parody. But in some ways, it sounds like the kind of absurd line of logic that prevails whenever anything related to federal immigration policy or our nation’s relations with Latin American nations comes up in discussion.

This rhetoric got stepped up in recent days when the leaders of the Democratic caucuses said THEY had reached agreement with Trump to get him to back off of talk that the people who have only been in this country because of the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals program will not face deportation come next year.

That program is the Barack Obama initiative that was meant to make it possible for these young people who have lived the bulk of their lives in the United States to continue to exist here openly and contribute to our society.

But Trump said about a month ago that he wants to do away with DACA because, of course, it was an Obama initiative. And that makes it very bad, particularly in the minds of the xenophobic twits amongst us who think that immigration policy reform ought to solely be an increase in the number of deportations of non-Anglo individuals.

Have Pelosi and Schumer ...

SO I HAVE no doubt that those people are not grossly offended by the thought that Trump would even contemplate anything other than deportation. Because what they’re hoping for is the six-month time period for Congress to address the issue to pass with nothing happening – thereby making deportations inevitable!

It’s also why I’m not surprised that Trump, himself, is now saying he has NO DEAL with Democrats on this issue. Trying to make it seem that Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., are telling tall tales (if not outright lying) in saying that a deal has been reached.

Yet the Pelosi/Schumer talk has too much detail too it to be mere exaggeration or wishful thinking.

... seriously reached a DACA deal with Trump?

Whereas even the Republican political opposition talk in response has a bearing of truth – in that GOPers are saying that Congress will have to approve any deal before it can take effect.

MEANING THAT IT could easily be rejected by the same majority-Republican Congress that went out of its way to ignore serious immigration reform efforts all throughout the Barack Obama presidency.

Which is why I’m sure the ideologues amongst us probably fantasize about some version of the parody blurb I alluded to – that the young people wishing to remain in the country they call home will be put to work as laborers.

Just as how some of those same ideologues like to claim all these “foreigners” coming to this country are really hurting the U.S. black population – taking away jobs they could be doing.

As though their vision of our society is one where black people are still picking cotton and doing other hard labor for the economic benefit of the remainder of society.

WHICH IS AN outlandish concept for our modern-day society, if not an offensive one. How could anyone seriously have such a thought bopping about in their brains?

TRUMP: What does he really think?

Then again, the debate over immigration manages to bring out the worst in some of us, and the desperate and outlandish sides of many of us.

So as to the question of “Do we have a DACA agreement?,” I can’t even begin to offer an answer that would be anything other than a wild guess.

We can only hope that sense and decency prevail. Although in this Age of Trump, there are those to whom absurdity and offensive behavior is their wildest dream come true.

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Does Illinois/Indiana border region personify our national partisan split?

I’m wondering if the politically partisan split our nation is currently engaged in during this Age of Trump can best be visualized by a very local place – that area at the city’s far southeast corner where Illinois and Indiana converge.
 

MADIGAN: Has Ill. backing DACA lawsuit

One venturing down to places like the East Side or Hegewisch neighborhoods might not think there’s anything special about State Line Road. Standing there, one might not think there’s anything terribly different about Chicago versus Hammond, Ind.

YET THE TWO states do take such differing approaches to the issues that confront our society these days. One almost has to feel sorry for someone with the misfortune to be born on the “wrong” side (based on their ideological leanings) of the street.

Illinois, because of Chicago’s dominance over the state, is solidly in the Democratic Party column. While Indiana’s major city (Indianapolis) doesn’t come close to outweighing the partisan interests of the rest of the state, allowing the Hoosier State to be solidly Republican.

Take the whole debate over immigration, particularly with whether President Donald J. Trump is in any way justified in wanting to do away with the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals program.

Illinois this week became one of 17 states to join in a federal lawsuit challenging the president’s authority to do away with the program that was created by former President Barack Obama as a reaction to Congress’ refusal to do anything to address immigration reform.

 

DONNELLY: Pressure to pick Trump over Dems

INDIANA CERTAINLY ISN’T amongst the states supporting this legal action, which our state’s governor, Bruce Rauner, also is questioning the legitimacy of.

But the Illinois attorney general, Lisa Madigan, is on board, thereby putting the official muscle of the state behind the legal action – of which none of the other so-called “Rust Belt” states are behind and only one other Midwestern state (Iowa) is supportive of.

Now before anybody argues that the Illinois House speaker’s daughter is overstepping her legal authority by getting Illinois involved in such a lawsuit, it should be noted the heavy share (nearly one-third) of Chicago that is Latino ethnic origins, and the heavy share of Chicago residents in general whose ethnic ties are to another nation and remain strong.

 

RAUNER: Theoretical stance misguided?

It could be said that Lisa Madigan would be behaving negligently if she didn’t get involved. The real question may be why Rauner won’t support her. His argument about immigration being federal would be stronger if Congress were actually willing to take on the issue.

NOW ONE FACTOR to consider is that the portions of Indiana just across the state line share the same heavy Latino and heavy immigrant characteristics of Chicago. But those people (who really ought to consider coming over to Illinois) are going to be aware of their political people not willing to fight for the issue.

One of their senators is Joe Donnelly, a Democrat from South Bend. Yet he is going to be solidly in the Trump-backing camp, regardless of what he may actually think about the issue.

The Washington Post on Thursday reported how Donnelly is one of a few Dem officials facing re-election in 2018 from Republican-leaning states who are getting local voter pressure to support Trump’s stances on issues.

Donnelly reportedly has been told by many constituents how they will turn on him should he not support the president (whom Illinois overwhelmingly rejected in 2016 but Indiana solidly supported in the Electoral College).

SO ANYBODY WHO’S perceiving Democratic Party plots to undermine the president must keep in mind that the Democratic Party itself won’t be fully united in its presidential opposition.

 

TRUMP: Giving rise to our national divisions

If activists backing immigration issues think this will be a key to a successful Trump Dump come the next election, it might not be as solid as they wish it to be.

I don’t doubt there is a segment of our society that views Trump’s ignorance on so many issues and views it as a plus because it matches up with their own level of vacuousness or bias on certain issues.

The sad part is that all we have to do to see this difference of opinion in action is to venture to our own city’s southeastern boundary – provided you can put up with the aroma from the nearby oil refinery in Whiting.

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DACA ‘repeal’ the kind of thing an un-American ‘police state’ would try to do

Just as President Donald Trump chose to let us know about his pardon for the Arizona sheriff who targets Latinos for harassment just as Hurricane Harvey was beginning its devastation of Texas, Trump chose a moment when it was likely few were paying attention to say he’s going to take a whack at another measure related to our nation’s flawed immigration policies.

TRUMP: Hiding behind Harvey, No. Korea?

This one is the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, the program that former President Barack Obama tried creating to allow those brought when young by parents who didn’t follow the formalities of obtaining visas to permit them to live in this country openly.

TRUMP WENT THROUGH a campaign for the presidency threatening to overturn this particular measure, which he can do because Congress never did anything to legitimize Obama’s actions. Thereby giving Trump the authority to repeal – if he so desires.

On Sunday, he said that’s what he plans to do – although he made a point of saying there will be a six-month time period before anyone starts trying to enforce this change. Which would mean scouring the nation for all these young people who have been raised in this society, only to now be told they’re “foreign” and need to “Get Out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Doing it on Sunday means it occurred when many people were at the heart of preparations for the Labor Day holiday weekend. If they were paying attention to public events and the news cycle, it was likely that the Wrath of Harvey continues to dominate their mindset, along with the reports that North Korea is stepping up its own nuclear missile activity.

OBAMA: His DACA to be no more?

Trump, as I see it, wants to smack about the Latino population, but doesn’t want to be called out on his nonsense. So he picks these inopportune times to make his statements – in hopes he won’t have to deal with backlash.

WHICH IN MY mindset makes Trump little more than a petty tyrant – if not just a twerp or a mental midget. Although perhaps I should apologize to “little people” for implying that the half-wit currently occupying the White House is in any way similar to themselves.

Anyway, Trump is now moving forward with the DACA repeal – which is what had the Democratic Party and immigration activists outrages on Monday. My own email box was loaded with the appeals from various groups and officials wanting to be sure I was aware of what the president had done.

ROMNEY: Reminiscent of 'self deportation?'

They also want my money to help pay for the lobbying efforts they plan to engage in during coming months to try to strike down the president – mostly by getting Congress to do something that would legitimize what Obama tried to do and thwart Trump’s desire to erase anything Obama did.

Why the Republican-led Congress that refused to do anything to back Obama would now suddenly want to do so is a mystery. Which may make the activist efforts a moot point.

ALTHOUGH THE TIME period being offered up by Trump is somewhat curious. Is he going to claim he’s offering up a bit of compassion? Just as he lamely tried claiming his Joe Arpaio pardon being timed to Hurricane Harvey increased the chances people were paying attention?

In this case, is Trump taking on some of that “self deportation” nonsense that former presidential hopeful Mitt Romney tried spewing back in 2012? Does he really think that hundreds of thousands of young people will suddenly return to a nation whose daily lives they’re relatively unfamiliar with?

Of course, when it comes to immigration policy, the nativist element of our society has always had a sense of delusion in their thoughts.

The idea that everybody not like themselves is suddenly going to clear out to leave all that open space across the nation to their own kind is ridiculous. Then again, the idea that it is practical to deport everybody not like themselves as equally absurd.

Will we soon see sights like these signs everywhere?

BUT LOGIC HAS never been a part of the process for those who refuse to consider the serious reform that our immigration policy does need.

When these ideologues complain about federal bureaucracy complicating their daily lives, they’re usually just whining about having to follow the rules. Although the mess that our immigration policy has evolved into is a case where we’d be better off with a thorough policy re-write.

But to the ideologues, any harassment against “foreigners” is justifiable. Harassment against others is acceptable to these people, which strikes me as being about as un-American an ideal as can be espoused.

It’s almost like the nativists and ideologues amongst us fantasize about the United States as a police state. A repulsive comment making me think that “deportation” might make most sense for those xenophobes amongst us who can’t handle living in our 21^st Century version of society.

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What is citizenship, really?

I have always thought we’re all residents of Planet Earth, and that the fact of individual citizenship is more an accident of birth than anything else.

Obama assimilation dream is Trump's erasure fantasy

In my own case, I am a U.S. citizen because I had two grandfathers both of whom had the tremendous ambition to want more out of life rather than just sit around on their nalgas and take what others would have handed to them.

WHICH IS WHY they both wound up living the bulk of their lives in the South Chicago neighborhood working in the steel mills that used to be nearby, why my parents were born and raised there and I was born there.

Anything about myself that makes me a more desirable human being than others in our society has little to nothing to do with the location of my birth – although don’t get me wrong, I consider myself fortunate to have been born and raised on the shores of Lake Michigan in and near the greatest city on the aforementioned Planet Earth.

Which is why I find much of the political debate over our nation’s immigration policies to be downright pathetic; it seems far too many of the nativist nitwits amongst us think their birthplace is what makes them superior.

When most of them have no right to think of themselves as superior to a gnat, let alone any other individual. If we could deport people based on what they contribute to our society, many of these folks would be the first to go – except I doubt any other country would be willing to take them off our hands.

SO I’M HEARING the rhetoric being spewed by the president in this Age of Trump about the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program that some people were convinced would be wiped out of existence effective Friday.

Even Speaker Ryan thinks Trump ...

For those of you who don’t pay attention to details, DACA was the initiative created by now-former President Barack Obama to offer legal protections to those people born in other countries but who were brought here by their parents without the proper papers being lined up.

Obama’s initiative was intended to give these individuals who had been raised U.S. and were fully assimilated to be able to advance in life without the bureaucratic mess of immigration and the lack of a valid visa.

But to Trump, it is merely yet another policy that must be wiped away so as to erase any trace that this nation was ever deluded enough to elect one of “those people” as president.

... goes too far with DACA talk

PLUS, THREATENING TO erase the policy helps to keep those individuals off-balance and forevermore uncertain about their status in this country, which only serves to benefit those individuals amongst us who are so insecure they want to think their U.S. birthplace is what makes them superior to others.

Heck, even some Republicans, such as House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., think that Trump should let Congress try to revamp DACA, rather than abolish it by presidential decree.

It’s actually as sad as the case of Genoveva Ramirez, a grandmother from suburban Berwyn whose visa expired years ago. She had immigration tell her she must produce a plane ticket that shows she’ll be leaving the United States by the end of October – or else the federal government will force her onto a plane at a moment’s notice.

There’s also the fact that Ramirez could now be detained by federal immigration officials at any time, if they suddenly decided to see her as a threat.

HER CASE IS that her family is here. They have become U.S.-based. Her grandchildren definitely are assimilated. Although I’m sure the xenophobic amongst us will try arguing that her status means nobody in the family ought to be permitted to stay.

DACA another Obama relic Trump wants to erase

The debate over immigration policy truly has become a pathetic argument by people who enjoy the bureaucratic nightmare that currently exists because it harasses people who aren’t exactly like themselves. Keeping people harassed is probably more important to the nativists than actually removing them -- an act that would be costly.

Too many people who want to talk about increased deportations, rather than engaging in a serious debate over who ought to be permitted in our society and how they wind up enhancing us all.

So for those young people who registered for DACA and now wonder if all that personal data they gave to the federal government will be used against them and for the grandmother who could wind up being sent away from her family, keep in mind that this is the particularly embarrassing part of this Age of Trump we all must endure.

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How times change; Rahm now our ally in upcoming political fight w/ Trump

I can remember a time not all that long ago when Rahm Emanuel was an enemigo of Latino activists with an interest in reforming the nation’s immigration policy.
 

EMANUEL: Face-to-face w/ Trump!

Back then, Emanuel was the chief of staff for President Barack Obama, and the perception was that a significant part of why Obama was so slow on the draw to do anything to push for reform was that Rahm was holding him back.

EMANUEL SAW A long, drawn-out political fight and didn’t want to expand capital to take the partisan actions that would have been required to actually win such a fight. He didn’t want to make the enemies that would arise at the very mention of creating a sensible, rather than nativist, policy for immigration.

Yet now, it seems that Emanuel is being put into a position where he has to take the lead in trying to push for sensible policy. Or more actually, to not have blatantly xenophobic policies take over.

Emanuel of Chicago was one of several mayors from across the nation who sent a letter to President-elect Donald J. Trump asking him to not revoke the executive order that Obama signed off on a couple of years ago that created the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy.

That is the one that says people who came to this country as children without a valid visa would not face deportation.

IT IS AN order that was never popular with the conservative ideologues of our nation, particularly those who define immigration reform as an increase in deportations of people they find less than desirable.

And for some people, particularly many of those who were inclined to support Trump’s presidential campaign, it is Priority Number One that the executive order be revoked.

If possible, as Trump’s first act as president on the very day that he takes office next month.

 

TRUMP: Will he care what Rahm thinks?

Asking Trump to leave the executive order in place is most definitely asking him for something he won’t want to give. Particularly since it would be seen by his backers as a violation of everything they wanted to believe “the Donald” stood for!

IT WON’T MAKE any difference that all Emanuel and the mayors want is for the order to be left in place until Congress itself can enact something resembling a long-term reform policy of immigration laws.

Considering that the incoming Congress will be solidly Republican in leaning and filled with people who are looking to Trump to reinforce their own standing in Washington, it’s not like any long-term policy is going to be favorable to the many people who have spent years dreaming of the day when we have a sensible policy dictating who, and how, people from other countries can choose to have lives here.

The letter was signed by mayors from across the country, including Bill diBlasio of New York, where Trump lives. Yet it was Emanuel who on Wednesday made the trip to Manhattan and had roughly a 45-minute-long meeting to discuss various issues – including immigration.

Now I don’t know if Trump will pay one bit of attention to anything that Rahm said. After all, there are many people of petty and offensive moral leanings (a.k.a., the deplorables) who are counting on him to tell Rahm and others like him where they can stuff it.

BUT AS ONE who has long had a particular interest in the immigration issue, I find it ironic that the very activists who have long decried Rahm Emanuel are now in a position where they’re going to have to put their faith in him as someone tough enough to stand up to Donald Trump. Our amigos have the ability to change at a moment's notice.

 

OBAMA: What will be left of his policies?

The one thing I can say is that I’m fairly sure Emanuel isn’t intimidated by Trump; largely because they’re both capable of matching each other when it comes to egotistical blowhard behavior

It will be interesting to see if our city’s mayor can have any influence on this issue – because perhaps Rahm is just one of those guys who was meant for the national scene and not the municipal level of dealing with parking meters and trash cans.

“In Rahm, We Trust.” A thought that many of us people of a certain progressive sensibility are going to have to adopt – no matter how much the very thought makes us shudder.

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