Supreme Court acting decently, but it could be opposite a year from now

For those people of a progressive mindset, the Supreme Court of the United States acted Monday in a responsible manner; although one should keep in mind that the nation’s high court ultimately is unpredictable and could wind up issuing rulings that offend the sensibilities of decent people.

Likely to offend somebody, no matter how they rule

For this is also the day that the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case out of Illinois that could go a long way toward undermining the influence of organized labor within government.

HECK, GOV. BRUCE Rauner himself made a point of being in Washington, D.C., for the morning court call. The man who got himself elected governor so he could single-handedly undermine labor unions in Illinois government wanted to be on hand to see, and hear, for himself what the high court thinks. Which Democratic gubernatorial challenger Daniel Biss said Monday is sufficient reason not to re-elect Rauner.

A ruling in that case will come up later this year, as likely will be any action the high court takes with regards to federal immigration policy – specifically the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals program that President Donald J. Trump wants to have eradicated from out government.

That program is the one enacted during the Barack Obama presidency and is meant to treat young people who were brought as children to this country by their parents without valid visas.

DACA to live on, at least a little while longer

In the wildest of fantasies of all those individuals who voted for Trump, making America “great” again means deporting every single one of the roughly 700,000 young adults who fall into this category.

TRUMP LAST YEAR used his executive order powers to eliminate the program, but federal district courts in San Francisco and New York have issued orders that keep the program in place for the time being.

The president had asked the high court to immediately take up the case, instead of requiring both of the cases to go to federal appeals courts first. The Supreme Court on Monday refused, saying Trump hasn’t given sufficient reason why the usual legal process should be cut short.

Of course, the “reason” is that Trump is a political and governmental amateur who probably really thinks he ought to be able to bark out orders and have government minions do what they’re told. Privately, he probably thinks the Supreme Court is being insolent and disrespectful of his presidential authority.

Will the court ultimately undermine the union?

But it means the rule of law is prevailing, thus far. Although it always is likely that the appeals courts will rule, and the Supreme Court will wind up taking on the issue some time next year – and could wind up issuing a ruling that will be Trump-pleasing at that time.

I SAY SO because in the case of Janus vs. AFSCME Council 31 (which represents Illinois government workers), court watchers suspect the nine-member court had a 4-4 split, with the newest justice, Neil Gorsuch, the unknown who’d likely decide the case.

Gorsuch, of course, is the justice who got appointed by Trump himself, and Trump has made it clear he sides with Mark Janus (the state worker who objects on ideological grounds to being part of a labor union and doesn’t like that union dues are withheld from his pay).

Not that Gorsuch gave any hint of where he stands – during Monday’s hour-long hearing, he said nothing and asked no questions from any of the attorneys involved.

But it has certain people convinced that the end result will be a 5-4 ruling against organized labor interests and in favor of those people who’d actually be inclined to vote for Rauner’s re-election come Nov. 6.

WHICH IS ALWAYS possible, except that my own observations of appeals courts throughout the years is that nothing is absolute. Those of us of a progressive leaning can only hope the knee-jerk reaction doesn’t prevail.

TRUMP: How angry will he be a year from now?

Which also is what I’m telling myself with regards to the fate of DACA, since I suspect Gorsuch got his life-time appointment to the high court because Trump feels (at least) he can be counted on to do what The Donald expects of him.

Could we be getting another ruling on this immigration issue that will wind up offending the people who were pleased on Monday that any threat of deportation for hundreds of thousands of young people would be postponed for the time being?

Or will the high court wind up surprising us by issuing responsible rulings in both cases – thereby reaffirming our faith in our government, while most likely turning the presidential complexion from his current sickly orange to a bright red bursting with anger?

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Feds still tipped off to DACA beneficiary, despite sanctuary policy

Christian Gomez Garcia spent a couple of days in jail this week, awaiting the possibility of deportation from the United States even though he’s one of the individuals under federal policy who supposedly is protected from such a fate.

Gomez is one of the people who registered under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program so that he could live openly in this country even though his mother brought him here at age 6 without getting valid visas for herself or her son.

TECHNICALLY, HE’S AMONG the ranks of the undocumented in this country – an illegal alien in federal bureaucratic-speak that the ideologues like to use because it dehumanizes the individuals they wish to deport.

Technically, his fate is one that isn’t supposed to happen. It was a screw-up by law enforcement, although the Chicago Tribune reported that his DACA protections may have lapsed. Which is why Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials reviewed his case before releasing him from the county jail in Kenosha, Wis., where they house some immigration cases while they’re pending prior to deportation.

But I’m sure Gomez isn’t going to feel all that relieved. He’s going to know that the slightest little slip-up will cause the bureaucrats to throw his life out of whack – and that the ideologue-inclined of our society won’t feel the least bit of sympathy.

Gomez is 29, and he’s supporting his mother, Luz Maria Garcia, who left their native Mexico to get away from instances of domestic abuse. He came to the attention of law enforcement for an incident in December. He drove his car through a stop sign, and was issued a ticket.

HE HAD HIS day in court on Monday, making his appearance at the courthouse in suburban Skokie. All routine; something I’m sure all of us have gone through at some point in life.

But when Gomez tried leaving the Skokie courthouse, the Chicago Sun-Times reported that he found ICE agents waiting for him in the lobby. It seems someone notified federal officials that a person with uncertain immigration status was in court that day, and they should come to pick him up.

Even though the whole point of the DACA program is that those young people with no serious criminal records aren’t supposed to have to fear such hassle from law enforcement. DACA registration gives them the work permits provided they continue progress through the naturalization process toward eventual U.S. citizenship.

What has Latino activist-types all worked up is that this happened in a Cook County government facility. If it turns out to have been a sheriff’s deputy or some other county official who picked up the phone to call the feds, then someone is in violation of Coo County’s own sanctuary policy.

THAT’S THE POLICY that says county officials don’t assist federal immigration officials by providing such information about their jail inmates. It means that appearing in court for a traffic ticket should have been a circumstance in which Gomez felt secure.

Now I’m sure some people are going to argue that the inconvenience to Gomez wasn’t that big a deal. After all, the federal government wound up admitting their error and releasing him on Thursday.

Although it also means that he came to the attention of immigration officials, and this is exactly the kind of bureaucratic screwup that has the ability to come back and bite one on their nalgas. Or their derriere, if you prefer more effete language!

Who’s to say that having drawn this kind of attention will cause federal officials to tune their antennae more intensely to Gomez’ presence, looking for anything they could construe as a screw-up so they can justify their actions of this week?

BESIDES, I ALSO wonder how many of the rest of us would appreciate a screw-up that resulted in having to spend even a single day in a county jail. Particularly since the offense that initiated this whole incident was a blown “stop” sign.

The DACA policy, the one-and-the-same that President Donald Trump would like to see done away with, or at least extort other ideologue benefits in exchange for keeping it, was supposed to eliminate the chance of deportation being the end result for such petty offenses by people who are far from criminals.

Except in the mindset of those ideologues who want to believe that existing in this society without being exactly like their narrow-minded selves is a crime in-and-of itself.

For so long as we allow the immigration debate to be dictated by the idiotic thoughts of the most bigoted of our society, we’re going to continue to have more silly incidents like these clogging up our justice system.

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Immigration policy an issue that absolutely refuses to be rushed

There are Latino activists these days who are p-o’ed at Democrats, who they think sold them out in their political resolution to bring to an end a shutdown of the federal government.

Abandoned w/o resolution?

Those activists wanted the shutdown to extend indefinitely as a means of pressuring Republican politicos into taking seriously the issue of immigration reform, in particular the fate of those people whose existence in this nation is at risk due to President Donald Trump’s desire to dump Barack Obama’s legacy measure – the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.

LIKE MOST SPECIAL-interest groups, they have their focus on one measure, and could care less about the big picture.

So when Democrats in Congress went ahead and voted to approve funding to keep the federal government open (at least until Feb. 8), they weren’t trusting of Republican promises that they really would conduct serious discussions about DACA and immigration in general.

When Trump followed up quickly by letting it be known his thoughts about those issues hasn’t changed one bit, it has the Latino activists feel like nothing will be accomplished.

An asterisk on the resolution?

Personally, I’m not as hung up on this concept as many of these activists – even though I have just as intense an interest in immigration issues as they do.

PERHAPS IT’S BECAUSE I realize that it isn’t going to be the president or Congress who ultimately will decide the fate of those young people who were brought to this country by their parents without valid Visas or other immigration papers.

If DACA (the program that allows those undocumented to register with the federal government and gain work permits while progressing toward eventual citizenship) is truly to remain in place, it most likely is going to be because the Supreme Court of the United States will – in effect – ram it down the president’s throat!

Shutdown merely first of many fights

To me, the more significant move was the Supreme Court’s announcement Tuesday that it would allow a federal court ruling out of San Francisco that thwarts Trump’s efforts to abolish DACA to proceed directly to the high court.

Instead of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9^th District (also based in San Francisco). As far as when the Supreme Court in Washington will take up the issue, we could learn something as soon as the court’s conference Feb. 16.

TRUMP, OF COURSE, is the guy who had wanted to use his executive order powers to abolish DACA, and had hinted he wanted it gone by early March.

That deadline, which was thwarted by the ruling of U.S. District Judge William Alsup, could wind up being relevant after all – if the Supreme Court winds up putting the rush on their efforts to overturn the measure.

Or, the high court could wind up surprising us by ruling that Alsup had the principles of the law on his side when he struck down Trump’s partisan effort to do away with DACA – whose greatest offense in his and the minds of conservative ideologues is that it was something desired by Obama.

D.C. Times always thinks GOP wins

As for what is bound to happen to DACA (and immigration reform in general), I’ll be the first to admit there are many amongst the Republican caucus who will view anything that harms the interests of these young people trying to make a life for themselves here as a political victory for themselves.

ANYTHING THAT ALLOWS those young people to do anything that benefits our society is something they will be determined to view as detrimental – more specifically as a benefit that was “stolen” from a young person they’d prefer to view as a “real American.”

Although the truth is that those individuals aren’t willing to work as hard to achieve greatness in life, and want to think the ethnic origins of their descendants entitle them to something in life.

A concept I personally find to be un-American to the max!

And one that the justices of the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., will have to resolve for the good of our society. The sooner the better, so that we can progress to the higher levels that we ought to be capable of achieving, but can’t because the nativist elements of our society seem to be determined to ensure no one else makes them look weak by surpassing them.

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EXTRA: Shutdown ends, GOP at fault

The shutdown of the federal government came to an end Monday with both chambers of Congress passing an interim spending deal, with Republicans promising they will give serious discussion to the immigration issue in the near future.

It was the tying together of those two issues that caused the inability of federal officials to move forward.

NOW AS TO whether those future discussions will amount to anything remains to be seen. Nobody has pledged to change their stance, and it’s very possible the hard-core ideologues will remain solidly behind policies that will eventually result in increases in the number of deportations.

But the sight of the U.S. government doing nothing will come to an end, and there’s less chance of lingering harm being caused by the partisan politicking.

As for who gets the blame for the partisan nonsense that’s already occurred, I found a quickie poll conducted by Morning Consult for Politico to be interesting.

Technically, more people blamed Democrats than any other one group.

BUT THAT MEANS 35 percent of those surveyed are anxious to blame the party of Clinton and Obama, compared to 34 percent who want to say it’s Donald Trump’s fault. As for another 15 percent, they say it’s the fault of Republicans in Congress.

It also seems that 47 percent of those surveyed said immigration and the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program were a worthy cause to bring other government activity to a halt, while 39 percent said it was not.

That compares to a similar poll taken earlier this month in which the sides were evenly split 42 percent apiece on that very same question.

So it’s likely that Democrats gained a superficial boost from the day of inactivity – although I do find it interesting to see that their opposition splits between placing blame on Trump and Congress. It seems we have 15 percent who are just determined to refuse to say that Trump did anything wrong – even though I doubt that anyone in Congress would have moved toward a shutdown if not for The Donald whispering all those sweet nothings into their collective ears.

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Federal government shutdown shows we really likely are that shallow

The federal government came to a “shut down” during a weekend, meaning most people likely haven’t noticed one bit of difference. It could be come Monday that things start being impacted publicly.

TRUMP: Blame? Or praise?

Although I have to admit, my initial reaction to learning our Congress is ideological enough to be stubborn and let daily government activity come to a halt was to check on how this would impact U.S. Postal Service delivery. I get paychecks in the mail.

YES, MAIL DELIVERY is one of the so-called essential services that will continue even if the United States government is supposed to be closed for the duration.

But what is going to happen, particularly since President Donald Trump on Sunday engaged in political trash talk – saying he thinks Republicans ought to go ahead and just stick it to their Democratic Party opposition. Change the rules that give minority parties some say and make it impossible for the GOP majority to just ramrod their desires through into public policy.

Which is something they could easily do. In fact, it is the reason that Democrats say Republicans deserve full blame for any disruption of government activity. How can a Republican president and Republican-dominated Congress blame somebody else for nothing happening?

Personally, I have long realized how petty partisan and ideologue leaning government officials can be. I’m fully aware that for some government officials, being able to say they dumped on Democrats would be the very purpose of government’s existence.

SO ON SATURDAY, when my father asked me whether I thought the government would really shut down and officials would really be so hard-core hostile toward immigration policy and the DACA kids, I politely told him that “Yes” they could.

While deep-down, I had to hold back a temptation to laugh in his face and mock his naivete.

Keep in mind that my father is one of the normal people; as in those who don’t really pay much attention to daily government activity and procedure, and I suspect deep down thinks I’m a tad ridiculous for giving it much thought myself.

The focal point of how partisan politics does impact our daily lives

I don’t doubt many people are like that, and they’re the ones who most likely are watching the activity taking place out of the District of Columbia these days and wondering to themselves, “Why?”

IT’S BECAUSE WE have those people who are determined to muck up the process that might allow for a more sensible federal immigration policy to move forth.

Specifically, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy that Trump wants to see wither away in a couple of months. But he has oh, so generously offered to let something remain in place IF Democrats give him one of his longest-running pieces of political rhetoric – the barricade built along the U.S./Mexico border.

Democratic officials in Congress will never do anything to support that concept. They’re using the powers provided to a minority party to stall a vote from being taken in Congress toward funding that would keep the government’s operations from occurring.

Democrats don’t have the power to pass anything. They can merely thwart; just as Republicans did for years during the presidencies of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

THERE WERE GOVERNMENT shutdowns, most famously the one of 1995 when Republicans led by then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia thought they’d have the nation’s backing in openly thumbing their nose at Clinton. They didn’t -- the shutdown was a significant part of Gingrich’s decline as a public official.

Which is why I’m sure Republicans are convinced they’re now due for a shutdown-related victory. They probably believe that Democrats MUST take the blame for whatever inconveniences are caused by this current shutdown.

They still have to work during shutdown

While I’m sure many Democratic-leaning people are convinced this will be perceived as yet another GOP screwup; and one that can be a prime part of a Trump legacy of governmental incompetence.

All of which I’m sure will come to a head when people start seeing how our government (which we’d like to boast is the finest form of self-governing in existence on Planet Earth) is just as cheap and petty as the people whom we elect – we really do get what we deserve. We put these people in office to begin with.

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Gutierrez offers Kelly an apology, and all it took was the White House chief of staff implying Donald Trump, misspoke

I always take apologies by government officials half-seriously.

GUTIERREZ: A 'lo siento' from 'el Gallito'

They’re usually less-than-sincere, and more motivated by some official’s desire that the public stop talking about something perceived as a gaffe.

RARELY ARE THE officials actually regretful that they said something stupid. They just wish everybody else would agree with them instead of the other guy.

So when I learned that soon-to-be retiring Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., was apologetic Wednesday toward White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, I was skeptical.

Gutierrez, who has used his decades of time in Congress to try to make himself the Voice of Latinos across the nation rather than just in his Latino-enclave district in Chicago, has been critical of Kelly for saying he opposes the demise of the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals program.

The program is meant to make it possible for young people who came to this country without a valid visa to exist openly in this country. It is a part of the Barack Obama presidential legacy that Donald Trump is most anxious to abolish.

GUTIERREZ HAS SAID that Kelly, a former Marine Corps general, is “a hypocrite,” “mean” and “a disgrace to the uniform he used to wear.”

Ouch!

But on Wednesday, when Kelly met with several members of Congress to discuss the future of DACA and immigration reform, the Chicago politico who has been outspoken since his days as an alderman made a point of publicly apologizing for his past rhetoric.

KELLY: Accepted the apology

The Washington Post reported that Kelly accepted the apology, telling everybody “we all say or do stupid things.” But then later told Gutierrez that the public apology “means a lot.”

NOW MAYBE GUTIERREZ wants to create the impression of being the bigger man in the ongoing immigration debate.

But one also has to consider that at that same meeting with congressmen, many of whom were members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Kelly tried to give the impression that all of his boss, Donald Trump’s, talk about demanding a barrier be erected along the U.S./Mexico border before any talk of immigration reform or DACA preservation could proceed was, to put it simply, cheap.

Now one can argue the cliché “talk is cheap” applies to all government officials.

But Kelly let it be known that, deep down, Trump knows that a border wall along the 1,900-mile stretch of desert separating the two nations is impractical. He even told them they shouldn’t take it too seriously when Trump says he’s going to force Mexico’s government to pay for the barricade that Trump insists will cut off the flow of people headed northbound into the U.S.

TRUMP, OF COURSE, continues to insist he really means it when he makes such threats. In recent days, he has insisted that DACA will die, no matter how much it will hurt young people who have established their lives in this country. And it’s all the Democrats’ fault because they won’t go along with his wall talk.

Kelly, however, said that Trump’s hostile talk during his 2016 presidential campaign was that of an “uninformed” candidate, and that he is learning about the ways of government. It’s that old argument we shouldn’t take Trump too seriously. Which sounds much like the old line about Mayor Richard J. Daley’s inarticulate manner of speaking when they said, “write what (Daley) means, not what he says.”

TRUMP: Who knows what he really means!

Perhaps such talk from Kelly did put Gutierrez in the proper frame of mind to want to say “I’m sorry” to someone who had in the past spoken out against the interests of the people whom Gutierrez sees as his larger constituency.

Or maybe he was just wanting to make sure Kelly didn’t wind up using him as an excuse to later come back and shoot down some immigration deal, just because Gutierrez once felt the need to be critical. Then again, anybody familiar with Chicago politics throughout the years would know Luis didn’t get the nickname of El Gallito (the little rooster) by being meek as a mouse!

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Trump’s immigration “bill of love” too laughable to be taken seriously

President Donald J. Trump’s talk of a “bill of love” being part of the solution toward arriving at a sensible federal immigration policy is just another bit in the line of nonsense that often gets spewed whenever trying to figure out how to properly integrate non-U.S.-born residents into our society.

TRUMP: Still delusional on immigration

It amounts to more cheap rhetoric about the issue, particularly when it relates to people who were brought as children by their parents to this country without all the valid papers being lined up.

WHAT WE HAVE is many thousands of people living in this country who, for all practical purposes, are assimilated into our society. But the paperwork glitch makes it impossible for them to fully enjoy the benefits of living in this country.

Former President Barack Obama tried to address this issue with Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals – a program by which those young people registered with the government and were given permits allowing them to work, while also being spared the threat of deportation. Some 700,000 young people took advantage.

It was a step in the right direction (allowing them to work toward naturalization and gain citizenship would complete the process). But of course, to the mindset of people in this Age of Trump we’re now in, it has to be undone. Just as everything Obama became involved with now has to be eradicated from our society.

Trump abolished DACA last year, but said he’d give Congress until March to come up with a long-range solution to the larger problem. Although U.S. District Judge William Alsup late Tuesday ruled against Trump's March deadline -- creating the possibility the issue could drag on longer.

WHICH IS VERY likely, considering that we're talking about the same Congress that has been so inept throughout the years that it can’t come close to finding a solution to eliminating the bureaucratic glitches that exist in our national immigration policy.

So the idea that anything would happen was always laughable – particularly since many of those people most pleased by Trump’s presence in the White House are of a belief that the only real solution is mass deportations. Eliminating all those damn foreigners is what they mean by the insipidness of Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan.

Trump on Tuesday met with members of Congress, of both major political persuasions, supposedly to try to come up with a solution to nudge Congress off their collective derriere to do something.

That’s where he came up with his “bill of love” rhetoric, which he says would be a two-phase plan for immigration reform, albeit one that strikes me as being more inaction than anything else.

TRUMP’S FIRST PHASE involves taking action to move forward on the president’s long-desired talk of a full-scale wall along the U.S./Mexico border. He’s determined to have something built along those 1,900 miles in the southwestern U.S. – regardless of how impractical, stupid or irrelevant such a barricade would prove to be in deterring entry into this country by people considered less-than-desirable by racially-motivated ideologues.

The second phase would then give Congress the “green light,” so to speak, to try to figure out a comprehensive immigration reform plan that would resolve the problem, once and for all.

But like I wrote earlier, Congress has tried for decades to come up with real reform – only to be thwarted by the element that likes the bureaucratic mess we have now because it complicates conditions for people wishing to come to this country.

Basically, Trump’s talk on Tuesday amounted to “gimme da wall,” then do nothing more. Which doesn’t fix a thing.

I FOUND IT particularly laughable to learn that Trump talked of restoring “earmarks” to the budget process so as to encourage members of Congress to act. Earmarks are the process by which Congressmen can get federal funds for pet projects in their home districts.

Meaning we use federal funds to buy off the Congress, with no guarantee they’d follow through with immigration reform.

It may actually be more evidence that Trump is a rank amateur when it comes to politics – spewing out such nonsensical talk in hopes that he can get that pointless wall built.

Although considering Trump was a real estate guy who has had several structures bearing his name built all over the world, I’d insist that if this wall ever does get erected, it too should carry his identity. “Trump, the Border Wall!” is all about his warped sensibilities, rather than anything representing American ideals.

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EXTRA: Emanuel among those fighting against Trump’s DACA dump

Amy and I have had the pleasure of hosting dreamers in our home for dinner. You can see in their eyes and hear in their voices how much it means to them to be part of the fabric of America. President Trump’s decision to end DACA is not only harmful to these young people, it strikes a blow against our core American values and is an affront to basic human decency. It is a betrayal of more than 800,000 children who have done nothing wrong and of the unique role the United States has played in the world for centuries. The United States is a nation of immigrants, not a country that tears families apart or deports children who have placed their faith in the promise of America. I know countless dreamers in Chicago who are talented, hard-working and dedicated to their families and the only home they have ever known. Not only will Chicago continue to welcome dreamers, we will pursue every legal option to protect our children, defend our immigrant communities and uphold the enduring promise of the American Dream.

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EMANUEL: Fighting against Trump? Or for re-election?

If it turns out that Rahm Emanuel is able to resuscitate his political image enough to win a re-election bid come 2019, it will be because of actions like this statement he issued Tuesday in the wake of President Donald Trump’s decision to eliminate the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program that the president supposedly intends to do six months from now.

“Good Rahm” fighting against the tyranny created by our federal government in this Age of Trump. As opposed to “Bad Rahm” creating what a significant share of the Chicago populace views as his own level of tyranny.

THEN AGAIN, CHICAGO voters can be so parochial in the way they view the world that Emanuel’s views on immigration, or any federal issue, may not be enough, particularly if a legitimate challenger manages to come forth between now and the next municipal election cycle.

For what it’s worth, none of the would-be mayoral challengers rise to that level. And if we can be honest, Jesus Garcia never rose to that level in the 2015 election cycle.

So will 2019 be a mayoral battle of memorable proportions? Or just the centennial of the year that gave Chicago a race riot on the South Side AND a championship ball club with some members willing to throw away a World Series title for a few extra bucks cash.

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