The President Trump Immigration Thread

[T.Lex]

If we don't really know how many there are, how can we quantify the services they use?

 

[jamil]

Still playing Socrates, I see. I will assume the thrust of the question to be the interpretation I can answer

Things I could criticize about Trump (recent events edition)

1) Staying in Syria after not staying in Syria after staying in Syria. I see nothing to potentially be gained in Syria worth anything near the likely cost in blood and treasure. The leave Syria/Stay Syria cost him Mattis (ignoring the supposition that Mattis was a snake, which I don't think is completely correct) for no gain whatsoever. I sympathize with the plight of the Kurds somewhat, but not enough to sacrifice one more US soldier. They have the same problem the Palestinians do, to a lesser degree - so much of what they want just isn't going to happen

2) Not declassifying and releasing all the source material surrounding Russia! Russia! Russia! that is possible. I believe the narrative that the Obama appointed/supporting heads of the DoJ and the surveillance state conceived and executed a plan to weaken Trump, make it harder for him to get quality cabinet members, and distract him from actually running the country at a crucial time in order to hopefully get rid of him with your cherished BAMN. I think this borders on actual treason on their part. If he has relevant data and can release it, he should. Many of us are bright enough to see where that evidence leads, regardless of the expected howling and spin of the MSM. I am still hopeful that this is the intent and the delay is a matter of timing

3) The bumpstock ban. Deeply ambivalent about this one, though. I don't like our guy giving an inch on 2A without a fight; but I believe that these are the stupidest, most useless accessories for a firearm and only serve some purpose in the most unlikely #ResistTyranny fever dreams. If you have rapid fire but you can't aim it, you might as well just have a MAC10. I'm pissed that morons made this the hill they wanted us to die on. Almost a wash for me except I wish he had put up more of a fight, if he thought rolling over would get him some maneuvering room elsewhere he was wrong and this calls into question the whole 4D chess thing - maybe should stick to 3D

4) I'm ambivalent about the plan to end the criminalization of homosexuality. We already pretty much don't have that, neither does the civilized west. He's going to have to make headway in the ME, the far east and Africa. It's a tough row to hoe, is a distraction from arguably more important first order concerns, and lacks an apparent carrot or stick. It just seems like cynical pandering designed to give the appearance of doing something without any real expectation he can affect the issue in anything more than a marginal way. This makes me wonder if he is more cynical and political than I currently believe

5) The wall emergency declaration, but not for any reason remotely similar to you. As I've stated previously, I think the only thing that has prevented Democrats from using exactly these methods is they might not have thought of it. Once it was talked about, I don't think anything Trump does or does not do will affect the likelihood of them using the stratagem in the slightest, so the whole bad precedent thing is a non-starter for me. What bothers me is if this was deliberately timed. If the whole point is that the planning encompassed the knowledge it would be tied up in the courts for quite a while, this too speaks to cynical politicking - giving the appearance of going to the wall for the wall just to seem to be fighting the good fight.
I see two ways it could play out. First, the timing correctly allows for the court challenges to exhaust themselves and the wall is well under way in November 2020 - I'm OK with this, even if the timing is off. Second, the timing is designed to not be effective before the election and is thus intentional manipulation - it could be indicative of re-election being of greater relative importance to him than this core promise. This affects my level of cynicism


There, are you happy now? I'm betting not, that no level of admitted doubt less than your own will satisfy you - which should maybe be instructive for you about why people won't play that

Nothing I know or suspect now if known in 2016 would make me any less likely to vote for him in the primary or the general. Nothing I know now would make me one iota more likely to vote for any of his likely potential challengers in 2020

Now will you answer why this form of overt witnessing to your favored viewpoint is so important to you. Can you truly not spot the thoughtful Trumpers, or do you just doubt there are any?

Thank you. I think there may be hope for you after all.

Kinda wish the things you opposed were authoritarian things. Just to address some of those issues themselves, which is more interesting to me that having to ***** at you people for letting Trump get away with so much.

1) I'm completely ambivalent on Syria. I've seen the Syrian thread and it's just not a topic I can get interested in. I seriously don't give a flying **** about Syria.

2) I'm not a fan of BAMN. It's authoritarian **********y. I'm not a deep state conspiracy theorist, but it's quite disturbing the lengths to which it appears people within the system went to thwart Trump. They should be at least fired promptly.

3) This is an area of deep disagreement. I don't give a **** about bump stocks. I don't own one. I don't care to own one. I'm not into novelty firearm accessories. I like practical stuff. However, my position against what Trump is doing is yet again revolving around authoritarianism. I don't like that he just tells his AG to redefine bump stocks to make them machine guns. They're a ****ing hunk of plastic. Making people criminals at the stroke of a pen is bull**** and should not be tolerated by a free society. And it's discouraging to hear so many Trumpers deny that Trump was even responsible. I don't recall if you were involved in that, but dayam. That's some crazy ****.

4) the homo/decriminalization thing I think is another Ivanka pet issue. I care more about what we do in this country. It's fine and noble to advocate for human rights worldwide, but in the end, other countries are going to do their thing.

5) This is something I just don't get. If Democrats tried to use this to get their way, Trumpers would be up in arms about it. I've INGO'd for quite some time now. I kinda get the drift. It's a surety. It's bankable. I don't see why, especially given the HBICOTH's warning. It's not that they haven't thought about it. I think Obama looked hard and long about what he could get away with in gun control to get around congress. But it appears he looked for things that wouldn't push the window. I doubt it's something they didn't think of. It's more like something they didn't think they could get away with. No POTUS has ever used emergency powers to bypass congress. Nearly all declarations over the last few presidencies have been sanctions. I doubt they thought they could get away with it. But Trump just doesn't give a ****. He'll do it and then see how he does in court. If that works, it would be foolish and naive to thing Democrats wouldn't use that to enact through emergency powers pieces of their Utopia. It's foolish and short-sighted. And that's why I called Trump dumb as a bag of ****.

 

[Libertarian01]

Part of the problem, as I see it, has been the shift over the last 120 years of power and leadership. At the turn of the 20th century it was the congress that controlled, well, about everything. They didn't exactly "control" but they set the tone and direction for America. It was a much more stable system as we were guided by a consensus that was slow to change and wasn't subjected to the personal whims of any one president. The president back then didn't guide all that much. I'm not saying they didn't do anything, but by and large they left congress to set the tone and policy.

Then comes WWI. We faced a global crisis and Woodrow Wilson started to take some authority and social control. He co-opted the Red Cross to censure and control people who disagreed with the war effort. He was like the first minny McCarthy as anyone who was against the war was both persecuted and prosecuted.

Then comes the great depression and WWII. FDR gave his weekly fireside addresses and people shifted looking to congress and looked to him instead. From there it was all downhill. The president jumped into the drivers seat and congress willingly got in the back seat. As time has passed congress has been granting the presidential office more and more power, maybe because it allows them to dodge the hard issues and blame him for all the problems. I don't know?

Now we come to this 1976 law where "emergency" is only a word that has no legal meaning. So my thinking is simply this: if SCOTUS determines that law to be valid then Trump wins, simply because he is operating within the law, period.

In my opinion we have allowed too much power to be given to the president. The president can sign executive agreements with foreign nations that have equal power to a treaty, just so they can be kept secret. This completely bypasses the founding fathers intention of a check on the presidents power by having the senate review international treaties. We allow the president to lob ordnance into foreign nations without a formal declaration of war, because it is easy and avoids a debate on what our true policy should be.

I want to see the power of the president radically curtailed. However, I do NOT want to see it done in a vindictive or malicious way. In other words, I don't want Pelosi trying to gut Trumps power just as I wouldn't want the republicans to gut Hillaries power had she been elected. It should not be done because congress doesn't like the person in the office, but rather because the office itself needs to be put back on a leash.

I do not believe this will happen. Power, once given, is hard to take back. But I wish it would happen.

Regards,

Doug

 

[jamil]

you go back to the cost of the wall, simple math will tell you that if you stop paying the way for illegal invaders by giving them free medical care, free food, free or discounted housing.. the wall would pay for itself in no time, and again I will mention...obama declared an emergency 13 times.. so did he abuse power 13 times or is it only because it is Trump? and you debate the effectiveness of walls? do you have 4? do they keep people from strolling through your living room? do people walk in and help themselves to your money? I would like to argue the effectiveness of walls.. walls plus security will equal a significant amount of decreased illegal entries..to argue that fact is ...well

The wall won't pay back the cost I'm most interested in. It won't cover the cost of the unintended consequences of abusing emergency powers.

And about Obama's 13 uses of emergency powers. Did you even read my last post about that? NONE of those declared emergencies were to bypass congress. NONE of them were controversial. ALL OF THEM except the H1N1 influenza pandemic were sanctions against foreign governments or foreign groups. Now, before you start thinking I'm a fan of Obama, please understand that I'm not a fan of Obama or his husband Michelle. But reality needs defending. He did not exploit this power to bypass congress. This is new and dangerous ground for uses of emergency powers.

 

[Brad69]

So help me understand things here this dude in CALIFORNIA had previously been deported SIX times, had a long rap sheet ect. Local police didn’t alert ICE due to sanctuary laws. Self deprecation is a mental illness!

BTW
You guys are really getting into the weeds on several issues.

1. We have to stop the flood from Central America

2. President Trump did everything humanly possible including a government shutdown to do this the way it was supposed to be done.

3. The legal battle may take the remainder of President Trumps time in office.

4. If you think this is dangerous now think about if President Tump loses the next election.
Harris and Warren have already spoke in favor of reparations for minority’s that combined with the money that could be wasted on climate change, paid time off, basic income ect. This combined with “Open Borders” will make for some interesting conversation.

 

[SheepDog4Life]

Fox News:Man who shot at California cop previously deported, arrested but cops wouldn't honor ICE detainer, feds say
https://www.foxnews.com/us/man-who-...-but-cops-wouldnt-honor-ice-detainer-feds-say

Illegal alien.

"Bad hombre."

Protected by California sanctuary policies.

Tried to murder a patrol officer at traffic stop.

[video=youtube;qX4Z-aYkIIU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qX4Z-aYkIIU[/video]

 

[jamil]

you go back to the cost of the wall, simple math will tell you that if you stop paying the way for illegal invaders by giving them free medical care, free food, free or discounted housing.. the wall would pay for itself in no time, and again I will mention...obama declared an emergency 13 times.. so did he abuse power 13 times or is it only because it is Trump? and you debate the effectiveness of walls? do you have 4? do they keep people from strolling through your living room? do people walk in and help themselves to your money? I would like to argue the effectiveness of walls.. walls plus security will equal a significant amount of decreased illegal entries..to argue that fact is ...well

Oh. And I forgot to address MY 4 walls. If thousands of immigrants per day were highly motivated to get on the other side of my 4 walls, my 4 walls would be completely ineffective to stop them. So would yours. Of course a wall at the border would be scaled to such a purpose, but, it's still a facile point to compare your walls or walls in general to the potential effectiveness of walls at the border. I'm not disputing that walls can be effective in deterring people from getting to the other side if scaled properly for the use. There's a law of diminishing returns though.

I've only disputed that walls are 100% effective or 0%. It's some unknown quantity in between. Some people will still come to the US illegally over or under the border. Undoubtedly a wall will make that more difficult. But that number is unknown. So to T.Lex's point, if you don't know the numerator, or the denominator, you really can't do much more than an educated guess. Doesn't look to me like people are looking for the educated part of the guess. The ideologically driven people on both sides appear to derive estimates based on whether they want the wall or not. So it's reasonable to suspect that ardent open borders people and the ardent Trumpers are looking for the guess that most quickly relieves the cognitive dissonance.

 

[fnpfan]

The wall won't pay back the cost I'm most interested in. It won't cover the cost of the unintended consequences of abusing emergency powers.

And about Obama's 13 uses of emergency powers. Did you even read my last post about that? NONE of those declared emergencies were to bypass congress. NONE of them were controversial. ALL OF THEM except the H1N1 influenza pandemic were sanctions against foreign governments or foreign groups. Now, before you start thinking I'm a fan of Obama, please understand that I'm not a fan of Obama or his husband Michelle. But reality needs defending. He did not exploit this power to bypass congress. This is new and dangerous ground for uses of emergency powers.

The abuse of power has been going on for years, we would not have the illegal alien issue we do had powers not been abused, Trump is just doing what he can to try and bail out a sinking ship, I for one am not interested in passing down a 3rd world country to my children.. slowing down the flow of illegals is a good step towards that goal, and you are right..it will not 100% stop the flow of invaders, but it will stop ones that would otherwise walk right over, drop a baby and live off our tax dollars, all while having no respect for the hand that feeds

 

[jamil]

Part of the problem, as I see it, has been the shift over the last 120 years of power and leadership. At the turn of the 20th century it was the congress that controlled, well, about everything. They didn't exactly "control" but they set the tone and direction for America. It was a much more stable system as we were guided by a consensus that was slow to change and wasn't subjected to the personal whims of any one president. The president back then didn't guide all that much. I'm not saying they didn't do anything, but by and large they left congress to set the tone and policy.

Then comes WWI. We faced a global crisis and Woodrow Wilson started to take some authority and social control. He co-opted the Red Cross to censure and control people who disagreed with the war effort. He was like the first minny McCarthy as anyone who was against the war was both persecuted and prosecuted.

Then comes the great depression and WWII. FDR gave his weekly fireside addresses and people shifted looking to congress and looked to him instead. From there it was all downhill. The president jumped into the drivers seat and congress willingly got in the back seat. As time has passed congress has been granting the presidential office more and more power, maybe because it allows them to dodge the hard issues and blame him for all the problems. I don't know?

Now we come to this 1976 law where "emergency" is only a word that has no legal meaning. So my thinking is simply this: if SCOTUS determines that law to be valid then Trump wins, simply because he is operating within the law, period.

In my opinion we have allowed too much power to be given to the president. The president can sign executive agreements with foreign nations that have equal power to a treaty, just so they can be kept secret. This completely bypasses the founding fathers intention of a check on the presidents power by having the senate review international treaties. We allow the president to lob ordnance into foreign nations without a formal declaration of war, because it is easy and avoids a debate on what our true policy should be.

I want to see the power of the president radically curtailed. However, I do NOT want to see it done in a vindictive or malicious way. In other words, I don't want Pelosi trying to gut Trumps power just as I wouldn't want the republicans to gut Hillaries power had she been elected. It should not be done because congress doesn't like the person in the office, but rather because the office itself needs to be put back on a leash.

I do not believe this will happen. Power, once given, is hard to take back. But I wish it would happen.

Regards,

Doug

Agreed. Except I'd just add that the emergency powers has been used for uncontroversial purposes up until this point. I think presidents did not want to be seen abusing the power. It would distroy their legacy, or perception of them as leaders. You get a president who doesn't give a **** about precedent and how other president's have used emergency powers and you'll have one that just decides to abuse it and take his chances. And his ardent supporters are okay with that because it gets them what they want. And given the conversations here, no one believes it'll be used against them. Now Democrats will have the cover of, well, the Republicans did it.

Probably the best way to solve it so that we dont' have to worry about the weaponization of "emergency" in the culture war would be for congress to change the law to define more clearly what an emergency is and limit the scope further for how a president can use it.

 

[Route 45]

The abuse of power has been going on for years, we would not have the illegal alien issue we do had powers not been abused, Trump is just doing what he can to try and bail out a sinking ship, I for one am not interested in passing down a 3rd world country to my children.. slowing down the flow of illegals is a good step towards that goal, and you are right..it will not 100% stop the flow of invaders, but it will stop ones that would otherwise walk right over, drop a baby and live off our tax dollars, all while having no respect for the hand that feeds

I read on INGO that the problem is mostly visa overstays. I'm sure that this illegal who was deported several times and tried to murder a police officer was just a visa overstay. #wallsdontwork

 

[KLB]

So help me understand things here this dude in CALIFORNIA had previously been deported SIX times, had a long rap sheet ect. Local police didn’t alert ICE due to sanctuary laws. Self deprecation is a mental illness!

BTW
You guys are really getting into the weeds on several issues.

1. We have to stop the flood from Central America

2. President Trump did everything humanly possible including a government shutdown to do this the way it was supposed to be done.

3. The legal battle may take the remainder of President Trumps time in office.

4. If you think this is dangerous now think about if President Tump loses the next election.
Harris and Warren have already spoke in favor of reparations for minority’s that combined with the money that could be wasted on climate change, paid time off, basic income ect. This combined with “Open Borders” will make for some interesting conversation.

Everything except get the funding when the Republicans controlled both chambers of Congress for two years.

 

[jamil]

So help me understand things here this dude in CALIFORNIA had previously been deported SIX times, had a long rap sheet ect. Local police didn’t alert ICE due to sanctuary laws. Self deprecation is a mental illness!

BTW
You guys are really getting into the weeds on several issues.

1. We have to stop the flood from Central America

2. President Trump did everything humanly possible including a government shutdown to do this the way it was supposed to be done.

3. The legal battle may take the remainder of President Trumps time in office.

4. If you think this is dangerous now think about if President Tump loses the next election.
Harris and Warren have already spoke in favor of reparations for minority’s that combined with the money that could be wasted on climate change, paid time off, basic income ect. This combined with “Open Borders” will make for some interesting conversation.

1. The "flood" from central america is unlikely to be stopped by this emergency action. By the time this gets through the courts, assuming the SCOTUS will rule that since emergency is undefined that any declaration of emergency is within the law, if not within ethical use. It's unclear that a wall is the only way to stop it, or that it would be or remain effective to stop it.

2. You're justifying exploitation of a law which gives cover to the other side to use it for their pet projects. Like gun control. Global warming. Any number of things they maintain are national emergencies.

3. Exactly. Which means whatever it is that the wall can contribute to stopping the "flood" is far off.

4. Trump may win, he may lose, but eventually Democrats will have the same power of emergency that Trump has broached.

 

[jamil]

The abuse of power has been going on for years, we would not have the illegal alien issue we do had powers not been abused, Trump is just doing what he can to try and bail out a sinking ship, I for one am not interested in passing down a 3rd world country to my children.. slowing down the flow of illegals is a good step towards that goal, and you are right..it will not 100% stop the flow of invaders, but it will stop ones that would otherwise walk right over, drop a baby and live off our tax dollars, all while having no respect for the hand that feeds

So let's be the side that breaks it wide open? I mean. Dude, the way it is now, presidents still couldn't do a whole lot without congress. We got through a horrible time of relentless attacks on the 2A. Obama's pen and phone werne't all that effective against us. If this use of emergency powers stand, look out.

And we need to stop this back and forth crap. You guys keep telling me how urgent this problem is. Well, maybe it is, or maybe your fears are being as manipulated as the left's are by their press. It's not **** the rule of law urgent! We're not to the point where we throw that out. Continually trying to convince me that it's as urgent as you think it is, isn't going to make me think we're at the point where it's literally by any means necessary, including breaking congress. If just anything can be declared an emergency it's a lot easier to just say the President has all the power he needs and congress is just a figurehead.

 

[BugI02]

So let's be the side that breaks it wide open? I mean. Dude, the way it is now, presidents still couldn't do a whole lot without congress. We got through a horrible time of relentless attacks on the 2A. Obama's pen and phone werne't all that effective against us. If this use of emergency powers stand, look out.

And we need to stop this back and forth crap. You guys keep telling me how urgent this problem is. Well, maybe it is, or maybe your fears are being as manipulated as the left's are by their press. It's not **** the rule of law urgent! We're not to the point where we throw that out. Continually trying to convince me that it's as urgent as you think it is, isn't going to make me think we're at the point where it's literally by any means necessary, including breaking congress. If just anything can be declared an emergency it's a lot easier to just say the President has all the power he needs and congress is just a figurehead.

But your preferred remedy is for him to lose in court, rather than call for the loophole to be closed? It seems like you are also valuing expediency over the rule of law. You just want him stopped a little sooner, like now; but you can't claim to be for the rule of law unless you can accept that it is legal if SCOTUS rules it so and it being against the rule of law will not be established without it going through the process

I hope that like me, you have never liked the whole ideological battle over the soul of SCOTUS, that that court and the circuit courts should only rule on whether something is constitutional or legal according to laws actually on the books rather than it being necessary to have a majority of [insert preferred ideology] justices or it's TEOTWAWKI. Now might be a good time to start worrying again that SCOTUS has all the power it needs, and if ideology must prevail at SCOTUS that it damned well better be our ideology for limited government to have a breath of a chance

Whether the emergency declaration is within the rule of law has yet to be determined, so the assertion that we are abandoning the rule of law has not been established, it is just your opinion. Trump has never failed to obey a court order, he just *****es about it. From my viewpoint your fears are drastically overblown

 

[SheepDog4Life]

I read on INGO that the problem is mostly visa overstays. I'm sure that this illegal who was deported several times and tried to murder a police officer was just a visa overstay. #wallsdontwork

I get the sarcasm.

I've seen "estimates" that 400k illegally enter into the country, while 600k illegally overstay their visas. That's a million per year total entering or overstaying.

Yet, ICE in 2017 only deported 226k. https://www.ice.gov/sites/default/files/documents/Document/2017/iceByTheNumbersFY17Infographic.pdf

Basic math says a net 774k illegals per year, but the same estimates that gave us 400k and 600k say the illegal population is steady or even declining.

 

[Brad69]

The Presidential power to declare a “emergency” is there and if not changed could be used for all kinds of evil IMO.
President Trump is doing everything he can to stop what he perceives as a emergency right or wrong.

The Immigration issue is real, the ability for a country to assimilate immigrants into the culture, language, laws, norms of behavior ect. Is the key. Immigration from countries with similar culturural norms of course is much easier and quicker. If one of us were to immigrate to the UK for example other than some cultural norms the class system and certain laws our transformation would be easy.
In contrast migration from Central America where poverty is real and most of us here cannot relate to how poor the people are.
The transition for a person who grew up in a third world country is difficult I would imagine first world problems are baffling to them.

BTW
The highest country with VISA overstays was Canada with 101,281 in fy17.
Most of them are “snowbirds” that spend the winter in the southern US and return to CA in the summer.

 

[jamil]

But your preferred remedy is for him to lose in court, rather than call for the loophole to be closed? It seems like you are also valuing expediency over the rule of law. You just want him stopped a little sooner, like now; but you can't claim to be for the rule of law unless you can accept that it is legal if SCOTUS rules it so and it being against the rule of law will not be established without it going through the process

I hope that like me, you have never liked the whole ideological battle over the soul of SCOTUS, that that court and the circuit courts should only rule on whether something is constitutional or legal according to laws actually on the books rather than it being necessary to have a majority of [insert preferred ideology] justices or it's TEOTWAWKI. Now might be a good time to start worrying again that SCOTUS has all the power it needs, and if ideology must prevail at SCOTUS that it damned well better be our ideology for limited government to have a breath of a chance

Whether the emergency declaration is within the rule of law has yet to be determined, so the assertion that we are abandoning the rule of law has not been established, it is just your opinion. Trump has never failed to obey a court order, he just *****es about it. From my viewpoint your fears are drastically overblown

No. I'd rather congress get together and say, no, let's head off this. Loosing in court, depending how the decision comes down, would be the most likely thing to happen though. And I don't want an ideological decision either. I can see a lower court ruling along ideological lines, and then it finally reaching SCOTUS. That seems like the most likely track things will follow. But, there is a reasonable cause for a lower court to rule it unconstitutional, if they have the guts to do it. And that is to say that congress does not have the authority to delegate this specific use of emergency powers. I think a principled "originalist" kind of SCOTUS justice might agree. An idealist would say either yes or no depending on which team they bat for.

On the question of rule of law, I think it's obvious and should be obvious that it's not. There is the letter and spirit of the law, and yes, you can find some loopholes to get around laws, especially in a way that is extraordinary, and when you do that to bypass the separation of powers laid out in the constitution, that does subvert the rule of law in effect. And I think it's a pretty good argument that congress was never given the authority to delegate its power in the way that Trump is using this. In fact, I don't actually have a problem at all with the few dozen declarations of emergency since the law went into effect until now. They're all mostly santions. They're all uncontroversial acts which a president should have the authority to do.

So, if Congress does the right thing and readdresses emergency powers, probably they shouldn't remove it altogether. But they should at least put some kind of definition around "emergency" so that presidents can't just use it to bypass congress.

 

[T.Lex]

Quick question: does the "national emergency law" limit how often POTUS can declare something an emergency.

Seems to me, as soon as Congress does its thing to try to stop it, POTUS can just declare another one. Maybe not exactly the same one, but a really really similar one.

 

[Kutnupe14]

Quick question: does the "national emergency law" limit how often POTUS can declare something an emergency.

Seems to me, as soon as Congress does its thing to try to stop it, POTUS can just declare another one. Maybe not exactly the same one, but a really really similar one.

Back to back National Emergencies? Not even Trump is that stupid. Not to say he won't try it again, but I think he's smart enough to allow for a cool down.

 

[Libertarian01]

Agreed. Except I'd just add that the emergency powers has been used for uncontroversial purposes up until this point. I think presidents did not want to be seen abusing the power. It would distroy their legacy, or perception of them as leaders. You get a president who doesn't give a **** about precedent and how other president's have used emergency powers and you'll have one that just decides to abuse it and take his chances. And his ardent supporters are okay with that because it gets them what they want. And given the conversations here, no one believes it'll be used against them. Now Democrats will have the cover of, well, the Republicans did it.

Probably the best way to solve it so that we dont' have to worry about the weaponization of "emergency" in the culture war would be for congress to change the law to define more clearly what an emergency is and limit the scope further for how a president can use it.

I agree that precedent has guided much thinking in the past. To my thinking that is part of the problem.

Power should be used, and exercised wisely with prudence and caution - but it should be used to its fullest extent.

That is why the power should be limited and balanced so that all the power that can be brought to solve problems and execute the lawful responsibilities of government is done so. But that is why the power should be, in my opinion, limited and defined. I would like to return to that power which probably existed before 1930 when we were not ruled by fear. Fear of unemployment in the great depression. Fear of war with, well, anyone and everyone. Fear of communism. We were still the most powerful government on earth, we just didn't know it or do anything with it. Culturally and socially I mean.

Today I don't believe we have an immigration problem. We have a social welfare state problem. We have a corrupt business problem. We have an overwhelmed LE problem. Heck, many of the folks coming here from the south aren't even immigrants, they're asylum seekers. Resistance to them is easier than facing the welfare/corruption/LE issue(s), so that resistance will exist.

Note this does not mean that I in any way support illegal crossing, just that it is a smokescreen issue for bigger issues that will be harder to solve.

Regards,

Doug