Let the Immigration Courts be in the Home Countries

   There's a move to have immigrants apply for their asylum in their home countries, instead of having them cross into the U.S. to apply.
   I don't know that I would no longer let them apply upon entry. Having them come here to apply is okay with me. But, it does seem evident that taking care of the matter before traveling all the way here is a logical way to do it.
   But, I have a warning: Don't end the court system. I do not know that this is the intent, but I am sure to warn against it. Don't do away with the court system and make the decision on whether they are allowed without giving them their day in court.
  If they apply in their home countries, where will the cases be tried? If they are tried in our immigration courts in the U.S., the applicants will not be able to be physically present. I suppose teleconferences might work.
   I, though, like the option of opening immigration courts right in the home countries, in the consulates there. In gathering background information on the applicant, it might possibly be done better if done right where the sources and witnesses are at hand. And, the judges would be living in the environment the applicants are coming from, giving them a knowledge of the conditions the applicants are fleeing. This fits in closer with the tradition of being tried by your peers. Read the Sixth Amendment. Having the courts in their home countries is more in keeping with the spirit of what it says.
  "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense."
  Asylum trials are not for crimes, it may be pointed out. Still, the spirit of the Sixth Amendment should apply to these trials.
   

The Current System Capping Immigration is not Fair

  What Sen. Mike Lee is attempting to do is good thing: bringing an end to the very low per-country caps on employment green cards.
   Current law limits immigrants from any given country from comprising more than 7 percent of the total number of visas allowed. So, those from countries with large populations end up waiting longer periods of time than those from smaller countries.
   I don't know that Sen. Lee seeks to totally end the cap system. That would be good. But, I read how the cap for family-sponsored green cards would raise to 15 percent. That's giving justice at least a little more leeway.
   When something is unfair, it should be changed. Laws that make you wait longer just because you are from Mexico instead of Siam are not fair.
 

Has Our High Court Diminished to This?

   Look at a decision rendered by the Supreme Court this week, and wonder if the court members are quite willing to make decisions so as to entrench their party in power.
   The court threw out two cases where partisan gerrymandering was alleged.
   So, I word search, to see if one party is more inclined to gerrymander than the other. A New York Intelligencer story indicates that might be the case, Then, an Associate Press article suggests that news-gathering agency did draw such a conclusion from an analysis it made.
   "The analysis found four times as many state with Republican-skewed state House or Assembly districts than Democratic ones," the story said. "Among the two dozen most populated states that determine the vast majority of Congress, there were nearly three times as many with Republican-tilted U.S. House districts."
   So, let's see, the Supreme Court now has a conservative majority. Allowing political gerrymandering favors the Republicans. Any possible connection?
   There was perhaps a time when being on the Supreme Court had nothing to do with being a Republican or a Democrat. Those days are past. The court is now divided by its politics.
   That the nation's highest court might have handed down a ruling that helps keep its own party in power is disappointing, to say the least. Appalling is an appropriate term.
   Just as legislators who draw the districts to favor their party aren't going to admit as much, so the members of the Supreme Court, if they are doing this as a favor to their own party, are not going to admit it.
   But, the thought that a court of justice -- even our highest court -- might have sunk to this level is troublesome.

Don't Let Biased Legislators Draw the Lines

   Former Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy once said he would favor banning partisan gerrymandering if only someone could show him a way to identify it.
   You see, partisan gerrymandering is done without it being announced as such. Political parties don't normally confess to what they are doing, even when it is obvious.
   In answer to Justice Kennedy, I would say that while a law against partisan gerrymandering might be difficult to enforce, a law taking redistricting out of the hands of biased legislators is not. Just require that independent, non-partisan boards draw the districts. And, as part of their oath to office, let them swear they will not draw lines just to favor a political party.
 

The Supreme Court or Congress did Abdicate on Their Responsibility

  The Supreme Court ruled this week that it has no authority to protect the citizens against partisan gerrymandering. So, a state filled with Republican lawmakers, such as Utah, can take a community that otherwise would be Democrat, and simply shave into it areas that are Republican, so the vote of that district then swings to Republican.
   Such a practice goes against fairness. A community filled with Democrats should be allowed to elect a representative who is a Democrat.
   But, the Supreme Court says such gerrymandering is legal as far as the federal government is concerned. It says it has no jurisdiction to overturn laws that gerrymander this way.
   Does it? The Constitution says, "The United States shall guarantee to every state in the Union a Republican form of government." Now, the argument becomes whether a Republican form of government is just one based on representation, or whether a Republican form of government implies fair play and fair elections.
   But, don't leave it just with that one statement in the Constitution to determine if the Supreme Court has jurisdiction here. The Constitution says the Supreme Court's judicial power shall extend to all cases involving not only that Constitution, itself, but to "the Laws of the United States." If, then, there is a law specifying that elections shall be fair, the Supreme Court is within its jurisdiction in requiring fair elections.
   If there is a void here -- if there actually is no federal law suggesting elections shall be fair -- then it becomes incumbent on Congress to pass such a law as quick as the Supreme Court justices march out court having made their decision.
   I would wonder if there not only is not a single federal law speaking not just to fairness, in general, but specifically to gerrymandering. You tell me there is no such law? There is no federal law dealing with gerrymandering? Or, if there is, it doesn't require fair play?
   What a void. If so, why has Congress failed to pass such legislation?
  You may argue that regardless what federal law says, this is a states-rights issue. Indeed, I believe the Supreme Court said its decision applies only to cases being adjudicated in federal courts, and left open that state courts can make their own determinations.
   But, that is not so. The Constitution does make this a federal concern. There is language right in the Constitution dealing with this. "The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States." If this passage does not apply to this circumstance, I don't know what it does apply to.

Too said to post tonight, other than this.

Open Borders are but Open Arms

   Open borders are open arms, and open hearts. You must tell me why we do not open our arms to them, why we do not welcome them, accept them, love them.
   These are the poor. These are they who brave the ravages of the desert as they flee from the ills of other nations.
   You say they arrive without permission. Truth being worthy, though, they largely come seeking asylum, which is a legal process.
   It is we who say asylum is but a loophole in our law, and it is we who say that they don't truly deserve to come here. It is we who make a case against the poor and the destitute. It is we who would throw up a wall and cast them out.
  Open arms? When the poor and afflicted near our borders, do we seek a way to stop them. Do we say, Stay and live in Mexico while we adjudicate your case. Do we say, Better yet, let's let the police at the border make this decision, instead of our judges, and let's train our police in how to judge them, so that we can keep more of them out.
  You may not be aware President Trump has proposed this, but he has.
   Open arms? Are open borders so different? If we were to let in as many as we could take in -- as many as we have room for -- would that be so bad?
   Think of a poor person, a poor family, moving into your neighborhood. Would you say, No! Don't come. You will ruin the neighborhood.
   We should open our arms. There is no sin in this, no sin to letting them in.
 

Even as the Trail of Tears

  We think of times in America's history, such as the Trail of Tears. With what America is going through now, with the detention camps being compared to concentration camps, are we not going through another such moment?
  Even as we look back at the Trail of Tears with remorse, so will the day come that future generations will not be proud of what we are doing now.

Since when do police 

stop those who seek freedom?

America's borders were once for crossing, and all were invited here. Now, we throw up walls and hire police to stop those who seek freedom in our land. 

Once you crossed America's borders and the world was thrown open to you. Now you cross the borders and are thrown in a concentration camp. 

America's borders were once an invitation for those seeking freedom, prosperity, and an escape from oppression. Now they are a block against those who seek that same freedom, prosperity, and escape from the government oppression of their home lands.

The love of America by those who come here is greeted by the hatred of those whose can see no further than that they forgot their permission slip. 

When the dream becomes the crime, we should ask what we are criminalizing.

The dream is coming to America, 

and the crime is the same.

Once Trump said this is Obstruction of Justice

   It is officially Sunday, then -- the day the raids are to begin. President Trump has suggested he will round up millions of people here from other countries -- people he says are illegal -- and deport them.
   Beginning now.
   A day or two ago, I was reminded of the raid in the San Francisco-Oakland area of more than  a year ago, and of how Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf announced the ICE agents were coming, and of how President Trump said that for making that announcement, she was guilty of obstruction of justice,  for she was jeopardizing the raid.
   Will President Trump postpone the current nationwide raid at the last minute, realizing he has tipped off the immigrants just as the mayor did?
   Last night or the night before, I thought on it. Would I warn the immigrants, if I were given a chance? Would that make me guilty of obstruction of justice?
   How many will hide away this time, because President Trump has announced he is coming after them? If he says it was obstruction of justice that the mayor announced it, why is it not obstruction that he, himself, has announced it?

  Death always comes as a stranger
For you meet it only once
  But it comes also as a friend
Relieving pains that have bothered for months

   You embark in war to conquer, yet it, itself, is defeat. For when peace is gone, that is defeat.

 If the goal is peace, the loss of it is defeat. Therefore, war is, in a word, defeat.

Every ancient city has a drum that doesn't beat
A guitar with broken strings
And a song that's never sung

Every ancient city has a park where you cannot play
A pool where you cannot swim
And swings that will not swing

Every ancient city has a dream that's never lived
A life that's past and gone
And hope that has no hope

All the world is an ancient city
Where every street becomes deserted
All the world is an ancient city
Where weeds and weeds grow tall

We live and play while the city prospers
But time sweeps across the land
And an ancient city grows around us
And the hustle and bustle dies
Honking horns give way to winds that whistle
And an ancient city comes



Let the

Cast Out the Poor, and You Will be Re-elected?

  I wonder at President Trump's promise that he will deport millions. I wonder if I could persuade you to pause, to look at what is happening, and ask yourself why such rejection of these people.
  They are the poor. They are the poor of other nations. Yes, many of them come without our consent, and against our wishes.
  We would deport them? Millions of them? Mass deportation? And, we would make this the cornerstone of our reelection announcement, President Trump?
   We would take the poor, and force them out of our land? We would say, "Of course we will deport them, for they come illegally"?
   Some would point out that they will use our hospitals without properly paying for them, and they will use our welfare system.
   Such a burden, then, are the poor to us.
   Reflect on this, and wonder what we have become as a nation, that we cast out the poor who come without our permission, and that we make their deportation the diadem of our election campaign.
   This is the way to popularity? This is the way to be elected? Cast out the poor, and the people will love you? Cast out the poor and you will be elected?
   Yes, I wonder what we have become, as a nation. I do so wonder.
 

We Would have Her Apologize for Speaking Up for Them?

  If someone were being treated badly, and someone suggested they were being treated badly, should that person be asked to apologize for saying someone was being treated badly?
  Bless Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. She labeled the migrant detention camps as "concentration camps." House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy said she should apologize.
  For what? For defending the poor and afflicted who come from other nations, only to find themselves mistreated here?
   Bless AOC for standing up for them. Bless us, as a nation, but it is perhaps we who should apologize -- and more. Why is it we treat them this way, then, instead of feeling guilty, demand that anyone who feels we are treating them wrong should apologize?

Freedom begins with the right to roam

   Consider this thought: Freedom begins with the right to wander.
   Freedom has no bars, no shackles, no prison. Those who lose their freedoms are locked up, and not allowed to roam. You stick a man in prison, and he loses his freedom. And, what does that mean? What has he lost?
   The right to roam. The right to go where he chooses. His wandering is limited to the small confinement of a jail cell.
   So, what of the immigrant? Are we taking away a freedom when we limit his right to wander? Are we taking away a basic freedom by tossing up a wall, or by restricting him from crossing a border?
  Of course it is a loss of a freedom. Of course it is. The question is whether we are justified in taking away this freedom.
   And, I wonder.

The Poor Coming in Defiance of Laws that Reject Them

  We wonder what to call them. Will it be "illegal immigrants" or "undocumented immigrants"? Or how about "illegal aliens," a harsh term that stirs up a likeness of them being invaders from another planet.
   Tell me that's accurate.
   I have another term, which accurately describes them -- or at least many of them. I wonder at using it as I discuss them in the future: "The poor fleeing from other nations."
   "The poverty-stricken from Central and South America."
   "The poor pouring in from other lands."
   I do not think the term, "the poor from other countries," inaccurate, nor inappropriate. It is as accurate a description of them as there is. Perhaps if you want to be more complete, say, "the poor coming from other lands in defiance of laws that reject them."

   A beggar knocked on my door tonight. I send him away, scolding him for entering my yard without permission. Then, I called the cops to chase after him.
   As they arrived, lights flashing, and cornered him just a block away, I thought of the poverty-stricken arriving from south of the border -- the so-called illegal immigrants -- and how we treat them just as I had just treated this beggar. 

Statistics don't lie, people do.

 This is a take-off on the old phrase, Guns don't kill, people do. The thought has been expressed before this way:  Statistics don't lie, but liars use statistics, and, Statistics don't lie, but statisticians do.

More than 6,000 have Perished Crossing from Mexico

   Six thousand perished trying to cross from Mexico into the United States in the 16 years leading up to 2018.
    That's the official number. I take it from a website of the American Immigration Council, which (in 2018) reported this: The Border Patrol is under-counting -- has been for years.
   I read how there were 412 reported deaths in 2017. And, about 200 in 2018
   I wonder at the figures, if they are being purposely shaded so as to not contribute to any sympathy for the immigrant. I wonder if the under-counting has become worse the past year.
   

More Violence in St. Louis

  Three people were killed and at least a dozen wounded in multiple shootings in St. Louis this weekend.
   You will remember that four children and teenagers were slayed in five day from June 8 to 16, one being killed each day except Tuesday.
   None of the four killed this weekend were children or teenagers, though one was in his 20s.
   I do not know what the level of violence was in Chicago this weekend, but two weekends ago, 52 were shot and 10 died. It was the most violent weekend so far this year in that city.

Robert Mueller: Cybersecurity Expert

  The years were 2013-2014, I believe, and Robert Mueller's job at that time was as a consulting professor and lecturer at Stanford University  . . .
  Focusing on issues of cybersecurity.
  Cybersecurity. So, just a few years later, he came to serve as special counsel, investigating Russia's influence in our election. Such a background in cybersecurity surely was beneficial, even making him ideal for the post.
   I didn't know this about Mueller's background, and am sure most people were and are unaware of it.

Everything comes from a mental command, 

even health and good favor.

 
  This is a generality, I know, and there are things that we cannot control. Bad things do happen even when you have positive thoughts. Still, I believe this. I believe certain physical ailments can be healed with but the flip of a mental switch. 

The right to wander 

is where freedom begins.

Hatred is a chosen value.

The sane man and the insane

are steps apart.

A march is forward, a retreat is back

To conquer an opponent, you must attack

If You Want the Electoral College, Consider You've Already Dumped it

  They scamper about, screaming and shouting how the Elector College should be saved.
  Without ever stopping to consider that it already has been lost.
   For those so concerned that we not go to a popular vote, for those anxious that we do it no other way than what the Constitution says, what about the Electoral College?
   Not the way it is, but the way it was intended to be?
   We scream how we cannot switch to a popular vote. Excuse me, but we already have. It's a little modified, and that allows for an occasional close election to go to the one with slightly fewer votes.
   But, if it is that you do not want to switch to a popular vote, then go back to doing it the way the Constitution outlined it.
   Elect electors. Put their names on the ballot. The way it is now, the elector's names are not even on the ballot. Even when the election is over, we seldom learn the names of the electors who were elected.
    Names, please.
    And, once the electors are elected, let them consider whomever they want for the office -- regardless if that person was even running. It's an appointment, really, and few appointments are filled with people who announce they are running for that office. Did any of the current cabinet members announce their candidacies? Did they spend millions of dollars campaigning?
   If you want your republican form of government, don't give the pretense that what we have is it. It is not. If it is so important that we do it the way the Constitution says, then let's do it that way.

Resignations can be a Matters of Protest

  I have wondered on this: Robert Mueller resigned. He didn't just say his investigation was finally complete; He resigned. Sometimes, resignations come as acts of protest. We don't know that this was the case. Perhaps it wasn't.
   But, I wonder.

A Fourth Child Dies Today

  Four childhood slayings in five days in St. Louis. I cannot imagine a much bigger story than a string of murders of children. Yet it is getting little play in the national news.
  One each day for three days -- Saturday, Sunday, Monday -- and then a skip before the fourth one tonight (Wednesday).
  I wonder on why it isn't getting bigger play. The latest is being classed as a suspicious death, rather than a homicide. Another is being investigated as being a possible suicide, in addition to the possibility it is a homicide.
  I do believe how loud the police ring the bells -- or how much they downplay things -- is a factor.

Glacier National Park isn't Melting as Much as Thought

   They are taking signs down put up during the Obama Administration that predicted glaciers would be gone from the Glacier National Park by 2020.
   2020 is a year away, and some of the glaciers are -- rather than disappearing -- growing.
   It would seem the climate change theorists certainly got it wrong.
   Or did they? Turn to a National Geographic article from January of this year that contains a climate change prediction found from 2017. The National Geographic article explains how climate change is pushing arctic winds south. Think of the cold arctic winds that came down from the arctic this past winter, literally fulfilling the prediction. Now, lets quote from the National Geographic article:
   "As more Arctic air flows into southern regions, North America can expect to see harsher winters. That was the conclusion of a study published in 2017 in the journal Nature Geoscience. It found a link between warmer Arctic temperatures and colder North American winters. A separate study published in March of last year in the journal Nature Communications found the same link but predicted the northeastern portion of the U.S. would be particularly hard hit."
   So, that one group of climate scientists got it wrong doesn't mean another group didn't get it right.
 

That which bobs and weaves
 Dodges a mortal blow
But that which stands and takes the shot
 Does off to heaven go

Justice has truth for its master.

Falseness casts its own shadow.

Blind eyes often turn black.

Republicans Represent not Well Their Party by Standing with Trump

   It is not a light thing that so many Republicans senators and representatives stand behind Donald Trump. It reflects ill of the party that they can see what has transpired -- the many acts of subverting justice -- and yet rather than calling for impeachment, they hail the president.
   It speaks not well of the party. A party with no more values than this does deserve to be abandoned. If the truth is plain to see, and you refuse to see it;  if you refuse to give justice where justice is clearly due; if you are do not stand up for what is right even when it means going against your party . . .
   Obstruction of justice? You need not an investigation to see this.
   President Trump asked James Comey to take it easy on Michael Flynn. When that didn't happen, he fired James Comey. Then, President Trump tried to keep Mueller from being appointed special counsel, and tried to get him removed. The White House asked Bob McGhan to fire Mueller, then asked McGhan to place a false statement in the file saying he was not asked to fire Mueller. How wrong can it be, to ask a witness to lie to create a false record? The President also sought to influence the witness of Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and Michael Cohen by dangling the possibility of pardons before them.
   How are these things not efforts to undermine and influence the investigation? You do them and you should be accountable to that law that says don't do them. No one should care if you are a Republican or Democrat.
   Truth and justice should not be divided this way, Democrats on one side and Republicans on another. Wrong is wrong. You should line up on the side of truth even if you have to stand with Democrats.
   It does not take much to see that what Trump has done -- time after time after time -- is obstruction of justice. If you place your party above truth and justice, your party has little moral value to stand on.
   Stand on the side of truth, even if it doesn't stand on the side of your party.

  If a beggar 
sticks his head in your garbage can, call him a thief.

   I know this analogy isn't an exact one. Yes, it is illegal for the beggar to come on your property and take something out of your garbage -- just as it is illegal for an immigrant to come into America without proper permission -- but taking something out of a garbage can can be different than coming to America.
   Or is it? They take jobs no one else wants. That is much the same as them taking something out of a garbage can that no one else wants.
   But, some of those jobs people do want. The argument is that they take jobs away from the native-born. And, there is the matter that not everyone coming to America comes to take jobs. Some would suggest a leading reason they come is to take advantage of our welfare and medical systems.
   That is hardly like taking garbage out of a garbage can.
   Still, the analogy is correct in the point it is trying to make: A beggar taking something out of a garbage can is doing something illegal. If we become obsessed with sending the undocumented back simply because they are doing something illegal, isn't that much the same thing as crying, "Thief! Thief! and calling the cops on them for breaking into our garbage cans?
   These are the poor, these immigrants. Make no mistake that there is a likeness. We are as one crying "Thief! Thief!" and rushing to our phone to call the cops.
 

Protest Park

  How about a street just for protests? Set it aside so there are no businesses or anything alongside it. And, a park just for protests. Give it a block and call it Protest Park.
   The street would cut through the center of the park. Now, this street would introduce a new mode of protesting. Electric video signs would carry the protest messages. In addition to the video signs that might be viewed in seconds by those in cars. there could have longer videos for those walking the sidewalks to stop and watch.
   Is there a place for pre-recorded video protesting, or is this an invention?
   So, even when no protest groups were actively protesting in the park, the protesting would continue with the electronic messaging.
   Is there a park anywhere in the world dedicated just to protesting, or is this, too, an invention?
   Protesting can be good, but it can also inflame. I would put rules on the protesting, just as some newspapers have requirements for civil dialogue. The electronic signage would be subject to these rules. I'm not sure you could put such rules on the live protesting, but perhaps.
   I do think it would be neat if you had a place where all the debate was civil. No name-calling and such. Perhaps require it in all the electronic messaging, and just encourage it in the live protesting. Perhaps tell them, No, you are not going to be kicked out. But, we are hopeful you won't use foul language, won't demean each other, won't call each other names.
   When accused of being the thought police, tell them you were not there to enforce, just to encourage, and that your voice, also should not be shut down.
    Having someone actively identifying the incivilities as they went down could discourage such conduct.

A Street Well-Lit Might be an Attraction

   I wonder if a city might seek to make somewhat of a tourist site of one of its main streets, just by lighting them well.
   I think of the lights at Temple Square during Christmas season, and how people come to see them.
   The street could have a motif, if desired, with the manner of lights all being similar, for continuity.
   Street lights, themselves, could be part of it. Or, you could have the street so well lit that no street lights would be necessary.
   A canopy of twinkling lights over the street? Mirrors that catch the lights from the cars, arranged so they do not blind the eye, but please it? There are a lot of possible motifs. Maybe use one on one street and another on another street.
 

We shake a fist in the face of the poor? 

The immigrant comes in poverty, yet we greet him in anger.

From the Beaches of Normandy, to the Port of Entry at San Ysidro

   Someone posts a meme on Facebook honoring those who landed at Normandy. One of his friends replies, "Would these young soldiers, many of which died during the D-day landing, support putting illegal alien benefits ahead of their own and that of their bothers and sisters who have served honorably in America's wars since?"
  Normandy? D-Day? I reply:
  All these 75 years later, another war is being fought, it in the hearts of men, it not on foreign shores, but on the beaches and plains of America, it not against an oppressor from another land, but the oppressed from another land. Even as France was under German rule, so most people in America ascribe to the thought that these people should not be allowed. Back then, we sided with those who fought for those in another land; Today, we side with those who oppose their coming to our land.

I do not Oppose Their Coming

   I don't oppose them, these immigrants. They are just poor people wanting to come to America. Some might carry Mexican flags with them. I have no objection. They can retain a pride for their homeland, a love for their homeland. I would not force them to renounce it. I do not ask a man to be like me, to speak like me, nor to renounce the traditions of his fathers. To me, when that flag of America waves, it symbolizes not conformity, not the requirement to "assimilate," but the right to choose your own language, and to honor the traditions of your fathers as much as those found here. I would look at their poverty, look at their desire to work, and to join their families, and I would say, "Come on in; Why should I oppose your coming?"

Has not Robert Mueller been Muzzled? Did We Even Notice As Much?

   We speak of free speech. I wonder if there is a more grievous denial of free speech than what Robert Mueller has suffered.
   He was muzzled. We spent spend millions of dollars on his investigation only to muzzle what he could say. It was one of the highest profile investigations ever, yet what was found out about our president was not fully allowed to be said.
   Tell me if you saw that angle in any of the news stories on Mueller's speech. Did you? How many news outlets covered that? How many saw this, and reported it?
   Pick up the text of his speech and read it.
   "The Special Counsel's Office is part of the Department of Justice and, by regulation, it was bound by that Department policy. Charging the President with a crime was therefore not an option we could consider."
   Does he not say they were not allowed to charge the president with a crime -- that that would be against department policy?
   Read just a little further.
   "And, beyond Department policy, we were guided by principles of fairness. It would be unfair to potentially accuse somebody of a crime when there can be no court resolution of an actual charge."
   If you cannot charge someone with a crime, because the department won't let you, yet you make the charge, anyway, even though you don't file that charge, isn't that pretty much the same thing? If you make the accusations, they, themselves, beg for charges to be filed. You may as well file them because there's not much difference.
   Mueller seems to have recognized that and chose to not even verbalize what he would say if he were allowed to say it.
    Read Mueller's speech further, and learn that he said they had to choose their words carefully in the report, itself.
   Tell me we have not muzzled our highest investigator? Tell me we have not taken one of the highest level investigations in our nation's history, and muzzled it. We speak of erosion of our freedoms. Why should this not count?

Freedom begins with the right to wander.

Mueller isn't Allowed to Say What He Found Out?

  If, in America, you are a federal investigator, and you don't even feel free to say the president committed a crime, what has our country come to? If we spend all these millions of dollars on an investigation, and it goes on for two years . . .
  And a department policy prohibits you from telling the truth about what you found out? Yes, what has America come to that it has come to this?
   Mueller told us he had to choose his words carefully, but he said:"The Special Counsel's Office is part of the Department of Justice and, by regulation, it was bound by that Department policy. Charging the President with a crime was therefore not an option we could consider."
   That is succinct enough: He was bound by policy that did not allow him to charge the president with a crime.
   He goes on to suggest that he doesn't even feel free to accuse Trump of a crime, much less charge him. He says, "It would be unfair to potentially accuse somebody of a crime when there can be no court resolution of an actual charge." 

He who insists on choosing his neighbors
Is often not the friendly kind
He who would limit the neighbor from coming
Is not of a welcoming mind

They come from far countries
And they come from afar
And we tell them they're not welcome here
We tell them all of the lots are taken
And we chase them away in our fear

These immigrant folks would only be neighbors
But we are not of an neighborly mind
We chase them away and look for their faults
And faults are what we find. 

(Index: Poem, poems)

The right to buy 

a house does not come with the right to say who lives next door. 

I would for a merit-based immigration system,

 but let the search for freedom, the search of family, and the search for the American way of life be their merits. 

Peace is not made in retreat, 

but only when both sides have 

nothing to flee. 

Dominion demands its borders,

while freedom opens them.

Freedom welcomes all, 

while dominion rules over those 

who would enter.

A gun fights solace

 in the death of another.

Guns always get their way. 

But they seek no more than hate. 

In search of hope, 

you must go to places you fear.

Political parties come only with rancor;

 Friendship is never their goal. 

Guns always stutter, 

and yet their words are clear. 

The ornament gets the praise 

though it does none of the work.

No one spreads the seeds of discord 

more than the followers of politicians.

With the dignity of night 

comes the dismissal of the day. 

Sleep is the pleasure of both 

the working class and the sloven, but one is less likely to toss and turn than the other. 

Sleep comes to but two, those who know peace, and those who know fatigue.

Society goes where the school ventures.

  If we would have peace, we must teach peace. If we would have love, we must teach it.
  If we are having racial tension, if we are having mass murders committed against Muslims or Christians, if we have division between Republicans and Democrats . . .
  Why not our schools teach against these things?

The greatest foe we face

 is the fear of facing a foe.

Dreams inspire our future, 

while nightmares haunt our past.

The foes in life are many. But none are worse than the refusal to face a foe.

Everybody faces a foe in life, and sometimes that foe it the refusal to face a foe. 

From the Birds and the Bees to the Bible, What is it We Should Teach?

  Putting a lid on knowledge is not what education is all about.
  So what of banning sex education, or the Bible from the classroom? Those teachings are at the opposites ends of the spectrum, in regards to what we say is acceptable to teach.
  But, should either be banned?
   I will grant that the way you teach, and the way you approach a topic can make it wrong. But, I hesitate and wonder if learning about the birds and the bees is something we need to know.
   And, if we need to know, something, it ought to be taught.
   You may argue that parents need to teach this lesson. Not schools. I hesitate on that. Parents should be involved in all the teaching of their children. All things moral should be taught by parents.
   But, that doesn't mean others cannot teach as well.
   Some tell me that the teachings of the Bible should be taught in the home, not in the school, for the teachings of the Bible are something the parents are responsible for.
   If you are learning in depth about what the Bible teaches, perhaps those classes should be elective. If you are teaching that the Bible is truth, then surely that should be an elective class.
   But, I would not ban the Bible, altogether. Nor the Koran.

Religion Might be Most Important Thing to be Taught in Our Schools

   Christianity is an important element of society. It is not wrong, but rather important, that you learn about the world about you.
  Let the beliefs of Muslims, Jews, Atheists, and Wiccans all be explained. In life, we brush shoulders with all beliefs. If school is to prepare you for life, it is not wrong to learn about the world about you.
   It is important.
   Perhaps an understanding of Muslim beliefs might help us be more tolerant of them.
It would seem to me, that of all the things to be taught in school, nothing is more important than learning about the society you live in. Wars are fought over religion. Mass murders are committed. If we would reduce these things, we must learn why we should not fear each other, and why we should not hate each other.
    Religious education (taught in this manner) is perhaps more important than math, or chemistry, or anything.

The Question is How Many Times He Committed Obstruction of Justice

  I read of how and hear of how and am weathered by those who say, Two years of investigation and all this money spent and the Mueller Report came up with nothing.
  Nothing, they say. Nothing.
   Are their eyes closed?
   A video I just saw spells it out. "Former Republican Federal Prosecutors Speak Out Against President Trump's Obstruction of Justice."
   If you look at these incidents, many of them (if not all) were so public, the average person can clearly see they were obstruction of justice -- and that they did occur and were not fake news. You don't need a federal investigator to tell you these things were obstruction of justice; It is obvious.
  The video is short. You might want to view it. It points out how the Mueller Report discusses these incidents. We don't need Mueller's Report to tell us these were criminal acts. We can see as much.
   President Trump asked James Comey to take it easy on Michael Flynn. That is attempting to influence the even handidness of an investigation; It is obstruction of justice. Then, when that didn't happen, he fired James Comey. He, himself, acknowledged the firing was due to the Russian investigation. If you fire someone because they are investigating you, how is that not obstruction of justice? Then, President Trump tried to keep Mueller from being appointed special counsel, and tried to get him removed. The White House asked Bob McGhan to fire Mueller, then asked McGhan to place a false statement in the file saying he was not asked to fire Mueller. As the video points out, asking a witness to lie to create a false record is a classic case of obstruction of justice. The President also sought to influence the witness of Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and Michael Cohen by dangling the possibility of pardons' before them. His words were public, and on record, and in the news. When asked if pardons were possible, he said he was taking nothing off the table. The witnesses in the case read the papers, so whether he communicated the possibility of pardons to them more personally, or not, they got the message from the news.
   The question is not whether he committed obstruction of justice, but how many times he committed it. If someone were to write a history of obstruction of justice, I doubt they would find a person in all of U.S. history who has committed more such acts than President Trump.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwnMpneFR34

If we count truth by how much it hurts democrats or republicans, we don't count truth at all.

What about this?

   Was it late April? Was it a month ago, a story broke about Ukraine not cooperating with the Mueller investigation in exchange for receiving weapons?
   That story didn't get much coverage, did it? I just heard of it today.
   If a president gave weapons of war to someone in exchange for their not cooperating with an investigation against him, isn't that a high crime? Do we want a president who would do this? Should we not be gravely concerned?
   Or, do we just turn our heads? Do we dismiss it as another red-herring, and say, Enough with all these investigations. They're over. Finished. Just accept that Trump is cool.
   A president got Ukraine to not cooperate with an investigation against him in exchange for warheads? If that is not high crimes, what is it? If that is not bribery, what do we call it?
   And, we don't care about this? It barely makes the news?
   You can dismiss this as a false story, but from what I read, there might be plenty of evidence it is true.
   Says a New York Times article:
   "The decision to halt the investigations by an anticorruptions prosecutor was handed down at a delicate moment for Ukraine, as the Trump administration was finalizing plans to sell the country's sophisticated anti-tank missiles, called Javelins."
    The article says one Ukraine official "readily acknowledged that the intention in Kiev was to put investigations into Mr. Manfort's activities 'in the long-term box.' "

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