> Trump is banning visa and Green Card holders from returning to the States. This is notably different.
From a foreigner's standpoint, that isn't notable at all. In fact, it's nothing more than closing a loophole.
When the US government specifically dictates that a kind of foreigners are banned from entering US soil, the exceptions to that rule doesn't change the rule or even the spirit of the rule.
The US government wants those foreigners off their land, and that's it.
I agree that it's a silly rule, but it wasn't implemented overnight.
Yeah, but Obama also bombed their countries first, which is notably worse.
As a foreigner, for me this looks like a hypocrisy theater of crocodile tears. But then again, this is par for the course for politics in general, and US politics in particular.
That bombing was extensively reported and widely criticized.
This attempt to dismiss complaints as hypocrisy is really tiresome. Obama bombed some countries so who cares if Trump fucks over law-abiding American residents for no reason.
>That bombing was extensively reported and widely criticized.
Really? Did taxi drivers stop serving the airport? Company leaders asking others to "take a stand"? Liberal media unanimous against it? Judicial intervention?
Because it seems this has 10x or 100x the scale those "widely criticisms" of the bombings had under Obama (during Bush, and for the Iraq war it was only slightly better).
>This attempt to dismiss complaints as hypocrisy is really tiresome. Obama bombed some countries so who cares if Trump fucks over law-abiding American residents for no reason.
Well, that's the hypocrisy though. What's worth protesting "law-abiding American residents" who are denied entrance is not for non-Americans from the same countries who are bombed.
Is the world tiring US with all these demands for consistency?
It's like that Mel Brooks quote: “Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.”
>Also, I'm fairly sure Obama didn't bomb Iran.
No (though Bush did several covert military action and internal meddling there), but he did the same thing Trump did:
"The State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months in 2011, federal officials told ABC News [in 2013] – even for many who had heroically helped U.S. forces as interpreters and intelligence assets."
Why do people keep bringing up this Iraq refugee thing as if it were equivalent? I'm not going to defend that action, but it's not at all the same. Screwing with legal US residents is a whole different level.
Please point out the vast protests that occurred in the US over the Syrian bombings. Surely that drew extremely large marches. Or perhaps link me to the Huffington Post's Syrian death counter that tracked how many people Obama's war on Syria killed.
Whataboutism is absolute poison. Are you actually arguing that we should ignore evil on the basis that prior evil wasn't sufficiently protested? Or are you just trying to score a point for your team? I don't get it.
>Whataboutism is absolute poison. Are you actually arguing that we should ignore evil on the basis that prior evil wasn't sufficiently protested?
No, selective interest is absolute poison.
Whataboutism is merely about prioritization.
It allows people to have their pet causes and feel good about themselves while ignoring larger scale evil going on and affecting both their country and the lives of millions.
And it's not like what's suggested is something like "do something about everything bad going on or do nothing" paralysis.
It's like, major major evil affecting hundreds of thousands of lives is going on by your country and you don't give a damn, and suddenly you all jump for a much smaller offense.
Prioritize damnit. You can't largely ignore 10x and cry wolf for 1x. Or you can, and you did, but you shouldn't.
In the 60s they knew how to mass protest for both civil rights, women/gay rights, AND the Vietnam war for example, at the same level of engagement.
I could argue about priorities, but I'm more interested in a larger question.
What's your end game here? If you want us to go back in time and protest drone strikes more strongly, my understanding is that this is not practical. If you want us to stop caring about Trump's insane actions, I can't understand why. If you want us to care more about more stuff in the future, that makes sense, but it's not the meaning I get from what you write. What are you after?
+1. Can't wait for them to start "protesting" against the exact same kinds of drone strikes and bombing raids Obama ordered for years when Trump starts ordering them.
The difference to me is context. I admit that I don't have a great recollection of the details of Obama's refugee ban, but from what I remember I have no reason to believe that he was motivated by something other than national security risk (whether or not the risk was significant enough to justify the ban is something I don't claim to know).
But the context of Trump's ban is very different. He promised a Muslim ban during his campaign, and according to Rudy Giuliani (tonight on Fox News), Trump asked him for advice on implementing the Muslim ban but in a technically legal way. I see no reasonable interpretation of this as anything other than Trump's team's best effort to discriminate against Muslims while being technically legal.
> I see no reasonable interpretation of this as anything other than Trump's team's best effort to discriminate against Muslims while being technically legal.
How about Trump fulfilling his campaign promises while being technically legal?
The State Department implemented new layers of bureaucracy at the start of 2011 which acted as a de facto impediment/delay to applicants in the Iraqi refugee program, and were rightly criticized at the time. [1]
This differs substantially from an affirmative ban which stranded people at airports.
This report (dated 13 July 2011) by the NYTimes with the title "Visa Delays Put Iraqis Who Aided U.S. in Fear" is the exact opposite of "nary a peep". [0]
EDIT: remove appositional identification of the NYTimes as "widely considered the US newspaper of record". Change from interrogative to declarative mood.
Yep, hardly a peep at all. Where were the large scale protests? Where was the 24/7 media coverage across every possible outlet? Where was the widespread outrage? It didn't exist, which is why the story didn't continue to have legs and most forgot it ever happened.
> The Obama administration has required new background checks for visa applicants, reacting to a case in Kentucky in which two Iraqi immigrants were arrested on suspicion of ties to an insurgent group, according to American officials in Baghdad.
You're surprised that there weren't nationwide protests for "required new background checks for visa applicants", versus an outright ban against green card holders? Maybe because most people don't know of a current visa applicant from Iraq, but many people know of green card holders -- i.e. people who have been living legally in the United States -- who are now banned from re-entry.
The "peep" is national media coverage. The insinuation of the GGP was that mainstream media did not cover this fact. Given the reputation of the NYTimes as the US newspaper of record, the article I cite is the journalistic equivalent of using a bullhorn.
The fact that people did not protest the 2011 executive order which suspended the approval of visa applications from Iraq indicates people were not unduly alarmed.
In the present case, however, many people believe that the indiscriminate ban on immigration from 7 majority-Muslim nations is immoral and possibly a violation of the US Constitution. The protests indicate that public opinion opposes this administration's executive action.
In other words, the media were very "loud" about Obama's 2011 and Trump's 2017 executive actions halting immigration.
The people, however, see these two things very differently, as well they should.
EDIT: grammar, readability, clarification of subject in second paragraph, change metaphor from "shouting" to "using a bullhorn".
No, it specifically relates to increased security checks and verification for refugee visa-seeking applicants (a major discussion point of R governmental agenda, but since it was enacted by a Dem president he is still clearly soft/weak on terrorism).
