Trump pardons a notorious drug dealer while he deports a bright college student. The college student didn’t flatter him and hire Roger Stone. Her bad.
Any Lucia Lopez Belloza is a 19-year old student at Babson College near Boston who has been in this country since she was seven. She has no criminal record. In fact, she appears to be a bright young woman on her way to a successful career during which she’ll pay her fair share of taxes and contribute to her community.
Belloza was on her way home to Texas to surprise her family for Thanksgiving. Instead, ICE surprised her with an arrest and deported her back to Honduras. Anyone who wants to explain to me why this was necessary or anything but a waste of taxpayer resources is welcome to give it a try in the comments section below.
Then only days after Belloza was deported, Donald Trump pardoned former Honduras President Juan Orlando Hernandez, who had just begun serving a 45-year sentence for drug dealing. Prosecutors characterized Hernandez’ operation as “one of the largest and most violent drug-trafficking conspiracies in the world.”
Trump offered no explanation for his action beyond vague, unsupported claims that he had been wrongly accused by the Biden administration. Actually, his prosecution started before even Trump’s first term. Hernandez, who paid an equally sleazy guy, Roger Stone, a small fortune to shill for him with Trump, appealed to Trump’s vanity, his sense of grievance and his view that he alone is the final arbiter of justice. He started off by referring to him as “Your Excellency.” Oh, for cryin’ out loud…
And, of course, Trump did this as he prosecutes a drug war against Venezuela, ordering boats that he alleges, again without providing evidence, are carrying drug traffickers. It’s possible that these actions amount to war crimes, but they are certainly a misuse of our nation’s military. Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro may want to retain the services of Mr. Stone.
Americans voted for Trump in part to close the southern border. In theory many may have even agreed with the general notion of deporting those who crossed that border illegally, especially if they had criminal records.
But nobody signed up to deport the likes of Any Lopez. And nobody was clamoring to free the likes of Hernandez. So, just who is Trump representing? I’m going to take a wild guess and say it’s the highest bidder.
Yellow Stripes & Dead Armadillos 
“But nobody signed up to deport the likes of Any Lopez. And nobody was clamoring to free the likes of Hernandez. So, just who is Trump representing? I’m going to take a wild guess and say it’s the highest bidder.”
Yes you are correct the highest bidder or who ever has something he wants, like a large plane or some land to build a new Trump resort. It also helps if you kiss his ass. So pucker up. So glad the price of ground beef is $7.99 a pound. But hey they owned the libs.
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“nobody signed up to deport the likes of Any Lopez”
People did vote to deport the likes of Any Lopez. Sure, not all Trump voters, but a chunk of them, and a large enough chunk that the campaign actively recruited their vote: RACISTS.
This blog goes to great lengths to downplay the role racism plays in our society. I often comment to remind readers that things often don’t make sense unless one comes to understand the extent to which racism has shaped and continues to shape our society.
As for pardoning the drug dealer: it’s just incredible to me that so much corruption can occur in broad daylight and conservatives still support the president. This administration is light years beyond the “both sides do it” trope. The flooding the zone technique worked.
Rich people run the show, as they have. Thus, rich people have decided that this is ok, otherwise it wouldn’t be happening. They don’t feel the need to moderate this approach, they’re embracing this new paradigm.
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It’s not racism but the accusation of racism that has continued to shape our country. And a boatload of rich and powerful people use it for their own purposes, and so do you.
After all who wants to admit they look the other way while immigrants dilute labor’s bargaining power? Much easier to put up your “In this house” sign and virtue signal how great you are.
I did not vote to have people like this girl removed but strictly from a strategic perspective it makes sense. IMO ICE realizes the biggest impact will come from illegal immigrants self deporting. What better way to get that to happen but by deporting the young attractive girl with such a bright future? People now know if it can happen to her it can happen to anyone. Yup, it’s harsh.
As for the pardons… meh. Happy to see the Jan 6 pardons and the Silk Road guy but others like the Honduras guy and Trevor Milton (look him up) and I consider it a wash.
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“I did not vote to have people like this girl removed” followed by an analysis of what a great tactic it is. So you didn’t want it initially, but appreciate it as a bonus?
“It’s not racism but the accusation of racism…”
Ha! So, all those kids spitting on Ruby Bridges grew up and decided not to be racist, and they taught their kids not to be racist? We elect a racist to be president, running on a racism platform, yet we aren’t racist ourselves!? “America is so racist, that when you protest racism people think you’re protesting America.” (I don’t know who that attributes to)
I agree that the rich and powerful use racism, LBJ’s quote about this is spot on: “If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.”
It’s just that your analysis turns reality upside-down: rather than denying racism exists, we need racists to understand this quote and stop buying in to the con. The White working class needs to get woke so we can unite against the pocket-pickers. Which is PRECISELY why the pocket-pickers have a war on woke right now.
“immigrants dilute labor’s bargaining power”
I say workers of the world should unite. The last person I should scapegoat is another worker – owners try and make workers hate each other instead of the owners, and you’re repeating their corporate propaganda. You’re also acting like labor has any remaining bargaining power left! (I’ll save an analysis of the demise of labor’s political and economic power for another day, but guess what? It has a big dose of racism.) After the White working class can stop blaming “the left,” minorities, and immigrants for their woes, we can turn to the actual source. And before anyone tries to tell me the White working class doesn’t see themselves as having any woes at all, might I remind you of Trump’s entire schtick?
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“This blog goes to great lengths to downplay the role racism plays in our society. I often comment to remind readers that things often don’t make sense unless one comes to understand the extent to which racism has shaped and continues to shape our society.”
Rollie…buddy…that’s because, unlike you, the commentariat (the overwhelming majority of whom align with you ideologically) don’t see racism behind every flippin’ tree, or manufacture it from whole cloth to prevent confronting the REAL root causes.
Anywho, a comment from a pal-o-mine (who is reportedly Black, and according to you, racist):
(bolds/caps/italics mine throughout) “How can a country that oppresses an entire race of people, a group of people that share the same race as I, somehow not oppress me? Not oppress my father? My brother? My sister, uncle, niece, cousins?
“If there is something that makes us different, that makes Thomas Sowell, and Jason Riley, and Walter E. Williams, and Derrick Green (writer for Project 21, a leadership network for Black Conservatives), and many other blacks who are apparent immune to this different, then why is no time devoted to identifying what that secondary component is, that causes us to be excluded from this oppression? We spend so much time discussing intersectionality, but ignore the intersection where systemic racism meets some unknown, unspoken characteristic possessed by some of us, where we become immune to that aforementioned systemic racism. If that’s our goal, eradicating racism, why is no one asking those of us who aren’t finding racism around every street corner, what our secret is? Why are the cameras consistently shoved in the faces of the victims of our racist society, but never us? (You and I both damn well know the answer)
“But, to my original question…by what metric can one claim that America is oppressive towards blacks?
“Is it the ritualistic, indiscriminate killing of blacks by cops? B/c according to the Washington Post Police Killings tracker, in 2017, twice as many whites are killed by cops than whites (164 to 326). And while, yes, Im fully aware that means (since whites outnumber blacks 5 to 1) that blacks are MORE LIKELY to be killed, it also means that whites are killed in high enough number, that police killings cannot be solely about race. And 95% of police killings involve men, but there’s no outrage about that…so if we’re being intellectually honest and consistent, it cannot be about police killing rates relative to a particular demographic’s representation in the population, right? Unless we’re willing to admit that men are over represented in activities that bring them into violent contact with police…but that can’t be it, unless we’re ALSO willing to admit (I think you see where this leads)…
“Is it about black poverty rates? 46% of Black families with children that are headed by single Black women live in poverty, vs 8% of black families where the parents are married (which obviously trails statistics for while single mom headed households/married households), but as of 2014, only 29% of black adults were married, down from 61% in 1960. It stands to reason that a 2 income household leads to more financial stability, and is something that can be created regardless of how racist our society is (I mean, the black marriage rate was 80% in 1890, when the US was still in the immediate shadows of the Civil War and Reconstruction). Did the legacy of slavery just…skip a few generations? Is systemic racism somehow preventing us from marrying one another?
“Is it black property ownership? According to Jason Riley in his book ‘False Black Power’, ‘74.2 percent of black homeowners completely owned their residences as of 1900, versus only 68 percent of white families.’ And yet, according to Ebony, that number for blacks ‘was down to 41.2 percent in 2015’…some 115 years after a time when laws were in place specifically to prevent and deter black progress.
“So, what exactly is it about our modern society, with the number of social liberals who live in the US at an all-time highs (as bound by the length of time that Gallup has been polling for this statistic), and the number of (dirty, racist) social conservatives at all-time lows (also bound by the same Gallup limitations), that makes us MORE of a racist society that we were in 1960? or 1900? Or 1890, when discriminating against blacks was still codified by law?
“HELP ME UNDERSTAND THE OPPRESSIVE SOCIETY THAT EXISTS ALL AROUND ME, BUT REPEATEDLY FINDS A WAY TO STAY OUT OF MY PATH, TIME AND TIME AGAIN“***
***Help ME understand how it manages to stay IN your path.
Citations:
http://blackdemographics.com/households/poverty/
http://www.scholarsstrategynetwork.org/brief/why-has-marriage-declined-among-black-americans
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/book-excerpt-jason-rileys-false-black-power/story?id=48521842
http://www.ebony.com/news-views/black-homeownership-decline#axzz4tiw3Acej
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/22/socially-liberal-poll_n_7422440.html
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