Here's acting USCIS director Ken Cuccinelli saying on NPR this morning that the Statue of Liberty plaque should be changed to read, "give me your tired and your poor who can stand on their own two feet, and who will not become a public charge." pic.twitter.com/q8OoNn3k6r
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 13, 2019
I asked the president about the Statue of Liberty poem. He said: it’s not fair for the American taxpayer to pay for immigrants to come into the United States pic.twitter.com/hAjDCZXcvL
— Jeff Mason (@jeffmason1) August 13, 2019
Per Vox:
… This is not the first time the Trump administration’s effort to curtail legal immigration has brought it into public conflict with the Statue of Liberty. Back in August 2017, when the administration was pushing an ill-fated bill that would’ve restricted legal immigration while giving priority to fluent English speakers, CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta grilled White House policy adviser Stephen Miller during a news conference about how “what the president is proposing here does not sound like it’s in keeping with American tradition when it comes to immigration. … The Statue of Liberty says, ‘Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.’”
Miller replied by trying to make a distinction between the statute and Lazarus’s poem, which wasn’t placed on it until years after the statue was installed in New York Harbor.
“I don’t want to get off into a whole thing about history here, but the Statue of Liberty is a symbol of liberty and lighting the world. It’s a symbol of American liberty lighting the world,” Miller said. “The poem that you’re referring to, that was added later, is not actually a part of the original Statue of Liberty.”Miller’s talking point didn’t really help matters, as it echoed one commonly used by white nationalists like David Duke and Richard Spencer to suggest that Lazarus somehow perverted the true meaning of the statue, which was a gift from France to the United States and originally conceived to be “a symbol of democratic government and Enlightenment ideals as well as a celebration of the Union’s victory in the American Civil War and the abolition of slavery,” as the National Parks Service puts it…
Hilariously Cuccinelli was the guy leading the last ditch Ted Cruz floor fight at the RNC against Trump. Trump has every reason to despise him with one of his endless petty grudges. But they both love racism and cruelty more than their own dignity.
— Zeddy (@Zeddary) August 14, 2019
This is *not* what your mother taught you, Mr. Cuccinelli…
Ken Cuccinelli's mother told The Washington Post in 2013 that this is how he was raised: “As a matter of faith, care of the poor, of your neighbors, was always very conscious and upfront. If someone is starving, you want to bring him a meal, not a book on how to cook.” https://t.co/oU1EBtX9sR
— Matt Katz (@mattkatz00) August 13, 2019
And it’s not what the Founders wanted, either, so-called conservative ‘foundationalists”:
And here are Abraham Lincoln’s thoughts on the matter.
But maybe Ken Cuccinelli & Donald Trump are the guys to have really figured this out. pic.twitter.com/zGdpvDbnqs
— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) August 14, 2019
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Cuccinelli = rapist
Mai naem mobile
I would like to see Stephen Miller’s daddy hurt. He owns a development company in Los Angeles and from what I can figure out has rental commercial property. His daddy is a Republican(the mom’s family is the one who were disgusted by Millers anti immigrant rhetoric) who was the head of the Republican Jewish Coalition. I don’t like the way Miller doesnt seem to get affected personally while hes hurting so many people out there.
mrmoshpotato
I’m tired and I’m poor, but hot damn! I can stand on my own two feet and need no help from nobody!
*slams head into table again*
Some ask this assclown about conditions in Italy (or Sicily) when his ancestors brought their poor, tired asses to these shores.
Amir Khalid
Doesn’t that whole right-wing political ilk repudiate the principles of the Enlightenment?
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
This kind of attitude and argument is insidious.
Morons think it would so simple and easy to deport 11 million people. Just as simple as buying plane tickets and sending them on their marry way. They’re here illegally, so the argument goes, what due process do they have?
Never mind that they might have children who are citizens. Never mind that they’re pillars of their communities.
It’s just like that Dead Kennedys song, “Great Wall”
There was already an innocent man sent to his death in Iraq who was diabetic, an American citizen, because of Trump, because of Putin’s meddling, and ultimately because of the 62 million people who voted for Trump. They all have blood on their hands.
Brachiator
In an alternate time line, Alexander Hamilton, a kid living in a shit hole country, is denied entry to the North American colony. He dies an unknown, frustrated, overworked clerk with unrealized dreams of becoming famous.
Chetan Murthy
@Amir Khalid: I’m guessing that these RWNJs subscribe to the part of the Enlightenment that yielded “classical liberalism” and hence, libertarianism. And, heck, laissez-faire capitalism.
BC in Illinois
From Josh Marshall:
From Emma Lazarus:
World-wide welcome.
Not always our reality, but always our ideal.
FlipYrWhig
Isn’t the whole fucking point of the mythos of The American Dream that YOU ARRIVE WITH NOTHING? God, everyone involved with this shitbag administration is fucking vile.
different-church-lady
Tellin’ ya: most UN-American president ever.
NotMax
@Brachiator
But conceivably at a more advanced age.
;)
Eljai
Of fucking course. Cooch and Miller – how much longer must we endure these slimy evil shit-goblins?
mrmoshpotato
@different-church-lady: Hard to argue with that.
Adam L Silverman
@Mai naem mobile: @FlipYrWhig: According to his uncle, Stephen Miller’s great grandfather, fleeing from a pogrom in Belarus, arrived in the US with the equivalent of $8 in his pocket and spoke no English.
dmsilev
@FlipYrWhig: You’re supposed to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps the way Horatio Alger’s heroes did. You know, by serendipitously being in the right place to save a rich merchant’s daughter from being run over by a runaway carriage and being rewarded by her grateful father.
FlipYrWhig
@dmsilev: The country just hasn’t been the same since the demise of bootstraps.
Ruckus
@FlipYrWhig:
As I commented to MaryG downstairs, you start at the bottom of the barrel, the next level is the worm ridden rotting scum beneath the last bit of shit.
It smells, it can kill you, no one likes it for any reason, but it’s always there and has to be dealt with. trumps main trait is thinking that this worm ridden, rotting scum is his best friend. Because it is.
dmsilev
@FlipYrWhig: Also, a crying lack of buggies and the associated whips.
RandomMonster
Give me your hungry, your tired your poor I’ll piss on ’em
That’s what the Statue of Bigotry says
Your poor huddled masses, let’s club ’em to death
And get it over with and just dump ’em on the boulevard
Lou Reed, Dirty Boulevard
Jay
NotMax
@dmsilev
Horatio Alger was a man of, shall we say, questionable proclivities.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@FlipYrWhig:
Thank Reaganism, IGMFY, and good ‘ole racism for distorting that classic American folkway, as complicated as real history is
Jay
@dmsilev:
@FlipYrWhig:
In the USA of today, it really helps if you are a fictional character.
Brachiator
@NotMax:
Nope. He dies of yellow fever, around age 35.
Ruckus
@Adam L Silverman:
Wonder if Miller knows that.
On mom’s side I’m second generation and both generations from Los Angeles. Before that, Italy, Sicily to be accurate. Dad’s side here a bit longer from Scotland/Ireland. With supposedly a great, great grandmother of Blackfoot Indian heritage. I think that makes me 1/64 Blackfoot. I think same level as EW. IOW a mutt. Like most of the rest of you. And seemingly most every species of mammal on this rock.
Mai naem mobile
@Adam L Silverman: I think that’s his maternal side of his family. His dad’s name is Michael Miller. This is the link to the family owned real estate company.
http://cordary.com/ They have an apartment complex in West Covina and another in Pico Rivera. Heavily hispanic areas. Wonder if their hispanic tenants know that their owner’s son is the Stpehen Miller. For all I know Stephen Miller is one of the owners through trusts etc. There is another complex in Valley View which is also seeing a surge in its Hispanic population.
Heres the commercial real estate website
https://ymcllc.com/management-team/
Michael Miller was a member of the Republican Jewish Coalition board not the head of it.
NotMax
Think I may be in peril of getting a contact alcohol buzz from watching Brian Donlevy movies today on TCM.
:)
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Ruckus:
Did you ever get genetic testing? My HS Spanish teacher did that 23 and Me one and found she had neanderthal dna, which is common for Europeans. I’d get it too if not for the price. 100 bucks is a lot of money
Brachiator
@Adam L Silverman:
Izzy Demsky grew up pretty poor. His family spoke Yiddish at home.
Kirk Douglas is 102 years old. His wife is 100.
This interview clip from the Dick Cavett Show recently bubbled up and brought Douglas to mind again.
https://youtu.be/3_wkIunDlgA
Amir Khalid
@Adam L Silverman:
Has Miller ever been shown reacting to someone pointing this out?
mrmoshpotato
Dump has fucked over the truckers too: Seth Meyers – The Check-In
Amir Khalid
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
Everone has Neanderthaler DNA, unless they are Africans descended from those who never left the continent in the migration push tens of thousands of years ago.
kindness
Trump isn’t going to hire anyone who is noble. Who is kidding whom? Trump’s ego won’t allow what he thinks is a bigger light into the room. So we are stuck with scum and villany. h/t ObiWan
NotMax
@Amir Khalid
Of interest primarily to obscure trivia buffs: Neandertal vs. neanderthal.
Ruckus
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
That genetic testing crap is a scam. It says you have x% of genes from the samples we’ve tested. It’s like a political poll of 100 white people wearing white robes and pointed hoods being asked who will make the best president. We are all mutts. Some just won’t admit it. But mutts are better because our genetics actually get spread around, we get the good and the bad. Too small a genetic pool and you have the bad stuff being better able to get an upper hand. If this is in any way an actual design by someone, something, they did an amazing job of making variability part of the design program. Giving the entire mess a better chance of survival.
The Dangerman
@mrmoshpotato:
So, the Midwest Farmers are shit outta luck? Or does the public charge concern not apply to the Base?
FWIW, I wouldn’t bail out the Farmers. Fuck ’em. They voted for this shit.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
Really? I thought it was primarily Europeans since that was where Neanderthals lived. Thanks for the info : )
How’s Malaysia?
Ruckus
@Amir Khalid:
Mutts I tell ya. Every last one of us.
NotMax
@Ruckus
There’s probably an “Oh Lucy, you got some splainin’ to do” line in there somewhere which would elicit howls of mirth at an anthropology convention.
Amir Khalid
@NotMax:
One should really go with Neandertal, which is the more modern spelling. The spelling reform of 1906 threw out some silent Hs like that in Thal (valley), which is nowadays spelled Tal.
Chetan Murthy
@Amir Khalid:
As we wait in vain for the French to do the same …. “le fils electrique” vs “les fils electriques”
Seanly
Fuck all these motherfuckers. I am tired of their fucking dumbass nazi bullshit.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Ruckus:
Thanks for the warning. I guess that’s $100 I can keep in my pocket
NotMax
@Amir Khalid
Yeah, I figured the Germanic jiggery might strike a chord.
Amir Khalid
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
The migration path out of Africa went through Europe, where there was much interbreeding between H. Sapiens and H. Neanderthalensis, and this is how come most humans today have Neandertaler DNA.
Malaysia is fine. How is America?
Ruckus
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
You are welcome.
The bill is in the mail.
It’s $100.00
mrmoshpotato
@mrmoshpotato: Reading Wonkette, and this bastard is half-Irish, half-Italian! G’damn!
Chetan Murthy
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
There’s another, more sinister reason for not getting your DNA tested. Turns out, most of these companies take ownership of the data, and you have no control — literally none — over what they do with it. Like: “sell it to insurance companies who can and will use it to charge you higher rates, if the ACA is ever repealed”. Or (who knows?) employers who might decide not to hire you, b/c you’re a bad (health) insurance risk.
I think anybody who gets their DNA tested in this day and age, with no controls on where that data goes, is just rolling the dice.
Ruckus
@Seanly:
Germany got so tired of it they outlawed it.
We are a younger country, more smart ass (if you can believe that) and can’t be told the proper way to do anything. Just ask us.
frosty
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: The DNA tests are interesting and worth doing when you’ve got the $$ to spare. If not, no big deal.
ETA With Chetan’s cautions of course.
Ruckus
@NotMax:
Was going to say “Mutts I tell ya. Every last fucking one of us.”
Thought that might be too much for this fucking family blog.
mrmoshpotato
@The Dangerman:
Part of me wishes.
NotMax
@Ruckus
LOL.
mrmoshpotato
@Chetan Murthy: Everyone knows French is impossible to speak. All the letters are silent! :)
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Amir Khalid:
Interesting. That makes perfect sense then.
Honestly? It really sucks. My own personal slice of life is alright, but I hate seeing innocent people being targeted by fascist racists. I can’t help but think I might be a victim in the next mass shooting, despite my being white.
I’m feeling hopeful with all of the R resignations from the House and what that signals. Basically they don’t see the R’s regaining the majority in the House for the foreseeable future. Also Texas is trending blue and Trump is underwater in several battleground states, including my “great state” of Ohio. Of course polls this early out don’t mean anything but it shows that Trump isn’t unbeatable
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Ruckus:
Heh.
“And the check better not bounce or you’re a dead motherf*****r!”
mrmoshpotato
@Ruckus: The Nazis had to have it bombed out of them to be fair.
NotMax
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
If it’s not too personal, do you graduate next spring?
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Chetan Murthy:
@frosty:
Oh yeah, no way would I want to do that then, even if it was free. There really needs to be laws governing this stuff
NotMax
@mrmoshpotato
Yeah, that whole Make Germany Great Again thing didn’t pan out at all.
westyny
Happy that MSNBC went at Cuccinelli pretty hard tonight. Enraged that he was even able to get his miserable message out twice today without immediate pushback. I hope the candidates go after him tomorrow. Emma Lazarus’s poem should be a sacred American text. It was meant to be. Cuccinelli is a liar, hypocrite, and fundamentally un-American.
Ruckus
@frosty:
They really aren’t worth it. On the testing alone but read @Chetan Murthy’s: comment for worse news than how actually valuable the information isn’t.
mrmoshpotato
@NotMax: No, but it panned out worse for many others.
Ruckus
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
Now that’s honest advertising.
Ruckus
@mrmoshpotato:
True. They still learned from it. We bombed the shit out of them to teach them that and how well did we retain our own lesson?
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@NotMax:
I in fact graduate this coming spring, hopefully. Two goddamn clinicals and lectures every week on top of having to work a reduced schedule. I just have to get through these two last semesters and pass the NCLEX next year. After that I should be home free. Too bad I’ll have like $10,300 in private student loan debt (20,000 with interest, but I’m currently paying that off every month), but if I get a good paying RN job that’ll get paid off in no time. And I plan to get into either advanced practice or management eventually
Raoul
@Chetan Murthy: Not joking (and yes, I need new glasses, but mostly I’m really tired this late at night) — I thought for a second you said “And, heck, laissez-faire cannibalism.”
I realized my mistake pretty fast, but that I even went there sorta says something about the ‘modern’ GOP.
chopper
@Ruckus:
i took one of those tests and it said i was 100% awesome.
Brachiator
@Amir Khalid:
Modern humans may also have a little Denisovan as well.
I remember when Neandertals were supposedly subhuman brutes and nobody wanted to be associated with them because they had genetic cooties. Now everybody but Trump wants to claim some Neandertal descent, even though it doesn’t mean much.
ETA. It’s unclear whether evangelicals believe that Neandertals were created in God’s image.
mrmoshpotato
@Ruckus: We didn’t. We’ve “become the gravediggers” as Rod Serling put it.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Ruckus:
Yup lol. I read somewhere that it was a fake ad put together for some advertisers’ (or car dealers’ forget which one) convention in the early 90s
?BillinGlendaleCA
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: I mentioned to the kid that you studying Nursing, she agreed with my advice that your best lead on a job is with the hospitals that you do your clinical(make a good impression). That’s how she got her job. What are you going to specialize in? Oh, and take a prep course for your NCLEX, it’ll make it a breeze(that’s what the kid did).
Anne Laurie
@westyny:
I’ve seen tweets already from Warren, Harris, and O’Rourke — without even checking their feeds. I’m sure the other Democratic candidates have / will do the same. Didn’t bother including any, partially for fairness, mostly because I assumed we’d all take their protests as given!
scav
wonder how all those Walmart workers feel, staring in the mirror every morning, knowing that, but for an accident of birth, their employed public-assisted self wouldn’t be good enough to let in the country.
If only they were self-aware enough to notice that and the blue spot of paint on their forehead.
Amir Khalid
This just cries out to be shared with the jackals.
Ruckus
@chopper:
I can do that and my bill is only $75 for that. If you want information as to why (that I make up) the cost is $100. If you want me to lie to you about being an asshole, it’s $400. I can go yes or no.
It’s my new business I’m starting called What’da Wanna Hear About You?
Guarantied Bullshit 100% of the time.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Well, I’ve thought about going into surgery, perhaps as an RNFA or a CRNA. Both would require further education and experience, especially CRNA. I’ll need to get a doctorate in nursing practice by getting into a nurse anaesthetist program and probably spend a few years years in cardiac or some other critical care floor. I’ve considered becoming a charge nurse as well. Last fall I got to be a team leader during a clinical day. I had keep everyone on task and I was pretty good at it if I don’t mind saying so. Spending a few years in Med-Surg will happen no matter what path I choose.
Your daughter’s correct about getting hired at clinical sites. They’re where you make impressions on possible coworkers and employers. My clinical instructor for last spring got complimented by the floor staff for how polite and professional we were. I’m fairly sure they were talking about me since I had just been testing a patient’s blood sugar and my instructor was told soon afterwards : )
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
It’s unclear how evangelicals believe the bullshit they do and haven’t gone up in flames. In any case whatever the answer it’s for sure they won’t find it.
Ruckus
@mrmoshpotato:
Digging our own maybe.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: The kid’s an OR nurse, she loves it.
mrmoshpotato
@Ruckus: I was referencing this closing narration: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0734563/quotes?item=qt1678028
Anne Laurie
@Amir Khalid: *I* thank you, anyway — I had a battered second-hand copy of Chandoha’s Kittens & Cats books as a child, and loved his work for National Geographic and Life!
Steve in the ATL
@Chetan Murthy: GINA should cover that risk, IIRC. It’s not a law that has been used much. Passed with only one vote against: Ron Paul, grifter père.
prostratedragon
A little music by an immigrant who lived for a time on the Lower East Side, 313 E. 9th Street:
[Edited to add address]
Chetan Murthy
@Steve in the ATL:
Oh nice! I was unaware of this.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Steve in the ATL: Ah, this Gina, she hawt?
Ruckus
@mrmoshpotato:
In the navy we stopped in a number of ports in northern Europe. I went to a museum about the Belgian underground. They didn’t forget. I didn’t get a chance to go to Germany, don’t know how I’d feel about seeing any of the camps. I’m sure it wouldn’t be a good feeling. I’d like to go Normandy just to see it because they sure haven’t forgotten. It’s a problem with our world, we are so invested in the now that we often forget the past, the lessons we should have learned, the changes that might keep the past from being repeated. We never did anything about the rampant racism of this country and it’s biting us in the ass big time. I think this is our opportunity to take that very necessary next step. It won’t be easy for a lot of people and it will take probably at least a couple more generations to change, but this, where we are today, is a perfect storm, and time to take that next big step of cleaning up this mess. Black and brown people can’t do it, the problem isn’t in them, it’s in the white people and the privileged who have made it worse, it’s in the republican party that has used racism as a central point of it’s party for longer than I’ve been alive.
I don’t have answers to how to do this, I just see it as a perfect opportunity to take it.
Sloane Ranger
@Brachiator:
As evangelicals believe the world was created only a few thousand years ago they probably don’t believe in Neanderthals at all.
Matt McIrvin
@Brachiator: When having Neandertal DNA got associated with whiteness, suddenly they transformed from a subhuman to a superior master race.
satby
@Sloane Ranger: and they don’t believe in evolution. So modern humans were “created” fully as they are now, not descended from hominid ancestors.
The insistence on “intelligent design” rather than accepting evolution is based on racism.
jonas
@mrmoshpotato:
All these midwestern Trump voting farmers are certainly nodding in agreement to this right as they rush to cash the taxpayer subsidy checks Trump gave them to bribe them to shut up about the trade war he caused.
Procopius
@Mai naem mobile: Every time I see a picture of Stephen Miller, I’m struck by how much he looks like Reinhard Heydrich.
Denali
@Amir Khalid,
This shithole country?
instajimba
The Trumpian interpretation of the Statue of Liberty: “Give me your white Europeans, who can pay for themselves, as long as they’re Trump supporters” truly excites my RW relatives and makes them love Dear Leader even more. So it’s a “success” from that standpoint.
They’ve been saying variations of this for years: “All these illegulls and immigrants want to do is come here and get on welfare and food stamps. They get all the free health care they want too, while I have to pay for it cause I’m white. None of ’em pay taxes and they’re BANKRUPTING THE COUNTRY!#@!”
The Trump talking point of “All we’re asking is that they support themselves, just like “our” ancestors did” — it works. They’ll be happy to tell you that their immigrant ancestors, despite being destitute and mostly illiterate, improved their lot through their own Hard Work. And even if they DID get help, it was the “voluntary” kind — from churches, or Kiwanis Clubs, or something something. “It’s different today, you just don’t get it!”
Trying to educate/convince them differently is an utter waste of time.