Almost immediately after Donald Trump won the presidential election last year, “Dirty Jobs” host Mike Rowe posted these comments on his Facebook page: “The people did not want a politician. The people wanted to be seen. Donald Trump convinced those people that he could see them. Hillary Clinton did not.…the world is full of very happy septic-tank cleaners and miserable investment bankers.”
No one was surprised, therefore, when five months into his first term in office, President Trump issued an executive order directing the Labor Department “to allow companies, trade associations and unions to develop their own apprenticeship-program guidelines.”
According to Trump’s EO, the federal government would have a role in evaluating the success of these apprenticeship programs, but the Labor Department would no longer “dictate how programs are administered, including the minimum length and how many hours of classroom instruction are required.” When the National Restaurant Association won a contract to develop an apprenticeship program for restaurant managers last year, it had to negotiate with Obama’s Labor Department for many months before applicants could include their prior work experience toward the two-year program.
As usual, party politics threatened the success of President Trump’s plan. Bobby Scott, the ranking Democrat on the House education and workforce committee, complained that industry-led apprentice programs would limit government “oversight.” There are now 43 job-training programs across 39 government agencies. A glimpse of the Labor Department’s Education and Training Administration and Training website yields a perplexing morass of regulations and standards that would frustrate any attempt to streamline and/or simplify the existing programs. So, all you would-be septic-tank cleaners, don’t get your hopes up too high. As long as President Trump occupies the White House, no good deed will go unpunished.
It’s all part of the bi-partisan “Never-Trump” conspiracy. Whether he’s trying to save American jobs for real Americans by suspending Obama’s illegal and completely illogical DACA and DAPA programs or pushing Congress to allocate the tax dollars needed to help Texas, Louisiana, Florida and now Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands survive and recover from the hurricanes that have ravaged our coasts, Democrats and Republicans in Washington are determined to heap opprobrium on everything the president says and block every reform he proposes.
There is something downright pathological about all this spite and malice. Where is all the anger coming from? How can one man stir up such whacky animosity among elected leaders who are pledged to uphold the Constitution of the United States and protect every American citizen’s right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?
Consider what some of America’s most articulate solons of the conservative news media have been saying about our 45th president of late. On three consecutive days during the first week of September, lead editorials in The Wall Street Journal pounded President Trump for his position on DACA.
First, there was the editorial board’s Sept. 6 screed titled “The Dreamer Debacle,” which claimed “Mr. Trump was at his worst during the campaign when he assailed DACA as ‘unconstitutional executive amnesty.’…These young immigrants have committed no crime and trusted the federal government to protect them.”
Yet, in the same article, the editorial board also claims it was “Mr. Obama’s ‘political decision’ to act as his own legislature that teed up this moral crisis and created the legal jeopardy.”
So apparently the wise men and women of the editorial board believe that DACA was, in fact, unconstitutional and that Obama, not Trump, was responsible. In the last paragraph of this hit piece, however, they couldn’t resist spiking the blame ball on Trump’s side of the net by noting that Republicans should “be prepared to send Mr. Trump a clean authorization to make good on the government’s moral obligation to these young people.” So much for the law of the land!
Then, the next day, there was Deputy Editor Daniel Henninger’s highly imaginative narrative titled “The Immigration Morass.” Henninger begins his op-ed story by comparing the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620 with the DACA babies brought by their illegal immigrant parents to the United States, beginning in 2012. Embellishing on this ludicrous flight of fantasy, Henninger observes, “As a result of this unconstitutional influx. the region’s native tribes voted unanimously to pass the Immigration Control Act of 1632. As we know, it didn’t work.”
As those of us who took American History 101 also know, there was no Immigration Control Act of 1632.
Having already “fast-forwarded” almost 400 years through American history, the deputy editor then claimed that, “Until the late 19th century, the U.S. had virtually no controls on immigration.”
Apparently, Henninger forgot about the federal government’s effort to stop the immigration of slaves. It was called The Civil War. But why worry about historical accuracy when you’re on a soaring flight of fancy?
Next comes yet another sweeping generalization about alleged root causes: “Immigration—legal or illegal—is propelled everywhere almost entirely by economic forces as strong and inexorable as the currents of the sea.”
Wow! Sounds like a line out of Homer’s “Odyssey.” Even so, Henninger manages to zero in on something specific, claiming that in the 1980s “the Latin American debt crisis” and “Ronald Reagan’s supply-side economics” were what “pulled” millions of illegal Latino immigrant workers across our southern border. So now we’re supposed to believe it was all President Reagan’s fault?
Not to be outdone by her venerable colleague, that other deity of conservative opinion, Peggy Noonan, piled on the next day with her column, “Trump Finally Pivots—But Will it Last?” That title must have immediately grabbed the attention of Noonan’s most avid acolytes, for it highlights her signature ability to pluck one word out of somebody else’s cliché and generate from it thousands of words of her own rambling palaver.
In this case, the magic word was pivot—a basketball term the media has often used to describe Obama’s constantly shifting political maneuvers. It was perfect shorthand for Noonan’s core message—to wit, that Trump’s “pivot toward the Democrats” in the deal he made with Sen. Schumer and Rep. Pelosi is just as deceptive and corrupt as those of his predecessor.
Ever the sly and caustic elder pundit, Noonan parses her own words carefully by observing, “As Ben Domenech noted in the Federalist, it can be assumed there was something of a personal angle in the pivot: Mr. Trump ‘doesn’t like McConnell and Ryan, never did. He likes Chuck Schumer, and knows him, and thinks he can work with him. And he knows Chuck always makes money for his partners.’ That last is a brilliant allusion to ‘The Godfather, Part II.’”
In other words, Trump is nothing but a gangster, which is pretty much what Peggy’s been saying about him since he first tossed his hat into the presidential running ring.
So far, the only Wall Street Journal columnists who’ve gotten things right about DACA are Jason Riley (Sept. 5: “Congress’s Chance to Do Its Job and Solve the Dreamers’ Dilemma”) and William McGurn (Sept. 9: “The Cruelty of Barack Obama”).
Ultimately, none of this matters because President Trump is not an outlaw but an outsider—a tough business man who doesn’t play by the schoolyard rules of Washington politics but by the street-smart rules of a successful deal-maker.
Or, as Larry the Cable Guy might put it, President Trump knows how to “Git’r done.”
Bruce Robinson is a writer and former Benicia resident.
Sharing is caring!
Mr. Robinson where was your voice when President Obama was being treated with unprecedented disrespect? So much of your letter is troubling, to say the least, and it would take much too much time for a person who is actively doing something to effect change to respond. However, there are a few points you make that are glaringly egregious.
Members of Congress, on the night of President Obama’s election, behind closed doors, vowed that they would see that he was only a one-term president and that they would not support his agenda, a Congressman called him a liar during the State of the Union address, the current president falsely accused him of not having been born in the United States and refused to admit he was wrong, and the list goes on. These activities, along with the divisive rhetoric and actions of the current administration are but a few of the breeders of the weariness of the soul that you prefer to call spite, malice, and anger.
You misspeak when you mention the “bi-partisan “Never Trump” conspiracy.” A conspiracy is a secret plan to do something evil or unlawful. Those of us who are speaking out are not hiding or doing anything illegal. We are practicing our Constitutional right to oppose openly that which we know is wrong.
The Civil War was not “the federal government’s effort to stop the immigration of slaves.” The reason for the Civil War depends on the version of history you choose to believe – states’ rights, economic consideration for the South’s cotton growers or emancipating the four million mortal souls held in bondage. The importation of human cargo was outlawed in 1807, well before the start of the Civil War. Slaves, as you call them, were mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, and children transported here as property against their will. An immigrant is one who chooses to live permanently in another country. Those human captives, living in their own feces and urine, shackled like animals in the belly of a ship had no choice.
As you stated, “But why worry about historical accuracy when you’re on a soaring flight of fancy?”
Norvanna,
There are many troubling comments made in your response. I previously addressed one, here are two more:
** ” not hiding or doing anything illegal.” — That is at odds with ANTIFA and their many criminal actions, assaults, torching’s, clubbing’s done while hiding behind masks.
** Immigrants — No an immigrant is one who asks permission to live permanently in another country, as did many of my ancestors. An “immigrant” does not violate the laws of the country in which he seeks to live, in order to live in that country.
Thank you.
Very good DDL
Novanna,
With all due respect, your definition of ‘conspiracy’ is at odds with the great and wonderful former Secretary of State; Hillary Clinton. (she won the popular vote!!) You will recall that she made us all aware of the “Vast Right Wing Conspiracy” that was out to destroy her and her wonderful husband, by making things up like sex with interns in the White House. Who would have believed that?
Now, I admit though that Hillary could have just made all that up as a distraction to saver her budding political career and that of her wonderful husband, But Hillary would never lie to the American people just to save herself or her career.
Would she?.
Unlike Novanna Hunt’s well- thought out, well-written and understandable response, I find your comments, Mr/Ms DDl, to be sarcastic and unhelpful. The discussion was not about ANTIFA. or Hillary Clinton.
You defined immigrants unnecessarily. I think one hope was that Mr. Robinson and others would understand, from Novanna Hunt’s informed response, that slaves were not immigrants.
I encourage you to re-read Novanna Hunt’s response, and perhaps what’s “troubling” you may disappear.
Claudia,
Actually, in the fourth sentence of the fourth paragraph it was Norvanna that defined what she believed to be an ‘immigrant’. I took exception to her definition.,
I do respect immigrants and seek to differentiate between ‘legal’ immigrants and illegals; those who circumvent the law. I admit I am unclear as to why some find that distinction to be offensive,
As to the question of slaves as immigrants, you may want to do some research on that, as it was President Obama who in 2015 defined slaves as immigrants.
Dr. Carson, did the same and was attacked for doing so. Perhaps you can shed some light on why Dr. Carson was castigated for his words, while President Obama was not.
Your insights on that discrepancy would be very helpful.
Dennis (aka DDL)
PS. as to my sarcasm, yes I do use it on occasions. It was something I picked up in college, many years ago, from a book called ‘rules for radicals’. It was very enlightening. If you have not read it, you may want to do so., Hillary was very fond of the book, as well as of the author.
Dennis
My comments were specifically about defining enslaved African people as immigrants. I disagree with both President Obama’s and Secretary Carson’s description of those Africans as immigrants. There is no universal agreement amongst scholars and historians on the definition either. Immigrants are usually seeking opportunity for a better life. Not so with Africans crammed into the putrid belly of a ship. They were involuntarily transported, as property, had no legal or illegal immigrant status and no federal rights.
I think we can agree that we want all residents, citizens and immigrants alike, to obey the law and receive equal protection under the law.
As for sarcasm – I learned long before earning my college degree that sarcasm is usually mean-spirited and does not promote the respect and understanding of opposing viewpoints. And after all, isn’t respecting and understanding one another’s views the ultimate goal of a civil society?
This is my final comment. I think my time is better spent actively working against divisiveness and for positive change.
Norvanna,
One last comment: There was no need to educate me on the details of the barbaric treatment of slaves brought to the Americas, as we are on the same page in that regard. My comment was more to the specific issue of other people (Obama, Carson) referring to them as “immigrants”. They were not. Yet Obama was given a pass for his comment and Caron was not. That was my issue. Both men made an incorrect statement and both men should have been corrected.
Dennis
Thanks to all for your interesting comments. It’s always interesting to see how different readers respond to the op-ed I produce as well as to the responses among the responders. sometimes the experience is like riding on an elevator where somebody has pushed the stop button for every floor.
A couple of points of clarification may be helpful:
In this instance: First, my statement “Apparently, Henninger forgot about the federal government’s effort to stop the immigration of slaves. It was called The Civil War” may have been surprising to Novena Hunt and Claudia Thompson because it seems to disparage the African-Americans who were being forced to come to America against their will. As Mr. Lund astutely observes, both President Obama and Dr. Carson have made similar observations. The point is, from the point of view of the North, these salves were illegal immigrants while from the point of view of the South, they were imported commodities. It’s important for everyone to consider the historical context and not try to impose our 21st Century perceptions on historical fact
Another point:
I noticed that Ms. Hunt referred to my article in the Benicia Herald as a letter. Technically, this article was an op-ed (opinion editorial posted on the “Forum” page. Op-eds typically run from 500 to 1,000 words and involve considerable advanced planning and research–the research involving the identification of any primary or secondary resources the author uses in the text. In the electronic form of these op-eds, you will notice color coded words. If the reader clicks on these words, she or he will be linked directly to the on-line source. Dennis Lund, Jim Pugh and I have posted hundreds of these on the Forum page during the past eight years. Although we are not professional syndicated writers and receive no monetary compensation for our work, as “citizen journalists we take our work very seriously. There are also several other local Benicia resident op-ed writers who have also posted to the Forum page.
Respectfully,
Bruce Robinson..