A jogger was detained for two weeks for accidentally crossing US Canadian border while out for a run. Read this short description and see if you can answer this simple quiz question.
As reported by The Guardian (and The Telegraph), a teenager named Cedella Roman accidentally crossed the border into the US while on a trip to Canada. There were no border markings.
Two border security officials arrested her. They then transported her to a detention facility 200km away from the border. She was stripped of all her possessions and subjected to an invasive search.
When her mother produced her passport and travel documents, proving she was a French citizen, the US authorities refused to release her and kept her locked up for a further two weeks while they spoke to the Canadian authorities.
Now, here’s the quiz question: what colour was the teenage girl’s skin?
If you were to read my Facebook feed, you would probably thing the apocalypse has genuinely happened. It may be easy to think so from the snow that appeared over night. However, I note that we are now a whole day later and all still alive. The reality is that a Trump presidency is not that bad. Here is why.
This is Brexit times 0.1
Brexit times ten? It might be for Trump? But for us this is nothing. Brexit has probably cost us a lot of money in the collapse of the pound and a weakened economy, and might lose us our European citizenship.
In comparison, this does not directly affect us. It will probably indirectly affect us, but that is no where near as bad as Brexit. The only person who has genuinely almost-died because of Brexit is the UKIP MEP Steven Woolfe.
Brexit is also forever. Trump will be gone in eight years. Probably four. Maybe less.
The president is not that powerful
The president of the United States is heavily constrained in what he can do. Powers are divided between the executive, judicial and legislative branches of government. All the president really does is set the direction.
You could argue that Trump has a bigger influence than normal given that the Republicans control both the House and the Senate as well. But you are forgetting that Republicans hate Trump just as much as anyone else does. He has about as much chance of getting his own people to enact his crazy policies as Jeremy Corbyn does.
Being a alleged rapist was never a blocker
People have said they have been appalled that someone like Trump could be elected given he is accused of sexual misconduct. They are right that this is disappointing, and I wish the world did not work this way.
However, unfortunately, Clinton’s own husband proves that you can be (re)elected president even after claims of sexual misconduct have been made against you. The world has not suddenly got worse; it was always this way.
Not has intelligence ever been a barrier to the White House. Remember this guy. The one who served for two terms.
People have always voted for their own interests
Similarly, people have said they are shocked that someone who says racist and sexist things, like Trump does, could be elected. But people have always voted for their own interests.
When you make people feel guilty about the way they are voting, they do not stop voting that way. It is a secret ballot. The only thing you change is that they lie to pollsters when asked about it.
That is how we end up with Conservative governments, and Nigel Farage, and Brexit. People are selfish and vote on their selfish interests. They are not bad people, that is just what normal people do.
Trump won the election because he ran a better campaign. I saw the adverts they were using while watching an American stream of the NFL. Clinton’s adverts were awful. They were simply a character assassination of Trump.
Trump’s adverts are a million times better. They speak of “our movement” hook into people’s genuine fears about jobs, and a rich elite, and mass immigration, and presents a positive message of how to fix it.
People did not vote for Trump over Clinton because there is something wrong with humanity. They voted for him because he spoke to their interests and Clinton did not.
Trump is already showing signs of reconciliation
Trump’s polices are not that crazy. For example, he talks about banning all of the immigrants and building a wall, but that is actually a plagiarised British policy. Remember how we refused everyone in the Calais Jungle and actually started building a wall?
In fact Trump was a leftie liberal until he decided to run for the Republican party nomination.
But even so, his early speeches have already shown signs of wanting to reconcile differences and work together: it’s all part of making the deal.
Back in July, I wrote about how it might be time for the United States to re-think their attitude to guns in the wake of the Batman cinema massacre, that left 12 people dead.
Then, just as that incidient faces from our memories, or at least those of us who weren’t personally affected, a fresh gunman walks into yet another high school, this time in Newtown, and massacres 26 people, including 20 children.
The US gun lobby was quick to explain how the situation could be resolved – armed guards at the entrance to every school, and maybe even teachers with guns too, that way they can return fire and stop it before it turns into a massacre. Guns are always the answer!
The more civilised portions of society spoke out about the tragedy.
I have to say, however, that I don’t think tragedy is the correct term. To me, the term tragedy suggests a degree of chance or unpredictability – 100,000 people die per day, but it isn’t a tragedy (it probably should be – but that is another discussion) because most of them die of old age. A busload of children going off a cliff though – that is tragedy. It is an unfortunate and unlucky event.
The reality is that there is nothing unlucky about someone walking into a school in the United States, and shooting the place up.
Rather than calling it a tragedy, they need to face up to the truth. They have a simple choice. Choice A is to maintain the freedoms they enjoy, namely, being able to bear arms and not contribute to the cost of providing health care to others and accept that from time to time, some of their children are going to get massacred.
Choice B is to restrict the freedoms to own weapons designed to kill, and contribute to the cost of providing mental health care to those who need it. The advantage to which though is that you get to life in a society where you know your child isn’t going to be shot in the head by a gun-toting young person in need of psychatric care.
Much like providing freedom of expression has the unfortunate consequence of meaning you have to provide nutters like Nick Griffin a platform to spout their views, if you want to live in a society that loves guns and hates universal healthcare, you have to accept the consequences of your actions.
The reality is, that the United States chooses to have these massacres on a regular basis. That is the true tragedy of the situation.
Another month goes by, and, as usual, another senseless gun-related massacre occurs in the United States. Around 50 people in total were shot, 12 of them are already dead.
I was going to say “with another 12 people dead” but this would simply be nieve. Based on the statistical average, somewhere in the region of 33 people were gunned down across the United States today anyway. And yesterday. And there will be another 33 victims tomorrow.
Surely it is time to adopt a more progressive attitude towards guns? To be clear, by progressive attitude, I mean get rid of them all.
The sadistic irony of this video increases with every victim.
It’s great news to see the Supreme Court have upheld Obama’s healthcare reform, which puts the US a step closer to providing a proper universal healthcare system. Now if they could just introduce social welfare, a living minimum wage, workers rights, reduce the amount of gun crime and religious adherence and give their citizens back their civil rights and repeal the Patriot Act, they can finally be classified as a developed nation.
While you’re enjoying that humour, here is what Yahoo Answers said.
“And non-believers” may be a small fish in the UK, but in the US even such a small mention is worth something. Not to mention his support of stem cell research and gay rights. So chances are he’s just Christian because you could never get elected president of the United States without being one. If this is the case, it is no suprise he hides his atheism so well – he is smart enough to get himself elected president of the US after all.
This got me thinking – what is George Bush is an atheist? I mean, he got himself elected as president of the United States. Which seemes to leave us with three possibilities:
George Bush is really smart, smart enough to be an atheist and smart enough to know that if he wants to be president of the United States he needs to pretend to be Christian.
It is possible to be both smart and a Christian, and George Bush is one of these people.
You don’t know to be that smart to get yourself elected president of the United States – just lucky and have the right people supporting you.
All three of these I would consider valid possibilities.
It is possible for people to be both smart and a Christian. For them to be scientists and yet when it comes to spiritual matters for them to turn off the logical part of their brain.
It is possible to be president of the United States without being that clever, perhaps. The main reason for thinking this is that George Bush seems to be such an idiot. But also consider how many utter blondes attended your red brick university with you. You think to yourself, “these girls are just so ditzy and blonde, how did they get in here?” Yet they did, and go on to graduate most of the time as well! There are some people who are just naturally really good at something, even academics, or maybe politics, that aren’t overall that smart.
Finally, it could all be an act. This would seem unlikely in George Bush’s case because he on the whole did take a conservative Christian approach when it cames to policy which suggests he did actually want to push these policies through. After all, what would be the point of ataining office only to push the pretence so far as to actually push through all the things you didn’t believe in?
However, if it was anything short of this, I would probably ask the question as to whether George Bush could have been an atheist. It’s no great leap to think that someone could act dumb for his public image when they are actually very clever – take a look at the bumbling Boris Johnson who has now planted himself as mayor of London.
Mulling this over though, it will hopefully make you wonder who else could have potentially been simply religious for political reasons – much like it was suspected that many of the founding fathers of the US were deists because this is as far as they could push it at the time.
Of course, Tony Blair’s secret raging Catholicism adds a whole new dimension to the debate…
