Wayne Besen

August 3, 2017 • The Wayne Besen Show, Uncategorized • 1199

Trump’s Immigration Velvet Rope Visa and Greenbacks for Greencards Policy

Trump’s new chief of staff, General John Kelly, swept in to the Oval Office and immediately fired Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci. This was supposed to professionalize the communications department.

So who does Trump trot out to unveil his new immigration fiasco? None other than Stephen Miller, the one dude in the entire world that makes Scaramucci look good at his job. Yesterday, America marveled at bizarre exchange with CNN’s Jim Acosta.

The White House deliberately put forth the insufferable Miller as a dog whistle, as he crouches in a bunker with his right wing base.

Consider the facts:

• The latest Quinnipiac Poll shows that only 33-percent of Americans approve of the job Trump’s doing. If he were a first round draft pick in the NFL, they’d be calling Trump a bust.

• But, even as Trump’s approval plummets, he is still embraced by his hardcore supporters. Nationally, conservative Republicans still approve of Trump’s performance by a whopping 89-percent. And, let’s not forget that 81-percent of white Evangelicals voted for Trump.

To solidify the support of these extremists, Trump has recently attacked the environment, urged police to use excessive force, banned transgender service members in a Tweet, and instructed the Department of Justice to focus on reverse discrimination against white people.

The proposed plan would cut legal immigration in half within a decade. It is clearly an attack on America’s core values and is a bigoted bone to the base, which wants to keep non-whites from immigrating to America. This twisted proposal mocks the Statue of Liberty’s call to welcome the poor and huddled masses.

The twisted idea that new immigrants should only be well-to-do or speak English before they arrive is reminiscent of Trump’s golf resorts: Snobbish, exclusive, and available only to the global, mostly white, elite.

Trump’s noxious proposal should be called: “Velvet Rope Visas” or “Greenbacks for green cards.”

Aside from offending our core values, Trump’s policy is bad for the economy – especially in the agricultural and tourist friendly states that voted for the president. South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said, “If this proposal were to become law, it would be devastating to our state’s economy.

The National Immigration Forum says the United States is already facing a gap of 7.5 million jobs by 2020, and that cutting legal immigration would cause “irreparable harm to the American worker and their family.”

But why concern yourself with facts if your goal is to peddle fiction to a rabid base, eagerly searching for scapegoats.This is Wayne Besen with your daily Reality Check. Until we meet again, have an amazing day.

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July 28, 2017 • The Wayne Besen Show • 1213

Wayne Smacks Down Gay Republicans for Inflicting Trump on America

We’ve all heard of D-Day, but yesterday was G-Day. It was a full-scale attack by the Trump administration on gay people. The vicious assault came on three fronts.

The president banned transgender people from serving in our military. Trump’s justice department went out of its way to argue that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not protect LGBT people from job discrimination. And, the president appointed arch homophobe, former congressman and Kansas governor, Sam Brownback, as the nation’s Ambassador to “religious freedom,” which basically is a euphemism for allowing bigot business owners to not serve gay people by claiming it’s against their religion.

Once again, this is a pathological attack, from a sick president, on Obama’s legacy, which Trump is obsessively and systematically trying to erase.

But the real blame lies with gay Republicans. I hate to say “I told you so,” but I told you so. Look what you did to us. Look what you did to yourself. How many LGBT kids will commit suicide because of your thoughtless, self-centered actions? But, hey, who cares, maybe you’ll get a tax cut.

I’m sure you’re now going to cover your ass, and loudly claim nobody could have known.

But how could you not have known?

Was the writing not on the wall when the President was palling around with staunch LGBT foes, such as Mike Pence, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, Alex Jones, Sean Hannity, and Jeff Sessions?

An astounding 81-percent of white evangelicals, the most anti-LGBT demographic, voted for Donald Trump. You really didn’t think he’d owe them — and the price was our hides?

You really weren’t a wee bit concerned when Trump spoke at Liberty University and was endorsed by Jerry Falwell Jr.?

It didn’t raise eyebrows when Trump repeatedly said he was in favor of “religious liberty”?

Did it not concern you when every neo-Nazi and white supremacist group uniformly lined up behind Trump? Did you not notice that Trump stammered and equivocated when asked to criticize former Klan leader David Duke?

And how about that awful Republican Caitlyn Jenner? Her’s was quite a transition from reality – continuously burying her head in the sand to justify Trump’s outrageous, bigoted, sexist behavior?

We were so close to total and complete victory. We could have solidified our hard-fought gains by controlling the Supreme Court – but now it looks as though we may lose the court – and possibly our rights — for a generation. Suddenly, our full humanity and patriotism is questioned, and we are so disrespected that our military careers can be ended by a Tweet.

Most of these gay Trump voters were selfish white dudes who said: “Hey, I don’t have a pussy to grab, so Donald Trump can’t sexually harass me. I’m not Mexican or Muslim, so a travel ban or a wall won’t harm me.

But guess what? Today, Donald Trump and his self-righteous troglodytes did come for you. And you have nobody to blame but yourself. Shame on you.

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July 26, 2017 • The Wayne Besen Show, Uncategorized • 1330

Draft Dodger Trump, Shamefully Bans Brave Transgender Service Members

Today, Donald Trump banned transgender soldiers from serving in our military. On a whim, our Comrade in Chief shamed America, betrayed our values, degraded our military readiness, and destroyed more than 10,000 careers.

This is an outrageous move by a monumental coward who was a college athlete until he suddenly had bone spurs, just in time for the Vietnam War, then miraculously healed when the war ended, and today can’t quite remember what foot the bone spurs were in.

It’s nauseating to think that our Putin-selected, draft-dodging President might be deliberately harming our military and running lives, simply as a diversion tactic from his obvious, and nefarious, ties to Russia, the removal of press secretary Sean Spicer, as well as his broken promise to build a wall and have Mexico pay for it, and his failed effort to reform healthcare.

Given these disasters, Trump is the least popular president in modern times – having squandered his honeymoon period with a chaotic and backbiting West Wing, humiliating foreign trips, a failed legislative agenda, and his family and campaign staff’s secret meetings with Russian operatives.

On Monday, USA Today’s top headline was “Americans Split on Impeachment,” with 42-percent of Americans believing Trump should be removed from office. This is remarkable and unprecedented, considering he has only been in office for 6 months.

With the news bad, and getting worse, the president is desperate for distractions to get people talking about anything other than his lies, disappointments, weird Russia connections, and catastrophic presidency.

One misdirection play was Trump’s embarrassingly inappropriate, overtly political, Hillary Clinton bashing l speech to the Boy Scouts. He followed up this monstrosity with vicious attacks on Attorney General Jeff Sessions. When these efforts at distraction flopped, Trump upped the ante by banning transgender service members.

As usual, the Comrade in Chief announced a major policy change via Twitter. According to the presidential Tweets:

“After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States government will not accept or allow Transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you.”

Once again, Donald Trump lied to the American people. The Rand Corporation reports that transgender medical care in the military costs one-one hundredth of one-percent of the annual military healthcare budget. In other words, it’s a rounding error – that will be far eclipsed in cost by litigation challenging the ban.

I’d also like to know how decreasing the number of soldiers helps with overwhelming victory? And, there is not one shred of evidence, by the way, that transgender troops harm readiness.

It’s worth noting, the Palm Center reports that 18 of our allies, including Israel and the United Kingdom, allow transgender troops to serve – with no problems to report.

Right wing groups, such as The Family Research Council, claim that transgender troops make some soldiers uncomfortable. That’s the same shallow, debunked argument used to ban African American troops, women in the military, and gay soldiers. The chicken little’s who said the sky would fall have been incorrect every time – and they are wrong again. Diversity has made our military stronger, not weaker. What has decreased America’s strength is Donald Trump.

Finally, would you rather have next to you in a Foxhole, a transgender soldier who fought to get into the military, or a president who fought to get out of it? Not to mention, his two “brave sons”, who murder helpless animals on expensive safaris, never served our country in Afghanistan or Iraq.

I think the real problem here is that the president is in foxhole – with his eyes glued to FOX News. He ought to put down the remote control and meet with transgender troops before making this consequential decision.

Unfortunately, brave trans men and women who honorably serve this country will have their careers ruined by a president who only serves himself.

This is Wayne Besen with your daily Reality Check. Until we meet again, have a great day.
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July 22, 2017 • Uncategorized • 1193

Trump Interferes with Russia Probe by Attacking Investigators

Donald Trump is petrified of independent counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, so he’s preemptively trying to kill the messenger. The president is actually investigating the investigators looking for alleged conflicts of interest.

These so-called conflicts include investigators who gave money to Democrats. Those who had business clients affiliated with Democrats. And, those who had friendly or professional relations with fired FBI Director James Comey.

One wonders if Trump will eventually try to disqualify investigators who gave money to, or voted for, his Republican primary opponents – such as Little Marco, Low Energy Jeb, and Lyin Ted.

Trump seems to believe the only people qualified to investigate him are hardcore loyalists and lackeys who support him no matter what he does. You know, like shooting someone in the middle of 5th Avenue.

Trump has made it clear that he doesn’t think Mueller’s investigation should extend beyond Russia. But in the real world, it doesn’t work that way. If law enforcement uncovers new crimes while investigating Russia, it’s their duty to enforce the law. You would expect Law and Order Republicans to understand this concept.

To put this in perspective, notorious serial killer Ted Bundy was caught after he was pulled over by police in Florida because he was riding in a stolen Volkswagen. When the police realized that Bundy was on the FBI’s “10 Most Wanted List”, Bundy didn’t get to say, “Hey you can’t arrest me for murder – this investigation was supposed to be about car theft.”

The same goes for Trump. If they find the crime, you do the time. At least until you pardon yourself and your shady family members.

And let’s not forget that independent counsel Ken Starr’s investigation of Bill Clinton started as a query into an Arkansas land deal. By the time he was finished, Monica Lewinsky was a household name.

In that case, Ken Starr actually was a blue-nosed partisan hack with an axe to grind. It was a wild goose chase that morphed into witch-hunt over oral sex, with the goal of bringing down a sitting president.

So, stay tuned and watch the coming hypocrisy of Republicans. They were perfectly fine with the nosy Kenn Starr widening the parameters of the Clinton investigation, but will now go ballistic when Mueller expands his investigation beyond Russia.

In this unseemly and unpresidential spectacle, Trump’s fall guy is Attorney General Jeff Sessions. The president is livid that he recused himself after having lied in his Senate confirmation hearings about meeting with the Russian Ambassador.

Trump expected Sessions to be a lapdog apparatchik stooge who protected the president from being investigated. Trump flat out told The New York Times this week that he would have never hired Sessions had he know he would have recused himself.

This statement, in and of itself, is incriminating and shows Trump is corrupt and committed to obstruction of justice. Just like he probably obstructed justice when he fired James Comey.

No matter what political party the investigators belong to, or which politician they gave money to, the facts are still the facts. Either Donald Trump is innocent, or he is guilty. Based on his bizarre and unconscionable interference, I’m betting on the latter.

This is your daily Reality Check with Wayne Besen. Have a great weekend.

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July 21, 2017 • Uncategorized • 1132

Chicago Mayor Rahm ‘E-Scam-uel’ Bilking Chicago Tax Payers

Script:

I know it’s early, but I’m going come out and endorse anyone but Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Two breaking stories today highlight why he can’t be trusted – and rips off taxpayers.

In the first story, Chicago settled with city drivers for $38.7 million dollars over its red light camera racket. More than 1.2 million people are eligible to be reimbursed for half of what they paid for their tickets.

The city’s red light and speed cameras were always a con. They often don’t work properly and they pick pocket drivers who can least afford to pay the fines. They are essentially an enormous backdoor tax – ripping people off by turning Chicago’s main thoroughfares into legalized mugging zones.

The red light cameras first appeared after an Arizona company bribed a Chicago official to get the city contract. A Chicago Tribune investigation found that drivers were ticketed after yellow light times were illegally slashed below federal minimum standards.

Ever speed through a yellow light and it turns red before you get through, and you say to yourself – “damn that yellow light was quick?” Well, in Chicago that scenario was true – and it’s a great way for cowardly politicians to rake in money for the city without having to raise taxes.

In the latest twist, the city settled with drivers for failing to give proper notice to those who were ticketed, as well as not offering enough time to pay their fines.

The biggest joke is when the mayor tries to pretend the red light cameras are about public safety. The Chicago Tribune found that red light cameras caused a 22-percent of increase in rear-end crashes, yet provided no safety benefit.

Alderman Anthony Beale, who has criticized red light cameras, said that the program was about “trying to balance the books on the backs of the people who can least afford to pay.”

Hey Commissioner Beale, ever think of running for mayor?

In the second big story, the Better Government Association and Crain’s Chicago Business found that the Emanuel Administration played a cynical shell game with $55 million dollars of taxpayer’s money.

In Chicago, we have what is called tax-increment financing – or TIFs. It’s basically money siphoned from property taxes to fund much-needed investment in poor neighborhoods. What the city did, was take this money and ostensibly shift it to a hotel project at McCormick Place convention hall – which is located in a disadvantaged South Side neighborhood.

Once the money was in the hotel’s account, it was funneled to the tourist destination, Navy Pier, which wasn’t eligible for the funds because it’s located in a ritzier north side neighborhood. The transaction was difficult to detect because the owner of the hotel project also ran Navy Pier.

South Side residents should remember the mayor’s priorities the next time he campaigns in these neighborhoods.

Whether it’s red light cameras or acting shady with TIFF funds, the mayor needs to be upfront with voters – and stop acting like Mayor Rahm E-Scam-uel

This is Reality Check with Wayne Besen. Have a great day.

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