Etiquette



DP Etiquette

First rule: Don't be a jackass.

Other rules: Do not attack or insult people you disagree with. Engage with facts, logic and beliefs. Out of respect for others, please provide some sources for the facts and truths you rely on if you are asked for that. If emotion is getting out of hand, get it back in hand. To limit dehumanizing people, don't call people or whole groups of people disrespectful names, e.g., stupid, dumb or liar. Insulting people is counterproductive to rational discussion. Insult makes people angry and defensive. All points of view are welcome, right, center, left and elsewhere. Just disagree, but don't be belligerent or reject inconvenient facts, truths or defensible reasoning.

Monday, April 21, 2025

News bits: MAGA's terrorism demagoguery; Hegseth did it again

Yahoo and other sources are reporting that MAGA elites in government are contemplating federal crime prosecutions for people who want the rule of law to apply to immigration and deportations:
Donald Trump’s counterterrorism czar Sebastian Gorka [Senior Director for Counterterrorism in the White House and Deputy Assistant to djt] claims Americans who don’t support the president’s anti-immigration agenda and deportations policy are “on the side of the terrorists.”
He suggested advocates for Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran father living in Maryland who was mistakenly deported to a brutal prison in his home country, could be prosecuted for “aiding and abetting.”

“And you have to ask yourself, are they technically aiding and abetting them?” Gorka continued. “Because aiding and abetting criminals and terrorists is a crime in federal statute.”

“It’s not left and right, it’s not even Republican or Democrat. There’s one line that divides us: Do you love America, or do you hate America? It’s really quite that simple,” Gorka told Newsmax on Wednesday.

“It's quite telling that we have Democrats on Capitol Hill, not just the lunatics who are torching Tesla dealerships in acts of terrorism themselves, saying, ‘Oh my gosh, the rights of this individual!’” Gorka says of Garcia. “You mean the terrorist who came here illegally?”
Like all other MAGA elites, Gorka conveniently ignores inconvenient facts. Here, (1) Garcia is not a terrorist, (2) a US immigration judge granted Garcia "withholding of removal" status in 2019 because he was threatened by gangs in El Salvador, and (3) there is no solid evidence that Garcia is or ever was a member of any criminal gang.** All that reasonable people are asking here is just that Garcia get due process. The Department of Homeland Security and djt administration have alleged involvement in criminal activity and gang membership, but have not produced any evidence of felony charges, indictments, or convictions. There is no such evidence.

** The government's confidential informant said Garcia was a gang member active in the western New York M-13 criminal gang. Garcia never lived anywhere other than Maryland since he arrived illegally in the US in 2012 at the age of 16. In exchange for his uncorroborated confidential information, the informant was granted a visa to stay in the US, i.e., the informant was highly motivated to lie.

Q1: Should people who ask for due process for everyone entitled to due process, including Garcia, be prosecuted for aiding and abetting*** terrorists?


*** Under federal law aiding and abetting is a felony if the underlying crime is a felony. According to 18 U.S. Code § 2, anyone who aids, abets, counsels, commands, induces, or procures the commission of a federal offense is punishable as a principal—that is, as if they committed the crime themselves. There is no separate charge for aiding and abetting; the aider and abettor faces the same penalties as the person who committed the original crime, including felony penalties if the principal offense is a felony. Garcia has no criminal record in the US or El Salvador. There is no underlying crime.

Q2: Should Gorka be prosecuted for treason, false prosecution or just plain threatening, lying to and insulting the American people? (just a rhetorical question)
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From the only the best people files, everyone is reporting that defense secretary and stupid, incompetent MAGA thug Pete Hegseth blew off security concerns for a 2nd time. This time his wife and some other miscellaneous people got to see secret US defense plans. AL.com reports: Trump thinks Hegseth doing ‘phenomenal job’ despite new chat scandal, won’t fire him over ‘anonymous smears’ -- President Donald Trump won’t ask for Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s resignation following a report he divulged attack plans to his brother, wife and personal attorney, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Monday. “The president stands strongly behind Secretary Hegseth, who is doing a phenomenal job leading the Pentagon,” Leavitt said during an appearance on “Fox & Friends.”

In the first outrageous security breach, Hegseth participated in a Signal chat about the March 15 Yemen airstrikes with senior Trump administration officials. This time, the treasonous idiot shared essentially the same sensitive secrets—such as flight schedules for F/A-18 Hornets and timing of the airstrikes—on a separate Signal chat he created, which included his wife, brother, and personal attorney.

Q: In view of the recent massive, gigantic leak of secret government information to the Russians by Elon Musk, does this leak amount to anything of concern since the Russians already know just everything secret the US government had?