(I posted this three days ago. Now comes the NY Times with a similar story. Trump Wavers on Deportation, Angering Both Sides in Debate)
DonaldTrump now says he is going to be "fair" and "humane" in deporting the 11 milllion undocumented people in this country. Trump, Shifting Tone, Says He Will Be ‘Fair’ on Immigration This "pivot" announcement is his bid to change his hard-line image because he has awoken to the fact that he can't win the presidency with the backing of only the racists and haters. He needs some "moderates".
But he is making a huge mistake. Most moderates are not going to believe he is a changed man, that he has suddenly become humane and fair just by saying he has. Moderates have some sense. That's why they are moderates. They are a bit cautious. They don't buy bridges.
The actual bridge-buyers are Trump's hard core supporters, the ones who believe his wild claims and dote on his "strong man" image. They loved him saying he is going to round-up 11 million brown- skinned people and deport them behind a wall he would somehow make Mexico pay for. This was his original head-line grabbing promise, and it's the one that launched him into nearly-the-presidency.
They are all he has, these racist and gullible folks. If he loses them, he is gone. But now he is betting they will stay with him while he tries to attract moderates by using supposedly moderate rhetoric. Good luck with that one, Mr. Trump! In my judgment that is really a very bad bet.
Your supporters, Mr. Trump, don't want anything to do with "fair" and "humane". To them that is sissy talk. They want you as a tough guy, not as a sissy!
And it's also completely phony! No mass round-up and deportation of 11 million people can be fair and humane! In this context these terms are not moderate at all. They are a hideous joke. Most of the undocumented are the grandparents or parents of people born here. To deport them and thus tear families apart can never be done in a fair and humane way. No matter the right or wrong of how the undocumented came here nor the responsibility they bear for the risk they took in starting families here — it is obscene to tear their families apart. I know these families. Many of them have been going back and forth across the "border" since before there was a border, since the days when the Southwest and California were part of Mexico. In our egomania we conquered that territory 170 years ago and have tried unsuccessfully for centuries to turn an already-existing river of people. We should have recognized long, long ago that we needed an intelligent and orderly way to accommodate a natural occurrence, not fight it with an arbitrary "border."
The proposed deporation is also a non-solution. The jobs in hospital laundries and at the sinks in restaurants, on the hot streets of summer spreading asphalt, on the roofs of houses in 100 degree heat, or bending and bending picking strawberries hour after hour — these jobs are not the jobs your followers want, Mr.Trump. Yet these are the jobs that many of the undocumented now fill. Deporting these workers is going to do nothing for your followers. Nothing at all.
So, Mr. Trump, you are promising to do something "humanely" and "fairly"that cannot ever be done humanely or fairly and cannot benefit your supporters who look to you for help. And you think by making this empty promise you will appease the moderates but keep your hard-core followers? That is, in my judgment, a fool's bet.
For your own sake, Mr. Trump, you'd better stay away from the gambling tables at the casinos that bear your name. In making your bets, Mr. Trump, you just don't figure the odds, do you?
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