Collective guilt
Apparently, the National Guard shooter in DC was an Afghan refugee. Now the Trump Administration has got its panties in a twist, calling it an act of “terrorism” and blaming all Afghan refugees.
“Afghan refugees in Massachusetts who fled the Taliban in recent years fear they won’t be able to stay in the country after the Trump administration announced sweeping changes to Afghan immigration policy in response to the shooting this week of two National Guard troops near the White House.
“Soon after officials identified the suspect as an Afghan national who had worked with the CIA in his native country, the federal government announced it was halting immigration from Afghanistan and would conduct a review of green cards.”
The Nazis used collective guilt. The Bolsheviks used collective guilt. Now the Trump Administration is following those examples.
Shame.
Trump refugee crackdown
“Afghan refugees in Massachusetts who fled the Taliban in recent years fear they won’t be able to stay in the country after the Trump administration announced sweeping changes to Afghan immigration policy in response to the shooting this week of two National Guard troops near the White House.
“Soon after officials identified the suspect as an Afghan national who had worked with the CIA in his native country, the federal government announced it was halting immigration from Afghanistan and would conduct a review of green cards.”
The Nazis used collective guilt. The Bolsheviks used collective guilt. Now the Trump Administration is following those examples.
Shame.
Trump refugee crackdown
Joel:
Use them and throw them away. Maybe countries are better off to be taken over by other countries rather than the U.S. We are not the Lone Ranger to many of them.
The story I read intimated he was afflicted mentally by the acts the CIA had him commit in Afghanistan. If his defense lawyer uses an insanity defense, the government could be seriously embarrassed by the evidence. Might be a good thing.
@Jack,
” . . . the government could be seriously embarrassed by the evidence.”
I’ve seen no evidence that the Trump Administration is capable of embarrassment. Have you?
@Joel,
Maybe embarrassed is the wrong word. They do seem to get upset when their narrative is contradicted by those pesky facts that they seem to dislike so much that when they pop up,
the administration spokespeople virtually shriek, “Fake news!”
@Jack,
So “. . . outraged by the evidence . . .”
Outraged by the citing of the evidence.
Will the media or Democrats mention that it was a Trump and Pompeo policy to escalate the use of C.I.A. paramilitary Zero Unit forces and specifically target the Taliban thus making evacution of those forces after the Trump-Taliban negotiated withdrawal of U.S. forces obligatory??
NYT: Oct. 22, 2017
A Newly Assertive C.I.A. Expands Its Taliban Hunt in Afghanistan
By Thomas Gibbons-Neff, Eric Schmitt and Adam Goldman
WASHINGTON — The C.I.A. is expanding its covert operations in Afghanistan, sending small teams of highly experienced officers and contractors alongside Afghan forces to hunt and kill Taliban militants across the country, according to two senior American officials, the latest sign of the agency’s increasingly integral role in President Trump’s counterterrorism strategy.
…
The expansion reflects the C.I.A.’s assertive role under its new director, Mike Pompeo,
[1] to combat insurgents around the world. The agency is already poised to broaden its program of covert drone strikes
[2] into Afghanistan; it had largely been centered on the tribal regions of Pakistan, with occasional strikes in Syria and Yemen.
“We can’t perform our mission if we’re not aggressive,”
Mr. Pompeo said at a security conference this month at the University of Texas. “This is unforgiving, relentless. You pick the word. Every minute, we have to be focused on crushing our enemies.”
I don’t know, something about it doesn’t “feel” right. It’s too … clumsy; too pat, too many loose ends, too “do something to reinforce the wobbling narrative”. COINTELPRO
Trump is as responsible for that young woman’s death as the shooter …
Insanity pleas are very uncommon. If the alleged murderer did any kind of rational planning, it’s pretty much impossible. If he shot up his original place of residence and didn’t select specific victims (uniforms, here) there would be a better chance. Another issue is that it is difficult to argue insanity using the allegedly insane individual’s own testimony. Judges often will not grant subpoenas in a case based on the notionally insane party’s contention that the prospective witness has important evidence. Even his rational participation in his defense can be used to refute insanity. I’d be surprised if they try insanity here if for no other reason than he probably made a trip that required a good deal of sane behavior just before the attack. Mental health more likely would be a factor in sentencing if found guilty. A very cynical possibility is an insanity plea that the government accepts. The guy goes into an institution and it’s 20 or 30 years (if ever) before anyone thinks about this other than the victims’ families. We here are gone, Biden is gone, Trump is gone, 3 subsequent administration have come and gone. I do not expect it, but I’d be surprised at any discussion of his CIA experience at trial either (prior sentencing possibly).
It seems that his CIA experience formed the basis of his motive. Something like PTSD. I was speculating that a creative defense might want to use exposure of that as leverage in some way. Perhaps, as you suggest, at sentencing.