National Review: Trump the elitist stomping on the little guy in Scotland

The New Neo Posted on by

A kind reader alerted me to the fact that National Review has come out with a lengthy piece titled “The Playboy Bully of the Western World”* about Trump the elitist and the shenanigans he engaged in around the construction of his Scottish gold course.

It’s the same story I tried to push here and in a similar post at Legal Insurrection. The point of all the stories is the same. This is how Ian Tuttle, the National Review writer, puts it:

Two properties provoked Trump’s particular ire. David Milne’s home, in Balmedie, Aberdeenshire, Scotland, was built in 1954. It was then a Coast Guard station, occupying the same spot on which another Coast Guard station had stood, going back to the 1860s. Trump thought it was an eyesore. Likewise a house and several outbuildings owned by Michael Forbes, a salmon fisherman who had left school at 14 to learn his trade, and whose family had lived in the area for several generations. “His property is terribly maintained,” Trump told reporters. “It’s slum-like, it’s disgusting. He’s got stuff thrown all over the place. He lives like a pig.”

…It would be an extraordinary irony if Donald Trump secured the Republican nomination riding a groundswell of working-class anger toward “elites.” In Scotland, Trump teamed up with “elites” in the local and national government in an attempt to railroad working-class residents out of their homes. In Scotland, Donald Trump was not against “special interests.” He was special interests.

The article is long, and I wish it had emphasized Trump’s elitist statements more, and included the video. Also, I’d like to have seen it drive home the point that Michael Forbes’ property was wanted by Trump not to build anything, but because Trump felt it ruined the view for the rich people who would be using the golf course.

However, I’m happy to see it, and I wish some candidates would pick up on it. The visuals involved in the video are awful for Trump, just awful. I think they would make an incredibly hard-hitting campaign ad. It’s not just his attempt to force the sale of the land, it’s the elitist nature of the vicious personal attacks on Forbes that would hurt Trump’s populist image with at least some of his supporters.

As I said, I’ve tried to get someone to pay attention to it. Maybe National Review will succeed where I failed. Or maybe a reader has a way to reach someone involved with the candidates. If there’s not enough time left to make an ad, there’s always social media.

The videos can be found here, towards the end of my post.

Time’s a wasting.

[* NOTE: The National Review’s title is a reference to this play set in Ireland.]

Today is the South Carolina primary

The New Neo Posted on by

[BUMPED UP]

In case you’d forgotten.

This post is an open thread for discussing it. And here’s an article analyzing what’s at stake, how the candidates stack up, and what they’re hoping for.

Polls close at 7 Eastern time. That’s when the results start coming in.

UPDATE 8:10 PM:

It’s a funny thing, but I’m so weary of politics that I haven’t been able to bring myself to turn on the TV. That doesn’t mean I’m not following it; I am. I’m just trying not to obsess about it. I read a bit, and from that I’m aware that the news is better than feared. In other words, although realistically I pretty much knew Trump would win, if current trends hold he is not doing as well as predicted, and both Cruz and Rubio are doing better than predicted. Their totals would beat his. Late-breakers are going to them. This is all to the good.

It would be even better if the bottom three—the troika of Bush, Carson, and Kasich whose ego-driven quests seem at this point designed to guarantee the nomination of Donald Trump—were polling at around 1% each. As it is, at least so far they’re doing worse than expected, and that’s good, too. I want each of them to come to their senses and go home, thanks very much for your service.

I am going to take a nice break now and wash my hair. This activity takes the better part of an hour. You don’t want to know.

UPDATE 9:15 PM:

Jeb Bush is out. I am glad. I never disliked him, but I disliked the role he took on as this campaign has worn on. He became destructive rather than constructive to the larger picture, and I’m happy that he realized it (or someone realized it and made him realize it). I respect him for doing this. I would respect Kasich and Carson, too, if they went the same way. Now.

If they don’t do that, they earn my enmity. Not that they care.

UPDATE 11:30 PM:

One of the odd things about this primary season is the even splits. What do I mean? Looking at the results right now, with 99% reporting, we get Trump at 32.5% (his expected third), Rubio at 22.5% and Cruz at 22.3. Let that closeness between Rubio and Cruz sink in for a second. They are splitting 45% of the vote right smack dab down the middle at a tad over 22% each. Then you have Bush at 7.8%, Kasich at 7.6%, and Carson at 7.2%. Couldn’t be much closer among those three, but if you add up their portion you get 22.6%, which is basically what Rubio and Cruz get.

There is some very odd math mojo going on here, folks. I can’t explain it, but I can notice it.

Aldous Huxley has a little talk with you

The New Neo Posted on by

Yes, yes, I’m well aware that Huxley died in 1963, over fifty years ago. In death, he had the strange fate of being eclipsed by JFK, who was assassinated on the very same day (C.S. Lewis died that day too, by the way).

I have read most of Huxley’s books, even some of the more obscure ones, and his Brave New World continues to impress and amaze me with the detail and creativity of its dystopic vision, so different from that of Orwell and yet equally brilliant.

This interview is from 1958, and the questioner was Mike Wallace. Huxley may get a few unimportant details wrong—for instance, subliminal messages turned out not to be the tool he thought they might become—but on the big picture he could not have been more correct. When I watch him and listen to him, I get an overwhelming impression of a powerful intellect that has spent an entire lifetime pondering the Big Questions, attempting to express answers in words that any simpleton (that is, everyone else) can understand, and to do it without any condescension or arrogance whatsoever. Huxley seems to be searching for elegant simplicity of expression, and I think he attains it:

Brits will vote on membership in the EU

The New Neo Posted on by

A June 23 date has been set for a British referendum on its EU membership:

Cameron said he was making good on a 2013 commitment to give British voters a chance to decide whether to remain in the bloc, which is seen by some Britons as meddlesome, overly bureaucratic, and unable to control its borders.

Britain has always remained somewhat apart from the European project, preferring to keep its own currency rather than adopt the euro and declining to join the passport-free Schengen zone in place in much of Europe.

The June vote will come as the EU struggles to cope with a sustained immigration crisis that last year brought more than 1 million people fleeing war and poverty to its shores.

The referendum battle pits those who believe Britain is better off in a formal union with Germany, France and other countries against those who see Britain as a proud island nation better capable of managing its affairs on its own.

Cameron is for membership, and he’s selling it to the people with the idea that Britain will be able to get the benefits of EU membership without the pain:

He said a landmark deal reached the day before with EU leaders in Brussels would give Britain more control over its future, lessen welfare payments to migrants who come to Britain, and protect Britain from being absorbed into a feared European “superstate.”

I know that, were I a Brit, I’d vote to stay as far away from the EU as possible. I would not trust a deal, because the British goal of relative autonomy runs directly counter to every impulse of the EU leaders for homogenization “for the greater good.” Polls say the electorate is pretty split on the issue, and most business leaders favor Cameron’s position.

If Britain does end up voting against the EU, I wonder if the effect could be contagious.

2016 is the codger campaign

The New Neo Posted on by

Whatever happened to all those concerns about the age of candidates?

Remember back in 2008, when Democrats were hootin’ and hollerin’ about how old John McCain was? I remember writing this post arguing that if elected he was almost certain to be perfectly fine for his first term and probably even a second, and explaining why. And here he is, eight years later and still in the saddle at 79, although I know that a lot of people wouldn’t mind if he dismounted (in the job sense, that is, not in the fuller sense).

Now the orthopedic shoe is on the other, more Democratic foot, and they are mostly silent about it. Hillary Clinton is 68 but would be 69 by election time, and Bernie Sanders (who would also be the first Jewish president, something else we don’t hear much about) is 74 but would become 75 by the time of the election. That would make him the oldest president ever, and the oldest presidential nominee. The oldest previous president at first inauguration was Ronald Reagan, who was just a few days shy of 70 on taking the oath of office for the first time. McCain was only the second oldest nominee at 72, the first having been Bob Dole at 73 in 1996. Note that Dole is still alive (and seemingly functional, although you wouldn’t want to hand him the Oval Office) to this day.

Even if Joe Biden were to be called on to run in a somewhat-unlikely scenario, this would most certainly not help the Democrats in that regard. He’s 73, and would be 74 at inauguration.

But that doesn’t mean Republicans are home free. Kasich (63), Bush (63), and Carson (64) are very close to each other in age, in the range (early-to-mid-60s) that’s not uncommon for contenders. Cruz and Rubio are 45 and 44 right now; it’s just that Cruz looks older than his age and Rubio younger. But the frontrunner, Donald
Trump, is currently 69 and would be 70 if he were to become president, the oldest president ever.

Trump does not project an image of near-70, and his age is barely ever discussed. It ordinarily would be almost certain to come up if he were the nominee—the Democrats will be eager to bring up every negative thing about him, of that you can be sure. But if his opponent is either Clinton or Sanders or Biden (and it’s hard to see how it could be anyone but one of those three) Democrats won’t breathe a single word about Trump’s age—although they’ll have plenty other flaws to talk about, of that you can be sure.

It’s not that 70 is so very old in the scheme of things, particularly not these days. At least, I hope it’s not, for personal reasons. The ages of these possible nominees do make their VP choices even more important than usual, however.

And I have no idea—none—how any of these candidates keep up the pace of the seemingly endless campaign. Young or old, it seems inhuman, and some of them (particularly the younger ones) keep up a schedule in the weeks close to each primary of up to four or five appearances a day.

Something drives them, though, and drives them hard. Ego is certainly part of it, and the adoration of the crowds feeds that. I imagine that those who drop out—especially if, unlike Scott Walker or Chris Christie, they have no current office to return to—feel a certain amount of withdrawal pain. Nevertheless, I hope against hope that we’ll see at least three dropouts after South Carolina. I doubt that particular wish of mine will be granted.

How far does Christian duty go?

The New Neo Posted on by

[NOTE: This is a repeat of an earlier post that seems to me to be worth repeating, particularly in light of the Pope’s remarks the other day about building walls and Christians.]

A great many Christians seem to be arguing that we Westerners have a duty to accept all the refugees coming from war-torn countries such as Syria, or those in economic distress such as illegal immigrants from Mexico, whether the “we” be individuals here or in Europe. I’ve read many such arguments on blogs in posts and comments, and have seen them offered by talking heads on TV.

To me as a non-Christian, it is a puzzling argument. To me it seems that the prescription to give to charity, to help the needy, never requires that one help all the needy to the point of beggaring yourself. Nor does it require putting yourself in personal jeopardy. In other words, although Christianity has long admired the saintliness of martyrdom, it does not require it of individuals and certainly not of societies.

There is a saying, “charity begins at home” that has these origins:

The notion that a man’s family should be his foremost concern is expressed in 1 Timothy 5:8, King James Bible, 1611:

But if any prouide not for his owne, & specially for those of his owne house, hee hath denied the faith, and is worse then an infidel.

John Wyclif had expressed the same idea as early as 1382, in Of Prelates, reprinted in English Works, 1880:

Charite schuld bigyne at hem-self.

So it seems clear that helping everyone in need is not possible in the real world. Nor does helping people require that you take them into your own home, either in small numbers or large.

Another principle to remember is that generally any behavior that is rewarded will increase in frequency. So, issue an open invitation to your house saying that all who come will be fed and clothed there and given money, and see what happens if you broadcast it throughout the entire world.

In the case of immigrants from a country such as Syria, the current refugee crisis is a golden opportunity for a significant number of terrorists to come in among them. The more immigrants arrive the more difficult it will be to properly vet them (if indeed there’s any effort at all to do so). In addition, a great number of bona fide refugees fleeing a harsh situation in Syria are nevertheless sworn to the cultural and religious overthrow of the West through the demographic change of which they will be part.

So, how far does your obligation to help go, and to accept the stranger into your home? Does it extend to those who want to take over your dwelling?

I am not completely familiar with the tenets of Christianity, to be sure. But I can’t imagine that it requires such self-destruction in the name of good. To me, it seems that limits are necessary, and the proper topic for debate is the question of where to draw those limits.

Could Trump’s 9/11 story be false?

The New Neo Posted on by

[NOTE: Please read the ADDENDUM at the end of this post for some additional information I’ve seen that tends to support Trump’s account rather than the 2004 Time article. The information has to do with the timing of a video interview of Trump, and also a contradictory account in another print interview.]

Donald Trump has told a number of stories about what he saw on 9/11, and you may recall that some of these stories became controversial and people doubted their veracity (more about that later). But one basic constant has always been that on the morning of 9/11 he watched the burning towers from his midtown Manhattan apartment, and as far as I know that has never been disputed.

Let me say at the outset that I have no idea where Donald Trump was that morning, and he might be telling the absolute truth about having been in New York in his apartment. I certainly had always assumed he was telling the truth about that part of it, and would have had no reason to doubt him.

But this evening I happened across this article about skyscrapers that appeared in Time magazine on December 20, 2004, long before Trump’s location on 9/11 had much relevance to anything except his own memories. I have no idea whether the following is true, but I’d certainly like to find out:

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, Adrian D. Smith, a well-known architect in the Chicago office of Skidmore Owings & Merrill, was in a meeting with Donald Trump. The hyperbolic New York City developer was in Chicago to go over the design of a proposed Trump residential tower in that city that he had decided should be ”” what else? ”” the tallest building in the world, around 2,000 ft. In the midst of their meeting, the two men got word of the first plane that hit the World Trade Center. “When the second plane hit, we all rushed to the television to see what was happening,” says Smith. “That was the end of the meeting.” And also the end of the 2,000-ft. tower. A few weeks later, Trump’s people came back with a revised proposal ”” at 900 ft. or so.

The author of the article, Richard Lacayo, is still at Time magazine, and architect Adrian D. Smith is still alive, as well.

Most people retain vivid memories of where they were on 9/11 and can tell the tale accurately. I am going to assume that, because the Time article was written a mere three years after 9/11, the facts in it are based on much fresher memories than today’s recollections would be. Furthermore, it is often said that memories of where a person was when learning of enormous and shocking crises like 9/11 don’t tend to fade or to change; they remain fairly constant. There actually has been research done on the question of the accuracy of 9/11 memories, and the findings were that the memory of where a person was when hearing about it was one of the most stable types of memory of the events of 9/11. When answers at one week later were compared to memories one year and then three years later, the consistency of people’s answers were 89% and 83%, respectively. I don’t know the researchers’ definition of “accuracy” in terms of how exactly similar a story had to be to be judged accurate. But a difference as enormous as being in one’s apartment in New York watching in real life, versus being in a Chicago office having a meeting with an architect and then watching on TV, would certainly qualify as an extremely wide disparity. One of these stories—either Trump’s or the one in Time—is true, but they cannot both be true.

NOTE: To recap the other controversies around Trump’s personal 9/11 narrative—his first suspect story was about watching “thousands and thousands” of Arabs in New Jersey celebrating on 9/11. Diligent fact-checking revealed that, although there indeed were some small celebrations reported there, nothing of that magnitude occurred (the largest seems to have been about 30 people), and nothing was shown on TV except for some large celebrations in Palestine. So the consensus was that perhaps Trump had conflated the two. Memory can do that.

The second Trump story about 9/11 that has been questioned was that he could see people jumping from the WTC the morning as he watched from his midtown apartment, which is four miles away. Is such keen eyesight even possible? Some experts doubt it.

The third suspect story is Trump’s more recent claim of having lost “hundreds” of friends in the 9/11 attack on the WTC. The Daily Beast reported at length on the problems with Trump’s claim (estimating it would have meant he’d been friends with close to one in ten of the 9/11 victims), and stated that as of the time they wrote the story (2/17), Trump had not answered requests to name even a single friend he lost on 9/11.

[ADDENDUM: After writing this post I found two interviews that Trump gave very shortly after 9/11. One appeared in print on September 18, 2001, and the other is labeled on YouTube as having been videotaped on September 13, 2001. Part of the video is in German, and I don’t see or hear any corroboration of the 9/13 date (or anything about the date at all), but I don’t speak German, so it’s possible there is one.

Neither the article nor the video sheds any light on the question of where Trump might have been on 9/11, although if he’d been in Chicago on 9/11 it probably wouldn’t have been easy for him to return to NY in time for that video—if in fact that interview was taped some time on 9/13. We know that the airports were closed for a while after 9/11. This article says flights resumed on 9/13, however, so it seems it could have been possible. It would certainly be helpful to know when private planes were first allowed to fly after 9/11, but I haven’t been able to locate that information so far. The subject matter of each interview was Trump’s opinion on rebuilding on the WTC site, from the viewpoint of a real estate developer.

Also, and even more importantly, an article written in 2002 by Charles Shaw that conflicts with the Time account has been brought to my attention. It says:

Adrian Smith recalls where he was on the morning of 9/11. In what can only be described as sickening irony, he was with representatives of Donald Trump, preparing to go live with a press conference to unveil his new design for Trump Chicago…

Time says that Trump himself was in Chicago, but Shaw says it was “representatives.” Again, someone got it wrong, but there’s no way to tell for certain who it was. But putting all this additional information together, (the video said to be taken on 9/13, and the conflicting article), I’m now very strongly leaning towards saying Trump is much more likely to be telling the truth about being in his apartment and that the Time article is more likely to have been mistaken. Probably it was either the architect who misremembered exactly who was there, when being interviewed three years later, or the article’s author had misunderstood him and thought he said Trump himself was there rather than just the representatives.]

Two new statements from the ever-evolving Trump

The New Neo Posted on by

[UPDATE: I had to also add a link to this, where Trump praises the Iraq war (hat tip: “sdferr”):

Republican primary front-runner Donald Trump claimed on the second day of Operation Iraqi Freedom that it appeared to be “a tremendous success from a military standpoint.”

Speaking to Fox News’ Neil Cavuto on March 21, 2003, Trump predicted the war would continue to bolster Wall Street.

“Well, I think Wall Street’s waiting to see what happens, but even before the fact they’re obviously taking it a little bit for granted, and it looks like a tremendous success from a military standpoint, and I think this is really nothing compared to what you’re gonna see after the war is over,” Trump said, as first reported by BuzzFeed News…

Trump also speculated in the interview as to what kinds of weapons of mass destruction the Iraqi regime was hiding.

“The main thing is to get the war over with and just make it a tremendously successful campaign, and it’ll be very interesting to see what kind of weapons they uncover,” he said.

Wow.]

Every time I vow to get off the topic of Trump there is something new that needs highlighting.

So without a whole lot of discussion, I will just point out these two posts from Powerline:

(1) Trump likes the Obamacare mandate.

So I wonder: why then is Trump so down on Justice Roberts? All Roberts did was to say the mandate was perfectly all right if you call it a tax.

Mirengoff writes that the CNN interview in which Trump made this pro-mandate statement was generally incoherent, although that particular statement was clear. I wrote about that interview here, but in all the flurry I missed Trump’s moment of clarity—and approval—about the mandate.

Could someone please inform the people of South Carolina of all of this? Quickly?

(2)Trump is on record as saying in a 2002 interview that he favored attacking Iraq:

Donald Trump has made his alleged opposition to the war in Iraq a central theme of his presidential campaign. He claims that it differentiates him from his opponents and speaks to his sagacity when it comes to foreign and military policy.

Early on, we noted that there was no evidence Trump opposed the invasion before it occurred. He began to criticize the war only after it appeared to be going badly. That’s known as Monday morning quarterbacking.

More recently, we pointed to a book Trump wrote in 2000 where he spoke favorably about the possibility of an invasion. In that interview, however, Trump stopped short of saying we should invade.

Now, Andrew Kaczynski of BuzzFeed has unearthed a 2002 statement by Trump in which he said the U.S. should invade Iraq.

Note again that the timing of Trump’s opposition to the war is a big part of his campaign; he talks about it a lot.

A significant amount of what Trump is saying now about his past statements and positions is made-up stuff. His contempt for the press and the public seems to encompass the idea that they won’t bother to fact-check him, or that they won’t care. Perhaps he’s correct about at least one of those, maybe both.

Another stabbing in Israel

The New Neo Posted on by

Once again there has been a fatal stabbing perpetrated by Palestinian teenagers who have been incited by propaganda (from the Palestinian Authority, and also spread through social media) to instigate these low-tech attacks.

Yesterday’s victim was 21-year-old Tuvia Yanai Weissman, pictured here with his wife and baby:

weisman

RIP.

This also seems important:

The Palestinian attackers were 14 years old. They were shot by a private citizen during the assault. One died and the other is an Israeli hospital where he will receive as complete medical treatment as the person he stabbed.

A great many of these attacks have been truncated by the timely action of private citizens carrying weapons.

“The person he stabbed” does not refer to Weissman; it refers to another victim who was wounded in the attack.

Death of a Salesman: “well-liked”

The New Neo Posted on by

Okay, I admit this is a bit odd. But when Donald Trump (yeah, Trump; but don’t worry, this post is not really about Trump) disses Cruz and others about their likability, for me it conjures up the way Willy Loman talks in the play “Death of a Salesman.” Here’s a typical quote from Trump on the subject:

…[Cruz is] a nasty guy, nobody likes him. Nobody in Congress likes him. Nobody likes him anywhere once they get to know him. He’s a very ”“ He’s got a edge that’s not good. You can’t make deals with people like that.

You might think it’s ridiculous of me to think of Willy Loman in connection with Trump. You might even say that Loman is Trump’s opposite. After all, Trump is fabulously successful, and Loman was a failure in business who had once managed to eke out a living but by the time the play starts was about to be put on the shelf, a has-been. So why was I thinking about the character?

Well, I’ve seen that play many, many times, on the stage and in the movies. My favorite version is the 1951 Frederic March black-and-white movie, the first one I ever saw, on TV when I was a child. It made a deep deep impression on me. I might not have understood every word and every nuance, but I got it, all right (and yes, as an adult I know that Miller was a leftist and that the play fits in with leftism; but I saw it, and still see it, in very human and individual terms). I was transfixed by the pathos of March’s performance, the warm glow of his memories—for example, of playing ball with his sons when they were still teenagers, when all was new and promising for him and for them, before disillusionment and heartache and betrayal had set in.

Loman’s character made an indelible mark on me. His emphasis on success, on being liked—well-liked (the words are mentioned over and over in the script) was a hallmark of what he felt a person should strive for. And yet the trajectory of the play was cruelly ironic. Trump’s words about Cruz made me think of the way Willy spoke of his rivals.

This YouTube video is of the entire movie. If you’re interested in a somber but brilliant rendition of the play (far better, in my opinion, than the Dustin Hoffman version, which I cannot stand), please watch the whole thing. Here’s the scene, one of many flashbacks or fantasy sequences where the older and despondent Loman, whose relationship with his sons has degenerated over time, steps away from the present into memories of a far more pleasant past. Willy’s statement about being “well-liked” takes place at around 17.30 (he’s speaking of a successful neighbor, “Uncle Charley,” who’s achieved a lot but isn’t liked). But I’ve started the clip at the beginning of the scene, late in the evening. It begins with Willy alone in the kitchen, speaking to his present-day grownup sons even though they aren’t there, and something sparks a journey memory (notice the change in the light as Willy steps into the past):

Then there’s this, which starts in the present when Willy is playing cards with the afore-mentioned neighbor Charley (then one who isn’t “well-liked”), and begins to remember an occasion when his mega-successful brother Ben (successful in the monetary, Trumpian sense, but without a “likable” Trumpian personality) came to visit and gave him some advice about success:

I am very anxious…

The New Neo Posted on by

…about tomorrow’s primary.

I’m assuming Trump will win. The question is: by how much, and in what order the others will come in, and what will their percentages be?

And even more importantly, will any of them drop out right afterward? I believe this is the key, and I also fear that for some or most of them (we’re talking Bush, Kasich, and Carson) their egos and desires will get in the way and drive them onward in a cause that is not only lost in terms of their being nominated, but destructive—unless a Trump nomination is something they want, which I tend to doubt. Of course, perhaps some of them have been promised the VP spot if they stay in, which would explain something about their motivation.

I have never been nervous during primaries before, much less this nervous. During elections, yes—as in 2012, when I was pessimistic about Romney’s chances, and feared Obama would be re-elected.

What was Trump actually saying about DACA—or was he saying anything about it?

The New Neo Posted on by

In the comments section of last night’s post there was a discussion about what Trump actually meant to say during his press conference when asked about Obama’s deferred action on illegal minors, otherwise known as DACA. There is a video at the link, but this was how Trump’s remarks began:

REPORTER: Um, there are over a hundred thousand young people known as DREAMers”¦

TRUMP: Yeah.

REPORTER: Who have the deferred action given to them by the Obama administration..

TRUMP: Sure. I think it’s great.

That was about it on the actual subject of DACA, because then Trump went on an extended riff about other people in this country—especially young black people—needing to be able to dream as well. When the reporter asked him again whether he would revoke Obama’s deferred action (although the only thing he’d said about it thus far was “it’s great”) Trump then replied “I’ll look into it” and took a new question.

When I wrote last night’s post, I assumed that most people would remember what “deferred action given to them by the Obama administration” refers to. But it occurs to me that it happened long enough ago that perhaps a lot of people can’t recall it.

Immigration and illegal immigration—and what to do about future immigration as well as the immigrants and illegal immigrants already here—is Trump’s signature policy, the stance on which he is attracting many of his supporters. The reporter’s question was about deferred action on DREAMers (more officially known as DACA, which stands for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals). This was one of the most controversial policies of Obama regarding immigration, and one that most Republicans objected to when it was announced in the summer of 2012:

President Obama announced on June 15, 2012, that the U.S. Dept. Homeland Security would not deport certain DREAM Act”“eligible undocumented youth. Under a directive from the secretary of DHS, these youth will be given temporary relief called “deferred action.”

Do you remember what a brouhaha that caused? You could even argue that it’s a form of amnesty (although not citizenship) for people here illegally. That was one objection to it. Another was how it was done: executive rather than Congressional action—that is, an executive grant of amnesty from deportation, and the granting of certain privileges, because Congress wouldn’t pass a statute granting these things.

Now we have Trump saying “It’s great!” What did he mean? Perhaps he didn’t understand what she was talking about. But let’s say that Trump did understand, and that he meant what he said. If so, that would (a) be enormous news and a huge reversal of his usual attitude towards immigration and amnesty; and (b) it would require an explanation of some sorts, at the very minimum—for example, telling us whether he thinks the whole thing was great, including the method by which it was done, and why he is departing from most of the GOP on this.

Expecting a candidate to be minimally conversant with something that was not a small story, or a little unimportant detail—on an issue that is his own signature issue—is not asking someone to be a detail man. It is asking someone to have the absolute minimum of knowledge about something he’s supposedly been studying and thinking about since June and even before June.

Here’s more about the things that Obama’s “deferred action” effected, things which Trump apparently either doesn’t know about, or doesn’t think he needs to talk about, or thinks are “great” (or some combination of those choices):

While the DREAM Act failed, the name stuck, and now the term DREAMers applies generally to illegal aliens under the age of 35 seeking full or partial legalization / amnesty and/or taxpayer subsidized tuition…

In 2012, President Obama unilaterally implemented a new program called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). The Migration Policy Institute (MPI) estimates there are 1.2 million DREAMers to whom this action applies. Under DACA, illegal aliens are offered two years of amnesty (“deferred action” – meaning a stay of deportation), are given a social security number, and are allowed to apply for a work permit…

In August, 2012, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, stated:

“The president”s amnesty program is a magnet for fraud and abuse. While potentially millions of illegal immigrants will be permitted to compete with American workers for scarce jobs, there seems to be little if any mechanism in place for vetting fraudulent applications and documentation submitted by illegal immigrants.”

Isn’t competition for jobs between citizens and illegal immigrants one of Trump’s main themes, as well?

And finally—and in a way this might be most important—Obama’s issuance of DACA is one of the reasons for the influx of under-18 illegal immigrants to this country that picked up steam during the summer of 2014. I wrote about it in this post, citing this CS Monitor article:

At issue is Mr. Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), which in 2012 allowed some undocumented immigrants who came to America as minors to defer deportation for two years. Last week, the administration announced guidelines for how these immigrants could defer deportation for a further two years.

DACA would not apply to anyone coming across the border today. Only undocumented immigrants who were brought to the US as minors before June 15, 2007, are eligible. But to Republican critics, DACA created the opportunity for misinformation and confusion.

“Word has gotten out around the world about President Obama’s lax immigration enforcement policies and it has encouraged more individuals to come to the United States illegally,” said Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R) of Virginia, a key broker in immigration reform efforts on Capitol Hill, in a statement last week”¦

…Obama called the situation [the increase in young illegal immigrants] a “humanitarian crisis” Monday. Poverty and violence are driving the migration, administration officials say, and activists working with migrants agree. But some also suggest that DACA could be a factor.

At the time, there was quite a bit of consensus on the right about DACA being part of the impetus for the groundswell of recent illegal immigration of minors and resultant anti-illegal-immigrant sentiment—a sentiment that later ended up fueling Trump’s bid for the presidency.

Although, come to think of it, maybe Trump thinks it’s “great” because without it he wouldn’t have had a chance at being nominated. And whatever benefits Trump is “great.”

However you interpret Trump’s remarks, this sort of press conference answer should strike fear into the hearts of his supporters. Of course, it doesn’t. Nor is it being especially publicized, as far as I know. That’s because the press wants Trump as the nominee for two reasons. The first is that, with their help, he can be destroyed in the general when this sort of thing, plus almost countless incidents from Trump’s past, are trotted out and exploited. The second is that he’s very very good for business—their business, that is.