Open Source Devs Reverse Decision to Block ICE Contractors From Using Software (vice.com)

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Open Source Devs Reverse Decision to Block ICE Contractors From Using Software (vice.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on Saturday September 1, 2018 @02:34AM from the taking-licenses dept.

An anonymous reader quotes Motherboard: Less than 24 hours after a software developer revoked access to Lerna, a popular open-source software management program, for any organization that contracted with U.S. immigrations and Customs Enforcement, access has been restored for any organization that wishes to use it and the developer has been removed from the project... The modified version specifically banned 16 organizations, including Microsoft, Palantir, Amazon, Northeastern University, Johns Hopkins University, Dell, Xerox, LinkedIn, and UPS... Although open-source developer Jamie Kyle acknowledged that it's "part of the deal" that anyone "can use open source for evil," he told me he couldn't stand to see the software he helped develop get used by companies contracting with ICE.

Kyle's modification of Lerna's license was originally assented to by other lead developers on the project, but the decision polarized the open-source community. Some applauded his principled stand against ICE's human rights violations, while others condemned his violation of the spirit of open-source software. Eric Raymond, the founder of the Open Source Initiative and one of the authors of the standard-bearing Open Source Definition, said Kyle's decision violated the fifth clause of the definition, which prohibits discrimination against people or groups. "Lerna has defected from the open-source community and should be shunned by anyone who values the health of that community," Raymond wrote in a blog post on his website.
The core contributor who eventually removed Kyle also apologized for Kyle's licensing change, calling it a "rash decision" (which was also "unenforceable.")

Eric Raymond had called the decision "destructive of one of the deep norms that keeps the open source community functional -- keeping politics separated from our work."

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Quote by dcollins · 2018-09-01 02:43 · Score: 2

"Everything is politics." -- Thomas Mann

--
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
1. Re:Quote by malkavian · 2018-09-01 03:06 · Score: 2
  
  That's something a politician would have you believe.. Politics is the glue that fits disparate pieces together, but it should stay the hell out of doing the actual work for those pieces.
  "Everything is actually science, just the politicians do it badly." -- Me.
Market still rules... by CRB9000 · 2018-09-01 02:48 · Score: 3, Insightful

...so you open the software and you make it available to all, but what makes OSS companies money is the support and other services that are value adds. If you say your biggest payers are now cut off, you aren't going to last. Imagine if Walmart decided trailer park dwellers and fat people were no longer allowed to shop there...
A blind eye by Anonymous Coward · 2018-09-01 02:48 · Score: 2, Insightful

Its funny how we allow countries with communism, dictatorships, genocide, censorship use open source, but we must ban ICE. Trumpâ(TM)s command on ice is just horrible, but if there is any glimmer of compassion with the ICE agents, why suppress it?
1. Re:A blind eye by Anonymous Coward · 2018-09-01 03:01 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Trump Derangement Syndrome is real.
2. Re:A blind eye by GuB-42 · 2018-09-01 03:03 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Another reason to keep politics out of software dev. Your bad guy isn't the always other community member's bad guy. If we let everyone exert their grudge on software licenses, no one would be able to use that software.
3. Re:A blind eye by Chas · 2018-09-01 05:08 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Said by a man living in one of the countries that is the greatest beneficiary of Capitalism lifting a huge portion of the planet out of abject poverty...
  Is Capitalism perfect? Of course not.
  But, carefully overseen, it's still a damn sight better than anything else humans have tried in the entirety of their history.
  
  --
  
  Chas - The one, the only.
  THANK GOD!!!
4. Re:A blind eye by Bruce+Perens · 2018-09-01 05:19 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  While you are next driving down our public roads to our parks, consider that all of these things are commons. And they don't do all of those bad things some folks pin on communism.
  
  --
  Bruce Perens.
5. Re:A blind eye by ChatHuant · 2018-09-01 07:41 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Communism isn't inherently evil, it's just that it has often come with totalitarianism.
  
  Sorry, Bruce, but you're wrong.
  Communism is inherently evil; it can't work without tyranny, because it relies on idealized people who selflessly put the interest of the society above their own. This is not how real people behave. Capitalism relies on people following their impulses (even supposedly negative ones, like greed). It channels those impulses them in directions that benefit others, for example by rewarding people who produce or create new stuff. Communism wants to completely repress those impulses, so it has to force people to behave contrary to their natural inclinations. It has to indoctrinate people to follow the ideology, so freedom of speech and the free flow of ideas are forbidden. Also, communist countries don't reward producers or creators - at best, they should be happy they contributed to the betterment of society. At worst, they are regarded as exploiters, and repressed.
  I have first hand knowledge of both systems - I lived more than half my life in an Eastern European country that was theoretically "building a Communist society", and then moved to capitalist America. The difference is huge. And I know some people will come up with the "no true Communism" argument - but those are mostly folks who have never experienced life in a communist country, and can't really understand the realities there.
  I believe the best balance is a Canadian or Western-Europe style of capitalism, with strong laws and strong social support. American-style capitalism has become, IMHO, too unregulated and too influenced by money. However, with all its warts, it's miles better than any communist country.
Should Politics be Separated from Work? by iCEBaLM · 2018-09-01 02:52 · Score: 2, Interesting

Eric Raymond had called the decision "destructive of one of the deep norms that keeps the open source community functional -- keeping politics separated from our work."
Should politics be separated from our work? I'm not convinced it should be. The whole idea of open source / free software is political in nature as it is a means to keep power and control of a users computing with them and not in the hands of any outside entity such as a corporation or government.
So let's take this to the extreme: If computing and Linux were around in WW2, should we have let Hitler use Linux? What if Hitler's use of Linux was the deciding factor in NAZI Germany winning the war?
1. Re:Should Politics be Separated from Work? by plopez · 2018-09-01 02:57 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  Computing was available. IBM sold tabulation machines and rented technicians to run them to the SS for use in the concentration camps.
  
  --
  putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
2. Re:Should Politics be Separated from Work? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-09-01 03:08 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Yes. If Hitler wanted to use Linux, he should have the freedom to use Linux. It's not our job as software developers to save the world.
  Sure, we can't completely remove politics from out work, but the current open source model does an excellent job of drawing the line.
  We want freedom in software, and that freedom is extended to everyone, including evil people, unfortunately. That's the politics of open source. Anything else is a slippery slope that will be detrimental to the entire community.
  If we deny Nazis from using Linux today, we can deny the Russians from using it tomorrow, then we can deny rich people from using it. And why stop there? Why allow people who think pineapple on pizza is acceptable to use Linux?
3. Re:Should Politics be Separated from Work? by malkavian · 2018-09-01 03:21 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Yes, politics should be kept the hell away from work in an open group.
  In your example, a significant amount of developers would actually have been on the German side, so they'd be developing away like crazy on their fork (possibly as closed source extensions for their own personal use as a military in some cases), which is allowable anyway.
  When in peace time you have an "agenda", and you try and poison open solutions by disallowing groups based on political belief (which is often poorly informed), then you're often just enshrining ignorant bigotry.
  Take the ICE case; this is a completely underfunded organisation, trying to do the best it can to juggle a lot of conflicting factors (people trying to game the system, people abusing the system, and genuine people that need to follow particular paths and have them filtered away from the ones trying to game the system), and look after the people as well as it can with the funds. Individuals in it may have unpleasant attributes, but what organisation doesn't? The majority are trying to do a job well.
  Denying them access because politics is only going to make matters worse for the end recipients, piss off people in the middle as it could muck about with them doing their job, and they'll see the reduction in care they're able to give, which sure as hell isn't going to endear the open source movement to them..
  The options in a movement that explicitly states "this is open, available to everyone" are to either put the work in, knowing that you may disagree with some end uses, but the majority case is that you're benefitting people in general, or you can withhold your work, and not be part of that movement.
  Good on ESR; I count this as a sane move. It's a shame the guy was the one thrown under the bus for what seemed to be a general consensus; if they were good at what they did, then a good old rollicking, learn from being stupid (and against the license you were working under), and getting on with the work would have been my preference. And all the senior staff that agreed with it should have been rollicked.
4. Re:Should Politics be Separated from Work? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-09-01 03:29 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  So let's take this to the extreme: If computing and Linux were around in WW2, should we have let Hitler use Linux?
  
  Do you _really_ think Hitler, and Nazi Germany are going to obey your little license agreement in that little readme during a war? Get serious here.
  
  What if Hitler's use of Linux was the deciding factor in NAZI Germany winning the war?
  
  Then I guess Linus gets the gas chamber? This is one of the stupidest questions I've heard in a long time. You might as well ask "If The Beatles has been around during WWII, should Hitler be allowed to copy their records to raise morale? What if "It's a Hard Days Night" was a deciding factor in rousing the troops, and thus winning the war?
  Anything can be used for purposes people don't like. Maybe we should start getting all cranked off when members of the KKK are "allowed" to eat our favorite breakfast cereal. "Cheerios bans the sale of Cheerios to members of the Nazi Party, the KKK, and Donald Trump".
  What a great world that would be where everyone starts drawing lines around what you can and can't use based on your politics.
5. Re:Should Politics be Separated from Work? by quantaman · 2018-09-01 03:46 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Eric Raymond had called the decision "destructive of one of the deep norms that keeps the open source community functional -- keeping politics separated from our work."
  Should politics be separated from our work? I'm not convinced it should be. The whole idea of open source / free software is political in nature as it is a means to keep power and control of a users computing with them and not in the hands of any outside entity such as a corporation or government.
  I think it's a good idea to keep them separated. The problem with your movement or organization taking a political stance is partisans start fighting back. Just look what's happened to science, AGW has big political implications and the moment it was embraced by "one side" the other side basically became an anti-science political movement. If Open Source gets rebranded as a left wing political philosophy you're going to start seeing legislation targeted at stopping those Libera^H^H^H Open Source people from writing code that controls important infrastructure.
  The other big issue is that the Open Source community doesn't necessarily agree on politics outside of the idea of Open Source, and the Open Source community by it's nature tends to take political philosophy a bit more seriously than most. So branding community as a left-wing thing could really split the community. And you don't really want to get into discussions on whether to ban ICE while allowing the Chinese government.
  
  So let's take this to the extreme: If computing and Linux were around in WW2, should we have let Hitler use Linux? What if Hitler's use of Linux was the deciding factor in NAZI Germany winning the war?
  Ignoring the question of how you could stop him from using Linux...
  Yes. I'm willing to sacrifice many of my principles to fight NAZIs.
  
  --
  I stole this Sig
6. Re:Should Politics be Separated from Work? by lgw · 2018-09-01 04:03 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  he problem with your movement or organization taking a political stance is partisans start fighting back. Just look what's happened to science, AGW has big political implications and the moment it was embraced by "one side" the other side basically became an anti-science political movement.
  What he said. The right has been saying to the left for a decade or so now "you keep changing the rules, but you're not going to like the new rules". Politicizing everything seems fun until you start realizing the other side can do it to. And, right now in the US, if you're on the left, you might ponder: hmm, the right has all the political power and seems to be on the rise.
  Politicizing everything: think about how it will play out.
  
  --
  Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
7. Re:Should Politics be Separated from Work? by Solandri · 2018-09-01 04:24 · Score: 2
  
  The underlying fundamental premise behind open source is that since software has zero cost of duplication and distribution, its benefit to society is maximized by making it free to copy and distribute. Thus maximizing the number of people who can benefit from using it.
  
  If you then start stipulating reasons (other than self-preservation) for why you should be able to restrict people's ability to copy and distribute open source software, you're saying that software's benefit to society can be increased by restricting how it's copied and distributed. You're basically saying the closed source, for-profit software distribution model is superior to open source. At which point, why even bother working on an open source project?
Don't be a tool by Kohath · 2018-09-01 02:54 · Score: 4, Insightful

Letting yourself get emotionally manipulated by so-called news media is never wise. Their stories are just stories. They aren't about you. Don't be a tool -- don't let the news media control your life, or your actions, or whether you're happy or sad. They haven't earned it. They don't care about you. They won't be there for you when you need help. Your life means nothing to them.
1. Re:Don't be a tool by Kohath · 2018-09-01 04:23 · Score: 2
  
  Not sure I get your meaning here. Isn't caring about other people a pretty fundamental and important part of humanity? In fact people who really don't care about others are called psychopaths.
  Pretending to care and making political noise isn't caring. Actually, genuinely helping individual people is caring. You have caring confused with posing and pretending.
  
  Surely that's not what you meant, but I feel like caring about the activities of ICE is important and a good thing.
  You don't know about "the activities of ICE". You only know stories. You don't know which stories are true or false or 40% true/60% false. You don't know all the stories the news media decided not to tell you -- to hide them from you.
  
  Especially when your actions at the voting booth directly lead to those actions and their effect on other people's lives.
  Not really. How do they? Because we're pretending laws might somehow change? Because we're fantasizing that open borders might someday be a thing?
  In a non-fantasy, non-pretend world, voting isn't going to make sneaking across the border work out for people. Living a life without following the basic rules of a society is never going to have a high probability of a good outcome -- not in the US or anywhere else.
  Telling people otherwise is the opposite of caring.
2. Re:Don't be a tool by AmiMoJo · 2018-09-01 04:32 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Pretending to care and making political noise isn't caring. Actually, genuinely helping individual people is caring.
  Trying to effect political change will help more people than trying to help one or two individually. Also, claiming that any sentiment you don't like is posturing (or "virtue signalling" in newspeak) is not an argument, it's just an out of hand dismissal.
  
  You don't know which stories are true or false or 40% true/60% false.
  Claiming that the truth is unknowable because all media lies all the time is a standard post-truth tactic to avoid criticism and generate apathy by making misdeeds easier to ignore.
  
  Because we're pretending laws might somehow change?
  It didn't even take a change in the law for ICE to start separating children from their parents, and it didn't take a chance in the law to stop it either. You argue that trying for political change is ineffective, when clearly it was effective in that case.
  
  --
  const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
  SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
3. Re:Don't be a tool by Chas · 2018-09-01 05:43 · Score: 2
  
  Trying to effect political change iwll help more people
  Unless you happen to be wrong or misled.
  So if you wind up harming people en-masse, then what?
  
  Claiming that the truth is unknowable
  The truth isn't unknowable. You simply haven't done the research to discover the truth for yourself. You're relying on hearsay.
  
  It didn't even take a change in the law for ICE to start separating children from their parents, and it didn't take a chance in the law to stop it either. You argue that trying for political change is ineffective, when clearly it was effective in that case.
  They started well before Trump took office. Because what's ALSO happening down on the border is CHILD TRAFFICKING. People picking up kids at the border, claiming to be the parents, and using loopholes in the law to escape. A change, years back, made this harder. As attempts are now made to actually verify whether or not said children actually ARE the offspring of the adult in question. Also, it came about because of rules changes stating that children being brought across by adults could NOT be incarcerated with the adults.
  But keep focusing on images of babies being ripped from their mothers' arms...
  You have blinders on. You only see what you're allowed to see. So you think it the sum total of everything...
  
  --
  
  Chas - The one, the only.
  THANK GOD!!!
This is still about microsoft buying github by t0y · 2018-09-01 02:54 · Score: 3, Informative

The same guy made a huge drama when Microsoft bought GitHub:
https://twitter.com/jamiebuild...
https://github.com/Microsoft/w...
Boo-hoo by guruevi · 2018-09-01 02:55 · Score: 3, Insightful

You're contracting with ICE if you live in the US. They're part of the law enforcement arm of the government and the government is a representation of you (US citizens). Vote or stop paying taxes if you don't want to support ICE, better yet, move out of the US. Us immigrants spent a lot of time and effort to never run afoul of ICE, not sure why some people have such trouble with them.

--
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
1. Re:Boo-hoo by El+Cubano · 2018-09-01 03:50 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  No. As a US citizen, you're being ROBBED of your tax money...
  I'll stop you right there. You are more right than you know. Taxation is not robbery only if you disagree with the use of the funds. If you think about the nature of taxation, it is really a confiscation of money from a person (remember that corporations are persons too). It is a confiscation because it is not is not an equitable and mutually agreed upon exchange. Therefore, it is always robbery. Also, the one on whom the tax is levied does not have the ability to not pay (in practice people evade taxes, but the government enforces compliance with harsh penalties) and market forces have on bearing on taxes (really taxes are themselves an influencer of the market).
  All that said, taxes are necessary. The governed populace collectively identifies those matters which the government must discharge, manage, execute, etc., and via their representatives they levy taxes on themselves to see to it that those functions are accomplished.
  This is what underlies the principal grievance of the American colonists prior to the American Revolution: taxation without representation. If taxation were not by its nature confiscatory, there would have been no grievance.
  So, where we are left is to strike a careful balance of the things that the government should do and the things it should not do, then levy taxes appropriate to accomplishing the things it should do. This exercise must be accomplished at each level of government. It is painful, arduous, tedious, and never-ending. If you look at the last 100 years of history in the US, various crises have enabled the government to tip the balance toward expanding what government does at every level and especially at the federal level.
  Of course, people are going to come out and say how every civilized nation provides healthcare, education, and jobs for their people. I suppose that is fine when you talk about a nation that has the population of Florida and you do not have a founding document that enumerates the power of the national government and then specifically prohibits it all other powers. To say nothing of the economic complexity of implementing those things on the scale of a nation and economy the size of the US.
  Politics in the US is so polarized right now because lots of people want to rebalance the "things government should do" and "things government shouldn't do" while those who benefit from the expansion of government are not particularly excite about ceding their benefits. Add to that the fact that while many Republicans want to paint the party as being about small government, the reality is that they want as much government as the Democrats, but they want to get there by growing different parts of it.
Re:Slippery one-upmanship by plopez · 2018-09-01 02:59 · Score: 2

What's wrong with restricting how you want your work to be used? It is yours after all.

--
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Re:SJW Cancer by sabt-pestnu · 2018-09-01 03:00 · Score: 4, Insightful

Kyle's modification of Lerna's license was originally assented to by other lead developers on the project, but the decision polarized the open-source community.

This wasn't a cancer. This was Kyle being thrown under the bus when the other lead devs saw the inevitable shitstorm get kicked up. It does not endear me to the other lead developers.
Re:Slippery one-upmanship by Anonymous Coward · 2018-09-01 03:12 · Score: 4, Insightful

Feel free, but then it's no longer FOSS and is effectively removed from the open source community.
Re:Slippery one-upmanship by malkavian · 2018-09-01 03:25 · Score: 3, Insightful

If you're working under the express license that you can't restrict how you want your work to be done, as part of a much larger project, then your choices are either do the work, knowing you'll benefit the groups that you want to help, with edge cases that ones will exist that you don't, or just leave the project. That simple.
If the entire group feel that strongly, they can stop using the license, and build a new product that they can happily play politics with.
Eric's memory is imperfect by Bruce+Perens · 2018-09-01 04:12 · Score: 3, Informative

Eric was not one of the original authors of the Open Source Definition. His memory is imperfect, I doubt deliberately, we're just old. The OSD was created about 9 months before the founding of OSI as the Debian Free Software Guidelines. Eric wasn't a Debian developer. The only change upon forming OSI was the name of the document. Later on, OSD #10 was added (which IMO was not necessary as it's implied by OSD#6).
Also, Eric's call for shunning is a bit over the top. Just get with the values of Open Source and move on, or be very careful to call your non-Open-Source paradigm something other than Open Source.
Nor does it seem necessary to have expelled a developer, if he wished to remain with the project after the removal of an ill-thought-out license term. We can preserve the ethos without being draconian.

--
Bruce Perens.
1. Re:Eric's memory is imperfect by Bruce+Perens · 2018-09-01 05:13 · Score: 2
  
  Well, if you really want to convince people not to do it, tar and feather him and place him in stocks in the town square, where anyone who dislikes him or just wants some kicks can come along and do whatever they like to him (that's how it worked) unless one of his friends stands there constantly to defend him.
  Yeah, over the top.
  
  --
  Bruce Perens.
Futile gesture by DRJlaw · 2018-09-01 04:34 · Score: 4, Interesting

The modified version specifically banned 16 organizations, including Microsoft, Palantir, Amazon, Northeastern University, Johns Hopkins University, Dell, Xerox, LinkedIn, and UPS... Although open-source developer Jamie Kyle acknowledged that it's "part of the deal" that anyone "can use open source for evil," he told me he couldn't stand to see the software he helped develop get used by companies contracting with ICE.
And U.S. law, 28 USC 1498, specifically allows contractors for the Federal Government to use intellectual property for government projects whether they are licensed or not. Link discusses 28 USC 1498(a) (patent infringement), but 28 USC 1498(b) covers copyright infringement.
Oh sure, you can file an action in the Federal Court of Claims for "recovery of [your] reasonable and entire compensation as damages for such infringement," but since the licensing cost for the rest of the world is zero... you do the math.
Why was he removed? by aardvarkjoe · 2018-09-01 04:43 · Score: 3, Interesting

The aspect of the story that doesn't make sense to me is the revocation of the developer's access. If he had gone and made the license change without consulting anyone, that would make sense, but by all accounts the other lead developers agreed to the change. In that case they should all share responsibility for making the change.
Is there something else going on with this guy?

--

How can we continue to believe in a just universe and freedom to eat crackers if we have no ale?
Re:Slippery one-upmanship by jwhyche · 2018-09-01 04:43 · Score: 3

I totally agree with you. Bush Omega and Obama never should has enabled that policy to start with. How about this? When we arrest them we just toss their children into prison with them? But wait! Families need to be kept together so lets just toss granny in there with them. Just like they do in NK or old style USSR? How about that?

--
I read at +2. If your post doesn't reach that level I will not see or respond to it.
Politics are in everything in life by jbn-o · 2018-09-01 05:00 · Score: 4, Insightful

I consider that an attempt to bamboozle people into believing that politics is something to be avoided or an attempt to fool people into believing that one can "keep politics separated from [one's] work". Such a thing is not possible as people hold different views on all sorts of things and work together for different reasons.
Right in line with this is an assertion I've only ever read from advocates of the open source development methodology that some licenses (such as the MIT X11, the 3-clause BSD, and the Apache v2.0 licenses) are "apolitical" whereas the GNU GPLs (v2, v3, and the AGPLs) are "political". And this is typically said in a context which tries to demean use or defense of the relevant GPL. It's no accident that the former set are lax permissive, non-copyleft, or (as free software activist Richard Stallman aptly puts it) "pushover" licenses which all allow proprietary derivatives and these GNU GPLs do not allow proprietary derivatives. It's also no accident that large proprietary firms are fans of the open source development methodology. They stand to benefit when people develop powerful useful software and license it to allow for proprietary derivatives.
A better and more useful observation is that politics are an inescapable part of life, it's better to understand what's really going on and why (typically uncovered by asking 'who benefits?'), and that different political views are not the same as an absence of politics.

--
Digital Citizen
Re:"I just send the rockets up" by bobbutts · 2018-09-01 05:08 · Score: 4, Informative

It's because you're buying into the strawman argument about the D's wanting to have totally open borders. That's not anywhere near the policy Obama had, and not the policy Democrats in office or their voters want. What should be common sense is to treat immigrants and refugees humanely regardless of whether or not they are ultimately allowed entry.
Re:SJW Cancer by Chas · 2018-09-01 05:11 · Score: 3, Informative

No. It's cancer.
Kyle wasn't thrown under a bus.
He tried to make a major change to the licensing of software that wasn't entirely his own.
He was smacked for it. End of story.
Kyle's still free to fork "My Shitty, Politically Vindictive Learna Offshoot".
He's simply not being allowed to do it for the primary project.

--

Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Re:"I just send the rockets up" by Anonymous Coward · 2018-09-01 05:24 · Score: 2, Insightful

The Deporter in Chief's (Obama) policy resulted in kids being handed back to human traffickers to be sold as slave labor.
Maybe it's time for Congress to actually fix the fucking problem instead of calling ICE nazis?
Re:Slippery one-upmanship by Chas · 2018-09-01 06:00 · Score: 2

If their children are to be detained also, like the immigrant children are, then why shouldn't they be detained together?
Because the law was changed, years ago, so that children couldn't be incarcerated in adult facilities.

However, I note this didn't happen under Bush or Obama.
You are mistaken.

I'll also note that when citizens are detained awaiting trial, their children aren't just shipped some place without sufficient documentation to reunite them.
Those are citizens. Different rules apply to citizens.

--

Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Re:"I just send the rockets up" by Raenex · 2018-09-01 06:07 · Score: 2

It's because you're buying into the strawman argument about the D's wanting to have totally open borders.
The Democrats have become the party of illegal immigration and transgender bathroom "rights".
They support the "sanctuary" city/states. They cry when Trump calls MS13 animals. They act hysterical when Trump has the same policy as Obama. They are the ones against a wall, deportations, and an end to chain migration. They are the ones who are happy their white grandchildren children want to be brown.
Re:Let Me Get This Straight by Chas · 2018-09-01 06:12 · Score: 2

Because we're hallucinating when we hear protesters chanting "Ban ICE!" and "No ban. No wall. No borders at all."
Right?
We're imagining that Democratic leaders insist on mangling the language to the point where they can't even say the legal term "Illegal aliens". And they're more concerned about the illegal aliens than the people they murder...
Right?
As to your BS assertion about cracking down on people employing illegal immigrants.
What do you THINK was going on?
The manpower of ICE is limited.

--

Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Communism is a Grift by Jodka · 2018-09-01 07:42 · Score: 2

Bruce Perens wrote:

Communism isn't inherently evil, it's just that it has often come with totalitarianism.
Communism is a lie told by tyrants to grow and sustain political support for themselves.
Because falsehoods told to advance malevolent ends are categorically evil, Communism is inherently evil.
So Bruce, would you say it is an accurate characterization of your own beliefs that the lies and propaganda use by tyrants to gain power are not themselves evil? That it is exclusively the exercise of power for harmful ends which is evil? If so, what is your basis for that distinction? Additionally, would you make the same distinction for any other grift, such as an advance-fee scam; Are the deliberate falsehoods told to the mark not evil, but only the subsequent monetary transactions evil?
"It's not that advance-fee deals with Nigerians don't work, its just that they have never really been tried," says the mark.

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Ceci n'est pas une signature.
Re: "I just send the rockets up" by Anonymous Coward · 2018-09-01 23:07 · Score: 2, Informative

There is no human right to go to the United States. That is a privilege we may chose to offer or not. This has nothing to do with morality.
If the US was directly responsible for the horrible conditions others find themselves in then you might have an argument on morality grounds. But otherwise, no non-US citizens have a right to come to the United States or any other nation for that matter.
CAPTCHA: patriot (not kidding)