Connect with us

Jim DeMint’s World View Slammed By Top Conservatives After ‘Shoddy’ Immigration Study

Published

on

Jim DeMint‘s world view has been slammed by conservative leaders in his first important event on the national stage after taking the helm of the Heritage Foundation. DeMint is the former U.S. Senator from South Carolina who spent his political career attacking gay people, single mothers, minorities, and immigrants as “less than,” and as somehow not fit for America.

“The conservative Heritage Foundation is launching a new campaign to sink immigration reform by claiming it will explode the deficit thanks to increased social services for undocumented immigrants,” Talking Points Memo reported today:

On Monday, the think tank debuted a new study by Robert Rector and Jason Richwine claiming the bill would cost $6.3 trillion over the lifetime of the 11 million undocumented immigrants who could potentially gain legal status through bipartisan legislation under consideration in the Senate.

“We contend … that amnesty is unfair to those who come here lawfully and those who are waiting, it will cost the American taxpayer trillions of dollars over the next several decades, and it will make our immigration problems worse,” Heritage president Jim DeMint said at a press conference debuting the study.

 

Now, in his new home at Heritage, his peers, “top fiscal conservatives from Americans for Tax Reform, the Cato Institute, the Kemp Foundation and the American Action Network,” and “even the author of Heritage’s 2006 study,” are taking DeMint’s Heritage Foundation “to the woodshed for its immigration report that sees trillions in cost and no benefits from immigration reform,” according to none other than the radical right wing Tea Party blogger, the Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin.

Rubin herself, whose general view of almost anything Democratic or progressive or liberal is it is from hell, whose columns tend to constantly reflect her hatred of President Barack Obama, slammed DeMint’s immigration report.

“These are longtime allies of Heritage and promoters of free market capitalism who are witnessing the intellectual bastardization of a once great institution to adopt a cause that is inherently unconservative, namely opposition to immigration,” Rubin writes:

Josh Cullings of ATR [Americans for Tax Reform] said that while Heritage was a “treasured ally,” its work was a rehash of a flawed 2007 study that ignored all the benefits of immigration reform. Cato’s Alex Nowrasteh was even more outspoken saying “how disappointed” he was that Heritage abandoned conservative dynamic scoring (i.e. the impact a piece of legislation’s impact on the economy). He accused Heritage of not following years of their own work, which has striven to look at the impact on behavior of changes resulting from reforming the tax code and other innovations. “They ignored GDP, they ignored productivity,” he said in reeling off the list of items in the Gang of 8 legislation left out of Heritage. Cato’s study, which did use dynamic scoring, found that immigration reform would add $1.5 trillion in growth over ten years while forcing out 11 million immigrants (the Heritage solution) would lower GDP by $2.6 trillion over ten years.

The prize for candor, though, went to American Action Forum’s Douglas Holtz-Eakin, who stated flatly, “It really misleads.” Without dynamic scoring, H1-B visas, a guest worker program, and the other economic pluses from immigration reform and with a load of ludicrous assumptions (e.g. everyone would qualify for government benefits and take them) Heritage, he said, “gets a really big number.” He continued in describing the Heritage view of immigrants, “There is no American dream. They start in poverty. They end in poverty. Their kids are in poverty.”

Most compelling was Jimmy Kemp, son of the late congressman Jack Kemp, who (in a gravelly voice that sounded a little like his dad’s) was damning. “My dad was a significant supporter of immigration reform.” Objecting strenuously to the idea that immigration reform weakens the economy by adding workers, he exclaimed, “People are not a drain on society.” Saying it was “surprising they took a static approach,” he said bluntly, “You can’t lead from a place of fear.”

While I applaud these conservative leaders, including Rubin, I feel compelled to ask, where were you all when then-Senator DeMint in 2011 refused to attend CPAC because GOProud was there? Where were they when, in 2009, when Jim DeMint said a gay president would be “immoral“? Where were they when Senator DeMint objected to the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act? And where were they when DeMint talked about banning LGBT people and unwed pregnant mothers from teaching in schools?

Jim DeMint was at the center of the “intellectual bastardization” of the Republican party, giving support to the rise of the Tea Party, but no one seemed to mind then.

Better late than never.

Perhaps DeMint’s last gasp shows that the anti-gay, anti-women, anti-immigrant 61-year old Tea Partier from South Carolina will do anything to stop immigration reform:

 

 

Related:

Don’t Let The Door Hit You… DeMint’s Resignation Celebrated By All Sides

Anti-Gay Sen. Jim DeMint Resigns For Million-Dollar Salary As Head Of Heritage Think Tank

DeMint To Obama: Stop Promoting Human Rights Protections For LGBT Communities Outside The United States

On Our Radar: Senator Jim DeMint’s Anti-Gay Palmetto Freedom Forum

 

Related Topics:
Continue Reading
Click to comment
 
 

Enjoy this piece?

… then let us make a small request. The New Civil Rights Movement depends on readers like you to meet our ongoing expenses and continue producing quality progressive journalism. Three Silicon Valley giants consume 70 percent of all online advertising dollars, so we need your help to continue doing what we do.

NCRM is independent. You won’t find mainstream media bias here. From unflinching coverage of religious extremism, to spotlighting efforts to roll back our rights, NCRM continues to speak truth to power. America needs independent voices like NCRM to be sure no one is forgotten.

Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Help ensure NCRM remains independent long into the future. Support progressive journalism with a one-time contribution to NCRM, or click here to become a subscriber. Thank you. Click here to donate by check.

News

‘Petulant Toddler’ Trump Smacked Down by British Journalist at Chicago Economic Club

Published

1 hour ago

on

October 15, 2024

By

Donald Trump sat down for a live interview with the editor-in-chief of Bloomberg News Tuesday afternoon at the Economic Club of Chicago, and quickly grew defensive when questioned about his economic policies as the journalist explained to him how they will harm the American economy.

At one point Trump sat back in his chair and folded his arms in a defensive posture before telling his host,”You’ve been wrong, you’ve been wrong all your life.”

John Micklethwait has served as Bloomberg’s editor-in-chief since 2015 and previously in the same role at The Economist, starting in 2006.

“President Trump,” Micklethwait said, “the markets are looking at the facts. You are making all these promises—latest one was car loans—you’re flooding the thing with giveaways.”

READ MORE: ‘He’s Not Ok’: Questions of Trump’s ‘Cognitive Decline’ Explode Amid ‘Bizarre Behavior’

“I was actually quite kind to you,” Micklethwait continued as Trump tried to interrupt. “I used seven trillion, the upper estimate is 15 trillion,” he said of the debt Trump’s policies could create. “People like The Wall Street Journal, who is hardly a communist organization, have criticized you on this as well.”

Trump interjected, “Yeah, but you don’t know.”

“You are running up enormous debt,” Micklethwait told him.

“What is The Wall Street Journal know? I’m meeting with them tomorrow,” Trump said.

“What does The Wall Street Journal know, they’ve been wrong about everything,” the ex-president, in defensive mode, continued. “So have you, by the way. You are wrong, by the way.”

“You’re trying to turn this, you’re trying to turn this —” Micklethwait interjected before Trump again attacked by saying, “You’ve been wrong.”

“You’re trying to turn you’re trying to turn this into a debate,” the journalist countered. “There are business people —” he added, pointing to the audience.

READ MORE: Trump Abruptly Cancels Another Interview, This Time With a Trump-Friendly CNBC Host

“But you’ve been wrong,” Trump argued. “You’ve been wrong, you’ve been wrong all your life on this stuff.”

Mother Jones’ David Corn responded to the video (below), writing: “This is a man incapable of listening to others. His aides have said that for years. He cannot absorb information that challenges anything in his big brain. It’s hyper-narcissism. And the business class ought to worry about this and not just drool over tax cuts.”

Former Lincoln Project executive director Fred Wellman, also responding to the video, said, “Look how he crosses his arms like a petulant toddler.”

Watch below or at this link.

READ MORE: Trump Campaign Furious Walz Using Trump’s Own ‘Reckless, Dangerous Rhetoric’ Against Him

Continue Reading

OPINION

‘He’s Not Ok’: Questions of Trump’s ‘Cognitive Decline’ Explode Amid ‘Bizarre Behavior’

Published

2 hours ago

on

October 15, 2024

By

Nobel Prize-winning economist, professor, and popular New York Times opinion writer Paul Krugman on Monday published, “Trump Has Become Unmoored in Time.” In it he closes by asking, “what would Trump say about an opponent who, like him, seems stuck in the past, who routinely describes America in ways that suggest that he doesn’t know what year it is?”

On Tuesday Krugman posted a link to his piece on the social media platform X, and wrote: “This was filed before Trump’s bizarre behavior at his latest rallies. Maybe I was too polite in describing one aspect of his cognitive decline.”

Krugman is not alone in calling out what some are calling Donald Trump’s apparent cognitive decline, which seems to have become increasingly obvious over the past few days, and especially since Monday evening.

At a town hall in the suburbs of Philadelphia last night, two medical issues among audience members led the Republican presidential nominee to decide he would no longer take questions (he had taken just a handful) and declare the Q&A over. Instead, Trump said, he would like to play some music. The “impromptu D.J. session,” as The New York Times generously called it, and a “bizarre musical event,” according to NPR, went on for 30 to 40 minutes.

“Let’s not do any more questions. Let’s just listen to music,” Trump told supporters at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center. “Let’s make it into a music ——. Who the hell wants to hear questions, right?”

RELATED: Trump Abruptly Cancels Another Interview, This Time With a Trump-Friendly CNBC Host

South Dakota Republican Governor Kristi Noem, who was acting as the town hall’s host, asked Trump, “Well sir, do you want to play your song and then greet a few people?” After the ex-president, apparently not understanding, questioned her, she explained, “Well, you had said you wanted to close with a specific song.”

The GOP presidential nominee spent the rest of the evening on stage listening to music and occasionally dancing (photo.)

Trump on social media described the evening: “I had a Town Hall in Pennsylvania last night. It was amazing! The Q and A was almost finished when people began fainting from the excitement and heat. We started playing music while we waited, and just kept it going. So different, but it ended up being a GREAT EVENING!”

He also called those who suffered medical emergencies “patriots,” as ABC News reported, which he has done before under similar circumstances.

“‘Would anybody else like to faint?’ Trump said as the second person made their way out of the Expo Center.”

Former Trump White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci remarked, “The October surprise is that Trump has completely lost his marbles.”

Even a Fox News reporter found the event “very strange.”

“That thing Trump did last night is not explainable and it is not small,” an apparently concerned U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI) wrote. “It shows that he’s increasingly detached from reality. Everyone knows if Biden or Harris did that it would be media mayhem. He’s not ok, and you can’t ignore it anymore.”

READ MORE: Trump Campaign Furious Walz Using Trump’s Own ‘Reckless, Dangerous Rhetoric’ Against Him

Filmmaker and podcaster Andy Ostroy called it, “the craziest shit I’ve ever seen in politics.”

While only a qualified medical professional can make diagnoses, more than a few commenters on social media suggested Trump was “sundowning,” a term the Mayo Clinic describes as “a group of symptoms that occurs at a specific time of the day. These symptoms may affect people with Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementia.”

Professor of Politics Jack Pitney, who left the Republican Party when Trump was elected in 2016, is the author of several books including, “Un-American: the Fake Patriotism of Donald J. Trump.”

He writes: “Kristi Noem’s face during Trump’s sundowning episode gives a whole new meaning to Raymond Chandler’s phrase: “that plastic smile people wear when they are trying not to scream.”

Political scientist and professor David Darmofal adds, “I know the symptoms of dementia extremely well from being a caregiver for 7 years. 78-year-old Trump’s father had Alzheimer’s & now he’s showing undeniable symptoms of cognitive decline. I’m begging our national media to address this issue.”

“Donald Trump’s dementia is NOT a political issue,” declared SiriusXM host Dean Obeidallah, “it’s a national security issue. Trump could be easily controlled/manipulated by top aides and foreign leaders to do what they want. This DEMANDS coverage from the corporate media!”

“There is something profoundly broken in our national press corps. Trump clearly had some kind of a mental break last night – those of us who have family members with dementia recognize it. He didn’t know where he was. And they’re pretending it was nothing,” Democratic strategist Laura Chapin said.

Trump’s night did not end with his town hall music event.

In the early morning hours of Tuesday, the ex-president, who remains a convicted felon awaiting sentencing on November 26, lashed out at his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris—while defending his mental health and attacking her recently-released and very-detailed physician’s report.

“Harris ‘remains in excellent health,’ her physician, Dr. Joshua Simmons, said in a letter on Saturday,” ABC News reported. The report also stated: “She possesses the physical and mental resilience required to successfully execute the duties of the presidency, to include those as Chief Executive, Head of State and Commander in Chief.”

“The doctor pointed to seasonal allergies and hives (urticaria) as a ‘notable’ part of her health history,” ABC added. “He also listed a number of over-the-counter medications used to improve her symptoms, which he said have never been ‘severe.'”

Trump, on his Truth Social platform, proceeded to falsely characterize the details of Harris’s medical report.

“As to her completely desperate request for my Medical Statements, she is dying to see my Cholesterol (which is 180!), I have already provided them, many times, including quite recently, and they were flawless,” Trump claimed. He has never released a thoroughly-detailed medical report.

“However, I have just seen Kamala’s Report, and it is not good. According to her Doctor’s Report, she suffers from ‘urticaria,’ defined as ‘a rash of round, red welts on the skin that itch intensely, sometimes with dangerous swelling.’ She also has ‘allergic rhinitis and allergic conjunctivitis,’ a very messy and dangerous situation. These are deeply serious conditions that clearly impact her functioning. Maybe that is why she can’t answer even the simplest of questions asked by 60 Minutes, and others. What is this all about? I don’t have these problems…”

“…I’ve put out more Medical Exams than any other President in History, and aced two Cognitive Exams (the Doctor stated that my ‘cognitive exams were exceptional!’),” Trump continued. “I am far healthier than Clinton, Bush, Obama, Biden, but especially, Kamala. Also, I am far too busy campaigning to take time, from the 22 days left, as I am using every hour, of every day, campaigning, because we have to take back our Country from the Radical Left people that are destroying it. MAGA2024!”

Right now, “dementia” is trending on the social media platform X, formerly Twitter.

Watch the videos and social media posts above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Is He OK?’: Trump’s Dark of Night Rage Posting Backfires

 

 

 

Continue Reading

News

Trump Abruptly Cancels Another Interview, This Time With a Trump-Friendly CNBC Host

Published

4 hours ago

on

October 15, 2024

By

Donald Trump has just canceled a scheduled interview with CNBC’s Joe Kernen, who has been described as “pro-Trump.”

The cancellation comes as many are watching video and reading reports about Trump’s Monday night town hall in Pennsylvania, during which the Republican presidential nominee, three weeks before Election Day, took just a handful of questions. Then, after two audience medical issues, he turned the night into a music event as he stood and swayed on stage listening to his favorite hits.

Trump “abruptly canceled an interview on his economic plans with business channel CNBC, one of its anchors announced Tuesday,” The Daily Beast reports. “Joe Kernen, the conservative-leaning host of its flagship show Squawk Box, revealed the move during an interview with Charles Phillips, the Oracle chairman who is supporting Vice President Kamala Harris, saying ‘Trump canceled.’ The interview had not previously been announced by either side. Sources told the Daily Beast that the network had invited Trump to an in-studio sit-down on Squawk Box to take place later this week and that his campaign had initially accepted.”

The move comes after Trump pulled out of an agreed-upon “60 Minutes” interview, and one day before Vice President Kamala Harris, his Democratic presidential opponent, will sit down for an interview with Fox News.

READ MORE: Trump Campaign Furious Walz Using Trump’s Own ‘Reckless, Dangerous Rhetoric’ Against Him

“The cancelation continues Trump’s policy of avoiding mainstream television interviews,” The Daily Beast adds. “Instead he has been interviewed repeatedly by friendly Fox News hosts including Maria Bartiromo, and appeared with podcasters including comedian Andrew Schultz. His public schedule said he would be interviewed Tuesday by Bloomberg before an address to the Economic Club of Chicago.”

The Bulwark reports since Trump’s only debate with Vice President Kamala Harris, he isn’t giving interviews to the mainstream media.

“In recent weeks, Trump has almost exclusively decamped to outlets that are already in his tank. Since the September 10 presidential debate, with the exceptions of a Las Vegas ABC affiliate and a quick NewsNation hit, nearly all of Trump’s 14 one-one interviews have been with interviewers ranging from friendly to sycophantic:

“Fox News hosts Maria Bartiromo, Laura Ingraham, Brian Kilmeade, Sean Hannity, and Greg Gutfield.
Chris Salcedo, Carl Higbie, and Rob Schmitt of NewsMax.
Sinclair’s Sharyl Attkisson.
Conservative radio host Dave Ramsey.
Wayne Allyn Root of Real America’s Voice.
Andrew Schultz and Akaash Singh of the comedy podcast Flagrant.
Over the same period, he’s totally eschewed tentpole mainstream outlets—making a point of skipping, for instance, the traditional interview with CBS’s 60 Minutes.”

READ MORE: ‘Is He OK?’: Trump’s Dark of Night Rage Posting Backfires

“Trump still talks with the press and takes questions at events, including (likely) today when Bloomberg News is hosting his speech at the Chicago Economic Club. But when it comes to one-on-one interviews, he’s never been more cloistered within his MAGA media bubble.”

Overnight, Trump lashed out at Harris in a series of social media posts, defending his mental health.

“I’ve put out more Medical Exams than any other President in History, and aced two Cognitive Exams (the Doctor stated that my “cognitive exams were exceptional!”). I am far healthier than Clinton, Bush, Obama, Biden, but especially, Kamala,” Trump alleged. “Also, I am far too busy campaigning to take time, from the 22 days left, as I am using every hour, of every day, campaigning, because we have to take back our Country from the Radical Left people that are destroying it.”

RELATED: Buttigieg’s GOP Roast Ruffles CNBC Host

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2020 AlterNet Media.