[omegaworks]

It's amazing the mental acrobatics that people go through to try to find an after-the-fact justification for targeted racist policy.

The administration is run by white supremacists. They overtly and covertly signal their support for neo-nazis, and have campaigned on their overt bias against hispanic immigrants.

Where is Occam's Razor in this case? Why is this simple explanation invalidated by a more complex one?

[lamarpye]

Why was this particular policy started under Obama? Interested to hear your mental acrobatics.

Let me apply Occam's Razor, a lot of government employees are lazy, so going to the Motel 6 makes sense. Get the names, run some queries, arrest some people, hit my target number, the boss is happy. We have been doing this since 2015, why fix it, if it isn't broken.

[omegaworks]

Why do you assume Obama was or could have been any better?

The same people held power in 2015: Graham, McConnell, Sessions. The same media institutions toed the line. McCain got the whole nationalist jingoism ball rolling with Sarah Palin on his ticket.

[lamarpye]

Because Obama is in charge of the Executive Branch, the President sets policy and Obama was President for 8 years.

I also don't have this cognitive dissonance where I blame the current occupant of an office for the policy his predecessor started.

[omegaworks]

I hold to account whoever has power now. I don't play the "whataboutism" game, because it is unwinnable. There was always someone in the past that has done worse.

What matters is progress.

[lamarpye]

No, you are not. You are blaming Trump for a policy that was started when Obama was President. This isn't a "whataboutism" situation. When called on it, you tried to blame Republican Senators, even though they were in the minority when this policy was started.

[omegaworks]

I'm blaming Trump for continuing and amplifying the policy's negative effects. Hundreds of families have been separated by border enforcement without any records[1]. Children are being taken from their mothers and fathers and forcibly adopted via agencies run by white evangelical churches[2]. You're trying to deflect from the actual, unprecedented harm being caused now to people on the border by pointing at history.

Even the fact underlying your basic premise is wrong: Republicans had the majority in both houses of congress in January 3, 2015[3], gaining the Senate after having held the House since January 3, 2011. They continued to hold both in majority until the past midterm elections seated a Democratic house majority this January.

1. https://www.vox.com/2019/2/21/18234767/parents-separated-chi...

2. https://newrepublic.com/article/149161/uncertain-fate-migran...

3. https://ballotpedia.org/114th_United_States_Congress