Listening.

Could not get to sleep last night.

Know why?

Trump.

Mother-fucker's really in my head, man. Almost decided to buck it and get up at 3 am to write this.

Trump has taken more heat than usual for his proposal to put a moratorium on all Muslim immigration to the U.S. "until our leaders can figure out what is going on." What prompted that proposal was a poll, which I was not able to find, showing that some quantum of Muslims worldwide really don't like the United States. Everybody went batshit on Trump. The Brits have a petition to ban him from the country.

Official Washington's narrative is, and has been, "Islam is Peace." Guns kill people, Muslims don't kill people. Don't make the natives restless. Appease Muslims. All religions are the same.
.

Well, fuck that.

No one outside of Official Washington buys the official narrative anymore but outside of that Mrs. Lincoln, how was the theater? The official narrative is being imposed with a heavy hand now that an official candidate is calling it shit. The British petition is based on the position that Trump's proposal constitutes hate speech. The U.S. Attorney General says she is considering making some extreme Islam criticism, and Islam-baiting, prosecutable.

I am counting on you all to bail me out.

I am a big believer in Islam-baiting, have been for thirteen years. Have done my level best to incite Islam every chance I get. Because for hundreds of years Islam has warred on Christendom in the only effective manner it can, the sneak attack. Islam lost the Crusades, they could not then defeat Christianity mano-a-mano, army-to-army, so they have long practiced guerrilla warfare. Because when you bait an enemy you turn a surprise attack into an ambush. See Garland, Texas.

But I've explained all that a zillion times before. No one pays attention to me. And when they do they want to jail me. Back to this Trump proposal. I am surprised that Trump was surprised by that poll but not having seen it maybe there is something new. I did see another poll, or polls, I forget, that had the level of dislike for America in Egypt at 80%. Turkey, our beloved NATO ally, also had very high levels of anti-American sentiment.

I don't know how I feel about Trump's proposal. That's what kept me awake last night.

On the one hand, I don't like the blanket nature of Trump's proposal.

On the other hand, why the fuck not?! I like blankets. I have used Islam as a singular. Only in Official Washington, and only when they want there to be, is Islam a billion points of Peace rather than a singularity. See, all Muslims have the religion of Islam in common, see? 

On the first hand, clearly, clearly, not all those light bulbs burn with the same intensity. There was
more dissimilarity among Muslim nations in the poll(s) I read than I had envisioned. 

And so then I thought, okay, if, IF, it is a good idea to ban some but not all Muslim immigration mightn't we start with those precincts where the Islamic bulb of Peace is particularly dim? Obama has already said that he wants to end the fast-track mail-order-bride loophole that got Tasheen here from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. I take it as a given, but maybe I shouldn't, that if a card-carrying member of ISIS presented his membership card as id at an airport in Syria or Iraq and tried to board a Washington non-stop flight, he would be...delayed perhaps. 

There are two parts to that. One, card-carrying member of ISIS; two, port of exit. I would expect any card-carrier to be on a no-fly list. I would also expect there to be a more blanket policy of exclusion from Damascus or Baghdad at this particular juncture in the rent fabric of space time but I could be wrong! But I don't think so. I think travel to the U.S. from certain of these dim bulb areas is looked at with particular focus.

That started me thinking of near-parallels and I thought of the Ebola scare about a year ago. Going to certain precincts in West Africa back then was like checking into the Hotel California, you could never leave. Humans are biological organisms, no? Ebola is a biological organism, no? Islam is a creation of a sentient, albeit paranoid schizophrenic grandiose type, biological organism, no? Didn't, in fact Jeb! propose we admit only Christians from Syria? Yes, he did. But nobody pays attention to him either.

On the other hand! Obama hisself wants 10,000-15,000 refugees from Syria to be granted entree. He excoriates opponents for denying refuge to "widows and orphans." "They're fleeing the violence!," he says. 

How do we know? Isn't Obama draping a, far smaller to be sure, comforting blanket over 10,000-15,000? How does he know that one of those widows isn't going to be Tasheen? How does he know that one of those "widows" isn't going to be, not a widow at all, but Tasheen in disguise? Didn't Tasheen and her death-do-them-part abandon-orphan-their child to its grandmother before attending
the festive Holiday Party? Yes, they did. 

ISIS is a growing business, have you noticed? It has absolutely capitalist expansion ambitions. It has already opened some franchises in Europe and in most of the fifty of the United States. ISIS has sent its representatives abroad scoping out new markets. I would think much less of ISIS than I do if they have not already thought: "Hey, Tasheen, you're a widow. Go to the infidel Americans and tell them you're tired, you're poor, you yearn to breathe free. Don't forget your AK-47." 

And that started me thinking, last night, about 3 am, of near parallels and I thought, and I almost started out of bed when I thought of it:

Man, do I remember that. 

The Mariel boatlift. That mass exodus from a garrisoned precinct began when some truly tired and poor sought to breathe free in the Peruvian embassy in Havana, Cuba. Fidel was mortified.

But then Fidel got an idea. "Open up the jails! You wretched refuse wanna breathe free, too, dontcha! Step right out and step right up and introduce yourselves to President Jimmy Carter. He'll help ya!"

And he did. President Carter really, really, really, reallyreally, helped. Gave the wretches a new start
on a life of crime across the Straits of Florida. It took Miami about ten years to sort out all the Tasheens in that flotsam and jetsam. 

ISIS is fully capable of pulling a Fidel.

On the other hand, Obama is now friends with Raul, no? Si.

That's when I finally fell asleep. I haven't decided if, or how much of, Trump's proposal I support.

We have never had a national discussion on Islam. Bush43 ended it with his "Islam is Peace" speech. I have bitched about the lack of a national discussion for thirteen years, but...see above. Donald Trump triggered a brief national dialogue on Islam the other day, I don't think Trump had any idea he had touched so live a wire. So Trump started it, see? It's his fault. He also cost me a night's sleep.