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I mean, anyone who is still defending this administration isn't even trying to have a conversation in good faith.

I have a Republican friend who appreciates the Supreme Court Justices, and then suddenly has zero clue about any news story involving the administration, and shrugs off the war. This despite meticulously following Benghazi hearings when it was someone he wanted to dislike. He would rather Trump be Romney, but he's not going to do anything about it whatsoever.

I blame myself for teasing my Italian friend in college over Silvio Berlusconi, and now I've found myself in the same position :(

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> defending this administration

"Leave to renew" has been policy for decades.

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> isn't even trying to have a conversation in good faith.

What about the sweeping halt of all legal immigrant visa processing?

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Right, the point isn't that "Leave to renew" is some kind of horrible policy. Such bad-fucking-faith on display everywhere.

The point is maybe signal to people that we will soon be pausing all visa renewals so people who trivially have good jobs and good records know they ought to literally just plan on moving out of their apartment rather than have to deal with paying thousands of dollars to have someone else move their shit overseas, just to maybe get their visa renewed right when their shit arrives and they have to do the same thing all over again.

This would literally just helping law-abiding folks follow the law. But no, the cruelty is the point.

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It’s not “cruelty” to have and enforce rules. The words “temporary” and “nonimmigrant” is plastered all over the laws that govern these visas. People shouldn’t have treated them as permanent immigration visas. And employers shouldn’t have mislead employees into thinking these were permanent immigration visas.

It’s like saying that it’s “cruelty” to remove someone who uses a 2 hour parking spot as their permanent car parking.

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> It’s like saying that it’s “cruelty” to remove someone who uses a 2 hour parking spot as their permanent car parking.

That's a very weak analogy for the moral issue here.

The consequences are radically different; losing a parking space is a minor inconvenience; losing immigration status can/does involve relocation and upends employment, family, property, and years of life planning / general stability.

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The moral issue is the same in both cases: there’s a big sign that says “temporary.” People have chosen to ignore the sign.
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> The moral issue is the same in both cases: there’s a big sign that says “temporary.” People have chosen to ignore the sign.

No. Your analogy works well solely for the concept of temporary authorization.

If you're offering up 2h parking as proof that the moral stakes are equivalent...

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The moral issue is defined by the nature of the rule, not the stakes for someone who has transgressed. Enforcing the rule doesn’t become less legitimate just because someone has invested more in breaking it.
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The principle is the same; the magnitude is different. I don't see why adjusting the magnitude should affect the principle.
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This entire article is about immigrant visas.
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No it’s about B-1 and B-2 visas:

> The State Department and Department of Homeland Security are reviewing all B-1 business and B-2 tourist visas, he said.

https://www.uscis.gov/working-in-the-united-states/temporary... (“B-1 Temporary Business Visitor”)

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Are we reading different articles? The headline says immigrant visas. The first paragraph says immigrant visas.

“The Trump administration has paused processing of immigrant visas, which allow recipients to move permanently to the U.S., to train visa officers on new guidance ensuring that applicants have enough financial means to support themselves after they arrive.”

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Suspicious given the xenophobic nationalist government the US has in place. "But we're just following the rules!" innocent look
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American immigration laws are designed to have a small stream of permanent immigration, both to protect american jobs and to protect american culture from foreign influence. That’s what people voted for over decades. The New York Times did a good podcast on the issue. https://youtu.be/xgDdTV7A57w. If you want to define “xenophobic” to encompass that then that’s your choice. I don't think that's a sensible or useful definition. The concept of "xenophobia" only applies to individuals. It's wrong to assume that somebody will be a certain way because of their nationality. That obviously doesn't translate to immigration, which involves the mass movement of people who do have a distinct culture in the aggregate, and do transplant their culture into the U.S.: https://www.sup.org/books/economics-and-finance/culture-tran...
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I know a lot of people that support these cruel and chaotic changes to our immigration laws and they are mostly xenophobic - they don’t like people speaking languages other than English at the store, they don’t like religions different than their own, they don’t like family traditions different than their own.
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Suppose a homeless guy knocks on your door and asks if he can stay in your living room. If you say no, or ask for more information, would it be fair for the homeless guy to say "the cruelty is the point"?

Tradeoffs exist.

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To equate immigrants who have followed due process to a homeless person insisting on staying in a property owner's living room is appalling.

It's understandable for everyone to have varying views on immigration and immigrants, but this sort of rhetoric is a vile, racist and xenophobic dog whistle.

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An immigrant who has followed due process is equivalent to a homeless person who has convinced the property owner to willingly let the homeless person stay in the property owner's living room. The property owner is allowed to change their mind about the arrangement at any point, unless and until the person obtains part ownership of the property (citizenship).
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"due process" means in concordance with the law. And the law is drafted and implemented by our elected politicians. As a sovereign country, we're allowed to change our laws and our policies.

The homeless person thought experiment is meant to illustrate the existence of tradeoffs. "The cruelty is the point" is essentially rhetoric meant to demonize political opponents, and sweep under the rug the existence of tradeoffs and differences of opinion.

If immigration is such a good idea, people ought to be able to defend it on the merits, instead of pearl-clutching and playing dishonest rhetorical games.

I'm not exactly sure what is so racist or xenophobic about my thought experiment. Homeless people are people too. I'm tempted to pearl-clutch just like you, and accuse you of denying their humanity. Want me to do it?

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