# Extricating us from the Imbroglio: Repairing the Damage **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [January 20, 2021, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007 "2021-01-20T18:45:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/81 "2021-01-23T05:25:43Z")
Sure, but not all kids. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/82 "2021-01-23T05:26:56Z")
I’d think we’re better relying on something objective like a DNA test rather than the judgement of a child. Some of these children were separated from their parents when they were very young. And they’re being held in detention camps. They might agree to go with the first adult who shows an interest if them. ---
**Author:** ![ShadowFacts](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shadowfacts/32/2934_2.png) [@ShadowFacts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShadowFacts)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/83 "2021-01-23T17:05:11Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I looked online and they haven’t made any Orange Vanilla Coke Zero since 2019 Man, I am genuinely unhappy to hear this news, as bad as that shit is for me. ---
**Author:** ![ShadowFacts](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shadowfacts/32/2934_2.png) [@ShadowFacts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShadowFacts)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/84 "2021-01-23T17:22:39Z")
On topic to the thread, I agree that this should be a “first 100 days” priority for the Biden administration. It’s a stain on the entire country. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/85 "2021-01-23T17:27:47Z")
> [@ShadowFacts](#): > > > [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > > > I looked online and they haven’t made any Orange Vanilla Coke Zero since 2019 > > Man, I am genuinely unhappy to hear this news, as bad as that shit is for me I found a little neighborhood store that was selling cherry M&M’s and I kept buying them because I loved them. I just put out my mind the knowledge that the company had stopped making cherry M&M’s two or three years earlier. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/86 "2021-01-23T18:10:26Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > And yes, it smells like somebody in ICE did this maliciously with full foreknowledge of the inevitable consequences. The cruelty was the point. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/87 "2021-01-23T20:57:14Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > The testing will be to make sure that the people who show up to claim a child are the actual parents. Fingerprinting would have been a cheap and easy way to verify identities. But now we’re going to have to use DNA testing. Fingerprinting would also have provided a way to link children to guardians who accompanied them who were neighbors or more distant relatives – possibly because one reason they were fleeing was because their parents had been killed. Some additional check needs to be made in such cases to be sure that the adults claiming the children have legitimate reason to do so. But allowing children to be reunited only with their genetic parents is a method that has its own problems. > [@DrDeth](#): > > Why not just let the parents claim the kids that the kids accept? When the children are old enough to do so, that makes a lot of sense. It’s my understanding that some of them aren’t – and bear in mind that some have already been separated for years. > [@ShadowFacts](#): > > I agree that this should be a “first 100 days” priority for the Biden administration. It’s a stain on the entire country. Yup. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/88 "2021-01-23T20:58:18Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > When the children are old enough to do so, that makes a lot of sense. It’s my understanding that some of them aren’t – and bear in mind that some have already been separated for years. Alright I concede testing may be necessary for some, but by no means all. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/89 "2021-01-23T21:01:45Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > Fingerprinting would also have provided a way to link children to guardians who accompanied them who were neighbors or more distant relatives – possibly because one reason they were fleeing was because their parents had been killed. > > Some additional check needs to be made in such cases to be sure that the adults claiming the children have legitimate reason to do so. But allowing children to be reunited only with their genetic parents is a method that has its own problems. A valid point. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2021, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/90 "2021-01-24T08:00:12Z")
Parents are hardly likely to be able to claim a child if they don’t know where the child is in the system, in the first place. It needs a searchable database of all the children involved with whatever identifying information can be collected, and where there are very small children with limited information, DNA would be essential. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/91 "2021-01-25T03:54:04Z")
Biden Administration rooting around for Trumpy appointed holdovers to fire. > [@Senegoid](#): > > This makes no sense at all that I can comprehend. Civil Service is for employees who are hired through a merit hiring system, and are then protected from firing for political ends. How does a political appointee get hired directly into the Civil Service system? Anyone who is hired politically should be subject to being fired politically. Article in WaPo today about it, discussing the possibilities (and sometimes impossibilities) of purging trumpist appointments. One of the difficulties lies in just finding out who they all are! It seems this kind of “burrowing” is a commonplace thing and all administrations do it (some of Obama’s burrow-ins are mentioned). OTOH, there seem to be some possibilities. > **[Biden is firing some top Trump holdovers, but in some cases, his hands may be...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/biden-trump-burrowing-federal/2021/01/24/a495ae76-5c02-11eb-b8bd-ee36b1cd18bf_story.html)** > > Trump-friendly officials who served the previous administration as political appointees have burrowed into career roles at federal agencies, with protections against dismissal. > [@](#): > > At most agencies, career officials serve a year on probation — that period is two years at the Defense Department — during which they can be fired without cause. If some of the Trump loyalists already have made it through probation, they can be reassigned to other roles or given little to do. Like all career employees, they have rights to due process, experts said. Somewhere the article also mentions that these burrow-ins also get reviewed annually for five years before their Civil Service jobs are considered truly permanent. But apparently the rules aren’t quite the same for all positions in all departments, otherwise why would Biden have any obstacles at all in canning some of these people? ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/92 "2021-01-25T03:59:40Z")
ETA: Many specific names are mentioned in the article. The numbers of Obama vs Trump burrow-ins are compared. No mention in the article of Louis DeJoy. 😡 ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/93 "2021-01-25T17:41:48Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > Muslim travel ban Thankfully gone now, one of several orders reversed by Biden during his first 24 hours. > **[President Biden rolls back Trump policies on wall, climate, health](https://www.newsnationnow.com/politics/president-biden-rolls-back-trump-policies-on-wall-climate-health-muslims/)** > > U.S. President Joe Biden signed at least 15 executive actions shortly after being sworn on Wednesday, undoing policies put in place by his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump, and making his first… ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2021, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/94 "2021-02-06T23:51:07Z")
> [@Author\_Balk](#): > > Apparently now Biden has a lie/false statement. HA HA HA HA HA! That’s what constitutes a “lie” when it comes to Biden - he exaggerated in common parlance the attitude he felt was displayed. When he announced 100 million doses in 100 days, it was thought ambitious. Then suddenly it is considered not ambitious enough. That’s the reality of what the opinions were. This is ridiculous “both-sidesism”. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/95 "2021-02-07T00:36:12Z")
I’ve suggested (see OP) this thread should be reserved specifically for Biden Administration actions in service of un-doing or repairing the damage from the Trump Clusterfuck Admnistration. Here are two seemingly large-scale items that caught my eye recently: 2/5/2021: News item that Biden rescinds 32 of Trump’s last-ish-minute nominations for various things, including two nominations for lifetime judgeships. > **[Biden Tosses Out Trump's Last-Minute Judicial Nominations](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/joe-biden-judicial-nominees_n_601c8e04c5b68e068fbcf08f)** > > The newly installed president prefers to fill those lifetime federal judgeships with his own picks, thank you very much. 2/3/2021: New Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin announces some kind of major purge of Trumpish holdovers in Defense Department: > **[Biden’s new Pentagon chief purges Trump loyalists — including one who called...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/biden-pentagon-trump-allies-lloyd-austin-b1797057.html)** > > Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announces ‘immediate suspension’ of former appointees, including several known for their incendiary online rhetoric Purge the Trumpists! Round them up, march them to the wall! More! More! I’m still not satisfied! ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2021, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/96 "2021-02-07T22:37:49Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > But if we genuinely don’t have the data to reconnect kids to families, how can we just release them? To adoption agencies? To anyone who wants one? > > My point is this might be a genuinely un-unscrambl-able egg. > > As long as the kids are in some Federal custody, and hopefully a humane kid-friendly one, we retain the practical ability to reunite whoever we can identify. Once we disperse the kids they’re gone beyond recovery. The foster care system in America is not adoption agencies, and not cages. It is a system designed to care for children whose parents are currently not available. It is completely possible for them to place any remaining children into foster care and trace relatives to end up placing them with. The act of tracing relatives itself is the challenge. Some of the children are too young to talk, or know full names of relatives, or any information useful for finding relatives. Dispersing the children isn’t the problem, and in fact many have already been dispersed. The problem is retaining the traceability. The system for placing kids is supposed to have that kind of records system, but the Trump Administration officials executing this policy purposefully did not gather or retain the information. Biden just announced a task force to start addressing this travesty. He’s committed to doing whatever he can to right the wrong. > [@LSLGuy](#): > > And yes, it smells like somebody in ICE did this maliciously with full foreknowledge of the inevitable consequences. It was absolutely on purpose. [Trump admin ran ‘pilot program’ for separating migrant families in 2017 (nbcnews.com)](https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/immigration-border-crisis/trump-admin-ran-pilot-program-separating-migrant-families-2017-n887616) > [@](#): > > The government was separating migrant parents from their kids for months prior to the official introduction of[zero tolerance](https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/immigration-border-crisis/fed-failing-migrant-parents-n886701), running what a U.S. official called a “pilot program” for widespread prosecutions in Texas, but apparently [did not create a clear system for parents to track or reunite with their kids](https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/immigration-border-crisis/here-s-how-hard-it-find-migrant-kid-who-has-n886216). > [@](#): > > Records and interviews indicate that mothers and fathers, most from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, went to jail on charges of misdemeanor illegal entry or felony re-entry. Their[children](https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/defendants-diapers-immigrant-toddlers-appear-court-alone-n887356) were reclassified as “unaccompanied” and sent into a network of shelters scattered across the country run by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the care of unaccompanied migrant children apprehended by the government. > [@](#): > > The idea of separating migrant children from their mothers was discussed during the earliest days of the administration as a way to deter asylum-seekers, according to notes from an asylum officers’ meeting. > > At a town hall for Citizenship and Immigration Services asylum officers on Feb. 2, 2017, the agency’s asylum chief, John Lafferty, told officers they might have to “hold mothers longer” and “hold children in HHR/ORR,” an acronym for childrens’ facilities run by HHS. > > The next month, then-Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly told CNN he was considering separating families caught crossing the border “to deter more movement along this terribly dangerous network.” > [@](#): > > On Nov. 1, six months before Attorney General Sessions officially implemented “zero tolerance,” Magistrate Judge Miguel A. Torres expressed frustration from the bench in El Paso about the number of defendants who had been separated from their children and had no word of where they were. > > In a hearing involving five such defendants, Judge Torres questioned the lack of information provided to parents. > > “I’ve been troubled that by the time of their pleas they don’t have this information,” said Torres in audio obtained by NBC News. “It is an anxiety that looms large.” > [@](#): > > A week later, Judge Sabraw issued the injunction in Jocelyn’s case, about ten months after she had been separated from her son in El Paso. His order echoed Torres’s incredulity that the government had broken up families without any plan for putting them back together. > > “The unfortunate reality is that under the present system migrant children are not accounted for with the same efficiency and accuracy as property,” he wrote. “Certainly, that cannot satisfy the requirements of due process.” This was a Stephen Miller brainchild to deter illegal immigration. > [@Senegoid](#): > > It might(?) be some crime in the United States, but too much politics in the way. If The Hague gets involved, they can impose outsider justice as seen from a more international viewpoint. While there is some value in a justice overseen by non-participants, I ultimately feel it is a necessity for Americans to be a part of pursuing the justice against these criminal bastards. This wasn’t the actions of the vast majority of American citizens, it was the evil of a few people in high places. Americans need to show future potential autocrats they can and will be held accountable. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 9:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/97 "2021-02-08T09:43:21Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > It was absolutely on purpose. This was a goddamn war crime. Everyone who knowingly helped organize and administer it should go up against the fucking wall. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/98 "2021-02-08T22:48:02Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > This was a goddamn war crime. I can’t agree, as there was no war. It was, however, an act of unmitigated evil perpetrated by our elected officials and their appointed agents. Everyone involved in devising and executing this plan needs to be held accountable. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/99 "2021-02-08T23:12:42Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > > [@Cervaise](#): > > > > This was a goddamn war crime. > > I can’t agree, as there was no war. While the term war crime is often used as shorthand, war crimes are actually a subset of the more general set of international laws like this. There are also crimes against peace and crimes against humanity. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2021, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007/100 "2021-02-08T23:18:01Z")
As I opined in one of these threads a few days ago, I think this was not a “War Crime” but a “Crime Against Humanity”. Aside from that, @Cervaise is spot on: Round up the MFs and march them to the wall. Of all of Trump’s multitude of crimes and atrocities, this one is way high on the list. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extricating-us-from-the-imbroglio-repairing-the-damage/931007.md?page=6)