I went on Hajj in 2012. Why is it so life-changing?
It is the ultimate spiritual retreat. The chance to disconnect and see the big picture.
It is an antidote to despair. A chance to *use* faith to win something very real: tranquility.
It is beautiful. You'll rarely, if ever, see humanity that up close and personal. Everyone takes away something that affects them, but for me, it was the unified diversity of Hajj.
No matter what, it goes on as it has for centuries. No matter where you're from.
Where everyone has consciously decided to leave their worries behind and focus on something greater than themselves.
Millions of people gathering in a barren desert valley. Your politics don't matter. Your bank account doesn't matter. Your privilege doesn't matter.
The humility it teaches you as you navigate crowds in the heat.
The trust it forces on you as you yield to its pressure.
The link with history it creates as you sit where your ancestors sat.
There's a tranquility learned there that provides a lifeline for years to come.
Faith and action are two sides of the same coin. You have to believe in something to spur you to action.
@FAIRImmigration, founded by Dr. John Tanton, is a mouthpiece of white nationalist rhetoric. But it's more than that: it injects its foul ideology into actual policy.
One (latest) example: Temporary Protected Status, or TPS. Read what a federal judge found:
On p29 of the decision, the Court gives yet another example of Acting Secy Elaine Duke, who is supposed to make a dispassionate assessment of conditions on the ground in determining TPS eligibility, said "this conclusion [to end TPS] is the result of an America first view..."
Curious, because America was founded on ideals of welcoming the forcibly displaced. I'm not sure what "American first" has to do with terminating TPS.
If the White House is influencing the decision, we have a problem, because the White House has made A LOT of racist statements.
Feeling drained after the #KavanaughHearings? I've been thinking about why. Objectively, there are far worse injustices going on even as Kavanaugh spoke.
Sure, there's the out of sight out of mind factor. Most injustice goes unreported; yesterday's hearing was not that.
But there was something distinctive about the hearing. It was a rare exposure of several different vectors of underreported injustice, concentrated into one episode.
We hear stories of sexual assault all the time. Or oppression. Abuser protection. Entitlement. Privilege. Character assassination. Lip service to the oppressed. Trauma. Legalized discrimination.
Rarely do we get to see it all in one day, before hundreds of millions of people
This administration continues to target aspiring American communities, one by one. DACA revocation, TPS de-designation, changing asylum laws, the Muslim Ban...
Once again, the administration regurgitates rhetoric spewed by nativists, and with H-4 work permit revocation, they get an added "bonus" - getting to undo something Obama put in place. Yes, this is what they base their policies on.
But I also wanted to say something about the new public charge rule that greatly expands ineligibility grounds for green cards, which will also play into this attack on the Indian-American community.
This is an attempt to backdoor the RAISE Act into law.
Well this is curious. Apparently @FAIRImmigration believes I am a paid operative of "state-owned propaganda outlet" @ajplus to meddle in 2018 midterm elections.
Why? For this video I did calling FAIR out as driven by white nationalism:
They accuse me of "spreading malicious disinformation in what is a clear attempt to influence the upcoming midterm election." I'm flattered they think so highly of me.
Entirely different, of course, from FAIR's statements influencing lawmakers here:
More effective than any physical barrier on the southern border. Keeps people out before they can even begin their journey.
You can't fly over it or tunnel underneath it. You can't sneak around it, either. And it's much, much harder to tear down.
It's the combined bureaucracy of several different agencies that keeps people out. Physical barriers are a small slice of the pie of exclusion.
But with due process, there is sometimes a way through. Perfectly legal, not unlike carving out a nice little door for yourself.
Today, a green card for our North African client was approved after a 4 year delay. He had been apart from his US citizen wife since 2013, and even though they followed the law to the T, repeatedly told they just needed "one more thing," the visa remained stuck.