Prevalence of masked gangs (ostensibly a Gestapo, but without uniform or id) kidnapping people in government buildings without police intervening appears (as an outside observer) to be ~100% higher than under recent USA administrations.
Are you saying this was already happening, just as much, under Obama, say?
Of course it didn't happen as much, but the fact that we already had active black sites and people getting pulled off the streets and abused at all paved the way towards apathy about its expansion now. If city or state police forces can do such things to random citizens for decades before now, why would we expect federal agencies under the direction of the president and his cabinet to not be able to get away with it too?
>Are you saying this was already happening, just as much, under Obama, say?
Are you saying that only this particular type of government abuse matters, so if prior governments didn't do this particular thing, then they're A-OK no matter whatever else they did?
As for your strawman:
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According to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) data from fiscal years 2009 to 2016, more than 3 million individuals were formally removed from the country during the Obama administration. Annually, between 58% and 84% of these removals were so-called "summary removals" carried out through legal procedures such as "expedited removal" and "reinstatement of removal," which do not involve a hearing before an immigration judge. On average, about 74% of removals during this period fell into these categories. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/obama-deportations-court/
--
No police intervened for those 3 million people either (except to deport them summarily).
But the guys that took them didn't wear masks (maybe), so that's ok.
Yes, due process is important. Habeus corpus is important. Rule of law is a cornerstone of democracy. People acting for the state, such as border police, should act lawfully; they should identify themselves, wear the proper uniform, get the proper warrants and so on.
Why? Because you're breaching innocent peoples rights and removing their ability to get justice.
The fact that prior administrations did this on a large scale without the need to have gangs of thugs shows that the lawlessness of the administration is unnecessary to meet the ends of managing immigration.
Could you explain why you consider this a strawman? It sounds like you're onboard with the dismantling of USA democracy?
[flagged]
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>In china, there is a murder wagon with a crematory. Nobody ever finds you..
In China there are portable vans to serve as execution places for executions that are ordered by court - in lieu of having special buildings. No crematory and no 'nobody finds you' nonsense.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Execution_van
Still bad, but same for the "land of the free" that still has and carries the death penalty (for comparison, no EU or European country has it).
Right, other places also have evil people in charge and lack of rule of law. Agreed.