The Trump Administration’s Stupefying Hypocrisy About the Well-Being of Children

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By Abby Zimet / Common Dreams

In another day of unfathomable cognitive dissonance, a blindingly heedless Melania unveiled her (stolen-from-Obama) initiative to keep kids safe from cyber-bullying and drugs so they can “do all they can to be best in everything” even as, in a galaxy really not very far from there, the soulless cretins of her philandering husband’s administration were doing everything in their depraved power to make life hell for said children.

Melania’s “Be Best” campaign – proving she can multi-task by both plagiarizing and committing heinous crimes against grammar – is based on “the pillars of well-being, social media and opioid abuse” (wait, what?), featuring a website and leaflet that turns out to be a page-by-page replica of an Obama-era Federal Trade Commission website and leaflet “Net Cetera: Chatting with Kids About Being Online,” with very minor tweaks.

Neither that, nor the fact that she cohabits with the planet’s most vile cyber-bullier, didn’t stop her from writing in her intro, “The lessons in this booklet can help kids act thoughtfully and kindly,’ or intoning stone-faced at the launch, aka meaningless photo-op, “Too often, social media can be used negatively…We can and should teach children the importance of social and self-awareness, positive relationship skills, and responsible decision-making.” Kinda like with Iran, we figure.

This would leave us speechless enough without the fact that, as Rachel Maddow notes, Melania was proclaiming at 3:21 p.m. that, “Children deserve every opportunity to enjoy their innocence,” and Attorney General Jeff ‘Zero Tolerance In Every Conceivable Way’ Sessions was announcing at 4:12 p.m. that it will now be legally codified U.S. policy to forcibly separate immigrant families under a new rule – based, many say, on entirely false statistics – that all adults caught crossing the border outside of authorized ports of entry will be criminally charged and incarcerated, even if they’re seeking asylum, and their children will be put in homes or shelters.

“This border is not open,” he said at an Arizona gathering. “We are not going to let this country be invaded. We will not be stampeded. We will not capitulate to lawlessness.”

Nor, evidently, empathy. Sessions’ proclamation of an official policy of cruelty towards the most vulnerable among us also came the same day Trump announced he wants to pay for his massive tax giveaway to the rich by stripping over $15 billion in previously approved spending, including $7 billion from the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) – a move deemed “despicable on every level,” which pretty much covers Trump World in all its moral squalor.

After Melania’s grifter crimes were revealed, the swampy White House tried to defend her, but social media made it clear they reject the laughable notion that any of these people will ever do anything best. “Be best!” they trumpeted on Twitter. “Aim stars! Many Bully! Don’t drugz! Me Give No Fucks!” Way too much winning for kids today.