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Michelle Obama called President Donald Trump the "wrong president for our country" during her speech at the Democratic National Convention. USA TODAY

The claim is illustrated in a Facebook meme that recently went viral. Former President Barack Obama's head was superimposed over the face of a person in a construction worker's outfit. "Obama" stands in front of crowds of fenced-in children who are supposedly migrants detained at the southern U.S. border.

The text above the image reads, "Michelle Obama: Trump is putting kids in cages. Guy who built the cages."

Barack Obama is implied as the "guy who built the cages."

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The meme was posted to the Facebook page Vintage Political Memes. The page is an extension of Being Libertarian LLC, a group that caters to"minarchists, classical liberals, anarchists, independents, Objectivists, capitalists, and right/left-leaning libertarians," according to itswebsite.

The picture in the meme minus the inserted Barack Obama of a crowded enclosure full of migrant children at a border facility in Texas was released by the Office of the Inspector General in 2019, according to a tweet by NBC News correspondent Gadi Schwartz. Schwartz saidasenior manager called the conditions at the facility, "a ticking time bomb."

USA TODAY reached out to Being Libertarian for comment.

During her keynote address at the Democratic National Convention on Aug. 19, the former first lady made a comment about the Trump administration's policies toward migrant children detained at the border.

"They watch in horror as children are torn from their families and thrown into cages," Mrs. Obama said, according to The Associated Press.

More: US government sued after report of detained migrant children at Hampton Inn hotels

Fact check: Melania Trump did not remove cherry trees, historic roses from Rose Garden

The entire statement can be found in atranscript posted to CNN.com on Aug. 18.

"They see our leaders labeling fellow citizens enemies of the state while emboldening torch-bearing white supremacists. They watch in horror as children are torn from their families and thrown into cages, and pepper spray and rubber bullets are used on peaceful (protesters) for a photo-op,"she said.

It is true that Trump administration immigration policies involved separating migrant children from their parents and detaining them in "cages," a practice halted by a federal judge in 2018, according to USA TODAY. During the speech, Obamadid not mention the holdingenclosures were built during her husband's administration.

Fact check: Joe Biden delivered his Democratic nomination acceptance speech live

In a 2019interview with nonpartisan think tank The Aspen Institute, Jeh Johnson, Barack Obama's Homeland Security secretary, told NPR's Mary Louise Kelly that the "cages" predate the Trump administration.

"Chain-link barriers, partitions, fences, cages, whatever you want to call them were not invented on January 20, 2017," Johnson said.

Kelly asked Johnson about a 2014 photograph of him touring an Arizona facility for migrants along with former Gov.Jan Brewer. The picture is archived on thewebsite for the Arizona Capitol Times.

Thatimage was also part of another social media meme accusing Michelle Obama of lying about "kids in cages" during her DNC speech. Facebook userEulalia Maria Jimenez posted it to her page on Aug. 18. Johnson is circled in red in the image.

Johnson explained the picture was taken during a spike in unaccompanied minors crossing the southern border of the country.

"The photograph you're referring to was a facility in Arizona I recognize the photograph because Gov. Brewer was with me and it was during the spike ... and we had a lot of unaccompanied kids, we had a lot of family units. And under the law, once they're apprehended by the border patrol, within 72 hours, we have to transfer unaccompanied children to (the Department of Health and Human Services). And HHS then puts them in a shelter, and they find placement for them somewhere in the United States." Johnson explained.

He said the construction of the 72-hour holding facilities was prompted by a sudden influx of migrants.

Local NBC affiliate KVEQ reported on the conversion of aMcAllen, Texas, warehouse into a holding facility for up to 1,000 migrant children in 2014.

"You can't just dump 7-year-old kids on the streets of McAllen or El Paso. And so, these facilities were erected ... they put those chain-link partitions up so you could segregate young women from young men, kids from adults, until they were either released or transferred to HHS. Was it ideal? Of course not," Johnson said.

In 2019, former Trump administration acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Thomas Homan confirmed the migrant holding facilities were builtduring the Obama administration during a panel hosted by The Center for Immigration Studies. The center isa "pro-immigrant, low-immigration" think tank, according to its website.

"The kids are being housed in the same facilities built under the Obama administration. If you want to call them cages, call them cages. But if the left wants to call them cages, and the Democrats want to call them cages, then they have to accept the fact that they were built and funded in FY 15, and I was there," Homan said, according to a transcript.

The Associated Press reportedin late 2019 that an unprecedented 69,550 migrant children were held in U.S. custody overthat year.

But Michelle Obama's assertion that the Trump administration torechildren from their families and threw them into cages alludes to "a frequent and distorted point made widely by Democrats," according to the AP. The facilities designed during the Obama administration to temporarily hold migrants were used for a similar purpose by President Trump, the AP also concluded.

Fact check: Meme is partly false about Republican National Convention speakers

We rate this claimTRUE, based on our research. The initial claim correctly attributes migrant holding facilities to the Obama administration. However, the meme doesn't elaborate on the intended purpose of the facilities:to hold migrantchildren for 72 hours before releasing them to the Department of Health and Human Services for further placement.

Contributing: Associated Press

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Fact check: Obama administration approved, built temporary holding enclosures at southern border - Courier Journal

On August 26, 1920, the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment, giving women the right of the vote, was formally certified. In 1973 Congress designated August 26 as Womens Equality Day. Equal suffrage is one part of equality under the law, but by no means the only part. Visiting Pittsburgh afew years ago Icame across this historical marker:

Anyone who thinks Americans were free in some earlier period might want to ponder the message on the plaque, which celebrates the woman who persuaded the legislature in 1848 to allow married women to own and sell property. (Court decisions, however, limited these rights, including declaring that earnings were not property.) As Charles OBrien wrote in the American Law Register in 1901, in an article titled, The Growth in Pennsylvania of the Property Rights of Married Women,

Whether these criticisms are sound or not, the practical results were as stated, and in substance her property and contractual rights as asingle woman were almost entirely destroyed, her legal existence for most purposes suspended. and other legal disabilities not to be properly considered here added to her estate when she became amarried woman. Such legal servitude was incompatible with the spirit of the founders of the Commonwealth and their descendants.

Throughout the 19th century states began to change those laws, though other legal disabilities for women remained.

The cause of womens rights has always been bound up with the spread of classical liberalism. In England the liberal writer Mary Wollstonecraft responded to Edmund Burkes Reflections on the Revolution in France by writing AVindication of the Rights of Men, in which she argued that the birthright of man is such adegree of liberty, civil and religious, as is compatible with the liberty of every other individual with whom he is united in asocial compact. Just two years later she published AVindication of the Rights of Woman, which asked, Consider whether, when men contend for their freedom it be not inconsistent and unjust to subjugate women?

In the United States the ideas of the American Revolution life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness led logically to agitation for the extension of civil and political rights to those who had been excluded from liberty. Women involved in the abolitionist movement also took up the feminist banner, grounding their arguments in both cases in the idea of selfownership, the fundamental right of property in ones own person. Angelina Grimk based her work for abolition and womens rights explicitly on aLockean libertarian foundation: Human beings have rights, because they are moral beings: the rights of all men grow out of their moral nature; and as all men have the same moral nature, they have essentially the same rights. If rights are founded in the nature of our moral being, then the mere circumstance of sex does not give to man higher rights and responsibilities, than to women. Her sister, Sarah Grimk, also acampaigner for the rights of enslaved persons and women, criticized the AngloAmerican legal principle that awife was not responsible for acrime committed at the direction or even in the presence of her husband in aletter to the Boston Female AntiSlavery Society: It would be difficult to frame alaw better calculated to destroy the responsibility of woman as amoral being, or afree agent. In this argument she emphasized the fundamental individualist point that every individual must, and only an individual can, take responsibility for his or her actions.

The Declaration of Sentiments adopted at the historic Seneca Falls Convention in 1848 consciously echoed both the form and the Lockean naturalrights liberalism of the Declaration of Independence, expanding its claims to declare that all men and women are created equal, endowed with the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The document notes that women are denied moral responsibility by their lack of legal standing and concludes that women have been deprived of their most sacred rights by unjust laws. Consider some of the specific grievances relating to the concerns commemorated in the Pittsburgh plaque:

He has made her, if married, in the eye of the law, civilly dead.

He has taken from her all right in property, even to the wages she earns.

After depriving her of all rights as amarried woman, if single and the owner of property, he has taxed her to support agovernment which recognizes her only when her property can be made profitable to it.

He has monopolized nearly all the profitable employments, and from those she is permitted to follow, she receives but ascanty remuneration.

He closes against her all the avenues to wealth and distinction, which he considers most honorable to himself.

That classically liberal, individualist strain of feminist thought continued into the twentieth century, as feminists fought not just for the vote but for sexual freedom, access to birth control, and the right to own property and enter into contracts.

A libertarian must necessarily be afeminist, in the sense of being an advocate of equality under the law for all men and women.

The rest is here:
The Rights of Women | Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute

Dave Gragg Published 6:44 p.m. CT Aug. 28, 2020

My dad told me a story about his older brother from when they were in their late teens/early 20s.

The two of them were home from the Navy and Uncle Rodger decided he was going to jump off the bridge outside of Urich.

Alcohol may have been involved.

The more my dad tried to convince him it was a bad idea, the more Uncle Rodger insisted he was going to do it anyway.

Look around right now and you can guess how the story ended.

The more some insist that everyone should wear a mask, the more others insist theyre not going to.

Ive heard lots of reasons why people shouldnt have to wear a mask: They dont work, the pandemic panic is overblown, the government doesnt have the right.

The irony is that usually its the same people who yell that nothing is free.

Our escape from this pandemic isnt free, either. But we have a choice as to what price were going to pay.

We can watch it continue to ravage our state, killing some of the most vulnerable, leaving the survivors with long-term damage and hamstringing our economy.

Or we can stay socially distanced and wear a mask. Let me be clear here: Masks may help protect you, but theyre really about protecting those around you.

I lean more toward the socially liberal/libertarian side of the political spectrum. Im a big fan of individual responsibility and the right to swing my fist.

But when individuals dont take responsibility for their own actions when my fist hits your face the government must step in.

Weve learned that we cannot count on Gov. Mike Parson to lead our state.

So we have to ask more from the folks closer to home.

To my friends on the city councils in Republic and Willard, its time to enact a mask ordinance.

The need is especially pressing in my home of Republic, where a fireworks display and business expo are planned in the coming weeks. The towns annual Pumpkin Daze, which was just cancelled because of COVID concerns, would have been able to happen if the state had stronger measures in place months ago.

Combined with the start of school where my kids will be Monday I worry Republic is going to turn into a COVID hot spot that spreads beyond western Greene County and wont end without another shutdown that slows the body count but does other long-term damage.

Its too easy to point the finger somewhere else: Individuals should be able to decide for themselves. Businesses should require their clients to wear masks. Cities and counties are the closest to their communities and should make the decision. The states should. Why isnt the federal government doing more?

I grew up in a town where there arent enough people to get away with Somebody should do something. If theres something that needs to be done, go get it done.

So we start small and work our way up. I see too many people refusingto wear masks even in businesses that require them. Especially during an economic slowdown, businesses shouldnt have to worry about alienating their customers. A city mandate gives those businesses some cover cover I appreciate the city of Springfield giving my business.

Requiring masks should not be political. Its the government watching out for its citizens, just the same as it does with speed limits, drunk driving laws and restaurant health inspections.

Republic and Willard, its time to step up.

Dave Gragg is a Republic resident, Springfield business owner and Democratic candidate for the 130th seat in the state House of Representatives.

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It's time for Republic and Willard to step up - News-Leader

* Illinois State Board of Elections Hearing Examiner David Herman

This matter commenced when Doris J. Turner (hereinafter Objector) timely filed her Objectors Petition with the State Board of Elections. Objectors Petition is based solely on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reversing the Order entered in Libertarian Party of Illinois v. Pritzker, 20 CV 2112. In the Libertarian case, the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois entered a Preliminary Injunction on April 23, 2020 reducing the required minimum number of signatures for candidates nominated by any new political party, as defined by 10 ILCS 5/10-2, and for any independent candidates, as defined in 10 ILCS 5/10-3, to 10% of the statutory minimum established by the Illinois Election Code. Objector admits in her Petition that the Candidate filed a total number of signatures greater than the 10% threshold established by the Order entered by the Northern District. Objector argues that should the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reverse the Order entered by the Northern District, then the Candidates Nomination Papers are invalid in that they contain less than the 25,000 signatures required by the Illinois Election Code. []

While the Hearing Examiner has reviewed those filings, the Hearing Examiner will not make a ruling as to the merits of the Motion to Dismiss because the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has not yet acted.

At the time of this Recommendation, the Seventh Circuit has not ruled on the validity of the Preliminary Injunction entered by the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. Therefore, there is no basis to reach the merits, if any, of Objectors Petition. Wherefore, the Hearing Examiner recommends that the Illinois State Board of Elections DOES place the Candidates name on the ballot for the office of United States Senator for the State of Illinois because the Candidate has filed a total number of signatures meeting the 10% threshold established by the Preliminary Injunction Order entered by the Northern District of Illinois.

Conclusion

The Hearing Examiner recommends that Candidates name BE PLACED on the ballot as a candidate for the office of United States Senator for the State of Illinois at the November 3, 2020 election.

The board will meet Friday and likely issue its ruling at that time.

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Your Illinois News Radar Hearing officer recommends that Willie Wilson's name be included on the ballot - The Capitol Fax Blog

Amidthe sociocultural convulsions and boutique displays of urban anarcho-tyranny that have taken place in America in recent months, there has been renewed discussion within certain circles of the liberty movement about how appropriate it is for libertarians and their intellectual brethren to self-identify as right-wing or left-wing. While libertarianism itself, which merely requires adherence to the nonaggression principle (NAP) and a desire to minimize or abolish state power, need not be considered a right-wing or left-wing political philosophy, I contend (from a decidedly right-wing perspective) that individual libertarians are almost certainly on the right or on the left.

All too often, libertarian infighting and internecine squabbles come across as mere navel gazing, with many mainstream libertariansespecially LibertarianInc.insisting that they have heroically transcended the old left-right spectrum. (Strangely enough, some libertarians seem to believe that this spectrum primarily pertains to red/blue politics.) Nevertheless, in recent months there have been some important conversations touching upon rights, human nature, the left-right spectrum, and what being a libertarian actually means. These conversations have taken place on podcasts such as Dave Smiths Part of the Problem, Free Man Beyond the Wall, and The Tom Woods Show, among others.

I believe that these conversations are quite useful, as they might help convince some libertarians to abandon the hackneyed idiocy of defining and summing up the movement as economically conservative but socially liberal. It is a cheap cop-out, and individual libertarians should not shy away from accepting a right-wing or left-wing label; in fact, attempting to do so is an exercise in futility.

Stripped down to its very core, being right-wing entails a defense of natural hierarchies and a recognition that human beings are not all the same. This is consonant with thinkers from Aristotle all the way through the revolutionary leaders of the American War for Independence. Thomas Jeffersonadmittedlynot typically cited as a right-wingervoiced this sentiment in a letter to John Adams:

I agree with you that there is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents.The natural aristocracy I consider as the most precious gift of nature, for the instruction, the trusts, and government of society.

Many on the right augment their worldview by noting that there is an objective moral order in the universeand that it is knowable to us. Imperfect human beings are capable of great evil but also incredible acts of love, mercy, courage, and creativity. The embrace of an objective moral order (i.e., natural law) can be traced back to Catholic scholastics such as Thomas Aquinas and, later on, the Jesuit thinkers of the School of Salamanca (whom Murray Rothbard considered to be proto-Austrians in their approach to economics).

The very understanding that we are born with inherent natural rightsis a sine qua non for civil society that is embraced by most anarcho-capitalists, propertarians, paleolibertarian minarchists, Ron Paul supporters, and true conservatives on the right. They recognize that the sacrosanct rights to private property and free association do not come from any government or collective entity.

Critics of the Right toss around (what they believe to be) slurs such as reactionary and counterrevolutionary. Yet, as Jeff Deist and others have argued, when considering the twentieth centurys long and disastrous litany of egalitarian and statist experiments here in the United States (e.g., the institution of the federal income tax, the Federal Reserve, the popular/democratic election of USsenators, the New Deal, the Great Society), it is almost impossible for a libertarian NOT to take up a reactionary stance against these statist usurpations. After all, right-wingers contend that not all changes to civil society are desirable and that not all novelty serves the good. There might even be a modicum of wisdom from past generations that should be retained and imparted to future generations.

The Left, on the other hand, is defined by a devotion to egalitarianism, fighting for what they define as oppressed groups, and working for what they see as social andeconomic justice. They typically promote radical social change and keeping the ancien regime in a state of upheaval, believing that inclusion and tolerance are more appropriate for a progressive polity than reactionary morality and societal mores.

It is a leftist view that human beings are not born with intrinsic natural or God-given rights; rather, they are granted and assured those rightsby the state or the collective. Any differences that might exist between human beingswhether disparities in wealth, innate abilities, health, intelligence, or even biological sexcould be unjustly exploited, so it follows that there might be a much bigger role for the state.

There are a variety of different economic views among left libertarians. Some adhere to anarcho-socialism and mutualism as described by Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. Others on the left practice countereconomics and agorism as promulgated by Samuel Konkin. All left libertarians are against economic and military imperialism; many of them recognize the labor theory of value, along with the rejection of private ownership of natural resources and the means of production, as fundamental economic principles.

In many instances, the line between left libertarians and right libertarians roughly approximates the delineation between thick and thin libertarianism. Thin libertarians merely believe in the NAP, the inviolability of private property, and the illegitimacy of state violence. Under subsidiarity principles, any government that is allowed to exist has its relatively small, distinct sphere of influence, and it must not intrude upon local communitiesand especially not the family. Thick libertarians usually go much further, though. As Lew Rockwell has argued:

Proponents of a thick libertarianism suggest that libertarians are bound to defend something more than the nonaggression principle, and that libertarianism involves commitments beyond just this. One such proponent recently said, I continue to have trouble believing that the libertarian philosophy is concerned only with the proper and improper uses of force.

So while thin libertarians are primarily concerned with limiting state power and protecting private property, it is thick libertarians who often seek to infuse their political philosophy with leftist social justice exhortations and calls to fight injustice and racism everywhere, even if the state must eventually be invoked as an intervening power (e.g., Gary Johnsons bake the cake fiasco, or Jo Jorgensens recent Tweet). As Rockwell has noted, this has happened before, with what he sees as the degradation of classical liberalism into todays American liberalism.

Certainly, it is possible for left libertarians and those with thick tendencies to avoid the siren song of authoritarian power and live according to the NAP, but it could very well represent a constant internal ideological struggle. After all, who would enforce the far lefts desired ban on privately held land and factories? Who would step in and prevent workers from being exploited? What entity will outlaw discrimination, curtail racism, and punish rogue bakers?

The differences in economics, ethics, and worldview among libertarians are plainly evident. When libertarians approach political and societal questionsand when they define the scope of their own libertarianismthey clearly do so from the left or from the right.

More:
Why There is a Left-Proper Divide amongst Libertarians - The Shepherd of the Hills Gazette