Shutdown or Not

I wrote this on Friday, January 19^th. I revised it today, January 20th when I learned the US government did shut down due to inept deal making by trump and his lackey leaders in the republican party.

So, this is the day the congressional leader's decision was to shut down government operations because the DACA question was not resolved as both parties would like. Or the Wall, or the CHIP program protecting healthcare for low income kids.

Indeed, the government shut down is a trump decision because congress reached a bipartisan agreement but he didn’t like it. At the last minute he reversed his position, insisted on building ‘the wall’ and DACA youth would not be used as a bargaining chip. Funny thing is he made those young people the bargaining chip when he announced cessation of the program in March 2018. He even asked congress to fix this issue regardless of the wall; but he went back on his word.

So the shutdown belongs to donald trump.

It also belongs to republican house and senate party leaders. They knew the Democrats would not give in on this issue. Too important for the nation and its historical DNA of immigrants. And fairness.

So government shutdowns in this case belong to the republicans and trump.

The Wall is a dead issue. It is a meaningless symbol: impractical – won’t make much difference in the illegal immigration flow – and too costly. It is an albatross suggestion that won’t fix anything but it is a big idea for a big problem. That’s all donald wanted out of this. An image of attempting to do something big with boldness.

Well, it won’t hold water or immigrants back. Immigrants will enter our nation via air, ship, boat, truck, car and bus. Almost all of them will enter legally. A small portion will be illegal. We already spend billions to find these folks and return them to their home countries. That process is slow, costly and ineffective in the final analysis.

Ineffective and impractical. Those two words should sound familiar. They have been used constantly to describe the problem and the proposed solutions for decades.

A really big fix for this is simple: announce all immigrants are welcome and design identification methods for each newcomer, track their whereabouts at all times until they become citizens, and support their enculturation to America with a hug and a smile. An open society should greet newcomers in an open manner.

The administrative details that follow this fix would redirect all the resources and systems that currently are assigned to the immigration and naturalization process. Only now the process would be direct and simple. Get the big idea right in the first place and the details should follow easily. No one has tried this. But several presidents have wanted a simple fix for a long time. Reagan wanted a fix. George HW Bush did as well. So did Bill Clinton, George W, Barack Obama and now trump. The people standing in the way are not the civil servants. The barriers are elected congressional members.

How sad. How very, very sad.

Political games have been played with uninformed citizens seemingly supportive of hare-brained ideas and proposals. The time for that should now be over.

Make DACA legal; convert  all registrants in the program to full citizenship; and devise a process whereby all immigrants can be made citizens in time. Easy peasy. So do it.

Mitch McConnell, stop playing your infantile games. Same to Paul Ryan.

If you all want a meaningful discussion and solution to defining what the role of a central government is, then get to that discussion. Educate the nation on the issue. Clearly define the consequences of making changes to implement whatever decisions might follow. Consider the Constitution and whether this discussion is even necessary. But discuss it honestly and in the open. Then let’s decide as a nation whether the federal government ought to be as small as a pea, or as large as whatever it takes to serve the people as the Constitution warranted.

But a shutdown? Never!

January 22, 2018