Is anyone really surprised about Trump's latest move ? He apparently is feeling some heat from his fellow Republicans to end the shutdown. But so far they haven't developed the spine to buck him on the issue.
Part of me feels like the parent in Walmart with a toddler in the shopping cart who is having a meltdown over a toy that he wants. I would know that the other shoppers are thinking, "Just buy the damn toy and let us have some peace. We don't care if the toy is worthless or if it's bad parenting!"
That would be the same part of me that is thinking, it's a small part of the budget. Are we going to hold the whole government hostage, and keep the federal workers under the bus?
But another part of my mind knows that if it works for him this time, playing chicken with the government could get to be a habit. What all the parts of my mind know is that something's going to have to give.
Here's an article which references a 1970 US-Mexico Treaty which indicates a wall would be in violation. Apparently we DO have barriers where they CAN be built. But where the border is in the middle of the Rio Grande, you have to build it on dry land on the US side. But where? The wall can alter flooding patterns. The wall might be undercut by floods and it has been flooding lately. What about ranchers and farmers who want to access the river? How much land will landowners lose to the wall project?
ReplyDeleteYes, one of the things not talked about are ecological and territorial complications. Native American reservations straddle the border in some places. How will that be handled?
DeleteI wish the Democrats would give Trump his wall ON THE CONDITION that he a) come to Jesus on DACA and that b) the wall money can only be built in areas were it can be shown to violate no treaties or to have a neutral impact on environment.
They could even hand out candy.
Those conditions would tie up construction for years. Moreover, if they don't give him.some kind of token victory, he is likely to send the Army down there to build it on the basis of his fake national emergency, and they will lose total control of the situation.
In taking the tack that "we can't give in to a toddler tantrum," the Democrats are letting themselves be outsmarted by a dumbass.
"...if they don't give him.some kind of token victory, he is likely to send the Army down there to build it on the basis of his fake national emergency, and they will lose total control of the situation."
DeleteJean, that is my feeling also. Somehow this has to end, best to do it in a way that will cause the least damage. He doesn't care what kind of damage he causes, so other people have to.
I think the junkyard dog strategy would work better with Trump than the toddler strategy. Put a tight collar on the guy and give him enough leash to run and bark at stuff so that he feels important, but keep it short enough to keep him from biting anyone until Bob Mueller with Animal Control can show up.
DeleteEncourage trump to spend as much time playing at Mar-a-Lago as possible while (I can't believe I'm saying this) relatively sane people like Bolton and Pompeo clean up the international doo-doo.
Meantime, I enjoy watching videos in which Richard Ojeda talks about why he has voters remorse about Trump and why he wants to run against him.
Jean and Katherine, you both make valid points. But I think Tom does also - holding the federal govt hostage as a tactic is a bad idea and if he succeeds this time, he'll try it again the next time a policy he wants is opposed and he sees his "manhood" as being at risk.
DeleteI don't know which route is better - hold tight and don't give in, or give enough for him to save face while getting something in return.
Sigh.
My thinking is that someone has to govern. Someone has to get the government going. Maybe these piecemeal bills to open things incrementally will work and thwart Trump's Wall or Shutdown ultimatum.
DeleteBut that's basically poking the junkyard dog with a sharp stick. Make him mad, and he still has a lot of executive powers he can wield to set fires the Democrats will have to put out for the next two years, leaving them with no record accomplishments to run on in 2020.
Lord knows I would like nothing better than to see Trump politically emasculated and doing a perp walk in an orange jumpsuit.
But my visceral and ignoble desires hardly constitute a strategy for good governance.
We have problems with infrastructure, pollution, addiction, wage stagnation, and THOSE are the things that need to be front and center.
He says (when he isn't saying something else) $5.7 billion would get him 258 miles, leaving roughly 174,000 miles to go. For extra credit: How many $5.7 billion tantrums will it take for the Orange Poltroon to extort enough money to build the wall Mexico will pay for on a Tuesday afternoon in Fantasyland?
ReplyDeleteIt's not this shutdown. It's all those shutdowns to follow that Chuck and Nancy have to protect us from.
The shutdown hurts the small business people the most. The federal workers will get their pay - eventually. The main impact I see out here in the suburbs is less traffic during rush hour, and more people shopping mid-day during the week.
ReplyDeleteIn the meantime, they have to juggle to try to pay their bills if they don't have enough savings. When I check bank and credit cards online, I have seen notices to contact them if impacted by the shutdown because they will 'help". Don't know what that means - short-term loans? I don't know if these notices are targeting IP addresses in the DC region only or if everyone in the country is getting them.
Most of the work of the federal govt is actually contracted out, My husband and I worked for the federal government for about 90% of our careers, but never as federal employees. We worked for companies that won contracts to do the actual work. Most projects have no more than one or two federal employees working with the contractors - the project director and asst project director usually. Many contractors are not working now, and they will not get back pay.
Worse off yet - the people who operate the food carts and small businesses downtown near the federal office buildings and the tourist areas of DC. With offices closed, nobody is going out to buy lunch or run errands at small businesses. With museums and other DC landmarks closed, tourists are not visiting small restaurants, food carts, and souvenir stands. The driver who took us home from the airport when we got back from California told us that he and other drivers are really hurting because of the shutdown.
The "little people" who help keep DC going with their services will not get back pay either, and they have the most marginal incomes of all.
So I am with Tom
It's not this shutdown. It's all those shutdowns to follow that Chuck and Nancy have to protect us from.
I ask this dumb question every now and then. Does any of this surprise anyone? I thoroughly expected all this. I am somewhat surprised that the Orange Poltroon has Democrats in a position of power to contend with. But nothing, including the threat to declare a national emergency, is unexpected.
ReplyDeleteNo, Stanley, it's not unexpected. He governs according to the whims of his ego. He actually was ready to give until Rush and Ann Coulter implied that if he backed down on his campaign promise to build a wall, he would lose the next election. God forbid he disappoint his "base". Even worse - God forbid he be seen as giving in not only to Democrats, but to Democrats led by a woman.
ReplyDeleteIt's all so stupid. But not unexpected.
I feel sad for all the small entrepreneurs in DC who depend on federal govt and tourist business who will not get any back pay - ever. Some may go under if this lasts much longer.
If Whoozie can simply declare that he has created a state of emergency and have the Corps of Engineers build a big, beautiful wall, then, Sara, why was it necessary to shut down the government?
ReplyDeletethis article is saying that the "national emergency" may be the easiest way to end the shutdown.
ReplyDelete"...the solution to the impasse seems to be Trump declaring a national emergency at the border, using a dubious authority to reprogram military construction money for the wall, and then Congress passing clean funding legislation ― without wall money ― while Trump’s executive maneuver gets tied up in court."
"...The difficulty is such an arrangement will inevitably derail future appropriations talks, as Democrats would push for riders blocking Trump’s authority to reprogram money and the president wouldn’t sign a bill undercutting his ability to unilaterally build his wall, even if the ultimate decision was for the courts.
Basically, we’d just be deferring the fight for the time being. But such a move seems like the least messy option as more than 800,000 government workers continue to go without paychecks."
Katherine, Yeah, you and I both seem to be leaning toward letting him declare the emergency, re-open the government and be sued. What does seem to be the best course is based on something many Rs have already said is politically stupid and some Ds have said is illegal. When dealing with Mr.T, stupid and illegal is the best we can do.
ReplyDeleteWhich is sort of the answer to Stanley's question about whether this is surprising.
The David Leonhardt at the NYTimes is leaning the same way - let him declare an emergency and let litigation tie it up for some endless period of time.
ReplyDeleteShould Democrats be willing to bargain on the border wall — say, win big progress on other parts of immigration policy in exchange for wall funding? I asked this question on Twitter yesterday, and the roughly 1,500 responses were split almost evenly between yes and no.
I was struck by the even split, because it’s consistent with my own conflicted feelings. ...
I worry about the political effect of rewarding Trump’s tactics on the wall. Remember, he canceled a deal to keep the government open that both Republican and Democratic members of Congress agreed to. He did so in large part because Fox News hosts and other conservative pundits began making fun of him. And his case for the border wall is based on a torrent of lies.
“To those who say, ‘Trump should give DACA, Pelosi should do the wall,’ we must say a clear, ‘No.’” Reverend William Barber tweeted yesterday, referring to the policy that would make Dreamers legal. “The wall isn’t negotiable b/c it’s based on lies, racism & white nationalism.”
The Democrats’ best bet is probably to force Trump to end this mess himself, likely through a legally questionable declaration of emergency. That declaration would be the subject of a legal fight, and it would create some political risks for Trump. He is apparently considering taking money away from disaster relief in Florida and elsewhere, which doesn’t seem like the smartest move given the state’s electoral importance.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/opinion/shutdown-border-wall-trump-democrats-dreamers.html
In a way he has painted himself into a corner. Any way out of the mess is going to cost him. The temptation is just to sit back and watch the train wreck; except for concern about the collateral damage which is sure to occur.
DeleteWe already have some stretches of wall at the southern border. If a wall represents lies, racism, and white nationalism, why aren't politicians and commentators also agitating to tear the existing wall down?
ReplyDeleteTrump's Wall would never get built if it were tied to environmental impact studies.
And I am sick and tired of idealogues wasting time and energy on making speeches about what the wall represents instead of making progress to protect immigrants already here.
If we are against lies, racism, and white nationalism, we will turn out attention away from the wall and toward DACA, racial profiling, judicial reform that imprisons minorities and the poor at higher rates, and the caps we've placed on refugees.
Does Trump even want a wall? Is it possible he knows he'll never get it, but is using the issue to distract and exhaust Democrats while he uses the issue to jack up his base? I think he cares about creating drama and keeping himself at the.center.if attention. The Wall is just a McGuffin.
And all the drama also likely has to do with him feeling twitchy about the Mueller investigation
DeleteAbout him being twitchy, CNN's Don Lemon noticed some telltale body language.
DeleteJean: Is it possible he knows he'll never get it, but is using the issue to distract and exhaust Democrats while he uses the issue to jack up his base? I think he cares about creating drama and keeping himself at the.center.if attention. The Wall is just a McGuffin
DeleteVery true. BUT, it's also true that the wall symbolizes his campaign and his campaign was based on inciting fear and loathing of Hispanics and of brown refugees who are not christian from other parts of the world.
The walls along the border have not always symbolized racism, but "the Wall" does now, at least to some degree. Trump gave permission to people to express their hidden racism along with other hidden prejudices (against women, against gays, etc) - they called it being tired of "political correctness". They cheered mightily when he accused most Mexican illegals of being criminals and rapists. Those who cheered had never dared to so openly express their feelings before.
There are reliable studies documenting the rise in hate crimes and hate vandalism since the 2016 election.
The wall has come to symbolize all of this. The sections of the border that already have walls were not built during a heightened climate of racism encouraged by the president of the country.
I am frustrated that nobody in either party is proposing something realistic to handle the immigration crisis - and it is a crisis. It no longer is Mexican labor coming to pick crops, but people living in effective war zones, caught between government corruption and drug gangs in their countries, not to mention poverty.
John Kelly actually admitted that a huge problem is the extreme demand for drugs in the US. If there were no market here, the drug gangs would have to find new markets, farther away, more expensive to get to. Their wealth and power would diminish, and perhaps some of the threat they present to their own country's poor citizens would diminish also.
The 5 billion $ would be much better spent on beefing up consular staffs in central american countries, educated foreign service country experts who speak the language, and understand the culture and the local terrain. They would be well-placed to know which asylum requests are most urgent. If people could get their requests for visas and asylum processed quickly, they would not take the risks involved with a 1000 mile walk to the border of the US. Some of that money could also be used to greatly expand the number of judges at the border to hear the cases of those who did make it this far.
Taking care of the dreamers is a matter of justice, but there need to be policies to address the long-term issues because desperate people will continue to try to get here - even with more walls along the border.
The Libertarisns propose legalizing all drugs, take the profit out of the drug trade, maybe even let the govt make and sell the drugs at cost. Extreme? Yes, but maybe worth a try. The "War on Drugs" that started decades ago has obviously been a total failure.
The latest is that he's eyeing Puerto Rico disaster funds for the wall. Surely not legal?
Delete