Shutdown Futility

The shutdown is over, or at least in an armistice as a continuing resolution provides a three week window to negotiate on border security.

Its hard to imagine the shutdown being revisited after this one was an expensive exercise in futility, that did not succeed in financing a wall that the public generally doesn't think is needed.

Certainly in some areas on the border either physical or technological barrier might serve a purpose, but we also need to understand that barriers can almost always be defeated.

There are two issues on the border.

One involves immigrants, people who want to find a better or safer life for themselves and their families.  They cross illegally because we allow so few of them to come legally.

A good number of Americans object to them because they violated the law but also because they represent changes in our population that some resent and reject.

We see Spanish becoming more and more common in many aspects of our life as the Hispanic population has grown.  This is not a new trend but conservative media has taken it on as a crusade arguing that traditional "white" America is threatened..

This is essentially the same argument that was made by previous generations as waves of German, Irish, Italian, Polish, and others came to this country.  Of course we had African Americans brought here against their will who help form our traditional America.   Already we see the sons and grandsons of Hispanic immigrants occupying positions of importance and their ethnic background is not a factor.

The other issue is the importation of contraband, mainly drugs.  Drugs are so profitable that all our attempts to stop them have failed in the end.  People who want them have consistently been able to get them.  Stopping usage would be the only effective control, eliminate demand and supply will stop.  We have been unable to do that, either by treatment or incarceration and it has been costly failures.

A wall will not stop this profitable business, it probably won't have any impact on it.

It just won't work.

Dealmaker?

The refusal of the dontard to sign the funding bills is based on an apparent miscalculation on his part, certainly not his first.

He assumed the democrats would act like the adults in the room and let him have his way.

He must be as frustrated as the tantrum throwing toddler the first time that tactic doesn't work.

It leaves no options except to grow up.

Being untrustworthy, he is being required to put up before any concessions are made.  He has backed out of a number of agreements before including the very same spending proposals now available.

When you word loses value you have to pay up front.

He also has the distraction of watching those who he selected to work for him start to sell him out.

Everyone is now used to how these people who were hand selected by the dontard who was of course the best at that are now being called self serving liars.

His behavior towards everyone who is not him inspires no loyalty.

He only cares about himself.  He was never loyal in his marriages, not even the current one.  His view of the world is based on his own character or lack of it, so of course everyone else is also a self serving egoist.

It isn't a good thing for an actual deal maker.

Unpaid Labor

So the dontard doesn't want the shut down to inconvenience any of his supporters or too many Americans, so he has required more of the locked out employees to work on the promise of future reimbursement.

The mote he mitigates the impact of the shutdown the less reason he has to sign the appropriation bills and try to persuade America we need a wall.

Its a ridiculous situation in the first place where you can fail to fund the Government and avoid the consequences.

If failure to fund the Government resulted in the real consequences, it wouldn't happen.

Shutting down the TSA, the Coast Guard, the IRS etc. would not be tolerated.

It doesn't even seem like it can be constitutional OK since slavery is abolished to make people work without pay.  There is a promise to pay after the shut down but by making them work you are prolonging it by reducing the impact.

Whether you believe we need a wall or not we should all be outraged by how the brunt of this is on the workers and their families who have bills and expenses now.

The situation on the border is no more of a crisis now than it has been, if it is a crisis.

Convince the American people and their representatives we need a wall and it will be built.

It is pretty clear from the last election we don't think it is needed.

Elections have consequences after all.

All In

Its pretty obvious that the dontard has gone all-in on the wall.

In poker, if you go all-in, you bet all your chips and wait for the outcome of the hand.  You have no more moves you can make, you can't bet and you can't fold, so you sit back and see what happens.

Unfortunately the outcome in the current situation is not going to end without some involvement by him.

He is convinced that if he gives in on the wall, his base will desert him.

Since his chances at re-election require his base to support him to have any chance, he has made his play.

Since his only actual concern relates to how things impact him, the fact that Government workers and the public are impacted by the senseless shut down doesn't bother him.

In fact he counts on those who do care to have to concede.

So the current hand will be decided by whether the Democrats or the Republicans in the Senate feel more pressure.

Many Republicans are more concerned about primary challenges in 2020 than they are about the actual election.

The primaries are where the dontard's base has the most impact.

The democrats on the other hand have a lot at stake as the first act they take can't be seen as betraying their electorate.

So neither side has any incentive to move, and it will require public opinion to sway one side or the other.

The shutdown continues in the meantime.

Is A Compromise Posible?

We seem to have no middle ground available in the current dispute over the wall.

It wasn't that long ago that there was an agreement that involved the wall and the Dreamers but it was stopped by some hard liners.

Could it be resurrected giving some money for extra border security but resolving the issue related to DACA?

It would give both sides something but both sides have problems with "hard liners".

There is an effort going on with some :moderate" republican senators to fashion a deal.

It actually isn't that hard to do if both sides can behave logically and with some flexibility.

However if the wall is anathema one side and Dreamer path to citizenship is anathema to the other, a deal becomes unlikely.

Sadly both sides are now held hostage by the extreme elements in their parties who weld outsize influence in the primaries.

Still surprises do happen and we should be hoping that the Government is reopened and the issue is resolved.

You Get What You Vote For

It seems that the only reason we have a shutdown is because the dotard wants one.

The issues are effectively non-existent for a continuing resolution since both parties agree on the main elements.

In fact there was a bipartisan solution pitched that the dotard rejected not too long ago.

Protect the dreamers and it goes away and everybody says they want too.

It seems that the dotard and republicans feel the democrats want it more so they want to use it to bargain on other immigration issues.

Even then the democrats were willing to include some money for the silly wall, but the dotard turned to jello and shifted his position.

We have to live with the jello man for another three years barring some unforeseen situation, and the simple fact is that he is not either a politician or a man of his word.

He used to change deals with his vendors all the time, often refusing to make final payments and seeing if they would bother suing him.

Many of them couldn't afford the cost of that, which is what he counted on.

He had no honor was never faithful to his wives and lied constantly.

All of this was obvious and yet he won the primaries and the electoral college.

We probably got what we deserved, or what some wanted.  A dysfunctional government.

Great Dealmaker/

What's going on in Washington now is all geared towards the upcoming mid-term elections, not governing the country.

There is a clear path to a short term budget resolution that includes things both sides effectively favor but to just agree to it would possibly jeopardize certain elections in November.

The Republican want to tie the Dreamer issue to other immigration issues, such as the wall or the ban on people from shithole countries while the Democrats want it addressed in the short term resolution more as a separate issue.

Meanwhile the extension of the Childhood Insurance Program and the elimination of some medical taxes is included in the resolution, trying to make it look like the Democrats are blocking those issues.

This is all geared to talking points that are aimed at helping certain representatives win re-election in a mid term that right now doesn't look good for the Republicans.

How the public perceives the current impasses is going to be telling and it is a bit uncertain right now how that will fall out.

Of course the odds are that the great deal maker will be blamed for his inability to make a deal and the reports on both sides is that he takes inconsistent positions.

I'm familiar with negotiators like the dotard who never want to honor what they agreed to the day before.

They don't trust themselves and tend to say things they regret.

They are hard to negotiate with but you have to force them to do it all in one day if you want to get it done.

Or leave them out of it completely.

Shutdown Politics

The issue that led to the shutdown is more along the lines of who is going to get blamed by the voters rather than any fundamental differences.

The republicans liked the fact that the dreamers felt betrayed last time and took heat for agreeing to a short term deal that didn't include them, so they knew that they couldn't do it again.  Of course they shouldn't and why should they?

There's no reason to believe that if they delay doing something no that anything will happen before the next deadline.

Both sides want to allow the dreamers to stay as do most Americans.  They are not tied to any other issues related to immigration, they are a pretty clear category of people who while being born elsewhere grew up as Americans and are as American as anyone.

Clearly they were too young to have any control over where they went or lived and at this point should be allowed to stay and ultimately become citizens.

One could of course make a similar argument for anyone who has lived in this country for many years, but if they came here as an adult they knew what they were doing so in that case they have some culpability.

Of course if the goal is to have good, hard working citizens, someone who has been just that for many years should probably be considered to have passed the probation period.

Entering this country without papers is of course a violation of US law and the main punishment is to be expelled.  That is something worth discussing but not the same as the dreamers who were young children when they came here.

Silly Shutdown

When you play poker, you have to "know when to hold them and know when to fold them"  and if you don't you will get taken to the cleaners. 

Certain Republicans thought that the cards they held, shutting down the government, were worth holding and that they could get concessions.  Well they didn't and I think they will get taken to the cleaners.

The scary part is that they are simply too ignorant to realize that the Affordable Care Act is not going away and to shut down the government or too create a default will end up causing a lot of unnecessary grief.

I think they are terrified by the fact that the dire predictions they made about the law are not going to come true.  The exchanges are up and the premiums are actually reasonably affordable.  There are some glitches, but mainly because of the tremendous amount of interest.

There is a lot of misunderstanding about the law, but it is going to become better understood now that it is going live and the Republicans are terrified by that.  It really is a pretty good law once you get to know it, not perfect, but still pretty good.