Here is where we stand with this partial shutdown of the federal government.
Donald Trump and some right wingers in Congress want to erect a wall along our southern border. The rest of Congress won’t give them the money to build that wall, which Trump pledged would be paid by Mexico.
The government has shuttered some agencies. All’s quiet in many federal agencies, along with Capitol Hill.
Meanwhile, Democrats and some reasonable Republicans are blaming Trump for this monumental government cluster-flip.
But as Politico reports, Trump is OK with that.
I want to stipulate something that I believe is the reason behind this shutdown: It’s all about whether to build the wall; it has nothing to do with the overall scheme of “border security.”
Democrats want to secure the border as much as those rigid Republicans. They just don’t to erect a wall. They keep saying they support border security in the form of implementing and augmenting existing technology. Thus, they are willing to appropriate a sum of money that pays for those techniques.
That’s not good enough to suit Trump, members of that far right coalition called the Freedom Caucus and a handful of Fox News commentators and right-wing radio talkers. Indeed, it was the radio blowhards who got to Trump and persuaded him to renege on the pledge he made to Senate Republicans to sign the bill they approved.
That, my friends, is the sign of a mealy-mouthed weak leader. Yet the president pretends to be a strongman when in reality he is a tool, a puppet being manipulated by the right-wing element of his political base.
This shutdown might last a while. Or, it might end if senators and House members can come up with a compromise that everyone — including Donald Trump — can endorse.
This is an unacceptable state of play in Washington, D.C.
Donald Trump pledged to take control of government, to “drain the swamp,” to “unite” a nation torn by political division, to make the “best deals ever seen.” He is an abject failure.
He told congressional leaders in the Oval Office he would be proud to take ownership of a government shutdown. He’s got one now. Trump seems proud, all right. He also is acting like an ignoramus.
Despicable.