Why We Can't Have a Decent Country
Here's a depressing story from the Los Angeles Times this morning:
"WASHINGTON — The Senate is poised to approve a military-style buildup along the U.S. border with Mexico, doubling the number of Border Patrol agents on the ground and tripling the number of drones overhead — a $30-billion plan designed to win the votes of as many as 15 Republican senators for the immigration reform bill.
The plan would add so many new agents to the Border Patrol — 20,000 — that if all were deployed at once, they could be stationed roughly every 250 feet along the border, stretching from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.
Spending that amount — more than four times what senators initially had proposed — would also be a boost to defense contractors..."
This idiotic waste of billions of dollars is necessary to get Republicans to vote for an immigration bill which they largely all supported before it occurred to them that they could damage Obama by voting against it. So, it takes a thirty billion dollar bribe to get them to do the right thing. At the same time, we have this spectacle from the Republicans on the farm bill:
"The embarrassing loss for Republican leaders was the first time in at least 40 years that the House voted down a farm bill.
Food stamp cuts are the major issue for the farm bill. The House bill called for the largest cuts in a generation - $20 billion - that would disqualify 2 million poor Americans. Democrats, said it set unduly harsh work rules and gave states incentives to cut off recipients. Tea Party-backed Republicans wanted even steeper cuts in food stamps."
Twenty billion over ten years needs to be taken from poor people, and that isn't even enough for large numbers of Republicans in Congress. But it is okay to loot the treasury of thirty billion to give to defense contractors for nothing. And so it is now impossible for the government to do the decent, necessary thing ever, unless the legislation comes with massive giveaways to Republicans and their campaign contributors.
This is a recipe for national decline, which is apparently what the Republican party wants.
"WASHINGTON — The Senate is poised to approve a military-style buildup along the U.S. border with Mexico, doubling the number of Border Patrol agents on the ground and tripling the number of drones overhead — a $30-billion plan designed to win the votes of as many as 15 Republican senators for the immigration reform bill.
The plan would add so many new agents to the Border Patrol — 20,000 — that if all were deployed at once, they could be stationed roughly every 250 feet along the border, stretching from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.
Spending that amount — more than four times what senators initially had proposed — would also be a boost to defense contractors..."
This idiotic waste of billions of dollars is necessary to get Republicans to vote for an immigration bill which they largely all supported before it occurred to them that they could damage Obama by voting against it. So, it takes a thirty billion dollar bribe to get them to do the right thing. At the same time, we have this spectacle from the Republicans on the farm bill:
"The embarrassing loss for Republican leaders was the first time in at least 40 years that the House voted down a farm bill.
Food stamp cuts are the major issue for the farm bill. The House bill called for the largest cuts in a generation - $20 billion - that would disqualify 2 million poor Americans. Democrats, said it set unduly harsh work rules and gave states incentives to cut off recipients. Tea Party-backed Republicans wanted even steeper cuts in food stamps."
Twenty billion over ten years needs to be taken from poor people, and that isn't even enough for large numbers of Republicans in Congress. But it is okay to loot the treasury of thirty billion to give to defense contractors for nothing. And so it is now impossible for the government to do the decent, necessary thing ever, unless the legislation comes with massive giveaways to Republicans and their campaign contributors.
This is a recipe for national decline, which is apparently what the Republican party wants.
Comments
The Farm Bill also had a massive giveaway to large corporations. Always something Rethuglicans like. As far as immigration goes, there are three groups here. The corporate Republicans who want cheap labor, since it is all about money, the lunatic Republicans who oppose it since it is all about hate and us, who are trying to do the right thing and wrestling over how to best do that.
If the spending was forward-directed into co-operative action with the Mexican government in ending the insane level of organised crime in Mexico, and aiding what is very fast growing economy into delivering its potential for posterity in that country... so people don't feel inclined to head north in the first place.... then it might have some justification, however problematic.
From the sounds of it though, it is just expensive posturing and an excuse to flush money away to the people who ultimately own the Republican party.
I spent the month of March in Mexico. There is massive poverty with one guy being worth more than $70 billion. A Republican kind of country.
migration flow from Mexico
to the United States has
stopped and
may have
reversed,
according to a
new
analysis of government data
from both countries by the
Pew Hispanic Center,