Sanctuary Cities: Testing the Balance

Sanctuary Cities: Testing the Balance.  There is a common theme in the administration of government that runs through all departments and agencies.  When a law, regulation, or procedure flows from the top echelon of government downward towards the people who execute the action, it will inevitably be modified or adjusted to reflect the very real concerns of the ultimate site of impact.  This is as it should be, because it is oftentimes clear in the administration of government that one size does not fit all and local concerns should be factored into the application of the rules.  However, it is typically understood that while the changes may occur as the downward flow commences, the changes shall be more restrictive, but not less restrictive.  This a fundamental premise that recognizes that the supreme lawmakers in our culture are those who reside in Congress, elected by the people.  When a law is passed by Congress and signed by the President, it is subject to the review of the Judiciary; and when it passes that muster, it is considered the will of the people…ALL of the people.  The occasional allowance by government to allow more localized authorities to make the law even more restrictive is recognition that we are a nation of individual states and localities where each has their own set of unique challenges and concerns.  It is also recognition that even though these individual states and localities have their own set of problems, we are nonetheless a nation united and there must be one set of universal, federal laws that supersede all others in order to preserve the union.   The federal government should not attempt to micro-manage the lives of people; at the same time, local states and municipalities must respect the right of the federal government to promulgate restrictive laws that protect the citizenry.

To me, this is the issue at hand when dealing with the sanctuary city question.  Certain parts of the country must deal more directly and intimately with immigration than others based simply on their physical location.  Other areas have, for various reasons, become magnets or settling regions for certain groups of immigrants.  These are natural occurrences that should be expected and must be addressed in any immigration discussion.  However, the ability of an individual state or locality to thumb its nose at federal law in pursuit of its own interests or beliefs is a luxury that cannot be afforded and must be addressed with a high degree of immediacy and diligence.  If federal law can be countered by localized law, does that not endanger the very fiber that holds our diverse nation of states and peoples together? 

States and municipalities clearly need the liberty to fashion their culture and society to suit the citizens who choose to reside there.  This is the quality that helps to make our country great and makes us stronger as a nation.  Through this method, American citizens are presented with options in choosing how they live their everyday lives and how they might live in sync with their beliefs and desires.  But people in San Francisco, California do not need to be telling people in Lexington, Kentucky how they should be living their lives.  Nor should the legal actions taken by Chicago, Illinois, in an effort to reflect the personal philosophies of their citizens and leaders, endanger the health and well-being of Americans who live outside the Chicago city limits but certainly within the same geographical region.  Individual states and municipalities do not exist in a vacuum and do not enjoy the privilege of an independent nation.  At some point in the process of balancing national interests with local concerns, a line must be drawn ceding ultimate authority to the greater entity.

Within the framework of federal immigration law, states and municipalities can and should fashion immigrant policies that reflect the views of those that live and work there.  They can use their own resources, their own tax revenues, to pursue additional services and outreach to immigrants that go above and beyond those offered by the federal government.  For instance, Chicago could set up municipal offices that can assist immigrants with necessary documentation and other types of support and assistance.  If that is what Chicago wants, let the people of Chicago pay for that.  However, when they choose to disregard established federal laws; they must adjust their actions to that area reserved to them for localized input.  There is much that Chicago can do to make itself a desirable place for immigrants, both legal and illegal, to gravitate towards.  This range of options is broad and can be creative to the point of reflecting Chicago’s unique set of beliefs and principles.  But Chicago should not, and does not, have the right to ignore and supersede federal laws that were put on the book to protect this nation and all of the people that live in it. 

The Intolerant, Invalid, and Irrelevant Snowflakes.

The Intolerant, Invalid, and Irrelevant Snowflakes.  The “win at all costs” philosophy that has become very popular in our culture is not a very attractive trait; especially when exhibited by youth.  However, the fruits of victory are so very sweet when those defeated fail to accept their demise with any semblance of grace or honor.  Such is the case with the pathetic, whining Hillary Clinton supporters who are proving incapable of accepting Donald Trump’s presidential election victory.  From the pampered brats on college campuses to the anarchical protestors in the city streets to the disconsolate media personnel who behave as if the apocalypse has arrived, Clinton’s supporters are really having a hard time accepting the reality that ClintonWorld is passé and TrumpWorld has arrived.   And though it is an exercise in an admittedly guilty pleasure, the behavior of these people is amusing when viewed through the prism of an inevitable Trump presidency.   I love the popular term “snowflakes” being applied to these folks; it is a stroke of genius.  Why should we discount these snowflakes as the fragile element they have so obviously become?

First off, for a group that screams the mantra of tolerance, they are pretty damn intolerant.   Merriam-Webster defines tolerant as: 

1: willing to accept feelings, habits, or beliefs that are different from your own.   

  

How can you claim the mantle of tolerance when you scream and demand that your feelings and beliefs be addressed while you summarily dismiss the feelings and beliefs of those who disagree with you?  These snowflakes are walking oxymorons (yeah…go ahead and play with that one!) who are demonstrating to anyone paying attention that they are nothing but a bunch of stark raving hypocrites.  They vocalize messages and creeds that they perceive to be transcending while exhibiting just the opposite message with their very real behavior.  They parade about and want to be perceived as idealists with a laissez faire attitude, when the reality is that they eschew the principles of live and let live tolerance while adopting a let them eat cake mantle of privileged existence.

Secondly, in order to be considered valid, there must be a certain degree of logic or common sense to your position.  There is absolutely no question that the election of Donald Trump as President is open to criticism and questionable on its face; but that is not what the snowflakes are saying.  What was their alternative to Trump? They do not parade in the streets or occupy the campus commons with the message that Trump’s election was wrong.  Instead, they are devastated by the fact that their candidate…Clinton…did not win.   It is not so much that the electorate did things the wrong way and made a poor choice; it is that the electorate did not do things their way and make their choice…Big difference.  In order to be taken seriously, there is a certain amount of legitimacy that must accrue to your preferred alternative as compared to the terrible reality you are protesting.  The fact that these people put Hillary Clinton the Crook up against Donald Trump the Pig kinda weakens their credibility.  Once again, we find that if events do not unfold in their preconceived sequence, then they have no choice but to be infuriated.  It is their way or the highway.  You know…Trump was a sorry candidate and certainly has many flaws as a President-elect, but criticism of his election is best framed as dissembling his policies in a democratic exercise rather than complaining that your candidate did not win.   The pompous and entitled attitude of the snowflakes when they exclaim… “You beat Hillary with HIM!!!... paints them much more as sore losers rather than principled voters with substantive policy differences.

And finally, the element that makes the snowflakes amusing and tolerable rather than serious and concerning is the fact that they are irrelevant.  Due to the very attitude exhibited by these malcontents, many traditional Democratic and liberal voters crossed over and voted Republican in this election cycle; note Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.  If you have a legitimate beef with Republican policy, you had best be off the street and in the backroom figuring out a strategy of combat because you are now at a distinct, political disadvantage.  As depressing as it is to lose and face the reality that all of your dreams and ideals will amount to naught, it is equally exhilarating to imagine the possibilities of accomplishment when simultaneously possessing Congressional majorities and the White House.   The Democrats and their snowflakes will be nursing at the rear portion of the mammary gland for the foreseeable future and that is obviously a very, traumatic experience for them.

Could This Be Trump's Waterloo?

Could This Be Trump’s Waterloo?    In my lifetime, I do not believe there has been a President enter into the office with more bipartisan and popular support than did Obama.  Democrats were united behind their candidate in a spectacular fashion; the public at large had pretty much bought into his “hope and change” mantra; and most all Americans were enthused that this nation had finally elected a person of color as President.  He had a colossal amount of political capital.    And what did Obama choose to do with his political capital?  Did he go for the low-hanging fruit where bipartisan support could be achieved?  Did he seize the opportunity to tackle some of the nagging issues that were confronting this nation and were begging for reform?  Did he decide to take advantage of his position and negotiate from a position of strength, handing out an olive branch or two to the opposition in the course of events?  No.  He chose to adhere to his rigid ideology and shove Obamacare down the throat of this country without a single Republican vote.  His desire for a single payer health care program blinded him to the fact that three-fourths of Obamacare could have been passed in a bipartisan way if some degree of respect and negotiation had occurred.  This choice to go “all or nothing” on Obamacare poisoned the partisan well in WDC and Obama never recovered from it.

I believe there were two watershed moments for Obama in his tenure.  The first was his ill-fated decision to jam Obamacare through Congress using extraordinary means.  The second was his last mid-term election battle with the Republicans.  Obama ran all over this nation preaching that even though he was not on the ballot, his policies were.  The American electorate soundly repudiated those policies by giving the Republican Party a majority in the House and the Senate.  Rather than accepting this unequivocal response from the people, Obama instead began his executive action orgy by announcing he would govern with his “pen and his phone”.   Americans do not elect kings; they elect chief executives.  They expect for the three branches of our government to work together, but independently.  Not only was Obama’s abuse of executive power a rebuke to the constitution, it was a foundation built upon the sand.   President Trump will now have the ability, and the apparent inclination, to easily dispose of Obama’s executive actions with his own pen.  Obama could have done what President Bill Clinton did before him: Understand the message from the voters and find a middle ground with the opposition party.  He chose otherwise.

If you think about it, there is one very significant parallel between Obama’s entry into the Presidency and that of Donald Trump.  Much like healthcare presented as a complex and emotional issue at the beginning of Obama’s first term, immigration reform is on the list of most people’s legislative agendas.  Both are extremely important issues that touch the lives of so many people and there are clearly at least two sides to every aspect of these issues.  There are many valid, sincere, and conflicting opinions about immigration reform.  If Trump is wise, he will slice off the border security section of immigration reform and focus his efforts on that particular area.  It is certainly possible that bi-partisan support combined with an incoming President’s honeymoon political capital should be sufficient to get an effective piece of border security legislation passed and approved.  The more complicated and divisive immigration reform can be studied, discussed, debated, and put off until a later date; a more deliberate approach.

If President Trump insists upon shoving immigration reform to the front his legislative agenda, he runs the very real risk of poisoning the partisan well much like Obama did with Obamacare.  Let us hope that he is student of history and chooses to instead focus on meaningful and practical legislative efforts upon which he can begin to build some degree of bipartisan chemistry.  It would be a tragedy in so many ways if immigration reform ends being Trump’s Waterloo, just as Obamacare was to Obama.

What Just Happened?

What Just Happened?  Our nation dodged a bullet yesterday (November 8) and chose not to make a terrible mistake by electing Hillary Clinton as our next President.  We can all hope and pray that a mistake was not made in choosing Donald Trump to be our next President.  Although it is clear he was not elected entirely on merit, it is hoped that he will prove worthy of the faith and trust that so many Americans have placed in him to lead our country.

This…..http://centerlineright.blogspot.com/2016/10/darkness-on-edge-of-town.html….is why Donald Trump was elected.  A large, diverse, and heretofore disorganized group of working Americans came together to send a message that they are sick and tired of the way things are and that they…want…change.  We can only hope that Trump has the wisdom, courage, and character to achieve the positive change that so many yearn for and that this nation so desperately needs. 

To loosely quote Michelle Obama…for the first time in my life, I am proud of the American voter.  People who have been financing the opulent lifestyles and swollen egos of the political class in WDC for generations finally stood up and said…ENOUGH.  In rust belt counties where Republicans had become extinct, Donald Trump found support.  In small but significant numbers of minorities, Donald Trump was the hope for a better way.  In large numbers of active voters, Donald Trump was viewed as the lesser of two evils and is being given a chance to deliver on his promises.  With the exception of 2012, many of our last several presidential elections have been “change” elections.  But somehow, someway, and following those elections, the change message got lost in the entrenched power structure of WDC and was quickly forgotten. 

I see two significant differences between those change elections and this one in 2016.  Be he good or be he bad, Donald Trump is certainly different.  He is the consummate political outsider and should come into office with the least amount of political baggage conceivable.  Trump should be able to truly operate with a high degree of independence, from both parties, and although his election win was the product of a clearly divided electorate, he will have the benefit of a Republican House and Senate to further his agenda.  Secondly, Trump will undoubtedly bring a new perspective to the White House.  He is a product of the business and corporate universe and will view the operation of our government as a CEO might view his or her company.  This does not mean that he will automatically improve the efficiency and effectiveness of our government; it simply means he is likely to bring a fresh approach to how government operations are assessed.   These two factors will make the Trump presidency a unique chapter in recent political history and will test the broadly held assumption that WDC is corrupted by Beltway Insiders and needs an Outsider to shake things up. 

Shaking things up, or as Trump likes to call it…draining the swamp…is not necessarily synonymous with successful government.  Clearly a new and more pragmatic approach to government would be welcomed, but the reality is that the powers of the President (no matter how much we tend to over-blame or over-credit him) are limited.  In order to be successful, a President must work with Congress in order to implement policy.   We are getting ready to see a quick demonstration of the frailty that Executive Actions possess.  No doubt, Trump will move quickly to simply eliminate many of Obama’s executive orders with a stroke of his pen.  They were purchased on the cheap and they will end on the cheap.  The temptation will be great for Trump to seize upon the Democrat’s newfound affection for the executive order and begin his own string of autocratic rulings.  This would be a huge mistake and an abandonment of trust with the people who put him in office.  The American people want to see our President and our Congress work together to implement fair and practical policy in the fashion our Constitution envisioned.  And even though the Congress will be controlled by Republicans, the Senate will not be filibuster-proof.  It will be necessary, and proper, for the President and Republican Congressional leaders to deal with the Senate minority leadership in order to facilitate effective legislative function.  And while we do not demand that our leaders compromise on principle, we can expect them to compromise on practice.  While the election clearly put Republicans in charge of our government, people will legitimately expect the concerns of both parties to be reflected in the policies of our government.  The degree of that concern and how it is divvied up will be the game.  One can only hope that Trump’s business experience in the free market will lead him to a pragmatic and reasonable approach in legislating.  Trump has a great opportunity to fill his administration with some of the best and brightest minds among us. Who and how he selects these people will speak volumes to his competence as a President.  What he does not need is a cast of the same old Republicans and Democrats who have been living off the WDC political complex for decades.  It is time for fresh faces, fresh approaches, and bold actions.  Blending these new attitudes with a sufficient amount of experience  to keep the trains running while rerouting the tracks will be quite the challenge.

Donald Trump comes into the White House as a change agent.  He is terribly flawed and has not enjoyed the popular and enthusiastic support that many of his predecessors have.  He has some convincing to do in demonstrating that he has both the character and temperament to be a good President.  He must somehow bridge the chasm between the two political parties in this country.  Once again, American citizens have voted for change.  What…will…that…change…entail?