Something is Wrong 1_14

Something is Wrong!
January 14, 2024

What is wrong with us as a nation? What is wrong with us as a people? The governor of Texas, Greg Abbot, directed his state’s National Guard to block U.S. Border Patrol Agents from rescuing a mother and two children who were in trouble crossing the Rio Grande River from Mexico into Texas. (Woman, 2 children die crossing Rio Grande as Border Patrol says it was prevented from intervening) The mother, and her two children, drowned. Greg Abbot is now officially a murderer. There is no other way to put it. His ordering his troops to prevent the Border Patrol from rescuing these people, to instead stand by and watch them drown, is murder.

Every citizen of the United States understands that there is a pressing need to come up with reasonable border control laws. We, like it or not, can certainly not allow unfettered and totally open access for anyone to cross over into the country. By the same token, we cannot rationally, or morally, completely close our border either. There must be some middle ground. Some compromise that allows people who are fleeing oppression and almost certain death or political imprisonment, to enter our country. There has to be some compromise that allows people who are willing and anxious to take on jobs that most citizens won’t consider, to enter.

There has to be some understanding that we are, and have always been, a country of immigrants and that, if we are to remain true to our identity, we must continue to be so. The fact of the matter is, much of the richness and flavor of our nation is because we have traditionally allowed, often encouraged, other cultures to come and merge into ours. Our arts, our food, our music, our science, and so much more are enriched by allowing new ideas to challenge the existing status quo. If we prevent this going forward, we as a nation, loose.

The far right, led by their racist leader Trump, constantly spew their lies that most immigrants are murderers, and drug dealers, and rapists. That they, as Trump recently said, ‘poison the blood of our nation.’ A quote that Hitler would be so proud to see his words continuing to be used to promote bigoted and irrational hate. They know it is a lie. They don’t care. They impassion their followers by spewing the most vial hate for anyone who is not white.

The far right’s goal is not to ‘strengthen’ our borders, it is to take and retain power by any means necessary. If they wanted stronger border control, why did they vote against Democrat proposals to hire more Border Patrol Agents? We know the answer to that. They did it to fuel their goal of blaming the current administration for problems with our borders so that people will focus on that, rather than all the other things today’s GOP has done to restrict freedom in this country.

They don’t want people to remember that Trump’s Supreme Court is reversing decades of precedent by overturning Roe v. Wade. They don’t want people to realize that the GOP is restricting who can vote and making it harder for people of color and the poor to vote in virtually every locality they control. They want people to forget that their leadership has, and many continue to, support dictators, especially Putin, who is a direct threat to democracy, not only in the U.S., but worldwide.

Our system of government was designed to be a system of compromise. The idea was to prevent any one ideology from instantly making drastic changes to our freedom and laws. The idea of checks and balances our Constitution is designed around, is to assure that divergent viewpoints must work together to make changes. Change is painful for many and so our system aimed to slow change down, but not prevent it. It was also designed to assure that when the majority of citizens came to believe in something, then that something would become the law of the land.

Most people believe in a woman’s right to choose. According to a Pew Research Poll, a large majority, 61% of U.S. Citizens believe abortion should be legal in most circumstances.

Most people believe in LGBTQ rights. A Gallop Poll shows that a huge majority, 71% believe that gay marriage should be legal.

Most people believe in some form of universal healthcare, often called Medicare for all. Again, according to Gallop, 57% of registered voters believe the U.S. government should assure health care coverage for all in the U.S.

Most U.S. Citizens want stricter gun control laws. According to Gallop, 56% want some stricter laws. According to Fox News, yes Fox, a whopping 87% of registered voters want universal background checks, and 61% support an assault weapon ban.

And back to immigration, according to the Cato Institute, 72% of American’s believe that people come to the U.S. to find jobs and improve their family’s lives, not commit crimes. And an incredible 91% believe that some immigration is good for our country, with 53% saying that being allowed to immigrate is a basic human right.

And yet the current GOP fights against every single one of these. Today’s GOP has embraced the radical far right and no longer believes in a free democracy. They have shown repeatedly that their goal is a White, Christian (even though they follow very, very, few of Jesus’s teachings) fascist government where they maintain power and line their pockets at the cost of every citizen that does not fit their mold. Their votes and their rhetoric show again and again that they are the party of the elite, not the average citizen.

Our democracy has not been under such a threat from within in its history. The power and the promise of our country depends on inclusion, not exclusion, yet the GOP only focuses on the latter.

We must not allow the likes of Trump, DeSantis, Green, Graham, McConnell, Gaetz, Jordon, the murderer Greg Abbott, and others of their ilk to destroy our freedom and ultimately our country. We can no longer vote for someone based on party. We must vote for those that believe in freedom for all, not just a few. Currently that will, more often than not, mean anyone who is not a part of the GOP.