Frosted
Eyes of the 45th POTUS
He
said he'd build a wall. It was going to be a beautiful 2,000 mile 30'
high wall. It was going to have a unmistakable grandiose door in a
key spot accessible to all. Mexico was going to finance it. They'd
cough up the 70 billion no question asked. Campaign promises. Red
meat. Herrings. Metaphors. The master showman, the real-life Harold
Hill goes to the White House. Trouble right here on the southern
border, in Rio Grande city. An unscalable, impenetrable,
intimidating, discouraging, physics defying wall is needed
desperately to keep out all the unidentified bad hombres.
On
the last day before what can only be described as organized chaos in
a room full of idiots turns 100-days-old, not one bragging point has
been achieved—least of all the errection of a wall. Appointing a
SCOTUS judge greedily out of spite, thievery and belligerence is the
only notable accomplishment, but that was not a point—not mentioned
in the campaign much at all. Not ad nausea like the wall, repealing
ACA and locking Hillary up. It was not a “red meat” item. Trump
threw chum to the toothless sharks, the bush-whacked counter-culture
of the right wing. He knew the back roads of Appalachia, where West
Virginia looks for some road out of economic neglect, where they
need—but may be too proud or stubborn to admit they need—affordable
health care.
So
Trump and the rest of the Our Gang cast scrambles. They pump out EOs
like drug addicted doctors use their Rx pad. They execute military
raids and offensive actions with a calculation that makes me think of
a scene in STRIPES. The moniker Trump-care never caught on. The bill
was DOA. He could not get his own party, for the most part, to
support it. It was ill-conceived, non-specific, catered to those who
have never given health care a thought, and destined to throw
24,000,000 to the wolves, to the streets, to decide between feeding
their family or getting a life-sustaining operation. And then there
was the idle (I really think it was always in idle) threat to cut
federal funds to “sanctuary cities” such as Minneapolis—a city
that has the first Somali legislator. The cities are havens were
immigrants, perhaps those with misdemeanors, those waiting to become
citizens or those simply with demeanors that are misjudged, don't
have to fear deportation. The EO, though, in contet, evidently
neglected to define precisely what a sanctuary city is, thereby
enabling a circuit court to impose a temporary injunction. And the
Trump tax plan: one page of bullet points on a
pocket-himself-and-the-rest-of-greedom trajectory. In 1986 Reagan at
least offered a well-thought out plan that actually reformed tax
codes to close loopholes frequented by the Trumps in the 99% crowd.
I
often get the sense that deep down Republicans know they're fucked.
I've seen that dance before (I imagine it was quite a show in the
60s) but now the steps are high, fast, but lack any existential
rhythm. They know it's wrong and implausible to pass, or try to pass,
legislation for less-than-half of their constituency. They are saving
face in so many instances. I saw it on Paul Ryan's face when, after
his a Trump's HC plan failed, he said the ACA is the “law of the
land” and we will have to abide by it until something better comes
along. Don't hold your breath.
When
all is said, when all is failed and Trump's current inklings and
ill-conceived thoughts have been derailed, the wall stands as a
monument to broken dreams. It is a symbol of unrequited promises,
loyalties never reciprocated. That god damn border wall can stand as
a metaphor, a parable, an homage to Robert Frost's 1914 poem “Mending
Wall.” Will the bad apples of Mexico invade the property of
America's “pine cones?” Are such borders necessary in a land of
such “freedom and discovery?” No.
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