Biden’s Border Burlesque–What’s A Mother To Do?

At the end of Francis Ford Coppola’s movie, Apocalypse Now, Kurtz asks Willard why he has been sent to terminate his command.

KURTZ  Did they say why, Willard, why they wanted to terminate my command ?
WILLARD I was sent on a classified mission, sir.
KURTZ It appears.. that its no longer classified, is it? What did they tell you?
WILLARD They told me that you had gone totally insane and that your methods were unsound.
KURTZ Are my methods unsound?
WILLARD  I don't see any method at all, sir

The same can be true of President Biden’s border policy – one cannot see any method at all.

Former President Trump dealt with the immigration crisis forthrightly and unequivocally – illegal immigration must be stopped, he said.  Unrestricted entry to the United States was causing a depression of American wages, a strain on border states’ welfare system, unneeded pressure on the environment, a rise in gang activity, linguistic and culture divisiveness, and unnecessary policing of the southern border.

While legal immigrants were welcome (Trump made it clear that while the United States welcomed talented, trained, and educated foreigners who would add intellectual depth to academia, industry, and commerce), he saw no value added by undocumented workers.  There were legal and legitimate avenues for the unskilled labor needed to supplement American resources, but wholescale, open-door, come-one-come-all policies would be disruptive and dangerous.; and while Trump’s policies overlooked the economic benefits of foreign labor (illegal immigrants paid no taxes and drew down on scarce public resources,  but they also filled jobs that Americans were unwilling to take, and spent their earnings in the American economy, creating jobs and wealth), he was unequivocal about the need for rational, decisive immigration policies.  As importantly, he understood the cultural zeitgeist – rightly or wrongly Americans saw their country overrun by those who entered illegally, worked illegally, took advantage of the social system; and refused to integrate as earlier European immigrants had, and lived within insular minority communities.

Trump’s infamous border wall was never intended to solve the migration problem – it never could, for the border was endlessly porous and the Mexican coyotes infinitely inventive.  It was built to send a message both to Mexico and to Americans – we will not stand for unlimited entry.  Trump’s policy, however explicit, evaded more structural issues.  The business community thrived on cheap, undocumented labor, and American consumers were quite happy with the lower prices and costs that resulted; yet politics prevented any stringent punitive measures on business.

Yet with Trump, the immigration gauntlet had finally been thrown.  Illegal immigration was a serious problem, and only a coherent, rational policy would resolve it.  Trump’s policies were more Sturm und Drang than rational, objective, and data-based; but at least he was consistent and forcefully so.  He might not have the answers, but it was time the American public realized the seriousness of the problem – ‘No mas!’

President Biden, elected on a wave of progressive sentiment and anti-Trump hatred, immediately acted to display his liberal, compassionate, inclusive credentials.  Migrants from Central America wanted refuge in America for good reason.  Successive civil wars and continuing civil strife; endemic poverty; and corrupt governments all militated against economic and social reform, and the people suffered.  As such, they were victims not unlike American blacks, gays, ethnic minorities, and women.  America needed a foreign policy of compassion and understanding, one which echoed the time-honored “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses”, engraved on a plaque on the Statue of Liberty.

Times had changed, however, and when America opened its doors to European immigrants in the early 1900s, they were needed to run the factories of the Industrial Revolution.  While the spirit might have been one of welcome and compassion, the reason was economic.  America now has all the labor it needs, and if illegal immigration were halted, wages would rise, even low-end jobs would be attractive, and the economy would be more equitable, fair and balanced.

Biden, however, living in a 19th century fantasy and a liberal fairy tale, has called for poetic justice, not Constitutional justice and foundational legal principles.  Open the doors, he has said, and America will take care of the world’s tired, poor, and  oppressed.  We will provide temporary shelter for the undocumented, help them to reconnect with their families, and especially welcome their children.

To no one’s surprise, the border has been inundated with Central Americans who, hearing Biden’s encouraging words, have trekked to the border; and many have sent their children on alone, knowing that they would be given priority entry, and once in the United States would serve as anchors for their relatives who would follow.  Border holding pens became overcrowded, miserable places, far worse than migrants had left.  ICE and other border patrols were overwhelmed by ‘visitors’ who were encouraged to cross any one of the now unpatrolled points on the Rio Grande.

When Vice-President Harris went to Guatemala to discuss the border crisis with its President, he told her in no uncertain terms to send a clear message to would-be immigrants from his country – “Don’t come, don’t even think of coming”.  The chaos at the American border was not the only place for incivility.  The illegal trade in human trafficking, linked with the highly profitable drug trade was already beyond control and destabilizing in his country and those neighboring.  Open borders would mean only an increase in illegal, often violent activity. 

Harris was surprised and non-plussed.  She thought that Biden’s Policy of Compassion would be welcomed.  It was not.  So she quickly called Washington and asked for help.  “Now what?” she asked.  Increased foreign assistance, her handlers in the State Department advised.  Economic development would provide jobs and a living wage in countries of origin and citizens would stop headed for El Norte.

Of course that policy has been tried for decades and has never worked.  Foreign assistance in Latin America, just as in Africa and Asia, has been diverted, misused, and misspent.  While the President of Guatemala would of course take American largesse, it would not solve his political problems. 

So, in little more than four months of the Biden presidency, the border is a chaotic mess with no end in sight.  His initiatives are spontaneous, erratic, and useless.  He has quickly found that the liberal, progressive creed is valueless; and only political savvy, self-interested negotiations, and mutually beneficial deals make the grade.

The coyotes are happy, the drug traffickers are happy, Salvadoran gangs are happy, and American liberals are happy – no one else.  Governors of border states both Republican and Democrat are raising their voices in protest.  We are being overrun, they say.  Stop this nonsense. 

But how? asks Biden behind closed doors.  We can’t turn our backs on the poor – and to be honest on the progressive claques who helped get me elected – he says.  Meanwhile Kamala Harris immediately capitulates and tells the Guatemalan president that she in no uncertain terms will honor his request.  “Don’t come”, she says to would-be illegal immigrants. “Help is on the way here”.  Of course that is nothing but political chicanery, for she knows – or should know – that Central American governments, for so long powers of misrule and venality, will do nothing, and that pouring American dollars down the sluiceways will simply go for naught.

Slowly but surely Biden will return to Trump era measures.  The temporary migrant shelters on the border were deliberately harsh and unwelcoming.  Compassion was not an operative term.  Illegals needed to know that if they managed to cross the border, life would be difficult, harsh, and punitive.  Biden, in the name of humanity and good will began to turn these shelters into Hiltons, and once full, found places in Marriotts inland.  Not only would illegals be rewarded by a virtual green card, but their wait for it would be luxurious.  Now, he is not so sure.

Worst of all, the very progressivism which got Biden in office in the first place, is being scrutinized and defied by more and more Americans.  The chaotic missteps at the border have repercussions throughout the canon.  If Biden has been so wrong at the border, so idealistically snookered and blind-sided, then perhaps his other initiatives may be just as frivolous.  Push back against radical transgenderism, teaching the gender spectrum in schools, and indoctrinating primary school children in the value of sex change and the hideous evil of whiteness has begun.  One chink in the progressive wall was always the first of many.

So Kamala Harris will return to Washington more befuddled than ever.  “They don’t want us”, she will tell Biden about Mexico and Central America’s leaders.  “They want Trump back”.

Meanwhile when asked by a reporter why she has not visited the Mexican-American border and reviewed for herself the situation there, she flippantly replied, “I haven’t been to Europe either.  What’s your problem?”

One only has to look back a few decades to see Biden’s political parentage – Jimmy Carter, the president of compassion, goodwill, understanding, charity, and commiseration, a one-term president roundly defeated by one of the strongest, most determined, and most popular presidents in history, Ronald Reagan, a man of principle, clarity, and determination.  “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall” will be remembered long after any nostrums of diversity and inclusivity from Joe Biden.

Biden is in office largely because of anti-Trump hatred; and now that Democratic moderates who voted for Biden have seen what he intends – punitive taxes on the rich, a stifling of American energy enterprise, a re-introduction of restrictive government regulation, an endorsement of the cancel culture, denial of freedom of speech and expression, and give-away treaties and agreements with America’s political and economic adversaries – the progressive juggernaut may be stopped in its tracks at the mid-terms in two years.

“What’s a mother to do?”, asks Biden, throwing up his hands at his disobedient children.  “Why won’t you behave?”.  Suddenly the fairytale storybook-endings he had assumed would be the legacy of his presidency, look far distant.  Of course those who voted for Trump knew all along what was in store for the country.  They knew that Uncle Joe, the reincarnation of sweaters-hearths-and-warm-fires Carter, the dupe of black radicals and young progressive militants, and a man of failing acuity and ability, would stumble and fall; but they were surprised at how soon.  Oh well, better sooner than later, they say, and look with anticipation to 2022.