I agree with Donald Trump.
I wholeheartedly agree with Donald Trump from back in 2015. There is a BIG difference between a wall and a fence. But the proposals released by the U.S. government this week are in stark contrast with POTUS’s promises. This is the nullification project at work.
The Trump administration will request $18 billion over a 10-year period for 316 miles of fencing, and for a reinforcement of 407 miles where barriers are already in place. This is less than half the U.S. border, and less than half of the strength of a real brick and mortar wall — as Mick Mulvaney was touting earlier this year.
The administration was warned by supportive voices as far back as May that this wouldn’t do, but it appears that at least through 2027, this is their idea for a wall.
As the British have come to learn, this is what happens when you allow the fundamentals of your revolution to be actioned by those who opposed it, career political class, and life-long bureaucrats: Theresa May, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, Tony Blair. It’s all the same crowd, backed by the same multi-nationals and corporate interests whichever side of the Atlantic Ocean you’re looking at it from.
Just as Brexit didn’t see a significant change in the British government at any level, nor did 2017 see the required wholesale re-purposing of U.S. government departments. Bush and Obama holdovers, and the departments of Justice, State, and Homeland Security are still running much of the show.
In Britain we have a prime minister who campaigned to remain in the European Union, but who is really led by the hard-line remain voices like Blair, who was, this week, absurdly claiming that Britain should have a second referendum, or perhaps even a THIRD depending on how that one goes.
Similarly, the Department for Homeland Security has at its helm the former Bush staffer Kristjen Nielsen, and now Vice President Mike Pence is inviting Senator Jeff Flake into the negotiations on the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals (DACA) programme, and amnesty for illegal immigrants.
In American parlance, The Deplorables are “getting rolled”.
In the past history was written by the victors, but since WWII we have become alarmingly accustomed to history being written by the losers.
A bully Germany now runs Europe, the U.S. media is more frightened by the old Soviet Union than ever before, and the cultural warriors of the 60s, whose Marxist pretenses are scarcely covered, now dominate Western media and culture.
This is due to the fetishisation of democracy. Our drummed-in obsession with the ballot box as the be all and end all. But that it is not. The be all and end all is power. And the power is currently being wielded by Remain campaigners in Britain, and by Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, and Bush-Obama holdovers in the United States.
This weekend at Camp David, a group of Republicans are compromising amongst themselves on immigration, the wall, and amnesty. Attorney General Jeff Sessions — regardless of what you think of him on the Russia investigation recusal — is a long-standing immigration hawk who was not invited to the Republican conflab.
Remember, they haven’t even got to the negotiating stage with the Democrats yet, who are themselves hurriedly making plans for government shutdowns, taking the U.S. House of Representatives, and impeachment against this President if and when they do.
Caving on DACA and the wall isn’t going to save this President from that. In fact, it opens up the likelihood that real MAGA supporters refuse to vote in droves this coming November, hastening such proceedings.
Think it won’t happen? Look to the collapse of the Conservative Party vote in the snap election last year.
Campaign and policy flubs aside, the Conservative Party suffered from the activation of younger voters, which led to the highest voter turnout since 1992. Yes, the Tories still won the election, but instead of increasing their majority as expected, it was cut to a point where we had a hung parliament. There’s no doubt about it, this was a Brexit backlash from younger, more left-leaning, anti-Brexit voters. It was also due to the “Corbyn” factor — with Marxist Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn offering a terrifyingly authentic Chavista socialism to kids with frontal lobes not yet fully formed.
While the Democrats in the U.S. haven’t just yet handed his American counterpart — Bernie Sanders — the reigns of the Democrat Party, there is almost certainly going to be an anti-MAGA backlash vote in 2018.
Team Trump are currently fooling themselves into believing a deal on DACA — alongside vicious condemnation of MAGA figures — will spare them the rod. It won’t.
The only thing they should be focused on is delivering on agenda items, and making sure the 62,984,825 people who voted for President Trump on November 8th 2016 are motivated and mobilised. But this wouldn’t suit the nullifaction artists. Ryan, McConnell, and their corporate backers are intent on this presidency being a failure. They got their tax reform bill which helped their big business buddies and scarcely impacted the ordinary working American. Now, as far as they are concerned, it is time to shut it down.
Raheem Kassam is the Editor in Chief of Breitbart London