by Pa Rock
Citizen Journalist
The number of Central Americans seeking asylum at the southern United States border is on the rise. Thousands, mostly in family groupings, are making the long and arduous march north through Mexico in search of peace, stability, and safety in the United States. They are being driven from their homelands by social and economic forces that are well beyond their control, and life becomes so difficult and dangerous that often a long walk into the dark unknown seems to be the only answer.
But in coming north they often trade one villainous government for another. The horrors that many face from immigration authorities at the United States border can seem to be almost as wicked as those they left behind.
These refugees are coming north are not on a walking vacation as some in the Trump administration seem to believe. They are instead fleeing tyranny by their governments, gang violence, rampant crime and drugs, and ubiquitous social injustice in the slim hope of at least having a chance at some semblance of a normal life in the United States. They are the desperately poor sons and daughters of impoverished countries being run by despots and criminals.
The United States provides a pittance in foreign aid to Central America in comparison to what it spends on foreign aid and war expenses in the Middle East, and obviously much of what it spends in any location is drained off by corrupt local officials and crime syndicates, but some of it does serve to help stabilize countries through economic development and job opportunities. To summarily end foreign aid to any nation is to suddenly reorder the economic priorities of that country, and that type of process will invariably hit the poor and the powerless first.
Donald Trump is a man who has been trained from birth to get his way by shouting his demands. This week he has insisted that Mexico find a way to derail the immigrants seeking to enter the U.S. through the southern border, and he has threatened that if Mexico fails to contain the situation, he will shut the border for a "long" time. His "plan" is ill-conceived, undoubtedly the brain child of the Nazi's who run loose in the White House and encouraged by his personal strategists at Fox News. A closing of the southern border for any duration will wreak economic and social havoc in Mexico and the United States.
But Trump was not satisfied with that threat alone. He has also announced that he is ending financial aid to the Central American countries of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. The aid that the United States has promised to those countries from 2017 and 2018 but has not yet delivered amounts to a little over $500 million, again, a pittance of what the United States provides to nations in other parts of the world - and less than what our country has spent on Trump's golf outings.
(It almost seems as though we have been in a prolonged effort to keep our neighbors to the south poor and dependent on our national largess.)
So Trump turns off the dollar tap. Then what?
Corrupt government officials will have to make up for the shortfall by taking even more from the poor. Criminal gangs will have to expand their areas of operation and sell more drugs and commit more crimes - and where better to expand than in the United States? And the terrorized and oppressed poor will try even harder to flee the horrors of their homeland - and the numbers seeking to cross the southern border of the United States will increase faster than ever.
All thanks to the brilliant petulance of Donald John Trump.
But Trump will be playing golf at his private cocoon at Mar-a-Lago - and he will see and hear only what Fox chooses to share with him. Trump is going to save his country money by kicking the crap out of poor people in Central America - and more money here at home means more golf! And more golf means more money in Trump's own pocket! Can life get any sweeter than that!
Citizen Journalist
The number of Central Americans seeking asylum at the southern United States border is on the rise. Thousands, mostly in family groupings, are making the long and arduous march north through Mexico in search of peace, stability, and safety in the United States. They are being driven from their homelands by social and economic forces that are well beyond their control, and life becomes so difficult and dangerous that often a long walk into the dark unknown seems to be the only answer.
But in coming north they often trade one villainous government for another. The horrors that many face from immigration authorities at the United States border can seem to be almost as wicked as those they left behind.
These refugees are coming north are not on a walking vacation as some in the Trump administration seem to believe. They are instead fleeing tyranny by their governments, gang violence, rampant crime and drugs, and ubiquitous social injustice in the slim hope of at least having a chance at some semblance of a normal life in the United States. They are the desperately poor sons and daughters of impoverished countries being run by despots and criminals.
The United States provides a pittance in foreign aid to Central America in comparison to what it spends on foreign aid and war expenses in the Middle East, and obviously much of what it spends in any location is drained off by corrupt local officials and crime syndicates, but some of it does serve to help stabilize countries through economic development and job opportunities. To summarily end foreign aid to any nation is to suddenly reorder the economic priorities of that country, and that type of process will invariably hit the poor and the powerless first.
Donald Trump is a man who has been trained from birth to get his way by shouting his demands. This week he has insisted that Mexico find a way to derail the immigrants seeking to enter the U.S. through the southern border, and he has threatened that if Mexico fails to contain the situation, he will shut the border for a "long" time. His "plan" is ill-conceived, undoubtedly the brain child of the Nazi's who run loose in the White House and encouraged by his personal strategists at Fox News. A closing of the southern border for any duration will wreak economic and social havoc in Mexico and the United States.
But Trump was not satisfied with that threat alone. He has also announced that he is ending financial aid to the Central American countries of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. The aid that the United States has promised to those countries from 2017 and 2018 but has not yet delivered amounts to a little over $500 million, again, a pittance of what the United States provides to nations in other parts of the world - and less than what our country has spent on Trump's golf outings.
(It almost seems as though we have been in a prolonged effort to keep our neighbors to the south poor and dependent on our national largess.)
So Trump turns off the dollar tap. Then what?
Corrupt government officials will have to make up for the shortfall by taking even more from the poor. Criminal gangs will have to expand their areas of operation and sell more drugs and commit more crimes - and where better to expand than in the United States? And the terrorized and oppressed poor will try even harder to flee the horrors of their homeland - and the numbers seeking to cross the southern border of the United States will increase faster than ever.
All thanks to the brilliant petulance of Donald John Trump.
But Trump will be playing golf at his private cocoon at Mar-a-Lago - and he will see and hear only what Fox chooses to share with him. Trump is going to save his country money by kicking the crap out of poor people in Central America - and more money here at home means more golf! And more golf means more money in Trump's own pocket! Can life get any sweeter than that!
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