The so-called ‘Greatest Nation on Earth’ - the one that built the world’s largest economy and the most powerful armed forces this planet has ever known - should also be the country that solves the global immigration crisis.
We must not let bad actors like Vladimir Putin, who sows war and misery while using human beings as cannon fodder, to instigate mass migrations by fueling conflicts the world over, most notably in places like Syria, Sudan and Yemen.
Using Iran as a cat’s paw, Russia’s interest is in causing global upheaval and damaging democratic nations by forcing the issue of a refugee crisis upon already overburdened countries.
Thereby stoking the reactionary forces that will use xenophobia to consolidate power and inveigle themselves further into the body politic.
We have seen this in Europe and now we are experiencing it in the USA.
Conservative politicians become evil doers while doing Putin’s bidding by proxy, as they are seduced by their own thirst for power and the fortunes that come from corrupt public policy morphing into outright kleptocracy.
It also undermines war efforts like defending democratic allies, such as Ukraine, by eviscerating Republican support in US Congress - ironic for a party that at least at one time gave lip service to ‘protecting freedom’.
The ‘America First’ platform that Donald Trump is running on is an echo of the same drumbeats of cowardice that have bounced off American ears since domestic Hitler sympathizers preached isolationism at the advent of WWII and enabled millions to suffer and perish before the eventuality and ultimate heroism of our involvement.
Who would we be today if America had not stepped up (along with our Allies, whose contributions are far too often downplayed by the long shadow cast by Uncle Sam) to save the free world.
It was the policies of FDR and the ‘can do’ spirit every citizen was called upon to summon, to sacrifice and build on behalf of the war effort that in essence not only lifted us out of the Great Depression but birthed the modern economy that made the United States a global leader in technology and manufacturing.
Our collective effort is ultimately what made us a super power (an oversimplification for sure, that doesn’t take into account that we were not bombed on our mainland, leaving our industrial infrastructure intact along with the development and use of nuclear weapons and imperialism).
We are a nation of innovators and immigrants - these two factors are inextricably linked and inseparable from the final results.
This fact cannot be dismissed or overlooked but should be celebrated and fertilized in every aspect of public and governmental life.
Politicians who understand this speak to our better angels and tap into a strength and resiliency that will always outlast the feeble brittleness of small-minded men like Donald Trump and his co-conspirators in the MAGA movement.
I am not just speaking of the goons at his January 6th, 2021 insurrection but the members of Congress who played into his awful designs for their own hold on power, and of course some of these cowards know better but are afraid to say it under Trump’s threats of primaries and the possibility of losing their seats.
These men and women will be footnotes in history, cautionary tales and punchlines in the not-too-distant future.
Much like the isolationists and anti-Semites that attempted to undermine democracy in defense of fascism nearly a century ago.
When Nikki Haley gave her third place ‘victory speech’ in Iowa last week she took a moment to thank family and friends.
When speaking of her own parents, Ajit Singh & Raj Kaur Randhawa she simply said: ‘parents’. She left out their proper names, but when speaking of her in-laws, Bill & Carole, she used them.
Did she believe her corm-fed Iowa audience couldn’t handle hearing the names of Sikh immigrants?
She should be quite proud of them, a professor and a lawyer who emigrated first to Canada and then the United States - whose daughter went on to become a governor and ambassador to the UN in a single generation.
She should be taking great pride in that fact and shouting it from the rooftops, the message that Sikh immigrants and many others are just as much a part of the fabric of America as those with anglicized names and apple pie upbringings.
She should be using it as an example of what this Nation is at its best.
A place where hardworking immigrants can gain a foothold in the American dream and their children can go on to success beyond their own wildest dreams.
An America where any child can grow up to become President of the Untied States.
Trump was bound to hammer Haley on the race card anyway so her playing coy yielded bitter fruit, it’s the only political play he has as a mediocre white man with a sub-average intellect and a long record of fraud and failure. Less than 24 hours later he played that card against her, and in his perpetually stupid fashion even got that wrong, spelling her birth name ‘Nimrada’ instead of the correct spelling, Nimarata.
As gutter politics as it gets, with all the subtlety of hack comic who relies on bigotry instead of imagination.
There is nothing to be scorned or mocked in Mrs. Haley’s birth name, even if she herself has anglicized it. (She’s apparently got a thing with names, changing her husband’s from Bill to Michael because she said he doesn’t look like a ‘Bill,’ but I digress.)
She herself perhaps cannot feel full pride in her ethnicity - and seemingly has no problem playing to the racists in her base on her quest for power.
Which is why she will never win her party’s nomination and Trump will continue to mock and belittle her.
Haley will leave this campaign weakened instead of using her ethnicity as an opportunity to appeal to the true spirit of equality an inclusivity that defines the America that most of us believe in, whether or not it has fully come to fruition.
Trump will continue to steamroll over his opponents (bye, DeSantis) and will destroy their hopes and dreams within the party going forward.
It will become just another painful lesson for folks who can’t see the simple truth of American life: we are a nation of immigrants and this is our enduring strength.
I believe we should now lead the world in solving the border crisis, one that will only get worse as climate change continues to wreak havoc and people that once sought asylum to escape poverty and political persecution will now also be seeking higher ground as sea levels rise and storms become ever more catastrophic.
Let us work to solve the problem now before it gets worse.
Republican policies have only poured fuel on the fire - no matter how FOX News attempts to spin it to it’s gullible viewers.
What men like Governors Abbott & DeSantis have done with their mistreatment of migrants is both sadistic and abhorrent and has left a permanent black mark on our Nation’s soul.
We must do better.
We must allow a human and orderly introduction for immigrants seeking asylum and a better life.
We are a nation of ingenuity, surely we can figure out a way to triage the situation and use some of our plentiful resources in service of the greater good rather than demonizing women and children and using them as political pawns.
Surely we can pull together now, as we did stateside during WWII’s war effort, where so many men and women sacrificed for the greater good and used their skills and talent to solve problems that seemed fearsome, vast and intractable.
We can provide the services and helping hands HUMANITY demands of us, much of it a result of shortsightedness in our foreign policies of the past.
We don’t just owe it to them, we owe it to us.
We need to learn not to see immigration as a threat, or a workforce to be exploited and demeaned in slash and burn capitalism and consumerism.
There’s a vast resource of imagination and talent that heretofore has gone largely to waste by our more dehumanizing economic realities and their rapacious appetites.
Most Americans don’t give a second thought about the laborers that put food on our tables and make much of our service-based economies run.
This is a narrow-minded approach that weakens us a nation.
Labor unions and livable wages, and a desire to offer the same benefits afforded to most of us will strengthen America and bear fruit that will once again turn this great land into the breadbasket of the world.
At a time when the globe is crying out for real innovation, economic justice and leadership.
There are people coming to this country today that can and will solve the problems of tomorrow if they are only afforded the dignity and opportunities that a truly great nation can provide.
It is time for us to become that Nation, again.
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Well written article. I feel the same as you, but alas there are too many spineless opportunists who are on Trumps team and everyone has to be on a “team” or in a group. Too many humans whose whole identity is: Trump supporter, golfer, Christian, etc. The thought of not being in their selected group or not having their identity freaks them out so they double down. Just wish more people were their own person and wanted everyone to succeed and be happy. 😎
Is there any chance of you being interviewed about Trump by the mainstream media to get this stuff out to a wider audience?