In a more quaint time, government shutdowns and playing chicken with the debt limit were common tactics to take something away from people.  Now it’s committing international human rights atrocities to get what they want.  This new tactic is nothing but hostage taking.  In the 1980s, Reagan used several government shutdowns because the budget contained spending he didn’t like.  Newt Gingrich used government shutdowns trying to get slashes to Medicare, public health, and education spending.  The 2011 budget drama caused S&P to actually downgrade the US’s credit rating for the first time ever due to the irresponsibly of the Congressional Republicans’ continuous brinksmanship.  In 2013, they tried it again when brand new Senator Ted Cruz whipped up the House to shutdown the government in an effort to take healthcare away from millions of people.  All this screwing around never works, but Republicans continue using showdowns over the debt limit and budget to kill everything from healthcare, social spending, to funding Planned Parenthood.

Which brings us to now.  Donald Trump lied in a continuous stream about many, many issues, but one of his biggest lies was that he was going to build a “big beautiful wall” to keep dark-skinned people out of the country.  The most outrageous part of that promise was that, through his singular strength and negotiating prowess, he was going to make Mexico pay for it.  The notion was and is idiotic, and everyone but his biggest sycophants dismissed the promise as extreme hyperbole.  As expected, Mexico shot Trump the finger, and former president Vicente Fox makes sport of regularly poking him in the eye over the issue.

Having failed at destroying healthcare for millions of people and after blowing a gigantic multi-trillion dollar hole in the nation’s budget passing out tax cuts to billionaires, he’s now trying to keep his most outrageous promise by pushing funding in the federal budget and taking money from parks and military budgets to build his wall, but the Democrats have planted their feet saying no.  So, to put pressure on the them, Trump’s in-house white supremacist, Stephen Miller, with the help of a few other deplorables, cooked up the scheme to start holding dark skinned people hostage on the border.  As is typical for extremists, Miller miscalculated, but Trump and Jeff Sessions stupidly blundered into this political and human disaster.

Sessions defended this new hostage taking plan and continues to do so, even in the face of loud and getting louder opposition.  This tactic is also the reason that Trump’s newly assigned talking point blames the “Democrats’ terrible law” that’s forcing him to take hostages.  As we all know, there is no law.  He’s taking thousands of children hostage, in violation of international human rights laws attempting to force the Dems to fund his stupid wall.  It’s familiar territory for him, since he’s connected so closely to the Mob.  You know that line, “Cute kid – it would be a shame if something bad happened to her.”  That’s PRECISELY what Trump’s doing.  To force Dems to fund his wall, he’s doing irreparable damage to thousands of children and even more parents.

How anyone could support a politician who so regularly takes hostages is beyond me.  Such a tactic is not only immoral, it costs US taxpayers billions of dollars and destroys our standing on the world stage.  A government shutdown that merely costs jobs and damages the economy is one thing.  This tactic is literally costing lives. The Dems should stand fast, and we should back them doing that.  Like the Mob, extremists don’t compromise; they destroy and threaten until they get their way.  It’s time to take that tool away from them.