gulliver
gulliver's JournalA New Spirit of Compromise
(BNN, Washington)
In what many are calling a "New Spirit of Compromise," President Donald Trump reached an agreement with Republicans in the Senate and House on the Trump Wall.
"The era of gridlock has ended," announced Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. "The United States Congress and the President of the United States have created a new spirit of compromise. We now have a president who understands what compromise means."
Details of the revised legislation emerged over the past three days as Congressional Republicans worked long hours to craft the agreement with President Trump's team. Trump officials confirmed that the wall height in the legislation will be fixed at 12 feet for the entire 40-mile length of the wall.
"The new wall will be beautiful," announced a jubilant Trump via Twitter. "It's bigger and longer than the Great Wall of China. And Mexico is paying for it." BNN has not been able to confirm that the planned wall will in fact be bigger and longer than the Great Wall of China, although the claim raised some skepticism among Democrats. Reached for comment, Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi alleged that the wall in China was actually "a lot bigger than that, you idiots."
In a statement to the press, a spokesman for Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto confirmed that Mexico has agreed to pay for the wall. "What can we say, Trump voters? You win. Mexico will pay for the wall with new bonds. Your President Trump truly drives a hard bargain. Your American Social Security Administration is getting a great deal on the bonds."
Man-on-the-street interviews with Trump supporters found them supportive of the compromise. "With Obama in power, this never would have happened," said Arnold "Arnie" Arnold. "Never. We finally have a government in Washington that knows how to work together to give the American people what they deserve."
Scarborough Fair (update for the American voter)
Are you goin' to Scarborough Fair?
Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme
Remember me to one who lives there
They once were a leader of mine
Tell him to lead us to better healthcare
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
With everyone happy on the way there
Then he'll be a leader of mine
Tell her to manage the Wall Street crowd
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
And never say "capitalism" out loud
Then she'll be a leader of mine
Tell her to fight like a female Conan
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
But funny, authentic, and not like a man
Then she'll be a leader of mine
Tell him to bring all Earth's people together
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
With us right behind him (barring bad weather)
Then he'll be a leader of mine
Are you goin' to Scarborough Fair
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Remember me to one who lives there
They once were a leader of mine
Resiliency
You can't be resilient if every little thing tailspins you into emotional oblivion. What Donald Trump has shown (and what George W. Bush showed before Trump) is resiliency. Nothing destroys a person or position that has it. No matter how many times George W. Bush made himself look like a complete idiot on live TV, he simply bounced back and acted like it didn't matter. By doing that, he made it not matter. Trump did and does the same thing constantly.
People on the left are going to make mistakes, even mistakes that make them look "dishonest" or "two-faced" or "traitors to the cause" or "stupid" to one person or another. We need to just accept the fact that everybody is a little dishonest, a little two-faced, a little judgmental, a little selfish, a little sneaky, a little dumb, a little stuck up. None of those things should surprise us. None of them should shake loyalty or self-acceptance at all. We need to stop being so damned emotionally lightweight and easy to turn.
Part of the double standard treatment Hillary and all Democrats get is our own double standard. We need to be the good guys, not the saints. It's easy to be the good guy, nearly impossible to be a saint. We need to wear our dirt proudly. Then when someone tosses more dirt at us, it won't be noticeable.
Dem "political power systems" need to adopt a less hackable architecture.
Our political architecture is vulnerable to dedicated adversaries. If you think of Dem political power as a system, we have numerous system vulnerabilities. These have been demonstrated in the most convincing way possible, by exploitation. Someone needs to hit the whiteboard. We need a security upgrade.
Since the Dems tend to be the brains of the outfit when it comes to American politics, our vulnerabilities translate into American vulnerabilities. We owe it to the country to not be so incompetent when it comes to security, not just computer security but the overall robustness of our entire system. That includes institutions like the DNC, processes like the primary system, and computer systems. We have more fence holes in all of those than fence.
The Republican system is much more robust than ours. It isn't vulnerable to rationality, empathy, or ethics at anything near the level we are, for example. They don't play by the same rules we do. Even a cataclysm like the George W. Bush presidency wasn't enough to destroy the Republican Party. They learned from it. We didn't.
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