In WaPo Marc Thiessen makes the case that President Trump’s address to the nation was a big win for the embattled President:
And he laid out his solution, which he explained was “developed by law enforcement professionals and border agents” and includes funds for cutting-edge technology, more border agents, more immigration judges, more bed space and medical support — and $5.7 billion for a “physical barrier” that he called “just common sense.” Without naming her, Trump responded to the absurd charge from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) that a wall is “immoral.” Democrats voted repeatedly for physical barriers until he was elected president, he noted. If a wall is immoral, Trump asked, “why do wealthy politicians build walls, fences and gates around their homes? They don’t build walls because they hate the people on the outside, but because they love the people on the inside.”
Thiessen, of course, is well-known as a Trump apologist who has twisted himself inside out on occasion to justify Trump’s record. Steve Benen’s reading of the situation is hardly correlational with Thiessen’s:
He probably won’t admit it publicly, but Donald Trump reportedly didn’t even want to deliver his Oval Office address last night.
The New York Times reported, “[P]rivately, Mr. Trump dismissed his own new strategy as pointless. In an off-the-record lunch with television anchors hours before the address, he made clear in blunt terms that he was not inclined to give the speech or go to Texas, but was talked into it by advisers, according to two people briefed on the discussion who asked not to be identified sharing details.”
The president, of course, delivered the speech anyway, and by any objective measure, it was a transparent failure. As became painfully obvious over the course of his nine minutes, Trump has no plan. He has no new material. He has no offer to extend to his rivals. He has no bill to promote or lobby on behalf of. He has no facts, as evidenced by the avalancheof falsehoods he peddled to the nation. He has no support, with polls showing broad American opposition to his demands for a border wall.
Benen, too, reads the events of the day through his prism, and while I have more sympathy for his take on things – and in particular his reference to polls which document the lack of public support for Trump’s wall – it comes to mind that, in reality, it’s better to wait for polls to emerge indicating whether the citizenry was swayed, or not, by the President, by the Democratic response – or if they just didn’t give a shit. Either or both of these writers may hope to sway opinions.
But while I was contemplating the various spins presented, it seems that after these two and more years, one fact about walls finally tapped me on the shoulder and asked me why I hadn’t mentioned it yet. It’s this:
Do walls at zoos exist to keep visitors out? Or the animals in? How about prisons?
Did the Berlin Wall exist to keep the Western hordes out? Or to keep the citizens of Communist Germany IN? If my reader is too young to remember the Berlin Wall, go look up the statistics on how many people were killed by the Communist guards for attempting to go over the wall, and their identities.
For those readers who prefer to interpret reality through the prism of fantasy, consider the purpose of the wall at the Tower of Cirith Ungol.
Now, I’m not really sure how this all applies to our particular situation. Perhaps it doesn’t. But in all the yelling and screaming from both sides, it’s worth remembering that walls can keep people in as well as out. And that’s an infringement on our freedom, now isn’t it?
