Remember Mr. Obama’s version of a plan?
Yeah, a sticky note with almost no detail behind it. What about Mr. Trump’s version of a plan?
Trump seeks $18 billion from lawmakers for border wall
The Trump administration has told lawmakers that it wants $18 billion over the next decade for the initial phase of a Mexico border wall, laying out for the first time a detailed financial blueprint for the president’s signature campaign promise.
The money would pay for 316 miles of new fencing and reinforce another 407 miles where barriers are already in place, according to cost estimates sent to senators Friday by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. If the work was completed, more than half of the 2,000-mile border with Mexico would have a wall or other physical structure by 2027.
“Detailed financial blueprint.” It’s a little easier for Congress to get things done on their end if you tell them how it’s going to be done and where the money is going. Of course, this is the Washington Post, so, by paragraph 3, we get Outrage
Democratic lawmakers blasted the $18 billion request, first reported by the Wall Street Journal, and it arrived in the middle of delicate budget negotiations that include the risk of a government shutdown Jan. 20 if no deal is reached.
“President Trump has said he may need a good government shutdown to get his wall. With this demand, he seems to be heading in that direction,†said Sen. Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Immigration subcommittee.
Interesting. The border wall is already required by law. Furthermore, why do Democrats have such a problem with securing the U.S. border from outside invasion? It is one of the actual duties laid out in the U.S. Constitution, unlike, say, mandating that little girls must share bathrooms, showers, and locker rooms with the gender disturbed. If they think the Republicans, or, at least Trump, won’t be bringing this weakness up in the runup to the midterm elections, you haven’t been paying attention. And he’ll get the media to cover it with his tweets.
Anyway
In addition to the $18 billion in wall funding, the CBP also requested $8 billion for additional personnel and training, $5 billion for new border technology and at least $1 billion to build more access roads. The final price tag for the CBP spending plan would exceed $33 billion over the next decade, according to a copy of the document obtained by The Washington Post.
Benjamin L. Cassidy, the DHS assistant secretary for legislative affairs, said in a letter to Durbin that the funding requests “were developed through a rigorous assessment and are derived directly from the experience and insight of U.S. Border Patrol Agents in the field, supported by operational data and analysis.â€
So, Democrats want to go against the advice of the people who actually do the job. An $33 billion over the next decade is a small price to pay for border security.
Crossed at Right Wing News.
I particularly loved President Obama’s “refinancing for responsible homeowners.” What actually happened was that the government bailed out the irresponsible, taking tax dollars from people like my family, which bought a home we could afford — we borrowed less than one year’s annual income, and we never missed a payment — to give to people who bought far more home than they could afford.
When they couldn’t keep up with the payments, the government took money away from people like me, to give to people who bought homes which were valued more highly than the one we owned.
Under liberal government, when you do everything you are supposed to do, the government penalizes you and rewards those who do the wrong things.
Of course the taxpayers paid trilions (not billions) to bail out and prop up the Wall St banks and their shareholders. That doesn’t bother you but a little help to the homeowners swindled by the banksters does. You probably feel sorry for tRump for swindling all those students who paid him to attend the fraudulent “tRump University”.
It’s reasonable to debate whether the gov’t has any responsibility to victims of fraud other than forcing the perps to compensate the victims. Even in that case the wealthy (e.g., tRump) can avoid responsibility with their access to a retinue of attorneys (e.g., tRump) to negotiate the best deal.
Who says that it didn’t bother me? I didn’t support the automobile industry bailout, and will now buy only Fords, because Ford was the sole American carmaker which didn’t take the bailout.
That Lehman Brothers collapsed bothers me exactly as much as the Enron collapse did: none at all. That the government bailed out others does bother me, but at least some of the bailout has been repaid; the HARF refinancing never will be.
I have no problem with letting failures fail.
Toyota, Nissan and Honda are also American car makers who didn’t take bailouts. They didn’t need them.
Well of course, the stupid and inept need govt to survive and they’ll vote for more of that. People who are not idiot children do not need someone to provide for them their entire life. You are an existential threat to the parasites that both administer and receive the fruits of your labor.
Glad you agree that the stupid and inept on Wall St and their investors didn’t deserve the trillions in support. Whatever happened to the risk of investing? How much value did they receive knowing that the banks were “too big to fail”? That knowledge likely increased the banks’ values by billions. The US gov’t stepped in and made the banks whole. Investors would have lost billions otherwise. It’s good to be rich!
Do you drive on our roads? Deadbeat. Do you now or do you plan to receive Social Security and Medicare benefits? Deadbeat. Ever collected unemployment? Deadbeat. Enjoy the fruits of living in this stable and secure society? Deadbeat.
Almost all of our federal expenses go to defense, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and interest on the debt. What spending would you eliminate?
Glad you agree that the stupid and inept on Wall St and their investors didn’t deserve the trillions in support. Whatever happened to the risk of investing? How much value did they receive knowing that the banks were “too big to fail� That knowledge likely increased the banks’ values by billions. The US gov’t stepped in and made the banks whole. Investors would have lost billions otherwise. It’s good to be rich!
Agreed. All of that is theft. And since those people give most of their support to the Dems but still get plenty of support from the GOP, they are both in the wrong. There should be no corporate welfare. There should be no welfare period, it is theft.
Do you drive on our roads?
Yes, I pay fuel taxes and all other taxes associated with operating a passenger and commercial vehicle. Income taxes amount to slavery.
Do you now or do you plan to receive Social Security and Medicare benefits?
No, this is an unconstitutional pyramid scam that I’ll never see anything from. Forty years ago my parents knew that they would never see their money from it. Everyone knows that it is a scam – it needs to go away, good money after bad and all that.
Ever collected unemployment?
No, I think that it’s amoral.
Almost all of our federal expenses go to defense, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and interest on the debt. What spending would you eliminate?
All defense based and acting in foreign nations, including foreign aid payments, I would give them the option of purchasing the service at current PMC prices where every grunt and gun bunny made 6 figures a year.
Social Security, gone. Unconstitutional, broke, and a scam.
Medicare/Medicaid, gone. Unconstitutional, and it negatively impacts the marketplace.
I don’t have a problem with unemployment compensation, because it is paid for through a separate tax levied by the government, just as are Social Security and Medicare. Workers are paying for unemployment insurance through payroll deductions.
I have said it before: even if I had a billion dollars in the bank, I would collect every last euro of my Social Security and Medicare benefits, because I was required to pay Social Security and Medicare taxes specifically for those benefits.
The GOP owns America, controlling the White House, the Senate, the House and the Supreme Court. They should just build their wall, deport the Dreamers and pay for it all by slashing billions out of Medicare and Social Security. It’s the will of the voters who elected the Repubs to Make America Great Again.
@Dana, I understand that, but am not comfortable receiving monies to not work. Self reliance is something that I’ve worked hard on for myself and to instill in my now adult children. I grew up desperately poor, and my parents would’ve never considered a handout of any type. I strive to be the man that my father is.