Declaring Emergencies

THERE IS NEARLY universal agreement among reasonable Americans, including some Republicans, that President Trump's declared emergency, much like Trump's honesty, integrity, and good judgment, is nonexistent. The House of Representatives has already repealed it, the Senate soon will, with sufficient republican assistance, and Trump will veto the repeal, thus fully exposing himself as a petty tyrant by formally declaring thousands of homeless, hungry Latin American mothers and children to be a national emergency, which they are most assuredly not. Desperate refugees constitute an emergency threat to the United States only in the twisted minds of the deranged. These homeless, hungry desperate people are actually a potentially golden opportunity for America; to gain hard working energetic young citizens with skills who will pay taxes and create prosperity, but it is quite beyond the capacity and willingness of those who hate immigrants with dark skin to comprehend this simple fact. By declaring a national emergency, the president assumes far reaching dictatorial powers, including the power to deploy the military inside the United States, the power to seize control of the media, including the internet, and the power to suspend basic civil liberties, including freedom of speech, habeas corpus, and legal due process, among others. A demagogues, possessed of poor judgment and hunger for power, can, simply by fabricating an emergency, become a virtual dictator, and that is precisely what President Trump has become, and now is. In the twenty first century, it can be argued, no head of state in any sovereign nation should ever, under any circumstances, be accorded such sweeping powers, certainly not in a democracy, or democratic republic. The sheer power of military weaponry and the reliance of modern culture on media sources precludes any reason, no matter how dire circumstances may become, for such extreme concentration of power in the hands of any one person, much less a power hungry, paranoid demagogue. What sort of person, if any, could ever be considered even remotely qualified to vest such powers in, even for a short period of time? The framers of the U.S. Constitution obviously had no intention of allowing for such a situation; otherwise, they would have written it into the document. Instead, they gave congress, and only congress, the power to suspend civil liberties and to assemble the military in times of emergency. In 1977, congress transferred this power, and much more power, to the president, during the cold war, thinking that modern technology and communication required the government to possess the capability to respond rapidly, and decisively, more rapidly and decisively can could ever be expected of a deliberative legislative body. Now, we are stuck with Donald J. Trump, and his politically motivated, false declaration of national emergency, and the likelihood that he will preserve it with a veto, assuming the Senate does indeed override it. Then, it will require a congressional veto override to finally put the irresponsible demagogue in his place, and the votes, among the republicans are not sufficient. Sadly, a sufficient number of Republican Senators will refuse to abandon their support of Trump, and refuse to preserve even the semblance of democracy. that is a tragic, sad price to pay for a petty tyrant's petty resentment of homeless, hungry refugees. And yet, we have no one to blame but ourselves, for having elected a cruel and heartless demagogue with poor judgment and even worse moral character.