How does this work? — protect the borders, but don't pay the Coast Guard?

© 2018 Peter Free

 

27 December 2018

 

 

Unintended consequences and feeble minds

 

Republicans talk a lot about protecting America's southern border against impoverished brown people.

 

(The brown part is why they don't worry about the northern one.)

 

And President Trump is willing to have part of the federal government close down, in his effort to force Congress to fund his border wall.

 

 

Meanwhile . . .

 

During the resulting (partial) shutdown, the Coast Guard looks like it will not be paid:

 

 

The Coast Guard is the only branch of the military directly affected by the partial shutdown that began Saturday because it’s funded through the Department of Homeland Security. The other branches receive their money through Department of Defense appropriations, which were signed into law in September.

 

With the DHS funding lapsed, roughly 44,000 active-duty Coast Guard members will be working without paychecks until Congress and the White House reach a deal to reopen the government and provide back pay.

 

Another 6,000 Coast Guard employees are being furloughed, according to DHS guidance. That means they won’t be working and any pay for the shutdown period would have to come retroactively, through an act of Congress.

 

A Coast Guard spokesman said active-duty members are usually paid on the first and 15th of each month. If the shutdown persists through Friday, they would not receive their scheduled Jan. 1 paychecks.

 

© 2018 Dave Jamieson, These Service Members Will Work Without Paychecks During The Government Shutdown, Huffington Post (26 December 2018)

 

 

Gee

 

I thought the Coast Guard helped protect American borders. And did other important first responder stuff, like saving people who inadvertently meet hostile waters.

 

Yet, the quasi-grifters in elected American governance think that it's okay to screw with them. While the screwers go home on Christmas break to diddle around raising money. Campaign money, so that they can continue their Fat Cat gigs.

 

 

The moral? — Mental ability and reliable honor are generally not among elected national leadership's list of talents

 

Is it true that we get what we deserve?

 

Or is the problem deeper than that — as Greek philosophers long ago surmised?