What does it mean when my neighbors keep their Christmas lights up well past New Year’s Day? It should mean something good — thoughts of one’s neighbors, of the poor, of what we owe to each other, of calling up the best side ourselves.
I was out for a run last night, January 7th, and it felt to me like Christmas lights are hanging on longer this year than ever before. It could be the LED lighting revolution, but it could be something else, a spontaneous feeling, in house after house, that the lights this year haven’t yet finished their job.
How did we get to where we are now in the partial government shutdown? Late last year, a Republican House, the Senate, and the Executive Branch cannot agree on a budget with enough “wall” money to score a win for the President, so the Republican-controlled Senate passes a budget without. And then suddenly, our TV-watching Chief Executive changes his mind. Goaded on by Fox News commentators. Figuring he’ll win, because he doesn’t care who gets hurt when he starts burning it all down.
A year ago, Trump declared an end to DACA, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. When I try to start collecting my Social Security, these are young workers I’m depending on to pay into the water wheel system as my earned benefits come out. States have paid $10,000 per year to educate these children in public schools. They are integral in our community now. Very few Americans want to take the young grownups they’ve become, and throw them back to countries they never really knew. Now DACA needs legislation to come back. And DACA program members deserve a path to citizenship, not permanent status as a disenfranchised underclass from now until they die.
A wasteful, hateful monument to Trump, for over $5,600,000,000, with no solution to DACA? No! The last shutdown fight went Trump’s way a year ago. That’s why the good guys are digging in this year, and saying no.
People pass through stages. Children in school, and then workers paying taxes, and then the aged supported by Medicare. The Holy Family passed through the stage of being refugees, fleeing into Egypt to escape the infanticide ordered by Herod. Chief Executive of his day.
The Christmas lights are on our side this year, in support of the Government workers that POTUS has chosen to hurt just to make his point. So maybe they should stay up a while longer. A modest proposal.