Rules for thee, not for me
I have a story straight out of high school civics class. But first, one big question:
All of us remember sitting in Civics class when we were in school, learning about the structure of the government laid out in the constitution.
Here's the long and the short: our Federal government is split into three co-equal branches. These branches are meant to act as checks and balances on the others, ensuring that no single part of the government is more powerful than the other.
We also have a division of power between the states and the federal government, because the founders understood that there are some decisions which we must make as a country, and some on a state-by-state basis.
Earlier this month, the Supreme Court ordered Texas officials to remove barbed wire from stretches along the Rio Grande River because, in addition to being an archaic and brutal attempt to hinder immigration, it was impeding federal Customs and Border Protection agents from doing their jobs. This includes forcing federal agents to stand by while a mother and her two children drowned in the Rio Grande earlier this month.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott has refused to comply with the Supreme Court's order, as he is obligated to by the constitution, and rallied 25 other Republican governors to back his cruelty. Now, Speaker Johnson (showing his true, extremist, colors) has said he will do "everything in his power to back [Abbott] up".
I want you to think about just how many times we have heard the GOP demands for "law and order" and the basic sanctity of human life. Judging from these actions, it doesn't appear that they think either is too important, do they?
This is absolutely unacceptable and is just another case of the Republican party's "rules for thee and not for me" attitude.
Fired up and ready to go,
Jim
