In July, New York Times columnist Bret Stephens offered a notable mea culpa, acknowledging his failure to read or empathize with the mood of about half of the country. “I belonged to a social class that my friend Peggy Noonan called ‘the protected.’ My family lived in a safe and pleasant neighborhood. Our kids went to an excellent public school. I was well paid, fully insured, insulated against life’s harsh edges,” he wrote.
We have all seen the iconic photo allegedly showing a horse-mounted Border Patrol agent “whipping” a Haitian migrant on the banks of the Rio Grande on Sept. 24, 2021. We now all know that the report was false. No “whipping” or “strapping” ever occurred.
Summer is over. Kids are heading back to school and members of Congress are heading back to Washington to try to hammer out a federal budget for the new fiscal year that begins on Oct. 1. In the best of times, this is never an easy undertaking – and these are most certainly not the best of times.
In an alternative universe – otherwise known as Capitol Hill – the 8.9 million largely low- and unskilled, illegal migrants who have poured across our borders since President Biden took office is still not enough to satisfy the insatiable demands of the U.S. business lobby for low-wage labor. As legislators race to approve some funding mechanism to keep our federal government operating past 11:59 pm on Saturday, they have somehow managed to find the time and the chutzpah to champion provisions that will massively expand the number of temporary low-skilled guest workers that will be available to business interests.