For 35 years, I proudly served as a government employee, honoring the provisions of the Hatch Act, which severely restrict the rights of civil servants to engage in political activity. Now that I am no longer restricted, I can state my opinion that what gave rise to the current shutdown is not politics, it is the vindictiveness of an incompetent, petulant narcissist, who does not care how dirty he plays, as long as he wins.
So the “great mind” that rejects global warming, but who is convinced that both “wheels and walls work,” has latched onto another ancient invention as a means to defeat those who disagree with him: the siege. Surround the enemy city in order to starve the innocent women, children and men who work and live within its walls, in order to secure victory from their rulers.
Not just government workers, but all of us suffer because of a president who fails to understand that “the art of the deal” is ensuring that all parties to a negotiation can reach a point of accommodation — ideally a win-win solution — through good-faith bargaining. It is not, however, good faith when one party takes hold of innocent people who are not a party to the negotiations, and threatens them with bodily harm unless the other side agrees to spend billions of dollars on an ineffective project that merely stokes the ego of the tyrant. There must not be any bargaining until the hostages have been released.
Releasing the hostages by lifting the siege must be a prerequisite for continued negotiations; otherwise, the siege will be restored to a place of honor in the arsenal of incompetent leaders.
Jim Palermo
Southampton