The New York Times has discovered the crisis at the United States Southern Border. Yippy skippy, right? The article is titled “The U.S. Immigration System May Have Reached a Breaking Point” with the subhead “For years, there have been warnings that America’s immigration system was going to fail. That time may be now.” So, the manufactured border crisis is now a real crisis? And, the warnings have been there for years? Oof. Welcome to the party, NYT.

As recently as December, 2018, the failing New York Times was publishing quotes about the manufactured border crisis. It’s nice that they at least recognize the problems, Baby steps. Today, the Times reported:

The migrants come now in the middle of the night or in the bright light of day. Men and women arrive by the hundreds, caked with dirt, with teens and toddlers in tow. They jump the small fences in remote parts of Texas, and they gather on the hot pavement at the main border crossing in California. Tired and fearful, they look for the one thing that they pray will allow them to stay in the United States, at least for a while: a Border Patrol agent.

That first sentence is just weird. So, like, if it’s a cloudy day, they hang back? It must be the middle of the night or the “bright light” of day? Sorry. This is not funny. There is more:

Gone are the days when young, strong men waited on the Tijuana River levees for their chance to wade across the water, evade capture and find work for the summer. These days, thousands of people a day simply walk up to the border and surrender. Most of them are from Central America, seeking to escape from gang violence, sexual abuse, death threats and persistent poverty. The smugglers have told them they will be quickly released, as long as they bring a child, and that they will be allowed to remain in the United States for years while they pursue their asylum cases.

The next paragraph is key:

The very nature of immigration to America changed after 2014, when families first began showing up in large numbers. The resulting crisis has overwhelmed a system unable to detain, care for and quickly decide the fate of tens of thousands of people who claim to be fleeing for their lives. For years, both political parties have tried — and failed — to overhaul the nation’s immigration laws, mindful that someday the government would reach a breaking point.

That’s right. Both political parties have failed and failed and failed again, on purpose. The Democrats and the Republicans have failed on purpose to address illegal immigration. The United States NEEDS migrant workers who come seasonally. The United States NEEDS educated and motivated immigrants to fuel the economy. The United States does not NEED families endangering children to make a dangerous trek with smugglers who will abuse and abandon them. Our spineless politicians do nothing.

And, no matter what you think, we are damn good to these people. Check out this video from the CBS Evening News:

Those poor, chubby-cheeked, well-scrubbed children. Wait, just a minute there. Those children don’t look impoverished to me. Not like I have seen poverty in parts of the United States. Those children don’t look like they are trying to escape gang violence, say the way some kids are in Chicago. Sexual abuse and sex trafficking are far more likely to happen on the dangerous trek through lawless areas with coyotes who prey on the vulnerable.

Which all leads us back to the border crisis. If we have to shut down the border, then shut it down. These “caravans” keep coming and coming:

The immigration courts now have more than 800,000 pending cases; each one takes an average of 700 days to process. And because laws and court rulings aimed at protecting children prohibit jailing young people for more than 20 days, families are often simply released. They are dropped off at downtown bus stations in places like Brownsville, Tex., where dozens last week sat on gray metal benches, most without money or even laces on their shoes, heading for destinations across the United States.

At the current pace of nearly 100,000 migrants each month, officials say more than a million people will have tried to cross the border in a 12-month period. Some of those arriving today will have a strong legal case to stay under international refugee treaties and federal asylum laws, but most won’t have a formal asylum hearing until 2021.

And, while they are waiting for their hearings, they will tax the abilities of the communities they are bused into all across the United States. This makes every community a border community. Maybe now, Nancy Pelosi won’t “reject” the facts of the Homeland Security Secretary.

The border crisis is real and the time to act … well, it was decades ago, but let’s start now.

Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons.org/Public Domain