Can you believe it? Even The New York Times has come around to seeing there is a crisis at the southern border and it has to be addressed, which is to say, Democrats should give the Trump administration the $4.5 billion it has requested to deal with death, sickness and misery. This horror is afflicting not just a few but tens of thousands of illegal immigrants taking advantage of progressive malfeasance.

The Times, while conceding the Trump team is right this time around, wants you to know that it has been absurd and worse in past rumblings about drugs and murderers and such. In fact Trump has time and again referred to humanitarian concerns. Yes, he has bleeped demagogic stupidities as part of a seemingly irrevocable style, although few any more objectionable than the politically evil theory that walls are evil.

Perhaps Trump’s own worst move was a government shutdown that in effect said we will hurt the innocent if you don’t compromise with us. That’s inexcusable. It was also inexcusable for House Democrats to reject a bill that would have funded not just some wall-building, but more border agents and a change in a law that incredibly says come one, come all because we will let loads of you unchecked lawbreakers wander about the country as you see fit.

Please, please tell me why the Democrats could not see that one triumphant caravan would breed more triumphant caravans? How could they miss the need for more border agents given ever larger numbers of immigrants who could not conceivably be dealt with properly by the number of agents on hand? How could any truly caring, open-minded legislator not grasp that a legally reworked asylum law could have could induced more safety through rational orderliness?

And, as an issue that points to politics overruling information, why did some Democrats make it sound as if Trump were still talking about a 2,000-mile wall, or one that was concrete or 30-feet high? How come they did not know that walls do in fact work and can help free border agents up to forestall possible human tragedies? Oh, and getting back to the Times and other critics, why didn’t they know that some killers were sneaking through along with human traffickers and that the Trump administration knew you had to address points of entry to stop drug smuggling?

Yes, it’s true that dictatorial Central American regimes have established murderous living conditions for some and, despite what a number of unobservant idealists are saying, nation building does not work. But please also understand that a Gallup poll says 150 million people worldwide would like to immigrate here and, if we don’t have some sense of sovereignty and limits, we could be crushed.

The immediate issue at any rate is taking care of those assaulted by the conditions in part perpetrated by too many liberals always heeding self-righteous intentions until the consequences say ready, aim, fire. As the Times wisely points out, neither Democrats nor Republicans should get so caught up in side issues as to neglect the suffering of these people.

We must do what’s right in the here and how and then revisit what will be right for the long run, including merit-based legal immigration that is not thereby neglecting the needy. People with job skills can be needy, too, and they are less likely to endure hardship in America and more likely to contribute to the national good. As the Trump administration knows, we must also address those overstaying their visas with an E-Verify system. And there’s another matter recently raised again, and that’s Trump’s suggestion that walls could be topped by solar panels. Some university research shows that’s feasible.

Yes, we are a nation of immigrants, but we are also a nation of laws, without which there would be no nation at all.

Jay Ambrose is an op-ed columnist for Tribune News Service. Readers may email him at speaktojay@aol.com.

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