Help Wanted -- NINA

NINA = No Immigrants Need Apply

Picture this ad:

Help Wanted -- NINA. No experience or competence necessary. Absolute loyalty a must. Apply: 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., Washington DC. Our motto: "You take the job, you get the blame."

   The White House said it would set up a "war room" to combat the barrage of allegations against President Donald Trump.
   Apparently there were no volunteers, so the draft plan was abandoned.
   There are some 558 high-level government positions that require Senate consent, but only 123 have been nominated, and fewer have been approved. Also, no new U.S. attorneys have been selected. After the inauguration, half the 93 federal prosecutors around the country resigned, and the rest were fired. In addition, there are many hundreds more job openings waiting for presidential nominations that do not require Senate approval.
   So for all the campaign talk about the need for jobs, the president has the ability to hire several thousand people for key government jobs, but has not done so. Why?
   One can only speculate, and one reason could be that he doesn't care. But one reality is that some of those he has hired have since resigned or have been sacked, some for good cause and some because their loyalty to the president's ever changing wish was not absolute. This includes James Comey, the director of the FBI, who had to choose between pledging loyalty to Trump or doing his duty as a law enforcement officer.
   At least, that's part of the story. The president has yet to explain in detail why he fired Comey, except to say that "he wasn't doing a good job."
  What a  way to run a country.

   Meanwhile, for those who don't recognize the acronym at the beginning of this blog posting, the initials NINA originally stood for "No Irish Need Apply," and it was common in mid-19th Century newspapers, along with such phrases as "applicants of all backgrounds considered, except no Irish."

   Bigotry and discrimination are no strangers in American culture, but to see and hear a president endorse, proclaim and demand such practices, ranging from building a border wall to preventing newcomers from entering solely because of their religious beliefs, sounds a strong danger signal for the future of this diverse nation.
   By the way, the Constitution specifically prohibits any religious test as a requirement for any office or public trust in America (Article VI). Citizenship is a public trust.
   It's time this president read the Constitution he took an oath to "preserve, protect and defend."
   Instead, he is actively working to dismantle it.
   Now it's time for Congress to call him out.