Groundbreaking

Abbott sent the National Guard to the Texas Border, a few years back. They got so bored some went AWOL (i.e., home), and some attempted suicide. I’m sure it was quite the recruiting mission. “Join the Guard! Go sit on the border!”

Six members of the Guard — including infantrymen, officers and two officials in leadership roles — spoke of low morale and deep concern that the deployment may hurt recruitment for the state-based military force for years to come," reported Shawn Hubler, shielding their identities to protect them against military rules prohibiting discussing active deployment. "All but one of the six expressed reservations about the deployment."

Many of the members "said they had raised objections themselves or knew someone who objected, either because they did not want to be involved in immigration crackdowns or felt the Trump administration had put them on the streets for what they described as a 'fake mission,'" the report continued.

“The moral injuries of this operation, I think, will be enduring. This is not what the military of our country was designed to do, at all,” one member of the Guard told The Times.

A number of Latino soldiers were uncomfortable with what they were being asked to do, the report continued.

"In one incident that several soldiers said occurred early in the deployment, 60 troops were awaiting transport to planned immigration raids in Ventura County when a Latino soldier approached officers in charge of the mission. He told them that he strongly objected, and he offered to be arrested rather than take part in the operation. Eventually, they said, he was reassigned to administrative tasks. Officials at the military’s Northern Command declined to comment about the incident."

Additionally, the report noted, many of the soldiers called up to the Joint Forces Training Base in Los Alamitos in Long Beach didn't end up doing much.

"Mostly, they said, they lounged in warehouse-sized tents, listening to music and playing games on their cell phones. Only about 400 of the 3,882 deployed Guard members had actually been sent on assignments away from the base, Guard figures showed."

You see, the problem with democracy is that it’s like the fabled mills of God: it grinds slowly. But it grinds exceedingly fine. Trump’s stunts with immigration have both failed spectacularly, and driven over 3/4’s of the country to think favorably of immigrants. Overcoming American xenophobia, by making Americans sympathize with the immigrants? Who but Trump and Miller could pull that off?

And wrecking morale from the DOJ to the DOD? I mean, I get it that ICE is 99% thugs, but I don’t think that’s changed.  What does seem to be changing is the ground Trump thought was underneath his feet.