The impossible dream

Politico: "Immigration talks quickly hit a wall."

Senators crashing on a two-week deadline to come up with an immigration plan are already sparring over funding for President Donald Trump’s border wall, what qualifies as border security — even what the scope of the negotiations are.

It was an inauspicious start Tuesday to the bipartisan effort to break the months-long impasse over Dreamers and the budget that crescendoed with last weekend’s government shutdown. That crisis ended quickly, but Congress could be back in almost the same spot in two weeks absent a deal that can get 60 votes.

Here's what I don't understand: Obama and the Democrats had eight years to put in place some kind of legislative remedy to help the "Dreamers."  But despite a promise as a candidate to make immigration reform "a top priority in my first year as president" he did nothing.  Then, once his Democrat majorities were safely squandered away, he flip-flopped on his Presidential authority and launched the illegal DACA program.

That program would have continued, unhindered, once there was a President Hillary.  Instead, Obama handed Trump a powerful tool in the immigration reform battle.  So - guess what? - the guy who ran a campaign by screaming "Build that Wall" at every stop wants...a wall.  I'm not saying he has a mandate and I'm not saying it's even an effective policy.  But the Democrats misread the public mood terribly on this issue and lost all their government-shutdown leverage.

Having sequentially squandered the initiative, the opportunity, the power, and the debate on immigration reform, who do the Democrats think they are setting terms?