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Sandbagging our Principles

The Red River, flowing north into Canada, meanders through what used to be grass and swamps and prairie.  In the Spring, every year since the glacier melted, the river bloats, and floods thousands of acres of land which was once vacant, but which now has cities and towns and farms and fools. 

Fargo, North Dakota, and Moorhead, Minnesota are two of those cities, and they are the home to the largest collection of sandbags north of New Orleans.  There are a hundred schemes to solve the problem of water coming into the basement, climbing up to the first floor, easing on up to the second floor and the attic and, finally, over the T.V. antenna.  Most of the solutions involve building a huge levee that will divert the water to the people outside the levee, or on the other side of the river.  Others involve building dams to hold on Red River tributaries, and allowing it to flood whoever is upstream. 

This morning I heard a Red River Valley resident lament that, although he hated big government, he was tired of all the competing patchwork solutions that only made problems for everybody.  He said that the federal government had to step in and do something because nobody else could do it. 

That's a little like hating health care until you need it,
like hating unemployment insurance until you lose your job.
It is like hating immigrants until you remember that your name
is Gunderson, or Gilhooly, or Swartzkopf, or Jones. 

There are times when we have to take our principles in hand and do the right thing. 

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