Due to the 2018 midterm elections, America no longer has a functional Congress. About the only things getting done in Congress, such as judicial confirmations, are happening in the Senate and don’t require the House. The House, now controlled by Democrats led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, might as well go home.

To appreciate just how worthless the new House is, consider the budget. Federal budgets are legislation and originate in the House. For 2019, the Congressional Budget Office forecasts a deficit of $896B. That’s an increase of 15 percent from last year’s $779B deficit, despite a rise of 2.3 percent in federal receipts. But some think the deficit could hit a $1 trillion in 2019.

Having presided over the nation’s first trillion-dollar deficit in 2009, Pelosi is the most fiscally disastrous speaker in history. Voters were warned that she was lying about ever abiding by her promises of PAYGO. Every so-called “moderate” Democrat representative who vowed to not vote for this ridiculous woman to be Speaker of the House (third in line to the president) but who then voted for her, should be “primaried” in 2020, and never heard from again.

House Democrats are an alarming admixture of hoary antiques and feral children. But these two groups have one thing in common: the answer to everything is more government and more spending.

But Congress has been shedding its responsibilities for decades. Congress has ceded over its own authority and duties to the judiciary (by not removing judges who “legislate from the bench”), to the Federal Reserve (by expecting the Fed to keep unemployment down, rather than using fiscal policy to help the economy), and to the bureaucrats of the administrative state (i.e. the permanent government) to create regulations that have the same impact as laws. Congress has also forked over power to the president, such as the power to levy tariffs. There are exceptions, of course, but nowadays Congress is more like a gaggle of effete palace courtiers than a body of serious lawmakers.

On June 14, the American Enterprise Institute ran “Congress should fix itself before reclaiming its power” by Jay Cost, the blurb for which is: “The Constitution requires it to take the lead, but right now it’s too dysfunctional.” Mr. Cost addresses the tariff issue, and also gives us an elegant little history of what Congress used to be and just how Congress has been abdicating its role in the central government. I highly recommend Cost’s article; here’s a taste:

Public opinion is not terribly well formed, and it is easy to overinterpret. But in general it is fair to say that the people have been more likely to support cuts to congressional power than to support expansions -- and for good reasons. As a dyed-in-the-wool Republican, I do not like the idea of being governed by an imperial president and his army of unelected bureaucrats. But by the middle of the 20th century, congressional governance had become such an intolerable blend of incompetence and corruption that the “imperial presidency” was arguably... better.

The U.S. House under Pelosi shows us why “politics is show business for the ugly.” Would these preening dandies even exist if cameras weren’t constantly pointing at them? They actually think that they create rights for us, like a right to free healthcare, free college, and a guaranteed wage, even for illegal aliens. What have these miserable clowns done for Americans but rack up unimaginable debt for us and our children to pay off, send our children into stupid wars, embarrass us, and then expect gratitude?

Perhaps the most salient indicator of how worthless the U.S. House has become under Pelosi is their utter dereliction on the border crisis. First the Democrats (and their spayed lap dogs in the mainstream media) said it wasn’t a crisis; they even took umbrage at the invasion being called an “invasion.” Then they said it was a humanitarian crisis, but not a security crisis. Now they’re actually saying that the crisis is real but that it was created by President Trump.

If the Democrats in the House were worth anything they would have long ago passed a bill that dealt only with the problem at hand: the invasion. They wouldn’t lard up the bill with comprehensive immigration reform. Such a bill would address the disastrous practice of “catch and release.” But the Democrat House doesn’t deal with a crisis unless it benefits them; the American people be damned.

What we’re doing with the unchecked invasion by caravans from Central America is importing poverty and all the government expenses that go with it. We’re also importing disease and all the expenses that go with that. With the deficit headed back to a trillion dollars, if a recession were to hit the economy our problems will be much worse with all these millions of poor invaders. And what does Miss Nancy’s rabid caucus do but investigate the president? They’re worthless.

Recently on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show, Colonel Douglas MacGregor (ret.) outlined what he thinks needs to be done at the border. The following video takes five minutes and six seconds, and if you’re alarmed by the border crisis you need to watch it:

So, what would a declaration of martial law on the border, as Col. MacGregor advises, allow the military to do that we can’t do now? One would hope that martial law would allow the military to summarily return the invaders to Mexico, regardless of their asylum claims. That would mean that the military could ignore the insane diktats of the judiciary, like the ones that direct Homeland Security to release invaders into the interior of the nation without being checked for disease.

Maybe if the residents of Portland, Maine, come down with nasty cases of Ebola contracted from their new Congolese arrivals, Congress will start doing its job. But given Congress’ dysfunction on all matters dealing with the border, it’s time for President Trump to declare martial law on the border and send in the cavalry.

Jon N. Hall of ULTRACON OPINION is a programmer from Kansas City.