Dr. Diana Pi is a Lorain physician.Dr. Diana Pi
WESTLAKE, Ohio — President Donald Trump called climate change a Chinese hoax. What he may not know: In addition to cooking up weather data, Chinese are very good at a few other things, like fireworks — and building walls.
Everybody knows the Great Wall of China. It spans over 13,000 miles, visible from space, an awe-inspiring feat of human fortitude, ingenuity — and wishful thinking. Currently, it is China’s No. 1 tourist attraction. The nation’s pride, if you will — in a way that your family is famous for having a great aunt who has a horn growing out of her forehead. It may or may not be funny at the time, but it’s making your family famous.
China’s obsession with wall-building started over 2,000 years ago with six warring tribes, each walling defensively. When the Qin tribe defeated the others, the leader, King Zheng, connected the walls, giving birth to the first long wall. He went down in history as the first Chinese emperor and the first of many, many rulers who fancied a wall could keep his harem, wealth, empire and his royal self safe.
To keep costs down, he enslaved his people, and the carnage began. The Great Wall was expanded and improved upon dynasty after dynasty, and couldn’t keep out the invasion of hostile tribes, nomads, and barbarians. Mind you, in retrospect, no wall can keep a dynasty, no matter how brilliantly or brutally it had started, decaying from decadence, corruption, internal power struggling, and sheer incompetence.
So I have a few concerns and humble suggestions for President Trump on building the second greatest wall on the planet.
Read more: How would Trump’s plan to pay for Mexico border wall work?
First, about keeping out the “bad hombres.” Forget the facts that drug cartels own their own planes, speedboats and submarines, and desperate migrants can walk, run, swim, crawl, climb, rappel, drive, fly, and, I don’t know, ride hot air balloons. There’s the emerging problem with border tunnels. According to a recent article from the Los Angeles Times, 148 such tunnels — some equipped with electricity, ventilation, rail carts and elevators — have been uncovered since 2006. Every gardener knows: Ten-foot fences can’t keep out gophers.
Second, I’m concerned that the wall (let me be one of the first to honor it by calling it the “Trump Wall”) is practically a thousand-mile blank canvas for liberals and other pranksters to graffiti-deface the president. And that’s just the American side of the wall; who knows what the Mexicans are going to write on their side of the wall. Did you see the Berlin wall the day it came down? Imagine those living at the border having to look at “My Body, My Choice,” “We are the popular vote,” “I did Na-zi it coming,” “January 20, 2017, End of Earth,” “Keep Bahis Siteleri your [picture of small hands] off my [picture of female reproductive organs].”
Third, President Trump estimated the cost of building the 1000-mile-long, 40-foot-tall, precast-concrete wall to be around $8 billion to $12 billion. Other experts, including one from an October 2016 MIT Technology Review article, estimate it to be around $27 billion to $40 billion. The Mexican government already has said it’ll pay “nada.”
If we can’t cover the wall’s construction cost and its subsequent maintenance by ending the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act for millions of Americans, trimming Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, and gutting the Environmental Protection Agency and Sesame Street, President Trump might consider pulling one of his all-time business tricks: Negotiate the contract with the Mexican powers-that-be, have them build the wall, and once it’s complete — stiff them with the bill.
Lastly, the Chinese have an unfortunate nickname for their Great Wall — “the longest cemetery on Earth.”
To avoid the appearance of autocracy, isolationism, and a total lack of empathy, I suggest we get the country’s children (who might well be paying for this wall after they retire) cheering by having a naming competition. Choose, reluctantly, “Trump Wall” over “Patriot Wall.” And celebrate it each year on our National Day of Patriotic Devotion (for those who missed the tweet: President Trump had proclaimed Jan. 20, the day of his inauguration, a national holiday) with lots of fireworks.
As a child, my mother told me a great love story surrounding the Great Wall. The young and beautiful Lady Meng Jiang just got married when her husband was drafted to build the First Emperor’s Wall. Winter came, she heard nothing from him. Defying the tradition of domesticity, she set out looking for him, carrying his winter clothes. She suffered immeasurably getting to the wall. Upon arrival, she learned that he had already died from exhaustion. Lady Meng Jiang cried for three days and three nights. Her tears shook the bones of every passer-by — and the gods, who rained torrents, eroding part of the wall. The wall crumpled, revealing her husband’s bones. She died with him.
Liberals and feminists will weep. But concrete walls don’t crumple where tears fall.
Dr. Diana Pi is a physician at the Lorain County Free Clinic.
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