People Will Win

A few months ago, Trolling in Shallow Water posted an analogy between flows of water in rainstorms and flows of money in politics:

One phrase the inspector seemed to like was "water will win." Apparently this is an aphorism he picked up in the Army Corps of Engineers. What it means is that, unless you give water an easy route to somewhere harmless, it will make its own route by wearing through whatever is in the way. A roof is not kept in good condition by waterproofing alone; that will fail unless there are appropriate gutters and flashings to let the water run off the roof. Likewise, the rain gutters must give water a clear path to a point far from the foundation, or the crawl space will flood no matter how solid the foundation is. Water will win.

………

Money will win. Like water, if it is not given a clear path, it will wear its way through any barriers we may erect. The clearest path is to permit any American citizen to donate any amount of money he pleases, to any candidate he likes, at any time he wants -- with full public disclosure. It's the only way of shining sunlight on campaign financing that is consistent with the First Amendment and which we can reasonably hope to enforce.

After reading Eternity Road on the difficulties in enforcing immigration law, I realized we can add “people will win” to “water will win” and “money will win.” It's not enough to block off flows of water/money/people, we have to conduct them away. (That's one reason I'm less offended by Palestinian immigration to the West than many of my fellow Red-Sea pedestrians. We need the gutters and flashing.)