It is Time to Cut Puerto Rico Loose

In the present system, Puerto Rico, a financial and demographic weight on the United States, needs to be cut free and forced to sink or swim on its own. Apparently, US President Donald Trump is at least somewhat sympathetic to this point of view. CNN reports:

President Donald Trump suggested Thursday that Puerto Rico is going to have to shoulder more responsibility for recovery efforts from Hurricane Maria, saying the federal government’s emergency responders can’t stay there “forever.”

His comments — in which he also blamed the beleaguered island for a financial crisis “largely of their own making” and infrastructure that was a “disaster” before the hurricane — come as Puerto Rico still reels from a lack of electricity, public health access and a rising death toll.

…He wrote in two separate tweets, “‘Puerto Rico survived the Hurricanes, now a financial crisis looms largely of their own making.’ says Sharyl Attkisson. A total lack of……..accountability say the Governor. Electric and all infrastructure was disaster before hurricanes. Congress to decide how much to spend…”

…He continued in a third tweet: “We cannot keep FEMA, the Military & the First Responders, who have been amazing (under the most difficult circumstances) in P.R. forever!”

Most Puerto Ricans have fled their homeland to take advantage of opportunities and government benefits in the mainland USA. About 5.4 million Puerto Ricans live in the US while just 3.5 million live in Puerto Rico. As the Los Angeles Times has reported, Puerto Ricans are “pouring into the US mainland”:

The mainland had already been absorbing record numbers of Puerto Ricans fleeing economic decline and a mounting debt crisis, with more than 700,000 migrating between 2006 and 2015. Some people also moved back over that time, but after decades of population growth, the island saw the total number of residents drop from about 3.8 million to 3.4 million — or more than 10%.

To be brutally honest, this debt-ridden island of Spanish-speaking mulattoes has little potential in the modern world. As an agrarian colony with a traditional hierarchical and paternalistic system it could be productive and stable again. But democracy and equality assure that Puerto Rico, like many other regions of the former Golden Circle plantation civilization, is doomed to be a burden rather than an asset for any civilized nation which claims it.