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One thing that was missing from the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings was something that is tough to find on the Potomac: ol’ fashioned common sense.

For instance, as someone who watched most of the hearings, I don’t think I ever heard any member of the Senate Judiciary Committee or the so-called elite media make the point that was probably running through the minds of average Americans: Human beings are usually completely different people at 17 than they are at 53.

As is so common in today’s politics, much of the debate — about whether to believe Kavanaugh or the woman who accused him of sexual misconduct as a teenager, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford — happened at the extremes with not much room for nuance.

Half the country seemed to think Kavanaugh was not capable of such misbehavior as a teenager because he was now such an upstanding man. The other half of the country thought Kavanaugh was no doubt capable of misconduct in his teens and that he was likely still engaged in such behavior.

Both sides were painted into corners. Those on the Right couldn’t concede that Kavanaugh had, at any age, ever done anything wrong. Those on the Left couldn’t admit that, regardless of what he was accused of doing as a teenager, he turned out all right.

Not me. I’m blessed to not live on the Right or the Left. And, that’s just as well since I often cannot tell them apart.

So, I had no trouble believing both narratives: that Kavanaugh was, as a teenager, an entitled train wreck who drank too much, and may have on occasion acted inappropriately with girls; and that he has, for the last three decades, lived an exemplary life marked by public service, devotion to family, and a genuine commitment to God and the Catholic Church.

Those two ideas can co-exist peacefully on the same plane. That is, they can both be true. It’s not either / or — despite the best efforts of politicians frame most public debates in precisely those narrow terms.

And the best way to understand this fact is to listen closely to what Kavanaugh said to supporters at a recent White House ceremony intended to celebrate his confirmation.

In his remarks, the newest justice on the Supreme Court made his case as plainly as anyone could by giving due credit to the three people who saved him — his wife and his daughters.

“My daughters, Margaret and Liza, are smart, strong, awesome girls. They’re in the middle of fall lacrosse, looking forward to the upcoming basketball season. I thank their teachers for giving them the day off tomorrow so that they can come watch two cases being argued at the Supreme Court.

“My wife Ashley is a proud West Texan from Abilene, Texas. Graduate of Abilene Cooper Public High School, University of Texas in Austin. She’s the dedicated town manager of our local community. She’s got a deep faith. She’s an awesome mom, a great wife. She is a rock.

“I thank God every day for Ashley and my family.”

As well he should. It’s hard to imagine the stress that this average American family has endured over the last several weeks. I’m sure that, at various times, both the nominee and his wife were tempted to walk away from the entire process, and withdraw from consideration.

That would have been a mistake, and a big loss for the country and the judiciary. But it would have been, for most Americans, totally understandable. Most of the credit for pulling us back from the brink, I’m sure, goes to Ashley, who stood by her husband in his hour of need.

The Brett Kavanaugh story is not about allegations of sexual assault, or teenagers who drink too much, or crude jokes scribbled in high school yearbooks. Nor is it about opponents overplaying their hand and displaying their hypocrisy, as they try to destroy the life of a fellow human being with no real evidence that he did anything wrong.

The Brett Kavanaugh story is about salvation and redemption and second chances.

It’s about a theme you find throughout the Bible, and in the lyrics of a glorious Christian hymn penned by English poet John Newton back in 1779. The words go like this:

“Amazing grace! (how sweet the sound)

That sav’d a wretch like me!

I once was lost, but now am found,

Was blind, but now I see…”

Americans understand this idea. Christians put faith in it. Most people have no trouble grasping the concept that we can be one person when we’re single and alone — and a completely different person after we get married and have children. That’s how life works.

It’s common sense. Which goes a long way toward explaining why this critical aspect of the Kavanaugh hearings eluded so many people who make their living in politics and media.

Ruben Navarrette is a contributing editor to Angelus and a syndicated columnist with The Washington Post Writers Group and a columnist for the Daily Beast. He is a radio host, a frequent guest analyst on cable news, and member of the USA Today Board of Contributors and host of the podcast “Navarrette Nation.” Among his books are “A Darker Shade of Crimson: Odyssey of a Harvard Chicano.” 

What have we become? America the furious? The land of the irate and the home of the enraged?

Our country urgently needs a full slate of anger management courses.

That’s one of the things we learned at the circus that surrounded the confirmation of Brett Michael Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court.

At first blush, one might think that everything the American people endured over the last several weeks was about an alleged sexual assault more than 30 years ago and the passionate manner in which the accused defended himself against the charge.

But 90 percent of what we’ve seen, heard, and been through during this public fiasco had nothing to do with Dr. Christine Blasey Ford or Judge Kavanaugh.

Consider the ugly confrontations of Republican senators by angry pro-Democrat, anti-Kavanaugh protestors. Just when lawmakers thought it was safe to go back in the Senate elevator.

First, a pair of Democratic activists who claimed to be sexual assault victims got into the personal space of Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona. They yelled and screamed and harangued the poor guy on his way to take his seat on the Senate Judiciary Committee. And naturally, they videotaped and distributed the whole spectacle. After all, if you speak truth to power, you had better have your phone handy to record it.

Flake was polite but quiet, hanging his head as if he had done something wrong and trying not to look directly at the protestors. “Look at me!” one of the women repeatedly screamed at him, proving that she knew more about social justice than social skills. When the Republican made his way back to the committee room, he was visibly shaken and ready to cut a deal with Democrats that would allow for what turned out to be a speedy FBI investigation into the allegations against Kavanaugh.

Once the investigation was over, and senators got ready to cast their votes for the judge’s nomination, there was yet another confrontation with yet another Republican lawmaker at yet another Senate elevator. This time, the target was Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah who was verbally attacked by anti-Kavanaugh protesters who were itching for a fight. When Hatch waved his hand, one woman took offense and shouted back: “You don’t wave your hand at me! I wave my hand at you!” Then she yelled at the senator: “Why aren’t you brave enough to talk to us?”

Unlike Flake, Hatch pushed back, albeit with dismissiveness and condescension. He told the woman: “When you grow up, I’d be glad to.” That made her even angrier, and she yelled back: “How dare you talk to women that way?!”

The whole exchange was videotaped and circulated widely on the Internet, which is the real goal of these confrontations. No one is trying to convince anyone. The idea is to embarrass them.

Anyone still think that public tantrums like these are about Kavanaugh or Ford? These hearings, and the allegations against a Supreme Court nominee, were the spark for this eruption of public anger. But the kindling was already there.

When political observers try to pinpoint when the well of judicial nominations got poisoned by such intense acrimony, many cite the bitter confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork, who was rejected by the Senate in October 1987.

But I think the public anger, which often spills out way beyond politics, had a different birthdate. I think it started with the Bill Clinton administration, and how furious — and frustrated — conservatives got with a public figure, who they saw as morally flawed and yet impossible to defeat at the ballot box. Add two terms of George W. Bush, who Democrats found just as flawed and just as tough to beat. And follow that with two terms of Barack Obama, who — well, you get the idea.

In the absence of being able to come up with a viable political alternative to keep some of these races competitive, anger became the national default position for conservatives and liberals alike. And over time, this anger was compounded.

So here we are. Half the country is in the face of the other half. We don’t think anymore; we just yell the loudest. We’re not guided by reason; we’re driven by emotion. We’re spending so much of our lives racked by pain, anger, and hurt feelings that some are missing out on life. We carry around us our traumas and victimization, and we wait for someone or something to come along that we can dump it all on.

Someone like Brett Kavanaugh, who was made to pay for the sins of every man who ever acted improperly toward a woman. That is a long list.

If Americans are fired up and want to get angry over something, they should get angry over that.

Ruben Navarrette is a contributing editor to Angelus and a syndicated columnist with The Washington Post Writers Group and a columnist for the Daily Beast. He is a radio host, a frequent guest analyst on cable news, and member of the USA Today Board of Contributors and host of the podcast “Navarrette Nation.” Among his books are “A Darker Shade of Crimson: Odyssey of a Harvard Chicano.” 

It’s the $57 million question. That’s roughly one dollar for each Latino/a living in the United States.

The question — which I seem to be getting asked a lot lately — goes something like this: “What needs to happen for Latino/a students to fulfill their full academic potential?”

The answer has been hard to come by for the last few generations, even to people who work in the educational system.

Correction. Better make that especially to people who work in the educational system.

Not good. America is becoming more Latino by the day. Currently, one in four children in kindergarten is Latino. If this population isn’t better served by our public schools, the whole country will be in great difficulty.

Because my brain works in threes, I’ll tackle the subject from three different angles: My own experience as a student, teacher, and parent; what I’ve learned over the years from studying education, teaching students, and being around educators; and what, as a journalist, I’ve gathered from interviewing current and retired teachers and administrators.

— First, my own experience. I’m the hexagon who wound up at Harvard. In elementary school, I benefited from ability-grouping. My teacher divided up 30 students into five groups of six students each, and assigned each group a shape. There were circles, squares, triangles, rectangles. I was a hexagon, one of the smart kids, and the only Latino in that group. I worked hard over the next six or seven years in the toughest courses available. I became valedictorian and went to Harvard. But one of the reasons I found myself on track to take those difficult courses was because I started out as a hexagon.

After college, I spent five years as a substitute teacher in my old school district, where I saw the plague of low expectations up-close in a way that I never did as a student. It’s amazing what you can pick up in the teacher’s lounge about which students are expected to go to college or which are more likely to wind up in jail. The one big lesson I learned was that the public schools don’t exist for the convenience and benefit of the young people who study there but rather for the convenience and benefit of the adults who work there.

Now, as a parent, my wife and I have learned another lesson: not all children learn the same way, and so they ought not be taught in the same manner. My three kids attended a Montessori charter school for the first several years of their schooling. Today, our 11-year-old son — who needs rules, deadlines, supervision, and consequences — goes to public school. Our daughters — ages 9 and 13 — are being homeschooled by my wife, who is a teacher, and spending part of their week in supervised instruction at a traditional charter school. So far, everyone seems to be going with the flow of their specialized educational approach. Apparently, one size doesn’t fit all.

— Second, given what I’ve learned over the years about educational best practices from experience and research, I always come back to one idea over all others: In order for Latino students to realize their academic potential, all three legs of the stool — parents, students, and teachers — have to be working together and treating one another with respect. Instead of undermining one another, or shifting blame while making excuses for what they’re not doing well, all three entities must work in concert toward the common goal of educating the student. That doesn’t always happen, but it needs to.

— Third, from many years of reporting and listening to educators tell me what works and doesn’t work in reaching and teaching Latino students, I have heard some good ideas. A high school principal told me that the priorities should be early learning at the K-3 level, hiring enough school counselors and psychologists, and finding qualified and well-trained teachers who can learn new tricks. A retired teacher said the secrets were maintaining effective communication between home and school, requiring strict accountability for student performance, and changing how we think about education to the point where we pay teachers more and perhaps even give them low-interest home loans to encourage them to remain in the profession.

For me, helping Latino/a students fulfill their academic potential starts with changing the paradigm. Fifty years ago, if that promise went unfulfilled, it was assumed there was something wrong with the student. Twenty-five years ago, the blame shifted to Latino parents who, according to a vicious lie, didn’t value education. Now it is time to put the blame where it belongs: on the schools, and the people who work there.

Folks like to talk about fixing what’s broken. The schools are what’s broken. Let the fix begin there.

Ruben Navarrette is a contributing editor to Angelus and a syndicated columnist with The Washington Post Writers Group and a columnist for the Daily Beast. He is a radio host, a frequent guest analyst on cable news, and member of the USA Today Board of Contributors and host of the podcast “Navarrette Nation.” Among his books are “A Darker Shade of Crimson: Odyssey of a Harvard Chicano.”

Many parents will relate to this story. My three children may be growing up in the same house. But — at 9, 11, and 13 — they’re quickly growing into totally different people.

My oldest daughter’s first word was: “dada.” My middle son’s first word was: “mama.”

But, I’m pretty sure that my youngest daughter’s first words were a loud and definitive protest that went like this:

“It’s not fair!”

That’s how it is with many families, I’m sure. The baby always feels like they’re the one with the eternal grievance, the one who has been wronged, the one who always gets ignored or winds up with the short end of the stick.

And this is how it is with my little girl. At least once a week, she makes certain to inform my wife and I that something isn’t right in her world. Either she is not getting her share of ice cream, or she is being asked to do one too many chores.

So, to stick up for herself, she’ll holler: “It’s not fair!”

Lately, every time I hear my daughter belt out say those three words, I immediately think of that old saying about how no one ever said life was fair or promised it would be.

I think about how John F. Kennedy — our nation’s first and, to date, only Catholic president — made a point of telling Americans, every chance he got, that they should not expect fairness at every turn or for life to turn out to be a bowl of cherries. In March 1962, when asked by reporters at a press conference about his plan to send more U.S. troops to Vietnam, Kennedy noted: “There is always inequality in life. Some men are killed in a war and some men are wounded and some men never leave the country. Life is unfair.”

There it is. Short and sweet, with the added benefit of being true. Life is unfair. Deal with it. Simple as that.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Those of us who have gone a few rounds with life will attest to the unfairness, but also to the virtues in accepting that fact without complaint and without casting yourself as a victim.

There is no point in that all-too-common exercise, which only makes obstacles in your path or the adversaries who put them there.

Just don’t try telling that to factory workers in Ohio who lost their jobs when the factory closed years ago, and who are still hoping it re-opens. Or the young Latinos who have never had a decent job to lose, and think white people are holding them back.

Don’t tell that to the white male who didn’t get into Stanford and who is convinced that what he considers a less qualified African-American woman took his spot, or an African-American high school student who thinks his classmates enjoy “white privilege” because they can afford tutors and test preparation courses.

And, above all, don’t waste your time trying to sell that line to my 9-year-old daughter who is not about to surrender her victim status without ample compensation. It gives her leverage, and — sadly — even a built-in excuse if she ever comes up short in whatever goal she pursues.

“Don’t look at me. It’s not my fault. Life is unfair.”

No one wants to hear about how we must accept the unfairness of life and rise above it. They’re all wedded to the narrative that casts them as the victim, and they’re not about to let go.

Moreover, every four years, they can look forward to a steady stream of presidential candidates coming by and promising them that they will restore fairness by ending a trade deal, scrapping affirmative action, re-opening a factory, closing the border, imposing a tariff, starting a trade war or doing anything else that must be done to “level the playing field.”

Not that old chestnut. I guess it falls to me to reveal what many of us have already learned: There is no such thing as a level playing field. Not in this life, not anywhere. There never has, and there never will be. It’s a total fantasy.

Sure, there are Americans — including our president — who think that our country got shafted by the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada. Guess what? The Mexicans think the same thing. Ditto for the Canadians. That’s the very nature of trade deals. Everyone who has ever signed one thinks they got taken to the cleaners by the other parties.

Some people start off with advantages over others, or have to overcome obstacles that others will never face. Some people sprint through life, others hobble. Some people are handed their inheritance on a silver platter while others scrape for everything they have. Some people have a God-given talent for an art form, while others struggle to express themselves.

There is no way to smooth out all those rough edges, no matter what some loose-lipped politician promises you. And yes, you may indeed be victimized now and then by this or that. But the trick is not to let that injustice define you or defeat you.

Recently, I’ve learned a thing or two I didn’t know about my alma mater. According to the New York Times, the Harvard admissions office has — since the 1970s — discreetly maintained something it calls the “Z-list.” In recent years, about 50 to 60 applicants wind up on the list on the condition that they agree to defer their enrollment by one year. It has been alleged in a lawsuit over the school’s admissions policies that many of the students on the list are legacies (i.e., the children of alumni) who might not otherwise have the academic credentials to get in on the natural.

These days, of every 100 students who apply to Harvard, only five get in. It is currently the most selective college in America.

According to the Times, there is also a “dean’s interest list” or a “director’s interest list” that identifies candidates with other connections to Harvard. Presumably, these people also get special treatment in the admissions process.

Are you kidding me? What happened to merit, standards, maybe a little friendly cut-throat competition?

All these trap doors, and secret passageways, and underground tunnels running underneath Harvard Square so that the privileged and the elite can find their way to the mother ship of privilege and elitism. Shh, don’t tell anyone.

And it never ends. Look where I sit, what I see every day. God didn’t give me athletic, musical, artistic or mechanical ability. But He gave me this — the ability to express myself with passion and clarity in ways that make people think.

Granted, I’ve done a fair amount with that gift over the years. Even so, I do now and then run across other individuals in my line of work who are further down the track. They’ve accomplished more, accumulated more accolades, achieved more fame.

Often, these people had a head-start or a leg up. Sometimes, all they had — or needed — was well-connected parents who went to the right schools and belonged to the right clubs.

Me? I’m the grandson of farm workers, and the son of a retired cop. I grew up in farm country in a town surrounded by grapevines and crippled by low expectations. What connections did I have?

I think of my Harvard classmate Jeff Zucker, the president of CNN, who spent his summers home from college interning with NBC News thanks to a family friend and wound up running the peacock network at one point.

Or conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh who has, on numerous occasions, told his audience that he got his first break in broadcasting thanks to his father’s connections.

Or journalist Carl Cannon, whose father, Lou, built a solid reputation in our business and became a biographer of Ronald Reagan.

Or Mark Halperin, the former political director of NBC News, whose father was a foreign policy expert and served in three presidential administrations.

Or Ross Douthat, New York Times columnist, who recently discussed with the podcast, “The Axe Files,” hosted by CNN’s David Axelrod, how he was recruited out of Harvard to write for The Atlantic because the editor came looking for talent at the Harvard Crimson, where Douthat was writing a column.

That’s how life works. Some people get breaks that others don’t get, and it’s not always about talent or skill or merit or hard work or getting what one deserves. Sometimes it’s just about dumb luck. Sometimes it’s about knowing the right people — or merely being in a position to meet them someday. The list of the lucky, and the connected, goes on and on.

So what? What are any of us supposed to do about this? We can’t change it. Some things will go our way, and other factors will go against us. We have to take the good with the bad — and adapt. We shouldn’t expect the world to be fair, but nor should we fall apart at our first encounter with unfairness.

This is what we should be teaching our children — that they should be grateful, thoughtful, helpful and kind but also resilient in the face of adversity. They don’t need to be taught how to succeed, but rather how to persevere when they fail. And they don’t get to use the mysterious unfairness of the universe as an excuse for their mistakes, missteps and shortcomings. That’s on them.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have an important sermon to give to a certain precocious 9-year-old who thinks the whole world is against her.

Ruben Navarrette is a contributing editor to Angelus and a syndicated columnist with The Washington Post Writers Group and a columnist for the Daily Beast. He is a radio host, a frequent guest analyst on cable news, and member of the USA Today Board of Contributors and host of the podcast “Navarrette Nation.” Among his books are “A Darker Shade of Crimson: Odyssey of a Harvard Chicano.”

I’ll just say it: I believe both of them.

In this climate, I’ll get hammered by loyal partisans on both the right and the left for reaching such a conclusion. But I don’t care.

We’re living at a time when a lot of people can decide whether testimony is believable even before hearing it. Don’t confuse us with facts, we’re too busy formulating an opinion.

But the truth is tricky. You might think there is only one version. You’d be wrong. The mind is a mysterious thing with the power to convince us something happened or didn’t happen.

Think of all the people who sit in jail right now, wrongly convicted and hoping to one day be exonerated by DNA evidence. Many of them are locked up because of one of the most unreliable forms of evidence: eyewitness testimony. You have all these people doing their civic duty who, it turns out, were 100 percent certain of identifications that were false.

Thirty years ago, I spent a semester back home in Fresno County working as a law clerk at the Public Defender’s Office. I spent the next semester seeing things from the other side of the table by working at the District Attorney’s Office.

One thing I learned: The criminal justice system is terribly imperfect, just like the human beings who created it. Mistakes are made every single day. Guilty people sometimes go free, while innocent people sometimes go to jail.

I believe that something terrible happened to Christine Blasey Ford at a house party in Maryland more than three decades ago, and that she sincerely believes — and has always believed — the culprit was Brett Kavanaugh. The same Brett Kavanaugh who is now a federal judge who has been nominated to the Supreme Court.

Ford was authentic, believable and effective in her testimony Thursday to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Only partisan Republicans, acting out of reflex, would say otherwise.

But I also found Kavanaugh authentic, believable and effective — especially when he talked about the enormous cost to loved ones, including his daughters, and how his family had been “destroyed” by these accusations and the spiteful way in which they were handled by members of the committee. Only partisan Democrats, acting out of reflex, could not see that.

This is not a repeat of what happened in the fall of 1991. In the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill hearings, you had to believe one narrative or the other. Either Thomas was obsessed with Hill, or Hill was obsessed with Thomas. I believed Hill.

This is not that. I believe — and I think many Americans now believe — that both Ford and Kavanaugh are telling their truth as they know it, and that each of these individuals has paid a high price for doing so.

What a disgusting system we have for confirming judges to the federal bench, including these high-stakes confirmation battles for seats on the Supreme Court.

Advise and consent has now degenerated into horrify and disgust, or insult and attack, or seek and destroy. More and more, it’s become painfully clear — no matter who is president, which party controls the Senate, and who sits on the Judiciary Committee — that the very last thing this process is about is the nominee.

My wife, who is foreign-born, is still learning about our system, and I sometimes have trouble explaining it to her. This was one of those times.

“You mean this whole thing isn’t about figuring out the truth and finally knowing what really happened?” she asked.

She believes Ford, and only Ford. She thinks Kavanaugh is lying to save himself, and that women don’t forget details of a sexual assault.

No, I told her, truth is not on the menu in these hearings. Elections have consequences. Presidents pick judicial nominees, and, usually, they’re confirmed. These hearings are mostly about giving senators a chance to preen, pontificate and perform. They get to have their “Spartacus” moments and collect “b-roll” footage that they can use to raise money and create campaign commercials when they compete for re-election or run for president.

“Oh, c’mon! Are you kidding me?” she exclaimed. Then she threw up her arms and stormed out of the room.

Given the salacious allegations leading up to these hearings, I assumed the program would be rated “TV-MA” — for mature audiences only.

But having binged on the hearings and watched what was probably an unhealthy amount of the proceedings, I would have labeled the spectacle “TV-BS” — for broken system.

What did you think I meant?

© 2018, Washington Post Writers Group

Email: ruben@rubennavarrette.com. His daily podcast, “Navarrette Nation,” is available through every podcast app. To comment, submit your letter to the editor at SFChronicle.com/letters.

Recently, I wrote a provocative column for USA Today that made a lot of sense but made almost no one happy.

In it, I revealed myself to be a NeverTrumper who was hoping the first term would be the last, and who would welcome impeachment. That part angered the right.

But then I listed 20 items — of both style and substance — that President Trump had done right in his first 20 months in office. That part angered the left.

One of the more controversial items on the list went like this. Trump was right to:

“Refocus debate on immigration reform when he ended DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) and tried to force Congress to confront the issue of what to do with the Dreamers.”

A week after the column ran, I was in Colorado for a speech at Colorado Mesa University. Members of the community were invited to attend, and a well-meaning but not well-informed white liberal immigration lawyer did.

During the question and answer session, the lawyer went to a microphone with a copy of the column in hand. Then he fired off three questions: What on Earth was I thinking? And since I am often identified as the most widely-read Latino columnist in America, didn’t I see how dangerous it was for me to write such a thing? And, finally, what would I say to a Dreamer to explain to him or her why I thought Trump was right to end DACA a little more than a year ago, a move that put many of their compadres at risk of deportation?

Once you brush aside the condescension of a white liberal lecturing a Mexican-American about what’s best for undocumented immigrants in the United States — most of whom are Latino, you wind up with good questions.

And here is how I answered them.

First, I said, I don’t explain anything to anyone, and that includes Dreamers. If they don’t like what I wrote, or if they have a different opinion, then they are free to write their own columns and express their own opinions. And many do write op-eds or appear on cable shows or write books or give speeches. This population of young people lacks legal status, but it certainly doesn’t lack media attention or a microphone. I don’t work for them, and it’s not essential that they always agree with me.

Second, I said, as someone who has been writing about immigration for 30 years — longer than many Dreamers have been living in this country — I would imagine that I know more about DACA and how it impacts the immigration debate than most people in the media and most Dreamers. And what I know leads me to oppose DACA, as a temporary band-aid over a bullet wound that President Obama offered instead of a permanent fix that couldn’t be yanked away on a political whim.

Moreover, given that Obama required DACA recipients to turn themselves into law enforcement, get fingerprinted and photographed, and hand over their home address where immigration agents could find not only them but also their undocumented parents and siblings, DACA was a treat but a trap. Anyone who would like to argue otherwise, please be my guest. You can start by explaining the benefits of Donald Trump now having in his possession the home addresses of nearly 700,000 Dreamers.

Third, I said, if Obama had the Constitutional right to start DACA, it’s hard to argue that Trump didn’t have the Constitutional right to end it. The immigration issue always belonged at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, and Congress can’t run away from it anymore. Trump killing DACA forced Congress to confront this important but thorny issue, even if lawmakers then proceeded to do so poorly. Pressure is a good thing in politics, and no good comes from the executive branch releasing the pressure on Congress to fix the immigration system by simply kicking the can down the road and extending DACA in perpetuity.

That’s pretty much what I would tell Dreamers about why Trump was right to end DACA, even if the outcome makes them feel uncomfortable and vulnerable.

And, while we’re on this topic, I would add a few more items for Dreamers. I would tell them that in politics, things aren’t always what they appear to be; that you can, in the end, only count on yourselves; that you should work with everyone but trust no one; that you should ask questions, be skeptical of those in power, and not just take what’s given to you out of desperation or a misplaced sense of party loyalty.

Trump may have ended DACA for all the wrong reasons, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t the right thing to do. And we shouldn’t be afraid to say so.

Ruben Navarrette is a contributing editor to Angelus and a syndicated columnist with The Washington Post Writers Group and a columnist for the Daily Beast. He is a radio host, a frequent guest analyst on cable news, and member of the USA Today Board of Contributors and host of the podcast “Navarrette Nation.” Among his books are “A Darker Shade of Crimson: Odyssey of a Harvard Chicano.” 

I’m not one to back down from a challenge from the likes of Tucker Carlson.

The Southern native has spent much of his life on the East Coast, most of all Washington, D.C. I’ve known him for 20 years, since he wore a bow tie and was considered a moderate who supported immigration and had no beef with multiculturalism.

He was regarded by fellow Beltway journalists as an excellent magazine writer, and a thoughtful chronicler of politics and culture.

That was then, however. The new Tucker — the one with a primetime show on Fox News, a two-book deal worth $9 million, more than 2 million Twitter followers, and about 2.7 million nightly viewers — is not exactly kinder and gentler than the old one.

Quite the opposite. He has become mean, snide, condescending, and hostile to immigration. He most certainly does not see people of different colors and cultures as his equal, and he is not shy about showing it. Most of all, he enjoys tackling sacred cows — then killing and grilling them.

Recently, Carlson — who, it has been shown by media critics and civil rights groups alike, has a strong following among white supremacists — questioned the value of diversity.

Few cows are more sacred. Diversity is something pursued by everyone from the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies to Ivy League admissions officers to government recruiters.

In fact, how’s this for a small world? Achieving diversity in its workforce is also a stated objective of 21st Century Fox, the global media company that owns Fox News and pays Carlson’s multimillion-dollar annual salary.

Still, when it comes to pushing racial hot buttons, it often seems as if Carlson can’t control himself. Thus, he mused:

How, precisely, is diversity our strength? Since you’ve made this our new national motto, please be specific as you explain it. Can you think, for example, of other institutions such as, I don’t know, marriage or military units in which the less people have in common, the more cohesive they are? Do you get along better with your neighbors, your co-workers if you can’t understand each other or share no common values? Please be honest as you answer this question.

Very well. I can be both specific and honest.

First, I have to challenge the ludicrous suggestion that diversity is — for Americans — “our new national motto.” Americans have many national mottos.

We have the one that the Founders left us: “E Pluribus Unum” (“Out of Many, One”). And the one that defines how we feel about immigrants: “There Goes the Neighborhood.” And the one that springs from a nation of victims: “Call My Lawyer!”

Meanwhile, diversity is a desirable goal and a widely acknowledged asset. But it is not a motto, national or otherwise.

Second, I can, in fact, think of many institutions that are diverse and yet quite cohesive. Not in the phony contrived sense that Carlson puts forth — “the less people have in common, the more cohesive they are.” The less of this, the more of that. But plenty diverse and still cohesive.

Yes, in fact, it is true in marriage; if it’s really the case that opposites attract. And it’s also true in the military; the rank-and-file include people of all races and backgrounds, who are Christian, Jewish, and Muslim.

And the fact that members of this group are different doesn’t make it any less cohesive. They still come together as one — around their love of country, commitment to service, and sense of duty.

Also, while I’m touched that Carlson cares so much about whether I get along with my neighbors and co-workers — even if we speak different languages and come from different cultures — he needn’t worry. We all get along fine. We do understand one another, and we have many shared common values — like family, work, sacrifice, faith, patriotism, education, and more.

Finally, America is a magical place where people find commonality even while relishing their diversity. My college roommate — a Connecticut Yankee, Italian-American, and Catholic — told me a story about taking Italian cookies to school for “ethnic day” and being embarrassed that they did not look more like mainstream cookies.

The story rang a bell, because many years earlier my parents had — in Central California — experienced the same discomfort whenever they took tacos to school for lunch.

You see, our differences don’t get in the way of our similarities. Our differences are our similarities.

I was blessed to grow up in a small farm town with friends who were Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Armenian, Portuguese, Jewish, Irish, German, Italian, Filipino, Swedish, and Mexican.

I learned about their cultures, and they learned about mine. Everyone got along. There was no cultural conflict or ethnic strife. And from that, I’d like to think, came empathy and the ability to see things from the point of view of a friend or neighbor.

In fact, I see this dynamic every day in my work. For instance, if I write a column about farming and the labor shortage and include a few lines about the kind of wages farmworkers are typically paid these days, there is going to be a gap in understanding between those who come from the city and others who were raised in the country.

It’s extremely useful to able to communicate with both camps, and you’re only able to do that if you take the time to understand different types of people.

Finally, all of his recent crusading against diversity makes me wonder what Carlson’s day-to-day reality is like. Does he surround himself only with people who look, think, act, and speak like he does? If so, I feel sorry for him. That’s no way to grow, no way to learn.

We all need to challenge ourselves by going outside our comfort zones now and then and exposing ourselves to opinions different from our own. Otherwise, we’ll become soft and predictable and not very bright — suitable for no other employment than, perhaps, a hosting gig on Fox News.

Women have pressured Julie Chen Moonves over her husband, but she didn’t do anything wrong. When did we start punishing women for their husbands?

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Time to set some boundaries.

Public figures are not public property. And while they live their lives in the public eye, there are still things that are none of the public’s business. Every human being deserves some degree of privacy, and there is nothing more private than family.

This includes the relationship between spouses. Most of what goes on between a husband and a wife is their business, and no one else’s.

Remember what defenders of President Bill Clinton said in the late 1990s after he acknowledged an improper “relationship” with a former White House intern? The Democrats’ talking point was: “If Hillary Clinton doesn’t have a problem with it, why should voters?”

But that was before the #MeToo movement, which doesn’t know when to quit.

Sean Penn would probably agree with that last part. During a recent interview on NBC’s “Today,” the actor said that much of the #MeToo movement is “too black and white,” and that “it’s really good to just slow down.”

Others’ marriages are none of our business

Now what should go without saying must be said: It is none of your business, none of my business and certainly none of the business of the women on ABC’s “The View” whether Julie Chen Moonves — a co-host of CBS’ rival show, “The Talk” — is standing by her husband, Les Moonves, the disgraced former chairman and CEO of CBS Corp.

Media observers noticed when Chen Moonves — who has long identified herself simply as “Julie Chen” — recently used her full name in an apparent show of marital solidarity. Some wondered whether the co-host could still do her job.

“I think it’s going to be hard for her to go back to ‘The Talk,’ ” said Joy Behar, co-host of “The View.” “What topics can they do? They can’t talk about the #MeToo movement without her coming clean about her husband.”

Foul-mouthed comedian Kathy Griffin was more blunt. In a tweet, she shared a message that she claimed to have recently sent Chen Moonves. It went like this: “F— you and your misogynistic husband. You two deserve each other. …Bye b–ch.”

Now Chen Moonves has quit her job at “The Talk,” saying in a video statement that right now, she needs to “spend more time at home with my husband and our young son.”

The departure should please those who thought it was inappropriate for a woman to participate in a talk show aimed at women when her husband is accused of assaulting women.

Notice I said that it is her husband, the former network chief, who faces accusations. Not her. Chen Moonves is her own person, with her own life and career.

Why should she be punished, or pressured to do anything, because of what her husband stands accused of? Shouldn’t she be allowed to have a zone of privacy around her marriage — and be able to separate her private life from her public one?

Should women be defined by their husbands?

That might be too much to ask when you’re the one accused of misconduct. Consider the spectacle surrounding Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, who stands accused of an act of sexual misconduct that allegedly took place more than 30 years ago. Even if Kavanaugh is innocent, he cannot hope to have a protective barrier of privacy around his family.

But, again, what misconduct has Chen Moonves been accused of?

Finally, I have to wonder: Is this where the feminist movement has taken us after more than half a century? I have two daughters. I always thought those who wanted to empower women, push for equal rights, battle wage inequality, and ensure that girls have the same opportunities as boys also believed that women shouldn’t be defined by their husbands.

Now some of those same people are eager to hold a woman accountable for her husband’s behavior. Gosh, that was a short ride.

I’ve been married for 15 years this week, and there are still times when I feel like I don’t understand the rules. Now it seems the rest of society doesn’t either.

We have enough respect for the martial bond to not compel a wife to testify against her husband in a court of law. But we reserve the right to bully, in the court of public opinion, a wife who stands by her husband?

Let’s give women like Julie Chen Moonves some space. Most of us don’t have any idea what they’re going through.

Besides, Americans have bigger problems. We’re a mess. Social skills are out the window. We’re in each other’s faces. We impugn each other’s motives, think ourselves superior to everyone else, and put tremendous stock in our own opinion while dismissing opposing ones.

No wonder we so often step over the line. More and more these days, as we’re reminded by the case of Julie Chen Moonves, we don’t even know where the line is.

Ruben Navarrette Jr., a member of the USA TODAY Board of Contributors, is a syndicated columnist with the Washington Post Writers Group and host of a daily podcast, “Navarrette Nation.”  Follow him on Twitter: @rubennavarrette