Not going to happen, even if purely for the economic reasons. Unless the Captain is willing to gamble the whole enterprise.

I think you've got it backwards: The current administration--and its 2016-2020 predecessor--have demonstrated they are exactly the type of "captain" that wrecks ships trying to play chicken with an incoming lighthouse.

Republicans already passed a budget giving ICE a crazy amount of taxpayer dollars, a subset of that being $45 billion-with-a-B directly earmarked for the creation of new "detention centers". If "economic reasons" were gonna stop them, it would have already happened.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politic...

I wonder where this thinking comes from.

"The current administration won't do X because that would hurt Y."

Nevermind they have demonstrated over and over again they don't care what happens to Y.

It it just cope? Is it overfitting being used to old school politicians who talk a big game but are afraid to destroy the whole country?

The thinking comes from the understanding that even on a pirate ship, if the Captain tries to sink the ship, he will be offed. History has proven this again and again.

Not really: History has plenty of opposite examples as well.

Some particularly striking cases involve cults, where the members are anything but exemplars of homo economicus.

Yes, we were using a captain/ship metaphor for bad leadership ruining everything, but that doesn't mean everybody on board is structured as a pirate crew.