Immigration: Of Things Illegal And Legal

Let’s be honest here; America is a nation OF immigrants.  Not only that, but the greatness of our nation is in large part the product of the greatness of those immigrants.  This isn’t, or shouldn’t be, surprising.  After all, it is the precise individual who is willing to risk everything to come to an unknown land in order to build a better life for himself that creates the very greatness we’re discussing.

With that said I’ve been baffled by the resistance republicans have to immigrants and immigration reform.  Baffled for two reasons:

  1. It is the leftist that is the statist.  It’s not the lovers of Liberty that want to empower the state to dictate the whos, the whys and the whens of an otherwise free people to decide where they wanna live and work.  Building a state that controls such thing is normally the domain of the left, of the democrat; of the statist.  It distresses me that the republicans have abandoned a principle based in Liberty like this.
  2. The Latino population is not one that naturally is liberal.  The Latino is very conservative.  They are very religious, value a strong family and embrace personal responsibility in the form of a massive work ethic that not only supports the immediate family but often the extended family.  Even if that family is in another country.  By alienating the Latino, the republicans are walking away from a natural base.  And a base that is only going to grow.

All of which makes what Obama did today distressing:

(Reuters) – About 800,000 young illegal immigrants who came to the United States as children could be spared deportation under new immigration rules announced by President Barack Obama on Friday …

I’m not distressed that Obama made bad policy here, he didn’t.  Allowing immigrants who wanna live and work here the legal opportunity is absolutely the right thing.  And for this, I am in rare but enthusiastic support of the President.  Rather I’m distressed because the republicans have so utterly failed in the whole immigration debate.

This decision will garner support from the Latino vote.  And to be sure, those folks won’t suddenly turn into died in the wool leftists.  But, BUT, we know that politics is a team sport and soon, not very long to be sure, as people begin to affiliate with a “tribe” they will become a member of that tribe and we’ll find it hard to convert them back to their natural support.

Congratulations to President Obama.  Here I think he did the right thing.  And the right lost a massive opportunity to do the right thing as well.

17 responses to “Immigration: Of Things Illegal And Legal

  1. As you might guess, I agree with your post almost completely, and am curious on how Romney is going to respond. I disagree with point one — statists are on both the left and the right, and anti-statists are also on both the left and the right. You have many on the right who want a strong and controlling state, just as you have many on the left – though they usually would control different things. You also have leftists who opposed Bush and now oppose Obama and exercising too much state power. But other than that quibble, I agree!

  2. Pino,

    Naturally I disagree with you and Scott . I have a question for you . Are you in favor of unlimited immigration into the US ? That is the real question . If you forgive current illegals now, you set up a new mass illegal immigration .

    • Are you in favor of unlimited immigration into the US ?

      I am As long as you’re not:

      1. Wanted for a crime in your native country
      2. Carrying an infectious disease [think plague, not the cold]
      3. On a terror watch list

      You’re in. I really don’t care about the whole citizen thing, though I don’t know why we make people wait so many years. But if someone wants to come here and work—well, they’re better than half of today’s democrats!

      😉

  3. Pino ,

    Why don’t you care about numbers ? Why don’t we let all 7 billion people in ? Mass immigration always causes problems . America can only economically absorb a certain number . We are getting millions of poor uneducated people . This strains our schools, hospitals, and all other facilities .

    Why even have borders ? Why even have laws since we have a President and Attorney General who do not enforce laws they do not feel like enforcing ?

    • America can only economically absorb a certain number . We are getting millions of poor uneducated people . This strains our schools, hospitals, and all other facilities .

      First, What ever the number we allow in now is too low. Nothing horrible is happening as a result.

      Second, we are only talking about work permits, not citizenship.

      Third, we are only really talking about people who are already here.

      Why even have laws since we have a President and Attorney General who do not enforce laws they do not feel like enforcing ?

      There I agree with you. We do have borders and we do have laws that speak to them. This is why I agree with states like Arizona.

  4. Being a Republican isn’t about views on the role of the government; it’s about resentment of perceived outsiders.

    If they did have policy views, and they were upset about deficit spending and expanding government power, they would have been out there protesting the Bush-era policies that created our debt, the executive’s asserted power to indefinitely detain citizens taken into custody on American soil without trial or charge, and to wiretap American citizens without a warrant, No Child Left Behind, the Bush administration’s position in Raich v. Gonzales, our misleadingly sold and incompetently prosecuted invasion and occupation of a foreign country, and deficit-spending-financed Medicare Part D (as opposed to the deficit-reducing ACA).

    But they weren’t. In fact, as Pres. Bush left office, he had an approval rating around 30 percent from independents, around 65 percent from Republicans, and around 80 percent from self-described “conservative Republicans”.

    Because today’s Republicans don’t care about policy. They care about being on a side, and having their side win.

    Conservatism in the US today is an ever-shifting array of enemies onto whom conservatives project disdain. All that matters is the expression of scorn for outsiders– it’s the only way conservatives know who they are, given that they dropped any and all political convictions by the wayside sometime in the past 5-10 years.

    Immigrants come from far away, they look different, and they don’t speak English as a first language. So Republicans don’t like them. There’s no theory of state power behind it.

    • Being a Republican isn’t about views on the role of the government; it’s about resentment of perceived outsiders.

      Well, kinda. I happen to think that if you have laws you should enforce ’em. So, if people come here illegally they should be returned home when that status is made known.

      Kids are just different; they didn’t decide to come or not come. It’s the same reason I support taxing the general public for education and for SCHIP.

      they would have been out there protesting the Bush-era policies that created our debt, the executive’s asserted power to indefinitely detain citizens taken into custody on American soil without trial or charge, and to wiretap American citizens without a warrant, No Child Left Behind, the Bush administration’s position in Raich v. Gonzales, our misleadingly sold and incompetently prosecuted invasion and occupation of a foreign country, and deficit-spending-financed Medicare Part D (as opposed to the deficit-reducing ACA).

      Politics is a “tribal” sport to be sure. Which is why I kinda like the idea of a Democrat President and a Republican legislative body. While Obama is too liberal for even that scenario, just look at the wonderful work the Congress has done this term; the lowest number of laws signed in 40 years!

      The less they do the better we are. And if it takes a Democrat in the White House to make Republicans act like conservatives, maybe that’s what we need.

      • I happen to think that if you have laws you should enforce ‘em. So, if people come here illegally they should be returned home when that status is made known.

        I agree with your general position, to an extreme extent. I think that speed limits should be raised & enforced for just that reason.

        A discussion of what should happen to someone who violates the law, though, should include how that law applies to reality. And it’s been normal behavior to violate the law on immigration for about ever– to some extent because of the fantastic amounts of red tape we impose on folks who want to come here. I’m not sure that it does make sense to send folks home– particularly, as you point out, folks who were brought here as kids and may not even speak the language in their “home” country.

        just look at the wonderful work the Congress has done this term; the lowest number of laws signed in 40 years!

        Well, that’s the libertarian bias toward preferring bad government. Given that we’re in the middle of a quasi-depression, though, with diminishing social mobility and personal wealth, with the Fed just about out of bullets, and low rates on government borrowing, now is actually just the time for the government to respond. It’s not the time to strike a grand bargain on our long-term debt problem (which is largely health care costs) because unemployment is a more pressing problem.

        Also, Obama is the most conservative Democratic postwar president, as VoteView pointed out. You’re free to prefer policies further to the right, of course, he’s not unusually liberal for US leaders.

  5. A discussion of what should happen to someone who violates the law, though, should include how that law applies to reality. And it’s been normal behavior to violate the law on immigration for about ever– to some extent because of the fantastic amounts of red tape we impose on folks who want to come here. I’m not sure that it does make sense to send folks home– particularly, as you point out, folks who were brought here as kids and may not even speak the language in their “home” country.

    So, I should say that I think the law should be changed. We should allow more immigration. And it doesn’t matter to me if they wanna become citizens or not.

    And yes, the red tape is horrible and is inexcusable.

    unemployment is a more pressing problem.

    Insofar as you and I could agree on what leads to increased jobs, I agree. Perhaps we could agree that congress should to UNDO bad legislation?

    Also, Obama is the most conservative Democratic postwar president, as VoteView pointed out.

    That’s always been an interesting graph. It would be neat to see which vote he supports that are liberal and which are conservative. I suspect that Obama scores high on the conservative things like war, terror and defense. After all, he’s really just “Dubya II” when it comes to the War on Terror.

  6. Pino ,

    Correct me if I am wrong . but didn’t they have some kind of amnesty back in the 1980s? That was supposed to fix the problem. What did that do ? It acted as another magnet . Desperately poor people have continued to stream in . Every time you forgive this problem, millions of others say, why not us .

    “First, What ever the number we allow in now is too low. Nothing horrible is happening as a result.”

    And as far as this not being a problem, you must agree with our Democrat friends who believe everyone in the border states who complain about being overwhelmed by the continuing tidal waves of poor immigrants , are just big fat racists .

    I am strictly arguing numbers. I am happy that people are fighting to get into this country instead of trying to get out . I point out that even those of us who are proud to have ancestors who came here in the mass immigrations of the 19th century , have got to admit that our great great grandparents caused a lot of problems like slums and crime for those who got here before them . They sure didn’t do the native Americans any good .

    • Desperately poor people have continued to stream in . Every time you forgive this problem, millions of others say, why not us .

      I’m the grandson of a desperately poor person. It’s been a pretty good deal for me.

      you must agree with our Democrat friends who believe everyone in the border states who complain about being overwhelmed by the continuing tidal waves of poor immigrants , are just big fat racists .

      I do not agree with the Democrats. I don’t think the Arizona law is racist and I agree that states can enforce immigration laws. I just think that the laws should be changed.

      our great great grandparents caused a lot of problems like slums and crime for those who got here before them

      Right.

      • The type of response to the policy problem matters. Net immigration from Mexico was actually zero from 2005-2010. Immigrants come here for jobs; when the jobs dry up, people stop coming. That’s why anti-immigrant fervor as we’ve seen in Arizona and Alabama is by definition racist. If people were worried about “excessive” immigration, they’d insist on severe penalties, with enforcement, for anyone who hires people here illegally. Instead, we get the kind of “show me your papers or we get to lock you up” stuff that reflects racial animus, rather than an effort to solve policy problems.

        As to what the government should do in economic times like these, “it’s relatively uncontroversial, for folks who have studied economics, that the proper response in these conditions– terrible unemployment, low government borrowing rates, low inflation, collapsed demand– is stimulus spending.”

        This was reflected in a poll a few months back: “The latest Chicago Booth poll of economists focuses on the 2009 stimulus. The first question asked whether the stimulus increased employment by the end of 2010. Eighty percent of the polled economists agreed. Four percent disagreed. Two percent were uncertain. The second question asked whether, over the long run, the benefits would outweigh the long-term costs (like paying down the extra debt). Forty-six percent agreed. Twelve percent disagreed. Twenty-seven percent were uncertain. …”

        These are, happily, very unusual times, of the sort that call for a policy response.

        • That’s why anti-immigrant fervor as we’ve seen in Arizona and Alabama is by definition racist.

          I’m not sure.

          I think this is the same stuff we saw when the Italians came over, then the Irish, then the Russians…

          I’ll agree that parts of it aren’t rational but I don’t think it’s racism.

          • Well, I don’t feel like getting into a discussion of the word “racist”, but I think we can agree on “grounded in & appealing to irrational animus of a perceived out group”.

  7. Pingback: President Obama’s Executive Order | Tarheel Red

Leave a Reply to reflectionephemeral Cancel reply