January 29, 2013

Immigration Policy: Reality Bites

The problem with reality is that it can get so, well, real. As when it storms through the door, kicks over a chair or two and demands recognition, when the problem of immigration has done, as signified by eight senators, both Republicans and Democrats, this week. The process of normalizing, so to speak, the status of 11 million illegal immigrants now in the United States is not an unusually attractive one, particularly to those who set store by observance of laws and norms. What the alternative may be, one isn’t sure. To eject 11 million people from the country? I do not think anybody has ever believed that can happen. Something messy and disagreeable to many would get done instead. That was always the muted, mumbled understanding. Reality has crossed the United States border demanding admission.

The problem with reality is that it can get so, well, real. As when it storms through the door, kicks over a chair or two and demands recognition, when the problem of immigration has done, as signified by eight senators, both Republicans and Democrats, this week.

The process of normalizing, so to speak, the status of 11 million illegal immigrants now in the United States is not an unusually attractive one, particularly to those who set store by observance of laws and norms. What the alternative may be, one isn’t sure. To eject 11 million people from the country? I do not think anybody has ever believed that can happen. Something messy and disagreeable to many would get done instead. That was always the muted, mumbled understanding. Reality has crossed the United States border demanding admission.

There are various reasons four Republican senators, including Marco Rubio and John McCain, have reached general agreement with Democratic colleagues acting from other motives. The agreement, if enacted by the full Congress and signed into law by a president who longs for immigration reform suited to his own taste, would regularize in the short run the status of the aforesaid 11 million. The agreement would specify how they might become citizens; at the same time, it would set up procedures for tightening border control.

Adequate procedures? Who knows? The aforesaid Republican senators, this being their end of the deal, would have to work assiduously to make the political sprockets engage the legislative chain links. A deal to which the present president of the United States is a party cannot automatically - alas! – be called a deal without bear traps and demagogic accusations. The fallback realization is 11 million immigrants who can’t, realistically, be expelled.

No, it’s more than that. It’s votes. “We are losing dramatically the Hispanic vote, which we think should be ours,” McCain says. Maybe should be but wasn’t in 2012. Sen. Rubio of Florida is a voluble exponent of measures to capture a major share of the Hispanic vote before it goes away forever.

Can it be done? A writer for the Daily Beast sneers, “You think the party that wanted to repeal health care expansion is going to get the bulk of [Hispanic] votes?” Not with a GOP base whose instinct is to “howl to the moon.”

A different kind of “howling” than the kind the writer obviously has in mind might turn the trick for the Republicans. What if they were to present the nation as a whole – all regions, all races – with a manifesto for economic growth through responsible economic stewardship and rewards for the old-fashioned virtues of hard work, diligence, thrift, the sorts of things no one ever hears Democrats talking about? Virtue: there’s another attribute rarely praised by political figures not wishing to turn off the non-virtuous.

Look, why do immigrants, legal or illegal, come here for in the first place? The chance to be as batty and dependent and worthless as they could be back home without having to rise from bed? Do the great majority not want, fundamentally, the things they see Americans enjoying, and not just government subsidies, but rather, privately created opportunities for growth and prosperity? That is a large generalization but not a reckless one, I think.

If the GOP need not so much “reach out” to newly empowered illegals as remind them of blessings, and jobs, that accrue in a climate of comparative freedom, where tax men and bureaucrats keep low profiles – how can that hurt the quest for immigrant votes? Or for the votes of natives? Such things are worth affirming on their own terms. A 2012 presidential campaign that linked jobs and freedom and growth and prosperity might have issued in a different result than the one we got, with Hispanics and whites wondering just how Mitt Romney meant to reinvigorate his country. Always remember: Never let a crisis, or a dose of reality, go to waste.

COPYRIGHT 2013 CREATORS.COM

Who We Are

The Patriot Post is a highly acclaimed weekday digest of news analysis, policy and opinion written from the heartland — as opposed to the MSM’s ubiquitous Beltway echo chambers — for grassroots leaders nationwide. More

What We Offer

On the Web

We provide solid conservative perspective on the most important issues, including analysis, opinion columns, headline summaries, memes, cartoons and much more.

Via Email

Choose our full-length Digest or our quick-reading Snapshot for a summary of important news. We also offer Cartoons & Memes on Monday and Alexander’s column on Wednesday.

Our Mission

The Patriot Post is steadfast in our mission to extend the endowment of Liberty to the next generation by advocating for individual rights and responsibilities, supporting the restoration of constitutional limits on government and the judiciary, and promoting free enterprise, national defense and traditional American values. We are a rock-solid conservative touchstone for the expanding ranks of grassroots Americans Patriots from all walks of life. Our mission and operation budgets are not financed by any political or special interest groups, and to protect our editorial integrity, we accept no advertising. We are sustained solely by you. Please support The Patriot Fund today!


The Patriot Post and Patriot Foundation Trust, in keeping with our Military Mission of Service to our uniformed service members and veterans, are proud to support and promote the National Medal of Honor Heritage Center, the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, both the Honoring the Sacrifice and Warrior Freedom Service Dogs aiding wounded veterans, the National Veterans Entrepreneurship Program, the Folds of Honor outreach, and Officer Christian Fellowship, the Air University Foundation, and Naval War College Foundation, and the Naval Aviation Museum Foundation. "Greater love has no one than this, to lay down one's life for his friends." (John 15:13)

★ PUBLIUS ★

“Our cause is noble; it is the cause of mankind!” —George Washington

Please join us in prayer for our nation — that righteous leaders would rise and prevail and we would be united as Americans. Pray also for the protection of our Military Patriots, Veterans, First Responders, and their families. Please lift up your Patriot team and our mission to support and defend our Republic's Founding Principle of Liberty, that the fires of freedom would be ignited in the hearts and minds of our countrymen.

The Patriot Post is protected speech, as enumerated in the First Amendment and enforced by the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, in accordance with the endowed and unalienable Rights of All Mankind.

Copyright © 2024 The Patriot Post. All Rights Reserved.

The Patriot Post does not support Internet Explorer. We recommend installing the latest version of Microsoft Edge, Mozilla Firefox, or Google Chrome.