So quite a few of you know that I am a huge Greg Gutfeld fan - he's the guy on Red Eye if you haven't heard me refer to him by name. He's also the guy who routinely beats the pants off MSNBC's lineup despite the fact that he's on at 3am.
I was recently watching an interview he had with Bill O'Reilly, reiterating a point he has made in the past. Secure the borders, create a path for illegals to legal citizenship, in that order. Without a secure border you cannot legalize the immigrants already here.
I'd go one step further. Secure the borders, then immediately legalize the immigrants already here. It's the right thing to do. Anyone that argues we can feasibly expel the estimated 12-15 million illegal immigrants already here is not a sane person. It's a consequence of irresponsible border policy since the days of Davy Crockett.
Ok so we can't get rid of the illegals here. Who cares? The worst thing about illegal immigration isn't the crime itself, it's the financial burden on state governments (and indirectly the federal government). Imagine if these people paid taxes!
But none of this can happen if we don't secure borders. Look immigration is great, but there's a reason we have immigration quotas. If we let everyone who wants to leave a crappy place for a better life, we will become the next crappy place.
Janet Napolitano thinks our borders are too vast to secure. Really? The Great Wall of China seems to be more effective than our porous fences, and that was built in 220 BC with the hopes of keeping those damn Mongolians out. And it still works. Last time I checked, China's borders were far more vast than our own.
I think it's pretty clear that this issue to far too politicized for common sense. The left, to a certain degree, realizes the influx from the South is a potential voting base (just wait till Rubio gains national steam). The right, apparently forgetting that the economy was their number one campaign point, seems to ignore the potential tax revenue realized by legalization of 15 million people who are already in our country. I bet the net sum of cost to secure border is far outweighed by potential revenue.
It's not that I want to reward illegal behavior by granting automatic amnesty, it's that I'm a pragmatist, and I realize that booting 15 million people out of a country is impossible.
I just can't agree with you at all on immigration. While immigration is in itself a good thing in the sense you can compete for skilled labor and increase the general ability of your population, it must be done slowly and immigrants must be assimilated more quickly than they are allowed to settle. What is occurring on the southern border is not this kind of immigration but a mass migration, and mass migrations are always destructive to the societies allowing them. It creates a social disunity and fundamentally alters cultural identity, and it is a mistake to assume that because people want to come to your country they do so with a desire to emulate your values with the hope of one day becoming just like you.
ReplyDeleteIt is also worth considering the kind of place your migrants are coming from. In their own world, they are not in America to assimilate and become Americans. Most of them culturally don't even recognize the border with Mexico because they consider the Southwest to be occupied Mexican soil. If you legalize the migrants, you will still do nothing to change this mentality. Within two generations the Southwest will become just another Latin America, stricken with poverty and social unrest as it attempts to assert its own cultural identity from the rest of the United States. Pragmatism is great in the business world, but immigration is more than securing a simple business transaction. It gambles with entire nations, and it's not something to be taken lightly. If America is unable to do something about this mass migration, it will eventually come to regret its pragmatism should it choose for amnesty.
America has two options. It can focus on self-preservation and the unconditional assimilation of skilled migrants who wish to stay (not all are Latino). It can begin documenting unskilled migrants and doing mass deportations to combat mass migration from Latin America, bearing with the economic turmoil this will cause until the dust settles. A reformed guest-worker program strictly enforced with severe consequences must be established and maintained, and it is possible to do this effectively. It can also accept, on the other hand, that by now there are simply too many migrants to do anything about it and just look the other way, hoping an amnesty will solve the problem quietly and it won't be something Americans have to worry about any longer. If America accepts it can no longer control the migrants within its borders, then it needs to simply accept the United States will not maintain its union and stop denying Latin and Anglo/Germanic/Scandinavian cultures can live peacefully together. Either way, neither option is a very pleasant one.
I also don't buy the tax revenue argument at all. Amnesty will do nothing to change the economic situation for the people it's being granted to, and the United States will see very little tax revenue come from it.
Brad,
ReplyDeleteI was wondering who our German friend was that was viewing the site. You people keep tricking me into thinking people we don't know are looking at this blog.
I'm not sure we're in disagreement as we both recognize the problem. The problem is a mass migration from the South - let's face it, how many Norwegian illegals are living in the US. I think out disagreement is the approach to the solution. If amnesty is a risk, as you suggest, what is your solution? The fact is 15 million illegals are already here. Mass deportation is a logistical impossibilty. There needs to be some level of deportation - illegals convicted of any crime, misdemeanor, felony who cares. But the mass assumption that illegals want to maintain their culture while domination a particular region of a foreign land sounds like a sweeping generalization to me. Perhaps I still believe too strongly in the good will of most humans.
Regardless, without a secure border no solution is sensible. Mass deportation would only be followed by a new wave of mass migration. We can disagree on the approach to the illegals already here, but let's face it, the problem stands only to get worse unless action is taken towards stopping the border issue.
Greetings from Germany Dave! I know my arguments seem like sweeping generalizations, but let's face it. Mexico and the States have very different histories and very different ways of looking at the Southwest. For most of them, we are on their turf.
ReplyDeleteMuslims don't come to Europe to embrace secular humanism and further the belief an open society is good for everyone. They come here to finish the job of bringing Europe into the Dar-al Islam. Even the most liberal of Muslims sees this as a great thing, and no amount of assimilation will change that mentality.
Take Kosovo, for example. Historically it is European and Serbian, but that all changed when mass migration from Muslims (and there is no such thing as a European Muslim) started making their way into the region. Notice when Kosovo eventually broke away most of the people there were not flying their new Kosovo flag. They were flying the Albanian one to show their ethnic and Muslim roots above their new-found nationalism, not to mention celebrating that after centuries of ambition they had finally taken the area away from Serbia. It will happen the same with Latin America. At immigrant rallies, the immigrants are not flying American flags showing their pride in America's values and their willingness to become American. They are flying Mexican flags and desecrating ours, and the fact that most people are not even a little bit alarmed by this trend tells me the United States is not savable and not even worth saving.
I already proposed solutions for how the States can handle the problem. It is so out of hand at this point neither solution is really a very pleasant one, as I am uneasy about the idea of a Berlin Wall going across the border and mass deportations.
I am not, however, really concerned with what happens to the United States anymore. Most Americans are either flag-sucking halfwits for Jesus, ignorant bigots, or just outright wishful-thinker idiots on the Left. Very few of them actually understand the Constitution or liberty and even fewer truly appreciate them, especially when it comes to people like me and others they don't understand. I hope I can officially emigrate back here after I finish grad school, and I can watch Americans only dig themselves digger into the problems they helped create. It doesn't phase me in the least.
Fair point, but I think Muslim expansion into Europe presents a bigger problem than predominantly Hispanic migration to the US. Although your analogy is correct as far as maintaining their culture, the desire to implement Sharia law poses a far bigger threat, I think - I've been to the Dominican parade in NYC, only 4 people were beheaded, and even less women stoned.
ReplyDeleteBut I like your comments on Kosovo and it's a fair point. Any interest in doing a guest blog? I find Germany's situation fascinating because they are experiencing population decline, which Muslims have been looking to fill the void. Merkel doesn't seem to be too receptive to the idea though.
Let me know if you'd like to post something.