Hawkins: Parkland Gun Control Activists Driving Americans Toward 2nd Amendment

There’s all sorts of things the SCOTUS *should* do, however we must deal in the present.

And, now that you mention it, you raise other questions. For example, what constitutional rights do *legal* aliens have?

“It is a class C felony for any person who is not a citizen of the United States to carry or possess any firearm, unless the person: 1) Is a lawful permanent resident; 2) has obtained a valid alien firearm license pursuant to RCW 9.41.173; or 3) meets the requirements of RCW 9.41.175.”

So, to a great extent, they are under similar rules to illegal aliens. All civil rights but the 2nd Amendment, which they have to jump through the hoops to get.

And here’s yet another twist. If you are convicted of a state felony, some states permit rights restoration, while others do not. But if it is a federal felony, even a completely non-violent minimal felony for which you don’t even serve prison time, you lose your gun rights, irrevocably, forever. They don’t even have a process by which a judge could restore your rights.

I have ‘zero’ compassion for illegal aliens of all ages, skin color, religion and language and I can still sleep at night knowing that I’m a good and worthy American. No, I don’t love everyone. No, I wouldn’t befriend them if they lived next door and yes, I would report any other neighbor(s) if I knew they were hiding or otherwise protecting illegal aliens, especially if they possess illegal firearms. If we had a real need to accommodate these people I might feel differently about it and until a majority of Americans start ‘feeling’ the way you do, I’m dead set against it. When I think of ‘Uncle Sam’ as being a person, and if I were he, I would never think that someday I might lay down my life for a stranger no matter what some people think Jesus would do.

It really does get complicated. In US history, immigrants came to the US in “waves”. From there it was observed that the first generation were “old world”, speaking their native language and following their culture, but generally hard working for whatever job they could find. They also tended to ghettoize on the east coast, which actually slowed their integration.

The second generation were troublesome. With one foot in the old world, and one in the new, they weren’t comfortable with either. This was the generation that formed gangs and mafias.

But the third generation were “mostly American”, speaking English, with only some being able to converse in the old language. With an American education and expectations.

But Mexico changed all the rules. To start with, the deserts, and *very* hostile Indians, prevented a lot of immigration, unless there was a crisis in Mexico, such as their civil war at the start of the 19th and 20th Centuries that sent genuine refugees north. Then there was the “industrial” ethnic cleansing of the Yaqui Indians, where they were taken by train to southern Mexico to be used as slave labor. This deportation didn’t end until the 1940s.

But since WWII, instead of a wave, there has been a continual flow to the US. And this has resulted in a break from the generational pattern.

Today, it is not uncommon to see bizarre blends of integrated and not integrated, legal and illegal, all in the same family.

The grandparents might be legal, but not speak a word of English. Some of their children might be legal, born in the US, with others illegal, born in Mexico, with varying literacy. And their children (grandchildren) might have been born in Mexico, but brought to the US as infants, and only know America as their nation, were educated here, speak perfect English, are culturally integrated, and have zero connections to any people or place in Mexico. And they are still illegal.

It’s not clean, or easy, and it is without ready solution.

However, if *future* illegal immigration is stopped, or reduced to negligible, it is almost certain that as a people they will fully integrate, maybe.

This is because, for example, ghettoized Mexican communities in Los Angeles make it possible to *not* integrate; but places like Phoenix with little or no cultural concentration *force* integration, so it is much faster.

So the most definitive answer is to build the wall. Powerful forces in both parties are adamantly opposed to doing so, however, for their own greedy and partisan reasons. If the wall is built, much of the problem will evaporate on its own.

As far as illegals currently living here, America has an “absorption rate” for immigrants of all kinds. As long as their raw numbers are below a threshold, they integrate with minimal fuss, mostly invisibly.

I like to remember that when Vietnam fell, the US absorbed a very large number of Vietnamese middle and upper classes. Phoenix absorbed some 30,000 in a single month, and nobody even noticed. Of course they had education, brains and money, but still. I remember a funny story about how one such family became very respectable ranchers within a year or two. Culturally indistinguishable from other cowboy ranchers.

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