“Illegals” hysteria & the place I can’t go

I had doctor’s appointments most of the day, and while I was in the car I kept switching around on the radio. I pulled up Rush and couldn’t listen more than a few minutes. What I heard was a disappointing, strange, paranoia-feeding rant on how the “moderate Republicans and Democrats in the Senate” have a deliberate plan afoot to “enlarge the number of victims and people who will need welfare services” so as to “enlarge government…”

It’s all a plot and a conspiracy, you see…nothing could possibly simply be about stupid and lackluster career politicians trying to finally, finally, finally do something about an issue no one has wanted to touch for 30 years and doing it haphazardly, fearfully and imperfectly, and with the usual suspects trying to add their own flourishes, which must always be batted down, whether the issue is illegal immigration or almost anything else.

No, no. It’s a plot! It’s a conspiracy, meant to bring down America and put the conservatives in their place! To create a permanent underclass! To enlarge government, create more victims and raise our taxes! (what nonsense…we’re in a freaking war and spending more than ever, yet our revenues are growing thanks to the tax cuts…it’s funny how, when it suits a need, suddenly taxes will have to be raised…)

Maybe I should launch a conspiracy theory of my own…say…oh, something silly, like maybe this hysteria is just the conservatives doing everything they can to foment enough discord and discontent to create the “demand” for a third party candidate.

Which worked out so well for all of us in 1992. Hey, one conspiracy theory is as good as the next, isn’t it?

Now, I grant you, some of what is in this Senate immigration bill is objectionable and must be striken - it makes no sense at all for illegals to have better job-protection and benefits than American citizens. Social Security entitlements? I don’t think so. The idea of giving Mexico veto power over a fence or barrier idea is ludicrous.

But…for heaven’s sake, the thing is going to go to Congress, it’s going to get cleaned up and turned around - what has come out of the senate will not be the thing that (assuming anything actually gets passed) will be passed. There is some evidence that something workable may actually emerge from all of this ‘initial’ hoo-ha.

I know there are different opinions on the issue of these illegals, and everyone, on every side, “has a point” but I was extremely disheartened by what I heard on the radio, and by some of what I am seeing in blogs and in my email. I had to turn Rush off - there was something so insideous about the “ship them all back,” rhetoric flying between him and his callers that it was making my flesh feel crawly. “Round them up and ship them back, devote a whole law-enforcement team to it, we can get rid of all of them in 7 years, Rush!” Stunning. Appalling. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

Aside from the legal and moral ramifications of trying to “round them all up -” I got out of the car thinking, are they forgetting that we are talking about human beings, here? Many of whom have been here for years, initially through legal means, and who have created lives? People with lives and families who - like how they got here or not - are HERE and are mostly contributing to society in positive ways? Honestly, the folks on the radio sounded extremely narrow and over-the-top. The humanity of the illegals seemed as unmentionable to them as the humanity of a baby-in-utero is to a feminist.

And funnily enough, I didn’t hear anyone complaining about the annual influx of illegal Irish immigrants who come in via Montauk and stay. But they’re charmers, aren’t they? Good senses of humor, they work and they don’t ever cause trouble…right?

Build a wall, by all means. Make sure you build it deep, so tunneling is difficult. Arm it and stand guards. I’m all for it. But this overheated rhetoric, this astonishing willingness by too many to keep blowing on the flames until something erupts…this is not good.

I cannot buy into this idea that suddenly America will be overthrown unless 11-12 million illegals are “shipped out, no matter what the story is…” I also cannot buy into the idea that there is a conspiracy afoot to create a socialist state, anymore than I buy the idea that this brouhaha is a conspiracy on the right to form a third party. But what do I know? Maybe everything is a grand conspiracy, after all. In which case, everyone is working at cross-purposes and all of this sound and fury may signify nothing…

I also believe that Hispanics are the upcoming huge voter bloc in this nation, and that most of them (not the A.N.S.W.E.R. rowdies or the useful idiots who exist in EVERY ethnic group) are fairly conservative types of folks, and the conservatives are doing all they can to convince the Hispanics that they will never be welcome in the GOP. I have emails from Hispanics who have worked on GOP campaigns and contributed to GOP causes and who are dazed and feeling very much like they are not welcome. One fellow - Mexican/German - of immigrant parents, has gone from supporting the initial idea that immigrants should be encouraged to come here legally to deciding that the conservative tone has crossed a line where he cannot follow.

I am concerned about people running so hot on this issue - with the heat being enhanced by the bellows blowing on it via talk radio and some blogs - I am concerned that someone is going to get hurt. I’m concerned that people are losing their heads over this.

“Oh, Anchoress, the whole nation is going to be hurt if we don’t ship them all back and seal the borders and blah, blah, blah…”

Are we? I have a plumber friend who owns his own business, and he can’t find young white or black men to come learn the trade under him. “The black kids all want to be rappers and athletes, and the white kids think the sweat is beneath them. The Asian kids are all going to college to become doctors.” But the Hispanic kids want to learn. They want to work and support themselves, they want to learn the language so they can enter the marketplace. I hear a lot of sneering about the “jobs Americans don’t want to do” line…but the truth is, while the line may be just a line…it has some (limited) basis in fact.

70 or 80 years ago, my own ancestors were coming in, legally, and learned to hang drywall and fix automobiles and fight fires. Yes, they were legal…the nation had well-run, functional programs to handle a huge influx. Had such a program not been in place, they would have come, anyway…and they would have been illegal!

I wonder why it is that we do not, today have a well-run, functional immigration program to handle the huge influx of people who wish to live here. Why aren’t we WORKING on creating such a program? Why isn’t that part of any immigration bill - the reform of the INS?

We’re going to need our immigrants as the boomers retire and weigh heavy on our SocSec system and their children barely reproduce at replacement levels. Why can’t we bring back the idea of Ellis Island - create an Ellis Island West, so to speak which would prevent the “illegality” of our immigrants.

That might be helpful, you know? Make ‘em legal, get ‘em paying taxes…Sure, some people called my grandfather a “filthy wop” and my other grandfather a “lazy mick” and they bitched because the carousel at Coney Island suddenly played Italian hurdy-gurdy instead of genteel songs from the gay 90’s, but everyone adjusted. The nation grew stronger.

Alexandra has a good post up on the issue, and she ends by linking to this very interesting partial transcript of an interview between Rush and Tony Snow.

Funny thing about this interview…I saw it linked to yesterday at another right-wing blog, but when I went back to access it, the link had - for unexplained reasons - been taken down. Once I finally got a chance to listen to it, (thanks to a pal) my sense was that Rush was not convincing in his arguments and he knew it. He sounded tentative and uneasy the whole time, and I came away thinking Snow got the better him and had been entirely too convincing for Rush’s liking. And I am not a Rush-hater by any means. I’ve often admired his skill and enjoyed his humor…but lately…

The right has a disproportionate number of Christians in its tent, and Christians are supposed to know a thing or two about forgiveness and second-chances. By the light of Christ, a whore is not forever a whore and a thief is not forever a thief. Are we conservative Christians going to forget our own second chances - some of them known only to God and ourselves - and declare that while we might not always be wretches, “an illegal is always an illegal and there is no mercy, no chance to be something more…”

I can’t believe that. Can’t accept it. Won’t be part of it. Our Lord demands more from us than a shrill dehumanization of what He has created, some demagoguery and a quick look-away as we shout, “ship ‘em back! Bad! All Bad!”

Maybe the answer is something I’ve been thinking about for a little while - a sort of registry in which a “guest-worker” who has been here for a while and has demonstrated his peaceable intentions would register and pay a recurring fee (not a tax, which would give rise to demands for representation and votes, but a fee - a usable source of revenue for the local government) and in exchange have the “right” to work without being harassed or having to look over his shoulder all the time. Perhaps these registration centers would offer classes in English for nominal fees, to help them in their assimilation. Such a registry might even be able to eventually offer affordable group health insurance to take some of the burden off of the hospitals (and the rest of us). Okay, maybe it’s a stupid or naive idea. I never said I was brill. That’s why I’m not a community leader. But someone, somewhere has an idea that will work.

I seem to be losing friends over this issue which is not my choice - but there you go. I cannot get on the train with the people who are spitting mad and convinced that the nation is utterly doomed, and will die quickly unless their EXACT RECIPE is followed. There is just something really wrong with that - with the whole mindset. And there is an undercurrent of something - not among the friends I am losing so much as in the blogs and on the radio - I can’t put my finger on, but I don’t like it. I can’t embrace it.

If your convictions demand that you no longer read me, that you de-link me, that you consider me unfit to be a friend, a conservative, a woman, a Christian, or whatever…well…I’m sorry to hear that, but so be it. I agree with some of what you say, I support some of the measures you propose…but I cannot go where you want me to go, and I cannot fume and boil and roil and churn as you clearly wish I would. And I cannot embrace the hate - yes, real hate - that I am seeing roll off some of you like fog off the sea. Nothing good ever comes from embracing the hate.

"But dont you think that there is hope that many of these nonsense provisions(SS Security for one) will be knocked out."

Nonsense provisions, huh ...

Then why wasnt this sham FIXED IN THE SENATE ALREADY?!?!

"I just think that any compromise bill would have to be very tough and would not have many false illusions of enforcement."

Why did the Senate pass a sham? Why did almost all Democrats vote for it? Why did Frist praise it?
Why did the Senate fail us so badly?

Well I have looked to the scriptures for guidance. I have also set back and looked at the commenatary and the back and forth between Christians of good faith in debate(The little of it that its been) on this whole issue. It seems on many Christian blogs ,Catholic or otherwise, there has been a big silence. Howevr , it seems that it comes down to issue of justice, of how we treat the forigner, and the power of the State and its responsibility. THere is guidance but no clean cut answers. I think one problem is that the modern nation-state that we know today is quite different from the state of Biblical times. For instance, when Jesus, Mary , and Joseph fled into Eygpt did they have to report to the regional authorities.? Were they Illegal Aliens? Who knows? I tell people when the engage thast particular scripture that example doesnt prove much to either side. It just raises questions and something for us to pray over. The same with many of the other scriptures dealing with Jews and the "alien question" as they were slowly playing out their role in salvation history.

Very well put.

I haven't commented much on the illegal immigration issue because the one-world thing is going to happen, because it's part of the plan of God, and there is no way to stop it.

Apparently, there was a meeting a little while ago that involved the notion of making North America like the European Union- borderless, free-flowing, one-worldish. We are almost like plastic soldiers on a child's toy battlefield- moving and being moved by a force over which we have no control and have no hope of halting.

I get angry about this, but then remind myself that we were told this was going to happen, it is happening, and they only way to escape the worst of it is through Christ.

I think part of the Senate bill is politics. I have no doubt that some of those provisions were put in there to get it out of the Senate no matter what. That particular Dems could say hey I supported you here. I am also cynical enough to know that many provisions were put in the Senate Bill so Republicans in the House could take credit for taking them out. I am sure there is good bit of that going on.

Even your cynicism is naive.

These were not put in there to be taken out.
The Senate bill was concocted to create a lie, a lie that we were fixing immigration with a 'comprehensive' solution. In fact it is a bait-and-switch scam, with amnesty for illegals the only real part of the bill. Most of the rest is a hood ornament for the sham-nesty.

Enforcement provisions actually *weaken* current law!

See:

http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=15165
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Immigration/wm1092.cfm

I suspect you are a decent person, even the kind to run into traffic to save a injured kitten...

But what we are talking about is changing the whole political face of this Great Nation.

Maybe you should try understanding folks like ME fer instance.
My hot buttons are Abortion, respect for the constitution and a bunch more, but you can be certain my wallet is in the top 10.

I personally witnessed the construction of acre after acre of welfare offices when the 86 - 87 crowd became eligible.

The county I worked for had to start charging $35.00 to get a copy of every official document needed.

All county parks had to start charging admission fees.

The state of California through the wisdom of the legislature took traffic fine money away from the counties.

But for the fact the tow companies were paying kick backs to management, we would have never made an arrest for DUI.
The court and overtime pay made it a loser to enforce the laws.
The fees and tuition for the state colleges and universities leaped upward and still never enough.

All so they could pay welfare to people who were rewarded for breaking the law.

I could go on and on and on ..... So the Country Club Republicans are trying not to hear us, but they'll know soon enough.

There are a lot of third party people on Free Republic trying to gather support for just that "conspiracy" and they're leading a lot of good conservatives right off the cliff with them.

Okay...this convinced me (or at least until I quit reading at the part that erroneously stated that Rush was on the defensive in the Snow interview, which was blatantly untrue) Anchoress is really Barbara Bush.

I think one problem is that the modern nation-state that we know today is quite different from the state of Biblical times.

You realize, of course, that this is the same logic that liberal revisionists in most mainline denominations have used to justify gay marriage. "It was so different then! People in Biblical times had no concept of committed same-sex relationships!"

Anyway, you can't just throw out a statement like yours, and not back it up. It's up to you to state exactly how the nation-state of Biblical times was different, if it was, and how those states were LESS likely to have controlled travel and immigration through their territory than those of the modern era, if that is in fact your argument.

For instance, when Jesus, Mary , and Joseph fled into Eygpt did they have to report to the regional authorities.?

So what if they did? That would have been among the least of their problems at the time. Probably even less onerous than having to return to Joseph's birthplace, on the emperor's order, to be taxed.

I read the transcript, I would say that Tony Snow was destroyed by Limbaugh, and I am not a Limbaugh fan in the least.

It is all fine and dandy for "conservatives" to have ideals anhjd all, but the reality is this influx of illegals and even in many cases legals, and all one has to see what has happened to California to see the future, will destroy conservatism as a viable political force. The anchoress form of go along get along "conservatism" is not only wrong, its dangerous.

Yes I was stunned hearing how it was all a plot by "Big Business" to keep wages down and oppress the "little guy" Excuse me? When did Rush become a Perotista? That was their argument about NAFTA. Then it was the "Elites want to send your jobs to Mexico" which Rush laughed at. NOW, it "The Elites want Mexicans to come here and take your job" and it is RUSH saying it! The Country's finished! When the "True Conservatives" start using the same Class warfare and economic arguements of the Wacko Left, it all over.

Forget any idea of "Limited Govt." Now it is just a matter of which side gets to grow Govt to what THEY want to those they don't like.

(Its not Amnesty (INSERT COLD CHILLS) its a GUILTY PLEA with a PLEA DEAL)

Changing the law to benefit the lawbreakers is amnesty, no matter how you guys try to spin it.

The 1986 amnesty quadrupled the problem. So will any "reform" that gives any benefit at all to the present lawbreakers.

In twenty years, we'll have fifty million illegals to worry about.

Loved your post. Be prepared for an attack tho. Yesterday I posted much the same thought on the globalists goal for our country and of Canada and Mexico.

I suggest that anyone whose first inclination is to come on and "dis" you about this,might be better advised to do a little checking as to the agreement and road map the leaders of the above mentioned countries came to last Spring. Too bad the MSM chose not to comment on that. We Americans are going to be in for a very rude surprise down the road.

"Why do I do not view this as Amnesty? Well, they do have to admit guilt. They have to pay fines, taxes etc. "They have to keep their nose clean for a period of time. I have heard 11 years in some proposals before they can even apply to be citizens. I really don't care if people want to add more provisions. 1000 hours of community service? I just have to think there is a middle ground less than they having to leave and wait 20 years to get back in and anything short of that is Amnesty. Again, the family issue is what probally drives me most as to this issue."

It is AMNESTY. Illegals would not have the opportunity to follow the proposed 'path to citizenship' if they were not granted AMNESTY first.

I don't see what the problem is with families. If you're deported, you take your family with you. Period.

Sorry, I'm not taken in by the sugar-coated liberal agenda you're here to promote among believers. Is this your 'target audience' assignment?

You're a catholic "freeper" after being here a little over nine weeks? You've come a long way, baby, in a short time.

Leni

Jay Rockerfeller thanked the press and media not long ago for keeping quiet about their globalist agenda until the average man had become "enlightened" enough to accept it.

Translation: Thanks for hiding all this from the public until it's too late for them to do anything but divide into two camps. The "enlightened" who will cause us no problems and go about their buisness, and the "xenophobe" camp who will cling to the dead idea of nationhood and must be delt with if they cause trouble.

I think you are very smart. I post so much on the subject for two reasons, "when good men remain silent, evil triumphs", and because ignorance will be no excuse when people have been warned, shown the truth, have had the quoted words of the leaders involved flat out stating their intentions, goals, and agendas, and explained to them what a Trade Zone entails.

The only thing that Jesus promises us is to rule and reign with him a thousand years, if we remain faithful unto death after we are arrested, judged, imprisoned, beheaded, hunted down, property taken, and suffered greatly.

I refuse to be found hiding under the bed during the events of that time, which seems to be right around the corner. I don't know why, it just isn't in me. I know there is no stopping it, my head tells me to keep quiet maybe it will pass over me. I just can't get my big mouth to agree.=o)

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