Wall Builders Are Winning the Debate(Good fences make good neighbors!)

Newsday ^ | May 2, 2006 | James P. Pinkerton

[kellynla]

Yesterday's immigration protests will be remembered as a turning point. The pro-amnesty, zero-enforcement coalition gambled that it could take to the streets and intimidate the majority of Americans into backtracking on their plans to toughen immigration law. It was a bold gamble for the open-borders bunch - and they lost.

"It will be tens of millions from coast to coast, from Los Angeles to New York." So predicted Javier Rodriguez, a spokesman for the protests, to CNN.

Well, the paralyzing marches and stoppages didn't happen, because the Hispanic community is split on the protest issue, just as it is split on the immigration question. Like most Americans, many Hispanics understand that while some population influx is healthy, a flood is unhealthy. It's the difference between drinking and drowning. And, of course, protests featuring Mexican flags guarantee a backlash from those who prefer the American flag raised high.

Without a doubt, immigration has been beneficial to the United States in recent decades. Perhaps the greatest benefit was that these new Americans, clamoring to get here, proved the resilience of the American Dream. Forty years ago, liberal and leftist critics blasted this country as horribly racist; in 1968 the Kerner Commission, a group of limousine liberals assembled by President Lyndon "Great Society" Johnson to guilt-trip white America, declared that the United States was "moving toward two societies, one black, one white, separate and unequal."

[kellynla]

"The forces of immigration control - the folks who want to build a wall - are winning the political debate. The challenge now is to convert political victory into policy action. That means repealing bilingualism, multiculturalism and ethnic preferences, so that every American, regardless of color, can get an equal shot at the American Dream, if he or she plays by a fair set of rules."

[kellynla]

ping

[mgc1122]

When we kick them out, and build a wall, I am hopeful we are more inclined to wash our own cars, and mow our own yards. Or at least get some aliens who APPRECIATE America and want to be part of her - not just some isolated malcontent tresspassers.

[Yo-Yo]

America is not anti-immigrant, we are anti-"illegal-aliens-who-sneak-in-here-and-work-illegally-then-demand-that-their-illegal-actions-be-made-legal."

[RexBeach]

Now, this if right off the top of my memory...but, as I recollect, the Robert Frost poem that many in this debate keep referring to, i.e., fences make good neighbors, actually is not true, according to the poem. I thought it was Frost's opinion that fences kept people apart and that that was not a good thing.

However, before you all flame me, I think a really big fence is a good idea for the border problem.

[markedman]

They mean to turn the spirit of E Pluribus Unum on its head. We need an official English language amendment.

[Personal Responsibility]

I have found Pinkterton to be a little left for my tates in the past but he nailed this one.

[Ol' Dan Tucker]

Without a doubt, immigration has been beneficial to the United States in recent decades.

Ugh!

What has been beneficial has been LEGAL immigration.

[piceapungens]

As long as a globalist occupies the WhiteHouse no meaningful enforcement will occur.

[kellynla]

"I am hopeful we are more inclined to wash our own cars, and mow our own yards."

that's what our children are for. LOL

[trebb]

You are correct that Frost opined that fences did not make good neighbors (poem "Mending Wall"), but he alluded that in cases where possessions (cows, etc.,) might get intermingled they might be appropriate - which would be a similar case with illegal immigration invasion. The neighbors he was talking about were actual neighbors, not folks from a different country ignoring the laws of the present country.

[Vectorian]

Good fences make good neighbours - no they don't. I have 22 miles of rough sea and the white cliffs of Dover between me and the french, but they are still not good neighbours! :D

[TheDon]

In honor of the May 1st illegal alien amnesty demonstrations, contribute to the building of the border fence.

[359Henrie]

Ah, but you have 22 miles.

[DoctorMichael]

From: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15719

Mending Wall
by Robert Frost
Something there is that doesn't love a wall, That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it, And spills the upper boulders in the sun; And makes gaps even two can pass abreast. The work of hunters is another thing: I have come after them and made repair Where they have left not one stone on a stone, But they would have the rabbit out of hiding, To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean, No one has seen them made or heard them made, But at spring mending-time we find them there. I let my neighbor know beyond the hill; And on a day we meet to walk the line And set the wall between us once again. We keep the wall between us as we go. To each the boulders that have fallen to each. And some are loaves and some so nearly balls We have to use a spell to make them balance: 'Stay where you are until our backs are turned!' We wear our fingers rough with handling them. Oh, just another kind of outdoor game, One on a side. It comes to little more: There where it is we do not need the wall: He is all pine and I am apple orchard. My apple trees will never get across And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him. He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors.' Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder If I could put a notion in his head: 'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it Where there are cows? But here there are no cows. Before I built a wall I'd ask to know What I was walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offense. Something there is that doesn't love a wall, That wants it down.' I could say 'Elves' to him, But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather He said it for himself. I see him there Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. He moves in darkness as it seems to me, Not of woods only and the shade of trees. He will not go behind his father's saying, And he likes having thought of it so well He says again, 'Good fences make good neighbors.'

[Balding_Eagle]

I just sent them this email:

Why don't you ask for donations "by the foot"?

Let's say the cost estimate is $250 per foot of fence. Ask people how much fence they would like to buy.

1/4 foot? a foot? Or does the office want to go together and buy 10 feet?

[tumblindice]

"Something there is that doesn't love a wall." Frost

They must have had an illegal alien problem back then, too.

[RexBeach]

Thanks, Doc!

[RexBeach]

"Two roads diverged in a wood,

and I took the one less traveled by...

and that has made all the difference."

Thanks for your note!

[kellynla]

"Good fences make good neighbours - no they don't. I have 22 miles of rough sea and the white cliffs of Dover between me and the french, but they are still not good neighbours!"


I have a free moment so I'll respond.
Have the French "en masse" invaded/trespassed on your property?
Then I rest my case.

The South Koreans, Israelis and others don't have "good" neighbors but they also don't have mass invasions because they have good fences.
that's all we are trying to accomplish here with a fence.