Posted on 10/27/2007 1:26:41 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson roused himself from his torpor long enough last week to offer an "immigration plan" that is too impractical to ever become reality but isn't designed to. It is nothing more than red meat thrown to primary voters, providing further proof of how far we have come from the quaint conceit that presidential elections offered Americans an opportunity to debate the issues on their merits alone, free of fear-mongering and race-baiting. Illegal immigration is too complex an issue to be reduced to black or white, good or evil, friend or foe. In today's angry, frightened America, however, that is how issues are often defined. The effort to create a convenient villain is threatening to define a whole group, specifically poor Hispanics regardless of their status in the country, as the un-American "other" hiding under our beds, as Communists once did. It is shameful to see and hear this demagoguery in a nation of immigrants, and it is poisoning the presidential campaign.
The centerpiece of Mr. Thompson's plan, which is similar to that of rival Mitt Romney, who employed illegal immigrants to work on his lawn when he was governor of Massachusetts, is there be no "amnesty" for illegal immigrants. This is a simplistic way of saying that the 12 million illegal immigrants in the country should not be offered a way to gain citizenship, as a bill that died in Congress this year would have done. If illegal immigrants are not offered a path to legality than a plan is needed to arrest and deport them, which is of course, impossible. But again, the Thompson plan is not designed to address the issue but draw votes from the immigrant-bashing right wing, fueled in their fear and hatred by the likes of CNN's Lou Dobbs and talk radio demagogues.
Mr. Thompson would also take federal money away from so-called "sanctuary cities" where law enforcement officers refuse to involve themselves in immigration matters. Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who has a punitive immigration plan of his own, at least knows that sanctuary cities like New York cannot pursue illegal immigrants if they want them to report crimes or seek medical treatment. Punishing these cities, as both Mr. Thompson and Mr. Romney suggest, is no solution to illegal immigration, just a bid to scapegoat immigrants, and the major cities that harbor many of them, to ratchet up the hatred of minorities that fuels many voters.
A responsible immigration plan, as opposed to a farcical one advocating a fence along the Mexican border, would consider that roughly 70 percent of the nation's farm workers are illegal immigrants and to drive them underground would cripple agribusiness. Rather than advocate the deportations that divide families, as was the case in a raid of a New Bedford factory earlier this year, it would consider that illegal immigrants are not a class of criminals but in general people who want a piece of the American dream.
On Wednesday, a bill that would have granted legal status to illegal immigrants who are high school graduates was defeated in the Senate. This bill would have helped many young people who are the children of illegal immigrants become integrated into society. There is no logical argument against it, but when the goal is not to address problems but to demonize a group of people who want no more than what generations of American immigrants wanted, there is no need for logic.
A diaper change would be a start! LOL
Summary:
Fred’s common sense plan is “farcical” and the “reasonable plan” is for open borders, amnesty and free tuition for illegals.
String theory may be correct in that alternate universes do indeed exist...
What state is this written in?
Let's send the additional 28 million illegal aliens they refuse to count over to their house.
paranoid delusional
It's editorials like this that make me shake my head and wonder if anyone's paying attention to the world around them.
Or Ibrahim Hooper of CAIR?
The Berkshires are that hilly region of that alternate universe where Cash and Kerry are the senators.
Notice how Liberals always label Conservatives fearful of “good, righteous” people such as: illegal immigrants, terrorists, jihadists, abortionists, communists, criminals, environmental extremists, militant homosexuals, and activist judges? [To name a few.] The supposed point being that Conservatives are perpetually reactionary, unenlightened, and just plain silly. Of course the people that Liberals are always fearful of include: corporate executives, anyone who ACTUALLY enforces the law (judges, police, and politicians) conservative talk show hosts, and (yes) devout Christians.
Now, objectively, which group is the more silly?
“What state is this written in?”
Confusion?
No, we just have to get busy and deport them. No need to sit around making "plans", just do it according to the laws that already exist.
They are illegal aliens, criminals. It has nothing to do with "racism".
That's a pathetic play of the race card.
Bleeding heart liberals like this lefty are a destructive force to America’s future sovereignty.
Just because Fred refuses to dance around like a fart on a hot skillet, it shows “torpor”? Give me break! Fred gets his brain up to speed, BEFORE he opens his mouth! We need more of this!
We need Fred more than ever.
Having lived in Pittsfield, Ma. and Canaan, NY (Queechy Lake actually), I can tell you the Berk is the laughing stock of “normal” folk in the area...unless you were a flaming NYC lib., come up for the weekend. I wouldn’t even trust their sports scores.
“String Theory”
I prefer Spaghettification!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaghettification
(That stumped Spell Check!)
The last President to do a competent job of approaching the problem of illegal immigrants, was Dwight Eisenhower. He appointed a colleague, a retired general, to attack the problem. The general cracked down on companies which employed illegals. He also rounded up and deported some illegals. But the fringe benefit was the much larger numbers of illegals who SELF-DEPORTED, bailed out and went back to Mexico because they could see the handwriting on the mall.
The Bracero Program is also a matter of history. It was begun in 1942, to bring Mexicans into the US for specific jobs in agriculture, replacing the work of young Americans who were going to war. The program lasted until 1964. Mexico controlled ITS side of the border. And both the US and Mexico agreed on the number of workers who would come in, and that they remained Mexicans, and would return there when their work was done.
This geopolitical moron for a local rag is talking through his/her hat, to put it mildly.
Congressman Billybob
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