Ramifications of ideology

Victor Davis Hanson writes,

We don’t know how many illegal immigrants are in the United States, only that the proverbial figure of “11 million” exists in amber since the last century, and despite massive influxes each year. So there is no way to ascertain either the size of the pool of illegal immigrants or how many have committed crimes. Rounding up every illegal alien and immediately deporting them is not feasible, but that does not mean that over one million with criminal records could not be returned to their home countries as undesirables.

...Some states report a fourth to a third of their murders are likely committed by illegal aliens. That cohort makes up over 25% of federal prisoners.

...Make Mexico Pay?

Sending Mexico a bill, or charging tariffs on trade, to finish the wall as penance for its cynical manipulation of American magnanimity is childish and unnecessary. Instead, we should look at some $40-50 billion that are sent as remittances home to Central America and Mexico each year, largely by illegal aliens themselves. Such a staggering sum might represent on average a $200-500 a month expense per illegal alien, a disposable sum that at best suggests existential poverty may not necessarily haunt every illegal alien resident, and at worse might remind us that government subsidies are sometimes used to free up income to send out of the country. Imagine if $40-50 billion were instead infused into the U.S. health care and legal systems for the indigent.

All the government would have to do, in the manner that most nations abroad already do, would be to impose a federal surcharge on all remittances by any sender who could not provide a U.S. passport to substantiate the transaction. At a 10% rate, billions could be raised ($4-5 billion a year?), and applied to the completion of the border fence. Within four or five years, the cost ($20 billion?) could be easily met by those whose illegality prompted the wall to be built.

Anchor Babies? ...In a practical sense, anyone who lives in an area with a large population of illegal aliens knows that it is a common tact for pregnant foreign nationals to deliberately plan on giving birth in the U.S., both to ensure citizenship for their children, and to create a proverbial anchor, by which they can either obtain legal residency for themselves or cite familial humanitarian claims later on if deportation suddenly looms. Is that not a means of circumventing and subverting the law by avoiding an application for legal green-card resident status? If “anchor baby” is a pejorative term, what then is the politically correct expression for that real fact?

Euphemisms...Breaking federal law is not a neutral matter of being without documents, but simply deliberately choosing never to obtain them at all. Alien (“not of this locale”) is not a pejorative term, but recognizes that Mexico and the United States are two different legal entities. Oddly, what is an offensive noun is La Raza (“the race”), racial chauvinism at its worse. Raza has a terrible history of modern usage in fascist Franco’s Spain and Mussolini’s Italy, and has disappeared from popular accepted usage in both countries. Raza was brought back into contemporary American parlance by racial separatists, particularly in the 1960s. Mrs. Clinton just spoke at the National Council of La Raza, and yet has been vocal about accusing others of polarizing the debate through charged language. That is absurd.

Absurd? ...Elites have branded Trump’s immigration proposals as absurd, especially the inflated rhetoric about a wall, and good and bad people. His idea of mass deportations en masse is unworkable, but not an argument against weeding out criminals and those without work histories in the United States.

Jeb Bush implied that elements of illegal immigration are an act of love. Perhaps that is true for millions of illegal aliens, who work hard and for little pay, and usually do not violate further state and federal laws. I see them every day.

But not all foreign nationals from Mexico and Central America do that.

One would accept Bush’s blanket generalization only if he had the clout or capital to be exempt from the ramifications of his own ideology. When a car zoomed into the barnyard last night and tossed out a brood of puppies (twice now in one month), and when last week a man threw wet garbage from his pickup next to my mailbox (full of Spanish language magazines, diapers, and used baby clothes), and when last month someone stole my pickup (found by police abandoned and damaged in a Fresno alleyway, with Mexican beer, food, and Spanish-language ads inside), and when two weeks ago a non-English speaker came in the driveway looking for trailers of prostitution (caravanas) down the road, I felt that they all had expressed little love for animals, the environment, or young women, or for that matter themselves — or me.

In other words, I sensed no act of love.

Read more here.

We can choose not to wear the gag of political correctness

"Undocumented immigrant?" Kurt Schlichter writes,

Being here illegally is not a mere technicality. This is not a simple matter of a lack of documentation, as if the issue is that Jose went from Oaxaca to Fresno and getting the proper paperwork somehow slipped his mind. Ironically, one of the many problems posed by illegal aliens is that they are documented – with fake identifications, fake work papers, and fake Social Security numbers.

While they are not all “workers,” they are all “aliens.” The illegal alien scumbag who murdered Kate Steinle wasn’t a busy little beaver bringing home the chorizo to his family, all of whom were likewise employed. Calling them “workers” is simply another lie designed to distract from the critical point – many aren’t “workers,” and those of us who aren’t aliens are paying for them.

"Anchor babies?" Schlichter writes,

...“anchor babies” are not merely “babies.” They are the babies of illegal aliens birthed within the territory and jurisdiction of the U.S.A. (sorry, 14th Amendment revisionists) who are then used as a means for the rest of their family to stay here permanently and weasel from us benefits to which they are not morally entitled.

A “baby,” in contrast, is any kind of baby – unless it’s been carried into a Planned Parenthood butcher shop.

Of course, the language liars don’t only try their scam when the subject is illegal immigration. Everyone remembers “global warming,” which got replaced by “climate change” when the globe failed to cooperate and warm. With “climate change,” every kind of weather supports their thesis. Hotter, colder, the same, it doesn’t matter – it’s critical to give liberal elites more of our money and sovereignty right now or else weather will keep happening!

And then there’s “thug,” which is the perfect term to describe an enormous strong-arm robber who unwisely decided to try and punch out a cop. The left would replace this accurate, evocative descriptor with “honor student,” as if Michael Brown was wearing his mortarboard when he tossed around that convenience store clerk prior to making his final miscalculation.

What happened in Baltimore was a “riot” perpetrated by “criminals,” not a “demonstration” conducted by “community members.”

The losers trying to murder Westerners from Tunisia to Chattanooga are “Islamic terrorists,” not generic “militants” whose shouts of “Allah akbar” offer no hint about their motivation. When a jihadi fanboy murders over a dozen Americans in a (good guy only) gun-free zone, it is “terrorism,” not “workplace violence.”

No, it’s not “a procedure” used to extract “products of conception” that are then “donated for research.” It’s the “dismemberment of a human baby by giggling ghouls who sell off the shredded pieces to the highest bidder.” Maybe if the mom was an illegal alien it would become a “baby,” and the liberals would finally object to it being torn apart.

Politically, pushing back against PC is a winning strategy. Donald Trump has practically built his whole campaign around doing that. Jeb Bush got his first good news cycle in months by refusing to kow tow. Others did too when they showed some courage; Marco Rubio put months of rebuilding at risk when he didn’t.

People are tired of being commanded to lie, because when you consciously use language that fails to fully and accurately describe its subject, that’s a lie. Political correctness is a gag we choose to wear ourselves. And we can choose not to.

Read more here.

Looking for excuses for not trying

Thomas Sowell writes at Investors Business Daily,

In so-called "sanctuary cities" across the country, local police are under orders not to report illegal immigrants to the federal authorities.

Nobody has a right to obstruct justice when it comes to federal laws — not even the president of the United States, as Richard Nixon discovered when he had to resign after Democrats threatened him with impeachment and Republican senators told him that they would not defend him.

One of the most widely known abuses of the immigration laws is the creation of "anchor babies" to get automatic citizenship when a pregnant woman simply crosses the border to have her child born on American soil.

...This is not limited to people who cross the Mexican border. Some are flown in from Asia to waiting posh facilities.

Not only do their children get automatic American citizenship without having to meet any requirements, this also increases the opportunities for other family members to gain admission later on, in the name of "family reunification."

Read more here.