There’s also an important divide in our immigration system. Citizens from some countries have a legal quota for immigrating to the United States; citizens from other countries have no legal quota.
So when the anti-immigrant crowd complains that some people are illegal immigrants, they should remember that American law prohibited those people from immigrating legally.
Still think I was overreacting?
Sure, but — again — compared to what? Let’s say, because it’s true, that I like the way you put it there: “contribute not only economically, but have demonstrated respect for the rule of law.” And then a someone comes along who says “contribute not only economically, but have demonstrated respect for this nation’s culture and rule of law”. And I say, well, I like two of those, but I’m raising an eyebrow at the bit about culture; maybe I’ll vote against that guy…
…but if he’s running against someone who says, oh, hey, I disagree about culture, and about contributing economically, and about the rule of law, then I’m raising multiple eyebrows at that guy. Dangit, I’d say to myself with a sigh, I sure wish either of these candidates only signed on for the two criteria I like; but if I’m choosing between these guys? Okay, looks like one of them agrees with me on five other issues, but disagrees with me on three…
It’s funny you mention that. The America First Caucus addresses this directly.
An important distinction between post-1965 immigrants and previous waves of settlers is that previous cohorts were more educated, earned higher wages, and did not have an expansive welfare state to fall back on when they could not make it in America and thus did not stay in the country at the expense of the native-born.
It’s made up bullshit, of course, and has a little racist nugget at the end, but they do address it.
The difference between the racist version and the non-racist version is the racist part.
Sure, don’t vote for this made up guy who has no resemblance to anyone running past, present, or future for any office. I agree with you here that the candidate whose platform is, “Let’s import criminals,” is a dogshit candidate and doesn’t deserve your vote.
Straw man much?
Well, no — but if someone tortures and murders, and then mentions that he thinks arson should be illegal, I’m going to say, hey, I disagree with that guy about torture and murder, and we should look into locking him up; but I’m not going to back down on my anti-arson stance just because he’s anti-arson, because that would be absurd. He might favor dozens of things I’m also in favor of; none of that means I’m okay with murder or torture, just that I hold my beliefs regardless of whether he happens to agree with them.
And who, pray tell, would that be?
That is not the position of the Democratic party, so you can leave all your eyebrows down.
So all we need to do is point out their position is based on incorrect information and they’ll acknowledge their movement is unnecessary and disband?
Yes, but would you take his word for it when he starts claiming he knows who the real arsonists are?
'Cause that is exactly what you are doing when you lap up this bullshit.
Uh, yeah. Like I said, if the next election involves a Democrat who doesn’t take an open-borders stance, then he can put a sundae up against shit and earn my vote; but I’m not ruling out the possibility that he’ll offer up open-borders shit when the time comes, is all.
Are you asking about current legal immigrants, or current illegal immigrants?
Nope.
I’m asking about immigrants. Because otherwise the issue becomes a tautology; saying we should have a law forbidding people immigrating from a country because all of the people immigrating from that country would be doing so illegally.
It is very unlikely, as there is no one in any influential part of the Democratic party with that stance.
It’s possible that there’s a dark horse newcomer, like the Republicans had with Trump, who brings in such a position, but I don’t find it likely, and certainly don’t find it likely enough to use it as a consideration as to whether or not I find things agreeable in a explicitly racist screed.
But that’s my point: if you’re asking about legal immigrants — either now or in the past — I’d say that our elected officials based their decision on the idea that, hey, these are the folks we’ve chosen to allow in, presumably because we think it’d be for the benefit of the country; and if you’re asking about illegal immigrants, now or then, I’d say that our elected officials have decided that, oh, yeah, these folks, we haven’t chosen to allow them in, because we don’t think it’d be to our benefit.
And, again, we can debate which criteria should be applied — whether things that were disqualifying in the past should now be overlooked, and whether skill sets that weren’t seen as useful back when now strike us as especially valuable — but with an eye on that same goal.
A common setting for an immigration raid is… (dun dun dunnn…) places of business. Because the immigrants in question come here to work.
No matter what any racist fool Republican has to pretend.
So, how does that square with people who are undocumented workers also being designated as essential workers.
Maybe it wasn’t that not letting them in was to our benefit, maybe us not letting them in was to our detriment, and was only a result of racism and xenophobia. Racism and xenophobia rarely benefit even the racists.
But you do too much at the end, there: talking about whether you find things agreeable in it. I can find some things agreeable in it even while disagreeing with some others; I probably agree with you about some things, and won’t stop doing so even if you mention two or three or twenty or thirty that you disagree with me on.
But that brings up multiple questions: one is what should the law be changed to, while another is what should we do until the law is changed. If you want to debate whether it’s to our detriment that some folks aren’t currently being let in who’d benefit us, we can do that; but if you want to debate what’s to be done with those who illegally enter the country at present, that seems like a very different argument.
There are things in it that are not just disagreeable, they are abhorrent, and the congressional caucus with members who hold these abhorrent views should be condemned for this even if they also hold some non-abhorrent views.
A racist who thinks puppies are cute is still a racist.