Illegals and the Election
The left cannot win that match. Illegal immigration violates too many fundamental precepts involving security, economics, and questions of national identity. Polling reveals an overwhelming public aversion to illegal immigration, with opposition reaching up to 70%.
By J.R. Dunn at American Thinker
Thanks in large part to Governor Jan Brewer’s bold action in signing SB 1070, immigration is shaping up as the issue of the 2010 election. More than the economy, more than terrorism, more even than the question of whether Obama was chased back into the oval office by a rat, a vole, or a trilobite, illegal immigration has become the arena in which the upcoming election will be fought.
The left cannot win that match. Illegal immigration violates too many fundamental precepts involving security, economics, and questions of national identity. Polling reveals an overwhelming public aversion to illegal immigration, with opposition reaching up to 70%. The Democrats might be better-advised to run on a platform calling for more child abuse.
No wonder the president was “thin-skinned” in his meeting with Republican senators yesterday, where following the meeting he suddenly announced more National Guard troops for the border, a move he never mentioned during the meeting itself.
But leftists can distort the debate by ignoring the central argument and instead playing the margins, as they so often do. They are past masters at changing the subject and directing debate into channels where they hold superiority. Consider how they distorted the public view of the War on Terror, playing on fears of government surveillance, Nazifying efforts to protect the country, and smearing the agents and officials attempting to implement a workable strategy. By refusing to acknowledge that the U.S. was at war, concentrating on ill-conceived areas of the national effort, and planting seeds of doubt and paranoia, the left undermined the entire anti-terror program. Today, nearly a decade after 9/11, America’s anti-terror system consists of Janet Napolitano holding a microphone. Once the jihadis get past her, they pretty much have a clear shot at anything they like, as Fort Hood, Detroit, and Times Square have so clearly demonstrated.
A similar process is at work involving the illegals crisis. The attempt to bulldoze opposition through demos and marches has failed. Instead, the left, along with the captive legacy media, will hard-pedal questions vaguely related to the topic while by no means central to it. We will hear endless talk about “rights” (always the rights of illegals, never the rights of citizens), racism, and the government as an oppressive force unleashed against third-world victims. All contrary arguments, on the other hand, will be abstracted out of comprehension or flushed down the memory hole, in the same way that rancher Rob Krentz, murdered by an illegal on his own land, and Deputy Louie Puroll, shot by cross-border drug smugglers, have become nonpersons to the eastern media and liberal politicians.
They may not be able to win the debate, but they can fix it so they don’t lose either, at the expense of the country as a whole. As for conservatives, we are often only too willing to stumble into the elephant trap laid out for us, losing public arguments you would think it impossible to fumble (see Paul, Rand).
So what are the proper tactics for debating the illegals question?
* First, analyze how the left will play it: how they will work to generate sympathy for illegals, impute racism to opponents, and to transform opposing arguments into bloodless abstractions. Identify the topics that the left wants to fight over and ignore them. They cannot become controversial if there’s no controversy. And if there’s no controversy, there’s no impact. Keep in mind that not every damn fool thing the lefties bring up needs to be answered, and avoid the temptation to do so. We will only be playing the role that they have laid out for us.
* In particular, avoid becoming bogged down in racism. The topic has already come up, as it always does. Racism is the hole card of the left, and has served them well for fifty years and more. The latest example can be found in Salon. The first thing you’ll notice about this piece is that it really has nothing to do with the illegals crisis; it is simply another run-through of the miseries of Jim Crow now a lifetime in the past. As such, it does not require an answer. The subject became fatigued many years ago, and it is unlikely to gain traction under current circumstances. If it does, a few anti-illegal comments from blacks — who, after all, have more to lose in this situation than whites — should lay it to rest.
* Avoid direct attacks on illegals. Last week Michelle Obama was speaking at a school in Silver Spring when a second-grade schoolgirl brought up the question of immigration in terms of “the right papers,” which her mother, it seems, didn’t have…
The scene leaps to mind complete in detail: the child’s eyes growing wider as she realizes that she’s said a Bad Thing. An expression of compassion settling on the First Lady’s face. Her Secret Service detail biting their lips and looking away…
We’re lucky that an ICE agent didn’t take it upon himself to bust the family that very evening, as camera crews filmed the sobbing child and mother being dragged from the house. And all this just days before Felix Calderón arrived in D.C. Hmmm…
Anybody who thinks this incident was spontaneous requires a quick introductory course on contemporary image manipulation. The same can be said for the web page that appeared almost simultaneously, which claimed to feature mugshots of illegals picked up in Arizona: Marvin the Martian and Dora the Explorer. Curiously enough, Dora, who could pass as a Latina and looks to be of an age for second grade, was badly bruised, apparently having been beaten for “resisting arrest.” (Marvin looked untouched, but of course he’s got that ray gun…)
We cannot forget that the left is ready for this. From their point of view, illegal immigrants are the crowbar they intend to use to pull the American polity apart. They have been preparing for this for a long time. These people have succeeded in making Mao, Che Guevara, Castro, Stalin, Chávez, and all their goons look wholesome and attractive. Don’t think for a minute they can’t do the same thing for the illegals. Target illegals directly, and they will magically turn into the Holy Family fleeing Herod, with our side wearing Klan costumes that won’t come off. For every direct attack, they will trot out a hundred weeping second-graders — and believe you me, some of them will be bruised and bleeding. We cannot fall for this. The illegals themselves are the stick that we must ignore as we instead go for the hand that wields it.
The exception is the criminal element, which has been too often overlooked. It is estimated that up to 10% of all illegal immigrants are felons, a number high enough to suggest deliberate dumping. The results are commensurate. According to William Bennett and Seth Leibsohn,
Illegal immigrants account for 16.5 percent of those sentenced for violent crimes; 18.5 percent of those sentenced for property crimes; 33.5 percent of those sentenced for the manufacture, sale, or transport of drugs; and 44.4 percent of those sentenced or forgery and fraud in the Phoenix area.
This is not something the left can answer. They have not had any workable defense against the accusation of being soft on criminals since Willie Horton politically destroyed Michael Dukakis in 1988. The left hated the Horton ad because it worked. It can easily be made to work again in the present context.
Every criminal drifting across the border must be Hortonized. Local papers in the Southwest, and many others elsewhere, features endless stories of illegal criminality. (Take for example this charmer here, for whom I confess a sneaking fondness due to his philosophical attitude: “Sometimes we have control in our brains, but we make mistakes.” Sartre said much the same thing…but lo and behold, what’s this? A later report on the same clown reveals that he was deported at least nine times previous to this latest crime. This guy’s the Professor Moriarty of the border-crossers.) For some reason, this material is absent from the national media. It must be collected, collated, and made available to all. A website would be a good start. Above all, any political or media attempt to excuse illegals must be tied directly to criminality. To speak for illegals is to speak for crime committed against fellow Americans. Hammer this continually, and the left will never get a chance to bring up anything else.
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