Education

Joe R. Hicks, writing, somehow, in the LA Times – perhaps I should say, LAs Tiempos? – has some telling points to make. While noticing the generally uninformed motives of the truants, in their escapades – called “protests” – he observes that the student walkouts occurred on the day given to commemorate Cesar Chavez.

“The great Chicano labor organizer held a march in 1969 from the Coachella and Imperial valleys to the Mexican border. Chavez and the United Farm Workers were protesting the use of illegal immigrants as strikebreakers. Further, Chavez believed that illegal immigration was antithetical to the wage interests of the migrant workers he represented.”

There is much talk of racism. I find - always, in my experience - that it issues from racists. This is an example. What Chavez actually stood for, actually cared about, actually achieved, is irrelevant. What is relevant is his race. Because of his skin color and his accent, they identify with him. Pathetic.

Once upon a time, there was a man who was a teacher. Generally he taught teens, but one year he had a class of little ones, mostly Spanish-speaking background, but that class had some black children – it’s okay to say “black”, right? One little boy did have some pretty aggravated behaviour problems, but the man was a patient man, and the boy made good progress. One day the man had the child stay in for recess (remember recess?), and the little boy was extremely sad that none of his protestations or excuses could get him out of this. And then he said, “It’s because I’m black.” The man squatted down, and took hold of the boy's hands, and looked him in the eyes, and talked to him a bit. And the child threw himself into my arms like he’d never let go, and sobbed to break your heart. Gentleness matters.

Here’s the point. Some stupid adults had taught this child a very evil excuse. I suppose they’d never heard that most famous idea of Martin King’s – about the content of a man’s character. May the Lord rebuke them.

Well? Chavez stood for something too. And the stupid, stupid, stupid adults who should have been teaching these ignorant teenagers something, taught them that Chavez was Mexican. Brilliant.

Education: from the Latin root, educare, "to lead forth, from within".

J

A Joke

Question: How many Islamists does it take to set off a nuke?
Answer: Just one ... but he has to be an Islamist!

(laughter)

I know, it's a good one. Cracks me up. 'Cause it's, like, so true, y'know? But seriously dudes, this brings up a serious thing, dude. 'Cause there's this thing called like suitcase nukes, um, like a really big atom bomb, only little, in like a basket or something, y'know? Downer, right? It's like, uh, something that just one guy could like carry, in a backpack or something like that? I mean, like over the border or something, y'know? Oh! Hey! I just thought of something! What a trip! Man, it's like, some dude with a nuke could walk over the border! Like this border that all these dudes is crossing all the time over every night? These illegal dudes? Like, um, these undocumented dudes? Man! Wow, that's like totally heavy! 'Cause it ain't like, uh, just only this illegal documented protest thing. It's like, um, like about security, too. Wow, dude, that's heavy. Like a total bummer. Somebody ought to say something to like these politicians or something.



J

Bad Tactics

Here's why it was dumb. They are here by sufferance. We tolerate their unlawful presence not because they are sympathetic characters, not because our economy benefits from their labor, not because we understand their yearning for the monetary opportunity found here and not in their home village, not because they are just regular hard-working family-oriented foreign but decent folks. These are all stereotypically true – that is, true when we want to make excuses for them – but they are fictions, meaningful only as statistics are meaningful: in the general, not the specific.

We tolerate them because their presence is at worst an annoyance: perhaps we hear too much Spanish, not enough English – perhaps we notice an increase in the amount of brown- but- not- because- of- Africa- and- not- because- it’s- tanned skin, and this is different than what we remember from when we were young. The mere irritation, the diffused discomfort we might feel at such frankly small-minded observations is insufficient to motivate any effective action. Such ideas are petty, and even the most mediocre of us would feel some hint of shame, to act solely because of them. For even the mediocre can hear that Spanish is a beautiful language, can see that brown skin is just skin - and our skin is brown, as it is every hue of mankind.

A more principled, but still abstract objection would appeal to the rule of law, to the need to regulate and control our borders, to preserve our sovereignty, to protect that culture which has created our success. Perhaps the idea of their not waiting their turn, but rather paying some illicit guide, some most-likely drug-smuggling coyote, to sneak them in – or the idea that they burden our infrastructure, taking housing, driving down wages, crowding emergency rooms, crowding classrooms - these are principled objections. But if we have homes and jobs and healthcare and classrooms for our children, such issues don’t affect us in a tangible and personal way. They are Apollonian, not proletarian – we will only think about them, and not act.

We might mutter, we might complain, we might enter into grand theoretical debates about notions of how things ought to be. But we wouldn’t ever do anything meaningful about it, because we understand that things change and not all change is bad, or we understand that even though they represent a gradual disintegration of what is uniquely ours into a hybrid that is partly theirs, yet the change is gradual, and an unyieldingly principled stance is tiresome. Standing, unmoving, talking and thinking about the problem is just about all we might summon the energy to do. After all, what does it really matter. They are, at worst, an annoyance. We suffer them, and suppose that they are a neutral presence.

But now they take to the streets, and act offensively and insultingly. They call us vile names while claiming their ascendancy. They mock our laws while demanding special favours. They pretend to a moral outrage that is reserved for us, should we have the integrity to exercise it. Their arrogance dishonors the vast multitude of upright immigrants who had the moral sense and the common decency to ask admittance and swear allegiance. They block our highways, more than mere scofflaws now, not just a nuisance, but a threat and a hazard. They menace young women who carry our flag as an honored thing, and on our public buildings they fly our flag, upside-down, beneath their own. Upside-down. Beneath. They think they can intimidate us by their amassed numbers, swollen beyond expectation. They think they are a force. In our nation.

We have tolerated them. They are here by sufferance. But they are not necessary. We can tend our own infants, as we always have. We have neighborhood kids to mow lawns. We have teenagers who will prepare fast food. We have young men who will do hard labor for a living wage. It has always been so, and all the illegal alien has done is lower the cost of labor, while raising the cost of healthcare and housing and education. They have caused a price war in labor that our entry-level workers cannot win. But let none delude themselves that Americans cannot work. We have transformed the world with our muscle and our sweat - the honorable toil of those born here, and those who have joined us honorably. If a germ of indolence has for a time infected us, it was bred by a policy of governmental entitlements and unearned largesse that enabled sloth and discouraged enterprise. But we can find again our pride of work and our ethic of diligence. So, no. They are not necessary.

And if they act intolerably – if they continue to do so, we will suffer them no more. We already have an alien enemy, who hates us and would destroy us. If we discover we have another enemy – arrogant, subversive, inimical to our institutions - in our very midst, well, it is our country, and we Americans have shown that we know how to protect what is ours. Their millions are as nothing, to our hundreds of millions.

That’s why these protests were dumb. They turned over the rock, and uncovered the ugliness, the selfishness, the ingratitude toward our indifference and inertia. They do not want to move us. Believe it. Because we will move in a direction they do not wish to go. They need to smarten up. They need to respect their hosts. They are guests. Unwelcomed guests. Arrogant, offensive, shameless ungrateful unwelcomed guests. Smarten up.

J

My Country

There are two kinds of Americans – those who view it as their country, and those who do not view it as their country. The latter group is for open borders … for no borders at all. A John Lennon imagining, of no countries. Countries, to them, are like religions: both separate people from each other – they create artificial and, um, imaginary (here, the imaginary is bad) borders. They are unmoved by, say, the analogy of the house: How would you like it if I just came and lived in your dining room, uninvited … I mean, you don’t care that they come into the country, so why would you care if they come into your house? The analogy is invalid, I suppose they suppose, because a house is not a country. There seems to be no use in pointing out that an analogy is never the thing it represents. It is a clarifying similitude.

A less literal mind, on their side, might suppose that such reasoning is flawed because a house is owned by an individual, whereas a country is, at best, a sort of corporate asset, and, uh, corporations are evil (here, I am just supposing their attitude). If not evil, then this mass ownership is such a diffused reality, when applied to the individual, that the statistical effect of the illegal alien upon any given citizen is infinitesimal, and thus no cause for concern. The emphasis, the acknowledgment of legitimacy here, appears to be in favor of the individual. The idea of a citizenry, coming together to decide as a body how their land is to be governed, seems to be ignored or dismissed as illegitimate, at least when compared to the desires or perceived need of the individual non-citizen. Perhaps the thinking is that there’s plenty to go around, there’s no harm done, the happiness of foreigners would otherwise be diminished, so the laws are unjust.

That might be what they think. It’s what I think they think. But what the guy who disagrees with you thinks you think is always an iffy proposition, so I’m open to correction. These people, the ones who are for Los Estados Unidios de Mexico y … um … Norte America? - Norte Mexico? – they are in a better position than I, to inform me of their ideas about nationality, country, and the rights of citizens to make and enforce just laws.

As to what I think, well, here I can speak with some authority. My home is mine. I may not kill you, if you invade it – appropriate force and all that – but I have the unassailable right to use reasonable force to defend it. It is something worth defending. Who enters, is up to me. Guests must be invited. Gate-crashers will be expelled. Home invaders will be stopped, up to and including the use of deadly force. It’s not a fetish, not a macho thing – it’s a necessity, interwoven throughout the first two, the most basic, the most needed, of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

So what? A home is not a country. True. With a home, a single individual, or some small group of individuals, is the presiding authority – the “owner”. With a country, the ground covered is larger, and largely unroofed. And the presiding authority is appointed through some process to represent the interests of the polity – the “owners”. This is what is known as an “analogy”. But the things that make a home worth defending, apply also to a country.

The application of this analogy is thus: this is my country. My fellow citizens and I own it. We band together and agree upon its laws. We enforce those laws with all necessary force. Those who disagree with this reality, do not just get to have it their own way because they would have it so. As members of this society, they are subject to its laws and the punishment that follows the breach of those laws. They enjoy the benefits of this society, and the price of such benefit is compliance with its mores. If they would not follow the law they must change it. If they would not follow it or change it, then they must suffer its penalty. If they would not suffer its penalty, they must leave the protection of this society. There is no integrity, outside this formula.

Such is my reasoning. I state it with authority, because it is mine. What they think, I can only surmise based upon their actions and statements. If those who agree with me are in the reasonable majority – in contrast to a rampant majority - we will force compliance through the agencies of government. We are in the majority: as Tony Blankley reports, 80% of Americans want a tougher illegal immigration policy, 74% want "major" penalties for employers of illegals, and 92% believe securing the US border ought to be a first priority of both Congress and the White House. If those who disagree with me prevail - that minority - they will change the law, or change the society to such a degree that the law becomes moot, and they will abnegate the validity of the concept of nationality. Or so I imagine they will do. In either case, and even given the passion felt on both sides of this issue, it will not be acceptable, not legitimate, not honorable, to misrepresent the other side, to call them by scurrilous names, to reflexively impugn their motives prior to a good-faith effort to discover them.

Civility is the heart of civilization, and this is no merely glib consonance of syllables. The passion they feel, to protect and promote the interests of the desert wayfarers who seek or have achieved illegal entry into this land, is no less, and no more, than the passion we on this side feel about the unique and precious system of governance we have crafted, and about the preciousness of our culture, however flawed. Because of such passions, we must tread lightly. But if reason is not sufficient to persuade those who break the law, to follow it, we have the power, and will gather the will, to force them to, or punish them. For we are the reasonable majority, and it is our right, and it is our country. My country.

J

Just As I Thought

So after what turned out to be a quite unsatisfying discussion, in the comments of "Not Against the Pro-Illegal Immigration Rally" - I bit the bullet and delved into a topic I really have very little interest in: the Sensenbrenner legislation in Congress. I've read through the provisions of the bill, and I find nothing I have a problem with. Draconian? No. Stiffer penalties. That seems like a really good thing, to me. What is a law that doesn't provide for meaningful penalties upon its breach?

The crux of the issue seems to reside in the phrase "aggravated felony." Specifically, Section 203 of H.R. 4437 makes `unlawful presence' in the United States a misdemeanor. That really doesn't seem unreasonable to me. At all. Where does the "aggravated felony" come in? Section 201 makes a conviction under 203 an "aggravated felony" for immigration purposes. In other words, it is not an aggravated felony, except as a legal fiction.

Clearly, we have a group, a large multitude, that is unimpressed with the law as it stands. They break it with impunity, and at will. Well, folks - time to get serious. Don't like it? You can protest, but you'd better obey the law, or you'll be a misdemeanant who partakes of the nature of a felon. Simple.

Here's the thing. Borders matter. You are not "just the same" as us, for a simple reason: you are not citizens. The unliscenced driver is not "just the same" as the licenced driver. There are rights that come with status, which not everyone gets. Membership has its privileges. It is the nature of nationality. It is a private club, which you must petition to join. It's a movie theater, and you have to buy the ticket to see the film. It's the YMCA - you have to be a member, or an invited guest, to use the facility. We are a membership organization, and you don't get a vote. You have rights. But not equal rights. Tough. I can't vote in Mexico. Boo hoo for me. If for some reason I wanted to vote in Mexico. They do vote in Mexico, right?

Don't like it? As long as we remain a sovereign nation with the power to make and enforce law, the self-serving opinions of illegal aliens is a matter of indifference, to me. The opinion of a drug addict about drug laws is a matter of indifference. The opinions of whore-mongers is unimportant. Theirs are crimes against society, not against individuals. This does not diminish their disrepute. Just so, the illegal alien. That they are so shameless, to publicly proclaim their demands, having pushed themselves forward ahead of the honest people who wait in line to enter legally ... that they are so blind, so morally insensible to the stink of it - no, this is a crime, and they are criminals.

The thing about civil disobedience is that it has integrity. You don't skirt the law, sneak about by night. You confront it, and make it confront you. In the face of such courage, even injustice becomes ashamed. These protestors, to be respected, should walk up to the federal building, line up, and say, one by one, "I am here illegally. Apply the law to me." Gandhi. Martin. Heroic. They put their bodies on the line. These people skipped the first line, and are too cowardly for the second. Instead, they have a fiesta outside city hall. Contemptible.

Hardworking? Mostly. Looking out for family? Undoubtedly. Taken advantage of by slum lords and crappy bosses? Comes with their status. But twenty percent of the prison population is illegal aliens. A majority of gangsters are illegals. As I've said, hospitals close, schools are over-crowded ... I don't care about any economic benefit they bring. Bring it lawfully. Or stay home. Too harsh? Racist? Grow up. Enough with the excuses. Honorable people take responsibility, and act openly and honestly. Period.

This is why I've wanted to avoid the issue. Not pleasant, is it. Not gracious.

Okay, I'll go into it. Every empire falls. They fall because they are invaded by barbarians - people of an alien culture that do not respect the land they enter. The Germans into Rome. The Spanish into Mexico. The Moslems into Europe. It seems to be an inevitable, unavoidable process, that can only be slowed, not stopped. One method of slowing it is to build a wall - either a literal wall, like the Great Wall of China, or the wall against the Amorites built during the Old Babylonian era (don't ask) - or a metaphorical wall, say, the Roman frontier provinces ... a buffering zone. What does the US have? A river. Some desert. In other words, nothing. So of course they will come. We can't stop them.

But we can control their entry, and we must. This is the difference between order and chaos, and I trust I don't have to spell out the importance of order. Consider Ellis Island. As I understand it, people pretty much just got on a boat and came over. No such thing as illegal immigration. But wait. Yes there was. Because even though the process had hardly any paperwork, there was some guy in a hat who looked at your passport, and who looked at you. And if you were coughing up blood, well, sorry, mate - no entry. The borders were regulated. Is it more complex now? Perhaps because the times are more complex. To ignore this fact, is to dishonor us. Enough, of the disrespect.

A wall won't work? Um, tell that to the East Germans. There was a mass influx into the west only after the Berlin WALL fell. How ever might we puzzle out this insuperable mystery? The glib response, of course, is that such a wall would make us totalitarian. Ah, so that's the definition. If you have a wall, you're a fascist. Very reasonable. I now envision a joyous paradise, a Messianic paradise where babes play happily at the adder's lair, and pink bunnies gaily scamper with smiling foxes across sun-dappled meadows ... and all brought about because those mean old Americans knocked down all their nasty old walls.

I've heard "The Racists" ... I mean, "The Race" claim that this is their land. Let's examine this proposition. It is true, that the American southwest did once upon a time belong to the Mexican government. For twenty-seven years, from when the Mexicans stole it from Spain with the Treaty of Cordoba in 1821, until the US liberated it in 1848. Yeay, that sounds fair to me. For the past nearly 160 years, we've had it. So is it Mexican? Did we steal it? Win it in a war? Buy it? Take your pick. But who did the Mexicans steal it from, or win it in a war? And it belonged to Spain for, what? - over three hundred years. And who did the Spanish steal it from? Some Indian tribes, now largely destroyed. Who did they steal it from? Some tribe there even sooner. In other words, the argument is stupid.

If this land belonged, still, to Mexico, well, it would be Mexico - poor, corrupt, and the place people would want to leave. California would be as rich as, um, Utah. The Mexicans who lived here would be finding the US border by night and crossing it illegally. Because it isn't the land, it's the culture, that they come to. American culture breeds prosperity. Mexican - Latin American - culture breeds poverty. How do we know? - some theory? The inconvenient and implacable tangibility of reality. Mexico's chief export is Mexicans. Don't like that fact? Find an excuse for it. "Poor Mexico. So far from God, and so close to the United States." Blame some corporation or cite some conspiracy. But agree that the reality is that the USA is the place where people want to be. That is, after all, the heart of the problem.

This really is a rant. It's a reaction to what I've come to consider some rather disrespectful treatment, from A in the comments of Not Against the Pro-Illegal immigration Rally. Ah well. It's fundamentally meaningless. Communication is such a difficult thing. Like obeying the law seems to be. What a world.


J

Not Against the Pro-Illegal Immigration Rally

I’m not angry. Really. I’m not. Not angry. At all. Now, why don’t you believe me? Because I’m not angry. It’s not anger.

And I’m not racist. Really. I’m not. Not racist. At all. Now, why don’t you believe me? Because I’m not racist. It’s not racism.

Tonight, tens of thousands of, um, people are crowded about the Los Angeles City Hall, protesting pending legislation in Congress. The law would criminalize those who assist the, um, people who enter this country unlawfully. There are, apparently, at least some tens of thousands of, um, people who believe that it should be legal to assist law-breakers, and that it should be legal to enter this country illegally. And these ... people are protesting.

It is the right of every citizen of the United States to petition the government for redress of grievances. Surely a protest is a form of petition. And even if some number, large or not, of these protestors are not citizens of the country they presently occupy, it is still entirely fitting that the free expression of opinion be allowed. That they hoot, and chant, and shout and disport themselves, and wave the flags of alien nations, and carry banners and signs that call racist those who would have the laws, of the country they currently occupy, obeyed – well, offensive speech (for so this would be categorized) is lawful. That they don't have the ... I won't say intelligence ... I won't say honesty ... that they don't have the clarity of expression to call it what it is - illegal immigration, well, perhaps there is a political purpose, in this inaccuracy. And political purpose, lawfully pursued, is the right of every citizen of the United States - and of our guests.

That they come to this country and are free to express their opinions, brings honor to us. We are glorified, when compared to, say, the countries from which they are fled - countries of economic oppression and rampant corruption - countries of poverty and backwardness - countries they don’t want to be in, as proven by their presence here. They have fled like Lot from Sodom, from the Third World to the First, and are comfortable enough here to loudly voice their political opinions, about what they think our laws should be. They have transformed themselves, with the crossing of a border, from peasants into participants in the greatest political enterprise ever undertaken by mankind.

All who cross our borders and lawfully petition for the right, may be citizens of this land. We are the envy of the world, and even our enemies would join us if they dared. We are not a race, not an ethnicity, not the children of some necessary heritage. We do not call ourselves, say, la raza - "the race" - imagine people who call themselves "the race" calling others "racist" ... but there is no need to imagine it. We, however, are not a race, and to say otherwise would diminish us. Our heritage is the birthright of everyone who would cherish liberty as we do - that balance of rights and duties. We come from every habitable continent, and we join together to build something that endures, to defend something that is worthy, and to make and enforce laws that are just and necessary. How beautiful and fine. How blessed we are, and how noble, to share our blessings. God has smiled on our shores, and we must be thankful for it.

Ingratitude is an ugly thing. Flouting our law is an ugly thing. Calling decent people racists is an ugly thing. How shameful, to call what is lovely by an ugly name. But not every people is a great people, and no race is great. Perhaps, if they stay long enough, they too will, each of them, individually, take on some of our greatness. Perhaps they will learn gratitude. Perhaps they will thank God for their blessings, rather than curse their hosts with curses.

So, no. I am not angry. I am proud. They make themselves small, by calling us names – but we are great enough to bear the insult. They reveal themselves to be hypocrites, by entering unlawfully but demanding the law’s full protection – but we begrudge the freedom of no man, and understand their burning ambition. They show themselves to be ingrates, by spitting on our laws and then exploiting our tolerance. But we are not who we are, that we might receive gratitude.

All who obey our laws are welcome. Come, and be a blessing to us, as we are to you. But obey our laws.



J