Despite what certain talk show hosts might lead us to believe, compromise is not a dirty word. I watched Brit Hume yesterday evening and they talked about the Rasmussen telephone survey concerning the issue of immigration. Needless to say more people opposed the bill than supported it. Now Dafydd at Big Lizards gives us the rest of the story:
A flurry of anti-immigration-bill conservative pundits are about to start quoting (selectively) from the new Rasmussen poll on immigration. Most will only tell you about two of the questions:
* "From what you know about the agreement, do you favor or oppose the immigration reform proposal agreed to last Week?" Favor: 26%; Oppose: 48%; Not sure: 26%.
* "How Important is it to improve border enforcement and reduce illegal immigration?" Very important: 72%; Somewhat important: 16%; Not very important: 8%; Not at all important: 2%.
And from this, the opinion-makers will conclude that the very idea of a comprehensive immigration bill should be dropped, and we should move to the enforcement-only approach, which "everybody wants."
This leaves aside the political dilemma: Since we live in a country that has a political government, not a military dictatorship, how can we simply ignore the majority in Congress -- which overwhelmingly wants regularization? Is the president supposed to issue an executive order dissolving the legislative branch?
But the conclusion that Americans oppose any regularization also pretends not to notice a much more proximate point: Those were not the only two questions asked; and among the other questions is one that utterly upends the first question, transforming it instead into a pop quiz on current events:
Still, 65% of voters would be willing to support a compromise including a “very long path to citizenship” provided that “the proposal required the aliens to pay fines and learn English” and that the compromise “would truly reduce the number of illegal aliens entering the country.” The proposal, specifically described as a compromise, was said to include “strict employer penalties for hiring illegal aliens, building a barrier along the Mexican border and other steps to significantly reduce the number of illegal aliens entering the United States.”
That would be 2/3rds of Americans willing to support such a compromise; but only 26% willing to support this particular compromise.
Putting these two answers together, we find that a minimum of 39% of Americans (but probably much more) do not read Big Lizards... because, in fact, every single one of those provisions is in the current compromise legislation.
So, who are you going to believe? Your government or talk show hosts fighting for market shares and political oppurtunists demagogueing the issue?
Tough call, but one we have to make.
20 comments:
I think most people that support this crap must live somewhere that is not affected by it. But they are coming your way.
"That would be 2/3rds of Americans willing to support such a compromise; but only 26% willing to support this particular compromise."
Your summary of the analysis is not correct. This particular compromise is not discussed in the analysis of the Rasmussen poll which you quote.
Confusing, no?
richard:
Well richard if neither side gives the status quo reigns and I keep hearing how intolerable that is.
But I think some folks are more than willing to let this go on forever, it works for them.
bob:
Four out of five Californians support comprehensive reform.
bill:
That was not my analysis, it was part of the post I linked to, and I am not really sure what you mean.
My feelings are that if they are not going to deport all these people we should make some of them legal and make them taxes.
It will take years to build a fence and the status quo is certainly not a disincentive to people not to come. Half of the illegals did not come in that way anyway.
Drain the swamp, make it harder for people to blend in by allowing some of them legal status. I don't think making them citizens is necessary.
But the truth is I also think there is a lot of hysteria out there about this bill. That seems to be the only way people know how to debate anymore.
Blame Bush, after all he stole the election in 2000 and let 9/11 happen so that he could go to war in the ME to steal their oil. He also let the poor people in New Orleans die after Katrina because he hates black people and he is personally responsible for the global warming that created the hurricane in the first place. And he has destroyed the Constitution with the Patriot Act as well as mandating torture for all prisoners.
So I guess selling out to the Mexicans so that they can steal back the southwest is par for the course.
Too bad dummies like Michael Barone can't see what is really going on here. Thank God for Michelle Malkin and Michael Savage and their ilk for educating us all as to the REAL purpose of all this.
and something else richard, we are not talking about compromising with Imperial Japan, it is a compromise with other Americans and their elected officials who might not agree with you.
No one is saying it is all right for anyone to sneak anywhere.
I support comprehensive reform. How many hispanics in the poll? It does seem the majority of California politicians more or less support this current give everybody the vote, lawyers, welfare, etc etc. California is a mess. Lots of people that can are moving out I read.
As I have said before many times in my tiresome way, I am half Hispanic. I grew up speaking both Spanish and English at home. I still speak, read, dream in both languages. But as I read these threads, I can't help but remember that my LA high school, which at one time taught nine languages, had a science program second to none, and was a pipeline to UCLA, USC, and others, is today a Latino gang-infested hellhole of knife fights in the yard and spray painted graffiti on the outside walls. How long, assuming the best, to get it back to what it was? A generation? Two? A hundred years? Forever? I can’t comment on these threads anymore – it is simply too depressing. Suffice it to say in closing that if you are educated and productive – from Nicaragua or Laos or Burundi or Colombia or the UK or Estonia or anyplace else – I say, come on in. You are the kind of people we need as we race with China and India into the future. But that seems destined to never happen. The alliance between big business and the race industry seeking cheap labor that has crafted this abomination, designed to bring in the poorest and least educated in an analogy to the slavery of the 18th Century, will persist until they get what they want - transforming our society into a Balkanized nation in the process. Lovely. I can hardly wait.
Well said skookumchuk.
Seconded.
I do not doubt that there were many hispanics in that poll, but when the mayor of Los Angeles can nust blow off the INS there is really no point in blaming the feds for everything.
They let it go on too long.
If people think they can get enforcement only past this Congrss then they should push for that. But there are other things in that bill like harsher penalties for employers and a merit program for immigration and streamlining the doportation process that make it worth trying.
Is it an abomination? Well, what is the politically realistic alternative? I hear the status quo is an abomination and that is what we will have if the critics kill this thing.
Back in the 90's the only case I remember involving illegal immigration that really got the attention of the right was that of the boy from Cuba {whose name escapes me}, his motheer tried to come into the country illegally and died in the process. The fight was over whether or not to return her son to his father in Cuba. The right wanted to keep him here. The fact that his mother was illegally trying to enter the country was not something used to bar him, but to keep him. We have different rules for different people and that is part of the problem.
I know this bill is not perfect and if there were some way to actually remove most of these people I would say deport them...but this is not just about big business. That is a cop out. Average people hire these people. Small businesses and individuals hire them everyday and most of the time they do not even know if they are legal or not.
So just blaming it on the feds or big business does not deal with the fact that a lot of people were complicit in allowing this to happen. Thes tates who are constantly asserting states rights did not jump in there when it might have mattered and dealt with this. They might not be able to build a wall on the southern border, but they can petition for one, they can pass ordinances concerning housing, they can penalize in the state tax codes, they can use their legislators to enact laws that will inhibit the ease with which people can just come in and claim squatters rights. Blame it on the boogey man big business, but a lot of people failed to respond to this and now they just want to build a wall and deport 12 million people. Just like that. Well, go tell that to the Democrats running Congress.
If you can get an enforcement only bill pass the Democrats, fine, but I doubt it will happen. And then we will be right back where we started.
I do not want to see the balkanization of a culture, I despise multiculturalism. I want the drug dealers and criminals and gangs gone too. It is not as if I want these people here.
BTW, they are building the fence. 75 miles is under construction. The moat will be next.
You are correct in that it is not only big business that is behind this - it is small business, too. But the Feds clearly lack the will and the ability, the competence, to do much about it. I agree that there are other avenues besides the Feds that could be used, with an enormous expenditure of civic energy over many years. And yes, I agree we all let it go on too long. So Balkanization is what we shall get. Sorry.
Polling
Habu said... (on Steyn)
To return to the 72-virgin jackpot, even the looniest jihad-inciting imam understands that human nature responds to incentive, to the tradeoff between obligation and reward.
But the immigration bill is all reward and no obligations.
The only clause that matters is the first one:
the mandatory open-ended probationary legal status the bill will confer the moment it's passed.
All the rest -- the enforcement provisions on border agents and security fences that will supposedly "trigger" Z-visas and then green cards -- is nonsense, most of which will never happen. If you're "undocumented," you don't care about whether your Z-visa leads to citizenship 15 years from now:
What counts is crossing the line from illegal to legal, which in this bill happens first, happens instantly and happens (to all intents and purposes) irreversibly.
All the rest is Beltway kabuki.
Mark Steyn
---
Panama Ed said...
Mr Steyn asks:
So the question is: Why is enforcement of U.S. immigration somewhere between minimal and nonexistent?
By some estimates, half of all illegals have arrived on George W. Bush's watch -- i.e., they broke into a nation at war with borders supposedly on permanent "orange" alert.
READ MORE.
---
Habu said...
Panama Ed,
It is to me, a former 2X Bush voter that says that this is an abrogation of his PRIMARY DUTY, to defend this country from all enemies, domestic and foreign. He has ALLOWED this to happen, it just didn't suddenly occur. It is clearly an impeachable offense, and one where a verdict of guilty should be rendered.
I would like for him to HAVE to explain just how these 12 million illegals were allowed to invade our country, many to murder, rape, and yes, the old time honored pillage..can't have righteous invasion without some pillaging.
Terrye,
CURRENT laws are not being enforced, there is nothing magical about the new ones that will increase their enforcement.
Since the only effect then will be to GIVE AWAY more of what our ancestors fought, died, and sacrificed for, this makes no sense!
CALIFORNIA IS PERMANENTLY LOST TO THE DEMOCRAT/SOCIALISTS AND RECONQUISTADORES!
---
Let's be like them!!!
"what is the politically realistic alternative? "
---
DEMAND our politicians enforce the law, and honor their oaths of honor.
ELECT someone that is not a corrupt sellout next time.
Turn Up the Heat
As Congress heads out for Memorial Day, the immigration bill continues to enjoy bipartisan support in the Senate. We hope congressmen are challenged on the details of the bill at their events back home.
We suspect that, compared with the Washington press corps, constituents will demand more candor and less cant.
If they do, they will find that the bill’s contents don’t match its promises.
The Bush-Kennedy deal that supporters talk about is exquisitely balanced:
Immigration laws will be more seriously enforced, in return for a “path to citizenship” for 12 to 20 million illegal immigrants.
In reality, illegal immigrants are far more interested in legal status than in citizenship. The bill gives them that immediately. (It is a prize available only to those aliens who have violated our immigration laws.)
The enforcement provisions in the bill, meanwhile, are meaningless.
At Thursday’s press conference, President Bush declared, “So this legislation requires that border-security and worker-verification targets are met before other provisions of the bill are triggered.”
That is untrue.
Illegal aliens can get “probationary” legal status as soon as the bill is enacted.
NRO Editors
"The world is watching our southern border, as long as they realize that it's open.
When we pass a bill that gives people the impression that there are new benefits to be had in the United States, and that's the Senate bill, you will have a stampede for the U.S. border that will overwhelm our border forces."
-- Duncan Hunter
Post a Comment