Daily Record - Local News - Morris Residents vent over immigration

Daily Record - Local News - Morris Residents vent over immigration :

"'I think the reason most people find amnesty objectionable is that there is no penalty to people coming here illegally,' [Morris County resident Arnold] Dunn said. 'None. We have not sent that message.'"

Mr. Dunn shows a simple and sensible appreciation of the problem than his congresscritter who hosted the town hall meeting. On the other hand, US Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-NJ) demonstrated a position so nuanced as to be divorced from any connection to the real world.

Bear with me while I try to untangle the congressman's muddle-headed thinking on this issue.

"'There's a difference between legal immigration and illegal immigration,' Frelinghuysen said."

No there isn't. That is, the difference in the law doesn't matter if you don't enforce the law. And talk of amnesty (by whatever name President Bush tries to pretty it up), encourages more people to come illegally. Not just to get in on this amnesty, but even after the deadline to get in on the next one - remember, we already did this once during the Reagan administration.

"'We are a nation of immigrants. But if you look at who does the hard labor, who cuts the grass, washes the cars and dishes, many people in Congress raise the issue, why aren't Americans getting these jobs?'" Frelinhuysen continued before pointing out how tight Bush is with President Fox and mentioning their amnesty proposal.

That first sentence is designed to make all the Italians, Poles, Greeks, Jews, etc. feel guilty about objecting to to an uncontrolled flood of people pouring in over the southern border and a steady trickle over the northern border, plus the occasional ship or container load smuggled into one of our ports. Of course throughout our history as the USA (well at least since 1808) the Constitution has made the federal government responsible for setting immigration policy. When it suited the nation's needs immigration was very free, at other times there were tighter controls. We have chosen to give preference to persons from certain places, we have chosen to exclude persons with certain diseases or who had demonstrated bad character. The difference today is that we are not enforcing our own laws.

Regarding the second sentence, it simply isn't true, as President Fox (a member of the white clique which rules Mexico even though its population is predominantly Amerindian and mestizo) said, that his people come here to do jobs even blacks won't do. What the flood of Mexicans and OTMs crossing our southern border does do is to drive down wages, even when they aren't working off the books. Even though living costs may be a little higher here, they can still make so much more money here than where they come from that they can live better here and still send money home to pay for smuggling the rest of the family in.

"'I realize there's a school of thought that we ought to go to the Morristown train station, gather everyone who is here illegally up and fly them back to their countries. But they're entitled to due process by law,' Frelinghuysen explained."

This is a classic liberal answer in that it does nothing to address the issue itself (why we are not enforcing the immigration laws) but attempts to put the questioner on the defensive (by accusing him of lack of respect for our laws). It is the illegal alien who has disrespected us and our laws, not the honest taxpayers who want the laws enforced.

In that small number of cases where illegals are caught, they are routinely given the option of a ride back across the border with no mark against their record, or they can request a hearing which, if they lose and get formally deported, there will be criminal consequences for entering the country again. Most of the Mexicans and Central Americans caught near the southern border choose the bus ride and take another shot at walking back across later. The real travesty is that those who want hearings are generally not in custody awaiting a hearing. Nominal bail may be required of adults, but those who are or plausibly claim to be juveniles are simply turned loose. That's how Lee John Malvo was able to connect with John Muhammad and carry out the Beltway snipers murder. It's also how a Brazilian woman, released in Texas as a presumed juvenile with a paper directing her to appear for an interview in 30 days, managed to get to Massachusetts, borrow a car and run over a policeman.

We want due process, Mr. Frelinghuysen. But it must be a process that leads to illegal entrants being sent home.

If you thought the foregoing statements of Mr. F. were a bit fuzzy in the logic department, here's the real doozie:

"'I'm not saying that I endorse illegal activity, but it's a huge issue ... many of them have families. But my attitude is if they're working hard ... if they're not on welfare, and sending money back home, more people won't come here,' Frelinghuysen said."

He may not be saying that he endorses illegal activity, but no other construction can fairly be put on his words. Why is the scale of a problem relevant to whether the laws should be enforced? Auto theft, burglaries and murders are rampant in many cities, but that is not an argument for giving up on enforcing the laws against those things.

Many of them do have families, typically families they have brought in illegally although some have children who were born here. That doesn't change what they have done. (We need to clarify our laws so that a child born here to parents who lack legal status to be here do not acquire US citizenship jus soli. There are towns on the southern border where the maternity wards are full of women who crossed the border illegally just to give birth on our side of the border.)

Working hard at a job that an American ought to have is not an argument that someone ought to be allowed to stay who broke the law to get here. And, the congressman's reference to not being on welfare overlooks how much financial strain these individuals and families put on our social services by charity care in our hospitals, filling schools for which they pay little in taxes even indirectly, and the disproportionate burden on our prisons.

The real howler comes at the end when Frelinghuysen associates the idea that illegals sending money home is a good thing and that it makes further illegal immigration less likely! Quite the contrary, money they send back to their homelands often are used to enable even more of their friends and relatives to come here in defiance of our laws.

You need to get out in the real world congressman. The real world where over half the population of Mexico wants to be here and the majority of the planet is poorer than Mexico.