Unless you live in a cave, you're by now aware of the recent law passed in Arizona that requires that the police, when given reasonable cause in a law enforcement situation, to check the citizenship of a person. This has, predictably, caused the progressive Left and the various La Raza-type groups to explode in anger. They are promising various protests that the mainstream media will describe as mostly peaceful', in the same way an anarchist protest at a G8 meeting is mostly peaceful'. We can expect provocations, large and small, in the coming weeks.
We've seen this before.
In 2006 there was a similar debate over immigration policy, and the same groups that are protesting today protested back then, in the same way and for the same reason.
No, not for a change in immigration policy. Don't be silly.
For a change in political leadership in Washington.
Back in 2006 the Democrats used their progressive and latino pawns to foment trouble. They hoped that the Republicans would fracture over the issue, and they got their wish: that's just what Republicans did. Throw in a few tawdry scandals and dismay over the Iraq war, and the Democrats regained control of Congress.
Four years later the Democrats are in big trouble with the electorate, bigger than the problems the Republicans had in 2006. The economy is their problem now. The scandals are theirs. The stalemate in Afghanistan. The health care bill. The progressive base isn't enough to lift the Democrats, and voters who might ordinarily favor them are dispirited and unhappy. Independents think they were suckered. Working people see their money disappearing.
In response, Democrats apparently plan to double-down their progressive push on immigration, all in an effort to rally their own base and, once again, fracture the Republicans.
It will work like this, as Elizabeth Scalia explains at The Anchoress: the Democrats will provoke the Right. The Right will overplay its hand. The public will become disillusioned and will turn off the Republicans. The Democrats will squeak by in November, and then go after their agenda again in 2011.
If you recognize the sequence of events, it's because this is how leftist groups, particularly terrorist groups, try to get the public on their side, by provoking the other side into an over-reaction.
It has to be immigration as the wedge issue. The health care bill has hurt them but that's over. Cap and trade is too technical. Afghanistan is too far away. Democrats are too encumbered with people like Barney Frank and Chuckie Schumer to whack Wall Street but so hard.
But immigration provokes an emotional response. We're a country built on immigration, but illegal immigration, lax border security, rampant drug importation, and good old fashioned hypocrisy give immigration the potential to be a weapon for Democrats. They can provoke their opponents, and when conservatives over-react, they can demonize them.
Just in time for November.
Keep in mind that the Democrats and their friends in the media have been preparing this play some time now. The description of the Tea Party as ugly', violent' and racist' will be used, should conservatives over-react, to paint the tea party activists as personally responsible for what happens. Discrediting the Tea Party is essential to the Democrats retaining control of the Congress, and provoking people over immigration has the advantage, for Democrats, of being something that they have done before.
They think it will work.
It might, if people let it happen.
How does the Tea Party prevent this? How do conservatives keep the Democrats from successfully labeling them as nativists, racists and slack-jawed wing-nuts? How do we keep the Democrats from getting the public relations victory they need, one that the media will give them at the very first moment?
It's simple.
Chill.
Don't over-react. Don't attack Hispanics. Don't wave rude signs and chant obnoxious slogans at tea party rallies. Keep it civil.
Talk about the harm that illegal immigration is doing to our country. Talk about the two-legged coyotes who take money to leave people to die in the desert. Talk about the drug problem.
But show concern and empathy for the illegals themselves. Don't hate them, don't attack them, don't denigrate them. Keep the focus on the law, on national security, on doing what's right, while at the same time making sure that the average person hears us acknowledge the humanity of the immigrants.
The progressive Left thinks that conservatives are, by definition, bigots, and are planning this campaign based on that definition. They lose if conservatives prove them wrong.
Chill.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/29/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
How do conservatives keep the Democrats from successfully labeling them as nativists, racists and slack-jawed wing-nuts?
#2
There's a difference between chilling and quietly getting into the box car.
But immigration provokes an emotional response.
National sovereignty is what provokes an emotional response. We're in this together. If we're not, then, its everyone for themselves. You can't have it both ways. You can not claim the power of a sovereign government of the people and at the same time denounce by act and deed the very basis of that sovereignty and its power.
#3
The issue isn't feeling strongly, which is a legitimate response. The issue is reacting emotionally, and allowing them to provoke a response that can be turned into a propaganda win that will have long-term impact.
#4
I will be very calm and rational at all meetings and protests and online. But the second a liberal Nazi attacks me for my beliefs he will be eating his own ass after I break his back.
The root of the issue is our broken economic and political relationship with the Mexican state. We do not have an immigration problem. We have a Mexico problem.
As a tactical matter, people should always steer the conversation back to two completely race-neutral points:
1) Mexico is a failing state. Our #1 priority must be to secure the border. No discussion of
reform ie amnesty until the border is secured.
2) working people on both sides of the border are being hurt by NAFTA's carveouts and by our open-border policy that merely enables a corrupt Mexican elite to export its economic failure northward. Real low-end wages have been crushed here by the importation of a second underclass, which itself is fleeing a severe fall in rural incomes because US corn producers are dumping more than a billion dollars in subsidized corn into Mexico each year.
Secure the border. Help working families on BOTH SIDES of the border. End the corrupt bargain between US corporations, Democratic pols and Mexican oligarchs.
Oh, and recruit a few spokesmen from among the millions of legal hispanic immigrants who are opposed to illegals' queue-jumping.
#7
Well, I sneaked across the border once, from Yugoslavia to Italy (from Czechoslovakia to Germany or Austria was a 99% suicide). I then was for 4 months in a refugee camp to wait for an interview at the embassy and then another 2 months until my immigration application was processed. Of course, returning me back to CZ would mean a serious jail time for me.
So, I understand sneaking, but don't understand no refugee or immigrant camps. And if one is refused, they can go back to MX without any repercussions... well, if they are from Juarez, maybe they can move to some other place in Mexico, can't they?
#8
Actually, stet that. They can go to US embassy/consulate in Mexico and fill out green card application and wait in the convenience of the environment they know.
I did NOT have that option. If I did that back in CZ, I'd have been whisked to a jail pronto.
#9
I will chill. How about the Hispanic protesters in AZ? Will they also chill.
I don't see what the problem is if you are a law-abiding citizen if some officer of the law asks you to produce identification. We are asked to do such in all kinds of situations: Whenever we travel on the airlines, whenever we cash a check, whenever we get stopped for a traffic violation, and sometimes when there is a case of mistaken identity. If one applies for a firearm permit, there are all kinds of identification and background checks one must go through. If a citizen is not doing something illegal, what's the problem?
After 911, officials from the United States Department of State began occasionally asking people if they were U.S. citizens or not, and in the latter case began enforcing the legal requirement that the person be able to immediately present their Permanent Resident Card or other proof of legal status.
Arizona is just trying to frame the issue--particularly the issue where neither party is willing to do anything about the illegal alien problem. Both parties are trying to suck up the Hispanic vote. It takes a woman governor in Texas to display any cojones (at least in a political sense).
#10
Problem is - even if we 'chill' the Leftist will attempt to provide whatever 'RACIST' claims they need and the media will knowingly go along.
Just ask the Black Congressional Caucus.
And we need to do the exact same thing people did then. Provide proof. Demand proof of the accusation. Point out the 'plants'. Basically do what the treasonous media refuses to do.
#11
I'll have plenty of time to "Chill" while I'm dirting napping through eternity. Until then, they come through the door... they get a 230gr .45 caliber Hydra-Shok double tap. They try to hi-jack the old Ford... .45 double tap. They mess with the wife or kids.... .45 double tap. Easy can-do.
Posted by: John Maynard Keynes ||
04/29/2010 07:06 ||
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Well, regrettably, if there will be another Great Depression and ensuing totalitarian Nazi-like government, people better hope their skin color is of the right hue.
Posted by: Jack Salami ||
04/29/2010 8:55 Comments ||
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Greece has agreed the outline of a 24bn austerity package, including a three-year wage freeze for public sector workers, in return for a multibillion-euro loan from the eurozone and the International Monetary Fund, according to people familiar with the talks.
Final details of the measures, which are intended to slash the budget deficit by 10-11 percentage points of gross domestic product over the next three years, were still being worked out, a senior government official said.
If you can only read one article on the Dodd financial reform bill, read this guide to what the legislation proposes and what it doesn't propose in today's Washington Independent. It's the most understandable summary I've read anywhere. Republicans would be smart to introduce amendments to it such as Rep. Ron Paul and Sen. Chuck Grassley's proposals to audit the Fed, whose books are holding over $1 trillion in mortgage-backed securities from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as well as toxic assets from Bear Sterns. They'd also do well with Sens. John McCain and Maria Cantwell's planned amendment to re-introduce the Glass-Steagall provisions that were repealed in 1999, which outlawed banks from engaging in commercial and investment activities at the same time. My favorite is language that Republicans are urging to ensure there would be no more taxpayer-funded bank bailouts.
Democrats are really playing games with this bill--shutting Republicans out of negotiations, as they did with the health care bill, then accusing them of being obstructionists' afterward. But by offering some amendments that promote transparency and fiscal responsibility, Republicans have an opportunity here to stand on the side of small businesses and community banks and take the high road. And if they do take the high road, they won't be running into the Democrats.
Rich Lowry of the National Review points out that in the 2008 election cycle, when Goldman Sachs gave money to politicians, three-quarters of the time it was to Democrats. UBS and Citigroup did the same thing. Over at Politics Daily, Patricia Murphy points out, We also know that Wall Street firms and their employees were three of President Obama's largest donors in 2007 and 2008, with Goldman's people giving nearly $1 million to help the president get elected.' And while Republicans aren't completely clean when it comes to accepting campaign contributions from banks, Lowry lays out the Democrats' new M.O.:
The more Washington does, the greater the need to protect yourself, and the greater the opportunities for profit. A writer for the Huffington Post reported on carve-outs in the financial-reform bill. Obtaining a carve-out isn't rocket science,' a Republican financial-services lobbyist told the website. Just give Chairman [Chris] Dodd and Chuck Schumer a [expletive denoting a lot] of money.' That's the Democratic appeal writ large. They are running a protection racket. No matter how bad a reform' is, it could be worse. This is how they bought off the drug companies in the health-care debateby threatening worse. It is why the insurance companies were conflicted. Yes, they were maligned. But they'd live to fight another day, and in the meantime, the government would mandate that people buy their product. The entanglement of business and government is potentially lucrative for both sides.
So the Democrats can threaten anything from reforming' to nationalizing an industry, and then collect a boatload of money from frightened corporate executives who want a carve-out.' It's like something out of The Sopranos. In the immortal words of Silvio Dante, as he collected his protection money, You're only as good as your last envelope.'
Posted by: Jefferson Smith ||
04/29/2010 08:10 ||
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"Nice little economy ya got here, Sammy. Be a real shame if anyt'ing wuz ta happen to it..."
(CNSNews.com) -- A new government report says global warming could lead to an increase in both cancer and mental illness worldwide, and it calls for more federally funded research to determine how that might happen.
It might be a good idea to first determine whether there actually is global warming outside the historic range. I'm even willing to define that historic range as "since the end of the last ice age", as opposed to "since the earth cooled enough for multicellular organisms to exist" or "since the genus Homo has been throwing off species".
The report, A Human Health Perspective on Climate Change, was published by the Interagency Working Group on Climate Change and Health -- a combination of scientists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, NIH, State Department, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Agriculture, the EPA, and the Department of Health and Human Services.
Do these people truly have nothing better to do?
The report's overall thrust is for more federally funded research to investigate the alleged links between global warming and public health, including the potentially negative effects from warming and the potentially negative side-effect of green technologies.
What, no thought about the potentially positive effects? An easy one is that nuclear power plants don't emit carbon dioxide, about which y'all used to be so concerned. Windmills, on the other hand, tend to be placed in bird migration corridors, and could result in the extinction of a great many migratory bird species. Skyscrapers have already wreaked havoc, you know.
While the report touches on, for example, the health effects of unclean water and respiratory ailments, it also deals with two other types of health issues not normally associated with global warming: cancer and mental illness.
While the report does not claim that global warming will cause new types of cancer, it says that "higher ambient temperatures" caused by global warming will have an effect on cancer rates, probably pushing them higher.
"There are potential impacts on cancer both directly from climate change and indirectly from climate change mitigation strategies," the report said.
This increased risk supposedly comes from increased exposure to toxic chemicals, caused by global warming. The report also said that global warming would cause heavy rainfall, which would wash these toxic chemicals into the water. Hotter temperatures may also make these toxic chemicals even more toxic. I doubt you'll wish to read further, but there is much more at the link.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
