Reality can be a harsh teacher.
Or, as Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Tuesday, the country is not divided between Left and Right, but between Normal and Crazy. And not the kind of Crazy Patsy Cline sang about.
Starting with Crazy, for more than a decade, Democratic-run cities and larger jurisdictions have been self-righteously pounding their chests and virtue-signaling that they are “welcoming” to migrants, irrespective of their legal status.
Philadelphia is one of them, bragging about how it would “protect” migrants from ICE, which means “protecting” them from federal law.
Interfering with federal agents is actually against the law, but courts have been unduly generous in defining “interference” as taking actual action, rather than not taking action, meaning it’s OK to not cooperate with the feds, to not even share information. Even about convicted felons.
Not that migrants had much to worry about under President Joe Biden, who broke with his Democratic (Barack Obama) and Republican (Donald J. Trump) predecessors, by basically telling border enforcers to stand down. And calling them racists if they did their job — I refer here to the infamous non whipping incident.
Prior to his election, Biden stupidly made remarks about how welcoming the U.S. is to immigrants. He “forgot” to say legal immigrants.
Migrants responded by coming here in unprecedented numbers, creating a crisis along our southern border.
What the above chart does not say is almost all those apprehended at the border were then released, to continue on their merry way to the interior. And many were bused or flown north by the federal government. And you thought there was no free lunch.
Governors Greg Abbott (Texas) and Ron DiSantis (Florida) took the unusual and controversial step of bussing migrants from their states to Sanctuary cities, such as New York, which soon had Mayor Eric Adams screaming foul, and shipping migrants elsewhere as soon as he could, even buying bus tickets to Canada, which is more extreme than sending people to Martha’s Vineyard.
In doing so, he is essentially duplicating what he had criticized Abbott and DiSantis for doing. Some operational details were different, but the intent was the same — get these people off our front steps!
The reality is that wealthy New York City can no easier bear the burden of tens of thousands of migrants than can Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, and Florida.
Biden’s border policies — which has admitted millions of illegals or faux asylum seekers in the past two years — amount to Open Borders, and as I have written in the past Open Borders will destroy America. We simply can’t take the tens of millions who would come here if they could — 158 million by Gallup’s count.
It’s not a matter of being “anti-immigrant.” It is not “racist.” Under current law the Top Eleven countries sending us immigrants are nonwhite.
So the “racist” trope is a lie. And Open Borders is assisted suicide. We want and need immigrants, but they must be admitted in an orderly fashion, so they can be absorbed.
The Open Border types ignore reality, but the numbers speak much louder than their beliefs. And when the numbers become unmanageable, the “Sanctuary Cities” start filling buses and shoving migrants toward the door.
And that reality now — finally — has Biden getting ready to deport illegals to Mexico. Just like meanie Trump did. Sssshh.
This is a mess Biden created by mindlessly, reflexively, and spitefully reversing Trump’s policies.
Another mess, for Democrats, is being labeled as Woke, which Mayor Adams said the other day is driving minorities out of the party.
I guess that makes me a minority, but I am not leaving. I will stand and fight.
Getting back to Sanders, she defines Woke as Crazy.
So do I, but I think it is even worse.
Starting out as an enlightened idea, it has morphed into a fascistic weapon, demanding everyone think and talk the same way.
No way.
Now, some Democrats are trying to slip from its embrace. Such as Adams, who says too much of his party has been captured by the Crazies on the Left. Let’s have more kitchen table issues and less palaver about gender and “safe” injection sites and defunding police and other Froot Loopy notions.
He’s right.
And too much of the Republican Party has been captured by the loons on the Right.
The fringes do not, and must not, represent America.
I agree. The loonies in the GOP are making a mockery of Congress. Taxpayers should not have to carry the burden of spending money on investigating whether fairies, goblins and witches actually exist to censor the GOP, whose loud and obnoxious mouths increase in volume while they complain that they’re being shut up.
As for the immigration issue, I’ve said it before. People need to come here legally as my parents and I did. Sanctuary cities are enabling illegal behavior. But neither side has managed to get this problem under control for many years. Trump managed to separate children from their parents and years later many have not been reunited. There has to be a humane way to deal with desperate people. But I don’t see any movement on either side of the aisle to come up with a humane solution. Just political posturing. I have to conclude that there is something in it for both sides to be maintaining the status quo.
So let’s review: the Democrats talk nicely about immigrants and the immigration situation and do nothing about it as far as passing laws to fix it. Meanwhile, the Republican talk shit about immigrants and the immigration situation and do nothing about it as far as passing laws to fix it. Trump used a health crisis to stem the flow, and it would simply be illegal for the current administration to extend that law, as it just does not apply and longer. So where are we? We seem to have two sides who are providing lip service to the problem. Show me one piece of sensible legislation the Republicans have passed to fix this. They share equal blame.
I know this was to Wanda, but . . . Republicans are equally to blame BUT Trump did fix the problem. Not just with Title 42, but with “stay in Mexico” and ending catch and release. Biden’s first act as President was to undo these, and we see the result.
If the Dems could investigate what turned out to be a faux Russian connection, and impeach DJT twice, I’m OK with GOP seeing if FBI is politicized — and there seems to be evidence of that.
As to immigration, “humane” may be the enemy of solution, as “equity” is the enemy of “equality.” We must follow the law as it exists for asylum seekers. To loosen it, as I said, will flood us with numbers we cannot accept.
Wanda, there is a more humane way. Stop illegal entry. Once it becomes clear that they can’t gain entry illegally, migrants will stop trying. Couple that with massively more generous immigration and Bob’s your uncle.
Spray-paint the statue of Liberty with graffiti. Then she’ll be a much better symbol of what our nation has become.