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The speech
How is tonight’s statement different from all other statements that President Bush has made about immigration since he first announced his open-borders plan on January 7, 2004? In all his other statements, Bush didn’t even make an effort to sound sincere when he spoke about the need for border security; in fact, he made not the slightest effort to conceal his utter indifference to border security. In tonight’s statement he made an effort to sound sincere. But that is the only difference. In all other respects, the speech consisted of the same kinds of palpable lies as Bush’s other immigration remarks over the last 2 1/2 years. How can we believe that he is being truthful about intending to keep illegal aliens from entering the United States, when in the same speech he also says, and with much more emotional warmth, that the illegals are “decent human beings” (a standard that would require the granting of permanent U.S. residency to half the human race); that we must suppress the “anger” that we have against illegals (but it’s that widespread “anger,” directed not at illegals but at Bush for his refusal to enforce the law against illegals, that has finally required him to sound more serious about enforcement); that we must not “exploit” the illegal immigration issue for political purposes (what, then, is the dividing line between legitimate disagreement with Bush and illegitimate “exploitation” of the issue?); and that we are a “nation of immigrants” compelled by our very essence as a nation to keep our borders open to a never-ending flood of strangers from cultures incompatible with our own? And how can we believe him, or even have a modicum of respect for him, when he repeatedly tells the lie that this is not an amnesty bill because it doesn’t put illegal aliens at the “head of the line” for U.S. citizenship? As we know from Robert Rector’s detailed report on Senate bill 2611, discussed by me here, S. 2611, which Bush favors, grants provisional legal status to qualified illegals, which will be changed to legal permanent resident status after six years; and of course it is legal permanent residency (the green card), not citizenship as such, that is the great object of all people who want to come to the United States. To say that the granting to illegal aliens of temporary legal status leading to permanent legal status is not an amnesty is one of the biggest lies in American political nistory, and our president and his supporters such as Sen. McCain have made a career out of promulgating this lie. Finally, the president does not even mention the provisions of the bill involving an inconceivably huge expansion of legal immigration via a fraudulently named “temporary worker program” which in fact will more or less automatically turn “temporary” workers into legal permanent residents in exponentially expanding numbers each year, so that if the full amount of “temporary” workers permitted under the bill is admitted into the U.S., there will be 193 million new immigrants over the next 20 years. All of which leads to the question: Given the mainstream conservatives’ revolt against the president on this issue, how could he have believed that his newly minted semi-sincere tone, plus some extra detection gadgets at the border, plus some extra beds to hold apprehended illegals, plus the assignment of a few thousand constantly rotating National Guard troops to assist the Border Patrol, would convince conservatives to back the amnesty and the huge increase of legal immigration? Mark Krikorian writing at NRO says Bush has been fooled by slanted mainstream media poll questions into believing that the majority of Americans are for amnesty. If so, it would be deliciously ironic. Liberal news organs, of course, routinely phrase poll questions in a misleading way so as to push respondents into choosing the more liberal answer; their purpose being to make the society seem even more liberal than it is and thus strengthen liberalism politically. But, according to Krikorian, the false notion of a pro-amnesty electorate has persuaded Bush that the amnesty foes are just a small minority of loudmouths whom he can safely ignore. This assurance is leading him to reject any compromise, which in turn (it is to be devoutly hoped) will result in the defeat of his monstrous bill, the most radical ever proposed by a U.S. president.
A reader writes:
When I hear Bush opine about how wonderful our immigrants are, his hazy bonhomie reminds me of that other deep thinker, Winnie the Pooh: Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 15, 2006 10:08 PM | Send Email entry |