Home and illegal immigration

So......if these folks with the cars and the parties and all that were native-born citizens this would all be OK? Or maybe excluding illegal immigrants will ensure that no one ever behaves this way? Surely we have our full and complete share of native creeps and criminals, no?
Does the writer even know if these people are here illegally? Has he checked their papers personally? Maybe they've all been here for three generations, for all he knows. This just sounds like scapegoating to me. Some poor folks have moved into the neighborhood, and they behave in ways that middle-class residents don't like and/or are criminal. (If they're breaking the law, why are they not being arrested?) The writer doesn't know, I assume, whether these people are in this country legally or not, but "illegals" are a convenient target for his anger.

Oops, meant to say "...the perception that the police are little more than a occupying army."

Yawn-- another Rod post that can be reduced to four simple words: RUN TO THE HILLS!

Perhaps I am just a pollyanna but I am optimistic. There are things in this bill worth considering. The fact that many far left groups are opposing it should tell us something. I am hearing a lot of talk that we can't and will not enforce immigration laws in the future. I find that hard to accept. If we can plan a trip to Mars and find the orgins of the Universe we can enforce immigration laws. I think its time that conservatives quit throwing up their hands and saying what's the use. There are key provisions in this bill that if had been in place in 86 might have stemmed the problem .That is the Workplace ID and Verfication system I like many of the proposals and there are some things that need to be improved.. In the end the current situation and also solutions offered by the extremes on both sides don't mesh with my Christian principles. These proposals I am seeing are starting too. I keeep hearing George Bush will not enforce this bill. Well I must say that even though I dispute that whats the point. HE is only going to be President for a year and a half. IN the end this defeatism on this issue I think is something more. THe provisions can be enforced if we demand it and we stay engaged. I wonder if the truth is that we really don't want to be bothered to stay engaged. That we are the problem and not DC. We rather get back to watching Lets make a deal and not have to tune in. TO listen and monitor how such a bill is working out. To even change it if necessary. That is how this govt is suppose to work. Active Citizen Involvement and interaction. If we don't address why that isn't happening and instead just rant about politicians then nothing will work. Immigration or otherwise JH Louisiana

It's true, nobody can say for sure if these workers are here legally. But we can't know this, can we, absent la migra checking their papers. Which rarely happens. Then we can't assume they're illegals, can we.

Dreher: " business interests and ethnic activists and the government don't give a rat's rear end. This is not going to end pretty, I fear. You cannot expect them to sit back and take it forever." The rat's fuzzy pretty much sums it all up. Yes, Rod, they really do expect you to take it forever. Mostly because they'll be safe behind their gated communities, which have guard towers and razor wire surrounding them. Now they're writing even more complicated laws although nobody is bothering to enforce the ones we got now.

Here's what I think is a core issue beneath all of the other arguments and such that go on around this issue: we are a country of laws, which we expect ourselves and other occupants of our country to follow. Most of us stop at stop signs in the middle of the night when no one else is coming because it is the law and we instinctively understand that if we each decided for ourselves when to follow laws and when not to, chaos would ensue. We understand that there needs to be enforcement of laws and accept when we are caught breaking a law that may even seem silly to us, like keeping our speed down on the open highway. Even when there is no enforcement likely, (like shoplifting from a small store with no security cameras) most of us follow the law. Because it's the right thing to do, because if we decided not to follow the law, so could our neighbor and his unsavory cousin and, again, chaos would ensue. Illegal immigration cuts to the very core of our understanding of what it means to live in a country with laws and how we restrain ourselves to those laws, even when we have no other immediate motivation than because it's a law. There are laws which are so out of date as to be not worth enforcing, like not dressing your donkey in women's clothing on Sundays. However, I don't think the overwhelming majority of us have come to the conclusion that we should just get rid of all immigration laws and allow open borders. Therefor, even those of us who think that we need to fix our immigration system expect that in the meantime, we will enforce our laws which prohibit entering into our country without permission, working without being elegible to work here, using fake identity papers, stealing other people's social security numbers for you own use and so on. For those of us who habitually stop at stop signs in the middle of the night, this aquiescence to illegal behavior is appalling. We don't decide for ourselves which laws work for us and which we want to set aside and we have the expectation that others will govern themselves likewise. What is even more galling is not only that there is so much illegal activity going on unabetted or challenged, but that there is an expectation that unearned and ungranted rights will simply be given as reward to those who are breaking the law on demand. I mentioned in a previous post that I have had close relationships with people from every continent except Antartica. I wasn't exaggerating. I have seen what people have to do in order to gain entry to this country. I have seen people face very, very difficult circumstances when they were forced to leave this country after being denied permenant residency, including families torn apart. I have seen people struggle for years and years, following every last bit of the arcain rules to gain citizenship and I have seen the pride and joy of freshly minted citizens after being granted such. It is an insult to the struggles of so many other people who have submitted themselves to our system of laws to grant the same rights to those who feel entitled to them by virtue of having gotten away with breaking them. We can quibble over how we know if a bad neighbor is here illegally or not, the effect on social services and the like (and these are all serious issues to be sure), but even if we put all that aside at its base the question is are we a country of laws or are we a country where everyone can feel free to make their own rules? If we are a country of laws, then we as citizens have every right to be furious at seeing our laws broken with impunity.

I think the suggestion that we round up and deport 12 million people is just as unrealistic as building a 2,000-mile fence to our south.
Both of these options are realistic. I don't think rounding up 12 million people is the most effective but we could certainly get many of them.
2000 mile fence could be done very easily.

I emailed Rod in response to this article when it was blogged about on the DMN blog. I've been through this. I bought a townhome in NoVa in 2001. It was a fine middle class neighborhood with a very diverse population. It was great. I know I'm going to get blasted here, but when the property boom took off and lending standards were loosened, many of these homes were sold to people who couldn't afford to pay the mortgage unless the rented rooms out to illegal workers. Soon the townhomes were crawling with roaches and MS-13 was a regular fixture in our neighborhood. It basically turned into a pit. The crime rate got so bad that I sold in 2005 and now I rent. The fact is that law enforcement would not enforce zoning laws because, as Rod mentioned above, it's hard to do that. People who haven't experienced something like this like to hurl the 'racist' word around but I'll tell you, until you've lived through it, you have no idea how bad it can be. I'm not saying that illegals or hispanics are more prone to crime, but I only can tell you what I experienced. Crime attracts itself to (or people who perpetuate it willingly prey on) lower income folks, that's just a fact. I've seen a lot of commentary about how the law as drafted will never be able to be enforced, and because of the financial penalty, many illegal immigrants will simply stay illegal. So the cycle of poverty and crime continues. Nothing is going to change folks, except your neighborhood. You don't think it will happen but it is, all over the country not just in the south.

Susan, have you ever lived in a decaying neighborhood? One where illegals and criminals start to intrude? I'm there now and I'm leaving before it gets too bad. It's not fun to be broken into twice in three months, having people yelling and partying at all hours of the night, to have teens running around causing vandalism, and to have the 4 unmarked police cars show up at the next door neighbors. Reality has a way of slapping you in the face. I used to spout all of the nice pieties of the liberal religion about everyone is the same and don't judge by certain characteristics. Well, those days are over. A good chunk of people in certain groups may be fine people but they tend to have certain cultural attitudes that encourage the lawlessness and chaos that follows them. If that make me a racist, fine. I'm leaving a house I've lived in for 15 years because my family isn't safe. It was safe when the neighborhood was white, working class.

Rich, what you saw is a perfect illustration of why the issue of law is so central to this debate. There are many places where laws are not treated with the respect that we treat laws with here. From what I've seen people who have no qualms about breaking our laws to live and work here come from countries without a strong tradition of law. When we allow our laws to be flaunted as we have, this has the effect of conveying the message that we don't care any more about our laws than their country of origin does (which is to say hardly at all unless you run afoul of the wrong people or politicians need to do some granstanding). I think this is why one of the main manifestations of illegal immigration which we hear complaints about is disregard for zoning regulations. Zoning regulations are of course laws, but in practice must be self-enforcing. If we have people who come from a culture where laws aren't respected and we've demonstrated to them that we don't really care about laws by allowing ours to be broken with impunity, then it is no suprise that these same individuals would not see the need to self regulate over such trivial things as zoning regulations. It really all comes down to respect for the rule of law, I think. And that's precisely why I also think it's an important fight to have.

Do you know what countries with a strong tradition of law are called? Dictatorships. If you don't want to be bothered with ethical constraints greater than 'the law', move to Cuba. This country was founded on the belief that men enjoy certain inalienable rights.
You don't have to be happy that we have 12 million illegal immigrants, but dammit, don't pretend that the law and only the law is this country's tradition. Some want to moan and complain that there are 12 people living in a 2-bedroom apartment. The Fathers would have found ridiculous any such requirement. New York City had to go to the courts 3 seperate times to try and mandate landlords offered apartments with windows. That challenge wasn't in the 1700s either. Somedays I wonder if it would just be better to roll up a joint and be a libertarian. It reminds me of what a commentator said at my blog, "Most people's idea of heaven is limbo." Most people's conception of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness don't extend further than having a roof over their head, food on their table, and circuses to keep them entertained. Does the condo owner think that he might have just made a piss poor investment? No, he has to blame that foreign element that moved in. End of rant.

MZ, actually, people living under dictatorships generally break the laws all the time. They toe the line when it comes to political issues, but dictatorships are notorious for thriving black markets and citizenry who habitually hide what they are doing from the government in order to survive. These countries are generally the sort of places where law may be feared, but is not respected. Ben, part of the moral problem with our illegal immigrant problem as it related in particular to Latin American countries is that we are allowing ourselves to act as a safety valve for corrupt, greedy olgiarchies to use in order to protect their priveleges in their society. Without easy access to US job markets political pressures would build in these countries which would undermine the corrupt governments and force market changes which would benefit all citizens, not just those willing to leave their families and break our laws (although I do understand their motivations). It's a tough spot for these fathers to be in, but sometimes you have to fight not just so your children can be fed, but so that your children's children's children can eat as well. We are enabling the very people who create situations of families living in dirt huts because of big business's thrst for cheap, easily exploited labor.

I suppose we could round up as many of the 12 million illegals in this country, but you would have to ignore the tremendous cost of executing this program. Would you be willing to allow major police departments to divert manpower from other crimes to capture illegals? Well, I would certainly be willing to allow the military to divert tens of thousands of troops now fighting George Bush's vanity war in Iraq to capture illegals. Here's another thought: If so many Mexicans insist on coming here, maybe it's time we seized some more Mexican terrority to compensate ourselves for absorbing so much of their population. Maybe just grab all of Baja California.

rebbecat, People break laws all the time. Stand at a busy intersection for an hour two, and you will observe plenty of law breaking. Depending upon where you are, just doing that might mean you are breaking the law by loitering.

"People break laws all the time." You do have a point. But what happens when they are caught? If you run a red light and hit another car, you will most likely be charged. I've not heard of many cops saying "this is a sanctuary city, we don't report red-light runners." The officially-sanctioned and/or willful ignorance of violators of immigration law is corrosive.

M.Z., if one officer gives me a warning and the next actually cites me, you can bet I won't be organizing a rally to protest that my right to a warning has been violated.

Rebbecat's comments are correct. She(I assume you are a woman) understands that the problem is more nuanced than most people. It's simply a fact: every society must have a means to control it's borders. If not, then the game is over. The United States has developed certain unique characteristcs. One of them is a large (albeit shrinking) middle class. I've seen the stucco and barbed wire topped walls which seperate the rich from the poor in Mexico and elsewhere. It ain't pretty. I say it would be better to work to preserve what's left of our middle class AND put pressure on the oligarchies Rebeccat mentioned. Enforcing our own laws would be a terrific start.

A fair reading of Rod's post would indicate that it is not all about him and his money. "Fair reading"? From Daniel? Please. When he turns his house over to squatters, maybe then he'll have some credibility with me.

Rod's closing paragraph takes us from immigration to "When in the course of human events it becomes necessary...." No, it won't be pretty.

I'd say give the police a chance. If they can't improve things within a few months, then you might be justified in giving up. But I don't know, maybe they have been there a while now. I can sympathize with your feelings about the police.
Although I am in constant company with men in body armor and machine guns, they are MY GUYS, and they have my back. The one time I've had a cop pull on me, I was in a car (admittedly overloaded with young revellers, but our driver was sober and we had NEARLY enough seat belts) I nearly made a scene. Weapons are cool, as long as they are NOT DRAWN ON ME (especially dumb since his partner was at the other window and if he'd fired on any of us, he'd likely shoot his own guy as well.) That ratcheted my adrenaline up rather high. I told the driver the cop had drawn on us, and that pissed the cop off. Until he got a stack of military IDs and sorted out that we were in the 10th MOUNTAIN DIV's 1st Brigade, headed for Baghdad in two weeks. He sort of relaxed after that, and told us to go find a place to sleep it off.

The dilemma this man found himself in is the same situation many Memphians find themselves in; and with time, other suburban families nationwide will find themselves in this situation too, if they haven't already. I think it'll happen to all neighborhoods--the only exception being gated communities unless there's something in their restrictive covenants to thwart it.

One last point: Mexico is indeed a failing state. All the more reason for us simply to take it over. We couldn't do any worse than we're doing in Iraq.

"When he turns his house over to squatters, maybe then he'll have some credibility with me." Please. Your nativist seige rants (first it's the Muslims, now it's the Latinos) doesn't impress me. You unwillingness to speak to what Jesus would do and what the Scriptures say speaks volumes. This is much more con, then crunchy, and there doesn't seem to be a smidgen of faith and religoin.

Great comments, real food for thought.

But, I never see the distinctions between illegal crime and "legal" crime really brought out.

Would love to see this.

--Jack Payne
www.sixhrs.com