by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
NRO’s\u00a0The Corner<\/em><\/p>\n There was very little new in the president\u2019s speech \u2014 certainly not his tired hope-and-change trope of blending legal and illegal immigration (\u201cThe scientific breakthroughs of Albert Einstein, the inventions of Nikola Tesla, the great ventures of Andrew Carnegie\u2019s U.S. Steel and Sergey Brin\u2019s Google \u2014 all this was possible because of immigrants\u201d). There is broad public support for the former but not the latter \u2014 so he had to imply that those who oppose massive illegal immigration are unappreciative of the great contribution of legal immigrants. (And note his use of euphemism in \u201c11 million undocumented immigrants\u201d\u2014 as if immigrants simply forgot their documents upon entry.)<\/p>\n Confusion was thematic, and evident in, for example, the idea that \u201cbeing an American is not a matter of blood or birth. It\u2019s a matter of faith. It\u2019s a matter of fidelity to the shared values that we all hold so dear.\u201d If so, anyone in the world with the requisite beliefs and virtues would be an American. Actually being one, of course, requires either birth in the United States or lawful naturalization.<\/p>\n It is disturbing to hear a president confess that he cannot enforce the law or secure the border. (\u201cBut our borders are just too vast for us to be able to solve the problem only with fences and border patrols. It won\u2019t work. Our borders will not be secure as long as our limited resources are devoted to not only stopping gangs and potential terrorists, but also the hundreds of thousands who attempt to cross each year simply to find work.\u201d) I hope the Taliban are not listening to that admission.<\/p>\n For most of our history, illegal immigration was not a problem of the present magnitude, and the country had confidence that it could enforce its borders when it wished to. What has changed is not the terrain, or the reality that many wish to enter illegally, but our attitudes about such fundamental issues as the rule of law, national sovereignty, and assimilation. Indeed, the president ordered a halt to the building of the border fence, suggesting an absence of will rather than a hopeless task.<\/p>\n I agree with the president that employers bear a great deal of the responsibility for illegal immigration. But one cannot admire the plucky illegal alien for wanting to work and at the same time demonize the employer who fulfills his dream (\u201cBusinesses must be held accountable if they break the law by deliberately hiring and exploiting undocumented workers\u201d). Parse the logic: If it is understandable that well-intended persons break the law to find work, then it must be equally understandable that other well-intended persons wish to help them do it. In truth, employer and employee alike put their economic interests above adherence to the law. They alike worry less about the social costs of illegal immigration than about their own welfare. That one is a wealthier American and the other a poorer Latin American alien does not change this.<\/p>\n The president likes the passive voice and the use of abstraction, which suggest that illegal aliens are guided not by their own choices but by impersonal forces: \u201cCrimes go unreported as victims and witnesses fear coming forward. And this makes it harder for the police to catch violent criminals and keep neighborhoods safe. And billions in tax revenue are lost each year because many undocumented workers are paid under the table.\u201d Note the absence of any reference to thousands of illegal aliens who commit crimes or the mounting cost of incarcerating them, which in California, for example, is nearing $1 billion a year.<\/p>\n Of course, tens of billions are also lost in the remittances that illegal aliens send south of the border. This lost income not only hurts our economy, but induces the states and the federal government to make up for the remitted cash by providing its senders with entitlements to housing, nutrition, education, and legal advocacy.<\/p>\n There was not a word about the responsibility of the Mexican government, or the need for market reforms to open Mexico\u2019s economy to create jobs and capital. In a long speech about a problem that increasingly involves Mexico and Mexican nationals, Obama mentioned Mexico just once, and only in conjunction with the story of a former Mexican national who became a citizen. Yet Mexican president Felipe Calder\u00f3n, speaking from the White House lawn, has recently blasted one of our states as acting in prejudicial fashion. (No wonder he opposes a policy that would curtail the remittances that subsidize his government\u2019s social-welfare responsibilities.)<\/p>\n The subtext of the speech was politics of the very sort the text often deplored. Obama has to square a circle: He and his base, as we saw in the campaign of 2008, want veritable open borders that will result in more Democratic constituents, who in turn will change the politics of the Southwest; more recipients of federal largess; and more government workers to dispense it. This is in line with a postmodern sense that sovereignty is pass\u00e9 and commitment to principle is as mundane as obedience to the law. On the other hand, a vast majority of the American people, of all races, oppose illegal immigration for reasons that have nothing to do with race or class, and simply want the borders enforced.<\/p>\n So, presto! You confuse illegal and legal immigration, deplore politicking, blame the opportunistic employer more than the opportunistic illegal-alien employee, and pretend to lecture all sides while in fact demanding amnesty (something doable) as a condition of closing the border (something impossible). That\u2019s pretty much where we are, and it will not work.<\/p>\n \u00a92010 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Victor Davis Hanson NRO’s\u00a0The Corner There was very little new in the president\u2019s speech \u2014 certainly not his tired hope-and-change trope of blending legal and illegal immigration (\u201cThe scientific breakthroughs of Albert Einstein, the inventions of Nikola Tesla, the great ventures of Andrew Carnegie\u2019s U.S. Steel and Sergey Brin\u2019s Google \u2014 all this was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[586],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-oj","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4032,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/assimilation-is-the-real-debate\/","url_meta":{"origin":1507,"position":0},"title":"Assimilation Is the Real Debate","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 3, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Hypocrisy and paradoxes abound when it comes to illegal immigration. Even the fiercest critics of illegal immigrants in the American Southwest never seem to check first the legal status of those who fix their roofs, mow their lawns or wash their dishes. This\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "April 2006"","block_context":{"text":"April 2006","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2006\/april-2006\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5897,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/illegal-immigration-as-slavery\/","url_meta":{"origin":1507,"position":1},"title":"Illegal Immigration as ‘Slavery’?","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 22, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson NRO's\u00a0The Corner Marco Rubio\u2019s press secretary, Alex Conant, might wish to cease his demagoguery when he\u2019s behind. After replying to a skeptic of \u201ccomprehensive immigration reform\u201d with ahistorical nonsense like, \u201cWe haven\u2019t had a cohort of people living permanently in US without full rights of citizenship\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Immigration"","block_context":{"text":"Immigration","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/immigration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9301,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/elites-support-mass-illegal-immigration-while-the-working-classes-suffer\/","url_meta":{"origin":1507,"position":2},"title":"Elites Support Mass Illegal Immigration While the Working Classes Suffer","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 12, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"By Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Online Support for, or opposition to, mass immigration is apparently a class issue, not an ethnic or racial issue. Elites more often support lenient immigration policies; the general public typically opposes them. At the top of the list are Mexico\u2019s elites. Illegal immigration\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Trump","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/trump\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8580,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/still-blind-to-the-costs-of-illegal-immigration\/","url_meta":{"origin":1507,"position":3},"title":"Still Blind to the Costs of Illegal Immigration","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 31, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"What really explains Trump\u2019s rapid climb to the top of the polls. by Bruce S. Thornton \/\/ FrontPage Magazine Donald Trump\u2019s blunt and clumsy comments about illegal immigration sparked the usual firestorm of criticism from the well heeled of both parties. Particularly vocal were those Republicans who think that an\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Immigration"","block_context":{"text":"Immigration","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/immigration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Photo via FPM","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/pl_5-500x281.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8723,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/are-sanctuary-cities-the-new-confederates\/","url_meta":{"origin":1507,"position":4},"title":"Are Sanctuary Cities the New Confederates?","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 15, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson\u00a0\/\/ National Review Online There are now 340 sanctuary cities in the United States \u2014 and the list is growing. All of them choose to ignore federal immigration law by refusing to report detained undocumented immigrants to federal authorities under most circumstances. 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