The willingness of the Democrats in the U. S. Senate to shutdown the government in an effort to force Republicans to grant amnesty to DACA recipients should come as no surprise to any thinking person. The DACA law, enacted not by the Congress, but rather by a sweep of President Barack Obama’s pen, was never intended to be permanent. In fact, when Obama announced the program in 2012, he called on Congress to act on immigration and described DACA as merely a “temporary stopgap measure.” Since that time, some would have us believe DACA assumed the status of permanent protection for a class of youngsters who are all assumed to be high-achievers, all but certain to fill the seats at Harvard, Princeton, Yale and every other Ivy League university in this nation. That’s a mighty big presumption.
Those folks who oppose illegal immigration are dismissed as ill-educated and heartless. That is pretty much what the elitists on the left think about the people Hillary Clinton dismissed as “deplorables.” And make no mistake about it, most of the Democratic party really does deplore anyone who disagrees with them.
The left in this country refuses to even acknowledge there is such a thing as illegal immigration. Along with their accomplices in the mainstream news media, they refer to the people in this country illegally as “undocumented” or simply immigrants. That certainly does sound better than illegal aliens; the left’s narrative makes it sound more like some thoughtless bureaucrat simply forgot to somehow certify someone’s entry into the United States. Nor does the left recognize borders or boundaries. It’s all a part of the new gospel of guilt espoused and promoted by the left with the new original sin of presumed privilege.
Of course this has less to do with compassion, hope for the future of the country than it does in Democrats making few bones about pandering to Hispanic voters and clinging to the idea borders or boundaries really don’t matter at all.
The America many immigrants came to decades ago no longer exists. That America lured immigrants here with the promise of work in factories while currently the sun has set on an industrial economy in the United States. Nor are the current illegal aliens fleeing oppression and inhumanity in their own countries to come to a lawless America. The rule of law is important, as are borders and boundaries. Citizenship is supposed to mean something and people here illegally have no rights to demand anything. One cannot demand rights one does not legally have.
I would stress I am all for legal immigration to the United States of America and if Congress should decide to pass some form of amnesty, it should include an individual check; each Dreamer should be evaluated. Does the Dreamer have a high school diploma, a college degree, a criminal background, service in the military, or is gainfully employed? The notion illegal aliens pay their way through payment of taxes, etc., is a fiction. According to the Immigration Reform Law Institute, illegal immigration carries a price tag of $116 billion. The 12.5 million illegal aliens in this country have 4.2 citizen children, all of whom are eligible for government services and assistance. State and local governments are the hardest hit with expenditures totaling $88.8 billion; the federal government pays $45.8 billion. Only $19 billion is recouped in taxes. The $135 billion in cost associated with illegal aliens compared to the taxes collected is a 7-1 ratio. The biggest cost is medical services, which is more than $17 billion. States and local governments spend more than $44 billion for education of illegal aliens and their children. The cost to individual states is staggering – – – it costs California $23 billion, Texas almost $11 billion and New York $7.5 billion. If one considers the cost after taxes are paid, it leaves a deficit of $116 billion. A researcher at the Center for Immigration Studies has found the cost to U. S. taxpayers over the lifetime of the current illegal aliens in this country will cost nearly $750 billion, which is six times the amount required to deport every illegal alien in this country.
A CNN poll showed 56% of the American people did not believe the DACA program was worth shutting down the American government. Breaking down the demographics of the CNN poll is worth a look. 49% of Democrats DID think the DACA program was worth shutting down the entire government, while 42% of Democrats thought keeping government services open was more important. 75% of Republicans and 57% of Independents believed avoiding a government shutdown was more important than the DACA program. 96% of Democrats polled by CNN say they support the DACA program, yet only 49% thought it worth shutting down the government.
If you really think this issue is about justice and kids, consider for a moment the leaked memo from Jennifer Palmieri, a former Clinton communications director who is currently with the Center for American Progress Action Fund. Palmieri was urging Democratic members of Congress to “refuse to offer any votes for Republican spending bills that do not offer a fix for Dreamers and instead appropriate funds to deport them.” Ms. Palmieri described the Dreamers as a “critical component of the Democratic Party’s future electoral success.” Ms. Palmieri did invoke “a moral imperative”, but finally came to the most important point: “If Democrats don’t try to do everything in their power to defend Dreamers, that will jeopardize Democrats’ electoral chances in 2018 and beyond.”
Of course that’s not what we hear publicly from these people; they argue instead it’s the only country many of these youngsters have ever known and it wasn’t their fault their parents brought them here illegally in the first place. That is quite true, but it completely ignores the question of the law, much less the existence of borders. Clearly, there is much more incentive here for the Democrats; a million Dreamers given amnesty and allowed to stay here means a million votes for Democratic candidates.
The fact Democrats have so little regard for average hardworking Americans who have paid their taxes for years certainly won’t do them any good, but they obviously have a plan to do without your vote.
