pragmatism

26 Mar 2006

A few open questions to those that advocate any immigration reform legislation that includes any of: no amnesty, increased criminalization (making it a felony), “beefing up” border security, etc:

There are an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States right now. How do you propose that we deport them, exactly? Herd them into “freedom camps”?

I mean, this debate essentially falls along the dividing line of “progressive” versus “reactionary conservative”. The people are here, now. 12 million people. If you’re going to be a reactionary conservative, and pine for some imagined ideal where everyone in the U.S. speaks english, is a pleasant shade of white, and is legal under our current (or future, further-restricted) immigration law, that’s fine. But I need you to answer the question “what next?”

What do you plan on doing with (or to) the 12 million people already here? Are you willing to sacrifice the liberty that this nation was founded on to establish the sort of military police state that this action would require? (People that voted for the Bush administration a second time are exempt from this question, since it would appear we already know the answer to that question.)

If not, then what are you really advocating? Because I don’t see any easy answers there.

Instead, all I see is further criminalization of the status quo, and the further entrenchment of a second-tier class of labor.