Sorry, Jeff, but, you have gone of the deep end of the Rio Grande on this one: Where conservatives have it all wrong
YOU’RE A sensible, principled conservative. You want America to be a land of boundless opportunity and freedom, where people are treated as individuals and judged on their merits. You reject the divisive identity politics of the left – what matters most about any of us, you would insist, is not race or class or ethnic origins: it is personal character and achievement. There are few things about contemporary politics you deplore more than the demonizing or scapegoating of entire groups (“white males,’’ “the rich,’’ “the Christian right,’’ “gun owners’’), as though every member of the group is interchangeable and indistinguishable, wholly defined by a single disparaging label.
But let someone mention “illegal immigrants,’’ and your principles fly out the window.
So when Governor Deval Patrick recommends allowing young illegal immigrants – residents of Massachusetts who have graduated from high school – to attend a public college and pay in-state tuition, you flip out. This is outrageous, you protest. It rewards people who broke the rules. It’s unfair to the taxpayers who subsidize public higher education. Why should an illegal immigrant get a valuable tuition break that Massachusetts wouldn’t give to a kid from Maine or New Hampshire?
You vigorously agree with Charlie Baker, a Republican candidate for governor. “If you’re illegally here, you’re illegally here,’’ Baker said last week. “The notion that we should treat illegal immigrants with the same benefits and opportunities that legal immigrants and legal citizens have doesn’t make any sense to me.’’
Jeff goes on in that vein for awhile, complaining about treatment of illegals who are just looking for a better life. Since it is bad form to excerpt an entire post/column/article, I would suggest clicking the link to read the whole thing before continuing.
Done? What Jeff is missing is that the people looking for a better life entered the country illegally. Why should we excuse that behavior? We shouldn’t embrace that behavior just so they can build the American dream. If they want to live the American dream, they should come to our country legally and apply for citizenship, just like so many others, not start their American Dream off by scoffing at and breaking our laws. It is a simple proposition. Not to mention that so many illegals end up not attempting to assimilate, but, instead, demand everyone accommodate them.
