the mice will blog about whatever they darn well feel like:

I'm quite curious about how today's Latino immigrants will feel about immigration once they've been around as long as the Irish. Though perhaps we'll all be thinking whatever our robot overlords tell us by then.

Bonus: actual video of Megan, before her triumphant return; the guest-blogger of the day is Conor Friedersdorf.

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And I think this will create positive ripple effects. But I'd still like to see a path to citizenship, for those who merely came here to work their butts off. Call me sentimental.

Or: call me the kind of pragmatist for whom a two-pronged attack seems wiser than a frontal assault. (Isn't there an old saying about "good generalship"? Place that quote for me, please . . . AtH? Mr. Manitoba?)

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The National Review guys against the WSJ. On immigration, no less. Be still, my beating heart.

I must admit: the more I find out about the bill currently on the table, the less I like it. Would someone leak the damned text online?—all 1000 pages of it? Come to think of it, that should be done with all bills these days. Otherwise, you know: we might conclude that our legislators have something to hide.

I'd hate to see things go that way.

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. . . is give wetbacks a chance."

Or, at least Hugh at Big Lizards is suggesting that we give the immigration bill a chance: no contempt prior to investigation, right? And more hard data on its actual provisions is here.

So that makes, what?—eight of us slightly right-of-center bloggers whose heads are not about to explode over the immigration bill? There's the Anchoress, Beth, Sean, Hugh, Captain Ed, Jonah Goldberg (to some degree), Desert Cat, and me.

Hey—I think most illegals do end up assimilating. So I guess that makes me part of the "Coalition of the Instillin' [of American Values]."

Still: there ain't many of us. Maybe we need a cute icon, like a mortar & pestle with some delicious salsa or guacamole in it. Or perhaps a margarita glass!

Or a slice of beautiful Mexican papaya—those things are about the size of my truck. Yum.

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. . . on, of course, the Immigration Bill:

John Podhoretz says there things to like and hate about the bill and heÂ’s distrustful of it, astonished by all the screaming, but doesnÂ’t mind if the screaming brings a better bill. I donÂ’t eitherÂ…but honestly, I worry that the screaming and foot-stomping, if successful, will become a permanent tactic of the hard-right, and then weÂ’ll have both parties constantly doing this acting-out-and-threatening stuff.

There does seem to be a sort of contest going on as to which group—the hard left, or the hard right—can be more immature. It's a sort of race to the bottom.

"Oh, my God! It's 1986 all over again! But this time, it's the end of the world!"

Well, no. And—no.

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. . . on why the current immigration bill represents progress, even if it doesn't offer perfection:

"It rewards illegal behavior; the penalty for illegal entry should be deportation."

There are 12 million illegals in the US. Let me explain how difficult that would be. In the first place, the ICE has to find them, usually where they work. They then have to build a probable cause for a raid and search warrants (unless we want to toss out the 4th Amendment). That takes quite a bit of time; it might take months to build that kind of a case against an employer, but at least it will take a few weeks. Then they raid the shop, arrest everyone without proper identification, and start the deportation process—which requires a hearing for each person in court to determine their status. During that period, we have to house and feed them.

Now, let's say we can summon up the vast resources it would take to send 10,000 people a month through that long, laborious process. (In comparison, we have 16,000 murders a year, and it sometimes takes years to resolve the cases.) It would still take 100 years to deport all 12 million illegals in that manner—while clogging our courts, eating up our law-enforcement resources, and disrupting American commerce and politics for a century, all while we're fighting a war with radical Islamist terrorists.

Emphasis added; read the whole thing.

H/t: The Anchoress, of course. She's one of the maybe half-dozen bloggers considered "right-of-center" who still want to give this bill the benefit of a doubt, and keep moving forward. We are very much in the minority right now. (The comments to her post are recommended, btw: there is the usual "we are legal and we went through hell to get here, and we want everyone else to go through hell, too" non-argument, along with some interesting flashbacks to the Dubai Port deal flap, which was hardly the rightosphere's—or talk radio's—finest hour.)

Bottom line: I'm seeing a lot more emotion on the right regarding this issue lately than I am solid reasoning. And it worries me. Very, very much.

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1 Well I tiptoe just a bit on this issue, because it looks like what the Right doesn't want to have happen is likely to happen in some form anyway. And I'm not so sure that it will be a wholly bad thing. Regarding "rewarding law breaking", sometimes it is the law that needs to be adjusted. That's one that too many on the Right have a hard time stomaching. I suppose this is where my libertarian leanings make me part company with the statist Republican mainstream. As long as what we end up with is an adequate and legal means for employers to hire the help they need, and a stronger enforcement regime against those who continue to enter illegally, I'm likely to be satisfied. My larger concern is getting the border secured, and if that means taking the pressure off the border by creating a legal path to residency for those who previously violated that border, then so be it. I'm not likely to be completely happy with the final result, but the status quo is worse than anything now being considered.

Posted by: Desert Cat at May 21, 2007 06:51 PM (ogl5V)

2 I have relatives in Asia who've been biding their time, doing their paperwork, following the law. Suddenly 12 million law-breakers are going to get in line in front of them. It will take years to process 12 million sets of papers. My relatives will die of old age before they get here. (Hmm, maybe I'll adopt their kids.) Whatever happened to "equal protection under the law"? Also, why the left okay with paying illegal aliens low wages, but Walmart needs to pay citizens higher wages than they do? -Bob

Posted by: Bob at May 21, 2007 07:31 PM (aTv/9)

3 Bob the key is to make sure your concerns are heard. IF you have relatives in Asia that are in line then call and fight to get those concerns met in the bill. It is not a reason to the kill the bill. This is a process and there is alot in this bill. THe 12 million here and the issues to deal with it are just a part of it. Also remember that groups like FAIR. NUMMBERS USA, and CIS that is behind the opposition to this bill don't won't you relatives to come over either. THey are pretty much against all immigration even those legally. Something to keep in mind when picking alliances JH Louisiana

Posted by: jhood at May 21, 2007 11:09 PM (lrzQR)

4 Bob: I know. I hate that. I, too, would like a system that doesn't suck. But in order to get one that doesn't suck, we might first have to accept one that simply sucks less. Theoretically, my friends-of-friends in Eastern Europe would be able to get here just as easily as those who are already in the Americas, through the accident of birth. But they cannot. Those who are born in the Americas have an advantage, just as I have an advantage through having been born here (through, BTW, no virtue of my own). Desert: Took you long enough to weigh in, here! I've been waiting . . .

Posted by: Attila Girl at May 21, 2007 11:28 PM (3F7vn)

5 I hear very little discussion of what instantly legalizing 12 million illegal immigrants is going to do to this country's social services and the costs to the taxpayers. We are not talking about 12 million skilled workers. For the most part, these people are poor and uneducated. They are going to be a burden on social services as it is, and I do not even want to think what is going to happen once the next recession hits.

Posted by: Mark at May 22, 2007 10:36 AM (HjIN7)

6 Almost all that I am aware of are working in the construction trades. Those are skills that are not hard to pick up on the job, if they don't already have them before crossing the border. As far as the impact to social services, I'm not sure it would be much worse than right now. Even Arizona, with our propositions that were supposed to prohibit illegals from obtaining social services, still provide them as far as I know. Legal status hasn't been a barrier to benefits so far. Why would legalization change that?

Posted by: Desert Cat at May 22, 2007 06:56 PM (ogl5V)

7 Actually if we can get them on the tax rolls instead of being paid under the table, it might be a wash. Anyone done that analysis?

Posted by: Desert Cat at May 22, 2007 06:57 PM (ogl5V)

8 At this point--at least in CA--everyone needs a social security card to work, so people simply get fake ones. But the taxes and Social Security are being paid--just into bogus accounts. Verdon over at Outside the Beltway did an analysis a while back that concluded that illegal immigrants were, in fact, a "net drag" on the economy, but I know for a damned fact that a lot of them do pay taxes--very often without receiving services beyond the routine health care they get at the county (which is a terrible thing: people going to the ER for routine care, which means it takes longer to treat real emergencies).

Posted by: Attila Girl at May 22, 2007 07:50 PM (/obaa)

9 Not bogus Social Security accounts, STOLEN SS #'s. Stolen from real people--identity theft. Totally made-up numbers are discovered immediately. Numbers from deceased taxpayer also are red-flagged immediately. Real citizens find that someone else is making claims on their SS accounts, and it takes months to unravel. I knew someone who was injured in an explosion at work and found out someone was already receiving disability payments from his account. He was SOL, and it took almost a year to straighten out. The only solution is to let the people whose identity was stolen keep the excess contributions. Congress gives it back to the identity thieves under all plans. Examine those statements SS sends you every two or three years carefully. Report any inconsistencies immediately. The latest trend with illegals are "hit and run" immigrants People that have no intention of living here permanently, and send 80-90% of their wages back to Mexico. They can only do this because "employers" are giving them room and board, usually in a cheaper single-family home that 15-20 workers use as a flop house. These people don't put any money back into the US economy, like a typical worker would do with normal spending. They pay little or no taxes because their wages are paid under the table, or they claim a large number of dependents on their W-4 to keep withholding down.

Posted by: Darrell at May 23, 2007 10:14 AM (kIf/q)

10 Right, Darrell--and how to we sort out the abuses from the quiet people who are simply doing their jobs, and paying taxes? (And, for that matter, find out about the slaves and near-slaves living among us?--some of 'em actually physically locked into the structures they work from?) By reducing the numbers of people living in those shadows. There is no way to sort through that population properly without reducing it as we go, by creating a path to citizenship for the ones who are simply looking for work, and otherwise keeping their noses clean. And for every person you point to who is claiming benefits he/she is not entitled to, I'll point to the ones who pay taxes, but never receive the actual benefits, because they are illegal. The door swings both ways, there.

Posted by: Attila Girl at May 23, 2007 03:01 PM (VgDLl)

11 Why don't we just set a reasonable number for new, legal immigration that we can all live with? If you aren't happy with 2 million/year(2005, including status change), how about 4? 5? 6? Whatever. Make the process quicker/easier too. And advertise it. Illegals spend, what, $25k and up for travel, documentation now. None of that going to US coffers. Make the real deal a bargain. The people who live here now have to be in on that decision. And once made, we have to stop people from getting around the rules. However necessary. Doesn't that sound fair? Keep in mind that 2.5 million is about a 1% growth rate annually. No country in the world allows more. No country in the world has to. You may not want construction/factory jobs, but there are plenty of American-born citizens that consider these PREMIUM jobs. Like most of my family! Maybe that's why when that meat plant in Iowa was raided, 1000's of real citizens applied for those jobs. Including LEGAL immigrants! Heck, 4000 people applied at a new WalMart by my house about a year or so ago--in a single day. It made the national news. Not everyone can or wants to push paper/sell balloon juice for a living. They all take more than they pay into the system, according to detailed studies that I have read. Schools, second-language demands, medical care are just some of the costs. Those combined with claiming married and 9 dependents for their W-4s, even when they are single, make it a greater burden to taxpayers. The only studies that say differently are agenda-driven, and they are pretty easy to shoot down. The last study from the University of Chicago I remember said it takes ~35 years(of working at their avg. tax rates) to reach payback(actual cost vs. avg annual tax contributions) for a typical illegal alien. And most left the tax rolls before that level was reached. A local town recently passed a referendum simply stating that it Will follow and enforce Federal immigration law, and various groups are lining up threatening to bury them with ligation costs. The town's lawyers are suggesting that they ignore the referendum. Civil war? You betcha! The real reason behind the problem? You betcha! You handle the 10-30 million illegal aliens the same way who handle thieves--one arrest at a time. And you don't do it by sending them a letter telling them to show up for a hearing, allowing them to run. Somewhere, every day, someone shows up on the radar in a traffic stop, data check, something. When they do, they should be taken into custody right away. And DNA taken. Maybe that's a way to handle that name-change problem. RFID chips, tamper-proof methods? Maybe. Along with border enforcement/prevention, eventually we can make LEGAL immigration a preferred option. Maybe. Over time. And we have to stop electing people that rope-a-dope us into believing they want to solve the problem. They want you to shut up about it. Like in 1986. After amnesty, did they do 1 thing to seal the border? Enforce the law? To prevent it from happening again? Remember foreign aid? Remember how the number-one gripe of US taxpayers used to be foreign aid in the 60's and 70's? Know how Congress got you to shut up? By transferring $trillions of cumulative revenues (by now to) Europe and elsewhere. Where did the money come from? US industry. They did it with clean air laws, unleaded gasoline bans, and metrification. Ever wonder why green-Europe didn't switch to unleaded gasoline until the mid-90s? Didn't ban most CFCs when we did~1971? Did you know that Japan was ready to switch to English units(inches, etc) if the US banned metric imports? (I talked to the MITI people that were ready to issue $billions in orders to US machine tool manufacturers) if Congress acted.(The US was their marginal market and they would have been driven into an immediate depression if exports stopped). Instead, US manufacturers placed $billion of orders with Japanese/European machine tool manufacturers to get metric equipment. Did you know the US chemical industry had a 90%+ share of the world chemical market? Did you know they actually had people employed to make sure that share didn't rise?(I interviewed for one of those positions). Did you know about the 100s of $billions the oil refiners had to spend on higher-temperature/ higher-pressure processes to produce unleaded gasoline that the rest of the world didn't have to invest? Look up today's US share of the world chemical market... All on US industry's back. Thanks, Congress! Set whatever pollution laws you want. But make everyone join in. Or wait until they do. But you didn't want that, did you? Or to explain foreign aid. Maybe 30 million quiet, hard-working Americans, along with a token 150 million rural Chinese would like to join me in Mexico, to work for a better life. Under Capitalism this time around. I bet in twenty years, we'll be building a fence. Heck, the way things are going, make that 2008. Note to my Chinese friends, because of concerns with Chupacabras, stop at you local arms factories and pick up some personal protection to bring along. And extras. Don't forget all those specialty places like the "123 Factory," "7103 Factory," and a few of those other places in the Chengdu and Sichuan Provinces. Don't forget the special toys you'll find there. Everyone needs protection to build a dream.

Posted by: Darrell at May 23, 2007 09:40 PM (d/aUJ)

12 Darrell, if we make enforcement a priority and make it easier/faster to get here properly, I'll be a very happy camper. Have you read American Alone yet? There are a number of other ways in which the U.S. subsidizes the rest of the world that you didn't even touch on--but Mark Steyn enumerates.

Posted by: Attila Girl at May 23, 2007 10:40 PM (VgDLl)

13 My usual rant on this subject is the length of a book. And, of course, you have to touch on global warming. If only to show that these things continue. And the real reason for the hysteria. I didn't read Steyn(thanks for the tip), I lived it. All this money involuntarily confiscated from American industry(with a simultaneous windfall profits tax in place, no less) was designed to buy the world's love. That worked out great, didn't it? In our next lesson, we will talk about when the Euro was issued with its value set at one US dollar. The markets quickly set the real value at 50 US cents. What changed? And we never even got a "thank you!". . .

Posted by: Darrell at May 24, 2007 07:50 AM (KgDxt)

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John Hawkins is threatening a "scorched earth" policy, involving "Google bombs" (something every legislator dreads, I'm sure).

I had dinner with Justene (of The Bear Flag League) last night, along with our husbands and a few other people—including She Who Will Not Practice Law. Justene and I agreed that although we hadn't studied the immigration bill thoroughly enough to have an informed opinion yet, it was very promising that both the left and the right were pissed about it.

I'll post more on it once I've had a chance to actually review the sucker. Though, as with all bills, there may be just a bit too much of it. Thanks to N.Z. Bear, whose dishy picture adorns the inside of many a Cotillion girl's locker door.

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She's got it goin' on.

She also agrees with me that we might want so start somewhere realistic in dealing with the immigration issue . . . which, you know—that's an idea some should definitely ponder.

Unless they prefer to sit around wringing their hands, and getting angrier by the day.

(News of the Anchoress' redesign reached me via My Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy.)

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Strong feelings, here: he's encouraging people to leave the GOP over this issue. Of course, if that happened, there'd be no one left but us little old libertarians, and we could, like stretch out a bit.

But, here, a ray of light:

Again, I'm not really bothered by the amnesty part. I mean, that's a given. What else are we going to do, realistically?

But I refuse to grant amnesty unless I get my part of the quid pro quo first. Amnesty is acceptable only if it's the last amnesty, and the government needs to secure the border, finally, to prove that.

12-30 million new American citizens I can accept. The problem is the 40-60 million to almost immediately follow. Amnesty, if necessary, but as a one-time deal, and I'm going to need some serious evidence to show it's a one-time deal rather than an ongoing cycle of runaway illegal immigration followed by periodic amnesties.

No one gets their side of the quid pro quo first, Ace: it's like a drug deal. The money and the stuff have to show up simultaneously, or the transaction doesn't take place.

No one trusts anyone in politics. Nor should they.

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And it looks like the approach is somewhat holistic, which is all I asked. (Well—it's one of the things I asked.) Details so far are sketchy. For instance, when we ask people with high-level skill sets to return to their countries of origin in order to become citizens here, how long do they have to stay there? And who covers their jobs or runs their businesses while they are gone?

This would explain why John McCain wasn't available for his periodic blogger conference call this morning, of course.

The fact is, we had to do something about this, and preferably in a way that didn't create perverse incentives for more people to come here simply because some magical "window of opportunity" might close soon. Not because the system wasn't working previously: in a sense, it's been working all along, in its own messy way. But the "don't ask, don't tell" approach has been expensive in some respects, and—more importantly—it's just too risky for us to have porous borders in this day and age.

The "back door" into this country must close, and part of the solution is to make it easier for people to get here legally. We must cut down on that red tape, or the whole thing falls apart.

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but I love Dennis when he's cranky, which is of course most of the time.

Except for the obsession with you-know-what after it launched: that got boring in a hurry.

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I've been meaning to link this entry since the collapse of the Roman Empire.

And if I'm ever home in a state other than one of total exhaustion, I'll have a response for her.

But she most certainly makes good points. Why, exactly, did I think I could tangle with her?

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Glenn publishes a handful of mail from people who are upset about our lopsided immigration "policy." But please note that a big part of the problem is how punishing the system is for those who want to immigrate "the right way." Fixing this is essential to the problem, which means we have to reform a bureaucracy.

And that's hard to do, but it's essential.

Right now, our attitude toward immigrants—whom we need, by the way, given our system of entitlements and falling birth rates—is, "welcome to the United States. Fuck you."

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Steve Verdon has an interesting post in Outside the Beltway that reflects a lot of my concerns on the question of "illegals." Please note that I do not regard all those who advocate sealing the borders as racists, but I have yet to hear a conversation about this on the radio that doesn't accommodate at least a few racists. Very often, callers on talk radio will say the most disgusting things about Mexican-Americans without being checked whatsoever by the host. After all, we're "all on one side in this thing." Which presumably means we should tolerate the racists. It makes me queasy, to tell you the truth.

Verdon's focus, however, is on the cost-benefit aspect of illegal immigration, regarding which Darleen and I have been playing verbal volleyball for some time. (You'll want to note here that Darleen's non-racist credentials are impeccable, though I wonder if her saturation exposure to the Latin underclass occasionally informs some of her views.)

I continue to believe that in order to address the problem, we must 1) secure the border; 2) streamline the legal immigration system for those who truly want to come here and assimilate; and 3) offer some sort of guest-worker program for young people who simply want to be here temporarily to make a few dollars, and then go home.

Typically [this morning's radio] discussion was about little Juanito and how much money it costs to educate this illegal child in the U.S. school system. Nothing was said about the work that JaunitoÂ’s parents do and the value such works adds to the economy. Nothing was discussed about the taxes paid. The true measure of the costs here should be the net costs, not the total costs.

So how much are the net costs of illegal immigration? This report from the GAO from 1995 (pdf) put the net costs at anywhere from $2 billion a year to $19 billion a year with an illegal population of 3 to 5 million. So even if we take the worse case scenario of 3 million immigrants and $19 billion in net costs and scale it up to todayÂ’s estimated population (say 12 million) we are talking about $80 billion in net costs. A middle of the road estimate would be around $50 billion. Either way I see this as chump-change for the most part.

First we have to remember that the U.S. economy is well over $12 trillion dollars in terms of GDP. Or in other words illegal immigration is equal to about 0.64% of GDP. By contrast the U.S. budget deficit is ten times larger as a percentage of GDP. Spending for the Medicare Prescirption Drug plan is going to cost $18.2 trillion.1 And Medicare, aside from the prescription drug program, has a shortfall in the range of $50 to $60 trillion over the next 75 years. But here we are worried about chump-change due to illegal immigration.

This leads me to, “Why?” The only thing I can think of is that things like Medicare shortfalls are boring and dull. After all it requires reading actuarial reports, figuring out what the taxable wage base is, and looking at projections which brings in things like statistics and already 48.3% of the audience is on the verge of a coma.

Nice, Steve. Some of us were paying attention, there.

Illegal immigration on the other hand seems to touch off some sort of fear of people who are different. They don’t look like “us”, the don’t talk like “us” and they eat all that weird food and dammit I can’t read the signs over the stores that cater to their consumption! So illegal immigration gets lots of attention, but the complete shambles that things like Medicare are in are just ignored. If we could just stem the flow of illegals why economic nirvana would result. Americans would go back to hanging drywall, mowing their own yards, and chopping up chickens. I’m even sure that controlling the U.S.-Mexico border would reverse the global downward trend in manufacturing employment.[/sarcasm]

In short, I see all this handwringing about the U.S. becoming part of Mexico as nothing more than misplaced priorities by people who seem deathly afraid of people who are different than them. The response to the charge of racism is often, “It isn’t racism! We just oppose illegal immigration. And the costs are real.” Sure the costs are real, but they are much smaller when compared to other issues such as Medicare funding. And sure illegal immigration isn’t a good thing, but instead suggest a guest worker program (i.e. make those illegal immigrants legal) and you still get the howling. So both objections, IMO, while technically true are just rhetoric to deflect criticism and hide the rather disquieting aspects of the illegal immigration movement.

Okay. So he's just as turned off by the Latino = bad thing as I am, and it looms large in his argument.

But the cost-benefit thing is relevant, and the huge resistance to guest-worker programs does set off a lot of red flags in terms of some of us feeling that there's a huge xenophobia out there, and/or a huge willingness to ascribe the recession we just went through (over the past five years) to a phenomenon that's been going on in one form or another for decades.

Tag, boys and girls. You're it.

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Dafydd has a short summary on the problem of illegal immigration.

The main problem WRT illegal immigration is that no one will budge an inch on either side: the free-market types won't concede that border control is a good idea in this day and age, and the border-control types won't admit that we depend on large numbers of immigrants to run most of the border states.

The problem can only be solved if the border is controlled, but legal immigration would have to be liberalized tremendously, and the extreme bureaucratic nature of applying for residency/citizenship would need to be likewise streamlined, so that legal immigration would become a realistic option for poor people in foreign countries.

In a world wherein it seems like a better bet to pay off a coyote and risk your life, versus entering this country through the front door, something is seriously wrong with our system.

And, no: I don't really want to pay $10 for a bag of lettuce. I really don't. We're writers in this house: our incomes are really unreliable.

And I'm not good at construction, so forcing the local contractors to hire citizens helps me not at all. Except that it decreases the likelihood that we'll ever be able to remodel—even if we're flush again—and strict controls on employers would mean that a lot of people in my neighborhood wouldn't be able to afford their gardeners any more, increasing the devastation during wildfires.

The problem needs to be attacked from both angles, but each side only sees through its accustomed prism.

UPDATE, 3/29: This would appear to buttress the notion that the overwhelming majority of illegal immigrants pay taxes—and suggest that many do not take benefits out of the system. I understand that some people's observations are going to differ, but I'd really like to get an idea what the big picture is—beyond anecdotes. ('Cause we all like to extrapolate from our own experiences, and that doesn't appear to give us much clarity on this issue.)

Gotta run.

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I've been looking for a flashlight to shine my way through the fog of immigration. Here's one, by a friend of mine who was ostensibly writing about abortion. Not so incidentally, she makes some good points about what amounts, in a lot of cases, to a sub rosa system of indentured servitude.

Or: slavery in the present day in this country.

It has to stop, but I don't think the answer is to militarize the border and to kick all the "illegals" out of the U.S.

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One of those little things about political speech: the terms people use to frame an issue serves as a signal to the like-minded about where they stand. This phenomenon has its uses, but if you're writing about current events it never helps to persuade anyone to your point of view. Know the difference between cheerleading and persuasion; make it your friend.

For example, I have plenty to argue about with other SP Repubs in terms of immigration. Matter of fact, it's sort of an exciting time, because no real concensus has emerged among libertarian-leaning righty warmongers on this particular issue. Naturally, Malkin has persuaded a lot of people that the conservative approach—sealing the border, making sure everyone has to stand in line—is the way to go, but it's not really a done deal yet: we haven't tended to swarm one way or the other with respect to immigration policy, and people like Larry Elder and Desert Cat are still advocating a more flexible immigration policy that's libertarian in principle, yet common-sensical in its specifics. The President appears to be working toward this middle ground in his approach.

My sympathies here are with the President, but I listen to everyone. I have to say, though (getting back to my thesis) that whenever I hear the word "illegals," my mind tends to shut down: I figure whoever is throwing that word around is preaching to the converted, and I oughtn't to listen in on their private conversation.

Take-home questions for bloggers and political junkies:

1) When you talk, write, blog, or debate others on political issues, do you use terms that will be meaningful to them, or do you try to strong-arm them into thinking your way with your language?

2) Where are we going here regarding immigration policy? Is this something that the right side of the blogosphere (Malkin aside) hasn't focused on sufficiently? Discuss.

3) Who is doing the best job in covering this issue, other than the illustrious Ms. Malkin? Where are the best arguments for/against liberalization of these policies, a tightening of border controls, or some variation on guest-worker programs? How about amnesty—it that dead, or is there a good way to handle it?

4) When you think about immigration, are you driven by a) security; b) issues of fairness; c) culture and language; or d) economic concerns? How sensitive are you about cultural issues, and is this "fair game," or merely a reflection of prejudices? (That is, where do you draw the line between bigotry versus believing English should be the common language in the U.S. and/or wanting a certain "cultural imprint" on immigrants?)

5) How do immigration concerns in the States differ from those in other Western nations?

UPDATE: Steve at Secure Liberty has some practical, hard-headed suggestions for getting our arms around this problem. However, one element in his plan contains a small measure of "amnesty," a dicey concept (and also a good scare word for the anti-"illegal" hysterics).

And that's the problem at the heart of this: one side insists that we militarize our borders, and throw anyone out who didn't originally come here legally—no matter how long they've been here, how hard they've worked, or how clean a life they've led. The other side wants to ignore the problem entirely.

And, yes, at the fringes there are people who are simply turned off by Latin American culture and want it out of their cities. And at the fringes of my position there probably are corporate interests who want cheap labor, no matter what.

It's another "third rail" issue, for sure.

One more thing: for those of you who insist that this has to do with the "rule of law," and people following the rules no matter what it means to their families' lives, I'm just wondering if your grandparents were adults during Prohibition.

Are you sure they never took a drink? Positive?

How about you? Ever try pot? Not once?

Rule of law, Baby: it's a bitch.

Posted by: Attila at 08:57 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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I made Malkin's blogroll, despite our differences of opinion on how to fix the illegal immigration problem.

She even linked me a few weeks back.

Is this significant beyond my link-whorish existence? Maybe, in a certain symbolic sense: I wondered, after the last Presidential election, whether the neocons, more traditional conservatives, and libertarians who came together to re-elect President Bush would be able to get along at all after the task at hand was finished.

I've had a few spirited discussions lately on hot topics (medical marijuana, gays in the military) with some of the more traditional conservative bloggers and commenters out there, and I've been very encouraged by how rarely these talks degenerate into name-calling. It seems that most of us who would like to see the War on Terror won have been able to keep in mind how important that is, and focus in on it. We do need to hash these other issues out, and engage in the debates we are having now—but it needs to be done right.

Yes, I'll be doing more reading on the immigration issue. And I do agree that the existing "system" isn't any such thing, and is dangerous. So far, I'm pretty libertarian on the issue, and feel that a willing seller of labor and a willing buyer should be able to get together with as few restrictions as possible. (I believe people like me are called "Wall Street Journal" types, and there's usually some implication that we're blinded by our corporate financial interests, which I would desperately love to acquire—gas money for this month would be a nice start.)

But I'm willing to read and learn, and I'll certainly begin with Malkin's primers.

Posted by: Attila at 11:38 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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