THE COMPETING BULLSHIT OF RIGHT AND LEFT POSITIONS ON IMMIGRATION SIT ON THE HONDURAS BORDER MOCKING US.

It is time that both parties and all of us started talking practical, compassionate but not naïve things about immigration. The need is to face reality and offer partial solutions to something where there is no magic answer. This has become reified on the Honduras border with Mexico *** I heard some of the things coming out of the Republicans described as odious and I agree with the description. *** On the other hand, some of the statement from liberals are naïve or disingenuous and probably dangerous if they believe them. *** Looking first at the foolish ideas and surrounding my fellow liberals: - First, I doubt more than a handful of people want an open border which is what republicans are saying that all democrats do want. Maybe more people than I think like the idea of no border control. To be clear I am not one of them. Once you accept that a border is not open you must accept that there are rules about who enters. You must control the border and it will lead to practical cruelty because no rule is perfect. Liberals make it clear that you see border controls as a necessary part of the law *** Second if you do not have the right documents to enter the country you enter the country illegally. Stop pretending that such people are not illegal. Undocumented means illegal – let’s stop the naïve politically correct distortion of the meaning of words. You sound stupid. Concatenate the words if you like and call them undocumented illegals but stop lying to yourselves ** Thirdly I ascribe this bullshit to liberals, but it is maybe more shared by both sides. Why do people come to the US? The answer is because it is a great country and they live in horrible countries. Countries that are either run by dictators or where in theory democracies have given up governing. Countries where the economic system, whatever it is labeled, is an irrational, ill-conceived and inconsistent mish mash where the only similarity is that rich get richer and more powerful and the poor get poorer and even less powerful. Wouldn’t you want to leave such a place? ** I don’t have a solution for this one, but I think that acknowledging it will help the practical debate. It is the reason why there are 5000 people in a caravan on the Honduran border ** So much for the liberal bullshit – now let’s look at the right-wing cruelty bullshit *** Illegal undocumented immigrants are nearly all honest hardworking contributors to the economy. It does not make them legal, but it does not make them more likely to commit crimes than anyone else. The solution needs to handle the realities of what they are doing while they are in the country and offer compromise solutions that offer hope, are not naïve but are equally not cruel. *** If they were below the age of consent, sometimes no more than babies, when they came to America they did not participate in their illegal status. They were in effect kidnapped by the adults responsible for them. Does this make them legal immigrants by itself – No and nor should it. It should be clear that it also stops them being cultural residents of the place where they were born. Should we feel compassion for them and try to find a solution their behavior as residents count towards qualifying for citizenship. I think so and I believe that most Americans do too even if the details of what the agreement should be might vary. It was the reason why DACA was so quietly popular before the cruel wing of the Republicans took over. No one is completely comfortable with it, but we know it is the right direction in which to walk. There was no need to kill it *** So now we are faced with a real challenge in the 5000-person caravan where the worst of our competing bullshits clash with no obvious solution. *** Common sense says that these are mostly people fleeing horrible lives with little but hope and desperation to motivate them. The idea that they are hardened criminals or middle eastern provocateurs is a ludicrous lie. *** On the other hand , I don’t see how they can reasonably be let in en-masse to the US and still allow us to pretend we have a controlled border and I think we need a controlled border. *** What happens if they use violence to try and cross, do we respond with violence – I think we have to consider it of the border is meaningless. *** So, do we may soon reach a point where we must decide whether to open fire on women and children. Gandi’s march to the sea for salt in the 1930’s only succeeded because the British decided not to open fire . Had Nazi Germany controlled India I doubt that would have been the answer. *** We are going to be tested. Mutually spouting Bullshit at each is not going to cut it