A Divorce, Republican Style

Is the conservative movement divorcing President Bush as David Frum says? To me the divide is more disheartening than that. The divide is between the elites and the commoners. The commoners are now being told to stay in their place for daring to disagree.

Even if a citizen agrees with the President and Senate on it's convoluted proposals, I would think the contemptuous tone would worry them. These are elected leaders, after all, not the House of Lords with a monarch.

If, as Peggy Noonan recommends, the government would shut the border and get serious about that, first, the rest of the policies might be given serious consideration. But the government is not serious about border security which means it's not serious about sovereignty which means the War on Terror is a partial war, because the most important front on the war on terror is on America's border.

And those who disagree with amnesty are being vilified. The division now, is the conservative movement against everyone. As I've written before, this fight is about an economic principle: free markets, even free markets of people, supersedes everything. Cheap labor, President Bush believes, is what is fueling this economy. He is looking at the question one-sidedly, the side that suits him. He is ignoring the long-term consequences of an unassimilated underclass and the socialist mentality it brings with it. He is seeing the Italians and the Irish. And many Italians and Irish are seeing that too, when they look at the Mexican hoards within America.

There is one tiny difference: legal versus illegal immigrants.

Becoming an American has always been hard. Being a new immigrant has been often grueling and demeaning. New immigrants are hazed, if you will. There was a time in the past, when that difficulty was still worth it. Freedom was worth it. Today, thousands of legal immigrants still believe it's worth it. This bill presumes that illegal immigrants want to become legal. That is a disputable premise. In addition, where's the love for all the low income Americans struggling?

Becoming an American often meant being spectacular. As Charles Krauthammer notes, under the new bill, Albert Einstein wouldn't have been allowed into America. We will become a nation built on an "egalitarian" point system. Get enough points, you get in. I see more pay-offs and point padding in our future.

But no matter the result of immigration reform, I hope, like others, that agreeable disagreement will continue to the hallmark of the Right. It certainly isn't the Left. Submit or leave is the order of the day over there. I guess that's why the name calling--racist, un-American, nationalistic, etc.--bothers me. It is possible to love all races and classes and disagree with this legislation. While some kvetch about the "angry right", I might point out that the elitist naming calling smacks of the Left and that's, why that's un-American.