Amnesty in Pieces

Last week, the President made an announcement that he was declaring a subset of illegal aliens legal to work within the US. Putting aside the constitutional and moral aspects of the move, its goal is clear - amnesty.

Whenever leading politicians seek to do something that is unconstitutional, against the will of the people, or both, the plan is always the same. That plan is to first create a "compromise" which is ridiculous on its face, to allow that compromise to remain in place until the populace forgets how it got there, and then to seek out the original goal by pointing out the ridiculousness of the situation which they created.

An example of this is allowing openly gay and lesbian soldiers to serve in the military. When the public opposed such a move in the early 1990's the government created a "compromise." That compromise was to allow them to serve, but only if they didn't talk about their sex life. The government would in turn no longer ask about a soldier's sexual orientation.

As ridiculous as this policy was, it remained in place for almost 20 years. Eventually, the same people that heralded the "don't ask, don't tell" policy began to point out the absurdity of a system that allows a person to live as they see fit as long as they don't talk about it with their employers. The same people that created the situation then got their eventual goal by pointing out the unsustainability of that program.

This is the plan for amnesty. Last week, the President created a program where illegal aliens who came here below a certain age and have been here for a given amount of time are allowed to have their deportations deferred for up to two years and are given legal work status. Now we have a scenario that is both unsustainable and unfair. It is unsustainable in that the bureaucracy needed to validate the claims made by these people does not exist and cannot be trusted to do a fair job when it will be created by an administration whose obvious goal is to legalize as many of the people in question as possible. It is injust in that the US does not have a "second class citizen" structure. You are either a US citizen or you are not. You are either in this country legally or you are not. The system is, on its face, discriminatory and demeaning.

However, this is the point. This is why this type of system was chosen. In a few years, Democratic leaders will began to decry the injustice of the system. They will ask "why are these people allowed to work legally, but not to vote." They will decry the inhumanity of a nation that takes their services in the workforce, but leaves them out of the voting process to select the leaders of that nation. They will protest against the taxation of their services without the ability to select their representatives in local, state, or national elections.

This is how the system works. They take a person with no legitimate complaint - an alien who came here illegally and works illegally, and places them into a scenario in which they have a legitimate grievance - the can work, but have no voice in the system. The same people who then created this "compromise" will tear it down by decrying it as an injustice, and the ultimate goal of citizenship for illegal aliens is achieved. The argument is shifted from rewarding illegal aliens with citizenship to granting full rights to second class citizens.

This plan has been successful in the past. It will be successful again unless the American people require their elected representatives to address the issue at hand - illegal immigration - and not create an argument that they can win later.