Opinion
Posted on Sat, Sep. 02, 2006
The immigrant invasion
Buchanan declares State of Emergency' over growing threat
TOM ASHCRAFT
Special to the Observer
Has America been caught napping while our southern border proved porous to criminals, drug traffickers and illegal aliens? Or is the recent mass migration from the south a deliberate effort to change the country?
In "State of Emergency: The Third World Invasion and Conquest of America," just published and already a bestseller, Pat Buchanan makes a powerful case for the latter. He concedes that simple mistakes have been made, including President Reagan's acceptance -- with Buchanan's support as a White House aide -- of amnesty for 3 million illegals in the 1986 immigration bill.
Nation is more than creed
But Buchanan marshals an array of evidence and arguments that something more sinister is going on: the elites versus the people; radical chic liberalism over wise tradition; the almighty dollar instead of American patriotism; wily Democrats outfoxing dim Republicans.At the heart of his case, Buchanan correctly holds that what makes us a country is not an American political creed, however important for our political institutions, but the ties of family and history, culture and language, soil and blood. He says, "A nation is organic; a nation is alive; a nation has a beating heart. A constitution does not create a nation. A nation writes a constitution that is the birth certificate of the nation already born in the hearts of its people."
He quotes a number of liberals, neo-conservatives and others, including George W. Bush, who argue that we are a "creedal nation," that our political tenets of equality and democracy are learned, are what bind us together and make us a country. False, says Buchanan:
"Human beings are not blank slates. Nor can they be easily separated from the abiding attachments of the tribe, race, nation, culture, community whence they came. Any man or any woman, of any color or creed, can be a good American. We know that from our history. But when it comes to the ability to assimilate into a nation like the United States, all nationalities, creeds, and cultures are not equal."
With this understanding, Buchanan finds recent U.S. immigration levels alarming: "In 1960, there were perhaps 5 million Asians and Hispanics in the United States. Today, there are 57 million. Between 10 percent and 20 percent of all Mexican, Central American, and Caribbean peoples have moved into the United States. One to 2 million enter every year and stay, half of them in defiance of America's laws and disdain for America's borders. No one knows how many illegal aliens are here. The estimates run from 12 to 20 million."
Who benefits? Democrats
So what, some say, we're a nation of immigrants. "This is an invasion," Buchanan explains, "the greatest invasion in history. Nothing of this magnitude has ever happened in so short a span of time. There are 36 million immigrants and their children in the United States today, almost as many as came to America between Jamestown in 1607 and the Kennedy election of 1960. Nearly 90 percent of all immigrants now come from continents and countries whose peoples have never been assimilated fully into any Western country."
Who gains from such unprecedented immigration?
According to Buchanan, it is "locking up the future" for the Democratic Party: "[With some exceptions] immigrants gravitate to the party of government. Mostly uneducated and poor, they get more back in government benefits ... than they ever pay out in government taxes."
Asserts Buchanan: "Either Bush secures the border now, or the Bush Republicans go the way of the Whigs."
Buchanan gives an interesting analysis of what the Mexican government is up to, including the possible reconquest of the southwestern United States.
Practical solutions
As for solutions, Buchanan enumerates a common-sense list far too practical for most incumbents in Washington, including:
• Impose a moratorium on mass immigration to assimilate those already here legally, limiting the annual number to the 1960 level of about 160,000. Give preferences to those who speak English, are educated, can contribute significantly to society, come from countries with a history of assimilation, don't need welfare and want to become citizens.
• Remove illegal aliens over time through attrition. Create incentives to self-deport by cutting welfare and other government subsidies. No amnesty or "path to citizenship" for illegals. Meaningful penalties for businesses hiring illegals.
• Erect a fence along the entire 2,000-mile border with Mexico. The $8 billion cost would be offset by savings in social programs and incarceration expenses related to illegals.
• End automatic citizenship for U.S.-born children of illegals, dual citizenship and "chain migration" preferences for extended family members of immigrants.
Tom
Ashcraft
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Observer columnist Tom Ashcraft is a Charlotte lawyer. Write him c/o The Observer, P.O. Box 30308, Charlotte, NC 28230-0308, or at [email protected].
Solutions to a problem.
