The NYT editorial "A Platform for Immigrants" supports the "original" Bush plan for immigration "reform." In so doing, they get so many things wrong it's hard to know where to begin. As a first start, let's examine this paragraph:
Anybody who has watched the Republicans wrestling with this explosive issue this year knew it would be difficult to please both the Republican moderates who realize that the system is "broken" - as Mr. Bush put it in January - and ideologues like Representative Tom Tancredo of Colorado, who has not only opposed easing rules for undocumented workers but has even favored a "time out'' on legal immigration. Mr. Bush will gain more support in that wider middle ground if he sticks with his original proposal to mend the immigration system and begins supporting bipartisan proposals in Congress.
The system is "broken" only in so far as we've become unable and unwilling to enforce our own laws. The so-called "fix" will just make the problem worse. We need to return to first principles and enforce the law before talking about any "reforms."
Also, the "wider middle ground" is a lot narrower and farther off to either side than the NYT's myopic Manhattan vision could understand:
[Tancredo] added: "I am astounded that my position on an issue that commands somewhere near 75 percent support from the general public is perceived as being problematic for the party. Most Americans want secure borders. Most Americans want an end to illegal immigration. These have to be addressed - even when people call you names."
As an example of that name-calling, the NYT editorial - which was probably reviewed by several people - uses the phrase "anti-immigrant."
I'm considering sending a letter to the editor, and if you want to do so go here or try their forums.
Immigration2004 · Mon, 08/30/2004 - 11:40 · · Importance: 1
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Comments
The use of the term 'anti-immigrant' is implicitly ad hominem and below civilized standards. The abstract idea of immigration restrictionism is thereby reduced to a personal quality in which it is suggested that someone is perhaps constitutionally anti-immigrant. This ad hominem approach is improper; anti-communists were not called anti-Russian, anti-capitalists are not called anti-Anglo-Saxon, those who are anti-affirmative action are not intelligently called anti-black. By trying to take positions down to the level of personal animosities, the user of that method shows that he believes his argument to be a losing one. The supporters of large-scale anti-merit immigration into a welfare society, are so certain of the unattractiveness of their cause that they don't dare to even name it as such.
Posted by: John S Bolton at Aug 30, 2004 8:23 PM