There was a Town Hall meeting in Murrieta, California on Wednesday. Modeled after the New England meetings held by our Founding Fathers, this particular gathering was about something that’s troubling the Murrieta community — why their tax dollars should support foreign citizens.
Murrieta is one of a handful of towns currently handling the overflow from the waves of illegal immigrants crossing over our southern border. The Town Meeting came after angry citizens managed to do more than talk — they took to the streets, and blocked a bus carrying illegals to a local processing center.
Although federal money supports Border Patrol facilities, including one in Murrieta, local government has to provide the cash for law enforcement and nonprofits assisting the immigrants now being relocated from their initial Texas border crossing. It’s a process being duplicated in Chula Vista and El Centro, California; Phoenix, Arizona; Dallas, Texas; and elsewhere in the nation, albeit without the Murrieta street protests.
Once the illegal immigrants are “processed” in Murrieta and elsewhere, they are assisted in locating relatives in the nation, and given help in transportation to reach them. It’s amnesty without being called such, and it’s stretching the limits of toleration of US citizens. Murrieta was the first uprising — it won’t be the last.
Why Are We Doing This?
There’s no good answer to the question of why US citizens should engage and support the efforts of another country’s people to violate our immigration laws. There is an emotional argument: compassion for those less fortunate than American citizens. While that’s a powerful lure that appeals to the best instincts of mankind, it also ignores the most important need of any species — self-preservation.
You can call the people who packed the Murrieta high school gym on Wednesday a lot of things, and you can be sure Leftists will call them those names. But they weren’t there because they oppose all immigration. What they do oppose is being overwhelmed by a wave of people that threatens to undermine our society’s economy, culture, and resources.
The US can certainly take in some of the people who arrive unannounced and without authorization. But we can’t take all of them, and hope to sustain our own nation. No one has held a vote asking the American people whether they support a “come one, come all” policy that will change our society. They already know the answer to that.
There’s already high unemployment among young people and African Americans, the people who used to hold a lot of the jobs in the service sectors of the economy — industries like construction, restaurant work, hotel cleaning staff, landscaping, and meat packing.
These are jobs that citizens used to do, so there is evidence that the old “jobs that Americans won’t do” argument isn’t true. But we won’t get a chance to prove that when there’s a mile-long list of workers available, who will work off the books or with forged documents, depressing wages for everyone and filling tasks that used to be the launching point for US citizen careers.
We remind you that no less than labor leader and Chicano civil rights activist Cesar Chavez used to patrol the US border, sending back illegal crossers. He understood that wages and opportunities are depressed by unchecked immigration.
President Obama is either ignoring the issue, or making plans to thwart the people who oppose illegal immigration. Already there’s talk that if more citizens plan to turn away bus loads of illegal immigrants, federal authorities may order US Marshalls to step in and escort them. That would turn the valid arguments of those opposed to federal policy into a caricature, akin to George Wallace in the school door. Maybe that’s the idea.
Obama’s latest statement on the situation came when Texas Gov. Rick Perry offered him a border tour that would show how to stop the flow. Obama’s answer? Perry and others concerned “should lend their support to comprehensive immigration reform.” Are you listening, South America? He’s speaking in code again.
Unless Obama’s end game is following the playbook of the notorious Cloward-Piven strategy that threatens to turn the US socialist, there’s little logic behind the president’s push for reform. It’s too late for that.
Another wave of immigrants is set to arrive in Murrieta for processing on Friday, the Fourth of July. For US citizens who will be supporting the new arrivals, it means Dependents Day. Because that’s what’s ultimately being created for the services that are being provided. Over 200 years ago, taxation without representation started a war. Maybe Murrieta is the first step for the next one.