Peggy Noonan Strikes Truth Again

Peggy Noonan has a great column today in the Wall Street Journal. "The Big Alienation." It's one of the best summations of the immigration policy debate I've read in a long while.

There's some great stuff about dysfunctional Washington.

It is not that no one's in control. Washington is full of people who insist they're in control and who go to great lengths to display their power. It's that no one takes responsibility and authority. Washington daily delivers to the people two stark and utterly conflicting messages: "We control everything" and "You're on your own."

She doesn't mention this but it fits the situation in the Gulf right now where it took President Obama nine days to decide to engage the federal apparatus to help British Petroleum with its problem. Obama doesn't want responsibility, just control. And he famously declares that BP "will pay all the costs."

On why Arizona had to act:

Which brings us to Arizona and its much-criticized attempt to institute a law aimed at controlling its own border with Mexico. It is doing this because the federal government won't, and because Arizonans have a crisis on their hands, areas on the border where criminal behavior flourishes, where there have been kidnappings, murders and gang violence. ...

... the larger point is that Arizona is moving forward because the government in Washington has completely abdicated its responsibility. For 10 years—at least—through two administrations, Washington deliberately did nothing to ease the crisis on the borders because politicians calculated that an air of mounting crisis would spur mounting support for what Washington thought was appropriate reform—i.e., reform that would help the Democratic and Republican parties.

And why is that, Peggy?

The American president has the power to control America's borders if he wants to, but George W. Bush and Barack Obama did not and do not want to, and for the same reason, and we all know what it is. The fastest-growing demographic in America is the Hispanic vote, and if either party cracks down on illegal immigration, it risks losing that vote for generations.

But while the Democrats worry about the prospects of the Democrats and the Republicans about the well-being of the Republicans, who worries about America?

Ms. Noonan has a simple prescription for solving the problem. First, fix the border. After that is proven, then do some small things when people have calmed down. But she fears that no one in Washington will do this. Here's why:

Because so many within it are stupid and unimaginative and don't trust the American people. Which of course the American people have noticed.

Do yourself a favor and read the entire article.

Eight More Reasons We Need Border Control

You could argue that getting control of our nation's southern border would be a humane act to prevent just this sort of atrocity:

Eight illegal immigrants "stacked like wood" in the back of a sports-utility vehicle were killed when the driver lost control on a remote southeastern Arizona highway, authorities said Sunday.

At least 27 men and women were in the vehicle traveling about four miles east of Sonoita when the vehicle rolled for an unknown reason shortly before midnight Saturday, said Officer Joy Craig of the Arizona Department of Public Safety.

Most of the vehicle's passengers were ejected.

The department originally reported that 10 people were killed but later lowered the number after learning two people were in the hospital.

The "coyotes" were not running from immigration authorities. They were just doing business as usual.

And that, in human terms, is unacceptable. All humans have an unalienable right to life.

Think, too, of how many accidents of this type probably take place through Mexico as these desperate people are maneuvered through Mexican highways.

Controlled, LEGAL immigration -- of necessity involving strict border crossings -- is humane.

Aliens Are Entitled to 'Effective' Attorneys?

Deportations of illegal aliens may slow down now that Attorney General Eric Holder has reversed former AG Mukasey and will now grant illegals the right to an "effective" attorney.

Mukasey held that the Sixth Amendment right to counsel applied only in criminal matters. Immigration, unless there are crimes involved, is a civil matter. Under the Mukasey standard

Immigrants in removal cases are allowed to have counsel if they wish, but they must retain lawyers on their own, at no expense to the taxpayers.

This reversed a situation that had developed over the years where the system had bogged down. As NR's Andy McCarthy explains:

About 20 years ago, however, immigration judges (who tend to have been immigration lawyers before becoming immigration judges) fabricated a right to effective assistance of counsel for removable aliens under — you guessed it — the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment (that bottomless reservoir of "our values" which, of course, guarantees no such thing).

What was the practical effect of this? Well, the government would go through the burden of trying to remove from the country illegal aliens and criminal aliens; after losing and being ordered removed from the U.S., the aliens would then complain about the purported incompetence of their lawyers (the privately retained attorneys for whom the government and the public were in no way responsible); then, immigration judges would entertain those claims and, if persuaded that the private lawyer might have been ineffective, they would vacate the removal order, causing the government to bear the burden, and the public to bear the expense, of doing it all over again. And you wonder why no one ever gets deported?

AG Mukasey decided to end all this nonsense. He ruled (as the AG is entitled to do in immigration matters) that aliens in removal proceedings had no right to effective assistance of counsel. In so ruling, he was following a number of federal appeals court decisions which held that there is no such right.

[SNIP]

[F]or the vast majority of cases, it was absurd to penalize the American people for the alleged errors of a lawyer the removable alien had no right to have in the first place — a lawyer over whose performance the public had no control. Today, AG Holder reversed AG Mukasey's ruling, in a two-and-a-half page opinion that analyzes none of the pertinent law and does not address the constitutional issues.

Believe it or not, Holder claims his two-and-a-half pages was more thorough than Mukasey's 34-page opinion.

But the ACLU is happy.

Investigating the Good Guys

Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Arizona, is being investigated by the Dept. of Justice at the insistence of congressional Democrats kowtowing to liberal activists claiming that Arpaio has violated the civil rights of detained illegal aliens.

One of the groups behind this vendetta: ACORN.

Sixty members of Sheriff Joe's force have been trained by ICE -- the federal Immigration & Customs Enforcement agency -- and have special certification to enforce immigration laws.

So guess what? Congress is also insisting that ICE itself be investigated.

I don't know what else to call this other than what it is: Radical rabbit shit, hereinafter to be known as RRS. Change you can really smell.

Refugees from Gaza Authorized by Obama

While we were sleeping, or worrying about America's double-time march to socialism through the Porkulus package, our new president has been busy issuing executive orders.

One of these, according to a website called Canada Free Press, Presidential Determination No. 2009-15, authorizes a bit over $20 million for the resettlement of Palestinian refugees to ... the United States!

First, will we do extensive background checks and make sure that we import no known terrorists from Hamas, et al, coming in with the wave of refugees? The historical record is fairly clear that where ever Palestinian hotheads have been relocated, trouble has followed.

Second, and perhaps more importantly, who told Mr. Obama that it was okay to do this? Shouldn't there be a national conversation of some sort, perhaps through our elected representatives (after conferring with their constitutents) in Congress, to determine if resettling a group of Palestinians in the U.S. is something we really want to do right now?

That's the way it used to work in this Republic. Of course, the "progressives" among us see nothing wrong with the imperial presidency as long, of course, as it's their guy in the big chair.

Property Rights in Jeopardy in Border Lawsuit

Is a man's home his castle or not?

Are property rights just one more thing that Americans will need to surrender in order to be part of the "more perfect union" that progressives envision?

You have to read this article, "16 Illegals Sue Arizona Rancher", before you answer that. Roger Barnett has been waging a one-man holding action on his Cross Rail Ranch on the U.S.-Mexico border for the last 10 years, in the process detaining over 12,000 illegals for the U.S. Border Patrol!

Now a handful of them, backed by Big Lawyer (the Mexican-American Legal Defense & Educational Fund) are pushing a $32 million civil suit against the rancher, his family, and the Cochise County sheriff.

for civil rights violations, the infliction of emotional distress and other crimes. ...

The lawsuit is based on a March 7, 2004, incident in a dry wash on the 22,000-acre ranch, when he approached a group of illegal immigrants while carrying a gun and accompanied by a large dog.

Attorneys for the immigrants - five women and 11 men who were trying to cross illegally into the United States - have accused Mr. Barnett of holding the group captive at gunpoint, threatening to turn his dog loose on them and saying he would shoot anyone who tried to escape.

Now the bleeding hearts among our readers would probably argue that he should have just let them pass through his 22,000 acre ranch and let the authorities handle it. But consider Barnett's side of the story:

Mr. Barnett told The Washington Times in a 2002 interview that he began rounding up illegal immigrants after they started to vandalize his property, northeast of Douglas along Arizona Highway 80. He said the immigrants tore up water pumps, killed calves, destroyed fences and gates, stole trucks and broke into his home.

Some of his cattle died from ingesting the plastic bottles left behind by the immigrants, he said, adding that he installed a faucet on an 8,000-gallon water tank so the immigrants would stop damaging the tank to get water.

Mr. Barnett said some of the ranch´s established immigrant trails were littered with trash 10 inches deep, including human waste, used toilet paper, soiled diapers, cigarette packs, clothes, backpacks, empty 1-gallon water bottles, chewing-gum wrappers and aluminum foil - which supposedly is used to pack the drugs the immigrant smugglers give their "clients" to keep them running.

He said he carried a pistol during his searches for the immigrants and had a rifle in his truck "for protection" against immigrant and drug smugglers, who often are armed.

At one point, he said, illegals even broke into his home.

Since when do Americans just sit back, play the victim, and let the authorities take care of it? I guess sometime during the last 30 or 40 years as our progressive media and education establishments have tried to convince us that any individual action of self defense was really just vigilantism in disguise. You are much safer, they have tried to convince us, by letting lawbreakers have their way. Let government "protect" you after the fact.

Whether we are talking about home invasions in Tulsa, carjackings on the streets of Detroit, or Rancher Barnett on the Mexican border, this logic is nuts! Surely no court would give this lawsuit a second thought.

In March, U.S. District Judge John Roll rejected a motion by Mr. Barnett to have the charges dropped, ruling there was sufficient evidence to allow the matter to be presented to a jury. Mr. Barnett's attorney, David Hardy, had argued that illegal immigrants did not have the same rights as U.S. citizens.

So the lawsuit proceeds, and if the illegals are successful they could finish the destruction of the life of one American rancher, and accelerate the destruction of life along the border. And property rights for all Americans, one of the freedoms enshrined in the Constitution, becoming meaningless.

"This is my land. I´m the victim here," Mr. Barnett said. "When someone´s home and loved ones are in jeopardy and the government seemingly can´t do anything about it, I feel justified in taking matters into my own hands. And I always watch my back."

Maybe we should watch each other's backs.

Ramos & Compean Sentences Commuted by Bush

It's about damn time.

WASHINGTON (AP) - In his final acts of clemency, President George W. Bush on Monday commuted the prison sentences of two former U.S. Border Patrol agents whose convictions for shooting a Mexican drug dealer ignited fierce debate about illegal immigration.

Bush's decision to commute the sentences of Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean, who tried to cover up the shooting, was welcomed by both Republican and Democratic members of Congress. They had long argued that the agents were merely doing their jobs, defending the American border against criminals. They also maintained that the more than 10-year prison sentences the pair was given were too harsh.

Rancor over their convictions, sentencing and firings has simmered ever since the shooting occurred in 2005. ...

Compean and Ramos, who have served about two years of their sentences, are expected to be released from prison within the next two months.

Why will it take two months?

Many of us will have a hard time forgetting that President Bush waited until nearly the last possible moment to do the right thing, or the least thing that would satisfy justice.

Sadly, the entire affair exemplified everything that was wrong about Dubya: his internationalism, especially with Mexico, and his blind loyalty to his friends, some of whom were self-aggrandizing zealots like Johnny Sutton, the prosecutor in the case.

I'm sure there will be other, better commentary to link to shortly. As usual, the full AP report is full of quasi-truths and misperceptions.
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UPDATE -- The wives of Ramos and Compean were on Glenn Beck's new Fox News Channel show this afternoon. The amazing thing is how their gratitude to President Bush was conveyed despite the fact that he waited so long and apparently gave a little speech about how the former Border Patrol agents would have to live with the shame of their convictions. "I just want to thank him (Bush) for giving us a chance to be a family again," Mrs. Ramos said, a sentiment immediately echoed by Mrs. Compean. Theirs was a class act, a display of graciousness that I hope gets noticed.

The Dutch are on Thick Ice

This is nice to see.

The International Herald Tribune reports that for the first time in 12 years the Dutch canals have frozen over - and they are rediscovering their national identity! And this identity involves personal injury?

For the first time in 12 years, the Netherlands' canals froze this month, bringing the Dutch, who like their tulips in neat rows, a heady mix of pandemonium and euphoria.

Hundreds of thousands of skaters, their cheeks as red as apples in the freezing temperatures, took to the ice, and hospital wards were filled with dozens of people with fractured arms, sprained ankles and broken legs. ...

In the 19th century, when Hans Brinker, the hero of the novel in which he tries to win a pair of silver skates, coasted along Holland's ice, the canals froze almost every year. But water pollution and climate change have made this so rare that today a boy of 15, Brinker's age, may never have seen a frozen canal, or at least remember one. Until, that is, this year.

But this is my favorite part:

With an influx of immigrants, the country has been struggling to maintain what it considers its Dutch soul, and Gustafsson was one of many here who thought the skating experience enabled the Dutch to reconnect with their identity. "There were only Dutch people on the ice," he said. "I saw no people of Arab descent."

But Andre Bonthuis, who has been mayor in this town of 23,000 people for the past 20 years, said he had seen Indonesians and Moroccans, among other newcomers to the Netherlands, on the ice. "It's rather new for people from Morocco," he said.

Just let 'em ice skate for awhile and they'll drop all this Islamic nonsense.