re: "But It’s Just 19 Murders"

Mark Krikorian at The Corner ("The one and only.") was almost ready to miss the Bush Administration.

Money quote(s):

"The House Judiciary Committee has released a report on how many immigrants identified by the Secure Communuties fingerprint-matching system were released (i.e., not deported) after being arrested by local police, and how many went on to commit additional crimes. (The report is here and the Washington Times story is here.) According to the report, over a nearly three-year period, just in the jurisdictions using the Secure Communities system, almost 47,000 illegal aliens were arrested but released because ICE chose not to take them into custody."

&

"(T)he administration refuses to ask Congress for more funds to increase deportations — funds that would be approved. So they’re intentionally setting the ceiling on how many people they can deport lower than necessary, and then pointing to that ceiling to justify the release of illegal aliens who go on to kill Americans."

7/31

re: "If Every Immigrant Were Like This . . ."

Mark Krikorian at The Corner ("The one and only.") doesn't care much for the mass immigration model.

Money quote(s):

"The new national commander of the American Legion is Fang A. Wong, who moved here (legally) from Hong Kong with family members at age twelve in 1960 to join his father. He enlisted in the Army during Vietnam, where he served for more than two years, and retired from the service in 1989."

This is why CAA loves legal immigrants. CAA loves legal immigrants who, like CAA's forefathers (and mothers) re-made themselves from Grand Fenwickians, Graustarkians, and Ruritanians into un-hyphenated Americans. Yes, CAA favors the melting pot theory of assimilation and proudly identifies himself as a "Heinz 57" American.

"Does Wong’s example somehow mean that mass legal immigration is therefore a good thing, that our current arrangements ought to remain untouchable? The question sounds silly (especially since Wong came before Ted Kennedy got a hold of our immigration law), but that’s exactly the kind of thing apologists for mass immigration say all the time. Now, I might conceivably be willing to rethink my position if there were some kind of highly accurate test to ensure that every immigrant we admitted would become not only a productive, law-abiding member of society but also an ardent patriot, deeply committed to the principles of the Constitution, displaying a genuine enthusiasm for our nation’s history and culture, and immune to the wiles of our post-American elites.

But there is no such test."

The United States, or at least its political elites, have swapped out the very successful "melting pot" assimilationist model for the "salad bowl" model which has been so successful in no place where it can be identified. This presents problems which now amount of chanting the Orwellian "diversity is strength" mantra will solve.

9/23

re: "Re: Will the Pentagon Always Be Able to Evacuate Americans from Hotspots?"

Michael Rubin at The Corner ("a web-leading source of real-time conservative opinion") responds to Mark Krikorian's comments.

Money quote(s):

"(T)he Congress certainly should acknowledge that evacuation is no longer a responsibility of the U.S. government, and the State Department should stop encouraging every Tom, Dick, and Harriet from registering at the U.S. Embassy. What is needed is to enter into the debate with eyes wide open. When a crisis hits — for example, the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah War — we should simply tell Americans that they should hunker down, and that the advantages of being citizens of a superpower are less than what they once were."

Yeah, that's going to take some of that "courage" stuff we see so much of on Capitol Hill.

"Congress may conclude that the decline in capability is worth it. What Congress should not do is pretend that budget cuts will not undermine capabilities that many officials, rightly or wrongly, wish the military to have and then whine they did not know when, a year or two down the road, constituents demand assistance evacuating their loved ones."

re: "Re: Will the Pentagon Always Be Able to Evacuate Americans from Hotspots?"

Mark Krikorian at The Corner ("a web-leading source of real-time conservative opinion") takes a stab at answering Michael Rubin's question.

Money quote(s):

"(Y)our point about the thousands of Lebanese with dual U.S. citizenship raises an important point — why should a U.S. Marine, who enlisted to defend his fellow countrymen from harm, risk his life rescuing people who have not fully committed to the American nation? Dual citizenship — a “self-evident absurdity” in TR’s words — means, in this case, people who want to live in Lebanon, as Lebanese, and perhaps even vote there, but who also want to make sure that if things go bad someone else will risk his life to rescue them."

Lebanon blew up pretty quickly, as I recall. Lots of college and h.s. age kids visiting their grandparents back in the old country. And lots of naturalized U.S. citizens who decided their retirement dollars would stretch further back in said old country; not necessarily folks who've done anything wrong or falsely.

Americans take it as their God-given and Constitutional right that they can go anywhere without hindrance, that they can live and work where they please, and then if things go "South," Big Sam will come and get them. And their relatives back in each of those congressmembers' districts have the same assumption. So it would definitely behoove them to have Mr. Rubin's question somewhere in the back of their collective minds.

(Disclaimer: Like many people in my line of work, I participated, however tangentally, in support of the Lebanon evacuation. Collectively, we were able to help a lot of people get out of harm's way. It's a part of my life's body of work of which I'm justifiably somewhat proud.

And at the same time, as new reports about other country's dual nationals and legal residents came out, about how people who were supposedly refugees from Lebanon had moved back and were living off of the public assistance received, as refugees, from those European countries.... well, I'm sure we have our share of welfare and public assistance fraudsters too. But asking, or looking for answers, of such questions is way down on the to-do list when you're scrambling to organize an evacuation.)