So, look, I know you\u2019re all getting tired of my blog posts on Rubio, but please put up with one more, before I move on to New and Exciting Non-Election Blog Content, coming your way shortly. \u00a0(Though this weekend is pretty full with family commitments.)<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s the trouble: \u00a0if you look at current immigration policy positions \u2014 without<\/em> evaluating the credibility of the candidates espousing them \u2014 I line up with Rubio\u2019s enforcement-first, legalization-second approach, at least more in broad outlines, to a greater degree than any of the other candidates. Cruz\u2019s \u201cdeport them all, period\u201d is preposterous, and Trump\u2019s \u201cdeport \u2019em all and let the good ones come back\u201d is even more foolish (why expend all that energy only to allow them back in afterwards?). \u00a0Kasich keeps suggesting that he wants a guest worker program on top of amnesty. \u00a0For good measure, Sanders is all about amnesty, and immigration expansion, and only reluctantly concedes any sort of enforcement at all. \u00a0To be honest, I haven\u2019t looked at Clinton, but I believe she\u2019s pretty much identical to Sanders on this point.<\/p>\n Why am I OK with a (limited) legalization program?<\/p>\n Like it or not, politicians have spent so many years announcing that illegals were welcome as long as they didn\u2019t cause trouble (\u201cjobs Americans won\u2019t do\u201d), and have allowed them to establish lives here by their refusal to enforce immigration laws, so that it really would be unjust to now implement a deportation program. \u00a0Or, rather, any such deportation program should not include in its scope those who have been here for a significant number of years, have learned English, and have become part of the community. \u00a0The laborer who arrived recently, knows no English, lives in a flophouse, and sends wages back to family back home, has no grounds for claiming that it\u2019s unjust\u00a0to send him back.<\/p>\n But this is again an issue of trust, of credibility. \u00a0Questions about Rubio\u2019s authenticity on this matter are hard to set aside when his entire narrative for why he\u2019s come around to an enforcement-first approach are that \u201cit\u2019s what the American people want\u201d, and when he\u2019s squirrely about the exact nature of his subsequent-to-enforcement legalization program, and when he\u2019s pretty much said that the enforcement won\u2019t touch existing illegals, only new arrivals.<\/p>\n Is Donald Trump pro-life? \u00a0Beats me. \u00a0But he at least took the trouble to come up with\u00a0a conversion story. \u00a0As I recall, it has something to do with someone he knew, who had what pro-life folk call a \u201ccrisis pregnancy,\u201d but whose child turned out to be very successful. \u00a0Not the most inspiring story, but he\u2019s got a narrative.<\/p>\n Rubio needs a converstion story on immigration, a way to communicate to voters that enforcement-first is something he genuinely believes in, rather than something he reluctantly accepts as politically expedient. \u00a0He can use the age-old device of telling folksy stories of people he supposedly \u201cmet on the campaign trail,\u201d anecdotes about exactly those workers who were turned down at Trump\u2019s guest-worker-using hotel, for instance, or former poultry-processing workers who were displaced by immigrants working for lower wages, or the former Disney worker who testified before Congress about training his replacement. \u00a0He can use the fact that even the new arrivals from Central America are not being sent back, and that even the plans to send a hundred-odd back produced protests, as the last straw that made him realize that it\u2019s not about \u201cthe American people\u201d not trusting enforcement but the government not deserving that trust. \u00a0I don\u2019t really care exactly what he says, but he has to say something.<\/p>\n Would that be enough? \u00a0God only knows. \u00a0Watching Trump at the debate yesterday, even having read repeatedly explanations for his success, it still astonishes me that he has supporters, when he makes such preposterous claims. \u00a0He\u2019s going to solve the budget deficit by cutting \u201cwaste, fraud, and abuse.\u201d \u00a0He\u2019s going to solve healthcare exclusively by enabling cross-state insurance purchases, and \u201ctaking care\u201d of those who would otherwise \u201cdie in the streets.\u201d \u00a0By sheer force of will, he\u2019ll bring back jobs to the U.S. \u00a0Support him and \u201cAmerica is going to start winning again, and it\u2019ll be great.\u201d \u00a0Yes, I know that there are people who support him just to show their emnity to The Establishment, but, Good Lord, even Cruz is a better choice if you hate The Establishment, isn\u2019t he?<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" So, look, I know you\u2019re all getting tired of my blog posts on Rubio, but please put up with one more, before I move on to New and Exciting Non-Election Blog Content, coming your way shortly. \u00a0(Though this weekend is pretty full with family commitments.) Here\u2019s the trouble: \u00a0if you look at current immigration policy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[139,257,325],"class_list":["post-3989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-illegal-immigrants","tag-rubio","tag-trump"],"yoast_head":"\n