I’m sick again (talk about the mind-body connection: this semester has been horrible), so I missed Obama’s speech on immigration and pretty much everything else that’s been going on. And today I found everybody obsessed with this hugely earth-shattering speech. So I decided to find out what the hullabaloo was all about and read the transcript. After a lot of “our values blah-blah, our great nation bleh-bleh”, I got to the part with some substance to it:
So we’re going to offer the following deal: If you’ve with been in America more than five years. If you have children who are American citizens or illegal residents. If you register, pass a criminal background check and you’re willing to pay your fair share of taxes, you’ll be able to apply to stay in this country temporarily without fear of deportation. You can come out of the shadows and get right with the law. That’s what this deal is.
Now let’s be clear about what it isn’t. This deal does not apply to anyone who has come to this country recently. It does not apply to anyone who might come to America illegally in the future. It does not grant citizenship or the right to stay here permanently, or offer the same benefits that citizens receive. Only Congress can do that. All we’re saying is we’re not going to deport you.
Yeah, wow, that’s totally a big whoop. What a profoundly shocking, enormous transformation of the status quo. “We have no capacity to deport you (as I said at the beginning of the speech), so we are not going to exercise the capacity we admittedly don’t have and won’t deport you.” Yip-dee-do.
This is so characteristic of Obama. He is constantly trying to sit on two chairs at once and doesn’t seem to notice that this approach just angers everybody. Gosh, just choose a position and stick to it already, whatever it is.
Yes, yes, I know, this is better than nothing. We all belong to the “it’s better than nothing” and “the other guy is even worse” party.
Clarissa's Blog 
I know a tale about Obama:
The Donkey and the Old Man (short version)
An old man and his grandson are going to the neighbouring smalltown to sell the donkey of the old man. The old man is putting the kid up on the back of the donkey, and they are setting out towards the smalltown. The oncoming people are asking him why he is letting his grandson just sitting comfortably on the back of the donkey while he, the old man is walking, and are demanding him to make the kid walk. He is making the kid get off and they both are moving on walking besides the donkey. New people are coming, and they are beginning to laugh at them mockingly saying to them how stupid they are, they are having a donkey yet going on foot. So the old man is sitting up to the back of the donkey. They are meeting people again who are condemning the old man for making the small kid walking while he is sitting comfortable up on the back of the donkey, so what else could he do? He is rising up his grandson, and now both of them are sitting up there when they’re meeting new bypassers who are becoming quite angry that the old man and his grandson are torturing the poor donkey by forcing it to carry the weight of two people. When they are arriving at the neighbouring smalltown, the locals are seeing a quite strange scene: a young kid and old man carrying a donkey on their shoulders. Everybody is starting to laugh at them. The stupid old man was called Obama. And finally nobody bought his donkey that couldn’t even walk on its own.
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Absolutely brilliant! !!
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And yet this mealy mouthed status quo speech has right wingers going into hysterics about “tyranny.” At this point, Obama could fart into a stiff wind, and someone would be furious.
Hoping for the man to change his temperament and political positions is futile.
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“And yet this mealy mouthed status quo speech has right wingers going into hysterics about “tyranny.” ”
– Yes. Which just goes to show that trying not to hurt their feelings are useless. Their feelings are hurt by default because the advent of modernity is their original trauma.
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Immigration debates go smack against the idea that nation state boundaries are increasingly less relevant. Could you imagine an EU kind of compact in the Americas?
Side note: I can never know why someone decides to rate a comment the way they rate it, so I always wonder whether it comes down to tone/message.
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\\ Immigration debates go smack against the idea that nation state boundaries are increasingly less relevant. Could you imagine an EU kind of compact in the Americas?
They are less relevant if you have several rich countries in the EU kind of compact, but if your rich country is surrounded by 3rd world failed states – boundaries are still very relevant imo.
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Actually, the intensity of the immigration debates is proof that borders are fading away. Obama said in his speech that there is nothing that can be done to remove the millions of “illegal” immigrants from the US. The US is bending to the new reality. And the degree of hysteria on the subject shows how potent the issue is.
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I disagree. What Obama has done is go against our Constitution and our laws.
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Unlike the free movement of mail order brides and religious nutjobs :-).
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The mid-term elections were (in large part) the majority telling Obama they didn’t want him to do this so I imagine he toned down the scope from what he wanted.
The problem with immigration politics in the US is that both sides of the power structure, for different reasons, want lots and lots and lots of low-skilled, low education immigrants.
Roughly, Democrats are thinking of new voters and Republicans like the idea of servants and disposable workers who don’t have much in the way of rights.
The majority would like a more …. selective system but being all modernity-ish both parties are ignoring them.
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