Is amnesty for illegals a Republicans vs. Democrats thing?

Many partisans don't realize that the amnesty issue cuts across party lines. The vast majority of rank & file Republicans oppose amnesty & want illegals here now persuaded to return to their own countries. Yet the Republican-controlled Congress (prior to 2006) nearly passed a "comprehensive immigration reform" bill.

And around half of rank & file Democrats oppose amnesty as well. Yet they have no voice among the Congressmen they elected.

It many ways it's both parties' voters vs. both parties' elected representatives & their corporatist patrons.

Even a quarter of Americans of Latino heritage oppose amnesty, according to exit polls after several California elections that included anti-illegal immigrant initiatives.

And it should be obvious that most American Blacks oppose amnesty, while nearly all their elected representatives & self-appointed unelected leaders thump the tub for amnesty without letup.

There's a reason for this. Blacks & Latinos disproportionately occupy the lower rungs of our socioeconomic ladders, bringing them into direct competition with illegal immigrant laborers. And many rank & file Democrats haven't forgotten that their party traditionally stood up for the little guy--including working class Blacks, Latinos, Asians & Whites who've all gotten hammered by illegal labor competition.

And they haven't forgotten that the Democratic Party isn't the Democratic World Party or Northern Hemisphere Party. It's the Democratic Party of the United States of America.

You know, the guys you call if you're in another country & wind up in jail there. You won't be calling the UN or the Guatemalan consulate. You'll be calling the American one.

"Home" is the place where if you go there, they have to let you in. Same goes for "my country." That's the folly of border deniers. No one thinks they're a "citizen of the world" when they're looking out at the world through the bars of a foreign jail.

But there's a deeper reason why so many ordinary Democrats oppose amnesty & oppose our country being flooded by Latinos from the lowest economic & educational ranks of Mexico, & thereabouts: it's culture.

Americans like American culture. They're fine with Mexican restaurants and a certain infusion of la cultura Latina into our highly diverse culture. They aren't fine with our culture being displaced by theirs--especially when we aren't getting the full spectrum of Mexico's culture: we're just getting the bottom half of it.

I've lived in Mexico City & hobnobbed with its intellectual elite--the college crowd. I'd love to have them for neighbors.

But instead we get the scrapings of Mexico's barrel. I'm not talking about the crooks coming in. It's the ordinary folks who are constantly praised, even lionized, by the amnesty crowd. Mexico's peasantry is fine as far as it goes, but they're not middle class--not remotely. Anyone who's spent quality time in Mexico--as I have--& who speaks Spanish--as I do--knows that the standards of cleanliness, decorum, treatment of neighbors & all that are a lot sloppier when you go downscale substantially.

I've traveled in 17 countries, & one universal in the third world is trash piled up everywhere--even in places as innately beautiful as Bali, or La Paz, or Cozumel.

Now much of the Southwest is starting to look like those Third World countries.

People hesitate to broach this subject because those in the Al Sharpton school of politics immediately start howling Racist!!!! if you bring up stuff like this.

Which is pretty funny to those of us who have as many Southern white trash relatives as I do, & whose standards are pretty much as uncultured as the Mexican campesinos I'm talking about.

Several factors exacerbate this culture clash.

One is the fact that the Mexicans living here illegally believe, by and large, that they have every right to be here. Their government tells them so repeatedly. And so do officials in the religion most of them belong to, along with numerous American leftist supporters. That's why they proudly fly their flag--La Bandera Mexicana--at rallies here where they're demanding their rights as they see it.

Another is the constant chorus of American leftists saying it's all our fault--because "we" asked them to come here; because "we" are responsible for their destitution; because "we" stole the Southwest from them; because "we" are guilty of the Original Sin of being white and therefore by definition racist; and because "they" are taking over and there's something wrong the the current American majority for not welcoming our coming destruction as a people with open arms.

But corporatists asked them to come here & profit from their labor, then outsource their social costs to taxpayers. And their destitution stems from their overpopulation (from 13.1M in 1900 to 111M now). That's not our fault. And the Southwest was Indian first.

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This was originally a comment on the first Ross Douthat column I've ever agreed with. He's a conservative columnist for the New York Times. The column was titled The Borders We Deserve. However, you won't find it among the 66 comments the NYT published. It was censored out.

We can only speculate as to why. My guess is that we aren't permitted to talk about the culture of the Mexican peasantry that has moved here & is moving here. I find this fascinating. I'd love to see all the comments the NYT censors out of illegal immigration articles.

Another thing you'll see there is the occasional comment that gets censored out after having been allowed in, because there will be a place marker for it accompanied by a starchy note about NYT editorial standards.

I won't include obscene or abusive comments in this blog myself, so I'm fine with editorial standards. OTOH this comment was hardly a rant. So from my POV the NYT considers anything that compares cultures--except to laud Mexican peasant culture--abusive and not fit to print, so to speak.

But as I said I'm just speculating, since the NYT never says why it censors a particular comment, beyond not very useful generalities.