Our Thursday and Saturday letter writers are quite justified, of course, in their skepticism that a Governor Meg Whitman will ever do anything useful about California’s immigration inundation.
But we must not let it be forgotten that Steve Poizner’s spirited use of the issue caused Whitman to start running ads proclaiming, and going out of her way in speeches to assert, that she sound on immigration control. She would not have done this except she was scared.
Frustratingly, as with the disastrous McCain nomination in 2008, it does seem that the political discussion is becoming extremely bi-polar. Finding coherent, reasoned opposition to the immigration restraint proposition in the blogosphere is very difficult. Mostly it is just blatant ethnically-driven emotionalism. The favorite tactic remains silence. But a very large slice even of the GOP electorate, with a fleeting attention span, a College Football attitude to elections, and still pathetically dependent on a malignantly dishonest MSM, simply has not thought enough about the question.
As I said last year, once one does think about the issue, the culprit in the destruction of California is clear—Elements of the GOP leadership:
Historical causation is intricate. Of course, having a Democratic party owned by certain ethnic minorities deeply saturated in socialist prejudices was going to be a problem. It has been in many US states. But faced with the lethal threat of inundation by economically low quality Hispanics, Californians reacted wisely.
They passed, in 1994, Proposition 187. Re-reading its provisions is heart-breaking - it could have saved California:
1. All law enforcement agents who suspect that a person who has been arrested is in violation of immigration laws must investigate the detainee’s immigration status, and if they find evidence of illegality they must report it to the attorney general of California, and to the federal Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). 2. Local governments are prohibited from doing anything to impair the fulfillment of this requirement. 3. The attorney general must keep records on all such cases and make them available to any other government entity that wishes to inspect them. 4. No one may receive public benefits until they have proven their legal right to reside in the country. 5. If government agents suspected anyone applying for benefits of being illegal immigrants, the agents must report their suspicions in writing to the appropriate enforcement authorities. 6. Emergency medical care is exempted, as required by federal law, but all other medical benefits have the requirements stated above. 7. Primary and secondary education is explicitly included.
Proposition 187 was of course murdered by an activist (proto-Kagan!) Federal Judge Mariana Pfaelzer. An appeal was abandoned by the Democratic Governor with the connivance of the GOP establishment, cheered on by Neo Conservatives like Jack Kemp.
The Neoconservatives and their GOP poodles then proceeded to repress even discussion of immigration at the State or Federal level for years. So extreme was this process in California that only last year a Neocon servant could publish a 6,000 word essay Who Killed California? National Affairs Fall 2009 with only one sentence on immigration, a ridiculous action rightly excoriated in an excellent discussion by the Mangan’s blog in: Neocons Ask: Who Killed California? Saturday September 26 2009.
The bulk of the GOP leadership is comprised of bovine patronage-chewing airheaded egomaniacs. They will eventually respond to prodding — as Whitman did. The true enemies are the fanatical open borders types who with their lavish funding and MSM relationships continue to be able to bemuse most of the Republican rank and file. They must be ”outed”. As Peter Brimelow has said: "We need a rebellion". In the meantime, precisely who gets elected matters,
