Publius' Forum

Well, all up and down the blogosphere on the right, Bush's immigration speech from Monday night is being drilled, flayed and lambasted. Unfortunately, most of the complaints don't seem to be based on ANYTHING the President said.

Bush is claimed to be offering "amnesty". He isn't.

It is said he is against the fence. He is not.

It is moaned that he wants to make it easier for illegals to automatically become legal. He said no such thing.

In short, nearly all the complainers from the right are claiming that Bush said the exact opposite in all instances of what he actually said. Bush's speech was a well rounded, fairly comprehensive, and even handed speech full of ideas that will work well to curb the giant hole we have in our border.

I think, though, that those bloggers on the right are not attacking the president for what he actually said at all. In fact, most of them seem not to have heard a word that the president said. Nor are they reacting to what he didn't say, for that matter.

What they are reacting to is 30 years or more of no enforcement. In other words, no one believed a single word the president said on the issue and they didn't hear a word. Sure, he had great ideas, but we all feel in our bones that neither Congress, nor the Dept. of immigration beauracracy will enforce any ideas, laws or restrictions no matter WHAT anyone wants.

I can't say I disagree at that level.

We get more evidence every day of why bloated government, all powerful government, is detrimental. It can neither react in a timely nature, nor institute reform and change. It is hidebound, immovable. We don't need new laws, we need to fire thousands of government workers, eliminate their unions and start fresh.

President Chester A. Arthur is called the "Father of the Civil Service" in the USA for getting rid of patronage and reforming the rules for being hired by the Federal government. He created tests and requirements of schooling or experience for newly hired civil servants. But he did NOT intend that these civil servants be impossible to fire.

This sense of entitlement causes Federal workers to feel no sense of urgency, nor pride in their work. They feel they have a job for life, so why all this rushing around?

This and the PC garbage of being afraid to hurt anyone's feelings has paralyzed our border operations.

Until Americans can come to believe that the government will actually enforce the laws they create and until the beauracracy is forced to get the wheels turning, we will never see the border handled correctly. And, until the border is controlled, we can never make any sensible laws for the illegal immigrants that are already here. The later cannot precede the former. The foolishness of shutting the barn doors after the horses got out is not just a mindless aphorism.

The president's speech was great. But, we all just know, as sure as the sun will rise on the morrow, it will amount to nothing. But, let's hope Bush can use his last few years and his waning power to make it happen anyway.

-Warner Todd Huston