Sunday, April 16, 2006 | 7:30 a.m.
A rule of physics - that an action results in an equal and opposite reaction - certainly is evident as well in the immigration debate.
Persons marching for the legal rights of illegal immigrants in this country - a difficult argument to support even when greased with the best public relations - certainly lost credibility when the advocates rubbed our noses in Mexican flags. They quickly adjusted their tactics.
Just as the pro-immigrant marches were poorly executed, so too are rallies of U.S. citizens who are intolerant of illegal immigrants. Their rhetorical blather is so xenophobic that any good arguments are lost in hysteria.
I will engage in a reasoned and intelligent debate about immigration policy when it deals with supportable facts, real problems and possible solutions. But I won't suffer whiners, loose facts, imagined problems or fantasy, impractical solutions.
I heard a lot of that last week when I sat in on a gathering of nearly 300 people at Cashman Center. They oppose illegal immigrants and rally beneath a banner that reads, "Wake Up America." The group's motto is, "It's your country ... take it back!"
The organization is a bit more than a year old and, according to its Web site, is "poised and able to help solve the issues related to sensible immigration reform."
Sounds good, because the nation has been grappling with the issue for a couple of hundred years.
The organization has pledged to work with politicians "to craft pragmatic steps" to deal with our troubled borders. Here here!
I'm encouraged because I hear the words "sensible" and "pragmatic."
But they fail to deliver. And instead, what I heard at the meeting from a host of speakers gave me pause and undercut any respect I might have had for the group:
"Every time we go to the gun shows (to recruit new members), 20 more people sign up." (And the message here is what?)
"Mexican-Americans are the largest organized racial supremacist group in the country." (No they're not. They may have, within their ranks, organizations patriotic to their flag, but they are neither organized as a people, nor spouting a supremacist line.)
"We want no more rhetoric. We want results, dammit, with an exclamation point after dammit." (That's good rhetoric, dammit!)
And so the evening went. Every time they fired away, they shot their credibility in the foot. I heard nothing that was sensible or pragmatic.
"Eventually, Las Vegas - the entire city - will be a foreign enclave."
"And they keep having babies!"
"It's the equivalent of four army divisions invading us every week ... And that's their next step - declaring war on the United States."
"Let's hope we're not on the cusp of a very serious national disorder."
"Harry Reid, he's a damn traitor ... Our leaders are complicit in this overflow of America."
"You can point the finger at the Las Vegas City Council - that's where the blame belongs." (Huh?)
"The answer is the impeachment of the president!"
"If you will vote for someone other than a Republican or a Democrat, we will solve the problem."
"I knew how bad it was when I heard on the radio today a commercial ... about 'keeping up with the Perezes' instead of 'keeping up with the Joneses.' "
A fellow sitting next to me leaned over and asked who I was. "Looks like you're taking good notes," he said. And nowhere in my notes did I find any discussion about practical and compassionate solutions.
Certainly there was venting at the meeting, and in many respects for good cause. Many people are frustrated that U.S. taxpayers are supporting illegal immigrants in our schools and hospitals. (Others among us see it as the humanitarian thing to do.)
One of the speakers last week asked, "Under what authority are we obligated to take care of the world's impoverished?"
We're under no obligation, of course. But if we can't find a compromise solution to the immigration challenge that respects U.S. citizens yet demonstrates compassion for those outside our borders, then we'd better sandblast that plaque at the bottom of the Statue of Liberty.
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