The Big Alienation

OPINION: DECLARATIONS
MAY 1, 2010
The Big Alienation
Uncontrolled borders and Washington's lack of self-control.
By PEGGY NOONAN

We are at a remarkable moment. We have an open, 2,000-mile border to our south, and the entity with the power to enforce the law and impose safety and order will not do it. Wall Street collapsed, taking Main Street's money with it, and the government can't really figure out what to do about it because the government itself was deeply implicated in the crash, and both political parties are full of people whose political careers have been made possible by Wall Street contributions. Meanwhile we pass huge laws, bills so comprehensive, omnibus and transformative that no one knows what's in them and no one—literally, no one—knows how exactly they will be executed or interpreted. Citizens search for new laws online, pore over them at night, and come away knowing no more than they did before they typed "dot-gov."

It is not that no one's in control. Washington is full of people who insist they're in control and who go to great lengths to display their power. It's that no one takes responsibility and authority. Washington daily delivers to the people two stark and utterly conflicting messages: "We control everything" and "You're on your own."

All this contributes to a deep and growing alienation between the people of America and the government of America in Washington.

This is not the old, conservative and long-lampooned "I don't trust gummint" attitude of the 1950s, '60s and '70s. It's something new, or rather something so much more broadly and fully evolved that it constitutes something new. The right never trusted the government, but now the middle doesn't. I asked a campaigner for Hillary Clinton recently where her sturdy, pantsuited supporters had gone. They didn't seem part of the Obama brigades. "Some of them are at the tea party," she said.

None of this happened overnight. It is, most recently, the result of two wars that were supposed to be cakewalks, Katrina, the crash, and the phenomenon of a federal government that seemed less and less competent attempting to do more and more by passing bigger and bigger laws.

Add to this states on the verge of bankruptcy, the looming debt crisis of the federal government, and the likelihood of ever-rising taxes. Shake it all together, and you have the makings of the big alienation. Alienation is often followed by full-blown antagonism, and antagonism by breakage.

Which brings us to Arizona and its much-criticized attempt to institute a law aimed at controlling its own border with Mexico. It is doing this because the federal government won't, and because Arizonans have a crisis on their hands, areas on the border where criminal behavior flourishes, where there have been kidnappings, murders and gang violence. If the law is abusive, it will be determined quickly enough, in the courts. In keeping with recent tradition, they were reading parts of the law aloud on cable the other night, with bright and sincere people completely disagreeing on the meaning of the words they were reading. No one knows how the law will be executed or interpreted.

Every state and region has its own facts and experience. In New York, legal and illegal immigrants keep the city running: They work hard jobs with brutal hours, rip off no one on Wall Street, and do not crash the economy. They are generally considered among the good guys. I'm not sure New Yorkers can fairly judge the situation in Arizona, nor Arizonans the situation in New York.

But the larger point is that Arizona is moving forward because the government in Washington has completely abdicated its responsibility. For 10 years—at least—through two administrations, Washington deliberately did nothing to ease the crisis on the borders because politicians calculated that an air of mounting crisis would spur mounting support for what Washington thought was appropriate reform—i.e., reform that would help the Democratic and Republican parties.

Both parties resemble Gordon Brown, who is about to lose the prime ministership of Britain. On the campaign trail this week, he was famously questioned by a party voter about his stand on immigration. He gave her the verbal runaround, all boilerplate and shrugs, and later complained to an aide, on an open mic, that he'd been forced into conversation with that "bigoted woman."

He really thought she was a bigot. Because she asked about immigration. Which is, to him, a sign of at least latent racism.

The establishments of the American political parties, and the media, are full of people who think concern about illegal immigration is a mark of racism. If you were Freud you might say, "How odd that's where their minds so quickly go, how strange they're so eager to point an accusing finger. Could they be projecting onto others their own, heavily defended-against inner emotions?" But let's not do Freud, he's too interesting. Maybe they're just smug and sanctimonious.

The American president has the power to control America's borders if he wants to, but George W. Bush and Barack Obama did not and do not want to, and for the same reason, and we all know what it is. The fastest-growing demographic in America is the Hispanic vote, and if either party cracks down on illegal immigration, it risks losing that vote for generations.

But while the Democrats worry about the prospects of the Democrats and the Republicans about the well-being of the Republicans, who worries about America?

No one. Which the American people have noticed, and which adds to the dangerous alienation—actually it's at the heart of the alienation—of the age.

In the past four years, I have argued in this space that nothing can or should be done, no new federal law passed, until the border itself is secure. That is the predicate, the common sense first step. Once existing laws are enforced and the border made peaceful, everyone in the country will be able to breathe easier and consider, without an air of clamor and crisis, what should be done next. What might that be? How about relax, see where we are, and absorb. Pass a small, clear law—say, one granting citizenship to all who serve two years in the armed forces—and then go have a Coke. Not everything has to be settled right away. Only controlling the border has to be settled right away.

Instead, our national establishments deliberately allow the crisis to grow and fester, ignoring public unrest and amusing themselves by damning anyone's attempt to deal with the problem they fear to address.
Why does the federal government do this? Because so many within it are stupid and unimaginative and don't trust the American people. Which of course the American people have noticed.

If the federal government and our political parties were imaginative, they would understand that it is actually in their interests to restore peace and order to the border. It would be a way of demonstrating that our government is still capable of functioning, that it is still to some degree connected to the people's will, that it has the broader interests of the country in mind.

The American people fear they are losing their place and authority in the daily, unwinding drama of American history. They feel increasingly alienated from their government. And alienation, again, is often followed by deep animosity, and animosity by the breaking up of things. If our leaders were farsighted not only for themselves but for the country, they would fix the border.
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Immigration Is In Chaos After Obama Remark

By DANA MILBANK
Posted 04/30/2010 06:50 PM ET

Air Force One was about seven miles over Appalachia last week when President Obama dropped a bomb on his fellow Democrats.

Senate Democrats had that very day circulated an immigration reform proposal, and the Associated Press, receiving a leaked copy, reported on the "draft legislation."

But as Obama returned to Washington from Illinois Wednesday night, he walked back to the press cabin on the presidential aircraft and, in an impromptu Q&A, essentially declared immigration reform dead. He said "there may not be an appetite" for it.

Obama's retreat — after encouraging senators only weeks ago to take up immigration reform — clotheslined Senate Democrats. Since their proposal had already leaked, they had no choice but to roll out the plan Obama had just doomed.

"I don't know in what context the statement was made last night," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told reporters at Thursday's rollout.

Well, Mr. Leader, the context is fear. As the Arizona abomination makes clear, there is a desperate need for federal immigration action to keep the country from becoming a nation of vigilantes suspicious of anybody with dark skin.

But leaders on both sides have instead run for the hills, called there by the yodels from their respective extremes.

The most tragic case is John McCain, who once nobly led the fight for immigration reform but now, cowering in the face of a conservative primary election threat, supports Arizona's racial profiling plan.

On the Democratic side, Reid has been in an immigration panic. In need of Latino votes in his Senate re-election bid, he suddenly promised he would move immediately to pass immigration reform, then reversed himself, then floated the "framework" with no promise of action.

Obama, meanwhile, afraid of breaking his campaign promise to immigration advocates to take up immigration legislation during his first year, tried to juggle immigration reform and climate change legislation — and now he may wind up with neither.

The lone GOP supporter of immigration and climate change legislation, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, has for the moment pulled out of both, justifiably feeling that he's been jerked around by Reid's maneuverings and Obama's mixed signals.

The episode was a reminder of what works and what doesn't about Obama's management style. When he engages forcefully, as he did in the final month of the health care debate, the results are good. But when he hesitates and leaves matters to Congress, the results are poor.

After the extended health care fight kept immigration off the agenda last year, Obama, trying to appease immigration groups, assured them in March that he would get it done this year.

He summoned to the White House Graham and Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who had been negotiating in good faith on an immigration proposal.

The two senators, at the president's urging, published an op-ed in the Washington Post on March 19 outlining their plan, and Obama endorsed the idea.

Then, in the absence of forceful leadership from the White House, it all fell apart. Obama called five Republican senators to lobby them on the immigration bill (Schumer and Graham told him they couldn't proceed without a second Republican sponsor) but came up empty.

Reid, meanwhile, went rogue, proposing without consulting Graham to take up immigration before the climate bill—and Graham bolted.

The president could have made a major push for reform (always a difficult prospect in an election year) or he could have told immigration advocates they had to wait until 2011 (which would have antagonized a key voting bloc).

But instead, he left a vacuum. This may sound familiar to those who watched Obama's handling of another thorny issue — the "public option" in the health care debate. He neither made an all-out push (which would have been politically perilous) nor ruled it out (which would have angered liberal groups) — a stance that resulted in months of disarray in Congress.

The immigration vacillation led to Thursday night's humiliation in the Capitol, where Reid and his colleagues unveiled their dead-on-arrival immigration plan.

They played down the rollout as best they could, walking before the cameras at the exact moment Florida Gov. Charlie Crist was announcing his independent run for the Senate.

In questioning, Reid admitted that, without Republican help, "we're not going to have a bill on the floor." The White House, trying to repair the damage, issued a written statement calling the plan "a very important step." For those thirsting for strong leadership, it was too little, too late.

Guest Comment: Alienation: one word or two? Another campaign promise broken by Obama--fixing the broken immigration system.

Every country has the right to determine who will enter, for what purpose, and for what duration. That is the basis of the international visa system and immigration process. There is nothing racist about it; it s a matter of national security, economics, and to some degree family unification and humanitarian concrnes embedded in a refugee system. This is a system of selection, a right of every sovereign nation. At the same time our Constitution an existing laws also assure that those who have entered, albeit without permission, and have accumulated certain equities, may apply for discretionary relief from removal (formerly deportation). Our process can work only if safeguards are in place, including a secure border.
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Best,
Aggie