PrintMay 20, 2010
Obama's Border Corner
In a masterful display of backing himself into a foreign policy corner, President Obama has taken his stubborn insistence upon misrepresenting Arizona's law to the international stage. Considering that the Arizona immigration law is based on federal law, Obama's stance seems to be that there is no illegal immigration, just misguided racism. President Obama recently stood shoulder to shoulder with Mexico's Philippe Calderon and declared that immigration law is misguided and misdirected. Calderon, for his part, called US immigration law discriminatory. Obama seemed to agree.
The President has put himself into the untenable position of declaring the enforcement of current immigration laws as "potentially" racist. To follow the President's logic, any law written and enforced in the United States will carry the potential for profiling. The American people are not capable, under Obama's point of view, of enforcing any law as it pertains to immigration. The result can be nothing short of an open border.
Obama commented yesterday addressing employers as if the Arizona law is directed solely at the supply side of the issue. Arizona, maybe unbeknownst to the President, has one of the country's most stringent laws against employing illegal workers. The implications of the President's comments are that illegal immigration is a result of American employers' desire to dodge labor laws and nothing else. There is no culpability for coyotes, or the conditions that exist in these people's home countries. The inability of a corrupt Mexican Government to provide for its population is, according to Obama and Calderon, a burden that the US must shoulder.
Obama has announced plans to create a comprehensive (read international) immigration policy. Bodies such as the Mexican Government and UN will be involved in setting our immigration policy. Not since the days of Nicholas Trist has the Arizona border been in such dispute. Unfortunately, the President has already shown that he will not stand up for the integrity of our national border. To our current Administration, America exists not with physical boundaries called borders. No, America is just an idea on paper, and that paper is under attack by Washington.
Obama is the first president to actively campaign overseas. Under his leadership, bailouts know no international borders. Under his leadership, drug crime and immigration know no borders. Obama has proven that he is not interested in an American solution to problems, deferring instead to an era of internationalism in the formation of American Policy. That policy, however, has gone too far when the Administration begging to collaborate rather than cooperate with a foreign government. Arizona has been vilified and made a scapegoat for the failure of either political party to solve the illegal immigration problem. The difference now is that the highest office in America is siding with a foreign power against one of its own 50 states. The current Administration has decided to no longer represent Arizona or the 60% of the population that agrees with her.
