Our Government's Duty on Immigration
Stratfor has published an interesting analysis of the recent U.K. terrorist plot, in which 12 terrorists "sought to conduct suicide bombing attacks against a list of soft targets that included shopping centers, a train station and a nightclub." Eleven of the 12 were citizens of Pakistan in the U.K. on student visas.
Clearly there's a problem here. While it's reasonable for foreigners to want access to the advantages we in free countries have secured for ourselves, and while it's also reasonable for us to welcome those immigrants who we expect will become good citizens and contribute to the well-being of our nations, an indiscriminate "open door" policy viz. foreigners has proven to be both foolish and deadly - deadly not only to our lives but to our liberty and pursuit of telos as well. (Need we be reminded that the securing of these three is the very reason for creating a government?)
I propose a stricter policy viz. foreigners - a policy which must, above all other considerations, accomplish the objective of securing the rights of our citizens:
1. Our policy must not put at risk, nor allow to be put at risk, the lives of our citizens.
2. It must not permit a crisis to develop in which we are encouraged - even pressured - to relinquish our liberty in exchange for safety.
3. It must not inhibit the expression and teaching of our national and individual principles and pursuits as expressed in our founding documents.
If our policy fails in any of these regards, it must be rejected. Whatever else beneficial it may accomplish, these criteria are non-negotiable.
Current policy has clearly failed us. We continue to permit the enemy to infiltrate our societies and to plan and execute mass-murder attacks.
Nor is it appropriate to blame our police and intelligence forces. If, during World War II, we had allowed Nazi and Japanese troops to live in our cities and train on our soil, would it have made sense to blame the OSS or the local police department when these troops planned and carried out plots to massacre Americans?
Our present enemy do not wear uniforms. They are spies, assassins and saboteurs, making war on us in the most cowardly fashion, without honor and deserving of ignominious execution. Yet since they refuse to identify themselves as enemy soldiers, it is left to us to find the means of identification. As this is impossible - or has at least proven beyond our capacity - we're left with no alternative but to severely restrict or bar outright all immigration permits to those of certain identity. That identity may be national citizenship, as in the case of the 11 Pakistanis above. Or it may be a political ideology, such as totalitarian islamism.
Whatever the criteria, the primary goal of our policy must be to restrict as far as possible the infiltration of our border by the enemy. If, as a side effect, law-abiding and freedom-seeking Pakistanis are kept out, so be it. Let them blame us and call us paranoid xenophobes if they must. Or let them take up their disappointment and anger with their fellow countrymen who caused the situation.
Some may object to our restrictive immigration policy, not because they seek the freedom America offers, but because they disagree with our constitutional-republic form of government and want to move here and change it. If our immigration policy fails to address those who disagree with our form of government, it fails utterly and completely.
And yet that is precisely the situation in which we find ourselves, as masses of muslims move to America but want to be governed by the laws of their homelands. But the freedoms and advantages available in America were not achieved, nor will they be sustained, by adhering to foreign political philisophies. To reject America's political principles is to destroy the political freedom which those principles protect, and in turn to destroy the prosperity and opportunities that are an outgrowth of that freedom.
If some are unconvinced of this fact, and consider it a worthwhile political experiment to reject America's founding principles, let them stay home and use their own countries as political laboratories. To sneak into our country under false pretenses, to pledge fealty to our republican form of government while harboring hidden intent to undermine and overthrow it, is covert invasion by the enemy, and must be stopped.
Any government that fails to protect its citizens from such invasion is criminally negligent. Any government that permits such an invasion and furthermore uses it as cover for the abridgment of its citizens' liberties is ignoble and despotic.
Clearly there's a problem here. While it's reasonable for foreigners to want access to the advantages we in free countries have secured for ourselves, and while it's also reasonable for us to welcome those immigrants who we expect will become good citizens and contribute to the well-being of our nations, an indiscriminate "open door" policy viz. foreigners has proven to be both foolish and deadly - deadly not only to our lives but to our liberty and pursuit of telos as well. (Need we be reminded that the securing of these three is the very reason for creating a government?)
I propose a stricter policy viz. foreigners - a policy which must, above all other considerations, accomplish the objective of securing the rights of our citizens:
1. Our policy must not put at risk, nor allow to be put at risk, the lives of our citizens.
2. It must not permit a crisis to develop in which we are encouraged - even pressured - to relinquish our liberty in exchange for safety.
3. It must not inhibit the expression and teaching of our national and individual principles and pursuits as expressed in our founding documents.
If our policy fails in any of these regards, it must be rejected. Whatever else beneficial it may accomplish, these criteria are non-negotiable.
Current policy has clearly failed us. We continue to permit the enemy to infiltrate our societies and to plan and execute mass-murder attacks.
Nor is it appropriate to blame our police and intelligence forces. If, during World War II, we had allowed Nazi and Japanese troops to live in our cities and train on our soil, would it have made sense to blame the OSS or the local police department when these troops planned and carried out plots to massacre Americans?
Our present enemy do not wear uniforms. They are spies, assassins and saboteurs, making war on us in the most cowardly fashion, without honor and deserving of ignominious execution. Yet since they refuse to identify themselves as enemy soldiers, it is left to us to find the means of identification. As this is impossible - or has at least proven beyond our capacity - we're left with no alternative but to severely restrict or bar outright all immigration permits to those of certain identity. That identity may be national citizenship, as in the case of the 11 Pakistanis above. Or it may be a political ideology, such as totalitarian islamism.
Whatever the criteria, the primary goal of our policy must be to restrict as far as possible the infiltration of our border by the enemy. If, as a side effect, law-abiding and freedom-seeking Pakistanis are kept out, so be it. Let them blame us and call us paranoid xenophobes if they must. Or let them take up their disappointment and anger with their fellow countrymen who caused the situation.
Some may object to our restrictive immigration policy, not because they seek the freedom America offers, but because they disagree with our constitutional-republic form of government and want to move here and change it. If our immigration policy fails to address those who disagree with our form of government, it fails utterly and completely.
And yet that is precisely the situation in which we find ourselves, as masses of muslims move to America but want to be governed by the laws of their homelands. But the freedoms and advantages available in America were not achieved, nor will they be sustained, by adhering to foreign political philisophies. To reject America's political principles is to destroy the political freedom which those principles protect, and in turn to destroy the prosperity and opportunities that are an outgrowth of that freedom.
If some are unconvinced of this fact, and consider it a worthwhile political experiment to reject America's founding principles, let them stay home and use their own countries as political laboratories. To sneak into our country under false pretenses, to pledge fealty to our republican form of government while harboring hidden intent to undermine and overthrow it, is covert invasion by the enemy, and must be stopped.
Any government that fails to protect its citizens from such invasion is criminally negligent. Any government that permits such an invasion and furthermore uses it as cover for the abridgment of its citizens' liberties is ignoble and despotic.
posted by Lear's Fool | 8:18 AM
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