By AC Smith
The following is a response to Charles Garcia’s editorial for CNN in which he argues that the term “illegal immigrant” is a slur.
Liberals are at it again, trying to make it seem like we are accusing someone of committing illegal crime beyond the already illegal act of being an illegal alien. When we call someone an illegal alien, or simply say a person is illegal, everyone knows we are talking about their immigration status and nothing more, unless we state an additional specific illegal act.
The CNN article also states that it it’s not illegal to apply to a job. Technically that might be right, but using false documentation to cover up or disguise legal status, or not updating expired immigration status, is illegal.
Now, how do we get something racial out of calling something what it truly is? Undocumented immigrant? What a joke! According to Garcia, half of the people had visas but over-stayed the term. We would not know they are now illegal unless it is documented that the visas expired.
Are we that stupid? Come on! Let’s stop changing the rules of reasoning.
This only makes sense as an appeal to the left; yet as such it is utterly vain and impotent, since confusion is to the left what the web is to the spider.
Yguy,
Are you saying that the left’s whole foundation is built upon confusion? How far left are we talking about? Does this refer only to full-fledged liberals, or also to people who simply vote for democrats most of the time?
There are extremely stubborn people in both political camps, and perhaps they cannot be reasoned with because they’ve conditioned themselves to become immune to the very concept of reasoning. They prefer to keep their eyes, ears, and minds shut from anything besides what they think they already know. But the rest of us would rather eliminate confusion than dwell in it, and that includes many good, honest liberals and conservatives alike.
Yes.
I’m talking about the core constituency of the Democrat party, as represented by Obama and the Dems in Congress.
Sure, but you’re making it sound like they’re outliers, when they are the heart of the Democrat party.
My exchanges with you do not indicate to me that you are such a person. The impression I get is that you seek to draw others into your confusion, which makes it seem less like confusion from your perspective.
You are talking like someone who will not budge from your perspective long enough to consider that perhaps I truly want to find consensus on at least SOMETHING. You are making statements that you take as absolute truth, thus requiring me to abandon all my beliefs and agree with you on EVERYTHING if that consensus is to be found. I bring an open mind to this discussion and I’d recommend you do the same. Try it…it’s liberating! Maybe I just happen to have some truth on my side too!
On a side note, I believe this discussion has inspired AC to write another post!
The last thing I would gainsay is your desire to find consensus – a desire shared by such notables as Hitler and Stalin, though their methods were more overtly barbaric than those employed by the American left thus far.
Not my problem, since I’ll take truth over consensus every time.
That implies the capacity for reflection, of which I have yet to see evidence.
Certainly if my mind is open to lies I will be liberated from truth, but I am at a loss to understand how I’ll be better off.
That hardly matters if you believe in fundamental lies in favor of which you will abandon those truths when it’s expedient.
Do not confuse being power-hungry and (believed) superiority as having a desire for consensus in the context I’m referring to here. Stalin and Hitler wanted and actually demanded consensus only through complete obeyance. I’m just stating that, despite our disagreements on the general issues, there must be some specific elements to which we see eye to eye. For instance, with health care, I’m sure we both agree that all children under a certain age should be covered. The details (i.e. who pays for it) might be debateable but not the principle.
The biggest difference between you and I is that you hold as absolute truth that what you believe IS the absolute truth. But in reality, your beliefs are probably true in many cases, and not true in others. However, it’s hard to prove nearly all of the time. So that being the case, it comes down to differences of opinion. When you can prove your arguments, I’ll understand why you won’t budge. Until that time, I urge you to listen and learn. Just as I’ll do, and we’ll probably find out that we’re both a little right and a little wrong.
Problem is, the Hitlers and Stalins of the world can always count on de facto support from people like you.
You assume pollitical power must be shared between conservatives and liberals, which of course is nonsense.
It certainly is amusing how often you’re sure of things that just ain’t so.
To which “principle” do you refer, exactly?
It’s impossible to prove such truths to people who hold no “truth” higher than that nothing can be proven.
And you won’t have it any other way, which is why you’re content to support politicians who make up “truth” according to their own convenience.
Let’s summarize what you just said, and please tell me if I’m getting anything wrong.
1. “You assume pollitical power must be shared between conservatives and liberals, which of course is nonsense.”
So you believe it’s ok, and perhaps even preferable for ONE party (as long as it’s the conservatives, that is) to hold ALL the power in government? True or false?
2. “For instance, with health care, I’m sure we both agree that all children under a certain age should be covered.
It certainly is amusing how often you’re sure of things that just ain’t so.”
So you believe there should be no obligation required of parents or any other party when necessary to provide health insurance to children 0 to 18 years old who obviously are not capable of providing for themselves? If an infant or child gets sick and dies because he/she wasn’t covered, that’s just too bad according to you, right? True or false?
3 “Problem is, the Hitlers and Stalins of the world can always count on de facto support from people like you.”
I have not and will never blindly follow any politician and to suggest that I would is highly offensive to me and other people that vote like me. Nobody wants rule by oppression. Nobody wants to eliminate the checks and balances we have in place today. Nobody wants to expand the power of the executive branch (although some presidents throughout history have seen fit to try and do it themselves). So finding consensus so that we can get things done and supporting evil dictators who usually only leave their position through death or overthrow of their country are two completely different things. But this certainly raises an interesting final question.
Let’s turn this around. Is it fair to say that the Senator McCarthys and Pat Robertsons of the world can always count on de facto support from you?
First things first, Mr. Neben:
Well?
The principle is that a child’s health care should be covered. Period.
Assuming you mean every child’s health care should be covered by insurance either with federal tax dollars or by federal edict, that “principle” is most charitably described as asinine.
Not preferable, imperative.
Of course not, bearing in mind that health insurance and health care are not synonymous.
Sick people don’t die for lack of insurance, they die for lack of medical care.
Yes, just as it’s just too bad that children die every day even when they’re insured to the hilt.
You supported Obama, didn’t you?
Cry me a river.
Certainly no one will cop to such a desire, but I don’t know why that should impress anyone.
What planet are you living on?
That’s only valuable if the things we can agree to get done are worth doing; and it is abrasively clear that many, many things you want done are not.
Even if your premises weren’t so cockamamie, this is a non sequitur.
No, because I don’t know much about McCarthy and I’m no fan of Robertson.
Let me clarify further. A child should not die due to a lack of access to health care. Obviously, there are no guarantees that even the best possible treatment will prevent death depending on the illness or injury. But the child should get the proper care nonetheless, and not left to die because the parents could not or would not cover him. I don’t think there’s any way to dispute that unless you just don’t like children.
Now your turn to clarify. If it’s imperative for conservatives to be in control of federal government (we’ll leave state and local governments alone for now) at every level, are you alright with a democrat/liberal minority, or do you want a conservative president, 535 conservative members of congress, and 9 Supreme Court justices?
It would behoove you to learn more about Senator Joseph McCarthy, since I have a feeling you’d agree on many things.
Yes, no child should ever perish due to parental negligence of whatever variety; but of course that cannot be enforced prescriptively except under a despotic regime. Surely you can understand that.
The more conservatives are in power, the better it will be for any liberal worth his or her salt – the rest can go to the devil.
All you’re doing here is admitting you can’t find fault with anything I said on its own merits, so you’re trying to discredit me personally by associating me with someone widely perceived as a historical pariah.
I have neither the time nor inclination to engage in personal attacks. But even if I did, there is no need to because there’s still plenty of fault to be found. If there wasn’t, I would admit as much and thank you for setting me straight. I only brought up McCarthy’s name as an example of a right-wing crusader who was dangerous to our democracy, and in rebuttal to your suggestion that the Hitlers and Stalins of the world could count on me. I would hope you wouldn’t have supported him, but your apparent desire to squash out all signs of liberalism was of concern enough to conjure his name.
I’m glad we have found consensus (I knew we would) about the requirement that children should receive health care. You say that it cannot be prescriptively enforced, but what’s the alternative? I would imagine the hospital would not (and should not) refuse anyone due to lack of coverage, but if the need arises for care, should the parents pay a penalty if it’s found out that they can afford the coverage and didn’t get it?
What do you mean about conservatives being better for the liberals and the rest going to the devil? Do you honestly believe that liberals (maybe with a few exceptions) are heathens?
I don’t know who the Hell you think you’re kidding.
But of course it serves no such purpose, which you would have seen to begin with had you even understood my contentions well enough to begin to criticize them.
I have no such desire. What I want is for liberals to be politically disempowered, so the decent ones can see the error of their ways, and so the rest can crawl off and die somewhere.
Actually, “requirement” connotes a governmental edict, and I never agreed to that.
Let people make their own arrangements, obviously.
Obviously not, since failure to provide coverage is not failure to provide health care.
“Actually, “requirement” connotes a governmental edict, and I never agreed to that.”
You’ve got a point here, as this actually is a moral edict that any decent person would uphold. But, of course, we can’t legislate morality, right? So why do conservatives keep trying to do that? I thought their battle cry was supposed to be for freedom. Yet, they are all too happy to have government around to dictate who can marry, or tell women what they can and can’t do with their bodies, and so forth. Why is freedom so suddenly unimportant if it benefits somebody you don’t agree with?
“Obviously not, since failure to provide coverage is not failure to provide health care.”
Oh, you are happy to let the taxpayers pick up the bill because a mandate infringes on your freedom (there’s that word again). Of course, that’s not truly what happens as the parent is going to be charged for the service at probably a much higher rate, and threaten their financial security, but if that can’t be paid, it has to be eaten somewhere. But from what I’ve heard on conservative radio and television, they say that “we the people” are paying the bill when illegal immigrants can’t pay, so why is it any different here? And would you feel the same way for an adult (U.S. citizen) that needs emergency care? Would you be raising hell about why they had not taken out a policy and thereby raising our rates? Why not, whether child or adult?
Well that would depend on how one goes about “upholding” it. No decent person would countenance “charity” by governmental edict, but of course such edicts are to modern liberals as the smell of the smoke from the crematoria was to Hitler.
Wrong; but of course you don’t understand what morality is in the first place.
You don’t understand what that is either, so obviously you can’t understand that the two are inseparable.
I don’t know of any conservatives who want anything like that, and of course it isn’t conservatives who made marriage strictly a man-woman deal.
I don’t care what they do with their bodies, I care what they do with the bodies of those who reside within them by their own implied consent.
You have me confused with someone else.
What does that have to do with anyone’s freedom?
It isn’t, as long as medical care professionals are deemed unworthy of protection under the thirteenth amendment.
Why would I, as long as I don’t have to carry insurance?
Sorry for the delay in this response as I had to travel to beautiful Colorado for some well-deserved R & R.
So where were we?
Well, I do not support any requirement to be charitable. This should be done strictly out of generosity and decency to the people and organizations of our choice. Plain and simple as that. We agree, right?
Yes, I do know what morality is, and this might surprise you, but I do have a good set of morals and I adhere to them.
Who exactly did make marriage a man-woman deal if you don’t mind me asking?
As for women and their bodies, you must concede there are instances without any consent, implied or otherwise. I must defer to the woman’s decision as a legal right, although I certainly don’t respect anybody who is reckless and uses that right as birth control after the fact. I would hope that is uncommon as I have to imagine the decision to end a pregnancy is not considered lightly.
So what happens if you don’t carry health insurance because you’re not required to, and then something happens where you need expensive care and cannot afford it? The rest of us that do choose to carry insurance pay in the form of higher costs.
Sure, if that’s what you actually believe…but I see no reason to think that’s the case.
You’re kidding yourself.
Your conduct here doesn’t show it.
No Christian worthy of the name would have to ask.
And if infanticide were legal, I think we may rest assured that your reaction to women who slit the throats of their infants because they didn’t feel like taking care of them would not go beyond “disrespect”.
Why is that, exactly? And even if that’s the case, do you think the decision to murder someone is “considered lightly” by anyone with a conscience?
I didn’t make it that way, and neither have I ever advocated for such an arrangement.
This article will be closed down soon, so there’s just a couple of things that I’d like to know before that happens:
Why’s it so hard for you to believe that I can be a decent moral person? What conduct do you refer to that would contradict that?
Your comments come across as self-righteous, judgmental, and superior. Do you believe that you are better than me, and if so, on what grounds?
God created us but he gave us free will to decide whether to love, worship, or even to believe in him. Of course, there are many people who choose not to believe. Thus, we Christians (or any religious people) cannot insert our beliefs into our laws to the extent that it reduces or eliminates freedom and freewill of non-believers. That would be opression or even tyranny, which is what our country’s founders wanted to escape from. If God wanted tyranny he wouldn’t have given us any choice but to obey him, right? If people are doing wrong, they will have their judgment day soon enough. In the meantime let’s remember that he is our creator and savior….not the author of our federal and state laws. He would want us to love one another and not take away the free will or the self-evident unalienable rights that we are endowed with.
That isn’t the point.
Your refusal to answer straightforward questions which would expose the unacknowledged underpinnings of your contentions, your regurgitations of threadbare liberal cliches, and your weaselly duplicity come to mind.
It’s a silly question, since even if I did revel in a sense of superiority, illusory or not, you have no reason to care. Such information has no value beyond its utility as a distraction from the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of your arguments.
How about unbelievers who justify their immoral acts on the basis of their unbelief? Is it OK to “reduce or eliminate” their free will?
And what people like you would lead us back to.
In Heaven do you think anyone will have any choice but to obey Him?
Lucky you, huh? 🙂
Sure, but you don’t understand a word of that.
I think we made some real progress here. Perhaps in one more week and after a few more exchanges, you may have given me some credit. But that’s ok. Hopefully, there will be many more opportunities. I’m just praying we don’t go back to square one the next time.
Such prayers are in vain as long as you remain determined to be an evangelist for confusion.