Rich ‘Starburst’ Lowry, writing in Politico, continues the emerging convention of referring to the Gang of Eight’s immigration outline as “Rubio’s Plan.” And he doesn’t like it. What’s interesting is that he isn’t really very straightforward about why he doesn’t like it. While he makes clear that his objection is mainly about creating a “legal status” for undocumented workers and not their potential full citizenship, can he really be that hung up on the letter of the law? Is Lowry’s problem that folks who violated our immigration laws are getting a pass on it? That’s it? He wants justice?
The word is ‘amnesty,’ and it seems to have a special power over the conservative mind. Is this some relic of the amnesty that Jimmy Carter granted to the Vietnam-era draft dodgers? How did this word come to have such a negative connotation in Republican circles? Ordinary people understand that people came here to work because there was a demand for their work. Countless employers were completely complicit in this arrangement, and only political resistance to overtly allowing this immigration made it necessary for people to break the law. Does Lowry demand justice for Tyson Chicken executives or countless agricultural outfits?
There are those who oppose the browning of America on racial terms. Others oppose it on purely political terms (those Latinos are liberal). That’s self-serving and understandable. But opposing immigration reform as a matter of fairness? That’s just juvenile. If Lowry were serious, he be advocating provisions in the bill that he felt would prevent the same thing from happening all over again. He’d be promoting legal immigration of farm workers sufficient to meet demand for their labor, rather than the continuation of a racist immigration policy that won’t openly admit our need for Latino labor. But he doesn’t have any positive suggestions.
He just wants to say ‘no.’
Maybe that’s what his National Review audience demands.
