By Irene F. Starkehaus -
Round and round we go. Day after day conservatives ask: what exactly is the right thing to do with regard to the multiple thousands of minors and not-so-minors who are crossing our southern border illegally on the promise of a better life or at very least a better clientele. Circular arguments that pound against the resolve of a historically charitable people shred consciences to a pulp as waves of undocumented, unvaccinated, unaccompanied children cross over illegally to be contained…detained in a macabre limbo of wistful hope that their parents will soon rendezvous and make things whole again. What is the best thing to do – for them and for our own children?
There's so much noise coming from all directions about this humanitarian crisis – most of that clatter includes a stern remonstration to Americans against enforcing our much maligned immigration laws…it's for the children after all.
And we expect such criticism to come from the Democrats who are so hell-bent on turning Texas blue that they are willing to disregard anything even remotely resembling law for achievement of their long-term electoral objectives. Like their European brethren, any means to the goal of socialist supremacy shall be regarded as justified and necessary. Clearly, there are no rules in love, war or socialism. To the Left, our border crisis is just another form of guerrilla warfare in name of fundamental transformation.
Forget that these are actual human children that American Democrats are manipulating for the chaos of it all. History will recognize the condemnation of conservative opposition to our all but obsolete border policy. Excessively erudite and morally transcendent, such is the Left's rhetorical censure of conservative resistance. Butter wouldn't melt in their proletariat mouths for the freeze dried grandiloquence concerning moral imperatives.
The Left's bleak cynicism in matters of immigration are so reflexive that they border on nauseating and might be walked back effortlessly were it not for unexpected apostates away from the cause of American sovereignty.
Republican moderates, we might even understand their defection as they poll-watch their way through the greatest moral crises of our generation.
The betrayal by the Chamber of Commerce, though, utterly baffles most of us, and the most unholy alliances that have been formed in this battle of the border seem to come from the usually unfaltering traditionalists…people we assumed could steer free of muddled, malformed arguments. Defections such as those of Glenn Beck or Kathryn Jean Lopez of National Review are nearly unbearable wounds to the heart.
Both would say that they are not turning traitor, but just making the best of a bad situation in the name of all that is holy and good. Lopez, for instance, mounts a stalwart defense of Pope Francis's admonishment of Americans, pronouncing that he is just reiterating what he has been saying along about social justice. In fact, we can all agree on that point. He most certainly maintains consistency. That is absolutely the problem. Quoting from a recent post:
[Pope Francis] specifically addressed our current border situation: "I would also like to draw attention to the tens of thousands of children who migrate alone, unaccompanied, to escape poverty and violence." They have largely made the trip, he wrote, from Central America and Mexico "under extreme conditions and in pursuit of a hope that in most cases turns out to be vain. They are increasing day by day." He described it as a "humanitarian emergency" that "requires, as a first urgent measure, that these children be welcomed and protected."
Now, before you start agreeing with my tweeters, read on. "These measures, however," Pope Francis continues, "will not be sufficient, unless they are accompanied by policies that inform people about the dangers of such a journey and, above all, that promote development in their countries of origin."
Instead of demanding that the U.S. open its borders to whomever, whenever, the pope implored that "this challenge demands the attention of the entire international community so that new forms of legal and secure migration may be adopted." (emphasis added)
So let's address those concerns.
If I'm reading his words correctly, Pope Francis believes that these illegal immigrants should be welcomed with open arms into the US by international dictate if necessary to avoid a humanitarian crisis. I've gotta say, these are interesting words considering that Vatican City is a sovereign nation. Can you imagine what Pope Francis's reaction would be if the United States took an active role in developing an underground railroad from the war torn Middle East to Vatican City so that Muslim children of decimated nations could show up by the thousands to demand food, clothing, shelter, medicine and education on the Vatican dime and on Vatican soil? Just how amenable would Pope Francis be to our intervention in that case?
He would not be. He would see such an act as a form of anti-Catholic aggression meant to erode the autonomy and mission of Vatican City. And he would be right. Especially if those children then brought along their parents who would naturally carry their own cultural preferences with them. How would he react to parades of anti-Catholic Middle Easterners marching up and down the square demanding cultural equality with Roman Catholics within the borders of Vatican City?
According to Michael Voris of ChurchMilitant.tv which is a traditionalist Catholic online community, the United States federal government is funneling around a million dollars to the dioceses of Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas and something like $15 million dollars to the diocese of Galveston to bankroll the care of illegal minors. Those religious districts are then asking their parishioners to house the children with the promise that they will be reimbursed. If the story is true, then this is likely a violation of the Anti-Deficiency Act.
Kathryn Lopez reiterates the prevailing debate point of American Catholic leadership, ""Yes, laws must be observed, but the real issue is, what can we do to help the children?" Because, again, it's for the children. Isn't it always? But who really wants to discuss the real solutions to the growing problem.
What we can and must do is send children over the age of twelve back home. That is the most humanitarian act possible given the situation. Children under the age of twelve should be legally adopted to American parents who can transition them into full citizenship. Deliberate child abandonment has occurred and those biological parents must be viewed as negligent. If this really is about the children, then there must be an understanding that when consenting adults send their children into a foreign country illegally, they lose any legal claim to those children.
Moreover, the continued acceptance of illegal immigration to the US should be viewed as a tantamount admission by the Left that the American culture is superior to the culture that the illegals left. That should provide necessary authority to the United States to export the American republican/free market/constitutional system to the nation(s) violating our sovereignty through mass immigration.
You see, it is neither moral nor right for Americans to forfeit cultural identity through excessive immigration simply because we are more economically successful than nations led by despots. Indeed, we have the moral obligation to our own children to keep our economy and culture strong. Unless God himself demands a la Abraham that we must sacrifice our children for a transitory improvement through handouts, then our first responsibility is to our own children.
Instead of welfare, let us define social justice as the distribution of the political and economic systems that led to our success in the first place.
Let us prove once and for all that American Exceptionalism has nothing to do with locality or any kind of superiority of nationality. It has to do with the superiority of opportunity. Mexicans and other Central American nations are just as capable of recreating the American way of life within their own borders. All they have to do is get rid of the despots and replace them representatives who are committed to America's founding principles. For that matter, we ought to look to our own inner cities and convince those populations to do the same.
Let there be a Mexican Tea Party movement that beats down the cartel of oppression that infuses the whole of Mexican culture. Let there be a Central American Tea Party movement railing against communist and socialist dictators in favor of the natural rights of Man. Let the conservative revolution spill over the borders and engage those currently oppressed people in the freedom and liberty that God gave them. American conservatives welcome an international neighborhood of equals because such an environment will change the trajectory of human existence for the better.
I would like to believe that such an improvement would be what God actually calls us to embrace. Forget the handouts. Let us focus on a leg-up policy of economic freedom. That is the only real solution to international poverty. Political and religious leaders here and abroad insist on placing the problem of poverty at America's doorstep for us to solve. In the spirit of American ingenuity, we ought to take such a challenge to heart and show the world how it is done. That is what is right and moral.
