By Douglas V. Gibbs
Author, Speaker, Instructor, Radio Host
“But, there are families in that caravan that don’t know they are being used. What about them?”
My wife was born in Mexico. Her parents immigrated legally to the United States when she was just a baby. She is the oldest of seven, the only one born in Mexico, and the only conservative-leaning of the siblings. She finally naturalized about a decade ago.
For years her sisters had been telling me that their dad jumped the border illegally to work in the United States before he made the decision to move his whole family stateside. Papi told me otherwise, explaining that he worked in the United States through the Bracero Program, a guest-worker program that lasted until 1964, the year my wife was born.
He, legally through the program, came to the United States to work for weeks at a time. He saved the money he earned, and then used that money to pay the fees and moving expenses necessary to bring his family to America. He picked fruit, back then, in Corona. Then, once he was here permanently, after taking English classes to assist him in his journey to be more like an American, he took welding classes to improve his skill set, and improve his ability to be a productive member of American society.
When asked about his opinion regarding the hyphenated term, “Mexican-American,” he shook his head to me and said, “No, not Mexican. I didn’t come here to be Mexican. I came here so that my family could be Americans, and have a better life.”
I asked him about illegal aliens, as well. “Ah,” he said, “no good. They come here with hand held out. They do not respect the laws. I always obeyed the laws and I always appreciated what America had to offer. I never took welfare. The only government help was a program to help with buying our house.”
Papi is a proud immigrant who assimilated, and embraced, the American Culture.
I remember when, shortly after I married his eldest daughter, he and I sat and talked about things that are uniquely American. He enjoyed talking to me about the history of baseball, about the rules of American Football, and the United States Constitution. He recognized that the reason the English Speaking people in history became so successful was not about race, or skin tone, but because of the kind of system we have embraced. Prosperity is directly linked to limited government, and free market economics. He wanted to be more American, and learning about these things helped him in that journey.
As a Mexican by heritage, he wanted to participate learn more and embrace American prosperity. He realized that the way to do it was to let go of the authoritarian-based beliefs he had been taught in Mexico, and to embrace the principles and philosophies of the American System.
He never got to the point of voting. He never felt like he was knowledgeable enough to take that leap. His wife never even considered citizenship, nor did she ever learn to speak English. Her opinions, from what I have gathered, are not as conservative as her husband’s, either.
My wife’s six sisters have been mostly liberal lefties, as well. A few of them have shifted a little bit away from the bowels of hard-left politics, but none of them have fully embraced conservatism, or constitutional originalism.
To be honest, I’ve never understood the tendency of the descendants of Mexican immigrants to the United States to vote Democrat. The culture is very conservative. The Mexican community (and Hispanic community in general) tends to be very religious, finds abortion and anything contrary to the basic traditional family unit offensive, and they tend to be a hard working, self-reliant people. Yet, the Republican Party has trouble drawing in the majority of Latinos.
Now, we have a migrant caravan marching towards America, composed mostly of people from Honduras and neighboring countries.
After my wife exclaimed that women and children were a part of that caravan, I explained to her that most of the “families” (women and children in particular) have been put out front for no reason other than optics. Seventy-five percent of the approaching invasion force are military-age males, many with links to gangs, drug cartels, and/or jihadist groups. And, on top of all of that, the liberal left is not only orchestrating the march towards the American border, but there is evidence that hard left groups are funding the whole thing.
The liberal left Democrats are calling Republicans “heartless” for daring to stand against the oncoming invasion force. The open-borders lefties want unlimited immigration into the United States, without any obstacles (vetting protocols or immigration procedures) standing in the way of the arrival of any potential Democrat voters. “Come one, come all,” has been their mantra.
The Democrat Party’s lust for power exceeds any potential for common sense, or the ability to recognize the devastating effects uncontrolled immigration can have on a society.
All we have to do is look at what has been happening in Europe under the onslaught of unrelenting Muslim immigration.
The conventional wisdom being presented by mainstream outlets is that anyone showing any kind of concern about Islam (or south-of-the-border migrants) is fascism. The desire by some people to stop Muslim immigration, and to rid their countries of Muslims, is being compared to the treatment of the Jews by Nazi Germany.
The reality of the whole situation tells a different story.
Muslim integration into European society has been disastrous. There is no desire by the Muslim invaders to assimilate into European society no more than there is a desire of the south-of-the-border migrants to assimilate into American society. Their aim is to dominate, not integrate. They want their authoritarian ideas to conquer our system of limited government.
As for the claim that Republicans are fascists for standing against unlimited immigration, or for daring to be critical of anyone refusing to fully embrace the American System, Islam in particular, that is a misinformation campaign that must be nipped in the butt immediately.
In World War II, the authoritarians seeking genocide were the Nazis. In today’s world, the people seeking to stop Muslim immigration are not authoritarians seeking genocide. They are seeking survival, because the authoritarians who are seeking to slaughter anyone not like themselves are not the “right-wingers,” but those who adhere to the teachings of the Koran (Muslims) and those who adhere to the teachings of Karl Marx (leftwing Democrats and their allies). The violent styles of the Muslims, and leftists (Black Lives Matter, Antifa, and La Raza come to mind) are unacceptable in our society, and more mirror fascism than any Tea Party or conservative group might.
This is not a right-wing, fascist, hateful political attitude. It’s common sense. We want the best and the brightest coming into our country. We want people who embrace our system and wish to contribute to America in a manner of improving our system. Instead, the liberal left Democrats are proclaiming we are all supposed to be stupid, just leave our front doors open, and let anybody in. This is the progressive way of doing things, and such thinking is suicide.