Weekend reader comments.
January 13, 2024
As we wait for the opinion from the D.C. Circuit on Trump's presidential immunity defense, the important news stories heading into the weekend are continuations of developments from earlier in the week. So, I will provide a few articles to prompt discussion among readers in the Comment section.
More on immigration.
In response to my comments on Joe Biden and immigration yesterday, readers sent links to commentary from other Substack writers on the same subject. Dan Kowalski published an article on his blog, Dan’s Substack, An Opportunity, Not a Crisis. (Kowalski is Editor in Chief of Bender’s Immigration Bulletin, available from Lexis/Nexis).
Kowalski writes the following about mass immigration into the US:
In fact, there is no crisis. Yes, there are logistical problems around feeding and housing migrants, and legal problems around sorting out their legal claims in immigration court.
But the numbers are the numbers: “[T]he past decade has seen unusually slow growth in immigration. In fact, the period from 2012 to 2022 saw slower growth in the immigrant share of the population than the 2000s, 1990s, 1980s and 1970s. You have to go all the way back to the 1960s, when the immigrant population actually shrank, to find a lower growth rate.” - David J. Bier, Oct. 3, 2023
America is graying. We need more immigrants, not fewer, and the younger the better.
Another reader sent a link to Robert Reich’s recent article on Substack, The Four Big Lies About Immigrants--and the Truth. Reich discusses the net percentage of illegal immigrants living in the US over the last fifteen years:
MYTH: Legal and illegal immigration is increasing.
Wrong again. The net rate of illegal immigration into the U.S. is less than zero. The number of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. has declined from 12.2 million in 2007 to 11.3 million now, according to Pew Research Center.
Many readers said the Biden administration needs to do a better job of communicating the facts about immigration. Others said, in effect, that statistical arguments won’t change feelings about immigration. Fair point. But when the truth doesn’t persuade people, coming up with a message that does is challenging. Share your thoughts in the Comment section (or send me an email by “replying” to this newsletter).
Another fine essay from Professor Tim Snyder.
Several readers sent a link to an essay on Substack by Professor Timothy Snyder on Thinking About, Constitutional Courage. Snyder writes in response to those who say, “The voters should decide if Trump is re-elected,” rather than disqualifying him from holding federal office as provided by Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Snyder writes:
Yet Americans who should know better are choosing fear over the Constitution, finding excuses to ignore what it says. Indeed, they are choosing to fear the Constitution. Far too many politicians and other media commentators respond to our present situation—a real insurrectionist who has tried to overthrow the Constitution while in office, a real Constitutional ban on insurrectionists running for office a second time—by saying that it is the Constitution that must yield.
Their slogan is: “let the voters decide.” That is to say: in the case of Trump, and Trump alone, let us simply overlook what the Constitution says.
The exceptionalism reeks of fear. In no other case do we wish away the qualifications for office. [¶¶]
When we are ourselves afraid to defend the Constitution, we indulge in a kind of victim-blaming. Trump tried to overthrow the Constitution; when we say “let the voters decide,” we suggest that the Constitution deserved it. In ignoring Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, we refuse, as it were, to hear the Constitution's side of the story.
Trump’s newest defense: “I can’t be guilty of election interference because the election was “over” when I tried to interfere.”
Trump has spent the last three years claiming that the 2020 election has yet to be decided. Just a few weeks ago on the campaign trail, he was asserting that there is still doubt about which candidate won the 2020 election.
But now that he realizes his presidential immunity defense may be toast, he is changing his tune. As explained in Politico, Trump is now claiming that the election was “long over” when he was busy inciting insurrection and trying to overturn election results in Georgia. See Politico, Trump’s latest about-face: He now says 2020 election was ‘long over’.
Per Politico,
Now, in a bid to derail criminal charges, he’s saying the opposite. At least six times in the past two weeks, Trump has declared that the election was “long over” by the time he began pushing state officials and then-Vice President Mike Pence to overturn his defeat. [¶]
In a video he posted on social media Tuesday about his post-election activities, he said: “The election was long over. I wasn’t campaigning. I was just doing my job. I am entitled to immunity. I am absolutely entitled to immunity.” He’s repeated the refrain often in recent days.
In technical legal terms, Trump has resorted to “gaslighting” us. We all lived through three years of Trump claiming that the election was not over because the election was “rigged.”
What is truly extraordinary is that Trump and his attorneys believe we (and federal judges and Supreme Court Justices) will not remember the arguments he made incessantly for three years. While Trump's change in position is breathtaking, his belief that we won’t remember his prior position is jaw-dropping, gob-smacking, next-level delusional.
Concluding Thoughts.
The Iowa caucuses are next week. Whatever happens, don’t freak out. Although caucus meetings emerged from reform efforts in the 1970s, they are an outlier in our modern electoral system. They allow for manipulation, distortion, and voter suppression. And remember—the Iowa primary caucuses have a high degree of predictability—for choosing candidates who will not become president. According to the Des Moines Register,
“Iowa caucuses don't actually do a great job at predicting who the next president will be. Only . . . one Republican since 1972 ha[s] made it all the way from an Iowa caucus win to the presidency.”
So, ignore the hype and breathless over-interpretations. A coin flip would do a better job than the Iowa caucuses of predicting the next president.
Have a good weekend, everyone! Talk to you on Monday!
My dentist is from Ghana, my primary doctor is from India and my mom and husband are from Germany. My neighbor to the east is from Mexico, my neighbor to the west is from Israel, my neighbor across the street is from Finland and her husband is Egyptian-German. My uncle was from Panama, and my best friend growing up had a Pakistani (now Bengali) dad, and Austrian mother. Another good friend's mom was from England. All of them have wonderful children who are growing up bi-or tri-culturally. One of my best friends is from The Philippines, and another from China. Friends in a group that I sing with weekly are from Finland, Austria, Lithuania, Iran and Germany. I live in a neighborhood in Chicago that has embraced supporting immigrants to our city since the Syrian war. My class has held fundraisers where we made things for people to buy such as scarves, hats, and jewelry to bring Syrian refugee families to our community. Now our refugee support, which is supported by the neighborhood interfaith organization of churches, mosques and temples, has expanded to include supporting those who are being sent by the Texan governor to our wintry city. I know that the lies about immigrants are that they take jobs, when the opposite is true. We should be vying not just for Africa's natural resources for our green economy but their people resources, since people on their continent has an average age of 19. Currently we had about a 10 mil job shortage and only 5 mil Americans who were available to fill those jobs. That tells me that these immigrants can help fill the job deficit. I do see some systemic things that need to change, like faster processing of legal immigrants to be able to work, and a system that provides free education through college at least through state universities, so we can be training people into the professions that have a shortage. Not just immigrants, but all. We also need more people going into teaching, medicine and mental health. We need a national health insurance that people pay into on a sliding scale based on their incomes. With these systems set up we will more easily be able to support citizens and those who come here.
Probably the most outstanding quality of immigrants to the United States is their desire to do well and get ahead. In my opinion, and from my experience, most newcomers work far harder than many American-born citizens.
With the unemployment rate being so low now, people willing to start at the bottom and work their way up are a boon to the economy. They are the future pioneers…
My great uncles sold candy on the Staten Island ferry when they were just eight or nine years old. My grandmother was the first to graduate from high school. My mother was the first in her family to get a college degree. That’s how it works.