Amnesty for Illegals?

Just when I have given up on him Victor Davis Hanson returns to some plain spoken common sense. He sees the trap of Repubs taking their anti-amnesty into the realm of mass deportation which is, after all, the logical end point to such talk.

... while it is easy to say, "I oppose amnesty in all its forms," note apparently how difficult it is for the candidates to make the next intellectually honest and logical corollary, "Thus I am for the mass deportation of all illegal aliens."

It is fine and good to talk of "attrition" by slowly and incrementally rounding up illegal aliens as they come in contact with government agencies and need various licenses, papers, statements, etc., but you are still talking about deporting millions, who are currently working and crime-free, rather promptly.

His conclusion:

Bottom line: Republicans have to be careful that they don't turn a windfall issue (the Democrats are mostly open-borders and captive to the identity-politics wing of the party) into a mass deportation albatross.

Personally I am not so sure they can do this. I am pretty sure, however, that the Demos are capable of mishandling the issue, one way or another.


One of these days I am going to have to get around to reading Hanson's book Mexifornia.