Even Cesar Chavez was opposed to illegal immigration....

...until he let racist 'identity' politics trump his concern for poor US farm workers.  And the UFW monitored the border in the 'minuteman' style.  Of course back then it was righteous to keep out 'foreigners stealing American Jobs' rather.  It used to be the left didn't think they needed tens of millions of poor immigrant votes to win power.  Now that the do, the definition of moral has changed - war is peace, we've always been at war with Eastasia.

Not only was Cesar Chavez against illegal immigration, not only did he speak out against the Me
xican invasion before Congress, not only did United Farm Workersmembers monitor the United States-Mexico border à la the Minutemen, but Chavez even sicced la migra on the undocumented from time to time. The curious case of Chavez and his evolving views on illegal immigration is best explained in University of California, San Diego professor David G. Gutierrez's 1995 book, Walls and Mirrors: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the Politics of Ethnicity.


This is really part and parcel of the Left's opposition to free trade:  they really don't like poor brown people or their products unless they are useful.  Trade with Columbia erodes their power so it is bad.  Giving Columbian undocumented workers the vote enhances their power so it is good**. The thing I don't get is how so many ostensibly 'educated' 'elite' people can work up so much moral righteousness for such transparently cynical opportunism.

I respect arguments both for and against immigration restrictions, what I don't respect is the willingness of partisans to treat the poorest and weakest among us merely as tools in the service of their power lust.  Pick a side and and have the integrity to stick to it.

Read the whole thing.

**The astute observer will argue:  "what is the difference between supporting legalization/opposing free trade and the opposite which is a conservative norm?".  Simple, free trade helps Colombians in Colombia and Americans in America and builds good international relations - therefore we support it regardless.  Illegal immigration is - in a word - illegal.  We conservatives believe in enforcing a modest number of laws with limited reach and only passing laws that we are willing to enforce.  Don't like the immigration laws?  Change them.  But don't outlaw that you aren't willing to enforce whether it be graffiti, prohibition or immigration.