November 23, 2013

Immigration "Reform" turned out to be a Paper Jaguar

The massive push of 2013 by much of the Establishment for the Schumer-Rubio immigration bill was a classic Hi-Lo Teamup against the middle, in which various elites cover their naked pursuit of their self-interest with the fig leaf that they are doing it to liberate some minority from discrimination, given near 100% air cover by the media. It's one of those recurrent patterns that's really obvious once you notice it (subprime catastrophe, anyone?), but you aren't supposed to notice it.

In The Atlantic, Molly Ball (kind of like MoneyBall, but not), is puzzled: all the Good People (e.g., the more PR-savvy billionaires, the diversicrats, etc.) were for Schumer-Rubio, and yet the Bad People somehow managed to live to fight another day.
What Happened to Immigration Reform? 
A powerful, well-organized coalition did everything it could, with no results. Now advocates are preparing to shift from lobbying to revenge. 
MOLLY BALL NOV 22 2013, 7:00 AM ET

Last week, John Boehner was having breakfast at his customary spot on Capitol Hill, Pete’s Diner, when he was approached by two teenage girls with a video camera. Clad in a baseball cap and fleece pullover, the speaker nervously fiddled with his ear as the pair told him of their undocumented immigrant parents’ fear of deportation. “I’m trying to find a way to get this thing done,” he told them. “It’s, as you know, not easy. It’s not going to be an easy path forward, but I’ve made it clear since the day after the election that it’s time to get this done.” 
Just a few hours later, Boehner, now wearing a suit, addressed reporters in the Capitol. On immigration, his tone was rather less encouraging. “The idea that we’re going to take up a 1,300-page bill that no one had ever read, which is what the Senate did, is not going to happen in the House,” he said. “And frankly, I’ll make clear we have no intention of ever going to conference on the Senate bill.”

For the broad, well-organized coalition of immigration-reform activists, that statement was a stunning blow. If Boehner keeps that pledge, he will have rendered moot the months of wheeling and dealing it took to get a massive, bipartisan bill through the Senate in June, forcing the upper chamber to start from scratch even if the House manages to get its act together and pass its own bill or group of bills—a prospect that appears increasingly unlikely. 
That Boehner could make encouraging noises when confronted by activists, then pour cold water on immigration's legislative prospects, neatly summarized the plight of the reformers, many of whom are coming to grips with the possibility that their efforts, despite politicians' apparent receptiveness, have come to naught. The reformers' official line remains one of optimism that the House will act, perhaps even before the end of 2013. But many activists have already begun to take a more aggressive tack, arguing that lobbying is over—it’s time for revenge. 
“We can’t force them to get to yes, but we can make them pay a price for getting to no,” said Frank Sharry. An immigration-reform advocate for decades, Sharry heads America’s Voice, the reform coalition’s main clearinghouse. He holds out hope that legislation could still pass the House in the waning days of 2013, he told me, but he and others are preparing to move into a new gear once the calendar flips—one in which their focus will shift to punishing House Republicans. “If this Congress isn’t going to pass immigration reform, let’s elect a Congress that will,” Sharry said. 
It is an emotionally wrenching juncture for a movement that, until recently, was riding high. “The reason there’s such a sadness is that we got very close,” said Joshua Culling, a conservative policy strategist who worked on immigration for Americans for Tax Reform [Grover Norquist's organization]. “The momentum for the better part of a year was on our side.”
Conservative commentators like Sean Hannity backed comprehensive reform; the Republican National Committee came out in favor; the Senate Gang of Eight successfully completed its work. The reform coalition, comprising tech executives and evangelical pastors, unions and human-rights groups, agriculture and law enforcement, libertarians and bleeding-heart liberals, kept Democrats largely united while winning over large swaths of the conservative movement. They kept up a blitz of grassroots pressure while their opposition was barely seen. 
And yet their incremental successes have failed, so far, to add up to the big goal: getting a law passed. ...  
The diverse coalition of immigration activists has managed to remain remarkably unified and even to grow over the past year. Their disappointment is grave. “On the left, you have a bunch of ‘Dreamers’ and undocumented folks who think of themselves as Americans and are still technically criminals,” Culling said. “On the right, you have people who care about the [Republican] Party and feel like this was our one opportunity” to change the way voters perceive the GOP. “Everyone was on board the week after the election, and we pissed it away again.” ... 
The carrot didn’t work, so it’s time for the stick. Sharry estimates there are five to 10 Republicans in the House who could be defeated if the Latino vote goes strongly enough against them—not enough to hand the House to Democrats, who are currently 17 seats from the majority, but enough to send a message. For most of the year, advocates, even those on the left, have sought to give Republican members room to maneuver rather than going on the attack. But that’s changing as the shift to campaign mode begins. 
Earlier this month, unions and immigrant-rights groups teamed up on what they termed an “escalation,” a batch of tough Spanish-language television ads in the districts of nine GOP congressmen. ...
FWD.us, the advocacy group founded by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg with the help of both Republican and Democratic strategists, has begun to take a tougher tack, switching from the supportive ads the group previously ran to spots that seek to remind politicians of their promises. ... 
Meanwhile, activists are stepping up pressure on the White House to unilaterally halt deportations. ...
At any given time, the immigration-reform community is engaged in a dizzying flurry of activism.

No, they are not. I've barely witnessed anything in the real world over the last year. For example, remember the massive Mayday demonstrations of illegal aliens in 2006? Well, the Mayday rallies in favor of the Schumer-Rubio bill in 2013 were flops.
For whatever reason, activists' herculean efforts appear to have run aground.

Herculean? This stuff is astroturf activism. It's a paper jaguar.

40 comments:

Anonymous said...

>>"It's one of those recurrent patterns that's really obvious once you notice it (subprime catastrophe, anyone?), but you aren't supposed to notice it."




Thankfully, Steve, there are some who do notice it.

For all of us who aren't always quick to notice things.
Keep noticing. It certainly cant hurt and maybe in its own way, it helps.

Keep noticing.

Anonymous said...

I think you nailed it regarding the writers mentality. Zuckerburg and Obama and the rest are divinities to people like her. How can they fail?

You can't have a discussion with someone who's arguing in bad faith. As long as the narrative is that only *bad guys* are against immigration *reform*, that there is no legitimate reason people might not support it, people like the writer of this piece will continue to be befuddled.



Anonymous said...

Look out America - the NY power structure needs 400 million American in order to keep things running (preferably non-white).

The oligarch Western banking system will collapse if the US dollar fails - the only way out of this mess is to create an ever growing populace that can pay off the bills of the past.

p.s. Rubio represent the NY power structure that moved to Florida.

carol said...

Huh, I don't like Hannity much but when I tuned in a few times last spring he seemed quite critical of the immigration bill. I was pleasantly surprised; he sounded like one of us. Good feint if that's all it was.

Anonymous said...

Steve, I keep thinking of ways to get even with Zuckerberg. Sure, getting off facebook is a start (and an inconvenience). But, he wouldn't have a clue as to why he lost a customer and how would such punishment on a scale likely to be noticed be orchestrated? Wish there was a 'revenge on Zuckerberg' fund one could contribute to.

Auntie Analogue said...


"Paper jaguar," or not, it is time for American citizens to press their representatives to pass an amendment revoking and prohibiting birthright citizenship. Enough is enough!

Anonymous said...

Your links at the bottom of the article just forward to a google login page.

Anonymous said...

On Arne Duncan from someone on facebook:

"Knowing Arne well he is a fake. He is from tons of money, went to and sent his kids to the most elite school in Chicago, and only socializes with rich people. He used to be chauffeured every day to his job at the board (he lived next to my inlaws) and had little contact with the average Cps parent. The only reason he has the job is due to his basketball playing skills and friendship with Jonathan Rodgers."

Corn said...

If they want to punish 10 House Republicans for being too pro-enforcement, then we need to punish double of that number in the GOP primaries for not being pro-enforcement enough.

Anonymous said...

Ok, now I'm convinced that Glen Renyolds reads this site.

Anonymous said...

The problem is that amnesty will mean the newly minted Americans can apply for government jobs and compete against the demographic Washington is most sensitive to, government workers. IMO that is the only thing holding up the amnesty.

As an aside to illustrate that government workers are still a powerful force, the only local paper in New York City that is not a shadow of its former self is "The Chief" which is the newspaper of the civil service. After "The Chief" maybe El Diario and The Forward(Jewish) still have some life left in them.

http://thechiefleader.com/

Anonymous said...

It didn't take long to put out their threat, did it?

Makes one wonder what else do they have in store for their enemies, i.e. us?

Anonymous said...

Look at this liar! Hannity has been against immigration reform for months.

Anonymous said...

Sean, Rush, Laura, and Mark always have to do some rhetoric for the based. Actually, Laura and Mark are the most against illegal immigration among the conservative talk radio people.

Mountain Maven said...

Thankfully the voters had their way on this one instead of the bastard immigration coalition. Better late than never but not by much if you live anywhere near the Mexican border.

countenance said...

Hannity started this year in support of some form of "comprehensive immigration reform" then turned against it.

This article claims that the EL CHEAPO and Razatard lobbies are going to target 10 House Republicans whose districts have a substantial Hispanic population. The problems with that, for their cause:

1. Even in high turnout cycles, the Hispanic vote is far underneath the Hispanic population. The Hispanic vote is even less in midterms. 8.4% of all voters in 11/2012, it will be less than that nationally in 11/2014.

2. What is their campaign strategy going to be? Are they going to run general media buys complaining about how Republican incumbent won't throw the borders wide open, actually expecting the average white person in that district (a district with a lot of Hispanics) to be less likely to vote for that Republican? Or are they going to run Spanish language ads aimed at the Razas? The problem with that is that immigration is not the biggest deal in the world to Hispanic voters, so that strategy won't really have any success in goosing up either Hispanic overall turnout or the percentage of them that vote Democrat, compared to what they would do in 2014 anyway. Maybe they'll try to primary these Republicans to try to replace them with open borders Republicans, but Hispanics don't much turn out for Republican primaries.

Luke Lea said...

Another one of those clever Onion-like news stories! Nice too see that the NYT has gone full tilt into the entertainment business.

Anonymous said...

Best news ever!

Blair has been playing hide the sausage with Rupert's mailorder wife.

Aggro MSM Headlines of To-day said...

Revenge!!!1!!uno!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yVK6Ite2xY

Alcalde Jaime Miguel Curleo said...

In the spirit of vengeance Twitter is going to restrict tweets to 120 characters

Cail Corishev said...

What is their campaign strategy going to be?

I'd imagine they'll concentrate on their strengths:

Driving illiterates and criminals to the polls, giving them ten bucks and a dead person's name to use, and showing them which boxes to check.

Putting threatening individuals like the Black Panthers outside polling places to intimidate white voters.

Enlisting the media in accusing immigration patriots of racism, baby-roasting, seal-clubbing, and whatever else they can think of to convince nice middle-class white people not to vote for them.

Bert said...

"Hannity started this year in support of some form of "comprehensive immigration reform" then turned against it."

Because his ratings halved.

Anonymous said...

At any given time, the immigration-reform community is engaged in a dizzying flurry of activism.


At any given time, ... Mark Zukerburg ... is engaged in a dizzying flurry of activism.

Gotta look good in front of the right people, and all that.

Luke Lea said...

Ridicule is the best way to bring a regnant lie to its knees. Better than righteous indignation, better than rational criticism (well, better than rational criticism alone).

Anonymous said...

Putting threatening individuals like the Black Panthers outside polling places to intimidate white voters.

Ironic, since in the Bad Old Days menacing white thugs would hang outside polling stations to discourage black voters.


Prof. Woland said...

Steve, I like your top and bottom v. the middle. I have long looked at the proponents of mass immigration as two towers defending a fortress. With only one tower, mass immigration enthusiasts would be relatively easy to assault, but by having two towers they can give each other and the walls cover fire. If you notice, rather than argue that cheap labor is a good thing, the wealthy immigration boosters rigidly adhere to only being in favor of diversity and fairness. The ethnic hacks on the other hand, always say that Latinos are just selflessly supporting the American economy as in, we scrub your toilets and pick your lettuce so you don't have to. Each side needs the other to carry the other's argument. If the US Chamber of Commerce types were to state their real intention, their approval ratings would drop below leprosy. In that same vein, if the ethno-whores were to state outright that their raison d'ĂȘtre which is so their children could take my children's birthright and become a new majority to, their ratings would be even lower.
The winning strategy is to be to pick the weakest tower and undermine it; literally. Once that has been accomplished, the other tower will become irrelevant. If you try to take both at the same time it will fail. But to do that, the anti-immigration side needs to decide whether they would rather tackle the business end of their party, who is cash rich but voter poor, or go after the ethnics, who are growing in number but are an outright minority and have no economic clout to speak of.

haddox said...

How about the red state Senate Democrats up in 2014 that voted for S 744? Pryor, Hagan, Landrieu even Begich. Reid made them walk the plank with that vote. They are the ones who will be punished, at least in the real world of people who actually vote in mid-terms.

Anonymous said...

"Best news ever!

Blair has been playing hide the sausage with Rupert's mailorder wife."


Wow.

I love the comments. "Tony Blair denies it. Enough proof for me."

Dennis Dale said...

"herculean"?

Are they even trying any more? When did "Herculean" come to mean "failure despite every advantage"? The stupidity of our elites mocks us.
For the first time in history no one will resort to the David and Goliath cliche. Too bad. It's never been more appropriate. Suck on it, Mollyball!

Anonymous said...

'Democracy' - A pesky little thing isn't it?

Anonymous said...

The biggest problem is the Rand paul syndrome which is not to punish companies that hire illegal immigrants but put up a wall. About 40 percent of illegal immigrants come on work or tour vistas. Paul against a stronger ID system to catch vista overstays since it leads to a national ID. The right fear of National ID is why its been split on illegal immirgation for years.

Anonymous said...

Well, no conservative business person has started a company to mechanized low skilled jobs. I've seen robotic prep cooks in China not here. Anyone left or right that supports less immigration needs to get a company that will developed robots or a machine to reduce dry wall workers in construction and so forth. The politicians are basically a waste of time. If robots will doing all the farm work during George Bush reign and a machine was developed to reduce dry wallers and some mason work during Geroge Bushes time, I bet that official illegal population would have dropped about 3 million from the Clinton years instead of increasing during the Bush years.

Mr. Anon said...

"Bert said...

"Hannity started this year in support of some form of "comprehensive immigration reform" then turned against it."

Because his ratings halved."

After the election, Hannity started going on about the need for "comprehensive immigration reform". A lot of his viewers decided that was required instead was comprehensive Hannity reform, so they stopped watching him.

Anonymous said...

It seems utterly insane. Frankly, the best "pillar" to bring down (and the one that would cause the liberals the most anxiety) is the black pillar. What could a white liberal say to a black man who asked him why he was selling out and impoverishing American black folks by giving black jobs to foreigners and driving black wages down? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

You have a point, I never see a conservative in Houston or Dallas use this argument, in fact I think blacks in Texas have lost out on the job boom because Mexicans have came in and took their jobs. I think I saw a figure of white unemployment in Texas of 4 percent and Mexican of 7 percent but black of 9 percent. Instead conservatives who liked Texas a lot don't mention that blacks have lost out on the low skilled jobs to Mexicans in their state.

Art Deco said...

I still can't figure out the personal advantage to the Talented Tenth-types who are selling out regular black folks in favor of cheap foreign labor.

Because their proximate relatives are not nursing home orderlies and dietary workers. Their proximate relatives are social workers and school administrators. More immigrants means more clientele and more jobs for people like them (more niche programs meaning more administrators).

Anonymous said...

I still can't figure out the personal advantage to the Talented Tenth-types who are selling out regular black folks in favor of cheap foreign labor.

This is simple. The Democrat Party is the party that gives Free Stuff to the brothers and sisters. Anything that helps to permanently cement the Democrat Party in power is all good.

Anonymous said...

Well, no conservative business person has started a company to mechanized low skilled jobs. I've seen robotic prep cooks in China not here. Anyone left or right that supports less immigration needs to get a company that will developed robots or a machine to reduce dry wall workers in construction and so forth. The politicians are basically a waste of time. If robots will doing all the farm work during George Bush reign and a machine was developed to reduce dry wallers and some mason work during Geroge Bushes time, I bet that official illegal population would have dropped about 3 million from the Clinton years instead of increasing during the Bush years.

Check out Momentum Machines and their new automatic hamburger maker.

Anonymous said...

"You have a point, I never see a conservative in Houston or Dallas use this argument, in fact I think blacks in Texas have lost out on the job boom because Mexicans have came in and took their jobs. I think I saw a figure of white unemployment in Texas of 4 percent and Mexican of 7 percent but black of 9 percent. Instead conservatives who liked Texas a lot don't mention that blacks have lost out on the low skilled jobs to Mexicans in their state." - Are they acting from a rational economic basis, or from an irrational status obsessed stick it to YT basis? Politicians do what works to get elected, if there were votes to be had, they'd go for them.

David said...

>the only way out of this mess is to create an ever growing populace that can pay off the bills of the past.<

Yeah, they'll make up the loss on volume.

Anonymous said...

http://youtu.be/DR1LjxldqrI