A Thought on Current Illegal Immigration Row

Instead of trying to compose a full post covering the subject, I just wanted to share a thought and a couple memories that came to me while observing the current row over the Trump Administration's anti-illegal immigrant policy. The intent here is NOT to cover the whole topic or hash out the nuances and history of the heavily contended topic, but rather to point out a couple inferences of what is not being explicitly said yet must be implied.

First for some context, I'll mention part of my background and the angle from which I am viewing the matter. I grew up and attended school in western Pennsylvania in an area that has a long history of industry and labor movement politics. For full disclosure, my mother actually helped found a union and was a leader in an effective strike that won lasting concessions. My mother was a throwback liberal who had come from the South to the North. Being a Southern Democrat (as if there was any other political party during periods in the South), she naturally became a Democrat in the much more industrialized North. Though quite different flavors at the same official party—even campaigned for Jimmy Carter in the primary and general. My father worked on the white collar side in the technical areas of northern industry. He would pass stories to me about his experiences of dealing with northern labor and unionized labor in particular. There was a bit of a culture shock for him, having moved from the rural South in which labor unions didn't really exist. Certain things he had to learn the hard way.

When I was growing up my mother would sometimes bring me to Democratic political rallies and events where I would be exposed to organized politics at a very young age. I can recall sitting (or more frequently standing) while a union leader got up to give a speech on why it was important to back the Democrat running. The "Labor Democrat," as he was known, was a powerful force in the party, and for good reason. Things would go as far as union members passing out cards telling exactly who to vote for in the upcoming election. I became familiar with the labor movement and its rich history. Especially in Pennsylvania and like regions. Without going into detail, let's just say there's a reason why labor laws came into being. The American labor movement had valid points. One historical tidbit, one not widely known, is the reason why Hoffa partly got the Teamsters in bed with the Mob — for physical protection. Way back in the day, mining companies would hire thugs to actually beat the living crap out of labor organizers. For a time there were even private police forces. Despite being founded for perfectly valid reasons, the companies owned and ran "Coal and Iron Police" that were notorious for abuses. This actually directly led to the establishment of the State Troopers. Violence and intimidation against strikes or labor demonstrations also applied. But as with many things in this world, benefits come in a mixed bag. Good and Bad frequently are not exclusively segregated.

The background and the history I came up in have always made me pro-labor. But my formative years of being exposed to close-up Democrat politics with regard to a bigger city and the sausage-making also made me a Republican at age 18. There was hardly any journey for me to becoming right of center in American politics from a liberal position. I enthusiastically registered "R" as a teenager because I wanted to be with the resistance, the reform-minded people. Republicans largely were the minority. Now this isn't to say my political worldview hasn't evolved or become deeper over time. It certainly has by a lot. But I have always been on the right. This also does not mean I have always been in line with the Republican Party. In the past I did cross-vote for particular Dem candidates. Sometimes I thought Republicans of the past were tone deaf on labor matters or some other practical issue that was easily fumbled. Since Obama's second term, though, I've become a hard-line Republican voter. Not necessarily because I agree with everything in the party or its candidates, but because the Democrat party has become so dreadful. I used to consider myself always "Center-Right" but somehow found myself ending up being called "right-wing" or "extreme right" despite making very few alterations to my core beliefs. However, I could also understand and sympathize with American labor. People who just wanted to do honest work, make a decent living, have some benefits, live a little in this life, and raise the next generation.

The Democrat Party has abandoned its American labor roots. There's still that inertia among American workers thinking along the lines of old, outdated paradigms, but one massive change in American politics is the Republican Party picking up more of the common man worker (though they seem to be declining in overall number). It's part of the reason why Trump allegedly outperformed in PA three times. Being exposed to heavy industry and some hard union labor types gave me a certain appreciation for them. But it also prevented me from seeing things through rose-colored, idealized glasses either. Perhaps that's also the reason why I'm less of a fainting, pearl-clutching when Trump says something off script versus some prep-boy country clubbing Republican. But now I'm getting too long-winded and the need to get to the intended topic - the illegal-immigration inference:

The USA appears to have a massive black market labor economy. Perhaps even a de facto Scab system.

A Victor Davis Hanson line I heard once went something like this regarding California:

California is the most regulated state, while also being the most unregulated state.

Basically, the state will crack down and hyper-regulate the typical American law-abiding patriotic schlub, while giving free rein essentially to those groups deemed with special exempt status — illegal immigrants frequently among them. Well, it appears that this type of chimeric Californication has been applied to the whole of the USA. The trend seemed greatest during the Biden administration, but had been going on before for some time. Now the Trump administration is attempting to reinstitute some level of order and regulation of American immigration and labor markets. Disorder is breaking out as a result. It is becoming a test as to whether the US federal government even has the authority and the ability to regulate and enforce its own laws. I saw a video today of a NYC crowd harassing federal officers arresting foreign scammers who had threatened Americans. With the physical safety of federal officers in question while doing basic law enforcement runs, it brings up issues of augmented security and derelict local governments.

One of the main arguments I hear against immigration law enforcement is that we need these individuals to work—that the USA cannot function without these millions of undocumented or illegal immigrants. It is not said, but one can only infer that the US labor market is absolutely entrenched with black market labor and with fraud to run cover for it. This implies the following:

• Companies big and small have to crib paperwork
• Many shell companies must exit
• Flourishing market for fake IDs and counterfeit paperwork.
• The reason why state-issued IDs are now considered invalid for federal ID. Thus the creation of "Real ID" issues by states at extra cost
• Massive special interests that have a vested interest in keeping the status quo black market system going
• Massive obfuscation of the labor rights won during the Labor Movement of previous generations. Circumvention of employment rules and regulations, not to mention tax collection avoidance.
• The ability of employers and business operators to leverage against Americans in the labor market.
• The strong pressure for legit businesses to engage in dubious practices to "keep up"
• The total resistance to common sense immigration reform which could include things like non-resident seasonal guest worker status for certain industries like agriculture.
• The exposure of the US as not having any real teeth in a functioning tracking system of legal immigrants and residents. An Emperor has no clothes moment.
• Passive government support for criminal organizations or at least dubious operations.
• Two-tiered injustice system in a supposed "nation of laws" at local, state, and federal levels. All supported by many judges scattered throughout the system.
• The use of strings-attached immigrants on special work status in big companies to replace Americans
• The welcoming of the triumphant return of "the scab"

About 8 years ago I was taking a drive down the lower Ohio Valley on the West Virginia side, listening to the FM radio. There was work being done in the gas industry there, and a pipeline was required. I saw a large homemade sign that read "NO Scabs." I instantly understood it and the sentiment behind it. Locals and US citizens in the industry wanted to benefit from doing the work. There was resistance to the idea of importing Hispanics to live out of shabby town encampments to work at cut-rate prices under dismal living conditions. The same basic view is seen in a lot of today's America. A race to the bottom. There's a saying that gets used in skilled trades, which goes:

Cheap labor isn't Skilled, and Skilled labor isn't Cheap.

There's truth in this statement. As I mentioned before, with organized labor it's a mixed bag. But one thing I have seen is how, in certain cases, union shops can have quality training and deliver a worker to the job site who actually knows what he is doing and is skilled. Not just any guy with a hammer holding a crumpled "help wanted" leaflet (in multiple languages). Now there are certainly cases in which imported or transient labor is legitimate and preferable. But it seems like running things to the lowest common denominator is almost a goal at times. And there's a skills issue in the American labor market, as best I can tell. A lot of Americans have stunted practical skills. I don't want to make a blanket statement on any of these things. But I think it helps to work from a default position of strength, and then make reasonable and practical accommodations.

The old stereotypes I grew up hearing about conservatives and Republicans were how heartless and awful they were. Boot lickers of the rich man. They supported undermining the American working class. We needed to keep Republicans out of office because they might bring in scabs to take away jobs from Americans — that is, if those same Republicans hadn't already gotten rich by exporting those jobs overseas (once the 90s-2000s rolled around). As a right-leaning person, I had to try to argue that not all conservatives were soulless, blood sucking, greedy types willing to crush the working class, sell out the USA for a dollar. But nowadays we find ourselves in a much different position. Democrats are the party of the big corporations and the mass importation of unskilled immigrants. I'm not sure if the Republican Party ever actually "won over" the American working class or whether the Democrats simply had a DEI enforcer throw those "Deplorables" out. But whatever happened to America's political realignment, it has disjointed those old orthodoxies and stereotypes. We're "No longer in Kansas anymore," figuratively speaking. However, it seems a lot of people on the right still have not fully realized this. A few remnants of the old labor Democrats are with that out-of-touch crowd too.

Perhaps the term "Scab" itself is entirely outmoded. The cultural context of it in today's pop culture might be even less understood than hieroglyphics. If you use it in common language today I wonder how many people under 35 would even recognize the term. The line the political left seems to recognize these days sure ain't the strike line or the American border line, nor the legal limits boundary line, but perhaps only the Woke imaginary line.

I've heard the progressive slogan/cliche "No person is illegal" quite a bit recently. I suppose this statement could be amended to say, "Nothing is illegal in the defense of what can be stolen."