Liberal Talk Radio

It’s probably not a good thing that the only thing I took away from today’s day without immigrants is that there are apparently way too many businesses employing illegal immigrants.

That and I suppose that immigrant support organizations — just like anti-war groups — should feel sheepish about International ANSWER co-opting their message:

Some local Latino leaders said they worry about being associated with a Los Angeles-based group, Act Now to Stop War and End Racism (ANSWER), that has been active in promotion of the boycott. They said they fear that the group’s broad-based opposition to Bush administration policies could hinder attempts to win allies for immigration reform on Capitol Hill.

ANSWER protested numerous administration policies, including sanctions on Cuba, the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan and the war in Iraq. The organization began supporting immigrants’ causes last year in opposition to the Minuteman Project’s plan to patrol the southern U.S. border, said Carlos Alvarez, a Los Angeles-based ANSWER spokesman.

“Ideological cohesion to the T isn’t something that is absolutely necessary right now,” he said.

In California, ANSWER has closely allied itself with the immigrant movement, providing a sound system for marches, creating banners and distributing fliers to promote the boycott. Members of Washington’s Hispanic leadership have not been as welcoming.

Carlos Castro, a leader in two local business groups and owner of the Todos Supermarkets in Northern Virginia, said he was wary of some advocates’ attempts to link immigrants’ rights with leftist causes.

“They want to create instability in the community,” he said. “It is kind of scary, because I lived through the metamorphosis of the Civil War [in El Salvador], and I know leadership and I know instigators. I want to make sure that we get the leaders of the Hispanic community out front. I’m not accusing anyone, but that’s certainly how it looks.”

Juan Jose Gutierrez, director of the California-based Latino Movement USA and a representative of ANSWER, called opponents of the boycott “rather paternalistic.”

There’s a very practical reason not to involve ANSWER — they’re Stalinist creeps, for one!

But back to illegal immigration — as a general matter, it’s not healthy for a country to have such a large non-voting, non-participating underclass. And I have to assume that were businesses not encouraging immigrants by ignoring labor laws, we wouldn’t have so many illegal immigrants in the country. So as unintended consequences go, this is a pretty lame one — and Democrats should listen here, because I’m saying that we should go after unscrupulous business owners for hiring illegal immigrants. What they’re doing is immoral, and probably just as bad as the stuff Enron is doing.

In New York City they make a big deal out of zoning. One specific problem is illegal conversions, where homeowners and landlords carve up single family homes and create apartments out of basements, apartments out of floors, etc. against the zoning in their neighborhood. The idea is that unauthorized increased density stresses communities and social services — more trash, more students in schools, more everything.

Immigration is the same thing on a macro scale. And if you give a s**t about your neighborhood — and I think most people agree that vigilant zoning is a necessary thing — then you should give a s**t about your city, your state, your country.

So it’s pretty clear what we need to do. First, go after business owners. It f**ks up our neighborhood when business owners provide an opportunity for illegal immigrants to be exploited. That’s immoral. They need to be stopped. And it’s not enough to say that Americans won’t do those jobs. Pay workers enough and someone will do the job. And if they really won’t do the job then maybe those jobs shouldn’t be in the U.S. There’s no inherent reason California strawberry farmers need to exist. And the strawberry industry isn’t a good enough reason to screw up everything else. Send it to Mexico. That’s called free trade.

You know, there really is no “second.” It’s business owners’ fault. That’s it. It’s certainly not the immigrants’ fault. Sorry if this isn’t the conclusion you wanted me to arrive at, but it’s there: some people play by the rules and then there are a host of immoral c*********s who take advantage of human beings in order to make money. F**k them. F**k all of them. Decent, caring people play by the rules. Decent people pay their taxes. Decent people don’t cheat. And decent people don’t hire illegal immigrants at below minimum wage and then implausibly claim that “Americans won’t do the work.” Sorry, but I don’t f**king believe you.

So there you go — thanks, ANSWER — you just helped me understand what this is all about!