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« on: March 20, 2017, 07:12:16 PM » |
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The Patriot Post - Alexander's Column 3-15-2017
From The Federalist Patriot
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Are Sanctuary Cities Safer?
By Mark Alexander
Mar. 15, 2017
“The policy or advantage of [immigration] taking place in a body (I mean the settling of them in a body) may be much questioned; for, by so doing, they retain the language, habits, and principles good or bad which they bring with them. Whereas by an intermixture with our people, they, or their descendants, get assimilated to our customs, measures, and laws: in a word, soon become one people.” —George Washington1 (1794)
My interactions with rational liberals (not always an oxymoron) provide a window into how they process “facts,” reshaping them to comport with their statist and utopian worldviews.
I had an opportunity to engage one such lefty this week — an acquaintance who’s an attorney, and who took strong exception to my characterization of so-called “sanctuary cities” as being more dangerous because they advertise immunity for illegal aliens, thus attracting more violent offenders.
Liberals, of course, become insufferably sanctimonious when advocating for things as ostensibly wonderful as a “sanctuary,” but, despite all the “warm and fuzzy feelings,” the secret among Democratic Party2 leaders is that the sanctuary city movement is nothing more than a pandering political charade aimed at Hispanic voters — and sanctimonious fellow leftist elites.
The previous administration’s “immigration reform strategy3” was designed to fail, because otherwise it would flood the markets of their dwindling union and blue collar constituencies with cheap immigrant labor, and the former would never tolerate the latter. Instead, the policy has always been one of smoke and mirrors: placating Hispanic voters with empty promises of blanket amnesty, while never losing a constituent by fulfilling that promise.
That notwithstanding, there are now more than 5004 sanctuary cities, large and small, all across the United States. That’s almost twice the number of a year ago. Not surprisingly, the growth has been driven by opposition to President Donald Trump’s commitment to enforce our nation’s immigration laws5. Consequently, Trump has put those cities on notice6, threatening to cut $2.7 billion in federal funding if they refuse to abide by the law.
So, here’s how my debate with a big-hearted but light-headed lawyer began.
Last week, a friend was on his way home to our mountain community outside of Chattanooga. He stopped at a hardware store for some supplies, and when he returned to his vehicle in broad daylight, he was subjected to aggravated kidnapping (at gunpoint) and robbery. A local gang thug forced my friend into his vehicle for an “ATM joyride” — after stealing the money in his wallet, the thug forced him to drive to a nearby money machine and withdraw hundreds of dollars. My friend kept his calm, though, and was later released without bodily harm.
My friend, a physician and man of strong faith who had no option to fend off the armed assailant, told the gang member at the end of the ordeal as the offender left his car, “I will be praying for you — and this story is not over.” The gang member was later arrested, and I suspect the next chapter of this story will likely be my friend’s role in leading the offender to the transformation of God’s grace — behind bars.
But the first chapter of this story — which now occurs with alarming regularity across our country — could have ended in violence and tragedy. Indeed, most gang violence occurred between gang members a few years ago, but it is now metastasizing into frequent violence against citizens who have nothing to do with gangs.
According to the FBI’s most recent Uniform Crime Reports (2015), there were 1,197,704 violent crimes, up 3.9% from 2014 — a trend that started several years earlier after Barack Obama initiated his war on cops7.
That violence, which is erupting across the U.S., is part of Obama’s failed legacy.
For the record, my home state of Tennessee ranks near the top of conservative states8. Overall, conservative principles have put our state at the top of many lists, including economic growth and freedom indexes. Just this week, our state initiated a lawsuit against the federal government rejecting Obama’s leftover Middle Eastern migrant resettlement plans, citing violation of the Tenth Amendment9 as the basis of its complaint. (Yes, they are migrants, not refugees10, according to the UN’s own accounting of the mass migration.)
However, our urban centers have been subject to the same social entropy and blight that afflicts other cities under Democrat “leadership.” And the most costly measure of that blight is violent crime.
Memphis is ranked #4 on the list of most dangerous cities11 nationwide, and now Chattanooga is moving to the top of the ratings12 for violent cities with populations under 200,000. |
